#but did I think huh what an awful holiday? no. I thought huh what an awful capitalist spectacle

[artemisiatridentata]

single people who hate Valentine’s Day are corny. die in my arms

[charliemwrites]

…. So Mister(s) steal your girl, huh?

Content: Unhappy Relationship, (Brief) Gaslighting, Sad Reader

Bombshells, you always thought, were supposed to making a whistling sound before landing. A high pitched warning of impending doom. Too late to escape the incoming devastation, but at least it wouldn’t come out of nowhere. There’d be some time to brace, for all the good it would do.

Maybe you watched too many movies.

Three months. That’s how long you got to enjoy the bliss of engagement before the world began to fall around you.

Your fiance came home and sat you down, his hand around yours. You thought he was breaking it off for some reason. What he did instead was worse.

In the aftermath you can only remember snippets of the one-sided conversation. Like tinnitus, an awful running in your ears left over from a dropped bomb.

Things like,

Still young, I want to explore…

How will I know you’re my forever unless I know what’s out there?

Last bit of freedom before being tied down…

If you love me and our relationship…

You love your fiance and your relationship. You don’t want to lose it just because you’re selfish. He’s still coming home to you, after all. You’re the one with the ring and all the plans for the future. So what if he wants to… explore? He’s even offering the same to you.

An open relationship, he calls it, like it’s some innovative idea.

You’ve heard of them before, never had much interest. Still don’t, honestly, but it was that or the desolution of 4 years.

You insisted on a long engagement. Your fiance promises that you two can revisit the open relationship when you’re married.

Within a week of agreeing, he’s leaves for the weekend. He doesn’t tell you where he’s going, who he’s meeting. He comes back Sunday evening smelling like someone else’s perfume with a hickey on his collarbone. When you refuse any advances, he sighs and says he “understands that this is a transition” and goes to shower.

It’s like that for six months. Weekends without him. Sometimes sending him off Friday morning and not seeing him until Monday evening. Lipstick on his collars, strange perfume invading the laundry. You start doing his clothes separately.

Six months. You spend months suffering in silence, sniffling through Saturdays and drifting through Sundays. Adjusting meal plans to cook for one.

The last straw is when you try to make plans on a holiday. You and your fiance haven’t done on a proper date in months. You want to go out, have all his attention on you, not shared with his phone.

“Ooh, sorry dear, I’ve already got plans with Malorie. Rain check, yeah? We’ll do something next week.”

You decide to go out anyway, sick of feeling sorry for yourself. Nothing fancy, just a bit of self care. You buy yourself a cute new outfit, put on a bit more makeup than usual, do your hair. Find an interesting little late night book shop. They serve wine and food and have comfy booths for people to read or talk or play board games.

The perfect place to be out but alone.

You’re debating the merits of a romance novel when a voice comes from your left.

“Love that one.”

You blink, glance up. Find a handsome man with eyes simultaneously so dark and so warm. Coals, you think. There’s a cheeky little quirk to his mouth as he nods at the novel.

“It’s good if you like will-they, won’t-they.”

You hum. “I’m more in the market for something… easier? If that makes sense.”

He hums, gives you a solemn look. “It does. Here, you might like this then.”

He plucks a book off the shelf and offers it for inspection. You feel awkward reading it the summary thoroughly, especially when you can feel his eyes on you. But you skim it, it looks promising, and a hot guy just suggested it, so…

“Read a lot of romance?” you ask curiously.

He ducks his head a bit, endearingly shy. “A bit, yeah. Call me hopeless.”

You bite the inside of your cheek, but can’t help saying. “I think it’s just romantic.”

His eyes light up. “Yeah? And what kind of books d’you usually like?”

Before you know it, you’re talking thrillers and horror novels with him. Recommending your favorite spooky novel and then following up that you always read a comedy afterwards as a palette cleanser.

You end up touring each other around the shop, talking books and authors and genres. Yet you’re somehow surprised when he asks if you’d like to sit with him. But you agree, a little thrill in your stomach that you haven’t felt since… a while.

You each buy a stack of books, then claim a booth and proceed to read none of them. He tells you his name is Kyle, that he’s in the military but on leave right now, stocking up on entertainment for flights or long spans of hurrying up and waiting.

You’ve never met a military guy before, and you trip over your curiosity. Trying not to pry but interested in what he does. He’s polite and patient, admitting there are a lot of things he can’t tell you but he’ll answer. You don’t stay on the subject long, figuring the last thing he wants to talk about it work.

He gets you back in the department of uncomfortable topics when he notices the ring on your finger. You’re quick to explain the situation, hot with shame all over again, eyes stinging despite yourself.

Instead of mocking you or just getting up and walking away, Kyle sits back looking flabbergasted.

“That’s fucking mental,” he says, “excuse me for saying.”

You burst into laughter. Haven’t told anyone any of this out of embarrassment, but hearing someone on your side is… good.

“I thought so too, but… he’s happy,” you admit.

Kyle frowns. “What about you?”

You blink, can’t look him in the eye. You know the answer but make a show of thinking about it.

“I’d… like to be again. This — the open relationship thing — seems to be working for him. So… maybe it’ll work for me too?” You shrug. “Worth a try.”

Kyle reaches across the table, a big warm hand enveloping yours. There are callouses you’re not expecting. Tantalizingly different.

“Would you like to try it with me?” he asks. “Don’t have to put a label on it or anything. But my schedule is a bit… it’s hard to keep up a traditional relationship, you know? But I like you, and I think your fiance is a knob.”

You snort, but flip your hand around, thumb brushing over his.

“Yeah…” you muse, and after saying it, a surge of confidence infuses you. “Yeah, I’d like to try this with you.”

His smile is absolutely brilliant. You won’t admit — not even to yourself for a long time — but you fall in love a little right then and there.

Next

Masterlist

[stubz]

Kim and Max and the adventures of running an alien child care centre

"Human Max I'd like you to meet Ezshi, they will be joining you soon in the youngling centre."

"Oh hey there buddy, nice to meet you!"

"Now, what do we say Ezshi?"

*croc sounding hissing and snarling*

"Ezshi! You apologize right this instant!!"

"...oh boy"

days later~

"I don't know what to do! The kid won't stop hissing at me everytime they see me! As soon as they spot me they flare up and won't stop hissing at me, they almost bit me when I tried giving them their chocolate milk!! I don't know how I'll survive this year Kim."

"That's rough buddy," she gives sympathy pats to him. "but why don't you try my method? Y'know, the one I used with my siblings and cousins."

"Kim if I did that I would get fired."

"Yes, in an earth school you would without question buuut...here?"

"...here I wouldn't! Kim you genius!"

later....

"Ah, human Kim, I am here to pick up Ezshi early today. May you point me to them?"

"Yeah sure, right over there with Max." she points to a large crowd of children and parents.

"Thank you Human Kim."

"Of course....maybe I should've stalled them for a bit...shoot."

"Ezshi! Where are you? Ah, there you-- oh my."

In the middle of the crowd is Ezshi and Max both hissing and snarling at each other. The young reptilian slowly advancing towards the human, eyes slitted.

"EZSHI! Youngling you will stop this at--!"

"Wait Mx. Ezshi's Bubba! Maxie is okay, look look!"

"Youngling Human please release your tiny hands off me, I must save your 'Maxee'...huh."

Max advances as well but more predatory like, circling around the youngling until their back hits a table. Jumping onto it thinking it'll make them look more intimidating, Ezshi hisses down at the lowly human. No one interferes, especially the other reptilian and predator like species.

"Okay now here it comes Max, remember not too much spit and be aggressive!"

Back straight, toes pointed, chin up, the young man closes the gap between them with a headbutt while releasing a roar. Silence. Until finally, with eyes dilated, Ezshi chirps and bows their little head.

"Aw, its okay buddy. Now go get your stuff, your Bubba is here."

"Thank you caretaker Maxee! Lets do that again!"

"Human Max how did you know how to assert dominance among my people? Was it Tarlak's family? Tigihalaxes and Repilixes do share similar customs..." they muse.

"Oh it was Kim."

"Yep!"

"And how, may I ask, do you know how to assert dominance among my people Human Kim?"

"My siblings and cousins."

"....you were taught by your human kin?"

"Some of them started to roar and hiss while we goofed around and to make sure they still listened to me while we did this I would 'assert dominance' by doing exactly what Max did."

"I thought humans did not have displays of dominance and that everyone is to be treated equally, like a herd."

"Yes thats right."

"But you just said..."

"Oh that was just us playing around. We still do it every now and then, just over the holidays my little sister and me did the equivalent of the gorlazitics display of dominance."

"For fun??? And not to be the new leader? No one was killed?"

"Save for our mother's opinion of us, no."

"Are you sure you two are herbivores?"

"The proper term is vegetarian, which is what I am, Kim is a pescatarian."

"May the fish forgive me for finding them so delicious in sushi form."

[anemoelliacia]

the five times tighnari knew he loved you

warnings: female reader, literally just tooth rotting sweet fluff, but a mention of blood and a minor injury in one part, reader is mentioned to have a good maternal instinct, also vaguely mentioned to be an anxious person.

▶ i recommend listening to the song Backup Plan by Maya Hawke while reading this chapter <3

The first instance was when you gave him a scrapbook with all of his favorite plants dried and pressed, not even for an occasion or holiday. It was just because you wanted to. You loved when he would infodump about botany and all his favorite plants, it made you happy just to see him so happy. Which gave you the wonderful idea to take samples of all his beloved plants when you see them out in the wild, perfectly preserving them in a scrapbook for him to keep. Eventually, you had a whole fifty page scrapbook filled with his most cherished flora and vegetation. You gave it to him one random Tuesday evening, with such a big smile on your face. You looked so delighted with yourself as you affectionately gave him a kiss on the cheek, handed him the scrapbook and explained what it is. He couldn't help but think about how bewitching you are, not necessarily in how you look but how you act, how you choose to show affection. So he wondered “could this be love?”

Secondly, the time you removed a bug from your house by helping it outside rather than killing it. You blamed it on your motherly instinct, saying if someone needs a mama you’re a mama, no matter who or what you are. You scooped up the bug in a cup, placing paper over the opening so it wouldn’t fly off, all the while practically cooing at it and telling it you were trying to help it. You walked the bug all the way outside, and freed it from the cup far away enough that it wouldn’t get back in the house. He watched you in awe, looking at you with pure adoration because not everyone would care enough to do something so menial as rescuing an insect, pondering to himself “huh, I think I love her…” 

Thirdly, when he saw you tending to Collei because she had an injury. It wasn’t even a bad injury, rather it was miniscule compared to anything else she has dealt with in the past. You saw her fall and scrape her knee- it was really nothing terrible. Though, when you saw the scrape and the blood starting to trickle down her shin, you lovingly made her sit down so you could clean it up as gently as possible, and put a bandage around it. You even presented her with a piece of candy after you cleaned up the minor wound, as if you were treating a child. Collie and you both giggled at each other, and Tighnari stood back watching you care for her with an affectionate smile on his face, thinking to himself “she just might be the love of my life.”

Fourthly, was the first time you helped him groom his tail. He had accidentally dragged his tail through some mud, without realizing at first until it started to dry- it was caked into the delicate fur. He was abashed by it because he likes to keep himself tidy, especially around you. You found him in his washroom, ears drooping with an agitated demeanor as he was trying to wash out all the mud. You wordlessly joined him, giving him a soft smile as you took over for him, gently taking your time to clean all the mud from the fur of his tail. You even took the time to dry off his tail when you were done washing it, as well as combing it to ensure no tangles developed. He watched you with such fondness as you groomed his tail, picking up on the pure devotion radiating from you. He thought, “Archons, how did I get so lucky? I think I truly love her…”

The fifth and final instance was when he came back two days later than expected from a forest rangers expedition. Before he left he assured you that he'd be back in a week, but there was a hold up in the expedition. Truly, he was in no danger. Though, he had no way of telling you that, to which he felt terrible because Tighnari is well aware how much of a worrier you are. He imagined, you must be anxiously pacing your house awaiting his late arrival, probably thinking about the worst case scenario. Two days later than his estimated arrival, he finally comes home- he'll never forget the look of pure relief on your face, and how fast you ran to his side. "Tighnari!" you yell all the while practically launching yourself into his arms, causing him to stumble backwards, nearly falling onto his ass. He wrapped his arms around you, breathing you in as you nuzzled into the crook of his neck, mumbling about, "I was so worried for you, worried I'd never see you again…" Tighnari let out a sigh, feeling guilty once again for making you worry so much for him. However, in the moment his heart swells knowing you care that much about him. So, "I'm not going anywhere. I love you too much to leave you behind." he replies, wholeheartedly meaning it, wanting to spend the rest of his days with a person as wonderful as you.

▶ if you liked this, check out the other parts linked in my masterlist :) every genshin man i write for is getting their own part.

[beachy--head]

Hey Cha! Feel free to ignore this, but could I request a drabble of Jackson reacting to April dyeing her hair back to its natural red colour? Like maybe she visits family and comes back with red hair and it surprises him (or something). I for sure think he had some thoughts™ about it!

It's okay if not, I love your writing and your blog either way, and have a fantastic day 😊

I'm so happy you sent this request, because I have the same headcanon about April's red hair (that it's her natural color and she dyed it brown to blend in). Thank you so much for your support and kind comments, and I hope you'll like this one! <3

___

“Have you seen April?”

Jackson looks up from the chart he’s signing to face a frantic, out-of-breath Lexie. 

“No, but she’s supposed to come back from her family holiday today, though.”

Lexie nods fervently. 

“I know that, I bumped into her this morning. She changed her hair, and I may have said something like ‘it’s such a big change!’, but like, in a positive way! But now she’s having second thoughts, so you have to tell her her hair is perfect the way it is, because it suits her, and I don’t want to be responsible for one of her freak-outs.”

Jackson rolls his eyes.

“Newsflash, Lex, I’m a guy. We don’t care about haircuts. I’m not going to see April and pretend I’ve noticed she cut 1 inch of her hair.”  

“You know what? You suck, Avery.”

Lexie gives him a dirty look and scuttles back to an exam room. He shakes his head and goes back to his chart. What does Lexie think he and April talk about? 

“Hi!”

He doesn’t need to look up to recognize his best friend’s cheerful voice. April smiles at him, in the familiar way he’s now used to, like she’s genuinely happy to see him, and he can’t help but smile back. Her surgical gown and scrub cap indicate that she’s fresh out of surgery, and she confirms it (a double bypass, lucky her) before removing her cap in one smooth movement, freeing her hair.

Her newly bright red hair.

Oh.

“Uh.”

Catherine Avery has raised him better than this, but he can’t help but stare at her. 

“You’re okay?”

Her green eyes, the perfect contrast to the red, look at him with concern, and he shakes his head to get his head straight. 

“Yeah, yeah. How was your trip?”

“Good! The flight was awful, but I managed to see everyone, and…,” and as April recounts her vacation, he observes, mesmerized, as she runs her hand through her hair, untangling the knots her scrub cap has made. When she frowns, though, he realizes he has not listened to a single word she said.

“You’re staring.”

“Huh?”

“You’ve been staring at me for the past minute, and it’s becoming creepy. Do I have something on my face? Wait, it’s not blood, isn’t it? Ugh, I know Cristina oriented that bleeder towards me during surgery.”

“What? No, sorry, I drifted off. Come on, let’s get lunch.”

Lexie finds them in the cafeteria a few minutes later, and what he’s supposed to do is study for the cleft palate surgery Sloan is letting him scrub in later that day. Not give furtive glances to his friend and eavesdrop on Lexie and April’s conversation  – well, on April’s rambling about how she wanted not to stand out in med school with bright red hair, so he guesses the hair change topic is back on. 

“Being another brunette just seemed easier, and my sisters were livid when I did it, which honestly was a bonus,” and every time she talks about her sisters, Jackson finds himself extremely glad he never had any siblings. “My mother is happy I went back to red though, she said we should always go with our God-given color and that my hair was red for a reason.” 

He doesn’t know April’s mother, but he completely agrees with her. Red suits her, way more than the brown hair did, and why is he even thinking about this? 

“I’m not sure about it though, sometimes I think the red is still too much. Do you think I should dye it back?”

He’s lucky Lexie is quick to reassure his friend that her hair is fine, because he doesn’t think that the indignant “No!!!” he had to bite back would have been a useful contribution to the conversation. Since when does a guy care about their friend’s hair color? 

Sneaking one last glance to April, he goes back to his book and reads a sentence about temporary stitches for what must be the fourth time.

He figures his new staring habit would last just a few days, the time to get used to her more vibrant hair (the perfect match to what he knows his best friend is), but it’s now been three weeks, and if anything, he notices her more, which is probably because of the brighter color (or so he tells himself). In the hospital crowd, his eyes find her more often than not, usually when she’s not even aware of his presence, and he’s had time to study all the ways the light reflects on her locks. Not that he would admit it to anybody, but he studies her, the way one studies a work of art, trying to absorb the slightest nuances, and it unnerves him. It’s just a hair color. 

“Avery! Back me up here!”

Alex’s voice brings him back to reality, and he realizes he’s, once again, drifted off the second April entered the room.

“What?”

“Pippi Longstocking here wants us to study tonight and practice for our fellowship interviews. We’re watching the game, right?”

April rolls her eyes.

“Well, fine by me, Karev. Just because you don’t have any hospitals wanting you doesn’t mean we can’t prepare.”

Alex grunts, a sure sign the insult landed, and April smirks, proud of herself, a sight Jackson finds adorable (or something similar a grown man should feel towards his best friend). She takes a hairband, ties her hair in a knot, leaving a few strands of hair fall on her exposed neck, and the staring comes back with a vengeance, followed by a lip twitch. 

Uh.

Fixating on a friend’s hair is completely normal, right?

Right?

[calistrae]

ville de l'amour. a trent alexander-arnold blurb

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

pairing: trent alexander-arnold x gn!reader

requested: yes

request: hii can i request reader and trent maybe in paris and he proposes under the eiffel tower in the dark?

warnings: teeth-rotting fluff, obnoxious lovey-dovey couple activities

notes: no proposal under the eiffel tower, simply because i personally think it's overrated, instead check out the luxembourg gardens and you'll see why i picked it as inspiration for this! tysm for requesting and all the love on my fics! 🧸🤍 (not proofread as per usual lmao)

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

you had no idea, what your boyfriend had planned for your holiday in paris, but his requests and suggestions had made you beyond suspicious of his plans.

why did he have the sudden urge to go to paris, despite having never shown interest in it? why had he suddenly asked you to dress up? why was he looking so formal when all you were doing was taking a little walk?

not that you were complaining. paris was beautiful and the man strolling through the gardens with you was a god. you could swear he was a divine being walking this earth. from the bottom to the top, he looked gorgeous, especially in this sunlight. what had you done to deserve this? to deserve him?

you never realized you were staring until his words brought you out of your trance. "you never realized you were staring until his words brought you out of your trance. "my love?" he spoke, his thumb gently stroking the back of your hand as he kept it in his own. "huh?" was all you could reply, having been torn away from your thoughts.

