#but he is actually not just a cringe fail man with a flare (which is also good)

[fragmentedblade]

Argenti is actually pretty Lancelotcoded, he is deranged and even suicidal. I adore him

[trashytummiez]

what if Orca ate too much and Killer Croc rubs her belly?

Killer croc returned to his underground lair and rubbed his scaly stomach hungrily. It growled like an animal and left him grumbling for his own stomach to keep it down. But when he checked his fridge to his dread he saw the whole thing was picked clean.

"What the hell?!" Croc shouted.

He had a stocked fridge when he left how could it it be empty just like that?

Then he heard groaning from the other room and straight away got his answer.

There he found his girlfriend Orca sitting on the floor and caressing her massively stuffed tummy. Orca had eaten so much that her stomach looked like she was pregnant and expecting any second now. Her blubbery tummy was so huge that she had to sit on the floor with her back against the wall and her thighs spread out just to give it some room to breathe.

"Ey why'd ya eat everythin' in the fridge??" Killer Croc complained.

Orca groaned miserably. "Unnngh sorry Croc. Something got me feeling anxious again so I had to distract myself..."

"So ya settled on cleanin' me out?"

Orca hiccuped which made her huge belly jostle and slorsh. Not a good feeling right now. "...Unf couldn't help myself..."

The way her massive tummy groaned so loudly was enough to make even Killer Croc cringe almost as hard as Orca did. He'd certainly been there countless times in his life.

He decided to cut his girlfriend some slack so Croc sat down next to her and planted his rough scaly hands against her giant smooth tummy. Then in a surprisingly gentle way Killer croc began to rub Orca's massive tummy with a great deal of care. His hands delicately moved up the giant blubbery medicine ball of a tummy where his claws gently dug into the fat flesh.

Orca's eyes rolled to the back of her head and she moaned at the much needed tummy rub. For a monster so rigid Killer Croc knew how to be surprisingly tactile and docile with her.

"That feel good?" Croc asked.

Orca hummed through her chest and smiled pleasantly.

Killer Croc grinned and kept it up even when his own stomach rumbled.

Orca frowned guiltily when she heard Croc's scaly belly complaining. "Sorry I really should've left you something..."

"Ah it's cool. It's pretty late so I'll go back up t'the surface and find a mugger later."

Orca shrugged. At least Killer Croc would be getting a more filling meal that way. Then she continued to enjoy his soothing treatment over her tummy.

His scaly hand ran up and down the fatty side of Orca's massive stomach. He just kept rubbing it up and down occasionally rubbing upwards with his palm or gripping into Orca's blubber and kneading it to help it settle. Croc's hands traced over every bit of that giant whale belly and kneaded into it on top of rubbing away.

Orca sat there loving every second of it. Especially when Croc dug his claw into her very deep belly button. Croc kneaded into Orca's navel moving around circularly inside which got Orca moaning a little louder. Even when she was human her belly button was always extra delicate.

When Croc yanked his claw out of her belly button her whole chubby tummy wobbled around until Croc patted it heartily which caused it to slosh around and made Orca hiccup again.

"Man ya really know how to pack this stuff away don'tcha!" Croc admired.

"I stress-eat sometimes," Orca admitted with embarrassment. "I keep meaning to maintain better self control."

"Pssh self control's overrated," Killer Croc dismissed speaking from extensive gluttonous experience himself. "Besides ya look good with a belly on ya," Croc almost purred when he grabbed a hold of Orca's hefty blubbery tummy.

Orca blushed and scowled back in response. "Y-You're just saying that to make me feel better."

"Naw I'm serious," Croc insisted and looked down at that big plump tummy which he rubbed circles all over. "Ya look sexy as hell."

"...You're an idiot..." Orca said but the way her cheeks flared up hinted something else.

She didn't object when he continued stroking her tummy though. Her silky flesh felt so smooth to Croc even with his scales partially diluting everything he felt. Even he could feel the sleekness to it and how much softer it was when Orca was so unbelievably bloated. He couldn't help marvel at her girth as his hands roamed every bit of that hefty belly.

Killer Croc fondled her heavy underbelly gripping into her tummy and heaving her whole stomach up a little to just feel its weight in his arms. And the way he looked down at this massive tummy with this hungry look in his eyes was telling.

Maybe Killer Croc really did have a thing for tummies, especially Orca's tummy.

Orca also had to admit. Having her belly tended to by her big scaly boyfriend was doing something for her too.

It was enough to make her forget all about her troubles. At least until Killer Croc brought it back up.

"So what was buggin' ya anyway?" Croc asked while he rubbed.

Orca shifted a little. "You know me. I'm an anxious person."

"But ya usually ain't anxious fer nothin'."

"I don't know. I guess I was just thinking about the future. I've accepted this is who I am now but I don't know things like how it's going to affect my lifespan if I can have children or if it will affect my mind going forward."

"You've been this way fer years now though."

"Mutations do still occur and I never got a chance to read the fine print when they transformed me."

Killer Croc frowned. He'd changed a lot too when he grew up but for as much as he mutated he was still himself. "D'ya feel any different?"

"No?"

"Yer thoughts ever make ya think differently?"

"Well I didn't used to think humans tasted so good," Orca joked and rubbed her fat belly fondly patting it a few times too. "Besides my hunger and my new body though no. I guess not."

"I ain't smart bout nothin' but I know people well enough. I think the fact yer so nervous bout this sorta crap only means yer still you cuz ya always overthink crap. Comes with bein' a nerd right?"

"Scientists aren't nerds," Orca frowned.

Croc grinned teasingly. "C'mon ya could be playin' video games with me but instead yer always readin'? Yer the queen'uh nerds babe!"

"And you're an asshole."

Killer Croc laughed and nodded in agreement. Orca herself couldn't help laugh and shake her head. Croc wasn't the most sensitive of maneating monsters but he was surprisingly very good at listening and helping Orca get out of her own head sometimes. That was all she really needed sometimes and he never failed to give her that relief from her own anxieties.

"Thank you," she said sincerely.

Croc smiled back at her and leaned up to kiss her on the lips.

Or at least he tried to until her huge belly gurgled heavily enough to actually make it ripple slightly.

Orca cringed and turned her head with a fist pushed against her mouth. She stifled a deep burp in her mouth that Killer croc could hear rumbling in her cheeks. Then Orca gripped the dead center of her chunky belly and muffled an even bigger burp that made her cheeks balloon out somewhat.

She blew the gas out from the corner of her mouth and blushed.

"Unnnnf excuse me. That was gross," Orca pardoned herself.

"Pssh ya forget who yer datin'?" Killer Croc teased. "Don't hold 'em in if yer feelin' gassy babe. That ain't gonna feel too hot fer yer gut."

Killer Croc leaned his heavy scaly torso against Orca's giant belly. The added weight of his body alone was causing the pressure to build but then he squeezed Orca's tummy firmly and forced that pressure right up her throat. Before she could stop herself Orca a huge echoing burp that rumbled throughout the tunnels.

BBBRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHP!!!!!!!!!

Croc grinned. "There ya go babe! Get it all out!"

Killer croc gripped the center of Orca's belly and pushed his hands deeply into the middle of her heavy tummy. Before Orca could tell Croc off she burped so hard that the ground felt like it was shaking!

HHUUUUUUUURRRRRAAAAAAAAAOOOOOOOOURRRHP!!!!!!!!!

Croc laughed heartily. "Damn! Ya been holdin' out on me haven'tcha!"

Orca panted heavily and waved her hand to get Croc to pause for a moment. Her blubbery tummy rose and fell heavily with her stunted breath. Orca's face was pretty red. She was never shy about burping at all even back when she was still human. But these days she usually only did that either if she was alone or if the only other person around was in her stomach.

She couldn't help be a little embarrassed by how loud they were. But she had to admit it felt so much better getting the gas out.

Whatever the case Orca puffed out her cheeks and blew in a weary sort of way. "Ungh push here," Orca instructed Killer croc pointing right around her belly button again. She felt that part of her stomach bubbling and making it feel even more tense.

"Grand finale time huh?" Croc grinned. Then he pushed his thumbs into Orca's belly button and pressed both hands right into the middle of her chunky gut. They actually sank into the blubbery belly fat and caused her whole stomach to churn.

The Orca's mouth parted with an absolutely colossal burp that was louder than any she'd ever let out and rumbled out of her tummy so long that Croc stopped counting the seconds.

AAAAAAAAAHHRRAAAAAAAAAAUUUUUUUUURRRRAAAAAAAAAOOOOOOOOORRRRRHHHHUUUUUURRP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Orca panted so heavily she started drooling. She slumped back in a daze feeling absolute relief while her belly spilled out freely and bubbled much more softly.

Killer croc slapped his thigh with laughter. "GAHAHAHA!!! Holy shit babe! You'n I definitely gotta have ourselves a contest later!" He said childishly patting her tummy and making her hiccup again.

The relief she felt was so astronomical that Orca didn't even blush. She just smacked her lips and said, "I wouldn't want to embarrass you."

And in an uncharacteristic display of cockiness Orca thumped her chest and burped one last time to prove her point.

[titularkilljoy]

Black Coffee

Summary: Spencer had changed since prison. And no one seems to be able to help.

Pairing: Spencer Reid x Reader

Warnings: Strong language, mental health struggles, angst

Author’s note: Inspired by this post. Also, this is my first time writing for a fandom. So, don’t be gentle. Be brutally honest. 

Spencer was different these days. On that much, everyone could agree.

Everyone on the team walked on eggshells around him now, myself included. It wasn’t that we didn’t want to be there for our friend who had just gotten out of a three-month stint in prison; it was quite the opposite. All of us were waiting with bated breath for an opportunity to help. None of us wanted him to bottle up all his frustration and end up throwing books at the bureau walls again. As it was, he refused to acknowledge it or talk about it, and as a result, we all talked around it, trying to profile him without making it too obvious; trying to help him without him catching on to the fact that we were trying to help him. All in all, it was a Herculean feat. Every time he detected the slightest ounce of what he deemed to be pity, you could see his hackles raise, and an impenetrable barrier would form around him. That was incredibly unpleasant for everyone involved.

Spencer and I had been close, once. Extremely close. We had confided in each other about everything. I think he had always appreciated the fact that I never treated him like an all-knowing alien or a socially awkward little brother. It probably helped that my feelings for him were far from brotherly. But he didn’t need to know that.

Regardless, our close bond seemed to be a thing of the past. I had been there to welcome him back to the outside world on the day he was released. My heart was fuller than it had ever been, with love and relief and grief, and I had thrown my arms around him without a word. He had been stiff in my embrace for a few seconds before I felt the familiar warmth of his arms clutching me tightly. I had sighed deeply. I had missed his touch.

Since then, however, he had shut himself off. I had tried to give him space, to let him resolve those issues , which he clearly did not want to speak to me about, on his own. When that didn’t seem to work, I decided on a more hands-on approach.

For a week, I had been trying to muster the courage to follow through on that decision. But every time I tried to broach the matter, the emptiness of his gaze and the rigid set of his shoulders would stop the words in my throat. I felt like I was trying to speak to a stranger. Worse than that– I knew how to deal with traumatized victims and witnesses. Spencer was neither of those and both of those at once. Besides that, he was the ghost of my best friend. Every conversation felt like trying to breathe new life into a relationship long gone dead and cold.

Right now, he was alone in the break room. On the surface, he seemed to be going about his routine like a normal person. But to the trained eye, it was horrifying. Because he was pouring himself some coffee. A black coffee. With one sugar. Knowing him like I did, the sight was bleak, and it spurred me into action.

I set my shoulders and walked into the room. He lifted his head and nodded at me in greeting. I sidled over to the counter and set my gaze firmly on the pot of coffee as it if contained all the secrets of the universe. He leaned against the counter, staring at the opposite wall while blowing on his coffee. I cleared my throat. There was a palpable tension in the air. Maybe it was just me. He certainly didn’t seem bothered. I, however, was choking on it.

“Spencer,” I tentatively began, “I was thinking, maybe we should talk?”

I cringed at my own words even as I said them. I’d spent a week working on this and the best I could do was some sitcom staple dialogue?

Spencer’s eyes darted over to me, brow furrowing in curiosity. “About what? Is this about the case?”

“No. No, it’s not about the case.”

That seemed to be the wrong answer. He heaved a frustrated sigh and rubbed a hand over his face.

“(Y/N), we really don’t have time for–-“

Another deflection. Except this time, I was expecting it, and wouldn’t accept it.

“Yes, we have time, Spencer. We’ve apprehended the suspect. We saved a victim. Today we’re doing paperwork”, I pointed out, “and this is definitely more important than paperwork.”

“If this is a personal matter then we shouldn’t be talking about it here anyway,” he said in a clipped tone. He was getting defensive.

“You’re right, Spencer.” That took him by surprise, and I was rewarded with his grudging attention.

“You’re right. This conversation shouldn’t be happening here. Except, you’ve been dodging my calls for a month. You pretend you’re not home when I show up at your apartment. You won’t even say a word to me that isn’t about work.” I let the frustration I felt bleed into my words; he needed to know this wasn’t a profiler’s attempt to poke and prod at his psyche. It was just me, and I wanted my best friend back.

“I’ve been busy,” he hedged, but there was a trace of guilt in his eyes. He had never liked seeing me hurt, after all.

“Don’t lie to me, Spencer,” I practically begged, “You’re shutting me out. I know you’re struggling. It’s so damn obvious that you’re struggling. I just want to help you. I hate seeing you like this.”

“I’m not asking you to! And I don’t need your help,” he spat with a scowl. “I’m not struggling. I can do this job just as well as you or anyone else on the team can, if not better.”

The sting from those words was overshadowed by my incredulity. “Are you serious? Spencer, this isn’t about the fucking job!” I cried in frustration. “This is about you. I care about you. You’re in pain, and I don’t understand why you won’t let me help. You used to tell me everything.”

He let out a dark chuckle, placing the mug back on the counter and standing up straight. For the first time in what felt like forever, he stared right into my eyes. Except I would have given anything not to be on the receiving end of that stare. It was so full of malice and bitterness; it was so unlike my Spencer.

“You’re so fucking transparent,” he began in a low tone, and my eyebrows shot up in surprise. Spencer wasn’t usually one for expletives, especially not at work.

“You claim to be worried about me, but you’re really only worried about yourself. You’re lonely, and you can’t form a real connection with anyone. Now that you don’t have me as your emotional crutch, you’re projecting those issues onto me. Typical.”

My jaw dropped against my will. “Spencer, that’s not fair,” I managed to whisper around the lump in my throat. But he wasn’t done yet. Nostrils flaring, he towered over me menacingly.

“Oh, it’s not fair. What isn’t fair is you trying to jeopardize my already precarious position at the FBI by bringing this kind of petty drama into my life. Not everything is about you.”

“I never said it was!” I practically yelled, shocked into anger.

“Yes, but you clearly think it is. You’re not actually worried about me. You just want things to go back to normal. You want me to be the old Spencer again. Sweet, naïve Spencer who would have gladly let you string him along for his entire life. Admit it.”

“String you along? What the fuck are you talking about? How about the other way around? And it’s fucking rich that you’re accusing me of not being able to form a meaningful connection when you’re the one who’s so scared that we’re going to reject you that you’ve completely shut us out. Your fucking family who went through hell and back to get you out. We don’t care that you’re not the same Spencer. No one expects you to be! But I’m sick of all of us talking around the big fat elephant in the room and I’m scared I’m going to find you drugged up and dead on the floor of your apartment one day!”

We were right in each other’s faces at this point, and I was breathing heavily. Surrounding us was a pregnant silence. Spencer’s face had settled into an unreadable mask that I desperately tried to decipher anyway.

Finally, he spoke. His voice was cold as he delivered the killing blow.

“I told you I didn’t want to talk about it. So, I’m not going to talk about it. That’s my decision. You’re not entitled to my confidence, (Y/N). Not anymore. Just leave me alone.”

Every word was well enunciated, and I knew he meant them. He was done with me. When he stormed out of the room, I collapsed back against the counter, trying to call out his name but my vocal cords refusing to cooperate.

I didn’t know how I felt. When your body suffers a massive injury, it numbs you for a while, to protect you. You often don’t even realize you’ve been hurt. But after the numbness fades, your entire body feels like it’s on fire. I supposed that was as good a way as any to explain what was happening to me at that moment. Something so monumental and world-shattering had just occurred that I was being given a few moments of numbness as a reprieve, before the pain would inevitably consume me.

I remained rooted to my position for uncomfortably long time before I realized several pairs of eyes were focused on me, trying and failing to be subtle at it. Overcome with a sudden wave of nausea, I rushed to the restroom. Splashing some cold water in my face, I stared at myself in the mirror.

Well, I thought, that backfired pretty spectacularly.

I closed my eyes and came to the grim realization that prison had left some indelible scars on Spencer. We had all been turning a blind eye to it–- we’d been hoping against all odds that Spencer’s endlessly resilient innocence would be preserved, even in the face of solitary confinement and selective memory loss. After all, the man had literally died and been resurrected, once. He had fought a drug addiction all on his own. He had been parenting his schizophrenic mother since he was a child. He was strong. If anyone could come out of this intact, we had reasoned, it would be Dr Spencer Reid. Being faced with clear evidence to the contrary was a bitter reminder that life always managed to snuff out light and goodness wherever it was found.

I kept my head down on my way to my desk. I made it halfway before I heard Hotch call my name. Garcia was at Morgan’s desk and she offered me an anxious, pitying smile. I didn’t want to acknowledge it. I turned and met his sympathetic yet firm gaze squarely, summoning a confidence I did not feel as I took the detour into his office. What other choice did I have? Life had to go on.

                                ___________________

The next two weeks were tense, to say the least. Spencer and I could barely stand to be on opposite ends of the briefing room with each other. Hotch, perceptive as always, was gracious enough not to pair us up on either of the two cases we worked in that time. I threw myself into the gory details of case files and victimology, refusing to address the fact that I felt like I had lost a limb. I couldn’t succumb to that. Not quite yet, at least. Spencer, for his part, remained inscrutable, although I noticed Morgan and Emily trying to talk to him on more than one occasion. I appreciated their support, but Spencer had made himself very clear. There was nothing anyone could do.

I was dead on my feet when we finally wrapped up the case in Seattle. Derek Morgan needed to learn the meaning of the word “no”, because he still dragged me to some pub I can barely remember the name of. The memory loss could probably be attributed to the blackout drinking I embarked on that night. I drank, downing whiskey shot after whiskey shot until I lost my inhibitions and started giggling and singing along tunelessly to the music, then I drank some more until I felt comfortable enough to dance, and then I kept drinking until I hit the stage where I started sobbing. I usually knew to cut myself off before then. That night, though, my senses seemed to have left me entirely. To curb the sobbing, I drank some more, and that was about the point where I blacked out.

I woke up the next morning in a hotel room, ruing the day I was born, but there was an unopened bottle of water and some aspirin on the table, next to a note from Emily saying she was downstairs with the others. I gingerly caressed my forehead, groaning, before forcing myself out of bed and into the day.

The dark sunglasses I wore did little to make me feel better, and the teasing from Morgan about my alleged shenanigans the previous night did even less to that end. I boarded the jet with a grateful sigh, relieved that I could just curl up and go to sleep.

Alas, that wasn’t what the universe had planned for me, it seemed, because moments after I had nodded off, a hand on my shoulder gently shook me awake. I opened my mouth, ready to yell at whoever it was, but what came out instead was an embarrassing squeak.

Because standing in front of me, clutching a Starbucks cup, was none other than Spencer Reid.

He looked different. Different, and familiar. There was no tightly wound coil. There was no steel in his eyes. There was only warmth.

I eyed the cup in his hands curiously. Had he taken to tempting diabetes with his coffee once again? Had this mess all just been one long sugar crash?

He looked immensely sheepish as he murmured, apparently mindful of my piercing headache, “Can I sit?”

I nodded dumbly, enraptured by the sight of him sinking into the seat across from me, his knees almost knocking into mine. Was I just having a really good dream? Was I still drunk?

“(Y/N),” he whispered, and it felt like I’d travelled back in time. To back before our fight, before prison, before Mr Scratch, before Cat.

“I owe you an apology. Several, actually. I– you have to know that I didn’t mean any of the things I said. I was just lashing out. Textbook defensive behaviour.” He paused, watching me. I just stared back at him. I could only imagine what he saw on my face that made him continue even more gently, if that was even possible.

“You’re my best friend. You always have been. And you were absolutely right when you accused me of being worried about rejection. I- I’m not the same, anymore. I’ve never been particularly fond of myself, but now, I don’t even recognize myself.” He sounded miserable, and all I wanted to do was hug him. I stayed put, though. He looked like he really needed to finish what he had to say.

