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astroboots · 1 year

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Issue #11

Pairing: Miguel O'Hara x female reader

Summary: Miguel brings you gifts.

Word count: 3,600

Series Masterlist | Spiderverse Masterlist | Astroboot’s Masterlist | thirstworldproblemss’ Masterlist

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Stark’s courier service arrives at your hotel the following day, a crew of four brawny looking men dressed in overalls, carrying in some 13 boxes of equipment, which take up the majority of the floor space of your luxury suite.

It finds residence in the seating area of the hotel room. Fancy looking gadgets of shiny chrome and colorful LED lights that look like they were stolen from the movie set of Back to the Future.

Miguel sets up shop, turning the pink girly vanity dressing table into an impromptu workbench. It’s where he’s been seated most of the last 36 hours, hunched over the tiny little table tinkering with the watch and various futuristic looking mechanical gears at all hours of the night.

The laser scalpel he’s using might be soundless, but Miguel sure isn’t. Last night, you’d been constantly woken up by his growling as he trashes another expensive looking tool with an angry growl. Pacing the room for a few minutes, mumbling and complaining about the cheap quality of Stark tech and how primitive this world is. Then he's right back at it, sitting back down on the little pink velvet ottoman to continue tinkering.

Tonight is no different. You’re in bed, scrolling your phone to unwind before going to sleep, when you hear him grumble again then stab the laser scalpel into the surface of the table.

Peeling off the fluffy comfortable quilt wrapped around you, you make your way over to him before he destroys any more fancy furniture you can never dream of affording to replace on your modest salary.

“What’s wrong?” you ask, as you stand behind him.

“Bastard’s tagged the thing with a receptor that feeds information about any modifications made back to him. It’s booby trapped so that if I try to remove it, the whole thing will disintegrate.”

You lean over to peer at the desk over his shoulder, observing the arc reactor that's pulsing like a beating heart with a glow of blue.

“Does it matter? Let him have your technology.”

In the reflection of the vanity mirror, you can see the small muscle in his jaw tic with irritation.

“No,” he says flatly, picking up the scalpel again from where it’s wedged into the table. “We can’t risk him getting a hold of inter-dimensional technology. I don’t want Stark to be able to locate and come after you.”

Oh Jesus, not this again.

“I already told you, I’m not interested in Tony Stark." You resist the urge to roll your eyes at part two of Miguel's unwarranted jealousy feud with Stark. Didn’t the two of you have a heartfelt conversation about this?

“That’s not the problem.”

“Then what is?”

He's grinding down on his jaw with irritated anger at whatever it is he’s thinking but not sharing with you. “We can’t trust him.”

“He’s a superhero, Miguel, just like you. If we can't trust him, then I don't know who we can trust.”

Miguel's mouth pulls into a grim and tight line at your words. For a brief moment, you think you catch a hint of fear on his face, before he breaks eye contact and turns away, back towards the bench. It takes you by surprise because you didn’t think Miguel was scared of anything.

“Tony Stark is one of the good guys,” you try again.

You rest a hand on the edge of his shoulder, trying to help placate his unease. “He’s an Avenger, remember? It's their job to protect the world.”

It dawns on you when you hear the words from your own mouth. The reason why he doesn’t want Tony Stark to be able to keep tabs on you and come after you.

The Avengers are meant to protect the world from any threats, and right now one of the greatest threats to this world is… you.

“Oh,” the tiny sound punches out of you as a yawning pit of uncertainty and fear opens up in your stomach.

One in every 40 New Yorkers will have a run-in with Superhero in their time in the city.

You've just always thought that, if your turn to encounter the Avengers came, it would be as a grateful civilian saved from the clutches of evil. You never thought it would be because you were the danger the world needed saving from.

Miguel must sense the moment the realization hits you, because he sets aside his tools and takes your hand, gently stroking the palm of it with his thumb.

"You have nothing to worry about, it’s just going to take some time," he murmurs, and he looks up at you with such warmth it makes the anxiety in you thaw slightly. "I'll be done with it soon.”

He eyes the arc reactor, not letting go of your hand. "Try to get some sleep."

You fall asleep to the white noise of tinkering metal and Miguel’s frustrated murmured curses. The noises should annoy you, but they don't. You find it oddly comforting, being able to hear Miguel move around in the same room as you when you’re in bed. Know with every fiber of your being that his presence means you're safe and easily drift fast asleep.

You don't know how long you stay asleep for or how much sleep you manage to catch before you feel the bed dip beside you.

"Hey," a voice softly cajoles you. There's a warm palm on your shoulder, gently nudging you awake. But you're not prepared to wake yet. Too comfortable in the haze of sleep to give it up.

You bury your head into the pillow, hoping to shut out any interference that's trying to keep you from your sleep.

"Cielito," the gentle voice tries again. "Wake up."

Grumpily and with great resistance, you strain to turn your head, squinting your eyes awake to see Miguel's face filling your vision.

It’s dark in here save for a small lamp left on in the far off corner. In this muted light, his scarlet eyes are illuminated with an otherworldly brilliance. If you had been more awake, you would have wanted to take a second or two to marvel at how beautiful they are.

"I got something for you," he says.

There’s a barely contained eagerness in his voice as he speaks, and sleepy as you are, it peaks your interest. You blink your eyes properly open, adjusting to the dim dark to see two small boxes set next to your pillow.

"Miguel, it's..." you flick your wrist towards you, when you remember the watch is no longer there. It’s odd how naked you feel without Lyla as your constant companion on your wrist.

You awkwardly prop yourself up on an elbow with great effort to figure out time the old fashioned way, glancing at the alarm clock on the nightstand.

In a bright glaring LED, the digits announce: 01:00.

Past midnight?! Has he lost his mind?

"It's one in the morning! Why are you waking me up after midnight!?"

Unbothered by your outrage, he continues to lean across you to drag one of the boxes closer.

"I'm finally done modifying the parallel universe traversal device, so I got you something to celebrate."

You blink up at him in surprise. When he said he’d be done soon, you didn’t think he meant tonight.

“It’s from that place you wanted Stark to take you," he says, opening the box one-handed to reveal a gaudy looking golden donut waiting for you.

Then he drags the second box over, setting it next to the first and flips the lid open. Inside are half a dozen cinnamon-sugared donuts.

"And these are regular old donuts, from the Lower East Side for fifty cents each. We can do a comparison test. If that ugly golden donut is tastier, I’ll chop off my arm.”

You snort out a laugh. His one-sided feud with Tony Stark is alive and well you see. You don’t understand why this has become such a point of contention for him. Stark had never actually suggested he was going to get you golden donuts.

Before you have the chance to dig in, Miguel puts out his hand, palm up, on the mattress in invitation. "Give me your hand first," he instructs.

You oblige him, placing your hand in the middle of his, and he wraps the familiar watch around your wrist. Except it’s not as familiar as you remember it to be. It’s considerably chunkier now to accommodate Stark's arc reactor that sits in the middle and if anything it looks more like a cuff bracelet than a watch.

But you don’t mind, you’re glad to have the comforting weight of it back on your arm, wrist no longer feeling quite so naked.

“It’s bulkier than I would’ve liked. But there’s no helping how primitive Stark’s tech is,” Miguel snarks, clearly pleased with himself even though the man he’s bitching about isn’t even in the room to hear his clever insults.

In the gloomy light, the bright blue gem of the arc reactor shines back at you like a precious jewel. If you didn’t know better, you’d think you were wearing jewelry fit for royalty.

"I like this upgrade on the watch. It’s pretty.”

"Not a watch," Miguel corrects, but he's not scolding you. The fondness in his voice is plainly there.

Looking up you meet his eyes to see the open affection that's there for you. Your face warms under his unwavering attention, until you have to duck your head down, unable to hold his gaze anymore.

You reach over the bed, to busy yourself, bypassing the golden donut to pick up one of the plain cinnamon ones. In the corner of your eye, you catch his lips curve into a smile as you take a large bite of the regular-non-golden donut.

He would gloat about that, wouldn’t he, the overgrown childish brat. You grin around the mouthful, as the sugar melts onto the tip of your tongue and you moan loudly at the perfect warm cinnamon that floods your senses.

Miguel is still smiling at you warmly, face propped in his broad hand as he watches you eat, and the heat in your face reaches an almost feverish pitch under his gaze.

"So what's next?" you force yourself to ask him over a muffled mouthful to distract yourself.

"Get some rest, sleep in. We'll take this for a few test drives in the morning to make sure it works the way it's supposed to, and then I'll take you to my home world."

There's a jittery sensation. A mix of exhilaration, excitement and anxiety blending with the sugar in your stomach at the unknown that waits before you. Even though you knew this day was coming since your visit at Wong, now that the time has come you're nervous.

The only world you’ve ever known is your own. You’re hardly an intrepid traveler. During your gap year in Europe, the use of the metric system was a culture shock for you. You can't even begin to imagine what it'll be like to travel to another alternate reality.

But you’re going to have to do it—and keep doing it, if Wong is correct.

Will you need to get a whole new wardrobe to fit in with the fashion trends of each universe? Will you have to learn new languages? Will there be a thousand sets of unfamiliar customs and quirks you’ll have to learn to adapt to?

…Will Miguel be there for any of it?

Biting down on your lip, you try to stave off the tight knot in your stomach.

One thing that's become clear is that even if Miguel takes you to his world, you won’t be able to stay there for very long. You aren’t going to be able to stay anywhere for very long.

Even if he intends to give you Lyla for good or build you another device that allows you to jump from world to world... what then?

Will he come with you?

Or will you be left to travel by yourself from one unknown world to another?

The loneliness of that fate makes your stomach hurt. You’d be lying to yourself if you didn’t admit that you want him to come with you more than anything, but you have no right to ask that of him. Not after everything he’s already done for you.

Like he can read your mind, Miguel gives you an appraising look.

"Once we're in Nueva York, we'll stay there for as long as it's safe," Miguel says, leaning across your lap to snag a donut from the box next to you for himself, and you try to ignore the heat that goes skittering through your leg when his arm brushes past your knee. "Then we'll jump to the next location."

You watch him scarf the cinnamony treat down in two mouthfuls, barely chewing. Your heart leaps excitedly until it jumps all the way to your throat.

"We?"

He grins, crumbs of caramelized sugar dotted on the curve of his lips. "I can't leave you by yourself, can I?"

Your mouth opens and closes, then opens again and you leave it there, hanging in the air, probably looking incredibly dumb and speechless.

You don’t know what to say to him. Don’t think there are adequate words in the English dictionary capable of expressing how happy it makes you to know that you’ll have him by your side. 'Thank you' seems incredibly lacking.

Somehow despite that you are both sitting down, he still dwarfs you and from your seated position you barely come up to his shoulders. You don’t quite know why you do it, but you move before you think, getting to your knees to lean up and place a small kiss on his cheek.

A faint pink tinges his cheeks at the small contact. Then it’s his turn to duck down. He scoots over, bringing the smaller donut box closer to you.

"Eat your golden donut," he says.

You peer up at him. The way his mouth pulls into a tiny and almost shy smile, and happiness buzzes in your chest at the sight.

A dopey smile spreads across your cheeks as you watch him. The way he rubs one broad hand over his jaw to hide his reddening face from you.

Taking the box from him, you look down at the shiny pastry. If your words are failing you, maybe food can speak for you instead. You pick up the golden donut in your hand and hold it out to him.

“You go first,” you offer.

There’s not a second of hesitation from Miguel. He leans down and takes a large bite of the gilded pastry, fangs first, puncturing the soft, squishy dough.

The whole thing bursts, and you squeal with laughter as the champagne flavored jelly filling squirts across his bottom lip, onto your fingers and drips onto the sheets below.

“Miguel, you’re making a complete mess!”

You lick up the sticky jam from your fingers as you watch him. There’s dust of gold smudging against his cheeks and even on his nose as he takes another bite. You’re tittering with amusement at the sight of him.

“Here you got some–” you bring your thumb to help him wipe at the corner of his mouth.

For a man who doesn’t like casual touches, sneering even at the idea of handshakes as a greeting at work, he doesn’t seem to mind yours.

Miguel lets you rub off the flecks of gold from his cheek, eyes dropping half-closed in contentment. His jaw moves under your hand as his mouth drops open, then he presses his lips to the inside of your palm.

It’s a barely there touch, but it has warmth furl from the middle of your stomach and blooms outward, spreading to the rest of you.

In this gigantic Wyoming king-sized bed, Miguel is seated close enough to you that your knees touch. He’s close. So close that you can feel the heat rolling off of his big body.

Somehow that's not close enough, because you close the remaining distance between you, until your knee is pressed against the firm inside of his thigh, his broad shoulders brush against yours.

It wouldn’t take much now. If you leaned up at this moment. If you tilted your head upwards even slightly. Your lips would be on his.

You shouldn’t, the small voice in your head warns. Kissing him is probably not a good idea.

He might not feel the same. Kissing him might change something irreparably between you, and then who will you travel the outer limits of the universe with?

But... if you're going to die tomorrow or the next day or next week, then what does it all matter anyhow? What’s a little bit of rejection when the end of the world is hiding right behind the next corner.

You tilt up and press your lips to his top lip, then the full lower one. It’s chaste and brief, and only lasts for a second. But for a first time it’s familiar and intimate in a way that it can only be with you and Miguel.

His lips are warm and dry and slightly open under the press of yours and it sends a fluttering warmth from the tip of your nose to the end of your fingertips.

You pull back with the tiniest movement, nose still brushing against his, as you gather the courage to look up at his face and try to find out if you just made a terrible mistake.

Those scarlet eyes are staring down at you in that familiar way you catch him doing sometimes. When he thinks you're not paying attention to him and his eyes lingers on your face.

His thumb catches behind your ear, face inching closer, and then he’s kissing you back. It’s sweet and electric, the sensation surges through you with a giddiness that makes your toes curl.

Miguel presses his lips to yours and holds you there. Long consecutive kisses that don't let you pull up for air. His other hand gently cups your face, thumb stroking the apple of your cheeks like you’re the most precious thing his big hands has ever held.

You want this to last, that it could always be like this. You want it to be you and him.

This man who brings you cupcakes when you’re crying. Who saves you the best portion of the food that he likes even though he’s a glutton. Who folds you paper flowers and leaves them on your desk to make you smile when you’re having a bad day at work. A man who stays by your side through the end of the world and never asks you for anything in return.

You love him.

One large hand covers the back of your neck. He tilts you back, like he’s trying to shield and protect you as he holds you. Holds you like he’s never going to let go.

Then he stops.

Why is he stopping?

He stiffens above you, the whole of his back tensing. You chase his lips but he is already pulling back and away from you.

Your eyes open to the muted darkness of the room.

In front of you, Miguel is looking at you with an expression you can't pin down. Eyes wide, and distracted. For a terrifying moment, you think that the look on his face is one of regret.

Maybe he realized he doesn’t feel that way about you after all. Maybe he's trying to find a way to let you down gently.

You pull back and study his face.

No… it’s not that.

His expression is the same distant look he had two seconds before a helicopter crashed into your apartment. The same tension in his eyes that will have him hauling you into his arms to protect you from a rogue vehicle. The same pinch in his brow when he’ll stop a conversation with you mid-sentence because the ceiling is about to cave in and he needs to push you out of harm’s way.

Something is wrong.

A cold sliver of fear crawls up your spine as Miguel’s face turns, and he stares into the empty space of the room beyond the bed.

There’s speck of pink spilling onto the sheets on your lap like the color of the sun on stained glass from the outside.

You follow his gaze in the direction of the radiant dusk pouring in from the window.

It’s too bright for one A.M, enough to be blinding.

Pulling away the quilt from your body, you slide out of bed and walk towards the brightness pouring in from the outside until you’re standing in front of the wide glass panes of the balcony.

You look up at the sky, and it’s not the familiar calm midnight-blue. There are vivid streaks of fluorescent pink and glowing purple staining the sky. There are fractures in the sky like someone took a sledge hammer to it and cracked it wide open.

The cityscape looks like it is folding onto itself. Skyscrapers, bridges, and streets are contorted and warped like badly-folded origami. The impossible architecture reminds you of a M.C Escher painting you saw on a school trip at MoMA as a child.

Outside, the pavements of New York is mirrored where the sky is supposed to be. Silhouettes of skyscrapers spring out from below and above and the vast sky is wedged between. Up is down and down is up and nothing makes sense anymore.

You've seen this scene take place before, when you were under Wong's multidimensional spell.

Your universe is starting to collapse.

The end of the world is here. You’ve officially run out of time.

~ Next Issue

Dedications & Credits:

To @guruan for her endless kindness and incredibly talented. I cannot thank her enough for the art she gifts me with that constantly inspires my little squirrel brain and drives me to write like I am possessed.

And @thirstworldproblemss my babe, my bestie, my moose! Thank you for always being there with your pretty face!! I adore and love you, our friendship and time together brings me endless joy. Thank you for going on this ride with me.

#miguel o'hara x reader #miguel o'hara x you #miguel o'hara fic #miguel o'hara #miguel o'hara fanfic #miguel o'hara fanfiction #spiderverse #marvel #across the spiderverse fanfiction #spiderverse fanfiction #marvel mcu #oscar isaac #spider man: across the spider verse #across the spiderverse #miguel ohara x reader #miguel ohara #miguel ohara x you

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dvchvnde · 2 months

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It appears on several lists of must-see places before you die, usually accompanied by a beautiful picture of the sprawling park—one with towering, gunmetal batholiths and rugged, snow-capped peaks on either side of the frame, almost perfectly mirrored. They plummet into a vertiginous drop down to a lush valley of vivid Scheele’s green below.

Through the unfathomable gap of these primordial mountains, nestled in the thick of the valley, is a white line of the rushing river that bleeds into what makes this place an absolute must:

The roaring waterfalls, the gorgeous fjords.

When you click on the pictures, the magnitude of just how massive this land is, and just how big those gorges are makes it all seem so empyrean. As if the land itself touches the heavens in places, disappearing into the sky. Swallowed by the aether.

It's dizzying.

And entirely remote.

Save for a visitor centre close to one of the bigger falls, this place is far removed from civilisation. A protected land hidden like a glimmering gem in the privacy of the wilderness. It's the sort of place where novices are well-forewarned about the dangers of testing their mettle against a basin of nature that sees less than one hundred people traversing the rugged landscape a year.

You only have yourself to rely on out here, someone writes. It's not for the faint of heart.

Simply put: it's perfect.

Cheap, too. You follow the instructions, requesting a weekend pass in the northern backcountry. Permits approved, credit card accepted. A map is emailed off along with an itinerary of what to bring, what to do (and what not to do—no scents, nothing that isn’t bear-repellent approved, no firearms without pre-approval from park services; same with fishing and hunting), and where to go. Signing in and out is mandatory lest they have to launch a massive, and expensive, search and rescue for you.

