#i can barely see past my huge clown nose

[zoddamnit]

"i fucking hate baldur's gate," i gripe, making sure to check the wyll and lae'zel tags once a day to make sure they're okay.

[sporadicthingcollection]

Would You Rather...?: Part 1/2 (LA!Buggy the Clown x F!Reader)

Summary: In which you make an occupational switch and a clown grows covetous. In other words, a different sort of romance dawn. Prequel to "Kiss, Marry, Kill." Pairing: LA!Buggy the Clown x F!Reader Rating: General. Word Count: ~4.5k Warnings: Reference to past abu$e, canon typical violence.

A/N: And now for something a little different! There's no smut in this one, but the seeds of pining are planted. 🌲🌲🌲 I originally posted this this morning, but was having some technical difficulties. Take two!

I knew right from the beginning

That you would end up winning

I knew right from the start

You'd put an arrow through my heart...

---

PART 1: TROOPER'S TRIBUNAL

You start the week getting thrown in the brig by your commanding officer. You end the week helping some goofy pirate kid and his not-friends beat said commander up and legging it on a stolen boat.

All in all, it could have been worse.

Right now, you’re sitting in the cabin of said little boat, hands bound, legs crossed, and your mouth politely shut as the redhead -- Nami? Nami. -- finishes giving the men a geography lesson.

“So, now that that’s out of the way...” She casts an icy glare in your direction. “What do we do with her?”

“Toss her overboard,” the bounty hunter says -- Zoro, you’re pretty sure his name is.

Luffy is the only person who’s been giving you any grace all day. All week, even. “She helped us out and that’s how you want to repay her?” He shakes his head like a parent scolding a child. “As your captain, I’m disappointed in both of you.”

Eyerolls all around, but only Zoro speaks. “You’re not my captain and she’s not my crewmate. Between kidnapping a Marine and stealing the map, we’ve got a huge target on our backs.”

Your voice croaks as you speak. You haven't said anything in a few hours. “I deserted,” you say. “They probably won't send a goon squad or anything after you--”

If Nami’s glare was cold steel, his is titanium in a blizzard. You click your mouth shut before he decides to use those swords on you.

Luffy frowns. It’s an unnerving look on him. “Well, whatever you were before, you’re with us now.” He pauses. “Eh, what’s your name, by the way?”

More annoyed groans from the other two. Nami pinches the bridge of her nose hard enough for you to worry she might bruise it. Zoro turns away, so nonplussed that he might as well be a subtraction sign.

You think to yourself. What is your name? Your parents gave you one name, then it got changed on you, and then you got rid of that one and picked out a new one.

You give him that one. You're fond of it and it rolls off the tongue well enough.

He repeats it back and his smile returns. “Great! So that’s four of us. Good starting number--”

The crack of cannonfire splits the air, followed by an explosion.

It’s a little gratifying to see something other than annoyed disinterest on Nami’s face. “Marines?” she asks.

“Told you she’d be trouble,” Zoro says.

They run on deck. Luffy helps you to your feet so you can follow. Streaks of red rain down upon you like the boughs of a willow. It's beautiful in a concerning way, like a poisonous frog.

You’d be more concerned if you had any idea what you were looking at. Naval smoke bombs are usually a searing neon orange to better stand out against the sea and sky. Not to mention that they’re next to useless at night. This is... well, you’re not sure what it is. But whatever it is, it’s bad news.

A whistle splits the air, followed by another plume of red smoke. A powdery scent hits your nose, accompanied by something familiar. But what? Smells like talc and the anesthetic they use on pack animals...

...uh-oh.

“Kids," you say, "find something soft to land on."

Too late. Nami drops to her knees, then hits the deck with a painful thunk. Zoro fares no better and you really hope he didn’t land on his swords.

Well, no use in fighting it. You barely manage to make it back into the cabin, slumping against the bench before your legs give out. Darkness edges at the corners of your vision, and your eyes droop shut.

Footsteps make you open them. Luffy scrambles for the map and, after a moment of contemplation, tips his head back. Perhaps it’s the gas hitting you, but you can’t help but be awed as it disappears, little by little, down the kid’s gullet.

He swallows, grimacing. He then notices you.

You look at Luffy. Luffy looks at you.

“Cool,” you mumble.

Your eyelids come crashing down, and all you see are kaleidoscopes.

---

Well, that was a fucking disaster. Started out well, everyone hit their marks, and then that guy in the spot booth fucked his grand entrance up. Again. He's gonna strangle that fucker.

But that's a Tomorrow Buggy problem. Right Now Buggy has something more important to deal with: four upjumped little shitstains who stole his boat and his map.

“I've been scheming for weeks to get that map from old Axe-Hand--” Ooh, this one’s good. This'll knock 'em dead. “Moron!”

He pauses for a beat. Miss Ginger does not react, just stares at him in fear and disgust. He’s a little disappointed, but whatever. Can't land 'em all.

And then he hears it. A loud snnnnnrrrrrk, the tell-tale sign of a repressed laugh. He turns.

He'd gotten a look at all four people on the ship as they'd been hauled aboard, but you'd completely slipped his mind. A sliver of your smile flashes in the light before your eyes go wide and you slap your hand over your mouth. You look everywhere but at him, eyes darting around.

He gives you a quick appraisal. Tall, dark, in uniform. Interesting. He’ll grill you later.

Which comes sooner than expected. Miss Ginger pulls a fast one and tries to escape. He’s already got a bead on Rubber Boy and the bounty hunter, so now it’s your turn.

“Ya know, I've always found some small charm to a woman in uniform,” he chirps as he approaches you.

You stare dead ahead -- right at his nose -- and swallow stiffly. You rattle off a name, rank, and a string of numbers he doesn’t care about. He’s too busy studying your face.

And what a face it is. Roundish, but not plump. Tanned, but not burnt. The beginnings of lines crease the space between your brows. Eyes as dark as the sky opposite the dawn stare right through him and you’ve got thick, black hair to match. Damn shame you have to put it up in a cap.

Despite standing at parade rest, you spin one of the many rings on your fingers -- those don’t look regulation. You’re nervous about something, something that isn’t just the fact you're being stared down by Buggy the Clown.

You start to rattle off your identification number again. He waves his hand at you. “Just tell me where my map is, Miss Gyrene,” he says.

You bristle like an old toothbrush. It's cute. “You want that map, you’ll have to gut him--”

You clap your hand over your mouth again, eyes darting back and forth. Rubber Boy flinches slightly.

So you and Rubber Boy know where it is, and the bounty hunter and Miss Ginger don’t. Good to know.

Speaking of which, they haul her back inside soon enough. She gives him an earful and he continues to not care. He dismisses her and the bounty hunter, but stops his goons before they can haul away you and Rubber Boy.

“Not them.” He points at the two of you and crooks his fingers.

Rubber Boy wanders over with no prodding -- not an ounce of self-preservation in this one -- but you struggle as they drag you closer. He likes that little spark of fight. Makes it all the more fun to snuff it out. 

"I'm gonna have a chat with my stretchy new pal. And as for you..." He gives you his toothiest, showiest smile. “Well, there’s always a place in my show for a beautiful woman with a sense of humor.”

---

Now ya done it, ya dumb bitch.

Maybe if you'd stayed quiet, you wouldn’t have had Barry Buzzy Buggy getting up in your business. Maybe you wouldn't have missed Nami's cue to leg it -- not that she got far. Maybe you wouldn’t have been voluntold for the position of lovely assistant.

But no. You had to be so nervous and jittery that you couldn't help but laugh at the dumbest thing you ever wished you'd thought of yourself.

Axe-Hand Moron. Heh.

And so here you stand, cranking a wheel on demand, assisting in the torture of the only person who's been nice to you all day. All week, even.

Not that it's really torture. Luffy seems mostly fine. Ish. He screams a bit whenever the rack stretches him, but it quickly gives way to laughter. Good to know that at least one person isn't miserable in here.

Blinky Biggy Buggy is eerily calm. He conducts himself like a shrink, probing for reasons to slap his patient with a Section 8. Or a man of the cloth, urging a stray member of his flock to self-reflect. Or a prehistoric high priest, preparing the sacrifice for slaughter.

"Oh, Miss Gyrene, dear?" he calls in a sing-song voice. "Give us another... I dunno, ten feet?"

Definitely a high priest. Definitely a sacrifice. And here you are with no choice but to twist the ceremonial knife.

...but you do have a choice. Your medical satchel hangs heavy at your side. Do no harm. You wonder why they let you keep it.

Regardless, you give the wheel a crank. Sorry, kid.

"Thanks, sweetheart." The clown returns his attention to your little buddy. Tormenting him. Grilling him. Finally finding an exposed nerve and striking out at it.

You don't listen to what they're saying. Your sanity, heavy as a sledgehammer, hangs on by a rapidly fraying thread. 

What have you done? You threw away your life on a lark. Again. Why do you keep doing this to yourself?

Because you were miserable, that's why. You were miserable before. You were miserable again. So instead of dealing with your problems, you left. Coward.

Didn’t you try, though? You talked to them. One threw you in the brig. The other popped you in the mouth. So you went above their heads. One wrote you up. The other slapped you down. Only then did you burn the bridges -- absent without leave on one count, a mysterious abduction on the other.

The clown is having a moment, yelling at Luffy's hat. You wish you had a hat to yell at. But no one in either of your lives was big on headgear.

You know what? There’s no gun to your head. No threat of being thrown in the brig. Death is certain, sure, but... If you go through with this, if your saving grace dies because of you, is your life really worth living?

The clown orders you to crank the wheel 'til Luffy snaps. It registers somewhere in your mind, but you’re too caught up in your internal spiral to acknowledge it. Take a ticket and get in line with all of the other demands.

"Hey!" the clown barks. "You deaf?!"

Tiny little strands of your common sense, snapping and spinning and fraying, one by one. Just leave. Simply walk away. Or give that fucker a piece of your mind. You’re free to backtalk for once. 

The clown huffs. "So hard to find good help these days," he mutters. "Gotta do everything my own damn self..."

You don't have to do anything you don't want to. You're a pirate now. The worst that could happen is death and after the times you've had, that doesn't sound too bad today.

Bitumen Blitzen Buggy stands opposite from you. He grabs the handles and gives the wheel a turn.

The thread snaps. The hammer drops. Your sanity and your last shred of self-preservation shatter like a dropped vase. 

Your grip on the wheel tightens, stopping his cranking. You look him dead in the eyes.

"No," you say. 

The clown stares at you, gaze wide and bright as a searchlight. "Excuse me?"

"I said no." Grabbing the bottommost spokes, you heave the wheel upwards, slackening the lines. 

The glare Buoy Bursary Buggy levels at you flickers a moment. To what, you can't tell, but it returns to normal soon enough. He grips the wheel and pushes against you.

“I offer you a place of honor in my show," he says, voice rising with every word, “and you repay me with a no?”

You push back. “I'm not gonna help torture a kid. Not today. Not ever.”

After a moment of a push-pull stalemate, he loosens his grip just enough for you to lurch forward. Taking advantage of your stumble, he tightens the line. "I could find a geriatric, if that's more your style. Mister Mayor is getting up there in years."

You regain your grip. You reach deep inside yourself to summon the strength you need. Summon all the rage you've kept buried. All the fire and fury.

"I--" You grab one spoke. "--said--" Then another. "--no!"

With a mighty heave that hurts your shoulders and makes your elbows pop, the clown loses his grip and the wheel spins out. The lines lose all of their tension and Luffy hits the ground with a smack and an "oof."

You glare at the clown. In his face, you see every person who ever made you do something you didn't want to do.

Morgan. His spawn. Your birth family. Your marital family. And now a literal clown.

You spin the wheel hard. The spokes whack Blasphemy Bathymetry Buggy in the chin a few times, knocking him back a step.

You throw your Marine hat down, freeing your mane from its prison. You pull the bobby pins out and shake it like a dog coming in from the rain. With a mighty toss, you let it fall down your back.

You feel freer already.

You don't expect him to be cowed, but you'd at least hoped he would look a little taken aback by the sight of an ex-Marine with eight fingers full of rings ready to throw a punch.

But no. He just straightens up, rubbing his jaw. You can't read his face in this light. Scorn? Pity? Interest? You have no idea as he peers at you with pale eyes.

He speaks. With the gentle tone he uses, he sounds almost genuine. "Gotta hand it to you, Miss Gyrene: you've got balls."

Genuine enough to knock you off-balance. "Say again?"

"Standing up to someone ready to kill you," he says. He takes a few steps towards you. "Awfully brave. You done this before?"

He's not wrong. That sudden burst of spit and vinegar came from a decade of pent-up misery. "Kinda," you admit.

He steps a little closer. From far away, all you could make out of his face was his makeup. But now you see features you weren't expecting. Strong jaw. Cleft chin. Eyes you can't tell the color of -- blue? Green? The dim light is no help.

"No stage fright on you, kid."

He reaches towards you. You flinch, but all he does is tuck a strand of hair behind your ears with a gentle touch. He lingers on your cheek.

He's not much taller than you, but when he's this close, you have to lean back to peer up at him. His gaze is soft, his lips curled into something close to a smile, head tilted just so.

Your heartbeat quickens. Why? You have absolutely no idea. 

Now he smiles, albeit thinly. He's close enough for the peak of your breasts to touch his chest. He radiates warmth, even through all of his clothes.

"Who was it that hurt you?" he asks quietly. "Was it one person? Or a whole troupe of terrors?"

You swallow. Names and faces swirl around in your head. Aunty Yoko. Sakazuki. Uncle Arun. Morgan. Mama Shruti. Nezumi. Mr. Jaswinder Rajendra. Helmeppo. Dowager Chambeli.

Your voice trembles like a harp string about to snap. "Too many to count."

“Sorry to hear that.” His lips purse. "Don't suppose one of them was ol' Axe-Hand Moron?"

Your traitorous mind still finds that funny. You manage to keep your lips shut, but the snnnnrrrrk escapes through your nose all the same.

You try to look away, but he touches your chin and tips your head back towards him. 

The clown is smiling. A real, up to his scrunched eyes smile without a hint of malice. A giggle bubbles through his lips, light and airy. It almost sounds cute.

Your heart flutters again. Like a hummingbird trapped in a birdcage, tickling your ribs and making you want to vomit all over your shoes. "Morgan's a jerk," you say.

He nods. He takes your hand in his own, clutching it as he raises it higher. "I'll tell you what, sweetheart: if you tell me where my map is..."

He leans in. His warm breath tickles your ear. He smells like a tube of fancy lipstick you can't afford and sea air that blows through a bar window.

"...we'll go blow that old geezer and his base to kingdom come," he whispers, a smile still in his voice. "You and me and all my freaks. I'll even call in some favors. We'll have a whole fleet. And your little friends can come too, if they play nice."

Now that's a thought you'd entertained more than once over the years. Blow up Morgan. Stab Morgan. Feed Morgan to sharks. Set Morgan on fire. But it only ever remained a thought.

You're not sure how to feel about that. "You'd start a war over me," you state.

"What can I say?" He pulls backwards, eyes twinkling beneath his lashes. He strokes your knuckles with his thumb. "A face like yours deserves to launch a thousand ships."

Raising your hand to his lips, looking into your eyes, he places a lingering kiss on your knuckles.

For the briefest of moments, the hummingbird breaks free and zips right into your throat, stuck there between your trachea and your heart, still flapping hard. Your chest burns with a fire you haven't felt in a long time, flames licking up to your cheeks to scorch them red.

And then you're catapulted back in time, back to when a handsome man kissed your hand and smiled and made promises and you fell head over heels down the stairs.

It all changed in time. The kisses stopped. The smiles vanished. The promises were forgotten and shoved into the back of the closet. You started falling a lot more often.

Never again.

You yank your hand back. "Nice try," you growl, "but I'm not stupid."

He has the gall to pretend to look hurt, his smile slipping from his face and the glimmer in his eyes winking out. But his gaze hardens, and his cruel smile returns.

"Shame," he says. "Guess I'll just throw you on the rack instead."

You try to jump away, but he strikes like a snake, wrenching your arms at awkward angles and gripping you so tight you worry you might bruise.

“Let her go, Boogie," Luffy growls.

Grip still firm, Boogie Bouffant Buggy whirls around with you. Luffy is on his feet, free of his shackles and glowering. It's still unnerving to see anything but a smile on his face.

"It's Buggy," the clown spits. His grip on you tightens, and you cry out. "And why should I? We were hitting it off so well! Weren't we, darling?"

He simpers the last word and grabs you by the waist, pulling your hips right against his. He places his head on your shoulder, his stubble scratching your cheek.

"We were about to start picking out flowers and sending out invites and everything."

This man has triple backflipped right off the deep end. You keep struggling. You manage to hook your leg behind his, but the angle is too poor for a takedown.

He kisses your cheek. A big, ridiculous mmmmmmwah, but a kiss nevertheless. You gasp. He laughs and throws his arm wide.

"Screw the RSVPs! Everyone is invited to the Fabulously Flashy Wedding of Buggy and--!"

Two things happen at once. Luffy reels back a punch, the stretch of his skin audible. You grab Buggy’s arm, finally in a position for a takedown.

And then two other things happen. Luffy's arm snaps back like an elastic cord and punches the clown’s head clean off. You crash to the ground holding a severed arm.

Someone screams. It was you. You drop the limb like a bad habit and scramble away.

You look at Luffy. Luffy looks at you.

You both look at his fist, at your hands, then back to the headless clown, still standing.

---

Buggy didn't go into this intending to get up close and intimate with you. It just kinda happened.

Who can blame him? You flexed those big strong muscles and let down that long pretty hair and you looked so hurt and frustrated. Like an angry little kitten in need of some TLC.

So he threw you a bone. All the while, you gazed at him with those deep, dark eyes, hanging onto his every word.

He meant them as much as he could. He doesn't have the firepower to take on the whole Marine operation, but he could swing something. You seem like the kind of woman worth blowing up Marine bases for. Or a battleship, at the very least.

Shame you threw your lot in with the rubber punk.

Your skin is so warm beneath his gloves, your body so supple against his. And your hair smells very, very strongly of vanilla and... Is that cinnamon? It can't be. It's too citrusy. Regardless, it's hypnotic.

He just can't help himself. This might be the only chance he's got. He tips your head to the side and kisses your cheek.

And it's everything he hoped it would be. Your skin is so soft, so warm, so sweet beneath his lips and squished against his nose. He wishes he could linger there forever. But everything good must come to an end, and he pulls away before he overstays his welcome.

Next thing he knows, he's flying through the air. Well, just his head. He lands in an audience member's lap. She screams, of course. He plays it off with a wink and a quip.

He zooms back to his body and reattaches with a pop. Seems his arm is gone as well. He gives it a flex and clenches his fist, making you scramble away and to your feet. Terrified is a cute look on you.

"You ate a Devil Fruit?" Rubber Boy asks. He sticks his arm in front of you like it would actually help.

"Sure did!" Buggy chirps. He recalls his arm and shucks his coat, one sleeve at a time. "The Chop Chop Fruit. So you can slice me and you can dice me, but I'll always pull myself back together."

He separates his limbs from his torso and his head from his neck, just because he can. It's worth seeing the shock on your faces. Especially yours. Open-mouthed and wide-eyed. Good look on you.

It takes all of his self control to not grin as he folds his arms behind his back. "Wanna see what else I can do?"

He sends his hand skittering up your back and onto your shoulder. You scream as it jumps at Rubber Boy's face, and he yelps as well. His other hand positions itself to the side.

When you're both suitably distracted, he grabs both of your heads and slams yours against Rubber Boy's. With a sharp crack, out go the lights and you both crumple to the ground.

"Sorry, dear," he says. “Never would have worked between us.”

---

All this going unconscious is going to scramble your brains, you think as you stir. You shouldn't make a habit of it.

You open your eyes. A thin light shines right on you, burning your vision. Are you dead? Have you died?

No, your head is throbbing. Pain means you're alive. At least you've still got your medical satchel. Its presence against your side is a small comfort.

You sit up. Next to you lies Luffy, stirring slowly.

You nudge him. “You okay, kid?” you ask.

He gives his head a shake as he sits up. He smiles and it's like putting on a comfy sweater. “I'm bouncy. I can take a hit." He tips his head like a puppy. "What about you?” 

"I'll have a migraine in a few hours, but I'll survive."

You go to touch the lump on your head -- only to take Luffy's wrist with you. You're cuffed together, two metal shackles connected by just enough rope to hang yourselves with. He pulls at his own shackle, but it’s stuck fast.

"I can't get it off," he says, eyes wide. "I can't stretch!"

“Of course you can't. It's lined with Seastone.” 

A spotlight switches on. Buggy the Clown sits atop the edge of a large box draped in candy-striped fabric. He kicks his legs like a child sitting on a bench, twirling Luffy's hat in his hand.

“The essence of the ocean, compressed into a pretty little rock." Slowly, he pulls a yellow straw from the hat. "So not only do you have to worry about getting your feet wet, all those wonderful powers are completely useless when you least expect it.”

Besides you, Luffy bristles. You grab his hand to stop him from charging. He tenses, but squeezes back.

Buggy examines the straw, then flicks it away. “You gonna give me my map?”

Luffy scowls. “Never.”

"Not sure what I was expecting." He rolls his eyes, then turns them on you. “And what about you, sweetheart?”

You don't appreciate being patronized. "I'm gonna make you eat your hair," you spit.

“Aw, c’mon. Where do you have to go? You deserted. You’ll never be safe again.” He leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees. "Join the crew of the future King of the Pirates, and you'll have all the protection you need.” He gestures broadly. “Hell, if it really matters, your little buddy can come too. The more the merrier."

You enunciate every letter of the word. “No,” you say.

The calm interrogator evaporates, replaced by a petulant child. He slams his fists against the top of the box. “Well, why not--!?”

The box rocks and rattles violently. He yelps and hangs on for dear life, succeeding in staying atop it as the shaking stops. He huffs. “Fine. Have it your way."

He climbs to his feet and shoots his hands off to grab the corners of the tarp. Raising them reveals a black, rancid-smelling cavern.

“My kitty cat's been restless lately,” he says. “Lucky that I have a new pair of toys for him."

A low growl vibrates the very air around you.

You look at Luffy. Luffy looks at you.

“That wasn’t your stomach, was it?” you ask.

He shakes his head. "Was it yours?"

Another growl. Out from the darkness emerges the biggest lion you’ve ever seen. Mangy. Mean. Saliva drips from his bloodstained mouth as his eyes fix right on you.

Luffy swallows. "I think we should run," he says quietly.

You nod. “I think you’re right.”

The lion roars.

---

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[thesightstoshowyou]

Dessert Before Dinner

Otherworldly Anthology

Pennywise

Summary: Christmas shopping is hell.

Warnings: Female reader, sexual innuendo, horror elements, blood, gore, threats, violence, predator/prey.

This is my piece of the writing collaboration I did with @stay-outta-my-blood-circle, @sp00kworm, @thedeathdoctor, @carpenter-synth, @trashy-slashy, @august-bleeds-red, & @bisexual-horror-fan

Thank you for including me in this little exercise. I had a blast!

~~

             Overly cheerful Christmas music echoes overhead, jingling bells and piano notes barely audible above clamor and chatter of last-minute holiday shoppers. Inwardly, you groan as the escalator ascends, carrying you to the upper level of the department store.

            Why? Why had you waited until the last minute once again? Why do you do this to yourself every year?

             Pushing past a gaggle of grandmothers, you make your way into the labyrinth of stores. You double check the list on your phone; just few gifts left to buy. You can do this.

             Quickly, you navigate the line of screeching, crying children in line to see Santa. Exhausted mothers and fathers bounce angry babies and placate impatient toddlers, all while checking their watches and glancing ahead to see how much longer they must wait. You do not envy them.

             Making it through the throng unscathed, you begin a brisk pace down the endless stretch of shops. You make it about ten steps when a shrill giggle stops you in your tracks. You’d heard it, clear as a bell, as though someone had laughed directly into your ear.

             Every hair on your arms standing on end, you slowly look around you until your eyes lock on piercing, sky blue. You blink, not quite understanding what you’re seeing. It…he is perched on a bench, gangly arms spread wide across the back, foot resting on the opposite knee; the epitome of relaxation. He’s dressed head to toe in a tattered, blood red Santa suit, the fluffy white frill of the hat resting atop a wild mane of vivid, orange hair. His face is…painted white, like a clown, crimson lines drawn from his eyes to his scarlet lips, the tip of his nose stained with the same red.

             He crooks a white, gloved finger and makes a come-hither motion. You glance around, wondering if he’s looking at someone else, but when you look back, he shakes his head and points right at you, a sly grin tugging at the corners of his generous lips. You should ignore him, should keep walking, but your feet seem to have a mind of their own as you take one, two, three steps toward the clown.

             You stop an inch from his bent knee, quickly glancing around you to see if anyone else is watching this strange exchange. No one even looks your direction, too flustered with their eleventh-hour purchases. How can they not notice the clown dressed like Saint Nick?

             “And what do you want for Christmas, little girl?” he sings in a strangely grating, yet lilting voice. You scrunch your nose in discomfort.

             “They run out of dirty old men to play Santa? What’s with the, uh, clown…getup?” you ask, motioning to the make-up. This close, you see the white paint cracking and peeling along his huge forehead. He snickers, uncrossing his legs and patting his thigh.

             “Why don’t you come sit in ol’ Penny’s lap,” he taps his ear, “Whisper what you want from Santy, hmm?”

             “Nah, I think I’m goo—

             You don’t finish your sentence. Spidery fingers sneak around your wrist and jerk, the other hand wrapping around your waist and tugging you into his lap. You squeak in shock, but this is the only noise you emit before he’s gripping your jaw with bruising force, commanding silence.

             “Be a good girl,” he chides playfully, “You wouldn’t want to end up on my naughty list!” he adds with a maniacal laugh. Wildly, you look around, pleading wordlessly for help, but it’s like you’re invisible. No one even glances in your direction.

             Suddenly, the fluorescents overhead begin to flicker. Each light down the long hall flicks off and on at different intervals. Your heart races, fluttering against your ribs like a frightened bird. The clown titters gleefully, nuzzling his nose against your ear as your eyes dart from light to malfunctioning light, trepidation roiling nauseatingly in your gut.  

            Then, every light in the building goes off at once. You’re plunged into complete darkness. All sound ceases simultaneously until the only noise you can hear is your shallow, panicked breathing. The clown inhales deeply and something wet brushes against your cheek, making you flinch away.  

            “Ah, there it is,” he groans, snuffling into the crook of your neck as you writhe in the darkness, “Perfect fear. You’re a sweet, sugary little thing, aren’t you? You can be dessert. Yes. You. Will.”

            You clamp your eyes shut when the light returns all at once, blinding you. It is still so quiet you can hear a pin drop. Tentatively, you peel your eyelids apart.

            Your heart leaps into your throat. Everyone has stopped dead in their tracks and they are all looking straight at you, staring at you as you sit, trapped in the clown’s vice-like grip. No one moves, no one speaks, they don’t even breath, all standing as still as statues and staring, unblinkingly. Your chest heaves, your terrified brain struggling to grasp the situation.

            Slowly, you turn your gaze to the clown. He’s grinning wide, too wide, blood red lips stretched completely across his face, his mouth filled to the brim with pointed shark teeth. Golden, glowing eyes—eyes that were once blue—burn with inhuman hunger as they search your horrified face. You can’t stop the scream that crawls up and out of your throat.

            He laughs, long and loud until the sound is bouncing around in your brain and you’re recoiling, desperate to be free of the way your skin crawls. He releases you, something you’re not expecting. You crash to the cold floor, wincing when your wrist breaks your fall.

            Scrambling to your feet, you back away. The clown unfurls from the bench and stands. He’s tall, enormously so, well over six feet. Your breath comes in little gasps, your lungs seizing up and refusing to draw in air.

            You accidentally bump into one of the frozen shoppers. You jump away, expecting them to react or move, but they remain motionless, staring at nothing. Quickly, you look back at the clown but he’s gone, vanished into thin air.  

            Frantically, you look around, but all you see are still bodies. Straining, you hear nothing but your own blood rushing in your ears. Get out, get away.

             You turn on your heel and flee, weaving in between frozen figures. You bump into a shopping bag which sends you stumbling into another statue-person. They only sway slightly on the spot before resuming their previous pose.

             A wild giggle echoes somewhere nearby and you whip around, searching for the source. You see nothing but vacant eyes. Gasping, you spin and sprint away once more. The entrance to the department store is just around the corner….

            Movement to your left has you skidding to a stop, your shoes squeaking noisily against tile. A shadow passes across the opposite wall, inhumanly tall, with claws and…horns? You duck into a menswear store, crouching behind one of the mannequins and clapping a hand over your mouth to stifle your haggard breaths.

            “Run, run as fast as you can!” You flinch as the clown’s shout reverberates off the walls. Carefully, you peer around the legs of the mannequin, attempting to pinpoint the creature’s location.

            You spot the hair first, wild orange bobbing along as the clown stalks like a predator down the line of frozen parents and children waiting for Santa. He pauses and squats down next to a young boy who is poised with his arm raised as though he is waving. When the clown reaches out to grab hold of the child’s face, your heart stutters. What is he doing?

            “Ready to float?” he nods the child’s head and speaks in a high pitched, “Yes, Pennywise!” Drool spills past the clown’s bottom lip, dripping onto the child’s shoes as he leans forward. His mouth opens, pointed teeth inches from the little face—

            “NO!” you scream, jumping to your feet. You freeze when the clown grins up at you. You haven’t given any thought to your next move.

            “Oh, is it time for dessert already?” He mimes looking at a watch. You take off again, hurtling around the corner, but you don’t make it far. Long, clawed fingers close in your hair, wrenching your head back and tearing a pained squeal from your throat.  

            The clown—Pennywise—bends low to growl in your ear, toothy maw dripping onto your shoulder. The scent of his breath hits you; rotten meat, carrion, coppery death, so strong it brings tears to your eyes and bile up your throat. Claws dig under your ribs and you’re lifted clean off your feet and hurled through a glass storefront window.

            The deafening crash rattles your skull as you tumble in a flurry of glass shards. You land with a hard thud and sharp pain stabs up your entire right side, glass embedding itself in your flesh, a hundred different points of agony. You sob, gingerly pushing yourself upright, but every movement jars the shards in your skin.