“I feel…darker, somehow. And I didn’t want to infect you with that. I didn’t want to hurt you. And instead, I hurt you more than I possibly could have if I’d just let you help me. I’m an idiot. I’m so sorry, (Y/N), I–“

“Spencer,” I finally interjected, and slowly, deliberately, reached out and took one of his hands in both of mine. “Yes, you’re an idiot,” I conceded, trying to hold back the relief that was flooding my entire body, “but I’ll forgive you. If you promise you’re not going to pull that shit again. I’m serious, Spencer. You’re hurting yourself, you’re hurting me, you’re hurting the team. We need you. I need you”, I said vehemently, and that was as close to a confession as I would get. At least, for the foreseeable future.

His face told me he heard the unsaid, and the dark guilt clouded his face once again. He was remembering what he’d said to me. String me along, he’d thrown out. Steady determination chased the guilt, and he opened his mouth, but I cut him off.

“No. Not now. You need help. You know how I feel about you. But we can’t right now. It’s not fair to either of us.”

He looked like he was going to protest, but I tried to convey as much sincerity through my eyes as I could. We’ll have our chance, I tried to tell him. I’m not giving up on you, so don’t give up on me, I implored.

Slowly, he nodded. For the first time in half a year, my heart felt light. I knew there would be plenty of hurdles to navigate, but for now, the promise of his company in doing so was enough.

“Besides,” I said seriously, “we need to talk about this bad habit of ours.”

The bafflement on his face was familiar, and I grinned, biting my lip.

“Having these intense conversations in front of everyone in the FBI absolutely has to stop,” I clarified, staring at each of the other people on the jet pointedly. They were doing a very good job of looking busy. Morgan had a smirk on his face. I caught his eye for a second, and we shared a smile.

My comment made Spencer chuckle. “I’ll, uh- I’ll let you get back to your nap then.”

“Oh, thank God,” I groaned dramatically, pulling the blanket over my head to block out the dim light.  It served another purpose; as I listened to the soft cadence of his retreating footsteps, it obscured the smile which threatened to rip my face in two. Morgan would never let me live that down.

[adarlingwrites]

Dormouse

Summary:

After playing a game with two of The Beach's most dangerous members, the dormouse gets her tail caught by a tiger's paw.

He’ll make a wildcat out of her.

all my days were spent by a telephone | that never rang and all I needed was a call | that never came to the corner of First and Amistad

IX

Surrounded by armed and dangerous people, Mr. Yamane and his new wife backed away. Aguni kept his eye trained on the pair, while Niragi chortled and faced Yamaneko, who is glaring daggers at Mr. Yamane’s back.

“All of you, scram. Get ready for the games tonight,” Aguni barks, and he turns to walk away. The rest of the militants do as he says, save for Yamaneko, who finally let out a breath she was holding, and Last Boss stood a little closer to her.

Then, she runs after their leader.

“Chief Aguni, wait. I need to say something,” she said.

Stopping to listen to what she has to say, Aguni crosses his arms and lets her continue.

“No one really stood up for me when my father abused his family before I came here. I tried calling the cops once, but they saw who my father was and only left with a warning. I’m more than capable of handling him now, but you still backed me up. Thank you. You have my loyalty as my show of gratitude,” she declares, and gives him a deep bow.

Something in Aguni’s stony facade shifts for a moment; old and painful memories of his own past fleeting through his psyche, but it’s gone after a few seconds. “Get ready for tonight's game, then. Show your loyalty to me by surviving and bringing back a card.”

Without another word, Aguni leaves. Yamaneko turns and presses her face in Takatora’s chest.

“Thank you for defending me, too. I wish I had someone like you long ago,” she whispers.

Truth be told, Takatora wishes she came into his life earlier as well. He begins imagining what life could’ve been like. Perhaps he wouldn’t need to pour his heart out in online columns that no one cared about. Perhaps he wouldn’t have ended up as a recluse if he had someone who understood his existential dread, his philosophy, and him.

“No one’s allowed to hurt my wildcat.”

Hearing those words made her heart go aflutter. Her lover took her back to their shared bed, where she curled up in his arms. She will survive tonight, for her chief, for herself, and for Takatora.

Especially Takatora.

Tonight’s game was a Five of Clubs in an art gallery.

Yamaneko wasn’t sure if she was distracted because of the sudden appearance of her father, or due to the side effects of the pills Sunohara prescribed, but she nearly got roasted alive in the ordeal.

One of the Beach members she came with perished, foolishly braving the jets, only to drop from the pain midway. Now there’s only Chishiya, another woman in a blue bikini whom he referred to as Kuina, and Yamaneko herself. She had seen the other two’s tags; they’re in the top twenty, just like her. Hell, their ranks are higher than hers, and she found out Chishiya’s actually an executive member, so they must be good. There were ten players total, and they were the only three left.

The game is simple: cross a narrow hallway to the next exhibit area within the given time limit, and avoid getting roasted alive in the process by the jets of fire that blow through the wall. There are three columns of tiles, and ten rows. Kuina had considered risking it, seeing how the others had made it three-fourths of the way, but Chishiya held her back. The man in white waited for the other players to make a move, like he always does.

Observe, then formulate a plan.

Kuina cringed as the others got burnt to a crisp, while Yamaneko’s only reaction was a glassy stare. She didn’t know what the other two are thinking about, but the more she sees people dying, the more determined she is to avoid their fates.

She has someone to go home to now.

“So, any plans?” Yamaneko asks them, stumped. It doesn’t help that she’s feeling nauseous, and a killer headache is making her space out. Kuina regarded her warily, while Chishiya had the same, condescending smirk on his face the first time she  met him.

Being the smartest of the three, Chishiya figured out the trick to winning the game.

“Look closely,” he tells the other two as he watches the others fail and burn. “That man stepped on one tile, and the jet in front of him stopped for five seconds. It’s a pressure plate.”

“So, someone needs to be stepping on the correct tile one row behind,” Kuina replies. “But, if the person behind steps forward, they’re both toast.”

“Well, there’s nothing in the rules forbidding two people to step on the same tile, or that we can’t use an object to apply pressure on the plate,” Yamaneko adds.

“Ah. Always looking for loopholes, huh, Yamane? You’re starting to convince me that members of the militant sect are capable of basic thought,” Chishiya comments in a sing-song manner.

“It’s Yamaneko now. I’m not just some mindless goon just because I’m allowed to carry a weapon,” she spits, crossing her arms and temper flaring from his condescending tone.

“I always had an impression that most militants are given that role precisely because they are mindless goons.”

Yamaneko draws a dagger, irritated to no end. “The chief’s not here, so if I hurt you, I’m not doing it as a goon. I’m doing it on my own accord because you’re such an ass.”

The man in white’s only response is his signature infuriating smirk.

Before a fight can ensue, Kuina steps in between the two. “Can we just focus on the game? The clock is ticking.”

The militant sheaths her weapon. “You’re lucky Kuina doesn’t get on my nerves, or I would’ve ignored her.”

“Oh well. Now that we know how to clear the game, let’s begin.”

“Wait, could you at least spell it out for the two of us?” Kuina asks, eyebrows furrowing, and Yamaneko nods in agreement. “Yeah. I’m not exactly some smug bastard who can figure things out with a glance,” the militant adds, tilting her head.

Chuckling, Chishiya indulges them.

“First, Person A needs to step on the correct plate. Then, Person B will step on the same tile. Person A will leave Person B to figure out the correct tile for the second row. Then, Person C will join Person B. Person B will leave Person C to move to Person A’s spot, while Person A steps on the next correct tile. Then, Person C needs to drop a weight on the tile she’s standing on, and join Person B. Then, Person B will join Person A again. Person A figures out the next tile, then Person C should simultaneously move to Person B’s spot and move the weight to her previous spot, while Person B jumps to Person A’s spot. Rinse and repeat. It’s all about timing. A simple game, really.”

Yamaneko’s head starts to pound from trying to understand the plan, and she groans, massaging her temples.

“You call that simple?! Why don’t we just place weights on every correct tile then?” Yamaneko asks, exasperated.

“Look around you,” Chishiya replies. “The only item in this hallway is that pedestal over there. The room before this one had a few paintings and sculptures, but retrieving them would take too much of our precious time. We’re not even sure if they would weigh enough to keep the plate pressed.”

“Ah, shit. Let’s just go with your plan then. I’m nimble, so I’ll be Person C,” Yamaneko sighs, walking over to the pedestal and dragging it with her.

“I’ll be A,” Kuina volunteers.

“I guess I’m B, then,” Chishiya says in an offhand tone.

Despite the need for a few reminders and a few curses thrown here and there, the plan worked. Yamaneko’s reflexes definitely helped; moving the pedestal quickly and jumping to Chishiya’s position almost at the same time is no easy feat. Time it wrong, and they will both be burned to a crisp. Of course, if they die, Kuina will have no chance of survival too. Such is the nature of a Clubs game: players either have to rely on all the skills required to survive in the borderlands, or work together with other players.

In this case, it’s both.

“This game would’ve been easier if those morons didn’t just rush in,” Yamaneko grunts as she moves the pedestal and maneuvers her way to Chishiya’s side at the same time.

“Well, we wouldn’t have figured out what to do if it wasn’t for their mistakes,” Kuina replies, testing which tile would get the stream of fire in front of her to stop.

“They’re still fucking idiots, rushing into the fire like that without a strategy! Couldn’t they have tried to look for an off switch first? Idiots!”

“Look at that, I actually agree with you. They are idiots,” Chishiya says in a sing-song manner. “I hope you’re not a pot calling the kettle black, though.”

Yamaneko rolls her eyes, head throbbing. “If my survival didn’t depend on you, I would’ve left you to burn simply for being a condescending asshole.”

On the last row, the militant’s line of thought got befuddled due to the searing tension around her forehead, and she still took the pedestal with her and froze instead of just crossing to safety. The five seconds were up, and flames burst out of the walls, licking the left side of her body. Before it could completely engulf her, Kuina pulled her out of harm’s way, eyes wide with terror.

Screaming, Yamaneko panics as her hair, the left sleeve of her jacket, and her skirt caught fire. Kuina quickly tackles her to the ground and rolls her around, extinguishing the flames. As soon as the fire is out, the taller woman helps her out of her burned clothes, both breathing hard.

They looked at each other when they heard the robotic voice from their phones chime in.

“Game clear! Congratulations!”

One of her hair buns is singed, her left arm is suffering from minor burns, and she’s wearing nothing but her black bikini and her shoulder brace now, but Yamaneko is alive.

That’s all that matters.

She can go home to her new family now.

Kuina lets out a sigh of relief, leaning back and closing her eyes as she sits on the floor, while Yamaneko remains lying on her back, staring at the ceiling and still in shock from yet another near-death experience. Chishiya walks over and leans down, and she waves her good arm.

“Fine, fine. You’re a genius, and I can be an idiot,” she admits, not wanting to engage with any more arguments with the man in white.

Chishiya gives her another maddening smirk. “I never said that.”

Then, he walks away.

The militant sits up and watches as he does. “I know that’s exactly what you think though!” Yamaneko yells after him, and Kuina just scratches her head.

All three of them made it back to the car after Chishiya collected the card. He drives, Kuina sits in the passenger seat, and Yamaneko lies on the back. She looks at the burned skin of her left arm and hisses at the pain. It went through so much in just a span of weeks.

After a few minutes of silence, Kuina speaks up.

“Does it hurt?”

Yamaneko wanted to roll her eyes, because it obviously does, but the other woman is probably just trying to make small talk. If it can distract her from the pain, she’ll engage in it. “Of course it does. But I can manage.”

“Sorry about your hair,” Kuina adds, and Yamaneko shrugs.

“I’ve tried crazier hairstyles before. It’s just hair. It’ll grow back.”

“So, how did you end up hanging with those militants anyway? From what Chishiya has told me and from what I’ve seen, you’re not violent unless you need to be.”

“Two of them took me with them, and the rest is history. I’m pretty sure you can figure out why I can’t say no.”

“Fair. They say if you want to live a peaceful life on the Beach, you’d stay out of their business. But if the militants want you to get involved in their business… you better say yes if you value your life,” Kuina replies.

“Yeah. I didn’t have a choice. But even so, I’m grateful to have met them.”

The other woman gives her a questioning look through the rearview mirror. “Why?”

“They stood up for me against my abusive asshole dad. Nobody did that before. They’re a fucked up bunch, but they take care of their own.”

Kuina gives her one last look, a sympathetic one, and looks out the window, wind tousling her hair. On the other hand, Chishiya’s look is cold and calculating.

“You do know that most of them are abusive themselves, right?” Chishiya asks, eyes flicking back to the road.

“Well, I’m no longer at the receiving end of the abuse, so I’ll take what I can get.”

The rest of the ride is filled with silence, a silent understanding forming between the two people in the front seat. When they arrived at the Beach, Yamaneko left the two without saying another word, looking for her lover amidst the crowd.

“So, do you think we can still win her over?” Kuina asks the man in white, placing a faux cigarette between her lips.

“I think she’s a lost cause. Look.”

Kuina looks to Yamaneko’s direction, where Last Boss of all people approaches the shorter woman. The tattooed militant sees the burns on her arm, her lack of clothes save for the bare minimum, and he quickly sheds his hoodie to cover her. Last Boss puts one arm around her shoulder and whisks her away from the crowd.

“Huh.”

“She’s involved with one of them,” Chishiya comments, then he turns to leave, leaving Kuina to gawk at the odd couple.

Takatora held Yamaneko close as they made their way to the clinic. Onlookers be damned, he’s not allowing her to walk to the clinic alone. When arrived at the doorway, Sunohara is tending to an injury of her own, dabbing antiseptic on her scraped knee.

The doctor looks up and her face falls.

“Oh, what happened to you?!” she exclaims, putting down the used cotton swab and walking over to her friend, if she can call Yamaneko that.

“Game involved fire,” she groans, holding her singed arm out. Sunohara leads her inside, and Last Boss follows suit, close as a shadow.

“I can take it from here,” she tells the tattooed militant, who only stared at her with a defiant look.

“Just let him come with me, it’s fine,” Yamaneko tells the other woman, and Sunohara nods, not wanting to deal with what might follow if he didn’t get his way.

Sunohara cringes at the condition of her patient’s arm. “You really should be taking care of that arm,” she mutters, eyes not leaving the injuries. “First you dislocated your shoulder, then you almost nicked a major vein, and now it’s covered in burns.”

“It’s not my dominant arm, so I think I’ll manage. Do you think you can switch me back to tramadol, though?”

Sunohara gives her a pained look. “You know that I’m trying not to get you addicted. I’m sorry, I can’t-”

The words came to a halt when Last Boss drew his sword, and Sunohara panics, jumping away from the two of them. Yamaneko is quick to calm him down. “Relax. If she thinks giving me the medicine might harm me, I trust her decision to withhold it from me.”

Nodding, her lover withdrew, and Sunohara cleared her throat to defuse the tension. As the doctor and Yamaneko talked, Last Boss couldn’t stop observing the two, eyes flicking back and forth between the two women. Sunohara had planned to sit and ask about Yamaneko’s day, but her lover is already whisking her away.

“Talk again tomorrow. I need some rest,” Yamaneko calls out as she leaves the clinic.

“Right! Right. Rest well,” Sunohara replies with resignation, watching her slip away.

As soon as they’re away from prying eyes, Takatora mashes his lips against Yamaneko’s, her lipstick staining his mouth. She sank right into the kiss, tongue darting out to meet his. It was a frustrated, desperate makeout session, and it left both of them breathless.

“Huh. Somebody missed me,” Yamaneko whispers breathlessly.

“You got hurt. I was scared.”

“I didn’t know there were things you’re scared of, Tora. You’re my big, brave tiger, after all.”

With those words, he claims her lips again, softer this time, cupping her face between cold hands. As soon as they broke the kiss, Yamaneko buried her face on his chest, breathing deeply.

“C’mon. Let’s go back to our room. I need to treat my wounds and salvage the rest of my hair.”

Takatora nods.

Showering together is becoming a habit of theirs. Takatora helped wash his lover’s back as she avoided getting hot water on her burned arm. When she turns to face him, she chuckles as she reaches up to clean up the stain her lipstick left on his face.

“I should probably look for a formula that doesn’t smear,” Yamaneko mumbles. His long fingers found themselves on her face, and he gently wipes the rest of her makeup away with a soft washcloth. Not a lot of people ever saw her bare-faced.

Takatora considers himself lucky to be one of them.

After they have dried off, Yamane rummages around for scissors, and heads back to the bathroom. Dragging a stool inside, she sits in front of the mirror, assessing the damage. The fire nearly reached her scalp, mere inches of healthy hair between the singed parts and her skin. She’ll need to cut it short. Using a wide-toothed comb to part her hair, she takes a pair of scissors and trims the ends off.

Then, she looks at the other side of her head and sighs.

“Tora?” she calls out to her lover. He opens the door and peeks.

“Could you do me a favor?”

He nods.

“Could you help me cut the rest of my hair off?”

After a moment of reluctance, he nods again.

Behind her, Takatora holds a pair of scissors. Her lover takes the long strands of her hair, and proceeds to cut. He continues cutting until the ends of her lover’s hair are a blunt, uneven mess.

“I’m not good at this,” he says in a low voice as she helped her shake the strands of hair off.

“It’s fine,” Yamaneko replies, turning from left to right to look at her new hair. “I kind of like it. Looks wild. I guess calling me ‘wildcat’ is appropriate after all.”

Cold fingers caress her neck and tilts her head upwards. Takatora presses a gentle kiss, lips cool as well, and she smiles against him. He gets cold easily and Yamaneko’s warmth is a nice contrast. She always warmed him up.

They sit on the bed, Yamaneko sitting with her legs crossed and her back against Takatora’s chest, whose long legs are splayed on the mattress. He watches in silence as his lover applies burn ointment all over the affected areas of her arm, while his are wrapped around her waist.

“So, how was your game?” she asks him, pressing the back of her head against him.

“Easy. It was a Spade.”

“I wouldn’t expect anything else from you,” Yamaneko responds, smiling as she bandaged her arm. Soon, her eyelids are getting heavy.

“I’m sleepy. Hold me?”

Wordlessly, the tattooed militant shifts his position on the bed with her, spooning her and avoiding contact with her bandaged arm. Takatora buries his face against her hair, getting sleepy as well.

“Hey,” Yamaneko mumbles, voice thick with drowsiness.

“Hm?”

“I love you.”

For a moment, her lover tenses up, which made her fear for the worst. Maybe she should’ve waited longer, or didn’t say anything at all.

But then, he draws her closer and presses a kiss on top of her head.

“I love you too.”

Yamaneko fell asleep with a smile on her face, curling into her lover’s embrace.

The morning after, they headed to the banquet for brunch. The aroma of beef curry made Yamaneko’s mouth water, and she immediately went to ladle some for herself. As she filled her plate with rice and curry, Mr. Yamane stands next to her, waiting for his turn.

It’s their favorite dish after all.

Determined not to spoil her good mood this morning, Yamaneko moves away as soon as she’s finished, not giving him an opportunity to speak to her. She stands next to Last Boss, good arm bumping with his, and she leans against him as he grabs a few sticks of yakitori.

“Could you take a few more for me, please? My plate is full,” she asks him, and with a small smile on his face, he grabs the entire tray, making her laugh.

They were about to leave for their room when people started running towards the outside of the building. Sunohara is among them, and Yamaneko shouts after her.

“Sunohara! What’s going on?”

Pausing, Sunohara has a worried look plastered on her face. “Someone jumped from the third floor of the hotel! I’m sorry, I have to go and see if they can be saved.”

Eyes trailing after the doctor, Yamaneko couldn’t help but feel uneasy.

A few hours later, she was called alongside her father by Rizuna An, the Beach’s number six, and an executive member. Last Boss came alongside her, being an executive member himself, and because he wanted to ensure her safety. However, Mr. Yamane’s new wife, who usually stuck to him like a lost pup, is nowhere to be found.

The militant has a bad feeling about this.

They were led to the lower levels of the hotel, to a room with various medical equipment and tools. Other executive members are waiting, including the Hatter and Aguni themselves. The ones loyal to the Hatter regard the members of the military sect with suspicion. Then, what Yamaneko saw behind them made her stop in her tracks.

On one of the gurneys lies Mrs. Yamane’s corpse.

Desensitized by all the death and violence in the borderland, could only stare with her mouth open. On the other hand, her father rushes to his wife’s side, shouting and crying.

“What happened?” Yamaneko asks, not moving from her spot.

“We thought it was a suicide, but there’s a laceration on the victim’s neck. She’s been murdered.”

Then it hit Yamaneko.

She is summoned because she’s a suspect.

[123goth]

The syndicated man

“Oh, I swear to God, if you don’t start spinning this goddamn instant, I’m gonna smash your glass in and make the toaster watch.” Gripping the edges of my microwave, tightly enough to feel its corners digging into my palms, I growled and gave it a hearty shake. This animalistic roar echoed off my kitchen’s green floors, and another mighty peal of thunder sounded outside.

A flash of lightning painted the room a strange shade of white-olive, the tile catching the glint, and all at once, I felt as though I were the god of storms, speaking my almighty willpower into the microwave that night.

