#being disbelieveing and disgruntled suits him

[thetarttfuldickhead]

I think it's worth noting that this outraged disbelief

isn't just Jamie's reaction to Zava's arrival in general but his direct reaction to Roy and Zava sharing a respectful nod.

Like, this guy gets a nod from Roy Kent? This guy does?

Um, I've been Roy's nemesis forever and ever and I'm the prick and the star on this team and I've cried on his shoulder while he held me so so tight and I was there to (try to) pick up the pieces when this idiot dumped his amazing and gorgerous and fantastic girlfriend and I was all he could think of when he was first getting together with her and I've had his poster on my wall since I was a kid and he's called me a pretty boy and an ugly boy and he thinks my right foot was kissed by god but this guy gets a nod?

i mean, Jamie would never have never have been Zava's number one fan (Dani was right there, after all) but after this? It's on sight, bruv.

[accioprozac]

Jealous : Fred Weasley x Reader

Summary: You’d known the Weasley twins since 1st year and had been pining after Fred nearly as long. You knew it wasn’t requited, Fred treated you like he treated Ginny, like a little sister. Your crush on him was painfully obvious, almost everyone knew except Fred. Still, you were holding out hope. Then Fred asked Angelina to the Yule Ball and you felt your heart spilt in two. But despite Fred’s apparent disinterest in you romantically, he still attempts to sabatoge all your dates and you’re getting sick of it.

Warnings: Swearing

Author’s note: Please interact! Also, I wrote this on my phone so sorry if the spelling and format is a bit wonky.

“The Yule Ball is coming up,” you mention, trying to keep your voice light, “Are you going to ask anyone?”

George gives you a knowing look and you glare at him. He knew about your not-so-secret crush on Fred. Hell, almost everyone did, except Fred. You weren’t exactly good at hiding your feelings.

“I have someone in mind,” he grins slyly.

“Really? Who?” You ask, a bit too excitedly, and he gives you an amused look. “Come on Fred, tell me!” You wheedle but he puts a finger to his lips, zipping them shut.

“I’ll give you a hint,” he starts, “She’s in Gryffindor.”

Well obviously,” George snorts. Fred gives him a look that says what’s that supposed to mean? “You barely talk to any Hufflepuffs, Ravenclaws are too smart to put up with your shit and Slytherins? I’m pretty sure that whole house hates you after the prank we pulled last year.”

Fred’s eyes light up at the mention of the prank and he enthusiastically starts to recount Snape’s reaction to his House’s robes being turned red and gold.

⋆﹥━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━﹤⋆

“He didn’t say much, but do you think he could be talking about me?” you ask Hermione anxiously as you both get ready for bed.

“Well it would make sense. You are the girl he spends the most time with.”

“I hope he asks me,” you say wistfully, “Night Hermione.”

“Goodnight Y/N.”

⋆﹥━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━﹤⋆

The next morning, Hermione’s forehead is wrinkled in thought when you sit down for breakfast, “Y/N,” she starts, “I heard from Lavender Brown who heard from Katie Bell that Fred asked Angelina to the Yule Ball.” Her lips are pursed as she anxiously studies your face for some type of reaction.

“Oh,” you say dejectedly, “Good for him.”

“I’m sorry Y/N,” Ginny says sympathetically, “My brother is an idiot.”

You give her a weak smile back.

⋆﹥━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━﹤⋆

A few days later, Ernie Macmillan comes up to you and nervously asks you to Hogsmead. He’s sweating profusely but you secretly admire his bravery. You accept and the date is fairly uneventful, mostly consisting of playful banter, and he walks you back to the Gryffindor common room, kissing your cheek chastely before departing.

Fred and George caught sight of the kiss and Fred snorts, “A Hufflepuff?”

“What’s wrong with Hufflepuff?” You demand, crossing your arms.

“Nothing. Nothing at all,” he mutters before angrily storming off. George mouths “sorry, I’ll talk to him,” before following Fred.

Ernie doesn’t talk to you again after that date. Every time you approach him, he finds some reason to leave quickly. You couldn’t lie, it was hurtful, was the date that bad? He seemed almost scared to be around you.

⋆﹥━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━﹤⋆

A boy from Durmstang ends up asking you to the Yule Ball. His name is Ansen. He’s tall and has nice eyes, so you accept. Maybe you aren’t in love with him, but he’s a nice distraction from Fred. You get along with him well enough, you both like quidditch and chocolate frogs. He’s not a bad dancer either, he twirls you around and that combined with your F/C dress makes you feel like a princess.

When the Yule Ball ends, he walks you back to the Gryffindor tower and wishes you a good night.

When you enter the common room, George and Fred are talking in harsh whispers, heads bowed. Both of them are still in their Yule Ball suit. Fred looks up and seems a bit annoyed, “Who’s that bloke you went to the ball with?”

“His name is Asen, he goes to Durmstang,” you say, shrinking a bit under Fred’s glare. “He’s really nice,” you added, just because you could.

“You went with him??” Fred huffed, sounding a bit disbelieving. “He’s Bulgarian, how do you guys even talk?”

George grinned, “I bet there’s not much talking involved when they get together.” You shoot him a look, not helping George.

Ginny glares at them from a armchair by the fireplace, the splitting image of her mother, and they shrunk under her angry gaze. “Stop being gits,” she grabs my hand and pulls me to the girls dormitory, “Tell me everything.”

Once you’re done recounting the date, she smiles, “He sounds nice.”

“He is.”

“You don’t sound too happy,” Ginny notes innocently.

“I know,” you sigh. “I just wish I that Fred had asked me.”

Ginny winces, “I know the feeling.” Harry, right.

“I’m sorry Gin.”

“Boys are stupid, who needs them?”

“Here, here,” Hermione agrees from her bed, her voice is thick with tears and muffled slightly by her pillow.

“I’m going to kill Ron.”

⋆﹥━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━﹤⋆

The next day, Ansen’s hair is bright blue. When you try to talk to him, he seems disgruntled and brushes you aside, muttering something about “stupid Weasley twins” and “she’s not worth the trouble.” You narrow your eyes and put two and two together. Fred and George.

You storm up to them and Fred gives you an annoyed look as you cut of his conversation with Angelina.

“You two are unbelievable! You can’t just prank everyone I try to date,” your voice raises a bit and you know you’re making a scene, but you’re to mad to care. You can feel onlookers burning holes into your back with their curious stares.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Fred drawls and George quickly removes himself from the situation, putting his hands up like don’t get me involved.

“You dyed Ansen’s hair blue and now he won’t speak to me,” you shoot a glare at him, “Not to mention whatever you did to poor Ernie.”

“We prank everyone,” he says defensively.

“You scared them away,” your voice is accusatory.

“Well if they’re that easily scared away, they’re not worth your time,” he replies breezily.

“You don’t get to do this,” you repeat. Your voice is quiet but shakes with anger and hurt.

“Why not?” Fred asks, looking a bit sullen.

“Because you don’t get to do this. You don’t get to ruin all my chances of love after you broke my heart,” your eyes widen at your thoughtless confession.

He gaped silently for a moment, “When I broke your heart?”

“You took Angelina to the Yule Ball.” At his blank look, you felt your face grow hot with anger, “You know what? Forget it. Fuck you Fred Weasley. Stay out of my life”

“Wait, Y/N!” He scrabbles up and grabs your wrist. You jerk it away from him, feeling like he burned you, before running into the girls dormitory.

Hermione, who had been silently watching the exchange, set her book down, “Fred Weasley, you are a compete arse,” she hissed before running after you.

She finds you lying face flat on your bed, “Y/N? I’m sorry about Fred, boys are idiots.”

You let out a watery laugh, “I hate him,” you pause, “but I also love him and he doesn’t love me back and it’s hurts, Mione.”

“I know,” she sighed, wrapping you in a hug. You allow yourself to cry on her shoulder and she glares at the wall behind you, thinking of all the things she wanted to do to Fred Weasley for hurting you.

