#if youre interested about these guys then (you have my lowest bows like to the floor kinda bow) but also feel free to ask!

[sentientstump]

oc things with tiny explanations in descriptions

[theemissuniverse]

“YOU HAVE CHOSEN WAR WITH A GOD” LIU KANG X FEM!READER

SUMMARY : To say Liu Kang is in love with you is an understatement. You’re a princess and Kitana and Mileena’s younger sister. You start dating a guy but he doesn’t respect you at all. Liu Kang won’t stand for it. (The lowest of keys inspired by that one “that 70s show” episode. If y’all know know then you know)

WARNINGS : none I think lmao

Liu Kang was absolutely miserable. The Royal family of Outworld once again was throwing a party but this time in celebration for their father’s return. Of course, Liu Kang would show up to pay his respects but there was one small problem: you were with another man.

Now, it took Liu Kang a lot and I mean, a lot to get jealous. Liu Kang was usually always secure in himself but not when it came to you.

Instead you had your hand over this man’s arm. Your lips on him. Laughing at his jokes. It made him feel physically ill.

Johnny had noticed Liu Kang’s behavior and he knew why too. It was because of you. “Come on, dude. You’re the God of literal fire. You totally beat a guard of a palace.”

“Johnny is right…surprisingly.” Kung Lao said. “I have never seen you so nervous around someone before, Lord Liu Kang.”

“If you created this timeline then why didn’t you get her to fall in love with you?” Johnny asked. All his Earthrealm friends looked at him as if he was stupid. “What?”

“Do you not hear yourself right now?” Kenshi questioned him.

Liu Kang sighed. “I created the timeline to allow people free will. If she doesn’t want to be with me then so be it.”

Johnny let out an irritated moan. “You don’t even know. Why don’t you ask her?”

Raiden shook his head. “And jeopardized their friendship?”

Johnny flicked Raiden’s head and Raiden let out an ‘Ow.’ “We’re not talking about you and Kitana. We’re talking about Liu Kang and (Y/N).” He turned his attention back on you feeding your date with some grapes. “There’s gotta be something up with this guy. I don’t trust him.”

“I agree…again surprisingly.” Kung Lao said.

“Looks like we’re about to find out.” Kenshi said as you started to walk towards the champions.

Johnny gave him a confused look. “Look? You’re blind.” Kenshi flicked Johnny’s head and Johnny let out an ‘Ow.’ Kung Lao and Raiden snickered.

“Hey you guys.” You yelled out happy. They all bowed to you and you rolled your eyes playfully. Compared to your sisters, you were laid back. “I told you to stop that.” You then pulled Liu Kang into a hug. “Hey, Liu.”

Liu Kang was always happy with your guy’s relationship. Considering you were a princess and he was a God, the two of you did not act like there was a power imbalance. He hugged you back. “Hello, (Y/N).” He had stuck it in his head to call you just by your name every time he addressed you because you told him to.

The two of you pull away. You motioned over to your date. “This is my boyfriend, Brady.”

Kenshi felt his head and then turned his attention to Brady. “You’re not from Outworld. I can read your thoughts.”

“Strange…” Brady said with a laugh. “Yeah no, I’m from Earthrealm but my business is in Outworld.”

“Pretty interesting move…Brady.” Johnny Cage said, eyeing him up and down.

“Yeah…it is..” Brady said a little uncomfortable.

You listened to the music. The music had slowed up. “I swear they always do this. I’ll be back.” You kissed Brady’s cheek and walked away. “Hey! I said I wanted fast paced!”

It was just the Earthrealmers and Brady. There was a bit of an awkward silence. Liu Kang, as much as he hated it, did not want to be rude and now felt inclined to keep the conversation going. “So, you and Princess (Y/N)?”

Brady nodded. “Yeah isn’t she something?”

Liu Kang didn’t like how he spoke but decided to push it aside. “She’s a wonderful person.”

“Yeah, but sometimes I kinda hate it when she talks.”

The group was shocked at what he said. They all turn to Liu Kang to see his reaction.

Liu Kang looked pissed as ever. Why was he with you if he couldn’t stand you? Liu Kang was madly in love with you. He could listen to you talk for hours. Even if it was literally about paint drying. How could he not? He still tried to keep his composure and offered a fake smile. “Why are you with her then?”

Brady let off a chuckle. “I mean, I figure it’s worth it if I can nail her.”

Raiden was the only one confused by the statement. “Nail her? Like with a hammer?” Kenshi bent over towards his direction and whispered in his ear, explaining to him what Brady had meant. “Oh…”

He wanted to use you for sex? This was crossing a very big line. Though, Liu Kang still tried to use reason. “You should think about that. (Y/N), doesn’t really get into relationships so-“

“That’s not a surprised.” Brady said. When the Earthrealmers waited for his response, he gave them a look as if they should know why. “I mean, she’s an annoying bitch.”

Again, the Earthrealm champions turned back to see Liu Kang’s reaction. This time Liu Kang looked even more angry. They took one step back, knowing what was going to happen.

Liu Kang was a simple man. He did not evoke violence or promote it. Did not believe that fighting was the first resort to anything.

That didn’t matter when it came down to you.

Liu Kang grabbed a hold of Brady’s shirt and made him look directly in his eyes. “Take it back.”

Brady tried to hide his fear. He scoffed at Liu Kang and tried to get him to release his grip on him. “What are you in love with her or something? Relax. You can have her when I’m done.”

That was the final straw. Liu Kang started to feel himself lose control. In one swift motion, Liu Kang used his power to fling him across the party. Brady hit the brick wall and fell onto a table where he then broke it.

“Yeah! Kick his ass!” Johnny said, pulling out a phone and recording. The others gave him a look. “What?”

Liu Kang was not finished. He walked over to Brady and picked him up by his neck. His free hand started to build up fire and he was ready to use it on him until you came along. “Liu Kang?”

The sound of your voice snapped him out of his rage. Liu Kang looked over towards you and immediately dropped Brady. “(Y/N).”

“What happened?” You asked concerned. You then realized that obviously it had to be Brady’s doing because Liu Kang would not attack anyone for no reason. You turned your attention to your boyfriend. “Did you start the fight?”

Brady looked at you like he couldn’t believe you. He stood up from the ground and pointed in the direction of Liu Kang. “Me? He attacked me! I didn’t lay a hand on him.”

You were stunned by the accusation. You turned your attention to Liu Kang, who looked ashamed by his actions. “Is that true? Did you attack him first?”

Liu Kang kept his head down, not daring to look at you. “Yes, Princess (Y/N).”

You couldn’t believe that Liu Kang would start a fight. No. Something was missing. You turned back to Brady. “Okay, well what did you do or say because Liu Kang doesn’t just go out attacking people.”

“Are you serious?” Brady questioned you in disbelief. “You’re picking his side-a psycho, over your own boyfriend.”

By this statement, Raiden decided to speak up. “Brady told us that he was only using you for intimacy and then called you…” He tried to find the right words.

“An annoying bitch.” Johnny helped him out.

“Yes. That. Lord Liu Kang was just defending your honor, Princess.”

Of course you believed your Earthrealm friends. You were beyond angry. You looked at Brady. “I’m an annoying what now?”

Brady looked scared out his mind. If he feared Liu Kang, he didn’t know you at all. “No, no. Baby, I would never. They’re lying.”

Two of your guards had walked up to you. “Is everything alright, Princess (Y/N)?”

You looked between the guards and him. You didn’t even want to deal with him anymore. “Escort him out of here. Make sure he never enters the palace again.”

The guards grabbed onto Brady. Brady tried to break out. “Baby, wait. We can talk about this-“

“No, we cannot.” You leaned in, making sure your eyes met his. “Be incredibly grateful I offer you mercy.”

The guards escorted Brady out of the party. Not without him screaming after you. You rolled your eyes at his dramatics. Then you turned over to Liu Kang. “Thank you for standing up for me. I didn’t know you could get so angry.”

Liu Kang smiled at you. “Only for you.” You smiled a little, feeling the butterflies you always felt for him erupt. Liu Kang gently took your hand. “May I have a moment with you?”

“Sure.” You took Liu Kang inside the palace and all the way to your room. When you made it to your room, you closed the door and looked at him. “What did you need to talk about?”

Liu Kang bit his lip. It shouldn’t be this hard to confess his feelings for you but it was. He didn’t want to ruin any friendship he had with you. “I didn’t just do that because of his disrespect for you…I did it because I love you. I have had feelings for you for the longest but I didn’t want you to feel incline to have them for me or push me away. I’m sorry I wasn’t honest with you. Every time I look at you, it’s as if time itself stops. I have never felt so strongly for anyone the way I have with you before.” He took your hands in his. “Please, if you do not feel the same, don’t shut me out. I still would like to remain as friends.”

You were shocked by his confession but not at all surprised. You’ve waited forever for him to say that. You pulled Liu Kang close to you and kissed him.

Liu Kang happily kissed you back, deepening the kiss. He kissed you as if you were the only woman in the world.

The two of you pull away. You smiled up at him. “It’s about time.”

Liu Kang smiled at you and pulled you into another kiss. Everything felt right within the world now.

[aeferkssr]

serendipitous encounters. ━ if the stranger never meddled into your personal affairs, archons know where you would be right now.

‎‏‏ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‎i. charas. lyney x gn!reader

ii. an. double uploads!?!!? thats crazy!!?! anyways i kinda rushed the end i hope its still okay tho ><

‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏g ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎iii. cw. su!cide attempt, hum4n trafficin (mentioned vaguely), reader wears a dress, ooc lyney (???), hurt/comfort, angst. please tell me if there are more!

‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏ ‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏ ‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏‎ ‎‏‏

the air on the balcony was cool, cool enough to calm you from the several interactions.

the breeze danced around the delicate fabrics of your dress, shoes being long disregarded as you stood on the railings. you whisper faint and final farewells to the very stars that keep you company on your lowest nights, the garden that you would hide away in when you needed some time alone, and to the very life that you have been blessed with.

you doubt you'd be able to live as lavishly in your next life, (you doubt you'll even remember this one, much less make a comparison) but you decided to let fate take the lead.

"you can feel the midnight air just fine from down here, i don't think the need for elevation is mandatory."

fate has got to be fucking with you right now. you didn't even look at him. you respond:

"you needn't worry about me, i'll be careful."

"really?" you could hear the skepticism in his tone. he leans over on the railing and looks up to the stars.

out the corner of your eye you could see the top hat atop his head, intricate designs softly illuminated by the light of the gala and the moon's luminescent rays. a black and maroon ribbon covers the base and is tied in an extravagant bow.

you huff as you look back to the sky, closing your eyes and slowly leaning forward.

well, since he was here, clearly he's entertained by your misery. might as well give him a show.

"what bring you to a fatui ball, stranger?"

archons be damned...

slightly annoyed, you look down to be met with violet eyes and a facial expression you couldn't describe. honest, but sly? guarded, yet vulnerable? who exactly was this guy?

without an answer, he continues:

"clearly you have to have some sort of authority, why lose it all here?"

you take a deep breathe, exhaling every ounce of courage you would of have to climb up in the first place. gently, you make your way down with the help of the stranger, or your savior in this matter.

he takes your hand in both of his as you steady yourself on the floor, he looks worried? interested? whoever this guy is, he's definitely hard to read.

he finally asks,

"excuse my prying, but, what would make someone like you give up?"

you sigh, "very trivial matters, i'm afraid. i'm just a coward running away from my problems"

"a matter worth taking your life over isn't trivial to me."

you stare at him, someone you met for the first time is more worried about you than he was. he's been with you all this time, yet you feel more understood by a total stranger.

you try to not meet his eyes as you told your story, holding his hand a little tighter.

"count blanchett of poisson, he's have many wives in his years. there has been rumors of the women he weds only serving as countess for a few months... until never being seen again."

you sniffle as you try to blink away the upcoming tears, you shouldn't be weak right now, you can't be weak right now.

"...i've told father about the rumors but he tells me i'm being dramatic, that there was nothing to worry about and that his past wives were just incompetent, and to never be like them..."

you can hear his stern voice boom throughout his office:

"all of those women simply went back to their homes. to add, they came back disastrous, unfulfilled, disappointments. that will not be you, understand?"

"the stress of the eldest always goes to the weakest" your voice starts to crack as tears flow down your face. "all of my other siblings are just lap dogs, only there as trophies of his blood..."

you finally look him in the eye,

"why did i have to be the disposable one?"

his mouth hands agape, he didn't know what to say, there was nothing he could say. you pour out your heart and soul through you tears, your hand tries to wipe them away but fail as the sheer amount of sadness that flows out.

he couldn't comfort you, but he could distract you. even if it was for a moment.

he takes your other hand and slowly walks into the grand ballroom. it glows with the warmth of chandeliers casting a soft, golden hue over the polished marble floor. the room is alive with the sounds of a live orchestra playing a mesmerizing waltz.

he brings you to the center of the floor and the music swells. he extends his hand towards you as you sniffle,

"don't be shy. you do know how to dance, right?" he teases as you take his hand with a small smile.

you two begin, moving in perfect harmony to the lilting rhythm of the waltz. the stranger leads with finesse, guiding you across the floor with effortless precision.

your bodies sway in sync, a mesmerizing spectacle of fluidity and grace. with every twirl and dip, you two seem to float on air, lost in the timeless allure of the dance. the world around you fades into a blur, leaving only the two of them in their own enchanting universe.

you can faintly see your silhouette through his eyes as he looks directly into yours.

"you're a good dancer." he speaks, breaking the silence between you both.

"i learnt from the best."

he pulls you closer to him, your chest flush against his as he whispers into your ear:

"lyney."

aeferkssr.

[jeweled-blue-eyes]

Do you have any headcannons or ideas for any of potential male leads for og! Penelope? Also I liked the ones that you suggested in my previous ask

P.s. Penelope deserves better than to be pair up with her tormentors like come on

My favourite idea of a male lead for Penelope is a cook. No secret bastard prince or powerful wizard hiding his talents. Just someone absolutely ordinary. I have a few reasons for this choice: All of the men who tormented and killed Penelope were nobles (Callisto is a crown prince, Iklies a prince of a fallen nation, Vinter is a marquis, Reynold and Derrick are dukes). On top of that they are usually insanely talented at something be it swordmanship or magic. They could easily crush Penelope between their fingers. Penelope has no good association with the nobility. Whenever she leaves the house to go to balls she gets either ignored or mocked. She has to bow down to them and make herself small and insignificant and apologize for anything that caused troubles even if it wasn't her fault.

If her love interest was a commoner this would be quite a different story. It would be a different kind of power imbalance where the girl is kind of in charge instead of the guy. Remember when she was alone with Iklies and it was probably the first time she smiled from the bottom of her heart? With a commoner lover Penelope could finally be herself without worrying how others might perceive her. She doesn't have to follow complicatet etiquettes or watch his every move to detect any sign of anger. It'd be true freedom.

Why a cook you ask? Because food is a love language and for Penelope, someone who has grown up with food insecurity, being cooked for and served a warm homemade meal has a big meaning. It means "I thought about what you might like and cooked it with you in my mind. I want you to be full and happy and never be hungry again for the rest of your life." It'd be just very sweet.

I picture them starting out as childhood friends. The boy doesn't start out as a cook. He's a kitchen boy or a servant meant for the lowest and dirtiest work. He has to chop the firewood and do the washing up. He's getting a bit pushed around by the fellow servants and the dream of becoming a gourmet cook is still out of reach for him.

How do they meet? After a week of being starved again, Penelope sneaks into the kitchen to steal some leftovers and there she catches him stealing a pie! At first she's very angry at him. The food was meant for her (it wasn't) and all the anger at being starved is suddenly redirected at him. She can't scream at him as it might alert people but she shakes him, glares at him and threatens she'll tell the duke. The boy apologizes profoundly and explains he couldn't help himself he was so hungry and Penelope..understands. She knows what it's like to be a commoner and live at the mercy of others. They make a deal: she won't snitch on him and he won't tell the others about her coming down to the kitchen.

They start out as just two stranger bound by nothing but their unfortunate circumstances but eventually they become friends. Sometimes he waits for her to come out at night at a certain time and has already food prepared for her and is sad when she can't make it.

I headcanon him as having a sick mother or a crippled father (from the war maybe?) making him the only breadwinner of his family full of hungry younger siblings. And more often than not he has given up his food to them. He's just a very kind person and can't stand to see a person in need. When he mets a beggar on the streets he'd give him his last shilling that he wanted to use to buy candy for his youngest sibling. I also picture him as a bit dumb? Or naive? Like he legit didn't notice what was going on with Penelope until he actually met her. He just thought the bad leftovers were for the pigs or something. In his defense he worked his fingers to the bone 24/07 and just had other worries.

I also have the headcanon that Penelope leaves jewels as a gift to him to show her gratitude but he thinks someone is trying to blame him for theft and tries to get rid of them lol.

When Ivonne arrives and Penelope is blamed for the poisoning and confined in her room, he uses the time window where her door is unlocked and he has to serve her food to gives her the uniform of a maid and they escape at night together. They settle somewhere far away from the capital, pretending to be a young married couple in need of a job. The boy becomes a cook just like he always dreamed of and Penelope is finally free from her family. She is unspeakably happy when he asks her a few years later for her hand in marriage (for real this time) and they open up their own restaurant with their savings.

[candycryptids]

4 do they have a canon mount or minions? What are their names? If applicable!

30 what was their highest point in Shadowbringers? Their lowest? What caused it? 

((Omg I’m dumb I forgot the number but:)) how do they feel about Zenos?

Ok ok I’m sorry this took a while I was gonna take screenshots but then the mog-event started and instead I raided until my wrist hurt LOL (and then I typed this all up laying in bed and kicking my feets- read more cos it just got fuckin long

So for Minions/Mounts/Names; Mochiie has adopted two little Chocobo hatchlings- a tan-brown one he named named Anne, and a deep orange one he named SallyBeth he’s not 100% sure what breeds they are, but he does end up eventually saddling Anne adventure during Heavensward and SallyBeth during Stormblood, with the two of them each having their own strengths in terms of riding. SallyBeth is a Draft sized Chocobo too tender hearted for battle and ends up being more suited to long journeys across the continent or carrying luggage/passengers/pulling the cart, if need be. Anne is a smaller sized spitfire that is most likely to kick and bite apart anything that gets in her way. Mochi is the only one that can safely handle her, though I would call them “drift compatible”. Anne has bitten several people on the ass before, and will steal gyshal greens out of your bag.

Anne is also kitted out with a special ‘trick saddle’ he had custom made during his stint on the Steppe in Stormblood, so he can put his foot up on the saddle horn for extra height-stability to fire his bow while riding. (Hence why they are “drift compatible” in order for this to work, Anne actually wears blinders to keep her focused and running steady)

(Since I haven’t thought about Shadowbringers too extensively for my two canon WoL’s, I’ll give you this weird answer from Chuusday the non-WoL, and her wife, also a non-WoL but more involved w/ the WoL, it’s complicated ik ik we haven’t nailed out what happens with the WoL yet tho;)

Lowest point was when Chuusday’s wife Talia got soul-ganked and she didn’t even get to find out about this until she was summoned to the first (eon become instant yadda yadda) a week or so later to help fight The Big Problem which was all told a hilarious situation. Because her wife was really hurt and despite being inactive by nature that was enough to send her into a guns blazing fury. I think she temporarily became a Gunbreaker she got so mad-

High point was the Yorha Raids- for all the ups and downs during, getting to explore the ruins of the city and pick through the parts for upgrades made all Chuu’s dopamine receptors light on god damn fire. Tuesday gets a body upgrade just from all the salvage. He’s lighterweight than ever. His link Pearl gets built in temporarily but ends up disabled in favor of a physical linkpearl after concerns abt being listened in on without safe action to prevent it being available.

Aaaand, “how does the WoL feel about Zenos?”

The short answer; Mochiie is obsessed with this guy for a long time. It makes him worse. It brings out the ugliness in what he would’ve considered his good traits.

The longer answer;

“I can fix him” but it’s a hard lesson. It’s a hard lesson because sometimes people can’t be fixed. Zenos becomes an all-consuming yard stick that Mochi measures himself against strength wise as he fights to become stronger, faster, wittier, he’ll think of the right things to say this time and make Zenos change for the better and recognize the humanity and feelings in others but it just keeps not working. Because Zenos doesn’t want to be fixed. He wants to be your obsession. He wants the person with the potential to be an interesting fight, a meal to be fattened and braised for hours- he wants them to be obsessed with him just as much as he is. More than he is. And Mochi falls right into that readily, of having potential to be a fight that makes his blood sing. And Mochiie thinks in his overwhelming strength is the same potential for overwhelming goodness. It is. Not easy to accept when that isn’t so.

He’s never had to run into a wall like Zenos before. He does eventually make peace with it, after beating him down as Shinryuu, baring his whole self snarling and ugly and tired to face against a terrible primal that was someone he thought worth saving. (He’d made it work with Ysayle, they found common ground before her death, even Urianger, for his turncoat moments, they found sense, things made *sense* Zenos doesn’t make any **sense**—)

Zenos isn’t here to make sense and fit into neat and tidy boxes or be some ‘fix-it’ project that can be saved lmfao.

I joke in a modern au Mochiie would write a ten+ paragraph argument, cited sources, research, hours, days of carefully picked words and picked apart drafted, revised, revised again thoughts, and Zenos would send back the equivalent of

“ur mom suck me good and hard through my shorts 🤣🤪😜” like .2 seconds later, implying he didn’t even bother to read it… and he like, really won’t.

[hyenahunt]

Saga: Release - 10

Writer: Akira

Season: Spring

Characters: Chiaki, Jin, Hokuto, Tori

Proofreading: 310mc (JP) & Peace (ENG)

Translation: kotofucius

Tori: Yup, let’s kick the small-fry about and keep the top seat for ourselves.

Location: Empty Classroom

Chiaki: Hmm… Having listened so far, I don’t see the bad news in that at all.

It seems to me that Project-Saga has developed according to the plan the magazine laid out.

After all, the goal of this project was to blow life into the stagnating idol business by dragging retired idols into the spotlight, right?

From the very beginning, they wanted not just us, but a ton of temporary units to take part.

It isn’t that the scale has gotten way bigger — it’s more that things are finally proceeding according to their ideal and original proposal for the project, isn’t it?

Jin: Yeah, I won’t argue with that. But I think it’s going their way a little too much…

Kunugi-sensei’s investigation brought a lot of fishy business to the surface, too.

I feel like someone’s brewing a conspiracy behind all of this. It’s going too well; isn’t it just weird that things suddenly move exactly the way we want?

Hokuto: Isn’t that a little cynical? We should definitely be on our guard, but we won’t get anywhere being overly cautious.

Jin: Yeah. That’s why I added that I couldn’t write off the news as being actually bad.

There’s been no harm so far… Good for all of us if it’s really just my paranoia talking.

Anyway, there’s a bad side to having more idols participate, y’see…

Even if funds did increase, it seems they don’t have enough to lavish rewards on everyone.

So from now on, idols will be pitted against each other, graded through various methods…

…and the lowest ranks will be periodically eliminated from Project-Saga.

It's been a walk in the park with this work so far, but…

We’ll have to be strategic with our moves now that it’s essentially a battle of survival of the fittest.

Chiaki: Mmh… The budget and the pages the magazine could spare for Project-Saga are limited, so I suppose there’s no way around that…

But even this is turning into a competition, huh? Yumenosaki’s DreamFests should’ve been enough.

Why can’t we all live in peace?

Jin: Who knows… Whoever finds the answer to that would get a Nobel prize, I bet.

It’s a difficult problem that all great men in history, throughout the whole world, haven’t found a neat solution to.

We're destructive by nature; we kill and eat other living things to sustain ourselves, and use up oxygen to live. Not everybody can become Gautama Buddha. [1]

But still, there isn’t really any value in being alive if you stop questioning it… so keep thinking, Morisawa.

Find your own answer to it, and make the world a kinder place for the children of the future.

Chiaki: ………

Jin: Haha, well, the discussion got a little too grand, so let's bring it back somewhere closer to eye-level.

Like I said before, our rivals for Project-Saga have increased like crazy.

At the moment, we Rain-bows stand out, since we’re one or two steps ahead of them.

Hokuto: Of course we are; we were the first unit to be formed and become active.

Jin: Yup, good things come with being early birds, though they’ll probably get past us in no time if we slow down.

There's an older bunch of agencies vying for a piece of Project-Saga — I think you guys already know the name of one of 'em. Seems like they're hoping to save their business, so they’ve been investing a lot into the project.

The odd thing is, CosPro hasn’t made any clear moves, despite showing interest with their money investment on the project…

But they’re a shrewd bunch; I’m sure they’ll come out with some surprise eventually.

Hokuto: CosPro… Hmm, I've heard that name somewhere not that long ago. Was it one of the rare times my father was home…? Maybe he mentioned it in passing.

Jin: Seiya-san did? I guess an active idol’s nose would be on a different level — has he laid his hands on CosPro already?

Hokuto: That guy has no moral integrity, after all. … Anyway, we should be thinking about how to maintain our lead and shake off our competitors.

Jin: Yep. That’s probably the most decent strategy to go about it.

So I’ve tried planning out the activities Rain-bows will be doing going forward.

It’s still at the drafting stage since I need to consider your schedules, too.

Hokuto: Right, so I’ve heard… You really did formulate a plan, Sensei.

I personally agree that we should be more proactive and widen our gap over other units.

Tori: Yup, let’s kick the small-fry about and keep the top seat for ourselves. …So what’s this plan? Are we holding another show?

Just don’t decide at the last moment, ‘kay? I’m still having a tough time catching up with fine, so I don’t have spare time to learn Rain-bows’ songs and choreography.

Chiaki: Yeah, we Ryuseitai are broadening our genre and holding live shows more frequently, as well. Our schedules may not always agree.

Jin: I thought so. That’s why we should talk this over, yeah? So tell me if you have any ideas, I’ll slot ‘em in wherever I can.

Anyway, since our live show the other day was a huge success, Rain-bows has gotten a few job offers. Right, Anzu?

Chiaki: Ooh, you gathered the documents and offers in a file, huh?

You’re growing fast as a producer, aren’t you, Anzu? We can’t lose to you, either ♪

Tori: Show me, show me! It’s always been Prez devising our plans and deciding what jobs fine should take, so I’ve never seen an offer letter.

Mhm… Huh, so this is what an offer letter is like? Everybody writes in a pretty similar way, huh?

