#i wrote a super small brief fic about them a bit ago about them just. hatching a plan. so that’s from there

[calebs-hangout-corner]

Evil besties hatching a plan. A silly little (evil) plan.

[moccabunie]

things I've learned after a year writing fanfiction

This is a post from a non-writer who, apparently, now writes (❓) And this is a little crazy to me, considering that a year ago writing less than 1k decent words took a lot of effort. But this year I have completed a +100k project. (It's still difficult, though.)

I found out that the more I wrote, the easier it was to get into the story. So I think that being captivated by my own story has made a lot. I am an eager fanfiction reader, but I had yet to really try to write something on my own.

That was until I got hyper-fixated on three characters and wrote a small story about them sharing a room, and it was one of the funniest and most rewarding things I've done. So I was like "oh, maybe I can try to imagine stories I would like to read?"

(1) story one - a bird told me to wait

The first thing I considered was to make it completely self-indulging. The second was to make it as evocative as possible, not only telling what was happening. I like sensations and emotions, so I really wanted to write things I would like to feel as a reader. I wrote this story, and after that, I added a second longer part because I was enjoying it a lot. I used to doodle about the characters and make small annotations about their dynamics, but there wasn't really a lot of planning here.

(2) story two - beneath the moonlight

My second attempt was a three-chapter story (not so distant from the previous one that can be read as three parts too). But for this one, I wanted to challenge myself because I wanted to explore new themes and tropes, so I made a brief list of the things that should appear here. (but honestly, I just wanted to write a soft mating bite scene lmao, because I was super into a/b/o at that time.) I used keep notes app this time.

I barely showed explicit themes here but I got to enjoy the story anyway. This one wasn't difficult to write because I felt familiar with the characters. It's a light story but these 20k words gave me the courage to take a step further. I said to myself

"stop being a coward. you have enjoyed this. keep writing."

(3) story three - lucid dreams

This one was planned for four or five chapters, quite in the same line as beneath the moonlight. But, and the keyword is planned, it became a full 13 chapters as I developed the story and the characters. If I wanted it to be coherent then I needed to explain the things, build the context, and introduce the world. But it was also an experimental work. I took my notebook and listed the new things I wanted to try, such as - write in past tense - write first and edit later

my process was something like this • imagine random scenarios with pretty imagery as I listened to music • doodling the characters doing things so I didn't forget • open the notes app to write random sentences and dialogues in the middle of the night, I'll find a place for them later • dream about the story and daydream about the story

as for the physical notebook, I have scribbled A LOT there during the writing process.

(a little bit chaotic but functional enough)

One thing I wanted to keep in mind was the evolution of the characters, or in other words, how they were gonna be at the start and the end of the story. And this made things a lot simpler because it gave me an insight that was helpful whenever I had to decide what kind of decisions the characters would make along the story.

Parallelly, I was aware of my narrative flaws, as well as there was a lot of vocabulary and grammar that would escape me in a different language. So I used the notebook to do writing research. Some of my pages were like "how to write action scenes," or "tips for flat scenes." Whenever I felt blocked I read again these pages.

I'm going to copy down here some tips that were useful during the writing block days.

• read another book or fic you like, since sometimes, getting yourself caught by another writer's style can help you to flow through your own. • scroll on pinterest and try to find pictures that capture the vibe of your story, maybe try to describe them or setting a scene in a similar environment that you can see? • changing the setting (for example, day to night, or sun to rain) can add more variants and ambiental tools to play with. • or, changing the character's pov. maybe a scene feels flat because it's narrated by the wrong character. • use objects, not just the characters.

(4) finishing a story

To have an insight into the plot, I wrote the main scenes in really short sentences. That was useful for the first chapters, but suddenly I had 70K words of the story and a lot of details to track. Frequently I had to split chapters into two parts because the "short sentence" became a very long scene. See this comparison: the scenes' guide in the last chapters usually are fragmented into shorter scenes. That's how I avoided losing my mind as I wrote (?)

These are a few tips that were useful to me during this last part.

• write the important plot points as they are mentioned so you can come back to them later and don't forget about them. • keep a scrip to annotate significant things about the characters to make the story consistent. • notion pages is a great place to make inspo boards (usually I added 4 pictures for each scene). During the last chapter, I used the to-do list tool to keep track of the closed story points and the things that were yet to happen • list some of your favourite past scenes, those that have been nice to write, so you can pursue the same vibe again.

The last two months writing the fic I joined the nanowrimo to keep myself motivated but also to have an impulse. My only goal was getting the habit of writing everyday, not minding how many words (usually it was around 400-600 daily). I ended that month with 16k added on my wordcount (to me, that was a lot!). Since I enjoyed that little challenge, I did the same on the next month, resulting in finishing the fic :)

The most important thing during this time was remembering myself from time to time why I am doing this. Let me say I am an utter perfectionist, so I would easily get trapped in making-the-story-perfect, which would end in a writing block. So each time this happened I repeated to myself that I didn't want to write a good story. I just wanted to enjoy and have fun while writing a story, so I should write only things I enjoy. And this simple thing was incredibly helpful whenever I wasn't able to continue a scene.

I think that this is what most writers say, but now I have come to understand that it's true: just have fun. Write what you wanna read.

(5) the next story - requiem of the sleepless

This would be the third part of my first fic. I miss these unhinged boys and I have a little draft of (unholy) things I want to happen to them! Now I want to unlearn everything I know. I want this story to be zero planned, I just want to ~feel~ the characters and make a lot of random things happen. This is about not forgetting why I started, so here I am again.

Being a non-writer writing.

thank you for reading ♡ 

[felixantares]

11 22 19 ayo

omg some of those are so fun!! 💚

11. Do you believe in the old advice to “kill your darlings?” Are you a ruthless darling assassin? What happens to the darlings you murder? Do you have a darling graveyard? Do you grieve?

I have such a hard time killing my darlings 😭 I never want to. But I do it!! even though it’s hard! I did it not even like a week ago. There was a whole severitus plot line in build me no shrines that I was super attached to and I cut it, because it wasn’t working. I was crying the whole time and now I have a separate severitus fic that is in no way related. But yes I have a darling graveyard, usually they don’t stay dead long and get turned into new fic ideas

19. Tell me a story about your writing journey. When did you start? Why did you start? Were there bumps along the way? Where are you now and where are you going?

I mean, I’ve been doing creative writing forever it feels like. I wrote little short stories as a kid and drew really terrible comics. My mum got me this novel writing program that had a code for an online forum when I was around 12, and so I started writing a novel (I finished it too! I was 13 and it’s actually insane, the plot makes no sense, but like!! I did it, 45k of nonsense. my mum was so proud) but I joined the forum and it was a bunch of other kids all 12-17 who wanted to write books too. I kinda stopped for a while in high school and uni because I’d been told I couldn’t do anything with writing, that it was too hard to make a career out of it and I was better off doing something practical (haha jokes on them I went into art). Then in like… 2016? I had a brief little period where I wrote a couple Merlin fics, they didn’t do super well and I got a couple nasty comments that kinda put me off writing fanfic at all. Then in uhhhh August last year I got really into Harry Potter again after I broke off a toxic friendship with someone who said I couldn’t be queer and also like Harry Potter, so as a giant fuck you to them I joined the first HP discord server I found — which I kinda found my people right away and now I’m quite happily inhabiting my little corner of the internet and writing my stupid little stories.

22. How organized are you with your writing? Describe to me your organization method, if it exists. What tools do you use? Notebooks? Binders? Apps? The Cloud?

Okay I don’t think I’m crazy organised but then I’ve been told I am, so idk make your own calls. I’ve got 2 physical notebooks, one for my two long WIPs and I just kinda put a coloured sticky note in the pages whenever I switch the fic I’m writing for, and a second book for random ideas and notes and stuff that usually gets transferred to the appropriate document later. The idea notebook is very small and lives in my pocket in case I’m out and need to write an idea down. But I don’t really take a lot of physical notes. My docs and folders though are perfectly organised. Docs are put in folders with their fic (or in the case of one shots, a folder for that) or like my general writing folder if it’s a resource, but I have a naming system that I use for all my projects, based on what kind of file it is so they get tagged with like [OUTLINE] or [WIP] or whatever is relevant. There’s a colour coding system within the documents (so like as I’m writing, notes to myself are always blue, notes on a character are green, sections that need editing are highlighted in red, sections that I’m currently working on are orange… and a few other colour keys that I won’t bore you with) and then I have a spreadsheet I use to track wc goals and overall progress and stuff. I’ve thought about using that “make your own wiki” site that was shared with me a little while ago (or I’ve got a subscription to WorldAnvil for my D&D notes, so maybe that) to start organising my lore notes a bit better, but that’s a fairly large project and I might just stick to what’s working for me.

[user21340]

my only exception

(i don’t own this gif or any of the characters in this fic)

summary: you and nat are separated when in the Red Room. you both are reunited. after holding onto a couple things to give her for a couple years you both realize love is well and alive.

warnings: violence, abuse, swearing, lil angst, fluff

pairing: natasha romanoff x fem!reader

word count: nearly 1.8k

a/n: omg i don’t know what to say! thank you for all the support on the stuff i’ve released so far. it’s super crazy seeing some of my favorite writers following me. thank you so so much for 30 followers! much love 💕💕

(italics in dialogue mean the person is speaking russian)

sorry for any mistakes i wrote this at 3am and have to get up for school at 6 😪 no bueno

It was a cold and stormy night as the power in the Red Room continuously flickered on and off even with the help of a high powered generator.

You and Natalia had been waiting for an event like this to occur so you could break out. Even though both herself and you lived only a small bit of life outside in the real world before you were taken in and trained to become a weapon, both of your humanly morals knew right from wrong. The Red Room’s treatment definitely being a wrong.

Madame B and the other monstrous staff at this facility put all you girls to bed roughly an hour ago. Nat and yourself undid your cuffs connecting your wrist to the metal bedframe so you could pack the few things you both owned before you made your escape. Both of you had talked this plan over through and through so you both were on the same page as soon as you saw that flicker of a power outage surge though the site.

At the moment you both were eighteen years old meaning both of you had proven yourselves worthy enough to hone a spot at this academy and had graduated a couple months prior.

GAME PLAN

Some information you had gathered which the staff weren’t aware of was every time the power flickered off, it disarmed and unlocked the exit door/s for nearly five seconds. The weather has been dry but cold lately not making this discovery too useful. The plan was to sneak over to uncuff yourselves in the middle of the night when these brief power outages were occurring, pack your items, and as you were about to escape bang on the wall of the large room where the girls kept at the academy would sleep to create enough of a distraction before you were out and free for good. Easy right? How wrong you’d be.

When it was time for the distraction, Nat stood by the door waiting for the next surge of lightning of whatever broke the electricities stability as you walked to the far side of the sleeping quarters where you were sure you’d have enough time to bang on the walls and sprint out of that door.

You heard a crash of thunder so you knew your escape chance would be soon. As you were about to start banging on the walls you see a door knob parallel to Nat but far away none the less start turning.

BAM

Lightning strikes, what seems to be right outside of the building. You sprint for the door only to have your arm caught by one of Madame B’s henchmen.

Just like that the power flickers.

five.

Without much thought you break away from the man’s grasp lunge at Natalia who happened to be at the door.

four.

“We’ll meet again Natalia.” you speak softly

three.

You shove her out of the door with all of your might.

two.

You use all of your remaining strength that you can muster up to slam the heavy metal door closed.

one.

Click

The door locks once again.

“You stupid little bitch. Get over here NOW!” the man practically growls.

You slowly and steadily walk over to the man as he gruesomely pummels and kicks you.

Sure the beatings, mind torture and manipulation hurt, but you’ve never experienced any kind of pain on the same caliber to what being separated from Natalia feels like.

Madame B is more than disappointed, enraged and annoyed with one of her ‘star students’. You receive daily beatings and long, tiresome training hours for helping Natalia escape. Although everyone is ‘replaceable’ in the minds of the staff as well as Madame B, they just lost Natalia so they couldn’t afford to lose you as well.

Months later the beatings finally slow down to a couple a week which you are able to endure. Madame’s mission now is to make a monster out of you by pushing you to and past your limits when training.

One night you finally drift off to sleep. You hate sleeping. It’s a constant replay of your last night with Nat. Only hoping that she made it to civilization safe and sound and is living a normal teens life. However, tonight’s dream is different. In this dream you see yourself shoving your packed-escape bag between your mattress and bedframe as you are bleeding out on the ground from the beatings. You wake up in a cold sweat and manage to kneel on the ground and slowly lift up your mattress only to find that same, small bag filled with the few, but important belongings of yours and Nat’s. You open up the bag forgetting all about what you both had packed. The most important items you see is a picture of Natalia as a toddler with alongside her mother and father, a small metal ring which you had made for her after stealing a small teaspoon at dinner, banging it against the concrete floor with a rock to flatten it out as you’d continuously bend it back and fourth so only the thinnest part is of the spoon is left which you bend into a ring before surprising Nat with it after you know she had a pretty rough day training, and lastly Nat’s papers containing important info about her such as her full name, birthplace, parents names, and birthdate.

November 22, 1984

November 22, 1984

November 22, 1984

November 22, 1984

You make sure you have this date burned into your head, latching onto any important information about her you can learn.

You hang onto those three items keeping them hidden.

Two and a half years later...

It’s late at night when you hear gunshots and fights breaking out throughout the facility. You quickly get up out of bed (once again undoing your cuffs) and grab those three items from under your mattress. You place them in your pocket getting ready to make a break for the outside world. As you reach for the door you turn back taking one last look at the place you’ve been living for pretty much the entirety of your life, only before a man in a funny red, white, and blue costume enters your view.

You bring your hands up ready for a fight.

“Look kid, I’m not here to fight you. We are breaking you out.” the man ensures

“Who even are you?” you sternly question

“Steve Rogers. But the public calls me Captain America.” his gaze settles on your figure, “Mind telling me who you are?” he pushes

“Names y/n, but look I’ve got places to be ma-“ you are cut off when Captain America’s jaw drops.

“No, we both know you don’t. But, you ARE coming with me.” you know there isn’t much room for protest but that won’t stop you from trying. You lunge at him and push him to the ground as you wave a small goodbye and sprint towards the door only for your body to fall on the ground limp. Realizing you’ve been stunned by something temporarily.

“YOU MOTHERFUCKER!” you shriek, he only chuckles.

“God, Nat was right about you.” she shakes he head with a small grin on his face.

“N-nat?” you whisper as you vision fades black.

You regain consciousness and look around only to find yourself in a weird windowy, loud vehicle type thing. You see a group of people standing around you but you see one particular familiar face hovering directly over yours lightly combing through your hair with one one hand and gently outlining your jawline with the other.

“NAT!” you screech, your brain is feeling too many emotions to comprehend at the moment.

Once she sees and hears you are awake she pulls you into a bone crushing hug.

“Y/n/n I’m so sorry I left you and you had to stay in that hellhole for so long alone I don’t know how I would’ve help up it if that-“ you cut her off

“Natalia, all that matters is I’m here with you right now.” you reason.

After getting off of what you learned is a ‘plane’ you and Nat spend hours together clinging onto one another as if, as soon as you separate you will be absent in her life for another couple years, vice versa.

Months pass by. Even though you and Nat have yet to label yourselves as a couple your hearts belong to one another after being attached to the hip to one another for pretty much every activity or mission you both do. In this time you were also recruited as an Avenger due to your skillful hand to hand combat and your masterful types of fighting you have nearly perfected from your time in the room.

The date just happens to be November 22. You are pretty sure no one in the compound is aware of Natalia’s birthday, hell, you aren’t even sure if she’s aware.

Today is the day you decide to return the missing items from her bag that you recover after she left.

You wake up next to her and wake her up with a long, graceful, soft kiss on her lips to which she responds shortly after by kissing you back as you feel as tiny smirk against your own lips.

“Hey, what was that for?” she asks playfully

“Ohhh nothing. Just maybe it’s for my favorite girl’s special day today.” Nat blushes.

“H-how’d you know?”

“Oh honey, I know e v e r y t h i n g.” you reply

Before she can respond you pull her to sit up on your shared bed and hand her an envelope containing her papers as well as he one and only photo of herself and her family.

As soon as she sees both items she sobs into your chest. (more because of the picture, you really only included her papers so she too would know all the most crucial parts of her life pre-red room era.

“Uh, uh, uh’” you tut,”One more thing.” you reach for her hand slowly and tell her to shut her eyes. You slowly slide the makeshift ring on her finger.

“Open.” you instruct

To which she gasps at the sight and just like the day you both were reunited you hugged and kissed for hours on end.

“Nat, will you be my girlfriend?” you ask with a sheepish smile.

“Of course y/n/n, I thought you’d never ask.” she takes a breath,“I know love is for children, but you are my only exception.”

“Ditto.” Natalia chuckles, “That is what the Americans say, right?” you backtrack with flushed cheeks.

She holds you tighter and presses a soft kiss to your forehead.

“Sure.” she breathes out.

[kindahoping4forever]

My Drug Is My Baby // Ashton Irwin

Thank you to everyone for your patience - I wrote and teased this story quite a while ago but I’ve unfortunately had some real life matters keeping me away from Tumblr. So it fits that I’m back with somewhat of a comfort fic (with a dirty edge because obviously) 😌. No big backstory, I was in a shitty mood, decided a horny smoke sesh in Ash’s backyard was the only cure and I wrote this surprisingly easily (for me). Thanks to @cal-puddies​​​​ for assuring me that this wasn’t just a “me” fantasy (lol) and for cheering me on in the form of copious clown emojis in the comments section of Google Docs.🤡🤡🤡🤡

Warnings: A boyfriend!Ash fic featuring weed smoking, mention of masturbation and sex toys, dirty talk, brief manual and oral stimulation of a female, dry humping, cum play

Word count: 3300

Masterlist // Ko-Fi and New 2021 Taglist linked above

Let  me  know  what  you  think!

You close your eyes, stretching out on the patio lounger and losing yourself in the music pouring from the bluetooth speaker on the table next to you. The cool night air blows across you and you surprise yourself with the volume of the pleased sigh you let out; it could just be the state you’re in but you swear it’s the best thing you’ve ever felt.

It’s only Tuesday but you’ve already absolutely had it with this week and all day the only thing you could think about was getting home, getting off and getting high. You’d hoped to tackle those last two items on your checklist with your boyfriend but just as you were pulling into the driveway, he texted saying he'd be home late.

You felt disappointed but adaptable and made a nice little evening for yourself: you ordered dinner from that Italian place only you like, indulged in a hot shower that went on for far too long and spent some quality time with your favorite vibrator. To close out your evening, you threw on your panties and one of Ashton's hoodies and headed out back to have a smoke in his “garden.” 

It’s not much, just a few pots with flowers and vegetables, but he’s so fucking proud of it, especially since you’ve helped him spruce it up with string lights and furniture, you’ve come to love it as much as he does.

You sigh again as the breeze continues to tickle your skin and you wiggle your toes, trying to decide if your bare legs are actually chilly or if you're just sensitive from your high. You're pretty sure you saw a blanket by the door but that seems super far away right now so instead you just hug your knees to your chest and try to fit them inside your oversized sweatshirt.

"Thought I heard a party back here," a voice teases from across the yard. 

You turn to look behind you, delight decorating your face. "I didn't hear the car pull up!" You consider running over to him and leaping into his arms but again, that seems like a lot of work so instead you just sit up on your knees, pucker your lips and wait.

Ashton chuckles, bounding over to plant a soft kiss to your impatient mouth. "Mmm, you taste sweet," he comments.

"Oh! I saved some for you," you exclaim, offering him the three-quarters eaten bag of kettle corn you've been snacking on.

He snorts and shakes his head but still dips inside for a handful. "Midnight snack in the garden and about 20 minutes ago I got five different messages that had no words but roughly three dozen kiss emojis… my love, are you high?" He spots your pipe on the table and turns it over in his hands, exaggeratedly inspecting. 

"Why, you jealous?" You giggle as you swipe it back from him.

"A little," he laughs, running a hand over your face and grinning as you melt into his touch. "Had a bit of a day myself."

You pout at his statement, yanking him down into another kiss, mewling as his beard scratches your face. "I was thinkin’ about packing another bowl, come smoke with me, tell me about it,'' you insist.

“Planned on it when I heard you back here,” he smiles. “Might need to go in and grab us another snack though, evidently.”

You stick your tongue out at him. "Oh wow, you're right, I am super sweet," you observe distractedly, now happily licking your own lips. 

Ash laughs joyfully, settling into the chaise opposite yours. You start off asking softball questions about each other’s day, wanting to save the bigger complaints for later, when the high can take the edge off. In between anecdotes, there’s that comfortable silence you always love falling into with him. The two of you are thinkers as well as talkers and sometimes you need to collect your thoughts before you launch into the next topic; you love that you both recognize and appreciate that need. You also love the chance to just observe your man, love watching his wheels turn as his mind works, love taking him in, marveling that he exists in your world.

Tonight you find yourself fascinated as he takes the supplies off the table and gets to work, fingers reaching into the stash jar to break off pieces of the bud, long hair falling in his face as he methodically loads them into the grinder. You can’t take your eyes off him, the metallic cylinder seeming to disappear in his large hands, veins becoming visible as he grips it, arms tensing and tattoos flexing as he twists, offering you a soft smile when he notices your gaze.

He stretches in his chair, trying to reach the pipe near you. It takes a minute to register that you should hand it to him, you’re caught up thinking about how big he looks leaning across the table, how his t-shirt pulling across his chest like that makes you want to bury your face in it, how warm it’d be, how safe and content you would feel.

Ashton gently says your name, breaking you from your reverie and gesturing towards the pipe.

You grab the glass piece and happily plop onto his chair to hand it to him, pecking him on the cheek for good measure. He chuckles at your eagerness, shifting to make room for you; he watches amusedly as you attempt to find a sitting position opposite him that is both comfortable and allows you to cover yourself with your hoodie.

“You know you’d probably be warmer if you didn’t come out here pantsless, baby.”

“You know I don’t believe in pants after 11pm, I can’t believe you’d suggest such a thing,” you reply with playful indignance, looking up at him triumphantly as you successfully bring the sweatshirt down over your crossed legs.

He cackles as he packs the ground weed into the bowl; he nudges your knee, which you correctly assume is his way of asking for the lighter he knows is in your hoodie pocket. You hand it to him and watch as he lights up and starts to take his first couple hits. 

You intended to pay more attention - admire his lips wrapping around the mouthpiece, his fingers flicking the lighter, let yourself be awed at how small your pipe looks in his hand - but you got distracted at the sight of his thick thighs as he sits cross-legged in his favorite basketball shorts. You think to yourself you don’t appreciate Ashton’s legs enough and reach out to tenderly rub your palms over them, humming contentedly when you find his skin as warm and comforting as you imagined.

“Baby...” He squeezes your hand on his thigh, refocusing your attention as smoke pours from his mouth. “You’re in a mood tonight, aren’t ya?” You can tell by his sing-songy tone and goofy smile he’s already starting to relax.

