#i've awokened......temporarily...

[malewife-overlord]

SCL:C

Part X: Memories of the Moon

chapter summary: What happened all those years ago, when two Cybertronians left to find a weapon to end the war? The moon may be dead, but it remembers.

trigger warnings: violence, death, medical malpractice, girlbossTM, cannibalism, SAD, tragic yaoi, Unicron

word count: 11008 because i cannot fucking calm down

prior chapter here.

chapter below cut!

"Solace! Solace, wake up!" 

Silvery servos tapped his helm again and again. Solace let out a small grumble of protest as his yellow optics onlined, the lull of stasis threatening to disable them once more. 

"What's...what's happening?" He asked, rubbing the stasis from his optics. "Did we arrive?"

They'd both been asleep for years at this point. He and Luster had departed in a small ship with the intent of travelling millions of light years. Stasis had been imparted on them both at the start, to preserve fuel and resources, while the autopilot handled safely carrying them to their coordinates. The only time it was to break was if danger became present or they arrived. 

Considering there was no blaring red light and he hadn’t been jerked from stasis, he could assume there was no danger present. Solace hadn't expected to awaken as soon as he did, but as usual, stasis felt like just a long recharge. As far as his frame was aware he had just awoken on Cybertron in his own berth after a night of too much engex. 

Luster was practically towering over him, excitement turning his bright blue optics to eager slits. He tapped his helm again, then gently grabbed his servos and pulled him up a little. Solace grumbled and moved a servo over his arm, sitting up fully on his own. 

"We're almost there! We're almost there!" Luster's grin was so wide he could have split his faceplate in two. He was practically dancing on his pedes, which shook the pod Solace was nestled in. "I've woken you up so you can see it! It's beautiful!" 

Solace blinked again, still groggy, and did a preliminary internal scan, just to ensure he was still in working order. Nothing immediately came off as being irregular. Nope, he was just always this bad at waking up. It was one of the (many) reasons he’d dropped out of medical school.

"Almost?" He hung on that word, giving Luster a look. "We weren't supposed to awaken until we were there. Did you mess with--"

"Just a little!" Luster beamed, clenching his fists excitedly. "But it's fine! We're still here, and I wanted to watch the planet come into view with you! It's your first time, isn't it?"

Solace frowned. “Yes, but--"

Before he could finish Luster grabbed his arm and pulled him fully out of his pod, catching him when he stumbled slightly. His larger form was able to easily maneuver Solace's smaller, cold constructed frame, holding him as if he were little more than an unruly minibot. It was a small pet peeve of his, but one he never wished to share with Luster. He couldn't help the fact that he was naturally forged, while Solace himself was cold constructed in a body he didn’t quite feel was always right.

"Come on!" Still holding his arm, Luster practically rushed out of their personal quarters, dragging Solace along with him. 

He managed to keep pace after only the first few steps, and they quickly ascended to the bridge of their small ship. The spaceshield was as clear as it had been the day they'd left, and was displaying their current coordinates and proximity. The effect of interplanetary gravity upon them was displayed on the screen, as were their current fuel reserves, storage and weight capacity, and life signals. Luster moved to commandeer the bridge, temporarily dismissing all of the notifications to focus on the image coming into view. 

"Do you see it?" He asked, eagerly pointing towards a gray dot. "It's right there!" 

In the vast empty blackness of space, a single pinpoint of gray was gradually growing in the middle of their spaceshield. Solace squinted slightly, taking it in. 

"It looks like a dot."

"A beautiful dot!" Luster grinned at him, optics shimmering like the diamonds embedded in his faceplate. "A shimmering dot! A dot that's got the weapon that'll end this war once and for all! And it was discovered by yours truly!"

He struck a pose, servos on his chassis, and beamed like he was on a stage. Solace quietly rolled his optics, though there was no discontent behind the action. Luster simply enjoyed attention too much, always acting like he was showing off to someone. 

The dot grew bigger and bigger, until it was no longer a dot but a blot, then a circle, then a planet. Solace could make out what looked like a rocky continent on it, alongside great streams and canyons of black and purple. Cloud cover swirled around varying spots of the globe, gathering towards one end and gradually wisping out before finally clearing up entirely on the other side. 

"It looks habited," he said, frowning. "You don't think the locals will be happy about us taking their treasure, do you?"

"We don't know if it's habited," Luster said back, grin unwavering. "And if it is, we'll just ask nicely. We're Cybertronians, everyone loves us!"

Solace winced at that statement. Luster could be so airheaded sometimes. Perhaps everyone he met loved him (if not, he wouldn't have nearly as many foreign gemstones and pearls as he did), but the general consensus on the Cybertronian species, to the best of his knowledge, was not positive. And Luster was no fighter. 

Neither was he, but unlike the former, at least he had built in electricity to defend himself. 

"I don't think we should go in expecting them to welcome us with open arms," he responded gently, moving to place a servo over Luster's own. "If it turns out to be some kind of special artifact for them, we might have to fight for it."

"We won't have to fight!" Luster immediately protested, his grin finally slipping. "I'll trade with them. Look at their skies, there's nothing zipping around in them. Their chances of having an advanced society with the current rate of progress I'm observing is about 0.14%. It'll be fine, Solace." He smiled again, tilting Solace's chin up slightly. "You worry about every little thing. Come on, lighten up a little!"

He responded by frowning a little deeper. "I worry because this exact scenario has played out for many other bots who never came home, Luster. And neither of us are fighters, we--"

"It'll work out, Solace." He raised a servo to his helm and cupped his cheek. "It'll work out. You just need to destress." His gaze was as gentle as his touch. "Why don't I help with that?"

Solace's fans clicked on as his faceplate heated up. Before he could say anything, Luster leaned in and brushed his dermas against his own. Their EM fields collided, and for a blissful moment, he found himself in the weightlessness of overwhelming joy. 

Without even thinking he moved his servos to Luster's helm to hold him there, kissing him a little deeper as he did so. His dermas were soft, courtesy of all the treatments he gave himself, a harsh contrast to the rough protoform of Solace's own. He'd heard it a million times from Luster that he needed to take better care of himself. 

It was over too soon, as it always was. He could spend entire solar cycles basking in Luster's EM field, floating in that weightlessness, surrounded by the love of a mech who would do anything for him. But Luster pulled away, albeit slowly, taking his EM field with him. It still stood as a warm sensation next to him, but no longer did theirs both cross over. 

"Feeling better now?" He purred, his own fans clicking on. Solace, pink as an organic, floundered a moment before nodding. "There you go. It'll work out, yeah?"

He nodded again, and just at that moment, their ship issued an alert. Emergency braking was initiated, almost knocking them both over. Luster grabbed Solace's arm, keeping him from tumbling off the bridge and onto the couches below, as the emergency thrusters activated, carrying them away from the planet. 

"What's going on?" He yelped, internal calibration adjusting as he caught his balance. 

The spaceshield displayed a warning message, flashing red twice before it pulled up an image of an approaching planet. 

Wait, an approaching planet?

The approaching planet was significantly larger than the one they'd arrived at, and gray in color. A circle of gold metal extended around it, connecting to its surface with the shape of a cross. Horizontally across its middle was a golden seam from which burst dozens of gilded spikes, ultimately culminating in a circle from which emerged two enormous, curled grabbers. They almost appeared as jaws, their tips ending far above the center of the gilded circle, within which a light shone. The two of them stared in disbelief. 

A feeling of dread settled in his tanks. Solace gripped Luster's arm tighter, looking between him and the monstrosity on the screen. It was impossible. Planets couldn't move at that speed. The force of gravity it let off alone was enough to pressure their ship into moving away. Yet there, before them, was a moving planet, on a collision course with the one they had spent years seeking out. 

The curled horns suddenly activated, spreading wide as the planets came close to collision. The center of the golden circle lit up, a similarly colored tractor beam emitting from it onto the surface of the planet. Debris floated up and water swirled as it was pulled towards the source, which opened to reveal rows and rows of chainsaw-like teeth. Just before the two planets would collide, the horns grabbed onto the other planet, digging deep below its surface. 

And the teeth of the mouth whirred as they dug in, diminishing the surface before them to a fine, consumable powder.

"It's...it's eating the other planet," Solace gaped, unable to tear his optics away. "It’s eating our planet..."

Luster was silent, his optics wide. 

The cannibalistic planet worked quickly, breaking through the other like it was nothing more than a large energon cube. Kliks turned into mega-cycles, but no more than that. Their planet's surface was destroyed, its remnants crumbling into space dust. Its inner mantle splurted into the cold void of space, hardening into jagged stones before being swiftly gulped down. The clouds were sucked into the toothy void, the water joining them. 

The planet they'd come so far to find had become nothing more than some rocks floating about in space. The cannibalistic planet finished, its maw closing and beaming that light out once more. Then it settled in the place of its prey, like a glutton resting after a meal. 

Luster and Solace both stared, the previous joy that had infected them both draining away alongside their hope. 

"It's...it's gone," Luster whispered, blinking in disbelief. "All that we've worked for...all I worked for…"

"What the frag is that?" Solace gasped, fear pulsing through his EM field. "It's...it's not possible. It can't be." 

"It ate the planet. Our planet." Luster's shoulder's hunched. "Our hope. Our..." His voice cracked. "It can't be..."

Solace looked over to him and set his jaw, moving to hold his servo. "We...we can go back. We'll find another way to end the war. It's not all lost. We've still got each other."

Luster glanced over, optics bleary. "But—but--!" On the verge of tears he froze, realization dawning on him. "Wait. The crystal!"

The crystal in his crest, deep blue in color and diamond in shape. Luster removed it and stared. 

"It's still speaking to me!"

Solace raised an optical ridge. "What does that--"

"The artifact! It has to still be solid!" Luster placed the crystal back in his crest and focused back on the planet. "Which means it..."

They both stared at the planet again, a knowing dread settling within their sparks. But to have come all this way, and to return with nothing...

It was worse than the truth of what they must do.

—------

The sparkeater moved swiftly as it rushed between the labs, searching for one specific room. It overcharged the gates to each, forcing them open only to slam them shut when disappointment reared its head. Room to room, it met nothing but the same: abominations, storages of live specimens, freezers, cryogenic chambers, a decapitated head kept alive by wiring,ever begging to be plugged in, and worthless living quarters of empty pods. 

But for every dozen failures one success was sure to reveal itself. It tore open the door of the uppermost chamber and paused, analytical optics narrowing as they scanned what was within. Here. The last pieces of the being used to repair it. 

Step 1: Repair itself. In its present state it was too weak to properly climb the shaft and ascend to the top of Cybertron. If it was attacked it would be easily caught off balance and eliminated. It must not be. Its lord needed it.

Upholding its quick pace, the sparkeater grabbed the remaining pieces of the dragon, sending surges of electricity through its tentacles to serve as welding devices. First, it brought the legs, bowed and tall as they were, to the sockets of its pelvic plating. The wiring was frayed, but with a bit of heat, a surge of electricity, and some of the strange power still running through it, they took. It stood on shaky legs, almost falling over, and caught itself with its tentacles. 

Adaptation would have to be faster than this. It forced itself to focus on maintaining balance, new claws scraping the floor as it stood on them. These were designed for a quadruped. Maintenance of an upright position was awkward at best.

That mattered very little. It could balance with its additional limbs. And on the topic of additional limbs, it had found the head plate and wings, tattered as though they were. 

The head plate, for its chest, to keep its vital spark essence safe. The wings, merged with a pair of its tentacles, discarding the Cybertronian hands that had once been attached to them. The webbing mattered not, for it had always been useless; rather, the boosters attached to the ulnare area were what mattered most. With only a weak spark, they reanimated and powered on. 

With its repairs completed and the metal still cooling, the sparkeater fled the parts room, leaping from the catwalk onto the elevator which ran straight down the middle. With both sets of its claws alongside its new boosters, it quickly ascended, climbing the solid, smooth metal as easily as a face of rough rock. 

Step 2. Find a high point. 

Spotting the top of the elevator shaft, the sparkeater burst out from it, spilling into an empty, dark room. Computers lined the walls and control panels alongside them. Doors at the back lead deeper into the base. 

It had no time for this. Repeating its prior metal welding technique, it opened a hole in the wall and crept through, removing every wall before it until it was outside. Once outside, its head snapped up, searching for its target:

Cybertron's newest moon, golden and horned. 

Closer. It must be closer. Looking up at the walls of the Decepticon base, it began to scale them, claws digging into the reinforced metal like it was nothing but freshly forged protoform. Ascension was swift. It found its way to the roof in no time, and from there, moved to climb the signal transmitter, now dark and quiet. The base had not been alive for many solar cycles now. 

At the very top of the antennae it perched, maintaining its balance as it focused on the moon. The humming beckoned. Reaching to the crest on its head, the sparkeater removed the cracked blue crystal from within, raising it high. The moonlight shone upon it, dancing within as a gentle glow. 

The glow quickly became brighter and brighter, transforming into a beacon. All of a sudden the crystal shined brilliantly, a beam of pure light shooting from it to somewhere in the sky. 

The debris circling Cybertron’s atmosphere suddenly began to move, breaking from their orbit to crash to the planet below. 

Step 3: Wait for him. 

It perched, returning the crystal to its crest, and waited. 

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

They would have to be fast. An initial scan of Skyrend's melted form revealed his spark was rapidly fading, not just from the stress of trying to hold onto its dying body but from the hunger of its metal as well. Channel had already failed to save Oracelle and Uptick. She couldn't fail Skyrend now. 

Her scan also indicated dangerous radiation levels around him, radiation levels which were quickly growing worse and worse. It wasn’t just Skyrend she was trying to save by keeping his spark from extinguishing–Channel had read about just what happened to point-one percenters when they flickered out. If she didn’t find something to preserve him in, and fast, the entire P1U70 lab could go up in flames.

There were several ways she could preserve his spark, most of which weren't looking viable. In usual cases of total frame death, the entire spark chamber would be removed and placed on life support while new sentio metallico was prepared for its second forging. In the field, sparks could be placed within specialized containers made of spark chamber glass, which were designed to prevent loss of charge while they were transported to medical facilities. In a pinch, a spark could even be kept in another Cybertronian's spark chamber, as long as they were compatible in charge and spark type. 

Other methods existed, of course, but none of them were valid options based on their current predicament. Time was of the essence regardless of the method.

“Well? What’s his diagnosis?” Puncture demanded, her voice crackling over Channel’s comms. She was preoccupied with whoever had come out of Shockwave in the upper room, and was working on finding her way back down. “He’s going to live, right? Because I’ll give up half my fragging spark to ensure it.”

“You…you may have’ta do just that,” Channel grimaced, scanning the gooey mess of Skyrend for his spark. She located it, a small, upraised mass in a sea of molten gray, barely visible beneath the darkness that coated it. “He’s fadin’. He’ll need a compatible spark to nourish him ‘till we can get him to a repair bay. Either that, or we gotta pry a workin’ spark chamber from one’a these…”

The Seekers in the pods didn’t exactly look like they had functional spark chambers. All of them, despite being formed, were empty. Channel had seen cold constructed frames that were ready for use before, and none of them looked like the ones she was seeing now. She bit her derma. 

“That’s it? Just carry him?” She could feel Puncture’s opticroll. “Easy. Get him ready, I’m coming down–”

Channel intended to warn her about how “carrying” another fully developed mech was nowhere near the same level as carrying a developing spark, including the potential for them to collide and literally explode, but she was interrupted by the shriek of metal as Puncture suddenly leapt from the broken window, using her claws to slide her way down. Under one arm, she held an unfamiliar bot with a familiar color palette. 

Channel blinked at the sight as the two of them slammed down. The unfamiliar bot stood on weak pedes, her protoform still cooling and her armor completely undeveloped. An alt mode couldn’t even be guessed. But the colors already present were a dead giveaway. 

“Is that…Invert?” Channel asked, raising her optical ridges. “Didn’t you–”

“She’s fine, she helped kill Shockwave.” Puncture lumbered over and immediately opened her sparkchamber. “Skyrend. Now.”

Invert hung back, watching them silently. Channel grimaced.

“It ain’t safe, Puncture. Are you two even compatible? I know you’re family an’ all, but he’s not your carrier or sire, and if you ain’t compatible, then he might–”

“We’re compatible,” she interrupted. “He shared some spark energy with me before I was even forged, we’re compatible. Now get on with it.”

That wasn’t exactly grounds for complete compatibility. Sure, it was likely that, if Skyrend had really shared spark energy with Puncture, they had similar sparks, but the only thing that could determine that was a spark test, which required a specialized machine, two weeks processing, and–

Now wasn’t the time. She’d just have to hope Puncture was right. The cylinder Shockwave had used had probably been destroyed by him, and even if it wasn’t, she didn’t have time to run back up and see. Silently, she cursed Puncture for her haste in returning to her proxy’s side. But there was no point lamenting it now. Giving Puncture a nod, she turned back on Skyrend. 

He’d melted into a fine, thick slick of molten metal, which sat on the floor in a squishy pile. His spark was just barely visible beneath the crushing weight of the gray goop atop it. Removing it would be an incredibly delicate operation. 

She’d prefer to have her medical tools and a cylinder at the ready, just in case something went wrong. But a field job was a field job, and it wasn’t like he’d last much longer. Her internal chronometer gave him an approximate of five kliks and 8 nanokliks, which were ticking down faster and faster every minute that his spark was exposed to the air. 

And for every nanoklik which passed, her life–and those of everyone in the next 10 miles–came closer to death. 

Channel swallowed before speaking to Puncture. “Right. Don’t move. Keep your spark still as possible and brace, it’s gonna feel real weird. Also, yer plating might feel like its trying to crawl off’a you and your system’s might overheat an–”

“Skyrend,” Puncture growled. “Now.”

Channel vented and waded through his remains, the metal pooling around her pedes as she bent over the half solid shape of his sparkchamber. Its glass was intact, which mattered the most, though as she lifted it from his remains, it began to collapse. Her danger sensors indicated high levels of radiation around her, levels which were rapidly causing her damage.

