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peachyysugaa · 3 years

Text

gravity

– nasa operator!sim jaeyun x astronaut!gn! reader

miles of sky and space doesn't stop gravity from pulling him to you.

genre: strangers/coworkers to lovers, fluff

wc: 2.7k

warnings: 3rd person pov, probably inaccurate astronaut/nasa lingo sorry i'm a chemistry major LOL, one curse word, couple of time skips, food cw

a/n: yea it's another fluff one-shot 😎 finally a jake one-shot! i hope y'all enjoy this i took a while to write this but i'm p proud of how it turned out despite no proofread.

♞──────────────────────────♞

time on earth: 3:43 am

one of nasa's star rookies sits inside the mission room, monitoring the ISS diligently. today, sim jaeyun was assigned to keep watch on their astronauts as well as the station itself. it's supposed to be a reward for performing well on the latest calculations, but he can't help but find it a little boring. he flips through the cameras quickly, as if trying to find something new.

'yeah right, like anything happens in space,' he mumbles in his head. adjusting his thin glasses and stretching his chair to feel just a tad bit more alive, jake takes a look at one of the three astronauts on board as they float to the window. it seems to be l/n y/n, a rookie who excelled at their simulation tests and the one they say has stars in their eyes themselves.

the astronaut peeks over their shoulder surprised. they make swimming motions to reach over the intercom, which makes jake laugh a little. finally, they push the button and make a reply. "yes houston, this is l/n. is something wrong?"

now jake hadn't planned this far, but since he was already doing it, he might as well go through with it. "do you miss earth?"

he can see through the cameras that y/n wasn't expecting that question as their eyes widen. someway somehow, jaeyun was able to see the stars in their eyes everyone gushed about. maybe it was even better because they were actually living with the stars in space at the time.

"i-i don't know if we should be talking about this, but yea, i do miss earth," they finally reply. "not that being in space isn't fun! i just can't help myself especially since i can see the planet spinning in front of my eyes..."

it's silent for a bit, making the astronaut worry. "h-hello? houston?"

jake blinks before shaking his head and hurried to reply. "y-yes! sorry, i was just caught up in how lonely you sound?"

again, an awkward silence stills. the nasa operator curses to himself, realizing how awkward he must have made it and scrambling to fix the mistake. "i'm really sorry i didn't mean to overstep my boundaries!" he rushes. "my name's sim jaeyun, by the way. people know me better as jake."

"sim jaeyun? rising star sim jaeyun?" they owlishly repeat.

"that's me," he states back, rubbing the back of his neck. "i guess you've heard my name."

he sees the astronaut nod in camera before they're absentmindedly spinning circles midair. "you're my age, and you're already working in nasa headquarters. quite a feat would spread around, you know?"

jake laughs and shakes his head at their comment. "you say that like you're not star rookie l/n y/n."

at the sound of their twinkling laugh, jake's eyes perk up to capture the joyful astronaut holding their stomach on the cameras. "i can tell we're a lot alike, jake," you say with a smile stretching across your face.

it turns out he likes hearing his name off their lips albeit via nasa intercoms. calming down the beating of his heart, jake starts off the first of many late night conversations. "so would you like to hear what's happening on earth?"

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ゜・・゜゜・*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

time on earth: 2:26 am

"—and layla was having such a good time meeting other puppies at the park this morning!" jake laughs out with the rookie astronaut laughing with them on the other side of the intercom, separated by thousands of miles in between them. they've been talking like this over the system for weeks now, practically a little over a month. safe to say, the nasa operator was developing feelings for them, perhaps already smitten. sunghoon in the other unit said something about being whipped?

"i wonder how she would react seeing my puppy," they reply.

"when you come back to earth, the first thing we'll do is have them meet on a puppy playdate," he tells them earnestly.

"just layla and rosie on a date? what about us?" he could hear the smirk in their voice even though they weren't next to him.

"i-i-huh? what?" jake stammers. he heard the smirk, but did he hear the words properly? for one, he's not sure they know what he looks like. does that matter to them? without realizing it, his hands are taking off his glasses and fiddling with them.

"are you nervous?"

"hah, what makes you think that?" jake asks nervously.

"jake, i can hear you playing with your glasses."

"shit," he curses, and an endearing giggle is heard on the other side.

"i like you, let's make it a date between us too," he hears, his face gradually becoming hotter.

the chance to confess to his crush is literally handed to him on a silver platter, but he's too busy acting like a middle schooler trying to give chocolates to the person he likes. it's unusual for him to feel like this, his heart's beating way too fast for him to think, and he has to cough to calm down.

"it's a date then." a happy hum is the response he gets, which does nothing to calm the beating of his heart but ignites a new warmth in him. "hey, wait a minute, do you even know what i look like?"

"i kinda remember, but does that even matter?"

"i don't know what if you don't like my face?"

"please, my roommate told me you're on par with that sunghoon guy, and he's known as the prince of his division."

"yeah, but-"

"don't take this the wrong way, jake, but shush." he's sure that if they were here in person, they would put a finger on his lips. it seemed like a(n) y/n thing to do based on the time they've gotten to know each other. "i don't care what you look like. the connection we have together is enough, don't you think?"

he knows they're right, but it doesn't stop the sassy compliment from tumbling out of his mouth. "well, we have a connection and i know you're pretty and smart and funny."

perhaps it's just the color of the screen, but jake swears he saw a blush on their face. it makes him proud after he had somewhat embarrassed himself earlier.

"good night, jake," y/n playfully scoffs at him.

"good night, y/n."

'what a night,' jake thinks to himself with a stupid grin spreading across his face as he prepares the systems for the person on the next shift.

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ゜・・゜゜・*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

time on earth: 9:18 am

today is the day. today the pod that stayed at the ISS for 3 months was coming back to earth, and everyone was on their toes. jake was currently scanning the computer calculations from any errors, clutching the paper and burning holes in it with his eyes.

"you good there, bro?" he doesn't need to lift up his head to know that it's sunghoon.

"i have to make sure these are perfect," jake replies in a tone that screamed don't-bother-me.

he feels his coworker's hand pat his shoulder in reassurance. "relax, jake. they'll get here just fine."

jake's whole body sighs when he takes a deep breath. "yeah, i know. i'll just check one more."

his friend offers a comforting smile and one more pat before leaving him to perform his own duties for the landing.

for this last check, jake takes it upon himself to calculate the angle in which the pod enters the earth's atmosphere by hand as a safety precaution. his head jumbles with all the physics equations necessary as his hand complains by cramping from how fast he's calculating.

upon finishing, he looks at the two final numbers side by side. "same to the 5th decimal place," jake affirms to himself.

"great, does that mean you're ready to turn it in, mr. sim?"

turning around abruptly to the sound of the voice, jake finds his supervisor and rushes to grab all the papers for presentation. "yes, ma'am!"

a smile graces her face as she takes the materials from him and flips through the calculations. "good work," she finally says. "our astronauts will get home safely thanks to you."

it's like a weight lifted off his shoulders when he hears those words. jake lets out a sigh of relief once his supervisor walks away and tells him to wait for further instruction. he folds into his chair, thinking about how soon he'll finally be able to see y/n in person.

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ゜・・゜゜・*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

time on earth: 9:45 am

"everyone, standby!" jake's supervisor announced. the whole command center took a deep breath as they tuned into the astronauts, soon to be leaving the ISS via pod.

"l/n, song, johnson, do you read me?"

"loud and clear, houston," y/n l/n replies in crisp audio.

"get ready to launch then, atlantis ii."

"copy that, houston." the sounds of buckling and buttons flicking can be heard on the other end as jake's palms sweat.

"3... 2... 1... launch!" and they're detached from the ISS, launched into the endless ocean of stars and dust that is space.

"coordinates and angles, houston?"

"atlantis ii, the speed, angle, and coordinates at which you are to enter..." and jake hears his checked numbers be repeated to them. "...you'll be dropping in the gulf of mexico."

"copy that, houston. ready to enter earth's atmosphere in 3... 2... 1... entering!"

the audio delivers the rough shaking as the temperature regulation beeps steadily.

"your temperatures are in the right range, atlantis ii."

it's a rough 5 or something minutes, jake's not sure of the time. he just knows his armchair is having a field day with all the gripping he's doing. he can hear the shaking of the pod driven by the weight and the acceleration of gravity once it takes its pull on the astronauts' pod.

"prepare for impact, atlantis ii!"

everyone is rising up to see the camera pan to the oceanview team who waits for the pod to enter.

"initiating parachute!" and there! the pod appears on the command center's screen in high definition, the mic picking up some of the breeze of the mexican gulf. it enters the ocean with a large plop! and everyone is standing up and cheering.

"successful landing, everyone! congratulations!!"

sunghoon is coming to jake and lifting him out of the chair, engulfing him in the joy that comes from returning the astronauts home. he didn't realize he was staring stupidly at the screen with a blank look and still sitting.

"dude, we did it!" at the sound of his friend's voice, jake mirrors his friend's smile and they embrace each other.

"we did it!" jake replies. soon, he'll finally be able to see y/n in person.

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ゜・・゜゜・*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

time on earth: 8:04 am

the next day when he clocks in for work, it's calmer and more exciting. jake can feel it in the atmosphere as the nasa operator walks through headquarters.

he makes his way towards the rehabilitation center for their astronauts, his heart unable to calm down the rapid rate of beating. he hears it before he sees it: the bell-like laughter jake was so familiar with, the one he associated with late nights. his feet is pulled towards the sound like gravity, his strides getting longer and his steps having a bounce to it.

jake hears his name being called happily, and he turns to face the voice with an unstoppable grin before taking steps towards the astronaut going through rehabilitation.

"hey, gravity got you bad, i see."

they laugh joyfully. "i'll be good in about a month or 2—i'm pretty quick at this."

"i have no doubt about that."

the two are silent for a bit as they do a few more crunches, jake crouching down in front of their feet to meet them. it's nice and comfortable between the two as he helps them go through their exercises.

"so about that date..." he starts off, watching as their eyes sparkle like stars upon hearing his phrase. his mouth starts to hang a little, loosening up to have words spilling out without his complete knowledge. "wow... your eyes really do have stars in them..."

they stop as they finish a crunch and reaches out to close his mouth with an eye roll. "close your mouth first, sim jaeyun."

"okay, but what about that date?"

"we're getting it. just wait a week or so when i can walk properly," they say with a teasing smile. jake can't help but to smile back.

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ゜・・゜゜・*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

time on earth: 2:57 pm

the only thing keeping his nerves calm is layla. the golden retriever was far from nervous as she sat wagging her tail happily with her tongue out.

"jake!!" he hears from the voice he's come to love listening to over the past few months. looking up from layla while holding her leash tightly, he spots the person he's been waiting for and he's mesmerized, left breathless by what he sees.

a light summery fit adorns their figure as they dash towards him with a puffy pomsky dog equally excited. their smiles are bright and sparkles adorn their eyes as usual, but it doesn't make the effect any less beautiful. they slow down, owner and dog panting a little.

immediately, layla gets up from her sitting position to greet the new guests, starting to sniff the two of them.

y/n laughs as they squat down and let the golden sniff them and their hand before giving her warm pets. "hi layla! i'm y/n, and this is rosie."

the two dogs sniff each other in circles, but soon enough they're bouncing and pouncing each other as if they've been best friends since litter days.

"they're getting along so well, and we haven't even gotten to the park yet," y/n comments with a giggle.

"should we get going?" jake offers. they reply with a nod and holds their leash in one hand, grabbing jake's with the other.

if he's taken by surprise, he doesn't show it, but inside, his heart is pounding more than ever before and his head is screaming in joy. the pair walk together hand-in-hand towards the park with two even happier pups prancing ahead of them.

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ゜・・゜゜・*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

time on earth: 4:31 pm

the two dogs are getting a bit tired, it seems, as they walk back to jake and y/n who were talking comfortably, y/n's head rested on his shoulder.

"look who's back from playing," y/n says as they ruffle rosie and layla's head, jake following suit.

"let's go get some ice cream for us and puppucinos for them?" jake suggests.

"ooh! that sounds good!" the pups seem to like the idea too, wagging their tails once more and looking at their owners with puppy eyes. jake thinks he's surrounded by three pairs of puppy eyes as he shakes his head in endearing disbelief.

"let's go then."

once they get to the shops, order, and receive their foods, the four of them sit down and enjoy their treats. the owners laugh at their dogs when they see them lap up their puppucinos with so much excitement and vigor, getting the cream all over their faces.

as the sun sets, it casts its glowing light onto the astronaut-in-rehabilitation, making jake's eyes move onto them. he notices a smudge of ice cream at the corner of their lips and without thinking moves in to kiss it off. y/n blinks their starry eyes at him, reminding him of their first "meeting" over intercom and camera screens.

"i like you," he blurts out. "can i... kiss you?"

"i thought you would never ask," they reply with a wide grin, leaning in to press their lips together before he does.

it's like gravity pulls them towards each other because they can't ever seem to get enough of one another, no matter how far apart they are.

#enhypen #enhypen x reader #enhypen jake x reader #enhypenwriters #enhypen fanfiction #sim jaeyun #sim jaeyoon #sim jaeyun x reader #enhypen fluff #enhypen imagines

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supermanshield · 3 years

Text

Naps are overrated, anyway

~~~

There is a picture in the watchtower cafeteria of Superman and Batman, asleep on the Javelin.

This is the story of how it came to be, and why Batman let it be.

~~~

Words: 4,092

Relationship: Clark/Bruce

A/N: I had the idea for this story a year ago. For the longest time, the summary you see right now was all I had typed out. Only now, after reading a bunch of JLA vol. 1 did I finally find the right characters, the right feeling and overall vibe, and wrote this in the past three days.

It doesn’t completely comply with continuity, because while I imagine this set somewhere in the 1997-2006 JLA run, Bruce mentions 6 kids (he would have only had 2 at the time + a dead Jason), although they don’t make an appearance. And I'm actually not sure if the Javelin is a thing in that run, maybe that's just a DCAU thing. Just go with it.

Also, Bruce is a bit of a boomer in this. idk, I had fun writing him.

Read on AO3

______________________________________________

Batman doesn’t nap.

However, that is not to say that Bruce doesn't. He's nearing 45 years of age, not a grey hair on his head, but if he were to grow a beard now, or a moustache like his father, it would show a mix of salt and pepper, so he shaves it off, vigorously and every day. Moustache and beard, those are the first things to turn grey. Then the eyebrows. When that happens, Bruce will lose. He will give in to his age and keep his beard. Not yet. If Clark ever walks in on him during his morning ritual (probably soon), he will look at him with that forgiving smile. He will say what he thinks of it, because that's what he does. (Keep it, I like it, Bruce hopes secretively, but there is a sadness present in Clark's eyes that he will never completely understand, and that's exactly why he shaves).

Clark has seen it already though, he's sure. His 5 o'clock shadow must look like a foggy forest to Clark’s microscopic vision, and even worse in the morning, right before his shave. Clark hasn't mentioned it. A conversation for another day.

If his children ever found out about this particular insecurity, all 6 of them would laugh.

Bruce never really napped, or took time out of the day to simply rest, but now, Clark is there. To pull him onto the couch in the study when he's on his way to his desk. To keep him in bed after sex and before patrol. To fly through his window at WE at 50 floors up and pat next to himself on the couch in Bruce's office, door locked, and red cape hung up in the corner.

"It's time," he says. Every time. "You need one."

Bruce will raise his eyebrows. "Already, hmm?" he asks, almost every time.

He's made the mistake of sending him away before. (He won't do that again). Clark is the most stubborn man Bruce knows. He will say the same thing about Bruce, but that's beside the point. And It's not as if Clark distracts him from a case or work; he knows exactly when he has some time and is unable to make excuses.

Bruce is used to taking 20-minute power naps in uncomfortable positions on his desk chair, at the kitchen table behind the newspaper, with his feet up in the batmobile.

Clark sets the alarm for one hour. He pulls Bruce into a horizontal position against that broad chest, either spooning him or facing him, encasing him in his large arms (there are still 76 ways out of his hold, but Bruce can't think of a single one worth a try). They sleep.

Apparently Clark needs naps too, even though he doesn’t need sleep. Bruce has been meaning to ask him about that, wonders if it's a mental thing, a kind of meditation. Therapy.

His naps are dreamless. Afterwards, his return to consciousness is quick, he reorients on the surroundings, on Clark. Kissing him is a good strategy for grounding, Bruce has found. And just like that, they get on with their day again, because there is no time for dwelling, for another moment together. Nevertheless, Bruce is happy with what he does get. It’s more of Clark - and more time with him - than he deserves already.

So, Bruce naps.

---

After a long mission off-world, the league is on their way home towards the watchtower in the javelin. Diana is flying, with J’onn at her side in the co-pilot chair. The rest of them are hauled up in the back of the vehicle, they’re tired, exhausted, just trying to get some rest. Even Wally sits still. Only Batman is pacing up and down, his mind already on Gotham, on home, the cases that were open, the ones that he was *this* close to cracking. Batman doesn’t nap.

His mind is wandering, going at a speed that would make even Clark dizzy, but the puzzle pieces don’t make sense. Yet. His heavy boots are silent on the metal floor of the javelin, his cape a mere whisper of wind behind him as he turns to pace the other way again.

“You’re driving me crazy,” Hawkgirl’s voice cuts through the relative silence of flying through space (beeping, machinery, turbines, the jet - there’s a lot). She holds up one of her large wings, cutting Batman off from his path. “Sit down.”

He does. Next to Superman. A big mistake, although he doesn’t realize it until much later. No need to upset his teammates. He can meditate instead, stay awake. The noise of the jet doesn’t make it easy, but it can be done. Clark smiles calmly at him.

He sits straight, eyes open, breathing focused, and the turmoil in his brains slows down. Soon, they’ll reach Earth’s solar system and he’ll have access to the batcomputer. Not soon enough. Next to him, Superman is a steady support of a brick wall, but his shoulder feels warm and soft against Bruce’s, even through the suit. Underneath the cape and hidden from view, Clark’s thumb rubs circles into his side, lower back. He knows exactly what he’s doing. A Pavlovian effect has Bruce relaxing his shoulders, if only slightly. None of his teachers ever taught him how to deal with a superman when trying to meditate. His superman. His annoyingly super man.

His last thought is of Clark, and that it must be irritating to have a bat ear poking into his cheek. But then again, rarely anything physical ever annoys the Man of Steel. Then, finally, he dozes off, the roar of the jet diminished to a distant snoring.

---

Bruce is proud of the watchtower. His watchtower. It stands erect on the bright side of the moon, pointing towards earth. Always looking out. Within such an enormous structure however, some simple rules are needed. There is a long list next to the fridge in the break room, and one in the meeting room. No running unless there is an emergency. Masks on outside of one’s own room. Food is to stay in the cafeteria (he’s found everyone and Clark with various wrappers and chips bags in the monitor room, so he gave up on that – it’s crossed out). Training gear stays in the gym. The coffee machine has to be cleaned once every 2 days - the stuff isn’t that good, not what Bruce is used to, but it has helped him through several meetings and dull monitor duties in the past.

A couple days after returning from their outer space mission on the javelin, Bruce returns to the watchtower. There are several new members to have a meeting about. He has made up his mind on all of them already, the meeting is merely a formality.

Connor Hawke runs past – one of the new proposed members, codename Green Arrow after his father – and Supergirl flies over his head. “No running.” He stops them both with one move of his arm and a line on a batarang.

Kara turns towards him and slips out of his trap easily. “I wasn’t even running, B,” she says while she floats down. Connor has crossed his arms and looks out the window, Batman’s line still taut around his upper arms.

“There are rules. If you want to be in the Justice League, behave like it.” He reminds her of the proper use of code names too, for good measure, and unties Connor.