It’s all a little overwhelming (beware of wild animals, do not engage with them, do not feed them; do not leave trash in the outback; do not swim in the rapids and be wary of the vicious undercurrent in the river; do not go where you are not prepared to be) and the laundry list of what not to do seems bigger than you’re prepared for. Trepidation sinks in.

And then, as if in mockery of your unease, an email pops up in your inbox—

you're in bear country now, it warns, and then proceeds to tell you how to defend yourself against an attack—defensive and predatory—and to always, always, report any sightings you see to the park rangers. Immediately. Instantly. Without hesitation. Anything. Everything. Footprints, feces. It could save someone else's life.

It’s daunting. you are your own protection, it adds, vicious and cold. Cruel. We share the responsibility, but you are the one who carries the biggest burden. Be smart, be prepared, and be cautious.

They send three emails about safety, and advise that you attend a two-hour-long park seminar when you arrive on your first day to warn you about the dangers within the valley, the wildlife and rugged mountains, the steep ravines, and the treacherous rivers.

The man leading the seminar is dismissive during it, derisive. The park is open to the public, the ranger mumbles, gruff and unkind. His eyes skewer into the meagre rucksack on your back, and the outfit you picked—trousers, a thermal long-sleeve, and hiking boots the sales associate assured you that you would grow into, and huffs, adding: and it’s up to said public to decide if it can survive in here; we post signs and warnings and make all of the dangers as accessible as we can, as apparent as we can, but once you sign in, and head out, you are on your own.

But in none of these pamphlets, in this abrupt dressing down of your limited experience and their ambivalence on whether or not you can take care of yourself, does anyone ever tell you about the real danger hidden in these woods:

man.

Or rather, a man.

There's something unmatched about the wilderness, about the innate sense of self-reliance that seems to exude from within, this precocious sense of isolation and inner dependence. Out here, so far away from rescue or civilisation (about seven clicks in the opposite direction, give or take a few additional hours just maneuvering around jagged rock cliffs and steep canyons), you only have yourself for guidance, for salvation.

Maybe that's part of the reason why it draws you in so much. This idea of alienation. Of loneliness.

You are as safe as mother nature permits. As the grit in your bones allows. Flash flooding, intense storms. Whiteouts. Avalanches from the highest peaks in the distance. Surges in the river below. Currents. And—

Bears. Wolves. Wolverines. Bison. Moose. Coyote.

The list of hazards always seems to exceed the majesty of the world around you—haphazard cliffs, towering batholiths, roaring rivers—but only marginally. It's always worth it when you're there. In the heart of it all, staring down at the ink-black water below a massive fjord. The cut of limestone. Water slicing through the valley. It's ancient, primordial. And standing in the basin of its grandeur, a meagre slip of time in the palms of unfathomable aeons, the dangers balance out. Risk, reward.

This one, though, is probably the loneliest place you've ever been.

As you stand outside the visitors centre, the park looming large and untamed before you, there's a prickling sense of unease that permeates the air. A fine mist of worry draping over your shoulders. The park is—

Unfathomable.

The ledger they had you sign in on boasts five names in the last three years. A quick flip through the aged pages is just as barren. Empty.

“Not the most isolated or remote, no,” one of the wardens says, eyes creasing against the harsh glare of the sun. He offered to accompany you into the park, and you'd eagerly taken him up on the offer. Not quite ready to be on your own. “That's probably higher up. Quttinirpaaq, maybe? Heard from some buddies up there that they had no visitors last year. We do pretty well. About one thousand a year? Usually filmmakers and the like. Adventurous types. Gets kinda lonely up here. Ain't no Banff, that's for sure.”

You felt that isolation when he'd reached the cut-off heading toward South Nahanni, and waved you along. Sage advice following him as he walked, hand on his holstered gun.

“Keep yer wits about ya. Strange things happen in these parks, ya know?”

Strange things, indeed.

It starts with a noise.

The rustle in the tussock concealed between heavy, darkened spruce. Snap of twigs underfoot. A shallow grunt when you're clamoring up the steep incline cradling the mouth of a still lake. Footfalls echoing through the valley when you rest in the lush green grass, peeling an apple to satiate the meagre appetite you've dredged up on your climb to get to this spot.

It can all be chalked up to the wilderness. Sound, you know, is a mirage in a place like this. Deceitful. Screams that sound like it's right next to you are just the trawling echoes of wind whistling in a canyon. It isn't anything to be immediately worried about. This space is vast. Open. You'd see someone if they were there.

An animal, maybe.

But that thought does little to quell your sudden nerves. Or abate the spike of anxiety that rivets down your spine.

It feels like you're being watched.

This unease lingers as you pack your apple core inside your travelling pack. Nothing left behind, you remember, and pretend that's the only reason for the quick survey you take of the area. Just in case. Just in case—

Nothing.

Just a sprawling valley, an endless sea of green, crawling up jagged monoliths. In the distance, a thunderous plume of fog curls over the sawtooth peaks. Their heads lifted to the heavens as if scenting the looming danger congealing in the distance. Thick gunmetal clouds brew over the mountains. A sudden swell sweeps through the valley, shaking the tussock. Cold enough that your teeth chatter.

They warned you of an oncoming storm.

#the og intro #with soap stalking you through Nahanni #and also more about her lacklustre hiking capabilities #this was meant to ask the question “why did Doe really come to park?”#buttt #it wasnt important to the story

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gainerstories · 2 years

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Lifetime Supply: Chapter 4

Written by: Gainer Stories

Lifetime Supply is a collaborative story penned by Gainer Stories and Gaining Fiction.

Ryan didn’t notice there was a hole in the crotch of his pants until he spilled Taco Bell on himself on the way home from school. There was no denying these jeans were getting snug. Hell, he could barely even button them. But for how long was he walking around with a solid three inches of thigh fat bulging out?

In the last several weeks Ryan had undeniably gained a good deal of weight. Nothing was fitting right, everything was jiggling, and he was constantly hungry. It almost felt like that damn Adesco box was conspiring against him. No matter how many times he tried to cancel with that customer service representative, Luke, more boxes showed up with better and better treats.

Nevertheless, Ryan knew he couldn’t blame everything on Adesco. Perhaps the snacking had kickstarted his weight gain, but it wasn’t forcing him to pig out like he had been. For some reason he was simply hungry. He wanted food all the time, the more the better. Pizza, ice cream, burgers, burritos, he couldn’t get enough and the weight was catching up fast.

It wasn’t only his wardrobe that was pointing out how chubby he was getting. Ryan was also making a concerted effort to go on dates in an effort to get over his ex. In fact, he had just left one when he noticed the tear in his jeans. The guy was attractive and nice, but seemed uninterested and now Ryan was worried if the fact he was busting out of his jeans might have contributed to that.

Returning to the apartment, Ryan tossed the Taco Bell wrappers into the neighbors trash so that Ahmed wouldn’t see them. He didn’t know why, but he tried to hide his piggishness from his roommate, even though Ahmed often joined in. In fact, Ahmed had put on some weight himself, but he was also gaining muscle so it was less noticeable.

“Woah there chubs,” Ahmed greeted Ryan as soon as he walked through the door. “Was gonna see if you wanted to go in on some wings, but looks like you just ate.”

“Why do you say that?” Ryan was incredulous.

“Well besides the fact your pants are literally bursting at the seams, you have a sauce packet stuck to your ass.”

“Christ,” Ryan muttered and grabbed a snack from one of the many Adesco boxes littering the house. “I guess it’s that obvious. Maybe that’s why five out five dates won’t text me back. Am I really that fat?”

“You’re looking thick my man, but don’t sweat it. It suits you!”

“I gotta get out of these pants. I’ll get in on that order, just double whatever you’re getting. We have any beer?”

Ryan grabbed a beer from the fridge and headed to his room. He felt great relief removing his denim and tossing them in the trash. Unfortunately, even the sweatpants he put on felt a little snug. Looking in the mirror, they left little to the imagination. Ryan’s had definitely gotten cakier, and the elastic waistband sunk beneath his muffin top. Ryan resolved he’d have to purchase some new clothes once again tomorrow morning. But tonight, he and Ahmed would feast.

Ryan wobbled through the fast fashion chain browsing the racks. He had no idea what size he was anymore. He didn’t even know what would look good on his body. After multiple humiliating experiences in the dressing room, he settled on the fact that it was best to buy a little bit larger than he needed. The extra room would conceal the weight he gained, and besides the clothes were cheap and would probably shrink in the wash anyway.

It was the same cashier at the counter as last time, Antoine. Antoine couldn’t keep his eyes off Ryan. He glanced at the college student’s swollen midsection every few seconds, stirring insecurity in Ryan. Was he being judged? Did this guy remember him? Was it embarrassing he was buying such large sizes? By the time the transaction was over, Ryan was sweating bullets and made a beeline for the food court to quell his anxiety. After a corn dog and cinnamon roll he was headed back home.

Unloading his purchases, Ryan began to doubt himself. Why did he buy horizontal stripes? He should have known better. And he accidentally grabbed a button up in the wrong size. He had gotten this specifically to wear to the LGBT mixer that evening with Ahmed, and although it fit Ryan was afraid it was a little too snug.

Luckily a cold breeze came in that evening and Ryan was able to cover up by throwing a zippered hoodie over the button up. Standing next to Ahmed, Ryan’s insecurity heightened. Ahmed was developing broad shoulders and baby biceps that framed the swelling at his midsection, whereas Ryan’s belly pushed outward dramatically.

Once they got inside, Ryan felt a bit of relief. Most of the guys there were gawky and awkward. In fact, no one really caught his eye. He originally hoped he might get a date or two out of this event, but Ryan was quickly discovering the only perk was the free food. Catering was supplied by one of his favorite Mediterranean spots in town and Ryan couldn’t get enough.

He found himself piling his plate high and returning for seconds and thirds before continuing to graze for the rest of the night. Occasionally Ahmed would leave Ryan to flirt with some boys on the dance floor, and so Ryan just stationed himself at the buffet. As he was chomping down a stuffed grape leaf, Ryan spied a hot guy from across the room.

The man was fairly fit with broad shoulders and a defined chest, floppy brown hair, and great legs. Ryan washed down his food with a drink and took a deep breath. Looking down, he became self conscious again. The buttons on his shirt were straining. He couldn’t believe it. They were fine at the beginning of the night!

Still, Ryan had forced himself to go in for the kill. Guzzling a rum and coke he approached the sexy stranger who only became hotter up close. Just as Ryan was about to say hello the guy turned to the bathroom and waved. Ryan’s eyes followed the action, and his heart sank. The guy was waving at none other than his ex, Jason. Ryan was trapped as Jason approached and stared at him oddly.

“Oh my god, Ryan, I didn’t recognize you at first. You’re looking… good?”

The question mark at the end of that sentence made Ryan want to scream.

“You look good,” Jason reiterated, unsure who he was trying to convince. “This is my boyfriend, Luke.”

“Nice to meet you,” Luke said and shook Ryan’s hand with a twinkle in his eye.

Ryan’s head was spinning. Was this the same guy from Adesco? It couldn’t be…

#Lifetime Supply

212 notes · View notes

waeziverse · 2 years

Text

Royal Punch: Atsidas and Connie

The Pie House had been the most successful eating establishment in Onyxville for the last sixty years. Besides the many pies and quick service, the place had been revolutionary back when they became the first restaurant in the dock town with a toilet. Such a thing was considered a matter of course in modern Nesredna society and no one thought of the brilliance of the dwarves who had made the removal of feces so simple. The miracle called toilet was truly unappreciated.

Atsidas the Orc did not appreciate the toilet as he was cleaning it. How much importance they had did not occur to him as he was pretty simple minded. The list of things he did not consider was rather long, which was part of the reason to why he would soon be in a lot of trouble.

One of the many things he did not consider, just to name an example, was how dangerous the neighborhood he both lived and worked in were. But that was most likely because Atsidas was a big fella. Taller than most adults he met. He was not used to creatures trying to pick fights with him.

So he was met by a surprised when his shift had ended and left the restaurant through the back door. Someone who as not impressed or intimated by his size ambushed him by hurling cold water in the face with so much force that it felt like as if he had been punch in the kisser.

“You bastard! You green piece of shit!”

On the backstreet behind the Pie house where trash had been thrown, a creature with light-brown skin, round ears and dark hair glared angrily at Atsidas. She was dressed in a blouse made of cheap silk with (poorly) hand-sewed patterns. She was also wearing an apron that had white powder on it, presumably flour.

Her beautiful black hair had been gathered in a braid.

“Ouch...” Atsidas’ cheek had turned red from the impact of the water that now had returned to the human who had cast the spell. The human held her hand over her head and the water levitated over her open palm. “Hey, hey, easy.” Atsidas said as he held up his hands to show he did not want any trouble. “What is this-”

“SHUT UP!” The human grind her teeth as she with a wave of her hand sent the floating orb of water flying as if it were a ball. It landed on Atsidas‘ stomach, making him trip backward. “Do you have ANY idea what you have done to me, asshole?!”

Atsidas shrugged. “No?” His reply seemed to make the human even more pissed as she clenched her fist, making the orb of water freeze and getting small spikes. Atsidas gulped. It looked unpleasant. “Wait, just tell me what I-”

“What’s going on out here?!” Rosalio, the satyr with black wool who cleaned the toilets with Atsidas, had heard the commotion and had just opened the backdoor and was about to enter the backstreet. The human turned red as a tomato and the ball of ice turned liquid once more. She threw it at the face of the satyr. “AARGH, MY EYES! WHAT THE HELL?!” Rosalio nudged his eyes as the human ran away. Atsidas still sat on his behind, confused. He only now realized that he sat on puke.

“Hey, you okay?” Rosalio offered Atsidas a hand that the young orc accepted. “What was that about? Did you piss off that human?”

“I guess...” Atisdas shrugged as he dusted off his clothes and used the back of his sleeve to dry himself of water. It did not smell pleasant.

Rosalio rolled his eyes. “Nasty creatures. Still don’t get why the orcs didn’t get rid of the kids as well. Did you get a good look at her? We could tell the city guard on her ass.”

“... Nice earring.” Atsidas noticed the feather-formed pieces of silver hanging from Rosalio’s long sheep-ears. “Are those new?”

Rosalio’s nostrils grew wider as he got annoyed. “Don’t change the subject, this is serious! Did you get a good look at her?!”

“Nooo...” Atsidas blinked three times as he lied. Rosalio luckily did not notice as his eyes were still sore. “No, it... happened so fast. Humans, ah, look all the same, am I right?”

“Come on, there live, like, five or six humans in this town. Skin color? Nose size? You must have noticed something about her.”

“Nope.” Atsidas blinked rapidly once more. “No, I’m not sure I could recognize her if I met her again.”

***

Kahaani the Human, called Connie by friends, took the dough and slammed it against the wooden table, getting flour on herself. She knead the dough as she blew a lock of hair away from her face. She kept pounding the dough over and over again, taking her frustrations out on this bread-to-be. As she finished kneading the bread six times too many, she placed it inside a pot and then sprinkled flour on top of the dough before putting the lid on the pot. As she did so, the water inside a bowl turned around by itself mixing the water with oil, salt and yeast. Connie then added flour to the mix that eventually became dough that she also punished.

After doing so for an hour or so, she felt exhausted and sick to her stomach. She was about to leave the kitchen as she was created by Agnes, the owner of the bakery and the centaur who had agreed to be her foster parent when Connie’s parents had been banished from the kingdom after the orcs took over. Like the rest of the human adults.

“You look pale.” Agnes was leaning her upper body through the window that connected the kitchen and shop. “What’s the matter, luv?”

“I don’t wanna talk about it...” Connie went to the stairs that led to her bedroom. She knew she could be in peace from Agnes there since centaurs and stairs did not get along.

Orcs however did stairs just fine. That and ladders.

“What th-” Connie was about to yell, but stopped herself as she did not want Agnes to be worried. So she took in a deep breath, walked into her room, closed the door and then glared at the orc who was about the same age as her. “What the hells are you doing here?!”

“I just wanna talk.” Atsidas casually closed the window he had used to enter the room. “Is something wrong? Did I do something... bad? If I did, then I’m super sorry!”

“Do something ba-” Connie stopped herself yet again from working herself up and took in a deep breath as she took off her apron and sat on her bed. She held up a hand as Atsida was about to sit next to her. She then sighed. “I’m... I went to the local healer and... Look, I’m pregnant, okay?!”

Atsidas’ jaw would have hit the wooden floor had it been long enough.

Connie looked at Atsidas as she was expecting something from him, then she looked away and scratched her nose.

Atsidas looked at the human girl and tried to say something, but his mouth was dry and his throat felt like was filled with nuts. But then he forced himself to speak despite his voice being meek. “So... so, what do we do now?”

Connie groaned. “We? WE are not doing anything. I’m gonna work extra hours at the bakery to save up money. And I’m gonna change my diet to gain weight so no one will think it’s weird my stomach is getting bigger. And I will hopefully somehow save up enough to leave town and figure out what to do about this mutant baby.”

“Connie, I’m not an asshole. I will save up, too. Help and... stuff.”

Connie made a bitter laugh as she shook her head. “Sid, you barely make enough as a cleaner to pay rent. Hells, you don’t. You have to share a shitty apartment with an overgrown turkey.”

“Actually, I think Don is a pheasant harpy... sorry, not important. Look, I did this to you, I-”

“Stop, Sid, just... just stop.” Connie nudged her eyes as she stood up from her bed. “You are sweet, but... Just stay away from me from now on.”

Atsidas blinked. “But-”

“We both agree that everyone and their aunt hate hybrids, right? So lets keep our distance so no one thinks the eventually visibly pregnant human and orc are somehow connected. Besides, you and me... this was a bad idea to begin with, right? It’s stupid how lucky we been so far, not getting outed. You don’t owe me anything. This was never gonna go anywhere.”

Atsidas looked like a lost puppy. A big green one. Connie tried to smile but instead just made a weird grimace. She then placed a hand on the cheek she had hit earlier. Atsidas placed his hand over hers. It felt as if time went too fast and too slow simultaneously.

Unsure what to do, Connie pulled her hand free and patted Atsidas on the shoulder. “It was... nice while it lasted.”

“Yeah. It was... I will go, I guess. See ya lat... ah, right, no.” The young orc opened the window and turned one last time to look at the prettiest creature he had even laid eyes on. “... bye.”

After Atsidas had climbed down the ladder and hidden it in the bush like he had done many times before, Connie closed the window, went to bed, buried her face into the pillow and wept.

***

Atsidas’ home was a three-room flat above a shop that sold cheese. The young orc had lived there for two years since his parents had agreed that it was time for him to learn what Nesredna society was like and work on his personality like his three older siblings.

Atsidas wondered why he couldn’t work on his personality while working at the family company. Then again, having his big sisters and brother as supervisors might not have been that great.