Chiaki: Hm? No, that’s because Anzu reformatted them to Yumenosaki’s standard.

Actual offer letters are much more varied.

Tori: Ohhh… It’s nice that they’re already filed like this~ The pay, period, and contents of the job are laid out very clearly.

We just need to pick out ones that’ll benefit Rain-bows the most, right?

Hokuto: Yes, while finding a compromise between our respective schedules, too.

Chiaki: Heheh, I'm always going through job offer letters like these in Ryuseitai…

So I’ve had enough of it by now; I think I'd like to leave deciding things in the rest of Rain-bow's hands.

Jin: Right. I’m the leader, anyway — I’ll make the final call and take responsibility for decisions.

Morisawa and Hidaka can rest from being leaders and see things from a different perspective, simply as members of an idol unit.

Tori: Hmm? Wait a minute—not that I care, but Hidaka-senpai, you’re Trickstar’s leader?

Hokuto: Yeah, on paper. …Is it surprising?

Tori: A little. You don’t really seem to suit the part — I guess your condescending attitude is kinda leader-ish, though. But you lack the charisma my Prez has~♪

Hokuto: ………

…………

Chiaki: Heheh, well, no one would seem like much of a leader compared to Tenshouin; even me.

Leaders come in different shapes that suit the units they lead.

In Yumenosaki, authority lies in the hands of the leaders, so the position might demand a degree of leadership ability, but…

From the perspective of normal idols, we’re just the face of the unit at most.

So don’t beat yourself up over it; just become a leader only you can be… Hidaka.

I mean, Trickstar’ll likely never need a charismatic commander, right?

Gautama Buddha was the founder of Buddhism, and is the Buddha most people have in mind when regarding it.

✦✦✦✦✦

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[itsnothingofinterest]

So with the end supposedly approaching (relatively speaking), people have started giving some thought as to who the final threat is really going to be; Tomura Shigaraki or All For One. It’ll definitely be one of them, they’re the strongest and most established villains by a mile; but both have their own reasons for people to think they’ll be the “final boss” of the series. And far be it from me to keep my opinion to myself; I really think it’s going to be Tomura.

I’m not sure if that’s some level of controversial among the fans hoping for Shigaraki’s redemption, as I do believe the alternative’s gotten a lot of traction lately. Because understand that I’m still expecting his redemption too, and don’t expect his hypothetical final boss status to really prevent that. (Practically nothing can, it’s as much a guaranteed outcome at this point as Deku getting his sixth bonus quirk.) Realistically, the only difference would be if he & Deku then team up to fight the evil potato head, or to...just start fixing stuff I guess.

On that note, the eventual redemption is actually one of the reasons I think he’s the better choice. Almost every point of comparison between the two villain I can think of makes Tomura seem like the better choice, actually...with maybe one or two exceptions. So I wanted to go over all those points of comparison & everything they’ve got going for them as endgame villains and why the comperrisons overall seem to favour Tomura as the final boss.

1. Someone who was defeated to the power of just one man

For one, just looking at pure power levels, AFO’s just not as threatening as Tomura; and there’s not really a way to bridge that gap.

Like, Tomura’s obviously more of a threat personally; he’s got the stronger body that was scientifically enhanced, and only he has Decay on top of the AFO quirk and the collection that came with it. It is just a fact that right now, Tomura is far more powerful. And before anyone thinks that AFO could become an equal threat by just taking over & fighting in his body; that’s not true because, along with just more combat experience that doesn’t rely on an arsenal of quirks, Tomura also has that Shimura trick where you remember your origin and become super bad ass. You know, the trick that All Might used to beat AFO in Kamino. In other words, the most dangerous individual in the series right now is the AFO!Tomura body with specifically Tomura in control.

And as long as the slight edge in mentality in Tomura’s favour exists, there’s not really a way to bridge that gap and have AFO take Tomura’s place as the biggest potential threat. Restore or enhance AFO’s original body? That’s just catching it up with AFO in Tomura’s body, which is still behind Tomura in Tomura’s body. Have AFO boost Tomura’s body with him in control? It would still be better with Tomura in control. There’s no scenario where Tomura isn’t the most powerful character in BNHA.

(Well, except maybe AFO weakening him by, say, stripping him of his quirks; but if he has to make things easier for the heroes to become the most powerful, I think that kind of proves my point anyway.)

But one person can only be so dangerous, so lets talk followers. Tomura has a close knit group of friends & allies on top of a vast army super loyal to him specifically that reaches a six digit figure, and AFO...just doesn’t. And I’ll get back to this later; but I don’t think he wants one either. He sticks to just a handful of people useful to him and what’s left of his Nomu. And while maybe that is the better way for him to accomplish his own personal goals, it’s simply not as threatening as the force which Hawks thought could’ve conquered the country if the heroes hadn’t struck first.

Tomura is a country ending threat, who in the right circumstances could fight literally all of the heroes with a chance of winning, and AFO simply isn’t.

2. His own little world

And to return to what I was talking about earlier, I’m not sure he really cares to be either. Like, people say he wants to conquer everything, and I imagine he’d think regaining lots of money & power would be great down the line; but evidence seems to suggest he doesn’t really care much for the country as a whole or any of the major themes being discussed by the actual main characters at the moment.

I mean if he did, he’d probably have rescued the PLF, that army capable of competing with all of hero society. And he probably wouldn’t have told ~10,000 dangerous and powerful villains indebted to him for their freedom to just run amok while he keeps contact with only the ones useful for his personal goals. And he definitively wouldn’t be laying low & sleeping through his enemies lowest moment & giving them a month to recover, also in service to those personal goals. That activity seems to imply those personal goals matter a whole lot more to him than societal conquest.

And what are those goals? Seemingly, taking over Tomura’s body so he can finally steal One For All. To what end, we’re not 100% sure of, but I believe it’s either a) a weird pride thing where he finally has control over his brother who’s rebelled against him for decades upon decades or b) an attempt at immortality as a sentient & transferable body-controlling quirk. Either way it’s some selfish personal thing he just gets others wrapped up in.

He’s incredibly disconnected from the greater themes and conflicts of the story. He seems to have no opinions on heroics besides how people are stupid for attempting them, and no opinion on society besides that it just naturally sucks. He’s mainly just a nuisance for the actual main characters. This self-important old man stuck in his own little world is supposed to be Deku’s final opponent?

Oh, and on that note-

3. Deku who?

We’re also talking about who’s going to be the final obstacle for Deku to face; and the problem with the being AFO is that...they don’t really have much to bounce off of with each other. You might be able to argue slight foil-ment, but they don’t really know each other, nor do they have any kind of connection to each other besides Deku having OFA so he’s AFO’s enemy by default.

(In fact their latest & 2nd convo, which came out as I was drafting this post out, kind of proves that with how AFO basically just shallowly made fun of him for trying to be a hero. That’s basically the extent of their antagonism.)

In fact, I’m like 80% sure this is a major reason for the Dad For One theory existing; just to give them some connection, something to talk about. Because otherwise AFO is just an evil guy known by people Deku knows/wants to save. He’s basically just another, more dangerous Overhaul; who Deku's already fought. And to AFO, Deku’s just another OFA holder acting all high & mighty; which we also already saw him face in the Kamino fight. So what little they do offer each other has already been done for both of them. And there’s nothing wrong with that for carrying a fight, I just wonder if that can really carry the final fight.

Compare that to Shigaraki, who foils Deku in ways so numerous & obvious it’s almost hard to talk about, such as: their position as successors, strategic thinkers, very similar origins, very similar core characters, team players, red shoes, they looked really similar as kids...just to name a few parallels. Contrasting AFO, there is a lot to work with here that would contributed to a good fight that’d double as a battle of ideologies. And admittedly, we know this because it already has, this is also something we’ve seen before; but there’s a lot more unexplored with their conflict, a lot left unsaid that we could see from them arguing their viewpoints. A lot more than from Deku & AFO anyway.

I mean for Pete’s sake; All Might & Shigaraki have more in common and more to talk about than Deku & AFO. That’s a major problem if those two are meant to carry the final battle; which is why I don’t think they are.

4. Just punch him

There’s also the fact that AFO doesn’t really challenge Deku in any real way; and I’m not just talking about how All Might solo-ing him (twice) should logically mean endgame Deku should also be able to solo him. I’m more talking about how...that’s kind of all he’d need to do. If you can just beat AFO up enough then...that’s it, threat over. Wrapped up in a neat little bow.

To compare, Shigaraki is the greatest threat the heroes have ever faced, the victim most in need of saving, and to top it off, he’s got the gall to be both of those things at once. What’s a hero supposed to do with that? That’s a serious question characters are going to have to think about when deciding how to deal with Shigaraki. His position is that of, not just the greatest challenge, but a set of the greatest challenges a hero could face. And that’s before you get into his side representing those oppressed by serious systemic issues that need to be addressed as well; quite possibly simultaneously.

No one needs to address systemic corruption or prejudice to beat AFO though. They just need to punch him real hard. The biggest challenge AFO presents the heroes is “how do we make sure this guy stops being a problem for good when neither our most secure prison, nor removing his head, did the job?”

(Personally, my answer is to have Tomura do it. Because unlike Deku, Tomura actually does have a proper antagonistic relationship with AFO, so he has reason to be the one to end him besides just being the protagonist. Plus he’s under no obligation not to kill, so there’s that.)

And like yeah, that does make AFO the easier guy to deal with, and thus write an ending around (to say nothing of how he's also the most satisfying person to see punched in the face); but does that really mean Horikoshi would want to use him instead of the more interesting option of Tomura? I mean I guess we can’t be sure, there is merit in writing the easy resolution; but I’d prefer the complex finale if I were in his shoes.

5. Horikoshi’s favourite

And lastly there’s just the issue of which of the two Horikoshi’s put more work into. Spoiler alert: it’s not the guy that spent like 200 chapters in jail being menacing every one in a while.

Tomura is by far the more developed between the two, having constantly evolved over the course of the series. And more than just as a character, as described above he’s been developed as the more threatening and challenging conflict for Deku while also reflecting him in a lot of important ways. We’ve seen the growth of his power & influence, we’ve gotten to know & understand his motives, we’ve seen how he’s been failed by heroes before. Everything about him has built him up as the ultimate villain, the most desperate victim, and overall greatest challenge for Deku and the story as a whole to face.

And AFO is...nearly one of those things. Which is pretty much what he was from his first appearance. He has not developed at all over the series, and from what we can tell from his flashbacks, he hasn’t developed at all over the past ~200 years either. (I’m half tempted to call him more inciting incident then character.) What we have with AFO, as far as a character and a villain goes, is pretty much what we’re getting until he’s done. And, well; if Tomura is a better villain & a better pick for final boss than he was then, that gap’s just going to keep growing.

Like, I doubt it really needs stating how Shigaraki is probably the character Horikoshi has put the most work into in the entire series. And a lot of that work, a lot of his development, has gone to the idea of him surpassing AFO or being a villain foil to Deku, who himself is mean to surpass All Might. For his roll to be usurped by the guy he’s meant to surpass just feels like it’s going against that. Like, it’d feel almost as wrong for his character and the story around him than it would for Deku is All Might got his powers back and took over for him as main protagonist. It just doesn’t feel right for Tomura not to be the final villain, is what I’m getting at.

6. ...One saving grace

Okay, but I will admit one thing AFO has going for him that I would be remiss not to bring up. Besides being the most hated character in a series that also has Endeavor in it, I mean. He’s got this one trait that makes him an effective antagonist to anyone in the series; his complete disregard to pretty much every major theme in the series.

I mean think about it; the major themes of Shigaraki’s circle all revolve around trying to fix the society that rejected them; but AFO believes Society just naturally sucks that way as part of human nature, so their cause is doomed. And the heroes’ major themes all revolve around how to become/what it means to be a hero; but AFO believes trying to do good in that society can’t really be done & also it’s ridiculous to believe comic books are real, so their cause is also doomed and they look stupid doing it. So despite not really interacting with anyone’s core conflict or goals in favour of wrapping them up in his own, he still manages a one-sided ideological opposition with nearly every major player in the series; and that’s not nothing.

But, and I completely understand that this is just a matter of opinion, that kind of just leaves him feeling to me like a good antagonist, not a good final antagonist. I’d still prefer it be Tomura even from this perspective, because he’s able to oppose the ideologies of his opponents on purpose & with proper ideologies of his own.

To summarize:

Shigaraki feels the better choice for final boss because he’s more threatening, more interesting, both as a person and as an opponent for Deku specifically, he’s far more directly tied into the themes of the story and their resolution, & he’s had far more set up. AFO is more hated, and his callous disregard for everything everyone else holds important is something I guess, but that’s pretty much all he’s got going for him in compression. I don’t know about you, but I know who I think would carry the conclusion to the series better.

But I also know this isn’t the most popular take among my villain fan colleagues right now. So if anyone disagrees, I welcome any civil discussion about these two & their viability as final boss.

[nothing-but-dreamy]

THE NIGHT UNFURLS

Characters: Leon Kennedy x fem!Reader

Warnings: erotical language

Words: 2.616

As yn entered the hotel bar, she caught all the attention of all men in the room. She was dressed in a long, well-fitting, black dress with a cutout back. It got closed in her neck with long, silk ribbons. The open back gave a perfect view of her soft, naked skin down to the small of her back.

Her curled hair fell over her shoulders in loose strands. The bright eyes were rimmed with smokey eyes make up and her lips were glowing red. All in all, she was a jaw dropper and Leon had spotted her the second she entered the room.

Leon played with his whiskey tumbler and let his index finger slowly sliding along the rim while he watched the mysterious woman. Her black leather high heels with ribbons around her ankle and calf were making soft sounds on the parquet on her way through the room as she aimed for the bar.

With an elegant move, she sat on a free bar stool, crossed one leg over the other and revealed more skin as the dress slid upwards. Her black painted nails clattered over the mahogany surface while she waited for the bar keeper to take her order.

Leon was fixated on her appearance. Everything on her screamed beauty and he got distracted more and more by her long legs and how she presented herself. Now and then, her eyes met his and Leon knew that her moves were just for him to give him a small show of herself.

The bar keeper served her drink, a Vodka on the rocks. While looking at Leon, she raised her glass to him with a small sexy smile and a small nod before she took a sip of her drink, still connecting their glances.

From the outside, Leon seemed to be calm but on the inside, his mind was already running wild with fantasies he had about this sensual woman. He imagined how her skin would feel under his hands. How her full lips would taste and how it would feel if these bright eyes would bore into his while he was inside her...

Leon's unleashed imagination stopped suddenly as a guy, tall, broad shoulders and with black hair appeared in his line of view. The unknown man walked over to the beauty, leaning against the bar to talk with her in a low voice.

Leon was able to watch the scene just for five minutes before he had enough. She faked a laugh about something the guy said and Leon noticed it didn't sound right. The whole scene between them didn't look right and he wanted to change what was wrong. Mostly, because she still searched his eyes no matter how close the guy came to her.

Leon cleared his glass, walked over to the two and tapped the guy on the shoulder, "Excuse me, but-"

"Don't you see that I'm talking with this woman? So, go away."

"Yes, I've noticed that. That's the reason why I came over. You might not see it but she's not interested in you.", Leon said serious with a stern expression.

The guy turned around to face Leon to the fullest. He straightened himself but was still a bit smaller than Leon. The guy was not amused to be interrupted, "Listen, buddy, I was here first and you're an intruder in this very nice conversation we have."

"First, I'm not your buddy.", Leon said and stepped forward. He looked serious at the man in front of him and drew his brows together, "And now, I would advise you to go away, letting this lady alone.", Leon said with a dark and threatening voice.

The guy looked at Leon, considering his next best move but as he stared at Leon and saw his stern expression and the determination in his eyes, the guy accepted the fact that he had no chance against Leon. Without another word, the guy left to search for the next victim.

"A white knight. That's very rare these days.", Yn purred with a honey like voice, looking at Leon through her long, black lashes.

"I can't stand it if men don't know when they're unwelcome."

"That's true. But, luckily, you were there to help me."

"Leon Kennedy at your service.", he said with a small bow and a smirk.

"Nice to meet you, Leon. I'm yn. But please, take a seat. Have a drink with me. I have to thank you."

Leon agreed more than willingly. His imagination was back in charge.

*

Thirty minutes and an incredible conversation later, Leon escorted her to the elevator. With his hand on the small of her bare back, he guided her through the bar. The whole time, he couldn't take his eyes off her. The way she moved, talked and laughed made him nervous and excited at the same time.

Patiently, both waited for the elevator to arrive and as the door opened, they both were relieved to see it empty. Leon let yn enter it first and she went to the mirrored wall opposite the entrance. He followed and the moment the doors closed, Leon stepped in front of her.

Yn and Leon didn't have to talk anymore. They knew what they wanted. It was exactly the same. Like a starving man, Leon cupped yn's face with one hand while he brought her close with his other arm. She rested her hands on his chest before they kissed like never before.

There was a bond between their lips that was unbreakable. A promise for the night which connected them. Leon deepened the kiss even more. He wanted to feel everything of this woman. He was desperate to have her as close as possible. With his hands, he roamed over her body, appreciating every single curve, never stopping on one spot too long.

Yn wanted the same. Deep in her body, she felt a heat rising she barely experienced before. His hands on her bare skin let her shudder with sexual excitement. His lips knew what they had to do to take her breath away. And even through the fabric of his black suit shirt, yn felt his body heat and muscles.

Leon left her lips and stared into her eyes, "Where have you been my whole life?", he breathed against her lips.

Her eyes flickered back and forth between his clear, bright ones. Even after this short time, she couldn't get enough of these endless oceans of mirrored emotions, "I was out there just waiting for you.", she breathed with a low voice.

The sound of the opening elevator door distracted both of them but Leon was the first who reacted, "Spend the night me, yn.", Leon asked, stepped back and offered her his hand as an invitation to follow him.

Yn didn't need a second to consider her next step. Of course, she would follow this mysterious looking man with the brooding expression that told her he had seen a lot of things. She was already addicted to his masculine scent. She wanted more of the way he let her feel. And she was already a slave for his lips.

As yn placed her hand into Leon's, his heart skipped a beat. He was sure she would follow but then as she did it, his excitement got kindled once again. He lead yn to his room. And as he opened the thick wooden door, yn found herself in a huge, luxury suite. The view was incredible as well as the interior but she was sure nothing of this would matter for one moment.

As if Leon was reading her mind, he approached her from behind and let his hands roam over her curves while he kissed slowly over her bare shoulders up to her neck. Yn closed her eyes just to focus on him. His lips left a trail of goosebumps. His fringes tickled her bare skin and as he reached her sensitive spot underneath her ear, he bit softly into it which caused her to moan.

The low sound was music for Leon's ears and he hoped he would hear it again and again in this night. With the back of his right hand, Leon let his fingers slide over her bare back. From the lowest part, along her spine, carefully tickling the tiny hairs, up to her neck to the knot of the ribbons where he waited for her permission.

Yn turned her head to the side and met Leon's darkened eyes. They were filled with hunger and lust. His fingers were lying around her neck, playing with the ribbons. She knew what he wanted. But to tease him, she stared into his eyes, gnawed lasciviously on her lower lip and leant forward to stop inches in front of his face, "Do it.", she whispered and swiftly, she noticed the knot opening. As the knot was out of the way, the silky fabric slid slowly down her frame.

Leon was amazed by the view. This incredibly beautiful woman stood almost naked in front of him. She was just dressed in some black lace slip. Slowly, she turned around and snaked her arms around his neck. Her naked frame melted against his solid body and while she kissed him desperately, Leon stroked over her soft skin to make her shudder.

Carefully, yn pushed Leon into the direction of the edge of the bed while slowly opening the buttons of his suit shirt. As he hit the bed, Leon sat down and looked up at yn. She stepped between his legs and stroked the fabric over his shoulders to expose his perfect chiseled figure.

Leon watched yn admiring him. With the nail of her index finger, she slid along his torso and grabbed his shoulders with both hands as support as she climbed on top of his crotch. Straddling him, she cupped his face softly, tracing his facial features with her thumbs, "I'm already addicted to you, Leon.", she purred low against his lips.

Leon hugged her strongly and brought her even closer, "You're not alone with this feeling.", he whispered back. Smoothly and with a swift move, Leon got up and placed yn on the bed to hover over her.

Yn snaked her legs around his waist to keep him close while she immediately started to roll her hips, already feeling his erection against her core. Leon was eager to kiss her again. He needed to feel her and so, he crashed his lips on hers for a hungry kiss.

And then, very quickly, Leon had undressed himself not wanting to miss one second with this goddess while yn did the same with her slip before she reached for her high heels. Leon stopped her, "Keep them on, please.", he asked and smirked.

She obeyed and waited for Leon to join her. But Leon wanted his own way with her. He stared at her naked body as if she was an expensive painting, painted in Leon's favorite colors. He approached the bed and stroked his fingers over the leather of the highheels. Carefully, he took one of yn's feet in his hands and slid along the soft curve of her calf, admiring every single inch.

Leon leant down and kissed his way along her legs. Prepping kisses on the inside what let yn shudder whenever his stubbles scratched over her skin. He worked his way up to her core and played her like an instrument to let her sing the song of the night. The way yn squirmed and cried out his name was the melody that let Leon's blood boil. That she clawed her fingers into his hair was the fuel to continue what he had started.

Only as he was pleased with the result, that she resembled more a sweaty, heavy breathing mess, he crawled on top of her. Yn's darkened eyes looked hungrily at him. It was the way he had hoped she would look at him. Without a word, yn pulled Leon down for a deep kiss and at the same time, Leon used the moment to enter her teasingly slow which left her gasping for air.

Yn snaked her legs around Leon's waist and rolled with her hips into his to increase the friction even more. Leon left her lips for some air and supported himself with his arms to create some space. Yn let her eyes roam over his handsome features. The fringes were falling into it and between the strands were his bright eyes shining like gems. With her hands, she explored his strong, muscled chest, his abs and his back where she clawed her nails into his muscles as he rolled into her once again.

Yn arched her back up in ecstasy and closed her eyes. Her head fell back, deeper into the pillow under Leon's observing glance, "I want to hear you cry out my name again, yn.", he breathed.

She opened her eyes with a sensual smirk, "Then make me."

Leon didn't have to hear more and within a few more moments, yn closed her eyes and cried out his name as she relished the exploding sensation of the rhythmically waves of the orgasm. This was the second song of the soundtrack of their night.

*

As the sun slowly began to rise into the dark blue velvet sky, the last song of the two got played. A duett. And for yn and Leon, it was their best song of the whole night. Happy and exhausted, both laid on their backs with an erratic pulse and covered in sweat.

Leon turned his head to yn. He watched her chest rising up and down. As she noticed that he stared at her, she turned around on her side and placed her hand on his cheek. Leon placed his own hand on top of hers and smiled, "This was an excellent idea, babe."

"I thought you would like it to seduce me once again.", yn said with a soft smile, glad about the fact that her idea had worked out.

"Yeah. First, I was sceptical about this whole roleplay thing but it was fun. Just... This guy at the bar? Was he part of your game?", Leon asked and she saw true jealousy sparkling in his eyes.

"No. Actually, he really was hitting on me. And I have to admit, he had charme.", she said and watched amused how Leon rolled on his side to face her.

Possessively, he placed his hand on her hip and pulled her close to his chest, "Charme, huh? Babe, I know exactly what you like and that's nothing this guy had to offer. What you want is rather something like this.", Leon breathed low, leant in and kissed her deeply until she was breathless.

"You know, baby, you're so damn sexy when you're jealous. Even after five years, a random guy is able to make you nervous? Good to know.", she chuckled.

Leon smirked and pushed her back on the mattress to hover over her.

"Sexy, huh? Speaking of, these shoes...can you keep them?", Leon asked and looked at her feet.

Yn moved one of her feet in the rays of sunlight that fell through the curtains of the window, "You like them? I never expected you to be a fan of shoes."

Leon looked back into her eyes, "They suit you. And I'm a really big fan of you, sweetheart. Since day one. What shall I say, you turn me on so fucking much.", he whispered low before he kissed her deeply and before yn could react, Leon S. Kennedy, her boyfriend, best friend and partner, laid between her legs again, already prepared for the next round.

[hadesisqueer]

I'm bored and I don't care and you most probably don't care too but I don't care about that either, so here it comes: my Blake analysis.

People tend to think Yang is my favorite character. And, although they're not entirely wrong, because she's the character I relate the most to, my actual favorite character is Blake. I just find her so inspiring, and such an interesting character yet flawed character. CRWBY did a great job showing her traits as both the Beauty and the Beast, and I just love it.

Leaving the White Fang and Beacon times

Honestly, one of the things I admire the most about Blake is just how freaking brave she is. Because it takes an incredible amount of courage to be able to realize about your mistakes and seek a way to redeem yourself by learning to help people. And it takes a lot of strength to be able to leave your abuser behind.

Blake leaves the White Fang and gets into Beacon hoping for two things: redemption and a new life. She starts off as the typical quiet, kind of cynical (yet still idealistic), emo and mysterious girl who we knew basically nothing about her. We had basic information about the other three, but nothing from her except that she wore a bow and liked books.

I really liked how she seemed to not want to get close to anyone, but then the interactions with Ruby and Yang came. She, although kind of annoyed because they wouldn't let her read (mood), seemed amused by them, and even awkwardly tried to tell them that it was a pleasure to meet them as they fought and before Weiss came and she gave up reading (mood).

Which is one of the reasons I think she chose Yang as her partner. She was probably looking for a partner who she knew she could work well with. And having being partners with Adam, who was just as much of an offensive fighter as Yang, she knew she could work with that. That and the fact that she also seemed to like her and Ruby the night before, so Blake probably recognised her and followed her around to check if Yang could fight too (also because she was hot okay this is just me shipping). And when she saw she could, she was probably like “Okay, I'm keeping this one”. Which is fun, because Blake was the quiet girl and then she went and chose the most extrovert partner (besides Nora) there was. And actually liked having her around, as anyone could see when she smiled when Yang said something.

And that's the thing: she didn't want to get really close to anyone, but she was really eager to start a new life. Even though she wasn't really sure about Weiss, she had good teammates and genuinely liked them. She joined Ruby and Yang in their idiocy (love those two) from the start and showed to be as much as a dork as them if she wanted. She was relaxed with them and liked team JNPR too (we never really saw her having conversations with them alone but if she sat with Pyrrha in class it meant she was cool with them too) and, if you read the books, she was really good friends with team CFVY as well.

