#but the schadenfreude here takes my breath away

[lovedbythesun]

Robert Rosen on John, Paul, obsession and John’s reaction to Paul’s arrest in Japan (bolded)

RR: If you read Nowhere Man, you're gonna spend a couple of 100 pages in Lennon's head and you'll see what that's like. The neurosis and the occult, and the insecurity and the anger and the rage and the petty jealousy and the absolute expression of joy when McCartney was busted in Japan for trying to smuggle in marijuana.  And you'll also get the creative genius, the guy who went down to Bermuda, knowing it was time to break out of his seclusion and get back into it and release an album. After five years, the painful creative struggle to reconnect with his muse and the love he felt towards Yoko and towards Sean. I mean, that's all there. It's like the beautiful part of Lennon and there was indeed, a beautiful part, with the part that was heady and angry and resentful and jealous.

Host: You just described his reaction to the Tokyo drug bust with Paul. There's been definitely conflicting accounts, what the state of their relationship was not just the 1980 but throughout the whole of the Beatles solo years, where he definitely had the signs of an obsession with Paul's career and his successes. At the same time publicly talked about I don't pay attention to Wings, I don't pay attention to my peers. I don't pay attention to Jagger, or Dylan or all that stuff. Yet. You see things like the tape diary he did in 79, where he clearly is paying attention very much to Paul's career. Overall, did you get an impression of where things stood regarding his feelings toward Paul?

Robert Rosen: That is like a huge part of Nowhere Man because he spent so much time thinking about Paul and writing about Paul and obsessing over Paul. And everything Paul did, it drove him..every time he heard a Paul song on the radio, especially Coming Up off McCartney II that it would make him jealous. He saw his life as him and Yoko being either up or down in relation to Paul and Linda. And he just flat out said, I know this is not the way to be. There was like, the jealous part of him, that would just go crazy over something Paul did..and nobody's paying attention to me now. And there was that part of him and then there was the larger part of him, where he wanted to be like Jesus and Gandhi and Mohammed and Buddha, and he wanted to follow the path he wanted to follow the way, he wanted to merge with God.

It was just this constant struggle between this man who wanted to be pure and this man who wanted to take drugs and have sex with May Pang and just like, oh I bought this beautiful house in Palm Beach and Paul's gonna read about it and that's a great victory over McCartney and oh, Yoko just sold a cow for a quarter million dollars and it's gonna be in the papers and Paul's gonna read about it.  That's another great victory over McCartney and it's just like Yoko did it, she used her magic powers to have Paul busted in Japan and this is not in Nowhere Man because this is what he wrote in the diaries that I couldn't quote from the diaries but he was just so overjoyed that say, it was like the high point of 1980 up to that point and he writes, go to jail, go directly to jail, do not pass go, do not collect $200 - that's the thing from Monopoly and I'm not quoting from the diaries, I'm quoting from the Monopoly board, right [both laugh].

You know, that's what John wrote and he was just "oh, Paul's still in jail, maybe they'll keep him there for a couple of years and they let him out after only 10 days but the Wings tour was ruined and it made him happy.” 

- Robert Rosen / Something About The Beatles Podcast / 10/08/2022 (x)

[ganymede-princess]

A Hazy Shade of Winter | Angus Tully

PART 2

ship: Angus Tully x fem!OC

warnings: Angus is literally so mean, but he's like that in the movie anyways.

summary: Carol's parents send her to spend the winter break with her uncle at Barton Academy, and a certain curly-haired boy takes an immediate (dis)liking to her.

word count: 2790

a/n: I watched the Holdovers like 2 nights ago and I’m obsessed with it now so here’s this! Maybe a second chapter coming?

written by @ganymede-princess

Misery. Absolute fucking misery. That’s all Angus could see for the foreseeable future. Just an ocean of black, sticky misery, stretching out to the horizon in every direction. As he settled his bony rear on the hard edge of the ping-pong table and listened to Hunham gleefully dole out their sentences, he thought he would vomit any moment, or drop dead. He kind of hoped he would. He scoured his eyes over the pitiful creatures he’d be bunking with this winter break; two little boys: a religious fanatic and a foreign exchage student, the school’s star quaterback, and fucking Kountze. Five little Christmas orphans. Angus would blame karma, if he believed in that hippy-dippy shit. The most unbelievably unfair part of all this was that he wouldn’t even be able to jack off in peace since all five of them would be bunking in rooms one and two of the infirmary, with Hunham in room four. God knows why they couldn’t use room three, but Hunham seemed determined to avoid any questions pertaining to that.

Just when he thought his holiday couldn’t get any worse, the girl arrived. She skittered in like a mouse, out of breath, red-faced and shaking like a handbag dog. Six little Christmas orphans.

“Ah, you’re here.” Hunham extended his hand welcomingly, and gestured to her to step forward.

She crept over, giving the ping-pong table and couch full of boys a wide berth, then nervously shook Hunham’s hand and scuttled away to sit on the floor and tuck her knees up under the frumpy men’s jumper that swallowed her whole, like a turtle retreating into a shell. She waved at the five of them, cherry lips curling into a tight smile.

“Is that a girl?” Kountze said, loudly.

“Indeed, it is. Students, this is Miss Carol Hunham, my niece. She will be joining us at Barton for the winter break.”

“Teddy Kountze.” The little freak said, practically falling over himself to shake her hand. He looked ridiculous crouching there beside her like he was about to accost a rabbit at a petting zoo. If brown-nosing was a sport, he’d be a world classer. “Wonderful to meet you. If you need a tour guide, come to me. I know this place like the back of my hand.”

She nodded in thanks, regarding him with huge puppydog eyes. Angus thought she must be dumb or tongueless. Five-foot-nothing, wearing unfashionably tapered plaid pants and Chelsea boots that were all the rage a decade ago, huge turtle-shell glasses that made her brown eyes bulge out of her head like a salmon… the only cool thing about her was her dirty blonde shag haircut, but even that came across as trying too hard. With that, and those round cheeks and fat mushroom of a nose, Angus almost expected to hear Hunham introduce her as his niece. Almost.

“You’ll be taking her nowhere without a chaperone, Mr Kountze. Now, gentlemen, and lady, off you go to the infirmary building.” Hunham’s one good eye roved over the room, then settled on Angus. “Mr Tully.” He addressed him in his weasley way, voice dripping with schadenfreude. "Be a gentleman and help Miss Hunham take her bags to room three."

Now it made sense why they'd been forced to leave it empty. The little fuck had a whole room to herself.

"I'm not a gentleman." He responded, insolently as possible.

"Then play the part."

"Fine." The ping-pong table screeched backwards as he stood up, grabbed his case and stormed over to the girl who leaped to her feet, eyeing him warily as he marched her out of the room and collected one of her ridiculously heavy suitcases and set off outside with the puppy in tow.

"Um." She began, her voice a pathetic whimper. "I'm Carol Hunham."

"I heard."

"And you?"

"Angus Tully. Are you deaf or something?"

"He d-didn't say your first name." Angus grunted in response. "So, you're- you're holding over?"

"What?" The question was so insipid it made him stop in his tracks and gawk at her. "Of course I'm holding over! Are you stupid?"

"Sorry." She whispered, averting her eyes. Angus felt a rush of regret as her lip trembled, but he swallowed it and marched on.

The air was biting cold, and Angus wished he had two jackets on- or better yet, a hot-blooded model on each arm- but unfortunately he was stuck between this girl making goo-goo eyes at Kountze and her machiavellian gargoyle of an uncle. As the rest of them caught up, his simmering rage suddenly bubbled over and he broke the silence in a voice thick with hatred.

“This is the most bullshit ever! If we have to stay, why’d we have to draw Wall-eye?”

“Uh, y’know he used to be a student, right?” Quaterback drawled.

“Yeah, that’s why he knows how to inflict maximum pain on us, the sadistic fuck.”

“Yeah.” Quaterback agreed with a giggly laugh. “I mean, no offence Hunham, but your uncle sucks.”

“I don’t know him.” The girl had retreated to the fringe of the group, and when she spoke up her voice didn’t command much attention.

“At least we didn’t draw Decker, he’d be perving all over us.” Kountze sidled up alongside her and let his arm brush against her. “And we wouldn’t have Carol here with us.”

Angus rolled his eyes, but felt vindicated when he noticed her pull away from him, almost fearfully.

“Hey, guys, hold up for a second.” Angus leaned up against the pickup at the side of the road and lit up a cigarette, eager to relieve all this tension.

“No, I got something else.” Kountze pulled out a stinking doobie and gestured for his lighter. “Gimme that.”

“Hey, don’t smoke that out here.” He chided. “I don’t wanna get busted by Wall-eye.”

“Don’t be such a pussy.”

“I’m not a pussy.” Angus felt his blood pressure rise. “I just don’t want to get up at Fork Union paying for your mistake.”

Kountze didn’t bother responding, just blew out a fat drag and smiled in satisfaction.

“Teddy Kountze.” He said, offering the joint to Quaterback and trying to sling an arm around Carol but she sidestepped him to Angus’s amusement.

“Jason Smith.” Quaterback responded with a sickeningly charismatic smile.

“Yeah, I know who you are.” Fucking bootlicker. “You wanna hit this?”

He cast a glance up the road, but Wall-eye was nowhere to be seen. “Uh, yeah.” 

He took a puff and offered it to Carol.

“No, thanks.” She held up her mittened hand. “I-I hear pot can give you the heebie-jeebies.”

“The heebie-jeebies.” Jason repeated, grinning. “Cute.”

She was sort of cute- Angus begrudgingly admitted now that he’d seen her up close- in that pitiful way that those fucked up little pug-dogs are cute. He wondered if she had asthma. Besides, it’s not like he cared. At least, if somebody like her could be cute, maybe he was too, with his hawkish nose, narrow eyes, five o’clock shadow, gangly limbs, scraggly hair… No, that’s ridiculous. Unless… He wondered if she thought he was.

“It’s mellow stuff, babe.” Kountze assured her.

She blushed and shook her head, then turned her massive obsidian orbs to Angus.

“C-can I…?”

He sighed heavily, arranging his face into a scowl before he handed over the cigarette. She took a dainty puff, then handed it back. He took a drag himself, savouring the knowledge that his lips were touching the same place that a girl’s had just rested.

“More?” He offered it back.

“No, thanks. I don’t really… y’know.”

“‘Course you don’t.” He scoffed and stuffed it back in his mouth. “Such a pristine girl, I bet you never did anything wrong in your life.”

Flushing, she averted her eyes.

“So, how’d you get stuck holding over?” Kountze queried, his demeanor forced casual.

“I’m supposed to be skiing with my folks up at Haystack,” Jason said cheerfully. “But my dad put his foot down, said I can’t come home unless I cut my hair.”

“So why don’t you just cut your hair?” Angus snorted, feeling a fresh rush of anger. How could you throw away a perfectly good winter break just because you’re sentimentally attached to your godamn freak flag?

“Civil disobedience, man.” He grinned.

“I dig it.” Carol spoke up suddenly. “Conformity is a dangerous thing.”

“See, she gets it.” Jason put his arm around her shoulder.

“You like Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young?” Her blonde lashes fluttered as she gazed up at him. Angus could have puked all over the sidewalk, and Kounze looked like he might actually do it.

“Man, I love ‘em!”

“Almost Cut My Hair?”

“My anthem.” He nodded solemnly. “That album was my whole life last summer.”

“Neat.”

Angus noticed her head tilt to rest on his shoulder as he offered her the joint. This time she took it, allowing herself a long drag. He gritted his teeth and fought off the urge to deck that filthy hippy then and there.

“Anyway,” Jason waved his hand, as if clearing the conversational slate. “My dad’s cool. It’s just a battle of wills. Still, I was kinda hoping he’d cave first, because the powder up at Haystack is so sweet right now.”

Jason’s hand made its way into Carol’s hair, curling a lock of it around his finger. Angus’s fist closed involuntarily while Kountze’s eyes narrowed as he looked around, lip slightly curled in frustration.

“What about you, Mr Moto?” He said, locking onto his target. “Why are you here?”

“Uh, no. My name is Ye-Joon.” The boy explained innocently. “Uh, my family is in Korea, and they think it’s too far for me to travel alone.”

“I figured it was because your rickshaw was broken.” Kountze laughed and looked around for approval, to which he found none.

“Uh, wh-what’s a rickshaw?” Ye-Joon seemed genuinely baffled.

“You’re an asshole, Kountze.” Angus said darkly. “Your mind’s a cesspool, and a shallow one at that.”

“Who’s the asshole, Tully?” He sneered back. “You’re the one who blew up history.”

“Hey.” Jason held out his hand gently, then turned to the other kid. “What’s your story, man?”

“Alex Ollerman.” He responded, his voice stronger than the other boy’s. All that faith in a higher power, I guess. “I’m here because my parents are on a mission in Paraguay. We’re LDS.”

“Mormons, right?” The kid nodded proudly.

“Don’t you guys wear some kind of, like, magic underwear?” Kountze gawped.

“That’s a common misconception.” Alex began. It seemed he had all his bases covered, and he turned to address the Korean kid too, as if he might convince someone to join. “Actually, it’s called a temple garment, and we’re only supposed to wear it when we-”

“Hey, what’s up with the townies?” Kountze interrupted, already distracted by something shiny. Angus was mildly relieved he wouldn’t be hearing any more panty-talk- he’d had quite enough for one day, what with his bathing suit and all- but, his relief quickly turned to annoyance when he noticed the two men coming down the road, hauling a Christmas tree between them.

“Hey!” He hollered. “What are you doing with our Christmas tree?”

“The school sold it back to us.” One of them responded. “Scotch pine, still fresh.”

“Yeah, we’re gonna put it back in the lot.” The other explained. “We do it every year.”

Angus turned back to the group and shook his head darkly.

“This is the most bullshit ever.”

______________________________

Angus didn’t think he’d ever be so happy to be in the infirmary, but when they stepped into the heated building, he might have sighed in relief if he wasn't in such a black mood. His arms absolutely caned from carrying that stupid suitcase, and Kountze had been smack talking the whole way up the hill. He thought the only thing worse than bunking with the two kids would be sleeping in with Kountze while he tries to tickle Jason’s balls. He’d much prefer to cosy up in the girl’s room, irritating as her face may be. He abandoned his luggage outside room two and hauled Carol’s down the hallway while she pattered along at his heels.

"Why do you need two cases, anyway?" He sneered, stealing the comfort of silence. "You can't have that much shit to carry."

"It's-" She paused and cleared her throat. "Well... well, why should I tell you, huh? You're- you're-"

"What? An asshole? A jerk? A philistine, as your mole uncle says? Y’know, I'm pretty sure there's a faculty rule against targeted insults towards pupils."

"You're mean." She admitted in a small voice. "And I don't know why."

"Yeah, well get used to it sweetheart. Just wait till Kountze gets over your gyno-gimmick and starts treating you like he does everyone else, you'll be begging for 'mean.' And by the way, you’re just antagonising him by hanging all over Jason all the time.”

“What’s Jason got to do with it?” She snapped, raising her voice for the first time.

“Aw, I hit a nerve, huh?” He delighted in watching her face turn scarlet.

"Y-y'know, when you stood up for Ye-Joon earlier, I thought you might actually be cool. I'm disappointed."

She said nothing else, just ducked her head and ran ahead to open the door for him. Baffled, he barged past her and dumped the suitcase on the nearest bed.

“Thanks.” She whispered.

"Why are you even here, anyway?" He rounded on her, suddenly tired of the way she let him walk all over her. "I mean, other than to ruin the ambience with that hideous sweater-"

That did it. She let out a choking sob and made for the door.

"Hey, hey wait!" He flailed out his long limbs and caught her around the arm, but she wrenched herself from his grip and made off down the hall, away from Hunham and the other boys to Angus' relief. "Carol, wait I didn't mean it."

She didn’t respond, just sped off and careened around the corner. Angus caught up just in time to see the door of the broom closet swing shut. He clucked his tongue and sat down on the hard floor outside, feeling a wave of disgust as he listened to quiet weeping. Gently, he rapped the door with his knuckles.

“Carol?”

“Go away.”

“Carol, I’m sorry.”

“Go away!”

He paused for a moment, and considered his options.

“Your sweater isn’t actually ugly, by the way. I was just ribbing you, y’know? Horseplay?”

“No.” She said firmly, voice muffled through the wood. “No, I know ribbing and that wasn’t it. Y-you were being cruel, and you wanted to see me cry, I know it.”

“What? No!”

“You enjoy it, don’t you? You’re so miserable, the only fun left for you is making everyone else feel as wretched as you.”

He swallowed thickly, feeling a lump of shame coating his Adam’s apple. He took another long moment to collect himself. He resented how easily she read him, but if he wanted to keep her from finking, he’d have to choose his words carefully, and eat a large portion of his pride.

“It’s true.” His stomach roiled in revulsion as he grovelled to her. “I’m sore about holding over, and I wanted to take it out on someone, and you looked like easy pickings. I’m brash, I’m rude, I hate everyone including myself, and I make it everyone else’s problem.”

She paused her sniffling, as if sizing him up.

“Well.” She said thickly. “Thank you for admitting it. That was very… self reflective.”

“I go to a shrink, I kind of have to be self reflective.”

“Ah.” She sniffled. “You can leave me alone now.”

“I would,” Oddly, it felt good to tell somebody… Good enough that he was able to go back to being sly. “But this closet doesn’t open from the inside. Every time we get a new janitor they get locked in here. Happens like twice a year.” She said nothing, but Angus heard her breathing pick up in pace. “I mean, I can always leave you in here.”

“No!” She said urgently. “Let me out, please.”

“I will, if you promise not to fink.”

“I-I won’t fink. If you leave me be, I won’t fink. Pinky promise.”

“Alright. I’ll stay as far away from you as humanly possible.” He clambered to his feet and opened the door for her. She was already standing, and as soon as she saw the light, she tried to scoot out beside him, but he moved his arm to stop her. “Pinky promise, remember?”

Begrudgingly, she curled her finger around his, then slipped out past him and returned to her room. Angus watched her go, and something broke inside his chest as the door closed behind her.

[ashintheairlikesnow]

ash beloved, as a prince of woe and misfortune (a fibromyalgia haver) can i request some jameson on a bad pain day

the current vibe is 'i need to pee but my legs are fucking screaming and i havent even moved them yet and my shoes feel too tight because all my peripheral joints are getting inflamed' and i feel Terrible bc i used to be able to just ,, do stuff and now i cannot because of the evil 'You Have Pain And Doctors Don't Know Why' Disorder™

i am not sure whether i want to revel in shared misery or schadenfreude but i am sure i want to see a guy in pain

Anon, my gift to you and my sympathies for your Whole Body:

CW: Chronic pain, self-harm (brief, self-hitting), self-loathing, aftermath of whump, recovering whumpee

-

"You pushed yourself too hard, that's all." Nat tries for soothing, but when she puts a hand out to touch his shoulder, Jameson shoots her a furious glare and she carefully shifts it back again. "Right. Okay. You have to take things slow, honey, your legs-"

"-are goddamn fucking useless, yeah, I get it. I got it." Jameson's rasping voice is thinned to little more than a whisper as he hunches over himself, sitting sideways on the couch with his legs out on the cushions bent at the knees, refusing to straighten. He slams a fist down on his thigh just to feel a bloom of new pain that's is brighter and new compared to the eternal goddamn throbbing of the old. It's... nice. He tries it again on the other side.

Jesus, how fucked up is this? That this is what helps?

"Hey, hey now," Nat says, and before he can do it again she takes his wrist in her cool hands and holds his arm steady. "Not your best idea. I didn't call any part of you useless, that isn't what I said, honey."

"I wanted to walk to the goddamn gas station." Jameson glares at her hands, but he holds still under her deft, gentle touch. He doesn't pull away, or hit anything, he just... sits here, his knees shifting and muscles twitching in a pointless attempt to escape what's inside of them, what's as much a part of him as his own breath in his lungs now. "It's less than two miles. Less than two! I used to-... to run, on the treadmills in training, for fucking five miles, ten miles, no fucking sweat. My handlers told me I had a record for going so fast. I could run for fucking days on end, if I had to! Now..."

He groans, dropping back against the arm of the couch, even angrier when hot tears burn against his eyelids, trying to force their way out.

"Jameson-"

"Now... I can't even fucking walk."

"You do have the crutches, and the chair you can use, I know the sidewalk runs all the way past the gas station-"

"I wanted to fucking walk, Nat! I felt really good this morning! This shit didn't start up until I was putting on my fucking clothes! I shouldn't have fucking needed the goddamn fucking crutches or the stupid fucking chair!"

He grabs almost sightlessly for the crutch leaning against the couch, has it in his hand, and pulls his arm back to throw it.

"I hate this fucking shit!"

Nat's hand closes back around his wrist, and this time her grip is like iron, and Jameson feels his rage wither when he meets her steady hazel eyes.

"Jameson. You are not going to throw that."

Nat rarely uses this voice. Not with him. But now she does, firm and even stern, brooking no appeal. If she wasn't Nat, that voice would be an impossible turn-on. He'd be on his knees, not that he could do that without screaming any longer. He'd be begging her for... anything.

If she was Nanda...

No one's ever going to be Nanda. Not ever again. He pushes down the sharp, if finally slightly faded, spike of pain.

Nat refuses to let him look away this time. "Listen to me. That crutch is a tool, not a weapon. It was a gift, and it is a gift for you. It lets you go places you could not go before. Just like the chair. So if you break it, it's broken, and you lose that tool. Please, honey, don't cost yourself something that helps by getting angry at it for being needed."

"I didn't need it, before," He whispers, and she takes the crutch away from him, laying it down on the floor. He lets her do it. "Even when I was on the run. I didn't need this shit until I started getting better, and it feels like I'm just getting worse."

She nods, and holds his hands in her own. The ache in his fingers fades a little when they warm to each other. "Your body is incredible," She says, voice low. When he scoffs, she shakes her head, smiling. "Come on, let me finish. You survived two people who tried to kill you."

