#i think a lot about how fucked up ash is mentally after the events of her game. her buddies t.erra and v.en? gone. her adopted father? gone

[silverselfshippingchaos]

the way she looks at him here... goodness...

[megan-bopo-journey]

15th December

This morning was a tough morning with coeliac stuff. I'm feeling extremely anxious about glutening myself being pregnant but also this weird imposter syndrome just thinking about how relaxed I've been with this diet and yet I still fell pregnant and have seemed to maintain the pregnancy so far. I'm also 11 weeks which is when mum and Beth both lost their first pregnancies. I feel like because I havent been careful enough with my diet that I 'should' experience a miscarriage too, even though that's not how it works.

I have my work xmas party tonight and even though I called and confirmed they know what cross contamination is and how to avoid it I'm still scared that they'll react badly, or it'll bring up sympathy from my colleagues that I just cant deal with right now. I still have no idea if I'll go to Ash's thing, I'm leaning towards yes but I am feeling exhausted because I then have the thing on Sunday which again is around food and not a lot of time to set myself up for the week. I'm so thankful I only have one week left of work because between the anxiety with this pregnancy, anxiety coming up to social events with coeliac while trying to work I am TIRED!! Tired of making the decision of bringing my own food or asking all the coeliac questions and taking the risk, tired of thinking of what to eat all the time and meal prepping. Yesterday I got Roll'd and immediately regretted it because I KNOW it's a may contain and I should avoid it. But I was starving and didn't want to buy snacks I just wanted a proper lunch for once! And then I felt guilty and so worried I'm hurting my baby because I just can't manage how fucking strict this diet is. I hate how much stress this time of year brings because it all revolves around food which means me having to make decisions that I never asked to make. I feel like it isn't this hard for most people and I don't know why I just can't get past it. I'll be fine during quiet periods where there's not as much social events but as soon as there is I burn out so quickly. I tried to promise myself to follow up with 'treats' after events however when looking into it I don't always have time for solo dates and I still have to advocate for myself even if the restaurant is known for being coeliac safe. I'm getting my hair done on Monday (which is funny because I also had a hair appt after the retreat thing that was stressing me out so much) and apart from christmas day and the 27th that'll be it for food events for the year. Perhaps I just need to focus on doing the best I can to survive the end of the year mental health wise even if I can't advocate for myself every time and hopefully the new year I can focus on it more.

PLAN:

Tonight: "Just letting you know that I have coeliac which is like a severe gluten allergy, just wondering if you would be able to prevent cross contamination with the other pizzas when making mine?"

Tomorrow: Bring my food, just tell people "it's just easier", always the option to leave if it gets too hard. really think about whether I want to attend these events next year (this will be a good therapy topic) -this will be the hardest event, I want to push myself to at least try and go and I'll be relieved it's over but also proud of myself for going.

Sunday: I feel confident eating Elizabeth's mousakka and will be providing the pav so I know I'll get a safe dessert :) Be mindful with the crackers and dip etc.

Monday: get things to make chicken wraps for the week

Thursday: suggest non-food things with Navin e.g. starbucks, walk the river if she wants, nails done? tell her I am scared of getting glutened since getting preg

Xmas day: hard to control/predict, just do the best I can

27th: offer to order the chicken and let them know someone eating it has coeliac/severe gluten allergy

28th: unsure if I'll go, decide before xmas and just decline invitation.

Oh yes and thank god I have therapy on Wednesday!!

[cryptid-killjoy]

Valentine’s Day for the other Laveaus aka “The Growed Up Kids.” Also Meaning - Cinderella’s Death Date and Abandonment Anniversary Era For What Used to be Celebrated as Their Parents’ Anniversary. 

Scout

Scout has a lot of support. She’s surrounded by a new family after the “Series of Unfortunate Events” if one could even call it that anymore. 

She wouldn’t. 

The fact she’s moved on seemingly so well doesn’t mean this doesn’t affect her like Cinderella never existed. She’s a very good chameleon like Flotsam used to be and perhaps Valerie tries to be sometimes. It reveals itself in less than obvious ways. 

The way she deals with the loss of her father Jetsam is seen in her clothes, her makeup, her language, and her music. It’s seen in her attitude more often than is caught. Her teachers have given her a few side eyes and wonder where the Hell a nice child came up with a mouth like that all of a sudden because it doesn’t stream like a fountain. 

But with Cinderella it’s a hard place to stand in. It’s not like never knowing your mom like Flotsam. It’s not like she just up and died like Koda. Grief was natural, but betrayal of the family - leaving that duffle bag of money and disappearing - Then dying? It was hard because the good memories still existed. But that’s what made the betrayal that much worse. If everything was so fucking bad then how dare you stay this long to torture a child’s heart with memories like that just to make it more painful? 

Like if you really had problems from the start and couldn’t deal with her father from the get go why fuck? Why did she even bring her into this world? Why didn’t stop while she was ahead? How selfish was she? Did she think having a child would keep them together? Because it won’t. It didn’t. It never does. But her father always did call her stupid. Guess it was true. 

So how it affects Scout is the same mental issues her lovely “real mother” has, Valerie. She questions her existence. She questions her value especially now as she’s struggling in New Zealand and feeling like the outsider here. She clings like holy Hell to Thomas, she’s knows of two parents that left this family already. Cinderella and Jetsam. Okay, Jetsam died, but she’s not unaware of how Chip and Dale came about and how he and Cinderella ran off and left River. Elsa left too. That’s three even if she came back too. She’s heard stories of people leaving and coming back. Jetsam didn’t come to see her on the Day of the Dead. People can’t always come back. She’s sick of hearing but they came back. 

She’s got a big fuck that on her shoulder. 

She’s scared to be left behind. She’s scared to death to know who’s next? Because good memories don’t mean shit. She had those too with Cinderella and they’re fucking worthless now. She’s heard I’ll love you forever. Words are shit. Memories are shit. Smiles are shit. Everything can turn to ash in a second. That’s what Scout knows as well as Valerie now thanks to fucking Cinderella. 

So how did Valentineiversary Death Date go for Scout? Shitty. 

GoGo was the highlight. 

She walked through the motions of gift giving kids at school as mentioned before same as her parents and family as was tradition. 

But internally? 

A mess. All she’d really been doing since her and Thomas’s talk was thinking I don’t need anymore time. I wonder how long I have to pretend I’m thinking about it to make him think I’m really thinking this through so he doesn’t think I’m being a dumb rash teenager? If I do it will it matter? Does he want me to think about because he secretly hopes I change my mind? That way I can just eventually die and get the fuck out of everybody’s hair? Jokes on you dude. Mom sealed me to her. I’ll probably end up a ghost like River. Fuck. Did Mom forget that? She’s so caught up in being a wolf. Didn’t even invite me. What happened to we all die together? Fucking bitch. How’s that gonna happen if you don’t invite me? Then came the silent night tears with her eyes closed like the whole world is trying to leave her. 

But is this her regular thinking? No. This is the spiral brought on by all the emotions that went soaring on high triggered by V-day - ex-that - Dreaderellatines Day. 

Valerie might have found her peace in a new spouse but there were still some residual effects left behind even if they were hard to spot with kiddos that like to keep them well hidden. 

Also note: She doesn’t actually have her bag money. She switched it out for Monopoly money a long time ago. She keeps the bag and it looks full. No one ever snoops. She did while all the windows were shut and sleeping. She really thought someone might have snooped by now. It goes to show how much they stay out of each other’s business. (minus trying to steal her voodoo doll from Chip but it got destroyed in the fire which only proved Chip was teasing her his whole life and never put the magic on it or she’d be burned alive. He’d have never harmed his sister. It was always just a threat)

Damn she loves her brother 

That said some random people who buy Monopoly boards in Walmart are going to be very happy. 

Dale

Dale was far less active and more passive for once in his life. 

He had a lot going in his head with the whole Piper thing and walking that off still for a heart day. 

So besides anything mentioned before for general V-day stuff - how the death day affected Dale was general grouchiness. He’d have been giving short answers to people, not rude, but just rushed, and move it along type answers to get back to being by himself. 

He printed off a target of Cinderella’s face and XFuck’s face for old time’s sake and beat the shit out of them with a crowbar he wrote Zig on because the name Xigbar was stupid. Ended up saying something like “Stop beating yourself up. Stop beating yourself up.” Like an old school bully who kept making someone punch themselves. 

It didn’t make him feel much better. But it was something. 

So there wasn’t a great reaction or big to-do from Dale, but he’s still affected. He was always the one that held the most anger in about it. 

He still is. 

It’s only easing because he sees his mother and father now, Thomas and Valerie coming along so well, and Scout too. 

But as long as anyone’s affected and he knows his sister and brothers are, but his baby sis? Yeah, he’s never going to truly be settled. He just doesn’t know what to do about it. He’s just carrying it because beating the shit out of things until they cry mercy or die doesn’t make it go away with this one and that’s all he knows how to do. 

Chip

Chip’s big man on campus in his family. He’s got a lot to think about on Valentine’s Day. Lots of gals and kids to be paying attention to and give love to not to mention his siblings and Valerie and Thomas. 

For him that makes things different. Everything’s different for Chip. 

Everyone lost Jetsam and everyone can place this on how he behaved towards Flotsam near the end, how it got out of control with Valerie, and Chip finally made a call, but that’s not how he sees it. 

There’s a Cinderella element in this to him because he knows Savvy as Jet’s husband on earth through his father Flotsam and now he’s the vessel for this Jet’s husband. So, he’s closer to any of this than he ever was before. 

He knows in far more intimate detail there was no soap opera going on in his family’s household growing up about who loved, who left who as a child might have been led to believe for ease of understanding how their non-traditional family came about.  

He knows it was far more sinister. Plotted and controlled by Jetsam. 

He fucking knows and knows it’s because he hated Cinderella not loved her. Okay. He just saw Flotsam wasn’t going to let her go and chose a new route since killing might literally destroy his brother because contrary to popular belief Jetsam believed if he did all those really mean things to Flotsam he’d hate Cinderella after. It blew up in his fucking face and Cinderella never even knew it. She always missed how evil he was. Always. That’s how conniving Jetsam can be. 

At that point he knocked up the bitch with twins after proving to Flo she didn’t love him best. She ran away with him. He left Flotsam open to go for who his heart’s been bleeding for for years. He comes back. He drove Flotsam’s true love, the one that got away, Elsa away AGAIN????? That wasn’t in the plan. Eh fuck it. He already got some good shagging out of her. Good enough. Flotsam should really love him now AND HATE Cinderella. But no. Elsa fucked it by leaving. Flotsam went right back to Cinderella and forgave everything like okay? It blew Jetsam’s mind. What the fuck? Did Flo actually care about Cinderella or something? That’s how Jet’s mind worked. Like he didn’t get it. 

This is what Chip knows. So it is really hard for Chip to give a fuck about Valentine’s Death Day about a mom who cheated on River’s dad first, who his own dad did not love in the slightest when they procreated to have him, and was trying to get rid of her by creating him, and only married into it all because Flotsam did. Then she turned around and abandoned them all especially after River’s dad forgave the first time she left him whether they want to call it cheating or not he does. Chip sees it how he wants to see it. Flotsam forked his eye out. Surely that was not something mutual. 

So the fact he sees Valerie good this year helps him be good. River’s dad. His dad. They both mean a damn lot to him. Thomas is the best thing that ever happened so far since but Chip’s got his every watchful guarded eye. He’s Chip. The protector. He’s always been the one making the rounds of Laveau property even back then. He watches out for everyone. 

 Of course he loves Thomas. More than he can express. He doesn’t mind the others calling him dad. It’s a little harder for him to go there when he has direct access to Jet more often than the others. He lives a different life. He almost feels guilty about it when he thinks Valerie and Jet being separate might be negative instead of helpful. He realizes it has it’s pros and cons now. 

So mostly Death Day for him brought up quiet contemplation of the current events, situations, and of his own part in it all. Due to that though, with the effect everything has on others he’ll continue to blame the one person not here to defend themselves and not care because in conclusion no matter how much better things have turned out - he stands - it could have reached this moment from a different path - and it’s Cinderella’s fault it had to be this hard on everyone.  

Chip knows everything from being one with Savvy who’s been in Flo and married to Jet. He’s so close to everything all he can think of by the end of his contemplation is Good fucking riddance. 

He’s got better people to spend his time Valentine-ing about. 

He does have however the same little worry for Scout Dale does. He’s a big brother. He can’t help it. He doesn’t have the aggression about it like Dale. He’s got a full plate though. If there was someone to snipe he would. There’s not. They’re already dead. As Chip sees it it’s as done as it can get. He can’t do much about the residual effects. It’s too long term to predict and out of his hands. If he sees something he could help he would. He made that decision long ago. No more fucking around. No more second chances no offense to Maddy or Elsa he loves them both, but he’s been watching and to him gambling on any more rare few aren’t worth the damage caused by the ones that will fuck up their chances by him giving out too many. No more bullshit. Not if he’s involved. 

That’s where Chip’s at. Everyone can thank Cinderella for that. He can link her to every bad thing that’s ever happened to every person he knows in his family, from their ideals, the way they used to think because of her, decisions they never would have made because they were raised by her, the list goes on. Even people they’ve dated, or their partners would never have been compared to and judged by Cinderella’s life similarities first. Cinderella effects everything they all touch and everything that has touched the Laveaus. The boy’s got a grudge. Chip has a chip if you will. 

He’ll be spending Valentine’s with his wives getting lots of sex not commemorating D-day. 

River

He’s a ghost yo

He’s so not thinking about it

He’s in stagnant mode yes, but that is not what he’s stagnant on about

His brain is more stuck on I need to spend time with Valerie. I need to protect Valerie. I need to make Valerie proud. Thomas too. Yes, Elsa too. But, mostly Valerie/Flotsam/Thomas. Family. It’s all wrapped up in a primordial soup of details as the only reason for his daily existence. 

Yes, he can think back on the past. Of course he can. But, he doesn’t dwell. His inner landscaping doesn’t work that way anymore. He’s so focused on wanting to be this one thing he has tunnel vision now. 

He does have his memories but some can seem blurry now when it doesn’t apply to his ends now. Its like how Frollo never seems to stop focusing on being a pervy cad and unholy holy man on a power trip. It’s his thing. He can’t be anything else. Well, now River has a thing that strong too. 

So he’s not so affected by Valentine’s Day in this context about the death day - only might be if a family brought it into his existence and forced him go back into that part of his life for them to fulfil his goals of being super brother now. He won’t be triggered otherwise. And this year no one brought it to him so he wasn’t. 

He did sit next to Scout’s bed when she cried with her eyes shut in the middle of the night from the veil - all ghosty - she never knew it. He just had no idea why she was crying. He can’t read her mind. But he did not leave her alone. 

Summary - Dale and Scout are affected the most. River is least affected. Chip nah. He’s gonna be fine. He’s too close to Jetsam and Savvy not to be. Dale has anger management and trust problems he’s not letting go of over it. Why the fuck you think this boy don’t want a commitment in girlfriendland? Scout has serious abandonment issues. 

[tryingmybestpls]

Not A Team: Part 2- New World Order

Pairing: Steve Rogers x Reader

Summary: The Reader gives a speech at the opening of Steve’s exhibit and has a talk with Sam following his speech.

Rating: T

Word Count: 4.1k

Warnings: SPOILERS FOR THE FALCON AND THE WINTER SOLDIER, talks of death, talks of mental illness, feelings of isolation

Read Part One here

Listen to the playlist inspired by the series here

Y/N felt like coming here today was a mistake.

Her stomach tossed and turned like a stormy sea, threatening to send her breakfast all over Rhodey's shiny shoes. She was second guessing everything. Was her dress nice enough? Rhodey had told her she looked great, but she hadn't worn a dress since Steve's funeral-Oh God, what if he was lying to her? No, he wouldn't lie to her-but what if he felt bad? Jesus, dd her shoes look stupid? Maybe she shouldn't have worn heels-but then she always wore heels with dresses and if she wore flats that would look childish. Did her speech sound coherent? Fuck, what if she messes up. Would they think she was doing it on purpose out of retribution for what Steve did? No, they didn't know what Steve did, what he had done to her. What if-

"Hey, hey. What's wrong? You look like you're going to blow chunks." Rhodey cuts through her thoughts like a hot knife through butter. He puts his hand on her back, "Breathe, Y/N."

"Maybe this a bad idea, Rhodey. I mean they have Sam. I think Sam can handle this." She stumbles over her words, trying to calm herself down. Her heart was racing a hundred miles a minute and she swore her hands were shaking,

"You're going to be okay, but you need to relax. I've read and reread your speech a dozen times. It's perfect." Rhodey tries to soothe her, his hand rubbing her back. Y/N squeezes her eyes shut, working on slowing her breathing. In through her nose and out through her mouth.

"Hey pretty lady, I was wondering where the exhibit is. I'm supposed to be giving a speech there today." A voice calls out, sending Y/N's eyes flying open. She turns on her heels, being greeted by the sight of Sam walking towards them, holding the leather case that carries the shield. Y/N can feel the tension melting out of her shoulders as a smile spreads across her nervous face.

"Rhodey, I think they might be letting anyone speak here today." Y/N teases, the anxiousness slipping away, releasing its hold on her. Rhodey chuckles, shaking his head at his friend's antics. She hadn't seen Sam since the days following Steve's funeral and right now, he's a welcome sight. Sam rests his hand over his heart, feigning hurt as he gets closer.

"You wound me, woman." Sam jokes, smiling right back at her. They embrace, her arms wrapping around his neck as his go around her waist, "I missed you, kid."

"I've missed you too, Sammy." She murmurs back, squeezing her eyes shut for a moment. They pull away and Sam smiles at her, the skin around his eyes wrinkling. Rhodey clears his throat, gently touching Y/N's upper arm.

"Hey I need to go talk to some people, alright?" Rhodey announces, almost as if he is asking permission. Y/N just smiles and nods, the smile staying on her face until he walks away from the two.

"How are you feeling, Y/N?" Sam questions, to which Y/N sighs, looking down at her shoes.  She stays quiet for a moment, feeling his eyes on her.

"You want the truth or you want me to tell you what I tell Rhodey?" She replies, looking back at him. Y/N shifts from one foot to another, glad they were far from the crowd that was gathering. He gives her a look, giving her an answer without opening his mouth. She sighs again, twisting her wedding ring around her finger.

"I don't sleep, not really. I get maybe an hour a night if I am lucky. I-The house is filled with boxes that I can't unpack because-" Her voice cracks, her chest rising and falling quickly. She bites the inside of her cheek, forcing herself to not cry, "I thought that leaving the apartment would make him go away, but it didn't."

"Well Steve was always stubborn." Sam responds, making a laugh bubble out of her throat before she could stop it. There was an "I'm sorry" buried in the joke and Y/N knew it, but decided to only focus on the joke.

-

The stage looked daunting.

She forced herself up those steps, the person who had introduced her still had his hand outstretched towards her. Y/N wondered if she could make a run for it. Sure people will be mad at her, but she won't be forcing herself through this. Everything seemed to be moving in slow motion, the clapping nothing but a ringing in her ears. For a moment, her eyes landed on the giant banner of her husband, a lump forming in her throat. He was watching over her, his face emotionless as his eyes seemingly followed her every step. Cameras flashed as she stood on the stage, striding over to the podium. Once she stood in front of it, a hush fell over the crowd.

Y/N Rogers had saved thousands of lives. She was an Avenger and had faced countless foes. Hell, her wedding had more people in attendance than this event, but she still felt sick to her stomach. Y/N gave them all a smile as she forced herself to calm down, swallowing hard before speaking.

"To say that Steve Rogers was a special man is putting lightly. He was a hero that many of us, myself included, aspired to be one day. And while many of you only knew him as Captain America, I was among the lucky few that got to know him just as Steve Rogers. Now I could stand up here and tell you about every battle he won, how valiantly he fought-but everyone else is going to do that. Hell, you can read about it in the exhibit." Y/N chuckles, blinking away the tears in her eyes as the crowd laughs.

Y/N finds Rhodey and Sam in the crowd, both of them giving her smiles of encouragement. Out of the corner of her eye, she can see the diamond on her wedding ring sparkling in the light. It's the first time she's worn it in a while, but it felt almost right to wear it. Once again, she's pretending like Steve didn't leave her. No, Y/N is ignoring that completely, almost blissfully. These people only know Steve as Captain America, as a god-damned American hero. She isn't going to tarnish that, won't ruin his legacy. And regardless of what Steve did to her, she is still in love with him and she wants to talk about the man she fell in love with, not the one that hurt her. Y/N inhales and exhales shakily before continuing.

"Steve was so much more than just Captain America. He was my best friend and my husband. He was the type of man to pick up flowers for you just because. The type of man to tell you that you looked really pretty even though you were covered in dirt and ash. He would let me go on and on about things that didn't even matter, but with the way he paid attention you would think that I was telling him the secrets of the world. Steve loved staying in and having movie marathons-he-he had a list he'd carry with him to write down things he needed to learn about. Before we dated, he would text me randomly, asking me why Jar Jar Binks is hated so much or asking me to explain what emojis are. He never quite got the hang gof the latter." A laugh comes out of Y/N's mouth, the crowd following suit. There was a smile on her face, a warmth spreading in her chest.

"He's the man I'll be in love with until the day I die, but then I'll fall in love all over again because I'll be able to see him again. Steve was the sweetest, kindest man I've ever met and while I will always wish we had more time together, I was lucky to have him as long as I did. We were all lucky to have him." Y/N pauses again, her throat constricting with emotion, "Even though he's gone, Steve lived a long life-a life longer than some of us get and I am happy that so many different facets of his life is going to be explored and shared with so many people. I hope you all enjoy the exhibit. Thank you."

The applause that followed was almost thunderous. Y/N smiled as her heart slammed against her ribcage, cameras flashing as she made her way off the stage. She was glad it was finally over as she moved to stand next to Rhodey and Sam. Sam kissed her cheek before he climbed up the stairs to the stage. Rhodey rubbed her back, telling her quietly that she did great. She just nodded in response, her eyes on her friend, watching as Sam leaned the shield against the plexiglass podium.

"Thank you Y/N for making my job a lot harder." Sam teases, causing everyone to chuckle. Y/N smiles right back at him, shaking her head as her friend carries on, "Steve represented the best in all of us. Courageous, righteous, hopeful. And he mastered poising stoically. "

Sam's a natural at this, standing up there like its nothing. And while Y/N should be focused on the speech, her eyes keep drifting down to the shield at his feet.

"The world has been forever changed. A few months ago, billions of people reappeared after five years away, sending the world into turmoil. We need new heroes. Ones suited for the times we're in. Symbols...are nothing without the women and men that give them meaning. And this thing," Sam chuckles, picking up the shield, "I don't know if there's ever been a greater symbol. But it's more about the man who propped it up and he's gone. So, today we honor Steve's legacy, but also, we look to the future. So thank you, Captain America. But this belongs to you."

Y/N feels sick to her stomach as she watches Sam hand the shield off. Her chest feels tight and she-she can't be here. There's a ringing on her ears and she can't breathe. Y/N pushes through the crowd, not bothering with pleasantries as she does it. A dozen emotions rack her body, causing her hands to start to heat up. She forces it down, deep down as she walks into an empty bathroom, locking the door behind her.

Sam gave away the shield.

He gave it away.

Like it was nothing.

And she wants to scream, wants to cry, but it won't come out. Y/N won't let it, not now when she is still in public. She walks over to the sinks, her hands gripping the counter. Her eyes are rimmed with red, eyes all watery. Her red painted lips press into a thin line as she forces herself to not cry, practically glaring at her reflection. What did her therapist tell her to do? Ah yes, breath in and out. In and out.

This was all too much way too soon. She couldn't handle this. She was being bombarded with memories and emotions already and now Sam giving the shield away? She felt like she was going to lose it. A part of her felt like she was overreacting. overthinking this whole situation. And maybe she was. Y/N did that from time to time. Tony had told her she was an expert of making mountains out of molehills. Maybe Sam just didn't want to be Captain America, didn't want to shoulder that burden. That was understandable. It was a shitty, shitty job-one that Sam didn't ask for. He shouldn't be forced to take on the mantle of Captain America, not when the previous owner had tossed it away so carelessly.

Yet, the bigger part of her was incredibly upset. Angry at the fact that Sam handed off the shield to be shelved in a museum. Overwhelmed by the amount of Steve that was everywhere. Confused over the multitudes of feeling that were swarming her body.

And there was nothing she could do about any of them. She just had to grin and bear it, just like she's been doing since Steve decided he much rather spend an entire lifetime with a woman he knew for a few months. So Y/N collected herself, blinked away her tears, and left the bathroom. Her feet had a mind of their own, carrying her towards the one place she didn't want to be.

The exhibit.

Steve's image is plastered on every single surface, telling the details of every part of his life. Scrawny Steve, bootcamp Steve, darling icon of patriotism during the war Steve, frozen Steve, Battle of Manhattan Steve, cartoon Steve punching Hitler, Steve during Sokovia, Steve on the run. Steve, Steve, Steve, Steve. He covers every single square inch, which makes sense because this is his exhibit. And while Y/N knows she should just turn on her heel and not put herself through it, she throws caution to the wall. She's already incredibly upset, so she might as well pour gallons and gallons of salt and lemon juice into that open wound.  So she forces herself deeper into the exhibit, running straight into the very last man she wants to see at this moment.

"You know I wasn't expecting to find you here." Sam tells her as soon as her foot enters the next room. She keeps her mouth shut, so he adds "Rhodey is looking for you."

"You know on his right sleeve of his suits, right near his wrist, he had my initials stitched. He told me he wanted to carry a piece of me into every mission, into every fight." Y/N announces as she looks at a picture of Steve on a mission, most likely taken by Natasha. Sam sighs, walking over to her, wanting her to see his point of view.

"Look I know you're upset-" He starts, but is immediately cut off by a dry chuckle slipping out of Y/N's mouth as she walks around the room. She wants to lay in to him, wants to give him a piece of her mind.

"Oh I am far past the point of being "just upset", Wilson. It wasn't yours to give away. I-I don't care if you didn't want the mantle, but..." Her angry words trail off once she realizes what part of the exhibit she has reached, her face dropping.

Y/N stops in front of a part of the exhibit labeled 'Two Heroes United'. Her eyes roam over the pictures of her and Steve's wedding and the pictures taken throughout the duration of their relationship, so much more than what the file Rhodey had left detailed. So many smiles, so much happiness filling each and every picture. Her facade is cracking, chipping away as she forces herself to study every picture, studying their faces over and over, trying to see if there was something she had missed, if-if there was something she could have said or done to hold onto him a little longer. If there was something hidden behind his smile, behind his touches, they don't reveal themselves in the photographs.