Atsidas opened the door and heard the snore of Don, the co-owner of his humble home. He took off his work suit and picked his casual brown shirt and pants that hung from a nail hammered into the wall next to the door. He took a look in the bedroom and found the red-faced bird guy sleeping like a rock and having accidentally kicked his blanket off. He was wearing nothing but his trousers, making almost all of his brown and green feathers visible. After opening a window to get some fresh air inside the flat, Atsidas went to the humble kitchen where there were some bean stew left, easy to heat up. Don had written a note for him again despite Atsidas and all other orcs not being able to read.

Atsidas decided to eat the stew cold since the heat crystal was not working and filled a wooden bowl with food and decided to reuse the spoon used to cook it. He went to his bed and sat on it as he ate and took a quick glance at the harpy dude on the bed next to his. He considered if Don could help him, but decided not to since he did not want to be called a pervert and then having to find a new home.

As he chewed on the stew that tasted fine cold, Atsidas decided that the best thing to do was demanding a raise. He was a hard worker, he deserved one.

***

After being laughed out of Mr. Yarrow’s office, Atsidas sighed and went to join Rosalio in cleaning tables before the Pie House would open for customers.

“What’s the matter with you?” The black-haired satyr was about to dry the washed chairs with a rag.

“... I asked the boss for a raise.” Atsidas took a rag from the bucket of water next to Rosalio.

“HA!” The young sheep-man tried his best not to make a stupid smirk as he covered his mouth. “Sorry, sorry...”

Atsidas just shrugged and whipped the tables in the restaurant.

“Seriously, I’m sorry.” Rosalio took a dry rag. “What’s the matter, money trouble?”

Atsidas hesitated. He liked Rosalio, but he didn’t know him that well. “It’s... private.”

“Fair, fair. None of my beeswax.” Rosalio took a glance at Atsida’ built. He came to the conclusion that the tusked green-skinned guy could do well in the Undersea Temptress. “But, ah... I know...” The satyr’s eyes flacked left and right to see if they actually were alone. Then he stepped closer to the orc and lowered his voice. “... I know a place where you could make some quick cash.”

Atsidas stopped moping and blinked. He looked at Rosalio. “What? Where?”

“See, you can’t tell anyone, I’m not really suppose to tell anyone, I risk getting my cute wooly tailed kicked for this, and if you go there, don’t mention that I told you, but... You know the Undersea Temptress?”

“The tavern at the other end of town?”

“Yeah. You know what coronet style is?”

***

Idun the Half-Elf was the owner and bartender of the tavern named the Undersea Temptress, a shady little establishment near the docks. Shad her long red hair cover most of the left side of her head so you couldn’t see the nasty scar that was where a pointy ear had once been. She cleaned a mug with a rag as she stood behind the bar counter. She studied the young orc with the one eye she had left. “Well... You are a tall shit. But you ever been up fighting?”

Atsidas scratched the back of his head. “I got sent to wrestling lessons by my parents when I was ten. For like... a year or so?”

Idun narrowed her eye. “Aha...”

“AND, I have three older siblings, so there’s that.”

“Ouch.” Idun ginned. “So you know how to take a punch and throw one as well, eh? Good enough. You got two coronets?”

Atsidas took two coins out of his pocket. “Yeah. Why?”

“Because I sure as hell ain’t trust you enough to give you two of mine.” Idun leaned over the counter to see if she could spot the satyr who practically lived in the Mermaid after he had been told his boxing career would go nowhere. “Yo, Hector! Want to introduce a newcomer to two-crown fighting?!”

The satyr Hector finished his beer and burped. He had a pair of impressive swirled horns and was dressed in a shirt without sleeves to show off his arms. He was one of those satyrs who did not wear pants, something that was considered rude by most. The creatures in the tavern stood up and shoved chairs and tables towards the walls as they knew a fight was about to start. One of the tavern workers, a goblin, took a piece of chalk and drew a white line on the floor and disappeared in a small cloud of smoke and reappeared sitting on the counter. Next to the goblin was now a big jar that Idun had placed on the counter to collect the coronet coins the creatures would bet on the brawl.

Idun had a piece of paper ready to note bets. “Awright, you pieces of puke! We got usself a brawl! Hector versus the newcomer orc Albert! First bugger to drop a coin lose! Place your bets, ladies and gents!”

“My name is Atsidas, but some call me-”

“Don’t give a shit, kid.” Idun pushed Atsidas so he would go toward the chalk line on the floor. “Win and I might. Now, hold a coin in each hand and make fists. Rest should be obvious.”

Atsidas answer was a shrug as he then stood in front of Hector with his fists raised in order to awkwardly guard his face. He waited for a start signal of some sort, but instead got a fist on the left side of his head.

***

Agnes the Centaur stood by the table in her kitchen and waited for Connie to join her for breakfast. The warm bread was about to get cold as her human foster child finally came and took a seat and made a sandwich with cheese. “Sorry, I had to pee.”

“By the Unknown Architects, is your bladder leaking, girl?” The elderly horse-lady looked concerned at the very hungry human who devoured her bread and cheese as if her life depended on it. “As a matter of fact, you seem to have been sick in general for a month or so. You spend too much time in the outhouse, you get tired, you are queasy... Maybe you should go see a healer-”

“Trust me, I have.” Connie did her best to not snap at Agnes, easier said than done as her chest felt sore. “It’s some sort of influenza, the healer says I should just walk it off.”

Agnes tilted her head. “I don’t think that’s how influenza works, sweety-”

“Well, the healer says it does. I forgot my apron upstairs.” After making her bad excuse to leave, Connie went upstairs, making it impossible for the horse-woman to physically reach her.

Sitting on her bed, Connie took in a deep breath and then moaned as her body felt uncomfortable in general. She massaged her temples and then finally realized that her window was open. Connie thought this was weird as she was sure she had shut it before going downstairs, but she found it likely that she had just forgotten to do so given her current state of discomfort.

But then she noticed a small bag on the floor. She picked it up and opened it. It was filled with coronets. There was no note attached to it since orcs did not read or write.

Connie rolled her eyes. “Gods dammit, Sid!”

***

Hector the Satyr sat at a table at the back of the Mermaid tavern and glared at the creatures who made a circle around the orc who had become the patron’s favorite fighter since he had beat up Hector two weeks ago.

The creatures who spectated the fight, most of them having had one drink too many, yelled at Atsidas to get his head into the fight as the humanoid salamander-man Bartholomew the Grindylow was mercilessly pummeling the young orc.

Atsidas did not know much about grindylows. He didn’t know that the reason to why they were so strong were that these salamander-men where born to be able to live and move under sea. He did not know that sea creatures were not allowed to participate in any sport held on land. He didn’t know that the reason to why Bartholomew’s punches had so much weight behind them was because he could use his tail as an extra leg. But what Atsidas did know as he guarded his face was that sea creatures did not handle sweating very well.

As Bartholomew was panting due to not being used to fighting anyone playing defensive against him, Atsidas planted a fist on his flat nose. Bartholomew tried to use his tail to make the orc trip, but Atsidas had learned most of the cheap tricks used in the Mermaid by now and stepped on the tip of said tail as he made his fist connect with the grindylow’s liver area. This resulted in the sea-monster tripping and losing his grip around one of the two coins he held in each hand, meaning he had lost the match.

The patrons of the bar clapped at their champ as Atsidas made a sigh of relief and simply dropped the coins that he had held so firm that marks were left on the palms of his hands.

“Bloody hell, kid.” Idun grinned as she poured the young orc a drink as he sat on a stool next to the bar counter to catch his breath. “Have on on the house! I knew the moment you stepped inside my joint that you were a tough green bugger, I just knew it-”

“Yeah, sure.” Atsidas took the cup and swallowed the burning liquid. Idun offered him a rug which he took and dried his sweaty face with. “Cash, please.”

Idun placed a small leather bag filled with coronets on the counter. “Speaking of money, some rich broad said she wanted a word with you. She sits at the other end of the room.”

Atsidas stopped counting the coins in the bag. “About what?”

The eye-patched elf grinned. “Perhaps she needs you as her gardener since you have such delicate and gentle hands?”

“Fuuuunny.” Atsidas walked across the room, being clapped on the shoulder and congratulated by a few, though most of the creatures had turned their attention to a short plump harpy singing while a spindly elf played on a fiddle.

Atsidas looked for the so-called rich broad, then spotted on he was sure fit the title as she was female as well as had an awful lot of jewelry on her. She was dressed in a black fur coat

Atsidas hesitated joining her at her table as he noticed the snakes for hair. The gorgon smiled as she noticed Atsidas and pointed toward an empty chair. Atsidas decided despite his better judgement to take a seat at the gorgon's table. “Ah... hey... ma'am.”

“Please, Veronica.” She poured herself a glass of red whine. “I saw your fight, you got some moves. They tell me you the balls of a lion, kid.”

Atsidas scratched the back of his head as he evaded eye contact. “I, ah, I never met a lion, so I wouldn’t know.”

“HA!” The snake-woman grinned as she sniffed in the scent of her wine. “So, you have a stage name?”

“Atsidas.”

“Naw, kid. Not a name. A stage name. What do folks around here call you?”

“Well...” Atsidas shrugged. “Sometimes, when someone is pissed at me, they call me stuff like that tall green shit.”

“Heh, doesn’t exactly command respect, knowwhatimsayin?“ Veronica took a sip of the blood-colored liquor. “See, I been out of town since before you could wipe your own green ass, and I used to run a pretty good fight club. But to get back in business, I need some brawlers.”

Atsidas looked up from the table and forced himself to look Veronica in the eyes covered by a pair of black glasses. “You offering me a job?”

Veronica finished her glass of whine as each snake-head of her hair wiggled their tongues at him. “Sure. And I pay better than one-eye over there.” Veronica nodded toward Idun who was dragging drunk satyr to the door and then planted her right foot on said satyr’s tailed behind. “But you need a stage name, something that got presence, ya dig?”

Atsidas tilted his head. “Presents? Like gifts?”

Veronica rolled her eyes. “Eh, fuhgeddaboudit. Hmm...” She scratched the chin of one of her snakes. “Let’s see... tall green shit... Green... Hehe, got it.” She patted Atsidas on the shoulder, startling the young orc. “How about we call you... Green Plague?”

***

Connie decided that after finding a bag with 2000 coronets at her window ledge that enough was enough and went to the less fancy part of town to find Atsidas and tell him to knock it off. Whatever he was doing to get that sort of money was not something she was interested in even being involved with, not even directly.

She had been pregnant for two months without anyone noticing. That is, Connie very much noticed as she felt bloated and her breasts felt weird. She was pissed for understandable reasons, but her mood swings made what was bad worse.

She had first gone to the Pie House to try catch him there, but going to the store manager after claiming she needed to make an complaint about some orc who worked there, she had been told that the only orc employee that had worked for them had quit his job some weeks ago.

So she instead went to his home. Unwise since she had tried since they met to not be seen with Atsidas in public, but she was annoyed, felt sick and was somehow hungry at the same time, so her sense of reason was a bit pressed at the time. She knocked on the door to Adsidas’ apartment. The door was opened by Don, Adsidas’ roommate and a pheasant-type harpy. He held a bucket of water that smelled like soap.

The bird looked at the brown-skinned creature, slightly startled. “What do yer want?”

Connie narrowed her eyes. “I need to talk to the tall green shit you live with.”

“He don’t live here no more.” Don tried to close the door, but Connie blocked the door with her foot.

“Then where is he now?”

Don blinked as he gathered his nerves. “I ain’t tell yer shit. Beat it, bitch.”

Connie’s eyebrow twitched. “What?”

Don straighten his back to look taller. “Yer heard me. Piss off.”

With the bucket of water, firm arms that had knead plenty of dough and magic that allowed her control over water, Connie introduced Don to the concept of a swirly whirly. Don had transformed his arms to wings as he basked with them to get free, but they were no help as Connie had a foot planted on his back as she held his head.

Connie pulled up Don’s face by the feathers on his head. The water in the bucket was still swirling. “Still a tough guy?”

“I don’t know where he is, I don’t know where he is!” Don coughed and blinked franticly. The feathers on his head were heavy and wet. “I’m sorry I called you a bitch, human! That was SOOO uncalled for!”

“Then where is he now?” Connie rattled Don’s head.

“How should I know?! He moved out some weeks ago, left with a bag of his junk, no explanation or nothin’! Him and that black sheep dude took his stuff and-”

“Goat?”

“Year, you know, a satyr. With black wool. Atsi told me he had to move and that satyr helped him-”

“Tell on me to the city guard and you will regret it, birds for brains.” Connie let go of Don’s head and stood up from the floor as Don was still on his knees. Connie left the room, angry at herself for losing her temper as she went to the Pie House where Atsidas worked.

***

Rosalio the Satyr hummed as he tapped his hoof on the wooden floor while he ate his dinner before leaving work for the day. One of the perks of being an employee in the Pie House was the free pie. Sure, it was leftover pie, but second-hand food was still food. And he needed all the free food he could get his hands on as he had accidentally spent too many coronets on his new jacket.

But if Atsidas kicked ass then he would acquire a fairly large sum of coins tonight.

While enjoying his free meal, Rosalio did not pay attention to the human watching him intensively. She wore a shawl around her hair and had a hefty appetite, practically ate for two.

After finishing his food and having changed from his work uniform to his newly bought jacket, Rosalio left the restaurant cheerfully. Connie the Human followed him.

Rosalio was kind of a moron, so he didn’t notice that he was being tailed. Good thing since Connie was not great at it.

The streets of Onyxville were illuminated by oil lamps, but not great ones. Made the end of town they had gone to seem murky in every sense of the word. Connie kept her distance as she watched Rosalio stop in front of a building that seemed like it had seen better days. Had it not been this dark, she would have been able to read the sign over the door that said Hard Knocks Gym. In front of said door stood a rather tall Grindylow who resembled a fire-belly newt. Said grindylow wore a blouse with a neckline that showed the top of her red area on her chest.

Connie couldn’t hear what Rosalio was saying to the grindylow, but he was close enough to the light from a lamp so she could see the satyr laugh and move his hands as if he was telling a joke or a funny story. The sea-creature looked at him unimpressed. Rosalio then gave up what he was doing and gave the grindylow a small sack, which resulted in her opening the door to the gym for him and she quickly slammed it as he stepped inside, almost hitting his little tail.

Connie then stepped closer to the grindylow, unsure what to say. “Hello. I... Well, the thing is-”

“Okay, let me stop you right there.” The grindylow held up one of her scaly hands. “If you as much as think about trying to sweet-talk me into giving you a discount, then forget it. Some furball already tried to. It’s 100 coronets or piss off.”

“Right. No discount, one second...“ Connie collected the amount of coins from her purse, no idea what she was paying for. The black salamander-creature weighted the coins in her hand and then opened the door and gave Connie a light push and then slammed the door.

Connie found herself inside a large open space illuminated by light crystals on the ceiling. A large group of creatures stood at the middle of it and yelled and cheered and she heard the sound of a gong. They were around a boxing ring, watching two creatures beat the shit out of each other. Before this horde stood a dove-styled harpy wearing a multi-colored dress made of sequins held a sign shaped like an arrow that said Place Ur Bets Here. The arrow’s head pointed toward a table were an elf in a black dress accepted coins and handed a blue or red piece of paper to creatures who stood in a line, looking impatient as they turned their heads toward the fight.

Connie decided to get a closer look of what was the center of attention. She managed to push and shove her way through the creatures till she could get a better look at what was going on inside the boxing ring.

And then she spotted Atsidas inside the right with a pair of red gloves and a black eye.

“Aw, hells no!” Connie couldn’t recall being this angry as she watched Atsidas exchanging blows with a bison-styled female minotaur.

“I know, right?!” said a centaur who had a much clearer view of the fight because of his height. “I paid to see a blood bath, where’s the dang blood?”

Connie blinked. “Wait, what?”

The centaur soon got what he wanted as the minotaur, after planting a hook on Atsidas sore eye, lowered her head and stabbed the young orc in the chest. Atisdas screamed in pain as he retaliated by hitting the minotaur in the back of her head.

“Holy shit!” Connie was horrified.

“I know, right?!” The centaur raised his arms over his head and clapped. “Now we're getting somewhere!”

The creatures clapped and whistled while Connie felt as if she was gonne puke. Atisdas and the minotaur mercilessly took turns hitting each other in the face. Atsidas elbowed the bull-lady on the forehead, resulting in her taking two wobbly steps backward as she started to bleed from the cut the orc had just given her. She lowered her head and tried to ram Atsidas who managed to get hold of the horns of his opponent with his gloved hands and slammed the minotaur’s head into one of the corners of the ring. Atsidas stepped away and as the minotaur stood up and was about to turn, the young orc threw as many punches he could while practically gasping.

There were some boos and some cheers around the ring as he had forced the minotaur against the ropes. But most of the spectators started to chant: “GREEN PLAGUE! GREEN PLAGUE! GREEN PLAGUE!”

After getting a last punch, this time directly on the chin, the minotaur fell to the canvas, spread out on the canvas and gasping. Atsidas looked as if he was about to fall as well but managed to lift one fist over his head as the spectators still chanted his stage name. His face looked like crap.

“That dumb bastard!” Connie was furious but also felt great relief.

“I know, right?!” The centaur looked annoyed as he ripped his betting slip in half. “I just lost 1000 slaps because of that green shit.”

Connie was relieved that Atsidas had survived the fight. Because that meant she had not been robbed the opportunity to kill him for his idiocy.

***

After washing his face and getting dressed and wrapped a bandage around his chest where his wound from the horn was, Atsidas left the gym with Rosalio as two rooster-styled harpies were duking it out in the ring. As they got out on the streets, it started to rain.

“That was awesome!” Rosalio slapped Atsidas on the back.

Atsidas looked uncomfortable. “Please don’t do that, everything hurts. So, the money?”

“Sure, man. Sure.” Rosalio gave him a leather pouch. “This is your cut of the money I bet on you.”

“Not so loud, someone could hear you.” Atsidas hissed. “If someone knew I bet on myself I would be screwed.”

“Eh, it’s not like you fix the fights, you just bet on winning.” Rosalio gave the orc a light pat on the shoulder. “See ya when I see ya.”

As the satyr skipped away, Atsidas turned his head to look at the creature who had tailed him as soon as he had left the Hard Knocks Gym, unsure if he should keep pretending not to see her. Then he sighed. “Yeah, I know it’s you, Connie.”

The human remained some feet away, standing behind one of the poles that held a street lamp.

“Look, ah... we could go to my place? Maybe talk? I live not far from here.”

Connie didn't answer at first. Then, she walked past him and quickly whispered. “Keep your distance from from me as we walk.”

Atsidas watched Connie walk in front of him and realized she was dry despite the rain swince her magic made the raindrops vapor above her person. “Ah... shouldn’t I go in front?”

Connie stopped up. It took her a sec to realize he was right as she walked back and kept her distance while following Atsidas.

***

“Screw you!”

Connie had just entered Atsidas’ new apartment after being sure no one would see her go into the young orc’s home.

“Nice to see you, too...” Atsidas was drying himself with a rag. Getting a cold from rain was a luxury he couldn’t afford. “Want some tea.”