Frag. She needed to be faster. Slogging back through him, she presented the glass to Puncture’s open chamber and placed her servos on both sides of it, working the natural seam that formed with every forging. If she was just careful enough, she could crack it by pressing certain points, then split it evenly in half with a single twist. 

She pressed hard on the bottom and top, then in a diagonal direction. The glass began to crack. Good, going smoothly. Energy began to radiate out from the chamber she handled, the already dangerous levels reaching critical points. Spots began to show on her HUD. 

But there was no backing out now. Either he died and took everyone in the next ten miles out, or she learned to live with a shortened lifespan. Puncture formed two fists, bracing for impact. 

With a twist of her servos Channel split the circular chamber perfectly. Skyrend’s spark hung in the air for just a moment before it moved towards Puncture, the tantalizing charge of her chamber enough to cause a natural pull. She winced as it forced its way in, pressing against her own spark and forcing it against the glass of her own sparkchamber. 

It looked painful, but she forced it to close. No sooner had she done so, however, that Puncture hissed and fell to one knee, gripping at her chassis. 

Channel dropped with her, giving her a scan. Her vitals were through the roof, trying to accommodate for a second, fully developed life sharing her space. Energon consumption alone was at 500%. 

Her own was elevated, and her damage repair systems were in overdrive, but she wasn’t the focus right now. 

This was way too dangerous. She was not losing another ally. Firmly, Channel grabbed Puncture’s arm and squeezed it. 

“Release him. He’s killin’ you. Skyrend wouldn’t want that.”

But then again, what was the alternative?

Puncture spat. “Frag off. I’m not losing him again.” She winced with pain again and forced herself to stand. “I can take it. How long till your buddies arrive?”

Channel checked her comms and reissued her ping. At first, silence. Then another ping sounded from several hundred floors above. It was distant and small, but it was there, and it was a ping she recognized. 

Kup. 

“Give or take about thirty kliks,” she offered. “Think you can take it for that long?”

“Thirty?” Puncture almost looked ready to puff out her chest, though the action of even trying to appear nonchalant threatened to knock her over. “I can go for…for five times that many. I’ll be fine.” She gave a shaky thumbs up. 

Channel bit her derma, the worry and radiation making her tank churn. 

“Your buddies are coming?” Invert suddenly piped up. Her expression was one of worry, exacerbated when Channel nodded. “Autobots, like Ultra Magnus?”

“They won’t hurt you,” Channel said. “They’re just clean-up. This battle is done. We need’ta–”

“This battle is not done,” Invert snapped. “I’m still alive. You think they’re going to ignore me?”

Channel gave her a deep frown and slowly stood. “What, you plannin’ to fight or somethin’? This battle is done. Shockers’ is dead. You tryin’ to finish what he started?”

Invert��s expression darkened, her eyes narrowing. “I’m a Decepticon. Maybe our cause is dead, but the energon I helped shed is still live as a hot wire. Your fellow ‘bots will kill me.” She shook her helm. “I just got the life I’ve been wanting since I was forged. I am not about to give it up.”

Before Channel could say anything more, she heard the sounds of gears whirring, joints clicking, and optics activating. Behind her, the wall of remaining Seekers suddenly came to life, leaping from their pods to slam to the floor below. 

Shockwave had used maybe thirty of them. That easily left almost a hundred behind. And they were all reacting to Invert’s commands. 

Whoever had burst out of Shockwave. So he had forged himself properly with that bond. And though he was dead…the bond wasn’t. It was still alive, alive in the angriest Seeker she’d ever met. 

A Seeker who now controlled an army of the undead. Her tank may as well have dropped out of her body.

Channel immediately raised her servos in surrender. “Invert, calm down,” she said, cold fear pulsing through her systems. “We ain’t gonna hurt you. We’re just tryin’ to get the wounded out.” 

“And then you’ll turn around and shoot me while my back is turned,” Invert snarled, raising a fist.

“We ain’t–”

“You’d do it to Shockwave. Megatron. Soundwave. Starscream. Any Decepticon who ever held even an ounce of power. Like me. Like her.”

She pointed to Puncture, who twitched her antenna and narrowed her optics.

Channel didn’t protest her words, because they were true. Her comrades…they did plan to eliminate Puncture once her usefulness was through. How would her comrades react to Invert, who controlled almost a hundred mindless soldiers? If there was anyone who could ruin their hard-earned peace, it was her. 

Her, Puncture, Skyrend, any surviving Decepticon. The price of peace would be their sparks. 

Puncture growled beside her, clenching her fists. 

“I will not die here,” she snarled. “Invert, I spared you. Return the fragging favor, you glitch.” 

She dipped her chin. “Fine. Even’s even. But you, Channel–”

“I won’t say nothin’,” Channel cut in. “I ain’t told them nothin’ of you. If you run now, you can get away. Take ya Seekers, take ya weapons, disappear into Cybertron’s depths. They’ll never even know ya existed.” 

Invert looked between the two of them with regard. “Prove it.”

Channel almost groaned in exasperation, but an idea suddenly burst into her helm.

“I’ll force myself t’ forget you. Me and Puncture.”

“What?!” Puncture protested, but Channel silenced her with a single servo. 

“See these pads on my servos?” She presented them. “They let me access the minds’a others. Includin’ my own. I’ll erase you from both’a us, and then we can’t talk even if we wanted to.” 

Invert raised an optical ridge. “Really? You think I’ll fall for that?”

“What other choice you got, ‘sides destroying us both? But careful now, Invert–you extinguish Puncture, and Skyrend might go up like a quantum engine filled with the wrong kind’a fuel. You wanna lose your army and life at the same time?”

Invert growled. “Fine. Do it, then. Now.”

Puncture glared at her, and Channel felt slightly sheepish beneath her gaze. “I’m sorry,” she muttered, reaching for her helm.

Invert raised a servo and pointed at her. “No, not her.” Channel froze as two Seekers stepped forward, grabbing her and lifting her off the ground. “Just you. Puncture, I don’t want you to forget me. You’re too proud to let the Autobots get the last blow in, aren’t you?”

“Shut up.” 

“Even’s even. But I don’t want to be even. I want to win.” She looked back to Channel. “You do it to yourself. Now.”

Channel vented defiantly, but already one of the Seeker’s was moving her servos to her helm, which the other helped open. 

She had promised. It was time to make good on it. If she didn’t, the others would be in for a warm welcome of laser fire. 

“Alright. Careful with my servos, they break easily,” she grumbled, pressing the pads against her own helm to access her brain. “Now–”

She didn’t remember the rest. When her optics onlined again, she lying on the floor, Puncture crouched beside her. They were alone in an empty hangar. Hundreds of empty pods honeycombed the wall. Something important had happened here, something she didn’t quite remember. She moved a servo to Puncture’s massive arm, blinking a few times in the process.. 

“It’s over,” Puncture said, meeting her optics. “You can relax.”

Her voice was strained. Channel frowned and scanned her.

“Your systems are indicating overload,” she chastised back. “Sit down. Ain’t no honor in sufferin’. You’ve done enough. We…we did defeat Shockwave, right?” 

“Yeah. We did.”

Puncture slowly lowered to the ground beside her. Channel moved just enough to sit on her leg, intentionally positioning herself so that her body was in the way of Puncture’s sparkchamber. If her Autobot brethren wanted to shoot on sight, they’d have to kill one of their own. 

“Of their own”. They’d already let that happen with Uptick, with all those guards they’d left unaware at base. She was little more than another bullet sponge, a body to be commanded, used, and discarded once it lost its energy. 

She ran her servos over the Autobrand on the side of her helm and stared at Puncture’s torn chassis. Perhaps it was time for her to do the same. 

But first, medical care. She pinged Kup again–how long had it been since she’d asked him to come down here?--and he pinged back, much closer than she remembered–remembered? She hardly remembered anything at all. But that didn’t matter. Soon, it would all be over, and they’d be in medical berths and able to finally relax. 

For now, she leaned against Puncture’s warm chassis and listened to the beat of two sparks within it.

Wait, two?

—--------------------

Streaks of light ran across the sky like teardrops as more debris from the planet eater’s body entered the atmosphere of Cybertron. The sparkeater watched them run the length of the horizon and burn out, waiting for the one that would fully endure its plummet to the land below. Red streaks joined the legions of white, indicating the burning of fuel as colored jets from below filled the air. But the sparkeater cared nothing of them. 

It needed only await the arrival of its second half, and all would be complete. And soon enough, one of the stars from the sky fell in its direction, the glowing white orb of its body rapidly growing in size as it approached its target. 

The sparkeater watched it, unblinking and stock still. The star approached rapidly, threatening to blow them both away with its impact. But before it could slam into the communications tower, it suddenly stopped and hung in midair, just inches from the surface of the roof. 

Before the sparkeater was an orb of golden and gray metal. It was smooth, too smooth to be natural. Its fiery entrance could not have caused such a thing. As the sparkeater watched the surface of the orb slowly began to reshape, melting away as if it had always been liquid. 

Like a broken geode the orb opened up, revealing a pitch black chamber. Something within shifted, and yellow eyes met the sparkeater’s green. They held for a long time as the stars fell from the sky. 

Then a croaky voice spoke. 

“Who are you?” The being asked. “How did you get that crystal?”

The sparkeater did not answer. It had no need to. Stepping down from the satellite, it approached the orb.

The thing inside shrieked like a banshee. “What are you?” It asked now. “You are not my Solace. What are you? What have you done to him?”

The sparkeater was silent as it grabbed the entrance of the orb. Its green optics lit up the dark innards of the orb, and its neck cracked as it cocked its head. 

Inside was a hollow skeleton of what had once been a Cybertronian. The remnant lacked legs and arms, and for its neck it had only several long tubes. Its torso, the last intact part of itself, was half welded into the metal around it. Faded rusty plating could be observed only on the upper half of the torso, plating from which wires and tubes spilled out, long severed and bled for all the Energon they’d had. 

The remnant’s face was white and red, and from its head burst two horns, one which curved towards the sky, one towards the ground. Gold and black were they in color, matching the optics on the remnant’s face, for they had long gone dark, yet now animated with a strange golden power. 

Colorless crystals burst from several areas of the remnant’s body. They filled the back of its helm, sprouted from the sockets of its missing limbs, and occupied the empty spots of its torso. Its spark chamber was on display, opalescent spark within beckoning. But none of this was of interest to the sparkeater.

No. It cared only of the thing which had long become the remnant’s torso. Gold in color, the artifact was in the shape of infinity, bearing at its farthest arches two mirrors. One showed the world in inverse, and the other, for what it was. Filling in the spaces between were two sockets, one of which had become the remnant’s sparkchamber. The other was in the shape of a diamond, and was empty. 

The sparkeater reached into the orb and the remnant’s optics glittered. Immediately, the orb animated, its liquid metal moving to grab the sparkeater’s claws and hold it in place. 

“Answer me,” the remnant demanded. “How did you get that crystal? Where is my Solace?”

The sparkeater’s own optics glittered and, finally, it spoke. 

“Resist your lord no longer.”

The remnant’s optics went dark as a cackle rose in its throat. 

“Lord. Lord my lord. Oh lord my lord.” It laughed, the metal of the orb twisting and distorting with each choke of sound. “My lord, I have remembrances of you. My lord, I shall obey. O lord, my lord, my lord.”

The orb suddenly launched the sparkeater, collapsing in on itself as it did so. Metal ran over the ground and arose in the shape of a Cybertronian, one whose shape had long been destroyed but never forgotten. As it stood on shaky legs, metallic tubes and wiring burst from the sockets of the remnant, becoming like whips as its head jerkily inverted, yellow optics burning in the night. 

The sparkeater caught itself on the edge of the roof with its tentacles, using them to launch itself into the air and slam back down. It flared its limbs and showed its claws, emotionless green optics locking onto the taller remnant. The two of them circled one another as the stars continued to fall.

“Oh lord my lord,” the remnant repeated, its voice the gurgle of a dying mech. “To have lived this long under your torment. You offer me the chance to rest only to snatch it away. Your cruelty knows no bounds. This thing, is it him? Is it my Solace?”

The sparkeater said nothing once more. The remnant let out a croak of agony.

“No. It cannot be. He is safe. No matter where he is, he is safe.”

“Resist your lord no longer.” The sparkeater lunged with a swipe, just barely missing the remnant’s torso. In response, the remnant caught the sparkeater’s claw, its molten metal swiftly running up the length of its arm.

Equally swift was the sparkeater’s response. With a brutal jerk it tore its own claw off, activating its boosters to place distance between them. The molten metal consumed the arm and grew, swelled, then formed a dozen pinpricks in the air, all of which followed the sparkeater’s movements. 

Just in time it broke into a run, narrowly avoiding the darts which shot after it. Crossing the roof’s length in seconds, the sparkeater leaped, running down the tower’s length as the metal overhead flew into oblivion. 

Midair it froze, circled back, and returned to its master.

The remnant crept along the roof, head turning in circles as it moved. Its wiring snapped, reformed, and snapped again from the movement. 

“Oh lord my lord, this cannot be all you are capable of now. In your slumber you have weakened. Has your dream ended, dead Unicron? Do you feel the same darkness you once subjected to me now?”

The sparkeater clung to the tower wall, optics swiftly running over its surroundings. As the remnant moved for the edge it dug its wings into the metal and braced, launching at the first glimpse of metal peered over the edge. The remnant, bait successful, backed off instantly. 

Sharpened claws dug into a wall of molten metal. The sparkeater opened its maw in a silent shriek as its legs were swiftly torn away, its only savior the boosters in its tentacles. 

“Predictable. Feral. Lacking your tact and forethought.” More pinpricks formed and shot, their target little more than a sitting cyberduck. The sparkeater made no sound as it was assaulted, its tentacles torn from it in seconds. A final arrow shot into its chest, pulling it forward. 

“Worthless mockery.” The remnant whispered, extending its neck to circle the sparkeater’s head. “Leave my sight, worthless blight.”

The remnant’s head snapped forward, its barely functional jaws clamping around the sparkeater’s neck. In response, the sparkeater grabbed its lanky, wiry neck with its remaining claw, piercing the jacket and shielding in nanokliks. 

Its tentacles were gone, its wings had been blasted off, and its chestplate was rapidly leaking out life essence. But it still had a single claw, and with that claw, it would kill. 

No words were exchanged. Their optics did not meet. The act was swift, as it always was.

Both their necks sparked as they severed. The remnant’s head, too heavy for its weak wiring, fell to the ground, snapping its final few threads in the process. With it came the sparkeater’s own, green optics extinguishing as they were severed from their power source. 

Their bodies hit the ground. The molten metal lost its shape, running like mercury over the rooftop and off its edge. But only one remained inert. 

The sparkeater’s headless form animated, grabbing the ground with its barely functional arm. As it dragged itself towards the heads its plating began to pull, caught in the hold of the molten metal on the ground. The draconian head it had affixed flaked away, breaking off in pieces that floated in the metal like wood in a sea. Opalescent spark fluid trailed through like an oil slick. Yet still the arm persisted, reaching its head with little more than its skeletal structure left. 

The arm moved over the heads, scraping its decaying claws over their faceplates, searching for something. It found it, diamond in shape and warm to the touch. Grabbing the crystal from the helm of its host, the arm raised it high, almost breaking out of its socket as it and threw the crystal to the body left behind. 

The crystal flew in a high arch, straight for the socket it matched perfectly in shape. 

And it fell just short. The arm, its purpose finished, went limp. The sparks in the remains of the sparkeater were all that still moved. In the sky, the shooting stars had ceased to fly, their white streaks replaced now entirely by the red of Seeker jets. 

And those streaks grew in size as they approached the sight upon the communications tower. A short femme crouched upon the back of one jet, her single red optic scanning the scene below. 

“So that’s where he went off to die,” she said to no one but herself. “Take me down there. Now.”

The jet winged down in a circular motion as it approached, slowing down just in time to allow the femme to gently step off of it. Then it transformed back, standing up as an empty Seeker shell. 

The femme looked over the remains of the two abominations, her dermas curling in disgust. 

“Looks like something Shockwave would make. But what’s this?” She stepped towards the remaining body, curious, and plucked the crystal off the ground. 

A whispering filled her helm, a whispering so sudden and loud that she gasped and dropped it. 

“Leave it,” a voice croaked. Looking up, her optics fell upon the horned head, which, somehow, was still animate. “It will do nothing but destroy you.”

The femme raised an optical ridge and frowned. “And just what the frag are you?”

“I am Luster,” the head spoke, its golden optics staring off into nothing. The femme blinked in surprise. “And I was like you, once. Young. Excited. Hopeful. I found something which could end the war, I was sure of it. I let it destroy me.” It shuttered its optics. “Myself, and my love.”

The femme rolled her optics. “I’ve already done that. This thing here, the infinity sign, is that what you thought could end the war?”

“Yes. It is an artifact of pure power. Within it lies the ability to shape matter according to your will.”

“Really?” The femme grinned, kneeling, and grabbed the golden artifact, pulling it from the broken torso with only a bit of a struggle. “So as long as I have this, I can create anything?”

“Anything…so long as you give your everything. Your body, your mind, your spark, and all that you love.” 

The femme looked the artifact over, running the optics over in her helm. Then she looked to the head on the ground. 

“How do you use it?”

“No. I will ruin no more lives with that wretched thing. And know if you do, you will end up just like I have now.”

Invert looked out over the dawn sky of Cybertron, saw the sun rising on its horizon. The jewels of the stars had disappeared and the horned moon had begun its second orbit. Below her was the broken skyline of the city, and beyond that, the shapes of Autobot bases. Flying in the air above her was her army, circling their new leader, prepared to follow her lead regardless of where she would take them. 

The Autobots had not won this war. Megatron was dead. Shockwave was dead. Starscream was dead. Who knew where the rest of the cause had gone? But she was alive, and she was all that mattered. The future could be hers. Cybertron could be hers. 