She's just a footnote in his life, a blurb at the end of a long story. A tool to make him look like an all-American family man. Bucky and Sam had much larger parts of the exhibit dedicated to their roles in Steve's life and who they are outside of being Steve's friends. Y/N-well Y/N gets this, a paragraph saying that she was on the team and then married Steve. She is just haphazardly tacked onto the story of his life, a cute story to make people feel all warm inside. He got his happily ever after, they'll say-or they'll whisper to one another God she was so lucky to have him. They won't ask if she got her happily ever after or if she feels lucky now.

Sam got to hand off the shield, got to throw away the title of Captain America. He gets to keep on living his life after this, but Y/N-Y/N will always be Steve's wife. And it doesn't matter how many people she saved or what she did with her time on earth, she will only be know for being the wife of the man who abandoned her. Y/N's tied to him for eternity, stuck loving a man who decided to love someone else.

And then, just like that, something inside of her just snaps. Her facade fully crumbles, leaving her unable to mask what she's going through.  Y/N's eyes fill up with tears and she's unable to blink them away before they spill over the edge, sending tears rolling down her cheeks. And as she stood there, crying in the middle of the exhibit dedicated to Steven Grant Rogers, a depressing epiphany popped into her mind.

The shield was the last part of Steve that she had that wasn't tainted in some way, a piece of him that she could still bear to see. And Sam had just given it away, leaving her with nothing but memories that would haunt her.

-

"I watched your speech. You did really good, Y/N." Her therapist praises, giving her a soft smile. Y/N nods, twisting her wedding ring on her finger. She had decided to start wearing it again, even though her feelings about Steve were still conflicted. While a part of her thought that this meant she was healing, Y/N knew it was more likely tied to the fact that Sam had given up the shield.

"It-It felt good." Y/N replies, shifting in her seat. She had thought it was a subtle movement, but Dr. Raynor gave her a look. After a few months of court-ordered appointments, the therapist knew Y/N all too well and she sure as hell knew when Y/N wasn't telling the truth.

"Something is upsetting you. What happened?" The doctor questions, clicking her pen. Y/N dreaded the noise. It meant a longer session, more bandaids being ripped off in order to force the wounds into the light. It would mean she would return to her home a little colder, a little emptier.

"Nothing happened. It-I had a good day. A good week." Y/N tries to reassure her, even going as far as to give her what she thought was a honest smile. Dr. Raynor held up her pad of paper, making a show of slowly bring the pen down to the paper. Y/N's smile falls and she looks down at her hands, letting out a small sigh.

"He-Sam gave away the shield. He gave it away like it was nothing." The ex-hero announces, feeling like a scolded child. Raynor lowers her pen and paper, settling back into her seat.

"And you feel like he shouldn't have?"

"No. No, Steve-Steve chose him. Steve gave him the shield because he knew that Sam was good, that Sam could handle it. And-And Sam just gave it away." Y/N stammers, picking at a thread that was hanging off her shirt.

"You know, I think that is the first time you have said his name aloud." Raynor mentions, causing Y/N to stop her movements. The thread is caught between her fingers, pulled taut. The doctor continues, "You always refer to Steve as 'he' or 'him' or 'my husband'. You never say his name."

"I don't think I was ready to be around...Steve. Not that much." Y/N tries to shift the focus, shame filling her, her face feeling hot. She knows she has her reasons not to say his name, but she still felt terrible about not being able to say his name.

"But you still spoke at the opening of his exhibit. I'm sure everyone would more than understand why you couldn't. So why did you decide on speaking?" The therapist asks, taking down a couple notes of her pad of paper. Y/N stays silent for a moment, letting go of the thread to start twisting her ring again.

"I-I don't know. Rhodey asked me and I-I guess I thought I could do it. And the speech wasn't bad I just-I wasn't expecting Sam to give away the shield." Y/N responds, her voice soft. She feels so small, sitting here on this charcoal grey couch. Y/N almost felt...stupid for being so angry at Sam. It wasn't his fault at all and as Y/N said everything out loud, she felt like such an asshole.

"If you would've known that Sam wanted to give the shield away, would you have stopped him?" Dr. Raynor replies, leaning forward slightly as she takes a few notes. Y/N feels herself sinking into the couch.

"I don't know. I-I wish he would have just told me so that we could've talked about it." She answers, looking out of the window. Dark grey clouds filled the sky, blocking out a lot of the sunlight that wanted to shine down on the city. Y/N didn't know if she would have actually forced him to keep the shield. That wasn't on him to have hold on to hat chunk of vibranium. It was wrong for Steve to have thrown that all on Sam. What would be the alternative? For her to keep the shield? Y/N highly doubted that the United States government would allow that.

-

Y/N was watering her garden when her phone started to ring in her back pocket. She quickly moves to shut off the water hose before she slips the phone about her pocket. Sam's name and picture appears on her screen, making uneasiness fill her stomach. Y/N exhales through her noise loudly before answering it, holding the phone against her ears.

"Have you seen the news?" Sam asks, not even letting her get a single syllable out.

"No, I've been outside-What's going on, Sam?" Y/N questions, making her way to the house. Something was definitely wrong. Sam never called her unless it was for emergencies. if they did communicate, it was mainly through texting. Her heartbeat started to race, as did her thoughts. A million different scenarios filled her head, each one worse than the last.

"You need to turn on the news right now." Sam replies as she opens the back door, quickly crossing the kitchen and walking into the living room. Her hands are almost shaking as she picks up the remote, turning the television on. Luckily for her, the last thing she had been watching was the news. Unluckily for her, she was greeted with a man holding the shield-Steve's shield, dressed in what looked like an off-brand, shitty version of the Captain America suit.

Anger filled her body. It had been four days tops since Sam handled off the shield and already, they had found their 'new Captain America'. The man in question was smiling smugly in the ill-fitting suit, waving at the camera, holding onto his shield tightly. God, Y/N wanted to beat the shit of the man and every single person who had okayed this. She could only hear bits and pieces of the speech as the news replayed it, but even that bullshit was too much for her to handle. She muted the television, tossing the remote on the couch.

"Are you fucking kidding me? Are you fucking kidding me?" Y/N exclaims, her hands getting warm. The Avenger was unable to get to anything articulate as rage filled her. She quickly put the phone on speaker, setting the device down just in case her hands caught flame.

"I know. I know. It's fucking bullshit." Sam replies, sighing. Y/N paced in front of the television, trying to calm herself down before she burned a hole through her rug. On the screen, the fake Cap was talking about something, a saccharine smile spread across his face. Y/N wanted to take that God damn shield and smash his teeth in.

"That asshole has my husband's fucking shield. They-He isn't supposed to be Captain America, okay? It's just not-It's not theirs to give away." Y/N's voice cracks towards the end, tears filling her eyes. While she wasn't Steve's number one fan, she hated that they had already chose someone to take up his title. If Sam wasn't going to be Captain America, then no one should be Captain America.

"I'm sorry, Y/N. I wouldn't have given away the shield if I would've known...I'm sorry." Sam murmurs over the phone. Y/N covers her face with her almost glowing hands as she tries to control her breathing, not able to respond to Sam’s apologies. Her sadness and anger quickly shifted into something else. 

Something inside of her switched on, something that she hadn't felt in a long time, not since she was a hero, back when she was an Avenger.

Y/N wanted to go to work.

------

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[stellar-imagines]

NSFW SCENARIO REQUEST: ❝jealousy bloomed.❞

[ Fandom: Boku no Hero Academia ] [ Characters: Bakugou Katsuki ]

「Scenario where Bakugou and you are dating, but no one knows. You’re quite the popular girl in UA, a lot of boys hit on her and lust over her. It didn’t take long for Bakugou to get pissed off. And he eventually drags you to remind you who you belong to.」

BAKUGOU KATSUKI

Bakugou, surprisingly, didn't want to brag to anyone about the fact that he managed to get a girlfriend. It didn't really bother you at all but it was shocking when he said he wanted to keep quiet about it. He didn't want people asking a lot of questions regarding your relationship. So, you both kept it a secret and it was actually kind of thrilling in a way. Quick kisses after training where you and Bakugou would purposely stay back a bit longer to meet up with one another. On the weekends, you'd both coincidentally go out, making an excuse that you were going to buy something or whatnot. But it only ends up with the two of you going on dates.

No one knows that you're both dating and Bakugou intends to keep it that way. However, it annoyed him that you're quite popular among the males in UA. This guy knows that you're a nice person who talks with people with a smile and always sees the good in people. To top it all off, you were pretty and there were people who actually looks up to you. As a third year student, you had built up quite the reputation, earning admirers from female students and male students. But Bakugou was very unhappy at one specific thing.

"[First Name]-senpai is quite pretty.”

He has heard people complimenting you for your looks and personality. At first, he was pretty smug about it, knowing that the two of you are dating and that those extras will only be able to admire you from afar. But these days, guys are very open with their emotions and don’t seem to care what others think. Bakugou was waiting for you in front of class with plans on training together with you in one of the unused gym. He spotted you in the hallway, a guy standing in your way and attempting to start. The ash blonde narrowed his eyes at the nameless guy.

"Are you sure you don't have a boyfriend, doll?" one of the guys asked.

Bakugou felt his eyebrow twitch. Over the years, he had really mellowed down and he was no longer as the guy who yelled at the littlest things anymore. However, he was known for his intimidating looks and the fits of anger he had occasionally. The ash blonde has gotten better with handling his temper and honestly, he thanks you for that. If he was the same person back then, he would've grabbed the guy by his neck, yelling profanities and threatening to kill him.

"You look really hot in those thigh highs, it shows off your legs."

"Yes, thanks I guess?" you find yourself responding. It happens all the time and you seem to be used to it. Bakugou knows that you're loyal to him and that you have for only him. The guy knows that you'll handle it somehow on your own, after all, he has full faith on you. But it just pisses him off. He wants to run over to beat the shit out of them for talking to you like that.

"Sorry, Katsuki. Thanks for waiting." you skipped over to the blonde who looked irritated. Bakugou was glaring at the two males who were flirting with you. Gazing at him with a confused look on your face, you slowly grasped his hand to gain his attention.

”Is there anything wrong?” you asked him. Bakugou shakes his head furiously. The last thing he wanted was to appear like some annoying, overbearing and childish boyfriend. He had the tough guy image to keep around you.

”Nothing.”

Surprisingly, Bakugou doesn't really express when he’s jealous or not. You were aware of how popular you are in school and it was thanks to the UA School Festival where you were unwillingly signed up for the Beauty Contest. Thanks to that, you earned quite a lot of fans.

Honestly, he gets jealous whenever people hit on you but always forces himself to hold back. There was no reason for him to get jealous, not when you’re always giving him that lovestruck look in your eyes and kissing his cheek whenever you find the chance. Bakugou stared at you while you had your attention on the manga in hand. He studies your features, the way your eyes widen at a sudden turn of events and how you pressed your lips when something interesting happens. It was just so cute. Bakugou found himself pressing your lips with his index finger which earned a confused look from you.

”What’s wrong, Tsuki?” you questioned when he moved to lay down on the bed.

”Nothing at all.” he mutters, cheeks bright red. Its not fair that just from hearing you call him with an endearing he can turn into a blushing mess. He hears you close your book and felt you moving around. Just as he was about to get up, you laid right on top of him, resting your head on his chest.

”Sorry that I haven’t been giving you attention. Are you upset?” you asked innocently.

Bakugou released the breath that he didn’t realize he had been holding in. Now he felt like an idiot for being jealous and angry at the people flirting at you. The male sighed, running his hand through your hair before wrapping his arms around your body. The last straw was what happened today.

You remembered that the weather was exceptionally nice and commented on how it was the perfect weather to go on a date. Bakugou rolled his eyes in response and told you that he's not taking you on one. A laugh escaped your lips when he said that, you told him that it was a joke. Although, it would be nice to go on a date with your boyfriend. But you were both busy with school and all that. The ash blonde seemed to be pointing fingers at you though. He said that since you were whining about going on a date, he would take you to your favorite ramen shop later to shut you up. You giggled, knowing that he was just making excuses to take you out. After all, you never whined about anything.

Uraraka and Ashido greeted you by the school entrance. Both you and Bakugou joined the two girls and headed to your respective shoe boxes to retrieve your indoor shoes. When you opened the small door, you spotted a light blue colored letter sitting atop your shoes. It didn't even take you long to realize what this meant. While the girls teased you for such a popular girl, Bakugou seemed displeased by this. No one knew about your relationship with Bakugou and only assumed that you two were close friends. You mentioned that you wanted to buy a drink right after this and waved at the girls who decided to go on ahead.

"Another shitty love letter?" you heard your boyfriend's voice behind you.

"Come on, its not shitty. It takes a lot of courage to write something like this you know." you smiled gently at the boy who followed you the entire way to the vending machine at the end of the corridor.

"Look, I'm gonna turn them down nicely at the back of the school and we can eat ramen afterwards." you fiddled around with your coin pouch and bought a drink from the machine while the male leaned against the wall with an annoyed look on his face. He really didn't like how popular you were with guys and to this day, he's kind of surprised that you wanted to be his girlfriend. Of course he wasn't complaining at all. Besides, dating in secret is quite fun in a way. Bakugou was snapped out of his trance when he felt you peck his cheek.

"Don't be so pouty, Tsuki. Wait for me after school okay?" you smiled before skipping ahead.

Bakugou found himself waiting nearby. He was tapping his foot while looking through his phone. You had left earlier, telling him that you would meet up with him as soon as possible. He has spotted you walking to the back of the school and quietly followed you without you knowing. With his back against the concrete wall and his bag placed on the ground, he pretended to look busy but in reality, he was trying to listen to the conversation between you and this extra. Though it annoyed him how this extra is dragging on his confession, he was somewhat glad that he had decided to wait nearby.

"Go out with me, [Last Name]-senpai.”

This guy pissed him off, alright.

"Thank you, I really appreciate your feelings but sorry, I don't feel the same way as you do." It was almost like you were an actress from a drama. The line sounded like you have practiced it over and over. And honestly, it was the same response you would give to the people who confessed to you.

”Are you perhaps dating anyone right now?” he asked further.

”Eh? No but—“

”Then think about it. I’ll cherish you properly. After all, someone as pretty as you should be treated like a princess.” the guy added, which made you awkwardly laugh in response. When he started moving closer to you, the first instinct was to back away. The moment your back hits the wall, you mentally scolded yourself for telling Bakugou to wait for you elsewhere. Honestly, the chances of you having to deal with a persistent person like this is very low. But you should've considered the possibility.

”If you date me, I'll treat you right. I've experienced a lot of things, you see." he lightly grabbed your chin to make you turn to him. When you felt his arm around your waist, you instantly knew that it was time for you to make your leave.

"Well—“

"Hey."

The voice itself made you and the guy shudder. Honestly, you were supposed to feel relieved that Bakugou came by to actually save you from this predicament. However, just from the tone of his voice and the look in his eyes, you could tell that you were probably in trouble as well. Your class has gained quite the reputation and everyone seems to know Bakugou as the cool and intimidating third year student. Even for Bakugou who has started to control his anger better than before, he lost his patience the moment that extra put his hands on you.

"You're 100 years too fucking early to be asking her out." Bakugou said, grabbing your wrist and dragging you away.

You felt stupid for actually believing that he would keep silent and remain calm. Honestly, you were quite surprised that he lasted this long. A relieved sigh left your lips when you finally left the scene and rejoined with your boyfriend. The odd silence between the two of you somehow made you uneasy. It was supposed to be something that you often did but this was completely different. Bakugou ignored the greetings from your fellow classmates who were relaxing in the common area and you made up some dumb excuse about needing to study together or whatnot.

"Tsuki?" 

��That fucking extra had the nerve to touch you.” Bakugou’s voice was right in your ear which made you shudder. His voice was low and it wasn’t hard to hear that he was really pissed. 

Before you could even say anything, he kissed you. He was quite rough with it too. You weren’t given a chance to match his rough and unbelievably fast pace. It felt like you were going to melt from how good it felt. His tongue was dominating your mouth, forcing its way into your mouth aggressively. Your hands threaded themselves into his hair, tugging lightly as you moaned into his mouth. The instant Bakugou pulled away, his lips instantly attached themselves to your neck.

He growled, his teeth nipping at the flesh of your neck. You gasped in response, losing yourself in the feeling of his mouth attacking your neck. At the same time, his hands made quick work of your uniform, unbuttoning the buttons expertly and took off your clothes. His hands trailed up, running up your skin to grope your breasts. The sudden attack made you weak on the knees and when his hands pulled away, you were in a daze. You never knew you craved for his touch and you could imagine and feel the lewd things he would do to you — having his fingers thrusting into your cunt while he licks at your clit, making you beg shamelessly for him to fuck you with his cock which will result with him fucking you so roughly that will leave your muscles sore for a few days.

”Your ears are sensitive right?” he pulled your earlobe with his teeth while his hands wandered around your body, groping at your flesh lewdly.

”Down here too.” he smirked devilishly while rubbing his fingers against the crotch of your damp panties. The mewl that left your lips didn’t go unnoticed and Bakugou wasted no time ridding you of your skirt and panties. Just one step backwards had you pinned up against the door with your boyfriend towering over you as if to assert his dominance. 

"You're already this wet. I know that you like it rough."

He slid his fingers down your thighs, spreading your legs apart slowly to expose your glistening folds to him. He let his fingers ghost over your lower lips, spreading them slighting before you slid one finger inside. It was enough for you to shudder and moan. He started with one finger before adding another one into the fray. Your head knocked against the door and you allowed yourself to moan. Thrusting two fingers inside your cunt, Bakugou set a fast pace that had you twitching and moaning in pleasure. You held onto his shoulders for dear life, legs shaking and panting heavily.

”K-Katsuki.....” your face was red as a tomato and your head was spinning. 

"You're already dripping here. My fingers feel good don't they?" without having to look at him, you could already see that smug grin on his face.

You had your eyes screwed shut when Bakugou decided to step up his game. He let out a low growl before flicking his tongue over your clit and your folds, making your hips raise as a loud moan leave you. He can’t help but let himself drown in your melody, the cries of his name and unfathomable pleasure were music to his ears. He allows you to thrust against his face which effectively pushes more of his tongue inside your velvety walls. The contrast you felt from your back pressed against the cool door and the heat between your thighs was such a pleasurable feeling. 

“Hm, you’re making such cute noises. Does my fingers feel that good inside your cunt?" he teased, pushing his fingers all the way in until it hit that one particular spot inside you.

"Ah! Haa.....Wa-Wait! I'm going to come already......" the lewd squelching that resulted from his fingers pushing in and out of your pussy made you even more embarrassed. Bakugou watched in delight as you began squirming, nails digging onto the flesh of his shoulders while his tongue moved sinfully against your clit. 

Your back arches up towards him and your hips quiver in pleasure as he continues to finger you through your climax. Cries of his name echoed in the room and you were certain that anyone within the vicinity could hear your cries. While you came down from your high, Bakugou stood up and began to unfasten his pants. You gasped when you felt his hard cock pressed against your skin and his lips on your ear, nipping at the lobe.

"My fingers are soaked, you came so much, did it feel that good?" his fingers were evidently soaked in your essence and at that moment, you thought to yourself — was is that necessary to show you that?

“You’re gonna take responsibility for making me hard aren’t ya, princess?” he growled into your ear, teeth tugging at the lobe lightly. You hummed and gave a nod in response, not trusting your voice.

Bakugou looked down at where you were kneeling on the floor between his spread thighs. His pants were unbuttoned with his cock out, his large hand wrapped around the base of his thick length as he leisurely stroked himself. Precum dripped from the tip, down the shaft to meet his hand. Your eyes followed it, subconsciously licking your lips at the thought of having the taste of him on your tongue. Bakugou groaned at the sight of you, grabbing hold of his shaft and licking at the tip like a kitten.

“Such a good girl." he threaded his fingers through your hair and tugged you closer, urging you to take more of him into your mouth.

You took his cock into your mouth without any complaints, choking when you A low groan erupted from his throat at the sensation of your warm mouth enveloping his length. Your eyes fluttered back into your skull as you finally tasted him. You set a pace not too fast yet not too slow, making sure to not let your teeth hit him. It wasn't a comfortable position with your knees against the cold laminated floor. You took much as you could, a little more than half of his length and your hand made up for whatever you couldn't fit in your mouth. It didn't take you long to relax and take his entire length inside your mouth, bobbing your head slowly before taking it out.

Bakugou threw his head back when your tongue licked up the underside of his dick while fondling his balls. He looked down to see you peering up at him with those lust filled eyes that drove him absolutely insane. He grabbed onto your hair tighter and guided your mouth back onto his aching cock. You set a slow pace at first but it didn't last long when he began to buck his hips into your mouth. His thrusts grew more desperate and it didn't take long for him to take the reigns over this situation. He pushed your head further onto his cock until the tip hit the back of your throat. 

"Fuck your mouth feels so damn good. You're taking it so damn deep." Just before he could let loose into your mouth, he was tearing you away from his cock. A loud popping sound emitted as you released him from your mouth. You felt dizzy, whether it was from being deprived from air or from the pleasure he had given you — it was hard to tell. 

With constant training, Bakugou became strong and he was able to effortlessly pick you up. You were starting to gain feeling in your legs despite having such an intense orgasm earlier. He captured your lips into a kiss while his hands gripped onto the back of your thighs. You were backed onto the wall, chests pressed together as your tongue danced. You instinctively wrapped your arms around his neck to pull him deeper into the kiss. He had his left hand against the door while his other was around his cock which was prodding against your soaked entrance. He filled you slowly using his free hand to guide you down his length.

"F-Fuck, you feel so tight around me...." Bakugou bucked his hips, letting out a groan at the feeling of your pussy walls fluttering around his cock.

"Aaaah! It's deep inside....!" you moaned loudly when he was buried all the way to the hilt. Tears pricked at the corners of your eyes at the sensation of being so full. Bakugou grabbed your ass and began thrusting into you feverishly. He latched himself onto your neck, biting down hard and sucking on your skin to leave a mark. He had his eyes glued on your face the entire, watching as you slowly lose into the world of pleasure. Your cheeks were red, eyes unfocused and your mouth was hanging open, moans and pants spilling out from them. It was truly a sight worth a billion yen.

"Just a little bit more. Hold onto me properly." he buried his head onto your neck and pushed in deeper. All you could hear was your own moans, his groans and the sinful noise of your skin slapping. You heed his advice, digging your nails onto his shoulder hard enough to leave marks. Narrowing his eyes, Bakugou thrusts faster while you throw your head back against the door.

"Wait! It's too fast! Aaah, Katsuki.....Hyaaaah!" your entire body shuddered at the feeling of his cock throbbing deep inside you.

"Feels fucking good right....Mnmm, you're all hot and tight just for me. Those extras who're always lusting over you will never get to see you like this. Tell me, baby. Who do you belong to?" Bakugou's gaze was like fire and if you gazed at him for a long period of time, you'd surely burn.

"Yours, Katsuki.....I'm.....Aaaah.....all yours!"

"Good girl." he whispered, capturing your lips into a searing kiss. Your moans were muffled and you couldn't imagine how loud it would've been. Just thinking about it made you feel embarrassed so you quickly shook away the thought.

The feeling of his hips snapping against yours and his cock pushing into your cunt repeatedly was starting to become unbearable. The knot inside your stomach finally snapped and you scream out his name one last time while Bakugou let out a groan of your name. Bakugou felt your insides clench around him tightly, twitching and pulsating like crazy as your fluids began to coat his hard cock. He hissed through clenched teeth, pulling out from you as he came all over your stomach.

You let out a sigh as you finally came down from your high. Bakugou slowly lowered you back to your feet only for you to slide down against the door, your legs completely weak and feeling like jelly. You heard the sound of water running and you assumed that he was cleaning himself up in the bathroom. He returned wearing a new set of clothes and a damp towel which he placed at the bedside before walking over to you. With a small glare, you moved your thighs together, pressing them up in an attempt to cover yourself up.

"Thanks to you I can't even get up." you grumbled with an annoyed look on your face. If this was your attempt to be mad at him, you gotta do better than that because this guy thinks that you're being fucking adorable with that pout on your face.

"Feels too good that you can't even feel your legs, huh?"

"Stop making fun off me and help me up." you huffed, outstretching your hands for him to pull you up.

Bakugou picked you up and put you on his bed. On the side of the table, there was a towel which he picked up before sitting in front of you. He took responsibility of cleaning you up with the towel while you laid down on his bed in exhaustion. You sighed and rolled around in the bed, it would be nice if you could just fall asleep right there without worrying about anything. But alas, you were interrupted by the sound of your stomach growling. It took you a while to remember that you both didn't eat anything when you got home. Bakugou glanced at the clock to see that it was past dinner time. 

The two of you decided to head to the kitchen to get something to eat. Much to your surprise, a lot of people are still around but the moment you arrived, they were staring at you both. There was Midoriya and Jirou who was doing everything they could do to avoid looking at you. Upon closer inspection, you noted that their cheeks were slightly red.

"What are you idiots staring at?" Bakugou narrowed his eyes at the closest person which happened to be Kaminari.

"Well! We didn't mean to! I mean, it is by accident so we did nothing wrong right? It's an accident!" Kaminari was avoiding Bakugou's gaze, in fear of being yelled at for saying stupid things — which happened quite often.

"You guys weren't exactly......quiet." Kirishima rubbed the back of his head.

"I'm surprised you could do something like that with people around." Sero muttered.

"But we were at the 4th floor?! Was I that loud?" you cried out, burying your face into Bakugou's back in embarrassment.

Total: 4102 words Published: 17.08.2020

Thank you for requesting! ｡٩(ˊᗜˋ)و*｡ As you all can see, we got carried away. It’s been a while since we actually wrote a smutty scenario for our lovely readers. So it’s a bit rusty. But we do hope you all enjoyed it! ― author Lou

Thank you for requesting!  It’s already mid-August and its just a day away from the day we will reopen out ask box. We’ve actually updated our blog, changed our theme and all that. The new features can only be seen through desktop. We do hope that these features (upcoming events, status) actually help everyone somehow!― author Natsuki

Requests are closed for now! Matchups are closed!

Please do not mind the grammar mistakes and typos.

[lnterjection]

Sleepy Bois Inc and DSMP Fanfic Recs

Uhhh I realized I have a ton of stuff in my bookmarks list and might as well compile a list of favorites because I’m always looking for good fanfics, and this might help some people. Most of these are SBI, though a few focus on things other than their dynamic with each other. Nothing explicit here. Feel free to suggest more recs. 