⋆﹥━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━﹤⋆

You avoid the Fred for a whole week and you’re absolutely miserable. You’ve been spending more time with Hermione which is fun and all, but you missed George(and maybe Fred too). It’s not that you were mad at George, but if you spoke to him, Fred would probably be there. You made sure to continue to smile at George in hallways but your face would turn icy at the arrival of Fred.

The next week, you’re walking to potions and Fred grabs you and pulls you into an empty classroom. “I need to talk to you,” he says.

You sigh wearily and avoid his gaze, “What do you want Fred? Can’t you just leave me alone?”

“I want you.” His voice is so earnest and when you look up to meet his eyes, he’s smiling nervously, hands wrung together.

You look away, “No, you don’t. You’re just saying that because you can’t stand seeing me with another boy and no longer fawning over you like a lovesick little girl.” Your tone is venomous and you take a step back, preparing to leave but his voice stops you.

“That’s not true,” he says defensively, “I fancy you, I think I always have. It just took seeing you with another bloke for me to realize.”

“What about Angelina?”

“I don’t love her, I love you,” his frank declaration stuns you into silence.

“You love me?” your voice is a hoarse whisper.

His face flushes and you hate that you still find him endearing after everything he’s done, he nods solemnly, “I do. I know I’ve been awful to you these past weeks and I don’t blame you if you don’t want to see me.”

You feel your resolve crumbling, “I’m still mad at you but I do miss being friends.” You don’t address the love confession, you were still too mad and hurt for that.

“I’ll make it up to you Y/N, I promise.”

⋆﹥━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━﹤⋆

He stays true to his word. He walks you to every class and even apologizes to Ernie, who is no longer avoiding you. He doesn’t try to demand anything from you or push you, leaving everything up to you. Slowly, you begin to trust him again and can feel your relationship shifting from friends to something else.

Your first kiss is at the end of the school year. You say goodbye to George and turn to Fred, nervously aware of his family standing a few steps away. “Write to me?” you ask and he nods. You stand on your tip toes and peck him on the lips, quickly. He stares at you in shock for a moment before gently grabbing your waist and pulling you in for another a kiss that leaves you both breathless. You can hear his brothers hollering in the distance and Molly scolds them.

When you pull apart, Fred’s face is almost as red as his hair, “Bye Y/N, I’ll uh- see you next year,” he pauses, “Or maybe you could come to the Burrow sometime during the summer? You don’t have to but I reckon Mum would love to have you, and I would too of course-“

You cut off his rambling with a laugh, “I’d love to Freddie.”

[fanfictionofkathrinesnow]

Keep in mind that this is an ongoing project, so the timeline may change to suit the story’s needs.

This timeline also CONTAINS SPOILERS as it shares a brief breakdown of all the Super Mario stories I intend to write.

Part 2

Super Mario Disaster Master Page

──────────────────────────

- Mario Bombs Away

Mario Sr.’s wartime adventures before he enters the Mushroom World.

Mario Sr. immigrated to the US from Italy as a young adult, where he lived a normal life as a workman. I’m not sure if he was drafted or if he volunteered, but he ended up as a soldier about midway through the Vietnam War. He picked up the skills to navigate the Mushroom World there, from his experiences with jungle warfare.

(I don’t plan to write this, but it provides valuable background information.)

- Donkey Kong

Later in life, Mario Sr. stumbles into the Mushroom World, where he meets his future wife (who doesn’t have a name yet).

DK (a young Cranky Kong) saved her from an arranged marriage and a horrible political situation. However, she doesn’t know that was DK’s intention and neither does Mario. Mario happens to spot them and chases the two around for a while until the misunderstanding clears up. They leave DK on good terms and Mario escorts her to the Mushroom Kingdom (the closest group of humans not caught up in her homeland’s mess) to seek asylum, and Peach’s family welcomes them warmly.

She adores Mario, and eventually they get married.

(Mario Sr. and his wife end up playing a significant role in the Mushroom Kingdom after their arrival. The bro's mom is a powerful star sage, and becomes something of a mentor for Peach’s mother. Peach’s dad takes Mario Sr. on as a sort of bodyguard, and they become fast friends.)

- Yoshi Island

Some years later, Mario Sr. and his wife have twins. Things go well for a while, but when the boys are around two, word gets out about some particularly potent prophecies concerning them. Bowser’s dad sends Kamek to kidnap the boys; he gets Luigi but loses Mario along the way.

Mario Sr. attempts to get them back, but sustains a serious injury in the process. He walks with a cane for the rest of his life. The Yoshis save the day and everything turns out alright, but Mario Sr. no longer feels capable of protecting his kids. He moves his family back to the US—to his old home in Brooklyn.

(Between the kidnapping and his time in Darkland, Luigi develops some childhood trauma from this incident. This plays a big role in his young life.)

(Despite these events, Mario Sr. doesn’t leave the mushroom world until the boys are about five. Not long after Yoshi’s Island, Bowser’s father dies at the hands of Cackletta, making Mario Sr. think the boys are safe. But yet another incident occurs a year or two later. I don’t know the details—it’s a stand-in for Partners in Time, but I know it doesn’t play out the same way. This is the last straw and Mario Sr. moves his family to Brooklyn.)

(I’m pretty sure Peach’s dad and Mario Sr. have a falling out as well, over the Surassaland-backed pilfering of Darkland after King Koopa’s death. Mario Sr.’s injuries save him from having to get involved, but I don't think the concept sits well with him. It caused a rift between them—nothing nasty, but enough to prevent any burning desire to return to the Mushroom World soon.)

- “Origins”

The bro’s mom dies in an accident when they’re 15 or 16, removing any lingering desire Mario Sr. has to return to the Mushroom Kingdom. He lives the remainder of his life with his boys, running “Mario and Sons Plumbing” and eventually dies of a stroke. The boys are probably 22.

Origins is several of the side-scrolling games wedged into one.

When the bros go through their parent’s possessions after their father’s death, Mario finds the portal painting their parents kept to get back to the mushroom world (the same deal as the paintings in Mario 64). He jumps through and mucks about for a while, exploring the world and having the strangest sense of dejavu. He winds up in the right place at the right time to save Princess Peach from Bowser. When Mario escorts her back to her castle, Toadsworth recognizes him immediately, because of how much Mario looks like his father. Toadsworth doesn’t say anything, but he encourages Mario’s visits and makes him feel special and welcome. Mario makes a habit of showing up after that, and starts building a reputation for heroics.

(Peach’s parents both died not long after Mario Sr. left. I don’t know the details yet, but I’m pretty sure it was a case of “what goes around comes around.” This left Peach in the care of Toadsworth, who she basically considers her dad now. Despite the sudden loss of the king and queen, with the help of Sarasaland Toadsworth managed to retain most of the Mushroom Kingdom's land and resources, including the territory stolen from a young Prince Bowser.)

- Super Mario Land

Mario and Peach have become good friends by this point. When Peach gets word that her childhood friend Daisy needs help, she goes to Mario, sending him on a wild adventure into the heart of Surassaland. He meets Daisy’s family in this story, and though they keep their feelings veiled, they instantly consider him a threat and a rival for Peach’s hand (despite their falling out with Peach, they still hope she will get over her issues with them and marry Prince Haru, Daisy’s big brother). This incident foreshadows some of the political issues that come into play later in the timeline.

- RPG

Mario is pretty well known across the Mushroom Kingdom, Darkland, and Surassalnd by now. He visits the mushroom world more frequently and stays for longer (leaving Luigi very concerned, but more on that later). Then Smithy shows up, sweeping Mario into one of his biggest adventures yet.

Through this situation, Mario meets Geno, who talks about some of the prophecies that mention the bros. He also introduces Mario to the concept of “star chosen” and “sages.” He heavily implies that the bro’s mother was a very powerful figure in the mushroom world. I don’t know how much of this Mairo swallows, probably not a lot, but it opens the door to that sort of thinking. It also prompts him to talk to Toadsworth, who confirms that Mario Sr. had lived in the mushroom world and met the bro’s mother there.