The appliance whirred. It bent to me. And dully, the light came on. The timer blinked. And the leftover pizza began to twirl. And that was that. I sighed, deeply, slumping back against the countertop as the sky finally opened.

The patter of rain filled the building.

This routine could not have come from a sane man, I realized. Sane men did not anthropomorphize their microwaves. They did not threaten to kill their microwaves. They did not inflict psychological torture on their toasters.

Crash!

I jolted. It was that special time of night when the dude in the apartment above seemed to trip and knock everything over. Clank. Bang. Thud! Kaboom! I winced. Was he okay?

“Shut up!” My voice was hoarse. With a long-practiced motion, I pulled the broom from the nearby wall and gave the ceiling four good thumps. And then silence.

I caught my reflection in the oven door. There I stood, armed with a broom, with my shoulders hunched like the world’s worst action figure. I came with a super-hydraulic striped bathrobe, patchy facial hair, and a crooked lip, which healed badly after some guy clocked me in high school.

The microwave beeped. And leaning the broom against the wall, I tugged it open with a grunt to pull out the bubbling grease sponge I was going to eat that night.

I grimaced, knocking the microwave closed with my hip, flicking off the light, and dragging myself into the living room, where I dropped down on the sofa in front of the TV.

The sofa was old, covered in faded brown flowers, and in truth, the television was not much newer. I got them both at the same thrift store—although the attendant would not give me a deal. I wrote them a pretty nasty review that night.

But placing the plate on the cushion to my left, I scooped up the slice in one hand and shoved it into my mouth. My nostrils flared at the sour sensation on my tongue, my taste buds screaming: “No, no, not like this. Anything but this. Just drink actual poison or something.”

I dropped the pizza back onto the plate with a grunt. So much for dinner. I would starve to death.

Michael had been the cook. That night, two years ago, when I sunk into a chair at our kitchen table, my tie already undone, something was boiling on the stove. He had even arranged the alphabet magnets on the fridge to say cutesy shit like, ‘bake the world a better place.’

He did that a lot. I thought it was stupid and told him so, but he was good with words. And I wasn’t.

The little television on the counter was playing a Password rerun.

I should have said something that night. I should have said that whatever was boiling smelled great, or looked good, or that he had worked hard on it. But I didn’t.

“The prick finally did it, Mikey,” I mumbled instead. “He fired me.”

“Oh…oh, it’s okay! We’ll figure it out. You’re good at so many things. You’ll land on your feet.” And he draped two arms over my shoulders, squeezing them tight. But we did not figure it out, and I was not good at anything. And I realize now those were the only two times Michael had ever lied to me.

But screw him. And screw that job. And screw that fridge. And screw the fancy cheeses he kept in it. And screw how much rent that place was asking. And screw me for taking it out on him.

I sighed again. All I did these days was starve and sigh and fight with the microwave. And it was my damn fault. So, I would sit here and feel sorry for myself and mourn for the rest of my life.

Leaning forward, my bones creaking, I manually clicked on the television. Another flash of lightning sparked outside, and the screen came to life in a flurry of static and snow.

Click.

I moved through the channels, one hand on the dial and one on the antenna, twisting it left and right.

Click.

“Romance. The new fragrance….”

Click.

“Italia right in your microwave! New pizza from….”

Click.

“Welcome back to our 24-hour Buzzwords! marathon!”

I could barely see the picture through the fuzz, but the program was some game show from the 70s, complete with a mustached host in a plaid suit.

He dragged around a narrow, wired microphone and made his way through a bright studio, shimmering orange, utterly, sickeningly orange, while a young woman with a sparkling smile, the fabulous Carla, showed off a deluxe dinette set.

I rolled my eyes and crossed my arms as I slumped back into the cushion.

And all at once came another mighty crash of thunder, a rumbling noise punctuated by dude upstairs, who dropped another pot, perhaps as startled as I had been by the sound.

The rain reached a climax as if it might break the windows. Something bright darted across the darkened sky, an airplane maybe. I wonder if it had been struck by lightning. And I cried out as, with a mighty surge, the television screen flashed and sputtered out, fried. 

“Oh, Christ!” I growled, throwing back my head. The microwave did this, I decided. It had gotten all its little technology buddies to act out.

I slammed the thing with my palm, once, twice, three times, each responding with only a hollow thud. And when this scientific effort failed, I climbed to my feet and dropped to all-fours to crawl around the television’s rear. The frayed carpet dug into my knees as I tugged the extension cord from the wall.

Well, at least it wasn’t smoking, I mused, something of a crude smirk finding its way to my face. Because this was funny. In a sad tragicomic kind of way, this was funny.

Even now, I could find humor in how utterly pathetic I looked, crawling around on my knees with my boxers hanging out, all because I wanted to watch lesser-known game show reruns.

“Work or I’m gonna go back in that kitchen and throw your commander out the window, you hear me?” Leaning backward and sitting on my legs, I waved the cord deliberately before the television screen. And with that, I ducked back down and plugged it into the wall.

I blinked. And all I saw was light, a strange, fluorescent glow that consumed every inch of my vision.

Oh my God, I thought. I’m dead.

I electrocuted myself, and I’m dead.

My feet were planted on the ground. I was standing. I had crawled around to plug the television into the wall, but somehow, I was now standing. And I could not remember getting up.

“Welcome back to Buzzwords!”

I blinked again, and at that moment. I realized the blinding light was not white at all, but utterly, sickeningly orange. And there I was, like a moron, standing at a podium with a smile plastered across my face.

In truth, I wanted to scowl or grimace or something, but I couldn’t. My muscles ignored me. And on their own, my hands came up to applaud.

“Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. I’m your host, Buddy Guy. And we have a great show for you tonight.”

The hell?

“Let’s meet our contestants and get the game underway.” Buddy smiled broadly and walked in my direction.

I found my mouth opening of its own accord.

“Hi, Buddy! My name is John Smith. I’m from Columbus, Ohio, and I want to say hello to my wife, Betty.” These words spilled from me as if rehearsed, without my input, as though I were a passenger in my head (or, as it turned out, someone else’s).

And the absolute worst was that I could not cringe. I could not roll my eyes. I could not grunt or groan at just how saccharine I sounded, nor at the fact that my name was John Smith.

“Welcome, John. Good to have you.” Buddy Guy moved past me like an automaton, introducing a waitress from New York and a wannabe actor, who lived with his beloved roommate William of five years in Los Angeles.

And if I had to choose someone to be from this panel, it probably would have been him, because then at least I would not have a wife named Betty.

But this could not be happening; it certainly was not happening. I was not miming the motions of John Smith from Ohio. It was not 1970-whatever. And so, I truly must have been dead.

This whole illusion was that thing, that thing where synapses fire because your brain is pissed about non-existence. And if I could turn my head, which I could not, I would have peered into the audience to look for departed relatives.

But John stared forward, and so did I.

“Tonight, our contestants are competing for a stunning new kitchen set. Tell them all about it, Jack.”

An announcer from offstage began singing the praises of the sparkling refrigerator, oven range, and microwave that appeared from behind a velvet curtain. The audience lightning-sparkedooo’d and ahh’d.

And by now, Carla had emerged to point at everything, but I barely saw her. Even from this vantage point, unable to move on my own, I could catch my reflection in the oven door.

John Smith was, well, a man, yes, but in a strange, overly generic way. He, and by extension, I, had an average build, brown hair, brown eyes, and a decidedly uncrooked lip, one nobody had ever socked in.

He was the sort of person you might see in a department store catalog, I thought, or in a stock photograph of an office: unassuming and smiley.

But I could not look long.

My head was turning as the unflappable Buddy Guy made his way once again in my direction.

“Let’s reveal our first puzzle,” the host smiled, and taking this cue, Carla pulled out a marker, as if from nowhere, and drew a crude approximation of a gallows on the refrigerator door.

Spinning in a little circle, red gown flashing, she then tugged open the microwave to allow a multicolored pile of alphabet magnets to spill forth from within.

It was just goddamn Hangman, I realized. And I didn’t even get to spin a wheel or anything.

“How about a letter, John?”

“V!” I cried against my will.

Oh great. John sucked at this game.

“Sorry. No ‘V’s.’”

And so, it went.

The waitress guessed a “Y,” and scored a few points. Fishing the letters from the microwave pile, Carla stuck the magnets to the fridge. The actor guessed a number in the form of a question.

I unironically said the phrase “Oh, gee!” when there were no “X’s.”

And at this rate, it took us two whole commercial breaks to get to the unimpressive:

Y_ _  M_D_  Y_ _ R  B _ D.  N_W  LI_  IN  I_

By now, the hanging man was missing only his feet.

This was hell, I thought. I had died, and I had gone to hell.

And I would be terrible at this word game forever, and that was my punishment for being mean to the dude in the apartment upstairs.

And writing that bad review of the thrift store.

And for Michael, who had only ever lied to me twice.

“I’d like to solve it, Buddy!” I grinned.

“Go ahead, John.”

“You made your bed. Now lie in it!”

There were buzzers and bells, and the audience cheered.

“That’s right, John. You made your bed. Now you’re lying in it.”

Buddy smiled at me, and for a moment, a crack appeared, something sharp and sinister behind his cheery expression. His lip twitched, and a flicking tongue, snakelike, nipped the lower part of his mustache.

“I deserve to lie in it, Buddy!”

And somehow, this was pretty goddamn funny. If I could, I would have laughed.

“Onto our next puzzle,” Buddy cut in as Carla knocked down all the letters, leaving them on the floor. She used her bare hand to smudge off the marker.

“Can I have a ‘Y,’ Buddy?”

Jesus Christ, John. How about an actual letter or something? Whatever happened to “A?”

I sighed internally. But to my surprise, Carla reached into the microwave and retrieved the red letter, placing it on the refrigerator door.  John did it. He got one. I felt excited for him.

I squeezed the podium. My hands were working, I realized, and so, overcome, I squeezed, just as tightly as I had the microwave that night, finding again the sensation of willpower.

But by now, Buddy was busy with the waitress and the actor, the former somehow earning a double penalty, which made Carla draw both a head and a body on the gallows.

But when play returned to me, I was able to speak up.

“What the hell is going on?”

The host narrowed his eyes, sniffing the air.

“Guess a letter, John.”

“I don’t know. An ‘A!’”

Sifting through the alphabet pile, Carla placed two magnet letters on the fridge, but she too was giving up her pretense. There was no pointing and smiling. She stared at me with a dour, annoyed expression, as if she could not believe my gall.

“It’s ‘Abandon All Hope Ye Who Enter Here,’” I said.

Which was a cliché, but I was realizing now that if kitsch was going to be my hell, I could at the very least lean into it.

“Well, all right. Thank you for tuning in, ladies and gentlemen. After this important message, John will be moving to the bonus round,”

Buddy said to the camera. “Are we at commercial?”

No one responded. He marched over to me, twirling the microphone cord around his hand. I looked at it and realized it may very well have been the noose with which the poor loser might be strung up.

“You’re not playing by the rules, John,” he said nonchalantly, beginning to use the wire to bind my hands together, tighter and tighter, around my wrists, his grip surprisingly firm.

“Hey! Hey!” I retorted, trying to pull away.

“Don’t be a jerk. You’ll make this harder if you resist.”

“But that’s my problem. I’m here because I’m a jerk. You can’t damn people and expect them not to be jerks.”

“Do you think you deserve to be damned, John?” the host asked me. He cocked his head to one side.

“I think your show is stupid. But I’m finding that making fun of it and John’s wife Betty probably won’t help me win it.”

“You can’t win it, John. The outcome’s already set. This marathon’s just reruns. Your life is just rerun. The same thing over and over forever. Wake up. Eat. Sleep. And you lose every time. So why should this be different, hm?” Buddy dropped his voice low, but all at once, the studio lights flared, and he spun around to face the audience. “And we’re back!”

The soundstage went dark. The cheers stopped, and it was just me and Buddy, caught in a silent spotlight. Another lamp, mounted on a ceiling somewhere in the expanse of shadows above us, shined straight down, casting the refrigerator, the microwave, and the letters, in its fluorescent glow.

“It’s just us now, John. This is the bonus round. You get four letters. You have one chance to go up and complete the puzzle. And that’s it.”

_  F _ R _ _ _ _  M _  S _ _ _

I cast my gaze at Buddy, wavering a moment, before stepping uncertainly forward into the expanse. Although I could not see the floor beneath my feet, just deep darkness, I felt its steady weight as I moved to stare at the blanks.

An eternity passed as I stared. And maybe it had. At this moment, in this place, seconds and minutes and moments, they seemed to mean so little.

I forfeit my soul.

That was it. That was the joke.

I had already done it, I knew. I had become so wrapped in the misery of my own making that I had forfeited my very self to it. And willingly.

Choice. That was it, wasn’t it? I, willpower personified, exerting it in every wrong direction. And so, moving for the pile of letters, hands still bound, I pulled them out the microwave one at a time.

I stuck the magnets in place, whispering the words aloud as they appeared on the refrigerator. And only then, with a definitive nod, did I step back to see my handiwork.

I FORGIVE MYSELF

I awoke on the floor beneath the TV with a sudden, painful gasp.

The dude upstairs dropped something. I stared a good few seconds at the ceiling. And with that, I pressed back onto the carpet and laughed, a full hearty noise, the television set’s extension cord wrapped around my fingers.

Wrestling them free, I checked my reflection on Paula sparked the screen to be safe.

And taking a few more steadying breaths, I moved for my apartment door. I tugged it open to poke my head into the hallway, craning it up the stairwell to the sole unit above mine.

“Hey, pal? Do you need help up there?” 

[itmighthavebeenintentional]

Shackled

Chapter 1

Summary: After nearly ten years, Sam Winchester calls Miriam Bard to collect on a life debt. Unfortunately for Miriam, Sam leaves out a few important details.

Warning: Implied loss of family, grieving, depression, cursing, Demon!Dean, Sam’s tendency to leave out vital details for folks helping him to save Dean (read: Sam’s tendency to be a Winchester)

Word count: 1,895

Author’s Note: This story would not be possible without @thoughtslikeaminefield​ , who convinced me to write and finish this story, cheered me on every step of the way, and convinced me that even after over a year of not finishing a single thing, I hadn’t lost my writing after all. MJ, thank you for poking the story til it squeaked. And for the banner. And lots and lots of other things. If you’re reading this, hi! Have a seat and strap in, it’s gonna be a bumpy ride (in the best way!).

“Hey, Miriam, it’s Sam...Sam Winchester...I don’t know if you remember me from-”

“I remember you, Sam. Not likely to forget a Winchester, much less...it’s one in the morning, what’s up?”

“I need to call in that favor.”

“All right. Where do you need me?”

…

Miriam stared blearily at the road as it stretched out in an infinite blur of dismal sameness, each expanse of asphalt and surrounding fields a dreary replica of the one before.

The last couple hundred or so miles had been hypnotically wretched, especially with the remnants of her headache hanging on by the tips of its claws since Sam Winchester had woken her with a phone call a few hours ago.

Caffeine and aspirin had taken the edges off, but straining her eyes into the endless darkness, alternating occasionally with too-bright headlights shattering the night (fucking halogens), had done nothing to ease the sharp ache that wouldn’t quite dissipate.

If she was being honest, the headache had been hanging around much longer than just a few hours, and if Sam’s call hadn’t woken her, the nightmares would have. They always did. She couldn’t really remember what an uninterrupted night of sleep felt like anymore. Exhaustion was her state of existence; it was preferable to feeling anything else.

“Suck it up, Miri,” she muttered into the muffled quiet of the car. Even her GPS was set on silent; the soft hum of the engine was the only noise she allowed to permeate her cocoon of quiet suffering.

Aaron would have been blasting some stupid metal band on the stereo, slapping her hand away every time she went to turn it down or change the station. He wouldn’t offer to drive and let her sleep off any physical maladies, but she wouldn’t have accepted anyway. He was a shit driver, and she always said she’d rather live long enough to let the next case kill her rather than the inevitable wreck if her brother was behind the wheel.

“Suck it up, Miri! Take another pill and quit whining!” he would have told her in the middle of an air drum solo.

Would have.

“Shut up,” Miriam muttered aloud. She drove on.

She pulled up outside something she would have dismissed as public waterworks or an electric station if Sam hadn’t told her what to look for. No cars outside, no mailbox, nothing to tell her this was an actual residence and not the setting for a seventies slaughterhouse flick. She checked her phone.

Text me when you get here; I’ll come let you in.

Alrighty, then.

Sam met her at the door and led her into the last sort of place Miriam could have imagined, a cross between a sci-fi/post-apocalypse novel and some sort of Cold War relic. He gave her the briefest of explanations as he led her through the bunker, saying something about legacies and a secret society, information which mostly passed right through her fatigue-addled head.

Pretty nice home base, she thought as they walked through the meeting room and past the library.

The research-oriented part of her itched to run her fingers over the spines of those books, to find out what was inside. Miriam cringed internally as she heard the echo of Aaron’s voice calling her a nerd, equal parts affection and ridicule in his voice. Then she throttled the pain down, locked the thoughts away, and dragged herself back to the present.

A few minutes later, Miriam was slinging her duffel down on one of the nicest beds she’d been able to claim in any capacity in months, maybe even years. Absolutely spartan and about six decades out of date, almost military in decor, but it was clean, and it had air, electricity, and both sheets and blankets on the bed. No nasty or rotten surprises left by former inhabitants; definitely an upgrade on a few of the shitholes she’d stayed in.

“We’ve got a fully stocked kitchen just down the hallway, and showers. Let me know if you need anything,” Sam said, rubbing the back of his head.

Miriam decided to save him further discomfort and cut to the chase.

“Fancy digs, Sam. It’s been a few years. You wanna tell me what’s got you so bothered?”

She’d noticed a distinct lack of the elder Winchester on the way in, but Miriam’s own recent history had done nothing if not jam a filter firmly in her mouth that kept her from sharing any and all thoughts that flowed through her mind.

Sam’s mouth quivered at the corners before he schooled his features into a mask of control that failed to hide the depth of his worry.

“I...Dean is why I called you. It’s...complicated.”

She took advantage of the awkward pause to re-evaluate Sam Winchester. He’d aged a lot in the few years since she and Aaron had run across the Winchesters. He’d grown broader since she last saw him, and he gave the impression of being even taller than she remembered, to say nothing of the length of his hair. She resisted the urge to offer him a hair tie for his shaggy mane.

Her gaze flicked down to his injured right arm, bound to his chest in a sling. She waited for several beats, but when he didn’t continue, she crossed her arms sternly, letting a shade of her impatience show on her face.

“You called me, Sam.”

Sam cleared his throat as if he still couldn’t get the words out. Miriam sighed. Her headache flared, burning the inside of her skull like a wash of acid between her eyes. Fatigue pulled at her, weighing her down towards the bed, but she locked her knees and straightened her back until she could trust her weary body not to betray her to gravity.

“Sam, we’re not close friends, I get that, but you called me here because I owe you, and hopefully because you know you can count on me. I haven’t been in the field recently, wasn’t planning on it any time soon. I’m tired; it’s been a hell of a year. If you want my help, talk to me. If not, I’m taking advantage of your hospitality to catch a few hours sleep in a decent bed, then I’ll head back out.”

“Dean’s a demon.”

His bald declaration woke her as the coffee she’d consumed after his phone call hadn’t.

Wasn’t expecting that, she thought as her eyebrows threatened to meet her hairline.

“Demons aren’t my area of expertise, Sam. And, let’s be honest, it’s fairly common knowledge that the Winchesters can exorcise a demon. What do you need me for?”

Sam shook his head, tension making the movement jerky and stiff as his jaw tightened. He had circles under his eyes to rival hers, and his shoulders slumped with a weight she knew all too well.

He reached up, awkwardly tugging down the neckline of his shirt to reveal a tattooed symbol she vaguely recalled from research she’d done years ago.

“Neither of us can be possessed,” he said, shrugging his shirt back into place with a wince of discomfort. “Dean is...Look, just come with me; I need to check on him anyway. You'll see.”

Making a physical effort to keep her jaw from hanging slack, Miriam followed Sam from the small bedroom. The whole situation was surreal, and the bland, institutional walls of the bunker only added to Miriam’s sense of dissociation.

She raised a curious eyebrow as Sam led her into what looked like nothing so much as a large file storage room.

Their footsteps echoed strangely; the space felt somehow emptier than the full shelves should have allowed. The ceiling, higher than what seemed necessary, continued much further back than the shelves. And what kind of shelving needed caging to connect it to the ceiling? The metal screen wasn’t what drew her attention, though.

The second she set foot in the room, Miriam felt an inexplicable pull to look behind those shelves, to push past Sam and shove the files out of the way. There was a presence in the room, something that spoke to a place deep inside her that she’d trained herself not to acknowledge, something familiar and forbidden all at once.

For the first time in months, she felt something more than tired, foggy despair.