Still, she was afraid to open up about her past, or even tell them about being a faunus to the point that when she slipped and told them when she was mad at Weiss being an ignorant, she ran away. Because after all, she doesn't think they would like her true self. I mean, we're talking about a girl who ran away from the White Fang because she realized it had turned into basically a terrorist organisation -one she took part of, and left her family behind for. A girl who's suffered from abuse, making her feel like she doesn't deserve anything good. It's crystal clear in the comics (though they're vol 4 content), Blake thinks she is poison and ruins everything good around her. And she felt like she'd just ruined it again. Which is why when she sees that they don't care, and that Weiss has decided she doesn't care either (and to me, that's the beginning of her arc of being an ignorant and daddy's girl to “when I see a racist a floor him and fucky you, dad), Blake almost cries.

Then in vol 2 she is literally obsessed with Torchwick and the White Fang. It's understandable: she used to be part of that organisation (goddammit, her own father created it) and she's had to see how it went from believing in peace and equality to becoming more violent to start working with human crime lords in a way that doesn't seem to benefit the faunus at all? She knew there was something big going on, and even if she had to fight her own past, she was willing to if that's what it took to find out what it was. It's funny because I felt like she was the main protagonist in that volume instead of Ruby and it's true: she was the one calling the shots.

The thing is that she took it too far and led her to basically become obsessed with the White Fang, as I said. To the point that Yang had to almost literally slap some sense into her and tell her to chill and go to sleep. And well, it worked. She took Yang's advice and didn't forget her goals, but took her time instead of destroying herself in the process.

In vol 3, she seems more relaxed than we'd ever seen. She doesn't have to hide who she is to the people she cares about, because she's slowly opening up more and they are understanding. They succesfully stopped a Grimm attack in Vale and got Torchwick in jail, so she felt more confident and hopeful. And they were killing it at the Vytal Festival. So yeah, she deserved to chill a little, enjoy herself, to be a little goofy and eat some tuna with her friends. The girl had earned it.

... but it's volume 3, and if it fucked everyone up, it wasn't going to be any different with Blake. Like, for fuck's sake, give the poor girl a break.

It starts with Yang breaking Mercury's leg and Blake not knowing what to think. Because as she said, the whole situation was so familiar. She'd had a passionate and aggressive yet “kind” partner before, one she thought she loved and trusted, and he slowly became more and more violent, and more abusive, and for a long time, she was blind to it. And then Yang does that. Her passionate and kind of aggressive yet sweet new partner, who she may already had romantic feelings for (even if she hadn't realized yet), who even had the same semblance as Adam. Was it all happening again?

Yang and Adam are, after all, foils of each other in a way. They're really similar. The main difference is how they deal with their suffering: Adam used it as an excuse for hurting others and never really got over it, and Yang took meaning from it instead and found the way to move on. Her heart was never driven by hate; she used her pain to become a better, stronger person. After all, just as Blake said, Adam was Spite, and Yang was Strength.

Blake's reaction was understandable. She was a victim of abuse and the situation reminded her of it. And as I said, it didn't help that Adam and Yang were so similar. But deep down, she knew that Yang wasn't Adam, that there was an explanation, which is why she gave Yang that chance to tell her. And she knew Yang wasn't lying.

And then everything gets REALLY fucked up for everyone. The situation couldn't be worse. Penny has died, Ruby is at Amity Arena, Yang is still at the dorms. Blake and Weiss are fighting together at Beacon against the White Fang and Grimm- and also the robots. And getting separated was honestly the worst thing they could have done, but Blake went after that Beowolf. And then she found Adam.

I don't think I have to even explain how I think she felt at that moment, when she saw her abuser right there in front of her eyes, for the first time since she left him. I think the look in her eyes are enough to express how terrified and conflicted she was. And yet, she is brave enough to fight him. And she loses. And then the guy uses “summon love interest” card and Yang appears, and he sees right through Blake. And the thing she feared the most happens. She's ruined it. She's really ruined it.

Vol 4 & 5 or the Belladonnas, Sun and Ilia.

Volume 4 is, without any doubt, Blake's lowest point, and again, thank God for having her parents and Sun around, because the girl was almost suicidal (most of all, when you read the comics). As I said, she feels like she's poison who ruins everything good around her, and this once, the universe has proved her right. Yang, her lovable partner who had been nothing but sweet, funny and understanding since she'd met her, had lost an arm trying to save her. And she knew that Adam wasn't kidding when he said that he'd kill her. So she left because she'd rather have Yang, Ruby and Weiss hating her than risking their lives. And because she couldn't stand the guilt she felt. The poor girl hated herself for what happened.

It took her while to decide to go back to Menagerie, but she did, and I was honestly thrilled to find out about her family. Like, we knew about Ruby and Yang being sisters and later we also find out more about their family life. We knew about Weiss being the heiress of the SDC, that she came from an important family, and later we know that she has siblings and it's implied that her father is a dickhead. But we didn't know anything about Blake's family life. We didn't know if she had any family at all or if she was an orphan, or if she had been abandoned, or if she was poor or rich. I think a lot of people had those headcannons before vol 4. But nope. Those ideas were obliterated.

Her father had created the White Fang, which explained why Blake always took the whole matter so personal: it was her legacy, and it had been taken from her and became corrupted. Not only wasn't she poor: she was some sort of fucking princess and owned a mansion. And not only wasn't she an orphan or an abandoned kid: out of team RWBY, she was the only one with two functional, loving parents. She clearly felt guilty about leaving them as well but both of her parents forgave her without any doubts, and showed her unconditional love. Kali and Ghira were two understanding and forgiving people who loved their daughter more than anything, and really, it was such a relief.

And I have my issues with the whole Sun thing, most of all after reading Before the Dawn. He followed her without permission, didn't respect her boundaries and she got too aggressive with him sometimes because of that (first slap I get it, the other two no). And I don't think he was completely necessary for the whole Battle of Haven thing. But at the same time, I really think having him around actually helped Blake a lot. Because yes, he didn't understand her many times, but I do think that having him around helped her as much as her parents. He had a big crush on her, and Blake did like him back, but never at the same level. After the time-skip, he still liked her but her crush on him had faded. And he took his time, but he realized. Blake didn't need a boyfriend, she needed a partner, a good friend who opened her eyes and made her understand that not everything that happens is her fault. That pushing people away with the excuse of protecting them wasn't helping anyone: she was just hurting herself and others more. And that's what he became. And I love the fact that he never for a second thought that she owed him anything: he helped her because he wanted, not because he expected anything from Blake. He would literally be disgusted with people who think she did owe him. Sun has his issues but he is an amazing friend and a perfect example of a guy without one bit of toxic masculinity, and his friendship with Blake is just great (can't wait to see more of them. Brotp).

Blake got love, forgiveness, support and friendship from her parents and Sun, but honestly, I think that what finally pushed her to stop running away and put an end to this whole bullshit was Ilia's appearance. Her former best friend up until she left the White Fang (who was, by the way, the person who indirectly gave her the idea of using a bow to pass for human).

She had already seen someone she cared about lose his way and turn into a monster. Blake herself had lost her way for a good while, found it back and then lost it again, and was working to find it once more. Seeing Ilia in that situation too made her brain go like “Okay, there's no way I'm letting you end up like Adam”. Blake knew Ilia wasn't like Adam, she knew it wasn't too late for Ilia yet, just like it hadn't been too late for Blake herself. So she gave Ilia the same things her parents and Sun had given her, the same things team RWBY gave her once too: love, forgiveness and friendship. And by helping Ilia, Blake also helped herself. I've done this before in another post, but I'll do it again; as uncle Iroh said once: sometimes the best way to solve your own problems is to help someone else.

(I'm not going to get too deep about the White Fang; most of all, because I'd need an entire post just about it. I'll just say that even though I thought I liked most of it, I still have a lot of issues with the White Fang thing and I found the end to be a bit disappointing and rushed).

Back with team RWBY, rebuilding relationships and Adam's end.

I'll never stop thinking that the fact that she didn't know what the fuck was going on at Haven but still joined the fight was hilarious, but still, it really made sense. She's done running away from her fears and her past, and one of her fears was that: confronting her team (mostly, Yang, because of the whole Adam thing) after leaving them. And then they all appear right in front of her eyes.

Past Blake would run away again to avoid the consequences. But she'd grown from that. Instead, she dealt with her own problems with Adam and the White Fang, and as soon as she was done, she went right back into the building and start fighting by Weiss and Ruby's side. And after the fight, while she was talking to her family and Ilia, Sun gave her the final push: he encouraged her to go and actually talk to the team, and she did. She went and told them that if they gave her a second chance, she wouldn't leave them again. Because she knows that leaving them had been one of the biggest mistakes of her life, if not the biggest one. She didn't know if they'd forgive her (a part of her probably still thought they wouldn't, and that she probably didn't deserve it anyway) but she still tried. And Ruby and Weiss accept her without questions. And honestly, the face Blake makes when she sees that Yang is also accepting her back and then they all invite her to the group hug still gets me every time.

She was obviously really happy that they'd forgiven her and that they gave her another chance that it's clear she was really trying to make the most of it. She clearly wanted to make up for lost time, and really make up for leaving, showing Ruby a bunch of times that she was always ready to follow her lead, reassuring Weiss after finding the bodies and... the whole thing with Yang. Because she felt guilty. But don't think Blake was feeling guilty because of the arm thing; at least, not anymore. She had reached a point where she understood that Adam's actions weren't her fault. No, she felt guilty because she left.

Yang had told her about Raven, and Blake knew that the poor girl had some serious abandonment issues (actually, Blake and Raven are kind of similar as well but with many differences, like the fact that they both tend to run away when they're scared, but for different reasons; one leaves by putting people in harm's way to protect herself, and the other because she wants to protect people in the wrong way. Eventually both get called out on that behaviour, and one responds with running away again, and the other with learning to not to run and face her fears. Both are foils of each other in Yang's eyes just like Yang and Adam in Blake's. Okay I'll continue). And Blake knew that when she left Yang, she most likely made said issues worse. Which is why she was trying so hard to make sure that Yang knew she wasn't leaving her again. She even actually tells her over and over again. “I'm not leaving”, “I'll hurry back”, “I'm not gonna break my promise, I swear”. Even during the Bees vs Adam fight, she says “I have people who actually care about me and I promised I'd never leave them again, so I'm not dying now”. That states two things:

1) She wants to fucking live, of course.

2) Blake is telling Yang that she is not going to die, not only because, as I said, she is a normal person who wants to live. But because she knows that, even if she would totally do it given the case, Yang doesn't want her to sacrifice herself for her, because then, she'd be leaving her again. She is telling Yang that she's not going to do that, and that they'd leave that place together.

But the thing is, Blake was trying SO hard to be there for her that she made things awkward, making Yang think Blake believed she was fragile and needed protection, which wasn't the case (I already talked about all this and Yang hating people taking care of her she thinks it makes her weak in the Yang analysis). And which is why Blake corrected herself and said “protecting each other”, as equals.

(Before people complain about how I'm talking too much about Yang in here, let's be clear: you can't make an Yang analysis without talking about Blake. Just like you can't make a Jaune analysis without talking about Pyrrha. You can't make a Salem analysis without talking a lot about Ozma. Or a Weiss one and not mention her entire family. Because that's what happens when you write a complex character with varied relationships with different characters - the relationships shape the character into what they are-. And Blake and Yang's arcs is so intertwined with the others' since the Fall of Beacon that you can't make an analysis of one without talking a lot about the other. Thus, I'm analyzing their relationship too, just like I'm talking about Sun, Adam and more. And yes, I'm doing this from the romantic perspective. Because, in case you hadn't noticed, the relationship stopped being platonic since Heroes and Monsters, and has been showing to be more and more romantic as the show goes on. It's been even confirmed to be romantic. So please, anon, I'm talking to you: if you don't like it stop reading lmao).

Now for the Adam part. Man, I can't even talk about this.

People complain that it didn't make sense that Blake seemed full of confidence at Haven when facing him, and then at Argus, she was terrified. Well, let me clear one thing up: the situation was totally different, dude.

At Haven, she was surrounded by people she knew they would help her: Sun, her parents, damn, even team RWBY. She had a whole army supporting her (and even with Sun's help, she wasn't dumb and she knew better than trying to follow him, because she knew him and knew that that's what he wanted). So of course she was going to feel safer then than being totally alone with that guy who had been stalking her across the world like a total creep. Like, thank God Yang appeared and helped her.

Once again, these three are all together again since the Fall of Beacon. This guy, who maimed and traumatized Yang in a way she will most likely never completely get over (as a person with PTSD, I know it gets better, but it will never entirely go away). Blake's ex boyfriend. A person she trusted and loved, and turned out to be completely different than he made her believe.

Blake's done with running away from him. And she's done with being afraid, because she is. But even though she's afraid, I love how during the entire fight, he tried to get in her head but Blake didn't let him. Because she was done with that. He had abused her, tried to kill her and the people she loved, took her innocence and confidence, even stole her own legacy. And she's not letting him do that again. Not now, and nevermore.

Sorry, I had to.

Blake and Yang give him multiple opportunities to leave. He didn't. We know how that ended for him. And even after that, Blake feels terrible about having to take his life, and feels guilty about it, or felt like she'd ruined the whole “let's steal an airship” plan. But luckily, she had all of her friends reassuring her and being completely understanding and loving, and honestly, I'll say it a million times: that scene between Ruby, Blake and Yang is one of my favorites.

Volume 7

We don't see much Blake during volume 7, to be honest. Yes, we get that great moment with Weiss and Jacques (fuck you). We get to see how she really hasn't forgotten about the whole Adam thing, and how killing him was haunting her in a way. We got to see her and Yang being the ones who reached out for Robyn (people with brains who don't try to take her out and try to make her and the HH allies instead. THANK YOU). We got to see her and Yang kicking some ass in the RWBY vs Ace Ops fight. And of course, we get confirmation (we already knew, but some people are blind and needed more. Some people won't understand until they kiss) of Bumbleby going the romantic way. And I liked that.

But neither Blake nor Yang had much of an individual arc or important stuff to do last volume (and I really hope that changes in volume 8). That annoyed me. But at the same time, I remember that they hadn't had a break since vol 3; Blake had never had one, actually, because every volume found the way to emotionally fuck her up in some way. And after losing limbs, being stabbed, having to deal with terrorists, with bandits, with terrible moms, with abandonment issues, with PTSD and depression, with an abusive exboyfriend they even had to end up killing to survive... I was kind of fine with both of them getting an “easy” volume where they didn't have to deal with big emotional arcs like that, and were just chilling and enjoying themselves for a little while. Still, I want them to be more important, both as a couple and individually, next volume.

Conclussion

As I said, Blake is my favorite character. She is a very flawed person who learns about her flaws and works hard to be better. She is incredibly brave, by far, the bravest character in the series, who overcomes her fears and her abuse and moves forward. Blake's arc, besides taking back her legacy and fighting for equality, is about her finally understanding that she's not to blame for others' actions, that she isn't poison. She learns to finally stop running from her fears and her guilt, to stop pushing others away, and realize that she deserves a second chance, that deserves forgiveness and love and friendship, and to be happy. Blake's entire personal journey is about her finding her path, about overcoming her abuse and trauma, and about learning to love herself. And I love it. I love her.

[blackwidowsim]

My (spoilery) thoughts and theories on Crescent City:

Hunt x Bryce is endgame, I‘m 100 % sure

There were just sooo many scenes with them that screamed endgame. They saw each other on there lowest points, saved their lives multiple times and other characters saw the spark between them too (even Danika pointed it out)

Not to be dramatic or anything but I am really good at spotting the love interest in a book/movie and the only character I think Bryce should be with is him

I know some of you think Aidas might turn out to be the second Rhysand but Aidas gives me complete Suriel vibes

AND SJM can’t always do the same plot twists on us for all of her books, this time Bryce‘ first love interest will stay

There is definitely something more to the seventh Asteri

The Asteri either killed her or she is still alive

Maybe she lives in hell? Because Aidas told us that the Asteri twist the reality so I think there is definitely more to the war between Hell and this world

Because it really seems like Aidas was right that Hell doesn’t give a f*ck about the Asteri world and Jesiba seemed to trust him

AND did the epilogue drop that Jesiba was with Hunt‘s dad?

Who even is he?

Either a demon or one of the Asteri

(What speaks for demon: Aidas knew about him as well as Jesiba)

(What speaks for Asteri: One of them is named Rigelius, Rigel is a star in the constellation Orion, which is Hunts real name)

After all, the angels bowed to him so I think Bryce is not the only one with a powerful bloodline

This could also explain his special powers

The mystery involving Hunt‘s dad is also a reason why I think he won’t be the next Tamlin: SJM is giving Hunt a proper backstory with secrets of its own and therefore gives him plot that doesn’t involve Bryce so he still has things to learn

Rhys and Rowan both were pretty much perfect when we meet them, they new about their full potential while their female counterparts had to learn about their powers and got a lot of character development but with Crescent City I think it will be different because Hunt got his full powers back and the mystery about his father is still unsolved which could potentially give him more powers or in general just more character development (I hope you know what I mean, English isn’t my first language)

I think we can all agree that the Asteri are the evil guys and they must go lol

And what‘s the thing between Theia and Pelias? Did he kill her? Why is her light so different? Why does Bryce have it? Is she the reincarnation?

To me it seemed as if Aidas and Theia were close so this makes the story the Asteri tell everyone even more unbelievable

And why does Aidas want to see Bryce? What secrets will he tell her?

And btw we still have to get a s*x scene between Hunt and Bryce which we would have definitely gotten sooner if SJM plans on tearing them apart (this is me materializing Hunt x Bryce endgame)

I hope that Ruhn and Bryce will wield these twin swords or daggers this fae prophecy spoke about

And who is Danika‘s Dad? I think he might be important at one day

The last 300 pages were btw so so so good, the twists killed me! I am so hyped about CC 2

I know that some of you don’t like it that Bryce is starborn but I just honestly thinks that SJM is the queen of epic scenes and battles and I read her books because I know the main protagonists will be badass and I just feel so empowered by them and that’s all I need

Please tell me your theories for CC :)

[lala-ladybug]

Healing Hands: Chapter 4

Yesyesyes I’m super excited to share this one with you guys!! The game is finally beginning, ahhhh!!!!

Jasonette Sword Art Online AU

Read here on AO3

Tag list: @iloontjeboontje

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Chapter 4: Goddamn wimps, all of them

Marinette opened her eyes, squinting against the bright sunlight. She stood in a huge village square filled with hundreds of people, the gaps between them growing smaller as more and more players appeared. The sun shone merrily, and an excited chatter began rising in the air. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. It felt good to be back.

“Marinette!” She looked around to see Alya and Nino waving a few yards away. She broke into an excited smile and jogged over to meet them. They must have spawned in relative to their actual locations since Kagami, Luka, and the others from her class were already there.

“Hey guys!” Marinette said breathlessly. “Almost didn’t make it. Thanks for the call, Alya.”

The brunette gave her a quick hug. “Anytime, girl. Now you and Lila can show us the ropes!” She bounced excitedly.

Marinette barely caught herself from rolling her eyes and just nodded instead. Of course Lila would be able to help teach the others how to play. It definitely wouldn’t just be Marinette teaching everybody. Again.

Meanwhile, Max and Nathaniel were remarking on how realistic the textures of the cobbled streets were. Marinette did a double-take when she saw Adrien standing next to them. He had an immensely intricate and ornate suit of armor. There was an excess of spikes, ribbons flowing from every joint, and every inch of him was covered in metal. A tall helmet adorned with skull decals cast a shadow over his grinning face.

“What are you wearing?” She spluttered. He pointed a thumb to his chest with some difficulty, the thick metal creaking with the movement.

“This bad boy is the toughest armor in the game! I may have made a few embellishments of my own, so now I look even cooler.” He stated with pride.

Marinette shot a look at Luka, who wore a light set of simple leathers. He grimaced and shook his head, warning Marinette not to question their friend’s surprisingly atrocious taste in fashion. Or serious misunderstanding of armor weight classes.

“You know you could’ve picked any armor you want, right?” Adrien asked.

“Oh, I know. I crafted this set during beta testing!” Marinette spun around to show the boys, gladly welcoming the change in subject. She was dressed in a light suit of armor, the metal tinted a deep red. Black fabric peeked underneath the gaps, a strong yet flexible design of her own making. A simple grey cloak hung off her shoulders, concealing the quiver behind her back.

While Luka and Adrien complimented her brilliant design, she spotted Lila. She looked a little out of her element, hanging back to awkwardly watch a conversation between Kim, Alix, and Kagami, oddly enough. The three were dressed in heavy sets of armor, lamenting about how there weren’t any monsters to battle yet.

Chloe sauntered over to join them and, having heard how even Kagami was itching for a fight, wrinkled her nose. Marinette giggled to herself. This was going to be interesting, to say the least.

* * *

Jason’s eyes snapped open and he threw out an arm to steady himself. The transition from logging on was dizzying, but the sensation faded with every deep breath he took. He noted the smell of freshly baked bread wafting through the air. Damn, even he had to admit this tech was impressive. Dick and Tim stood next to him, wearing blue and red-toned armor respectively. Tim was looking around wildly, grinning like an idiot.

“Timmy!” Cassie Sandsmark sprinted towards them to tackle her boyfriend in a hug. Oh great, looks like the rest of the kiddy patrol was here too. Looking to where Cassie had run from, Jason indeed saw various members of The Team. Connor looked just as nauseated as Jason had felt after joining. Roy stood next to him, unmoving as he stared down at his very realistic-looking hand. Ouch. Jason had to have some sympathy for the poor kid, not that he’d ever tell him that.

Bart and Garfield, on the other hand, appeared to be having the time of their lives. Bart got into a running stance and Garfield gleefully jumped into the air, both falling flat on their faces. Jason snorted as he watched Jaime help his boyfriend up. Jaime asked him, “Whoa there ese, what gives?”

Bart shook his head and muttered, “I don’t have my speed.”

Garfield furrowed his brow and strained his face. “You look like you’re either really constipated or trying to shift,” Artemis informed him.

Ignoring her, Garfield locked his panicked eyes with Connor’s. “I can’t shift either, SB.”

“Der kaolc ym nrut,” Zatanna intoned quietly. When nothing happened, she nervously said, “My magic doesn’t work either.”

Jason rolled his eyes. Goddamn wimps, all of them. “Looks like all you supers will have to stoop to our level.”

“Stay whelmed everyone,” Dick stepped in to mitigate half the group’s outrage. “It’s just a game, we don’t exactly need our other skills right now.”

Before they could say anything else, an enormous bell mounted in the center of the town square began to ring. A hush fell over the crowd. The sky darkened as red hexagons interlocked to create a massive dome around the town.

A tall being flickered to life in the air above them. The hooded figure floated high overhead, their face eerily concealed.

“Attention players,” the figure raised their hands. “I welcome you to my world.” Well that didn’t sound ominous, Jason thought to himself. He felt the mood from the others shift into high alert.

“You may call me the Game Master, and I am the only one in control of this world. You may have noticed that the logout button is missing from your main menu.” The figure paused dramatically. “I assure you, this is no defect in the game. It is all as I have designed it to be. You cannot log yourselves out, and no one outside the game will be able to remove you forcibly. If anyone tries to do so, a transmitter inside the VR headset will emit powerful microwaves into your brain that will end your life.” Shit, shit, shit. This was just supposed to be a dumb game he played to make Replacement shut up about it, what the hell?

“Of the 10,000 players, 215 have already died because their family or friends ignored this warning and attempted to remove their headsets. Media outlets have been reporting on this, so it is safe to assume the danger of your headsets being removed has passed.” This guy had to be joking. Though if he wasn’t, Babs would surely research everything within her power to try to remove them safely.

“One other feature of the game is that you are no longer able to revive players. If your HP drops to zero, your avatar will die and the headset will destroy your brain.” Jason’s eyes widened and his head whipped to Dick. He ran a hand through his hair, looking just as horrified as Jason felt.

“The only way for a player to return to the real world is to clear the game. You are currently on Floor 1, the lowest level of the castle. If you make it to the dungeon and defeat the level boss, you may progress to the next level. Defeat the final boss on Floor 100, and you will clear the game.” This motherfucker couldn’t be serious.

The game master, god what a pretentious prick, raised his hands and began to disappear once more. He said, “Good luck, players,” before disappearing entirely. The sky returned to its cheery blue.

 A beat of silence passed before someone started screaming. Then the thousands of players erupted into a cacophony of sound.

* * *

Marinette stood stockstill amidst the chaos. She felt more than heard masses of people panicking around her. Her eyes darted back and forth without truly seeing anything, mind racing to figure out a solution. If there was no way to safely remove the headset, then they’d have to beat the whole game. What about the Kwami? Could they connect with their miraculi? What about the small powers they’d each accumulated over the years? If those were accessible, then they might stand a chance, but god if they weren’t--

A hand on her arm made her snap her head to attention. It was Adrien, his jaw clenched tightly. She gripped his arm in return, the small reassurance barely that. Around her, the new Order looked to their leader for orders, direction. And behind them, her classmates....

Most were white in the face. Max had his hands clenched in his hair and was muttering to himself about the likelihood that the headsets actually could kill them. From the way he was shaking his head, she guessed it was a definite possibility. Lila looked like a cornered animal, twitchy and desperately looking for an escape. Even Kim and Alix wore uncharacteristically serious expressions.

“Well?” Chloe prompted Marinette. The latter took a deep breath. Better focus on solving the smaller problems first. “Your VIP package came with a house on the first floor, right?”

Chloe blinked in surprise. “Yeah, it did,” she replied uncertainly.

“Good.” Marinette whistled and gestured for the rest of her friends to gather around. “Listen up! We don’t know how everyone else is going to react, so it’s best for us to go somewhere safe to lie low for a while. I can teach everyone the gameplay, and we’ll do our best to help beat the game.”

She looked Alya and Nathanial in the eye, since their hands seemed to be shaking the most, and said with all the confidence of Ladybug, “Think of all the bullshit Hawkmoth’s put us through. We are not going to die here. That’s a promise.”

Marinette drew her bow and half-strung an arrow, holding it parallel to the ground. “Chloe has a house on the first level. Let’s go.” She nodded to Adrien, Chloe, Kagami, and Luka to establish a perimeter around the rest of the class as they moved. She exhaled a quiet, shaky breath and led the way out of the square.

