#coming back from the dead THIRTY YEARS LATER to a world you don't know where all your loved ones are dead and two strangers

[hermywolf]

i just saw someone say they hate mary because she’s a bad mother. guess what their very next edit was. it was a rowena edit. by god im about to start biting people

[achenetype]

Hihi can you please do a Luke x reader where it’s basically an unrequited love like reader is so in love with Luke and he has no idea so she moves on and years later she’s over him and confesses to him like a oh I thought you should know and the whole time Luke had been in love with her, kinda base it off that one TikTok audio where it’s like “I’m not in love with you anymore” “I never knew you were” 🩷🩷

OHH YOURE FEEDING MY ANGST BRAIN WITH THIS ONE. buckle up lets break some hearts

edit: this ended up being WAY sadder than i originally intended. i am so sorry anon oh my god

i gave you a rare gift (but you didn't want it) — luke castellan

pairing: luke castellan x fem!reader

word count: 2.8k

content: angst, major character/reader death, unrequited love, mutual pining, reader is part of kronos' army, luke and reader are doomed by the narrative, [Y/N] used (sparingly), alcohol mention, description of injury

listening to: bloodfest (from mizumono) by brian reitzell

You are twenty-two years old, sitting on the rocky beach of a lake somewhere in the forests of upstate New York. Light, gentle fog hangs in the air around you, and the only sound is the tap-tap-tap of Luke skipping rocks across the water.

Come dawn, the world will burn. The gods will be dethroned. Every demigod will either be free, or dead.

But now, at midnight, you are twenty-three and Luke turns to you. He's holding a small, squashed cupcake in one hand. "Happy birthday," he says, "to my right-hand man." He pauses. "Woman. Right-hand woman."

He holds the pastry out to you and smiles, but something behind his eyes is empty. Hollow. He hadn't been sleeping recently. As much as he tried to hide it, he couldn't stop you from seeing when he came to you every morning for a cup of coffee and to debrief for the day.

Perks of being the revolution leader's best friend, you think. His right-hand woman.

Luke's eyes flick from the cake to your face. "Do you like it?" He asks, and for a split second, you swear there's a note of hope in his voice. "I wanted to do something, y'know," he says. "Twenty-three is huge. It's a monumental age."

You nod, but stay quiet.

He pauses for a second. "You remember how you always said you wished you never had a birthday?"

When you were twelve, nearly thirteen, your mother drove you across the country to go to summer camp.

"It'll be like a road trip," she said, tossing your duffel bag into the back seat of her battered car. "And then, hey, you'll only stay at camp until the end of August, and then you can come back and go to school. See all your friends again." She squeezed your shoulder and pushed the car door closed. "How about that?"

"Sure," you said. "Super fun."

And it was; you were actually kind of excited. You'd never been to New York. It seemed a million universes away.

And it was your birthday tomorrow. Maybe this was a gift, something that your mother had put together to make up for the years of being too tired and too drunk to make a cake, or get presents, or anything.

Your mother put her hands on her hips and sighed. "You know how I feel about the attitude, yeah? Let's not do this today."

"I wasn't even trying to—" You cut off as your mother glared at you, her face tense. You knew that look: the biting-the-inside-of-her-cheek, trying-to-be-understanding, trying-to-be-a-good-mom-despite-it-all look.

You hated that look.

"Just..." She sighed. "Just get in the damn car, [Y/N]."

You did, fighting back the tears building in the corners of your eyes, and the slam of the car door closing was as loud as thunder.

Twenty silent minutes of city streets and highway merge ramps and cold, empty stretches of asphalt and concrete passed before either of you spoke.

"Mom," you said, thirty-three seconds into minute twenty-one, "I'm sorry for talking back earlier." Your voice was quiet, shaking, cupped in your throat like a scared animal.

She didn't answer, keeping her eyes fixed on the road.

"I don't like being like this, Mom," you said, looking over at her. The silhouette of her through the driver's side window, backlit by the streetlights, was shapeless. Impassive. "I don't like doing this with you all the time."

She scoffed.

You pulled your legs to your chest, tucking your head between your knees, and tried to find sleep.

You weren't sure how long you slept, but you woke up to the sound of music playing softly over the speakers. Exit signs whizzed past you at what felt like breakneck speed. You wondered, briefly, if you would break your neck if you jumped out of the car right now.

Ultimately you decided against it. You didn't want your mother's last words to you to be, get in the damn car.

That would make her feel guilty, you thought, and that guilt would make her hate me even more.

"I don't wanna fight," you tried instead, picking at a loose thread in the cuff of your jacket sleeve. "Mom, I'm sorry, okay? I don't want us to be mad at each other anymore," you said. A sob caught in your throat, heavy and wet and choking.

Your mother sighed and reached one hand from the wheel to tuck your hair behind your ear. "I know you don't, sweetie," she said. "I don't want to be mad at you either."

"Then why do you do it," you asked.

When she turned to look at you, her eyes were wet. She smiled, or tried to. "Sometimes, certain people just…can't help but fight," she said. "It's just part of who we are, I think."

"Did you fight with Dad?"

Your mother inhaled, quick and sharp through her nose, as she flicked the turn signal to right and guided the car down the exit ramp from the highway, her eyes locked ahead. "Yes," she said. "Sometimes. Sometimes I think that's where we get it."

You swallowed. "Do you ever miss him?"

She doesn't peel her gaze away from the road. "Every day."

The two of you made your way through bustling streets and across too many bridges to count. You thought you fell asleep again, for a minute or maybe a year. Maybe it was all a dream.

"Mom," you asked as she turned onto a worn dirt road, the sunrise barely stretching over the horizon, "why are you bringing me here?"

She didn't answer for a moment. Two moments, then three. Through the leaves, you saw one tree standing impossibly tall. A pine tree.

Your mother parked the car and turned to you. "Because I don't know what to do with you, [Y/N]," she said. "I don't know how I can keep you," she paused, "safe. How I could do this, on my own, in any normal way."

She got out of the car and grabbed your bag, shoving it against your chest. "Camp is just up that hill there," she said, gesturing in the direction of the large tree you'd seen earlier. "They’ve got people up there waiting for you."

"Mom," you said. "Wait, I—I wanted to talk to you—"

She shook her head. "I can't come with you, sweetie." She smiled, the curve of her mouth falling just short of her eyes. "You just remember that I love you, okay?"

At that moment, you knew: she was going to leave you here.

“No,” you said, tears rolling down your face. “No, no—Mom. Mom, please.”

“Before you go,” she said, her voice tight and sharp, “I wanted to give you this.” She reached into the back seat and pulled out a jacket, worn leather with patched elbows. “It was mine in college,” she explained, not meeting your eyes. Like she was reading from a play or book, and you were the unfortunate audience. “I figure, it doesn’t fit me anymore.” 

She pressed a kiss to your forehead. “Happy birthday, baby.”

It was the first time you had ever felt like your mother loved you. You knew she liked you, sometimes. But you were never quite sure if she loved you until that moment. 

And then she got back into the car with one final, teary nod. 

And you never saw her again.

“Yeah,” you tell Luke, shrugging. “I think I’ve got a pretty good reason, though.” Your lips curve into a smile.

He laughs and tilts his head. It’s a habit of his; he’ll say something and twist his neck just a fraction, narrow his eyes. A nervous tic that not even years of training and fighting and killing could stamp out.

You used to think about kissing his neck when he did it, but now you’re not sure whether you would know the difference between kissing and ripping his throat out. 

“True,” Luke concedes. You laugh, too, unrestrained and loud. “Gods, your sense of humor is dark.”

“You laughed first,” you remind him. He grins.

The cupcake he offers you, despite its lumps and smears of frosting, is pretty good. You split it apart with careful fingers and hand half of it back to him.

“You’re celebrating with me,” you laugh, “so you get half. That’s the rule.”

Luke simply smiles at you and takes the crumbling cake from your hand. “Whatever you say.”

You roll your eyes, grinning back. “Damn right.”

Luke’s laugh rings out again, sharp and bright against the night sky. Firelight flickers across his face, painting him in brilliant streaks of orange and gold. 

“After tomorrow,” Luke murmurs, pulling his knees up to his chest, “we can do this whenever we want.” The wind ruffles his hair almost fondly, floppy brown curls stirring and settling back against his skull.

You raise an eyebrow. “This?”

He gestures in a wide arc. “Be here, like this. Just be people, instead of demigods or heroes or revolutionaries.” Luke’s voice picks up, conviction surging into his words. “I mean, seriously—when was the last time you thought you would ever have a normal life?”

You’d never understood the demigods who joined Luke’s cause without knowing him. The plan itself seemed crazy—the only way anyone would follow it was if they knew their leader could pull it off. 

You have to know Luke to know he was capable of that, you think.

Until now. Now, you see what you think everyone else sees—a real leader, a revolutionary. A force for change with a silver tongue.

He makes it all seem so possible. You almost think he might pull it off.

Luke looks over to you. “We’re going to change everything,” he says. 

Almost.

“We’re going to change the rules,” Luke said, spreading the map over an empty cot in his cabin. “If we want to win, we need to be thinking six steps ahead of the enemy.”

A few of the campers huddled around the makeshift table shuffled and coughed awkwardly. 

“Every strategy’s been done before,” a tall girl with bubblegum-pink hair and an eyebrow piercing shouted from the back of the group. “How are we going to out-war the god of war’s kids?” 

Murmurs rushed around the table, soft and susurrant. There’s no way we’re going anywhere here. We’ve gotten our asses beat six weeks in a row. What are we even doing?

Luke smiled. “Ares is the god of war,” he said, “not strategy.” He slung his arm around one of the campers next to him and inclined his head in the direction of the map.

Quietly, almost too quiet for you to hear, he murmured into the girl’s ear. “Don’t doubt yourself, Bethy,” he whispered.

You learned three things in the ten minutes that she spent explaining your team’s new strategy—

—one, your team was going to kick some major ass—

—two, your strategist’s name was Annabeth Chase, and she was the smartest eight-year-old you have ever met—

—and three, Luke was right.

Annabeth’s plan took the rules of Capture the Flag and threw them out the window. She split the team into four subgroups, each with a delegated leader. Luke nodded along as she talked, marking the map with a stubby pencil. 

When Annabeth’s eyes, dark and piercing, searched the crowd and landed on you, you felt your heart stop.

“You,” she said, “are you good with a sword?”

You raised your eyebrow, pointing to yourself—just to confirm this genius child was speaking to you—and Annabeth nodded. 

“I guess?” You said, shrugging. “I know some basic stuff, and I’m good at disarming.”

Annabeth’s face broke into a smile. “Work with Luke on the first wave of offense.” She gestured to the map. “You two will take points B and B-one,” she explained. “My group will take the A-points. You wait for our signal to move in.”

You met Luke’s eyes across the table. Hey, you mouthed. 

His eyes flicked up and down your form. Hey, he mouthed back. You ready to win?

You smiled and nodded.

Good, Luke said, all teeth. Let’s go.

He stood and grabbed his helmet. You did the same.

“I’m [Y/N],” you said as you followed Luke through the forest. “We, uh—we met when I first got here, like, a year ago.” I was sobbing my eyes out because my mother abandoned me, you didn’t add. It was kind of pathetic. I think I threw up from crying so hard.

You suddenly hoped Luke didn’t remember meeting you, actually. That would be less embarrassing.

He turned and caught your eye. “You live in the same cabin as me. ‘Course I know you.” 

Of course he remembers.

You laughed, flushing red. “Oh. Yeah. Of course.”

The silence was so thick, you could have cut it with the sleek bronze of your sword.

In the end, it was Luke who broke the silence. “You wanna play a game while we wait out here?”

You shrugged. “Sure,” you said. 

“Twenty questions,” Luke replied. “So we can learn enough about each other to actually work together.” He smiled. “What’s your favorite color?”

“Low-hanging fruit,” you said, your voice just barely taking on a teasing tone. “It’s green.” 

Luke laughed, loud and full and bright. “Apologies,” he said; mirth crept into his words, staining everything with a tinge of that laughter. “I’ll go for the more gut-wrenching, intimate questions next time.”

You flushed red again. Intimate questions. What the hell does he mean by that?

“My turn,” you said instead. “What do you want to be when you get older?”

“We’ll be heroes,” Luke whispers. “Real heroes. Not figureheads propped up by the gods.”

You wish you could believe him. He’s lying on the beach next to you, his head resting in the junction between your shoulder and your neck. Over the treetops, the stars are beginning to fade from the sky.

It’s almost time.

Your throat feels like someone has sanded it down to expose your vocal cords. This is a bad idea, you want to say. We shouldn’t do this. Tell me we can still not do this. 

“Wanna play twenty questions?” You say, crackling and hoarse.

Luke turns to look at you. “Yeah,” he murmurs. 

“My turn first,” you whisper. Luke nods.

You take a deep breath, in and out. “Are we going to die doing this?”

Luke inhales sharply. “Maybe,” he says. Slowly. Deliberately. “But we’ll do everything we can to make sure we don’t.”

“I got another question,” you say. Luke raises an eyebrow. His knuckles brush yours as you sit up.

“Are you scared?”

It’s your birthday. 

You think you’re going to die. 

Luke is kneeling over you, the palm of his hand pressed against the wet opening in your stomach where someone had caught you with a spear. The shaft of it is still sticking out of you, you think. You’re afraid to look down, afraid to see it. 

“No,” Luke gasps, “no, no, no.”

You watch as the gold fades from his eye, leaving behind the honey-dark brown you remember. His hands are slick with blood—most of it’s probably yours, it has to be yours. You’re bleeding out, after all. 

You tug on Luke’s sleeve weakly. “Hey,” you breathe. “Luke. It’s okay, it’s okay. It’s going to be okay.”

“No,” he says. “You’re—you’re hurt.”

“I know,” you rasp. “I know it hurts. I’m the one—” 

You break off as a cough sticks in your throat. It feels wet. Oily. Desperate to get out. You taste the blood in the back of your throat before you can even take another breath.

“—I’m the one who’s feeling it,” you finish, your voice tilting up at the end. A joke. Gods, your sense of humor is dark.

Luke laughs weakly. “Don’t talk,” he says. “You’re gonna be just fine, [Y/N], just fine.”

He meets your eyes. You see him realize it in slow motion.

Tell him. Tell him now. He’s never going to know otherwise—he could die any minute—

“Luke,” you murmur. “Luke, did you know I loved you?”

He freezes. “What?”

You cough again. Blood spills over your lips. “I loved you,” you repeat. “Since we were campers. Had the…the biggest, stupidest crush on you.”

Luke shakes his head. “No, no,” he says. “You—”

“You’re my best friend,” you continue. “Whatever feelings were there, you’re my best friend.”

Luke’s palm against your stomach is warm. It feels safe. It feels like sleeping side-by-side in the cabin, like shared meals and shared secrets. 

“Why are you telling me this?” Luke says, “why are you—why?”

You blink, just once, but it takes everything you have to open your eyes again after closing them. “Because I’m going to die,” you whisper. “And even if—even though I moved on, I wanted you to…to know.”

Luke bows over your body, pressing his forehead to yours. Tears slip from his cheeks and fall onto yours, driving little rivers through the blood smeared there.

He’s crying. Why is he—

“You idiot,” Luke says brokenly. “I loved you too. I loved you too.” He cradles your head in his lap, brushing your hair away from your face. “[Y/N], I’m so sorry.”

Your eyes slip shut.

I loved you too, Luke’s voice echoes. I loved you too.

[difeisheng]

碎鏡

My Qiaofang fic 《原諒我可好》 was originally the ending to a slightly longer draft, before I edited/cut it down and it became its own oneshot. However, I still like what didn't make it in, and Qiao Wanmian's perspective was a joy to write. So here is everything that happened before, as an extra (but can be read on its own).

Qiao Wanmian learns, days after the fact (again), that a man is dead, disappeared from the world (again), and as she feels the last ten years of her life warp, rush past, reset (back to the start, back to the end) the world fractures into sharp glass.

Qiao-guniang, are you all right? makes its way around the shards, the sound cut too harsh in its gentleness. Menzhu, do you want us to keep looking for him?

Qiao-nvxia, I'm sure he's still alive.

Qiao-guniang, he came back last time. He wouldn't leave you.

(For the second time, no one says.)

Days turn into weeks, turn into a month, strung together by a symphony of demand, of advice, of people who remember a heartbroken maiden mourning her destined, and no one beyond that.

Menzhu—

Qiao-nvxia—

Qiao-guniang—

Qiao Wanmian—

"Enough," she says, and for not the first time, she understands why Li Xiangyi wanted to run.

And so finally, Qiao Wanmian does too.

~*~

Here is the measure of Qiao Wanmian's life:

She is almost thirty, and two betrotheds have come and gone. She has spent half her lifetime dedicated to a sect, defining its name and its honour, but pride though it is, her name does not exist outside of it. Qiao Wanmian of Sigumen, as she hears it echoed in the streets.

And more than that, because the names of heroes will not, cannot die? Qiao Wanmian, Li Xiangyi's beloved.

What is it like, she wonders, watching a trio of girls walk through a market in a small town, sword wrapped in cloth for anonymity, to be someone who loves with the freedom of leaving it behind? What is it like, to exist and nothing more, as someone other than a widow who was never a wife?

What is it like for the world to look at oneself and see a person, not a story, perfect in her sculpted tragedy?

And somehow, somehow she finds the answer after two months of wandering. Or rather he finds Qiao Wanmian, seated at an inn toward the south, blue silk and silver stepping out of a storm and through the door for too-wide eyes to find her own.

"Qiao-guniang," Fang Duobing breathes. When Qiao Wanmian looks at him, all of twenty years old and too young to lose a first love, she knows that before him stands a shattered world too.

"Join me?" she says to that, and signals for another jar of wine.

~*~

Fang Duobing is an interesting one, Qiao Wanmian thinks, several hours later, studying him by the relief of candlelight. His hair sweeps over his shoulder, dark river with a few strands fallen loose, as he slumps forward to brace his arms on the table. He's staring downward as he props his chin up by one hand, the other fidgeting with his sleeve. "How long do you think it'll take to find him?"

Maudlin, he is. He hasn't had the years to build up a tolerance for wine, although Qiao Wanmian cannot say she's been sober this evening. The warmth to her face is from more than the inn torches.

How did Li Lianhua talk to this boy, when he was in this state? What was lie, what was truth, and for how long? Did it feel like this, where Qiao Wanmian knows the answer to Fang Duobing's words, but cannot let it escape her tongue?

"I don't know," she settles for instead, a soft lie to cushion the truth. "It might take a month. It might take years."

"It won't be years," Fang Duobing murmurs. The strings of beads in his hair rustle as he tilts his head to look at her. "We both already waited ten. I'll find him sooner than that."

Xiangyi, Qiao Wanmian thinks, thinks of the last ten years gone by without lighting lanterns for the dead. You always chose the ones who could never give up, didn't you?

"Good luck," she says softly, nearly a whisper, and takes a slow swallow of wine. The jar is nearly empty.

Silence unspools, punctuated by the flicker of the lights. Fang Duobing unstops the next jar of wine and brings it to his lips, neck a graceful curve in the lean of his head back, accented by the line of his jaw. He's grown into his features, for all the room he still has left to mature. If the jianghu hadn't called his name, he would have made a handsome aristocrat in the imperial court.

Is that what else Li Lianhua saw in Fang Duobing, for him to take on a companion after ten years of solitude? Qiao Wanmian wonders briefly, in the split moment before Fang Duobing glances at her again, then somewhere in the distance, darting away too quickly to count as an idle movement. "Something to say, Fang-gongzi?"

Fang Duobing closes his eyes, in a moment's thought. When he opens them, it is to lean closer, close enough that Qiao Wanmian can feel the shape of his breath. Perhaps this dearth of respectable distance, if anyone cares, can be excused by a wine-fuelled lapse in judgment. She chooses to let it be so.

