#he's just stuck in his pond until the next storm so he's bored and wants stories

[salamispots]

slams froggy fists on table (frog thor voice): ANOTHER

[notyourdayrdream]

Tan Hands and Tan Lines

Day Three, Side A: Ubiquitous

(read it here on AO3)

Nobody wants to spend their summer vacation working. But spending it with your two best friends wasn’t too bad. So when Mercedes told Rachel and Kurt that there were two openings at the retro fifties diner in downtown Lima, they jumped on the opportunity.

Diner in the Sky started out as a relatively slow job. It had just opened a few months ago and the word hadn’t gotten out to much of the city that it even existed. In those early days, Kurt and his friends spent the afternoons and nights singing through the empty store, twirling on black and white checkered floors. Finn and some of the other New Directions would stop by before the sunset and order milkshakes with fries. He and Rachel would not-so-mysteriously disappear for five or so minutes, and Kurt noticed the way Mercedes and Sam giggled around each other. He eventually cornered her during a graveyard shift, and she admitted that they had been dating in secret since prom. It took two days for Mercedes to win Kurt back, after buying him the new Marc Jacobs piece he had been dreaming about.

It was a cute job with even cuter outfits. Until July fourth came around.

The mayor of Lima stopped by that night and made a big show of it all, forever putting the little diner on the map. The appearance knocked out every ubiquitous fast food joint in town. It’s been packed every night since.

“I need a number five without onions!” Kurt hears Rachel scream into the kitchen, followed by the clanging of a few plates. She storms out a minute later, hair sticking to the sweat on her face.

“I hate this job,” she grumbles to him as she makes her way to another table of hungry customers.

Kurt leans his body weight against the counter. The metal is cool against his skin, a nice distraction from the oppressive summer heat. The bar isn’t nearly as packed tonight as the rest of the restaurant, mostly just little kids ordering heart attack inducing malts and ice cream cones. He’s adjusting the stupid rectangle shaped hat on his hat when he hears the door jingle at nine o’clock on the dot.

Blaine Anderson strolls into the diner with his little private smile, pulling his usual denim jacket off as he goes. He’s humming again, a pop song Kurt notices. Probably Katy Perry. He overheard Blaine tell Rachel she was his most listened to artist last week. Not that he was listening to hear if his name came up in conversation or anything like that. That would be crazy.

They meet eyes for a brief second, hazel to blue. Blaine grins before sliding onto one of the red leather barstools. “Hell again?” His cheeks are flushed pink, but Kurt blames it on the heat.

“Yeah,” Kurt replies, sounding breathier than usual. Blaine has a way of doing that to him. With his funny quirks and ability to make restaurant issued bowties sexy, the Dalton Academy junior has snuck his way into Kurt’s heart from the second he started working with him.

There’s a particularly loud crash in the corner of the building, followed by a baby screaming. Blaine takes a moment to sober himself, eyelashes fanning out on the apple of his cheeks. “I better get to work. I mean, I should get to work.” He’s flailing, adorably so. “I mean, I should check that out.” Blaine stumbles. The back of his neck is red as he walks away.

“Remind me again why you won’t ask him out?” Mercedes says with a poke to Kurt’s shoulder. Her hair is still intact, textured curls bouncing at her shoulders. The only way you’d know she had been working was the ketchup colored stains on her baby blue dress and apron. “He’s obviously into you.”

Kurt’s thought about it so many times, and the answer is that he doesn’t know. Competing schools wasn’t an excuse, it was summer. Besides, the Warblers had been so gracious in their loss at Regionals that they invited the New Directions over for coffee at the Lima Bean.

Truth is, he was scared. He’s never had a boyfriend, let alone asked a boy out or even told one they were handsome. This is still Ohio, and being out and proud has its consequences. He knows Blaine is gay at least, so his crushing isn’t creepy.

It sort of terrifies him to care about someone so deeply. When Blaine came in with red rimmed eyes after his fifteen minute break one night in the middle of June, Kurt sat with him as he ranted about how awful his dad was. He’s the only friend Kurt has that likes to watch old black and white movies for fun. Blaine makes him laugh so hard he cries, and everytime he brushes past Kurt during the busy nights, the spot tingles for until he gets home.

Kurt sighs. “I don’t know.” He rests his head against the edge of the soda machine. “Crushes are so damned difficult.” Mercedes hums in sympathy.

“It’ll work out, boo. Even if Rachel and I have to force the two of you to close together like last time.” He can feel her laugh beside him, and soon he’s laughing too. That was a good night.

“Kurt! ‘Cedes!” Rachel all but screams, turning a few heads. After knowing the girl for two years, he’s convinced she only has two settings: Loud and Louder.

Her face is bright pink and there’s a deep crease between her brows. She’s got her Business Face on. “What’re you two doing? This large party just came in, and you guys are just sitting here! A little help would be appreciated!” She huffs, pumps tapping against the floor as she walks to the back at a dizzying speed.

Kurt and Mercedes share an eye roll before going opposite ways. The party Rachel was talking about is huge, five adults and three kids under ten years old. After finding a table large enough so they’d all be comfortable, he pulls out a notepad and asks what drinks he can get them started with.

An older woman starts speaking in rapid fire Italian, gesturing to the rest of the group, who nod in return. Kurt instantly regrets taking up French instead of literally any other language.

“I’m so sorry,” he says, hoping they could understand. “I don’t understand what you’re saying.”

A younger man with a beard cocks his head and speaks in an incredibly thick accent. How a family of Italians decided to spend a summer in boring Ohio confuses him. “Could we get another waiter?” He stutters through the sentence, and Kurt feels bad to inconvenience them.

There’s a familiar tingle on his left shoulder. “I can help them,” Blaine whispers, side-stepping him to get closer to the table. He says something to the family, who grin back at him. He has that effect on people.

“You speak Italian?” Kurt hisses. This guy is just full of surprises.

Blaine puts his head down and smiles. He shrugs like everyone in America is fluent in the romantic language. “I spent a few summers in southern Italy with my grandmother when I was younger.” Because of course he did.

“Oh,” Kurt offers lamely. “Okay, well tell them I’m really sorry for any inconvenience.”

Blaine smirks at him and turns to the table. He says something to them, laughing afterwards. Kurt watches behind him, amazed at the way Blaine can make anyone feel so important. Not to mention Italian is such a hot language to hear coming out of his mouth.

A kid who can’t be above twelve pipes up, pointing back to Kurt. The rest of the family looks back at him too.

Kurt pulls at the edge of his crisp button down. They’re looking back and forth between him and Blaine, unnerving him beyond belief. He feels called out and exposed even though he has no idea what’s being said about him. So he just returns a wavering smile and turns to leave and prepares to never show his face again when he hears it.

Amore.

That stops him in his tracks. Love? Kurt’s no language expert, but the word is pretty universal in every one of them. He turns around to ask Blaine for a translation, but to his surprise he’s gone uncharacteristically silent.

Blaine eventually stammers through a reply, hands stuck stiffly at his sides. Kurt hears him murmur, “I’ll be back with your drinks,” before walking into the kitchen as fast as he can. He won’t make eye contact with Kurt the rest of the night.

Diner in the Sky closes at eleven every night, and it takes another thirty minutes on a good day to scrub stains from the tabletops and lock everything up. It’s Kurt’s night to close up. Usually either Rachel or Mercedes is on schedule to help him, but since his luck is just absolute shit, he has to clean up the place with Blaine.

Closing up is usually an intimate job. Just two people, the nostalgia of an old diner, and a jukebox. Depending on who you’re with, it’s either heaven or hell. Kurt’s not sure which one he’ll get tonight. The other two times he’s had to suffer through it with Blaine, it’s been fun. They dirtied dishes making vanilla shakes and doo-wopping along to the jukebox tunes.

Tonight feels like purgatory. Blaine avoids him at any cost. If Kurt goes to mop the kitchen floors, he goes to the front room, and vice versa. He won’t speak to him, or even acknowledge him when he accidentally sweeps Kurt’s feet. It’s fine at first, Kurt can handle the awkwardness. But eventually, it simmers to anger.

“Can I talk to you?” He calls after Blaine. He stops like a kid caught in the cookie jar, hand freezing on the light switch. He turns slowly, eyes as big as saucers.

“Yeah?”

Kurt glares at him for a moment before speaking. “Look, I don’t know what that family said to you, but it gives you no right to be so absolutely rude—”

“They said I looked like I loved you.” It comes out as if it pains him to say.

That sentence makes any anger Kurt has, flow out of him and into a pond on the floor. Love?

He scraps up any dignity he has left and smiles to himself. “Well, do you?”

“Do I what?” Blaine snaps, coming to sit on the stool next to him. His leg trembles on the floor. Kurt can recognize now the little tells he didn’t know he ever noticed; how Blaine presses his thumb and ring finger together when he’s especially nervous, the way his eyes seem to light up when he looks at him.

“Love me?” Kurt continues, heart threatening to beat out of his chest. He wants to hear him say it.

Blaine doesn’t answer, instead opting to bury his head into his hands. Kurt hears him mumble to himself. Something about not the right time and tan messed everything up. His stomach flip flops.

“So,” Kurt drags, tapping the edge of the metal counter. “Love, huh?”

“Shut up,” Blaine mutters. They sit in comfortable silence for a little, until the hum of Ella Fitzgerald fizzles off the record. Then, Kurt feels a warm, almost clammy hand on top of his. It’s enough of an answer for him.

[yergink]

Bravery and a Bowline Ch. 2

Heavier on the fluff this time around! Also a bit longer than last chapter at 4.6k words.

First Chapter

Next Chapter

Crossposted to Ao3

Summary: Walter learns a bit about the other people on the island. Meanwhile, the kids decide to amuse themselves the best way kids know how.

They’re out gathering charcoal one day and Walter has a particular thought on his mind. 

By now, his stay on this island the others call “the Constant” has reached a whopping ten days, and in that time, he’s been doing his best to be of help around camp.

For instance, he’d been helping Webber tend to the farms. Walter didn’t mind the dirt and muck staining his clothes, and he’d gone on a field trip to a farm for school once, during which he’d been paying a lot of attention, so he was sure he could help. They’d packed seeds into the ground with manure and mud, and to Walter’s surprise, the crops grew alarmingly quickly. Webber seemed to enjoy the company as well, chatting away about the things he liked as they worked. Walter’s found out they both have a similar penchant for bugs. 

He’d been helping Wendy as well, and her biggest chore was tending to the rabbit traps spread amidst the plains. She showed him how to weave them and how to set them above the rabbits’ dens. That was where his help had ended, though. Walter tried to help her collect the traps at the end of the day, but he’d ended up feeling so bad for the rabbits that he’d ended up letting one go and Wendy said she’d handle it after that. 

Still, Walter wants to be as helpful as he can, which is why he’d volunteered to help Willow gather fuel without realizing what exactly that would entail until. And then, he was standing in front of a forest ablaze, eyes wide as he watched Willow clap excitedly until the burn died down. When he’d piped up about fire safety, she’d just waved him off and reassured that this was a “controlled burn.” Walter didn’t think that was true, but he bit back his objections.

Now, amidst the scorched trees, he watches Willow heft her axe over her shoulder and asks, “You said there were other people on the island, right?” She pauses, adjusting her angle. 

“Hm? Oh, yeah. There are. What about it?”

She swings the blade at the trunk of a freshly charred tree, and it crumbles under the force. Walter gets about, kneeling to gather the fallen pieces of charcoal and packing them away in his backpack. Woby, well-fed and in her large form, lies on her back in the sunlight just outside the forest.

Walter fidgets, rubbing his soot-stained fingers together. “Can I meet them?”

Willow snorts. She’s leaned down now, helping gather the pieces as well, and she stuffs the last charred branch away and straightens up. “When they decide to show up to our base, then sure. I’m not supposed to let any of the kids wander around.” She approaches the next tree, and before she can even regain the grip on her axe, Walter zips around it, clasping his hands together and putting on his best pout. His mom always told him he could convince the moon to fall with that face.

He’s not certain it’s going to be enough, but it does give Willow pause. “Stop using little kid powers on me, it isn’t gonna work.”

Walter pouts further, blinking a few times to make it really dramatic. His eyes water a little bit.

Willow makes a show of not looking at him, but after she cracks down the tree and sees him still waiting expectantly, her resolve seems to falter. She sighs. “Listen, I can’t really take a break to give you a whole tour of everyone’s camps, but I can tell you about the rest of them at least.”

“That works!” Walter chirps.

Her axe fells another tree. “So, I’ve mentioned Wilson before, right? He’s like, a scientist or whatever, which is just a codeword for ‘huge nerd’ if you ask me.”

Walter personally finds science rather enjoyable, so he just gives a small hum at that. “What kind of science?”

She makes a vague hand gesture. “He’s never really specific about it, to be honest. But he’s sort of a doctor. Or, he used to be, I think. Before we got here. And he used to be really stuck-up about it, too, thinking he was all smarter than the rest of us.”

“But not anymore?”

“I mean…” she trails off. “I think it was mostly just him being defensive. When it comes down to it, he’s really sweet, even if he is an idiot sometimes.” She turns, moving towards the next blackened trunk, but not before Walter catches the half-smile on her face, a look that seems uncharacteristically soft for Willow. She clears her throat. “Anyway. Ms. Wickerbottom also stays at the eastern camp with the kids. She can be a bit strict, but she’s pretty nice. She’s kind of like everyone’s grandma. You’ll probably get along with her pretty well, spouting off facts the way you do.”

They keep gathering, circling the edge of the forest line. In between felling trees, Willow’s counting off people on her fingers. “There’s Winona. She’s real spunky, and smart to boot. And there’s Mr. Wolfgang who comes off really intimidating, but he’s a sweetheart under all that muscle. He gives the best piggyback rides. And there’s Wigfrid--she can be a bit intense, but she isn't too bad. And--”

“Hey, Willow?” Walter interrupts. He feels like he’s back home trying to memorize plant names, and he wishes he had a notepad. “Maybe I’ll remember them better if I actually meet them.”