"Technically five people have tried to kill me."

"Five?" Nat looks, briefly, so baffled that Jameson nearly laughs. "You've only mention the two-"

"Those were the two where I killed them first," He says, voice low. "I don't even feel bad about it."

"I know. And I'm not asking you to feel bad. I've done some things in my life I'm not proud of, too, but it kept this safehouse together and I don't regret it for a second."

"What... what did you do?"

"We're not talking about me. I'm saying that you lived when other people died. You have survived more than any other runaway I've ever met. Your body carried you through it. It kept you alive. It kept you moving, kept carrying your weight when it wanted to give out because you hadn't given up fighting. Now, it doesn't have to carry you so far anymore. Your body knows you're safe, that you have people here who care about you, so it's hurting like hell because it hasn't allowed itself to hurt as much as it needed to for a long, long time. Your body carried every bad thing that ever happened to you, and I for one am grateful for it, because it got you here to us. Look at you."

Jameson shifts, trying to move his legs so he can face her. They protest with a scream that he has to grind his teeth against, but he manages to get both feet flat on the floor. "Look at me?"

"Yeah. Look at you. You're alive, honey." She smiles, hands on either side of his face, and he finds himself - reluctantly - smiling back. "You're alive and you wake up every day and sometimes the days are good, and sometimes they're not-"

"Like today. Today sucks."

She laughs, short and soft, and he loves her so much it is physically painful, the way that you love a mother, or a sister. "Yeah, okay. I'll give you that. But today is just one day, and you've got more comin'. Maybe tomorrow you can walk to the store, or maybe you'll need the crutches or the chair, but you know what? You'll still get there, if you want to, because you are the most stubborn son of a gun on earth and if you want those awful taquitos, I know you'll find a way."

Jameson's smile shifts. Incredulous, he asks, "Did... you just say 'son of a gun'?"

"Oh, shut up. I grew up in a family where that was just about the worst thing any of us could say without serious punishment. Sometimes that stuff still comes out." She pokes him in the nose, watching him wrinkle it in response.

There's a pause.

Then he clears his throat.

"It wasn't, uh, it wasn't taquitos." He discovers he's mumbling, flushing a little.

"Oh. Doughnuts, then?"

"No, not those, either, just... it's stupid. But Vince, uh, the other day he made this stupid fucking joke about Red Bull, so..."

"So..." She blinks, eyebrows furrowing. "You were... going to buy him a Red Bull?"

"I was... gonna buy about fifty and put them in his bed."

Nat just stares at him, blinking, as seconds stretch slowly out. "You were... you were going to-"

"Buy like... fifty Red Bulls and put them in his bed, uh, cover them in his fucking blankets and like arrange them like a person, and then... you know... It, uh, makes better sense in context."

"How could it possibly? You know what, doesn't matter. Here's what we'll do. You get those crutches on your arms, and i'll drive you to the gas station, and we will... we will get you your... fifteen Red Bulls."

"Fifty."

"Oh, my God. Where do you even get that much money?"

"... Vince gave me money."

"You're using his own money to prank him?"

"It's not like he fucking needs it!"

"You know what? I'm going to stop asking questions when the answers only give me new questions to ask." She pats his arm, and he takes the opportunity to brusquely throw an arm around her and crush her tightly to him in a hug. "Jameson-"

"Thanks," He mutters, then pushes her back and away so he can clumsily get on his feet. His knees nearly buckle, but when he throws his hand out Nat is holding the crutch, and he slots his arm into the cuff that fits just below his elbow. Nat has to hand him the other one, and help him with his shoes, and the whole time his legs ache like someone is slowly sawing them off with a nail file, but he stays standing.

He wants to play this stupid fucking prank on Vincent fucking Shield, and he can already tell it's the only thing he'll be able to do today and even that's only with Nat's help.

By the time they get back from one single errand he'll need more painkillers and a nap just to recover enough to finish putting the energy drinks into Vince's bed. Then maybe another nap after that.

But it's what he wants to do.

Fuck it.

If he only gets one thing to work on this shitty day, it might as well be the most bafflingly confusing thing he's ever done.

Plus, Nat always plays Jameson's playlist when she drives him in her car. So that's one good thing.

-

[spacelazarwolf]

I had no idea about “Trans broken arm” syndrome until I just read your post, and OMFG. Been there, done that. I just didn’t realize the full dynamic of what actually went down. Eyes opened now. Here’s my experience. I am 50y.

I had been ordered (barked demands at) by the bigoted “ally” nurse assigned to me as my primary at my GP LGBTQ clinic, to hospitalize myself if I took more than 4-6 inhalations of albuterol rescue inhaler in a 24h period, or she would have me hospitalized for drug abuse treatment against my will (not for the asthma) because I was Transmasc, she didn’t believe in my life-long prior diagnosed allergic asthmatic medical condition- Transmasc meant to her that I had to be a junkie that just wanted to get high on prescriptions. So, though I couldn’t afford all the bills without insurance, was a multi violent hate crimes survivor from my hospitalization 2 months prior for the latest round of allergic asthmatic pneumonia and anaphylactic shock, I went anyway, in fear of having my freedom taken away, imprisoned over an asthma attack.

After those violent discrimination hate crimes from another hospital in the area, my local LGBTQ community center strongly recommended if/when I was hospitalized again, that I go to a specific hospital in my area that was “trained and certified LGBTQ safe”… so I went with their recommendation.

This is how that went.

I had been brought by the county paramedics into the emergency room, covered only with a sheet of paper they called a “blanket”, naked and hate shamed as a disgusting “exhibitionist” (reality: bedridden and covered in blankets to my neck, without a caregiver, sick, isolated, without access to a washer & dryer, unable to stand, and way too ill to spend hours hand washing jeans and a t-shirt the night before in preparation), via ambulance for anaphylactic shock and uncontrollable asthma, which the hate attacking paramedic team leader refused to document, and out of the blue told me that he was putting on the records that I was “uncooperative”- a common game I’ve faced by medical providers who hate Transmascs to block my long term access to state financial and food aid, because it’s effective. I was rolled in on a stretcher, and after a very prolonged stop at the hospital door, being treated like a criminal while in medical crisis, frisked for weapons and drugs, bag searched, background checked, and attempts at verbal entrapment by the clearly bigoted security guard snarkily demanding detailed descriptions of where I grew up and other irrelevant private information trying to prove that my regional accent was fake and I was actually local criminal element lying about having moved here, while I couldn’t breathe. I finally got taken into a room.

A bigoted nurse demanded to drug test me solely because I identified as Transmasc, and decided that my asthmatic condition that I was already under long term treatment for must actually be drug junkie issues, and she shook, beet red and enraged when I said no, this is ridiculous, I’m here for my asthma. Then another one came in and with great schadenfreude started to misgender me “little girl! missy! miss! denying my intelligence, agency and validity as an adult as a twofer bonus. When asked to stop, she kept laughing and said “I’m from the Deep South, and you can take the girl from the Deep South, but you can’t take the Deep South out of the girl! It’s just who I am!” (She returned several times during my visit to do that.) Then another nurse came in after she left, and speared me with a hard plastic covid test and physically wrestled me as I screamed in tears begging for her to stop, to ram it even deeper, causing me to cough up blood in agony for over a month & 1/2 after and it got infected. Then the doctor came in and bizarrely checked me for blood clots in my legs instead of asthma, and told me to stop T. I told him that I wasn’t on HRT, and he thought I was lying at first and was adamant; then finally with a shit eating grin, s l o w l y so I could understand him, told me “Gooood. Don’t ever, ever go on T or try to medically transition, because you will die of a heart attack from it.” Then I was forced to take prednisone on an empty stomach (huge no-no) by ‘miss-missy’, forced to leave while still ill, and refused a wheelchair when I couldn’t even walk, barely stand. Pissed, she eventually put me into a dirty used & abandoned wheelchair in the lobby (during peak covid in a burgundy zone hotspot area) when I was begging for assistance after the long distance hobble that was too slow for her to tolerate… even though she was required to have me in a wheelchair while on the premises.

And this was before DeSantis’s anti LGBTQ laws struck us here, February 2021, at the hospital in my area that proudly advertised that they were all trained to be LGBTQ allies, strongly recommended by the local LGBTQ community center. The hospital staff had used everything they had learned from their LGBTQ compassion training as an instruction manual for how to find the most juicy sore spots to prod at during their discrimination, and what to say to their supervisors to skirt prosecution instead. The hospital brushed it all aside and didn’t even bother to follow up on my injuries (which were very high risk for problems because I’m immuno compromised). This, and for all the other medical provider hate crimes that are even more shocking and horrific that I’ve been put through, no lawyer in the state is willing to defend my federal constitutional civil and human rights… erased and dying from it without access to safe medical care, and the bills making me battle waves of starvation and possible homelessness because I’m 50, disabled and deliberately blocked from all aid.

This is just one of many experiences of violent discrimination that I’ve experienced in the hospitals and clinics here. There’s a lot worse I’ve experienced… but this is a PRIME example of “Trans broken arm”.

holy shit i’m so sorry this happened to you. thank you for sharing.

[bailey-reaper]

A drabble where Barok finally asks his crush out on a date but everything goes wrong? with a happy end? :)

A Comedy of Errors... (but Barok's not laughing)

Notes: 😂 Even though I love Barok having happiness and love and kindness to counterbalance all the suffering and turmoil he's endured... I do also love it when he loses his rag at people / things go wrong and irk him. I *love* everything that goes on in his office during the 3rd case in the 2nd game... it's my favourite part of the whole thing! He gets so angry and it's glorious!

S/O is gender neutral (they/them pronouns). Barok refers to them using petnames.

Content Warnings: schadenfreude; cringe; things going wrong; frog mention...

"It's a date!" they said with a big smile and a rosy blush on their cheeks. It almost felt like a dream – Barok had said he was 'deeply fond of them' and invited them out to dinner with him; a date.

"Yes..." Barok nodded, similarly blushing but trying not to acknowledge it, "I'm... looking forward to it," and he was. Deeply.

"Me too!"

The two agreed to meet a week later at a restaurant that Barok was familiar with; he explained it was not because he thought his taste was better, but rather because he was on good terms with the proprietor and, thus, far less likely to be poisoned...

──────≪⊰✥⊱≫───────

At last, after a week in which the two of them thought of little else, the day of their date arrived. Despite a few annoying things going awry prior to him leaving the home, such as a button popping off his shirt when he accidentally rolled his shoulders back with a little too much gusto and his favourite cravat still being too wet to wear, he was determined not to let himself be downhearted.

He arrived at the venue promptly and waited outside for his beloved to arrive. Much to his frustration, a pigeon decided to relieve itself from its perch just above him -- leaving an unpleasant stain on the shoulder of his dinner jacket. Thankfully, he spotted it before his beloved arrived and was able to remedy it with a handkerchief before they saw it.

That didn't stop him scowling up at the pigeon, who flew off in a hurry as it clearly sensed danger.

"Barok!" their voice drew his attention, and took his breath away as they approached looking as radiant as ever. They were clearly dressed for the occasion.

"You look lovely," he remarked as he took their hand and kissed the back of it, "Thank you for coming."

They giggled, "The devil himself couldn't have stopped me."

He smiled at that, "I'm glad..." before offering them his hand, "Shall we?" they nodded, accepting his hand, and allowed him to lead them inside. Barok regarded the maître d and frowned slightly. Something was niggling in the back of his mind; déjà vu but not in a pleasant way, "Good evening," he pushed the feeling away. It would not spoil this date, "I arranged a table for two, name van Zieks."

"Ah yes!" the head waiter said, smiling, "Good evening, Lord van Zieks, allow me to show you to your table."

They were led to a lovely little table that offered a wonderful view of the inner courtyard and the fountain that was situated in the centre of it; it was an appropriately intimate space for a date. Barok pulled the chair out for his beloved and tucked them in, before sitting down himself. The head waiter handed them both menus and set a wine list down on the table, leaving them to look over the fare on offer.

"Wow," his beloved breathed, "This place is amazing."

Barok smiled, "I'm glad you like it... it's a fitting venue for one as beautiful as you."

They blushed and buried their nose in the menu, "T-...Thank you..."

"What wine would you like?" he picked up the menu to inspect the selection on offer.

"I think you're best suited to choosing that!"

"Hmh... very well."

Finally, the maître d came over, "Can I take the order of the two lovebirds~?"

Barok peered at him once more, cocking his head slightly as he studied the grinning man; there was definitely something... odd about him. It gave rise to the most curious irked sensation in the pit of his stomach, "Ahem... We'll have a bottle of the House Sauvignon--"

"Oh do forgive me, sir, we're fresh out of the Sauvignon Blanc..." the waiter said, vaguely apologetically.

"I see," Barok sighed, "Never mind... we'll have a bottle of the Moselle..."

"Mmmm... we're out of that one, too...."

"How about a bottle of Hock?"

"Sorry... none of that, either..."

"Well, in that case... a Burgundy?"

"... Ah... I regret to inform you...."

He grimaced in disbelief, "What the devil is going on... has your cellar dried up or some such? What wines are on offer, then?"

"Well... actually we're fresh out of wine, sir."

"Then why didn't you say that at the start?! More to the point, why bother bringing the wine menu over?"

"Well... on the other side are a number of other drinks that are available..."

"....." he sighed and turned the double-sided drinks menu over to peruse the other beverages on offer, "Fine. A bottle of Moët & Chandon. Black label."

"My, my! Someone has expensive tastes!" the head waiter remarked with a jovial laugh.

"..." The seething glare Barok offered in reply seemed to have the effect of making the man wither somewhat, "Just... tell me you have the damned thing in stock."

"Yes! We do indeed."

"Well that's a relief. Now, before we even bother with food, is there anything not on the menu?" he wasn't going through that... ordeal again.

"No, no!" the annoying man said with a shake of his head, "The kitchen is fully stocked!"

"A small mercy," Barok observed, before looking over at his beloved, "I'm... sorry about that rigmarole regarding the wine... what would you like to eat?"

They smiled and shook their head, "Oh, no, no, don't be!" then, they gave their order to the maître d before folding over their menu and returning it to him.

"Excellent taste!" the waiter said, before looking to the dour reaper, "And what can I get to delight you, sir?"

"Frogs legs to start," he said, "Followed by the steak, rare, with seasonal vegetables."

"Very good, very good!" he made a careful note, then took both the food and drinks menus, "I shall bring over your champagne in a moment and your food will be ready shortly. Do enjoy the wonderfully ambient surroundings, perfect for a date like this!"

Barok peered at the waiter as if he were more than overstaying his welcome; finally, he left them in peace.

"Gods..." he shook his head and sighed, "I do not remember the head waiter ever being that... vexatious. What has gotten into him?"

His beloved smiled, "Oh it really doesn't matter, I'm just happy to be here with you."

"Yes..." he nodded, "You're right, I'm delighted to finally have a chance to spend time with you... like this," it was a blessing that they'd reciprocated his feelings and were amenable to a date with him. No doubt most would be intimidated by his pseudonym and the general way in which he carried himself. But not them, not his beloved. They seemed to accept him as he was, and that was greatly welcomed.

They talked, mostly about how their weeks had been and about shared interests, such as the books that had taken their fancy of late. It was surprisingly easy to converse with them, which was a welcomed change from Barok's perspective. His beloved made for far more enjoyable company than the wooden aristocrats who drove him to the depths of boredom with their inane nattering and inconsequential opinions.

"This champagne is really lovely," they remarked, after taking another sip from their flute, "I'm not normally that fond of bubbles... but this has such a nice, fruity after taste."

"I'm glad you like it," he said with a nod; relieved that the beverage had a) materialised and b) wasn't corked or in some other way undrinkable. The way this date had been going thus far, outside of the interaction with his beloved, had left him wondering what else might go wrong.

Sadly, he didn't have to wait long...

"Your starters!" the waiter announced as he came over with two plates, their contents concealed by silver cloches. He set the two plates down, one in front of each of the diners, then lifted the first cloche, before turning to Barok's, "And, for the gentleman, frog's legs..."

Only, it was not frogs legs. It was a whole, live frog. After a few blinks of its beady black eyes and inflations of its vocal sac, the amphibian launched itself off the plate and into Barok's hair.

"What?!" he reached up in a bid to grab the creature, but his unwelcome passenger hopped out of the way and on to the floor, before disappearing in the direction of the kitchen. Barok glared at the waiter, "What is the meaning of this?!"

"Gracious me! I do apologise! I must have written 'raw frogs legs' by mistake!" the maître d said with a look of shock that was strangely disingenuous, "Do forgive me! I shall put in your order immediately--"

"Don't bother," Barok snapped, "Just make sure the main course isn't an entire living, breathing cow."

"Now, now, don't be ridiculous, sir...."

Once more he levelled the waiter with a withering glare.

"Please," Barok said to his beloved, "Don't let your food go cold."

They smiled, "Shall we share it, perhaps?"

"Oh..." that brought a blush to his cheeks, "No... I... couldn't possibly take from your plate..." but, to his surprise, a piece was already being presented to him. He decided against continued declining, and leaned forward to accept the mouthful, "Thank you..." he said, once he'd finished chewing and swallowing.

"It's good, isn't it?" his beloved said.

"Yes..." perhaps all the more so, having come from their plate.

──────≪⊰✥⊱≫───────

Thankfully, the rest of the date seemed to go surprisingly well -- in so far as there were no more frogs or similar cock ups (though his steak was medium, much to his disappointment, he decided against complaining as the mere fact the thing was edible was relief enough).

"I've had a lovely time," his beloved said to him as they finished off their dessert course.

"So have I," Barok replied, smiling softly, "Thank you, for agreeing to join me."

"Oh.... no... it's my pleasure... I've enjoyed myself a great deal in your company, Lord van Zieks."

"I'm glad to hear it... this has certainly been an... eventful date. I'm sorry, again, about all the oddities that have occurred."

"Oh, no, don't be! It's been a wonderful and memorable date, I loved every minute!"

"Oh ho! It seems this date has been a marvelous success, dear fellow!" announced a familiar voice. Barok knew that voice. It brought a scowl to his lips and a furrow to his brow almost instantly; as if the very muscles in his face were conditioned to respond in this manner.

"Herlock... Sholmes?!"

The maître d tore off his disguise and grinned happily, "Yes! It is I! You never suspected a thing!"

"... What are you doing here?!"

"Why! I had heard rumours that the Reaper was going on a date, so Iris and I took bets on whether that was the truth or not. Alas, it seems I now owe her five pounds..." he looked momentarily crestfallen, "But who can be glum when such a lovely couple is here before them? Truly, you two are as sweet as syrup together!"

"Hehe, thank you," his beloved smiled happily at the compliment.

". . . . . . . So you came to sabotage my date?" Barok hissed.

"What?! No! I came to ensure that you had a most memorable and eventful night, and I think I've exceeded expectations on all fronts!"

"You have indeed!" they said, nodding.

"Well," Barok folded his arms, "In that case, I shall leave the bill to you," he stood up smoothly and took his beloved by the arm.

Sholmes fell over, arms flailing, "Wait... WHAT?!"

"Farewell, 'detective'," Barok called over his shoulder as he escorted his beloved out the door. It brought him no end of delight to think that the man would be washing pots until the early hours.

(Let that be a lesson to you, you second-rate crime scene botherer!) he thought, smirking to himself. This was a most pleasing end to what had been a wonderful date, despite Herlock's meddling.

"You have some truly interesting and intriguing friends, Barok," his beloved observed as he walked them home.

"I'm not certain that 'friend' is the correct word here, my dear," he replied, though he was still smiling to himself as he held their hand and squeezed it fondly. It seemed that despite the ... characters that plagued him, they were not enough to deter his beloved.

That was certainly a huge relief.

[watermelonlipstick]

Junkyard

PG-13 oneshot: semi-angst into fluff. Thanks so much for reading!! I would love any advice or critiques, and please let me know if you’d like to be tagged in anything :) 

Title: Junkyard

Pairing: Dean X Reader

Word Count: 2170

Summary: Bobby’s a little too overprotective of you with Dean. Sam is very much a younger brother about it.

gif not mine! please let me know if you know whose it is so I can give them credit!

Dean’s hand slipped under your t-shirt, his fingers ice cold from the Sioux Falls October night. You gripped his collar with one hand, the other running through his gelled hair. The tip of his nose was cool against your cheek as his lips crashed into yours, and you nipped at him with your tongue. He answered in kind, pulling you into him. Your jeans slid on the trunk of the old junk car under the pressure until you were ground up against Dean’s belt where he stood. He slipped his other hand into your hair, gripping the base of your neck and exposing your throat before kissing and sucking hungrily. You groaned involuntarily and could feel Dean smile into your soft skin. Sliding down his chest, you gripped his belt buckle and flicked it open with one hand, your turn to grin when Dean gasped softly.

           He leaned into you, the hand on your head lowering you urgently but gently onto the trunk. The exposed skin on your back screamed at the freezing cold metal but you didn’t care, trying to yank him over you like a blanket while he tore at his jacket.

           “Boy if you don’t get that poor girl inside I’ll tan your ass and use it as a coin purse! It’s damn near freezing out! You must think I’m pretty goddamn stupid and I’ll tell you: I was born at night but it wasn’t last night!” Bobby yelled from the house, his voice carrying over the salvage yard.

           “Fuck,” Dean pulled away to whisper through gritted teeth. He pressed his forehead into you, waiting for a beat while you both caught your breath before leaning back to offer a hand. You took it and hopped down from the perch of the trunk. Feeling in the dark for any major bumps, you adjusted your ponytail and yanked your shirt down to meet the waist of your jeans. Dean re-buckled his belt and held out his arm so you could go first back to Bobby’s house.