"How did you survive this the last time?" Fang Duobing asks, less question and more plea. Qiao Wanmian can see now that it's been on his mind all evening, desperation forcing his tongue.

His eyes are dark now. He looks lost.

And before she can respond, "I'm asking because you were also someone who knew him."

Oh.

Qiao Wanmian doesn't deserve to have the word zhiji alongside her name. Not when it comes to Li Xiangyi. But she knows what Fang Duobing is searching for, and so she holds it out, that lifeline of kindred recognition.

Thousands mourned the loss of a legend. They both mourned the death of a man.

When her hand moves toward Fang Duobing, half by some instinct, half by impulse, he leans into the touch, letting himself be tugged up by his chin to face her.

"I don't have a good answer for you," she says, and there's no lie for this that will fare any less painful than the truth. "You'll get through one day hoping he'll be there waiting at the end, and he won't be, but you'll go to sleep so that maybe he'll find you in the next. He won't. But if it means you see tomorrow, then you have to keep hoping, until someday, you've found something new to wake up for."

It all comes out in a rush, and it surprises Qiao Wanmian by the honesty of it, so much so that her last words are too quiet by contrast. "That's how people like us keep living."

Fang Duobing's eyes are too bright. She brushes one gemstone of a fallen tear away with her thumb.

"You did this alone?" he says, and Qiao Wanmian recognizes the tremble to those words.

A wandering swordsman with a blade can fight any demon that throws itself at him. Fear, though, has ten thousand different ways to find you.

"You won't have to."

A promise, she realizes a moment too late, but she's already made it. These words were for him alone. Something else takes over Fang Duobing's expression: relief, like the first blossom of spring after a bleak winter.

He's too young for this to be his life.

And of Qiao Wanmian? What does Fang Duobing think? She waits, drawing away from him, the comfort of another's warmth gone.

His words are too soft in his mouth, gaze too earnest. "I know you haven't said anything about yourself all night, but you don't have to either, you know."

It feels like an arrow let fly.

Qiao Wanmian is left helpless by its wound, staring in the half-dark at a boy too sweet for her, willing to break her fall while he doesn't know how to land himself, and, and—

Something inside her breaks.

~*~

When she reaches for him, anything of him, drowned in the shadows by the doors to his room— waist, collar, mouth— he lets her.

[terresdebrumestories]

This idea ambushed me in the shower and wouldn't leave me alone until I wrote it, so there you have it. This is the result of an hour of frantic typing on my phone and shall be cleaned up before I cross post it to AO3.

"I wanna come out," Jamie says, and Roy freezes in place so fast Phoebe bumps into his back and swears under her breath.

Roy doesn't even pretend to try and tease her for it, too stunned for words.

"If we win tonight," Jamie adds on the other end of the line, "I wanna come out."

"Are you sure?" Roy manages at last, and it comes out so raw Ruth does a double take in the kitchen, raising her eyebrows in question.

Roy, gripping his phone like he'll die if he lets go, shakes his head and turns away, making his way to the corridor on shaky legs. From very far away, he thinks he hears Phoebe ask if he's alright, but Roy pushes her out of his mind as soon as Jamie says:

"I'm sure."

"Jamie," Roy hisses, "it could end your career."

"So what?" Jamie says, and Roy almost ask who the fuck is possessing his partner.

"Jamie."

"Roy. I'm thirty-four. I've won the Premier League, the Europe League and the fucking World Cup. I'm in the fucking Olympics. Once I've won that, who the fuck cares if I get a goodbye tour?"

"You do," Roy says. Then Jamie grunts and Roy adds: "I'm with you. You know I am, always." Jamie hums, but it sounds like he's relenting, not skeptical, so Roy makes himself continue despite the risk of Ruth or Phoebe overhearing: "I just don't—I don't want you to regret it."

To regret me, Roy is surprised to mean. After all, they've been together for almost ten years now. Any coming out Jamie makes is likely to result in their relationship becoming public, and Roy...Roy has apparently not quite managed to get over their age difference as thoroughly as he thought he had.

"I won't," Jamie promises, the sound of his voice suddenly echoing, like he just stepped in a bathroom. "I really won't. Just 'cause I'm buzzin' doesn't mean I don't know what I'm doing."

Roy can't help worrying anyway, but he still makes himself breathe in, and then out, and then say:

"Okay. Then I think you should do it."

"Oh, I was gonna," Jamie says, playful, and Roy smiles at his sister's bathroom door like an idiot. "But also. Em. I don't—if I'm gonna come out publicly, I don't wanna have to like. Pretend like I'm single or whatever. Or like. If I do get my fucking retirement tour and we meet in a game or whatever, I don't wanna have to pretend like I'm not dead gone on you, you know?"

Roy's heart expands in his chest, like it's trying to make a run for it through his ribs or something, and he knows he's full-on grinning at the bathroom door when he says:

"Me either. Please feel free to mention me by name."

"Grand," Jamie says over the sound of a shower turning on. "Great. Well. I gotta go soon but uh. Wish me luck?"

"Good luck," Roy obliges. And then, because he's had nearly ten years of practice to make this bit easy, he adds: "I love you."

"Love you too."

*

"What a game," Arlo White shouts on TV a few hours later, while Ruth and Phoebe do a victory dance around the couch, where Sam and Keeley are singing Jamie's stupid fucking chant along with the crowds in the stadium.

"What a game! What a play! What a goal! And what an ovation for Jamie Tartt, indubitably the man of the match!"

"I agree," Chris Powell adds, sounding almost excited for once, "I'd even say: what a career! Jamie Tartt won it all! Honestly Arlo, I wouldn't be surprised if he decided to retire soon, I mean at this point what else does he need?"

"Oh shut the fuck up," Roy yells at the TV, earning himself a playful shove from Phoebe and a prod in the ribs from Keeley. "Stupid fucking pundits," he mutters into his champagne.

"That would be so much more convincing if you weren't pink with pride, babe," Keeley teases, and Roy grunts without heat.

The truth is, now that White and Powell have announced a transition on the ground and the camera switched to Barbara Carnahan on the side of the pitch, Roy feels himself tense with anticipation. Everyone here knows about him and Jamie, of course, but they don't know what he's planning to do. That leaves Roy alone to deal with the nerves of Jamie's impending announcement, and holy fucking shit, they're a lot.

"First of all," Carnahan says when she catches Jamie and gets him to stand in front of her camera, "I want to congratulate you on an absolutely marvelous game!"

Roy watches Jamie's tongue dart out in celebration, like he's a goddamned emoji or something, and finds himself gripping Keeley's hand out of sheer need to share the moment with someone.

"Thanks," Jamie says, sobering up a little bit, "We did really good, yeah!"

"Oh, definitely! How does it feel? Did you expect this when you woke up this morning?"

"Well, you know," Jamie says, running a hand through his hair, "nothing's ever certain, but I knew our chances were good, yeah, so I was like. Fairly optimistic about it."

"And you were right!" Carnahan agrees with a little bounce. "I'll admit I was nervous when the first half ended at one-one, but that goal in injury time was magnificent!"

"Yeah, Satō gave me a great assist there, that kid's gonna get far," Jamie says, wiping at his brow.

To Roy's left, Sam coos a little, happy to see one of his Marseille teammates get some recognition. He hasn't looked that cheerful since he busted his knee right before the Olympics started and he knew he had to sit the competition out.

"What was going on in your head at that moment?" Carnahan asks Jamie. "As the whistle blew and you realized you'd won, where did you mind go? Is there anyone you thought of in particular?"

"Well there's me mum, of course," Jamie says. "She's in the stands, and I'm really glad she could be here for this. And then there's my partner."

Around Roy, the living room falls into the most intense silence he's ever heards, even as Jamie adds:

"Actually, is it okay if I talk to him for a sec?"

"Him?" Carnahan asks, at the same time as Keeley and Phoebe shriek:

"WHAT?"

"Yeah, him," Jamie says, prompting Sam to shout and grab Roy's left shoulder. "Can I talk to him?"

And this. This wasn't the script, right? Roy thought—usually—this isn't. No. No!

...no?

"Oh my god, uncle Roy!" Phoebe is saying, gripping Roy's right shoulder, "Oh my god!"

"Yes, sure," Barbara Carnahan says with the dazed look of a reporter who's just been hit with the exclusive of the decade, "go ahead."

Jamie grins, and thanks her, and then he takes a deep breath—Roys mirrors him, can't help it, feels like he's about to explode, or melt, or both—

"Roy," Jamie says on the screen, eyes turned straight at the camera so it looks like he's actually watching Roy in 16:9 format, "it's hard to remember what it was like to hate you enough to nearly fight you right on the pitch."

Someone says a very strangled 'what the fuck' and it takes Roy a second to realize it's Keeley, but also the reporter on the telly.

"Turns out you're actually one of the best men I've ever fucking met—" ('Oh my god!' Says Keeley, slapping Roy's arm.) "You support me and challenge me all the fucking time, you're funny, and the grumpiest arse in the morning." ('OH MY GOD!' shouts Phoebe from behind Roy.) "I've spent nine years of my life loving you to your face, and you've taken it like a champ so far...so what do you say we make it official and tie the knot?"

"OH MY GOD!" Screams the living room, pushing and pulling and slapping at Roy.

He can barely breathe, feels himself grow twice, thrice, ten times bigger than he normally is, floating like a bubble of champagne as Phoebe nearly breaks his nose trying to shove his phone against his ear—"YOU HAVE TO FUCKING CALL HIM, UNCLE ROY!"

And then there's a dial tone, and some spluttering on tv, and more shouting, and a phone comes into view, lands against Jamie's ear, and then—

"You motherfucker!" Roy yells into the phone, and Jamie-on-the-screen blinks and grins, and Jamie-on-the-phone gives this little hitch of breath he does when he thinks 'I love you', and Roy is saying: "You absolute wanker! No fucking warning—"

And Jamie-on-the-screen scrunches his nose and grins harder, and Roy's heart goes into fucking overdrive, his pulse loud in his ears and in his palms, and Jamie-on-the-phone asks:

"So like, that's a yes, right?"

"Yes! Of course it's a yes you gigantic prick!" Roy yells, and Jamie-on-the-screen fist pumps while Roy's world turns into one giant shriek of joy, and then there's champagne popping, and four different footballers bursting on the screen to hug and jump up and down and shout so loud Roy hears them even when Jamie has to take the phone away from his ear.

"Oh my god!" Keeley shouts, muffled, into Roy's neck when he hangs up, knowing full well there's no way Jamie's getting back to his phone until much later tonight. "Congratulations! I'm so happy for you!"

"Did you really not know?" Phoebe asks, shouting into his other ear.

"I knew he wanted to come out and go public about us," Roy says, falling back from the adrenaline-induced shouting to the best sort of daze. "I didn't know he was going to propose!"

And Roy sounds grumpy about it, he knows he does—will probably get shit from Jamie about it as soon as his fucking plane lands, really! And his sister, his niece, his friends are being way too loud about it, and now his phone's buzzing and will probably keep buzzing for the next four or five hours, and Roy sounds grumpy but he does not mean it for a fucking second.

[thefastestelementalmasteralive]

procrastinating school work so let me talk about my starwars (Anakin) aus

There's that lion!Vader Au, if I named it I don't remember the name but basically, either Anakin doesn't tell Padme where he's going or she doesn't go to Mustafar. might actually have R2D2 with Padme as her bodyguard or Anakin just didn't want r2 to know what he did to the separatist leaders. anakin doesn't come back from Mustafar because when he leaves the planet, the force decides 'okay, enough atrocities for the next... two decades.' and transforms him into a lion and sends him to a green planet. Sidious finds him a year later and decides to just build a gladiator ring and throw him in there to execute the people he wants dead on television.

19 years later Luke, Leia, Obi-Wan, Ahsoka, Padme, Cody, and Rex all get captured and are sentenced to be executed as a group with some other non-important people. Anakin eats the non-important people and vaguely recognizes some but tries to kill Luke and Leia because he doesn't recognize them.

SITS au - sith in the senate au - me trying to explore my favorite arc (mortis) and what would have happened if Anakin left with the son (and the daughter) and the father let Ahsoka and Obi-wan go thirty minutes later but Anakin is nowhere in sight when they go back to the real world. this is also the au where the Tusken massacre is really addressed in this au, in others it didn't happen, obviously in lion!vader it did since it only changes in rots. i don't know if it's really a character study that I'm doing for this au but I'm actually writing an essay on Anakin for my writing class and I'm so using elements from this for that and from that for this.

(please- someone stop me from making Barriss run away from the Jedi and Anakin adopting Barriss after she ends up on Tatooine and Anakin gets over his initial feeling of 'YOU D:<')

14!au. i have no other name for it as of right now.

anakin gets found by Palpatine and Shmi dies (i think) but surely its not you Pal Friendpatine's fault :0

Anyway, Palpatine finds Anakin at like... 5 and adopts him and brings him on his path to becoming chancellor and then the clone wars start at the Naboo blockade, Palpatine started cloning **early**. no, I have no idea how old Jango Fett is, why do you ask? anakin befriends some of the clones and takes an interest in politics because he thinks he can convince then senate to stop creating clones and just recruit normal civilians to the army.

this au is inspired by Hazbin Hotel song 'you didn't know' and some brave group of clones tries to plead their case to the senate, ankin watches in on it, nala se mentions the chips in the kaminoan rebuttal of clone rights and Anakin FREAKS. palpatine tries to calm him saying 'they are to control them, they're dangerous otherwise' and basically dooms himself. also, Anakin specifically has wings. see, I subscribe to the thinking of 'Anakin can shapeshift due to his unstable DNA' Edit: I Found it! @thewildballyntynesgrow or mballyntyne on Ao3 with their series 'A Wild Thing to Tame'. Anakin leaves taking a majority of the coruscant guard with him and goes back to Tatooine and starts freeing a whole bunch of planets over the years. the meeting in the senate takes place when he is fourteen, the empire starts when he is seventeen. Anakin adopts Boba and Galen Marek. anakin and the freed outer rim either hide rebel bases or use their revolutions as distractions for the empire.

Retconned rebel Anakin Au. aka, Barriss is the same age as Anakin and befriends him and Ferus eventually befriends him, and Anakin is closer to those two and some others than Obi-wan and Ahsoka (who is Obi-wan's padawan) Barriss never bombs the temple, the empire rises but the original empire dies like a year into the reign and another emperor rises.... Emperor Obi-wan Kenobi and his daughter Ahsoka how are both overly attached to rebel leader Anakin Skywalker and are both trying to adopt him and turn him to their side... by kidnapping Anakin's family. (rexanidala). anakin adopts so many kids, most of them are force-sensitive and want to fight so he lets them reluctantly but those not young enough to choose or fight are sent to live with Rex, Padme, Luke, Leia, and their grandparents; Dooku and Plo.

Ventress and Anakin Swap au, sort of. anakin got nabbed from his mom by Dooku. Dooku never found Ventress, Obi-wan does instead. Obi does not train Ventress but they are friends forever after. ventress tries forcefully redeeming the seventeen-eighteen year old Sith lord and it only sort of works. he defects but really only after he finds out about the slavery in creating battle droids. Anakin isn't really a separatist general, he just has a specialized group of droids that he rebuilds after fights with Jedi. he never fights clones with droids.

after defecting Anakin plans with Ventress and decides to free the outer rim then take the former slaves that will join him and start up a third party to the war. inspired by 'blood oath' by the art of pleasing princes.

okay so for this next au, named Anakin Umakkar, The rain storm. sources are ADragonsFriend and @fialleril or fialleril on a03, and @clawedandcute or ClawedandCute (Adi_Fire) on a03. and songs this au is inspired by for this au is (and in order) Puppeteer, Done For, Hell is Forever, There are Other Ways, What Did I Miss? and Respectless.

Umakkar was a name I first read about in a book called 'Elder sisters' by ADragonsFriend. I first heard about Ekkreth in Fialleril's books. the concept of Anakin staying on Tatooine was inspired by ClawedandCute's book and au 'The Accidental Sith'

Anyway, Qui-gon and the queen's ship never stops on Tatooine, but the clone wars do not start early. a solid two months into the Clone Wars, it is revealed that Jabba the Hutt has been dead for a year, and Tatooine has freed itself from the huts. Senator Padme Amidala and Jedi Obi-wan Kenobi (and Padawan Ahsoka Tano) are sent to Tatooine to try to get Tatooine to align with the republic. now please listen to Puppeteer and Done For (no, Anakin does not turn any clones into pigs, just like any non-clone serving in the army ). once Obi-wan draws his lightsaber on Anakin, Anakin just swipes it away, unhurt, and has him and other... three (Cody, Padme, and Ahsoka)locked up until he decided to hear them out. (cue hell is forever, the last lines being, "the freed outer rim has found both the separatists and the republic to be the enemy" ya know due to their armies) then when it looks like Anakin is gonna do something to them to send a message to the republic, Obi-wan pleads with him and mentions the Sith Dooku mentioned and any evil smile on Anakin's face slips away into annoyance "Sidious, huh?" and in 'There are other ways' fashion tells obi-wan about Mortis and other wells in the force that might be better for the Jedi to focus at. when asked why he had that reaction to the 'Sidious' character, he implies that Sidious has reached out to him to join either side of the war, like once per side.

he sends Obi-Wan and the Clones that want to return on their way and a year later decides that enough is enough and heads to Coruscant under the pretense of negotiating. palpatine sets up a committee to welcome Tatooine to the republic only for 'respectless' to happen and Anakin starts arguing with Orn Free Taa, then Palpatine himself and once Palpatine leaves, turns to the Jedi in the room and says "yeah, you might want to look into that..." and leaves.

Detached Mortis god au: inspired by the ocean saga

switching up the timeline here, Rako Hardeen happens, the Wrong Jedi arc happens, *Then* mortis happens. Anakin is alone on Mortis, he decides to stay, Padme is pregnant, the empire rises, Padme survives and joins the rebellion, Ahsoka becomes Fulcrum. Obi-wan joins the rebellion to help train Luke and Leia. Luke, Leia, Han, Ezra and some others start on a mission, but it starts off rough. Ezra decides to pray to a Force Diety he or Ahsoka met once and the diety appears and decides to grant them safe passage to the actual start of the mission as long as they keep Ahsoka, who they meet up with later on the mission, safe. if they accept and fail, another god is going to have a really big problem with them. they accept and all goes well until the last day of the mission, everything falls apart and Ahsoka is separated from the group and captured. the gang decides they need to go back to base to think and plan. on their way back their ship is seemingly attacked but they cant tell by what, they crash land at base and get out of the ship, not the falcon, only to meet two dragon-like-creatures, and a portal opens and a very pissed Anakin steps out. he kidnaps a bunch of rebels and puts them in the world between worlds and tells them they only get their people back when Ahsoka is safe. Obi-Wan and Padme only make it to the hangar this goes down once Anakin has stepped back through the portal.

[reblrths]

𝙽𝙾𝚃𝙷𝙸𝙽𝙶 𝙱𝚄𝚁𝙽𝚂 like the cold. finch delval, district five.