With a sigh, both young heroes are off, making their way towards the break room. Bruce follows them and finds Wally and Kyle already inside, but as soon as they see Batman turn the corner they scurry out through the door on the other side.

It’s the first clue that something is amiss. The newer heroes standing around the fridge and chuckling, the second. Bruce lays eyes on the offending appliance and feels his body tense. If smoke could come out of his ears, it would.

“Flash!”

---

The standard size piece of paper lies on one of the metal surfaces in the computer area of the cave. Bruce tries to ignore it while he works, but the primary colours of Superman’s suit in the image are a thorn in his peripheral vision. With a swift move and a smack, he turns it around, and gets back to his files. He has sent his notes for the meeting to the watchtower, reported that he’s too busy to attend.

He works on some of his own active cases, gathering data and looking at evidence. Most of it is paperwork, boring but necessary. He slowly makes his way through every file, meticulously and efficiently. Everything gets reported and written down in case a pattern reveals itself later. The puzzling can be done when he’s more focused. Meanwhile, the cases that are solved and closed get a little custom-made bat-stamp on the front of their manila folder before they get filed away. Alfred brings down coffee, the good kind. Time passes quickly and he’s still busy when Clark flies in.

“Hey,” he walks up to Bruce and bends down for a quick kiss. “I thought you’d be at the meeting today. Diana said you were busy.”

Bruce points to the piece of paper in explanation, Clark turns to grab it. “Wally happened. And I’m always busy.”

“I see. He seemed almost unnaturally giddy today. Oh hey, look.” Clark holds up the picture of Batman and Superman, asleep on the javelin. In it, Clark’s face is peaceful, his mouth open, despite one of the ears on the cowl that is indeed poking his cheek. “We look cute.”

“Batman doesn’t do cute, Clark.”

Clark sighs. But you do, his eyes seem to say. No, I don’t, Bruce replies with his. “Where’d you get this, anyway?”

“Wally put it up on the fridge in the watchtower cafeteria. You didn’t notice him taking it last week?”

“Clearly,” Clark points to the Clark in the picture. “I fell asleep.”

“And here I thought you always listened to your surroundings.”

“We were in space. Not exactly much I can hear out there.”

Bruce gets up from his chair. Having a Superman has once again proven useless. Only Clark can do something so silly and time-wasting as sleeping, on purpose. Naps are overrated, anyway. They’ve had this discussion many times, Bruce knows the outcome. *Always* be on high alert, he will say. Clark will push back, it’s not that simple, he will say. Everyone needs sleep, his eyes pleading, apologetically somehow. They do. But it has taken Bruce obtaining Clark’s powers in a freak magic accident and chasing after the sun and every criminal on the planet for 72 hours straight to realise that. Now he knows the desperation, the feeling that it will never end, the knowledge that in the end, not everyone can be saved, even if you try.

Everyone needs sleep, even Superman.

Clark watches him milling through these thoughts, it must be written on his face, and holds out his hand when Bruce’s features finally relax. He’ll just have a stern talking-to with Wally and Kyle next time he’s on the watchtower.

If only it were so simple. The next time he’s on the watchtower, the picture is back on the fridge. And in the main hallway. And in the transporter room, the trophy room, and the ground level bathroom. Bruce groans, suppresses the urge to face-palm. He takes the things down one by one, systematically going through the entire watchtower. Then, he has that talk with Wally. And with Kyle. Best to keep them separated. They snicker that it wasn’t them *this* time, and don’t seem scared of him at all.

He’s either gone too soft in his old (not old, mature) age, or he should have designed the watchtower with a lot more corners for menacing shadows.

Wally and Kyle are both telling the truth, Bruce finds out in the next couple of days when more pictures return while Kyle is off in space and Wally is busy on earth. This time, it’s not just the one of them sleeping on the Javelin. A bunch of pictures have been put up in the break room. There’s one of Clark, asleep on monitor duty with his feet on the console (Bruce makes a mental note to talk to him about that). There, right there, that’s the reason why there always have to be two leaguers watching the screens. J’onn looking desperately at a small pile of Oreo crumbles on the floor of the meeting room. Diana vigorously devouring a tub of chocolate ice cream. And Batman, pointing at the camera, the other hand on his hip.

He has no idea who took it, but it has to be one of the speedsters. All he knows is that this has to stop. No matter if one finds this kind of thing funny, there are rules, privacy issues, secret identities and all that.

The security footage that Bruce watches back in the cave that night reveal some of the newer, younger members of the league sneaking around the watchtower with a roll of tape. They don’t know where all the cameras are, clearly. They don’t know the rules, clearly. Wally and Kyle have to have set them up to do this, clearly.

Clark watches with him over his shoulder. He chuckled when Bruce showed him the evidence earlier, but now his face is serious. He mouths an Oh. “This is getting out of hand. I’ll organize a meeting tomorrow.”

---

The next day, in the biggest meeting hall on the watchtower, over 30 faces stare at them from across the large round table. Diana and J’onn are seated on their side, for good measure. They’re victims in this too. It’s intimidating to be called to the watchtower by Superman and Batman for a meeting on professional conduct, and even more intimidating to sit across four of the original members, especially for the new ones in the crowd. Good, Bruce thinks. He stands up, and so does Clark.

“Welcome, everyone,” Clark starts, the warm and commanding baritone all Superman. “We’re glad you could all make it on such short notice…” While Clark talks, Bruce regards the crowd of heroes standing nervously, or sitting on the few available chairs. Firestorm’s flame burns smaller than normal, the new Green Arrow has his bow clamped between both hands, and even Plastic Man seems to genuinely pay attention to Superman. Wally has his chin in his hands on the table, pretending to be interested, and Kyle only seems to pay attention to a scratch on the table’s surface. “…today is not an emergency, but it is important nonetheless…” Get to the point, Clark. “It seems that whilst we acquire more and more members for the JL, some of you think this is some sort of club and not an international organization to protect the earth,” he drones on. Arthur sighs, and for once, Bruce agrees with him.

“I will not tolerate this any longer,” Bruce cuts Superman off brusquely, in his most serious bat-voice. “Take all pictures down. And if I see another one…”

Wally huffs, interrupting him. “No fun allowed on this godforsaken rock.”

Before Bruce can retort, Clark puts a hand on his tense shoulder. “What Batman is trying to say, is we can’t do this. Even if it seems harmless. Because if we get careless about the little things, we get sloppy, and if we get sloppy, the wrong information might fall into the wrong hands.”

“You’re just as paranoid as he is,” Plastic man points at Batman. “It’s a couple of harmless images.”

“And what did I just say?”

“You’re saying no fun allowed,” Kyle supplies this time. Once again, Bruce takes tremendous effort to suppress a face-palm, and crosses his arms instead. He grunts. Really, they have 37 children here. Not just the 6 back home – a rookie number. 37, except maybe not Diana. Maybe. “Man, we bust our butts for you guys. I’m behind at work, barely get any sleep or free time and you’re getting on our case for something as dumb as this!” Kyle throws his arms up in anger. Behind him, Connor tries to shush him.

“This is work just as much as your civilian job. And more important on top of that. If you want to slack off, you can do that back home. Not here.”

“Grumpy much, bats? Someone missed their morning coffee today…” Wally mumbles.

They continue staring at each other, but it’s Superman who breaks first, uncrosses his arms and sighs. “You can have a couch in the break room… and a tv.” he looks at Bruce. At his expense, of course. “That’s it. No more images of JL members. Leave your personal lives at home.”

“Fine,” Wally sits up. “We’ll take them down.”

---

A couple days later, Bruce is back on the watchtower. No weird pictures greet him this time. Much cleaner. He steadily makes his way to the break room to grab a coffee before the current meeting, but only because he didn’t have time to wait for Alfred’s Italian brew anymore. Clark is with him, already more cheerful because of Bruce’s relatively better mood.

The cafeteria is still empty, the little kitchen still clean. Save for the fridge. There, prominently in the middle of the door, the original picture of Batman and Superman on the Javelin stares him squarely in the face. It’s held up by a pair of small Wonder Woman magnets this time. Clark says something behind him, but Bruce isn’t paying attention. As he gets closer, he can tell it’s different. The paper is thicker, a nicer quality. The image is not a print, but hand-drawn in a mix of coloured chalk and high-quality pencil. The lighting, especially, is magnificent. Kyle Rayner. A new addition is the caption in curly handwriting underneath the image:

Even the world’s finest heroes need to sleep

Now, Bruce face-palms. Hard. Clark mutters a fuck, but regains control quickly. “I’ve got to hand it to them; they have nerve.” Bruce ignores him as he opens the fridge to grab the milk for Clark’s coffee. “It’s a good quality to have.”

“Or a bad one.”

Clark shrugs. His face breaks out into a grin. “And, I have them on my side now.”

Oh, no. Bruce whips his head up from the coffee machine to look at Clark. “Batman doesn’t nap.”

Clark inclines his head, raises an eyebrow. But *you* do. It’s so goddamn frustrating when he’s right.

“Hn. You already have Alfred on your side, that’s enough. And I’ve been good about it.”

“According to your standards, sure. Don’t you think it’s time for one later today? After the meeting?”

“Not here,” Bruce whispers.

“Back home.”

Home. It’s a good thing the security cameras don’t record sound. “Okay,” he mumbles. “I’ve got some time before patrol.”

Clark’s grin turns victorious, and Bruce burns his tongue on the coffee while he tries to hide a smile himself. He’ll decide what to do about Kyle’s art project later. Right now, they have a meeting to attend to.

---

The next morning, Bruce wakes up to Clark kissing his jaw, his mouth. He tastes like Alfred’s coffee. Too early, as always. Not early enough, as always, because Clark is already getting up for work. He considers pulling him back into bed and just straight up explaining to Perry that Clark is late again because he’s fucking the owner, but then he remembers yesterday’s incident. He’ll have to do something about it, obviously, but he’s not looking forward to acknowledging the whole thing yet again, maybe even admitting that the younger members are right, if only a little bit. Stupid watchtower clubhouse. His foul mood must be showing on his face, because all he gets is a “Let it go, Bruce” before Clark disappears into the bathroom. He comes back out in record time, fastening his tie. “Just, let it go. Let them have a little bit of fun. They’re young.”

But not doing anything about it is not an option. Not for Batman, and not for Bruce. “If I don’t retort, they’ll keep going. This won’t die out.” He sits up in bed. At the foot end, Clark is putting on his shoes.

“It will. You can’t fight fire with fire, sweetheart.” He walks over to Bruce and kisses his cheek. That’s it.

“That’s it. I’m going to fight fire with fire.” Get down to their level. He has kids, knows what teenagers and twenty-something year olds think like.

“No,” Clark groans. It turns into a sigh. “I’m going to be late.”

Bruce gets up. “Then go. Have a good day at work, honey.”

Clark clenches his jaw, and swings his messenger bag over his shoulder, giving up. “I’ll meet you for lunch,” he says, already halfway out the window.

Bruce closes it behind him, and then quickly makes his way down to the cave. He lets Alfred know he’ll have breakfast on the watchtower, dons the batsuit, makes a quick stop at his desk in the cave, and beams up to the watchtower. 9 am. He’s still on time.

---

At lunch time, the cafeteria is buzzing with excitement, more and more heroes gathering around the fridge as they point and whisper Really? And Do you even think it was him? And Wally, this must be another prank of yours. Bruce hears shushing and He’s right there while he drinks his coffee on the other side of the room. Finally, Clark walks in and takes a second to behold the spectacle, his brow furrowed, listening in. He clearly gives up on going to the fridge to get food, and instead makes a beeline to where Batman is sitting at one of the tables. “What’s going on? Did you remove it?” he asks as he sits down across from Bruce.

“I did not.”

Wally sticks his head out of the crowd and looks at the two of them. “Hey Bats! Does this mean we can keep it?”

Calmly, Bruce sips his coffee, pointedly ignoring the younglings and the little victory he supplied for them. But of course, and without skipping a beat, Clark notices his smug mood. He leans closer across the metal table. “What, did you put your bat-stamp of approval on it?”

“As a matter of fact, I did.”

Clark looks back over at the fridge with his spectacular vision to see what Bruce has done earlier, before anyone else was in the vicinity; his bat-symbol stamped onto the lower right corner of the caption. Later, he’ll add a rule to his original list next to the fridge. Only approved art and trophies allowed on the watchtower.

“I also hacked their phones and made sure there are no digital copies anymore,” he explains. “That should teach them to think twice next time.”

“You’re unbelievable, you know that?”

Bruce shrugs. After all, he’s heard it all before. Only this time, Clark is unable to suppress a smile, he puts a hand over his, and adds “I love you.” Even that is nothing new, he knows it already, but it hasn’t happened on the watchtower yet. He allows a smile to form on his face while Clark holds his gloved hand. The rest of the league is too busy with the commotion around the fridge, anyway.

A few days later, he finds a copy of the drawing in the cave, this one with a small Superman stamp in the lower-right corner. It may just be exactly what he needs to see after a long night of patrol. Alfred seems happy about it too, and not just about the two people in it. He now simply points to the text with a stern face instead of obnoxiously and repeatedly clearing his throat whenever Bruce comes back from patrol battered and bruised or refuses to go up to the house and his bed.

There is another one in the fortress, although Clark doesn’t spend much time there. Bruce figures he can use the reminder whenever he does go there, so far away from humanity, to work on a case. And in Blüdhaven, Dick has one on his bedside table. The last time he visited Titans tower he noticed one in the hallway. Both of those not Bruce’s doing. He lets it slide, right of his cape and cowl and cool exterior. He just hopes everyone can keep it within their inner circles and that Batman and Superman won’t get turned into one of those ‘memes’.

#superbat #write write #humor #jla

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newbornwhumperfly · 4 years

Text

it started out as a feeling...

CW: stress position, wrist trauma, blood, cigarette burns, modern slavery, slave-soldiers, discussion of war, references to abuse

tagging: @haro-whumps, @whumping-every-day, @whumpthisway, @lave-e, @stoic-whumpee, @swordkallya, @whumpster-draganies @liliability

so. i Finally wrapped up my first installment of a whump series i’ve planned for ages after enormous support from fellow whomp-bloggers, many brainstorm sessions, amazing people drawing amazing art, & kind questions from people asking about original content <3<3<3

this wouldn’t happen w/to @haro-whumps cause they’ve been utterly invaluable <3<3<3 not only have i gained an enthusiastic cheerleader and beta but a good friend. thank you from the bottom of my heart :))))

title from “the call” by regina spektor

it’s Quite Long & exposition heavy but i promise - it gets angstier :)))

July. 13.

Author: Captain Abraxas Hutchins.

Confidential Situation Report: cc; TATT Commander’s Guild

In this ninth official year in the conflict between New Athens and Upper Tyrus, I agree with general assessments that the cold war has heated significantly. In the past three years in particular, we have seen a sharp increase in subterfuge and sabotage towards essential operations.

Though skirmishes at both borders have become more frequent, our greatest concern regarding national security appears to be increasing levels of assination and data theft from New Athenian agents against the state of Tyrus (in both Upper and Lower Regions).

I understand that several commanding officers at TATT (Tyrus Anti-Terrorism Taskforce) are concerned about several bombings in the past three years as they are believed to be the efforts of New Athenian covert agents (unverified but probable). Despite the violent nature of these bombings, it is my opinion that the theft of data (as well as targeted assassinations) be considered PRIORITY. I consider it New Athenian strategy to cripple our operations.

(NOTED OBJECTION: My team sniper and fellow threat-analyst Cdr. Jorah Cuthbert’s assessment considers these bombings PRIORITY due to initial attacks causing military casualties, and some civilian, casualties.)

Though we have strengthened forces along our borders, even maintaining several “watchtower” outposts in the “Wasteland” region between Tyrus and New Athens, such security measures have failed to prevent the aforementioned acts of aggression.

Despite intense vigilance and dogged pursuit, no New Athenian covert agents have ever been successfully interrogated for high-value information and those few we have managed to apprehend committed suicide (or were assassinated) in custody and, since, before capture.

OPINION: A renewed focus on the apprehension, detainment, and interrogation (NOT “ENHANCED INTERROGATION”) of a New Athenian covert agent would reap invaluable rewards in data-gathering, threat-analysis, and contributing to a stalemate in this crisis.

Though neither government has declared an official state of war, the political tensions of the past two decades have culminated in acts of aggression that might soon bring negotiation and diplomacy to their breaking points. The Tyrus Parliament’s recent statement is that they intend to “aggressively protect” mineral mining expansions into the borders of South “Wasteland” territory “with Legion support if necessary (Senator Gilroy, Parliamentary Address, June 22). Such mineral expansions will certainly extend to Raetean coastal territory, which would inevitably result in clashes with Athenian security forces protecting land development projects conducted by New Athenian government).

In my assessment, this will exacerbate tensions further between our nations. The Islands of Raetea off the coast of New Athens continue to suffer, with recent blockades and Tyrus sanctions increasing Raetea’s economic crisis, which has only worsened over the past four years. It is very likely that there will be a new wave of refugees into the state of New Athens as a result of tensions between Tyrus and Athenian operations, similar to what we observed at the unofficial start of this conflict over a decade ago. Consequent economic burdens and the optics of this influx of refugees will contribute to pro-war sentiment in New Athens.

It is my view that if the Legion must communicate with Parliament that if state negotiators do not increase their efforts--

Brax paused in their writing as another pang shot through their wrist.

Blinking against the blue dots which hovered in their periphery, they set down their stylus to stretch the kinks out of their aching fingers. They really needed to finish their sit-rep before noon tomorrow but there was no harm in pausing for some tea. Oh, and they still needed to get Jorah’s electronic signature before they sent off the document…

Allowing a groan to break through the stifling silence, Brax glared balefully at the slow-spinning ceiling fan.

It is an inanimate object.

It cannot feel your recrimination and will not go faster.

Rational, reasonable facts which didn’t stop them from glaring harder at the offending blades, languidly batting the warm air from corner to corner. Sweat began to dampen Brax’s robe a mere minute after they slipped it on, clinging to their back as they rose from the bed and strode to pour themself another cup of Darjeeling. It was a sign of how oppressive summer had become that the heat bothered them enough to glare at a goddamn ceiling fan.

Or maybe it was just this report.

Brax’s eyes throbbed to match their hands as their gaze tracked the bubbles rolling in the coffee-maker and thinking, suddenly, how they would rather do this than spend another minute on this report.

A report they had written before, in fewer, less urgent words. Perhaps they would come to write it so often that they could pen it with their eyes closed.

Brax was not born for...this.

Analyzing data for larger patterns, working with people to coalesce them into workable teams, untangling the knots of complex problems - it was all Brax’s bread and butter.

They just never thought they’d be doing it in service of a war.

Especially not such a war as this, which stretched on, cold and quiet as perpetual winter, for years upon years with no official frontline, no certain death toll, and no end in sight. It crept like frost through even the most iron structures of their society, the bite of corruption and desperation corroding from within, unrelenting attacks from without. A conflict that Brax had seen steal the best of their generation, silently and suddenly, into the night.

Alright, that decided it. Melatonin with their tea it was. Brax reminded themself not to make this a habit as they tapped two pills into their palm before they carried a steaming mug back to their bedside.

A fair and direct fight was more their speed.

Well, technically their speed was to avoid fights if at all possible but the past few years with the Legion had taught Brax that the thin line between caution and cowardice was easily crossed - regardless of intent.

They were not so foolish to hope to keep their innocence but they intended to keep their worldview intact, despite how determined the world seemed to shatter their views. They would not allow their intelligence to be broken into shards of cynicism and brutal practicality.

But in such a war as this, intelligence was never undervalued and Brax’s reputation for swift, sure judgement had left their opinion heavily in demand. They had heard the call and gone from analyzing political conflict behind a desk to the field with surprising ease, mirrored in their meteoric ascent through the ranks.