           Coming through the door, the first thing you saw was Sam sitting at the kitchen table. He smiled up at you slyly without raising his head, and you were thankful that the cold air had already flushed your cheeks. Bobby was a few steps behind him, thankfully looking past you at Dean. If looks could kill, Dean would be burning alive.

           “How was your, uh, walk?” Sam asked with the kind of smug grin only he could deliver.

           “Fine,” you said briskly, adding a tight lipped nod. Sam looked past you to Dean, whose smile was popped open at the edge by his tongue in his cheek. You shot him a warning look and he closed his mouth.

           “Great,” Dean added.

           Bobby slammed down the casserole dish he was holding with enough force that you listened for the Pyrex to crack. “Here you go then,” he said, even more gruffly than normal.

           Dinner was so awkward and silent that it made you sick to your stomach. You tried your best to look only down at your plate, the glances you stole showing Sam’s barely contained glee at Dean having been caught out and Bobby’s barely contained disdain at it. When you finally finished your plate, you grabbed all the empty dishes within reach and headed to the kitchen sink with them. “Thanks for dinner, Bobby! I’m beat, I’ll see you all tomorrow!” you threw over your shoulder as you went, feeling for all the world like a frog trying to climb out of a near-boiling pot.

           “Not so fast, kid,” Bobby barked. You set the dishes down quietly in the sink and marched back to your seat at the table. “We need to have a talk.”

           Sam sat still, but you could tell from the expression on his face that he would’ve been exploding out of his chair with schadenfreude if he could.

           “I’ll leave you guys alone, then. Goodnight! Dinner was great, Bobby,” Dean said, playing dumb in an effort to escape himself. Bobby slapped one open palm on the table hard and the older Winchester returned to his seat. Dean had been keeping it together remarkably well, but the color drained from his face as he settled.

           Bobby sat silently for a few agonizing moments before speaking. “Now. I know you boys haven’t had a lot of experience living with a young woman before—”

           “Oh. My. God.” Sam said under his breath excitedly. Bobby glared at him.

           “But I will be damned if you plan on treating this house like some sleazy frat basement!” he yelled, building steam. You were absolutely mortified, unable to even look at Dean or Sam. “Now get your dumb asses up and go to bed. Don’t make me give this speech again.” His voice was low and grim as you got up and pushed your chair in. Sam and Dean got up too, but you heard Bobby growl a dark “sit” to Dean as you and Sam walked away. You felt a tinge of guilt at leaving him alone, but it was nothing compared to the dread that fell over you at the thought of sitting at the table a second longer.

           Sam followed you up the stairs. “Holy shit,” he whispered. “You think he’s going to kill him?” You knew he was joking, but were scared at what Bobby was going to say to Dean anyway. It was ridiculous, for three adults to be wrapped up so much in the opinion of a man who wasn’t the real father of any of you, and yet you felt exactly like a reprimanded child.

           You changed quickly into a big old t-shirt and worn cotton sweatpants, padding down the hallway in a messy bun to wash your face and brush your teeth when Bobby started yelling. Sam shot his head out of the bathroom curiously and came to the stair landing with you to listen.

           “This is not a random girl in some town you’re passing through, Dean!”

           Dean responded too quietly for you and Sam to hear.

           “That’s how you treat her with respect? Slip her out the back door to fool around in a damn junkyard?!” You heard a crash that you thought sounded like one of the chairs being tossed to the ground. When Bobby spoke again he was quieter; Sam and you leaned in to hear him.

           “If you make that girl shed one tear, boy, so help me God you’ll be wishing you were back in Hell.”

           Sam sucked air through his teeth, wincing. You realized your mouth was hanging open, stunned both that Bobby could cut that deep and that he seemed not to trust you to protect yourself at all. You weren’t stupid; of course you knew Dean’s reputation. On some level, you were worried he might live up to it. But for now he was gorgeous and it was a little lonely staying with Bobby up in Sioux Falls. You were having fun, and the fallout was for you to beat yourself up about in the future, not now.

           When you heard movement in the kitchen, you darted into the bathroom and Sam tried to head down the stairs casually to the day bed in the library. You brushed your teeth and washed your face brusquely, making it back to the spare bedroom without seeing Bobby head to the other bedroom upstairs. Pulling the old comforter over you on the old brass bed, you fell asleep fitfully.

           You woke with a start feeling like you were being watched. Based on the dim glow creeping through the slats between your blinds, it was at least a few hours after you went to sleep. When you scanned the room, Dean’s silhouette filled the doorframe.

           “What’re you doing?” you whispered urgently.

           “I wanted to see if you were up,” he answered, stepping into the room so that the moonlight illuminated his face. The shape of his full lips made you ache, the shadow of his jaw onto his neck begging to be touched. You realized as always that his socked feet were his only concession to the hour; his “pajamas” were his still-belted jeans with a t-shirt.

           “I’m up now, what’s going on?” Dean kept took a few more steps into the room toward you, biting his lip slowly. You got up to your elbows, the old bed’s springs creaking underneath you. “What’re you doing?” you repeated. “Bobby’s going to kill us,”

           “I think you mean Bobby’s going to kill me,” he smiled, half of his face obscured by shadow. He was standing at the foot of your bed now, fiddling with the hem of a blanket. “Seems pretty interested in protecting you from the big bad womanizer.”

           “Yeah, I heard some of that,” you offered cautiously.

           “Figured you and Sam would be listening. Hear everything?”

           “Not everything, but enough. So come on, don’t poke the bear. Go to sleep, I’ll see you tomorrow.” You laid back down, tucking the comforter up under your chin. Dean didn’t move.

           “You don’t want me here?”

           You smiled in the dark. “Dean, Bobby’s room is like 15 feet away.”

           “Guess we’ll have to be quiet then.”

           Dean rounded the corner of the bed and leaned down, grazing your lips with his. He knew what he was doing, and you could only hold out for a second before greedily snatching the back of his head and sliding your mouth onto his. The bed groaned in response to the extra weight and you pulled away sharply, alarmed at the noise.

           Dean grabbed the extra blankets you kept at the foot of your bed for extra cold nights in Bobby’s drafty Midwestern house and spread them on the floor in a sort of picnic-nest before spinning around and picking you up off the bed, comforter and all. You put a hand over your mouth to keep from giggling as he lowered you both down onto the blankets. “Better?” he asked as you nodded into his chest. Warmth came off of him through the thin cotton of his t-shirt, seeping into you like melting honey. Easing down until your chests pressed together, he kissed you deeply and softly without any of the urgency he had in the junkyard. You relished in the roughness of his hands and stubble on you as he took his time exploring your lips and neck. Dean pulled away to take a breath, leaning back on his knees.

           “Wait,” he whispered.

           “What’s wrong?” you spit out, scared he might’ve heard something in the hallway.

           Dean looked down at you and the shadows caught all the angles in his face. He looked into your eyes and then out the window, biting his lip.

“I’m not just messing around,” he finally said. There must’ve been enough moonlight for him to see your face because Dean pursed his lips in frustration. “I mean what Bobby said is not true. Or maybe it was before, but not now, not with you. I don’t want you to feel like I’m using you.”

“Dean, I know what this is, it’s okay. You don’t have to worry about ‘sparing my feelings’ or whatever,” you replied, touching his chest. He grabbed your wrist.

“Sparing your feelings? No, that’s what I mean. I want it to be more than…this,” he said, gesturing to the blankets surrounding you on the floor. “I just, I want to be, like, with you,” he mumbled.

“Are you serious?” you replied, sitting up.

“I, uh, I mean yeah,” he said, leaning back onto his heels. “If you want to.” Seeing Dean shy and nervous like a teenager this way was unusual, and it caught you off guard.

“Uh, wow,” you breathed, unsure of what to say. “I didn’t know you like, dated, or whatever.”

He let out a chuckle and rubbed the back of his neck. “Yeah I guess I don’t really, huh?”

“So this is you asking me out?”

“Yeah. But only if you’re going to say yes.” The half-smile playing at the corner of his mouth looked more like the Dean you knew.

“And if I did, would that make this our first date?” you asked, pulling at a loose thread from your sweatpants’ hem.

“I was thinking dinner or something, but I mean, sure, why not?”

“Hmmm, bummer,” you thought aloud with a smile. “Thought you’re not supposed to have sex until the third date.”

Without Dean’s hand behind your head it would’ve cracked against the floorboards with the force of him suddenly slamming into you, but instead you were enveloped in his kiss and the scent of leather and pine that always floated around him. You giggled into his lips when you felt Dean grin against you, and he pulled away a few centimeters. Your breath mixed as he asked, “That’s a yes, right?” It was all you could do to nod as you melted into each other, turning into a tangle of muffled little laughs, discarded clothes, and heavy, warm breaths.

~

ETA: Did you know there’s a Junkyard, Part 2? Might be worth checking out 😉

Thanks again for reading! If you liked it, check out my Masterlist or send me a request!

Tags: @sams-sass​, @akshi8278​, @dream-believe-and-love​

[autisticzukka]

what is this hakoda zuko arranged marriage you speak of? i am intrigued

okay so the long story short is that it’s a slight rebuttal of a popular post that is very fun but i find like... unrealistic in a really intriguing way like, how would this ACTUALLY play out. I’ve talked about it at length in my server a few times, and it’s one of those AU’s -- like the genderbend zukka ATLA rewrite or the zukki fic that starts with sokka failing to assassinate zuko -- that lives rent free in my head and I’ve written a couple thousand words for.

tw for like VERY unrequited zuko in love with hakoda and the inherent comedy of sokka being in love with his fire nation stepmom.

so here’s hakoda, chief of the southern water tribe, happily not-married to Bato. and here is a more balanced war, where the north and the south are actually  allies, rather than whatever the fuck they were in ATLA. Yue already has a fiance and the Northern chief refuses to remarry. that leaves hakoda responsible for biting the bullet and doing a political marriage even though, as he points out at length, he is an elected official and if he stops being elected it’s no longer a marriage with the chief of the south pole. intelligently but mostly selfishly motivated (yue’s fiance is his nephew, after all) pakku points out that its not like the fire nation knows... that. the fire nation is dumb. ozai’s stupid.

faced with such inarguable points hakoda stiffens his upper lip, pre-emptively ends things with bato on the understanding that if this is another kya situation they’ll get back together and that he’s still the most important person to him but the tribe comes first yada yada, and deals with katara throwing the mother of all tantrums. it is slightly softened by the fact that in return for him marrying the fire nation noble, a thing everyone can agree isn’t traditional, the north has finally agreed to train katara. she heads out before the wedding, in protest but also so as to not cause an international incident.

(on her way, she’ll find aang. with the war less dire, katara will be sympathetic towards his desire to live without committing violence, even if she deeply can’t relate. they’ll have a hot girl romcom summer of self discovery and coming to terms with the dichotomy between duty and love as they become master benders. at some point they pick up toph. they ARE a throuple.)

sokka meanwhile is like.. not cool with it.. but ? kind of relieved? like. he’s the eldest kid. he’s 18, and he’s been a man of the tribe as far as legalities for several years. it would have been entirely understandable if his dad had asked HIM to do it. he had his emotionally crushing romance with yue, and as much as he was like ‘im kind of a prince’, he finds he doesn’t actually want some of the responsibilities and demands that would bring. yue’s life sucks.

back in the fire nation, zuko never demanded a quest and never went on it. he’s spent years hardening into something that, while brittle, can survive the pressures of the court around him. he still has his scar. he still wants his father to love him, but he knows by now that it’s not something he’s capable of earning. he watches his sister, never the most stable person, start to have complete breakdowns of sanity once she hits puberty, and helps her cover for it and receive medical treatment on the down low. he’s the heir, but he lives knowing that if he was ever in a position to inherit his choices are to abdicate or have the baby sister who he raised kill him and destroy herself and the country in the process.

when he realizes the plan is to marry azula off rather than someone more reasonable-- mai is RIGHT there, for fucks sake-- he doesn’t realize ozai’s true intent is to fuck this up through malicious compliance and false shows of good faith. he panics, and does the zuko thing: he blurts out that this is unacceptable and immoral and she’s only 16 and Ozai sees the true opportunity for two birds with one stone. send zuko, let him piss someone off so badly he gets killed or divorced, and he gets rid of zuko from the line of succession permanently. there are those who are incredibly attached to teh idea of a firstborn for firelord, and it’s been a constant thorn in unpopular ozai’s side to nto be able to name azula his heir apparent without costly rebellion. but if he can taint him in the mind of the fire nation so much that birthright is easy to supercede-- yeah. this’ll work PERFECTLY.

so zuko is sent to marry hakoda, chief of the water tribe.

literally NO ONE was expecting it to be a member of Ozai’s immediate family. besides the fact that his oldest child is half hakoda’s age and his brother has 20 years on hakoda, it would have been sus as fuck - the treaty is not favorable enough to grant that kind of secession of interests. it becomes quickly apparent that this young man -- hakoda reminds himself of that repeatedly. not kid. not kid. young man. don’t think of him like a kid, it’s hard enough on both of us already. -- is not a horrible threat. he’s scared shitless and shakes with what he thinks is bravado. he’s desperate to make the marriage work. he’s desperate to not go home. he’s got a giant fucking scar on his face from where the fire lord punished him for some grievous but unstated offense.

zuko “daddy issues” fire nation sees his husband to be and, despite being scared shitless, immediately begins to soften a little. like... he’s not nearly as scary as he thought he’d be. his face can be stern, but it just as easily breaks into huge smiles, and his eyes are crinkled with laughter. he’s incredibly handsome. and his biceps are. his biceps. are. his hands are...

like. zuko thinks. okay. maybe. maybe his marriage duties. won’t be so horrible as he thought. maybe he’s ready for this. and he knows what to expect, Uncle had discreetly provided him the means and the contacts to acquire an intimate education in the whirlwind of activity that was the two months before leaving. and like, once he’d gotten past the nerves, it was often even... good? or at least... not bad? he thinks that even if hakoda isn’t a professional expert, he has a certain.... je ne sais quoi, if you will.

((DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF DILF))

sokka sees his new stepfather and immediately falls in love because he’s that kind of dumb bitch. (the core of this au is that i cant breathe thinking about sokka falling in love with his hot young stepmom his age who his dad doesnt even want to fuck. like. i CANT. sokka masturbates to ‘hand caught in the washing tub’ fantasies which are even more absurd for requiring zuko to be DOING LAUNDRY. i find it so funny.)

bato watches them at the wedding feast while hakoda is very clearly trying to treat zuko as an Equal Adult Partner and mostly managing to seem like someone having a serious conversation with a seven year old about the game they’ve made up. zuko is clearly enamored with it, soaking up the attention, blushing and doing his best to Bravely Flirt, which at one point includes awkwardly attempting to feed Hakoda by hand. bato has to excuse himself to have a teary eyed giggle, hoping that Kya is in the spirit world looking down and laughing with him. he can’t resent the kid even a little bit, when hakoda is sitting there looking so incredibly fucking befuddled as to what he’s supposed to do with this star struck infant he’s legally wed to

anyways all of this... is very funny. their wedding night... is less so. zuko does not take the rejection from hakoda very well, especially because he’d been caught wanting. HE’S the one who should be rejecting hakoda. and he catastrophizes almost immediately about his potential value to the water tribe, his future treatment, that endless inescapable freezing cold loneliness is the good ending for him here... hakoda, meanwhile, drops zuko off at his home, reassuringly informs him that there’s NOTHING else expected of him and he will be well taken care of, and books it to bato’s. bato refuses to let him in on grounds of ‘you can’t sleep under the same shelter as me on your wedding night to that kid, have a fucking brain’, and he ends up crashing at sokka’s.

sokka, who had KNOWN that his dad wouldnt, but also upon seeing zuko and zuko’s awkward flirting was like... but how COULDNT he???? sokka is relieved.

the core of this fic is that i find it endlessly hilarious for zuko to try and seduce his husband while sokka simps around zuko and bato tries to be heartbroken or betrayed but mostly ends up with a giant case of hysterical schadenfreude. but the thing that CLINCHED it for me, like THE scene. several years after being married, settled into their life. they’re partners and they see each other as people. and zuko just fucking snaps one night

he just kisses him, desperate and clawing and climbing and maybe a little drunk. he knows hakoda is going to push him away, maybe even hit him, but he doesn’t care anymore, he doesn’t care. he can do anything he wants to him as long as he just-- finally does something. zuko is 21 and married to the surface of the sun and the surface of the sun jr is his best friend and clearly in love with him-- so clearly not even zuko can miss it-- and like. listen. listen. zuko is not a patient person. but he’s been patient for this. he waited and he matured and he is a fucking amazing husband and he wants this, he wants him. he wants to be wanted.

but hakoda doesn’t push him away. hakoda doesnt yell at him, or hit him. hakoda gentles the kiss into something soft and closed lipped. he pulls away slowly, and his eyes are so sad for zuko, so pitying. he strokes his cheek with the back of his hand so gently. he says, I’m sorry. I don’t want you.

and zuko daddy issues fire nation swallows

and he nods

and he leaves, even though its his own fucking house

and he knows he’s never going to be good enough

like FUUUCK i am OBSESSED WITH THAT

[enha-woodzies]

➸ CHAPTER 7 | " A BREW GONE ASKEW "

starring: enhypen ft. i-land daniel

pairing: jungwon x fem!reader x sunghoon

genres: royal au, romance, angst, slowburn, 18th century setting

word count: 1.7k

warnings: mentions of blood, very mild swearing

taglist: @serendipitysung (betareader) @angeljungwon @en-sun @affectionaterainoflove @renkiv @softforjungwoo @jislix @gyeraniee @fluffi @stxrryemxlys @jungwon-luv-bot

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A week has passed since the favored pair passionately promenaded around town. They’ve always looked very fond of each other, and the ton can only imagine the two tying the knot by the end of the year.

Only a week in but Sunghoon was already finding it hard to keep himself away from Y/n’s side. From their long, humorous talks, to past secrecies, bliss, and memories, Sunghoon isn't always a big talker. But when it comes to the young miss, he blurts out almost anything and everything that comes to mind, and the lass would happily enjoy them; so much that she even laughed with a snort once, to which Sunghoon found really adorable and charming.

Sunghoon told her she was magnetic, and the girl helplessly clung herself to the marquess like an ornament.They've shared a lot of stories with each other in the course of a week. And in every topic, Jungwon never ceases to be mentioned. Y/n almost always connects everything with the boy, and Sunghoon can clearly see how Y/n’s got it so bad with Jungwon.

He told himself that he was going to change that.

Today, it was said they were seen traipsing around the Swan’s Lake一 a cradle for the tons banal scandals. Further ahead, the Queen’s garden can already be seen just by the tip of the tiny greenhouse that’s solely standing amidst the wildflowers. Sunghoon leads the way for the young miss to enter first.

“See that? The garden admires you.” Sunghoon whispers against her ears and send tingles through her entire body.

“This is amazing. I’ve only ever been here once, you know. It’s actually one of my favorite places here in Northumberland.” The young miss exclaims while softly touching the brightly colored flowers in each step she takes.

“Was the first visit special enough to make this one of your adored places?”

“Yeah.. I was with Jungwon.” She mutters the name under her breath with a look of regret.

“What was the reason he brought you here?”

“We were nine. He said he wanted to show me something that only this garden can offer.”

“Let me guess. Was it a ring made of twigs and he played pretend like he was proposing to you?” Y/n chuckles at the marquess. Though she wouldn't admit it, she finds Sunghoon very ideal and gentle.

Could it be that she wishes Jungwon to be more like him? Or is she just telling herself that Sunghoon’s perfect enough to bury down her dying feelings for Jungwon?

“That’s cute but unfortunately, that's not what happened. He showed me the Catalpa tree and gave me its flower. He said it reminds him so much of me and that I should tuck the flower in my favorite book to remind myself that he thinks of me often.”

“Ahh. Quite the romantic our little Jungwon here, eh?”

Y/n looks down to the ground remembering the dead Catalpa flower that was tucked between Jungwon’s Austen book; the book that was now back in the comfort of its owner after she threw it in the Kielder Forest. 

“Once upon a time, yes.”

Sunghoon quickly picked up the mood and snapped it away. Seeing how Jungwon made this hole in her heart annoyed him to the extent he realized he had been living in hypocrisy as well.

He oddly sees himself in Jungwon, although in his case, it was much different. Jungwon never had any rivals when it comes to Y/n’s heart. Whereas with him, he had Niki, who wasn't even a bad guy in a story that Sunghoon tried so hard to own.

“Did you know that there's a poison garden here?” He breaks the silence.

“A what now?”

“A poison garden. The Queen’s very particular with it. Although it's off-limits to everyone except the royal gardener, anyone can still have a peek at it. I bet Jungwon never told you that.”

“He didn't.”

“Of course. Your chap doesn't alway know things, Y/n. You sometimes think so highly of him.”

The young miss kept her mouth shut the whole walk to the poison garden’s entry. They decided to take a brief peek, as per Sunghoon’s wishes, and she went along. It's not an everyday occurrence that you get to see a real and existing poison garden in Northumberland's Alnwick Castle.

“Sunghoon? Until when are we going to keep up with this whole ruse?” She softly whispers.

“Well, Jungwon hasn't told you anything worthy yet, has he?”

“The other day, he uhh… he told me to stop seeing you.”

“Why do you suppose he would say such thing?”

“I don't know. Must be something that happened between you and my brother?” she stopped shortly.

“What happened, Sunghoon? How come they all know about it and act like it was so horrid, yet keep it very subtle?” Sunghoon clicks his tongue and hisses before letting out a deep exhale.

“It's all in the past now. Even Niki. Though, I want to start fresh with him, but he doesn't seem to give me any chance at even trying.”

“What happened?”

“I don't think your brothers would want you to hear it. I respect Jay the most, and I owe Niki a whole lot. Or even if they do, I won't tell you anyway.”

“Was it… that bad?” Sunghoon fakes a chuckle while sitting on the nearby cemented bench. Y/n reaches out to hold his hand and the gent softly grips her fingers while brushing it with his thumb, locking hands with her in the process.