➶ did you see them?! they’re finally back as a mentor, and you know they’re one of my favourites! it’s finch delval, the thirty-four year old winner of the seventy-sixth hunger games! i’m just so excited to see them returning to the capitol all the way from district five! they won their games using hydroelectric turbines so their tributes will no doubt be desperate for their wisdom. the capitol just loved them for being so resolute, even if they have been known to be mercurial at times. they do have a relative in this year's games ( nephew ) and they did volunteer to go into the arena with them. ( character is part of the uprising )

BASICS.

name: finch delval

age: thirty-four

gender / pronouns: demi woman, they/she

home: district five

countenance: tattoos on right arm in attempt to cover large scarring, multiple small silvery scars on cheeks, forehead, through eyebrow, etc. little scars on knuckles, missing pinky and ring finger on right hand.

faceclaim: roberta colindrez

BIOGRAPHY.

tw: mention of fighting, suicidal thoughts, death, drowning, gore, science stuff that i KNOW is definitely not right but for the sake of my sanity and laziness and plots, we're going to pretend it is <3

you are born into the district for power yet the irony of that does not hit you until you are much later. though it is wealthier than the other non-career districts and the tesserae is not as utilized here, you hate it all the same. you hate the schooling, you hate your inevitability of working at one of the plants that power panem, you hate the insisting from your parents that you be more just as they were. they were classically proud of themselves and their role in helping create the solar plant at the heart of your district -- you should strive to contribute something of that stature as well. but there are expectations put on you that are not put on your older brother, wren, and you spent your whole life bitter about it. you butt heads constantly, and even if you know you cannot live up to him, you love him wholeheartedly. you earned your first bruises and scars from the glass bottle to the face while defending him. though while he seems to be perfect and can do no wrong, he aces anything he does in the first try, where you struggle more than anything. so you don't try at all.

what you are good at are not skills that can help you. you see the world in red – blinding anger towards all that is wrong, all that is wrong with you. you busy yourself, bruise your fists, but it's messy. you leave trails of blood, the smallest thing can set you off and you quickly earn a reputation in the district. but you are as determined as are you reckless. somehow, it is not a shock to you when your name is called at the reaping. you aren't happy for it, but it seems just your luck -- your brother, going all six years without his name called, but you’re two years out from being clear when you are thrust into the capitol. you always did think those things were rigged, anyway. you try not to feel too smug at the idea of snow deeming you a problem that needs taking care of. shoulders squared and refusing to cower, you walk up to that stage. you have no real skill for this, baseless knowledge from this stupid fucking district and unless that arena has anything to do with solar panels, you're fucking dead. but you won't let them get you -- you’re a connoisseur when it comes to digging your own grave, alright.

your mentors quickly learn there is no getting through to you and they focus on your district partner instead. your attitude is hardly manageable and any advice they try to give is met with a remark simply for the chance to be contradictory. your interview with caesar practically ensures no sponsors step forth for you and you are fairly certain you may have been the first person to get him to break his friendly persona on screen, as minute as it was. just a twitch of his lips, but your smug grin sealed your fate. you can hear wren yelling at you in your head, telling you to stop acting so fucking proud and try, but you simply cannot bring yourself to. how many kids have died during these games? what was one more on the mantel?

you picked up a few new skills in training but not enough to help you survive, not enough to retain. you are better in close combat which doesn't surprise you, but you aren't flawless by any means. brute force does not equal skilled combat. you cannot help but think wren would be better here, he might have a chance to win. he'd be able to throw these stupid fucking knives and start a fire with no problem. but because it's you, because you shun any help that might be offered because you won't look weak in front of the other tributes, you suffer by your own hand.

as it turns out, you didn't need to learn how to build a fire or forage or any of that stupid shit. because when you step into that tube, it goes down instead of up.

underwater. the arena is underwater -- you can see it surrounding you. it is almost submarine-like, where the cornucopia is. 24 of you stand under a large metal dome, covering the top and the sides, the light is killing you, but there is glass, too, and you can see the blue from here -- and on each side of the dome are four parallel entry ways that lead to god knows what. you cannot swim and you debate stepping off of the platform entirely because there's no possible way you're winning these games. couldn't they be outside like the games before you, and the games before that? who cares about double victors, you just want to be able to put what little tricks you learned to use. but the countdown beats you to it and you refuse to be killed by anyone other than yourself.

you don't go for the cornucopia, you run to the closest of the four entrances. it's like a never-ending hall until it opens up and even then, you keep running. it takes you forever to find somewhere safe, somewhere you think no one will find you. you regret your decision almost immediately -- no water, despite being surrounded by it, no food, no weapons, just metal. metal and bright lights and you feel like you're going fucking crazy. you're far enough away from the noise of the bloodbath that when the cannons begin to sound you wonder how much time has passed. eight tributes.

what started as living out of spite turns into spiraling as you wait for someone to find you, really. or for the game makers to do you a favor (ha!). you sit and wonder what the other entrances lead to and if you just happened to pick the unluckiest one, the dead end. how big was this arena? how do the sponsors get their gifts in? how do you get out? you ran for what felt like forever. you know you sabotaged yourself -- you refused help at every point, you made a spectacle of your hatred every step of the way, and now you're stuck. if snow wanted you gone, he didn't need to try very hard.

you think you're going crazy as you begin looking out of one of the glass windows, seeing if anything could possibly help you outside of this arena -- and then you hear it. you stick your ear against the metal and then you feel it. the vibrations, the low thrum. you perk up immediately, remembering days spent shadowing your parents at work and learning about these stupid power plants at school because they won't teach you anything of actual value. of course, of course. how could they keep this arena powered? those bright lights, those fucking lights.

you have to find the power source. you feel dumbstruck by this information and a newfound will to live; an arena that should have been your downfall and you have possibly found a way to use it to your advantage.

when you find it, it nearly kills you -- no one was supposed to be able to find it, that's for sure. you get lucky, only fighting when necessary and stealing what you can to manage. you find out what the other entrances lead to; doors open at inopportune times, flooding certain sectors and taking anyone who gets in the way of the water with it. the mutts that enter with the water are deadly -- piranhas, sharks, you think that the gamemakers even make the water full of toxins at some points -- you learn that the hard way while watching one of the tributes drink some of the overspill from afar and they drop dead after a coughing fit. and sometimes, the water doesn't go down. you watch on the other side as doors close and don't open until a cannon sounds. you aren't sure if there's even a chance for the tribute to survive that.

you're able to flood the sectors yourself when you find it; two days it took you. two days and you're dying of dehydration, bloody from fighting and running, you're missing two fingers and your right arm is limp and unusable, covered in red. but you're determined as you are reckless. you'll destroy this whole fucking arena if you have to. you kill nearly all of the remaining victors with your floods, and at some point you watch the cornucopia itself begin to fill because she finds you.

the last tribute, a brunette career from district four whose name you never bothered to remember because you didn't think you'd be alive this long, and you think this is it. she can swim, you can't, and you're going to die and watch your blood swim away from you in the rising water. you swing and swing and swing aimlessly, warding her off, panic rising in you as the dome fills steadily and surely. you make it on top of the cornucopia as you run from her, and you've got a few good hits in, she's just as bloody, you bitterly think the capitol must love this. or maybe they don't -- you haven't seen a game this short in your lifetime, three days total, but if they don't love it -- why didn't the gamemakers stop you? they must be eating this up. they'll surely want something longer, but they'll just have to wait until next year.

there's a machete in your good hand and she can't climb after you but she can grab you. you twist, watching as she tries and tries to pull you down with her and you swing as hard as you can when you feel the water nipping at your ankles. you feel her hand go slack for a moment when the machete finds the side of her neck. you feel the blood make contact with your own body and when one of those mutt piranhas drags her into the depths of the rising water, you climb frantically to the top of the cornucopia.

the first thing you do is breathe. you stare up at the metal dome and listen as the water recedes away, dehydrated and on the brink of death because of it, bloody and so incredibly fucking lucky. the second thing you do is laugh. you laugh until your lungs hurt, because this feels wrong -- the last cannon sounds and you are crowned victor. you laugh and laugh and laugh. you did not win from sponsor gifts or charming personality, skilled combat or any survival skill at all -- you won because of your knowledge from the district you hated. the irony of it all continues to make you laugh -- you should be dead. perhaps your parents were right all along.

you learn quickly that the president is not happy with you and your stunt. your victory tour is hell, you are faced with the reality of being a victor and you think perhaps it might have been better to die in that arena after all. these people who hated you three days ago now act as though you are something special and lovely and something to fawn over. you prove quickly you are not. wren has a son whose mother dies in childbirth, your parents pass their wealth between you both (you give it all to wren, you have more money than you need). your awful attitude never changes over the years, always finding some way to defy -- and for this reason, it's your fault when he dies.

it's claimed a freak accident at the plant he works at, but you know the truth. he was too careful. you saw the fury in snow's eyes on your tour, even on amp's tour -- you know this is your warning. in the end, snow wins.

you raise the nephew -- lark, because this family is very original -- that looks too much like his father and acts too much like his father and he's fourteen when he's reaped. fuck flooding an arena -- you want to flood the mansion snow sits pretty in. even if you argue and butt heads with lark as you would with wren, you're more sister than aunt, hardly even a parental figure at all, but -- you volunteer as soon as you're able. there is no doubt in your mind you will leave this arena limp and lifted out, especially when you've already proven you have no skills except dumb luck and stubbornness. lark is your responsibility -- he is affected by your reputation already.

your first time going into the arena, you defied at every chance you got because you did not think it was worth saving your own life to go back to one that was hardly desirable anyway. now, you have to try -- for him.

PINTEREST | PLAYLIST

++

WANTED CONNECTIONS

secret ???? affair/love/whatever: finch is NOT liked by the capitol and they aren't fond of the capitol themself, they've earned a reputation that is sure to hurt the other person's if caught around them. angst. thanks

mentor friends: finch is also shockingly an awful mentor considering everything that has happened is pure happenstance for them, sponsors definitely don't fw them. someone to help finch mentor their tributes and actually try to get them to win LMAO

enemies/haters: let this bitch fight ok

friends: if you can stomach them. yeah

[aibidil]

Ray Bradbury, “Dusk in the Robot Museums: The Rebirth of the Imagination,” 1980

For some ten years now, I have been writing a long narrative poem about a small boy in the near future who runs into an audio-animatronic museum, veers away from the right portico marked Rome, passes a door marked Alexandria, and enters across a sill where a sign lettered Greece points in across a meadow.

The boy runs over the artificial grass and comes upon Plato, Socrates and perhaps Euripides seated at high noon under an olive tree sipping wine and eating bread and honey and speaking truths.

The boy hesitates and then addresses Plato:

"How goes it with the Republic?"

"Sit down, boy," says Plato, "and I'll tell you."

The boy sits. Plato tells. Socrates steps in from time to time. Euripides does a scene from one of his plays.

Along the way, the boy might well ask a question which hovered in all of our minds the past few decades:

"How come the United States, the country of Ideas on the March, for so long neglected fantasy and science fiction? Why is it that only during the past thirty years attention is being paid?"

Another question from the boy might well be:

"Who is responsible for the change?

"Who has taught the teachers and the librarians to pull up their socks, sit straight, and take notice?

"Simultaneously, which group in our country has backed off from abstraction and moved art back in the direction of pure illustration?"

Since I am neither dead nor a robot, and Plato-as-audioanimatronic lecturer might not be programmed to respond, let me answer as best I can.

The answer is: the students. The young people. The children.

They have led the revolution in reading and painting.

For the first time in the history of art and teaching, the children have become the teachers. Before our time, knowledge came down from the top of the pyramid to the broad base where the students survived as best they could. The gods spoke and the children listened.

But, lo! gravity reverses itself. The massive pyramid turns like a melting iceberg, until the boys and girls are on top. The base of the pyramid now teaches.

How did it happen? After all, back in the twenties and thirties, there were no science-fiction books in the curricula of schools anywhere. There were few in the libraries. Only once or twice a year did a responsible publisher dare to publish one or two books which could be designated as speculative fiction.

If you went into the average library as you motored across America in 1932, 1945, or 1953 you would have found:

No Edgar Rice Burroughs.

No L. Frank Baum and no Oz.

In 1958 or 1962 you would have found no Asimov, no Heinlein, no Van Vogt, and, er, no Bradbury.

Here and there, perhaps one book or two by the above. For the rest: a desert.

What were the reasons for this?

Among librarians and teachers there was then, and there still somewhat dimly persists, an idea, a notion, a concept that only Fact should be eaten with your Wheaties. Fantasy? That's for the Fire Birds. Fantasy, even when it takes science-fictional forms, which it often does, is dangerous. It is escapist. It is daydreaming. It has nothing to do with the world and the world's problems.

So said the snobs who did not know themselves as snobs.

So the shelves lay empty, the books untouched in publishers' bins, the subject untaught.

Comes the Evolution. The survival of that species called Child. The children, dying of starvation, hungry for ideas which lay all about in this fabulous land, locked into machines and architecture, struck out on their own. What did they do?

They walked into classrooms in Waukesha and Peoria and Neepawa and Cheyenne and Moose Jaw and Redwood City and placed a gentle bomb on teacher's desk. Instead of an apple it was Asimov.

"What's that?" the teacher asked, suspiciously.

"Try it. It's good for you," said the students.

"No thanks."

"Try it," said the students. "Read the first page. If you don't like it, stop." And the clever students turned and went away.

The teachers (and the librarians, later) put off reading, kept the book around the house for a few weeks and then, late one night, tried the first paragraph.

And the bomb exploded.

They not only read the first but the second paragraph, the second and third pages, the fourth and fifth chapters.

"My God!" they cried, almost in unison, "these damned books are about something!"

"Good Lord!" they cried, reading a second book, "there are Ideas here!"

"Holy Smoke!" they babbled, on their way through Clarke, heading into Heinlein, emerging from Sturgeon, "these books are-ugly word-relevant!"

"Yes!" shouted the chorus of kids starving in the yard. "Oh, my, yes!"

And the teachers began to teach, and discovered an amazing thing: Students who had never wanted to read before suddenly were galvanized, pulled up their socks, and began to read and quote Ursula Le Guin. Kids who had never read so much as one pirate's obituary in their lives were suddenly turning pages with their tongues, ravening for more.

Librarians were stunned to find that science-fiction books were not only being borrowed in the tens of thousands, but stolen and never returned!

"Where have we been?" the librarians and the teachers asked each other, as the Prince kissed them awake. "What's in these books that makes them as irresistible as Cracker Jack?"

The History of Ideas.

The children wouldn't have said it in so many words. They only sensed it and read it and loved it. The kids sensed, if they could not speak it, that the first science-fiction writers were cavemen who were trying to figure out the first sciences-which were what? How to capture fire. What to do about that lout of a mammoth hanging around outside the cave. How to play dentist to the sabre-tooth tiger and turn him into a house-cat.

Pondering those problems and possible sciences, the first cavemen and women drew science-fiction dreams on the cave walls. Scribbles in soot blueprinting possible strategies. Illustrations of mammoths, tigers, fires: how to solve? How to turn sciencefiction (problem solving) into science-fact (problem solved).

Some few brave ones ran out of the cave to be stomped by the mammoth, toothed by the tiger, scorched by the bestial fire that lived on trees and devoured wood. Some few finally returned to draw on the walls the triumph of the mammoth knocked like a hairy cathedral to earth, the tiger toothless, and the fire tamed and brought within the cave to light their nightmares and warm their souls.

The children sensed, if they could not speak, that the entire history of mankind is problem solving, or science fiction swallowing ideas, digesting them, and excreting formulas for survival. You can't have one without the other. No fantasy, no reality. No studies concerning loss, no gain. No imagination, no will. No impossible dreams: No possible solutions.

The children sensed, if they could not say, that fantasy, and its robot child science fiction, is not escape at all. But a circling round of reality to enchant it and make it behave. What is an airplane, after all, but a circling of reality, an approach to gravity which says: Look, with my magic machine, I defy you. Gravity be gone. Distance, stand aside. Time, stand still, or reverse, as I finally outrace the sun around the world in, by God! look! plane/jet/rocket—80 minutes!

The children guessed, if they did not whisper it, that all science fiction is an attempt to solve problems by pretending to look the other way.

In another place I have described this literary process as Perseus confronted by Medusa. Gazing at Medusa's image in his bronze shield, pretending to look one way, Perseus reaches back over his shoulder and severs Medusa's head. So science fiction pretends at futures in order to cure sick dogs lying in today's road. Indirection is everything. Metaphor is the medicine.

Children love cataphracts, though do not name them thusly. A cataphract is only a special Persian on a specially bred horse, the combination of which threw back the Roman legions some long while ago. Problem solving. Problem: massive Roman armies on foot. Science fiction dreams: cataphract/man-on-horseback. Romans dispersed. Problem solved. Science fiction becomes scientific fact.

Problem: botulism. Science fiction dreams: to someday produce a container which would preserve food, prevent death. Science-fictional dreamers: Napoleon and his technicians. Dream become fact: the invention of the Tin Can. Outcome: millions alive today who would have otherwise writhed and died.

So, it seems, we are all science-fictional children dreaming ourselves into new ways of survival. We are the reliquaries of all time. Instead of putting saints' bones by in crystal and gold jars, to be touched by the faithful in the following centuries, we put by voices and faces, dreams and impossible dreams on tape, on records, in books, on tv, in films. Man the problem solver is that only because he is the Idea Keeper. Only by finding technological ways to save time, keep time, learn from time, and grow into solutions, have we survived into and through this age toward even better ones. Are we polluted? We can unpollute ourselves. Are we crowded? We can de-mob ourselves. Are we alone? Are we sick? The hospitals of the world are better places since TV came to visit, hold hands, take away half the curse of illness and isolation.

Do we want the stars? We can have them. Can we borrow cups of fire from the sun? We can and must and light the world.

Everywhere we look: problems. Everywhere we further deeply look: solutions. The children of men, the children of time, how can they not be fascinated with these challenges? Thus: science fiction and its recent history.

On top of which, as mentioned earlier on, the young people have tossed bombs into your nearest corner art gallery, your downtown art museum.

They have walked through the halls and dozed off at the modern scene as represented by sixty-odd years of abstraction super-abstracting itself until it vanished up its own backside. Empty canvases. Empty minds. No concepts. Sometimes no color. No ideas that would interest a performing flea at a dog circus.

"Enough!" cried the children. "Let there be fantasy. Let there be science-fiction light." Let illustration be reborn.

Let the Pre-Raphaelites re-clone themselves and proliferate!

And it was so.

And because the children of the Space Age, and the sons and daughters of Tolkien wanted their fictional dreams sketched and painted in illustrative terms, the ancient art of story-telling, as acted out by your caveman or your Fra Angelico or your Dante Gabriel Rossetti was reinvented as yet the second giant pyramid turned end for end, and education ran from the base into the apex, and the old order was reversed.

Hence your Double Revolution in reading, in teaching Literature and pictorial Art.

Hence, by osmosis, the Industrial Revolution and the Electronic and Space Ages have finally seeped into the blood, bone, marrow, heart, flesh and mind of the young, who as teachers teach us what we should have known all along.

That Truth again: the History of Ideas, which is all that science fiction ever has been. Ideas birthing themselves into fact, dying, only to reinvent new dreams and ideas to be reborn in yet more fascinating shapes and forms, some of them permanent, all of them promising Survival.

I hope we will not get too serious here, for seriousness is the Red Death if we let it move too freely amongst us. Its freedom is our prison and our defeat and death. A good idea should worry us like a dog. We should not, in turn, worry it into the grave, smother it with intellect, pontificate it into snoozing, kill it with the death of a thousand analytical slices.

Let us remain childlike and not childish in our 20-20 vision, borrowing such telescopes, rockets, or magic carpets as may be needed to hurry us along to miracles of physics as well as dream.

The Double Revolution continues. And there are more, invisible, revolutions to come. There will always be problems. Thank God for that. And solutions. Thank God for that. And tomorrow mornings in which to seek them. Praise Allah and fill the libraries and art galleries of the world with Martians, elves, goblins, astronauts, and librarians and teachers on Alpha Centauri who are busy telling the kids not to read science fiction or fantasy: "It'll turn your brains to mush!"

"Go, children. Run and read. Read and run. Show and tell. Spin another pyramid on its nose. Turn another world upsidedown. Knock the soot off my brain. Repaint the Sistine Chapel inside my skull. Laugh and think. Dream and learn and build."

"Run, boys! Run, girls! Run!"

And with such good advice, the kids will run.