“Thanks, Luster,” she said, dropping her gaze back to him. “You know, I knew someone just like you not so long ago. He also was a great help to me.” Stepping forward, she held the artifact under one arm and picked him up with the other. “I think we’ll get along just fine, if you’re anything like him.”  

Luster blinked. “What…what are you going to do?”

“You’ll see,” she grinned, stooping to pick up the crystal. “They all will.” 

Slotting the crystal into the artifact, she disabled her audials, letting the whispering fade into nothing. 

Invert held the artifact before the glow of the morning sun, an almost maniacal grin on her faceplate. “Just you wait, Autobots. I’ll bring a new dawn to Cybertron, one all of you won’t live to see.” Then she turned back to her Seekers, mounting the one she’d left behind. “Come on, dead me’s–let’s fly.”

And they flew off, chasing the shadows the sun had banished. 

—------------ 

Maneuvering their ship to fly low over the cannibal planet, Luster had devised a plan to drill into it, using his crystal as a tracker to locate wherever the artifact presently was. Solace fidgeted nervously as they flew closer, as if the cannibal planet might suddenly activate and turn its jaws on them. 

It was unlikely and he knew that, why would a planet react to something as minor as a spaceship running over its surface? But after what he’d seen, he couldn’t help but fear it. Here he was with the love of his life facing down two seemingly impossible choices: search a cannibalistic planet for an artifact that may or may not help end the war, or return to their planet empty-handed and face the disappointment of everyone they’d ever known. 

He was caught between a rock and a hard place, and he had no plan for how to get out of it. But Luster did. And Luster…Luster acted, as he always did. 

“Here.” He disengaged the thrusters, letting their ship drift before activating its magnetized anchor. “I think here is just over where the artifact may be located.” 

Solace looked out the spaceshield and grimaced. They were dangerously close to the planet’s ‘mouth’. One wrong move and they could end up at the base of its horns. 

Luster in-vented deeply and moved for the airlock. “Alright, Solace, here’s my plan. I’m going to drop down there and start drilling as fast as I can. From my scans of this planet, it’s partially hollow inside–it’s got innards, but there’s plenty of space between them, so I’ll have plenty of room to move around in it. Once I’m in, I’ll search for the artifact.”

“What if there’s aliens inside of it?” Solace asked.

“There’s no movement inside of it. I haven’t seen anything indicating that there’s living beings within this thing. I think, at worst, it might have an immune system of sorts, but considering I’m a fragging drill tank, I think I can take them.” He beamed. “We’re made to work in lava, after all!”

Solace frowned. “I’m coming with you.” 

Luster lost his grin at that. “I’d really prefer you didn’t. I-I mean, Solace, someone needs to stay behind and watch the ship. And I can’t lose you. What if something happens down there–”

“Oh, so if something happens to you, I’m expected to just sit up here and be okay with letting you offline?!” Solace challenged, pointing an accusatory servo. “I’m a medic, Luster. I was made for helping mechs like you when they do stupid things like cave-diving into cannibal planets that might try to eat them. I am not being left behind.”

Luster blinked, then let out a small laugh. “You’re right, of course you aren’t.” His EM field lit up around him, mixing with Solace’s own and letting him feel some of that giddiness. “Primus, what am I saying? I could never leave you up here. We started this together, and we should finish it together!”

Solace flushed slightly, glad that his words had been so effective so quickly. Then he allowed himself to lightly chuckle as well, electricity crackling slightly from his servos. 

“Yeah,” he agreed. “We should. So, uh, how are we getting down there? We’re not just going to jump, are we?” 

Luster nodded, which made him grimace. “Of course we are…” he grumbled, but despite his complaints, shook his head and vented. “Alright, but you’re carrying me. I am not breaking my struts because we didn’t pack enough cable line.” 

Luster took his servo, and Solace felt his spark leap in his chassis. 

“Of course I’ll carry you,” he promised, warm EM field enveloping Solace again. “I’ll carry you anywhere, my Solace. My shining jewel. My sparkling diamond.” 

His faceplate flushed pink, at which Luster giggled and, unexpectedly, hit the button for the airlock, opening it and dragging them both inside. 

—

The inside of the planet wasn’t quite what he expected. Luster had been able to drill through its gilded surface without issue, and the two of them had dropped down into silvery innards. It was like a massive palace within, complete with halls and passageways. Luster held his crystal with one servo, his analytical optics moving over every inch of space before them as they travelled deeper into the planet. 

“Are we getting closer?” Solace asked, joining his partner in scanning the area. It gave him the creeps. Something about the fact that the planet around them was alive, and hungry enough to eat, made him feel unsteady. He moved closer to Luster for comfort, who welcomed him right in. 

“We are,” he whispered, turning his head. “There. That way!” 

A dark hall was before them, one riddled with curved tentacles that bore scythe like protrusions on their ends. Solace cringed at the sight. 

“I don’t think we should go that way,” he whispered, and Luster paused in his stride. 

“It’s the most direct,” he said back. “We’ll be fine. None of those things are active. Come on!” And taking his servo, Luster charged down the hall, dragging Solace with him. 

The moment they entered the lights turned on. Luster froze as the beams centered on him. Solace felt a cold chill run through his entire frame. As the lights affixed them both, the things on the walls suddenly animated. 

“MOVE!” Solace screamed, bolting forward. Luster yawped in surprise at the sudden force, stumbling as he struggled to keep up. His pede caught on a tile and he tripped, the crystal flying from his servos as he hit the ground. 

Solace stopped in his stride, his servos lighting up with electricity as he turned. “LUSTER!” 

“The crystal!” He yelled as the things descended on him. “Get the crystal!”

It had landed the length of two mechs away from him. Solace ignored it, charging back to Luster and grabbing the tentacles ripping at his plating. Bolts of electricity ran through him and straight into them, enough to restart a Cybertronian’s spark four times over. 

The force was hot enough that the things melted, their claws tinking uselessly to the floor. Disabling his electricity, Solace grabbed Luster’s shoulder and began to drag him away, the other finding his footing now that he was no longer besieged. 

“The crystal!” He repeated, and Solace rolled his optics before turning after it. The tentacles had completely ignored it, and he scooped it up with ease. 

More of the damnable things were animating in the walls. Solace grit his dentae and pointed back to where they’d come. 

“We need to retreat! We’ll never outrun them all!”

Luster’s gaze passed between him, the exit, and their intended destination. Wordlessly, he lunged, grabbing Solace and tucking him under his arm. Then, like a tank breaking through enemy lines, he charged forward, wincing slightly as the tentacles slashed at his plating and tore at his joints. 

Solace covered his head and closed his optics, begging Primus above that if this was how they died, that they might do so at the same time, to save one another the pain of loss. 

The choice never came. Luster broke from the line and ran straight over the lip of an open chamber, yelping as he tumbled down the lining of a crater. Solace curled in tighter on himself, his HUD reporting damage from all over his frame as the two of them were thrown towards the pit. 

Finally, at the bottom, it ended. He slowly raised his helm, taking in their surroundings. 

The two of them were in a metallic chamber, one which still bore the scent of raw protoform. They were in a smooth pit, with four entrances lining the edges above them. The walls bore biolights which glowed a gentle green, and at the very center of the pit was a pedestal of sorts. 

He heard a drip, and looking up, spotted what looked like a stalactite of golden metal. It was dripping its substance to the pedestal below–or rather, what was on the pedestal itself. 

A metallic object in the shape of infinity rested upon the pedestal. It was gold in color, with two mirrors on its opposite edges. One showed the world as inverted, the other, as it was. Between the loops of infinity was opalescent glass, with two shapes within it: one, diamond-like, and the other, rotund. 

Solace blinked in confusion, then turned his gaze to Luster. He was pulling himself off the ground, groaning. Energon was leaking from hundreds of scratches on his plating, scratches which looked deep enough to damage his delicate protoform. 

Immediately Solace was at his side. “Luster? How are you feeling?” He scanned him, picking up heavy damage to the exterior plating, but relatively little to his delicate innards. Solace vented a sigh of relief. “You look stable. Oh, thank Primus…”

But Luster said nothing to him, instead moving as if in a trance. He broke from Solace’s grip and beelined for the pedestal, holding the crystal forward as he did so. 

“Luster?” Solace said again, but his voice was lost on him. 

The crystal came into contact with the artifact and locked into place. One final drip of gold fell upon its surface, and Luster lifted it from its position upon the pedestal. 

As he did so a humming filled the air, so powerful and intense that his audials broke. Solace screamed in agony, disabling them too late. But even as his world was deafened, he could feel the vibrations of sound ringing through the air, making their way to Luster. 

And horrifically, he could do nothing but watch as Luster opened his chassis, presenting his spark to the artifact. It slotted perfectly within the circle atop. His body seized momentarily, then went completely still, holding the damnable thing like a lifeline. 

“Lus…ter?” He thought he said it, though Solace couldn’t hear his own voice. He tried to spread his EM field over to Luster, to feel it brush against his, to experience that temporary comfort once again. 

What brushed back against him was cold and massive. It was so unbelievably big he could barely comprehend its full scale. And as Luster turned on him it threatened to swallow him whole, to break him down to his most basic elements, and to remake him as nothing but itself. 

Luster took a step forward. Solace winced and retreated back, raising his servos to protect his face. And that enormous field gave a command, one they both felt. 

The last thing he saw was the flash of the artifact. The last thing he felt was the ripping of his spark from his chassis. And the last thing he thought was how greatly he wished they had stayed home. 

And then he was gone. 

—

Solace convulsed once, twice, on the ground. The power running through him had its way with his frame, twisting it, reforging it, reshaping it, into what Lord Unicron desired. A perfect soldier, a perfect monster. The first of many. 

His soldier ceased all movement entirely, its spark giving out as its charge was torn away. Slowly, metal burst from its back, metal which formed tentacles identical to the ones which had previously given chase to them both. They lifted Solace’s limp form off the ground, raising him up as his optics onlined again. 

They were gold. Luster moved a servo to stroke his faceplate, feeling the warmth of his plating. 

“My sparkeater,” he cooed. “My love. My perfect soldier.” The artifact was warm against him, thrumming with the energy it had taken from Solace. The very pulse of his life had been absorbed, rewritten, and returned. Whatever remained stayed with him. 

Solace did not speak, did not return his affection, did not even blink. He only stared, awaiting a command. Luster frowned. 

“My Solace,” he said, taking his servo away. “We’ve done it. We’ve found the artifact that will turn the tide of the war. How are you feeling? Speak to me.”

Solace only stared. 

“My shining jewel. You are the first of my Lord’s creations. The first of his promises to me. Doesn’t it feel amazing? You’ve been reborn.”

There was no response. 

“My sparkling diamond, you’re still in there, aren’t you? My Solace?”

Water cannot pour from an empty cup.

The power which thrummed through him was warm, but Luster had never felt colder in his life. 

Go, the word of Unicron echoed through him. The power to shape matter, to make an army, is at your command. Go and conquer. Bring back to me what you plunder. Take the lifeblood of your planet and present it for me to drink. 

In the moment, it had been so easy to say yes. In the moment, he hadn’t had to think, only act, as he always did. And now, before him, he saw the consequences of his actions. 

An army of Sparkeaters, run by the Autobots, would decimate the Decepticons. An army of Cybertronian slaves would decimate Cybertron. And a decimated Cybertron would give them nowhere to live, nowhere to go, and nothing to call home anymore. 

He had sold his very species to the chaos bringer. And the first of his kind to fall to his hubris was the one he loved most. 

“Oh, Solace,” he whispered, his voice cracking. “Oh, my Solace…” 

He threw his arms around the inert sparkeater, who did not respond to his movements, his voice, his emotions. 

You have your power. Go.

It was all he could do. 

“Yes, lord, my lord.”

—

They reached the surface of the planet with no issue. Solace followed him loyally like a cyberdog would its master. Luster couldn’t bring himself to look at him anymore, to face what he’d done. 

With only a bit of effort, he used the artifact to generate stairs, stairs which brought them back to the ship they’d called home for so many years now. Opening the airlock, he welcomed Solace in first, who obeyed him without complaint. Luster closed the doors behind them and headed for the control panel. 

The coordinates for Cybertron displayed on the screen. He selected them and watched the ship chart a course, predicting that in a few hundred thousand years, they would reach their destination. There was enough fuel left for their journey if they entered low power mode, adding another two-hundred thousand additional years. During that time, both of them would sleep.

And during that time, Unicron would follow them, awaiting his promised gift of Cybertron. 

Luster stared at the coordinates on the screen, then at his own servos, the servos which had doomed Solace, were dooming his entire species right now. 

For once in his damnable life, he needed to think before he acted. For once in his damnable life, he needed to make a decision he wouldn’t live to regret. Maybe it wasn’t entirely possible, but he could still try. 

He always fragged things up. No matter what he did, he always did something wrong. Today, he would change that. He’d ruined Solace, he’d ruined himself, but he was not about to ruin Cybertron. He’d fix it. He’d fix all of it. 

But his lord knew his face, his signature, his mind. He could not leave. At the same time, he could not keep Solace here, to rot, forever, as his slave.

He would rather offline a thousand times than let Solace be this. What could he give to fix it?

Everything. He could give everything. He could take his place. He could be…

He could be the sparkeater. 

Luster lowered his servo, dismissing the coordinates to Cybertron. “Ship,” he commanded, “plot a new course to the farthest planet you can reach. Anywhere is good, so long as it’s safe.”

The ship loaded for a moment before displaying new coordinates to a planet called ‘Earth’. Luster nodded and tapped them. “It’ll do. How long will it take to reach there?”

The estimate was around three point five million years. He nodded again. 

“Prepare to launch.” Turning to Solace, he gestured for him to follow. “Come on, my Solace. We’ve got to get ready for our journey. Have you ever heard of ‘Earth’?”

Solace did not respond. Luster resisted the solvent pricking at his optics as he descended into the bowels of their ship, back to the pods that they had rested in only a solar cycle before. 

The ones he and Solace had slept in were still on, side by side. Luster moved to deactivate the one he’d slept in, then climbed into the other, turning so that his back hit its wall. 

“Solace, stand before me,” he commanded, and the other obeyed. “Good, thank you. You remember this pod, right? You know I invested extra Shanix in yours, to ensure it was as comfy as possible? I know you love your sleep.”

There was no recognition in those yellow optics. Luster couldn’t help the solvent running down his faceplate now. 

“Right, of course, it’s not good for me to tease you. You sleep a lot because you work hard. You always do, even when it hurts you. And you always…you always encourage me, even when I frag it all up. I…I just wish you’d take better care of yourself, you know? You–you have potential to be the–the prettiest mech on Cybertron. Just a bit of polish and love, and you’d shine like a jewel. Like…like my jewel. Was I…did I…I…I should have gotten on you more, shouldn’t I?”

Nothing. 

He felt like he was going to choke. “I should have. Maybe you…maybe you would have…maybe I would have…”

But what could have stopped him from taking the actions he did? Certainly not himself. And he would not stop himself now. 

“Solace,” he sniffled, “I’m going to give you a gift. It’s all I have left. I’m going to let you go. I’m going to let you be free from me. From all my stupid mistakes. And I want you…I want you to take what I’ve invested the most amount of my time in, too, while you’re at it. Take it, and…and forget about me.”

He focused, the energy in the artifact gathering within him. It hung in his spark, lighting up the top mirror which showed the world in inverse. 

“Show me your spark, Solace,” he commanded for the last time. Obedient as ever, Solace did just so. 

He didn’t quite know what happened next, only that in one moment, he was in his body, gripping the artifact and looking out at Solace. 

And in the next, he was looking down at his body, still holding the damnable golden thing. 

With his new hands he reached forward and plucked the thing from Solace’s grip. His spark, which could not power the artifact, had retreated into its new chamber, cozy and warm in the body of a Cybertronian, not a sparkeater. 

No, that was his body now. Turning the artifact on its head, Luster plucked the crystal from its second half, the last piece required for activation. He placed it within the socket on Solace’s forehead and backed away, a tiny smile tugging at his dermas. 

“You look beautiful, Solace,” he whispered, tears running down his faceplate. “You are beautiful. And I hope you never forget that.”

Closing the pod, he turned and set the coordinates, ordering them to launch in five kliks. Then he wiped their coordinates and their map, along with every other bit of data he could find. No matter what, he didn’t want anyone to find out what had happened here. Returning to find the artifact, to find Unicron, and guiding him back to Cybertron…

No. He would not allow it. 

By the time he’d finished, the timer was at fifty nanokliks. Before it could launch he opened the airlock, leaping from the ship just in time to watch it soar away. 

The last Luster saw of his love was a twinkle in space, disappearing into the void of the unknown. He said a final prayer to Primus, not for forgiveness, but that Solace might find his new home safely. 

Then he returned to the reality that he was alone, in the cold void of space, with a planet-eating god whose great eye was now turned on him, well aware of his betrayal. The humming in his head was not an enraged shriek. It was a cold, knowing threat. 

“Lord Unicron–” he began, and received a strike in his head so painful it caused him to scream. Before he could react, the floor gave, dragging him below. Metal wrapped around him tighter than any vice, digging into his plating and burrowing into it. 

For his betrayal he would suffer–but without his spark, the artifact could not be powered. So Unicron would not kill him, oh, no. He was too valuable for that.

Instead, he would be brought to the darkest depths of the planet, and sealed away in a chamber where no one could hear him scream. And as the metal welded into his body, it began to eat. For three point five million years, it would eat. 

Cell by individual cell, flake by individual flake, Luster would be savored, consumed, and absorbed by the planet eater.

[midnightkolrath]

Time for another chapter of 'Leo analyzing DMC stuff' with something that woke me up at 4 AM to think about, as a sudden ponder point

So, the series has a running joke of impalement, namely with Dante being impaled by some sort of sword. Mostly his own sword, though. This little running gag comes full circle in DMC5, when Dante laments on why he was given Rebellion and decides to impale himself with the handle that then proceeds to combine with the Sparda sword to unlock his Sin Devil Trigger form.

But thinking about this more, I realized that this sort of thing has been common, not just with Dante himself.