Though they often wished for their cramped desk and stale coffee, they knew they were needed here and could not now resent being so pressed for their help.

Which is why they didn’t have much of a right to be surprised when a knock, heavy and booming, rapped against the door of their quarters.

Brax allowed themself a regretful blink at their unswallowed pills and undrunk tea before setting them down delicately, not at all with a disgruntled thud, before striding to the door.

Cobi had the decency to look a little rueful when faced with his commanding officer, haggard and bleary, clad in only a robe.

“This had better be damn important, Lt. Pfeffer,” Brax attempts to be wry but the strain in their voice rather diminishes the humor. “My Darjeeling has melatonin in it.”

“Yeah, uh, yes, Captain. Ok, uh…”

Cobi hesitated, chewed his lip as his mighty hands flexed, clenched white-knuckled, and suddenly Brax knew that shit was about to go down.

“Captain, someone...an Athens agent crossed the border. Like, just fuckin’ walked right into an outpost and, uh, gave themself up. This morning. So, uh. Yeah. Guessing that’s important, Captain.”

Well.

It seemed that report was going to have to wait.

The government car felt too small and too hot as it rocketed through the thick, buggy dark and Brax once again resisted the urge to adjust their shirt collar.

Putting the heat, and the thought that they really should have changed their undershirt, to the side, they glanced at the car’s digital clock.

02:45

They didn’t think the driver would notice if they fixed their appearance but Brax preferred not to bring undue attention to the sloppy adjustment of their hastily donned uniform. Repressing a sigh, Brax scrolled through their data-pad, sweaty fingers slipping on the screen as they skimmed through the electronic sit-rep.

At approx. 22:10, a New Athens covert agent approached a Wasteland outpost.

The agent was bound and searched. The agent was unarmed and scans revealed no explosive devices or any other weapons. The uniform was confiscated to search for bugs. Upon interrogation, the agent would only state name, serial number, and desire to speak to someone in the command structure. The agent has been restrained securely to prevent possible suicide.

Stated name: Morja (Serial #:13308)

Approx. 5’, 5-6”

Approx. late 20’s to early 30’s

Brown skin (possible Raetean descent - known to be typical for covert agents)

Health Status: no diseases, no medical conditions known

No current, major injuries noted.

Once again, Brax’s eyes drifted inexorably towards the clock’s bright glare.

02:47

Shit.

Time crept like the dark fields beyond the tinted window, too slow and yet too quick, as Brax struggled to grasp their prided equilibrium. Yet they felt like it was slipping from their grip like the datapad through sweaty hands.

The security bureau likely felt they were already lagging too far behind this development. This interview ought to have happened hours ago. Brax needed more time, more information, to interrogate this agent. They needed to know if this agent had previous contact with Tyrus forces.

They need more time.

The truth was that, despite the considerable efforts of Tyrus' intelligence agents, they had very little notion of how covert assassins were trained on the other side. Even the recruitment process was shrouded in mystery and misinformation, but many analysts suspected that service was..less than voluntary. They knew that impressment targeted Raetean refugees, third-class citizens, and often poor prisoners, all conscripted with grand offers of security - or, as Brax recalled with a gag from a propaganda newsclip, “the service of the lesser so the great will prosper”.

These agents started young and desperate, understandably - easy to break into desirable moulds. New Athenian agents fought with fervent loyalty on par with religious devotion, with most Tyrus citizens considering these agents devout to their nation like cultists to their faith.

Brax did not entirely buy that.

Being trained (likely brutally) and indoctrinated with nationalist gratitude since youth, plucked from a miserable existence. Especially where the third-tier citizens and refugees often died of untreated illness, ration shortage, and climate poisoning.

Choice was all well and good to praise when one has never had...no choice.

There was also the fact that treason, dissension, any sort of breaking ranks - all punished with a proud severity typical to an authoritarian state. Add these all together and a nation gets a loyal stock of “servants”, bound for life to die for a state which did not seem to care how many they lost as long as they achieved their goals: the prosperity of the great.

They need to focus on the details at hand.

They need beads of sweat to stop rolling off the dome of their head, trickling to the wire-rimmed lens and clinging to the glasses, refusing to fall.

Ignore it.

One thing was quite certain - Brax had no idea what to expect.

The atmosphere in the outpost bunker buzzed with anticipation, goosebumps rising along Brax’s arms even in the sweltering air, as they stepped down into the building. Two fresh-faced lieutenants stood at restless attention and once Brax stepped into the room the fidgeting figures snapped out their salutes, hand to forehead, with a nervous, jerky speed.

A reedy blonde, the sergeant in charge, seemed to barely keep herself from crossing her arms across her body, hands making abortive gestures towards her torso as she briefed Brax on the situation. She was sweating dark stains through her uniform and her mouth ticked sporadically, twisting into a small, hard shape.

Brax knew all the information given but they allowed her the extra minute to grit the story through her teeth. She clearly needed this.

Nodding sharply at her conclusion, Brax inquired and was led to where the agent was being held, a small soundproof room with a heavy steel door.

“Under no circumstances am I to be interrupted - is that clear?”

Satisfied by the brisk nods of their wide-eyed subordinates, Brax gripped the cell’s door handle harder than necessary as they input the code with slow, steady presses of a slippery finger. Taking a moment to cycle through all known factors in their head, they allowed their shoulders to drop and slipped on the politely inquisitive neutrality of their game-face.

As they stepped, resolutely, over the threshold of the cell, their eyes adjusted to the dark room and they finally laid eyes on the agent in question.

A stocky figure, likely short in stature, thickly muscled limbs, dressed in a Tyrus Legion issue slacks and teeshirt. Even in the low light, Brax could see the agent was dark in complexion, with the brown skin and black hair typical of Raetean citizens.

“Likely” short, Brax noted, since no real gauge could be made of the figure’s height since said figure was on their knees, shackled.

Their ankles and shins had been tightly bound together, leaving the figure to balance in an uneven kneel, straining the broad shoulders where their arms had been drawn back and up to the wall, where their clenched hands were bound in thick, steel cuffs.

Shit. That was just wonderful, wasn’t it? They knew the agent would surely be cuffed - they had been handed keys after all - but nobody had mentioned...stress positions.

Just as well. Brax’s opinion on the outpost’s flirtation with torture was well-known amongst superiors and subordinates alike. They didn’t need their blood up. Ir would have been nice if these soldiers hadn’t played fast and loose with protocol. But the reprimand can wait, Brax sternly reminded themself. Focus on the task at hand.

As the door swung heavily shut behind Brax, the figure raised their head slowly.

A dim glow from the one dangling bulb threw shifting shadows onto a rugged face - thinly bearded, a wide brow, chin and nose, the broad bridge crooked from an old break. Their mouth was pressed into a thin, hard line. Their thick, jet-black hair gleamed with perspiration, the sweat-drenched locks watermarking the pale green of their shirt-shoulders.

The low light accented thick scars ridging the bronze flesh: a wide mark swooping over his nose, slashing through a thick right brow, curving below the left cheekbone, and a jagged mark splitting the tender skin below one of their dark, deep-set eyes.

Those eyes glinted for a moment, alighting on Brax’s face before flicking away, settling blankly somewhere around the fourth button of Brax’s uniform.

No further movement, not even a change in breathing, from the agent. No flicker of expression disturbed the blankness of their face. Only steady blinking and a cadenced swell of the broad chest indicated that they were even alive.

Well, they were a stoic one, that was certain.

If they were as smart as they must be, they were either suppressing terror at their predicament (likely) or smug certainty in some nefarious ploy (plausible but less certain).

Brax let the air simmer for a few more moments before striding with purpose towards the figure, ready to undo their bonds. At their first certain step, every line in the agent’s body tautened, rigid as a sail in the wind, as their rhythmic breaths quickened - shallowly, shortly out, deeply, swiftly in.

So - the former.

Reassured by a confirmation of their assessment, though less pleased to be a source of distress, Brax made quick work of the restraints.

They stepped back, giving the agent a moment to straighten up and rub their wrists. The figure’s gaze flicked to Brax’s face, brow nearly creasing into a furrow before smoothing once more. They allowed their arms to fall and settle stiffly on their lap, settling on their knees and settling their gaze once more upon Brax’s waist.

Alright then - no aggression, no combative expression, nothing but complete submission so far.

Good cop it is then - good.

Sinking to one knee, Brax tried to seek out the agent’s eyes but that dark gaze remained lowered, so Brax focused on keeping their voice low and soft.

“Hello, Morja, my name is Captain Abraxas Hutchins. I was told you wanted to talk to someone higher in the ranks, so, you got me. Can you tell me what it is you want?”

An intake of breath, sharp and sudden.

Brax would almost call it a gasp and their close observance caught the figure’s eyes flickering with something like shock. If the agent was bewildered or shocked, however, they recovered swiftly, their soft burr revealing no more emotion than their stony face.

“Anóteros, I came to...offer my service to Tyrus.”

....Well. Alright. Well.

Brax allowed themself a blink. Taking a moment to process this statement.

“Are you...are you telling me that you’re surrendering?”

“...Yes, anóteros.”

The agent opened their mouth, paused, spoke once their gaze flickered over Brax’s nod of encouragement.

“I am… deserting New Athens. I… offer my service to this nation. I will offer information. I will fight. I will….do whatever you want.”

The way that the agent spoke, measuring each word as some fragile and heavy thing, sat uneasily with Brax. So did being called “master” or “superior” or whatever that word meant.

As the agent’s palms stiffened, flexing upon their thighs, their close proximity allowing Brax to note the copious scars and burns (some little and disturbingly round) littered upon those wide hands. Brax kept noting that too, the broadness of the figure before them and how often they forgot the size in light of the demeanor. Their shoulders did not hunch, their head did not hang low, but they projected absolute submission.

I am not a threat. I am small and harmless. You do not need to hurt me.

Brax did not need psych-profile terminology at the moment. They could almost hear Sarai’s murmurous meandering on abuse survivors and body language, atypical trauma symptoms, and all the things Brax knew too much about for a lifetime. This agent’s possible history with abuse was an issue for the aforementioned team medic and therapist to ponder if she wished.

Brax was here to assess potential threats.

They were not at all influenced by how the shift of movement drew their eyes to the cruel grooves in the agent’s wrists, deep and ugly crimson, the clear marks of viciously fastened zip-ties.

Not in the least.

Skin on the left wrist had broken and blood sluggishly trickled from the cruel, red circle.

“Do your wrists hurt?”

The agent’s eyes snapped up, fixing Brax with another brief flicker of astonishment. It lasted a mere moment before the agent lowered their gaze. They shifted, their lips parted, shut, parted again.

“Don’t lie - are you in any pain?”

The agent visibly twitched this time, nodding quickly.

Brax would not be accused of being soft by most people. Secretive, observant, strict - usual adjectives whispered regarding the taciturn leader. But for all Brax had purposefully cultivated their reputation of principled sternness, they hoped to be accused of compassion just as often.

What was the use of incisive insight, being able to read people fairly, assess their intentions accurately, and deal with them rightfully if they could not extend it to someone right in front of them?

Well, they would rather be damned for humanity anyhow.

Rising from their haunches, Brax strode to the door and rapped sharply, demanding a first-aid kit from the blinking officer. After some fumbling in cabinets beneath the open stares from frozen compatriots, the officer handed over the item.

Brax traded their crouch for a kneel, mirroring the pose of the rigid agent while they fished some analgesic ointment out of the kit.

“Hold out your hands for me?”

The figure obeyed without a moment of hesitation, palms spread and forearms balanced in tandem.

Brax hummed in approval, cleaning their own hands with alcohol before hovering a fresh wipe over the maimed flesh.

“This is going to sting but the ointment will help with that in a minute.”

The agent did not so much as wince, palms perfectly still as Brax swiped at the gashes as swiftly as they could. Despite the lack of reaction, the agent’s wrists likely felt aflame at the disinfectant.

“So, stop me if I’m wrong. As I understand it, you’re…”

Brax balanced two words on their tongue. Defecting? The alcohol swab snagged a pucker of scar. Round. Diverted. Still pink, a few years old.

“...fleeing. And you want to cooperate, work with us willingly, yes?”

A nod.

“Have any of your anótero ordered you to surrender yourself?”

The agent twitched but their mouth pulled down in another flash of bewilderment.

“No, sir,...New Athens does not infiltrate. I am...committing treason by being here. Even...even by speaking to you, anoóteros, I would be...executed.”

Dry tracks of crimson had eked down the agent’s forearms from their downward angle.

“Then why are you here? What do you want?”

Peeling the wrapper off another wipe, Brax began cleaning those trails, smothering a frown as the stale air thickened with the sharp, metal scent of blood and alcohol.

“I...believe that there is a better way. For my people. A better way that those at the head will not see, will never see. It is not…their way. The only way to save...to have this better way is to end the conflict. To dismantle central operations in New Athens until there is no choice but to change things.”

“So you want to use y-their own tactics against them?”

“They are effective, anóteros.”

A fair point.

“And…”

Brax hummed in question and after a strained beat of silence, the agent continued.

“In e-exchange...for an active policy of recruitment of Athenian agents, taken in alive.”

Well.

“You, you think other agents will defect.”

“...I do.”

Well.

“I see.”

Brax focuses their attention on a crusted clump of blood at the agent’s pulse point, dabbing wetly and turning the information over, the blunt shock of the agent’s words tumbling through their mind. The heat pressed against Brax’s skin, thickened like a cap against their skull, they needed to think.

They need to let their instincts guide them.

“So those are your, uh, conditions for cooperating with us?”

“And I will not execute civilian targets - on either side.”

For the first time, steel edged the tone, the words all weight and no hesitation.

Brax had no counter to this so they merely hummed.

Crumpling bloodied wipes into the kit, Brax dolloped ointment onto their fingertips and began rubbing it into the cuts, grateful for the waft of peppermint which broke up the morbid odor and finally fully gazing up at their patient.

The agent regarded Brax openly, eyes glinting with a bright mixture of caution, bewilderment, and something very much like awe. That look pinned Brax. It seemed that those eyes were shocked into aching vulnerability from an act of simple kindness and it made Brax...unsettled.

“Better?”

“...Y-yes, anóteros.”

“Ah. You don’t need to call me that.”

That little furrow deepened between the agent’s brows.

“Anoóteros. If it makes you more comfortable, I don’t object to it. But I’m not requiring you to call me ‘superior’, ok?”

Now the corners of the agent’s mouth creased downwards as their lips parted, pressed together, and their sharp nod followed suit.

“Yes, sir.”

“Call me Captain. Sir’s a bit, ah, inaccurate anyway.”

Brax quirked their lips softly, trying to assuage any potential tension at the correction. They did this with any new subordinate, awkwardly hovering between honorifics in the face of Brax’s...ambiguity. It usually worked well - usually. The agent, however, had ceased to breathe and their fingers stiffened within Brax’s hold.

“I...apologize, s--, Captain.”

“No need.”

Brax dabbed ointment generously into a welt, a rare unbroken patch of wrist-skin rubbed to blister, as they elaborated in the same low, steady tone.

“I have to inform almost everyone that I am genderfluid, since I present as pretty masculine. I go by ‘they’. Being referred to as ‘he’ is fine, it only bothers me if those are the only pronouns someone calls me.”

Satisfied that infection had been successfully belayed, Brax wiped the ointment off their hands and began

tilting their head as they scrutinized the agent’s flat demeanor for cracks, shadows, flickers - searching for any hint of what was going on in their head.

“What about you?”

There was the bewilderment again, the agent pausing, likely weighing their response, stiffening as they finally spoke, somehow quieter and more measured than before.

“...I apologize, Captain. I...I...don’t understand.”

“I’m asking what pronouns you prefer for yourself.”

The agent’s chest rose, fell, rose and fell quicker as their proffered arms quivered, the creases flattened and deepening across their face in a waning struggle for neutrality. The body warred with itself before Brax’s eyes, some invisible cord of tension winding tighter as the agent seemed to scramble for an answer.

Brax quickly thought of the agent’s name as they tried to belay any possible swell of panic by offering up solid bases - affirmation, instruction, guidance.

“Hey, Morja? It’s alright. There is no wrong answer here - just tell me your gender identity, alright.”

“...Yes, Captain. I...am a man.”

“Alright. So you prefer ‘he/him’?”

A quick nod.

“Alright.”

Plucking a bundle of gauze from the kit, Brax ignored the weight of the agent’s gaze on them as they unwound strips of material.

They had watched Morja. Now it was his turn to watch them.

“I understand that agents on your side are trained to be perfect. Perfectly obedient. Perfect killers. I’m sure you understand why I can’t be certain of what you say.”

Only once they began binding Morja’s wrists did they glance up from the softly trembling hands and catch those dark eyes head-on. They were sharp, affixed to Brax’s throat like lodestones, as his brow crinkled in thought. As Brax began tucking the edges of the bandages into the bindings, Morja spoke.

“Tyrus has been searching for a hidden data farm in New Athenian territory. It shows grids of border weaknesses here and to the West and it’s a high-value storage. It is low-security to disguise its importance. I can offer its location and optimal invasion strategy, Captain. I can offer this as proof.”

As Brax stood, gazing down at the agent, their senses were attuned to the utter submission of Morja’s posture, how his eyes were bright with caution, and though his hands still bore the faintest tremor, there was not a hint of deception.

Either he was telling the truth or Brax had never met a better liar.

“Alright. You can lower your arms, Morja.”

The man obeyed and the faint light showed his flat mask slip a fraction.

Brax barely had time to blink before Morja folded at the waist. Spreading his open palms flat, shuffling forward to press his head upon the ground. With his broad back bowed, his dark head brushing Brax’s boots, gauze-swathed hands unfurled as though in prayer, Morja was the perfect picture of supplication.

“Thank you...for your mercy, a-- Captain. Thank you.”

Well...alright.

Brax can process this: rituals of deference, kneeling, no eye contact.

Superior.

Still, a groveling enemy was not their idea of a good Saturday morning.

A wounded, terrified person at Brax’s feet, throwing away all he’d ever known for a change in heart.

A man who Brax had bandaged, thanking them for the mercy.

“That’s, uh, alright. You’re alright. You can get up.”

Without looking to see how he responded, Brax strode to the door of the cell, rapping to be let out. When the blonde sergeant swung the door wide, her gaze slid balefully to the shadows behind Brax, eyes like icy chips in her clammy face. Her mouth was a small knot of fury.

And just like that, Brax made their decision.

“I need a pair of cuffs and the car. He’s coming back to Base Forthill with me.”

Brax swung back to Morja, catching his dark head snap up suddenly, the neon light glinting at the whites of his widened eyes and limning his parted lips in the most blatant show of emotion Brax had yet seen.

Shadows of shock, relief, fear all flitted, swift and pale as moths across Morja’s face before fading away, leaving only the level mask settled staunchly in place.

Brax really hoped they wouldn’t regret this.

And yet, somehow, they didn’t think they would.

i crave validation so tell me what you thought!!!

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less-intelligent-spencerreid · 4 years

Text

The Sitter-Three

The Victim

Hotch x Reader

Warnings: Mentions of Family's Death

A collab with the incredibly talented @flightsoffandom

Tag List: @icantswimhalp

@hommoturttle

@winterscaptain

@jovialtimetravelgladiator

@lex-is-a-shipper

A note: I’m on mobile so I apologize for any weird formatting.

—————————

5 years ago:

You were laying in bed reading when Sammy crept into your room. “Hey bean, what’s wrong?” You asked, putting your book to the side.

“I can’t sleep y/n, I heard scary noises.” Sammy replied.

“Come here,” you said scooting over and patting the bed beside you, “you can sleep in here tonight. You don’t have to be afraid of anything because I’ll protect you, okay?”