Sunghoon wanted to let everything out. But he fears the young beau would distance herself. If he were to be honest, there's nothing for him from this ruse they plotted. It was just to help the poor miss and satisfy himself with the look of envy upon Jungwon's face. He has nothing against the chap, but he may just simply be a schadenfreude.

The following day, Jungwon received a personal letter from the soon-to-be-duke himself. The moment he read the contents, he hastily dashed from his house and onto his horse, galloping in a speed of light to the Kielder Forest.

It is peak afternoon and the golden sun hit the forest perfectly, making it look like the two men are bathing under the immaculate bliss. Picture perfect as it may look, they didn't meet there to dawdle time away.

“Your Grace.” Jungwon bows to which Sunghoon returns in the aftermath.

“Why did you summon me here?” Jungwon glints at the marquess with a scorn. As much as he wants to showcase his manners, it didn't seem like the time and place to do it.

“Let's cut the formalities from here on out, Jungwon. Who do you think you are to give orders to Y/n? You know, the more you convince her to stop seeing me, the faster she runs to my tail. You're just doing me a favor to be very honest, and I am so pleased for this wonderful opportunity. You don't have the slightest idea of what convenience you are to me right now.” Sunghoon mockingly exclaims with both hands holding together like a child in prayer.

Jungwon aggressively walks towards the marquess and grabs his cravat with both hands. “You pompous blowhard! What are you doing with her?!” Jungwon grunts while shoving Sunghoon against the tree. With a stern look upon his eyes, the marquess suddenly finds the situation very amusing. He smirks and chuckles before pushing Jungwon's hands from the tight grip on his clothing.

“Are you talking about yourself? Take it easy, Yang. I don't think you're hearing yourself right now. Shouldn't I be the one asking you that?” Sunghoon lets out a laugh that makes Jungwon even more furious. It was his plan, after all.

“You haven’t had enough of triggering Niki, and now you're using his sister?! You're a big mess, Sunghoon! Admit it! You couldn't have Yena all to yourself with Niki around, so you're tainting Y/n to get revenge on the both of us?! You’re a lost cause!”

“Am I? A lost cause, eh? You're plainly calling yourself out, don't you think? All these years of having the most beautiful lady in Northumberland at the palm of your hands, yet you're too much of a dimbo to even hold onto her. And besides, it's like hitting two birds with one stone, yeah? You and Niki?”

Sunghoon mockingly laughs at Jungwon's fuming face and before he even realized it, his glorious face landed on the cold ground with an angry clobber from the chap. Jungwon straddles him and continues punching him while sitting on top of the fallen boy.

In a swift response, Sunghoon pulls Jungwon by the collar and pushes him aggressively to the side. While landing several punches on Jungwon's face, the marquess spits out blood in the process.

“Enough!” Sunghoon sternly yells at the former who is now bending over his knees, huffing out exhales with a fast beating heart.

“Stop this stupidity you're doing with Y/n! You're no good for her, Yang, and you know that! Can't you see? You're just wasting her time when she could've been married last season already!”

“Don't fucking tell me what to do, ugly bastard!” Jungwon hisses with gritted teeth, mustering up his anger to give the marquess another blow of his fist.

“Stain my face with more blood, Yang, and you’ll have to kiss your princess goodbye. Mark my words, you will never have Y/n. Not even a useless moment with her.”

“Niki! Niki! Niki!”

Daniel runs inside the Park manor with such haste, unknowingly bumping the mansion’s servants along the way. “Nishimura Riki!” The boy helplessly cries out to the latter, who apparently seems to be very preoccupied in the garden, impulsively firing the target on the branch.

“What?!” Niki yells back.

“I have big news to tell you!”

“If it’s about Sunghoon then shut your mouth ‘cause I have no intentions of hearing it. Sister will get tired of him soon enough, so I’m not worried. I trust Y/n’s wit to deliver her from that traitor.”

“But this is about Y/n and it's something that you should be worried about!” Niki swiftly turns his head to the boy bearing no more second thoughts as he throws away the blunderbuss and rushes to Daniel, “what happened to sister?!”

“She made a deal with the devil himself.”

*send me an ask or a message if you wish to be added on this series' taglist!

ㅡ © ENHA-WOODZIES, 2021

[potassium-pilot]

Prompt 9: Friable

“Dia, could I ask you a favor?”

“When have I ever said ‘no’ to you, Tataru?”

“Fair point”, Tataru replied as she placed her hand in her pocket and revealed a small crystal trinket in her palm, shaped like a sun, about an ilm tall. “I need to leave for a bit, but I don’t want to leave this alone, nor would I care to lose it because it fell out of my pocket. Could I trouble you to hold onto it for me?”

“This is the least troublesome thing I’ve been asked to do in a long time. Of course I’ll take care of it for you.” Dia took the sun-shaped trinket with her finger and thumb and lifted it close to her face for a better look.

“Thank you, Dia! I owe you for this!” Tataru waved at her and sauntered out of the Rising Stones, leaving Dia to marvel at the inanimate object for a while before placing it within her inventory.

“You know, you ought to learn to say ‘no’ sometimes”, a gruff voice commented aloud. Estinien sat at the table in front of Tataru’s desk, giving a wry smile. “And what’s that supposed to mean, Wyrmblood?”

“Means you run yourself ragged for them already. When do you put your foot down?”

“You don’t say ‘no’ to Tataru Taru.” She sat down across from him. “It’s one of the unwritten rules of the Scions. You’ll get used to it soon enough.”

“Why is that an unwritten rule?”

“Consider it like this; Tataru has watched her friends be murdered and kidnapped before her very eyes and nearly died herself, she was forced into exile alongside Alphinaud and I after that godsforsaken banquet, and she helped me fight a giant turtle man in Hell’s Lid. All this, she’s done and kept the Scions afloat, which was rather difficult when the majority of us were across the rift in the First. None of us would be here without her keeping all the things that would distract us from our duty away from us. If she needs something, I’m damn well doing it.”

Estinien wore a perplexed look on his face. “There’s a couple of scenarios in there that I’ll need you to explain.”

“All in good time. The point is, never say ‘no’ to Tataru, ever. She’s done and seen too much. She can have anything she wants.”

“You can’t always say ‘yes’ to people, or they’ll expect further agreement from you.”

“Good? That means they trust you.”

“That means they think you’re a doormat.”

Dia scoffed at the notion. “This is also my place of employment. What about when you were ordered to do something as a Temple knight? You couldn’t have been able to say ‘no’ to your commanding officer.”

“The Scions are not a military, as I recall. At any rate, are you implying the coinkeeper is your commanding officer?”

“As good as, if not better. Have you ever tried saying ‘no’ to her?”

“I have said no to her.”

An evil curl of her lip began to form into a half-smirk. “And weren’t you chased around Kugane for your efforts?” Estinien darted his eyes away with a scowl. “And then ended up saying ‘yes’ to taking down Black Rose facilities anyways…and then to becoming a Scion?” Estinien growled under his breath. Dia leaned back in her chair and pretended to hold a book. “Or was that in your day planner?” She started a pale imitation of the man. “10am: Brooding. 11am: Jump a million malms in the air. 12pm: Destroy any Black Rose facilities I see. 1pm: Become a Scion of the Seventh Dawn.”

“Don’t you have a crystal to watch?!” he retorted.

“I do, yes”, she reached into her inventory and opened her palm in front of him, “and I’m doing it well, see?”

There was a moment of silence, then the dragoon said, “That’s not the crystal” with a small bit of pleasure in his voice. She popped a very quizzical look and checked what was in her hand herself. A small sapphire charm was staring back at her.

“Shite! I was going to give this to Aymeric last night, and I forgot!” She stared into her inventory with no small amount of desperation. “Well, where in hells is the crystal, then?”

“Don’t ask me. You’re the one who agreed to keep watch of it.”

She sifled through her bag frantically. “I couldn’t have lost it; I was sitting here the whole time!”

“Ah, Dia, Estinien, how are you faring?” G’raha greeted cheerfully, as she continued to search through her possessions while Estinien reveled in his schadenfreude.

A few footsteps later, a shattering sound rang the loudest that any crystal could ever make.

Dia’s eyes widened. She slowly stood up from her chair, took a few very slow steps, and delivered to G’raha a look that could strike fear into the heart of Halone. “G’raha Tia”, she rumbled in a very low voice, “Move your foot.”

G’raha slowly moved his head downward to look at his feet, then slowly returned it to meekly gaze into her fearsome visage. “I’m afraid to”, he replied quietly.

Her voice started to raise slightly. “Move your foot, or I’m moving you!” He almost hopped away, and unveiled the result of her carelessness- the shattered remains of Tataru’s sun-shaped crystal. She gathered as much as she could and dashed back to the table with G’raha.

“You were a crystal once! Do something!”

G’raha stammered, unsure how to reply to a comment like that. “I-I-I can’t! I don’t know what it looked like!”

“Do I have to draw you a picture?! It looked like the sun!” She brought her face closer to his. “You don’t understand. Tataru had me keep watch of it.”

G’raha’s eyes widened and he gave a grimace. “She’ll kill you.”

“Me? Oh, hells no. Us. If I’m going down, I’m taking you with me, crystal boy!”

He gulped loudly. “All right, maybe this isn’t so bad. Maybe this is still fixable.” The two of them used their magic to lift up the shards, and start solving the puzzle. Behind them, Estinien stood and laughed under his breath. The distracting dragoon caused her to lose her focus, the shards dropping back on the table. She swung around and barked, “If you’re just gonna sit there and snicker at us, then bugger off.”

“This is too delicious to turn away.”

Dia groaned. “All right, look, I’m sorry I teased you earlier, okay? But when Tataru asks me to do something, I do it, and not because I’m a doormat! It’s because she’s been the one good constant in my life, and she’s stood by me from the very beginning. She’s my friend, and I’d do anything for her because I think she deserves so much more than I could ever give, and now I’m pissed because I couldn’t even do this for her!”

She turned around and finished with, “So you’ll forgive me if I’m not in the mood.”

The two arcanists started their puzzle once again as Estinien slowly walked away from the duo.

“So that’s how you feel about our receptionist?” asked G’raha.

She let out a sharp, quick breath through her nose. “Tataru’s not just a receptionist to me. A normal receptionist would have quit the Scions the moment we were implicated in the Sultana’s murder. A normal receptionist wouldn’t have been secretly learning arcanima in her spare time and use it to help me fight. A normal receptionist wouldn’t have helped nurse the Scions as they laid there unconscious, and fret over whether they’ll ever wake up.” The last struck a pang of guilt in the Mi’qote’s heart. “A normal receptionist doesn’t casually learn airship engineering and build a new one from scratch!” She let out a light laugh after that one.

“She’s as much a Scion as the rest of us.” Dia went quiet for a moment as she started to fit some of the last few pieces together. “She’s the best of us, really.” G’raha gave a empathetic smile. “Have you ever told her this?”

She hesitated, then responded, “…no, not really. At least, not aloud.”

“I think she’d appreciate it if she heard it from you”, suggested G’raha, “It’s good to extend appreciation to those who work so hard for us, especially if it’s as passionate as yours. I don’t think I’ve ever heard you express emotions like that before.”

“Ha, Aymeric can attest to how hard it is for me to express my feelings. If anything, I should be more willing- at least these feelings are completely platonic.” G’raha gave a light chuckle.

The pieces of the puzzle had finally linked together and the sun shined back at the arcanists…

…except for one shard that made an obvious hole in the bottom.

“Oh, you have got to be kidding me”, Dia complained. The two stared back at the scene of the crime in hopes of seeing it glimmer behind them. “All right, help me look for that last part.”

“Right.” The two took one step before they heard the sound of latches from the front door.

“I’m back!” Tataru announced gleefully. The two quickly spun around to look at her as she walked back with boxes in her hands. “I was picking up supplies from House Fortemps. Dia, can I have the you-know-what back?”

The two averted their gaze towards anything else and started sputtering, trying to figure out just what to tell the lalafell.

“Uh…” Dia started.

“Well, see…”, said G’raha.

“The thing is…”

The door to Dawn’s Respite had opened and closed and from the doorway. a gruff voice spoke out. “It’s my fault, I’m afraid.” The dragoon stepped out to stand beside Dia. “She handed it to me because I wanted to see it. Stupidly, I dropped it, and well…” Estinien turned around and saw the unfinished result on the table behind them. He gently picked it up and showed Tataru. “You can see what happened. These two came together to repair it.” Tataru took the stone from Estinien and gave it a good look.

“Hm, overall, a very good repair job”, remarked the receptionist nonchalantly, “Though I didn’t take you for one with butterfingers, Estinien.”

She moved to her desk to give it a better look under the lamp. “I’ll need to remedy this missing chunk here, of course.” Tataru noticed a glint of light from the corner of her eye and found the missing piece of the sun. “Ah, there it is!” She hopped off of her chair and picked it up from the floor before hopping back onto it. Gently, she picked up the trinket, and easily fit the last piece into the hole.

“There we go!” She held out the sun in front of G’raha and requested, “G’raha, you were a crystal once. Do you think you could bind this last piece for me?”

His ears drooped. “Why is everyone calling me that?” He obeyed and repaired the last piece of it to make the sun whole once again.

“Yay!” cheered Tataru, “Thank you, both of you. You two are far better at reparations than I am.”

“Than you?” repeated Dia curiously.

“Oh, of course. I’ve repaired this thing about five or six times myself. This is the best it’s looked in a while.”

G’raha and Dia shot their gazes to each other, completely bewildered, while Estinien smacked his head into his hand and shook his head, muttering the word, “Idiots.”

“Well, Tataru, if I may”, G’raha spoke up, “What exactly was it meant for?”

Tataru stayed silent for a moment, then finally sighed and said, “Oh, I might as well. I practically gave it to you anyway.” She took out a long gold chain and a display case the same shape as the sun trinket. “The plan is to encase it in this, a much sturdier glass, and attach it to the chain to create a charm necklace for Dia’s nameday. I trust Dia, so I asked her, and I hoped that maybe she’d forget about it by the time I would give it to her.”

Dia’s mouth went agape. “What?”

“It’s true!” Tataru jumped off the chair one more and walked in front of Dia. “You do so much for us. You’re always going in harm’s way for everybody, and I feel like you get so little for it. Sure, you get a bed, some gil and recognition, but that can’t be the only thing you should get from this. I don’t get to do much for you, and frankly, I don’t think I’ll ever have a proper gift to thank you, but at the very least, I want you to feel special on your nameday.”

Dia was tearing up. She couldn’t resist going down to her knees and wrapping Tataru in a proper hug. “I couldn’t ask you to do any more! You’re the best of the Scions!”

“Oh, Dia, I’m not a Scion!” Tataru exclaimed as she returned the hug, tearing up herself.

“Oh yes you are! You’ve been through too much with us. You’re a better Scion than I am. I’ve barely come by here since I moved into Borel Manor, and you’ve been working yourself to the bone here.” She unwrapped herself from Tataru and stood back up. “I can’t ever thank you enough for everything you’ve done, Tataru Taru, for going through so much with us. I owe you the best gift I could ever give you on your own nameday!” Tataru’s smile wavered, and she wiped away her tears with her sleeve.

“I’m going to find my goldsmith’s set, and I’m going to finish this for you, Dia Sito!” she announced through the lump in her throat, and ran back to the solar to look in storage for her kit.

Estinien gave his usual smile that was barely a smile, and G’raha told her, “Now you see what I mean?” She gave a smile of her own. “I do. There’s only one thing.”

“What’s that?”

She lowered her voice and near whispered. “When the hells is Tataru’s nameday?” G’raha pursed his lips while Estinien quickly removed himself from the situation by retreating back into Dawn’s Respite.

“Let’s find her calendar”, suggested G’raha.

[spicycreativity]

Soft-Shoe Shuffle - Ch 1

Chapter: 1/12 Rating: T (for language) Content Warnings: Canon-typical Remus content. This chapter only: alcohol use Characters: All Pairings: Moceit, background Prinxiety, background Intrulogical (yes I played a little game of "pair the spares") Additional Tags: Hey it's the fic I published on Anon because I was embarrassed of how utterly pretentious it is!, post-PoF, sickfic, dirty poetry, humor interspersed with philosophy and Janus-typical pontification, this is VERY speculative and will get Jossed in the future lmao Summary: After claiming his place in the Light and coming face-to-face with the consequences of his actions, Janus finds himself unwillingly re-calibrating his moral compass. For selfish reasons, of course. But one apology snowballs into several, and soon he's running around the Mindscape with a low-grade fever and a guilty conscience as he desperately tries to regain some sense of self. Oh, and he's definitely not falling in love with Patton, so don't even bring it up. One Last Note: I wrote this in an ADHD fugue state. It is HEAVILY influenced by Dostoyevsky's Crime and Punishment, but there are also references to poetry and various other works of literature. I also deliberately used symbols, themes, and motifs. Most of them are pretty in your face except for the recurring ouroboros, which is used as a symbol of rebirth. ...Told you it was pretentious.

When you wake up to the promise of your dream world comin' true With one less friend to call on, was it someone that I knew? Away you will go sailing in a race among the ruins If you plan to face tomorrow, do it soon

Janus appeared in the Dark side of the Mindscape, elation swelling in his chest. Even the ringing headache and bitter taste in his mouth couldn't hollow the unfamiliar triumph that warmed him to the core. Caught up in his own thoughts, it took a moment for him to register the sight before him: Remus, upside-down on the couch, his brow furrowed and face an alarming shade of purple.

For a moment, Janus stood stock-still as he tried to get his bearings. He must have been more flustered than he'd realized-- He'd been aiming for his bedroom.

But here he was, staring down at Remus, who was definitely going to burst a blood vessel (or several) if he didn't flip over soon.

"That's not horrifying at all," Janus said, thinking it would be rude to dismiss Remus, especially since he had probably been eavesdropping. He had likely heard everything. Everything. Even the ugly parts.

"Do you remember when Thomas read that post about Nutty Putty Cave?" Remus asked in a strained, strangled voice. "That spelunker who died because he got stuck upside-down?"

"No," Janus said, before realizing his mistake. "Yes." He definitely wanted Remus to remind him of the gory details.

"That's what I thought," Remus said with a wicked grin.

Janus sighed through his nose. Remus, though he thrived on attention, seemed content enough to continue his experiment by himself. On the other hand, if Janus didn't bring up a certain insult he'd levied at Roman, Remus most certainly would, and at a time where it would cause the most upset and turmoil. Better for Janus to deal with it now, even if he would have to fight the tension pulling his muscles taut. He wanted to dance. He wanted to scream.

Hesitation proved to be Janus' downfall, and by the time he'd opened his mouth to broach the subject at hand, Remus had beaten him to the blow. "You're not usually this quiet, Oralboros. Snake got your tongue?"

Janus, again, sighed. Rather than answer, he doffed his hat, set it on the coffee table, and clumsily arranged himself upside-down next to Remus. The change in position immediately made his head throb. He ignored it. "I definitely meant it when I called you 'evil'."

Remus' eyes widened in faux-shock. "You called me evil ?" he shrieked, voice ringing out high and clear. "Me? How dare you. I'm an angel!"

At least Remus was taking it well. "Sarcasm is my thing," Janus said, realizing that he might make it out of this without having to properly apologize.

For some reason, Patton's face flashed into his mind, and a subsequent twinge of guilt made his tongue go sour. Fine. If there was ever a time to start telling uncomfortable truths… "But I am sorry I said that."

"Wow!" Remus laughed. "You must be upset." A red stain began to spill across his left eye. "You don't apologize."

"It’s not like I care about your feelings or anything." Janus would have liked to have drawn himself up to his full height, but it was impossible to do while upside-down. "As much as I'm enjoying watching your blood vessels slowly burst, would you please turn over before you hurt yourself? I've suffered enough psychological trauma for today."

"Oh, fine." Remus kicked his legs and landed neatly on his toes like a gymnast.

Janus, by contrast, got his arms tangled in his capelet and nearly folded himself in half before he found his balance again. "I meant to do that," he said, turning to grab his hat so Remus wouldn't see the blush on his face.

The sudden sensation of blood draining from his head made the room whirl. He steadied himself against Remus' shoulder until it slowed somewhat, but nothing could dampen the horrible ringing in his ears.

"Well," he said, adjusting his shirt. The sudden appearance of his conscience had taken the wind out of his sails more than he cared to admit, and all thoughts of dancing bled out of him along with a good deal of energy. "I'm not going to go scream into my pillows until I tire myself out."

"Being an agent of chaos is hard work," Remus said with a sage nod, "but that doesn't sound very relaxing, Mr Self Care."

"It's a form of meditation, if you think about it," Janus said.

Remus made a face. "You know I don't do that."

"...Meditate?"

"No, think."

"Ah. Well." Janus made only a token attempt to hide his fond smile. "Good night, Remus. Please stay up late and injure yourself."

"Can do, Snakeypoo.”

Janus turned. It was close enough, he might as well walk to his bedroom, especially considering how well his last attempt at appearing in it had gone.

The reason why that had been so difficult became apparent in mere moments. Janus froze in the hall and dropped to his knees at the giddy wave of horror and delight that made him too light-headed to stand.

He knelt in front of the empty stretch of wall where his door had been previously.  Heat flooded his face.

"Jay?" The rounded toes of Remus' boots appeared in his line of sight. Janus zeroed in on them, the mud splatters and stains on the soft leather. "You have an aneurysm or what?"

Janus, unable to speak, motioned for Remus to turn around. He couldn't deal with this right now.

"Ohhh," said Remus. "Well. Good luck with that ." He hauled Janus to his feet. "So you're a boner fide good guy now, huh?"

Janus stared over Remus' shoulder at the empty stretch of wall where his door used to be. "That depends entirely on who you ask."

Remus shrugged and rose up on his toes. "You can scream into my pillows instead, if you want."