"what were you staring at?" he questioned with a wide grin on his lips and from that smile alone, you knew you'll never be hearing the end of it. he could read you like a book so you knew that he was probably aware of what you were thinking. "come on, tell me, babe. promise i won't tease you about it" he smirked and you both knew he was lying.

"it's so pretty here, trent" you said as you took the sight in, moving closer to him as you held onto his arm to avoid bumping into the large groups around you. the gardens were beautiful, truly. but there were a lot of people and this put both of you slightly on edge. your relationship had always been private, you rarely posted one another and you rarely appeared in public cozied up.

"only the prettiest place for someone as pretty as you," he replied with a gentle hum and the two of you attempted to remain serious but quickly failed when glancing at each other, bursting out into laughter. "that was so bad!" you exclaimed and he only nodded as he continued laughing. "i give you a compliment and you react like that?!" he argued back.

"that was the cheesiest thing i've ever heard, trent. we both know it was awful, don't try that one ever again." you told him and leaned against him as he guided you through the gardens, now having reached a more quiet, private area. "you love it deep down, i know you do." he hummed and smirked to which you couldn't help but roll your eyes.

"i love you but sometimes i can't believe how i fell for you" you pointed out and chuckled at the offended expression on his face. he let out a joking huff and stopped walking in front of the medici fountain. "i was planning to propose to you just now, but you've just broken my heart. can't believe you." he mused but his tone was a clear indication he was only joking.

when you heard the word 'propose,' your eyes widened as you stood in front of him. "what?" you laughed and shook your head, throwing it back in disbelief as you glanced at the sky and took a deep breath. "what? i'm not kidding, my love." he chuckled and pressed a kiss to the back of your hand.

while you had been convinced he was joking, his words threw you into a frenzy, your eyebrows furrowing together in confusion. he had to be joking, right? there was no way he was being serious. you shook your head and looked him straight in the eye, however the playful expression remained on your face "stop playing. there's no way you were going to propose."

at this, he beamed up once again and within a single second, the man was on one knee in front of you. you felt like you had been hit in the face and you were sure your jaw was hanging open. "what are you doing, trent? get up!" there was no way this was real.

the look on his face could only be described as pure love and adoration as he took your hands in his and flashed that gorgeous smile you loved so much. "i'm not joking, love. with or without a ring, i want to be yours forever but i want to celebrate our love. i want you to be my partner in everything, whether it's a game or whether it's in life. i don't think i've ever felt more loved and i certinly have never loved anyone as much as i love you. everything about you is...pure perfection, really. i want to love you at your best, your worst and your everything in between. it sounds awfully cheesy, i know it does but i can't word it any differently because this is how i feel." he told you and kissed the back of your hand as he was holding it.

"you've shown me what love is supposed to look and feel like and i'd be a fool to not ask you to marry me. so, would you make me the happiest person in this entire world and marry me, love?" he asked as he pulled out a tiny emerald green box and opened it, revealing what must've been the most beautiful ring you've ever seen. it wasn't huge or flashy with a massive diamond but it was perfect, beautiful. you were in complete disbelief but quickly, you dropped down to your knees and smiled at him as you nodded almost frantically.

his smile only grew as his arm wrapped around your waist and he pulled you in, burying his nose deep into the crook of your neck "i love you so much" he whispered as he held you close and you could swear you felt tears against your skin. but you weren't any better as you were in tears the moment he said he wanted to love you through every moment of your life. the two of you were never serious with one another but the look in his eyes alone told you that he wasn't kidding. you held each other's gaze for a few more seconds until trent cracked and pressed a kiss to your cheek.

"we should probably get up, we're kneelin' in the middle of a park and i think people are staring." he pointed out with a chuckle. as he helped you up, he pulled you flush against himself, the muscular pair of arms tight around your midriff. he nuzzled against your temple and pressed the gentlest kiss against your skin. you observed the ring with a small smile on your lips as he led you out of the park and in your gut, you had a feeling there was more planned.

[the-french-belphegor]

I finished another fic for the @critter-genfic-events's bingo card! "Beach day", this time. I swear I did mean it to be funny and only funny, but then it was also Vox Machina post-campaign, so "Missing someone" ended up being A Thing. Plus "Found family" because that's unavoidable when Grog and his gnomes are concerned 💜

I'll be posting this on AO3 shortly here if you prefer to read on AO3!

—

Grog wiggles sand between his toes and squints at the Marquet sun shining through a passing cloud.

“Oh man,” he hears Scanlan sigh from the chaise lounge thing next to him, “this is the life.”

Meh, Grog thinks, just a little.

Sure, it’s a nice day out, and it’s great that they finally got everyone for a little vacation weekend in the Bay of Gifts – even Keyleth, who’s very busy being leaderly, and even Vex and Percy, who have their hands full with Whitestone but mostly with little Vesper. (Grog still calls her ‘Whisper’, because it became A Thing, and to be fair she’s a fairly quiet kid, in his meagre experience.) Now the girl is napping with her dad under the shade of the parasol after burying Grog into the sand (with helpful pointers from her mum, her uncle Grog and her auntie Keyleth) and playing in the shallows with her auntie Pike and her uncle Scanlan. That’s a lot of things to do, and the little mite is all tuckered out. So’s mostly everyone, it seems, except for Trinket, who is having fun chasing seagulls in the distance.

And Grog is slowly but surely getting bored.

Of course, that’s the moment his insides choose to give a twinge at the lack of Vax shenanigans. One of the many things Grog misses about the guy is that you’d never get bored when he was around. Sometimes not getting bored meant getting half your beard shaved off or various belongings stolen for a prank, but… well.

Pike, Wilhand and Scanlan all say that it’s normal to still be sad about Vax even now. Privately, Grog wonders if it’s stupid to miss some of the truly infuriating things Vax did, like the beard thing. He has a feeling the answer would be “no”, but there’s no way in hell he’ll ask.

“Hey Pike!” he calls out, mostly to distract himself from the oncoming boredom but also from being sad on what’s supposed to be a fun day out. “Wanna go fight the sea?”

Pike is in the process of gathering Vesper’s discarded beach toys and eyeing Percy – who is currently fast asleep near his daughter – with Vesper’s shovel in her hand and a gleam in her eye. Just as Grog is starting to think pranking Percy might be a good distraction as well, she turns to him and grins.

“Sure, buddies. How d’you wanna do that?”

“I was thinkin’ I could walk into the waves and just, like, not budge. Or put you on my shoulder and then see how far we can go till you get splashed.”

“Okay, yeah, that sounds nice,” she says, nodding. “Scanlan? Wanna come with?”

“Eh,” says Scanlan from under the hat covering his face, “I had my share of the ocean earlier. Might work on my tan for a little bit.”

“Come on,” says Grog, because the first time they took a beach holiday Scanlan wasn’t there and their second trip to Dalen’s Closet was, well, A Lot – way too much to just let loose and have fun afterwards, “I have two shoulders. That’s one for Pike, and one for you. It’s huh. Balance.”

(He’s really proud to be able to say a number and not hesitate even a bit. Long sentences with lots of letters still elude him, but he’s starting to know numbers well.)

One of Scanlan’s eyes peeks out from under the hat, along with a smile.

“Aw, big guy. Okay, for balance then, but on one condition.”

“What’s that?” asks Pike with something sharp in her grin, like she really wants to laugh but she’s saving that for a better moment.

“My hair stays dry.”

“That’s it?” says Grog, eyebrows raised. He was expecting something a lot less simple.

“Yeah, that’s it.”

That sounds pretty fair, so Grog agrees.

So maybe walking into the surf isn’t quite fighting an entire ocean, but the three of them manage to make it fun, just like Grog thought they would. Pike stands on his left shoulder, hanging on to his head, and shouts at every wave just as loud as he does; meanwhile, Scanlan sits on his right shoulder, beating a rhythm on his chest with his toes and humming a vaguely familiar tune. There may be something magical at work there, because Grog is feeling a tingling warmth along his spine and into his ribcage, like they’re in the middle of a battle and Scanlan is singing to give him inspiration. That’s nice of him to do that. Maybe it’ll give Grog and Pike an edge.

(Even wearing no armour at all and with waves rolling up to his chest, Grog always feels just a little invincible with those two on his shoulders.)

“You know what, Grog?” says Pike after a while, settling down on his shoulder and grinning at him, her cheeks red and her chest heaving. “That was really fun. I think we could all do with some screaming at the ocean once in a while.”

“Seconded,” says Scanlan, who didn’t do any shouting and mostly either chilled with his eyes closed or looked at Pike like he does sometimes, all soft eyes and slight smile.

Pike gets the same sort of look every now and then. It’s this kind of little details that tells Grog that one of these days the guest bedroom in Wilhand’s attic might become a real guest bedroom again (that and the fact that dawn often finds Pike and Scanlan tiptoeing out of each other’s room). As long as they keep most of the lovey dovey stuff out of sight Grog is fine with it.

“Well, I’m smart like that,” says Grog with a grin, like a joke where only he knows the punchline. Which is kinda the case, actually, if the joke is The little bits are dating and Grog did notice. “I got lots of good ideas.”

Scanlan leans his back against Grog’s head and nods.

“You sure do, buddy. And you guys definitely win in my book. Eat your heart out, ocean!”

“Hey guys!” They all turn – which means the gnomes have to turn a second time because they’re facing the wrong way now – to the beach, where Vex is standing with her hands cupped around her mouth. “Keyleth says there might be some jellyfish in the water by now, have you seen any yet?”

“Some what?” asks Grog, and promptly steps on something squishy.

It’s like walking into a bramble bush. The sole of his foot is fine, but tendrils sneak up his ankle and fire up a prickling pain that instantly runs up his whole leg. The surprise, more than the actual sting, makes him bark a shout and instinctively jump back, but this is uncomfortable as hell.

His shoulders suddenly feel somewhat lighter. Oh shit, he thinks with a flash of fear, old habits taking over, Scanlan should float but Pike’s in heavy armour, she’ll go straight down—

But they’re on vacation, not adventuring – no weapons, no plate armour, just sun hats and bathing suits. When he whirls around he spots Pike easily treading water not far from his elbow. The waves rolling in towards the beach make her go up and down, but she’s completely unfazed.

“You okay, Grog?” she asks, looking a little startled, and Grog isn’t even sure if that’s from being thrown off her perch or on his account.

“Sure,” says Grog, not that sure. “Except, uh, question. Can people die from jellyfish?”

“Well,” says Pike reasonably, “that depends on the jellyfish. I saw some really big ones on the Broken Howl, like big big. But the ones around here just burn a little.” Then her eyes zero in on something ahead of her and her nose crunches. “Yikes. Yeah, you can tell Vex Keyleth was right, look.”

The first and last time Grog saw a jellyfish, it was in Vesrah. Two kids were poking a small blob with a stick until their father told them to stop. What’s floating close to the surface five feet from them is still a blob, but it’s got long thin tentacly things that look like a bunch of transparent seaweed. They’re trailing underneath like it doesn’t know what to do with them. It’s creepy, and it’s weird to think these are why his ankle and calf are stinging like he kicked through embers without a boot on.

Grog scoops Pike up, holds her up out of the water, and makes his way to the beach, trusting Scanlan to meet them there.

When he’s close enough to talk without shouting, he tells Vex, who’s been watching them curiously, “Yeah, maybe don’t let lil’ Whisper into the water just now. There’s at least a couple of the suckers out there. I even got bit, look.”

“Stung, Grog,” Pike corrects, hanging on tight to his arm to avoid toppling over when he lifts his foot. Oops. “Jellyfish don’t bite.”

Vex throws him a look, complicated and quick – worried-sharp-relieved – then grins.

“You know, I’ve heard you can treat a jellyfish burn by having someone pee on it. Not that I’m volunteering, but perhaps if you ask—”

It’s the way she says it. Something flashes in Grog’s mind, like he’s realised something isn’t right but his brain is taking a while to catch up on what, exactly. (It happens.) It’s not that it’s wrong for her to say that – although in the old days Grog wouldn’t have put it past Vax to bring it up instead – so much as she shouldn’t have been the first to say it.

Fortunately, Pike’s brain works much better and faster than his. Her eyes go wide real quick and she exclaims, “Wait – where’s Scanlan?”

A small sliver of cold creeps its way up Grog’s spine. Oh. Shit.

“Didn’t he swim to shore?”

“He didn’t,” says Vex, tense and sharp once more, but worse, like she used to just before a fight. “I would’ve seen him.”

“Well, he has to be somewhere, he can’t just – oh gods no.”

Pike’s voice goes sideways on the last word like someone tripping and falling down a flight of stairs. Grog looks into the same direction and goes cold all over.

There is a shape bobbing along in the water a little ways behind the waves crashing onto the beach.

Grog runs.

He does kind of end up fighting the sea for real today after all.

When he reaches Scanlan, what feels like the next second but also so much time later, the gnome is floating belly down just under the surface of the water. His arms and legs drift a little in the current, like the jellyfish’s tentacle things did. It looks so much creepier. But not as creepy as the way Scanlan lies completely still when Grog picks him up, arms and legs at odd angles like his limbs and joints are missing strings. Both his eyelids and his lips are a little bit blue.

At least there’s no blood. It would bring back real bad memories if there was blood. Well, it does, because this is not the first time Grog’s carried his second best little buddy cold and lifeless like that, but the absence of blood makes it a bit easier to push those memories away.

Pike takes charge as Grog limps out of the water, white seafoam frothing around his calves. Her face is nearly as pale.

“Lay him down,” she says, her voice steel under the usual warmth, and Grog does. He watches her press her ear to Scanlan’s chest, tip his head back, open his mouth, and blow into it. And look, Grog usually doesn’t like it much when they start getting kissy and too wrapped up in each other, but it’s the last thing he’d mind right now. This is the worst kiss he’s ever seen. He’s not even sure it counts as one.

Pike lays her hands flat on Scanlan’s chest and her arms find a steady rhythm – “…three four five six come on eight nine ten—” and Grog winces when he hears something crack. Pike with her gauntlets and her mace and the Blessing of the Everlight is strong, second only to Grog in strength in Vox Machina, but even without she’s a force to be reckoned with. Scanlan’s going to feel that when he wakes up. If he wakes up.

They can’t lose somebody else that’s theirs. They can’t.

Sometimes people go and you never get them back, Grog remembers Kerrek say to Keyleth once, that time Scanlan was dead and Grog spent a very complicated few hours grappling with the fact that all those powerful spellcasters couldn’t bring him back right now. Kerrek had looked surprised way before that when Grog had told him that when someone died, they just brought them back. Like that was usually not the way of things. Like sometimes even people you knew and loved a whole lot just died, and that was it, no Revivify spell, no resurrection.

Grog hadn’t really understood that before Vax died and then became feathers.

If Scanlan dies now, for real, is he going to become feathers, too?

Just as the terror starts to give way into rage – that’s always been Grog’s default way of handling things like that, mostly – Scanlan’s body gives a lurch and he upchucks more liquid than Grog’s ever seen him down in one go in all their years of tavern hopping.

The next second he hears Keyleth yell, “Turn him on his side!”

She’s motioning the water out of Scanlan’s lungs with her hands even as she’s full-on running towards them, spraying sand where her feet hit the beach. In the distance, Vex talks urgently to Percy sitting up next to Vesper before following her, almost as fast.

By the time she’s standing nearby, Keyleth is drawing out the last of the water and replacing it with air with complex arm gestures, long fingers flexing fluidly. The second she’s done, Pike flips Scanlan on his back again and smacks her hands flat on his chest with a flash of intense light that makes Grog see bright spots for a while. A heartbeat later, Scanlan is coughing and retching as if it would make more sense for his insides to be outside. Between dry heaves he takes big gulps of air that sound painful.

But at least he’s breathing.

Grog’s knees suddenly feel like jellyfish tentacles. Sea salt burns in his eyes, and wiping them doesn’t really help. He spares one furious thought towards the ocean – I still won, motherfucker, you don’t get to keep him, just a fleeting remnant of rage – before sitting down on the sand a lot more abruptly than he means to.

From there he catches some soft whispers, some in Gnomish he doesn’t understand, some in Common he does – “It’s okay, you’re okay”, “Slow down, deeper breaths”, and “I know, sorry about your ribs, babe, hold on a sec” – as well as the faint glow from Pike’s fingers as she runs her hand gently along Scanlan’s back. Scanlan’s breaths do come easier after that. (So do Grog’s, incidentally.) He still looks a wreck, though, his soaked curls all over the place, ashen-faced under his tan and half covered in a fine layer of sand. So much for keeping his hair dry. Oops.

“Are you gonna be okay?” asks Keyleth, her voice trembling just a little.

“What the hell happened?” Vex’s voice sounds clipped and almost angry, so sharp it could cut through diamonds but also kinda like it could break if she wasn’t careful. It only does that when things get bad.

Scanlan blinks up at her; he looks at Pike, at Keyleth, and at Grog, and blinks again.

“Good… question?”

It’s because of the jellyfish, Grog realises, and only notices he’s said that aloud when everyone turns their eyes to him. He concentrates hard on not voicing the niggling doubt that it’s his fault more than the jellyfish’s. The squish and the burn might have startled him, but letting both gnomes fall was on him alone. And that… that sucks. A lot.

Pike helps Scanlan sit up, one hand in his and the other still on his back.

“We were just messing around. Grog stepped on a jellyfish – by the way, you okay, buddy?”

“Yeah,” says Grog, even though his ankle still burns a lot, kinda, because he’s – they’ve all – gone through way worse during battles. Fortunately they’re not battling anyone, so Pike still has plenty of magic, and he almost immediately feels the familiar warmth of a Heal spell down to his toes. The next second the red welts on his skin are gone. “Thanks, Pike. And, uh… sorry for getting your hair wet, Scanlan.”

“That’s… a way of putting it, I guess,” mutters Vex.

Scanlan stops brushing wet sand off his face, still looking a little dazed. He looks up (and up, and up) at Grog and waves off the apology with a slightly shaking hand.

“Eh, it’s fine. I probably should’ve told you I can’t swim in the first place.”

Everyone stares at him in a stunned silence that Keyleth finally breaks.

“Wait,” she exclaims, “you can’t swim?”

Scanlan gives half a shrug. “Just never learned, I guess. And I learned Polymorph years ago, so I can just turn into something that swims better than I ever would anyway.”

That does nothing to placate Keyleth, whose voice climbs straight up.

“But – how did we not know that?!”

“It never came up!” protests Scanlan, eyes wide, almost defensive.

“How the hell did that never come up?”

“Guys.” Pike’s voice is clear and sharp; it’s not brittle like Vex’s was, but it’s a fine edge that slices easily through the rising tension before it turns back into her usual soothing tones. “Thank you,” she says to the two women. She opens her mouth, closes it again, and finally just says, “You know. Just… thanks.”

