#imagine. not only do the boys carry this aching feeling of loneliness and emptiness with them everyday

[clowningaroundmars]

i keep thinking about how in 1610 miles was p much haunted and followed by the number 42 (thanks to that one tumblr post, yknow the one) after his spider bite.

the bus seating capacity, the numbers that fell off into the streets after miles crashed into them, all those tiny lil details that followed him throughout his journey to becoming Spiderman

and i also wonder if miles42 was also haunted by numbers like 1610. maybe his neighbor down the block's address is 1610. maybe the dorm room capacity at visions is 161. maybe he always gets up at 6:10 am to get ready for the day....

anyways

*breaks down crying*

[navegandoaciegas]

California Bound.

Pairing: Bucky x fem!Reader

Warnings: smut, yandere, homeless!bucky, stalking, home intrusion, obsession, loneliness, sad!bucky, disturbing thoughts, dubcon? This is a dark fic.

Words: 4k

Summary: You’re so lonely and isolate in this city that if you died your neighbours wouldn’t even notice, your colleagues wouldn’t care and your boss would probably be pissed that you didn’t put in your two weeks notice before you went to hell. Bucky is tired of being alone and invisible and he knows you are too. He knows you can mend each other's’ hearts. 

A/N: set after CA:TWS. I’m not a native speaker so forgive me for any mistakes. Please let me know what you think and like and reblog if you liked it :) feedback is always appreciated!

In the unstable state of his scattered mind he can vividly recall a woman in a red dress. 

Some memories are long gone, some are fragmented, and although the lines of her face have been blurred by the passing of time and decades of electrocution, her plump red lips are permanently burned in the back of his brain.

When he closes his eyes, sometimes, he can still see her smile. 

Only she’s not smiling at him.

She’s smiling at Steve, his brother, his friend, his mission. 

Not even seventy years of brainwashing and torture could get rid of the sadness that filled him when she walked past and ignored him as if he wasn’t there, as if nothing else in that room existed except for Steve.

In his memory she doesn’t see him, and nobody has since. 

Perhaps it’s in that moment that he became no one, in that moment he was condemned to an existence of pain, loneliness and invisibility.

He’s a ghost that haunts the dirty streets of Philadelphia, crouched behind the dumpsters of dark alleys, begging the ones who sneer at him for spare change in train stations, lurking in the shadows to pickpocket the rich passerbys of the city.

  The hormone suppressants HYDRA forced on him are wearing off.

He can feel himself slipping, his most primal instincts violently surging back after 70 years of being repressed. His brain goes haywire when he catches sight of a pair of legs clad in a short skirt, the blood draining from his brain and travelling straight to his cock, and he wills himself to restrain his urges.

Modern women are so pretty, and they wear so little clothes. They don’t see him, of course, but he sees them. 

He sees those tight little dresses, those high heels, those long lashes and bright lips.

In another life he could have been like one of the rich boys he often spots outside of clubs, well dressed and well groomed, and maybe those pretty girls would have fawned over him too.

But not in this life.

In this life he’s been alone for 70 years, and his loneliness consumes him so intensely that some nights, when the cold is unbearable and the streets are empty, he wishes he hadn’t been born at all.

In this life he doesn’t shower and shave for weeks on end, and his hair is so greasy and matted that even if he wasn’t in hiding he’d have to wear a baseball cap anyways. When he looks at himself in the mirror he barely recognizes the handsome soldier in a blue uniform he saw at the Smithsonian. The man who stares back at him in the mirrors of soiled public restrooms has deep frown lines on his forehead, dark circles under dull eyes and a patch of white hair on his beard. Only the startling blue of his eyes has stood the test of time.

Those pretty girls wouldn’t spare him a second glance.

 He’s tired of the loneliness that plagues him. He just wishes to be seen.

He wants someone to look at him, really look at him, in anything other that pity or disgust. He wants someone who could hold him at night and take care of his battered soul.

He wants a companion to spend his time with, someone he could talk to; when was the last time he uttered a single word? When was the last time someone touched him tenderly?

You’d think after all he’s been through that being alone would be a walk in the park in comparison, but the emptiness that eats him alive is the most unbearable torture he’s ever been subjected to. It took HYDRA 20 years to break him, it only took the loneliness a couple of months.

  He just wants someone.

Someone who sees him.

And you do. You see him.

 He’s hunched over in a recess in the wall of an alley, violently shaking. The ground beneath him is frozen, the strong winds are like a slap in the face and the heavy-duty winter jacket he was able to steal isn’t doing much to protect him from the harsh weather. Maybe he won’t survive tonight, he almost dares to hope.

He’s still crying when he spots a pair of crisp white sneakers coming his way, and he looks up. He’s seen you around a couple of times, you’re one of the pretty girls who short circuit his brain.

You’re wearing a bright yellow winter jacket and black jeans. You look young, but he can’t tell how young. People nowadays age different than they used to back then. You’re probably way younger than him, although he has no idea exactly how old he is; he was 27 when he went to war, how much has he aged? How young is too young for a man with no age?

The light of the lamps behind you diffuses a soft halo around your body. You shine on your own light, brighter than the sun; you’re an angel so beautiful, so perfect that he doesn’t know if you’re a figment of his imagination.

You crouch down and hand him a bunch of blankets and a warm cup of something, maybe tea? When he grabs it his fingers brush against yours and it sends a jolt of electricity down his spine. He expects you to grimace in disgust at his touch, but you don’t. You smile.

You smile at him.

Suddenly he doesn’t feel the cold anymore, he only feels the warm tingling in his stomach. 

He smiles back, or at least he tries. He hasn’t smiled since World War II, as Nazis didn’t give him a lot of reasons to, to be honest. 

And just like you appeared, you’re gone in a heartbeat.

But he can’t simply let you go like that, so he resolves to summon back the Asset’s stealth and gets up to follow you.

That night when he closes his eyes the smile he sees belongs to you.

-

   They say even your worst day only lasts 24 hours; too bad your worst day has become your worst year so far.

They also say when you reach rock bottom the only way to go is up. They lied about that too.

Somehow today you’ve been scraping the bottom of the pit you’re in and have dug yourself even deeper than the lowest you could get.

You want to say your day can’t get any worse than this, but you know there’s always room for worsening.

The feeble March sun shines through the clouds and you’re dreading the flight of stairs that awaits you since your landlord categorically refuses to have the lift fixed. By the time you get to your door you’re exhausted and can’t wait to shower the day away and lounge on your couch.

 You open up the door to your apartment and get inside in a rush, only to stop dead in your tracks when you notice something is off about your home. There’s an eerie stillness about the open space, and maybe you’re going crazy but it seems like some of your things are not where you’d left them.

Apparently you just unlocked a lowest level to rock bottom.

It takes you a couple of seconds to register it, but when you do the hair on the back of your neck stand up and your brain screams danger at you.

There’s a smell inside that is not yours. It’s the strong, manly smell of sweat, and it wouldn’t be entirely unpleasant if it weren't for the fact that you live alone and don’t usually have men over.

 You never think it’s going to happen to you until it does.

You took self defense in college, you carry pepper spray with you, you always thought if you were in danger you’d be able to defend yourself, or at least bolt away.

They never tell you that fear is paralyzing. They don’t tell that the anticipation of pain roots you on the spot, that your legs feel like they’re made of lead and all you can do is wait for the impact to come. They don’t tell you that the dread that chills the blood in your veins can break the most primal of mechanisms humans have, and the fight or flight response you were counting on to save you abandons you too

When it happens, you don’t even hear it coming; there’s a prickle at the base of your neck and, before you descend into the darkness, two arms envelope you, and you feel the ghost of a kiss on your shoulder.

-

  You try to peel your eyes open when a hand delicately caresses your cheek and lingers on your lips. Your eyelids are heavy, your head is pounding like you’re having the worst hangover in you life and your whole body is aching. You want to speak, you want to shake that hand away, but you are unmoving. 

It reminds you of the medicine induced hallucination you used to have, which were an inconvenient side effect of the same prescription drugs that were supposed to help you sleep. It feels like a sleep paralysis, minus the demon sitting on your stomach. 