"As tempting as that is…" Janus trailed off, his eyes still fixed on the wall. It was tempting, despite the constant chaos in Remus' room. But he'd have to face the Light side sooner or later. It wasn't like he could move his room back, not without psychologically damaging Thomas and undoing all the work he'd done. "I'm really looking forward to getting insulted some more."

"Alright," Remus said with a shrug. "Try not to throw me under the bus this time, alright? Unless it's a real bus…" His gaze became dreamy, unfocused. "And it's doing 50 in a school zone and there's a whole pack of screaming kids in the crosswalk--"

"Goodbye, Remus." Janus turned and left.

--

The barrier between the "dark" and the "light" sides of Thomas' brain had been a joint venture. It would have been there in some form no matter what, but it was Janus and Roman (with Patton's tacit blessing) who had worked to put up something more physical between them.

Janus ducked under the red curtain, trepidation percolating in his stomach, but what he found on the other side was anticlimactic to say the least: It was dead silent on this side of the barrier.

Janus wasn't sure what he'd been expecting. He knew by now that the so-called "Lights" had issues working out their interpersonal issues, and this most recent conflict wasn't the kind of thing you just got over. It did follow that they would all go off to lick their wounds for a time.

Hesitantly, toe-to-heel, Janus crept down the hall. It felt for all the world like he was sneaking around a vast hotel, right down to needlessly ornate design on the plush carpeting. That was probably Roman's doing.

Janus focused, trying to call the Mindscape to work for him. He wanted to go to his room.

The Mindscape listened. Janus turned a corner and found a row of doors stretching down yet another brightly-lit corridor. His eye was immediately drawn, not to the brilliant yellow of his own door, but to the figure huddled in front of it: Patton sat with his arms wrapped around his legs, forehead resting on his knees.

"Looking for someone?" Janus asked, slightly louder than necessary.

Patton jerked his head up. "Oh! Janus!" He plastered an unconvincing smile on his face. "You sure pop star-tled me."

Scaring Patton hadn't brought Janus nearly the level of schadenfreude he'd thought it would. He crossed his arms over his chest, extending a third to help Patton up. "Take your time getting to the point.”

"Oh." Patton accepted Janus' proffered hand and got to his feet. Warmth spilled from him, permeating the fabric of Janus' glove and gently heating his palm. "Well, it's just…" He took a deep breath. "I noticed your door and I thought-- Well, I wanted to make you feel welcome!"

A high-pitched tone resonated in Janus' skull. He bit down on the inside of his cheek to keep from wincing at the mounting pressure-pain-exhaustion in his temples. "Aren't you just a saint ." Patton's face fell. Janus fought the urge to swear aloud. He usually had a better handle on himself, and he knew better than to alienate potential allies. "I mean, thank you, Patton. Truly. I appreciate it." Patton had proven himself useful. Janus should at least cultivate that relationship, even if it meant a little discomfort.

"Have you eaten?" Patton asked. "It's a little late, but I could make something if you wanted." He paused. "Maybe we could play cards or something." Another pause. "O-only if you want to, I mean."

Janus let his face remain impassive even as he internally cringed at the idea of staying awake for even another second. It would be so easy to brush Patton off with a few honeyed words and disappear beyond the barrier of his door. But Patton had stood up for him today, or at least he'd tried to. Janus sighed. Quid pro quo. "That sounds like an utter waste of time."

"Are you… I'm sorry, sometimes I can't tell when you're…"

"Yes, Patton. That sounds lovely."

Patton actually hopped in place, an adorable little jig that absolutely didn't send a confusing little shockwave of fondness through Janus' ribcage. "Really?"

"Really," Janus lied.

He followed Patton down the hall into the living room, which opened into the dining room and the kitchen. Janus studied his surroundings, trying to take in as much as his exhausted faculties would allow. Even in the absence of other Sides, the living room felt warm and welcoming. All the lights were on, and they bathed everything in gentle golden light .

"You're awfully quiet," Patton said.

Janus shook himself. "I was just getting my bearings."

"I guess you've never really been over here, huh?" Pattton opened the refrigerator. Was he actually going to cook , instead of just manifesting something? How quaint. "Do you like grilled cheese?"

It had been a long, confusing day. Doublespeak came to Janus as naturally as breathing, but he was obviously running circles around Patton even when he wasn't trying to. "Yes," he said, hoping to telegraph his sincerity by not emoting at all.

It seemed to work. Patton studied him for a moment before turning back to the fridge. "Then that's what I'll make."

Janus took advantage of this temporary distraction to clamber onto one of the barstools. The slick velvet of his capelet tended to disagree with surfaces like wood and vinyl, and he needed a moment to arrange things so he didn't look as unbalanced as he felt.

He watched Patton work in the kitchen, a detached coolness washing out the scene. Quid pro quo, he reminded himself when he felt his facade begin to slip. He owed Patton this.

He certainly didn't feel the slightest twinge of guilt, that he had been the one to orchestrate this breakdown. Yes, the Light Sides had loaded the gun, but in the end it was Janus who had pulled the trigger.

He shook his head and thought about playing cards, good Bicycle playing cards with holes punched through them like they'd come from a casino. "What should we play?" he asked, pulling the deck from his breast pocket.

Patton looked up from the stovetop, his eyes flicking to the cards in Janus' hand. "Do you know Kings in the Corners?"

"Not personally, no."

Patton laughed, but there was something cold about it. "It's really simple," he said. "I'll show you how to play and you can tell me if you like it."

--

It was nearly impossible to cheat at Kings in the Corners. Janus doubted this had been a calculated measure on Patton's part, doubted he had the capacity for that kind of foresight, but he respected it just the same.

They played in funereal silence, staring each other down across the light wood of the dining room table. Janus, ill-inclined to take off his gloves, utilized a napkin to keep from staining them with melted butter from the grilled cheese Patton had made. Neither one of them smiled. Neither one of them spoke.

Janus pulled a card from the deck to indicate the end of his turn and glanced up at Patton. His face was somber, almost sorrowful, and it clashed against the gentle domesticity of the dining room, with its floral table runner and mismatched placemats.

Janus started to laugh.

"What is it?" Patton asked, cheeks darkening. "What? Do I have something on my face?"

Janus swallowed down another peal of laughter and cleared his throat, unable to wholly restrain the smile tugging at the corners of his lips. "You look like I’m holding you here at gunpoint." It was somewhat ironic, considering Janus was the one who felt like he couldn't leave.

"What?" Patton smiled, but it was more akin to an offering than an expression of joy.

"It’s not really funny. " Janus wasn’t quite sure how to make Patton understand.

Patton sat back with a sigh, placing his cards facedown on the table. "But I guess it is pretty funny, huh? In a really sad way."

Janus almost asked what was sad about it before realizing that Patton probably missed his friends. Instead he said, "Yes" and stifled a yawn behind his free hand.

"I'll make coffee!" Patton leapt to his feet and was off to the kitchen before Janus could so much as blink.

The newfound solitude made it that much harder for Janus to ignore his headache, which had only worsened in the hour or so he'd been playing cards with Patton. Despite the nonchalant facade he'd tried so hard to project, he'd been holding himself tense.

Maybe the night (or morning, at this point) would be easier to tolerate if he had, say, a bit of gold rum.

The corner of a flask dug into Janus' hip. He smiled.

"Just how late are you planning on staying up?" he asked Patton when the latter returned holding two mismatched mugs.

"Oh, I don't know," Patton said. Lied. He set a mug down in front of Janus and then resumed his seat, the cards forgotten by his elbow. "I'm… A little scared of what tomorrow will be like."

Janus eased the flask out of his pocket. "Rum?"

"Oh, um," Patton said, staring at the flask. "I don't know…"

Janus raised an eyebrow, working something out. He landed on it a millisecond later: Patton wanted to be convinced. Easy enough. Janus opened the flask and poured what he hoped was a shot into his own mug. It was black, he noticed, except for the yellow snake that wrapped around it, its tail firmly in its own mouth. Ouroboros. "Surely you don't intend to make me drink alone?"

As Janus had expected, Patton buckled the second he was pushed. "I guess not."

It was funny, Janus mused as he carefully tipped rum into Patton's coffee, how lying was only off-limits when Janus suggested it. Hilarious.

But now wasn't the time for bitterness, now was the time to repay the debt he owed Patton. "Cheers," he said, pocketing the flask once more.

"Cheers."

Janus sipped his coffee. "You put milk in this," he observed.

Patton's smile was surprisingly sly. "I know you want me to think you take it black. Virgil did too, at first. I know you ‘Dark Sides’ have an image you like to uphold."

"And how does Virgil take his coffee now?" Janus asked, lifting an eyebrow.

"With Snickers-flavored creamer."

"Well, I do take my coffee black," Janus lied.

Patton's smile never faltered. "We'll see, kid-- Uh, Janus."

"Patton," Janus said, before he could start thinking about the implications of Patton wanting to call him 'kiddo,' "you are planning on sleeping tonight, aren't you?"

"Maybe eventually," Patton said, suddenly unable to look Janus in the eye. "At some point."

"Tomorrow will come whether or not you sleep. It's definitely better to pull an all-nighter and feel like garbage instead of facing everything with a clear head."

"I know." Patton leaned forward so he could rest his head on his hand.

For a moment, Janus was tempted to mirror him. Sitting up straight was becoming quite the chore. "I know how the others love a calm, rational discussion."

"Oh, I wish." Patton's expression turned wistful.

Janus stifled a yawn behind his hand. He had half-expected the coffee to counteract the depressant effect of the alcohol, but all he had to show for the combination was a racing heart.

"I'll be fine out here if you want to go to bed," Patton said. Without seeming to realize he was doing it, he brought his hand to his mouth and bit down on his thumbnail.

It was a tempting offer. A day ago, Janus would have taken it. After all, it wasn't like he cared about Patton outside of professional courtesy. They weren't friends. But guilt nagged at him and wouldn't let him entertain the idea of abandoning Patton for longer than a second.

"That's a remarkable impression of a window," Janus said, waiting for Patton to look confused before elaborating, "I can see right through you."

"You got me." Patton smiled sadly. "That's something I've always admired about you, Janus."

Now it was Janus' turn to be confused. "What?"

"You're so… clever."

Janus narrowed his eyes. "Please do keep trying to change the subject."

"It's just… I don't want to have to lie there and, and think about today and everything I did wrong. I hurt Thomas. I hurt my friends." Patton's eyes were shiny behind his glasses; the unshed tears sparkled in the light when he locked eyes with Janus. "Aren't you going to think about the same thing?"

Anger flared, perhaps prematurely, in Janus' chest. "About what you did wrong today?"

"About what you did wrong," Patton said timidly.

"I," Janus said icily, "didn't do anything wrong." He stared Patton down across the table, jaw set, daring him to push back. Let him lecture and nag, let him prove that he hadn't changed no matter what he said.

But Patton only nodded, his face lined with misery. "Okay," he softly. "I think you're right, Janus. We should go to bed."

Janus thought about how much faster he could get to bed if the table was cleared, and all the dishes and cards vanished in a blink.

"Um, Janus?" Patton said.

"Yes?"

"I don't regret everything that happened today."

"Oh?"

Patton only nodded and sank out.

Janus made a beeline for his own room; better to find his way there on foot rather than risk appearing in the wrong spot.

Once inside, he looked around to ensure nothing was amiss, eyes roving over the dark wood of his bookshelves and desk, his mirrored closet doors, the leather armchairs across from his bed.

Everything was exactly as Janus had left it. He nodded, satisfied, set his hat on the nightstand, and sprawled out of top of the covers without bothering to further undress.

One hazy thought crawled to the surface of his mind before he fell asleep: At least he wouldn't be one of the regrets haunting Patton tonight.

[rosethornewrites]

Fic: The Rebellion of Adrien Agreste, ch. 14

Relationships: Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir & Gabriel Agreste | Papillon | Hawk Moth, Juleka Couffaine/Rose Lavillant, Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir/Luka Couffaine, Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug & Kagami Tsurugi, Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir & Luka Couffaine, Lila Rossi/karma, Gabriel Agreste | Papillon | Hawk Moth/aneurism, Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug/Kagami Tsurugi, Plagg & Tikki

Characters: Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir, Gabriel Agreste | Papillon | Hawk Moth, Lila Rossi, Jagged Stone, Plagg, Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug, Luka Couffaine, Penny Rolling, Anarka Couffaine, Rose Lavillant, Juleka Couffaine, Kagami Tsurugi, Alya Césaire, Chloé Bourgeois, Wayhem, Nadja Chamack, Nathalie Sancoeur, Sabine Cheng, Tom Dupain, Tikki, Fang, Principal Damocles, Caline Bustier, Ms. Mendeleiev, original minor character, Alec Cataldi, Lila Rossi’s Mother, Sabrina Raincomprix, Roger Raincomprix, Mylène Haprèle, Le Gorille | Adrien Agreste’s Bodyguard, Nino Lahiffe, Nooroo

Tags: Lila Rossi salt, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Teenage Rebellion, Swearing, Bad Parent Gabriel Agreste, Crack Treated Seriously, Lila Rossi’s Lies Are Exposed, Cuddling & Snuggling, Luka Couffaine Needs a Hug, Paparazzi, Parentification, Marinette Dupain-Cheng Needs a Hug, Gabriel Agreste Needs an Aneurism, Uncle Jagged Stone, we’re all queer here, the spirit of punk is sometimes just being allowed to be yourself, Kagami Finds Her Groove, punk rock fashion, Savage Kagami, Marinette protection squad, Good Parent Sabine Cheng, Good Parent Tom Dupain, Protective Kagami Tsurugi, Protective Luka Couffaine, Bisexual Marinette Dupain-Cheng, Pansexual Luka Couffaine, Sharing a Bed, Pet Names, LGBTQ Character, LGBTQ Themes, Instagram, Bullying, Social Media, Anxiety, Makeover, Hugs, will cure your acne, Face Punching, Bad Ass Juleka Couffaine, Rumors, Protective Juleka Couffaine, Protective Adrien Agreste, Lawyers, Hijinks & Shenanigans, Holding Hands, accountability, mental health, Jagged Stone’s well-paid pet shark, How to Make the Evening News, Sexy eyeliner for days, one fish two fish Lila is a screwed fish, How to have fun and piss Gabriel off, Fuckery, sweet litigious karma, Alya sugar, lawyer shark doo doo doo doo doo doo, Schadenfreude, Bad Ass Alya Césaire, Gaslighting, abuse denormalization, Jagged likes his lawyers like he likes his pets: toothy af, Blood in the Water, Everything you didn’t know you wanted and some things you did, Gabriel Agreste is shark bait, Denial, Consequences, Principal Damocles salt, caline bustier salt, the impotence of Gabriel Agreste, snarky Nooroo, lies and the lying liars who tell them, Lila’s brain is a narcissistic hellscape, Lila’s mind is built like an Escher piece, Alec Cataldi salt, Adrien Sugar, wholesome salt, Fu Salt, Kwami Shenanigans, Nooroo is a little shit

Summary: Jagged's Shark! Doo doo doo doo doo doo!

Notes: Jagged’s shark! Doo doo doo doo doo doo! (@norakwami​ fault, there.) For real, though. Look up the lawyer’s first and last name for extra lulz. I research too much. And also I love puns. Also researched diplomatic immunity—Lila’s mom could refuse to waive it only for her bosses to override her and waive it anyway. And for serious crimes that’s sometimes the case. I wanted some Alya sugar here; yeah, she and multiple other people believed Lila and dismissed Marinette's concerns. The adults are the ones who deserve salt, though. Not a 14-year-old.

AO3 link

Chapters 1-2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6 | Chapter 7 | Chapter 8 | Chapter 9 | Chapter 10 | Chapter 11 | Chapter 12 | Chapter 13

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They were still waiting for M. Damocles to finish contacting Mme. Rossi, Marinette having fallen asleep against Sabine and Adrien tempted to follow suit, when a commotion caught their attention. Marinette blinked awake at the shouting.

Curious, Adrien got up to peer around the corner. What he saw left him gaping.

Mme. Bustier’s class had spilled out of the classroom, and were watching as Lila and her mother yelled at each other in rapid-fire Italian, both red-faced. It was almost shocking how they met the stereotype of the hot-blooded Italian in their fervor.

Adrien watched, captivated, only vaguely aware when he was joined by the others, and when the lawyer knocked on the principal’s door and let him know about the “spectacle,” as she called it.

Marinette cried out, her face pale, pointing at a butterfly hovering near the scene. Alya took out her phone to record it, her face a mix of horror and excitement, as though she wasn’t sure she wanted an Akuma just now. Mylène started crying. Juleka moved protectively in front of Rose. Other classroom doors were opening as teachers and students alike came to investigate the commotion.

The Akuma hovered, seemingly uncertain as to which of the Rossis it wanted to go after. Unfortunately, Lila saw it, her expression brightening as she dashed toward it.

“I’ll show you all!”

Adrien gasped as the girl touched her pendant to the Akuma and a familiar butterfly-shaped mask appeared over her face. She would come after him and Marinette, and probably Luka and Kagami. And Jagged and Penny and the lawyer and Tom and Sabine… They were all defenseless. He wasn’t sure he’d be able to get away quick enough to protect them.

As he stood there, frozen, Alya dropped her phone, rushed forward, and clocked Lila in the face. Once she was on the ground, she ripped the necklace from her neck. Mme. Mendeleiev rushed forward with a large beaker from her chemistry lab as Alya broke the pendant, capturing it and covering the opening with a book.

Marinette rushing past him unfroze Adrien, and he ran after her as she hugged a pale, panting Alya.

“Alya, that was amazing,” she breathed. “You saved everyone.”

“Mari— Oh, god, Mari. She wanted to be Akumatized. She was going to go after you and hurt you, and I just couldn’t—” Alya was sobbing in her arms, babbling. “I’m so sorry I didn’t believe you. I’ve been a terrible friend! You tried to tell me, and p-protect me and instead I believed someone I barely knew instead of you. I c-couldn’t let her hurt you!”

As Marinette reassured her, Mme. Mendeleiev told a pallid and shaking M. Damocles that she would put the Akuma somewhere Lila couldn’t reach it for Ladybug and Chat Noir to deal with later.

Lila was keening softly on the ground, her nose obviously broken with this punch, and Adrien couldn’t help but feel a bit of schadenfreude at the sight. Her mother seemed frozen in shock, not even moving forward to comfort her daughter.

“Alya got the Akuma on video,” he murmured, thinking aloud. “So there’s video of Lila going after it to be voluntarily Akumatized.”

Nino picked up Alya’s phone, checking to see that nothing was broken. He pressed the screen to stop the recording. “Yeah, dude. She totally did. Sabrina, you might wanna call your dad. This is big.”

Sabrina immediately pulled out her phone and retreated into the classroom; Chlo�� blocked the door to make sure Lila didn’t try to stop her, though it seemed unnecessary—the girl gave no indication she’d heard.

M. Damocles stepped forward toward Mme. Rossi. “We will need to have a conversation about your daughter, but perhaps that will need to wait until after her arrest.”

Mme. Rossi turned white, eyes wide. “A-arrest?!”

“Your daughter just knowingly and willingly attempted to aid and abet a terrorist, Mme. Rossi,” the lawyer said, not unkindly. “She will face far more than just the lawsuits by M. Stone, M. Dupain, and Mme. Cheng.”

She stared at the lawyer as though uncomprehending.

“Of course, you could claim diplomatic immunity for your daughter, but it is likely she will at least be expelled from France, though France may choose to refer this matter to the Court of Justice of the European Union, as anti-terrorism laws extend beyond our borders.”

“Who are you?” Mme. Rossi finally demanded.

The lawyer smiled her best shark smile. “I am the head of M. Stone’s legal team, Maître Eulalie Reschignier.”

Adrien tried not to smile when he realized her name was almost a pun.

“My daughter has diplomatic immunity from all lawsuits, as I’m sure you are aware.”

The shark smile became a bit toothy. “We’re aware of that, but also aware that she can be expelled from France at the discretion of the French government.”

Whatever response Lila’s mother intended to give was interrupted by the arrival of Lieutenant Raincomprix and a retinue of other officers.

Nino stepped forward and played the video for the officers. Afterward, Roger approached the still-crying Alya to explain they’d have to take in her phone as evidence until the file could be processed. She just nodded, accepting the temporary loss; she hadn’t let go of Marinette yet.

Then he turned to Mme. Rossi. “We’ll have her injuries checked at the station, but it appears your daughter was attempting to voluntarily become an Akuma. While Akuma victims are never prosecuted, this is a very different issue.”

Mme. Rossi balked. “My daughter has diplomatic immunity!”

“We’re aware,” Officer Raincomprix said with a nod. “Since she has diplomatic immunity, she’ll be moved to a facility outside of Paris pending her likely expulsion back to Italy. Since she attempted to aid and abet a terrorist, your home country will decide whether to waive her diplomatic immunity, but regardless she is too dangerous to keep in Paris.”

That silenced Mme. Rossi, as she realized the limits of the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations.

Several officers helped Lila off the ground and led her down the stairs toward the school entrance, followed closely by Mme. Rossi.

Adrien breathed a sigh of relief at their exit. He doubted they’d ever have to deal with Lila again—at least not in person. And he was willing to bet Italy would take a long hard look at her. Meeting Marinette’s eyes, he could see she was having similar balming thoughts; it’d take them all a while to heal from this—especially if the tears still streaming down Alya’s cheeks and the guilt in her eyes were any indication—but they’d move past this somehow, and hopefully their relationships would all be strengthened.

M. Damocles cleared his throat. “Are we finished here?”

Jagged’s smile was almost malicious. “I don’t think so. Eulalie?”

Maître Reschignier turned to the principal. “It seems Mlle. Rossi’s removal from class will no longer be necessary. Instead, we seek anti-bullying and anti-harassment training for all school personnel in addition to the investigation into the treatment of Mlle. Dupain-Cheng.”