“You’re welcome,” Vex says in her normal voice, but her face is pretty pale for all that she just ran a bunch of yards to go get Keyleth. “And Scanlan?”

Grog almost expects him to look up and go “Oi?” with a small smile that could mean pretty much anything. But he just looks up at Vex and doesn’t smile. His eyebrows go up a bit.

“A soon as we can find a body of water that doesn’t have waves in it –”

“Or jellyfish,” adds Grog, whose takeaway of the misadventure is that those things are more dangerous than ocean waves. One corner of Vex’s mouth twitches.

“– or jellyfish, we are teaching you how to swim, darling. And that is non-negotiable.”

Scanlan’s face is still a bit white, his voice still a bit raw when he nods and says, “Understood.”

“I mean it. I hope you can handle a crash course.”

“Well,” says Scanlan, sounding a little more normal, “you know what they say about old dogs and new tricks, but I—” Vex’s eyes glint, “—yep, okay, swimming lesson, no prob.”

Vex flashes a satisfied smirk, but it only stays up for a second. The next moment she’s hugging Scanlan, and it’s over just as quickly before she mutters, “I’d better go and inform Percy that nobody died, thank the gods…”

And it’s like Grog can hear the ‘nobody else’ hidden in that sentence, clear as day.

After she leaves, Scanlan looks at Keyleth with one of those smiles that mean he’s being serious.

“Thanks, Kiki. You know, you’re pretty awesome.”

Keyleth looks less spooked now. She gives a short snort of a laugh and unfolds her long lean body from where she’s sitting on the sand.

“Yeah, well. I spent a long time learning these spells, so. I’m glad you’re okay, Scanlan,” she adds in a softer voice before following Vex.

It’s when her back is turned and she’s a few feet away that Pike – who’s been so still Grog almost expected her to start vibrating – grabs Scanlan by the shoulders and then throws her arms around him. Doesn’t kiss him, just goes straight for a tackling hug that seems to drive the air from his lungs (again).

“I thought you’d Dimension Doored to the beach,” Grog hears her say in his hair, a little muffled, because after a second of surprise Scanlan is hugging back, just as tight. “I thought you’d swum back. You should’ve said you couldn’t, you… I should’ve checked… Holy shit, Scanlan. That was so fucking dumb.”

But she’s trembling a little as she says this, so maybe it’s not really dumb to be scared still, even though everything is okay now.

…Well, kind of okay. No matter what happens, Vax will stay dead. Which means Vex, and Keyleth, and Scanlan, and Pike, and Percy, and Tary won’t really be okay okay for a long time. They’ll still have those moments where they go quiet and still and kind of fragile, like they’re made of glass you can’t quite see through. Like Grog, when his memory betrays him and he thinks I gotta show this to Vax, or Vax will go nuts when he hears that – and then he remembers that Vax is gone and they’ll never get him back.

Maybe that’s part of why Pike is holding Scanlan so tight, and why Scanlan is murmuring to her in Gnomish looking like he just smacked his head into a wall.

And since there’s no kissing involved, just ‘holy crap you’re alive I love you you’re alive’ hugging, Grog picks up his gnomes for some hugging of his own.

The thing is… well. It’s like this. It’s Wilhand and Grog and Pike and Scanlan, living in Wilhand’s house. It’s Grog and Scanlan and Pike, going to taverns and sometimes – less often than they used to, but still sometimes – going home so smashed they can’t walk straight. It’s Pike and Grog and Scanlan going to Vasselheim via teleportation circles; Grog and Scanlan check in at the Slayer’s Take headquarters while Pike drops by the Temple of Sarenrae first, Pike and Grog fight at the Crucible while Scanlan sneaks them some inspiration from the stands, and Grog and Pike and sometimes Scanlan take a contract from the Take to kill some big beast that doesn’t hold a candle to a dragon or a god but is still fun to fight.

The thing is… Grog knows gnomes live a long time. The particulars are unclear and not really interesting to be honest. He just knows that one day, he’ll be too old to fight anything – which sucks, so he hopes it won’t last a long time – and he’ll die for good, and Pike and Scanlan will still be young compared to him. That’s not scary in itself. Grog Strongjaw has never been afraid of dying (especially not since the two halves of Kevdak’s corpse hit the cobblestones of the Westruun town square). But Grog Strongjaw has learned to fear death like he used to before he learned about resurrection spells, whether it comes from the fingertips of a snarling god or the whisper of raven wings. Revivify doesn’t always work, and it gets harder if you died and got brought back more than once. And then sometimes they’re just. Gone. (They could have lost Vex for good as well at the not-wedding a couple of years ago. Sometimes Grog looks at her playing with Vesper, or slumped against Percy with her head on his shoulder, and the thought goes through his brain and leave ice in its wake for a while.)

The thing is… They’re not always out of harm’s way, but they are safe now.

They killed dragons. They thwarted a god. They lost family. They’re entitled to safe, now, right?

None of them are allowed to die before Grog. Not for real. That would just be unfair.

(Especially because of a stupid misstep and a stupid jellyfish.)

So yeah. The gnomes hug each other, and Grog hugs his gnomes.

“Hey, Scanlan,” he says when the two break apart – slightly – and make themselves comfortable against his chest without even thinking about it, out of habit.

“Yeah?”

“Are you mad we didn’t know you can’t swim?”

Something complicated flashes across Scanlan’s face for a second, but then he shakes his head.

“I’d be mad if I’d told you and you’d forgotten,” he says, and Grog believes him.

“I wouldn’t forget a thing like that.”

“I know, bud.”

“We’re gonna teach you, anyway,” Pike points out as the three of them make their way up the beach towards the others, the towels and the parasols. “And no Polymorph allowed. You’re not cheating your way out of this one.”

“That’s not cheating, that’s just… creative thinking! Swimming is boring – why would I want to swim when I can turn into a porpoise instead?”

“Why didn’t you do that earlier, then, instead of giving us all a heart attack?”

“I was taken by surprise, obviously!”

“Wait,” says Grog, “how the hell do you turn into a purpose?”

“P-o-r-p-o-i-s-e, buddies. It’s an animal. Kinda looks like a dolphin.”

“Dolphins are usually purposeful, so that tracks.”

“You’re not helping, Scanlan.”

“Yeah, you’re not helping me cultivate my litter-a-see, Scanlan.”

Grog isn’t sure (yet) how to spell ‘literacy’ and he mostly means it as a joke anyway, but Scanlan’s whole face lights up with delight, so maybe it means he stuck the landing.

Of course this is where Vesper’s little voice pipes up to ask what ‘literacy’ means, and what’s a porpoise, and then what does a jellyfish look like, because she’s a curious little one and she loves to know things and figure things out. Scanlan spins a tale on the spot for her that only looks like what actually happened if you tilt your head and squint really hard; at some point a giant whale is involved and Pike, Vex and Keyleth swing down from an airship to save the day. Percy’s eyebrows shoot up from behind his glasses at that, Keyleth laughs, and Vex grins and takes a mock bow before returning to scratch the spot behind Trinket’s ear.

Vesper listens to Scanlan with increasing awareness that this is A Story – firmly in the land of make-believe, where no one dies, nobody is ever in real danger, and all’s well that always ends well – and gives dramatic gasps and laughs at the right places.

Pike plops Scanlan’s hat on her head and settles behind him to comb the sand and the knots out of his hair with her fingers as he talks. Sometimes she smiles the same soft little smile Scanlan had earlier, while she and Grog were screaming at the ocean.

And Grog?

Grog settles on the ground, wiggling sand between his toes, and watches his family being alive.

—

Raise your hand if you love Grog Strongjaw and his gnomes 🥰

Me a couple of months ago seeing this post:

"Ooh, that's great! Great potential for comedy!" So I jotted down these lines -

“Wait, you can’t swim!? How did we not know that?” “It never came up!” “How the hell did it never come up??

- and then a couple of months later came up with the fic above 😅

Hope you liked!

[darkhymns-fic]

The falling snow tells us, our love makes us strong

Months after escaping Welgaia, Lloyd Aurion and Colette Brunel are on the run from Cruxis. But a brief rest in Flanoir has them considering an important question: Why not get married?

Fandom: Tales of Symphonia Characters: Lloyd Irving/Colette Brunel, Altessa, Pronyma, Genis Sage Rating: T Word Count: 11,232 Mirror: AO3 Notes: It's Colloyd Day! So here is the art and fic collab me and @frayed-symphony have been working on for our Cruxis Lloyd AU. More notes about this fic are on the AO3 mirror. Thank you to everyone who joined in on today's event too! ✨

--

When they had arrived at Flanoir, it was the very first time that Lloyd had ever seen snow.

They hadn’t had much time to really explore the area, already searching for an inn. That and Lloyd had been looking at every passerby with suspicion. It was routine for Cruxis to instill agents into towns, but none gave them more than a passing glance. It was just the two of them, like any couple visiting for a holiday—or perhaps any pair of travelers embarking on a pilgrimage.

He thought he could even see the spire points of a cathedral, far ahead…

“Hey, Lloyd!”

He turned, a little wired from their travels but trying to shake it away. “Huh?”

“Here!” Colette giggled as she held out her cupped hands to him. Within those hands was snow she must have gathered as they walked into the town, pure white and just so cold. He could see her shiver from the touch, but she seemed to relish it. Her smile was ecstatic, the flush on her cheeks as pretty to him as the sunrise on this world.

Tentatively, he held out his hands, accepting the snow from her as it slid down from her palms to his. “Uh, what do I do with it?”

“You can use it to make a snowman. Or even a snowball!” She tilted her head, looking at the drifting flakes around them. “At least, that’s what the child from before told me, hehe. I don’t have much snow where I come from either.”

Lloyd looked down, already feeling so cold that his hands were becoming numb. Even though he still wore his gloves, his Exsphere winking from its place on the back of his left hand, he could still feel the chill wind cutting through the fabric—and still feel the warmth of Colette’s cheeks whenever he touched them.

He grinned, packing the snow more firmer between his palms. “I think I read about this once. You gotta make it like this!”

And before Colette could ask him, Lloyd had somehow made the snowball into a doggy-shaped snow sculpture instead. It had a snout, two floppy ears, and even a tail, indicated by the small nudges in the snow. It had been carved with dextrous fingers, its simplicity belying the little details Lloyd had accomplished with it.

“Wow! How did you…?”

“Pretty cool, huh?” Lloyd said with a smile, then carefully handed it to her. “It’s…probably gonna fall apart if you so much as breathe on it, but it’s for you!”

The little doggy did look as frail as anything, already a few flakes off the top of its head blowing along with the wind. But Colette held the snowdog carefully in her hands, cupping it just so that it could be safe, as well as comfortable.

Lloyd couldn’t help but be in awe at her consideration for what was just a silly thing he made. He chuckled slightly. “You don’t have to be that careful, Colette. I don’t want you to have to keep that thing around while we walk.”

At his words, Colette raised her head, blinking curiously. “But you made it for me, Lloyd. I’d like to keep it for a little longer, if that’s okay.”

Lloyd instantly flushed. Now he worried that he sounded like he was blaming her for her caution. “I mean, you still can! Just… uh, never mind.” Sometimes he still spoke so awkwardly… and maybe it was because someone like Colette was right in front of him, caring for something that wasn’t even a living creature.

She smiled at him, holding up the snow doggy, marveling at the little details that were already in danger of melting away. “He kinda looks like the dog you have… Noishe, right?”

Lloyd swallowed, remembering Noishe, shocked almost at how much he missed those high whines of him. “Heh, yeah. I guess I was thinking about him.”

Colette nodded. “Me too.” Her gaze lifted to the far south, past the snow-coated stairs that led further into town. “I heard this place had some famous ice sculptures. Maybe we can put Snoishe there and he can be with friends!”

Lloyd almost hadn’t caught it, waiting a full three seconds before asking Colette, “Snoishe?”

“Oh!” Colette giggled and flushed as well, the redness in her cheeks matching prettily with her hair. “Hehe, that’s what I named this little doggy. Is that too weird?”

“No way! It’s…it’s cute.” Lloyd brushed away the snowflakes from his hair, feeling it grow damp. Or maybe he just needed something to do with his hands. He could always make another snow dog. “Want to see those ice sculptures then?”

And as they climbed the stairs, Colette still holding her precious doggy charge while Lloyd made sure she wouldn’t slip on any icy surface, he couldn’t help but feel warm, even in such a cold place.

He hoped they’d stay safe here, at least for a little while.

.

.

.

Because it was only just a few days before, when they’d have to lay low within a strange home carved into the mountainside within the dark, hoping no one would track them down.

Hoping Cruxis had long lost their scent and was now searching for scraps of their existence.

Lloyd remembered heavy footfalls coming through the open door, his nerves still on high-alert. But Colette’s hand in his grip didn’t tighten, didn’t flinch at their visitor. He willed himself to calm down, raising his head towards the dwarf.

“Is it alright to come near?” asked Altessa.

“Uh, yeah,” Lloyd answered. He tightened his fingers around Colette’s, feeling nothing back. Both of them sat on a bed, the guest bedroom a generous offering from their host. “She won’t do anything.”

And how many people could Lloyd say would ever take in those such as them; a boy who knew so little of the worlds below, and a girl who couldn’t speak, couldn’t laugh or cry, but only gaze ahead?

The dwarf entered the room, his eyes hidden beneath heavy brows, his beard trailing nearly to the floor. Back in Welgaia, Lloyd had never seen a dwarf, had barely even known about their existence except in books. But ever since he and Colette had escaped, Lloyd had seen so many things, so many different people that were not just the impassive faces of angels.

He looked to what Altessa was holding in his grip. “What is…”

It glinted in the lamplight. At first glance, it looked like a necklace, but the characters written into it were so ancient that even Lloyd could barely read it. A looped chain trailed from the fashioned piece of metal, the links made in it so miniscule. It seemed that even a good tug would rip the thing apart, but Lloyd recalled what Kratos told him about dwarven craftsmanship.

“The Rune Crest, by what you and that girl from Mizuho were able to give me. The old Key Crest still lives on in this.” Altessa held the accessory facing upwards, and Lloyd remembered the red jewel that had been a part of the Key Crest that Colette used to own. He couldn’t help but notice how the jewel was the same color as Colette’s eyes...

“It was still very good work, with a strong foundation and a knowledge of the craft.” Altessa gave a nod, or Lloyd assumed he did. It was hard to tell through the thicket of hair that made up much of the dwarf’s face. “But without the right ingredients, such a necklace would have only stalled the inevitable. Was it yours?”

Lloyd hadn’t expected the question, momentarily stunned as if he had been struck over the head. “Uh–I, um…” He looked away, rubbing a thumb over Colette’s skin. “Another dwarf made it. Back in Sylvarant. His name is Dirk. I don’t know how to make things like that.”

Dirk had also been one of the first people Lloyd had met since escaping Welgaia. A man with a loud laugh, a shorter beard than Altessa’s, but his eyes had been more open, more friendly to his and Colette’s plight despite barely knowing them. He was also an old friend of Kratos.

How did dad even meet a guy like him? But it was a question he wasn’t getting an answer out of anytime soon. Kratos had been gone, continually trying to throw Cruxis off their trail. There had been no guarantee if he’d even see his father again, a father he still felt he barely knew.

Lloyd rubbed a hand over his forehead, feeling dizzy. Feeling oddly alone. Because Colette still wouldn’t hold back his hand.

“Ya haven’t eaten or slept in hours, boy,” spoke Altessa once more, his voice as gruff as rocks being grounded to a fine dust. “Let Tabatha treat you to some dinner, and I will work on affixing the Rune Crest.”

“Huh? But, I’m fine.” Yet even as he said it, he was already swaying, losing his balance, and—

And Colette held onto his hand, swiftly. To keep him from tumbling to the floor.

Lloyd stiffened, suddenly so wide awake. Any of the fatigue had vanished with a faint hope that was already lightening his chest. He quickly turned to Colette, who sat on his left side. “Colette? Are you–?”

When they had left Welgaia, they had only the clothes on their back. Seeing Colette against the soft lantern lights that hung from the wooden beams overhead, she still wore her Chosen outfit, white trimmed in a light blue that turned dusky in the atmosphere. Her hair still held a golden shine, and her other hand was placed limply over her lap.

Yet even as she held onto Lloyd, Colette only continued to look ahead, her eyes steeped in red emptiness. Her wings, also, were framed behind her like a faded stained-glass window.

In every other aspect, she didn’t move. She didn’t speak. She sat there, frozen, like a sculpture.

Had it only been reflex? Was it foolish for him to think it had been more? Lloyd felt the sudden hope in him melt away.

He felt another hand press against his shoulder, roughly. Fingers kneaded through the fabric to grab his attention. But he couldn’t tear his eyes away from Colette just yet.

“Does this mean she’s still in there?” he asked Altessa.

The dwarf took a moment to form his answer. That silence was already enough to tell Lloyd what he thought. Still, he spoke, “Many who succumb to their Exspheres react on their motor skills alone. She also has that ancient sickness.”

Lloyd knew what he meant. The patches of green crystal were still present on her, reaching up to her cheeks. It had worsened since when they first met.

There was always a chance that Altessa’s craftsmanship might not be enough.

“Go now. Or you will distract me from my work.”

You’re useless here. Lloyd heard the meaning between the words. He couldn’t deny it.

Lloyd stood up finally, letting go of Colette’s hand. Her fingers slipped from his so easily, her hand going to join with the other in her lap.

Maybe it had just been reflex, after all.

Lloyd left the room, his stomach hurting, and only hoped that Altessa could cure all of their problems.

.

.

.

It wasn’t long after they visited the ice sculptures, and Colette had placed little Snoishe next to one that was called Bigfoot, (and seemed kind of intimidating… Did these kind of monsters really live on the worlds below?) that Lloyd noticed something. Even though they were still outside, the snowfall not lessening, and the chill continuing to make them shiver, Colette started to take off her gloves. First by the top right of her left hand, pulling at the fabric until it was free.

When they had left Welgaia, her crystallis had worsened, taking over that certain hand completely, encased in glass that looked in danger of breaking into pieces at any moment. Though she kept up her smile, it was clear that she was in pain, her fingers too stiff to even move, the skin always threatening to crack.

But now her hand was clear of any crystal. She could flex her fingers into her palm. The only memory of the crystal left were a few lines of scars here and there, a dim pale white against peach.

With both ungloved hands, she cupped them to her mouth, breathing out. To warm them. 

He must have stared for too long, for she caught his gaze, her head raised and her blue eyes catching the brief sunlight that could pierce through the thick clouds. Her smile made him waver a bit, made him clear his throat as he tried to cover up the embarrassment.

“Hey, um, if you’re too cold we can go inside somewhere,” he said, hoping his voice wasn’t as shaky as it sounded in his ears. “We can try staying at one of those inns you mentioned before.”