“Promise?”

“Forever.” You turned the lamp beside your bed off and put an arm around them.

Present Day:

There you were, making your yearly trip to the cemetery. Every year got a bit easier but it didn’t exactly take away the pain. Maybe just dulled it a bit. You ambled over to the spot, after five years your body was just on autopilot as you navigate your way through the ocean of tombstones. Once your body came to a stop you looked down at the three graves. These three slabs of fancy rock was all you had left of your family. Your mom, dad and little Sammy. You sat in the middle of all three of them. Pulling out a packed lunch. On special occasions your mom and dad made a special family meal, with recipes that were passed down through the generations but you had never gotten a chance to learn them and now the recipes were long lost. You tried your best every year to recreate it and you were getting close. It still didnt taste right but it was the best you could do.

The next morning you woke up and watched Sammy sleep for a little bit before shaking them awake.

“Good morning Bean. Happy 7th Birthday!”

“Thanks y/n,” Sammy smiled, “let’s go downstairs!”

“Alright, bean let’s go.”

Of course your mom had made the special meal that day. That last time she would ever cook it.

As you slowly ate you noticed flowers had been placed on each of the graves. You must have missed them in your fog of melancholy. It wasn't too unusual. Sometimes people would put flowers on empty graves as a way to show the less visited tomestones some care.You did take care of them whenever you visited but you didn't visit as often as you would have liked. You decided to take a look at them when you had finished eating. You wiped off the face of all three stone plaques, cleaning them up a little. Then you reached down and picked up the first bouquet of flowers off of Sammy’s grave. Once you had them in your hand you noticed a card attached. You had never seen a card on anonymous flowers before. Flipping the card over in your hand so you could see the writing. All it read was ‘To: The One That Got Away.’

You had hidden Sammy’s gift at your friend’s house to make sure they wouldn’t find it. It was something they had been asking for for months.

“I’m going to go pick up Bean‘s present,” You told your family after lunch. “I’ll be back in 45 minutes.”

“Okay honey, see you soon.” Your mom said, kissing the top of your head.

“Drive safe, love you.” Your dad called out to you.

“I will! Love you too!”

Your stomach clenched so tight that you regretted finishing all of your food before looking at these flowers. Immediately you dropped them to the ground before picking up the next set. All three sets of flowers had the same taunt on them, ‘To: The One That Got Away.’ The bouquets felt like hot charcoal in your hands and you dropped them like they were burning you. Everything from your past came rushing back to you causing you to stumble over to a nearby tree. Wanting to be far away from any graves just in case you did actually lose your lunch. Doubling over clutching onto the rough bark of the tree even as it scraped into your skin. The tears started streaming down your cheeks as your nightmare of a memory hit you like a brick wall.

“I’m back!” You called in a sing-song voice as you opened the door.

“Sorry I’m late. Traffic.” You set the package inside and closed the door before walking into the living room. As soon as you were in the doorway, you let out a blood curdling scream.

“Sammy! Mom! Dad! What happened?” You yelled frantically as you dialed 911 and ran over to Sammy.

Feeling like you were being watched and you couldn't be here anymore. You had to leave. Starting to head back to your car, about half way back you realized you left your lunch bag and you had to double back. Your vision was blurred from the tears that wouldn't stop rolling down your face. When you got into the driver’s seat of your car you crossed your arms over the steering wheel. Burying your face into your arms as you start sobbing uncontrollably. Even as you got swept up in your own emotions you couldn't get the creepy feeling that someone was watching you to go away. You steeled yourself so that you could see clearly enough to drive before speeding out of the cemetery. When you got home the first thing you did was park the car. The drive had calmed you down a bit. You had managed to convince yourself that you were seeing things and the cards on the flowers didn't mean what you originally thought they did. Your delusion was shattered the second you opened your mailbox. In the stack of mail you pulled out the first thing that caught your eye was a brightly colored envelope. You stepped into your house and immediately went to open it. Ripping the paper open you pulled out a card. When you saw the childrens birthday card you didn't even need to read it. You knew. All the mail fell out of your hands and you abandoned it on the floor in your doorway. You rushed up to your room, trying to figure out what to do as you started panicking.

You knew what you had to do. You picked up the phone and dialed, “Aaron, hey, sorry for the late notice,” you inhaled deeply, hating what you were doing “I can’t watch Jack anymore.”

#hotch x reader #the sitter #aaron hotchner fanfiction #aaron hotchner #thomas gibson #cm #cm fanfic #criminal minds #criminal minds fanfic #hotch x you #hotch x nuetral!reader #hotch x gender nuetral!reader #hotch #aaron hotchner x reader

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justshekthings · 3 years

Text

just for a moment - park jisung fanfic (part 1)

“Continuing to run you turn around with a huge smile across your face, locking eyes with the boy whos awestruck expression turns into a comforting smile. Somehow without even knowing each other's names you both felt as if you've managed to escape reality, like the two of you were the only people in the universe, a feeling so rare, a scene only in movies, an occurrence never forgotten and yet was just experienced by these two individuals, even if it was just for a moment.”

Park jisung x reader

Word Count: 8731

Reading time: 1h 7m

Italics = thoughts

“normal” = spoken

*IMPORTANT PLEASE READ*

Authors note: Since this a fanfic, therefore fiction, there story is set in your last year in highschool with the rest of the dream members who are all the same age. The school year will also be following the korean academic year system, just for some realism. I also made up a few characters with a korean name generator so please don’t overthink! I will also be releasing this story 4 chapters at a time with 3 parts in total, making a total of 12 chapters #quickmaths. Apologies in advance if my uploads are slow or my grammar is awful. Make sure to like and comment any suggestions or thoughts, but try to be kind, it’s my first time writing a fanfic.

Enjoy reading~

March: March, although somewhat an afterthought or rather a shadow of winter, left with only it’s remains, it sets the groundwork for the rest of the year. March plants seeds that grow from mere sprouts to full grown plants during the course of the year.

It’s early March, the month when the snow starts to thaw in preparation of the well anticipated season of spring. The feel of the winter air has managed to remain in Seoul, resented by the thousands of students forced to return back to school for the first semester. One of those poor unfortunate souls is you, y/n l/n, an 18 year old girl and you’ve come back to start and, hopefully, finish your senior year at Seoul Highschool. Although what does seem to make your experience there a little more bearable are your two friends Seo Kyung-Hu and Hu Mee-yon, while those two have been friends since primary school, you only met them in Middle school when you first transferred and they being the only nice enough kids willing to approach you, the three of you clicked instantly and ever since your trio have stayed a complete set.

Unlike your two friends, you could care less about school purposefully staying up late in hopes of sleeping through your alarm and having a valid excuse to miss the first day of school. And your plan worked… to some extent. Your mother on the other hand was keen to send you to the school you paid money for, as you should. You were fast asleep dreaming about exo performing as ot9 was suddenly awoken by the screaming of your mother. “YAH Y/N WAKE UP AND GET TO SCHOOL BEFORE I TAKE ALL YOUR EXO POSTERS AGAIN!” hearing that was enough to make you jump out of bed and start getting ready, not without a few complaints of course. Walking into your washroom you take one good look at your face in the morning, “oh god” you’re at least grateful your skin decided not to break out on the first day of school however your face was still puffed and quite dull. You continued washing your face, brushing your teeth and putting on that god awful, ugly, disgusting, and horrific uniform, as you described. Objectively your uniform wasn’t at all bad however you had the tendency to well… overthink. (the uniform looks like the A-teen beige uniform)

It being 8:35 and school starting at 8:45, you speed walked and slightly ran to school attempting to cut the initial 10 min walk in half with at least 5 mins to spare just in case. Fortunately enough you managed to get there on time to check what your classroom was, before the bell. Room 215? Ok… WHERE IS THAT AGAIN?! Somehow the break managed to erase most of your memory of the school, although there wasn’t much worth remembering about your most hated location on planet earth. You run around frantically desperately trying to find your homeroom before a teacher, or worse a hall monitor. You stop in the middle of an empty hallway to text your friends where the hell room 215 is, until you hear a unfamiliar voice reach out to you, “Are you lost babygirl” WHAT THEEE it took a second for you to process what the guy had said until out of instinct you start to laugh uncontrollably with your eyes starting to tear up. You turn around, hand holding your stomach, “What did you just say?” you ask, unable to take the male standing in front of you seriously. He stares at you, seeming to enjoy that you understood his reference, “What so you’re telling me you’re not totally turned on by that comment?” With a slight over exaggerated gasp at the end of his sentence, obviously showing that he was joking. “No no your question was valid just-” unable to finish your sentence you rerun the moment that had just unfolded through your head, succeeding in making you burst out in laughter again. His voice cuts through your laugh, “No but seriously you seem lost” finally regaining your composure, you take a minute to examine his appearance, and his attractiveness, and realizing you’ve been staring for a bit too long you panic quickly trying to cover it up, “YEAH UM i'm lost do you know where room 215 is?” “New student?” “no just dumb” He laughs at your honesty and points you in the right direction like a true gentleman. “Oh my god thanks so much, hope I see you again cute stranger!” you end your sentence with a wink and then run off after getting a glimpse of his dumbfounded expression although close enough to hear him yell out, “The name’s YangYang!”

The odds were in your favour managing to slip into class before your teacher arrived and you had a mini-mental celebration before choosing to sit in the empty window seat in the middle row with an empty seat beside you to limit the amount of human interaction you get. Sitting down in your seat and see the teacher walk in and start the generic beginning of the school year talk, you text your friends to pass the time, who were lucky enough to have their class together, while the class goes through the course outline. After waiting a few minutes at the front, you see both of your friends, Kyung-hu and mee-yon or as you called them kyuhu and mimi to simplify their names, walk out and you guys greet each other before the three of you walk in the direction of your neighborhood, talking about what you all did during the break, all the annoying teachers and most recent gossip.

You’d notice that the first week of school would follow this routine, passing by quite quickly and finding it uneventful as your teacher didn’t give a lot of homework as it was the first week of school. During the first week you concluded that there was no one in your classroom, or in the school for that matter that piqued your interest except for the fellow that helped you on the first day but has managed to slip your sight every time you scanned your surroundings to find him. Although just as fast as the first week passed by, the weekend went just as fast, and based on how your school operates, it’d be the only free weekend you’d have in a long time. And much to your dissatisfaction, you found herself in the same situation from a week ago, tired, lazy and lacking any motivation to go to school. Despite this you actually made an effort to wake up early, too early, to get ready for school to escape the never ending nagging from your mother over calls from the office over your tardy attendance. After eating a good enough breakfast, you open your door expecting a cold breeze to meet you as it did last week but to your surprise the outside was bright and dry, with no traces of snow, almost as if the weekend magically changed Seoul from winter to spring. However the leaves on the trees would need a lot more time than a weekend to grow back to their former glory. Remember when I mentioned you woke up too early, you were exactly two hours early when you arrived at the school, which suddenly made sense to you when you realized that no one in your house was awake yet and the roads in your neighborhood felt deserted. After walking around the campus you finally settle on a familiar tree on the outskirts of the school grounds, its location the very reason why you and your friends chose it as your casual lunch location for the past two years. You set your bag on your lap hugging it like a pillow laying your head on it for support and almost immediately you start drifting off the sleep.

Unbeknownst to you, your perfect sleep would be ruined by one Park Jisung, you see park jisung made the mistake of waking up 20 mins before school started not taking into account it was his very first day at the highschool and he was bound to get lost on the way to school and if he even managed to find the school, he’d have no idea where his classroom as he also missed orientation for all new students. Late and lost, jisung looked around the front of the building in search of someone to help him but since school had already started most staff and students were already inside. Although it would’ve been easier for jisung to walk inside the building somehow he noticed a figure under a tree not too far from him, jisung assuming it was a student figured it’d be easier to ask a student then suffer a scolding or even awkward small talk with a teacher. He runs up to the sleeping person under the tree and realizes it’s a girl from the long hair and skirt, legs criss crossed under a bag you is hugging and sleeping on. Reluctant to grab your attention, awakening you from your slumber, but he must do so if he ever wishes to get to class. “Excuse me?” Jisung repeats this a few times first with a shy voice growing in volume in desperation to wake you up. In your dream EXO OT9 were just about to sing love shot, one of the comebacks lay missed out on, when you heard a reluctant voice repeatedly saying excuse me disrupting your peace and not to mention exo’s performance. Jisung seeing that his voice was not enough to wake you up he starts to get physical. You try to ignore the voice hoping it’d go away until it actually starts poking your shoulder, now you have no choice but to let go of your perfect dream and wake up to respond to the thing that dares interrupt your nap. Jisung notices the girl moving, satisfied that he finally woke you up, he watches as you yawn and rub your eyes, cute he thinks to himself admiring the girl’s sleepy and adorable state. You open your eyes to see a timid but tall boy crouched beside you, finger still pointed after persistently poking you. “Yes?” glaring at the poor boy with the rudest voice you could muster expecting him to get the hint to leave you alone. “U-um can u help me?” Looking at the nervous state of the boy you empathize with his confusion seeing as you were in a similar dilemma a week ago. Softening your expression you say, “yeah what's up?” using a tone completely opposite of the one a second ago, causing Jisung to relax and become more at ease after noticing your change in attitude, “oh can u tell me where this classroom is?” Jisung points at his paper, saying Room 215. He watches your face light up, “Oh! That's my classroom you can just follow me!” And you give the boy an eye smile, happy that you can help him and possibly become friends with the boy. Jisung’s ears turn pink admiring how cute your smile is and touched by your hospitality. you stand up dusting off your skirt and checking if you had any dirt on your clothes or legs. Putting your backpack on and adjusting the straps you ask the boy what time it was. “Oh it's 9:00 am” Jisung says to you sheepishly hoping he doesn’t shock you by how late they both are, “OH SHOOT'' After hearing the time realizing just how fucked you were, acting quick you grab the new boy’s hand and start running towards the building. Jisung trailing behind the small girl is blushing due to the sudden skin ship and can feel his heart pounding due to the spontaneousness of the girl's actions along with the running not at all helping with his heart rate. Running across the field underneath the sunlight causes an increase in heart rate, a mutual feeling felt by the two, but you both recognize it as a mere adrenaline rush as you both try to take in the predicament you find yourselves in. Jisung staring at the hand who had taken his own so boldly, looked up staring at your hair that had turned from a raven black shade to a chocolate brown in the sunlight admiring how it swayed while you ran. Continuing to run you turn around with a huge smile across your face locking eyes with the boy whos awestruck expression turns into a comforting smile. Somehow without even knowing each other's names you both felt as if you've managed to escape reality, like the two of you were the only people in the universe, a feeling so rare, a scene only in movies, an occurrence never forgotten and yet was just experienced by these two individuals, even if it was just for a moment.

April: April bears us spring, which in turn prepares us for summer. The weather is unlike any other, it follows the frigid temperatures of winter and yet precedes the intense heat of summer, the month is in equilibrium.

You watch from the safety of the other side of the field as Jisung is teased yet again by his new found friend group. As cliche as it sounds he managed to land himself with the “popular kids'' group despite this school not caring much for social norms, even if there was a popular group it’d be them and they’ve accepted him wholeheartedly as if he spent the last two years with them. Much to everyone’s surprise Jisung was capable of fitting in despite him being the new kid and it being the last year, it was almost as if he was the missing part of their friend group. The group consisted of Chenle, Renjun, Jeno, Jaemin, Haechan and Mark and they weren’t just popular, they were rich and attractive as well. “Oh how he’s blossomed” you say to yourself while admiring Jisung for coming out of his shell and express himself freely “Oh god please don’t tell me you just said that” “You sound like a pedo” As if on cue your two friends arrive at your spot under the tree, slightly creeped out by your confession. “YA I didn’t mean it like that!” you say pouting at your friends' judgmental remarks. “It’s just that he’s grown so much and it’s only been a month'' taking one last glimpse at Jisung having fun before turning to your best friends who have already started to eat. “Jisung was an innocent shy boy when you met him, your maternal instincts kicked in when you first saw him, so helped him out and get comfortable at the school and now you feel like you’ve raised him but now that he’s found a proper friend group you’re sad blah blah blah yes we get it.” Shocked and speechless at what Mee-yon just said, you shake your head looking down before resting your head on your arms placed on your knees while meeting their gaze, “Did I really sound like a pedo?” this time Kyung-Hu was the one to reply “yes you definitely did” nodding innocently while getting it to you straight. And with that final blow you hide your head in your crossed arms similar to a fetal position, accepting your defeat at their teasing.

As you hear your friends move on to a new topic you just keep your head down too tired to raise it and decide to take a mini nap to hopefully make up for the 3 hours of sleep you got the night before. It wasn’t like you and jisung falling off bothered you that much you actually rarely thought about it, but for some reason today you were bothered. I guess we were never really friends. I guess more like friendly acquaintances? What about the time we hung out after school or skipped class together, did that mean anything? You sighed letting go of the memories of jisung and started falling asleep unaware of the glances from the same person you were just thinking about. You dreamed about the day you two met, after getting too tired to run the whole way there, since the two of you were already late you decided to just walk the rest of the way to your classroom while in the school, to give Jisung a mini school tour. “You just transferred here right?” “yeah I used to live in Inseon” “so why’d you decide to move here and transfer just a week after school started?” “My mom got an unexpected promotion she couldn’t refuse so we had to move to Seoul, but you sure ask a lot of questions'' you remember him teasing you for that “Well do you blame me? I’m curious.” You catch him off guard by your retaliation, “so do you miss it?” asking another unexpected question that causes a change in mood after bringing up his old home. “Of course I do, I grew up there, I had friends there and I had memories” you turned around noticing his melancholy expression while reminiscing and looked at him with concern, feeling sorry for the boy who was just staring at the ceiling almost as if he was trying to find something that was not even there. He notices the silence and makes eye contact with you realizing he must’ve worried you. “Oh but it’s better this way!” He says happily to ease your obvious concern and you stare at the nervous boy, eyebrow raised not convinced by his sudden change of heart. You let it go and the two of you walked a little bit more in silence before stopping, well at least you stopped, Jisung was absent minded enough to not realize you had stopped walking and bumped into back, you instantly looked up and stared at the boy directly over you. Jisung as the shy boy he was, panics and steps back slightly red which causes you to chuckle at his innocent behaviour. “Well here we are room 215” but before jisung was able to walk into the classroom, you turn around and stop him holding out your palm showing the universal symbol to stop, before extending it as a handshake. “Before you hear it from anyone else, I'm y/n” while grinning from ear to ear and jisung grasps your hand and gives you a light handshake, “hi i’m park jisung” returning you the same enthusiasm through a smile. After holding each others hands a little longer than expected, you let go awkwardly and enter the rowdy classroom filled with talking, laughter and pure ruckus.

You didn't know one was capable of dreaming of a memory but you just did, and just as it was before, your nap was interrupted by noise, this time in the form of whispers, many whispers. You lift your head using your right hand to rub your eyes to adjust to the light and you meet eyes with the very boy you were dreaming about. “Jisung?” you ask with open eyes, confused and surprised. “O-oh hi y/n we meet here again” he answers, scratching the nape of his neck sheepishly. His friends beside him, snicker at his awkward response and continue laughing amongst each other mocking him, jisung notices this and pretends he’s about to hit them so they’d stop making you feel uncomfortable. He looks back at you even more embarrassed to explain his presence in front of you, “so-” “Why are you here, and where's kyung-hu and mee-yon” You notice that your two friends are nowhere to be found and you become more and more anxious being alone with practical strangers. “Funny you should mention that, they actually-” “We went to get some snacks!” Although kinda mad at them for leaving you alone, at least they showed up before this conversation could get any more awkward than it already was. Jisung feels quite relieved sparing him from the awkward exchange however his friends can’t get enough of his uncomfortableness bursting out in laughter when he was interrupted, not once but two times. Jisung and his friends move themselves to the tree beside you guys resting under the shade after mee-yoon and kyung-hu return back to their seats. After waiting until they were at a comfortable distance you start yell/whispering at your friends, “WHat the fuck guys you dont leave me alone with strangers!” “Oh don’t worry at least you finally talked to him instead of staring at him all day. Plus we needed to get enough snacks for all of us and we all know one person can’t carry all of that food. So please consider this strawberry milk as an apology.” Kyung-hu offers you the drink with Mee-yoon nodding her head in agreement. “Ugh I guess this was worth that horrible experience” you take your favourite drink after barely eating anything due to your lack of appetite.