She laughs. “Sure.”

The sky grays out a bit by the time they finish hacking down trees and collecting the charcoal. The sight of incoming rain makes Willow anxious, and she gestures for them to begin the trek back to camp. The two of them walk side by side, Woby shuffling along quietly behind them. Walter shifts his hands up the backpack straps while they walk, getting a better hold on the heavy load. Despite intending to shelve the topic of the other people on the island, he can’t quite stop thinking about it.

Cautiously, he asks, “So, how many people are here in total?”  

Willow hums in thought. “I think with you we’re up to a whole seventeen.”

Seventeen people. It’s a bit difficult for Walter to comprehend. Not the number itself, mind you, but that so many people would have been lost here and had yet to find a way home. It’s worrying, although Walter doesn’t want to linger on it for too long. If he’s honest, the biggest concern he has is that this is going to make him get sick of camping.

...He just hopes his mom isn’t worrying too much.

-

After they return to camp and unpack the charcoal into the boxes by the fire, he notices Willow keep glancing fretfully at the clouded sky, and she juts her thumb towards the tent, saying that she’s going to take a nap before nightfall.

Walter nods, of course, fully intending to stay in camp as well, although as afternoon sets in and the promise of rain is still unfulfilled, he finds himself growing bored. He sits by the smoldering ashes of the firepit, tossing a stick across the length of camp for a now-small Woby to fetch, although it looks like even she is getting tired of doing so.

She drops the stick at his feet and whines, headbutting his arm when Walter reaches to throw it again. He lets the stick fall and scratches behind her ears. “You’re bored too, aren’t you,” he mumbles, and Woby barks in agreement. She darts away from him abruptly, pointing her nose towards the gate and running back and forth between it and where Walter is sitting.

He perks up a bit. “You wanna go on a walk?”

She barks. Walter stands, glancing back towards the tent, listening to Willow’s snores gently emanating from it, and then to the sky, weighing the risks. Then, he carefully unlatches the gate and slips out without looking back.

Together, he and Woby meander through the plains a bit. The air here doesn’t smell like the air back home; it’s got a sense of danger on it, not to mention the heavy smell of monster blood that Walter hasn’t entirely grown accustomed to. Still, there is still the thrill of taking it all in. Nature is nature, and Walter has learned to appreciate that. He even has a badge for it.

The tall straw-like grass begins to give way into forest, and he’s wandered back into the midst of the deciduous trees, where he first met Wendy. As autumn has gone on, more and more of the trees have gone bare, and with the clouded sky the forest has a much eerier atmosphere than usual. Woby sniffs out mushrooms for him to pick, particularly the spongy green ones that tend to sprout in the evening.

He’s just crouched down behind a few bushes to dig up another one when he pauses, the sound of voices brushing by on the wind.

There are several. One of them is high, an echoey sort of trill that he recognizes as Wendy immediately. There’s also that haunting wispy sort of noise that Wendy’s sister Abigail always makes. She doesn’t speak with words the way Wendy does, and Wendy’s the only one who can understand her, but she’s a good translator. Walter thinks he and Abigail have become pretty good friends, even if he was a bit creeped out by her at first.

Then, he hears a third voice, one that’s unfamiliar. Woby starts growling, a low, threatening rumble that doesn’t sound right coming from her small body. Walter shushes her, going still to try and hear what was going on.

The unfamiliar voice is talking. It’s a deep, smooth cadence, and it makes Walter think of that old ragtime tune that had played on the radio that brought him here.

“--struck with a bout of insomnia and was coming by for some assistance,” the voice says.

“Out of nowhere?” Wendy asks.

“I believe it has to do with that ridiculous robot screeching up a storm every night just over the river.”

Walter pushes aside the lower branches of the bush to get a better view. He sees Wendy, standing by a nearby pond with an older looking man in a sharp suit. Immediately, he’s a bit suspicious. The man is tall, and he all but towers over Wendy, leaning slightly down towards her as they talk. Walter feels Woby, still rumbling with a quiet growl beside him as he looks on.

He watches Wendy shake her head. “I’m afraid Ms. Wickerbottom is currently absent from camp. Both she and Mr. Higgsbury embarked to the underground nearly a fortnight ago. Only Ms. Willow is there right now.”

The man scoffs. “They left you in the care of the firestarter? I wouldn’t trust that woman to look after a goldfish, much less a child.”

“To be fair, uncle, it would be extremely difficult to burn a goldfish.”

Walter looks to Woby, who cocks her head in what seems like an equal amount of confusion. “Uncle” ?

The two conversing fall into a lull of silence. The man clears his throat.

“...And you’re sure you won’t reconsider staying at my camp?” he asks. There’s a hesitation behind his words, an uncertainty that marrs his otherwise smooth, charismatic tone, roughening it around the edges.

“I do not feel comfortable leaving the camp at this time,” Wendy says after a moment’s thought. “And, in fairness, I believe Ms. Willow to be a good caretaker. You needn’t worry.”

The man coughs. “Right.” He glances backwards. “I’ll be on my way, then.”

A peal of thunder rumbles across the sky, and Wendy murmurs, “May you stay well,” as the man leaves. She watches him leave with that odd sort of stillness of hers, like a statue in the forest. A few leaves fall, sticking in her hair, though she does not move until the man has entirely vanished from view. It’s only then that Walter makes a move.

“Wendy!” he calls, shaking himself out of the bushes. “Who was that?”

Wendy pauses, glancing to Abigail, then back at him. “You were eavesdropping,” she frowns.

“Kinda,” Walter admits. “So who was that?”

With some trepidation, she says, “That was our”--she indicates to herself and Abigail with a nod--”Uncle Maxwell. He camps by the rock fields.”

Woby barks, and Walter looks down to see that she’s glaring in the direction the man left, her hackles raised and tail angled in alert. He frowns. “Woby stop, that’s not nice.”

Usually, a command like that would be enough to calm her, but she growls again, low and threatening, pawing at the ground like she’s about to run off after him.

“Woby, what’s wrong with you?” Walter exclaims, swooping to pick her up before she has a chance to take off. The dog squirms in his arms, and he struggles to keep his hold on her, her back paws digging into his stomach as he tries to get her to still.

“She probably senses Their presence in him” Wendy suggests, her head tilted sideways as she watches him grapple.

He rests a hand on Woby’s head, scratching in the space between the bumps of her horns as her growls begin to taper off. “What do you mean?”

One of her hands reaches for the flower clipped in her hair--a nervous habit. “I forgot that you don’t know.” Upon seeing her sister hesitate, Abigail floats closer, whispering in that airy, incomprehensible tone. It seems to help, because even as Wendy looks away, she keeps talking.

“My uncle was the one who brought many of us here,” she explains. “And even while he has lost his crown of shadows, there are many who have continued to forego forgiveness.”

“Oh,” Walter says. He doesn’t know how to respond.

“Not all of us were condemned by his hand,” she says hurriedly. “You, for example. But my uncle has a hard time finding good favor with others. His time as king has tainted him with a terrible arrogance.”

“He did seem kind of rude. Uh, no offense.”

“None taken.”

They keep walking. It’s awkward. Walter breaks the silence. “So, do you talk to him a lot?”

Wendy hums. “As often as I must. Despite everything, he is still family. And he has been earnestly attempting to better himself, which I believe we all appreciate.”

Abigail makes a sound like steam rising off a lake, and Wendy nods in agreement. “Abigail makes a good point. We know that he cares about us.”

It’s an offhand comment, but it sends a pang of jealousy through him. Wistfully and without thinking, Walter says, “It seems kind of nice. To have family with you.” It’s a more emotionally revealing statement than he wanted to make, and he’s a bit alarmed with himself for having said something like that. Wendy seems to take it in stride though, making a sort of sympathetic sound.

“It is difficult,” she says, “to be forced to face a cruel world without a caring presence beside you.” Walter gets the feeling she isn’t talking about Maxwell anymore. Abigail murmurs sadly, hovering over Wendy’s shoulder.

“Yeah,” he agrees. Quickly glancing around to verify that they’re alone, he puts a hand over his mouth and steps closer to her. “Don’t tell anyone, but… I think I’m getting a bit homesick.”

Solemnly, Wendy nods. “I shan’t speak a word of it to anyone.”

-

According to the strange thermometer set up in the camp, winter is approaching, and Walter is sure starting to feel it. The forest has started going bare, the coating of leaves along the ground growing denser by the day. There’s a chill pervading the air, one that sends him shivering on early morning fishing trips and late-night firefly hunting. He, along with the other members of the camp, huddle closer to the fire at night.

Wendy’s been making hats from the silk and fur they have, decorating them with different patterns and toppers. She’s steady with a needle, and Walter watches her thread the fabrics together in awe as they sit together.

“Who’s that one for?” he points at the completed hat she has sitting atop the spool of silk beside her.

“It’s for Webber.” She lifts it into the air, showing off the ear flaps. “So his extra legs don’t get cold.”

“It’s pretty.” The hat has been colored orange and red with boiled eggshells and berry juice. It’s an impressive feat of craftsmanship, and he wonders if Wendy will teach him how to sew like that, too.

She turns it over. “Thank you. But I think I made it a bit too big.”

“Let me try,” Walter says, reaching for it. The hat is soft, and he takes a moment to admire the texture before going to put it on. Before he gets a chance, however, Wendy interrupts.

“That’s backwards.”

Walter stops, looking at the hat. “It is?” He turns it over. The other side looks exactly the same. “It’s kind of hard to tell,” he admits.

Wendy shrugs. An idea suddenly dawns on him.

“You know,” he starts, and Wendy must hear the mischief in his tone because she immediately frowns at him. “It would be kinda funny if he wore it backwards.”

Unconvinced, Wendy asks, “Would it?”

“Yeah! My older cousins once convinced me that you can wear a skirt like a shirt, and they thought it was pretty funny, so I guess it must be funny to wear clothes wrong.”

“Maybe.” She still sounds dubious.

Walter stands up, gesturing for Webber to join them. “Here, give it to him,” he whispers to Wendy, shoving the hat back into her hands as Webber approaches.

“What is it?” the boy asks, glancing back and forth from Walter to Wendy. His smaller eyes don’t quite synchronize with the movements of his larger ones, and Walter finds himself momentarily distracted by this. Luckily, Wendy takes charge, standing as well. She holds the hat out to him.

“Here. Try this on,” she says.

“Oh, you finished our hat!” Webber exclaims. He grins as he takes it, taking a moment just as Walter did to marvel at the softness, before placing it over his head. Wendy’s initial assessment that the hat was too big was immediately obvious, and coupled with having put it on the wrong way, the hat leaves Webber with just a bit of his furry head showing. The front lip falls all the way down past where his nose would be, and his mouth is just barely visible underneath, open in alarm.

“It covers our eyes!” Webber says loudly, as if to make up for his lack of sight.

Walter giggles, trying vainly to stifle it with a hand, and Wendy shushes him. “It’s the intended design, Webber. And you have to wear it because I made it for you.”

They both know Webber will be too polite to object to that. His mouth abruptly shuts, hiding his fangs, and Walter thinks he sees the boy swallow, as if steeling his nerves. His stance straightens, like he’s fully committing to spending the entire winter blinded. “We will wear it then!” he declares, turning and almost immediately running headfirst into the camp’s outer stone wall. With a startled cry, he backs up, and Walter just barely manages to grab hold of his shoulder before he trips and falls backwards.

“Thank you,” Webber says as he regains his balance. “This hat is scary!”

Wendy laughs. It escapes her like a puff of smoke, a small, flightless thing that could be mistaken as nothing more than a breath come too fast. But Walter can tell what it is, and he looks to her in surprise for a moment before a grin spreads across his face.

He thinks Webber can tell what it is too, because Walter sees him lift the hem of the hat, and even though he’s not very good at discerning spider expressions, to him, Webber looks incredibly pleased.

“That was amusing,” Wendy says after they’ve gotten the hat off Webber and tucked away in Wendy’s bag for further tailoring. “I will admit that despite your naivety, you have good ideas, Walter.”

It’s a bit of a backhanded compliment, but Walter doesn’t take it personally. “Thanks. You’re a lot better at holding it together when it comes to pranks, though.”

She nods. “That is true. Does that mean you would be opposed to orchestrating a second one?”

He grins. “Not at all.”

-

They get Webber to help with their next one. Willow’s used to him spending nights by the spider dens along the forest, so it’s not suspicious if he doesn’t show up by nightfall.

Woby whines, shaking her shaggy head as Webber gets close, and Walter does his best to hold onto her collar and keep her from bucking him away and scampering off. “It’s okay girl, he’s nice, trust me,” Walter soothes, petting her big floppy ears as Webber struggles to mount her.

He gets it eventually, holding on tight to the fur on the back of Woby’s neck, and Walter takes her head between his hands and speaks very sternly. “Be nice to Webber, and listen to him, okay? We’re doing a prank on Willow, and you’ve gotta be good for it.” Woby woofs, which doesn’t really sound like agreement, but she seems to quickly give in, licking his face affectionately when Walter pouts at her. He grins. “There’s a good girl.”

He rejoins Wendy by the outer camp wall, where she’d been watching.

“It is impressive how well you have tamed such a great beast,” she says.

He shrugs. “Woby’s not much of a beast. She’s scared of butterflies.”

“I see.”

Nightfall finds both of them back in camp with Willow, watching as she rummages through the fridge for something to put together into a half-decent meal. Wendy looks over to him and gives him a nudge, indicating that they should start.

“I have a story!” Walter announces loudly, planting himself cross-legged by the fire. That does enough to gather attention. Willow likes to pretend she isn’t all that interested in his stories, but oftentimes she’s the one sitting most on edge, her chin resting on her hands as she listens with wide eyes and held breath for him to finish.

Now is no exception. She lingers at the crockpot for a moment while Wendy joins him by the fire, although sky quickly abandons the meatballs she’d been preparing in favor of listening to the story. Walter clears his throat, glancing out beyond the walls. There’s a small gleam of light out there, a torch, where Webber and Woby are waiting for their cue.