And the Republic will be saved.

[mvsicinthedvrk]

Was that [ZHANG ZHEHAN]? Oh no no, that was just [MO XI], a [CANON CHARACTER] from [YUWU/REMNANTS OF FILTH]. They are [THIRTY] years old, use [HE/HIM], and [ARE] aware that they are not actually from Washington DC. Too bad they can’t stray from this city for long. {it is me, ollie}

me, banging pots and pans about meatbun's webnovels constantly: if u are a cnovel / cultivation world / danmei enjoyer, read yuwu.

i'm also not 100% set on his fc yet so that may change, but we'll see. anyway. non-spoiler info about mo xi below the cut!

how long has your character been here

3 or 4 months by april 2023.

what is your character’s job

tba-- i'm still trying to decide. i don't want him to join the army lol so i'm trying to figure out what job would make most sense based on his skills.

where has your character been pulled from in their fandom

for now he only remembers gu mang being brought back to chonghua as a traitor & captive, and running into him again the first few times. so early novel-ish when everything is still very yikes (as though the whole novel isn't yikes, lmao)

has any magic affected your character

no!

and any other information you might find useful for us and the other members to know:

mo xi is a general of the northern frontier in chonghua; technically his title is xihe-jun. his cultivation level is fairly high, both naturally and through his hard work.

he's known for being strict, boring, and a buzz-kill, essentially. people working under him generally respect him on the battlefield but don't particularly like him and occasionally even fear him, because he can be harsh when it comes to judgment & punishment. BUT he is very kind-hearted as long as people aren't terrible.

he looks unhappy 99% of the time, does not enjoy being social, prefers to keep things clean and organized, and has an extreme dislike for dirt/germophobia. control freak mo xi my beloved <3

the man is deeply in love with his shixiong, the former commander of the army who mo xi believes betrayed him by defecting, and also, literally stabbing him in the heart and leaving him for dead. big yikes. so he has not had a great time since then. love and hatred, gratitude and resentment. it's all very confusing for him !!

he feels so much all the time! and is just bad at showing it in a healthy way. unfortunately, he represses all emotions until they explode. you can imagine how well this has worked out.

he's more than capable of being civil when dealing with people, though he does not put up with bullshit or nonsense, and when he loses his temper it does not usually end well.

may add more details later but those are the basics! i love him! thanks!

[avasghost]

When We Drown Update #2

[image description: a pale blue photo of a rocky cliff, and a boy at the edge in the distance, standing on a pile of rocks and looking down. in white serif font in the centre, reads “when we drown: update two” / end id]

wip intro here. first writing update here. 

DISCLAIMER: this is my original work, please do not plagiarize in any way.

hi everyone! it’s been a while since i did a writing update (time is fast) and i’ve written quite a lot! up until about a week ago i was in a really, really bad writing slump (which lasted like,,, four months) and so that’s why there hasn’t been a crane anatomy update for a ages because (: i haven’t been writing it (:

i don’t know if i mentioned this in the first update, but this book is now non-linear which has been an ~adventure! the non-linear plotline is kind of freeing because i can just pick a scene i want to write from any time in april’s life and just ... write it? i don’t have to follow the years chronologically. i try to create some kind of causal thread between the scenes but i don’t know how well that’s working out lmao. since WWD follows an entire life story with the protagonist looking back on it and remembering her life, i try to make her memory of one event trigger the memory of the next event, and usually they’re linked by either emotion or information.

current word count: 13,228

so when we drown is officially longer than crane anatomy now, despite being the side project! fun.

anyway lets get into the chapters because i have nothing else to say. tw for death, and other trigger warnings are before the individual chapters!

excerpts under the cut.

chapter 5: faces

[image description: a birds eye view of a forest of snowy pine trees. above the trees in black serif font reads “chapter 5: faces” / end id]

this is a very short chapter (a page and a half) which is a flash forward to when april and elena live together in a cabin in the woods sometime in their late forties. elena is asleep in an armchair and april stokes the fireplace, and then goes outside and sees elias’s ghost and then it dissapears (tbh,,, i think a lot of the chapters will be like this oops) this is the second ghost sighting in the book, but at the point when april is 48 it’s almost a regular occurrence! i might end up moving it to later in the book eventually, since i might want the ghost sightings to be in linear order if nothing else is, to keep the main thread of the book in order.

I closed the door of the woodstove, and glanced over my shoulder to see if Elena had been woken by the clanging of metal. She stirred slightly, a familiar face in her nightmare, an unfamiliar face in a familiar dream. Two fingers clenched against the armrest, then became limp again. Half of me wanted her to wake up, to see me, to speak to me, to see the fire bouncing in the grate and be happy for warmth. But again, she needed rest. She needed to be alone for a while, even if that was just in her head. She’d seen her fair share of fire.

also its snowing in november and its british columbia and i know this is unrealistic but! aesthetics are more important than logic we all know that.

[image description: blurry pine trees and a light snow falling in front of them, with a ridge of snow along the bottom. white serif text in the centre reads “The snow-tipped pines that cupped the cabin sagged under the weight of unexpected snowfall. Their fallen needles jotted the snow. The sky was white, spotless, like an expanse of faraway ocean or the inside of a crystal ball.” / end id]

The snow-tipped pines that cupped the cabin sagged under the weight of unexpected snowfall. Their fallen needles jotted the snow. The sky was white, spotless, like an expanse of faraway ocean or the inside of a crystal ball. No birds flitted between the branches, no foxes slunk between the pines. All was still. All was white. I was alone.

and the ghost is seen then disappears as usual and april goes inside again.

You were gone by the time I reached the door again, by the time I stepped inside and Elena stirred in her armchair, by the time I had stepped out of my shoes and gone to stoke the fire again, which was already starting to dwindle.

i like having elias referred to as “you” because its like april is telling the story to him, but he’s not there, so she’s talking to herself, which is very in character for her to do.

chapter 6: the party

[image description: a slope of pine trees with a grassy field at the bottom. mist shrouds the trees in the distance. a dirt path leads through the grass towards a cabin. in the top right corner, reads “chapter 6: the party” / end id]

chapter 6 follows the day before elena’s fifteenth birthday, and then her party the next day. this is a traumatic time for april because she decides she should mention her first elias sighting at the party. obviously people think she’s crazy and so you can guess how that turns out (aka april goes home and cries because she’s a soft bean)

elena has a cool tree in her backyard apparently!! this seems to be a running theme.

Dribbles of leftover sunlight sifted through the branches of the elm tree that ribbed the sky, its roots furrowing the lawn like varicose veins.

i will admit i didn’t finish this chapter and haven’t written most of the party scene yet so i will probably update on the rest of it in my next update (if i’ve written it by then which i probably won’t have but! we’ll see.)

chapter 7: sacred ground

[image description: the ocean stretching into the distance, with small waves. a blurry girl with long brown hair stands in front of it, facing the water. in the middle in white serif font reads “chapter 7: sacred ground” / end id]

the aftermath of the first elias sighting, when april goes and tries to talk to elena about it. i actually don’t know if this or the party comes first and the non-linearness might be catching up to me oops but we’ll just pretend everything makes sense okay <3 

first she tries to decide who to talk to about it and her options are quite limited. she picks elena because she’ll probably take her seriously, and then goes to her house in a state of shock.

I considered my options. Elena: the calm one, either pretending to be wise or really wise. Magnolia: probably less stupid than she made herself out to be. My mother: still crying over a tragedy of five years ago and a tragedy of fifteen years ago and the tragedy of a lifetime wasted in crowded cult meetings and stark bedrooms, tears always falling, thoughts either always whirlwinding or too dead to pay attention to. I found myself winding up the jittery pathway to Elena’s house, or maybe it was me that was jittery. Maybe it was me, who made the world blurry like this. Maybe it was me who was seeing things, not those things drifting into my line of vision and then falling out of sight. The pearly birches jagged the edges of the valley, their leaves chartreuse in the wind-rustled sunlight.

and then elena rejects her plight and april returns to where she saw elias. turns out elena isn’t as accepting of april’s hallucinations as she was supposed to be! here’s a bit of dialogue i generated from that incorrect quote generator that seems fitting for this moment!

April: Bad things keep happening to me, like I have bad luck or something.

Elena: April, you don't have bad luck. The reason bad things happen to you is because you're a dumbass.

this IS april and this IS elena how does this generator know what my book is about!! anyway back to excerpts:

I ran back to where I had seen you, all slow wonderment vanished, and found the place where my old footsteps in the sand looped around. I knew you wouldn’t be there, I wasn’t surprised that you didn’t appear again, your face bobbing in a rice paper mist. I wasn’t surprised that Elena didn’t chase me out, eyes drained of tears, to apologize. And I wasn’t surprised that from that point forward, I thought of that place as sacred.

chapter 8: always falling

[image description: a blurred black-and-white close-up image of water falling. white serif font in the center reads “always falling: chapter 8″ / end id]

tw: death, drowning, blood, fantasizing about drowning

eight-year-old april and magnolia visit a waterfall with magnolia’s parents. feat. april’s dog, august!

The waterfall coiled down the cliff face, cracking the surface of the river like a thousand strands of thunder. I could hardly hear Magnolia’s parents shouting something up ahead, their voices lost in the blare of water.

shortly after:

When I heard suspension bridge, I pictured one from old fairytales I read: wooden, burlap ropes for railings. A thirty percent chance of falling in. I was reassured by the stability, but August shivered at the way it jilted underfoot. He had never walked on ground that shifted under his feet, maybe it was an earthquake, maybe the ground was breaking in.

and here’s sweet eight-year-old April fantasizing about what it would be like to drown. If you think that’s foreshadowing no it isn’t 👁👁

[image description: a slightly grainy photo, half water and half sky, both tinted turquoise. a hand lifts out of the water toward the sky. above the hand in white serif font, reads “What it would feel like to drown, water snagging in my lungs, sharp stones shattering my ribcage until the entire river turned to blood. Being sucked by the current until someone finally found my body, far from where I lost it.” / end id]

I stared over the edge, tried to pierce the thick buzz of mist that separated me from what would be the teeth of my fall. I imagined the bridge giving way, like it always did in the stories I read. One end breaking, the ropes snapping, the entire bridge swinging into the bottomless river. What it would feel like to drown, water snagging in my lungs, sharp stones shattering my ribcage until the entire river turned to blood. Being sucked by the current until someone finally found my body, far from where I lost it. Maybe it would be an old fisherman, hauling a girl in with the day’s catch, or his frail wife, who would faint on the spot at the sight of a dead child, bloodied and mangled and already tearing apart.

they cross the suspension bridge, and august unfortunately falls in! this is just a bit of april’s childhood trauma and i wish i didn’t have to cause her this pain but i do i’m sorry 😭

chapter 9: dead letters

[image description: a close up sheet of paper with a few lines of cursive writing across it. a fountain pen lies across the page. in the bottom right hand corner, a black serif font reads “chapter 9: dead letters” / end id]

a very young april and elias get caught in a hailstorm then go inside and find letters from their father, who they never met because he still lives in the cult their mother escaped from the day april was born. their mother tries to hide the letters from them but! these children do not relent. 

We tracked through the colourful forest in autumn, our rubber boots tore trails through the scattered maple leaves. Pronged pinecones crackled under my heels as I chased you, threading between the trees.

I was eight, you were faster but I managed to keep up all the same. A haze of rain sizzled on my skin, but rain didn’t phase me back then. I didn’t mind the water droplets that pearled down my neck into the hem of my bright yellow rain jacket.

they escape from the hailstorm and find their mother in the kitchen making tea (rare!) 

When we tripped over the doorframe and found ourselves panting in the kitchen, the kettle wheezed and mother emerged from her bedroom to take it off. The scent of green tea wafted through the air as she poured it, steaming, into a ceramic teacup with a crack veining down the side.

april tries to take one of the letters but her mother stops her. later during the night, she and elias get out of bed and read the letters and it turns out their father left the cult as well, and wants to meet up with them. april wants to meet him, but elias is bitter about it and doesn’t really even consider him their father because he was never there for them. 

chapter 10: frostbite

[image description: two pale hands reach towards the sky, in front of a blurry indigo background. in the top left corner, white serif font reads “chapter 10: frostbite” / end id]

tw: freezing to death

there are those weird times when their mom tells stories about her life. these incidents never end well but happen occasionally! she tells april about a time when her and a few other cult members were in the mountains and one of them froze to death. at this point april is around fifteen (which is where the main plot of the book is at right now)

She cut off there, blanched, stared out the window at the sun-speckled backyard, but I could fill in the rest of the details myself: skin a cold stone blue, frostbite jittering through the lungs and spine like a poison, eating everything slowly. Lying in the snow, letting the cold overcome them. Dead before morning. I wanted to ask if they buried the body, dug a grave of snow that would be melted by spring, or just left the corpse lying in the snow for someone else to find, or be eaten by a wolf pack, or to deteriorate, and haunt those lonely slopes forever.

afterwards, april goes outside (yes its snowing again 😭 as someone who dislikes snow i sure write about it a lot) 

On those days, my desperation to leave the house rose to a high and I would slide into a pair of ragged sneakers and a cable-knit sweater and push out into the cold. Once vibrant green leaves now greyed with frost, a snowfall months early but not unwelcome. Striking before the trees had the chance to shed their leaves. Frost brittled the branches of the oaks so I could snap them without an effort, not that I wanted to snap them. The concrete of the road was spined with ice that made it look like the ground was caving in, icicles barbed the eaves of our house like jagged teeth. Sometimes I thumbed snow into my mouth like a child, hoping no one was watching a seventeen-year-old eat snow, and let it blot my tongue and dribble down my throat. The cold shock to my system helped clear my mind of whatever mother had been talking about, helped me cope with the pain I shouldn’t have been feeling in the first place.

aaannd that’s everything i’ve written so far! this has been the worst writing slump of my life and i’m not too happy with most of the stuff i’ve written lately, but hopefully that clears up so i can update y’all again soon!

- ava

wips taglist (ask to be added or removed!) @shaelinwrites​ @august-iswriting​ @wildswrites @nodeadnarrators @annlillyjose @shaonharryandpannisim @letsgetsquiggly @strangerays @mel-writes-with-her-dragons @dallonswords @teaandtypewriters @chewingthescenery​ @kahaaniyaa @coffeeandcalligraphy @47crayons​ @writing-is-a-martial-art​​

[lokis-army-77]

If You Please

Chapter Fourteen

Bucky Barnes x Reader

Word Count: 4440

This is technically a reader insert but without the (y/n) and all that. She also has no name mentioned so feel free to imagine as you please.

Follow the reader through the events of the Captain America movies and experience her love for Bucky Barnes.

Warnings: canon typical violence

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Masterlist

We escaped quickly and descended down into the dark, damp sewer system of D.C. until we came to a steel ladder directly in the middle of our path several minutes later. Maria climbed up first, to make sure the coast was clear then she signaled for us to follow. There was an SUV waiting for us a few paces away from where we had emerged. I slowly trailed behind the others and into one of the back seats. The drive to the base, which seemed to be a rundown dam in the middle of the woods, took us almost half an hour.

After getting out the van we rushed in through a singular gated door at the base of the dam. Nat was still losing blood but the first aid kit in the van helped slow it down. As we walked down the dimly lit hall I spotted a man running towards us.

“GSW,” Maria shouted out to the man. “She’s lost almost a pint of blood.”

“Let me take her,” the man shouted back, still jogging to us.

“She’ll want to see him first,” she said before we reached a set of double doors and hurried through them. Maria led us down a long corridor which opened up to a large room with a section closed off with plastic strip curtains. She reached out and pulled part of the curtain back to let us see inside. There lying down in a hospital bed was Nick Fury, who was supposed to be dead.

“Well, it’s about damn time.” Fury stated in a sarcastic tone. I looked to Steve, Who was holding Nat up, and gave him a quizzical look, which he returned with his own shake of the head.

After the initial shock of seeing Fury alive, Nat was sat down by the doctor who was trying to stop her arm from bleeding. In the meanwhile, Fury was explaining to the group how he was able to fake his death and why he was hunkering out in a dam. This plan also helped him to know which people he could have some trust in, seeing as how SHIELD was now compromised and there was no telling how far the clutches of HYDRA had gotten. Now that people thought he was dead, it would come as a surprise when he inevitably resurfaced.

When Nat’s stitches were done we headed to a table on the other side of the room which had several files and computers scattered about. I took a seat on the far end and put my head in my hands. I could feel a massive headache coming on, which was uncommon for me since I took the serum. It felt like white-hot knives were digging through the back of my skull and into the spot right between my eyes. It was so bad that I completely missed the whole conversation the group was having. I eventually laid my head down in my crossed arms to try and combat it, but the pain never subsided.

A hand came down on my shoulder, startling me out of my painful daze, it was Steve. I saw his mouth move but couldn’t hear anything but the loud ringing in my ears. I just looked at him confused. He tried saying something again but I still couldn't hear him.

“Stevie, I can’t hear anything over this loud ringing in my ears,” I whispered, I knew if I talked loudly the vibrations of my voice would hurt. He gave me a nod and held up his finger, telling me to wait as he walked away. The doctor from before came back with him and sat in front of me. The doctor motioned his hand like it was talking and I knew he wanted me to tell him what was going on, so I did. When I was done, he took a small flashlight out from his pocket and shined it in my eyes. He turned to Steve and said something then turned to me and grabbed hold of my hand.

Both the doctor and Steve led me to a second hospital bed, which was a couple feet away from where Fury had been and made me lay down. As I got situated under the covers, Steve tapped my hand a few times to get my attention and when he got it, he started to tap again. Morse code, he had made me learn it as kids, that way mom could never hear our secret conversations, it even came in handy when I joined the SSR. I watched closely as he tapped out a series of long and short patterns. He was telling me the doctor was going to give me something to help me sleep and that I would be okay. I nodded and tapped back a thank you before the Doctor came back and inserted a syringe into my arm, seconds later I could feel myself drifting away.

I woke up hours later without the searing pain of a headache and my hearing fully intact. I flipped the covers away from myself and turned to let my legs drape off the side of the bed. I hulled myself onto my feet and began to make my way to the table the group was setting at yesterday. Sam was there drinking coffee and talking to Nat, and from what I could tell, it must have been early morning.

“Good morning sleepy head.” Sam sang out. I gave him a small smile as I took the seat to his right, across from Nat. “How ya feeling?”

“Eh. I’m not in physical pain anymore if that’s what you’re asking.” I looked down at my hands and eyed the ring I had been wearing since a few days ago. It glimmered in the light as I took it off and placed it on the table. I then took my locket necklace off and slipped the ring onto the chain. I was lucky I hadn't lost it yesterday, but I wasn’t thinking I would be going into a fight. Now that I knew more fighting was to come, it would be safer around my neck.

“Is that your engagement ring?” Sam asked quietly.

“Yeah. It was Bucky’s mother, Winnifred. He originally proposed with this locket, but a few months later, after talking to her and begging her to keep it a secret from Steve, she finally gave it to him.” I smiled at the memory.

“Wait, I thought Steve knew.”

“He does now. I kind of blurted it out when he tried to stop me from going with him to rescue the 107th from the HYDRA base in 1943, but we got engaged in ‘41.” I took a long pause before talking again. “You know it feels like just yesterday when I lost him, like the pain from him being gone still hurts, but I’ve learned to cope with it over the past two years. Now I have to find out that he is alive, but not himself because he's being used as a mercenary by HYDRA. He looked at me after you knocked him down and that look broke my heart. It wasn’t the look of a man wanting to kill, it was of someone who was scared, someone who had no clue what was going on. He’s still in there, I know he is and I’m going to be the one to bring him back.” I jammed a finger down on the table to make my point.

“Are you sure he’s really still in there? He’s been in and out of cryo hundreds of times throughout the last 70 years, no to mention, he’s probably endured countless hours of brain wiping and torture from HYDRA.” Nat said in a concerned but doubtful tone.