“Been thinkin’ bout relaxing with you like this all day,” you say dreamily. He offers you the pipe and you take it, practically purring when he sneaks his hands inside your sweatshirt and strokes over your legs while you smoke like you did with him. “Just happy you’re home and here with me.”

Ash pulls you into a slow kiss, tongue moving in the same delicate pattern his fingers are tracing on your thighs. “I missed you too, baby,” he admits as he pulls away. “You know I try not to be a downer but it was one of those days where I couldn’t help thinking it would’ve been better if we’d just shut off our alarms and stayed in bed together.”

“God, fucking same,” you commiserate, taking one more puff before passing the pipe back to him. “Tell me what happened.”

The two of you go back and forth trading stories, the pipe and every so often, a kiss. After a while, he decides to pack one more bowl and you lean back opposite him on the chair as he sets up again. You look at the stars, smiling to yourself as the combination of your high, the breeze and the sound of Ash quietly singing along to your playlist makes you shiver. Today was hard but if it’s what you had to go through to end up here in this moment? It was worth it.

You sit up on your elbows when you hear the spark of the lighter. You watch him take a long drag from the pipe and you’re not sure what it is but he just looks so goddamn beautiful, you find yourself overcome. Before you even realize what you’re doing, you crawl over to him and bury your face in the crook of his neck.

He giggles softly, sitting the pipe aside as you attach your mouth to his neck, giving him what could either be three hundred quick kisses or just three long ones, you’re not sure, your lips seem to be moving of their own accord and really all you’re thinking about in this moment is how much you wish the beard burn you’re feeling on your face was between your thighs.

“You good, baby?” He asks with a slight rasp in his voice, which you suspect is partly from his long day but also perhaps an indication he’s beginning to feel needy for you too. You take a detour to nip at his ear for a second before you kiss your way down his neck again; you work your mouth over the front and you moan when your tongue feels the vibrations of the soft moan he lets out.

You climb into his lap, straddling him and he stretches out his legs to accommodate you. You wrap yourself around him, in a kind of koala hug for a beat or two before quietly murmuring, “Been thinkin’ bout this all day too.” You offer him a deep, passionate kiss that tells him how much you need him, today, everyday and right now this fucking minute.

Ash waits for your lips to slow and then he pulls away, cradling your face, looking into your eyes, searching. His hazel eyes are gorgeous as always but blown wide from smoking; you know yours must look similar but you can tell he sees the love in them, can sense your hunger. He makes out with you for a few minutes, following your lead, waiting to see how far you want to take this.

Your kisses are becoming increasingly heated, increasingly filled with need and he decides to have a little fun with you. His hands run down your back and land on your ass, affectionately rubbing over your hoodie covered backside as he cheekily replies, “Thinking about me all day, huh? What exactly you been thinkin’ about all day?”

A naughty grin spreads across your face. You love playing this game with him. “Started this morning when I had to drag myself out of bed even though I had you naked next to me,” you start, leaning into another slow kiss before you pull back just slightly, staying close enough that your lips brush against his while you speak. “You looked so good when you told me goodbye, laying there half-asleep, cock more awake than you were. Wished I’d taken the time to slip you inside me, started off my day by feeling you get hard for me.” You begin grinding into his lap to emphasize your point.

Ashton licks over your lips, squeezing your ass approvingly as you move over him. “If you’d have done that, I guarantee neither of us would’ve left the house today,” he laughs sinfully. “What else, baby?”

Your hands brush over his bearded cheeks. “Every time I saw my reflection today I expected to see the marks your beard leaves - every weekend I just get so used to seeing my neck and chest so red… I miss it when we have to go back to reality,” you sigh, leaning back on your hands as you grind, exposing your neck, whining a little as he takes the bait and sucks a few spots on your skin, purposefully dragging his beard on you.

“Like that, baby?” He eggs you on, helping you ride him over his shorts, hands now roaming your ass over your panties, your hoodie having ridden up from your movements. “You want to know something I thought about today?” Suddenly his fingers are firmly gripping you and he gently lifts his hips up against your center, meeting your hips a few times to show you how hard you’ve made him.

You nod, gasping as you feel the swollen head of his cock rub directly over your clit, just two thin pieces of fabric separating you. Weed always makes you sensitive but you can’t believe how you can feel yourself already soaking through your underwear, making them feel even thinner than they already are.

You can tell Ash notices it too, his fingers moving down your ass, inching closer to your pussy, clearly having felt the wet spot you’re spreading on his shorts and wanting to feel it for himself. “Mind was wandering while I sat in traffic… thought about that time we got caught in that big jam driving home from the airport? Been so long since I’d seen you… you didn’t want to delay our reunion any longer so you started jerking me off right there,” he remembers, breath heavy. 

For a brief second you think he might pick you up and take you inside, fuck you against the glass door or maybe on the table in the entryway. But instead he keeps moving his hips with yours, biting his lip as the friction builds. "Got so hard remembering your lips wrapping around my cock just as I started to cum… I was so sure someone was going to see us but you couldn't give less of a fuck… Jesus, baby, you're dripping." His fingers dance over the wetness that’s spread down to your thighs and you breathe his name as he stills and pulls your panties to the side, sliding his fingers through your folds.

You brace yourself on his shoulders as he teases your clit. “Thought about you all day, Ash... was so ready to let you have me however you wanted as soon as I got home… but then you weren’t here… had to do it myself, think about you some more.” You’re not sure if you’re making sense but you’re so far gone you don’t really care and judging by the look on his face as he watches you grind into his hand, he doesn’t either.

“Saw your vibe on the nightstand, wondered what I’d missed out on,” he laughs, pressing your clit a few more times before bringing his fingers to his mouth and licking them clean. “Might have to ask for an encore performance, you know I love watchin’ you, baby.”

You feel his cock throb beneath you, as if to back up his claim. You groan and grip the tent in his shorts, pulling the material slack against him and squeezing, watching in awe as precum seeps through the fabric, leaving his bottoms almost as wet as yours. You can’t stop picturing how angry and red his cock must be from leaking like this; you decide you need to see it and pull him out of his shorts, whining when you see how shiny and wet he is for you.

You tap his cock on your clothed clit, rolling your hips over him, the both of you moaning at the motion. As good as it feels, it’s not enough and you push your panties to the side again and rub his tip directly against you, whimpering as he growls your name, his hands flying to your hips to keep you moving. 

Ashton’s fingers dig into your skin as he holds you against him, thrusting steadily through your wet folds. In your hazy state, you have the briefest thought of slipping him inside you but you’re already sure you could cum from this and it’s just feeling so good… has anything ever felt this good? You don’t want to stop. As you slide your pussy over his length, you can feel every ridge, every vein, you swear you can even feel his pulse as you move against his cock. You can’t stop.

“So fucking wet, baby,” he pants, hips moving wildly now. He slaps your ass a couple times, partly hoping it’ll get you moving faster and partly hoping it’ll get you to cum sooner because he’s not sure how much longer he can hold out. “Were you this soaked when you played with yourself earlier?”

You moan when you feel the sting of his palm. “Of course not,” you huff, nearing your end. “Nothing’s ever as good as when I’m with you… fuck Ash… love your cock so much, don’t even need it inside me to get off,” you ramble as you move eagerly on him. A few breathless whimpers later, you’re grabbing onto his shoulders as you cum and shake against him.

“Oh fuck, oh fuck, fuck,” he groans, pushing through your wetness once more just as it gets to be too much. You feel his cock jump and then he’s shooting cum all across your pussy; you gasp when you feel the warmth of his release on your thighs, a stark contrast to your cool, exposed skin.

Ashton tries to keep his eyes open so he can watch himself cover you in rope after rope but between the noises you’re making and the relief of finishing, he has to let his head fall back in bliss. You lean over him, softly nibbling at his lips as he comes down. 

“Hi,” you coo as his eyes flutter open.

“Hey,” he sighs, dazed.

“Think you ruined my panties,” you smirk.

Ash grins devilishly. “Is that a complaint?”

You coyly shrug and squeal as he suddenly presses the latch on the armrest, laying the chair flat, settling back to easily hoist you up over his face. You let out a desperate “Oh! Ash!” as his tongue licks you clean, eagerly moving across your folds and your thighs, mixing his cum with yours and swallowing it all down.

As he pulls away, he flicks over your clit a couple times, laughing warmly as you nearly jump out of his hold. “Relax, baby, I’m just playin’,” he soothes, pressing a soft peck to your pussy and each of your legs before moving you off of him.

Neither of you can seem to hold back the satisfied smiles painting your faces as you resituate yourselves: him putting his cock away and readjusting his chair, you peeling off your underwear and pulling your hoodie back down before crawling back into his arms.

You lay against his chest and the two of you bask in euphoric silence for a few minutes, curling into each other as the late night breeze picks up. You start to wonder what he’ll do if you fall asleep out here, when he reaches for the long-forgotten pipe, sparking the lighter to finish the bowl he started before you got frisky.

Your eyes meet as he pulls his hit and when he’s done, you press your lips to his, inviting him to pass the smoke from his mouth to yours. You easily finish off the bowl together like that and then you’re back on his chest again, sated and stoned.

“Sorry you had a shit day, love,” Ashton murmurs, pecking your forehead.

“Same… but it’s kinda funny to think that the shittiest days always seem to lead to some of my favorite nights with you,” you muse, softly sighing as he wraps his arms around you and squeezes you tight.

————-

Thank you to everyone who has signed up for the taglist, both for the support and the lovely (occasionally hilarious) feedback! If you haven’t signed up yet, the form is linked above! (If you signed up and your name is crossed out or not listed, I was unable to tag you, please check your blog settings and either re-sign up or send me a message letting me know you allow mentions now)

@matchacal​ @cxddlyash​ @2fangirl4u​ @cashtonasfuck​ @talkfastromance4​ @itjustkindahappenedreally​ @saywhatnow07​ @mymindwide​ @suchalonelysunflower​ @pxrxmoore​ @findingliam-o​ @fedorable-killjoys​  @trix-arent-for-kids​ @olivia-foster-irwin​ @saphseoul​ @calmsweetcreature​ @onthecliffside-mgc​ @feliznavidaddycal​ @himbohood​  @maggiesupertramp​ @wiiildflowerrr​ @karajaynetoday​ @ashtonangst​ @sunshineeashton​ @aladyofalbion​ @xsongbirdx​ @loveroflrh​ @memyselfandbea​  @calumrose​  @youngblood199456​  @sunshineeeluke  @irwindoll​​

[cttrajan1206]

#arrow sys#Love them#Absolute sweethearts all of em#And suoer fun to sprint with

FIRST OF ALL SOBS /pos

second,,, i know nothing abt twst or obey me but grabby hands at a ramble; i will absolutely listen if you wanted to talk about it :starry:

JSHDJF [WAILS ALOUD] I TOOK SO LONG SO GET BACK TO YOU THAT I FINISHED ONE OF THE WIPS IN THAT TIME LMAO!!

Well!! This is good promo! :> The one that i was typing up is finished now and it's the obey me fic! You can find it here:

https://archiveofourown.org/works/33644662

Mammon and Movies:

Basically! Someone read another fic of mine that included my self insert flappy stimming and also getting mental breakdown so it asked if i could include a couple other stims in another work since he enjoyed my first one! I. Took that request and made an entire fic dedicated to him lmao. So! I asked it later on for what it would like me to include and which character to use and here we are!

This is a 4K fic of Mammon from Obey Me paired with a Neurodivergent!Reader. The plot is that of him showing you a magic trick and smoothly whipping out a movie ticket!! You've been wanting to ask him to see a movie with you for a while so this is perfect! So perfect in fact that you're overwhelmed with happiness and have a brief moment of being nonverbal as you're overwhelmed with euphoria. Then the next day, you meet him at the venue and the date begins! Other scenes include him allowing you to hold onto his bracelets as it's one of your stims (he wears one of every texture to accomodate to your tastes), you dissociating out of anxiety in a movie theatre and him helping to ground you, and finally! Him sleeping on your shoulder before the movie ends.

Ik i kinda just said the majority of the plot lmao but! Its just a fluffy and sweet movie date! I enjoyed writing it a lot although i got about 80% of it done a month ago and tyn didn't touch it for like 2 weeks sjdbsjd i was p sad abt that. I like finishing things quickly esp when its for other people!! But it was a comfort during a hard time to write this work at 2am under the light of a night lamp and to the tune of street life ambience.

ALSO I FOUND OUT THAT MAMMONS OFFICIAL SONG "ARE YOU READY" LEGIT HAS NO HOURLONG LOOPS AND THAT WAS A HARD HIT TO ME BC LIKE I WANTED TO LISTEN TO IT ON TV BUT IT WASNT HAPPENINGGG TWT WHY DOES EVERYONE LIKE ALL THE OTHER OTHER BROTHER'S SONGS INSTEAD LIKE PLSSS

Anyway lmao i'm quite happy with this work, it feels very round and finished to me which makes me happy because it means I didn't need to worry about editing it to feel satisfied. The requester liked it a lot too! Which made me super super happy. :>

Now!! For the twisted wonderland!! That’s a comfort plotline of mine that doesn’t really have a title yet and is still a wip that is written through my friend’s DMs BUT! I will also take the time to promo my twst writing blog! It is dead QvQ On there, you can see a bit more about the self insert in question but for now, i’ll just put the ship name as the title.

https://twst-sumi-squad.tumblr.com/

Kalim Al-Asim X Sumi Bint Khattar (Plot line):

So!! This one stemmed from me drawing something out of self indulgence and to show it to my friend, I described Sumi B in full and then I told them about my ships and around that time I had like five love songs I was obsessed with. And for each of them. I had. A separate animatic. For like at least 1 ship, the average was two but one had three. Sumi B was the centre of the most ships but not the only one. Anyway!! I told my friend about this and asked if I could dump my ideas onto them! They agreed and I started with a summarised version but then realised I needed a bit more build up so I started to write it in a bit more detail. Hah. It ended up being a Lot More Detailed but even then, I would write the scenes in a much more fluid and descriptive way if it were Real Writing so! I call it a Plotline. It is very long.

The plot itself is. long now. it’s a slowburn lmao because most if not all of my self insert ships tend to be slowburns. But this one? This particular self insert? Sumi B? Yeah she’s the only one with trust issues so she mothers the BIGGEST slowburns known to history. It takes them a year before she even considers him a friend despite seeing him every day and also having multiple deep conversations with him. Anyway though, this one is a big comfort becuase it has something I didn’t really dare to do before. Kalim, the canon character, falls in love with my oc first. Normally I have it the other way round becuase I’m too scared to assume that I would be like, deserving or like desirable enough for someone to have a crush on me. But with Sumi B, even I have a goddamn crush on her lmao. I indulge myself a bit with this one and really play around with emotions and!! In the most recent scene! We have finally reached the part where she actually starts to love him back! :D

I started this one a loooong time ago, at least a month and maybe two? It was Intended to be finsiehd in one night and then i got carried away and my friend got invested and then I ALSO got invested and so I started to develop the plot further so make it more interesting and keep the buildup going. It’s very fun and though i try to limit myself to summarising actions and dialogue, i fail. very often. so it often has little tidbits of more beautiful sentences and tension lmao. 

This particular fic is based off of my imagined animatic for the song “Would you be so kind” by Dodie! I didn’t know about the song until i saw other people’s animatics and I ended up taking it and running away haha! I’m currently really happy with it however I am really dreading the day where I actually write it out properly. If I don’t? I don’t know. Maybe I’ll post the plotline by itself. I have another fic just like it, one with a different self insert who (in fact) is very very close with Sumi B and considers her his older sister, that i ALSO wrote in semi detailed plot lines in someone’s DMs. Both are massive comforts to me and though i love them, their plot lines are so goddamn long that i will dread the day i decide to write them all out.

So uhm!!! Yeah!! XDD Those are the two fics I was talking about! I hope you enjoyed my small ramblings about them haha. I’m starting college soon though so I fear I might have much more time for fanfic.

[hopeassassin]

Rally’s Scribbles in the Work

So after that lovely anon blew my mind away with their kind words and wonderful support, and because I keep telling you guys about my writing plans without actually giving you even a teensy little detail, I have decided to stop being coy and actually likely get your hopes up a bit by dilvulging small details and bits of plots of what is currently going on in my G-Drive. 

This will be a brief recount of what I have currently baking in the AoMomo oven, so let’s dive right into it! Please note that the numbers are in no particular order - I just keep revisiting each of these stories and writing a bit more to them whenever I feel like it. So there’s no ranking and no importance, just a number to keep proper count.

1. “Knight of Renown” Dragons and Knighthood AU, based on that one AoMomo pic with Momo ithe Knight and Dragon Aomine that I reblogged a while back and I actually let me imagination go a bit too much in the tags. I ended up actually rather enjoying the premise I set up in the tags so I actually started writing that one out!  Completion rate at about: 5%? I’d say? Less? :D 

2. AoMomo Music AU - a dearly beloved project that I am pouring a lot of love and attentioin to. That’s why it’s coming along super slow. It’s been in the making since November and I chewed it and mulled through it so thoroughly that I’ve grinded to a halt with it. Intending for there to be 2 chapters, and I am at about 25-30% of chapter 1 currently ready currently. At the pace I’m going, it might be another full year before you actually get to see this bad boy up, but when you do, I’m sure you’ll see all the care and effort that went into making it perfect. Honestly, no joke here, I am intending for this to be one of my rare masterpieces in this tag. So I’m not gonna rush it!

3. AoMomo Car Accident AU where Daiki barely manages to save Satsuki from being run over by a hit-and-run and ends up being the one run over instead. This was my first piece of writing after coming back to AoMomo last summer and yet completion rate is a sad thing. I want it to be flawless, a perfectly agonizing, thrilling type of torturous read that gives you a great sense of relief by the end of it. Needless to say, the clusterfuck of negative feelings is a bit difficult to hold onto for a prolonged period of time and the work is coming along slowly. Planned at about 5 chapters, I have 2 complete ones and the 3rd one is at about ... 30%? Hopefully before this year’s whumptober, we’ll have a finished piece!

4. AoMomo bond character study, which went in a direction I did NOT expect nor intend. It was suppsoed to be an idea that you will see also listed below. But I started this one from their early childhood and somehow, instead of focusing on the kids and their bond and their weird interactions with each other and their first moments of realizing they are of opposite genders, it turned into something much too fun to let go of and the ideas for scenes just kept piling. It’s going to be a long one, very explorative and very in-depth character study on the bond between these two and how it changed over the years, and their first encounters with their sexuality inbetween (because that was really the main idea that I started with... xDDD;;;) Currently at 1 chapter complete, chapter 2 somewhere around 50-60% completion, and at least 6-7 chapters to come after that, soooo.... :’DDDD YEAH. THIS ONE AIN’T SEEING THE LIGHT OF DAY ANYTIME SOON.

5. AoMomo deciding to practice stuff on each other, because I am a sucker for this trope.THIS will be what the idea under previous number 4 was SUPPOSED to be like, but it instead spun out of control. So this one, under number 5, is going to be the smutty, idiots bumbling through physicality to discover that they actually have serious feelings for each other kind of piece. Chapters are planned at about at least 6-7 or so, but not my usual monstrocities! :D First we start with practice kissing, and we move our way up from there! 

6. “The Evil of Humanity” AU - a dystopian futuristic kinda mecha AU, sort of an amalgamation of some of my favourite anime in the genre - a bit of NGE, a bit of Gurren-Lagann, a lot of Darling in the Franxx rewrite and improvement, in distinctly AoMomo colors. I poured a lot of thought and love into initial outline of main moments for this one, and I really hope to make it an epic, thrilling action/adventure with a big dash of romance kind of read! Chapters currently not even planned properly, because I need to sit down and consider this seriously. It will definitely be more than 10-15 though, and they will be my usual chapter lengths so.... likely no time soon. :D 

7. Aomine Fanclub - I got a plot bunny some time ago and I shared it here and my friends were spurring me on with it, so I started trying it out a little more. I’ve written out like... maybe 30% of this one as well, but need to re-read and reconceptualize to get it back on track. The issue with this one is that I’m not really sure where I want to take it, thus it’s on the back burner at the moment.

8. KagaKuro AoMomo double-date kind of story, where Aomine is asking some curious questions of Taiga about going to America and pondering if any of his immediate friends know what Satsuki wants to do with her life. I’m really invested in this one but haven’t started properly writing it out yet beyond just sketching out the idea so I don’t forget it. (I’d say 1% complete here.) Really looking forward to using the idea of Kagami being super impressed with AoMomo perfect sync when playing as a team in arcade games!

9.Laws of Attraction Chapter 2 - You might be surprised at this, but I’m actually super invested in this one. Likely the reason why I am delaying so much working on it - I feel like all my great scene ideas are just too chaotic and I have a hard time starting the chapter flowing properly. I had like 4-5 false starts already and I’m feeling a bit skittish with picking it up. But I have such AMAZING concepts on where to take it after it revvs up the engine, so... Maybe sometime this year! Completion rate: 0% written, but at least about 30% ideas built up for the installment!

10. AoMomo college rooming together story - sort of an expansion on my fill for one of the prompts way back those years ago in AoMomo week. I really dig the concept and the trope of sharing spaces with someone you consider nothing more than a friend and then gradually learning to appreciate each other for something so much more. I am definitely doing this one some day, but not anytime soon, likely.

11. A random idea bit me the other day (read: a month ago) and I actually wrote out like... maybe 25% of it already as well. A random comment from Wakamatsu miffs Satsuki but then she realizes why he’s asking dumb questions and she comes to realize that something is wrong with the equation: either Dai-chan likes someone really close to them and she hasn’t realized, which is unlikely, or Dai-chan likes HER and is super blase about it in a way that betrays his feelings not at all, which is even more unlikely. Being a curious  individual, she sets out to find which it is! Some hilarity should ensue but mostly just some mess-with-Dai-chan fun!

12. Touou summer training camp at the sea - progress is practically 0, I wanted to write a summery piece and set my mind on this, but nothing beyond has come to me, so I’m not forcing it.

13. AoMomo cultural festival fic in second year of high school (meaning something approx end of Oct -> beginning of Nov.) with Daiki being in a distinctly Haruhu Suzumiya role at that festival (has anyone even seen this anime? I adored that episode to freaking bits, man, it’s engraved upon my soul) and singing Billy Idol’s “Rebel Yell” and one more song just like Haruhi did. And Satsuki just beholding the phenomenon he becomes in no time flat while he lays bare his passion for life for all the student body to see. Shippiness will happen in private afterwards!

14. You Can Leave Your Hat On Chapter 2 - Probably like 2-3 years ago while I was still in the damn woodwork and wrestling with real life and adulting being crap, I remembered this AU premise and I got super hyped on the idea of Club Owner Dai-chan being a flirt with innocent Satsuki who got dragged to his joined and fell in love at first sight with his shenanigans. I’ve already played around for like 7k words with the second chapter of this but I’m still not where I want to be at, so it will take a while longer to flesh it out.