Fics set in DSMP universe/about DSMP (One-shots first, then longer fics):

One-shots and series of one-shots-

therein lies the madness by sapphicist - 2095 words. Currently says it’s one chapter out of three complete, but can be read as a standalone one-shot. Nice introspective fic on Tommy’s exile and his parallels with Theseus. In 2nd person, but it’s actually done nicely. Mostly angsty, can have hopeful interpretation depending on how you look at it. 

crazy how life goes on without me (2090 words, one-shot) by itisjosh - What if Ghostbur did remember everything, and just pretended to be clueless and vapid? Made me cry. It’s so good. Tortured my heart. 

the inner mechanism of a black box (13521 words, one-shot) by Bee_4 - only work of a series called “system theory”. “Technoblade lets himself get imprisoned for Philza’s sake. He doesn’t plan on being there long. Unfortunately, he’s underestimated Pandora’s Vault. There are things that will make even the Blade fall apart in due time, as it turns out.” Yeah so Techno’s mental health goes out the window in this one and its written brilliantly. There’s comfort at the end, if it helps? 

A State For One Man Is No State At All (5247 words, two-shot) by angstfortheangstgod - “A different version of the festival, in which Dream shows up unarmed, the Community House is left intact, a traitor is executed, and Tommy doesn't betray Technoblade.” Ranboo centric. Angst and comfort. 

All the Kings Men series by MollyPollyKinz - “After Ghostbur's suggestion to do Lads on Tour, Tommy finds himself reunited with his family. However, escaping from Dream is going to be harder than anyone previously thought.” A connected series of one-shots and short fics about Tommy, his exile, his family, and escaping Dream. Well written, good characterization, great studies into the characters themselves.

ad astra per aspera series by cacowhistle - Collection of one-shots that start with Tommy’s exile and expand to be about SBI and their dynamic with each other, including a resurrected Wilbur. Really, really well written and probably my favorite of the “Tommy exile fic groups”. 

the fall of a hero series by cracklesnaple - “After being threatened with being exiled yet again, Tommy takes the decision into his own hands. If those around him can't see that he's given up everything to make this nation what it is, then he's not sure he can stay in L'Manburg any longer.” Series about SBI and mainly Tommy, eventually crossing over into Mianite territory in a way some might enjoy and some might now. Writing’s good, though, which is what I care about.

Longer fics-

Rewind (101002 words, 25 chapters, unfinished, last updated Jan 17 2021) by Anonymous - Best time travel fix-it fic I’ve ever read period. Tubbo and Tommy travel 10 years back from a very messed up future to the first L’Manberg election. Concept may seen a bit weird at first but trust me, holy fuck this is amazing. 

second chances (hurt the most) (8841 words, 4 chapters, unfinished, last updated Jan 17 2021) by Anonymous - “Wilbur wakes up alone in a bloody room, and has to come to terms with living again. (How can he go on, knowing who's blood is on his hands?)”. Amazing fic where resurrection requires someone else’s life as sacrifice. Phil is dead. Wilbur struggles to come to terms with his father’s decision, and his second chance. 

all scotch, no soda (47466 words, 43 chapters, unfinished, last updated Jan 14 2021) by fishstixx - “Vulnerability meant trust, though, and trust was a thing not so easily given. Post-exile and canon divergent, follows the consequences of Tommy’s isolation. Expect chases, heists, bloodshed, and the mending of a family.” Features raccon hybrid Tommy being badass, and I live for it. I really, really love this one. 

DON’T FORGET THAT ICARUS FLEW. (16426 words, 6/10 chapters, last updated Jan 1. 2021) by orpheusaki - “The day before and the days that follow Tommy's exile; told through the eyes of The Blood God.” Techno (and Dream) is a god, and gods often forget how the intricacies of the minds of mortals. He’s trying to get better, however. 

what do you fall for? (16374 words, complete) by tablrcloth - Ranboo centric fic with Techno, Phil and Tommy. Ranboo realizes that playing L’Manberg’s politics is less than ideal for him. What can I say, it’s just really good. 

Breathing’s Just a Rhythm (12631 words, 6 chapters, unfinished, last updated Jan 17 2021) by MollyPollyKinz - “Tommy, Tubbo, Jschlatt, and Dream all end up in the past. (Oh, and the Chat comes too).” Great time travel fic. 

What World Have We Inherited? (73635 words, 12 chapters, unfinished and last updated on Dec 22 2020) by Anonymous (this one has a series with all their works, and they’re all AMAZING). Holy fuck this one is probably one of my favorite fics in the fandom so far. “Wilbur blows everything to hell on the day of the Manburg festival, just like he wanted. When the ashes settle, it's just Tommy and Technoblade. It's not good, but it's better than nothing. It's just them, healing up in a world that never wanted them.” Amazing characterization, worldbuilding, everyone’s internal thoughts are portrayed and written so well. Even if it never updates again I would keep coming back to it. I rec this Anon’s works so much. 

In June, I Changed My Tune (29489 words, 6 chapters, unfinished and last updated on Jan 6 2021) by KryOnBlock - Eret runs away and eventually becomes friends with Techno. Nice cottagecore aesthetic. I have mixed feelings about this one - the writing’s good, descriptions and characterizations are really good. Just that there’s consistent punctuation mistakes and it takes me out of the world a bit. Everything else is good enough for me to continue reading, however. 

stay with him (24353 words, 12 chapters, unfinished, last updated Jan 9 2021) by junipersand - I especially rec the first chapter, which can be read (and originally was) a standalone fic with the summary “Every ghost had a purpose to fulfill. So what was Tommy’s?” Utterly heartwrenching, probably the most emotionally gut-punching bit of writing I’ve ever read in this fandom. It continues with other lore stuff afterwards that eventually branch off from just SBI and Tommy, but man. I don’t think I can ever forget that first chapter. 

I’m not angry at you, well, sometimes I am (52801 words, 16 chapters, unfinished, last updated Jan 14 2021) by sircantus - After Tommy is exiled, he runs away to Techno’s house instead of going off with Dream. SBI decide some revenge and “world domination” is in order. 

Fics set in AUs outside DSMP happenings:

One-shots and series of one-shots-

Empty Crowns AU by UnderUrsa - the SBI + Tubbo are gods, and a family. Series of one-shots. Nicely written, what can I say? Some angst, some fluff.

Secure, Contain, Protect AU by blue000jay - Amazingly written SCP AU. Knowledge of the SCP universe would help with understanding some more meta things, but is not needed to understand most of it. Some angst, disturbing themes around memories but nothing terribly gory.

CLASSIFIEDS. (13804 words, finished). SCP pages on SBI, short stories and audio transcriptions as well as files, lots of good lorebuilding here. Features an escape, + Tubbo!

CONFIDENTIALS. (13232 words, finished). Centers on Dream Team.

ARCHIVES. (1270 words, one-shot). What happened after SBI and Tubbo’s escape from the SCP foundation.

old gods (new gods) AU by WriterWinged - the relatively well known SBI gods AU. Amazingly written, great character interpretations. 

the gods are cruel (none crueler then you) (1394 words, one-shot) - As much the grammatical mistake in the title hurts me it’s no doubt one of the best pieces of work in the fandom. 

and yet they find kindness (and so do you) (2/4 chapters posted) - continuation of “the gods are cruel”. 

there’s a risk to the world (but the kindest are strongest) (2/3 chapters posted) - continuation of “the gods are cruel”. 

SBI Antarctic Princes AU by ScripWriter -  One of several Antarctic Empire AUs, this one just has these two preliminary one-shots but they’re nice bits of fun and neatly written. All fluff and mild hurt with lots of comfort so far. 

Younger Holding On Another (1781 words, one-shot). Techno is a good brother and reassures and newly adopted Tommy. 

But Oh, Don’t You Know How It Goes (2511 words. one-shot). Tommy, Techno, and Wilbur have some “fun” at a boring gala. Phil is very exasperated. 

Antarctic Princes ‘verse AU by BirchWrites - AU where Techno, Tommy, and Wilbur are princes of the Antarctic Empire (well, Techno’s technically the emperor now), but this time the events of DSMP still happen (at least up to the 1st season).

Homeward bound for the arctic ground (10562 words, one-shot). Wilbur and Tommy travel to the Antarctic Empire in person to ask Techno for help in fighting Schlatt. Good worldbuilding and acknowledges Wilbur’s beginnings of insanity while still being rather light.

Surprise Hugs (2542 words, one-shot). Dream doesn’t realize Tommy is Techno’s brother and thinks he’s going to get killed for tackling the infamous Blood God.

Family Reunions (1396 words, one-shot). Fundy never realized he’s loyalty and Techno informs him unexpectedly.

Longer fics-

leave me your starlight (14620 words, 4 chapters, unfinished and last updated Jan 11 2021) by findingkairos - “Once upon a time, Philza Minecraft is the only person who does not shy away from the bloody teen that regularly turns the tide of war. This cements a friendship that will last wars, empires, worlds, and lifetimes.“ Amazing backstory fic on Phil and Techno’s relationships, one of my absolute personal favorites. Very well written and really digs into the intricacies of Techno’s character (or an interpretation of it, but hey, that’s what all fanfiction is).

I was a kid in a village, doing alright, then I became a prince overnight (21736 words, 5 chapters, last updated Jan 13 2021) by sircantus - another Antarctic princes AU, this time centering on 16 year old Tommy catching the attention of Phil, Techno, and Wilbur after thwarting an assassination attempt. Really well written. Actually, I rec all of sircantus’ SBI stuff because they do amazing work.

antarctic adage (26591 words, 4/7 chapters posted, last updated Jan 13 2021) by blue000jay - Another very well written Antarctic princes AU with Emperor/ruler Phil. Are we seeing a pattern yet? blue000jay is another writer I’d rec, with really great SBI stuff.

a renewal of faith, and of family (56684 words, 31 chapters, unfinished, last updated Jan 13 2021) by SolivangantStories - One of the only fics here that doesn’t feature SBI, this one is Tubbo and Dream centered. Basically, the DSMP!Tubbo is executed by Schlatt and wakes up in a world where Manhunt!Dream is trying not to die and is also actually a nice person, to Tubbo’s surprise and confusion. Not SBI and technically not even DSMP, but it’s really good so I’ve decided to rec it anyway.

[achliegh]

Bronze

Alright, I had this wonderful idea come into my head about Clayton, honestly he deserves his own fic. So here is his version of events! Lots will tie together with Golden so I recommend you read that as well. But you don’t have to of course.

Explaining:

Before Letter is the present.

Letter is updating the lives of the people back home, of whoever wrote it mostly.

After Letter is memory.

The first few letters will be very awkward because writing letters and not being sure what to talk about and what not to talk about is hard and confusing. Stick with me! Yes, this prologue is just a letter.

TW/CW: Discussions of death, miliatry training, smut, cringy jokes, underage drinking, dumb choices, swearing, hospitals, injuries and death caused by someone close, domestic abuse, blood, unfair treatment from police, false alligations.

Beta: @walking-crisis

Some Characters belong to @lumosinlove

Chapter 4:

Survivors Guilt

Whiskey Lullaby

“Can you at least tell me what happened?” Clay was getting restless, he has noticed a few odd things since he has woken up.

No higher up has come to see how he is doing.

No doctors or nurses have come to check on him while he is awake.

His guy, Grev, is always in the room. Sitting in the same chair. Looking at the same book or newspaper.

It made him think about his training, maybe he was a POW and didn’t even notice.

“I can tell you what happened if you think you can handle it.” Grev looks up from his newspaper with a playful look. Clay rolls his eyes.

“I think I can handle it.” He looks down at his hands and mentally prepares himself for something terrible. Being in a hospital reminds him of his ex when she threw shit at him after he broke up with her.

“You know your friend, Bryan? Well, it turns out he was struggling with an undiagnosed mental illness, the pressure of the job and the conditions you were living in caused it to increase in its severity.” He pauses and folds his newspaper over his arm to look Clay directly in the eyes. “He was convinced he was the next target for the mission and decided to take out your whole team. Execution style. There were no survivors.” The music in the background coming from an unknown source sunk into his body.

“Whoa… I-” Clay feels guilt just filling up his body from his toes to his chest like tar, dragging him down.

He was the only one who survived.

Clay,

Ifuckingmissyou,youfuckingdickhead!IhateyouIhateyouIhateyou!

Please come home…

Please.

Love, Reg

Ashley gets in the truck and gives Clay a sweet kiss on the cheek, catching him by surprise. She was in a good mood, but he knew it wouldn’t last long after they had a talk. He really hoped she wouldn’t somehow convince him into sex after the talk but knowing her she fucking would. He just turned the radio up to keep her from talking about anything.

Pulling into his driveway he was getting sweaty. He was nervous. He should have done this in public. He knew she would lash out but he really wanted this to be just between them. Walking into the house he feels her arms wrap around his waist and she nibbles on his neck. He gently gets out of her grip and turns around to look at her. Thanking the good lord that his parents were gone. The radio in the kitchen was on the same station as it was in his truck.

She is looking at him like he is insane. She may be skinnier and not as built as clay but he knows she has some power behind her words… and a good throwing arm.

“Ash-” She cuts him off by pulling him into a rough kiss, again grabbing her shoulders he pulls away and keeps her at arms length away. “Can you let me say what I need to say?!” He huffs annoyed.

She rolls her eyes and crosses her arms, then gives him a ‘get on with it’ motion with one of her hands. He lets go of her shoulders and takes a deep breath. Before he can even get a word out she interrupts him.

“I knew you weren’t manly but… all this ‘I want to talk about my feelings’ shit is getting annoying.” She examines her nails and shifts so she is slouching, leaning onto one of her hips. “Get on with it!” She snaps at him.

“I want to break up.” He speaks fast and jumbled but knows she got the message from how her face goes through many different emotions. Shock, confusion, thinking, to anger.

“EXCUSE ME! You.” She gestures up and down at him and takes a step forward. “Want to break up… with ME.” She gestures to herself. Laughing annoyed she puts her arms to her sides and starts flexing her hands. Clay backs up to hit the little table they have next to the wall phone that his mom sits at in a fancy chair to talk to his extended family.

“Yeah, I do.” He stands up straight and looks down at her as she gets right in his face. What he didn’t think about is that his mother's favorite item in the house was also on that table. A glass lamp that cost ‘an arm and a leg’. It’s a heavy son of a bitch too, so when it suddenly was being thrown at his face, he was so shocked he just stood there and let it shatter. Falling backwards taking the table down with him, he sees stars popping in his vision.

He feels blood dripping into his mouth and nose but he is so dizzy that any movement made him feel sick. He saw a blur move closer to his face.

“You’re nothing more than a criminal anyway.” She stands back up and uses the phone on the wall to call 9-1-1. Putting on her best sob, he hears her screaming into the phone before everything goes black.

Waking up he is in a hospital room. Monitors hooked up to him and he can only see out of one eye. He freaks out for a moment trying to reach his face but his arm is handcuffed to the bed… he realizes after a moment that it is gauze that is blocking his vision and he calms down.

“Good morning.” He jumps a little and looks over to see Sheriff Johnson sitting in the chair next to his bed. Fuck. He stands up and walks over to Clay, slapping a folder of pictures in his lap. Confused Clay looks up at him.

“I want a Lawyer.” He knows better than to try to talk to Sheriff Johnson without legal help. The death stare he gets from the sheriff is one he will remember forever. He could hear his mom and dad… and Eloise maybe outside the door trying to be let in but the officers at the door were denying them access. The sheriff walks away and talks to the officers real quick.

Hours later of nurses poking at his face and him getting medication. The family lawyer finally shows up. After hours of looking at the pictures of Ashley’s “bruises” which were really just red marks on her pale ass skin from him holding her away from him. The lawyer said some lawyerish stuff and finally got the police and Ashley to drop the charges.

Clay was exhausted, falling asleep before he even saw his parents that day.

Waking up a second time in the hospital he looked down to see his wrist was no longer attached to the bed and his parents were sleeping in the chairs next to his bed. Clay isn’t much for crying in front of people, even while sleeping. The only person he has ever been comfortable crying in front of has been Leo. But Leo isn’t here right now… and Clay really needs to cry.

So, he did. Silently. In the hospital bed next to his parents sleeping in chairs.

[allthingsfern]

In order, my responses to comments in Reply of my COVID19 era post that was my answer to my question “My answer to my questions: Has the era of COVID19 changed your photography? How? And perhaps also, why?“ I am so confused now...

adventuresofalgy

Algy thinks you are lucky and - certainly if compared with Europeans - perhaps quite unusual in not having experienced a more profound effect on your creative outlets and expression. Many of Algy's creative friends have experienced wide-ranging and often severe impacts on their creativity and associated motivation - and therefore on their mental health as well.

themazette

As @adventuresofalgy Jenny said.... you are lucky...

I am indeed very lucky, or as I think of it, blessed. However, it is no way a US thing, nor even a California thing. I add California, because I know many in the US and around the world think of the Golden State as a haven, a progressive, hippie filled state that is all about peace and love and marijuana. However, that is far from the truth. California is like Germany in the 1920s and 30s. There was Berlin, where there was a wildness in the city that was not shared, and was often looked-down on, by those in the majority of the country, who lived in more conservative areas and who, often, economically could not afford the grand life of partying Berliners. In California it is the same. Except for a few urban areas, the state is full of very conservative folks, and for them, like for those in the cities (and in the rest of the world) this COVID19 era has been devastating. Well, and the fires for Californians have been too.

Even in this cool college town where I live, which is lovely and quiet and inspiring, the painfully empty streets, movie theaters, restaurants, shops (think of all those unemployed people) is (still) staggering. In mid-March last year, right after lockdown, I took several phone videos of the deserted street in our town and the campus, but I could not bring myself to share them, since I knew that so many others here on Tumblr were experiencing the same desolation in many different ways. (I figured: “Why add to the sorrow we are living, almost globally?”) I was overwhelmed by the emptiness of the major (well, major for a small town of around 65,000 people) street where I live and the empty bicycle trails and street on campus. And by empty, I mean that even now, I see maybe 3 cyclists per hour, and very little car traffic. Remember, this is a bicycle town; I do not own a car, doing most all my errands on my bike with its 2 fordable baskets in the rear.

And now, over a year later, that same heavy, oppressive emptiness persists. And no, I am not used to it. And yes, I traveled over the last year, but I found the same suffocating blanket of emptiness in each city I visited, even in Las Vegas. It was unnerving. As a matter of fact, last year when I drove to San Francisco 2 months after lockdown for my birthday, I wound up getting depressed and disoriented, in a city where I lived for almost 7 years. Driving back home across the Golden Gate Bridge with tears of sadness in my eyes on my birthday was not what I expected. However, I did get some solid photos of the malaise that hung thick in the air, a malaise that physically took up the space that once was taken up by crowds of people.

Now, I am also very aware that my situation is unique. (Not a fan of the word exceptional, since it can mean both unique and special, and I do not see my situation as special.) My life situation is very unique in that I have a job I love and I work with a great team of characters. We get work done and we have fun, share about our lives. My job is often, especially since COVID19 first got noticed in early 2020, stressful and demands my colleagues and I learn (and sometimes then teach) lots of new technology and that we adapt to the vagaries of the technology gods, which are sometimes unfriendly and unresponsive. And a big part of my job is trying to figure out how to get the technology gods to like us again and grace us with their gifts. (I never realized, until now, with this discussion, that the troubleshooting that is a big part of my job is creative and probably fuels my photographic creativity. Who knew?) Yet, as a group, my colleagues and I support each other. And I am fortunate to count my closest colleague, Steve, as a friend. We have been a great emotional support to each other over the years and now through this COVID19 era. And I recently was reminded (as if I needed reminding) just how unique my work situation is because I participated in a committee that was going over responses to a UC Davis-wide survey exploring levels of employee satisfaction. My 2 colleagues who were also on that committee and I did not have the complaints that others from other departments shared. We work well together, have supportive management that share what is going on and include us (as mush as possible) in the decision making process. And as a department, we get stuff done.

Possibly the best example of how blessedly unique my situation is is what happened this morning when I was talking (yes, on ZOOM) with my immediate supervisor. We discussed the work related stuff, including how at around 10:30 pm the night before I figured something out about an online tool integration I had never done before that I knew was easy but I did not see as easy until I reread the overly complicated instructions a couple of times and just figured out how and where to cut and paste the lines of code (it was that easy, just fucking cut and paste some lines of JSON code) that got the fucking thing to work. Then we talked about his dealing with his young children returning to school and how “normal” now is not “normal” from before and how disruptive the whole thing has been, yet since we work in a supportive atmosphere (and are both salaried), he was able to deal and keep living.

Then, and you are gonna love this, I shared about my original COVID19 question post and the responses and pretty much said to him what I am sharing here.

We talked for a little over an hour. That kind of rapport is rare, for any job, anywhere.

And then there is another way my situation is unique. In some ways, previous “bad things” were actually a preparation for this era of physical distance and uncertainty. In mid-2019, from July to August, first because of my work related bowling concussion and then an antibiotic resistant infection, I was bedridden for about 5 weeks and then had several absences because of concussion issues, like sudden and extreme anger flare ups, nausea, headaches. But however bad I thought that concussion and infection were, the concussion induced forgetfulness and my desire to sharpen my mind and nurture and nourish it have lead me to become, in my old age, organized. I now often take notes of important stuff, add work and personal dates and notes to my Outlook calendar, and even know what day it is, which bugs my colleagues who often find they have no idea what day and/or date it is. Yep, unique, but the bad concussion shit got me to be organized in ways that I was never able to be before, no matter what I tried. This time, I just fucking get organized, without thinking about it too much. And if I fuck up with my being organized, like I did the other day for work, I admit it, fix it, and move on.

Preparation for isolation (and unexpected natural threats) came by way of the 2018 Northern California (the region where I live) fires that year, which caused the campus to shut down for about a week. (As my friend Steve called it, the smoking break.) And for work, my colleagues and I faced a couple of long term, emergency technical outages that impacted all of the UC Davis faculty, one of them for over a month. Pretty much on a professional and personal level, I was, if not ready, at least getting used to the WTF of whatever life decides to surprise me with. (And lets not forget the really bad fire last September, seen in this video I posted of ash “snow” falling. We did not have to shut down the campus because there was no one there anyway.)

Another aspect of this last year, and one that has been present in my life for a few years now, is the BLM movement and the brutal police violence against Black people in this country. As someone who was a teaching assistant and taught in African American Studies and worked closely with students of color on campus in a student run organization, I was and am still devastated, in part because I know, from hearing so many personal accounts, the pain many of my friends, former colleagues, and former students, are still facing and how overwhelmed they felt and still feel. I understand, if as an outsider, their emotional exhaustion. This has been going on for a while, plus add the years of anti-immigrant hate against the Latinx in the US and the rising tide of violent hate against Asians, and yes, it has been sorrowful. Heartbreaking. And I have, in several ways, including my photography, tried to capture the sorrow and resilience of US people of color. It hurts, almost physically, that many people of color are just tired of talking and dealing with the hate.

So, yes, my situation is unique, but with its own emotionally draining weight. And yes, I am extremely grateful. This leads to the other 2 comments in Reply:

kkomppa

Thank you for sharing, Fern. Very interesting. Like you, I would say my output hasn’t changed much. However, I have sought locations deeper in the wilderness. This has been fulfilling.

schwarzkaeppchen

Really interesting thoughts. We live in strange times, but creativity and motivation comes and goes for so many different reasons. My photography has changed a lot. I used to work as a photographer at events and took portraits for fun... Now I'm officially a portrait photographer.

Both of these comments point to another unique aspect of my life situation: For some of us, our photography and how we do it, has not changed much, and if it has, that has been a part of our overall experience with this art form we love so much.

For me, because of my depressive tendencies, the Zen of photography, at least the way I do it, is therapeutic. And I do not use the  term “Zen” lightly here, because my spiritual life has helped me come to terms with the WTF surprises that are pretty much life, if at times the WTF of it is more impactful, as it is during this COVID19 era. And that is part of what I was trying to share with my original post: Before this period of isolation and disorientation, I was already coming to grips with the gospel truth that “creativity and motivation comes and goes for so many different reasons.” as @schwarzkaeppchen​ said. In no way do I diminish the anguish flared up by these bleak times that impact so many around the world. And really, when you think about it, bleak times have been a norm, at least here in the US, since late 2016, though, of course, lockdowns and physical distance make it all worse. But, at least for me, I try to learn from the bleak times, even if I abhor going through them. And when dealing with the highs and lows of creative energy, at least for me, I have a calm certainty that photography is part of my life and I do not have to worry, since I only love it more each day. And the other side to my certainty is that if someday my love of photography fades, some other treasure of creativity will replace it.

Let’s be real, because of photography. I think about stuff like this and get to have discussions with so many great Tumblr original photographers.

And I am grateful for it, and no, this is not unique to my life situation. I know many of us love being here and sharing the good, the bad, the confounding.

Please think about joining @tvoom and me for InConverversation this month. It has been a long time since we talked, and this COVID19 era will be our topic.

I am grateful for all y’all.

[bookwyrminspiration]

Shattered Upside Down

A kotlc wings au: masterpost here

Chapter 7: The Outside

word count: 8.2k

chapter summary: Everything seems to be crashing down around Sophie, so she had to try and figure out how to clean up the aftermath.

warnings: explosions, injuries, burns, panic and numbness, theft, desire to pull out hair (no actual pulling), collapsing, swearing, intentional misuse of grammar

taglist: in the replies. let me know if you want to be added or removed!

I had a lot of fun with this one, so hopefully you'll enjoy it even a fraction as much as I enjoyed writing it. And I don’t want to keep you here, so enjoy the chapter!

ao3 link here or read below

The world ended years ago.

Left in haphazard chunks littered across the sky, cracked glass sunken and molding at the bottom of a lake, stone pillars crushed into ash.

So why was it still breaking?

Why were those shards of glass splintering into dust, why were the pillars scattering in the wind? Why did every single day wake a new horror from the shadows.

Sophie’s ears rang hollow, each and every second stopping as the mist parted. Marella and Linh were moving so slow, each fork of lightning visible and trackable, the nothingness building to a roar in her mind and then everything was happening all at once.

Creatures had abilities now.

Lightning struck and something screamed and the thunder cried and her hair whipped about her face in a frenzy the winds were agonizing the air pressure pressed against her ears her shirt stuck to her skin the air yelled its fury and dragons fought fought fought in the sky.

When had she last breathed?

Air rushed, choked into her lungs as the world broke around her. Focus. Choose a fight and win it.

Marella.

That would be her fight.

Far below, the assortment of friends she’d dragged into this hellish world watched as Marella glowed hotter and hotter, a light against the storm. Sophie took the single moment it took to find her amongst the rain, pinpointed her location, and moved.

The dragons were not the priority, getting Marella away from them was.

Distance ceased to exist before Sophie as she darted forward, carried by those wings. She jumped through pockets of space, teleported through around and out of reality, blinking through existence, each jolt taking her closer and closer to Marella.

Marella, who had nearly reached the origin of the storm.

Sophie was mere feet away now, a single glitch away from grabbing her.

Her fingers wrapped around Marella’s wrist; Heat boiled against her skin, the glow of the flames simmering beneath her skin scorching her eyes. Don’t let go. She couldn’t.

