#because post canon if he survived I think she’d just panic if you tried to kiss them

[incorrect-ikevamp-quotes]

hey so I’m not trying to be gross but this genuinely something that I wonder about like how does mc survive on her period in a mansion full of vampires? Especially with a pure blood like Comte or Leonardo like can’t they sense it? sorry if this is weird I’m just genuinely interested In like pure blood and vampire lore and like what they pick up on especially comte as he’s a fave. I’d love to hear your thoughts as always I love your posts and I hope you’re doing well and staying safe and healthy 💛☺️

Haha, please don’t worry! 😂😂😂 I’ve often wondered about the very same thing, and while I don’t have any canon answers, I can offer the most likely scenario from my understanding of the game. Hope you’re doing well too, lovely, thank you! Stay safe out there~💛💛💛

Given what I know, and the fact that blood is only a small component of the discharge that comes with one’s period, I’d wager it poses a low risk generally speaking. I think the plan would be to make sure everyone’s on guard and has been keeping up with their usual doses of Blanc/Rouge (no waiting until you starve, Jeanne, yes that is a threat) but otherwise everyone proceeds as they normally would. I think it would be hardest on the vamps who are most sensitive to the presence of blood/have a harder time controlling their thirst, like Isaac and Arthur. 

Purebloods have been canonically established as having a much lower tendency to bloodlust by comparison to lesser/turned vampires, so I very much doubt Comte or Leonardo would react much. A blip on the screen for them, nothing more. (I often categorize Jeanne as the closest to pureblood level reactivity because his ability to control the thirst is exceptional; the only time he has ever come close to attacking MC was when he was at a point of intense starvation.) I think the only time her period could potentially become risky is if one of them was starving (and therefore reacting on the level of base instinct) or grievously injured. If they have feelings for her or she’s in a relationship with one of them, it may make them want to bite her more, but I don’t think they’d necessarily act on it. I’d assume most of them would be reluctant because MC is already losing blood as it is? Better to be safe than sorry, and all that.

As for whether or not they can anticipate it, I’m really not sure? It’s possible they might sense hormonal changes, but given I haven’t seen them react to anything so slight I can’t be sure. Purebloods I’d say it’s a coin toss; it’s very possible they can sense it before it comes--but I just have no way of knowing for sure. Lesser vampires, I very much doubt it. 

That being said, you bring up a very timely contention (for me) as of late. Which is to say: what are purebloods capable of sensing? I’ll be elaborating on a recent JPN collection story event that included Comte, as it had a very interesting tidbit that I’d like to share with y’all. It isn’t a huge spoiler as I’ll be focusing on the pureblood lore that was included, but for those who don’t want to see it I’ll be placing it under a cut. (Also some slight spoilers for Comte and Leo’s main story rt).

Mandatory spoiler warning:

So this last event featured MC and her suitor taking care of a child for a few days, in which they act like a pair of surrogate parents. Naturally, being a feral Comte stan, I got his story. In it, both he and MC are taking care of a young girl named Emma--the daughter of a fellow aristocrat (a friend of his). At some point during the story, MC accidentally loses sight of Emma while hanging up the laundry. MC searches the entire mansion but can’t find her anywhere, and she begins to panic when Comte encounters her. Alarmed, he gently asks her what’s wrong and she explains what happened. There’s a brief pause [”...”] and then he says “It’s okay, MC. Emma is–”. Comte then leads her to the gazebo where the little tyke is fast asleep, taking a midday nap in the shade. Naturally MC is relieved to see her safe, but also a little baffled as Comte led her directly to Emma. 

MC: “I’m so glad she’s okay. But…how did you know she’d be here?”

Comte: “Purebloods are good at sensing/detecting nearby human beings.”

And I ????? Granted it’s possible it got translated incorrectly but...I really don’t understand how else he would have known exactly where she was? If MC asked around and searched the entire place and still couldn’t find any trace of her, how would Comte have just known in an instant? Additionally, if he spotted her before he found MC panicking, then I doubt he would have just left her there without an adult/guardian nearby--he would have either stayed there or taken her with him. 

So this makes it plenty plausible that he really did just sense her presence in the vicinity. But........like..........howmst in the fuck. Is that even possible. I have no idea, but I find it a little shocking that I’ve only discovered this now? I mean maybe I missed it somewhere else where this tidbit of lore came up, but as far as I know they don’t discuss it much? The most I remember is Comte giving very clear indications that purebloods were able to sense each other, but I assumed that was restricted to purebloods only...

That being said I’ve been thinking about it and, well, there are at least three pretty strong instances in the game that could affirm his claim in this story. Namely: the beginning of the story itself (Comte’s POV of the prologue), the kidnapping incident in Comte’s main story, and the beginning of Leonardo’s main story.

I remember @a-maidens-dream asking about something very interesting in Comte’s POV story, and at the time I was a little unsure what to do with the information--it wasn’t aligning in a way that made sense. But I think this might help that tidbit fall into place? I think that Comte really hadn’t realized she followed him into the door until she was already in the mansion, and as such this ability to sense humans would explain why he knew she was there before Napoleon even told him anything. If purebloods can sense human people, then he would know a human being entered the house because of the species signature; the only human person living there otherwise was Sebastian. I’m not sure if the sixth sense is acute enough for him to be able to differentiate between human people. (My guess is that it’s not that specific, or if it is, the pureblood has to know the person very well to be sure.)

Building on that, this is a subtle distinction, but it still stood out for me. In his main story route, both MC and a fellow aristocrat (a woman she was friends with) are taken to these small cabin things in the middle of the woods. All Comte, Napoleon, and Jeanne have to go on is the general location of these hideouts. They decide to split up; Comte goes one way, Napoleon and Jeanne go another. I find this instance particularly interesting because Comte’s POV indicates a kind of loss of rational thought--he is 100% in a panic state, just moving to satisfy one objective: save MC before time runs out. This suggests that Comte very much could have been relying on that sense to pinpoint her and her assailants. We have no evidence to believe he was ever a soldier or somebody with extensive experience in tracking--or that knew the landscape well. But he only trusts she’s alive and unharmed for sure when he has her in his arms again, suggesting either that this sixth sense has its limits (in regards to specificity of the person being detected) or that his judgement in that moment was too compromised for it to be clear.

The last one, and perhaps the funniest possibility of the three, lies in the beginning of Leonardo’s main story route. Iirc, Leonardo spends much of that time hauling MC around the mansion to interact and properly situate herself in the mansion’s social dynamic. While this may just be a coincidence, MC notes that she actively tried to hide from him and make herself scarce, but whenever she tried no amount of stealth worked. One can certainly argue he just paid attention or asked other residents about where she was, but I do think it’s worth considering? I need to re-look at the chapters, but I seem to recall her trying to hide in a garden shed and he still found her immediately and just picked her up and walked right back out. 

Tl;dr: So does this mean Comte/Leo can sense when MC is on her period? I have no idea, but at this point I really can’t be sure what abilities they do and don’t have!

[disneydreamlights]

I Won't Lose Her

AO3 | FFN

Summary: When Vader sends a hostage video to Padme saying he holds her daughter captive, she does the only thing she possibly could, tries to save her life for her daughter's.

A/N: For @anidalaweek Day 2: Canon Divergence. Basically a Padme lives and becomes leader of the Rebellion AU because honestly we stan.

Yes I did publish this on AO3 hours before posting it here don't worry about it.

She knew she should've told Bail not to let Leia take the mission.

Padmé Amidala sat at her desk, unable to stop staring at the notice on her page. Leia had been sent to Tatooine to collect Obi-Wan and bring him and the Death Star plans to the Rebellion.

Leia had been captured en route to Tatooine by the Executor and had failed to get to Obi-Wan.

"Padmé." At the sound of her name, Padmé looked up at the hologram of Mon. It was clear that her fellow rebel leaders regretted what had happened to her daughter by the guilty expression on Mon's face. "We have news of Leia."

"News…?" In an instant, Padmé leaned forward, her eyes wide. "What did you learn? What happened? Is Leia alright?"

When Mon didn't answer right away, Padmé felt a surge of panic. "Is...she didn't…"

"No. No. Leia is fine," Mon answered, interrupting her before Padmé could continue to focus on that idea. The emphatic denial gave Padmé some reassurance that Leia was alright. "It's...perhaps I should just show you the message."

Mon vanished, instead showing a hologram of Leia and Vader, the mysterious dark lord of the Sith. "This is a message to Senator Amidala, the true leader of the Rebellion." At the sound of Vader's voice, Padmé's blood went cold. "As I am to understand it, the news of your death was exaggerated. As I have found in the princess's mind...you have been alive and in hiding, controlling this war from the shadows while the Organas and Mothma were the face of your rebellion."

"If you would like your daughter unharmed, you will arrive on the Executor within a standard week from receiving this message. As a show of good faith, I am using a private transponder, and will not trace it to the location of your current base. If you do not arrive, Leia Skywalker will be executed. She will meet the same fate as your late husband."

"I look forward to your arrival on my ship." The hologram vanished, and Padmé fought any feelings of nausea as Mon's face returned.

"I'm sorry Padmé. We're hoping General Kenobi will get there in time, but…"

"But we don't even know if he got Leia's message." The moment she had seen the message, seen that Darth Vader held her daughter, Padmé knew there was only one option for her. "I can't leave her Mon."

"I know." Mon looked down, as though she had expected this. "Please be careful in rescuing your daughter."

Padmé nodded. Once Mon hung up the call, Padmé ran to her closet to find her flight suit.

She'd lost Luke, back when she had first given birth Obi-Wan had insisted it would be best to separate the twins, and Padmé had reluctantly agreed, giving up the chance to know her son for the best chance of life he could have. If she lost her other child too, this one to a more permanent fate, she wasn't sure if she'd be able to forgive herself for the mistake.

She had to trade herself for Leia. The Rebellion would survive without her presence. It was the only option she had.

-x-

The Executor loomed in Padmé's vision, an ominous warning of her impending fate as her small X-Wing steadily crept closer to the Star Destroyer. It was large and imposing, and the Sith inside had already done so much damage to her family that she wasn't sure how she would face him. But she kept holding onto the single hope that Leia was alive when Vader had spoken to her. She just had to keep believing that. The dark feeling in the air meant nothing. She could survive.

The radio clicked on as she received a transmission from the empire. "This is the Executor. You're in a classified zone. State your purpose or you will be shot down."

Padmé took a deep breath, hoping to keep her voice steady in spite of her nerves and fear. "This is Padmé Amidala, leader of the Alliance to Restore the Republic. I'm here to trade myself for the princess Leia Organa."

She watched, anxiously, expecting to be fired on as soon as she stated her name, expecting this to have been a trap to lure her out of the shadows she'd remained in for so long. Instead however, there was nothing but silence before a deep voice came from the radio. "Senator Amidala, I will meet you down in the hangar. Do not try anything foolish. My men will shoot without warning."

The radio cut out, and Padmé took a deep breath. So far, she was alive. A small part of her hoped that this wasn't a trap, but a genuine trade to capture a larger target. She hadn't known Vader to be a man of his word, but then again, besides the fact that he was a Sith and the one who had killed her husband, Padmé didn't know much about him at all.

The hangar bay doors opened, and rather than have to pilot herself in, her ship was grabbed by a tractor beam, slowly pulling her in. Once she was safely inside and the ship landed, she opened the cockpit and jumped out, her hand on the only weapon she had on her, her blaster. In the back, she saw a dark imposing figure with his black armor and the mask that kept his face hidden. She couldn't get a read on him, but he didn't seem keen to attack. To her disappointment, her daughter wasn't with him.

Gathering her courage to her, Padmé broke the silence that had remained between them as neither had spoken. "Lord Vader. I see the promise of my safety wasn't a lie. Where is my daughter?"

"Leia is currently being kept in my quarters." The way he said her name caused Padmé's stomach to tie itself in knots. There was a fondness to it, one the Sith never should have had. She hated to imagine any of the reasons as to why. "If you'll follow me, I'll take you to her."

"How do I know this isn't a trap?"

"If I wanted to kill you, you would already be dead."

The statement was a punch to the stomach, a reminder of what Vader was capable of, and one that left Padmé with little idea of how to respond. Her silence left an awkward void, only filled by the harsh breathing of his respirator.

Seeing no other alternative, she relented. "Very well. I will follow you. But if any harm comes to my daughter–"

"I have no desire to see her harmed, though whether you believe me or not is irrelevant." Vader's voice was harsh, and there was an underlying note of offense, as though he couldn't believe she would assume he would want to hurt Leia. With that, he started down the halls of the Star Destroyer, leaving Padmé confused.

She wasn't in binders, Vader was escorting her himself, and he had no desire to harm Leia.

None of it added up. Yet she still followed him quietly deeper into the ship, trying to figure out just what he was doing and why.

When they finally arrived in his quarters, Padmé was surprised to find that it was furnished fairly normally, although nothing besides the pod in the back looked as though it had been used in quite some time, and in the bed on the back of the room was Leia, who looked no worse for wear to her mother's relief.

"Princess." Leia looked up at Vader. At first, her eyes had been narrowed in distaste, but once she saw Padmé, her eyes widened in shock, and the biting comment she had been preparing for Vader fell silent.

"Leia." Padmé reached out.

"Mother." Leia stood up from the bed and ran into Padmé's arms. "Mother I'm so sorry. I tried to keep everything contained like Auntie 'Soka said but–"

"You did your best Leia. You did so much more than I could've ever expected against Vader." Padmé held Leia close to her, not letting her daughter go as she realized how close she had come to losing her. There weren't any marks on Leia, which meant that Vader hadn't done much to harm her beyond mentally, and Padmé couldn't fight the smile that formed in relief that her daughter was alright. "I'm so proud of you."

"I didn't want you to come. I could've handled Vader."

"I already lost so much Leia. I couldn't lose you too." Padmé kissed her daughter on the head, and Leia hugged her once more.

They stood there, holding each other, though Padmé wasn't sure for how long before she heard Leia whisper in her ear. "Artoo and Threepio got away. I think they made it to General Kenobi."

Through it all. Leia still made sure that the mission succeeded. If Padmé thought she couldn't have been prouder of the girl, she was mistaken. Leia had gotten the message to Obi-Wan (and to Luke). The Death Star would still be destroyed and the Alliance would gain the edge they may have needed to turn the tide in this war. There were still so many reasons for hope.

"It is time for you to leave, Leia. Your mother has fulfilled her end of the deal." Mother and daughter sprung apart when Vader spoke, attracting their attention. "I will escort you personally to the ship she came in."

"I don't need your escort." Leia glared at Vader. "And don't call me Leia. You have no right to use that name."

"If you do not want any of the officers or Storm Troopers to capture you once more, you will." Leia remained silent. "You are, of course, welcome to stay aboard my ship, but I would presume that's not what you wish."

Leia remained silent, as though deciding what her best course of action would be. Padmé attempted to give a reassuring smile. "Go, Leia. Find Obi-Wan. Tell him what happened."

Leia ignored Padmé's pleas and looked at Vader, who seemed to have stiffened slightly at the mention of Obi-Wan. "What do you want my mother for? Why did you spare me?" She grabbed onto Padmé's hand. "The moment you learned about her, you stopped torturing me. You refused to answer any of my questions. You forced me to compromise the entire Rebellion for a phone call for a deal that based on everything any of us know about you would be so obviously fake–"

As Leia continued her demands, Vader raised his hands. For a moment, Padmé felt fear. The last time she had seen a similar gesture from a Force Sensitive had been nineteen years ago, right before she'd lost Anakin. Thankfully, it was just a gesture to stop, as he instead spoke. "I spent nineteen years thinking I was responsible for your deaths. I would not wish to see that happen again."

"That didn't stop you from killing my Father!" Leia's words hung in the air, and Vader stepped back, as though the accusation wounded him in some way. "Don't deny it, mother–"

"Your mother was misinformed." Though Padmé couldn't tell because of his mask, it felt as though Vader's eyes were locked directly on her, and she shivered. "I did not kill your father."

"Obi-Wan said–" She was cut off before Padmé could repeat the story she'd heard.

"Kenobi lied. Or perhaps, he could not face the truth himself." Vader continued to keep her gaze, though he didn't elaborate any further on his statement. "Princess, it is time for you to go. No harm will come to Padmé so long as I am alive to see to it."

"You still haven't answered my questions!" Leia protested.

"We do not have the time for me to answer them in a way you would find satisfactory." Vader crossed his arms, finally turning back to Leia. "I cannot hide your presence here forever, and if you would like to escape to your Rebels, you will need to go now."

Knowing she had lost, Leia hugged Padmé. "I'll come back for you. With help."

"I know." Padmé hugged her back quickly. "I love you Leia. If something happens to me, never forget that."

They let go, and Leia was taken out of the room without another word.

-x-

Vader came back into the room about an hour later, Leia no longer beside him. Padmé had taken to laying on the bed that had held Leia earlier, choosing to read one of the holo novels that were on the shelves. He stood next to her on the bed, but Padmé chose to say nothing. She didn't want to talk to Vader, let alone have anything to do with him. No matter how desperate for an answer as to why he was doing everything, she wouldn't give him the satisfaction.

"Leia has left. She flew out on your ship, and will remain untracked." As though he realized Padmé wouldn't speak, Vader did instead. "I'm sorry to have threatened her, but once I knew you were alive, I knew it was the only way to bring you here." She remained quiet, pretending to be invested in the story to continue to ignore Vader. "I would never have hurt her. Had you chosen not to come, I would've found another way."

"Why?" Padmé asked. She put down the novel, finally giving Vader her attention. "You haven't explained anything to either of us Lord Vader. I have no reason to believe you when you say you won't hurt her. I have no reason to believe you won't hurt me now."

"Nineteen years ago, on Mustafar, you tried to stop me from heading down a dark path I could never come back from." Vader started, despite still remaining harsh due to the vocoder, his voice felt softer, as though he was trying to be gentle. She stiffened at the start of his story, wanting to deny everything he was implying. "I wouldn't listen, and I lashed out. I thought I'd killed you, Padmé. For nineteen years I thought I'd killed you and the child."

Padmé's eyes widened, and although Vader reached out for her, she scooched back, as far away from Vader as she could. "No. You can't be. He…" She shook her head, her hand resting over her mouth as she tried to process this. Anakin couldn't. He wouldn't.

Vader didn't deny, and instead let Padmé come to terms with the implication of his words on her own. It was everything she'd feared. Obi-Wan hadn't hidden that he'd fallen, she was aware that Anakin had attacked her that night, but she'd always hoped…

"Darth Vader destroyed him. I'm so sorry Padmé, Anakin is gone."

"I see you needed more time before I told you the news. I'd just hoped…" Vader's words fell to silence, and Padmé couldn't stop herself from staring. There had to be something to prove this wrong.

"Why?"

"I thought I'd lost everything." Vader sat down on the bed, but made no further move to get closer to her. "My master was all I thought I had. I did not care about what became of me, and I became nothing more than a weapon, until I started going through Leia's memories and I saw…"

"You saw me." Vader didn't react, but Padmé didn't need one to know it was the truth. She may not have been force sensitive, but the knowledge of the true identity of the monster in front of her held more answers than the Force ever would. "Ani…?" She reached her hand onto his mask, cupping where his cheek would've been without it.

"I'm sorry. I've done many things you wouldn't approve of since your death." He had, and there would be time for her to process that the atrocities he had committed were all performed by Anakin. There would be time for her to decide if she could forgive him. There would be time for him to prove that he deserved her forgiveness.

But in this moment, all she cared about was that the man who she had spent so many years mourning and fighting to avenge was alive. "I'd thought..."

"So had I." Vader bowed his head, moving away from the gentle touch he could not feel. "But now that I know that you and Leia are alive, I'll do everything in my power to keep both of you safe."

Padmé shook her head. "Anakin, I can't stay your prisoner. I have to go back." She had to make sure that Leia was safe. She had to meet with Obi-Wan and talk to him about this. She wanted to have the chance to truly meet Luke in more than a few holocalls that Obi-Wan managed to set up between her and her son.

To her surprise, he didn't protest. "For now, you'll have to. When Leia gets the Death Star plans to the Rebellion and destroys it, that's when there will be enough chaos in the system that you'll be able to escape without attracting suspicion." Padmé couldn't help but stare. "I'll give you an encrypted comm system to communicate with, just like we used to during the war."

"You'll let me go back?"

"If you stay here, then the Emperor will find you. It won't be safe," Vader said. "There is no other choice, my master must die. If I have to work with your Rebels to achieve that end, then so be it."