“So there’s this monster out in the woods,” he begins, putting his hands up. He’d practiced for this one, no messing up or scrambling his words. It has to be good. He takes a breath to steady himself.

“They say it’s huge, almost three meters tall, with long shaggy fur that drags behind it, getting all dirty with mud and leaves, and long scary claws. The people who see it say it looks like a piece of the forest itself.” He thinks that was pretty good, but Willow doesn’t look impressed yet. He goes off script, amping it up. “A-And it’s super venomous too, with acid breath and big sharp teeth!” He claws his hands in front of his face, imitating fangs. “It goes around hunting people who wander too far into the woods. Sometimes, people’ll see lights shining through the trees without knowing that they’re just the monster’s shiny eyes.”

The fire pops, sparks flying as if to emphasize his words. Willow seems pretty enraptured now, head tilted slightly as her eyes flick between the flames and Walter’s gestures.

“What else?” Wendy prompts, just as they’d planned.

For the briefest moment, the script slips from his mind, and Walter stumbles. “Huh? Oh, yeah, so--” he clears his throat again. “It uh…”

“They say…” Wendy whispers.

“Right! They say it roams out there, stalking unsuspecting campers...” he turns and finds that speck of light with his eyes again, raising his voice for the final line. “...Waiting for a chance to strike!”

With a resonant howl, Woby leaps over the southern wall of the camp. Webber, with his hands wrapped around her neck, holds on for dear life. She doesn’t quite nail the landing, scrambling to slow down on the dirt and slamming sideways into the alchemy engine, nearly knocking it over.

Walter giddily looks to see Willow's expression, but quickly finds himself pushed backwards, scraping his knees in the dirt, with Wendy toppled over and looking equally confused beside him. He winces, assessing the rough scratches of grit on his skin. Once he’s confirmed he’s not bleeding, he glances forward.

There is a towering dark shape before him, backlit by the glow of the fire, and it takes him a moment to realize it’s Willow, her spear readied and sharp in her grasp. She’d shoved them behind her almost immediately, widening her stance and placing herself firmly between them and Woby.

Walter uprights himself, reaching out hesitantly for her sleeve. “Willow--”

Her head snaps down to him, and he flinches backwards. There’s nothing but ferocity and aggression in her eyes, although it slowly fades as she takes note of Woby skittering away from her spearpoint nervously, and Webber sliding clumsily off her back, landing with an ‘oof’.

After another few moments of taking in the scene, her stance drops. “Okay,” she says finally, sinking her spearpoint into the dirt and turning to glower at each of the children in turn. “I don’t know what you all were thinking, but that was really dumb. Like, actually really dumb.”

“It was my idea,” Wendy pipes up, brushing dirt off her skirt as she stands up. “I asked Walter--”

“No, you just said you wanted to do a prank,” he argues. It doesn’t feel fair for her to try and take blame. He faces Willow, hands folded behind his back. “It was my idea.”

“...We just thought it would be fun, Ms. Willow,” Webber says sheepishly, wringing his hands as he edges forward.

“Yeah? Well I could’ve stabbed you. Bet that would’ve been real fun,” she snaps.

Webber’s eyes start welling. Seeing this, Water steps forward. “I asked him to do it. It’s my fault.”

Her sharp gaze turns to him and Walter stiffens, looking down and feeling very much in trouble. Still, he can’t let his friends take the heat for him. He’s got honor, after all.

“I know you don’t know yet, but things bursting into our camp and attacking us isn’t really something we can joke about,” Willow lectures, her tone like an edge of broken glass. “Putting one of you in the position of some monster? That’s really, really dumb.”

Walter keeps examining his shoes, his hands tightening around each other behind his back. “I’m sorry,” he mumbles.

Something in Willow seems to soften at that. She sighs, patting him on the shoulder. “Just. Don’t pull that sh-- stuff again.” She grimaces. “I have a headache. See you in the morning.” With that, she disappears into the tent.

Webber still looks on the verge of tears, and Walter murmurs an apology to him as well. Through it all, Wendy still looks nothing more than apathetic. She glances to the tent, then nods, as if to herself.

“To be fair,” she says. “Conceptually, it was very amusing.”

Walter sniffs, brightening at that. “Yeah?”

The tiniest of smiles graces her lips. “Yeah.”

[malereader-inserts]

I’m so Tired

Fandom: BBC Sherlock Pairing: Sherlock Holmes & Brother!Reader, Mycroft Holmes & Brother!Reader Summary: Just some brothers trying to be normal brothers. Word Count: 1,538 Request: “A Brother!Holmes!reader. The choice is up to you (also, I don't mind you going off the rails, it adds more spice to the story) Have AN AWESOME DAY honey 🍯 😘 A/n: Hey nonnie, you requested this a few days ago with an angels request too but I no longer do requests for Supernatural because I feel like it’s lost its touch for me and that it’s gone on far too long.

God.

That’s what you need, you need a god to put you out of your misery. You haven’t had a good night sleep since forever, you just want someone to put you out of your misery.

You tried everything, tea, warm glass of milk, counting sheep, hell you’ve avoided naps throughout the day and now you’re just wide awake for twenty hours a day. You weren’t an insomniac, you loved your sleep, you rather stay in bed and continue sleeping for half the day.

But, somewhere along the pathway of following your brother Sherlock on one of his cases, it went wrong. Then, just you were about to fix your sleeping schedule, you were forced to accompany Mycroft in some endeavours over the pond that requires two Holmes - whilst Sherlock was a hissy fit you were dragged along.

So, you spent time just being bored out of your mind. Your mind was rapid, it never stopped thinking and it completely drains you throughout the day but the moment you hit the bed, your eyes can’t close and you lost your bearings for anything practical. 

When you were younger, you used to raid one of your brother’s room, it wasn’t often because even when they were growing up that they hated any some form of affection and physical contact. It grew awkward and weird as you got older since there was a big age gap in between you and your brothers - they were adults when you were still a child. 

You learnt to power through it, until you almost got ran over by London’s shit taxi drivers. 

You found yourself taking sleeping pills, even though you are still convinced you’re not an insomniac (you are).

“Zopiclone,” You read out loud, “Take one pill each night for the next four weeks, takes one hour to fully work.”

Your thumb rubs over the label, you look at yourself in the mirror and run your hand over your eyes. You sighed, ready for bed, looking down at the packaging.

“Side effects: May cause bitter of metallic taste in mouth, dry mouth, daytime sleepiness, dependency (DO NOT TAKE AFTER PRESCRIBED WEEKS).” You continue, popping one out and swallowing one down with a fresh glass of water.

When you hit the bed, feeling relaxed, shutting your eyes. 

Until your phone started to ring. Snapping your eyes open, you pat down the bedside table for your phone. “BIG BROTHER SHER” on the caller ID. You groaned, locking your phone hoping that he would drop whatever he’s working on.

But, he didn’t stop. 

“What do you want,”

“Hello to you too!” Sherlock greeted, hyper, obviously wither having some sort of mental break down, a breakthrough, or he finally got a good case after weeks, “How quick can you come to the flat?”

“Sherlock, I just-”

“Sherlock leave him alone.” You heard a disapproving voice in the background.

“Myc-”

“Oh, shut your mouth Mycroft, our brother should come here and solve this brilliant case with us.” Sherlock interrupted you, you blinked sleepily, the medication taking its full effect on you.

“Sherlock, it’s one in the morning, let the poor boy sleep-!”

“I want to sleep,” John was heard in the background, you chuckled to yourself.

“(Y/n) get over here!”

But before you could respond, Sherlock hung up on you. You sighed, looking at your attire and the comfort of your bed was calling, but you knew full well that Sherlock was persistent and he will never stop calling you until you get there.

Shuffling to put some joggers, a shirt and a hoodie as you slip on some trainers before you exited your flat. Locking the door behind you and shoving your phone in your pocket as you hail one of the taxis to Sherlock’s home. The journey there almost made you pass out, but when the car jerked to a halt in front of the famous door, you sighed.

Fishing out some money before exiting the cab, who drove away quickly as he arrived. You rubbed your eyes and scratched your hair as you inserted the spare key that John gave to you to prevent you from knocking the door at ungodly times and accidentally waking up Mrs Hudson.

Taking your time to get up the stairs, you open the door.

“What’s up losers,” You greeted, Sherlock jumping in joy as he grabs your shoulder, “Hey, what’s going on?”

“Murder case,” John replied as he sat in his armchair, nursing a coffee in hand as he was already on the verge to murder his best friend.

“He’s been at it for hours,” Mycroft piped up from Sherlock’s armchair, “He won’t drop it - apologies brother for calling you in such an unideal time.”

You waved your hand, “It’s Sherlock, I expect nothing less.”

Sherlock smiled as you sat down on the sofa, at first you were paying attention but the medication was at its peak. You felt droopy and you wanted to pass out, Mycroft noticed how you became disinterest quickly, focusing in and out, being less responsive than usual.

Mycroft wanted to pass it off that you were tired and it was half two in the morning yet, the way you had lean your head on your hand was like you’ve been stuck in that position for days. At one point of the night, you snapped yourself awake as you blinked a few times at Sherlock.

“Did you get that?”

“Oh, sorry, did you expect me to listen to you?” You responded, your mouth was quicker than your brain as Mycroft chuckled at your snarkiness.

Yet, Sherlock, who was still pacing the floor, took your comment as a light joke, “We need a plan of action, a bait.”

You tiredly deduced your brother, his mind analysing the best plan, your eyes flickered to Mycroft, who was staring at you.

“You’re enjoying this, aren’t you,” Mycroft questioned, seeing your amused face that your calculating brother in his own flat.

You nodded, “Yes, because having my life threatened by a psychopathic monkey is just what I wanted to do today later,” You rolled your eyes as Sherlock finally stopped his pacing and spun his heels to look at you.

“…I can’t tell if you’re being sarcastic or not…”

“Jesus, Sherlock, not to be offending but I’ve been like this the whole night, can’t we just continue this tomorrow?” You asked, holding a pillow to your chest, “I haven’t slept for the past few days-”

Sherlock narrowed his eyes at you, “Take my bed,”

“What-?”

“Take my bed,” He responded, affectionately, “It’s better sleeping there than the sofa.”

You blinked rapidly for a few times, trying to process what had been said to you.

“Oh dear, you’ve managed to malfunction our brother, Sherlock.”

You turn to look at Mycroft before silently getting up and walking down the hallway to Sherlock’s room.

“He’s not okay, is he?” The three men watched you almost run into the door before shutting it close.

“It appears not.”

When you woke up, you unexpectedly hot. You were sure you had removed your hoodie to stop you from overheating, yet you were sure you’ve sweat through the sheets. Squeezing your eyes shut and stretching your hands collided to bodies.

You opened your eyes and sat up, on your right, Sherlock was hanging off the bed - snoring with a blanket wrapped tightly around him. He had not gone under the duvet like you did because he figured it would wake you up.

You look over to your left and see Mycroft curled up into a ball, his back facing you, taking up little space and another blanket over him. 

It was no wonder you were heating because you had three covers as you slept. You smiled to yourself remembering the times when you were younger. When you would have a nightmare or a bad thunderstorm, your brothers would rush to your room and comfort you.

They would refuse to leave each other, proving that you were in dire need in both your brothers to protect you from your dreams or the storm outside the house, rattling your windows.

You remembered the days when your mother would come to call you down for breakfast to find all her boys sleeping on one bed, cramped and a tangled mess, lying on top of each other. She found it adorable, especially the way you would cling onto one of your brothers.

You were snapped out of your thoughts when you heard a bang on your right.

Sherlock finally fell out of bed.

“Morning,” You mumbled, as Mycroft groaned on the left side of you, waking up as well.

“Do you think John made breakfast?” Sherlock questioned.

“Don’t you do the cooking?” You questioned.

“I’m your brother, not a baby sitter.”

You smiled sweetly at him, he sighs, standing up and pinching your cheeks, “You’re lucky I love you.”

You chuckled as Sherlock saunters out the door. You looked over to Mycroft, who was desperately trying to fall back to sleep. You roll your eyes as you pushed him off the bed as well.

“Wake up sleepy beauty, Sherlock’s making breakfast.”

“He’ll poison it.”

Just your typical brothers, the only human things the Holmes can achieve. 

[thetunewillcome]

The Weight of Ice

31 Days of Ineffables Prompt #16: ice storm

Word Count: 1817

London lay under ice.  Everything was frozen in place, all the routines of all its citizens surrendered to the storm.  Schools and businesses had closed.  Most roads sat vacant.  Some motorways were littered with abandoned vehicles, not a driver in sight.  Fresh snow covered empty sidewalks.  Overnight, ice and quiet had spread in thin, fractal layers over the whole city.

The only sounds shattering the day’s silence came from parks.  The city’s normally-green spaces had become playgrounds for bored and adventurous children, excited by the prospect of a whole school-free day ahead of them.  In Greenwich Park, kids hauled sleds up the hill and then raced back to the bottom.  In Regents Park, they tested the edge of the frozen pond, shuffling away from land until fear took over and they skated, laughing, back to solid ground.  

And in St. James’ Park, a boy scraped together enough snow for a snowball and torpedoed it at his friend.  It flew through the air, narrowly missing an innocent bystander, and hit its target in the chest.  A chase ensued, complete with violent war cries, and while everyone else either ignored the boys or shook their heads in disapproval, a shivering figure in a dark coat, collar buttoned to his chin, watched with an amused half-smile.

Have you seen a sheet of ice seconds before collapse?  The surface laced with growing scars; the crackling groan of anticipation, barely audible but there.  The suspended moment when you realize it will all dissolve to ruin soon.  Don’t blink.  Don’t even breathe.  Perhaps you can hold it all together if you want it bad enough.  If you’re really still.  But suddenly, it fractures.  Shards fall, jagged edges that can never be patched together again.  You’ve lost.