            Your hand trembles as you lift it to your face. A sliver is embedded in your palm, blood welling up around the glass and dripping down your wrist to splatter onto the floor. Gritting your teeth, you peel the glass from your flesh, hissing and swearing when it pulls free.

            You jerk when Pennywise laughs from the window. He lifts a long leg and steps into the shop, boots crunching on glass as he advances on you, eyes glowing with feral hunger, shark mouth dripping. You whimper and scoot back, wincing when the movement shocks your injuries. The clown mocks you with a whiny cry, face contorting in false anguish.

             Suddenly, he pounces, gripping you around the throat and pinning you to the ground. You shriek and arch when more glass sticks you in the back. Pennywise straddles your waist, free hand darting out to grasp your bloody wrist. Leisurely he brings your palm to his face, giggling and turning it this way and that, watching the way your blood flows.  

             You can only watch in horror as he opens his mouth too far, like a snake, bones popping and cracking as his jaw spreads unnaturally. A warm glow emanates from his throat, one that makes your eyes go out of focus the longer you stare. You don’t get long to look because the clown shoves your bleeding hand in his cavernous maw and closes his scarlet lips around your wrist. You shriek and squirm when you feel something thick and slimy lap at your wound. He groans and his eyes roll back, revealing bloodshot white as he slurps the gore from your palm.

             Suddenly, his mouth snaps open and you rip your hand from the glowing depths, catching your skin on sharp teeth and tearing another laceration into your flesh. You cradle your injured arm to your chest as tears spill down your cheeks, the clown cackling all the while.

             “First course, what will it be? A thigh?” he pinches your leg, “A wing?” he scratches at your arm, “A cheek?” he prods at your wet face.

             “P-Please, please,” you beg, twisting away from his sharp digits. It’s stupid, begging for a being this incomprehensible to spare your life, but what more can you do?

             “Pwetty pwease!” he mocks, grasping your jaw and wiggling your head back and forth. He gasps, eyes going wide, one black, clawed hand covering his mouth as though he’s ashamed.

             “But that’s awfully naughty of Pennywise, isn’t it, having dessert before dinner?” A coy smirk curls at his dripping lips and his claws fall to the waistband of your pants. He chortles, tapping the tip of your nose and fisting a hand in your shirt.

             “You won’t tell on me, will you?”

             The sound of ripping fabric is almost louder than your scream.

[flannels-and-fannypacks]

Will They Won’t They | Part 4/4 [Reggie Peters]

Pairings: Reggie Peters x fem!Reader

Words: 6.0K

WARNINGS: swears, ANGST

A/N: oh my god it’s finally here. the last part. our baby. i literally can’t believe it i’m almost in tears. thank you so mcuh for being with us this past week and sharing the joy drea and i have had writing this for you guys. please i’m literally begging you guys to SEND IN MEMES you’ve made related to this series they make our day. anyways lots of love babes - mimi

A/N: GUYS IT’S THE LAST ONE IM SO EXCITED SEND MEMES PLEASE - drea

                          ◤━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━◥

“(Y/N) excited for a school function that doesn’t require academics?” Rose questioned.

“Someone called the police there’s been a kidnapping!” Alex exclaimed.

“Oh so now you want the police involved,” you crossed your arms and rolled your eyes.

“How are you still not over that!” Luke exclaimed. “I took you in and fed you, and bought you clothes and loved you,” he said exaggeratedly and you just pushed away his pouting face from yours.

“And how am I not allowed to want to go to a school dance? I like having fun every once in a while. The last time I checked that wasn’t a crime,”

“Yeah it’s not a crime if you’re anyone but (Y/N) (L/N),” Bobby nudged you and you sighed loudly. “Hey where’s Reggie by the way? I thought he was going to come,”

“I think he is,” Alex nodded. “He said something about maybe having to walk, his parents are busy,”

You bit the inside of your cheek hoping the Peters could hold off fighting for one night, Reggie deserved a break. They might not have realized it, but he secretly blamed himself for it all even though it could be nothing further from the fact. You knew that well enough.

“Hey I’m here,” Reggie said, jogging up to the group that was waiting for him so they could head inside the school. “Sorry I’m late,” he apologized. “I got a little distracted when leaving.” You could tell he was lying but didn’t speak up about it.

Luke shook his head, patting Reggie’s back with the hand that wasn’t holding his guitar case. “It’s all good,” he said with a grin. “What matters is that we’re all here, and ready to rock these nerds!”

Rose made a sour face. “We’re still here,” she pointed out, gesturing to the two of you.

“Right,” Bobby nodded, elbowing Luke in the ribs. “Let’s rock these nerds except for our fashionista Rose and (N/N)!”

You beamed. “Thank you!”

“The ultra nerd!”

“Fuck you!” you shot back.

Reggie pulled you into a side hug. “Leave Cookie alone,” he told them. “The only one who gets to tease her is me.”

You rolled your eyes as Luke grabbed you by your wrist. “Hands off my daughter,” he warned. “And for the record, no one teases my child? Say one word and I’ll fight you myself.”

“If someone pulls me like a rag doll one more time it’ll be your sorry asses that get beat,” you threatened.

Luke beamed at you, pinching your cheek. “Oh, she learned how to threaten people!” he gushed. “Like mother, like daughter.”

You pushed them all towards the stage. “Alright, you dorks,” you grumbled. “Get on stage. Make me a happy bunny, or whatever.”

The boys saluted before marching off. “Got it, Lady Bunny!” they cheered as they made it backstage.

You glanced over at Rose who had her arms crossed on her chest as she shook her head. “Those boys,” she sighed. “I can never understand how we put up with them.”

Shrugging your shoulders, you took Rose’s hand in yours. “You gotta admit, they’re growing on us,” you joked. “Now come on, let’s get to the dance floor!”

You and Rose watched as the boys finally got on stage, their instruments ready in their hands. Luke took the microphone and smiled widely at the crowd.

“What’s up, Los Feliz High?” he said into the microphone. A roar of cheers followed, making Luke laugh. “We’re Sunset Curve, and this is one of our original songs. It’s called Now or Never.”

The entire school adored Sunset Curve and their music. By the time they were finished, they were cheering for more. It made you happy to know that those boys were bound to go far with their music.

You and Rose met the boys backstage where they were putting away their things and getting ready to come and join you out and dance.

“Guys that was amazing!” you exclaimed with a grin. “You all played so well,”

“I’m so proud of my little renters,” Rose joked and the guys all laughed, tossing their things aside before dragging you and Rose to the dance floor.

Now that the DJ had taken over, the guys were able to finally dance with you guys. In a circle, the group and you sang along to the music, occasionally jumping up and down and screaming the lyrics.

In the corner of your eye, you saw Rose continuously glancing back at a boy in the back of the gym. Following her gaze, you lit up at who you saw. You pulled Rose down to your level, whispering in her ear,

“Ray Molina, an absolute sweetheart and my coworker at the cafe. Loves photography and apparently you. Now go!”

Rose blushed, shaking her head repeatedly. “No, I can't,” she stammered.

Rolling your eyes, you grabbed her shoulders and pushed her towards your friend. “Ray!” you greeted excitedly. “This is Rose! She loves espressos and photography.”

The shy boy put his hand out for Rose to shake. “Hi,” he whispered nervously. “I like your jacket. The flower is...gorgeous. What is it?”

Rose grinned. “A dahlia,” she replied, finally going back to her normal, extroverted self.

You sent Ray a big thumbs up from behind along with an exaggerated wink before heading back to the boys.

You saw Alex awkwardly shuffling his feet while Luke, Reggie, and Bobby were dancing and making complete fools of themselves, but that was kind of the point wasn’t it.

So you made your way to him, grabbing his hands and pulling him more into the dance floor with you.

“Come on Alex you gotta let loose!” you insisted while attempting to twirl him around.

“Um who are you and what did you do with the real (Y/N)?” he joked and you rolled your eyes.

“Already been over this Mercer! Seriously though, I know you get anxious and nervous, I do too and you know what helps me?” you whispered. “Singing,”

“Actually?”

“Yeah! It calms me down,” you admitted. “So come on, you know the song! Belt it with me!”

Alex scrunched his nose and you frowned and started to sing, proving to him just how much it could help.

Slowly he got more comfortable until it felt like it was just the two of you dancing around like friends did and singing Whitney Huston’s greatest hit.

“Oh, I wanna dance with somebody! I wanna feel the heat with somebody! Yeah, I wanna dance with somebody! With somebody who loves me!”

Alex, finally out of his shell, danced along energetically to the music with your hands intertwined. Occasionally he would pull you close and spin you like no one was around. You had to admit, the boy had a talent for dancing. He would definitely make Mrs. Leona proud.

Reggie watched you and Alex dance and fool around, laughing with your heads tilted back. Reggie couldn’t help but smile as you belted the lyrics with Alex joining in. He was shocked, to say the least, to see Alex so carefree. You really did bring out the best in people. He would know, you brought out the best in him.

Reggie barely noticed Bobby walk over to him, his eyes following Reggie’s to the dancing friends. The boy smirked, shaking his head. “You got it bad, don’t you?”

Reggie couldn’t help but nod. “Yeah, I do,” was all he could say.

“You gonna do anything about it?” Luke joined in and Reggie shrugged.

“I don’t know. Sometimes I wonder if maybe if I say something or do something, that look she has, how happy she is, it’s gonna change and I don’t want that to happen,” he admitted.

“I know it’s a weird thing to ask, but what do you like most about her?” Bobby asked.

Reggie had a stupid smile on his face, shaking his head and covering his mouth with his hand,

“Everything,” he shrugged his shoulders. “Absolutely everything,”

You and Alex had since then finished dancing to the song and ran up to the other three boys who were chatting. You were out of breath with a huge grin on your face when you looked at Reggie who couldn’t stop thinking about how adorable you looked with your flushed cheeks.

“Everything alright Flicka?” you asked.

“Everything’s perfect, Cookie,” he nodded.

And perfect it was.

—

You sighed as Rose brushed through your hair for probably the millionth time that hour.

“Can you guys at least explain what you’re doing to me?” you whined. “I feel like I’ve been sitting here for ages and have like...a hundred layers of makeup on my face.”

Alex glanced up from the random magazine he found on Rose’s bedroom floor. “Nope,” he responded, sprawled lazily on Rose’s bed. “You’re going to find out soon enough.”

You grumbled to yourself. “If you make me look like a clown, Rose-”

Rose laughed, taking a lipstick tube and swiping it against your bottom lip. “You’re fine,” she reassured you. “Besides, this is my work we’re talking about. I have skills, and I’m going to flaunt them.” You giggled, finally relaxing as the girl continued to fix your hair and makeup.

Nearly another hour passed when Alex glanced at the clock. “Shoot, we have to be at the arcade in twenty minutes.”

You rolled your eyes. “And with your grandpa driving, we’re not going to get there until the next decade.”

Alex rolled off the bed, waving his keys in front of your face. “Who’s the one with the driver’s license again?” he asked.

You stuck your tongue out at him. “Fuck you, my driver’s instructor totally had it out for me. And you don’t even have a real van, it's a minivan.”

Alex flipped you off. “Haha, now let’s get going.”

“One second,” Rose said. The girl reached into your jewelry box, pulling out your horseshoe necklace. Before you could protest, she clasped it around your neck. With an approving smile, Rose pulled you up to your feet. “Come on, Cinderella,” she teased. “You’re ready for the ball.”

“Let’s stop by the studio first,” you said, straightening out your white shirt. “I left my bag in there.”

You and Rose made your way to the studio, parting so that you can grab your bag that was sitting on the coffee table. Rose followed close behind, picking up the lone red flannel on the couch. Walking behind you, Rose quickly tied the flannel around your waist.

“Rose, what’s this for?” you asked, eyeing the flannel.

She waved your question off casually. “It completes the look,” she explained. “Now, let’s get to the van before Alex leaves us!”

You hopped in the van with Rose as Alex drove off to the arcade, much faster than necessary to prove he wasn’t a slow driver, not that you thought this was how he was going to retaliate that comment.

By the time you reached there Luke, Bobby, and Reggie were all waiting by the claw machine.

“What took you guys so long?” Bobby asked and you pointed at both Alex and Rose in blame.

“Wow, I think I just saw the bus that you decided to throw us under,” Rose shook her head, turning it just the right direction to see a certain amateur photographer sitting at one of the tables with a few friends. Immediately, her face turned into a million shades of red.

“Oh is that Ray?” Luke asked, quickly joining in on the conversation.

“Um, can we maybe address that later?” Reggie asked. “Cause I’m pretty sure that’s my flannel,” he pointed to the fabric tied around your waist.

“Oh my God is it? Is it? I knew it looked familiar,” you said while trying to untie it from your waist but Reggie put a hand on yours, stopping you from doing so.

“It’s fine Cookie,” he shrugged. “Keep it, I have a few. It looks good on you,”

You blushed and nodded, tightening the flannel again around your waist.

“Okay, so what’s the first thing you guys normally do?” you asked, knowing them they probably did some sort of voodoo ritual before playing games, they were weird like that. “Oh and Rose you should call Ray over to join us cause if you don’t I will,” you said in a sing-song voice. Rose’s face turned red as she repeatedly shook her head.

Luke called out to the group to get everyone’s attention. “Game plan, kids,” he said.

You rolled your eyes. “Of course there’s a game plan,” you groaned.

The guitarist shot you a look before continuing. “Anyway,” he said. “First we start with the basketball shooting game, then we work down the aisle, all the way down to the claw machines. Don’t spend any longer than five minutes on each claw machine game. We all know those games are bullshit. If you have any coins left, use them on the game you’re best at.”

You made a sour face. “Yet you guys call me the nerd of the group,” you scoffed, crossing your arms on your chest.

“Hey, don’t disrespect the arcade kings,” Bobby shot back. “We practically own this arcade.”

“Sure, whatever helps you sleep at night.”

“(Y/N) why don’t you come with me and play some basketball,” Alex suggested.

“You’re just saying that cause you know my hand-eye coordination sucks and you wanna see me fail,” you said sticking your tongue out at him.

“Yeah and I’m not even gonna deny it, come on,” Alex said, dragging you over to where the game was and placing some tokens in the machine.

“Alex,” you whined. “I don’t wanna,”

He shot you a grin in your direction. “Let’s play, and the loser has to pay for pizza later?”

You narrowed your eyes in determination. “You’re on, Mercer.”

Time continued to fly by faster than you preferred. You and Alex had played every game nearly three times now and you were running low on coins and energy. Losing count on your wins, the two of you decided to call it a tie.

“Let’s go sit by the skeeball machines,” you suggested.

Slightly out of breath from running down the aisles to race you, Alex nodded gratefully. Hand in hand, you guided Alex through the waves of teens and children to finally find the benches in the quietest — well as quiet as an arcade can get — part of the building.

You glanced over at Alex, his cheeks flushed from playing. “You want me to go get you some water?” you asked, slightly concerned.

“If it’s not too much trouble,” he said, smiling slightly.

Standing up, you made your way to the vending machines, only to be stopped by the sound of a high pitched giggle. Hiding behind one of the game machines, you peeked to see Reggie and some blonde girl talk to each other. They were standing far too close for your liking as the girl pulled Reggie down to her level, whispering something in his ear that made him laugh.

Your face was burning. Something about the two of them together didn’t sit well with you. After a second of thinking, you decided you were upset because Reggie left you guys to go hang out with some girl. You were upset about the band not spending time together. Definitely not because Reggie was talking to another girl...smiling at her the way he does with you, and holding her waist like he did with you during your dance detention, and absolutely not because he’s joking around with her like he used to with you.

Ripping your eyes away from them, you stormed back to Alex, chucking the water bottle at him. The poor boy barely caught it, raising an eyebrow in confusion at you.

“(N/N), you okay?” he asked, setting his water bottle down to place his hand on your knee.

You nodded rigidly. “Of course I am,” you briskly answered.

“Sorry (N/N), I know fine and this clearly isn’t it,” Alex countered, still not understanding what was going on until he stood up to take a quick stretch, seeing Reggie tucked away by one of the arcade games with another girl. “Oh, I see,”

“What do you mean you see?” you asked. “There’s nothing to see,”

“Um I’d beg to differ,” Alex countered yet again. “(Y/N) if you’re upset you should just go talk to him, I’m sure Reggie will be reasonable.”

“Yeah right, reasonable is Reggie’s middle name,” you said sarcastically.

“(Y/N),” Alex said pleaded, “I swear to sweet little baby Jesus just go to him, please, put me out of my misery,”

“I guess you’re going to have to suffer,” you said stubbornly, making Alex roll his eyes and groan.

Luke and Bobby ran up to you guys. “We think it’s time we head back to the studio,” Luke told you two. “It’s nearly dark, and you know how much Alex hates driving at night.”

Alex shuddered. “Fine, let’s go,” he said before turning to you. “Don’t think we’re done with this conversation.”

The entire group filed into the car, Rose giving Ray a kiss on the cheek before joining you. Rose began to tell you about her little date, not skipping any detail. For the time you were together, you started to forget why you were mad.

But then Reggie entered the van. “Hey guys!” he greeted energetically, finding his spot in the back. You remained silent while everyone else said their “hellos.”

“How was everyone’s time at the arcade?” he continued to talk. Reggie glanced over at you. “Did you win against Alex? I know he’s terrible at playing games, but so are you so it’s an equal playing field.”

Normally, you would have laughed. But this time, you didn’t even look him in the eye. “It was fine,” you said stiffly.

Reggie snorted. “Just fine, come on, Cookie, I-”

“Why don’t you tell us about that girl you were talking to the entire time, then?” you cut him off, staring out the window to stop yourself from crying.

“What girl?” Rose asked, whipping her head around and narrowing her eyes.

“No one” he answered quickly.

You scoffed, crossing your arms on your chest. “So it’s okay for you to lie, but not me?” you muttered.

Reggie raised an eyebrow at your weird behaviour, but remained silent for the rest of the ride. If there was something wrong, he’d talk to you properly, and in private.

The moment Alex parked in the driveway, you quickly unbuckled your seatbelt and left the van with Rose glued to your side.

“What happened?” Rose asked in a hushed voice.

“Nothing!” you said frustratedly. “You and Alex keep on making things out of nothing. I’m telling you, there’s nothing wrong.”

As the night continued, you were still bitter towards Reggie, occasionally throwing out a sarcastic remark towards him. The group, to say the least, was very confused as to how your friendship with Reggie somehow shattered in just five hours.

“Let’s watch another movie,” Rose proposed after the first movie ended. Everyone else nodded, as Reggie piped up,

“Can we watch Star Wars?” he asked. “I’m really in the mood to-”

You groaned. “Will you just shut up,”

Reggie looked over at you stunned and just before Luke was going to say something Reggie grabbed your arm and looked at you with a serious face,

“Can I talk to you? Alone,” he said cooly.

You were about to respond with a sarcastic retort, but he stopped you by pulling you up and dragging you out of the studio into the brick open-spaced area around the rock garden.

“What the hell (Y/N),” he deadpanned.

“What do you mean what the hell?” you asked innocently and Reggie scoffed, letting go of your arm and looking away.

“Enough of the fucking bullshit (Y/N)!”

“What bullshit Reggie please enlighten me because I wasn’t the one ditching the gang to spend time with some random blonde,”

“You have no right!” Reggie angrily exclaimed, pointing roughly at you. His eyes were dark with anger, unlike anything you’ve seen before. “You have no right to say- t-to act like a child after what happened?”

You rolled your eyes. “What are you talking about?” you demanded.

Reggie laughed to himself, frustratedly running his fingers through his hair before looking back at you. “I don’t fucking understand you,” he hissed. “You’re so frustrating and unpredictable. First, you joke around with me, blush when I tell jokes or better yet flirt, but the moment I step out of line even an inch, you turn around and hate me again! I don’t get it, what the fuck do you want from me?”

“I want you!” you cried out. “Dammit, Reggie. I want you, but sometimes you’re so far up your ass you can’t even tell!”

“Me?” he yelled back. “I gave you so many chances. You wanted time? I gave you plenty of it! I have you so many opportunities that you ignored so don’t you fucking dare pin this on me.” Reggie didn’t bother letting you try and defend yourself. “You said it yourself, you wondered when people will leave you, and that you’ll be left alone again. Here’s the reality, (Y/N). People don’t leave you, you push them away. You put the blame on everyone but yourself, so all you’re left with are your own broken pieces. Face it, you’ve never changed.”

You staggered back, feeling as though you were caught under a wave of emotions. He was right. Every single word he said...was right. And damn, it hurt so much to realize it.

Reggie looked up from his shoes. “I want that necklace back,” he said in a low voice. “I don’t want to see you with it, or any piece of me, ever again. You hear me? I’m done. I’m done with your mind games. I’m tired of waiting for you. I’m done with you.”

There it was. The moment you were waiting for, the reason for Reggie to step out of your life again. Or, in reality, the reason that made Reggie realize you weren’t worth it anymore.

You quickly unclasped the necklace, throwing it on the ground along with his flannel.

Before leaving, you looked at him one more time. “It was always me, wasn’t it?” you whispered in a broken voice. “I was always the reason. The problem. The second choice. Right?” Reggie refused to look you in the eye. You wiped away your tears, a sad attempt to, really. More tears just took their place.

“I tried, Reggie,” you told him in a quiet voice. “I really did. B-but if I’m the only thing that’s holding you back, then let me go.”

Reggie remained silent. Taking it as your cue to leave, you ran down the street, not bothering to say goodbye to your friends.

And just like that, you were alone again. Just like you predicted.

—

As if your week couldn’t get any worse, the universe didn’t fail you. You had detention with him. And even better, you were forced to sit in silence with him.

Seriously you thought to yourself Did he actually fall asleep while supervising detention.

Mr. Alderman, the gym teacher, was fast asleep, snoring at his desk.

You hadn’t spoken since your fight a few nights ago, the emotions still fresh under your skin, burning your eyes and throat, just making you wish for it to end.

Reggie muttered something under his breath and for the first time in a few days you took a good look at him.

His eyes were sunken and he seemed angry. It radiated off him like light bouncing off a mirror.

“Have something to say, Peters,” you whispered quietly.

“Yeah, I’m leaving,” he nodded, standing up and grabbing his bag.

“You can’t leave,” you said flatly.

“Watch me,” he turned his back and you followed him out of the class and into the hallway.

“Reggie stop,”

“No (Y/N)! I’m not stopping anymore! I’m not waiting anymore!”

“I’m not asking you to do that Reggie! It’s me, I’m leaving okay?!” you exclaimed.

“W-What?” his voice grew quiet.

“I’m transferring out at the end of the week,” you look at him with stone-cold eyes. “Not that you would care.”

“(Y/N), you...Wait you can’t-!”

“Stop telling me what I can and can't do Reggie! I hate that my fucking feelings are controlled by you! I hate that my entire life will be spent trying to find someone to live up to you! I just want some fucking peace and quiet for once in my life!” you sobbed, unable to bottle things up anymore. “I work and I work and I work and I get nothing! I try and I try and I try and I still get nothing! And maybe that’s because I can’t be in control when I’m around you so yes I’m leaving!”

Reggie didn’t say anything, he just stared at you blankly, the only sound in the empty hallways was that of your soft cries.

“I can’t do this anymore,” you choked out, turning around and running out through the back of the school and into the pouring rain, not even bothering to hide for cover under the pavilion; falling to your knees and wrapping your arms around your waist as the most devastating sounds ripped from your heart and soul.

You cried until you couldn’t cry anymore. Scream until your throat was raw. Pulled at your hair and kicked yourself, ashamed and frustrated, until the pain was too much. But even then, it could never match the pain you were feeling in your heart.

It felt good, felt right to feel this way. Ever since middle school, you had been told you were a robot, an emotionless nothing.

Look at you now. Crying like everything had up and left in your life because it did. You were alone, left behind to pick up your broken pieces. Just like Reggie said.

You hated how Reggie was right about everything. You had no right to be mad because it was true. You pushed everyone away, placed the blame on them so that you didn’t have to get hurt. Is this how he felt? Did you ever make him feel this way?

The cold air angrily nipped at your fingertips, your eyes red from the weather and your tears. Turning your head, you looked at the school door, internally hoping that maybe it would swing open. Maybe Reggie would come out of the building and take you in his arms and tell you that everything will be alright.

The door never opened. Reggie never came. You were left alone with your thoughts in the pavilion.

And the rain continued to pour on and on.

—

Reggie was distracted the entire practice. His fingers would roughly strum against his strings as he stared off into the distance, a faraway look on his face.

Luke, having noticed Reggie’s odd behaviour, stopped playing.

“Hey, Reg you wanna cool it on those strings?” Luke asked.

“Or does he need to mention how much money we have combined,” Bobby added.

“It’s negative seven hundred forty-five dollars and thirty-two cents.” Luke deadpanned and Alex rolled his eyes.

“Are you mad at Alex again?” Bobby asked and for a moment the blond drummer looked frightened.

“No, it’s not that,” Reggie shook his head.

“It’s (Y/N), isn’t it,” Rose said softly, looking at the bassist with sympathetic eyes. Just as Reggie was about to ask how she knew, Rose answered the question. “You keep looking at the spot on the couch where she used to sit during practices,”

Reggie chewed hard on the inside of his cheek while Luke came closer to him, laying a hand on his shoulder.

“You don’t need to bottle it up,” Luke whispered. “We’re here for you. You know that.”

“I messed up,” the tone of his voice was wavering as he tried to make sure it didn’t crack. “I messed up so fucking bad. The only thing I’m good at is pushing the good things in my life away until I fuck it up entirely. I’m a time bomb. It’s only going to get worse the longer people are around me,”

Reggie carefully slid his bass’ strap off his shoulder and placed his instrument against the couch where you would normally sit.

“No you’re not,” Alex told him, quickly coming to join Luke next to his friend. Bobby and Rose followed soon after and before long Reggie’s head was tucked in Luke’s shoulder as tears finally streamed from his eyes and his friends surrounded him like a shield from the cruel world.

“Aren’t I?” Reggie croaked. “I can't even talk to you guys without exploding or storming off, a-and (Y/N), she’ll never forgive me for all the things I’ve said and done… I don’t deserve any of your guys,”

“Reggie cariño, everyone deserves a family,” Rose said in a soothing voice. “And we’re each other’s family. Family sticks together no matter what, even if you don’t think they should.”

“And what about (Y/N)?” he whispered. “How could I possibly erase all that?”

“You don’t,” Luke spoke up. “You use it, use it to apologize. Use it,” he repeated, placing his songwriting pen in Reggie’s hand.

Reggie bit his lips and took the pen from Luke, seeing his tattered red book resting on the couch.

He was sure it wasn’t the first time he wrote something for you and it definitely wouldn’t be the last, but it just might have been the first one you’d hear, so it had to be perfect.

And somehow, just like you’d always managed to do, the only thing on Reggie Peters's mind was his Cookie.

—

“Rose I already said I don’t want to come here,” you sighed as your friend dragged you through the crowd of people waiting to get into the show.

“(Y/N) come on, these are your friends! They want you to be here,” she tried to convince you, but you were still skeptical, and it didn’t help that you didn’t know if you wanted to see Reggie or not right now.

Rose gave you another tug, but you dug your heels into the ground. The girl sighed, giving you a look. “It’s your last day as a Los Feliz high student,” she told you softly. You stiffened at her words, looking down at the floor. “At least spend it with us. Then, I’ll leave you be. I promise. You don’t have to see another gig -better yet, another bass- ever again. Will you do at least that for me?”

You finally glanced up from the ground. “For you,” you answered begrudgingly.

“What’s up Los Feliz High,” Luke said into the mic and was met with cheers.

“We’re Sunset Curve,” Reggie added. “And this is a little something we wrote called I Remember,”

There was a soft opening with Reggie’s bass and Alex on drums, slowly layering in the guitar riff intro before Reggie came close to his mic,

“I remember those nights, stayin’ up late, listenin’ to the radio.

I remember the days, callin’ your name, running to your patio,”

Rose glanced over at you, grinning as you tried to listen to the lyrics, finding a sense of familiarity in the words. Luke and Bobby now joined as backing vocals taking a lower and higher harmony.

“And as the years went by slowly you - left my life and I can’t, I can’t, I can’t figure out why, why?”

Alex led to the chorus with a drum fill before the hard rock beat came in, Reggie, Luke, and Bobby really getting into playing to the beat and rhythm, before all coming in again singing the chorus.

“So tell me, tell me when it all fell apart. Tell me, tell me can we go back to the start.”

The music backing instruments quieted slowly as Reggie leaned into his mic, looking directly at you. Your breath hitched at you finally made eye contact with him. You hadn’t bothered to look at him in so long, you wanted to burn the feeling into your memory so you never forget. His eyes glistened with tears as he began to sing,

“Tell me, tell me what happened to us Cookie,”

You looked over at Rose who only smiled knowingly as you tried to hide the fact that you were most definitely losing your composure, your heart beating faster and your vision becoming blurry.

“I remember I hurt you, a stain on my heart that’ll never go away. I remember I kissed you, my heart said to stay but my feet ran away.”

They transitioned back to the chorus and you couldn’t help but try to push back the lump in your throat as you looked up at your Flicka, singing for you. Reggie took the mic and walked over to you. His hand was stretched out to you, face lighting up in hope. Pushing down all your doubts, you took his hand in yours, squeezing it tight.

“And I promise, I promise, I promise I’ll never go away. And I promise I promise, I promise I’ll be there every day. Just tell me, just tell me, just tell me you’ll look the other way. Cause if I lost you one more time I don’t think that I’d survive,”

Tears streamed down your face as you listened to the lyrics, each word slowly chipping down the walls you put up around your heart. Reggie leaned in close, removing his hand from yours and placing it on the side of your face, wiping away your stray tears.

“So tell me, tell me when it all fell apart. Tell me, tell me can we go back to the start.”

The music slowed and quieted one last time, Reggie’s eyes interlocked with yours as he sang the last line,

“Tell me, tell me, will you be mine Cookie?”

Silence followed as everyone turned to you, waiting for your answer. You glanced over at Rose, who was just as impatient.

Locking eyes with Reggie, you nodded. “As long as you’ll be mine, Flicka,” you whispered so that only he could hear.

Not waiting any longer, Reggie dropped his microphone, hopping down from the stage and taking both sides of your face and pulling you into a long-awaited kiss. The crowd cheered, but your mind blocked them out.

You missed Reggie’s lips that tasted faintly of that cherry chapstick he always used. You missed feeling his hands against yours, warm and comforting.

You missed your Reggie. But now he was here, and he was never letting you go.