- Mario Bros

Things stay quiet for a while after RPG. Bowser keeps himself busy rebuilding his castle, and generally being conflicted after fighting alongside Mario and Peach. But when he finally does go after Peach again and Mario stomps him as usual, all his hard feelings come rolling back.

In the meantime, Luigi is becoming seriously concerned. Mario hardly helps with the business anymore—he’s hardly around at all. When he does come back, he brings all sorts of money with him, and more than once he’s been busted up. Luigi's starting to think Mario has gotten tangled into a gang or something.

That is, until Mario takes home a power star and tucks it under the floorboard.

Geno told Mario about the star chosen—told him that only the chosen can hear the glittering sound that stars make. With Bowser obviously growing desperate, Mario tucks a star away in his secret stash just in case, assuming Luigi won’t be able to hear it.

Luigi spends all day looking for whatever’s making that infernal ringing sound, and when he finds it, the star won’t stop following him and flying around his head. When Mario comes back to find a very disgruntled Luigi with questions.

Reluctantly, Mario starts to explain. Luigi is incredulous, that is, until a hoard of massive turtles come flooding after Mario from the sewers.

- Mario 64

When Mario and Luigi become cornered in the apartment above their shop, Mario drags Luigi through the painting. They sprint for the castle to warn Peach, only to find Bowser waiting for them. The situation ends badly.

Luckily, Yoshi manages to free Mario so he can save the day, but it’s a rough first introduction to the mushroom world for Luigi. But once he’s free, he does help Mario gather stars, and as the adventure goes on Luigi gets the same feeling of dejavu for the world that Mario did.

(After 64, utterly exhausted and their home in Brooklyn destroyed, Mario and Luigi accept Toadswroth’s offer to stay at the castle for a while. Mario explains to Luigi in detail his adventures in the mushroom world, and with both brothers finally present, Toadsworth explains the full story of their parents as well. Luigi can’t disbelieve it—not anymore. He can also see that Mario is very taken with the princess.

At the end of their stay, Luigi offers to relocate to the Mushroom Kingdom for good, moving what’s left of the family plumbing business with him.)

Keep in mind that this is an ongoing project, so the timeline may change to suit the story’s needs.

This timeline also CONTAINS SPOILERS as it shares a brief breakdown of all the Super Mario stories I intend to write.

──────────────────────────

Part 2

Super Mario Disaster Master Page

[stillness-in-green]

Salt-Sweet Curse

A wild departure from my usual fandom interests, but what can I say - the villain drama in My Hero Academia is really doing it for me right now. For MerMay, and also for @codenamesazanka, whose post about this really inspired me, have some Shigaraki and Toga mermaid AU. 

Toga Himiko had a new target, and he wasn’t exactly her usual type. He walked around town slouched and hidden away in a black hoodie, just radiating ‘societal outcast,’ while she preferred people with more cheer. Killing someone who’d just die with an attitude like, “Yeah, it figures,” would be the absolute worst! Also, he smelled bad. Like, really bad. But she only knew that because she’d passed him by close enough to see the other thing, the one that caught her interest—his eyes were red. Really, true ruby red, and that was enough to have her tailing him for hours, because she wanted to know if his eyes really did match the color of blood as closely as she thought they would.

He was a wily one, though! He must’ve clued in that he was being followed, because his shoulders had gone tight and hunched, and he kept looking over his shoulder, those gorgeous eyes scanning the crowd. She was a wily one, too, though, and his eyes hadn’t landed on her yet (though she wouldn’t hate it if they did—patience, Himiko-chan, patience).

She saw her chance when thunder rumbled through the open air, and the crowds of people paused and then resumed walking, all a two-step faster. The boy—older than her, but still not quite a man, she didn’t think—stopped at the mouth of an alley and looked up at the clouds. They were quite the picture, an impressionistic panorama in shades and strokes of grey, layers on layers. The darkest ones were piling in from the west, though, a haze of rain already visible on the horizon. She could see the consternation on the boy’s face, frustration visible even from her safe distance. He scratched at his neck and turned his head down, pulling his hoodie tighter and looking around. Didn’t you bring an umbrella today, silly thing? Toga giggled at the thought, her own umbrella pink and playful, still unopened over her shoulder.

Eventually, the boy headed for the bridge. How convenient! When he didn’t go up over the top, but rather down towards the riverbank, she even wondered if it was a call-out. Well, that suited her fine. He ducked up between the pylons and out of sight and she decided to give him a few minutes, watching the school kids and stray fishermen along the bank pack up and trail off towards home as the rain came in.

Once the embankment was clear, she gave her umbrella a spin, sluicing water in every direction, then closed it and tossed it to the ground. Right away, the rain began to soak through her hair and clothes, and she stifled a laugh as she ran down the slope towards the cover of the bridge.

In the dim and damp, she felt the weight of someone’s eyes—someone’s gorgeous red eyes—but the boy wasn’t immediately visible and she didn’t search for him. Instead, she made a show of examining herself with a disgruntled expression before wringing out her sleeves and kicking loose water off of her shoes. She shook her head and rubbed her ears, dislodging a bit of trickling wet, gave the pouring rain a half-hearted glare, and finally straightened her shoulders to start looking around.

Discarded bits of paper and cigarette butts littered the lee beneath the bridge, roadwork signs for the thoroughfare overhead stacked in haphazard piles in amongst the pylons. Graffiti slogans marked the cement walls on the opposite side of the river. The rain sounded a steady drumming, mixing in with the lapping of the river, and the air whispered cool and dark on her cheeks.

She turned, gaze scanning up the near walls, and saw him again at last, a black lump tucked up in the highest recesses of the gloom.

“Oh!” She raised a hand to her mouth in surprise, then her voice in greeting. “Hello, up there! I’m sorry; I didn’t realize anyone else was here!”

He didn’t move, features indistinguishable in the shadows.

“It looks like the rain’s gonna keep going for a while,” she called, and started up in his direction—no sense giving him a chance to turn her down. “Do you mind if I come up?”

If he responded, he didn’t do it loud enough to make himself heard over the rain, so she clambered up towards the upper recesses where the cement embankment met the underside of the bridge. The boy, she saw as she neared him, sat curled up with a ragged-looking backpack pulled up over his head, his arms wrapped around his knees, taking up as little space as possible.

Are you scared? she thought, and bit the inside of her lip, fighting back her grin.

“I said no,” he growled when she stopped a few feet away from him. His voice was hoarse, a groan like buckling metal.

“Oh—sorry, I couldn’t hear anything over all that.” She waved blithely at the downpour and gave him an apologetic smile, dipping her head in contrition. A drop of water squeezed out of a chink in the concrete above her, plopping down atop her head, which she ducked down further, twisting it to look up at him sideways. “Is it dry up there? I just need somewhere to wait until it dies down a bit.”

He edged away from her minutely as she closed the distance and plopped herself down beside him with no further fanfare. Up close, the stink hit her again—so profound it passed out of the realm of bad and into some farther territory of personalized, body odor so layered that she couldn’t even pick out the usual things like “sweat” or “blood” or “piss” or “beer.” He just smelled like himself—something sour and penetrating and old. She itched to ask him about it, but a schoolgirl like herself should be polite, so instead she rummaged in her pockets, fingers skimming over her switchblade to land on her cellphone.

She pulled it out and squinted at it, swiping the lockscreen away and pulling down the status bar to look at—and sigh at—the moisture warning. “Darn… Cellphone’s wet, too. Do you have one I could use to call home? I’m afraid to use mine when it’s wet like this…”

“No.” He clipped the word out like a snip of scissors. Her sidelong glance found a tight frown on his face—he was so thin, protruding cheekbones and a jawline so sharp it was a wonder it hadn’t broken his skin, and his hair was the color of an old man’s, gray-white, while still having a shaggy thickness that couldn’t be all matted grime. Two old, small scars marked his face, short cuts that lay over his right eye and the left side of his cracked, dry lips. Her heart skipped a beat—his eyes were just as red as she remembered.

Patience, Himiko-chan! Oh, but you’re making it so hard…! She racked her brain for the right thing to say—he was obviously some kind of runaway, maybe from home, maybe from the police, so the usual ‘So what do you do for a living?’s and ‘So where do you go to school?’s wouldn’t work.