To Crowley, the whole world was an endangered pane of ice.  In less than a year, a boy, who lived a few miles away and looked a bit like the one tackling his friend to the ground, would turn eleven.  If they had done their jobs well, nothing would change.  The surface would hold.  

If they hadn’t done enough – and, really, when had they ever done enough to prevent human suffering, to divert divine plans? – the world would break apart.  All this would shatter and disappear: the park, the people, the snow, the city.  For now, all existed in suspended animation.  Nothing to do but wait, keep still, and measure the cracks for signs of growth.

(Keep reading below or on AO3 here.)

From where he stood, leaning against a bare, frost-tipped tree, Crowley was barely noticeable.  His red hair stood out starkly against the white blanketing the land, but if Crowley didn’t want to be noticed, he wouldn’t be.  No one glanced in his direction, not even the parents, who were busy teaching kids to make snow angels or comforting little ones who had slipped on ice.  

Not even Aziraphale, who had wandered into the park, neck wrapped up in a thick tartan scarf, and was now standing by the edge of the ice-laced water.  Crowley smiled, tipped forward instinctively toward him, and then froze.  They hadn’t arranged to meet; they had separately been drawn to the park on this bright, brisk day.  With a hum of contemplation, he settled back against the tree.

On this day of rarities, when snow had stuck to London’s streets, Crowley seized the chance to study him.  The square, sharp shoulders of a soldier.  The light curls that matched the sunlight shining off the icy surface of the water.  The way he clasped one gloved hand in the other behind his back.  He felt pulled in his direction, but he resisted.  A few more minutes, he thought, a child in bed on a bone-chilling morning, willing extra seconds into the day so they can soak in heat just a little longer.  He’ll never know.  It was a delicacy, getting to look without being watched in return.  He was so used to keeping his guard up, minding where his eyes lingered, even when his lenses hid them, just in case Aziraphale could feel the fire of his stare.

Like a kid plunging a bare hand in the snow, covetous, foolhardy, Crowley let himself imagine.  What it would be like, walking down to stand next to him and not caring who might see.  Dusting snow off those rigid shoulders, feeling them sink a little, relax into his touch.  Tugging apart those worrying hands so he could hold one in his own.  Pressing his lips to the spot where a curl met his temple, forgetting himself in the smell of bergamot and book dust.  Hastening him home with tempting tongue until he could warm his chilled, pink skin behind closed doors.  

Aziraphale’s head turned to the side and a puff of frosted breath escaped his lips and Crowley watched, the familiar glowing embers of desire sparking to full flames.  Tell him, whispered that reckless voice in his head.  Tell him before this all falls to ruin.  While you still can.  The clock is ticking…  Crowley shut it up with a practiced shake of his head, his jaw clenched tightly to keep words from spilling out, even though Aziraphale would never hear them from this distance.  Someone else might.  Someone who could use those words against them.  So he kept quiet.

Then, somehow, Aziraphale noticed him.  Their eyes met, and his face lit up with recognition.  He waved - a little wiggle of gloved fingers - and then replaced his hand behind his back as if remembering he shouldn’t be excited to see the enemy.  Something in Crowley’s chest snapped.  Screw it, he thought as he let himself be willed down toward the water, toward Aziraphale.  Maybe I should tell him.  If we don’t pull this off… If this all goes up in flames and we’re forced into the war and he never knew…

“Crowley!”  His name on those chaste lips, something chiming in the ring of it.  Fresh from his self-indulgent fantasy, it licked wildfire down his spine.  Aziraphale turned in greeting and then went back to watching the water.   “Hello.  Should I blame you for this cold spell, then?”

“Nah.”  He may have taken advantage of the storm, bursting a few pipes here and there on his walk to the park, but he hadn’t started it.  “Too quiet.  Not my style.”

“It is quiet, isn’t it?  Rare to see the city like this, so peaceful.”

“Mmm.”  Crowley noticed that his eyes were the color of the icy water, then hated himself for noticing.  Say it, but in the dead quiet, with the city hushed and the snow muffling all noise, it felt as if finally spitting out those words would rattle it all to destruction.

A scream of delight came from behind them.  “The children do seem to be making the best of the storm.”

The boy with the snowball was now shoving a handful of snow down the back of a girl’s coat.  He swallowed a laugh.  “Yeah.”

Aziraphale studied him for a moment, a sad smile on his face.  “Remind you of someone?”

Behind his glasses, Crowley winced.  Always.  Why could he always read him?  He wasn’t one of Aziraphale’s precious books; if he was, he’d earn the touch of tender hands in exchange for all his secrets.  Instead, he felt like some flayed creature, killed and cut until his heart was on display, pinned in place.  He shrugged and shoved his chin deeper into the collar of his coat.

“I do worry about him, alone with his parents now.  Ten is a bit old for a nanny, I suppose, but he was so attached to you.  You did a wonderful job with him, you know.  Er – wonderfully evil, I mean.”  

Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Aziraphale’s admiring gaze.  Crowley knew he was picturing skirts and bedtime stories and spelling lessons in the garden, and he couldn’t stand it.  His dismissal and departure still stung; his short hair felt too light, made him untethered, bare.  “He’ll be fine.”  He tried to sound as cold as the water before him.  “Gotta grow up sometime.”

Aziraphale made a face that told Crowley he wasn’t fooling him.  Course not.  Still, the angel knew to respect the lines Crowley drew in the sand – or snow – between them.  Knowing what was coming, Crowley held his breath.  “Well, I had best be on my way.  I should reopen the shop for the afternoon, though I doubt anyone will brave the ice for a book.”

I’ll come with you, he wanted to say.  But first, let’s walk the park.  Make footprints in the untouched snow, yours next to mine.  I’ve something to tell you.  I’ll keep you warm, I promise.  But Aziraphale didn’t need him for that: he could will himself warm.  They didn’t live on the same grounds anymore, hadn’t since summer.  They were back to needing excuses, one for each stolen minute together, and on this grey-blue day, with everything at a stand-still, there weren’t any left.  “Alright, angel.  Be safe.  Mind the black ice.”

Aziraphale rolled his eyes at that.  “Ah, yes, one of yours, if memory serves.  I’ll be careful.”  

He still hadn’t moved from Crowley’s side, and Crowley still hadn’t exhaled.  Silently, Aziraphale opened his mouth, then closed it, reconsidering.  The warm breath behind his unspoken words dissipated into the winter air.  After a moment, he said quietly, “don’t be a stranger.”  And then he turned, walking stiffly away, shoes crunching on the snow and ice.  

When he was gone, Crowley let himself breathe out, watching the smoke-like vapor trail out of his mouth to be blown away in the biting wind.  Ice shifted on the pond, pieces breaking off to float toward deeper waters.  In the wake of Aziraphale’s departure, he felt splintered in places that had felt whole before, or at least numb.  He watched the water for a while longer, frozen in place with the rest of London.  

What hovered between them, persistent and powerful, was surely much too heavy for the fractured surface of their world.  Aziraphale knew it: that was why he didn’t press him, hurried back to his rightful place, let him be.  Nothing to do but wait.  Hold strong.  Hunker down.  Stay the course.  Never mind how the weight of ice can snap power lines, fell ancient trees if you let it build for long enough, layer upon heavy layer.  He glanced down at the collection of footprints to his left and sighed.  How he wanted to follow them.  Not smart.  Not safe.  May as well linger, then, in the quiet paralysis of the city.

Just before sunset, the crowd of children began to thin.  Stomping in their heavy boots, dragging sleds or siblings behind them, no one paid any attention to the figure by the water, snowflakes collecting in his auburn hair as he stood perfectly still, listening for something, perhaps, or waiting for the ice to thaw.

(Read my other 31 Days of Ineffables fics here on AO3.  A million thanks to @drawlight​ for the inspiration, and best of luck at your new job!)

[su8arandspite]

For Old Time’s Sake

Summary: It’s 1995 in Hawkins. When Heather Johnson returns home for the Hawkins High School reunion, she comes face to face with an old lover. Or, alternatively, the one where Steve falls in love with Heather all over again.

Steve Harrington x oc

Warnings: 18+, mature content, smut

Tags: @casaharrington

The town of Hawkins kept its secrets well. From the outside, and to every kid who made a run for it after high school, not much about the town changed. Small town stillness washed over the buildings and suburban homes that Heather Johnson passed on the drive home to her parents’ place. If not for the empty lot where the Dairy Queen had been and the newly painted houses, Hawkins could have been a time machine to 1985.

She parked curbside outside of her childhood home. Through the trees, just past the Harrington home, she could vaguely make out the ruins of what was once Hawkins Lab. Even abandoned, it brought bile to her throat. When Heather left Hawkins, danger eschewed the rosy lens of childhood she knew it under. Time blurred and muddied her memories, but fleeting images of a boy with a baseball bat comforted her; whatever it was, they defeated it together.

Heather yanked the keys from the ignition. She didn’t come back to dig up old nightmares. Steadying her breath, she hauled her suitcase from the hatch of her car into her old home. Whatever she saw ten years ago in that shadowy building couldn’t hurt her now.

She retired to her bedroom that night with a head swimming in unsaid words and forgotten dreams she bottled up and left here in Hawkins. Traveling through the hallways of her parents’ house brewed an unwelcome, lonely sense of dejavú that could swallow Heather whole.

The door closed softly behind her. Heather looked to the window next door, partially out of habit, partially wrapped up in foolish hope, but instead found the curtains drawn. She longed for the secret notes passed through window panes on late nights and the stolen kisses as he stumbled into her bedroom. That was- they were- long gone now.

Now, standing alone in her girlish lilac bedroom, she felt like a stranger in her own life. The knick-knacks, trophies, polaroids, and photo booth strips belonged to someone else entirely. She thumbed over the picture frame sitting proudly on her nightstand, swiping the dust away from the picture-perfect memory of two smitten teens. Her mother must have retrieved it from the floor and replaced it sometime after she left. The crack down the center obscured her face, but she cared more about the way Steve looked at her. Just as she let herself want, her finger caught on the crack and blood sullied the cheap frame. Cursing, she cushioned the wound between her lips to dull the bleeding.

Heather Johnson blossomed into her own person through the past decade; she had a place to call her own, a job she felt passionately for, everything she once doubted she could earn without her Daddy’s help. Something about Hawkins, though, made that woman shrink slowly back into the scared girl who ran away from it.

High school for Heather looked picture perfect. In some ways, it had been, yet a part of her always felt sandwiched into the tiny pond that Hawkins was and desperate to swim upstream into the outside world. For someone with as many friends and as surrounded by people as Heather the Cheerleader had been, she never felt more lonely. Her friends’ parents worked boring desk jobs that required no traveling and most of them had one boyfriend or another to waste their time with. She kissed as many boys as she could just trying to make up for the loneliness she felt in her parents’ absence; it always found its way back. Until Steve.

Steve Harrington lived next door. He talked too much, slept around quite a bit, and had a poor taste in friends. Heather might nod along and listen as Laurie or Becky rambled off reasons why he could not be trusted, but she never cared to listen. She liked to think she knew Steve perfectly well.

The first time Heather met Steve, she might have agreed with what her friends thought of him. They knew each other only through summer block parties and whatever other events their parents dragged them to until 1982. That summer leading up to sophomore year changed a lot for Heather; her body filled out and her Dad started leaving home more. She took up a job lifeguarding at the community pool and returned to school in August sunkissed, slightly curvy, and in need of a little trouble. Steve, who received a shiny new BMW for his sixteenth birthday, looked exactly like the kind of trouble she wanted.

She had him completely, utterly wrapped around her finger by the end of September. Heather and Steve soiled every inch of that car as summer came to autumn. She only meant to distract herself, but her desire for fire and trouble died down into an ache for the boy next door. Heather let herself love him wholly. Steve became her future; he tamed her rebellious spirit into a lovestruck girl who wanted only for him to stay with her forever.

Forever, for Heather and Steve, instead became the beginning of junior year. He stomped on her heart and spit it right back at her. As Heather pulled back to lick her wounds, Steve zeroed in on his next prey. Nancy Wheeler stood for everything Heather could never be. Girls like Nancy didn’t just offer up their virginities to the first boy who called them pretty or invent their own hangover cures out of necessity. Heather hated the thought of Steve with someone like that, because she could never be half as good. Good girls like Nancy shone like blank canvases void of any tarnish and squeaky-clean enough to bring home to Mom; Heather the Whore and her Father-sized baggage could never compete with a girl like that.

Even now, the sight of that swimming pool nauseated her. Mr. Harrington had it drained years ago, but she only saw the very end of Barbara Holland’s life, the thing that took her, and the boy she still loved already falling for Nancy Wheeler, all right outside her bedroom window. Heather yanked her curtains shut. The demogorgon might be unreachable now, but nothing so far healed her battered little heart.

---

“Joey, you little shit! Let go of your sister’s hair”

Heather clung to the kitchen island, watching as the red-headed toddlers tornadoed across the living room. Carol stormed out of the bedroom sporting only one shoe and looking more grown up than Heather ever imagined she would be. Tommy and Carol’s wedding unsurprisingly predated the prompt birth of their first child by mere months. Between the two nightmares currently messing up their house and the heavily pregnant bump in her purple gown, Carol looked about one temper tantrum away from a spectacular breakdown of her own.

However exhausted parenthood and married life looked to someone like Heather, that new sheen in Carol’s eyes and the bizarrely adult change in Tommy’s demeanor suggested otherwise. The life of a Hawkins housewife, with all its cliquey glory and PTA snobs, suited Carol’s catty nature and, to everyone’s surprise, fatherhood had calmed Tommy’s recklessness. Heather took one look at their messy, chaotic, love-filled life, and her confidence crumbled. Her life in New York outpaced anything Hawkins could offer her, but she couldn’t pretend that she had once not wanted anymore more than this life with Steve.

“For fuck’s sake Tommy, would you hurry up?”

Carol herded her husband towards the door, cursing under her breath at his inability to correctly tie a necktie. If not for the wedding rings and Carol’s baby bump, Heather might have mistaken the scene for a recreation of their senior prom night.