Whatever was back there, Miriam wanted it.

It took her a second to realize that Sam was speaking.

“Don’t...um...don’t let him get to you, okay? It’s Dean, but it...isn’t,” Sam finished lamely with a grimace.

Miriam tilted her head to the side, considering his words. She opened her mouth, then closed it and shrugged, bracing herself for whatever it was Sam didn’t seem to be able to explain.

His shoulders slumped for a moment as he struggled to pull himself together.

Miriam hadn’t spent much time with the Winchesters, just the couple of weeks they'd worked that witch case all those years ago. Sam and Dean had been so in tune with each other, working the case with instinct and skill on a level that she’d both admired and envied. Then they went and saved her stupid brother.

Sam had been so much younger, then, not exactly sure of himself, but much more solid and in control than the tired, injured man in front of her.

“I owe you, and I mean it,” she’d said back then, shaking first Dean’s and then Sam’s hands, looking each brother in the eyes.

“You need someone to watch your back, to help you take something down, I’ll be there. I wouldn’t normally speak for that asshole,” she nodded at her younger brother, currently sleeping off the leftover ill effects from the hex bag that had nearly taken his life, “but I’ll go ahead and vouch for his dumb ass, too. Call me if you need me. Don’t lose my number.”

She hadn’t heard from them since.

Oh, she had heard plenty of them. What hunter hadn’t? All sorts of misadventures and exploits, taking down creatures most hunters had only ever heard of, much less encountered. But Miriam had gotten no phone calls from them, no requests for help. She figured they'd probably forgotten her and Aaron the moment they’d left town, rock blasting from the speakers of their legendary Impala as they cruised on to the next town, the next case.

“Why now, Sam?” Miriam asked quietly. “After all this time, why call me now?”

There were approximately a thousand more questions she wanted to ask, chiefly what the cage behind those shelves was holding, but she held her tongue after the one. Sam had obviously brought her here for a reason, so she reminded herself to be patient and ready for whatever happened next.

The younger Winchester hung his head for a moment longer, then turned eyes on her that were so familiar, her heart seized in her chest. She saw those same eyes every time she’d looked at her own reflection in the mirror since she’d returned from that last job, with one more scar and one less brother.

“Because I knew you’d understand.”

And then Sam straightened, and she watched as he willed steel through his limbs, stiffening his spine and hardening his features. He pulled on a narrow section of shelving and rolled it out of the way.

“Heya, Sammy.”

...

Chapter 2 is up! 

[delimeful]

cut clean from the dream (1/3)

warnings: person being treated as merchandise, mentions of murder/injury, panic, fear, crying, sharp implements, feeling trapped

A small bell’s ring echoed through the small store as the door was pushed open, the first customer of the day. 

Logan couldn’t see them from his shelf, but he heard the rapid footsteps of the shopkeep emerge right on schedule, approaching them with vigor. 

“Hello! Anything in particular I can help you with today?”

“Uh…” An uncertain voice, low in contrast to the shopkeeper's shrillness. 

Logan sighed, tuning the conversation out and turning away from the mid-morning light. The rounded bottle he was in wasn’t great for sleeping, which was a shame, seeing as being trapped as merchandise in a local potions shop was already enough of a nightmare. 

He’d love to pretend that he had no idea how this had happened, but what it really came down to was his own foolishness. It had only taken investigating the bag of a hitchhiker who came back earlier than expected, and his habit of trying to glean knowledge from humans got him well and truly captured, passed from hand to hand in sales until he wound up here. Far from home, and everything he’d ever known, and Patton.

His gossamer butterfly wings fluttered, agitated, and he sat back up. There was really no point trying to get back to sleep with such thoughts hammering against his skull, and the shopkeep was busy jumping around the store with loud, heavy steps anyways. He rested his chin on his hand to watch the man go by, figuring he could at least see what this new customer looked like. 

He didn’t expect the two humans to stop right in front of him. He stiffened, suddenly straining to hear the words properly through the glass. 

“-have any stock left of severed wings, unfortunately, our next order comes in around three or four days. However, as you can see here, we do have a fairy with wings intact! It’ll be a little pricier, obviously, but I can give you a discount for the trouble!” 

The customer was a tall, skinny figure draped in black from his cloak-like apparel to his makeup, staring at Logan with dark purple eyes. Definitely a witch, going by the sigil tattoos along the patches of visible exposed skin. Logan narrowed his eyes back at him, trying to look like trouble. It’d be much easier to just come back after a few days than deal with the delicate process of shredding the wings from a fairy. The witch dragged his gaze over to the shopkeep, looking exhausted. 

“I don’t need a whole fairy. You seriously don’t have any wings in stock? Like, in the back or anything?” He asked, looking already resigned to the answer. 

“Afraid not, that is a rather rare ingredient with the elusiveness of fairies.” The shopkeep hummed. “Is this a budget thing? If you’re willing to wait a few hours, I can call in our alchemist and have him harvest this fairy and get you just the wings for a lower price.” 

Logan felt the color drain from his face, hopes shattered. He looked away from the human’s piercing gaze, trying to keep the dizzying panic from overwhelming him. He’d heard the stories. He’d known it would turn out this way since he got captured. It wasn’t a surprise, just an unpleasant eventuality.   

“Ugh.” The witch pinched the bridge of his nose with a sigh. “Just… I’ll take the fairy.” 

“Excellent!” The shopkeep clapped cheerily as Logan’s stomach dropped. He whisked the glass bottle off the shelf, hurrying over to the register and leaving Logan sprawled on the clear bottom of it, watching the ground below whiz by. He grimaced as the bottle was set down, shoving against the glass wall to prop himself back up and scoop his glasses up off the bottom of the bottle. 

The transaction took place over his head, and then long fingers wrapped around the glass, and he was lifted up again, slower this time. The bottle was carefully tucked into a pocket of the cloak, and everything went dark and muffled. For a while, Logan’s world was reduced to the small gap of light and noise from the pocket opening, swaying with the momentum of the human’s steps. 

He pressed up against the lid of the bottle despite knowing it was futile. The enchantment on it held strong, and would remain that way until it was opened from the outside by his new captor. He’d only have one chance at escape. He’d have to use it wisely. 

The noise overhead died down, and a door thudded closed. There was some muffled conversation, another door, and then finally quiet. Logan braced himself just in time for the hand to grab the neck of the bottle, pulling him back into the light. 

Even after the darkness of the pocket, the room wasn’t blinding. It seemed dimly lit, heavy black curtains over the windows and halloween-themed fairy lights strung on the walls. Logan blinked. It was still the summer months, was it not?

His attention was drawn back to the witch as he set the bottle on his desk, sighing as he sat heavily on the chair in front of it. Logan refused to flinch as he leaned in to look at the bottle, face warped oddly by the glass. The witch scrubbed his hands through his hair and sighed again, pulling a piece of wide parchment out and scrawling a sigil on it with a red ink pen that smelled suspiciously of iron. 

A moment later, Logan’s prison was finally being opened, and he stumbled as the jar was tilted on its side, opening resting on the human’s palm. He seized the opportunity, kicking off the glass wall to propel himself out of the jar into fresh air. 

A second after he flitted out, there was a sudden yank on his leg, and he found himself dragged down to the desk below by a shackle made of thick, shadowy magic. 

“Yeah, thought that might happen.” The witch said, voice resonating through Logan now that he wasn’t hearing it from behind a wall of glass. The shackle finished retracting back to the sigil, leaving him pinned down by his leg, and the witch pushed him over with a finger. Logan had the sense to flare his wings out so they wouldn’t get crumpled painfully beneath him, but this left him flat on his back and vulnerable. He shuddered, wings slapping against the wood ineffectively. 

Above him, the witch was casually pulling some kind of tool from a drawer, and Logan felt a flare of irritation break through his fear. He opened his mouth before he could think better of it. “You could not just wait for three measly days? Truly?   

The witch paused, looking down at him with a raised eyebrow. Logan refused to cower, even when the witch leaned his elbows on the desk, arms bracketing either side of him. He glared back despite the chills running down his spine, and the witch snorted.

“Big attitude for someone so small.” He muttered, but he looked tiredly amused rather than angry. “I can’t wait three days, actually, because this project is due in two.”  

Great. A procrastinating student was going to be the one to kill him, after trying to learn was what got him into this mess in the first place. He let his head thunk back down onto the desk, eyes stinging with frustrated tears.

“Tell me you at least know how to… how to harvest my wings.” Logan said, bile rising in his throat. He forced himself to keep speaking, his voice coming out sharp. “If I have to spend my last living moments watching an amateur mangle my body, I will be very unhappy.”  

“Hey, I’m no amateur. I wouldn’t have bought a whole goddamn fairy if I didn’t know how to...” He gestured vaguely. “You know.” 

“Reassuring.” Logan responded dryly, and the witch gave him a half-hearted glare before pulling out a few metallic square rocks. 

Weights, Logan realized as they were placed at the outer corners of his wings, pinning them down so that they couldn’t move. His wingspan was large enough that he couldn’t reach the weights with his hands, and his breathing began to speed up as he instinctively tried to pull his wings free, to no avail. After this, he wouldn’t ever move them again. He suddenly wished fervently that he’d gotten more than that brief heartbeat of freedom outside the jar, that he’d at least been able to fly more than a few inches, even if escape was futile. 

Movement above him caught his eye, and he realized that the witch was staring down at him with a strange expression, with a sharp metal tool in one hand. He stared at it for a moment, and then decided that he didn’t want to watch himself be taken apart, actually, and closed his eyes, swallowing heavily. 

Despite knowing logically that being captured meant he was going to die, being faced with his own imminent mortality still made some primal part of him feel panicked and fearful. Patton would be proud of him, admitting that he did feel things after all. 

Oh, stars, Patton. Logan had vanished without even telling him where he was going. The bubbly sprite would never even know what happened to him. He hoped desperately that Patton wouldn’t search for him, wouldn’t get himself in trouble because of Logan’s own foolishness. The pressure behind his eyes finally broke, chest shuddering with barely restrained sobs as his cheeks went wet with tears. And why shouldn’t he cry? What was the point of pride when he’d never get to see the stars or his home or Patton ever again? 

“Oh man.” There was a long groan from above him. “Ugh, I can’t do this.” 

Logan blinked his eyes open in surprise, squinting through the blurriness of his tears at the human. “What?” He said, voice thick. 

Surprisingly, the witch was not hovering over him menacingly with the tool as he’d imagined. Instead, he was slumped back against his chair, rubbing at his eyes and smearing his eyeliner even further. “I’m gonna fail so hard. What kind of witch can’t even kill a fairy?” 

“Are you- what?” Logan repeated, still trying to catch up to the implications of his words. The witch sighed, and then leaned down, smudging a thumb over the ink of the sigil and breaking its circle. The shackle dissipated into dark smoke, and Logan stared up at him. 

“Are you… not going to kill me?” He asked, voice tinged with disbelief. The witch cringed. 

“Nope. I’ve decided fuck this actually, ‘this’ being my life.” He raised a hand and Logan flinched back, anticipating being crushed, but all the witch did was carefully pluck the weights off of his wings. 

Before he could change his mind, Logan scrambled to his feet, wings aflutter. The witch ignored him for the most part as he took to the air, turning to his desk and clearing it off, occasionally glancing at Logan as though worried the fairy was going to dive-bomb him. It didn’t seem like the witch wanted to re-capture him at all. Logan hovered lower cautiously.

“You needed to do this for your project. What… changed your mind?” He asked. Clearly, he hadn’t learned his lesson about curiosity, but this human was a strange one.

The witch huffed. “What changed my mind is that according to textbooks, fairies are insectoids with no true sentience, only able to mimic human emotions.” He looked sardonically at Logan. “Does that seem true to you?” 

“Ah.” Logan said, getting it. “So, because you believe me to be sentient, you’re… letting me go?” 

“Yeah, that’s the long and short of it. I know what real terror looks like, and you weren’t ‘mimicking’ anything. I’m not going to kill a person, no matter how shitty a witch that makes me.” He finished, wiping some dust from his desk before walking to the window and pulling the drapes open. 

The warm light of a setting sun poured into the room, and Logan watched as the witch unlatched and then opened his window. “There you go.” He said, and stepped back.

Logan landed on the windowsill, staring at the unfamiliar silhouettes of the buildings around him. He spread his wings out fully and focused on home, on the tug of magic in his core that would guide him back.   

Nothing. 

He tried again, feeling tears of frustration threatening at the corner of his eyes when his magic remained frustratingly non-responsive. 

“Uh, you good?” The witch asked, making him jump in surprise. He had to stop letting his guard down around this stranger.

“No.” Logan responded shortly. “I cannot access my homing magic, and without it I fear I shall not be able to find my way back without being captured again or becoming terribly lost.” 

“You can’t access it, huh… Could I, uh… could you show me your wrists?” The witch asked, holding out a hand hesitantly. Logan tilted his head, wary. 

“How do I know you won’t simply trap me again?” 

The witch rubbed at the back of his neck with his free hand. “Okay, I’m not trying to be, like… a jerk. But if I wanted to hurt you or keep you trapped, I would have just done it back when I had you pinned to a table. There’s literally no reason for me to let you go only to con you back into containment.” 

“Hm. That is true.” Logan admitted, and flew up to the witch’s hand without fanfare, standing on the edge of his palm. The witch blinked, startled, and Logan presented a hand with an eyebrow raised impatiently. 

“Right.” The witch muttered, and leaned in close enough that Logan could have reached out to touch his face. He focused on not being nervous, though it was hard with those eyes locked so intently on him. They seemed to be almost glowing?

The witch retracted, nodding to himself. “Yeah, you’ve got sealing magic on you. It’s human magework, pretty subtle stuff.” 

“Can you remove it?” Logan asked immediately, and the witch snorted, jostling him slightly.

“I’m a student, a failing one at that.” The witch bit his lip as Logan’s expression fell. “But I can probably get my hands on some book about sealing magic.” 

Logan eyed him suspiciously. “Why would you?” 

“Because I want you out of my hair?” The human tried. 

“I am not in your hair.” Logan answered, unimpressed with the nonsensical response. The witch sighed. 

“How about a deal. You teach me about fairies and their real culture, not the garbage they put in the textbooks, and I’ll help you figure out the basics of human magecraft. Figuring out the sealing magic is out of my depth, though, so you’ll have to tackle that yourself.” 

Logan thought the terms through before answering, but there wasn’t much to think on. It was everything he could have wanted, though the human couldn’t have known it. He just had to be careful about what he revealed in case this witch truly was malicious. “Deal.” 

“Great.” The witch said, offering his other hand to Logan to shake. “I’m Virgil.” 

Logan clasped a hand on Virgil’s fingertip, shaking it once firmly. Virgil’s lip twitched at the movement.  

“Logan. When can we get started?” He asked, rising to hover in the air once more. 

Virgil’s lips twisted up into a half-smile, and he pulled a worn textbook from the shelf above his desk. “Why not now?”

Logan couldn’t help but return the sentiment, his glow already brightening at the sight of a new source of knowledge. 

Despite the rocky start, it seemed to be the beginning of a promising partnership.

[bngtanah]

The Difference Between Boys & Girls | o5

summary: Sam & Erin are university students who share a cheap one bedroom apartment above a shitty takeaway restaurant. Due to the limited space, they’ve grown accustomed to sharing just about everything, including the occasional kiss.

pairing: Jung Hoseok (Samuel Park) feat. Park Jimin (Brian Yi)  x Named OC characters: meet the cast.

genre: angst, smut, fluff word count: 4.5k chapters: o1| o2| o3| o4| o5| o6| o7| o8| o9| 10| 11| 12| 13| 14 warning: boyfriend!hoseok, jealous!hoseok, friends to lovers trope, college au, angst, sexual themes, slow burn

a/n: still a fool. still reuploading.

Erin-ah have you eaten? ...Sure. Are you lying to me? I haven't eaten yet but I will soon, I promise. :) Well now I don't trust you ㅡ.,ㅡ^;) Should I bring you something? Lol, nooo I'm fine really! ^.^~

Brian smiled gently as his eyes darted across the screen, reading Erin's message twice before locking his cell phone and placing it back in his pocket. It had only been about three weeks since he'd first met Erin but he was confident in the fact that he knew her well enough to know that if she hadn't eaten anything substantial by twelve o'clock in the afternoon she wasn't going to make the effort to have a real meal for the rest of that day and Brian just couldn't allow that to happen. So he chose to ignore her promise and take her a meal anyway, he was already out running a few errands and planned on dropping by her apartment for a surprise visit later that day.

Though they’d only known each other for close to a month now, in that month they had been out together on three dates, well four if you count the time they ran into each other at a laundry mat and shared an ice cream while they waited for the clothes to dry. It wasn't something he initially expected to happen that night after they met at his viewing but Brian was genuinely enjoying getting to know Erin better, she was so much different from the usual type of woman he chased. Where most of the women he tended to be attracted to were vapid and sometimes downright silly; Erin had a solid head on her shoulders, the way she spoke about what she was learning at her university and her plans for the future with so much passion and intensity was such an inspiration to him. Even though they were spending so much time getting to know one another and in Brian's mind Erin was already his girlfriend, the pair still hadn't had a conversation about being exclusive. That was something that Brian planned on rectifying today.

Three short knocks were thumped against Erin and Samuel's apartment door before Brian pressed his ear to the door to make sure that the muffled noises he was hearing were actually coming from Erin's door and that he wasn't just hearing things. His suspicions were confirmed when the door swung open and the racket of mixed voices and blaring 8-bit music hit Brian with full force. 

"You can't claim victory if you win on a technicality, Sammy! I fell off the edge you didn't touch me!"

Erin was screaming at the top of her lungs with her head turned in the opposite direction, giving Brian a few seconds to scan her body which made his jaw go slack slightly and his eyebrows knit together with confusion since she wasn't wearing anything but her underwear and a tank top.

"I-um..." Brian stammered and his grip on the plastic bags tightened, but words seemed to fail him until Erin turned to face him and gave him a bright smile.

"Brian! What are you doing here I said you didn't have to come by," she squealed and lunged forward to wrap her arms around his neck and pressed a kiss to his cheek before dragging him inside and out of the cold air of the hallway.

He nodded and slowly and leaned his back against the door, daring himself to look up and down Erin's body again just to make sure he wasn't imagining this. "Uh, yeah. You said you hadn't eaten, and I was in the neighbourhood so I bought you something..." He paused for a second then looked from Erin over to Sammy who was currently seated on the edge of the couch hunched over with a controller in his hands and just as undressed as Erin was.

"Am I interrupting something?" Brian asked as his nostrils flared and he did nothing to conceal the tone of anger in his voice.

 Erin raised an eyebrow at his sudden change in mood but followed his gaze down her own body before hanging her head forward and laughing slightly. "No, no. We fixed our heater!" She explained as she took one of the plastic bags from him and hooked an arm around Brian's to lead him over to the couch "It's been broken for like three months but Sammy's friend, Dun-kim-"

"Du-Jin" Sammy corrected without looking up from the screen.

"Right. Du-jin, why can't I remember that? Anyway, he's crazy good at reverse engineering things so he came over today and fixed it for us! We've been celebrating the warmth by lounging around in our underwear and kicking Sammy's ass in Super Smash Bros."

That accusation finally made Samuel pause the game and look over, at Erin only. "Would you like me to pull up the records because I don't think winning two games out of six is considered 'kicking someone's ass'" He teased and leaned back against the couch cushions only to be hit in the head by a flying throw pillow.

Brian was still at a loss for words, his eyes squinted together as he tried to figure out whether the explanation actually made him feel better. The way Erin said 'lounging around in our underwear' so casually made it seem like this was an ongoing occurrence and just the thought of another man's eyes roaming over Erin's body made a pang of jealousy flash up within the boy's heart.

"O-oh." He eventually said, "That's... not weird at all."

Erin grinned and pressed her warm palms to his cool cheeks, silently thanking him for being understanding. She knew it must have been weird for him, and if she had walked in on him in his underwear with a female roommate, she would have jumped to the same conclusions he probably did. 

"Yah, who are you to call me weird?" The petite brunette taunted with a playful wink and moved to rest the bag she'd taken from him on their living room table. "You are spoiling me, do you know that?" Erin queried as she tucked her feet beneath her bottom and took a seat at the table before motioning for Brian to put down his bag and join her, which he did, settling right next to her and wrapping his arm possessively around her waist so that he could pull her close to his side.

"Sammy was just about to make us something to eat, you didn't have to spend any money on me."

"I wanted to make sure you're taking care of yourself" Brian answered with a wide smirk and a playful tap against the tip of Erin's nose. She reciprocated by scrunching her nose upwards and leaning forward to peck his lips.

Sam was sure that if he had to spend another second watching them, he would end up vomiting or decking Brian in his face.

Maybe both.

"I'm going to leave," Samuel said, rather abruptly, and got up from his seat on the couch.