-

 You’re slipping in and out of consciousness when you hear it. There’s a voice speaking.

You suppose whoever it belongs to is talking to you. You strain your ears and will yourself to concentrate real hard, despite your brain pulsing in your skull and threatening to burst out.

The voice definitely belongs to a man, and whoever he is, he sounds very soft spoken and polite. Too bad he broke into your house and drugged you.

“So pretty, so perfect for me.”

“We won’t ever be lonely anymore, I promise you that.”

“...cleaned up real good for you...”

“...can’t wait for you to wake up.”

It’s all you can make out in your drowsy state. He peppers your forehead and the crown of your head with soft kisses. There’s two strong arms holding you. You fall back asleep.

-

  The sun shines brightly through the curtains of your bedroom and you want to flip the universe off for lining up the morning rays directly onto your face, and yourself for forgetting to draw the blinds.

You almost cuss yourself out for being yet again late for work when the events of the previous evening rush back to you. You wake with a jolt and you feel terror enveloping you when you see him. 

Fear grips your throat and you want to scream, you want to thrash about and punch him, and yet all you can do is look at him with wide eyes.

You feel your chest heaving but it’s almost like it doesn’t belong to you, it’s not happening to you, it can’t; you breathe but the air won’t reach your lungs. 

The man detects your distress and sits next to you. He carefully reaches for your hand and places on his chest, over his heart.

You are immobile.

You hate yourself for it. You wish you could do something about this but your stupid brain refuses to cooperate.

“Calm down baby, I’m not here to hurt you.” says the guy who gave you morphine. “Concentrate on my breathing, ‘kay? Inhale, hold your breath- good, now exhale, and again.”

He guides you through a breathing exercise that suggests you it may not be the first time he’s had to calm himself or others from an almost panic attack. The steady beat of his heart calms you down.

“Don’t cry, please.” he pleads with you.

You’re back at it again with the inappropriate thoughts for someone who’s been kidnapped and might get killed in the next few minutes, but you can’t not think how handsome your captor is.

He’s got dark hair gathered up in an elastic at the nape of his neck. His jawline is sharp and his cheekbones high. His eyes are the bluest you’ve ever seen, his lips look soft and pink and his nose is small and cute for a man so chiselled and intimidating.

“I promise I won’t hurt you.” he tells you, and smiles almost shyly at you.

There’s a look on his face that should reassure you, because it means that you won’t die today, but it can only mean you’re doomed to something maybe worse than death. 

His expression is tender, like you’re the most precious thing in the world. He seems so affectionate, so loving, that for a moment you wish this was real, you wish your former partners would have looked at you so devotedly.

He takes your hand in his again and traces soothing pattern with his thumb. 

Finally you seem to snap back to reality.

“Who are you?” You manage to squeak out. Your throat is on fire, and you’re grateful for the water bottle he hands over to you.

He frowns and seems to think about it until he manages to mumble a “My name is Bucky.”

He hesitates over his name like it doesn’t really belong to him.

You’re puzzled as to why you’re so calm. You’ve never been a feisty one, that’s true; you spent your life conforming to rules, you always complied to orders because you like to be praised and you hate to disappoint. As a child you feared punishments, being grounded, the look of dissatisfaction on your parents’ faces more than anything else in the world.

But you never imagined you’d be striking a conversation with the intruder in your house like it was an everyday occurrence. 

It only takes a look to understand that you can’t outrun the guy, nor overpower him. He’s built like a bulldozer and his biceps are bigger than you. He said he wouldn’t hurt you, and as absurd as it sounds you believe him, but it doesn’t mean you’d come out unscathered if you tried to fight him.

Maybe you could outsmart him? Comply until he trusts you and then take off?

“I’ve been watching you.”  Oh shit . “You saved my life.”

You can’t stop the remark from escaping your lips. “A thank you would have sufficed, you know, no need to kidnap me and all.” 

You weren’t feisty, sure, but that didn’t mean you weren’t a snarky bitch.

The guy chuckles, and it seems like his own amusement surprises you both alike.

“Two months ago, back in January. I was freezing to death. You came and gave me blankets and tea. It warmed me enough to survive the night. I knew back then you were perfect.”

Oh, God . The one time you decided to be a good citizen and gave the blankets you hogged in your cubicle at work to the homeless guy that was always crouched in the back alley of your office building, then one you’d see when you sneaked out the back to smoke on company time.

You almost don’t recognize him. 

“You’re just like me in a way. I saw you so sad all this time, you hate your job, you’re always alone. I saw you cry because you feel so lonely. I know that it feels like. I’ve been alone for so long.” He whispers the last part softly, and your heart clenches because it’s true, you’re so damn lonely, but you can recognize the loneliness in his eyes too. He cradles your face in his hands. “But I promise you won’t be alone anymore. You got me now.”

“I don’t know- I-I don’t even know you. Please just let me go, I promise I won’t tell anyone. Please don’t hurt me.” You start to plead with him and your words get swallowed by the sobs that shake you. Your heartbeat picks up again. 

You know fear now, the real one, but it pales in comparison of the one you feel when the implication of his words starts to sink in.

He just smiles at you. 

“What do you want?” you manage to whisper.

“You. We’re going to be happy I promise. I read the notes on your phone where you wrote you wanted to travel, remember that?” You nod weakly, recalling the depressive entry about how stuck your boring life is and the bucket list of all the places you’d want to visit.

“We’re going to travel, I’ll take you wherever you want. Just don’t leave me please, be with me.”

You almost ask with what money since you’re homeless my guy, but then a thought strikes you.

You won’t miss your boring life the moment it will slip away from you; you won’t miss being stuck alone in a city you despise doing a job you hate. You won’t miss the homesickness. You won’t miss berating yourself for accepting a job immediately post grad in a city on the other side of America, just because you were scared of being left behind, of being that one person who ends up with no job after college and has to move back to their parents house.

Maybe, had you stayed in your hometown, or accepted that other position in Austin, maybe this shit wouldn’t have happened to you. You’ll never know.

He pulls you into a hug and you’re so startled your crying subsizes. 

He shushes you and coos you while rocking you in his arms. “It’s okay baby, I promise you’re going to like it, you don’t have to worry about a thing, I got it all sorted out for you.”

You’re shocked.

He pushes you down on the bed and as your mind elaborates the worst case scenario possible and as you’re on the verge of another panic attack, he simply envelops you in his arms and puts his head on your chest. 

You’re stunned again.

Almost on instinct you wrap your own smaller arms around his shoulders and he sighs contentedly. You’re so touch starved and desperate for affection that even hugging your stalkers feels kinda nice.

You haven’t touched anyone and no one has touched you in such fondness in almost a year. Hook-ups don’t count. 

You’re so lonely and isolate in this city that if you died your neighbours wouldn’t even notice, your colleagues wouldn’t care and your boss would probably be pissed that you didn’t put in your two weeks notice before you went to hell.

 Lost in thought you only notice he’s about to kiss you when it’s too late.

At first he hesitantly pecks your lips, and then he’s trying to pry your mouth open with his tongue. You don’t know what possesses you to do it but you part your lips.

He’s uncertain on how to move around, like he doesn’t know how to kiss or he’s forgetten how, he has absolutely no idea where to put his hands, and it’s honestly kind of awkward.

You imagine this is what it’s like to kiss a middle schooler.

He pulls away and blushes. “Sorry, it’s been a while.”

You’re stunned yet again.

He’s not apologizing for stalking you, breaking in and drugging you, but because he’s a bad kisser?

He slants his mouth against yours again, this time more forcefully than before. And after almost choking you when he pushes his tongue so deep it would have reached your tonsils hadn’t you had them removed, he seems to get the gist of it, or maybe the muscle memory kicks back in, because even if you won’t admit it to yourself, it feels nice.

You feel sick and twisted but it’s good to have someone desire you, touch you so tenderly, kiss you so passionately. The guys you use to entertain yourself in your solitude never kiss you while they fuck you into oblivion. You forgot how comforting the weight of a warm body on yours is.

You don’t push him away until you feel your t-shirt rip.