The bell goes off and everyone starts to leave the field and head under the main building including you and your friends and since those two had a class together you took a different hallway hearing footsteps behind you before realizing the only person that could’ve been behind you was someone in your class, god please kill me now. And before the awkwardness kills you, you turn around and break the silence “hey thanks for watching me while I slept I understand my friends prolly asked you to do it as a favour and I really appreciate it” Jisung looks up after staring at his feet initially scared to stare in your direction. “No problem, i'm sorry that woke you up from your nap under that tree, it feels almost like deja vu” Both of you shyly laugh at his reference to your first encounter reminiscing the past memory. “Tell me park jisung why is it always you that must ruin my napping time? What have I done to deserve such cruelty.” Your exaggeration and choice of words managed to put a smile on his face and even a chuckle out of him. “Hey that's not my fault you’re obsessed with sleeping under that tree.” “But it’d be a waste not to, the weather this time of the year is just right, you can feel the heat but it's not overbearing it comforts you, it doesn’t require you to add layers nor remove any. We don’t need to change, not one bit. I can’t afford to take these moments for granted.” Jisung stares at your back taken aback by your sudden seriousness, not to mention the topic being the mere weather. Coincidentally the roles were now reversed, it was now Jisung that was perplexed by the change of mood similar to how you were a month ago. Although he could tell your words held more depth than they let on and decided not to speak on the matter moving on with the conversation. “But seriously no need to thank me after all I do kinda owe you for helping me out, plus you’re my friend, actually my first friend at this school” flashing you a smile which eases the awkwardness of your conversation. “Friend?” you widen your eyes at the title, unaware he saw you like that considering the limited time the two of you spent together. “Yeah that's what you call people you care about right?” your eyes follow his figure with a speechless expression on your face as he passes by you and walks ahead to go back to class, but just before he walks in he steps back to look back at you, “are you coming, friend?” before winking at you, emasked in the sunlight coming from the classroom, changing his eyes a lighter shade, before completely walking into the classroom. He leaves you baffled and blushing at his new found confidence and you are still processing what just happened, did he just wink at me? You shake your head trying to forget his words in hopes of calming your heart rate and enter your classroom sitting in your seat, on the other side of the class. Despite how much you try to hide your embarrassment, you just couldn’t hide how pink your ears were, same as jisung who might have put on a brave front, is slightly regretting and yet at the same time, proud of what he said. Both of you refusing to look anywhere else but down and especially not at each other, lost in your own thoughts but if the both of you had just looked at eachother even if it was just for a moment, you both would’ve found out something crucial about each other.

May: May does not only serve as the last stretch of spring but as a period of freedom. It enables the ability to be free enough to have dreams and independent enough to act on them.

Unlike the last two months you and jisung actually managed to talk more, although more doesn’t necessarily mean a lot but considering you and him have only shared a few meaningful conversations over the span of two months, your current relationship was a huge upgrade. Disregarding the occasional partner project or pairing in physical ed, in which you and jisung had always chosen each other considering both of your friends were in different classes, you’ve developed somewhat of a casual and low maintenance friendship, that didn’t need frequent conversations but had few but worthwhile moments, all of which were cherished by the both of you, as they reassembled the same serenity the two of you shared the first day you met each other. The moments you shared rarely felt forced and if they were, due to the immature pressures of both of your friend groups, the two of you had no trouble slipping into your own world. As naive as it sounds the friendship the two of you shared was purely platonic, no doubt there were moments of butterflies and heart racing however it only lasted just for a moment, quickly fading away. However someone you were interested in was the guy that helped you on your first day, although all that you knew about him was his name, yangyang.

You and your two friends approach the stands taking your seats to watch the soccer game hosted by your school after getting invited to sit beside jisung and a few of his friends to cheer on Jaemin, playing as a forward and Jeno, the goalie. As you look forward at the field and someone wearing the number 24 caught your eye. You found the haircut and build of number 24 familiar. You struggled trying to figure out just where you saw someone with similar features as 24, but it was only until he finally turned in your direction, getting a good look at his face. “That's him!” you accidentally stood up, hands covering your open mouth and jisung who was having a conversation with his best friend chenle, turned around to look at your stunned expression. “Hm? What happened?” You looked around embarrassed by drawing attention to yourself and sat back down awkwardly, leaning towards jisung who sat in the row in front of you to whisper, “do you know who number 24 is?” “Yeah that’s yangyang but what about him?” “Yeah I KNOW what his name is, but like who is he?” “I hope you realize how stupid you sound, but why are you asking me, I’M the new kid remember? Not the person who has been attending this school for the past two years.” Jisung raises his eyebrow to you confused as to why you don’t know who this guy was, expecting the both of you to have already met at least once. “So what you’re basically saying is that you got nothing?” “No I never said that, for your information yangyang is our age but he only transferred here last year from Germany. I guess he keeps himself lowkey, soccer is really his only extracurricular.” “bruh you should’ve just led with that, not with any of this new kid bs” “I think you meant to say thank you” Jisung gives you a deadpan look disappointed by your ungratefulness, you catch a glimpse of his face and laugh at how annoyed he is. Hoping not to make your friend upset, you lean in and stick out your tongue playfully in a teasing manner before flashing him your signature smile, “Thank you Jwi~”. Taken aback by his nickname (jwi means mouse in korean) along with the hint of aegyo in your voice, blood rises to his cheeks and to his ears but before you properly see it, he covers his face with his hands while looking down although his ears, like always, were giving him away.

But before you could tease him the announcer's voice filled the outdoor stadium, “Ladies and gentlemen the game between Seoul Highschool and Apgujeong Highschool is about to commence!” Suddenly you hear everyone in the stands start screaming yelling to the top of their lungs. “We will first introduce the starting lineup of the home team, starting with co-captains Na Jaemin and Lee Jeno!” You, jisung and both of your friends stand up and start cheering on the duo running onto the field, as you have become quite friendly with jisung and his friends so it was only fitting for you to support them. After their introduction you paid no attention to the remainder of the names until, “Now introducing number 24 yangyang!” Your head that was previously resting on your palm was raised after hearing that familiar name and you lean in trying to get a closer look at him before going beside jisungs ear. “Ya” Jisung, scared by the sudden noise, flinches back leaning on to chenle, who was too distracted talking to Renjun to notice his best friend but jisungs reaction does cause you to grin. Pointing at the smiling boy on the field, you say “Do you know what class he’s in?” “Oh him?” He takes a double check looking you up and down weirded out by your enthusiasm and interest in the soccer player. “Yes we were literally talking about him like 10 seconds ago” you rolling your eyes at his forgetfulness, you find it hard to believe he could be this oblivious knowing he was acting like this to tease you. “Yeah I know what class he’s in” you glare at the boy already knowing you’d have to do the most for him to finally spill the tea. “Uh would you like to tell meee?” you, not caring if you seemed desperate. “Lemme think, hmmm yeah no i'm good” “YAH PARK JISUNG'' you see his amused expression before coughing to regain your composure and trying another strategy “Can u please tell me~” you try to act as soft and cute as possible and although aegyo tears away at your soul, you know jisung couldn’t bare the sight of it. “STOP OH GOD” He tries to cover your face so he wouldn’t need to watch your aegyo any longer but you being determined, keep dodging him so he could see every cute action you’d do. “Please jisung~” “OKOK FINE JUST PLEASE STOP!” You quickly change your expression to a serious one which slightly scares jisung “so tell me what his classroom is” you say in a threatening tone while stabbing his ribs with your fingers causing him to flinch away, he sighs and slouches showing his surrender, caving into your antics, “fine it’s room 105” “Thank you! See that wasn’t so hard now was it?” You happily smile at him but you can see he obviously didn’t reciprocate the same feelings of joy and instead glaring at you. “Easy for you to say I have to bleach my eyes and tend to my wounds” Jisung cries out while holding the ribs you just stabbed, you roll your eyes yet again and scoff at his over exaggeration. “You’re such a kid.” “I'm legit older than you soo you’re the child here” him feeling proud at his comeback, looks up to catch your reaction but you’re pouting, hand crossed over your chest upset by the undeniable fact, which he finds kind of adorable. “Anyways why are you so interested in this guy anyways? Do you like him or something” jisung asks with his eyebrow raised while poking your leg suggesting that you do hold feelings for the boy, you feel your face become slightly hot by his suggestion. You swat his hand away and say, “N-no, the answer is no. How can I even like him, I hardly know anything about him. I’m just...” “you're just?” you start glaring him for interrupting your sentence and for teasing you. “I’m just interested” you finally end your sentence returning a playful wink to jisung just as he did a month ago. “Uh huh” Jisung says with a suspicious tone before turning around showing his back to you and properly watching his friends play in their first game of the season. Not satisfied with his answer you decide to talk a bit more, “what, can’t a girl be interested in a guy? I can’t just sit around dreaming about the day he approaches me, when I want something, whatever that may be, I go get it! Plus don’t you have anyone you’re interested in?” Still refusing to turn to you, you assumed he was just ignoring you, not paying attention to your question but jisung’s act backfired when you noticed his ears turn pink after hearing what you asked. “Heoll~, our jisungie has a crush?” (heol is korean slang for omg) you start shaking his shoulders out of excitement of this discovery. Still not looking at you, jisung puts his head in his hands to hide his embarrassment, amused by his timidness, you try to make him turn to you but he won't budging, unable to look at you to spare himself further embarrassment. In truth jisung didn’t have anyone he was interested in, so he was confusing himself but it was probably the question itself and the possibility of him having a crush that made him embarrassed, or at least that’s what he told himself. “Yaaaaa jisunggg tell me~” You say in a teasing voice but realizing your strategy wasn’t gonna make him turn your way, you smirk hoping that if anything were to get him to turn around it’d be this. So you start tickling him hoping he was even ticklish which fortunately he was, severely ticklish at that too. He starts to spasm due to the tickling laughing uncontrollably using his hands to block your hands and move away from your grasp. “YA STO-” turning around to yell at you, unaware at how close you got when trying to tickle him, he stops mid sentence finally realizing the lack of distance between the two of you. He takes a small gasp interrupting what he was going to say, speechless by the sudden eye contact, but it’s too late your eyes were already locked. “Ah there you are~” you say that in such a gentle tone that it was more of a whisper, inaudible to anyone besides you and jisung. Once again you guys find each other in the sunlight, which lights up both of your eyes making them seem as clear as honey, unaware of everyone standing up, cheering as yangyang just scored a goal. Both of you too lost in each other's eyes to notice anything else besides the smallest details in each other's iris’. However the gaze is suddenly broken when you look around and realize the cause of celebration, clueless to jisung's lingering gaze. “Oh my god look yangyang just scored a goal!” You tell the boy in front of you eyes glimmering with admiration, much to jisung's displeasure. Jisung was slightly upset at the soccer player who was the reason for breaking your eye contact, along with the fond expression brought to your face when looking at yangyang rather than himself. And although jisung might never admit it, deep down he’d wish for you to look at him like that even if it was just for a moment.

June: After months in the cold waiting for the arrival of summer, at last June has arrived. The month does not only represent a drastic change in temperature but in emotions as well, this month is when mere feelings can finally develop, for better or for worse.

“I like you” the words you hear coming out of your newest friend, whom you’ve become quite close to and bonded with over the past month. “Yangyang I-” “it’s okay you don’t have to answer, I just wanted to tell you” The boy says before winking and smiling at you with confidence. In the distance you could hear his friend Hendrey call out to him in a distance and you see him turn around to wave at his friend and turn back around, “anyways y/n I kind of need to go now, my friend is calling me” He says scratching the back of his neck, reminding you of another male friend of yours, using his thumb to point back to hendrey. He runs off to his friend, not forgetting to turn around, giving a cute wave before Hendrey wraps his arm around his shoulders walking off to who knows where. Now you’re left alone dumbfounded, behind the school building with a stunned expression, while physically you look as if your mind is blank your thoughts were far from that of panicking at your friends sudden confession. In retrospect you were kind of expecting this to happen as at some point considering your relationship was never just friends, you yourself started talking to him with slight romantic interests involved. Although it was, at least for you, a bit too soon. Still baffled by recent events you failed to notice the running footsteps of two boys come from behind you. “YA CHENLE GIVE THAT BACK!” You remain stuck in your headspace as both boys suddenly stop when they notice your strange figure and start whispering to themselves. “Yah isn't that y/n?” Chenle says to the jisung who steps closer to get a better look at you standing alone, he turns back to his friend “Uh yeah I think so?” There’s a second of silence as the boys try to figure out the odd circumstance, before Chenle says, “oh well HAVE FUN!” sticking out his tongue and running away while laughing uncontrollably hoping jisung doesn’t try to go after him after successfully figuring out his password and stealing his phone. “YA” jisung lets out a heavy sigh giving up trying to get his phone back and turning towards the dazed girl, shaking your shoulder a bit to get you out of your trance “Y/n?” “H-huh? Jisung? W-what're you doing here?” “I should ask you the same thing, I mean you're all alone out here” “Oh I was? I guess I didn't notice.” You shake your head trying to forget yangyang’s confession and bring yourself back to reality not noticing jisung turning his head to the side to hide the slight blush after seeing you in a confused state. Confused as to why he had suddenly spaced out looking in another direction, “Jisung?” You ask him while tilting your head cutely, an action jisung was still able to see in his peripheral vision which made him want to keep his head turned away even more. It was now you trying to get his attention so you smile realizing the irony of the situation,”Y-yeah?” “You wanna go to class now?” You say smiling before walking ahead of him with a slight skip in your step. “Yeah sure” you hear him say awkwardly following you to class. The two of you walked in silence from that moment on side by side, you taking a few glances to check up on him as he did with you and whenever you two did make eye contact you both gave each other a smile that although a bit awkward, was comforting in some way.

It was almost a week after yangyangs confession and since then you’ve fortunately managed to avoid him, still confused with what your answer, but it wasn’t whether or not you had feelings for him or not because you knew the boy could make you laugh, smile and give you butterflies at soon as you laid eyes on him, but you felt as if it was rushed. You considered it as only a crush than deep feelings for a committed relationship, simply put it was too early. And yet you knew you’d regret rejecting him because you didn’t want your relationship to end, rejecting him would risk losing, what would've been a perfect relationship due to your own indecisiveness. Ugh I hate feelings, you trying to decide your answer, was exactly what caused you to get lost during your late night walk you took to clear your head. Realizing that you’d been spacing out, you take a look at your surroundings and you had absolutely no idea where you were. “Oh shit” although what you could recognize is a neon sign at the end of the street that spelled out Convenience Store with a couple tables and seats at the front for eating. Feeling your stomach give a loud growl, you unlock your phone just to check if you have time to spare to eat some ramen, before your mom yells at you for staying out too late, 9:00 only? “OK! Lets go!” you celebrate to yourself, pumping a fist in the air before skipping towards the store and greeting the cashier. While you run your finger through the shelfs scanning the inventory trying to find your favourite ramen, “cheese ramen, cheese ramen, cheese ramen” All of a sudden you hear the door of the store open due the iconic bell and you hear a voice, a male voice greet the cashier as well, “Good evening~” FUCK! You instantly recognize the voice cursing inwardly at the chances you’d bump into him at a convenience store of all places. You immediately move to the next aisle, away from the entrance praying that he wouldn’t see you hiding behind the end of the aisle. “This literally cannot be happening to me” “What can’t be happening to you?” you let out a shriek, jumping back startled to hear ANOTHER voice. Please don't be him, please don't be him, you open your eyes that were shut due to fright, to look up at the stranger that just scared you “J-jisung?” “Yeah who else?” You wonder why you didn’t recognize his voice initially but you see his confident grin while looking at your distressed state, it somehow pleased him to see you like this. “So you gonna answer my question or are you gonna keep on staring at me?” Realizing you must look completely crazy, you fix your posture to look at jisung straight in the eye, “none of your business.” And you walk away from the boy taking your former spot using the aisle to block anyone’s view of you. You occasionally peek your head out just to check on the whereabouts of the mystery boy and jisung takes notes of this, standing behind you, hovering like the giant he is. He chuckles at your childishness, “who are you hiding from?” He asks out loud not caring if anyone heard him, you panic quickly putting your hand over his mouth to shut him up. “Jheez can u be any louder? Plus did I not make it clear, none. of. your. business.” Jisung pouts at you before licking the inside of your hand causing you to let go of him and give him a look of a disgust while you try to wipe his saliva off your hand with your sweater, but all he does is flash you a playful smile satisfied with your reaction. You roll your eyes at jisungs shenanigans and turn around to continue your spying seeing that the boy stayed by the cashier examining the gums and candies. Jisung follows your gaze tryna figure out just who you’re so afraid of before realizing who it was and his smile then turned into a thin line. “Him?” “Ya what do you mean him? That's yangyang!” You hit jisung offended by his reaction to your crush. Jisung flinches pretending that your hit actually hurt, “yeah did I stutter?” you ignore what jisung just said, too focused on predicting the movements of yangyang, maybe focusing too hard that just when you thought he was going to leave without noticing you, you two accidentally make eye contact and you quickly hide behind the aisle hoping he didn't see you. With your chest going up and down, you struggle to control your heart rate placing your hand on your chest to hopefully help lower it down. Jisung widens his eyes seeing you so flustered, “why what happened?” he looks at you, concerned thinking you’re having a heart attack. “He saw me” you slide down now sitting on the floor with your legs folded in front of you while you hide your face in your hands breathing into them, trying to calm yourself down. “What am I gonna do, what am I gonna do” you continually repeat those words slightly scaring jisung in the process, although after seeing you in this condition he realized he needed to help in some way. “Okok just stay here” patting your head before walking off leaving you to curl up on your own. Jisung walks down the aisle that yangyang just saw you in, already meeting face to face with the boy that had walked in your direction trying to check if it was really you or a hallucination. He stops when he sees jisung, taking a step back confused as to why he’d see him there of all places, “Jisun-” “Oh hey Yangyang funny seeing you here, isn’t it a bit late tho? Based on what jeno and jaemin were talking about I swear you guys have soccer practice in the morning tomorrow at 6, no?” Jisung interrupted yangyang, rambling on about a made up soccer practice, jisung thought of on the spot, while putting his arm around the clueless boy's shoulders pushing him until they made it out of the store and before yangyang could process what was happening. “O-oh they never told me we had practice” “oh well good thing you heard it from me, tho you might wanna double check just in case, ok?” “y-yeah ok, but wait-'' but before jisung could hear his question concerning you, and then be forced to answer it he turned around and walked away allowing the convenience store door to shut thus ending their interaction, leaving yangyang completely dumbfounded as to how he ended up outside of the store instead of inside looking for you. Jisung gives a sigh of relief upon returning to the scared figure on the ground in front of him, “It’s okay now” you hear those comforting words escape his mouth and you lift up your head to look up at him, “is he gone now?” Suddenly, jisung feels heat rise to his cheeks when looking down at your curled up body, resembling a scared child and somehow your question triggered a protective instinct in jisung, who felt the need to protect you from all the things wrong in the world well at least all the things that you couldn’t protect your own self from. Finally calming down after your nervous breakdown you stand up wiping away the dust on your clothes before turning to jisung with a smile on your face, “Now let's go eat some ramen!”