“So…” She busied herself fiddling with the edge of her sweater. “How long do you think the rain’s gonna last? I can’t believe I forgot an umbrella today…”

“Too damn long,” the boy groused, eyes flicking out to the rain, and back to her again.

“Yeah.” She huffed a short laugh. “I thought maybe I could beat it home, but…

“So… Do you live around here?” she went on when he didn’t take the bait to ask where she lived or volunteer a story of his own. Such a puzzlebox! She poked at her cellphone screen, adjusting the lighting so she could better see the moving outlines of their reflections, the boy’s and hers.

“I live around,” he answered, voice flat, and oh, there was only so much stonewalling a girl could take!

“It’s just that,” she said hurriedly, stumbling a bit on the words. “Your eyes are so pretty.” He stiffened beside her—at the compliment? The forwardness? “I’ve never seen anything like them. And your hair’s white, too—are you albino? Is that too rude?”

He’d gone silent, an emotional shift Toga felt like a barometric drop, and was drawing back from her—dangerous, it felt dangerous, how exciting!

The next few seconds happened very fast.

“Can I take a picture? Smile!” She held up the phone in front of them, her thumb tapping over the screen to pull up the camera app. She grinned at the rictus of dismay and the flare of anger in his eyes; he uncurled from his hunch to reach over, faster than she’d been expecting, to grab at her wrist.

Her other hand, unnoticed, slipped down to her pocket again and closed on a well-worn lacquer handle.

“I don’t want to be in your fucking selfie, you—!”

His words cut off, his hand—chilly, so cold and it wasn’t even autumn yet—tightening reflexively as his eyes widened.

She giggled and hit the snapshot button on the phone, capturing his dumbstruck expression as he looked down at the knife between his ribs.

“What”—he wheezed, the breath rattling in his lungs—“the fuck.”

Toga pealed with laughter and pushed herself away from the swipe of his other hand. She left the knife in him and he didn’t try to get up, blood already soaking a darker circle through his hoodie.

“You know this doesn’t work, right?” he hissed, curling up around the wound.

“What, stabbing?” she drawled, cupping her cheeks with her hands. What a delightfully strange boy she’d found. “Stabbing works on everyone, silly.”

“…So you’re just a random psycho? Just my luck,” he mumbled, glaring up at her—those eyes, those eyes, she just had to know!

“Your eyes really are so, so pretty!” she cooed, ducking back in towards him, pulling a handkerchief out of her pocket. “How’d you ever get eyes like that? Your mother? Your father?”

He tried to bat her away, but with all the blood he was losing, there was no strength in his arms, at least not enough to stop her from pressing the cloth to his wound.

“What the hell,” he whispered, and coughed wetly. This close, she could smell blood mixed in with rainwater. “Gonna patch me up now?”

“You’re so snide even when you’re bleeding out,” Toga giggled. “That’s so unique. What’s your name?”

He gave her a disbelieving look and coughed again, the force of it rattling his thin frame. She pouted at his lack of response, wondering briefly if he had an ID she’d find when all was said, done and drank, but the wet heat at her fingertips wrested the thought away from her. Her breath hitched in excitement and she pulled her handkerchief away, the cloth now stained a dark, dark red, brighter around the edges.

She brought it up to her face, breathing in the smell—blood, yes, and something salty and stale, maybe some of his sweat, or a musk of fear that didn’t show on his face but couldn’t lie through physiology. She opened her mouth, extending the tip of her tongue, and—

He tackled her, out of nowhere, and there was his strength, sudden and desperate, like the dying man he’d been all along but was only just now thinking to act like. His hands wrapped around her wrists like claws, like wire cables, his breathing gone deep and guttural, and his eyes, when she looked up to meet them, shone bright and desperate and furious.

“No,” he snarled, pinning her arms to the grass. She laughed, delighted.

“Yes!” she cheered in reply and raised one foot to kick them into a roll down the hill. They tumbled together, and in the tangle of his body and the ground, she managed to get a hand on her knife and wrench it loose. He cried out, short and sharp, and then they spun to a stop at the edge of the lee, the raindrops hard and heavy where they gathered, ran and fell. He cursed and jerked away from her, scrabbling backwards towards shelter, and she was left with the knife, which wouldn’t have long before the rain washed it clean.

She wasted no more time, bringing the blade to her mouth and carefully, exquisitely carefully, wrapping her lips and tongue around the metal. Oh. Ohhhh!

The usual taste of iron hit her mouth first, laving over her tongue like juice from a burst peach, but there was more there, more, a salt like sweat, like brine, like nothing she'd ever tasted in blood—that smell from before, was that this saltiness, his blood and not his sweat at all?

I'm going to keep you, she thought, delirious, nicking her own tongue in her haste to suck down more of his flavor and moaning at the taste of his blood of mingling with her own, brackish copper and red iron. I'm going to drag you off somewhere and keep you, I can't get enough of this, oh, why’d I go for the ribs first, oh please don't die from that!

The sound of cloth ripping brought her back to herself, and she found a dull and distant pain waiting for her, swelling in her ankles and her feet. She looked down at herself hazily—Did I twist something going downhill? That would suck!—and blinked, slow and owlish, at the sight at her shoes, bloated like the store had overstuffed them with paper.

And then the pain grew sharper, knifing up through her legs. She gasped in shock, dropping her knife and curling up on herself, patting at her knees, hunting for broken bones, red cuts, anything at all to explain why her ankles felt like they were breaking, feet twisting in on themselves like wilting flower petals.

The boy laughed, low and harsh, and she looked up at him, eyes wide. He stared back from under the lip of the bridge, ruby eyes bright and hateful, and an enormous fish tail, dull silver and speckled with red scales, lashed in the flensed remains of his jeans.

“Congratulations. Now you’re cursed just like me.”

And then the red hurt in her legs rose in a song like the swing of a knife, and she had no ear for any other melody.

When the pain finally receded, she looked up to find the boy giving her a long, narrow stare. He looked from her and her new tail—her new tail, her new tail—up to the empty road atop the embankment, and came to some unspoken decision.

“We can’t fix this here,” he told her bluntly. “Come on.” And then he slipped off his backpack, his hoodie and the unspeakably stained shirt beneath it, cramming them both inside the backpack. Reshouldering it, he began dragging himself down to the riverbank. His fins flipped and flopped as he shifted the bulk of his tail one heave after another, his gaze fixed on the dancing surface of the water. A trail of blood smeared the grass behind him, thinning and running in the pouring rain that slicked his hair to his skull and almost, almost drowned out the pained hiss of his breathing.

So I guess stabbing really doesn’t work?

She didn’t hesitate. The pain still lingered in her new extremity, but that was nothing, really—not compared to the ruby-eyed boy who’d just changed her in a way more profound than any of her previous crushes, and whose surface she’d clearly only just scratched, judging by his sudden turn-around from actively rebuffing her to inviting her to follow him. And there was all that weird talk about her “just” being a random psycho—as opposed to what? So who knew how many more delicious secrets he could be keeping?

It wasn’t like she was going to get up and walk somewhere else, anyway.

She picked up her knife, folded it back into its casing, and tucked it carefully into her bra, where it pressed a reassuring two inches of cold solidity against the curve of her flesh. She looked thoughtfully at the mess where her lower half was just a minute ago—burst shoes (no wonder it’d hurt so much) and just shreds of her knee-socks, but her skirt had just rucked itself up about her waist and was maybe salvageable. She unfastened it and tried to slide it down, flexing the curve of her tail—bright yellow with two curving arcs of red like blood spray, and very beautiful, for all that he called it a curse—but the tail was so long, much longer than her arms, and she couldn’t quite sit upright anymore, and—

A splash sounded from the river, nearly swallowed up by the rain, and then the boy barked at her, “I said come on!”

Toga sighed and followed. Probably this’d be easier in the water.