Colette once again moved her fingers, blowing out another warm breath that turned to mist in the air. She paused, looking at her hands with curiosity.

This got Lloyd to worry, a frenzy of thoughts rushing through his head. Was there suddenly a lost sensation? Did the crystal sickness come back? He walked up to her before he could think. “Colette?

And then, without any hesitation, she reached for his own hand, clasping his right together with both of her own.

Lloyd stopped, flushed deeply, but said nothing else.

“I really am cold,” Colette said, but she said so with such joy that he could feel it in the way she gripped his hands, and could see it in the turn of her smile. Snowflakes caught onto her eyelashes, only some of it falling away with a blink. “And I’m so, so glad. I also feel my own breath when I try to warm them, and I can feel you now! I was so worried I wouldn’t be able to again…”

They hadn’t really talked about it before, their rush from Altessa’s home before Cruxis could find them again overtaking their thoughts. But Lloyd rushed a thumb over Colette’s own, feeling her shiver, then clasping their hands more tightly together.

“I promise you’ll never have to go through that again.” Another brief gust of wind blew past them, whipping up their cloaks around their bodies. Lloyd shuddered a bit at how the cold bit at his ears. “And, I think we should definitely head inside somewhere. I don’t want you to suddenly get sick just after getting your sense of touch back.”

Colette giggled, taking his grip more firmly, entwining their fingers together while she let one of her hands fall to her side. “Can we keep holding hands as we walk? If that’s okay.”

Lloyd did all he could to not grin like an idiot, but by the stretch of his cheeks, he had already failed hard. He didn’t care. “Heh, yeah, I’ll keep you warm then! You can count on me!”

If he had been back in Welgaia, someone (like Kratos) would have told him to tone down his voice. How one didn’t need to shout, or show such emotions so freely. But Colette absorbed his excitement with a glow on her face, giggling along with him as they went back to the stairs that led to the different levels of the town. 

Lloyd tried to recall where the inn was exactly. Didn’t we pass by it before? He was about to lead them down, until Colette gave a little tug with their interlocked hands. 

“Hey, Lloyd. Do you see that? It looks so beautiful.”

She was looking upwards, just past a lamppost they were standing under, the light inside its glass container flickering. He followed her gaze, past the light, blinking away the snowflakes that flurried around them both.

It was only then that Lloyd suddenly realized how close they were to that cathedral, its spires reaching high into the rapidly darkening sky. Though it was up another flight of stairs, he could now clearly see its architecture. Dark stone cut walls that steeply climbed, its rooftops covered in several inches of snow. But what made it fascinating were the myriad of colors that reflected off its many windows. From sharp crimson to ever gentle green, and what little left of the sunlight making such colors shimmer before them. 

It was beautiful, and yet also so familiar. In Vinheim, Lloyd was sure he’d seen such similar designs too. He saw the shapes of people pass by it, some going through its great double doors, hearing the wood creak. 

“I know what it is now,” Colette spoke softly, catching his attention. She kept their hands clasped, even as she looked further away at the structure. “There’s another church similar to this back in Sylvarant, so grand and wonderful. A place where you could pray to Martel. I know it’s made by Cruxis, but…” 

Lloyd heard the strange note in her voice, a mixture of emotion he wasn’t sure he could identify. Sadness? Or pain? Maybe even anger at all the lies Cruxis had fed her all her life? “Colette… If it’s too much, we can leave this place. We’ll find another town to rest in.”

“No, that’s not…” She shook her head. He noticed how the flush rose in her cheeks. “I’m sorry, Lloyd. But, it’s not that I’m unhappy seeing this. It’s, well, it actually reminded me that I wanted to ask you something…”

He didn’t understand just yet, but he wanted to. He wanted to learn more about Colette, as eager as a starving man stranded in the wilderness. Because that’s what all these years had felt like without her; empty and weary, but her face broke the pattern of the gray stillness he had long been used to.

Maybe it showed in Lloyd’s face, his desperation, until Colette’s eyes met with his. She held his hands gently, as she did with that silly snow dog he had made, unaware he had crafted it in the shape of Noishe. Is Noishe okay with Dirk? he asked himself, remembering seeing his dog, once his only friend, comfortable in the makeshift stable the dwarf had created for him, as if the place had always been his home.

Then, Colette lifted up his hand, still encased in his glove. It had been too cold for him to remove it like he did with hers. He wasn’t used to this weather, to the changing seasons as with everything else that made up both Sylvarant and Tethe’alla. 

She held up his hand by the fingers, his knuckles then pressed against her lips. She did it softly, the warmth of it rushing through the fabric, making his chest tighten and his heart beat rapidly. Suddenly, his face felt hot, despite all the snow.

It took him a moment or two to realize that she had just kissed his hand. He didn’t even know what to say.

Back in Altessa’s home, underneath the night sky, he had also felt this same sensation when she…

Underneath the softly flickering lamplight, as the snows fell around them both, Colette finally asked her question.

.

.

.

“Keep her hidden,” Kratos had told Lloyd on his brief visit—so brief, Lloyd could barely remember if his father had mentioned anything else. “And don’t bring attention to yourself.”

On Welgaia, before they had made their escape, Lloyd had rarely left his room. He made sure to keep the door locked, and to sneak away food from the nearby supply machines. Arms full of gels, of fruits and vegetables, and other packaged assortments that he had never seen another angel ever eat. But just like with the coffee from before, he shared such treats with Colette, who stayed huddled in the blankets of his bed.

Lloyd tried to get rid of the nervousness of having another person in his room, messy as it was. Just his bed and some sparse furniture, along with a few plants he had focused on to grow underneath artificial lights. She didn’t seem to mind though, especially as Noishe had nuzzled her cheek with affection, his tail wagging at the excitement. It was probably one of the first times Lloyd had ever seen Noishe not balk or whine at the concept of a new person hanging around.

Colette, sitting on his bed and wrapped in blankets, had been busy scratching behind Noishe’s ears before Lloyd relayed her the news. The crystal over her arm had slipped past her sleeves. She unconsciously pulled it back down, hiding it from sight.

“Mr. Kratos was here?” she had asked him.

“Yeah…for a little bit.” He scratched the back of his neck, taking a roll of bread from the stash he brought, and taking a big bite from it. “I don’t know what he’s up to though. He never really tells me anything if he can help it.” He swallowed, then offered the other half of his meal. “Want some?”

Colette nodded, her own bites a small nibble in comparison, as if she didn’t want to intrude too much on this offered food item. She made a curious noise in his throat. “This tastes a little strange…”

“Huh? Is it bad?” He was sure the bread hadn’t gone stale… It physically couldn’t, unless the machine was broken.

“No, not bad… just different. Maybe because it’s not made the way our bread is back on Sylvarant.” She tilted her head. “Or…are my senses being strange again?”

Lloyd didn’t know. If Kratos was still here, he could have probably asked him, but his father never stayed in one place for so long. “It’s probably because it’s, uh, synthetic? I think that’s the right word. Hey, I can just get us more food though!” With a quick gulp of a gel, Lloyd got up, then wagged a finger at Noishe. “Don’t eat the gels, Noishe. They’re bad for you. Too much sugar!”

A soft plaintive whine, followed by Colette giggling besides the furry creature. “Can I feed him some of these sausages then?”

“Well… just a little!” Lloyd answered as if he never snuck his dog a pile of sausage slices himself. “But try to stay quiet in case anyone’s around. I’ll be back!”

Colette nodded, smiling at him. “Okay. You be careful, too.” She said so while still wrapped in his blankets, her hair shining brightly, even in the dimness of his room.

He had only known her for a few days, keeping her in his room. She had slept for so many hours, catching up on the rest she had sorely missed during her sickness. She saw her yawn a bit, and was certain she’d take another nap again.

No one else had ever slept in his bed before. Noishe didn’t count.

Lloyd left quietly, letting the door, powered by magitechnology, whoosh past him to slide shut. He left the hallway, finally making it out of one of the many empty buildings for the supply machines.

Welgaia had always been a place filled with silence, the air charged from remembered encounters. It wasn’t like Lloyd talked with people every day—sometimes not even for weeks at a time. The entire population was filled with other angels who barely spoke, who barely moved a muscle, letting their wings take them where they needed to go. They never even needed to blink.

Lloyd brushed past some of these angels, who conversed with each other only when it concerned with their duties (“Lord Yggdrasill has stated retrieval of the Chosen as our top priority.” “The warp pad is currently at 70 percent efficiency. Repairs are forthcoming.”) Few barely gave him a glance. It seemed these angels weren’t given the information that it had been up to Lloyd to find the Chosen.

He was so glad none of them had the capacity to be curious enough to ask.

His wings dissipated as he flew towards a platform for a familiar machine—one that should work and not be close to breaking down like a few others. Lloyd always wondered if all the machines suddenly stopped working, would he just starve? No one else seemed to ever need to use these. 

It won’t matter once we leave, he thought, fiddling with the buttons and dials, until he felt a presence near him.

He didn’t even need to hear her speak to know who it was.

“You again.”

Lloyd, with half an orange gel in his mouth from his latest stash, turned around quickly to face her. Keep an eye on your surroundings, Kratos had told him. If his dad had been watching right now, he would have given him a failing grade.

He had met Pronyma enough times, as she tended to visit Welgaia. The lady was hard to miss. Her attire did all it could to make an entrance, the fanning blades of her armor now enclosed around her, like a shield of metal. But Lloyd knew if anyone got close enough, those same blades would reach outward, impaling anyone who came too close.

Lloyd didn’t remember this exactly—but Kratos had mentioned how at seven years old, he had nearly gone too close to the woman, wandering to her in curiosity. Kratos still sported a scar across his forearm when he had shielded Lloyd quickly from the attack. “Said she never liked children,” Kratos had said, his tone completely humorless. Even though it had happened years ago, Lloyd had never seen his father so quietly angry.

She wasn’t as close to him now, but her dark eyes, painted in kohl, riveted onto him, as well as onto the several gels he was holding in his right palm. No one really hung out around the food dispenser he was at—he was still one of the only people here who regularly ate food. Or gels.

Then again, Pronyma wasn’t an angel. Does she actually use these?

“You… need something?” Lloyd mumbled in confusion, still chewing on his gel.

At that, Pronyma snorted in disgust. “So, you still talk with your mouth full, I see.” Then a smile, her lips cutting across her face in a dark line. “Lord Yggdrasill is truly so merciful.”

It was more than just her words—her tone was biting into him. But Lloyd held back any remarks he was tempted to make. Kratos had told him not to, that and the gel did effectively keep him from talking too much.

Even after all this time, Lloyd knew so little about Pronyma, or what exactly her role was besides being a Grand Cardinal. It was also so rare to see her on her own, usually so attached Yggdrasill’s side, like some loyal dog.

And like a dog, she obeyed her master’s commands, punishing Lloyd to the fullest. His side still ached from the last time.

Frustrated she was still here, Lloyd pointedly turned away. “I have to go,” he said.

He didn’t see her expression, but her tone did all the imagining for him. “Oh? Does this mean you actually have your other duties to attend to, besides stuffing your face? Or that you will finally do what Lord Yggdrasill has ordered of you?”

Find the Chosen. Find Colette. And bring her to Lord Yggdrasill.

He would never follow through on that last command.

Gritting his teeth, he turned back—and that was when Pronyma moved a fraction closer.

Lloyd did all he could to not relinquish any space to her. She was his same height, but her demeanor made her more intimidating than even Yggdrasill at times. “Each of Lord Yggdrasill’s servants have their tasks. You’d do well to remember that.”

He never understood why she seemed to hate him so much.

At that point, Lloyd couldn’t help it. “I’m not his lackey,” he said, and that unlocked even more from him. “I’m not like you!”

He inwardly winced. That was a mistake.

Pronyma frowned immediately, uncrossing her arms. She just barely floated in the air, the tips of her steel-toed heels hovering only an inch above the floor. She floated towards him again.

Lloyd instinctively unsheathed one of his swords, practically hearing Kratos’ reprimanding voice in his head the very second he did so. Another mistake.

“And what exactly do you expect to do with that?” she asked him. She leaned over, Lloyd unsure whether to raise his sword or put it away, and instead held it mid-level. Her smile was so cruel and poisonous, that he tried not to look at it. But there wasn’t much elsewhere to retreat to. It seemed like she blocked any reasonable path of escape.

It was the same smile she had given when she attacked him on Yggdrasill’s orders. Cruel and vindictive, and oddly joyous at him failing to do anything else.

She saw him hesitate. She deftly knocked the sword aside with her heavy mace she was suddenly holding, the metal glinting a bright gold in its arc.

The quick motion had made him drop it. His grip had been lax, his nerves had been shaky. And his mouth still tasted of the orange gel. 

“I could very much report to Lord Yggdrasill that you are causing trouble again, ignoring your task . It would be simple, since you already do so often enough.” Then, surprisingly, she moved back.

Lloyd found himself breathing again. He hadn’t before?

With a bored shrug, she was turning away again. There were different parts of Welgaia, and the hint of violet above for what served as their ‘skies’ was broiling, more evident out here, more aware that Yggdrasill’s domain was not far ahead.

“The Chosen must be retrieved soon. Surely you remember that.” She said the words in nearly a hiss. “Or do you wish for your father to die?”

The words sent a brief flash of rage through him. Rage and contempt. His father had been under their noses, had even visited Lloyd, and Pronyma still had no clue. Or she wouldn’t be talking so easily about Kratos with that awful smile on her face.

“You can’t even find him like you can’t find the Chosen!” he shot back. “So do I even have anything to worry about?”

Immediately he felt a backhand across his face. The force was so strong he thought he had been hit with a boulder. He stumbled, hitting the side of the machine roughly, hearing the metal dent and crack.

And when he raised his head, Pronyma’s smile was gone. Her teeth were bared, and her eyes suddenly looked so dark and furious.

“Impudent little pest. You’ve been on such good behavior, even agreeing to follow on your latest orders. And yet, you would go and ruin all that?” She then grabbed Lloyd’s chin, bringing him around to face her again.

“H-Hey! What are you—?”

“Be quiet, Son of Kratos. Pure filth. All your little rebellious attempts have given you nothing. A pity you simply can’t be executed along with your miserable traitor of a father, but Mithos saw there was more use for you. I won’t question him. My Lord knows best.”

The shock and discomfort he was feeling was soon overtaken by confusion. “Mithos?”

Pronyma’s eyes widened.

“You called him—”

“Shut up.”

She tightened her grip, nails digging into his skin. He reflexively reached for her wrist to pull away—but it was like she was made of stone. “Let me go!”

“Did you forget your other sword?”

She pushed him away before he could respond. Lloyd stumbled, his back hitting the machine again . Though he flinched, he tried to keep his eyes open. He could already feel his wings start to form to each side of him, his emotions still running high.

Any of the previous shock from before had left Pronyma’s face. Instead, she smiled once more. A cold expression, her lips in a thin line. “Or maybe Yggdrasill’s lesson has rubbed off on you. I will be sure to give him the good news.”

With that, she vanished, lines of shadow cutting through her image before she fully faded away. Lloyd had already turned away by then, looking towards his fallen sword.

Dammit. He winced, trying to stand, his face now feeling sensitive. Guess that could have gone worse.

Lloyd attempted to get back to getting more of the food from the machine until he took another look at it. It was almost half-destroyed, the front glass of it cracked, and the buttons dislodged. Electricity sparked from its sides. 

It was completely broken, another machine left to decay in this already dead world. Lloyd sighed, looking at the few orange gels he had managed to snag before the end. 

At least he and Colette wouldn’t starve just yet.

He couldn’t even remember the journey back, his motions almost mechanical. A quick flight past other angels who still didn’t give him a glance, a turn into an empty structure, then unlocking his door. The orange gels already felt too warm in his hands, and he sighed at his incompetence of even doing this single thing right.

“Hey, Colette. Sorry, I wasn’t really able to get much…”

He stopped when he heard a startled gasp. Raising his head, he saw how Colette had already left her cocoon of blankets, rushing up to him.

“Lloyd! Your face…”

“Huh?” He pressed two fingers gingerly against his cheek, then winced. Ugh. If it already hurt this much, he could only imagine how bad the bruise must have been. “Sorry, I just…got caught off guard.”

Colette still looked at him with that worried expression. She reached out her hand—the one where the crystal had spread up past her wrist—and then hesitated. Yet, it was only for a second, for she then pressed her hand against his cheek so gently, so softly. 

Lloyd felt sensitive at being touched, but it didn’t spark any new pain. He found himself leaning into that touch, without fully realizing it.

“Who did this to you?” she asked him. She talked to him in such a soft voice, that it almost made his heart break.

He couldn’t remember anyone ever talking to him like this, like he was fragile and precious. If Kratos ever did, it was probably back when he was a kid, back from when he could barely remember anything.

Lloyd shook. “It’s…nobody. Nothing.” He looked away. “I’ll heal up quick. That’s what my Exsphere is for.”

“But…it still hurts you, doesn’t it?”

It did so, so much.

Lloyd couldn’t find it in himself to answer, but he felt Colette take his other hand, leading him to the bed. Sometimes, after a punishment from either Yggdrasill, or from Pronyma, or even another angel following orders, Lloyd would collapse onto his bed, waiting for the pain to finally fade away. Maybe, in some ways, he was a bit jealous of the other angels. They didn’t have to feel anything like this.

But then they didn’t feel anything at all regardless.

The last time he had done this, he had been paralyzed, Yggdrasill standing over him and giving him his orders to bring Colette. But now, it was Colette who led him to it, who wrapped the blankets around him, and then her arms. 

She laid with him on the bed, holding him close. To his other side, he could feel Noishe curling up beside him, his wet nose nuzzling against his hand.

“We can give you an apple gel if you’re still feeling bad,” Colette told him. Her head was pressed into his chest, her hair tickling his chin. “I’m sorry you got hurt.”

“Don’t…apologize. How is it your fault?” But even as he spoke, something in his voice cracked. His body shook, and then his arms wrapped around Colette so tightly. She didn’t seem to mind the strain. “It’s never your fault.”

A pause, before Colette whispered to him, “Then, please know that it’s not your fault either. Don’t blame yourself for getting hurt.” She looked up at him, her eyes bright in the dark.

There was something there that she knew, more deeply than anything else.

They continued to hold each other in the bed, quietly, even as Lloyd felt himself sobbing for the first time in years.

.

.

.

“Lloyd, will you marry me?”

Colette’s voice was as clear as a bell within the winter air.

How she held his hand was that same gentleness from before, all those nights ago. Even with his palms callused from his training, from using his swords to fight against the angels that continually chased after them, she handled it delicately within her own.

He stood there, his cheeks hot, his mouth half-open. Only dimly was he aware of the townspeople that walked around them, traveling up those same stars, going into nearby shops or even to that same church. 

“I…” he croaked out, his voice halting. 