His hands explore your body ignoring your pleads to stop.

He’s nowhere and everywhere all at once. One hand squeezes your ass and the other kneads your breasts while he leaves open mouthed, hungry kisses down your throat, until he reaches the soft skin between your neck and clavicles and starts sucking in like a man possessed. You automatically jerk forward and buckle your hips until they touch his and he lets out a groan that travels straight to your already dripping core. 

You hate yourself for it, but you’ve never been this aroused.

You hate yourself for giving in so effortlessly, for being so damn weak, so damn lonely.

It’s mortifying how easy you’re making this for him. 

Your mind tries to will your body to push him from you, but instead of shoving him away your hands grab his shoulder and pull him closer.

You hate yourself because when he dips his hand in your soaked panties as he suckles on your nipple, your body doesn’t even try to protect you. 

You’re at his mercy as he pushes his long fingers through your folds and smears your arousal around, before dipping them inside.

“All this for me, pretty girl?” 

Cocky bastard.

He moans in your mouth as he grinds his hips on your leg and you feel the extent of his manhood. 

“So pretty, so perfect, so good for me.”

It shouldn’t feel this good, but again you’ve been a slut for praise since you came out the womb. You moan and whine in pleasure and he’s clearly very proud of himself for being the one who elicits these sounds from you. His thumb finds your bud and massages it, sending jolts of unadulterated pleasure down your spine.

You’re trembling under his touch. Your legs are shaking, toes curling, and you can’t stop yourself from moaning louder what you ever have. You can feel the familiar tightness in your core that precedes an orgasm, but you need more.

“Please Bucky, please. Faster.” you whine, ashamed of yourself for pleading like that. 

You’re so lost in your own pleasure you don’t notice the look of hunger that crosses Bucky’s face at the mention of his name. He never thought he’d be able to give you so much, he never knew his hand could bring anything other than pain and destruction, but his name sounds so sweet on your tongue.

“Cum pretty girl, cum all over my fingers for me, I know you can.”

And you do. You cum so hard your vision goes black for a second as you lose yourself to the pleasure that travels from your core to the rest of your body.

You’re floating, so dazed that you barely notice he’s undressed you and taken off his pants. When you feel something prod at your entrance, you look down in horror only to find him already lined up with you.

He’s got the prettiest cock you’ve ever seen, and it’s so big, so thick you’re scared he’s going to rip you apart. He doesn’t give you time to react before he’s slamming inside of you.

The scream that rips out of you is animalistic, and he stills.

“God you’re so tight, clamping down on me.” He grunts in you ear as he sets a slow pace.

The pain soon subsides and gives place to more pleasure than you’ve ever felt in your life. He picks up the pace when you stretch around his girth painlessly, and rolls his hips around.

“So good for me.”

“Mine, only mine.”

“My good girl.”

“Taking me so well.”

“Gonna fill you up so good.”

“Fuck, you feel incredible.”

Your pussy clamps down on his cock with each praise he grunts in your ear. You’re so overstimulated and he’s so vocal that you feel like you’re about to burst when you cum again and again for what feels like an eternity, before his movements become sloppier and messier.

You cum once more when he swells inside of you, and you feel the tell-tale sensation of fullness when he fills you up with his cum.

He collapses on you, panting. 

You’re both satisfied and spent.

He kisses you once more, on your lips, and it’s so sweet and tender that you almost cry because you know deep down you couldn’t take one more day of solitude.

His voice is deep and hoarse when he speaks again.

“How ‘bout we start with California?”

[milfnearyou]

                 𝐤𝐢𝐦 𝐣𝐨𝐧𝐠𝐢𝐧: 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐞 𝐚𝐬 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐚𝐫𝐞.

      “𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐩𝐡𝐲𝐬𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥 𝐞𝐦𝐛𝐨𝐝𝐢𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐨𝐟 𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐢𝐧𝐧𝐞𝐫 𝐝𝐞𝐦𝐨𝐧𝐬, 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐨𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐫 𝐡𝐢𝐦.”

𝐖𝐎𝐑𝐃 𝐂𝐎𝐔𝐍𝐓: 𝟑.𝟐𝐊 | 𝐓𝐄𝐀𝐒𝐄𝐑 | 𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐏𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝟏

𝐊𝐈𝐌 𝐉𝐎𝐍𝐆𝐈𝐍 𝐗 𝐅𝐄𝐌!𝐑𝐄𝐀𝐃𝐄𝐑 𝐗 (𝐗-𝐄𝐗𝐎 𝐊𝐀𝐈)

𝐖𝐀𝐑𝐍𝐈𝐍𝐆𝐒: KIDNAPPING. TORTURE. PTSD. TRAUMA. WHIPPING. HARASSMENT. NO SMUT IN THIS CHAPTER. MENTIONS OF PSYCHOLOGICAL ELEMENTS. LIGHT TALK OF PERSONALITY DISORDERS AND SCHIZOPHRENIA WILL BE DELVING INTO MORE DETAILS ON THE NEXT CHAPTER.

I ALSO DECIDED TO MAKE THIS A SERIES TO PREVENT MAKING THE WHOLE THING REALLY LONG ON ONE POST SINCE TUMBLR GLITCHES A LOT BUT ALSO FOR PEOPLE WHO CAN’T FOCUS ON VERY LONG FICS :)

VIEWER DISCRETION IS ADVISED.

To say that you were hurting would be an understatement.

Everything and anything served as an infernal memory. Whether it be an object or something as simple as the weather, the effect it had could potentially be triggering for you. This new way of life felt more like a slow, painful process in which you were dying.

Overwhelming, things were now always overwhelming. Your anxiety shooting through the roof, the small person inside of you crumbling away into nothing as you screamed at the top of your lungs only to never be heard.

Your life felt orchestrated, the strings and rhythms conducted by no one else but Lucifer himself. With your pain, he created a symphony for a play, one that was to be forever engrained within your mind, body and soul.

It felt surreal, a simulation with you as its subject and yet, it was in every way authentic. None of it was a figment of your imagination, it wasn't just a bad dream but it was your reality. The scars that littered your body like a tormented and abused piece of canvas served as proof that it had all happened.

Your body ached, countless spikes of excruciating pains rushing through your many vessels and arteries, the nerves on your body were almost always on edge. It was difficult to hold onto reality, the point of returning being so far away that the thought of just letting go, would be a much quicker and simple solution. After all, you were halfway to insanity and the thought of being sane no longer remained a possibility.

It didn’t stop there. Your biggest enemy was your mind. The cursed piece of soft tissue that sat right in the middle of your enclosed skull was the one thing quickest to abandon you, betraying you within a blink of an eye and letting your body act on its own. It was impossible to control your thoughts when you almost always gravitating towards self-destruction.

Day and night, your mind screamed at you, unleashing a cacophony of howling, piercing screams that made your head ring. Blaring on and on, it had no limit. Going as far as venturing into your dreams late at night, filling your only moment of peace with countless nightmares. It was driving you mad. Always pushing you to constantly fight with yourself. You tried your best to ignore the urges but it seemed impossible.

Loudly, you'd scream into the emptiness of your surroundings telling yourself to shut up, to make it stop. Occasionally going as far as becoming physical, slapping the palms of your hands against your temple in attempts to strike yourself awake or hitting your head against a flat surface in attempts to knock the thoughts out. 

But there was no chance to wake up. You were long gone. Stuck in a deep slumber that caused your physical state to act like a zombie. Almost as if your frontal lobe had shut down. Everything occurring in a rather monotone way. Laced with a sudden breakdown that hit you every other day, exploding with fear and anger. The effects of your past trauma reminding you that you still had feelings within, that you had emotions but that they were no longer positive. The negativity overflowed within you and was always ready to burst.

You saw people, individuals who claimed they could help. Medically known as psychiatrists but in your opinion, middle-aged women who seemed lonelier than you were. Portraits of Persian cats hung all over their workrooms, the scowls plastered on the faces of the felines were ones also visible on the psychiatrists themselves.

They always said it was the voices, emerging from your previously traumatic experience. Well no shit, of course, you knew that. It was a no brainer that there were voices in your head, you had diagnosed yourself of having un-welcomed people inside your mind a long time ago. 