“No, I don’t want some bloody tea.” Connie took a glance around. It was a three-room apartment, it seemed. They were in a big room with a table and some cushions around it used for sitting. A big sack was dangling from the ceiling and it looked slightly worn. There was a mattress next to it with a blanket. A pair of boxing gloves and some training weights were next to the mattress.

Atsidas had a bucket with water he used to wet a small rag he placed on his sore eye. “I don’t really have any food, I just buy something from the restaurant next door, I could go pick some food for us-”

“I don’t want food!” Connie said annoyed. “And I don’t want your money! Especially not if you get them from getting brain damage!”

“Look, how else was I gonna get money for you? I’m tall and I’m pretty good at hurting others-”

“I don’t give a shit, stop coming to my place and stop giving me money, I don’t want to be associated with your shit.”

Atsidas sighed as he wrung his rag. “I keep telling, you, I’m careful-”

Connie kicked one of the gloves that Atsidas had left on the floor. “Why do you have to make this so difficult?! You don’t owe me anything, okay? I don’t want you to get your face battered just because you feel bad about knocking me up. It’s my fault that you get hurt because you want to play gentlema-”

“I’m doing it for myself, okay?!”

Connie blinked. It was the first time the orc boy had raised his voice at her. Heck, she couldn’t recall him raising his voice at all.

“Look... it’s not about anyone being in anyone’s debt. Or, you know, you are not in my debt. I just...” Atsida blushed as he looked at Connie. “Is it really so bad that I want to take care of you?”

“Ah, shit...” Connie mumbled as she sighed.

“Maybe... maybe I’m just doing it for myself, right? Not because I want to feel good about myself, just because... because I don’t want it to have been just us fooling around.”

Connie covered her face a her fingertips tried to drill through her skull. “Don’t make this harder than it already is...”

“Because... because what we had meant something. Or it did to me, I don’t need you to feel that way about me. I... you know...” Atsidas shrugged as he grimaced. “I love you, Kahaani the Human.”

Connie felt as if her entire body was about to bust. She had not felt this pissed and scared since she found out she was pregnant.

“ I have a new fight next week. A big one. This time I’m being paid 5000 coronets. And I thought, well... You think there could be enough money so... I could get a ticket for a boat sailing to Mino as well?”

Connie didn’t say anything.

“I mean... if that’s okay with you. I just thought I could help out when you get more pregnant... wait, is that what it is called? Or is it pregnanter or-”

Connie made it impossible for Atsidas to sound even dumber as she looped her arms around his neck in order to pull his head down to hers and kissed him. Confused for a split second, Atsidas then locked his arms around Connie and lifted her up as their lips were still connected.

“OUCH! You cut me!”

“What?!” Atsidas panicked and let go of the human girl. “What did I do? What did I do?!”

“Your tusk, it cut me.” Connie glared at her own feet as she nudged the tiny wound she had just received on her cheek.

“I-I-I I’m sorry!” Atsidas covered his tusks with his hands as if that should somehow help. “I forgot how thin human skin is compared to... I’m sorry.”

Both of them felt incredible embarrassed. But only for a moment as they went back to making out.

***

As Atsidas took his pants off, he suddenly realized something. "Ah, SHIT! I don't have any condoms!" He pulled his pants up. "Hold on, I will go to the butcher and get-"

"Who cares?" Connie lied on his mattress completely naked and rolled her eyes. "You already knocked me up, genius."

"Ah... oh." It took a second for the orc to let the logic sink in. "Oh. Oh yeah!" And then he dropped his pants.

***

Atsidas ran a hand through Connie's black hair while his other arm was wrapped around her back.

Connie lied on Atsidas' left side, resting her head on his chest, enjoying the feel of his warm, rough yet smooth green hide. She placed her hand on his right shoulder, stroking it. She could feel the bandage that was covering his injury from the fight.

Connie pulled herself free and sat up. Atsidas looked confused. "What's wrong?" He asked, nervously.

Connie sighed. “Okay, look... if this is going to work-”

“Yeah?!” Atsidas both blinked rapidly and swallowed.

“You have to promise me something.” She gave the orc a stern look. “And you have to say yes right away. If you even as much as hesitate-”

“Anything!” Atsidas smiled like a happy child. “I will do anything.”

“We do need the money. So next week is the last time you do this shit. We take the cash, leave the kingdom with the first boat we can find and you will never get in fights again.”

“Yeah. No problem.”

And then, Connie smiled. It was the first genuine smile she had made for a long time.

One week later...

Whatever hopes Connie might have had for starting a new life on Mino was shot down with a harpoon as she from ringside watched a human girl obliviate Atsidas’ face and kept beating him despite him looking half dead.

***

After Atsidas had been dragged out of the ring while still being glassy-eyed, Connie waited a moment before following the two big guys who had picked him up. They had gone to a back door and thrown him outside the building. Connie stood behind a staircase and waited for them to leave. Once they had, Connie went out the door and found Atsidas being left in the dirt.

“Sid?! Sid, say something!” She managed to lift the heavy orc up enough so he could lean against a wall and somewhat sit up. “Sid, are you okay?!”

The orc just breath in an unsettling way. Connie was unsure if he actually looked at her or if it was just an empty stare. His face was a mess, she almost puked looking at him. She tried to get him to stand, but even if she could then she realized putting this sort of strain on herself was not a great idea as she was pregnant.

“This is a load of shit...” Connie was stressing out as she pulled her own hair. "Shit. Shitshitshit..." She was starting to cry. “Wait here, okay? I have an idea.”

She went inside the building and realized that was a dumb thing to say as Atsidas was most likely unable to lift a finger or barely breath.

She got near to the ring again and started to go looking for satyrs with black wool. The creatures around paid her no mind as they were busy watching the harpy in the ring called Sweeper live up to her name.

She finally spotted Rosalio the Satyr who stood up and was swearing as it looked like he was gonna lose a second bet. He got startled as someone grabbed him by the shoulder. He turned and saw Connie. “What the- what do you want, human?”

Connie gave him a mean glare. Her cheeks were still wet from tears. “You. Help me. Now!”

“Help you with what exac... hey, don’t I know you from somewh-”

“Not important. Atsidas needs a healer. Help me get him to town.”

“Ah...” Rosalio scratched the wool on the back of his head. “Look, I don’t get what your deal is, but helping him would not be... smart.”

Connie’s eyes looked like they could burn a house down.

“See, these fights are not that... legal. So if we help him and someone is like Hey, this orc looks like he was in an underground fight club I could be in trouble since some might think I was at an underground-”

Rosalio got water splashed in the face. He could feel something cold poking his neck. He realized that it was ice in the shape of small arrow-heads.

Rosita blinked. “I know who you are! You are that crazy human bitch who can magic water and was trying to kill Atsi and me!”

Connie narrowed her eyes. “And if you don’t help me getting the orc to a healer right now, then I will freeze the blood in your veins.”

Rosalio dropped his betting slips. “You can do shit like that?!”

She couldn't.

“Damn right I can. Come on.” She had a firm grip around his wrist as she pulled him along to go help Atsidas as everyone else in the hall cried for blood.

***

Atsidas woke up with a terrible headache. He could only see out of one eye as the other one had been covered by bandages. Most of his face had been covered by bandages that had been dipped in healing salvia made from mushrooms. He was unsure why he lied in a bed he couldn’t recognize and was in a room that was far cleaner than any room he had ever been inside.

He was for a moment unsure why he had gotten hurt to begin with. But then he recalled the freckled human girl who had beat the ever-loving shit out of him. He turned his head and noticed a window. The sun was up, so he had been some hours since the fight. His entire body felt like an open wound as he managed to sit up.

“Yeah, I wouldn’t do that if I were you.” Atisdas saw that a male elf in a white tunic entered the room. On the chest of the tunic was sewn a green snake with red spots coming from it’s mouth. The spots were suppose to look like three red roses. The snake symbol meant the elf was a professional healer. “You need to lie down and let the enchanted salvia do its work on you. You have suffered a severe case of head trauma, and that’s putting it lightly. The body needs to rest, you are lucky that you aren’t braindead.” The healer looked at Atsidas as if he was something slimy that was dirtying the bed. The elf then turned his head toward the door. “You can come in now. Your... friend... is awake.”

As the elf left the room, Connie came in. She looked terrible, as if she had not slept at all. She had not. “Hi.”

“Hi.” Atsidas didn’t know what else to say. He lied down but leaned himself enough up so he could look at Connie. She looked somehow happy and miserable at the same time. “You wanna sit, or...?”

Connie took a seat at a chair next to the bed. “I told them you got hurt by some muggers. Not sure they are buying it.”

“Okay...” Atsidas felt ashamed.

“I mean, they don’t really have to know how you got hurt, right? I pay them to fix you. Done.” Connie made a half-assed laugh.

There was a long minute of awkward silence.

“Wait... how much does this cost?” Atsidas asked as he placed a finger on the bandages around his head.

“Um... I don’t think I wanna tell you that.”

“Aw, Connie, noooo...” Atsidas groaned, partly due to still feeling pain all over his head.

“Don’t worry, I still have some coronets left-”

“I knew the risk, okay? I knew I might get beaten to a pulp, you weren’t suppose to use that cash on getting me a healer, you didn’t owe me that.”

Connie made a bitter smile. “It’s not about anyone being in anyone’s debt. Is it really so bad that I want to take care of you?”

Atsidas narrowed his one open eye. “Hey... wasn’t that what I told you when-”

“Yes, genius.” Connie chuckled as she dried her eyes. “Gods, Sid. You are so-”

“You two should be ashamed!”

Connie and Atsidas turned their attention toward an elderly satyr who stood by the door and glared at them through her thick glasses. She were dressed in a gown worn by patients. “Disgusting. Perverts!” She then left.

“Yeah, it’s a small hospital.” Connie sighed. "Some healer noticed the bump on my stomach and... well, you know, they can put two and two together.” She shrugged. “And I guess gossip spreads fast here.”

Atsidas was unsure what to say. So he said nothing and moved himself to the left side of the bed and patted on the mattress. Connie accepted the invitation and got in the bed and hugged him as he hugged her back.

“I think I have to get out of town as soon as possible.” Connie kissed him on the cheek.

“Yeah, you probably should.”

"By the way...” Connie tightened her hug. “I love you too.”

#Atsidas the orc #atsidas #connie #connie the human #royal punch #connie x atsidas #atsidas x connie #orc #fantasy #Kahaani #Kahaani the human #Veronica #Veronica the Gorgon

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spookyspaghettisundae · 1 year

Text

Yellowness

Reality was disintegrating. People scarcely noticed such an event whenever it had happened before. Even the people whose hearts had opened to secrets of the cosmos.

Like in this very moment, with all manner of people, sitting in their cars, trailing down THE HIGHWAY, oblivious to the invisible fire that was devouring their world. Driving to where they needed to be, or wanted to be, or even just driving aimlessly. People always needed to be somewhere, or elsewhere, or… anywhere, really.

And whenever you took that apart, word for word, concept by concept, the cracks always started to show. Some magi had said it before, and they would say it again: perception was shaped by belief, therefore the world as we perceived it was subject to change by changing our beliefs.

Underneath the cracking surface of one egg, another reality was already on the rise, emerging from its own nested depths. It had been gestating in the dark void where all memories met, melting into a primordial soup where all ambitions went to die. If the people traveling THE HIGHWAY were like the land’s blood cells, then the first extremities were already on the verge of withering and rotting away. Blackened, with potholes forming in the asphalt, and nothing to stop the spreading decay.

Deep down, deeper down, beneath the dust and shadow, ancient fossils slept. Turned to oil and tar and stone. Drawn from the earth, transmuted with blood and sweat and dollars into plastic and steel, and combusting into the suffocating smoke of industry and corruption. Whole worlds had risen and crumbled into sand, over and over again.

Some more obvious in their transfiguration than others. Sometimes, someone’s dream was dying, and with it a previous world. Sometimes, another someone’s dream took its place, and changed the way reality worked.

And whenever any world ended, another would rise from its ashes.

Whatever would happen if that cycle was broken somehow? The phoenix—rather than being shot dead, and eaten by the hungry hunter, and shat out to return to the eternal circle of life and death—what if something were to remove it from the cosmos entirely?

Most people in those cars, drifting up and down THE HIGHWAY, paid no mind to such esoteric thoughts. Most of them had never noticed previous realities dying and replacing each other. Events as invisible to them as the sky over their heads, and as unfathomable as the seas and the millennia of eras past.

They had other things to worry about.

Such as Special Agent of the FBI, Derek Wells. Sliding doors opened for him before he exited the clothing store at a strip mall.

He had exchanged his damaged suit for a pair of denims and a bright yellow T-shirt emblazoned with a cartoonishly smiling bright sun. His shoes lay discarded in a trash can nearby, previously swapped out with a pair of cheap white sneakers. His service pistol and its concealed holster stayed hidden, wrapped up inside the fabric of his bureau-issued jacket, squeezed underneath one arm.

He ran his hand through his short hair, figuring it needed a new trim soon. Considering the bureau’s dress code and how he was now violating it with his new outfit, the thought of quitting the job crossed his mind.

Then the thought of winding up in prison eclipsed it.

Derek Wells sighed deeply, as if he was jettisoning debris from the surface of his soul, from which another was emerging, unbeknownst to him.

Aria Chambers was leaning against the side of her limousine, chattering on a chunky mobile phone. Wells sighed again, somewhat disappointed over the bureau never having issued him one of those devices. The pocketful of change he always used for payphones hung heavy in his balled up jacket.

Barry, Aria’s bodyguard, stood watch near the limousine. Wearing his shades again and looming in the background, Wells figured they’d be fine.

According to Aria, she had some things to talk about with another one of the Witches of the West Coast. Part of Wells had been burning with curiosity to listen in on that conversation, but another part of him was fed up with all the talk of magick, and ghosts, and necromancers, and the occult.

Mostly, he wondered if time in prison would be the equivalent of vacation he was long overdue for. A time out he desperately needed.

The thought of his breakup with Aleena returned to haunt him—just as someone else exited the store behind him, and its doors slid open again, the soft R’n’B of Chasing Waterfalls by TLC traveled from the retailer’s radio speakers, reaching him outside. It pained him how he still liked the track, but the sound of it now cut deep, forever intertwined with a broken relationship.

He clicked his tongue. The damned song would stay on the air all year. He knew it before he knew it.

Took a walk. Away from the clothing store. Away from the music.

Straight to the fast food joint near the next corner. It afforded him enough distance from the music, though its beat and melody and dulcet vocals still lingered as ghostly echoes in his ears.

While he counted coins to gauge if he could afford a burger and milkshake, rather than making a call to the bureau, he paused.

A figure in the window of the electronics store stared back at him. The ghosts of TV screens behind the glass flickered.

Electricity. Crackled.

That figure was neither his own reflection nor a person behind the glass. That figure was a person from… elsewhere, entirely.

Reality was disintegrating, and Derek Wells just didn’t know it yet.

The figure was a man with messy blond hair, dressed in an old black leather jacket.

Jericho Kane.

The suspect Wells and Parker had pursued across America on a wild goose chase, only to find out he was the symptom of something bigger, and not the cause.

And here he was—or wasn’t? Jericho Kane, the shadow, or the ghost, or the echo—banged his fists against the glass from another side, shouting at the top of his lungs, making no sound whatsoever. Inaudibly pleading with Wells to help him. Almost entirely translucent. Barely visible.

The clinkety-clinking of coins hitting sidewalk tore Wells out of the sinuous vision. When he looked back up, the image of a desperate Jericho Kane had vanished. Like a hallucination that had given up on haunting him.

Wells tilted his head one way, then the other, almost hoping he’d catch another glimpse of the bizarre apparition. A few weeks prior, and he would have been questioning his sanity over such a sight, but he knew better now than to dismiss such phenomena as anything but a sign of the presence of something unnatural.

Picking up the fallen coins, Wells rubbernecked and swiveled, hoping to catch a glimpse of the ghost again. Or something else that stood out.

Aria was still on the phone. Waving the hip flask in her other hand excitedly, taking a swig, and responding into the mobile receiver. The traffic of the nearby HIGHWAY drowned out whatever words she exchanged.

Other passersby gave Wells funny looks. One of them oozed with pity, like he was looking at a crazy man.

Wells averted his gaze, shook his head, and did the next-best thing after looking for a way to find the ghost.

He entered the fast food joint.

Slowly, surely, reality was disintegrating. He just couldn’t see it. Nobody really could.

Standing in line to get that burger and shake, Wells shot a glance at his wristwatch.

3:33 PM.

He found it funny at the time though had no concept as to why.

Mostly, he thought one thing: Agent Parker was late. Too late.

Something was wrong. It couldn’t have been taking her this long to interrogate the imprisoned serial killer, Freddy Fletcher, at the Kentucky supermax.

He sighed every time he remembered his previous conversation with her.

How she had insisted on going alone, in case they were apprehended for having gone dark on the bureau—it only made sense if only one of them was caught in such a case.

How she had insisted on going alone, because Fletcher’s profile told her he would be more talkative that way—and dismissing him on the “good cop, bad cop” tactic ever worked out for the better.

How she had insisted on going alone, because their enemies were spying on them somehow, and splitting their attention would make it more difficult for that shadowy cabal to stall them, to stop them from reaching the dark heart of this invisible world.

Wells sighed because he knew, deep down, she was right.

Wells sighed yet again, because he had developed a deep sense of loyalty towards his new partner and colleague over such a short amount of time, and was now growing worried about her well-being.

Worried that something was wrong, and Parker was in trouble.

Even with reality disintegrating as it was, and a whole cast of realistic doubts gnawing away at the tenuous equilibrium within himself, one more person stood in line in front of him. Ordering a cheeseburger and fries. A small and greasy reality check, grounding him in the reality he thought he knew.

He shot another glance over his shoulder.

Aria was still on the phone.

Then, Wells froze. Paralyzed with shock.

A familiar face filled out the entirety of his perception. His beliefs flip-flopped in that very moment, as he had seen too many coincidences for them to remain in the realm of coincidence. And with that very realization, and reality disintegrating as it was, and his beliefs tearing apart at the seams, and altering his perception, he saw—

Director Anthony Collins.

His superior. His mentor at the bureau.

His friend of several years.

That had been Wells’ perception and beliefs for a good long time now.

Now, he perceived an enemy.

Anthony was one of their enemies.

Instinct—instinct told Wells that Anthony was the leak in the bureau. The one who had sold them out to the Way King’s cabal.

It was the only way Wells could explain why on Earth he would encounter Director Anthony Collins in the middle of nowhere, an entire US state away from the West Virginia office, rooting around inside the back of a strange black van with a wizard painting airbrushed onto its side.

Though Wells lacked the words to describe this tingling and weird sensation, he sensed the inherent synchronicity, drenching the fabric of reality in that very moment. A dizzying sense of vertigo overcame him as he stared at Anthony. Their confluence here, brought together at this innocuous strip mall, against all odds, and against all logic.