Energy drained from her fingertips, dispersing and scattering and leaving and powering and enhancing.

No difference existed between the two of them.

Her eyes were alight with flame and pain, the very core of her power thrumming outside her skin, her gaze focused on those beast above, the lightning crackling all around them, the boom of smoke curling through the air, the harsh rasp of teeth and talons on scale as they fought just above the two of them.

Marella and Sophie were the only two people in the entire world.

And then it ended.

Pure heat exploded out from Marella in a shock wave, turning the rain to steam, lighting the sky as though the sun had gone out and she was the only thing left to replace it. Something bright white flashed around her, enveloping her for a brief moment as the sky shook. Sophie’s skin screamed, but she did not let go. She would not freeze. She couldn’t.

Sophie glitched away, dragging Marella with her.

And the void did not let them out.

There was nothing everywhere as far as the eye could see. Infinite empty for eternity. The everything in between.  

And they were ablaze.

Sophie’s eyes were pressed closed against the deluge of dry heat and light emanating from Marella, but she just couldn’t bring herself to let go. She couldn’t now, would lose her forever if she did not hold tight for all she was worth.

“Marella!” she hissed through clenched teeth.

Marella. No response. All she could find within the web of consciousness around this void was the--

 MARELLA.

Something snapped, and a downpour of something aqueous crashed through their minds, sizzling and popping against the flames. Streams of multi-colored thought flowed, flooding their minds until they were completely submerged, sinking down down down into the depths of an ocean, bubbles rising above them as they descended, utterly helpless.

Down

down

down.

Until the fire went out.

An ocean surrounded them, infinitely deep, the surface trickling further and further away. Smoke curled against her skin, the taste poignant on her tongue as she drowned her fury, her pain, seeing nothing but everything.

They hovered there, time meaningless as it ticked past, suspended in those watery graves, that space between.

Distantly, she became aware of ragged breathing, uneven and pained rasping against her ears. The sound was so far away, yet she began to follow it, chase it through those depths until it became clearer and clearer and she could hear it and she was aware and the ocean parted around her and she erupted into her own mind and body and she was alive alive alive.

Sophie’s hand remained clenched tight around Marella’s wrist, the flood of adrenaline dancing through her veins masking the pain for now, but eventually it would fade and she’d have to face the consequences of playing with fire.

The breathing continued, harsh, uneven.

Marella. She needed to check on Marella; there was no way she was alright after an event of that scale--

No.

That wasn’t Marella’s breathing.

The pained breaths were coming from the figure beside her, draped over her shoulder, holding tight like the world was in her hands and it was made of glass and she couldn’t dare break it.

That was Linh.

“Don’t let us out,” Linh grunted, fingers spasming as her breathing quickened.

She had followed. Sophie had been reaching for Marella, but Linh had been too. And now her fingers clenched in Marella’s clothes were red and raw and bruised and peeling and her skin was cracked and dry and nothing but pain pain pain caressed her face. No. There was fear there, too.

Not for herself. No, she was staring down down down at the figure she held so tight, so fragile. She had come to save her and she would not stop until she had.

What? Her mind was moving too quickly to make sense of what Linh had said, to remember to respond, or what she meant--out of where? Don’t what?

“The void,” she said, having heard her confusion. Sophie didn’t bother raising her mental barriers now, the thought not even occurring to her. “Give her--Marella--a few minutes to cool down. Don’t let us out yet.”

Oh.

Marella’s eyes moved beneath shut lids, the rhythm of her moving chest hypnotically slow as they drifted through the void, waiting waiting waiting. Light continued to pulsate out of their unconscious friend, a glimmer of bright against this endless dark, pressing in like an ocean of inevitability around them.

Her gaze darted back and forth between all the space around them, the tiny threads she could feel, the places they would take her. Memories of when she’d been here before, the places she’d gone, the places she could return to.

The Lost Cities, the underground.

Home.

It was foolish to even think about--Havenfield had one of the first places overrun with all those animals around. And the people she wanted so desperately to hold her wouldn’t be there anyways.

She needed to stop thinking so hopelessly about the past. It was gone. Remembering it did nothing but propagate heartbreak and regrets.

Linh inhaled sharply, jerkily, and Sophie’s shot to her, the crease between her brow, the gritted teeth, the--

“What the hell,” Sophie gasped, leaning forward involuntarily with disbelief, the sudden movement sending them spinning as they floated along.

Linh grimaced, offering a shy, embarrassed smile as she flexed her hand. It was...iridescent. The surface of her skin was separated into small, chaotically organized sections, reflecting the light from Marella’s skin off her own. The effect was not local, instead spreading up her entire arm, across her chest, over her face--every inch of skin.

Rainbows of faint color refracted, lighting her up and setting her aglow, a muted complement to Marella’s intense blaze.

Linh’s muscles spasmed, disrupting the brief serenity as she glanced down at Marella, exhaling heavily. Shit. How badly had she been hit? How close had she been to Marella when she’d gone off like a bomb?

Close enough that she tagged along on Sophie’s teleportation. Close enough to make skin to skin contact. Shit.

How badly was Sophie hurt? Adrenaline still buzzed through her as they floated, but it became less and less with each second, even as Linh’s clear pain marred her determined face.

Dammit. What was she supposed to do in situations like this? Burns--how did you treat burns?

“We need to leave now,” she said, gentle. The next step was to get them out of here. They couldn’t do anything just floating around in the void, and they’d left their other friends behind.

Fuck.

It hadn’t even registered until that very moment. How long had they sat here, what had happened back at the gnomish village? Were they all looking for them? They’d just vanished out of the sky--

“Okay,” Linh whispered, and it broke Sophie. Whatever happened, she had two injured friends on hand, alongside her own injure body.

She conjured up the clearest picture she could of the village, the one she knew by heart, had stared at so solemnly she could tell you how many flowers dripped down the shattered window even without her photographic memory.

The void ruptured, the intricate web parting before her as she pulled them all through, into that bedroom she’d claimed as her own.

They needed to be with the people who could care for them when the adrenaline faded.

Hard wood and poignant petals grated against her skin, tearing down her arm as she skidded slightly. The echo of the thunderclap lingered in her ears, haunting as that nothing was replaced with everything.

Move.

Forcing herself to push upwards, propped on her elbows on her back, she allowed herself a few moments to observe before taking action. Marella was still unconscious, sprawled across the floor, petals and glass curled in her hair. Linh lay beside her, still conscious but fading quickly, flush with Marella’s back.

Okay. She could do this, she could think this through.

Sophie?! Sophie where are you--

Never mind. A cascade of voices barraged their way into her mind, the mindbubble screaming with activity the moment she’d left the void. Every single friend howling and scrambling, their minds hives of thought and panic.

They’d heard the thunder, heard them return, now frantically running about trying to locate them.

My house. She responded, unsure how else to describe it. It wasn’t hers, but it was the one she’d claimed. Gingerly, she sat up fully, pressing her hands to her temples, fingers tangling in her hair. It was so loud--

“Sophie. There you are--wait, what? Hang on--” Fitz had burst into the room,  cutting off as he saw the prone figures on the floor.

Over here. His voice echoed through her mind, reaching out to the others and giving them a sense of direction to follow, a way to find them. He winced slightly as he did so, the cacophony overwhelming for him too.

All at once, the adrenaline faded and reality came crashing into her, the scrapes on her arm the burns across her skin the dryness of her lips the crackling simmering skin coating her body.

Fitz caught her as her muscles went limp and tensed, sagging to the floor. He set her down, and it was all she could do to breathe breathe breathe and hold her eyes closed as footsteps approached, as the door was tossed open and voices whispered and screamed and panic and sweat and indecision coated the air, dripped down her tongue.

People were moving talking singing crying, yet Sophie’s world was painted with deep blues and hurt reds and all she could see was nothing.

Cool water poured over her head, gliding down her hair and back, soothing the burns, the ache, the regret. Tam had told her Linh rerouted the irrigation systems. He hadn’t told her she’d redone the entire goddamned room. Rich greens frothed and bloomed from every available surface, overwhelming the pots and creeping up the walls. The open wall to the side showed off the night sky, starts blinking overhead, moonlight reflecting off the glass pots and decor scattered around the space.

There was no way she could’ve done this on her own in such a short time.

Sophie sat, curled in a raised bath, water spilling over the edge into other pools, sprawling through the room until it eventually drifted off towards the open wall, spilling towards the ground below. It reminded her of those natural hot springs she’d visited as a child--although this one was chilled, reminiscent of a pool on a summer day.

Stop. Stop remembering what’s past.

Her fingers clenched and she pushed off the edge, drifting back until that silent pour of water from the top hit her in the head once more. Carefully, she made sure the wings were held above the water line. Linh wasn’t here to keep them dry anymore.

Linh.

No, as talented as Linh was, she couldn’t have done all this. What purpose this place used to serve the gnomes, she couldn’t even begin to guess, but the overwhelming scent of pollen and nectar pressed against her mind, a heady lull that wouldn’t fade. The flowers were unnaturally bright, the way white glowed under a UV light. That’s not important.

Cool water to soothe burns. That’s how it went. That was important. So she sat here.

Tam had taken her here, pushed her gently through the door, and left. To give her privacy. Fitz had stopped by a few minutes later, dropping off a thing of water, along with an elixir or two he must’ve grabbed from Elwin’s office before they’d run. Smart. Thinking ahead. She’d have to ask him how he did it.

Cool the burns, replace lost fluid. That was the procedure. So she did.

She was the only conscious one, that’s why she’d been left here. Marella was unconscious, Linh too, so they were being cared for elsewhere. She shouldn’t be so calm.

She should want to be by their side, wait with them till they woke, hold cold compresses to their skin and wait wait wait for them. So why was she so unbothered?

Her friends--

Oh.

Her friends, the ones she trusted so entirely, were taking care of the situation. Sophie had got the three of them out of the sky, held them till they mellowed and brought them back. She’d done her part. Everyone else could handle the rest. For a brief moment, she could breathe easy. Delegate.  

So what was she supposed to do? What was next?

Faint rain pattered against the roof, splashing through the open wall the water fell from. But it was...natural. Where had those beasts gone? What had happened to them after the three of them tore the sky apart and vanished into it?

There was so much information she was missing--

No. Not now. That was a problem for the future, for when her skin didn’t peel from her bones and her tongue didn’t grate against the roof of her mouth.

It was like a river, the flow of the water around her, constantly in gentle motion, running against her skin. But she couldn’t follow it, couldn’t linger and tip over the edge to see where it led.

Her friends had covered where she faltered, but she still had a responsibility to them. Sophie belonged with them, beside them, leading them.

Grabbing an elixir and downing it like a shot, she rose from the water.

   Fatigue pulled at her each step she took, bare feet thudding against the wooden bridges as she moved. Twigs and flower petals pressed against her skin, but she ignored it. She’d tracked the others with her mind, now all she had to do was get to them. The rest she’d figure out later.

   Fitz had left a change of clothes alongside the elixirs, a simple pair of black drawstring shorts and a blouse to match. She’d torn slits in the latter, wings protruding through the loose fabric. Mindlessly, she pulled her hair back, braiding it out of the way as she went, wet strands sticking to the back of her neck. Vertina had taught her how. She wasn’t sure, but Vertina might be broken now. In her destroyed bedroom.

   It didn’t matter, don’t think about it.

   She wasn’t as tired as she should’ve been. Wasn’t in as much pain as she knew she should’ve been. They were completely without the resources to properly treat burns, yet she was walking and talking--well, she could talk, she just hadn’t yet--perfectly fine, if a little loopy. Whatever fragrance those flowers gave off was strong.

None of this matched any of her past experiences with medicine, and she had plenty. What was going on with her?

   One of her friend’s presence flickered close by and she paused, looking around for them. They weren’t with the rest of the group, the others who were clustered around one space, the place she was heading. She assumed that’s where Linh and Marella were.

   Her ears were better than her eyes, and the telltale creak of a swinging bridge off to her right had her pivoting in place, turning to see--

   Dex. His pace quickened when he saw she’d noticed him, but he winced slightly, holding a hand to his chest as he came to a stop beside her. When had he gotten so tall?

   “You...alright?” he asked, but it clearly wasn’t what was on his mind. Like he was expected to ask and he just wanted to get out of the way. He seemed...distracted, fidgety--more so than usual.  

   “I’m not dead. You?” He laughed slightly, then winced again, the movement jarring to his injuries. She didn’t know what else to call it; none of them knew what was wrong with him, but at the very least it seemed to be improving with time. Maybe. She couldn’t tell if it was the lighting, but he seemed unnaturally pale.

“About the same.” Okay, so he wasn’t going to make this easy. Whatever was eating at him would have to be drawn out then.

“I was going to go check on Linh and Marella, need anything?” That seemed a good place to start. Open the conversation for him.

“Oh. Cool. I’ll go with you,” he said, turning alongside her as she resumed her stride, much slower with him beside her--not that she minded. She’d prefer he take things slow until someone could figure out what was going on with him. Not that any of them were qualified to do that. No, that was something for--

“I have a request,” Dex blurted out, uncharacteristically formal.

“What is it?”

He wouldn’t make eye contact, looking around the trees, surveying the flowers. “I…”

Sophie nudged him slightly, playfully, trying to encourage him. “I can’t do anything if you don’t tell me, dumbass.” He smiled slightly at that, although he didn’t stop wringing his fingers. She’d take the partial win.

“I want you to take me back to The Lost Cities.”  

   What. She’d stopped moving. Clouds drifted by overhead, wind swayed through the leaves, time ticked onward. But Sophie had stopped moving.

“What.” Her voice was dead flat, shocking even to her.

Dex bit his lip, holding his hands up, placating. “It’s not what it sounds like, I promise.”

“I hope not. Because it sounds like you’re saying you want to go back home, you know--where there are hordes of creatures. Creatures that drove us underground. Just...roaming around. Everywhere.” Shivers trembled down her spine at the mere thought. That one day, when they’d crushed the gates and shattered through crystal walls, looming and gaping and towering over her--

“Okay so maybe it’s a little bit like that.” She could feel her eyebrows raise, and the color staining his cheeks reminded her that he was a friend a friend a friend. She should be nicer. She didn’t have the energy left to be nicer. “Just for a quick trip. To...pick up some things there. And I’d go on my own but--”

“Nope. You cannot go alone to the monster-infested Lost Cities--”

“I’m not going to! I can’t! The pathfinder cracked, remember? You’re our only form of long-distance transportation.” Fuck. He had a point. “I literally cannot do this without you! And I don’t want to, either.” The last part was so quiet she would’ve missed it could she not hear every single sound screaming through the night.

“Where exactly in the Lost Cities do you want to go?” She wasn’t agreeing, not yet. But dammit she was curious. And he was her friend. She trusted him, wanted to hear him out.

Dex shook his head slightly, as though trying to keep himself awake, hand shooting out to catch himself on a nearby tree trunk. She reached out as if to catch him, but he wasn’t falling and there was nothing for her to do. Her hand dropped back to her side.

“I’m fine,” he said. She didn’t believe him. “I need to stop by Slurps and Burps, where my old lab is. Just...Eternalia in general.” Right. He’d said he needed supplies; there’d be a plethora of things for him to work with there. Whatever project he was working on, clearly he hadn’t brought enough when they’d run away.

Run away. Huh. They were runaways now, weren’t they?

“I’ll think about it. I can’t...too tired to think through all the details right now, okay?” She rubbed at her eyes and he nodded along. “I’m not saying no.” She wanted to. “I just…” she trailed off, exhaling heavily.

He nodded even more, looking slightly off kilter and pallid after doing so. He really shouldn’t be moving around so much without treatment for whatever it was. But they didn’t have anyone who could do that sort of thing. Or properly treat her and Linh’s burns.

“I understand,” he said. “Thanks.”

For what? The world had ended already. She wasn’t doing anything.

Dex had left her a ways away from the clustered mass of minds she’d been approaching, most of them in some sort of lull. Worn and tired. She glanced towards the sky, the stars on full display--Dex hadn’t seemed even remotely tired. Fatigued? Yes. But that was from his healing injuries, not any kind of natural exhaustion. She’d forgotten how late it was despite the ache in her own bones.

He seemed...better. Like it was just a matter of time before whatever had happened yesterday--holy fuck was that just yesterday? Why was everything moving so fast? Life had been so much more peaceful, even boring when they’d been underground. She supposed this was why they were down there in the first place. Just a few days above the surface had tossed them into absolute chaos so consuming it felt like the last few hours had lasted weeks.

And now she sat on the floor of an old dilapidated cottage, flower petals scattered beneath her, two friends unconscious before her, other’s resting around her. They’d made the most out of what they had, cool water poured over burns and pressed against feverish foreheads, torn clothing wrapped around blisters. But they hadn’t anticipated this. Any of this.

Their world had only shifted underground a few months ago, how could everything above be so chaotic, so frantic? Beasts could have abilities, control the weather, breath smoke and scream ash. She still didn’t know what had happened to those two, the one’s battling up above, the one’s Marella had tried to join as if entranced.  

She didn’t want to ask.

And now Marella lay sleeping before her, skin pulsating and gleaming with sweat, uneasy even in rest. The blankets had been thrown to the floor, damp sheets sticking to her exposed skin--entirely unblemished from the blast.

Linh hadn’t been so lucky. Her skin was angry angry red, shining in this dim light. And not the way her new iridescence sparkled, no, this was hurt, damaged skin coating her body. And still...it didn’t seem bad enough.

Marella had exploded, each of them mere feet away at most. They should be coated, covered, dying from these burns. Instead she was only aching, wincing, awake. What had happened?

“It was Maruca.” Tam’s voice took a moment to register, but she looked at him. He was perched beside Linh’s bed, sitting absolutely preposterously in a chair--how hadn’t he fallen out of it? His lip was red and raw, chewed over and destroyed. How had he made such a mess of it? Sleep appeared to elude him, and he tugged at his bangs as he shifted, eyes darting towards her. Wait, right, she was supposed to respond.

“What was Maruca?”

“She happened.” This was a very productive conversation. Tam exhaled, tugging harder at his bangs, like he was trying to gather the proper words. “You said it into the mind bubble,” he continued. “What happened? Maruca did. That’s why your injuries aren’t as bad as they should be--or at least part of it.”

Oh. She checked her mental barriers and sure enough, most of them were down, her consciousness standing exposed within their shared network. She fixed it.

“What did she do?”

He took a moment to respond, looking down at Linh. “It was hard to see what was happening because of all the rain and storming, but Marella was easy to track. She lit up the sky like a beacon. Whatever was happening with her...it clearly wasn’t good. So Maruca threw up a shield, trying to isolate her, but she wasn’t quick enough. It only blocked some of the explosion. But it was enough to help.”

Wait.

“Wait I saw it,” she responded, talking mostly to herself. “There was a...like a white light just before she went off. It wrapped around me--that must’ve been the force field.” Oh. Okay. Problem solved. She wasn’t as hurt as she should’ve been because she’d been shielded. So why did the question still irk her?

Turning, she searched for Maruca; she had to be in here somewhere. Ah, there she was, asleep against a wall beside Biana. Everyone had passed out from stress and exhaustion, littered around the room like they couldn’t even muster the energy to make it past the door. She could see Keefe and Fitz cuddled on a couch in an adjacent room, haphazardly draped over one another. Wylie was nowhere to be seen, and Dex hadn’t come into the room with her.

It was just her and Tam awake against the world.

Neither of them spoke, falling into an anxious, taut, comfortable silence. Pain buzzed along her skin, and she lowered herself backwards onto the floor, staring into the ceiling. She hadn’t thought ahead enough to take any elixirs from Elwin’s office when they left, and none of them had grabbed nearly enough. She didn’t even know what they had and she still knew it was insufficient.

What the hell were they going to do?

She sat up. Tam looked at her and she stared back.

An idea struck. A stupid one, but those were the best kind. “How do you feel about petty theft?”

“I can’t think of any possible way this could go wrong,” Tam whispered, and she resisted the urge to shove him over.

“I can. I can think of several.” They stood just outside the cottage, the others’ sleeping forms still visible through the window. She pressed her hands together in thought, trying to think through as much as she could in the next few minutes before all reason left her.

Tam crossed his arms, looking down at her with faint amusement. She scrunched her nose at him.

“Okay. Okay okay okay,” she repeated to herself, shaking her hands slightly to get her mind working. “We need to stay hidden. So who would...” She glanced back inside, looking towards the couch. Who out of their group would be the most prepared when they’d run away, specifically…

“What are you doing,” Tam hissed as she crept back into the building, stepping over Biana’s legs, hoping she could muster just enough agility to make it through without waking anyone else up. She already had Tam on her side, but she didn’t know if she had the energy to convince anyone else.

The wings at her back shivered in agitation. “Something smart.”

Silently, she crept towards that couch, the one Fitz and Keefe had collapsed upon. She was looking for--there. Fitz’s bag was discarded towards the end, spilling out various elixirs and fruit bars and water bottles and an old shirt. Hands ever so gentle, she pried open the top as she crouched down, the sound of the shifting floorboards grating against her ears.

Keefe’s breath caught. She stilled, not daring to move a muscle. Tam pulled at his bangs in her peripheral vision, face planting.

She eyed Keefe; his hand tensed in Fitz’s shirt, the fabric riding up his back. He relaxed, turning slightly.

Sophie exhaled heavily. He was still asleep. For some reason, the idea of anyone else knowing what they were doing was absolutely unacceptable. She rummaged through the bag for a moment--aha. Perfect.

She held the obscurer close, rising fully and making her way back to Tam, moving around cluttered floors and unconscious friends. Fitz’d had the foresight to bring an obscurer along when they’d run away to join the Black Swan, wandering through Florence. If anyone would have one, it’d be him.

She pressed the gadget into Tam’s hands, and he looked at her in question

“I don’t know how to use it” she explained, hooking her arm through his and dragging him away. The longer they were near those rooms the more anxious she became that someone would wake.

He fidgeted with the thing for a moment before a faint ripple marred its pristine surface, and she knew he’d turned it on.

“And what’s the next step in this brilliant plan of yours?”

She glanced around the area, then pointed to the near straight path of bridges laid out before them.

“I’ve gotta be honest, I’m mostly winging it,” he glared at her unintentional word play, but she just ignored it. “But now we run really fast.”

“We what--” his words vanished into the night air as Sophie charged forward, building speed with each step, the trees a blur around her and she pounded over the wooden bridges and platforms, darting so quick her feet barely grazed the ground. Tam, to his credit, tried his best to match her pace, but she was mostly dragging him behind her.

And then she could taste the void on her tongue and they vanished.

Sophie always forgot how much the Forbidden Cities stunk, but the gas fumes and humidity was home. Tam’s face was apprehensive, lip curled as he adjusted to the poor air quality.

She just stood there a moment, observing the scene--she hadn’t seen humans in months. Tam’s unease propelled her forward, shaking her out of it, ignoring the people on the street who ignored them. They couldn’t even see the two of them, obscurer clutched tightly in hand.

She glanced to the sky--the sun was just beginning to set, late afternoon. Good. That meant a few select places would still be open. It was disorienting, almost, to jump that quickly through time zones.

“Okay. This is good. This is fine.” Sophie grabbed Tam’s wrist, pulling them along the street, past the rush of the cars.

“You don’t sound confident.” She ignored him. She could hear the faint whine and compress of each individual engine as it shot past, and she made a mental note that they’d all need earplugs if they went literally anywhere ever. Especially the Forbidden Cities. They’d been loud before, but now…

They both winced as a motorcycle revved a few streets away.  

A few minutes passed in relative silence until the building Sophie was looking for became visible as they rounded a corner, narrowly avoiding some family out for a casual stroll. It was so...normal. She’d known that the Forbidden Cities had been left unaffected, had been untouched by the ruin, but to see it so clearly--

“Wait for me to say it’s okay, Tam!” she screeched, jerking on his sleeve, hauling him back with a burst of that new strength. He’d been inching out into the road, Sophie so lost in thought she’d almost let him walk into the intersection.

He nearly toppled over from the force, and she mentally scolded herself for not giving him at least a basic rundown of how to not die.

“You can’t just walk in the street,” she began, trying to calm her pounding heart. “The cars won’t stop for you, and they can’t even see us right now. See that little red hand over there?” She pointed to the street light on the other side of the crosswalk and he nodded, confused but sensing her distress. “When that turns into a white figure, then we can go, okay?”

He fiddled with the tips of his bangs and nodded, face flushed beneath. His eyes were too bright, too reflective, and he looked away.

“Anything else I should know?”

“I…” Huh. Everything human was so deeply ingrained in her mind she didn’t even know what was useful to share, what she just assumed was common sense and didn’t need explaining. “We’ll see.”

Tam’s attention shifted and he pointed across the street, to the white figure now on display and the countdown that had just begun.

“See, now the cars are all stopped,” she gestured as they hurried by. She wasn’t comfortable with the idea of crossing the street when no one could see her, so she moved a little faster than necessary.

Once they made it to the other side with no trouble, she began to cut through the store’s parking lot, holding Tam close. No cars could see them and he didn’t know what to look for, so she was not taking any chances.

The more she thought about this, the more she began to realize maybe she should’ve come on her own--but she’d already snuck off once today, she wasn’t pushing her luck.

She was hoping she’d never have to tell them about that creature she found in the forest, about what she’d done.

A couple walked through the doors just ahead of them, and Sophie dragged them in behind. She didn’t think the automatic doors would be able to detect them, and even if they could, it might draw attention.

“What is all this?” Tam asked, glancing around. Aisles of overflowing shelves filled the space, everything from scented soaps to candies to old movies to vitamins to books to prescription medication counters.

“A human store,” she whispered--she knew the obscurer covered any noise they made, but she didn’t want to give it more work than necessary. She could hear the pounding of each of their hearts as they moved, beating a fraction too quickly to be comfortable.

Their bodies were so close they nearly bumped into each other with each step, slipping through aisles and around humans, each of them none the wiser to their presence. She brought them towards the back of the store, the rows of human medications and ointments and creams--this was what they’d come for.

Tam had been willing for this reason alone. They didn’t have any useful medication, hadn’t thought to bring any--aside from Fitz--so this was their next best bet. Sophie eyed the shelves, grabbing bottles of pills and tubes of cream at random, just looking for key words--she’d figure out what to actually use later. Burns, irritation, pain relief, blister, you name it, she grabbed it.

Footsteps sounded as an elderly woman wandered into the aisle, moving with surprising agility. A family approached from the opposite way, two young children in tow. Shit.

One of the kids screamed, throwing a fit as they tossed themself out of their parent’s arms, running down the aisle directly towards them.

Neither Tam nor Sophie dared breathe as they searched for an escape; they couldn’t get caught between the two. Tam’s hand clenched around her arm as he hauled the two of them back, narrowly avoiding the kid as they skirted by.