15. Idol Worship - a story that I promised my mate aricana some 6 years ago the premise for which I am super hyped for but not quite engaging with it yet. The idea was that Momoi finally starts gettiing the dates she has been pesting Kuroko for for years, and Daiki feeling terrible about beholding that, whilst Kise is being pestered by Horikita Mai for a date and instead ditches her with Daiki because he knows his former Teikou classmate is a huge fan of her. Mai-chan isn’t particularly happy but somehow ends up enjoying her time with Daiki and starts considering actually pursuing him instead of Kise when she sees what an interesting soul he is, with the torch that he’s carrying for some girl in his life he doesn’t really talk about but is evident from the little things he drops off as hits. AoMomo shenanigans will start to ensue properly when Satsuki realizes that Daiki is actually having a close female friend who is not her but is Horikita Mai instead, Dai-chan’s perfect woman, practically. She doesn’t take well to the news and has to grapple with why that is! And what to do with these newfound frustrating emotions!

16. Obstruction of Justice Chapter 3 - MAYBE SOME DAY, I WILL GET TO WRITING THIS. Last summer I inteded to do just that but instead, Wild Side of Justice was born. And it became a spin off of sorts on its own. ORZ. I WILL FINISH THIS SOME DAY, I do have some plans for it and I do have the desire to pursue them. I just need to be in the right headspace for it ahsjkfhkjaf

17. A PWP story of Kagami arriving early for a practice match at Touou and somehow walking in on AoMomo getting busy with each other in very unexpected and explicit ways that Kagami did not see headed his way. Because, we need more PWP in this fandom, honestly.

18. And since we DO need more PWP, recently when checking the 30 lemons community on LJ (shut up, I’m not ancient, YOU’RE ANCIENT) I was wondering how exactly a smut plot around the “Taken by the Faceless Stranger” could work for Aomomo and I came up with this Masquerade ball that they end up both attending because of their friends and meeting each other and hitting off fantastically just chatting the night and then banging in a niche in the long castle-like premise of the ball. :’DDDD Cuz it’s me and if I don’t have something like that in the works, you know i’m likely sick.

ALL OF THESE I am planning on eventually finishing one day. ONE DAY!

For now they are in various states of completion and in various stages of being cared for and improved on with more ideas added and fleshed out.

I am not joking when I say I am very invested in this fandom. I just have difficulty getting to writing out these ideas when I spend like 60% of my free time playing my mobile games. :D 

So there you have it. I didn’t want to say anything about these because 1) I don’t want to get your hopes up. You Can Leave Your Hat On 2, for one, has been in the making for 3 years, very on-again-off-again kind of way, and I just... can’t do that to you guys. I have decided against posting any incomplete fics so I don’t torture you guys and my muse doesn’t abandom me forever for them. So when something is complete, it gets posted promptly for your viewing pleasure!

And 2) If I divulge too much of the story, I feel like my hype of it may disappear completely. Ehh, my muse is a willful creature, what can I tell you... 

So let’s hope at least SOME of these get to see the light of day soon!

[i-dont-want-your-hysteria]

Curiosity Cursed the Leppard

(This is a stupid little idea I wrote 2 years ago- one of my first Leppard fics that I actually executed. Normally I try to be as historically accurate as humanly possible, but I’m a teeny bit lazy with this one. I didn’t edit much when it came to proofreading this. I posted this on ao3 and rockfic 2 years ago once it was done, so if you recognize it, thanks for reading it so long ago!)

Words: 3,406 Characters: Phil, Steve, Rick, Sav, Joe, Peter Mensch Setting: March 1983, beginning of the Billy Squier tour Summary: The baby Pyro Leppards are sick of sitting back and doing what they’re told. To spite their dearest band manager, they need to- as Steve once put it- “break up the monotony”. Unfortunately, their curiosity comes with some minor consequences...

------

March 1983, somewhere in Europe

“Look at this over here!” Phil called back into the hotel room from the balcony, “Swimming pool!”

Steve trotted out to the balcony and joined his Terror Twin at the railing. Down in the small yard of the hotel was an in-ground pool with a few lawn chairs and a diving board. It was nothing extravagant, but it was a pleasant sight no less.

“That’d be really nice, if it were a bit hotter out,” Steve leaned on the railing of the balcony. When he spoke, the fog of his breath was visible.

The Leppards were about to begin their tour as the opening act for Billy Squier. They had about a week before any of the shows actually started, though. With all this extra time and no plans, there really seemed to be no telling what they could get themselves into before they had a show. Since it was the first day of their down time, curiosity seemed inevitable.

“It’s still early in the morning, it’ll get warmer,” Phil encouraged, “Don’t know about you, but I’d take the chance!”

Steve hung his head, looking directly down from where they stood, “I think you’ve forgotten what season it is, mate.”

“It won’t make a difference if it’s winter or summer,” Rick appeared in the doorway, joining in on the conversation, “I heard the pool’s heated, anyways. They haven’t turned it on for the day yet.”

Phil’s head popped up and he cooed, “Ooh, even better; we can pop in for a hot swim after our runnin’ around today.”

“Don’t even think about it!” Peter Mensch echoed from the inside, “Heated pool or not, it’s only 34 Fahrenheit outside right now, and you boys can’t risk getting sick! Besides, you probably won’t even have time to swim after all that we’ve gotta do today.”

Sav appeared next to Peter, holding a few of his luggage bags, “Oh, it’s not that much to do; it’s mostly just the dinner with Bill!”

Peter had to object, “Maybe it mostly is the dinner with Bill, but it can still take forever. All I’m saying is, don’t take the chance; we’ve got stuff to do.”

And with that, he exited the one large hotel room the Leppards all had to share.

“All this ‘stuff’ he’s claiming we have to do is just the same old story,” Joe muttered to Sav, also carrying luggage, “He says its ‘super important’ and we’ve ‘got to be there’, but we just end up taggin along with him for the ride and he does all the work.”

“It’s like we’re his pets or something,” Rick flew past the two of them and jumped face-first onto one of the beds.

“Or his children,” Sav commented, “Either way, he thinks he needs leashes on us.”

Phil suddenly called back into the room over his shoulder, “I say we spite him.”

Steve yelled back in the same manner, even though he was answering to Phil right next to him, “Ditto.”

“But how?” Joe inquired to the men on the balcony, putting luggage on the bed right next to Rick, “You two are the experts of spite.”

Phil simply motioned his arm out towards the yard of their hotel with a formal demeanor, “Let’s go for a quick swim; it’s the perfect opportunity!"

Steve nodded in approval of Phil’s proposal, and silence fell between the band for a sudden and brief moment.

“Count me in,” Rick muttered into a pillow, which made it sound more like gibberish. He sat himself up and stared at Joe and Sav, awaiting a response to support the future actions of the rest of the band, “What about you two?”

Sav and Joe looked at each other and shrugged.

“I’m alright with it, ‘long as we do it later,” Joe expressed his agreement as he looked out to the Terror Twins on the balcony, smirking, “Can’t spite him too early in the day.”

“Yeah, I say we do it later when it’s not freezing outside,” Sav suggested, “Spitin’ him doesn’t mean we have to freeze our arses off.”

***

When leaving for their day activities about an hour later, the five band members gazed in awe at the steam coming off of the pool water. As they walked on by, a woman with long dark hair and pale skin was in the pool.

“Ooh, can’t wait for that later,” Phil cooed.

“Can’t wait for what?” Steve asked him while they both stared outside, “The pool, or the girl?”

Phil casually joked, “Ah, I’ll flip a coin.”

“Okay,” Joe whispered to the rest of the band as they fell behind Peter a little more, “After we get back, we hide out in our room and wait until he’s gone.”

Sav added onto their plan, “And hiding time is prep time. We get changed, we check to see if anyone’s around the pool, all that jazz.”

“Sounds like the most exciting thing we’re gonna do all day,” Rick commented as they strode along into their “busy” day, “Don’t know how long I’ll be able to last through all of this useless shit we’ve gotta do.”

“It’ll all be worth it,” Phil assured them, “We’ve just gotta wait... and Lord knows for how long.”

***

They ended up waiting until about 7pm that night before they got back to the hotel. It was strange, because once they did get back, Peter said that he was going to simply leave them for the night. At the time they found out, the Leppards reacted normally, talking about being cooped up with the telly for the night or getting a good drink or two in. They all knew Peter had to run back out and do other manager-type things, but they didn’t know when he was leaving.

While they were waiting for him to leave, they all hastily got changed into swim trunks and fished out towels from the bathroom and kept peeking around to see whether the man of the hour still remained close by.

“I can’t take this anymore,” Phil said at one point, “We’ve been waiting 11 bloody minutes!”

“So?” Steve walked out of the bathroom in swim trunks, “It’s just 11 minutes. We weren’t expecting him to leave right away.”

Phil put on a pair of jeans over his own trunks, threw on a shirt, and made his way to the door of their room, “Well I’m impatient, and it’d be nice to know where this little plan of ours stands at the moment. We gotta look to see if he’s gone yet.”

“Be careful out there, solider,” Joe joked, strolling into the room with a bath towel.

***

Phil slipped out of the room and into the empty hallway silently. He walked towards the end that had Peter’s room, when Peter himself suddenly turned the corner in front of him, making him jump.

“Oh- Peter!” he awkwardly greeted him, “Hello, there!”

“Long time no see,” Peter greeted him back, not taking a second to stop walking. Phil, however, needed that stolen second.

He turned around to look at Peter and tried not to sound rushed when he asked, “Hey- uh, where are you headin’ off to right now?”

“Just to the arena where next week’s first show is,” he began, “Then I’m off to another meeting with Bill’s managers, then I’ve got to meet up with Mutt for a phone call to-”

“Oof,” Phil interrupted hastily as if it were bad news to him, and kept walking along, “That’s a lot, that’s tough. Hope you get it all done, bye!”

He suddenly turned and walked in the opposite direction, waving farewell. It prompted Peter to wave back (confusedly). Once their paths had crossed for good, and Phil turned a corner, he slowly peeked back around the corner to see if his target had completely gone. Once he saw the man in question enter the lift, the guitarist made his way back to the band’s room with a smug grin on his face.

It was go time.

***

“He’s been gone longer than I thought he’d be,” Steve commented as he gazed through the peep-hole of their door after only about three minutes of Phil’s absence. The other three were close by him, awaiting any news from their foot solider.

Joe pitched in, “Maybe he had to hide?”

Rick suggested, “Maybe he got in trouble?”

Sav countered, “And what would he get in trouble for so quickly?”

“Oh, he’s coming!” Steve whispered excitedly as the four of them back away from the door, leaving room for Phil to open it. When he did, he came in quickly, shut it behind him and exchanged a pleased look with the rest of the band.

They all waited in anticipation for a quick moment before Phil announced, “Our plan is a go, lads! He’s gone!”

The other four clapped and cheered briefly before each heading in a different direction to get their towels and shoes.

“What took you so long?” Steve asked him with a laugh, “I thought you were just snoopin’ around, weren’t you?”

“Well,” Phil shrugged, walking over to a bed where his towel lay, “I had to hide for a bit to watch him leave because I accidentally ran into him, and I also asked that lovely girl we saw in the pool earlier to join us...”

The older guitarist exchanged a smirk with the rest of his band, and they all suddenly looked excited. Whenever they hung out with girls, it tended to get wild (and almost certainly meant that one of them would get lucky).

“And?” Rick anxiously inquired, speaking for the whole band.

The smirk left Phil’s face instantly, and his voice dropped to a tone of disappointment, “She said she had to go meet up with friends.”

A collective chorus of “aww”s and “dammit”s subtly filled the room, but they all headed out the door and down to the pool no less. They passed the front desk along the way when-

“Excuse me, gentlemen?” the fairly young American man at the desk called out to them as they walked on by. They stopped in their tracks and faced him, trying to cover up their bare chests with their towels. Their turning around was a good enough answer to the man's question.

“I’m sorry, but we’ve just gotten a report that the heater in the pool has stopped working. We’ll have maintenance around in the morning to fix it,” he informed them. The band all sighed and moaned in defeat. Their one rebellious act on this boring day was cancelled.

“Can’t we still go in?” Steve asked him, resulting in a slap on the arm from Sav.

“It’s freezing out, and you wanna go swimming in an unheated pool?”

Steve shrugged, trying to prove a point, “Well if it hasn’t been broken long, the pool’s probably still heated a bit, right?”

“If you all wanna go in, you’re more than welcome,” the man at the desk offered, “But I wouldn’t recommend it.”

“Right, thank you, sir,” Phil smiled, turning with the rest of the band towards the exit to the outdoor patio where the pool was. They didn't care about temperature at this point; they had a goal. Right about now Joe would normally be the one to turn them onto the right path, but he knew that they all had their minds set on the same path. He knew they weren’t just gonna stop.

“We’re all mad, we really are,” he mused excitedly to them, “Old man Peter’s gonna have our heads if he finds us right now.”

Rick tied his towel around his neck like a cape and laughed, “If he finds us, but we know he won’t!”

They all giggled like children as they walked outside to patio where the illuminated in ground pool resided, their breaths now visible. The freezing air of the evening enveloped them immediately, causing them to pull their towels around them tighter. After a moment, though, they all tossed their towels onto the chairs nearby, embracing the brisk temperature.

“Little chilly,” Sav stated as they kept walking towards the pool. When they got there, Steve kicked off his shoes and dipped his toes in right away.

“Little heated,” Steve said back as he felt the water with his foot.

“Little jump!” Phil threw his towel behind him and suddenly jumped into the pool, splashing the others in the process. They all gasped and started laughing at the guitarist’s perfect entry.

Rick pointed at the water where Phil was, “Okay, he’s mad!”

Phil came back up, wiped his eyes and told them, “It’s actually quite nice! Just come right in!”

“Well someone’s gotta go first!” Joe proclaimed, “And it’s not gonna be me!”

A quick pause between the remaining four ensued. It was broken when Sav suddenly yelled for a split second and fell forward into the pool. Joe, Phil, and Rick all turned and looked at Steve, who had just been standing behind Sav (and was now giggling).

“Oops,” he sarcastically snickered before jumping in after Sav and swimming as far away from the bassist as possible. Rick and Joe both broke down in laughs and wheezes, along with Phil in the pool.

Sav resurfaced with a curtain of wet hair over his eyes and called out to no one in particular, “Where the fuck is he?! Steve!”

“Over here!” Steve playfully called out from the middle of the pool, far away from where Sav currently was. Sav scooped his hair out of his face, located Steve a few yards away, and dove after him.

"Okay, okay, who's next? Me or you?" Joe said to the drummer.

"Actually," Rick proposed immediately after the inquiry, "I've got an idea for both of us."

***

“Okay, ready?” Rick asked Joe, who was standing on the side of the pool opposite himself.

“Ready,” came the response.

“One...” Rick counted.

“Two...” Joe continued.

“Three!” they both shouted as they began to run. Once they both reached the edge of the pool, they jumped simultaneously and just as clumsily as one another. For the second that they were both in the air, they managed to high five each other perfectly with a quick scream before plummeting into the slightly heated water. The three other band members that were already in the water applauded them at their success with enthusiastic claps and laughs. When Rick and Joe resurfaced, they were immensely pleased with their accomplishment, celebrating it with a proper high five. And thus, the private (but still forbidden) pool party had begun.

The next two hours housed a wide variety of spontaneous activities. These happenings ranged from cannonball competitions, to genuine conversation, and to reenactments of live shows (but played underwater, of course). The band’s wading in the water went unnoticed by the hotel staff the whole time it commenced, just as the cold temperature outside went unnoticed by the band themselves. Once the pre-provided heat had worn off into nothing but steam, the band's energy began to wind down slowly as well.

"Man," Phil remarked at one point when they were all still swimming, "Who knew that swimmin' for a bit could make your throat hurt."

"We've all been yelling too much, you know what that does to your voice," Joe told him knowingly (after all, he was the singer), “You know what happens when your energy gets up.”

“I feel like we’ve just played a show,” the drummer pulled himself up onto the edge of the pool and stretched both of him arms, feeling how sore they now were.

Sav, on the other hand, kept his shoulders underwater in order to provide some protection from the bite in the air. His hair was also acting like a scarf to the back of his neck to retain some of his body heat.

His jaw chattered when he spoke, “Is-sn’t anyone g-gonna mention how cold it is n-now?”

“He’s r-right,” Steve supported Sav, floating right next to him in the exact same manner, “It’s gotten a l-lot colder...”

“Guess it’s time we all called it a night, then,” Joe pulled himself out of the pool and quickly wrapped himself in a towel, now visibly shivering as well. The four other men followed his lead as the water on the ends of their hair slowly began to chill to a freezing temperature. In a few minutes, they were all heading back to their room, smushed together in the hopes of heating up even a little bit.

"Can't wait to get me some nice, hot tea," Rick rubbed his towel back and forth around him, "Now my throat's killin' me."

“Blimey, can you believe how cold it is in here?” Phil asked his friends once they were back inside the hotel (even though the heaters were most certainly running). They all nodded and murmured in collective agreement at the remark.

The man at the front desk had heard this interaction, and sighed as he continued to fan himself with a folder, sweating in the excessive heat of the hotel.

***

“You guys are all idiots, you know,” Peter stated bluntly to the band members the next morning.

They were all grumpily moaning in front of him on the beds and couch, far from being ready for any sort of activity. They were also all as sick as dogs; each of them running a fever, each of them huddled up under several blankets, and each of their noses acting all kinds of crazy.

“I can’t believe you guys would go swimming in an unheated pool when it’s 39 fucking degrees outside, and think that you wouldn’t get sick- especially when you know we’re at the beginning of a tour!”

“Hey now, Peter,“ Joe croaked sassily from under the covers, his beloved voice now destroyed, “We’ve still got a whole week before any shows.”

“Besides,” Phil added nasily, “Aren’t you happy we’re learning our lesson?”

“You got me there,” the manager pointed at him, “I shouldn’t be surprised; I don’t know why I am, but lucky for you dumbasses, you just got yourselves out of today’s activities.”

Soft sighs of “yes” swept over the hotel room as Peter covered his eyes with his hand in disappointment.

“No, not yes!” he couldn’t help but chuckle with a hint of anger, “You're still very sick! Now you boys have to get better, and fast! The fact that you’re sick doesn’t take away the fact that we’re on tour!”

“We’ll try to get better soon, we promise,” Sav whined before sneezing loudly, then holding his head in discomfort, "Ughh... I hope so..."

“We’re real sorry, Peter,” Steve pouted and made a fake but sleepy apology, “But we’re actually gonna need you to get some medicine for us, if it’s not too much trouble.”

The manager sighed at the innocent request and gave in, “Yeah, yeah, I can do that. Maybe it’s actually a good thing you’re all sick; now you don’t wanna run off into trouble.”

Sav mumbled to Joe next to him, “Told you he wants to put us on leashes.”

Peter spoke up, “What was that?”

“Nothing!”

“And for god’s sake, guys,” the oldest man in the room began to make his way over to the heater, “Would it kill you turn down the heat in here?”

“Yes, it would kill us!!” came five disgruntled objections, making the manager freeze in his current action and back away from the heater with both of his hands up in surrender.

“Alright, alright, I guess I’ll see you guys in a few. Is there anything else you want me to get?”

“Tea,” was all Rick needed to say.

“Gotcha,” Peter confirmed with the young drummer before quitting the Leppards’ room. A bit of quietness took place right afterwards, just to make sure that Old Man Peter didn’t come running back in to see if they were faking the band-wide illness.

“So what do you think?” Joe asked his four other friends, “Worth it?”

There was another brief silence before Phil answered, “Yeah. Definitely worth it.”

“Same here.”

“Agreed.”

“It was delightful.”

Low, evil, chuckles made their way around the room and faded away. The band members then laid in silence and stared up at the ceiling, now uncertain of what to do next in their unexpected down time.

“So...” Phil proposed to them, “First one to break their fever wins?”

Steve immediately turned his head to answer for the entire band, "You’re on.”

The end

[connan-l]

Flower Person

Fandom: The House in Fata Morgana

Rating: General Audiences

Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply

Relationship: Maria Campanella/Iméon

Summary: Iméon wasn’t the kind of person to care about flowers and she never liked receiving these as gifts, but could she really refuses it when a pretty blond woman she doesn’t know show up on her doorstep with a bouquet of lilies? [Femslash February 2021 Day 24: Lily]

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Link on Archive of Our Own

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Notes: So, I admit I actually tend to headcanon Iméon as being nonbinary/trans masc, which wouldn’t really fit a femslash event, but well as far we know in FataMoru canon she still identifies as a woman. Another headcanon of mine is that Iméon does remember her past life even after being reincarnated (which is what happens in the short story ‘Tír na nÓg’), and I wrote the fic with that in mind. Also I know Iméon likely just goes by ‘Noémi’ in the modern era, but… weh, I’m too used to refer to her as ‘Iméon’ lol.

This takes place after Reincarnation so spoilers for all the games, and there are also brief references to the short story ‘Girl Hunt Girl.’ (If you don’t know about it, it’s just a very short post-Reincarnation story where Iméon meets Ceren in Paris by saving her from a conman.) And warning for slight drinking/alcohol, I guess.

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Iméon had never been a flower person.

It wasn’t like she hated them or anything, but she couldn’t really unsderstand what people found so captivating or pretty about these plants. They smelled nice, sometimes, she supposed — but that was the extent of the qualities she’d gave them.

She had told as much to Michel once when they stopped by a flower shop so he could buy a few roses for his wife — the fact this guy ended up getting married was still mind-boggling to her even months after she’d learned that fact — and he laughed, saying he used to think the same ‘back then’ but that now he couldn’t help but love them. He hadn’t explained to her how this change of heart happened, but Iméon could guess pretty easily it was also a courtesy of Giselle.

In any case, that was also why people never offered her flowers as gifts, either — the only time she could remember this happened was when she was maybe eight or so and her grandma had given her a bouquet of hydrangeas. Iméon had never been able to tell the absentminded sweet old lady that she couldn’t care less about those flecks of blue-purplish petals and she’d unfortunately had to keep them in her room against her will until they withered.

Tonight, however, would mark the second time of flower-offering she’d received in her life, because the first thing she saw upon opening the door after it rang twice was a huge bouquet of lilies, followed by a turf of messy, short blond hair and a pair of clear green eyes that popped out just barely above the white bell-shaped plants.

“So, okay, here’s the thing,” her visitor started, trying to speak clearly in spite of the enormous gift in her arms that was camouflaging almost all of her upper body. “That’s kind of a long story, but bear with me. There’s this dude where I work — a client — who sort of got a crush on me. Not, like, the creepy kind, but still pretty annoying. He hit on me a few times, and despite me trying to fucking tell him subtly, ‘Hey, dude, not interested, let it go,’ he brought me this tonight upon seeing me. I thought at first about throwing it away in the trash cause flowers are not my thing, you see? But then my boss — I mean Giselle, you know her too, right? — threw a damn fit, ‘bout how it wasn’t nice for him and those were such beautiful flowers or something, so I was like ‘then take them cause I don’t want this’ but she refused cause Michel is allergic to lilies or something and — who the fuck even is allergenic to goddamn lilies? Anyway, after that I—”

Iméon blinked incredulously, trying to makes sense of why there was a short irritated blond woman with a thick Italian accent she didn’t know in front of her who kept rambling on and on at her at eight in the evening. She seemed vaguely familiar, but she couldn’t recall why — where had she seen her before?