Surprising herself, Padmé smiled. "If that's the case, then we'd better get started."

[hawkland]

Destiel fic recs (round #4) + commentary

Time for another (mostly) Destiel fic rec round-up post before my bookmarks get out of control! This one’s a mix of longer and some shorter fics (or series thereof), no particular theme except I guess a lot of angst, hurting Cas, and all the other things that tickle my Id. Several Season 9 human!Cas divergence fics, plus some later season angst-fests and rewrites.

In the Shadow of your Wings by Enochian Things (Salr323) (52k) The first of two fics by this author which I absolutely fell in love with! Canon-divergence from the end of Season 11. Cas finds himself blasted to Naples, Italy by the banishing sigil in the bunker and he stumbles — almost literally — into a sexy, delightful Italian Man of Letters, Luca. When he makes his way back to the bunker and finds Dean still alive, he tries to confess his feelings but Dean panics and shuts him down. Cas goes back in Italy soon thereafter and ends up beginning a relationship with Luca, much to Dean’s chagrin. Meanwhile Sam is still missing and it turns out there may be some dangerous individuals who are out for Cas more so than even the Winchesters. 

I loved everything about this fic so much - Luca is an amazing OC, the Naples and London locations are wonderfully evoked and took me straight back to places I’d been. The angst, the pacing, the plotting and the eventual Dean/Cas getting together are all amazing and this is definitely on my re-read in the future list.

The rest of my recs below the cut!

My heart is beating from me by Enochian Things (Salr323) (55k) The other fic by this author that I literally inhaled in one day! Season 9 Human!Cas canon divergence. It’s been months since Sam and Dean have heard from Cas, and when they do, it’s in the form of a wedding invitation. Cas is getting married to Daphne - the woman who “rescued” him and named him Emmanuel when he’d lost all his memories post-Leviathans. It seems Cas went back to her while on his own and they’ve rekindled their relationship...whatever it is. Dean just knows something isn’t right about her, so he sets out to investigate and try to figure out WTF Cas is doing before it’s too late. 

This story is so, so good! The case Dean gets Cas to come along on is unique and provides a neat investigation subplot, but what’s so especially wonderful is the explanation the author gives of who Daphne really is — and why she’d been so cool about just having a strange man with no memories move in to be her “husband” (and then want to marry him for real a couple years later, after he’d vanished from her life!) In fact it’s so brilliant I’m basically accepting it as my Daphne headcanon from now on and I don’t want to spoil it. The fic is also great in exploring Cas still struggling with understanding human emotions, customs and etiquette, Sam is A Very Good Friend, and Dean is, well, Dean. (I’m just sad this author hasn’t written more SPN fics because what they have is just brilliant.)

The wilderness. by orange_crushed (8k) Wonderful, shorter Season 9 canon divergence fic by an author who consistently makes me happy. Human!Cas leaves the bunker with a few things to get off the ground from Dean and directions to connect with Garth...but he ditches that plan to try to find his way on his own. It’s wonderfully detailed about the basic struggles of survival, finding work, making ends meet and trying to make some new friends...and why it’s important for him to prove he can make it on his own before he’s willing to welcome Dean (back) into his life.

I Through My Window See by deHavilland (26k) This is an interesting one, written well before we had canon human!Cas in Season 9. Canon-divergence in which Cas remains human after they avert the apocalypse in Season 5. Sam and Dean set him up in an apartment in Sioux Falls and then...just kind of abandon him there. He spends most of a year just barely existing before a visit from Sam finally stirs him out of his inertia and depression, to eventually get a job and also start hunting on his own. This is an interesting read, if just to see an author exploring the idea of human!Cas abandoned by Dean a few years before it actually...ended up becoming canon! I love how Cas is written in this (it’s a story much like the next one on my list that I thought does an amazing, realistic job of capturing what depression feels like), but I do have some issues with Dean. It’s never fully resolved or explained why Dean was being such an ass so I honestly wasn’t totally sold on the ending - I wanted some more out of Dean, some more explanation or apology or something. It’s a story that would have been great to have a sequel from Dean’s POV but after all this time, that will just have to exist in my brain, I suppose! Still worth a read because it’s excellently written, Cas becomes totally bad ass again by the end and it’s always fun to read early SPN fic speculating on future developments.

I Shall Not Want by domesticadventures (20k) I found myself inhaling a bunch of wonderful short ficlets by this author the other day, but this is the one I had to stop at to rec. It’s another Season 9 divergence fic, of a sort - Cas is newly human, for the sake of the story there’s no Abbadon to worry about, Sam is healed...and Sam wants to move out and get on with his own life. Cas and Dean are both struggling with adapting to their new lives and it’s a hauntingly rich and stark portrayal of depression, inertia, and the slow healing process of accepting and adapting to change. I also liked that this story gives us a Dean who is a little more aware of his feelings for Cas and they both struggle to reach out to each other - for once it’s not sexuality causing a crisis of identity but all the other shit they are coping with.

Don't Sing Love Songs by ireallydidthistomyself (17k). I’m not normally a big fan of baby/toddler!Jack fics - I like the angst that he was forced to grow up too quickly, and in general I’m not big on kid!fic in fandom. This author’s work is a big exception to that. They’ve written several stories along a similar theme: Cas raising Jack on his own/in secret for years, Dean only finding them or coming back into their lives later on. But this is the version of that idea that really packed the most punch for me and was incredibly emotionally satisfying. Dean finds Cas after 6 years, where he’s kept Jack mostly isolated and safe from the world. But with Dean allowed back into his life, Cas may be inviting grave danger upon Jack as well. This one ripped my heart out but managed to make it all better by the end.

Better Ways to Kill Our Time by always_a_birthday_girl (8k) I don’t know why I torture myself reading Dean-in-the-Ma’lak-box AUs, but I do. I think because it’s pretty much my biggest nightmare/horror and for some reason it’s cathartic while terrifying? Anyway here’s one where Dean goes through with his plan, Cas crashes and burns for most of a year, until Dean finally starts doing what he promised he wouldn’t: praying to him. Cas figures out a way to communicate back and over the distance, they manage to have certain conversations they should have years before. It’s painful but lovely and there is a happy ending, so it’s well worth the read!

Time Flows Like Water and We're Drowning by triedunture (7.9k) A little break from the later-seasons stuff I (mostly?) read, featuring a seriously hot (but angsty) Cas/Endverse!Cas/Dean threesome. When Zacariah’s plan to show Dean the future doesn’t change his mind about taking on his “responsibility”, he sends Endverse!Cas back in time to try to convince Cas instead, showing him what he’s to become. I don’t think Zac expected it to turn into a threesome, but it’s hot and beautiful and sad and wonderful all at once. 

hachikireru by vaudelin  (23k) At one point I went on a wallow-fest of reading a bunch of sad 14x20-15x03 divorce-arc fics. Just to hurt myself more, I guess. I know this fic’s been recced around a lot (at least on fail_fandomanon) and I can see why! After leaving the bunker, Cas ends up in Sioux Falls to visit Claire. She’s busy tracking down leads to find Kaia’s killer and he decides to go along with her on one such hunt. But what they find is an unexpected supernatural threat targeting those with broken hearts. Well. I think you know where that might be leading. This is a wonderful casefic with lots of character moments between Cas & Claire and then Cas & Dean, working through their pain and angst and just...it’s a very satisfying read.

Moriah Codas: A Trilogy by Toomanyfandoms99 (11k total) A series of 3 shorter fics spinning off the events of 14x20, developing a slightly divergent universe the author’s written where Cas does have his wings back and has helped resurrect a few of the angels (Balthazar, Gabriel, and Samandriel in particular). This series is absolutely heartbreaking — Cas is completely broken by Jack’s loss, has “fallen out of love” with Dean after he was ready to kill Jack, and sees no way back to what he’d had and felt before. He’s determined to just let the Empty take him...but not until he and his assembled squad of “avenging angels” clean up the mess Chuck has created, smiting zombies and taking out super-powered monsters across North America. 

Cas’s motorcycle gang/angel squad is so fucking awesome (I want a happy fic where they do this!) and this is BAMF!Cas at his finest. I just have to include a quote:

He set down the empty glass, and Gabriel said, “well, dearly beloved, we have gathered here today to kick some zombie ass. Since they have chosen to amass in Carthage, we are here to take out as many as we can without causing this town to flip the fuck out. Are we in agreement?”

“I expect,” Balthazar grinned, “a full-on bar brawl. Do not disappoint me.”

“Cassie, Driel,” Gabriel addressed the duo, “how are we with weapons?”

“I have enough machetes in a storage facility uptown to film a Jackie Chan movie,” Castiel said.

But it’s also utterly and completely heartbreaking, so don’t read this one if you need a happy ending. If you do read, check out the author’s other later-season coda fics and fic series as they are all really great.

to mend what is not broken by gothyringwald (2.6k) This last short one I’ve mentioned before, but I just have to rec it again! It was my gift for the 2021 Hurt Comfort Gift Exchange and it’s everything I wanted, and more. Sweet and caring Dean, wounded but still prideful Cas, and some lovely wing!kink/wing!care that pushes all of my button just right.

Anyway, that’s it for now as I think this is long enough. If you enjoy my recs, could you let me know? I try to not just list titles but give some commentary...as it helps me re-find stories I enjoyed the most, too!

[tw-anchor]

38. Yes, Werecoyotes Exist

Anchor

Stiles Stilinski x Original Character

Episode:  3x14; More Bad Than Good

Word Count: 6,132

Warning(s): Mature language, canon violence + gore, panic attacks

Author’s Note: Introducing Malia! I freaking love my girl and I can’t wait to write about Olivia and Malia’s relationship. I hope you enjoy the newest chapter! Make sure to tell me what you think, reblog, and like!

Masterlink in Pinned Post!

When Scott had waltzed into Stiles' bedroom and said, "We're going to find a dead body," Stiles had expected the night to go much like that one night, not so long ago. Thankfully, his best friend was the alpha in this situation and Scott definitely wasn't going to bite him. Also, this time, the dead body was not one of Olivia's relatives—which he considered a blessing. She'd be so pissed if she knew he was looking for one of her dead relatives.

Actually, she'd probably be pissed that he was going to look for a dead body at all. He could picture it; she'd have a lecture all set and ready for him, but he'd get distracted by her beauty and then distract her. And then, well, what happened next would be private—for no one but him and Olivia.

The sharp snap of a stick under Scott's shoe brought him out of his fantasy of a night spent between Olivia's thighs. Yeah, he should probably be paying attention to where they were going.

"You know, if my dad's right, that means there's another werewolf in town that we haven't met yet," Stiles brought up the elephant in the room—er, woods. The only reason they were coming out to look for a dead body was because Noah thought that the accident that killed the women of the Tate family had been caused by a werewolf.

The theory had some substance; after all, the accident took place on the night of a full moon.

"I know," Scott was paying more attention to the GPS on his phone, but Stiles didn't mind. They had to get to the site of the wreck somehow and neither of them knew the woods that well.

"If it turns out to be something like triplets that form into, like, a fucking three-headed hound of hell, I'm seriously not up for that."

"Yeah, me either," Scott sighed in agreement. "Especially if I can't even control my own transformation anymore."

Eventually, they came across a ravine, close to where the accident should have been. They would have to climb down a few feet of stone and dirt, but it was doable for the both of them. It wasn't like it was Mount Everest or some shit.

A howl echoed through the air, making Stiles flinch. He flinched so violently that he accidently bumped into Scott, causing the phone—and GPS—to go flying out of his friend's hands, into the ravine below. It was just their luck that it had recently rained, because the phone had sunk down into a puddle.

"Fuck, sorry, dude," Stiles grimaced, looking from the phone and the puddle to Scott's annoyed face. "I hate coyotes so much. They always sound like they're mauling some tiny, helpless animal."

Amused, Scott scoffed and jumped down into the ravine. While he grabbed the phone from the puddle, Stiles got to work on following him down. He slipped and slid a little on the way, but he managed to get into the ravine no problem. Yeah, it was nothing like Mount Everest.

"It still works," Scott informed him, showing Stiles his phone, which was apparently waterproof.

Stiles only glanced at the phone, as the beam of Scott's flashlight had caught something that intrigued him. He grabbed the flashlight from Scott's hand and crept forward, following the light to where an old car lay, upside down and ultimately destroyed.

"I think we found it."

Scott walked over to him, looking at the wrecked car in confusion. "Uh, why wouldn't they move it? Isn't it evidence?"

"Probably too much of a pain in the ass to tow out," Stiles studied the vehicle. Its windows were long gone, probably from the crash, the tires had been scavenged, and thankfully, there was no blood from the accident. There was, however, claw marks scratched down the car, imprinting the metal. "Look at this. See those?"

Scott nodded and shifted closer to the car. He put his own hand on the marks, surprised that they were a match in width and height.

"Animal claws would be closer together, right?" Stiles prompted. "A lot closer."

"It was a werewolf," Scott agreed.

"So my dad was right."

A hint of pride bubbled in Stiles' gut at the thought of his dad taking all of this supernatural shit in stride. He just wished that the reason wasn't because Agent McCall was out to get him impeached from his job. Still, at least his dad would know that this case was closed, even if it meant that a werewolf had decimated a family.

Stiles dropped to his stomach and flashed the light through one of the windows so he could see into the vehicle. He just wanted to make sure that there was nothing wrong going on down there. It wasn't until Scott kneeled down next to him and pointed something out did he see something.

He pulled the doll out of the vehicle and got to his feet, Scott following. They stared at the doll, a basic one that most little girls would have to play with, when out of nowhere, it spoke.

"I'm hungry!"

Stiles shouted and threw the doll away from him, so scared that he lost his balance. Scott stared at him in shock, but Stiles felt vindicated. There was no way he wouldn't have screamed from that fucking doll speaking out of nowhere. It was out of a fucking horror movie.

He inhaled deeply and pressed a palm against his chest. "I think I just had a minor heart attack."

Scott sighed heavily in agreement before pausing. Stiles saw the dangerous look on his face and stood still, his heart starting to race when he heard the low growl come from the other side of the car.

"Stiles," Scott reached for Stiles; he shakily joined his friend. "Please tell me you see that."

Stiles stared in the direction where Scott was, spotting the coyote within seconds.

Shit, shit, shit, he cursed himself. Oh, we are so fucked.

He didn't voice his fear, though his voice did shake when he answered Scott, "I see it."

And then Scott was off, chasing after the coyote.

"Wait, hey, Scott!" he yelled after his best friend. "Scott, wait!"

What was the fucking point of running after a fucking coyote?! If anything, Scott needed to stay by Stiles' side as they left, so he could protect them. Without Scott around, who knew if another coyote would come around and eat him. And also, Scott could get hurt as well. If he couldn't control his transformation, how was he supposed to go up against a fucking coyote.

God, I hate coyotes so fucking much.

He couldn't just stand there and wait for Scott to come back—if he came back at all. He supposed he should at least take a look around the area to see if he could find any hint that Malia Tate had been killed around here. The sight of a coyote by the wreck almost confirmed her death. Though her body wasn't found with her mother and sister's bodies, she couldn't have survived for long out in the woods by herself, with coyotes around. It was sad, but it was the truth.

He walked slowly and with purpose as he aimed the flashlight in front of him. He slowly made his way to the opposite side of the ravine, secretly hoping that Scott would come back soon so they could get the hell out of there, and tried to find anything that stood out. He was about to leave and head back to the site of the wreck when the flashlight caught a shadow of an opening in the stones in the ravine wall.

He raised an eyebrow in realization; a coyote den.

He didn't want to explore the den without Scott, so he made his way back to the wreck. He was halfway back when he crossed a tree and ran smack dab into Scott. There may have been some frightened screaming on both sides, but they would never mention it to anyone.

"I think I found something," Stiles blurted out once he was sure he wasn't going to die of a heart attack.

Scott nodded. "So did I. I think that coyote I followed is Malia."

"Malia Tate? Come this way," Stiles led Scott toward the den. "The girl who wasn't found..."

"Exactly," Scott nodded. "She's like me—well, not like me, because I don't change into a wolf."

"Maybe it's like Derek's mom," Stiles suggested, his mind racing a mile a minute as they walked. "She could turn into a four-legged wolf. Maybe werecoyotes can too."

"I can't believe werecoyotes are a thing now."

"Me neither."

Together, they climbed up the ravine wall and entered the den. While Stiles hadn't known that the coyote was Malia, it didn't surprise him to see an old jacket that would fit a nine-year-old girl, as well as a couple of shoes, a scarf, and a patterned blanket. They were all dirty from age and time in the den, but still recognizable.

"You see this?" Stiles picked up the blue jacket. "This is Malia's. Remember, it's the same one she was wearing in the photo."

Scott nodded, recognizing the garment, before hesitating. "We shouldn't be here."

Stiles gave him a look of confusion. "What do you mean?"

"She's not going to come back now," Scott explained. "We just invaded her home. Our scents are gonna be everywhere."

"Shit," Stiles sighed in realization, his eyes landing on an old teddy bear. "Well, if she's not going to come back here, where's she going to go?"

"I don't know."

"Can you track her now?" Stiles asked Scott, his eyes still wandering around the den. "You think you got her scent?"

"Maybe, but I'm better at this when I'm a full wolf," Scott sighed. "And I'm still worried that if I do it, I won't be able to turn back."

Stiles remembered what Deaton had told them earlier that day; when the three of them underwent the sacrifice, they had opened a door to their minds. That was why he, Scott, and Allison were having such a hard time with things.

"The door's still open," he stated; Scott nodded. "Well, what if Olivia helps you?"

Scott nodded. "And if that doesn't work, I'll ask Derek if he can help," he sighed heavily and looked around the den. "This is basically a crime scene, right? I think it might be a little out of Deaton's league."

"And more my dad's," Stiles finished his thought.

Yeah, he already dreaded trying to get his dad to understand what had happened to Malia Tate.

-

-

"How much are we talking here? I'm not doing it for any less than ten."

"Ten thousand?" Olivia hissed into her phone, eyes narrowed.

"And if you want the older one alive, I'm thinking fifteen."

"You want fifteen thousand dollars to rescue Derek and Peter?" Olivia lowered her voice when the girl who had the locker a few feet down from her gave her a weary look. "Did Morrell give you this much to get to Isaac?"

"I don't talk about previous contracts," Braeden, the girl who had rescued Isaac from the alpha pack at the beginning of the school year, snapped through the receiver. "And we're talking about the Calaveras here. I'm not going in for under fifteen."

Well, when she put it like that...

"All right, fine," Olivia sighed, digging into her purse for the checkbook she kept on her. Luckily, Peter had decided to start giving her child support and had given her access to his bank account. She rattled off his account information while glancing at the clock on the wall; she had two minutes to get to class. "If it doesn't go through right away, it'll need Peter's approval."

"That's hardly getting paid upfront," Braeden argued.

"Well, I don't have fifteen thousand dollars in my bank account," Olivia rolled her eyes. "Peter's good for the money, he just might have to authorize the payment. Are we gonna do this or not?"

It was silent for a few seconds on Braeden's end. "Fine," she finally decided. "I'll head there now. I'll make contact when I pick up the packages."

Olivia furrowed her eyebrows. "Why are you talking like a UPS worker?"

Braeden sighed. "Goodbye, Olivia."

"Bye."

Olivia slammed her locker shut and rushed toward her history class, cursing Braeden for getting back to her right as the warning bell rang. She slid into the classroom with a minute to spare and headed right into the back corner of the room where Stiles, Scott, and Allison were huddled around Stiles' iPad.

"Here's where we found the den," Stiles pointed out to Allison as Olivia walked over to them. "It's right in the middle of the hiking trails."

"Well, that could narrow it down," Allison said thoughtfully. "Coyotes travel in fixed trails. But, I think you're right about her not going back to the den. Coyotes don't like wolves."

"And they're really smart," Olivia piped in; she didn't know what they were talking about, but she never brushed off a time to show off her brilliance. "If they don't want to be heard, they actually walk on their toes."

Stiles gave her a surprised look. "Coyotes tiptoe?"

Olivia shared an amused look with Allison. "Yeah, they tiptoe."

"Wow."

The bell rang, announcing the start of class.

"I got to go," Allison said hurriedly. "but send me the pinned location."

Stiles nodded and she ran off, hurrying to her class. Once Scott had started to head to his seat, Olivia confronted Stiles, still a little confused about what he and their friends had been talking about.