However, unbeknownst to the therapists themselves you also knew that they'd been planted into your mind from god knows how long ago. They simply waited for something to set them free, triggering the alarm and giving them proper cause to make you lose your mind.

All they needed was freedom and they were granted access to that with the help of a certain someone. A man who shared the same looks, name and identity as someone you grew close with, someone you developed feelings for. A man you fell in love with that had a terrible secret. It was hard to determine what exactly his secret was until you came face to face with it yourself. And when you did, you wanted out. Pandora's box had been opened and yet, it wasn't even your fault that it had.

You simply had to face the consequences of falling in love with someone who had a duplicate. Was it a clone? Or was it a twin? It was hard to say because he seemed to be from another world, a different planet even but in reality, he was conceived by the hands of a twisted mind. Fabricated inside a laboratory, only to be sent out many years later to wreak havoc upon your life.

And one dreaded night, he arrived. Snatching you away and hiding you for what added up to be weeks of torture. A show in which you were the leading role, the subject to many horrendous acts that one could never imagine. Acts that he always said were done because he “loved” you.

“You know I love you?” He’d say, all while his nimble fingers danced along the grains of your skin. Brushing up and down your arm as the fear raced through your veins. Your blood running cold, the hairs on your neck standing upwards. Your body was all too familiar with reacting with terror.

A few painfully quiet moments would pass, the sound of water dripping from the faucet, filtering into your conversation until he’d clear his throat. Leaning in forwards and resting his lips just above your left ear, his hot breath burning against your skin as you feel yourself holding in your breath.

“Silence isn’t an option, you either speak or be spoken for,” He warns and you nod rapidly in response. You knew the protocol and you knew exactly what it meant when he said that.

“Do you love me like I love you?” He asks. Circling from your back as he stands in front of you, using his calloused hand to hold your face upwards. Cupping your chin, his touch is moderately tender but you know that with one wrong move, everything could change.

“Define love,” You respond, not wanting to give him the direct answer he wanted. It would feed his ego all too much if you were to be so direct and yet, secretly he enjoyed you defying him. He loved how you didn't give in so quickly, it allowed him the chance to get physical and boy, did he love to get physical.

“Define love? I— obviously, don’t understand the concept of love as much as I'd like to admit. But when I look at you, the sickening feeling that emerges within me makes me think that yes, this is love. It’s everything that suppresses inside my chest, threatening to explode at any given moment. The oxygen that carries through my blood, that fuels the life inside me is filled with the thought of you. Love is, being alive and there’s nothing else except for you that makes me feel more alive.”

You fall silent at his response. Simply because none of it made sense, a cluster of babbled words falling out of his mouth as you stare at him watching as his expression slowly falls apart. The look of love is no longer there, replaced with infatuation, obsession and anger. He acted as if he’d known you for an eternity, professing his delusional love as if it mattered. As if you’d have a change of heart and drop everything within a blink of an eye just for him.

“...You must also understand that I love you because I can’t let him be the only person who loves you too,” He adds, “So do you love me like I love you? It’s only fair you do.”

“Love is a blessing in life. Something that isn’t forced upon, a concept in which— it may hold the key to your life in its hands but cannot be obtained without the honest feelings of another. It takes two to tango, not one, but two." 

Momentarily pausing, you swallow the lump inside your throat, pushing it downwards. Allowing the newly found courage inside your body to come forward, "...And I'm afraid I can’t dance with you.” 

Your rejection is something that hits him hard. Time seems to stop as the fleshy look on his face drops, the expression in his eyes have been replaced with a newfound fury. But it quickly wipes away as you watch him throw his head back letting out a cackle, his voice echoing inside the dingy, dark basement. 

Like a slideshow, his emotions were quick to change moving from pure anger to joy as he laughs at your response. You can't help but sit there and think that he's absolutely mad. A man who shares the same body, face and voice as your lover but seems to be much more cunning and sinister. He's evil and he proves himself to be just that with his following actions and honestly, you aren't even surprised at this point. 

His large hand that once caressed your face had now found its way to the knotted locks of hair, gripping it tightly as he shoves you to the ground. Pushing you down from the chair you once sat on and glueing you to the floor. The coldness of the surface is somewhat, soothing against your painfully hot skin as he presses your face against the ground. The weight of his body adding more pressure as he straddles you from behind, moving strings of your hair aside just so he can see your face. Amused, he smirks to himself when he sees you withering in pain, strings of saliva dripping past your chapped lips and leaking onto the floor.

"Oh dear, what a waste," He pouts, bringing forward a free hand to wipe your drool away. The tip of his finger now covered in your bodily fluids as he brings it to his lips, licking his finger in excitement. His eyes practically rolling to the back of his head as he moans in delight, "Deliciously, sweet." 

Disgusted by his actions you can't help but shut your eyes. Shielding yourself one way or another from looking at his grotesquely beautiful visage. Naturally, the tears also begin to seep past your eyes, drifting down your cheeks. You can feel him lean in, hovering over you. A whimper squeaks past your lips when you feel his tongue dragging itself across your cheek, it feels like he's about to eat you alive. Like a lion licking its prey.  

Removing his tongue from your cheek, he brings it towards your ear. Licking your helix before sucking gently on your earlobe, “I hope, you consider this next special thing. Perhaps, as a warning of some sort?” 

Pushing himself off of you, you can hear him rummage around in the drawer he’s got next to the chair you once sat on. The sound of metallic objects rattling around and clinking against each other until it comes to a halt. The silence isn't soothing, it's terrifying. 

Your heart begins to thump profusely, rapidly beating. You find it hard to breathe, to possibly calm down as your mind races with all the possible objects he could’ve chosen to use on you. A knife? Perhaps a nail gun.

The possibilities were essentially endless due to his massive collection of murderous weapons. But you receive your answer when you feel the long, multiple strips of leather entwined in cotton and tiny pieces of cattle bone brushing against your skin.

“Cat o’ nine tails,” He answers, introducing the weapon to you. Teasingly he brings the weapon up and down your bareback. Shuddering in fear as you feel the item grind against your back, the softness you feel now will be nothing in comparison to what you'll actually feel. 

"Baby, remember that I have to do this because I love you."

Thwack!

The first blow that hits you makes your ears ring. The sensation feels hot, tingling at your skin. It's a mixture of pain along with pins and needles, only getting worse with each blow that he gives you. The stinging had a pain so strong and immense that it was hard for you to even lay there still, writhing around on the ground like a worm on hot pavement. You began to feel overwhelmed with pain, your nerves essentially on fire as you struggled to keep yourself awake. 

Thwack, thwack, thwack!

You could feel the skin on your back begin to rip open, the crimson blood seeping from your wounds as he kept going. There was no mercy as you screamed, your vocal cords straining so hard your voice went hoarse. Slowly, you began to shut down. First, your hands falling limp at your sides, your body cased in sweat as you felt drained to a pulp. Then your screams came to a halt, the breathing in your voice drastically slowing down. Finally, your eyes began to droop, fluttering shut as you saw nothing but black. 

Was this the end for you? 

Jolting upwards, you topple off your bed and collide with the ground. Gritting your teeth in pain when you feel your back begin to burn, your semi-healed scars becoming agitated from the impact. Slowly rising upwards you panic at your dark surroundings but calm down once you realize that you're at home. Your sweet Maison, inside your calming bedroom with your lover sound asleep on his half of the mattress.

He's at peace with his soft and supple cheek squished against the fluffy pillow. Strands of his brown hair sticking about, his eyes shut tightly. You can't help but mumble to yourself about how adorable he is before leaving your room. Quietly heading towards the kitchen and flickering on the lights, flinching when everything seemed to be much too bright.

Your eyes gravitate towards the clock on the wall, it was four in the morning. You decided that there was no way you were going back to sleep at this hour. Shuffling towards your coffee machine, you brew yourself an iced coffee mixing in a shot of almond milk with your drink. Adding in a few ice cubes, you stir your drink slowly trying your best to ignore the pain in your back.

"You alright?"