“—asked my stupid childhood friend cause of course she’s the kind of gal who’s into flowers and stuff, except I forgot she was in Amsterdam to introduce her creepy boyfriend to her parents, but as a result the only person left was fucking Jacopo and I sure as hell wasn’t going to show up to this dumbass’ door to give him some lilies — and then it hit me; ‘Oh, there’s this chick who’s friends with Michel and Ceren and doesn’t live far away, so why not check her out!’ And so here I am.” She finally stopped and breathed in deeply. “So. Yeah. Want some lilies?”

The names of Michel and Ceren awakened Iméon’s memories and she realized it was, indeed, because of these two that this woman was familiar to her. More than a year ago, she had met Ceren by coincidence and helped her out of some trouble and since then they’d become good friends, and she managed to meet Michel again a few months later. Seeing her old friend from a past life neither of them should remember had been quite a shock — though a pleasant one — but discovering that somehow he’d gotten married to a bubbly lady and now lived in the same building as the goddamn little witch who’d messed around with them had been quite confusing. And to top it off, apparently Michel also knew Ceren because she herself was friends with said little witch. Fate really was a funny thing.

In any case, about three weeks ago she’d briefly gotten introduced to this woman by Giselle, but it had been a five minutes meeting so the encounter had quickly left her mind. If she recalled her name was… Martha? Marianne…? Mar—

“Oh, Maria,” she suddenly said out loud, snapping her fingers, and the woman frowned at her.

“What?”

“Your name. It’s Maria. Right?”

“Wait, you only now remembered who I was?”

“Yep.”

“Maria is like, the less forgettable name in the world? How did you do to forget that?”

“Sorry. I’m just not good with names. And faces. And people.”

A big silence propagated between the two of them, and then Iméon cleared her throat.

“You know… if you wanted to ask me out on a date, you could’ve just… said that. Or ask Michel my number or something.”

Maria arched an eyebrow at her, looking genuinely surprised. “What? Wait, no, that wasn’t… it’s not what it’s about.”

“No?”

“If I wanted to ask you out, I’d just do that. I’m not the kind of person to make excuse or beat around the bush.”

Iméon literally knew nothing about this woman, but somehow she could believe that.

“Oh. Okay. So it’s… really just about the lilies.”

“Yeah.” Maria marked a pause. “It did sounds less weird in my head when I thought about coming here. But I’m just, uh… a bit desperate to get rid of these.”

Iméon hummed thoughtfully and crossed her arms. Desperate was indeed quite an apt descriptor — her hair was all disheveled, her clothes unkempt and she appeared out of breath, as if she had run left and right for a long time to try to get someone who’d agree to take in the huge bouquet.

Iméon wasn’t a flower person, but… she didn’t mind accepting a few lilies for this one time.

“All right. I’ll take it,” she conceded, and Maria seemed so relieved to hear that it was almost comical.

Iméon gathered the flowers into her arms, the soft perfume tickling her nostrils and the petals brushing her cheeks, and then she turned around towards Maria once again. She was clearly about to leave and go down the stairs, but somehow Iméon felt a tinge of pity for her to have to yet again hurry to go home, so she grasped her wrist.

“Hey, no need to rush out of here. I was just about to eat something, so… Wanna have dinner with me?”

“What? Really?”

Iméon flashed her a smile. “Sure. I mean, you’re a friend of Michel, so I’d feel bad to just let you go home like that.”

Maria stared at her in silence for a while, as if hesitating, then returned her smile. “Oh well. Not like I had anything else to do anyway.”

And so the both of them stepped into the small two-room apartment together — the inside was a mess, to be honest, with various clothes and papers laying around, but Iméon didn’t care in the least and neither did Maria apparently as she threw herself on the couch without eve asking. Iméon somehow managed to install the lilies in an empty jar on the table, then tranquilly started to prepare their meal. The dinner only consisted of a quick reheat from yesterday’s leftovers and Iméon had always been far from being a super good cook, but it didn’t matter much as the room quickly got filled with cheerful chats and laughters. They talked about their common friends and then their jobs and movies and Maria’s home country, and while Iméon wouldn’t reveal too much about herself and was careful to keep her walls up even once they added a few beers in the mix, she had to admit she felt quite comfortable with this woman whom she couldn’t even remember the name a few hours prior.

Maria was a fun and easygoing person to talk to and despite her crude words and rough attitude she had a smile as bright as the sun, and it just felt nice to be around her.

“So you’ve only moved in here recently?” Maria asked.

“I don’t like to stay in a same place for too long. That’s just not in my blood. I travel a lot too, went to a bunch of different countries…”

“Hmm. I get that. I traveled around quite a bit too before coming to Paris.” She sighed, then stared vacantly at her beer. “I wonder if I should try going moving somewhere else again. I mean, I like it here, but…”

Maria fell silent, suddenly looking surprisingly melancholic. But in a way, Iméon felt she could understand that. She herself had spent most of her life jumping from a place to another ever since her parents kicked her out of the family house, and she liked living that way, but occasionally she wondered if it wouldn’t be best to find somewhere to truly settle in and call home. Maybe she envied Michel’s stable life a little bit for having this, or Ceren’s airheadness for never even questioning what the future might held in for her.

In that sense, she got the feeling Maria was more similar to her because of that. Weird, given she’d basically been a stranger to her only a few hours ago.

As Iméon was still lost in her thought, Maria abruptly rose up from her chair, almost knocking over the lilies from the table. “Oh, wow, fuck! I didn’t realize it had so damn gotten so late! I should go now.”

Iméon looked at the clock, and it was indeed already past three AM. She also had not noticed the time flee at all.

“You sure you don’t want to spend the night here?” Iméon asked while Maria hurriedly put on her coat. “I mean, we did drink quite a bit, and there’s no metro at this time…”

“Nah, it’s fine. I’ll call a taxi or something. Ugh, and tomorrow I have to work… I’m going to be a fucking mess and Giselle’s gonna have my head.”

“Giselle?” Iméon repeated, because she didn’t know Michel’s wife all that well but somehow she couldn’t picture her as the kind of employer who’d got angry at anyone.

“Yeah, she seems all cute and sweet like that, but she’s actually fucking scary and ultra perfectionist at work. Don’t let her fool you.”

“Huh… I’ll remember that.”

Maria grabbed her last beer and gobbled up all that was left of it in one shot, before quickly heading towards the door. She stopped her pace on the doorstep, however, and turned around towards Iméon.

“Thanks for tonight,” she said, smirking. “It was fun. Let’s do this again.”

“Sure. No problem.”

Maria stared at her, seemed to hesitate, then finally leaned forward and kissed her. It was a pretty brief kiss, lips only brushing against each other, but Iméon still hadn’t really expected it and she blinked back at her when she pulled back.

“I thought the bouquet wasn’t an excuse?”

“It wasn’t,” Maria argued. “That was just as thanks for the meal. Now, I really have to go, so see ya!”

She waved at her with a smug smirk, as if she was quite proud of herself for what she had just done, and then disappeared in the stairs. Iméon still felt pretty confused, but she was much too tired to try to think more about it.

So she got back inside her place, locked the door, and found herself face to face alone with the big bouquet of lilies.

For a brief second, she felt kind of bad for the guy who’d bought it for Maria in the first place, and it was kind of annoying she’d have to keep that bouquet until it wither away like her grandmother’s hydrangeas, but…

If it meant she’d get to have a fun evening dinner and a kiss from a hot Italian woman, maybe it had been worth it.

[morelikesin]

You Know You're Cute, Right?

ANOTHER APEX FIC BECAUSE I CANNOT CONTROL MYSELF SKNDLWKDM,, this time I wrote differently than how I normally do - it consists of quick snippets of a day-in-the-life type thing, featuring Mirage-Octane-Bloodhound-Caustic as a polycule 💕 Huge inspo from this song (as well as included in the fic)✨

Take this as a late Christmas-early New Years gift ✨ Super fluffy and casual type work, with a heavy dash of romanticism because I'll be damned if I'm not a romantic. Fic under the cut 💕💕

"You call your cat sweetheart? 'Zander-"

"Not a word."

Elliott suppressed a snort. That cheeky little smile he had when he found an opening for playful jabs was always so irritating - the kind of irritating that made the scientist want to kiss it right off of him.

"I think it's cute," Octavio hummed, leaning back into the sofa with his arms crossed behind his head. "That means you're cute. Que lindo."

The way Alexander scoffed an "Octavio" would've been more intimidating had it not been for the big, sleepy cat he cradled in his arms. She stretched her big fluffy paws, made a squeak as she yawned, and buried her head into the man's chest.

Blóð smiled.

"Vhatever helps you sleep at night, elskan."

It was incredibly late. The last time they had checked the clock wasn't that long ago, and apparently it was supposed to be sometime around 4 in the morning. It didn't feel that way at all.

They knew it'd kick their ass in the morning - getting so little sleep.

Well, Octavio might be fine. But Elliott had made it a habit to wake up at 8, Blóð still hadn't made much progress on getting more sleep to begin with, Alexander had his internal clock waking him at 7, and they all had somewhere to be at 9. This entire night was probably a huge mistake. They normally try to get to sleep by 2, but admittedly, they may or may not have a bad practice of keeping each other awake for company's sake.

And now that an entirely new subject was brought up after Alexander had rather adoringly picked up Bear, his senior cat, and called her "sweetheart," the prospect of playfully pestering him about his soft spot was all too enticing to go to sleep just yet.

"You've never even called us sweetheart," Octavio began. "You save it for her?"

There was a brief pause. Alexander had kept petting her back paw with his thumb, as his eyes remained averted until he sighed. "It...is something I've grown accustomed to for her, yes."

Elliott made a pleased hum. "Well isn't that just adorable," he teased before leaning over and petting Bear across her back - fur unbelievably soft.

It started as a joke a while ago - the way they noticed how Bear could make anyone sleepy just by looking at her - her cozy looking fur, her sweet little face, her ability to get comfortable and sleep virtually anywhere - but over time the joke had increased its humour when the idea became seemingly true. Alexander occasionally would mention how he'd sometimes stop working at his desk late at night because Bear was sleeping in his lap, and turn in a few hours early compared to his usual 2 in the morning bed time. This was deemed an exaggeration until the three others experienced it for themselves.

This happened to be one of those magical sleepy-Bear moments, as made evident by how Blóð made a quiet yawn shortly after leaning over to give Bear a loving scritch under her chin.

Octavio staved off a matching yawn. He rubbed at his eyes, began to stand, and nodded to Alexander's bed. "We should probably try and get some sleep."

-

The sun coming in through the blinds was a rude awakening. Elliott instinctually raised an arm to cover his eyes - making a soft groan in annoyance at the bright rays somehow coming through at a perfect angle to hit him in the face. Turning, he lowered his arm and began to sit up slowly as to not wake up the sleeping Octavio who had his arm wrapped around his waist.

Elliott sighed, and leaned down to give him a kiss on the temple. He lingered for a moment before sitting up again and rubbing the sleep from his eyes.

He noticed a weight on his legs, and looked to see a peacefully sleeping Bear curled up in a ball. As he went to pet her head, his eyes glanced up to see Blóð sitting in Alexander's desk chair - hands busy sewing a thick-fur item. From the time spent with the hunter, Elliott had picked up on the types of hides they'd hunt and use - this one appearing to be rabbit fur. What they were making, though, wasn't clear yet.

Elliott's voice came deeper, and a bit more throaty in post-sleep fashion, "Morning."

Blóð briefly looked up, gave a gentle smile, and proceeded to look back down to continue their work. "Góðan morgin. How did you sl'leep?"

"Pretty good, considering." He took in a deep breath, and stretched his arms out in front of him. He rested his hands in his lap as he went to speak again, "When did you wake up?"

"Before Alexander, but not by long."

Elliott frowned slightly. Blóð took notice when they looked back up to gauge his reaction. They made an effort to ease his concerns.

"I'm sure Octavio will get me to take a nap vith him later today," they assured, "don't worry about me. I'll be fine."

Elliott made a small hum indicating reluctant agreement. "...Alright. Just promise me to keep doin' what you're doin' - trying t'get more sleep, I mean."

"I promise, ástin."

If Elliott was a sucker for anything, it'd be terms of endearment - especially when they're used so casually. Having all four of them be big on using said terms made for an eternally happy Witt.

"Beloved, right?"

Blóð hummed, "Yes. Closest tr'ranslation I can equate to it." They briefly stopped their handiwork in the wake of a smile they couldn't seem to get rid of. "I'm touched you remembered."

Elliott smirked and made a quiet laugh, turning his head to find the time on the side table clock - 8:21 AM - before looking back over. "I try my best. Making it a goal to learn as much as I can from you and Octavio."

"We find it very sweet," Blóð assured, letting it be known that Octavio and they had seemingly discussed the language efforts before. "Alexander said as much, that you and he were doing so."

"Think I can speak for him when I say that we love learning it. Speaking of him...?"

"He's downstairs."

Elliott made a quiet "Ah." As much as it pained him to do so, he gently lifted Bear and set her on a free spot of the blanket so he could get up - her being left generally unfazed, besides her slightly annoyed tail wag in being moved from her spot.

With Octavio being so small, Elliott could easily leave the bed without disturbing him too much, albeit moving his arm so it wasn't draped across his body anymore. He stretched, walked over to Blóð, and gestured for a kiss. They hummed, seemingly still in their work, but Elliott knew they were keen - the hunter picking up the hint and looking up so their lips could gently meet.

"Que lindo, mis amores."

The two of them made a small hum in surprise before pulling away from one another with a blush. Blóð was smiling to themself shyly, while Elliott made a small chortle and flirted with the newly-awakened Octavio, wearing his darling little smirk.

"Welcome to join us."

Octavio laughed - the sound half-purr, half-grain. "I'd love to. Watching is only so much fun."

He started to rise, stretching his arms upwards and making a groan before reaching over the bed to grab his prosthetics and put them on. Standing, shaking his legs to help himself wake up, he made a small yawn before walking around the bed and giving a kiss to each partner - looking satisfied with himself.

"Big guy downstairs?"

Blóð nodded.

Elliott and Octavio made a mutual decision to go see him - the latter turning around before they headed out the bedroom door to question Blóð. "You comin' down?"

They shook their head, hands busy sewing the fur item again. "I will soon. I von't be long in finishing this."

Octavio nodded, and proceeded to take Elliott's hand as they went downstairs.

-

Dr. Somers and Alexander seemed to be having a chat when the two made it to the kitchen, their hands busy with mugs of black coffee all the while. Elliott could never understand how people drank their coffee so bitter, much less Octavio.

Dr. Somers was the first to notice the two, as she was facing the stairs leaning against the counter. Giving a small wave and giving a nod to Alexander, she drank from her mug and gave them a minute to exchange expected affections - something she learned the polycule are incredibly prone to do, despite several joking complaints about PDA from the others.

Octavio quipped with a laugh between his words as Elliott and Alexander exchanged a coffee-flavored kiss, "Not even creamer, 'Zander?"

The man bore an amused hum. "Black coffee actually tastes like coffee. You may as well drink candy if you add so much sugar to it."

"You sound old."

"No avoiding that, I'm afraid." He gestured for a kiss, to which Octavio happily gave, before drinking from his mug again. "How did you sleep?"

"Great!"

Elliott gave a "Ditto" in response, though he followed it up with a fitting yawn and a "Wish I slept some more, though."

The statement was seconded by the way Alexander made a soft hum in agreement, and thirded by Octavio and his rightly timed yawn.

Dr. Somers waited a few quiet moments before stepping forward and piping into the conversation. "It'll just be a few stores we stop by, darlin's. Doubt we'll be out that long."

"That's still gonna' be so long," Octavio complained, his voice coming as a whine.

It was common knowledge that Octavio wasn't exactly big on shopping. Elliott, however, could spend all day doing it. If they had to disagree on anything, it'd be how long they were out for things - Alexander and Blóð keeping things relatively frustration-free during a shopping trip, though Blóð would always get antsy to go home if they stayed out longer than a few hours out in a city.

"It'll be fine, babe," Elliott assured the man while rubbing his back. "It's kinda'- kinda' just mainly food shopping, isn't it? You like doing that."

"Aren't we going to the pet store after, though?"

Elliott rose a brow, "'Tavio, are you complaining about that?"

Octavio snorted and began walking to the fridge - grabbing a Bang from inside and popping the can open. "No, para nada - prefer that to everything else, even food."

Mary laughed at that, shaking her head before taking a gulp of coffee and making her way to the living room. Before she left, though, she spoke with her back still facing them, "Oh, remind me t'grab a level while we're out -  puttin' up a shelf an' think I lost the one I had."

"Lucky for you, I'm the best at reminding people of things," Elliott half-joked. Mary laughed again and took her leave with a "Thanks."

Being left alone in the kitchen, the three stood in comfortable silence for a few moments. Alexander prompted a question shortly thereafter;

"Is Blóð still upstairs?"

"Yeah," Octavio began, "Think they were working on something - dijo no tardará mucho. I can go see them if-"

The stairs creaked a bit as someone walked down the stairs, causing Octavio to cut himself off as he turned to see who it was. In seeing so, he sighed damn near dreamily and softened his gaze a bit - Elliott and Alexander softening all the same.

Pulling their past-the-waist long black hair behind their jewelry-adorned ear, they rounded the last stair and looked up to see their partners - smiling warmly and lowering their hands to fold their arms. The coyote jaw necklace (that Octavio had gifted them this past holiday, knowing they loved real animal items), that rest against their lower chest rose slightly with every breath, as quaint a detail it was to notice. Not a day goes by do any of them not love seeing their pretty face.

And Elliott made sure to tell them that.

"Not a day goes by do we not love seeing your pretty face."

Blóð bore a chuckle and rolled their eyes, though it didn't mask the rosy blush the comment gave them. "I should say the same for you, ástin."

They unfolded their arms and looked back to the three. They couldn't suppress the amused hum they made in seeing that the three were still checking them out - becoming more flushed and brushing their hair behind their ear again, looking away with a shy smile.

They always looked at each other with such warmth. They got playful tease about it from the others, especially Alexander given he was quite brooding to most things, but the gazes never subsided. They'd like to say they were subtle about it - but everyone else would vote against it. And it'd be true.

They were obvious about it. So sticky-sweet obvious - embraces and hand holding and gazes and kisses and all. They didn't mind.

-

By 10 till 9, mostly everyone was ready - save for Loba, Renee, and Elliott, who always took a while to clean up to their own high standards. Elliott called from upstairs whether he should wear his orange body mist or his cologne, and with the majority vote leaning towards cologne today - well, he must please the people.

With Renee in tow, Elliott had finally come from upstairs. He looked handsome as ever, however, wearing a black turtleneck and an orange, knee length open-front sweater. His hair looked meticulously tended to, tossed to the opposite side of his pierced right ear and framing his face well.

The cologne served him wonders, too, with Blóð and Alexander taking a clear liking to it.

Octavio walked down the stairs with a pep in his step - smoothing back his hair as best he could just so it could partly fall into his face once again. Swinging around the corner, he spotted his partners and proceeded to greet Blóð and Elliott with a firm smack on their behinds. They were startled, sure, but Elliott only looked down to give Octavio a laugh and a smack of his own, while Blóð merely scoffed in jest.

Octavio bit his lip. "Don't you all look good? Eres tan sexy," he gave a wink while unabashedly checking them out. Blóð was always so pretty, even when showing their strength in the games or when they hunted or chopped wood (Octavio could go on for days about that), Elliott was always so charming and confident (even if his suave attempts happened to fail, they were all the more charming), and the rolled-sleeve button up that was unbuttoned just enough to show collarbone and brief chest on Alexander was something Octavio (and the other two, admittedly) would store in the memory bank for personal satisfaction.

"¿Qué hubo?"

"Just talkin' about whatever." Elliott adjusted the cuffs of his orange jacket sleeves, rolling them up his forearm a bit. He took notice of Octavio's outfit. "You gonna' be alright out there? You know I love you in your crop tops, but-"

Octavio made a "Pshhh" and scrunched his nose up a bit in response to that, cutting him off. "I'll be fine, bebé. Can't be that cold outside, can it?"

Alexander seemed to check his phone for confirmation on that. "Sixty degrees."

Elliott did find the temperature better than he had anticipated, but still swiveled his head back to Octavio with brows furrowed in concern.

"You don't even have a jacket."

"I can grab one before we go."

Elliott seemed satisfied by that and left the discussion there.

Loba came downstairs, holding the car keys and jangling them as her other hand brushed her hair past her shoulder. "Any takers on being driver?"

Alexander motioned her to give the keys to him, to which she happily did - she was a great driver, but happened to not be particularly fond of doing so, rather liking going on drives as a passenger.

Octavio quickly claimed shotgun.

Before they left, Blóð gave Octavio the fur item they'd been sewing earlier - the latter finding that it was a soft rabbit fur coat. The delight in his face was all Blóð needed to feel assured that he liked it, and helped him put it on. It was a little big, and just how Octavio liked his sweaters and coats. To all of their agreement, he looked rather stylish in it.

-

They were out for most of the afternoon, starting with a two hour Costco trip (that Octavio nearly made his partners carry him for), several smaller shops in between just to browse, a liquor store to buy champagne and sauvignon to celebrate New Years tonight (along with sparkling juice for Octavio who nay drank alcohol), and a hardware store mainly for Mary to pick up that level Elliott reminded her of. By 4:30, their last store of the day was the pet store - everyone individually needing one thing or another.

When they got inside, Elliott asked his partners if they could accompany him for a minute - guiding them to the aquarium section and proposing something.

"Pick one of these guys that you like," Elliott gestured to the wall of individually kept male betta fish, of all sorts of colors and sizes. "You remember those 5 gallon tanks I got a while back? Thought I'd use 'em, and thought a' you guys."

Like Blóð was simply an animal person, and how Octavio and Alexander were cat people, Elliott was partial towards fish. The two large tanks he manages in the living room are rather serene, and despite Renee's concerns, the fish kept there seem to love the foot traffic of everyone coming through.

"One collectively, or-?"

Elliott shook his head, politely cutting Alexander off, "Three total. Was thinking you all pick one, and I set their tanks up in my room. I-I thought it was a cute idea, I dunno'-"

"It's sweet, actually," Alexander softly spoke.

"Think so?"

Blóð made a content hum - leaning down a bit and surveying the curious little fish to see which one stood out to them. "Incr'redibly, my love."

Octavio's approval was nonverbal, made of him apparently finding which one he wanted immediately and picking up the container the little guy was kept in. He looked to Elliott with stars in his eyes and a grin, "Can we name them?"

Elliott chortled and waved his hand dismissively, "I enco- en- enco- implore you to."

"Octavio Dos."

His answer was so quick the others couldn't help but bear a laugh.