Heather piled into the backseat of Carol’s mini-van. Tommy stuck his head out of the driver’s seat as they sped off to Hawkins High, screaming:

“Class of ‘85, motherfuckers!”

Carol yanked him back into the car by the collar. She added a swift smack to the head for good measure. Heather smiled to herself; at least some things never did change.

As the burgundy minivan pulled into the spot once reserved for Heather’s Jeep, she saw her life from the outside. Without the safety of her green and white cheerleading outfit, Hawkins High School looked a whole lot less impressive than back in the day.

Tommy and Carol dispersed into the crowd not long after their arrival, while Heather gravitated towards the open bar. She greeted passersby who recognized her and watched the crowd swell. She stirred her drink absently and watched the night unfold around her.

Old cheer squad members earned careers in fashion or television or teaching. Her third grade best friend married her ninth grade lab partner. Old Hawkins friends gathered like nothing ever changed, but Heather felt acutely aware that everything had.

Meanwhile, Steve tore himself away from a conversation with a few classmates he only vaguely remembered. He stopped a few feet away from her, as if unsure whether or not to proceed.

Time dealt Steve Harrington the short hand. He stayed in Hawkins, he told himself, not out of fear but just to keep an eye on things for a while. Jim Hopper promised to call if any more monsters popped up. No need, he said. I think I’ll stick around a while longer. First, Nancy and Jonathan Byers, even Billy Hargrove, graduated and took the fast track out of town. By the time Dustin and Lucas and Mike and the rest of the rugrats set off to college, Steve was fresh out of excuses.

Hopper took a quick visit down to the record store where Steve took up a job to pay his bills. He leaned down over the counter Steve worked behind and lowered his voice:

“What the hell are you still doing here, kid? We both know you don’t belong in this shithole.”

“Yeah,” he deadpanned. “You’re probably right”

Hopper, more a father to Steve than his own ever was, refused to let him give up like this. Where Steve saw in himself the self-righteous asshole who vandalized the town movie theater, Hopper saw the young man who readily put his own life on the line to save those kids.

“Look, I don’t really care what you do,” he lied. “Just quit feeling sorry for yourself and do something with your life.”

The next morning, Hopper arrived at the station to find Steve Harrington sitting with his tail between his legs in the chair facing his desk. By that time the next year, he was the latest member of the Hawkins PD. And a damn good one at that, he might add.

For the first time in his life, Steve had everything he could want. Everything, that is, except someone to share it with.

His heart skittered as he worked up the courage to get Heather alone. He’d heard that she came alone and wanted little more than to catch her attention. Things ended so badly between them- his fault, really- that he hardly imagined she wanted to see him again. So, with the same sense of humility as that fateful morning in Chief Hopper’s office, he tapped her shoulder:

“Save me a dance? For old time’s sake.”

Gooseflesh rippled her bare arms; she would recognize that voice anywhere. Heather set her cocktail glass on the bar, turning her head towards him. He looked the spitting image of the nervous boy who first asked to take her out to the movies. Hands scrunched in his suit pockets, and sporting the very same crooked smile she remembered, Steve Harrington stood before her.

Heather’s powder blue dress blended well with her skin tone in the dim gym lighting and her dark hair popped against the fabric. His heart swelled at the sight of her standing in the very same gym they shared their first kiss in. Steve wondered how he ever let a girl like that slip through his fingers.

“Okay,” she said. “For old time’s sake”

He led her by the hand to the makeshift dance floor, feeling for the first time in ages the sweaty anticipation of a lovestruck school boy. Her rosy cheeks swelled with a smile in tandem with her shaky hands as they locked between the ducktail of hair at the nape of his neck. His hands resting easily on her hips, they danced.

“Y’know,” he chuckled. “I really didn’t expect to see you again. I’m glad I did”

The way he looked at her, even after all these years, sent Heather to the verge of tears; no one had looked at her like since she was a teenager. Since she and Steve were in love.

“Yeah,” her voice came out soft and small. “Me, too.”

They’d come full circle. Although life led them in different directions, and took Heather and Steve to the wrong people in their journey to find the love they first had in each other, it seemed their story looped back to that dingy old gym. Steve knew the second he saw her that tonight would be a whole lot more than reminiscing with a lost lover. Even if Heather didn’t know that, yet, Steve didn’t mind waiting.

Steve would wait forever for her if it only meant that he could see that smile one last time. The way her brown eyes sparkled in the dim lighting, the way her hips filled out the fabric of her gown, the way her delicate touch ghosted over him as they danced; Heather was filled with reminders of the way he once loved her. The way Steve still loved her.

Heather cupped his cheek, stroking it with her thumb and watching after him with a melancholy smile.

“I am so proud of you,” she whispered.

Heather clung to her once-lover long past the end of slow songs, the two swaying to synthetic pop tunes. It seemed that each of them darted around fears that, should they let go of each other, they might never get the chance to do so again. Whether she admitted it to herself or not, Heather let herself believe that, maybe, she was always meant to find her way back to him. She felt not like an adult but once again like a teenage girl nervously dancing with the prom date of her dreams.

He nuzzled his nose forward against her cheek. His hot breath fanned out against her skin and pulled her in even more. The sweet, mesmerizing scent of Steve’s rosewood cologne, the ghost of spearmint chewing gum, and a hint of musk hypnotized Heather. As he finally kissed her, Heather folded into his touch. The kiss was a decade in the making, the kind featured on movie screens and cheesy discount novels. Every word they were too afraid to speak into existence and all their repressed emotions poured into the kiss.

Reluctantly, he broke off the kiss. Only as the final song of the night faded into its closing note did Heather pull herself away from his warmth. Steve stole a quick kiss to her cheek. They walked slowly towards the edge of the dance floor.

“Here,” he said. Steve draped his sports coat over Heather’s shoulders.

Hair bouncing along with his lopsided grin, Steve couldn’t take his eyes off of Heather and that captivating laugh of hers. Even as she led him away from the dance floor, Steve found himself absorbed in her. Her neatly styled hair fell rebelliously out of place, the heat on her cheeks and perspiration from nerves and the dancing all adding just the right amount of lived-in smudge to her make-up. Heather looked radiant. The words fell out of his loose lips like thoughts so strong that his mouth couldn’t contain them:

“You’re beautiful.”

She slumped into a seat, letting out a breathy laugh. He slid into the empty chair beside her. Although his mind seemed acutely aware that they were running on borrowed time, Steve swore that the night would last forever. Time was edging on despite his best efforts to run backwards against the current; he would never be fifteen again, and their relationship would never be from a clean slate again.

She thanked him quietly. Another stolen kiss followed. The night grew thin around them, their classmates retiring to whatever lives they put on pause for the night's trip down memory lane, but neither could be bothered to tear themselves away. Heather was quiet for some time afterwards, trying to make sense of her emotions. Steve turned to her, forehead pulled in thought:

“We made quite the mess, didn’t we?”

Heather paused, tearing herself away from the fears of yesterday. Her eyes flickered to him. She smiled sadly. All Steve has to do was stay. When it was Heather’s turn to choose Steve, she decided to run instead. It seemed neither of them had the courage to face the very real feelings between them that even time and betrayal couldn’t seem to erase.

“Yeah,” she said eventually. “We sure did.”

He chuckled dryly, rubbing his palms together in thought. The universe seemed to laugh at them, to revel in the tragedy of their bad timing; love itself just wasn’t enough to make them work. His eyes begged Heather to ease his nerves. Steve needed Heather to give him some sign that this was more than just in his head.

“Why is this so hard for us?”

The worry in his tired face looked all too familiar to Heather. A sinking feeling returned to her stomach.

It wasn’t until the summer after graduation that Heather let herself start to forgive Steve for breaking her heart. With the drama and confines of high school now behind them, Heather and Steve vowed to make that summer theirs. A last hurrah of bad decisions with minimal consequences. What they intended to be a string of crashed house parties and getting drunk by the quarry instead was a summer filled with late-night conversations on the hood of Steve’s car. With Heather often teetering between sunburnt and sun-kissed after a shift at the community pool and Steve sticky and burnt out from serving ice cream at Starcourt Mall, they lacked much time or energy to live out the summer they outlined.

Neither of them really minded the extra time to themselves. In fact, Steve soon found himself excited for his shift to end and comforted by the knowledge that Heather was waiting for him in the parking lot, food in hand. By late June, Heather had his order memorized and Billy Hargrove had stopped trying to get her to hang around with him past closing time. That was how they found themselves devouring take out from Dairy Queen, still in their work uniforms, and sitting closer than necessary on the BMW.

She wiped the grease from her fingers with a napkin, laughing. Heather caught a glimpse of Steve in her peripheral vision- dripping with happiness, a shine to his eyes, his Scoops Ahoy sailor hat sagging lowly on his head.

Having Heather back in his life, even if only for brief, stolen moments on the hood of his BMW and late summer nights thick with their past, the future; it patched up the broken parts of his battered heart. She felt like home. It might only be for the summer, but Steve fully intended to hold onto every second with Heather that he could.

“Hey, Steve?”

He looked so eager, so happy to see her. Steve wouldn’t even know what hit him. That summer, he slowly tore down the walls their break-up built against her and she knew from the start that she couldn’t take him with her. The thing about running away from her problems, it seemed, was that Heather had to abandon every good thing in her life right along with the bad. Unfortunately, that included Steve.

She knew she should have told him from the beginning, that she never should have let herself get that close to him again so soon before leaving town. Heather should have told him, and yet she couldn't bring herself to break it to him. Not that Heather hadn’t tried to; she had, many times. It just hurt too much.

His laughter tapered off into an inquisitive hum.

“Do you ever think about leaving Hawkins?”

Maybe it had treated him less than kindly the past year or so, but it was still the only home Steve had ever known. The thought of skipping town never crossed his mind. He decided a long time ago that he would stand his ground and fight until his dying breath if he had to- Steve was braver, more stubborn than Heather that way. Another reason she would tell herself they didn’t work out; Steve Harrington was a fighter but Heather Johnson was a survivor. And sometimes that meant putting herself first.

“No, I can’t say that I have. Why?”

She shrugged, uncharacteristically shy:

“I don’t know,” she balled the napkin up into a makeshift stress ball. “I-I just think maybe I need to get out of this town, Steve. Parts of me can’t seem to shake what I saw, what I did-“

She let Barbara Holland die. Heather watched from her bedroom and did nothing as the thing ate her whole. And when she saw the damn thing again, she hadn’t been strong enough to kill it. She couldn’t save its future victims.

“Hey,” Steve pulled her under his arm. “Don’t say that, okay? You did what you could… We all did. It’s not your fault.”

Tilting her chin upwards with his fingertips, Steve pressed a meaningful kiss to her lips. She leaned into him. His embrace quieted her thoughts enough to mute her worries away. It wasn’t the first kiss they shared that summer, but something hid behind it that made Heather unable to shake him- so much so that she lost her nerve to break the news to him. She left Hawkins the next morning, while Steve dreamt of seeing her again.

The guilt ate at her from the inside out until the town she once loved only suffocated her with living nightmares and her own inadequacies. Deep down, Heather knew that running away from her problems would not solve anything. Still, she craved a change of scenery, an escape from the reminders of what Hawkins truly was under its all-American suburban facade. Hawkins was, quite simply, home to the gates of Hell and Heather didn’t want to stick around and wait for them to crack their way open again.

They had, eventually, done just that; only, Heather wasn’t by Steve’s side that July Fourth when he needed her the most.

Steve stood abruptly, offering her his hand:

“You want to get a drink?”

Nodding, she smiled. The last thing she wanted was to leave Steve’s side. Heather took his hand and followed him through the parking lot. They walked in a comfortable silence. She squeezed his hand in hers.

“Steve?”

The pair paused beside his car. Heather glanced up at him with the guilt of a child caught breaking their parents’ valuables while playing inside the house.

“I’m sorry that I didn’t tell you I was leaving,” she paused. “I should have.”

Steve’s eyes softened. He brushed loose hair from her face, smiling sadly.

“I know you are,” he said. “It’s okay, Heather. That was a long time ago.”

Forgiven or not, Heather still juggled her feelings of guilt and lingering feelings for Steve between stolen glances on the drive home. He may have absolved her, but Heather still needed

to forgive herself first.

“Come on,” Steve opened the passenger door. “How ‘bout that drink?”

---

The pair of them stumbled into Steve’s old bedroom between stolen kisses and wandering hands. Retracing steps from a lifetime ago, they fumbled blindly in the dim lighting, too utterly consumed in each other to care much for the world outside those walls. There was only the electric rush of pure, raw sexual chemistry and unresolved feelings.

Steve pulled back momentarily, lips dripping in unspoken words. Heather shook her head, stroking his cheek sensually with her thumb:

“Not now, Steve,” she shushed him, her waiting kiss soaking up his silent fears.

He pulled her hips flush against his torso, working blindly on her dress zipper. Steve’s rough palms explored every inch of her flesh that he could reach. He pinched purple hickies into the crook of her neck, chasing after her as her head flopped in pleasure. Heather hadn’t let anyone mark her skin that way in years. Steve made her feel young again, like his touch was the Fountain of Youth and she was Ponce de Leon, drinking him in deeply.

Her dress pooled on the floor around her feet as Steve pushed the thin straps from her shoulders. She looked even more mesmerizing than he remembered. Heather grew into her curves; time transformed her from a bewitching teenage beauty to the woman of Steve’s dreams. And he wanted to feel, to taste, every inch of her.

Spreading her legs apart ever so slightly, Steve dropped to his knees before her. He thumbed at her through the meager fabric of her lace panties. Another hickey on her smooth upper thigh. He groaned at the smell of her arousal. His expert mouth latched hungrily onto her core through the fabric.