"Hm? Oh no, Sammy you should stay," Erin implored, watching him approach the bedroom over Brian's shoulder "There's more than enough food for all of us and you haven't eaten either."

Brian's lips fell into a flat line but he didn't verbally object, he had been looking forward to eating alone with Erin but he knew her roommate had just as much right to stay if he wanted to.

Samuel stared back at Erin, seriously thinking about her request even though he knew there was no way he wanted to spend the afternoon eating with the guy Erin was seeing. When they made eye contact Erin pouted and mouthed the word 'please', making Sammy groaned and buried his face in his hands because he had never been able to say no to her when she pulled that face.

"Fine," he sighed "But I'm not eating without a shirt."

"I appreciate that!" Brian commented with a gentle laugh "Are you sure you don't want to put on some pants or... something?" He asked Erin in a murmured voice once Sam was out of the room.

"Why? You seem to like all the exposed skin" Erin retorted and nodded her head toward the spot on her thigh where Brian's hand was, he didn't even realise that he had been caressing the area with a gentle touch since he sat down.

His lips spread into a shy smile once he noticed but he didn't stop, if anything he applied more pressure into tip of his fingers that rested against Erin's upper thigh "I can't help it, your skin is so soft and smooth" Brian whispered and leaned down to capture Erin's lips in a teasing kiss, he gently pressed his lips against Erin's upper lip for less than a few seconds then leaned down to suck on her lower lip before pulling back and moving in to repeat his actions.

Erin put a hand against his chest and stopped him from moving forward a third time, "Well if you're going to be doing that, I need to put some pants on" She laughed, pulled away and stood to her feet while swatting away Brian's playful hands. 

"Come on, I'm fine with it now" Brian called after her, but Erin ignored him and his gaze that was focused in on her ass as she shook her head and walked away.

Erin tapped lightly against the bedroom before pushing it open and going inside, not waiting to make sure that Samuel was even done getting dressed. 

"So does it take this long to put on a shirt?" She asked out loud as her eyes moved over to Sammy who was laying down on the bed scrolling through his phone, still shirtless.

"I thought I'd let you and your boyfriend have some quality time, sounds like he appreciated it," Sam replied as his head tilted in Erin's direction.

"Were you listening to us?"

"The walls are thin and you're a noisy kisser, I couldn't not hear it," Sam said with a shuddering cringe. 

Erin gasped softly and bounded toward the bed, "You pervert!" she exclaimed with a laugh as she leaned over him to swat his shoulders with the pair of sweatpants in her hands. Sam guffawed and did his best to dodge the attacks, eventually deciding to grab Erin's wrists and hold them against his chest to stop her. She sighed softly and opened her palms to rest against Samuel's bare skin as she switched her position from kneeling on the edge of the bed to sitting down.

"He's not really my boyfriend y'know," Erin spoke up and grazed the fingernail of her index finger over Sam's flesh. "We've been out a few times and we talk a lot but we haven't really talked about being exclusive..."

Sam nodded and pressed his lips firmly together in thought. A big part of him wanted to be supportive and reassure her that Brian might have just been waiting for the right time to talk about it, but the petty part of him wanted to play up the doubt that may have been taking root in Erin's heart.

"Maybe he's just waiting for a good moment to making official" Samuel counseled with a smile, choosing to be a good friend and ignore his base desires. "You should get back out there," he said while releasing her wrists from his hands and sitting up.

"Yeah... maybe" Erin exhaled while looking down at Sam, he had this knack for saying exactly what she wanted and didn't want to hear whenever they talked about Brian. She loved that he didn't outright hate him but there was still that nagging in the back of her mind that hoped he would give her something that pointed toward wanting to be with her. Erin shook her head to refocus herself and stood up again, "Put on a shirt and come and eat with us, I don't like knowing you haven't eaten anything."

Sam nodded and gave Erin a thumbs up as she pulled on his sweatpants and walked back out to the living room. Samuel pressed his closed fist against his forehead and silently cursed the air, flopping back against the mattress. "I'm going to go crazy..."

By the time Erin made her way out of the bedroom Brian had already set out the dishes he brought with him, it wasn't anything fancy just comfort food meant to fill the belly yet Erin's stomach grumbled loudly at the sight. She was a lot hungrier than she realised.

"Oh, this looks so good, Brian" Erin spoke with gusto while returning her seat next Brian her head leaning against his shoulder as his arm found its way around her waist again.

Brian pressed his lips to the side of Erin's head and smiled pleasantly, enjoying the comforting feeling of having her body pressed against him. At least, he was comforted until Sammy emerged from the bedroom, thankfully with a shirt on, and joined the couple at the table. He took a seat across from them and spread his lips into an eerily complacent smile.

"So, is it just the... one bedroom here?" Brian said as everyone began feeding themselves "You two don't share that do you?"

"Not usually," Sam answered flatly while scooping a serving of rice and meat into his mouth.

Erin choked slightly on the rice she'd recently swallowed and waved both Brian and Samuel off when they asked if she was okay. She took a loud gasp of air into her lungs when she was able to breathe normally again and tried to add some context to Samuel's answer "No, we don't share it. I mean Sam keeps his clothes in there because he can't put them anywhere else but the couch here pulls out and I have the bed all to myself."

"Oh, cool" Brian nodded and continued eating silently.

Sam's lips curled upward however, he knew it was devious of him to relish in the very probable fact that Brian would excuse himself from Erin's life without Samuel having to resort to petty tricks. Sure, Erin might be sad for a bit but that's what he was there for.

Brian's head picked up for a second while he was chewing and his eyes darted around the entirety of Samuel's and Erin's living room; despite it being the holidays there wasn't anything to represent the season in the apartment.

"Erin-ah,"

"Yes?"

"Do you not celebrate Christmas?"

Erin opened her mouth to answer but then looked over at Sammy and they both started laughing. "Not exactly, I mean we exchange gifts but we don't do the whole decorations and tree thing" she replied through the laughter.

"Is there a reason why not?" Brian asked cautiously since they were both still laughing and he had yet to hear anything funny.

"Oh my god. Okay, so when we moved in together Sam and I made a vow to not put up any decorations or anything like that because of what happened the last time we did. We were at my parents house and Sam thought it would be a smart idea to decorate the tree by ourselves and I guess we put too many lights on it or the tree was too dry or something because we all got woken up in the middle of the night to a fire in my parents living room," Erin said, still chuckling "It's funny now but we really thought we would die when it happened. Ever since then we both decided it's just safer to not decorate and do our gift exchange at a bar if we can't visit our parents, which I don't think we'll be able to do this year."

The remnants of a smile still played on Sam's lips but he stopped smiling so widely when Erin mentioned visiting their parents for the holidays. He had yet to tell her that he had the ability to go back to Busan if he wanted to but he was deciding to stay in the city for her. That wasn't a detail she needed to know right then, so he just went back to eating.

"Wow, you set fire to the tree on Christmas? I feel like that's a signal of the antichrist or a really evil grinch," Brian smirked down at Erin who scoffed and flicked a clump of hair away from his eyes. 

"It wasn't on purpose!" She argued, "And besides it was mostly Sammy's idea anyway, I wanted to wait for everyone else."

Samuel pursed his lips and gave Erin a disbelieving look "But it was your idea to put on that extra layer of string lights" he revealed then turned his attention to Brian "I'm pretty sure they caused the fire." It was the first sentence Samuel had said directly to Brians for the day and even though it only contained eight words, but it was still a start.

Erin groaned threw her head back and landed against Brian's shoulder; who was still laughing. "Alright, fine I'm the antichrist what are either of you gonna do about it?"

"We could start by getting you some actual- nonflammable- decorations to put up," Brian offered and curled his arm around Erin's shoulders, making Samuel's blood pressure spike just slightly. "What do you think, Sam? This weekend all three of us could go to the mall and look for stuff."

Samuel knew he could respond in two different ways, he could decline and let Erin and Brian go alone which would probably just draw them closer thus allowing Erin to slip just a little further away from him, or he could agree to go and risk wanting fight Brian even more than he did right now. It was instinct to go with the first option but Sam knew it would mean a lot to Erin if he attempted to get along with Brian, even if it was fake. There was also the possibility that him just being there would work out in his favour, he and Erin just had a natural kind of chemistry that overshadowed everything and everyone else when they were together. With any luck, the shopping trip would just be another nail in Brian's coffin.

"Yeah, that sounds fun" Sam agreed with a smile that Erin reciprocated.

With the three of them eating it took less than an hour for the group to finish all the food that Brian brought over, and once they were finished eating and sharing a bottle of flavoured soju Erin received from her boss she convinced Brian to stick around and compete in their ongoing Smash Bros. tournament. Everyone seemed to forget about the previous awkwardness once the soju flowed and a few rounds of the video game passed. It was well after ten o'clock when Brian finally decided that it was time for him to say goodbye.

"Do you really have to go?" Erin frowned as she watched Brian stand up and stretch.

"Yeah, I do," He answered with a reassuring smile "I've got a meeting in the morning and I need the sleep."

Erinn huffed and folded her arms against her stomach but followed Brian toward the front door anyway. She grinned when he waved goodbye to Sam who responded with a peace sign and intertwined her fingers with his once they were out into the hallway. She wanted to walk him downstairs but Brian protested and asked her to say goodbye in the hall instead.

"Thank you so much for coming today and feeding me like a child," Erin giggled and wiped her hair away from her face.

"No problem, I'm happy to take care of you. I like being able to see more of your life," Brian replied then chewed on his bottom lip "I was a little worried about your roommate being here but I kinda like him."

Erin hummed with agreement "Yeah, Sammy's great..." 

A comfortable air of silence passed between them and Brian ran his thumb over the top of Erin's knuckles. The focused look in his eyes made it seem like he wanted to say something but he wasn't quite sure how to find the words. "There's actually something I wanted to talk to you about today. Um, I know we've only been getting to know each other for a little while but I was wondering if you would like to continue doing that while also dating me."

"Are you asking me to be your girlfriend?" Erin tittered and looked up at him with her head tilted to the side.

Brian wasn't sure why his heart was beating so fast, he was only asking her to date him not marry him and yet he felt like he had just run a marathon as he looked down at the beautiful girl smiling up at him. "Yes, but only if you want to be."

Erin's hand tightened around Brian's and her smile doubled in size before he was even finished speaking, some small part of her heart was still waiting for a sign from Sammy, but the more sensible part of her heart was telling her that this was all the sign that she needed to realise that her and Sammy would be better off remaining just friends, no matter how attracted to him she was it wouldn't make sense for her to deny the man standing in front of her just because she was waiting for the heavens to part and a divine light shine over her and Samuel.

Without words, Erin loosened her hands from Brian's; cradled his face between her palms and brought his lips down to her own, closing the space between them. Not that there was much distance between them, anyway. She kissed him slowly, with no sense of urgency like the first time. This time, it was tender, and Brian moved his hand to the small of her back and the other to the cusp of Erin's neck, pressing her lower body close to his as both their heads tilted to the opposite side to deepen the kiss. This feeling was still somewhat new and foreign to Erin, she had dated her share of men in the past but, in all honesty, dating had never been a priority for her. She had school to focus on and Sammy for human support and contact so what else could she want? But with Brian now she was beginning to feel…. different, like she wanted more but also like she didn’t.

"I would love to be your girlfriend" Erin whispered on his lips, pulling back just a few inches to look at Brian’s expression. He smiled that amazingly wide smile that made his eyes disappear which Erin absolutely loved to see.

"Good," Brian growled and hooked his index finger under Erin's chin to bring her lips back to his "I'm really happy to hear you say that" he murmured and moved to kiss her again. He brushed his tongue along Erin’s bottom lip before he pulled at it gently with his teeth, opening her mouth up to him. A gentle moan slipped past her lips the instant their tongues touched and Erin grasped at the hair on his neck a little tighter and pressing her body as close to his as her small frame would allow. Realistically she knew she would have to stop herself soon, them being in the hallway of her apartment building. She just wanted this small moment between her and Brian to last a little bit longer.

It seemed that Brian had the same idea since his hands left their places on her back and neck and moved downward to grab her waist, the back of her thighs to raise Erin into the air and press her between the wall and his body. Inherently Erin wrapped her legs around his waist and he pulled away, needing to breathe. But that didn’t stop his touching, his mouth kissing a trail down Erin's neck, nibbling and sucking just hard enough to have an effect and make her shudder and sigh with content beneath his touch. Brian's hips pushed forward, pressing into Erin's core and she moaned directly against his ear, feeling the hold she had on her self-control slipping away slowly.

The sound of someone coughing behind them stilled the overheated couple and the sight of Erin's elderly neighbour coming up the stairs made Brian drop Erin back down to her feet without a second thought. They both bowed politely to the woman who seemed to have no idea what she'd just interrupted as she greeted them warmly and waved as she entered her apartment. Brian and Erin made eye contact and silently laughed together, endorphins still buzzing between them.

"I should let you go, call me when you get home?" Erin said while fixing her tank top.

Brian nodded and pulled her forward by her neck to press his lips to her forehead "I will. Goodnight."

Back in the apartment, Samuel had already pulled out his bed and was curled up on his side by the time Erin came back inside. He felt the bed dip next to him and the scent of Brian's cologne on Erin's skin made him wince.

"Are you going to bed without saying good night? Rude," Erin whispered.

"I'm not sleeping yet, noona~" He cooed sweetly in a way that made Erin laugh and cringe at the same time.

When she walked around to his side of the bed Erin felt the urge to tell him about her moment in the hall, not the kissing, just the part about her and Brian becoming official, but now that she was looking at him she didn't feel that desire anymore. There was always tomorrow.

"Want noona to sing you to sleep?"

"Please, god, no," Samuel replied quickly "You could do that thing you used to do though, that always helped me sleep better." 

Erin thought about hitting him for insulting her singing abilities but decided against it and moved around on the pullout couch so that she was laying flat on her back then held her arms open for Sammy to join her. Her hands wrapped around his body once his head was resting against her chest and Erin began gently raking her fingertips against his scalp then slowly smoothing her hand over his cheek and back up again. She could feel him exhale against her and the soft hums of pleasure he made while she held him made her smile. Erin wasn't exactly sure when they'd slept like this for the first time or why it became a habit but for whatever reason Sammy always slept like a literal baby when she ran her hands through his hair or over his skin. 

"Goodnight noona, love you" Erin heard her roommate half whisper, half yawn against her skin and the words made her heart soar as they always did, no matter how many times she'd heard him say it before.

"I love you too Sammy."

[fullmetalscullyy]

riza is in the hospital but has flasbacks to the tattoo when she sees the doctors ate gonna use needles

WARNING: suicidal thoughts

thank you anon! it was actually quite interesting to delve into riza's thoughts on her tattoo especially in such a high pressure situation as this

Ishval was cold and unforgiving and that was the same for the medical staff who patched up the wounded on the front lines. Their job was efficiency - keep as many soldiers alive as possible but do the job as quick as possible. There was no care, no bedside manner, just a quick fix for something that needed long-term care. The higher ups didn't care. They just needed their pawns to be back up on their feet quickly so they could be gun fodder again. It didn't matter if that would make things worse for the patient in the long run. As long as they were hitting targets and the Fuhrer was happy with the progress, that's all that mattered.

Riza was lain - none too gently - on her back upon a wooden cot. She hissed in pain, scrunching up her eyes. Agony flared in her right side where she'd been stabbed by an Ishvalan. When it happened she wished her comrades hadn't come to help her. She wished the man had killed her. If he had, it would've gotten her out of this nightmare.

Hands removed her military jacket and tore at the shirt underneath to give them access to the wound. Hot air washed over the gash as the desert winds blew through the medical tent and Riza gasped, her mind imaging thousands of tiny bits of sand being trapped inside the wound.

Voices spoke above her, shadows moved as they prepared to quickly patch her up. Something glinted in the sunlight that had just managed to poke through the tent door in that moment.

A needle.

Her breathing quickened, taking her back to her childhood home as her father's weight held her down on his desk. The tattoo needle bit into her skin, making it feel like there were a thousand tiny knives stabbing her all at once. A familiar feeling of loneliness, helplessness, and despair washed over Riza on that cot in Ishval. Her chest heaved as she began to panic. She tried to shuffle away from the offending instrument. The voices picked up in volume and hands began to restrain her. Just like her father's hands had done.

Tears began to escape. She no longer knew where she was. Riza had often thought Ishval reminded her of her home in her hellish childhood. The only light in that darkness she'd had was Roy, but he'd left her. Because he'd left, her father had turned Riza into his notebook so that she could pass his work onto Roy - probably the only person Berthold Hawkeye cared about in his later life.

I just want Roy, she'd wished in her mind, whimpers leaving her as the pressure on her shoulders increased. Pain stabbed her side and she let out a yell. She began to struggle, thinking that this time she wouldn't let her father win.

He was too strong. The pain flared again as he continued to work on that damned tattoo and Riza thrashed, managing to slip out the hold on her shoulders. She tried to escape, trying to roll off her father's desk.

Something pricked her neck and her body instantly grew limp. A tear escaped, rolling down her cheek. Once more, Riza hadn't been able to escape Berthold's hold on her. She slipped away as more tears fell down her face.

--------------------------

Riza's eyes flew open and were met with darkness. Beige material fluttered over her head, bringing the smell of the desert with it. That was strange. The last thing she remembered was being in her father's office -

There were shouts in the distance, followed by gunfire.

Right. She was in Ishval. She wasn't in her father's office. That had been a weird fever dream.

Sighing heavily, Riza brought a hand to her face to cover it. Her body threatened to shake as her emotions started to overwhelm her.

Once more, she wished the Ishvalan had killed her yesterday.

"Hey," a quiet voice greeted.

Her eyes flew open underneath her hand. Removing it and looking down the cot she spied Major Mustang offering her a relieved smile. She swallowed thickly and lowered her hand, nodding in greeting. "Sir."

"How are you feeling?"

This was the first time she'd properly spoken to him after their initial meeting. After that moment a small part of her no longer felt so alone in this war zone, however that had been a week ago and their paths had never crossed since. She'd heard rumors of him being sent to the front lines and heard the higher ups praising him, talking about how pleased they were with the work he was doing. 

They were pleased with how many people he was killing. The thought almost made her sick.

"Fine," she replied, cringing internally at the sound of her own voice. It was hoarse, betraying how she really felt, which was not good at all.

"Riza -"

"I'm fine, sir," she cut him off quickly. "Just a misstep."

Major Mustang sighed and stood from the chair by the foot of her bed. He lifted it, moving it to beside her head. 

"You don't make missteps," he replied softly.

"How would you know?" It held more bite to it than she would have liked, but it was true.

"Because I watched you grow up shooting and I watched you wrestle an injured deer expertly so we could have it for dinner that night." He reached out for her hand hesitantly, but grasped her fingers in his. "You don't make missteps in a fight."

How could she tell him that a brief thought had crossed her mind yesterday? That if she was just to hesitate a moment longer the Ishvalan would remove her from this hell and she'd no longer be in so much pain and suffering?

Tears threatened to spill over. She didn't deserve an escape like that, and apparently the universe didn't think so either. It brought her back to earth with a rough bump in the form of a burning wound in her side. She couldn't leave yet. She still had to pay for all the innocent lives she'd taken in this war.

A tear finally spilled down her cheek.

"They told me what happened in the triage room." His eyes met hers with concern, his thumb stroking the back of her hand. "What happened, Riza?"

She broke.

"I was back there," she whispered, body beginning to shake. "When I saw the needle, I was back with him -" Her chest was heaving now with breaths as she tried and failed to hold it all in.

"It's okay, I understand." Mustang removed his hand from hers and she opened her mouth to protest in a moment of weakness. What shocked her more was he climbed into the cot next to her. It really wasn't big enough for two people, but Roy managed to make himself fit. "Say no more." His arms wrapped around her. 

"But what about -?"

"It's all right," he reassured her, pressing a kiss to the top of her head. "Hughes is outside standing guard. He figured you needed this. Figured we both needed this." She froze. "Get some rest, Riza," he murmured into her hair, then he chuckled, the sound reverberating through his chest in which her head was pressed up against. "That's an order."

Another few tears fell down her cheeks but she nodded, burrowing herself deeper into his chest.

In a rare moment of weakness - one she really didn't deserve - yes, Riza found she really did need this. After a lifetime of feeling abandoned and feeling helpless, she needed to be cared for. It was a reminder of why she couldn't give up just yet. She still had work to do to redeem herself and pay for her sins.

[konilt]

Parenting in all its Glory

Following the theory of All for One |Sensei being the biological absentee parent of Midoriya Izuku, and the greatest villain of all times himself, failing to bond with his own son:

[trigger warning, but only for this first chapter; attempted suicide]

Parenting in all its glory - Chapter 1 - Konilt - 僕のヒーローアカデミア | Boku no Hero Academia | My Hero Academia

Summary:            

a story were Izuku is subjected to a psychologically horrific yet paradisiac environment, where the one person that cares the most about his flesh and blood becomes the one monster to avoid at all costs, with that Monster of all monsters trying at the same time to “repair” their “damaged” Relationship, while taking over Japan all the same.