The crowd did not part easily. People were sobbing, shouting, hyperventilating. They needed to get out fast before the shock wore off.

Someone stood in front of her. The poor soul was probably just as scared as they were. She put her bow back in her inventory, trying to appear as non-threatening as possible.

“Excuse me,” Marinette gave a little half-wave to get their attention. “May I please get through?”

“Oh, sorry,” He had a deep, male voice. One hand gestured to the direction she was headed as he stepped out of her path. “Go right ahead.” His hands weren’t shaking as the other crept towards his belt. Not good, not good.

A flash of silver was all the warning she got before Luka pulled her back. A knife collided with his hastily raised shield, shedding sparks as the assailant nearly dropped his weapon in surprise. Marinette dropped down to sweep her leg beneath Luka’s shield, knocking the man off his feet. He gave a shout of surprise as he went down, and Luka disarmed him in the confusion.

“Come on, move it!” Marinette shouted over her shoulder. She re-equipped her bow and surged forward, picking up the pace to get the hell out of there. Such a large group was an easy target, they had to get out of the open and fast. People were starting to react beyond their shock, and more of them were bound to get violent.

Her eyes scanned over the buildings in front of them. There. A momentary break in the throng of players allowed her to spot Slipcut Alley, a favorite shortcut of hers. It was only a few yards away. The alley was too narrow for anything but a single-file line, but it provided cover and was hidden by a spell that only other beta testers would know about. It was their best option.

She squared her shoulders and pushed through the last of the crowd. She turned to face her friends, who gathered around her as they too made it out into the small clearing. Chloe, Kagami, and Adrien were watching the crowd behind them, ready to defend against any other attacks.

Marinette put her bow away one more time and asked, “Do you trust me?”

Shaky nods and wide eyes. That would have to do.

“Then follow me,” she said, and walked straight through the wall before them.

* * *

“Our first step should be finding shelter for the night,” Dick said sharply. “We can figure out the rest tomorrow, but it’ll do us no good if we die tonight.” Tim nodded, ever the protégé.

“And just how do you suggest we do that?” Jason countered. He couldn’t help it if it came out a little accusatory. He did not sign up for a damn death trap.

It was Garfield who had the answer. “Well, in order to do anything, we need money. So we need to start killing some monsters!” He palmed his fist with a resounding smack. “And then we can see about an inn or something.”

Connor rubbed his chin. “That’s not a bad idea, kid.”

“Just tell me where to hit them,” Roy said in a low voice, sounding about as pissed as Jason felt.

“Let’s split into three teams. Alpha squad will be Artemis, Wally, Bart, and myself. Tim, Roy, Gar, and Connor will be Beta. Jason, you’re with Jaime, Cassie, and Zatanna for Gamma.” Great, Jason was the only non-super there. What a grand old time that’ll be.

He made to leave the square and disappear into the panicking crowd, but Dick held his arm. “Hey, I’m trusting you to keep them safe,” he kept his voice low. “It’s been a while since they fought without powers, so keep an eye on them.” He then turned to address the rest of the team. “Alpha will take north. Beta, go south and Gamma see what’s west. Meet back here at sunset. Alpha will secure lodging before engaging enemies.”

“What, no pep talk?” Wally elbowed Dick. The latter didn’t crack a smile as he said, “Just stay alive.”

Beside him, Garfield swallowed hard and said weakly, “Noted.”

Jason rolled his eyes and jerked his head in their assigned direction for the other three members of Gamma squad to come with him. He’d follow along as long as Dick made good plans, and Jason didn’t exactly have any better ideas for now.

He put on his very best I know exactly how to kill you and I’ll do it if you don’t get the hell out of my way face and lead the way out of the packed square. The crowd parted easily before him, and they were out on an open street within a matter of minutes.

”Where to first, ese?” Jaime asked, shifting nervously from foot to foot.

Good question. Jason looked around for a map or something that could tell him the way out of the damn town. When he glanced back for a quick headcount and only counted two, he cursed and asked Cassie, “Where the hell is Z?”

She pointed at a nearby stall where the magician was chatting with the vendor. Zatanna waved to them, then sauntered back over to the rest of the team. “The shopkeeper says there’s a bridge further down this street and to the left that’ll take us west out of the town.”

Cassie frowned. “Was that a player with their own shop already? Man, we are behind.”

“Oh, no it was an AI.” Zatanna readily supplied. “An NPC?” She added on seeing the confusion on her companions’ faces. “Honestly, was I the only one to do research on this game before playing it?”

Jaime sheepishly scratched his head while Cassie squeaked, “Well....” Jason had to agree with them, he just did this to keep Replacement happy. And get Dick off his ass, the meddling prick.

Zatanna shook her head. “Look, AI stands for artificial intelligence, and NPC is a non-playable character. They’re computer-generated people, not actual players.”

Jason caught enough to surmise that these NPCs were created by the same maniac that locked them up in here. He crossed his arms and asked, “How the hell can we trust their word if they’re controlled by that fuckin’ game master freak?”

Cassie bit her lip and had the good sense to look concerned.  Zatanna just shrugged and said, “I guess we’ll just have to find out. We can try following their directions but stay cautious in case it’s a trap.”

“Fine,” Jason sighed. “Let’s go.” He was already resigned to the absolute stupidity of the situation anyway.

They made it to the end of the street without incident, and turned where the shopkeeper had directed them to. There was a bridge, spanning a merrily bubbling river, and open fields dotted with trees beyond it. Jason could smell the greenery and apple blossoms from here.

“Wait!” Jaime threw his arm out. He made a face, then sneezed. “Aw man,” he gave a tremendous sniff. “Can’t eben escabe allergies in a video gabe.”

Cassie laughed at her friend and slapped him on the back, which only made him sneeze again. Dumbasses, they didn’t have time for this. Jason rolled his eyes for what felt like the umpteenth time that day and walked up to the base of the bridge. He slowly, carefully stepped across and edged his way to the other side.

The other three followed suit, and upon joining him, Zatanna said cheerfully, “Seems like we can trust the NPCs!”

“For now,” Jason muttered, still not convinced. He turned his gaze to the rolling hills before him, warm breezes sending waves that shimmered through the knee-high grass. He didn’t see any monsters, but there had to be some... right?

He used two fingers to swipe the air in front of him, opening his inventory. At least he remembered that much from the tutorial. He equipped the crossbow he’d loaded in when he created his avatar. Damn, that night in the Batcave felt like it was a week ago.

Jason took a wary step forward, into the grass. “Fan out,” he directed the other three. He didn’t turn to watch as he heard them draw their own weapons and creep up to flank him.

A rustle in the grass ahead had him throw a clenched fist into the air to have the others hold their positions. He waited until the movement stilled, then crept forward a few more steps, careful to keep his footsteps silent. He was within feet of it now, whatever it was. He hoisted up his crossbow to brace it on his shoulder and trained it on the last place he’d spotted movement. There was a sharp inhale behind him, and then Jaime sneezed loudly.

The head of a wild boar whipped up and it lunged for Jason. “Shit!” he yelled. Damn kid and his perfect timing. Jason blindly jumped backward and fired a bolt at the same time. It met its target and the boar shattered into glittering dust that resembled pixels. In front of him, a notification popped up that 20 copper coins, the crossbow bolt he’d shot, and a boar tusk had been added to his inventory. Huh, that was surprisingly easy.

“Wow, that was so crash!” Cassie pumped her fists in the air. “This game is gonna be a piece of cake.”

“Not so fast,” Zatanna frowned. “Remember, this is only the first level. It’s bound to be easy. It’s only going to get harder from here.”

Jason turned around to face them. “And just because that little shit was easy to kill doesn’t mean they all will be on this level.” He noticed Jaime hanging back, looking embarrassed.

“Hey kid,” Jason jerked his chin at him. Jaime's head snapped up. “Do you want to try the next one or wait by the bridge until your allergies clear up?”

Jaime opened his mouth to respond but had to sneeze again. “I think I’ll just waid by the bridge. I’b really sorry guys.” He trekked back to where they’d come into the fields.

“And then there were three. Ladies first,” Jason mockingly bowed, gesturing to the open fields beyond where the boar had been. Zatanna smirked and Cassie stuck her tongue out at him, which he returned with a rude gesture.

[petri808]

Paid By the Heart

Bakudeku, A!Bakugou/O!quirkless Midoriya.  Growing up Midoriya was picked on and bullied, harassed by the other sexes. In desperation he turns to the only Alpha he knows, begging for help. They reach a deal for the little Omega to use the Alpha's scent to keep the other's at bay... but was that really a good idea? Intermingling their scents for years had a consequence that left them only one option.

The life of a quirkless person in their world was a sad one, but couple that with being a small Omega; double whammy. Ever since that fateful doctors visit informing his mother, he’d never have a quirk, Midoriya Izuku was shunned at school, even bullied for being a small, gangly nerd. He was easy pickings and there was nothing he could do about it.

By the time he’d hit middle school, life was a lonely existence for the young man. His solace was in books or chronicling the exploits of his favorite hero All Might. For outside of that little bubble, pain and frustration was the norm. If only he’d been born an Alpha or at least a Beta, maybe then he’d gain a small measure of respect, quirkless or not. But no, the universe decided, he was to be an Omega, the lowest of the ranks. Could things get any worse?

The answer was yes. When he wasn’t being bullied, he was being harassed. Horny teen Alpha’s really were a bane of his existence. This lot didn’t care who or what he was, only interested in the scent he gave off. At least going into heat was still a few years away, because that could lead to bigger problems.

Sometimes things got so bad in school, Midoriya would hide in teachers classes or the nurses room until finally one called his mother about it and she promptly put him on scent inhibitors. He’d been too embarrassed to tell her what was going on. At least now he gained a small reprieve, but that didn’t stop the bullying. What could he do?

Midoriya racked his brain to come up with a solution, including quitting school altogether. Not ideal, no, considering learning was one of the few things he actually did enjoy. That’s when he realized, if only he had someone to protect him. Like a bodyguard. But who would be willing to help a small omega? He didn’t have any real friends that were Alpha’s or at least bigger Omega’s. Though he did know one Alpha…

Nah, Bakugou would never willingly help him. Despite growing up around each other, once he was deemed quirkless, the boy shunned him completely. They were complete opposites in personality; him being shy and Bakugou a bastion of anger.

No one dared to mess with Bakugou Katsuki, least get an explosion to the face.

But desperate times, called for desperate measures and Midoriya was tired of the split lips, black eyes, or torn clothing. He didn’t want to be shoved and messed with anymore and the one Alpha, despite their rocky relationship, who didn’t pick on him physically, was Bakugou. So, one day after school and a particularly egregious fight, Midoriya waited at the foot of the staircase of their apartment building. He lived on one floor and the blonde Alpha lived on another. As he waited, thoughts of what he should say worked their way through this analytical mind.

The man wasn’t going to do this willingly, that was a given. Bakugou’s main focus in life has always been power. To get to the top someday as a hero like their idol All Might. Maybe that’s a potential answer, play to the man’s desire to protect. Frankly, Midoriya wasn’t sure if it would work, but he had an alternative. He’ll pay the man to be his bodyguard. Not that he could afford much, but if it took getting a part time job or something, it beat getting assaulted.

He stands up from the step the moment he smells the Alpha coming. ‘Breathe, Izuku, stay calm…’

“Outta my way nerd!”

Midoriya swallows hard, fidgeting with his fingers nervously. “K-Kacchan, I need to talk to you— ask you a-about something.”

“The answer’s no.” The man starts to push past the smaller male. But Midoriya grabs his arm to stop him. He whips around, grabbing the hand on his arm and throwing it off. “Do you have a death wish?!”

“Please, Kacchan!” Midoriya grovels with tears streaming down his cheeks. “I can’t take all the bullying anymore.”

Bakugou narrows his eyes. “Nothing I can help you with nerd, now get out of my way before I do hurt you.”

Midoriya drops to his knees with his head hung down. “Kacchan…” He looks up now with sullen eyes, sad and forlorn. “I-I—will you please protect me?!”

“Argh!!!” Bakugou growls. This stupid Omegas scent was filled with such desperation it was rattling his senses! “Deku what the fuck makes you think I’d help you?!”

His shoulders slump further. “I know you have no incentive to help me. I’m just a worthless quirkless Omega. But I’m desperate Kacchan. I have no one else to turn to and I’m willing to pay with whatever I can afford.”

“I don’t want your money idiot.”

“Please! I’ll do anything!”

Fuck!! No matter how much the little freckle-faced mouse irritated him, he could never lash out except with words. Bakugou knew exactly why the man was so desperate, saw him picked on by the other sexes. The fresh cut above the man’s eye and torn shirt was evidence enough, but laying a hand on Midoriya, he just couldn’t do it. Plus, he believed his mother would kill him.

“Ugh!” He groans and snaps. “Fine! But you are gonna pay somehow. You’ll cover my lunches at school for starters and… I don’t fucking know, but I’ll think of something. So, what the fuck am I supposed to do?”

“Oh, thank you Kacchan!” In his elation, Midoriya jumps onto and hugs the larger male, snuggling his face into the man’s neck.

A flush of heat colors Bakugou’s cheeks. “Oi! Oi!” He peels the man off. “Get the fuck off me nerd!” Too close! Too close! Whether he wanted to admit it or not, Midoriya’s earthy scent pleased his inner Alpha and in his happiness that scent exploded.

“S-Sorry, Sorry!” He bows and takes a step back. “Thank you, you saved my life Kacchan.”

“I still don’t know what the fuck you want.” He crosses his arms. “I ain’t just gonna beat people up for you unless I really need to.”

Midoriya’s eyes widen and he waves his hands, “no, I wouldn’t ask you to! I hope that just being around you, or,” his face heats up, “like your presence and scent on me will deter them. And eventually they’ll just stay away out of fear.”

Unlike a lot of the Alphas their age, Bakugou had no desire to engage in primally driven acts. In fact, those types pissed him off too. Just mindless idiots as far as he was concerned. He wasn’t about to let stupid mating instincts distract him from his goals. “So basically, a fake relationship?” His lack of giving a damn about such trivial matters made it easy for him not to care. “As long as I don’t gotta be affectionate and shit.”

“R-Right!” Just the thought of intimacy made Midoriya bloom red. “Yes, nothing like that. Just the illusion of being your property.”

“Ha! I kinda like the sound of that!” Bakugou finally smiles, though more like an evil smirk. “You’ll be my bitch from now on!”

And so that’s how it was for the next few years. Each morning before school, the Omega would swipe a bit of sweat off the Alpha and rubbed it on himself. With the man’s scent on him, all the other Alphas and bullies stayed clear. They never eluded to any relationship, barely even hung out together, but everyone was too afraid to question it. Midoriya quietly went through the school days and for the first time in a very long time, he could finally relax. Even though his life was still lonely.

Once they finished middle school, Bakugou moved on to the prestigious UA Academy for pro heroes in training, while Deku managed to get into their Support program. Turns out his passion for learning and analytics was a skill he could trade on. Since they’d be at the same school, they could keep up the same rouse. Not that Bakugou seemed to care. Though the trade off for his part of the deal had perks with the Omega still footing any request he made.

Things continued unabated for the first two years of high school and Bakugou didn’t pay attention to the subtle changes taking place. Midoriya still dutifully came for his scent every morning before class. The Omega continued to pay for his services. But he failed to notice a change in the Omega’s scent. Where once the smaller male reeked of sadness, now there were hints of elation. The man smiled brighter and even had a bounce to his step. Midoriya was blossoming in the Support program. He had friends to call his own and Bakugou couldn’t be more thrilled the guy wasn’t trying to hang around him anymore.

It wasn’t until the third year was halfway through when the changes became glaringly noticeable. Midoriya continued to pay, but gathering his scent had grown from sporadic to nonexistent. Perhaps he wasn’t in need of Bakugou’s help anymore? No one was bullying him, on the contrary, the Omega was a top student in his program who’d gained the respect of his peers.

Bakugou corners the man outside one day between the dorm buildings. “Oi, Deku, what’s the deal? You don’t need me anymore?” He refused to admit it bothered him to not be needed.

“What do you mean?”

“You keep paying me, but never come for my scent.”

“Oh… well, you see, now that I’ve found my place here, it’s, um, hurting my reputation that I smell like an Alpha. I still pay because I do appreciate everything you did for me Kaachan.”

“What the fuck? You getting all horny now, looking for action but nobody giving you that kind of attention?”

“What?! N-No!” He waves his hands desperate to wipe the statement away. “That’s not it, I’m not looking for that! I’m even on Heat blockers. It’s just, the Alpha’s they treat me differently. They’ll talk to me like they respect me but always at an arms distance and it’s frustrating. Even after a few months without your scent on me, they still keep a distance.”

It was driving Midoriya crazy! So, he started to question, what will happen when he does want to be courted by an Alpha?! What helped in his youth now backfired and the plans were blowing up in his face. The reputation of Bakugou having staked his claim years ago on the Omega would make finding a partner almost impossible unless he could find a way to distance himself. Who in their right mind would dare touch the Lord of Explosions chosen mate?!

“I hope once we graduate and go our separate ways, people will finally realize we’re not together.” Midoriya was sure that once the blonde settled into pro hero life, he’d start dating as well, and that’ll take the heat of his back.

“Tch, well I’m not a charity case, so stop paying me if you ain’t getting a benefit out of it. Guess that’s it.” Bakugou’s turns his back to the man and starts walking away. He tips two fingers, “see ya around nerd!”

Huh? Well that went easier than he’d expected it to. All this time avoiding the conversation only for Bakugou to have no real reaction. Guess this really was just a business transaction for the Alpha. Midoriya shrugs, so be it, and continues on his way.

Unfortunately, things weren’t all that it appeared to be for the Alpha. After walking away from the Omega, a dull pain centered in his chest making it a little hard to breathe. But not wanting to show weakness, Bakugou ignored it and continued to strut back to his dorm room. Perhaps he’d overexerted himself again in the gym.

It’s a pain that started a couple of months ago that came and went, that he equated as simply working too hard. His muscles are still adjusting to the heavy schoolwork on top of the skirmishes the students got pulled into. That had to be the answer, for what else could it be? But after a week of the pain not letting up, Bakugou finally relented and consulted the nurse.

“Well,” the nurse, Recovery Girl sits back on her stool. “Don’t know what to tell ya, cause they ain’t nothin physically wrong with you that I can find. But if you think it’s muscle related, ease up on your workouts and take magnesium supplements.”

“The fuck you sayin old hag?! I can’t stop exercising. My quirk demands a topnotch body!”

She shrugs her shoulders, used to the hotheaded Alpha by now. “Then just learn to live with the pain. It’s not uncommon from pro heroes to suffer from pain, especially those with strong quirks like you have. You’re kinda young, but with how hard you push yourself, it’s inevitable.”

“Argh!” Bakugou storms out of the room. Fucking useless old bat! Two months away from graduation and being told he’s already developing, what, an old person’s problem?! “Fucking hell!” This is bullshit!

He flies it out of the room so quickly, that when he rounds a corner in the hallway, runs smack into a body. “Get the fuck outta my way!!”

“Kacchan?! Oh my god, sorry I didn’t see you coming!”

The world stops cold. “Deku…” suddenly the pain in his chest lessens as the calming scent of the concerned Omega wraps around his body. Bakugou’s eyes flash wide. “Oh, fuck no!” Quick like a bolt of lightning, the Alpha races away leaving the shocked and confused Omega standing there alone calling after him. Bakugou grits his teeth as he beelines it back to his dorm room. ‘It’s just a coincidence!’

“What was that all about?” Midoriya mumbles under his breath. It was the first time he’s seen the Alpha look, scared? No way, the Omega dismisses the notion. Bakugou wasn’t afraid of anything. He must have just been surprised to see him.

He continues on to the lab where he’s close to finishing a new project. The Alpha, Shouto Todoroki, requested a better cooling material for his suit. The pro needed something that insulated the cold from his quirk for a longer lasting effect. That way Hellfire would also be more sustainable.

It was a major nod to the Omega considering the man was up and up against Bakugou in terms of power. Currently, they were the top two pro students and Alpha’s of UA. Plus, Todoroki was not only cute but the complete opposite of Bakugou in personality. He was always kind to the Omega. Not that anything was going on between them! But the minor attention was exactly what triggered him to back away from his old friend.

From that moment in the hallway on, every time Midoriya came into contact with Bakugou, the Alpha turned heel and avoided any interactions. He couldn’t lie that it didn’t hurt just a little. They’d never been the closest friends, but it was as if the blonde was angry with him and that bothered him because he couldn’t understand why? But he also wasn’t gutsy enough to question the man either. Did turning down his scent hurt Bakugou’s pride or ego? Frankly, that would not be surprising.

The day of their graduation was a whirlwind of activity. The stadium packed just like the Sport event; even a similar turn out. Family and friends were there to celebrate, pro’s and companies were there to recruit. First the Support class, then the General studies, and lastly the Heroes courses all went up and received their diplomas. After the ceremony, the students were sent to designated spots to meet with their families and friends first. From there they could venture around to see other people.

“Thanks mom,” Midoriya hugs the crying woman for the umpteenth time that afternoon.

“I’m just so proud of you son!”

A tap on his shoulder cuts into the tender moment. “Forgive me for intruding Mrs. Midoriya. My father would like to meet your son.”

The pair’s eyes widen as the Number One hero stood in front of them. He was such an imposing figure!

“N-Nice to meet you Mr. Endeavor!” Midoriya bows.

“My son tells me you were able to create a better suit for him.”

Midoriya looks to his friend then back to the man. “Yes, sir I did.”

“Good. Perhaps you’ll be very useful in the future.” Endeavor nods his head and simply walks away without another word.

“D-Did he just?!”

“My father would like me to bring you by the agency next week for an interview.”

“Oh, wow really?!”

“Yes,” Todoroki chuckles.

“I’ll leave you two to discuss things,” Mrs. Midoriya cuts in. “It was nice to meet you Todoroki.”

After the goodbyes, the two men continue discussing the interview. Things like what he should bring, how he should dress, and what time to arrive. Midoriya had assumed Endeavor contracted out support work, but it turns out they have in-house staff.

“There is one last thing I would like to discuss.” The Alpha takes hold of the Omegas hand. “You see I’ve grown quite fond of you,” he leans down, sniffing at the scent gland of the smaller males neck. “Your scent…” his voice grows soft like a purr, “I wish to court you properly Midoriya Izuku.”

“W-What?”

“WHAT!?!!”

The feral growl behind him causes Midoriya to flinch. Before he can register just what the hell was going on, he was pushed back and a second Alpha stood between him and Todoroki.

“K-Kacchan?!” He grabs the man’s arm. “Kacchan what are you doing?!”

But the larger male simply grabs hold of him and pushes him back again, all while staring down the other Alpha.

“This mouse is taken,” Bakugou growls low and narrows his eyes, challenging Todoroki.

Todoroki glares back unflinching. “You don’t care about him, only took his money for protection. That doesn’t make him yours Katsuki.”

“I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about!”

“You don’t,” the man grins. “Three years I watched from a distance. How he’d sneak into the dorms in the morning, pay for your lunch in the cafeteria, and for what? We could smell you on him yet not once did you two ever hang out with each other.”

“S-So what! That doesn’t mean I don’t care about him! I took the protector role to fucking protect him!”

Todoroki scoffs, “I bided my time and once the daily visits ended, I started making my move. Not once did you ever stop us because you ran away from him! Stupid fool, how dare you decide to claim him now!”

Bakugou lowers his head just slightly, fists clench, and tiny explosions going off in his palms. “Fucking icyhot bastard. You don’t know what I’m feeling. Think I don’t know I fucked up when I shoulda faced the music sooner.” He stares straight up. “But I do know now, Deku’s mine! Hear me?! Mine!! And I am not fucking giving up my mate to you or any other bastard!”

The blonde pulls Midoriya forward, hands gripped to his arms. “Tell him Deku! Tell him you’re mine!”

“But am I? You’ve never shown any interest in me before Kacchan. Todoroki has helped me so much and now because of him, I’ll be interviewing for Endeavors support staff. Yes, your scent protected me from bullies, but I thought it was always just a business transaction.”

“N-no!” Bakugou staggers back clutching to his chest as the pain swiftly doubles. This can’t be happening! “You can’t pick him over me Deku!” The sting of rejection was worse than a villain breaking every bone in his body. He cries out and drops to the ground in a fetal position as the pain rips through his chest and knocks the wind out of him. “Fuck it hurts!” It was too excruciating, so much so, his body was slipping out of consciousness in response.

“Kacchan?!” Midoriya falls to his knees too and grabs the man, shaking him. “Kacchan, what’s wrong with you?!” He felt helpless as the man’s eyes rolled back in his head.

“Wow Katsuki… you really do love Midoriya.”

The Omega looks up at Todoroki. “How do you know that?!”

Todoroki points at Bakugou. “If an Alpha covets an Omega but is rebuffed, they are stricken with illness. It only happens when we truly love someone.”

“S-So if I turn you down, you’ll get sick too?!” Why is this whole love stuff so cruel?! This was not what he’d expected to happen! Tears gather in his eyes. “That wasn’t part of the plan. I-I just wanted to know what he really thought about me.”

“Fret not,” Todoroki smiles at him. “You’re cute, but I’m not in love with you. But now that you have your answer, my role is done. I’ll see you at the interview next week,” he winks and walks away to find his girlfriend.

“O-Okay, thank you Todoroki!” Midoriya turns back to the comatose man by his side and continues shaking him. “Kacchan! Please wake up! I’m here! I’m not going anywhere! Just wake up!”

A small crowd gathered around them, but he didn’t care, too concerned with Bakugou’s condition. Had he known an Alpha could suffer like this, he never would have attempted this little rouse. Todoroki was the one who suggested it, but neither of them could have known the blonde had fallen so deeply in love.

With the help of Bakugou’s teacher, Shota Aizawa and another staff member who came on the scene, they take the unconscious Alpha to the infirmary. They place him on one of the beds where Recover Girl checks him over. The man was out cold, but his vitals were steady.

Midoriya takes a seat by the bedside, clutching to his friends hand. It’s been an hour since they’d arrived and according to the nurse, it was now a waiting game. “Please,” the Omega squeezes the Alpha’s hand, “come back to me Kacchan…” He closes his eyes to rest them, laying his head against the man’s arm. He was so emotionally exhausted from the ordeal of the day, but he’s not moving until the man wakes up. Six years and never once he allowed himself to hope, until now.