Anthony was the traitor.

The enemy.

“Uh, excuse me, can I get your order, sir?”

The clerk behind the counter had addressed Wells. Snapped him right back out of the vertigo.

He was already seeing red and all faces except for Anthony’s had blurred into soupy, indecipherable masks.

“I’m sorry. Get the next customer, please. I’ll come back later,” Wells pressed out before clenching his jaw.

Staring daggers at Anthony all the while.

“Uh, o-okay?”

Someone took his place in line while Wells marched straight out of the fast food joint, nearly shoving some stranger out of the way in his stride.

Across the parking lot he stormed, on a direct path towards his former mentor. Following a straight line to the gravity well. The magnet to his metal.

“Anthony!” Wells yelled. A furious yell, transporting pure and unfiltered wrath.

Anthony Collins jolted up into standing straight. He had the air of someone caught in the act. Wells didn’t know what exactly he had caught Anthony doing just now, but he knew he was right about his instinct.

This chance encounter felt wrong.

All wrong.

Wells kept pace, one angry step after the other taking him to Anthony fast. Fury rippled through his body. He shook and burned with indignant rage until his sneakers slapped the ground with increasing speed.

Anthony’s eyes widened with shock. Rooted where he stood, like a deer caught in the headlights.

The fury flowed. Adrenaline pumped. Wells burst out into jogging towards Anthony.

“Anthony!”

Anthony sprang into action. Slammed the van’s side door shut, then bolted to the driver’s seat. Didn’t even close the door as he fired up the motor, and the vehicle’s engine roared.

Stray coins jingled where they hit the parking lot’s asphalt—Wells gritted his teeth, oblivious to such paltry losses, and yet—

“Shit!”

Wells’ jogging transformed into running. He chased after the van. Sparks sprayed where the vehicle bounced over the nearest curb—Anthony taking a desperate shortcut past people stuck in traffic by the parking lot exit—the van scraped over concrete and fender metal screeched as it violently twisted.

Anthony gained more speed until he escaped with the van, long before Wells could catch up on foot.

Because the windows on the back of van had been tinted, Wells couldn’t spot anything. Through the red haze clouding his perception, he hadn’t even caught the license plate number.

“Shit!” he swore again.

He bottled up more profanities before they could cascade from his throat.

A car horn honked, and Wells waved the driver to go around him as he returned to the curb.

Aria and Barry were looking his way. Aria threw her hands up into a theatrical shrug—still holding the hip flask in one hand and the phone in the other—still so far out of earshot that they couldn’t communicate verbally. Confused over whatever had just played out on the strip mall’s parking lot—

Wells jogged over to them.

Shouted before he arrived.

“Get that car goin’! Quick! We can’t let him get away!”

Doors slammed and to Wells’ relief, both Aria and Barry reacted as quickly as he needed them to. He caught some wheezing breaths as he slumped into the seat in the back of the limo. The driver stepped on the gas, just like Aria told him to.

“Follow that van,” she instructed, between hasty sips from her flask.

She eyed Wells closely.

“Darlin’, who the hell are we chasing?”

Wells unraveled the balled-up jacket in his hands. Withdrew the empty pistol from the holster in its bowels. He checked it thoroughly, just short of taking it apart to clean it—a way he used to decompress and “meditate”, back in his days with the Rangers.

The weapon in his palm weighed as much as it should, its magazine filled with new bullets.

It centered him now.

“Okay, darlin’, you are really scaring me,” Aria said, taking another swig from her flask. “What in the hell is going on? Who is that? Talk to me, please, we’re, like, on the same side here. Right?”

Wells emitted a shuddering sigh, partially owed to catching his breath. Partially owed to exasperation.

He didn’t feel like explaining.

But she was right. They never had the luxury of picking their allies. He’d take whoever he got, and hope they had his back when it came down to serious business.

“That,” he breathed, “That was Director Anthony Collins of the FBI. Don’t ask me how I know, but I know—I know it’s him. Gotta be him. He’s the guy who ratted us out, at the bureau.”

Aria nodded.

He set his jaw and looked up. Aria and Barry both eyed him suspiciously—like friends would, these two strangers now strangely concerned with his well-being.

Wells spoke again, “How does your…”

He didn’t want to say it out loud.

He had grown to hate that word. Almost as much as he hated the memory of Aleena breaking up with him.

Aria cocked her head and asked, “How does what?”

“How does your magick work?” Wells finally asked Aria.

Barry averted his gaze, still uncomfortable himself over the subject. Probably because he had seen his former colleague, Mac, get possessed by a demon, then get his brains blown out by Aria because exorcisms apparently didn’t work quite as they did in movies.

“What? You want a crash course now?”

Wells shrugged. His grip around the pistol tightened to the point of his knuckles whitening.

The engine growled. Tires screeched. Her limo driver was doing his best.

Through tinted windows, Wells perceived the wizard van on the horizon. The two vehicles swerved and swooped, weaving through drifting traffic, all blood cells accelerating and evading and surviving, while adrenaline pumped through the body in sudden surges.

Several cars ahead of them on THE HIGHWAY.

Blood rushed in Wells’ ears. The gloomy sky outside continuously darkened.

Ever so slightly.

And reality? Well, reality was still disintegrating. The ghostly image of Jericho Kane once more banged his fists against a window between worlds, invisible to the people inside the limo. Helpless to communicate with them, unable to bridge the void, and incapable of reaching them in any way.

“Darlin’, I trust you’re as sharp as you look,” Aria said, “But there’s no way I can teach you how to—”

“I don’t want to learn how you do it,” Wells replied. “I’m just curious how it works. Like a crash course in astrophysics, or something. See, I know how this gun works. Combustion. Black powder. I know how to use it safely, and I know how to take a mean motherfucker down with it if I need to. So—how does your weapon work?”

Aria scoffed. Took another swig.

She raised the flask and clicked her long and perfectly-manicured black fingernails against its shiny silvery surface.

“Okay, Mister America. These,” she said, clicking the flask again, “are my potions.”

“It’s not just booze?”

“Oh, it’s booze alright. But booze is my potions, see? Booze is a lubricant which allows me to see the world differently than other people—hell, different even from how I see it when I’m sober, and believe you me, I try to keep that a distant memory.”

“You’re drunk all the time?”

She ignored the question. ”And when that changes—when I change—so does the world around me. I’ve hurled beer bottles with my mind, like some Jedi shit. You saw me drink that Gravedigger spirit asshole, well, because spirits and spirits are intrinsically connected when I’m transcendent like that, and it makes sense when I’m blasted. Shit, man, I’ve been in car crashes under the influence and climbed out of wrecks that would have killed an elephant—and I walked away without a scratch, like a newborn baby.”

Barry arched a brow, still trying to blend into their environment despite being the biggest person in the car.

Wells ran a hand through his hair.

This was helping. She was helping.

His blood still rushed. His body still burned. He still yearned to grab Anthony, and throttle him till all the answers came tumbling out of his rat mouth.

But Wells also knew he’d never get all the puzzle pieces from one single place.

And their chase was taking them in the direction of the Kentucky State Penitentiary.

To Parker.

He refrained from swearing and cracked a lopsided smile.

“Y’know, that’s the first thing I’ve heard about the occult that has made any lick o’ sense.”

Aria beamed. If she was toasted—and she likely was, given her drinking habits—then she was good at hiding it. Or so inured to the influence of it that it was her normal state of being.

He continued to grapple with her explanation, shaping it into something he could comprehend. “So you’re telling me… you get shitfaced, then the world bends to your drunk logic?”

She shrugged, still smiling. “Best I’ve ever heard it put into words.”

“Alcoholomancy? Alcoholemy?”

She laughed from the depth of her belly, snorting by the end. “Great names. I, well, I just call it witchcraft. But I’ll take those into consideration when I next engage in discourse with my coven.”

His grip around the pistol eased. Wells chewed on his lip and shot another glance to their target. The van couldn’t outrun the limo, nor could the limo catch up to the van.

The lamest chase he had ever been involved in.

“If they ever turn this into some fucked-up kind of movie, I want credit for that,” he mumbled.

Her slender hand rested on his forearm. Cold skin. Electric to the touch.

A soothing energy flowed from body to body. It caused his other hand to release all tension, unfurling from the fist he had formed in his lap, splaying his fingers before gripping the gun more lightly.

“She’ll be fine,” Aria said. “I feel it too. It’s all coming together now. We… we are all coming together now. All mysteries unravel when you pull on the right thread, and sometimes, the right thread just presents itself.”

She extended the hip flask for him to take.

And Wells took it. Stared at the sleek metal container, systematically shedding all inhibitions. He normally would have never had a drink on the job, but he no longer was on the job anymore, was he?

Thus, he took a long sip from the flask.

Its liquid burned in the back of his throat. Strong bourbon. Given how Aria dressed and behaved, he assumed it was expensive stuff. It didn’t matter to Wells in that moment, it only tasted like fire.

Fitting right in with his state of being.

Reality continued disintegrate all around them, unbeknownst to them.

“Do you feel it, too?” Aria asked.

“That we’re going to get answers soon?” Wells shot back.

“Something strange in the air, Agent Wells. Something…”

“Call me Derek,” he said. “And I feel it, yeah. ”

“Providence,” she added. “It tastes like providence.”

“Tastes like bourbon to me,” he replied, handing the flask back to her with another lopsided smile. “Thanks. And thanks for payrolling the ammo and clothing.”

She just nodded.

He couldn’t help it and tightened his grip around the pistol again. The lamest car chase was taking them off THE HIGHWAY, onto roads winding through a wooded area. The limo never really gained on the van. The van never outran the limo.

Anthony ran a red light, resulting in screeching tires at a lazy crossing, and more honking horns. Aria’s driver powered through, provoking more angry honks from other people in traffic.

“What are we doing when we catch up to him?” Aria asked. “I’d normally volunteer to be more proactive, but according to you, we’re dealing with the director of the Federal fuckin’ Bureau of Investigation, so I think I’m going to play my cards safe and follow your lead on this. I have only so many get-out-of-jail-free cards, Derek.”

His nostrils flared as he struggled to formulate a response.

He wasn’t sure himself what would happen next.

Blown away were all bureau protocol, all discipline from military days, and every iota of personal routine. He shook his head when he only came up with raw instinct, because raw instinct was gripping his stomach.

“We talk,” he finally reasoned out loud. “I will point this gun at Anthony, and we will talk until I’m satisfied with whatever he says.”

“That’s,” Aria whispered. “That’s not much of a plan. Listen, Derek. You tell me what to do, and we’ll do it, Barry and me both.”

Barry met her gaze and nodded slowly in recognition.

Wells rolled his jaw and figured her remaining bodyguard was worth every penny she paid him.

The things he must have seen.

After the final curve of the road ahead of them, the forest opened up, granting clear sight to long fields, leading up to the facility colloquially known as the Castle on the Cumberland.

The tall Gothic structure honored its name, looming over the nearby river like a foreboding fortress. The water tower jutting out from its rooftops lent it an almost alien appearance, like a UFO was about to land there any time now.

Aria’s attention became glued to the sky. Barry rubbernecked to follow her gaze.

Derek Wells squinted once it hit him.

Reality was disintegrating, and the sky was slowly transforming to match.

Clouds swirled with surreal shape and direction, forming a spiraling vortex in the sky. Like a misty black hole forming… right above the supermax prison.

All gloomy daylight gradually darkened, like a painter slathering on layers upon layers of black.

The horizon shifted in tone until a deep crimson saturated it, seeping upwards, like the earth itself bleeding, dripping upside-down into the heavens.

All distances melted—the fields to the tree lines grew as if they were driving away from them until a shadowy mist had swallowed them entirely.

The skies of different places clashed like different liquids admixing in a bartender’s glass.

Aria’s hand on Derek’s forearm centered him again. He stopped squeezing the grip of his pistol.

Reality was disintegrating.

Even the crimson died until a pitch-black darkness swallowed their environment. It swallowed the wizard-van and Anthony. It swallowed the prison, the river, and the woods, and the sky itself, until nothing but darkness remained.

The whole world outside the limo turned dark. And then even the dying light inside dimmed.

The driver slowed the car down.

“Stop,” Wells said. “Stop the car.”

Aria nodded.

The driver braked until the limo came to a gentle halt.

Wells got out.

The world had fallen as silent as it had turned entirely dark.

Unnatural in that silence.

He only heard his own breathing, a bit too shallow and fast for comfort, fueled by his heart, pounding with fear. He hardly saw his own white sneakers through the endless, let alone the sharp outlines of the vehicle he was standing beside.

Then the howling started.

Howling winds.

Those wind carried dust and desert heat, yet smelled like the final snow of a dying winter.

He’d remember thinking: It’s about time, because this is the end of May. What is summer waiting for?

Streetlights from another state flared up, one by one—a chain of light cast down a long, paved path; illuminating the lonesome road before them.

THE HIGHWAY.

Farther down the road, Anthony stood outside the wizard-van, gazing to the horizon ahead of them.

And farther yet down the road, Jericho Kane’s rusty Buick stood, and beside it, Agent Parker, and a man in a black duster.

“Anthony!” Wells yelled again.

Anthony Collins cocked his head back to stare at Wells, and the gun in his hand, and—

The distance melted.

Shortened.

Perception and belief both molted. Eggs bursting from eggs.

Reality disintegrated even faster than before.

The hundreds of yards between limo, van, and Buick had shrunken into dozens.

The man in the black duster raised a hand in greeting.

He smiled at Wells.

The small red-headed woman by his side—Parker—looked pale, disheveled, and distressed. She met Wells’ gaze and shook her head.

Barry and Aria emerged from the other side of the limo. The bodyguard was tense, every muscle in the beefcake’s body turned as taut as steel wire.

The man in black shouted down THE HIGHWAY to them, with the melody of song in his tone.

“Hello! You must be Agent Wells. I’m so happy to meet you. I think it’s high time we all met the Way King. Together!”

Aria muttered under her breath so only Barry and Wells could catch it.

“It’s him. I know that voice. The Oracle of New York.”

Parker shouted down the road.

“Put the gun away, Agent Wells. We’re about to learn the truth, and I would hate to see it bleeding out from gunshot wounds.”

Something about what she said matched poorly with how she said it. Parker crossed her arms, staring at the cracked road between them.

Distance melted yet again as reality continued to disintegrate. Warmth arrived on another gust of wind. Wells swallowed and tasted more desert sand.

His changes in perception lagged behind the sluggish adaptation of his beliefs.

When he next cast a glance around to take in the unreal surroundings, the sky solidified again. Distance shrank anew—transporting them farther down THE HIGHWAY even while they stood still.

Nobody looked as perturbed as Wells felt by this unnatural experience. The only thing he could read on Aria’s expression was one of distrust towards Michael. Fear, even.

Anthony appeared to be more nervous over the confrontation with Parker and Wells. Standing in between them, his gaze bounced back and forth, like someone observing a tennis match from the immediate sidelines.

Michael no longer needed to shout. The vehicles were all only one car’s length away from one another.

“Now, ladies and gentlemen. What say you we all take our trip down the yellow-lined Tarmac? It’ll only be a short way to the Way King now. He’ll be thrilled to meet you, I assure you.”

Awkwardly, everybody shuffled back into their respective vehicles.

Wells remained standing last, his burning ire locked onto Anthony Collins with a burning gaze. The FBI director broke eye contact, shrinking under the heat of that unbridled fury until he disappeared into the wizard-van.

Wells slammed the door shut behind himself.

It was high time to meet the man behind the curtain.

All darkness flaked away from the world, dissipating and scattering like dust in the wind.

The fiery sun shone yellow against the bright blue sky over desert.

The Way King’s ranch awaited.

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thatdykepunkslut · 2 years

Text

Because I wrote an entire essay for some guy on discord and I figured might as well put it somewhere someone might actually read it (some things are lacking context but just keep reading the arguments I'm refuting are mostly kneejerk reactions that will be evident from my response):

Capitalism does not address scarcity. It vastly, VASTLY overproduces cheap consumer goods (christmas gift type goods are made in the billions months or even years before the year they're to be sold in, completely divorced from market predictions) while completely neglecting or making unattainably expensive essential goods like high density housing, public transit vehicles, life saving medication, quality food, etc.

Capitalist profit-seeking drives unnsustainable food practices like intensive animal agriculture, monocropping, industrial fertilizer and chemical weeding. Causes cities to implode by building endless suburbs whose tax income does not cover the costs of road and utility maintenance as well as moving industry to areas with cheaper labor and destroying ecosystems with illegal or unregulated dumping and pollution. Insulin is VERY cheap to make and the patent was sold for $1 decades ago. It has gotten more expensive even relative to other expensive medications, soaring dozens of times faster than inflation would imply. After WW2, car companies that made absurd amounts of money off of building tanks and planes then bought up public transit across the US and literally stacked it in a pile and burned it. There's photos of hundreds of burnt out streetcars with Henry Ford (who inspired parts of Mein Kampf and profited off of Jewish slave labor before the war btw) smoking a cigar and looking rather pleased with himself in the foreground. These are just off the top of my head

[9:41 PM]Now for how non-capitalist economies differ:

When removed from the stress of having to earn a living and the desire to accumulate enough to give their children a better life, most people are often very willing to help each other out for free. Under the stress of capitalist workdays (which are literally designed to make you too tired to think, shorter workweeks and workdays have been proven to significantly improve productivity in all sectors), people don't have the energy to spare to help their neighbor. However, pretty much everyone expresses some desire to make the world a better place if they were able. What would you personally do if you didn't have to worry about rent or your next meal or clothes or transportation ever again? Maybe play video games and [redacted] for a week straight but after that? Pretty much everyone is gonna say "hang out with loved ones and cook food."