Turning around you see Jongin, standing there shirtless in his teddy bear PJ pants. He rubs his eyes a few times before putting on his circular framed glasses, giving you a sleepy smile when he finally sees you properly through the lens. He looked beautiful in his groggy state and so did you to him with your hair flowing freely. Dressed cosily in his white tee with your supreme briefs underneath it.

"Yeah, I'm fine. Did I wake you up?" You ask, taking a sip from your drink.

"No, you're good. Can you make me one too baby?"

Nodding in response you turn towards your coffee machine, your back facing towards him to brew him a drink. "Latte?" You ask.

"Mhm, you know me so well," Slowly he wraps his arms around you, failing to notice how you slightly flinch at his touch. His hands travel towards your stomach as he hugs you tightly, placing his nose in the crook of your neck as he inhales your scent, "I love you so much."

The scene feels all too familiar and it makes you nervous. Gently you push him off of you, unaware that your gesture has hurt his feelings. Departing from your back he comes to your side, leaning against the marble counter.

"Are you sure you're okay?" He questions.

"I'm fine, just...don't, do that," You reply, the tone of your voice is soft, almost delicate as if you spoke any louder something would break.

"Do what?" He asks while bringing his hand towards your shoulder, frowning when he sees you dip your shoulder away from his touch, "You don't want me to touch you?"

Sighing you turn to face him, observing his hurt expression. His eyes are slightly glassy as he looks at you for an answer.

"Nini, it's not that I don't want you to touch me. It's because I'm still injured from the incident, so everything's just a bit fragile," You explain, partially lying through your teeth. It was true you were very hurt but you also didn't want him touching you because everything he did reminded you of the other him.

He nods quietly, smiling softly at you as he slowly gestures you to have a seat at the coffee table, "I'll cover the drink, you go rest."

Sitting down at the coffee table you quietly enjoy your beverage. Jongin soon joining you, seated at the front. The kitchen is quiet, dimly lit by the singular overhanging light you've got on. Jongin's caramel complexion shining underneath the lightbulbs rays. His eyes are affectionate, his gaze never leaving you as he chews on his bottom lip.

"I'm sorry," He starts, "I know it's been hard and I'm really sorry that you have to be hurting. I just wish that the incident could've brought us closer somehow but it's just, pushing us apart."

Drumming your fingers against the table you avoid his gaze. You don't know what to say, you can't blame him for what happened. But you also can't help but think that had you not known Jongin then you would've never met the other him. His twin or, whatever he was.

"I should've told you about him. Then maybe I could've prevented this somehow," His voice falters as you look up to see him. He's wiping his tears away, the whites of his eyes are slightly red.

"Jongin—”

"Tell me," He interrupts, "Do you see him when you look at me?"

Looking at Jongin, you can definitely see the other him. Except for the fact that the other him or Kai as he liked to call himself had dark green hair. Besides the difference in hair colours, they were pretty much identical. Opting to remain silent, he receives his answer.

"I wish it had never happened but, now that everything's passed I want to be by your side to help you heal. I want to help you through this," He explains. Nonchalantly sliding his hand forwards, he offers you to take his hand and you do, though not right away. Intertwining your fingers with his, you feel his thumb rub the skin of your palm gently.

"You know I love you?" He says and you can't help but shudder when those words come fluttering out of his mouth. Looking up at him you momentarily see Kai rather than Jongin and your heart stops. Afraid that you'll be punished for not speaking back. You say it back, in an almost trained responsive way. Even if the man that's in front of you isn't Kai but Jongin. You say it back because you're still afraid, you're still scared and those affectionate words do nothing but terrify you.

"I love you too."

   𝐀𝐋𝐋 𝐑𝐈𝐆𝐇𝐓𝐒 𝐑𝐄𝐒𝐄𝐑𝐕𝐄𝐃: 𝐌𝐈𝐋𝐅𝐍𝐄𝐀𝐑𝐘𝐎𝐔©︎

[geraldineswriting]

𝐁𝐫𝐮𝐢𝐬𝐞𝐝 𝐁𝐮𝐭 𝐍𝐨𝐭 𝐁𝐫𝐨𝐤𝐞𝐧

(𝗠𝗮𝗶𝗻 𝗠𝗮𝘀𝘁𝗲𝗿𝗹𝗶𝘀𝘁)

𝘚𝘶𝘮𝘮𝘢𝘳𝘺 = 𝘓𝘪𝘭𝘪𝘢𝘯𝘢 𝘚𝘵𝘶𝘢𝘳𝘵 𝘩𝘢𝘴 𝘣𝘦𝘦𝘯 𝘪𝘯 𝘭𝘰𝘷𝘦 𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘩 𝘙𝘢𝘧𝘦 𝘊𝘢𝘮𝘦𝘳𝘰𝘯 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘱𝘢𝘴𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘳𝘦𝘦 𝘺𝘦𝘢𝘳𝘴, 𝘣𝘶𝘵 𝘥𝘶𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘩𝘪𝘮 𝘧𝘪𝘯𝘥𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘢 𝘫𝘰𝘣 𝘵𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘳𝘦𝘲𝘶𝘪𝘳𝘦𝘴 𝘩𝘪𝘮 𝘵𝘰 𝘮𝘰𝘷𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘮𝘢𝘪𝘯𝘭𝘢𝘯𝘥, 𝘴𝘩𝘦 𝘮𝘢𝘬𝘦𝘴 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘤𝘩𝘰𝘪𝘤𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘵𝘦𝘭𝘭 𝘩𝘪𝘮 𝘩𝘰𝘸 𝘴𝘩𝘦 𝘧𝘦𝘦𝘭𝘴 𝘩𝘰𝘱𝘦𝘧𝘶𝘭𝘭𝘺 𝘣𝘦𝘧𝘰𝘳𝘦 𝘪𝘵’𝘴 𝘵𝘰𝘰 𝘭𝘢𝘵𝘦.

𝘞𝘰𝘳𝘥 𝘊𝘰𝘶𝘯𝘵 = 2𝘬

𝘗𝘢𝘪𝘳𝘪𝘯𝘨 = 𝘖𝘊 𝘹 𝘙𝘢𝘧𝘦 𝘊𝘢𝘮𝘦𝘳𝘰𝘯

𝘞𝘢𝘳𝘯𝘪𝘯𝘨𝘴 = 𝘓𝘢𝘯𝘨𝘶𝘢𝘨𝘦 & 𝘈𝘯𝘨𝘴𝘵 & 𝘍𝘭𝘶𝘧𝘧

(𝘕𝘰𝘵 𝘮𝘺 𝘨𝘪𝘧, 𝘤𝘳𝘦𝘥𝘪𝘵𝘴 𝘵𝘰 𝘰𝘸𝘯𝘦𝘳!)

Small snowflakes filled up the frostbitten window, while the dimming fire started to burn to ash in Liliana’s living room. The wind blew through the vents in the ceiling, filling up the air with loneliness and indecision. The young girl sitting on the couch was lost and in love with a love that didn’t exist. A love that always lived in her dreams but never spilled over to reality. Her soft pajama pants were clean and new but her heart was tattered and bruised. 

Liliana looked over to the picture that had been framed and put on her shelf three years ago, showing a boy and a girl with their arms placed over each other so naturally that it was questionable. She could still feel his arm being placed on her shoulder and his laugh in her ear, “Smile like you mean it, Liliana Stuart.” 

That was the night they first met, caused by her unabashed loud laugh, which resulted in Rafe’s curiosity to see what could be so funny at one of his family's parties. She went home that night, finally knowing what it was like to fall in love with a stranger. It took the next three years for her to find out what it was like to fall in love with someone who couldn’t love her back. 

Liliana had been home for the past six days, not caring to leave her house or turn on her phone. The street lights that burned through her windows kept her company while the thoughts in her head left her haunted. In the past week, she had come to a few realizations that needed to be recognized. For one, she was in love with Rafe Cameron and the choice to pretend she didn’t was no longer an option. Second, she needed to move on because sacrificing even another day of her sanity just so he could unknowingly spend his time in her head was now pointless. And finally, she had to tell him. There was no other way for her to find closure except to hear it from his own mouth. Liliana knew and now she had made a choice.