“I didn’t lose hope when he might have been dead in the forties, I won't lose hope in him now. I’ll find a way to bring him back to me.” That was when Steve came through the double doors and into the room wearing his old suit. “Steve, where in the world did you get that?”

“I borrowed it from the Smithsonian. Here, I found your office. Thought you might want it.” He tossed a bag at me and I caught it, slowly opening it to reveal my old suit. “I still have no clue why you keep it in there and not on display with everything else.”

“Thanks, that was very thoughtful of you.”

“Don’t be sarcastic. You’re gonna want it when we go to take out the helicarriers.” He looked at me then to the other two, “Come on suit up, we don't have much time before they launch,” he looked back at me, “I’ll fill you in on the plan after you get dressed. Oh and Maria has your staff, and new guns for you.”

It was almost noon now and Steve, Sam, Maria, and I were quickly ascending the back stairs of the SHIELD base. We made it to the thirty-second floor in no time, only for the door to be locked. We all held our guns up to the door as Maria sent out some radio interference so one of the people in the room would come to check on the dish that was outside. When the door opened the man was surprised and instantly let us through

Steve came to a stop at the PA system and turned it on. “Attention all SHIELD agents, this is Steve Rogers. You've heard a lot about me over the last few days. Some of you were even ordered to hunt me down. But I think it's time, to tell the truth. SHIELD is not what we thought it was. It's been taken over by HYDRA. Alexander Pierce is their leader. The STRIKE and Insight crew are HYDRA as well. I don't know how many more, but I know they're in the building. They could be standing right next to you. They almost have what they want. Absolute control. They shot Nick Fury. And it won't end there. If you launch those helicarriers today, HYDRA will be able to kill anyone that stands in their way. Unless we stop them. I know I'm asking a lot. But the price of freedom is high. It always has been. And it's a price I'm willing to pay. And if I'm the only one, then so be it. But I'm willing to bet I'm not.”

“Always been one for speech haven't you Stevie?” I joked.

“Shut up kid, let's get going.” he shook his head, bemused.

“He totally came up with that on the spot didn’t he?” Sam asked.

“Definitely,” I replied.

We left Maria in the PA room where she would be able to monitor the status of the helicarriers as we tried to take them offline. Making our way down to the docking bay I looked out one of the windows next to where we were running.

“Steve, we need to hurry, the bay doors are opening,” I called out.

“Only a few more floors, we can make it.” After he said that, we started running faster, almost leaving Sam behind.

Finally, we pushed through one of the lower roof doors. I started to sprint toward the edge and before I jumped off, Sam grabbed my outstretched arm and started to fly. He maneuvered us to the far-right helicarrier and then let go of me. I plummeted to the deck and as I made contact with the ground I immediately threw myself into a tumble so I didn’t get hurt. As I sprang to my feet I was met with an onslaught of bullets. Ducking to dodge them I ran off to the side where a stack of crates was lying. I fished one of the guns from the hustler and cocked a bullet into the chamber. Taking a deep breath I stepped out from my cover and shot back at the men.

Two of the seven went down as a bullet went through each of their chests. I went to shoot again but a hand came out from behind me and yanked my right arm down. They tightly brought my arm to my back and grabbed my gun with the other hand. With my free left arm, I swung it back and clipped the person in the chin hard with my elbow. The grip they had on my right arm fell away as they fell to the ground. I turned around and quickly grabbed my gun from his hand and resumed shooting at the others.

I reached to the back of my holster where I had clipped two grenades before we had left the hideout. Pulling the pin and letting go of the trigger, I threw it at the men, who were immediately taken out with the blast.

“Hey kid you good?” I heard Steve's voice come through the comlink.

“Good as I can be. The deck is all clear, where are you?”

“Sam and I are inbound.” as he said that Sam shot up from below the carrier with Steve holding onto his hands. They landed a few feet in front of me and I jogged to catch up to them. “Wow, you took them all out really fast.”

I just smiled and held up the second grenade, “Work smarter not harder. Come on let's hurry up, the fact there weren't that many people on here is making me suspicious.” As soon as I said that we walked past one of the crates and Steve was pushed over the edge of the carrier by Bucky. “Steve!” Sam and I yelled simultaneously.

Sam jumped into action, trying to take off to save Steve from falling to his death, but Bucky grabbed one of the wings of his suit and flung him back. “Go put the chip in, I'll take care of this.” He yelled out to me.

I turned and sprinted to one of the doors that led into the carrier and I was met with two corridors. After looking down at each of them I decided on taking the right one. Reaching the end I heard a soft noise around the corner, I peaked around slowly and saw a man carrying an assault rifle. He was close enough for me to run up on him without him being able to get a good shot in with a gun. So that’s what I did. I ran at an angle from the corner and used my left leg to push myself off the ground and then my right to push off the wall and kick the man directly in the side of the head. He fell to the ground, completely unconscious. Not turning back I continued down the hall until I came to the stairs that would take me down to the systems room.

“Are you both okay?” Sam cut through on the coms.

“Yeah, I'm still on the helicarrier.” came Steve.

“Me too, I’m almost in the systems room. Where are you?”

“I'm grounded, the wings are busted.”

I exited the staircase and walked to the middle of the systems room. The opening to the targeting system was on the other side of the large cylindrical computer that took up the whole center of the room. I made my way around but stopped short when I saw him standing there, glaring.

“Bucky,” I held my hands up and took my finger off the trigger of my gun to show him I wasn’t going to do anything. “Bucky, I know you’re in there somewhere.” He just kept staring blankly. “I don’t want to hurt you, but I will in order to get this chip where it needs to be.” I took a slow step in his direction, but in an instant, he pulled his gun and shot mine out of my hand, and started to stalk towards me. I reached over my shoulders to grab the two separated staff pieces from their holsters as I moved backward. Bucky stopped walking and just started some more before he came at me full force. I quickly stepped up onto the railing and did a flip over him, landing behind him. Before he turned around I slipped the piece of the staff in my right hand around his neck and latched on with my left, forcing him to stumble back. This didn’t hold him long because he grabbed the bar and forcefully twisted it over his head, thus breaking my grip. I stumbled a few feet ahead, almost barely missing the punch that he threw. That was when I noticed Steve had made it into the room.

“Steve, a little help here would be great,” I said as I started to run back to Bucky who had turned around to face Steve. I jumped up doing a backflip kick, using Bucky’s back as a kicking-off point and landed back on my feet as Bucky slammed into the railing. Hoping he would stay preoccupied with Steve, I hurriedly ran to the system console and opened the chip holder. I took out one of the chips and placed it off to the side before reaching into my pocket for the new chip. I had almost put it in the open slot before I was knocked off my feet and the chip flew from my hand and over the banister. I turned over off of my stomach just in time to see Steve and Bucky also fall over the banister. I scrambled to the edge to see what was going on as I called out, “Steve the chip fell over.”

“I got it, stay there.” He yelled back before Bucky sent him flying. I watched as he grabbed the chip but it was dropped further down as Bucky came at Steve again. I took my second gun out and started to shoot near Bucky’s legs, in order to try and veer him off course without hurting him. Steve reached the glass bottom of the room and started sprinting to the chip which was nestled in between the glass and a metal beam. I stopped shooting as it became harder to get a clear target without also shooting Steve.

They were fighting now, hand to hand, Bucky had knocked Steve’s shield away and he pulled his knife out in the process. He stabbed Steve in the shoulder, when he fell to the ground Bucky dove for the chip. Steve wasn't far behind him, He latched onto Bucky, choking him then throwing him to the ground.

“Steve, don't hurt him,” I cried out as I watched them struggle on the ground, my hands went straight to my mouth as I heard the loud sound of bone breaking and Bucky’s scream right after. He tried rolling over but that gave Steve an opening to put him in a chokehold. “Steve stop, that's enough, you’re hurting him,” I yelled out in despair as I watched bucky struggle to stay conscious, I couldn't watch it anymore, I turned away. Seconds later Steve yelled my name. I hesitantly looked back over the railing, Bucky was lying unconscious and Steve was jumping up onto the landing under me.

“Here”, he tossed the chip up to me and I caught it. Suddenly a gunshot rang out and I looked to where Bucky was once laying, he was standing now, gun raised.

“Thirty seconds” Maria’s voice came over the com.

“I've got it,” I spoke back, making my way to the control board.

Another shot rang out, this time I heard the impact right behind me before a pain erupted on my side. I turned to see Steve laid out on the ground clutching his stomach, the bullet must have gone straight through him to me.

“Guys, they're going online right now, hurry!” Maria almost yelled into the com. I turned back around, holding my side and took the last few steps up to the console, and securely placed the chip in the open space.

“Charlie lock,” I huffed out, confirming to Maria that I had successfully put the chip in, as I slid to my knees.

“Okay, both of you get out of there.”

“No fire now,” Steve yelled.

“But Steve,” Maria said almost reluctantly.

“Just do it,” he yelled again.

The helicarrier jerked seconds later after being hit with the rockets. I slammed into the railing and was flung over, landing ungracefully in a heap on the glass floor. I could hear shouts of pain echoing, looking around I spotted Bucky stuck under a massive metal beam. Steve apparently had to because he was climbing down to him. He got to him quickly and started to lift the heavy thing off of him. Bucky wiggled out from under the beam and knelt there for a second before Steve said something to him that I couldn't hear, he reared back and swung a punch at him after that. I stood to my feet and slowly made my way to them, stopping multiple times to steady myself as the carrier trembled violently. I reached them just as a large metal cylinder fell into the glass floor, making it give way. I fell through the broken glass and into the cold water of the Potomac River.

I swam weakly to the surface. Once my head came out of the water I took a deep breath in and made my way to the rocky shore, careful to not be hit by any debris. The shore was farther away than I had anticipated and I was almost completely out of breath as I crawled my way out of the water. Laying on my back I looked and the smoke filled the sky.

‘So much for laying low,' I thought to myself. I was broken from my thoughts as a few yards down the shoreline Bucky came out of the water dragging Steve with him. He looked back at me as he dropped Steve to the ground but then turned to walk away. I got up quickly and ran to Steve, making sure he was okay. I took out the tracker Maria had given each of us in case anything happened and set it off. They would come find him now, I gave him a short kiss on the forehead. “Goodbye Stevie, I'll see you again some time,” I whispered to him before taking off my tracker and throwing it into the water.

I started walking in the direction Bucky had gone, He couldn't have gotten far with that broken arm and I was right. I found him slowly making his way through the woods. I stayed away from him, but he never left my sight. I knew he realized I had followed him when he tried to slip away behind a group of dense trees but was unsuccessful. He tried this a few more times before giving up and acknowledging that I wasn’t going anywhere. Finally, we broke out into part of the city, but we kept a low profile, or as low of one as two people in fighting suits and a man with a metal arm could. I kept inching closer to him as we walked and twenty minutes in I was almost next to him.

“Quit following me” He let out gruffly without looking back at me.

“No,” I argued.

“Quit following me, now,” He said a little more agitatedly.

“No, I won’t. I’m not leaving you alone and hurting Bucky. I love you, I can't leave you again.” That made him stop in his tracks and eye me down.

“Don’t know who you are.” his voice sounded uncertain.

“Yes, you do.”

“No, I don’t.

“I have proof that you do.” I yanked the necklace with the ring and locket over my head and marched to him, holding it out. He took it hesitantly and looked at the ring first then opening the locket he just stared at the picture of the both of us together. I saw something flicker in his eyes before he gave the necklace back, it almost looked like he remembered something. He started back walking but didn’t say a word when I kept following, just let out a long huff.

It took us an hour to reach Ronald Reagan Airport, and I finally understood what his plan was. “So your plan is to hijack a plane?”

“You aren’t coming.”

“I don’t know why you want to argue with me, I’m coming with you.” He gave me another glare after that.

We were walking through the small wooded area across the road from the runway when suddenly Bucky stopped. There was a small metal sign secured to one of the trees to the right, in big bold letters it said ‘NO TRESPASSING’. Bucky pulled on it and it opened like a small door into the tree where a keypad was nestled. He typed in a series of numbers and a few seconds later the ground started to move several right next to us. I jerked my head in the direction of the commotion only to see the ground opening up to a narrow staircase that descended into the earth. Bucky then closed the sign and started down the stairs, I followed suit.

It became darker the further we descended, the sounds of cars faded into the steady dripping of water. By this time I was thinking to myself that we weren't hijacking a plane, but I was proved wrong as the stairs leveled out to flat ground and Bucky turned the hanger lights on. There in the middle of the room was a black jet with a red HYDRA symbol on its side.

Looking around the room there were papers strewn about, dust even covered some of the desks along the walls. The place looked like it hadn't been used in years. To my left, I spotted Bucky grabbing all sorts of weapons from a rack on the wall and shoving them in a tattered duffel bag before zipping it up and heading to the jet. I trailed behind him.

He raised his hand up and pressed on part of the back flap to the jet, a small handle shot out and he pulled on it, which opened the back hatch of the jet. When it settled on the ground Bucky and I climbed up the ramp and into the cabin. Bucky tossed the duffel bag onto one of the benches and headed for the cockpit. He hit several buttons and switches before sitting down in the pilot's seat.

“Where are we going?” I asked softly as I sat myself down in the copilot’s seat.

“Romania.”

Tag List: @ginger-swag-rapunzel @underc0vercryptid-reads @geek-and-proud @intothesoul @leyannrae @starkleila @andy-is-gay

[slut-for-mothman]

Hell is For Children

Requested: Yes|No

Pairing: Aaron Hotchner/Spencer Reid

A/N: Special thanks to @oliverbrnch for editing this chapter and making it into what is is !!! I hope you all enjoy my first CM fanfiction !!!

Summary: After 13 years of trying to forget the man he was supposed to call his father, Spencer finds his phone riddled with messages from his father trying to catch up on "old times". He's met with criticism and shame when he reveals he has no want to talk to him. Everyone seems to think his father deserves a second chance. Everyone except for him. Aaron Hotchner. Logically it made no sense, Aaron had a kid of his own, would he not sympathize with his father for wanting to have a relationship with his son? Spencer finds comfort in the older man. Everytime his phone buzzes with a notification from William Reid, Aaron is always there to comfort him and distract him from the burning hole in his back pocket.

Chapter warnings: Angst, allusions to physical abuse. descriptions of violence and gore, swearing, and I think that's it.

Chapter One

December 16th, 5:15pm

"Hey son, I haven't seen or heard from you in a while. I hope you're doing okay."

Seeing that message was enough to twist the young doctors stomach in such intricate and painful knots he thought he might become violently ill.

"A while?" Spencer muttered to himself as he reread the message over and over. "it's been thirteen years, that's more than a while-"

A second message interrupted his train of thought.

December 16th, 5:27pm

"Why don't you come over sometime? My wife would love to see you, just something to think about..."

This message made something inside him break, the world shattering as his knees failed him. He swore he felt time stop as he reread those nauseating characters.

Wife? Since when was he remarried?

'Does she even know what he did to my mom, to me?' Spencer wondered, unable to tear his eyes away from his phone.

Does she even know she left a ten-year-old alone with his mentally-ill mother? Did she know what a selfish bastard he was?

Did they have kids?

Were they really that easily replaced?

Spencers mind was spinning, his apartment floor unsteady underfoot as his vision blurred. Tears stung his eyes, threatening to slip down his cheeks if he dared to blink.

His misery was interrupted as his phone buzzed once more in his palm.

Thankfully, it wasn't from the dreaded unsaved number, just Hotch.

December 16th, 7:14pm

"We have a case."

Spencer gathered his things, wiping the tears from his eyes on the cuff of his sleeve. He'd never been more grateful to hear those four words in his entire life.

His ride on the metro felt infinitely slower than normal, much to the young doctors dismay. The extra free time gave his mind permission to run away from his as much as it pleased.

His phone vibrated again and again with more messages from the unsaved number, each one more hostile and manipulative than the next when Spencer glanced at the device.

December 16th, 7:23pm

"Will you at least give me an answer? I know I screwed up, but that was a long time ago! I have a right to get to know my son."

December 16th, 7:25pm

"Imagine how I feel, not knowing my son has 3 PhD's and having to find out from my ex-wifes nurse. You're not the only one suffering here kid, remember that."

Spencer snapped his battered phone shut in frustration.

How did he even manage to make himself out to be the victim in this?

He's the one who left me.

'I don't owe him shit, not after what he did to me', Spencer thought furiously to himself, his knuckles white where they gripped his messenger bag.

'Maybe I should give him some kind of answer, let him know where he can stick-'

By the time the sentence popped into his head, his chest aching, he had reached his stop. Although cases weren't particularly a positive thing, anything was better than thinking about the man who had abandoned him and, subsequently, essentially ruined his entire life.

As soon as he stepped off the elevator and into the bullpen, he could feel his co-workers' eyes pierce right through him. It was almost like they could sense something was off with him the moment he entered Quantico.

Of course, while they were profilers, it's not like they were mind-readers.

He fled to the break room and poured himself a generous cup of coffee. He wanted to focus on what was important, which was certainly not the unread messages from a fetid man on his cellphone.

While pouring practically the entire container of sugar into his travel mug, he felt someone's hand touch his shoulder. He flinched slightly at the unexpected touch, and he turned to see Morgan, his eyebrows scrunched together in a confused and worried look.

"Slow down, kid. Have some coffee with your sugar." He said, his voice half-joking as he, presumably, tried to ease the tension practically emitting off of Spencer.

His phone vibrated once more from somewhere in his pockets, and Spencer's face twisted in fervent discomfort.

"Earth to Pretty Boy. You good?"

Spencer realized he was getting absorbed into his thoughts again and tried to brush it off with a quick sip of the sickly-sweet caffeinated concoction in his hand and a quick nod.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine. Just thinking." as if Spencer ever stopped thinking in the first place.

"Well, I'm here if you need anything, kid. But for right now, let's go find out about this case." Derek clapped Spencer on the shoulder again, which earned an instinctual flinch.

Instead of dwelling on that, Derek and Spencer strode towards the conference room, where everyone else had already begun piling in ad Garcia and Prentiss introduced them to their present case.

"Three men were found dead on the streets of a Nevada strip mall last night," Garcia began, pulling up the crime scene photos onto the screen.

Spencer flipped through the folder that was handed to him, scanning over the photos while distantly listening to the rather gruesome but ultimately unhelpful details Prentiss and Garcia were describing.

All three men had one of their fingers removed, yet their wedding bands were later found in their stab wounds upon closer investigation. They were all three found in close proximity to different hotels and known "lover's lanes".

The incessant vibrations and noise emitting from the dreaded device in his pocket was enough to make Spencer have a brain aneurysm.

He retrieved the phone from his pocket only to switch it off and shove it into the deep depths of his messenger bag. It wasn't necessary for a plane ride anyway.

His sudden movements earned him a few more concerned glances, but their attention was quickly diverted as Prentiss announced, "Wheels up in 30." effectively dismissing the team to get their things.

Spencer was restless the entire plane ride. It was only thirty minutes into the trip, with an hour and ten minutes left.

Normally, he'd be playing chess or even reading, but neither of those things seemed to tempt him, as all he could think of were the numerous messages probably flooding his discarded phone banished to the bottom of his messenger bag.

The last message he'd read replayed repeatedly in his mind like some awful alarm.

'Imagine how I feel...'

It made fiery anger swirl in his chest.

He could imagine how he felt. Because the pain William Reid inflicted before he finally left was enough to make Spencer understand what it was like to be sent to Hell and back, if such a place existed.

The memory of watching his own father leave his house at age 10 was enough to make him feel nauseous. His father leaving was the final stake through the young man's heart.

The physical pain, he could probably forgive him for. He would never forget, but maybe he could understand.