Though, I'm gonna start talking about his thing with DMC3 here.

With the DMC5 screenshot I've included with Dante's dialogue, plus thinking back about that very moment in DMC3, we know Dante unlocked his devil trigger thanks to Vergil through impalement of his own sword. This is THE main moment we see of a form like devil trigger be unlocked this way.

But, funny enough, if we fast forward into DMC4...we get yet another moment where we have our protag be impaled and awoken to atleast a FORM of their devil trigger...with Nero.

As a side tidbit, the details of this awakening are elaborated in the DMC4 novel, Deadly Fortune, where Nero recalls a dream he had after gaining his demonic arm, featuring a familiar voice (that we know is Vergil) that he remembers again as he went temporarily unconscious. (Though in the novel its implied he temporarily died before reviving...it states his 'heartbeat stopped', though the way its pictured in the game...who completely knows).

This moment of remembrance is what triggers not only the first (incomplete) form of Nero's devil trigger, but the reconstruction of the Yamato. This is the second time the domino effect of being stabbed (or perhaps simply overwhelmed in Nero's case...though Agnus did rub the salt in similarly to Vergil against Dante...not with his own sword but with a sword-like object...maybe its a parallel) resulted in the awakening of a devil trigger, or a newfound power.

Now, if we do the fun thing and roll both forward and back, we'll see that Dante and Nero weren't the only ones that experienced a power awakening this way. Thanks to Visions of V, we get a short flashback of Vergil's childhood. This included the very moment there was the demon attack that killed Eva and separated the twins, sending them on their own paths.

A VERY significant moment we (tragically) get to see is a young Vergil getting attacked by these demons, while he's alone. Its horrifying, but also shares a similar theme though much more brutally.

In fact, its similar to Nero's case, which involves impalement like Dante but grows into being overwhelmed to the point of helplessness. ALSO funny enough, its this bit of helplessness, of feeling that power is NEEDED to get themselves out of the situation they're in to survive for one way or another...that Yamato comes right to their side. When its needed most.

This is, for Vergil, an awakening to what would become his path to gain power at any cost, to never have to feel this helplessness again while also being haunted about the lack of strength he had to protect his mother.

Its interesting that this moment mirrors Nero's claim to yamato in DMC4, with even the desire and call for more power led to Yamato returning to its restored form and going to Nero's side. Like father, like son.

My original point, though, was how a funny ironic running joke of being impaled one way or another in this series apparently leads to awakening of power or resolve for the Sparda clan. This series has many running themes if you look for them, but this is one I've noticed lately. I wonder if Sparda himself went through something like this in his time (heh).

[lifeisabitch-butimcute]

this is such a belated self-rec but i've been thinking about Stars on Ice again. does anyone ever spend so long working on a fic they start to hate it and then come back later and realize it kinda ate? like i hated it by the time the last chapter went up but i've gotten a few notifs recently praising it and i was like was it actually that good? so i went back and read it and actually not to stroke to my own ego it was fuckin good!

Intro? ate.

It was 9 AM and Sirius was already exhausted. He’d been awoken at the asscrack of dawn - pre-dawn, actually - by Regulus banging on his hotel door and yelling, “I’m defending my title of National Champion in four hours , Siri, we need to move!” And Sirius, ever the devoted big brother/coach/choreographer that he was, had dutifully dragged himself from the warmth and comfort of his bed to trail after him. 

dialogue? ate.

“Close your mouth, Reggie, you’ll catch flies,” sniped Sirius from next to him. Regulus whipped around to scowl at him. “Is your plan to sleep this whole flight? Do you even care ?” Sirius’ face hardened, but Regulus didn’t back down. James turned in his seat to poke at his seatmate, who was also asleep. “ Remus ,” he hissed. “ Get involved .” A small groan told them when he was awake. Sirius’ head whipped around at the noise, brotherly drama temporarily forgotten. After a sniff and a few shuffling noises, a hand popped up over the edge of the seat, holding two chocolate bars. Then, in a grumble, “Can whatever you’re fighting over please wait until we’re on solid ground again?”

pandalily interlude? think about it every day actually

“Some people might call you a control freak, but you’re not, in the traditional sense. You want to be controlled.” She watched Lily’s face as it took on something more guarded, uncertain.  “But you don’t like the expectations that are attached,” Pandora continued. “You don’t want to be remote controlled from a pedestal. You want to be led through the mud by a leash.”

anyways. read your old writing it's not as much of a mess as you think it is. also go read Stars on Ice if you wanna read some gay disasters on ice

[leafkingofbirds]

Hi, I'd love to see some headcanons or a fic of a male Kieran with a pregnant Mc or Female Kieran who's pregnant with a male mc. I love your work btw ^♡^

Thank you <3

I've actually got a fic in the works like this - with pregnant MC and male Kieran - but it's pretty far down my priority list right now unfortunately. I'll definitely return to it when I can though!

Male Kieran would, of course, be obsessively worried over pregnant MC and not allow her to lift a finger, causing her no end of annoyance :) He's overly concerned for MC's health and his anxiety and need to protect her goes into overdrive. He's over the moon (lol pun) but he's also entirely clueless about pregnancy and babies and secretly enlists Salma and Silvia to teach him things like diapering and baby care. It's possible he's never even seen a baby before, but he's determined to be the best father ever, and no one is prouder or more protective than he is.

A female pregnant Kieran would at first perhaps be shocked - Fae children are rare enough that she hadn't considered it possible to happen so soon. But she stubbornly refuses to admit she might need to slow down or let up in her duties even when ill, but eventually allows MC to care for her and take over more duties of the realm temporarily. It takes a long time to sink in that this is actually happening, and she has a hard time letting herself trust that tragedy isn't about to strike. Perhaps she confesses one night to MC that she's actually terrified for something to happen to the baby, or that a threat will arise and she won't be able to protect him or the Moon Court. It isn't until she first feels the baby kick that it suddenly becomes real - that she's going to have a family of her own once more.

I feel terrible for how little I've been able to write for TCH lately, so here's a little bit of that fic as a preview:

Ella doesn't believe it at first. 

“It's only a few days late…and time here affects mortals differently…” she tells herself, wringing her dress nervously in her hands, her heart racing.

Even as she says it, she knows it’s been more than a few days. But time had a way of confusing her in this realm, even after she’d lived here so long.

Kieran is off on one of his patrols today, taking his horse for a ride through the woods as has become his habit lately, ensuring his lands and their occupants remain peaceable. He offered Ella to accompany him, as they often went exploring together. The forest was as safe for mortals as it has ever been now, and Ella had enjoyed many months of learning the ins and outs of the realm over which she now helped Kieran rule, mapping the paths of the forest and committing them to memory. 

But this morning she had awoken with a stomach churning of acid and bile and jittery nerves, and couldn’t stand the thought of the jostling carriage, much less horseback. 

“Next time,” she told him, offering a shaky smile, knowing she looked pale and sickly and that would set off alarm bells with her overprotective new husband. 

Kieran had frowned in concern and came to her, touching her cheek with the back of his hand. She had explained to him once that mortals often grew feverish when sick, and from then on had always checked her temperature at the slightest complaint. “Are you unwell, beloved?”

“Just an upset stomach,” she’d said, taking Kieran’s hand from her face to give him an encouraging squeeze. “Likely something from dinner didn’t agree with me. But don’t let that stop you from getting some fresh air. I’ll take something for my stomach and perhaps go back to bed.”

He never likes to leave Ella behind, especially not so soon after their wedding, but that morning she’d convinced him to go on without her, and now the castle felt quiet and bereft. 

Now she can think through this on her own for a bit, and decide what, if anything, is to be done, without the spectre of Kieran’s shadow right there at all times, worrying over her. She didn't want to concern him unnecessarily.

Once she knew if her suspicions had merit, then she would tell him. She didn't want to get his hopes up. Or his fears.

She hasn’t let herself think through the possibility that this could happen. What Kieran had told her, the one time she brought it up – that Fae children were rare – had put the thought out of her mind. That this sort of thing may not happen for years, if ever.  Still, she thinks it best to go to someone who knows, privately, just in case. And this isn't something Kieran would have any knowledge of at all.

[braindamagedrizz]

Wait I was going through your stuff and you said that Ruizx (I cannot remember how to spell for the life of me I am so sorry) was an arcstrider AND a dawn blade? Fascinating

No worries LOL I misspell Ruxiz's name so much too, He also can be called Rui if that's easier to remember! Okay so the whole thing with Ruxiz's Dawnblade/Arcstrider thing was basically in one of the stories I've made for him, he was in a self-proclaimed exile after faking his death and pretending to be a Warlock awoken that was working under The Spider in The Tangled Shore before Spider hit the road. Ruxiz eventually got found by these cultist Awoken where were like, actively denying Mara Sov's reign and had a patriarcal system going on. (Bare with me here, there's more to the story im just summing it up) ANyways, these cultist Awoken were hunting down an Ahamkara that had entered the Sol System and they called upon The Vanguard. Ruxiz is still masquerading as a warlock while under the control of this cult (Not even the cult knew he was a hunter), so everyone was like 'wtf is wrong with you why can't you use warlock abilities'. So, allying temporarily with The Vanguard, Osiris eventually offers his aid in tracking down this ahamkara and engages with Ruxiz who at the time was going by 'Rui', and his Ghost as 'Maroon'. Osiris basically pulls out his years of being Felwinter's student on this poor hunter, assisting him and trying to teach him how to use his Dawnblade despite being Lightless and he to was like. "What the hell, why can't you activate your Dawnblade, stop crying!" It was basically this entire thing of Osiris just getting very frustrated with Ruxiz because Ruxiz is obviously a Hunter, he's a gunslinger when using Solar, but by some miracle eventually did activate a Dawnblade before it set him on fire. Long story short, local hunter disguised as Warlock gets yelled at for 3 weeks by angry lightless warlock until he brute forces himself into activating the super of another class. Ruxiz being a hunter does eventually come out further into the story, but by that time he's used his Dawnblade multiple times and eventually began using it alongside his Arc spear. Ikora knew the whole time because of her hidden LOL --- Basically me going 'haha what if we could use the abilities of other classes' then forced Ruxiz to endure Osiris.

I'd like to state that this story came before I made Ruxiz's custom subclass and replaced the Dawnblade aspect, so this is just one of many of Ruxiz's little 'storylines'. This entire story is a mess, and it has so many plotholes but I love it dearly because it's my first creation and I made it when I first joined the fandom.

[nonbinary-salieri]

hhhhhhhhhh I found a thing about Antonio Salieri's older brother from @thedianex113

Though, it's in Italian

My friend, you've appealed to the music history lover in me. Okay, so I don't know Italian but I do know French so with rudimentary knowledge of Romance languages and Google Translate, I've come up with a rough translation of the cover. From top to bottom:

Musicology Notebooks from the University of Verona

Sources (or collections maybe?) of Venetian Instrumental Music Between the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries

Collected by Elisa Grossato

Francesco Salieri

Symphony in B flat Minuet

Introduced and Edited by Francesco Bissoli

Complete (Final? Closing?) Edition

It's from Academia.edu so it's free to download a pdf of it as is, or if you frequently search for academic papers, you could sign up and it offers a translated version (I'm not sure how reliable it is, though). Francesco Salieri and his life experiences are sadly not very well documented so he is a rather enigmatic figure. He and Antonio were separated due to the death of their parents when Antonio was 15, so I'm not sure if he would have had more insight about his brother. If you're looking for more on our most beloved Toni, might I suggest Dwight's Journal of Music? You'll find many pdf copies of many of the volumes on Google Books for free. Also, if you haven't already read this, here's the one that sparked my journey to know more about Salieri: https://www.academia.edu/3274737/The_Real_Story_of_Antonio_Salieri_Classical_History_Fall_2011_at_USM_?source=news_feed_share

[ddarker-dreams]

Hi Lock <3 I don't know if this has been asked before but I had this thought yesterday at 5 am... What happens to Scara's darling after he wipes his existence from Teyvat? Would he try to pursue them again? If so, would there be anything he'd do differently than before? He knows what works and doesn't now after all...

hello ada !!!!

WHEW BOY... do i have some thoughts on this... let's see if i can get enough neurons firing to capture what i have in mind. some of this response involves conjecture on my part about genshin's overall lore, but i promise i'm going somewhere with it. pinky swear. stick with me.

one of the key takeaways from scara's archon interlude is the flow of teyvat's fate. at first, i found it very odd that scaramouche erasing his existence had so little consequence. i've always been of the belief that even the smallest, seemingly insignificant acts can have unforeseen consequences on the future (butterfly effect type beat). at first i thought mihoyo was being lazy by keeping everything in this teyvat 3.0 essentially the same with teyvat 2.0 (and tbh who knows maybe this is the case and i'm reading way too into it bc i overanalyze anything scara related), but then i wondered if this is a hint at the type of universe teyvat is.

then i considered the possibility teyvat is ruled by a type of predeterminism. while we don't know exactly what the heavenly principle are, apparently the original chinese characters for what's translated as heavenly principles can be read as destiny (and or fate). this make me wonder if teyvat has a set of 'rules' that, for whatever reason, must be adhered to. if something disturbs this delicate balance, the universe reorganizes itself in such a way that it closely mimics the universe before it.

ALRIGHT . all that to say.

wouldn't this spell the ultimate tragedy for scaramouche's darling? a delicious tragedy, but a tragedy nonetheless.

for some inexplicable reason, the story woven by fate for his darling is one of subjugation. the universe rewriting itself does not change the genre of their play. no matter what point they start at, the ending to their story has already been determined. in this teyvat 3.0, the kabukimono is still drawn to them, still obsessing to an unhealthy degree. perhaps it's not as bad as living under scaramouche's thrall, but bad is a relative term here, this is still no way to live. kabukimono is granted a set of advantages which scaramouche never had, namely his naïve personality lending itself perfectly toward manipulation. he embeds himself into your side and makes it so it hurts you to try and pull him out. he'll get tearful, apologize profusely for crossing another line, quietly pleading to not be left behind when you're all he has.

then comes the events of the archon interlude.

when the blank slate version of kabukimono takes on all of scaramouche's memories, coalescing into one, your close ties surprise the freshly awoken scaramouche. in teyvat 2.0, he hesitated while wading through irminsul; it had been you who pushed him to make the decision to erase 'scaramouche', the sole source of your woes. after gazing through your memories from your lens, he saw the extent of your despair, felt it reverberate in his hollow chest cavity. it occurred to scaramouche that you really would have been better off without him, painful as it was to admit it.

so he resolved himself to do right by you just this once. his first and supposedly last act of sacrificial love toward you.

except... that wasn't the case. 'wanderer' as he goes by now condemns himself for his foolish, wishful thinking. what a revelation this is! the messy threads that pull you together are ties that can never be severed. this is definitive proof. in this universe where you were meant to be free, you still found him, or to be more specific, he still found you. he's elated, he's thrilled. the energy that fills him at this realization is more invigorating than when he temporarily became a god. yours is a story whose script shall never be altered.

after departing from the sanctuary of surasthana, it doesn't take long for the wanderer to happen upon you again. it's as if your presence quietly calls out for him.... whispering, beckoning.

the first words he says to a somewhat confused you are as such:

"how good it is to see you again."

[justyouraverage-simp]

daddy day care// steve rogers

pairing: dad!steve rogers x reader, slight bucky barnes x reader (platonic)

summary: when bucky goes on a mission and it goes wrong causing him to become a 6 year old boy once again who better to look after him than his two best friends.

warnings: none currently

a/n: guess who's back! i'm finally writing again and im so happy! ive been so busy with college and work but as it's christmas i've had time to write. i am currently working on my first request and i'm so excited for you to read it but first have this fic!

Y/N and Steve were sat in the living room watching TV when their four year old daughter, Sarah Jamie Rogers, came rushing into the room clutching one of her teddies and she had a silver princess crown on her head. 

“Daddy, when's uncle Bucky going to be back?” She asked.

“Either tonight or tomorrow princess,” Steve said.

“Ughh, okay” Sarah groaned

“Why baby what’s wrong” Y/N said to her daughter who was now pouting slightly.

“I need someone to play tea parties with” Sarah stated as if it was common knowledge.

“I can play with you princess all you have to do is ask” 

“No I don’t want to play with you, you don’t play it properly”

“Oh I’m sorry, I didn’t realise you could play tea parties wrong” Steve said jokingly, poking his daughters ribs causing her to giggle but then she stopped and wore a sad expression on her face once again. 

“You don’t wear the princess crown or the b-b-”Sarah stutters, looking to her mum for help. 

“Boa baby” Y/N said.

“Boa and without it it’s just not the same” Sarah said slightly whining. 

“Well, I’m sure when Buck gets back I’m sure he will want to play with you” Steve said, pressing a kiss on her forehead, “But until then why don’t me, you and mummy have a movie afternoon and I’ll go get some snacks and we can cuddle hmm?” 

“Yeeeaaahhh” Sarah yelled loudly, jumping onto the sofa elbowing Steve in his crotch causing him to grunt, standing up slowly and walking out the door. 

-

It had been two days since Bucky, Sam and Tony were due home from their mission and it was causing Steve and Y/N to worry none of them were answering their phones or had even contacted anyone in those two days.

“I’m worried they should have been back ages ago” Steve said pulling Y/N in closer rubbing his thumb up and down her arm absentmindedly.

“I know, if we don’t hear from them by tomorrow we will start to panic okay” Y/N said, pressing a kiss to his cheek. 

-

The next morning Steve and Y/N are awoken by loud banging on their bedroom door. Steve gets up and opens the door to see Sam stood panting.

“You’re back, what took so long,” Steve said, pulling Sam into a hug.

“Yeah um about that, we had a slight problem. Tony tried to fix it but without his tech he couldn’t so we had to come back”

“Why, what happened?” Y/N said standing next to Steve.

“It’s hard to explain, it’ll be easier to just show you” Sam said as he turned and rushed down the corridor. 