—

“Lady Bunny!” Luke cheered, running up to you backstage and pulling you into the tightest squeeze. “I missed you so much,” he whispered and you held him close against you.

“I missed you too, mom,” you sniffled while Luke pressed a friendly kiss to your hair before you were promptly tossed around the group, hugs and all exchanged along with the chatter of

“You’re gonna stay, right? You can’t transfer now,”

All to which the answer was yes, especially when you looked over at Reggie, the brightest smile on his face.

“Hey guys can I have a minute alone with Cookie?” he asked and they all complied, moving out of the way of the new couple.

“Have something for me Flicka?” you asked, slight teasing in your voice.

“Actually, yeah,” he nodded, fishing out a necklace from his pocket. “I shouldn’t have taken it from you. Or told you that you were the problem. You never were, I promise.”

“Water under the bridge,” you smiled shyly. “What matters is that you’re here now.” You turned around, allowing him to clip the silver chain around your neck, not without sneaking a quick peck to the corner of your lips after turning you back around.

“Perfect,” he told you, his lips quirking up into a smile. “You’re perfect.”

“And you’re overly cheesy,” you shot back jokingly.

Reggie grasped his chest in feigned hurt. “You love me, Cookie,” he pouted.

You went on the tips of your toes, kissing him softly. “Yeah, Flicka,” you whispered. “I do.”

--

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[artificialqueens]

Come Through Like the Sweetener You Are (Gottrosnali) - Writworm42

A/N: hey everyone! I’m really excited about this ship and about this fic, so I hope y'all like it. Title from Sweetener by Ariana Grande. Thank you thank you x1000 to Holtz for beta-ing, encouraging me, and brainstorming with me, you’re the best <3

“Mik, seriously, get on the ice. C’mon.”

Denali stays planted at the entrance of the rink, arms crossed as he watches his boyfriend shrink back shyly once again. If they hadn’t been at this for several minutes now, the sight of Mik so flustered and vulnerable, his ankles wobbling from the effort of holding himself up in his rental hockey skates and teeth chattering from the cold would have been pretty cute. It’s rare, seeing Mik this daunted by something, and it reminds Denali of the little kids he used to teach when he was a teenager. But, much like those kids after a six week cycle of classes, it’s starting to get old now, and they need to move—free-skate is starting to get crowded, and every passing skater that shoves their way past them seems to spook Mik just a little more.

He has to get Mik onto the ice, otherwise, he’s gonna have to get off it, and their skating date will be over before it’s even started.

“It’s okay, D, let me handle this, yeah?” Rosé comes up behind Mik just then, striding out from the changing room with a sympathetic smile on his face, as if he had anticipated the standoff. Knowing Rosé, he probably has, really—but Denali isn’t going to let him know that. He doesn’t need both his boyfriends ganging up on him, after all.

That’s a problem for another time, though; right now, Denali focuses on just shuffling to the side of the rink while Rosé wraps his arms around Mik, leaning over to kiss the smaller man on his temple.

“You okay, baby?” he checks in softly, giving Mik a little squeeze.

“I’m okay, I’m just…”

“You don’t need to be scared, sweetheart. D’s a pro, remember? And I’m here, too. We’ll make sure you’re safe, promise—Denali’s gonna be holding your hands, and I’m gonna be behind guarding your waist.”

Denali would be lying if he said he isn’t jealous of the way Rosé is with Mik in these moments, how easy it seems for him to make the other man relax. It’s not like he’s being mean, after all—he’s been coaxing and encouraging Mik ever since finding out that he’s never skated before. But for some reason, with Rosé in the mix, it just…clicks.

“Okay, I’ll go,” Mik sighs, rolling his eyes theatrically, “but only if Denali promises not to let go of my hand.”

The glimmer of validation and knowing he’s needed is enough to make Denali feel warm to the core as he glides forward, stops to take Mik’s hand. “I won’t, promise.”

“There’s a good boy,” Rosé teases, and Denali can’t help but giggle at how Mik blushes fiercely at the praise.

He leads Mik to toe-step onto the ice, marching him in place until they’re safely away from the entrance and off to the side in the back area of the rink, near the walls of the learner’s corner.

“So, like, can I hold onto—“

“Nope, we’re not letting you get into the habit.” Denali steels his grip on Mik’s hand as the man tries to reach for the rink’s walls, watching him pout as his attempts are thwarted. “You won’t be able to skate as well if you’re hugging the wall the whole time, trust me.”

“I’m not gonna skate that well as is.“ Mik huffs under his breath, but it’s no use protesting—all three of them know that Denali’s not going to hear it.

No, if he’s going to teach his boyfriend how to skate, then he’s going to do it right. Especially since realistically, being an LA boy at heart, Mik will likely never set foot on the ice again after today, so Denali really does only have this one shot.

Luckily, he’s dealt with enough kids by now to know how to get them comfortable.

“Let’s just start with some marches on the spot, yeah? C’mon, Rosie and I’ll do it with you.” he nods over to Rosé, and the both of them lift up their feet in sync, quiet chk-chk-chk noises echoing off the ice.

Mik watches hesitantly before finally throwing caution to the wind and joining them in their steps. He beams as he does, and Denali can’t help the pride that blooms in his chest—his sweetheart’s a natural, after all.

Of course, it’s at that very moment that Mik slips and starts to scramble, eyes wide until Rosé catches him around the waist.

“Oh shit.” Mik lets out a shaky laugh as Rosé pushes him back up with Denali’s help. “Not me almost dying with my boyfriends fully hanging onto me.”

“You didn’t almost die,” Rosé snorts, rolling his eyes, “We caught you, right?”

“And we’ll do it again, as much as we have to,” Denali chimes in, and Mik must know he means it, because even though he rolls his eyes, he smiles gently, his eyes soft and glowing with trust.

“Okay, from the top, let’s try marching forward now.” Rosé cuts through the tender moment with a light tap to Mik’s ass, grinning widely.

“Perv.” Mik launches over his shoulder, sticking out his tongue and scrunching up his nose, but he starts to step again.

They continue like that around the learner’s area for a length or so, Mik occasionally tripping up and needing to stop to hyperventilate for a moment before they can keep going, until they finally settle into a smooth rhythm that tells Denali that Mik is ready for something more. In fact, he’s pretty excited for it–even just over this small period of time, Mik’s confidence has definitely grown, and even though he’s kept a death-grip on Denali’s hands, Rosé has long gone from holding onto Mik to simply keeping his arms up close to him just in case, and Mik hasn’t actually seemed to notice. It makes Denali’s heart swell with pride, and when he looks into his boyfriend’s eyes and sees the excitement shining in them, he can’t help but feel warm inside, remembering how exciting it was for him the first time he’d moved on the ice, way back when.

“What do you think, Rosie, is he ready for gliding?” Denali peeks over at Rosé, whose hands have dropped completely from Mik’s waist and are now shoved into her jacket pockets.

“Oh, I think he’s ready for gliding,” Rosé grins, “Mik, you ready for gliding?”

Mik turns around to look at Rosé and almost falls again, but this time steadies himself, letting out a disbelieving laugh when he gets back upright. “After this gorge performance?” he strikes a pose, framing his face, “You guys, I’m so ready to gl–”

Before he can finish his sentence, a kid barely reaching his hip-level whizzes past, displaying excellent control and holding her leg up for one, two, three seconds before coming to a perfect stop in front of her parents.

It’s probably the longest Mik has ever gone without talking, the silence once again only broken by Rosé beginning to sing wake up in the morning, thinkin’ ‘bout so many things, followed by Mik and Denali both bursting out in laughter.

“So now that we’ve had our little self-aware gag moment, should we get to gliding?” Mik wipes a tear from his eye as the laughter dies down, and Denali and Rosé only nod before re-assuming their positions around him.

Denali tightens his grip on Mik’s hand but skates a little farther out to widen the distance between them and Rosé skates up from behind to bring his hands near Mik’s waist, not yet touching but ready to catch him just in case, and they feel the air around them change, Mik visibly relaxing at the re-institution of his safety net.

Of course the same kid chooses that very moment to whizz past them again while sporting a huge, shit-eating grin, and Denali has to wonder if she’s doing it on purpose now.

“Is it rude to trip a child?” Rosé ponders out loud, perhaps a little too loudly. “D, it’s good practice for them, right? Learning how to fall and get up?”

The kid stops mid-skate and changes her direction, and Denali has to bite down hard on the inside of his cheek not to laugh again.

“Okay, now that that’s out of the way, let’s get to gliding.”

Denali watches over his boyfriends’ shoulders as the kid glides out of the learner’s corner to join the regular circuit, and feels a little relief at how much safer it suddenly seems, with only wall-clingers, other marchers, and toddlers with tired parents left. Good; he can finally focus on Mik again. “Ready?”

“Gorge, let’s do it.” Mik nods resolutely, and Denali begins to pull him forward, grinning from ear to ear as Mik lets out a little squeal of excitement and pride as they begin to move.

—

“Okay, now sit here, behave yourselves, and stay quiet. ” Denali points sternly over to the bleachers by the rink, frowning at Mik and Rosé and hoping that his tone is enough for them to take him seriously.

Predictably, though, both of them just grin mischievously, blowing on their hot chocolates casually as if they’re not already dreaming up ways to embarrass him as Rosé shrugs, “No promises.”

“I swear to God—“

“Go practice, D. We’ll be perfectly behaved little angels, I swear,” Mik cuts in, batting his eyelashes innocently, and Denali resists the urge to snort at the statement.

He wishes he could believe them, he really does, but he also knows these clowns better than that by now, and knows that he is in for at least one shout of ‘ HE ON X GAMES!!’ before he steps off the ice again.

He doesn’t have time for skepticism, though—for better or for worse, it’s time for his practice session, and he had promised Rosé and Mik that they could watch.

Rosé and Mik have seen Denali perform a hundred times. Even before Denali and Rosé had started dating Mik, he had come to all of Denali’s shows with Rosé to support him, and to this day, they both hang onto the edge of their seats when Denali skates, taking him out for drinks after and excitedly retelling how gorge that triple lutz was or how much they loved his costume or how proud they were of him. They had learned everything about skating, all the terminology and competition rules. They know exactly what Denali likes to do to unwind after a long day of rehearsals, how to facilitate his pre-audition routine and what he needs to hear before and after one.

And yet, there’s something about his practices, especially the one-on-ones, that feel…sacred. Vulnerable. Like they’re for his and his coach’s eyes only. Like if anyone is around to see him fall flat on his ass, fuck up a combo so bad the whole rest of the number is thrown, then something will click for the spectator, a realization that he’s not so talented after all.

For those spectators to be his boyfriends? Well, sure, realistically, he knows that they would never think that about him. They’re his partners, after all, and they’re human too. He’s been in the house when Rosé is practicing a song and his voice cracks, and he’s walked in on Mik trying new makeup techniques that look… less than gorge, he’ll put it that way. In both of those moments, he’s never thought anything about either of them except that their efforts and dedication are adorable, and that for sure, they’ll get it next time.

But still–they’ve got confidence in him, think that he’s perfect. They’ve never seen him slam into the wall because he put too much power into his travelling, or wobble on his feet and make a messy landing because he hesitated on one of his jumps. Even the thought that they might see him imperfect–that they might get disappointed in him, that their image of him might change, is so painful it makes it hard to breathe.

No, when he’s on the ice performing, he’s untouchable. Above everything. Queen of the world. And if there’s two people in the world he doesn’t want to shatter that image for, it’s the his boyfriends sitting at the end of the rink, already whipping their phones out to record him stretching.

Oh, God. Now if he messes up, everyone on Instagram will see it.

He swivels around to face away from the windows of the rink and put his boyfriends out of his mind as he begins to stretch, bending down to touch the tips of his bare fingers to the frigid, freshly-smoothed ice, only to almost topple over when Rosé’s voice echoes through the rink.

“ YES, SHOW US THAT ASS, MAMA! GET FLEXIBLE!”  

Christ.

Well, he’s still got about a half hour left to warm up and practice on his own before his coach shows up. Might as well give those two fools a show.

He brings his leg up and stretches it above his head easily without holding onto the wall, and grins when he hears both men absolutely lose their shit, screaming and praising and probably making a million boomerangs. He almost wishes he could turn back to see the looks on their faces, really, though he knows he’d probably fall if he did. So instead, he drops his foot and does it on his other side, this time pulling it a little farther so that it’s behind his head, and it strains a bit, but it’s manageable, and the way Mik and Rosé’s screams get even louder makes it completely worth it.

“Three words: Gag. A. Tondra !” Denali hears Mik shout, either straight to him or to his phone, but suddenly, it doesn’t matter. This is the most fun he’s ever had just stretching, and when he’s laughing and smiling like this, it’s easy to forget where he is and what he had even been nervous about in the first place. So he can be a bit of a show-off at times—sue him. He’s living for it more and more with every stretch, and he finds himself getting excited to actually start skating.

He begins to mark his latest routine, spinning lightly and moving his hands to signal every jump as he looks down at the ice, trying to remember every move. It’s a new routine, one he’s only just fully learned but has to perform at an opening gala in two weeks, so he needs to have it perfect, and soon. Especially since he has a group routine for the same gala knocking around in his head, too, and he can’t let them get mixed up. It makes his chest tighten a little just at the thought of it, his attention so completely absorbed in his run through that he’s startled when he hears the boom of the rink’s gate swing open, surprised enough to lose his footing and stumble, tripping over his skates and falling to the ground.

Shit, fuck, and shit again. Not even half an hour into his practice and he’s already fucked up right in front of Mik and Rosé. And just when he was doing so well, knocking them dead with barely any actual stunts yet. They must think he’s stupid, getting scared by something as stupid as a noise he’s so used to, and now he’s lost his train of thought and can’t remember where he was in his routine—

“Go on, Nali! You can do this!”

“You’re doing amazing, sweetie!”

“We love you!”

His head snaps up to see Mik and Rosé standing up, clapping their hands and smiling warmly as they shout their encouragement across the room. It hits him then, exactly what Mik and Rosé have been cheering on this whole time. Not his success, not the flashy tricks and stunts he knows he can blow anyone away with. Not even his talent, really.

They’ve been cheering for his effort. For his enjoyment. For his passion. For the Denali they see on the ice whether he’s in his head or not, regardless of whether his movements are graceful or sloppy. The thing they’ve been enjoying most, so enthusiastic about this whole time?

It’s not figure skating. It’s Denali. He could be doing anything anywhere, and they’d be screaming and cheering and supporting him no matter what, because they don’t care what he’s doing–they just care that it’s him.

“Quite the cheering section, huh?” his coach steps out towards him, grinning as she looks over towards where Mik and Rosé are still watching, still waving and making hearts with their hands every time Denali looks over, and it’s all he can do not to get emotional when he smiles widely, nodding.

“Yeah. The best.”

And Hell, maybe it’s luck, maybe it’s just how happy he is. Maybe Mik and Rosé are just that good an influence to have around. Either way, that practice session is definitely his best one yet.

–

The first thing Denali does the minute they all step back into their apartment that evening is make a beeline for the couch to collapse. He feels the fatigue sinking down into his bones the minute his body hits the cushions, making him heavy yet content, happy to wriggle and get comfy before letting the exhaustion of the day fully wash over him. There’s something satisfying about being in this state, so spent from such a fun day. It’s like every memory he’s made today is carried in his muscles even this long after the adventure is over, each sigh he lets out a catalogue of every laugh, every smile, every bit of happiness he’d experienced in his adventures.

Not to mention how when he’s this tired, Rosé and Mik are eager to spoil him, but that’s besides the point.

“Can we get you anything, baby?” Rosé comes up behind the couch, reaching down to run a gentle hand through Denali’s hair. “Some dinner, maybe? Tea? A massage?”

“Will that last option come with a happy ending?” Denali jokes slyly, turning his head just in time to see Rosé roll his eyes, laughing a bit to himself.

“As much as I’d love that, this bitch is tired too, mama. Now scoot over a bit, make some room for me.”

“Mm.” Denali kicks his legs a little in protest, but obliges, pulling himself up on the couch just enough to give Rosé room to kneel over him comfortably. Within moments, Denali is melting under the other man’s touch, letting Rosé’s hands work the knots and fatigue from his back and shoulders slowly, tenderly, exactly the way he needs.

“Where’s Mik, by the way?” Denali ponders as Rosé begins to ease off, content with his work and how Denali has gone limp from it. It’s rare not to hear from Mik this long, not have him bounce around and whine for attention of his own from both of his partners, so Denali can’t help but feel a little suspicious at the quiet. If Mik is occupied, he’s either focusing on something or doing something he shouldn’t be, and if it’s the latter, then–

The smoke alarm answers Denali’s question before Rosé can so much as open his mouth.

“Shit, shit, SORRY!” Mik calls out from the kitchen. “Don’t worry you guys, I got this–”

“You’re supposed to be making ramen!” Rosé calls back over the shrill beep of the alarm, followed by a chair scraping along the kitchen floor. “How the fuck did you burn ramen?”

The smoke alarm goes quiet, and Denali has to cover his mouth from laughing as Mik protests, “I saw this gorgeous recipe that Ariana posted for this like, pan-fried noodles artistry moment, and I thought, hey, ramen is noodles, so why not?”

“Gee, I dunno, maybe ‘cause you’ll burn the apartment down?” Rosé pinches the bridge of his nose, but Denali can see that he’s trying not to smile.

“Well I didn’t, so crisis averted, problem solved.” Mik whips around the corner and points a fork at them with narrow eyes, and Denali can’t hold it anymore–he lets out a loud string of giggles, which become howls of laughter when Mik stamps his foot, pouting and demanding that Denali stop laughing at him. After a second, though, Rosé joins in, and then even Mik can’t resist letting out a chuckle despite himself.

“Okay baby, sit down with Denali, let the adults handle this.” Rosé teases as he heaves himself up from his position on the couch, tapping the cushion beside him to invite Mik over.

“Hey, I’m an adult!” Mik pouts, but Rosé doesn’t respond, only walks up to Mik to give him a little kiss before patting him on the head.

“Of course you are, sweetie,” he coos, pulling away just in time to narrowly avoid a swat from Mik. “Seriously, though, I’ll be right back–why don’t you and D pick something to watch in the meantime?”

Mik doesn’t look particularly satisfied with the suggestion, but makes his way over to the couch nonetheless. Denali watches him come over, even extends his arms out for his boyfriend to walk into, but it’s then that he realizes his mistake. Mik’s pout fades, and a glint of mischief shines in his eyes, and before Denali can shield himself, Mik pounces, landing pretty much in Denali’s lap and attacking him with a hug.

“Hi, gorge.” Mik’s voice is soft as he nuzzles into Denali, a dreamy smile on his face. It’s precious, really, the way Mik is glowing as he squeezes Denali tight, and Denali can’t help but run a hand through the shorter man’s hair before peppering a light kiss on the top of his head.

“Did you have fun today, baby?”

Denali pulls Mik just a little closer, his heart melting at the little mm of satisfaction Mik lets out as the closing of distance between them allows him to splay out a little, head resting on Denali’s shoulder. It’s almost enough to distract from the sudden uptick in Denali’s heart rate that he can feel, the stakes resting on the question suddenly sinking in for him. This day, after all, was a way of letting Mik into his world, more up-close than the LA native ever had before. And he really, really wants Mik to like that world.

Luckily, his fears are put to rest when Mik nods, his dopey, tired grin taking on a spark of excitement as he reassures Denali, “It was great, D. I loved it. Almost as much as I love you.”

Denali rolls his eyes at the cheesy line, but nonetheless, when Mik cranes up to kiss him on the cheek, he feels a rush of happiness swell in his chest. Not just at the fact that Mik had enjoyed their day, but also the fact that it is ending like this - curled up on the couch with his boyfriend leaning against him, craning up to give him playful, light kisses wherever he can plant them. Still, there’s something missing, another presence that would make this cozy scene truly home. Something, some one that would cuddle him in turn, hold him and squeeze him and–

“Are you guys cuddle-piling without me?” Rosé puts his hand to his chest as he gasps in mock-offense, propping a tray of piping-hot ramen cups against his body with his other arm. Denali laughs a little, because it’s cute how pouty Rosé looks at the prospect of being left out of all this affection, but he answers nonetheless by letting go of Mik briefly, extending his arms out and making grabby hands to invite Rosé to join them.

“Yay, sandwich!” Mik squeals with delight as Rosé gets on the other side of him, wrapping his arms around Mik and just reaching Denali’s waist with his fingers. It’s enough to make Denali melt, even the light contact enough to feel like he’s home. He lets out a contented sigh, wiggling a little to get comfortable and shimmy just a little more into Rosé’s outstretched hands, before he relaxes fully, his eyes fluttering closed as he feels his breath sync with his boyfriends’, their hearts beating almost as one.

“We should probably eat before the ramen gets cold, right?” Mik speaks up after a moment, but makes no attempt to move, and Denali just smiles, shaking his head.

“Let it keep cooling. I wanna stay like this for a little longer.”

[warmau]

kofi request: lovestruck!yukhei

yukhei strolls into the first eight am class of the semester with a huge grin plastered on his face

but that’s to be expected

he’s wong yukhei

when is he not smiling?

despite the rainy september weather, the gloom on every other students face, and the blaring white lights of the stuffy college classroom 

yukhei looks like he’s just won a beach getaway as he slings an arm around a grumpy looking haechan and starry-eyed mark

“well - didn’t yall miss me?”

“hell yeah dude!” 

mark grins and haechan buries his head into his hands - muttering something about how this is his freshman year and yukhei is already making his head hurt

yukhei takes it as a compliment as he teasingly leans over with puckered lips and haechan swats at him like an angry cat

the noise from their corner drowns out the awkward silence of the room as everyone waits for the professor to trudge in

they do, ten minutes late, a broken umbrella and all

yukhei cracks a joke about it and gets reminded that: “mr. wong this is college not high school. we don’t need a class clown.”

as usual, there’s a reading of the syllabus and mark takes notes excitedly as haechan doses off and yukhei surveys the room 

he basically knows everyone aside from incoming freshmen, but he’s sure they’ll all be best friends by tomorrow

and then the door opens with a slam

all eyes turn to look upon you

you’re d r e n c h e d

still holding your backpack over your head like an impromptu and horrible alternative to an umbrella

 your expression is far past disgruntled and the professor doesn’t even get a word in before you march past them and to the only empty seat  

directly in front of yukhei

the professor recovers and continues to drone on as you start shuffling in your bag and groaning to yourself because the only notebook you brought got absolutely damaged by the weather

you have nothing to write on, you look like a mess, and you’re sure the overall vibe you’re giving off is far from friendly

but then, to your surprise, a piece of torn out paper dangels in front of your nose

you look over your shoulder and yukhei’s grin grows wider

“thought you might like to take some notes”

he coos and haechan opens on eye to watch you sort of laugh a little quietly as you take it 

yukhei watches you turn back, almost in slow motion, the remaining drops of rain are disappearing on your skin and you might have looked offputting to everyone else

half pissed, half exhausted trudging to the seat

but to yukhei you looked - you looked - 

he rests his cheek against his palm, the back of someone’s head has never enticed him so much until finally, the class is over

mark is bouncing up and down eager to see if yukhei’s schedule falls in line with his and haechan is making up some excuse as to why skipping on the first day can’t be that bad

but yukhei can’t hear or see anything else

as you turn, slipping your backpack over your shoulder as you catch eye contact with him for a mere five seconds

you smile

yukhei feels white noise fill his head

“thanks for this!” 

you wave around the paper with your half-hearted notes and scribbles, walking out toward the door 

and yukhei isn’t used to all these conflicting thoughts hitting him at once

what’s going on with me? am i sick? why’s my hea-

“dude, i totally forgot - that senior yuta is having a party and-”

mark’s voice snaps yukhei back into reality and he gets back in his groove

no worries, just positivity, no meddling worries or problems

except its a lie

from that day on,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,yukhei is never the same

you only have one class together and it’s this horrible eight am

you’re late half the time, but yukhei is getting yelled at half the time

so really - you make a great pair

the thing is, no matter how easily yukhei has been able to connect with others

you’re different

everyone around yukhei is simple. haechan is hard to read, but loyal to a fault. mark can’t lie. xiaojun and hendery are funny just like him, but they’re also probably smarter. kun is dependable and the person to go to for anything. ten is one of yukhei’s favorites.

but you - what the hell are you?

you make yukhei’s throat clog up - his low pitch voice suddenly coming out in weird, mousy noises

you lean back and let your arms stretch up over your head during a boring lecture and 

it’s like an earthquake shakes through yukhei’s long body - his neck feels hot whenever you tilt your head sideways and his eyes can’t peel off the skin of your neck

yukhei panics - and he never panics - when you ask simple things like ‘does anyone have a pen?’ or ‘did we have homework?’

yukhei can never answer - mark always does 

and when mark starts joking with you after class one day, this i supposed to be prime yukhei territory - he’s supposed to join in with his own humor and have everyone laughing

but he jsut hangs back

because the thought of embarrassing himself in front of you is too much to bare

which is insane - yukhei is gracelessly shameless

haechan notices - like he always does - and asks yukhei finally as the midterms are coming up 

“so like are you broken?”

“what?”

yukhei raises an eyebrow and mark bites back his lip, “haechan don’t tea-”

“nah like has no one else noticed?”

haechan looks between yukhei and mark and then sighs with a roll of his eyes

“yukhei you’re literally always smiling and talking and this is the one class where you haven’t said more than ten words since all the way back in septemeber.”

yukhei opens his mouth - not sure what kind of excuse he can even put forth on the table because haechan is right he’s ,,,,,,,,,, he’s a little broken and it’s because

“the midterms next week - right?”

your voice fills up yukhei’s head and sets his whole body back into overdrive

you sit in your seat, turning all the way around and yukhei thinks he’s going to stop breathing at some point

why is your sweater all baggy and cute, why are you pouting as mark explains that the study guide isn’t getting posted till a day before the actual damn test, and why oh why why why are you so -

haechan clicks his tongue

“yukhei will help you prepare for it if you want.”

yukhei whips his head around so fast it nearly swirls right off

mark is about to say he can help too - but haechan slaps a hand right over his mouth and gives you a grin

you agree, saying you’ll meet yukhei in the library after then

and yukhei doesn’t do anything but let his wide eyes watch you turn away

the library feels like it’s going to swallow yukhei hold

at least thirty people greet him as he walks in, but all he can offer is a small nod which leaves everyone confused

you get up from the table and wave your hand for him to come over and yukhei thinks

if i book it right now, will that be bad?

he might be nervous but he’s not rude, so he makes his way over 

you already have some notes and the textbook out 

yukhei manages to say some words - but he forgets them right after they slip out 

and the whole hour you “study” together - yukhei is just sure he’s seeing pink spots in his eyes 

cherubs in the bookshelves

cupid trying to aim the perfect shot from the wall clock above the librarian's desk

he keeps bouncing his leg as you talk and when the hour is up he shots out of his seat

“i - uh - soccer -”

soccer practice, say you have soccer practice!

“gotta-  so-”

“yukhei”

his name sounds so sweet when you say it

“yukhei, hey - are you ok?”

yeah im ok, and you’re beautiful

“yukhei?!?”

he doesn’t realize he’s swaying dangerously close to toppling over and you grab his arm and get him out of the stuffy library and into the empty halls 

he feels that embarrassment he dreads getting around you and wants to apologize or do something

until suddenly you’re saying something and yukhei is pretty sure he’s dreaming

“do you wanna go on a date after the midterms?”

“a date?”

yukhei straightens up

“wait - a date?!”

you nod

“yeah, im asking you out.”

“wait - wait - wh-what?”

“do you?”

“do i?”

“do you - yukhei - want to go on a date with me?”

“wasn’t this about the midterms-”

“yeah but do you -”

he shakes, half from excitement and half from anxiety

“is this a joke?”

“no - do you wanna go?”

“yes, fuck yes-  i mean yes of course-”

you smile and yukhei remembers the smile you gave him back on that first day you walked in

covered in rain, a scowl on your face, arms crossed as you threw yourself into the chair 

and then - how soft you’d become when he’d handed you a flimsy piece of paper 

and how you looked - you looked so - you looked like the soulmate of his dreams

“wh-why did you decide to ask me out -?”

he asks as the high of the moment doesn’t leave his mushy brain completely unfunctioning

you take his hand and yukhei short circuits but keeps it together

“haechan told me you were broken and he told me it was kinda my fault.”

you giggle and yukhei short circuits again, this time letting it show with the goofy way his smile turns up

even though he finds haechan later, giving him a noggie and telling him to never pull a stunt like that again 

in the moment yukhei can only thank haechan over and over 

as you swing your hands a little and you make a joke about how maybe a date will make him un-broken

but yukhei doesn’t think so - he thinks rather than broken,,,,,,,, he’s more like lovestruck 

and the more you keep smiling at him like that, the more lovestruck he’s gonna keep getting

[uswnt-owns-this-homo]

What A Time To Be Alive (Lindsey Horan x Reader)

a/n: so I was planning on having this out like a lot sooner, alas, schoolwork wrecked that idea... I got the title idea from a TikTok (Yes I’m very ashamed)... thank you for the prompt!

prompt: hi! could you do either emily sonnet or lindsey horan (doesn't matter which one u pick!) x fem where they're just doing cute stuff together in quarantine? i love your work! :)

It’s only my first week of quarantine and I’m going crazy. Between my insane work schedule, and Lindsey’s tournament, on top of NWSL training, we’ve barely seen each other.  We’ve been focusing on ourselves, staying at our own apartments, which is where I so happen to be. I’ve been staying here, not wanting to disrupt Lindsey’s routine, or to throw her off her game. Which I now greatly regret. As soon as the virus hit, I wanted to bring some things over to Linds’s house, and hang out there, just in case, but avoided asking for fear that it would distract her. She’s been under a lot of stress, with Em’s upcoming move, and the recent SheBelieves Cup. But now I wish I would have sucked it up and asked her. 

I’m getting ready for another day working at home, calling in for some takeout and coffee for breakfast, putting on a sweatshirt of Lindsey’s and pulling my hair into a simple ponytail. I set up my laptop in the living room and grab my phone, planning on calling Lindsey later. I’ve just sat down and opened up my laptop when I hear someone knocking at my door. Damn, this delivery boy deserves a big tip, that was fast. I grab my wallet and start to pull out the money, opening my door, only to be greeted with Lindsey, instead of my takeout.