Heather wriggled in pure, hot pleasure against his magical lips. Her fingers dug into his scalp, pulling on his hair just the way she knew drove him crazy. Steve pushed aside her panties, buried his nose, his lips into her most sensitive nerves. She tasted like heaven to him, the mere sight of her writhing above him an ethereal vision. Her taste dizzied him and Steve coddled her closer to his lips.

Steve loved the chase almost as much as the kill itself. He knew what he was doing, and knew he was damn good at it, too. If Steve had been a wolf in the bedroom as a teenager, then the only thing to stop him now was a silver bullet. And Heather was his full moon.

Her first orgasm hit hard and unexpectedly early, received by Steve’s eager tongue. He pulled her in by the neck for another kiss. The salty taste of her own arousal clinging to his breath intrigued Heather; touching Steve turned all her other experiences into blurry non-memories. Touching Steve felt like coming home after a long day.

The sight of Steve in all his naked glory sent Heather into a tizzy. She licked teasingly along his length, easing her way into giving him the head of his life. As she worked, Heather focused in on the bliss reflected in his face.

“Jesus,” he whined. “I forgot how good you were at that.”

Eager to be inside her, Steve reluctantly pulled her back up to her feet. He backed her up against the bed. Heather melted back against his pillows, a siren waiting for him to fall right into her trap. He kneeled over her figure. Steve kissed her sweetly. One hand thumbed at her clit. In one fluid motion, he pushed inside her.

Steve loved the way she clung to her. Her touch only egged him on. Steve rutted into her deeply. He made love to her with a veracity and dedication that put every other man she’d been with to shame. It was only Steve.

With one final grunt sandwiched by her name, Steve came deep inside of her.

She fell back against his sheets, spent in a fucked-out bliss. Heather felt her life in the city slipping further from her mind the more Steve Harrington and his magnificent cock drew her to a future here.

“Do you remember what you said to me the night Nancy and I broke up?”

Heather hummed in her sleepy daze, nodding:

“Sure, I do.”

“Did you mean it?”

She rolled over on the pillow to face him, fully awake now. Heather blinked through the darkness. Grasping in the dark, she clamped their hands together. From behind his messy hair, Steve looked like a shivering puppy left out in the rain. A soft smile graced her lips. She thought of the last time she saw that look.

“She never loved me.”

Nancy might have been the good girl toying around with Hawkins’ playboy, but instead she tore Steve to shreds and ran for the hills. Now, he wanted someone to sympathize with him. Heather, though, had no room in her life to be anyone’s second choice.

Heather tossed the hat to her candy striper costume on the duvet, sighing. She pawed at the vomit stain on her skirt with a damp towel. Perhaps the only person in town who had missed Steve and Nancy’s fallout, Heather left Tina’s party early to lull a dangerously intoxicated Brittany Matthews home before she ruined anyone else’s costume.

“What? Why are you even here, Steve?”

“I don’t know,” he shrunk down. “This is the first place I thought of.”

Oblivious to his pity party, Heather fussed about. She tried to clean the night’s memory of her drunken, sophomore team mate nearly passed out on Tina’s front porch right off her dress right along with the stain.

“What the fuck are you talking about, Steve?”

“Nancy,” he suddenly fell sheepish. “She never loved me.”

Heather watched after him, incredulous. Her hands gripped at the soiled towel as she bit her tongue. Steve, craving some sort of reaction from her, pressed on:

“I should have known,” he sulked. “I mean…God, when did I become such a fuck-up? This is bullshit. Of course it was. I should have known no one could love me-”

“Oh, fuck you! I did! I loved you so much, Steve. You had to have known that.

“What? Heather-”

“You broke my fucking heart, Steve. I’m not about to pretend that I didn’t see this coming and I’m sure as hell not your shoulder to cry on”

She tossed the soiled washcloth right at his chest. If Steve hadn’t been crying before, he sure was now. Still no movement.

“But-“

“I think you should leave.”

When he made no moves to do so, some part of her snapped right along with the last string of her heart that still reached out for Steve. She plucked the picture frame from her nightstand, their picture, and chucked it towards him, only narrowly missing his head. It landed on the floor under her dresser, as cracked and broken as their relationship, where it stayed until well after Heather graduated and left home.

“Get the fuck out, Steve.”

He faltered a moment, her words hitting him full-force with the one thing he must have known and feared but chose to ignore for the past year. Thick layers of tears caked his cheeks. Steve moved slowly and fluidly back towards the window he snuck in through, hoping all the while that he might uncover some magic words to undo the damage he slung onto her poor heart. He found only silence, and by the time his feet hit the ground, Steve knew he’d really done it this time.

He wanted only to be the carefree fifteen-year-old who got to kiss her in secret moments shared in the backseat of his BMW and late at night in her bedroom, when her parents were asleep. Steve wanted Heather back, but this was too little, too late. She locked the window behind him.

Looking at him now, her heart ached. The stubborn parts of her hadn’t forgiven him for breaking her heart all those years ago. Yet, she mostly just wanted him.

“Yes.”

Steve pressed his lips lightly to her knuckles.

“For what it’s worth, I loved you too.”

Steve leaned over the extra pillows to face her.  

When Steve awoke the next morning, he found himself surprised to see her messy hair splayed out across the pillow beside him, and utterly bewitched by the sight of Heather curling into the sheets as she slept soundly in his bed. He thought, though not for the first time in his life, that he might like to wake each day to the sight.

Later, as he walked her to her car, the idea still bounced around his mind. He grabbed at her hips, using every last drop of cheekiness to woo her away from that car. Steve let Heather go once before and he spent the next ten years regretting it.

“Stay.”

“You know I can’t.”

“What’s keeping you?

She exhaled with a soft laugh. Her home, her friends, her career, all waited for her back in the city. The only thing Hawkins, Indiana had that New York City didn’t was Steve Harrington.

“I’m sorry,” she kissed his lips sweetly. “Goodbye, Steve.”

He stood at the curb, hands balled into his shorts pockets, and watched her drive off until the Honda turned out of sight. Steve smiled after her, sporting the same smile he’d flashed the first time he told her his name, only this time a bitterness hid behind it.

Like Lot’s wife fleeing Sodom, Heather knew better than to turn around, knew his puppy dog eyes would trap her here forever, melt her down into a pillar of salt. And, like Lot’s wife, she did anyways.

She knew she’d see him again, if only in her dreams.

-----

Heather nervously twirled the phone cord around her finger. She stared at the slip of paper and dialed his phone number, her mind stuck over the words. The last time she felt this afraid, Heather lodged an axe into the neck of an interdimensional monster. This time, though, she knew that wouldn’t solve her problems.

“Steve? I need to see you.”

The trek to Indiana did little to calm her nerves. She drove silently, the radio turned down to silence. No matter how many times Heather practiced the speech in her head, it didn’t get any easier.

She stood at his doorstep. Fiddling with her hands, she contemplating blowing him off. Heather felt out of place at his apartment. To her, Steve would always be the boy next door. No matter what happened tonight. She thought of him always as he was then- handsome, full of life, brimming with dreams. Full of love for her.

When he opened the door to let her in, Steve couldn’t dull his smile. He looked almost the same as the boy in her memories. The love hadn’t quite left his eyes yet. It was with the comfort of this thought that she stepped inside.

Steve’s apartment was neat, small, homely. She could see him settling down before the TV with a beer or fussing over his hair in the mirror by the door. The thought made her smile.

He sat down with her on the couch, hands clasping with hers. His bright eyes watched her closely, waiting and ready to accept her back into his life.

“Is everything okay? You sounded upset on the phone.”

“I just- I wanted to talk.”

“Talk?”

He blinked. Steve knew this song and dance and he was tired of trying to keep her here. Tired of letting her toy with his heart.

“I haven’t seen or heard from you in months and you came all this way just to talk?”

Steve told himself he would hear her out, but his emotions got the best of him. He raised his voice in frustration. The abrupt shift in tone caught her off guard. She hadn’t meant to upset him. Heather deflated in her seat, the speech she’d had prepared now stuck in her throat.

“Forget it,” she rose. “I don’t even know why I came here.”

He followed her out onto the sidewalk. Heather walked out of his life too many times for him to let her go again.

“Where are you going?”

“I don’t know! Home, I guess.”

“Don’t you dare walk away from me again!”

The brunette stopped in her tracks, whirled around to face him. Angry, frustrated tears welled in her eyes. He stood just close enough for her to touch. Close enough for her to feel his heart breaking.

“And why not? We both already know how this ends.”

“I love you so much that it hurts. Why can’t you just admit that you want this, too?”

“That’s not why I came back, Steve.”

“Well, then, what? Is this some kind of a game to you-“

“I’m pregnant.”

His expression blanked. Steve didn’t know the first thing about fatherhood. His own gave him next to nothing to start from; the last thing he wanted was to find himself repeating his father’s shitty parenting style. He liked to think that he had finally shed the damage his absentee parents did to him, and that he had found a way to fill the gap their cold demeanor created where affection should have been in his childhood, but that didn’t stop his fears of repeating the vicious cycle.

Heather looked just as afraid.

“Do you really think we’re ready to be parents?”

“No,” he held her hand tighter in his. “But I know that I’m not my father and we can learn from our parents’ mistakes. You’re my future, Heather”

“Do you mean that?”

“Of course, I do.”

They sat together on his front porch steps. Silence engulfed them for a moment as her earth shattering news settled in. Fear crept back up on Heather the longer he stayed quiet. Did Steve want to raise this child with her? Did he want her? Her questions and insecurities were overwhelming.

She broke into tears. “I’m scared, Steve.”

“Me, too.”

He held her close to his chest as she cried. A few tears slipped from his own eyes. Steve combed his fingers through her hair and whispered comforts into her ear. Suddenly, he saw a future for himself. A modest, comfortable cottage with a nice yard for the kids to play in, maybe a dog too, and Heather standing beside him with all the love in the world in her eyes. It was comforting, warm. He wanted that future, with her.

“Stay here, with me. I love you, Heather, and I want to raise this baby with you, if you’ll have me.”

Sniffling, she turned her chin upwards to face him.

“Okay,” she said. “Yes, I will. I love you, too, Steve.”

As he pressed a gentle kiss to her forehead, Steve knew that everything would turn out okay. He loved Heather Johnson and that was enough for him.

[starlightwrites]

Okay what about 47 and 73 for that prompt mashup?

Hi @becausestories! Sorry it took me a bit to finish this!

For the Fanfiction Trope Mash-up!

Not A Date

It was a perfectday—sun shining, cool breezes rolling lazily through the parks, and the sky wasa perfect, spotless blue, so bright it almost didn’t look real. The whole nineyards, like something out of a postcard. They were walking side-by-side throughthe wastes, on their way to check out a territory east of Fizztop when thethought struck her and forced a laugh.

They were on adate.

Not aparticularly good date, but they were hitting the benchmarks, so far as shecould tell.

(Continued after the cut!)

Sunny skies?Check.

Quiet stroll?Check.

Picnic lunch?Check, if cram and tinned apples counted.

All she neededwas a dress and some pearls and they could have been headed for the town parkto sit side-by-side in front of a duck pond. Just laughing away, sitting on thecommunity green amidst moms and their strollers, kids and their soccer balls,old men feeding geese. Gage on a proper date. Ha.

She snorted and theman in question glanced over out the corner of his eye. If he knew what she wasthinking, he’d snap at her that this wasn’t a date. Grumble something about allthe work they had to do or swear about the Disciples or something like that.His brow would furrow and his good eye would narrow. Gage didn’t seem to likeher goofy distractions, and he certainly wouldn’t tolerate that one.

So, of course,she had to needle him.

“You know,Gage,” she said. “I was reading this article in Live and Love about pre-war outings.”

“Yeah?”

“In particular,there was this one ritual where people would go out on nice days and eat mealstogether. They called it a date.”

If both eyescould have rolled, they’d have rolled right the hell out of his head. Adjustinghis pack on his shoulder and speeding up a bit, he groused “don’t you havebetter things to do?”

“Right now? Whilewe’re on a date?”

“We ain’t on adate.”

“I dunno, Gage.Seems a bit like we’re on a date.”

“We ain’t on adate, Princess.”

“Whatever yousay, dear.” She skipped up closer and looped her arm through his with a heartysmile. When he shrugged her off, she could have sworn she saw an answering grintug at the corner of his mouth.

She was halfwayto formulating a snappy response when the Geiger counter on her Pip clicked tolife. Gage stopped mid-step and glanced back. She pulled up the screen, butultimately, all she really needed to do was look straight up at the quilt ofthick dark clouds settling overhead so fast it was like night had fallen all atonce.

And just likethat, the perfect weather was gone.

Radstorms werestill new. She was getting used to most things, but something about the airturning green was just plain unnatural. The way the gusts were sharp, almostviolent, and she half-expected some upstart girl and her little dog to park afarmhouse on her head. As if she’d ever had a doubt she wasn’t in Kansasanymore.

A hand wrappedaround her arm and jerked her back down to earth and towards a hazy shape inthe gathering murk. It was one of those old rusted-red trucks that peoplebragged about using to move mattresses. The kind that always seemed to looklike it was on death’s door, even back before the apocalypse. With the radstormgearing up, however, it would have to do. She pried open the door and clamberedin as Gage thrust her forward. He practically crushed her when he followed and slammedthe door behind them. Crank window. It was hard not to giggle, watching himfrantically roll the window up to keep out the dust.

Gage collapsed,his armor propping him forward at a weird angle. Corinne shifted her ruck ontothe floor and adjusted herself on the bench seat.

“This isn’tgoing to do much, Boss.”

“It’s betterthan being out there.”

Cori glanced outthe windshield to where the wind pounded down on the ground, crashing into thedust like a wave breaking on the shore. At least all the windows in the oldtruck were still in one piece.

Gage shifted andthen finally tried to fight his chest piece off over his head. Problem was, hewas tall enough that his head was already brushing the roof of the car as itwas. Cori let him struggle for a second before he stopped and made eye-contact,glaring.

“A little help?”

“You seem to bedoing great on your own.”

“Corinne.”