“Mmmm,” Midoriya stirs at the feeling of fingers treading softly through his hair. “That feels so nice,” he purrs to the familiar scent of burnt sugar he’d come to know so well. It wrapped around, calming, calling the Omega out of his dream.  

Wait! Burnt sugar?! He pops up immediately, “Kacchan?!” Scrambling onto the bed and swaddling the Alpha. “I was so worried,” Midoriya buries his face in the man’s neck. “Why didn’t you just tell me?!” He sniffles.

Bakugou wraps his arms around the man, leaning his head against his and relishing in the contented tones exuding from the Omega’s scent. “I’m up now, so stop crying Deku.” He sighs, “and I didn’t tell you cause I’m an idiot.”

“You’re not an idiot.”

“Yes,” he lifts Midoriya’s face, fixing his eyes in a stare, “I am. All because I didn’t want to admit I was weak for you.”

“So, you really mean it? That you want me to be your mate even though I’m quirkless?”

“Did I fucking stutter? But guess what Deku?”

“What?”

The Alpha kisses him roughly, nipping his lip before pulling away, “I’m claiming my final payment.”

“Oh!” Midoriya giggles, “what’s the payment?”

“You.”

~~~XX~~~

Just because they finally figured things out, didn’t mean either of them wanted to rush into a relationship. It was simply satisfying to know they wanted to be with each other. And for that reason, Midoriya continued to use heat blockers as a birth control, just like he’d done for the last several years.

The Omega respected the fact Bakugou focused on having a good career in the pro hero world. His ambitions to reach the top given a whole new incentive in order to provide for a family one day. But the Alpha was proud of his betrothed’s advances as well. After high school, the up and coming Support technician proved his worth for the Endeavor agency while he himself worked as a side kick to the head man himself.

Bakugou dreamed of one day owning his own agency, but until then, he pushed himself hard under the constant tutelage of the number one hero. They were both paid well at their jobs, and continued to maintain separate homes… for now. The blondes excuse being he would court Midoriya properly this time around.

Except when it came to sex. That part of their relationship was consummated two nights after graduation. In a protected knotting, they marked each other and staked their claims for all to see. Bakugou  had been pleasantly surprised to find the shy, docile man was quite rambunctious in bed. But contrary to popular belief, it was closer to a vanilla encounter.

Both of them had been too excited and also nervous being a first time for either of them. Having been Midoriya’s protector for so long, the Alpha was almost terrified of hurting the smaller Omega and it took gentle coaxing to allay those fears. But in the end they’d been left satisfied and fully affirmed in their decision to spend the rest of their lives together.

Once the workload kicked in, any free time they had were spent together at one or the others apartment. Bakugou would take Midoriya out on dates, to dinners, movies, or anywhere the man fancied though it was rarely a lavish affair. The Omega preferred the quieter moments such as lounging on the couch and cuddling during a movie.

This went on for two years as the Alpha slowly built up a savings. He knew it would be several years before he could buy a bigger house, but soon enough he was ready to afford a 2 bedroom apartment in a nice area of town. So, he made up an excuse to stay with Midoriya while he moved into the new place, furnished, and prepared it to accept a mate.

“Perfect!” The blonde stands with his hands on his hips admiring his handiwork. Everything his Omega will need was purchased and set up in what will be their new nest. He’d spared no expense on a top of the line, plush, memory foam bedding. Extra blankets, pillows, you name it, Bakugou bought it. And last but not least, he scented all the fabrics with his musk. All that remained was surprising Midoriya.

He timed the reveal for the last week of the month, explaining his apartment was ready again and he wanted Midoriya to see the changes.

“Where are we going? This isn’t the direction of your place.”

“It’s the direction to my new place.”

“Kacchan, you moved apartments without telling me?”

He kisses the back of the Omegas hand, “well a surprise isn’t a surprise if I told you about it.”

When the elevator opens, Bakugou leads him to one of the apartments. He opens the door and gestures for the man to enter. “Welcome to your new home Izuku.”

“Huh? My, but I have an apartment…” the Omega gasps when he turns and finds his Alpha on one knee. “K-Kacchan,” his hands fly up in shock and face lights up.

“It’s time to officially cash in my payment chip,” the blonde grins, holding up a ring. “Izuku Midoriya, will you be my life mate?”

Moisture instantly builds in the Omegas eyes, “yes! Yes!” His hands shaky as the Alpha slips the ring onto his finger.

Bakugou gets to his feet and kisses the man slow and steady. He takes Midoriya’s hand. “There’s one thing I really wanna show you, then we’ll go pack up your apartment.”

“Oh my goodness!” The omega squeals at the site of his beautiful new nest and throws himself onto his Alpha, hugging and kissing the man. “Kacchan, you spoil me!”

“You deserve to be spoiled,” he smiles back. “Test it out.”

Midoriya dives onto the bed and bundles the blankets to his nose. It smelled like Bakugou! He closes his eyes with a moan, taking it all in and burying his face into the fabric. The Alpha laughs at how childlike his mate was behaving, but that was Midoriya for you. Just a ray of sunshine who wore his emotions on his sleeve.

While the Omega relishes in his new surroundings, Bakugou just stands back in admiration. To the outside world the pro Alpha hero was a temperamental hothead who took shit from no one. But those in the know, knew Midoriya had him wrapped around his finger.

The Omega never took advantage or made it feel like an obligation. Bakugou just came to realize he could be himself with the man. No keeping secrets or holding back. Their long history delving back almost two decades meant Midoriya knew him well and he Midoriya. This little mouse could calm him down without his Omega pheromones. But boy does those scents drive him wild too!

Just picturing his freckle faced cherub cuddled in his arms with a child between them sent a delectable shiver racing straight to his groin. Bakugou chuckles in his head, probably why the man was smart enough to stay on the birth control, because he knew without it they’d have already started a family before they were ready.

“Join me— Kacchan!” Hands reach out, beckoning him to the bed.

The Alpha grins and plops down close, pulling the Omega to him. He kisses Midoriya’s forehead. “I take it you’re happy?”

“Of course!” The man nestles deeper into his Alphas arms, resting his head against his chest. “But I’d be happy anywhere as long as I have you with me.”

Bakugou relishes in the euphoric scent his mate was giving off. It made his inner Alpha preen with pride. “Never in my life have I wanted a family more than I do in this moment. And I don’t care if they have quirks, are quirkless, as long as they’re healthy, and they’re ours.”

“Mmm, our own family…” child Midoriya’s dreams could never have predicted the life he ended up with. “Sometimes I pinch myself to make sure I’m not dreaming.”

“Did I ever tell you thank you for pulling that stunt at graduation?”

Midoriya sits up, hesitant, his scent immediately registering anxiety. “No.” Why is he bringing that up now?

But Bakugou counters with calming Alpha pheromones as he pulls his mate back into his arms. “I still can’t stand the smug bastard, but I’m glad icyhot helped you help me get outta my own head or I wouldn’t have this life.”

“You had me so panicked Kacchan! I thought I’d killed you or something.”

“Pfft, I’m tougher then that.” He kisses Midoriya’s forehead, sweeping his thumb lovingly over and caressing the Omega’s cheek with a grin, “but I think in the end I really got the better part of the deal.”

[panda-noosh]

all my friends go to hell {Sokka x Reader}

Words: 8.8k

Summary: Sokka joins the army. He doesn’t know what he’s getting himself into. 

Genre: angst 

Notes: ask me about commissions! - masterlist - yeehaw, have some unedited Sokka content because we die like men here at @panda-noosh

----

Sokka isn't meant to fight.

   You notice this from the moment you lay eyes on the boy, clambering onto that boat with his boomerang hanging from his shoulders, his body buzzing with excitement. That was the first red flag – how excited he was, how prepared he looked, how he grinned and bowed to every single person he passed, including you.

   It was sad, really, because you knew you were going to have to watch the realisation sink in eventually. At some point during his journey, it was going to become very clear to him that joining the ranks really wasn't all it’s made out to be. It's brutal work, torturous, tiring work, and anyone who thinks otherwise is going to get the shock of their life when the truth is revealed.

    Erin stands beside you, her buff arms folded over her chest. She narrows her dark eyes at Sokka as soon as he steps upon the boat, dressed in his oversized coat and a smile to go along with it. His blue eyes are alight with excitement as he hops up to the general and shakes his hand, bowing as he says, “It's an honour, sir, an honour. Do you remember my dad? He was part of the army too!”

   “Ah,” Erin mumbles. “So that's why he looks so excited.”

   You glance over. Erin, being six feet tall, is able to get a better view of the newcomer, but whether you can see him or not doesn't matter due to how loud his voice is, how well it carries across the deck.

  “We were all excited when we first joined,” you reply. “He's no different to the rest of us.”

   “But we all caught on pretty quick that this isn't the party we thought it was going to be.” She shrugs. “I just hate seeing the naivety, you know?”

   You purse your lips, because you do know. You know from experience, just as Erin does, just as every single person on the ship does.

  “Ah well,” you mumble, turning on your heel and heading back towards the workers deck. “He'll find out soon enough.”

  ----

  The wind is rowdy tonight.

  You hear it as you lay in bed, a dull whistle that mingles with the sound of footsteps thumping along the upper decks. It keeps you up sometimes, especially when it gets this bad, when the ship rocks back and forth and people are being told to stay in bed to keep themselves safe before the next stop. It makes this whole thing real. It makes you feel like a soldier, which is exactly what you are, but a fact you try and ignore as much as possible.

  You stare at the wooden ceiling, hands folded across your stomach. You try and focus on the days work you have ahead of you, how you're down in the weapons lounge for most of it, how you're going to have to polish and hold the weapons people will use to fight in due time. It's not exactly a pleasant thought, but it's a days work, and you long for the distraction.

  Eventually, however, these thoughts aren't enough to keep your hyperactive mind at peace. You stand up, knowing full well you're not supposed to leave your room after curfew, but you've been here for a while, so maybe the general will be a little easier on you.

  You head out onto the main deck, giving confused soldiers nods as you pass them. None of them stop to scold you, knowing full well there's no point in doing so – you don't listen. Not really. You take orders, and you do your job well, but you do what you want when it comes down to it. That's part of the reason you were sent off to join the army in the first place, but again, you don't think about that time.

  The wind really is bad tonight. Your hair blows in your face. Your face goes numb, fingers tingling from the wind burn. The deck is empty, though, as people fear the wind too much to step foot on it right now. You've seen it worse, though. Much, much worse.

  You head over to the handrails and look over. The water sways and bashes against the side of the boat. Fish leap from the water, making ripples in the waves. Up ahead, rocks protrude from the ocean. A little further ahead there are lights, civilisation, a life away from violence.

  Must be nice.

  You inhale the scent of salt water, heavy in the air as the wind lifts it to full attention. Nowadays it feels like the ocean is the only scent, the only sight, you've ever seen. You don't remember what else is out there, having been away from it for so long.

  A wooden board creaks behind you.

  You don't jump, merely glance over your shoulder with narrowed eyes, a silent warning for the culprit to just back away now; they aren't meant to be up here.

  “It's a bit chilly, don't you think?”

  You turn fully, hardly recognising the voice. Standing behind you is Sokka, dressed in a bath robe that you have no idea how he got his hands on. He's looking at you with a grimace, shoulders bunched up around his ears, teeth on the verge of chattering.

  “What are you doing up here?” you ask.

  “My room is boiling. I'm not used to the warmth.”

  “Enjoy it while you can. Once we dock, things like heat are gonna be few and far between.”

  Sokka shrugs, strolling to your side. His hands curl around the railing, making his knuckles pop. “I'm not too mad about that, to be honest; I'm from the Southern Water Tribe.”

  You know this.

  “Oh, really?” you reply.

  “Yep! Son of Chief Hakoda.” He leans in, lowering his voice to say, “You may have heard of him?”

  You stare blankly at the newcomers face. Of course you know Chief Hakoda, but you won't admit that.

  Sokka blushes at your look of confusion, quickly pulling away. “Oh. Well, he's my dad. He's my hero.”

  “He sounds like a . . . cool guy.”

  Sokka nods happily, staring out across the ocean. “I'm Sokka, by the way.”   “I know. I heard you tell the General.”

  “Really? I didn't see you there.”

  You shrug, not having the heart to tell him his voice carries. You could have been on land and still heard him. “Well, I was.”

   “Cool, cool.” Sokka nods again, tapping his fingers against the metal railing. You can't help but watch him; why is he still here? The conversation is dead, and you clearly have no interest in continuing it, so why is he still stood here?

   Finally, he turns to you and says, “Have you been here long?”

  Here. The army. Have you been a soldier long? Have you been witnessing death for a while now?

   You swallow the lump in your throat and say, “I was basically raised on this ship.”

   Sokka recoils like you've slapped him, though his face lights up with happiness. “Really?”

  “Yep.”

  “So you're like. . . well known?”

  “I guess so.”

  “I'm surprised I didn't recognise you. What's your name?”

  “Y/N.”

   Sokka hums like your name is some kind of riddle he has to figure out. You don't expect him to recognise you, of course, considering you spend most of your time trying desperately to remove your name from the topic of war and battle, even though it's been your whole life.

  “It's really windy out here, isn't it?”

  You look over and nod.

  Sokka shakes his head and mumbles, “We'll probably get in trouble if we're caught out here, won't we?”

  “You, maybe. I think I'll be fine.”

  “You didn't tell me off.”

  You shrug. “It's not my place. I'm nothing more than your common soldier.”

 “A common soldier who doesn't have to play by the same rules as everyone else.”

  You pout. Sokka chuckles, knowing full well he's hit the nail on the head.

  “It's cool,” he says. “But you should probably head back to your room, just so you don't get blown overboard.”

  He's right, of course. You glance back at the ocean you have grew up on and nod once. Sokka grins, following you to the stairs where the both of you will part and go your separate ways. You turn to him, wondering if he has anything left to say, wondering what he possibly could say, but he's standing there with his hands tucked into the pockets of his fluffy bath robe, and you're curious to hear what he's thinking.

  Finally, he says, “It was lovely meeting you, Y/N.”

  Your stomach flips as you nod back and mumble, “Nice meeting you, too, Sokka.”

  And with that awkward interaction finally pulled to a close, Sokka says goodnight, bows, and heads down the opposite staircase, leaving you to stare at his back as he leaves to get some rest for another hard days work.

  ----

  The next few days pass slowly, as they tend to do when you have little work to get done, and no land to explore. You sit on the deck of the ship, staring out at the ocean with an axe leaning against your leg, ready to grab if something happens.

  Nothing happens.

  Sokka talks to you in passing every now and then, giving you excited waves that you never know how to respond to; you're never exactly excited to see him, but you're curious. The son of a Head Chieftain should surely have a trick or two up his sleeve when it comes to weaponry, but so far, you haven't seen Sokka lift anything other than his boomerang. He's good with that, but how good can it be on a battle field?

  Besides that, Sokka is far too busy getting comfortable in his new ranks to stop and have long, valid conversations.

  Today, however, you are due back in the weaponry lounge. From the moment you woke up, you have been slaving away on the lowest level of the ship, sharpening swords and axes, listening to the Benders overhead practice their powers, as they always have permission to do.

  The door to the lounge opens shortly after midday. Sweat lashes from your skin, and you wipe it away with the back of your hand before turning to look at Sokka as he slowly closes the door and sneaks inside, looking around like he's going to get in trouble.

  “You can come in, you know,” you yell across to him, making his head snap up and his eyes widen in surprise. “You're not banned from the weaponry lounge or anything.”

  Sokka sighs, wiping a hand over his forehead. “It's so warm in here.”

  “Warm in here, cold out on deck. You're good at picking up on the climate.”

  Sokka scowls, strolling to your side. He looks down at the axe laid across the wooden desk, the one you have been busy sharpening to perfection for the past ten minutes. He pokes the point and flinches away.

  “That's sharp. Good job.”

  “Thanks.”

  He tucks his hands in his pockets and goes quiet; he actually looks awkward, or perhaps more secretive, like he has something to say but doesn't know quite how to word it.

  You glance at him, trailing the rock over the axe's edge. “You good, soldier?”

   He flicks his eyes up, offering you a forced, bright grin. “I'm fine. Why?”

  “You just look a little tense. That's not like you.”

  “What's that supposed to mean?”

  You shrug. “It's the truth. Things been getting difficult for you?”

    Sokka sighs, shifting from one foot to the other. “I just needed a break. It's exhausting out there sometimes.”

   “Yeah, you'll find that never changes. I'm tired, and I've been here for eighteen years.”

  “I just didn't expect it to be so. . .”

  “Challenging?” you suggest.

  Sokka nods. “Exactly.”

  You sigh, setting the rock down. You turn to him, wiping your hands on a towel you have clipped in the waistband of your trousers. “It gets easier, don't get me wrong. But you have to go through the transitional faze first.”

  Sokka raises a brow. “'Transitional faze?'”

  “You come in here thinking it's going to be the best time of your life, that you're gonna go to war and save lives and come home to a hero's welcome.” You shake your head. “It's not like that. It's far from that, actually. It sounds like you're in the stage of finding out it's not all sunshine and rainbows on this ship. It's actually pretty hell-ish.”

   Sokka flinches. “I wouldn't say hell-ish.”

  “I would.” You turn back to your work. “But that's just my opinion.”

  “Why do you hate it so much?”

  Your hand freezes.

  Sokka steps closer to you, so close you can feel his breath tickling the side of your neck, making goosebumps arise on your skin. It startles you to the point you stumble away, dragging the axe along with you. It scrapes against the wooden desk, echoes through the room.

  Sokka steps back, startled. “I see you on deck sometimes, just sitting there, staring at the water. You never look like you want to be here, even though you've never known anything different.”

  “Why would I want to be here?”

  “Why wouldn't you?”

  “Because I don't fancy running into battle, watching my friends die every other day. That's why!”

  You inhale shakily, trying desperately to calm yourself down before you say something you regret; you've dealt with newcomers before, people blinded by their desires and the lies they have heard about what the army is really like, but Sokka is just. . . different. He's different in the sense that you don't want him falling into the same trap as everyone else. You don't want him to be heartbroken over his expectations being shattered.

  He looks around like he's going to find the words floating above him. “That's not how I think of it.”

  You close your eyes, slumping against the table. “How do you think of it, Sokka?”

  “I'm doing my part.”

  “Your part?”

  “Without this – without you – my home would be destroyed right now. The Fire Nation would have taken us over years ago, and trust me, they've tried. I've seen it happen. I've – I've lost people to – to that kind of thing.” He hiccups, trying to regain his composure. You look at him, heart breaking at the genuine anguish now on his face, how he refuses to meet your eyes. It's so unlike him. “Nothing comes without consequences, but sometimes it's better to just think of the reward at the end of it all. That's how I get through the day.”

  You stare at him. He's your age, for crying out loud – so young, so innocent, so blind to the reality of it all. Yet the words he just spoke are so smart, so true, that you feel a little daft for not thinking like that sooner.

  “Okay.”

  Sokka's eyes snap up. “Okay?”

  “You make some good points,” you mumble. “For a member of the Water Tribe.”

   Sokka blinks before the grin breaks out across his face. He laughs, scratching the back of his neck as his cheeks heat up. “Oh. I get it. A bit of teasing. Well, jokes on you, coming from the – uh. . . Where are you from exactly?”

   You chuckle and nudge his shoulder, pushing him back towards the door. “Get out of here, Ol' Wise One. I have work to do, and I'm sure the General doesn't want you slacking, either.”

  “Oh, so you're gonna make me guess.” He grins cheekily, stumbling towards the door, pulling his jacket on over his work shirt. “That's cool. I can do that. Get back to me in an hour or two, and I'll tell you the exact location you're from without you even giving me a hint.”

   You roll your eyes, call over your shoulder, “Goodbye Sokka!”

  The sound of his laughter is cut off by the door slamming closed behind him.

  ----

  It's not like you've never been on land before.

  It's become a rule amongst the old time crew that the ships have to dock at least once a month, both to pick up refreshments and to stop the crew going insane throughout their travels. Once a month – sometimes a little less, if battle is busy – you are allowed to walk into shops and talk to others. You are allowed a tiny allowance of which you spend the majority of on sweets and other unhealthy goods that would never get past the front door of the ship. You are allowed to sit in the grass and stare up at the sky without it moving. You are able to smell barbecue cooking in someone's back yard, and it is always marvellous.

  Today is the mandatory docking day. The General isn't happy about it, saying you should probably keep sailing so you can get to the main destination a day earlier, take the Fire Nation by surprise, but nobody else agrees. After nearly an entirely month at sea, everyone is getting a little tired of it. The restless nights sat up listening to the wind, the sickening smell of the ocean, having to hold onto the railing every time you take a step lest you get blown overboard.

  This time, you dock in the Earth Kingdom, which certainly isn't your first choice of location, but you're too exhausted to argue. Your hands are charred from hours spent in the weaponry lounge, and your stomach is weak from malnutrition; a diet of fish and other sea food doesn't do a person any good. The first sweet shop you see will be entirely ransacked by you and whoever wishes to join you.

  The sun beams down upon the trees that litter the Earth Kingdom. In the distance, the turnip man is yelling out his offers, though he pauses and grins when he sees you walking towards him. You didn't even wait for anybody else to get off the ship; as soon as the ship was stationary, you were lowering the bridge and sprinting onto land.

  “Y/N!” the turnip man yells; nobody knows his real name. Growing up, he was always just the Turnip Man, and he's never disclosed anything else. “There you are! I was beginning to think your boat had gone under!”

   You give him a hug, unable to ignore his balding head and old eyes. It's a startling reminder of just how long you have been away, and you hate to think about how you must look.

  “How have you been?” he asks, pulling away. “Everyone's been asking about you.”

  Your cheeks heat up. “I've been fine. Busy, though.” You glance around. “The place is looking a little dead.”

  And you're telling the truth. The streets you once remembered as busy and cluttered are now barely inhabited, the odd pedestrian rushing past with their heads down, not even giving you or the other solders a glance.

  The Turnip Man frowns, giving a passing, startled woman a sad little smile; you know something is wrong when the Turnip Man makes eye contact and doesn't advertise his turnips.

  “Hey,” you mumble, leaning forward to catch his eyes. “What's going on?”

  “Don't you worry yourself about us,” he replies, nudging your shoulder. “It's been happening everywhere; I'm surprised you haven't seen it, what with all the travelling you do.”

  “We spend most of our time on the ocean. What are you talking about?”

  The Turnip Man sighs. “Everybody's just scared, little one. The Fire Nation are coming alive again-”

  “We're trying to stop them.”

  “And we all appreciate your efforts, but they're moving quicker than they did last time.”

  Last time.

  You remember the day so well. Sitting on the boat with your friends, receiving the news that the Fire Nation had gone underway with their worst massacre yet, taking out most of the Northern Water Tribe and a portion of the Southern Water Tribe. Your people had been too late. The job you were supposed to complete, your only purpose, had been shattered.

  You swallow the lump in your throat and say, “Have they been here?”

 “Not yet, but it's what we're all expecting. With Ozai ruling-”

 “He's no ruler.”

  “'Tis true, little one, but he's on the throne and he makes the orders. Everybody is just trying to stay safe.”

   “We'll keep you all safe.” You look into his eyes, suddenly more determined than you've been in months. “I promise you.”

  Turnip Man gives you a sad little smile, one that tells you he isn't entirely convinced, but he's not going to argue.

  Behind you, the dirt billows as someone runs to your side. Sokka doubles over, hands on his knees, panting for air. “Jeez, you move fast!”

  You pull him up straight by the collar of his work jacket. “Sir, this is Sokka. Sokka, this is-”

  “Call me Turnip Man. Everybody does.”

  Sokka blinks, and then breaks into the widest grin you've ever seen. He shakes Turnip Man's hand vigorously. “Sweet name, dude! I'm Sokka, as Y/N just mentioned. Soldier representing the Southern Water Tribe.”

   Turnip Man smiles. “Aah, a man who's proud of his home.”

  “Very proud, sir. Very proud indeed.”

   “I'm glad to hear it, boy.” Turnip Man releases Sokka's hand and turns back to you. “I'll let you two go now; I have turnips to sell, and I'm sure Y/N is buzzing to go and get some sweets whilst they have the chance.”

  You grin, giving Turnip Man one last hug; Sokka gives him a second hug, and before you can protest, he is walking beside you along the street of the Earth Kingdom, a skip in his step.

  “So, you're from the Earth Kingdom, huh?”

  You very nearly trip over thin air. “How the hell-”

  “You hugged Turnip Man like he was some kind of father figure,” Sokka says, grinning from ear to ear, not even looking at you. “That makes me believe that you've lived here before. Probably when you were younger. Probably when you were growing up.”

  You scowl, turning back to the path ahead. “Okay, Detective. Good job. You've got me all figured out.”

  “I don't even know why you wanted to keep it a secret so bad.”

  “Because it's none of your business where I'm from.”

   Sokka raises a brow, glancing at you. “Well, it's hardly encrypting information, is it? I don't see what the big deal is.”

  “I just prefer keeping my private life private, that's all.”

  “No wonder you have no friends.”

   He says this and then he laughs, so you know he is joking.

  But here's the thing – sometimes a laugh isn't enough to make the joke funny.

  A lump forms in your throat as you remember the faces of those you once called a friend; it's like you're a curse sometimes. That's truly what you think. You get close to people and then they go into battle and die, and you have to start all over again. A person can only go through that a certain number of times before they give up trying to make friends.

  And Sokka isn't stupid. He picks up on your silence and immediately his laughter dies away, followed by an awkward, “Oh god, I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that.”

  You rub the back of your neck and shrug. “It's okay. You're not exactly wrong.”

  “No, I am wrong. You do have friends.” He sounds desperate now, and that only makes it worse. “Everyone on that boat thinks of you as a friend. I'm your friend!”

  “We're not friends, Sokka.”

  You don't know why you said it. Maybe just to hurt him in the same way he's hurt you. Maybe because it's true. Maybe because, if you say he's not your friend, the universe will believe you and leave him alone.

  It's as if he physically deflates. His eyes dart over, just to make sure you're not telling some twisted joke, and when he sees your straight face, he looks away and mumbles, “Oh, right.”

  “I don't have friends.”

  “No, I get it. You're edgy. You're a lone wolf.”

  You raise a brow. “Are you mocking me?”

  He lifts his hands in fake surrender, angering you even more. “Hey, what other explanation could there be? I've been nothing but nice to you from the day we met!”

  “I never said you haven't been, but-”

  “But you're strong and independent and you don't believe in other people liking you, because you don't need anyon else. Is that it? Have I guessed right?”

  You freeze, curling your fingers into fists. “Shut up, Sokka. You don't even know what you're talking about! You've been part of the army for three weeks!”

  Sokka scoffs. “I'll leave the ranks before I let myself have the same lonely mindset as you.”