"So, what was that about?"

"Okay, so, you know how I told you that Scott's dad is trying to get my dad fired?"

"No."

He hadn't said anything about that, in actuality. Agent McCall was trying to fire Sheriff Stilinski? How was that even possible? She was pretty sure the FBI didn't have jurisdiction over local police forces—or they did, and she just didn't know about it.

"Right, sorry, I forgot," Stiles winced. "Anyway, McCall is trying to get my dad impeached, so Dad's been going through old cases. Since he knows now, he figured a set of fresh eyes might do some good. He found a case, this family had died in a car accident on the full moon and he thinks a werewolf did it."

It was a lot to take in at once, especially since Stiles was speaking a million miles per hour, but somehow, she managed. "So did a werewolf do it?"

"Not exactly," Stiles whispered as they took their seats. "it turns out that their oldest daughter, Malia, is a werecoyote."

Olivia blinked slowly. "A werecoyote."

"Yes, and she accidently caused the accident," Stiles finished up his story. "So, Scott and I went out to the wreck last night and Scott found Malia."

"...but as a coyote?"

"Yes, exactly," Stiles nodded excitedly. "So, now we're trying to find a way to get Malia to turn back into a girl."

"Oh, my God," she sighed. "You found this all out in one night?"

"Yeah," Stiles smiled casually. "What'd you do last night?"

"I had a dream about Derek and Peter, so I hired a mercenary to find them."

Stiles blinked at her, bewildered. "Excuse me? What?"

Before Olivia could elaborate, Mr. Yukimura was calling the class to attention. "All right, everyone. Let's get started."

Stiles turned and sat properly in his desk while Olivia straightened up her notebooks. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Scott at his desk, going through a huge bundle of paper. "Scott, what is that?"

Scott glanced back at her. "Kira printed this off for us. It's about that Bardo stuff."

"Huh," she hummed, impressed. She turned toward Kira's desk and smiled at her, earning her a shy grin back, before looking back at Scott. "That was nice of her."

"Yeah, it was."

"...We were just talking about internment camps and prisoners of war," Mr. Yukimura continued. "There's a passage in our reading that I'd like to go over in more detail. Who would like to come up and read aloud for us?" there was no volunteer, so Mr. Yukimura picked a random student. "Mr. Stilinski, how about you?"

Olivia's eyes cut to her boyfriend, watching him wearily. He couldn't read at the moment.

"Oh, uh, maybe someone else could," Stiles excused himself.

Mr. Yukimura wasn't having that. "Everyone participates in my class, Mr. Stilinski."

"Okay," Stiles sighed and got out of his seat, heading over to the podium where Mr. Yukimura's copy of their textbook rested.

Seeing someone you love struggle is never fun. Physically feeling someone you love struggle was even worse. Stiles' tether pulsed in sync with his quickening breaths as he stood at the podium, glaring down at the textbook. Though she was trying her hardest to help through her tethers, she just wasn't reaching him.

Olivia knew the signs of a panic attack, especially on Stiles and he was there; his rapid breathing, his glazed-over eyes, his tight-knuckled grip...She needed to get him out of there.

"Stiles," she popped out of her seat and rushed over to him, gently grabbing his arm. "It's okay. J-Just, just hold on."

Scott, who had followed her to the front of the classroom, glanced at Mr. Yukimura. "We should take him to the nurse's office."

Honestly, they didn't wait for Mr. Yukimura to agree. They had already started helping Stiles walk out of the classroom. It was only when they were freely in the hall that Stiles moved on his own accord, ripping away from Olivia and Scott's grip on him. He stumbled, breathing heavily, into the closest room, which happened to be the boys' bathroom.

"Stiles, look at me, man," Scott was almost as panicked as Stiles; he hadn't seen his best friend like this before. "What's happening?"

"It's a panic attack," Olivia told him as she hurried to Stiles' side. Her attempts to grab his arms and help him sit down were pushed away as Stiles gripped onto the sink.

"It's a dream," he mumbled frantically, tears slipping down his cheeks. "it's a dream. This is just a dream."

"Stiles, this isn't a dream," Olivia's voice was soothing, gentle. "This is real. You're here with me and Scott."

"It's okay, Stiles," Scott's eyes fluttered, afraid for his best friend. "What do you do? I mean, like, how do you tell if you're awake or dreaming?"

"Fingers," Stiles gasped out. "Y-You c-count your f-fingers. Y-You have e-extra fingers in d-dreams."

"How many fingers do I have?" Olivia immediately held out both hands so Stiles could see them. "Stiles, hey! Look at me, look at my hands and count my fingers. Come on, sweetcheeks."

Scott grabbed Stiles' arm and forcefully turned him away from the sink in order to face Olivia. Stiles inhaled and exhaled far too quickly to be safe, but he set his blurry eyes on Olivia's hands, counting her fingers one-by-one.

"One, two..."

Scott nodded in encouragement. "Keep going."

"Three, four..."

"Five," Olivia put the first of her thumbs down and gave Stiles a heartfelt smile. "Good job, babe. Keep going."

Stiles exhaled shakily. "Six, seven..."

"Eight," Scott supplied as Olivia put her last middle finger down.

"Nine..." Stiles inhaled and finished counting breathlessly, "Ten."

"Ten fingers, Stiles," Olivia encouraged. "I have ten fingers. This is real. You're not dreaming."

The weight of what that meant seemed to fall on Stiles all at once. He collapsed, his back hitting the wall, as he slid to the floor. Ignoring how dirty the floors in the boys' bathroom were, Olivia didn't hesitate to get on her knees and kneel next to him, grabbing his clammy hand to press a loving kiss to the back of it.

"What the fuck is happening to me?" Stiles cried out in frustration, knocking his head back against the wall. It broke Olivia's heart to see him like this, so frustrated and helpless.

"We'll figure it out," Scott joined Olivia and Stiles on the floor. "You're going to be okay."

Stiles scoffed in disbelief. "Am I?" he raised his head to look Scott in the eye. "Are you? Scott, you can't transform. Allison's being haunted by her dead aunt. I'm straight up losing my mind. We can't do this. We can't—we can't help Malia. We can't help anyone."

"Stiles, don't say that," Olivia shook her head, squeezing his hand. He lazily looked at her and went to disagree, but she cut him off. "No, seriously, don't. Can't is not in your vocabulary, Stiles. If anyone can do anything about anything, it's you, sweetcheeks. You are the one who figures things out. You are strong—you always have been, and you always will be."

"Babe..."

"And even when things are tough, we don't give up," Olivia insisted, her eyes starting to sting. "We try. We always try."

"Liv's right," Scott agreed, nodding proudly. "It's not in our nature to sit by and do nothing. We're doers, Stiles."

Stiles sniffed and nodded resolutely. "You're right," he agreed, straightening up as he looked between his girlfriend and his best friend. "We can do this."

-

-

The rest of school did not get any better. By the time Stiles was feeling better, class had already been let out and people were headed to their second period. However, there was one person who wasn't headed to their next class and that had been Kira. The nice girl she was, she had picked up the bags that Olivia, Scott, and Stiles had left in the history classroom and went to return them.

Unfortunately, Malia—yes, the Malia who was also somehow a werecoyote—had attacked her in the boys' locker room. No one had any idea how a coyote was able to get into the building, but apparently doors didn't deter her when Stiles had something of hers in his backpack.

Scott had saved Kira, thankfully, and the animal control and the police had shown up for the aftermath. The situation went from bad to worse, when Stiles admitted that he had brought the baby doll from the Tate's wreck with him to school at the same time that Mr. Tate walked onto the scene.

He went off the handle at Stiles and then was caught with a gun by Sheriff Stilinski. Fortunately, Mr. Tate left before things could get even more heated, while promising to find the coyote and kill it. He did all of that without realizing that said coyote was actually his daughter—not that anyone would just know that.

So now, the pack had to group together and save Malia from her own father. It was the how they were going to save Malia that was the problem. With Scott and Allison out of commission, they didn't have much options in the way of muscle.

Which led them to Dr. Deaton's animal clinic.

"Xylazine," Deaton set three vials of medicine on the stainless-steel counter in the middle of his exam room. "It's a tranquilizer for horses. For a werecoyote, expect it to work within seconds. I only have three, so whoever's shooting needs to be a damn good shot."

"Allison's a perfect shot," Scott was quick to say.

No, Olivia disagreed privately, she was a good shot.

Isaac voiced what she didn't. "She used to be."

"She can do it," Scott insisted.

Olivia shared a skeptical look with Isaac; Scott hadn't been there when Allison accidently almost shot and killed Lydia. They had. Ever since the sacrifice, Allison wasn't the marksman she used to be. She was so shaky nowadays that she could hardly write with a pen.

"If we manage to find the thing," Isaac muttered pessimistically.

Stiles was not happy with Isaac's negativity. "Okay, what is the point of him?" he pointed at the blonde werewolf. "Seriously, I mean, what's his purpose? Aside from the persistent negativity and the scarf? What's up with the scarf anyway? It's sixty-five degrees out."

Olivia sighed, tired of the back-and-forth between Isaac and Stiles. "Stiles, cut it out."

Stiles shot her a betrayed look as Isaac crossed his arms over his chest, irritated.

"Look, maybe I'm asking a question no one here wants to ask," he pointed out blankly. "How do we turn a coyote back into a girl when she hasn't been a girl for eight years?"

"I could do it, if I could keep myself in control," Scott said thoughtfully. "But...Liv, you could do it?"

Olivia pointed to her chest, confused. "Me? How am I supposed to do that?"

"Yeah, how is she supposed to do that?" Stiles echoed curiously.

"Well, you remember what Deucalion told you, right? About your abilities?" Scott prompted. Olivia's mind raced as she thought back to the night of the lunar eclipse. "He said you could turn a werewolf back with..."

"With a call of his name," she finished. "Yeah, I remember now."

"Is that true?" Isaac asked Deaton.

"Yes, it is," Dr. Deaton confirmed, studying Olivia with peculiar eyes. "You've already done something like that, haven't you?"

Olivia nodded. "With Ethan and Aiden."

"And Deucalion," Scott added.

"So, if you can make three alpha werewolves transform back to their human selves, you can do it with a werecoyote," Stiles encouraged Olivia, a proud smile playing at his lips. "It'll be a piece of cake for you, babe."

"We don't know that," Olivia disagreed. "I have no connection to Malia, I've never met her. Scott, you ran into her, didn't you?"

"Yeah, but I can't transform."

"So, we make a second plan, just in case Livvy can't get Malia to change back," Stiles clapped his hands as he started scheming. "We need a real alpha, though. You know, one that can get it up."

Scott sighed, embarrassed. "I'm an alpha with performance issues."

"It's okay, Scott," Olivia patted his hand. "You just need to practice. Unfortunately, Derek and Peter are somewhere in Mexico right now."

"Which leaves the twins," Isaac hummed.

"They're not alphas anymore," Dr. Deaton informed them. "After what Jennifer did, almost killing them? It broke that part of them."

Olivia didn't see how that was even possible, but okay...

"Yeah, but they still know what it's like to be alphas," Stiles pointed out. "Nobody's seen them in weeks, though."

Olivia winced; she had walked in on Lydia and Aiden one too many times in the past two weeks to say that no one had seen the twins. She knew what Aiden's ass looked like, much to her chagrin. Lydia was taking this I-don't-like-Scott thing to a whole new level by sexing it up with one half of the ex-alpha twins.

"That's not totally true," she spoke up reluctantly; Lydia was going to kill her. "Lydia may or may not be in contact with them...especially Aiden."

Stiles raised his eyebrows at her. "Still?" she nodded. "Ew..."

-

-

They were set. A plan had been made, with hopes that they wouldn't have to use their back-up plan. Scott could control his transformation again, but they were still counting on Olivia to turn Malia back into her human self. It was the easiest route to go since they knew that Olivia could change were-creatures back into their human selves.

All they had to do now was implement the plan. The six of them would be splitting up; Allison and Lydia would try to shoot Malia with the tranquilizer in hopes that it would slow her down, Isaac and Scott would chase Malia and get her to the site of the car wreck, and that's where Olivia and Stiles would be waiting so Olivia could change Malia back. It was a fairly simple plan, but anything could go wrong.

They arrived at the preserve in three separate vehicles; Stiles' Jeep, Scott's bike, and Allison's Toyota. Olivia, Stiles, Lydia, Scott, Isaac, and Allison gathered in a circle, ready to go over their plan once more.

"Anyone else think we might be doing more harm than good?" Lydia asked reluctantly.

Olivia twisted her lips together and glanced at Stiles, gripping his hand tightly. He didn't say anything to her, but his actions did their job in assuring her that everything was going to be all right. He squeezed her back and lifted their intertwined hands, wrapping his arm around her shoulder in assurance. She snuggled into him, the warmth of his shoulder defrosting her chilled cheek.

"We're trying to keep a father from killing his own daughter," Scott rationalized for all of them.

"Actually, we're trying to keep a guy from killing a coyote who is actually his daughter, who we don't know how to change from a coyote back to his daughter," Isaac corrected him bluntly.

Despite the situation, Olivia couldn't help but chuckle. She could always count on Isaac to tell it like it is. It was one of his many charms and why she considered him such a great friend—and there was also the fact that before she grew a heart and fell for Stiles Stilinski, she was just as blunt as him. In a way, that was kinship between them.

"And again with the not helping," Stiles shot a glare at the tall blonde.

Scott rolled his eyes and turned to Allison, who had stayed silent until then. "Did you bring it?"

"Yeah," Allison walked to the trunk of her car and opened it, pulling out her family's tranquilizer gun. "All ready."

As if the universe wanted to ruin their plan, a gunshot echoed through the woods. For some odd reason, they all realized what that meant; Mr. Tate had taken his coyote situation in his own hands and was out gunning for Malia.

Scott and Isaac made to take off, but Olivia quickly stopped them. "Wait, wait!" she shouted "Stick to the plan. Get her to the wreck."

Scott and Isaac only made noises of agreements before they were running off with Lydia and Allison trailing after them. Olivia and Stiles started their own journey to the site of the car wreck and when they were halfway there, Stiles received a call from his father.

"It took the doll again?" Stiles exclaimed, frustrated, once Noah told him that Malia broke into Tate's house to take the baby doll. "What the hell is so important about this doll? Why would it go all the way to the school and then all the way back to the house just for a doll?"

Stiles had ended his call with Noah now, and muttering under his breath as they continued toward the wreck.

"Well, you found the doll in the car wreck, right? Not the coyote den?" Olivia mused; Stiles nodded. "Okay, so, what does the doll even look like?"

"I don't know," Stiles quickly, a little snappish. "It's a doll, you know. It's got little arms, a big baby head, and dead, soulless eyes that scare the fuck out of you...Actually, I took a picture..."

Olivia hovered over his shoulder as he unlocked his phone and found the picture he took of a photo of Malia and her little sister. The older girl in the picture, Malia, wasn't even holding the doll; it wasn't her doll, it was the sister's.

"That's not Malia's doll, Stiles," she pointed out.

"It's her younger sister's," Stiles caught on quickly. "I know what she's doing. It's like taking flowers to a cemetery."

"She's heading to the same place we're going, the wreck," Olivia realized. "We have to get there, now."

They picked up their pace, practically running through the woods to get to the ravine where the wrecked car stayed for eight years. No one else was at the ravine yet, not even Malia, so they slowed to a walk to wait for everyone.

And then Olivia felt it. Isaac's tether pulsed painfully and before she could react, a pained shout echoed through the woods.

"Isaac?" Olivia turned quickly, facing the direction where the shout came from. It was when she took a step that she stood on hard steel which clicked with her weight. "Oh, my God."

It was a trap. A trap that was meant for Malia, but somehow caught Olivia instead.

"Livvy, don't move!" Stiles shouted from behind her. She stared at him with frantic eyes, her heart racing a mile a minute, as he slowly approached her. "I'm gonna look at the warning label, okay? Just stay still."

"W-Warning l-label?"

"There's instructions on how to disarm it," Stiles kept calm for her, though he wanted to vomit from the nerves pooling in his chest. "Animals can't read, so...fuck..."

Olivia swallowed thickly. "Stiles?"

"I can't read, either," Stiles' tone was heavy with anger, though not at her.  He was angry with himself for being unable to help her. Livvy was on the verge of losing her leg, and possibly dying, and he couldn't fucking read. He couldn't get her off the trap safely.

Fuck, fuck, fuck...

"You don't need to read the instructions," Olivia pulled together all of her courage to get herself and Stiles out of this mess. Everyone was counting on them. "You never read the instructions, remember? It's annoys the shit out of me."

Stiles chuckled wetly, wiping the tears from his cheeks.

"You don't need the instructions because you're smarter than them," Olivia recalled something that Stiles had actually told her on one of their date nights where they attempted to put together a Lego set. "You can figure it out, sweetcheeks...You can do it."

There were only two seconds until Stiles responded. When he did, Olivia drowned peacefully in relief. She believed in Stiles. He could do anything.

"Okay, okay," Stiles settled himself on his knees and carefully grasped the wheel that would disarm the arm. "Here we go. Are you ready?"

"Yes."

"I love you."

"I love you, too. Just do it."

"Okay, here we go," Stiles twisted the knob. All at once, the jaws of the trap snapped open, Olivia jumped out of it, and Stiles grabbed her and pulled her away from it. He let out a large sigh of relief when the trap snapped shut and she was unharmed. "Oh, my God. Thank God. You're all right. You're all right."

Olivia was hardly able to lift her head before he was pulling her into a dizzying kiss. She would have stayed in his embrace and celebrated her safety and his success for days if she could, but she couldn't.

Scott's tether was going off and one glimpse at her map told her that he was making his way toward them with Malia. She hurriedly pulled away from Stiles, muttering about Scott and Malia as she did so, and started sprinting toward the ravine.

She held out her hands, envisioning her power conforming to her palms. As soon as she saw Scott round a tree a hundred feet ahead of her, a coyote on his tail, she was pushing that invisible energy out. On her map, she had already located Malia as a navy blue tether; she attacked the tether with her purple energy, commanding Malia's attention.

She inhaled deeply and then:

"MALIA!"

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Scott collapse to the ground under the weight of her scream. In her map, she felt Isaac's tether strengthen and heal from whatever trouble he had gotten himself into. All she could really focus on, though, was Malia.

The coyote fell to the ground and right before Olivia's eyes, started shifting. Before long, a naked girl, around her age, laid where the coyote had dropped. She had dark brown hair, the same color as Olivia's, and somehow, it wasn't as messy or as wild as Olivia had expected it to be after eight years as a coyote.

She ignored Stiles' call of her name and ran toward Malia, shifting out of her peacoat as she did so. Malia stared at her, stunned, as she carefully wrapped it around her bare body.

"Hi, Malia," she greeted the girl in a gentle whisper. "I'm Olivia. Are you okay?"

"Y-You--I-I?" Malia seemed shocked that she was not her normal coyote self and that she could actually talk.

"You're okay, now," she didn't know why, but Olivia felt so protective over Malia already. "Everything's gonna be okay."

Shockingly, Malia seemed to believe her. Despite having been an animal for the better half of a decade, she still seemed to remember some human actions. Without a word, Malia wrapped her arms around the shorter brunette and buried her face into her soft hair.

Olivia smelt like family, like home.

(Gif is not mine)

[alongthoselineswrites]

You against the World

Senhaku (Senku x Kohaku) from Dr. STONE fic. ~3000 words. Written for kissing prompt #11: “I almost lost you” kiss. Manga spoilers up through Ch. 127 with slight canon divergence. Cross-posted to AO3. Enjoy!

It was dark. 

So, so very dark. 

Kohaku had no idea how long she had been encased in stone, but she had been having the weirdest sensations since she had been petrified. Tingling sensations, throughout her lower torso and legs, almost as if she still maintained some sense in them. She had tried moving them a few times, but had no way of knowing whether or not she had been successful.

Look at her, conducting her own scientific experiments, rudimentary as they were.

She had eventually given up on trying. She couldn’t tell whether she was moving, or even whether her bottom half was petrified, but the last thing she wanted was to draw attention to the fact that she was still alive, because until Senku and the others came to save her and released her from this stone prison, she had to assume she was among enemies. If what she had seen done to Ginro was any indication, she had no doubt they would simply hack off any limb that was still moving. She didn’t even know if she’d be able to feel it at this point.