Both of you walk out of the convenience store after finding your cheese ramen and his spicy one, cooking it using the hot water at the store. You both sit down on one of the tables in front of the store met with a cool breeze that cooled the two of you down a bit from the summer heat. After taking a few bites and many loud slurps from the ramen, the two of you take your time to chew creating a moment of silence so jisung turns to you, “so you wanna tell me what happened in there?” You feel obligated to give him an explanation especially after how he helped you out, swallowing your food you lay your chopsticks down and explain to him the situation of yangyang confessing to you and you being nervous and confused. “Heol, yangyang actually likes you? Whaa” You throw a piece of your trash at him offended by his question, “Ya what do you mean actually liked me, what is their not to like” you say while flipping your hair back confidently, “Mhm you keep telling yourself that” his comeback slightly surprising you but you stop there not trying to take anymore insulting comments. “Ok but I was really nervous back there, if I wasn't so antisocial or if I actually understood my feelings then maybe yangyang and I would’ve already been dating and doing whatever couples do.” Thinking about the possibilities you pout and shove a bunch of noodles in your mouth to chew angrily, showing just how stressed out you were. Jisung lets out a laugh which earns a glare from you after being charmed by your inexperience and instead of making fun of your fantasies with yangyang, he empathizes with your situation thinking of a mature answer to help you out. “Do you seriously think anyone understands themselves? Because they don’t. People may put on a convincing facade but trust me when I tell you everyone is just as confused as you are. We’re teenagers for god sakes, we’re supposed to be going through this. You may not know what you want now, but in the future you will and how are you ever gonna figure it out unless you try? I have no idea what you’re feeling right now but I do know it’d be a waste to push those feelings aside because you’re scared. You’re the only thing stopping yourself and for whatever the reason is to why you're scared, whether that be getting hurt or getting embarrassed, just know it's natural and what’s meant to happen will happen but only if you allow it to.” In awe of jisungs words and yet curious as to how he developed all that wisdom. You stare at him, trying to read his face trying to understand what he was thinking. Instead you notice the soft glow of the neon sign on his features, his hair and face slightly lit up. You soften your expression while examining the details of the boy in front of you, who’s sitting with a slight slouch while spacing out, looking down at his ramen that makes you giggle inwardly because it looks like he’s glaring at his own food. You notice just how innocent and vulnerable he looks, and yet on the contrary you are unable to understand his thoughts now matter how you try. You find yourself spotting traits about jisung that you never realized before, like the glimmer in his eye or the sound of his sniffle while eating hot noodles, or how his cheeks puff out in the slightest and his hands inter cross when trying to focus. Even if he was sitting right across from her, he felt beyond reach and in the perspective you found jisung in, he was what they call picture perfect. If only I could just read his mind, even if it was just for a moment. However you stop yourself from staring at your friend for any longer and look down to take in his words, the same words that caught you off guard. You take a minute to absorb jisungs advice and just as quickly as yangyang said those three words to you, three words of the same nature slip out of your mouth, delivering the long awaited answer you were trying so hard to figure out, “I like yangyang.”

If you were able to read this far, I love you~

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flightsoffandom · 4 years

Text

The Victim

(The Sitter Part 3)

Pairs: Aaron Hotchner x Reader

Words: 1050

Summary: Its that time of year again. Five years ago your life was changed forever.

Warnings: Mentions of family death (Reader’s)

Notes: Left completely gender-neutral. Collab Series I am doing with the ever amazing @dr-reid-ismyspiritanimal If you are interested in being tagged in the future parts of this comment on this or send me an ask. Anything that is bold and italicized like so is a flashback.

Continuation of The Sitter: Part 1–Part 2--Part 3*

5 years ago:

You were laying in bed reading when Sammy crept into your room. “Hey bean, what’s wrong?” You asked, putting your book to the side.

“I can’t sleep y/n, I heard scary noises.” Sammy replied.

“Come here,” you said scooting over and patting the bed beside you, “you can sleep in here tonight. You don’t have to be afraid of anything because I’ll protect you, okay?”

“Promise?”

“Forever.” You turned the lamp beside your bed off and put an arm around them.

Present Day:

The next morning you woke up and watched Sammy sleep for a little bit before shaking them awake.

“Good morning Bean. Happy 7th Birthday!”

“Thanks y/n,” Sammy smiled, “let’s go downstairs!”

“Alright, bean let’s go.”

Of course your mom had made the special meal that day. That last time she would ever cook it.

As you slowly ate you noticed flowers had been placed on each of the graves. You must have missed them in your fog of melancholy. It wasn't too unusual. Sometimes people would put flowers on empty graves as a way to show the less visited tombstones some care.You did take care of them whenever you visited but you didn't visit as often as you would have liked. You decided to take a look at them when you had finished eating. You wiped off the face of all three stone plaques, cleaning them up a little. Then you reached down and picked up the first bouquet of flowers off of Sammy’s grave. Once you had them in your hand you noticed a card attached. You had never seen a card on anonymous flowers before. Flipping the card over in your hand so you could see the writing. All it read was ‘To: The One That Got Away.’

You had hidden Sammy’s gift at your friend’s house to make sure they wouldn’t find it. It was something they had been asking for for months.

“I’m going to go pick up Bean‘s present,” You told your family after lunch. “I’ll be back in 45 minutes.”

“Okay honey, see you soon.” Your mom said, kissing the top of your head.

“Drive safe, love you.” Your dad called out to you.

“I will! Love you too!”

“I’m back!” You called in a sing-song voice as you opened the door.

“Sorry I’m late. Traffic.” You set the package inside and closed the door before walking into the living room. As soon as you were in the doorway, you let out a blood curdling scream.

“Sammy! Mom! Dad! What happened?” You yelled frantically as you dialed 911 and ran over to Sammy.

You knew what you had to do. You picked up the phone and dialed, “Aaron, hey, sorry for the late notice,” you inhaled deeply, hating what you were doing “I can’t watch Jack anymore.”

Continuation of The Sitter: Part 1–Part 2--Part 3*

Tags: @shrimpyblog @hommoturttle @winterscaptain @jovialtimetravelgladiator @lex-is-a-shipper

#Criminal Minds #aaron hotchner x reader #gender neutral #Criminal Minds Fanfiction #gender neutral reader #hotch x reader #reader insert #slow burn #series #aaron hotchner #fanfiction #fanfic #collab #TheSitterCollab

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pandamancer11 · 3 years

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Neo: Trouble Brewing - Chapter 1

Hey everybody! I write stuff, and I was told to put stuff up here sometimes. So here is one of my stuff. Here’s a chapter out of my cyberpunk mystery book, Neo: Trouble Brewing.

Missed the previous chapter? Find it here!

Following a quick rinse in the locker room’s shower, Cybil donned her uniform. Black pants, white button-up dress shirt with the first couple of buttons left undone, and sleeves rolled down to the cuffs, but kept on her black combat boots. While not within regulation, the Captain never seemed to have an issue with a couple of exceptions from the standard dress in the rule book.

Tucking her wet hair behind her ears, she popped open the bottom compartment of her locker and withdrew her regulation forearm-mounted police computer off of its charging port. She snapped the white and chunky looking bracer over her left forearm arm and clicked the blinking digital screen to life.

She heard a ping in her head as her Internal Cerebral Processor’s, ICP’s, operating system of choice, Sae, successfully paired with the equipment. The cool blue screen affixed inside the bracer exploded with new information, which Sae read aloud within Cybil’s head. ‘Good morning, officer Lane’ Stated Sae. ‘You have: 524 unread emails, 54 missed calls, 50 unheard voicemails,-’

“Delete all messages from Operator Harper,” Cybil ordered

‘Deleted’ The AI responded, ‘You now have: 12 unread emails, 45 missed ca-’

“Delete all messages from Mother.”

‘Deleted. You now have 5 unread emails, 2 missed calls and 1 voicemail.’

“That sounds about right.” Reaching for the door to close her locker, Cybil caught the movement of her image in the full-length mirror mounted inside the flimsy metal door. Though she stood only slightly under typical height for a woman her age, she still felt like a little kid playing dress-up in her father’s clothes.

But it was abundantly clear the person looking back at her wasn’t that innocent girl anymore. Despite her generously applied eye shadow and mascara, the bags under her eyes were still plainly visible. Her nose and ear piercings hardly detracted from the superficial scars on her right cheek from smashing into that mirror. If she looked closely enough, she could still spot the place a shard of glass had pierced her lip.

Though the scars and worry lines were hardly the worst of it. The woman looking at her from the other side of the thin glass made her cringe. All she could see was regret and disdain. No one detail was the source of her shame, it was the whole thing.

She could remember how not that long ago, a bunch of random barflies would hit on her when she still frequented that sort of scene. How they would compliment her figure, and how several particularly drunk individuals would feel brave enough to cop a feel. Of course, Cybil was sure that her body was the last thing that particular hand would feel after she was done with them. Even still, she never saw what the creeps did.

She spotted her pod, 9B, float up behind her in the reflection. Its blank gray rectangular face stared back at her in the mirror and rattled off a series of monotone beeps and boops. Sae translated the mess in real-time, ‘Officer Lane to report for duty in five minutes’. Cursing her wandering mind under her breath, Cybil quickly snatched her sidearm from its compartment, slammed the locker door shut, and sprinted full speed up the stairs.

“Jesus, Lane.” A building of a man with brilliant ebony skin stood in the archway of the precinct’s bullpen. His tree trunk arms interlocked neatly behind him and his sharp elbows jetted out from under his rolled-up pinstripe shirt. The fluorescent light from above cast a shadow over the lines in his face and the sockets of his eyes. A bright glare gleamed off of his polished bald head.

“Another minute and your flawless attendance record would have been compromised.” His voice boomed off the hallowed hallway walls. “What the hell do you have to say for yourself?”

Cybil confidently crossed her arms and picked at her teeth with her pinky nail. “Let’s just say... you’re lucky I showed up at all, Cap.” She met his volcanic fury with an equally level, uninhibited, dismissive attitude.

He lowered himself to her level, his leathery face scrunched in anger just inches away from hers. “You’re a loose cannon, Lane. You know what I do to punks who don’t like to follow the rules?”

Cybil propped her hands on her hips and met his glare. “What might that be, Cap?” A little voice deep in her head prayed she hadn’t bet all her money on a lame horse with her casual attitude toward her superior.

The Captain leaned even closer - so close that she could feel his hot breath on her nose. “I give little piss-ants like you-” He suddenly leapt backward and produced, with a flourish, a serving tray filled with steaming donuts.

“A fresh donut from the bakery next door!” He shouted gleefully.

***

So I’m sure not to clog up any feeds, I have the rest of the chapter here!

#cyberpunk #cyberpunkstyle #cyberpunkaesthetic #cyberpunk oc #neo #female protagonist #scifibooks

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96thdayofrage · 3 years

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Chris Hedges: The Price of Conscience

Drone warfare whistleblower sentenced to 45 months in prison for telling the American people the truth.

Daniel Hale, a former intelligence analyst in the drone program for the Air Force who as a private contractor in 2013 leaked some 17 classified documents about drone strikes to the press, was sentenced today to 45 months in prison.

The documents, published by The Intercept on October 15, 2015, exposed that between January 2012 and February 2013, US special operations airstrikes killed more than 200 people. Of those, only 35 were the intended targets. For one five-month period of the operation, according to the documents, nearly 90 percent of the people killed in airstrikes were not the intended targets. The civilian dead, usually innocent bystanders, were routinely classified as “enemies killed in action.”

The Justice Department coerced Hale, who was deployed to Afghanistan in 2012, on March 31 to plead guilty to one count of violating the Espionage Act, a law passed in 1917 designed to prosecute those who passed on state secrets to a hostile power, not those who expose to the public government lies and crimes. Hale admitted as part of the plea deal to “retention and transmission of national security information” and leaking 11 classified documents to a journalist. If he had refused the plea deal, he could have spent 50 years in prison.

Hale, in a handwritten letter to Judge Liam O’Grady on July 18, explained why he leaked classified information, writing that the drone attacks and the war in Afghanistan “had little to do with preventing terror from coming into the United States and a lot more to do with protecting the profits of weapons manufacturers and so-called defense contractors.”

At the top of the ten-page letter Hale quoted US Navy Admiral Gene LaRocque, speaking to a reporter in 1995: “We now kill people without ever seeing them. Now you push a button thousands of miles away … Since it’s all done by remote control, there’s no remorse … and then we come home in triumph.”

“In my capacity as a signals intelligence analyst stationed at Bagram Airbase, I was made to track down the geographic location of handset cellphone devices believed to be in the possession of so-called enemy combatants,” Hale explained to the judge. “To accomplish this mission required access to a complex chain of globe-spanning satellites capable of maintaining an unbroken connection with remotely piloted aircraft, commonly referred to as drones. Once a steady connection is made and a targeted cell phone device is acquired, an imagery analyst in the U.S., in coordination with a drone pilot and camera operator, would take over using information I provided to surveil everything that occurred within the drone’s field of vision. This was done, most often, to document the day-to-day lives of suspected militants. Sometimes, under the right conditions, an attempt at capture would be made. Other times, a decision to strike and kill them where they stood would be weighed.”

He recalled the first time he witnessed a drone strike, a few days after he arrived in Afghanistan.

“Early that morning, before dawn, a group of men had gathered together in the mountain ranges of Patika province around a campfire carrying weapons and brewing tea,” he wrote. “That they carried weapons with them would not have been considered out of the ordinary in the place I grew up, much less within the virtually lawless tribal territories outside the control of the Afghan authorities. Except that among them was a suspected member of the Taliban, given away by the targeted cell phone device in his pocket. As for the remaining individuals, to be armed, of military age, and sitting in the presence of an alleged enemy combatant was enough evidence to place them under suspicion as well. Despite having peacefully assembled, posing no threat, the fate of the now tea drinking men had all but been fulfilled. I could only look on as I sat by and watched through a computer monitor when a sudden, terrifying flurry of hellfire missiles came crashing down, splattering, purple-colored crystal guts on the side of the morning mountain.”

This was his first experience with “scenes of graphic violence carried out from the cold comfort of a computer chair.” There would be many more.

“Not a day goes by that I don’t question the justification for my actions,” he wrote. “By the rules of engagement, it may have been permissible for me to have helped to kill those men — whose language I did not speak, customs I did not understand, and crimes I could not identify — in the gruesome manner that I did. Watch them die. But how could it be considered honorable of me to continuously have laid in wait for the next opportunity to kill unsuspecting persons, who, more often than not, are posing no danger to me or any other person at the time. Never mind honorable, how could it be that any thinking person continued to believe that it was necessary for the protection of the United States of America to be in Afghanistan and killing people, not one of whom present was responsible for the September 11th attacks on our nation. Notwithstanding, in 2012, a full year after the demise of Osama bin Laden in Pakistan, I was a part of killing misguided young men who were but mere children on the day of 9/11.”

He and other service members were confronted with the privatization of war where “contract mercenaries outnumbered uniform wearing soldiers 2 to 1 and earned as much as 10 times their salary.”

“Meanwhile, it did not matter whether it was, as I had seen, an Afghan farmer blown in half, yet miraculously conscious and pointlessly trying to scoop his insides off the ground, or whether it was an American flag-draped coffin lowered into Arlington National Cemetery to the sound of a 21-gun salute,” he wrote. “Bang, bang, bang. Both served to justify the easy flow of capital at the cost of blood — theirs and ours. When I think about this, I am grief-stricken and ashamed of myself for the things I’ve done to support it.”

He described to the judge “the most harrowing day of my life” that took place a few months into his deployment “when a routine surveillance mission turned into disaster.”

“For weeks we had been tracking the movements of a ring of car bomb manufacturers living around Jalalabad,” he wrote. “Car bombs directed at US bases had become an increasingly frequent and deadly problem that summer, so much effort was put into stopping them. It was a windy and clouded afternoon when one of the suspects had been discovered headed eastbound, driving at a high rate of speed. This alarmed my superiors who believe he might be attempting to escape across the border into Pakistan.”

Now, whenever I encounter an individual who thinks that drone warfare is justified and reliably keeps America safe, I remember that time and ask myself how could I possibly continue to believe that I am a good person, deserving of my life and the right to pursue happiness.

— Daniel Hale, of learning about children killed by indiscriminate US drone attacks he participated in.

“A drone strike was our only chance and already it began lining up to take the shot,” he continued. “But the less advanced predator drone found it difficult to see through clouds and compete against strong headwinds. The single payload MQ-1 failed to connect with its target, instead missing by a few meters. The vehicle, damaged, but still driveable, continued on ahead after narrowly avoiding destruction. Eventually, once the concern of another incoming missile subsided, the driver stopped, got out of the car, and checked himself as though he could not believe he was still alive. Out of the passenger side came a woman wearing an unmistakable burka. As astounding as it was to have just learned there had been a woman, possibly his wife, there with the man we intended to kill moments ago, I did not have the chance to see what happened next before the drone diverted its camera when she began frantically to pull out something from the back of the car.”

He learned a few days later from his commanding officer what next took place.

“There indeed had been the suspect’s wife with him in the car,” he wrote. “And in the back were their two young daughters, ages 5 and 3 years old. A cadre of Afghan soldiers were sent to investigate where the car had stopped the following day. It was there they found them placed in the dumpster nearby. The eldest was found dead due to unspecified wounds caused by shrapnel that pierced her body. Her younger sister was alive but severely dehydrated. As my commanding officer relayed this information to us, she seemed to express disgust, not for the fact that we had errantly fired on a man and his family, having killed one of his daughters; but for the suspected bomb maker having ordered his wife to dump the bodies of their daughters in the trash, so that the two of them could more quickly escape across the border. Now, whenever I encounter an individual who thinks that drone warfare is justified and reliably keeps America safe, I remember that time and ask myself how could I possibly continue to believe that I am a good person, deserving of my life and the right to pursue happiness.”

“One year later, at a farewell gathering for those of us who would soon be leaving military service, I sat alone, transfixed by the television, while others reminisced together,” he continued. “On television was breaking news of the president giving his first public remarks about the policy surrounding the use of drone technology in warfare. His remarks were made to reassure the public of reports scrutinizing the death of civilians in drone strikes and the targeting of American citizens. The president said that a high standard of ‘near certainty’ needed to be met in order to ensure that no civilians were present. But from what I knew, of the instances where civilians plausibly could have been present, those killed were nearly always designated enemies killed in action unless proven otherwise. Nonetheless, I continued to heed his words as the president went on to explain how a drone could be used to eliminate someone who posed an ‘imminent threat’ to the United States. Using the analogy of taking out a sniper, with his sights set on an unassuming crowd of people, the president likened the use of drones to prevent a would-be terrorist from carrying out his evil plot. But, as I understood it to be, the unassuming crowd had been those who lived in fear and the terror of drones in their skies and the sniper in this scenario had been me. I came to believe that the policy of drone assassination was being used to mislead the public that it keeps us safe, and when I finally left the military, still processing what I’d been a part of, I began to speak out, believing my participation in the drone program to have been deeply wrong.”

Hale threw himself into anti-war activism when he left the military, speaking out about the indiscriminate killing of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of noncombatants, including children in drone strikes. He took part in a peace conference held in Washington, D.C. in November 2013. The Yemeni Fazil bin Ali Jaber spoke at the conference about the drone strike that killed his brother, Salem bin Ali Jaber, and their cousin Waleed. Waleed was a policeman. Salem was an Imam who was an outspoken critic of the armed attacks carried out by radical jihadists.