All necessary forms of labor/work are enjoyable or at least bearable in the name of the greater good to some people. There are people who fucking LOVE picking up trash, like being a sanitation worker is literally the only job they ever want to have. A pretty sizeable chunk of the population enjoys growing plants and taking care of animals and there are methods of farming that require remarkably little effort. Pretty much everyone has a hobby they either currently enjoy or would love to pick up that is required for people to have comfortable lives, but cannot dedicate themselves to it because it would not be profitable enough to live off of

[9:56 PM]decommodifying goods and services fixes this, everyone can do at least one of the things they like doing because there is no threat of violence if you don't work (violence meaning eviction, starvation, freezing to death, etc) In addition to refocusing labor on what actually makes people enjoy their labor, it makes it pretty easy to keep up with demand. "Oh we need more food? Ok well go give people some seeds from the seed library and tools from the tool library. Now we have more food." "We need more clothing? Ok tell the sheperds to let more of their flock have kids and the textile mills to work an extra thirty minutes a day for the next month" (side note, there's finally been developments in automating clothesmaking. Tailoring will be more important after capitalism to ensure clothes are better fitting and last longer but the general forms won't need slave waged third world workers anymore soon)

[9:59 PM]Without states or capitalists to bicker over resources, there's no reason for wars. There will still be some interpersonal violence but without needing drug money to make life bearable (or like, baby formula bc apparently it's violent crime for someone to shoplift baby formula) how often do you think there will be THAT much violent crime? (although various other forms of hierarchy will need to be torn down in order to stop hate crimes like lynchings, mass shootings, and rape)

honestly really the only refutation needed for this as you have worded it is paleontology. Some of our most ancient ancestors have signs of living decades after debilitating injuries that would have rendered them utterly useless to family and unable to care for themselves. This necessitates that they were cared for at great inconvenience for upwards of fifty years tens of thousands of years before the earliest hints of civilization, let alone the currency to pay for a hospice nurse

[10:07 PM]Also, even in the context of mineral mining, without the need for phone companies to sell phones every year, electronics will become much longer lasting and more selectively repairable, meaning less minerals will be removed from use and fewer minerals will be needed to support all the products that are never actually bought in the first place. Even more so with cars, public transit vehicles carry orders of magnitude more people for relatively similar requirements and they don't even NEED conflict minerals in some cases because of overhead electricity being a solution to the tyranny of the battery equation (has someone coined that phrase yet? it seems like a very obvious parallel to the rocket equation now that I think about it but anyways) ok I think I've completely poured my remaining braincells for the day into this I'm gonna take a nap now

#punkblogging #my writing

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useless-bi-otch · 1 year

Text

Cookies'n Cream - Chapter 8

Last chapter / MasterList / art by @aneenasevla

Chapter 8 - Bodyguards

"... And that's all for today. Thanks for today's services, guys!," Kanami declares, rubbing her hands with satisfaction, to which the employees, both hired and volunteer, let out big sighs, all happy for another workday. It was tiring, but productive, and it couldn't be otherwise.

After the incident involving the three troublemakers, the rest of the afternoon at the Heavy Bakery had passed without anything a hitch. They half-expected, not really anticipating, the police to show up, but hours had passed and none of them had heard a siren or seen the pulsating lights of a police car through the windows. Thank God. And anyway, Kanami was cautious and would have a video ready to show the cops, recorded by the security camera just above the area where the cash register was located, serving as evidence to justify her actions. None of them would have to worry about possible legal actions being taken against the bakery. Which was good, because Tomori wanted to fill her head with thoughts and memories far more pleasant than those.

The time she spent with Okubo and his friends was relatively short, due to the inopportune interruption, but no less pleasant. They even surprised her with some really yummy rice balls! If she could, she would like to have many more lunch breaks like that.

"You're welcome, Kana-chan! Are you sure you don't want help with the cleaning?," She asks while removing the apron and then the hairnet "There's more trash than usual, even though we've already got rid of the stinkier ones, hahaha."

Hiro laughs along with her, one hand over his mouth.

"By now Kana could open a second company, specializing in the collection and disposal of medical waste!"

"That's a bit too much, Hiro, c'mon," The baker rolls her eyes, although she smirked at the cashier's jokes. "And don't worry, Koga and Ryuki offered to help Paikon and me with the cleaning."

"Wait, what?", Koga widens his eyes, his jaw dropping a little, to which Ryuki, playing with a reusable pastry bag full of water, says:

"Did you forget that she asked for a night sparring session, Koga? We'll go straight to the SJPW headquarters from here."

"Ooh, it's true…" He nods. And then he asks, arching an eyebrow, "But how about we still get some croissants as compensation for the extra service, huh?"

"Croissants are given to students on merit, so you should start to work harder to earn them."

"Shut up! And why are you still holding that pastry bag? You even filled it with water…”

"Oh, I just like squeezing things out of a sac, it's kinda relaxing... what?," Ryuki blinks as Koga bursts out laughing, bending over himself. Tomoyo rolls her eyes as the adults allow themselves exasperated chuckles, Kanami clapping her hands again and raising her voice to be heard.

"Okay, enough with the double entendre! Tomori and Tomoyo have already organized the kitchen and Hiro has already closed the cash register, so they're off the hook for the day. Koga, Ryuki and Paikon, the sooner we start clearing tables, the sooner we'll be done."

"I already said I don't need help, but if you insist, Miss Oomori…" Paikon shrugs before turning to the two boys "And you two, use the mops to clean the floor this time, instead of hitting each other with them. They aren't cheap, you know..."

"It was Koga who challenged me to a sparring session with cold weapons, I just accepted," Ryuki points to the said challenger, who screeches:

"For when we had finished cleaning, and with bo staffs! If you want to blame someone for the lost mop, Mr. Paikon, blame Ryuki, who broke it on my back!”

"There will be no sparring sessions inside this establishment, or none of you will get croissants!"

And that threat seemed to be enough to convince the boys to behave. Tomori would always laugh at the control Kanami was able to exert over them. She was an all-natural big sister, however much she denied it.

After saying goodbye to those who would stay at the bakery to finish their end-of-hours arrangements, Tomori, Hiro and Tomoyo leave the establishment together.

"Okay, we are a little short of time, but if we hurry, we can catch the next train," The cashier says while checking his cell phone "I'll go off my usual path, but at least once I need to be a gentleman and escort the ladies, instead of feeling like one of them..."

"You can focus your chivalry on Tomoyo for today, Hiro," Tomori says with a chuckle "I'm not going straight home."

"Last minute shopping?," The girl asks, to which Tomori makes a brief gesture with her hand.

"Kinda. Mom texted me and asked me to pick up Dad's medicine from the pharmacy nearby. He was supposed to have done that himself, but he forgot," She rolls her eyes a little "He never forgets the snacks and soy sauce on the market, but his diuretics are another story..."

Hiro laughs, putting his hand over his mouth again "Your mother deserves a medal for putting up with those things, I swear. Well, we're off then. Be careful on the streets, girl. See you tomorrow."

"You too. See ya!," She waves to both of them, smiling, before adjusting the strap of her purse on her shoulder and starting to walk. If she quickened her pace, she could make it to the pharmacy, two blocks away, and be back in time for the next train. It was at these times that she regretted never buying a car.

Fortunately, the streets at that time were well lit and busy. The Heavy Bakery was located in a busy shopping area, with people leaving or arriving at their workplaces, customers on their way to restaurants and pubs, all of which made it a reasonably safe area to walk around, as long as care was taken with what was carried, such as purses and shopping bags. Tomori had never had a problem with her walks through that region until here…

Except, at that moment, she felt strangely alert, aware of the fact that she was a woman walking the streets of Tokyo alone. Memories of the afternoon's events flood back into her mind; the most unpleasant, in this case. It was amazing how the human brain was able to remember the bad things in detail more effectively than the good things. Those clueless idiots had been pretty furious with the humiliation they had been through. If they decided they weren't going to let it slide…

She shakes her head as she feels a shiver run up her spine. No, dwelling on that would only make her paranoid, looking over her shoulder at all times, looking for pursuers who weren't even there. And living in fear, always anticipating an attack, was just what men like that wanted from their victims. She wouldn't give them that satisfaction.

She walks more purposefully, her hand steady on the handle of her purse, until she feels it vibrate slightly. She fishes out her phone from inside it, taking care to walk as far away from the street as possible (pickpockets on motorcycles that took advantage of the distraction of passers-by to grab purse straps were common there) while she checks her messages. There were two: one from her mother, sent just now, and another from Okubo, sent a couple of hours ago; probably shortly after he and his friends left the bakery.

She smiles, her chest getting all warm, her spirits lifting considerably as unpleasant thoughts are put on hold. She decides to answer him first; she knew her mother well enough to know that the conversation with her would be a long one.

Okubo_Naoya:

hey

I know you're still working miss uta

no need to answer now

I just wanna thank you for the company and the compliments on the rice balls

Not seeing you turning green and running to the bathroom like rihito said tyou would made the hours in the kitchen worth it ^^

sorry, it's a joke

but seriously, it was really worth it

and hope all is well with you after that bs that happened earlier

She laughs, allowing herself a fanciful moment in which she imagined him fumbling around with his phone after sending that message, cursing himself in his thoughts. She felt kind of privileged to be one of the very few people who knew that cute side of the legendary King of Combat.

Uta_Tomori:

lol it’s ok

I'd be lying if I didn’t say I was relieved by that too

LOL jk

I'm the one who needs to thank you mr okubo

both for the visit and for your concern

don't worry, we're used to dealing with this kinda thing

dumbasses like that don't last one minute under kanny's rough treatment LMAO

She then clicks on her mother's contact, still laughing. She had sent more texts after the first one, deciding that needing to wait more than a minute for a response from her daughter was a disrespect to her maternal authority.

Mom:

Tomoh, could you bring a bottle of rose water along with your father's medicine? I already transferred you the money

honey??

aren't you off of your shift by now? Kanny put you off the clock today?

Uta Tomori, you have 3 minutes to answer me or I'll call the bakery's phone!

Tomoh:

mom calm down

I'm here

I was just replying to a friend

so don’t freak out

Mom:

watch your words young lady

how am I not going to freak out when you take this long to answer me??

not knowing if you were still at work or if you'd been attacked in the street, run over by a car or something

your father has high blood pressure, but mom's heart is not much better

Tomoh:

your heart's fine

if you can make such drama without having tachycardia there's nothing to worry about lol

But seriously, I'm fine, chill

I'm on my way to the pharmacy now

a bottle of rose water, right?

Mom:

yes please

I'll pick it up tomorrow morning before taking the train to the shrine

want to go with me?

Tomoh:

I can't, I’ll be at work

If it was in the late afternoon it'd be fine, but since it's not...

sorry

but which shrine is it?

Mom:

It’s Meiji Shrine

Tomoh:

in Harajuku?

it's so far away, mom!

there're closer shrines, why don't you go to one of them?

Mom:

it’s called a pilgrimage sweety!

the gods appreciate it and are more inclined to answer our prayers

and the ones I have are very important

Tomoh:

are you going to throw some coins in the offering box and light some incense to ask for Seki's victory in the next sjpw tournament?

Mom:

Not only that

I will thank them for the promotion your brother received at work

Ask for them to give your father's heart a break

And ask for my daughter to finally find a good husband

Tomori almost drops the phone in fright, her face heating up until it almost looks like it's burning.

Tomoh:

oh my god mom

we already talked about this

I haven’t had time to think about these things

Mom:

and when will you do??

time is passing, you're getting older and I still don't have a son-in-law!

you sure you don’t want to give a chance to Watanabe's kid?

he's such a good boy and he also majored in gastronomy

Tomoh:

no mom I don't

we are no longer in the Edo period

enough with the arranged marriages

Mom:

what am I supposed to do then??

you're not helping at all Tomori

I want grandkids, darling

I want to see you happy with someone

like Tatsu is with Saeko

I don't want to see you alone anymore

Tomoh:

I'm not alone

I have you guys and I have my friends

I'm anything but alone

so you don't have to worry ok?

now I'm gonna be offline cause I'm going to cross the avenue

love you bye

Tomori shoves the phone back in her purse, not waiting for an answer, still embarrassed. Year in, year out and her mother wouldn't freaking let it go. Typical mother, she supposed. If she had the slightest idea that her daughter was already interested in someone, but not for the pure reasons she fantasized about...

"... easy there, Takeh, you're still all fucked up. Are ya really sure it was a girl who did this to you?"

"Shut the fuck up! You weren't there, that bitch was a freakin' monster! She hit like a fucking man..."

"And yet you want to go back there? Why? You wanna get beaten again?”

"Takeh saw the light, guys, he got his ass kicked by a hot chick and now he can't get enough of it, hehehahaha!"

A chorus of loud voices starts approaching Tomori's field of hearing, pulling her out of her awkward thoughts. She lifts her head with a slight grimace of annoyance. Jeez, groups of boys were always so noisy...

"You guys are such dicks! I'm going to hit that tomboy where it fuckin' hurts, and that's why I called you. Did you bring the spray paint?"

"And baseball bats, yes. I swear, dude, if we end up in jail because of you, you're fuckin' dead."

"If you brought the masks too, it won't happen. And even if it does, Masahiko's dad is a great lawyer, he'll bail us out in no time. 'Come on, I want to blow that fuckin' place up-"

Tomori locks herself in place at that, that voice unpleasantly familiar to her ears, an icy, horrible feeling spilling into the pit of her stomach. In her distraction, she gets in the way of a passerby, who bumps into her shoulder, causing her to momentarily lose her balance due to fright.

"Aah...!"

"Whoa! Careful there, lady, watch your step."

She felt fingers close around her arm, catching her before she hit the pavement. She plants the heels of her flats on the floor, panting a little as she looks up at the man who had helped her.

"Oh, th-thanks-"

"Hey, hold on! You...!"

And her stomach plummets when she sees, next to the boy who helped her, a face that she immediately recognized. Not so much the features, but the bruises that covered him. And by the way he was looking at her, the fury being perfectly visible in the eye that weren't swollen, he recognized her too.

"You!," He points at her, his face getting even uglier when he bares his teeth "Katashi, don't let her get away! That's one of the bitches that humiliated us at the bakery!"

In a sudden panic, Tomori tries to pull away from the man, but he tightens his grip on her arm, making her squeak and flinch.

"Whoa, whoa, easy there, lady," He arches an eyebrow before looking sideways at his friend "Are you sure, man? I don't want to go beating women without reason..."

"Yeah, I'm fuckin' shure! We don't forget a face that easily!," Another of the man exclaims, and Tomori also recognizes him as one of the idiots making a ruckus in the bakery earlier. She feels her entire body freeze with sudden fear, her breathing becoming louder and raspier as she tries, almost in vain, to control her panic when she finds herself being trapped inside a circle formed by about ten young men, wearing school uniforms and carrying metal baseball bats. She tries to scream, asking for help from the people who were walking past them, but the Takeh guy immediately growls:

"Make any and we'll beat the hell outta right here! ‘You have a lot of nerve, sis. Walking alone through the streets and thinking you're so tough, even though you knew there were three guys out here, dying to repay your and your boss' kindness…”

"She probably thought we wouldn't have the guts to come back for a rematch. Well, you're wrong, weren't ya?," Another young man, the third among those who were at the bakery, smiles mischievously "We not only came back, but also brought our entire crew. That's one of the girls we talked about, guys! She's cute, but also a raging bitch, hahaha.

"But she's short. She isn't the girl who busted your face up, is she, Takeh?," Another boy asks, to which Take shakes his head.

“No, she was the little smartass who teased me until I lost my cool. But look, she's shaking all over!," He lets out a mocking laugh "Not so tough now that your friend isn't here to protect you, huh."

The others laugh too, one of them tapping the baseball bat discreetly against the palm of his left hand. They spoke in a casual tone, trying not to attract the attention of other people on the street. They were probably planning to take her somewhere more deserted where even screaming for help wouldn't save her, she thinks, her heart feeling like it's about to climb up her throat and leap out of her mouth.

She felt like she was about to throw up. Something clogged her throat, icy sweat making her shirt stick to her back, her mind conjuring up the most horrible scenarios, the worst possibilities of what they could do to her if she didn't gather the strength to scream, free herself and run, do something...!

“Don't panic, Tomori, don't panic, think, think…!”

There was no running back to the bakery, they had her surrounded from behind and she would only manage to bump into a wall of human bodies bigger and bulkier than her own. But the street ahead was busy. If she managed to run and lose them in the crowd... but they would still be able to block her...

"Is this really necessary?," Katashi, the boy who was holding her, asks with a grimace "She's just a short chick who's no match for any of us. Seriously, I really don't want to beat up a girl..."

"You want me to let her get away with humiliating me, asshole?! No way, she will get what she deserves!"

"If that's the case, just humiliate her back," Katashi lets go of Tomori, as she stumbles forward, her legs weak with fear almost giving way under her weight "Make her kneel and lick your shoes, I don't know. An eye for an eye and so on..."

"Heh… that doesn't sound too bad, Takeh," Another of the boys smiles, as Take seems to consider the proposal.

"Hnnn… yeah, that could be it then," He approaches Tomori, looking down at her with an expression of contempt "Go on, cutie, kneel down to show penance. Put your forehead on the floor and then give my shoes a good wipe. Then I'll decide if that'll be enough for us to forgive you..."

They all laugh again. Full laughs that made her ears ring. Something in the pit of her stomach bubbler. A certainty that, added to the fear, made her mind strangely clear.

The smartest course of action was to accept humiliation. There was no room for pride when you were in such a risky situation. But something inside her told her it wouldn't be enough. The idiot wouldn't let her go even after she agreed to bow her head.

If she wanted to save herself, she would need to fight.

She swallows hard, moving her eyes to the floor and nodding, clutching her purse to her chest as she slowly begins to bend her knees. The boys laughed more while Take smiled satisfied.

"That's how I like it. But damn, seeing you kneeling like that in front of me is making me think of something else, heh-"

And he is interrupted when Tomori takes momentum with bent legs, hoisting herself forward and bumping into him violently, at the same time that she rotates her arm, her teeth clenched with the force she put into the movement, and hits his swollen eye with one end of her purse. Take lets out a painful yelp, staggering to the side and clutching his aching face, nearly knocking two startled friends over in the process. And Tomori wastes no time, taking advantage of the opening in the human wall and dashing through the crowd.

"Aaargh! You fucking bitch!," She hears him shout, furious "Don't just stand there, damn it! After her!"

She doesn't look back, doesn't slow her pace, even pushing stunned and angry people to the side while keeping her eyes wild on the path ahead.

She didn't feel tired, even with her chest burning. Her legs had never felt so energized, adrenaline drawing from them a strength she didn't even know they possessed, her survival instinct on the peak making her more focused than she'd ever been.

She wasn't going to stop running. No matter what’d happen, she wouldn't stop running.

* * *

"Yamashitakazuo, we're leaving," Ohma announces, with the four idiots behind him.

"Yes, guys, good night," Kazuo smiles, following them downstairs "Do you need anything before you go?"

"Nope. We're good, Kazzy," Rihito assures, smiling, as Okubo, Himuro, Kaneda and he go down the stairs, right behind Ohma, leaving the office on the second floor "We just wanted to know what were the plans for after that whole scheme involving Koga’s rematch, but you already explained everything in detail."

"I should've been more involved, considering that I was part of that scheme…," Himuro comments, closing his eyes while lighting a cigarette. Kaneda just laughs.

"Well, we'll be now, won't we? Anyway, thanks for the coffee, Mr. Yamashita."

"Yeah, thanks! It was great, and we came back from the bakery with our stomachs full and everything," Rihito comments smiling, while Okubo, the last to go down the stairs, takes the phone out of his pocket when he feels it vibrate. He smiles a lot when he sees that Tomori has replied to his text, and immediately starts typing a reply, his ears barely registering the conversation that takes place ahead.

"Yeah, yeah, sorry for not showing up more often too..."

"Relax, Ohma, we know your reasons," the old man smiles, waving with his hand "Just stop by and sign your papers from time to time, it makes it easier instead of making this old man here go to Nara province, where you are living , hahaha."