Shit, he hissed, and her eyes darted to him, widening as she saw him fiddling with the obscurer, tapping it frantically. Fuck. Shadows condensed around the two of them, but they wouldn’t do much in the middle of a well lit store.

Panicked, she turned back to the scene--that little kid. The parents were chasing after the kid, the old woman’s eyes following. They had a few seconds at most before they were noticed, two beat up, ragged teens with fucking wings just appearing in the center of a store.

“Woah!!” Her heart constricted, head whipping around to the source of the noise, mind on high alert, only to see the other kid, no more than three, pointing directly at her over their parent’s shoulder, eyes wide.

“In a minute, buddy,” their parent said, but Sophie couldn’t think over that pair of too-brown eyes boring into her own. She stepped back almost instinctively, the urge to run overwhelming, the tapping of Tam’s finger’s against the obscurer incessant.

The movement jostled her arms, and a bottle slipped, careening towards the hard tile floor. No no no no no no no--

Got it! Tam breathed, and Sophie watched as the child’s mouth fell open in shock as the two of them vanished once more.

Desperately, her mind reached out towards the bottle, jerking and clenching around it as she stopped it midair, levitating it an inch above the floor. She didn’t dare move. Only slowly directed it back towards her, sending out other little tendrils of energy to the bunch she held in her arms, a preventative measure.

“Here,” Tam mumbled, shuffling the two of them over and away from the people. She had severely overestimated the number of things she could hold at one time.

They paused for a moment in a vacant section of the store, adrenaline lingering in both their systems. Neither said a word, just breathing until they stopped shaking.

“We need a bag,” Sophie whispered, barely audible even to her own ears. They should’ve thought of that before they left. Dammit, there always seemed to be one little detail she was missing when he planned something out and it always came back to bite her in the ass.

“Umm...there’s a few over there. Does this work?” He handed her a cloth backpack from a shelf after they shuffled over a little.

She dumped all the contents of her arms into the bag, pleased to see there was plenty of room left over for anything else they could grab once the aisles were a bit more vacant.

“Sure. This works,” she said, grabbing the handles. “We could put the obscurer in there too.” He seemed to consider the suggestion for a moment before he shook his head.

“If it stops working again it’ll take too long to get out and fix.” She hummed in agreement, looking around. They might as well circle around the entire store while they could. Fingering the straps on her shoulder, careful to keep the wings from brushing against them, she glanced at the display Tam had grabbed it from.

Her heart stopped.

It was a local artists display, filled with various embroidered backpacks and totes and hats and anything cloth, vibrant threads of red standing out against browns and rich purples and electric teals. She took the backpack from her shoulder, flipping it around to run her finger along the design. It was a bird of some kind, a peacock or a phoenix, golden tail feathers spilling down the black fabric of the bag. It came to life with luscious greens popping white, layer upon layer of stitches running together in such a deliberate, careful pattern she couldn’t breathe.

There was someone, somewhere in the world, who had the time, the safety, to decorate a backpack. To painstakingly carve the details into permanence, to render it exactly how they wanted at their leisure.

“It’s like nothing has changed here,” she whispered, and Tam’s hand came to rest on her shoulder. He had no connection to this past of hers, but he surveyed the people mingling in the store, the smiles and laughter and idle chit chat. No, these people were unaffected.

The world had ended for them, but it flourished here.

He glanced at her fingers fisted around the backpack handles. “Are you okay?”

“No.” How could she be? “But let’s finish this first.” He squeezed her shoulder in reassurance, and she threw the bag over her shoulder once more, that embroidered bird out of sight.  

They started moving again, shadows condensing around their feet as Tam added to the obscurer's power, Sophie scanning the shelves for anything that could be useful. She grabbed bars of scented soap, washcloths, fancy water bottles, heart pounding pounding pounding.

This had been her idea, so why was she so goddamned nervous? Her intestines squirmed and wiggled within her abdomen and she ran a hand through her still-wet hair, gripping it tight. She wouldn’t pull it out. She wouldn’t. It was braided anyways.

A hand intertwined with hers and gently began tugging at her fingers, untangling them from the strands. Tam’s face was blank as he pulled her hand away from her head, smoothed out her hair, and pulled them forward.

She couldn’t do this. There were so many people everywhere she looked, so many people living completely ordinary lives unaware of the creatures that roamed their Earth, wreaked havoc upon the delicate ecosystems. They didn’t know it yet. But they would. Eventually. When the ocean spoiled with more than just crude oil, when the animals vanished entirely, when the bees fell from the sky like rain.

“Breathe, Sophie,” Tam’s voice slammed into her, dragged her from the depth of her mind and suddenly she was breathing she was processing she was dying. She didn’t know where she was, blurs of shadows and nothing fuzzy in her peripherals and she was inhaling faster than she was exhaling and there was everything in her lungs and her heart was trying to implode, to scatter itself into pieces.

“I said breathe, dumbass.” His voice was so so soft, so gentle, a damp cool stone against the night sky of her imagination. She inhaled. She exhaled. She did it again.

The first thing she saw was her knuckles, white. Her fingers were wrapped around Tam’s wrists, gripping him so so tightly. She inhaled again. His hands were on either side of her body, holding her by the shoulders. She exhaled.

Slowly, she raised her gaze, meeting his eyes for a prolonged moment. They shone red, reflecting some far off light, oh so wide. Fear and concern lined the soft edges of his face, relaxing slightly as she held eye contact, as she breathed, as they both listened to her heart slowing, the race of her blood calming.

“Sorry,” she whispered, vision going blurry again, sagging beneath the weight of the world.

“There’s nothing to apologize for.” She nodded instinctively, not even fully registering what he said. Time ticked by, the sky darkening in silence.

She released his wrists, the skin red where she’d grasped him so tight, and he dropped his arms back to his sides. Carefully, she wrapped the guilt that sparked into the knot beneath her ribs, pressing her palm against it.

Tam noticed, but didn’t mention it. “Are you ready to go back?” She debated for a moment, taking stock of her body, all the signals and alarms beeping in the background. They stood a ways away from the store, off in a shadowed segment of the parking lot. She had no idea how he’d gotten them out here.

“Yeah,” she sighed. “Let’s go.” Her limbs were made of lead, her brain an amalgamation of dense fog, but she’d be okay.

He just nodded, retrieving the obscurer from wherever he’d set it before they turned back to the illuminated store.

“How are you so...awake,” she slurred, rubbing at her eyes. His brow creased for a moment, glancing down at her.

He wiggled his shoulders, drawing her attention to the movement, the things behind them. “I haven’t been able to sleep since the mission.” They flared under the attention, and she realized somehow she hadn’t taken notice of them this entire trip. Just how oblivious was she?

The wings protruded sharply from his back, bones spreading, membrane stretched between each section. Charcoal blacks textured like leather melding into fuzzy browns near his shoulder blades. Sharp talons graced the top--wait, were those talons? Her mind was too mush to tell, but it was painfully obvious what they were.

Bat wings.

It made sense, she realized. The reflective eyes, the alertness this late at night, the--wait a minute. Curiously, she looked to his face.

“Open your mouth.”

“What?”

“Just do it, real quick.” Something had clicked together in her mind, and she just couldn’t find the energy to be cordial about it.

Hesitantly, he opened his mouth slightly, bewilderment and embarrassment written plain across his face. Her own mouth fell open as she leaned forward, trying to get a closer look.

“What are you doing--”

“You have fangs,” she whispered, cocking her head to the side as he clamped his lips shut, hiding those sharp canines. That’s how he’d bitten through his lip earlier, chewed it raw so quickly. It might’ve even been an accident.

She shook herself off, backing away slightly, skirting towards the doors of the store once more. Just a quick, final lap, and then they’d head back. Nothing could go wrong this time. She’d hold it together, as long as it took. She wasn’t doing this just for her, although the longer she moved the more each of her muscles begged her to stop, the more her skin chafed against her clothes.

Tam’s face flushed as they snuck back through the aisles, heading straight for the pharmaceutical section. Her determination was just enough to get her moving. She knew the moment she stopped her body would give out, collapse, but she couldn’t allow that to happen.

She was Tam’s only way back and none of the other’s even knew they’d left.

They grabbed items in relative silence, more alert of their surroundings. Sophie was the only one between the two of them who could read the labels, and Tam was the only one with any energy. They made quick work of it, that embroidered backpack stuffed so full she could hardly close it.

As they made their way out of the store, weaving around people, Sophie stumbling along, eyes falling shut, she spotted one more thing she wanted. It was stupid and nostalgic, she knew.

But goddammit if she was going to commit crimes, she might as well enjoy it.

Tam said nothing as she swiped the items off the shelf, only smiled exasperatedly as they emerged into the dark parking lot.

The streetlights seemed to flicker above her, and Tam gripped her tight, more prepared for what was to come.

She took off at a sprint, fueling every last drop of remaining energy into her run as she cracked the void open before her, the lingering sweet scent of the memory fogging her mind.

Hard wood met her skin, her palms, scraping against fragile, healing skin.

And she collapsed.

 She couldn’t see herself.

 She was supposed to be here.

 That wasn’t her.

 That wasn’t anybody.

 Water rippled pulsated groaned over an endless expanse of everything, echoing the sky and screaming. Delicate. Inescapable. Never.

 The hallway stretched on for miles upon miles upon forever and ever and she couldn’t find her way back and this. was. not. her.

 The choice was not hers. It hovered there, taunting, before plummeting and vanishing beneath the surface, leaving not even a ripple in its wake.

 Wake. Wake up.

 No. She couldn’t. She wasn’t asleep.

Focus.

 Everything shattered.

 It rained down in heaving whorls and coasted through her consciousness and broke and broke and splintered and caved and cried and screamed and she was screaming too. It was not her and she was not dreaming and she was screaming too.

 Wake.

 Up.

 Something was breaking--no, broken. Something was going to break.

 It was her.

Commotion. Everywhere. Everything. Slammed into her all at once and she was choking she was breathing she was thinking the sun was burning her alive and her skin had turned to ash and her mind was fog and--

“Sophie? What do we--” Keefe hissed beside her, uncharacteristically tense, but she eased. Okay. Everything was okay. Keefe was right there and everything would be fine and--

Something buzzed and vibrated. Several somethings, all in sync.

Keefe supported her by the shoulder as she jolted upwards, that familiar tune gravel grating against her ears. She fumbled, the floor dancing and her stomach swimming, reaching for that bag, the one she’d taken from home not the one she’d stolen.

She slipped the device out of its pocket. Saw everyone else present in the room look towards their own. Their imparters, each buzzing with an incoming call.

Sophie tilted it towards her so she could read the screen, the words taking a few seconds to sink in.

An incoming hail, one for each of them.

Hers was from Councillor Oralie.  

[red-hood-vigilante]

more hbo spn rambles, thoughts, drabbles etc. long long post.

part 1 here

there’s some things i’ve omitted here bc others have already posted about those things, certain headcanons and characterizations and stuff. those posts are in my likes somewhere (and i’ll reblog them someday), and there’s some posts i’ve read but not liked, which i now can only vaguely remember, which is why some ideas/thoughts are similar

ALSO most of these follow the model i talked about in part one: how s1-5 will stay more or less how they are but s6-10 is changed (some things are cut out entirely, some things are tweaked and some characters + arcs are more fleshed out. more focus on sam’s trauma and post-cage adaptation to the real world as well as dean letting his rage and control issues consume him and how he’d recover and redeem himself)

as i typed these paragraphs, i realized i really have 10 seasons mapped out and ready to go. hbo hire me!!

alright go:

sam and dean get wearier as the show progresses (second half), and eventually they stop putting so much care and thought in the people they save. like...hm how do i say this, like as long as a victim/victims are saved, they don’t care about how that happens or how those people suffer potential consequences, like if the victims lose a limb or have their homes burned down because of the monster, then sam and dean don’t really care. they saved your life, now they’ll leave you with your life in potential shambles and not care because all that matters is that they saved your life, not how it is afterwards. they still care about saving that one person, but eventually it pales a little in comparison to a war between heaven and hell, being the vessels etc. ---> saving people becomes less about making sure they’re actually alright and healing from horrific events and more about just making sure they have a pulse before they move on

when angels lose their wings they are either burned off in the actual fall or ripped off of them in their vessels, which leaves pretty nasty scars on the vessel

ed and harry are so young and bright eyed about the whole hunting thing; sam and dean as kids, idolizing it, finding it exciting and intriguing when they shouldn’t. sam and dean try to get them out of the business before they too are too traumatized and desensitized to do anything but hunt. neither sam or dean will say it but they are jealous of ed and harry and their freedom to leave, and hate them for choosing this voluntarily instead of being dragged into it by tragedy

hbo spn is a slow burn. there’s a lot more shots of sam and dean in silence just sitting together after a hunt, exhausted and too tired to move yet. they’re covered in blood and guts on the side of the road after killing or covered with dirt in a graveyard after burning bones, sitting next to the fire, just watching it. the times they park the car and watch the stars? we get to see it. 

dean wears rings and the amulet all the time in the beginning, for the first five seasons. the rings vary; first they’re some of john’s old ones and stuff he finds in thrift stores. then later on he begins wearing rings from people they’ve saved/haven’t saved as a keepsakes etc. when he begins his descent to the holy murderer in s6-10 he wears less and less rings. they don’t matter anymore -> symbolically shedding who he was and what mattered to him

the only accessories sam has is a rosary/cross around his neck. he has jess’ engagement ring in his pocket/wallet. after the cage he vaguely remembers why the ring was there and who jessica was (more on this further down)

the four horsemen are manifestations of different aspects of human nature at its most grotesque and strongest, can’t be killed as long as humans live. war is conflict, famine is desire, pestilence is physical and mental illnesses.

(the seven sins are like the horsemen, tulpas of human nature instead of demons)

death isn’t a concentration of an existing aspect of humans as much as it is the end of life, the antithesis of life. death the oldest of the horsemen and has existed since the beginning of any life, organism, cell and atom. the opposite of life and light, the other half of god (as i’m typing this i’m confused as to why  amara was the opposite of god instead of death). death isn’t evil or good, remains 100% objective. doesn’t care for sam or dean at all, but has a begrudging respect for their stubbornness and entertainment they provide due to their flat out refusal to do as they’re told by celestial bodies when anyone else would crumble

by including death i feel like it very naturally begs questions of who decides when someone dies, when someone lives, why would death follow these guides instead of reaping whomever whenever, what happens if a life isn’t reaped at the right time etc. the reader in me adore the idea of death having a library with books and records of everyone who has ever lived and died and how they died - but then, who writes these books and why? do they decide, and if in that case, how? these questions are above my paygrade but you know what i mean? like there has to be some sort of system right, god created everything, death executes to maintain order, some third party deity writes the laws and the books. the three branches of government. ok but it’s hbo so again, i think we shouldn’t dive this deep into things, like as much as these topics intrigue me i don’t want to stray too much from the dirt road trip aesthetic

shapeshifters are extremely rare because they don’t require any kind of human blood or organs/sacrifice to live

i want more exploration of how magic is like science, like it just needs the right ingredients and right conditions. sam thinks of magic as an obscure branch of science; it just requires research and knowledge and clear intentions because science can be controlled and do a lot of good when used responsibly. dean doesn’t like it. he doesn’t trust the unpredictable elements and he’s seen enough to know it never goes well. magic is a force that can’t be controlled by anyone.

sam and dean have full on fist fights regularly. to practice and keeping each other sharp, but also because they’re siblings. they’re feral, insane and unhinged with each other and they get on each other’s nerves A LOT. it’s petty and childish and sometimes it can get a lil ugly but it becomes their way of family therapy. after a fight the next scene cuts to sam and dean with ruffled clothes, nosebleeds and swollen lips at a diner eating silently after beating each other up. either they sit in silence because they’re tired or both are harping on the other’s openings and weaknesses

sometimes they’ll fight a little dirty but they do so in different ways; dean will pull the old ‘look!’ and point to something and then tackle sam when he turns to look while sam will just cry out in fake pain which makes dean stop dead in his tracks before sam headbutts him or kicks him in the groin

we, the audience get used to these fights, they’re sometimes funny and for comic relief, sometimes for narrative purposes (like tricking a monster they’re fighting each other when they’re really not) BUT. then comes the times when sam and dean are actually fighting without holding back and we see how much they are capable of hurting each other or how heartbreaking and difficult it can be to watch when of them are incapable of fighting back/doesn’t defend himself -> swan song when dean doesn’t fight back against possessed sam, or when dean beats soulless sam unconscious

sam and dean also just verbally bully each other constantly but they do have their odd ways of expressing affection and care. they get the other person their fave snack whenever they go grocery shopping without being asked to and are the only other one they truly trust to have their back in hunts. have a cup of coffee ready before the other asks for one. brothers and each other’s best friend. nightmare duo but in a sweet way. the cooperation of ‘the usual suspects’ when they’re in different interrogation rooms but still has the cover story down to a t. code words and code names and cover stories, they know it all

when sam and dean fight together against a common enemy they’re a damn nightmare - because they know each others weaknesses and habits, they cover each other perfectly and in complete silence. they’ve been at it together since they were kids and read each other’s nonverbal cues like a picture book

to build off of what i said in part 1; the winchesters are pretty hated in the hunter’s community. even the people sam and dean frequently work with (bobby, ellen, jo, ash, rufus, bela, kevin, charlie, castiel etc) roasts them all the time and don’t hesitate with calling them out on their self-pitying crap when it get’s too much (spn was just objectively better when characters weren’t afraid of dragging sam and dean through the mud for being selfish and stupid) and this WILL persist in hbo spn. the only reason people continue working with sam and dean is because they know deep down a lot of the things that happens aren’t sam and dean’s fault - but they still blame them for it. doesn’t make it easier how sam or dean sometimes start crap on purpose to save the other

the winchesters are terrifying and people for sure tell stories about them, but not like ‘they’re heroes’, more like ‘they’re insane and dangerous. stay the fuck away from them’. some stories are true, like how they’ve worked with demons, but some are just game of telephone. (dean has apparently a ghost he is frequently possessed by while sam is actually a mutant vampire). hunters hate and are scared of the winchesters. sam and dean are never invited to hunter stuff (burials, memorials etc) but crash them nonetheless even though the hunters do NOT want them there.

you know what drives me insane when i think about it? how some characters in spn already are their hbo spn counterparts; john. mary. adam. maybe kevin?

other things that already are their hbo spn counterparts: dean throwing away the amulet right in front of sam. eyes burning when angels are seen. how ghosts are just tragedies, stuck in a loop they can’t leave. how a lot of the monsters they meet are just victims or their circumstances or the first victim of a curse. the impala being sam and dean’s home. dean not knowing how to comfort sam when he’s upset other than trying to do things for sam that usually brings dean comfort (driving the impala, listening to rock music etc). the roadhouse. heaven being an eternal version of the memories that made you the happiest even though it’s not real. sam wanting independence and freedom but never fully having it. dean fearing being alone more than anything else and that’s where he always ends up. sam has an eating disorder after the demon blood and dean has an alcohol problem he refuses to see as a problem. dean saying “i’d do it again” without an ounce of regret and pouring himself a drink when sam tells him it was fucked up to lie to him about gadreel

the demon/angel hybrid: THIS could be sooo interesting to explore. an angel and demon hybrid are you kidding me?? not to toot my own horn too much but i’m so clever. i should write this story myself. SO. does this creature have parents who fucked in their vessels or was this an experiment by god (yes i love the ‘mad scientist’ idea, that really should’ve been played up way more) or did a pre-existing creature (human or otherwise) drink demon blood and angel grace at the same time so that it created itself? so much potential for some really intriguing storytelling and character exploration - not only the creature itself and what they would be like, but also for the people around; sam, dean, castiel, jack etc. how would they react to this thing that is the very definition of defying heaven and hell and all the natural laws? does it exist before the show starts or will we see its birth?

the powers of the demon/angel hybrid would be tricky; a mix of holy and defiant, grotesque and beautiful. unconsciously forces people to tell the truth when talking to them. poisons whatever they touch. eyes of a demon, wings of an angel. can smite but skin will burn when touching iron. can do deals but will require a sacrifice in return, not a soul, usually a body part taken then and there (the hybrid eats it. it favours eyeballs and the liver - angels like raw meat). lights always flicker. makes things explode when angry (esp people and cars). can manipulate feelings, thoughts and memories. can travel to both heaven and hell, not welcome in either places. + standard stuff like telekinesis, teleportation, mind reading, super strength etc. 

sam and dean’s wardrobe are pretty much the same; whatever’s cheap and not covered in blood. however, they do have stylistic differences. sam thinks graphic tees are funny, dean uses whatever’s black combined with john’s leather jacket. their wardrobe melds as they stop thinking of themselves as individuals and more of “me and my brother,”. their clothes are tattered and torn to shreds all the time. hand me downs, hand me ups. when they stray off their “path” and do things that are the crux of a storyline/character arc, this would reflect in their clothes. when sam is with ruby and becomes more and more “evil” he wears more and more red, a colour he has stated in the past he doesn’t really like. when dean is dead, sam starts to wear his rings and john’s and dean’s leather jacket. when dean decides he’s going to say yes to michael he dresses in white, when sam is dead dean takes off every piece of jewelry except the amulet. he holds it clenched in his fists when he’s whispering what comes close to a prayer

logically the amulet should have a backstory but you know what? i love that it’s hinted to be just a piece of cheap jewelry sam found in a thrift store he decided to give to dean. but narratively it should be explained so... idk. what could be logical solution as to why it would react to GOD himself? maybe god wore it once cuz he thought it was neat but he sold it for three dollars because he wanted coffee and then sam found it a week later

i would prefer it if god didn’t show up at all (absent father number one) but if he DID he’s not all powerful just a true neutral (like death, 100% objective) who created a thing that just took a life of its own, much like a parent and a child - the parent helps the child but can’t control it. the times he did intervene or tried to do something it didn’t really have any real long lasting effect so he gave up on trying a while ago. 

@spneveryseason talked about this, how the storyline of sam being possessed by gadreel would be horrifying if we saw everything from sam’s perspective instead of dean’s (her fic is wonderful). in the ‘dean slowly descends into a righteous murderer to become holy’ idea i have this tracks so damn well because again, if dean believes something is right, it is right, no questions about it. everyone around him is like “that’s really fucked up and you should make amends” but dean doesn’t see any reasons for why - sam is alive isn’t he? and seeing it from sam’s pov would really underline how horrifying, dehumanizing and belittling that experience was

john and mary are adam and eve. sam and dean are cain and abel are michael and lucifer. time is a flat circle. history never stops repeating itself. 

sam is the villain of s4. he is manipulated and key information is withheld from him but in the end... would it made a difference? it crossed his mind, that he could be tricked because ruby is a demon after all, but maybe he likes the power, the feeling of freedom, that he wasn’t just the baby, the one who always needs permission to do things. if he has to drain possessed people to get that power... so be it. and it’s for a good purpose, until it isn’t. he’s hungry for more, to be feared and respected. he’s enticed by lucifer’s sweet words, the potential of all that power and the idea of ruling two out of three realms. dean manages to pull him back from the brink because sam decides he doesn’t want to be what john thought he was and fail dean and himself like that.

dean is the villain in s9. he is controlling, the mark of cain without the mark. what he says goes - it’s not a democracy, it’s a dictatorship. he doesn’t see how much pain, doubt and fear he causes the people around him. if some victims or civilians die on his watch that doesn’t matter - just some collateral damage. sam can’t make dean listen to him because dean is the older one, the one who’s always called the shots. dean is the angelic one, heaven’s chosen warrior, he is untouchable and unkillable. he’s is an excellent killer, filling the void with blood and rage which is better than the crippling fear of loneliness carved into his bones. 'i butcher for love, to protect,’ he tells himself. ‘why shouldn’t i exterminate, regardless of the cost? i’ve followed the rules, i’ve always sacrificed. now i call the shots. it’s my right.’

sam’s hell trauma is never magically removed. he’s stuck with the memories and the nightmares and the occasional hallucinations. castiel can’t do anything but offers to wipe his memory completely, but sam says no, he is still doing penance. 

after dean comes back from hell he starts calling himself old man and jokes a lot about he’s 40 years older now (after he’s more comfortable about speaking about hell) 

when sam comes back he feels ancient (he’s over 900 years old at least but he lost count), weary, tired and so so so out of place in this world. he’s forgotten how to put gas in a car, how to drive, how to use a credit card, all the song lyrics he and dean used to yell together, the faces of people he knew before he fell, the softness of a bed, the schools he went to, most of the hunts he and dean, how john died, who mary is, the initials carved into the impala, the taste of food that isn’t raw meat. it’s so much he’s forgotten that he has to relearn. he prefers figuring things out with castiel instead of dean because castiel doesn’t silently resent him for everything he’s forgotten

sam doesn’t laugh anymore. despite dean’s many and castiel’s few awkward attempts, it’s more like quick smile and a quiet “hmm”. on some days he recoils when he sees blood and guts, on other days he’s so apathetic it’s unnerving

sam sympathizes with the brought back mary and castiel more than ever. dean tries to get sam to remember things he’s forgotten from his childhood but sam can’t connect with it anymore. he stopped being that sam a long time ago. dean doesn’t know what else to do than try to force this connection to be revitalized and he fails. sam isn’t that person anymore and this wedge in their relationship becomes a central factor in dean’s s6-10 desperation and isolation. sam is here and safe but it’s not really sam, not the sam dean grew up with

while sam has forgotten how to make coffee, he now knows everything about angels, effective torture tricks, a bunch of lore + biblical history, how to navigate hell, the most powerful and influential demons, rare and powerful spells as well as perfect enochian (he will speak enochian without realizing and it feels more natural than english). lucifer and michael were surprisingly talkative (raging about the unfairness) when taking their anger and hatred out on sam and adam and each other. sam had access to all of lucifer’s memories and knowledge for the time he was the one in control. walking library and encyclopedia of biblical lore.

he still has some muscle memory from hunting and sparring, but sam is ghostly thin and very rusty. even though he’s an expert on lore, he’s not fit to go on hunts anymore and he knows it. 

sam remembers adam and swears he’ll try to get him out, but he can’t. just thinking about the cage makes him vomit. he can’t talk about it, much less go near it. after a while sam thinks it might be better to let adam stay down there than let him come back up and feel this crushing emptiness and loss of direction

sam’s trials take place in s9 instead of 8; coinciding with dean’s villain arc. for sam the trials are a chance to redeem himself again, this time for good by closing hellgates forever. they’re scrubbing him clean of the demon blood and his sins and they give him a sense of purpose again now that he can’t join hunts anymore. it doesn’t matter if he dies because of it. it would be nice with a permanent and peaceful death that did something good. dean is taken aback by sam’s devotion to repent for something that happened years ago and for something sam has already paid for a thousand times over. dean realizes how messed up he himself has become and how he’s helped put sam here, on the cusp of self sacrifice again because of sickening guilt and self hatred. dean begs sam to not complete the trials at the cost of his own life and swears he’ll better himself, be a friend and a brother, not a jailer, dictator or a murderer. ‘if you won’t give yourself or life another chance, please give me one.’ ---> s10 pacifist dean learning to let go of the control, the violent tendencies and the rage

oh wait what if gadreel still possessed sam after the trials to heal him but sam is the one who invites the angel in? he’ll keep his promise to dean about staying alive, as well as heal from the inside and have breaks from the world when he doesn’t want to be present, like he and gadreel will alternate being the one in control. he keeps it a secret from dean and helps gadreel imitate him so dean won’t notice. it’s not so bad, being possessed by this angel - sam can say no anytime and gadreel is a nice guy. since they alternate on who’s present they can access each other’s memories, which is terrifying and embarrassing at first, but since gadreel and sam have been tricked and used by lucifer and been punished for it for far too long, they understand each other. now another creature knows their trauma and terrors without the need for verbal explanation. also having an angel residing in his body makes sam feel like he can hunt properly again because gadreel can heal him and take over in situations sam’s overpowered. this could show how messed up sam has come to view himself and his body. 

dean is conflicted when he finds out; sam lied but gadreel does help sam heal, sam’s traumatized and his self-worth is fucked up and dean has contributed to that. dean convinces sam to push gadreel out, that sam is still valuable, loved and a good person who shouldn’t be in a place where he views his body and mind like a property to be occupied. sam’s faith begins to come back bit by bit, not in god, but in himself, his brother, in the good things in life. they build their little family; sam, dean, castiel, the hybrids, whomever of their allies that are alive at this point.

castiel can heal sam and dean’s wounds but they are never completely gone; they leave scars and phantom pains. the brothers have SO many scars over the years. dean flaunts them to impress people because he likes the questions and the fearful admiration, the attention and the nods of approval. sam hides them.

when dean is in a bad mood or needs to get his mind off of things, sam just drops something like ‘i don’t get the deal with led zeppelin. one of the most overrated bands of all time’ and dean will go OFF every single time about the entire led zeppelin history, their discography and how they’ve shaped rock music. this will go on for hours and sam will zone out after 1 minute. but dean rants nonsensically the entire drive and it does get him to think about something else for a little bit. they stop at a motel and dean is STILL ranting while brushing his teeth. stops when going to sleep but without fail picks up where he left off the morning after and is so into it he doesn’t notice sam not paying attention at all. we could see this once in s1 when they’re searching for john, another in s3 when dean is anxious about his deal coming to an end and then again in a later season, when sam doesn’t remember to ask/doesn’t have the patience or mental capability, so they’ll sit there in tense silence, showing how much they’ve changed.