Colette was patient with his shortcomings as always. She smiled at him, even as she shivered in her cloak. “I know it’s sudden,” she said to him. “And I know we haven’t even known each other for that long… But I’ve never been happier than I am with you. I feel…more alive than I ever have before.”

Alive. Something in that word held meaning. 

Lloyd, whose memories consisted of the dead world of Welgaia, knowing only the dead eyes of angels—had he ever been living before?

Colette laughed slightly, nervousness finally leaking through. “But, we don’t have to! It’s a little silly, isn’t it?” Her fingers tapped against his hand. He still remembered the feel of her kiss against it. “And you must be really tired from all that traveling—”

“I want to.”

Colette paused, blinking. She stared up at Lloyd, the snowflakes catching onto her eyelashes. It made him want to reach out and brush them away so much. It made him want to kiss them, to hold her close, to feel the heat even in the deep chill.

“Wait, I mean yes!” Lloyd restrained himself from smacking his own head. “That’s what I’m supposed to say, right? So, yes! I want to marry you!”

He spoke so loud that a few heads turned at his shouting. Some with raised eyebrows, others with laughing grins. Lloyd flushed in embarrassment. Maybe they thought he was proposing when it was the other way around…

“Lloyd…” Colette said his name in soft whisper, holding it as gently as she held his hand. “Are you sure?”

He grinned wide, gripping her hands back and bringing her close. He embraced her, just as they did in his bed, but with a giddy happiness this time. A hopeful thing blossoming in his chest as the wind gently tugged at both of their cloaks.

“Colette, I want to marry you,” he said, and knew what that meant, even having grown up in a world where such things hadn’t even been a possibility.

To say yes was to continue to live.

.

.

.

“You’re very weird, you know.”

Lloyd jumped, turning around to see the small child next to him in the kitchen of a wooden home. The boy’s silver hair shone from the sun beaming through an open window, the locks hiding his long ears. Genis had called himself an elf, but Lloyd could sense the mana coming from him. The mixture of human and elf was something he was all too familiar with, remembering the angels back home.

“...I don’t follow,” Lloyd said. He was leaning on a counter, to the spot closest to a window.

Genis rolled his eyes. “You act like you’ve never seen trees before.”

“...Ohhh.” Well, of course. “Uh, they’re kinda rare where I’m from, you know! So it’s kinda new to me.”

Nice save! Lloyd thought with pride. 

He probably shouldn’t have just begun staring at the trees out the window for what must have been more than ten minutes, but there were just so many! After escaping from Welgaia, it was all he could do to not just examine every small thing he came across; from the river that cut through the ground just past this house, to even the home itself with its walls made of cut wood. The only real metal he saw was from Dirk’s blacksmithing corner of the house, along with a cooking pot that hung near a stove—the same cooking pot Genis was using now, cutting some vegetables to dump into the pot.

Lloyd shifted his feet, hearing the wood creak underneath his boots. He and Colette had arrived here just a day ago, finally making their escape from Welgaia. He thought he’d be prepared, but he didn’t expect such a stark difference from the world he had lived in for all of his life.

Everything here just felt so alive.

“So… have you been living in someplace like Triet? I guess there’s not many trees there.” Genis seemed to really ponder on this, still staring at Lloyd with some suspicion, even as he multitasked on his cooking. His sister, the one called Raine, had apparently gone to see Colette who was still upstairs, but she hadn’t looked at Lloyd with much welcome in her eyes either.

Lloyd wondered if it was the way he was dressed. He supposed he hadn’t changed out of his training outfit yet…

“It seems like a very strange ecosystem that you lived in if trees really are a rarity.” 

The kid really wouldn’t let it go. Lloyd tried to shrug nonchalantly, eyes fixated on a little snail that crawled by the riverbank in the distance. So that’s what they look like… “Well, I just traveled around. Like my dad. We never stayed in one place. Uh, like places with not much trees!”

Oh, now he just sounded crazy.

Lloyd really just wanted to keep exploring this strange land, and was half-tempted to just leap through the window to do so. When he and Colette had escaped through one of the working warp pads from Welgaia, the sheer amount of greenery and fresh air was something he was still reeling from. But they’d had to rush from Kratos’ directions, finding this home that belonged to a dwarf, one that Kratos had apparently known for years.

And one of the first things the dwarf had said upon greeting Lloyd, warm eyes beneath bushy brows, was, “Haven’t seen ya since you were a small babe. You’ve truly grown.”

It set something aching in Lloyd, suddenly, even with Dirk’s kindness. I could have lived here.

Genis was still staring at him, even as a breeze picked up and blew through the window, tousling both of their hair. The wind brought in the scent of the nearby oak trees, making Lloyd’s nose tickle.

And Genis still kept staring at him.

“Do you…have to keep looking at me?” Lloyd asked, not without some annoyance in his tone.

Genis was not put off. In fact, he raised his head to meet Lloyd’s eyes fully. “Hey, you’re the one that’s hanging out in the kitchen with me.”

“I’m just waiting for Colette to be done, that’s all!” he said in a huff.

“And that’s another thing. My best friend suddenly shows up with some guy who doesn’t know what trees look like. I’m supposed to just accept that like it’s no big deal?”

“But I’m not doing anything!” Lloyd groaned, crossing his arms. “I just haven’t been here before.”

“Hm. And that you’re Kratos’ son?”

“Hey, I know he’s mentioned me!” Kind of. Sort of. Lloyd shook his head, going back to looking at some wildflowers growing in a pot by the door. Something new to look at, because even though the trees were fascinating, it did get a bit boring.

Then, a sigh from behind him. What else was this Genis kid going to complain about next?

“I thought I’d never see Colette again.”

The tone of Genis’ voice startled Lloyd enough to turn around. Suddenly, any of that attitude from before had evaporated, leaving a boy with sad eyes, looking towards the boiling cooking pot.

“When I saw her get taken at the tower, I thought… that would be it. She was gone forever, and Kratos was the one who took over. I didn’t even know it would be like that until…” His voice died, still looking away, the sun beating down on his silver hair.

Lloyd just stood there, unsure at first what to say. Would anything he said even be wanted? Kratos’ son. From what Colette had told him, they thought his father had betrayed them, giving her to Cruxis. So, would they really trust his son any better?

He thought on it for so long, with only the birdsong to fill in the silence—which was another fascination that Lloyd experienced. To hear sounds that weren't just the hum of machines or electrical wiring. There was the wind, the rustling of the trees, and the small animals that scurried into the bushes, away from his eyes.

“So, is it true?” Genis suddenly asked.

“Uh, what?” Lloyd asked dumbly. Damn, he was really not doing this first impression thing well. 

The boy took a moment before he followed up with, “That you’re in love with Colette.”

…

What?

Lloyd was still, a thousand lines coming up in his head, none of them making sense. Most lines were said in his father’s voice, telling him to do something to minimize the damage to the situation, and that he was being reckless again. 

And then he realized he had stayed quiet for too long. Long enough for Genis to be smirking at him like that.

“Who told you?” was what Lloyd finally decided to say.

And then, Genis was smiling. His expression held a smugness to his features that confused Lloyd.

“Wow, you admitted that pretty fast. And here I thought you’d try to keep denying it!”

It took a moment for Lloyd to really process the word. “Wait, did you just trick me? That’s not fair!”

“Is it really tricking you though? Geez, you’re really bad at lying. But, I can see why Colette likes you too.”

If it was possible, Lloyd’s face got even redder—at least it felt like it did. Then…

Colette likes me?

But before he could even begin to ask Genis how he would know anything about that, footsteps echoed from the stairs above.

“Genis! Lloyd!” Colette had quickly run down, with the woman called Raine following behind. Lloyd thought Raine had seemed cold to him, but did something change recently? He thought her eyes looked softer. “Sorry, I got caught up telling the Professor…” She looked over at the pot. “Oh, you’re making lunch?”

“Yep!” Genis said with a bit of bravado only a twelve-year old could pull off. “Some of your favorite soup to celebrate you being back with us!”

“Oh, thank you, Genis! I missed your cooking so much.” Colette then looked at Lloyd, her hands clasped, still covering up the green patches on her skin. “Are you doing okay, Lloyd?”

Lloyd tried to answer, but the words from Genis, I can see why Colette likes you, kept echoing in his head. He eventually said, “Uh, yeah! Just excited to eat, too!”

This would be the first time he would have real food, not made in a machine, but by another’s hands.

“You’re lucky I made enough for everyone,” said Genis, but already he poured the soup he made from the pot into a wooden bowl, handling the ladle with expertise. Then, he handed the bowl to Lloyd. “Here.”

The contents were an orange-red color, thick when Lloyd stirred it with a spoon. He thought he could smell spices from it.

“What is it?”

Genis grinned. “Tomato soup. Go on, try it!”

And when he did so, he just proved Genis’ point in the end. He really was a terrible liar.

.

.

.

“I guess it’s called eloping. I mean, with what we’re doing.”

“Eloping…” Lloyd stretched out the word, trying to figure out its meaning and contours. He might have come across that word in a book, but the definition escaped him. “Is that bad?”

At that, Colette flushed, huddling into her cloak as they climbed their way up the stairs. She fiddled with something over her finger, turning it every which way. “I think I used to believe that… But it doesn’t feel that way now.” She faced him as they reached the top steps, smiling. “It just means we’re getting married without our parents knowing. But we can always tell them later!”

That made sense to Lloyd! “Yeah! We can just tell them how it went.”

“Mmhmm!” Colette nodded, then grabbed for his hand to rush for the double-doors. “Let’s go inside!”

In the swirling snows, Lloyd caught the silver gleam around her finger, but once inside the church, his attention was soon drawn elsewhere.

The interior was softly lit up by candlelight, which were placed in intervals by the walls of the church. A few people were inside, some of them sitting in the pews that lined up on both the left and right sections of the tiled floor. Up ahead, Lloyd saw a dais, near where those in cloth robes softly spoke with each other.

Sometimes, with the help of his Exsphere, Lloyd could pick up on whispers that were spoken from across the room. Kratos had taught him how, and he had kept that sense on, in case someone from Cruxis was nearby, spying on them.

But what he heard most of all was the name Martel.

It was a name that he heard Yggdrasill speak of. Yggdrasill and, sometimes, his father. And whenever they spoke of her to Lloyd, it always sounded like they talked about two different people. 

Lloyd let his eyes roam across the church, from the polished marble tiles to the stained glass windows. It did remind him of Vinheim, in some ways. Except, this place wasn’t in ruins, the walls crumbling and the windows shattered. It also wasn’t empty or devoid of any life. People moved around, albeit in hushed tones. Footsteps echoed around the interior, and even a stray cough could be heard clearly. It made one feel exposed to something grand and imposing. In that way, at least, it was like Vinheim.

Lloyd saw the workings of Cruxis woven into every fiber of its construction, from the sweeping pillars to the dazzling colors of those windows. In one of them, Lloyd saw a woman’s face that was inlaid in the glass. She had long locks of emerald hair and soft eyes, half-lidded in prayer. Her arms were stretched out wide, as if in welcoming. 

His first thought as he looked at her was, That’s Martel.

He felt a gentle tug on his sleeve, turning to Colette who waited by his side patiently.

“Oh, sorry, I was just looking around. This place is really big…”

But she smiled at him knowingly. Her eyes also glanced towards the stained glass window, seeing the woman depicted. Rays of the sun shone behind her head, and a flowing dress hugged her form as she stepped over green hills. Even in the dim evening, every detail could be seen.

Colette started to lift both her hands up to clasp, then stopped herself. She hesitated before letting her hands fall back to her sides. “I know Martel isn’t really a goddess. Not after everything we’ve seen… It’s just hard to break the habit sometimes.” She once again fiddled with the gleaming shine from her finger. “But, you know… I think that actually makes me feel relieved. It means, she never chose for any of this to happen.”

A few people shuffled past to enter the church, and both Lloyd and Colette hurriedly moved out of the way. Colette did a small trip against one of the tiles, and in reflex, Lloyd reached out, holding her by the waist. The suddenness of it made them both retreat even further into a darker corner of the church, hidden from the candlelight, and even the shine from the windows.

Lloyd looked down at Colette, her face so near, and the air so hushed from whatever reverence the people had for this church, for the deities that Cruxis had laid out for them all. But he didn’t really think about any of that, still so focused on her eyes.

It was strangely dark here, in this tiny corner of the Church, and one of the pillars was effectively hiding them away.

Colette placed both hands on his chest, fingers moving underneath the cloak that still hung around his shoulders. Suddenly, she was quiet. Suddenly, they were both quiet.

They had run and rushed through so much to finally escape, to come here—and now that they had, everything froze completely.

Lloyd hugged Colette so closely then, hands against her back, feeling her warmth. She embraced him back, and they were like that for a while, hiding in the dark of the church. He didn’t want to ever let her go.

He loved her. And he’d known that for a long time.

“Is it still okay to get married here?” Colette asked him softly. He felt her fingers against the back of his neck, along with something cool and solid. “Maybe it’s odd with Martel looking down at us…”

At that, Lloyd grinned, reaching to take one of her hands and hold it in his own. He saw clearly the ring on her finger, matching his. They had bought it from the jewelry shop, cheap ones that they could afford. But it was enough. “You know, I think she’d like this… That we’re doing this.”

Colette raised her eyes at him curiously. “Really? Why do you say that?”

Lloyd’s eyes grew soft, lost in memory. “Because whenever my dad mentioned her, he talked about her like she was a real person. Maybe she was like us, too.” He shrugged. “It probably doesn’t make a lot of sense now that I’m saying it out loud…”

But the small laughter he heard from Colette, as she also entwined their fingers and matched with their rings, let him know that maybe what he said hadn’t been so out of place after all. 

“I think so too,” she said, then added shyly, “Maybe she felt the same way about someone else.”

Lloyd didn’t know, only having half-told stories and proclamations that he had heard all his life. But he wanted to believe it, more than anything. 

.

.

.

Once, Colette had believed herself to be at peace with her death. 

After all, she had been prepared for it for much of her life. Her journey emphasized it with each step of the way; a loss of her senses, a loss of her voice, and a loss of her place within the world. No one else had wings such as hers, and no one else looked to the tower as she did, hoping and dreading, wanting and detesting. But the chain that tethered her to what would be her final resting place couldn’t be broken. Each seal she unlocked further took away her humanity. 

Except, she had just been lying to herself. At the final seal, as Remiel looked down at her with a deep-set frown, she realized she didn’t want to die after all.

And didn’t that make her such a worthless Chosen in the end?

“...lette? Colette?”

She blinked, and the shadows cleared from her eyes. The soft lamplight that hung from the ceiling made her feel suddenly so fatigued. Her limbs were heavy, and she thought she had been laying down for a week or more. But no, she was seated on a chair, numbness leaving her throat, and a fog lifting from her mind. Memories coalesced, shifted with the reality of the home she woke up in, of the boy who stood in front of her, hands linking with hers.

“...Lloyd,” she spoke, her voice a bit dry and cracked, as if she had been wandering the desert. She couldn’t help but cough a little, and immediately, a water cup was handed to her by another soul in the room. She looked to her right, seeing a woman with long green hair that rippled down her back in a neat braid.

“Please. Drink this,” spoke the woman, as halting as the strange angels she had seen up in a place she once thought to be heaven.

Lloyd immediately unlinked their hands, his cheeks flushed, but heaving a sigh of relief. “You’re back, Colette! I was really worried because at first it didn’t seem to work but, Altessa said it might take time… Ah, sorry! You don’t know him, he’s—”

“The dwarf that lives here?” Colette said, half-confused at her own words. She shook her head, finally gripping the water cup in both hands. “I think I remember. We were running from Cruxis because they had caught up to us and…”

And then sudden darkness. She fell into cold waters and couldn’t seem to get herself to reach the top. So stuck she had been, seeing muted pictures moving before her, hearing half-whispers that sounded like her name. Such memories slowly started to fall into place…

She had left Lloyd alone, with no idea of how he could save her.

Lloyd smiled sheepishly, and his breath was shaky from past worries. But when he smiled at her, it was so beautiful that she temporarily lost her breath. She then took a sip of the water, tasting its freshness, relieved she wasn’t back to her senseless state again.

“I’m really sorry to have caused so much trouble,” she told him, heaving out a sigh. But a quick glance at her hands told her something else, noticing the lack of crystal over her skin. It’s cured? she thought, and of course if she could now speak, and feel, and no longer was left in an endless dusk, Lloyd would find a way to cure her.

Alive, and with no mark of her failure on her anymore.

“I can get you more water,” spoke the green-haired woman, again in those halting tones, taking back the cup. Something about her seemed so awfully familiar to Colette, and it was beyond just what she might have experienced in her soulless state. Looking at the woman brought a sense of nostalgia to her, something she had known since she was little—but the woman left the room, and such thoughts were set to fade once more.

She tried immediately to stand up, and struggled to do so. Her legs were wobbly, her steps more unsteady than usual. Lloyd immediately went to her side, holding her up by her right arm.

“Hey, you should keep resting for now!” His touch was warm on her arm, and she was suddenly so very hungry to keep feeling it. She almost latched onto him in a fierce hug, stopping herself from doing so.

Instead, she said, “But, I think I want to see the stars. Would it be okay to go outside?”

Maybe it was selfish, and she could see the hesitation in Lloyd’s eyes, but a quick look towards the windows seemed to decide for him. “I guess it’s pretty calm out there. Are you sure you can walk?”

At the question, Colette couldn’t help herself. She was always adept at lying, after all.

“I think I could use some help after all,” she said with a smile, happy to feel his touch just a little bit longer. 

Altessa’s home was situated in an isolated place, the rocky cliffside so very steep, but facing a dense forest to the north. The sky outside was full of wondrous stars, inlaid with streams of violet stuck within the black. Colette looked out to it, relieved to see such a sight was still familiar, even in this other world.

It had been the same feeling when in Welgaia, seeing the stars just outside the tower, so high up it pierced the very clouds. 

She glanced a look at Lloyd, who also raised his head to the night sky. He still wore his clothes from back on Welgaia, a wine-red outfit that echoed Kratos’ when he had traveled with Colette on Sylvarant. In the dimness, she saw even more features of her once-bodyguard in Lloyd; in the spikes of his hair, in the sweep of his neck, and the soft russet eyes that reflected back those stars.

But there was something else, something that was decidedly Lloyd’s that gripped at Colette’s heart more than anything else. She had never felt this way with anyone before. She had never thought it to be possible, always keeping such feelings down before they could blossom past admiration or childhood crushes.

She was in love with Lloyd. She didn’t know when it started, but she knew this to be a fact, as sure as she once did in her fate as a Chosen.

Except this time, it filled her heart instead of leaving it hollow.

“Sheena said we could head to a place up north next,” Lloyd was saying, looking out over the horizon. “She said it’s called Flanoir, and that we could travel to it on an EC? I don’t really know what that is though…”

Colette blinked, feeling a little ashamed that she hadn’t been thinking about Sheena, or Genis and Raine, or the other new friends they had made like Presea, who had shown them the way to Altessa’s home, or even Zelos, another Chosen like her… Was he still in Meltokio, unable to move from his place because of the Pope keeping an eye on him?