But leaving your young on to care for his mentally-ill mother? After all the pain he put him through, that kick while Spencer was already down was a new low.

For all Spencer cared, the man could rot. It was almost funny, thirteen years of healing down the drain with just a few text messages.

Once again, Spencer was ripped from his thoughts by a hand on his shoulder, It was Hotch, with a guarded but concerned look on his face.

"You've been way too quiet; is everything alright?"

'No', Spencer thought to himself. But he couldn't admit he wasn't okay, especially not before a case. More important things needed to be tended for than his own "daddy issues".

"I'll be okay," Spencer settled for. "Just some weird stuff has been happening lately. It's nothing I can't take care of, though."

It didn't dissuade Hotch's concerned look. If anything, it intensified the worry Spencer found there.

"Is it your mother? Is she alright?" He asked, leaning forward with furrowed eyebrows.

"She's okay! I actually just called her the other night," Spencer assured him. He bit his lip and gripped his messenger bag. "It's actually, uh, my dad. He's been messaging me, and I haven't spoken to him in thirteen years."

"Are you okay? Have you messaged him back any?" Hotch asked, releasing the worried lines on his forehead.

"I haven't, yet. I figured I'd wait until the case was over. That way, there's nothing in the way." Spencer explained, shifting uncomfortably in his seat as his eyes darted around the jet cabin.

Hotch must have picked up the signal to wrap up the conversation, because he gently reminded the young man that he could talk to him whenever he needs to, or just whenever he wants to.

Spencer smiled and inclined his head slightly. "Thanks, Hotch."

"It's not a problem, Reid. Now, let's get back to work."

Spencer flicked through the gruesome photos once more, the swirling anger in his chest dwindling for the first time since his phone at first pinged with that dreaded message.

For once, Spencer was able to completely forget about the slightly outdated phone burning a hole in the bottom of his messenger bag.

[thewidowsghost]

Daughter of the Sea - Chapter 3

Percy's POV

Confession time: I ditch Grover as soon as we get to the bus terminal.

I know, I know. It was rude. But Grover is kinda freaking me out, looking at me like I am a dead man, muttering, "Why does this always happen?" and "Why does it always have to be the sixth grade?"

Whenever he gets upset, Grover's bladder acts up, so I'm not surprised when, as soon as we get off the bus, he makes me promise to wait for him, then makes a beeline for the restroom. Instead of waiting, I get my suitcase, slip outside, and catch the first taxi uptown.

"East One-hundred-and-forth and First," I tell the driver.

A word about my mother, before you meet her.

Her name is Sally Jackson and she's the best person in the world, which just proves my theory that the best people have the rottenest luck. Her own parents died in a plane crash when she was five, and she was raised by an uncle who didn't care much about her. She wanted to be a novelist, so she spent high school working to save enough money for a college with a good creative-writing program. Then her uncle got cancer, and she had to quit school her senior year to take care of him. After he died, she was left with no money, no family, and no diploma.

The only good break she ever got was meeting mine and (Y/n)'s dad.

We didn't have any memories of him, just this warm sort of glow, maybe the barest trace of his smile. Our mom doesn't like to talk about him because it makes her sad; she has no pictures.

See, they weren't married. She told us he was rich and important, and their relationship was a secret. Then one day, he set sail across the Atlantic on some important journey, and he never came back.

Lost at sea, my mom had told us. Not dead. Lost at sea.

She worked odd jobs, took night classes to get her high school diploma, and raised me and my twin on her own. She never complained or got mad. Not even once. But I knew I wasn't an easy kid.

Finally, she married Gabe Ugliano, who was nice the first thirty seconds we knew him, then showed his true colors as a world-class jerk. When I was young, I nicknamed him Smelly Gabe. I'm sorry, but it's the truth. The guy reeked like moldy garlic pizza wrapped in gym shorts.

Between the two of us, we made my mom's life pretty hard. The way Smelly Gabe treated her, the way he and I got along...well, when I came home is a good example.

I walk into our little apartment, hoping my mom would be home from work. Instead, Smelly Gabe is in the living room, playing poker with his buddies. The television blares ESPN. Chips and beer cans are strewn all over the carpet.

Hardly looking, he says around his cigar, "So, you're home."

"Where's Mom and (Y/n)?" I wonder aloud.

"Your mom's working," he says. "You got any cash?"

That was it. No Welcome back. Good to see you. How has your life been the last six months?

"I don't have any cash," I toll him.

"Here," comes a voice, holding out a ten to the man.

Instantly, a smile sneaks its way onto my face.

"Hey, Perc," my twin sister says with a smile.

(Y/n)'s POV

I grab my brother's suitcase and carry it into his room; I set it down on the bed.

"You wanna come sit in my room?" I ask and Percy nods, a smile still on his face.

I lead the way to my room and when I open the door, Percy sinks into my desk chair.

"Percy?" comes our mom's voice.

She opens my bedroom door.

Our mother can make me feel good just by walking into the room. Her eyes sparkle and change color in the light. Her smile is as warm as a quilt. She's got a few gray streaks mixed in with her long brown hair, but I never think of her as old. When she looks at me, it's like she's seeing all the good things about me, none of the bad. I've never heard her raise her voice or say an unkind word to anyone, not even me or Percy or Gabe.

"Oh, Percy," she hugs her son tightly. "I can't believe it. You've grown since Christmas.

Percy's POV

Her red-white-and-blue Sweet on America uniform smelled like the best things in the world: chocolate, licorice, and all the other stuff she sold at the candy shop in Grand Central. She'd brought me a huge bag of "free samples," the way she always did when I came home.

We sit together on the edge of (Y/n)'s bed. While I attack the blueberry sour strings, (Y/n) stealing a few pieces of candy from the bag, Mom runs her hand through my hair and demands to know everything I hadn't put in my letters. She doesn't mention anything about my getting expelled. She doesn't seem to care about that. But was I okay? Was her little boy doing all right? The whole time, (Y/n)'s eyes were sparkling with amusement.

I tell Mom she is smothering me, and to lay off and all that, but secretly, I was really, really glad to see her and (Y/n).

From the other room, Gabe yells, "Hey, Sally���how about some bean dip, huh?"

I grit my teeth.

My mom is the nicest lady in the world. She should've been married to a millionaire, not to some jerk like Gabe.

For her sake, I try to sound upbeat about my last days at Yancy Academy. I tell her I'm not too down about the expulsion. I'd lasted almost the whole year this time. I'd made some new friends. I'd done pretty well in Latin. And honestly, the fights hadn't been as bad as the headmaster said. I liked Yancy Academy. I really did. I put such a good spin on the year, I almost convince myself. I start choking up, thinking about Grover and Mr. Brunner. Even Nancy Bobofit suddenly doesn't seem so bad.

Until that trip to the museum...

"What?" my mom asks. Her and my sister's eyes tug at my conscience, trying to pull out the secrets. "Did something scare you?"

"No, Mom."

I feel back for lying. I want to tell her about Mrs. Dodds and the three old ladies with the yarn, but I think it'd sound stupid.

Mom purses her lips. Both she and (Y/n) could tell I was holding back, but neither push me.

(Y/n)'s POV

"I have a surprise for both of you," Mom says. "We're going to the beach."

Percy's eyes widen. "Montauk?"

"Three nights - same cabin."

"When?" I ask excitedly.

Mom smiles. "As soon as I get changed."

I can't believe it. Mom, Percy, and I hadn't been to Montauk the last two summers, because Gabe said there wasn't enough money.

Gabe appears in my doorway and growls, "Bean dip, Sally? Didn't you hear me?"

"I've got it," I offer, rising from the bed and walking out into the kitchen to make the dip for Mom.

An hour later, we are ready to leave.

Gabe takes a break from his poker game long enough to watch me and Percy lug Mom's bags to the car. He keeps griping and groaning about losing her cooking - and most importantly, his '78 Camaro - for the whole weekend.

"Not a scratch on this car, you two," he warns us as I load the last bag. "Not one little scratch."

Like we'd be the ones driving. We're twelve. But that didn't matter to Gabe. If a seagull so much as pooped on his paint job, he'd find a way to blame us.

We get into the Camero, me in the passenger's seat, and Percy in the back.

Our rental cabin is on the south shore, way out at the tip of the Long Island. It is a little pastel box with faded curtains, half-sunken into the dunes. There is always sand in the sheets and spiders in the cabinets, and most of the time the sea is too cold to swim in.

Percy and I love the place.

We'd been going there since Percy and I were babies. Our mom had been going even longer. She never exactly said, but I knew why the beach was special to her. It was the place she'd met mine and Percy's dad.

As we get closer to Montauk, Mom seems to grow younger, years of worry and work disappearing from her face. Her eyes turning the color of the sea.

We arrive at the cabin, open all the cabin windows, and go through our usual cleaning routine. We walk on the beach, feed blue corn chips to the seagulls, and much on jelly beans, blue saltwater taffy, and all the other free samples my mom had brought from work.

I guess I should explain the blue food.

See, Gabe had once told Mom there was no such thing. They had this fight, which seemed like a small thing at the time. But ever since, Mom had gone out of her way to eat blue. She baked blue birthday cakes. She mixed blueberry smoothies. She bought blue-corn tortilla chips and brought home blue candy from the shop. This - alone with keeping her maiden name, Jackson, rather than calling herself Mrs. Ugliano - was proof that she wasn't totally suckered by Gabe. She did have a rebellious streak, like Percy.

When it gets dark, we make a fire. We roast hot dogs and marshmallows. Mom tells us stories about when she was a kid, back before her parents died in the plane crash. She tells us about the books she wanted to write when she gets enough money to quit the candy shop.

Finally, it seems that Percy gets the nerve to ask about what was always on our minds when we come to Montauk - our father. Mom's eyes go all misty. I figure that she was going to tell us the same things she always said, but neither Percy and I ever got tired of hearing them.

"He was kind, Percy," Mom says. "Tall, handsome, and powerful. But gentle, two. You have his black hair, you know, Percy, and you both have his green eyes."

Mom fishes a blue jelly bean out of her candy bag. "I wish he could see you, Percy, (Y/n). He would be so proud."

Percy's POV

I wondered how she could say that. What's so great about me? A dyslexic, hyperactive boy with a D+ report card, kicked out of the school for the sixth time in six years.

"How old were we?" I ask. "I mean . . . when he left?"

Mom watches the flames. "He was only with me for one summer, Percy. Right here at this beach. This cabin."

"But...he knew us as a baby."

"No, honey. He knew I was expecting twins, but he never saw you two. He had to leave before you were born."

I try to square that with the fact I seem to remember . . . something about my father. A warm glow. A smile.

(Y/n) and I had always assumed that he had known us as babies. Mom had never said it outright, but still, we'd always felt it must be true. Now, to be told that he'd never even seen us . . .

I realize I feel angry at my father. Maybe it was stupid, but I resent him for going on that ocean voyage, for not having the guts to marry Mom. He'd left us, and now we are stuck with Smelly Gable.

"Are you sending me away again?" I ask her. "To another boarding school."

She pulls a marshmallow from the fire.

"I don't know, honey." Mom's voice is heavy. "I think . . . I think we'll have to do something."

"Because you don't want me around?" I regret the words as soon as they come out of my mouth. (Y/n) bows her head, looking at the ground and Mom's eyes well with tears.

Mom takes my hand and squeezes it tight. "Oh, Percy, no. I - I have to, honey. For your own good. I have to send you away."

Her words remind me of what Mr. Brunner had said - that it was best for me to leave Yancy.

"Because I'm not normal," I say.

"You say that as if it's a bad thing, Percy. But you don't realize how important you are. I thought Yancy Academy would be far enough away. I thought you'd finally be safe.

"Safe from what?"

She meets my eyes, and a flood of memories comes back to me - all the weird, scary things that had ever happened to me and (Y/n), some of which we'd tried to forget.

During third grade, a man in a black trench coat had stalked us on the playground. When the teachers threatened to call the police, he went away growling, but no one believed (Y/n) when she'd told them that under his broad-brimmed hat, the man only had one eye, right in the middle of his head.

Before that—a really early memory. I was in preschool, and a teacher accidentally put me down for a nap in a cot that a snake had slithered into. My mom screamed when she came to pick me up and found me playing with a limp, scaly rope I'd somehow managed to strangle to death with my meaty toddler hands.

In every single school, something creepy had happened, something unsafe, and I was forced to move.

I know I should tell my mom about the old ladies at the fruit stand, and Mrs. Dodds at the art museum, about my weird hallucination that I had sliced my math teacher into dust with a sword. But I can't make myself tell her. I have a strange feeling the news would end our trip to Montauk, and I don't want that.

"I've tried to keep you as close to me as I could," my mom says. "They told me that was a mistake. But there's only one other option, Percy—the place your father wanted to send you two. And I just...I just can't stand to do it."

(Y/n)'s POV

"Our father wanted us to go to a special school?" I ask, a little confused.

"Not a school," she says softly. "A summer camp."

My head starts spinning. Why would my dad - who hadn't even stayed around long enough to see me and Percy be born - talk about a summer camp?

"I'm sorry, (Y/n)," she said, seeing the look in my eyes. "But I can't talk about it. I—I couldn't send you two to that place. It might mean saying good-bye to you for good."

"For good?" Percy asks. "But if it's only a summer camp.

Mom turns towards the fire, and I know from her expression that if either of us ask her any more questions, she would start to cry.

I have a weird, vivid dream. It is storming on the beach, and two beautiful animals, a white horse, and a golden eagle are trying to kill each other at the edge of the surf. The eagle swoops down and slashes the horse's muzzle with its huge talons. The horse rears up and kicks at the eagle's wings. As they fight, the ground rumbles and a monstrous voice chuckles somewhere and beneath the earth, goading the animals to fight harder.

I run towards them, knowing I have to stop them from killing each other, but I am running in slow motion. I know I am too late. I see the eagle dive down, its beak aimed at the horse's wide eyes, and I scream, No!

I wake with a start.

Outside, it really is storming, the kind of storm that cracks trees and blows down houses. There is no horse or eagle on the beach, just lightning making false daylight, and twenty-foot waves pounding the dunes like artillery.

With the next thunderclap, my mom and Percy wake. Mom sits up, eyes wide, and says, "Hurricane."

I know that's crazy. Long Island never sees hurricanes this early in the summer. But the ocean seems to have forgotten. Over the roar of the wind, I hear a distant bellow, an angry, tortured sound that makes my hair stand on end.

Percy's POV

Then a much closer noise, like mallets in the sand. A desperate voice - someone yelling, pounding on our cabin door.

My mother springs out of bed in her nightgown and throws open the lock.

Grover stands framed in the doorway against a backdrop of pouring rain. But he isn't . . . he isn't exactly Grover.

"Searching all night," he gasps. "What were you thinking?"

My mother looks at me in terror - not scared of Grover, but of why he'd come.

"Percy," she says, having to shout to be heard over the rain. "What happened at school? What didn't you tell me?"

I am frozen, looking at Grover. I can't understand what I'm seeing, and I see (Y/n) looking at my friend.

"O Zeu kai alloi theoi!" he yells. "It's right behind me! Didn't you tell her?"

I am too shocked to register that he'd just cursed in Ancient Greek, and I'd understood him perfectly. I am too shocked to wonder how Grover had gotten here by himself in the middle of the night. Because Grover doesn't have pants on - and where his legs should be . . . where his legs should be . . .

Mom looks at me sternly and talks in a tone she'd never used before, and (Y/n) flinches: "Percy. Tell me now!"

I stammer something about the old ladies at the fruit stand and Mrs. Dodds, and my mom stares at me, her face deathly pale in the flashes of lightning.

She grabs her purse, tosses me and (Y/n) our rain jackets, and says, "Get the car. All three of you. Go!"

Grover runs for the Camero - but he isn't running, exactly. He is trotting, shaking his shaggy hindquarters, and suddenly his story about a muscular disorder in his legs makes sense to me. I understand how he can run so fast and still limp when he walks.

Because where his feet should be, there are no feet. There are cloven hooves.

Word Count: 3041 words

[justforthesakeofitt]

How You Like That (M) Chaelisa (top rosé bot lisa)

Chapter 1

hi. this story contains many mature and adult themes that can be triggering and are just for fictional use. i don't condone any of this in real life, and this is pure fiction. so, therefore, if you can't handle that, please just leave this. but don't report this story. 

enjoy 🤍

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(warning. contains strong language, human trafficing, mentions of degradation, corruption, meansé, topsé, idek but the story in general is dark and mature. so if you can't handle that please don't read!!)

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roseanne smirked and swirled her glass around that was filled with her favorite champagne. the armand de brignac brut gold, which cost a mere two thousand two hundred dollars, had made it into the woman her favorite lists, when she tasted it for the first time when she was in France, at the age of nineteen. it made her feel as if she was drinking creamy silk with a lovely flavor, and she was all for that.

her silver hair, with a blueish undertone, was straightened and hung down

her back and over her perky breasts. the tint of her hair matched perfectly with her lamé velvet jacquard mini dress by one of her favorite brands, saint laurent. the dress was a perfect size, as it had been custom adjusted, and hugged her slim waist yet pretty wide hips quite well.

she was seated alone in her comfortable chair, her three bodyguards surrounding her so that she was protected at all costs. being rich had its many perks, but it also came with lots of downsides, such as constantly being exposed to the cruel world that was playing underneath everyone's feet. normal people usually weren't aware of half of the things that were going on behind the scenes of the portrayed world.

the dim and sensual lights that were present in the room, contradicted quite a lot with the chandeliers hanging from the ceiling. it seemed as if a night club had meet merged with a dining hall in an expensive mansion, yet they somehow made this entire look and vibe work.

and it was dangerous to know these secrets. behind all the glimmer and glamour of being rich, a lot of dark poison was hiding. and simply being aware of the poison, and knowing about how everything was really being run, was dangerous.

it was dangerous knowing which big companies, who were known for their customer service, actually had ten thousand upon then thousands of illegal so-called 'contract workers' working for them. people in the normal projected world thought that the people working for the minimum wage were being treated as slaves and inhumane, but they never saw the layer of people that were working even lower up than the minimum wage workers. and those were plenty.

billions upon billions of dollars would go down the drain if someone were to reveal that the biggest vegan chain in the world, also owned one of the biggest meat industries. if the companies that were known to fight climate change and induce eco-friendly ways of making products were owned by the same person that was one of the biggest carbon emitters.

if people know, that you know their secrets, your life is at great risk. and since the richest people in the world, all play the same game, you always had to be on your watch. this was no soccer game, where you had a theme behind you. this was like wrestle mania. only the strongest and smartest could survive. and the people that you would think are your friends, are the ones that wouldn't even hesitate to hire an assistant the moment they find a weak spot in you.