As Y/N and Steve entered the living room they saw Tony with his back to the two of them talking to Pepper who seemed slightly stressed but no Bucky in sight and that’s when Y/N heard it, the sound of tiny feet running across the floor and the sound of a small child's laughter. 

Y/N turned expecting to see Sarah except she saw a small brunette boy with bright blue eyes, Bucky.

“What the hell happened on that mission” 

“He may or may not have temporarily been captured by Hydra” Sam muttered 

“What!” 

“They have developed a new weapon, they used it on Bucky and when we found him he was a child” 

“So how do we fix this?” Steve asked as he watched Bucky jump onto the sofa giggling. 

“I’ll have to see what they actually did to him before I can reverse it, so it’s going to take a while,” Tony said.

“Okay, so what do we with him until then because he can’t be left alone, he’s a kid” Y/N said 

 “Well…” Tony said looking between Y/N and Steve, “I think it’s pretty clear who should look after him”

“I mean he isn’t wrong” Sam said “You two do actually have a kid that’s around the same age as Bucky”

“So does Tony” Y/N said

“Technically Morgan is older and I can’t look after him as well as try and reverse what they did all at the same time” 

“Maybe it would be good for us to look after him, he is your best friend and it will be good for Sarah to be around someone her age a bit more. We both know she misses Bucky” Y/N said as she turned to Steve.

“Okay, we will look after him” Steve said, pressing a kiss to her forehead. 

-

It had been three hours since Bucky returned and to say Y/N and Steve had their work cut out. Bucky was a ball of energy and with the serum it made it 20 times worse and when he was put in a room with Sarah and the two were wild. The two had always been close and when they were together they were always up to something and causing some sort of trouble and now they were the same age it was worse, mainly because Bucky now had the same energy levels as Sarah so he wasn’t getting tired as quickly so he could run around just as much as she could now. 

Y/N and Steve were laying on the sofa with her head resting on his lap as he rubbed her forehead slowly with his thumb. 

“Are you feeling okay? You don’t look so good” Steve said looking down at Y/N.

“Yeah just tired, they’ve just worn me out” 

“You sure, you’re not getting sick or anything are you?” 

“No, just tired. I think it’s cause I don’t have the serum but all three of you do” Y/N said, smiling up at Steve.

“Okay but if your tired go to sleep sweetheart”

“I’m okay, I just need to relax a little” Y/N said, although within twenty minutes she was fast asleep. 

-

It was the next morning and Y/N was standing in the kitchen making Bucky and Sarah breakfast whilst Steve was on a run, suddenly Y/N was hit by a wave of nausea. Holding back the urge to be sick when Sam came into the kitchen. Tony was slowly getting closer to solving what happened to Bucky and is working on something to bring Bucky back to how he should be.-=

“Can you keep an eye on the food and the kids please” Y/N asked Sam trying to talk quickly to get to the toilet quicker. 

“Yeah, you okay?” Sam asked with a concerned tone in his voice.

“Um maybe” Y/N said as she walked quickly to the toilet. 

She opened the door and kneeled in front of the toilet, shutting the door with her foot. 

“Hey, Y/N you okay?” 

Y/N recognised that voice from anywhere, Nat. Nat had become Y/N’s best friend, she was the reason her and Steve were together, for every big moment Nat was there. Her and Steve’s wedding, the proposal, Y/N finding out she was pregnant with Sarah, Sarah’s birth. It only made sense for her and Bucky to be Sarah’s godparents. 

Nat could hear her being sick and knew she hated it luckily she didn’t really have that problem with Sarah’s pregnancy. “Oh, Y/N.” Nat said, pulling her hair into a ponytail and tying it with the hairband she had on her wrist. “I know, just get it all out” She said, rubbing her back slowly. 

After a few minutes, Y/N sat up and leant against the wall next to Nat. “I think I might have food poisoning, I told Tony the chicken didn’t look cooked” Y/N said wiping her mouth with some tissue. 

“Babe, we all had the chicken and your the only one that’s ill” Nat said, that’s when it hit Y/N.

Her period was a few days late. She felt sick. Her hormones have been slightly out of whack but she assumed it was having another child around causing her to be slightly more reactive. But now that she thinks about the symptoms as a group she realises she felt the same around 5 years ago. When she found out she was pregnant with Sarah. 

Y/N jumped up and rushed to the bathroom that was connected to her and Steve’s bedroom with Nat following behind her. She could hear Nat calling her name but the adrenaline currently rushing through her veins. She rushed over to the sink and dropped to her knees and began rummaging through the cupboard. As she reached into the back corner that was when she felt the box. She opened the box and pulled out the white package. 

It had been 3 minutes and Nat was sat on the bathroom with Y/N. Y/N reached over to the white stick that rested near her feet. She picked it up and flipped it over. 

Pregnant.

Tears filled Y/N’s eyes as she felt Nat pull her into a hug. She wrapped her arms around Nat. Y/N wasn’t even sure how to feel, she felt overwhelmed. Would Steve be happy? How is Sarah going to react? And then there’s Bucky. Y/N is currently looking after two children and it’s hard work. Would she cope with three?

“Hey, look at me. It’s all going to be okay” Nat said as she wiped the tears off Y/N’s cheek with her thumb. Nat could tell that Y/N was overwhelmed. It happened when she found out she was pregnant with Sarah. Her mind just goes into overdrive thinking about all the possible outcomes, some good but some bad. 

The door opened causing Y/N and Nat to look towards it and saw Steve. 

“Hey, what's going on in here? It looks slightly dodgy. Should I be concerned?” Steve said as he walked into the bathroom leaning against the wall opposite the girls. 

“You should always be concerned rogers, you wife is sexy”

“Oh really Romanoff? I haven’t noticed” Steve said as he leant down to press a kiss onto Y/N’s lips, using his index finger to tilt her chin up. That’s when Steve noticed the white stick laying on the floor. 

“Y/N?” Steve said with a questioning tone in his voice “Is this what I think it is?” Y/N nodded quickly. Steve had never been so happy, his smile grew and he placed another kiss on her lips. Nat knew they needed a moment alone so she left and went to spend time with Sarah. 

He had always wanted a family pre-serum but after he came out of the ice he lost the desire. He couldn’t see himself having children with or marrying anyone other than Peggy. That was until he met Y/N. She changed him for the better and everyone around him noticed it, especially Bucky. When he came back from Wakanda he was finally ready to meet the girl his best friend wouldn’t shut up about and to say all three were nervous would be an understatement. Steve wasn’t sure what he would do if the two most important people in his life would get on but he couldn’t have been any further from the truth. The two immediately got on like a house on fire, if anything they got on two well. It was common for the two to pick on Steve. Especially once Sarah was born. It was Y/N’s idea to give Sarah the middle name Jamie in honour of Bucky. He saved Steve’s life multiple times and for that naming her child after him was the least Y/N could do. 

-

It had been a week since the pair found out they would be welcoming another life into the world. They were both laying in bed with Sarah in between them with Steve subtly rubbing Y/N’s stomach when they heard a knock at the door. Sarah immediately jumped up and opened the door. 

“Hey uncle Tony”

“Hey kiddo, where’s your parents?” Tony said, shocked slightly by the small person that opened the door.

“What do you need Tony?”  Steve said, standing behind Sarah with Y/N next to him. 

“I’ve done it, I can bring him back” Tony said, being careful what he said not knowing how much Sarah knew about the Bucky situation. 

“Are you sure?” Y/N asked, “It won’t hurt him will it?”

“Well I mean it might a little bit but it won’t cause any more damage to him” Tony said as Sarah ran off and grabbed her doll that was laying on the floor.

“That’s great, when can you do it?”

“Now. Where is he?” 

“Uh, terrorising Peter with Sam” 

“Okay let’s go save the kid and sort out that issue” Tony said as three of them leave with Sarah following behind, although she notices Nat and immediately runs to her. 

-

When they entered Tony’s lab Y/N was holding Bucky in her arms. Tony walked over to the two with a vial with a clear liquid in and handed it to Y/N. She placed Bucky on the floor and Bucky turned to look up at Steve.

“Stevie” Bucky said causing Steve to bend down onto one knee to be at Bucky’s eye level.

“Yeah buddy”

“I don’t want to drink the nasty liquid”

“I know but if you want to be back to yourself then you need to”

“What if I like being small? I don’t want to be big” Bucky exclaimed causing Steve to chuckle. “And Sarah will be sad she told me she likes me being little cause we can play all day” 

“I know but Sarah will have a new friend in about 8 months so she will be okay” Steve said quietly ruffling Bucky’s hair. Bucky looked slightly confused at first but then realised what they meant, Y/N was pregnant. 

“Hey, Bucky. I know you are feeling scared but I promise we would never do anything to hurt you, it will just be a little uncomfortable. We just need to get the old Bucky back” Tony said, kneeling next to Steve. The two had a complicated relationship and it took a while but eventually the two managed to put aside all the drama and tension  and are now civil. 

Bucky took the vial into his hand and poured it down his throat. He felt the liquid run through his body causing him to grunt.

-

Steve and Y/N walked into the living room where Nat and Peter were sat on the floor playing with Sarah. 

“Hey, there’s our little princess. Are you having fun?” Steve said as he picked Sarah up who came crashing into him.

“Yeah, we were playing princesses”

“I can tell” Y/N said looking at Peter who had a crown on his head and a tutu. 

“UNCLE BUCKY” Sarah screamed, wriggling out of Steve’s grip and colliding into Bucky’s legs. 

“Hey munchkin” Bucky said as he scooped up Sarah. 

“How are you big again” Sarah asked squeezing Bucky’s cheeks together

“Uncle Tony helped me out so now we can play again”

“But I liked when you were small, we could play more” Sarah said whining slightly.

“I know munchkin but we can still play, I will always play with you. You know that” Bucky said, pressing a kiss on her forehead.

Y/N looked over to Steve after seeing Sarah’s putty lip she felt guilty. She knew it was the hormones but there was one thing she knew would cheer up Sarah.

“Steve”

“Yeah baby” He said, wrapping an arm over her shoulders, looking down slightly at her.

“I think we should tell her” 

“You sure?”

“Yeah plus she will probably get suspicious soon” 

“Hey, it’s up to you. If you think we should tell her then we’ll tell her” Steve said pressing a kiss onto Y/N’s lips.

“Sarah, baby come here for me please”   

Bucky placed Sarah on the floor and she skipped over to her parents who were now sat on the sofa. 

“Hey princess”

“Hi mumma” Sarah says as she is placed between the two of them.

“We have something to tell you” Steve said 

“What is it?”

“You know how Peter is Morgan’s big brother?” 

“Yeah uncle Tony adopted him”

“Yeah exactly so how would you feel if you were to be a big sister in about 8 months” Y/N said, studying Sarah’s reaction which was a very confused one. 

“Mumma has a baby in her tummy” Steve said causing Sarah’s jaw to drop.

“A baby? How did it get there?” Sarah asked Y/N

“We will explain it when you are older princess” Y/N said chuckling as she kissed Sarah on the forehead. 

Sarah looked down at Y/N’s stomach for a few seconds and then lent in closer to it placing a kiss on her mum’s belly. 

“I love you baby”

[tsarbomba567]

Here's another Anacondrai OC that I've conjured up. Their name is Charles Chumsworth the Third, uncle of Pythor Chumsworth (104 years old, 10 ft 8 inches tall), younger brother of Arcturus Chumsworth (86 years old, 9 foot 4 inches tall), and the unknown 6th Anacondrai General that "died after the end of the First Serpentine War" (this is a lie). Standing at 9 foot 5 inches and 135 years old (though he's actually 85), this selfless uncle is a master military strategist and organizer, as well as being a flexible progressive; he is an albino Anacondrai, with his red eyes (though now his right eye is missing) and white, iridescent opal gems on his head and chest, although his white scales are now black, his purple scales silver, and his gold markings bronze. He wields both his and Arcturus' Anacondrai blades, as well as being able to practice magic (like the other generals). After surviving self-immolation due to unknown reasons, he's reawakened after 50 years (40 years of the Serpentine being entombed, 10 years after they were released), intent on finding and reuniting with Pythor.

Background:

When Pythor was a child, as well as growing up, Charles would often visit and play with the little Anacondrai, noticing how he resembled his mother, Olivia. The uncle would play with his cousin so much tha there would be times that Olivia and Arcturus found the two sleeping together, with Pythor holding his snake plushie, Cuddlesworth. As Pythor grew older, Charles began to less frequently come over to visit, though he would still have fun with his "little nephew," and the two had a very friendly relationship with each other. Eventually the two would part ways, with the uncle becoming an Anacondrai general, while Pythor spent his time at the library and with Pandora. It was also during this period that Charles would try to find a mate, though to no avail. Eventually, Chen would pull the strings that would cause the humans and Serpentine to be at each others throats, otherwise known as the First Serpentine War (which would last for 5 years).

He was only 75 when the First Serpentine War started, during which Charles lost his right eye to infection, resulting with him cutting it out; by its end, he was 80 and had temporarily evaded capture by the Elemental Alliance for several months before being cornered at the Fangblade Temple at what would eventually become the Mega Monster Amusement Park. After going into a secret chamber underneath the temple, he doused himself in lamp oil before committing suicide via self-immolation, and the Elemental Alliance left; the Temple was then demolished, however the humans in charge of it's destruction failed to destroy the secret underground chamber beneath the structure, since they weren't told of it's existence. Unknown to everyone, for some (divine) reason, Charles was still alive, only in a coma that went on for 50 years (during which he didn't age), until some human cataphilies - some time after the events of the Second Serpentine War - discovered a passage that led to the Anacondrai's resting place, only leaving after getting creepy vibes from the chamber (as well as the smell of burnt flesh). It was only here that the Anacondrai general finally awoken from his coma, only to see that not only was he alive, but that the fire had changed him: His white scales had become obsidian black, his purple scales a polished silver, and his golden markings a tarnished bronze. After getting up, he went exited the secret underground chamber, only to find that the Serpentine Temple has ben replaced by an amusement park; luckily, it was night, so he turned invisible and fled the area.

A few days later, Charles - with his armor and two Anacondrai blades (one of which is his, the other Arcturus') - infiltrated a library at night and got his hands on a BorgPad, which someone left unlocked. From there, he learns about the two Serpentine Wars, the Serpentine being entombed and released, Pythor being "the last Anacondrai," and the shenanigans involving the Oni and Overlord, among other things. Obviously Charles is distressed about learning all of this information, and swiftly leaves the library. After several more days, he makes his home somewhat far from a human settlement, where he noticed that they appear to have a legend about "The Woman of the Woods." Gathering his thoughts, he makes the decision to start hunting for his nephew, hoping to one day reunite with Pythor. That would have to wait though, since a flood sweeps throughout Ninjago; luckily for him, the flood didn't reach his camp and proceeded to recede some time later. Five years later, he goes and begin his quest to find his "little nephew," while also taking precautions to prevent exposure and possible capture.

[starlit-serenade]

Wash Away

🧼 Summary: When you're feeling low in the middle of the night, you go to wash dishes to relieve some stress and worry, and your concerned girlfriend Ryujin, comforts you.

🧼 Word Count: 1,031 words

🧼 Pairing: Reader x Shin Ryujin (Ryujin) / Characters: GenderNeutral!Reader; Shin Ryujin (Ryujin);

🧼 Rated: E / Warnings: None / Genre: Minor Angst; Fluff; Comfort;

🧼 A/N: Wrote this at [redacted time i should have been asleep] on a whim, sorry if it sucks 🤙🏾 I was in a °*~mood~*° Also sorry for the bad title it was like 3AM

Ryujin is awoken by the sound of a sink running water from down the hall, from the kitchen. In the dark room, she can see the light from outside from beneath the crack in the door. She realizes your side of the bed is empty, and checks the time on her phone--it's 1:30AM.

She squints and thinks, before concluding that you must be washing dishes. But all the dishes were washed after dinner. So then, perhaps, you must be feeling stressed or unhappy in some way. Oftentimes, when you're upset or feeling overwhelmed in some way, it results in you getting up late at night, in the dark, and washing dishes. If all the dishes are already washed, you'll end up going through for any dishes that might not have been perfectly washed, or even just rewashing dishes.

Ryujin pushes herself out of the bed and walks out of the room.

She enters the kitchen and sees you bent over the sink, washing away at a plate in your hands. There isn't a single light on in the room except for the single light that hangs above the sink, illuminating you, highlighting you in the darkness of the room. Beside you, you have a stack of plates and a cup, filled with several spoons, waiting to be washed. All of them appear to be clean already, and yet, you're still washing them, washing away at the plate in your hand lazily, eyes forward instead of on the plate, as if lost somewhere in your head.

"Baby?"

You snap out of your trance and turn around to face Ryujin in surprise. She sees you relax your shoulders a bit at the sight of her, your girlfriend, and you smile softly, but she can see something--Exhaustion? Sadness?--behind your eyes. Which isn't surprising, considering the entire situation, but it makes her sad nonetheless.

"Hey, Ryujinnie. Did I wake you? I'm so sorry . . ." you say, setting down the plate and rubbing at your eyes with the back of your soap-covered hand.

"No, it's okay," she says, walking over. She takes your wet, soapy hands in hers and leans against the counter. "Are you okay baby? Everything alright?"

"Yeah, just tired."

"You sure, love?" she asks.

"Mmhmm." You nod, but stop, seeing the skeptical look on her face. You know that she knows something is bothering you.

"No . . ." you admit. "I've been stressed. Worrying."

"About?"

You hesitate, and she sees it. She squeezes your hand gently. Reassuringly.

"Hey, Y/N, look at me," she says gently, and your eyes lift to meet hers. They're soft, filled with love and concern. "I'm here for you. And I want to help you and hear you, but I can't do that if you don't talk to me."

You nod and take a deep breath, squeezing your eyes shut. "I just. Been thinking about . . . why you're with me, I guess."

Ryujin frowns. "What? Why?"