   You open your mouth to respond, but his words are poisonous and your throat closes over. You step back and shake your head, muttering, “Leave me alone,” and Sokka doesn't argue. He stares at you a moment longer before turning on his heel and heading back towards the docks. You hear him mumble a, “Hello, Turnip Man,”  before he disappears round the corner, leaving you stood there feeling heavier, and more guilty, than ever.

  ----

  Getting back on the ship is awkward.

  You never took Sokka for one to keep secrets, and it's obvious now that you were right in that assumption. As soon as you clamber back on deck, all heads turn to you, some looking angry, some just downright curious. It's no secret that Sokka has somehow managed to win the hearts of everyone on ship, but you never expected them to take his side over yours, not after so many years of watching you grow up.

  You walk past them all, as you usually do. You don't want to get into it with them, and you certainly don't want to explain yourself. What happened between you and Sokka shouldn't even be that big of a deal, considering Sokka has only been on board a small number of weeks. You barely know the guy. You have no warmth for him.

  You head to the canteen. It's pretty crowded in there, too, but by the looks of things, Sokka hasn't made an appearance yet; the people in here don't yet know about what happened.

  Besides Erin, of course.

  As soon as she sees you, she clambers from her seat and storms over. Being six feet tall, it's difficult for her not to turn a few heads. Her long blonde hair is in plaits today, swinging to and fro as she stampedes towards you.

  “There you are.”

  “You were looking for me?”

   She scowls, grabbing your arm and dragging you into the tiny nook on the other side of the canteen. “Don't play dumb. Sokka told me to check on you, but he wouldn't tell me why.”

  Your stomach drops, both with guilt and surprise. “He told you to check up on me?”

  “Yep. Wanna explain what happened between you two?”

  Your face heats up. You remember the argument, how petty it was, how stupid. You only said those things because you were afraid – are afraid – of getting close to people, and it was selfish of you to push him away like that.

  Erin bends down, fighting to meet your eyes. “Well? Did something happen?”

  “We just got into an argument,” you mumble. “It's not even that big of a deal.”

   Erin reels back, bushy eyebrows shooting up her forehead. “Since when did you get into arguments with people? That means you actually have to give a damn.”

  You shrug. You genuinely have no answer for that.

  Erin sighs. “Well, the poor guy seemed pretty upset. I've seen him walking around the ship every now and then, and he's always got a smile on his face. It must have been a bad argument if you managed to upset him so badly.”

  You close your eyes. “Don't say that.”

  “I'm just telling the truth,” she replies.

  “I already feel like a shitty person.”

  Erin pauses. “What actually happened?”

  And you don't want to go into detail, so you don't. You give her the basic run-down, things she already knows, feelings you have expressed to her on multiple occasions. She knows all about your problems with getting close to people, how all of your friends have been doomed to death as soon as they announce they feel something friendly towards you. She understands why you would push Sokka away in the way you did.

  “But you clearly like him.”

  You freeze, the words so confident when coming from her mouth. She says it like it's obvious, like every single person who's ever laid eyes on you and Sokka understand that you both enjoy each other's presence.

  “I think he's alright,” you mumble. “He's – like – a cool guy.”

  Erin scoffs. “Yeah. Real cool. I'm just saying, I've known you for a long time, and not once have I seen you feel guilty about doing what you think is right.”

  It's a fair statement, and you both know it. Why Sokka is any different is a complete mystery.

  “Maybe you two should talk,” Erin says. “He really did seem upset, Y/N. I wasn't just making that up.”

  You purse your lips. Just the idea of going up to Sokka right now to discuss everything that happened makes you feel ill, which is probably pretty childish; you were part of a problem, and you should face it head on, just like you do with everything else in life.

  You tell Erin you need to go, and you head back to your room, where you don't emerge for the rest of the day.

----

  You're docking far too soon.

  Only yesterday you docked at the Earth Kingdom. You still have another two weeks before you're due to arrive in the Fire Nation. Why is the bus stopping now?

  It judders, and that's what wakes you. You don't recall how long you've been asleep, but you're groggy when you finally hop out of bed and stumble over to your weaponry table. You grab your sword and march upstairs, trying desperately to clear your eyes of sleep and grime; if the General were to see you in such a state, he would be furious at you for slacking.

  You follow the sound of the screams up onto the main deck.

  There they are in their ranks, dressed in red, war paint streaking their faces. The sight is scary, all too familiar, giving you flashbacks to a time you thought you would never have to return to. People are screaming and running for cover. Swords are clashing against swords. Suddenly, everything you've been training for is being pushed to the forefront.

  Someone knocks into you. You stumble, just barely managing to catch yourself. You swing around, ready to stab, but you stop immediately when you see Erin staring at you, wide eyed and frenzied. “They moved quicker than we thought.”

  “What do we do?” you demand.

  “We've gotta get everyone off the boat, Y/N. All the kids and the staff; we need to get them to safety.” She tries tugging on your arm, ready to sprint towards the canteen where no doubt everyone without a weapon is hiding. However, you pull out of her grip, snapping your head round to the deck; people are fighting. Fire is being thrown left, right and centre. Swords clash against swords. Injured people litter the deck, and you can only pray that none of them are dead.

  “Y/N,” Erin hisses. “We have to let the older ones handle this. There's a time and a-”

  Sokka jumps out from behind a barrel and starts yelling.

  Erin's head snaps around, her jaw dropping in horror. “No.”

  You don't even think. You can't. Your brain is no longer working to it's full capacity, and so you tug out of Erin's grip and dive head first into the battle. Behind you, Erin screams your name, calls you an idiot, and you cannot listen, because Sokka is sword fighting even though he doesn't know how to properly use a sword.

  The Fire Nation soldier whirls around when he hears your war cry. His sword clashes against your own, sending sparks in the air that mingle with the flames already taking over the deck. Behind you, something explodes, and people scream, and the boat lurches to the side. Sokka stumbles, catching himself on the hand rail, but you can't lose focus. You keep eye contact with the soldier in red and sneer as best you can.

  “Well this was a bit of an unexpected visit, wasn't it?”

  The soldier laughs. Laughs, and that's what really drives you over the edge. In that smile, you can see the faces of the people he has slaughtered, the families he has left distraught and helpless just because he can. They are the reason you flick your sword blade up and whirl, catching his knee just right. He cries out, buckling as blood gushes from the wound now embedded in his thigh. You take the chance to slam the hilt of your sword into his head. His eyes flutter closed and he crumbles to the floor, moving no more.

  You look up at Sokka frantically. “What the hell are you doing?”

  “That was so cool!” Sokka exclaims, rushing towards you. “The way you blocked his first hit? Incredible. You have to teach me how to-”

   You shove him out the way just as a blast of fire threatens to take his head off. Sokka cries out, but you're cry is even louder as the flames graze your upper arm, singing the material of your uniform, just catching the skin beneath. Your legs threaten to give out as your skin smoulders, but you keep yourself upright and slash your sword, catching the oncoming soldier in the side, knocking him over the railing – it certainly isn't your best move, but it's the best you can do whilst also desperately trying to focus on the pain embedded in your arm.

  “Y/N? Y/N, oh god, are you okay?”

  You don't have time to turn and tell Sokka to shut the hell up. Another enemy soldier is already barrelling towards you, his hands outstretched – a Fire Bender, a fact which is confirmed when he blasts fire in your direction. You twist out the way, letting the flames slam into another barrel of gunpowder behind you; it explodes, taking yet another chunk out the side of the boat.

  The Water Benders are keeping the boat afloat by now, but it won't last long and you know that; you've seen their powers deplete quite quickly when they're stressed. You only have a handful of minutes left until the entire ship goes down in either flames or waves.

  Either are deadly.

  “Sokka,” you pant, scrambling to your knees. You don't even look to see if he's listening, your eyes trained on the battle taking place in front of you. “Sokka, get out of here. Go down to the canteen and follow every order Erin gives.”

   “No. No, I can't just leave. You're injured!”

  He scrambles to your side, but never gets the chance to touch you before you're forced to your feet by yet another brutal explosion. This time, the entire left side of the boat crumbles, allowing waves to flood the deck. The Water Benders lift them as best they can, throwing them back, but the water keeps coming; a few people with water powers are no match for the entire ocean.

  “Fuck,” you hiss, stumbling to your feet. Sokka helps you, gripping your elbow but you shove him away and hiss, “Get down to the canteen!”

  You don't know if he listens. You can't keep still for that long. You delve back into the battle, helping your fellow soldiers in the way you have been trained to do, taking lives and trying to ignore the pain and shame that comes with it. You watch people die, because that's what you're here to do. You are on this boat, knowing full well that people will not make it out alive. You could be one of the dead ones at the end of this.

  And that's what it feels like when the flames catch your legs.

  You feel nothing at first – nothing major. Just a little tingle at your ankles that slowly makes its way up your leg, until eventually you're forced to look away from the battle and inspect the damage. Your heart lurches into your throat when you see your trouser leg on fire, taking the skin beneath with it. Once you've seen it, the pain becomes unbearable, because you know it's there. You can see the damage, the skin slowly peeling away before your very eyes.

  You scream, which is something you never do in battle. Your leg buckles and you fall to the floor, knees splashing in the water that has now engulfed the deck. Around you, people call your name – friends, people you tried pushing away because you were too scared to let them anywhere near you. Right now, with the pain flooding your system, you want to apologise to each and every one of them. You want to tell them how much you love them, how much you appreciate them, how much you-

  You are scooped from the floor.

  You cry out, startled, but your voice leaves you when you look up to see Sokka pressing you against his chest, ducking fireballs left, right and centre. His eyes never meet your own as he runs, ignoring the flames and the people screaming. He jumps over dead bodies and pants in your face, but you're too dazed to look away.

  His face is really pretty. You should probably tell him that before you die.

  “Your face is really pretty.”

  The last thing you see before the darkness takes over is Sokka looking at you inquiringly, a perfect eyebrow arched.

  ----

  You always hate waking up after a battle.

  You hate it even more when the first thing you see is the General glaring down at you.

  His face is just scary in general; gnarled, like it's been knotted. His lower lip has been bitten to pieces, and he has scars that go past the point of mysterious and head straight into downright brutal. He's sitting in a chair now, one leg folded over the other, staring at you intently.

  When you meet his eyes, he says, “You're awake.”

  It's instinct to want to scramble upright and give him a salute, or a nod, or a god damn bow, but you're frozen. You don't even respond.

  He sighs and leans forward, hands folded. “Why weren't you awake when the Fire Nation made their merry way onto our boat?”

  Your stomach dips. “The boat. Oh god, the boat.”

  “The boat,” the General parrots. “Long gone now, I'm afraid; our Water Benders could only hold up for so long. It went down, taking multiple of our people with it.”

   Your eyes well up. You shove the tears away, scared of making this moment any worse with your emotions.

  “It was near enough a massacre,” the General continues. “Erin is dead. So are a few junior soldiers.”

  The first tear slips. Erin.

  “You should have been there for them, soldier. You should have been keeping watch on that deck.”

  You close your eyes, a lump forming in your throat that is impossible to work past. You felt pain on the deck earlier on, but this pain is indescribable. It's unbearable, the worst thing you have ever felt. You remember Erin's smile, and the way she clapped her hands when she laughed. She laughed a lot, this loud and intimidating bark of enjoyment that made newcomers flinch, but made you laugh along with her. She was your friend.

  What a cursed word that is becoming.

  Slowly, the General stands up from his chair. It's like he knows the conversation is over, that his words have paralysed you to the point of no return. You have nothing to say to that, nothing to defend yourself with, and it hurts even worse that he knows that is the case.

  “I hope you make a full recovery, soldier, and soon,” he says. “Not all of us were so lucky. Even the ones who know how to do their job.”

   He leaves after that. The room is a little dimmer, your body a little more numb. You roll onto your side, ignoring the sharp pain that spirals up your leg. You curl up, hugging your knees to your chest, and you cry. You cry for Erin, and for the people who lost their lives, people you couldn't save.

  You want to fall asleep, but it doesn't happen. Night turns into day turns into night again before you're finally released from the infirmary. You make your way to the only home you've ever known – wherever the army is. Today, they have decided to take refuge in an old village in the south of the Earth Kingdom. You walk through the door of the tiny inn they have chosen, and immediately you see Sokka.

  He makes eye contact with you, but does not move from his seat. In front of him, he has a mug of something warm, and he's wearing a knitted jumper with a pair of trousers. There's a cut just beneath his left eye that has been knitted together by stitches that have not yet dissolved. He looks fierce. It's weird on him.

  You don't approach him. You just let him stare before his eyes become too much and you duck your head down, heading for the stairs without even asking what room you've been assigned. However, you don't make it that far before Sokka is grabbing your warm, whirling you around and cupping your face. You flinch when his delicate fingers make contact with your skin, but you don't pull away because you haven't felt a warmth like this in days.

  His blue eyes trail along your face, inspecting every inch. He purses his lips and asks, “Does it still hurt?”

  “No,” you croak. “I'm fine.”

  He drops his hands and steps away, giving you more space than you want. “Do you remember what happened?”

  “The General told me.”

  “Y/N...” He bites his lip, as if unsure of how to word what he wants to say. “I'm so sorry about Erin. I know you two were friends.”

  You shrug. “It happens. This is what life is like.”

  You turn before he can see the tears, but he grabs your arm. “Don't do that.”

  “Don't do what, Sokka?”

  “This. Pretending everything is okay.”

  “Nothing is okay right now.”

  “Exactly, so you don't have to act like none of it is effecting you.”

  You turn, glaring at him the best you can with your swollen eye and split lip. “Are you really doing this again?”

  He furrows his brows. “Doing what?”

  “Pretending you know everything about me.” You pull your arm from his grip. “Stop acting like I'm not scum.”

  Sokka reels back at that, blue eyes widening. “What?”

  “The General told me what happened,” you bark. “And he let me know that none of it would have gone down if I'd have just done my fucking job right! I was meant to be on watch that night, and I went to bed instead. I went to bed.”

  Something crumbles. You haven't cried for the past four days, sitting alone in that infirmary, knowing everyone you've ever known hates you for being so careless. You thought just because you've been here the longest means you can get away with anything, but it all comes with consequences. How you could be so selfish-

  “Y/N, you alone wouldn't have been able to fight the Fire Nation off whether you were sat on deck or not.” Sokka cups your face again, forcing you to look into his eyes. “The General told you it was your fault?”

  “He was telling the truth.”

  “Bullcrap.”

  It's the closest Sokka has gotten to swearing, so it takes you by surprise.

  “He's – He's – How could he just say that? You wanna know where that rat bag was when it was all happening? In his office, making phone calls. Whilst everyone else was out there risking their god damn lives, he was phoning people.”

  You blink. Sokka's cheeks are red now, and he's gritting his teeth. His fingers are warm around your cheeks, but he isn't letting go and you're not pulling away.

  “I just can't believe the nerve of him.” He shakes his head. “My dad would never put up with this. He treated all his soldiers with respect-”

  “Sokka-”

  “I'm gonna go and talk to him.”

  Your eyes widen, but Sokka's already storming towards the exit by the time you properly process what he's just said. You spin on your heel and scramble after him, calling his name desperately.

  “Stop, don't be an idiot,” you hiss, grabbing for his arm. He walks a bit faster, dragging you along. “Sokka, I'm serious. It's not worth it.”

   “I know what room he's claimed as his office,” Sokka mumbles. “I won't even knock, that's how angry I am...”

  You groan, but none of your protestations get through to him before he's turning the corner and slamming his fist against an oak wood door painted bright red. On the door handle is a sign that reads DO NOT DISTURB, which just makes the entire situation ten times worse.

  “Sokka, please-”

  The door bursts open. Standing there is the General, knotted face looking even more furious than usual. You cower behind Sokka, still gripping his arm tightly.

  Sokka straightens up; he's awfully tall for an eighteen year old, very nearly eye-to-eye with the General.

  “What the hell do you want, boy?” the General demands.

  You expect Sokka to back down once he's heard the General's anger, but he doesn't. He steps forward and says, “You got a minute, big guy?”

  “Oh, god...”

  The General raises a scarred brow and says, “What is this about? I have death letters to send out.”

  Your grip tightens on Sokka's arm. He glances down at you, mumbles something you don't pick up on, before turning back to the General.

  “What you said to Y/N was really uncool.”

   His voice doesn't even waver.

  The General pauses. “What?”

  “It was uncool, and untrue, too. Y/N was out there fighting for me. They were protecting me, because I was stupid enough to think I had enough experience to throw myself into battle. Without them, I would probably be dead right now.”

  You glance up; Sokka's jaw is clenched, his hands curled. His eyes are darker than you've ever seen them; the look is almost terrifying.

  The General shifts his weight. “You're one tough son of a bitch coming up to me to tell me this.”

  Sokka shrugs. “You were bullying my friend. Y/N lost people too. The last thing they need is to think they were the one that caused it.”

  The General scowls, but you're surprised at the fact he says nothing in return. He stares at Sokka, and then he looks at you, and then he slams the door closed.

  Sokka stumbles back. “Hey! What is he-” He goes to slam his fist into the door, but you drag him back before he can. Your heart is thumping with something you can't quite place, a completely new feeling that is making you dizzy. You want to cry and laugh and smile all at the same time, and it's all very confusing.

  “He's a coward,” Sokka says, before throwing his head back and yelling, “COWARD!”

  “Shut up.” You try and sound angry, but the words are intertwined with a laugh. Sokka looks at you, startled by the noise, but his face breaks into a grin when he sees you smiling, dragging him down the halls.

  “Are you laughing?”

  “That was the dumbest thing you could have ever done.”

  “Hey! I did it for you.”

  You look over. “Nobody's ever done anything like that for me before.”

  Sokka's smile falls into a frown, eyebrows furrowing. “Wait, seriously?”

  You shrug. “People aren't really that nice to one another in this line of work.”

   “But. . . But you saved my life.”

  Sokka pauses then, digging his heels into the carpet to stop you from dragging him along any further. You stumble back, and he catches you just moments before you crash into his chest. You turn and look at him, raising a brow.

  “I did my job,” you correct. “It's what I've been trained to do.”

  “Yeah, but I still appreciate it.” He awkwardly rubs the back of his neck. “To be honest, I thought you hated me after our little argument on docking day. I thought I really messed up.”

   You blink; after waking up to the news of Erin being dead, and seeing Sokka stand up to the General for you, you had completely forgotten about the argument. It seems like such a small thing after everything else that has happened.

  “Sokka,” you say. “I don't hate you. I've never hated you.”

  He lifts his eyes, a hopeful glint glittering within them. “Really? But you said-”

  “I know what I said,” you grumble. “I didn't mean it. I just. . . It's a fear of mine, you see. I feel like I kind of curse people when I claim they're my friend.”

  Sokka blinks. “That's so dumb.”

  “Excuse me?”

  He laughs, genuinely amused. You don't know whether to laugh along or get really angry. “Y/N, that's so dumb. You're literally in the army – people are dying because this is the job they have, not because you've called them your friend.”

  “But-”

  He cups your face, tilting your head to and fro as if trying to wake you up from a deep sleep. “I'm serious. You're smart enough to realise that, surely.”

  “People are just safer when they're not associated with me.”

  Sokka rolls his eyes. “Bullcrap. You saved my life earlier – that's the complete opposite of you putting me in danger.”

  You stare at him. He stares right back, a cheeky grin forming on his face. Your voice is quiet when you say, “Why does someone like you even want to be friends with me?”

  His smile tilts, becomes a little softer. He stops shaking your head and instead gently trails his thumbs beneath your eye. “Because someone like me needs someone like you sometimes.” He leans forward. Your heart thumps in your chest, panic seizing you, but you don't pull away. “And sometimes, someone like you needs someone like me. Don't you agree?”

  You flick your eyes to his lips, and apparently that is answer enough. He laughs lazily and leans in, kissing you. Your brain short circuits, part of you so confused that you very nearly pull away, but then you remember this is Sokka and he's that guy you literally dove into battle for, and you like him, you really, really like him. You wrap your arms around his neck and pull him closer, standing on tip toe to chase his lips before he can pull away to check that you're okay with him doing this.

  He mumbles something against your mouth, but the blood is rushing through your ears so you don't even hear him. You just nod, humming an affirmative as you kiss him back. Sokka laughs, placing his hands on his hips before he finally pulls away, panting for breath.

  “Sorry,” you say quickly. “I got carried away, and-”

  “Don't – you – dare – apologise.” He speaks each word through a breath, his smile growing with each one. “I genuinely thought you hated me earlier.”

  “No. No, I don't hate you.”

  “Well, clearly.”

   Your face heats up. You swat his shoulder, grumbling curse words beneath your breath. Sokka laughs and wraps an arm around your shoulders, pulling you into his side.

  “You might die now, you know,” you say as Sokka walks you back to the lobby.

  Sokka sighs, his breath fanning your neck. “I doubt I will, but if I do, that kiss was the best goodbye present you could have given me.”

[hermannsthumb]

Gonna request some camb0y newt who has Hermann as a regular follower who may or may not be requesting used clothing from Newt...😳

this one is less h0rny and more dumb and I died every time I typed newt’s screen name but (ALSO THE FACT THAT TUMBLR KEPT BLOCKING THIS MESSAGE....unbelievable) 18+/not sfw below cut

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

The whole thing only started because of the kaijus.

It seems foolish to place the blame on them, considering the severity of the damage they’ve caused in every other aspect of life, but it’s the truth. Hermann was never brilliant at romance even in the best of times; he never knew quite the right words to say, or quite the right way to kiss, and certainly not how to keep men interested enough to come back for more than a date or two. Then the end of the world came, and the jaeger program ate up what little free time Hermann had, and dating simply fell to the very lowest tier of his priorities. He had work to do. He had lives to save.

Unfortunately, his libido continued to run rampant.

Masturbation could only get one so far, though Hermann was undeterred and tried almost anything: dildos, vibrators, expensive lubricant, a paid subscription to a high-quality pornography website. He cancelled this after a week, when he realized none of its featured men--though undeniably good-looking--fit his particular area of interest. Besides, it was far too impersonal. Hermann did not like spending half of his time watching a video or scrolling through a photo gallery wondering what that man was doing now, or whether or not he’d enjoyed himself, or what he was like in person... In a fit of desperation, Hermann picked up a subscription to another website that promised live men 24/7. And, well. To make a long story short, Hermann is pretty sure he’s in love.

The object of his affections is twenty-something and stocky, a good few inches shorter than Hermann (he’d wager, anyway), with a chestful of tattoos and a voice that’s almost high enough to be grating. Hermann has seen his face only fleetingly, but it’s enough for him to know it’s a highly agreeable one. He’s got a nice sense of humor, seems intelligent enough, and the glimpses Hermann’s caught of the bedroom he streams from (at the perfect time of day, late enough that Hermann’s inhibitions are entirely nonexistent) indicate a healthy love of science fiction. 

Hermann is mostly in love with him because of how good of a show he puts on, though. Where Hermann fails in his use of dildos or vibrators and other nonsense, the man succeeds, and indeed excels, and he’s endlessly creative with dressing in lace and other funny little costumes. It makes for some very inspired jerking off on Hermann’s end. More importantly, it makes for a calming of his libido.

Hermann doesn’t know his real name, only his chosen screen name, though it doesn’t really matter: kaijulover69 is most certainly the man of his dreams.

Well. Nobody’s perfect.

“Tonight’s stream is dedicated to a very special fan for all his support,” kaijulover69 begins. He’s wrapped in a bathrobe, though Hermann has a feeling he knows what’s beneath it, and he flushes pleasantly with warmth at what’s soon to come. “And for what I’m wearing right now. You know who you are. Thanks again, dude!”

His lips are just visible on camera, and he grins coquettishly before slipping the sleeve off his right shoulder. Then the left. “That very same fan requested a strip tease tonight,” he continues, “and--well, I’ll let the rest be a surprise, huh?”

The belt is undone. The robe slips down to the bed, revealing the object of Hermann’s affections clad in nothing but a rather small pair of lacy black undergarments. (And a bloody expensive pair, at that--cost a third of Hermann’s weekly salary. It’s worth it.) You look very attractive, Hermann types encouragingly into the chat box, and hope it’s visible between the pleads for kaijulover69 to flash his face or pull his genitalia out already. 

He doesn’t appear to see any of them. “My week was pretty lame,” he continues. He begins to idly run his hands up and down his bare chest; Hermann mirrors the action on his own, enjoying the shiver he manages to elicit from himself even through two layers of shirt and sweater. “Work stuff has been kicking my ass. And--” His fingers falter. “Well, there’s this guy I really like, and we’ve kinda been...seeing each other, but I just found out he’s actually seeing someone else. So I guess it’s like, I realized I’ve been making all this shit up in my head?”

Who would ever turn down such a marvelous specimen of human? Hermann’s temper flares with a mingling of both righteous offense on the man’s behalf and a little bit of jealousy that he’s not the one who’s so captured his heart. He would like to knock some sense into them, whoever they are.

“But you don’t care about that,” he says, and forces a laugh. “You want to see me mess these up, don’t you?”

His hand drifts down to his panties, and he gives himself a squeeze through them.

“Please,” Hermann says happily, though he knows there’s no one to hear.

------

There’s an email from Newton waiting for him in his inbox the next morning. No subject.

Hey, dude-

Sorry I left you hanging yesterday. I was just a little shocked. Not shocked that you have a partner or whatever, of course you do, that’s totally normal, just that you never told me about them until now. I read over your latest article, and I just wanted to say what an utter load of--

“Hmph,” Hermann says, and quickly scrolls up and away from Newton’s annoying little rant.

Even as he does so, he feels a pang of guilt he doesn’t quite understand. Newton is shocked he has a partner: so what? And, er, so what if that partner isn’t quite as real as Hermann is pretending? The question came at him fast, and unexpected, and so very quickly into the switch from letter correspondence to email; kaijulover69 on his mind, Hermann panicked and wrote yes, I do have someone in my life. It’s not entirely a lie. Though Hermann holds no illusions about the nature of their dynamic, the man has certainly taken up the same amount of Hermann’s time and money that a real partner would. And besides--it’s easier. Less messy. Newton would probably try to set Hermann up with someone, or pester him about his sex life, or even--God forbid--try to offer him advice. (Once I blew a guy in the bathroom of this shitty dive bar, try that, he told Hermann a few weeks ago, and I always take my dates to the aquarium so I can talk about shit and look smart.) 