It took her longer than she’d have liked to get there, and clearly longer than the boy liked, from the way his eyes kept darting between her and the embankment and periodically up to the bridge. She was excited, and her arms weren’t weak, but the tail was heavy and unfamiliar. When she finally reached the edge, the boy planted one hand against the bank and reached out of the water to wrap his other hand firmly around the base of her tail. Unceremoniously, he dragged her in.

She yelped a laugh, startled but unfazed by the cold, and let herself sink. She was a mermaid now, and she’d seen enough cartoons to know how that worked. Down here she’d be able to get her skirt off better, and maybe look at the boy’s wound again, taste it in the water of the canal, see how blood smelled when she breathed in through—

She didn’t have gills. She realized that as her lungs expanded, foolhardy and confident for their very first mermaid breath, bringing water surging up her nose and down her windpipe, heavy and cold and tasting like lead.

She thrashed in the water, arms flailing—the boy was nowhere in her reach, but she smacked an arm against the bank and clawed at it, dragging herself halfway out of the water again, choking, gagging, instinctive tears of panic blurring her vision. The rain went on drumming down against her shoulders, leaving her sweater a sopping wet weight against her back, and the water she heaved up on the shore tasted, at last, a little, like a curse.

By the time they stopped for the day, a long and exhausting swim later, the boy’s wound had mostly closed, a red welt between two of his ribs. She had no clue how long it had taken—all her attention had been used up just figuring out how to swim and steer with one huge new muscle in place of her legs while also getting her breathing down such that she just came up for air when she needed it.

“It’s not here to turn your life into a sparkly magic fairy tale,” the boy told her when she complained about the learning curve. “It’s a curse.”

“How do we fix it?” she asked, curled up on the low, silty shore next to him. His backpack and her skirt and sweater hung over a tree root curling out from the bank and down to the water—not really out of the water to dry, just enough so they didn’t float away. Above, the clouds had started to clear off, and the sunset turned all those chiaroscuro grays into scarlet and gold and deep iris-purple.

“Hell if I know,” he said, brisk and derisive. He was even thinner without the hoodie, all sharp edges and dark hollows, like a pencil sketch. “If you didn’t want to get caught up in it, you shouldn’t have sucked my blood off your knife, you freak.”

“Your blood was delicious; it was totally worth it.” She grinned at his expression and rolled onto her back, stretching and swishing her tail back and forth in the shallow depths. “But I was talking about what you meant before. Back in town, you said ‘We can’t fix this here.’ So where do we fix it?”

“…The sea,” he allowed with a grunt after a few sullen beats. “You have to submerge in the sea.”

“And what triggered it to begin with?” she asked, curious.

“The rain,” he answerd, rolling his eyes. “But any water’ll do it, when you’re on land.”

“Wait, but what about when I need a drink?”

“Get used to booze.”

“I’m underage,” she pointed out gamely, though something nagged at the back of her mind.

The boy snorted, sharp and more bitterly sarcastic than she’d ever seen on a human face—insomuch as you could really call him human. “Yeah, you’re gonna have to get over that pretty quick, too.”

“What does that—wait, any water—is that why you smell so bad?” The words came out in a delighted shriek as she rolled onto her front, propping herself up on her elbows. “Because you can’t bathe?”

He scowled at her, but she was beginning to think that was just his default expression, disdain clear in the angle of his chin and the little scrunch of his nose.

“It is, isn’t it?” She dissolved into laughter, shoulders shaking. “Do you even try, like, body spray or baby powder or something? Maybe just wiping the grime off sometimes? Changing clothes once a week?”

“Yeah, see how well that works around the six month mark,” he sneered. “Or the six year mark.”

Her eyes went round as she took in the enormity of the thought—oh, this was going to take some work. But then, maybe she could just try the youkai life sometimes, living in deep rivers and picking off cute boys from the countryside—she’d never even met a cute countryside boy, only seen them on TV. That could be fun.

“Hey, what’s your name?” she asked, focusing back in on her companion. “If you don’t tell me, I’m going to start calling you Stinky, just so you know.”

He snorted again, eyeing her sidelong, but after a moment—and oh, she couldn’t wait until she’d dug into him deep enough to figure out what he was thinking when his eyes went all hard and calculating like that—answered her with, “Shigaraki.”

“I’m Toga Himiko,” she told him with a broad smile. “Let’s be friends from now on.”

[mindymusejottings]

Not Safe For My Heart [Part 1]

Chapter One:

Have you ever met someone and knew instinctively they were going to ruin your life?  Where just looking at them you can see the impending doom looming closer and closer.  I did the day I met him.  He looked like trouble and he was, but he was also so damn charming.  Charming, sweet, and handsome.  He was the kind of handsome that made your insides shiver from nervousness and had you stuttering over yourself like a silly little middle school girl with a puppy dog crush.

I would have given him the world had he asked, but instead, he broke my heart. That lying, no good, cheating, asshole broke my heart and that’s not even the worst part. The worst part is, I let him.  It wasn’t the first time he cheated on me.  It was the fifth.  It wasn’t the first time he degraded me. That happened every day since our second month together.  It wasn’t his first time raising his voice nor his fist.  Although he never actually hit me, I was always fixing a dent in my wall or cleaning up the mess from whatever broke this time.  I let him treat me like crap.  I let him walk all over me.

...I don’t even know why.

What I did know was the feeling of some random guy’s lips on my neck and his wandering hands that felt like heaven.  The feeling of his want pressed up against my backside as he swayed us to the beat was enticing and the fuzzy warmth of alcohol running through my system was a welcome feeling. I didn’t care about propriety that night.  I didn’t care at all about my resolve to never give myself to someone I didn’t know for sure I loved.  I didn’t care if letting this random, handsome man’s hands wander and grope made me look like a slut or a whore.  I just didn’t care.

I wanted to be loved even if it was just for one night.

A gasp escaped my lips as his fingers brushed just under my left breast and I felt him grin against my skin in response.  “You wouldn’t happen to be here alone, would you?” his husky voice asked against my ear.

“And if I am?” I questioned him, “What would you do?”

His dark chuckle sent pleasant chills up my spine. Those large hands mapped my curves for what seemed the hundredth time that night, sliding seductively down my hips to the ends of my short dress, teasing the hem and the sensitive skin beneath.  “Anything you want, princess.”

I lifted a hand to his cheek, my fingers admiring the sharp edges of his jaw appreciatively before threading into his thick black hair.  Pulling him closer so our mouths were only centimeters apart, I whispered, “Make me forget.”

His lips met mine in a searing kiss as his well-sculpted arms wrapped tightly around my body, pulling me flush against him.  “I can do that, sweetheart,” he murmured against my lips.

Everything after that was a blur of motion, heated kisses, wandering hands, and sinful pleasure.  He was gentle but dominating.  Loving, but fierce.  It didn’t matter that this was my first time with a man.  All that mattered were his hands on my body, his lips against mine, and the euphoric high he skyrocketed me towards over and over again.  By the time he was done with me, I was spent.  I was so tired and yet I felt so content.  Whimpers left my lips at the feeling of a warm cloth gliding against my skin.  I vaguely remembered his plush lips brushing mine as he whispered, “Shhh, sleep.”

And I did just that.

When I woke the next morning, I was sore.  Probably more sore than I had been in a long time and, when I finally managed to pull myself up out of the coziness of the bed, I noticed how shaky my legs were.  This was all so new to me.  I’d only ever heard stories from co-workers or past friends, each telling me the best sex left you wrecked the next day.  Being a virgin for as long as I had left me with very little to go on, but I ventured to guess they were right.  

Images of the previous night’s events streamed through my mind at a million miles per hour.  Every touch, every kiss, every thrust, and it left me blushing madly.  I could still feel his lips if I closed my eyes and concentrated.  Glancing behind me, I realize I was alone in the room.  His side of the bed was cold to the touch and listening carefully lead me to believe I was completely alone in his home.  