“One day in August 2012, local members of Al Qaeda traveling through Fazil’s village in a car spotted Salem in the shade, pulled up towards him, and beckoned him to come over and speak to them,” Hale wrote. “Not one to miss an opportunity to evangelize to the youth, Salem proceeded cautiously with Waleed by his side. Fazil and other villagers began looking on from afar. Farther still was an ever present reaper drone looking too.”

“As Fazil recounted what happened next, I felt myself transported back in time to where I had been on that day, 2012,” Hale told the judge. “Unbeknownst to Fazil and those of his village at the time was that they had not been the only watching Salem approach the jihadist in the car. From Afghanistan, I and everyone on duty paused their work to witness the carnage that was about to unfold. At the press of a button from thousands of miles away, two hellfire missiles screeched out of the sky, followed by two more. Showing no signs of remorse, I, and those around me, clapped and cheered triumphantly. In front of a speechless auditorium, Fazil wept.”

A week after the conference Hale was offered a job as a government contractor. Desperate for money and steady employment, hoping to go to college, he took the job, which paid $ 80,000 a year. But by then he was disgusted by the drone program.

“For a long time, I was uncomfortable with myself over the thought of taking advantage of my military background to land a cushy desk job,” he wrote. “During that time, I was still processing what I had been through, and I was starting to wonder if I was contributing again to the problem of money and war by accepting to return as a defense contractor. Worse was my growing apprehension that everyone around me was also taking part in a collective delusion and denial that was used to justify our exorbitant salaries, for comparatively easy labor. The thing I feared most at the time was the temptation not to question it.”

“Then it came to be that one day after work I stuck around to socialize with a pair of co-workers whose talented work I had come to greatly admire,” he wrote. “They made me feel welcomed, and I was happy to have earned their approval. But then, to my dismay, our brand-new friendship took an unexpectedly dark turn. They elected that we should take a moment and view together some archived footage of past drone strikes. Such bonding ceremonies around a computer to watch so-called “war porn” had not been new to me. I partook in them all the time while deployed to Afghanistan. But on that day, years after the fact, my new friends gaped and sneered, just as my old one’s had, at the sight of faceless men in the final moments of their lives. I sat by watching too; said nothing and felt my heart breaking into pieces.”

“Your Honor,” Hale wrote to the judge, “the truest truism that I’ve come to understand about the nature of war is that war is trauma. I believe that any person either called-upon or coerced to participate in war against their fellow man is promised to be exposed to some form of trauma. In that way, no soldier blessed to have returned home from war does so uninjured. The crux of PTSD is that it is a moral conundrum that afflicts invisible wounds on the psyche of a person made to burden the weight of experience after surviving a traumatic event. How PTSD manifests depends on the circumstances of the event. So how is the drone operator to process this? The victorious rifleman, unquestioningly remorseful, at least keeps his honor intact by having faced off against his enemy on the battlefield. The determined fighter pilot has the luxury of not having to witness the gruesome aftermath. But what possibly could I have done to cope with the undeniable cruelties that I perpetuated?”

“My conscience, once held at bay, came roaring back to life,” he wrote. “At first, I tried to ignore it. Wishing instead that someone, better placed than I, should come along to take this cup from me. But this too was folly. Left to decide whether to act, I only could do that which I ought to do before God and my own conscience. The answer came to me, that to stop the cycle of violence, I ought to sacrifice my own life and not that of another person. So, I contacted an investigative reporter, with whom I had had an established prior relationship, and told him that I had something the American people needed to know.”

Hale, who has admitted to being suicidal and depressed, said in the letter he, like many veterans, struggles with the crippling effects of post-traumatic stress disorder, aggravated by an impoverished and turbulent childhood.

“Depression is a constant,” he told the judge. “Though stress, particularly stress caused by war, can manifest itself at different times and in different ways. The tell-tale signs of a person afflicted by PTSD and depression can often be outwardly observed and are practically universally recognizable. Hard lines about the face and jaw. Eyes, once bright and wide, now deep-set, and fearful. And an inexplicably sudden loss of interest in things that used to spark joy. These are the noticeable changes in my demeanor marked by those who knew me before and after military service. To say that the period of my life spent serving in the United States Air Force had an impression on me would be an understatement. It is more accurate to say that it irreversibly transformed my identity as an American. Having forever altered the thread of my life’s story, weaved into the fabric of our nation’s history.”

Feature photo | People carry the shrouded casket of a villager killed by a US drone attack on the Afghanistan border in Bannu. Ijaz Muhammad | AP

Chris Hedges is a Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist who was a foreign correspondent for fifteen years for The New York Times, where he served as the Middle East Bureau Chief and Balkan Bureau Chief for the paper. He previously worked overseas for The Dallas Morning News, The Christian Science Monitor, and NPR. He is the host of the Emmy Award-nominated RT America show On Contact.

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yesdramas · 4 years

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have been tagged by @gangtaes, @cuddlybitch and @mercurialhigh thank you sweeties! ♥

1. What is the color of your hairbrush? black, but it’s not a hair brush it’s a hair comb

2. Name a food you never eat. beans

3. Are you typically too warm or too cold? too cold for the summer

4. What were you doing 45 minutes ago? writing a fucking giant letter to my friend saying that i really miss talking to him and that i screw things up really hard this time

5. What’s your favorite candy bar? i don’t have any faves on this, i eat it all lol

6. Have you ever been to a professional sports game? i guess football?? but i dont quite remember.

7. What is the last thing you said out loud? "fuck this” while overthinking

8. What is your favourite ice cream? cream.

9. What was the last thing you had to drink? water!

10. Do you like your wallet? well it’s kinda pretty but has been empty for a while now...

11. What is the last thing you ate? i dont even remember this lol i keep skipping meals its been 4 days or something

12. Did you buy any new clothes last weekend? yes, i bought a few stuff from SHEIN while crying and overthinking, i guess i spend money to be okay

13. What’s the last sporting event you watched? i dont even remember what i did yesterday, this is hard af

14. What is your favorite flavor of popcorn? dont eat popcorn since i put on my braces 3 years ago so yeah... i dont like it

15. Who is the last person you sent a text message to? another friend of mine saying that i sent my friend a reall big text

16. Ever been camping? never

17. Do you take vitamins? not anymore

18. Do you regularly attend a place of worship? nope

19. Do you have a tan? never.... sadly im so white i kinda shine like Edward Cullen in the sun

20. Do you prefer chinese or pizza? it depends on my mood

21. Do you drink your soda through a straw? only if i feel like putting the soda on my milkshake cup with the straw on it

22. What color socks do you usually wear? i dont use socks at home but i ever get to leave my house with sneakers i’d rather use white or plain black

23. Do you ever drive above the speed limit? i’m a 26yo woman with no license

24. What terrifies you? death. losing someone. and losing someone because of some shit i did. that’s the worse

25. Look to your left, what do you see? my wall

26. What chore do you hate most? washing dishes<<<<

27. What do you think of when you hear an Australian accent? cute

28. What’s your favorite soda? pepsi

29. Do you go in a fast food place or just hit the drive thru? right now i just call and they deliver to me

30. What’s your favorite number? its hard to think a fave number but i’d say i like the amount of money i have in my bank account right now: 16

31. Who’s the last person you talked to? a friend

32. Favorite meat? chicken!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

33. Last song you listened to? dejate llevar by juan magan

34. Last book you read? not even remember this one

35. Favorite day of the week? saturday

36. Can you say the alphabet backwards? i can try if im drunk maybe

37. How do you like your coffee? cold with cold milk also

38. Favorite pair of shoes? a 15cm high heels i used to work with

39. Time you normally get up? im unemployed rn so i dont have any right time to get up, it can be morning or evening....

40. What do you prefer, sunrise or sunsets? sunsets

41. How many blankets on your bed? 1. its kinda hot these days

42. Describe your kitchen plates - red wine color with a little bit of transparency

43. Describe your kitchen at the moment. a hot mess because i keep leaving my dishes to my mom to wash next morning

44. Do you have a favorite alcoholic drink? tropical gin.

45. Do you play cards? uno

46. What color is your car? i dont have a car, sadlyy

47. Can you change a tire? i can’t even change me, not to mention a tire

48. Your favorite state or province? i dont visit any place or go to any travels so im just gonna answer with my state, Sao Paulo

49. Favorite job you’ve had? in 2013 i worked at the theaters. most amazing job ever. they didn’t pay well enough tho, but i watched tons of films and got a lot of friends (that one by one forgot me)

I feel like everyone has been tagged already so please, do if you’re comfortable and wants to do it. ♥

#tag meme #thank you #this was really hard to answer please excuse my english

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honestlyfragile · 4 years

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Undertake Pt. 2 - Lee Minho • Lee Know

Originally posted on Ao3 as: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23861383/chapters/57579304

Pairing: Lee Know x Female Reader

Genre: angst

Tw: NSFW, cheating, smoking, showing of anxiety

Who was the first to take the bait?

Part 1 | Part2

A/n: thank you so much for the anticipation and love that you have given this story. This was my first fic of this genre so it was a great challenge to write! But i hope you all enjoy it ❤️

Minho starts his day normally and attends university, he has not contacted you for a few days ever since he walked out and you wonder why.

The truth is, Minho has been losing his mind over it. But the only thing that keeps him going is his god forsaken pride. He never likes being called a loser, it wasn’t in his vocabulary. He doesn’t know what to do, but is determined to continue and go on with whatever is happening with his life right now.

He parks his car and the moment he gets out, he receives a look that he has never gotten before.

Disgust.

How did he know it was that kind of look? Because he cares so much about his image and what people think. He knows what he wants and what he doesn’t. His tongue rolls in his inner cheek and he raises his eyebrows in confusion. “The fuck was that for” he whispers to himself and locks his car, throws his keys in his pocket and tries to shrug it off.

The closer he gets to the sea of people in the campus, the more he gets of that unfamiliar look. He pulls out his phone to call none other than Chan, asking where he was. The two agree to meet in a certain place, but it meant that Minho had to go through all those looks alone, which made him very uneasy. The fact that he’s guilty about something adds up to his anxiety, but it was beyond what he could imagine. It was something that he doubted people would know, not now.

He hides both of his hands in the pockets of his jeans and continues to walk across them while he sucks in his cheeks and bites it on the inside, his breathing is heavy. His palms turn cold and sweaty despite them being in his pocket, and breaks a small sweat on his forehead. His anxiety was going up the roof and he had to be with Chan right this instant.

Minho finally arrives at the place where Chan had asked him to go, and felt a rush of relief the moment he saw him from a few meters away. He takes his hands out of his pocket and reaches Chan for a hug. His friend immediately felt his fast heartbeat, which shows that it had been challenging for Minho to arrive at their meeting place, which was the rooftop.

“What’s going on, Chan?” Minho runs a hand through his hair and leans on a cemented post, trying to pace his breathing. Chan knew that the reason behind Minho’s heavy breathing wasn't because he was tired, it was because he was anxious.

Chan bites his lip and seethes some air in between his teeth and finally speaks, “They know, Minho. All of them” he shows him a picture of you and Minho kissing in front of your apartment door.Chan immediately prepares himself for Minho’s response.

Minho covers his mouth and punches the wall that he was leaning on, his legs growing weak and giving up on him. There were no other words to put it, Chan knew that he would instantly get what he was talking about. But how?

“What do you mean.” Minho says trying to contain himself, because he knew he couldn’t scream.

“You know what I mean. You wouldn’t want to hear me describe it, you know that.” Chan says firmly, looking at his helpless friend.

Minho buries his face in his hands, tears forming due to the built-up anger towards himself and the situation, Chan lowers himself to help him stand up.

“Please, help me. Help me cover this up Chan I’ll do anything you want. I’ll get you a new car if you want.” He holds both of Chan’s wrists,“Just, please.” Minho says all at once, practically begging Chan to save him from the mess he stirred up on his own.

Chan lets out a deep sigh, “It’s already overdue. Do you really think people wouldn’t find out sooner or later? I’m sorry man I’m out of this. But don’t worry, I won’t make it worse. I’ll keep quiet, that’s all I can do for you.” and with that, Chan was off for his class and left Minho on his own.

Minho later then composes himself. He gets up and brushes the dust off his pants, “You can do this. You’re alright.” he says to himself and takes deep breaths. He fixes his shuffled hair back to the way it was this morning, and wipes his tears that were formed out of anger. He was going to get to the bottom of this. “There’s no time to be a fucking coward now.” He knew he was on his own.

One of the first things that came to mind was Mi Yeon. He had prepared himself to put up an act that it was a mistake, that it was your fault. Because Minho only cares about himself, and not one bit about how you would feel when he throws you under the bus.

He dials up Mi Yeon and paces back and forth as he waits for her to pick up.

“Yes?” She hums on the other line, like usual.

“Baby, where are you? Can we talk?” Minho innocently asks.

“I’m on free cut. The professor didn’t show up, but i’ll be staying at the library. You want me to wait for you there?”

“Yes, please i’ll be on my way.” Minho ends the call and is surprised that Mi Yeon didn’t go ape shit on him, he assumes that she probably doesn’t know about it yet.

Once again Minho prepares to give a cold face to everyone who gives him looks, enough for him to hold until he gets to the library.

“Minho, over here.” Mi Yeon says in a whisper, hoping to not disturb the few students who were also in the library. He nods and heads over to her who had saved a seat for him.

He purses his lips for a moment, thinking of how he could start this terrifying conversation. “Do you know?” he asks, barely looking her in the eyes.

“Hm?” She seems to be unbothered, which was awfully strange. Or is she doing it so that Minho can say it on his own? Mi Yeon knew him too well, he liked other people finishing his sentences off for him.

“Me.. and..” Minho hesitates to say your name.

“And?” She taunts him, she wants to make him finish it.

“Y/n…” He says barely in a whisper.

“Ah, that.” Mi Yeon grabs her pen and pretends to chew on it a little. “Yeah, It’s nothing right?” She raises her eyebrows and continues to write down some notes from her lecture book.

Minho is taken by surprise by how calm she was, “Of course! It was nothing, it was just a stupid dare from a friend. From Chan.” Minho hastily chose his words, even dragging his friend into it.

“Chan? He knew her? Hm, interesting, I didn't think you guys had a common friend, she tells me that she doesn’t really know who you are. I guess she easily forgets.” Mi Yeon casually shrugs.

Minho knew what he said was wrong, dragging Chan into all this when all he did was protect him. Mi Yeon has been acting incredibly strange and calm, Minho didn’t have the best feeling about it but he let it go. How much further can he take his lies when he’s already single-handedly giving himself away?

“Do you have anything else to say? Aren’t you late for your class?” Mi Yeon says, seeming like she was in a hurry to send him away.

“Oh, um yeah that’s all. I’ll get going I guess.” He awkwardly stands up and leans forward to kiss her hair.

“See ya” Mi Yeon smiles and sends him off. ______________

Chan receives a call from an unknown number but answers it anyways.

“Chan?” The familiar voice rang.

“Mi Yeon ssi?” He says, unsure.

“Yes, it’s me. Are you free this evening?” She asks out of the blue.

Chan hesitates, he has always been casual with her, but he wouldn’t really consider her as a friend. “Uhm, not that I know of. Why?”

“Nothing much, I just wanted to treat you for a meal. Exams are coming up and I know you’re very diligent in your studies…” She trails off.

“Oh, well sure! I’m in. Where do I meet you? My class ends at around 5:45.” Chan finally agrees.

“Alright, meet me at the school parking after you get out of class. You know my car right? I’ll wait for you.” Mi Yeon smiles through the phone and ends the call.

As soon as the call was dropped, Chan wanted to text Minho about it, but he decided not to. Because his friend might get the wrong idea, it was just a harmless meal.

His classes for the day finally end and he heads over to where he was going to meet Mi Yeon. He spots her on her phone while leaning on her car and calls out her name. “Mi Yeon ssi!” He waves and her head perks up. She slides her phone back into her pocket and greets Chan.

“Lets go?” Mi Yeon says as she unlocks her car.

“Are you sure you wanna drive? I mean-” she cuts him off and insists.

“It’s alright.” She smiles.

Chan nods and goes to the passenger seat and buckles his seat belt, so does she. Chan looks around the car and out the window, trying to eliminate the awkwardness between them . “Nice ride.” He compliments. Mi Yeon chuckles and drives off.

The car ride was quiet for a few minutes. He had left it to Mi Yeon to decide where she would take him to eat. Until moments later, he notices that she had driven off into an unfamiliar road.

“Wah, is this a shortcut I’ve never been-” again, she cuts him off. But in a different way this time.

“You know what i hate the most?” Mi Yeon says, her eyes on the road and her hands tightly gripping the steering wheel.

Chan gulps and stirs lightly in his seat. “Are you alright?”

“People who cheat. And people who enable their friends to do so.” She says, ignoring Chan’s question. She chuckles, gradually picking up the speed of her driving. Chan’s eyes grow big and he gulps. He carefully tries to check the lock of the door until he discovers it’s on child lock.

“Mi Yeon listen, we can talk about it okay? Please slow down.” Chan tries to stay as calm as possible because Mi Yeon, was not.

“God, I just want all of them to disappear!” She shouts and steps on the gas even more, driving beyond 100 miles per hour. Chan was terrified, he didn’t expect her to be like this. She had always been bubbly and kind.

“Mi Yeon please please calm down, pull over for a while and let’s talk about it.” Chan tries to convince her but she doesn’t listen.

He pulls out his phone and Mi Yeon notices it, “Don’t even think about it.” She threatens him. Which had left him with no choice but to obey her. He was scared as hell.

Chan had become dizzy as moments were passing by, he couldn’t convince her to pull over and he had no idea where they were. “Mi Yeon please, my head hurts. I’m feeling nauseous. Please pull over.” He pleads.

“You think I care? You’re just as bad as he is.” Mi Yeon shakes her head. A few moments later, she steps on the brakes very abruptly, making Chan hit his head against the headrest. “Get out.” Mi Yeon says, and his breathing is heavy.

He looked around and there was nothing to see, he didn’t know where he was, and unable to hold it in, he threw up on his seat, making a mess of himself.

“I said, get out! Don’t make a mess in my car you fucking turd. You kept telling me to pull over, here we are. So get out. Don’t ever involve yourself with him anymore or else this isn’t the only thing that you’re getting.” She jeopardizes him, leaving him with no choice.

He immediately takes off his seatbelt and gets out of the car to throw up some more, they were in the middle of an empty expressway with no rescue points. Before Chan could even look at the car again, Mi Yeon had left him in the middle of nowhere.

________

Minho thinks of a person who could have possibly spread all this and he stops dead in his tracks when he remembers the conversation that he and Chan a few weeks ago.

“watch your back. Stop treating your side chick like shit or else telling your girlfriend is the first thing on her list.” Chan casually shrugs his shoulders.

There was only one thing to do. Minho was mad and desperate, and he had to have someone to blame, it was you.

He rushes over to his car and immediately heads to your apartment, not scared of being caught because in his thoughts, it could have only been you who had done such a thing.

He arrives and aggressively knocks on your door, rather, banging it with his fists.

You get up from your couch hurriedly as you were startled with the noise and peak through the peephole. “What the fu-“ you say, but before you even finish, he throws himself right in.

“You fucking bitch! How crazy do you have to be to start shit with me? What the fuck do you want?” He shouts at you and pushes his palm against your shoulder, making you fall back slightly.

“The fuck? I was going to ask you the same thing. I didn’t fucking do it!” You raise both of your hands in defense, because you really didn’t.

“Stop lying to me, If you didn’t do it then why did you make friends with Mi Yeon?” He asks, his veins popping out of his neck and the color red flushes out of his skin.

“Who are you to tell me who i should be friends with? Our friendship has nothing to do with you! You always think that everything I do has something to do with you!” You press your fingers on his chest. “You think the world is gonna stop spinning if it doesn’t,” she taps her finger once, “Include you.” Then twice.