In the past three years, she had become best friends with a boy, who then turned into a man. She knew the Rafe that hurt people but now she knew the Rafe that had turned his own and others pain into forgiveness. He’s still the same man she met all those nights ago, but now drugs, negativity and immaturity were no longer in the picture. He had opportunity and promise, now not just as a wealthy kook but also as himself. Maybe that's why he accepted the job offer to the mainland. Maybe it was something else. 

Liliana sat up, memorizing the cracks in the floor, trying to understand it all. When did her curiosity turn into adoration? Why can’t she unlove him? Why can’t he love her? She knows every answer but because of the flame that is burning in her heart, she needs to put it out. She needs to be able to wake up everyday and not ache with the false knowingness of imaginary maybes. It was time to move on.

The phone was picked up and turned back on, the screen turning from black to color. A few texts pop up, but only one catches her attention.

Are you alright? Call me. 

Such a simple question that carries such a complicated answer sent from such a beautiful person. It looks like it was only sent a few hours ago as she pressed his contact and called him. She held the phone much tighter than she meant to, nervousness creeping into her bones and settling itself as the goosebumps on her skin. 

“Thank fuck, are you alright?” Rafe asked breathlessly into the phone.

“Yeah, sorry for disappearing, I-I,” She paused, no longer knowing that way with which she wanted this to go. 

“It’s okay, I know what it’s like. I’m just glad you’re okay.” 

“Thanks, I’m fine. I was actually wondering if you were busy right now?” Her nervous laugh filled the sudden silence. Is she being stupid? Reckless? Or is she doing the right thing?

“Uh, yeah, yeah. Sorry I was looking at the time. Yeah, want me to pick you up?” 

“Sounds fine, see you soon then.” 

“See you soon.”

Rafe hung up and her ears were only filled with the faint sound of absolute silence. She felt scared and maybe even terrified. She looked back over to the picture frame on the shelf, his smile breaking her heart. How many times has he given her that same smile, all happiness and teeth, unknowing to the repeated pain it left her with. If only she could unlearn every smile, and laugh so that maybe his curse could be lifted off of her. She could be free. 

She stood up and slipped on a pair of sandals, keeping on her pajama pants and sweatshirt. She decided to wait on the front porch, even if a light snow covered the ground. Maybe the cold could freeze the river of heat flowing through her heart. 

She waited for a few minutes until she saw his small car pull up in her driveway. As she walked towards the car to get in, he jumped out, racing over to her side first. 

“Wait, I think we both need a hug first, it's been too long.” He wrapped her up in his arms and for a fleeting moment she remembered why she ever mistook his friendliness for more. He felt like a healing heart, an ending to end all endings. 

“I missed you Liliana Stuart even if it’s only been a week.”

“And I, you Rafe Cameron.” She could feel the painful lump in her throat, the feeling of tears crawling their way to her eyes. She was able to temporarily blink them back before he pulled away. She couldn’t let him see her pain, not tonight.

They both got into the car, him speeding down the street to stop into a desolate parking lot. She had a feeling that he knew she wanted to talk, which made this conversation somewhat easier to handle. She had to be strong, to not show her weakness. 

Once he parked, her hands clammed up in the pockets of her sweatshirt. Liliana felt his eyes burning into her skin like fire. She matched his gaze, so many different questions burning between the two. He grabbed her hand and squeezed it. 

“What’s been going on Liliana?” He whispered into the silence, trying to make himself seem comforting. Rafe had a deep feeling he knew what this was going to be about.

“It’s been a hard week and I just needed to think about things. With us I mean.” The tears were coming again and this time they were unstoppable. They seared her eyes, even though she used every bit of strength to fight them off. Just like loving him though, it was useless to try and stop.

“Hey, it's alright, you know you can tell me anything.” 

“I don’t know how to tell you this Rafe,” She paused trying to gather her thoughts. “To put this into words just seems impossible.” 

He could hear the anxious thoughts rolling around in her head. He could see the tears cascading down her face like a never ending waterfall of pain. He couldn’t stand seeing her like this.

“Well then how about I start?” He squeezed her hand tighter, now holding her hand in both of his. She looked out the window as she nodded, not standing the fact that she was having such a hard time doing something that should be so simple.

“I uh, we’ve been friends for three years and you mean so much to me. I know that something is wrong but just know that whatever it is, it won’t change our relationship. I’ll still be here.” He took a deep breath, trying to pick his next words carefully. He knew that he didn’t want to hurt her more, or make this any worse. “I’m guessing this has to do with more than just me moving away for that job.”

Liliana couldn’t stand the heartstopping pain that coursed through her lungs from using every bit of her self-control to not say what she couldn’t.

“Rafe, that’s the thing,” She gasped for breath, “I want our relationship to change. It’s the fact that no matter what I do you can’t love me like I need you to. My hands are so empty except for when they’re in yours. I’m just, I’m just in love with you and I don’t know how to make you love me back.” 

The ball had dropped. The unspeakable words were spoken. They both knew his next words would heal or break her heart. She tore her hand away from his hand, holding her head up on her own. The only proof of her sobs was the shaking of her shoulders, face hidden away from his sight. She couldn’t look him in the eyes when he shattered her into pieces.

Rafe wasn’t surprised those were the words that tumbled from her lips. Some part of him always knew her heart belonged to him. He just wished she had told him earlier because now things had changed. He was moving and starting a new life in a land that she had no plans to travel to.

He gently placed his hand on her back, taking back one of her hands with his other. 

“Hey, come here.” He spoke so gently, as he guided her into his arms. She gripped his shoulders, crying into his neck.

“I’m so sorry, Rafe. I’m sorry.” 

“There is absolutely no reason to be sorry,” She felt his hands on her back, holding her like she was a fragile piece of fine china that was breaking no matter how hard he held on.

“You know I love you back right? I always have.” He felt her cries pause as she slowly leaned back from his sheltering hug. “Why didn’t you say something sooner?”

“I never said anything because I never imagined you could feel the same. I thought you only ever looked at me like a friend.” Liliana spoke in a tone she hadn’t used in years, a tone with sincerity and happiness intertwined together. She couldn’t believe it.

“Since the night we met, I’ve always loved you Liliana Stuart. I just wish one of us said something sooner. We both know things have changed now.” 

And there it was. The happy moment that filled the air with static had ended. Reality was once again set into place and it was cruel and unapologetic. 

“So what do we do now?” She asked quietly, scared that if she spoke any louder it would chip further away at their already cracked hearts.

“Well the first option, which is my least favorite, is we do nothing. I move away and every once in a while we'll do our best to keep in touch as friends.”

“I don’t like that option either. Option two?” He was relieved to hear her answer.

“Option two, we try out a relationship until I leave. Then, well I guess, we go back to being friends. Again not my favorite choice.” 

“Please tell me there’s another choice.” 

She wished so deeply that he wasn’t moving away, or that they had this conservation years ago. This seemed entirely unfair for both of them. Love wasn’t supposed to be like this, timing was supposed to be rooting for them, not making things harder. 

“There is our last option,” He held her hand, looking into her swollen eyes. “You come with me.”

“Yes.” She spoke with such vibrance and assurance that it was undeniable. She had made up her mind and nothing could possibly change it. 

“Are you sure? I don’t want you to regret this Liliana.”

“Are you going to regret this Rafe?” He didn’t even need to think twice.

“No, not if it’s you.” 

“Then that’s that. I’m coming with you and we’re doing this.”

They couldn’t stop looking away from each other. They finally had unspoken permission to love each other without the secret glances and stolen touches. They were each other's for the taking, no holding back. 

“Can I kiss you Lil?”

“You better Rafe Cameron.”

[getinthering]

Traditions

[This is my first fic that I’ve published in years, but I’m pretty happy with it. Anyway,

Taang Week Day 1: Traditions @taangweek

Aang escapes to grieve his people, feeling lonelier than usual.]  

The Air Nomads are incredibly fortunate to have their culture preserved in such a beautiful way. 