She knew Senku had counted seconds during his imprisonment. For literal millennia he had counted seconds. Kohaku kept getting mixed up around the 10,000 mark, and then she eventually would start over hoping to do better the next time. It was mind-numbingly boring, and as she had no practical reason to count the time like Senku had had, she eventually just stopped counting and instead counted on her friends to tell her how long she had been out of commission when she woke up. 

Instead of rote counting, Kohaku filled her time thinking of her fellow members of the kingdom of science. Everything had changed when she met Senku, in the best way possible. Ruri was no longer sick, the lives of her people were infinitely easier, and they all simply had more fun. For many years, Kohaku hadn’t really been able to consider fun, with hunting and training and going to get water for Ruri. But she was glad she had time for it now, in and around the endless work Senku had for them to do. 

Goodness this was boring. How did Senku and the others do this for so long. She felt like she would almost rather die than spend another second encased in this sightless, soundless world. 

She still had some sort of sensation in her legs and torso, but no feeling at all. She could still be sitting on the master’s roof where she had been petrified for all she knew. 

She really hoped her top half being encased in stone didn’t have a bad effect on her lower half. After all, Senku had mentioned once that your heart and your brain are essential to keeping the rest of the body moving. If both her head and heart were encased in stone, could the legs survive?

For a few minutes, Kohaku began to panic. What if her legs didn’t work when they brought her back? She was one of the village’s strongest warriors! Being stuck at camp doing mindless science work intended for Gen or the children would be torture.

But Senku will find a way. Her deeper thoughts gently reminded her, and this thought calmed her like nothing else. In the three years she had known Senku, he had told amazing stories of people gaining back lost limbs through science. Maybe he could make one for her if things went poorly. 

The remaining time of her petrification was spent thinking of comforting science stories Senku has told her. Usually around a campfire or even on the Perseus on the way here. She felt warm and comfortable, even in her petrified state. 

And she quietly thought to herself that if she had to stay encased in stone for several more years, she had plenty of stories of Senku to keep her company, and the assurance that someday, even if it takes him a lifetime, he would save her. 

Some time later (Kohaku wasn’t sure how long exactly, she was only sure that she refused to count), light returned to her eyes, and sound to her ears. She felt the distinctive thump thump of her heartbeat return, and drew her first breath in who knows how long. Tears sprung to her eyes in relief. All of her friends stood before her in some sort of underground bay. Ginro was alive and depetrified next to her, currently ensconced in a teary-eyed, crushing embrace from Kinro.

And right in front of her was Senku. He was holding a small clay jar over her head, and he seemed to be frozen in place. His facial expression was part shock but overwhelmingly full of relief, and Kohaku wasn’t sure, even with her incredible eyesight, but she thought his eyes were shinier than normal as he turned away to continue fiddling with some sort of device made with what looked like feathers. 

Before she could register much more than that, her legs buckled beneath her, and she collapsed to the floor. Chrome was the first to reach her to help her up, and he slowly helped her wobble over to a chair. 

Looking down at her legs, she could tell even in the dim lighting of the cave that her legs were the wrong color. They looked nearly as gray and dark as the stone that had once encased her top half. She couldn’t seem to get them to work the way they used to, but she hoped that was simply a side effect of not using them for so long. 

“How long was I out?” She asked Chrome, who was still standing beside her.

“Almost three weeks.” He grimaced, “ we had planned to get you guys back much sooner, but Ibara stole your earring and figured out our drone plan.” He pointed over to the device Senku was still fiddling with. Senku paused to wipe something from his face, maybe even his eye, before returning to work, “So we had to turn tail and figure something else out. We ended up having to build infrared binoculars, which took longer than expected. Senku hasn’t slept in almost a week and a half.” 

Kohaku had no idea what binoculars were, nor what infrared meant, but the drone thing looked complicated enough all on its own. The comment about Senku’s sleeping patterns was really what caught her off guard though. For as long as she’s known him, he has always preached the values of getting a good night’s sleep. For Pete’s sake, one of the first conversations she ever had with the man was him telling her to go to sleep. If what Chrome said was true, what could have had Senku so on edge that he felt the need to sacrifice his sleep?

Over the next couple of days, color slowly returned to both Kohaku and Ginro’s legs. Regular bowel movements returned, and movements that had been so natural before the petrification were becoming easier by the minute. A few times since reawakening, Senku had come to her and given her body a very clinical appraisal, mainly to make sure all of her regular bodily functions had returned. Despite the fact that she was technically seeing him and talking to him, Kohaku could feel the distance Senku was placing between them. And even when she didn’t particularly want to see him after an especially awkward questioning regarding her monthly cycle, she still missed him. Although she had nothing on Taiju, she had spent the last three weeks basically sustaining herself on thoughts of him, and now that she was reanimated, she was having to come to terms with the implications of that fact. 

When several more days passed and even the excruciatingly clinical checkups had ceased, it became glaringly obvious that Senku was avoiding her. What was especially disarming was that he didn’t share the same attitude towards anyone else, least of all Ginro, who logically, since that was Senku’s thing, should have been receiving the same treatment as her because they shared the exact same circumstances. Except that oh wait, Kohaku saved Ginro’s life! 

Senku’s behavior made no sense. And so after nearly a week with no words spoken between the once close friends, Kohaku chose to act. 

The mobile lab was still parked up the beach from the coast line, absurdly high to be honest, since the entirety of a camp of nearly 50 people were positioned far from the tide’s reach between the lab and the ocean and the lab was still out of hearing distance from the camp… maybe even for Ukyo.

Amaryllis and several of her friends from the village were visiting before the kingdom of science shipped off in the next couple days, so the entire crew were engaged in campfire storytelling and drinking, and generally having a good time. But as per usual, a certain green-haired man that couldn’t hide if he tried was strangely absent. 

Approaching the lab, she heard sounds of science coming from the mobile building. Even to her own non-Ukyo level ears, however, the rustling and clanking sounded more agitated than Senku’s usual amount of frenetic energy. 

Approaching slowly, she leaned on the door frame and knocked lightly to alert him to her presence. He started slightly, which she couldn’t help but find adorable, obviously not having noticed her approach. 

“Kohaku!” He said tightly, before quickly averting his gaze and returning to whatever he had been working on, “what do you need?”

Kohaku wondered whether she should just come straight out and ask him why he’s been avoiding her. Then she wondered where this newfound timidness came from. Pre-petrification Kohaku wouldn’t have even wondered whether to come right out and say it, she just would have. 

She realized she was hesitating for too long right around the time she realized her new found shyness comes from her recently discovered feelings for their resident head scientist. 

Feeling a flush start to crawl up her neck, she stammers out, “N-nothing. You just weren’t at the party.” 

“Oh,” he still hadn’t looked at her again, instead peering into his microscope critically, “ I just didn’t feel like it one millimeter, had more important things to do. You should go though. Have fun!” 

Kohaku may not be a mentalist like Gen, but she can recognize a dismissal when she hears one. She doesn’t take the bait though, instead she stays silent before finally just getting it over with, “Senku, why are you avoiding me?” 

Senku froze. He stopped twiddling with the stubby knobs of the microscope. He stopped twisting his finger in his ear. If Kohaku didn’t know better, she would think he had been hit with the petrification weapon. 

He seemed to have no intention to answer, but Kohaku was no quitter. She waited him out. 

It couldn’t have been more than a few minutes, but Kohaku could have sworn it felt like 3700 years passed again as she leaned against the counter with her arms folded across her chest to wait out this stubborn man. 

Finally, Senku let out a humorless chuckle, still not looking up from his microscope, “Ha, I don’t know what you’re talking about Kohaku, I’m not avoiding you.”

Kohaku felt a flash of anger surge through her, “Look at me, Senku.” 

Senku froze again, but this time he came to sooner, only taking a couple seconds to recalibrate before turning and looking her dead in the eyes, daring her to look away first. 

Normally, Kohaku was intrigued by Senku’s eyes, as they normally had some sort of gleam in them, whether it be the gleam of a scientific breakthrough or the gleam of a madman. But these eyes were not those eyes. Senku looked at her with a blank expression, almost cold in its inexpressiveness. She held her ground. 

“Yes, Kohaku?” Senku said with heavy sarcasm. There wasn’t quite venom in his tone, but he was obviously growing frustrated with this conversation. Kohaku hadn’t the slightest idea why, but she wasn’t leaving until she had an answer. 

“Why are you avoiding me, Senku?” He opened his mouth to speak, but she cut him off, “And don’t tell me that you’re not. You haven’t spoke more than two words to me in over a week, and I’m tired of it. I miss you.” 

There was a flicker of something on Senku’s face before he pulled himself together, “I’ve been busy, that’s all.” His gaze dropped to the floor. Not in an attempt to avoid her eyes, but it appeared, in shame. Kohaku could only guess what for. 

“That’s a lie and you know it, Senku. You’ve had plenty of time to talk to everyone else this week, and you even went scuba diving with Taiju a couple days ago, completely for fun!” She paused, realizing that in her hurt and anger her voice had risen. 

Senku looked thoroughly scolded, and it was honestly a welcome relief to see emotion enter back into his eyes. Senku claimed to be immune to emotion, but Kohaku knew that was just a façade. He cared deeply about everyone under his command, he cared about his science, he cared about the natural world and food and Sagara the wild boar. He tried to maintain an air of impartiality but Kohaku could see through it. 

“What’s wrong with me all of a sudden, Senku?” She could hear the tears forming in her voice, and it broke as she said, “was there something I did that we’re not friends anymore?” 

As she watched, Senku’s face morphed slowly from shame and sadness to anger. He didn’t seem to be angry at her per say, but he was definitely frustrated, “Nothing! You didn’t do anything.”

“Then why…”

“Look, Kohaku, I…” he took a slow step towards her, “I don’t…” another step, “I can’t…” and another, bringing him within arms reach of Kohaku in the small confines of the mobile lab. He froze once again, but it was different this time. While last time he froze because he had been caught, this time he froze because he was caught off guard. Senku and Kohaku were mere inches from each other, eyes locked on the other, barely breathing.

Several seconds passed before Kohaku breathlessly asked, “You can’t what?”

For the first time in her life, Kohaku fell victim to a surprise attack, because the next thing she was aware of was the press of Senku’s mouth against her own. He was warm and solid, despite his lack of physical strength, and Kohaku melted. 

It lasted far too short. Kohaku had barely begun to respond, reaching her hand tentatively upward to hold his jaw, when he was pulling away. He began to pace the floor in the small room while desperately tugging at the roots of his hair. 

“I’m so sorry, Kohaku. I shouldn’t have… I didn’t even…” he groaned heavily, leaning against the counter facing away from her and hanging his head. 

He seemed so distraught, like he didn’t know what to do with himself. 

“Senku?” She asked gently, wanting to give him the space he so obviously needed, but also needing answers for the way he was reacting. Regardless of whatever just happened between them, Senku was her friend, who obviously was going through something. 

He murmured something under his breath, and Kohaku wasn’t able to quite catch it. She still wasn’t Ukyo after all. 

“I can’t hear…” 

“I said I was scared to lose you!” He turned halfway around so that she could see the tears clearly forming in his eyes, and her heart broke. She knew Senku experienced emotions, but she had never in her years of knowing him seen this caliber of feeling on his face. She waited for him to continue. 

“Getting you and Ginro back was such a rough patch with several failed plans along the way, and I knew we’d win with science but I hated you being in enemy hands. And then when I saw that your legs and lower torso weren’t petrified I didn’t know whether the two of your would ever be able to walk again, because according to science, limbs are ten billion percent useless after around six to eight hours without blood supply, and it had been nearly three weeks. And when you were able to stand again, and came out of the petrification with no problems, I felt such a huge sense of relief that I didn’t know what to do with myself.” He paused, finally meeting her eyes once again, “I’ve never felt as intense of emotions as I do when it comes to you, Kohaku, and I don’t know what to do with them. Psychology is such a lame science.” 

He chuckled slightly, and Kohaku followed his lead despite not getting the joke. There were a couple moments of comfortable silence as they contemplated each other, before Kohaku slowly stood up from her place leaning against the counter, and came to stand next to Senku. She gently placed her hand atop his where it rested, and when their eyes met again, she knew that their friendship wouldn’t suffer from this, everything could go back to normal, at least for now. “It’s ok that you don’t always know what to do, Senku. The important thing is that you did save Ginro and I, and I know we can always count on you to save us with science.” 

She averted her gaze, still not quite brave enough to meet him head on as she said the next part, “And it’s ok that you don’t know what to do about your feelings either. Someday it will get clearer, and if it doesn’t,” she met his eyes again, “you always can come to me for help.” 

Realizing how self-centered that sounded, she tried to backpedal, “Or Taiju. Or Chrome. Or Gen. Or even Ryusui for all I care. You really can ask whoever you…” She trailed out because Senku was laughing. She removed her hand from atop his, happy to see him in good spirits again. 

“You’re too funny, Kohaku.” He smiled at her for a long moment, before nodding his head towards the door of the mobile lab, “Come on, let’s go celebrate with our friends.”

Smiling, she nodded, and together they walked back towards the bonfire where their friends were drinking and telling stories, the two of them laughing and talking like the friends they were the whole way. 

[sarah-writes-stories]

Chapter 7: Confessions

A Post-Canon Inuyasha Romance/Adventure Epic

Find it on: Fanfiction.net / AO3 / Wattpad

Words: 3,589

Prologue  •  Chapter 1  •  Chapter 2  •  Chapter 3  •  Chapter 4  •  Chapter 5  •  Chapter 6  •  Chapter 7  •  Chapter 8  •  Chapter 9  •  Chapter 10  •  Chapter 11 •  Chapter 12  •  Chapter 13 

⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯

"Are you saying the jewel isn't gone?!"

Kagome's mind began to race with panic. 'No, no, no, no. It has to be gone. I made it disappear. It can't hurt me anymore! No! No! No! No!'

Inuyasha heard Kagome's heart start beating erratically a second before she began hyperventilating.

"Kagome, look at me. Look at me! Look me in the eyes." He turned her in his lap, holding her face between his clawed hands so she couldn't look away.

"You need to breathe, Kagome. Slow and deep. Breathe with me." He kept her eyes locked with his, urging her to match the rhythm of his breaths.

"What's going on out here?!" Sango asked in a loud whisper as she returned to the other room. She'd encouraged both Shippō and Rin to lay down with the other children, hoping that they'd doze off. It had worked, but clearly, she'd missed something while she was gone.

Sango watched Inuyasha calm Kagome while Miroku quietly filled her in on what had been revealed. Her heart went out to her dearest friend as she tried to process everything Miroku was telling her.

Kaede, too, felt pity for how much the child had clearly suffered. She spoke up then, hoping to ease Kagome's fears. "Kagome, child, the jewel is gone. When I examined ye, there was nought about the power within ye that I could sense as being impure or malevolent. Truth be told, the power of the Four Souls has so completely merged with your own aura that if we had not known ye so well before, we would not have sensed aught amiss now."

Miroku nodded in agreement. "Kaede is correct. The power was clearly purified by your wish, but it may be a while before we are able to ascertain the exact extent of your new power."

Inuyasha was having none of it. This revelation had shaken Kagome to her core and all he wanted to do was protect her from any more pain. "It doesn't matter what powers she has or doesn't have. Kagome is still Kagome. Nothing's gonna change that."

Kagome smiled weakly up at him before leaning her head down on his shoulder. Any tiny seeds of doubt that had begun to take root in her over what this might mean for them were banished in an instant by his words.

"I agree with Inuyasha." Sango's voice was filled with conviction. "We shouldn't worry over this. Instead, we should be grateful. Kagome is back with us now, so we have all the time in the world to figure this out."

She hesitated then, "I mean, I think we do… Do we, Kagome? Did you mention how long you'd be visiting while I was in the other room with the children?"

Inuyasha stiffened at Sango's words. He'd been avoiding asking Kagome that question all day, fearful of what her answer might be. Had she planned this to be just a short visit? Would she soon go back to her own time? Would the well close behind her again locking her away from him forever?

Kagome raised her head from Inuyasha's shoulder to look at her friends around the room. "I…" she trailed off. "This isn't a visit." She said finally.

"What do ye mean, child?" Kaede asked.

Kagome had hoped to talk to Inuyasha about this alone before blurting it out in front of the others. She could feel the embarrassment overtaking her as she thought of having to explain to everyone how the instant the well had opened, she'd jumped through without a second thought. No plan, nothing packed, and no return ticket.

'Nope,' she thought with a cringe. 'Not doing it.'

"Kaede-sama," she finally said. "It's been a long day and I'm really tired. Do you think, maybe, we can talk more about that in the morning?"

Inuyasha was crestfallen. Maybe she didn't want to talk about how long she planned to stay because the fact was she didn't plan to stay at all! Because if this wasn't a visit, like she'd said, then what was it? Goodbye?

No! He couldn't accept that. If this was going to be his only chance, then he would have to somehow convince Kagome that she shouldn't leave forever, that he wanted...needed... her to stay here with him. No matter how selfish it was, the thought of losing Kagome again was more than Inuyasha could bear. He knew he wouldn't survive it a second time without losing his mind.

Interrupting his thoughts, Inuyasha heard Kaede concede to Kagome's request. "Of course, child, of course. Would ye like to stay with me this evening? With Rin and Shippō sleeping here, there will be plenty of room."

"Yes, thank you, Kaede-sama. You're very kind."

Kaede got up from her seat then, stretching her old bones and groaning inwardly. She was not as young as she'd once been.

"Well, then I shall take my leave of ye now. I'm sure Inuyasha will be happy to walk ye back to my home once ye are ready to retire for the evening. Goodnight to ye all."

"Of course I'll walk her back," Inuyasha grumbled, then blushed furiously when the sudden thought of Kagome staying at his hut instead of Kaede's came into his mind.

Miroku saw Inuyasha's colour rise and, being the lecher he was, knew exactly what his friend was thinking about. Mischief sparkled in his eyes once more.

"Kagome," he began. "Did Inuyasha tell you that he has a hut now as well?"

"Miroku…" Inuyasha growled his name in warning.

But Kagome paid no attention to it. She was happy to latch onto any topic of conversation that would distract the others from returning to their previous questions about how long it was that she intended to stay.

"Inuyasha, is this true? You have a home in the village now?"

"Yeah," he grumbled. "It's true. When we were rebuildin' the village and had been invited to settle, that's when Miroku and Sango's house was built, and mine, too. It's a little ways apart from the rest of the village though, closer to my forest. I like it that way. Less noise and smells and stuff. I figured it'd be good to have a secure place to spend my human nights."

He didn't, of course, mention that the real reason he'd accepted the offered hut was that he'd hoped that, if ever Kagome returned, that she would be willing to share the small home with him.

"I'd love to see it," Kagome whispered shyly. She desperately wanted to talk to Inuyasha alone before morning, when apparently the headman would be searching for her and Kaede would, no doubt, be looking for answers as well.

Miroku smiled inwardly at Kagome's words. This chance for further teasing was simply too good to pass up! "Well, it's not too late. Inuyasha, why don't you walk her by to see it on your way to Kaede's. Sango and I really should be retiring anyway. Ichiro wakes many times in the night and if we do not retire soon, I fear we will both be quite useless come morning."

"Miroku…." It was Sango's turn to give her husband a warning growl. She knew him too well not to realize the mischief he was up to.

Kagome didn't care, she took the out when it was offered. "Oh, of course! I didn't even think about that. You guys are parents now. Come on, Inuyasha, let's go." She rose to her feet as the others did as well.

Sango stepped forward to embrace her friend. "You don't have to leave, you know. Miroku's just being Miroku." She gave Kagome a meaningful look.

"No, it's fine, Sango, really." She glanced over at Inuyasha and then back at Sango, urging her friend to understand that they still had more to talk about.

Sango seemed to understand. "Alright, Kagome. Then we'll see you both in the morning, yes?"

"Of course you will. It's not like she's gonna jump back in the well while you're sleeping." Inuyasha folded his arms across his chest, tucking his hands into either sleeve. He gave Kagome a quick look from the corner of his eye, gauging her reaction to his words. He needed to confirm for himself that she really wasn't about to do just that, but he couldn't bring himself to come right out and ask her either.

Kagome just smiled and shook her head. "Nope, I'll definitely be here in the morning. See you then!" She waved at her two friends as she and Inuyasha exited the warmth and light of the hut and were immediately enveloped by the chilly darkness of the night air.

Kagome shivered. It was only April and the short skirt and light cardigan she had on were doing nothing to keep out the cool spring breeze. She rubbed her hands up and down over her arms.