"number 603 thirty thousand dollars! going once. going twice. sold to miss kang!"

roseanne chuckled as the blonde girl got pulled off of the stage by her leash that watched attached to her neck. her head hung low and tears were streaming down her face as you could see them shimmer in the dim lights,  which made it all more amusing for the woman.

all of them looked like pathetic little lost puppies, getting pulled one by one to the stage where their new fate would be laid out for them. it all depended on who they ended up with.

her best friend, jennie, had found her own little pet this way and had suggested it to her. after years of being alone, and watching her best friend with the girl, she decided to finally come and see for herself. maybe she'd find something interesting here tonight. 

jennie's pet, who's name was jisoo, was quite a lucky girl. while jennie was quite a mean and tough person on a daily basis, she had developed a soft spot for her pet. it wasn't that she let the girl get away with shit, but she treated her well. better than these girls usually got treated.

jisoo had behaved so well and served her so graciously, that after one and a half year of her possession, jennie had granted her the privilege of being addressed by her name, which was quite rare for the girls that came from here.

not may of the owners ended up granting their pets the status of being called by their actual birth-given name, and rosé wouldn't be one of them either. while jennie was more of a dominant woman who loved for jisoo to worship her and take care of her, roseanne was the sadistic type. 

where jennie received pleasure by letting jisoo worship her feet and have the girl smothered underneath her wet dripping slit, eating her out until her thighs were trembling and she was panting heavily, roseanne wanted the girl to be laying at her feet, whimpers escaping her cracked lips as bruises and cuts were layered on her skin. 

the twenty-seven-year-old woman's eyes gravitated towards the podium once again, before she slightly shifted when she saw the girl that got pulled by the thick leather leash. 

her black lingerie contrasted beautifully with her pale skin, and her black hair had been put into two sideways ponytails with big red bows attached to them. that could only mean one thing.

she was a virgin.

girls with their hair loose were previous prostitutes or whores that they picked up from the streets, giving them the lowest value in the entire lineup.

girls with ponytails were normal girls that they managed to kidnap but weren't virgins anymore. 

but girls with their hair in this innocent style, and cute bows attached to it to give

them an even more pure look, were virgins.

and they sold for the highest prices.

almost everyone wanted a little virgin pet. it was a thrill knowing that all they would associate sex with was their owners. no previous partners or experiences to draw

comparisons from. 

just them.

when roseanne saw the girl's face, her doll-like features with her big doe eyes, and her plump pink lips, she knew that the girl was going to be hers.

"number 209! her price starts at a mere five hundred thousand dollars. who bids higher

than that?"

chaeyoung immediately held up her bidding board that had her slim fingers wrapping around the wooden part, "one million!"

another voice rang through the room, a few seconds later, with an offer of one and a half million dollars. but this girl was going to be hers. no matter the cost.

the bidding went on for a while before her offer rang throughout the room of "twenty-five million dollars." 

the man, that previously was bidding for the same girl, chewed on his bottom lip before shaking his head.

a smirk grazed roseanne her dark blue colored lips, "number 209 twenty-five million dollars! once! going twice! sold to miss park!"

her eyes locked with her newly bought pet, and she mindlessly licked her lips. the girl's eyes were glossy and looked with a terrified gaze at her. 

"yes...--" chaeyoung muttered to herself with s grin, "--be scared, doll. you aren't ready for what I have in store for you."

there were only a few girls left, so she patiently sat through it all, satisfied with her purchase of the evening. non of the girls could top her pet. and for once, she was glad that she had listened to jennie's advice.

after the auction was over, she walked to the back and got handed two briefcases by one of her bodyguards, which she delivered to the woman that was behind all of this.

"you made jessie very happy. i hope the girl will make you happy too."

roseanne hummed and watched as the men were counting the money, before turning her attention back to the woman in front of her, "everything is clean right? no traces. no record and no evidence."

jessie nodded and smacked her bright red lips together, "everything is clean. we tripled checked. the police have already been paid to drop the missing person case, so she has been declared dead. the parents are quite poor too so they won't be able to afford to search for her or take any legal actions. she's dead and has been reborn the moment you bought her."

roseanne smirked and, with a firm handshake, greeted the woman before she made her way into a dark hallway that led to where the girl should be.

she opened the door to a room and saw a black wooden crate, which had been sealed by a lid at the top, sitting on the floor in the middle of the room.

when she saw that it was the correct one, she snapped her fingers, making two of the three men quickly make their way over to the side and lifted up the top.

she once again, almost immediately crossed eyes with her toy, and saw how panicked and vulnerable she seemed. this made her feel only more in control and boosted her ego.

there were soft pleading whimpers coming from the bound girl, but she ignored them completely.

after a few seconds of further inspection, the crate got closed again.

"deliver her in an hour to my address. make sure that she keeps whatever bodily fluid she has inside of her. i don't want her to arrive in filth at my place."

she got helped into her thick fur coat, and flicked her hair back, before putting on a peeked black cap.

the men nodded in understanding and turned their attention on the crate. one of them followed her, also functioning as her driver, while the other two stayed behind.

there were two small holes on the top of the crate in the cover, which made sure that the girl got enough fresh air to stay conscious, but not enough to make her feel great, so the chance of her throwing up or peeing herself was a big possibility.

she just hoped that the girl could hold it in, as she was sure that she wouldn't hesitate to hose the poor thing down immediately. 

she climbed up the stairs before walking outside. 

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it was dark, already around the one at night, so the streets were fairly empty. these illegal legal things, were mostly done at night, just to give extra security and privacy.  "ready miss?" her chauffeur asked making her nod, "yes. take me home."

she stared out of the window, the snow slowly cascading down while the streets of Seoul were already covered in a thick layer of the frozen crystals.

it was only november, yet the heavens had sent them snow already. and to be fair, roseanne wasn't complaining. 

she smiled as she started to move up the hills, knowing that she was approaching her lovely home.  

her and her best friend, jennie, were actually neighbors, which was quite fun. this meant that she could show her new purchase off very soon, as all she had to do was go to the mansion next door. even tho it was a five-minute drive.

the moment the car stopped at the entrance of her house, she got out, hugging her black fur coat tighter around her body, before grabbing her purse and made her way inside.

"the room is ready right?" she asked one of her maids, who nodded and bowed slightly, before helping her out of her coat "yes ma'am. it is exactly like you wanted it to be."

she grinned and stretched herself before yawning a bit and walked inside.

"good. now, all we have to do is wait."

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[haddonfieldproject]

<<PREVIOUS⏺<<CONTENTS>>

WARREN COUNTY/CARPENTER COUNTY LINE, ILLINOIS

Twenty Seven Hours Later

“Oh god!” The Governor turned from the Mustang with a hand over her mouth, her face suddenly pale.

“Oh jesus fuck!”

She took off across the roadway, running has fast as her flats would carry her. One of those shiny black shoes slipped on the wet asphault causing her to teeter, but she did not fall. She reached the tall wet grass on the opposite side of the road, bent, and proceeded to vomit in the ditch there. Salazar hurried after her.

Meeker and McGrath gave each other a tired look, and then looked back to the wreck. They barely noticed the white truck pull up behind them and Fred Colbourne hop out. A siren wailed in front of them as another Carpenter County Fire Department vehicle joined the other one and ejected six or seven more fire fighters in full yellow and orange regalia.

McGrath pointed to the crumpled body which lay in the middle of the road, atop the white lines.

“That's definitely Lloyd Chumway there,” he said morosely, “And this one here in the drivers seat...that's Lee.”

Meeker spit. “Pretty well intact, considering.”

“Well, they were in a pretty nice truck.” McGrath said, glancing over to the Governor who had now dropped to her knees. Salazar held her gently by the shoulders. She was still wretching.

“It's Booger's truck,” Meeker replied softly.

“The cook from the diner? The one with his head in the..”

Meeker cut him off, “Yep.”

“What about the kids in the Mustang? Can you ID them?” McGrath asked, walking around to the other side of the orange sports-car.

“Well,” Meeker took a deep breath, “This is Brad Doyle's mustang. He's pretty well known by the police around here. Not a bad kid.” He spit again, “But not a very good one either.”

McGrath's eyes panned across the headless torso in the driver's seat clad in a blood soaked Code Orange shirt. Bits of blood, bone, and brain lay all over the steel bumper of the truck which had completley intruded upon the cab of the Mustang. Some of it belonged to Brad, some belonged to the mess of a carcass that lay in the center of the car beside him. There was nothing but a heap of blood, skin, bones, and some sort of leopard print clothing. Another crumpled body lay in the backseat. Young female, her head turned around the wrong way on her neck. She was missing her legs.

“Do you know these other two occupants?” McGrath asked.

“The one in the backseat is Kyndra Bailey. I'm guessing this one,” he gulped as he looked over the tattered remains, “this one is probably Zoey Gonland, her girlfriend. They liked to hang out with Brad.”

McGrath looked up from the other side of the car, “More trouble makers?”

“They were good kids. A little bit of the talk of the town, but good kids.”

McGrath shook his head, “I don't follow.”

“A high school lesbian couple in a small town like this. Everyone knows them.”

“Jesus God Almighty,” Fred Colbourne said as he stepped up to the wreck beside them.

Another man, this one tall and thin with short brown hair, a yellow polo shirt and khaki pants also appeared beside them. Meeker looked at him. The man extended his hand.

“I'm Shelton Ganoux, the Carpenter County Medical Examiner. They called for me as soon as they arrived.” The man said, nodding a head to the fire fighters who were laboring around the wreck of the semi-truck and ambulance.

“And we here in Warren County greatly appreciate your help,” Meeker said, shaking the young man's hand firmly. “We've had one hell of a night over here and our boys are a little tied up.”

Ganoux half-bowed his head, “So I've heard.”

“What the hell happened out here,” Colbourne asked.

The Governor and Salazar re-appeared next to them. The Governor pulled a kleenex from her pantsuit pocket and dabbed at her mouth.

“It appears we have two separate accidents, occurring within about an hour and a half of each other. The orange sports-car, the truck, and the tractor trailer incident occurred at around six o'clock this morning, while the ambulance seems to have collided with the tractor trailer at around seven thirty.”

“Makes sense,” Meeker mumbled.

“What?” Colbourne asked, “What makes sense.”

“It looks like Mustang was behind the tractor trailer and went to try and pass him when they struck the Chumway Brothers in the truck coming from the opposite direction.” McGrath said.

Meeker's phone began to vibrate in his pants. He pulled it out, hit the green button on the screen, and stuck it to his ear.

“Meeker!” He barked. The voice that answered was gruff.

“Hey Deputy, it's Lorne Appleby.”

“Who?”

“Appleby, from Protective Services.”

“Oh right. Well?”

“Nothing yet. I'm gonna head to the hotel room for some shut eye. Miss. Cromer should be back in a few hours. Just wanted to keep you abreast of the...”

“Mrs. who?”

“Cromer...Ellen Cromer...from DCF.”

Meeker rubbed his forehead. “Aww yeah..right right. I'm sorry Appleby, I got a million things going on right now.”

“I know, I know. Like I said, just wanted to keep you abreast of the situation.”

“Who do I got over there now?”

“Officer Chang just left, Officer Stanton just arrived, two other officers in a squad car just went on patrol an hour or so ago...forgive me, I don't remember their names.”

Meeker adjusted the phone from one ear to the other. “Oh right, that's Warner and Farnsworth I think.”

“Maybe.”

“Okay, keep me posted.”

“Will do.”

Meeker ended the call.

“Who was that?” Fred asked.

“Guy from Protective Services about Maddie Keane.”

“Still haven't found her?” Colbourne asked.

Meeker shook his head and waved at the wreckage in front of him. “And if it wasn't for all this shit and everything else I'd have every god damn cop out there looking for her.”

Fred patted his friend's back. “I know Bengie. I know. You're doing the best you can.”

They were quiet for awhile and Ben took some deep breaths to gather his thoughts.

“You know what I'm wondering?” Colbourne asked after some time had passed.

“What's that?” Ben replied quietly.

“How in the world did no one around here hear a wreck like that?”

“Well the only ones out here are Reverend Taylor over there,” he pointed to his right, to a house on the top of a hill, “and Amos Yoder. Amos claims to have been woken up by the second accident, he's talking to the state troopers now.” he pointed to his left, toward a dirt road leading down to a quaint little farmhouse with a big red barn. An Amish man was indeed standing along side the curb next to his driveway talking to an Illinois State Trooper who was dictating his statement on a clipboard.

“Amos said he slept right through the first accident, and I've known Kevin Taylor for years, we had sleep overs together when we were kids. He has to sleep with some kind of noise. He always brought a sound machine to my house, annoying little shit.” Meeker continued, “He sleeps with a box-fan I think. He probably couldn't hear a frieght train coming through his living room.”

“Besides that it was still raining at six o'clock this morning,” Ganoux said, “the sound of the storm could have muffled much of the noise.”

“I just can't believe Gary Windorf didn't see the over-turned tractor trailer.” Colbourne said, gesturing to the ambulance. Gary Windorf had been the driver.

“We told him to haul ass,” Meeker sighed, “it was still dark and raining.”

“Plus he was coming up from over this hill,” McGrath added, waving at the rise in the road behind them.

The Governor cleared her throat. “So we have the Chumway brothers here...where the hell is Myers? Is he in the back of that ambulance where he belongs?”

“Who is Myers?” Ganoux asked.

“Objective number one,” Meeker replied, “Big guy, jumpsuit..”

“The guy with the mask, kinda toasty?”

“That'd be him,” McGrath nodded.

“He's over there.” Ganoux pointed. Three firefighters crouched beside a body near the tree line. The figure was face down in the mud only a few feet from the trailer of Gabriel Couture's truck. “It appears the patient was thrown from the ambulance.”

“But he's dead?” Meeker asked.

“Very much so. He hit a tree in mid air.” Ganoux replied.

“He was dead before he was even put in the ambulance,” Colbourne grunted.

“Well, I can't tell that. I'd need to do a full autopsy to do that.” Ganoux said.

“Forget that,” The Governor spat, “Get his ass in a body bag and let's get it back to the High School. Get all these bodies over there so we can...”

She was interrupted by the sound of approaching vehicles. The whole party turned as a black GMC Van pulled up behind the firetrucks. In the distance, it looked as if the van had been followed by a train of semi-trucks. The truck tractors where plain white with no lettering, while the trailers were gray, and also blank. The hiss of the parking brakes sounded off one at a time.

The doors of the GMC Van opened. Several almost identical looking Caucasian men in black suits stepped out. They seemed to be led by another man, who had climbed out of the passenger side of the van. He was older than the others, judging by the gray in his hair.

The older gentlemen stepped up and extended his hand to the Governor.

“Governor Harris?” He asked simply.

“I am,” The Governor replied, taking his hand.

“I'm Dick Spencer, Director of the Disaster Mortuary Operational Response Team for Region Five.”

“How do you do?” The Governor asked with a forced smile. “This is Deputy McGrath of the---”

Spencer cut her off and pulled a piece of paper from the inside breast pocket of his coat, “Did you request Federal Response?”

“Yes sir, we've had a bad night in this town---” The Governor started but again, Spencer cut her off.

“And you are fully aware that in so doing, you have allowed the Department of Homeland Security to begin to conduct an investigation into the order, as to the reasons why such an order would be placed pursuant to Guideline 542, section B, article F?”

The Governor looked at Meeker and then to McGrath, who took the roll of papers from Agent Spencer. “Yes sir..I am aware of the...”

“Excellent then,” Spencer looked down at the papers and began to thumb through them, “I have two affidavits for your law enforcement officers here to fill out. They must be in precise detail as to the events that transpired over the night , and why you would need to place an order for a portable refrigeration unit for casualty victims.” He looked at McGrath, “You need to fill one out as does this local officer...Officer----???”

Meeker took one of the papers, “Deputy Sheriff Ben Meeker.”

“Meeker,” Spencer nodded, “I also have a battery of questions we need to go over, but first I have three questions.”

McGrath took the other paper, “Yeah, shoot.”

“Do you or do you not want to be a big pain in my ass today?” Spencer asked.

McGrath laughed in spite of himself. “What?”

“I'm not aware that I said anything amusing Agent?” Spencer replied, cutting a look to Meeker and then back at McGrath, “Do you want to be a big pain in my ass today?”

“No sir,” McGrath replied.

Spencer looked back at Meeker, “Do you want to be a big pain in my ass Deputy Sheriff?”

“No sir,” Meeker replied.

“Excellent,” Spencer said, “Now let's get something straight. I don't want to be here, okay?”

Meeker and McGrath nodded.

“You are aware that last night was Halloween?” Spencer asked.

Meeker and McGrath looked at one another, not sure how to answer. McGrath was brave enough to try. “Well—yes...”

“Do little girls and boys play dress up on Halloween?” Spencer asked.

The two men looked at each other again and then replied in unison: “Yes sir,”

“You know who else plays dress up?”

Meeker and McGrath looked at each other a third time and then back at Spencer and shook their heads.

“Russian mail order brides play dress up,” Spencer said matter-of-factly. “Just hours ago, I was playing dress up with my Russian mail order bride, and you can imagine what kind of activities proceed playing dress up and drinking Vodka and 7-Up all night. And you can imagine how doing these things would be very taxing for a man my age, couldn't you?”

“Yes sir,” the men replied.

“I would like nothing better than to be back in my bed, in my Chicago penthouse, with Katya on my ‪Saturday morning‬. But instead, I'm called out to this piss-ant little town in the Storm-of-the-fuckin'-century. You can imagine how that would put me in a bad mood, correct?”

“Yes sir,” the men agreed.

“If there is any thing between those two affidavits that doesn't match up, or if there is anything that has transpired in this town that isn't cherry, or if the two of you aren't one hundred percent crystal clear and straight with me and obedient to my will like two little golden retriever puppy dogs, I will have Washington DC on my ass, and I don't want ‪Washington DC‬ on my ass for anything, and that will turn you into a big pain in the ass for me, and we don't want that now do we?”

“No sir,” they responded.

“I want to get this over with so I can go back home and enjoy my weekend, got it?”

“Yes sir.”

“Good,” Spencer pointed to the trucks, “Second question,” he said, “Where is the mobile refrigeration unit going to be erected?”

McGrath stuttered and looked at Meeker.

Meeker swallowed and said, “Best place I guess would be the parking lot of the high school...we've already set up a field---.”

“You guess?” Spencer stammered.

“Yes sir,” The Governor cut in, “The parking lot of the High School is where we want it.”

“What high school? I need a name people! I need an address!” Spencer's volume level went up a notch.

“It's Haddonfield High School, on the corner of Belmont and Main Street,” Meeker said.

“Well is it Belmont or Main Street?!” Spencer nearly roared.

“‪248 Belmont Avenue‬,” Meeker responded calmly.

“Got it,” one of the accompanyng men in black suits said quietly, and then they all turned to walk toward the first truck.

“Third question,” Spencer said, his volume level returning to normal, “is there a police station in this god-forsaken town that we conduct business in, or do we rednecks like to stand out in the road and play with our dicks in front of a bunch of mangled car accident victims?”

“I have two of my boys setting up a big tent in the parking lot of the hospital. That's gonna be ground zero for now until that scene gets under control and we can shift everything to the high school.” Meeker replied.

“The tent we use for the exhibitions on fair days and stuff. The recruitment tent?” Colbourne asked.

“Exactly. Herman Beach and Chris Huber are grabbing it from the storage unit. They should be there any minute. We should probably get over there now, I think we're done here.”

“That sounds like a fantastic idea,” Spencer said, turning back toward his vehicle. “There better be coffee.”

The Governor piped up, “Don't you have a Mayor in this town somewhere? Someone is gonna have to talk to the press!”

Meeker winced.

NEXT>> (Coming Soon)

[alexhogh7137]

The Battle Between Love and Fire-

Ivar the Boneless × Reader

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Chapter Thirty-Eight: The Scare

Word Count 3k

Warnings: slight angst, heavy fluff

The day after your father's attempt to end your life, you finally gave your best friend a proper burial. You and her mother wept the entirety of that day which you knew was bound to happen. You lost Thyra and you can never bring her back, but her mother informed you continuously that it was not your fault. But deep down, you will always feel a sense of guilt because the man that took her life was none other than your own father. Nonetheless, she is in a better place and is having the best time with the gods above, which brings you as well as her mother, some comfort to this tragedy. After Thyra was buried, her mother went back to Wessex, but not without having this conversation with you:

Helga "Thank you, Y/n. The burial was beautiful."

"Mmm, I am glad that I could do that for her. She did not deserve this." You began to cry again.

Helga "No she didn't, but in the end, she died for what she felt was the right thing to do."

"I would much rather have her here than her gone, Helga. She did not have to sacrifice herself-"

Helga "Your father didn't give her that chance. He killed her because she never left your side. She loved you, she still loves you."

You sniffle, "I loved her all the same. She was my sister, even if we weren't blood, she was always my sister." She nods and wipes a tear off of your cheek.