Adrien couldn’t help but notice the elated smile that graced Mme. Mendeleiev’s face briefly, taking years off her appearance, before disappearing under her usual scowl. She, at least, was clearly not opposed to any of that. Mme. Bustier, however, looked displeased—and given that she’d rolled over multiple times to enable both Chloé and Lila, he wasn’t surprised.

The lawyer smiled, this time sincerely, at Adrien and Marinette. “I believe M. Agreste and Mlle. Dupain-Cheng would be best served returning to their class while M. Stone, Mme. Rolling, M. Dupain, and Mme. Cheng iron out the specifics with you in your office, M. Damocles.”

“Ah… Of course, Maître Reschignier.” The principal pulled out a handkerchief from his breast pocket and wiped his brow. “That seems best.”

Mme. Bustier gestured to enter the classroom. As Adrien moved past the lawyer, she murmured, “I do hope your father will present more of a challenge, M. Agreste.”

He couldn’t hold in his laughter—oh, Adrien hoped she wrecked Gabriel Agreste.

And that he had a front-row seat when she did. And maybe some popcorn.

[ladyhallen]

Stormbringer

part 1| part 2| part 3

Amidst the carnage, one building stood out for how undamaged it was.

Fon stares.

He didn’t usually indulge in knock-out drag-down brawls the way most people with Storm Flames did. It caused too many casualties and made the sour taste of guilt well up in his stomach after he’d seen the damages.

Of course, he was usually well away by the time the haze of Storm-frenzy left him, so the guilt wasn’t usually severe, but this time.

This time, he’s still on site when the haze leaves him and he sees the most definitely destroyed town.

Thankfully, there’s not much dead, given that it’s in the middle of the afternoon and everyone would be at work and not at home.

But. That’s one pristinely undamaged building.

Its taking Fon’s attention from what pissed him off in the first place and he knows it. He focuses his energy on it so he doesn’t slip under again.

“What in the world?” he asks.

He blinks, allowing Storm Flames to coat his eyeballs for a moment and... There’s no signs of Mist tampering on the building, or any other Flame help. It’s just standing all by itself, having survived Fon’s rampage where all its other fellows did not.

Curiosity gets the better of him and he enters the building. He’s aware that he should be well away from the town before the authorities and curious reporters arrive but peeking would only take a moment.

A bell jingles merrily when he opens the door, at complete odds with how grimy and blood stained he is. The inside is just as pristine and untouched as the outside, the shelves lined with small boxes, and those boxes filled with shining gems.

A...a trinket shop? A trinket shop managed to withstand his overwhelming Storm Flames untouched?

“Welcome to Harry’s Emporium of Charms, Luck or Otherwise!” a petite woman greets from the counter with a smile. “What are you seeking, stranger and how may I help you?”

The foreigner didn’t even bat an eye at the blood on his clothes, or the bloody knuckles that were slowly dripping blood on her clean floor. She just gave him a soft smile, patiently waiting.

“I was...curious,” Fon says. He eyed her dark hair thoughtfully. She looked as innocuous as her store, but the look in her light eyes told him that if he tried anything here, he would not be coming out of it unscathed.

“That is one reason to enter the Emporium,” she answers. “But what are you seeking, stranger?”

Fon remembers why he was angry in the first place and red filled his vision again before he quelled it forcefully. It took several deep breaths before he could remember where he was again.

“I need,” he says with carefully leashed violence. “Something to help me keep my temper. I am somewhat prone to loosing it when something triggers me. Other than that, I am mostly calm.”

“Mostly,” she agrees, for the first time making a reference to what he’d done outside. “What do you say you need more though, Reason or Patience?”

Other people asking this would get Dragon punched into the next life. The woman, however, wasn’t asking out of schadenfreude, or the intent to use it against him later.

“A mix of both,” he says.

She gets up from behind her table and went to one of the many boxes lining the walls of her store. She chooses three charms and, after a long thoughtful look at him, a sturdy looking red thread.

“You use your body often,” she says, more to herself than to him, glancing at his bloodied knuckles and bruised wrists, “And you would object to having your ears pierced, of course.”

Fon nods. He watched her fingers deftly twist the wire into shapes, looping it through one stone, then another, adding a decorative bead that shone, adding the last stone and somehow making it beautiful.

“What do you think about bells?” she asked again, producing a box of bells of all shapes and sizes from under the table.

He likes bells. But given his work, it would be inadvisable to wear one. With a pained expression, he tells her so.

But the woman isn’t deterred. “Try one,” she says, holding out the box to him.

Just to please her, he takes the smallest one and shakes it, releasing a small chiming sound that...sounded five seconds after he shook it.

“How,” he gasps out in shock.

Her smile is cat-like. “Trade secret. So. A yes for the bells?”

He nods. She adds it to the charm and it looked incredibly beautiful. Even if her charm turned out to be a hoax, he would still wear it.

“Where?” he asks.

She gestures to his hair and he realizes that the long tail he usually wore it in had slipped loose. She’d included a long, slightly elastic end that he used to tie his hair up, slipping his old hair tie into his pocket.

Impossibly, he felt calmer the second he placed his hands down. The bells jingled when he moved his head, the slight delay unnoticeable unless one was using the sound to track him down.

He breathes and didn’t feel the rage shimmering under his skin. Instead, it banked available until he deliberately called it.

“How much do I owe you?” he asks.

The amount she said was a more pittance compared to the peace of mind he would have for as long as the charm would last.

“A year,” she answers when he asked if he should get another one. Then, she looks at him closely. “Maybe less. You are...very powerful.”

He buys five more. Just in case.

Fon leaves the store, mood considerably brighter than when he entered it. That is, until he saw the police outside.

.

.

Fon didn’t tell anyone about the charms, or the woman who sold it to him.

He did get a reputation as the Eye of the Storm for how calm he could get, right until he eviscerated someone with a smile.

He did, however, drop by her shop whenever he had time. He owes her too much just to disappear on her.

Not that she took it that way.

“Welcome to Harry’s Emporium of – oh for goodness sake, it’s you again,” Harry cut off her spiel, looking exasperated and annoyed.

“Hello Harry,” he greets her with a slight bow and the chime of bells. “I bought you cake.”

She huffs and puts down the wire cutter, turning around to put the kettle on.

“What were you going to do with the wire cutter?” he asks, placing the box down on her working table.

“I was working on a commission, I would have you know,” she says. “Because I don’t just sit around and hope someone comes in.”

That is a sore point for her, given that he’d asked her that in one of his visits. How is he supposed to know that is insulting?

Her irritation melts the moment she opens the box. “Lemon cake! This will go well with some of that tea you gave me. I still have some left.”

She bustles around him and Fon feels the tension gathered around his shoulders bleed out. Harry exuded that incredibly calming presence that he’d never found anywhere else, not even those with Rain Flames or Sky Flames.

It was that surety of where she stood in the world, that confidence that no matter what would happen, she’d still be standing afterward. It was incredibly attractive to Fon, who only had the clothes on his back, and the orders of his Master to fall back on. Everything he had belonged to the Triads.

He would stock up on the calm Harry exuded until the next visit.

“Thanks for coming to visit,” Harry tells him after the cake had been eaten and the remainder packed away inside her little kitchen. She hands him a packet of cookies that is tied with another charm for luck. Harry keeps giving them away, it is a wonder she still made a profit. “I’ll miss you,” she sighs.

Fon would admit that he is an oblivious bastard. But even he could hear what she means with those words.

It takes all he has not to kiss her. It is too soon, and she doesn’t need the kind of man that would only show up sporadically.

“I’ll miss you too,” he sighs out, putting his forehead against hers, looking into her eyes. This close, he could see that they are a light color, green with flecks of gold and blue. It is incredibly enchanting and he could stare at them for hours.

But the appointment with Checkerface is waiting, as well as the promise of a challenge.

“I’ve got to go,” he murmurs.

Harry lets out a hitched breath when he releases her and Fon closes his eyes against the sheer need that flooded him.

[gothgirlmahi]

All That’s Best Chapter Five

Dark!Steve x Reader

Masterlist

Warnings: non con, dub con

Steve woke with a start, searching his surroundings. He was laid on his back, tied down to a metal examination table. Something was lodged in the side of his neck but he couldn’t maneuver to see what it was. A dim light flickered above him and from what he could see there wasn’t anything or anyone else in the room but him. The room was a little box, probably not bigger than fifteen feet in either direction with a door in front of him.

HYDRA. It had to be HYDRA. He had enemies but no one else had incentive or means to actually kidnap him from his home. The fact that he was living in the middle of nowhere surely didn’t help. He had to wonder how they bypassed his security system. There were sensors nearby the house to let him know when people approached and as far as he knew, none of them had gone off. Whatever they were doing, he was sure they were up to no good.

His thoughts immediately jumped to you. You had been in the house with him, looking terrified as he left you in the bathroom. That was all he remembered before he was out. He hoped you were okay. His entire intent had been to protect you and now you were possibly in danger because he was reckless. Because he got too comfortable. It had been stupid to think he could get his happily ever after. Wishful thinking on his part.

A clicking noise came from beyond the door. Mechanical shifting and grinding of metal. The door was opening. He was prepared for any number of scenarios. For a HYDRA agent to come in and demand information from him, torture, someone attempting to murder him...but he couldn’t have been prepared for what he saw.

In walked his girl, looking healthier than ever, holding his shield and a little remote in your hand with a black bag hanging off your shoulder. You had a bounce in your step and a happy little smile on your face. You struck a pose with his shield and laughed.

“This thing is sturdy, but it’s kind of weird how bad guys never aim at your legs.”

“Where am I?” he demanded.

“Disney World. Now say ‘ah.’” You set down his shield dug through your bag until you pulled out a thermometer. He wouldn’t open his mouth when you came close so you put it away.

“I just needed to check something.”

“Who are you?”

“I don’t know how I can make it more clear without tattooing HYDRA on my forehead. Welcome to the organization.”

Steve had shadowed you for weeks. Knew your schedule, what you liked, where you went and who you talked to. This didn’t make sense. You couldn’t have been a HYDRA agent because, for all intents and purposes, there was no HYDRA. At least not one cohesive group anymore. The Avengers made sure of that.

Furthermore, if you were a HYDRA agent at the time he met you, why were you lying half dead in one of their bases, tied to a chair? Maybe they had broken into the house and convinced you to do this. Convinced you to turn against him. He supposed you would have been easy to turn against him, considering recent events. But did you hate him enough to pledge allegiance to HYDRA? There were a million questions swirling in his mind.

“I’m not joining you.” You had welcomed him to the organization. Whether it was a petty jab or a genuine offer, he didn’t care.

You didn’t say anything, just dug around in your bag again. He heard the noise of metal sliding against something and saw you pulling out a knife. You made no move to use it and set it on the table next to him. You hardly looked at him as you spoke.

“You like rules, right? When I’m talking, that means you’re not. Rule 2, you try to escape, you get punished and I really don’t think you want me to be the one to punish you. Rule 3, you do what I tell you when I tell you. Do you understand?”

Steve didn’t say anything. His only response was a defiant glare in your direction. You nodded, taking his silence as an answer.

“Try again.” You hit a button on a remote and it sent Steve’s body into uncontrollable spasms. He was crying out in pain as the piece lodged in his neck made him seize. You hit it again and it stopped.

“Either you understand or I’m electrocuting you until you piss yourself or pass out. Your choice.”

“When I get out of here, you cunt—“

You hit the button again and this time let it go until he screamed and begged for you to stop. At least a minute or so. He swore he would follow the rules. You let it go a bit longer just to indulge yourself. The tears of pain welling in his eyes were all you needed and you stopped with a big smile.

“I’ll follow the rules.” His voice was low and hoarse from screaming and you smiled, very content with your work.

“Neat,” was all you said before picking up your knife, leaving and closing the door behind you. Steve heard some mechanical locking and some lights flashing on the other side.

He was beyond angry with you. After all he had done to protect you and care for you, here you were working for the enemy. He couldn’t even guess at what your intent was. Left alone with his thoughts, he toyed with the idea that this all could have been an elaborate set up. Did HYDRA know he would get attached to you? No, they couldn’t have possibly planned such a thing out.

Even if it was a set up to get to him, wouldn’t you have been more receptive to him? Though, he supposed he didn’t give you much of a chance before taking you from your home. He was suddenly reminded of the look on your face when you said you thought he was a better person than you.

He didn’t know why he did that to you. Any of it. Hindsight is 20/20 but he had to have known it would have blown up in his face. Life didn’t usually work out in his favor. Now he was here tied down at your mercy and you were the one with rules, wielding a knife and with very legitimate grievances against him.

No amount of analysis was making this make sense. He couldn’t reconcile you being tied up and nearly dead in a HYDRA base with you actually being a member. He also couldn’t figure out how, if you were a member, how you had correspondence with them without him noticing or, the alternative, why you weren’t having correspondence with them at all. How did they even know where to find you? Had they been specifically looking for you, or where they looking for him?

You came back later. Steve could assume an hour or so had passed. You walked through the door and it slid closed behind you.

Frustration was plain on your face.

“Contrary to what you may believe, I gather no schadenfreude from this, but I’m starting to think things happened like this for a reason,” you explained, pacing in front of the door.

“And that reason was?”

“You tell me, Steve. Why did you kidnap me?” 

“I wanted to protect you.”

You smiled at that, holding back a laugh like an inside joke with yourself. In the dim light of the room, your eyes met.

“And so you will.”

You approached the table he was on, staring him over once. You climbed on the table and straddled him, settling yourself directly on his crotch.

Steve jerked against the heat of your core against him. Your hips slid against his, slowly grinding. The two of you never broke eye contact.

Steve wished he could have his hands on your hips, guiding you against him. You were gorgeous, even in the dim lights of this awful room. Eyes still sparkling and filling him with hope. Your bodies were in sync. His hard length caressed your soaking core through the layers of clothing you all wore. Soft breaths left both of you as you ground against him. A perfect and natural rhythm until you pulled away suddenly.

Before Steve could utter any complaint, you were pulling off your pants and your underwear before sliding his own down to reveal his cock. Your hand wrapped around it, squeezing lightly and jerking him off. He threw his hand back on the table, pushing himself up into your hand as best as he could with the restraints holding him down. Your eyes were hazy and lust filled as you stared down at him.

You stopped again and adjusted so you could slide down onto him. The moan that left your throat had him wild for you. Once he was completely sheathed in you, you both cried out. He bucked his hips up and you whimpered before taking up your own rhythm against him.

The look of you on top of him was something else. A great view he couldn’t have expected in this situation. Although the whole thing was less than ideal, this had to be a perk. Another odd behavior of yours that didn’t fit in with the rest of the information he knew. But he couldn’t focus on your motives right now. He could only focus on how tight you were around him. Memorizing the look of delight on your face while you rode him.

“Oh, fuck, Steve.”

“You’re so beautiful.”

“Shut up—fuck!”

He was jerking his hips up into you at a violent pace. One of your hands slid down to your clit, rubbing against yourself fiercely.

“I hate you, I hate you so fucking much,” you whined. Steve smirked.

“You look like you’re enjoying riding my dick.”

You slapped him as hard as you could with your free hand. His head jerked back against the table but it seemed to make him all the more determined to fuck you harder. After all, that was the extent of what he could do in his current position. It was sad. He was so starved for your touch that even that felt good. Any time you chose to touch him just set his body alight.

You were close to orgasm, legs shaking and your body losing its rhythm above him. It was no matter because he was steadily pushing into from below. Slamming into that spot you needed him most while your clit was stimulated from your own touch.

He was panting, eyes rolling back as you bounced on top of him. He was close, too. A giggle left your throat.

“Are you gonna come for me? You wanna come in my pussy?”

Just your words were enough to send him over the edge. He groaned, releasing inside you and trying to pump himself deeper. You rubbed your clit quickly, getting off on how good he looked below you. Powerless. Submissive. Completely yours to control.

You came, squeezing around his oversensitive cock and moaning his name. By the time you climbed off of him, Steve’s eyes were closed and his body was relaxed. You stood near his face and caressed his cheek.

“Good boy.”

.....

Taglist: @princessdancingonthesunshine @sllooney @americasass81 @shippers-heart @villanellevi @boinkybornes @imrachellester @xoxabs88xox @momc95

Masterlist // Chapter Six

[newbornwhumperfly]

the ink bled right through...

CW: allusions to attempted non-con

so i love @much-ado-about-whumping and i love their beautiful characters – Déomas and Rhys – and i love writing spinoffs of other works rather than my own stuff (hehe) so here we are!!!

you’re so inspiring & kind, Bel, so here’s A Thing insp. by your boys and your love of sartorial whump!

title from “colour me in” by damien rice

~

Déma is rumpled.

It is the first thing which catches Rhys’ eye as he stumbles upon the slighter figure in the hallway to Rhys’ office. There is at times an aura of disheveled roguery Déma has, making what Rhys would deem sloppy in another person seem dashing. Daring. Charming…like it suited him somehow.

Yet now, there is nothing of the windswept to his hair, auburn strands sticking up here and there like the mop of an unruly child, ruffled by his mother. His shirt is crumpled, creased, unevenly untucked. A button on his trousers is undone halfway up and the lacings are loosened, partially-tied, as though they had been yanked.

Furthermore, the way he darts at Rhys’ rounding the corner puts him in mind of a spooked horse. Rhys glimpses the whites of Déma’s eyes before the man crooks a smile at him. 

“Hey, Rhys. Just heading to grab a quill from your office.”

Rhys frowns.

“Are you alright, Déma?”

The smile is...wrong. He didn’t meet Rhys’ eyes and as Déma tucks a strand of hair behind his ear, Rhys sees - 

“Are you hurt?”

A scuff, berry-red, sits bright on Déma’s temple. But when Rhys goes to brush his hair back, to see, to help, Déma glides back. The whites show once more and the smile flattens, paper-thin.

“It’s nothing, mother.”

“Don’t give me that, Déma, what happened?”

Déma opens his mouth to speak and pauses. His gaze, unsmiling and skittish, darts over Rhys’ face before he shrugs into an airy reply.

“If you must know, Sir Percy and I had a...small tiff. About my...availability to his, ah,  affections. His feelings were hurt but he’ll...he’ll get over it.”

His smile broadens, razor-edged, and now, closer, Rhys sees his rosy lips are darkened. Bitten. 

Rhys’ stomach floods with ice and his hand flies to his rapier.

“Sir Percy? He, Déma, did he hurt you?”

A stupid question. Rhys’ gaze rakes over Déma again, taking the detail in with new horror. 

He imagines the man in question. Taller than Rhys, heavier, threat stocked in wide shoulders and massive arms. A brutish man. He imagines those meaty hands on Déma and the ice melts, boils, turns to anger with a dizzying speed. 

“Where is that bastard?”

He’s gritting words through his teeth, flushed, aching to fight. Déma frowns and narrows his eyes, a cloud darkening in his expression. 

“I appreciate you’re such a gentleman, Rhys, but it’s all quite in the past now. Under the bridge, if you will.”

Déma quirks his eyebrows, grins – thin, sharp, bright as foil – and tosses his head back, flicking Rhys’ concerns away like a fly and the fringe of his hair slips to veil his left eye, to hide the mark on his temple.

Rhys has the sudden thought that this was his intent.  

“Déma, this son of a bitch hurt you, you can’t just expect me to do nothing.”

He’s hot. He’s burning up. He needs to spread that fire to something else, to watch it burn, to hurt whoever saw fit to touch and take and harm because they possessed some modicum of power. 

He grips his pommel harder and harder and doesn't even realize he’s taken an urgent stride forward until Déma starts again and steps back again, putting space between himself and Rhys. The wariness which burns, bright, in Déma’s eyes makes Rhys feels scorched by it. He wants to cry but instead he widens the space by stepping back himself. 

“I’m, fuck, I’m sorry, Déma-”

“It’s fine. Just...just don’t make this-, Rhys, don’t-, just let it go. Alright?”

Rhys bites, hard, on the inside of his cheek, the throb easing the harsh thrum in his veins. His muscles, defined with swordplay and archery, clench around his hot blood, as useless in their strength as his fury-sorrow-frustration is sitting idle in his veins. He feels helplessand he hates it. He trembles with the want – the need– to help.

But…

Déma is glancing up at him through the russet locks, coy – yet his bitten lip is worried by his teeth and there’s a tension coiled through him, the coquettish brace of hands on hips failing to disguise how his slim shoulders are hefted nearly to his ears and his dark eyes are watchful, wary…a plea in the pinch between his brows.

Rhys wants to push but this isn’t about what he wants – it’s about what Déomas wants.  

He also has some sense – an instinct unique to his lover – that Déma is fragile right now and any indelicate word, any sudden touch, will make him spring, snap shut like a mousetrap. So he breathes. Releases his tension with his exhale. Unclenches his fingers from his sword-hilt, palm swirl-grooved from the carved pommel, and – slowly – reaches for Déma’s chin. Cups it, rubs the cleft with his thumb, soothes. Cradles Déma’s neck, thumb soothing there too, circling behind the ear. Tries to cool the heat of his fury to a tender warmth, to pour his desire to protect, his concern, his fondness for Déma into his touch.

“Of course, Déma. Whatever you need.”

Déma sighs and with the breath, the ribbon of tension untwists in his body. He allows himself to be soothed and Rhys knows he made the right choice. Déma’s dark eyes soften and the sharp edge of his grin has dulled when he pecks at the ball of Rhys’ thumb, nuzzling, feline and malleable.

“Thanks.”

Rhys’ heart takes its turn to clench now, like a fist behind his ribs, the muscle seizing in his chest, creeping up to his throat, on all the things he wants to say – vows, reassurances, pleas.

But all he does is pair his palms in a cradle of Déma’s face – so sharp and so soft and so precious – and swoop into a kiss.

Demá hums into Rhys’ hungry mouth and when he pulls away, a bit breathless, he’s bright again. 