“Will Sheena be coming with us?” she asked him, unsure what she was hoping to hear.

Lloyd shook his head, the moonlight bouncing off his hair, casting it almost silver. “No, she has to go back to Mizuho, in case anyone from Cruxis comes by… I wonder if they’re still tracking us.”

Colette read between the lines. “So we’d be by ourselves?”

Lloyd cleared his throat, but she thought she saw the red dusting his cheeks again. “Eheh, yeah. But don’t worry! I’ll be better at fighting them off this time, I swear! I won’t… I won’t let them do that to you again.”

Colette’s memory was still hazy, but what she could recall was the imprint of her hands around her chakrams, Remiel going near her, reaching out to her Cruxis Crystal before everything went dark, like a candlelight going out.

She saw the worry flit across Lloyd’s eyes, and wondered if he was reliving that memory, one that was much clearer to him, one that he must have repeated in his head while she was locked inside her body.

“But I’m okay now,” she reassured him, placing a hand over her heart. She felt her own heartbeat, wondering if that same heart had slowed when her soul was trapped in chrysalis. “And we can keep traveling together too!”

Somehow, that question set something conflicting in Lloyd’s face, one that made her want to reach out and touch, to calm. “Is that really what you want?”

She stopped hesitating, and reached out her hands to his face.

As she did so, she felt her wings span out from her back. Maybe it was to test if she still held her angelic powers, or maybe it was the sensation of Lloyd’s skin against her hands, setting her heart racing. She saw the color of her wings reflected in his eyes, how he stared at her, seeing only her as the crickets chirped in the nearby grass, as the nightbirds sang in the distance.

She saw his own wings move past his shoulder blades; grand ones that were a brilliant blue, like a mid-afternoon sky. She felt such wings could wrap around her and keep her safe, but could she do the same for him? Could she keep him safe from all that had happened, and continued to happen as they tried to find a way to change the broken scales these worlds were balanced on?

“Of course I do,” she told him, drawn in by his eyes, feeling more brave than she ever had in all her life. “Lloyd, I’m so happy to know you. And I want to keep staying by your side.”

Like the Goddess, she felt she had been asleep for so very long, until Lloyd came into her life.

She had never kissed another person like this, lips pressed against another’s. But underneath the stars, she felt she could do anything now. And when she felt the soft, gentle pressure against her own mouth, Lloyd’s body closer to her now, it didn’t feel like a mistake.

She was so happy to be here and alive with him.

.

.

.

In the Flanoir cathedral, Lloyd and Colette got married underneath the stained glass window that depicted the goddess Martel. With witnesses that generously spared their time, and a priest who felt such sympathy for them, they were wed in the later evening hours, just as the bell rang for a final mass.

But the goddess Martel was no goddess, and Colette recognized the depicted woman’s face as that of Tabatha’s. She wondered at that connection, at those green eyes that showed her such kindness. But if such eyes did, then surely whoever Martel was would also feel the same.

“And I love you!” he said to her, so simple and so excited. It made her giggle, already leaning in to kiss him on the cheek, and then his lips, and then Lloyd copied her by kissing her forehead, then at her chin, before the tired priest had to tell them that they still needed to say their ‘I do’s.’

She hardly remembered the actual ceremony, dazzled instead by Lloyd’s eyes, by his smile, by the way he held their hands together, as if he never wanted to let her go.

But she had already known, for perhaps even longer than she realized, that she wanted to be with Lloyd, to have him by her side, and to declare that in some way. 

She remembered the weddings held in Iselia would bring in days of celebration and dancing. But somehow, underneath the soft light through the windows as the snow fell outside, Colette was happy with this—perhaps even more so.

Would it be selfish of her to keep Lloyd to herself just a little longer?

It’s what she thought when she was already rushing Lloyd with her down the aisle, leaving through the doors so quickly just to be out in the snow again, the difference in temperature so sudden that she immediately shivered.

“And I love you too,” she said to him, her voice shaking from the cold, or maybe something else. She had already said the words to him inside the church, but she now needed to say it again, just as the stars shone a bit brighter.

Let me keep loving you for as long as I can. Because the future was still uncertain, and they were still adrift, trying to change what seemed impossible.

But she had once thought it impossible for her to keep living past sixteen.

Lloyd wrapped her in his arms, leaning down to kiss her again—on her forehead, on her cheeks, on her lips, over her closed eyes—and whispered, “I’ll always stay by your side.”

And she knew for a fact that Lloyd always kept his promises. 

[artificial-sleep]

🎄🎅🎁 Xmas HCs ⛄🌡❄

Merry Christmas/happy holidays! Hope you're enjoying a restful day 😊💕

Here's a lil thread of some xmas-spirit fandom thoughts to read while drinking some coco 😌☕

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EraserMic ❤️💚❤️

EraserMic where Hizashi is getting ready for xmas eve dinner, listening to "Merry Christmas Baby" as he styles his hair.

CW// xmas fluff, a couple smooches 💋 

He serenades the toothbrushes on the countertop, proudly belting out the lyrics "Gave me a diamond ring for Christmas, now I'm living in paradise!" even though they've been married for years.

Shouta watches fondly from the doorway, propped up with a small smile on his face as the whir of the blow dryer competes w the volume of the music.

Shouta decides to walk in and hook an arm around Hizashi to pull him in. 

Hizashi yelps in surprise, the noise dissolving into chuckles as he looks at Shouta sweetly and caresses his cheek. "Was just saying how bad I wanted to 'hug and kiss you, baby,'" Hizashi says teasingly, pecking Shouta on the lips.

"Still thankful for that ring, huh?" 

"Everyday," Hizashi replies sweetly, kissing him again.

---

"Merry Christmas Baby" (the `Sheryl Crow version reigns supreme in my book... it's my favorite Christmas song!!)

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Dadzawa ft. Eri 💚❤️💚

I think that when Aizawa taught Eri about the holidays, he maybe left out a few key details about Santa. Because when he finds the letter she left for him, he can't help but chuckle.

CW// xmas fluff, Aizawa as Eri's caretaker 

She's left it laid out for Santa on the coffee table in the living room and has since gone to bed for the night. Aizawa skims it again and again, reading to himself:

Dere santa,

Hi my naym is eri. I lik yer bag red is pretey. Du u lik crismus or halowin mor? Thenk u for tawking to me. I no ther ar a lot of kids.

eri

She drew little hearts and what looked like both candy canes and pumpkins around the margins, and Aizawa laughs that not even once did she mention a gift she would like. 

Mirio spends the next day explaining to her in grandeur terms that Santa will give her anything and that's he magic and all she has to do is ask him for it, and she stares in awe and then considers it deeply before responding, "I like candy apples!"

Aizawa is sure she'll like the gift he got her just fine: a new hero costume, something small she can wear around school when he's in his.

He also got her some plushies. She tends to enjoy cuddling up when she goes to sleep, and he often finds her holding a pillow when he has to wake her. 

Aizawa doesn't mind not explaining to Eri that Santa already knows her name because it saves him trouble in the future. Plus, the kid is too inquisitive and bright for her own good. He'll stick with Santa being her pinpal who leaves her a surprise gift or two every year.

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KamiJirou ❤️💚❤️

I just think that the one year Kyouka leaves wrapping presents to Denki that he loses his whole entire mind.

CW// xmas hc, KamiJirou w kiddos, frustrated packaging, quirk use... 

Kyouka gets called in on xmas eve and Denki is like yeah yeah yeah I got everything. Don't worry babe. See you on xmas morning.

And he does have everything: the baking cookies for Santa, impromptu xmas music dance party while they're in the oven, watching a xmas movie, bedtime stories, and super fun red and green striped pajamas.

All is going great with the kids in bed by 9 until... packaging.

He's tearing the paper with his hands, misplacing the tape every 5 seconds, biting ribbon off the spool, and tearing his hair out to get it done. 

He feels like he's been doing this all night, staring at the clock to see an hour has gone by, but there's still a massive stack to wrap. He's already wrapped... 4... 4! 4?? He huffs in frustration, throwing a remote control car aside as he grabs the next gift. 

The doll is probably the worst one. It takes him 3 times as long to figure out the packaging than it does the other gifts, and when he sets it with the other stack of finished gifts, he's relieved. Until he finds later that the paper has torn???

He suppresses the urge to scream as he picks up the doll, electricity buzzing across his fingertips. He grabs more gift wrap, huffing exasperatedly, trying to patch it, but the doll's arm just pierces it again, and soon, before he can think about what he's doing, the paper crumples into ash as he zaps the toy with an electric current. The doll is fried, face a bit burnt and hair sticking straight up, and he grits his teeth in embarrassment, deciding maybe it's time to take a break.

He goes to "make sure" Santa has eaten his cookies with a glass of milk and then goes back to his room to reevaluate.

Just as soon as he's finished transferring wrapped gifts to underneath the tree, he hears a familiar voice behind him ask, "How's it going?"

He turns to see his wife smiling back at him, still wearing her hero gear and clearly just having walked in. 

Kyouka laughs when she sees the doll.

"I kind of figured honestly," she teases, and Denki feigns outrage.

"I can't believe you think so little of me," he pouts, and she chuckles as she pulls out another doll from the top of their closet.

"I just had a feeling..." she says, taking the wrapping paper and packaging it in a quick two minutes.

"You're magic," Denki says in awe, and she laughs.

"Whatever... You're the one that pulled off Christmas Eve all by yourself. I think you're magic."

"I love you," Denki mutters against her lips, and she gives him a peck.

"Love you." 

A/N: So basically "Toy Packaging" by Sara Groves

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KamiSero 💚❤️💚

SeroKami but ice skating!! ⛸

CW// fluffy xmas morning thoughts, basically a 🏳️‍🌈 Hallmark movie 🎄

I think that Kaminari goes skating every year, and now that he and Sero are dating, he invites him to come with.

Sero agrees without a second thought but acts bashful when the night comes.

They get some hot cocoa when they arrive, and Kaminari notices that Sero seems to look nervous, holding onto the cup tightly and darting his eyes to the ground nervously.

"Hey, you okay?" Kami asks him, and he chuckles a little.

"Y-yeah. For sure. Uh-" 

He scratches the back of his neck, his face flushed, perhaps from the cold or otherwise, as he admits, "I just, uh- well, I don't actually know how to skate..." Kaminari smiles big at him, and Sero returns it as they both start to laugh.

"Oh! That's fine, babe. I mean, we definitely don't have to, but... I can teach you." Sero smiles big and nods at him, taking his hand as they go to rent skates.

He's unsteady when he steps on the ice, and the look of panic in his eyes when he steps onto the rink sends Kaminari into a giggling fit. 

He holds him tight, but his wobbling just encourages Kaminari's chuckles until Sero's feet are sliding up from under him and sending him and Kaminari into a heap on the ice.

Kaminari is inconsolable, and Sero can't help but smile, even with the ache from hitting the ice so hard.

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Serroki ❤️💚❤️

Serroki where Hanta goes to The Todorokis' Christmas dinner

CW// Shouto getting overstimulated, cute boyfriends fluff

They haven't been dating for long, and this is their first Christmas being together, but Shouto asks him to come because Christmas dinner always proves to be difficult in his family, and he'd feel better having Hanta there with him.

Hanta knows how short Shouto's social battery is, particularly around his family, so he's prepared when midway through their meal, Natsuo starts to argue with their father and Shouto stands up abruptly and shuffles out of the room without a word.

He had been attuned to the way Shouto had been fidgeting with his fingers, drumming them against the top of his thigh before his eyes went vacant altogether for awhile, tuning it all out.

Then he was gone, and Hanta excused himself politely soon after to find him.

It didn't take long. Just down the hall was a coat closet beneath the stairs where he found Shouto nuzzled beside some boxes and totes, cradling his knees.

Hanta just smiled and sat down beside him, leaving a few inches of space between them as he pulled out his phone.

He sent him a request to play an iMessage game, and Shouto accepted it without looking up, playing a round of Connect 4 as Hanta listened for Shouto's breathing to level.

After a couple more games, Shouto had leaned into Hanta, allowing him to cradle him closely, placing kisses on his cheek.

They passed a chunk of the evening there in careful silence, and the family hardly noticed they had gone when they finally slipped back to the living room after Shouto had calmed down.

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That's it! Hope you liked it!!

[cerealmonster15]

okay but when you aren't at practice i would Love to hear your thoughts on riddle/floyd though

HEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEE thank u i love an excuse to talk excessively about Characters

i COULD link to some other post i could probs find where i talked about them a lot already. HOWEVER. i also love to repeat myself. i want excuses to do it AGAIN!!! sorry it is Long. teehee.

ok anyway. riddle/floyd, love those funny little guys. initially? like 2+ years ago? wasn't a fan, but i also did not like the octavinelle boys At All in the early days fklsdjfkldj but i warmed up to them by the end of book 4 bc they were Silly 😌

as for riddle and floyd together, my initial thought at first glance was "what da heck, floyd's just mean to riddle, that wouldnt work, i dont like it 😤

BUT through the power of obsessively rewatching scenes over and over again and getting a closer look at character vibes and motives [and also fun fanart lol], i have CHANGED MY MIND. mostly. i mean floyd is still floyd LOL but we'll get to that.

so my main thoughts for them could be one of two things: floyd having a one sided obnoxious crush on riddle and poking at him for attention/cuz it's funny, OR <- that but with the added layer of floyd picking on him half bc he thinks it's funny and half with some sincerity behind it [ill get to that] + floyds loose chaos way of existing is a good contrast to riddle who was forced to be Perfect and Proper and Rigid his whole life; he needs people to shake him loose a bit and teach him to learn to have fun and be a goofy lil guy!!! with time and growth they could balance each other out real well i think.

SO. yes on one hand riddle gets Upset with floyd and there are def times where it's like "uhuh floyds just bein mean for his own enjoyment and riddle's got the right to be upset here imo" like i think of i thhhiiiink floyd's regular uniform R vignette of an example of floyd picking on riddle for fun and riddle getting understandably upset, maybe getting a lil personal with his reaction but still i get him being like "why the fuck are you so awful to me get away" like. not off to a great start LOL but i actually really like that story. ive read it several times bc i feel like floyd and riddle's reactions to each other are interesting. the ambiguity [at least, i think it's ambiguous, im really not sure dklfjd] of floyd being like "....im bored now. bye." <- being either "was he upset when riddle compared him to jade/bit back at him, or did he really just have his regular mood swing and get bored? what was he feeling there???" also i just think it's funny how riddles like "huh, did i go too far and upset him...? oh well i dont care 🚶‍♂️" jsklfjdsl

ok ANYWAY. theyre complex and that's fun to me. i think however there are SEVERAL instances where floyd picking on riddle doubles as looking out for him - though im unsure if that's coincidence or intentional on floyd's part.

i can think of at least three off the top of my head: vargas camp 1 event, halloween 1, and the very start of book 4 when you're saying bye to everyone before they go home for the holidays.

Vargas Camp 1 scene [spoilers obviously lol]: the scene where people have gone MISSING and everyone's FREAKED OUT and they're by the fireplace. poor sweet lil riddle is shivering and very cold!!! floyd makes fun of him ldsfjds he's like "goldfishie, your lips are turning blue! if your hair turns blue too, i'll have to think of something else to call you lol" and riddle Gets Mad and is all "FLOYD why are you messing around RIGHT NOW OF ALL TIMES!!! TAKE THIS SERIOUSLY!!!" all red faced and 😡 so angy!!! floyd just laughs and is like "hehe glad you're all red and warm now 😌" <- so this is what i mean by it's POSSIBLE he did that on purpose, knowing it would make riddle mad and by extension make him all warm and toasty lol. it also could just be that he wanted to pick on him and it happened to also help djfkldsj. ALSO! right after that when riddle gets SNATCHED, floyd makes a comment about how the shadow beast must be strong because "even goldfishie's gone". just cute that he acknowledges riddle's skills there 😌

halloween 1: around the very end of the event when the second years are having their post party talking time, there's a scene where jade's still running around being Helpful and floyd + riddle are both like "hey man relax, come eat something" but the SECOND riddle says something to jade, floyd IMMEDIATELY turns around and is like "hahaha you're such a hypocrite, youve barely been eating anything yourself you tiny tiny cranky goldfishie" and riddle's all I Eat The Daily Recommended Calorie Intake. bjkldfjdsg. anyway floyd makes him mad but then hes all 👀 when silver mentions CAKE but then pretends hes too full. floyds like "uhuh well there's always room for dessert so let's go" and tugs riddle along with him and the others to go find cake lol. now on one hand you could look at that as Not Listening to Riddle and Doing Whatever, which i think is a totally valid interpretation too. BUT the way i see it is more of floyd being like "you're not fooling anyone here, we can all see you want to do this thing but you will not allow yourself to indulge, you need that push to enjoy yourself bc you havent learned to give in to indulgences so im going to give you that push". it's a cute scene of second years partying lol.

book 4 mirror scene: when riddle shows up to go home, he's distracted and low energy. he's gotta go home and wants to Face His Mother. having the dread of facing an overbearing parent, not wanting to go home for the holidays, i get it, it's a mood dampener. the other heartslabyul boys are all like 😔bc ya, sore topic, rough and heavy. then floyd shows up fdsklfdsklfjlk and he's like "what's the matter? dont wanna go home? then dont 😌 stay here with us! we can keep a tiny goldfishy as a pet hehehehehe" or something like that lol. the SECOND floyd shows up riddle is SCOWLING and COMPLAINING jfkldjsfl. even jade is like 😐floyd do not pry into his personal family life 😐 <- as if he's not a nosy bitch himself LOL. anyway!!!!! floyd's comment about riddle being a teeny goldfish makes him all mad and 😡 again and trey/cater gotta diffuse the situation like the mvp besties they are lfjsd. riddle's like "well anyway i do NOT wanna hang out with octavinelle for the holidays good BYE!!! 😤" and trey comments about how at least he seems like he's back to his regular self. i think again, you could see this as floyd just picking on riddle bc he likes picking on riddle, which i think is very true here lol, BUT if you read between the lines i do think it's a valid thought to look at it as like, floyd saw riddle down in the dumps and gave him something to get riled up about to distract him from his gloominess. i mean he made him mad jfldksjf but it was still more of the riddle theyre Used To and he was no longer sulking?? lol, that one may be a little more of a stretch but i stand by it as a possibility!!!

because!!! i wont get into it too much but it has been shown on several accounts that like, floyd's a smart dude when he wants to be. i fully believe he understands people decently well if he cares to, and has his own way of how he chooses to navigate it. like this part isnt about riddle but in one of the beans events, i think beans 2? when they spot malleus and lilia sparring, i think epel or someone's like "oh we could gang up on lilia and help malleus defeat him!!" but floyd stops them and is more or less like "nah they're havin fun over there doin their thing. we should leave them. if i were riled up havin fun like that i wouldnt want someone comin along to spoil it" or something like that. so like i think he's got compassion for other people at times and will act accordingly if he wants to. he's a very interesting multifaceted character!!

also heehee funny fish boy pokes fun at funny tiny red boy. opposites attract is just a fun dynamic i always like 😌

some other misc things i like with them:

in halloween 2, when they're initially gonna go in the mirror, floyd and riddle BOTH wanna just charge headfirst into it without a second thought fksdjflkd. it's SO cute seeing riddle on the same level as floyd with impulsiveness

also in halloween 2, when they find possessed jade and he's acting like floyd, riddle's like That's Not Floyd 😤 immediately, which i mean leads to a convo about the twins' hair lol BUT i like to think it also just shows how much riddle's around the twins

riddle has a lot of similarities to azul. floyd and jade like to pick on azul a lot. despite being weird about how they talk about it kfdjdlsdfjkl floyd jade and azul are all friends and i think they care about each other a lot. floyd also loves to tease riddle. i think it's both bc riddle and azul have entertaining reactions when theyre Being Teased, but also i think that's part of how floyd shows his affection. like he's having fun, he's playing!!! when he's not interested in something or someone hes got No Energy and is like im outta here 🚶‍♂️ but with riddle he's always like hehehehehe funny little goldfishie heheheheehehe

these two separate bits from the first twst anthology manga [fan translated by turtlesoupscans]:

^i think the anthology mangas are considered like semi canon or something but i think this is kinda cute lol, like floyd thrilled to hang out with riddle and riddle apparently spending time with floyd for five straight hours lol

and then this part, i think about it all the time:

thats just a very potent section of a small bit of floyd in general bothering riddle bc he's bored and wants to hang out!! but like. hi. hello. whoever wrote/illustrated this part? they had an agenda. a florid agenda. and i See It lolololol. and then floyd wants to play tag with him right after 😌 also i just like the way he greets him at the start lol-

YO~ 🤗 f l o y d ... 😔

ALSO it's said somewhere, i think a few places but idr where, that during the second years' orientation, floyd and riddle got into a chaotic fight with each other like how grim disrupted the first years'/game's opening orientation. enemies to lovers on sight or something LOL

anyway. there are probably more scenes i cant remember but ive been typing for like an hour [i had to go into the event archives i needed to fact check myself for ACCURACY] and i have to cut myself off or i will Never Stop sljkfjdsj THANKS for indulging me SORRY i talked for 500 years. i can and will do it again tho any time anyone asks me how i feel about anything twst related. im constantly locked and loaded with SO Many feelings.