The world has a gaping, empty hole without their presence, an entire way of life wiped out save for one boy.  And so it is an immense blessing, however small it may be, to have the four Air Temples left completely intact.  Aang is hopeful that one day, when the war is behind them and there is peace and trust between the nations, their intricate beauty can be shared with the rest of the world once more.  Perhaps there will come a day when people can live here again and learn the ways of the Air Nomads.

Maybe that is too hopeful, but it is a comforting thought on long and lonely nights when the feeling of how alone he is in the world weighs heavy on Aang.  From the moment he was told of his Avatar status, he became an outcast amongst his peers; but at least then, he was still surrounded by the airbending monks who had raised and grown up with him.  

Now, lying on a cot in the horrendously empty Western Air Temple, where once the female Air Nomads were raised and trained, the weight of his place in the world as the last airbender again bears on him.  True, he has his friends who have literally gone to the ends of the Earth for him.  They can’t, however, make up for the stinging ache in his chest as he takes note of the ways the paint has chipped and faded, the stone has cracked, the moss has overtaken the darkest corners of each room.  And so he finds comfort in dreams of what the Temples could look like after the war, teeming with life once more, him passing down the Air Nomads’ traditions to new groups of people, ensuring they will not be forgotten.

He has never dared to voice these dreams. 

They are not the only secret he keeps from the others, either.  When they first arrived at the Western Air Temple, he excitedly showed his friends around; he showed them the rooms where the girls and the higher monks slept, the dining areas, the training arenas, the spiritual commons, explaining in detail what he could remember from his last visit.  

Yet there is one room--attached to the bedroom he claimed as his own by a small corridor, hidden behind a jutting wall that blends into the rest of the room to the passing eye--that he kept to himself.  It is on nights such as these, when he is particularly mourning the loss of his race, that he ventures inside this room and sits on the dirty floor.  There are faded paintings on each of the walls, depicting Avatar Yangchen’s childhood in the Air Temple.  Aang smiles as he imagines her running through the halls with the other Nomad children, laughing as he had in those simpler days before he was shackled with the responsibility of being the Avatar.  

“Thought you said you were giving us the full tour,” a voice sounds behind him, making him jump.  He whirls around to see the familiar figure of a blind earthbender standing behind him.  

“Toph!” he exclaims, standing and brushing the dirt off his pants.  “How did you get in here?  How did you find me?”

She scoffs at that.  “Uh, I walked through the door, same as you.” She lifts one foot off the ground and points at it.  “I can see this whole place, remember?” Her brazen tone, tinged with harsh humor as always, is enough to shake some of his burning longing and let slip a chuckle.  She looks at him with her pale, sightless eyes and he is reminded that though she is blind, Toph sees more than any of them could ever dream of.  

“Wanna tell me why you’re keeping this place a secret?”  He starts to interject, but she cuts him off.  “Don’t lie to me, Twinkletoes.”

Aang’s smile slips away and he takes back his seat upon the floor, sighing.  “I don’t know.  I guess, I just...wanted part of the Air Nomads to myself for just a while.  It’s like...like a connection to my family and friends.  And I felt like, if I shared it with you guys, I wouldn’t have anywhere to go by myself to feel close to them.  It’s hard to explain, I guess.” 

There is a beat of silence.  To his surprise, Toph sits next to him, crossing her legs, close enough that their knees almost touch.  He expects a rough joke, maybe even an awkward dismissal and change of subject.  Instead, she places a hand on her own knee, gingerly reaching out to rest the tips of her fingers against his.  “I get that,” she says quietly.

He blushes, unsure of how to react.  He has seen Toph express a wide range of emotions, even something close to vulnerability, but never this.  Looking at her hand, he isn't even sure what to call it; the way her fingers arch over the small gap between them, all reaching to touch him, makes it clear the gesture isn't an accident.  

"What's in here?" She asks him, breaking his train of thought.  He is reminded that the room is all but empty, and a hollow sorrow invades his lungs, forcing out the air and threatening to drown him.  He can remember so clearly how this room once was.  He had visited the Western Air Temple with the monks a few short months before he was told that he was the Avatar, before he ran away, before he was frozen in an iceberg for 100 years while his people were slaughtered.  

The paintings of Yangchen were vivid then, well kept, colors bright enough to reflect her youthful joy.  The room had not been empty then.  It had been a small library of sorts, one of the many dedications throughout the Temple to the previous Air Nomad Avatar.  What he now calls his bedroom had been the main library, filled to the ceiling with books on varying topics transcribed from around the world.  This room, however, had been home to scrolls and artifacts from Yangchen herself.  There were once cushions upon the floor surrounding a small table for the monks who maintained the library to complete their studies.  Nearly every inch of the room had either displays of what few earthly possessions Yangchen kept throughout her life or scrolls composed of letters to and from the Avatar, writings about her life and the impacts she had.

All of that is gone now, destroyed by the Fire Nation all those years ago.  

"This was a library for Avatar Yangchen," he says lamely, unsure how to release all the grief he has caged up inside of him.

"So, you come and sit in a completely empty room because it used to be a library dedicated to your past life?" She asks, less gentle than before, sounding more like the Toph he is used to.  

"No!  I mean, it's not completely empty."  He describes the beautiful, if decrepit, paintings they now sit before, trying his best to do them justice for the girl who otherwise wouldn’t know they are there.  He pauses and looks at her.

"They make me feel happy.  I don't know if I really remember Yangchen’s life or if it's just my own memories, but either way, they remind me of my childhood and what it was like to grow up with the monks.  These paintings, they're some of the only ones left in the world depicting Air Nomads that were actually made by Air Nomads."

"You come in here to feel connected to them when you really feel like you're alone," she says, more of a statement than a question.  Aang nods, sliding his hand across his leg until it just barely grazes her fingertips.  

"I mean, obviously I always carry it with me, but sometimes it just really hits me that I'm the last one.  It's my responsibility to carry on the traditions of my entire culture, and I don't know if I can do that.  That's a lot of pressure and it's not even taking account for all the other pressures I have."

Both of them are silent for a while.  Aang contemplates everything he's gotten off his chest just now.  He thought he would feel violated, in a way, if anyone ever found him in here, but in actuality, he feels like a lot of his grief has been freed.  He knows it is only temporary, that it will return sooner or later, but he is grateful.  He's shared a lot of his longing for his people with Katara and Sokka, but they never really got it the way he wanted them to: Sokka just didn't know how to relate, wasn't comfortable enough with his own feelings, and Katara always pitied him and felt like she needed to baby him.  

Toph, on the other hand, took it in stride.  She always lets him air his troubles and tries to share them.  He doesn't think he’s ever properly appreciated that about her until right now.  He looks at her hand, still touching him as slightly as she possibly could, and wonders what it would be like to hold it.  

She inclines her head towards him and asks, "So what does that mean?  How do you plan to carry on your traditions?”

“Well...I’d like to restore the Air Temples first, I guess, when all this is over.  Maybe I’ll find some followers who would listen to the history and ways of the monks, even help restore some of the scrolls and artwork.”  Aang finds himself blushing and bowing his head, embarrassed by the vulnerable thoughts he had never told anyone until now.  For a moment, he is afraid Toph will tease him, point out all the flaws in his ideas, scold him for dreaming of this when he is days away from fighting the Fire Lord.

Instead, he suddenly finds her hand on top of his, fingers squeezing gently.  He lifts his head in surprise to see her offering a small smile.

“Well, you’ve found your first follower.  So you’d better start teaching.”

[rubyleaf]

As I’m almost done with Night of the Dragon (yes, finally), here I am again writing fic! This time, Tatsumi and the friendships he never formed with the squad in canon. I still think we were robbed, so here goes!

As the sun rises over the destroyed landscape, a single soul floats to the horizon in a glowing ball of light, drifting into the sky and leaving the confines of the world.

For a long time, Tatsumi flies through darkness. The earth grows smaller and smaller below, the sun a distant light that is soon lost in the vastness around him. Stars drift by, constellations, twinkling colorfully in the distance—glimpses of other worlds, perhaps, inhabited by beings far beyond his imagination. Tatsumi doesn’t stop to explore them. Carried by an unexplainable pull, he flies past all of them, on and on until he loses all sense of space or time.