Minho grabs your wrist and throws your hand away from his chest, he could not think of anything to say. “Fuck you.” He says, his breath seething in anger and leaves.

Once again Minho’s ego was thrown off a cliff and he hated it so much. He gets into his car and lets out a scream and hits his head against his steering wheel multiple times. “Fuck fuck fuck!” He hits his car horn and makes a fuss in the peaceful neighborhood, and lights up a cigarette.

He speeds off to god knows where, and you were left at home wondering who could have done such a thing when you had tried to be so discreet about it.

You go to your kitchen and get yourself a glass of water for your throat that has gone painfully dry. You start to breathe heavily and your heartbeat sped up. You honestly thought Mi Yeon was a good friend, you never had the intention to ruin your friendship because of Minho. In fact, he shouldn’t have been in the picture. He was nobody.

But you couldn't help it, you felt so guilty and knew that Mi Yeon deserved to hear something from you. You finish your glass of water and rushed to grab your coat and decided to head to her flat.

You anxiously wait for a cab and once you are able to catch one, you immediately tell the driver her address.

“Thank you.” You say to the driver and pay, quickly getting out of the vehicle.

You enter the lobby and register your name and head to the elevator. You bite your nails out of nervousness and try to pace your breathing. Your mind was blank and honestly didn’t know what to say to her, all you could think of was apologizing.

You arrive at her floor and head to her unit, your hands shake as you try to ring the doorbell.

And fair enough, she answers the door. “___, what are you doing here? Come in.” She says in a concerned manner. Which confused you because you expected her to yank your hair, or like throw you off the floor. Anything but this.

You break at the sight of her, you drop to the floor and kneel in front of her, your forehead touching her feet. You start to sob. “Mi Yeon, I’m so so so sorry.” You manage to choke out.

Mi Yeon chuckles. “I can’t believe it worked.” She says and crosses her arms.

You raise your head, your tear stained face looking up at her. What does she mean?

“What worked?” You asked. You were so lost.

“You took the bait.” She shakes her head in disbelief, still managing to laugh in an absurd manner.

“It was you? You spread it? Y-you knew?” You say trying to stand up and wipe your tears. You couldn’t believe what was happening right now. “But why? Why did you-“

“Because I knew at least one of you would break.” She smirks and jerks her head to the side. As if she knew someone would be coming.

1, 2, 3. He barges into her apartment.

“I'm surprised you took longer than her, coward.” Mi Yeon says to a mess of a person who was Minho.

—-end—-

35 notes · View notes

brynnmck · 4 years

Text

Tagged by @agirlnamedkeith, @pretty--thief, and @samirant, thank you! <333

What is the colour of your hairbrush? Mostly black, with a green ring on it.

Name a food you never eat: I have quite a few foods I can’t eat anymore thanks to some random health issues I developed a few years back (friends, aging is great from a mental/emotional perspective, Not Great from a physical perspective) but in terms of voluntary stuff, green peppers. I’ve outgrown a lot of my childhood food dislikes but that one is in my SOUL.

Are you typically too warm or too cold? Too cold, definitely.

What were you doing 45 minutes ago? I was in a boring meeting!

What’s your favourite candy bar? Probably Snickers? I really like 100 Grand too, though. And Butterfinger. And Twix. And I want Claire Saffitz to make all of them for me.

Have you ever been to a professional sports game? I’ve been going to Major League baseball games since I was a kid (it was my dad’s favorite sport), and the past few years, I’ve been to 20-30 games a season. I usually go for my birthday, too, which is in a couple of weeks, and it’s just kinda sinking in that there will be no birthday baseball for me this year. :(

What was the last thing you said out loud? Just saying hi to my husband.

What is your favourite ice cream? Coffee Heath Bar Crunch. I can’t have caffeine anymore so this summer I’m gonna try to make a decaf version for myself. (WHY IS ALMOST ALL COFFEE ICE CREAM CAFFEINATED. There are so many reasons people can’t have caffeine! Sigh.)

What was the last thing you had to drink? Water!

Do you like your wallet? Sure? It’s a nice blue and it holds my stuff.

What was the last thing you ate? Fruit and Greek yogurt for breakfast.

Did you buy any new clothes last weekend? I didn’t! I actually ordered a couple of soft bras from TomboyX on Monday, but nothing on the weekend.

What’s the last sporting event you watched? A replay of an old Mariners game a couple of nights ago. If we’re talking live sports, I watched about half of a Korean baseball league game a few nights back, which was delightful.

What is your favourite flavour of popcorn? Butter!

Who is the last person you sent a text message to? @ajoblotofjunk

Ever go camping? Not in a long time. My husband has been getting the urge to go lately, though, so maybe we will!

Do you take vitamins? I take supplements due to the aforementioned health issues. And vitamin B.

Do you go to church every Sunday? Lol no. My mother is very Catholic and she brought us to 6 am Mass every weekday when I was a kid. It was well-intentioned (her dad had a pretty volatile temperament and she always felt safe at church, so she subconsciously wanted us to feel the same way) but it did not sell me on the experience! Heh.

Do you have a tan? I live in the Seattle area and it’s May, so... lol no. I’m also pretty pale so I don’t get that tan anyway, but. I usually get a little something going in the summer, enough to have tan lines anyway.

Do you prefer Chinese food or pizza? Tough call, but I’m going with pizza.

Do you drink your soda through a straw? I don’t drink soda anymore (though I drink a LOT of carbonated water), but I’ll drink my drink through a straw if I get it at a fast-food place. Otherwise I don’t usually use one.

What colour socks do you usually wear? Most of my winter socks for work are black. Otherwise it’s a pretty random selection of colors.

Do you ever drive above the speed limit? Sure. Usually 5-10 miles over, rarely more (or less) than that.

What terrifies you? Climate change. Global pandemics. You know. Just generally suffering (both mine and other people’s).

Look to your left. What do you see? Through window of the room I’m sitting in: my neighbors’ house, and a cherry tree in their yard.

What chore do you hate most? Cleaning the bathrooms.

What do you think of when you hear an Australian accent? The hot Australian woman who’s been on Gold Rush recently, or a dear fannish friend of mine I haven’t talked to in years who is actually from New Zealand and I KNOW IT’S VERY DIFFERENT but it’s close enough to make me think of her!

What’s your favourite soda? I used to drink a lot of Diet Mountain Dew. I really miss ginger beer, too. I love a good spicy ginger beer. Root beer too.

Do you go in a fast food place or just hit the drive-thru? Drive-thru all the way. Isn’t that part of the advantage of fast food?

What’s your favourite number? I don’t really have one!

Who’s the last person you talked to? My husband!

Favourite cut of beef? Boneless ribeye. I finally bought a propane grill a couple of years back and I have now learned to make a badass steak, if I say so myself.

Last song you listened to? Eve 6 - Inside Out. A few months ago I suddenly remembered that this song existed and so I bought it and now I have to listen to it at least twice every time it comes up, ha.

Last book you read? An as-yet-unpublished Rose Lerner novel, because I am very lucky! (It’s a wlw Gothic. SUCH A GOOD CONCEPT.)

Favourite day of the week? Saturday

Can you say the alphabet backwards? In this economy??? Idk, I could probably figure it out, but it would definitely be work.

How do you like your coffee? I love a caramel macchiato, especially iced so you get those weird globules of caramel coming up through the straw. But a nonfat decaf double latte with a little bit of some kind of syrup is my go-to these days--hot when it’s cold out, iced when it’s warm out.

Favourite pair of shoes? I have these 40s-ish heels that tie over your instep with a little bow and I love them. I also have some extremely cool red velvet with black cording peep-toe Louboutins that I bought off some discount site years ago, except I can’t wear them for long because they’re about a half size too small. But they’re SO PRETTY.

Time you normally get up? In isolation, I’m discovering that my natural sleep schedule is about 2 am - 10 am. But I have a daily meeting at 9:30, and I try to get my workout done before that, so I get up at 8-8:30ish. I am discovering through this meme that SO MANY of you are morning people! What is that like???

Sunrises or sunsets? I love sunrises but I am not remotely a morning person, so. I see a lot more sunsets, and I love them too!

How many blankets are on your bed? Just one duvet.

Describe your kitchen plates. We have some with blue perimeters and kind of a white/oatmeal middle that we inherited from my in-laws, and the ones we actually bought on purpose are white on top and either sage-y green or charcoal black on the bottom.

Describe your kitchen at the moment. Somewhat messy, or at least there are dishes to do. I made some pretty epic cauliflower mushroom risotto with shrimp last night, though, so it was for a good cause.

Do you have a favourite alcoholic drink? Perfect Manhattans with rye are my go-to, or a Quebecois, which is basically a perfect Manhattan with a little bit of maraschino liqueur added (and ideally a lemon twist, though we’re usually too lazy for those). In the summer, I’m getting really into gin these days: either gin and tonic, gin and some kind of citrus spiked seltzer, or a Last Word. I also really love a good craft beer, and sparkling wine too.

Do you play cards? Not really. We used to play a shit ton of gin rummy in high school, but I haven’t really played cards much since.

What colour is your car? Blue!

Do you know how to change a tire? Theoretically yes, though the one time I actually tried to do it myself, I had a hell of a time getting the lug nuts off. I was fortunately in my driveway at the time (good place for a flat tire!) and my neighbors kept coming by and offering to help, and I was like NO I WANNA DO IT. I think I did need help eventually, though. Stupid pneumatic tools at tire installation places!

Your favourite state? That rare, usually-brief phase of writing where everything seems to fit and flow and you’re a genius and you understand all the secrets of the cosmos. Also Washington.

Favourite job you’ve had? My current one. It’s not my dream job, but it pays well and I like my team and I get to learn new stuff fairly often and I can work from home in the midst of all this, so. I am very lucky!

How did you get your biggest scar? The summer after my freshman year of college, I was part of a summer stock theatre troupe, and we performed half the summer at my college, and half the summer in a very small town in eastern Oregon that had an outdoor stage. One of my entrances involved running over the grass to get to the stage, and one night the grass was wet, and my costume involved ballet slippers, and I slipped and fell onto the stage stairs in front of the whole audience. It hurt SO MUCH that I got very light-headed onstage while I was trying to get through the scene, lol. Anyway, my costume also involved harem pants that had elastic around the calf/ankle area, and I got a friction burn from those, which ended up scarring because the skin over your shins is very thin! (I also got a few massive bruises on my leg that didn’t go away for weeks, so eventually my mom nagged me into going to the doctor, who promptly started gently hinting to see if my boyfriend at the time was responsible for the injuries. Which was actually pretty cool of the doctor! But then I was like, lol no, trust me, a hundred people saw me bite it, this is 100% dumbass mistake.) And that’s my scar story.

Tagging, if you want to do it: @ajoblotofjunk, @snowymary, @halcyon-red, @it-may-be-dull-but-im-determined, @unadulteratedkr, and anyone else who feels like doing this!

#meme me

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basscannonjack · 4 years

Note

1-100 SPEED RUN

Ama. How could you do this to me

1: when you have cereal, do you have more milk than cereal or more cereal than milk?

Lactose intolerant, only eat cereal dry

2: do you like the feeling of cold air on your cheeks on a wintery day?

yes, but not for too long

3: what random objects do you use to bookmark your books?

i just try to remember lmao

4: how do you take your coffee/tea?

don’t like coffee, drink tea plain or with some sugar

5: are you self-conscious of your smile?

not as much as I used to be!

6: do you keep plants?

I have one (1) cactus that I haven’t killed in the 9 years I’ve had it

7: do you name your plants?

sometimes!

8: what artistic medium do you use to express your feelings?

music or writing

9: do you like singing/humming to yourself?

ALWAYS

10: do you sleep on your back, side, or stomach?

I generally fall asleep on my stomach and wake up on my back

11: what's an inner joke you have with your friends?

I HAVE YOU NOW

12: what's your favorite planet?

Neptune, probably!

13: what's something that made you smile today?

my SON asking me ALL THE QUESTIONS

14: if you were to live with your best friend in an old flat in a big city, what would it look like?

oh god, probably a bit of a mess

15: go google a weird space fact and tell us what it is!

the ISS was launched on the day of my birth, so it’s been in space *literally* my entire life

16: what's your favorite pasta dish?

just plain ol’ chicken alfredo

17: what color do you really want to dye your hair?

keeping it silver baybeee

18: tell us about something dumb/funny you did that has since gone down in history between you and your friends and is always brought up.

oh man, there are so many, but i’ll go with the time that Roman got coke to fizz through my nose by making me laugh too hard

19: do you keep a journal? what do you write/draw/ in it?

no journal, only very similar looking notebooks to doodle and write in

20: what's your favorite eye color?

hazel!

21: talk about your favorite bag, the one that's been to hell and back with you and that you love to pieces.

my Bag of Holding! snapped the clasp on it a few years back though

22: are you a morning person?

not at all!

23: what's your favorite thing to do on lazy days where you have 0 obligations?

SLEEP

24: is there someone out there you would trust with every single one of your secrets?

Ashe, of course

25: what's the weirdest place you've ever broken into?

I had to break into my own safe at my old job, does that count?

26: what are the shoes you've had for forever and wear with every single outfit?

I’d say my boots, but I just got a new set, so the older ones

27: what's your favorite bubblegum flavor?

Spearmint or wintergreen

28: sunrise or sunset?

Sunrise

29: what's something really cute that one of your friends does and is totally endearing?

I just love seeing my friends blush

30: think of it: have you ever been truly scared?

yes, I won’t go into detail

31: what is your opinion of socks? do you like wearing weird socks? do you sleep with socks? do you confine yourself to white sock hell? really, just talk about socks.

SOCKS SOCKS SOCKS I used to collect weird socks, now I just have a bunch of fun dress socks lmao

32: tell us a story of something that happened to you after 3AM when you were with friends.

driving everyone home at 4 am and seeing other people on the road and going “you should be in bed!” at them

33: what's your fave pastry?

lemon meringue pie

34: tell us about the stuffed animal you kept as a kid. what is it called? what does it look like? do you still keep it?

Teddy a winnie the pooh bear that I still have!

35: do you like stationary and pretty pens and so on? do you use them often?

I adore new pens

36: which band's sound would fit your mood right now?

uhhhh I’ve been listening to a lot of Rise Against and ABBA lmao

37: do you like keeping your room messy or clean?

messy

38: tell us about your pet peeves!

nearly anything my brother does

39: what color do you wear the most?

black or blue

40: think of a piece of jewelry you own: what's it's story? does it have any meaning to you?

my claddagh ring from my grandmother, i don’t have much else from her

41: what's the last book you remember really, really loving?

not the last book but there was one about a girl having a single dragon finger that I remember reading so many times that I unfortunately don’t know the name of, or the Tamora Pierce Lioness series

42: do you have a favorite coffee shop? describe it!

Don’t like coffee!

43: who was the last person you gazed at the stars with?

James <3

44: when was the last time you remember feeling completely serene and at peace with everything?

I do not :’)

45: do you trust your instincts a lot?

not as much as I probably should

46: tell us the worst pun you can think of.

I’ve been changing my username to a different halloween themed pun for all of October, I’m all burnt out

47: what food do you think should be banned from the universe?

Balut, it icks me out

48: what was your biggest fear as a kid? is it the same today?

heights, and yes :’)

49: do you like buying CDs and records? what was the last one you bought?

I got a record player fairly recently, I have some P!atD ones, Foo Fighters, and Imagine Dragons

50: what's an odd thing you collect?

rocks

51: think of a person. what song do you associate with them?

Bitch by Meredith Brooks for my eldest sister

52: what are your favorite memes of the year so far?

the ones we’ve made in our server

53: have you ever watched the rocky horror picture show? heathers? beetlejuice? pulp fiction? what do you think of them?

all of the above except Pulp Fiction, I’m not really a movie person but I *am* a musical person

54: who's the last person you saw with a true look of sadness on their face?

my dad

55: what's the most dramatic thing you've ever done to prove a point?

Cotton Eyed Joe in six inch heels

56: what are some things you find endearing in people?

honesty and passion in an interest

57: go listen to bohemian rhapsody. how did it make you feel? did you dramatically reenact the lyrics?

I just vibe and belt, y’know

58: who's the wine mom and who's the vodka aunt in your group of friends? why?

can they both be me

59: what's your favorite myth?

the soup with a rock in it!

60: do you like poetry? what are some of your faves?

Where the Sidewalk Ends was always a good one

61: what's the stupidest gift you've ever given? the stupidest one you've ever received?

a coffee cup drinking horn for my dad, and some painted rocks from my brother

62: do you drink juice in the morning? which kind?

it would be apple juice if I did

63: are you fussy about your books and music? do you keep them meticulously organized or kinda leave them be?

not at all

64: what color is the sky where you are right now?

greyish, the sun is just about to rise

65: is there anyone you haven't seen in a long time who you'd love to hang out with?

My eldest sister

66: what would your ideal flower crown look like?

ROSES

67: how do gloomy days where the sky is dark and the world is misty make you feel?

give them to me, I love them

68: what's winter like where you live?

COLD

69: what are your favorite board games?

Monopoly and LIFE

70: have you ever used a ouija board?

no thanks

71: what's your favorite kind of tea?

raspberry or orange for fruit and mint

72: are you a person who needs to note everything down or else you'll forget it?

no, but I do write things down anyways

73: what are some of your worst habits?

I lose things all the time

74: describe a good friend of yours without using their name or gendered pronouns.

STARDUST SOULMATE

75: tell us about your pets!

I have a Min Pin named Lily

76: is there anything you should be doing right now but aren't?

Sleeping

77: pink or yellow lemonade?

pink

78: are you in the minion hateclub or fanclub?

*insert ick emoji*

79: what's one of the cutest things someone has ever done for you?

decorated my band locker to celebrate my birthday

80: what color are your bedroom walls? did you choose that color? if so, why?

beige, but I hung up a bunch of posters!

81: describe one of your friend's eyes using the most abstract imagery you can think of.

when the sun hits very rich dirt where a tree used to be

82: are/were you good in school?

best in class in math with a 101.8 but I also rarely did homework so uh

83: what's some of your favorite album art?

Too Weird To Live, Too Rare To Die

84: are you planning on getting tattoos? which ones?

Dragon on the shoulder blade, roses on the left arm, Exalt on the right

85: do you read comics? what are your faves?

webcomics! Barbarous, currently

86: do you like concept albums? which ones?

:? not sure what that means

87: what are some movies you think everyone should watch at least once in their lives?

TREASURE PLANET

88: are there any artistic movements you particularly enjoy?

nope!

89: are you close to your parents?

my dad!

90: talk about your one of your favorite cities.

don’t really have a favorite, in all honesty

91: where do you plan on traveling this year?

I was supposed to go see Ashe for their birthday but maybe next year!

92: are you a person who drowns their pasta in cheese or a person who barely sprinkles a pinch?

CHEESE CHEESE CHEESE

93: what's the hairstyle you wear the most?

uhhh it’s usually short enough to do nothing lmao

94: who was the last person you know to have a birthday?

I have a friend’s bday tomorrow!

95: what are your plans for this weekend?

WORK

96: do you install your computer updates really quickly or do you procrastinate on them a lot?

bit of both

97: myer briggs type, zodiac sign, and hogwarts house?

INTP, Scorpio, Ravenclaw

98: when's the last time you went hiking? did you enjoy it?

last year? maybe the one before? I did! but my heart didn’t

99: list some songs that resonate to your soul whenever you hear them.

How Far We’ve Come, Matchbox Twenty

The Call, Backstreet Boys

I2I, from the Goofy Movie Soundtrack (lmao)

100: if you were presented with two buttons, one that allows you to go 5 years into the past, the other 5 years into the future, which one would you press? why?

the future! I’ve had my time in the past, no changing it now

#ama i love and care about you so much darlin'#but this pains me #my dear sunchild

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