[kimi-twstheadcanons]

Holiday Magic

-You decided to spend some time in the Queendom of Roses for the Holidays. For a fun trick, you asked Deuce where Ace lived to surprise him and leave Grim with Deuce for the day. Honestly, his place is a lot more cozy than you thought.

Pronouns: They/Them

“Dang dad, you didn’t have to yell so loud. …Huh wait is that? (Y/N)?!”

•

•

•

“OUT! NOW!”

“Aww, come on little bro! I wanna meet your little friend from school!” Ace’s older brother whined as Ace pushed him out of the hallway of their house and away from his room. You had gone to visit him for the Holidays just to see what it would be like, but you had completely forgotten about his older brother. You hadn’t thought that his brother would be over for the Holidays. Or maybe he lived there? Whatever the situation may be is beyond your current knowledge and not your place to intrude. But you hadn’t thought that Ace would be so adamant about his brother being as far away from you as possible.

“Sorry about that, he can be a real jerk sometimes.” Ace apologizes as he walks back into the room. He closes the door behind him and continues to sit on the floor next to his bed since you were already sitting on his bed.

“So that was your older brother huh? He seems fun. Your dad seems nice too. Considering he’s the one who welcomed me in the house in the first place.” You say as you look around his room. You see his closet, his dressers with cards and fake wands on them, etc. He even has one of those magician top hats sitting on a hanger. As you look around Ace subtly tries to pick things up to make his room seem less messy. When his dad called him out of his room saying there was a surprise he hadn’t expected to see you. He rushed back into his room and threw things around to hide them but he couldn’t get it to be as clean as he wanted it to be. He wasn’t one of those boys whose rooms were gross and smelt awful, but more of an “I’ll leave it for now” and then never getting to it until three days later, type of guy. He knew there wasn’t much to fix but he didn’t want you to never allow him to stay at Ramshackle ever again.

“Yeah, my brother is pretty chill I guess. But since you’re here he’s going to try and make fun of me or embarrass me.”

“What can he do that you don't already do to yourself?” You ask jokingly.

“Hey!” He whined back. You laughed it off and stood up from your seat on the bed to walk around his room. You knew he liked magic tricks by magicians but why do all this when he can use real magic?

“Hey, Ace. Why don’t you show me a magic trick?” You suddenly suggest to him. He looks at you surprised, not expecting you to suggest that. He ponders for a moment, trying to decipher if you were being serious or not.

“I mean I could. But most of these tricks are to entertain kids. With the things we’ve seen, you wouldn’t really be impressed.” He explains. You think for a brief moment before answering back to him.

“Well, haven’t you learned any extra tricks of magic from your brother? He went to NRC too, right? Or maybe you picked something up from some third years in Heartslabyul?”

“I mean, yeah I picked up some things. But I’m not sure if you’d like them.” He says as he grabs his magic pen that was sitting on his nightstand.

“Surprise me. Entertain your guest.” You tease.

“Hey, don’t get cocky now.” He jokingly warns you. You chuckle and lean on a wall, waiting for him to do something. Ace steadies himself and begins to gently wave his wand around the room. Slowly vines begin to appear on his walls creating a pattern. You realized what he was doing when the vines began to get fluffier. This boy used the opportunity to decorate his room for the Holidays!

“Wait, dude, how did you learn to do that?” You question him in amazement.

“My brother taught me the start, and I improved the rest.” He explained as he finished up the details.

“Does that mean you studied? Whoa, that’s a new one.”

“If you keep insulting me I’m going to kick you out.” Ace threatened. You again laughed it off, knowing he wouldn’t dare do such a thing to you. Yet you smiled as you admired the little trick he did. That’s when Ace had an idea. With his magic pen still in hand, he gently waved it to his lamp and back to you as trails of light followed the direction he was pointing at. By that point, you hadn’t noticed what was going on. But you soon did when the light turned into little spheres and began to collect atop your head. You tried to touch it but felt nothing. You hear a click next to you and turn to the direction of the sound, to find Ace with his phone out and taking a picture of you. As soon as your eyes met the camera you heard another click, indicating he had taken another one.

“Wow, these are pretty good! Maybe we should send them to the group chat.” Ace teased as he looked at the pictures on his phone.

“What group chat?”

“…uh…oh look how the lights look against your hair color! Very pretty, right?” He tries to distract you as he shoves his phone into your face. You puff your cheeks in annoyance but let the topic go nonetheless. You look at the picture he’s showing you and indeed, you did look extremely attractive somehow. You’re not sure if it was the crown made of lights on your head or if Ace had edited slightly before showing you, but even you had to admit that it looked great!

“Illusion magic! A pretty neat trick if I do say so myself! You look like a fairy! Real cute, (y/n).” He subconsciously complimented. You blink for a moment after processing it. Ace has complimented you before but he’s never said you were cute. You use this as the perfect time to tease him again.

“Ace, did you just say I’m cute~?”

“…that’s it. I’m kicking you out.”

“No~, please! I’ll stop, I promise! That was the last one!” You pleaded with a smile on your face. He sent the lights on your head away and proceeded to walk over to his bedroom door. You held onto his arm to stop him while having a laughing fit. He pulled his door open and in came crashing his older brother and dad. They both fall flat on their faces and whine as the stinging pain affects their facial features.

“What the? What were you two doing?” Ace questioned. They both stay silent as they rub their heads and noses to ease the pain. After having put two and two together, Ace realizes that they were eavesdropping on you and him.

“Are you serious right now?”

“Hey~, listen little bro. We didn’t mean any harm! We just wanted to know your little friend here.” Ace’s older brother explains as he stands up and readjusts and dusts his clothes off. Ace’s dad does the same and straightens his composure.

“Come on, son. This is the first time we get to meet them! You talk about them all the ti-“ before Mr. Trappola could finish his sentence Ace covers his mouth with his hand.

“Alright, dad that’s enough, thanks!” Ace urged his father to be quiet as he proceeded to shove them away to get you out. He leads you to the front door and grabs his scarf and jacket to put on. He throws on his shoes and opens the door for you to walk through after you got your jacket on and everything settled.

“Okay, me and (y/n) are going to Deuce’s!” Ace yells into his house before rushing out and closing the door behind him. He grabs your arm and proceeds to speed walk away from his house, you two linking arms. You giggle at his embarrassed behavior.

“Well, that could have gone worse.” You tease him with a warm grin that is the complete opposite of the chilled air. He rolls his eyes and sighs in relief at getting you two out of there.

“Honestly, I’m glad it didn’t.”

[nightravens-therapycircle]

This is Halloween - WIP Preview, Chapters 1 -5

Since these are still works-in-progress, it is likely that the following excerpts will change between now and the final draft! Please keep that in mind while reading.

Chapter 1: An Upcoming Celebration

Lilia: Mm-hm. Halloween—

Emery: Halloween is a holiday that falls on the last day of October — the thirty-first. Every year, ghosts that have passed through the veil are able to return to the land of the living. Not just ghosts that linger, either. All of them.

Lilia: …

Emery: What?

Lilia: I wasn’t expecting you to be so knowledgeable about it.

Emery: I… (She blushes a little bit, chuckling nervously.) Halloween is my favorite holiday out of the year. It’s the one night that I felt like I could enjoy myself without any issue and I could just… be me, you know? (There might be more behind it, but whatever it is, Emery can’t remember. What she can recall, though, is a really happy and warm feeling associated with it that just gets her so excited and hyped up. Lilia chuckles, a bit amused.) A-Aside from all that, the living set up decorations to welcome the ghosts. We also dress up in costumes!

Grim: What? Why?

Gus: Not every ghost is polite and courteous like us.

Grace: You say that, but I remember being told how you three frightened our poor Ramshackle students when they first arrived. (The ghosts yelp as Grace hovers behind them, floating back away from her like she’s on fire.) I think they know by now how ghosts can be.

Emery: Hey, Ms. Grace. (Grace sighs.)

Grace: Trust me when I say that their pranks are a good idea of what will likely happen. Tying shoelaces together, swapping the salt and sugar in the kitchen… messing with your closest, drying out all the pens… Believe me, I can speak from experience.

Grim: Huh?

Grace: I grew up in a very… haunted mansion.

Emery/Grim: What?!

Grace: I’d rather not talk about it.

Chapter 2: Decorative Displays

Deuce: How did you get the librarian to let you use the library for your venue? I thought that she would’ve—

Idia: It was pretty easy. Ortho asked, and she said yes almost immediately.

Deuce/Jack: Huh?!

Jack: It’s that simple?! I thought that… She seems so protective of the place, so… Really?

Cater: Nah, Ms. H is crazy about Halloween. I think the only one who might beat her in terms of hype is Emmy.

Emery: Wait, seriously? (Cater nods.)

Crowley: She’s always been like that, from the moment that she started working here. Halloween has always… lifted her spirits, so to speak. If any student were to ask to use the library, Grace usually says ‘yes’ in a heartbeat under one condition. She gets to be involved. One year, Octavinelle did a truly spectacular display that turned the library into a token haunted mansion with a seance table to boot. (Oh, wow… Emery can practically picture that in her mind. It sounded amazing.)

Vil: “So that’s why you went with the library… you knew it would be easy.”

Idia: Would’ve been easy either way… the library was just the best place to set it all up…

Vil: Excuse me?

Chapter 3: The Week Begins

Jamil: You’re scaring her, Floyd.

Ace: No kidding. I’d be scared too if someone twice my size was looming over me like that. (Emery hums in agreement.)

Floyd: Aw, really? (He crouches down to the girl’s height.) Hey, sorry, little minnow. You gotta watch where you're going or you could hurt yourself.

Little Girl: I’m sorry. I just… I couldn’t find… (Jamil crouches down next to her as well.)

Jamil: Couldn’t find what?

Ace: Get separated from your mom? (The girl shakes her head.)

Little Girl: Mommy stayed home. (She holds up one of the stamp cards that were a part of the event. It’s been filled out.) I’m looking for the place you’re supposed to go when you’re done collecting stamps. I’m supposed to meet my daddy there.

Floyd: Easy enough. C'mon, kiddo. I'll walk you there. (He takes the little girl’s hand and leads her to the front gate with the rest of the group following him. Ace nudges Emery as they linger back behind the others.)

Ace: You okay? Your enthusiasm is just gone.

Emery: I um… remembered something.

Ace: So it’s not just your dreams anymore?

Emery: I guess. It wasn’t as strong as my dreams, but it was something. …I nearly remembered my mom. I heard her voice, and then snapped out of it before I could see her face. (Ace nudges her.)

Ace: You’ll be fine. It’s Halloween, so stop moping. Who knows? Maybe your mom’s here.

Emery: You think so?

Ace: Lots of people come here, so maybe. (Emery hums. Her mother’s voice did sound a bit familiar… like she had heard it recently. She wasn’t sure where from, though. Maybe when watching a movie with Ace and Deuce? Or from one of the portraits? Or her mind is playing tricks on her or something, she had no idea. She sighs, shaking her head. She could deal with this later, after Halloween was over.)

Chapter 4: Like Dark Clouds

Vil: As much as I enjoy seeing you, you’re blocking the entrance.

Astor: Sorry, Vil. (It seems Vil’s return causes quite the stir as soon as Astor says his name.)

Man A: V-Vil Schoenheit?!

Woman B:  No way! The celebrity model himself?! (Oops. But still, Vil puts on a smile and shows it to them.)

Vil: Happy Halloween, everyone. I hope our festivities are to your liking.

Woman C: Oh yeah, I did hear Vil went to school at Night Raven College. And I get to meet him in person! I lucked out big time!

Man A:  Hey, could I take a picture with—ah, whoops, no photography in the Mirror Chamber.

Woman B:  Even if there was, supermodels like Vil don't let your average Jill waltz up for a selfie.

Vil: If you’d like a picture, then by all means. (This catches the man and woman off guard.) Not in the Mirror Chamber, of course. We can take one outside. Shall we? It’s dark, so watch your step. (They leave.)

Trey: Have a lot of people shown up just for Vil?

Astor: Not a whole lot, but still a good few of them. Vil’s more approachable than he looks, and plenty of his fans are finding that out when they come by to visit. I think he’s also been distracting people when they ask for a picture with just me.

Trey: Huh?

Astor: Don’t look at me, I don’t know why either. Dad doesn’t want pictures of me alone to go viral, so Vil’s been stepping in to make sure that doesn’t happen. Instead of a picture with me, it’s with the both of us. It’s better that way, I guess.

Trey: That makes sense. I think. (He’s not even old enough to have a Magicam account of his own yet, and the only reason he has a phone at all is for emergencies or to contact his father.

Chapter 5: Magicam Monsters

Grace: This has gone off the rails… Dire, please help and do something!

Crowley: Why me?!

Grace: You’re the headmaster!

Crowley: Um… well, uhh… (He glances back at the students and clears his throat.) Everyone, settle down! And uh… you tree-climbers! Get down from there this instant! Otherwise… (He’s floundering.) Otherwise, the school’s security system will identify you as a threat and expel you from our campus!

Emery: Do we even have a security system? (Lilia shrugs. Emery supposed they didn’t, because otherwise Grim wouldn’t be able to sneak back in on that first night…)

Crowley: After I saw the Halloween crowds, I took the initiative of installing one in case of bad actors. (Grace raises a brow, but says nothing. Crowley clears his throat again.) The system activates as soon as it spots exceedingly dangerous activities. Yes, safety measures are firmly in place!

Man A:  Night Raven College has a security system? Siiick!

Man B:  And it sounds like a real fancy one. NICE.

Woman C:  So whatever we do is cool as long as we don't get kicked out? Sweet. Let's see how far we can push it!

Crowley: Ah… 

Grace: (in a low tone of voice) You were bluffing about the security system, weren’t you?

Crowley: Not so loud! (whispering so that only the students can hear them.) Do you really think a security system so convenient actually exists?! Of course I made it up! Nobody could’ve predicted this happening! (Emery glances over at Cater, recalling his strange behavior over the past few days. Had he seen this coming and kept it to himself in order not to ruin the holiday?) I thought that it would be enough!

Grace: Well it wasn’t. What do you suggest we do to get rid of these… these monsters?! (Emery hears Lilia chuckle.)

Lilia: I have an idea… (He curls a hand around Emery’s shoulder.) Distract those Magicam Monsters and Professor Trein.

Cater: What’s with the look, Lils?

Emery: I’m kind of confused, too.

Lilia: While our dear magpie— (Magpie?) —keeps them busy, we’ll use our magic to eject those monsters from the campus.

Cater: Lilia—

Malleus: Simple and to the point. I like it. Blowing them off of the campus should be easier than spinning thread.

Lilia: Hold on. If you don’t restrain yourself, you’ll blow the campus away with them. Don’t harm them, just… be discreet and get them out the gate. (Emery glances back at the tree.)

Vil: (sigh)

Emery: I’ll do it.

[saitama-division]

ARB Birthday Special: Kureha Koizumi

~~ December 25th ~~

“Most things will be okay eventually, but not everything will be.”

Login Lines:

“I woke up to my phone going off like crazy, it nearly scared the hell out of me, I had thought something was wrong until I went to check it. Turns out it was just everyone wishing me either happy birthday, merry Christmas, or both. It was…nice…I’m still getting used to celebrating my birthday but having so many people wishing me well helps a lot.”

Voice Lines:

“Haah…It’s that time again, I’ve been trying to finish all of my holiday commission before Christmas but I’ve been getting more and more requests, I’m not complaining though, I could really use the money.”

“The snow looks really pretty today, it’s cold which is good. I remember watching the snow fall with…him…he was really pretty too…I miss him…”

“What do 22 year olds even do on their birthday? I don’t drink much and I refuse to go clubbing no matter what Lola says. Honestly, I much rather stay home or spend time with Sayaka, it’s always nice and warm whenever she’s around.”

“Ehhhh?! No way!! I can’t believe the Vox wished me a happy birthday! I mean, I know we’re in the DRB together but I never thought he’d noticed me! Holy shit, holy shit, this is awesome!”

“The art museum in Saitama did something special for me, the recently opened up a new art exhibition in my honor, it had all my favorite paintings and works from my favorite artists there! There was even some of my own works! I was so shocked but also really, really happy!”