---> i can see this SO clearly in my head, how they’ll get in the car and we, the audience, will recognize the camera angle, the same lines and dean’s grumpy mood, and we’ll anticipate what comes next. but sam isn’t that kid anymore and he’s not peeking at dean to gauge what his mood is and how much of a shit eating grin he should wear when being an annoying little brother to cheer dean up. now he’s looking out the window, leaned back, they’re not looking at each other. this shot is a minute or two long, uninterrupted. dean turns on music but neither are singing along or doing anything to lighten the mood. 

s1-5: sam gets hooked on demon blood, dean has an alcohol problem. when sam goes through withdrawals, dean decides to quit drinking and joins him because he wants to be supportive, and he realizes that when he drinks two beers for breakfast there’s a problem

s6-10: sam takes painkillers, anti depressants and anti psyhosis meds to numb himself from the phantom pains and reduce post-cage effects. dean started drinking again after sam jumped and still does, but started smoking in addition because he still drives a lot and doesn’t want to die in something as pathetic as a car crash. 

there a scene in an episode in the first half of s8, when sam has decided to stay with dean instead of amelia, and dean has rejected benny in favor of sam, and then the brothers sit in a couch watching tv while drinking beer and neither of them look particularly happy about it - that’s how their relationship is a lot of the time. they know they’re fucked up and neither of them will ever be truly happy when the other’s around, but they owe each other so much and they don’t have to explain themselves to each other the way they do to others. they know each other so well, each other’s traumas and the things they’ve done, it feels fake and exhausting to try to be something other than the veteran hunters they are. misery loves company; they are miserable together but would be far more miserable apart and living a normal life. they do love each other, but neither of them are particularly happy as the show progresses. family is hell and so is the lack of it. 

OK OK i mentioned it in part one, how i had my own very specific idea about how jack should come to be and here it is. long winded but (might just write a damn fic): 

after lucifer was cast back into the cage, he is stronger than he has been in a long time (being in his true vessel helped him stretched muscles he forgot he had. and fresh air.) sam is pulled out of the cage and it leaves a rift in the magic and chains - the binding is weaker and lucifer must act fast to get out before it heals. the cage is still strong enough to hold two archangels, so lucifer has to become weaker somehow to slip out through the cracks. he can’t get out of the cage, but souls can come in. demons bring themselves and human souls as tools for lucifer to use. there’s not much he can do here - consuming them, eating them, touching them, dissecting them doesn’t give him what he wants

eventually lucifer realizes he must do like azazel and create something new of two halves, like when he created demons. he begins melding his archangel grace with a human soul. he tries with demons, but his archangel grace automatically purifies them and leaves them too weak. he must try with a human soul who is good. he finds the soul of kelly kline, who sold her soul to save a loved one. with her, the merging, works. 

he has another self, a twin, a son, who’s half human and half archangel. half lucifer. the old lucifer will die but that’s ok, his desires, presence and self will live on in his new creation. the new lucifer barely makes it out of the cage, only able to due to its human side. on earth it creates a body for itself and takes shape, no longer a form of pure power and energy akin to the sun itself but now a person, reminiscent of kelly kline on earth and lucifer in heaven. they name themselves jack. jack searches for familiarity and finds it in sam, their old self’s perfect tool and another hybrid. jack finds a mentor in castiel, a younger brother and fellow angel with human elements. they do not find anything in dean, the key to his former self’s doom.

jack’s powers: their powers are like and unlike the angels because he is half archangel. jack has wings but sometimes they don’t work, or they’ll end up somewhere else entirely. their body is their own, not a vessel, so jack can’t possess people. doesn’t talk but people “know” what they’re saying or want because jack emits their emotions and thoughts to people they’re talking to like a radio tower. jack can also have this empathic connection and communication with animals. his mood affects the weather. immortal. reads minds. can remove a soul from a body and send it to heaven/hell by touching it, with practice they don’t need to touch a body. 

other stuff about jack: the human/archangel nature means jack only need sleep and food once a week or so. eats only nougat and raw meat. because jack is a kid they nap a lot. levitates when sleeping. never blinks, stares intensely at everything. their eye colour changes based on their mood. eyes glow in the dark. normal humans who look at jack for too long experience memory loss, fainting spells or migraines and eye contact for more than 10 seconds give vivid hallucinations of their worst nightmares. always barefoot, often floats like 10 cm off the ground because they find it more enjoyable than walking. wears the wildest clothes they can find, nothing matches and nothing is weather appropriate

i have a very specific image of jack in my mind; they look like delirium from the sandman comics with the hair that looks like it’s underwater and the fishes floating around their head, here and here are examples. in live action this would look not good or maybe even ridiculous for sure but in animation... endless potential for angels and monsters to have super interesting designs sigh

castiel’s arc should end with him going from blind soldier, to the unwilling ruler of heaven, finding a place on earth with sam and dean, becoming closer with humanity and eventually a father of three (the hybrids). 

[clolikescloquetas]

THINGS I HOPE TO SEE (OR NOT) IN ACOTAR4

Nesta NOT STAYING AT THE ILLYRIANS MOUNTAINS for long, and travelling to other courts or the continent instead so she sees the world just like she wanted to do before the war. I think sending her away to a cold mountain surrounded by misogynistic warriors who hate her and are scared of her was a stupid af decision. Especially when it's a war camp and war triggers her PTSD. Oh and let's not forget there's a revolution about to take place. I see it as a very forced way of the narrative to make cassian and nesta interact. I understand an unexpected turn of events was needed as a beginning for acotar4, but going to the mountains shouldn't be anything more than a beginning that quickly leads us to another location. We've been told many times that nesta is "illyrian at heart" but I don't buy it. She isn't such thing, and her character is way too complex and interesting and has too much potential to just make her fit into a culture she doesn't belong to and has nothing in common with (it's stupid to think a place that reveres war and bloodshed will help her heal).

Besides, after all the places the previous books introduced I think it would be boring to stick to the same court. I loved Velaris but now that Feyre's story has ended it's time to move on. Not to mention that the Night Court is the worst place for Nesta, it reminds her of all her trauma and its high lord is a male she despises. Nesta needs to go somewhere else where she can recover her spirit and independence, and be free of the commands of a male that gives her orders as if she were her subject (she is not).

Hopefully, knowing how much sjm loves plot twists and given how she's already told us where nesta is supposed to go, it won't stay like that for long.

NO TRAINING. Maybe learning self defense techniques but that's as far as I'll go. No training to turn her into an almighty warrior. Nesta has power from literally the mightiest magic device in the world, and you're telling me getting beat on a ring will empower her?? Even when she's previously stated her refusal to train and said fighting isn't the only thing that makes someone strong?? And we're talking about Nesta, whose powers make her lethal. Making Nesta train would butcher her character and istg if they pull the "fighting helps her go back to her old self and empowers her" I will lose it. Enough with making that troupe work for everyone. We've seen it before and it has worked out well for other character, but in this case it wouldn't feel right and would be boring af.

I've seen a few people say they want Nesta to command the Illyrians, and help with the whole misogynist issue they have, or that she should do the Blood Rite I don't know if the name is correct, I don't remember it to gain the respect of the warriors. How should I put this: NO. This is more of the "Nesta is Illyrian at heart" bullshit Rhysass likes to pull, when what he actually means is that she is proud and stubborn. She, and I can't stress this enough, is not Illyrian. She shouldn't be participating in traditions she doesn't understand and doesn't engage in (she doesn't want to learn how to fight for fuck's sake) and we certainly don't need nesta to pull a white saviour behavior. I don't want her to come and solve a centuries old problem of a culture she doesn't belong to. And I don't see how she could do that in a credible way either, given how they all are terrified and wary of her. This also applies to the rioting issue that is looming over the illyrian camps.

Nesta healing and improving her mental health with cassian at her side to support her, without making him the reason why she gets better. And showing the effects war has on a veteran as Cassian too.

Someone, preferably Nesta, calling out Feyre, Rhysass and the rest of the IC on their shitty behavior and actions, and the narrative finally acknowledging their mistakes and portraying them as the deeply flawed characters they are. Now that we don't have Feyre's POV anymore there are no excuses for condoning their shit.

Cassian realising he has judged, ignored and said cruel things (like he doesn't know why her sisters love her are u kidding me) to Nesta and how he hasn't stood up for her before his friends. Oh and how he ignores her when Mor is present. I'm a sucker for nessian, but before they are a thing, he should apologize. I don't like how he treats nesta poorly and then expects her to love him, when she doesn't owe him shit. It's selfish of him to expect her to fit into his family even when they all hate her. I hope acotar4 handles well these issues. And I can't wait too read Nesta's POV and know why she didn't want to be close to Cassian after the war.

Nesta making new friends on her own, people who respect her and love her. I love nessian but I don't want their relationship to be the only deep interaction and relationship Nesta has. I would LOVE to see her and lucien become best friends (they were supposed to be lovers after all, and although a romantic relationship has been dismissed I'm sure their friendship dynamic would be amazing), or get acquainted with Helion or even Azriel. She needs to meet new people, and preferably not from the night court.

We've read many times how Nesta's powers are described as great and terrible. The source of her power is the fucking cauldron, used to create the world. Even tho no one knows yet what those powers are exactly, she has used them to turn hundreds of soldiers to ashes and even the bone carver, a death GOD, has spoken of the way the earth trembled at her power when Nesta was made. I want these powers to be a huuge part of the plot in this book. I want Nesta to master them fully, and for us to see the process. I don't know if I'm the only one who thinks like this, but when Feyre discovered she had powers from all the high lords, it seemed to me that she mastered them too quickly. I was hoping to get more attention on that issue, but it got dismissed quite quickly. Now that it's Nesta's time, I want the book to fully focus on these powers. Oh, and what I want the most is my baby to become the most powerful creature in the continent. More mighty than Rhysass and the other high lords by far. You can't give us a whole book preaching how nesta is really powerful, and how she took something from the cauldron that made the earth tremble, and then turn her into a common witch or something similar. I mean you can't expect me to believe the high lords have more power than the cauldron.

Although I find that to be another plot hole, bc the cauldron was supposed to be almighty but then Rhys and Feyre restored it when it broke?? Does that mean they are more powerfull than the object that created their world?? If that is so, they why didn't they win against hybern sooner??

Anyways, I want Nesta to never have to bow to anyone. Ever.

Well that is what I'd like to see in the next book. Which, based on the information we have, is basically the opposite of what will happen. As far as we know, sjm said there would be a lot of training in this book (I assume she was talking about Nesta) so there goes the chance of her not been a warrior. We know she'll go to Illyria, and although it's my hope she leaves soon or that she never goes in the first place, I know that's not what's going to happen.

And then there's the sex. Sjm said she had to delete some of the sex scenes bc her editor said they were too much and unnecessary. Which means there are still plenty of sex scenes in the books, as sjm confirmed. Don't get me wrong, smut is fine if handled correctly. But I don't think it will he handled correctly.

In fact, I think acotar4 will be placed on illyria the whole book or at least a huge part of it, and that we'll have lots of unnecessary and meaningless sex scenes inside of Cassian's cabin in the mountains instead of a well written and interesting plot, a well developed and complex relationship between the characters and a well handled depiction of PTSD and trauma healing.

In my mind it'll go like this:

Nesta arrives in the mountains. She and cassian are mean to each other for a while and the sexual tension is pretty obvious between them. Nesta starts training. At the beginning she hates it but over time she ends up loving it and excelling. Sex. Nesta makes a few friends between the illyrian female warriors she trains with, whose characters are shallow and totally secondary. Sex. More sex. Maybe something about Nesta's powers. A scene where cassian and nesta have an openhearted conversation about their relationship. Cassian never acknowledges how he treated Nesta, but she will apologise to him for how she kept him away. This leads to more sex. Nesta makes up with feyre, and apologies to her for being mean or whatever sjm comes up with. Feyre doesn't apologize back, or it's a shitty apologize for sure. Sex. Nesta stablish a cordial although cold relationship with Rhysass and Mor bc apparently she and Az are not destined to interact (even tho Az would totally oppose Nesta's situation of being sent to the illyrian camps). Sex. Nesta does the Rite. Sex. Sex. Something about the illyrian rebels. Cassian gets hurt. Nesta goes feral and gets a hold on the illyrian people. They respect her and answer to her now. Sex.

Or something along these lines. Oh and I have the impression sjm loves her main characters too much to write any scene showing how the decisions, actions or behaviour regarding Nesta of Feyre and Rhys were wrong. Acknowledging this could make it seem like they are flawed people like the rest, and apparently that's not possible.

I pray to be proved wrong once the book is released. Only time will tell.

[lucky-sevens]

mechanisms fiction!

also known as: i read all the fiction so you don’t have to!

under the cut: summaries of each fiction, word count, and content warnings! the summaries are of my own writing, and unlike the ones on the website, i’ve opted for useful rather than intriguing. i’ve also ordered the list to make a bit more sense/fit better timeline-wise!

some of the fiction has an audio version; i’ve included links to TheVoidSings’ lyric videos of said audio where applicable!

i’ve put the ones with relevant lore in bold, the ones i personally like in italics, and i’ve put a * after all the ones that include the mechs!

AURORA AND THE CREW

breakup*

summary: nastya and aurora have an argument and then both go off to sulk. mostly focuses on nastya. interesting thing: scuzz is in this one!

word count: 707

content warnings: implied nsfw

the story of the toy soldier*

summary: it’s the toy soldier’s backstory! covers what’s probably at least a decade and has a lot of lore! also has illustrations, most likely courtesy of ts!

word count: 605

content warnings: murder, images of choking, implied rape

who killed doctor carmilla?*

summary: carmilla’s just been pushed out an airlock and various mechanisms are going around trying to get an alibi out of everyone.

word count: 647

content warnings: n/a

interview transcript 34/08/7012*

summary: a police officer attempts to interview jonny when he’s in prison. includes a lot of information about him that’s nice to have for characterization!

word count: 782

content warnings: discussed murder, including child murder; attempted suicide

archive footage*

summary: an ivy character study, pretty much! goes into her fucked up brain and how it works. one of my personal favorites, as it’s very well written.

word count: 1390

content warnings: death, minor blood/gore

octokittens*

summary: a short one-off featuring some ashes and jonny banter!

word count: 208

content warnings: guns, animal death

feeding the octokittens*

summary: another one-off: this one has some quality tim, ivy, and nastya content. very fun!

word count: 455

content warnings: animal death

tales of the blogbot*

summary: comes off as an odd fiction, addressing the ‘blogbot’, the thing that used to send out the updates on the mechs mailing list (among other things) and makes passive-aggressive comments about them occasionally. goes through a few answers to what the bot is, and comes to no conclusion, but directly links to the next fiction in my list, ‘ghost in the machine’.

word count: 988

content warnings: referenced mass murder, implied nsfw

ghost in the machine*

summary: what happened to aurora’s programmer when jonny and carmilla took over ‘her’ ship (which is explained/expanded on in ‘how the aurora was won’); lots of aurora lore, as well as a more close view into the actual atrocities the mechanisms commit.

word count: 1152

content warnings: death

how the aurora was won*

jonny steals the aurora from the cyberian navy, in the most unsettling way possible!

word count: 631

content warnings: suicide, graphic depictions of violence

a bedtime story*

some fluffy nastyaurora for the soul!

word count: 326

content warnings: n/a

drive the cold winter away*

part of a group with cyberian demons and nomadic spacers! i think i’ve arranged them chronologically, but might have messed it up.

nastya visits the ruins of cyberia. jonny and ashes are there.

word count: 432

content warnings: n/a

cyberian demons*

a nastya character study- reflections on her memories, as she works on destroying what is left of cyberia.

word count: 1699

content warnings: blood, violence

nomadic spacers*

an outsider pov on the events of ‘drive the cold winter away’ and ‘cyberian demons’.

word count: 1120

content warnings: death

out*

nastya leaves the mechanisms for good after she finds her love, aurora, is no longer who she once was; presumably, this is her death.

word count: 1210

content warnings: suicide

ONCE UPON A TIME [IN SPACE]

gingerbread

hansel and gretal’s villain origin story! (they were the scientists speaking in ‘the twins’)

word count: 609

content warnings: child neglect, murder, needles/syringes

midnight

a bit of a cinders character study/some more of her backstory!

word count: 628

content warnings: n/a

mirror, mirror (audio version here!)

post-pump shanty/snow’s flight. the beginning of snow’s descent into a worse person, and how it overlaps with the myth of snow white/how she begins to take on the role of the evil queen.

word count: 860

content warnings: smoking

a fireside chat

a radio broadcast by scheherazade, king cole’s chief propaganda minister.

word count: 842

content warnings: mentions of concentration camps, death, and bombings

a rebel yell (audio version here!)

counter to ‘a fireside chat’- a radio broadcast by tom thumb, the voice of the rebellion! one of my personal favorites, as it’s very funny.

word count: 574

content warnings: mentions of mass murder

chapter’s end*

mad jack spratt and jonny d’ville play cards.

word count: 790

content warnings: discussions of death

by any other name

basically all the lore around briar rose, in a form of a report by hood, the rebellion’s hacker!

word count: 2023

content warnings: murder, graphic depictions of violence

this little piggy

all of the (incredibly fucked up) lore around the three little pigs!

word count: 993

content warnings: child abuse, brainwashing, non-consensual body modification, medical abuse (it’s a very intense one, please stay safe!)

what big eyes

all the lore we have on hood, in the form of king cole’s intelligence officers trying to figure it out.

word count: 1946

content warnings: mentions of war crimes and death

in the army*

the toy soldier and a group of rose reds hang out in a bar together! it’s a very fun one, with lots of banter! presumably takes place before the toy soldier met the mechanisms, but we don’t know that for sure. lots of lore about the rose reds, as well!

word count: 707

content warnings: mentions of war crimes and death

true love

colonel belle’s report on her efforts to manipulate adam ‘the beast’ bete into joining the resistance. (the mechs’ take on beauty and the beast). also a small bit of lore about rose!

word count: 1151

content warnings: manipulation, torture, unhealthy relationships

one thousand and two

a character study of scheherazade- the thoughts running through her head as rebels are about to find and kill her.

word count: 2236

content warnings: suicide; mentions of torture, concentration camps, and child death

ever after*

you know how jonny was being annoyingly cryptic about what happened to briar rose! well, they have a fiction that says!

word count: 680

content warnings: graphic depictions of violence

ULYSSES DIES AT DAWN

you’ll have to tell us the story sometime*

the mechanisms explore the ruins of the city, thousands of years after the events of ulysses dies at dawn!

word count: 469

content warnings: n/a

death in the metropolis

not anything super relevant- a news article about gang violence and the increased shifts for acheron workers as a result, setting a bit of a mood for the city as a whole. establishes hermes’ role in olympus.

word count: 547

content warnings: nothing to note, but there’s the background fucked-up-ness of the city going on and mentioned!

how not to die

another news article, this one focused on a group of people (’helljumpers’) trying to escape the acheron.

word count: 926

content warnings: suicide

fao: hermes – not urgent

a bit of a followup to the previous two fictions! the editor, herodotus, gets in trouble for discussing the helljumpers.

word count: 453

content warnings: n/a

orpheus, dionysus, muriatic acid and the strange whirring thing*

a look into orpheus’ character and how he ended up in the ulysses job! (mechs don’t heavily feature- just a note of the role brian took on, as well as mentions of ashes of course)

word count: 5017

content warnings: addiction, suicidal thoughts, police; implied nsfw, but only in the context of orpheus being a sex worker

orpheus and narcissus go to the seaside

i personally really love this one! it’s low-key the mechanisms’ take on the great gatsby- takes place a few years prior to the above fiction, and explores orpheus and narcissus’ friendship! it’s morbidly funny, with lots of very good banter/interaction! 

word count: 6300

content warnings: eating disorders, addiction, implied nsfw (again in the context of sex work), suicidal thoughts, mental institutions (even if that’s not normally a problem for you, they get very dark and graphic, so be careful), non-consensual drugging; technically self-harm, but it’s a lighthearted joke

in the madness of war

how ulysses was forced into the war (a darker take on the story about him attempting to avoid it at first).

word count: 817

content warnings: n/a

the hacker’s mistake (a fiction to accompany prometheus)

prometheus is revealed as corrupt, but that doesn’t stop people from believing in him, so he is made an example of.

word count: 903

content warnings: torture

one of the chosen

another low-lore worldbuilding piece- this one about a teenage girl who gets conscripted to the acheron early.

word count: 824

content warnings: n/a (it’s fairly dark, though, so be careful).

eskhatos*

after the events of ulysses dies at dawn, the mechanisms leave, but not without causing a bit of chaos first.

word count: 464

content warnings: cannibalism

HIGH NOON OVER CAMELOT

the fastest shot

guinevere’s backstory! 

word count: 792

content warnings: murder, child abuse, alcoholism

the sharpest aim

a western-style tall tale, starring lancelot!

word count: 1667

content warnings: relationship abuse, murder, violence

i will rule this town*

another personal favorite! expanding on ‘ten caliber railgun he got off a bandit in the flooded sectors’, it deals with arthur’s attempts to bring down nimue, the lady of the lake, and gain control! also has some lancelot/arthur/guinevere fluff, and a bit of an insight into his friendship with brian- as well as his original hopeful mindset, and how that diminished.

word count: 1488

content warnings: murder, drowning

the wake

morgan le fay (mordred’s surrogate mother)’s funeral, and mordred’s decision to go seek out camelot.

word count: 1045

content warnings: death (but only in the context of it being a funeral), cultural cannibalism

pellinore and the beast (audio version here)

this one’s a bit of an odd one- i’ve included it for the sake of completion, as it’s on the fiction list, but it’s just the lyrics to the mechs song pellinore and the beast? i’ve excluded the word count and content warnings for this one, as it’s literally just the lyrics. unsure of what to do here.

OTHER

the prisoner of dorian gray

the mechanisms’ take on the story of dorian grey! this one is part fiction, part song lyrics with a note of the tune they should be sung to.

word count: 1746

content warnings: suicide, torture

and that’s it! the fiction is all very good and well written, and i’d highly recommend reading at least a few of these!

[dearchikkie]

My Dream Soulmate

MARICHAT MAY 2020

Day 11: Chat Blanc

A/N: this fic is ignoring the events of the canon Chat Blanc episode, also pretend Marinette doesn't have the Ladybug Miraculous + a Soulmate AU... I know, it's a lot. also, i’ve decided for my mental health, i’m just going to update with the prompts I have ideas on and when i feel like... sorry if i miss a prompt you liked, but after may i WILL write a fic for every prompt and post them here and ao3, enjoy :)

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* ✧*:･ﾟ✧

At the young age of 9, Marinette had gained the courage to ask her mother what a 'soulmate' was. Immediately, Sabine Cheng smiled and sat her down.

A soulmate, she had started, was a lifelong partner. Someone to spend your life with, to grow old with. They'd care about you forever, and you them.

Marinette has been ecstatic. A soulmate! It sounded amazing, she'd always dreamed of a handsome prince sweeping her off her feet and taking her away to somewhere far, far away. And now that dream could become a reality!

There was someone out there, just for her. Someone to care for her. To cherish her. To love her.

But how would she find them? She asked, how would she separate them from the thousands of people she passed every day? She stared at her mother perplexed, to which Sabine had simply shaken her head. Marinette watched as she pulled up her sleeve, revealing a monstrous gash in her shoulder, clear signs of stitching through it.

When did you get that? Marinette scrunched up her face at the sight of it. Sabine covered it back down with her sleeve, remember that accident your father had last year? When he had fallen down the stairs?

Why of course, Marinette couldn't get the bloody sight of Tom at the bottom of the steps out of her mind that easily.

Well, Sabine continued, he has the exact same bruise on his same shoulder. Every bruise, scrape, scratch and gash would appear on her body in the same location her soulmate sustained it.

Thank god though, only the injury appeared; you barely felt the pain too.

With this new information, every mysterious knee scrape, stomach ache or simple scratch had a new feeling to it: when her nose bled she wondered if her soulmate had caused it; when her fingers ached she wondered what her soulmate had been doing so purposefully; she felt bad every time she accidentally pricked her fingers with sewing needles and cringed when she finally got her ears pierced.