Perhaps one of those tasks is slightly failed.

.

.

.

There wasn’t possibly anything wrong with this situation.

All for One had managed to get back his supposed rights of guardianship on him, and he had had to move from Toshinori’s apartment to a luxurious complex without having any choice in the matter.

His mother in a coma didn’t help.

He hadn’t even come by his own choice. He hadn’t even taken a bus, a car, something to go there.

Black goop was all he had seen.

There had been the crushing embrace that had been done before, and a few muttered words that had made him froze and panic, realizing who the person was.

He had already known, but once the teleportation was done, he had been able to see the black curls and an absence of all scarring.

Two tense flares had been fixed on him, the eyes not even leaving an instant as they had began talking the commodities and boundaries of his stay.

And how apparently, Izuku’s studies at U.A. had been removed from existence, and any references to them would be at best ignored, and at worst, followed by long admonitions and rebuttals.

The chiding was working, and Izuku hadn’t liked it as soon as he had realized it.

He was supposed to take classes with personal tutors, people that “would be able to bring the best out of him”.

He was sure that All Might was trying his best, outside.

But the fact that from the very few voice calls he had heard (his… father had been quite too efficient at hiding them from him in the four months they had- been in the same- house), All for One was somehow reappearing on the political scene.

And quite successfully, too.

That could only unnerve him.

He had tried to escape, at first.

So many attempts at escapes.

So many of them.

His f- his 'father' had not even punished him once for his attempts.

He had tilted his head, a disapproving glint in his eyes, and done nothing more than dulling him with way too much work for a single human being to do.

He had even forbidden him of taking dessert, once.

It had been utterly humiliating.

And it had slowly worked, for all that Izuku hated it.

For each escape attempt that Izuku made each new day, he had ineluctably been reduced to square one, with or the same damned black goop that seemed to come half of the times, or the slow steps that didn’t even show any kind of haste, catching up to him.

It had been the same disappointed stares, the same awkward silences that were held with unwithered control from the man who always wore formal attires.

It had only showed him how pointless each attempt was.

How ineluctable it was.

And slowly, his escape attempts had become less frequent.

Izuku knew that at first he had told himself that it was just to do more in the quality than the quantity.

In order to find a righter moment.

It was a lie, and Izuku could only grimace when he had realized that fact.

And somehow, his- his father had been pleased with that.

Pleased by “progress”.

Izuku had been allowed a bit more freedom with each day an escape wasn’t attempted, and when one was done once more, his newly acquired rights were reduced, his load of work increased, and Izuku, humiliated once more in subtle ways by the man that had probably more than 200 years of experience in doing so.

And if Izuku didn’t do his load of work, well.

There was punishment.

The only true thing he was punished for, contrary to escape attempts, that seemed a matter far less important. Far more futile.

One of the first lessons he had learned, all escape was futile.

And the man always managed to bring guilt in his guts whenever Izuku attempted one.

And Izuku hated it.

So when Izuku wondered in the kitchen, searching for something to eat, and trying to find something comestible and not old fashioned, he jerked when he noticed his- supposedly father, leaning on the wall opposed to the bar.

“You aren’t going to skip dinner, are you, Izuku?”

The younger boy hid behind his back the box of cookies he had found, cookies probably overpriced, probably coming from a company that somehow baked cookies with the luxury label on it.

Cookies were cookies, and he didn’t understand how one box could come at a price higher than ten normal boxes of those.

Though he wouldn’t admit that they weren’t delicious.

“Maybe I am”, he answered, a bit of spite in his voice.

He heard a disapproving tsk.

“You do know that that is not healthy for you, young child. Let me offer you needed counsel.”

He saw in the corner of his eyes maybe the damn goop appear, and the weight of the box disappear from his arms.

The box in question reappeared almost immediately like magic in the hands of the standing man.

The glare that was once more given had almost something warm in it.

He tried to ignore the caulked steps that approached him, and he kept himself immobile as he looked right in front of him, ignoring anything that wasn’t a wall.

He was destabilized by the sudden ruffle of his hair.

It was almost affectionate.

“Did you know that your uncle, my little brother, had the same tastes as you?”

Izuku answered by silence.

“Back then, the small company that it was made home-made pastries, but unknown to him, as we soon parted ways, that company sank with the low incomes it made. Yet, he continued to buy the same cookies from the same brand, unknowing that I had acquired it. It was quite a sweet thing, than to see him eat the same delicacies from our younger years, unbeknownst that the luxury boutique it had become was only of the consequences of my actions.”

So much for wanting to eat something not old-fashioned.

The affectionate ruffled stopped.

“But I must quite bother you with my rambles, how rude of me.”

Izuku looked up and stared back in the eyes of the man.

It didn’t last more than four seconds.

Somehow, he could never manage to win a staring competition.

Izuku tried to sigh.

He struggled not to make it remain blocked in his throat.

“So I expect you for dinner, youth.”

...

This time, Izuku did grimace.

It wasn't the fruit of any sort of reasoning.

Just... a fleeting envy.

This time, he didn’t wait for any sort of order to finally go.

He took shaky steps towards the door, ignoring the burning eyes that had to probably follow him from wherever the man was.

Izuku only  wondered since when he had accepted all of this.

Since when this had become the norm.

Since when he accepted curfew, since when he accepted the impossible amount of work, the rebuttal of his dreams, the denial of his needs.

“Young man.” he heard.

He ignored it.

He missed some of his friends. He missed Yagi.

“Young man.”

He missed mom.

...Did he miss mom?

There was a distinct instant of silence, and a cold menacing storm was about to break out on him, and for all that Izuku knew it, he decided to be the one to begin it for once.

“WHAT.” he screamed.

He was so done with the manipulation, with the entirety of all things that made him simply accept it, for everything that had made through him so easily.

Somehow, the man had so much control on him that he couldn’t just cope with it any more.

He felt tears in the corner of his eyes.

He couldn’t bear it. Not one more moment. Silence would be denial.

The tears prickled, and he bitterly remembered how he was hungry, how he was tired, how he couldn’t bear any more of the long stupid dinners where he was supposed to report, which very clearly, was only an excuse to bring him to talk his mind out, just so that the man could see how he was changing.

Yes, tears prickled.

But- yes, he only needed space.

No?

“What- is wrong?” came the answer, feeling too fake to be sincere, too worried to be actually of matter.

It was the first time the man reacted like this, and it was the only thing that was surprising Izuku right now.

“I am Done.” was his answer.

He felt the hatred coming through his eyes, that made the man’s eyebrows rise, and against all rationality, he activated Full Cowl.

The man, too, seemed surprised.

“Over a box of cookies?”

Izuku tsked, and didn’t wait for the man to do the first blow.

Not like the man would have ever thrown a blow at him.

...

And as he threw a violent kick, he thought that maybe that was the solution.

He had always run from him. He had always been or taken out cold or accepted the man’s words to give up.

He knew the man would never hurt him.

The least possible, at best.

Maybe the solution was to force the man to do something he would regret.

And as he kicked, he saw the man’s arm suddenly deflect it way too fast for the human eye, and grip his leg, almost gently.

Like he was made of paper.

And as Izuku’s punch came in contact with the man’s jaw, he twisted his leg, trying to make it break if the man didn’t unleash him.

He saw his father’s pupils becoming suddenly thinner, and Izuku was freed, to which he began immediately to fall down back on the ground.

He landed smoothly, and immediately jumped back, preparing a new assault.

“Playing dirty, aren’t we, Izuku?”

He didn’t answer. His eyes were concentrated on his next tool, as a crazy idea went in his mind.

He didn’t stare at his future to be tool. It would only give away what he was about to do.

Which his- father would definitively not like.

“There, there, young man, there’s no need to continue these frivolities. I’ll let it go if you talk to me and stop this right now.”

That made Izuku cringe.

He answered, this time.

“So WHAT? That you can break me and manipulate me better? So that you gain MORE control over me?”

His eyes were fury as he whipped his last tears.

“You hurt me, an-and I’m done. I am going to hurt you back.”

He saw a strange amused smirk appearing on the man’s face, but his eyes had a… worried edge?

No, that was just him imagining things.

He always imagined things.

“And how are you going to do that, youngling?”

Izuku met All for One’s eyes, and for once, smirking back, he said:

“By the only possible way, of course.”

One of the man’s eyebrows quirked.

Izuku didn’t look longer, and jumped towards the kitchen bar, sparks of electricity igniting along the way.

And he did what he had wanted to do.

He took solidly in his arms the tool he had wanted from the start.

A knife.

He smiled back, a pained smirk plastered on his face.

All for One’s face became suddenly serious.

“Izuku. Do. not.”

It was so strange, seeing for once the man immobile, as if he was an unstable animal, cornered, that would soon leash out.

And perhaps an actual threat for the first time in four months.

And Izuku smiled back, wanting probably to say to the man that he was sorry for his mother, if she woke up back.

Instead, those childish lines got out of his mouth, as he took his decision.

“You can’t order me what to do any more, father.”

And as Izuku settled for his veins instead of his throat, moving the knife from the place near his head to a farther one, somehow making All for One show Strange fake relief, he said one last time, as an echo:

“Yes, you can’t. Any more.”

And he pressed the metal, a swift movement, circular, deepening in his veins.

The knife was somehow immediately thrown away by an unseen force, and Izuku regretted that it was only one arm that was butchered. He felt more than saw firm arms taking him as he fell back, repeated “no, no, no”s as Izuku’s vision became blurry.

He looked with an empty stare in the eyes of the man, and he somehow saw an open panic inside of them.

Izuku mentally cursed once he remembered that the man had an arsenal of healing quirks probably hidden somewhere.

All hazy, a dark liquid pouring around them, he said a few last words as his consciousness finally faded away.

“Should have aimed for the throat.”

[livayl]

how to relieve magical exhaustion (part 1)

This is with Amaziah & Marya and starts out with stifled sneezes to credit a suggestion given to me (hi there!). Also somehow it turned out to be a sneeze fic with an amount of  h/c and whump? The actual comfort is going to come later though. 

A little heads up because this is more on the plot/world-lore heavier side and not as light-hearted & sneezy as the last one. Also there´s a mention of pain that Amaziah experiences from over-exerting herself with magic. There´s a minor injury mention on a “young human soldier” (hes 20) literally a few seconds before he gets healed completely. And don´t worry about the Wyngar- they are basically constructs born out of Alchemy and Magic and are not really alive beings & can be evoked again.

There´s nothing explicit so I hope you will still enjoy it and please only reblog this to other kink-blogs, thank you. :)

Amaziah hated to admit it but lately it became more and more clear that the constant use of magic, be it passive or aggressively, had started to wear her out inch by inch. Like an once adamant rock washed out to a cave slowly by a constant current. Further and further until the carcass like remains were not able to bear their own weight anymore. In fights the well known rush of adrenaline, a sheer burning blaze of power was able to fill the hollow, aching void for a time but made it even more visible and fragile once it was left empty again. It left her with a constant dull ache that resounded deep into her bones, humming it´s echo throughout her intestines only to be sharply reawakened, vibrated to life with every heartbeat. 

Marya still tried her best to brew more effective medicine but even those positive effects on the Archmages immune system had slowly ceased. The seemingly endless discussions at their little improvised war council did not ease the rhythmic pounding headache that had spread low enough to make piercing bolts of pain tug at her teeth. 

The tent was illuminated eerily by several golden glowing crystals and the flickering gleam of a dwindling fire that did emit more fumes than warmth. Fine clouds of breath made visible by the constant flow of frosty air were swirling and dancing around grey billows of smoke. Delicate fern frost had blossomed to a rich bouquet on rough fabrics. Amaziah hoped it was just the quickly fading rush that threatened to make the world spin once she turned her head too fast. Yet that wish appeared to be futile when her condition started to worsen with proceeding time: The Archmages legs seemed barely receiving her inward bellowed commands to stay and carry her weight steadily while her sight stayed dulled and foggy on the edges. 

".... And eventually we received some real aid! Be assured that it is much appreciated, your grace. Although I cannot help but perceive that my- uh your- supplies have been scattered and thus may be damaged and that the former attack rendered my carriage useless as well as killed my Wyngar for which I understandably demand recompenses from you for coming too-" Amaziahs already sapped patience had been stretched thinner the longer the noble merchants ramblings had lasted- which were nothing more than barely concealed, blustered complaints anyways.

"Those matters will have to wait until we reach a safer outpost." She interrupted him, a little shocked how rough her voice came out. "Everyone injured should have been treated by now. I´ll make sure that they are well enough to move out. Prepare for departure." Ah- finally crisp and clear, Amaziah thought. Still, speaking made her head and throat throb unanimously with stabbing bolts of agony. Without waiting for an answer- or worse, another volley of nagging, she turned, took her gloves and scarf and left without taking the time to fully dress again. Her own flames had been fueled and she feared to sear the self-centered fool not unlike to how the giants had burned that poor Wyngar. 

Right outside the Archmage was greeted by an icy squall accompanied by piercing hail that bit and cut into every bit of exposed skin mercilessly. But instead of cooling her down it managed to aggravate her even more. The grim frost did hurt her lungs and forced the mage to cough harshly. It also chilled her nose to a point were all the cold started to freeze-burn its way up her sinuses. She sniffed against the unpleasant sensation which just worked as an igniter that sparked the smoldering tickle into a sudden, stabbing blaze that could not be extinguished. Amaziah gasped in an abrupt breath and had barely time to bring up her hand, only managed to partially close her flaring nostrils with cold fingers. "Heh-knxdzsch-uh!" She then cringed at the failed stifle that had pushed past her defenses and steamily misted the palm of her hand. But her bodies attempts to get rid of not only the frosty irritants did not grant her much time to dwell in that small discomfort. She had barely opened her eyes again as they threatened to fall shut once more by the incoming sensation. Again a deep, building breath that titled back the mages head, this time followed by a secure and firm nose-pinch. The final release had been so repressed it was borderline inaudible and directly followed by an only slightly louder groan. The force of it was much clearer displayed in the Archmages body language as it made her stumble forward dizzily. She had only a short moment to steady herself until the insisting tingling need rose again and made her head bob down once more. This time with increased force as if to make up for her persistent resistance: "hah-ndxt!-ah" Amaziah blinked tears out of her eyes and had to give her head a clearing shake before she could resume her ways to the hastily built sickbay.

Inside the confined tent it was pleasantly warm but a mixture of several pungent odors thickened the air, assaulted her senses and threatened to cause another fit of vague outcome. Thankfully, all was overlayed by the both evocative and comforting minty scent of healing herbs. Ambrosial and refreshing for all senses as was the sight of its source: In front of her Marya was still busy taking care of the last wounded soldiers and merchants. 

Her wavy, vibrant red hair was pinned-up but a few strands had loosened out of the voluminous bun. They curled around her softly blushed cheeks, caressed the slightly exposed and freckled nape of her neck only to silkily float down further her coat veiled curves. The young Alchemists face was unusual rigid with concentration, her lush lips slightly parted and smooth forehead overshadowed by a delicate frown as she worked. Thankfully the Archmage could not detect the dreaded look of distraught marring her soft features. 

Amaziah noticed with much relief that most remaining injuries seemed to be superficial burns and minor flesh wounds. The four lads were still more or less lucid and not yet beyond capacities of the healing potions they had been given. A little too lucid maybe, the Archmage thought as she noticed the prevalent conversational topic enthusiastically declaimed by an eager and youthful voice:

"... And then the Archmage tore the sky open a second time! It was like exploding blazingly white with a rolling thunder. Spitting out thunderbolts which crashed into the Demons so powerfully that it shook the earth! All of the smaller ones vanished immediately, turned to ash only leaving behind scorch marks and the bitter smell of ozone. The raging Fire Giant crumpled under the spell as if smashed by an enormous  hammer, pinned down helplessly into the dirt, barely fuming... And- oh-OH- your grace!" The young human soldier interrupted himself as he became aware of Amaziahs presence. The left side of his face had been scorched but was already healing quickly- almost too fast to be followed by gaze alone. Despite this token of battle the young lad still seemed to be more a teen than the man their circumstances needed. All gangly limbs brimming with excitement only one so new to all of this could  maintain. "I´m-" Amaziah started but was cut short by a few raspy coughs. "Excuse me. I am relieved to see you all are more or less well." She then continued- voice still strained but lips curved up into a honest smile. "Very much so, your grace. We just reveled in your latest heroic legends." Marya answered, a little amused mischief sparking in her blue eyes. Amaziah hoped that her face was still flushed from the cold and that this was able to hide the blush she felt rising up. 

"Do you think everybody is well enough to depart soon? I don´t want to stay here longer than necessary." She then explained as Marya gently took her aside. Amaziah felt a light shiver creeping up her spine as the younger elf studied her observantly. "Yes, not too much worries there. Lord stuck up can be useful for once and lend us his other cart for those who shouldn't walk." "Huh- so no fast departure then. That man can´t do a thing without an endless discussion." The Archmage answered more peevish than she had intended. Apparently the pure mention of Lord Desjard was enough to push her already much battered buttons. 

And the obtrusive smells started to tease her senses more and more. Right at this thought the lingering irritation spread from playful to demanding again and her sharp nose reacted with a couple of angered twitches. The tingling sensation was aggressive enough to bring back tears to her eyes and made her take a few hitching breaths despite all her efforts to keep them steady. "Are you well? You look worn out. And sneezy." "N-nohh... I´m fine, th-hah-hhh-thank you." Amaziah replied around wavering inhales. She sheepishly rubbed and squeezed the tip of her reddened nose, tried to calm all the flaring and crinkling. When this did not more than hardly stall the announcing release, the mage started pinching her septum hard which only managed to intensify the feeling instead of weakening it. "Haeh-ERRSCHH-hue!" Initiated by a strangled yet powerful inhale the sudden sneeze had burst out unrestrained, was angled down and only partly to the side by a hastily raised hand. "Oh my I´m-hih sorriih- AERRSSCHH-ah! Snnff-HAiih-EERSSCHooh!" Her already staggering apology was harshly interrupted: The second one was equally powerful but with a throat scraping, chest aching quality to it and the third simply loud and echoing enough to drown out the nascent chorus of timid and astounded "bless yous". 

Amaziah was almost thankful that another volley of coughs spared her too much of a polite reaction. "Aw gesundheit my Sweet. Don´t hurt yourself!" "-I´m sorry." The Archmage managed to choke out bitterly. "Guess I´m up to wrecking myself anyhow.... Please make sure that everyone is ready as soon as possible." "No worries I´ll kick some healthy soldier butts to help me organizing. How about you sit down here a little and rest?" Amaziah felt torn between her wish to stay close to her Loves comfort and care and the fear of lapsing again with an audience this big. The openly shown, almost ridiculous hero worship some of the army actively participated in did not make things better. Also, how indomitable could a leader stay while slumping down to the dirt afflicted by whatever nonsense this current weakness was. 

“No thank you. The-uh- herbs are getting to me a bit, I´m afraid. See you at departure in an hour." Amaziah hastily excused herself with a gentle yet swift kiss atop of Maryas head. Then she left, almost fled the place too scared to admit how she longed for Maryas close company. 

[slamsams-blog]

Die Another Day - #24WeeksofBond

24 Weeks of Bond hits the low point this week with Pierce Brosnan’s swan song as 007 in “Die Another Day”.  Oh man, there is just so much to say and unpack about this movie, it’s hard to put into summary every which way this film fails to deliver.  This film came at a cross-roads for film goers who still loved Bond, but were starting to grow a little tired of the hokey-ness and sleaze of James Bond and were wanting something a little rougher.  “The Bourne Identity” had come out just a few months prior to high praise for it’s hard hitting, intense, stripped-down style...it was fresh.  A few months later “Die Another Day” comes out with an older Pierce Brosnan, some god awful writing and cartoonish cinematography.  Change needed to happen, and this movie would mark the end of the sex puns, over the top gadgets, and far fetched scenarios.

Listen, I LOVE Bond.  I really have a hard time saying a Bond movie is bad...but this movie. is. bad.  This is a tale of two films. The first half is an action packed drama that is gritty, and dark and the second half is like watching a Joel Schumacher Batman film (the one where Batman has nipples).  The plot is also a rip off of “Diamonds Are Forever” and constantly goes for the cheap pop - bringing out all the old gadgets and familiar looking scenes for the 40th anniversary of Bond.  There is just so much trash talk to shell out here, but let’s start with the good stuff.

Die Another Day actually starts out quite promising and delivers a thrilling pre-title sequence with Bond infiltrating a North Korean Army base where he has stolen the clothing of a man trading African Conflict Diamonds for some weapons with a Colonel of the North Korean military and his stooge Zao.  Bond is eventually found out but manages to escape the firing squad to chase down Colonel Moon on a HOVERCRAFT!  Pretty neat.  Colonel Moon eventually runs out of road and takes a fall appearing to be slain, but Bond is caught again by Moon’s dad and for the next 14 months, Bond will be held prisoner and tortured.