His arms weretrapped in the metal cage he’d seen fit to wear over his ratty tank tops andthere was nothing funnier than watching her big scary bodyguard trapped withinthe confines of his own armor. Sure, she could unlatch it. But there wassomething deeply satisfying about “always-thinks-ahead” Gage having forgottenthat cars have roofs.

“Listen,” hegrumbled, probably realizing that she wasn’t in a hurry to assist. “Ifsomething comes along and has the same thought we did about hiding in thisfuckin’ thing, you’ll want me to be able to use my arms.”

She looked backout at the storm and decided that was fair. Her fingers worked at the metallatches on the side of his armor she could reach and, once his arms were free,he finished the job, dumped his armor onto the floor, and leaned back againstthe seat.

Well. They hadtime. Corinne unpacked the two cans of cram and a tin of apples and set them onthe dash so she could root around for forks.

“Fuckin’ radstorm.Hope it passes before I start puking.”

“With our luck,we’ll have to finish out our date in this car.”

If he could havejumped out of the truck without irradiating himself beyond saving, he wouldhave left her there. She laughed and curled up with her boots braced on eitherside of the steering wheel and a spoon in-hand. Close enough.

“Picnic lunch?”She offered the can his way after taking a scoop for herself. Cram wasninety-percent salt and one percent processed ham, but it was better thannothing. Gage made a face but accepted regardless.

“Still not adate, Boss.”

“I don’t knowabout that.” She reached over and took another bite, almost elbowing him in theprocess. “Seems pretty cozy.”

“You’ve got somelow standards, then.”

“Got me there.”

They finisheddinner and even picked at the apples, but the storm didn’t seem to be lettingup. Gage rolled his head back and cracked his knuckles.

“Think we’ll bestuck here till morning?”

It had beenmidday when they set out, but in her experience, Radstorms lasted anywhere froma few minutes to a few hours, and if it got dark…well. She wasn’t big on theidea of stumbling around at night if she could avoid it.

“Who knows?”

“You’re probablyright,” he sighed as he stretched out, hands behind his head.

Cori opened thedoor for a split second to dump the tins out so they weren’t just sitting inthe cabin. It was silly; not like she was hell-bent on keeping this busted oldtruck neat and tidy, but still, she’d rather not sleep on trash if she couldavoid it. Gage made a face but didn’t offer reproach.

“Well,” shesaid, locking the door firmly. “This will be one of the longest dates I’ve everbeen on.”

“Still not adate.”

“And overnight,too. What kind of woman must you think I am?”

“The kind with abig fuckin’ mouth.”

She curled herlegs up to her chest so she could swivel in the small space. Her knee hit thehorn and nearly startled both of them out of their skin, but she squirmed untilshe could lay down, feet propped up on the window and head on Gage’s lap. He adjusted,sitting up so straight she could have used his spine like a ruler. One hand bracedon the seat next to him and then jumped up like he’d just realized her hair waspoisonous and he shouldn’t be anywhere near it. But then, when he couldn’t setit back on his lap, he seemed at a loss. He scratched his chest thoughtfullyand then set his hand back on the seat, right back where he’d started. Shecould have turned her head and kissed his forearm, and oh boy, if this freaked him out, that would sendhim scrambling.

“Well. You’vedone it, Gage. You’ve bored your date to sleep.” Her eyes trained up on hisface, the sharp jut of his chin, the shadow of his stubble, the planes of hischest. All sharp edges—Gage was one-hundred-percent sharp edges, with some scruffthrown in for looks. She’d cuddled herself up against the sheer rock face of anindomitable cliff, and wasn’t it just like her to wrap up in arms that wouldn’thug back. Funny.

That thought wasbitter coffee on the back of her tongue, and it wasn’t even fair. She hadbetter things to be bitter about anyways, so she stuffed it down and grinned.

“Look at you. Sostiff! Well, stay up if you want, but I’m going to get some shut-eye. Wake meif you want to swap out for watch.”

Corinne rolledonto her side, her head still cushioned on his thigh. She was starting to driftwhen she felt a light tough, a hand brushing over the point of her elbow andlanding on her forearm, a warm weight against her skin. Overhead, Gage relaxedback into his seat. He squeezed her forearm and she felt him exhale, tautness inhis stomach easing.

Not a date. Nota bad way to spend the afternoon, either.

[jonathansoffice-blog]

What inspires us?

What causes us to want to create?

The old trail wound down and around through the woods on its way to the pond. The trees seemed to remember not only his past but “the” past, they held, cherished remembrances of a more innocent time.

A time of base ball cards and bamboo fishing poles.

A time when an old friend was one you had known since first grade and the two of you looked forward to high school with a strange mixture of fear and excitement.

Today he walked slowly feeling the dirt and small stones through the souls of his dress shoes letting his mind drift back to when the same soil dusted his bare feet so many years ago.

There was no way to number the trips he had taken down this old path but it was rare for him to walk this way alone.

It had been years (he wasn’t sure just how many) since he had been here at all.

Overhead leaves that formed the uneven canopy caught the mid summers breeze and applauded his return.

Sunlight streamed through here and there making columns of light and giving structure to this sanctuary as birds sang a sweet song of worship to a God that he was sure was no longer listening.

It was beautiful and peaceful and for him sorrowful in this place that once brought him such childhood joy..

He remembered long days stuck in a stuffy class room dreaming of being here. Planning fishing and camping trips is how he past the time as the teachers droned on and on.

Then after class he would meet with his best friend and they would head for the old dirt path that lead to the pond and away from the lives they otherwise had to deal with.

It was a time before cell phones and they wouldn’t be bothered until the sun sunk low in the western sky and they had to rush home for  dinner and what ever problems may have arisen in their absents.

The next day would bring a fresh start and new adventures and the night before would be mostly forgotten.

As he made his way to the bank he stopped to pick up a flat mostly round stone, the kind his friend would have spent quite a long time looking for once up on a time a long time ago.

He walked along the bank until he came to a place where the tree roots hung over the edge forming a shallow cave.

He had spent untold hours here with his friend, fishing talking, and questioning life and all the mysteries there of.

Clear threw high school this was the place they had gone to get away from the world out side and this was the place he had returned to after his first marriage had failed, this is where his friend had found him, drunk beyond the pain.

He had woke up on his friend’s couch with the worst head ache.

He sat there under the roots paying no attention to the dirt he was getting on his dress slacks.

His fingers working the disk shaped stone

He turned it over and over as he stared out across the liquid mirror before him.

Absent minded he watched  the reflection of heaven.

He felt guilt, and a dull pain that kind of throbbed.

His best friend had been there for him but when the shoe had been on the other foot,

Well the whole time his best friend had struggled he was busy with his own life. Busy getting married again starting a new family. Working starting a business, failing in business.

He new, he had been told what was going on.

It was just like when they were kids he had known what was going on in his life he had seen the bruises but he hadn’t known what to do.

So they played, they fished, they pretended that there was nothing wrong.

The stone was smooth and growing heavy in his hand as the undisturbed surface of the pond began to show the signs of a coming storm in the clouds above.

He hadn’t been there, not really. He had wanted to be there he just didn’t know how, he didn’t know what to do.

He wished he could go back and at least try.

He wanted to have done some thing any thing and now it was over and there was nothing he could do.

He sat there numb as the sky fell under it’s own wait in the form of large drops that caused rings  transforming the mirror in to a kind of instrument that played a song of sadness and remorse.

He sat and listened letting his spirit join in the symphony tears marked his cheeks. Bitter tears so salty that they burned.

His body shook and rocked, trembling from the emotional pain.

He didn’t know how long he had sat there and wasn’t sure when the rain had stopped but when he had become aware of him self again the sky was starting to show signs of a clear evening the first star of night twinkling over the top of a large elm.  

He slipped the skipping stone in to his front pocket as he got up and worked his way back along the waters edge headed for home.

Just were the trail turned to go back threw the woods he paused, some thing caught his attention.

Going up the trail on the other side of the lake two boys with backpacks and fishing poles were sharing the burden of a large bag that most likely contained a tent.

They were talking about some thing in excited tones but he couldn’t quite make out the  words.

There was no need to here the words.

He smiled and turned back toward the woods.

The next day at the funereal rev Appleton would go on about how his friend should have fought harder and how heaven is only for those that endure until the end.

How his suicide condemned his mortal soul.

Appleton was a flake and a bore so he tried to block as much of it out as he could.

When the service was over he walked to the front and slipped the skipping stone in to the hand of his best friend and walked out.

He didn’t go to the burial.

He just couldn’t take it.

That had been over forty years ago.

Since then he had moved back to his home town and bought the land around the pond, he turned it in to a park and memorialized it to his friend.

He went there when he was feeling the need to be alone and think.

He must have felt the need for he found him self there on this sunny day. The birds were singing and for some reason he was sure that on this day their creator was hearing them.

He walked up the old familiar trail toward the old elm tree where him and his friend spent so many summer days.

As it came in to view there he was.

You, you’re here!

Of coarse I’m here, where did you think you would find me?

He just stood there stunned.

I got your gift.

He held out the skipping stone.

Thanks, its perfect. To perfect to skip so Iv decided to keep it.

It was then that he realized his friend hadn’t aged in fact he was younger than the last time they had seen each other.

Your dead!

Funny, I don’t feel dead?

Do you feel dead?

What? No I ,,,,,

But I thought rev Appleton said you had condemned your mortal soul?

I guess it’s a good thing God doesn’t do things according to the gospel of Rev Appleton.

But how could I be…..

Dose it really matter? It’s a beautiful day and our fishing gear is all ready for us up by the old elm.

There wasn’t a hint of bitterness to be found in his voice.

He was forgiven and that knowledge aloud him to forgive him self .

As they headed up the old trail together he realized he was a kid again spending a summer day with his best friend.

[ratkingdnd]

Chapter Thirty Two - Sucked off by a goana

Buffalo looks down, still hanging onto the rope. The rope was under less stress with only one person on it now. Buffalo could see his friends at the bottom of the cellar looking at the moving blob on the bottom and starts to move down, slowly descending the rope. Ned stares at the slime - “Hello?”, the slime continues to move around in a circle, not paying any attention to the heroes at all. Dolgan says “Ductu” in a low voice, a thin glow appears over Scaly as he feels a little more powerful. Buffalo looks around and sees roots creeping up the sides of the walls, he draws his bows and shoots three arrows, evenly spaced. Each one sinks into a root, giving a faint glow in each arrow, slightly lighting up the room. Scaly, feeling buff says “Suffer in sulphur!” yelling at the black slime and suddenly it stops moving. “What did you do?” asks Ned, “It thinks it’s in a lava pit at the moment, it’s in it’s own head/body/slime…whatever”. “Yeah..right, pretty full on man” Ned responds as the heroes look on the Slime shaking in front of them.

Ned raises his tuning fork, the chime of opening and bangs it on the floor. He then points it at the slime. The slime starts to quiver, almost in time with the ringing of the chime. Ned walks closer and closer towards the slime and attempts to touch it with the ringing chime. As soon as the chime touches the slime it starts to suck it in, Ned tries to pull it out, but the slimes strength was overwhelming and starts to suck Ned in too. Before a couple of seconds, Ned and the chime were floating inside of the slime, motionless. Scaly’s spell was still going and suddenly Ned could shake the feeling that he was in a lava pit and start’s frantically trying to escape, but he couldn’t, he was stuck just like the slime.

Dolgan holds his hand out at Scaly and says “Give me a bolt”, Scaly pulls one out and hands it over. Dolgan ties some rope to the bolt and walks over to the slime slowly, being careful not to touch it. He raises the bolt and stabs it into the slime. He manages to stab it in without touching it at all and pulls back on the rope - the bolt was firmly in, but was also being sucked in slowly too. Buffalo walks over to a part of the slime, that was protruding out a little and uses his short sword to slice a piece of it off. A piece of the slime falls off and the slime almost starts to bubble, it bloats a little and suddenly starts moving again. Buffalo looks back at Scaly and Scaly responds “It still thinks it’s in the lava pit, no idea why it’s moving”. Buffalo follows the slime with his sword and stabs it in, spinning it, trying to bore a hole inside of it. The slime starts to bloat again, rising and falling like a bullfrogs throat, pustules start to burst all over it and green slime starts to pour out from the pustules. Buffalo feels his sword being pulled in and manages to yank it out before it was too far in.

Scaly watches the blob and continues his psychic onslaught, even with Ned suffering the same fate inside of the blob. Scaly pulls out his crossbow and shoots a bolt directly into the slime. The blob absorbs the bolt and starts to bloat once more, the pustules open up and gas hisses out, right before green ooze continues out. This time the bloating doesn’t go down and the slime seems to get larger and larger, occupying almost double it’s previous size. As it expands into the free space, Buffalo finds himself being run over by it’s body and suddenly Ned isn’t the only one stuck inside the slime. 

Dolgan yells “TELO LUMEN!” as a bolt of light flies out of his cross, flying across the room and striking the black ooze. The black ooze shakes, visibly hurt by the spell. Buffalo starts to struggle inside the slime, twisting and squirming his body, breaking out of the slime and escaping, catching his breath. Buffalo looks at Dolgan and says “Throw your stone at it when you get a chance, then I’ll follow up with two arrows” and Dolgan nods. Dolgan looks towards Scaly and says “Stop the spell” and Scaly snaps out of it, releasing the slime and Ned from their psychic prisons. Scaly shakes his head and throws his palms out, shooting a fireball out and hitting the slime. The slime reacts and pulls Ned through it’s body until he’s on the outskirts. The slime uses Ned and slams down on the ground next to Ned attempting to attack him but misses and instead just throws Ned out of it’s body. Ned looks up, visibly shaken and short of breath.  