"Are you cold?" Inuyasha asked.

"Yeah, a little."

Inuyasha immediately stopped walking. He untied the outer jacket of his fire-rat robes, shrugging his arms out of the sleeves before draping it around Kagome's small form.

"Thanks." She smiled shyly up at him.

'It smells like him,' she thought and her earlier nerves began to return. There was just so much she still wanted to say.

Thankfully, she was rescued from her anxious thoughts by Inuyasha's next question. "So… you still wanna see my hut?"

Did she want the chance to be alone with Inuyasha? Kagome blushed a bit at the wicked turn of her thoughts.

"Yeah, I'd love to see it."

If anything, she thought, the walk would help her gather her courage. She was desperate now to speak the words she'd been longing to say to Inuyasha for almost four years, though she couldn't seem to bring herself to break the silence.

It was Inuyasha who eventually spoke first. "It's just up this next hill, near the treeline."

Kagome looked up to where he was pointing. She could just make out the faint outline of a small hut nestled amongst the trees at the edge of the forest. "I got them to build it up here 'cause it's a better vantage point for keeping an eye on things."

Kagome turned and could see that, indeed, the house sat on higher ground and from the porch, it was likely that Inuyasha would be able to see the entire village laid out before him.

They finally reached the hut then. Inuyasha held the door aside for her to enter.

Moving inside, Kagome hung Inuyasha's fire-rat on a hook near the door before removing her shoes and stepping up onto the smooth wooden floor.

Inuyasha went straight to the fire pit that sat near his kitchen area. Expertly, he unearthed the still-smouldering coals from earlier in the day, using them to help light a new fire, and before Kagome's eyes could even adjust to the darkness in the hut, the room began filling with light and warmth.

Kagome blinked several times, eyes adjusting to the contrast of flickering shadows and light. She turned slowly in a circle then, surveying Inuyasha's home.

There was a small kitchen area to the left of the fire with a good-sized low table for working or eating at nearby. To her right were shelves and a chest, likely for storage, though the shelves were all but empty except for what Kagome assumed were a few containers of foodstuffs. On the far side of the hut, opposite the door, she could see a sleeping area, privacy screen mostly blocking from view what looked to be the edge of a large, rolled-up futon against the wall with blankets piled atop.

It was a modest home, without luxuries… but to Kagome it was perfect. "I love it," she whispered under her breath, as much to herself as to Inuyasha.

He heard her words, of course. "Yeah? I mean, I know it's not much but it's… mine." He wanted to say 'ours,' wanted to blurt out everything he'd had to keep locked inside himself just as Kagome had been locked on the other side of the well.

"Look, Kagome," he began, unable to hold back any longer. "About earlier… That song…" He took a deep breath. "It's all my fault."

"Come again?" Of all the things that Inuyasha could have said about her passionate performance, 'It's all my fault' was not one that Kagome had mentally prepared herself for.

Inuyasha began again, his voice heavy with remorse. "Look, I know I hurt you back then… a lot. Looking back, I could kick myself... but I can't take it back."

"Inuyasha? I'm still not sure I'm following you…"

"You know…" He tried again, "About Kikyō."

Kagome flinched at the dead priestess's name, and the action was not lost on Inuyasha. She hadn't thought about Kikyō in a long time, but suddenly it felt as though her previous incarnation was standing right there in between them all over again.

Kagome sighed. "I'm– I'm not going to lie, Inuyasha. Yes, it did hurt when you chose Kikyō over me. I mean, I know I can never be her and I don't want to be, but–"

He cut her off. "I don't want you to be either, Kagome. Please believe me." He stepped forward, taking both of her hands in his. "I know you think that I chose her over you, but it was never like that. I know I never explained it either. It was just… I felt like it was my fault that she was dead, like I owed it to her to still be there for her. I had loved her a long time ago, and we'd made… promises…. and I just... My honour wouldn't let me walk away from that, no matter…" He faltered before continuing, "No matter how much my heart wished it was free to choose differently."

Kagome's breaths were shallow as she tried her best to hold back the tears stinging at her eyes. "I didn't– I mean, I always thought that you regretted everything. That you wished that she was still alive. That you loved her so much that you couldn't let her go. And that I was just…" She gulped, trying to force the words out. They'd been poisoning her soul for four long years, but she couldn't hold back now. A tear slipped down her cheek as she finally said the words aloud. "That I was just second best."

"NO! NEVER!" Inuyasha practically snarled the words. "Never that, Kagome! I never thought of you as second best. Please believe me. You have no idea how much you mean to me."

Inuyasha grabbed her by her upper arms. His eyes were smouldering with the passion of his words, willing her to feel all he felt for her, to trust that he would never – could never – see her as second best.

After a long moment, he shifted his eyes to look down and away unable to maintain eye contact as his guilt swelled within him again. He was the one who'd made her feel second best after all.

He spoke, his voice quieter than before and once again laced with remorse. "Please believe me. I don't think I could bear it if… If you left again."

Kagome felt weak all over from the intense way he had been staring at her just moments before. It was as though it had released some heavy weight that she hadn't even known she'd been carrying. She felt weightless and oddly separate from her own body.

Perhaps it was this feeling of freedom that suddenly gave her the courage to confess her own secret as well. "I'm not leaving, Inuyasha. I– I think the well is still closed."

Inuyasha's eyes shot back to hers at those words.

She continued, "I can't be sure. I mean, I'd have to try it to be sure… but that's not a risk I'm willing to take."

"What do you mean, 'the well is still closed'? You're here, aren't ya?" Even in his confusion, Inuyasha could feel a small flicker of hope igniting inside his chest.

"I think, this time, it was a one-way trip." She said softly.

"Kagome?" Her name came out as a strangled whisper, his mind reeling at the implications of her words.

Kagome closed her eyes and took a steadying breath before she began to explain. "I– I was in the well house. It wasn't even my usual day to try the well or anything, I was just wandering around and found myself there. I guess I was lost in thought, but as I stood staring down into the well I just– I couldn't bear it anymore. The idea that I was meant to stay in that world, that I might never be able to return here. I felt like it was eating me alive. It was the most wretched existence I could possibly imagine. And in that moment, all I wanted… All I cared about… was to see you again."

She blushed at her words but continued. "The next thing I knew there was a– a breeze blowing over my face and then I could see the sky here on this side of the well! That had never happened before, though I think I knew somehow what it meant, that this was it, my one chance. I can only think that some kami somewhere must have heard my prayers and decided to grant me a single chance to choose. Here or there…. And, well... I choose here."

Inuyasha had turned away from her at some point during her confession. He was trying desperately to reign in his raging emotions. He wanted to squeeze her tight and never let her go, but he also felt like yelling at her at the top of his lungs for being so foolish.

Finally, he was able to speak, though he did not face her. "You mean… You mean you're here forever? But what about your family? Your whole life is back there, Kagome!"

"No, my life is here, Inuyasha. My mom understood that. By some miracle she'd been walking by the well house when it happened and found me right before I jumped. She told me… She told me to follow my heart."

Kagome squeezed her eyes shut tight for a moment before continuing. "I don't think I'll ever go back there – that I'd ever want to go back there – because as much as I know I'll miss mom and gramps and Souta, if the past three years have taught me anything, it's that I would never have been happy over there because this is where I belong."

Inuyasha still stood with his back to Kagome, and she began to worry that she'd upset him with her confession. "Inu– Inuyasha? Is something wrong?"

"No. Nothing's wrong." His words came out low and thick. She moved quickly around to his front, needing to look him in the eye. She touched his cheek, forcing him to look at her. His eyes were filled with both relief and guilt, and it was almost as though she could see the inner battle he was fighting with himself.

Finally, he whispered, "You gave up everything to come back here to a place where it's not safe! You could get hurt, or sick, or attacked, or–" Kagome rose up on her tiptoes and pecked a soft kiss on his lips to halt his words.

"This is what I want, Inuyasha." It was a plain and simple statement of fact. There would be no changing her mind.

A long moment of silence stretched out between them before a thought struck Kagome. "But… why did you think my song earlier had something to do with Kikyō?"

"Well," Inuyasha began, only mildly phased by her non-sequitur. "Weren't the words to your song all about being hurt so bad you felt cut open?"

She took a deep fortifying breath before exaggeratedly smirking and rolling her eyes. Oh Kami, she loved him so much, even when he was being a total baka.

"Inuyasha, is that all you paid attention to? Didn't you hear the other lyrics of the song?"

She hummed the lyrics softly then, in Japanese this time.

"I don't care what they say, I'm in love with you…"

Trailing off, Kagome looked up into Inuyasha's golden eyes – eyes suddenly awash in comprehension quickly replaced by longing. It was a longing that, before now, he'd made sure to always keep hidden from her view.

And all Kagome had time to do was gasp in astonishment before Inuyasha grabbed her in his arms and crushed his mouth down onto hers.⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯⋯

A/N: I do not own Inuyasha, or any of the characters created by Rumiko Takahashi. (I only own this original story.)

And I love to hear from readers! Please leave me a comment below!

[shadowsong26fic]

The Handler AU

As requested by @tigerkat24.

(I do also have fulltext for one scene in here, which will be posted and linked here in the near future, probably tomorrow, after I clean it up some.)

Right. So. A couple of notes before I get started:

1) This AU prominently features Lavinia, and also super self-indulgent. Gonna say that straight-out. This is me and my OC and a bunch of tropes I adore. It is not the most self-indulgent piece I’ve ever put together, but it’s probably up there. I say this because, while I am pretty much past the point as a fan/content creator/whatever where I’m ashamed of my self-indulgent BS, I understand that it might not be everyone’s cup of tea, especially when it’s as obvious as this piece is. And I like people to know at least in general terms what they’re getting into when they open a piece of mine. So, you know, bear that in mind as you move forward.

2) Because of the way I work/develop AUs/OCs/etc., there are certain personality traits/satellite characters/plot points that are common to all/most of Lavinia’s storylines (...yeah, it’s a Thing I do, with OCs yeah but also with OC-free AUs and AUs of AUs and ‘hey what if I changed this plot point here, or put OC B in this situation instead of that one, or stuck Canon D in...look, y’all have seen my Distaff variants, you know the kind of thing I’m talking about; I don’t always stop at a single layer of canon-divergence, but then there has to be a thread connecting everything, or it becomes a totally different story/character, right? ...I’m not sure I’m explaining this very well. ...anyway, back on topic). As a result, despite being an AU of a completely different AU, this outline is therefore somewhat spoilery for a future Precipice arc. I mean, I’m pretty sure I’ve hinted at where I’m going with her in the fic proper and/or bonus content, or at least I’ve tried to, (plus, I know I’ve mentioned some things here on tumblr about particular narrative/character tropes I like), so it’s probably not too surprising? Or, at least, I hope it’s not. If it is, I need to get better at foreshadowing… Anyway, it is still technically a spoiler. To the point where I considered sitting on this (and a couple related AUs) at least until a particular event from Arc Seven that makes said future storyline about as clear as it can be until it actually happens. But…I decided ehhhhhh, why not (plus this was requested). But, you know, if that is something you want to avoid, might be best not to read this outline until after Arc…nine, I think? Just as a head’s up.

3) This is essentially a Kallus-centric Rebels fic (though, as mentioned above, also prominently featuring one of my OCs). And, other than that one bit in the Valdemar AU I wrote a month or so ago, this is the first time I’ve actually written Rebels content. (…granted, I’ve plotted more things--the closely-related Pellaeon AU features Rebels stuff pretty heavily, as does the middle arc of the Valdemar AU, which started as ‘Anakin would do really well as a Herald actually’ and has now turned into a massive three-part kudzu plot of a niche crossover and I should really redo that outline properly at some point, plus a few other things…) Anyway, the point is, I’m not necessarily super familiar with the conventions/etc. of this part of the fandom, and I apologize for any off-voice bits.

Okay! Now that I have warned for spoilers, inexperience, and self-indulgent BS…welcome to the Handler AU.

Oh, one more thing I want to mention—because this is, as stated above, super self-indulgent, Kanan is still alive because I said so. He got pretty crisped in that explosion and therefore missed the final battle, but didn’t actually die.

(Imperial records may have listed him as dead for a while, because No One Could Have Survived That, but he did survive.)

(How? IDK, maybe Ezra actually was able to do something from the between-place in this version.)

(Point is, we still have Kanan.)

(Ezra and Thrawn are still on a road trip with a bunch of space whales, though.)

ANYWAY. On to the good stuff.

It all kicks off like two months after Yavin.

Some timeline notes:

Because timelining anything in Star Wars is A Project, I am making some executive decisions here.

We’re approximately a year after the Rebels series finale.

(Meaning Jacen is like 3-4 months old, depending on exactly how pregnant Hera was at the time.)

This is also about how long Zeb and Kallus have been explicitly dating.

(There was SO MUCH PINING going on for a while there.)

(But it took that long for either of them to actually do anything about it.)

(Kallus figured out pretty early on that he was interested, but didn’t really think he deserved this/had earned it yet/that Zeb could possibly be interested in him, and therefore decided to bury his feelings Like A Goddamn Professional Okay.)

(Zeb took a while longer to clue in, and then couldn’t figure out if this was just him or what--see above re: burying things; worked a little bit too well--plus he has his own issues to work through.)

(And then there were some frantic Confessions and so-glad-we’re-alive sex and…)

(Yeah, this is a thing now.)

(Exactly zero people who have spent any time with these two dorks at all are surprised.)

(As is so often the case, the last people to clue in that this was A Mutual Thing are the two idiots involved.)

(There may or may not have been a pool or three going.)

(Hera won at least one of them.)

So. Kallus has made himself useful wherever he can since openly defecting, really, but generally works analyzing intelligence reports and training field agents for potential undercover missions. Even if his specific information is getting more and more out of date (few, if any, of the codes, etc. that he knows are still valid at this point), some things aren’t going to change that quickly, and his background is useful here.

Anyway. He gets called in--

“We’ve been approached by a would-be double agent deep in Imperial territory; received three transmissions in the past few weeks. So far, everything we’ve been sent checks out/has been useful, but.”

“But you’re wondering if this agent is an ISB plant.”

“Exactly. She calls herself Vector.”

“She?”

“Yeah. The scrambler she’s using is doing its job, which means we can’t actually use a voice print to ID her, but vocal pattern analysis got us that much. And that she’s likely Coruscanti, Human, and under thirty. That’s about all we know.”

He goes over the data and the recordings from the first three contacts and nothing jumps out as a red flag/any of the tricks he’s familiar with.

On the first call, there’s some dancing around; as if Vector’s trying to make sure of who she’s talking to. What he’d expect from either a plant or a genuine defector, really. Not particularly helpful.

The other two are fairly brief/straightforward, and start the same way each time--This is Vector. I have a data file for you. Do as you like with it. Also not particularly enlightening, given the question he’s been asked to answer.

The data itself, though, is--interesting. Not easy to access, for the most part, and not necessarily all from the same source. Parts of it are the kind of thing ISB would use as bait, but just as much of it is not. Some of it provides useful context for intel the Alliance has received from other sources (some covert, some not), which is not the kind of thing an ISB plant would send.

So, he goes back to his superiors and tentatively reports Vector as probably genuine. He wants to be on hand for her next transmission, though, to be sure.

(He wonders, idly, who they had evaluate his initial transmissions like this, or if using an established codename and protocol was enough…)

(He’s Concerned it might be the second.)

(There are some worrying gaps in Rebel Intelligence’s security that he can only do so much to patch.)

Of course, there’s a slight problem with that. Vector’s transmissions haven’t exactly been regular--the second one came four days after the first, and then it was nearly two weeks to the third.

And when they do come, they’re very brief, so if Kallus is, say, busy with a training exercise on the opposite side of the base…

(Or otherwise occupied in a supply closet.)

(He does have, y’know, a life when off-duty.)

(...which is something that still sends him into weird brainspirals of “how did this happen” and “i don’t deserve this” and “when is it going to blow up in my face” on occasion, but that is a separate problem. One that he buries. Like A Goddamn Professional.)

(no that’s not a habit of his why do you ask.)

IN ANY CASE, this means that it ends up being her sixth message, close to three weeks after Kallus is initially brought in, before he’s able to listen in live.

(Transmissions four and five, after he reviews them, don’t really change his analysis, but still.)

Transmission six comes in while Kallus happens to be in the tiny corner of the current base that Intelligence has claimed.

It starts like the others did--This is Vector. I have a data file for you. Do as you like with it.

Once the file transfer initiates, he responds.

“Vector, this is Fulcrum.”

(Okay, technically, he probably should be using a different handle now, since it’s really supposed to be for field agents only and he isn’t one anymore. And there are similar shared code names for Intelligence agents primarily on base duty, or he assumes there are, but even after over a year of not using it, it’s still the first one that comes to mind. Reflexive, almost. And now it’s going to stick.)

There’s a beat of silence from the other end, and Kallus is briefly concerned that he misjudged the situation, that she’d going to panic and cut the transmission.

But, “I can’t leave the link open long,” she says.

(Part of him thinks she sounds...almost relieved? Like she’s been waiting to be challenged like this, and the longer things went on without a test, the more nervous she got.)

(He can understand that worry. That sense of just waiting for the other shoe to drop.)

(And, yes, other Rebel Intelligence agents probably could have tested her like this, and if he hadn’t been around as a resource they almost certainly would have, but given that he knows exactly what to look for, the Powers That Be had decided to leave it in his hands.)

“Of course,” he says, and asks her a few questions, rapid-fire.

(He’s less interested in the specific details of her answers--and he’s not really asking her questions about her identity--then how she approaches answering him. Not necessarily something he can explain, which is part of why he didn’t coach any of the other officers and get this taken care of on transmission four or five, but just trying to get a sense of her.)

(One thing he does is privately revise the estimate of her age--he thinks she’s younger than the previous guess, probably twenty or so. Sabine’s age, maybe, at the oldest. Which makes her even less likely to be a plant in his opinion; ISB wouldn’t put this much effort into setting up an agent that inexperienced, not on a mission this sensitive, even if she was inconceivably talented and precocious. As an in-person infiltrator, yes, absolutely; but for this many layers of intrigue...no, they’d want someone Experienced.)

She ends the transmission somewhat abruptly, after about five minutes, but he was more or less expecting that and anyway he has what he needs.

“Well?”

“She’s genuine,” he says. “I’m as sure as I can be of that.”

“Good to hear.” A pause. “...you’ve run undercover agents before, correct?”

Kallus shuts down the knee-jerk paranoid response as fast and hard as he can.

(There are almost certainly people in the Alliance who still don’t trust me but none of them are in this room. I know that. Calm down.)

“Yes, once or twice,” he says, cautiously. “For short-term assignments.”

“Congratulations. You just volunteered to be Vector’s handler.”

(Hence the name of the AU. AKA the one where Kallus adopts a baby spy who JUST HAPPENS to be Palpatine’s daughter.)

(...yeah, he didn’t really see that one coming.)

(...at some point, I should probably go through and outline Lavinia’s politics and her reasons for defecting in detail, but in the interests of focusing on Kallus’s end of things, which is much more interesting, a (hopefully) brief digression on the subject:)

(Lavinia was created and trained to be a spy/manipulator, to perform the kind of tasks and access the kind of information that Palpatine could as the avuncular Chancellor but cannot as Emperor, now that he’s thrown that mask away.)

(...apart from very specific, carefully staged moments, like with Ezra.)

(So, part of manipulating people means understanding them, which means Lavinia does a lot of research to put her targets into context, and in so doing comes across a wide variety of cultures/forms of government, at least in an academic context.)

(And that means that, once she starts thinking beyond “how can I survive until tomorrow” and starts thinking about broader impact/more long-range plans, it doesn’t take her very long to realize that her father’s government is...well, let’s call it deeply flawed.)

(What she does when she comes to that conclusion varies, depending on other circumstances--but she doesn’t necessarily defect right away. Mostly for practical reasons; in Masks!Verse, which this AU is a variant of, she has no Rebel contacts that she’s absolutely sure of.)

(Meaning, in this case, both “absolutely sure is an actual Rebel and not just sympathetic to their aims/politics” and “absolutely sure would be willing to work with me despite my parentage.”)

(And if she approaches anyone she isn’t sure of, it’ll get her or her contact or both of them killed. Defecting from a distance, while she can better protect her identity, has a much bigger risk of interception, which, again, would get her and/or her contacts and possibly a lot of other people killed. Or worse.)

(Basically, she doesn’t think defection is a viable option for her--there are some other reasons for this, but those play a distant second to these concerns.)