But then things took a turn for the worse. As Alya's neck began to ache, Kim's elbows blackened and Mylene's knuckles bruised, Marinette started to get gapes along her legs and blood dripping down her face during class.

Luckily, Marinette knew she wasn't prone to sudden lethal injury, so she knew it had to be her soulmate, but could he slow it down a little? She was sick of suddenly vomiting during lunch or passing out during chemistry!

Then again, everyone knew why someone could be getting injured so badly: akuma's. The new threats rampaging Paris. Terrifying villains given powers only found in movies ran rampant in the streets seeking revenge against those who wronged them. Luckily, after a while they were returned to normal; whether that took someone random being beaten up thoroughly or some masked figure defeating them, it didn't matter. They always went away.

Until the 'Chat Blanc' appeared.

He'd been an akuma for three months now, and while he only appeared at night, he still was a terror: destroying billboards and expensive Agreste stores; turning trees to ash and trashing the homes of millionaires. He hadn't directed any specific person, he hadn't been taken down by a masked vigilante, and the police could do nothing to stop him.

No. Marinette shouldn't focus on that. She had incredible friends, went to a school she loved, had loving parents and wasn't completely failing in class. She had a lot of great things going for her; she didn't need a soulmate right now.

Despite that, Marinette couldn't stop thinking about them. Today, for example, she should have been paying attention to Mme. Bustier drone on about classic literature, but instead, she was daydreaming about her accident-prone soulmate. What were they like? What was their name? How did they act? How-

"CHAT BLANC!"

Screams were heard from outside the door as the students inside began to panic, "Ok everybody. You know the drill, emergency exits are at the back and west side of the school! Do not push or shove and leave your bags behind!" Marinette's classmates began shuffling towards the door, even Chloe [who had put up quite a fight the first time she was forced to leave behind her newest designer handbag] now followed without complaint.

Guess everyone was used to it now.

The calmness inside the classroom was now gone as students ran in all directions; Marinette watched as Kim leapt over a pile of debris, helping Max and Alix behind him.

"C'mon, girl! We gotta hurry!" Marinette moved away from them and let herself be dragged by Alya and Nino to the nearest exit. "Watch out!" rubble shot out from beside them and Marinette felt herself be pulled to the ground. Her blood ran cold as white flashed across the scene.

Alya stiffened beside her, and she could hear Nino begin cursing under his breath. A white flash flew by, the rubble before them crumbled and ash clouds rose from where they had once been.

Chat Blanc.

"Put your hands in the air!" police ran to the scene, swat teams appearing in front of the young teens. "Y-You're under arrest!" one cop shouted, sounding as brave as he could.

Chat Blanc glared at them all and whispered something under his breath. White mist materialized around his fingers as he gnarled his teeth at the nearest officer. Marinette could hear her heart pumping a mile a minute at the sight of his cold, violet eyes.

"This is your final warning; surrender or we will open fire!"

Chat Blanc opened his mouth slightly, revealing glaring white fangs. He smirked at them all and let his tongue slide over them, "Fuck off."

Gunfire rang through the air. Cops shouted orders as front guards reloaded frantically. In the face of it all, Chat Blanc easily dodged every bullet. Swerving and deflecting each one with his baton or tail. Then endless lines of fire; Marinette's ears began to sting from the loud firing,

"Get out of here!" a man with stubble pointed directly at the group of friends, that was all Alya needed before grabbing both Nino and Marinette and dragging them back onto their feet. For a moment, Marinette stared back at Chat Blanc. Instead of the usual fear, Marinette felt her cheeks warm and breath halt.

Chat Blanc froze and met her gaze. He looked at her with no malice, but instead, just confusion.

Taking advantage of his distraction, one of the shooters shot directly at his hand. Chat Blanc broke eye contact and glared at the guilty officer. He hissed in pain and shook his hand slightly, then pounced on him.

Before Marinette could see what happened, Alya hauled her away, sprinting together to the nearest exit.

Once free and around the corner of the school, Alya, Marinette and Nino all collapsed to the ground, heaving. Sweat dripped down their faces as a chill ran down their sides.

Marinette couldn't get his eyes out of her mind. They had struck through her; purple and bright. Why couldn't she get them out of her mind?

"Marinette! Oh, god-- are you ok?" Marinette stared down and followed Alya and Nino's concerned gazes. A thick, red liquid was dripping down her arm, staining her white shirt. She gasped and wiped it away, feigning pain.

But she felt nothing.

Her heart couldn't stop beating. Nino ripped off the sleeve of his jacket and carefully began wrapping it over her injury. She pretended to cringe in pain. She felt bad letting Nino care for a wound that wasn't even hurting her. But she couldn't let them know it was her soulmates. Marinette now knew exactly who her soulmate was.

She had watched her soulmate get shot. She had watched Him get shot. She had watched Chat Blanc get shot in the exact same hand as the one now bleeding.

It didn't take a genius to put the points together.

Chat Blanc was her soulmate.

Her soulmate was a criminal. A bloodthirsty akuma. A thief.

Oh god. Oh god oh god. Oh no.

No no no no no no no no no no

Nino barely caught her as she fainted.

End Note: guys!! I'm going to develop this oneshot into a short fic! after Marichat May is over, i'll be updating on ao3 and tumblr-- can't wait to start :)

[schrijverr]

Behind the Curtain

Ashes finds out about a play back on Cyberia about the glorious revolution of the people against the Tsar. They convice the others to go and get to see a theater piece about very familiar events for Jonny and Nastya.

On AO3.