My clothes were folded thoughtfully and placed on the dresser across the room, and though it took me a few tries to get the strength up in my legs to get over there, I managed to get dressed in record time.  Making my way down the hallway into the kitchen, I took a moment to really drink in the spacious apartment around me.  It was spotless.  I’m pretty sure you would be hard pressed to find a speck of dust anywhere.  Despite everything being so meticulous, the apartment had a warm and welcoming feeling to it.  I was slightly startled to find a note stuck to my purse on the gray granite countertop. ‘There’s breakfast in the microwave for you.  You might have to heat it up a bit.  Leave the dishes in the sink when you’re done.’

There was indeed a full breakfast plate in the microwave and I was more than mildly confused why he was being so kind.  I appreciated it, but I was incredibly confused.  I had never heard of a one night stand playing out like this.  From the limited knowledge I had, once you woke up you simply dressed and left.  Nevertheless, I was appreciative of his thoughtfulness and gratefully gobbled down the breakfast.  Despite the note telling me not to worry about the dishes, I disregarded it and cleaned up my dishes, leaving them drying on the rack beside the sink.  I found one last note posted to the front door on my way out letting me know about the key above the door jam.  I locked up and left the building as quickly as possible.  As I glanced at my watch, I nodded in satisfaction.  My internal clock was quite prompt thankfully, and I still had time to run across town to my apartment and properly prepare myself for my work.  

An hour and a half later I successfully arrived on time and settled into my desk with my cup of coffee.  There was a new pile of documents sitting on my chair when I arrived, so I made short work of sorting through them and putting them in order of urgency.  

“Good morning,” a voice called to me as they passed by my cubicle.  I glance behind me to see Kyungsoo offering me a warm smile and wave as he settled down in his area next to mine.  

“Morning, sunshine,” I grinned up at him.

Kyungsoo chuckled as he pulled out his laptop and set it up.  “I see you don’t have any oatmeal again.  Did you forget to bring it with you?”  Ah, he knew me so well.  Kyungsoo had experienced many a morning of my grumblings while I shifted around for some semblance of sustenance.  After a while, he made a point to have something extra in his desk drawers for whenever I did forget my breakfast.  Fortunately, this wasn’t one of those times.

“Nope, I actually already ate.”

Kyungsoo looked over at me with a baffled expression.  “You have?” he asked, his doe eyes widening in shock.

I scoffed at him and pouted.  “Is it that strange?”

“Uhm, yes,” he said with certainty, the perfectly arched eyebrow only adding clout to his statement.  “You always eat here unless you forget to bring it with you.”

“Touche,” I shrugged, but then smiled up at him.  “I got up a little earlier than usual.”

Kyungsoo’s expression screamed that he knew there was more to the story, but he didn’t push.  We worked in silence for nearly twenty minutes before the front doors to our suite swung open and Chanyeol came bouncing in.  I glanced at Kyungsoo and chuckled at his disgruntled expression.  It wasn’t that he didn’t like Chanyeol, it was just that every time Chanyeol bounced anywhere there was usually a reason behind it.  A reason he would either endlessly go on and on about or that we would find out later--usually when he pranked Kyungsoo.  I was still mildly surprised that Chanyeol was still alive.  Kyungsoo might be sweet natured and calm for the most part, but his wrath was legendary.  Literally.  Everyone in the building knew to not get on his bad side.  There was nothing colder than the death stare Kyungsoo could muster up if you were on his shit list.

Just as Chanyeol plopped himself down across from Kyungsoo in his assigned cubicle, much to Kyungsoo’s chagrin, and opened his mouth excitedly, Kyungsoo leaped up from his seat and held his hand up to stop him.  “I haven’t had enough coffee to deal with you yet,” he muttered and quickly escaped to the kitchenette in the back corner. Chanyeol deflated slightly and turned to me with an expression reminiscent of a kicked puppy.

“I haven’t even said anything yet…” he trailed off sadly.

I smiled at the young man and chuckled.  “Oh, don’t mind him.  You should know by now he just needs copious amounts of caffeine running through his system in the mornings.  He just got in a little while ago.”

Chanyeol instantly brightened up.  “I have information,” he practically gushed, a proud smirk stretching across his lips.  I noticed the tips of his ears go slightly red as Kyungsoo slipped back into his seat and leveled the chipper male with a look that clearly portrayed his inner thoughts.  “Oh, it’s not a prank or anything,” he quickly added, with a sheepish glance at the still disbelieving young man across from him.  

“Go on, Chanyeol,” I called his attention back to me with an encouraging nod.  

“I know who our new boss is going to be!”

“Seriously…?” Kyungsoo droned monotonously.

“Seriously?!” I grinned, leaning forward.

As Kyungsoo and I paused to look at each other, Chanyeol tried his best to decide whether or not to feel happy or put off by our simultaneous, albeit mixed reactions.  “If he’s this excited, do you really think it’s a good thing?,” Kyungsoo deadpanned.

“Well, we don’t even know why he’s so excited,” I pointed out.  “Chanyeol did know Jongin before he started and you two are practically besties.”  Kyungsoo glared but didn’t protest.  I winked at Chanyeol, who grinned back happily.  “So who is it, Chanyeol?”

“He’s a good friend of Jongdae’s,” someone smoothly interjected, causing all three of us to turn once again towards the unit entrance.  There stood our Department Head, Kim Junmyeon, looking just as dapper as always.  Sometimes I question why he never became a model.  The man was only a few years older than the rest of us and handsome as hell.  He grinned at us and sauntered past us towards the empty office where our new manager would be.   There wasn’t much in there other than a nice desk set up and a gorgeous view of the office courtyard from the wall of windows across from the doorway.  “He will be starting two weeks from now.  You should all get very excited,” Junmyeon smirked at us as he turned to lean against the doorframe. “He’s a great guy.  Incredibly capable, intelligent, and he while he runs a tight ship, he’s open minded and compromising.  He’ll be a perfect fit.”

“It sound’s like you know him as well,” Kyungsoo hummed, sipping on his coffee.

“I do, as does Yixing,” Junmyeon replied with a shrugged.  “We all went to college together.  He was a year ahead of us.”

“Do we get a name?” I asked curiously.

“Kim Minseok.”  Everyone turned towards the doors as Jongdae came waltzing into the unit, his arms carrying several large pieces of machinery.  Junmyeon and Chanyeol moved to help him set everything down on the back table.  “He’s been my friend since high school and he was my roommate up until he moved to Shanghai a few years ago.”

“Shanghai?” I heard Kyungsoo ask behind me.  

Jongdae nodded as he took his seat across from me.  “Yeah, we have some friends who live out there.  They used to go to school here, which is how we met them.”

Junmyeon nodded, leaning his arms on the top of the cubicle wall and added, “Yixing actually introduced all of us.  Three of them started a company together out there and they offered Minseok a temporary job with them to help get them started.  Of course, that turned into a long-temporary job,” he chuckled, shaking his head.  “I mentioned our open position in passing about a month ago and he applied.  Said it was time to come back home.”

I laughed and gave Junmyeon a sideways look.  I knew the man a bit too well to believe he just “mentioned” the position on a whim.  “In passing or more like a not-so-subtle nudge?”

The older male burst out laughing and just shrugged coyly.  Jongdae scoffed up at the man.  “Definitely not subtle, because the way that Minseok phrased it was ‘Junmyeon asked me to come work for him, so I said yes’.”

Junmyeon turned on his heels and headed for the door, glancing back at us with a wink and a smirk.  “What can I say?  I know talent when I see it, so why let a golden opportunity pass?”  We all just chuckled and watched the man disappear down the hallway towards Yixing’s office.

As the morning continued to pass by and the four of us powered through endless heaps of paperwork, I couldn’t help but let my mind wander to this Kim Minseok person.  I’d been working for the company for nearly three and a half years and we had never been able to keep a unit manager longer than a few months at best.  Kyungsoo once said that position had to be cursed or something.  Since I had come on there had only been one good manager, but he left after only four months due to a family tragedy.  We had all hoped he would come back, but he never did.  If it wasn’t for him, we wouldn’t have Jongdae in our department.  The guy had the brilliant idea to have one of the IT guys stationed permanently in our department, doubling as a data analyst.  Honestly, everyone was relieved.  It meant less running back and forth to the IT department.  The work we did was highly confidential, which meant every time we needed our data analyzed we had to compile and sort it into zip files and then transfer it over to an encrypted flash drive before we could run the stupid thing over to IT.  