You shrug, not quite meeting her eyes. You feel bad for saying it already, and your heart feels heavy, like a weight has been attached to it. "It's not your fault. My mind was wandering, as it tends to do. Today, it was just kind of wandering to not-great places. Sometimes, I just think about how, like, you're an idol, you have your friends, your idol friends. And oftentimes, you're busy at practice or shows, and sometimes I don't get to spend as much time with you as they do. I know that's part of the job, but sometimes I feel too ordinary. You and your friends are idols. And I'm just me. You could have anyone, and yet you've settled for me."

There's a moment of silence, and she's obviously thinking. You don't want to meet her eyes, you're afraid that your words have hurt her. You don't mean to. It's not her fault you're thinking such things, it's not like she's given you a reason to doubt her. Your brain just goes there.

Suddenly, Ryujin cups your face in her palms, making you look at her.

"Ya," she says, squishing your cheeks gently. "Y/N, I love you. And only you. Yes, I do have friends, yes, who I'm close to. And I love and care about them too. But they're not you. I love them and I love you. You're you, and that's amazing and wonderful and extraordinary and I love who you are. If I ever let you think otherwise, you need to tell me so I can fix it, okay? I love you, I wouldn't ask for anything else, my love. I'll tell you this as many times as you need to hear it. Whenever, wherever. I love you."

You feel yourself tearing up, and you suddenly wrap her in a tight hug. For a second, she's frozen, but then she hugs you back, gently rubbing your back to comfort you.

It felt stupid, you think, but it was nice to hear it. All of what she said, you already knew. But to be reassured every once in a while was comfort enough. To be reminded of what was probably obvious seemed to wash away the worry, even if it's just temporarily. It feels like the weight has dropped away from you heart, and you feel a little relieved and reassured.

"Thank you Ryujinnie," you mumble, burying your face in her neck. You find comfort in the smell of her, in just being close to her. "I just . . . needed to hear that."

"Always, baby," she says softly. "You can always come to me when that head of yours is wandering like this. I'm always here to listen to you and be here for you and reassure you."

You nod. "Thank you. I love you."

"I love you too, baby," she says, squeezing your hand and leaning forward to press a kiss to the tip of your nose. "Now, come to bed. It's midnight, I need sleep, you need sleep, we both need sleep."

At that comment, you let out an involuntary yawn, and Ryujin chuckles.

"See? You're sleepy too,  baby. Come on, baby, I'll snuggle you to bed if that's what it takes."

"I can't say no to that."

[xerxia31]

I wish you would write a fic where peeta has a failing bakery because he isn't able to implement anything new and exciting due to parents etc, and katniss is like gordon ramsay in kitchen nightmare trying to convince peeta that he's not an idiot sandwich. Is that too specific? sorry if it is, i've just been thinking about this for a while...

This took an incredibly long time to write, anon, if you’re still around, I’m sorry for that! But this idea gripped me, and wouldn’t be satisfied with a hundred word drabble…

The B Word

rated T

He had watched her all through middle school, and high school too, had spent years of his life imagining her walking into the bakery his parents owned where he could woo her with artisanal breads and fancy cakes.

But this was definitely not part of his fantasy.

“You are an idiot sandwich!” Katniss Everdeen hollered as she pressed two pieces of bread to the sides of his head. It was the good hearty bread too, filled with raisins and nuts, a bestseller at the bakery and one of his favourites. A myriad of emotions played through his mind; horror and humiliation, a feeling that he just might cry, but beneath was that familiar quickening of his heart rate at the way her white chef’s coat strained to cover her pert breasts. Thump thump thump his heart pounded, and she smirked, even as she pressed the bread more firmly to his ears.

Thump thump thump. “Peeta! Get your ass out of bed!” Peeta Mellark groaned as he pried his eyes open in the darkness and glanced at the clock on his bedside table. 3:45 am. The alarm wasn’t set to go off for another fifteen minutes.

“Dammit, Rye, it’s not even four,” he grumbled, dislodging the pillow - flat and slightly drool-dampened - from over his ear.

“That TV show chick is coming today,” the voice hollered through the door. “It’s going to be a big, big, big day!” Rye was far too perky for a quarter to four in the morning. But despite his pique at being awoken early, Peeta couldn’t blame his brother for being excited. Their little bakery was going to be featured on a brand new show from one of the hottest television personalities in Panem.

Kat Flickerman was a household name, her sarcastic and expletive-filled television show, Kitchen Nightmares, was must-watch TV. And her new show, The B Word, featuring small-town bakeries, was promising to be even better. Mellark’s, a staple in District Twelve for over seventy-five years, would be the first establishment showcased. The publicity and sales uptick that came from being featured on the program more than made up for the embarrassment of having a five-foot-nothing firebrand rip apart every aspect of your business. Or so the producers that contacted his brother said.

Peeta wasn’t convinced. After all, he’d been making a fool of himself in front of the former Katniss Everdeen his whole life, and it hadn’t gotten him anywhere.

Neither Rye nor their father seemed to remember that world-famous Kat Flickerman had once been Katniss Everdeen, from the poor part of Twelve. But Peeta remembered. He remembered everything about her, though she’d never paid him any attention.

He remembered her sparkling silver eyes as she skipped through the halls of their elementary school, singing to herself. Eyes that dimmed and hardened after her father’s death. He remembered how hollow her cheeks were in the months after that, when he’d leave part of his lunch in her cubby each morning. He remembered how she’d grown into a solitary, sometimes sullen but always striking young woman who worked and studied and never participated in any of the meagre social activities District Twelve offered.

He even knew how a quiet, shy girl from the wrong side of the tracks parlayed a gig reviewing restaurants for her college’s newspaper into fame and fortune, though that part he’d read on her Wikipedia page. He wasn’t sure he understood it though. The Katniss who’d stolen his heart when he was only a boy wasn’t a lot like the girl on fire he saw on television. Not that he watched her shows.

(He definitely watched her shows.)

But none of that mattered anymore, not really. Because Katniss Everdeen left District Twelve five years ago and had never, as far as Peeta knew, come back. There was no mention of District Twelve in any of her bios or interviews. Katniss Everdeen had essentially disappeared. Kat Flickerman - foul-mouthed, foul-tempered, fire and fury Kat Flickerman - was the woman he was going to meet today. And he was fairly sure she wouldn’t remember him anyway. Probably wouldn’t even notice him, unless it was to berate some mistake he’d made or pick apart the menu items.

o-o-o

Peeta had the display cases full of glossy frosted cookies and perfect cupcakes long before the production crew showed up. He knew that there wouldn’t be any filming that morning, save for some generic ‘before’ shots, but still he wanted to put his best foot forward. Mellark’s might not be world-class, but it had been in his family for generations, it was a part of him. Rye, too, was beaming, polishing the countertops until they gleamed in the shafts of sunlight that came through windows so clean they looked devoid of glass. Their father spent an hour on a ladder, writing the day’s wares on the menu board in practiced chalk strokes. Though District Twelve was nothing more than a tiny backwater village, the Mellark men had their pride.

The group that descended on their small shop was definitely not from around there. Loud voices and loud colours shattered the sleepy District Twelve ambiance. The TV crew consisted of a pair of burly cameramen with heavy mobile cameras encasing their bodies like insect shells, a woman director named Cressida who had a shaved head tattooed with green vines, and her assistant, Messalla, a slim young man with several sets of earrings. On careful observation, it appeared his tongue had been pierced, too, and he was wearing a stud with a silver ball the size of a marble. Peeta shuddered slightly. But missing from the crew was the one woman he’d been longing to see.

He shouldn’t have been surprised. She was the star after all, doubtless she’d breeze in only for her own scenes. But his disappointment was almost tangible.

Peeta opened the front shop and kept it running while Rye and their father walked the crew through the back, mapping out electrical outlets and places where spotlighting could be temporarily installed. Occasionally, the sound of laughter floated forward, but for the most part it was a typical Tuesday morning. The regulars wandered in and out, and he chatted with everyone, the comfort of familiarity soothing him.

He had just packed up some cookies for old Sae’s granddaughter when the hair on the back of his neck stood up. Standing in the doorway of the shop was a ghost. Katniss Everdeen.

She wasn’t dressed like Kat Flickerman. Instead of a chef’s coat and crisp black pants, she was wearing jeans and a muted orange sweater. Her black hair was in the braid he remembered from their school days, long and thick, glinting blue in the morning sun. She was stunning.

She’d been glancing around the front shop but then froze, lifting her eyes to Peeta’s, as if feeling the weight of his stare. So many times in school she’d caught him staring, and each time he’d looked away quickly, blushing. But not today. Today he held her silver gaze. And then she smiled. “Katniss,” he whispered, or maybe he just thought it. Either way, her smile widened.

“Hello, Peeta,” she said, and his name in her mouth evoked a rush of arousal so potent he was certain she could see it stealing across his face. “It’s been a long time.”

“Five years,” he said without even realizing. He was stunned she even knew his name. Her eyes widened a little, but her soft smile didn’t fall.

“It looks exactly the same in here,” she said, and Peeta stiffened. It was true that the decor hadn’t changed in a long time, except for the addition of some of his paintings, and the fancy European coffeemaker he’d insisted on when he became a partner after college. He’d always thought that was part of the charm of Mellark’s, it’s dependability. He viewed the warm wood and twinkling glass as classic, elegant. But he’d watched enough of Kat Flickerman’s shows to know that she was seeing only tired and shabby. It hurt to envision what her team might do.

“Well,” he drawled. “Not much ever changes in Twelve.”

“You have,” she said, her eyes sweeping over him and he felt the heat rising in his cheeks. She was right, though it felt kind of shitty to be reminded. In high school, he’d been all state in wrestling, had worked out every day and watched his diet carefully to make weight. Had been even more serious about his sport in college, until a torn ACL killed that. Nowadays, he stayed fit running and playing pick-up football with the guys. He was in good shape, but he knew he wasn’t lean like before. “Yeah,” she said, distracted, her pink tongue snaking out to sweep over her lower lip. He had the distinct impression that she was checking him out. But that couldn’t be. “You look good,” she murmured.

He crooked an eyebrow. “Thanks?”

Her eyes widened. “I just, uh. I mean. Working here. If, uh. If I worked here I’d weigh a ton for sure.”

Peeta laughed; Katniss couldn’t weigh a hundred pounds soaking wet. She’d always been tiny. “You’re around food every day,” he said. She shrugged.

“But everything you make is fantastic.”

A small, pleased smile teased his lips. But before he could respond, one of the Capitol people came through the swinging doors that separated the front shop. “Kat,” she practically yelled. “We weren’t expecting you for a few hours yet, we haven’t started assembling the tasting.”

Katniss stiffened, seeming to grow taller and more menacing before Peeta’s eyes. Her expression darkened and shuttered, a mask sliding into place. It was a fascinating and frightening process. The woman who acknowledged Cressida with a scowl bore only a superficial resemblance to the woman Peeta had been chatting with.

“I told you I would be choosing the menu items to feature,” Katniss said, and the frostiness of her tone made Peeta shiver.

“Of course,” the other woman said. “We could start now?” All of Cressida’s brashness faded into supplication.

Rye and their father had come into the frontshop and were watching the exchange warily. Peeta stood back as Cressida introduced the rest of his family to Kat. “We can set up in the office,” Mr. Mellark said.

Katniss nodded and followed the others through the swinging doors. His father turned back to Peeta. “Could you bring back some coffee?” he asked, and Peeta’s heart sank. Twenty-six years old, and still low man on the totem pole, still the one who was given the grunt jobs, relegated to the wings, or just dismissed outright. As much as he loved the family business, he hated the family dynamic.

Stuck in the shadows or not, Peeta remembered a few things about Katniss that the rest of his family didn’t know, and one of those was her hatred of coffee. Oh, it was likely that she’d learned to tolerate it over the years, as he’d done himself. Still, he thought as he steamed milk; coffee drinkers are born, not made.

He carried a tray ladened with hot beverages back to the room that acted as staff lounge and office for the Mellark men and the handful of part-timers they employed. Already, half-filled plates littered the table top, various bakery items cut open, then abandoned. And at the head of the table like a queen commanding her court was Katniss, still wearing her Kat Flickerman expression, sheafs of yellow notebook paper scattered around her. Peeta set the tray of coffee in the middle of the table, but he grabbed the lone different cup and placed it wordlessly beside Katniss, then backed away, unwilling to disrupt her.

He couldn’t resist glancing back as he exited the room, and he found Katniss watching his retreat, surprise in her silver eyes and the barest hint of a smile stealing across her lush lips as she traced the rim of the mug of hot chocolate he’d brought her with a single slender finger.

o-o-o

Peeta was busy the rest of the day, manning the ovens, covering the phones, serving the lunch rush. His father reappeared a few times to make more coffee or grab something specific from the display cases, but there wasn’t an opportunity to talk. And with Rye occupied in the back, catering to the Capitolites, there wasn’t time for Peeta to take a break either. By the time the rush was over, and Peeta staggered to the back full-bladdered and empty-stomached, the film crew - and Kat Flickerman - were gone. His father was cleaning up the mess they’d left behind in the office, and Rye was staring at a sheet of yellow paper with a particularly sour expression on his face.

“What’s going on?” Peeta asked as he stuffed half a day-old scone in his mouth. Rye grunted, and tossed the paper his way.

“They want all of this ready and plated for that woman tomorrow evening.”

Peeta scanned the list. There were only six items, and all were things they’d typically make anyway. All except the goat cheese and apple tart - they hadn’t made that particular recipe in years. “I don’t understand–” he started, but Rye cut him off.

“She hated everything, she’s going to rip us to shit.” Peeta rolled his eyes, but held his tongue. There was no point in reminding Rye that this had all been his idea.

“It’s going to be fine,” their father’s tired voice broke the silence. “She never said she hated anything, Rye.”

“You saw her,” he barked. “Cutting everything up, barely picking at it before tossing it aside. Big city bitch, probably never tasted real bakery bread in her life.” It was on the tip of Peeta’s tongue to tell his brother that not only was Katniss not a big city girl, but he knew for certain she’d had Mellark’s cheese buns before. But before he could defend Katniss, Rye turned back to him and smirked. “She wants you to be the one on camera with her.”

Peeta nearly choked on his scone. “What?”

“Yeah,” he sneered. “Guess she can tell you’re easy to push around. Bet she makes you cry.” Rye had inherited their late mother’s cruel streak, though he hadn’t aimed it in Peeta’s direction much since her death.

“Fuck you, Rye,” Peeta spat. Rye only laughed.

“Save the backbone for the camera.”

“Boys,” their father groaned, but Peeta had had enough.

“You can close up alone, asshole,” he snipped at Rye, tossing his apron on the table and heading out the back door.

o-o-o

Filming would take place after normal working hours, when the bakery was closed, both to keep compliant with health codes, and to keep small-town busybodies from trying to usurp the spotlight. But that didn’t change the fact that it was a Wednesday. There were customers to serve and orders to fulfil on top of the list of bakery items the show producers wanted ready for closing.

Apparently, Rye’s bad mood persisted. He stormed into the kitchen hours late, after Peeta had done the entire morning prep himself and had been forced to call in frontshop reinforcements - his father and one of the summer students. Rye bashed around the kitchen and snapped at the customers for an hour until their father simply sent him home again.

“He’s just jealous,” Mr. Mellark told his younger son, “Because Katniss asked for you specifically.”

Peeta looked up from the cookie he was painting with delicate white blossoms and arrow-shaped leaves. “You remember her?” he asked, though it was clear his father did. The older man laughed.

“I’m not yet senile, Peet,” he smiled. “She looks different on television, but seeing her in person yesterday, she hasn’t changed much from that little girl who used to come in here with her daddy way back when.”

Peeta chuckled. “I’d say she’s changed a whole lot, Dad. She used to be so reserved.”

“I have a feeling she still is,” he said cryptically. “She certainly wasn’t having any of your brother’s flirting.” Peeta huffed out a laugh; after the way Rye had treated him over the previous twenty-four hours, he couldn’t help feeling a little bit of pleasure in the idea that Rye had struck out.

His own crush on Katniss had nothing to do with that satisfaction.

“She’s a big celebrity now, Dad. She wouldn’t have time for a small-town baker.”

“Not so sure about that either, but Rye wasn’t the baker she was watching,” he muttered before wandering out to the front shop to help the lone part-timer clean up.

Peeta didn’t have time to ponder what his father meant. There were still cupcakes to frost and cheese buns to bake, and the film crew was due within the hour.

o-o-o

A prep team came twenty minutes before closing to get him ready, parking their small trailer in the lot out back. They clipped and tousled and gelled his hair, then powdered his face. Peeta had dressed in a nice blue button down shirt, but that was nixed in favour of a soft red Henley the crew brought along with them, surprisingly in the right size. They even let him push the sleeves up, the way he was most comfortable.

The woman who arrived later with the film crew was the one he knew from television. In a starched white chef’s jacket, and with hair and makeup done, she was gorgeous, fierce, unforgettable.

Peeta was a goner.

He barely saw her, though, as the director demanded his attention, coaching him on what to expect. “Kat doesn’t work well with being told what to say,” she admitted. “So all of the questions tonight will be unscripted.” Peeta nodded. “Think of it as a laid-back chat with a friend,” Cressida smiled, and Peeta barely bit back a snort. Twelve years in the same schools and they’d barely exchanged ten words; a conversation with Katniss Everdeen would be anything but relaxed.

Another half hour of explaining camera blocking and marks, and finally Cressida led him to the front shop, which had been transformed into a stage. Hot lights blinded him, microphones dangled over his head and it felt like a thousand people were crammed into the space.

Then she was there, Katniss. But no, not Katniss, Kat Flickerman. Aloof and business-like, gorgeous but cold. Untouchable.

Everything went exactly as Cressida had explained. Kat asked him questions, about the history of the shop, about the recipes, about the little town where they’d both grown up (though she didn’t mention that part).

Though Peeta was gregarious by nature, this was so far out of his comfort zone, the cameras, the crowd, all of them fixated on him, watching him interact stiffly with the woman he’d had a crush on since before he even knew what that meant. Sweat beaded on his upper lip and more than once he stammered, fell over his own tongue or outright blanked on an answer. He could feel Katniss’s frustration mounting. The fourth (fifth? thirtieth?) time it happened, Katniss cringed and turned away. “Clear the set,” she bellowed.