And by the time everyone was at checkout, there was definite fawning over the three new additions to Elliott's personal tanks - Ljón, the cream-colored, fiesty little thing that had fins flowing long behind him that Blóð adored, Violet, the red, pink, and white dumbo betta that was adorably curious much to Alexander's affection, and the deep-red colored Octavio Dos.

-

On the way home, it was decided to just grab something to eat on the way - near everyone could cook, but the idea of standing around in the kitchen to cook for fifteen people was lost.

Natalie passed the aux cord to Octavio, who was just taking his coat off for the ride home. He looked a little beyond himself.

"You trust me with the music? Wow - what'd they put in these fries?"

Natalie held off on a laugh while she tried to finish chewing, though her smile was tell enough on her amusement. "I actually like your music taste."

Makoa requested simply, "Nothing too dirty though, please, Silva."

"Me? Liking dirty music?" Octavio snorted, "You know me so well. How about flirty music?"

The man chortled. "That works, brotha'."

Octavio hooked the cord to his phone, and swiped his screen for a few moments before stopping on something. He looked hesitant, briefly, and pressed his screen. He set his phone down and put his hand on Alexander's, their arms both resting on the armrest.

The song sounded so dreamy. When the intro became a little more recognizable, before the lyrics, Loba made a snort from the back.

"You like this song?"

Octavio feigned offense, looking back to her with a "Of course I like this song!"

He shook his head and laughed softly - looking over to Blóð, who sat behind Alexander, he sang over the song and moved his hand from Alexander to cup their face.

"You're so uwu," his voice came sweet and a bit grainy, moving his hand from their cheek to their chin. Blóð practically giggled - blushing and leaning forward into his touch.

"You make me wanna' do," Octavio took his hand away and gave them a wink, "Naughty things to you - all these things to you, you."

Elliott joined the flirt-singing, joining Octavio in the chorus while they oh-so shamelessly wooed their other two partners (and each other, mind you). The others would've said a joke about it, but Ajay was busy holding Natalie's hand and cuddling up to her, while Anita was busy running her hand through Loba's hair and speaking quietly amongst themselves. The others didn't have the heart to interrupt their moment.

Besides, the song was catchy.

"You know you're cute, right?" Octavio sung in Alexander's direction, who shook his head. Still, he wore a soft smile and kept his hand reached over to rub Octavio's thigh.

Elliott leaned over to the side behind Octavio's seat, Blóð matching the movement from the opposite side, and wrapped an arm around the hunter's waist. He continued the phrase with a cocky smile, "Cute as a button-"

Then the two sang together, "Undoing the buttons and pushing your buttons, I just wanna' get you right-"

It was a red light, and so Alexander took the opportunity to lean over and kiss Octavio - lingering for a moment or two before pulling away and focusing back on the road just in time for the light to turn green.

Octavio's heart was a puddle.

Blóð reached a free hand across the armrest to drape his hand over the one Alexander had over Octavio's leg, their fingers soft and gentle in the way they caressed the back of both their hands. Elliott went to continue singing the song, but Octavio stole a kiss much to his surprise. He hummed, and just before they pulled away, Elliott opened his eyes and let his gaze linger at the man driving.

The glimpse of one another was quick, but just as warm as everything else, and left Elliott with a bigger smile than previously.

Octavio pulled up his leg that wasn't currently the resting place of Alexander's and Blóð's, resting his arm on his knee.

He was so lucky.

-

And finally by 6, everyone was tuckered out - ready to take some personal time alone before reconvening later tonight for celebrations. Putting groceries away, Elliott setting up the bettas (as well as having a bit of an audience while doing so), and having a pre-celebratory drink from the sauvignon left the group in need of a quick sit-down. They found themselves just comfortable in the living room, along with Bear and Octavio's cat, Octave, sleeping on one of the couches. Rightly, this was the couch the four of them decided to occupy.

Renee crossed her legs, her black-painted nails running over the leather of her knee-high boots. "Any plans before tonight?"

"Oh?" Tae Joon began, "I thought we were just going to be alone before- ah, ten tonight?"

"I'm just wondering if that was the time we could agree on."

Octavio gave a nod. "Should work for me, at least. I plan on getting blasted, hah."

There was a heavy silence - his other partners looking rather surprised and, especially Blóð, flushed upon hearing that.

Elliott cleared his throat. "Come again?"

Anita snorted at his wording. Elliott gave a quick "Not- not what I meant, uh-"

Renee shrugged, wearing a look painfully smug. "I mean...a bit too much information, but I'm sure that'll go well."

Alexander cleared his throat.

Octavio, despite his nature to immediately take things dirty, just now got what the issue was. And did he find it hilarious.

Through a series of snorts and laughs, he reiterated what he meant; "If I meant I was gonna' get pounded, I would just say that-"

Blóð, Elliott, and Alexander made a simultaneous "Octavio-!"

He kept laughing, shaking his head, "I meant- like, I'm gonna' smoke a joint. Ay, Dios mío - but hey, if that other option is on the table-"

There was another simultaneous "Octavio!" and it seemed to get him to stop talking and simply laugh. He and the others found this absolutely hilarious, leaving his partners to be lost for words and red in the face.

Octavio snorted, and dared to entertain a final joke.

"Like a refreshment."

"What?" Loba narrowed her eyes, leaning forward in interest in what he could possibly say right now.

"Y'know," Octavio snickered, "Quickie's like a refreshment. And there's four of us - heh, call that a concession stand."

Loba couldn't hold the shocked, boisterous laugh she made hearing that - no one really could.

There was a silence after the laughter died down. It was broken when Ajay snorted, though.

"Stop encouraging him-!" Elliott near scrambled to say, but was cut short when Ajay gave him a laugh and a 'look.'

"I know the one flirting wit' 'im all day isn't telling me t' not encourage him. Don't act like you don't like this."

Elliott quickly bit his tongue and raised his hands in the air.

"Touché."

Another small bout of quiet settled.

Loba snorted.

Octavio looked at her, and when their eyes met, they both snorted, and had to turn away to not outright laugh.

Given the situation, a little fun was wanted out of it. Of course, trivia about one another was a frequent, and a favourite, activity amongst themselves. If they all had any one exact thing in common, it'd be that they were all unabashedly nosy.

Loba uncrossed, then recrossed, her legs as she sat up a little. "Truth or dare without the dare, anyone?"

"I think that's a thing called 'having a conversation,'" Anita jokingly mocked.

"Then let's have one." Loba hummed, "I actually had a question for you," she pointed a nude-shade manicured finger towards Dr. Nox, who looked suddenly surprised.

"What is it?"

The woman leaned forward a bit, cusping her hand around her face as if she was telling a secret - the hand facing no one, ultimately defeating the purpose - and talking somewhat low but audible for everyone to still hear.

"Be honest. Is that sweetheart thing true, or was Octavio being dramatic?"

"Oh my god."

His exasperated expression made his partners in particular so delightfully entertained - Octavio especially, laughing and giving a shrug as he left the man to answer the question for himself. He must've mentioned it to them when they were at a store earlier today.

"The people are waiting," Ajay chimed in. It earned the approval of Loba, as told by the way she looked smug about someone else prodding it.

Alexander lifted his glasses, pinched the bridge of his nose in thought, and when he couldn't stave the answer off any longer he was brought to the doorstep of needing to say something.

With hesitation, he sighed. "True enough that she responds to it as well as her actual name."

As if on cue, right after he finished speaking and everyone was ready to pull the expected "big guy soft for a cat" card, Bear shifted her position from simply lying beside him to lying on her side and pressing her face against his upper leg. Despite it all, the instinct to lower a hand and pet her big sweet face was lost not in the man.

The onslaught of "Aww!"s would've been anticipated.

[shyvioletcat]

yknow that sad fic you wrote where aelin died in labour? could you maybe write one where rhoe and evalin survive and get to meet aelin and rowan's daughter? (like for the first time)

Let me tell you what happened. I was reading flashback scenes in Heir of Fire and I was like “damn i really want to write a fic about Evalin and Rhoe now”. Then I open tumblr and guess what appears in my ask box. I don’t know how you managed to read my mind anon, but you did. Then I got super carried away and this got long. Like 1300 words long.

~~~~~

Evalin had been reading in the Royal private rooms when Marion Lochan burst in with a letter in her hand.

“This just came from the cottage,” she said a little breathlessly as she rushed forward.

Evalin tried not to snatch it from Marion’s hand, but she couldn’t help it, her friend didn’t seem to mind, though. Evalin could feel Marion’s eyes on her as she read the note. Very short. Two sentences. The Queen of Terrasen gasped then handed the letter back to Marion before she was running from the room.

She knew Rhoe was in a meeting, but she didn’t care. She didn’t care about the curious glances from the servants who were milling about the palace, or the slightly alarmed ones from the guards as they rushed to open the door of the council room before she hit them. Inside all those around the table stood as she entered, murmuring Majesty as they did. All except King Rhoe Galathynius. He remained seated, watching his wife intently.

“Ev, what is it?” He asked.

“Aelin’s gone into labour,” Evalin said, breathing hard.

Rhoe blinked once then he was up, standing so fast his chair fell to the floor. “If you will excuse us.”

Rhoe took Evalin by the hand and started to lead the to their private rooms but she tugged him towards where they would meet their carriage.

“Marion knows. She would have seen to getting our departure ready,” Evalin explained.

“She’s a good woman,” Rhoe said quietly. Evalin gave him a nervous smile and Rhoe squeezed her hand.

As they excited the palace it was apparent that Marion had indeed taken the initiative and the carriage was moments from being ready to leave. At the bottom of the stairs Marion pulled Evalin into an embrace.

“Aelin is strong, Evalin,” Marion whispered. “It will all be well.”

Evalin wanted to say something, anything. But she couldn’t, her throat was too tight. Marion stepped back and pushed something into Evalin’s trembling hands.

“For the baby,” Marion said an then she was pulling Rhoe into a brief embrace as well. “Travel safe.”

“Thank you, Marion,” Rhoe said and Evalin knew it wasn’t just for his kind words. Marion gave him a tight smile in return.

Evalin turned to the carriage and Rhoe handed her up into it before stepping in behind her. Quinn rode past the window on his black horse. As Captain of the guard it was only natural that he would be escorting them. It only took a few breaths before the carriage was moving, the rattle of it and the clipping of the horses hooves the only sound. Evalin watched as Orynth passed by her window, some of the citizens waving or bowing as they went past. She sat back so they couldn’t see her face, the worry and fear she didn’t doubt was etched there.

Rhoe sensed her mood and laced his fingers with hers. It did nothing to quell her anxieties but it did bring her some comfort. About a month ago Aelin decided to leave Orynth with her mate, Aedion and a few select others for the remainder of her pregnancy. Court life was becoming more and more tedious and Aelin was about to start burning the hands of those who seemed to think her rounded stomach was an invitation for advice, stories or touching. Rowan had become a constant presence beside Aelin and his snarling face had kept people away. But then that had caused more issues, one of which was Aelin constantly snapping at him for his fussiness, so Aelin decided it would be best if they left court and stayed at the cottage by the borders of the Oakwald. It was only a few hours from Orynth and Aelin had promised to keep her mother informed and she was welcome to visit at any time. And Evalin had, almost once a week until now.

They exited the gates of the city and Evalin lifted a trembling to her face. Her own pregnancy with Aelin had been hard, in brutal honesty it had almost killed her. Rhoe had been the one to keep her tethered to this world, the one that willed the air back into her lungs. She worried for Aelin. That she had inherited too much of her fae blood, that she might...

“Rowan is with her. He will do everything he can for Aelin and the baby,” Rhoe said quietly. “Evalin, love, you need try and be calm. You’ll wear yourself out before we arrive.”

“I can’t.” It was those two word that shattered Evalin’s resolve. A shuddering sob escaped her lips and tears streamed from her eyes. Rhoe gathered her into his arms and kissed her head. He knew there were no words of comfort he could give his wife so he offered whatever else he could.

~~~~~

Evalin stayed in Rhoe’s arms for the rest of the journey, she only shifted a little when they passed through the high perimeter wall that encircled the cottage. The carriage had barely stopped before she was out of Rhoe’s arms completely and running through the ornate front garden and to the door. A primal scream echoed throughout the cottage as Evalin passed the threshold. Immediately she was rushing up the stairs to the second level where the bedrooms were. Aedion and Elide looked up at her arrival. Elide stood and curtsied while Aedion strode forward to embrace his Aunt.

“How is she?” Evalin asked, her voice wavering.

“She’s been going since early this morning,” Aedion explained as Rhoe joined them. “Rowan said Aelin’s doing fine. But it doesn’t... it doesn’t sound like it to me.”

Evalin would have laughed if she could. Aedion would never understand what it was to bring a child into the world, what it took, the sacrifice. Evalin’s eyes darted to the door at the end of the hallway, behind which was Aelin’s bedroom.

“She only wanted Rowan and the healer in there, no one else,” Aedion said quietly.

Evalin nodded her understanding. Aedion indicated to the seat he just vacated and Evalin took it. Elide gave her a small smile.

“Holy gods and rutting hells just get it out!”

Evalin looked at Rhoe who’s eyes were a little wide.

“That’s one of the tamer curses we’ve heard,” Elide said wryly.

Elide’s words were followed by a pained groan from beyond the door.

Rhoe shook his head. “I don’t think I can do this. Come out to the garden, Aedion?”

Aedion murmured his agreement and the men left down the stairs. Elide remained with the Queen as they waited. And waited. And waited. More curses and sounds of pain were heard through the door, each one like a knife to Evalin’s heart. But each one told her Aelin was alive. That she was breathing.

Aelin screamed again, and Evalin felt it shudder against her bones, it was raw and brutal and the beats of silence that followed seemed to drag on for millennia. Then there was a cry of a baby and Evalin was weeping. She may have been weeping for hours, she couldn’t remember. The baby continued to cry and it was one of the most beautiful sounds Evalin had ever heard.

“I’ll tell the others,” Elide said and she was gone.

Evalin remained sitting, watching the door intently. Willing it to open. Soon Rhoe, Aedion and Elide joined her again. Still they waited.

When the door finally did open Evalin was on her feet, her hand reaching for Rhoe’s. The healer was smiling as she closed the door behind her. Then she curtsied.

“They are both healthy and well, Majesties. The Princess has asked for a while longer before she receives visitors. Prince Rowan will tell you when they are ready.”

“Thank you,” Evalin said and the healer gave her a genuine smile before nodding her head and leaving.

“They’re alright Rhoe,” Evalin whispered as she lent into her husbands chest. “They’re alright.”

~~~~~

Evalin tried not to count the minutes until the door opened, but it was almost an hour later that Rowan emerged. His silver hair was a mess and he looked a bit haggard but his smile was bright and joyous.

“Aelin is asking for you,” Rowan said to both Evalin and Rhoe.

Evalin didn’t wait for anything more before she was moving forward. She paused in the doorway placing a hand on Rowan’s arm and he covered it with his own. But that was only for a lingering moment before she stepped into the room completely. Behind her she heard Rhoe and Rowan murmur a greeting and then sounds as if they hand embraced each other. But it was the sight in front of her that had tears welling in her eyes.

The room was set in a warm glow from the candles that were lit. Aelin sat propped up in bed, her face showing how utterly exhausted she was but she was smiling at her mother. The baby was bundled against her chest and Evalin could see a tiny fist poking out of the blankets latched onto Aelin’s finger. Evalin’s hand rested above her heart as the first tear rolled down her cheek. There was a quiet snuffling noise that has Aelin looking at the baby in her arms and her smile turned into a grin. Evalin stepped forward, far enough so she could see the baby’s face.

Such heartbreaking perfection in that tiny face.

Evalin’s sigh came out shuddering and Aelin looked up at her mother.

“Would you like to hold her?” Aelin’s voice was quiet and rough, proof her entire body still recovering.

Evalin nodded, words somewhere beyond her reach, and she leaned forward to take the baby from Aelin’s arms. The entirety of the world fell away as Evalin looked at her granddaughter. In that moment nothing else mattered except for the new life in her arms. She pressed a gentle kiss to the baby’s forehead, a tearful laugh followed.

“She’s so beautiful, Fireheart,” Evalin said. She was still looking at the baby, couldn’t take her eyes off her. “She’s perfect.”

Evalin sensed Rhoe come to stand beside her and she looked at him. There was a look of absolute wonder on his face. Evalin passed the baby into his arms and watched as tears unabashedly fell from his eyes. Evalin looked back to Aelin, silver now lining her eyes as she watched her father meet her daughter. Aelin turned away as Rowan joined her on the bed pressing a gentle kiss to his mate’s forehead.

“I never want to let her go,” Rhoe said quietly. But just then the baby started to squirm, followed by a whine that turned into a piercing cry. Rhoe looked shocked, as if after all these years he had forgotten that babies did that. “I stand corrected.”

Aelin laughed at him and reached out her arms to take the baby back. Rhoe passed the newborn back to her mother and after a few moments the room was quiet again. Evalin watched as Rowan draped an arm around Aelin, his other hand gently smoothing over his daughter’s head. She had not seen a more perfect sight in all her years.

~~~~~

Tags:  @fucking-winchester-trash // @literary-licorice // @galyxsy // @tangledraysofsunshine // @highqueenofelfhame // @3am-reading // @soup-that-is-too-hawt // @aelinfire-bringer // @nalgenewhore // @highladyofthesith // @http-itsrebecca // @sleep-and-books // @average-girl-at-best // @alifletcher2012 // @westofmoon // @sleeping-and-books // @ttakeitbacknoww // @armixers-unite // @mariamuses // @chocolate-eating-bitch-queen // @velarian-trash // @queenofxhearts // @princess-galathynius // @heroesofterrasen // @ladyofstoriesandmusic // @empire-of-wildfire // @camerooonchiu // @crackedship // @lowhangingtreebranches // @over300books // @yourwhisperingshadows // @thesirenwashere // @tswaney17 // @impossiblescissorspeachpaper // @cat5313 // @judelovescardan // @flowerspringsea // @chaoticskyy // @the-regal-warrior // @fanfictrash3000

[vernonfielding]

Can I get a witness

Story No. 8 of my Season 7 Countdown Project. Thank you to @fezzle for the prompt!!

Summary: “Wow, someone read her Wikipedia page.” “No, Jake, I wrote it.”

Amy begs Jake for details about the Honorable Laverne Holt. Takes place at the end of Your Honor. (Read on AO3.)

Jake’s not sure how he managed to go 35 years without knowing that claustrophobia is a real and terrible thing and not some made up word that other people use when they want to sound dramatic. (Other people who aren’t his amazing girlfriend. Amy hates enclosed spaces, and he always believed that hate is real, but let’s be honest – he kind of thought it was a control-freak thing. Now he knows she was correct to fear imminent asphyxiation.)

But this is the second time in a week that he’s been stuck in a tiny room with walls that are definitely closing in like something straight out of freakin’ Indiana Jones and an air vent that is absolutely sealed shut because it’s obvious he’s not getting enough oxygen and that’s why he’s gasping and his head is spinning and there are weird sparks dancing at the corner of his vision.

Holt and Laverne are still talking and maybe they’re saying something to him now, he’s not really sure (his eyes are still squeezed shut to avoid listening to them – it made sense at the time). Jake is just about to ask Holt to break out a slide rule and calculate how much air is left in the interrogation room – because there are three people in here now, damnit, and surely that’s at least two too many – when the door suddenly shoves open and Jake opens his eyes and there’s Amy, hesitating at the threshold, eyes gone wide as she takes in the occupants.

“Oh! Sorry, I thought this was empty, I’ll just-” And she goes to close the door again.

Their chorus of “No!” ricochets off the walls. Jake literally dives for the door and pulls it wide open. He’s panting, which is making it difficult to take in deep breaths of the sweet, sweet bullpen air outside this tiny asphyxia chamber.

“Um,” Amy says, and neatly sidesteps so Jake can escape. He stops just outside the room and closes his eyes and spreads his arms wide, chest expanding to make more space for his lungs to fill with oxygen.

“Thank you, Detective,” Holt says. Jake glances over in time to see Amy making a face like a (very cute) fish, mouth opening and closing wordlessly as Holt escorts his mother out of the interrogation room.

“Sir,” Jake says, because he loves Amy so much, “I don’t think Detective Santiago has met your mother.”

Holt scowls at him – he’s been remarkably, and scarily, emotive since Laverne showed up at the precinct – but it’s a brief thing and then he’s smoothly turning back to Amy, even as Laverne steps past her son and reaches out a hand.

“Laverne Holt,” she says.

“Oh, I know,” Amy says.

Jake swears her whole body is vibrating, like she’s barely holding her very molecules together right now. For a second he’s afraid she’s going to admit to stanning Laverne online but then Amy seems to get some small hold on herself and she throws her shoulders back as she pumps Laverne’s hand.

“I mean, I’m aware of your incredible career, your honor,” Amy says. “You’re an inspiration.”

“Thank you, that is very kind of you to say,” Laverne says. Jake notices that she doesn’t tell Amy to call her by her first name. He’s pleased and disappointed (though much more the former – look, they’re super competitive, it’s their thing).

“Thank you for saying that was a kind thing to say,” Amy says.

That’s when Jake intervenes, taking his beautiful, insane, super intense girlfriend by the arm and pulling her away.

“And thank all of us for fresh air, wide open spaces and Goldfish crackers,” Jake says. “Come on, I’m starving.”

+++

In the breakroom, Amy grabs the Goldfish bag out of Jake’s hand and establishes ground rules: one cracker for every detail about Holt and Holt’s mother.

“Does the detail have to be about both of them?” Jake says.

Amy glances up, thinks it over. “No. Either is acceptable. But it must be something you learned because you were hanging out with them. God, I can’t believe you got to hang out with Judge Holt. What does she smell like?”

“Old library books, Pledge, and a little bit like Christmas trees,” Jake says.

Amy hands him a cracker. “Pledge, like the wood cleaner?”

Jake nods and says, “For her gavel, I guess?”

“What does she call Holt?”

“Raymond,” Jake says, and grabs another cracker.

“Did you see any baby photos? Class pictures? Prom photos? Oh my god, were there any photos of him in a speedo?”

Jake stares. “That is a very weird thing to ask, and no. No speedo.”

“He was on the diving team!” Amy says.

“He was?”

“He told us about it during the morning briefing like two weeks ago, Jake.”

“I do not remember that,” Jake says.

“So, no photos?”

“Oh, there were photos,” Jake says. Amy leans over the table toward him, one hand buried in the Goldfish bag. “Tiny Holt. Tiny bowtie. Tiny slide rule.”

“Oh my god,” Amy says. She absently drops five crackers in front of him.

“And there was macaroni art,” Jake says. “An infographic about education spending in the Johnson era.”

He’s never been more grateful for his amazing ability to recall information that he doesn’t understand or care about than right now, when Amy bends half over the table and places both hands on his face and kisses him hard, lips smacking against his.

“Tiny Holt made macaroni PowerPoint,” Amy says, still so close he can feel her breath on his chin. “I love him.”

“It’s weird when you say that while your hands are on my cheeks,” Jake says.

“Oh, sorry,” Amy says, and backs away. Her own cheeks are flushed.