(But then Alderaan happens.)

(And these concerns carry a lot less weight.)

(It takes her a couple months to figure out how to make contact with Rebel Intelligence, let alone how to do it safely, but she starts working on it at that point.)

(...I think that’s the salient points here. Like I said, I have a fair bit more about Lavinia’s politics/etc. and the ways/extent to which she’s willing to defy her father in various AUs, but that’s enough for this one, I think.)

So, Kallus can’t really argue with the assignment (even if part of him kind of wants to? Not because he thinks he can’t do it, but because he’s concerned that being another deep-cover informant’s handler is going to dig up a lot of stuff he’d really, really rather keep buried.)

(Look, he feels like he’s finally found his equilibrium. He’s even, somehow, approaching happy with his life for the first time in what feels like forever which, guilt-induced brainspirals aside, he doesn’t want to give up.)

(Besides, handling Vector wouldn’t be his only responsibility, and if he does start losing that equilibrium, he’s not sure how much his other work will be affected.)

(On the other hand...)

(On the other hand, there are very few people who have done what he did and survived long enough to make it back to Rebel lines.)

(Oh, there are other deep-cover informants, sure; but the majority of them are plants inserted by Rebel Intelligence.)

(And while, even leaving aside the technicalities involved with Senator Mothma and others among the leadership who had previously served in the Imperial Senate, there are plenty of defectors--up to and including General Madine and some other persons of very high rank--for the most part, once they make that decision, defectors grab what they can and run.)

(The ones that don’t usually don’t survive as long as he did.)

(Or, alternatively, they don’t identify themselves to the Alliance or even necessarily work directly with them; they perform internal sabotage rather than espionage.)

(Those embedded defectors tend to last longer, but not by much.)

(Which means that he’s probably the only person--certainly the only available person--who has been where Vector is. Who better to help her?)

(As for his own issues...well, he is a Professional, dammit. He can damn well compartmentalize. He’s very good at that.)

(...yeah, this is kind of a running theme for him. Sometimes it’s a good thing, sometimes it’s...very much not.)

(It remains to be seen how much it’ll help or hurt when dealing with Vector.)

So, he accepts the assignment, and goes back to his quarters to tell Zeb and collect a few things--given the irregularity of Vector’s transmissions, until he can talk to her again and set up a better protocol, he’s going to basically have to camp out in Intelligence.

(Which he’s not looking forward to, but it is what it is.)

Zeb is already there when he gets back--their current shifts don’t entirely line up, which is fine; they have at least a few hours overlap most days which is better than some pairs can say.

After several minutes saying hello...

“Did I miss anything interesting?” Kallus asks.

“That Skywalker kid came by a bit ago,” Zeb tells him. “Looking for Kanan.”

Kallus blinks, halfway through fixing caf for the two of them. “...aren’t he and Hera off investigating a potential supply line?”

(Which is, of course, far below Hera’s current paygrade, but she volunteers for that kind of mission on occasion. An excuse to spend private time with her family, while still technically being useful and not taking actual time off.)

“Yep,” Zeb says. “Apparently, this is the third or fourth time something like that has happened. They keep missing each other.”

"Well, I’m sure they’ll link up sooner or later,” he says. “Especially if Skywalker’s actively looking for Kanan.”

(He hasn’t actually met Luke yet at this point, but he’s heard the rumors. He has no real doubt of this fact.)

“Yeah, probably,” Zeb says. “I think Kanan’s been trying to track him down, too. He’ll be sorry he missed him.”

(...yeah, we’re going with Anakin-and-Grievous levels of contrived coincidence to keep those two from actually meeting for a while.)

(Partly because it’s easier than figuring out all the timeline/plot implications that might have (and I’m lazy, and that is the focus of another story), but mostly because I think it’s funny.)

Kallus nods. “...did he and Hera take Jacen with them, or...?”

(He hadn’t seen any evidence the baby had been left with them, but that didn’t mean it hadn’t happened.)

But Zeb shakes his head. “Nah, Sabine has him this time. Why? Something going on?”

“I have an assignment,” Kallus tells him.

“Huh. Extraction?”

(Logical assumption--the bulk of the fieldwork he does now, all-hands-on-deck situations like Lothal aside, is extractions. Occasionally helping sell an insertion, but generally the reverse.)

“No, not this time,” he says. “The agent who reached out, the one I told you about--I’ve been assigned as her handler.”

(He has long since gotten permission to discuss at least surface generalities of his work with Zeb, and they both know where the line is.)

Zeb’s ears flick a little, and Kallus can practically see him weighing the same pros and cons that he himself did earlier--and probably several others he hadn’t thought of.

“So, I guess that means you’re camping out in intelligence for a while?”

“Unfortunately,” he says. “Of course, there is a difference between being on-call and being on duty. And my schedule technically won’t change.”

Zeb perks up at that and grins before kissing him. “Well, I’m sure I an find an excuse to be in the area. Sometimes. Just in case. You know.”

“Mm.”

Fortunately, call number seven comes less than a week later.

This is Vector. I have a data file for you. Do as you like with it.

“Vector, this is Fulcrum.”

A brief pause. “Yes.”

“I’ve been assigned as your handler.”

(He figures the best way to deal with someone who’s probably twitchy and paranoid and otherwise on high alert is to be as scrupulously honest as he can. That doesn’t mean telling her everything, of course, but it does mean being straightforward, difficult as it is, and not outright lying.)

(If he can. So far, he can.)

Another pause. “I understand.”

(She’s hard to read on this one, whether or not she finds it suspicious. She might even be relieved again, that she’ll have a set contact point, rather than a whoever’s-available sort of situation.)

“There are some protocols I’d like to establish, for further contacts.”

“I can’t call at a set time,” she says immediately. “Or at set intervals.”

"I understand,” he said. “But I’m going to give you a more specific frequency to call.”

“Yes,” she says, and that definitely has a faint note of relief.

“Can you, if nothing else, send an all-clear transmission every two weeks?” he asks. “It doesn’t need to be at a set time, but so we can gauge--” whether or not you’re alive and uncompromised “--how concerned we need to be after a long silence.”

She pauses. “...I think so. Yes. I can do that.”

(Definitely young, he thinks, maybe even younger than Ezra--would be.)

“That’s all for now,” he says. There are others he wants to establish, of course, but those are the most important and her file transfer is nearly complete. 

“I’ll be in touch,” she says; hesitates a second; “Vector out.”

(...well, she’s signing off officially now, rather than just abruptly terminating the connection. Progress. I think.)

He goes back to his quarters, and life settles into a new routine.

He keeps up his old duties--analyzing reports, training potential undercover agents, etc.--and also keeps track of Vector and her reports.

That last one proves...well, his early optimism wasn’t entirely misplaced?

Vector is very, very good at what she does. Her files are varied in their content, and sometimes not as useful as she might’ve hoped, due to timing or other resource concerns, but the quality of the work she does never comes into question.

But part of being a double agent’s handler is assessing how they’re holding up under the incredible stress of the position. And she is frustratingly vague when it comes to anything approaching anything personal about herself.

In addition, there are two additional protocols he wants to set up early on--first is a way for him to reach her.

“Just because I have access doesn’t mean I have influence,” she says. “I can’t seed disinformation for you. Not without getting caught.”

“That wasn’t what I meant.”

(Though, of course, he had considered the possibility--as well-positioned as Vector seems to be, how could he not?--but while he doesn’t completely rule out the idea, he files it away under “only as a last resort.” Better to leave her in place as long as possible.)

“But if there’s something specific we want you to keep an eye out for--or if we need to warn you about something...”

“Right,” she says. “That’s fine, then.”

The second, though...the second is where they run into real problems.

“I also want to establish an emergency signal. If you need extraction, or if you end up captured by Rebel agents.”

(He still wonders, sometimes, if staying behind when Ezra came to extract him was the right decision. It had seemed so at the time, but...)

(He’ll probably never know. And fretting about it doesn’t do any good.)

(knowing that doesn’t make it any easier to stop.)

“No,” she says.

“Vector--”

And she hangs up on him.

Exactly why she’s so reticent to establish something like that, he isn’t sure--he has some theories, but...

It’s frustrating, to be sure. Makes it harder for him to do his job.

(And it makes him worried about her--if she’s working without any kind of exit strategy, that likely means she doesn’t think such a thing will be possible. Which, on the one hand, shows her dedication to the cause, but on the other hand...on the other hand, if she thinks getting caught is inevitable, she might get sloppy with her own security and that might well turn into a self-fulfilling prophecy.)

(The other alternative, that she doesn’t trust him, or the Alliance, with her safety if things do go wrong, is...well, probably more distressing, in all honesty.)

(Though not, perhaps, altogether surprising.)

He decides to seek Kanan’s advice on the problem.

(Kanan, after all, knows best what to do with unruly teenagers.)

(...well, so does Hera, but Hera’s advice would probably be less applicable/harder to apply to his specific situation. Also, she has better things to do than help him do his job.)

(Which is the other frustrating thing, that he can’t handle this by himself.)

Kanan’s advice is pretty straightforward--be patient, and don’t push her too hard. You can’t help her if she won’t let you.

(This is part of why I wanted him still around, incidentally.)

(Because there is something utterly hilarious about Kallus going to Kanan for parenting advice.)

(And that’s exactly what he’s doing.)

(Even if he hasn’t quite figured that out yet.)

So, taking this in mind, he backs off. A little bit. Decides to start from square one, and build a rapport, and go from there to get some of the other basics that he wants established.

Standard interrogation technique, technically. Not one favored by ISB, obviously, or really encouraged, but even they knew it had its uses.

Vector is still cagey about personal details, but she does start to soften a little as several weeks go by.

He brings up the idea of an emergency code phrase again, after about two months of this kind of sporadic contact.

This time, she says she’ll think about it.

Things hold in this pattern for about a year, and then Vector makes a call, as usual.

Or, it starts like a normal call, anyway.

“You probably won’t hear from me for a while,” she says, as the file transfer is wrapping up and they’re about to sign off.

“Are you in trouble?”

“No,” she says. “Nothing like that. And nothing related to the work we’ve been doing. But things are going to be...difficult. I’m not even sure I’ll be able to get an all-clear message out for a while.”

He doesn’t like this at all. “How long?”

“A month,” she says. “Probably. Maybe a little more, maybe a little less. I’ll contact you as soon as I can safely.”

It is one of the longer months of his life.

But, as promised, the dedicated comm he has for her lights up eventually.

This is Vector. I have a data file for you.

“Vector, this is Fulcrum,” he says. “Good to hear from you again. Everything all right?”

“Yes,” she says. And she seems fine, and he breathes a quiet sigh of relief.

When he tells Zeb about it later, though, is where it gets...interesting.

“Glad to hear your kid’s okay,” he says.

“My--she’s not my child, Zeb,” Kallus says.

“Really.”

“....”

“Look, you talk about her the same way Kanan talks about Sabine, when she’s off blowing things up on Mandalore.”

“I...wait, really?”

“Yep,” Zeb says, and grins at him. “I mean, it’s not a problem. S’kind of what we do in this family, isn’t it? Take in strays. ‘Bout time you got in on it, really.”

Kallus just stares at him. “I...what.”

Zeb waves a hand in front of his face. “Alex. Babe. You all right in there?”

He shakes himself. “Yes, of course. Sorry."

“Ehh, don’t worry about it. I mean, it’d probably have been nice for the two of us to talk about kids in general before we started adopting our own strays, but--”

Really, sometimes Kallus thinks that Zeb likes the expression he makes when utterly poleaxed like that.

(He does. He thinks it’s adorable.)

(Also, Zeb figures this is a conversation they maybe should have, because they’re clearly both in this for the long haul and he saw this opening and...look, no one ever said Zeb was good at broaching delicate topics gently.)

“...do you?” Kallus asks, when he recovers. “Want children, someday?”

“I mean...yeah,” Zeb says. “If you do. I mean.”

“I hadn’t thought about it,” he confesses.

(Because long-range planning is hard; because they’re at war, because he’s still waiting for the other shoe to drop, because he doesn’t deserve any of this and planning for a future he doesn’t deserve is just--a little much for him sometimes.)

“But...yes,” Kallus says. “I think so, yes. I would like to raise children with you. Someday.”

Zeb’s response to that is positive and enthusiastic and leads to things they will definitely not be discussing with their hypothetical children ever.

It’s a month or two after that that Kallus finds out who Vector is.

(…well, for a given value of ‘finds out,’ anyway.)

He and Zeb are babysitting--Sabine is back on Mandalore; Hera is on duty; Kanan was supposed to be finally meeting Luke but there was an issue at the spaceport and he’s stranded for the next few hours.

(Like I said. Anakin-and-Grievous levels of contrived coincidence.)

Zeb has just put the kid to bed, and Kallus is watching the news.

“You’re still watching that?” he asks, nudging Kallus to make room for him on the couch and drawing him to lean on his shoulder.

“I’ve told you before, dear, knowing what the Empire is saying, no matter how different that is from what they’re doing, has its uses.”

“Especially if you know how their propaganda is constructed, I know,” Zeb says, and nuzzles his ear. “Just thought you were almost done.”

Kallus smiles faintly and leans into the caress. “I am, I promise. I’ll shut it off in a minute. I just want to--”

He pauses. Rewinds the feed. Pauses it--pre-recorded coverage of some public event the Emperor’s kid had been at, with the newscaster commenting on the progress of whatever “public works” project it was supposed to kick off.

“…what is it? Something she said?”

(...something to do with whatever this “project” is covering up?)

“Hush,” he says, fiddling with a few buttons and calling up a printed transcript and skims through it before sinking back against Zeb, letting out a breath.

“Babe?”

“I think I know who Vector is,” he says.

Zeb stares at him for a minute, then stares at the paused footage--frozen on the Princess’s face, icy and composed.

“…her?” 

“Her,” he confirms.

“Why…?”

“Little things,” he says. “The way she talks, some unique turns of phrase. And she fits the profile--young, Human, Coruscanti, close to someone powerful but essentially a civilian herself…and…when Vector disappeared on me last month, that coincided with a period where the Princess was more visible than usual.”

“Karabast,” he mutters. “When you put it like that…”

“It’s all conjecture,” Kallus points out. “I can’t prove any it. Not without digging deeper--which, if I’m right, risks compromising her cover--or asking her straight-out.”

(Which, of course, would also be a bad idea. It would probably seriously damage the trust he’s spent the past year and more building, and it might not even get him an honest answer anyway.)

“Right,” Zeb says. “…any chance someone else could put this together?”

Kallus makes a face. “Unlikely,” he says, though he doesn’t sound totally sure. “The recordings of our conversations are kept as hard copies only, for security. Not uploaded onto any networked drives. And a very small set of people have access to those copies. I doubt anyone could put it together without that access. Still…”

(Someone dedicated enough, who managed to access one of those recordings, or intercept a transmission along the way, or compromise the lines of communication from the other side…)

“Kriff,” he says. “Anything you can do about it?”

“Not really,” he says. “Other than brief Draven and keep doing what I’ve been doing.”

“Yeah,” he says, and studies the picture again; glances over at the morose look on Kallus’s face; feels his ears twitching. “Huh. Never would’ve figured the Emperor’s kriffing daughter to defect.”

Kallus jumps a little, drawn out of his thoughts, then rolls his eyes and gives Zeb a fond, exasperated smile (which was really the point, honestly; to needle him into a better mood), and rather dryly points out, “There was a time you would’ve said the same about me.”

“True,” Zeb says, and grins at him. “Guess it just goes to show, people surprise you all the time.”

“Indeed,” Kallus says, then reaches over to shut off the feed and changes the subject.

Six weeks after that, Vector goes quiet again. This time without warning.

When her two-week check-in goes by with nothing, he’s immediately concerned. She’s never missed a check-in before, not without warning. He decides to give her a day, and then ping her himself.

(He generally avoids doing that--only when he absolutely needs to speak with her about something time-sensitive that can’t wait for her to reach out.)

There’s no response to his message, either.

He reports the missed check-in, of course. Tries again the next day. And a third.

Still nothing.

(He knows a rescue won’t be authorized--technically, they don’t actually know for sure who or even where Vector is, and if his theory is correct, they cannot make a run on Coruscant for one agent, especially not one as visible as Princess Lavinia.)

(He keeps telling himself that. Over and over again. As he tries a fourth and fifth time to reach her.)

“Zeb,” he says, after a third full week has gone by since the last time he heard from her. “I need you to talk me out of doing something stupid.”

“Uh, sure, babe. What’s going on?”

He explains the situation as briefly as he can. “And I am this close to staging a half-assed unauthorized raid on Coruscant to extract her.”

“...nah, if we’re doing an unauthorized raid on Coruscant, it should be a full-assed thing.”

That...that wasn’t really the answer Kallus was looking for.

(In hindsight, he thinks, as he tries to redraw building plans from memory and plan this stupid, stupid venture, he probably should have gone to Hera if he really wanted someone to talk him down. Or possibly Kanan. ...no, Hera.)

(...it could be worse, though.)

(he could’ve tried asking Sabine.)

Fortunately, before they can actually run off and get themselves killed--

(or court-martialed)

(or in trouble with Hera)

--Kallus’ dedicated comm chimes.

“All clear,” he breathes. “That’s the all-clear. She’s...she’s alive.”

It’s nearly another week before he hears anything else, but finally a real call comes.

This is Vector. I have a data file for you. Do as you like with it.

“Vector, this is Fulcrum. Are you all right?”

(she doesn’t sound all right; it’s hard to tell through her scrambler, but she seems strained.)

“Everything’s fine,” she says. “I apologize for the delay, but things are settled now. My cover is intact.”

Which is good to know, but not what he asked.

“And what about you?” he says.

She doesn’t answer right away.

“Vector?”

“I’m here,” she says. “And everything is under control. You don’t need to worry about me. Nothing that--it wasn’t anything to do with this, I was caught on the fringes of something unrelated. It won’t interfere with my work going forward.”

Which still isn’t an answer.

(He’s pretty sure the non-answer is his answer, though. Damn it.)

(He knows the risks. Better than most. And he knows she knows them, too. It doesn’t make it any easier to hear, especially knowing that there is kriff-all he can do to help her.)

Into the silence, she says, “I’m your asset, Fulcrum. Not your friend.”

“......”

“I’m just--” She sighs. “I’m your asset. Not your friend. It’s...we should both remember that. It’s probably better, in the long run.”

And part of him is hurt; part of him is annoyed that he is being lectured on professionalism by a damned child; part of him is worried again--he did finally talk her into an emergency code phrase, in case of capture or other disaster, but here she goes again, hinting that she doesn’t have an exit strategy.

(Not like I did, either, he reminds himself. Can’t plan that far ahead. Not when you’re doing this kind of work. And even when Ezra came for me--)

(He buries it. Because he is a goddamn professional, Vector’s reproof aside.)

“It’s nothing I can’t handle,” she says. “And I’ve had worse.”

“........”

All right, that he likes even less.

“Vector--”

“I have to go,” she says. “I’ll be in touch when I have something else. And I’ll do my best to warn you if I have to disappear again. Vector out.”

And, in the interests of “good Lord this thing is close to 6k already,” we’re going to skip ahead quite a bit, about a year and a half, to just after the evacuation of Echo Base.

For the first time in a while, the whole family (minus Ezra) is back on the Ghost together.

(Kanan, Hera, Chopper, Sabine, Zeb, Kallus, Rex, and Jacen.)

(They’ve all been in touch and met up fairly frequently, but they’re no longer a discrete cell and they all have their own, often separate, duties with the wider Rebellion. So, while the circumstances leading to it are awful, it’s nice to have an opportunity like this.)

Orders are to lay low, and make their way by a prearranged roundabout route to the fleet rendezvous five days later.

The first night, they mostly spend catching up and letting Sabine fleece them all at cards.

(Except Rex. Do Not Play Sabaac With Rex.)

(They had all forgotten that rule.)

Hera is sending occasional messages back and forth to Command, to confirm/make adjustments/etc., but otherwise things are fairly quiet after the frantic rush of the evacuation itself.

(Fortunately, none of them were injured in the escape. It’s happened before, when they’ve had to leave a base in a hurry. That was a week no one wanted to repeat.)

It’s their second night of drifting, and Kallus is just starting to fall asleep (Zeb is snoring beside him; the noise honestly probably should have been annoying but is genuinely comforting at this point, to the point where he has trouble sleeping without it) when his comm beeps.

It’s Vector.