The crew leapt to attention; within moments, they were alone. Peeta stared at his shoes while he waited for Katniss to dismiss him too. His father was back in the office, perhaps he could take over and save the show.

Then a small, cool hand landed on his forearm, startling him from his misery. “Take a deep breath,” she said. Her voice was gentle, not Kat Flickerman anymore, but Katniss, the woman he often thought of as his Katniss, though she wasn’t that either. But she smiled at him, the barest quirk of her perfect peach lips. And a deep, guttural sigh escaped him as he started to relax. “Good,” she murmured, her hand on his arm squeezing lightly. “Feeling better?” He could only nod.

She pulled over the plate with the delicate painted cookies, smiling softly at the flowers she clearly recognized. “These were always my favourite when I was a kid,” she murmured.

Peeta looked up in confusion. He knew how much Katniss liked Mellark’s cheese buns, but he couldn’t remember a single time she’d bought the cookies. As if reading his mind, she shrugged. “I’ve never eaten one,” she admitted, softly. “They’re far too pretty to eat. But I used to come by with my sister and look at them in the display window.

He could see it in his mind’s eye; Katniss, her hair in two glossy braids, holding the hand of a smaller blonde girl, both peeking through the window. “Not very often,” she whispered. “Your mom was kind of scary, she’d chase us off if we got too close to the glass.”

Peeta cringed, and started to apologize, but Katniss waved him off. “It wasn’t your fault,” she said, still speaking softly, intimately. “You’ve never been anything but kind, always.” She looked away, laughing just lightly under her breath. “I always wondered how you could be so nice, having grown up with her.”

He shrugged, and deflected. “You should try a cookie now. Better late than never.”

Her smile widened, and it transformed her face, elevating her from beautiful to radiant. “Better late than never,” she murmured.

She didn’t eat the cookie, but they continued to talk, and Peeta got more and more comfortable. They talked about recipes - the age-old traditional wares that Mellark’s had been making for generations and the newer flavours and he and Rye enjoyed experimenting with. She admitted that she’d asked for the apple and goat cheese tart because it was one she remembered fondly, something her father had loved all of those years ago.

He filled her in on the things that had happened in Twelve since she moved away, their classmates, who had gotten married, who had children now. She was engrossed and engaged, reminiscing about people Peeta hadn’t even been sure she knew. She laughed at his anecdotes, and it was like bells ringing, clear and bright.

He even found himself telling her how much he loved the bakery, but how he longed to make it more, how he wanted Mellark’s to be a gathering spot, in tradition of the great Parisian cafés. “Have you been to Paris, Peeta?” she asked, and his smile faltered a little. Here he was talking about big cosmopolitan ideas when he’d never even left the district. Katniss, he knew, had been everywhere, had reviewed restaurants not just in Paris, but in Milan and Amsterdam and Vienna… what a fool she must think him, backward, small-town boy with grandiose ideas. He shook his head, embarrassed.

Katniss didn’t seem to notice his discomfort. “Paris is awful,” she whispered conspiratorially. “Crowded and loud and it smells like cigarettes and pee.” Peeta laughed lightly and she grinned at him, disarming him completely. “But Twelve isn’t any of those things,” she murmured. “I think this is a perfect spot for a café. People are already drawn here, they already gather at Mellarks. It’s always been so warm and inviting here.” Her words tugged at his heart. That’s exactly how he’d always felt about the family business too, how he’d always hoped others would see it. “I know I’d love to sit here and watch the world go by.”

“With a hot chocolate?” Peeta teased lightly, and she looked away, shyly.

“And a cheese bun,” she murmured.

“I wish you would,” he said, barely breathing. “Come back sometime, I mean.” She met his eyes then, and a myriad of emotions played across her expressive face. He just couldn’t understand what they meant.

She took his hand, shocking him with how good, how intensely right it felt. She guided him over to where the largest of his paintings hung, a spring landscape of the meadow that was on the edge of town, dotted with clover and dandelions. “This is yours, isn’t it?” He nodded. “It’s gorgeous,” she breathed reverently. She paused, and Peeta could see her weighing her words. “I always thought you’d make a career in art, open a gallery maybe.”

Peeta sighed, looking down at where their hands were still linked. He knew she wasn’t intentionally trying to pick at the barely-healed wound of his dead dreams, but it stung.

“You were always drawing in school,” Katniss continued, oblivious to his turmoil. “You designed the yearbook cover one year, and you won that award when we were seniors.” She trailed off, and they stood silently for several long moments. Finally, Peeta blew out a forceful breath.

“My eldest brother was supposed to take over the bakery. He and my mom, they, uh. There was a car accident,” he whispered, voice cracking. He’d been offered a job right out of college, with a studio in the Capitol, but the accident that took his mother and brother forced him home. Katniss squeezed his hand, hard.

“I heard,” she admitted, and it surprised Peeta. The accident was almost four years ago, well after she moved her mother and sister out of this dumpy town, never to return. “I’m sorry.”

Peeta cleared his throat. “Anyway, my dad was all alone here after that, trying to run this place. So Rye and I agreed to become partners.”

They stood silently, looking over the meadow painting, lost in their thoughts. “Are you happy, Peeta?” she asked, barely a whisper.

“Sometimes,” he said. He was happy in that moment, talking with the girl of his dreams, holding her hand, feeling the warmth of her body just inches away. He was happy right then, and that was something at least.

There was a scuffling sound behind them and they sprang apart. It was the red-headed cameraman, tucked unobtrusively to the side. Peeta hadn’t noticed his return until that moment, so focussed was he on Katniss, on talking and connecting with her, something he had never imagined possible.

But all good things must come to an end. “Do you think you can go on? Just the three of us?” Katniss asked. And Peeta nodded.

o-o-o

It was late when Peeta finally staggered home to the apartment he shared, often reluctantly, with Rye. The set tear-down had been pandemonium, people and equipment flying like a tempest, a whirlwind of follow up questions and paperwork and releases and by the time he could take a deep breath, Katniss was gone, slipped away like a thief in the night without even a farewell, before he could ask her if she’d like to go out with him sometime. And while he was trying not to be disappointed, the fact that after they’d shared what he had thought was a real connection she’d simply vanished without a word hurt more than he wanted to admit.

“How did it go?” Rye’s voice drifted from their shared living room. Peeta popped his head in. Rye was slumped on the couch, a tumbler of what could only be whiskey balanced on his thigh.

“Seemed okay,” Peeta said, carefully. It was hard enough to gauge Rye’s mood when he wasn’t drinking, with the addition of alcohol he wasn’t sure which version of his brother he’d find.

Rye smirked, then lifted his other hand, tipping the bottle in Peeta’s direction. “Have a drink with me,” he said. Still, Peeta hesitated. Rye shook his head. “I’m not going to rip your head off, little brother.”

Peeta grabbed a glass from the sideboard and Rye filled it with a couple of fingers of liquid fire. For a while, they simply sipped in silence. “I’m sorry I was a dick earlier,” Rye said quietly.

Knowing how much it cost his brother to apologize, Peeta nodded. He wasn’t really a grudge holder anyway. “It’s fine,” he said.

“It’s not though.” Rye sighed, rubbing a hand across his face. “I was really hoping this show would be the wake-up call Dad needed to let us make real changes at the bakery. It was supposed to be him in front of the camera, getting dressed down by that woman. When she insisted on you, I saw red.” Rye sighed, and downed the remainder of his glass. “You know he’s going to blame us now for every shitty thing she says.” Rye’s bleary eyes met Peeta’s. “If we’re going to be stuck here forever, we should at least be able to drag this place into the modern era.”

Peeta felt a pang of sympathy for his brother. He wasn’t the only one who’d had to give up his dreams for the future to come help their father run the business that neither of them had ever planned on inheriting. Rye’d had big city plans and a big city girlfriend who dumped him when he moved back home to sleepy District Twelve. He had every right to be bitter, even if he sometimes chose inappropriate targets to lash out at.

“She didn’t say anything mean, anyway,” Peeta said. “The whole thing was pretty tame. Not at all what I was expecting.” The beginning had been rough, but he felt good about what they’d filmed after he’d calmed down. He thought he’d presented Mellark’s in a pretty good light, all things told.

“Naw,” Rye said with a sigh. “They’ll add all of that in later. It’s always voiceovers.” That idea shocked Peeta. Was that possible? Would the screaming, nasty Kat Flickerman only make an appearance in the finished version? Surely not?

o-o-o

Days, and then weeks, passed, and while Peeta thought about Katniss often, there wasn’t a peep from her. Not an email, not a phone call, nothing. A cameraman returned to film some exterior and kitchen shots, and though Peeta tried to ask him about Katniss, he was all but mute on the subject.

There had been something between them, that evening in the bakery, he was sure of it, sure she’d felt it too. He couldn’t understand why she’d disappeared. She hadn’t even said goodbye. As if he hadn’t mattered at all.

Rye’s words rolled around his head, festered, made him doubt everything from that day. He compulsively rewatched old episodes of Kitchen Nightmares, looking for any hint that the screaming and cursing was added in after the fact. It was impossible to tell. But with every installment, his memories of sweet Katniss faded, replaced by the snarling mutt.

With every day that passed, his mood plummeted further. Because Rye was right: the majority of the screaming and vitriol could well have been voiced over. He just couldn’t tell what was real and what was not real

A message on the bakery phone almost two months after the filming convinced him. One of the producers wanted to give them a ‘heads up’ on what to expect for the broadcast, scheduled for the next week. It could only have been a warning. He was about to appear on national television looking like a chump, as useless and pathetic as his mother had always told him he was. Peeta deleted the message without even telling his father or brother about it.

There were two more calls after that. Peeta deleted both of those messages too, unheard. The only thing he couldn’t delete was the ache in his heart.

Every gentle thing she’d said to relax him, to ease him back in front of the camera, it had all been lies. Katniss, no, Kat, had used their past, their tenuous connection, just to manipulate him. Just to make him look like the idiot he was.

o-o-o

“I booked the lodge for our viewing party.”

Peeta glanced up from the wedding cake he was working on to stare at his father in confusion. “What?”

“With how many people want to watch the show, I can’t fit them all in at the house.” Peeta’s father still stubbornly lived alone in the bungalow where Peeta had grown up. It was large enough to host two dozen or so, at least.

“They all have televisions, they can watch at home,” Peeta grumbled. Despite his best efforts to ignore the existence of Kat Flickerman’s show entirely, the local station had been aggressively promoting the upcoming episode. Someone from the morning news had been in the week before, interviewing Rye and their father. Peeta had refused to take part.

“My boy,” his father laughed, steadfastly ignoring Peeta’s pique, as he had for weeks. As they’d all done for weeks. His mood had gotten progressively worse the more he thought about Katniss and how she’d used him, and he knew everyone around him could tell. “This is a great occasion! Our little bakery on national television. Of course we’re going to celebrate with all of our friends and customers.” Peeta cringed, but his father continued, undeterred. “I wish my own father was here to see it.”

The reminder of how much this meant to his father had Peeta feeling even worse. “Dad, it’ll be embarrassing, for all of us. I’m going to look like an idiot. People are going to stay away from Mellark’s after that.” He knew he sounded petulant but he didn’t care.

His father smiled. “I spoke with that director, Peet, the one with the strange tattoos? She called the house the other night.” Peeta groaned inwardly; he’d underestimated that woman’s tenacity. “She says the show looks great, that you were a natural.” Peeta knew there was no point arguing with his father. Once the elder Mellark had his mind set, he was intractable.

“How many people did you invite?” Peeta groused.

“Oh sixty, maybe. Plus the guys from the bowling league.” Peeta’s heart sank; at this rate, the entire town was going to be witness to his humiliation. “But don’t worry, I’m having Rooba cater it.”

“Geez, Dad, don’t you think that’s too much?” The elder Mellark set down his own piping bag and grasped his son’s shoulders, turning him until they were face to face.

“What’s gotten into you, son? You’re not usually this pessimistic,” he said, his hands squeezing soothingly. It took every bit of Peeta’s strength to hold his tongue. As much as he loved his father, the shame was his alone to bear.

“Nothing,” he muttered. “I just don’t think it went very well.” The two men stared at each other, and Peeta knew without a doubt that his father hadn’t bought his explanation. But he wasn’t ready to share his heartbreak, his stupidity. He’d been so caught up in that long-held crush he’d almost willfully ignored reality. Mr. Mellark simply sighed.

“I wish you’d talk to me Peeta. But okay.” He clapped Peeta on the shoulder, and turned back to his work.

o-o-o

Three days before the show was to air, there was a call on Peeta’s cell from an unfamiliar number. He let it go to voicemail. The bakery phone had been ringing non-stop it seemed with calls from media outlets, wanting interviews in advance of the airing. He assumed one of his well-meaning friends had given his number to someone at the D12 Gazette.

But when he picked up the message later, he nearly dropped his phone in the sink.

It was Katniss.

The message was brief, simply a request for him to return her call and a number, her number.

Peeta had no intention of calling her back. But it didn’t stop him from listening to the message five, ten, fifteen times.

There were two more messages the next day. He wanted to delete them unheard, but he couldn’t. Even wounded and wary, the bone-deep need to hear her voice prevailed. The content of each was the same, but her tone seemed progressively more urgent. The sound of her voice, the way she called herself Katniss instead of Kat, all of it pulled at his heartstrings, confused him even more.

The same cowardice and insecurity that had kept him from seeking her out their whole childhood silenced him now. Though his fingers twitched to redial her number, he did nothing.

o-o-o

“I said no, Dad.” Peeta knew he was being petulant but on this point he was firm: he was not going to his father’s viewing party. He’d capitulated to helping his father set up, he wasn’t a complete dick. But he’d decided the best thing for him to do would be to hole up in his apartment during the actual airing.

If only because he couldn’t get a last minute flight out of the country.

Rye, ironically, had been the most understanding about Peeta’s desire to avoid the show and all of the insanity their father was planning around it. “I’ll text you,” he said the evening before, when Peeta told him he wasn’t even intending on watching. “Let you know how bad it is.”

“I just don’t understand what you’re afraid of,” Mr. Mellark said with a shake of his head. “You’re going to be on national television, it’s exciting. The promos look terrific.” Those, Peeta had been unable to avoid. And while they hadn’t looked scathing, he no longer trusted his instincts.

“You’ve watched her other shows,” he groaned, the thousandth time he’d made the same argument, but his father was having none of it.

“This was different and you know it. You had a connection with Katniss, we could all see it.”

“Stop,” Peeta barked, and his father’s eyes widened. Peeta cringed, sad and ashamed of himself for taking his foul mood out on his father. “That was just for the cameras,” he said softly, giving voice to what his head had been telling him for weeks. “None of that was real.”

“You’re wrong, Peet. I know what I saw.”

“You know I had a crush on her, that’s all,” Peeta groaned, but his father cut him off.

“No,” has said firmly. “I saw how she looked at you.”

“Then why did she disappear? Two months, Dad, and not a word.” It wasn’t completely accurate, but Peeta wasn’t going to mention the messages to his father, who would surely read more into them than was there.

“I don’t know, son. Maybe for the same reason you’re avoiding her now.” Peeta shot a startled look at his father, who simply shook his head.

o-o-o

Peeta paced his apartment like a caged tiger, the dark television taunting him. The broadcast was scheduled to start any minute, his father’s party was more than an hour old, and he was alone with only a six pack of microbrew and his demons to keep him company.

One last message had come to his phone just a couple of hours earlier, a text message this time. Please talk to me, Peeta, was all it read. He’d been so tempted, so damned tempted to reply. Had started typing a dozen times, but erased every word. What could they possibly have to say to each other now? Too much time had passed.

The television called to him though, a siren song he was powerless to resist. He told himself he’d only watch the beginning, would shut it off as soon as she started yelling. But the moment Katniss appeared onscreen in the opening credits, beautiful face larger than life with glossed lips smirking, he knew he wouldn’t be able to look away.

The tone of the program was markedly different from her Kitchen Nightmares shows. The camera showed flattering pictures of the exterior and interior of the bakery while his own voice spoke overtop, recounting the history, the generations of Mellarks who had lovingly built the bakery into the the hub of District Twelve that it was.

But that was only the beginning.

The video unfurled almost like a love letter. But not to the bakery, or not exactly anyway. Instead, it showed Peeta himself, over and over. Peeta painstakingly frosting gorgeous cupcakes. Peeta laughing with a customer. Peeta kneeling before one of the small children that frequented the shop, handing her a cookie from the jar he kept behind the counter. Typical scenes from his everyday work, scenes he hadn’t even realized he’d been filmed in. Over and over he was shown smiling, laughing, creating.

Finally, Kat Flickerman began to speak. Rye was right that her part would be voiceovers, would be words she hadn’t spoken during the interview. But there was no swearing, no cursing. No yelling about the quality of the food or the shabbiness of the surroundings. No idiot sandwiches.

Kat Flickerman, Katniss, talked about the warm, welcoming atmosphere at Mellark’s, the three kind bakers who treated every customer like a friend. She paraphrased Peeta’s own hushed confessions about the improvements he wanted to make, and presented them as if they were things already planned to be implemented. Peeta, sitting on the couch in his apartment, laughed out loud. Somehow, Katniss had managed to manipulate the entire show in a way that would force his father to bring Mellark’s into the modern era after all. As if she knew exactly what he wanted.

Of course, she had known. He’d told her, when they’d spoken so intimately, about his hopes. He hadn’t realized how closely she was listening. But now, as he thought back, he understood that she’d directed their discussion back to his dreams for the future, time and again, and then worked all of those things into the show.

All but the one he hadn’t confessed. How he felt about her. How he thought she was gorgeous, more radiant than the sun. And now, because he’d wasted so long being wounded, he’d never get the chance.

His phone buzzed near continuously on the table beside him, but he didn’t spare it a glance.