“Look, I know they’re saying to stay by yourself, isolate, but I’ve missed you these past few weeks and wanted to come see you,”

I drop the money before I launch myself at her, going up on my tiptoes and cupping her face.

“Linds, thank you, so much. We can hang out here, or at yours? I just got takeout and coffee, so we can eat?”

She laughs and nods.

“Yeah, we can chill here, I’ll stay the night maybe?”

I pretend to think for a moment and she slaps my shoulder. I laugh.

“Well, we could do that, or we could go over to yours later, and maybe then we can see Emily during quarantine, that is if you’re cool with me hanging for it?”

She beams and picks me up. She swings me a bit and sets me down, She  clutches at my Thorns sweatshirt and kisses me. Not like a gentle, “I haven’t kissed you in forever” type kiss. No, this is a full on “How can you get what I need so easily” type gig. I grin and wrap my arms over her shoulders, feeling the muscle underneath near perfect skin. 

“Now I see why the firm wanted you, Y/N, you’re a freakin’ genius!”

“God, I missed you,”

I scoff and blush, taking her hand and pulling her to the couch.

“Okay, you sit here, I’ll make you a latte, or whatever it is, and you can just sit here and look good,”

She nods and grabs the remote while I go to make her a coffee. The doorbell rings right as I’m finishing it up, and I quickly walk to see Lindsey thanking the delivery boy, and paying him, my money still on the floor.

“Linds, I know I did not just see you pay that delivery boy,”

She grins and bends down to grab the money off the floor, handing to me and taking her coffee.

“Okay, then you definitely didn’t just see that, right?”

We make our way to the couch and divvy up the food, slowly drinking our coffee and talking about what has been going on. We finish and I grab her arm, pulling her down to where we’re laying on the couch, her big spooning me while I grab my laptop.

“Okay, so I technically have work today, but I only have one conference, so I’ll just work here until I have to get ready for that?”

She nods and gets a Netflix movie up and running, turning the volume down low enough to avoid distracting me. I slowly but surely make my way through the mountains of emails and work, letting out a sigh when I see that I need to start getting dressed for a client conference. Linds sits up and I smile, kissing her gently on the cheek.

“Okay, this should take half an hour, maybe an hour at max, and then I can get a bag together for you and Emily’s?”

She grins and gives me a kiss, nodding her head and going back to her movie.

“Yeah, babe, no problem, I’ll just hang,”

I smile and go to start doing my makeup and to put on my dress shirt, not bothering in nice pants, leaving me in just my boxers. I walk through the living room, making sure Linds sees me before I quickly make an iced coffee.  I go to my set up in the kitchen, making sure I have all my files and everything that I need.

A call should only last up to an hour. So, why did this one run close to 2? I groan as the stubborn client finally hangs up the call. Linds comes up behind me and gently rubs my shoulders, laughing when I sigh.

“I swear, you’d think they’d treat me better if they want me to take their case,”

She gently pulls me around, placing her hands at my waist and gently swaying, my head tucked under her chin and my arms up around her shoulders.

“Well, they obviously don’t know how awesome you are, or how cool, or pretty, or caring, or a whole lot of other mush that is definitely going to be used as blackmail later,”

I chuckle and detach myself, shaking out my stiff muscles and heading towards my room. I make quick work of packing, putting in a week's worth of shirts, pants, and some slip on shoes, as well as a couple dress shirts, and one pair of god forsaken dress slacks. I get some necessities and also grab the switch, looking at Lindsey, who’s taken perch on my bed, scrolling through her phone.

“Right, this quarantine, I’m getting you back on the switch, no if’s, and’s, or but’s. It’s happening, and I don’t care about the vow you have to the team. We’re playing the new Animal Crossing or else,”

She just looks up and shrugs. I finish gathering everything and throw it into my duffle, grabbing my keys and pulling Lindsey with me into the kitchen.

“You and Em have bad coffee, so I’m taking that, and then I thought I could stop at the store and grab some baking stuff, maybe some paints, or something?”

“Yeah, sounds good b. Em is going to the store later though, so we can either ask her or have her get that stuff,”

I nod and we walk down to the car, hauling my laptop and work bag. I put my stuff in my car and Lindsey gets in her car. I wave and get in the driver’s seat.

The quarantine with Emily and Lindsey is going great. We’ve painted… everything. We got a hold of Emily’s shoes, and painted them Orlando colors, kind of as a final send off for her move. We painted some clothes, and the best one yet. Emily’s face. She fell asleep first one night, and we couldn’t resist. We (Lindsey) painted her up as a clown… She was not a happy camper when it wouldn’t come off, leaving her with huge red splotches on her face. 

Today is Bake Day. Emily and I have been trying to get Linds to play smash bros with us, to no avail. So, we’ve compromised. Today Lindsey and I are going to bake, while Emily stays away from the kitchen (to this day we still don’t talk about the Thorns Cook Off Fiasco), and then tomorrow we will have the mario bros switch tournament of the ages.  I double check the cookie recipe before getting out the flour, sugar, and other things that we need.

“Ah, shoot, Linds, the butter is supposed to be softened,”

Emily bursts into the kitchen, laughing maniacally. 

“I read somewhere that if you put butter under your armpits, It will heat it up to room temperature!”

She swipes the butter before we can stop her, thankfully doesn’t take it out of the wrapper, and shoves both sticks under her arms. I groan, go to the fridge, grab a beer, and push her gently.

“Okay, you’re definitely going to leave, get tipsy, and for the love of preath, put the butter down,”

She continues to laugh, but does as I say. She slowly unearths the butter, squeezing it and whooping.

“Ha! It did soften! So I was right. I think I deserve a ‘oh thanks Sonny, how kind’ don’tcha think?”

I roll my eyes, shove the beer into her hands, and take the butter. She walks off into the living room and I turn to Lindsey, who has a look on her face, her nose scrunched up, eyes watery.

“Hey, you know she’ll be back to terrorize us at every chance she gets.. This isn’t going to change much, except maybe there will be less pit butter around,”

She laughs, coming and giving me a hug.

“God, how do you always know what I need to hear?”

I smile.

“Well… you have kind of a really expressive face, and I’ve known you for years,” 

We quickly set about mixing all the ingredients, everything going well until I go to put the eggs in, only to be hit with a huge handful of flour. I slowly turn to look at Linds, who’s grin drops.

“Wait, lemme get this straight, I mean, not straight, cause I’m not, you know what I mean, you just threw flour at me?”

I hear her whisper a “oh fuck” before she sprints for the living room.

“Sonnett, you grab her or so help me!”

I hear rustling and struggling and grin widely as I carry the bag of flour into the living room where Emily has Lindsey pinned to the floor, dodging her flailing limbs.

“Son, you don’t understand! She’s gonna get me, oh god,”

I cackle, upending the whole bag of flour over them as Emily’s eyes widen.

“Y/N, DO NOT.. THIS IS CARPET!”

I just shrug.

“Looks like payback’s a bitch, isn’t that right Linds?”

She coughs and nods. I grin.

“Okay, I’m going to go finish the cookies, you two can sweep, right?”

Sonnett looks ready to argue, but Lindsey just nods.

“Yes, babe. Of course, babe,”

I laugh.

“Come on, I’ll help, then we can finish them,”

   We make quick work of cleaning up the flour before I stop dead.

“Linds, I forgot to add the flour to the cookies before I dumped it,”

Emily bellows with laughter.

“Looks like we’ve got two options… floor flour, or weird flourless cookies, nice Y/N,”

So it turns out that floor flour cookies aren’t that bad. The three of us (Lindsey and I, plus Emily playing her switch in the kitchen) ended up scraping together enough of the flour to complete the cookies. I grab one as I tug Lindsey down onto the couch, handing her a cookie and kissing her cheek.

“Okay, next step is Animal Crossing, Mama needs crazy shells Linds,”

We sit there for a few hours, losing track of time as Lindsey drapes her arm over my shoulders, our legs entangled.

“This bastard! I cast that pole perfectly, the dumb fish,”

Lindsey took over for me a couple hours in. We’re fueled by coffee and cookies.

“Hey, Linds, when’s the last time we heard from Sonny?”

She just shrugs and keeps playing. I look at the clock and see that it’s 4:45.

“Hey babe, it’s like almost 5, we should probably go to bed,”

She sighs but shuts down the game, handing me the switch and giving me a peck on the cheek.

“I don’t even know where I am babe, this is why the switch is bad… we lost like 4 hours,”

I laugh.

“I’m sure you’ll be saying that when the little animals sing to you… I’m not tired yet, you wanna paint Sonnett’s face again?”

I’m pretty sure the whole apartment complex can hear her screaming to the mirror the next morning, trying to scrub the clown makeup off for the second time… The rest of the quarantine is going to be good, I can just feel it.

[orionsangel86]

Season 15 - Spoilers and Speculation

OKAY HI EVERYBODY GUESS WHO HAS BEEN SCREAMING OVER ON TWITTER FOR HALF AN HOUR!

There I was happily trying to watch the Great British Bake Off as you do, and my notifications start blowing up because someone decided to go write a ridiculous spoilery article about season 15 in the TV Guide magazine and all the good and terrible things we have to look forward too! So I promised I would attempt some sort of time line of spoilers and events so that we can jumble together some expectations (and some yummy speculation) about the upcoming season! 

Episode 1 - we know that Cas is in this episode as Misha was filming. We know that Alex was also filming though potentially either as a corpse, or as a manifestation of someones guilt/hallucination (these are theories not confirmed). Other than this we know that Jack “won’t be coming back from the Empty for a while now” and hasn’t been seen filming since. (source)

Episodes 2 and 3 - The main spoilers of relevance are that Dean and Cas are still not okay with each other. There is tension between them and they won’t be okay for a while (sources on this are from SDCC and well, everywhere, unless you’ve actually been living under a rock all summer).

Now today we got this spoiler:

[Twitter link]

“Theres a scene we shot recently that really got to me. Cas decides he’s going away for a while. And it wasn’t necessarily a goodbye, but it felt like that to me.”

and this one:

[Twitter Link]

“Cas feels he’s losing Sam and Dean, the only other people in the universe he has a connection to”

and this:

[Twitter Link]

“God becoming his primary enemy bent on destroying everything he cares about is a really difficult transition for Cas to go through” as a result, after a few episodes of chaos, Cas gets fed up and takes a personal time-out before returning to the action, or as Collins puts it, “He leaves in a huff.”

So we have been speculating that this likely takes place in episode 3 following some big dramatic showdown. Cas leaves because he just can’t deal with everything that is happening. Poor angel has lost his son, found out his father is basically enemy number 1, and he has lost the one person he cares about most in the universe (honestly I just don’t see Sam falling out with Cas here because those two are TIGHT but Sam’s friendship alone won’t be enough to make Cas stay - it’s the DeanCas tension that all the PR has been going on about lately).

So then we have two Cas free episodes with 4 and 5 (and I love that there was early speculation following a pic that Jensen posted that Dean might have a beard in episode 4 because OMG GRIEF BEARD OVER LOSING CAS HELLO YES PLEASE GIMME THIS!)

Episode 6 set spoilers show Jared and Misha filmed together, whereas there were very few Jensen sightings. We can therefore speculate that Sam reaches out to Cas because he is fed up of his brothers sulking? Or maybe Cas finds a hunt and calls Sam because he’s still mad at his husband. Or well, anything along these lines. If Dean and Cas don’t reunite in episode 6, then that makes for a very interesting timeline with episode 7. Which is looking to be EPIC.

We have received quite a few spoilers for episode 7 so far. We know that Christian Kane is going to be playing an “old friend” of Dean’s from his past (who it appears Sam doesn’t know, or at least isn’t involved with). We know there will be a fight scene which “the fans will love” whatever that means, and we know that they filmed at “Swayze’s bar”. [Twitter Source]

*rubs temples and tries not to reach for the red nose straight away*

We also now know that Jensen will be singing in this episode and that Dean and Leo have a “wild night” together where Dean will “recapture his mojo” [Twitter Source]

*starts painting face with red and white*

So Dean was down on his mojo eh Dabb? This is starting to sound a bit like early season 13. Dean clearly doesn’t take too well to Cas leaving him in episode 3. >.>

Now I am convinced that no matter what happens in episode 7, the homoerotic tension is gonna be EXTREME, but please allow me to go full clown mode here for a second 

*adjusts rainbow wig*

*HERE BE SPECULATION FOLKS - JUST SOLID CLOWN FACED SPECULATION*

If this episode does indeed go down the route of Leo being an ex boyfriend, if something DOES happen between Dean and Leo beyond just bros being bros, then we have a legit coming out episode here following a huge bust up with his actual husband that somehow ends with Dean getting his mojo back. This episode, like every Dean focused episode, usually ends up with Dean getting some big realisation. Dean growing a little bit more, and the audience learning something new about him. Whatever goes down, we are now in a prime position for a DeanCas reunion either by episode end or in episode 8. 

IF in episode 8 Dean is able to reconcile with Cas in someway, but because some other horrible shit goes down (which based on latest spoilers could potentially be an Adam/OG!Michael return/Cage breakout of hell nightmare) plus since episode 8 is a Bucklemming episode meaning it will be overly jam packed with plot stuff so a potential Jack return plus Empty entity in this one too - then...

*deep breath*

The time line fits.

Episode 8 plot filled mayhem interrupts a true DeanCas make up scene but we get at least some reveal that Dean wants to have a “conversation” with Cas, then imagine if following the episode 8 drama Jack returns. Imagine if we get a midseason finale in episode 9 where for at least a small part of the episode it looks like the family is back together? Following all the angst and separation of the early season we are right back to where we were during the midseason finale of season 14 - TFW2.0 together again and fighting side by side. Enough to bring some joy to our poor angels otherwise broken heart?

Imagine if though, when all is said and done, right after the boys think they have a win, Dean gets his moment. The show has already given us his coming out ep. He has already realised what it is he truly wants, now he finally gets the chance to reach out and grasp for it...

But when he does it’s a moment too late. It’s time to pay up. Cas gets his moment of true happiness - and the Empty takes him. Midseason finale ends with a horrified Dean having just laid his heart on his sleeve, and a dead Castiel at his feet.

THE TIMELINE FITS.

(I know. I’m a clown for having any hope in this - but my god the potential is too much for me to bare. HONK HONK)

Standard Disclaimer: Nothing I say here is claiming to be factual other than sources from PR related material and spoilers from set. Speculation is all based on what we have seen and my own foolish hope that this show might actually go the way it has been building up to for 10 fucking years. I am not a psychic. I do not have a crystal ball. Readers are asked to manage their own expectations and not blame me for daring to squee about my own excited enthusiasm on the internet on my own blog. Hate is not welcome. Negative comments and moaning accusations are not welcome. Either squee with me in excited delight or scroll on past. You are welcome to join my screaming over on Twitter as well.

Manage your own expectations. I am not telling you anything is going to happen other than what I would LIKE to happen. As always PR IS NOT SHOWRUNNING.

Thank you and good night.

[your-worst-knightmare]

Red: Pt. 11

Masterlist here 

Huge shoutout to @purefandomsalt for the amazing help with the article in this part. 

When Jason awoke on the cold tile of the bathroom floor, he noticed two things. One: he was, for some reason, dressed in a ridiculously oversized dark green suit. It had to be bigger than Bruce’s even, Jason couldn’t deny it. And two, more alarmingly– he couldn’t remember the events of the entire night. Or the past week, for that matter. The noise from outside suggested that Bruce was hosting some sort of event though. Maybe Jason had snuck one too many drinks. Alfred would kill him if he found out about Jason’s underage drinking. No time to think about that now– bile was rising in Jason’s throat and he scarcely made it to the toilet before emptying his stomach. 

As he cleaned himself up afterwards at the sink, he stopped to stare at himself in the mirror. He was aware of the massive suit (the sleeves which he had rolled up)  on his lanky frame. But it was his hair that made him pause. Yes, it was gelled back– if not a bit messily for this early into the night, but there was white. More specifically, a white streak in his hair that seemed so… stark. Was this someone’s idea of a prank? Because he was sure he didn’t remember dying it. 

Okay, just move on, Jason thought as he washed his face. It’s just hair anyway. It doesn’t look too bad. He just needed to sneak upstairs and wait this whole party out. He wasn’t feeling so great anyway. He stole one last look in the mirror, hiking up the sleeves of his jacket again when his eyes flashed green. Jason scrambled backwards. What the hell? They looked almost metahuman-ish and he was fairly sure he was not one. 

With the green flash came an itchiness in his brain. It wanted something– havoc, carnage. Jason didn’t want any part of it. He steadied himself on the sink. Breathe. That’s what Bruce always said. 

The prickling eventually subsided, along with the green in his eyes. Jason breathed a sigh of relief. What on Earth was that? He opened the bathroom door cautiously and checked the hall for any nosy socialites. Once he was sure the coast was clear, he dashed upstairs to his room. He noted the new “injuries” the walls seemed to have sustained as he walked. Scratches and dents, ones that seemed too random to be from a single fight. What happened? 

 His room had changed too. The walls– which were previously a dark blue were now a muted grey. Most of his stuff– useless stuff that he had collected–were gone. Framed posters hung around the room and Jason was baffled that he didn’t recognize most of the names on them. Had his double life as both Robin and Jason Todd really affected his knowledge of pop culture that much? 

He opened his closet to find another surprise. All the clothes were at least four sizes too big for him. Whoever set up this prank must have put in a damn lot of time. After rummaging around to at least find some of his own stuff, he stopped. Hidden in a drawer was a small handgun. He picked it up gingerly. It was loaded. His eyes widened when he inspected the barrel of the gun. J.T. His initials.

What would Bruce say? Where had this even come from? Jason placed the gun back into its hiding place, closing the drawer. He would focus on the problem at hand. Clothes. He needed clothes that actually would fit him. 

Jason stepped out into the hallway to look for wherever his real stuff was. The prankster had probably put them in the spare room next to Jason’s– it would require the least amount of effort. Nobody really went into it anyway. He was just about to push open the door when he heard someone inside. “Hello?” Jason asked, knocking lightly on the door. Upon hearing no response, he opened it. 

No sooner had he cracked the door open when he was slammed against the wall. A girl, about his age, held a blade to his throat. She looked like she had ditched the party downstairs as well, apparently having traded in the dark green dress currently lying on the bed for a pair of sweats. Her red hair had been meticulously styled at some point, but had since been pushed back and out of her face. 

“Where am I?”she asked.

“Wayne Manor, you probably came here for the party,” Jason replied, if not as smoothly as he would have liked. 

“Wayne Manor…” she muttered, thinking. “Who are you?”

“Jason. Uh, Jason Todd, Bruce Wayne’s ward…” 

She thought for a moment before letting him go. Jason inwardly breathed a sigh of relief. “Why are you wearing an ill-fitting suit, Jason?” 

“Honestly, I don’t know,” he said, rubbing his neck. ”I woke up about half an hour ago in this thing.”

Her eyes widened. “Do you remember any recent events, of how you got to this party?”

“No… wait, you don’t either?”

She shook her head. “Last I remember, I was on the other side of the Atlantic. I certainly don’t remember coming to this party to have a matching outfit with you.”

Jason eyed the dress on the bed. There was no doubt that both his suit and the dress were intended to be a pair. How he’d managed to get this girl to coordinate with him, he had no idea. He didn’t even know her name. “What’s your name?”

“You may call me Artemis. But that is unimportant. We need to figure out what is going on here,” she said, marching into the hallway. 

“Wait wait wait,” Jason hissed, grabbing her shoulder.

“Touch me again, Little one, and you will cease to have arms.”

He threw his hands up in surrender. “Okay, okay. Just– We can’t go downstairs. The press will have a field day if they find out anything is going on at Wayne Manor.”

Artemis stopped. “Fine. What do you propose we do?”

“First, let me find some clothes that actually fit me, and then we call Alfred. He’ll know what to do.”

The pair wandered through the rooms, most of which Jason didn’t even know were being lived in. Some of them had pictures of people who either seemed to age five years on camera or people he didn’t even recognize. Hell, he found some of someone who looked suspiciously like an older version of him, except way taller and more built. Something was definitely up. 

Jason finally found a t-shirt and sweatpants his size in a room that was probably meant for a vampire. All precautions had been taken to block out the windows. And it seemed like a very paranoid vampire, at that. The amount of red string in the room was appalling. “This is an odd bedroom,” Artemis remarked.

“Yeah, don’t remember it. Like at all.”  

They went back to Jason’s room to try and think through the situation. About five minutes into comparing notes, Jason’s phone buzzed. Funny, he didn’t recognize this model. There was a text from Dick. 

‘Hey, u ok?’

‘The food wasn’t that bad, was it?’

‘Dude, where r u?’

‘It’s been an hour’

‘D U D E’

Jason quickly replied. 

‘Come upstairs’

‘My room’

‘We have a situation’

No sooner than two minutes had passed when Dick arrived. “Hey, Jason what’s–” Dick stopped at the doorway dead in his tracks. 

“What?”

“Jason?” he asked, dumbfounded.

“Yes, that’s my name Dick. Stop messing around and help us.”

“You’re a kid…”

“Your brother is quite slow,” Artemis remarked, twirling the knife in her hands.

“I’m almost sixteen, dammit. Snap out of it and help, will you?”

“Jason… you’re supposed to be twenty.” He ran his hands through his hair, still not fully understanding the scene. 

“Then why don’t we remember anything of the past five years?” Jason asked, voice rising with every word. 

“A spell, perhaps. One that sent us back to our adolescent selves,” mused Artemis. 

“Who would do that?”

Dick thought for a minute. “Jason, did you get into trouble with anyone? Did you have any information that they don’t want you to know?”

“Well how am I supposed to know, Dick?” Jason burst out, throwing his hands into his lap. “Why don’t you ask my older self? I’m sure he has loads to tell you.”

“Okay, okay,  calm down. We’ll figure this out, Jay. Just– agh,” Dick grunted, pacing the room like a madman. “Just stay here for now. We need to figure out how this happened.”

“Whoever did this is probably long gone. Unless Jason and I possessed something of importance, I can see no reason for anyone to do this other than amusement.” Artemis narrowed her eyes. “ And if it was for mere mockery, I will–”

Dick laughed nervously. “Yeah, we get it Artemis. You’re mad. We’ll figure this out guys.”

“Yeah? Then at least explain this.” He pointed to the white streak in his hair. “Or would you rather explain these,” Jason glowered, allowing the flood of green carnage to fill his eyes. “Or how about the damn gun in the closet, Golden Boy?”

“Look, Jason, when you got older, your… relationship with us wasn’t… the best. We barely saw you… and I can’t tell you what happened because of that.” He scratched the back of his neck. “Just stay here for now. I’ll get some help,” Dick ordered before stepping back out into the hallway.

“He’s lying to you,” Artemis said plainly. 

“I know.” Jason pinched the bridge of his nose, trying to reign the green back under control. “He’s bad at it. I just wanna know who I became, you know?”

“Likewise. I will be in my room. Knock if you need me.”

With Artemis leaving him alone, Jason slumped onto the bed. His bed. The room didn’t feel like his anymore. Then again, he wasn’t even sure who he was. Maybe he just needed to deal with all of this in the morning. Maybe he would be able to remember things better when his brain wasn’t as fried as it was right now. Maybe if he just closed his eyes...

He was met with laughter. He recognized it, but this time it only seemed more maniacal. The Clown Prince of Crime couldn’t let him be even in his resting moments. All he could see was red. Blood pooling on the floor around him, the red numbers of a clock counting down, the tatters of his uniform giving way to mutilated flesh. He gasped, for air, for life, both of which he felt was being forced out of him. And then it was forced back in. He didn’t want it. The acrid, stinging, burning life. He felt alive, and it hurt. He was drowning in it, sinking, sinking, sinking uselessly clawing upward at a heaven that rejected him. The crazed laugh mocked his misery, simply cackling until Jason could take it no more.

Jason awoke with a start. He was drenched in sweat and his hands shook so badly that he had to steady them on the blanket. The damn knock on his door didn’t help matters. “Give me a sec!” he called, in as steady of a voice as he could. The clock read early into the next morning. So he’d slept through the end of the gala then. That was a relief. He dried his face and composed himself before finally letting the guest in.

 Artemis stood at the door with a laptop in hand. “I have found some information you may want to read,” she said, walking towards his desk. 

He managed a dry laugh. “I thought you hated me. Why’d you come find me?”

“I thought through some things, and I’ve come to the conclusion that I wouldn’t have trusted you without reason. Now stop whining and come here.” The Amazon slid the computer onto the table and motioned for Jason to sit down. “This is from last night. It’s from the Gotham Enquirer.”

His curiosity got the better of him and Jason did as he was told. Under the title was  a picture of his older self, a face he recognized only from pictures around the manor. He was standing with Artemis with an arm slung around her shoulder. He took a breath and started to skim through the article.

One Less Wayne Bachelor? 

By Maylen. K. Bird 

Gotham’s most awaited party has finally arrived, and it’s creating a buzz on the internet. With it’s large palace-like venue along with its impressive guests, (A-listers celebrities and high class rich folk– the entirety of the Wayne family included) it’s easy to see why. The Wayne charity gala was a stunning success for all parties involved- raising well over their aim for the night, donations exceeding half a trillion. The funds will be directed around the city to support soup kitchens, shelters and orphanages. 

However, what has the public scrambling is the unknown face brought to the gala by the elder Wayne boy. Jason Wayne, not usually known for even attending public events, brought a mystery woman to the party last night, one confirmed to be an Amazon. Quite the partner to say the least. 

Dubbed as the “lovable murderous recluse” by the youngest Wayne , it was quite a shock to both guests and reporters alike. If the piece of eye candy wasn’t enough, his plus one has us all drooling. Gothamites longing for his attention are certainly crestfallen, as finding an equal to his partner is no easy feat. The fiery-haired beauty wore a stunning outfit: A viridian halter-dress (which was worn too elegantly to be natural) matching Jason Wayne, which in itself was evidence enough of their closeness.

The two spent the entire night together, virtually ignoring the rest of the guests. Like a true gentleman, he invited his date to dance with a romantic flair. We didn’t expect anything less from a Wayne. Upon being asked about his relationship with the Amazon, the Wayne gave us this polished statement: “She prefers a more private life if you please. If you must have something, however, we met through work.” 

It is already well-known that Jason Wayne has invested much time and resources into countless charity projects. On working with Wayne,  the Amazon gave us this gem: “Jason truly wishes to help people at his core, and I only hope I am able to aid him in that. Through our work we have become very close, and I trust him with my life.” 

Albeit both very scripted responses, we managed to gather a more candid testimony from Jason’s  brother. Dick Grayson told us that the couple’s relationship has been recent news. “Jason’s never said anything about this before. He tends to be a private person, so consider yourselves lucky to even witness this. I’ve honestly never seen my little brother so happy.” Grayson goes on further, sharing a juicy timbit of information saying; “ They actually told us they were attending the gala a few days ago, we had no idea they were a thing, but Jason actually coming all dressed up for an event like this was shocking enough to stop me from connecting the dots. I’ll say it right here– I’m just waiting for the wedding ring.”

So could this be it? The Waynes' may be receiving a new family member, and to our surprise it's the wedding that nobody expected. 

Stay tuned as we try to get details on the potential wedding and this budding romance. 

 Jason whistled through his teeth, his eyes widening in surprise.. “What the hell did I just read?”

“I cannot be sure how much of this article is true or how reliable our own words are.” Artemis leaned onto the back of Jason’s chair. “But what I can take from this is that we were certainly close. In what sense, we must find out.”

Jason nodded exhaling. “Do you have any more information about me?”

Artemis brought up a new file, something obviously stolen from Bruce’s records. “I assume we really worked together through this. The Outlaws, as we are known.”

He huffed. What mess was he throwing himself into now? Nevertheless, he dove into the file. 

He had been one of the founding members of a team called the Outlaws. He was no longer Robin. The record didn’t say how or why he’d shed the mantle, but it said who he’d become. The Red Hood. Former Robin. Former crime boss. Current vigilante. One willing to cross lines. 

His team– the Outlaws– were all willing to cross lines. To spite their mentors, maybe. The lineup consisted of dishonoured proteges: A disgraced Arrow. A fallen princess. A failed Superman. A would-be-Wonder Woman. And him. A former Robin turned monster. What had he become?

Jason rubbed his face. He was honestly scared to keep reading, on account of what he might find. He wasn’t let down. The kill count made his breath hitch. He had a kill count. The Red Hood was confirmed to have taken close to one hundred lives. One hundred. He had taken one hundred lives. Maybe more. 

Part of him wanted for someone- anyone to tell him that it wasn’t true. That it was all a very elaborate joke. The other part of him knew it wasn’t going to happen. Just like how he knew deep down that his mom was really gone. And how he knew that she wasn't coming back no matter how much he begged her to. 

Artemis sat on his bed, tight-lipped and serious. Jason was sure, at least from her files, that she had only redeemed herself from the self that she remembered now. The opposite was true for him. “Are you alright, Jason?”

He wiped his eyes as discreetly as he could. “I don’t know. I don’t want to– just… I don’t even know what to make of this.”

“Sometimes death is necessary, you know.” 

“Yeah, coming from a mercenary turned vigilante. Or however the hell you see it.” His words dripped with venom and green began to edge his vision. Jason sighed, regretting his words. Artemis was going through the same thing as he was. He left the laptop on the desk and joined Artemis on the bed. 

“Sorry, just so much going on.”

She put a hand on his shoulder. “We go through this together, okay?”

He gave her a small smile. “Yeah. Okay.” 

[cum-a-calla]

this one's a doozy :))) commission for a cannibal lover. thank you so much for letting me take my time with this one

inside: cannibalism, dismemberment, implied death threats, knotting, fearplay, bloodplay, licking, pain, biting, too many teeth, and a some body horror

..

Work must be done.

Silas drives through the quiet, dark night. No stars – full dark. It brings a familiar thought loop to the forefront of his mind, occupying him through the same tired route he drives all too often now, cruising through the quaint neighborhoods of Derry. It’s so white-picket-fence, so stuck in a period long gone. Frozen in time. It feels slower inside the city limits, like the place is oozing along out of some strange spite. Refusing to die, refusing to acclimate to… what? To time, to reality?

[[MORE]]

And this is Silas’ reality. He glances furtively in the corn fields, knowing he won’t see anything worse than where he’s headed – namely, who he’s off to meet. Something kind of like him, something rotten, a thing that makes its way furtively into the night to hunt, to eat. It’s a lonely business, the feeding; Silas tightens his grip on the steering wheel and swallows past the throbbing lump in his throat, exhilarated and scared absolutely shitless.