I always liked how they utilized the title sequence to take us through Bond’s captivity (even though we are forced to listen to Madonna’s over produced and just flat out weird song...what’s the deal with the random “Sigmund Freud” lyric?).  Though the song is hard on the ear drums, it does a great job in providing an aura of despair and pain in the torture aspect of the title sequence...maybe because the song is torture?

We come back from Madonna, and Jesus Bond is now being traded for Zao who has diamonds permanently implanted in his face from Bond’s intrusion.  This makes Bond angry and makes him question why MI6 would give Zao up.  M is also pissed about it, it appears that there is someone who is playing MI6 for fools.  M is so mad that she essentially burns Bond and relieves him of his 00 status, but this doesn’t stop Bond from forcing himself into cardiac arrest to escape and find out who is behind all of this.

See?  Starts out great!  If only they can keep this momentum going...(spoiler alert: they can’t)

Another positive about this movie is a great fencing scene with Bond and Gustav Graves (Toby Stephans).  I've just always been tickled by how much this scene escalates from a little game of fencing to an all out sword fight.  It is one of the few highlights of the film, complete with a cameo made by Madonna...something I’m sure she negotiated to sign on for the Bond theme.  Get that payday, Madonna!

Well thats about all the positive I can muster for this film.  It’s time to take the gloves off.  Die Another Day’s wheels start to come loose when Bond is in Cuba looking for Zao...during this time, he meets Jinx (Halle Berry), and the dialogue that will unfold, sounds like the writer brought in his perverted nephew, who is just out of high school, looking to write a scene to get his friends to laugh when they watch it in his parents basement.  Halle Berry is the victim of poor writing, and possibly poor directing, yes, but she also tries WAY too hard to be a cool, witty, and deadly agent.  I’ll give Berry the benefit of the doubt to an extent, but I really think she just over acted here.

On top of that - Brosnan and Berry have absolutely ZERO chemistry.  Brosnan is no spring chicken anymore, so we are supposed to believe a woman like Halle Berry would welcome the advances from a bird watcher in his mid-50′s who says Mojito really weird?  Come on.  And the obvious dick jokes and creepiness from Bond who is foaming at the mouth, desperate for sex after being tortured for over a year makes this scene so uncomfortable to watch.

But we later come to find out that Jinx is more than just a reincarnation of Honey Ryder from Dr. No...she is also a secret agent that seems to never take anything seriously and in the face of death by laser, still has time for jokes.  We find out Zao is trying to do gene-therapy treatment to change his identity to someone else.  Much like Colonel Moon had done, turning himself into the man we will come to know as Gustav Graves.  The adrenaline filled, publicity junky, billionaire with an eye for diamonds.

Speaking of over acting, Toby Stephans puts out a good effort with the Gustav Graves character but he is just so over the top with his “evil” looks that there is no denying that he is indeed the villain.  Some of the best villains in cinema and television are villains that get you to like them.  They play to your emotions, let you in on their dark secrets, give you a smile and a laugh, maybe even make you connect with them in a twisted way...but Graves lets you know by his nostril flares and angry glares, that you couldn’t possibly like him if you tried.

Graves invites Bond to his party in Iceland, (isn’t Greenland the icy one?). This is when the movie goes off the rails completely, the second half of the film that looks like the props, sets, and lighting design were borrowed from the Power Rangers.  This ridiculous ice palace accompanied by the super ridiculous revelation of the “Icarus” - a satellite made out of diamonds (exactly like Diamonds are Forever) is just so off-putting. The Icarus shoots a beam as powerful as the sun and can also be used as a freakin sun beam death laser from the sky.  Yes, you heard that right.  At one point Bond is involved in a chase where he is being tailed by a sun beam death laser from the sky.  This leads to the most cringe worthy scene in all of Bond...Bond escapes by CGI surfing.

I’ve said before, one of the aspects of the Bond films that makes the series so successful is the heavy emphasis on real stunts.  REAL STUNTS.  Director Lee Tamahori thought it would be fun to amp up the CGI because he thought that CGI was the future of the Bond franchise, oh was he sorely mistaken. He also thought it would be a good idea to insert a bunch of slow motion shots throughout the movie, they were going for the ‘Matrix effect’ but it did not play well.  It’s choppy and pixilated and just ruins any momentum they managed to build up - it just ends up being annoying. 

If that wasn’t bad enough, Q Branch comes out to “Jump the Shark” by delivering an invisible car.  Really?  This is just another example of the theme of this film taking everything one step too far.  But maybe you could argue that that is what we needed in order to know what our threshold as a Bond audience is.  You could say that maybe Die Another Day was the most important film in the canon for that reason.  Maybe Die Another Day was the sacrificial lamb to fall on it’s own sword to prevent us from going in that direction again, maybe...this movie SAVED THE BOND FRANCHISE??

Eh, Now I’m just devil’s advocating myself.  This is thee worst Bond movie of all time and anyone who says differently has no idea what they are talking about, or are just trying to be ‘Ironic’, or whatever.  This film ends with Gustav Graves becoming an electrifying super-shredder villain whose design was probably stolen from the Mega-Man video games.  The final battle taking place on a plane that is crashing due to a window being knocked out and is also being destroyed by the Sun Beam death laser from the sky.  In other words...more CGI.

And to top it all off, we end on another uncomfortable scene with Bond and Jinx again, spitting out blatant toilet humor dialogue making us think that they are getting busy, but it turns out Bond is just putting diamonds in her belly button (which she really wants to leave in for some reason).  Traditionally, a Bond movie would end with some witty pun being the last bit of dialogue you would hear before credits, but this...I still can’t figure out how this left the writer’s table. 

Bond: “I'm still not quite sure how good you are.”

Jinx: “I’m sooo good...”

Bond: “Especially when you’re bad.”

huh??  It’s not even a pun, it just doesn’t make sense.

Honestly, you can tell Brosnan is thinking “who the hell wrote this shit?” while he is delivering that final line.  sigh.  The good news is that we can only go up from here!  This would be Brosnan’s final performance as James Bond, even though he publicly announced he was going to do another one.  Didn’t quite work out that way, the film studio eventually phased him out, leaving Brosnan at curbside.  Probably for the best, Brosnan was great for that time, but the pressure was on for change.  And change we would get - with Daniel Craig.

That’s all for me tonight, let me know why you hated this movie!

Reviews from Friends:

Tyler Dahlgren

See I like Toby’s Graves. That guy plays despicable well (Black Sails anyone?). It’s the redeeming part of the movie for me. That and the car. I love the Aston Martins, let’s stick to those.

Andrew Albertsen

I think the whole movie should’ve just been about Bond’s incarceration and torture and eventual escape.

My Mom

Sam you don’t mention Rosemund Pike in your review. I thought she made an outstanding ice queen. This had its moments and I do love Pierce Brosnan as Bond but this film was way too long and too much continuous action. A person tunes out.

Jake Benrud

The end of an era. All the gadgets and the over the top villains complete with "diamond face" and a genetically modified psychopath with daddy issues. I don't understand why he needed to drive his car in the ice palace in the first place. Also, that was an epic dive by Halle Berry.

24 Weeks of Bond will return next Monday with - 

Quantum of Solace

[dalgonachan]

Kiss It Better

member: Mingyu x reader

genre: fluff with a dash of angst, live-in partners, non-idol au (?)

warnings: swearing, mentions of injuries, mentions of alcohol, suggestive content

prompt: there's no doubt his kisses were all you needed to feel a whole lot better

word count: 1735

a/n: i had a hard time choosing what gif to put so pls don’t kill me

The comfort of lying in bed lessens the throbbing pain in your head. With eyes shut and breaths evened out, you try to keep your focus on achieving the state of relaxation you need. The silence, however, only seems to amplify the throbbing; you groan through clenched teeth.

"How much does it hurt?" The sound of Mingyu's husky voice fills your ears.

You want to tell him that your head feels like exploding, that you want to bang your head straight on a wall, that it hurt so much worse than hell. Instead, the pain restrains you from saying any more than two words.

"A lot." You reply weakly.

The bed dips and you feel Mingyu shuffling by your side. His hand rests warmly on your cheek for him to caress, then it trails upwards to your hair and runs his fingers through it. You let out a shaky sigh as you relished in the gentleness of his touch. Somehow, it helps you tolerate the headache.

"My poor baby," Mingyu mutters before placing a chaste kiss to your forehead.

"May you feel better soon, (Y/n)."

His hand stops to rest on your shoulder and you feel him scoot closer to press your foreheads together. A small smile forms on your lips, an expression that showed your content towards Mingyu's sweet little action. There was no doubt he had a healing kiss because, at that moment, you could feel the pain slowly subsiding.

Hot oil spatters out of the pan and lands on your arm, the brief scalding sensation making you yelp and hop away from the stove. Earlier today, you had asked Mingyu if he could teach you to cook which he immediately (and enthusiastically) complied. Now, he was laughing at you for being too afraid to come near the stove after being exposed to minuscule droplets of oil and a harmless burn.

"Stop laughing at me, you little shit!" You barked, but he only cackled even louder. "That actually hurt! I don't understand how you're able to withstand it."

"You're just weak." He teased and you glared at him. "Now come back here, you little shit. We're not done yet."

You shook your head and backed away. "Nuh-uh."

"Quit being such a scaredy-cat." It only took Mingyu a single stride for him to reach your arm and tug you back to his side. "You're all grown up already. You need to learn how to cook so that you can feed yourself without needing anybody's help."

"But it's so hot and my arm still hurts!" You whined, pouting at him while pointing at the spot the oil had hit.

"(Y/n), I literally don't see anything wrong with it." He said as he took you by the wrist and examined your arm.

"But it hurts." You insisted.

With an exasperated sigh, he pulled your arm next to his face and grazed his lips over the skin you claimed to have gotten burnt before turning to you and grumbling, "You're such a baby."

You flash him a cheeky grin. "But I'm your baby."

Sometimes, his kisses were all you needed even when unnecessary.

It takes a while before you finally decide what you're in the mood to wear. Grabbing your clothes, you toss them onto the bed while shutting the closet doors when—

"YAAA!" Mingyu jumps out of hiding and scares you shitless.

Startled, you shriek and accidentally bump into the closet. You don't need the loud thud to tell you how hard the impact was because you've already fallen to the floor while cradling your knee.

"Oh my god! Are you okay?!" Mingyu hurriedly gets down to your side, regret and worry on his face as he looks down at your writhing figure.

"You fucking son of a bitch, do I look like I'm okay?!" You yell and it takes everything in you to stop yourself from slapping him. "I'm going to get a bad bruise and it's all your fault!"

"I'm really sorry. I didn't mean for you to get hurt." He sounds so genuinely apologetic that it washes away all your anger. "I'm going to get some ice. Just stay here, okay?"

With that, he leaves the room and you listen to the echo of his footsteps trudging down the stairs.

"I don't think I'm going anywhere, Mingyu." You mutter with a chuckle as you manage to get off the ground and prop yourself on the bed.

Lifting your leg, you observe the dark-hued discoloration beginning to bloom on your knee. The swelling pain makes you cringe and you bite down on your lip to keep from hissing. Soon, Mingyu returns with an ice pack in hand and he kneels before you to place it on the fresh bruise. The sharp coldness on the injury causes your lips to knit into nothing but a thin line on your visage.

"I'm sorry, (Y/n)." He says, looking up at you with sad puppy eyes, pouting all the while with his lower lip jutting out.

"It's alright. You didn't mean it." You shrug nonchalantly, brushing his forehead free from hair then flicking it. "Just don't do it again, you idiot."

He flinches back in surprise, then nods while grinning sheepishly. "Yes, yes. I won't. I'm sorry."

Seconds later, Mingyu lifts the ice pack away to look at the bruise forming on your skin; you grimace at the sight of red and purple clotting right below the surface. Carefully, he lowers his lips until they delicately make contact with your knee. You don't feel anything due to the numbness caused by the ice, but you're pretty sure that kiss was just as good as any remedy—maybe, even better.

Soreness; it's the first thing you feel throughout your entire body when you wake up. The urge to immerse yourself in a hot shower reels your head off the pillow, but you wince halfway through sitting up by a twinge on your shoulder. To make things worse, the supposedly short-lived pain eventually flares into a nonstop stinging sensation. Wondering what the hell was bothering you so early in the morning, you look over to check on it and discover a huge hickey just right above your shoulder blade.

Last night was a blur thanks to all the alcohol, but you can still clearly recall making love with Mingyu. His canines were something you were fully aware of, but you had absolutely no idea how damn hard he could bite. You trace your fingers over the love mark and let out a whimper, partly out of shock and of pain.

Just then, your attention shifts to the man lying next to you who's stirred from his sleep. You watch him stretch out his arms and legs as he heaves a long and deep yawn. It takes a while before his eyes flutter open and he sees you staring, a silly smile lighting up his already handsome features to greet you good morning. However, the smile drops when he sees you rubbing the area he had bitten and instantly, he's up to take a look at it too.

"Does it hurt that bad?" Mingyu asks, furrowing his brows.

"Pretty much, yeah." You try to sound as casual as possible to make him less worried about it. "Hickeys last for only a few days though, so it's nothing."

He doesn't say anything, but the disapproving frown on his face speaks for himself. Seconds later, his strong arms wrap you in warmth as he pecks the skin he had nipped the night before. The desire of a hot shower is long forgotten as the two of you retreat into the covers once again.

It wasn't supposed to be much of a big deal, yet here you were bawling your eyes out on the couch. You were caught in the pounding rain on the way home and in your rush, failed to notice that you had dropped the keyring Mingyu had given you years ago. Most people would simply shrug it off and get on with their lives, but for you, that Mickey Mouse keyring possessed great sentimental value; it served as a reminder of the time you and Mingyu celebrated your first anniversary as a couple.

Back then, he had surprised you a few days before that you were going on a trip to Hong Kong Disneyland. The sudden announcement made your jaw drop from utter disbelief, especially because of the fact that he had paid so much and you were going out of the country just to celebrate your first anniversary together. It was a one week vacation, but the events in Disneyland were the only memories that stayed with you after you left Hong Kong. You had so much fun that Mingyu decided to buy you the keyring as a souvenir and you've never stopped using it ever since... until you lost it out of pure carelessness.

"It's alright, (Y/n). Look at me, I'm not mad at all." Mingyu said, trying to console you from your distress.

"But you gave that to me on our first year together and... and... now, it's gone forever!" You wailed in between hiccups caused by ceaseless sobbing. "I probably look like an idiot for crying over a keyring, but I'm an even bigger idiot for losing it!"

Your lament makes you cry even harder as Mingyu encases you into a soothing hug. It successfully pacifies your sadness and soon enough, your bawling gradually turns into sniffles.

"Are you still upset about it?" Mingyu puts his hands on either side of your face to wipe away your tears with his thumbs.

"Yeah." You respond in a quavering voice.

"Will it be possible for me to kiss it better?" He asks; his eyes are focused on you, but you catch them flicker to your lips for a split second.

It was a simple and innocent question, yet it was more than enough to lift your spirits. You smile at him affectionately and lightly giggle. "Well, there was never a time your kisses never worked, so go ahead."

He grins mirthfully, a charming sight adorning his gorgeous visage, making you fall for him ten times over again. Without further ado, your lips touch and it sparks a feeling so magical that you melt into each other. Your heartbeat quickens the same way your breaths do and in that blissful moment, you could already feel him curing you of melancholy.

[sibillascribbles08]

Sleep what is that??? lmaooooo

Anyway have some more... Max

In which Toby brings him to visit but they trip on the way in

Uhhh warnings for mentions of child death idk if I need a more serious warning or not for this mmmm

Toby probably should have given his friend some kind of run down or a warning before he pulled them both through the jump. But in all the excitement it didn’t really cross his mind.

Not until they landed, and Max’s wide grin rapidly turned into shock and horror.

Toby followed his gaze to where he was looking, at a pair of security droids chatting with each other across the street.

Static shot up his left arm, a sensation he didn’t recognize but he knew it wasn’t good. He saw Max bare his teeth, the gold growing them into fangs. Purple smog began to rise from his skin.

Toby reacted as fast as he could. He snatched Max’s arm and dragged them both through another jump, dropping them far outside the city. It was a messy leap, causing them both to crash onto the grass. Toby was quick to roll back onto his feet, watching Max.

“What the fuck?” His friend scrambled back up, fangs still out. Gold was leaking into his eye. “What the hell was that?”

“Max, it’s okay.” Toby walked toward him, hands out. “I’m sorry, I should have warned you–” 

“Why are those things just walking around?” Max pointed to the city which could still be seen from the hill they stood on.

“They live here.” Toby cringed. Why didn’t he consider Max would have a negative reaction to that. Hell, he still didn’t know the details of what his friend had been through.

“They what?” When Max shouted his whole body seemed to ripple, as if something was trying to break out of his skin. “Why?”

“Things have changed.” That was the simple explanation at least. “They don’t work for The Overlord anymore. If it wasn’t for them I couldn’t have gotten the city to where it is now.” Toby gestured at the buildings, or most of them anyway. Hopefully Max wouldn’t focus on the husk of Borg tower that still stood at the center. “I promise, Max, they’re not a threat.”

“That doesn’t change what they did to us.”

“No,” Toby agreed. “But there’s no point in lingering in that when they’ve done all they can to make up for it. Doesn’t that make sense?”

Max didn’t seem completely convinced, but at least the smoke dissipated and the gold retreated from his eye. “Guess things are just really different around here, huh?” He blew his hair out of his face. “But I have to admit, not sure I’m comfortable standing in the same room as them right now.”

“That’s fine.” Toby waved his hands. “We can uhhhh look around the city at night. Almost all of them go inside at night, pretend curfew stuff.” He nodded a few times, as if it was a for sure solution. “Except Gizmo, he’s up all night, but I know his routine.” 

His friend studied him for a few more moments before his shoulders relaxed. “Yeah, that might be better to start.” He turned around to look at the city, then at everything else. “It’s really weird to think this universe is so similar to the one I’m from. It’s so... vibrant.”

“It wasn’t always.” Toby offered a smile, relieved that whole mess was over. “Actually, there is something we can look at right now if you want. I know no one will be up there.”

Max still seemed uncertain, but curious enough to take Toby’s hand when he extended it.

One more jump had them landing in the top floor of the factory, the hallways Toby converted into a memorial. Names and numbers lined the entire wall, from top to bottom. Failed experiments, kids who never saw the light of day, others that died trying to fight back.

Toby wanted to make sure not a single one was left out.

It didn’t seem he needed to explain what it was at least. Max looked around the room, in a sort of awe. His gaze darted over the names before he stepped forward, running his fingers over the engravings.

“Huh,” his voice echoed in the empty room. “Really puts stuff into perspective doesn’t it.”

“Yeah.” Toby always felt some kind of comfort in coming here, but it still made him sad at the same time. He never even met most of these kids. “Part of why I had it made.”

Max kept walking along, looking at names, until he came to a stop again. His fingers lingered over where his own name was. “Can’t lie.” He tried to smile. “That’s a bit odd.”

“Yeah well, in some other universe it’s probably my name up there.”

His friend chuckled. “Man, remember how you got your name? Back when we were all planning our escape? Is it the same for you as it was for me?”

“What?” Toby smiled back. “You asking me what I wanted my name to be? And I repeated ‘to be’ so many times it just turned into Toby?”

“Yeah!” Max pointed at him and grinned wider. At least those fangs were gone. “Brook suggested it, and Flare said it was super lame.”

“Too bad, it stuck.” Toby stuck out his tongue. “Sorry I wasn’t creative to come up with cool names like Flare or Maximum.”

“Oh god, don’t remind me.” Max ran his hand down his face, letting it linger over his mouth. “Why did I think that was a good idea?”

“Because we were kids.” Toby said it as a joke, but the air was swallowed into silence again as the pair of them looked at each other.

They were kids.

They were just kids.

“You said you were just ten, right?” Max frowned. “When I fell apart.”

Toby cringed. “Can we... not talk about that?” He hugged himself. “Honestly, despite all the shit I’ve seen it still stacks up as one of the worst memories of my life.”

“Sorry,” Max ran his hand through his hair. “I just... pisses me off you were put in that position. It’s one thing if it’s me but–”

“What does that mean?” Toby didn’t mean to growl. “As if killing you friends gets easier with age.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“Then what did you mean?” His voice cracked and he swallowed. “I shouldn’t have been put in that position and neither should you. It doesn’t matter if you were older.” He shook his head. “You were always like that, trying to be responsible for everything. Even when you were dying you wouldn’t stop apologizing for dropping that burden on me. Hell, at first you tried to convince me to just run.”

Max frowned, his eye wide. “At first?”

Toby pressed his lips together, more than aware of the threatening tears as the images and sounds tried to rip through his head. “Yeah, then the pain really hit you and you... it was so bad you were begging me to put a stop to it.”