As the ending credits rolled, there was a gentle tap-tap-tap at the apartment door. It could have been any number of people, friends or neighbours who knew he was home. But as he stood to answer, he was struck with the certainty that it was Katniss standing on the other side.

His hands shook as he unbolted the door and pulled it open. She wore a dress the colour of candlelight, her hair was loose and she had just a hint of makeup. “You didn’t come to the party,” she said, a glint of accusation in her silver eyes.

“I didn’t know you’d be there,” he said honestly, unblinking as he took her in. As if he could have forgotten how beautiful she was, watching her shows compulsively over the past few weeks. But the camera never captured her luminosity, the way she lit up a room, commanded the attention of everyone within it. He was awestruck.

“Your father invited me,” she murmured. “Can I come in?” Peeta shook off his stupor and ushered her into his space with a muttered apology.

The television still blared, playing a Food Network promo, and Peeta quickly muted it. “Did, you, uh. Did you want a drink? Beer?” Peeta asked, not meeting her eyes. She nodded.

Only when they were settled side by side on his couch did Katniss speak again. “You watched?” It wasn’t a question, not really. Peeta nodded. She raised a single eyebrow at him, and he couldn’t help but smile.

“It wasn’t what I expected,” he said quietly. She frowned.

“You were waiting for me to scream, rip apart your family business, destroy your reputation?” There was no amusement in her tone. Peeta felt the heat rising in his cheeks.

“Kind of,” he admitted.

She’s silent for a long time, picking at the edge of the label on her bottle. “Did you really think I’d do that to you?” she asked, and there was a fragility, a vulnerability to the words.

Peeta sighed. “I didn’t know what to think,” he said.

“I thought…” She sighed. “The way we… connected,” she whispered. “I guess I thought you’d know.”

Peeta battled with himself briefly, whether to be honest with her or not. The warm room, the beer and the uncertainty in her eyes convinced him. “I couldn’t tell what was real,” he said, “and what was for the camera.”

“You really thought I’d manipulate you like that?” Katniss stared at the bottle in her hands, shoulders slumped in defeat. “I know my reputation, I know that people think I’m a bitch,” she said softly. “But we’ve known each other since we were children. I thought you knew me. The real me, at least a little.” She glanced up at him and his breath caught. She was so open, so guileless. But he still wasn’t certain what to believe.

“We never really spoke, back then,” he said. “And I know that was my fault. I was a coward.”

Katniss shook her head. “You were always kind, even when no one else noticed I existed. You saved me back then, you know. When my mom lost herself.” Those stunning silver eyes searched his own. “I owe you.”

“You’ve never owed me anything,” Peeta said, but Katniss wasn’t done talking. She set her bottle on the table and turned slightly to face him.

“That’s why I did this show. To pay you back.” Peeta was more confused than ever. “I had a plan,” she continued. “When I heard that you were here, instead of in the Capitol, I started lobbying the network to create this show.”

“What?”

“Delly Cartwright,” she said. “My sister keeps in touch with her brother. She said that you were back home, running the bakery. It took awhile to get the go-ahead for this show.” He’d been at the bakery more than three years, surely she didn’t mean that long? “I’ve always kept track of you,” she said, answering his unasked question.

“Why?” His voice was hoarse. She shrugged helplessly. “You disappeared, after the taping,” he blurted. “You didn’t even say goodbye.”

“I know,” she said. “I’m sorry. I was really confused. And afraid.”

“Of me?” Peeta was incredulous.

“I’ve never been able to forget you, Peeta. I only intended on breezing in, giving you some publicity, then leaving again.” She brushed her hands together, as if wiping him away. “I thought paying you back would get you out of my mind.” Peeta flinched; that hurt to hear. He dropped his gaze to the bottle in his hands and swallowed back his disappointment.

“But then I got here,” she continued. “And you were even nicer than I remembered. And…” He glanced up at the pause. She was biting her bottom lip, her cheeks were flaming. “And even more handsome. I didn’t expect to be so attracted to you,” she whispered.

They stared at each other, the air between them charged. Then Katniss began to squirm, as if embarrassed.

“I’ve had a crush on you for as long as I can remember,” Peeta said, and Katniss’s eyes widened.

“Me?” she squeaked.

“You really don’t understand the effect you have on me. That’s why I was such a doofus when you were at the bakery. I’ve never known how to talk to you.”

“You did just fine,” she smiled, tiny and tentative, but real. “I didn’t want to leave. It, uh. Well, it scared the crap out of me. I’m not very good with people.”

“You’re here now,” he said. “What does that mean?”

“I don’t know,” Katniss said. “But I want to find out.”

She shuffled just a tiny bit closer to him, and he reached out a tentative hand to cup her face. Her eyes fluttered shut, thick black lashes brushing her cheek. When he finally pressed his lips against hers, she sighed, and in that tiny, involuntary noise he found certainty.

The kiss was slow, almost chaste, a teaser of what could be possible.

A slow smile spread across his face as he pulled back, staring into her hazy silver eyes. Was it possible, that they could be on the same page? But as quickly as the hope flared it his chest, it was extinguished. Katniss, Kat, had a life, a busy life full of travel and tapings and all of it far from sleepy District Twelve. What they shared at the bakery, what they were sharing now, that was all they’d ever get. His hand dropped into his lap, his eyes followed suit.

“I, um. I’m going to be producing the new show out of a little studio in Victor’s Village,” she said. “I signed the lease on the studio space three weeks ago.” They were still so close that he could feel the words on his skin, a caress. A promise.

Victor’s Village was only a twenty minute drive away. Peeta shook his head, certain he’d heard wrong. “I thought you lived in the Capitol?”

“I do, or, well, I did anyway,” Katniss said. “I moved my mother there as soon as I could afford to. It was too hard for her, being in Twelve, surrounded by all of her memories.” Katniss pursed her lips, and Peeta’s eyes were drawn to them, plump and perfectly kissable. Lips he’d now tasted, after so many years of imagining. “But it’s the opposite for me,” she continued. “I hate the Capitol, I hate the noise and the crowds and the smell. Being back here, it made me realize how much I missed it. Missed home.”

“You’re going to be living in Victor’s Village?” Peeta asked, still struggling to understand what was happening. Katniss shrugged.

“I was thinking twenty minutes isn’t such a bad commute. Maybe…” she trailed off, then sighed. “Maybe it’s time for me to come home, where I belong.”

“To Twelve?” He could hardly breathe.

“I’d still have to travel a lot, for filmings. But yeah.” She laughed. “The people here, they don’t care about Kat Flickerman. To them, I’m Russ Everdeen’s kid, not some hot shot television personality. I walked here, from your dad’s party, and there was no paparazzi, no TMZ following my every move. There was just old Mr. Mitchell waving at me from his porch and asking after my mother.”

This time, Katniss reached for him, her small hand cool against his feverish skin. “And you’re here,” she whispered, just before she kissed him. This time, he was the one moaning as her tongue curled around his own.

With a little tug, she was in his lap, and he marvelled at how perfectly her body fit against his, how right she felt in his arms. Kissing Katniss Everdeen was incredible, something he was certain he’d never get enough of.

“Peeta,” she whispered against his lips. “I want–”

The door to the apartment crashed open, startling Peeta, pulling them apart. “Peet, why aren’t you answering your phone? You’ll never– oh.” Rye stood before them, slack-jawed. Katniss buried her face in Peeta’s shoulder, but he could feel her smile.  

“Okay,” Rye chuckled. “Yeah. This uh. This makes a lot of sense. I’ll just…” He turned back towards the door.

“Rye,” Peeta called before his brother could leave. “Is Dad okay?”

Rye glanced back over his shoulder and smiled. “Yeah, man. He really is. I’ll tell you more later. Or tomorrow.” And with one last laugh, he was gone.

“Cockblocked,” Peeta groaned, and Katniss laughed, hugging him tightly. He stroked her hair as his heart rate slowed.

Peeta smiled down at the woman in his arms, who was still laughing softly. He kissed the tip of her nose. Though he longed to go right back to making out with her, he was grateful for the interruption. After waiting so long, they both deserved to do things right. “Have you eaten?” he asked. She shook her head. “Let me take you out for dinner,” he said, the words he’d wanted to say all of those weeks ago.

“I’d like that,” Katniss smiled.

————–

I wish you would write a fic where...

[roleplayingorchids]

Mason looked down at his hand...

"I thought I would be talking to Yumi about this... But I guess you also have a right to know..." He paused and gave a sigh "... Try to save all your questions for when I finish my explanation, okay..." Valkyrie nodded...

He gave a sigh as he started... "This may be hard to believe but... There was a time I was afraid of Illagers. I wasn't very brave or risky like I am now, but I would be alive... And to me at the time it was all I needed. I was walking to fetch some clay from a nearby river when I ran into someone. At first I tried to say hello but they ran... And after reaching the tree they were behind I found that that was hurt. Instead of returning to the village for help... I gave chase... And when I found them again, someone was aiming a crossbow to shoot them. Something came over me as I ran into them and fell into a gorge with them in my arms... Somehow we survived and that's when I found out they were an Illager." He gave a pause before continuing "At first I was scared, but she offered me a safe way home... That's when I asked her name and she told me it was Orchid. After a short time with her I knew she was hurt, I just didn't know the severity of the damage..."

"After temporarily fitting makeshift bandages on them, we made it out of the cave and I brought her to my village to let her rest... She was insisting on me letting her go but something was telling me to help her. After getting her home and letting her rest on my bed I fell asleep myself... I woke up to my village under siege and a lone pillager choked Orchid with one hand... From what I had heard, she allowed herself to be a distraction while the villagers escaped... Something snapped in me and I just threw my 'peaceful' behavior out the window... I thought back for the first time and tried to protect her... But in the end she saved my life... While focusing on her someone else had killed the pillager... I didn't get his name, but he offered me a chance I could not pass up... A chance to change Orchid's history, a chance to help her so that she wasn't alone..."

"I hesitated... But I took it. I took the chance to be taken back in time, to meet her when she was younger..."

"When I had awoken, I was in a cleric's home... And she was so young, yet to know what harsh fate that she had gone through... I promised her I would watch out for her and that I would make sure she had a better life than before... To make sure that she didn't end up alone like before... I noticed I was no longer the villager I was before who was scared at the mention of Illagers... I grew a better understanding that I was now different... I'm bigger than I was before... faster... Stronger... I don't know who that stranger was or what he did, but he must have had some strong magic to have done that for me." He looked over to Valkyrie "... and since then I've gotten to meet lots of people, Villagers and Illagers alike... I may be just a stonemason, but I just can't stand by anymore as innocent people get hurt." He smiled "And Orchid may be my sister, but I still consider you as my sister too. I meant what I said when I told you back there..."

Jay wished Valkyrie well and She walked past Mason and Yumi's home. Mason walked out and ran next to her "I told you you're not going alone..." He stated...

As they walked out of the village, Mason had a look of deep thought and remembrance...

"Hey, is there something you want to talk about big guy? You can tell me you know..."

"... It's nothing..." He stated, still with that expression looking forward...

(one more reply before Mason reveals something strange...)

[moonlit-melodies]

Washing Dishes (Original Story)

Written & Posted: May 7, 2021

Warnings: None / Word Count: 1,457

Sora was awoken by the sound of a sink running water from down the hall, from the kitchen. In the dark of the bedroom, she could see the light from outside from beneath the crack in the door. She realized that the other side of the bed--usually occupied by her girlfriend Volana--was empty, and let out a sigh, before turning to check the time on her phone, which read 1:30AM.

She squinted and listened a bit. She could hear the scrubbing sound of the sponge against the ceramic plates, and concluded that Volana must've been washing dishes. At almost midnight.

But all the dishes were washed right after dinner.

So then, perhaps, Sora considered, Volana must've been feeling stressed or unhappy in some way. Oftentimes, when Volana has felt overwhelmed or upset in some way, it resulted in her getting up late at night, in the dark, and washing dishes. If all the dishes were already washed, she'd end up going through for any dishes that might not have been perfectly washed, or even just rewashing dishes. Sora didn't know how this worked, or why Volana resorted to late night dish-washing sessions. But that's the way it has been in their time together.

What Sora could gather, from the sound of Volana washing dishes, is that Volana must've been feeling a little low or distressed in some way. And, despite it being nearly midnight, Sora was worried, and wanted to check up on her.

Sora pushed herself out of the bed, rubbing her eyes, and walked out of the room.

She entered the kitchen to see Volana bent over the sink, scrubbing away at a plate in her hands. There wasn't a single light on in the room except for the single light that hung above the sink, illuminating her, highlighting her face in the darkness of the room. Beside her, she had a stack of plates and a cup, filled with several spoons, waiting to be washed. All of them appeared to already be clean, and yet, Volana was still washing them. Sora continued to watch Volana washing away at the plate in her hand lazily, eyes forward instead of on the plate, as if lost somewhere in her head.

"Baby?"

Volana snapped out of her trance and turned around to face Sora in surprise. Sora could see her relax her shoulders a bit and smile softly at the sight of her, but Sora could also see something--Exhaustion? Sadness?--behind Volana's eyes. Which wasn't surprising, considering the entire situation, but it made her worried nonetheless.

"Hey, Sora. Did I wake you? I'm so sorry . . ." Volana mumbled, setting down the plate and rubbing at her eyes with the back of her soap-covered hand.

"No, Lana, it's okay," Sora reassured, walking over. She smiled softly, taking Volana's wet, soapy hands in hers, and leaned against the counter. "Are you okay baby? Everything alright?"

"Yeah, just tired."

"You sure, love?" she asked.

"Mmhmm." Volana nodded, but stopped, seeing the skeptical look on her girlfriend's face. She knew that Sora knew something was bothering her. There was no point in trying to hide it.

"No . . ." Volana admitted. "I've been stressed, a bit. Worrying."

"About?"

Volana hesitated, and Sora saw it. She squeezed her hand gently. Reassuringly.

"Hey, Volana, look at me," she said gently, and her eyes lifted to meet hers. They were soft, filled with love and concern. "I'm here for you. And I want to help you and hear you, but I can't do that if you don't talk to me."

Volana nodded and took a deep breath, squeezing her eyes shut. "I just. Been thinking about . . . why you're with me, I guess."

Sora frowned. "What? Why?"

Volana shrugged, not quite meeting her girlfriend's eyes. She felt bad for saying it already, and her heart felt heavy, like a weight had been attached to it.

"I don't know how to say it . . ." she admitted.

She felt Sora squeeze her hand. "Take your time, Lana. I can wait."

Volana nodded, and thought for a second, gathering her thoughts. Breathing in and out as she tried to get the thoughts from her brain down to her lips.

"I . . . don't know," Volana said. "You've been so busy recently. With friends and work. And I know you don't mean to, Sora, but I feel like you've been . . . away?" She pauses, and shakes her head. "No. That makes it sound bad. You're not taking yourself away from me. But it feels like you're a bit far. I know you aren't doing it on purpose, but you're with me less and . . . I don't know how to say it, but it's been messing with my head."

"I've been thinking," she continued, still not meeting Sora's eyes, "that, maybe you've been losing interest in me. And I know it sounds stupid. But, as you know, my mind wanders. And it circles the thought that, since you've been spending less and less time with me, you're more interested in them. And just. The thought has been eating at me for weeks. I think of all the attention and time you give them, and I just feel . . . envious, I guess." Volana chewed her lip. "I think . . . I think that's all I needed to say."

There was a moment of silence, and Sora was obviously thinking. Volana didn't want to meet her eyes, afraid that her words had hurt her, or that Sora may have misunderstood or taken it in a way Volana hadn't intended. She didn't mean to be harsh or anything. It wasn't Sora's fault she was thinking such things, it's not like Sora had given her a reason to doubt her. Her brain just went there at times.

I shouldn't have brought it up, Volana thinks to herself, squeezing her eyes shut. Should have kept it to myself. God, I should've just not said anything.

She was pulled out of her head by the feeling of Sora squeezing her hands gently, and looked up. Her eyes met Sora's, and she inhaled sharply.

"Hey," Sora said gently, her voice washing over Volana like a wave. "Volana, I love you. And only you. Yes, I do have friends who I'm close to. And I love and care about them too. But they're not you. I love them and I love you. But you're you, and that's amazing and wonderful and extraordinary and I love who you are. If I ever let you think otherwise, you need to tell me so I can fix it, okay? I love you, I wouldn't ask for anything or anyone else, my love. I'll tell you this as many times as you need to hear it. Whenever, wherever. I love you."

"But I can't tell you every time. If I did, I'd be telling you every day, Sora."

"Then tell me every day, and I'll listen every day. That's what I'm here for."

Volana felt herself tearing up, and was overcome with the need to wrap her in a tight hug. Immediately, Sora hugged her tightly back, gently rubbing her hand over her back to comfort her.

It feels stupid, Volana thought, but it was nice to hear it. All of what she had said, Volana already knew. But, seemingly, what she needed was to be reassured and comforted. To be reminded of what was probably obvious seemed to wash away the worry, even if it was just temporarily. It felt like the weight dropped away from her heart, and she felt a little relieved and reassured.

"Thank you Sora," Volana mumbled, burying her face in her neck. She found comfort in the smell of her, in just being close to her, and immediately relaxed.  "I just . . . needed to hear that."

"Always, baby," she said softly. "You can always come to me when that head of yours is wandering like this. I'm always here to listen to you and be here for you and reassure you. And hey, how about we go out and spend tomorrow together, just you and me?"

"I'd love that, but you don't have to."

"No, no." Sora shook her head. "I want to. We can go to the art museum, I know you'd love that."

"Mmhmm." Volana nodded. "Thank you. I love you."

"I love you too, baby," Sora said, squeezing Volana's hand and leaning forward to press a kiss to the tip of her nose. "Now, come to bed. It's midnight, I need sleep, you need sleep, we both need sleep."

"But the dishes--" At that moment, Volana interrupted herself with an involuntary yawn, and Sora chuckled.

"See? You're sleepy too, baby. The dishes are already clean. Come on, baby, I'll snuggle you to bed if that's what it takes."

"I can't say no to that."