It’s also helpful in dissuading Hermann from his daydreams and illusions of dating not kaijulover69, but Newton; that, he fears, is an even grander pipe dream.

He skims Newton’s--rather poor--critique of his work, ignoring entirely his comments on Hermann’s partner, and types up a fast rebuttal. Kaijulover69 has another stream tonight, and he doesn't want to miss it.

--------

“The trick,” kaijulover69 pants, “is to just, uh, relax your muscles as much as possible. It’s easier when you’ve got someone doing it for you, obviously, but...”

His chosen method of masturbation tonight is a frightfully large tentacle dildo, wider and longer than any prick Hermann’s seen in his life. Hermann’s not sure if such a dildo would fit inside him; he’s not even sure if it’s going to fit inside kaijulover69. The man is rather compact. It’s stopped about halfway into his body, and even from the rather distant angle Hermann can tell it’s stretching him tight. 

“...I might’ve jumped the gun a little,” the man says, and bursts out into breathy laughter. “Should’ve, uh, should’ve gotten the smaller size. Or worked up to this one.” He works another centimeter into himself before his body goes taut. “Go--go big or go home, I guess?”

One hand moving steadily around his prick, Hermann uses the other to type an encouraging message: Excellent effort.

Kaijulover69 pulls the dildo out to the thinnest section, then once he relaxes, begins a rhythm of short, shallow thrusts. Each time, it goes in a little deeper. It’s very good to watch, and listen to as well; his little gasps, the creaks of his bedsprings, the spread of his legs widening. Hermann briefly considers how badly he would like to be the one pushing it into him and dragging out those sounds, and is surprised to find himself orgasming.

He tips generously once the stream is over: he does like to consider himself some sort of gentleman, and he likes seeing how excited it gets kaijulover69.

-------

The package arrives on an entirely ordinary Tuesday some three weeks later. Autumn has come, bringing with it a rather heavy series of rains, and Hermann is drenched and shivering when he finally ducks into the relative warmth of his flat. The knowledge of what the box tucked under his arm contains warms him considerably; he rented a P.O. Box for one reason and one reason exactly, not even daring to have his name attached to it. It’s gauche, he knows, but--isn’t it a bit like recycling? Kaijulover69 gets a fresh, exciting outfit from Hermann, and Hermann gets it back after he’s--well.

Hermann needs to unwind somehow. There’s nothing wrong with it!

The black lace undergarments are wrapped neatly up inside the box, with a sweet little pink bow on top. Attached to that is a simple handwritten card: To my number one fan! ❤️ There’s plenty more where this came from...

Simple, and innocently flirty. And so familiar it makes Hermann’s blood run cold.

“It’s not possible,” he says.

And yet--isn’t it? Hermann’s never seen his face--either of their faces--and the screen name--

There is no return address on the package, but a frantic search of its wrappings reveals its origin: stamped in black ink over frog-themed postage is BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS. “No, no,” Hermann mutters to himself, even as he reminds himself (unhelpfully) that plenty of people are from Boston. He tosses it to the bed and clacks over to his desk, clutching the card so tightly it crumples. Newton’s letters are all in the top drawer--he just needs--

The handwriting is a perfect match.

“Bugger,” Hermann groans.

[beerecordings]

hey!!! i'd love to see more with the favored puppet au, that's always been one of my favorite concepts. maybe at a point where chase feels apathy in the face of anti, his caretaker, being a bad person? or something from before, when anti decided chase was worrying him and he didn't want to play the games anymore? :'D ty ty

Favored Puppet AU (Chase): After stalking, haunting, and toying with Chase for years, Anti eventually realized it was no longer fun to play with him while his suffering was so high. Instead, Anti kidnapped Chase and keeps him away from the world as its companion. Chase has learned to be alright with that. The human world, after all, was never very kind to him.

Triggers for heavy discussions of Chase’s past suicide attempts and depression and Chase trying to cut himself again, though he doesn’t succeed. Also might be considered soft!Anti, though Chase is the only one it’s soft for.

Florence I decided to combine that first prompt (Chase feeling apathy when Anti’s being awful) with another prompt so you will see that later! for this one I decided to do that moment where Anti decided he didn’t want to play games anymore. thank you for sending them my dude!! also this is my first time writing for this au so the mythology is really experimental but I just tried to do something new with Anti :) it’s very inhuman and doesn’t really understand Chase, but it decides it wants him, so...

.

It sits on top of his refrigerator and watches him have his first meal of the day, a depression snack at nine at night compromised almost entirely of the last crumbs in an old bag of Cheetos. The skinny little human creature – though Anti’s seen him staring at his shirtless torso in the mirror enough times to know he’s only growing more dissatisfied with his softening stomach and arms – throws his head back and dumps the rest of the crisps into his mouth, getting orange dust all over his unkempt beard. Anti giggles at the sight of him. Clown boy with his Cheeto dust and the bags under his eyes. Little human thing. Too small and silly even to be able to die. Goofy, stupid human. Slouching, miserable child.

But if there is one thing Anti enjoys about the human, it is his fierce, hateful courage. At first, the laughter in the edges of his hearing sent chills up the boy’s spine and made him turn around with wild eyes, spitting and gnashing his blunt mortal teeth, but now, after months of being haunted, he does nothing except turn around and glare.

Anti is invisible on his refrigerator, but the human – what is his name? Charles, Casey, something – he still tries to find it. He has eyes made to burn, blue as flame, though, to be perfectly fair, fire can be as much a source of life as the bitter weapon Casey makes with his gaze now.

He used to be warm. Anti remembers. He would stutter when the girl came to see him and he carried those little chips with him, rubbing them in his pocket when he passed the liquor store, and his children were all he thought about. But he’s changed. Anti watched it happen. For whatever reason, the girl stopped bringing the children by at all, and at some point the pain of it must have overwhelmed the man, and Anti watched him embrace old habits with a ferocity only describable as self-harm. After his second suicide attempt – that was the only time Anti let Casey see it, standing over him and staring at the crimson of his blood in the bathtub while the man screamed for it to kill him already, shrieking in despair as Anti picked up his phone from the bathroom counter and dialed 911, giggling at the thought of just how powerful his despair would be when he woke up in the hospital – he removed his children from the background of that phone and replaced it with a stock image of the ocean provided to him by Apple’s recommendation.

The light slid out of his eyes at some point. Anti was there. It watched the whole thing.

It enjoyed the whole thing. Mostly.

“Fucking kill me, then, bitch,” hisses Casey, slinking through his own kitchen like he’s being hunted. He is. “Playing games with me, always, well, I’m tired of playing, you know that, I’m tired… fucking kill me then, not afraid of you, not afraid…”

This is also true. Anti’s pretty sure the only reason he moved back to America was to make sure none of his friends would be in the way of the creature who haunts him finally finishing the job. And to stop them from telling him “you need to get help, you’re talking to the voices in your head and seeing things, it’s not real, you need to see a specialist” in an endless carousel of concern and – as Casey always perceived it – condescension.

“Fucking kill me!” he screams, slamming his hand down on his counter. He shatters a pile of unwashed dishes on accident and blood comes pooling up hot and coppery in the lines of his palm, but Casey doesn’t even look down, doesn’t even flinch, just keeps staring straight forward with fire eyes as wild as a horse’s.

But Anti’s bored with him. It hops down from the fridge and wanders through the apartment, whistling. In the kitchen, it hears the man howling as the whistling returns to torment him, the monster’s singing following him for hours and hours every day, never letting him sleep.

Anti used to think it was really funny, that something as simple as a whistled lullaby could make the man shatter in half and sob like his heart was broken open in his hands.

But honestly?

It’s less fun these days.

“Music, music, music,” rants the human in the kitchen, slamming his palm down again and again, cutting open his palm again, again. There’s banging on the walls and muffled yelling. The neighbors are sick of his screaming. He’ll be evicted soon, Anti reckons. Humans used to travel in packs, making it harder to pick them off, but these days ones like Casey often find themselves alone, and no one is around to stand up for him. “I’ll make you stop, I’ll make you shut up, shut up, shut up….”

Anti lets the human sprint past it and retreat to his bedroom, crawling under the bed and taking his laptop with him. He puts on big earphones and presses them hard against his ears, and he rocks himself as his music plays, turned up to one hundred on his computer, mumbling to himself, laughing sometimes, if Anti listens closely enough.

Anti crouches down to look at him. It hums to itself and touches Casey’s face, and he shrivels in on himself and whimpers, but he does not fight or push it away. Not anymore.

He used to be so much more fun before he started to crumble instead of break.

And yet, Anti has not killed him.

It does not know why.

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

When bored – these days, it often is – Anti likes to wander through the other apartments that surround its own. Watching the human sleep can only be entertaining for so long, even if it does like to hear his sleepy, thick breathing and see his peaceful, dopey face, and it’s nice to just roam sometimes. Anyway, the people nearby can be interesting, though Anti doesn’t mess with them the way it does Casey. No one else has ever been that entertaining.

A young couple lives to their right, newly-married with a little rat of a dog they call Barkley. Anti’s human likes most dogs, but he grew tired a long time ago of the shrieking yips through the walls. Anti itself doesn’t mind it so much. One more thing to annoy the human on his slow road to madness.

“Who’s the best boy in the world?”

It passes by their door and hears them cooing and praising the yelping thing. “Are you a good boy, Barkley? Who’s my good little boy? Yes, you are! Yes, you are!”

Barkley has been sick for a few days and their fussing over him has been endless as they clean the nasty little animal up after every time it vomits, carefully feeding it vet-recommended dog food and plenty of healthy human snacks whenever Barkley shows an interest. How anyone could care to look after a creature so pathetic and useless is well beyond Anti, but it thinks it’s funny, really. Humans will bow down to pet the lowest of creatures.

I am not like that, it thinks to itself, drifting through the door, invisible. It is important for me to not be like that.

Anti had never had an interest in pets before this year, but, increasingly, it likes to come over and watch them look after Barkley. Constantly it reminds itself – I am not like that. It is important for me to not be like that.

But it doesn’t understand why this is important or why it should not be like that. Truthfully, it has never been skilled with its own emotions. It does as it pleases and what makes it happy makes it happy. If there is depth to that, it isn’t interested.

“Okay, Barkley baby, mommy and daddy are going to go for a walk and be right back in a few.”

“Aww, poor baby, we know. You wanna come on our walk and see all the other puppies along the way, but you can’t go while your belly’s all grumpy!”

“Yeah, little Barkley can’t come today, but mommy and daddy will be right back.”

“Mommy and daddy will be right back, we promise.”

They shower the dog in pets and belly rubs as they baby-talk their way towards the door, blowing it kisses as they head out and lock the door behind them.

“Do you think we should check on this guy here who’s so loud sometime?”

“What, that Chase guy? Are you kidding me? What a creep. He’s so fucking loud. We’re going to have to complain to the landlord again. Guy’s out of his mind.”

Ah, yes, Chase, that’s his name. Slipping into their apartment like a ghost, Anti laughs at the human fickleness and leans down to tweak the little dog’s tail, making it yelp in alarm and start running in circles around the apartment. It giggles and spends some time chasing it and leading it around with its chew toys and such. It likes the way it can make the dog do anything. It likes the cute little dog even if it is such a disgusting, purposeless, stupid little animal. It coos and picks the puppy up, tickling its skinny little ribs and rubbing between its ears.

“Stupid puppy,” it manages to say, in its painful, broken voice. Human language has always been difficult for it, but it prides itself on understanding it well. One day maybe it will speak it clearly too, though for now it knows it would sound like a struggling, glitching machine to a real human. “Stupid baby doggy.”

Faint laughter reaches its sharp ears and it quiets, setting the dog back down. For a moment, only silence, and it crouches in the living room with its black eyes boring into the universe, motionless.

Then it hears raucous laughter as the window in the back of the apartment is pried open and a pair of much, much more pathetic creatures than itself or even this little dog crash their way into the couple’s home. It straightens up, shaking its head, and heads back towards the back room, where a baby’s nursery is beginning to develop. Above the cradle, a pair of imps stop short, staring at Anti as they hover, startled, in mid-air.

Wearing its human’s form, it puts its hands on its hips and waits for them to speak.

They begin to laugh again, loud and boisterous, spit flying out of the one’s mouth while the second’s eyes bulge with hilarity.

“A fairy in California?” The imp rolls in circles in the air, shrieking with laughter. “Who would have thought?”

“Little far from home, Mr. Potatohead,” quips the second, floating up to the ceiling, sneering and sticking out its little purple tongue. Anti’s mouth curls distastefully. “Why don’t you go back to your hunts and your parades, your highness?”

“How’d it get here without getting stuck behind all that running water?”

“Careful, pure-blood, this spoon looks like it might be made out of iron!”

They dissolve into maniacal impling laughter, rocking through the air, shape-shifting in the limited ways they can to make themselves look uglier. If it were the sort of fairy who gave a fuck, Anti supposes it would feel disrespected, but it doesn’t much care. They’re little annoyances who have clearly mistaken it for a much less powerful creature than it really is. They break the monotony for a moment. It’ll kill them in a second. Anti supposes they just came here to make trouble. Imps love break into human homes and stealing their food or making their milk go rotten. They may well have been the ones who made Barkley sick, just to watch the humans take care of the dumb little thing for their entertainment. They’re common in this part of the city because the mountains are close, and imps are snuffling, stupid little creatures of the earth.

“Ew, what’s that?” squawks the first imp, floating closer to it. “Do you smell it?”

“Yuck. His majesty stinks like a human.”

“Just like a fairy to keep a pet.”

“Aw, do you have a widdle human to look after?”

“Maybe we should pay a visit to your stinky little human.”

“Yeah, maybe it needs some company.”

“Some friends.”

“Someone to play a couple fun games with.”

“And then we can find out what it is that made Tinkerbell here go all soft in the middle, like a rotten – ”

But they never get to find out exactly what rotted thing Anti resembles. It snatches the imp out of the air in one snapping motion like the bite of a snake and crushes its body between its fingers, its eyes turning black as the juices run down its wrist.

In its fear, the other imp does not even scream. Its eyes bulge in alarm and it scrambles for the window, but it never makes it. Barkley yelps in victory, chasing his own tail around as Anti’s teeth come down around the meaty little imp and tear it to pieces, silencing the both of the little monsters, leaving nothing behind.

It’ll be picking that out of its teeth for a week, it muses, wandering back out of the apartment and towards its own. But that’s what they get for talking about Chase like that.

It’s odd, though, how it makes it pause and think. That is something other spirits do sometimes, isn’t it? Take a human and keep it as a pet.

The couple with the dog are returning from their walk, holding slushies and each other’s hands.

“Barkley!” they coo, greeting their excited dog at the door. “Are you a good boy? Oh, why are you shaking, baby boy? What a silly little puppy you are. Who’s a cutie? Are you a good boy? You just want a big hug, huh, you just want to be looked after. Mwah, mwah.”

It’s kind of a cute dog, in the end.

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

It liked the way Chase looked up at it, that one day it allowed him to see it.

It liked the way his eyes changed. He was not afraid – Chase is a creature of courage and despair, and these, in Anti’s experience, are both flowers from the same root – but he was distressed. Anti would say that this was because the form he takes is such a disturbingly odd impression of a human that it scared the human, but, truthfully, he thinks he saw a sort of awe in Chase’s eyes that day as well.

He loves fiction. This is one thing it learned about Chase early on. He does not have a reputation for intelligence but he does love his fantasy escapism, or he did back when he still had the energy for things like interests and hobbies. He liked Gravity Falls and Doctor Who and anything with sci-fi or dragons and he would get stuck at bookstores every now and then just walking through the YA section and wishing he was still young enough to enjoy them as much as he used to. In the old days, human storytellers were vital parts of their social structure. Anti thinks Chase would have been a storyteller, in his own way, if this were a few hundred years ago. Maybe he would be happier then.

It does not know when it began wondering about Chase’s happiness. Do not ask it.

The point is that Anti liked the way Chase looked up at it, that one day it allowed him to see it, that day he tried to kill himself.

“No,”  he shook his head as Anti took his phone and called for an ambulance. “No.”

But his eyes were looking at something beyond life and death, something he had only read about in books, and Anti did not understand it.

It thinks, now, that Chase was looking at something he had longed for when he was younger. But Anti does not know what. There are fairytales about prophetic heroes and novels about chosen ones and tv shows where fantastical creatures whisk people away on great adventures, but Anti is not a fantasy. Anti is a nightmare. This is something Chase has always known, and Anti has always known, and there should be no misunderstanding between them.

But it liked the way Chase looked at him, that one time it allowed him to see it. That’s all. That’s all it’s saying. It doesn’t mean anything. It is not like that. It’s important that it’s not like that.

Anti touches the human’s face. He has fallen asleep beneath his bed, and his breathing is clear and deep, rhythmic as the song of a bird.

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

Chase sleeps for fourteen hours and then gets up to make a Cup-o’-Noodles. Beef flavored. It’s the only thing left in the pantry except half a jar of strawberry jam and some milk he was too drunk to put in the fridge a couple days ago, spoiled completely by now. Even the cheap rum he’s been buying is out on the table beside the stove. He hasn’t bothered to get dressed and he cuts a pathetically small figure standing over the stove in nothing but some gym shorts and rolled-up Christmas socks because everything else needs to be washed.

Anti roams the apartment, humming distantly and checking up on things. It deletes an unread message on Chase’s phone from contact name “Marv” and waters the succulent Chase picked up on an impulse last week. It’s so funny to it how attached the human can get to things, and so quick too. He once found a bee on the windowsill, brought it sugar water, and looked after it for several hours before letting it outside. The human put on his loudest comedy show afterwards to try and keep himself cheerful, but he’d ended up crying about halfway through, and Anti couldn’t tell if it was related to the bee or not. He’s always crying. He didn’t always used to be crying. He used to be less deep in his despair and much more fun to play with.

Anti shakes the thoughts off and decides to prove that Chase is still fun to play games with. There’s nothing deep about their relationship, Chase just happens to be entertaining. That’s the only reason it followed him all the way from Ireland. It floats towards the kitchen, silent and invisible. It’ll give him a quick scare, not enough to put him off his dinner, just enough to remind him he should still be fighting. Anti shape-shifts cleanly into a small boy with black hair and deep onyx eyes and goes to stand behind Chase, silent and still, staring up at the child’s father as he stirs the noodles in silence.

“I know you’re behind me,” he says after a moment. “Looking like Hunter.”

Anti startles and shivers back into invisibility, drawing away. Chase turns blearily to see that it’s gone and he laughs, deep and hollow.

“Yeah,” he mumbles, stumbling a little as he tilts back his rum. Anti knows he’s already drunk from the calmness in his tired voice. “Used to your tricks by now. You been getting to know me, I know. I been getting to know you too.”

He snorts to himself and leans back against the stove, seeming to forget his noodles. He squints blearily around the room, rubbing at his eyes. He hasn’t put his contacts in since the last time he tried to kill himself. Wanted to make sure he cut the veins, but after he survived that night, it didn’t much matter if he could see or not.

“I think I can sort of tell when you’re close, most of the time,” he adds. Anti sits at the dining table across the room, frowning. “Like… I can feel you. Or something. See you, maybe. I think you make things… a different color. Does that make sense?”

He points sluggishly towards the dining table and then shrugs, letting his hand drop again.

“Doesn’t matter, I guess.”

His pot is boiling over. The water will burn his hands in a moment, resting as they are against the edge of the stove. Chase laughs to himself again, shaking his head, and throws back the rum for so long that he’s panting when he’s done with the drink.

“Funny,” he says. “Would have almost liked for you to be there. As Hunter, I mean. See my baby one more time. My baby. Hunter, my son…”

His eyes trail far away. Anti doesn’t think he’s looking at anything at all. There’s nothing left for him to look at.

Water cascades across the stove, boiling. Chase whimpers as it hits his hands, but he doesn’t pull away.

Something yanks him back.

He stumbles away from the stovetop. Drunk, he can’t keep his balance, and he goes crashing to the ground, falling on his back and dropping his bottle, which shatters into pieces of glass and a small flood of rum across the kitchen floor. Chase gasps, grabbing at his bruised elbow, staring around for a sight of the monster that has haunted him for so long.

The pot of noodles goes spinning off its stovetop onto the other side of the stove and stops boiling after a moment, quieting the kitchen. The knob on the oven flicks to ‘off’ and the red light disappears from the stovetop, leaving it dark and silent.

Chase closes his eyes.

Anti stares at him and it knows, in the moment, that the human was not lying.

He can sense it.

He can tell it’s there.

“Why,” croaks Chase. “Did you call 911 that night?”

Anti steps back from him. His movement shifts glass on the floor with a faint clinking noise.

“Was this what you wanted?” Chase whispers. “Just to see me live like this a little while longer? Just to make sure I couldn’t get away that easy? Was killing myself too good for you? Are you ever going to actually finish me off?”

He is crying. He is always crying.

This isn’t fun anymore, Anti realizes. It isn’t funny.

And honestly –

Honestly…

Honestly, it doesn’t know why it called 911.

“I think that’s what I’ve actually been waiting for,” laughs Chase, sobbing as tears run down his reddened cheeks. “Fuck. Not even staying alive waiting for it, that’s not what I mean, I mean… like I haven’t killed myself because I’ve been waiting for you to do it.”

He throws his head back and cries and laughs and hugs himself with his burned hands and scarred wrists, his whole body shuddering with the tears.

“But you won’t,” he sobs into the darkness, as Anti’s presence draws away from him and the sun fades. “You won’t. Will you? No one will give me any mercy. No one wants me to have any fucking peace. So tired… You won’t…”

Anti retreats to his room.

It doesn’t want to face him right now.

He doesn’t want to face him right now.

Chase cries in the kitchen for a long time, until his whole body feels tired and numb and drained. He doesn’t clean up the glass. He doesn’t clean up the rum. He doesn’t clean up the water. He would probably have slept right there on the wooden floor of his kitchen, but the doorbell rings.

Too drunk to put himself together, he staggers to the door and throws it open to the cold, red-eyed and stumbling like a zombie.

“Uh,” says the delivery kid, fixing her alarmed expression after a moment. “Here’s your food, sir.”

Chase is too confused even to question. Almost dazed by it, he takes the bag of take-out carefully from her hands, thanks her in a mumble, and shuts the door behind him.

KFC.

Did he order this?

No, he was making ramen before he made a mess of it. But it’s what he always gets. Chicken tenders and mashed potatoes and a couple extra biscuits for the next morning.

In his bedroom, Anti closes out of the delivery app and drops his phone onto the bed, deleting one more message from Marv before it drifts past Chase and goes wandering, thinking, roaming, lost.

It’s not like that… it’s important that it’s not. It’s not like that.

Zayn and Mary are walking Barkley. Anti watches the happy little dog go yipping and dancing in the space between them, happy and safe and recovering, cared for by his masters.

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

The apartment fills with soft light in the evenings. White and gold from the weary sun. When it hits the horizon, the gold pirouettes and falls apart into a dozen different watercolors across the long shoulders of the sky. Pouring patiently through the windows, like syrup from the bark of a great dark tree.

Anti sits beside Chase’s bed and watches him sleep, playing slowly with his hair.

It likes Chase’s hair. It always has. Soft and dark but sometimes golden in the sunlight, and ever-so-slightly curly, so you can wrap it around your finger if you’re gentle, and make it spring back again afterwards.

Anti wants to kill something. It doesn’t know what. A human, probably, but not Chase. Chase, Chase, Chase. It had forgotten how much it likes that name.

You like a lot of things about him, it lets itself realize. When did that happen? When the fuck did that happen? One day you’re making him having a repeated dream where he’s carefully cut into pieces and eaten alive by a sentient crocodile because he always got scared of the one in Peter Pan when he was a child and the next you’re thinking about how soft his hair is. It makes Anti laugh, for a moment, but it thinks it feels… sad. It doesn’t know why.

Chase wakes up and it drifts back into invisibility, leaving him to sit up and look around. Check his phone for the time and stare at the floor for a while. Today he is groggy, but not sad, which strikes Anti as odd. Most days he is groggy and sad. Sad groggy stupid human. Anti’s sad groggy stupid hurting human. It sighs and spins lazily in the air, watching Chase push himself up on his feet, his eyes dead and weary.

Someone slams on their door and Chase groans, rubbing at his forehead. He’s hungover again.

“Brody!” The slamming insists. Chase stutters out a breath, slightly frightened, and totters to the door, pulling it open.

It’s his landlord. Anti’s lips curl up in a snarl. A mean, stupid man, stupider than Chase, even, and he looks angry.

And he starts to shout at Chase, and Anti does not like it. It doesn’t interfere, but it doesn’t like it either, and it knows Chase will do nothing. He stands there shirtless in his Christmas socks and stares at his landlord like he can’t believe any of this is real – not because it’s rare for him to be in trouble, just because his life is an alley puddle full of cigarettes and bathing rats and he’s most likely dissociating – and just nods when he’s told to get his act together and pipe the fuck down before he gets kicked out.

“Yes,” says Chase. “Okay.”

The landlord leaves.

Chase shuts the door behind him and looks directly at Anti, invisible on the ceiling above him.

“Jokes on him,” he says dully. “He’ll have to be the one to clean my blood out of the bathtub.”

Anti blinks. Chase pauses, letting his head rest against the cool wall for a moment before he pushes himself back up and wanders back towards his bedroom.

“What you will do?” asks Anti.

Chase startles so hard he slams into the wall of the hallway, whirling around to look at him. Unnerved by his response, Anti scowls and backs away again.

“Sorry, did you just talk to me?” asks Chase. “It’s a dream, then? Or did you talk to me in real life? Or am I really losing it finally? I mean, worse than I have already.”

Anti grumbles to itself and gets up in the fan, making the blades spin slowly, sulking. Can’t even talk to the human without him freaking out.

“Must still be drunk,” mumbles Chase, retreating back to his room.

Anti gets up and follows him.

“What, are you worried?” snaps Chase, digging under the bed, and Anti grins at the heat he’s showing again. That’s more like it. “Haunt me for, what, eight months and now you’re worried? I know you’re there, asshole.”