Max moved so quick Toby almost didn’t notice. His friend pulled him into a hug, holding him close.

“I’m sorry.” Max muttered.

“Stop apologizing for it.” Toby replied, though it made little sense to say. This was a different Max. “You were just a kid like the rest of us, older or not.”

“Yeah, but I know how it feels.” Max pulled away enough that he could nudge Toby’s bangs away from his face. “And the thought of you having to go through that at an even younger age... I wish I could have protected you from it. I wish I could have protected all of you.” He looked back at the wall of names.

Toby shook his head. “As much as it sucks, you can’t save everyone.” He rubbed his eyes where tears were trying to form. “You just do what you can, and try and make a better future for those you could save.”

“Hah,” Max’s smile was sad as he took another step back. “I couldn’t save anyone.”

Toby blinked, about to ask what that meant, but it was interrupted by familiar footsteps.

“Toby?”

He spun around to see Cryptor standing in the hall. His boyfriend’s eye darted from him to Max.

Oh no.

That same spark hit his arm. He spun around and rushed in front of Max, that gold already covering his eye.

“Max, it’s okay.” Toby said, not wanting to warp them out unless he had to. “He’s a friend, I promise.”

“Him?” Max’s voice boomed in the hall. “I know who that is.”

“I know you know.” Toby ran the risk of gripping his arms. “But he’s not the one you knew, I swear. Just take a breath.”

Relief rushed through him when Max did as he asked. The sensation in his arm dissipated.

“Sorry,” Max said. “Did you need Toby for something?” His expression toward Cryptor was nothing short of threatening, as if daring the nindroid to speak.

“I...” Cryptor’s gaze kept flashing over Max, occasionally pausing at the pin that held his cloak together. “I heard he came back. Thought it odd that he did without coming to see me but I suppose this explains why.”

Max snorted. “Well, if you need to catch up that’s fine.” He stepped out of Toby’s grip. “I’ll be in the roof.”

Toby moved to follow. “Max–”

His friend suddenly shifted into water, all of it dropping to the floor before it slid under the wall like a snake.

“Is... that normal?” Cryptor stepped up to Toby, but slow, cautious, as if he expected Max to come back at any second.

“I don’t know.” Toby frowned. “To be honest I’m still getting to know him all over again.”

“You said that was Max? But isn’t Max–”

“Alternate universes, you know.” Toby shrugged, his smile was half hearted. “Sorry, I would have explained as soon as I got here but he uh... isn’t a fan of nindroids.”

Cryptor crossed his arms. “In all fairness, you shouldn’t be either. I suppose I can understand his reaction.”

Toby shook his head. “I’ll sort it out, promise, but I better go check on him. I um... I’m not sure if I should have him running around this place on his own.”

Cryptor nodded. “Understood. I’ll leave you to it then. Come find me when he’s up for it, or when you get some free time.”

Toby smiled and stepped over. He put his hand on Cryptor’s wrist, convincing the nindroid to lower his arms so he could move in close before giving him a kiss.

Cryptor smiled. “Is that the ‘I’m sorry’ kiss or the ‘I missed you’ kiss.”

“That was the ‘I missed you’ kiss.” Toby grinned before kissing Cryptor’s nose. “That’s the ‘I’m sorry’ kiss.” He started to trail kisses over his cheek and to his neck. “These are the ‘I love you’ kisses.”

“Alright, stop.” Cryptor pushed him away, but he was still smiling. “You need to follow him.”

“Aw,” Toby pouted. “No ‘I love you’ back?”

His boyfriend shook his head before reaching out, hands on both of Toby’s cheeks as he returned a kiss. “I love you too. I’ll see you later.”

He was grinning again. He nuzzled his nose against Cryptor’s cheek and stole one last kiss before teleporting to the roof.

[kallura-icedcoffee]

Could you do a fireman au with kallura on it ;0

Allura can’t stop thinking about the man who saved her life.

Not because she almost died, although that was somethingthat definitely weighed on her at first, but she’s gotten over it now.

And not because saving someone’s life is the greatest giftone can give that can never truly be repaid, although she is super supergrateful.

But because he was hot.

Like super duper incredibly fucking hot.

And not just because he’s a firefighter and she’s alreadyhad like eight million fantasies where she replays the night she almost died inher head but instead of what actually happened she’s revised it so he’scarrying her out of the burning building in nothing but the firefighter pantsand a white tank top which he rips off in order to wipe the soot from her faceand she has on a red ball gown and then they kiss passionately before makinglove on the lawn…

No, that’s not it at all.

He’s also just handsome as hell in general and his smilemakes her melt like butter.

And she knows he has an amazing smile because she makes sureto get lunch at the café across the street from the fire station at least twicea week in order to catch a glimpse and damn the café thinks she really mustlove that French onion soup.

But now she has a dilemma: saving someone’s life really ISthe greatest gift someone can give that can’t be repaid, but you should atleast thank the person if it’s possible.

And it’s very possible for her, and this could be the in sheneeds to at least hear his voice outside of “ARE YOU OK? STAY WITH ME!”, butthere’s one little problem…

“Hunk I need to know how to make brownies!”

“Just follow the directions on the box.”

“I can’t make box brownies that’s not romantic!”

“What?”

“I mean, it’s not uh…it’s a nicer way to show appreciationif I make them from scratch.”

“But you can’t make anything from scratch.”

“Rude.”

“Allura you burn pop tarts.”

“It can happen to anyone!”

“No offense, but the sake of whoever these are for maybe youshould just buy some from the store.”

Her nostrils flare as she huffs into the phone.

“Thanks for nothing I’ll figure it out myself!”

“But-”

She hangs up and blows loose strands of hair from the frontof her face. She’s somehow covered head to toe in flour, has band aids on threeof her fingers and there’s already one failed abomination hot and fresh in thetrashcan. She can do this, she just needs to focus on the directions moreclearly. Her love life is on the line!

After two more attempts she puts the version that mostresembles brownies on very cute heart shaped paper plate, puts on her cutest “I’mvery much single but not desperate” outfit, gathers every inch of courageinside her and saunters over to the fire station.

Luckily for her he’s alone in the vehicle maintenance bay.

“Can I help you Miss?” he says as he wipes his hands on arag. He has on a fitted grey t-shirt, the pants she’s seen a million times inher dreams and that smile. Oh that smile.

“Um yes well um, you see I…my name is…” she stammers whileholding the brownies in her trembling hands.

He smiles encouragingly as his eyes dart back and forth fromthe shaking plate to her face.

“I’m…my name is Allura. You probably don’t remember mebecause you save a billion lives every day but I was in that fire at theVoltron Tech building last month and I just wanted to say thank you for savingmy life.” She suddenly can’t bear to look him, her nerves rattling her entirecore.

His eyes soften as he looks at the plate and gently takes itout of her hands.

“Are these for me?”

“Y-Yes…” She nods.

“Thanks I love brownies. I’m Keith by the way.”

Another nod. The whole talking thing is going terribly sofar so she decides to forgo it.

He picks up a brownie and takes a big bite as her eyesflicker up at him to see his response.

His mouth moves slowly, followed by a weird crunching soundthat should be impossible given she didn’t add any nuts or chocolate chips tothe brownies. Allura winces. Keith’s eyes go wide before he quickly takescontrol of his face, continuing to chew at an agonizingly slow rate before cringingas he swallows.

“They’re uh…great.”

“They’re terrible.”

“No, no they’re…”

“They’re terrible.”

“They’re terrible.” He chuckles and hands the plate back.

“I’m so sorry.” Her lip quivers.

“Don’t be, it’s the thought that counts. Although, if youkeep baking like that I may have to save you from a lot more fires” Keith says witha smirk.

“If that gets you over to my place” Allura jokes beforequickly blushing at her own boldness.

He smiles as he licks his lip then bites it.

“All right well I’ve successfully made an ass of myself so I’mgoing to go now thank you again for saving me have a nice day” she rambles andquickly tries to walk away.

“Do you like soup?” he blurts out after her.

“Hmm?” She stops and turns around with furrowed brow.

“Soup. The café across the street has a great French onionsoup.” He points with his thumb.

“I like soup.” She beams.

“Cool. Friday? Noon?”

“Sure!”

“Great, well uh, I gotta get back to work. See you Friday.”

“Yes Friday.”

Now they’re both grinning like idiots as he backs away and disappearsinto the building. Allura squeals before speed walking to her car, dumping thebrownies in a nearby trash can. She pulls out her phone and quickly dials.

“Hey this is Hunk.”

“Hunk!”

“Oh hey, how did the brownies turn out?”

“They were a disaster and it’s the best thing that’s everhappened in my entire life!”

[lhugbereth]

Coffee Beans and Hot Cocoa

For @ataraxetta who requested “Insomnia’s first snow in decades” for @ignoctsecretsanta :D Here are some fluffy boys snowed in at a coffee shop, on what they didn’t realize was supposed to be their first date. 

Title Coffee Beans and Hot Cocoa (Kisses) Word Count  2524 Rating Teen (SFW) Warnings None! 

Read on AO3

Winter had always been short in Lucis. The continent enjoyed a typically warm climate all year round, from the dust bowl of Leide to the humid mountains of Cleigne, and the Crown City of Insomnia was no exception. In December, the temperature merely fell to a noticeable chill, and it wasn’t until early February that residents went out went out in more than a jacket and scarf. Even then, it had been decades since the last time anyone outside of Galahd had seen snow.

Which is precisely why no one had expected it that year, either.

The forecast on the morning in question called for overcast skies, perhaps a little rain throughout the morning and afternoon. Nothing out of the ordinary, or so Ignis had thought when he agreed to accompany Noctis to the video arcade. Prompto, the prince explained, was stuck at school taking a makeup test for one that he had failed, and Gladio was attending some family function that was likely to last until well into the night. Ignis had cringed internally to think he’d been Noct’s last choice to invite, but an opening was an opening, and he’d never been able to say ‘no’ before anyway.

So at precisely 10:30 am, he strolled up to the prince’s apartment building to pick him up. Noct was already outside waiting for him - a pleasant surprise, Iggy thought - and he waved a hand in greeting as he approached. Despite the late January chill, however, Noctis looked about as half-assedly dressed as ever: he wore a dark grey t-shirt under a thin hoodie, bare hands jammed in the front pocket for warmth, while his legs shivered visibly beneath a pair of black jeans. The cold air left his cheeks and nose pink, and his lips trembling as his breath passed between them in short, white puffs.

Ignis slowed to a halt. It was no secret that the prince hated winter - he’d been born on one of the hottest days of the year, and thus his blood had always run warm - but to come outside dressed like this was beyond childish. He was putting his health at risk, and that was something Iggy could not allow.

“Highness, you’re going to catch cold,” he sighed. “At least go back upstairs and put on a proper coat.”

“Yeah, nice to see you, too, Specs.”

“Apologies. Good afternoon, Noctis. Now please go change into something more appropriate.”

The prince shrugged, his shoulders looking small beneath the loose-fitting hoodie. “I don’t have a coat. I lent it to Prompto and forgot to get it back,” he added in response to the incredulous look he was being given. “Besides, it’s gonna be hot in the arcade. I’d just end up carrying it around.”

“Well, you look ridiculous dressed like that in this kind of weather.” Ignis folded his arms across his chest, as if to say You’re not going out like that, young man, and that’s final.

But, as usual, Noctis showed no intention of budging. “If you’re too embarrassed to be seen with me -- “

“You know that isn’t what I mean.”

“Then what’s the problem? I’m not cold, let’s go already.”

“Highness….”

The conversation ended in concession, as it almost always did. Ignis sighed repeatedly as he allowed Noctis to take the lead, refrained from comment while they walked together, though his concern never once abated. Gradually, the further they got from Noct’s apartment the more relaxed the prince became, until he was smiling and joking and hanging back to fall into step with Iggy. The mood was contagious. After a while, even Ignis found himself caught up in the playful way Noctis was clinging to his arm, and the way his eyes shone when he laughed. Though the air had grown noticeably colder, Ignis felt his cheeks flushing with warmth.

Perhaps that was why he failed to notice at first. Too distracted by the sensation of Noctis’ fingers coiled around his elbow, it wasn’t until the gentle flakes landed on his skin that he even realized it had begun to snow. His eyes widened at the same time as Noct’s, and together they paused to look up at the sky in awe.

“Specs?”

“Yes, Noct?”

“Is that...what I think it is?”

“It would appear so.”

The prince shifted closer, as if suddenly noticing the cold for the first time. “I’ve never seen snow before.”

“I have, but never in the city. This is highly unusual, and yet….”

“It’s beautiful.”

Ignis’ breath hitched in his throat. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Noctis, lips parted and gaze cast up toward the blanket of clouds above them. All around, white flakes drifted down, down, growing thicker and heavier by the second, until they began to cling to jet black hair and clothes alike.

“...You must be freezing,” he observed aloud, if for no other reason than to silence the pounding of his own heart at the sight. “Here, take my scarf.”

Noctis didn’t protest this time. As Ignis unwrapped the thick, chocolate-colored fabric from his shoulders, the prince remained completely spellbound by the snow falling all around them. He watched on, wide-eyed, as it began to collect on the sidewalk, the grass, and even on Ignis when he turned to face him. But despite the cold, Iggy was smiling. His scarf was so warm - smelled of coffee and citrus and the cologne he sometimes wore - and Noctis immediately held it to his face and breathed in deep.

“Thanks,” he said, voice muffled by the heavy wool. “You’re not cold?”

Green eyes, soft behind fogged lenses, seemed to draw him in. “Not at all. But perhaps we should find a warm place to wait until this storm blows over.”

Noctis agreed, and they turned off the main road in search of shelter.

They found it moments later in the form of a Garbucks coffee shop, thankfully still quiet in the hour before the lunch rush, and together they settled down with steaming mugs to watch the snow fall outside the window. Ignis sipped his latte - it was hardly an Ebony, but at least it went down smooth - while Noctis nursed a hot cocoa, and they talked together while the hours melted away.

The lunch crowd came and went, and outside the snow only fell heavier, piling higher and higher until Ignis began to wonder how they would ever get home. By that time, Noct had wiggled in beside him in the overstuffed armchair, and had his head resting on Iggy’s shoulder while they talked. It was comfortable, relaxing, neither of them thinking anything more of the display than how natural it felt to cuddle close. All the while, Noct wore Ignis’ scarf around his neck.

“Well,” Iggy announced at last. “I’m afraid we’re going to need to call for backup at this point. Otherwise we may be stuck here in this coffee shop all night.”

“Like you’d really mind,” Noct grinned, referring, of course, to Iggy’s love for coffee and completely missing the blush that flared across his friend’s cheeks. “But I guess we could call Gladio. He’s got his dad’s truck.”

Something tugged at the back of Ignis’ mind. "I suppose we could," he began slowly.

"Or maybe we could make it to Prom’s place. He lives near here, and his parents usually aren’t home."

"Is that so?" Suspicion rose in the form of a frown. "I thought Prompto was meant to be at school all afternoon."

“O-oh, right. Yeah, he is,” Noct supplied hastily. “Uh, I meant maybe if he finished early. Or something.”

“And Gladio?” Now Ignis was looking right a him with one eyebrow arched high over piercing green irises. “I believe it was you who told me he’d be occupied until evening?”

If Noct could have sunk back any further into the chair, he would have disappeared right through the cushions. “Um…. I forgot?”

“Noctis.”

“Alright, alright! So I made that stuff up - but it’s not like I had a choice or anything. It was the only way to get you to come out with me.”

Whatever Ignis had been expecting, it certainly wasn’t such candid honestly. And the way the prince was flushing, cheeks red as he glared out the window…. Suddenly, he was very much aware of the proximity of their bodies in the chair. “What are you talking about?” he pressed, forcing his voice lower, calmer, hoping he didn’t sound as panicked as he felt in that moment.

Practically in his lap, Noctis huffed. “Seriously? Whenever I try to spend time with you, all I hear is, ‘I’m busy, Highness, why not call Prompto?’ or ‘Surely Gladio has nothing better to do today?’” Despite the poor attempt at mimicking his accent, the words still managed to hit Ignis like a blast of icy water. He hadn’t actually said those things to the prince...had he?

Still avoiding his gaze, Noct continued. “I had to make it feel like an obligation, otherwise you would have just passed me off on someone else again.”

“That…. That has never been my intention.”

“Oh, yeah?” Blue eyes turned on him at last, wounded and yet heavy with something else, too. Hope, perhaps, that he would be proven wrong. “What would you have said, then?”

Ignis’ chest was tight, his fingers itching to pull Noctis against him and take back every missed opportunity. What would he have said? He tried to imagine the scene: Noct catching him on his way home for the evening, casually inviting him to spend a day at the arcade. It wouldn’t have mattered that he wasn’t really interested in games, or that he had work to do in the morning. He would have wanted to go. He would have wanted to tell Noctis yes, to please him, to see him smile. He wanted to give Noct the world and then some, because he --

Ignis sighed. It was precisely because of that - because Noctis had come to mean more to him than his duty or his job - that he would have been forced to turn him down in the end. It was too great a risk. “I...suppose you have a point.”

“See.”

Voice falling flat, the prince turned his gaze back to the window and to the heavy flakes of snow falling beyond it. Outside, the streets had been transformed into a winter wonderland, everything from the sidewalks to the streetlamps swallowed up in white. There were no pedestrians, no cars, no bicycles. Even the small coffee shop had grown all but silent around them, most of the other patrons no doubt having escaped while there had still been a chance. Only a few others were left sitting at the tables in the back of the shop, Iggy noticed, and not a single one of them was looking his way.

He swallowed.

“Noct? May I ask you something?”

A noncommittal shrug told him the prince was, in fact, upset.

“Why me? You could have asked anyone in the Citadel to accompany you to the arcade.”

“Because I didn’t want to go with anyone in the Citadel,” Noct murmured so quietly that Ignis wasn’t quite sure he heard him correctly. “Today was supposed to be special.”

Ignis glanced out at the snow again, the first that had fallen in Insomnia in more years than either of them had even been alive, and smiled. “Today has been special.”

"Yeah, but. It was supposed to be….” Noctis shrugged, waved his hands in the air and sighed, but ultimately just sank back in the chair in frustration. “It was supposed to be more.”

More.

Ignis thought about the sight of the prince, dressed in an obvious hurry, waiting for him outside of the apartments. He thought of the easy way Noctis had laughed and hung from his arm as they’d walked together down the street. He thought, too, of the color of those soft cheeks when he’d draped his scarf around Noct’s neck, the deep eyes that had watched him in wonder.

More.

His throat went dry. How could he have missed it? How long had the signs been there while he’d been too determined not to see them? How many times had he convinced himself it was impossible that Noct could ever feel the same way as him? And how in the Astrals’ names was he ever going to find the strength to talk them both out of this one?

“...Noct, I-”

“It’s stupid, I know. Just forget I said anything, alright?”

“It isn’t stupid. But you know as well as I do that we...we simply can’t.”

Blue eyes rounded on him in surprise. “...Can’t what?”

“Date, Noctis! It would be highly improper! Just think what your father would do to me if he found out!”

But there was that color tinting the prince’s cheeks again, the one that made it clear Noct had seen right through him. And sure enough, the next words out of his mouth confirmed exactly what he’d read between the lines. “But...you’d be okay with it?”

Ignis snapped his mouth shut instantly. There was nothing he could say short of an out-right lie that would prevent him from walking right into a trap. As it were, perhaps it was already too late. The prince was regarding him with more than just casual interest now, and swiveling in the chair to face him more fully.

“What if this was a date? Right here, just the two of us, with no one to see,” he asked, smile growing a little bolder with each word. “What would you do?”

The awkward sound that started in the back of Iggy’s throat was hidden masterfully behind a polite cough. “Hypothetically? Well. I suppose I would….” Six, forgive me. I’m only human. His arm was moving before he could change his mind, sliding up the length of Noctis’ back between him and the cushion to finally come to rest around his shoulders. When Ignis drew him in, the prince settled easily against his chest.

“Wow,” Noct breathed, face flushing an even prettier shade of red. “It’s nice. H-hypothetically, I mean.”

“Right.”

“I don’t...want to go to Prom’s place.”

Ignis stroked his fingers over the strands of black hair lining Noct’s cheek. “We could stay a little while longer, I suppose.”

“Call Cor, tell him we got snowed in?”

“At a Garbucks, of all places.”

“Might have to stay here all night from the looks of things.”

“Better not get any ideas, Highness.”

Noct grinned up at him - a brilliant, mischievous grin - as he somehow managed to shift even closer against his side. He drew himself up, curled his fingers in the collar of Iggy’s dress shirt and pressed forward until the scarf around his neck was the only barrier between them. Ignis, for his part, forgot how to breathe. “Ideas? Never. This is all hypothetical.”

And so it went that Ignis and his prince shared their first kiss in the cozy warmth of a coffee shop, wrapped in each other’s arms in an overstuffed chair while the snow continued to fall outside the window well into the winter’s night.