“Thank you, Merry Christmas, Sayaka! I hope you liked my gift…Ah, that’s good, that makes me really happy, you’re welcome….Er, mom please, that’s so embarrassing, I’ve been grown up for a long while now besides, you have Yoshiko to dote over, I’m fine!…Mooom! Please! My face feels like it’s about to melt off!”

“Oh sick, mom! This is so cool! Thank you so much, I’m sure Kazu will love it! No, no, it’s fine, I’ve been meaning to get Kazu one of these for a while now but they’re usually so expensive and it looks super cool too, I love it and he’ll definitely love it. Aw, even when you’re looking for cat toys you’re still thinking of me, thank you, mom.”

“Merry Christmas, Lola. I see you’re back from wherever you’ve went, what? Did you not think I’d notice when you’re gone? Tsumugi’s a good actress but I’ve known you long enough to be able to tell when you’re not yourself or if there’s an imposter. I won’t ask for details, I’m just glad you’re back in time for Christmas…is that…is that blood?…Y’know what, nevermind, yes I’m sure now what is it that you got me?”

“Whoa! Are these gemstones? Wait, these are Yule Gemstones! Where the hell did you get these?! And how the hell do you know about them?! Ah…oh yeah, that’s right, I didn’t think you were listening…it’s not witchcraft, it’s Paganism, yes there’s a fucking difference. Shut it, he has nothing to do with my beliefs, still though, thank you for this, it’s really great.”

“Yoshiko! Hey, merry Christmas baby sister! Wow, you got that many presents huh? Well that’s no surprise, you’ve been a good girl all year and Santa knows that and is very happy with you. Hm? You got me something?”

“Awww, Yoshiko, this is so pretty! And well made too! You’re getting better and better each year, I’m seriously impressed, nicely done!”

Sayaka Lines:

“Merry Christmas and Happy Birthday, Sweetie! I really loved your gift, I never knew that I needed something like that, thank you so much! Oh, I can’t believe another year has gone by, I really wish that time would so down for once, my baby is all grown up! *sigh* I guess you’re right but just know that no matter how old you get, you will always be my baby….okay, okay, I’m sorry, here, I got you a present.”

“Ta-daaaa~! I got you a cat tree for Kazu-chan! I know it’s not something that you yourself can use but I figured that since you take such good care of Kazu, you’d want to get him something nice. I was thinking about what you usually wear when choosing which one to pick and I thought this one fit the bill. Oh, I’m glad you like it! Happy Birthday, honey!”

Lola Lines:

“Meeeeeeeerry Birthmas, my darling! Ehhh?? How did you know that I was gone?! Aww, and here I thought I was so clever to fool you…AWWW, Sunshine!! I’m so touched!! What did I do to deserve such a kind and considerate best friend?!…Hm? Oh, shit, I didn’t even notice that, you sure you don’t wanna know? It’s quite the tale? Okay, okay birthday girl, here you go.”

“I remember you telling me about those crystals you’re so interested in, something to do with witchcraft or some shit like that? Is there a difference, sweetheart? *sigh* I swear, sometimes I think I shouldn’t have let you met Lyall, didn’t think it was possible for you to become more goth than you already are, well, you look happy so I guess that’s good, merry Christmas sunshine.”

Bonus! Yoshiko Lines:

“Big sister! Happy Birthday and Merry Christmas! Did you look at the tree?! I got soooo many presents! Hehe, mommy said that too! Yoshiko’s a good girl! Hey, hey! I have a gift for you! Here!”

“Yay! I’m happy big sister likes my present! I made it alllll by myself! Merry Christmas!”

[lizadale]

MISS! I Cast *Fluff Attack* as retaliation to your tripple angst attack. You got me to 2/21 hp like damn. /j

Fr though, poor sad clown, i hope he dies stuck in a glue trap.

So. I got the motivation to write for the Polterpup speaks fic C:

{“This is what you ate?”

“Yes.” Luigi Picked up the can that were still on the floor, a tripping hazard Dimentio said when he saw it, then he went to a free counter and opened it “Not a single drop left, that’s impressive.”

“Thank you.”

“We could see the other’s of the same brand?” Luigi asked

“Yeah but it could’ve been just this one can too.”

“True but if we don’t want a talking we best not rule out any possibility” “It could just pass too.” Luigi said, moving back to the shelf.

“It keeps sassing me, I’m not tanking any chances.” Dimentio hissed

“If you say so.”

---

"Good Morning!" They greeted Mario on the gardens, everything is dormant and it's beautiful. He widened his eyes but he knelt to pet them.

"Hello Doggy!"

"How are you? did you have breakfast? I didn't. You still have the best jerky treats?"

After they showed Luigi where they eat the most delicious treat. Dimentio was still very confused and asked for them to stay away from the kitchens for the time being. "Who knows what will happen if you eat anything else you shouldn't?" He argued when the pup asked about the scraps.

"Sure do, " He said reaching for his pocket, he barely pulled the package out of it when Luigi jumped down from somewhere screaming "No, Bro Wait!!" then there was Dimentio's jingle.

"Huh?" Mario stopped midway through opening it, they could sniff it's tastiness too…

"As you can hear, Polterpup can talk now." Dimentio told.

"Yes and…?"

"Apparently, it's because they ate something weird," Luigi continues for him. "And I'm afraid of what will happen if something else mix to it."

"Like the children's book series?"

"i guess?" "the what now?" Luigi and Dimentio said at the same time. They looked at each other and Dimentio gestured for him to continue.

"I don't know if it was a abc soup it ate, but something like it definitely happened"

"Can you tell me the title of the book for later research?"

"Dio, do you even read children books?"

"It became relevant."

"I mean if you want it, but there's nothing-"

"Are they always like that?" Mario said with amusement in his voice.

"Most of the time, they stopped doing it for important things now though, that's how they say "i love you" i think." The puppy says while watching, they see Mario placing a hand on his chin as to contemplate their thoughts.

"You are very smart", he says after a minute.

"Yes! I'm a smart puppy!" They say. "Smart puppy gets treats?" they do their best pleading eyes

"No." Both Luigi and Dimentio stop their thing to say it to them.

"Aw…"

Mario gets down to their level and ask "Hey Puppy can you do me a favor?"

"I can!" Maybe helpful pups gets treats? that they don’t say out loud, hopefully.

"Go to the Peach and ask her to come to the garden"

"Okay!" They say and rush towards the castle, then they stop and go back "Wait, who's the Peach?"

Mario tilts his head "You don't know?"

"No, I've heard of her before but i don't know anybody named Peach "

"But weren't you playing with her and Toadette yesterday? The girl with the crown?"

"The Princess? She got two names?" they said with an air of wonder.

"Yeah, people call her Princess Peach most of the time"

"So those koopas weren't talking about The Princess and Peach yesterday?"

"The castle guard?"

"No. they were outside trying to get in but not by the doors. Dimentio told I couldn't scare the toads, so i scared them instead until you called me to play." They tell "I had to bite the big one to scare him though. but I won't tell anyone because good pups aren't supposed to bite."

"Bro, you'll stay until the weekend, right?" Mario turns to Luigi with a hopefull look.

"Sorry, I've already thawed tomorrow's roast." Luigi said "Also it's Dio's choosing how we're spending this holiday you know he gets fussy around parties."

"Dump him."

"Is everyone in this castle out to ruin my patience" Dimentio grumbles "I'm right here!" Luigi makes the funny holding in laughter face before dragging him out by his forearm “You are not going to like the day I lose it, I swear.” He Says when he’s almost out of earshot.}

Don't worry Puppy nobody knows you bit the Big Koopa ;)

i had to stop here because i couldn't stop snickering, i almost woke up my nephew twice, hope you're having a good day ^-^

(formated the pc and lost the little guy T-T)

JFISDLK "Dump him." i mean it's a sound solution...

also there's something very in-character about Mario encountering a talking dog and just shrugging. it is the mushroom kingdom after all

[tagsecretsanta]

From @womble1

From and by @womble1 for @tracybirds

Trash Christmas

Prompts used:

John + Hidden talent

Scott and Gordon being in charge of Christmas dinner

...

“What the hell are you doing?” Gordon stared across in disbelief at Scott

“What does it look like I’m doing?” Scott asked, still stirring what he hoped would become gravy, if only he willed it hard enough.

“If I knew that, then I wouldn’t be asking, would I?! John and Virgil made this look so easy at Thanksgiving” Gordon mumbled that last bit, but the point still hit.

“Well Thanksgiving isn’t Christmas. Whole different ball game.” Scott said, gesticulating with the wooden spoon, something splattered on the floor, but he tried not to look, he was sure gravy wasn’t meant to gloop like that, maybe if he just kept mixing.

“How do you figure that? It’s practically the same! Meat, veg, far too many sides.”

“Don't let Virgil hear you say that, you know how fanatical he gets about the sides.” Scott warned, looking across to the stairs, as if Virgil could be literally summoned by the topic alone. 

“Then let him come and make them!” Gordon threw his arms up in despair.

“That’s not how it works Gordon, it’s luck of the draw, they got Thanksgiving, we get Christmas” Scott calmly reasoned.

“When has any draw ever been random when John’s involved?” 

“I don’t know what you are suggesting Gordon.” Scott clung firmly to the calm reasoning, it was all he had by this point.

“I’m saying he cooked the books, which must mean you did something awful last year to make him avoid you like this.” Gordon pointed an accusing finger firmly in Scotts direction.

“Hey! Who says I had anything to do with it?” Scott was on the defensive instantly.

Gordon just gave him a hard stare.

“I didn’t do anything!” Scott declared, with much conviction, and more than a little overacting if you asked Gordon.

“Uh huh, and you never thought it was odd that you and John always got paired?” Gordon would have made a terrifying lawyer, not an efficient one, but terrifying all the same.

“We don't always…..?...oh” Scott stopped as the cogs turned.

“See? And me, Virgil and Allie always go together. The only random bit is who gets what holiday. I can’t believe you never noticed. So, what did you do? Because it must have been impressive to incur John's wrath bad enough that he's remembered for 12 months. No scratch that, John always remembers, but it is impressive that he's annoyed enough to switch up the cooking arrangements.”

“I swear I didn’t do anything!” Scott tried again.

“Well obviously,” (the ‘Duh!’ was there in spirit, if not in name) “that's the point.” said Gordon.

“I don't follow, you were the one saying I’d done something wrong.” Scott frowned, the spitting from popping bubbles in the pan drew his attention back to the quickly congealing sauce. He swore and redoubled his stirring efforts.

“Oh god, seriously, what are you doing? Give that here.” Gordon prised the pan of gravy out of Scotts grasp with one hand and grabbed a whisk with the other, he flipped the utensil in the air and caught it with a flourish. Some energetic mixing and only minimal cursing salvaged the sauce. 

“Why do you think John picks you? It's clearly not for your cooking skills. He picks you because you DON’T usually get involved. You don't get in his way.”

Gordon saw Scott's face drop along with his shoulders. 

“Oh, hey, no I didn’t mean it like that. You're busy, we get it, and you try, that's what counts. But really, at the end of the day, John just wants to be left to get on with it without interference. You know John, if he’s not juggling six different things at a time, he doesn’t know what to do with himself. Multitasking is ingrained into his DNA. All you have to do is turn up and peel a few veggies and leave him to him, and he can add whatever flourishes or garnishes he likes. But you didn’t, you did something bad enough that John would rather go toe to toe with the king of logistics in a battle of the accompaniments. Have you seen Virgil's Gantt chart? It’s broken down to the minute, to the actual minute, the man even stocktakes the roasting pans ahead of time. There is no room in there for a spontaneous little sauce or whatever John’s genius might suddenly think of. See, this is why the split was perfect, me and Al, we’re trained” Here Gordon returned the pan to the hob, and swiftly started slicing carrots into neat little batons. “Virgil tells us to jump and we jump, I am not even salting the cooking water unless its on the plan,” he said tossing a generous pinch of salt into the boiling water before scraping the prepped carrots off the chopping board and into the pan with the edge of his knife. “Anyway, I digress. If you don’t tell me then I will have to guess, and honestly the only things coming to mind wouldn’t paint you in a good light, so I would start confessing if I was you.” Gordon raised one accusing eyebrow as he moved across to a clean chopping board and his next task. It was like watching a machine, as he moved from task to task methodically. 

Scott had never stopped to think about it before. The fact that every year they dished up a culinary masterpiece, that Scott usually knew very little about until the moment it made it to the table. Sure, he cut things, and peeled things, but when he really thought back on it, that was all he did do. Sometimes he was given a pan to stir, but after the few times he had started checking emails on his phone whilst on pot watching duty, those occurrences had become less and less. 

He frowned, he had tried to make an effort, he truly had. Just last year he had tried to plan ahead and had ordered in a pre-prepared dinner from a catering company that they only needed to heat up…..

“Oh…” 

“Ah, I see the penny has dropped, care to share with the class?”

Scott rubbed a hand over his face, and regretted it since there had been onions in his recent past. 

“I might have ordered last year's meal in.” 

“Might have?”

“Did. Ok, I did. I ordered it in from that catering company, they provide everything, you just follow the instructions, minimal effort. Ugh! Everyone had been so washed out that I thought we deserved a break, I was trying to help. “ Scott groaned again.

“Yep, that’d do it. The one time he comes down and gets free reign in the kitchen and you clipped his wings with a package deal dinner. Oh Scotty, Scotty, Scotty. I’m surprised this is the only revenge he's enacting. Have you been having any issues with your electronic devices recently? Lost your favourite playlist? Lockscreens keep mysteriously resetting?” 

Gordon grinned as the realisation dawned on Scotts face that those hadn't been unfortunate accidents or isolated events.

“Ahh, yes , the John revenge special. I’m sorry to say you’re probably not even through the worst of it yet. My guess would be that he’s still got a few more tricks up his sleeves. In fact….” there was an audible clunk from the dishwasher. “Yep, unless my ears deceive me, that would be the sound of the dishwasher ‘mysteriously’ malfunctioning, it’s going to be double KP duty for us.” Gordon winked.

“Well, at least I can’t screw that up.” Scott rested his balled fists on the counter top and took a deep breath, his head hanging low.

Gordon meanwhile, didn’t stop his one man attack on all the vegetables in the vicinity, moving on to green beans. 

“How am I going to make it up to John?” Scott asked.

“Oh you can’t.” Gordon laughed, “sorry Bro, the only option is working through the penance until John gives up.”

“How long will that take?” Scott looked up, the smallest glimmer of hope in his eyes.

Gordon shrugged, then scooped up the trimmings for the compost and went to the refrigerator for the next veggie candidate for decapitation. “Who can tell, it could be months, it could be years, it looks like this one was a slow burn to begin with.”

Scott frowned, putting two and two together. “Hey Gordon, what did you do?”

“What do you mean, what did I do?”

“Just that. What did you do to get lumped in on the punishment? John's meticulous in his bookkeeping, you must have done something.” The blue eyes were set to piercing and trained on Gordon, who only stalled slightly in his chopping. 

“Oh Scott, that's slander, you know that right?” The stare continued with not the slightest waver. “Oh alright! There might have been a tiny little incident, nothing major…” one eyebrow raised a fraction of an inch, but the gaze stayed firm. “Oh fine! I might have eaten his burger. But honestly, it was unintentional, I didn’t realise it was the one Virgil had got for John, I thought it was a spare! Honest!”

Scott shook his head slowly in disappointment, he even dropped in a few tuts. 

“And when was this?” he folded his arms to add a little more solemnity to things, it also helped to tuck his onion smelling hands away. 

“Eighteen months ago.”

“Eighteen months! Johns been exacting revenge for over a year? For a cheeseburger?” 

“It was a double cheeseburger.” Gordon had the decency to look a little abashed at the admission. 

“Well, in that case, that's totally reasonable and not at all obsessive.” Scott picked up a small piece of chopped raw potato and threw it at Gordon's head. “What are we going to do then? We’re both in the dog house.”

“Well firstly I thought we could make dinner, and then see where we go from there.” Gordon shrugged, brushing at his hair with one hand to make sure there wasn’t any potato lingering. 

“But how? We’ve established I can’t cook, and you just jump on Virgil's command.”

“Hey, no fair, I told you I was trained. All of this -” he gestured to the various bowls and pans of prepped vegetables “all of this was from memory.”

Scott looked a little more optimistic, “Ok, well that's more promising, what do we sort next then?” he clapped his hands together and stood up straighter. 

Gordon, in contrast, slumped a little where he stood, “no idea. I was only ever on peeling duty. Well that and washing up. What are we gonna do?!” it wasn’t quite a wail, but it was close.  

Scott groaned, realising his chances of paying back his debt to John were getting slimmer by the second. But Scott Tracy is not a quitter, and neither is Gordon Tracy come to that. Scott strode towards his younger brother, and clasped him firmly by the shoulders and pulled in every scrap of confidence he had left lurking deep within his consciousness. “Well Gordon,  we’re just going to have to work with what we’ve got!” 

And work they did, dinner might have been several hours later than intended. It might have used every available pot and pan in the entire building. There might have been rather a lot of curse words deployed and the pantry might have looked like tornado season had hit early. But, by golly, there was a meal on that table big enough to feed the entire island nearly into the new year.

Nobody even bat an eyelid at the complete lack of turkey. It would have been a heartless individual who could have looked at Gordon and Scott in their exhausted state, smudged and sweaty from their extended time in the kitchen, and do anything so mean as to mention the fact that the meal was made up exclusively of side dishes. People went back for seconds and thirds, and still there was enough to warrant hunting out matching lids for the tupperware in order to stash the excess for the next day. 

Scott took it as a good sign that the dishwasher miraculously fixed itself halfway through the clean up operation.  

...

[beabaseball]

Starting to wonder if I perhaps have got Smalltalk backwards? I've talked to friends and other people after bad conversations and been like "I thought I was putting up pretty clear indications that went completely ignored" and they've agreed that I put out A Lot Of Signals That Go Ignored, which might be more of like. They know what signs to look for and so they are more obvious to those people? But there's that post like "smalltalk indicates to people what you're willing to elaborate on"

so maybe by saying things like "no I don't have holiday plans, I'm just going to hide in my room and distract myself for a week until people stop wishing me happy new year" the other people go " do you not like new years?" (I feel I have already embedded the answer to this question) instead of "aw that sucks. I'm gonna party til midnight" (Rock on) or even "oh huh. How do you keep distracted?" "How much do you want to hear about video games today?"

Admittedly that guy was very chill and that was a less obvious signal, but the person who responded to "if they keep talking like this [politics] I'm gonna leave" by talking like that more ("if Trump was still president there wouldn't be a war in ukraine") shouldn't have been surprised when I did not actually leave and just started yelling at him. Similarly, the person whose response to "i dont want to hear [the joke you offered to tell] if it's got plane crashes in it" with "actually it does! [tells joke]" like. I don't know what to tell you. I gave you all the clues.

But maybe it is my mistake to think warning signs are not being used as conversational gps driving them directly into the river.