Anti lets him hear it giggling. Chase rolls his eyes and then he gives a short laugh, shaking his head.

Anti feels pleased, it thinks. Chase turns to look at him. He can’t see him, but he knows it’s there. Anti likes that.

“You really are a monster,” says Chase softly, smiling at it.

And then Anti sees, in his hand, the little tin where he keeps his razor blades.

Anti’s mouth falls in a frown.

Chase looks up into the sunset. Orange and gold, tonight. Flowing over his hair and into his eyes, making them alight. Fire eyes. Fire Chase.

“I hated you for a long time,” says Chase. “But you’re either a monster or the part of my brain that really wants to hurt me, so I guess either way I shouldn’t blame you for being what you are.”

He stands up, straighter than he has in a long time, still fixated on that sunset.

“I… I’ll miss…”

Anti stares at him, waiting, but Chase never finishes his sentence. After a long moment, he turns and takes his phone off of his bed. A slow, shaky breath escapes him.

He always takes his calls between the hallway and the living room so he can pace. Anti knows. Anti knows everything about him. Anti knows things about him he doesn’t know about himself. Anti likes things about him he doesn’t like about himself.

The human steps into the hallway and opens his contacts, carefully picking a name he hasn’t picked in long months, and he closes his eyes, and he waits.

But no one answers. Chase lets out a soft, miserable laugh, gripping the phone in both hands.

“Ah, damn… ha. Sorry, Schneep, I was really hoping you’d pick up.”

He circles quietly in the hallway, running his hands through his hair, his eyes closed and that phone held up to his ear, trying to breathe even instead of weeping.

“Look, man, um. I know we fell apart. Honestly, I really needed you, and you were just too busy for me, and that stung, it did. Maybe it was selfish, but I just… I needed you, Schneep. And I felt like all you cared about was the research, and…”

He rubs his face, brushing away tears. Anti stands at the end of the hall, staring.

“Well, I didn’t call you to accuse you of anything. I just wanted you to know that, um, even though we both hurt each other… I always loved you, man. And I don’t got the courage to call Jacks or Marv, okay, but I love them too. I love them too. And I’m sorry. Cause I was a coward for running away from them, and… maybe you needed me even more than I needed you, and I couldn’t even see it. So I just want you to know: you were my best friend. And I’m really sorry I couldn’t pull you out of your head and that I couldn’t help, or didn’t try hard enough, or just that I wasn’t what you needed. And I…”

Anti sees Chase close his eyes and breathe.

“And I hope I’m not one more person you spend the rest of your life wishing you could have saved,” he whispers. “It’s not your fault, Henrik. I love you. Good night, buddy. Maybe someday – ”

The voicemail beeps. End of recording.

Chase lets out a hurting breath and sets his phone down. His eyes are fixed on the rising sunlit moon, past his window.

“Maybe someday I’ll see you again,” he says.

He goes into the bathroom and crawls into the tub.

And Anti – Anti is paralyzed in the hallway, staring at him, invisible.

But Chase can sense it. Chase can sense him. He looks back at him, his face – fuck, so familiar now, like Anti knows every line of it, every shadow – and says nothing.

Something in Anti cries out against it.

Don’t let him do this. Don’t let him do this.

But another part – oh, another part recognizes what has happened. It has grown attached to this human despite all odds, despite everything. And attachments are dangerous and stupid and useless, just like this little mortal curled up in his white bathtub, holding a razor, staring at it. This is Anti’s chance to let Chase break the attachment. This is its chance to stop this before it goes too far. Before it actually does decide that it likes Chase, that it wants him, that it should keep him, that he loves him in his own fucked-up way.

So it steps back.

It won’t stop Chase.

Let him go. Let him go. It’s better this way. He was just supposed to be entertainment. There was never supposed to be an attachment. So now Chase can die and Anti can leave and they can go their separate ways, and everything in Anti’s life will return to normal. It will go back to Ireland and find something new to do, someone new to torment. And everything will be okay.

It doesn’t stop Chase.

But Chase –

Chase –

“No,” he whispers to himself, gripping the blade. “Please.”

Chase can’t bring himself to do it.

“No!” he screams, lashing himself once, but it hurts and he hates it and he wants it to stop and it’s not like the other times he’s tried to kill himself, not at all. There’s no numbness. There’s no comfort.

He doesn’t want to die.

“Please!” he howls, gripping his own wrists. “Please!”

He’s begging himself. End it. Finish it. Stop it, let me go.

He’s begging the universe. No more. No more, please.

He’s begging Anti.

He’s begging Anti with everything he has.

He turns his eyes to it and he’s screaming, and there’s blood on his wrists, and the glowing moon is like the eye of a god staring down at them, and Anti is illuminated in its light, visible in the shape of a man, visible in a shape like Chase’s, and Chase is begging him –

“Don’t make me live like this any longer!”

Anti turns and flees.

Chase is howling like a shot dog, holding his own shoulders, unable to kill himself, because he doesn’t want to die, he doesn’t want to die, he doesn’t want Henrik to get that voicemail, he doesn’t want to never see the sun again, he doesn’t want to go, he isn’t ready, but he can’t live like this any longer, and he’s never felt more hopeless in his life, and he still doesn’t want to die, he doesn’t want to die, he doesn’t want to die.

Don’t make me live like this any longer.

Why can’t he end it?

He’s so drunk and so tired and he thought he wanted to die, he really thought he did. No, no, not… oh, he needs somebody, he needs something, he needs something to change. Henrik. He wants Henrik, wants Jackie, wants Marv. He’s staggering to his feet, trying to get up, trying to get back to his phone –

He slips in his Christmas socks and in his own blood, and he crashes down hard in his bathtub, and lies still.

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

“Oh, no, oh, fuck,” Anti hears him whimpering as he comes awake. “How much did I fucking have? Stupid, stupid…”

It stands in the hallway, pacing, its eyes set on the ground. It is determined now. It has decided.

“Oh, shit! Oh.” There’s a nervous laugh from Chase as he notices the shallow cut on his arm. “Oh, wow, I… I must have tried to… but I didn’t! I didn’t, wow…”

There’s an awe in his voice that hasn’t been there for a long time.

Is it… pride?

“I didn’t kill myself,” Anti hears him whispering. “I didn’t… didn’t kill myself. Or I just passed out before I could, but either way, pretty impressive for a fucking idiot like me.”

Anti retreats back to his room and begins to pack the human’s things up, taking only what’s immediately necessary. It doesn’t care about the personal effects, but there are some things they will need – some clothes, his hygiene products, shoes, medicine. He places the succulent gently on top and zips it into place as an added present.

It can hear Chase wandering around the house, apparently dazed by his own survival, or maybe just still drunk from the night before. Anti shuts his phone down remotely and doesn’t let it turn back on when Chase scrabbles at the power button, mumbling about his friends back in England. Anti doesn’t know where the sudden interest in them after months of deleting pictures and ignoring calls has come from, but it doesn’t care.

Here are the facts, in its mind:

Chase survived last night.

It has grown attached to him.

Because he did not kill himself, it can’t escape the fact that it’s grown… fond of the human.

The human survived one night, but Anti has watched him through a great deal of ups and downs, and it knows that Chase will be suicidal again soon enough, and then he might not survive.

Anti does not want to watch him die.

And so the conclusion it came to last night, watching over the boy as he lay in that tub, gently curling his hair between its fingers, was this –

Chase will be its, and Chase will not die.

It has a great satisfaction with this plan now, more than it thought possible. After months of boredom, finally, finally! Something that makes it excited again, something that makes it feel – well – happy!

Chase is still playing with his phone. Anti steps back into the hallway and sees him frowning down at it, pressing on the power button a few times in a row, looking unhappy.

“Did I call him, or…? Need to tell him I’m okay or he’ll – ahh!”

Chase screams aloud at the sight of Anti standing in the hallway with his backpack on. Anti frowns as he goes tumbling to the floor in his alarm, groaning from the whiplash in an already concussed head.

“You’re – you’re showing yourself to me?” gasps Chase, scrambling away. “What’s – are you going to kill me? What’s going on? Hey, stay away!”

But Anti is moving forward, a smile already on its face. This is perfect! This is perfect! It could howl! It could shout! The man is looking at it again, just like he did that night he tried to kill himself, the night that Anti saved his life, and there is the change in his eyes, the recognition, and Anti feels seen and known and in control all over again, and everything is good, everything is perfect.

“What are you doing?” demands Chase, his hands reaching out to protect himself. A fighter, yes, just like Anti always saw. Small and weak and mortal and foolish, yes, but also courageous, courageous, always something special about him. Anti always knew. It grabs Chase’s wrist and pulls him to his feet, humming to itself, singing the old lullaby it always used to haunt him with.

“No, stop, I hate that!” screams Chase, trying to cover his ears, trying to yank away from him. “Stop it, let me go!”

He’s such a pretty little human, even if he is built so scrawny. Anti likes his dark hair and his fire eyes and his soft stomach and even his stupid tattoos, just because they’re his and he’s so goofy, silly human creature. It’s all familiar to him now. The boredom that it thought it was feeling all this time it now sees was a secret fear of the truth that it was becoming attached to him. But last night woke it up to the realization that it did not want to see the boy die and it’s so pleased that he decided to live. In a way, the human was deciding to stay with it! Everything is good. It wrangles Chase’s other wrist and begins to drag him towards the door, unbothered by the sound of his shouting, which is little more than white noise to Anti after so long spent following Chase.

“No, no! Help me, someone help!” he cries.

Someone pounds on the walls of the apartment. A muffled “can you shut the fuck up for once in your life?” makes its way through the plaster. Chase sobs, tearing at Anti’s hands, his eyes wild and desperate. Anti keeps humming.

It will set him up somewhere just as good as this stupid little apartment. Better even. Bigger and less worn. And it will teach Chase to take better care of it too, so he doesn’t make such a mess like he always does. It will give him things he hasn’t even realized he wants yet. It will give him his little succulent back and he will take care of it. Humans need things to take care of or they get very sad and they die sometimes – that’s the thing about humans, they can get so sad they can die, and it’s no longer fun for Anti to watch, so it will get Chase things to take care of instead. What do humans like to take care of? Cows? Hamsters? Potatoes? Whatever he wants.

It takes Chase’s keys and drags him out to his car, opening the door and letting all of Chase’s trash litter onto the street. Its foot crunches on garbage as it pushes its human inside, chirping politely at him when he struggles and gently blocking him from escaping, keeping him pressed inside the car. When Chase tries to lunge forward past it, Anti shoves him against the glass and makes him yelp, clutching at its aching head. Whoops! It pulls back quickly and pats his cheek, checking the bruise and patting Chase’s head. It will take some time to learn the boundaries for touching the human, but it will learn. It keeps him carefully inside until the human has gone breathless and shaky and realizes he can’t get out right now. Satisfied, Anti gets into the car beside him and starts the engine.

Oh, no, wait. One more thing it wants to do.

Anti sets Chase’s apartment on fire, whistling its song to itself as it disables the alarms and leaves a few rags beginning to spread the fire from the oven to the counters. Fuck that landlord who yelled at him. Now the other humans will probably think he died in the fire or something and not come looking for him. Not that they could find him if they tried. Anti leaves the apartment smoking and gets back into the car, chirping and purring to itself, too excited to care that it’s acting like a youngling on its first Samhain.

The human stares at the road as they begin to move, shell-shocked and trembling. Eventually his eyes flicker over to Anti, and it can see that he isn’t sure if he should be angry or terrified or just numb to all of this, numb to everything.

Numb is what he settles on. Numb and a little weepy, anyway. Anti coos and reaches out to touch the human’s neck, rubbing warmly at his soft skin.

Chase curls in on himself, shirtless and shivering in the seat of his own car, kidnapped and alone, and he begins to cry very softly.

There’s blood on his arm. He’s tired. He’s hungover. He’s still struggling with the desire to die despite surviving the night before. He thinks he left Henrik a weird voicemail. The monster that’s been haunting him for years has just appeared in the flesh and thrown him out of his apartment. He doesn’t know what’s happening. He just wants everything to stop.

He just wants this to stop.

The monster repeats its cooing noise at his side, still petting at his neck and throat. Chase shudders and cries, rocking himself gently in the seat, wishing for his headphones. Anti turns on both the heat and the radio. A top-twenties station comes on and plays music familiar to Chase’s ears, and they drive, and they drive, and he begins to go quiet and still, sniffling to himself, hugging his shoulders. Feeling the monster petting him like an animal.

“Okay,” whispers a warbled voice when Chase has finally begun to calm down, and he looks up in shock to see the monster speaking, or trying to. He’d never known it to speak at all – only to watch him, and laugh, and whistle or hum, playing tricks on him or mimicking him in the corner of his vision. They’d never spoken.

“Okay,” it repeats, touching his hair. “Okay.”

Chase swallows and says nothing.

Anti pulls over after a couple hours of driving and hands Chase the backpack, helping him pull out the clothes and put shoes and a shirt on. It leads him inside a gas station and lets him use his bathroom and wash his face, staying beside him the whole time. Chase doesn’t try to protest or call for help. He does not know why.

Anti leads him carefully through the aisles of the gas station, a big truck stop station with rows and rows of snacks and toys and clothes and knick-knacks like phone charges for cars and California-themed snow-globes. It seems interested in everything, but in an amused way, like it’s laughing at everything, and Chase is supposed to be laughing with it.

He doesn’t know what to do. Anti’s arm is around his shoulder.

The monster buys something with Chase’s credit card while Chase shakes beneath his arm and tries to figure out what’s happening, though his brain seems to be shutting down from being so overwhelmed and he really just wants a drink. Anti pulls him back towards the car and this time, he clambers in without protest, sitting down in the passenger seat and buckling in.

Anti sits down beside him and offers him the bag from the gas station. Chase blinks and looks over, taking the bag numbly from its hands.

There are nuts for protein and three bottles of water. Chips and a breakfast sandwich and jerky and chocolate and a small, stuffed lion with the name “Lionel” in its ear.

Anti starts the car again. They drive.

“What are you?” asks Chase in a whisper.

The monster glances over at him and touches his face, stroking a finger down his cheek, down his beard, and, in that struggling, glitching, inhuman voice, it tells him:

“Anti. And you are mine. No more scares. No more slow dying. I look after you. Human. Chase. Mine.”

The monster who’s been haunting him for months wants to keep him as a pet.

The desert is rolling past Chase’s window. Lionel sits patiently on his lap. The radio plays something inane and catchy. Anti is touching his hand.

“Mine,” it says again. “Okay, Chase. It’s okay.”

Chase closes his eyes, and, leaning back against the headrest of the car, he lets himself drift into sleep.

[dragonrajafanfiction]

Yamata-No-Orochi (Part 2) Princess Tutu

Princess Tutu is a must watch if you haven’t seen it. It’s a bit after the MCs time though so she wouldn’t have been able to see it.

The throbbing bass from the speakers sync with the flashing lights of the dance club at Takamagahara. The crowd is thriving today. You can see glimpses of the masses of people in the pulsing of light. They appear like brief colorful snapshots on the floor below your center platform table.

The Romanceable MC contest continued despite the tragic death of Chance. The official narrative was that Chance died bravely defending you from street hooligans, which is horribly ironic, because that was something that you specifically told him not to do. Now Club Takamagahara was holding another Princess Night with the theme of Knights in Shining Armor. Men walked around like living walls of muscle wearing silver helmets, silver studded leather straps and bronze colored leather subligacula.

It was the exact opposite of what Chance’s life was. He was no knight. He would have been the first to admit that. He was on the underbelly of the world as a gang member, the lowest of his kind as an unstable hybrid and even then he lowered himself further, running sex dungeons for money to maintain the balance between his humanity and his raging dragonblood. And he still smiled and he still dreamed of a Hokkaido winter wedding.

Your chest constricts involuntarily.

“Are you going to be alright? You don’t have to be here.” A voice murmurs in your ear. Diamond is the only contender next to you. As a cowboy style performer, he has no need to dress up like a knight. Cowboys, like handsome knights, are just another font of masculine charm and marital fidelity. They work hard out on the lonely trails, wrangling sheep and cattle but they are true and come home to you, their sweet prairie wife. As sheriffs, they run out the outlaws in the town. “

You look up at him, his eyes are a welcome distraction. “You don’t have to be here either.”

He huffs. “Well, you can’t hurt too bad, if you come up with a sweet comeback like that.”

“Why are you here? Armani and Calypso have backed out.” Rumor had gone around that Chance's killing was related to an out of control fan who had fallen in love with you and had used his yakuza ties to put out a hit job and kidnap you. The other suitors didn’t mind losing a little dignity if it meant living another day.

“I used to work at Bliss Hall, also known as the Paradisio. I knew shady stuff went down. And when the gang war came there, I looked down the barrel of five guns while they interrogated me and patted me down. They determined I wasn't involved and let me go. So… if I was going to die of gang violence I probably would have already.”

“So why are you here?” You reach for the glass of champagne in front of you. Even though you were underage, you were already accustomed to the taste of drink and the smell of tobacco. Your high level of dragonblood didn’t let you get drunk easily as the men found out on your first day as the Main Character on this show. Chu Zihang checked the records on that night, and you had drunk two full bottles of vodka before you even felt the slightest bit tipsy.

He reached for his own glass. “I'm still a competitor. And I'm curious how Chance won three star-hearts in a single night. Is giving up your life the way to your heart? It’s a high price to pay and a lonely existence for you.”

Your mind flashes back to Renata and Chance. “I can see why you're second in the ranking. You dress much flashier than Kazama. But you’re no less of a sharpshooter.”

He presses his hand to his chest and bows.

“I don't need riches or beauty. So if you offer me those things, I'm not attracted. When I first came to Japan,  I didn't care about anything.  I felt my life was over. I was just trying to wait until the end and I wanted my life to end. But every time I reached for the end, there was a man who kept telling me no. I should not try to end my life and, even if it looked like my life was over, I shouldn't just take that conclusion at face value. His final lesson was I shouldn't just accept the inevitable death of others. It took a few times to accept those three lessons, but it was what I needed.”

“What happened to that guy? He sounds like a real keeper.”

You huff. “He was very happily engaged when we met.”

Chances eyebrows lifted. “I bet.”

“But I never forgot what he taught me. Chance helped me to speak those words from my own heart and my own experience. It's one thing to learn a lesson. When you teach that lesson to others, then you know it's part of your life. To see him listen to me and put what I learned into action because he loved me? How could my heart not overflow? Chance didn’t just accept his fate. He didn't just give up his life for me. He fought for us to be together. He… he wanted to live. I needed that in a person.” You run your hands over the empty glass in your hands imagining his smooth childlike face, so peaceful in the rain. “How many people are there out there who can look fate in the eye and say… ‘How about no?’”

Diamond reaches over with a champagne bottle and refills. “Oh You need someone who can rewrite the script! Like in Princess Tutu.”

You blink. “I’m sorry, did you just say ‘Princess Tutu’?”

“Oh come on, don't tell me you've never heard of Princess Tutu. It's just the best anime ever!”

You’re speechless. It was like this suave handsome Ikemen had suddenly turned into Lu Mingfei. “No, please fill me in.”

“Okay, hear me out. Once there was a writer named Drosselmeyer, who had the power to make his stories come to life. He especially loved to write stories with tragic endings! But he died before he could finish his final tale, called The Prince and the Raven, leaving the two title characters locked in an eternal battle.”

“After many years, the Raven managed to break free into the real world, and the Prince pursued him. To seal away the Raven's evil, the Prince shattered his own heart with his sword, causing him to lose all his memories and emotions. Without his emotions, he is reborn as Mytho.”

“Drosselmeyer, now a ghost, decides the story must have an ending. He finds it in the form of a little duck, who has fallen in love with Mytho. He gives her a magic pendant that can transform her, first into an ordinary human girl, then into the graceful ballerina Princess Tutu, another character in the story. As Tutu, it's Duck's job to find all the scattered shards of Mytho's heart and return them to him.”

“What's more, Duck learns that part of Princess Tutu's story is that she can never confess her love to Mytho, or else she'll turn into a speck of light and vanish. However, it becomes clear that Mytho wants his heart restored, so despite interference, she persists. She finds a friend in Fakir, a man who is the son of Drosselmeyer who also has the ability to bring his stories to life.”

“After most of Mytho's heart is returned to him, the seal trapping the Raven begins to break. Finally able to feel love again, Mytho realizes he loves Rue, another character – not Duck. Duck also discovers her pendant is the final shard, meaning she must give up her life as a human to return it. She eventually finds the courage to do so, and becomes a humble duck again.”

“Mytho and the Raven battle once more. When the fight turns bleak, Mytho considers shattering his heart to seal the monster away again. Duck begins dancing to show him he must not give up. As she does, this guy named Fakir writes a story about how she never stops, no matter how many times the Raven's minions attack her. They make that story a reality! This gives Mytho hope, which gives Mytho the strength he needs to rescue Rue and defeat the Raven. Mytho asks Rue to be his princess and they return to his kingdom inside the story. Duck and Fakir continue their relationship, even though she's stuck in her duck form. With nothing left to do, Drosselmeyer departs in search of another story.”

“The point is, you're Duck and you need someone like Fakir who can defeat Drosselmeyer by rewriting the script!”

When thinking about a ghost behind the scenes writing a script, it was clear who the Drosselmeyer in your life was. Z had rescued you and taught you to fight so your life could continue even though you didn’t really understand why. You were just like a duck receiving the pendant. But Z also had plans for you. He'd also forbidden you from confessing her love to Ruri Kazama before you even had feelings for him, only for you to meet him and suddenly he’s a potential contender for your heart with a clear connection with your past?

Z had a script.  And falling in love with Ruri Kazama didn't fit. Why was your love interest so important? Who are you supposed to fall in love with? Caesar asked that in a roundabout way. Why did the person you fell in love with matter to him, if he wasn't your boyfriend?

Chance said that Izanami loved Izanagi on a whim, as a hobby, while she used him to help her live forever.  She loved him and turned him into a monster. She needed him, and consumed him.

Z appeared and kissed you after you entered the MC contest. “I want to get to you before those idiots.” He’d said.

He entered the competition only after you nearly gave a star heart to Ruri Kazama. “I know how the story ends.” He’d said. 

Pursuing Ruri Kazama or anyone else would defeat his script! Whatever script Z wrote required that you love no one but him. 

Your hands tighten on the wine glass and Diamond massages your back. It's not that you had no feelings for Z at all, but Z was acting like Izanami, hiding his true intentions while making overtures of affection.  There's only one way to be sure you weren't going to end up a duck or a monster at the end. Force a confession out of Z!

You look up at Diamond. “Thank you.” Your eyes are sparking with something like anger. You felt fierce and wild inside realizing that you’d been led along by this stranger, assuming that ‘keeping you alive’ was good enough of a good ending to your story. But Izanagi was ‘kept’ alive… as a sacrifice to the White King. Until you understood Z’s intention, there was no telling where he was leading you.

You stand up and lightly tap your glass. The host of the Takamagahara lowered the music and all faces turned to your center platform. “I would like to thank you for coming out tonight. I’ll let you get back to your dancing in a moment, but first I would like to award 3 star hearts to Diamond, for opening my eyes to the truth tonight.”

You spoke looking down on your audience like royalty. Standing in your sparkling silver cheongsam, you looked like royalty. Diamond’s eyes opened wide and he hastily swallowed his Champagne before he could choke on it. He had been kicking himself for speaking so foolishly to this woman. She’d fallen into a deep silence and he figured he’d just killed all his chances of a win. But she liked it!

“And I would like to announce the winner of the MC Romance contest. He knows who he is. He has a deep connection to my past, and I would like to explore that connection further. If you’re listening.”

You raise your eyes to the cameras that broadcast your face to hundreds of screens around Takamagahara. Spectators pushed each other to get a good view and the loud hall descended into a deep silence.

You didn’t remember the tune, but you would always remember the words and you speak them, closing your eyes and placing your hands on your heart. “All happiness may be a fleeting blossom in the shadow of the moon, but I am in that shadow waiting for you in a field of those flowers. Won’t you join me? Together we will dance in the depths of Yomi!”

The hairs rise on the necks of every patron of the Takamagahara. Eyebrows knitted in confusion, hushed puzzled whispers were uttered involuntarily. Your words sounded nothing like a love confession, more like a forbidden incantation written in secret by a practitioner of black magic!

The flashing lights suddenly go dark, every large display screen clicks off in a successive wave. You turn around in horror as those screens replace your face with the words “GAME OVER” in bright burning red text!

The words were on every screen in the room. Your eyes scan the room and immediately spot Caesar moving towards you on the left. You quickly descend from the platform and hurry to him. He covers you, sweeping over you with one arm. “Get downstairs. Now!” 

His eyes meet with someone else's, likely Chu Zihang’s. “Don’t take the elevators, he can probably control those. We’ll take the stairwell.” He said.

You enter the beige corridor of the stairwell. It’s also pitch black. Not even the emergency lights are on. The basement is only one flight down and you can see to the bottom. A lone shadowy figure staring up at you with furious red gold eyes. You leap back and try to pull Caesar out, back to the crowd. “No! Caesar! Run!”

Caesar’s eyes blaze gold and he levels the Desert Eagles in the direction where you’re fearfully looking, but then he lowers them. He didn't hear anything, or see anything.

“Don’t! Don’t hurt him!” You beg.

“Z’s here?”

You gasp. “Yes. He’s mad.”

“Then we can talk?”

Your eyes swivel to and fro from Caesar’s eyes to Z’s eyes which apparently only you can see. Caesar still held his Desert Eagles but there was no fear there. “Yes.”

“Alright… Z. You’re running Takamagahara. The MC love contest was your idea right? What are your plans for MC?” Caesar asks. “I get the feeling you don’t have her best interests at heart.”

Z chuckles from the bottom of the well. “This conversation will have to wait. I’m a bit busy with another client.”

You’re shaking so much you hold on to Caesar’s arm to just keep yourself upright. “He’s gone.”

“What did he say?”

“He said he’s busy with another client.”

The door opens, scaring you both. Chu blinks at both of you in the dark stairwell but then he looks at Caesar and holds his questions. “We’ve got a problem. The Uesugi girl and Lu Mingfei have run into trouble. The whole area around the Robuchon restaurant is blocked off and it’s complete chaos. We’ve got to find Lu Mingfei and make sure he’s alright.”

Caesar gathers his arm around you and together you leave the stairwell. “MC, come with us. I don't want you and that Uesugi girl to meet, but until I figure out what Z is… I don’t think you should be alone.”