Helga "And you were hers, my sweet girl."

"Well on the plus side of life as we know it, the king is dead and Wessex will be safe again."

Helga "Oh, that is wonderful isn't it?" You nod, "But who will rule the kingdom?" You still have not thought of the concept because of all of the chaos, so you do not know what to say to her.

"I-For right now, I would like for you to gather a list of good men and women that you think will suit for being in charge, and send me the list. Once I have the letter, I will return to Wessex and give the final decision."

Helga "In charge?"

"Exactly. You see, they will not be a king nor a queen but the kingdom needs a sense of guidance and leadership in order to stay a kingdom." She nods, "But I will return every chance I get to check on everyone, especially you Helga." She smiles, "And as for a king or queen, my daughter will be queen of Wessex when she is of age."

Helga "Oh Y/n, that is so wonderful!"

You smile, "Yes. But my ruling is beside my husband. Wherever he is, I am. Ivar is the king of Kattegat, therefore I am the queen of Kattegat."

Helga "I understand."

"So, when the time comes, my daughter will rule with honor and dignity."

Helga "And so she shall."

"Now, you get home safely, yes?"

Helga "Yes. Thank you again sweetheart."

"You are so welcome." You hug and say your goodbyes. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Five Days Later…

Ivar has sent a letter to the prince of Kiev to ask for his approval of traveling to visit. It is only a waiting game as of now. 

Hvitserk "He is just going to love you, Y/n."

"Oh yeah?"

Hvitserk "Yes. He is a sucker for beauty such as yours." He caresses your cheek, making you blush.

Ivar "Yes but this time, I will be going there with my own queen." He smiles.

"A very pregnant queen, at that." You say as you rub your growing belly and sigh because you feel huge. You still have a few months to go before your little goddess joins the world but you think to yourself, 'how am I going to get any bigger than this?!'

Ivar "You are glowing, my sweet. You are more than perfect."

"Thank you, my love." He leans down and kisses your lips, "I'm just so excited to meet her."

Hvitserk "She will bring so much joy to our lives."

Ivar "Oh that is certain. As soon as she is born, she will be a new and bright, shining light in all of our lives." You smile at the thought. You and baby girl have gone through so much together and she hasn't even been born yet. She will be told stories about how strong she is and she will learn of her legacy and past ancestors. She will know all and then she will make her own story, create a wonderful life for herself, as you did. 

Hvitserk stands up from sitting down on a tree stump and walks over to join his brother in eating some chicken wings. You use your belly as a table as you snack on little bits of whatever you could find. You catch Ivar just staring at you and smirking.

"What?"

Ivar "Oh nothing." Hvitserk chuckles.

"What is it? You were staring."

Ivar "What?! I cannot stare at my beautiful wife?" He shouts, making you giggle. 

"But I am just eating, how can I be-"

Hvitserk "It does not matter, you are always beautiful, Y/n." You don't know what to say. They make you feel so special and so loved that you are lost for words most of the time. 

"Thank you, Hvitserk." He winks at you and continues to eat. After a few minutes, Ubbe and Torvi come join you three outside, enjoying the weather. Today is the first warm day of the year which brings your heart joy and warmth. 

Torvi "Uh, it is so lovely today." She says as she sits down next to you.

"It is."

Ubbe "Maybe it will melt the little snow that we have left." 

"I'm sure that my dragons are enjoying this weather.." you say as you look over at them, playing with each other. 

Ivar "Mm, do you remember when they experienced their first snowfall, my love?" 

"Oh of course I do. They were so small." You smile at the memory, "Their eyes sparkled!"

Ivar smiles, "It was the cutest thing!"

Hvitserk "Where was I?"

"On a trade shipment with Ubbe." He nods as if he remembered.

Hvitserk "Now we have new memories with them-"

Ubbe "And many more to come, aye?!"

You smile, "They are such a blessing, aren't they?"

Torvi "A true gift from the gods, just like your daughter." She places her hand on your belly.

"Mmm." That's all you can say, really. You are just so grateful to be carrying this miracle child in your core that you can only say the bare minimum. 

Ubbe "So, has Prince Oleg sent a letter yet?" 

Ivar "Not yet. He will though, I am sure of it."

Hvitserk "Will you be coming with us, brother?" Ubbe looks over at Torvi and she looks saddened. She hates it when Ubbe is gone for long periods of time, and if he were to go, he would not be home for two weeks. So Ubbe thinks for a moment before answering his brother. 

Ubbe "I do not think so."

Ivar "And why is that?"

Ubbe "Because I would like to stay home with my wife and children." Torvi smiles.

Ivar nods, "I see, well, will you look after Kattegat while we are away, huh?"

Ubbe "Of course." You three spend some time together before you all had to attend to your responsibilities.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A Few Hours Later…

"Do you hear that?" Ivar looks over at where the sound is coming from and nods.

Ivar "You go inside and rest-"

You and Ivar have been helping around the village: checking in your people, feeding them and making sure of their wellbeing, while Hvitserk and Ubbe tended to the hunting. You were just about to go inside to rest your body when you heard commotion going on by your dragon's resting rock. 

"No, I can rest later." You don't let him respond before you walk off and towards your dragon's. Once you see what the noise was, you were infuriated.

"Hey! They are not toys, get off of them!" To your shock, there are children attempting to get on top of your dragon's, making them very irritated.

Ivar "Aye, you four, c'mere!" Once Ivar joined your side, the kids left your dragon's alone. When the four boys got in front of you two, they could not look either of you in the eye. 

"Why would you do that to them? They are not a playground." 

"I am sorry, my queen." They said.

"You could have gotten seriously hurt, boys. I care for your safety, as well as my dragon's safety. So please, do not attempt to get on them anymore. Do you promise?"

"We promise." The eldest one said for the four of them.

"Right...you boys run along now." They scatter as soon as you give the order. But soon enough, their parents come to you, begging for their forgiveness.

Ivar "The only person or person's allowed on those dragon's are your queen and I."

"I understand completely, my king." The mother said, "I turned away from them for a second and-"

"They are fast kids." The father said.

"I understand, truly I do. Anything can happen in a matter of minutes or even in the matter of seconds. Your children could have gotten seriously hurt."

Ivar "It is a good thing that your queen heard them in time."

"And I am forever in your debt, my queen." The mother said. 

"All I ask from you is to keep a better eye on your boys. I might not be able to come to their aid the next time something occurs."

Ivar "In fact, isn't that your job, hmm? As their parents, you two should watch over them and keep them safe, no?"

"Yes!" They both said.

Ivar "Then keep them safe by keeping them close. If those dragon's weren't kind and gentle, your children could have been eaten in seconds. Do you understand?" They nod.

"Good. Now, I suggest you inform them of what we told you."

"Of course, my queen." The father said. 

"Very well, if you'll excuse me." You walk past them and towards your dragon's who are very agitated. You place your hand up for them to sniff you. Once they do, their senses calm instantly.

…

"I know, I'm here." Neith lays her head down by your feet so that you can pet her scales. 

"I won't let anyone use you as their playground. Any of you." You say as you look over at your boys. They blink at you so that you know that they understand you. 

"Tomorrow, we can go flying, how does that sound?" All three of them bolt their heads upwards in a playful manner.

"I will take that as a yes." You laugh. You feel a pair of arms wrap around your waist. 

Ivar "Are they okay now?"

"They are. They were just confused is all."

Ivar "Mm, I could only imagine how that made them feel."

"I told them that I would fly with them tomorrow. We haven't done that in such a long time..just me and them."

Ivar nods and kisses your forehead, "Just be safe while you fly, hmm?"

"I will." He smiles and takes you inside for the both of you to rest.

As night fell, all you could think about is taking a warm bath and then placing your head on a cold pillow and falling asleep. Your feet were swollen and your legs felt like they were going to break in half so you figured that a warm bath would suffice. Therefore, you asked for a maiden to run one for you, to which she obliged. 

Ivar pulls you into his side while you wait for the water to fill up. When you are in his arms, you forget all about being sore. 

Ivar "A bath will help, my sweet."

"Mm, I know." 

Ivar "Oh look," he looks at the entrance, "the idiot's are back." 

"Hey.." he laughs.

Ivar "Sorry, I know." Hvitserk smiles as soon as he locks eyes with the mother of his daughter. He makes his way over to you and he sees how swollen you are and he frowns.

Hvitserk "Are you alright?"

"Oh I am fine. Just been on my feet for too long. The maiden's are running me a bath."

Hvitserk "Oh good." He kisses your head.

Ivar "Any big catch today, my brothers?" 

Ubbe "Three deer, a few rabbits.."

Ivar "That is good. Now that it is getting warmer, more food to catch aye?"

Ubbe nods, "That is true." 

"My queen, your bath is ready."

"Wonderful, thank you dear." She bows and tends to other matters. "I will be out soon."

Ivar "Do you need help getting in, my love?"

"I think that I can manage." You offer a warm smile before wobbling your way to the bathroom. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

As you undress to get into the tub, you realize how hard it is to balance by yourself. Your feet are the size of pumpkins *to you, they feel like they are* and your legs feel like they are about to go numb from the aching. You try and hurry to get yourself into the tub before you physically can't do it yourself. But in rushing, you fall short of breath and have to take a breather by the vanity. You look at yourself in the mirror and realize that this feeling is not a burden, it is a pleasure to be able carry a human within you. This calms down your breathing but you hear a knock on the door, making you hurry up to cover yourself.

"Uhm, who is it?"

Hvitserk "It is me."

"Oh, come in." When he enters, he offers a small smile. 

Hvitserk "I had to come to see if you made it in safely..."

You sigh, "I am kind of glad that you did."

Hvitserk "How can I help?"

"I can't get the back of my dress." He walks over and undoes your dress and helps you into the tub without hesitation. "Thank you." Your eyes begin to close as the warmth of the water sinks into your skin and through your bones. Hvitserk kneels down and sits by the tub.

Hvitserk "Of course, kitten. I'll always be there to help you."

"And I will do the same for you, Hvitserk." He giggles, "What?"

Hvitserk "Nothing, sweetheart. You are just so sweet is all."

"I try to be. All of the time...it's draining.." you sigh as he begins to play with your hair. 

Hvitserk "I know this to be true. I try to be as kind as you but sometimes it gets me nowhere.."

"I suppose I am the way I am because of my parents."

Hvitserk "That is why. Our parents shape us, but our pain and suffering strengthens us."

"You are right."

Hvitserk smiles, "Are you feeling a little better now?"

"You always make me feel better Hvitserk."

Hvitserk chuckles, "No I meant, is the bath helping you."

"Oh, yes it is. Thank gods.."

Hvitserk nods, "Good. That makes me happy, love. But, I will be outside if you need me, I am starving." He kisses your head.

"Okay." You say as you laugh. As he leaves, you can't stop smiling.

When you get out of the tub, your muscles are so relaxed that you had to force yourself to get out of the warm bath to get to your bed. You can't take the chance of falling asleep submerged in water, gods know what could have happened if you did. So without hesitation, you got out of your bath and slipped on a soft robe and made your way to the door. As you open it, Ivar is waiting for you on the bed. 

Ivar "My sweet, how was your bath?"

"It was divine!"

Ivar "Mm, that is good." He smiles and then he frowns. 

"Ivar, what is it?"

Ivar "Nothing Y/n, I've come to the realization that Hvitserk has not had the pleasure of your company in quite some time."

"Oh, yes I know. Just with the battle and everything, I needed to be by my husband's side at all times." He smiles and kisses your lips. 

Ivar "I love you so much, do you know that?"

"I do, I know it well. I love you too, beloved." He kisses you again but more passionately, making you both moan.

Ivar "You go ahead. You can sleep with him tonight if you'd like."

"Are you certain?"

Ivar "Absolutely. I always seem to forget that that little princess in there is not truthfully mine, she is my brother's-"

"She is still your daughter, Ivar. Just in a different way."

Ivar smiles from ear to ear, "I know she is, but I have to be kind...you taught me to be kind and loving. So, yes..go be with him tonight. If you need me, you know where to find me."

"Sweet dreams, my love." You kiss him once again.

Ivar "You as well, princess." You are so happy that Ivar said those words because you were hoping to be with Hvitserk tonight. You haven't been in his arms since the night before the battle. With great haste, you made your way to Hvitserk's room. He was already in a sleep state when you opened the door and found him on his bed. 

Hvitserk "Hey..is every-"

"I just wanted to be with you tonight, is that okay?" He rises from his position and opens his arms for you. You allow him to engulf you with his arms and immediately feel a sense of tranquility run through your body. 

Hvitserk "I was hoping that you would be with me tonight. It's been so long."

"I know. Ivar suggested it because we have not been able too, so I was not going to refuse his offer." You laugh.

Hvitserk "I am glad that you are here, kitten." He kisses your head but you pull his face down and towards your lips. He captures them with love and affection. It feels like the very first time he ever kissed you and that feeling is one of the best feelings that you have ever experienced. 

Hvitserk "I love you."

"And I love you back." He smiles and kisses you again. After a while, you both fell asleep in each other's embrace. Today had its obstacles, but it ended in a wonderful way.

@hvitserkmarcosource @youbloodymadgenius @ivarsgoddess @a-mess-of-fandoms @herestherealproblem @saldelys @heavenly1927 @conaionaru

[whats-the-story-tc]

13th-15th of May, 2020

"The One Where the Mask Drops"

[INCREDIBLY LONG SORRY]

Hey, I'm not dead! And to show you how incredibly not dead I am, let me tell you a story.

It's around 2 AM that Wednesday, I'm going to sleep. God knows I'm incredibly exhausted, but there's one last thing I needed to write into my diary. One last thing I couldn't go to sleep without.

"please be good to me today"

I went to sleep hoping that finally, after two weeks of feeling like shit when I thought about us, the tide would turn.

That morning, it rained. I immediately remembered a rainy Wednesday morning just like this two months ago, when the rain brought V back to me. I got very excited. Things were going to change for the better again, I felt it. Suddenly, I couldn't wait for class.

8:30 AM that morning, I'm getting ready for my 9 AM class. Google Classroom–notif. V. Private message. Uh-oh, I thought. The make-or-break moment, and not a minute too soon.

V: Thank you very much for your work!

I almost laughed out loud. "Wow, [Name], don't strain yourself!" I remember saying as I read it.

One infuriatingly boring English (as a foreign language) class later, it was time for V's class. I was ready five minutes in advance, but as I went on The Platform That Shall Not Be Named... no one was there. I found it odd. Usually, there are a couple of us by now. Anyway, I didn't enter the voice channel. I waited five minutes in solitude outside for someone to show up.

Well, V did. And I wasn't very well going to leave her alone, now, was I?

She greeted me 0.1 second after I joined. I tried not to be awkward about it just being the two of us, I immediately stroke up a conversation. I told her how I was already waiting, all the stuff you guys already know, and she asked if we had any lessons prior. I told her about one third of us having had English just now. We spent about two minutes alone together, as I rambled about the awkward and unfortunate situation and she listened, mostly in silence.

She was very audibly tired, and said very little, that much was to be expected from a 10 AM class. But... I might just be overthinking it, but I heard something there that concerned me. Something crushed and disappointed, something that told me she wasn't expecting only one person to show. There was something painfully lonely in that voice.

Bookworm Friend joined, about 3-ish minutes into class, and Debate Friend a minute or two later, but they were both muted, so I carried on. I asked V to tell us what happened in school in the past two days, what we missed out on, enthusiastically replying to everything I could, so she wouldn't feel like she was speaking into the abyss, so she'd know I was trying my hardest to be there for her. Then she brought up the tests she was correcting at the moment, even naming a really stupid mistake she encountered with a little laugh. But what really smacked me in the gut was when I brought up the small attendance, and she said: "There's nothing we can do." in this very melancholy voice, like she was giving up. She even texted the class group chat that she's waiting.

How do I know that she wasn't just simply tired, and that's why she sounded like that, so worn and discouraged, especially at first? Because as soon as the others, who don't belong in my friends' circle, started showing up, her voice and entire behaviour did a 180°, as if she suddenly woke up. But she didn't. I know for a fact she didn't. Nobody just wakes up that suddenly.

It took me until that afternoon to realise that I'd just spent 5 minutes with the real V, the same V I spoke to in early December, who didn't try to hide her emotions. Not from me.

If you only heard the next thirty minutes of class, you could never tell she was feeling sad to begin with. And there was a LOT to be heard. Starting with how she mispronounced "cheat somebody out of sth" as "EAT somebody out", which is... well... all I'm saying is, I fell on my knees and tried to laugh as silently as I could. Prime moment.

She said something along the lines of "We're all very sober here", after which I just texted my friends:

S: "Darling, you tell us drinking stories every two weeks, would you mind if I didn't believe you?"

and sometime after, this text was also sent, for which I will not be offering context:

S: "[Name], that was enough sex for 10 AM, I'm gonna pass out"

And, of course, after all that went down, V saying "you can't satisfy everyone" sounded VERY different.

At some point, I attempted to joke around, but as she was reading a message in the chat that was sent at the same time, I got quite the half-assed response. But what happened in the last five minutes? Oh, that changed everything.

Art Friend knew how upset I was that V didn't reply at all to my assignment, and I told her I wanted to talk to V about it. During class, she texted me if I still wanted it, and I told her no, because I'm no longer upset with her. And what does this madwoman do? SHE ASKS ABOUT THE ASSIGNMENTS.

V is absolutely enthusiastic, she goes on about how much she liked what she saw and how creative we were. Art Friend asks about hers. Then comes my leap of faith. It's now, or never.

"I hope I didn't go too far..." I said, a bit nervous, not knowing how she'd react. She never did like me trying to undermine myself. And you guys... she chuckled. Incredibly soft and warm and just what I needed to feel at ease. That already threw me off, but then, she followed it up with: "No, I really-really liked it." I could tell she was smiling on the other side of the screen and that she was completely honest. I had to sit down after that, because I just couldn't believe what I heard. That I really just witnessed all that, that I got a reaction I couldn't overthink and/or misinterpret, because I heard it with my own two ears, in real time. I felt like I could do anything in the world.

And yet, the next day, I didn't do my usual notes for her test. Because what did Specs do all evening instead? I was fucking singing. I couldn't deny being a goddamn theatre kid if I tried.

Friday. The day of the test. I'm restlessly taking notes in the morning, but I don't have the time to get into the analytics of poems, only the basics of the dude's life and works. It makes me incredibly frightened, because V's tests are only easy if you come prepared — if you have no clue what she's talking about, abandon all hope. I had absolutely everything open for cheating that I could open, and you guys? I lucked out. Most of the test was just "Explain what [insert quote] means in 2-3 sentences", and if there's something I excel at, as you've probably noticed, it's talking. It was easy as could be.

The only thing making me anxious were my classmates. They were all trying to ask for help, constant questions and begging, everyone is hopeless, because they couldn't give two shits about preparing beforehand. They were all assured some loser was gonna give them the answers. And the some loser was me. I gave it to them, everything except for the final, longer essay. That was private, only meant for V to read. After all, how was I supposed to show them my essay, that ends like this?:

"Even if our existence is finite, it's always worth fighting for happiness."

And yes, yes it is. Always. Look at me. I powered through weeks of a shitstorm, where every single day felt like years, where I no longer knew or cared what was going to happen. And let me tell you, the sun always shines beyond the clouds. You just can't see it yet. But GOD, you will. You will.

I needed time to write this. There's loads going on at the moment, not necessarily V-related, and I'm trying to work my way through it gently enough that I can make it the end sane and healthy. Currently, it's three weeks since all this happened. One and a half weeks left until school ends. I might get to see V in person again, but we'll see how it goes. All I know is that whatever happens, I can do it. Because even if my existence is finite, it's always worth fighting for happiness.

~ S ♡

[Every story I share here, no matter how specific I get with my wording, depicts actual events from my own life.]