The turn on to Neibolt Street is like looking down the barrel of a gun. He pulls up to the old house, the eyesore of the town, and kills the engine. He lingers suspended between two worlds, like he won’t be able to budge from the front seat; it feels impossible, tethered between his hunger and his fear. Garbage bags wait quietly in the backseat, promising him everything he wants the most. Hunger always wins.

It takes three trips, but each run gets a little easier, a little more natural to traverse the decaying structure, to be a little less startled by things hiding in the corners. Sometimes he does that. Does it to test him, he assumes – strange faces behind doorways, running shadows. Garbled languages that make his ears burn. He avoids two Things this time, a slimy, creeping thing in the hallway that he has to steel himself for, staring straight ahead. It won’t hurt me. Just an extension of it. Just him, just a trick. The thing cackles at him in clicks, slithering around his ankles before bounding off in the opposite direction, limbs crackling.

“Pennywise?”

Silas’ voice echoes down by the mouth of the well. Peering down there offers nothing in the way of the clown’s location, and after a few moments of shifty waiting, he decides to begin opening the bags. The smell is strong. It hits him and he weathers the initial recoil, patient as his noses adjusts and his stomach aches for it. His heart beats a little faster, blood rushing through his veins hot as the twitch between his legs. It’s the headiest scent of all, the smell of somebody once they’ve been opened up. That deep, dark scent, the wildest game. Not so wild in several pieces. Not so wild at all.

Silas pulls limbs, innards, a torso. A badly damaged head and a head he’s been storing in a freezer, the body already used up and done away with. It still feels cold. Silas strokes the ratty, blood-crusted hair, the frozen lips. It almost feels sad to set it down, to complete the cycle of that relationship, knowing exactly what Pennywise is going to do to it. Fingers trembling, he removes his hands from the head, forces himself to pay special attention to the damaged one. The jawbone hangs by threads of mangled meat, fine chunks of bone stark in their whiteness. It was an accident. He doesn’t like to damage the heads too much; it feels… disrespectful. Not a true form. He runs the pad of his finger along the teeth, poking into several of the gaps.

He spreads things out in piles – things to be worked on, things that are easiest to prep for consumption. Things he keeps special for himself. There are parts he saves specifically for Pennywise, now, things he largely considers inconsumable – bones, gristle, parts with lots of fat or cartilage. Nothing he feels like wrapping up for home.

He rises up from the floor, already feeling those strong stirrings in his gut. The sensation of all that dull, chilled flesh under his hands makes him throb, and he steadies himself against the edge of the well on the way to grab his tools. They rest in their new home, in the relative safety of this cursed house, knives, cleavers, a hacksaw, clips. Scissors. Butcher paper, twine. A bevy of instruments dedicated to his desire, just as important as the people they part open for him. One big, warm, blissfully wet cycle. Ouroboros. He drags tools back to the parts arranged lovingly around the well, the thrill of his busy night flushing his cheeks.

It boils down to pure, naked effort and routine. There’s an art to it, a beauty in order, in realizing the big picture as well as the tiny parts that make it all up. There are sinews and curves and angles, tricks in which to properly trim the meat. Slowly, he builds stacks of cuts. There’s a pile of offal for the creature. He arranges it closest to the well, next to various other undesirable parts. It takes the better part of hours, takes diligence and every last nerve to survive the dimness, the anxiety of waiting, wondering.  

When Pennywise shows up, he peeks from over the edge. It startles Silas, rips a gasp from his lips as he locks eyes with it.

“Scared the fucking shit out of me,” he mutters. He stays silent, stays behind the lip of the well where he watches intently. Every single move Silas makes, he feels the weight of Pennywise’s gaze, the sheer focus laced with hunger. At least he’s not alone in this hellhole. At least the wait is over, the growing panic like fire licking up through his guts. The clown sits (floats. It floats) in the well and hums occasionally, as if in approval, in excitement. It awakens that spark again in Silas, heat prickling just under his skin. The combination of the heads, the loving way he handles each parcel of cold flesh, the blinkless gaze of a monster who allows him sanctuary, who wants to watch… it’s intoxicating. He draws a shaky breath and continues his task.  

Out from the well, one long, long arm reaches out. Fingers sprawl like a spider, huge, five pale legs skittering around until they close over a jawbone, the jawbone, barely attached to the rest of the head. The newest head. A pang of anger makes his throat close up – but not before a single, stern syllable leaves his lips.

“No.”

Silas licks his own fingers off and rolls that flavor around his tongue as Pennywise rises up like some demented god from the well. The glow of his eyes lights up the room, orange as a sunset in hell. Isn’t that where he is, anyway? Those eyes ground him as the creature towers, hulks over Silas’ seated form on the filthy ground. He snatches the head up, fingers hooked through the jaw, and unhinges his face until the flesh pulls back, tight and shiny and white as clay, and sinks his sharkteeth into the parietal and occipital lobes. Skull fragments shoot from his mouth like shrapnel and soft, pink, gelatinous meat dribbles down his face.

Pennywise grunts as he sends the remainder of the skull sailing to the ground, where it explodes. Flecks of gray-pink meat spray over Silas’ shirt, over the other cuts of meat, limbs ready to be stripped and treated with care. He bows low, nostrils flaring, nose crinkling into a snarl, and those teeth multiply by the second. They jut out of his face as he licks his lips, swallows.

The clown smiles, eyebrows lifting. He gives Silas a jaunty little shake, tiny bells jingling in the ruffles.

“Sorry, Silas, I don’t think I heard ya! Go on… say it again.”

Silas falters, mustering all his focus on keeping still as the creature looming over him comes close enough to rub noses, and he does. He nuzzles slowly into it like they’re lovers, and he clucks his tongue as Silas chokes on his own voice. No words come, and again the clown laughs.

“Oooohhh, sweet Silas, are you jealous?” It chuckles and Silas tastes the thing’s breath, rancid, spoilt over centuries. It’s intoxicating, it feels like tasting death itself, and Silas almost leans into it, curious about a flavor of death and decay he hasn’t tasted yet. “Don’t like me playing with your toys?”

“They’re not toys, they’re people.”

“Food.” He comes away from Silas with a grin. “Not people. Just meat. Do you like to fuck the meat, Silas? Do you love the meat?”

Silas reels, anger black as the night racing up the column of his spine, indignant, mingling with his fear like acid in the back of his throat. Cheeks burning, he takes a breath, tries to contain it before it gets him killed. Pennywise snatches the other head and Silas reaches out, tries to snatch it back.

Pennywise howls, keeping the body part easily out of his reach, like a child’s game. He runs his tongue over the face and sips Silas’ shaking rage like a cocktail.

“It’s not just meat, it’s – I don’t fucking know, just please… can you just –”

“– be nice?”

Silas huffs, up on his feet. Nothing can save him if Pennywise decides he’s being disobedient or meddlesome. He stands in the face of that knowledge, limbs seized by his immediate sense of danger, and he wonders faintly if this is it, if this is really fucking it, and buried underneath absolute existential dread is the disappointment that he didn’t get to truly taste his last victim.

Pennywise opens his mouth and his face comes apart. Bones crackle as they rearrange and grow new paths, marrow knitting itself over and over, teeth chittering into being, and he sends the entire head down into his glowing gullet. It’s like snakes eating eggs. The morbid lump travels down the throat, distending his flesh and bulging it through with veins, until it’s absorbed and crushed inside his ribcage, and finally those awful jaws come back together. It crunches, grinds against itself until he’s wearing that familiar, dripping sneer, face unbearably whole again. He comes so close, but this time he doesn’t bow. He’s solid, radiating heat and frothing pink-red at the mouth.

“Do you want me to be nice, Silas?” His voice comes, like the whisper of dry leaves on asphalt, like creaking hinges. His lips remain still. “Do you want me to be so nice?”

“Yeah…”

“Yeah? Want me to be as nice as you are with these… things?”

“They’re not things –”

“Do you like the feeling of them inside you?”

Silas can’t remember how to breathe. His lungs simply quit, too stunned, stomach lurching like he’s been punched. The clown giggles, dropping to its haunches and rocking on his feet. He clutches a fillet knife like it could ever harm the creature in front of him. His mouth works up and down several times before his brain sends the correct signals, misfire after misfire, and, finally, Silas utters a pained yes.

Pennywise pushes a long, gloved finger between Silas’ lips. The whine that surrounds that finger is enough to set his guts on fire, and there’s a shift in the light deep in those endless pits. The light back there dances. It’s calming, it makes his eyeballs tingle the longer he tries to find it in there, to see it a little more, see if it changes.

“You like them?”

“Yes…”

The fabric of the glove presses down on Silas’ tongue. Pennywise grasps him there, fingertip digging into the fleshy center, thumb up under the shelf of his jaw, and he tips Silas’ head back until his throat is vulnerable, a landscape waiting to be explored by teeth. No teeth come; instead, Pennywise leans in, nose tickling over his pulse, and inhales. He sniffs at Silas like an animal, like Silas is a meal, and the prospect is not only horrifying but irresistible. He all but leans into it.

“I like you, pretty boy. Like your scent. Like the stink of you here.”

The clown’s other hand cups Silas between the thighs, engorged cock trapped under his palm. The pressure is sharp, it makes Silas jump and whine.

“Oh, you like it? You want me inside of you, sweet boy? Are you hungry for me, too?”

Oh my god. That’s what he says, but it comes out garbled, clipped off, caught around Pennywise’s fingers. The clown titters and there’s a sound that makes Silas’ stomach clench and roil, a sound not unlike ripping meat. It’s wet and violent, and then there are teeth on his throat. They sink slowly, so slowly that he can hear the little pops as they break skin and razor under his flesh. They settle for barely a moment before there’s a sickening squelch and Pennywise rears back, licking the blood off his lips, and his brow knits together. He cocks his head and pouts, smiles, pouts again.

“Poor creature. I know it hurts, hurts so much. Heeere…”

Impossibly long, slithering over his throat until it wraps all the way around, Pennywise’s tongue drags over the wounds. It’s like a worm, like a writhing pink leech. It pulses and squeezes and soaks in his blood, the creature behind it moaning, eyes rolling wetly up into its skull. There are veins there, too, tiny spiderlike trails that thread his eyeballs as well as his thick tongue. It contracts around his neck until Silas is wheezing for air. The constriction sends a wave of electricity down between his legs, and he rocks into Pennywise’s outstretched palm like he’s offering himself, offering everything up, anything, just to keep feeling this.

His tongue slides back behind his teeth and Silas keeps rocking, burying his hands into the ruffles at the neck of the alien’s costume.

“I know what you need, Silas. I know you’re hungry.” He smooths his gloved hands away from where Silas is burning hot, digs his fingers into the fabric of his pants and RIPS. The force of it pushes him back, makes him prone below the towering clown. “So wet already. Messy, messy boy. Does it feel so good, taking apart your little friends, your meals? You want me to take you apart, S i l a s? Nice and slow, turn you inside out.”

“Fuck.” Silas allows the clown to spread his legs, push his thighs apart til they burn with effort, til he’s shaking, whimpering, arching up to try to catch Pennywise’s lips against his. He wants to taste his own blood, taste the fatal chasm of the monster’s mouth. “Please. I… I want that, all of that, anything…”

“Mmh, eager, aren’t you? Wanna be touched so bad. Wanna be fucked. Tell me. Tell me, brave little thing, tell me what you need.”

Silas begins to speak, but the words falter and tremble into more of those little, pitiful whines, watching Pennywise shift and change and buck his hips forward with an unmistakable bulge inside the pleats of his outfit. It throbs like a heartbeat, like Silas can somehow feel it inside his body, intimate as his own blood pressure. His body works overtime to get the blood anywhere but that engorged place between his legs, screaming for attention, slick and parted and exposing how swollen he is. Pennywise nudges with his fingers, teases. Nothing is enough.

“I didn’t hear that. Try again.”

Pennywise is less clown and more creature. He shreds his own costume, sheds it like a skin that’s grown too tight, too restrictive, and the scarred flesh around his ribcage ripples. It grows lumps, disgusting masses of flesh that squirm between muscle and bone until the structure is different. They split his skin and blood like tar pours from the open wounds, black and viscous, bones shredding through stark-white until there’s meat wrapping around them, lengthening, whipping mindlessly around until their form becomes clear. Rubbery flesh chases up the newly formed limbs, extra arms, fingers sprouting from the stumps of raw sinew until there are more hands to use, more fingers to dig into Silas’ yielding flesh. They go to work immediately, sliding up his shirt to touch his belly, his chest, between his thighs where he’s so painfully ready.

“Please be inside me, l-like the others, please… let me… taste you.”

No sooner does he admit his need does Pennywise comply. Freshly formed fingers shove past his lips and teeth and near the back of his tongue, ready to make him gag. Silas holds out til his eyes water, til his throat itches to swallow and sputter, but if there’s anything he’s good at, it’s handling things in his mouth that shouldn’t be.

“Oh, I will be. I’ll be inside you, big boy. You’ll thank me, oh, you’ll SING for it. You’ll SCREAM and BEG for me to leave you empty again, yes you will!”

Incoherent curses drip around Pennywise’s new fingers, stuffed so neatly in that obedient mouth, and his prehensile dick comes free. It wriggles against Silas, nudges at his own wet cock and the secret, tight place underneath. Pennywise watches Silas drool around his fingers and he matches him, jaw hanging open a little too wide, a little too toothy, like his entire face might split in a mess of bleeding gum and teeth, and Silas wriggles down. He pushes against a cock too big, too molten hot to ever be able to actually fit inside of him, and yet, with each soft rut of Pennywise’s hips, it seems a little more tangible. The alien cock writhes just like Silas does. It’s textured, lined and grooved and covered in tiny bumps that don’t seem to stay fixed to any one area. Everything changes as it pleases. It curves up over where Silas wants him without actually pushing inside – until he does.

Searing. His eyes fly wide open and they’re almost as wide as the clown’s, glowing like dying embers back in his massive skull, and Silas wonders if he can’t just burst into flames like those dancing lights. Might just fly with them, might float into Pennywise and become weightless, become eternal. There’s a continuation there, a loop of thought as the monster traces the places behind Silas’ teeth and thrusts between his thighs, that he wants to be the one inside of somebody else, wants to sink into Pennywise much the same way as Pennywise sinks into him, but more. The call of the void screeches through his head like tinnitus.

“Look at you. Look at you spread open, like a treat, a treat just for me.” Claws slash at him, into his belly, across his thighs, and Pennywise makes a sound deep in his frame that awakens a fear previously dormant in Silas’ blood. It courses through him like a warning through time as Pennywise makes those sounds, like clicking, like broken radio transmission and scuttling leaves, like snapping mandibles. It sounds like it’ll burst out of the beast’s body and then it’s everywhere, in the walls, vibrating up through the ground, leaking out of each pore. The clown moans, he drags that nasty tongue up Silas’ belly and seeks out all those shiny new gashes. “Let me take care of that – oh, you hurtin’ for me? Good boys hurt. Good boys let me fill them aalll the way UP!”

Pennywise bottoms out into Silas. His squirming, shifting cock practically spills out of him, there’s just nowhere else to go. Silas’ body aches, it clenches down on the monstrous thing inside of him until he can feel the butterfly pulse of his own climax creeping toward the surface. Above him, jaws come apart, snap together inches from his face, and he shudders with boiling heat. Everything is wet. Each little jerk and throb strikes an exquisitely primal fear in Silas that maybe he’s serious this time; maybe he’ll finally take what’s his and then consume him. Maybe he’ll slide into the tight, hot squeeze of the thing’s gullet, feel all that trembling flesh and meat closing in around him, like he’s done so many times himself with others’ bodies. The mental image is made all the more vivid by Pennywise’s gaping maw, studded far too full of teeth. They jut out from his bleeding ridges of gum and the back of his throat seems to stretch forever, to some unseen point where there’s a glow not unlike his eyes. This one’s a little prettier, though. This one makes his guts squeeze down, and for a moment, it feels like the cock inside of him is a little thicker.

“Feeling a little afraid? Been so good at taking it that you’ve forgotten what I can REALLY do to you.” Fingers crawl all over Silas, crawl over his ribs and at his waist and at the apex of his thighs, right above where he’s slowly, agonizingly fucked apart. Fingers stroke. He’s so slippery already that it’s barely begun and he can feel the wringing of pressure in every single nerve, the last, final tensing before he feels like he might lift weightlessly off the floor. “Doing so well, sweet boy. Show me just how much you need it, come on. Show me you can take it all.”

“I am,” Silas grunts. He’s panting, delirious with it, bouncing down mindlessly against the clown til he’s flush. The pain seems like an idea, existing and not existing at all. “I am, I can, I am… can – fuck! – can feel all of you.”

“Oh! Can you?”

Under Pennywise’s cruel laughter, under the dripping, toxic drool, the teeth crowding his sneer, Silas bucks against him and against his talented hands, stroking even after the waves are coursing outward from his belly all the way to his toes, the backs of his eyelids gone a horrible shade of bright orange before they’re white. It’s like being washed in stars. His muscles ebb and flow, constrict and contract, and through it all, Pennywise feels painful.

Each second lends to the explosion of his climax, dick pulsing with each aftershock. Underneath that, the clown grows. He barely moves, content to grab at Silas and tease him well past the peak of his orgasm, as deep as he can safely go, but… he inflates.

The base of his cock grows, stretching Silas out until it aches. It swells up against a particularly sensitive patch of flesh and forces a new, miserable kind of pleasure into him. It’s too much too soon. It hurts, it feels like fucking fire, it feels like he’s in a (sunset)

“Guess you can take it all, big boy.”

He rocks his body only slightly and then his eyes roll up to the threaded whites, blood welling in his lids and leaking down over his cheeks like the very vessels in his face can’t stand to hold it in, either. He erupts inside of Silas, fills him, pumps his cum into him with his cock knotted nice and tight inside. Trapped. Every single nail digs into Silas as Pennywise cums, growling, gasping, grunting like an animal. He leans down to nuzzle his bleeding face into his captive’s throat, tucked in the nape of his neck, and he breathes a giggle and smells him, licks him.

“Gunna keep coming back? Come a’callin?”

He nips at him, licks the soft little wounds like candy. He jerks his hips back and mocks the pitiful sounds coming from Silas.

“Poor thing. Pooooooor thing. Here. Let me make it better.”

Pennywise tugs against the lock of their bodies, pulling until Silas is nearly sobbing and incomprehensible before he opens his jaws and that tongue pours out of him like some monstrous new organ, slimy and dripping and hot as it slides around his captive’s dick. It feels far too soon. It feels like an impossibility, even with the delicious feeling of all that seed seeping out of him, coating him, body covered in a sticky film of saliva and blood and cum. That tongue brings him off again so quickly it leaves his head spinning, ears plugging up and voiding out until it feels like there are thick wads of cotton in them. It comes back slowly, returning on the edge of a high-pitched whine.

Finally, there’s a sense of relief, of deflation, and the eventual removal. The satisfaction of being so empty again is almost as good as the act itself. He lay spent on the floor, sprawled out and enjoying the near-doze of recuperation. Distantly, he knows there’s a job to finish. Things to take apart, to package. Things to feed the monster above him, whose limbs crack and snap and twitch as they’re absorbed back into his body. He looks like a spider, some psychotic arachnoid going through a reverse molt.

“Was it nice, Silas?” Pennywise smirks, lapping blood from his mouth, from his fingers. “Nice and full?”

“Yes.”

He laughs low, under unsteady breath like winds through the gallows, and the room gets a little colder, a little darker. The clown nods at the piles of meat, the spare parts. He winks, taking a bow, and perches on the edge of the well. Waiting. Watching. Expectant and free of distraction, free of the growing tension. Silas squirms where he sits, perversely happy to feel it there, feel the parts of him painted thick with its seed. Those parts tingle, they warm him and make his skin crawl in the most pleasant way.

Back to work.

[dragon-kazansky]

The circus - Jerome Valeska x Reader

Summary: It’s a personal show, just for you.

The very first thing Jerome did after escaping Arkham was look for you. You were, to say the very least, his partner in crime. Though you were not with when he got caught, he still held you in high regard.

There weren’t, yet, very many as crazy as he. That’s why he liked you so much, you understood. You were aware in every aspect that crazy. Only Jerome could murder someone and laugh as he moved onto the next victim.

Yet, you were attached to him. Something always drew you in.

You did wonder if he would come look for you once he was out and you were happy to see him standing on your doorstep, a smile on his face and look in his eyes that told you he had something in mind.

“Where do we start?” You asked.

Jerome could only laugh as he grabbed your hand and led you away from home.

“I have a surprise for ya’.”

You chuckled and let him lead the way.

At the end of the street there was a very nice car waiting for you. A young man with clown make up was holding up the back door.

“Who’s car is this?” You looked at Jerome with a playful glint in your eye. Jerome pulled you in close, his nose barely touching yours.

“Ours now.”

He gave you a quick kiss as he let you get in first, bopping the young man’s nose and hopping into the car, his laughter ever falling from his lips. The young man closed the door and hurried into the driver’s seat.

“Where are we going?” You turned to your companion.

“I told you, it’s a surprise!” He held his hands up and shook them in the jazz hands motion, his smile never once leaving his face.

You shoved him gently and looked out the window, trying to work out where you were going, but you heard Jerome mutter and complain about how he knew he forgot something. Next thing you knew his hands were covering your eyes and his lips brushed against your ear.

“Forgot the blindfold, this will have to do. Can’t have you ruining the surprise.”

The drive felt long, but you waited with baited breath when you felt the vehicle come to a stop. Jerome didn’t remove his hands from your eyes yet, but you could hear music in the distance.

If you had to guess, you were at a carnival. 

“Well, I’ll have to let go of you to get out..... keep your eyes closed!” His voice had lowered a few octaves in your ear. You nodded with a smile and kept your eyes closed as he removed his hands. You heard him shuffle out of the car and come around your side.

Jerome took your hand and guided you out of the car, keeping close to you as he began walking. The walk wasn’t long.

“Alright, open your eyes!”

You opened your eyes slowly to see Jerome standing in front of you with his arms open wide and huge smile on his face. Behind him was an entrance gate, balloons and streamers tied up front in all different colours. The music was louder now and you could see the top of a circus tent peeking over the entrance gate.

“The circus!” You grinned.

“Not just any circus, your circus.” Jerome placed an arm around your shoulders and leaned in close to you. “Your own personal circus.... with guests.” He waved off the people with clown make up waiting for your arrival. “Boy, do I have a show for you, sugar.”

You chuckled as he gripped your hand and all but dragged you into the carnival.

One of the goons at the entrance handed over a top hat to Jerome, which he placed on his head with his free hand. He pulled you past many of the games and rides that had been set up and led you straight to the entrance of the circus tent, where he let go of your hand.

“Now, you go go find your seat up front and we’ll get this show rolling!” He told you, shrugging on a red and gold coat.

Without a second more wasted, you ran inside.

Your seat was reserved for you right in the front, others guiding you to it as music began to play through the tent. The lights dimmed just as you got there and you waited in amusement as the ring leader, Jerome, made his appearance.

“Ladies and gentleman!” He opened up his arms just like he did at the entrance. “Welcome all to Y/N’s circus! I present to you, our opening act.” Jerome flourished his hand back to the curtain where many clowns ran out making a lot of noise and doing tricks.

Jerome jumped out of the circle and came over to you.

“Won’t this whole thing catch the attention of Jim Gordon?” You asked him, never taking your eyes off the show.

“Maybe, who cares? I can deal with him. He’s not aware we did this, so we have some time on our hands.” Jerome leaned in really close.

“How did you have time to put all of this together?”

“Do you doubt my genius mind?” He wigged his eyebrows at you.

“Of course not, it’s just, it hasn’t been long since you escaped.” You chuckled.

“I’ve been busy.”

The rest of the crowd applauded and you turned your attention back to the ring just in time to see the trapeze artists get into position. You watched in awe as they begun their show. 

Jerome stayed by your side for the rest of the performances.

There were dancers, magicians stunt tricks and Jerome made jokes every so often which had everyone in hysterics.

He had put this show together just for you.

When he announced the circus was now done for the night, he returned to your side and took your hand, tossing his top hat away to the side and pulling you back to the rides.

“Now, what shall we try first?”

Jerome got on every ride you chose and played every game you wanted to play, no matter who got hurt in the process.

Throwing darts at people may not be appropriate to some people, but you two didn’t think like others and took joy in seeing the fear on their faces. You could imagine the look on Jim Gordon’s face if he had any idea what the two of you had been up to.

After playing several more games and winning a few prizes, Jerome put his arm around you and led you away from the crowd. He held up his other arm and looked at it, as if checking a watch, though he wasn’t wearing one.

“Better make our exit.”

You smiled slyly and followed away from the carnival, getting into the car you had come in. It was parked much further away and a little out of sight.

As if on cue, once you had both had climbed into the backseat, police cars rushed onto the scene.

You clutched a teddy you had won and watched in fascination as the police scurried out of the cars and ran for the entrance of the carnival. Many of the people who had been in there began to run around, causing chaos to make it harder for the police to catch them.

You heard Jerome let out a loud laugh as Jim Gordon made his appearance with his partner in tow.

“Jim, Jim, Jim.” He chuckled. “Imagine the paperwork.”

You watched the mentioned policeman with an amused smile. Jerome never made things easy for the poor man. More so with you by his side.

“He’ll know this has something to do with you.” You turned to him curiously.

“Oh, I’m counting on it, sweetheart. I’m counting on it.” Jerome pressed a kiss to your temple and placed his arm around your shoulders.

“Onward driver!”

Your own laughter joined his as the car sped off and out of sight. Neither of you caring much if Jim caught a glimpse of the car leaving the scene.

You turned to Jerome.

“I had fun!”

“Me too, sugar.” He grinned. “Let’s go cause chaos somewhere else!”

It was going to be another long night in Gotham for the GCPD, especially with you two out on the streets. You knew if you got caught, Jim wouldn’t let you hear the end of it.

Tags:

@awyr @fandombeehive

[grumpyalpacaman]

Nexus Notes - Chapter One

"I already told you, you big dumb bastard, that energy core regulator isn't worth 3,000 Credits. It's not even close!" The young woman slammed her hands down on the clerk's table. Her eyes set in a narrow glare, she scowled between loose strands of bright red hair that fell in front of her face.

Behind the ramshackle stand of partially gnawed scrap metal stood the enormous shopkeeper.  The device she so coveted was tightly gripped in his huge, clawed hand. Dangling cables swayed to and fro and the polished chrome casing reflected the blinding glare of the sun. 

The taurus were the inhabitants of the planet Kakataka in the Aldebaran star system and the largest, most cantankerous of all sentient species in the galaxy. They were also notorious hoarders.

It erupted in a flurry of guttural growls, its ruddy brown scales rapidly scraping and clattering against one another to create a series of accompanying clicks. The chattering noises he emitted elicited a whir of life from a machine strapped to his broad, tapered chest. The gadget lit up and started to translate in a low, robotic voice.

"You don't know what you're talking about, Nexus. This a rare treasure. There is nothing else like it on Pantainos."

"Zakka, you are so full of shit," she said, as she reached into her lab-coat and withdrew a small pair of oval-shaped glasses. Slipping them over her nose, she peered past the imposing, alien shopkeeper to the staggering pile of discarded mechanical trinkets and components behind his kiosk. “I can see two more in the back from here!” Frantically, she removed her glasses and stuffed them back into her coat.

"3,000 credits or no regulator." 

The young woman stood up as tall as she could and crossed her arms over her chest in her best attempt to look authoritative. She was short and scrawny by human standards, not to mention leaning on a cane and absolutely minuscule compared to the seven-foot monster before her. "Listen here, you idiot, you have no idea what that's worth to me and you're just going to eat it anyway! So hand it over for a fair price and stop impeding scientific progress."

Without warning, the shopkeeper opened his jaws for the first time, the lower portion of his face splitting into two and spreading out in a slavering, triangular maw. Then, he chomped into the device in his hand. His shredding teeth crunched and tore the metal apart with ease as he ripped off a chunk and swallowed it before hurling the remnants straight at Nexus's head.

With only a moment of shock, she narrowly ducked under the incoming projectile. The move sent her stumbling and she barely managed to catch herself with her cane to avoid an untimely fall, face-first onto the cold steel ground. If the yelling earlier hadn't drawn the attention of the other merchants and customers that populated the market, this certainly would. Within moments, Zakka had dunked one of his whopping lizard paws into a pile of scrap parts and used it as a shovel to hurl yet more junk at the girl.

"Whoa! Is this how you treat all your regulars?" Head held low, she scurried away from the bellowing Taurus. Gears and batteries skittered across the ground and peppered her lab coat. One unfortunate stray something or other even bounced harmlessly, but no less annoying, off of her forehead. "Zakka, you Lunatic," she yelled as she departed the market square.

She looked back over her shoulder more than once on her way back to her apartment, just to make sure there wasn't an angry alien reptile behind her. It wasn't until she was nearly three blocks away that she stopped to catch her breath, leaning against the wall of a building and wiping her brow with the sleeve of her coat. Just from that short run, her muscles ached and her chest burned with exertion. "I left my apartment for that damn regulator and the dumbass took a bite right out of it," she said between gasps. “Still, I hope nobody calls the police on him. He may be a seven-foot, spiky asshole, but he’s still got the best stuff in the entire city. And perhaps more importantly, he doesn’t ask ridiculous questions like, ‘what are you gonna do with this?’ or ‘do you have a license for this highly unstable radioactive material?’”

She spent nearly a minute bent over and panting before rising back up and fanning out her coat to relieve some of the intense heat. “What I would do for a breeze right now. Just a little one.”

Pantainos City, built in the most habitable, lush part of the colony planet for which it was named, was in Nexus's own words, "Too damn hot in the Summer to be conducive to intellectual pursuits." So then why, she often wondered to herself, had the United Earth Federation decided to build its premier academies here? Pantainos was one of the UEF's earliest and most prosperous colonies and had become a grand centre for training and education in the past several decades. Academies and accompanying campuses for humanity's most prestigious schools in the fields of science and military had developed here and dominated much of the city. The best and brightest across all of UEF space were sent here to learn.

But far from the glamorous universities and labs at the city's centre, Nexus walked along the ill-tended streets at the fringes of the sprawling metropolis as she made her way home with a scowl on her face. Not that her neighbours could tell the difference between her usual scowl and today’s, extra perturbed scowl. 