Not that IT wasn’t great or anything.  In fact it was filled with a bunch of hot tech guys.  There was Byun Baekhyun, Oh Sehun, Kim Jongin and their insanely hot department head, Zhang Yixing.

“We’ll see how long this one lasts,” Kyungsoo shrugged, turning his attention back to his computer screen indifferently.

Jongdae huffed, a large pout taking over his lips as he glared at Kyungsoo.  “He’s not like the others!” he grumbled defensively.  “You’ll see.”

Indeed we would.

Two weeks flew by.  There was so much work to do, I hardly had time to think about anything other than the massive piles of paperwork that never seemed to disappear or lessen.  Of course, when I went home at night that was an entirely different story.  Despite our encounter being two weeks ago, every time I closed my eyes I could feel his touch, smell him, hear his voice in my head.  His face never left my mind and as pathetic as it sounded I found myself looking for him in every guy I passed on the street or in the market.  It was almost maddening.  The town I lived in was small.  Not so small that you would know everyone’s name, but small enough to see the same faces on a near daily basis.  Of course, this also meant the chance of running into my ex, but I decided I would cross that bridge when I reached it.

I hadn’t spoken to him since I ended our relationship and had a one night stand that apparently I would never forget.  As wonderful as the night had been, when I returned home from work the following day, I was immediately reminded of why I had left the previous night.  It took me over an hour to pick up the mess that was my apartment, lamenting the irreversible damage to several pieces of decor.  I only kept one of them, a mermaid clutching her tail and resting her head against it.  It was a beautiful piece and something my mother had given me before I moved to Korea.  The statue had split in two, effectively decapitating her, but I managed to sit the pieces just right so they leaned against one another.  You could tell it was broken, but I didn’t care.  It served as a reminder to myself not to take that asshole back.  Maybe he was right and I wouldn’t find anyone better than him, but that didn’t mean I had to be with him either.  

Kyungsoo had been such a sweetheart, coming over after I told him about the breakup and helping me remove all traces of my ex from my apartment.  He called Jongdae, Baekhyun, and Chanyeol to help him rearrange my apartment.  I told them it wasn’t necessary, but all four of them insisted that after a bad breakup change was refreshing and a good way to start from scratch.  One of them must have blabbed to Junmyeon because I also ended up with fresh decor as well.  “If you’re going to switch the furniture around then you have to change your theme as well,” he had said when I asked what he was doing at my apartment last weekend.  The man had entirely too much money considering all the stuff he ended up buying, though Yixing ensured me he had kept Junmyeon from going nuts.  I was grateful to them all honestly.  Our office was a small operation made up of the ten of us (if you include the incoming unit manager).  We were pretty much family.  I had thought it was weird that I was the only girl in the office, but the guys always reassured me there were a few positions open in IT that were waiting for the, and I quote, “perfect nerdy girls” to fill them.  We were more family than coworkers, spending as much time with each other outside of work as we did in the office.  Even Jongin and Sehun had shown up a few time already to drag me out of the house.  They both had dogs, so we frequented the dog parks together often.  “Nothing cures a broken heart like the unconditional love of a dog,” Jongin said as he practically shoved one of his dogs into my arms.  Truly, I was grateful to them all.

The day our manager arrived I woke up with an odd feeling in my stomach.  It wasn’t an unpleasant feeling, just odd.  Of course, I had brushed it off as remnants from the un-pure dream I had just experienced for the umpteenth time since my one night stand.  When I got to work, Kyungsoo already had a steaming cup of coffee sitting on my desk and my oatmeal already made.

“Special occasion, Sunshine?” I grinned at the male.  

He grinned back and shrugged, “I saw you coming in from the window, so I figured if I was going into the kitchen I’d just make your breakfast for you.”

“Aww,” I cooed, hugging him, making him squirm and sigh.  “Aren’t you just the bestest cubi-mate ever!”

Kyungsoo scoffed as he finally managed to pry my arms off of him and leveled me with an amused expression.  “Don’t get used to it.”

Chanyeol and Jongdae entered together about fifteen minutes later chatting in hushed tones and sneaking glances at me, twin smirks pulling at their lips.  I glanced at Kyungsoo for answers, but he gave me an equally confused expression.  We watched as the two sauntered over to their desks, still giving me their weird ‘we know something you don’t’ look.  I only started to get worried when those looks melted into shit eating grins.  “Oh my god,” I groaned looking around my desk and pushing away from it hurriedly.  “What did you two do?  Kyung, is there something under my chair?”

Kyungsoo’s chair rolled back and I watched him lean over, sharp eyes inspecting the underside of my chair.  “No, I don’t see anything and I didn’t notice anything different about your space when I got in this morning.”  

Even with his reassurance, I didn’t feel any safer, “Why are you looking at me like that?”

Chanyeol was snickering behind his hand at this point, barely containing his amusement, while Jongdae just motioned for me to come closer.  When I only narrowed my eyes at the male, he rolled his and sighed.  “We haven’t played a prank on you.  It’s not even your turn yet.”

“Wow, cuz that makes me feel so much better,” I droned, but rolled forward nonetheless.  

Jongdae’s grin was downright evil by the time I reached my desk once more.  He leaned as far forward as he could, dropping his voice into a low whisper.  “You’re in trouble.”

I scrunched my eyebrows together and shot a glance at Kyungsoo, who shrugged.  Very helpful, Kyung, I thought.  “What do you mean?”  

Chanyeol let out a bark of laughter, startling all of us into looking at him like he’d lost his damn mind.  “You really don’t know!  This is going to be great!”

“What are you talking about?  What the hell did I do?” I questioned them exasperatedly, which only made them cackle wickedly.  Before either of them could answer, or really before I could strangle the answer out of them, we heard the door to the office open.  The four of us turned to see Junmyeon strutting into the office proudly.  

“Ah! Everyone is here, fantastic!” he practically gushed with excitement.  It was amusing, to say the least.  With a clap of his hands, he announced, “I would like to introduce your new manager, Kim Minseok.”  Everything seemed to happen in slow motion at that point.  In walked a man who looked like he had been sculpted from granite, a masterpiece from God himself.  Only I knew that face.  I knew those shoulders, those hands,  I knew what his hard chest felt like and I knew how sinful those thick thighs of his were.  His sharp eyes swept over the room before they locked with mine and I knew he knew, too.

Holy…

          ….shit….

                        …. I slept with my boss.

��JN��

[blahblahblippyblah]

Nico's Quest (happens after events of THO)

Chapter 1: Nico gets a prophecy

full story: http://archiveofourown.org/works/11403567/chapters/25542171

Summary:

Nico must go on a quest to stop Orpheus bringing back souls from the dead. there only one person who can help him out. Will

Nico was relieved when Apollo finally left, scratch that he was overjoyed. He wasn't the biggest fan of the former god. It didn't help that he managed to destroy half the camp before parting. But now that Apollo was gone they could all take a breath until the next terrible incident happened.

The night after Apollo left Nico's nightmares started again. Not that he wasn't surprised. He always had nightmares. But this nightmare was different this time. He was in his father's castle in the underworld. His psychopathic step mother Persephone sat on her throne looking bored while his father stormed around the room shouting and breaking things. Yep just a regular old day Nico thought. Eventually his father calmed down and turned. When he saw Nico standing there he straightened up.

"Good you here. Well here enough. I need you to do something" his father said.

Yep world best dad. No ‘Hi son’, no ‘How you doing son’, just ‘Hey I have more chores for you’.

"What do you need father" I spat.

"Maybe we should get a more handsome and older hero husband. Not that your children aren't capable, but it would be nice to shake thing up" Persephone interjected while filling her nails.

Hades turned towards her. "My children will do fine dearest. Plus I would rather keep this a secret, and Nico is more suited for keeping underworld problems from Zeus"

"What problem? And why can't Zeus know about it?" Nico said.