“It’s cool, just thought I should note it’s also weird,” Jake says, cheerily.

Amy rolls her eyes a little and then passes the entire Goldfish bag across the table. She rests her chin in one hand and says, “Tell me more.”

So Jake tells her everything: He describes the art on the walls of the living room and the “regular” room that was filled entirely with books. He admits he never got to see Holt’s childhood bedroom, but he got Holt to say “kowabunga, Mother,” which is almost better, they both agree.

He tells Amy about Holt’s disagreement with his mother over George Kenderson (“Henderson?” Amy says. “Kenderson,” Jake says. They both make faces.) and about their promises to be 5 percent more physically affectionate. Jake tells her that Laverne was sad after her husband died, and that she didn’t want Holt to know so she never talked about it, and he really appreciates it when Amy takes his hand and squeezes his fingers.

He tells her that Holt and his mom hugged in the end, even though he doesn’t know that for sure and they said they didn’t.

“But it felt like a hugging moment,” he says.

+++

Later that day, Jake texts Laverne and invites her to brunch. She says yes and requests that he bring Detective Santiago. Amy says it’s the best thing that’s happened to her all year, and Jake’s not even mad about it.

End Notes:

Title is from Oakland Nights (Bash Brothers).

I feel like so many missing scene fics could/should be written about Amy and Jake recapping after the events of an episode. Hm. Maybe that’s another project someday.

[bangtanficrecs]

Lost & Found Batch #20

Can’t start up the blog again without posting the newest batch! As always, if you happen to know the fic the ask is looking for, reply to this post or send us an ask with the request number and title/author. If you happen to know any fics from Past Batches, those are more than welcome as well. Thank you!! ~ Admin P

                                                      --------------

1) Hi! I’m looking for a fic I read quite a while ago and if you can help me i’ll be forever grateful... it was about namjoon having powers and accidentally causing damage, so seokjin (who was a kind of a social worker assigned to him) sent him to live with yoongi as a way to make up for his “crime”. Yoongi was also magical and lived isolated from society. If I remember correctly hoseok was also guilty of something and sent to yoongi with namjoon. Sorry if it’s too vague, but that’s all I remember

2) Hi, I decided to give this a try though I think the fic may have been deleted because I just can't find the fic anymore. Basically its ot7 and the main character (Jungkook?) took the boys to meet his mom. The author had the boys super athletic, tall and in college;they were also from Texas. Jungkook sadly had to deal with homophobic classmates. It was a one shot I believe.

Hey, Momma by CaridwenAngetueur1

3) hi!! i’m trying to find a yoonmin fic i read a while ago, where yoongi lived in this small town and had an apothecary and jimin would come and sing in the town centre, and yoongi would give him something for his nerves before he’d go on stage. i remember jimin would glow and light would shoot out from him when he sung. it was a completed fic on ao3, i can’t seem to find it. thank you so much for your help!!

4) Hello! If you don’t mind helping me, im looking for a jikook fic i can’t seem to find again on ao3. Its a time travel, canon au where present day bts where in japan and Jungkook had went through a shrine? He ends up in the past with younger!bts and acts as like a cousin to Jungkook until they can figure out how to send him back. I remember there being a scene where younger!bts miss their flight to help older!jungkook get back to the future? If you need more details please let me know. Thank you!

5) Hello! I'm looking for a vmin fic where flowers literally grow on Tae and he's really insecure about it and gets depressed. It's super soft and fluffy and the entire thing is pretty much just Jimin taking care and comforting him. I'm pretty sure it's a one-shot and that they are the only two that are explicitly brought up. I love it so much and I hope that this isn't too vague.

6) hi idk if any of u can help me find this fic but imma try: its an au in which kids go disappearing often and i can only remember that one day taehyung is one of them and jungkook takes it up on himself to find him bc he firmly believes that he isnt dead yet. not sure bout this but i also think tae got kidnapped to get tested on? and seokjin is one of the doctors in that institution??? this fic is written by a fanboy as far as i can recall and had a reallyyyyyy hard to remember title sigh 😔

kotov syndrome by wormkun Note: The fic is locked and requires an AO3 account to view

7) Hey so I read this fic a while ago but no matter what i search, i can't seem to find it. Namjoon was a depressed ?college student? and he wrote songs that he only showed to his friend Jimin. He and Jimin go to a coffee shop where Yoongi works and yoongi keeps leaving notes to RM on Joon's coffee cups, but namjoon doesnt' know who RM is. I think it turns out Jimin had been posting Joons songs and yoongi recognized his voice and wanted to encourage him. NJ writes always and almost attempts suicide

8) Hello, I was wondering if you could help find this fanfic I've looking for forever. It's an ot7 relationship fic ( I think it's jimin centric). it was still not completed. The summary was something like taehyung asking jimin if he wanted to be in a relationship with them and jimin saying No. Because technically he already knew they were all in a relationship and he felt betrayed that he was left out for so long. There is something about a creepy sasaeng fan too. I would really appreciate it.

Last to Know by Meadow_Wanderer

9) Hi! Im looking for an au fic where Jungkook was depressed, and was with V who had anger problems bc of past child abuse. Jhope didn’t like Jungkook bc of something about his dark past involving his sister who I think was raped and died. I also remembered RM having a tattoo and being an ex member of a mafia group. He blew a gas station up, and Jin thought he died but he came back, and they had sex on the window. JK attempted suicide as well but Jin saved him. Thanks!!

10) I'm searching for a vminhope fanfic. It was I believe an A/B/O one. It was on aff. Hoseok was a berserker, Jimin was a beta and Tae was an omega.

11) Hi!!!!! I've been looking for this one fic forever. It's about jungkook who's an art student and jimin and taehyung are cops who look out for him. Jungkook talks a lot about suicide and he's a university art student. I think one of the art projects in the fic was a corpse painting with flowers. Jungkook also stole from a convenience store and when jimin and Rae caught up to him they noted he had a red beanie in his pocket. Thats all. Thank you!!!

12) There was this fic where Jungkook was lonely and lived alone in a hut on the woods, and he saw Jimin in a club took him to that hut and Jimin tried to run away but Injured his leg and had to stay. It's wip, and now i can't find it :( help please?

13) i'm having trouble finding a fanfic about taekook, where jungkook finds taehyung in a lake (or any body of water), and it turns out that he's from past times. he shows taehyung around present day, and taehyung at one point dresses up as a cowboy. jungkook gives taehyung's peepee the big succ, they get caught by the police, but they run away. from my memory, that's where it ends, or there may be more to it. even tags from ao3 to jog my memory will help.

14) I read this Taejin fanfic a while ago and now I can’t find it, all I know about it is that Taehyung was in some way abused and Jin brought him to his home, also that Jin had a twin brother, also it had many chapters, if you can find it I’ll be very grateful!!!

15) Hi! I read a yoomin fic in ao3 when I was new in the Fandom and I can't find it anywhere, I remember it being angst, mostly Yoongi's pov, it was set in the I need you era and Yoongi played the piano for jungkook's dance, I also remember Jimin struggled with eating disorders and alcoholism and that at some point they had a big fight when jimin came home drunk in a random cab d

16) Hi! I can't find a fic I read few years ago, so I was wondering if you could help)) It was Taehyung/Namjoon fic, and Namjoon hired him as his fake ex-boyfriend so that his friends (Hoseok and Jimin if I remember correctly) would stop asking him to go on dates or smth like that.

if it bleeds by wertstoffhof (roachprince)

17) Hello! I’m hoping you can help me find a fic, it’s a mental hospital one where all the members apart from jin and namjoon are in the mental hospital and another member (maybe jungkook) arrives and it turns out jin is making up their diagnosis because he thought they’d want to stay longer. If that’s too brief i can remember specific bits but i couldn’t find anything on your tags, thank you! Jin is a sort of like a therapist who looks after them and namjoon is like the manager of sorts i think

Seeking Heaven by fullofsuga

18) Hello, hope you're well! I was wondering if you could help me find a Jihope fic that I've been looking for forever! Jimin was friends with Taehyung and didn't know the rest of the boys until he was added into a group chat. I remember that Jimin worked in a shop that was broken in to, and that Taehyung didn't want Jimin and Hoseok to date? I think the chapter titles were all days of the week as well - thank you!!

19) Hey do you know the name of this historic au fic where Yoongi is a chaebol and I think he buys Jungkook from his abusive dad to be his servant? I remember he teaches him how to read and even gives up his money just to be with jungkook and becomes an author

tear the moon from the stars tonight by euphoriae

20) Hi! I'm looking for a YoonMin fanfic that's a pretend/fake dating au, where Jimin was at the grocery shop and his ex suddenly came up and started teasing/mocking him? Then Yoongi suddenly came up behind him and started pretending to be his bf? Thank you so much and I'm so sorry for the bother!

21) Hey! I've been looking for this fic forever (i've tried every tag on ao3, god help me). It's a v/yoongi fic where tae is really into public sex and yoongi too, but yoongi is shy at first. there's a scene at the beginning where yoongi is on a date with a girl and he goes to the bathroom to masturbate. at the middle they both are in a restaurant with 2 other people (from bts, i can't remember which members) and tae touches him. at the end tae masturbates yoongi in a restaurant/karaoke booth?

Hands-On Learning by pornographicpenguin

22) Hi! Looking for this multi chaptered abo fic where Yoongi is a omega and kookie presents as an alpha during practice and triggers yoongi's heat. Later on jin and joon become mates but it's mainly about yoonkook slowly getting together... Idk if that's helpful but it's driving me crazy because I can't find it

23) Hi, I'm looking for an old jin/yoongi fic that had a magical element in it I read a while ago and need a little help. Yoongi is an underground rapper and he always passes by this shop. One night after a gig he actually stops in front of it and goes in. Jin runs it and gives him a drink. (I think its tea but idk) he also gives him a muffin or cupcake. At the end jin tells yoongi he was looking for love and that's what led yoongi into the shop.

24) Hi! I’m looking for a fic I read a year back. It has Jin as an assassin and he saved the maknae line from abuse and stuffs and they fell in love with him. And he also has a relationship with Suga

25) Weird fic I read but I want to see if more came out. Anyway it's super weird, bts is the a werewolf gang and they go to a party for the higher ranking alphas. There they meet an omega of a high ranking alpha and then more stuff happens that I can't remember. I just thought of it randomly and I wanted to see if you could find it. It's okay of you can't I appreciate the help either way.

26) Ok color me corrected if you manage to find this fic, but I can’t seem to remember anything about it. It’s a red string of fate/soulmate au but I CANNOT remember the pairing. I think it was canon divergent, they lived in the dorm together. I remember that the string was actually tangible and the pair would always trip over it. Thanks haha

27) I am looking for a fic I read ages ago. It was jikook, they were in high school. Jk is really rich and loves taking photos one day he sees jm and is compelled to take a photo of his bright orange hair. Tae sees the photo and hires jk so take photos of jimin as he never sees him smile. Jm is very poor, he is freinds with joon and tae I think. Jin is jks brother. Jm initially gets mad at jk but eventually they become friends and fall in love. There was some past stuff with taegi too I think.

Imperfectly Perfect by whenIseeUsmile

28) Hi. I'm looking for a fic on ao3. It's a historical royalty au and I think it's yoonmin. I think it's incomplete too. Yoongi is a prince and his brother is JK. Jimin and Jin are spys from a neighbouring kingdom that's on the verge of war. The last chapter I remember has the castle being invaded and the royal family being killed, there may have been a fire. I hope you can help

Death In Disguise by pikachoi

[redheadedramblings]

All I want for Christmas is to hear your voice (One shot)

Title: All I want for Christmas is to hear your voice (One shot)

Pairing: Bucky x Reader 

Summary: After the loss of his hearing on a mission, all Bucky wants for Christmas is to hear your voice again

word count: 2471

warnings: blood, injury, fluff 

A/N : I am back! Hopefully for good this time! This story is in the same universe as two other fics I wrote about a year ago! Go check them out! You can find them here and here!

Masterlist

His eye brows scrunched together as pieces of hair ticked his face, the eye lids are heavy as they flutter open. The ground is soft under his body, the inches of snow begin to melt under his heat and soak through to his clothes. Blood stains his face and coat, everything is quiet he cant seem to hear anything. His breathing is steady and calm, the cold cloud that leaves his lips disappears into the wind.

His eyes wander and he looks up and he notices two things. One, your body is crouched above him, on your knees you rest next to him hovering very closely to his face. Words are leaving your mouth but he cant hear them just yet, blood is apparent on your fingers as they check every inch of his body. The second thing is, there are snowflakes falling from the sky not just the occasional snowflakes, no these were the thick and heavy ones. They looked so beautiful as they fell into your hair and down into your coat.

Fear was apparent in your eyes but your face remained calm and collected. Some pieces of hair fell down and itched his cheeks and his weak hand shakily rose up to tuck it behind your ear. You grabbed his hand and held it close to your cheeks, in that instant he felt how cold you were and he could feel you shivering under his touch. 

Turning your head he heard a muffled cry for help that left your mouth as you called for other doctors. Giving some orders and pointing around to some agents you readjusted yourself while the snow crunched under your weight. Slowly your face lowered down to his own and he felt your thumb wipe sweat from his forehead. 

“Hey Dollface.” 

He couldn’t hear the words that he weakly whispered to you but he knew for a fact that you heard it for your lip trembled for a moment after he spoke. Sounds were coming in and out of his ears like waves and he could hear boots on the ground along with sirens in the distance. He felt himself cough and began to taste the gross mixture of copper and salvia that filled his mouth.

“Shhhh Shhhh Shhhh.” he saw you whisper. “Everything is alright.”

He could barely hear your voice even though your lips were mere inches from his face, frustrated he tried to speak again but your finger tips found his lips. He saw you gently shake your head no, stopping him from speaking.

“Don’t talk baby.” He read your lips. “Its okay, don’t talk.”

Your hands left his face and the sudden loss of your warm hands sent a shiver down his spine. He watched you stand up and take a few steps back as his body was carefully lifted onto a stretcher by medial staff. Snow flakes fell into his eye lashes and he did his best to blink them away, the temperature was dropping quickly and the night sky was painted in all black. 

A foil blanket was thrown over his body, sealing in the heat while he was beginning to be loaded into a Quinjet. His head began to pound and his ears screamed, he couldn’t hear a thing but everything was too loud. Slowly he tilted his head to the side straining to see as your shivering form walking behind the medical workers. The snow was falling even harder now and a gust of wind almost threw you off balance as your legs carried you up the ramp.

Once in the jet he began to feel the warm air from the heaters on his cheeks, the muscles began to relax and slowly he sank into the cot. Doctors surrounded his body and began to cut the wet clothes that clung to his cold skin while examining and cleaning his wounds. Frantically his eyes searched for you, his shaking bloodied hand slipped off the cot and reached out into the air. Gentle fingers immediately intertwined with his own, the doctors backed away slightly as you stepped closer to him. Slowly your face lowered down to his and your hands cupped his cheeks, he could feel your calming pulse on his flesh. 

“Shhhh baby, close your eyes. Its okay. Everything is alright.” 

He read your lips, he felt your warm breath hit his face as you spoke, but he never heard your voice. Your soft lips hovered over his for a brief moment before placing a gentle kiss on them. His eye lids became heavy and they fluttered shut as he gave your hand one final squeeze and with that the solider fell into a deep sleep.

___

The snow fell carelessly from the sky, the windows of his home were slightly fogged and glistened with the frost clinging to the edges. Picture frames adorned every mantle and shelf along cards and hand made decorations made for this holiday season. The house was full of greens and reds, the lights that hugged the Christmas tree glowed beautifully, while the four stockings above the fire place moved slightly from the force of the flames below. 

A small human lay peacefully on his chest, her little arms wrapped around her daddys large muscular torso. Bucky looked down at his sleeping daughter, her mouth slightly agape breathing slowly and steadily. He smiles and grabs the handmade quilt that covers the two of them and pulls it up a bit higher covering her back. His fingers slowly play with her brown curly locks and she sighs out a relaxed puff.

A few moments later you walk into the room carrying your nine month old son George in your arms, he bounces while you sing a catchy Christmas carol. Eleanors eyes flutter open and she is awoken from her nap, she rubs her eyes and throws the blanket off of her while sliding off the couch to join her mother and brother. She skips over to you and begins to grab at her baby brothers feet, the baby begins to laugh as you continue to shuffle around the room dancing to your own tune. Eleanor turns to her father for a moment and holds out her arm making grabby hands at him becoming him to join the fun.

“Daddy! Daddy!” he sees her say.

It was five days before Christmas, he had stupidly taken that assignment thinking that it would be quick and painless. Four bullets ripped out of his skin, two blood transfusions and two perforated eardrums later, would prove him very wrong. He wasn’t expecting a encounter with flash grenades, he was told it would be a quiet recon, but everything hardly ever goes according to plan.

When he woke up in the infirmary he was told his ears would heal in a few days with the help of the super serum. That was a week ago and he still couldn’t hear anything, he hasn’t heard your sweet voice since he was loaded onto the Quinjet. And probably the worst of all, he could hear his children voices. He couldn’t hear his daughter giggling when she was watching morning cartoon or when she called out his name to get his attention. Bucky couldn’t even hear his own sons crying in the night, you had to get up in the middle of the night to feed him. If he had his hearing back he would have gotten up to fetch him instead to let you have your rest.

He was miserable, and although you kept telling him everything was going to be okay and that his ears would heal on their own, each day became more and more frustrating. A wave a guilt washes over him and he feels sick in his stomach, he shouldn’t have taken that assignment so close to the holidays. 

Slowly he gets up off the couch and limps over to his family, you meet him half way while you hold out your arm in case he needs it for support. Eleanor begins to jump up on her father and he lifts her up and holds his daughter in her arms while she bounces along to her mothers singing. George begins to giggle when you poke his round tummy and he watches as your eyes squeeze shut and laugh at the chunky baby. 

If only he could hear it… 

___

For the next couple of days he had to rely on his senses and mouth reading to get though the day. Eleanor was smart for a four year old, she knew her daddy was hurt so she would help him out the best she could. She would help him around their small home, open doors for him, grab him something if he needed it, she even helped put ear drops in his ears. He would reward her each time with a fat kiss and tell her how smart she was and how she was his little nurse.

It was getting closer and closer to Christmas and his anxiety was getting worse by each day. A lingering fear kept creeping into his mind while he watched everyones mouth move with silent words passing him by. He won’t be able to hear his families voices on Christmas morning. This made him feel so sick, he wouldn’t be able to hear his daughter squealing while she tares open her gifts. Or his son trying to grab a fist full of wrapping paper and shove it into his mouth while you playfully scold him nearby. 

The family sat at the dinner table that night, it was Christmas eve the children were finishing up their supper. Bucky would watch as you would talk to the children, most of the time he could make out what you were saying but he knew he was missing out on important pieces of the conversation. When everyone was finished you began to collect the plates, taking them over to the sink you started the dishes while Bucky entertained the kids. 

Laying on the floor he played with the children for an hour and a half or so until both of them began to slow down. George fell asleep in Bucky’s arms while Eleanor curled up next to her dad with her head propped up on his thigh. Walking over to them you threw the wash towel down onto the counter and kneeled down. Carefully you scooped George up and carried him to his crib, Bucky picked up Eleanor and followed behind you. 

Gently he lay his sleeping daughter down into her bed, he grabbed her favorite stuffed animal and placed it in her arms while he tucked her in. He hunched over the bed and began to caress her head tucking some loose strands of hair behind her ear. Bending down he gives his daughter a kiss on the temple and rubs her cheek with his thumb. 

“Goodnight baby.” he whispers.

“Goodnight Daddy.” she sleepily whispered back.

He stands up and turns around to see you standing in the doorway leaning on the frame. You give him a smile and he gives you a weak one back as he follows you out back into the kitchen to place the presents under the tree. Bucky hangs his head low and sulks as his feet lead him over to the tree, his eyes wander all over the ordainments. 

“Do you want some tea?” he hears you call from the kitchen. 

“Yea sure.” he says without turning his head towards you. From the kitchen the drawers open and close with a thunk, the faucet begins to run filling up the old kettle as it is placed onto the burner. 

“I just want my hearing back hon.” he speaks softly. 

The kettle begins to scream as the water comes to a boil and you quickly take it off of the stove setting it down onto the table. The mug you picked out sits on the marble counter and you pour a few squirts of honey into the mix before pouring the hot water in.

“I want to hear our kids laugh I miss that sound, I miss your voice doll.” He says with some defeat and anger laced in his voice. 

“I know.” You smirk while mixing in the honey with a spoon staring at his back.

“I…..” he stops. The sudden realization hits him like a truck. He quickly takes a look around, everything instantly comes back and all at once every little sound hits his ears, and he can hear again. Quiet Christmas music plays softly in the back ground, the train under the tree whistles hello to him and the wind outside howls hello. The ringing in his ears completely stop and the throbbing in his head vanishes, he turns toward you with wide eyes.

“Y/N.” he says. He shivers at his own words, he finally heard his own voice. Better yet, he finally heard your voice.

“Y/N.” he says again, this time a bit louder. His body tenses in fear of it all going away again and his hearing to disappear. 

“Hm, what do you know. Looks like you finally got your hearing back.” You smiled with a shit eating grin on your face. 

He sprints over to you and picks you up and twirls you around in the air, you laugh and its the most beautiful sound he has heard in weeks. Wrapping your arms around his neck he you hold on tight to him as he sets you back down on the ground not letting you out of his grasp. 

“I thought I was never going to get my hearing back.” he buries his face into the crook of your neck. He is on the verge of happy tears and you can feel it so you gently begin to run your hands up and down his back. 

“I know, but these things take time to heal remember? You just had to give it time. But you are okay now.” you whisper in his ear. The two of you stay like that for a long time, standing in the kitchen in one anothers embraces. You pull back slightly and your foreheads touch, your breathing is slow as the two of you sway to the soft music in the air.

“Merry Christmas Bucky” you softly say.

“Merry Christmas Y/N” he smiles back.

__

Merry Christmas ❄️

[artificialqueens]

Until the Flavor's Gone (6/?) (Biadore) - Kitschy Pixel

A/N: Hello! Wow, guys. I’m so super flattered that you all have been hanging on and interested to this fic so far. Especially since this is actually turning into a bit of a slower burn than I intended. I hope you guys don’t mind. I really don’t know if my usual writing standards quite hold up for this chapter (but I thought that with the last chapter too so… what can you do?) Sorry if this is a disappointment.

In this instalment, Courtney goes overboard to play matchmaker, Adore goes on another trip, and I think I may have fucked up my own timeline but I just really wanted to write this. So I mathed and tried to fix it (I wrote it down this time so I wouldn’t keep getting mixed up and confused). I think it still works? Maybe. I dunno. Numbers.

Language warnings and some flirting leading to some almost very close-to smut! Hurrah!

Additional note: The brief description of Danny’s discomfort in wearing drag for an extended period of time is based solely on my experience in cosplaying. I don’t know if it’s accurate, but what is? Okay, stop talking, start storying.