The moment she stepped into the lobby of her apartment and felt the cool, temperature-controlled air hit her face, she let out a long sigh. The familiar sights of the dusty floor, the seemingly permanent ‘out of order’ sign on the secondary elevator and the ever-expanding patch of mould on the far wall were just about the only means through which she could differentiate this and every other apartment building on the black. Nexus whispered a silent thanks to the closest thing she knew to a religious figure, Joey the maintenance guy, that one of the two lifts remained operational. If given the choice between the stairs and sleeping on the crumbling bench in the lobby, Nexus would have to spend some time seriously weighing her options.

With only a brief stutter of resistance, the elevator ascended to the second floor and deposited her in the hallway to find yet another annoyance. "Great. If the heat and the taurus weren't bad enough, some ass-clown piled a bunch of boxes in front of my door!" she thought. For some reason or another, cardboard shipping boxes of varying sizes, piled six high, stood right up against the entrance to her apartment.

Without another thought, she stomped forward and delivered a swift, hard kick with a flip-flop clad foot to the side of the box mountain. Much to her chagrin, the pile barely moved. So, she took a step back and shoulder checked it with the entire, fairly insubstantial, weight of her body and this time she sent it tumbling to the floor with an appeasing clatter. She grinned down at her handiwork, hoping there was something both fragile and valuable within.

The commotion brought someone running almost immediately as a man stepped out of the open door across the hall, looking concerned. His expression promptly shifted to surprise and confusion as he spied Nexus standing over the upended pile of his belongings.

If he put on a uniform, he'd look like he walked right out of a military recruitment ad for the Federation. She thought immediately of a very large and very stupid dog. He was like a man-shaped golden retriever and just as blonde.

"Did you knock over my boxes?"

"Oops," she replied with a shrug as she reached for the keycard in her pocket.

"The hell, lady? I keep important stuff in those."

"Well then maybe you shouldn't keep 'em in front of my door." By this point, she was already daydreaming about punching him in his stupidly handsome face. Though she was pretty sure she’d break her hand on that square jaw. 

He furrowed his brow and attempted to speak up but upon noticing the cane in her hand, he suddenly became very stiff and cast his eyes toward the floor. "Uhm... Sorry," he said as he kneeled and started to gather up his things, shuffling them out of the way for her. "So that's your apartment then?"

"Yep, 37B," she said with the absolute most disinterest she could muster while jabbing a thumb toward the numbers posted behind her.

With an armful of boxes, he stood back and extended his free hand toward her. "I'm just moving in next door. I'm Parker Walsh."

Her eyes drifted back and forth between his hand and his face for several seconds. "Are you suggesting I make physical contact with you?"

"Generally speaking, an offer to shake hands with someone would imply that, yes." Yet more confusion was starting to creep into his voice.

"Ew.” Rolling her eyes, she turned, swiped her card over the electronic lock and stepped into her apartment.

"Ouch," he shot back. "Can I at least have your name?"

"Nexus," she said as she slammed the door behind her.

"There is no way that is your real name," he yelled with his lips scant inches from the door but to no response.

"Parker?" said another man, sticking his head out of the open apartment. He was thinner and less chiselled than his friend but with a sly, fox-like countenance. "What are you doing out here?"

Parker shrugged. "Neighbour girl kicked over our boxes."

"And so you quit unpacking to come out here and flirt with her?"

"Not at first."

"But you did flirt with her?"

"She didn't even give me a chance. It’s just not fair."

"My heart aches for you, brother. Now get back to work. We need everything set up by tomorrow."

"On it." With boxes in hand, he started back toward his apartment, taking one glance at the door behind him as he went. "Well then. See you around, Nex."

The moment she stepped inside her apartment and flicked on the lights, she felt her legs start to shake. She grumbled softly, finally allowing herself to wince at the constant pain she felt in her muscles and eased her body into the wheelchair lying in wait by the door.

Inside her apartment, where one might normally find furniture, decorations or just about anything, Nexus had cables, power generators and several large processors stacked against the wall. In the corner sat a desk with a pair of computers, razor-thin glass panes mounted on swivelling stands. Nexus produced a third, smaller device from inside her coat. With a few swipes on the surface, her chair wheeled itself over to the desk. Once situated, she began sliding her fingers across the dual screens and they came alive with images and information. Her eyes darting back and forth between them. Within arm's reach of her chair sat the single greatest scientific achievement of mankind, an espresso machine. The divine tool was accompanied by a mountain of discarded flavour pods, generally counting among the excessively sweet variety. Though that didn’t stop Nexus from addition several more teaspoons of those godly white granules once the machine had finished its business.

All this technology (save the espresso machine) was connected to a strange, ceiling-high object in the middle of the room. The device occupied the vast majority of the available floor-space. It appeared to be a huge mechanical ring of some kind; that stood eight feet high and across. At the moment, it was deactivated.

She looked upon the centrepiece of her chamber briefly, shook her head, and returned to her work. "Damn Zakka, always a pain in my ass."

It wasn't long before she noticed she had an update on her post on the local University forums. She wasn't exactly a student, but where else was she going to share her hypotheses?

"Oh fantastic, this idiot," she said with mock excitement when she saw who posted. "Hello, Student 681966, a man so boring he uses his student ID as his screen name." Nex skimmed over his latest dull refutation of her work and rolled her eyes. 

"Your ridiculous idea of a potential intersystem artificial intelligence program has no bearing in modern computer science. Even the most simple-minded of your species is aware that software is limited by hardware.

You persist in the idea that your entirely theoretical sub-space processor would alleviate this issue and allow a program to move freely between systems, but this has in itself a litany of issues. There is no evidence to support the idea that information can travel freely between sub-space and normal space. How do you propose such a device would maintain a fixed location within sub-space? In addition, the power requirements would be astronomical.

Fixed sub-space pockets have never been found to be a remote possibility and tests have resulted in failure, every single time. The only possible use for sub-space is point A to B travel through fixed gates."

With a guttural groan of frustration, Nexus swept a hand back through her sweat-matted hair. "This guy has no imagination."

Reclining in her chair steepling her fingers, Nex pondered the list of possible rebuttals. Everything from explaining the potential power of a flywheel energy storage system in the absolute vacuum of sub-space or reference to the sub-space tests performed by Earth scientists decades earlier that implied the possibility of direct access to sub-space beyond simple two-way passages. However, when she received a sudden response from a rather important contact, she decided to let her opposition stew for a little while.

Anxiously, she opened the message with a tap of her finger and pulled the contents up on-screen.

"I have acquired the information you requested."

That alone was all she needed to send her mind alight with fireworks. There was some more afterward about releasing the hold on the promised payments and how to contact him again. She absent-mindedly tapped out an affirmative response and delved into the attached files with all haste possible.

A few weeks ago she'd contacted someone who claimed to have worked on some classified Federation experiments performed on Pantainos. She'd been making a few inquiries about them and they had become a subject of great interest to her, even though they never got off the ground. What they were attempting to develop and why it failed is still unknown to this day, but Nexus's digging had told her that it had something to do with personal-sized sub-space gates, as opposed to the massive rings that transported ships across the galaxy.

"I was right," she muttered to herself after nearly twenty minutes of poring over the contents. "Schematics, test results, dates and locations."

She gleaned from the notes that they had managed to design a miniaturized sub-space gate, though from what she could find, it wasn't able to sustain itself before collapsing after only a few seconds. Several pages appeared to be missing, including details of who was involved and the purpose of the experiments, but all the technical data she needed was right here in these files.

Again she gazed upon the massive mechanism in the centre of her apartment, this time with new excitement and rattling nerves. She bit her lip and considered her options before giving a small nod of affirmation. "To hell with the regulator, I've got work to do."

She wheeled over to the huge ring and pushed herself out of her chair. For hours she consulted the new specifications and adjusted her machine. Multiple trips were made back and forth between the device and her computer and she went through around a dozen cups of coffee and sixty teaspoons of sugar. She scoured every crate of spare parts she had lying around (which was no small number) and the clamour of her tools filled the apartment until the early morning.

She awoke with a start around noon the next day. She had passed out in her wheelchair with a collection of her tools sprawled across her lap and around her wheels. She yawned, grumbled and rubbed the sleep from eyes shadowed by black bags.

Blinking rapidly, Nexus looked at her device, consulted the schematics and then back to the device. It was a match. Better than a match even. She felt she'd improved on the old schematics. "I did it?" She brushed back a tangle of red hair and chuckled to herself. "Of course I did it."

Still coming to, she mumbled out a few commands. "Computer, begin recording a new log now. " A small robot, not unlike an ambulatory tripod, came alive. There was a lens built into the machine’s head, which promptly veered in Nex’s direction.

She pushed herself to her feet and stumbled toward the terminal mounted at the edge of her ring-like device. "Sub-space portal NG Model-1, test 27, sans energy core regulator. Upgraded system to further compensate for the Verdricci effect. Added new subsystems to target a specific location within sub-space, based on new research documents. No more firing off randomly. Begin activation now."

Triumphantly, she punched in the key sequence to start up the machine and listened with glee as it whirred. Lights flickered on around the ring and sparks coursed across the empty space in the middle.

Staring into her would-be sub-space gate, Nexus's hands shook excitedly. "Alright UEF, let's see what you were up to."

The machine's laboured noises intensified and she could feel a charged tingle on her skin. Then, all at once, a disc of torn space appeared inside the ring, contained and stable. Her smile vanished, only to be replaced by a slack jaw and wide eyes. The sight beyond the portal sent shivers through her body and made her stomach churn. Floating in the vast emptiness of sub-space, was a cylindrical device surrounded by lifeless human corpses.

[scoobydoominuscoobydoo]

The Meddling Kids in the Car

FF.Net & AO3

-

Darkness.

Silence.

Pain shooting through his leg.

And then he hears grunting, someone struggling to breathe; he can sense tears trying force their way to the front.

Shag realizes that the darkness is being caused by his eyes being shut.

When he does open his eyes he finds that the darkness is barely improved; his world being illuminated by a single car light above him.

It’s that observation that tells him he’s in a car, and after further investigation he can see that he’s cramped up in the back seat. That tells him this isn’t the Mystery Machine or any other form of big car, any small car never has enough leg room for him.

The next observation he makes is that the sounds of struggle from before were coming from the front seat. Shaggy directs his attention towards the front and only needs a moment to spot an orange turtle-neck.

“Velms?”

When he speaks his tongue feels like sand paper and the air is almost damp when he breathes it in.

How long has he been out?

His brunette friend turns to look at him and he sees her face light up, he also notices a large, purple bruise on her temple.

“Shag holy shit! I thought your were dead for a second there.” She says this with a chuckle in her voice and her eyes begin to tear up. She leans back in the driver’s seat and smiles brightly at him, making him worry that he had been out for longer than a couple hours.

Now that his brain is finally orienting itself he takes another crack at examining his surroundings.

“Like sorry to disappoint...” He says softly and earns another chuckle from Velma.

He can definitely confirm that they are in a small car.

And judging by the darkness around the windows it’s late at night.

They must be locked in the car or something because Velma was trying to force open the the driver’s side door. But cars can’t be kept locked from the inside, there should be a way for her to unlock it.

And why was it so damn hot?

Shaggy hadn’t realized it at first but it was definitely sweltering; sweat was dripping from his brow and his breathing had become labored.

Then he took a closer look out the window next to him - his blood went cold.

“Ve- Velma? Whe-Where are we?”

Velma stares somberly at him and takes a deep breath, as if trying to keep her emotions in check, “We’re underground. Buried alive.”

-

Hour One:

“What’s the last thing you remember Shag?”

Her words kinda echo for a second, he keeps trying to pull his body out of a state of panic because in a cramped area like this that could result in death.

How many hours had they been in here?

How many hours did they have left?

“Shaggy!”

He jumps and looks back at her, suddenly remembering that she had asked him something.

He runs a hand through his hair, “I-...I-uh....remember we were at the haunted amusement park looking for Ferdinand the Torture Clown and-”

“That’s not his name.”

“It’s a better name, don’t interrupt me or I’ll forget what I was talking about.” Velma rolled her eyes and crossed her arms, her version of admitting defeat.

“Like, thank you. And.... um Freddie had us split up. You and me plus Scoob - him and Daph?” She nodded and he continued, “So like, you and I were at the employee parking for the clown rental shop just outside of the park. You were on one side and I was on the other.” He looks down at his lap to sigh, he’s been short of breath since he woke up.

“I-.... I remember you calling me over to see something but.... by the time I got to where you were you were passed out and on the ground. Like, I didn’t even get a second to process before I heard a honk and saw bright lights. Th- That’s all I can remember.”

Velms nods, “That matches up with my memories. Somebody came up from behind right after I called for you and then clocked me in the head.” She points up to her lovely bruise, “And then they must’ve sauntered off and waited for you so they could run you over.”

“What?!”

Velms raises an eyebrow at him, “You know? Like with a car?”

“I got run over by a car?!”

“Well dur, did you think that nasty number on your leg was from me?”

Shaggy can’t believe his ears, he follows Velma’s gesture toward his left leg and instantly feels sick. It’s bent unnaturally and on top of the lovely mixture of dirt and blood its got going on, it’s also leaking some sort of pus that is making his stomach churn.

It’s right then that the pain coming from his leg registers, and it must show on his face because Velma steps in, “The adrenaline must’ve been distracting you from the pain...”

He groans, knowing he shouldn’t touch it but desperately wants to do something with it.

“Agh! I-Is is supposed to hurt this much?”

Velma bite her lips for a moment, “I-.....I don’t know. I’ve never been run over by a car.”

He glares at her.

“But it’s probably gonna get worse in these conditions.”

With that, he attempts to move in a more comfortable position, and the pain from the movement causes him to scream.

-

Hour Two:

“How much air do you think we have?”

“Judging by how long we’ve been in here, the size of the car and a couple hours to count the amount of time we were unconscious; I’d say five...maybe six hours at the greatest.”

“Like, fantastic.”

They’re silent for a few moments after that, and Shag finds that the quiet above ground and the quiet below are very different.

He’s hating the below ground one so far because it’s giving him the head-space to count out the minutes till his death.

And whenever Velma feels the need to break the silence, it feels so much louder now.

“Who do you think did this to us Shag?”

He sighs and gestures up toward the sky, however far up it may be, “I don’t fucking know- my best guess is our good friend Ferdinand but this seems like something above his pay-grade.”

A clown skipping around and turning off roller-coasters suddenly burying two teenagers alive seems like a huge leap. Leaps from dangerous pranks to actual life or death situations were rarely made, and Velma couldn’t picture their mask doing this.

“Yeah, I mean clearly this guy is trying to shut down the park because once it’s shut down the land will be at it’s lowest.”

“Like it’s always something with real-estate...”

This quiet is awful.

They can’t even hear bugs chirping.

No sign of life except for them struggling to breathe.

Velma takes another look towards their main problem, breaking the quiet once more, “How’s your leg?”

Shag also sends a glance its way, hating just how bad it looked, “Like it’s doing great, the pus is really coming along.”

Velms frowns at him and he can tell something is on her mind, but it’s something she’s gotta say gently. Otherwise she would’ve already blurted it out. She sighs before speaking, “It’s swelled up a lot in the past hour...”

“Well yeah, it did come face-to-face with a damn tire.” He musters up a grin, because he hopes that’ll help Velma deliver the bad news.

Her mouth is set in a grim line as she stares at his leg for a few more seconds, gulping as she replies, “I just hope it’s not because of infection....”

Shit.

He had forgotten that was a thing.

“And if it is?”

This time it’s Velma trying to summon the smile, her’s is far less convincing, “It’s gonna be a tough few hours.”

At that moment the only thing Shag can think is, ‘Don’t hyperventilate. Don’t hyperventilate.’

Velma can see that all over his face, “Shaggy if you start to panic then we’ll be out of air a lot faster.”

“You think I don’t know that?!” He almost wheezes that statement out, “Not like it matters anyway. We have no clue where we’re buried and there’s no way that Fred and Daphne will know that we’re under the ground!”

Velma bites her lip and looks away from him, wiping sweat from the bridge of her nose.

She’s not used to being the optimist in any situation, but neither is Shaggy. They both find that it’s impossible to put a positive spin on anything, but Shag’s leg isn’t doing too well and if Velma doesn’t bring the mood up he’s gonna start panicking.

She needs to distract him.

“Ou- There’s always the chance that Fred and Daph catch our guy, and if he’s the one who shoved us down here then Fred will get it out of him.”

He rubs his forehead and chuckles, “Yeah... if Daph doesn’t kill him first.”

She closes her eyes and smiles, “Indeed.”

Shaggy follows her lead and shuts his eyes, letting his head lean back against the window.

Pushing his hands into his pockets and letting his fingers trace over every item. He can feel assorted pieces of paper, candy wrappers most likely, his Commander Cool wallet from way back in grade school, that’s definitely a Scooby Snack in his left pocket. For the first time in his life, he’s starving but not in the mood to eat - won’t do much good in a dead body.

He’ll offer it to Velma in a minute.

Pessimistic as she can be, he knows that she has huge faith in Fred and is more convinced than him that their leader will be able to connect all the missing dots.

As smart as Fred and Daphne are, there are too many unpredictable details to make up for.

Suddenly, something pops into his head, he has a cell phone.

He releases his right hand to search his back pocket, relieved to feel the warm plastic at his fingertips. Shaggy grabs it and takes a good look at it; it’s surprisingly not cracked or scratched - at least there are no new cracks or scratches.

He presses the on button and sure enough, the screen lights up, instantly greeting him with Daphne’s bright eyes as Scooby licks her cheek.

She was cackling when the photo was taken, and as loud and extra as Daphne’s laugh could be, Shaggy couldn’t deny how beautiful she looked when she did laugh.

It provides some sort of comfort, in spite of the lack of reception he has.

Those violet eyes seem to relax every nerve in his body, he remembers choosing to make this his lock-screen. He had ran the risks through his head over and over again.

What if anybody sees?

What if Daphne sees?

What are they gonna think?

But, in the end, he lost the battle to those eyes.

Shaggy smiles fondly at the photo, almost forgetting he was in his coffin, but is interrupted by a gasp.

“You’ve had your phone this whole time?!” Velma cries out, forcing Shag to tear his gaze away from Daphne. “Like, calm down Velms, it doesn’t have any sort of signal.”

She stares at him for a moments before saying, “You don’t have the FM radio thing? It comes pre-installed in most phones.”

Shag raises an eyebrow at her, “And then we can do what, listen to the game? Radio and walkie-talkie are two different things.” Frowning, Velma bites her lip - trying to gather her thoughts.

-

Hour Three:

Their breaths are becoming shorter, he can hear just how shallow Velma’s inhales are, and the back of his throat is dry and burning.

Velms has already abandoned her turtle-neck as well as her glasses, which wouldn’t stop fogging up. “Fuck it, I’d rather make the choice to be blind.”

Shaggy had been spending the seconds alternating between looking at the picture of Daphne for sanity’s sake, and then looking down at the state of his leg.

Also for the sake of sanity, but in a different way.

Looking at Daph helped him feel at peace on his “deathbed” while looking at his leg reminded his that he would probably never see her again.

He had cut off the leg of his pants all the way up to the knee with a box-cutter Velma had found in the glove compartment, so as to better see the damage. It was safe to say it wasn’t healing in any way, the swelling had gone up noticeably as well as the pain.

Velms couldn’t really do much about it, just sigh and rub her forehead.

Neither of them saw much purpose in bringing up the bright-side, they had been here for a long time - long enough for reality to set in.

They had seen the last of the world just a few hours ago and now the last thing they were ever going to see was each other.

“Do you take me for granted?”

Velma lets out a soft “hmmm” before saying, “Yeah probably.”

He nods, even though she isn’t looking at him.

“But you can’t hold that against me.”

“And why ever not?”

She chuckles and turns back to squint at him, he knows that doesn’t help any, and says, “Shag, I have known you almost my whole life right?”

He nods again but isn’t sure if she can see that so he says, “At least.”

Velma smirks and continues, “In that time I have found there to be one consistent fact. Nobody thinks less of Shaggy Rogers than Shaggy Rogers.”

The sentence leaves him kind of winded, as if he wasn’t winded enough from the lack of air, and he’s left to ponder it. Velma turns back toward the front, she had said her piece and she had nothing left to throw out. Not like she had to worry about being sensitive with him, the only punishment she’d receive is him ignoring her.

Which works.

Silence being the last thing she remembers, the only peaceful moment in her life.

Shaggy is staring up at the car light, black dots appearing and fading with every blink, left to contemplate so many things and knowing that it won’t do any good.

At this point even the tedious ticking of a clock would be comforting, he was getting tired of listening to his own heavy breathing.

The glaring 57% battery life was mocking him, showing him how much time he had left with Daphne and Scoob before the screen would go dark and he’d never see them again. He heard Velma groan as she turned to look back at him, seeing her slide on her glasses through his periphiral.

“Shag what time is it?”

He didn’t answer, the 57% had just gone down to 56% and now Shaggy was thinking about mortality and how he didn’t have a charger to bring him back to life.

Velma rolled her eyes and leaned forward, yanking Shag’s phone out of his hand.

“Velms! Like what the hell?!” He attempted to grab it back but she was already out of reach, he winced as he leaned a little too far forward and his leg pulsed.

She raises her eyebrows, feeling bad for causing that pain, but keeping her tongue sharp, “I was asking you what time it was, I repeated myself like three fuckin’ times.”

Shaggy rolled his eyes and leaned back against the door, breathing through his nose and waiting for the pain to subside.

It wasn’t.

But it’s not like it mattered anyway.

Velma huffed and turned her attention to the phone, pressing the on button and wishing her skirt had pockets that would have been able to hold her phone. Sucking in a deep breath at the sight of Daphne looking back at her.

Without even looking at the time, Velma brought her gaze to her tall friend.

His eyes were closed as he concentrated on ignoring the pain.

Now Velma knew that a lock screen photo could mean anything, any number of things besides the one thing she’s thinking of.

But as she’s looking at Shaggy right now she can just feel what this picture means to him, why it’s there and why he’s been spending the last hours of their lives looking at it.

Daphne huh?

She can’t help but smile, because she’s learned a thing or two about Shaggy - but she’s also known a thing or two about Daphne.

Velma chooses not to say anything, deciding not to curse Shag with the information that he’s part of a doomed romance.

-

Hour Four:

They’re at the point where labored breathing can be changed to desperate gasps every few minutes, lungs panicking and searching for air before realizing the supply was just low - not gone.

Velma has been mentally counting out the minutes for the past one-hundred or so, resisting the urge to suck in deep breaths.

“Shags.... what is that?”

Her voice is so quiet, they haven’t spoken to each other for nearly forty-five minutes and he had almost forgotten what she sounded like.

“Like, what?”

He just barely wheezes that out.

“W-...What is that?”

She points to the car’s control panel in front of her, the small, grey rectangle resting on top of it to be precise.

“It’s a GPS.”

The earns a gasp as she leans forward in her chair and pops her glasses back on, “Oh my word I am so damn stupid! It’s been here the whole fucking time and I didn’t even notice it!”

Shaggy is surprised she can still summon the energy to shout, or be mad with herself.

He watches as she examines the device, tracing her fingers over each edge - clearly looking for something. She lets out a loud, triumphant laugh as her search merits pleasing results, he assumes as much at least.

“Care to share anything with the class Velms?”

With a grunt and a cackle, Velma crawls over to the passenger side and he hears the pops of the glove compartment being opened.

“This GPS is connected to satellite, real rich shit for sure. And as it just so happens, we have a little green van out there with a spunky navigation system that takes in almost any information sent it’s way.” She groans and slams the compartment shut as she turns her search to the small storage space between the driver’s and passenger’s seats.

“If I can remember the signal our good-for-nothing GPS is on than I could send out our coordinates or something whatever this is only a half plan.” She has yet to even look up at him, searching for he doesn’t even know what.

“Wait.... Velms even if we’re able to send out the longitude and latitude higgledy piggledy, how do we know Fred and Daphne will know it’s us? How are they supposed to know we’re sending this from however many feet beneath the earth’s surface?” Velma doesn’t answer, still not looking up from her goal.

And this makes him angry, the hairs on the back of his neck rising as he clenches his hands into fists.

Without thinking, he reaches forward and grabs onto the collar of Velma’s sweater, tugging her toward him, “Look at me!!! AaGh!”

He immediately withdraws and rubs at his leg, seeing that the redness that originally just surrounded the wound has now traveled up his leg and under his pant-leg. He can see the blood that was clotting now trailing down his calf and onto the seat.

Any form of movement sends Shaggy waves of pain and there’s nothing he can do but try not to scream. All of the pressing pain feels like fire in every place he can think of, this was like nothing else he’d ever felt.

Was this his body finally shutting down?

For now he bites down on his index finger as he feels tears stream down his cheeks.  

His brain repeating over and over again, ‘You’re dying. This is it.’

It’s pushing against his skull with the force of a bullet and more than anything he wants to scream out for it all to stop.

‘I’m not ready!!!!’

That final thought just barely manages to be louder than the rest, not getting a repeat or an echo.

And it’s enough to leave Shag feeling cold; freezing.

“Shaggy... I-”

“I’m nuts about Daphne!” He sobs out, not even bothering to hold it back.

He almost feels like laughing at Velma’s silence, finally she has nothing to say, “I’m over the moon, crazy stupid in love with her.”

Amazingly, she still says nothing.

Shaggy chuckles and wipes the tears from his face, “Like, aaahh.... I love her voice and her laugh - oh my gosh do I love her laugh. And her eyes might as well just be some sort of stun gun for me. Sh-She’s so confident all the time and so smart - Zoinks she’s a genius, and I hate that she lets people talk down to her so much.”

He wonders if she’s staying silent so he can get all of this out, because he’s not really sure when this will stop, if it’ll ever stop.

He’s been holding it in for a long time.

“So-Sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night ‘cause I’m completely terrified that she believes all the bad things people say about her.” His profession of love and need to start sobbing have been battling it out in his throat and it’s becoming really hard to even string words together, “Velms she’s so fucking amazing and..... I-I could never be with somebody as awesome as her but....”

The words won’t even come out anymore, just tears and shaky gasps.

Velma bites her lip as she sees the inner-turmoil that’s taking over her best friend.

She leans forward and lightly rests her hand on his uninjured leg, “Shags.... tell me what to do.”

Shaggy locks eyes with her and through his blurry vision he can see that she’s got a somber look on her face, her mouth set in a determined frown.

“I.....”

What does he want her to do?

No.

This is her asking what he wants, right now.

What he needs her to do to help that happen.

“I want to see her again....”

All it takes is that statement and Velma sends him a mischievous grin, clapping her hands together and turning back toward the compartment, “Right! So, as we all know most GPS connected to the car require the actual car to be running, and while the lights are on nothing else in the car seems to be functioning. Lucky for us though, this one is similar to Freddie’s -  meaning it has-”

“A keyhole!” Shag jumps in and Velma snaps and points at him.

“Exactly. Unfortunately, even if we do unlock it - assuming we find the key - we’ll only have a few seconds of time to send out the message before the device shuts off again. These things have shit emergency power and seeing as we’ve been down here for maybe eight hours already it’s safe to say that it’s dead. After that we get zero redos. Got all that Shags?”

Shaggy gulps and nods, “Like no second chances, got it.”

Then a thought pops into his head, “Uh yeah, quick question ma’am. It shouldn’t be hard to find our GPS to send the message to but uh... how are we supposed to know where the hell we are?”

Velma stares at him for a few seconds before smirking, “Ah... that is where you come in my friend.”

“Me?”

She chuckles, “Yes Mr. “I have the nose of a bloodhound.”

“Wha-.. Uh-...I.... Velms, like we’ve been down here for hours and I haven’t smelled anything. Zip. Nada.” Velma simply returns this with another chuckle before replying, “Well you were a depressed loser for a wide percentage of those hours.”

He stares blankly at her before sighing, “Yeah... but- blaming my lack of smelling ability on my mental state has a wide margin for error don’t you think?”

“And do you have a better idea?”

Shag ponders that question for a second and then groans.

Closing his eyes, he tries to concentrate on every little thing his nose has been able to detect thus far. Dirt, sweat, blood, iron, the rubber from the tires; that’s as far out as his senses have been able to travel.

Sighing, he opens his eyes and looks at Velma, “Velms I-”

“Norville Shaggy Rogers, you told me that you - yes you sir, nobody else - wanted to see the love of your life Daphne Blake again. Did you not?” She’s crossing her arms and scowling at him.

Her words send a wave of heat over him and he looks down at his hands, “Like-”

“Yes! That’s exactly what you said! Don’t bullshit me like this, I have seen you pick out every single ingredient in my mom’s vegan lasagna without even tasting it. You were able to help us find a gas station in the middle of Vegas when the van broke down. You’re a freaking X-Man Shags!”

Velma’s eyes are practically glowing as she rants to him, he’s not used to her putting so much faith in him.

And then he’s thinking about Daphne, her perfect eyes being the only thing in the world he needs.

He closes his eyes again and takes as deep a breath as he can.

He’s back at the scent of rubber, weirdly enough, they’re definitely new tires, but he doesn’t think much of it - trying his hardest to grip onto something new. Flames of red and blue and orange dance around under his eyelids, each one something he’s already seen before; no what he needs right now is a new color.

It occurs to him that he probably looks insane to Velma right now, eyes closed and a constant sniffing.

Not like he should be feeling self conscious, he’s just trying to save their lives.

He almost jumps in his seat at the flash of purple appearing just in the corner of his vision. Not wasting another moment gripping onto the color and following it, trying to place what it is.

“Funnel cake.”

He hears Velma gasp, “So we’re still near the park?”

Shag lingers on the shade for a moment longer before nodding, “Yeah, no doubt about it, this is the same stuff from our park.”

Velma nods and bites her lip in thought, recalling that they only had one funnel cake stand in the whole of the park. “D-Do you think you can place how far from the stand we are?”

Shaggy sighs and rubs the back of his neck, “Like, I’ll try Velms...”

Slowly, Shag begins to climb the violet hue, trying his best to avoid getting lost in all the rivaling smells.

It wasn’t helping that the purple was just making him think of Daph and then his mind would start to drift, only being pulled back in by his desire to see the real deal in front of him again.

He’s not quite sure how long he’s been ascending the lavender rope for but it’s definitely been a slow going process because his inhales are shorter and require more effort.