Buffalo says “Now!” and Dolgan throws his obsidian rock, the rock opens up a hole for a second in the slime and Buffalo reacts in that short moment, shooting a force arrow into the hole opening the wound up even further. Buffalo follows that up with another arrow, one that he had prepared in the Shadowfell. An arrow with an exploding potion strapped to the end of it. The arrow flies through the hole just before the wound closes over. The heroes watch on to see the arrow explode in the middle of the slime, the slime expands to a huge size and back to its original within a split second, but it was still in one piece. The slime starts leaking green ooze again and almost seems to revel in it’s own juices. The heroes follow up with a quick series of attacks - Scaly creates a lightning storm above it’s head, Ned smashes his tuning fork into a crossbow bolt and the ooze becomes more of a puddle on the ground, Buffalo shoots another two arrows into the slime and it starts leaking ooze once more, coating itself over with it’s ooze from it’s pustules. The slime makes another attack, slamming the ground with an extension of it’s body. As the slime hits the ground, the heroes hear a “Ting!” and a gem flies out onto the ground.  

Scaly takes another shot with his crossbow, the pustules leak again. Ned says to Dolgan “Gimme your rock”, Dolgan hands it over and Ned starts tying his tuning fork to it, but before making the last knot, the rock disappears from his hand and re-appears in Dolgan’s hand. Ned looks up and Dolgan shrugs saying “I don’t know man, it just always comes back”. The blob lashes out another arm straight into Ned. Ned attempts to ignore it, wearing the bludgeoning to his chest and throwing the tuning fork into the air - Dolgan takes the opportunity and hits it with his hammer. The tuning fork smashes into pieces, ringing it out loudly, echoing and reverberating throughout the circular room in a cacophony of sound. The ooze turns into even more of a puddle, almost completely covering the ground. It ripples like a stone thrown into a calm pond.

Buffalo raises his arm slowly in the air saying “Spica Incrementum” as spikes appear in a large area underneath the puddle, the spikes poking through the blobs now puddle-ish body. Scaly runs up to the blob with his sword drawn, but before he can make an attack, he falls over, slipping in the ooze. The blob’s pustule re-appear and shoot green ooze out again, covering it’s body as it rises back to it’s original size. It makes an attack on Buffalo, whacking him with it’s blobby hand, hitting him in the side as another gem flies out. Dolgan raises his hammer, imbuing it with all of his strength and magic into one strike, smashing it deep into the ooze - so much so that the metal of his hammer clangs into the ground underneath the ooze. Splattering it all over the walls, the heroes, and the roots. One last gem, remains of the ooze on the ground. Dolgan walks over and picks it up.

Buffalo grabs a vial that he had leftover from the Shadowfell and scoops up some of the ooze. The heroes all slowly make their way back up the rope, one at a time to reduce any stress and get back to the top, crawling back to the door so as to avoid the phase spiders and back into sunlight. They make their way back down into the courtyard and see Gurvaash. “What was in the cellar?” he asks. “A black puddle of ooze” responds Buffalo holding up the vial, we got rid of it though. “Ahhhh a leftover of the alchemists chemicals no doubt, brought to life by the explosion I assume”. “We’re going to head out to do some other stuff, but can we come back?” asks Ned, “I have no problem with that” says Gurvaash and they walk out the drawbridge again.

The heroes decide to walk over to the airship, a few gems under their belt and gusto in their stride now that they had a small place of residence in the forest. They arrive not too long after leaving the castle and a rock flies down next to Ned. Ned looks to his side, “What the hell?”, another rock flies down, this time next to Buffalo. “Ummm..” says Dolgan, as a hail of rocks start crashing down upon them. They look up and see tens of little goblins standing in the crashed airship, strewn across multiple trees stuck in the canopy, pitching rocks down. “Fuuuuck offfffff” comes the shrill shrieks of what seemed like the leader of the goblins, the heroes look around themselves and find that they are surrounded by goblins. “Stop! We don’t want to, but if we have to, we will kill all of you” says Ned, “YOUUUU AND WHAT ARRRMMMYYYYY” shrieks the goblin leader. Ned picks up his axe and chops a goblin in half in one shot. The other goblins back off. “I’ll do more if I have to” says Ned, “Just relax and no one else gets hurt”.

  “What are you doing here?” asks Buffalo. “We crash landed here. Our air elementals escaped somehow” the goblin looks around menacingly at his goblin group. “We run a shipping company from our airship, but have been stuck in these GOD FORSAKEN FOREST for TOO LONG!” the goblin’s shrieks echo through the trees. “If you can get us back the air elementals, we can get ourselves out of this forest and back to work” says the goblin, “What if we find the goblins, will you let us run this ship?”, the goblin laughs, spitting on the ground. “We will give you safe passage out of the woods, that is it. Bring back the elementals, then we will talk” says the screaming goblin. The heroes turn around, arms over each other’s shoulders, “If we want to find these air elementals, they’ll be up in at least the canopies. There’s no way in hell they’d stay here on the ground. We’ve got to look for considerably windy places” says Raish. “I don’t know about you guys, but I am heavily invested in finding these elementals and taking their ship” says Buffalo, “Why don’t we go and ask Gurvaash, he’s not far away and would probably know a lot more about them”

.  The heroes return to the keep and see Gurvaash, “Do you know where the air elementals are?” asks Buffalo. “I have no idea” responds Gurvaash, not really paying attention to the group. “What about the Wickerman Village, do you know about them?” says Buffalo, “Oh yes, they’re Wickerman and they have a village up north” says Gurvaash. “Okay, thanks for the information Gurvaash” Buffalo says flippantly as the heroes walk away. “I think we should head to the Wickerman Village, we have some gold now so we can get some things, we can also ask them about the air elementals” says Buffalo as they walk back out of the keep once more. The heroes decide to walk directly north of the keep, hoping to come across the air elementals on the way to the Wickerman Village, but they are stopped short in their tracks not a couple of hours out. A large cave entrance with left over clothes strewn across the entry was in front of them. 

[jadeslibrary]

The Girl Who Waited Decades- a Doctor Who Fan-fiction (1,799 words)

Summary

"You told me to wait- and I did. A lifetime." 

A breakdown of how Amelia Pond spent the decades she was forced to live out in the Two Streams facility while she waited, following the emotional transition we witnessed in The Girl Who Waited.

Link to Fanfiction.net story page

The Girl Who Waited Decades

There would be many, many times in her life that Amelia Pond would question the small choices she’d made in the past. Choices that, no matter how inconsequential they had seemed at the time, would have changed everything. Maybe if she hadn’t had gone back for her camera phone that day. Maybe if she had pressed the green anchor button, instead of the red waterfall. Maybe if she had left a better sign, found a way to boost her mobile signal, hacked the hand bots, or changed the way she asked the interface a question. Maybe if she hadn’t have trusted the raggedy man from space who showed up at her doorstep in a big blue box all those years ago. Any small shift, and everything would be different. Then again in hindsight, everything seemed a bit more obvious. That didn’t mean it could fix things now.

Year one was the easiest. In year one, Amy had known her raggedy man and centenarian would come back for her. It was an irrefutable fact, the same way the sky was blue, or the hand bot thingies were a little creepy if you really sat down and thought about it. Which she did, many times. She also realized rather quickly that while she wasn’t hungry, cravings were still frustrating things, and the cinema made wonderful popcorn. The salt and butter practically melted on your tongue, and the next thing you knew you realized you hadn’t had food in months, and you were laughing through your tears at a movie and taste you would experience countless more times.

It was also a year of learning. She learned that the engine room, indeed, masked her from the handbots (though occasionally a faulty one would wander in and she would have to disable it)

It was also one of the loneliest places in two-stream facility. The safest, but the loneliest. The Interface wouldn’t work in the engine room- for what reason other than whatever caused the handbots to malfunction, she wasn’t sure. But it meant that her contact with any voice, even a sometimes annoying robotic one with an unsettlingly bright light, was impossible there. Nevertheless, as it was the safest, she felt it was the area she would build her home. It started with a curtain she found in the cinema, looped between two pylons, and framed with a large tarp that had been used in the aquarium to cover a tank (at the expense of a few fish. She ate them. They tasted so good that she almost didn’t feel bad for her recently departed friends.)

She explored. Gallery, Cinema, Garden, Aquarium, Rollarcoasters, Mountain Zone. Her favorite eventually became the Mountain Zone. She would sit there on very lonely nights, watching the sun set over mountains made of glass, casting a breathtaking spectrum of light over everything in view. The first night she’d seen it, after she realized that the sun set at nights in the Garden, Gallery, and Mountain Zone, it was seven months and fourteen days after she’d been stranded there. She’d sat on a pile of red sand, feeling cool air brush over her face- the only sound in that part of the facility that wasn’t made by her- watching the glass plains visibly fracture with colors of light, and cried. No, not just cried- Sobbed. Full blown, anguished screaming, sobs. When she crawled back into her makeshift bed last night, covered in sand, she’d listened to the engines woosh. She thought briefly, about how similar it sounded to the TARDIS engine.

It was the first night that she worried that she may die alone at Two Streams.

The first decade after the first year was still relatively easy. Though she ran out of movies in the sixth year, unable to request more as an actual patient there would have from the hand bots, the reruns didn’t exactly bother her. The popcorn still tasted wonderful, as well. Her clothes were in good shape, the small brush she’d carried with her in her pocket hadn’t broke, and the toothpaste located in the bathroom of the gallery lasted quite a while. She developed a nice routine. Mornings she set out to scavenge- or if she couldn’t find anything that day, she spent them exploring the Mountain Zone or riding a coaster. The gallery was saved for the afternoons, when the heat was too much for her in the outdoor rooms. She mainly spent nights in the Cinema, or the Garden. Twice a month still, she would sit and watch the sun set over the glass mountains. On a particularly bad night, she would stare at the night stars and talk to The Interface. She would ask it questions about the distant constellations and planets she could see, and she would tell it stories about the ones she had visited. It was “Doctor” this, and “Doctor” that. Sometimes, if the night was clear enough, she could see Earth. On these nights, she would tell It about Rory. These were the nights that hurt the most. The nights were she would feel tears stream down her face, and her bottom lip would soundlessly quiver. She’d stopped crying out loud in the eighth year.

Decade one was the easiest. In decade one, Amelia Pond was still Amy. She was filled with hope, and always mused to the Interface where she would go and what she would do as soon as that big blue box showed up, with its old wooden frame and wonderful wooshing sound. In Decade one, Amelia Pond hoped.

Decade two was harder. In Decade two, the popcorn became repulsive. Movies became boring, drawn out, and downright terrible. She mocked them until the thought of sitting down for one made her sick. In Decade Two, the sunsets lost their wonder, and fighting the hand bots became a boring routine. Decade two could be characterized with very many things. But the most important thing that Decade Two can be characterized with, is the fact that, on the first night of Decade Two, something inside of Amelia Pond broke. She found herself sitting on the floor of her makeshift hut, amongst different pieces of scrap and salvage, wondering how she’d held so much hope in decade one. After all, hadn’t The Doctor abandoned her before? Yes, many times. And not just her- other people, too. She’d spent that night, and every night after that one, thinking of every story she had ever heard of The Doctor- Raggedy Man, The Oncoming Storm, The Valeyard, Destroyer of Worlds. The names he held stuck in her head, repeating in a terrible symphony of pain.

In Decade Two, Amelia Pond lost hope. She spoke to the interface much less, but when she did, it was with a venom-filled voice. It was snide, cruel, and everything that she had always told herself was wrong in the world. She hated The Doctor, she said. She hated The Doctor, she hated Rory, and she hated that stupid blue box that abducted her as a child. But that wasn’t quite right. Because what she really hated when she said all of those things was herself. She hated herself, for putting blind hope into a fairy tale raggedy man in a box. She hated herself, for running away on the night of her marriage with a strange man she wasn’t quite convinced was real. And then later snogging him. She hated herself, for throwing herself and those she loved into the face of danger because she saw herself as some invincible woman who’d died before, and figured nothing bad could ever happen to her. She hated herself, for ever believing that The Doctor would always come back for her.

In Decade Three, Amelia Pond resigned herself to spending the rest of her life at Two Streams. She found a robot, cut off his arms, and reprogrammed him. Though at one point she would have viewed this as inhumane, all she wanted was companionship in the last couple decades of her life. She didn’t think that was too much to ask for. She drew a face on him with a marker she discovered in a gallery (which, she almost laughed at due to the irony of it. Why would you put a sharpie near a bunch of expensive artwork? She wondered if this was purposeful, for the small children at the facility. Then she tried not to think of the small children.) She then thought for a very long time about what name to give him. She didn’t mean to name him Rory, originally. The stupid robot had stumbled into a pile of scrap she’d been trying to piece together, and she’d gotten frustrated, yelling out Rory’s name and whirling around, before she realized what she’d done, and broke down crying.

She called the robot Rory from then on.

In Decade Three, Amelia Pond re-watched the movies with a newfound interest. She re-read the books she’d found scattered about the facility back in Decade One, and found herself fascinated with the stories once more. Turns out lost hope is actually rather motivating. She found herself enjoying the sights in the Garden, the smell of the flowers, and the glass mountains once more. She ate popcorn, she cried, and she lived what semblance of a life she realized she would be spending here. In Decade Three, Amelia stopped waiting.

And then, at the end of Decade Three, He came. She heard a voice, and she’d ran into the room, and He was there, ginger and scrawny and with those stupid glasses on the tip of his nose. Her Centenarian. Her Rory. She felt a fire of hope. Love. Sadness. She felt everything, all the while pretending to feel nothing. She felt almost humiliated as she showed him what her life had become, and then had the so-called decency to defend her choices, and tell him that she didn’t want to be saved. Because in Decade One, the Decade of hope, when it had still been early enough for denial, she’d been told by herself she would never be saved. That she might as well buckle in for the ride, because it would be a long one. And she hadn’t listened. But now, standing face to face with her younger self three decades later, she changed her mind. She wasn’t sure why she changed her mind. Maybe she never would be sure. But she changed her mind.

There had been many, many times in Amelia Pond’s life that she had questioned the small choices she had made in the past. Choices that, no matter how inconsequential they had seemed at the time, would have changed everything. Choices that Amelia Pond made. Choices that did change everything. Amelia Pond would never have to question that again.