Chapter Six

Waking up in New Orleans wasn’t exactly what Danny expected to be doing roughly ninety-six hours ago, and yet? Here he was, rubbing sleep out of his eyes as a pile of clothes were being dumped onto him.

“Rise and shine!” Shane chirped excitedly, completely ignoring Danny’s squeaky protests. “We need to get up and get ready if we’re going to make it.” He shoved a water bottle in Danny’s hands. “Drink. Get hydrated and get up.”

“Make it where?” Danny groaned as he unearthed himself from what apparently was almost all of Courtney Act’s wardrobe upended onto his bed.

“You’ll seeeee…” The overly chipper inflection in Shane’s voice should have set off warning bells, and yet? It managed to fly right under Danny’s still not fully awake radar.

“Fuck man, did you bring every single thing you own?”

“No. This isn’t even half of it. Now go on. Get up! Clean yourself up and we can figure out what you’re going to wear!”

Danny complied, albeit with an eye roll and a sour mood. A few days ago, Shane approached Danny with the crazy idea of a road trip to New Orleans for Mardi Gras. Apparently it was a trip he’d been planning for months, but his nameless travel companion had backed out. Why Shane was asking him on this To Wong Foo-esque excursion (without the getting stranded part) hadn’t been discussed (and neither had been how late they’d be arriving for the festivities), but since he wouldn’t have to pay a dime and Shane offered him his own room – well, how was he supposed to say no?

After showering the grime of travelling in a car for two and a half (very nearly three) days and brushing his teeth, Danny wandered back out to sit on the small office chair and watched as Shane sifted through his belongings. “How did you get in here?”

Shane snapped his fingers like he nearly forgot and tossed the hotel room key to Danny. “Careful who you trust that with, the world is full of weirdos.”

“Pretty sure this room is full of them… how’d you even get this?”

The energetic Aussie put his fingers to his lips to shush Danny before he held up two dresses, similar in length, but different in color. “Which one?”

Danny pointed to the iridescent blue as he sipped at his water. “That one.”

“Oh, good choice!” Shane tossed it to Danny and the other blinked in surprise.

“What? No. Are you joking? This isn’t going to fucking fit me…”

“It most definitely will. I’ve got an eye for that kind of thing. Go put it on.”

Danny held the dress out in front of him and shook his head. “No fucking way. There’s no way!”

“Just do as I ask! Go on, shoo!” he gestured with his hands as he spoke, directing Danny back to the bathroom. “I wanna see!”

Shane bit his lip and craned his neck as he started to get his own outfit together for the day, calling out to Danny, “So have you talked to Bianca… or I guess… Roy lately?” he prodded gently, trying to sound as natural as possible.

“Not lately, but he gets busy sometimes. So it’s not a big deal…” Danny rounded the corner in the dress, struggling with the zipper in the back, “Why?” he raised an eyebrow at Shane’s sudden curiosity in the topic. It wasn’t exactly unusual. Shane had checked in on their conversations in the past – but it was usually while Danny was texting with Roy, so it never went unprompted.

Shane shuffled over to help Danny zip the dress the rest of the way, shrugging as he replied, “Oh, just asking. You haven’t talked about him lately so I thought I’d ask…”

“You make it sound like I talk about him all the time…” Danny paused as Shane turned him towards the hotel mirror. “I look weird.”

“You look gorgeous, for one. We can figure out a way to grunge it up a little if you’d prefer, but you look really nice… and two…” Shane began rifling through the duffel bag that Danny had brought all his drag in, as requested. “You actually do talk about him often and that’s perfectly fine… ugh, do you wash these tights?” Danny snickered out a ‘no’ and Shane wrinkled his nose, “Whatever. Okay, these shoes and this jacket… now go!” Shane shoved the items in Danny’s hands and shooed him away again before sitting on the bed and waiting for him to come back out again. “Give me a second and I can help you with your make-up.”

“Bitch, you’re not touching my face. I can get that on my own. Now can you like… go away for six seconds? Jeez…”

Shane shrugged and waited impatiently for Danny to come back out of the bathroom. When he wasn’t quick enough, Shane counted to ten and then got up to lean against the doorway, watching as Danny started to turn himself into the rebel princess he’d crafted over the past year, the shoes and jacket on the counter beside him. “Can I ask what’s going on between you two?”

“Between who? Me and Roy?” Danny leaned close to the mirror, half distracted by what he was doing. “We’re long distance friends who text when we can…”

“Is that all?”

Danny paused in what he was doing and set aside his eyeliner. He turned and faced the still hovering queen who did his best to feign innocence as he seemed to pry at Danny’s social life a little bit more insistently than usual. “Yes? Is there something else we should be?” He leaned one hand on the counter and watched as Shane did a very poor job at covering up that telling grin by chewing on his lip. Danny sighed heavily as he finally caught onto where this was headed, “Why are you asking about it?”

“Okay, don’t get mad but… let’s say a little bird told me that you haven’t had sex since your trip to New York…”

Danny sucked a long breath through his nose and flicked his eyes upwards. “I’m going to fucking kill, Jay…” he growled as he tossed his eyeliner down against the sink, just for the satisfaction of throwing something against something else. It was enough.

“Now, don’t get mad at Jay! He was just… sharing… some personal information that you’d given him in confidence… okay, I know that sounds bad but he really just had the best intentions!”

“You are fucking kidding me… who else knows?” Danny glared when Shane pulled a panicked face and shrugged, “I swear to fucking God…”

“I don’t know! Me, I know… and Detox… and Jasmine… maybe Raven and Alyssa…?” With each added name, Danny groaned a little louder. “It really isn’t that big of a deal, Danny! It’s okay! We just… all kind of figured that maybe you and Bianca were a bit more serious than you were letting on…”

“He’s across the country, with a work schedule that makes me exhausted. Not exactly prime boyfriend material…” Danny sighed as he picked back up where he left off. “Besides… it’s not like we have a lot in common.”

“Then how do you two still talk to each other on a regular basis?”

“I…” Danny stopped again before huffing out another sigh. “I don’t know. Can we just pretend I have a good answer to that one and just move the fuck on?”

“Whatever!” Shane threw up his hands and wandered off while Danny finished getting ready, holding out a wig as he exited the bathroom. “This one,” he insisted before he wandered to the bathroom to get ready himself. Danny took the long black wig and flipped it over onto his head, smoothing it out the best he could with his fingers. He took a step back and stared at the fully realized Adore staring back at him in that short borrowed dress that glittered in a deep, rich-looking peacock blue.

With a playful cock to her hip she skipped back to the bathroom where she’d left the jacket and shoes. Placing both hands on either side of the doorway, she leaned forward slightly and watched as Shane began his own transformation. They stayed like that in silence for several minutes before Shane finally spoke up again. “So why has it been so long, if you don’t mind me asking? If you and Bianca aren’t anything serious, then what’s up?”

Adore shrugged a shoulder and flicked her eyes up into a random corner of the room. “I dunno. Dry spell, I guess?”

“A year long dry spell?”

“It hasn’t been a full year…”

“Close enough. But seriously. Just disinterest or what?”

“I guess? I dunno…” Adore blinked a few times and focused back on Shane, frowning a bit. “You’re trying to get me to talk about New York again, aren’t you?”

“Again. It’s been close to a year and you still haven’t said anything more than ‘massive dick’ and a torn shirt. That, coupled with the fact that you haven’t had sex since? I mean… come on. Excuse me for being curious…”

Adore just snorted before she perched herself onto the back of the toilet and started to absent mindedly chew on her nails. Shane started to impatiently hop up and down in place as Adore continued to stay quiet on the whole matter.

“Oh, come on!”

“Nope.”

“You tell me about the guy who fell asleep on you mid-fellatio but you can’t tell me about this.”

“I’m sorry!” Adore laughed as Shane, now several steps closer to Courtney, groaned and headed back into the room to finish getting dressed. Adore hopped down and followed. “Have you ever just had a guy that you just… you wanted to keep to yourself?” She sighed as she sat down on the bed and started to pick at the mound of clothes spread across it. “Look,” she began when Courtney quipped a short ‘no’, “I can’t explain it. I really can’t. I don’t know fucking why I can’t. I just…” she added a shrug as if that was supposed to put the whole topic to rest.

It was obvious from Courtney’s face that it didn’t do much of anything other than frustrate her. But she relented none the less, “Fine. Fine. Keep your magic New York night to yourself if you wanna be selfish. We’re in New Orleans. It’s Mardi Gras and I,” she gestured to herself with a flourish, “Am going to end that ‘dry spell’ of yours somehow.”

–––––––––––––––––––––

“Holy fucking fuck in a fucking shit basket…”

The string of expletives weren’t from the crowd on Bourbon Street or Adore being crammed into the crowd on Bourbon Street in daytime drag with Courtney being shoved into her side. It had everything to do with seeing Bianca del fucking Rio on that stage, looking like some classic Hollywood showgirl in red and suddenly – suddenly – everything about this trip snapped into focus so fast it felt like vertigo on solid ground.

The vague story about the trip, the timing of it all, the borrowed dress, the overly helpful Courtney and her incredibly curious questions…

It was so fast that she couldn’t even get mad about it (at first). All she could do was stare, fixated on the vulgar bundle of energy shouting obscenities, casting shade, and doing it perfectly in sequins, feathers and high heels. God dammit, those legs…

When she finally caught her breath, she pinched the underside of Courtney’s arm. Hard. And the Aussie beside her yelped, only to be met with a glare. The spell of shock had dissipated and now there was the anger. Courtney rubbed her arm and shot Adore a sheepish look.

“You wouldn’t have come along if you knew…” She flailed and wrapped her arms around Adore’s waist to keep her still. “And I don’t understand why! That’s why I keep asking about New York. You talk to him constantly and yet we all knew that if you were handed the chance to see him again, you’d pass it up!”

“You all knew? You all knew?” Adore hissed. “You didn’t even try to ask! I’m not mad that I drove a fucking thousand miles with you on this trip because he’s here – I’m mad that you fucking tricked me into doing it! And what? It’s a conspiracy now?”

“Well… I kind of needed a little help with planning everything…”

“Are you joking? What kind of nightmare made for TV romcom special is this?”

“Look. I said I would end your dry spell, didn’t I?” She gestured to the stage, “There’s the solution! One way or another!” She tightened her hold and looked up at Adore with a plea and a strained smile, “Please, Adore. Don’t leave. At least… she’s right there. We can catch up to her when she leaves the stage. At least say hi. That won’t kill you, right?”

Adore prepared herself to argue but got sidetracked by Bianca and her co-host laughing a particularly poorly done costume off the stage and something about it – seeing her in her element, dominating the atmosphere, and just doing her job – seemed to soothe the salted wounds of this particular brand of betrayal (and maybe it was a bit harsh to call it a betrayal, but god dammit). Her whole body relaxed from the tense battle ready (or fleeing, it could have been fleeing) stance it had taken and she nodded. “Fine,” she conceded. “Fine, I’ll at least say hello to him… but only because he’s here.”

And she kind of wanted to, but she wasn’t about to admit that out loud.

–––––––––––––––––––––

If it weren’t for the number of people stopping Bianca for a photo or a compliment or a declaration of love, Adore and Courtney would have easily lost her once the crowd began to disperse. But they got lucky and Courtney’s very loud ‘Oi! Pussy face!’ over the din caught Bianca off guard long enough for them to close the distance. Courtney jogged up first and Bianca beamed.

“Holy shit!” She reached out for a quick hug, and stared in disbelief as if Courtney was just some delusion she’d conjured up one day that suddenly sprang to life. “You’re fucking kidding me. You didn’t mention…”

“I brought you a belated birthday gift,” Courtney gestured behind her just as Adore came into view. “Or early birthday gift, however you want to look at it.”

Adore didn’t quite know how to interpret the change of Bianca’s smile at seeing her. That wide grin dropped, those painted lips parted for just a moment (shock, maybe?) and was followed by what could only be described as an appreciative smirk. “I see…” She coyly cocked her head to the side and for a minute, Adore hated her for it. She bit her lip in anticipation as Bianca said in a voice too high pitched to be sincere, “I don’t believe we’ve met.”

That cackle broke out in waves as Adore rolled her eyes and she was brought into a good, firm hug. “Oh God, what the fuck are you two even doing here?”

“Looking for boys,” Courtney piped up, “Which I’ve found. They’re over there, so I’m going to go – bye!” She retreated quickly before either of them could protest. Bianca shook her head as they both watched the bubbly blond disappear from their sight.

“That fucking shady cunt,” she murmured before turning to face Adore. “So I take it this is the Adore Delano you were so afraid to let me see?”

Adore offered a tight lipped smile and a shrug, “One and the same, I guess. But before you rip me apart, I just want to say you look like a bedazzled chicken right now…”

The jab earned her a laugh, which helped her heart slow down from the rampaging rhythm it was pounding before and she let a genuine smile break through. Her eyes darted downwards as she fought to keep her hands to her sides, bunching up the shimmery fabric between her fingers before releasing it and smoothing it back in place.

“Look who’s on the defensive,” Bianca shot back before she reached out and pushed a few strands of wig fiber from Adore’s cheek. “And you look fine, if it weren’t for this sad looking wig. Dear Christ, do you own a brush?” Her fingers lingered as she felt Adore lean a bit into the touch before she dropped her hand and sighed. “Come on, walk with me. I can’t stay in one place too long or else people will start to swarm. Besides, I have to make an appearance. This way.”

“You’re like… a local celebrity…” Adore didn’t mean to sound so impressed, but she did and she was. There was a life that rippled off of Bianca like waves hitting sand, that pulled back and beckoned Adore to follow. She’d seen it before when they first met, but here it seemed to be stronger, more potent, and more likely to try to drown her.

“Celebrity is a strong word… I just made sure my name got around.”

Adore trailed back when Bianca was stopped for a picture and then picked back up again once ‘thank you’s were exchanged. “Really? Because it’s looking like ‘celebrity’ is the right kind of word to me…”

Bianca sighed out a laugh and shook her head, “I worked in this city for a long time, that’s all. I’m not famous, I’m just familiar.”

Their paces slowed and their hands nudged together, but neither seemed brave enough to lock fingers. Instead, Adore cleared her throat and took a slight step to the side and concentrated very hard on walking straight. She blinked a few times when she realized that Bianca was still talking to her, “What?” She turned her head a bit fast, sucking in a breath when she realized how close Bianca had leaned in and choked out an “I’m sorry…”

“I asked when you got here…” Bianca clarified, taking a step back and curling her hands into fists, taking a moment to smile and nod at someone yelling ‘hello’ to her.

“Oh!” Adore shrugged and started to fiddle with the ends of her wig, wrapping a strand around her finger, “Late last night. This was all Courtney’s brilliant idea…”

“Of course it was,” Bianca flashed a smile that made Adore’s stomach do – maybe not a full flip, but at least an enthusiastic flutter. “Have you ever been?” Bianca tipped her chin up as Adore shook her head and sighed, eyes looking upwards as she was obviously trying to figure something out. “Listen, I’d hate for you to wander around by yourself, but I can’t exactly promise to show you the full New Orleans experience while I’m dressed like this. I technically still have a couple of things I need to do…”

Adore snorted, “God, do you ever get off?” The words slipped out before Adore had a chance to run them through what thin filter she had. If she had, she was certain it wouldn’t have sounded… quite like that. She sucked in a breath as she tried to think of a way to salvage the statement gracefully but could only squeak out, “Work, I mean… you always seem to be working.”

Bianca nodded, “Yeah, I knew what you meant,” though there was a spark in her eyes that said something else that made Adore’s insides warm. “And you wouldn’t be wrong,” she added. “But…” she trailed a bit as she seemed to gather up her thoughts and then pointed towards Adore. “How about this… you text me where you’re staying and I can meet up with you in about three hours…?”

Adore nodded and chewed on her lip, trying to not seem so eager to accept the invitation. “Yeah, sure… I would…” she hesitated to say ‘love’ and settled on the lesser, “really like that…”

“Then that’s what we’ll do.”

–––––––––––––––––––––

After Bianca separated herself from Adore, the younger queen wasn’t exactly sure what to do with herself. Courtney had abandoned her, with the best of intentions, Adore knew. However, the fact remained that she was officially on her own. Besides, she didn’t want to end up a third wheel with whoever Courtney had planned to occupy her time with when she was obviously trying to stay out of Bianca and Adore’s way.

Maybe it wasn’t the most thoroughly planned out matchmaking attempt, but bless her for trying.

Finding her way back to the hotel wasn’t hard, but she took her time. By the time she got back, her head was pounding, her mouth was dry and her feet throbbed – walking around in drag on minimal sleep early in the day had caught up with her quickly and minor discomfort was amplified by exhaustion and slight dehydration.

She stopped at the edge of her bed and stared at the mound of clothes that were still there before shoving them off to one side. She unpinned her wig and tossed it and the cap onto the dresser, before grabbing the bottle of water she’d abandoned earlier in the day and taking a swig. The shoes, tights, and jacket came next after she pulled off her eyelashes and fell back into bed.

It hadn’t been Danny’s intention to fall asleep, to be honest, and he hadn’t fully realized he’d done it until he heard a knock on his door. Jerking awake and groaning softly, he stumbled a bit out of bed, adjusting his skirt on his way. He assumed it was Courtney coming to check on him.

He’d assumed wrong.

He leaned against the door and just stared at Roy, who was looking back at him with a critical eye, that eyebrow raised and a smirk. “Wow,” he quipped and tilted his head, “You look pretty.”

“Fuck you,” Danny shot back as he turned to retreat back into his hotel room. Roy followed.

“No, seriously. I’m feeling so special to even be in the presence of such radiance…” He snorted when he saw the mess of clothes on the bed, “Wow. This got better…”

“Shut up. This is Courtney’s fault. I take no responsibility. Also? I just woke up so… I dunno… fuck you again.” Danny sluggishly began to gather up the clothes and pile them onto the arm chair nearby just so they were a bit more contained. He gulped at the sound of Roy’s chuckle behind him and he slid back down onto the bed. “Sorry. Give me a minute… I’m still waking up.”

“Take your time.”

Danny stared up at the ceiling before focusing back to Roy and pushing himself back up onto his elbows. “You can sit, you know. You don’t have to stand there like an asshole.” He rolled his eyes as Roy gestured to the armchair full of clothes, “Fuck’s sake…” he scooted over to one side of the bed and patted the other. It didn’t take much arm twisting for Roy to relent and sit down next to him, resting his back on the headboard.

They stayed like that for about a minute or two, but it felt like time was crawling. Danny could smell Roy, who’d clearly showered shortly before arriving, and he had to mentally remind himself not to press his face into his thigh. He rubbed at his eyes, smudging up his make-up more than it already was, as he tried to steer his mind away from the warmth that radiated next to him.

“So did you have another show or something?” He needed a safe topic and work always seemed safe with Roy. There was a sigh and another smile as Roy shrugged.

“Sort of. I had a couple of dicks I needed to suck so I could come back next year.”

Danny snorted out a laugh before he grinned up at the man beside him, “Spit or swallow?”

Roy rolled his eyes before he dropped a pillow onto Danny’s face before snickering and answering anyway, though vaguely, “It depends.”

Danny pulled the pillow off his face and wrapped his arms around it as he turned onto his side, still looking up at Roy and still grinning. “On what?” He was straying rapidly from what would be considered ‘safe topics’, but for an opportunity to tease Roy? He was willing to take the risk.

“None of your business.”

Danny trained his lips into his best pout, “Oh come on…” He pushed himself up and leaned his head against the headboard so he could be eye level with Roy, “Would you swallow if it were me?”

He hadn’t actually meant to ask the question, but now that it was out there he craved for an answer. Roy raised an eyebrow – less out of disbelief and more out of interest – as he flicked his gaze down to the pillow that now covered Danny’s lap.

“Are you asking me to suck your dick?”

“It’s hypothetical.”

“Sure it is.”

Danny snorted again and lightly hit Roy’s shoulder with the pillow. He excused himself to clean up his make-up before they could hold eye contact for too long. Roy followed and trailed after him without a word and was there to hand Danny a clean towel to dry his face. He pressed the towel to his eyes as he tried his best to scrub away the stubborn eye make-up. He remembered rattling something off about it before the towel was pulled gently from his hands and Roy’s lips were on his own.

There was that same spark he felt all those months ago in New York and for a second he thought it was strong enough to transport him back to that night in Roy’s apartment. It didn’t, of course, he was still standing in a hotel bathroom in the New Orleans with the faint sounds of cheering tourists filtering up through his window. But Roy was here, kissing him and tasting like spearmint mouthwash and wine (again). That was already enough.

When Danny’s back hit the wall after being pulled out of the bathroom, Roy’s mouth was back against his, drawing out each moan and whimper with ease. When the kiss finally broke with a barely audible ‘fuck’, the skirt of Danny’s dress was pushed up past his hips and his fingers were frantically trying to work open Roy’s fly.

“I borrowed this dress, don’t rip it – fuck!” Danny threw his head back as his wrists were pinned down and Roy’s hips met his. He pried his hand out of Roy’s grip to grab the back of his neck as their lips found each other again. It felt magnetic, two strong forces being pulled together until they latched onto one another and couldn’t let go.

“Not gonna rip it,” Roy assured gently as the kiss broke apart again, “Turn around…” Danny did as asked, pressing his elbows to the wall and arching his back. Roy’s hands grabbed at his hips with a chuckle so deep it reverberated with sultry sin, making Danny’s heartbeat double as all the blood in his body threatened to rush downwards. His breath caught at the sound of Roy quickly unzipping his dress. He bucked backwards once more and Roy grunted out, “Eager?”

“Just horny as fuck.”

“Pretty sure… that’s the same… thing…” Each pause was punctuated with a kiss as Danny was turned around again and his hands crawled up Roy’s shirt. He was wearing way too many clothes for Danny’s liking. He managed to get it up over the other man’s head and tossed it carelessly to the floor before Roy wrestled his hands away from him again. He leaned in and whispered “hold still,” in a soft, raspy voice that made Danny suck back a plea, bite his lip, and comply.

He stood there frozen, with his hands on either side of his head and bared to the scrutiny of those darkened brown eyes. The kisses that followed were short and sweet and made it hard for Danny to focus. His head was swimming in a syrup of arousal fuelled by the warmth of Roy’s hands and the spicy smell of his soap. He felt the “please” fall from his lips more than he actually heard it – a single syllable that carried the weight of a nine month dry spell and countless nights of New York inspired fantasies that tumbled from his tongue to Roy’s ears.

A soft “ha” followed and Danny watched as Roy flicked his eyes towards the ceiling. He swore he could see a thankful prayer cross Roy’s lips and marvelled at the other man’s visible disbelief of their circumstances. He wasn’t given much time to ponder why Roy would be so surprised before the dress gathered around Danny’s waist (along with his underwear) was pushed to his ankles in one smooth motion when the other man dropped to his knees.

With a gasp, Danny brought his hand to his mouth, biting down on his knuckles as he closed his eyes tight to muffle his moans while the other hand tangled itself in Roy’s hair. Warm and wet suction made Danny dig his heels into the carpet and his head fall back, the only thing really keeping him from sinking to the floor was a nice firm grip on his hips. He whimpered “fuck me” into his fist as the building pressure, ignited by that first kiss, began to sizzle and snap behind his eyelids like small sparklers tracing through a starless night, growing in number and threatening to blind him.