More accurately, it’s her emergency signal.

He extracts himself from the bed and slips out into the hall to talk the call.

“Fulcrum.”

“It’s Vector,” she says, unnecessarily. She’s not using her usual scrambler this time, but a more standard vocoder, probably cannibalized from a stolen helmet. She sounds drained, and slightly breathless. “I’ve been burned. I got...I got away. I had more..." She stops, clears her throat. “I got away. I was able to remove my tracker and I’m as--I’m as sure as I reasonably can be that I’ve lost anyone following me by other means. I-I pulled as much raw data as I could onto a couple of portable drives on my way out, but I’m on a...I’m on a sliced public terminal right now, I don’t want to keep the line open long enough to send them in the usual way and I...I don’t know what the protocol is now. Please advise.”

“Where are you now?” he asks. There are so many other questions he wants to ask, needs to ask, both from a personal and a professional standpoint--is she all right; how did she get caught; how did she escape; how long has she been compromised--but they can wait until she’s been located and brought in safely. He sets them all aside, and focuses.

(Like A Goddamn Professional.)

“Ixaly,” she says. “I’m on...I’m on Ixaly.”

He closes his eyes, mentally traces their route through hyperspace. Ixaly is in this sector, it shouldn’t be far...yes. If he’s counted right--they’ll be doing a navigation stop shortly, and dropping out of hyperspace. From there--a few hours to Ixaly, unless he’s completely turned around.

“There’s a cantina,” he says, “in the Diira district in Central City. The White Shale. Can you be there in six hours?”

A brief pause; he can hear her breathing. “Yes,” she says, at last. “Yes, I’ll be there.”

“That’s the fastest I can arrange a pickup,” he says. “I’m sorry.”

(If he’s right about how close they are, it might not actually take him that long, but there’s a balance between getting to her as quickly as possible and budgeting in time for something to go wrong. He doesn’t want to risk being late and having her move on because she thinks he’s not coming. He may not be able to contact her if something goes wrong; not if she’s relying on sliced public terminals to reach out to him. And he has no idea when she’ll be able to make contact again, or how long whatever data’s on her drives will stay viable...so, six hours. He’ll have to trust her to stay alive that long.)

“I’ll be there,” she promises. “White Shale cantina, Diira district, Central City, six hours.”

“Exactly. You know how to reach me if there are any problems.”

“Yes,” she says.

“It’s almost over,” he says. “You’ve done well, getting yourself this far. Just hold on for a little while longer, all right?”

“I will,” she says; takes a breath. “I’ll see you in six hours. Vector out.”

The line goes dead.

Half a heartbeat later, he feels the familiar rumble of the hyperdrive cutting out, switching over to sublight engines.

He’s in his window now, he doesn’t have time--

As he heads for the Phantom, he runs into Kanan.

“...what’s wrong?”

“Vector,” he says, clipped. “She’s had to run. She’s not far--”

“Go,” he says. “I’ll let Hera know. ...take Zeb with you. In case you need backup.”

(Which he doesn’t really need, and it might well spook his contact if he brings a team--he has run extractions like this before, after all, and Vector is particularly cagey--but he nods.)

“I will. Thank you.”

“How long do we wait before sending our own rescue party?” Kanan asks.

Kallus does some quick mental math--six hours to the meet; going by Vector’s history, she may need some convincing to come along (like I did, until it was too late; but it’s already too late for her, isn’t it?); she might be wrong about having a tail; they might run into unrelated trouble...

“I’ll send word once we leave the system. If you haven’t heard from me in twelve hours, that’s when you worry.”

“Got it,” he says, and starts off towards the cockpit to update Hera, when Kallus realizes--

“Wait,” he says.

Kanan pauses, half-turns back to him.

“I don’t know who Vector is, not for certain,” he says, “but I have considerable circumstantial evidence that she’s Princess Lavinia.”

Kanan takes that in, then nods slowly. “Right. Thanks for the head’s up. I’ll pass that along.”

“Thank you,” Kallus says again, and the two of them separate--Kallus goes to wake Zeb and then get the Phantom prepped and underway; Kanan goes to tell Hera what’s going on.

(...and corral his son.)

(Jacen has developed this habit lately of hiding on the Phantom when he thinks it’s going somewhere Interesting.)

(Which is usually whenever someone other than Mamma is driving.)

(He likes going on Adventures with his various uncles and Auntie ‘Bine, okay.)

(They go on the best Adventures.)

(But retrieving one of Kallus’s deep-cover agents whose cover was blown like a week ago at most is maaaaaaybe not the best Adventure for a three-year-old.)

Fortunately, Zeb isn’t hard to wake and grasps the situation quickly. The two of them head for the Phantom--

And find Sabine sitting there waiting for them, spinning idly in the pilot’s chair.

“...Sabine--” Zeb starts.

“Whatever it is that’s got you two running around frantically when we’re supposed to be lying low,” she says, “I wanna help. You might need backup.”

On the one hand, Kallus is pretty sure they won’t. And his prior concerns about spooking Vector if he comes in with a team still apply.

On the other hand, Sabine is one of the best people to have beside them in a crisis, if things do go all to hell. She’s creative and generally carrying an array of weapons that defies the very laws of physics.

Besides, he doesn’t have time to argue with her.

“Fine,” he says. “But you follow my lead--both of you. Neither of you has been on an extraction like this before, and this is what I do. All right?”

“All right,” Sabine says. “Who is it we’re extracting, exactly?”

“A spy, working under the code name Vector,” he says. “She’s been feeding us intel for close to three years now. Her cover was compromised, and she had to run.”

Sabine nods. “Got it,” she says.

“And, if I’m right,” he says--because if he is, Sabine will have to know before they get there, “she’s the Emperor’s daughter.”

“...all right, then,” Sabine manages, after a moment of stunned silence. “Let’s get this show on the road.”

They detach, and the Ghost disappears behind them back into hyperspace as Kallus sets a course for Ixaly.

And now, since I’m sure y’all are wondering the same thing Kallus is--i.e., how did she get caught/how did she escape--let’s backtrack and leave Kallus’s POV for another brief digression--

It all comes down to a man named Vedric Greer.

Vedric Greer is a Royal Guard. He’s been in that elite unit for over fifteen years at this point, selected more or less straight out of the Academy.

He’s been the head of Lavinia’s detail since she was twelve.

(Before that, he had a variety of assignments; he never got stuck with Vader, for which he is profoundly grateful, but he guarded a few valuable objects/locations, and he was on Tarkin’s detail for a couple of years.)

See, here’s the thing about Royal Guards. They’re put through a lot of conditioning, both physically and mentally, to become living weapons who are absolutely loyal.

And he is. Vedric Greer is an absolutely loyal man.

The thing is, to be a Royal Guard assigned to any living being other than Palpatine himself--Vader, Tarkin, Mas Amedda, Lavinia, a few others--means to be equal parts bodyguard and prison guard. Such a Guard is at least partly there to protect his principal from external threats, of course, but if said principal steps out of line or he’s given certain orders, he becomes their jailer. Or executioner. Or worse.

When he’s assigned to someone like Tarkin, of course, that isn’t much of a problem.

But a lonely, precocious twelve-year-old kid like Lavinia? Who, whatever traits she may have inherited from her father, has them tempered by an actual conscience?

...yeah, it doesn’t take a whole lot for him to bond with her, just a little.

(Throw in the fact that he has a lover, an Imperial Archivist who survived Scarif by being transferred to Coruscant days before Tarkin blew it up...well. Maybe the cracks in his armor aren’t only to do with the little girl he’s been made responsible for.)

So. Vedric Greer is a Royal Guard, and that means he is a living weapon, and absolutely loyal.

But over the past seven years--and especially the last three--maybe, just maybe, that loyalty has started to shift.

(He doesn’t even realize it, at first; and when he does notice the traces of affection, of tangential loyalty in himself...well, he reasons that Lavinia is all but an extension of her father’s will, anyway. Right? And if he conveniently fails to see certain signs...)

(Reynard, his lover, knows way before Vedric does where this is going, of course.)

And then, one morning, his orders change, and all those little things come crashing down.

(It was such a simple thing that screwed her over; Palpatine seeds bait among his minions constantly, little nuggets of information so that, if there is a high-placed leak, he can track it back to its source right away. Standard counter-intelligence, really; and everyone, everyone, is under suspicion. Everyone is tested.)

(Lavinia is normally very good at spotting this sort of thing--she has a natural aptitude for espionage, she was trained by the best, and she puts just as much effort into surviving her father and completing her mission as he did into taking over the galaxy. How else would she have lasted nineteen years as her father’s daughter--let alone three as a deep-cover Rebel spy?)

(But this time--this time she missed it. And now he knows.)

And Vedric Greer has a choice to make.

It’s surprising, in the end, how simple it is.

“My lady,” he informs her, “you are undone.”

He helps her cut out the tracking device implanted inside her ribcage (which is also fitted with a killswitch, of course, in case she ever tried to slip her leash); she asks him to come with her; he refuses.

(He is not a Rebel. He is not disloyal.)

(What he is, is her protector. What he is, is--hers.)

“I’m so sorry,” she says.

“So am I,” he says, and, “Go. I’ll buy you as much time as I can.”

“Goodbye,” she says, and disappears.

He sends a brief message to Reynard--hoping he’ll know what it means (he will; he always knew this might happen), and prepares himself to meet his death.

(Or, at least, that’s what he believes is going to happen.)

(...look, as I said before, this is Self-Indulgent BS(tm). Like I’m really gonna let Greer die. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I have no earthly idea how he survives but he does. Because this is my self-indulgent BS, dammit.)

Okay. Back to Ixaly, and the actual rescue/extraction mission.

(…by which I also mean forward, since it’s like a week later.)

Our Heroes reach Central City about an hour ahead of schedule. After a brief discussion, Sabine disappears into the district to be on-hand for immediate help, if needed; Zeb, who doesn’t blend in as well, will stay with the Phantom; Kallus of course goes to the cantina to find his contact.

He heads there more or less directly, taking in as much detail of the city and the specific neighborhood as he can.

He’s been here before, but it’s been several years; there is a garrison in place, but the occupation seems comparatively light.

Which means there’s a not-unreasonable chance that this will go smoothly.

(Of course, as soon as he thinks that, he starts coming up with all the potential problems that could still happen. For one thing, he or Vector or Sabine might be recognized…)

Security on the cantina itself; mostly local talent, just as it was on his last visit. This is a fairly middle-of-the-road place; just dishonest enough that he and Vector should blend, not so dishonest that they’re likely to get caught in the middle of any…unpleasantness. Part of why he picked this place. That, the fact that it isn’t particularly difficult to find, and is fairly close to his ideal landing site.

(Not the official port, naturally; while Kallus doesn’t doubt that they could bluff their way through, he’d rather not try it on such short notice. They’d landed the Phantom on the city outskirts, about fifteen minutes away by foot.)

In other words, things are about as well-situated as they could be, under the circumstances. He has three separate exit routes at least tentatively mapped out, of varying efficiency and difficulty.

(And, if it came down to it, Sabine or Zeb could create one for him, of course, but he’d prefer to avoid that if at all possible.)

(In any case, best to have backup plans; he’ll pick the best route of the three once he has a better idea of what Vector’s capable of at the moment.)

(He’s almost certain she’s hurt, and he doesn’t know how badly, and she’ll never actually tell him, so that’s the best he can do.)

Inside, the cantina is fairly crowded--which is a mixed blessing; on the one hand, more cover for their activities/conversation, but on the other, more people to see them.

It’s a varied crowd; mostly local shift workers, a few semi-legitimate traders and mid-level bounty hunters. Most importantly, though, there are no troopers that he can identify, even off-duty. Excellent.

He gets a drink (to blend in, primarily) and finds a table in the corner where he can keep an eye on the other patrons and watch the door without being obvious about it.

He’s not kept waiting long.

She blends in pretty well--she’s managed to dress herself in a slightly-outdated local fashion, one that helpfully comes with a cowl that doesn’t quite hide her face, but does enough to keep her mostly anonymous from a distance and make dodging any security cameras easier.

(A few other women in the cantina are dressed similarly; not many, but enough that she doesn’t really stand out.)

She doesn’t head straight for him. She weaves through the crowd for a minute, hesitates by the bar as if she’s considering something, orders a drink. Her attention drifts over the crowd; she doesn’t linger on him, but her hand twitches a little.

(Ah. She spotted him, then. Good.)

(He isn’t really surprised that she figured out which Fulcrum she was working with. And it does make things simpler--there are a few signals he could have tried, but there wasn’t time, when she called, to pick one of them and be sure.)

(An advantage, if a counter-intuitive one, to using the legacy code name with her, he supposes.)

She starts moving again; doing everything right--wandering as if she’s looking for a seat, gradually making her way to a small empty table next to his.

(The whole thing takes probably less than two minutes. It feels longer. Then again, it always does--this isn’t the first time he’s met a contact like this, and that never changes. Doesn’t matter whether he’s the first or second to arrive.)

He taps out a quick signal on his commlink--contact made, everything’s on track so far--and waits.

“I have a data file for you,” she says softly. “Several, in fact.”

He smiles faintly into his drink. “Well done.”

The way the tables are laid out, they’re sitting next to one another, both with their backs against the wall. It’s a simple matter for her to slide the two drives over to him, and just as easy for him to make them disappear.

(Leaving together discreetly will be a little harder, but he’s been doing this for quite a while. They’ll manage.)

“I have transport off-planet,” he tells her. “We should wait a few minutes, not get up right away, but it’s best if we leave sooner rather than later.”

She shakes her head. “I'm not coming with you.”

(He wishes he could say he was surprised.)

He doesn’t turn to look at her, as much as he wants to. “If you’re concerned about reprisals…”

“I’m not,” she says. “Not really. It’s just…not a good idea.”

...and in the interests of “good Lord this thing is probably pushing 10k and it’s not even the full fic it’s an outline,” I’m going to skip the rest of this conversation. Suffice to say, he’s right and she’s wrong, though she takes some convincing, but they leave the cantina together like fifteen minutes later. Also, he confirms that his theory as to her identity was correct somewhere in here.

Anyway, like I said, he talks her down, and she agrees to leave with him.

Once out of the cantina, he can get a better look at her, assess how badly she’s hurt.

(He knows she is for certain now; she’s breathing carefully, shallowly, and a little too fast--but he could only see her hands and the vague shadow of her cowl before.)

“Are you all right?” he asks; even though the answer is obvious; she’s favoring her left side and very pale.

“It’s nothing I can’t handle,” she says.

A characteristic non-answer, but a step above denial. He supposes.

“All right,” he says. “Let me know if you need help.”

(There’s not much else he can do here and now, anyway; they have some supplies back on the Ghost, and she can get proper medical attention once they rendezvous with the fleet.)

“I will,” she says, which is something at least.

They make it two blocks before they run into a squad of stormtroopers.

It’s a routine patrol; and, even with a wounded asset  to escort, it wouldn’t have been a problem under most circumstances. He could avoid the confrontation, or talk his way past.

But the squad sergeant stiffens in a particular way, staring at him.

“Karabast,” he mutters.

(You’d think, after all these years, this would stop happening so often. But, no, it’s still even odds that, out in the field, someone will recognize him.)

Lavinia takes half a step back. “I can--”

“They’re not here for you,” he tells her, then drags her behind cover a split second before the troopers start firing.

Then takes a minute to take stock.

This is...not an ideal position for a standoff. And while they might be able to fight their way through...

Best plan is to stay put, hold them off as long as they can, and call in Zeb and Sabine for backup.

Good thing I listened to Kanan, he thinks.

He takes out his sidearm, then pulls his holdout pistol from his boot and offers it to Lavinia.

But she shakes her head. “Father kept my focus narrow. I’d do more harm than good.”

“...right.”

Even less ideal. But it’s all right. He can handle this.

He takes his comm, switches it to the voice setting.

“Specter Four, this is Fulcrum. We’re going to need a slightly more dramatic exit than I planned for.”

“Copy that, Fulcrum,” Zeb says. “Could use an opening, Specter Five.”

“And to think you boys wanted to leave me behind,” Sabine says.

“Yes, yes, can we save the ‘I-told-you-sos’ until after we’re clear?” Kallus says, firing off a handful of shots to keep the squad at bay.

“She does have a point, babe.”

“Not on open comms, dear, how many times...”

(Honestly, the little bit of flirting is at this point half an inside joke, after the one time they legitimately forgot to switch channels, and half a way to quickly gauge how serious the situation actually is.)

(Plus, it’s fun. They like flirting.)

“Thirty seconds,” Sabine cuts in.

“Right,” Zeb says. “I’m headed to your position. ETA two minutes.”

“Copy. Fulcrum out.”

Two minutes, under these conditions, is a long, long time.

But, right on cue, thirty seconds later, there is a magnificent explosion, which gives them some breathing room, and then Sabine slides down the wall to land next to him.

“Not my best work,” she says critically, watching the cloud on the horizon, “but it’ll clear a path. Hi,” she adds, for Lavinia’s benefit.

“Hi,” she says, softly.

“...she doesn’t have a blaster,” Sabine says, turning almost accusingly to Kallus.

“Because I’ve never had one before,” Lavinia answers for him. “And this really doesn’t seem the time or place to learn.”

“Well, we’ll fix that later,” Sabine says.

“All right,” Lavinia says, then ducks down as Sabine positions herself better to start shooting back.

The next ninety seconds go much quicker, and then comes the welcome sound of the Phantom’s engines on approach.

It’ll have to be a quick exit, and for a split second, Kallus wonders about getting Lavinia up the ramp fast enough without Zeb actually landing--

But then he sees that Sabine has her jetpack.

(He has never been so pleased to see it in his life.)

“Take her,” he says, once the shuttle is in sight. “I’ll cover you.”

Sabine catches his drift right away, and nods. “Hold on,” she tells Lavinia, who blinks, but does.

And then they’re off.

Kallus just keeps firing at the troopers until, based on the noise it’s making, he judges that the Phantom is close enough that he can make the jump.

He’s--almost right.

He comes within half an inch of missing, then Lavinia’s hands shoot out and grab one of his wrists; Sabine grabs the other and the girls haul him on board.

“We’re good, Zeb, go!” Sabine shouts, while Lavinia drags Kallus the rest of the way in and slams the hatch shut.

We did it.

He takes a minute to catch his breath--he knows it isn’t really over; there’s still a great deal of work to do once they get back to the Ghost and then to the fleet proper.

But for now--they’re all alive, they’re all safe, they’re all at least as intact as they were when they got to Ixaly; the extraction was successful.

Kallus decides to let the rest of the problems wait, and take the win.

He picks himself up and heads to the cockpit, to give Zeb a quick hug and send word to Kanan and the others.

For all the drama and the worry when it started, today turned out to be a very good day.

And I think that’s a good stopping point, don’t you? There is definitely more, featuring (in no particular order) the worlds most #Awkward Road Trip; Kanan and Lavinia meeting; Kanan and Luke finally meeting; Zeb and Kallus adopting a kid or three; Lando; Jacen being precious; and so much more.

But, uh, see all my notes above about “how long is this thing now?!”

(And, again this isn’t even fulltext.)

(This is just the outline.)

...so, uh, yeah, if you made it this far, thank you and I hope you enjoyed my Self-Indulgent BS(tm). <333333333

[theguardianangel-fanfiction]

Once Bitten, Twice Dead

Summary: It’s been two years since the beginning, and only five days since Clementine met them. But somehow, things got so much worse, and Carver was just the beginning. [Season 2 AU/canon divergent. New situations, characters, etc.] Chapter 6: On the Path. Author’s Note: I will be posting 1 chapter a day on Tumblr. Each chapter is already posted on AO3 and Fanfiction. I will resume posting on those 2 websites on October 1st, 2017. [Main Blog] [AO3] [FanFiction.Net]

The trek away from the campsite felt like years, rather than seconds. Everything seemed to move in slow motion and unsteadily, as though it was ready to break down. But this was nothing compared to what Clementine could feel in her arm.

The pain from Sam’s bite seemed to reach every inch of her flesh, stabbing at her skin over and over. The pain in her chest seemed to join it, while she struggled immensely to bite back the scream she wanted to let out.

Her trembling hand was doing all it could to block the wound out. Clementine pulled her left sleeve back up and put the small amount of pressure she could manage on it; her right hand shook too hard to grip a hold of it. The warm blood that soaked the fabric had turned as cold as ice, only adding to her discomfort and pain.