"I intend to get out of there, sooner or later," Ohma says "It's about time."

“We honestly don't know how you manage to live among those demons...," Himuro comments, blowing smoke to the side, while Rihito frowns with a snort.

"Especially with that fucking psycho..."

"Come on, guys, they helped Ohma when no one else could," Kaneda tries to appease "Assassins or not, we still need to recognize that they can be helpful, honorable..."

"Yeah, but there's a price for that, right? Tokita here will even have to marry that crazy chick, the patriarch's grand-granddaughter..."

"I won't," Ohma says dryly, interrupting the others with a hard look "And if anyone insists on that, they'll have to fight me," he looks at the others and turns to walk again "It's about time I stopped depending on them, that's my way to give back… and I'm also going to see what to do with the house they gave me here in Tokyo."

"The good 'ol word-of-mouth rarely fails either. We can spread the word around. Right, guys?," Rihito looks at his friends. Himuro and Kaneda nod, but Okubo continued with his eyes glued to his phone, smiling dumbly. The three exchange exasperated glances before Rihito sneaks up on him, leans close and whispers in his ear, in a sly moan:

"Don't forget the mosaics when sending the nudes, Mr. Okubooo..."

Okubo jumps in fright on the bottom step of the stairs, letting out an alarmed exclamation and quickly pulling away from Rihito while shivering, eliciting loud laughter from the other three idiots.

"Go moan like a slut in someone else's ear, you sicko!"

"Watch where you step, Okubo," Kazuo says, and then looks at the others "And are you seriously sending lewd photos to someone at this very moment? Shame on you..."

"Unless she wants to, whoever she is," Ohma completes.

"There are no fucking nudes! It's this idiot here who keeps projecting his perverted fantasies onto others!," Okubo blusters, red as a tomato, while glaring at Rihito, who was busy wiping tears of laughter from his eyes.

"My fantasies? Dude, you wouldn't know how to disguise your intentions even if we paid you to do it!"

"That's right. At least try to pretend you're listening to our plans on how to help the Seaweed Head, man," Himuro jokes, smirking.

"‘Wait- help? With what? Do you need help with something, man?," Okubo blinks as he turns to Ohma, and Rihito lets out a fart-like noise through his mouth while Kaneda shakes his head slowly.

"He wasn't even listening to the beginning of the conversation..."

"And he's not even exchanging nudes with her yet! Just imagine when it starts," Rihito laughs out loud "He'll be the first recorded patient in a vegetative state capable of walking and talking, a modern medical miracle, hahaha!

"I'll show you what a medical miracle is, asshole! Rihito, the first man in history to survive with his head up his ass," He tries to grab Rihito, who escapes his hands with a high-pitched laugh.

“Who are you talking about, anyway?," Kazuo asks as he closes his ofice for the day. Kaede had already gone home, so they were the only ones there.

"Apparently it's a girl," Ohma shrugs "As usual."

"And it is! You remember that we have been visiting the Heavy Bakery, right, Tokita?," Rihito asks while dodging the slap on the ear that Okubo tries to give him "Kazuo himself recommended the place to us. The food is delicious, by the way, as much as the owner-"

"For heaven's sake, Rihito, show some respect! Anyway, Okubo ended up getting closer to one of the employees there," Kaneda explains "One of the cooks, Uta Tomori. She gave him her number that day you appeared there and found us."

"She is apparently a die-hard fan of his. A guaranteed sustenance for the egghead's giant ego," Himuro nods solemnly "They've been exchanging texts and everything. Today was the third time we went back there, and two of those visits were just for him to have a chance to flirt with her."

"I'm gonna beat the everloving shit outta you guys, I swear...," Okubo growls, putting a hand on his red face, before clearing his throat in an attempt to calm down "But yeah, that's basically it. She is a cute, kind girl and a very devoted fan. I'm just giving back by being a helpful and sympathetic idol..."

"In hopes of eventually banging her."

"And what's wrong with that? She wants it too, dammit! I'm being very respectful about that, at least..."

"Oh yes, I know her. Short, wavy brown hair, big eyes, and it seems that she gets springs in her legs when she's happy. She's always jumping," Ohma nods "Kanami handed her a paper with the SJPW guys' autographs and she went screaming across the room as if she'd been stabbed… but in a happy way."

"Oh... really?," Okubo looks to the side, frowning a little – So… is she also a fan of Sekibayashi and the SJPW crew?"

"Well, it was to be expected, isn't it?' They’re famous pro-wrestlers and all," Kaneda comments, and Himuro nods, arching an eyebrow.

"Yeah. Are you going to be jealous of even a fighter in his forties, Okubo? It's true that she seems to like older men, considering that she has a crush on you, but Sekibayashi must be more of a surrogate grandfather to her than your possible rival..."

"Fuck off, Himuro! Let’s change the subject, okay?," Okubo waves his hands, desperately wanting to stop being the focus of attention. Even Kazuo seemed half interested in his misadventures in pursuit of the indisputable affection of what must have been his only female fan in the entire district. He really didn't want to dwell on how he needed to share her admiration with who knows how many other martial artists. That would spoil the joy that her most recent text had brought him, and he didn't want that "Spit it out, what's this about Seaweed Head needing our help?"

"Ohma is thinking of giving up the house the Kure gave him," Kaneda explains "Since he's going to leave the village and their protection."

"It's not like that, I'm not thinking about giving it to anyone. The house was given to me, so I intend to give it back to the Ku– FUCK!!," Ohma jumps back when a figure almost bumps into him, making the others bump into his back with fright.

What happened next was a real domino effect in descending order: Okubo lost his balance with Ohma's bump and bumped into Rihito, who collided with Himuro's shoulder, who accidentally hit Kaneda's stomach with an arm, which finally hit the Kazuo's chest with his back. The result, of course, was that the three smallest of the group ended up on the ground, screaming and struggling with their legs up in the air, while the two largest had to hold Ohma.

"Fuckin' hell, Tokita!"

"Himuro, I can't breathe!"

"Me- Me too! You two are on top of me! I'm too old to be dogpiled like that!"

"Sorry, Mr. Yamashita!"

"Dude, are you crazy? What the fuck was that? This isn't a rock concert for you to be throwing yourself on top of others!," Lihito exclaims.

"It wasn't on purpose… Didn't you see the woman who ran past us? She seemed to be running away from something...," and immediately they see a bunch of teenagers also running in the same direction "There! See? I wasn’t making it up," Ohma points, indignant, in the direction they were running.

They all watch, half dumbfounded, as the group of boys in school uniforms run past them, yelling and brandishing baseball bats. Further on, they could see the woman who had almost run into Ohma, running wild, her hair and skirts whipping around.

"Get her!"

"Go faster, damn it, or we'll lose her!"

"Get back here, you fuckin' bitch!"

"Hey!," Kaneda exclaims, worried, while Himuro and he helped Kazuo to get up "Wait a minute, are they chasing that girl?"

"And with baseball bats, to top it off," Himuro frowns, biting his cigarette a little "Holy shit, did she steal something from them?"

Kazuo widens his eyes, alarmed "My god, but that reaction is unnecessary, even when dealing with a theft-"

"Miss Uta?!," Okubo suddenly exclaims, shocked, to which all the others startle and turn to him.

"What did you say, Okubo?"

"It's Miss Uta! She was wearing those clothes earlier today at the bakery!," He repeats, turning pale, his stomach plummeting as he sees the woman, who was running away quickly, look over her shoulder to make sure her pursuers are far away. It was her, without a doubt! But why the fuck...! He feels his body go cold in sudden fear "Shit!"

And then he dashes off after the group, not waiting for the others to react. Ohma looks at Okubo and then runs after him, also without hesitation. Soon everyone left in a stampede, and Kazuo stayed behind, not understanding anything.

"Hey, wait!," He blinks, following them more slowly. "I knew I saw that girl somewhere… oh, someone has to stop these idiots before they commit a massacre…"

Okubo hears the others following close behind, but he doesn't turn to look at them. His eyes were fixed on the group of angry teenagers chasing Tomori, brandishing those baseball bats as if they wanted to... anger rises in his chest like magma about to be spewed out of a volcano. Those cowardly pieces of shit, attacking a woman like that! If their parents didn't teach them to be respectful, their friends and he would teach them, and in the hardest way possible.

"Hey!," He shouts when he sees them turn into a street, a few good meters away from Kazuo's office "HEY! Holy crap...!"

"Isn't that a dead end over there? They'll corner her!," Rihito exclaims right behind him, to which Himuro snorts.

"In that case they're fucked! They won't be able to escape us either."

“One of those brats is kinda familiar,” Kaneda says, panting a little. Okubo was about to ask what he was talking about when the five of them heard, coming from the alley, a very distinct sound. Was that… shattering glass? And then a female voice, very familiar to him, shouts:

"Step back! Don't come any closer!"

Okubo's eyes widened, his heart skipping a beat. Holy shit, had they managed to corner her?! He is the first to come to a stop at the entrance to the alley where the group had disappeared, his fists already raised in preparation for the blows he would deliver. But the scene before him brings him to a standstill, fury momentarily replaced by shock.

The boys had stopped running. They were staring at the brick wall that closed off the alley at the end, panting, baseball bats raised, but looking unsure whether or not to advance. And soon the reason became clear: Tomori had her back to the brick wall, teeth bared and brown eyes gleaming dangerously, holding tightly to the neck of a glass bottle that had been broken in half, the sharp shards of its remains pointed to the group menacingly.

"Step back! Now!," She yells, brandishing the bottle "Don't touch me!"

"Are you crazy, lady? You can rip someone's throat out with that thing," One of the boys comments while the others look at each other indecisively, nervous about the weapon their target has acquired. Another brat snorts.

"Are you sissies scared of a fuckin' bottle? We are ten and she is only one! She won't stand a chance with just glass shards..."

"You can stop right there, dammit!"

Okubo finally finds his voice again, his scream echoing through the alley, making both the kids and Tomori jump in fright. The brats turned, alarmed.

"Fuck, now someone's decided to go full white knight on us?!"

And Tomori's eyes widen, her jaw dropping, as she recognizes the huge figure figure approaching.

"Mr. Okubo?!"

And not only him, but four other men, all of them as imposing as the first, appear in the alley. The bald man was the tallest and broadest, but there was also a blond and a black wavy haired man, and two more behind him, a dark-skinned man with white hair and a young man with lank hair wearing a kimono. All of them looked at the scene.

"Hello," Ohma waves with one hand, looking the most relaxed of all of them "Do you need help there?"

Tomori gasps a little, taking a few steps back and leaning her back against the brick wall.

"You... but how... where...?"

"We'll explain later! Now be nice and just stay put, all right?,” Rihito cracks his knuckles, smiling devilishly, while Himuro throws his cigarette butt in a corner of the alley and Kaneda assumes a fighting stance "We don't want to end up hitting you by accident."

“Dammit… that's none of your fucking business! Get lost!," One of the kids screams, all ten turning to the newcomers, the baseball bats positioned for the attack. And Okubo feels a brief shock when he lands his eyes on the brat that screamed, more specifically on the swellings and abrasions that adorned his entire face.

"Wait a second! You're one of those idiots who made that ruckus at the bakery earlier today, aren't you?," He growls "Fuckin' hell, haven't you been beaten enough?!"

"Now I know why he looked so familiar," Kaneda comments, to which Himuro snorts.

"So you came after revenge, huh? And went right after the target that cannot fight back. Cowardly little shits..."

"Oohhh… so they started it?," Ohma raises an eyebrow "Now I understand…," He smiled, a bit malicious " So Kanami beat the crap ou of you, huh."

"And apparently they want more! They just don't know how to ask for it, the shy bastards...," Lihito laughs maliciously "Relax, we have a special delivery for you, courtesy of us, loyal customers from the bakery. It's called 'knuckle sandwich'!"

"Fuck you! We'll deal with you first then!", The kid with the swollen face screams, and soon, the whole group is advancing towards, baseball bats raised in the air. Tomori huddles closer against the brick wall, distressed, but unable to take her eyes off the scene.

…

It didn't even last a minute.

"Enough! Please stop!," The leader of the group screams, desperate, his face even more bloodied while Okubo holds him in an armbar "We surrender! You won!"

"That's not enough, damn it!," Okubo growls, grabbing the kid's right ear and pulling it hard, making him scream sharply "Apologize to Miss Uta right now, you little shit!"

"Uuugh..."

"Do you want another wedgie? 'Because that's what you'll get if you don't fuckin’ comply!"

"No! Sorry, sorry!," He was almost crying at that point "We won't do anything to you, miss, I swear! We won't go near that bakery ever again! Now stop beating us up, please...!"

“Yeah, that's more like it,” Okubo nods in satisfaction and lets go of the boy, who falls flat on his face with another squeal. He wasn't the only one. Most of the rowdy group was sprawled on the floor, half-conscious or curled up in a fetal position, moaning and whimpering. The few who put up the most resistance had been restricted by the quintet; Rihito even had two terrified kids under his arms, grinning from ear to ear.

"Holy shit, and I’ve been told that I don't have the capacity to educate brats! That, my guys, is what I call 'well intentioned bullying'! Take this as a lesson for your lives, boys, because there's always going to be a kid at the playground whose dick is bigger than yours!"

“That didn't give me any satisfaction. I really don't like beating kids up," Kaneda comments with a grimace while twisting the arm of one of the boys back, who whined like a puppy "Well, it was for a good cause, I suppose..."

"Yeah, both for Miss Uta and for these little shits here," Himuro grumbles, grabbing another whimpering kid by the hair while he was on his knees "Now they'll choose their next battles more carefully. Boy, who would have thought that I would be this good at disciplining cocky brats..."

"This has become an everyday occurrence for me," Ohma says, looking at the last two, hugging each other as they looked at him as if he were some kind of cosmic being "Every now and then I find someone like that to put in their place..."

"Boys, where are you-oh!," is the voice of old Kazuo, who had finally reached them "My God, what happened here?"

"Yamashitakazuo," Ohma nods, "Nothing, just the usual."

"Oh. Troublemakers," Kazuo sighs "I guess calling the police is the next thing to do, right?"

"Nope, these are minors, it's not even worth it," Ohma looks, hands in his pockets, as if he never took them out.

"Alright, to the hospital, it is," The old man pulls out his phone.

"And- And our mothers, please..."

"Don't give me that 'mother' shit! Grow a fucking pair!," Rihito growls, abruptly dropping the other two brats to the ground, while Himuro and Kaneda do the same "Start acting like men and stop terrorizing defenseless chicks!"

“You should be saying that to yourself, Rihito..."

"Fuck off, Kaneda!"

"Forget about the brats for a bit. The ‘defenseless chick’ right there is a more pressing concern now," Himuro points to the end of the alley, where Tomori was still paralyzed, breathing shakily, eyes wide. And the half-shattered bottle was still in her hand, poised as if about to be used as a weapon.

Okubo immediately turns to her, the anger fading from his features, his eyes wide with concern. She didn't look hurt, which was a relief. But she was very pale. And that tense, hostile pose...

"Miss Uta," He calls in a gentle tone, approaching slowly "Hey, are you alright? They didn't hurt you, did they?"

She doesn't answer right away, staring at him as if she didn't recognize him. The others behind watch them, confused.

“She's in shock,” Kaneda concludes, and Rihito and Himuro exchange worried looks.

“Shit, I don't know how to deal with people in shock… do we throw water in her face or something?"

"Hell, bro, I'm glad you didn't train as a paramedic at Teito University..."

"Hey," Ohma looks at her, getting closer "Where are Kanami, Koga and Ryuki? Why are you alone?"

She looks at him sideways, still not moving from the position she was in. Okubo, even more nervous, turns to Ohma.

“Dude, she just got through a hard time. Give her a break," He asks before getting closer to her, still cautiously, briefly wondering if he had to worry about being attacked with that bottle "Miss Uta? It's okay now. Those assholes won't pester you anymore. You're safe, okay? Now let go of that bottle, please...," He asks, slowly reaching with his hand "You could cut yourself on those shards..."

She looks from him to the bottle, looking kind of dumbfounded. And then her eyes clear, bulging a little. She straightens up with a gasp, dropping the bottle to the ground, and Okubo and Ohma have to step back as it shatters further, sending shards flying across the concrete.

"Aah! I- oh damn, I'm sorry!," She exclaims, her voice hoarse, before clearing her throat "I- I think I was kinda entranced by what I was seeing, I don’t know what came over me…," She claps her hands quickly on her skirts, flustered "And I think that's what they call the fight or flight response too..."

Okubo sighs in relief, relaxing a little.

"Good… I'm sorry you had to watch that. I swear that we don't go looking for people to beat up in the street," He guarantees, a little embarrassed "That was an exceptional case."

“A necessity, considering the circumstances,” Kaneda adds, and Himuro nods.

"Yep. Good thing we were around taking care of some business..."

"So no need to thank us, it was a pleasure!," Lihito smiles smugly, pointing to his chest with his thumb "But if you still want to show gratitude, your friend's number is more than enough-"

"Shut up, Rihito! But yeah... sorry for the shit show," Okubo scratches the back of his head, looking to the side. Tomori blinks in astonishment. And then she bulges out her eyes, screaming:

"Shit show? That was one of the most awesome things I've ever seen in my life! A live group fight featuring professional fighters, one of them being the Ultimate Fight Heavyweight Champion himself!," She stares at him with twinkling eyes, now looking absolutely delighted "I'm the luckiest woman this side of Tokyo, Mr. Okubo!"

… Alright, they didn't know what kind of reaction they were expecting, but it definitely wasn't that one.

"Huh?," Okubo blinks, perplexed "‘Wait, that's- are you serious?"

"Of course I am! I watched a professional level match without having to pay for a ticket or a pay-per-view channel!," She clenches her fists close to her face, which was now flushed with excitement "Do you have any idea how many people would kill to be in my place? It's a privilege! I got to watch your jabs, your submission, your famous Okubo tackle, all from less than five meters away! And you!," She turns to the others, enchanted "You were amazing too! Himuro, is your style Jeet Kune Do? It was like watching Bruce Lee in 'Enter the Dragon'! And you, Kaneda! I had never seen the Kujin Style used without a weapon, it was awesome! And I don't know Ohma and Rihito's styles, but you guys were awesome too! I had never seen anyone redirect blows like that..."

Himuro and Kaneda just stare at her, just as perplexed as Okubo, while Rihito looks at Ohma, blinking in amazement.

"Holy shit, either the girl went insane after seeing that display of gratuitous violence or she always has been…"

"It's the second option," Ohma sighs "Aaand those are the springs, look," He points when he sees her practically jumping in place, as if she was under the influence of cocaine.

"Hey- Hey, hey, wait, Miss Uta, we- we thought you were in shock," Okubo gestures a little, accompanying her jumps with head movements "You were chased, cornered, threatened with baseball bats.. ."

"Please don't remind me of that!," She suddenly asks, stopping jumping "I'm still running high on adrenaline and I want to continue like this a little longer, because when the rush's over I'll probably fall to the ground and not be able to get up anymore!"