Oddly enough, when he reaches the surface of what he’s assuming is the earth, Shag is completely winded.

And it takes no time for him to be absolutely drowned in a barrage of new colors, all of them trying to get him to look away from the purple. But he keeps his grip firm and tight, noticing that it’s definitely getting brighter and more intense in hue - he has to be close.

Suddenly, all the other colors vanish - being completely drowned in the ferocity of the violet. All Shag can comprehend is purple and he can practically feel Daphne staring into his soul, but this isn’t Daph - this is funnel cake. And it’s right on top of them.

He lets out a gasp and his eyes shoot open, Velma goes from bored and relaxed to alert in a second, “Did you find out where we are?”

Shag nods, still trying to catch his breath, “We-....We’re.....un- underneath.”

Velms raises an eyebrow, “Underneath....the funnel cake stand?”

He nods again, closing his eyes and groaning as he’s overwhelmed by the colors again.

“You mean....directly underneath?”

“L-Like we might be five or six feet below the surface, but we’re definitely underneath the stand.”

Velma is quiet for a second, crossing her arms as she processes the new information, “So....somebody knocks me out, runs you down, somehow takes down the entire stand, and then buries an entire car six feet under, and nobody noticed?”

Shag rubs the back of his neck in thought, “Like, wasn’t there a lot of construction going on? Because the park’s not up to code or something like that? I can’t remember what the lawyer chick said.”

Velms sighed, “Yeaahhh I kinda blacked out whenever she talked, remind me never to go to law school.”

“Noted.”

“Anyway, while you were going on a sniffing adventure, I managed to find the damn key to this stupid GPS. Now I just need to figure out the location of the stand in relationship to the Mystery Machine.” Velma is in super-detective concentration mode right now, meaning she’ll ask a lot of questions out loud but they’re all rhetorical and Shag should not attempt to answer any of them.

That’s Fred’s job, not his.

As he watches the one-woman show play out before him, a question from earlier pops back to the center of his brain.

“Uh... Velms?” She sends him an annoyed look but she stops mumbling to listen, “Again, if Fred and Daph can even get the message and know it’s from us and go to the tent, how are they supposed to know we’re buried under the crust of the earth?”

Velma’s eyebrows furrow and she nods, “Yes, that is an issue...”

She’s silent for several minutes before she snaps her fingers, “Of course!”

Without wasting a second, Velma leans forward and pops open the glove compartment again. Shag can hear her fishing around in there for a few moments before returning back in front of him, holding what looks like a black cord. 

His eyes widen when he realizes what it is.

“Like...is that...”

“Yes it is. A USB hookup. And if I’m right....” Velma reaches over and grabs Shag’s phone from his hand, ignoring his protests, and lines up the plug-in with the phone’s charging port.

“Hah!” She laughs loudly, making Shaggy jump.

“This hookup is compatible with your dumb Android.”

“Okay, like not all of us wanna use a thousand pesos of our parent’s money to buy a phone that’ll break in two months.”

Velma rolls her eyes, “Shag... now is not the time for smartphone feuds. We have our lives on the line.”

“Wh-? You started i-”

“Ah ba ba! More pressing matters... how fast can you type on this keyboard?” Shag’s sighs and leans back against the door, all this action is helping him forget the fact that his leg is starting to look like a zombie’s leg.

“Uuuhhh..... thumbs like lightening. Why?”

“Becaaauuse...” Velma starts as she begins to plug the other end of the cord to the GPS, “I’m gonna need those lightning thumbs to type out some sort of message while I put in our location.”

Shag raised an eyebrow at her, “A GPS is able to send and receive text messages?”

“Shaggy, Fred’s GPS is capable of semi-sentient speech.”

“....Fair enough.”

Without a moment to lose, Velma begins to map out their location in her head, knowing she’ll only have a couple seconds to lock onto the Mystery Machine and then plot out the point toward the funnel cake stand. Meanwhile, Shaggy will have the same amount of time to type out some sort of clue to hint at where they were in the stand.

After maybe ten minutes of psyching up and hoping their thumbs would respond fast enough, Velma slowly inserts the small, plastic key into the keyhole.

Shags hand are shaking but poised to type like the wind.

Carefully, she turns the key until she hears a beep and the screen lights up, giving them a low battery symbol before giving them a map of their location. 

The pressure kicks in as the beeping continues and Velma is suddenly looking for and sort of signal coming from the van, Shag jumps when a keyboard pops up on his screen.

He freezes up for a moment, completely forgetting what he was gonna type, the beeping sending blow after blow at his thought process. 

It takes one particularly deep breath for him to remember his word of choice and to begin typing it.

And then, his screen is black.

Never giving him the chance to finish the word.

“Di-Did you get it?” He asks as he looks up at Velma, she’s panting heavily and gripping either side of the GPS. Her knuckles are white.

“I-....I’m pretty sure I got it, i-it was sent out to the nearest signal I could latch onto. I’m really hoping it was the Mystery Machine.” She says that with a breathless chuckle as she leans back in the driver’s seat, “What about you?”

He gulps and licks his dry lips, “I at least got half of the word....”

Velma chuckles again, this one extremely dry, “What was your word?”

Shag leans against the door again, trying to avoid thinking about how he might have ruined their last chance of survival, “Underneath.”

-

Hour Five:

Shag jolted awake.

He had been fading in and out for the past half an hour at least with each little “power nap” lasting around five minutes.

The last time he had shaken himself awake with a sneeze.

He wasn’t sure that was gonna help any with the oxygen deprivation but at this point Shaggy didn’t even care how much time they had left.

It was narrowed down to either they would be found by the rest of the gang.....

Or they wouldn’t.

Shag pretended that whole unconscious thing was just awful and he was trying his best to avoid it, ignoring all the different stories he’d experience with Daphne when his eyes were shut.

Damn it.

He should’ve stormed up and kissed the living daylights out of her ages ago.

If only the extenuating factor that Daphne may not need - better word - want to be kissed by Shaggy Rogers didn’t take him over.

He certainly understood that.

She could be dating superheros and models and gajillionaires, people born with symmetrical faces and everything.

In his opinion, he wasn’t nearly perfect enough to kiss her, but didn’t change the fact that he wanted to. He so desperately wanted to; lost count of all the times he had been lost in thought and just thinking how easy it would for him to casually blurt out, “Hey I love you. Yes you. In the purple.”

But as easy as it was to say, it was chained down - never to escape his mouth.

Because those damn eyes just terrified him so much when the moment was important to him.

Maybe she’s relieved that he doesn’t love her.

Maybe she really needs him as her friend and nothing else.

He really didn’t want to mess that up.

Groaning, he put those thoughts on the back burner and rubbed his tired eyes that were fighting off the temptations of sleep, and failing. Shag wasn’t sure when but eventually if he let himself fall asleep, he won’t be waking up.

It was at this point he noticed a faint beeping coming from somewhere next to him.

For a split second Shaggy wondered if he had already been rescued and was just hooked up to an IV, safe in a hospital above the ground.

But then, he opened his eyes and indeed confirmed that he was still in the God forsaken car.

The lights had clicked off awhile ago and refused to turn off, making it even harder to resist sleep.

Him and Velma had tried talking back and forth with each other to keep the brain stimulated or whatever. But they soon found it hard to talk and breathe at the same time, so they dropped that.

Luckily, that beeping had yet to stop and was doing a bang-up job of keeping him awake, and annoying the hell out of him.

He heard a shuffle and Velma’s exasperated groan as she sat up and said, “Okay what the hell is that?”

Shag winced as he leaned forward, his leg was completely numb at this point and he was glad the lights were off because otherwise he’d be too afraid to look at it. His eye trained toward where the beeping was coming from, spots of purple blinking in and out around his vision as his eye failed to adjust to the darkness. Gasping as he saw what he believed to be the GPS blinking red in time with the beeps.

A timer set for fifteen minutes in black text stood out over the red screen.

After a couple of seconds Shaggy realized it was counting down.

Down to what, he didn’t know.

Didn’t wanna know.

But for some reason he was still alive to know.

“Like... it’s just one thing after the other isn’t it?”

He said that with a bitter chuckle, leaning back against the door and groaning as he attempted to shift his leg, it hadn’t moved at all.

Velma clears her throat and for the first time in an hour, he saw her face. Well, the silhouette of her face against the blinking, red light. As she’s examining the GPS, her brow furrows and Shag can’t really tell whether she’s confused or troubled. The last thing he needed was for that look to be troubled, his life was already in jeopardy, wasn’t that good enough?

After a few minutes, Velma sighs and leans back into the seat, “This damn thing is connected to basically everything in the car, there’s no way for me to know what this thing is whining about...”

And thus, she begins to think out loud.

Shaggy leans forward some more, with the hopes of preventing sleep - however tempting it may be. Luckily, the consistent beeping in proving rather helpful in that regard.

It was grating to say the least, each beep acting as some sort of needle stabbing into his brain until all he felt was a light stinging. Putting his head in his hands, Shags groans out, “Aaagh why couldn’t this psycho just send us flying off a cliff? Or suffocate us with the damn airbags? But noooo, all our criminals gotta be “quirky” and add sort of fun twist to the horror. God I hate serial killers...”

Velma chuckles and Shaggy brings his gaze up to her, “What? Airbag suffocation is a clever one.” He raises an eyebrow at her before she rolls her eyes and crosses her arms, “Whatever, I though it was funny...”

Suddenly, her face lights up, “Airbags!”

Shag sighs and leans back, “Yup, that’s what I said...”

Velma scoffs, “No you dweeb, that’s probably what the damn GPS is counting down to. Once it reaches zero I’ll bet you anything that it’ll activate the explosives in the airbags and blow up the car.”

Shag stares at her, after a beat of silence he says, “I’ll get in on that action, If it blows up and we like, die, then I owe you $50. But if we just suffocate to death due to a lack of oxygen than you owe me $50.”

“Hardy har smartass. The explosives won’t be enough to kill us.... But... they will probably blow a hole in the car, resulting several tons of dirt flooding in and drowning us. That might be a problem.” She leans back into her chair and sighs, Shaggy simply smiles and says, “Hey, so I’ll win the bet either way! Sweet!”

Another beat of silence.

Velma ends it, “Do-... Do you think Fred and Daph have started looking for us yet?” 

She begins to twiddle her thumbs.

“I have no doubt in my mind...” He takes a deep breath, it comes out more like a wheeze, “But, like, it doesn’t matter anymore. We’ve only got like...”

He leans forward to look at the timer.

“Nine minutes and thirty-four seconds until the white light comes to pick us up.”

“Wow, I can’t believe you’re gonna die a virgin...” Velma smirks back at him.

He rolls his eyes and smiles, “Yeah poor me, at least I can die admitting I fell in love. I don’t see your phone wallpaper of a certain trapping enthusiast.”

Shaggy wishes the lighting were better in here because he can tell she’s blushing.

“We-Well I.... I would have....i-if that damn clown hadn’t stolen my phone...”

Velma looks down at her lap as she states this and Shag can’t help but grin, “Well... It’s no declaration of love, but it’s close enough.”

She looks up to glare at him.

She opens her mouth to say something but is stopped short by the unbearable *screeeeech* coming from directly above them.

Shag and Velma’s eyes shoot upward towards the sound, then looking back down at one another - eye widened in shock.

“That-” Shag licks his lips, not brave enough to admit that was what he thinks it was.

Velma on the other hand is plenty brave and finishes, “Was something scraping the roof of the car?”

Shaggy’s heartbeat has sped up to far beyond what is healthy, leaving a drumming in his head to meet the constant stabs of the shrill beeping. He feels like he’s about to throw up, or faint, or both at the same time, it’s almost as if he can every little thing and yet can’t make out what any of it is.

Another long, scrape sends his pulse up even more.

Velma only needs to register the noise for a second before she starts banging on the roof, “We’re in here!!!” Shaggy is almost impressed at how fast she was able to act because all he can do listen to the drumming in his head and stare as his shaking hands.

Velma jumps back when then hear a knocking from above, instantly she bangs up again, “Freddie?! Daphne?! This better be you two!!!”

He can hear her voice tremble as she keeps shouting out.

Whoever is over them is shouting back, but their voice is muffled and neither of them can make out a single word. They both stare at each other for a minute and Shaggy can see that she’s crying, something he rarely ever gets to witness. And then he sees her gaze flicker over toward the GPS and his skin goes cold, it only takes a second for him to swallow up all the needles in his throat before he gets on his knees.

Slowly and with a lot of trying not to cry.

Biting his lip he looks over at Velma who has taken off her glasses to better let the tears flow.

With determination, Shaggy pounds his fist as hard as he can against the cushioned roof of this God forsaken car, “Fred, Daphne!!! There’s a bomb down here!! Like you’ve gotta get outta here!!!”

A sob catches in his throat and nearly chokes him, but he forces it back down.

He can hear Velma pounding away as well, but he can’t even really hear what she’s saying.

But he can feel his knuckle getting bruised and the air being all but gone from the car, and his leg is just introducing him to a whole new world of hurt. 

One that he certainly was not a fan of.

After several second of nonstop pounding, they both stopped, trying to contain their deep breaths. It was complete silence up top, no pounds back and no screeches to be heard, just the eerie beeping.

They were alone again.

Collapsing back against the door, Shag reminded himself that deep breaths were a luxury he could not afford right now.

Daphne was safe.

And that was all he needed to know.

Ever since the day he couldn’t look her in the eyes without being frozen in place, the attention toward Daphne’s safety tripled. Even now, while trapped in a car with no air left to breath and a bomb about to go off, all he could care about is the fact that she wouldn’t be caught up in it.

That she wasn’t the one stuck in the car for who knows how long.

The beeping seemed to get louder as everything else around his senses began to fade.

‘You can make it.’

‘She’s right there.’

‘You just have to survive a bomb blast and then you can fumble out the confession you’ve been waiting for.’

‘And then they’ll amputate your leg.’

He smiled as he continued to fight the battle of keeping his eyes open, seeing that Velma was putting up the same fight.

 “H-” His throat was in agony from the sudden barrage of screaming it had to go through just minutes ago.

“How long-”

“Two minutes and fifty-something seconds...”

Well damn she still had her voice.

Normally, Shag’s voice never gave out like this; but after dealing with oxygen deprivation and holding back tears for several hours - it was safe to say he was down for the count.

He simply nodded in response and tried to sit up straighter, hoping that would scare the sleep away.

Two minutes becomes an eternity when you’re just waiting for it to pass.

And then, poof!

Or, maybe a better word would be “boom!”

At the last second, Shag’s eye had popped open and he realized that Velma was sitting right in front of the airbags.

“Vel-” He coughed, groaning as the coughing didn’t stop; leaning forward, he grabbed her arm and tugged toward the backseat. Her eyebrows furrowed for a moment, but then her whole face contorted in shock, “Aw shit!” jumping out of the driver’s seat and into the back.

She crashed right on top of his problem leg, but he didn’t even have the strength the talk - much less scream.

“Tuck your head in so you don’t get any shrapnel lodged into your eyes.”

He sighed and leaned forward to put his head between his knees, and not even a second had passed when the whole front of the car went “BOOM!”

Something something hotter than Hell itself slammed against his cheek, and for a few moments he heard sizzling.

One of his favorite sounds was being used for evil.

But it quickly stopped and fell from his face.

Shag felt Velma grab onto his wrist and squeeze, as they listened to the car settle. His ears were ringing and he was coughing up smoke and dust, and the heat around them had become so drastically intense that he could already feel sweat dripping down his face.

He opened his eyes and found that the air was out to sting them.

Groaning at the sight of dirt spilling in from the shattered windshield.

He heard Velma let out a cough before puling on his wrist and moving toward the charred, front of the car.

“Velma what-” The coughing fit interrupted him once again.

Velma turned to look back at him, he saw a small shard of the windshield sticking out of her forehead, “We know that whoever is up there digging us out has reached the top of our car, so all we need to do is dig our asses out and then pass out on the roof.”

Shag looked down to see the the dirt was already burying her knees, if they were gonna do this then they needed to do it now.

-

He immediately regretted that decision as soon as his mouth got filled with hot dirt.

Swimming in earth wasn’t exactly a breeze like swimming around in water.

Now that was something Shag was confident in, he had gone scuba-diving so many times he had lost count. But fighting an upwards battle against relentless dirt that needed to occupy every open space was too much. Especially since there was next to know fight left in his body to begin with, just the promise of daylight to caress him and purple eyes to haunt him.

It was a system.

Push up with all the strength he had and then stop, think about food and Scooby and the criminal that did this to them being thrown into jail.

And Daphne, of course.

And even though he was running on empty, he’d push himself up again - squeezing on Velma’s hand to tell her he wasn’t dead yet. And then she’d squeeze back.

He almost made the stupid mistake of opening his mouth again when his free hand no longer felt dirt, but open air.

It only needed to hang out there for a few seconds before felt someone grip onto it, hard, and begin to pull. Shaggy held on tightly to both Velma and the Savior’s hand as, sure enough, he began rise even faster.

And then all at once, there was the sun again, hanging over their heads and welcoming them back into the land of the living.

Shaggy instantly took a deep breath of air as he fell down onto the roof of the car.

Spitting out every last bit of dirt so he could truly appreciate the air he was taking in.

He could hear Velma coughing up a storm behind her and he left out a relived laugh that she had also survived.

Falling down onto his back, he smiled up at the blue sky and felt hot tears streaming down his cheeks.

And then a shadow loomed over him, not even giving him a second to recognize who it was before the figured began to ravish his face with kisses.

Dog kisses.

“He- Hey Scoob! I’m- I’m okay bud, I’m right here!” He reaches up to scratch behind Scooby’s ears, then moving to cradle the dog’s face in his hands. Squishing up his jowls and smiling at how cute he was, “You’re the best pal a guy can ask for. Did you know that?”

Scooby tilts his head and whines.

Shaggy smiles and fights off the sob in his throat, reaching down to pull that forgotten Scooby Snack out of his pocket. 

The dog quickly begins panting and scoops the treat up from Shag’s hand, backing away as he swallows it whole.

He smiles again, before jumping at the feeling of somebody grabbing onto his now dog slobber covered hand.

His vision blurs for a second as he tries to focus on all that red, searching for those eyes he can lock onto.

They’re full of tears and kinda puffy, but they’re so happy to see him.

And he’s totally breathless once again.

But this lack of air is something he can deal with.

“I swear, nobody knows how to scare the living hell outta me like you do Shags.” She says it with a shaky laugh, but hearing her voice is enough to make him sob.

“I- I’ll choose to take that as a compliment.”

He gasps out before letting himself come undone.

Daphne giggles as she brings her left hand up to his neck, letting it rest on his cheek, he thumb barely grazing the nasty burn he just remembered he has.

It’s then that it all hits him.

He almost died.

Like if he were a few seconds too slow for anything, than he’d be dead.

And Daphne Blake is above him, squeezing the life out of his hand and stroking his cheek.

‘You need to tell her.’

‘Before she almost loses you again.’

Now that he has the chance to breathe as much as he wants, he finds that all he can do is hold his breath.

“Daphne.” He almost chokes out, lifting his right hand up to brush some hair away from her tear-stained cheeks.

“Shaggy.” She leans into his hand.

“I-”

‘Say it’

“I don’t think I can lose you again.” Daphne breathes out.

Before he can even think of anything to top that, she leans down and presses her lips to his. And through their actions alone, they both know.

They’re in love.

And the other finally can see it.

Her hands tangle up in his hair and he rests his hands on either side of her neck for support.

And they probably did that for several minutes but who’s keeping track of time?

It finally takes Freddie tugging on Daph’s shoulder to break them both apart.

“Daphne, the- uh... the paramedics are here...” He looks like he’s trying not to laugh as Daph slowly backs away, both of them out of breath and red and pretending they have no clue what just happened.

They hear Velma hoot from a short distance behind them.

-

As Shag and Velma are checked on the gurneys Fred and Daph give them all the details, details which they both already knew.

“And the dang GPS wouldn’t shut up! So then I figured that it was just malfunctioning or something.”

“Freddie, that thing is always malfunctioning.” Velma says as the medic checks her for a concussion.

“Yeah, like, weren’t we supposed to be visiting your uncle this week? Instead it brings us to a haunted amusement park of death!” Winces as they poke and prod his leg.

He hears Velma groan next to him, “Doc, when can I take th damn oxygen mask off?”

The paramedic clicks off his flashlight before saying, “When I say you can...” And then walking away.

Shag chuckles and then lets out a hiss as they try to move his leg.

Daphne bites her lip as she looks down at it, reaching for his hand and tangling their fingers together.

“Nasty right?” Shag jokes, looking up at her.

She gives him a glare that eventually turns somber.

“Just know that she’ll still love you, even with one leg.” Velma yells out, falling into a fit of giggles.

Daph’s face goes red and she rolls her eyes, “I don’t think she’s gonna stop doing that.”

He grins and gives her hand a squeeze.

Suddenly his eyes widen, “Oh! Oh- um do either of y’all remember the name of that lawyer chick?”

Velma jumps in, “Yeah, Shag and I were hashing it all out and we found out that she’d probably have the most to gain from this whole Ferdinand the Death Clown fiasco.”

Fred chuckles, “Ferdinand? I thought we agreed on Beebo?”

“Freddie that’s a dumb name and you’re dumb.” Shaggy says with a smile.

Everybody laughs for a few seconds, just trying to forget the past few hours and remember right now.

The five of them, still together.

“Wait...” Daphne says, “You two were buried alive for hours, and you both spent that time solving the mystery?”

Shag and Velma locks eyes, both bearing a confused look, “Well yeah...” Shag says as he melts into the pillows.

“What else were we supposed to do?” Velma says, eyebrows furrowed.

Daphne and Fred look at each other in astonishment.

Before Daphne snickers and lifts their joined hands up to her lips, pressing a kiss against his knuckles.

“Hey, once a meddling kid, always a meddling kid.” Shag jokes as he ignores the pink, shimmer lip gloss on the back of his hand.

-

A/N:

This legit took me like a month in total to write because work and school and writer’s block are conspiring against me.

This is based off of my favorite episode of the crime drama Bones, the episode is call “The Aliens in the Spaceship” and it’s a masterpiece.

Before Shaggy and Daphne, there was Hodgins and Angela and they are both very similar dynamic wise. What can I say? I have a type.

I’ve have a crime show addiction since I was young and my parents let me watch CSI with them.

And shows like Bones and Castle hold a very special place in my heart.

So I really wanted to pay homage to one of my favorite episodes from a TV show ever.

[katymacsupernatural]

A Royal Crush Part 10

Jensen Ackles x Reader

1700 Words

Story Summary:  Jensen and Y/N meet at a masquerade ball. Immediately sparks fly, but Jensen isn’t revealing the truth about him. The truth that he comes from royalty. What happens when Y/N finds out?

Catch Up Here: Masterpost

After Jensen left to relax in his own room, you sank down on the plush bed, still trying to calm your nerves. Women walked the gardens past your windows, their dresses fancier than anything you had seen. They all seemed so elegant and fancy, and you had never felt more out of place.

A huge part of you wanted to book a flight back home as soon as you could. Back home to the normalcy of your coffee shop, and a tiny shared apartment. But you couldn’t do that. You wanted to be by Jensen’s side, even if it meant being completely out of your comfort zone.

Instead of letting yourself wallow in self-pity, you stood up and made your way to the closet, planning on getting items out and ready for the ball tonight.

Your clothes were hanging on plump, ivory silk hangers. All the wrinkles had already been pressed out, looking nicer than they had in a long time. The closet was the size of your room back home, smelling faintly of lavender with a plush bench in the middle for sitting. Three mirrors lined the far wall, giving whoever stayed here ample opportunity to make sure that they looked their best.

Drawers and shelves lined the other wall, your shoes barely making a dent, looking shabby next to the gleaming pain. Even your clothes looked as out of place as you felt, and you could feel your anxiety rising again.

As you leaned against the cool, plastered wall, there was a sharp knock, before this petite woman stuck her head inside. “Miss Y/L/N?”

“Yes?” You asked, wondering who she was. She had some of the curliest hair you had ever seen. Not wild, or frizzy, but beautiful curls that were piled high on her head, a vibrant dark orange. Her eyes were wide, a brilliant shade of blue, while freckles dotted her nose. She barely made it to your shoulder, wearing the same dress the rest of the maids had been wearing.

“I’m Margaret. I think Benson told you I would be coming.”

You nodded. “I’m sorry, that’s just..this is all…,”

“A little overwhelming?” She finished for you. “I understand. I came from a tiny little fishing village, to work in the palace at the age of 16. My first year I felt completely overwhelmed, and wanted to quit at least once a day.”

“And why didn’t you?”

She shrugged. “The pay is nice. And for the most part, everyone is nice to me. Or they don’t notice me. And I get to work with some of the prettiest gowns in the world. Speaking of which, let’s get you ready for the ball tonight.”

“I brought a dress,” you started to say, but she shook her head, guiding you out of the closet and into the bathroom. It had to be one of the fanciest bathrooms you had ever stepped into. The floor was gleaming white marble, so shiny in spots you could almost see your reflection. A large mirror ran one wall, with an antique, dainty vanity perched in front. A walk-in shower was on the other side, with three different shower heads, the walls matching the floor. A claw foot bathtub, probably as old as this whole palace was perched on a pedestal, right in front of the window looking down at a large pond.

“The Queen wanted to make sure you fit in during this ball, so she had one sent in from the finest designer in our country. Along with shoes, jewelry, and makeup. I will be helping with all that,” Margaret assured you. “So all you have to decide is bath or shower?”

You couldn’t remember the last time you had taken a bath. It was such a luxury of time, and you usually were in and out of the shower in a blink. “How much time do we have?”

Margaret smiled at you, and you were grateful such a sweet person had been sent up to help you out. “We have more than enough time for you to relax in a bath.”

Almost an hour later you were wrapped in a silky bathrobe. People had been bustling in and out of your room for the past ten minutes, bring in shoe boxes, clothing bags, makeup, and jewelry boxes. You had looked over to Margaret in exasperation, and she sent a kind smile your way. “Her Grace might have also bought some items for the rest of your stay. She is so excited that her son has brought a girlfriend home.”

“I’m not really his…,” you started to argue, but you thought better of it. After all, you had just traveled thousands of miles to meet his family.

Margaret was busy styling your hair, gently but with more skill than you had expected for someone so young. She wielded the curling iron easily, turning your hair into beautiful trends, piling some high on your head. Your makeup had already been applied. Not enough to make you look like a clown, but she had given you smokey eyes, highlighted your cheekbones, and covered your lips with the creamiest lipstick.

“The two of you make such a beautiful couple,” Margaret continued to talk as she worked on your hair. “He’s so dreamy. I shouldn’t be telling you this, but I had such a crush on him. He visited our little village. Just once, with the King and Queen, and he shook my hand.”

You could see the faraway look in her eyes, the blush slightly covering her cheeks. “He is handsome. When I first saw him, he was wearing a tux, and a mask, and I couldn’t look away.”

“You love him, don’t you?” She asked, making your heart stop. You hadn’t even thought about the L word yet. It was too soon, and there was so much…

“I like him,” you admitted. “Even with everything that comes with him, I do care for him more than I thought I would.”

“Well, let’s get you into your new dress so you can dazzle him,” she said, standing back to admire her work. Your hair looked shiny and soft, elegantly piled on top of your head. Standing up, you followed her into the closet, which was now full of items. Flats and heels, brands that you never would have been able to afford were placed next to your Keds. Dressed, slacks and blouses hung next to your jeans and shirts, the price tags still on them. Glancing down at one, your eyes grew wide.

“I can’t except them! Look at these prices!” You exclaimed, immediately dropping the sleeve. “These are more than my rent!”

“You will. The Queen gave them to you. To not wear them would be to insult her Highness,” Margaret argued. “She is just trying to make you feel at home.”

The clothes were gorgeous, and you couldn’t wait to try them on. But still…”I think I’d feel more at home in my jeans and t-shirts,” you muttered.

It was then you noticed the dress hanging up behind the bench. It was dark green silk, just a little darker than Jensen’s eyes. The skirt was full, no doubt with a petticoat or two underneath. “Go on, put it on,” Margaret coaxed.

It felt a little uncomfortable, her standing there while you were expected to slip your robe off and put on the dress. “Oh, I forgot!” She exclaimed. She raced over to the drawers, opening the top one and pulling a couple of items out. “New panties, garters, thigh highs. Oh, and a strapless bra, which is a must for this dress. I’ll leave you to it then.”

She quietly shut the closet door behind her, leaving you to get dressed. The items she had placed out were exactly your size, fitting better than anything you had purchased before. They were lacy and black, and you felt scandalous wearing them, standing in front of the mirror. Wondering if Jensen would like them, wondering if you would ever be brave enough to stand in front of him like this.

Trying to ignore the butterflies flying about in your belly, or the warmth pooling deep in your core at the thought, you unzipped the dress, stepping into it. “Can you help?” You called out, and Margaret stepped back inside, easily zipping you up.

The bodice fit snugly, showing off your cleavage. The sleeves were off the shoulder, scalloped and beautiful. You felt like a princess, which was fitting since your date was a prince. “You look beautiful,” Margaret whispered, before taking a pair of heels from the shelves. “These will go perfect.”

You let her place them next to you, wanting to put them on last. Opening another drawer, she held out a large, velvet box. “These are from the Royal collection.”

Carefully, you opened it, a little gasp escaping your lips as you looked down at the opulence in front of you. Earrings, a necklace, ring and bracelet were sitting on black velvet. Full of diamonds, with the largest emeralds you had ever seen. “I can’t...they’re too much!” You exclaimed, moving to hand them back, but Margaret shook her head.

“You must. They were picked out, just for you.” Taking the box, she settled it down next to you. Handing up the earrings, she waited while you put them on before the bracelet was next. Finally, it was the necklace, and you leaned down so she could clasp it around your neck. It was cold and heavy, and you barely brushed your hand across the emerald before a large knock echoed through the closet.

“I think your escort is here,” she smiled, smoothing out your dress before standing back to let you through.

Hope you enjoyed this update!! Sorry it took so long. Please feel free to reblog/comment to show this story some love!!! 

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[jitterbugjive]

Live Action Dumbo

So I saw the Tim Burton Dumbo in theaters recently and I thought I’d save everyone the pain of watching it by pasting my summary of it here. I wish I was making this shit up but this movie is exaggerated so far beyond the cartoon that everything about it is less believable than the flying elephant it’s about.

YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED

So, basically the plot revolves around 3 people, 2 personality'less kids, one girl who's personality is "I like science but the only way I show that is by saying I like it and acting like no one understands me while all my lines are delivered like i'm smart but traumatized to have no emotions because my mom is dead" while the brother's only defining line is "I can stand on my head for ten seconds" basically to show he's a talentless useless nothing. which he remains throughout the whole film. Then there's the dad, the only really decent character of the three, a war veterin who lost an arm and used to ride horses in the circus, reduced to tending to the elephants because it was the only job he had so the circus is going out of business and the ringleader sold all the horses because no one was around to perform with them any more, and he buys a pregnant asian elephant from fuck knows where because he wants to market the baby baby is born, he gets mad that the baby is a mutated hideous freak and insists it wont sell

there's also a shitty guy taking care of the elephants who abuses them for no damn reason other than to be a bad guy anyway circus leader tells the dad to hide the ears, and they decide to put him in a weird baby hat that tucks his ears in now the kids just for some reason decide to blow a feather at him and he likes playing blow the feather with them, but he snorts the feather up his nose, sneezes, and flies for a moment but for some stupid reason they think it was him eating a peanut that did it so they cant convince him to fly again but now he's addicted to snorting feathers i guess because he snorts one off a lady;'s hat when he';s being paraded around as a baby, and he sneezes, ears come loose, but he doesn;t fly the ENTIRE circus starts laughing at himn and throwing food at him the other elephants spook because he's scary i guess??? his mom gets antagonized by asshole going "hur hur they laughing at your ugly baby" she gets mad, comes out to defend him, dad calms her down, asshole runs out screaming MAD ELEPHANT and pisses her off again so she tears the circus down on accident and kills the asshole circus leader lies to the cops i guess so they can keep the elephant locked in a mad elephant cage, the circus troupe for some reason sing baby mine together then circus leader decides "i was ripped off, i'm gonna sell her back to the guy but keep the freak baby as a clown because people laughed at him" the kids meanwhile try to comfort him by dumping peanuts on him but he's too depressed to eat, and then a feather just happens to get in so once again he snorts it up like a coke addict and sneezes and flies and starts flying all over the place and snorting the feather over and over until just snorting the feather and not sneezing lets him fly i guess

dad gets forced to be a clown because he was ashamed of himself having 1 arm and didn't want to be seen, they do the clown scene but with a monkey at the top of the building and dumbo as a firefighter to snort water and put out the controlled fires jackass mcgee controlling the fires doesn't do his damn job and a clown throws a thing that activates a lever to make EXTREME FIRE OH NO little girl risks her life going up the ladder to make dumbo snort a feather and fly now people see him flying and basically shit themselves, the circus begins advertising their flying elephant then the BIG BAD CIRCUS catches wind and is like 'let's make a coownership contract for the elephant and i'll hire your whole troupe and give them a place to live' This guy is so obviously scummy it's not remotely subtle, down to collecting girls as trophies one said woman he claims is her queen who does the trapese obvious love interest for lonely dad because disney i guess and they decide let's make her fly ON the baby elephant for some reason figure it out in less than a week or so help me the bank is gonna fund this but only if she flies perfectly on this BABY elephant because big circus is actually secretly going bankrupt and relying on dumbo to fix it

i forgot to mention the kids promised dumbo if he performed well and earned enough money they'd buy his mom back also the girl constantly points out the obvious. constantly, at the worst times too so the performance day comes, they dont think they're ready but they gotta do it anyway cuz big bank guy is watching

We get Pink elephants but it’s people blowing bubbles that somehow come to fucking life and all Dumbo does is bob his head to the music and watch them, I guess the whole theater is tripping because everyone sees this shit going down but no one questions how in the hell bubbles are doing all this. This scene is short and it’s just dancing bubbles, for a Tim Burton movie you’d think of all scenes PINK ELEPHANTS would be trippy as balls but nah. nah it’s just bubbles and repetitive music and a baby elephant nodding his head to the beat

anyway it’s time for the performance but then jackass circus owner is like lel no nets no matter that it's illegal and puts lives in danger and may traumatize people no nets because it makes it a better show (he doesn’t get in trouble for this at all btw, just the lady getting mad at him and him like ‘hey it’s show biz hur hur’ so lady is nervous, dumbo hesitates, performance goes to shit when lady falls and barely catches a rope and dumbo almost falls off a platform but he gets a feather somehow and weee flying ppeople are like oooh aah but then he hears his mom

because APPARENTLY the big bad circus bought her and put her on display as a spooky scary elephant in nightmare island dumbo is emotionally nuzzling her, everyone follows him, everyone is there as the big bad circus guy is like GET THE BABY ELEPHANT AWAY FROM HER and no one does a damn thing no one protests they all just stare as he's taken away and then only after he;s taken away this fucking girl goes "i think that's his mom :0" big bad circus guy is pissed and goes on about how it's better to do things alone and to seperate them, and asks that the mom be killed the next day to sever the problem also bank guy is like "well the elephant was flying but not with the lady so fuck you i';m not wow'd at all you fail, get it right next time or no money" big bad circus guy then goes "oh by the way ther troupe are all useless and do what our troupe already does so i fired them, send them away" so everyone's pissed and comes up with a plan to rescue the elephants and get them out of the circus

circus freaks use their circus freaky powers to bust mama jumbo out, while dumbo and lady distract people with a performance and the dad climbs the tent to cut it open with one arm because i guess no one else in the troupe could fucking climb i guess so dumbo can fly out with the lady

they fly out and go to a control tower to open a gate for mama jumbo in a truck to be free, they restrain the lady but are too scared of the baby elephant to stop it from SWITCHING ALL THE SWITCHES AND TURNING OFF THE POWER OF THE PLACE big bad circus guy busts in to the control room knowing they are there somehow and just starts trying to flip the switches back and a dude is like "wait nooo you have to let it reboot first or it'll short circuit" \big bad circus dude doesn;t listen and goes apeshit on the controls, even whacking them with his cane until they spark whole circus catches fucking fire kids are being chased by big bad circus dude's henchman in to the burning tent dad has to ride a horse in to save them but then they all get trapped in the burning tent

dumbo is about to be reunited with his mom when he realizes o no they are in the tent and flies off to rescue them, grabbing a bunch of water in his trunk he gets them out but oh no the feather burned how can he fly i know, a dumb speech about how he doesn't need the feather and an allusion to a stupid keyt around the girl's neck from her mother which she throws in a fire to prove "i dont need it like you dont need the feather" \and he;s just okay and flies them out dad steals another horse to get out

they drive jumbo and fly dumbo to a big cargo boat where they just kinda.... walk the elephants on no questions asked to be shipped to india now the little circus is doing a new thing where they no longer have animals because they dont believe in keeping animals captive for entertainment, and everyone jsut dresses as animals instead

and mom and dumbo get united with wild elephants who foir some reason give 0 shits about a flying elephant with huge ears unlike the circus elephants which freaked out the end oh and science girl does one science thing supposedly which is making her dad a metal arm when we see her not making anything ever the entire moviue and she has her own science tent where it';s just a projector showing a video of lady flying on dumbo???? idfk it was fucking stupid groan what a piece of shit

[surveys-at-your-service]

Survey #215

i’m not dead yet, just not into surveys very much lately.

What is your favorite dinosaur? Spinosaurus. <3 Would you rather live with wolves or tigers? Hypothetically, if I wouldn't be harmed, wolves. I love social species. Have you ever forgotten what a certain kind of pain felt like? Getting my nose re-pierced like fuck man. What do you remember the most about your childhood? I think the strongest memory is my parents not getting along. Or the stories I made playing with my favorite toys. Would you rather have a pet dinosaur or have mythical creatures be real? Have mythical creatures exist. I want a tame, little dragon. Do you have a favorite toy from childhood still? Astonishingly, no. I was incredibly surprised to find out I got rid of them at some point when I wanted to add the crocodile to my room as a cute decoration and memory. What are your thoughts on the end of the world? *shrug* Not like we can do anything about it, unless you count our own carelessness as a selfish species, but that won't actually end the "world," just mankind. Which sports do you enjoy watching? Dance. Would you ever have a breed of dog that is considered aggressive? I don't want another dog, but hypothetically, yes, because no species is inherently mean. It all depends on how the owner raises it. Have you ever made bread? No. Would your childhood self be disappointed? FUCK YES SHE WOULD BE. God, the thought is depressing. Has anything ever fallen asleep on you? Animals and my niece. Would you like to live in a realm where the zombie apocalypse is possible? Is it too far into imagination to say it's possible in the one we're already in? You have zombie viruses in things like bugs, so in time, something developing that can affect humans isn't out of the question. But anyway, anyone who answers "yes" to this, as in they'd like it, are full of shit. Most of us would die in a heartbeat. You'd witness others that you love die. Every day you question if you'll see the next. The zombie apocalypse has been so romanticized in many forms of media, but please, tell me you'll still be having fun when you watch your mother be eaten or some shit. Have you ever gotten into an accident with you parents’ car? No. What’s the wallpaper on your computer? A meerkat pup looking close up to the camera. What was the most difficult decision you’ve ever had to make? Deciding Jason couldn't be my entire world anymore and I had to let go. Name a band/artist you like that isn’t that popular. There's a YouTube artist named Jonathan Young that I MARVEL over the fact he's not signed with someone. My mom didn't even believe he wasn't professional the first time I played some songs in the car. Can you lift your significant other (your best friend if you’re single)? I'm certain I could. What is the first vehicle you recall your parents/guardians owning? A greenish-blue van. What was the most rebellious thing you’ve ever done? I don't know. I'm not really that rebellious. Pick one: Laundry, Dishes, or Vacuuming? I actually don't mind vacuuming. Have you ever moved and had to change schools growing up? No. Name the most meaningful thing a non-relative has done for you. When my former best friend let me live with her while we were homeless. Memories like that sometimes make me question my decision to cut her off permanently... though I remind myself the bad outweighed the good and our relationship was just never going to be stable. The highway and back roads take you to the same place; Choose your route. Depends on what's quicker to save gas. Are you more likely to give up or persist when you’re having trouble? It depends on the situation. Tbh I think I give up more often. Do you resemble one parent more than the other? I don't think so. Your best friend needs a kidney to survive; Do you give them one of yours? That's my girlfriend. So duh. Name a big life event that has taken place for you within the last 2 years. I physically met Sara. Do you end up regretting things you say often? I don't know about often. Name one thing you look forward to as you get older. Hopefully being financially stable. Do you use your hands when you talk to emphasize what you are saying? Yeah. You own a huge business; what is it? I can't even imagine myself owning a "huge" business. Are you afraid to ask for help when you know that you need it? Sometimes. Depends on who I'm asking. Name somebody you think died before their time. A LOT OF PEOPLE. I think above all of my options, Steve Irwin. Fucking saint, teacher, and pilot of conservation and loving our fellow animals. Name the possession you’ve had the longest. I have a lot of infancy stuffed animals up in the attic. You’re writing a novel; Is it horror, mystery, romance, etc.? Fantasy. Would you consider yourself an interesting person in general? I guess. I know I'm at least different. Have you ever gotten in trouble for running up your phone bill? No. When is the next time you’ll change your hairstyle? Will you color it? I don't plan on changing the style any time soon. Hopefully at some point soon I can get to the damn hair salon and get it dyed lilac, though. But it'll be expensive for a pro to do it (I'm very much so done with anyone less trying to do so, as it always fails), so that's something I don't think will come soon. It's not high on my priorities. Who was the last person to see you cry? Is this person special? I'm sure it was my mom. Probably. Of course she is. What season would you like the world to experience year-round? Autumn. When was the last time you took a picture of something? Was it yourself? Lmao it was of something funny on Facebook that I texted to Sara a few days ago. Are you currently drifting away from anyone? Who is it? No. Would you say you are really close to the members of your family? Most, no. I barely see anyone outside my immediate fam. Is there anyone who lives in the same house as you, that you can’t stand? The stupid dog. Do you remember the first conversation you had with the person you have feelings for? No, but it was likely RP-related. Think of the last person you kissed, when was the first time you talked to them on the phone? She knows I hate talking over the phone, so we use Skype to talk. I think the first time I called her via phone though was when I was having an emotional breakdown. What does your phone do when you get a new message? It makes the sound from Spyro when you pick up gems if it's not on vibrate, and when the screen goes black, a green light blinks. Do you automatically check your phone when you wake up? Yes, for the time. Who was the last person you were in a car with? Mom. Do you party too much? I never did. Who were you last on the phone with? I answered a number I didn't recognize, and it wound up being some bullshit about my car warranty or something when I don't even have a car. I just hung up the moment I knew what it was. Last movie you watched? The Lion King live action remake. Incredible. If you had to get a piercing (not ears), what would you get? Fuck, I want collarbone dermals so badly. Do you like holding hands? With Sara. Have you ever seen the last person you texted naked? Yes. What are you listening to? "Third Day of a Seven Day Binge" by Manson is on rn. Do your parents allow you to date? I'm 23. They never really restricted me from it. Then again, I started dating in the 7th grade, so I was older than most first couples. Have you ever had a serious conversation with your dad? Yes. Would you rather have long or short hair? I could not be happier than I have short hair now. It's so much easier to manage, and it really did me well chopping it all off considering my bad self-care episodes. I recommend it soooo much to anyone struggling with that. Do you want to have children? Big No. Do you think you’ll have the same boyfriend/girlfriend a year from now? Realistically, yes. How old were you when you stopped sleeping with a nightlight? I don't know. What topic did you write your last essay about? This awful book "Masters of Doom" or whatever I had to read in game design in college, I think. Whose car did you ride in last other than yours? Dad's. What was the last clothing article you purchased? Some pants. Who was the last person that made you cry [accidentally or on purpose]? Probably myself. Is there construction going on in/near your neighborhood? No. Who did you go/plan on going with to prom? I went to Jason's senior prom and he came to mine. What language[s] did you study in school? Latin for one awful semester, then German for four. I miss German, honestly. Have you ever been to a debate and speech tournament? Hell no, that sounds so boring. Choose two dead celebs who could be your biological parents - explain why? Steve Irwin for my incredible love of animals and uh... I'm not sure about a mom? I thought about this for like two minutes and really don't know lmao. If you were living in the past, which job that doesn’t exist anymore would you like to have? No idea. Which animal are you afraid of? Most afraid of, probably some spiders, like huntsmen spiders. I'm afraid of most spiders in general (if they're near me or in my house, anyway), I cannot stand maggots and larvae of that sort, and whale sharks freak me out. AND WASPS. FUCK WASPS. How would your wedding bouquet look like? *shrugs* It would probably depend on the wedding theme. What kind of game would you like to play that doesn’t exist yet? I can't even swallow how unbelievable Shadow of the Colossus would be in VR. What is one thing you would never ever eat? Escargot. Is there a music video that you would like to see turned into a movie or a TV show? Which one? *shrugs* Which character in your favorite movie do you hate the most? It's impossible to hate any from TLK. How do you think the world will end? A meteor striking, or a deadly volcano going boom. Either way, it's gonna be smoke shrouding the sun. Do you own anything clown related? No. If you were a celebrity - which celebs you would befriend? Y'all done know one, but I think the celeb I would connect to most and most easily befriend would be Shane Dawson. He is such a goddamn sweetheart, chill as fuck, and #relatable. There's really a lot... All YT-related lmao. Except Bindi Irwin. Damn, would I love to meet her. If you were going to make a horror movie that you would be scared of yourself, what would it be about/how would it look like? I can't handle those movies about women being raped and impregnated by a demon and shit. I can't. Fuck The Rite. If you could take a pill that would cure something in you that isn’t an illness - what would you be cured off? How ungodly shy and awkward I am. Ew. Do you like Rihanna? I don't know most of her music, but I don't enjoy most pop, so. Have you ever experienced hydroplaning? Not severely, anyway, and not while I was driving. What’s your opinion on the legalization of weed? Legalize it medicinally. What’s your current favorite song? Man idk. Have you ever hit a girl? I hit my sister once as a kid. What was your New Year's resolution? I don't make them. Do you find Eminem attractive? Not particularly. Are you wearing nail polish? I never do. Have you ever been/considered being vegetarian? I was for a couple months and definitely plan on going back to it once I get to the weight I want... if that ever fucking happens. What’s the last concert you went to? Alice Cooper. Do you own a cat? Yes. :') He's my best buddy. Do you like cats? I love cats. Do you like watching music videos? No. How are your grades? I'm not back in school yet. But SOON. Do you listen to Aerosmith? YO "Love In An Elevator" just finished on my iTunes. I love them. Have you climbed a tree in the past month? I never have. Were you ugly in middle school? Jfc save that child. What’s your type? CHARISMATIC. Stand out, man, and be proud of it. Having a smart head isimportant, too. Having a loving heart. Have a good sense of humor. Don't judge. Do you sleep with one of those mask things on your face? No. Have you ever straightened your hair? Yes. What kind of calculator do you use? The one on my phone or laptop. Have you ever seriously tried to count the stars? Lol no. Did you see the lunar eclipse? I'm guessing you're talking about the biggie from early this year? Yes. It was incredible. Do you have a bank account? No. Did you go on vacation last summer? What's a "vacation?" Where to? N/A Have you ever been in a choir? At church as a kid as well as elementary school. Are you happy with your looks? No. Have you ever gone streaking? You couldn't have paid me to do so even when I was in great shape. Are any of your siblings married? Yes. Were you in the wedding party? Yes. Have you ever seen a ghost? I've sure as hell seen something. Do you even believe in ghosts? I absolutely do. Have you ever had an eating disorder? Thank God no. What big corporation(s) do you support, particularly because you like what they stand for (many vegan items, donate large amount of money to charities, pay their workers a living wage, etc)? I'm really not educated on the morals behind most businesses. Oh, I do know Jeffree Star's products are entirely vegan and cruelty-free though, so his company definitely is one. If you wear foundation or have in the past, what type of applicator do you use (beauty sponge, foundation brush, fingers, etc)? Is there a type of applicator that doesn’t work for you? I've always just used my hands because we don't have anything else for foundation, I think. For those of you that do listen/watch ASMR videos, what are your favorite “triggers”? If you don’t watch ASMR, what are your thoughts on the whole phenomenon that seemed to happen the past couple years over it? I don't listen to it, but I don't care if others do. It doesn't do anything for me. I personally find the talking ones super uncomfortable, but if someone likes that, whatever. Are there any true crime cases that bother you immensely because of the story or verdict of the court case (ex. OJ Simpson)? I know there're some I've seen on Facebook and such. Do you use store loyalty programs? If you don’t use them, what is your reasoning behind that? What store loyalty programs do you feel offer the best incentives, regardless if you aren’t a member of them? I think I am for Hot Topic? I know I have a card for there. I think Sam's Club is a great place to have membership; that place has some damn deals. Mom used to be one, as well as an employee, and that shit was great. When it comes to skincare, what product could you not go without over the other ones? Where are you most likely to shop for your skincare needs? I could go without any, save of course for a wet washcloth. If I get something for skincare, it's just gonna be at Wal-Mart. Regardless if you aren’t someone who hoards or keeps stuff for a long time, what is one (type of) item that you have a hard time getting rid of? STUFFED ANIMALS. FUCKING CHRIST. If you eat meat, what is at least one vegan item (not necessarily a banana) that you like or would like trying (such as trying a soy ham substitute)? If you don’t eat meat, what is one meat item that you like and understand why people eat it? I have no idea. Being vegan just sounds... gah. I couldn't imagine. Major respect for vegans, man. What is a food that is always better homemade? How about a food that is always better at a restaurant? I don't know about the homemade one. Maybe like... cobblers? Meanwhile, steaks tend to be better at restaurants, I've found. If you watched teen dramas growing up (such as 90210 or One Tree Hill), which one was your favorite or you liked the best? If you watched family sitcoms growing up (such as Full House or The Fresh Prince), which one was your favorite or liked the best? I'm not sure if I watched teen dramas. For family sitcoms, ummm... I loooooooooooved/still love The Nanny. I like the two mentioned as well. What is a tradition either within your country or family that you feel is not needed or could in fact even be bad (ex. using paper plates for every party, eating hot dogs every weekend during the summer, etc)? Getting drunk as a motherfucker on New Year's Eve. Is there something you said you wouldn’t do, but in the end you did it? Yeah, a few things. Are you originally an American, or are you some other kind of nationality? I'm just American, save for like, if ancestry is involved. Then I originate from Europe. Do you sometimes pretend to do things you don't know how to do? No? What was the last compliment you remember someone gave to you? Who was it? Hm, I don't know. Have you ever had one of those pregnancy scares? When did this take place? Two completely unrealistic ones in high school. Are you someone who puts ranch dressing on everything you eat? No. Have you ever personally been friends with a stripper or prostitute? Not to my knowledge. What, to you, is the best way a guy can smell? Give examples? I personally like gentle colognes. How many times a day, on average, do you think critically about something? Twice or so. Are you someone who speaks their mind, or do you hold it all in? It depends. Where do you work at this moment in time? Does this place have insurance? I don't currently work bc I can't be a functioning adult in a work environment without collapsing into panic attacks. :^) If you have tattoos, which one that you have was the most painful? The inside of my forearm. Are you currently in the process of ‘bettering’ yourself as a person? I'm trying to grow more independent. What is something you tend to not be able to stand in the least bit at all? Anti-LGBT bullshit. OH BOY, or anti-vax insanity. Do not even interact with me if you're a "vaccines cause autism" imbecile. Does it make you angry when people complain an excessive amount around you? If it's over stupid shit or an issue you brought about yourself, then yes. At what age did you actually hit puberty? Was it hard for you to handle? I don't remember, and yes, it was. I remember crying outside the day I got my first period because I realized I wasn't a kid anymore. Are you considered a graceful person or are you more clumsy? I'm the clumsiest fuck you'll meet in your entire life. Have you ever sucked in helium? Did your voice change at all? No. Do you know any girls who have an overly manly voice and features? Girls can't be "overly manly," just as men can't be "overly feminine." Do you play any sports? If so, did you meet new friends that way? I did, and yes. Do people ever make fun of you for something you really can't help? No. Do you have any pets who will bite anyone else out there, besides you? No. Have you ever tried chocolate chip waffles? Are they now your favorite? Yes; no. What company are you signed up for car insurance, if any at all? N/A Are you someone who really likes to cook? What’s your favorite meal? No. Are you the candle lighting type? I prefer incense. Is your ex sexually attractive to you still? If he looks anything like he did, yeah. But I haven't even seen a picture of him in forever. Coffee in the morning, yay or nay? Don't like coffee. Do you ever drink your coffee black? N/A Body waxing, yay or nay? Ow, I would never do it. Honeymoon, where? I'd love the pink beaches of the Bahamas... but fuck Bermuda's Triangle, my conspiracy theory ass ain't going near that shit lmao. The black beach in I think... Scotland or whatever will do. Anal sex, yay or nay? Never tried, never will. The concept just really grosses me out. Has anyone ever written on you? Probably. Have you ever dated a fat person? I'd prefer the term "overweight," but w/e, once or twice depending on if you count one relationship as "dating." How many foreign friends do you have? In which countries do they live? Quite a few, having been on the Internet so long... I've got some in Europe and one in Australia. How long have you known the oldest friend you have? "Old" as in who I've had the longest? Since I was ten, I think. If you include my "real" friends. What’s the most interesting story you’ve never told anybody? Good question. When’s the last time you went to a bookstore? What did you buy? Last year when we were threatened by a really bad hurricane. I got The Fault In Our Stars and only read like... ten pages lmao. It wasn't because the book was bad, I just don't read anymore. What’s the most complicated meal you’ve cooked? Hunty I can't cook. I've cooked scrambled eggs and spaghetti like once lmao. What is truly attractive to you? Wisdom, for one. Have you ever come up with your own game? As a kid, yeah. What is something you value a lot in your life? The fact I have my mom in my life hit me first. I. Don't know where the fuck I'd be in life right now if my mom wasn't here with me. Whose hand did you hold last? Sara's. What was the last thing you planted? Oh boy, I have no idea. Oh wait, years ago I grew habaneros only to find out non-pickled ones are fucking gross. What or who was the last thing you gossiped about? I have no clue. I don't really do that. Did anything exciting happen just before you went to sleep last night? Well, my cat literally peed on Mom. That was "exciting." When’s the last time you helped a senior citizen somehow? I don't know. What’s the most selfless act you have done? Man, a lot of "I don't know" in this one. You see a spider web in the corner of your room. What do you do? I'm finding that guy or moving. Have you ever intentionally fed a house spider? No. How do you like your favorite beverage? Cold. What’s your big family secret? We don't have one. Do you answer the phones at your work? I don't have a job. Have you ever given up on someone and then went back to them? Many, many times with my former best friend. Did you wake up in the middle of the night last night? I do every single night, and it sucks ass. What shows do you watch? None. Have you ever broken someone’s heart? I don't know. Has anyone ever told you that you have pretty eyes? Yeah. When’s the last time you had a headache? I think I had a mild one a few days ago? I don't remember. My days are sooo blurred together. Do you know anyone who has been arrested? Yes. Think back to the last person you kissed, how many times have you laughed with them? A whole lot. Have you ever suspected anyone of cheating of on you? Yeah, because of his ex and a believable lie. It was ultimately a good thing that that was what immediately turned me away though, as I don't want to imagine how a long-term relationship with him would've gone, honestly. Who was the last person you kissed? Sara. Do you still talk to the person who hurt you the most in life? No. Who’s the last person you sent a friend request to? I've no clue. I don't really send requests because I don't know more friends on there. Is anyone in your family a criminal? Not by blood. Who was the last person you told to shut up? I don't recall; I don't tell people to shut up, generally. I haven't had a confrontation in a long time, besides the occasional arguments with my mom, and I wouldn't tell her to shut up. What was the last thing you lied to your mother about? I don't remember. Have you ever been in an abusive relationship? No. Name a song that reminds you of a past relationship: I could name 50 that remind me of Jason and myself if I cared enough to. Do you think anyone hates you? One person probably does, at least. What do you think your last ex would say about you? I don't know, but probably something nice. He's my closest friend irl. Do you still talk to the first person you fell in love with? No. Do you still want the last person that hurt you to have a happy life? Yeah. Have you ever had a crush on any of your teachers? No. I, along with like every girl in class, found a former band teacher attractive, but I definitely didn't have an actual crush on the dude. Thank God considering he was eventually fired for relations with a student. Why did your last relationship end? I learned I didn't like him romantically, and also because I discovered I liked Sara instead. How long did it take you to get over your last heartbreak? A year and a half. And that's just when I started moving on. Do you know anyone that looks up to you? I doubt it. Which one of your friends is always serious? I don't think any qualify for that. Are there any people in your life that you wish you never met? Yeah. Do people think you’re a bad person? Probably someone. Do they also think that you’re a slut? I don't see how a single person could think that. Are you with the last person you kissed? Yes. Have you ever been punched? No. How many people do you know that have been to jail? Multiple. Three off the very top of my head. Do you know anyone that sells drugs? I don't think so? Do you know anyone that does drugs? Yes. Do you care about what’s happening in other countries? Well yeah. I care about the world being a good, safe place. Do you think you have a pretty good reputation? I guess, at least as far as being a decent person goes. Meanwhile, I'm sure my rep as being a proper adult and such is shit. Where do you see yourself in 25 years? I don't want to think of that. You’re at a bar, you witness a man drugging some girls drink. What do you do? I'm not even REMOTELY kidding, I'm knocking the fucker OUT, calling the cops, and of course telling the girl. Fuck that guy getting out of that without a black eye. Who is more attractive, someone who is edgy or preppy? I could never, ever be attracted to a preppy person, so guess. I wouldn't want an excessively edgy person either, but I'm NOT into the preppy jazz. Short term dating, or long relationship? I've always been about long-term relationships. Kids? How many? Why? Names? Boy or girl? *Bugs Bunny "no" meme* Ever play that game MASHO?? "I’ve played MASH. I don’t know if MASHO is similar or something different entirely." <<< Same. A sad child, skinny and underfed, approaches you. What do you do? Obviously ask them what's up if they approach me, and from there, it would depend on what they tell me. I'd most likely call the cops first about a child like that because I wouldn't know the appropriate place to actually call; if the kid is underfed to an obvious degree, odds are I shouldn't find their parents first. I'd think it wiser to get some kind of officer to do so and determine if that child should even be with those people for their own good. What happens after death? I hope some kind of peace, but who really knows. Would you cheat on your BF/GF if you knew they would never know? No??????? Because I would know?????????????? And I have a conscience???????????????????????? Do you think there will ever be peace on earth? Why or why not? No. People as a whole can't get along and too many find violence to be the ultimate solution to big problems. Favorite childhood story growing up? I remember I particularly liked Stellaluna because of the drawings, and I enjoyed the actual story of Chrysanthemum. Worst way to die? Why? Some form of slow torture, I'm sure. Because if you've gotta die, make it quick. And humane. What were you in school? Jock, nerd, prep etc… I was recognized as an emo/metalhead thing. Did you ever eat playdoh at a child? I don't think so. Your dreams tend to be? As of the late, violent, at least those that I remember... I wake up attacking the air a lot. Describe your aesthetic? A quiet pastel bunny and a furious but awkward gothic demon are aggressively fucking 24/7 while trying to decide who's top and who's bottom. Do you believe in the afterlife? I believe in something. What book have you re-read so many times that the cover is completely worn? None. Are you a morning person or a night person? I'm in a brighter mood in the morning. Who do you most admire? There're multiple people I look up to for different things. But as for most, yeah, probably Mark. What is your favorite thrift/antique shop find? I love this shipwreck lamp that I have. What is the most incredible place in nature you’ve visited? The mountains. What is your greatest achievement? Still being alive lmao. Is something expensive better than something made with love? Almost never. What do you think of stealing? Uh, don't do it??????? If you could be told when you were going to die, would you want to know? NO. What would you do in case of the zombie apocalypse? Die very early on lmao. Okay but realistically, I'd want to climb somewhere. I'm going to assume a zombie can't figure out ladders 'n shit. What have you learned from pain? You yourself play a big part in making things better. Are you more worried about doing things right or doing the right thing? Doing the right thing. What’s something you know you do differently than most people? Eat biscuits like a fucking caveman by separating parts and eating each individually lol. Would you ever adopt a child? If I actually wanted a kid, yeah. If you could make anything glow in the dark, what would it be? *shrugs* Could you ever picture someone writing a biography about you? Hell no, my life's uneventful as could be.