“Well, speaking of water under the bridge, I’m all messy anyhow. Want to, uh, help me tidy up?”

Rhys slides his fingers through Déma’s hair, skimming his brow, kisses his mouth again, his little nose, his temple. 

“Of course, Déma.”

It will have to be enough.

For now.

~

Sir Percy was jumped. 

Or at least, that is what the chambermaid whispers to a fruit vendor, the murmured gossip snagging Déomas’ ear as he pays for a plum (and sneaks another, smaller plum for good measure). If the girl was to be believed – and she should really learn to whisper better, not that Déomas is complaining, but honestly – the knight was allegedly accosted by a masked man upon venturing home. The maid caught a glimpse of the aftermath, her master howling and cursing up a storm.

Broken fingers. Busted nose. Battered ribs. Shoulder sprained so badly it was nearly wrenched from its socket. Two black eyes and many a sore spot. He’d also, the little maid recounted with a note of glee, been kicked between the legs quite a lot. 

Déomas did not blame her one bit for her schadenfreude. Sir Percy was well-known for his wandering hands – it is good riddance they are hurting now. Some might call it poetic justice or even divine intervention.

Personally, Déomas scoffs at the notion of a deity and if there was one, they certainly seemed to possess the same biases as mere mortals by dropping further favor into the fat laps of those born favored. However, it is nice that the pervert got knocked down a peg or two.

Déomas rolls his shoulder - the bruise hidden below his shirt still sore, purple shadows lingering from the demanding clutch of meaty, mail-gloved fingers - before taking a bite of his plum.

A thought tickled at the back of his skull but it was swept aside as he wove his way between stalls, hunting and gathering remaining fruits – fresh fat berries of red and black and blue – in preparation for supper. He was baking a tart and it was going to be sumptuous and Rhys would agree.

He wasn’t baking it forRhys – Déomas loved pie. He would certainly do this all for himself, whether Rhys were involved or not. Certainly.

By the time the evening hour rolled around, a crisp, golden pastry is cooling on the sill of Rhys’ office. Déomas had charmed a flask of sherry off the cook and a sparkling compliment had left a glow to her wrinkled cheek as she thrust the bottle at him, grumbling something which sounded suspiciously like insufferable.

Rhys, however, is uncharacteristically late.

Déomas is sipping at a refill of his glass of sherry when Rhys sweeps through the door, apologizing profusely, dropping a soft kiss, another, once more to Déomas’ brow, breathlessly detailing some tale about horseshoes and cobblestones and really believingit would take an hour and Rhys is so fretful that Déomas forgives him immediately, scarcely pouting at all as he mellows under the kiss. He cannot be all that upset with anyone who says Déma so sweetly and is so very handsome.

Déomas blames the quite excellent alcohol for that thought.  

He blames the sherry further for the fact that it takes him a good while to notice that Rhys is…less than perfectly put together.

Rhys’ doublet is rumpled. A closer peek shows a seam has split along the shoulder at one spot, disrupting the perfect symmetry of stitches.

There is a spot of blood, nestled like a gem with the creamy folds of linen.

“Déma, I’m so sorry, I...I lost track of time. i had to take care of something and it got away from me.”

If Déomas were a little more sober, he might nod and smile and tell Rhys not to mention it. He really might just pull Rhys into a chair, straddle him, and kiss him senseless. But Déomas has never left anything he should leave be well enough alone and there’s a nervous weight to Rhys’ shoulders which provokes Déomas’ curiosity. 

“Bullshit.”

Rhys seems to very nearly drop his sword, setting it upon the desk with a heavy thump.

“D-Déma?-”

“Bull. Shit. What’d you do?”

Déomas is not suspicious. Nothing so childish. Nothing so jealous. He is...worried. Rhys looks heavy. A weariness lays over him - he has had to do something, something he doesn’t like, and there’s something about that which Déomas doesn’t like. Not at all. 

Rhys raises his chin, his deep, dark eyes direct and bold in the firelight.

“You won’t like it. But...if you ask me, I’ll tell you the truth.”

Déomas gazes back, just as steady, just as firm, and nods. 

Rhys sucks in his cheek, biting, he does that when he frets, and sinks into the chair beside Déomas.

“I know you told me not too...do anything. About him.”

Rhys spits the pronoun like poison, like he wants to get it out of his mouth, and Déomas doesn't ask him to clarify. He just waits, only the crackle of the blaze in the hearth disturbing the pregnant space between them. 

“I tried to make it random. Something which couldn't be tied to, to anything in particular. But I...I had to. I had to do something, Déma. Someone like him can’t just believe he can do this. To anyone. But especially...especially not to you. Not in my own home. Not ever. So I...hurt him. Nothing permanent. Less than he fucking deserves. But...something.”

He finally looks away from the dancing tongues of orange, blue, red fire to glance at Déomas. His dark face is drawn tight with uncertainty. He is resigned. Resolute. Hopeful. But there is still that familiar tenderness, a concern and a care, to be found in his expression, rolling under and over the anxiety, spilling through the cracks, filling in the blanks. Ever-present. 

“I understand if...if you’re angry with me.”

Seized but an urge, nameless as it was undeniable, Déomas surges from his chair and drags Rhys into a kiss. It is hungry, messy and missing lips for cheeks, scattered, falling again and again, one kiss becoming dozens in his need to touch, to appreciate, to...to be near Rhys, as close as he can be. 

Finally, Rhys gasps for air, weakly chuckling as he presses their brows together and Déomas sinks into his strong arms, feeling folded up and held and safe. 

“You’re a mess.”

“Hardly.”

“Hmm. For you, it’s practically a pigsty. You’re a disgrace to your class, Milord Rhys.”

The man snorts, startled into indignity, as he pulls back to smile ruefully.

“Help me to tidy up?”

Warmth pools in Déomas’ ribs. He kisses - again - Rhys’ cheeks, his eyes, his mouth. 

He’s so beautiful. So good. So...Rhys. 

Déomas never wants to leave this warm room, these warm arms, this feeling, ever again. He does not say so. Instead, he drops a fleeting, final peck to Rhys’ lips.

“Gladly.”

~

well....there we have it!!! a lil’ softness

[queenofbaws]

UD/MoM: Of Mummy Men & Bathtub Soup - 3

Chapter: 3/? Chapter title: What goes bump in the night Fic rating: T - Language, blood, light comedic body horror Chapter summary: Conrad has a plan. Author’s note: Reminder - this is also on AO3, where the texting actually looks like, uh...texting! Previous | Next ---

Driving with the CREEPs had been absolutely out of the question. Full stop. Period. End of sentence. Number one: He wasn’t about to get into that Mystery Mobile of Hartley’s, the second- or maybe even thirdhand piece of shit minivan that screamed of playdates gone by—no thanks. Number two: If he was gonna be spending the night with these dorks, he needed to squeeze in as much Conrad-time as possible before those floodgates opened. Number three (and this was probably the real heart of the matter): He knew he wouldn’t’ve been able to control his face as they zipped by Alex and JJ’s place.

Nope. Could not. In fact, even as he drove by it, all by his lonesome, he couldn’t help the way his eyes stuck to it, making his head turn until it was out of view again.

Their mom was out of her goddamn mind, calling that place a—wait, what had she called it again? A drafty…rickety thing? Some garbage like that. If that was her idea of drafty and rickety, by God he didn’t want to know what she’d think of his apartment in The Willows. She might actually go full fainting-couch on him, ‘Fetch the smelling salts!’ and all that jazz. But here? He hadn’t been lying when he told the nerds that this was where the rich SOBs had decided to set up shop; as a rich SOB himself, he felt especially qualified in his assessment that if even one of these suburban monstrosities didn’t have an in-ground pool in the back, it was only because the owners had filled it in to start the process of paving their own tennis court.

He jammed his turn signal on the second the understated-but-sophisticated (Mom’s words, not his) realty sign planted in the front yard caught his eye, slowing his roll so his ectoplasmic entourage would get the picture.

“Heeere we go…” Conrad muttered under his breath as his car smoothly glided into the driveway. He went to kill the engine, realizing with a snicker that he’d been humming the Ghostbusters theme to himself. “Oooh Jesus…oh God help us all, it’s contagious.” That got another laugh out of him—more of a snort, really—and count that as number four on his list of reasons why he was glad he hadn’t shown up to this song and dance with the creepazoids.

His eyes flicked to the rearview and he watched them begin the no doubt arduous task of maneuvering the minivan into the driveway in reverse, and while that might’ve been its own kind of entertainment, he had a good fucking feeling he’d be getting more than his fair share of Schadenfreude out of them tonight. Instead of watching, then, he unhooked his phone from its dock on his dashboard, unbuckling his seatbelt and sinking lower into that plush, buttery leather seating as he checked his texts.

JJ: Did you touch any of my stuff the last time you were here????????? JJ: Hello? JJ: Hellooooooooooooo????? Conrad: Omg why would I take any of your stuff? JJ: Because you’re a little sneak thief who doesn’t know how to keep his hands TO HIMSELF! Conrad: Now slow your roll there princess Conrad: What’s missing? JJ: My favorite bracelet Conrad: What, the black and silver one? JJ: OBVIOUSLY that one!!!

He reached down to the cup holder in his center console, popping the lid off his water bottle before bringing it to his mouth to take a drink, all the while pretending he didn’t see the lovely bracelet tucked away in the second divot. Was it black and silver? Hmm. Hard to tell, hard to tell…maybe if the person viewing it perhaps…squinted a certain way, or tilted their head to the side…or just kinda…looked at it.

Conrad: Oh man that sucks Conrad: Haven’t seen it though JJ: Uh huh JJ: Just like you haven’t seen any of the other stuff that’s gone missing around here JJ: SNEAK THIEF!!!!! Conrad: Look under the bed, lost shit always ends up under the bed Conrad: It’s like…a law of physics or some shit

Ah, but Julia wasn’t the reason he’d checked his texts. Don’t get it twisted—her being snippy about her stupid bracelet was fan-fucking-tastic because it told him without really telling him that she hadn’t noticed his car drifting through her neighborhood like a shark cruising for a school of sardines—but nonono, see, there was a different message he’d been hoping for.

Fliss: It’s due the Tuesday before break, I just checked. Conrad: Cool cool cool, all the time in the world then Conrad: So you got any fun weekend plans? Conrad: All work and no play yadda yadda

He sucked his teeth at the lack of response. Now, true, getting her number had been, oh, chef’s kiss, fantastic, but it seemed the charm boomerang hadn’t hit yet, huh? It was probably still whizzing its way through the air, just thuppita-thuppita-thuppita, zeroing in on its target like one of Cupid’s arrows. It would get there! Oooh, it would get there! It just…

Well, it hadn’t quite gotten there!

Yet.

His thumbs hovered over his phone’s keyboard as he thought of something witty to say, something that wouldn’t come off as skeevy or desperate or—

BANGBANGBANGBANGBANG!

“Jesus fucking Chr—” There was a pathetic noise as his phone tumbled out of his hands, half-fumbled, half-flung, and he dropped both of his hands onto his thighs, shaking his head and staring straight through his windshield as Washington continued to pound on the window only inches from his head.

Regardless of what they found (or didn’t find) in that stupid house, there’d be a haunting by the end of the night, all right. He was going to kill him.

He blinked once, twice, and then let his eyes roll towards the window. When Wash met his gaze, still knocking of course, Conrad pressed the back of his own hand to the glass, slowly raising his middle finger. It got him to stop knocking, but man alive it started him off guffawing like a goddamn goon, and honestly? Not a whole lot better.

Grumbling, he bent down to search the footwell for his phone, grabbing it up before jerkily opening the door, managing to get in a good, solid thwack to Wash’s side. “Insufferable, that’s what you are. In-fucking-sufferable.”

“Baby’s first five-syllable word! Color me impressed.” Asshattery or not, he hadn’t been raised in a barn, that Josh Washington—he offered one of his fists and Conrad knocked his knuckles against it, only sliiightly harder than friendly greetings usually called for. “Gotta hand it to you, Bishop…I was kinda expecting we were gonna pull up to nothing short of Grandma’s house, doilies in the windows and everything. This, uh…” he paused just long enough to cast a judgmental look about the property, “…this is not that.”

“Pretty sick, right?” He locked his car and slid his phone into his back pocket, glancing over his shoulder for only a moment to watch the rest of the geek squad struggle under the weight of unloading their equipment.

“Eh, I wouldn’t go that far,” Wash chuckled, jamming his hands into his pockets as he continued to look around. “You sure Mommy isn’t gonna get her panties all in a bunch over this? Us sneaking around and putting our grubby mitts on everything we see?”

“How about you save the snappy shit for the camera, how about that, man?”

Houses Washington and Bishop went back a ways, their storied meeting taking place right around the time Big Bob Washington himself had hit it big in the movie scene. Conrad was still a little fuzzy on the details of who, what, where, when, why, and how the blood pact or whatever had been formed (he had a suspicion it had something to do with investments or stock portfolios or some shit like that), but the moral of it all was the same: There hadn’t been a family holiday since as far back as he could remember that Josh wasn’t there, his lame-ass friends close in tow. His sisters too, but uh...well. Hmm.

Aaaaaanyway, it was for that reason that he knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that he would not keep the snappy shit for the camera. Wash was, in no uncertain terms, incapable of holding his lips together for more than thirty seconds at a time.

Except miracle of miracles, either someone upstairs had been listening or he was just real invested in putting on a good show for blondie, because their outdoor filming was carried out with the snark kept to a bare minimum.

It was magical, really, watching the change that came over those dorks when they were working on their stupid show. On the best of days—the absolute best—there were maybe two functioning brain cells between them, and even then, both of them were usually being used by Ash to memorize some sort of obscure literary trivia. But when it came to their pointless ghost hunting show, get out of the way! They moved like a well-oiled machine, setting cameras up for the best angles and shooting where the sunlight was best. It was almost impressive. Impressive in a decidedly pathetic way, sure, but like…impressive.

“So this is it, huh?” Sam asked as she joined him in front of the house, the others having already carted the king’s share of the equipment inside. “Crossing the threshold into Mummy Mansion. Well…definitely looks big enough to be hiding some ghoulies, I’ll give it that.”

He glanced up from his phone (and by extension the text thread he’d been trying to telepathically will Fliss to answer for the past twenty minutes or so). “Really wish you wouldn’t call it that,” he muttered, shoving his phone into his pocket again as he resigned himself to just not getting an answer. “Seriously ruins the ambiance of the situation.”

Having reached his daily recommended intake of goodwill towards man, Wash piped in from right behind him, “And what ambiance would that be, exactly? Because, uh, the spookiest part of this shit is the three-car garage, my dude.”

“You know, I seem to recall you saying you were desperate for help finding locations for this flop of a—oh, whoop, okay then…” He took a step back as Sam, seemingly done with their conversation, took it upon herself to head inside and leave the two of them on the stoop.

“Is that how you remember it?” Washington droned, “Because I seem to recall you accosting us at a party and begging that we come to this dump with you.”

“Begging? Begging.” He scoffed as loudly and derisively as he was able to (which turned out to be both very loudly and very derisively). “First off, I don’t beg. Especially not the likes of you.”

He kept scanning the property and the surrounding development, pulling one of his hands out of the pocket of his sweatshirt just long enough to flap his hand in his general direction.

Conrad grabbed the hand puppet in question and twisted it until Wash pulled away, giving him a good parting smack in the process. If any of the neighbors had been watching, he had to figure it would’ve looked, uh, not all that different from the slap-fights they’d gotten into as kids. “Let me humor you—humor you. Explain to me what I’m getting out of this arrangement, okay? Because let’s be real here, sure seems to me like you guys are the ones benefiting from this arrangement…”

“Oh, you mean besides your whole ‘I need you guys to scare someone for me’ thing?” Josh asked in an insulting (if not unpleasantly decent) impression of Conrad’s voice. “You get to tag along and pretend like you have friends for a night, so—”

That earned him a harder smack, but he pulled away just in time. Trying not to sputter, his laughter turned indignant. “O-oh, I can pretend like I have fr—fuck you, asshole.”

“Call ‘em like I see ‘em.”

“Newsflash dickwad, people love me.”

Washington raised his eyebrows. He said nothing.

This house was getting a new ghost tonight, no fucking question.

“Know what? I…” he drawled, yanking the front door open, “…don’t have to stand here and take this from you.”

“Sounds like someone’s feeling a little self-conscious all of a sudden.”

“This is why people hate psych majors, you get that, right? This? This moment right here? This is why everyone rolls their eyes in class when it’s icebreaker time and you go ‘Hi, I’m Josh, and I went into psych because I’m just really, really good at reading people.’”

“Awful lot of talk for someone whose feelings aren’t hurt.”

Oh, he just had to remind himself of the long con. This was a necessary evil, a building block for what was to come. This was the metaphorical five bucks he had to fork over to partake of the all-you-can-eat spooktacular later, so he could grin and bear it for now.

“I mean, I can’t blame you…it’s probably one hell of a treat to be able to surround yourself with people as compassionate and entertaining as we are, especially considering that rancid personality of yours.”

…yeah, he could grin and bear it for now, but he was absolutely murdering Wash later. With his bare hands. He was going to count how many different colors his face turned as he strangled the life out of him. His bet? Six.

He held his gaze for a moment longer, unwilling to so much as blink until he was inside the house. Then, to prove precisely how mature he was, he proceeded to slam the front door shut in his face, exhaling a relieved breath in the silence that followed. Conrad tugged his coat off and tossed it onto the stairs leading up from the entryway; the action felt unnaturally natural, if that made any sort of sense. He wasn’t sure why he was surprised…like, no duh it felt as though he was walking into Julia and Alex’s place—that was the whole point of this ordeal, wasn’t it? If the CREEPs got a solid feel for this place tonight, then it would be that much easier for the real job to be an in-and-out kinda deal later. Let them find the nooks and crannies to hide and hook up their fakey-fake bullshit now…reap the benefits later. A stellar plan on his part, really. Genius, almost.

A gust of wind blew his shirt hard against his back as Wash yanked the door back open, charging in with nary a sidelong glance his way. He did, however, manage to sneak in a horribly accurate backhand right under Conrad’s ribs, making him grunt and double over in surprise. “Hey, we’re starting in the basement, right?” he called up towards CREEP HQ, his mouth hooking into a smirk.

Leaning into view against the upstairs railing, something that looked suspiciously like an insulated lunchbox hanging from a strap on her shoulder, Ash offered up a smirk of her own. “That is where Conrad said we’d find our mummy, sooo…”

Long con or not, he was not about to stand here and get picked on by a bunch of AV Club nerds LARPing as Mystery Inc. “I didn’t say we’d find a mummy, I said someone already found a mummy!”

Half-pushing, half-shoving (at least until blondie joined them and Washington went back to being a dark, mysterious edgelord), they made their way down into the basement, walking carefully on the stairs. Everything in the house was well built, that wasn’t the issue, but without any carpeting or finish of any kind, the stairs felt a little…questionable. Rounded at the ends, maybe, and definitely, uh, made out of concrete. Or cement. Or both? Maybe both. Either way, they looked like they’d give you a hell of a bonk if you were unlucky enough to slip on them.

In his visits to the lovebirds’ nest, he couldn’t say he’d spent a whole lot of time in the basement. Like Julia and Mom had said during the dinner that started this whole fucking mess, the basements in this development were, uh…

Creepy! Creepy was the word. Hence the CREEPs.

“Yo, Conman,” Wash said, interrupting his surreptitious look around the place, “Your mom ever mention any of the previous owners using this place as a sex dungeon? Because let me tell you, I am…feeling that vibe.”

Ash’s disgust was palpable. “Josh, oh my God, could you not?”

“Could we get some lights down here maybe? I—” Both of the girls (and okay, maybe someone else, though they would remain nameless) gasped when Wash pulled the cord to the overhead light, plunging them into darkness. “Helpful,” Sam said flatly, “Mature. Professional.”

It wasn’t that he was afraid of the dark or anything like that—because he wasn’t—but he did not, under any circumstances or stretch of the imagination, trust these freaks out of eyeshot.

That didn’t turn out to be such a huge problem after all. As it turned out, the stairs weren’t the only janky part of the basement’s setup: something about the doorframe didn’t fit precisely right. It let a sliver of light from the entryway shine through, meaning once his eyes adjusted, he could see a bit more than he first thought. The Scooby Squad continued to act like buffoons, all of them bumping into each other in the dark until the recording light of Hartley’s camera popped on and Wash started rambling on about spirit boxes and communicating with the other side and blahdie, blahdie, blah.

Then one of them flipped something on and the world exploded into shrieking, ear-bleeding, brain-shattering static. That time he didn’t pretend—he jumped like a cat getting its tail stepped on, yowling just about as loudly. “Holy shitballs!”

For his part, Wash kept on his ghost host with the most bullshit, saying, calmly as could be, “Now, just to make sure none of what we’re saying affects what she’s hearing in the radio signals, she’s going to have these noise canceling headphones on…whenever she hears something from the box, she’ll call it out to us, right, Ash?”

In the silence that followed, Conrad blindly felt his way over towards Hartley, trying to position himself so he could get a halfway decent view of the camera’s display screen. Through it, he could see Wash and Ash, both perfectly eerie in the green light of night vision, their eyes made beady and black.

Another few seconds passed without Ash responding, and Sam cleared her throat from somewhere behind them. “Well. At least we know the headphones work.”

On the display, Wash paused, his forehead wrinkling. “Oh. Right. Uh. We’ll…fix that in post.”

Conrad couldn’t help but snort—and loudly, at that.

“Hey! Are you guys gonna leave me hanging the whole night?!” Ash snapped, way whinier than any tv psychic he’d ever seen. He could see her in the monitor, holding one side of the headphones away from her head, and even over the shrillness of her voice he could hear that awful static escaping from the headphones’ cup. “I’m already getting a headache! Can we get on this with? Puh-lease?”