The surrounding area didn’t look familiar. It was woods, Clementine knew that, but none of them looked like that tree with the red leaves or that stump with the splintery wood. Maybe, she thought, the problem was that it looked too familiar – maybe it looked too much like what she’d seen that she couldn’t tell anything apart. A steady pulsing was beginning to start up in her head; it only served to worsen her already fuzzy thoughts.

The hand that Clementine had clamped to her bite was beginning to go numb. It felt cold, stuck with pins and needles, but she couldn’t move it with ease. Her step faltered; her left leg was beginning to experience a similar, yet faint feeling from the knee down. Shoulder’s sagging, Clementine took in a shallow breath. If there was anything she wanted to do right now, it was sleep. She just wanted to sleep; to rest with no worries about anything.

After all, what was she meant to do in this situation? With this bite? Sure, it wasn’t a walker bite – but it was a bite. Blood still flowed gently from her arm with nothing to catch it but a thin sleeve, and it would keep flowing until… Clementine didn’t want to think about that. She didn’t. But part of her did; it continued to ask, what do we do? You’re bleeding out. You’re hurt.

The pins-and-needles feeling began to increase with each passing second. Another step faltered as the numbness in her leg and foot danced its way up and then down again – and then up again. With a slow, dazed glance down, Clementine was able to see that the path was full of roots, rocks, and patches of plants, though she was still unable to feel more than a small amount of pressure from her leg.

Dull pain made its way up her shoulders. It felt as though someone was pushing down on every little pressure point in an attempt to slow her down. Drowsiness was quickly hijacking her body, there was no doubt about that. She knew there was no way to stop it.

Clementine collapsed only a few seconds later, finally removing her hand from the bite as a sharp, itchy pain crawled through it. Her hands and knees hit the dirt in earnest, barely able to hold her. She sat down, pushing herself against the boulder that lay only a few inches away, and pulled her knees to her chest.

By then, she couldn’t stop, and she didn’t care what she was doing. Steady tears of pain and fear flowed down her cheeks as she automatically tried to hold back hiccups and whimpers. The pain in her arm was building up; Clementine wanted to scream. Her vision went blurry every few seconds. The background noise of the wind blowing, joined by chirping or screeching birds or other animals flickered on and off. It sounded muffled and garbled, like a radio and its static.

Clementine took a deep breath, and then another in an attempt to get her tears under control. She was shaking, unable to keep still, and barely able to breathe, but she knew this wasn’t going to help. It wasn’t going to do anything but attract walkers. Her foggy mind knew that was what she had to do – she needed to be quiet; she needed to calm down, but something inside her wouldn’t allow it.

A sense of dread filled her entire being when she heard the tell-tale signs of a threat: growling.

Her blurred vision searched around slowly and missed it at first. She caught the movement, perhaps fifty or sixty feet away, and then she made it out. It was hunched over slightly as it shambled, peering around wildly – but it was too loud to be so far, wasn’t it – ?

She spotted the other one nearly fifteen or twenty feet away, and it had easily spotted her before she’d seen it.

Her body protested every movement as she stood up, still alert enough to realize what was going on. She knew these walkers wouldn’t go easy on her – or anyone else, for that matter – just because she was wounded. Her mind suddenly filled with one thought, and one thought only: Run.

Clementine’s hand clamped onto her upper left arm as she lethargically began to limp away from the second walker. Even without looking back, she knew that there were more joining in; she could hear each individual rasp and gurgle from separate walkers that varying distances away from her.

She could only stumble, body aching too much to run or even speed-walk away. The closest growl continued to get louder, until she let out a cry of pain as a heavy object collided with her back, forcing her down on the ground. She turned on her back in panic, pushing as hard as she could against the walker, which was doing its absolute best to sink its razor sharp teeth into the flesh that was her neck.

Something connected with the base of the walker’s neck, slicing clean through it. The walker’s head fell, forehead hitting Clementine’s shoulder, before bouncing onto the ground. Breath caught in her throat, the body was pulled off of her in one motion.

She looked up to see a man – a human, real, alive – no older than thirty, in a dirty, orange shirt, with a machete in his left hand and a walker creeping up behind him. A crossbow arrow suddenly hit the walker’s head with a thunk; brown blood and fluids exploded from its head as it fell. Clementine turned as quickly as she could to see another man, this one much older, with a crossbow held to his face.

The man with the crossbow turned to his side, towards a third walker, and shot again without a beat. The third walker fell and a fourth took its place as the man with the machete instead kneeled down to Clementine – who still sat, rigid on the ground.

“I’m out!” shouted the man with the crossbow in a gruff, southern accent. “Grab her, and let’s go!”

The other man deposited his machete into its holder, which was strung across his back. “Come on, kid!” he told her in a similar accent. Clementine let out a groan of pain as he suddenly scooped her up off of the ground. By this point, she felt too dizzy and sick to protest. “We gotta get!”

Clementine closed her eyes, exhausted, leaning against the man’s chest. The two men left the area, with only a machete and an empty crossbow as their weapons, and took off as fast as they could. Clementine felt the younger man’s grip on her tighten as they sped off.

After only a minute or so, Clementine opened her eyes slightly; she could tell they’d come to a stop. The younger man who held her was panting heavily, while the older man didn’t seem to be fairing much better. He slung his crossbow across his back with a strap.

“I think,” the older man began, leaning over. He rested his hands on his knees. “… I think we’re safe.” He stood up to his full height, eyebrows scrunched and eyes widened slightly in Clementine’s direction. The younger man nodded, though both of them scanned the area with worried expressions.

“Yeah…” the younger man said, though his voice shook slightly. “We’re good.”

Clementine’s heart gave a jolt when she heard the younger man speak – much too loudly. Her head was already pained enough, and this wasn’t helping. Her heart rate hadn’t settled down much, either, and this was serving to make it worse.

“Hey, you alright?” he asked at the same volume.

She looked up at him, not meeting his gaze. He was definitely young, maybe a few years shy of thirty years old, with untidy brown hair and a stubble. Unable to think of anything else to say, Clementine muttered, “I can walk.”

The man gave a small chuckle. “Oh, is that so?” he asked in a playful tone. His face darkened slightly. “Because you could bar’ly climb away from that lurker back there… look, you’re in bad shape, kid.”

Both men resumed walking, but Clementine wanted nothing more than to be put down. She could walk… she could, she just needed to rest for a few minutes…

The older man shook his head at the younger, trailing behind him slightly. He tugged on his army-green jacket for a moment, and then looked over to Clementine with the same, half-worried/half-curious expression he’d had on before.

Clementine looked up at him through half lidded eyes, studying him cautiously for a moment. He was definitely older than the other – much older, she could tell – with fair skin, a light gray buzz cut, and a dark beard. She wondered briefly if the two men were related, or simply surviving together.

“What’re you doin’ out here?” he questioned, turning to her. He sounded genuinely concerned, a nice change from other people Clementine had met.

The younger man eyed him. “Where are the… uh, the people you’re with? There is no chance you made it this far on your own.” Clementine clenched her teeth in frustration; nearly everyone she’d ever met seemed to think that she couldn’t protect herself… though with what these two men had just seen, she wasn’t sure if she could blame them.

“I don’t want them thinkin’ we’re doin’ anythin’ but tryin’ to help you.” said the older man, cocking his head slightly.

Clementine gulped. She did her best to form a coherent sentence, despite the fact that her mouth felt like lead, and said quietly, “… My friend and I got attacked.” The memory of the scavenger sent shivers up her spine. A pang of anxiety hit her square in the chest as she thought of Christa, yet again.

The older man nodded. “Hmm… Did these folks mention what they were after?”

“I think they wanted our food.” Clementine responded, not meeting his eyes. “We were cooking this thing we found… I think it was a weasel.”

“They attacked y’all for a weasel? Damn,” The younger man shook his head. “That’s low.” Suddenly, he looked over to the older man and asked, “They didn’t mention any names… right? They weren’t searchin’ for anybody?”

Clementine shrugged. In the back of her mind, the question of why they wanted to know this popped up, but she was too tired to care. The older man simply let out another, “Hmm.”

They walked in silence for only a moment before the younger man broke it, saying, “Well, I’m Luke. And this is Pete.” He nodded to the other man.

“Hey there,” said Pete with a small smile.

“Hi.” Clementine said simply. “… My name’s Clementine.”

Luke let out a low chuckle when she said this, and looked over at Pete. “Clementine, like the fruit, or Clementine, like the song?” Clementine didn’t exactly find this as funny as he seemed to think she would. When he received no answer from the lethargic girl, he continued on. “Sorry – it’s nice to meet you, Clementine.”

Clementine gave him a small, tired smile, and he continued.

“For now, we’re gonna take you back to our group, okay?” said Luke in a gentler tone than before. “We’ve got a doctor, and you look like you could use some – OH, SHIT!”

Clementine let out a yelp of pain as she hit the ground with an audible thump, her bitten arm caught beneath her side. Luke’s eyes were wide as dinner plates, hands gripping his brown fringe, backing up away from her.

Pete gawked at him, and shouted, “What? What is it?”

Slack jawed with a horrified expression on his face, Luke shouted back, “She’s-she’s been bit, man! Fuck! Fuck, fuck, fuck! What do we do here?”

[fusrodie]

1~ 5 sal, 20~28 Kieran, 34 ~37 Evan.

So this one is… Very, very old. I’m sorry it took me so long to answer!

Get to know my character

for Sal:

01. What does your character’s name mean? Did you pick it for the symbolism, or did you just like the way it sounded?

Bruno means “brown”, Salvador means “savior”. I don’t exactly like the way it sounds, but I wanted a character whose nickname was Sal, then came the idea of making him Brazilian. I was between either Pablo or Bruno at this point, and Bruno sounds far more like a tupiniquim name. Not to mention, someone I admire greatly is called Bruno, too. Bonus that his name means “brown savior”. I mean look at him. *finger guns*

02. What is one of your character’s biggest insecurities? Are they able to hide it easily or can others easily exploit this weakness?

His appearance, though it’s actually both his biggest insecurity and his shield. While he doesn’t exactly stand out in the wasteland, pre-war Bruno was pretty far from the norm. Tattoos, jewelry, weird haircut, black clothes. He didn’t follow that style to stand out, not exactly, but it ended up becoming his weapon to fight against people’s mean comments and his ever present fear of not fitting in. 

03. What would be their favorite physical trait about themselves?

His hair! He absolutely loves his hair, and this goes for both Companion!Sal and Sole Survivor!Sal. It’s a warm black, wavy, and it looks absolutely amazing because he takes such good care of it.

04. What are their favorite traits about their lover? (one psychological and one physical)

Sal doesn’t have a lover in his canon playthrough, but I can talk about Debra, his wife. Physically, he loved her eyes and always said they were very expressive. But he also loved her confidence and determination, and her will to help others, all things he’s never really possessed.

As for AU pairings, there is @trashofthewasteland Michelle - and to be quite honest, he loves everything about her. But physically, I think it’d be how petite she is. It was never something he noticed on women before, particularly because he tends to prefer women who are taller and stronger than him and look like they could kick his ass. It’s strange - the good kind - that despite her being so different from what he’d always admired, he thinks his tiny boss is sublime. He also loves her hands. Don’t ask me why, he just does. Personality wise, he loves that she is genuinely a good person. She seems to have all the kindness in the world inside her heart and he couldn’t do that if he tried.

Bonus Leilani: he finds Lani an absolutely fascinating person to begin with. He feels like he’s finally found someone who understands what he means when he says he thinks in colors. And that’s comforting even though he never thought he’d want to be understood on that regard. He also loves her calm demeanor. Physically? Her eyes. He could stare all night if she’d let him. And her hair.   

05. Are they sexually confident or more of the shy type?

A bit of both? He doesn’t have the highest sex drive, so actively looking for sex isn’t happening often unless he’s in a steady relationship. He’s not the sort to look for one night stands. In the rare occasion that he does, he’s not ashamed of it, much less after the initial, possibly awkward stage has passed and it’s time to get down to business. He might get shy at first if it’s someone he really likes/admires, because he doesn’t want to screw things up. He wants things to be special, so he’ll be extra careful.

for Kieran:

20. Does your character like animals? What are some of their favorite animals? Would they want pets? What about mythological creatures?

Yes. Let me repeat that: yes. Kieran will tell you he was practically raised by a goat, and it’s true. Don’t ask me how goats survived in post-apocalyptic United States, but I’m calling it now, they survived, and Kieran’s family had a pet one. Her name was Myrtle. But farm animals were the only animals he had around growing up, dogs and cats not being very common in his village. Regardless, he loves all animals, though maybe not deathclaws or things that are bigger than him and have scales.

Radstags are his favorite, and he won’t kill a radstag if he has a choice. They are too adorable for that. He wants to have a pet radstag one day, but for now, he has D’Artagnan, a Maine Coon Cat. Sometimes they hunt together, go hiking together, and D’Artagnan is a big part of the reason why he lives so secluded - he wouldn’t forgive himself if anything happened to that cat. So he’d rather live far from people and somewhere D’Artagnan could hide if faced with danger and Kieran isn’t nearby.21. What is one of your character’s biggest fears? How would they react when dealing with this fear?

He’s afraid of tight/closed spaces, and ferals. That’s about it. Ferals he deals with easily enough - an arrow or a bullet, problem solved. Traps places and does his best to avoid them. The one time he got caught, he went into panic mode and doesn’t remember anything that happened after the first shot. Just remembers being back home, tending his wounds, with a lot of blood on his hands.

Regarding interiors/his claustrophobia, he just doesn’t go anywhere that looks cramped and doesn’t have a lot of windows unless he has company. Doesn’t matter if he knows there are things he needs inside. He just won’t go in.

22. What kind of tattoos, piercings, birthmarks, freckles, and other such unique physical features do they have?

I haven’t exactly decided on this, but in Skyrim, Kieran has a tattoo he got during his rite of passage with the Skaal - half a sleeve on his left arm. If he has a similar one in Fallout, I don’t know yet. But if there are two things Kieran has aplenty, it’s freckles and scars. You’ll find freckles all over his body, but it’s nowhere near Brandon’s level, for example. They’re mostly on his face and shoulders. As for scars, he has three claw marks on his face from a yao guai attack, claw marks on his back from a feral attack, bullet scars near his shoulder, and also one right between his right thigh and buttock. He got shot in the ass once. He has a bite mark on his ribs (mole rat, he can’t remember how it happened), and a half-moon shaped scar that begins just under his ribs on the left side, and goes down towards his crotch, that he got when he was with the raider gang. He seduced someone he shouldn’t have and they got a little, tiny bit angry when it became clear he didn’t want sex. They ran out of blade before they could do more damage, and he considers himself fairly lucky for it.

23. What is your character like when it comes to school? What subjects are they good/bad at? Do they get in trouble a lot or are well behaved?

Kieran never went to school, and while he did have people to teach him things, for the most part he didn’t want to learn. He was taught how to read and write, but didn’t learn out of stubbornness and a lack of discipline from his parents. He’d be good with science, though. Maybe philosophy. Wouldn’t do his homework, but wouldn’t misbehave.

24. In their own words, how would your character describe what their lover is like?

Fair warning, you would have a hard time getting Kieran to stop talking about them.

He wouldn’t shut up about how determined @njadastonearm Toni is - and how strong willed, and clever, and brave, and beautiful. I don’t think he’d ever vocalize it without some serious preparation beforehand, but she inspires him to try and do something out of his life. Here’s a woman that left her past behind, found herself a goal and went after it. That’s something he never had the courage to do, because he never managed to move on and still dwells in the past. Toni might be scared her past will catch up with her, yes, but she’s never let it stop her. He did. Being with her helps him learn a lot on how to do what he wants to do, rather than what he feels like he should be doing.

As for @mininuked Ahn - he sees that woman as a fucking goddess. A goddess of war, because he thinks she’s so goddamn badass. They butt heads sometimes, they learn together how to talk about their feelings, but there’s something about her that makes him feel like it’ll be worth all the trouble. She makes him want to try and that’s something no one had ever managed before. He feels like she gets him - they have the same interests, hobbies, they even have some of the same problems. She doesn’t have the answers, but it’s comforting to have someone to share the journey with. He’s used to being the rock for everyone - the one safe, solid thing people can count on. But with Ahn, for once he feels like he has someone strong and solid to support him.

25. Is there something traumatic from your character’s past that greatly affects them even to this day?

Losing his sister. He never talks about it openly, and has never told anyone his side of the story. If pressed, he will actually give you his father’s, and consequently his village’s take on it: he sold out. His sister’s boyfriend found out about it. Kieran killed them both and dumped the bodies somewhere snowy and dark so they wouldn’t be found. Feral ghouls attacked him when he went back to check on the bodies for whatever reason.

The truth is quite a bit different: Saoirse’s boyfriend got in with a gang from Quebec - the same gang Kieran would ultimately join. His ticket in would be selling out the village, and the raiders promised they’d just rob them all blind but leave everyone alive. Kieran happened to witness a conversation in which said boyfriend revealed his plans - but after that, he has no idea what happened. He notices the two have disappeared one early morning and tracks them, only to find their bodies dumped in the aforementioned snowy, dark place, half buried and half eaten. He is then attacked by ferals who almost kill him. He reports back as quickly as he can, and is accused by his father of having killed his sister to take her place as the next village leader. Given he had some shady dealings with traders from nearby settlements, his reputation with his people wasn’t stellar at the time. Having someone as important as his father blaming him made it worse. He never tried to tell his version - he simply accepted his exile and left his family behind.

He still has nightmares with feral ghouls, and even though she was already dead when he got there, he swears he can hear Saoirse screaming sometimes. He feels like their deaths were his responsibility, and never forgave himself for it. This is why he lives in seclusion and, despite being a sociable, friendly man who loves talking to people, punishes himself by staying as far away as he can and never truly making friends.26. What is their lover like sexually? How do they feel about their lover’s quirks, needs, etc?

I’m going to give more of a generic answer here because Kieran is a curious creature. He doesn’t know himself well, sexually in particular. Practically speaking, this means he will always put his partner first, and rarely stops to consider what he actually likes. That “I’m so used to giving and now I finally get to receive” meme? Kieran, only until his love interests (Toni, Ahn) came along he’d never had anyone care about his pleasure. Not even himself. So whatever his lovers want, he will accommodate and do what it takes to please them. It’s important to note that he does it because he likes to, though. He’s not putting up with anything, he is just a genuinely accepting person who respects people and tries his best to make them happy.

27. If your character was going to get arrested, what would be the most likely reason for it?

I have a hard time imagining Kieran getting arrested. Brandon? Hell, even Evangeline, but not Kieran. The only way he’d get arrested is if a) someone truly manages to piss him off enough for him to beat them up, or b) if a friend he really likes does something stupid and he plays along. 

28. If your character became a celebrity, what would they be famous for?

Realistically, I’d say his looks. But if he had a say in it, he’d like to become famous for his cooking. Cooking show shot in a cabin in the middle of nowhere. Treats his guests like Gordon Ramsay treats children. A delight, really.

for Evan:

34. Does your character have favorite foods? (breakfast, lunch, dinner, dessert, snacks, etc)

Pre-war, Evangeline is addicted to baked sweets (cookies, cakes, pies) and noodles. Post-war, she refuses to eat anything pre-war for fear of getting seriously sick, but will cave if offered Sugar Bombs. She is also a big fan of mutfruit. Preston introduces her to mirelurk meat - and she loves it. She hates mirelurks, got seriously injured by one at some point; so eating the flesh of her enemies gives her a strange sense of accomplishment. Veni, vidi, vici, motherfucker.

35. Is your character afraid of death? If they got to choose how to die, how would they want to go?

She is and then she is not. She hates the idea of her death being meaningless, something stupid or unimportant. Because she gives it her all to try and make a difference, so if her death just slipped under everybody’s radar, that means she hasn’t done enough. There will come a time, though, when she will be satisfied with the work she’s done in the Commonwealth. Then it will stop having such a meaning - and her fearing death will be because she doesn’t want to let go of the life she’s managed to build for herself.36. Does your character have any medical conditions? Are they serious or minor? Do they affect their day to day life?

Not exactly. Sometimes her left hand hurts a lot, because she once managed to stick a needle inside it while sewing. Other than that, she managed to stay perfectly healthy even after leaving the vault. Somehow. 

37. What are some of your character’s pet peeves? What are some things that annoy them or disgust them?

She… Really likes to color code things. It annoys her a lot to see things being organized with no obvious pattern to it.