“I’ll spare you the detail but we have an escaped soul. Many souls escaped during the waking of Gea but this one in particular needs to be sent back." Hades went on walking over to his throne.

"Who is it?" Nico asked.

Hades mouth twitched as if saying the name was going to cause him to burst in flames. Persephone however interjected.

"Orpheus. The handsome lad managed to get out and is now charging wealthy families to bring back there loved one. A clever business plan if you ask me" Hades eyes flared but he ignored his wife.

"You son can see why that is an issue. If Zeus found out I had someone s telling sold back from the underworld ... Well it wouldn't be pleasant."

"So why can't you look for him yourself? I'm kind of busy at camp" Nico said.

Persephone let out a snort which Hades also ignored. Nico bunched his fist. His understood where the stereotype evil step mother came from.

"You don't think I would have him in my current possession if I could find him. Orpheus is clever. He's hiding from me. I looked all over the earth and couldn't find him anywhere. That's why I need you to look for him. Go on one of your little quest and bring him back."

Nico frowned. He was kind of fed up with going on dangerous quest for his dad. Plus he was finally enjoying camp. He really didn't want to go out on his father's errands.

"But..." Nico tried to interrupt but his father waved him silent.

"I hear you have an oracle back online. She'll give you more detail. Now I have to get back to work.” Hades said getting up.

"Wait a minute” Nico started saying but he was immediately awoken by his alarm clock.

*

Nico put his food tray down on the Apollo table a little too hard when he went for breakfast. Orange juice sloshed out of his cup and onto his pancakes. He fell down beside Will who looked up at him confused.

"Wake up on the wrong side of the coffin this morning?" Kayla joked.

Nico just frowned at his pancakes and began stabbing them with his fork. Will put a hand on his for arm.

"Everything ok Nico?" he asked.

Nico felt bad. He didn't want to upset Will. Why did he have to be so caring?

"Nothing. I just had the pleasure of taking to my father last night" Nico said. He knew he wasn't being 100% honest but he didn't think this was the time or place to talk about his inevitable quest.

Will pouted at him but didn't press him any further.

After breakfast Chiron announced that tonight they would be having a small game of captured the flag with the few year round campers to celebrate the defeat of the Colossus. Also Apollo finally leaving many campers thought.

This cheered Nico up slightly. Even thought there was only around 20 campers he still loved playing capture the flag. It was something he was actually good at. It also helped that he enjoyed showing off in front of Will. Something he would never admit to.

So at 3 o'clock they all gathered outside the forest. Nico had put on his bronze beast plate a thick wool sweater and a more ripped pair of jeans so his good ones didn't get ruined. By the forest other campers had outfitted themselves and we're helping each other strap on armour. Nico scanned the group looking for the familiar mop of blonde hair. He quickly spotter it and headed over to Will.

He grinned as Nico approached

"You’re playing today?" Nico asked skeptically with an eyebrow raised. Will didn't usually participate in capture the flag. His archery skills were mediocre at best. His hand to hand combat was a joke. And he was always needed to reattach Paolo’s limbs.

Will gave a malicious smile.

"Since Percy, Jason and the other aren’t here I thought I'd finally have the chance to wipe the floor with you." Will taunted. Nico raised both eyebrows mockingly

"Ok we will see how well that works out. I hope you brought enough ambrosia for yourself once I'm done with you." Will just smiled at blew him a kiss mockingly.

Chiron called for everyone's attention and separated them into teams. Nico was stuck with the Demeter cabin and a bunch of other not so super cabins. At least the one Ares kid was on his side.

The Demeter cabin came up with the brilliant idea of growing a giant beanstalk and putting the flag on top. Nico was unsure at first when Miranda put a tiny seed in the frozen ground and draped the flag over it. But as she knot her face in concentration the plant grew taller than the tress taking the flag with it.

Sherman came up with an attack plan and Nico made some mental notes in his head about where Sherman thought they might be able to find the flag. When the whistle went off from somewhere in the forest Nico ran a wide flank. He knew that Malkolm and the Hectate kids would make sure he couldn't shadow down travel to the flag so that left Nico with having to actually find it.

He ran thought the tress listening intently for any sounds of movement. Keeping an eye out for any signs of the enemy’s flag. He heard 2 people someone running towards him so Nico jumped up into a tree and did his best to blend in with the shadows the branches were casting. The two people stopped under the tree and looked around.

'I swear I just saw him around here' one of the people said.

Nico craned his neck to see who it was being careful not to move too much so that he stayed camouflaged in the dark. He saw a familiar mop of blonde hair that blended in with his jacket and the snow on the ground. The second person was Connor Stool. Nico gave a grin. Of course it would be will he would run into.

Nico shifted his weight and gripped his sword at a better angle. He then jumped down out of the tree and on top of Connor. Knocking him out cold. Will quickly spun around pulling out his bow and stinging it. Pointting it right at Nico. They circled slightly. Nico knew Will wasn't confident with close combat but Nico didn't like the look of the tranquilizer arrow will had sting on his bow.

"Ready to have you butt handed to you by a healer?" Will taunted with a smile

"If I were you I would watch your footing" Nico laughed.

Before Will pieced together what Nico had said Nico spun down swinging out his leg to catch Will’s causing him to trip. Will's arrow went flying but landed far away. His hand kept tight on the bow. Nico used the hilt of his blade to hit Will’s writs causing him to drop the bow while Will continued to fall back.

This was way too easy Nico thought. He stood of Will who had a disgruntled look of annoyance on his face. This now made it 15 Nico 0 will for capture the flag games. Nico smiled down at Will then offered out his hand to help him up. Will to it but grunted as he stood.

"If you tell me where the flag is I won't knock you out like Connor" Nico promised.

Will's mouth went up at one side disbelieving.

"And why would I do that Di Angelo?: Will taunted.

"Because you realize how superior I am. Also you like me" Nico mocked.

Will gave out a genuine laugh.

"Ya I guess I do really like you." Will admitted. Nico saw Wills eyes twinkle. The twinkle Will got when he was up to something. Before Nico could figure out what it was Will had rushed forward and brought Nico up into a kiss. His arms wrapped around Nico like vipers.

Nico stood shocked for a second but then returned the kiss. He sheathed his sword so he could put both hands on Wills hips. Suddenly Will deepened the kiss. Will pushed into Nico harder an opened his mouth slightly. His tongue came out and began finding it's way into Nico's.

This was very new to Nico and his head spun. If Will hadn't been holding him up he would have fallen over. Everything became fuzzy. Then as quickly as it started it stopped. Nico noticed the sudden absence of warm against him and opened his eyes. Blinking a few times for his brain to come to from the kiss Nico saw Will holding out Nico's sword pointing it at him grinning.

"You sneaking little siren" Nico said half amused that will had the nerve to take his sword.

"Never let the enemy distract you" Will said in his mocking Chiron voice.

From in the forest they heard a shout from Sherman Yang.

"It's on Zeus’s fist!"

Nico smirked. He knew where to go now.

Before Will could reach road to stop him Nico took a step back into the shadows to get closer to the fist.

>>>

Nico stepped out of the shadows and immediately fell over. As soon as his feet touched the ground a log gong like sound reverberated around his head. It sent his head swimming in circles. His eyes unfocused and his legs tuned to jelly. He tried to stand but heard another loud gong like song which sent him back down. Blinking through the disorientation Nico realised he wasn't at Zeus’s fist. He was in the middle of a grove. Surrounded by giant tress so thickly entwined he could see the sky above.

Another gong. But this time Nico relieved it wasn't a gong. It was a voice that reverberated so loudly it shook his bones.

'Stolen soul shall find a pass If shadows fails to break the glass The musician hidden in plain sight Only the sun can find the light. Else the shadows fall to night'

The voice echoed through Nico's head. He could feel his eyes rattling inside his skull. Only two thoughts went through Nico's brain.

'Get Out'

He managed to get on his hands and knees and crawl towards the nearest tree. He used all his willpower and threw himself into shadows one more time. He didn't have a destination in mind. He only concentrated on one thing. Will. I need to find Will.