Ships: none

Wanrings: The mechs kills everyone in the theater at the end. Tell me if I missed anything or if you want me to tag something.

~~~~~~~~~

Ashes came striding into the room and slapped something down on the table, before exclaiming: “We have to go to Cyberia.”

“No we fucking don’t.” Nastya dropped out of a vent where she had been patching up some bullet holes from an earlier argument.

“Yeah, you know how Nastya feels about that, Ashes. Why would you suggest that?” asked Jonny, from he couch where he was cheating Tim out of a very nice rifle.

“Well, my dear Captain, we need to see this.” Ashes said as they gestured to what they’d put down on the table and waited until they’d all seen.

Jonny eyed them suspiciously, Ashes only used the title he wanted when they wanted something from him.

On the table was a pamphlet of a Cyberian theater, who was apparently putting on a play about the revolution that had freed their county from the Tsar. He looked up and asked: “And why would we want to see this?”

Ashes grinned and opened the pamphlet, pointing at a bit of text that read: Anastasia Nikolaevna Rasputina played by Nastasja Samboerskaja

When he’d read it Jonny matched Ashes grin and stood up while exclaiming: “I’ll tell Brian about the new coordinates.”

“Jonny.” Nastya said sternly.

“Oh, come on, Nastya.” Jonny pouted, “It’ll be fun. You’ll get to make fun of the people that killed you, we get to make fun of you. If it’s terrible, we’ll kill everyone there and be on out merry way. It’ll be fun and it’ll be fine. Just some entertainment.”

“Yes and teasing material for the next few centuries, I think not.” Nastya huffed.

“No, of course not.” Jonny said obviously lying, when he saw he wasn’t believed he pulled out his last ace up his sleeve and said: “Pleaasee, I’ll even get you those parts for an upgrade for Aurora after.”

Squinting suspiciously Nastya asked: “Even if we have to go through a boring sector to get them?”

Jonny nodded hastily and Nastya agreed after which Jonny practically sprinted away to tell Brian, afraid that if he stayed Nastya would retract her agreement.

Soon, too soon for Nastyas liking, they arrived on Cyberia, where they’d forced Nastya into a ridiculous disguise just in case someone would recognize her from a history book.

Sadly, The Toy Soldier had been in charge of the disguise, so it consisted of an obviously fake mustache and a pair of big sunglasses.

Still they managed to get in without more weird looks than usual and had taken place on the balcony all grinning and preparing for the show.

From the start it was clear that this was propaganda at it’s finest. People of the Revolutionary Movement were put down as brave heroes and the Tsar was cruel to the point of caricature, not that the Mechs cared about that, they were waiting for someone special.

When “Nastya” first entered the stage Jonny almost fell of his chair with laughter as he wheezed: “I’d forgotten the ridiculous dresses you wore when you got in.”

He choked when Nastya elbowed him and hissed: “And if you don’t stop, I’ll behead you and you also won’t be able to remember this.”

Jonny tried to shut up, but small chuckles still left his mouth every time he looked at Nastya in her big coat and easy to move in clothes, very different from the portrayal of her on stage.

As the actress said her lines it became apparent that they’d gone for a ditsy version of her, who only helped because she didn’t know any better and was being masterfully manipulated by her tutor, one of the heroes of the story.

Most of the crew was having the time of their lives, laughing as if this serious war play was a comedy much to the chagrin of their fellow audience members. Only Brian seemed to take pity on Nastya slightly and just smiled at her sadly whenever a new roar of laughter came.

They watched how “Nastya” tumbled about the stage while smiling: “Oh, no! Father, please don’t hurt these nice people, I’m sure they’re only screaming because they think it’s fun. You cheer at a sports game, don’t you?”

The actor, who played the Tsar looked stern for a moment, before softening and saying: “You are quite right, my smart dear daughter. I shall let them chant my name in glory.”

“That’s not what happened.” the real Nastya grumbled, slightly annoyed.

She was ignored by Jonny, who gleefully exclaimed: “You’re getting killed soon.”

And as Jonny predicted (and, of course, because although it might be historically inaccurate for the most part, the glorious death of the old regime was kept in), “Nastya” died, killed by her own tutor, who was hailed the hero he was remembered as.

What Jonny hadn’t predicted and what no one had seen coming was the fact that an extra, not important enough to be listed, came in dressed in strange clothes and yelled: “I am from Carmillas crew and I’m going steal her in order to help revive the dead princess.”

From the audience Jonny shouted: “Hey that’s not what happened!”

Giving him a vindicated grin Nastya told him: “What happened to we’ll make fun of them now, Jonny? Come on, it’ll be fun remember? As I recall this is pretty accurate.”

“First of, no you don’t, you were bleeding out at the time. Second of, I was way drunker, I could definitely not stand up that straight.” Jonny argued.

“I’ll give you that, but overall it seems quite realistic.” Nastya smirked.

Meanwhile the Jonny on stage was carrying a bleeding Nastya, although the blood was very fake and they obviously hadn’t had a good budget for special effects. The effects got worse when the Jonny on stage got shot through his head and collapsed with Nastya in his arms.

Jonny in the audience said: “Oh, I vaguely remember this, I think I got up and murdered that guy, before we got picked up.”

That was not what happened, the Jonny on stage stayed down and the man who had shot him grinned victoriously, getting a lot of applause from the audience.

With that Jonny rolled up his sleeves and said: “Okay now that’s going to far, we’re killing everyone and burning this joint to the ground.”

“Finally.” Nastya exclaimed.

“Did you say burning this joint to the ground?” Ashes piped up, suddenly all attention away from the play.

“Yes, Ashes, yes, I did.” Jonny grinned.

Ashes grinned back and got out a lighter while they said: “Well that sounds like much more fun. I think the fun part of the play is over anyway.”

And with that the Mechs got up and opened fire. It was brutal and it was violent and they were having the time of their lives. This would go down as a great massacre in the history of Cyberia, but it was just a normal Friday for the Mechs.

Back on the Aurora, Jonny sighed: “That was some nice violence. Where to now?”

“Now we go get my parts for Auroras upgrade.” Nastya demanded.

“But that’ll be boring.” Jonny whined.

“You promised, Jonny.” Nastya said in a warning tone.

Jonny gave her shit eating look and said: “When do I ever keep my promises.”

Nastya glared at him, before turning away and saying: “Brian, we’re going to the planet in the Mirny system and we’re getting the parts like Jonny promised.”

“Brian, no. Listen to your Captain.” Jonny tried to look stern, but petulant anger at Nastya was more prominent on his face.

“Uhhh.” Brian hesitated looking between the two.

Both said his name in a tone that promised a lot of pain from whoever he didn’t listen to, but in the end he decided he was less scared of Jonny and it was the right thing to do, so he said: “It’s wrong to break your promises.”

Then he hurried away while behind him sounds of a new argument rang. He ducked for a stray bullet and mentally sighed: jup, just another Friday.

[alolanrain]

Cold

Galar is cold. The coldest Region Ash has ever been to and this is including Sinnoh. He’s wearing his thickest sweatshirt and pants, full on gloves instead of those fingerless ones. Gou is shivering next to him, the mountain dog anthro is still fairing better though since his anthro shift was made for this weather.

Ash’s tail lashed out and then quivered. Wrapping around his stomach and squeezing his middle. Gou eyed Ash, it’s not like Ash even has an inkling of control over his appendages. Ash just wants to get to the hotel and call it a very early night, since it’s only like three in the afternoon.

Their Specifically in Wyndon, for the worldwide Championship that all champions have to be at. Well all this year, the last twelve Ash has been sneaking by with Drake going in his stead but now Lance had put his foot sown firmly now that Ash is a double titled Champion.

“You can explore,” Ash pointed a shaky finger at Gou, Pikachu making it a bit hard with the way he was hunkering down on his shoulder, “I’m going to be taking a long ass nap.”

Gou snorted and rolled his eyes, “yeah, whatever.” He snipped back. Maybe the cold was getting to him more then Ash thought. But that didn’t matter now, getting to a warm room with a fluffy bed is more important.

“How may I help you this afternoon?” The receptionist asked politely. Though she eyed them like they were at the bottom of her shoes. Rich neighborhoods suck. Pikachu bristled slightly but calmed down when Ash pet the back of his partners tail that was on his other shoulder.

“Master suite for Champion Ash Ketchum on the Alt floor.” Ash mumbled. Pulling out his Champion card and putting it in the little machine right next to the computer behind the desk wall. It was custom at this point that every high end hotel had one of these machines to actually check if people were impersonating a Champion or not. Not like it would be easy with all the mythical and strong animal anthro’s on the line up. The only one closest to a plain human was Ash, a simple house cat Calico anthro, even then the red in his fur was so rich in color that the most expensive dye jobs can’t reach it.

“Oh sorry,” the lady was soon loosing her mock happiness, “it doesn’t look like-“

“The lights green.” Ash stopped her. Tiredly looking at the green light on top of the small black box. Not only was the color indicating that he is in fact a Champion, but also that he does have a room rented.

The receptionist grit her teeth in a false smile that faltered as her eyes moved to something with a slight horror on her face.

Before Ash could move, and with the fact that Gou gasped pretty hard right after the change in the Receptionist’s face, a light hand ghosted from the outside of his shoulder over to his neck. Ash unconsciously moved his head when the hand ran up his neck to cup his jaw.

“You’re freezing.” Good old Wallace. Blunt as ever.

“I feel freezing.” Ash couldn’t help the slight whine filtering into his voice. He lent into Wallace’s hand that still cupped his jaw a little and eyes fluttered closed for a few milliseconds before slowly opening again. Pikachu chirped in greeting to the Champion and Wallace moved his other hand to pet under the mouse’s chin.

“Get your room keys,” Wallace motioned you the small envelope, Gou moved and snagged them off the counter, tossing it to Ash who caught it on reflex, “I’ll escort you and your friend up to your room.”

“Thank you.” Ash whispered. Moving to lean into the taller man’s side. Pikachu gave an appreciative chirp when the blue haired man’s warm hand pet down the spine of the yellow Pokémon.

“Thank you, Champion Wallace.” Gou was more formal. Bowing quickly while walking before catching up to the two who stepped into the elevator.

“It’s no problem,” Wallace’s light cyan angel wings spread out a little to cup behind Ash and Pikachu, “I warned Lance this wasn’t the right time to introduce you. You’ll be shivering and teeth chittering the entire time.” He ran the hand behind Ash’s back from the middle of his shoulders down to the small of his back.

Gou eyes the two Champions, mentally stopping himself from asking why their so affectionate with each other. It was answered soon after when the elevator door opened onto the secret floor when they came face to face with the retired Ex-Champion Steven Stone and Champion Alder.

“Ashton!” Alder belowed happily. Moving to allow the trio out into the floor before pulling Ash into a hug. Minding his fluffy tail that spazzed a bit before winding around the man’s thick ankle. “It’s so good to see you.”

“Hi Alder,” Ash sniffed back some snot before moving to curl tighter into the hug, “long time no see.”

“Hello, Ash.” Steven hesitantly reaches out before cupping the back of Ash’s jaw and neck and running his hands up into the semi long hair to brush some hair back. “Your shaking.” Steven frowned.

“I told Lance,” Wallace muttered again while coming closer and pressing a quick kiss into Steven’s hair before facing Ash who was still curled into the hug with Alder, The man never minding how cold the calico anthro is, “but he never listens.”

“It’s because he’s a dragon.” Ash grumbled as he forced himself away from the really warm hug with the gargoyle shifter. “He’s warm all the time no matter what weather, it clouds his judgement.”

“But for twelve years?” Wallace didn’t look to convinced.

“I don’t know,” Ash was fully whining now, “I’m just super tired and really want a bed.”

“Room one hundred and twelve right?” Steven asked. Thumbing at his phone which must have all the Champions room numbers on them.

“Ye.” Ash grunted. Reaching back and grasping for Gou’s hand before trotting behind light gray angel. He didn’t really pay attention to the passing rooms theirs only a few until they reached to the biggest one, which usually goes to Lance since he’s the oldest and the longest lasting Champion

———

It wasn’t long after that when Ash was finally sliding into a big plush bed in his room. Gou right across the hall, the mountain dog anthro had made a point in declaring nap time for him also, so Ash doesn’t have to worry to much in case another Champion or some hotel staff accidentally thinks Gou is sneaking in with a stolen card. Ash doesn’t need a fucking repeat two year ago when he brought Dawn with him that one time to a large scale conference and she was accidentally accused of thieft of Ash’s second key card and trying to sneak into their shared room.

Ash was pretty vicious with both Lance and Drake, who had accused the girl, and publicly dragged their ass’s to the police station to make them pay bail for Dawn. Berating and verbally ripping into the Chinese dragon anthro’s the entire time while sitting next to Alder who drove them there.

He both made them apologize and he and Dawn went to a thrift store to go get some ice cream before heading back to the hotel where they stayed up all night to watch some movies.

The only reason why Brock wasn’t with them was that he already had a room with Misty and another Gym leader that they were friends with on a different floor, floor delta, which is also a secret and private floor for any gym leaders on or off work.

Ash curled his tail tighter around his body, not keen on the cold silk sheets at all, his sock covered feet getting encased most by the multi colored fluff. Sleep was also terrible, which increased Ash’s anger and pushed him to the point where he threw off the covered and hit his hands and legs against the bed like a toddler before getting up and slinging on his sweatshirt from earlier again.

Pikachu blinked lazily you from his spot under the rest of the pillows and half of the comforter. Only stretching and getting out of his half warmth cave because he doesn’t like it when Ash is cold when he isn’t and the way Ash is stalking about looking for some warmer socks he packed made Pikachu anxious. He hopped onto Ash’s shoulders when his trainer offered an arm put after finding said socks and putting them on over his existing ones on his feet.

Shuffling out of his room, Ash’s back met with Gou’s. Making both of them jump and twirl around. Pointing their fingers at each other like the spider man meme.

“Your room cold too?” Gou asked. Floppy ears twitching as he glanced down a millisecond at Ash’s bristling and thrashing tail.

“Iceberg cold.” Ash hissed as he stalked past the mountain dog anthro to go over into the kitchen and the thermostat.

“It’s already at seventy five degrees Fahrenheit!” Ash nearly yowled in rage.

“No way,” Gou trotted into the kitchen and gently shoving Ash away with his shoulders, ignoring the slight hiss and pinned back ears as he looked at the thermo, “holy Arceus you’re not wrong.”

“No shit!” Aah hissed again. Pulling back away from Gou more and going back to his freezing room to snatch his phone of the charger. A loud yowl sounded in his throat as he noticed that it wasn’t even charging.

“My phones nearly dead!” Gou’s voice barked from his room. He must have went to grab his as well.

“Mines at half battery,” Ash convened with him in the middle of the hallway again, “I’ll call Lance to see if he’s up and having the same problem.” No doubt the dragon would be nearly throwing a fit if his heat was shut off and his room freezing cold. Not like it would bother him to much since he has a fire core even if he’s a water dragon, which made absolutely no sense to Ash when he explained it earlier when Ash first came on as his secondary Champion.

Alder would be having a similar problem since he doesn’t retain a lot of heat as well. Cynthia should have no problem since she’s a dragon to and actually is used to the blazing tundras of Sinnoh. Wallace and Steven, even though Steven isn’t a Champion anymore and Wallace just likes dragging his husband to all these events, should be at least okay. Their wings are pretty heat absorbant and should last them a while before they truly got really cold. Four hours into their stay and it’s already been terrible.

Before Ash could even lift the phone to his ears there was a harsh knocking on their hotel room door.

“Sounds like Lance.” Ash grumbled. Ignoring Gou’s bristled shock state at such a harsh sound.

Peeling back his door he was faced by a seething Lance followed by Alder and then even Leon. The Griffin was shuffling his feet and he looked absolutely wrecked, black eye bags and frazzled wings and hair.

“Is your room cold.” Lance snarled.

“Good evening to you too.” Ash hissed back.

“Is. your. room. cold.” Lance turned even a little more violent with his voice.

“Of course it’s cold dipshit!” Ash spat back, “I was about to call you, and ask a bit more politely, if you guys were having the same problem.”

At this Lance tipped his head back and pinched the bridge of his nose. Taking a deep inhale that looked like it hurt his lungs before exhaling. “I’m sorry.” Lance muttered. Much more calm and respectful. “I didn’t mean to heat up any anger. I was angry and wasn’t right of me.”

Ash relaxed as well. Letting some of the fight in him slink away in favor but that didn’t stop his tail lashing back and forth. “I’m sorry as well.”

”did one of you check the vents in your room?” Alder pipped up tiredly.

Gou made a nose before pulling back from behind Ash and going to the nearest vent. It was opened and Ash tiredly watched as he crouched down and hovered his hand over the metal.

“Nothings blowing in out sucking out.” Gou informed. Padding back over and taking the time to press his chest into Ash’s side. Going and grabby the calico’s tail and wrapping it around his would fluffy one. He stuffed his face into Pikachu’s fur and the mouse Pokémon papped at the top of his head like an irritated kitten.

Ash groaned and leaned into Gou more, pressing Pikachu between his neck and Goums face more much to the timing ones discontent but he didn’t mutter anything more then a squeak. At least he was warmer then the cold room. He ignored the way Lance and Leon tracked the movement and the way his chest heaved up and down in a very tired sigh.

“How’s Diantha?” Ash asked. Not doubting she wasn’t fairing good at all being a black jaguar anthro.

“Hissing and spitting at anyone who gets to close,” Alder laughed nervously while moving to show the inside of his arm where his sweater sleeve was in tatters with some little blood drops welling up, Good think Alder has very thick skin, “she’s stolen Cynthia and buried herself under their combined blankets and pillows.”

“Sounds like her.” Ash agreed before doing a full body shiver. Tail unwinding from Gou’s tail and thrashing enough that it’s hitting the doorway loud enough to make an auditable thumps.

“Stop that!” Lance growled and moved his hand quick enough to catch Ash’s tail before it thumped against the wall. “I know you’re cold,” he ignored Ash’s hiss and the clawed hand coming down to press his fingernails into Lance’s scaled hands, “but we don’t need you hurting yourself in anger.”

“Much easier said then done.” Ash growled low in his throat. Tightening his hold onto Lance’s hand.

Gou and Pikachu looked wearily from Champion to Champion. Gou for once experiencing one of their ‘legendary’ spats that Ash rarely talks about. Pikachu was looking more towards Alder, hoping that the Rhino anthro would stop this but by the man’s distant look he was going to be no help.

Before anyone could say something else Leon piped up, “I feel like this is all my fault.”

That made everyone pause and turn to stare at him. A mix of confusing and annoyance filtering through their face’s.

“What in the fucking world are you talking about?” Lance asked. Turning more, as much as he can with his arm across his chest in Ash’s hold, to look at the Galar Champion. “You had nothing to do with what’s going on.”

Leon fidgeted even more. Obviously tired and overthinking things, but he carried on. “If I didnt let Rose talk everyone into coming here for the starting ceremony of the worldwide Championship then none of us would be here at this point. No one would be cold, Ash wouldn’t have brought Gou because you wouldn’t have been able to do his long overdo introduction, Alder wouldn’t have gotten his arm scratched by Diantha, and everyone would be relatively okay.”

It took a few seconds for everyone to let the griffins words sink in. But after that they exploded.

“That is so not your fault,” Alder started, “no one would have predicted this happening at all.”

“Alders right!” Lance added, “it’s not your job to leash Rose like that and even then you’re no way responsible for what’s going on.”

Ash sighed heavily. Shoulder slumping as he picked Pikachu off of his shoulder and kinda shoved him into Gou’s arm. Letting go of Lance’s hand as he walked past the two taller Champions and traitor over to Leon. Reaching out with both hands so he could cup the fallen griffins cheeks and make Leon look into his brown eyes.

“Hey,” Ash cooed, “don’t beat yourself up over this. The ceremony would have taken place at another Region and we would all be staying at another hotel, I would have to make my debut anyways an Gou would still be with me since he’s my research partner, the same things that’s happening now?” Aah waved his hands along the darken cold hallway and to the few open door’s that lead into the other hotel room’s, “could have happened the same way like it is now at a different hotel. None of us could have perdicted this would happen.”

“Sorry,” Leon croaked out, wiping away a few tears that were forming in his eyes, “just tired and over thinking everything.”

“I know,” Ash soothed a hand through Leon’s more then usual wild hair, making sure his claws doesn’t catch on a heavy knot or scratch Leon’s scalp, “I am too. We’re all tired but we’ll get through this.”

In truth Ash was already at his fucking limit. It’s to cold and he can feel himself loosing feeling in his tail and ears. His hands shook as he brought them back from brushing Leon’s hair and cradle long his face to clutch them close to his chest. Taking a short breath and exhaling. Suddenly he was made a yelping noise as Leon dragged him into a hug. A hug that somehow made Ash feel safer and was warm. Ash’s face lit up in a blush as he looked up to Leon in a bit of shock.

“Sorry... again.” Leon mumbled into Ash’s own bed head. Hot breath feeling nice against his cold ear even if it did flick itself at the feeling. “You’re probably the coldest one out of us all right now.”

“Diantha is suffering!” Ash protested, “she has shorter fur then I do!”

“But she has Cynthia.” Lance added. Moving to gently slide the tip of Ash’s cat ears between two buckles. The oldest man hissed slightly at the feeling. “Your fucking freezing! Are you sure you’re all right Ash?”

That got Pikachu’s attention and the mouse wiggled out of Gou’s grip and hopped from Alder’s shoulder onto Leon’s. Chirping in worry at Ash.

“I’m good buddy.” Ash cooed. “I’m good.”

Leon draged his large wings over Ash, but not before motioning for Gou also to join. Now that he had the two in his arms Leon seemed to settle down.

“Wallace is trying to figure out what’s wrong, yeah?” Gou hesitantly asked. More concurred in keeping Ash, who started to shake more violently even with Leon’s body heat, warm.

“Along with Steven.” Alder sighed. “But The elevator is broken so they have to walk down thirteen flights of stairs down and up.”

“Why didn’t they ask for Diantha’s Gardevoir?” Ash piped up, looking very unamused, “they could have teleported down there and up in the matter of seconds!”

Lance bit his lips as he made a pointed stare at the floor then swinging it over to Alder who made an even more expressive face.

“Who wants to brave the dungeon?” Lance asked after a few minutes. Looking at everyone who immediately hesitated but one.

———

“Dinatha!” Ash yelled as he barged into Diantha’s suite. The black panther immediately hissed, fur standing on end as she was curled up with Cynthia who had her wings wrapped around the big cat anthro. “We need your Gardevoir!”

“I fucking told Wallace!” Cynthia shouted you the roof immediately after. “That dolt said that it wouldn’t be a problem.”

Diantha kept hissing but Ash’s sudden yowl of anger drowned her out and also surprised her. Blinking in shock her mouth closed with a click!

“Bitch you are not the only one that’s cold!” Ash hissed as he stalked forward to looks for her belt of Poké balls that must have been stashed in the mountain of pillows. “You have a dragon that’s eager to cuddle while I’m stuck with the most touch hating people in the group, get the fuck over yourself and help you useless soft bellied Yamper.”

“Harsh.” Gou muttered behind Ash.

“It’s the fucking truth.” Aah hissed back. Grabbing the Poké ball and calling out Gardevoir.

The physic Pokémon grumbled about being out of her ball. Rubbing her arms over her own shoulders while looking around before turning to face Ash again.

“Hi sweetheart,” Ash chose to be nice and kept his temper down, Dinatha’s Gardevoir wasn’t one to really take shit, “we need you to teleport to Wallace and Steven and then teleport them to the main reception hall if their not already there by now and then teleport them back.”

Gardevoir grumbled loudly at Ash’s request. Scrunching her face to show her displeasure. Making motions with her hands like she was using Kalosian sign language.

“Baby I’m so sorry,” Ash’s shoulders slumped and a weak apologetic smile crossed his lips, “but I can’t make out what you’re saying because we’re both shaking to much.”

The Pokémon grunted before immediately disappearing out of the room and down the hallway.

“Thank you!” Ash cupped his hands around his mouth to yell out to the Pokémon. Who was probably already down in the flight of stairs to check if said husbands were there.

He whipped back around and stepped towards Leon, who still held Gou close, and buried his face into Leon’s own sweater. Opting to keep quite now and save his energy. Though his cheeks were some how permanently stained red at this point.

Gou reaches out and grasped the sweater sleeve of Ash’s elbow, tugging insistently until Ash is curled in his arms and then slept is hugging both of them together. Which was more warm then Leon just holding them by their waists with his wings closed as tight as he could get them around the two.

Lance had moved over to Alder, raising his wings questioning to the Unovian Champion and already rapping his long red scaled tail around the back of Alders ankles. The taller man ducked his head into Lance’s fuffy hair between his two curled horns. Thankful that the Kantonian Champion was willing to share his warmth with the rhino anthro. 

It took five minutes for anyone to move next. Leon had moved his arm around Gou, causing Ash to tug Gou closer and lean into Leon’s arm wrapped around his waist, to dig into his pocket to pull out his phone. Thumbing through until he got to his contacts and clicked on one.

It rang three times until the other end came up. Leon put it on speaker phone and sent an apologetic glance towards the two under him that were right next to the speaker end.

“Leon,” a heavy growl sounded through the room, “you better have a good fucking excuse to be calling me at ten at night when you know I’m asleep at this time.”

“Sorry, Rai,” Leon flinched at the angry tone, “we just have a big problem at the hotel we’re staying at, something wrong with the electricity and heat, and we have some anthro’s who can’t really contain heat that well... and I was wondering if-“

“-that I would get up out of my comfy bed and come and help warm some people up?” Raihan injected over Leon’s voice.

“... yes?” Leon phrased it more of a question.

Another growl echoed out of the speaker, both Gou and Ash couldn’t help but flinch at how loud it was. Leon tightened his hold on the two with another apologetic smile that was more a grimace.

“Rai, please?” Leon begged, “two champions are literally about to go feral while another is gonna like... die of being to cold.”

“Damn right!” Ash and Dainatha belted out at the same time. Same tone and everything.

“Arceus. dammit Lee,” Raihan sneered, “You’re killing me here. You’re killing your friend and rival my dude.”

“Please?” Leon doesn’t care if he’s straight begging right now, he really doesn’t want to see Diantha and Ash actually go feral and kill like ninety percent of all league officials. 

Another growl, “I’m on my way.”

Leon made a happy griffin noise, wings fluttering a little around the two boys in his arms.

“Yeah, yeah,” Raihan gave a heavy sigh, presumably getting up out of bed, “I’ll be there in like twenty minutes.”

“Thank you Rai!” Leon sighed happily before ending the call. Putting his phone back in his pocket before wrapping his arms around Gou’s back again, giving the boys a squeeze and tucking his head down into Ash’s head only to jerk back a little and blink in shock. “Damn your ears are cold.”

“No shit.” Ash weakly hissed. “We already established that.” He buried his face to try and not to let out a muffled choke as Leon started to massage his ears. Trying to get them as warm as he could.

———

“We’re back!” Wallace yelled out from the hallway, “and we brought a friend!”

Gardevoir teleported into the room and clicked her own Poké ball that Ash had left on the kitchen counter. The physic Pokémon not wanting to be out in the cold any longer and returned to her, presumably, heated Poké ball.

A much taller dude came sliding down the hall and nearly crashed into the doorway, ducking his head and coming into the room. He towered over everyone and his larger dragon wings were tucked close to his back unlike his large tail that dragged behind him.

“Leon.” He grunted.

“Raihan!” Leon beamed before letting go of the two boys and pushing them over to the dragon anthro, “Ash, Gou? This is Raihan! He’ll warm you guys up in no time. I usually use him as a heater as well when it gets super cold here in Galar.”

“Which is like ninety percent of the time.” Raihan pokes his slightly split tongue out at the Galar Champion who did the same before turning back and going over to Lance and Alder. The rhino more the happily greeting the griffin.

Ash squeaked when one of Raihans arms reached out and wrapped around his waist. He looked back over to the dragon who gave him a once over.

“Well aren’t you a cutie.” He purred. Dragging Ash closer until he was tucked against his chest.

Gou was given the same treatment. both of their face’s were burning red, but it wasn’t because of the nice warmth that was radiating from Raihan’s body. Next thing they knew Raihan was sitting down, dragging them as well until they were both settled on both his legs.

“Better?” Raihan asked.

“So much better,” Gou answered, eyeing Ash who just tilted his face more into Raihans warm sweater instead since his face was a blushing mess more so then Gou’s, “thank you Raihan.”

Raihan only hummed. Eyeing Ash’s tail that was still trashing and hitting his arm. “You good there kitten?”

“Uh-hu!” Ash squeaked out. Turning quickly to nab his tail and tuck it close to his chest to keep it from moving anymore. Ash felt so embarrassed as he hid his face more in Raihans, extremely toned, chest.

“Ash is just super tired and cranky,” Gou grumbled, from what Ash could see he was nearly asleep which hes fucking lucky, “he kept getting piles of rain or water dropped on to him, so Ash’s been cold since the moment we left for the airport.”

Gou wasn’t wrong. Ash had somehow continually been getting splashed with water. Be it from trees or accidentally bumping into someone with an open water bottle, Ash was drenched or at least damp most of the day. It’s why he was so cranky when they got to the hotel, Ash was actually looking forward to going out on a sight seeing trip after dropping their luggage off at the hotel, but all he could think about was changing into some nice warm pajamas and sleeping until Lance inevitably knocked on his door to check up on him and Gou.

“Poor kitten,” Raihan rumbled low in his throat, leaning more into Ash and the smaller could feel the dragons muscles shifting under his clothes, “todays just not your day is it?”

“You and Leon are making it better.” Ash said without really thinking. Making the mistake to look up into Raihans extremely pigmented blue eyes, which widened and the pupils dilated.

“Oh really,” The dragon purred out. Leaning down more into Ash’s face. “how so?”

“Leon tried keeping us,” he nodded a little to Gou who was no completely asleep, tail tucked into his lap and looked peaceful, “warm and he called you here to help. By the way thank you for coming, Diantha maybe a pain in the ass while cold but I can guarantee I’m much worse.”

“I’d like to see that.” Raihan sayed. Tilting his head to the side and narrowing his eyes at Ash who blinked wide eyed up at him. 

“See what?” Ash cursed silently as his voice cracked a little.

“You all wild up,” Raihan gave him a little heated look, “bet you look hot while mad.”

Ash couldn’t help but snort a little. “I look like a fluffy ball of murder while mad, which is no way hot to see.”

“To each their own.” Raihan shrugged his shoulders and flinched the tiniest amount Ash has seen a person do when Gou made a sleepy whining noise before settling back down.

“So it’s gonna be like this for most of the night?” Diantha’s irritated growl echoed through the open room. Eyeing everyone that was standing around her and Cynthia in their pillow mountain.

“Most likely.” Wallace huffed. Wings starting to shake at the tiniest bit. “It’s only really our level and half of the Delta level, so most of the current gym leaders staying here tonight are good with bunking up with one another even more.”

“So we’re just stuck with the cold?” Ash asked. Reaching up for one of his numb ears and rubbing his pads into them, trying to stop them from aching so much.

“Again,” Wallace sighed, giving Ash an apologetic and worrying look, “most likely.”

Ash made a loud whining noise and curled up tighter. Shoving his face into Raihan’s hot skin of his neck that was open and uncovered from his sweater. The dragon hissed in shock and flinched away a little from Ash’s cold face.

“Sorry.” Ash muttered before pulling his face back down and rubbing it into Raihan’s, much less, warm sweater.

“S’okay,” Raihan was quick to answer, Tucking Ash and Gou more into his chest and even bent his head down to rub his face into Ash hair and ears, “don’t mind it at all, Kitten.”

Ash only hummed. Tilting into Raihan’s down right nuzzling fest and rubbing his own cheeks back against Raihan. Tonight’s gonna fucking suck but at least it’s not gonna be to bad.

Though Ash does wish he had taken a hot shower before throwing pajama’s on and sliding into that cold torture of a bed.

[tsarinastorm]

AA:Ashes to Ashes-Adam Sackler/Reader-Chapter 1

Rating: Explicit, eventual Smut

This is my attempt at a slow burn, sorry if it’s bad!

Summary:  You meet Jessa at AA and quickly become friends. She introduces you to her boyfriend, Adam, who it turns out you have a lot in common with. Always a girls’ girl you’ll have to choose between friendship and love.

       As usual, everyone went around the room introducing themselves and explaining their issues, you instantly regretted being there but it was for the best. While not a typical addict or alcoholic, you had been mixing alcohol and Xanax, even though you knew better. It began as only drinking during social events, then it became drinking every night, then it quickly developed into drinking every night and using Xanax to sleep. Your therapist suggested going to AA groups to talk to others about your problems, and to ‘socialize.’

           It was getting harder to resist the urge to drink and pop a few pills. But you did it to yourself. You had insisted on moving yourself to New York City, taking a job that was lower pay and cutting back your own hours to work on your writing. Now you did mostly contract-drafting work, and were just covering your rent, bills, and general expenses. You had to sell some of your clothes to consignment shops, and tutor some high school students for extra cash. But you thought it was worth the risk to follow your dreams. You were saving money by staying in a small studio apartment in East Village, and while it was tiny, it allowed to save some of your earnings. You were working on polishing your first manuscript to send to publishers.

           Everyone concludes introducing themselves, including you, then a woman comes in late. She is a blonde with a British accent, and after taking a look around, she may be the only normal one here. Apparently she thinks the same, because she comes over to talk to you after the meeting is over.

           “It’s good to not be the only pretty woman in here, and you look relatively normal.” She says and you nod your head in agreement. You say back, “Yeah some of them look like they’ve been rode hard and put away wet.”

           “I’m Jessa, wanna not stay here and get hit on by that guy,” She says as she gestures towards a big man standing over to side who’s eyeing you both suspiciously. That could get weird.

           That’s how you became friends with Jessa. The two of you would go grab food after each meeting, and she was pretty much an open book. You were surprised and entertained by her life stories, you told her that she should write a book, a memoir. You could tell that she put up a front to hide some inner vulnerability but who didn’t. She would talk about her former friends, then her boyfriend, named Adam, and what an ‘amazing’ connection they had. But you had never once seen him, or heard from him, he was enigma and it made you wonder about their relationship. She also said that he was her friend Hannah’s ex-boyfriend. The whole situation seemed strange to you, and you were suddenly grateful that you didn’t have that drama in your life.

********

In your third week of hanging out, when the two of you went shopping, or more specifically window shopping, she was talking about her last encounter with college. She told you that she did want to be a therapist but then she dropped out of school because it wasn’t for her. You tried to encourage her that there are other ways to help people with their lives that don’t involve school, and there were non-traditional routes.

“I just feel like I could really help other people so much but I’m not cut out for school,” Jessa says as she moves her hands dramatically while speaking. You listen before saying, “You could be a life coach or something, that stuff doesn’t usually require a degree. You just need to know how to sell yourself, find somebody to guide you in the business.”

           As you take another bite of your salad, you can see that Jessa is appraising your suggestion. She pulls out a cigarette, then her eyes light up. She gets excited and exclaims, “That is a great idea! I’m so good at making people buy into my bullshit and telling them what to do!”

           “Happy to help!” You say, then you start look up the process for how to be a life coach. This was a much-needed distraction from your daily life and your own stress. For some reason, you were much better about giving other people advice than following it on your own, maybe that’s why you became friends with Jessa in the first place.

***********

           Then, the following week was the time she took mushrooms, accidentally this time, and called you to pick her up from the party in the Garment District. You were trying to finish the draft of a contract when she called but you considered yourself a girls’ girl and would feel guilty if something happened to her.

Before you knew it, you were making your way there. You find the address from the drop-pin she sent you. As you walked in you noticed that the party’s attendees were the hippy type, dressed in tie dye, with marijuana growing around the place, yet still fashion hippies because they had on designer duds. The apartment was in an eclectic loft, and was filled with people. It didn’t bother you, it was just tightly packed, and was making you feel claustrophobic. You try not to stare at people, just look for Jessa. A couple guys made a few off-hand comments, but you ignored them, looking for your friend. Then your eyes settle on a blonde sitting across the room.

           Jessa was sitting in a corner, and you went up to her. You asked her, “Can you walk? This will be a lot easier if you can walk?”

           “I can’t feel my legs. Y/N, fuck I have never felt this good.” Is her answer. Her attitude made you instantly wish you would have ignored her phone call. She should have called her boyfriend or one of her friends that wasn’t busy. Frustrated, you pick her up, she stands, and then she takes a step forward. She is mumbling about something, you place her arms over your shoulder and head out, weaving through the crowd. Once outside, you hail a cab, then Jessa decides that she won’t go and stand stubbornly outside. You really don’t have time for this, so your anger boils over.

“Fine, call your damn boyfriend or whoever else you have, because I am done!” You shout, and throw your hands in the air in an act of disgust. You mentally decide to get in the cab and go back to your apartment to resume your work. As you go to step inside the cab, you hear Jessa speak.

           “Wait, Y/N, I don’t have anybody else, okay?” Jessa says, and you help get her in the cab and scoot her over so you can get in as well. She’s able to give the driver her address. As soon as you get her up the stairs which was a task in itself and to the door of her apartment, she vomits. You audibly release a sigh and step over it, and started pounding on the door. You remember that she lived with her boyfriend, and she said he should be home. You’ll wake up the whole damn building if that’s what it takes.

           “Okay, okay! I hear you, loud fucker!” You heard a man yell before coming to answer the door. Your jaw drops when a man who’s built like a brick house, opens the door standing in his black briefs. He has amber eyes, black, long, wavy hair, amazing pecs, and your eyes can’t help but notice the bulge in the briefs. That must be the Adam, you were certainly not expecting him to look like that, and you feel a blush creep on your cheeks. You shield your eyes and push Jessa towards him.

           “What the hell happened to her?” He demands to know from you. You didn’t like the tone, so you inform him, “Jessa went to a party, took mushrooms, and then called me to come get her. I have work to do, so I assume you can take care of her.”

           He nodded in agreement, Jessa stumbled into the apartment, and you left. Now you understand why Jessa put up with him treating her like a consolation prize, and why she was willing to betray her friendship with Hannah for him. You didn’t think that you would personally do that, but you could understand it now. You also knew that you would be thinking of your friend’s boyfriend more than you wanted to.

*************************

When you were heading out of the AA meeting today with Jessa, she said that needed to grab something from her apartment first. So you follow her to her apartment, and once inside, you turn around to see Adam sitting on a yellow couch, this time he was fully clothed. Jessa heads further inside to find whatever it is that she was looking for. Adam turns to look at you, and you can feel his gaze burning through you, you decide to ignore it and admire the architecture and space in this apartment.  Besides, considering your recent interaction with him, you weren’t sure you could look at him without blushing or checking out his bulge again.

You were happy that you had chosen to wear black skinny jeans, Chelsea boots and a sleeveless white top instead of leggings and an oversized sweatshirt. Adam gets up to stand beside you, and formally introduces himself, saying, “I’m Adam, thanks for taking care of Jessa that night. Sorry I was kind of an asshole.”

“I’m Y/N. It’s no problem.” You say back as your mind goes blank when his eyes meet yours. He continues holding your eyes for some time before asking, “Are you the friend from AA?”

“I am.” You answer, feeling a bit dazed. It must be equally awkward for him to know a lot about someone without actually knowing them. Or maybe he was socially awkward like you. You felt like you knew him already from hearing Jessa’s stories. He then coolly remarks, “You don’t look like an alcoholic or addict to me.”

           “What the hell is that supposed to mean?” You fire back. A person can’t just assume who’s an addict, or who’s not.Your brow furrows and your casual smile turns into a scowl. You take back any nice things about him you had thought before. What an asshole, he can’t even know you for five minutes before insulting you.

           “Adam, don’t be an asshole,” Jessa chimes in as she strolls back into the room and glares at him. He finds a way to recover and explain himself. He states, “I meant it as a compliment. You look very put together and classy.”

           Jessa scoffs at him and eyes him hesitantly, while you chuckle. You suppose that is a twisted compliment, and you’ve been called worse. You then feel the need to explain yourself to him and add, “Yeah well drinking and the Xanax quickly turned from happening occasionally at social events to all the time to numb myself. I got help before I hit rock bottom.”

           “Good. Good for you. I started drinking as a teenager and started AA when I was seventeen. Better to catch that shit early.” He says and you listen to him contently, but before the two of you get to talk more, Jessa is rushing out the door, declaring that she’s found whatever she was here for. You shoot him a smile and wave goodbye before following Jessa out.  Adam is certainly a curious man and you want to know more about him, even though it’s against your better judgment.

“Adaptations are almost never as good as the original, end of story.” You inform Ray of your opinion. You had just met Ray earlier tonight, and he seemed to be argumentative. You never backed down from a debate, so it made things interesting. You ignored the fact that Jessa wanted to set you up with Ray, he just wasn’t your type. You’re sitting on the yellow couch with Jessa and Ray. Jessa is listening to your argument while she eats yogurt, not bothered at all. Ray thinks for a moment before he makes his next move in this game of argument chess.

           “There can be thoughtful adaptations.” Ray declares, taking a drink of his beer. You’re not convinced, so you counter with, “Yes but they generally lose the heart and soul of the original format.”

“Okay well I can see that I’m not going to win this.” Ray finally concedes. Good. Better for him to figure that out now. You take a drink of your water, and snack on some chips. You’ve been set up with worse guys, and as long as Ray takes the hint, maybe the two of you can be friends.

“I agree with Y/N.” Jessa confirms, and Ray just shakes his head. You smile smugly, triumphant that you’ve won the argument. Then, Adam walks through the door, looks surprised to see all of you there, continues heading into the kitchen. He gets a drink from the fridge before joining the group of you on the couch, he points at you and adds, “I agree with her, adaptations are shit!”

           You smile at him, and he smiles back. You’re happy he agrees, because if not you would have to seriously question his taste, and put him the group with Ray. From what Jessa’s told you about him, he’s obviously cultured and has good taste, even though he doesn’t outwardly show it and in spite of outward eccentricity. During the movie, Ray heads out to take a phone call while Jessa goes to the restroom, leaving you alone with Adam.  And you actually has butterflies in stomach just from being alone with him, you feel like you’re fourteen again. Inwardly scolding yourself for feeling this way, you keep your eyes fixed on the television screen. You don’t know what to say, so you wait for him to make a move. Or who knows, the two of you might sit in weird silence until someone walks back into the room. Luckily, you don’t have to wait long to see how it’s going to go.

           “What do you do?” He asks trying to get the conversation started and end the tension in the room. He glances at you, and takes some chips from the bowl.

           “I’m an attorney, but I don’t do typical court work. I do the drafting and back work. That gives me flexibility to work on my writing on the side.” You says as you take another drink from your glass, and you notice that you’re each moving towards each other subconsciously. Or consciously, who knows. Adam chuckles, then jokes by saying, “Well I don’t have good luck with writers.”

           “Well I don’t have good luck with tall strangers. What do you do? You’re an actor, right?” You say back, not fazed at all by his bad joke, and you see relief wash over him. He cocks a half-smile, you admire his dimples that are now showing. And you mentally control yourself, because you cannot get a crush on your friend’s boyfriend.

“I am an actor.” He says in a drawn out voice, and you can’t tell if he did that intentionally or if he’s just nervous.  He definitely doesn’t strike you as a shy, or introverted guy.

“That’s why you have strong opinions on content forms then.” You say and the two of you continue talking about books, poems, movies and music you like. You find out that you and Adam have similar, but not identical tastes. As Ray and Jessa trickle back into the conversation while Adam is asking you about your trivia talents. Adam stuns you and everyone else in the room by saying, “Fuck, you’re the smartest person I’ve ever met.”

“You’re not too bad yourself. Brawn and brain,” You tease back as Adam tries to hide his blush, which you find adorable. You also know that you’re probably blushing too so you move your face to hide it. Then you remember that Jessa is right there and you worry you might have crossed the line. Self-consciously and slowly you scoot back over across to the other side of the couch, leaving plenty of room for Jessa, and you pat the space beside you. Jessa seems unaffected, and it seems you’re being self-conscious for nothing, she sits down. She puts her arm around your shoulder, saying, “Adam’s right. You are insanely smart, and kind. And you have fantastic skin.”

You blush and you can see Adam watching you out of the corner of your eye. Jessa moves in closer to you and starts telling you about the current state of her future life-coaching business. You listen to her as intently as you can but your thoughts wonder to Adam, then you guilt yourself because you know you shouldn’t think of him at all.

************************************************************************

Adam was walking out of Ray’s coffee shop with his typical, normal coffee. None of that fancy new age coffee that so many people drink nowadays. He’s been in a bit of downward spike lately, he knows he needs to audition for more parts and submit some of his writing to directors. He’s working on what he thinks is a lame indie film, but the pay is decent and the director is well-respected so he supposes he should suffer through the script. Though he’s considered walking out several times.

When he’s getting ready to head to the door, he sees Y/N walk in. She waves at him, and he finds himself smiling and waving back at her. She’s wearing a red sheath dress and heels, carrying a huge tote bag. How does she manage to look hot while still looking like a boss? Adam remembers that she’s an attorney so she’s probably way out of his league, and she’s Jessa’s friend. Once she gets her order, she sits a table that’s in the corner near the street, and motions for him to join her since he’s still standing by the door probably looking like an idiot.

           He knows he should probably just politely decline her offer, but instead he goes to sit down across from her. He felt a connection with her the other day when they talked about books, and things they were passionate about. Adam thinks he might as well accept he’s hooked on this girl, at least to some degree. After he sits, he asks, “Are you going to work? I don’t want to distract you.”

           “I’m mostly editing and listening in on video calls today. What about you? I mean I know actors and artists don’t have a normal schedule but are you working today?” She says as she takes a drink of her coffee and takes her pastry out of the bag.

           “I’ve been working on this indie film and it’s very frustrating.” Adam admits before he remembers that he doesn’t really know Y/N that well, and that she probably doesn’t care about his life.

           “Is it good for your reputation or at least good pay?” Y/N asks and sounds genuinely interested. Adam thinks back to the intensive conversation that he had with her a few nights ago, and knows that she gets it. She thinks about art, literature, and expression. So he opens up.

           “It’s good for both. It’s just everything else about it is a shitshow. And fucking mediocre,” Adam says. Y/N then continues making her point by saying, “Well stick it out for the credit then you can be pickier about your projects.”

           “That’s good advice. Thanks.” He tells her and she pulls out her laptop to get to work, when he gathers himself to leave, she stops him. “Company wouldn’t bother me…If you don’t have somewhere else to be.”

           Adam sits back down, content to hang around her.  He sees that she has a copy of Forster’s short stories and Emile Zola’s Therese Raquin in her bag. He can’t hold back from commenting, after all he does have a comp lit degree. He motions toward them, saying, “Interesting choices. Let me know what you think of them.”

“I like Forster’s description of sexuality and sensuality. This is my first brush with Zola though, so I’ll save my commentary when I’m better read.” She smiles and it looks like her whole face lights up. Adam can’t look away from her.

He barely knows her and yet he feels like he’s known her all of his life. He’s able to talk to her about things that he could never bring up around Jessa, and forgot what it was like to have a real connection to someone. He and Y/N sit there for hours, talking art, writing, and inspirations. He opens up about his past relationships, Y/N already knew that he dated Hannah, who was Jessa’s friend. Adam chose to leave out the part where he went back to Hannah to offer to raise her child with her. He knew how embarrassing it sounded now, and maybe Jessa had already told her that.

           She opened up to him about her writing: short stories and children’s books, though she wanted to do more. She told him about how hard it was when she first moved to the city, and about the ex who got her to mix alcohol and Xanax. She talks about her dysfunctional family, and the friends she’s made in the city. When it’s time to go, Adam finds himself following her outside the shop, not wanting to separate from her.

           Outside the door, he stops her to ask, “Can we do that again?”

           “Sure. That is what friends do.” She says before she heads on her way. Adam’s never really had friends before but he still feels like this was more than friendship.