"Uuh… so you were scared?"

"Of course! I was terrified!," She guarantees "Who wouldn't be? I mean, besides you," She turns to the others. She fixes her eyes on the boys who were still whimpering on the floor, huddled close to each other. She seems to quiet down at the sight, the surge of excitement giving in, the smile fading from her face "They… they could have… if you hadn't shown up…"

"Ooh… I think the shock came with a delayed effect," Himuro comments as he watches her lean against the brick wall again, her legs weak, one hand on her chest. Okubo immediately supports her with a hand on her shoulder.

"There, there… I’m glad we were around… but trying to fight them wasn’t a good idea," He tells her, not managing to hide the distress in his voice "You know the protocols when it comes to robberies, right? Resisting them doesn’t help at all. They could have hurt you, or worse!"

"I know… but when you’re a woman, you- you also learn to operate on the other side of the coin," She nods, breathing slowly to calm down "Those who resist, put up a fight and don’t cooperate are a lot more work than it’s worth, so they are best left alone. I thought... no, actually I didn't," She admits, shaking her head and swallowing hard "It was really inconsequential, I know. I'm glad you were around to save me," She smiles at him tenderly "My Bodyguards."

And they all felt certain that Okubo would try no more to argue as he stared at her with wide, glittering eyes, as if she were too wonderful to be real.

“Damn, she is so cute!!!”

"Well, Yamashitakazuo and I are going to take these kids to the hospital. You’ll go with Okubo, right?," Ohma says behind the fighter "He's the only one with a car…"

"Uh- oh yes!," He exclaims, widening his eyes, waking up from his reverie as he turned to look at them over his shoulder, barely disguising his excitement "That's right, I- I mean…," He puts a fist over his mouth, clearing his throat, before smiling at Tomori, puffing out his chest a little while saying, "If you consider us your bodyguards, then allow us to take you safely to home. I won't- I mean, we won't be able to be at peace if you go walking alone after all this."

"Oh... I- I was going to the pharmacy to do some shopping and then catch the train, but I'd have to go back to the bakery to do that...," She thinks for a moment, and Okubo sees with some satisfaction that the possibility of being in a car with him seemed too tempting for her to pass up; she was even biting her bottom lip a little "So... no problem? I don't want to take you out of your way..."

"No problem at all! The cavalry is at your disposal. Right, guys?," He turns to his friends. Rihito, Himuro and Kaneda exchange quick glances, communicating without the need for words. They stare at Okubo, who was practically begging with huge, pleading eyes, before Rihito shrugs and says:

“The cavalry will have to squeeze their asses in the backseat to make room in the carriage, but what's one more chivalrous sacrifice, am I right?"

“You're talking like giving her a ride would be too inconvenient for us, Lihito,” Himuro rolls his eyes a little, and Kaneda nods.

"That's right. It wouldn't cost us anything, especially considering what happened. It's even better that way, because then we'll have peace of mind knowing you arrived safely, miss."

"Haha, I'll be too, to be honest... thank you so much," She bows to them, her hair falling a bit down the sides of her face, so she didn't see when Okubo cast an irritated look at the other three, who were shaking their heads in clear disapproval.

Fucking hell... they tried to create an opportunity for him that only a freaking idiot would pass up. And he did, which said a lot about his mental acuity, he supposed. But he didn't think this was a good time to be alone with Tomori. Not after what she'd been through. He didn't want to give the impression that he was cornering her. And it's with that thought that another more worrisome possibility pops into his head, making him turn to her quickly.

"I- I'll stop by the pharmacy so you can pick up what you need, but… you don't mind being in a car full of men, do you? I promise I won't let those idiots try anything funny! And you can write down my license plate number and send it to someone if you like!," He adds, agitated, to which she laughs a little, blushing slightly.

"Hahaha, I- I appreciate it. After what you've done for me, it's hard not to give you my full thrust, but I need to prioritize my safety. You understand, right?," She smiles sheepishly when they immediately nod "All right, I… I'll accept the ride. Thank you so much, Mr. Okubo, everyone. And Ohma...," She looks back to Ohma "Sorry for not answering you earlier. Kanny, Koga and Ryuki stayed at the bakery to help with cleaning, and they intended to leave straight to the gym. And speaking of them...," She now speaks lower, sounding worried "Can you not tell Kanny what happened here? She would be worried, paranoid, and that would interfere with her day-to-day activities..."

"Hnmm…," Ohma seems to think for a bit, crossing his arms as he stares at her "Alright. But if it happens again, she'll have to know," he uncrosses his arms and looks at the kids still cowering in fear "Let's go."

And he helps line up the miscreants, facing all ten of them "And you... are you going to mess with us again, you brats?"

"No! We won't, I swear!," One of the boys screeches, eyes filled with tears, while the others nod vehemently "We won't even go near the corner of the bakery! S-Sorry, miss," He turns to Tomori, trembling "We're not going to do anything with you anymore! Just don't throw those monsters at us again, please!"

Rihito laughs out loud, while Himuro rolls his eyes again and Kaneda comments, looking satisfied:

"Am I considered a monster too? My, I'm flattered, haha."

Tomori doesn't respond, though. She looks away, hugging herself and shuddering. Okubo extends a hand in an automatic gesture, but quickly catches himself. He'd wanted to comfort her, but after that scary experience, she probably wouldn't want to be touched anytime soon. She now looked so different from the woman he'd seen minutes ago, with a wild look in her eyes as she threatened to shatter the faces of a battalion of men bigger than her with glass shards... that stirred up his protective side.

"She has nothing to say to you. Piss off already!," He grunts at the kids, who shrink back, almost running in a single line and bumping into each other. He then turns to Tomori "Ready to go? You must be tired..."

"Yeah… to say the least," She manages a weak smile "Thanks again. I promise I'll help pay for gas..."

"No need to. These three will already be contributing, anyway."

"You mean she has privileges we don't? Holy shit, being a woman must be a peach..."

"Don't be rude, Rihito. It's common courtesy."

"A courtesy that would cost nothing to pay with a phone number..."

"Forget about it for five minutes, you nutcase! Anyway, good night for you, Tokita, Mr. Yamashita," Okubo nods, and the others follow suit, waving their hands, before walking away, Tomori being held securely between them in a sort of protective semicircle. Ohma and Kazuo watch them walk away, until the sound of approaching sirens catches their attention.

"And your ride arrived," Ohma says while turning to the kids, a serious look on his face "My employer is a nice person who wants to leave you in good standing with us, so be thankful for that."

"Eh?," Kazuo blinks "Oh, it's nothing, honestly," he smiles friendly "After all, you're tyoung kids with a future ahead of you. We're not going to ruin this because of a mistake, are we?"

The boys goggle at him, jaws dropping. Was that skinny little old man the boss of all those muscle-bound monsters? Holy shit, if he alone was capable of commanding that much respect...

"Let's just do what he says, Takeh," Katashi whispers in his friend's ear, shuddering again. "That old geezer must be one hell of a Yakuza if he's in charge of this gang. If we piss him off, losing a finger each will be the least of our worries."

Take nod before answering, with a nervous smile, "Of- Of course! We- We'll turn a new leaf, sir, I swear!"

"Alright, good luck to you," Ohma nods, satisfied. And the ambulances arrive.

* * *

When the SUV was parked in front of an absolutely ordinary middle-class residence on an ordinary street in an ordinary residential neighborhood, Okubo felt pretty stupid for expecting anything else. A house that would be a monument to everything its owner idolized, perhaps? Statues honoring fighters she admired, posters adorning the facade, maybe bushes artfully pruned to represent Sekibayashi's head or his...

Holy shit, he better take those ridiculous mental images to his grave. He tries to smile at Tomori, sitting next to him in the passenger seat, in an attempt to hide it.

"Alright, ma'am, we arrived at our destination," He announces, opening the driver's side door, getting out of the car, turning around and going to open the passenger door for her, trying to ignore how Rihito, Himuro and Kaneda looked at him with mockery in the backseat "The Okubo Cavalry appreciates your preference. Please try to leave five stars and a good review on the app."

Tomori laughs as she unbuckles her seat belt and climbs out of the car. She looked a lot calmer now, and he liked to think that meant that her traumatic experience hadn't caused her to develop fear and distrust of men in general, especially them.

"I will, you deserve it. A very pleasant company and a very interesting music selection. I had never heard of this band before... what's the name again?"

"Maximum the Dogegencho!," It is Rihito who answers, smiling excitedly. "They only released one album, but still managed to record two or three hits that reached the top of the charts four years ago. The lead guitarist is the most talented by far."

"Eh, he has some quick fingers, but he's too out of tune when it comes to sustaining a semitone," Himuro comments casually, to which Rihito glares at him with a frown. Kaneda chuckles, turning to Tomori next.

Thanks for the company too, Miss Uta, and for ignoring Okubo's protests and helping with the gas money. We spent more at the bakery than we expected, but we don’t regret it."

She laughs again "Kanny would say it was money well spent, and so would I. Anyway, thanks for the ride! Come back to the bakery when you can, I promise I'll thank you for what you did today in the best way."

Himuro and Kaneda immediately cover Rihito's mouth, already anticipating the kind of thanks he would suggest she give. They smile and nod at her.

"We will be there on Wednesday. Goodnight, Miss Uta."

"Goodnight!"

"Hey, Okubo, are you just gonna stand there like a stuffed gorilla? Accompany her to the door," Himuro says suddenly, leaning forward a little to stick his head out the window. Okubo starts a little, and he's not the only one; Tomori blushes slightly, playing with the strap of the purse on her shoulder.

"N-No need to, the door is right there-"

“Yes, he needs to, it's pure politeness and chivalry,” Kaneda says, and Rihito nods vehemently.

"Yeah, captain, don't you want your five stars on the app? You need to earn them, man!"

"I- Seriously, there's no need..." Tomori hurries to say, still embarrassed, but shuts up when Okubo turns to her, a hand on the back of his neck. He also looked embarrassed, but his expression was of someone who was just waiting for her permission to enthusiastically accept.

"Uuh... I have to show that my service is the best to guarantee customer loyalty, right? Haha..."

Tomori blushes again, but if her delighted expression meant anything, it was for reasons other than embarrassment. She smiles, biting her lower lip a little before nodding slowly. Okubo then follows her towards the gate, not without casting a glance over his shoulder. There were three hands giving him a thumbs up, sticking out of the windows. Fuckin' bastards…

The walk to the front door of the house is shorter than he would have liked. But the light from a lamp shines on them as they step onto the porch (motion sensor? How timely), illuminating her flushed, smiling face, and he decides it was well worth it.

"Thanks again, Mr. Okubo. I really don't know what would have happened to me if you hadn't been close by..."

"Try not to think about it," He suggests, smiling as gently as he could "You're fine and that's all that matters, right? For you and for us. I was going to feel pretty bummed out if something happened to such a nice girl who makes the best cookies I've ever had, anyway..."

She laughs, shaking her head "I don't know whether to be extremely happy or extremely offended that my cookies are considered a valid reason for me to win such an elaborate escort, hahaha!"

"It's because they always have something good to go with 'em, hehehe."

"Me, isn't it?," She arches an eyebrow, and laughs again when Okubo has a brief coughing fit, looking away, his face turning red under the light from the porch lamp. Damn, neither she nor anyone else would let him forget that faux pas, would they?

"I-I was going to say 'your company' specifically, but- but of course, you alone are someone worth fighting for."

... Damn, he didn't mean to sound so intense and sappy, like he was confessing to her or something! Why did he always let his tongue walk two steps ahead of his head when he was with her? Was it because his experience with the opposite sex was meager, to say the least? Or was it her specifically who had this power to leave him bewildered and with the eloquence of a stutterer? He didn't know and he was, in addition to being too mortified, too worried that his friends in the car had overheard him to think about it.

She stares at him with wide, shining eyes. She discreetly wets her lips and bites them, making them fuller and pinker, and he had to fight the urge to cup her face in his hands and reach down to kiss her. She then manages to say, her voice coming out hoarse, even breathless:

"No... Don't talk like that, or I won't be able to let you leave, hahaha! I- I already knew about your ability to make an impact with words, but hearing it in person is something else. Don't make me want to listen even more at this hour of the night, it's kind of mean..."

"I’ll be less mean then," Okubo says immediately, without thinking, the astonishment and elation with her words making him grab the opportunity tooth and nail "Let’s schedule a day for you to be able to listen to my rambling without having to worry about the time or the place, how about that?"

She blinks in astonishment, going a little speechless for a few moments.

“You… are you asking me out on a date? That's it?

"... Yeah. Yeah, that's it," He nods after a second of hesitation, his heart racing, something jumping and fluttering inside his stomach "If you want to, I mean. You don't have to feel obligated to because of what happened today," He hastens to add "And I swear I'm not taking advantage of the situation either. I... I've been wanting to do this for a while, actually. Invite you to go somewhere more relaxed, reserved, just the two of us. So... what do you say?," He tries to smile, hopeful, the anxiety almost eating him inside.

Tomori's face lit up so much it was as if she had swallowed the porch lamp. She clasps her hands to her chest, shifting her weight from one foot to the other, looking like she was almost dancing with happiness for a second. Damn, how could she be so adorable?!

"Yes! I'd love to, it's going to be so much fun! How about this Saturday, around seven in the evening?," She suggests, and Okubo almost drops his cap as he nods enthusiastically.

"Sounds perfect! You can choose the place, then we can settle everything."

"Okay! Ooh, I can't even believe it...!"

"Yeah, me neither..."

They smile at each other, her face flushed with happiness, and Okubo wonders for a second if this was a good time to go for a kiss. Just a quick peck, a gesture to seal a deal, a promise...

"Well… yeah, I- I better get going then…," She says suddenly, twirling a lock of her hair around the index finger of her right hand "I now have to look for a nice place, besides having to make dinner... can- can we talk more about that via text?"

"Sure!," He nods, trying not to get upset at the missed opportunity. No problem, he'd have several more on Saturday, and he sure as hell wouldn't be wasting these "I'll text you as soon as I've got rid of the freeloaders on my backseat.

"We heard that, Chrome Dome Head!"

"Shut up or I'll tie you to the car hood like a dead deer!," He growls at Rihito over his shoulder, his smile still in place, since he managed to get a laugh out of Tomori "So… see you on Saturday?"

“Absolutely.” She nods, unlocking the front door. She enters, still peeking through the gap, smiling with a shyness that only makes her more beautiful in his eyes "Goodnight, Mr. Okubo. I can't wait 'til Saturday."

“Me neither, Miss Uta. Good night,” He removes his cap in a chivalrous gesture, and she laughs again. He walks away towards the gate, without turning around, walking backwards as he watches her slowly close the door. She, too, seemed to have a hard time taking her eyes off his, still smiling and waving at him, until the door finally clicked shut. He leaves through the gate, closing it (it was also automatic, how convenient), facing the front windows. He sees the lights turning on inside, and it doesn't take long before the curtains on the right window are drawn aside and Tomori's face appears peering through the glass. She waves to him again, and he waves back.

It was the second stupidest, sappiest and funniest thing Rihito, Himuro, and Kaneda had ever seen him do. The 'I-Want-You-As-A-Company' faux pas still held the lead.

Lihito comments, smirking, "I guess, considering everything, we can't be pissed that Egghead missed the chance to make out with her today, right?"

"For God's sake, Rihito, she went through a traumatic experience," Kaneda says disapprovingly. "I would be outraged if Okubo took advantage of her fragility like that."

"But I also wouldn't be surprised if it actually turned her on," Himuro comments "You saw how she reacted after we took care of those brats earlier. She seems kinda nuts..."

"Kinda? She's completely nuts! Comparing Himuro to Bruce Lee was the last fucking straw," Lihito laughs again, and Kaneda smirks.

"Yeah. She’s nuts... but in a kinda cute way.

"Yeah, fair enough," Rihito concedes, nodding "One way or another, all that craziness is Egghead's problem now. A cute, hot as hell problem. Lucky motherfucker..."

"Shush, he will hear you!," Kaneda puts an index finger in front of his lips. Okubo opens the driver's side door not even five seconds later, sitting up with a sigh, eyes closed and a goofy grin plastered on his face. But he doesn't give any of them a chance to say anything, commanding:

"Play Rock-Paper-Scissors to see who gets to sit in the front 'cause I'm nobody's chauffeur."

"Dibs, dibs!," Rihito opens the door and gets out of the back seat immediately, sitting next to Okubo and putting his seat belt on "I want to have the privilege of sitting next to my dear mate knowing that he's about to pop his cherry!"

"Fuck off! Did you hear everything then?"

"There was no way, you and that muscle-eater seemed to want to announce to the whole fuckin' world that you scheduled a horizontal tango for Saturday, hahaha!"

"Don't talk about her like that, you asshole... but seriously, do you think I'm going too fast?," Okubo asks, a little fearful, looking at Kaneda specifically. He smiles and shakes his head.

“No, you followed protocol perfectly. You were respectful, kind, and you waited patiently. Now you can go right ahead, just as I said," He makes a V for Victory with the fingers of his right hand "Just don't rush things too much during the date, enjoy every second and make sure she enjoys it too."

"That's right. The more you please her on Saturday, the more she'll want an encore later," Himuro guarantees "This can even turn into a friendship with benefits, why not?"

“Hey, hold on. The girl might end up getting the wrong idea, and then it'll be Okubo's turn to worry about having a stalker," Lihito warns, to which Okubo shakes his head.

“But I wouldn't mind that, man, honestly. Having a nice and pretty girl as a friend to call when I'm in the mood... boy, now I know how you feel, Himuro," He opens a stupid smile "Having a guarantee like that for times of need is the best thing!"

"It sure as hell is!," Himuro raises a thumb, to which Kaneda twists his mouth a little.

"I just hope you don't forget everything I said and starts seeing her as just a guarantee..."

"I won't, Kaneda! I... fuck, I like her. I couldn't help it with how cute she is," He turns the key in the ignition, and the car comes to life with a soft roar of the engine "I'm in too deep in this to see her any other way..."

"Yeah, pal, but it won't stop there," Rihito slaps him excitedly on the shoulder. "You're going to sink much, much deeper. Tell me, guys, how deep will our friend here go?

"Keep it down, Rihito, we're still close to her house-"

"Balls deep!"

"I'm going to throw you out of the car, dude, I'm not even joking!"

The car pulls away down the street, its passengers laughing and celebrating the resounding success of the driver, who could only wish, with a mixture of excitement and apprehension, that Saturday would come soon. And that absolutely nothing went wrong until then.

NEXT CHAPTER

#Kengan Ashura #Kengan Omega #kenganverse #fanfiction #Okubo Naoya #Naoya Okubo #okubo x oc #kengan oc #Rihito #Himuro Ryo #Kaneda Suekichi #Tokita Ohma #Narushima Koga #Gaoh Ryuki #Yamashita Kazuo #cookies'n cream #the heavy bakery series

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