He snorted again, quieter that second time, and began a slow circle around the main room of the basement. He made sure to keep the glowing square of Hartley’s display in his periphery to serve as a sort of buoy in case he got turned around in the dark. Was this what the others’ basement was set up like? He had to figure it was…like, if the rest of the house followed the same plan, then the basement would too, wouldn’t it? Stood to reason, at least.

Conrad walked along the back wall, skimming his hand along the exposed brick as he went, careful to test each of his steps before he put his full weight down. The floor was, much like the stairs, duh, made of cement or something like it, ancient dust crackling under the soles of his shoes as he walked. Whatever these people had used it for, he couldn’t say (hell, maybe Wash had a point with the whole sex dungeon thing, he could see it…), but the plan for the other house’s basement was to turn it into a gym.

Probably.

That sort of sounded right.

He hadn’t really been paying attention when JJ had started rambling about it.

Paying attention wasn’t really his thing.

As he walked, the CREEPs kept doing their stupid ghost stuff (“Is there anyone here with us? If there’s anyone—” “Sunday.” “Saturday, actually. You’re a little early, whoever you are! Do you have a name?” “Time. Go in. Apple.”), Hartley and blondie dark blobs behind the camera, Wash and Ash pale monstrosities in front of it. Whatever ‘spectral entity’ had taken it upon itself to control their spooky little radio…thing…clearly had a metric fuckton to say, though none of it seemed particularly helpful. Or, y’know, mummy-related.

For shits and giggles, he rapped his knuckles gently against the stretch of wall he was walking along, putting his ear close to try and hear for any sign of hollowness as Ash continued to spit out unrelated words.

“Stop. Open yard. Carpet.”

“Oh yeah,” Wash muttered at that. And oh, Conrad knew that tone. That was the temper-tantrum-on-the-horizon tone. Joshy-boy wasn’t all too pleased with the messages they were receiving from the Great Beyond. What a shocker. Like he expected lotto numbers or something. “Obviously. Carpet.”

“Oooh, maybe that means you should pull up all the carpeting. Maybe the mummy left a manifesto on the hardwood,” Sam offered, and though he couldn’t see her, he could hear the grin in her voice. It made him smile in turn.

Welly, well, well, well, he thought to himself, Guess I wasn’t too far off the mark when I said you’d sniff through his bullshit, was I, new girl? Know what? Good. Wash deserved a little pushback every now and then…he needed someone to remind him he wasn’t half as big as the britches he seemed to think he fit into. That twerp had had it too easy for too long.

Uh…other than the whole dead sisters thing.

A force of habit, Conrad shook himself out physically, flinging that line of thought right out of his head before it could catch like a hangnail. Instead of dwelling too hard on why it might be that the guy who’d lost both his sisters in the past year was suddenly so super obsessed with making contact with the dead, he made his way back towards their huddle, guided by the dim glow of Hartley’s camera.

“Ice,” Ash said, then again a moment later, “Ice?” And God help them all, that must’ve been the phrase that activated Hartley as a government sleeper cell or some shit because all at once he was singing the opening of that Vanilla Ice song, and that just would not stand. Someone had to put an end to that travesty.

“Let me try,” Conrad said, stepping out from the sidelines. He only had to feel around for a second or two before he made contact with Washington, shoving him out of frame to take his place.

“I’m sorry, is this your show?” he asked indignantly, nudging him right back.

Ah, but it was too late. Conrad looked up towards the dark ceiling, raising his voice until it filled the cavernous room. “Hey, uh, mummy man! Or…woman, I guess—the stories weren’t really clear on that front. Why won’t you let anyone live in this place, huh? Is it a territory thing? Or like…?”

“Okay, that’s it.” Warning? What warning? Before he could register what was happening, there was a pair of (pathetically scrawny) arms around his torso, jerking him out of the spotlight through sheer dumb luck. If he’d been paying attention to him, oh, there wouldn’t have been any chance of Wash getting the best of him like that, no sir, no ma’am. “This is why I said we didn’t want you coming, you fucking—”

He struggled against the impromptu bear hug…until his and everyone else’s attention was brought back to Ash. From that distance, the darkness only obscured the finer details of her face, so he could see the way she was half-hunched over, her hands pressing the headphones tightly to her ears; it was like she was trying to hear what was being said, or, probably more to the point given what he’d heard from the machine earlier, trying to keep up with what was being said.

“Answer me. Where? Cold call. Name. Help. Where? Answer me.” Something about the repetition, he was ashamed to say, brought a finger of chill running up and down his spine like a ghostly lover’s touch. “…gone.” With that, Ash whipped the headphones off of her head, holding them away from herself as though they were actually hurting her. “That’s it,” she said, the anxiety in her voice cranked to eleven, “I’m done. I am absolutely going to have a full-blown migraine in the morning.” She kept holding the damn things out, and like…

If no one else was going to take them…

Snatching them up from her, he shrugged, going to slide them over his own ears instead. ‘Going to’ being the operative phrase of course, as Wash made a grab for them immediately. A grab that missed. Conrad ducked out of his way just as Ash pulled the cord leading to the light, and the moment of confusion was the perfect excuse to put a few feet between the two of them. Once safely out of his reach, he put the headphones on, and…oh good Christ! The second the cushioned cups plunked over his ears, the rest of the world was swallowed up by dizzying radio static. Shit, did it need to be this fucking loud?! Did ghosts just whisper through this thing or what?!

“Oh shit!” he said at what he thought was probably a perfectly normal, non-shouting volume that no one could make fun of him for later, “This is so fucking loud! How do you guys do this?!” In front of him, the others’ mouths moved, but uh, if they thought he could hear them they were out of their goddamn minds.

Maybe they were still asking the spooky scary specters questions for him to answer. Eh, it was worth a try. Frowning, he really tuned into the random noises coming from the headphones.

“I think it just said ‘grapefruit?’” he said, shrugging as he looked their way. “It might’ve had more syllables though.”

And they all nodded, so something about that must’ve made sense to them.

Man, if this was all there was to ghost hunting, he couldn’t figure out why more people didn’t do it—this shit was easy peasy. Across from him, their mouths just kept moving, and maybe he wasn’t an expert in the field of paranormal activity or anything along those lines, but it seemed strange that they’d all be talking over each other like that. Wouldn’t that confuse the super-not-fake ghosts?

“It said ‘lamp?’ Maybe?” Another minute or so and he reached his limit: He had to take the fucking things off. Removing the headphones felt a lot like surfacing in a pool, like he’d entered a completely different atmosphere where the laws of sound were different. “Man, I get what you meant earlier…” he muttered, mostly to Ash, rubbing his ear with one hand and holding the headphones out to the group with the other, “My head’s fucking ringing, and—”

That was about the time he noticed they were laughing.

Hmm. Cool.

Great.

Fantastic, in fact.

“Okay, ha ha, what did I miss?” he asked, already suspecting he knew the answer.

Wash’s shit-eating grin told him all he needed to know about this particular reindeer game. “No idea what you could mean, my good man. Are you…are you accusing us of making fun of you while you couldn’t hear us?” He glanced from one of his friends to the next before assuming a perfectly punchable expression of insult, “Wow. Do you really think so little of me? Of us? Seriously, that says a lot about our friendship. Here I am, working for all these years to forge some kind of trust, some kind of bond, and you just assume—”

Oh yeah? Two could play at this game.

With a sniper’s precision he turned to Sam, lifting his eyebrows as he tipped his head down to her level. “Not for nothing, but you do realize that by choosing to regularly associate with this dickbag, you’re slowly but surely allowing yourself to get infected with…” he glanced up for only a second, flapping a dismissive hand in Wash’s direction, “…whatever’s going on over there, right?” He watched as her expression made the shift from one breed of amusement to another entirely, her head tilting to one side and her lips pursing into a sly smile.

Good.

Let the psych major deal with that.

“Did you have to sign some kind of waiver? ‘I hereby acknowledge my sense of humor, social standing, and sanity may be irreparably harmed in the process of joining Washington Pictures, Incorporated, etcetera etcetera ad infinitum?’ Something like that?”

She laughed, and oh he felt Washington roll his eyes. “Aw shoot…you know, it never even crossed my mind. I should probably look into that.”

Offering her both a sagely nod and the headphones, Conrad sighed, “You probably should.” When she didn’t take the god-awful headset out of his hand, he jiggled it temptingly. “But here, new girl, you wanna try and commune with the spirit world? I won’t lie to you…turns out it’s not all it’s cracked up to be. Well, unless you’re super into grapefruit, I guess.”

Sam held his eyes for another beat, and he realized with a brief sinking in his gut that oh no. It wasn’t only Wash’s shit this one could sniff through. The thought brought him neither joy nor comfort. Eventually, though, she took the headphones from him, shaking her head as she said, “Okay, okay…but only so I can say I know what it’s like.” She paused before putting them over her ears, eyes moving to each of them in turn. “I swear to God,” she started, lowering her voice into a deathly serious register, “If any of you three decide it’s gonna be funny to sneak up on me while I’m doing this…”

“Hey, no fair!” Hartley said, actually sounding legitimately offended, “Why didn’t you include Ash in that?”

“Because Ashley isn’t an asshole.”

Conrad snickered…and then stopped. “Hey!”

It seemed Ash had recovered from her time speaking with the other side, lucky her. She stood between Hartley and Wash, arms folded, averting her eyes as she said, “She has a point,” juuust loud enough to be heard.

“Man, whatever. Fuck you guys,” he shot back breezily enough, pulling his phone out of his pocket to see if he’d missed anything important during all of that.

“Y’know, for someone who insisted on coming with us for this, you’re sure not…hey, are you even listeni…”

He was not, in fact, listening to Hartley. Not to say he couldn’t hear him—he could—but fuck if he was listening, because there, right there, bright and bold on his screen was what he’d been waiting for.

Fliss: Define “fun weekend plans.”

Fuck the CREEPs. They could handle a few minutes of chit-chat with Casper on their own…he wasn’t about to miss this opportunity.

Conrad: Define fun, huh? Conrad: Tall order…

That time her response was all but instantaneous, dispelling every last ounce of uncertainty he’d had that morning. The charm boomerang was coming around, all right…collision course, baby.

Fliss: Call me crazy but I can’t help the feeling you and I both have very different meanings for the word. Fliss: Just a hunch I have. Conrad: Fun…fun…hmm…how does one…describe fun Conrad: Oh you know…dinner, dancing, partaking of frosty amber liquids… Conrad: You ever do anything like that? Fliss: “Frosty amber liquids.” Conrad: That doesn’t sound like a yes OR a no to me, leading me to the conclusion that maybe you need to be introduced to the wonders of FUN Conrad: If you’re looking for a guide into the wide, wondrous world of ENTERTAINMENT and RELAXATION, I should let you know I am both ready and willing Fliss: Uh huh… Fliss: I’m sure you are. Conrad: Would it sweeten the deal if my offer came with a satisfaction guarantee? Fliss: This will surprise you I’m sure, Conrad, but… Fliss: No? Fliss: I’m not sure it would. Conrad: Well if you check the fine print

That was where his text ended.

It was not where he had intended for his text to end, but it was where it ended nonetheless.

See, that was when Sam began screaming bloody fucking murder.

His phone clattered to the floor as he jumped a mile out of his skin, something dark flying a yard or so past his face until it crashed against the wall (later, he’d realize it had been the headphones). Whirling around, he saw Ash drop to her knees in front of Sam who, at some point during the past few minutes, had ended up on the floor herself, her legs splayed out before pulling tight to her chest. Her face was white as a newly bleached sheet, her eyes taking up the better half of her face, and maybe it was just the dark, dank basement thing, or maybe it was all the ghost talk, but holy shit the sight of her had his own pulse going at about five hundred miles an hour.

“Which one of you did that?!” she snapped, glaring first at him, then Hartley, then Wash, her lower lip threatening to start wibble-wobbling at any second.

His many, many years as an older sibling had taught him that particular expression was not the look of someone you wanted to fuck with, but…whatever she was talking about, he sure hadn’t done it. So quietly, helpfully, he pointed a finger towards the most likely candidate.

“None of us—” Wash began…at least until he saw him pointing his way, “Oh fuck you dude, you’re not helping! Asshole. You okay, Sammy? You get spooked?”

She wasn’t smiling. The fear and indignation on her face was such that it was hard for him to remember what her smile had looked like in the first place. “Which. One. Of. You. Did. That?” she repeated, jaw grit tight, “Seriously, that wasn’t funny.”

“Really gonna need you to elaborate on the who-what-where. We stayed right here like good little boys and—”

She cut Washington off by pointing viciously towards the (probably broken) headphones on the ground. “That stupid thing,” Sam said slowly, “Said my name.”

And that was a little too PG13 horror-movie for him, thanks very much. Conrad bent down to scoop his phone off the ground, praising every deity he’d ever heard of, and a few he hadn’t, that his case had kept his screen from cracking. If anything supernatural had ever happened in that stupid basement, his unshattered screen was probably it. Two drops in one night? And it was still in one piece?! Oh, someone was looking out for him.

“Shit,” Hartley sighed as Conrad swiped his texts open again, typing an explanation-slash-reply to Fliss’s single accusatory question mark, “Guess mummy man’s picked his first victim.”

Mummy man!

Before he could forget, Conrad added the big MM to his silent list of thank yous, going so far as to pick a random wall and shoot it a quick finger-gun and a wink. Someone sure had his phone’s best interest at heart…might as well have been Schrodinger’s mummy.

…he caught himself actually entertaining that thought and froze, pulling in a deep breath before scrubbing at his face with his free hand. Oh, this was going to be a long fucking night. He knew this was going to happen…he was letting himself get infected by their weirdness! That had to stop. Effective immediately. If not sooner.

He watched as Ash and Hartley did their awkward flirting routine as they tried to fit the spirit box back in its case. When the social anxiety of witnessing that train wreck became too much, he turned to see how Sam and Wash were faring (not a whole lot better, just judging by the pout blondie was rocking)…and then an idea popped into his head.

He stopped mid-text, holding down the delete button until everything he’d typed up disappeared.

Conrad: How about this… Conrad: Three guesses what I’M doing for fun tonight Fliss: Hoo boy. Conrad: You get three whole guesses! Conrad: If you can’t get it, then you have to be my partner for that project due before break Conrad: Sound fair? Fliss: Uh huh. Fliss: Sure… Fliss: You’re forgetting a very important detail though. Conrad: ? Fliss: What do I win if I guess correctly?

He thought for a moment, absently clicking his tongue. Then, smirking:

Conrad: Fliss. If you can correctly guess how I’m spending my night… Conrad: Which you won’t, fair warning Conrad: Then you have my solemn oath Conrad: My word as a gentleman and a scholar Conrad: My promise Fliss: Oh God. Fliss: Forget I asked! Conrad: I will do the entire project FOR you Conrad: No ifs ands or buts

The little ‘…’ bubble appeared at the bottom of his screen. Disappeared. Popped up again. Disappeared again. He watched as it happened, knowing there was no way in hell she’d missed the obvious—that she was agreeing to work with him on that dumb sociology assignment either way—and simply hoped for the best.

After what felt like twenty years, his phone buzzed in his hand.

Fliss: As long as you understand you’re doing the annotated bibliography win or lose, then fine. Fliss: It’s a deal.

[emptynarration]

Headcanons about my version of Dark

PLEASE BE AWARE THAT NEARLY ALL OF THESE HCS ARE FROM TWO YEARS AGO thank

// “Headcanon” about my Dark:

// He is in the body of Damien, not the DA

// They basically swap roles in chapter three, were they were arguing about going to the groundskeeper or not. Damien relents going outside, but only if the DA stays with Celine.

// Dark is primarily the dark entity that was the house/manor had been. It’s the glue holding everything together and alive

// But it needs the parts of Damien and Celine to survive and have enough power to hold everything together and functioning. Thus not only the bad parts of them are in the body, but more of them.

// Things such as memories are lost to Dark. He has no distinctive memories of Damien’s or Celine’s life. He has the “memories” of what he had done when it was just the dark entity in the house/manor.

// But feelings stayed. The dark entity only had been able to feel rage and anger, hate and jealousy and Schadenfreude. But now it gained the feelings of Damien and Celine, all that it hadn’t before. Happiness, joy, love, sorrow, sadness, lust, etc. And those feelings pushed the worse ones, the ones it only could feel before, in the background, in favor of exploring the nice ones // Thus making my Dark so nice

// Dark does have a shell too

// It’s, like, the mixture of three powers mixed into one trying to maintain a normal human looking form // It usually cracks when Dark is feeling strong forceful emotions. Like anger or sadness, usually only. Because both of those can be expressed differently // And Dark’s soul-parts usually disagree on how to express their anger/sadness, so the shell cracks

// When his shell breaks, it is very painful for Dark actually. He can feel the pain of his broken bones from falling down a balcony, the pain of having gotten shot in the stomach. He can feel his very own being tearing at itself and apart -which would kill him // When his shell breaks, usually the dark entity bleeds out through the cracks and swallows everything. Which leaves the body behind in pain with two soul parts trying to settle down again

// If you were to find him in that state, he’d have no idea who he is. Neither Dark, nor Damien, nor Celine will spark any kind of memory. The dark entity has mostly left the body, so left are the leftovers of the two human’s souls. // Mayor or Seer might spark a response though. // All Dark really needs in that state is to calm down his feelings. The two soul parts need to calm down and agree on how to feel and express themselves, without fighting basically

// If you know him well enough, you could probably manage to talk with just one soul part. It’d be near impossible probably for one of the soul parts to be in control when the entity is back to hold them together, but it is possible

// if you find him with a broken shell, talking with just one soul part and trying to get what that art is feeling through and the other soul to stay silent, then you can better talk with it, until the entity comes back. Getting the soul part to stay in control is hard though

// There are days, and times, when a soul part can be in control without having the shell broken before hand. It usually happens after sleeping, and mostly never lasts long

/ have some more smaller headcanons:

/ Dark is constantly cold. Like, he’s cold to the touch. He’s basically a dead body, so he has no body heat himself. Or, not a lot of it. / He can get warm though, with warm showers/baths or being near something warm (like a fireplace, a heater, etc.)

/ Dark can bleed, but his blood is thicker than normal blood, and much much darker. (Ofc it’s also monochrome but shh) / Wounds heal very very badly on their own, so anything more or less bad needs to get stitched up to help it heal better. / Though he can use his powers to heal, but he doesn’t like it much

/ Dark can’t see colours. He sees everything in monochrome, as if the saturation was turned down, ya know? / He would be able to see the red and blue of his shell though

(next comes what i just typed up today)

after years of having this exist and half forgetting half remembering Let’s add some more headcanons to this bad boy!

/ continuing off the “can’t see colours”: it’s because of his aura. / dark can control his aura to some extend. he can let it spread out, or pull it back close to him. the most he can do is pull it so close to him that he himself is the only thing affected. this causes him to not being able to see colour. / his aura, when spread out, turns everyhting it touches monochrome. being inside of it is cold, and the ringing and creaking sounds are rather prominent. / if a person just enters the aura, or the aura spreads over them, it feels like being dropped into ice-water, though slowly gets a little better. its constantly chilly though

/ his body is covered in very faint “scars”, which look like broken glass shards. they start from around the gunshot wound in his stomach, and are spread out. They stop at his collarbones, close to his wrists and close to his ankles. They’re able to be hidden pretty well with long sleeves/long pants/etc. / these scars originated from his shell cracking, and especially breaking. when his shell cracks, they tend to hurt then, but not as badly as when the shell breaks

/ when his shell breaks, his aura spreads like a flood, and further than dark usually lets it. it turns everything into freezing temperatures, going so far as to actually freeze things, making it very hard to get to him to attempt help / when his shell is broken, his (grey) skin seems darker than normal, while his scars spread a little, and appear to glow slightly / his appearance is hard to grasp with a broken shell. he still seems like who he was before, while also appearing more like a mix of damien and celine -a sort of androgynous mixture, in a way

okay little headcanons time:

/ dark really likes to knit for relaxation! it’s quite calming, and a good break from everything else

/ he handles all the legal paperwork they have to do. mostly its for wilfords/bims/jims/etc studio space, as well as theyre “employees” and such. a lot of it is masking murders, disappearances, and such that the egos caused though. / dark also takes care largely of their home. it is a rather.. “magical” space, you could say. a lot of it comes from the entity’s influence, so dark has to keep check on that

/ he’s a pretty bad cook, actually. while he enjoys the act, he prefers to help someone instead of doing it all by himself. he’s not so good at cooking by himself.

while we’re on that topic:

/ Dark has no need for food, actually. His body is already dead, and survives largely off of the entity holding it all together. / Which also means that he doesn’t actually need to breathe. it’s a comfort thing to do so, especially because his brain likes to believe he actually needs to breathe. / sleep is technically also not necessary for survival, but, it makes living a lot easier. it gives his broken body a rest, as well as his mind.

okay what else...

/ dark is afraid of heights. very badly. / he’s also afraid of guns, and gets startled quite badly by loud, sudden, bang like noises

/ his bed is as soft as clouds look like, and he uses weighted blankets. he needs his mattress to form to his body to not shift it around, and the weight on top of him is a very big comfort. lay down on top of him pls

/ he’s used to fidgeting with his collar, and running his hands over the material of his suit is comforting to him

now, last but not least, p a i n

/ dark is always, at the very least, aching. his limbs feel heavy, and a lot of movements tend to hurt. / he has good and bad days. On good days, his pain is very tolerable, and doesn’t bother him much.

here’s some things that can be during bad pain days:

/ dark can lose finer motor skills, struggling with writing and holding utensils. / he can have problems with moving his arms. ranging from every movement of his arms hurting, to being unable to move them at all. / on very bad days, dark may be unable to move completely, paralysis setting in. it limits him to only head movements, which likely also hurt. he spends these days just laying in bed attempting to sleep it away / he only rarely struggles with his legs, thankfully. he has days where walking is hard, and he uses his cane to help him move.

i think that’s it úwù