Needless to say, Danny got the answer to his question.

[modeoheim]

A Helping Hand pt 1

part of Cloud’s Birthday Week 2k17.  Summary:  A bizarre cat wearing a cape and a crown comes to Infantryman Cloud Strife for help. Through the occasional favor Cloud starts to learn more about ShinRa, get closer to his crushes, Zack and Sephiroth, and figure out what (or who?) is really behind Cait Sith's actions. Pairings: Reeve/Cloud, Cait Sith/Cloud (???), Zack/Cloud and brief Seph/Cloud rating: Explicit (though not this chapter)

guys I’m SO. EXCITED. to post part one of this. I’ve had so much fun writing this.  If you’re balking at the pairing, my suggestion is to go for it -- this fic kind of isn’t what it appears to be, and, well, I worked hard on it. Go forth ya’ll. 

"See ya," he said, holding up an arm. Zack bumped their forearms together and saw him off with another wink and a two-fingered salute.

"Later, Spike."

Cloud pushed his way out of the bar, gulping down fresh air once he was out. He hadn't realized how hot it was in there. Most of the sun lamps were off now, simulating 'night time' – but there were still enough to make your way around. It took Cloud a moment to realize which way the businesses were that Cait Sith wanted to visit, and then he headed that way.

"There's no one around," Cloud said, "You can speak up. I can tell you want to."

The backpack wiggled. He heard Cait Sith sigh. "…I suppose I can't complain when I'm hitching a free ride on your back, can I?"

"No," Cloud answered, "You can't."

read below, or on [ffnet] or [AO3]

ShinRa Tower was so large a building that walking around the outside of it in its entirety took quite some time. With a few smaller satellite buildings dotted around the main Tower there were all sorts of tucked-away places to hide in.

Most were under video surveillance for that reason; ShinRa took security seriously. Some Infantryperson somewhere was probably watching a couple-dozen computer screens showing footage of these areas, mostly walls, and occasionally the small nook with a bench for reading a book or resting after a jog around the Tower.

Cloud was pretty sure he'd found a small spot not under the watch of a video camera. And if there was one—it didn't matter anyway, it wasn't like he got up to no good out here, he just liked his space. While Nibelheim was mostly empty fields and tundra, with snow-capped mountains in the distance, Midgar had another metal wall every couple dozen feet and cramped hallways packed with Infantry.

He hadn't even realized he was a little claustrophobic before moving here.

And it wasn't even like his special spot was all that great—he was right by an exhaust vent for the building's HVAC. It was super loud and bellowed hot air, but he sat away from it and with enough time the constant drone of it faded into the background like restaurant chatter. As something of an introvert, Cloud needed some time alone every couple days; he retreated here and played games on his PHS or wrote letters to his mother. It was chill and Cloud stayed undisturbed.

Until, one day, the wall whispered, "Laddie."

Cloud looked up from his PHS, pausing his action game with a tap of his finger, and looked around. The acoustics in these little alcoves could get weird. He went back to it.

"Laddie!"

Cloud squinted, peering up and down the side of the wall. "In the vent," came the voice, muffled under the roar of the AC. "I need ya to do me a favor."

"Are you okay?" Cloud scrambled up, moving closer, feeling the sweaty gush of the AC's exhaust.

"Aie aie aie," came the voice, "Act natural! Pretend you're not talking to anybody, eh?"

"Um." Cloud moved to the side, away from the vent, and stared straight ahead. He tucked his chin into his scarf to obscure his mouth. He swallowed. "You're speaking to a member of the ShinRa Infantry," he said, his grip tightening around his baton lying along his right thigh. "Reveal yourself—if you're an eco-terrorist trying to infiltrate the Tower I will report you."

Whoever was in the vent let out a long whistle. "Impressive. The company's been hiring a good batch, it looks like. It's good to see."

Cloud cut off the distracting small talk with an aggressive, "Who are you? I will call my CO in the next thirty seconds."

"Oy!" They sounded outraged. "I work for ShinRa too, I promise."

"Prove it."

"What's your last name? I'll look you up in the database; I have the authorization to do that."

"…Strife," Cloud said, hesitantly.

"Hmm… only one of those currently employed. Seventeen years old. From Nibelheim—interesting place, there's a Mako reactor there, made it special—joined up seven months ago. Looks like you're struggling in your rifle class, nya ha ha."

"What!" Cloud had been thinking about how the person in the vent was either really employed by ShinRa or was a talented hacker, but the rifle comment distracted him. "That's in my file?"

"Yessiree, along with the fact that you're better than average with swords. Did fairly well in the SOLDIER exam with the practice swords."

"Oh." Cloud's heart skipped a beat at the mention of the SOLDIER exam. He fought the urge to stomp off, now hurting at the memories of failure. "Answer my question. What's the best elevator to use?"

"…The one behind the showroom on the lobby floor," they answered. "It doesn't have that couple-second lag when the doors close."

"And who never uses that elevator?"

"The execs. Stuck-up, the lot of them, if you ask me." They sounded a little nervous.

An exec, then, perhaps? Regardless, nobody would know the thing about the elevators if they weren't regularly in the building, actually walking around and not crawling through vents.

"What do you want?"

They sounded relieved. "I need you to block the security camera for me. Move a bit to the left, would you?"

"A camera?" Cloud had been so sure there was no such thing here.

"Obviously, laddie, they're everywhere. Except in here, nyahaha. There you go—a little more left. I can see you on the camera feed. Yes, yes, I know the air is hot—I'm practically melting apart in here. Angle yerself towards the wall. Now lean against it, all casual-like. Yep, you're facing the camera now. Stay just like that."

Cloud held the position he'd been maneuvered into. He squinted at the opposite wall. Eventually he found it; a little out-of-place dot in the concrete wall. Damn. His back was to the vent now, and he stiffened as the metal grate was pushed out from the inside.

"Reach a hand back," came the voice, a little clearer now without the grate, though still quiet under the roar of the AC. Cloud did, and the weight of the metal grate settled into his hand. He held on, hiding it behind his back. He pulled out his PHS and pretended to be playing a game with his other hand. The back of his neck prickled; it was so uncomfortable knowing there was someone behind him that he couldn't see.

"What are you doing?"

"Trying to help," came the voice. Cloud snorted, and they continued after a huff, "Getting some readings on the quality of the air we're cycling through the building. I installed a couple new air filters, to get rid of the smog and such, and if they're successful they will be used in some homes under the Plate. Unfortunately, no one is letting me close enough to measure the air quality."

"…Why not?"

"Well, laddie, I suspect it's because they're not working. Why else? It means I have to design some new filters and install them, and that costs money, and my department's budget is woefully low, and…"

They muttered to themselves, and Cloud heard a couple small movements. Metallic scufflings, the sounds of light feet. Casually, Cloud turned his head as much as he could to get an eye of the person who had been inside the vent.

Cloud expected them to be small, because those vents were too tiny for Cloud to fit in, but he hadn't expected a three foot-tall humanoid cat wearing a crown.

Cloud breathed, "What."

The cat turned around. It had a small cape, red, and it was blowing around in the hot air. "Don't be gapin', laddie," it said, "We're on a mission!"

Cloud's head snapped around again and he stared at the wall.

The cat had been hanging something around the wide, curved metal pipe beside the vent that carried presumably air up to the many stories above. It wore white gloves and had a white-tipped tail, most of it a darker black with white patches on its belly and face. It even had boots.

"Are you a monster?"

The cat laughed. "Nay, not a monster—I'm just a Cait Sith!"

"A Cait Sith."

"Yep. And just so you don't go worryin', this little device here ain't a bomb or anything like that—it measures pollution. I poked a small hole in the pipe so it'll measure it."

"Why all the secrecy?"

"Like I said, for whatever reason they don't want me pokin' around the filtration system, which makes me think it's not workin'. They'd rather let something not work than spend the money to fix it to ensure a good quality of life—now isn't that repulsive?"

"Ah…yeah."

After another moment Cloud heard the grate go back onto the wall. "Move back a couple steps," the voice said. Cloud moved more fully into the gush of air. "Lean back onto it as hard as you can."

Cloud pushed against the grate, and he felt small, gloved hands (…paws?) scrabble against the back of his uniform as it pulled. The blond felt the grate snap back into place.

"Thanks," Cait Sith said, "You were a big help!" Then Cloud heard it crawl away, the small thumping noises growing quieter.

Cloud casually inspected the small device hanging around the air pipe. He'd had a few classes on how to identify bombs and this certainly didn't look like one. If it was… well, he was now an accomplice to it.

Weird.

It was a few days before Cloud managed to get enough free time to go out to his usual spot. He wasn't sure what to expect. He was hardly in The Know around ShinRa but he did have a few Infantry friends who were fairly involved with building security and none of them had mentioned the discovery of a mysterious bomb or an intruder in the vents.

The little pollution reader was gone, a tiny bit of sealant covered the tiny hole that had been poked through it, and taped to the back side of the pipe, the side away from the security camera, was a note.

C.S., it said, Thank you again for your help last time. You are a trustworthy young man. If you're willing, I need your help again. According to your schedule you have the afternoon and evening of this coming Friday off. Please come to the stall all the way on the left in the men's bathroom on the lobby floor at five p.m. You're doing ShinRa a great service, even if they don't know it yet. —another C.S.

That was rather…demanding, Cloud thought. And rather rude. He helped someone once, and then there they were checking his training schedule like a creep and asking his help for…whatever they were asking his help for. The handwriting looked elegant and the diction fairly different from how Cait Sith spoke. Was it even the same person—cat? No one else would have known about this… It was ridiculous.

No matter how ridiculous it was, for some Gaia-forsaken reason Cloud found himself hesitantly opening the door to the bathroom that Friday. Some of his friends were going into Sector 8 to party and Cloud had even turned down their invitation, he was that curious about what was going to happen.

He peeked under the stalls; it was empty in here, and he couldn't see any furry legs in the stall all the way to the side. Still, he crept over to it and pushed the door inwards.

Cait Sith stood on the closed toilet seat, body bopping along to some rhythm Cloud couldn't hear. Crown, gloves, furry little face, red cape.

"Cloud!" Cait Sith greeted. "Ya made it. Good."

Cloud looked up—an air vent went into this stall. "You really did leave me that note," he said, a bit amazed.

Cait Sith tilted its head, peering at him with small, feline eyes. "Well, of course. Good help is hard to find 'round here."

"You mean people dumb enough to go along with what you want and not ask too many questions."

Cait Sith rubbed the back of its neck. "Maybe, but you seem like a genuine good sort. I promise, I'm not up to anythin' bad."

"A promise won't do me much good if I get jailed or court marshalled for this."

"You'll just have ta believe me, laddie—ya won't. I'll make it worth yer while for the help, though."

That sounded even sleazier than before, Cloud thought privately. "What was the verdict on the vent?"

"Aye, they're broken, all right. Barely stopping any of the mako smog from entering the buildings at all. Sure, the air inside the Tower looks prettier, and there ain't no green tint to it, but it's not healthy. Ya think people would care more since we're breathing the same air up there in the boardroom!"

We, Cloud thought. Cait Sith is in on board meetings?

Cait Sith sighed. They gestured to a sports bag hanging on the hook on the back of the toilet stall. "Put that on, wouldja? I'm gonna climb in."

As they left the bathroom, Cait Sith a sturdy weight against his back, Cloud asked, "Where are we going?"

"I need a ride down below the plate," came Cait Sith's voice from inside the bag. "I'm a little too conspicuous getting down on the trains myself. I need to visit a couple businesses in Sector 8."

"Why?"

"We installed a version of those air filters on ShinRa partner businesses—prototypes for the commercial ones we plan to install in people's homes. They won't be much help to the public if they'll still be chokin' on smog, will they, laddie?"

"Guess not," Cloud muttered, moving his lips as little as possible as they moved out through the lobby. It bustled at all hours; the rotating group of receptionists never left the front desk unstaffed. When he cleared the building and was outside he said to his backpack, "To the train station?"

"Aye, laddie."

Cloud wore civvies, having learned shortly after joining that if you were off-duty you did not want to wear your uniform beneath the plate. He had his badge, though, and with a swipe of it at the turnstile at the station he got in without his bag being inspected. He shuffled on the train behind what looked like some off-duty SOLDIERs, probably Third Class, and a couple civilians who just lived above the plate. Expensive stuff.

He sat in the back of the train car and carefully propped the bag up in the empty cushion next to him.

"Okay, we're on the train," Cloud whispered. He didn't get a response.

During the ID check halfway down, with the blaring red alarm and the scan of everyone's IDs aboard the train just in case someone snuck on that wasn't supposed to, Cloud asked Cait Sith, "Hey. What's your gender? How should I refer to you?"

"Cait Sith is a boy," was the answer, sounding amused.

"And what's your accent?" It was quite thick; sometimes Cloud had trouble understanding him.

"It's just how a Cait Sith talks."

"A Cait Sith. So… there are more of you?"

"Cait Sith the Third, at your service, laddie."

Cloud muttered, "Seems like I'm the one at your service, honestly."

Muffled laughter was the response.

Sector 8 was one of Cloud's favorite places. Nibelheim's version of nightlife was the single pub full of upset adults avoiding their families. This part of town had clubs and bars, theaters and LOVELESS Avenue. He shouldered his heavy backpack (was Cait Sith made of fucking metal?) and walked in the direction Cait Sith told him to go, towards an offshoot street.

He didn't get far before an arm was slung over his shoulder.

Cloud turned, hands coming up, preparing to knock the stranger away, but they came still to rest for a moment too long on the chest of the person when he realized it was Zack Fair.

"Hey, Spike! Long time no see!"

Zack Fair, the dude he'd gotten along surprisingly well with on a mission last month and who he'd been nursing a wicked crush on ever since. "Zack," Cloud said, "Oh—hey."

The arm around his shoulders squeezed and then disappeared. Zack was so tall, and so grin-y, and so handsome, and Cloud hated that he was 'on a mission' with a crown-wearing cat monster.

"How've you been, man?"

"Good. I've been good." Cloud's tongue felt clumsy in his mouth. "Not busy—ah, I mean, doing the usual thing."

Zack winked at him. "That's good to hear. You busy at all right now?"

"…Well, kind of."

"Aw, c'mon! I wanna buy you a drink. My treat. I've been meaning to come see you ever since the Mideel mission but I've been busy."

Cloud hesitated. He felt a small jab between his shoulder blades, probably Cait Sith's elbow. "Sorry," he began, but then Zack clapped his hands together and tilted his head with his dark bangs falling into his bright SOLDIER eyes just right—

A moment later he was being whisked along beside Zack to a really chill bar, you'll like it while Cait Sith stubbornly jabbed him again, trying to keep Cloud on track.

Tough shit, cat—Cloud was doing the weird little thing a huge favor anyway; they could afford a brief detour.

Zack and Cloud chatted about their week as they made their way there. The bar was just off LOVELESS Ave, and despite it only being about six-thirty the music inside was loud and vibrating. The neon lights took a moment to get used to after being outside in the artificial sun lamps.

There weren't any seats at the bar open, so while they waited for two people to leave they grabbed two drinks and stood off to the side, leaning against a wall. Cloud could feel the thud of the bass through it, moving through his shoulder and even stirring the tequila in his glass.

(Tequila, known to make certain drinkers rather horny, was perhaps not the best choice, Cloud realized as Zack stood so tall next to him. It kind of felt like he was being caged back against the wall… and, Cloud realized a moment later, he kind of fucking loved it.)

"So how's your training going?" Cloud asked. "I think before you mentioned Angeal Hewley pushes you pretty hard."

Cloud remembered almost every word, actually, but he was playing it cool. Zack groaned, closing his eyes and tipping his head back. Hot. "Ugh. Angeal's as tough on me as ever. It's cool though—it's only a matter of time before I hit First Class at this rate."

"Oh yeah? You think you'll be evaluated for it soon?"

"Yeah. Genesis let it slide the other day that Angeal and Lazard have been talking about arranging some sort of mission for me."

"You were really impressive in Mideel…I'm sure you'll do well."

Cloud wasn't sure how to flirt for shit, but he'd realized Zack liked compliments. Zack puffed out his chest and tried to give a casual shrug (he failed). "Ya think so?" He rubbed the back of his neck.

"Yeah," Cloud confirmed. "Sure do."

With the occasional jab from Cait Sith, Cloud and Zack kept talking. They eventually got bar stools and sat there, Zack buying Cloud three more drinks that were really strong, too—Cloud was tipsy at the end of it and even smacked his elbow back into the bag when Cait Sith hit his shoulder blade, trying to get him to abandon Zack.

"What's in there?" Zack asked, his elbow up on the counter and his hand propping up his chin.

"…Library books," Cloud said, feeling very transparent. "I had more free time than usual this month so, ah, I read a lot."

"Oh yeah, the one a couple blocks East? I like that place."

"Erm, yeah."

"There's a library in the Tower though, just so ya know. Near the SOLDIER floor."

"Oh. I'll be sure to check it out."

"Yeah." Zack smiled at him, his mako eyes lasered in on Cloud's face. "You should."

One last drink—and then Zack invited Cloud to dance. Cloud heard Cait Sith groan under his breath in the backpack.

Shyly, Cloud shrank back, wishing he had his green scarf with him. "I'm not very good," he said—but Zack waved him off with a grin. Then they were on the edge of the dance floor, Cloud still wearing his backpack. Zack gestured at the far wall but Cloud shook his head, yelling over the music, "I'll get tons of fees if I lose the books."

Zack was rolling his hips and working his shoulders now, dancing very casually to the beat—he managed to work in a shrug that looked so effortless. Cloud's robotic joints moved awkwardly at first but he managed to find something resembling what a few other people on the dance floor were doing. It made his backpack bounce against his back and Cloud knew he'd have a couple bruises from where Cait Sith's joints poked into his back but fuck it—it wasn't every day he got to hang out with Zack Fair.

"You look nice in civilian clothes," Zack said. Cloud understood this in a mixture of actually hearing the words and lip-reading. "Aren't you hot though?"

Zack reached out and his fingers played with the zipper at Cloud's collar. His sleeveless shirt had a zipper that went down to his sternum. "...A little," Cloud said, and with the most seductive grin anyone had ever flashed Cloud Strife Zack inched down his zipper bit by bit, revealing a few inches of sweaty collarbones and the upper part of Cloud's chest.

Cloud's hands came up and Zack captured them, pressing them over his beating heart. He spread Cloud's palms and fingers flat and moved them, his own hands covering Cloud's, to his shoulders and then encouraged Cloud to coast them down his arms: over the biceps, stopping briefly to squeeze, past the jut of the elbow, down the forearms and over the wrist…to his hands. Zack entwined their hands and moved Cloud's arms around, making the awkward teen dance more.

Cloud laughed, feeling…delighted, really—he was free in a way he'd never been in Nibelheim.

This was really fucking fun.

Cloud's jam came on next and he danced like a moron, all swinging arms and moving hips as he sang along—Zack laughed out loud, but kindly, and egged him on.

As much as Cloud wanted to stay all evening with Zack (and stay with him into the next morning too, if that's how this sort of thing worked—city people moved so fast)—he could not. The sulking cat in his bag had somewhere to be.

Cloud, wobbling a bit, reached out and pressed his hands to either side of Zack's face. Zack looked surprised, his eyes flicking from Cloud's mouth to his eyes. Cloud fought a smile; no, he wasn't about to kiss him, but Zack clearly thought he was. He drew Zack down, and Zack closed his eyes, but Cloud turned his head and spoke directly into Zack's ear instead.

"I've really gotta go. Thanks for everything, man—I had a lot of fun."

Zack pouted a bit as he stood back up, but he didn't press anything. "Yeah—me too. Wanna trade numbers so we can hang out again?"

They moved to the edge of the bar and they did so, Cloud squashing a gleeful feeling in his stomach. "See ya," he said, holding up an arm. Zack bumped their forearms together and saw him off with another wink and a two-fingered salute.

"Later, Spike."

Cloud pushed his way out of the bar, gulping down fresh air once he was out. He hadn't realized how hot it was in there. Most of the sun lamps were off now, simulating 'night time' – but there were still enough to make your way around. It took Cloud a moment to realize which way the businesses were that Cait Sith wanted to visit, and then he headed that way.

"There's no one around," Cloud said, "You can speak up. I can tell you want to."

The bag wiggled. He heard Cait Sith sigh. "…I suppose I can't complain when I'm hitching a free ride on your back, can I?"

"No," Cloud answered, "You can't."

Cloud felt like a major creep going into the tiny alley behind the weapons store ShinRa apparently had investments in. He wondered if they sold ShinRa weapons to the public or just to select people—he didn't actually care that much. He opened the bag with clumsy, drunk fingers and Cait popped out, his fur matted from being cooped up in there for so long and his crown askew.

"Har!" he barked a laugh when he saw Cloud. "You're still blushing, Spike. Does that happen every time you drink or are you just that fond of Fair?"

Cloud scowled. "You know him?"

"Sure." Cait hopped up on top of the reeking dumpster. "I know all the Firsts and most of the Seconds."

Cloud lost his filter two drinks back, so he blurted, "Even Sephiroth?"

Cait looked over his shoulder, now hanging from the gutter on the roof of the building. "You fancy that bloke too?"

"Oh." Cloud stuck his hands in his pockets. "Pssh."

Cait laughed again, then pulled himself up and disappeared over the lip of the roof. Cloud could hear him though, light footsteps moving across the roof towards what he presumed was the AC unit.

After a minute or two where Cloud tried to look like he belonged in some dank alley Cait came back, a small device in his hand. He climbed into the bag and Cloud shouldered it again. This time Cait directed him to a materia shop. It was noticeably cleaner and better-lit than the other shops on the street, a few of which had sagging boards in place of windows or heaps of trash just beyond the doorstep.

The benefits of being connected to ShinRa, it seemed.

"Around to the side," Cait whispered from the bag. "No, the other side."

"How can you tell where we are so well? Aren't you all mixed up being in there?"

"I'm watchin' from one of the security cameras on the roof of the plate."

Cloud frowned. How was this little monster so well-connected? "…On a PHS or something?"

"In my head," was the answer.

Weird. Cloud went to the other side of the shop. It was at the end of the block and had no smelly, saggy shops on that side. Cloud opened up the bag and Cait scrambled up to the roof as he did before. When he was done they headed back towards the train, Cloud still pleasantly buzzed and enjoying the walk around.

It was so different beneath the plate from up above, and especially different from Nibelheim. It was so bizarre to look up and never see the sky.

"Cait Sith," Cloud said breezily, chattier than normal from the drinks, "It's kind of cool that you seem to care so much about the air quality. I get the feeling that most people at ShinRa couldn't care less about regular people, you know?"

"Aye," Cait replied. "Don't I know it. My department does what it can, but we get push-back every step o' the way."

"Your department?"

Cait didn't answer. Cloud was another small step closer to putting this strange puzzle together.