And then, from one moment to the next, he flies into a bright light and his feet hit solid ground.

Tatsumi opens his eyes. He doesn’t know when he has taken up human shape again, but when he looks down along himself he sees the body he is used to: the lean teenage boy, dressed in his clan’s black and purple, black hair falling into his eyes and obscuring his vision. But his wound is gone, and when he feels for his sword he discovers it is no longer there.

Where…am I?

Tatsumi looks around. He has landed on a rocky shore, the waves of the sea crashing and foaming where they meet the land. His legs are up to the knees in water, but he barely registers the way it seeps through his clothes, and even though it’s cold, he doesn’t shiver.

So this is Meido, he thinks. He doesn’t know how he imagined the place to be, but somehow this isn’t it. This place looks like it belongs to the world of the living, except that, back in Ningen-kai, he couldn’t feel wind or warmth or water anymore after he died.

His eyes scan his surroundings, searching for other arrivants, other souls he might know. There is no one. He is alone.

Tatsumi starts walking.

Bordering on the shore is a deep, dark forest, the gnarled trees taller and older than anything found in the living world. All the same their shadows are eerily familiar, and as he passes between their roots he suddenly remembers why.

I carried her this way.

He has been here before, but back then he wasn’t alone. Back then he was alive, and he was half a demon, and on his arms he had a dying kitsune girl, unconscious and bleeding out. Now he isn’t injured anymore, not half drowned, not merged with the First Oni of Jigoku anymore. But his arms are empty, and the forest he walks through is silent except for the sound of his footsteps.

The forest deepens. On the edge of Tatsumi’s vision lights flicker by, but every time he stops and turns to look at them, they are already gone. Sometimes he thinks he can hear a voice calling out to him—Yumeko’s, Master Ichiro’s, Hakaimono’s—but there is never anyone there. The only thing around him are the trees, tall and silent and oblivious to his presence.

There are no times of the day here, no sunrise or sunset. There is no wind, no weather; only the trees, the undergrowth, the ever-unchanging light beneath their branches. Tatsumi keeps walking. He doesn’t know where he’s going, where he wants to go. He doesn’t know if he has anywhere to go. For all his life he has always had a destination, a place to go, a task to fulfill. But now there is nothing, nothing except for the great unknown.

Tatsumi keeps walking. He’s used to walking great distances alone. For most of his life, he has always been alone.

Except…has he?

Not truly alone, he realizes. Hakaimono has always been with him for the better part of his life, a constant presence that ensured he was never truly on his own. Abruptly Tatsumi finds himself missing the oni. He was the one responsible for most of his torment, and yet he would rather hear the demon’s taunting than nothing at all.

Without Hakaimono, all on his own—who is he, anyway?

Tatsumi’s feet stumble. The trees around him look exactly the same as those he already passed a few hours ago, or maybe days. Is it an illusion? Has he been walking in circles? Where is he coming from? Where is he going? Has he ever been headed anywhere at all?

And then his eyes land on a shimmering light in the distance, and though he doesn’t have a pulse anymore, his heart skips a beat.

This glade…

Forgetting himself, Tatsumi runs, crashing through the undergrowth into the light beyond. And sure enough, there it lies: the very glade where he called on the Kirin to bring Yumeko back to life, mere days ago and yet an eternity away. Except now the glade is dead and empty, and there are no kodama watching him from the trees, no sacred spirit to bring back the girl he loves more than life itself.

He is alone. Completely, truly alone.

Everyone and everything he held dear is worlds away, and he has no way to return.

His vision blurring, he falls to his knees. Can souls cry if they have no bodies to form tears with? For the first time in many years Tatsumi wants to cry, wants to break down sobbing until there are no tears left in his body, calling Yumeko’s name over and over until she hears him and answered. And yet there are no tears in his eyes, no sobs escaping from the tangle in his chest, no words coming from his ghostly mouth no matter how much his soul aches with loneliness and deep, deep loss.

Darkness falls around him. Tatsumi doesn’t know how long he sits there, unable to look up, unable to move, unable to think of anything other than Yumeko’s tear-stained, beautiful face. His light is gone. Gone, gone beyond his reach for many years, perhaps centuries, and all that remains for him are the shadows grinning at him like they want to swallow him up.

“…san? Kage-san!”

Something in Tatsumi stirs. This voice…he knows this voice. The shadows lift a little.

“Oi, Kage-san, can you hear me?” Footsteps rustle through the grass behind him, then a hand appears in his field of vision. “Are you awake? Hey!”

Tatsumi stirs, but his soul is still too heavy to respond, let alone take the long, familiar hand that is waving before his eyes. Something slides down his face, and it takes him a moment to register that it’s a single teardrop falling from his eye.

“He must be heartbroken,” another familiar voice remarks, and on the edge of Tatsumi’s vision something bright and shimmering moves over the grass. “Let us give him time, Okame-san. He may not yet be ready to stand up and speak.”

Tatsumi can’t respond, but he doesn’t have to. Two figures sit down beside him, one on either side. A hand comes to rest on his back, warm and strangely alive even though souls should be intangible. Another slides across his shoulders, then an arm wraps around his back and pulls him over to slump against a bony shoulder.

“I get how you feel,” Hino Okame mutters, his voice very quiet. “I miss Yumeko-chan too. She was like the little sister I never had.”

“We all miss Yumeko-san,” Taiyo Daisuke remarks, still resting his hand on Tatsumi’s back. “I am glad she still lives, but however selfish it sounds, our lives are less bright for lack of her presence.”

Little by little, the darkness around Tatsumi clears. His soul is still heavy, but the pain of losing Yumeko is now less acute, less overwhelming. Slowly, he lifts his head to look up at his two companions.

Hino Okame and Taiyo Daisuke. Yumeko’s friends, he thinks, and only tangentially his. If at all. They barely had any time to get to know each other.

“Why are you here?” he asks, his voice raspy from lack of use.

“We came across you on our search,” Daisuke replies, smiling quietly. “We have been looking for you for a while.”

Tatsumi blinks, an unfamiliar emotion fluttering up inside him. “For me?” he repeats. “Why?”

Okame offers a lopsided grin.

“We know how it’s like to be lonely,” he says, scratching his head the same way he did back when he was still alive. “So, you know. We were worried about you.”

Tatsumi’s soul tangles up into knots.

“Why?” he asks quietly. “I was never your friend.”

“You always were,” Daisuke corrects him.

“Yeah, you were a bit scary,” Okame admits. “But you’re still part of the family. Also, who else is supposed to look after you for Yumeko-chan?”

“I…” Tatsumi’s words fail him. He still isn’t used to kindness, to being cared for. And yet here these two are, offering just that.

“Thank you,” he mutters at length, staring at the grass and suddenly feeling like a small child.

Smiling again, Daisuke stands up, offering him a hand. Tatsumi takes it and rises to his feet, assisted by Okame from the side. To his amazement, he finds he can stand again. The glade doesn’t look quite as empty anymore.

“Let us go,” Daisuke says. “Reika-san will be glad to hear we found you.”

“Oh, she sure will,” Okame mutters. “The shrine maiden’s been nagging us for ages. Some things never change.”

Side by side they pass through the forest. The trees quickly grow less dense on either side, light filtering in through the branches until they finally step out into the open. A town rises up ahead of them, but even closer lies an almost-familiar shrine.

“Reika-san!” Okame calls. “We found him!”

There is a shuffle from inside, then the shrine maiden comes out. “About time!” she exclaimed. “What took you two so long? Kage-san!”

Hurrying up to him, she looks him up and down, inspecting his form as if looking for injuries. “Your soul is very battered,” she remarks, furrowing her brow. Turning to the noble and ronin, she adds, “What were you two thinking, taking so long to bring him back? Look at the state he’s in!”

“We humbly apologize,” Daisuke answers before Okame can respond with something less polite. “We only found him very recently, and at first he was in no state to walk. We brought him in as soon as we could.”

“Merciful Kami! Next time, Chu and I are doing the searching alone.” Reika lets out a huff. “Come on, Kage-san! Before you go anywhere else, we need to patch you up.”

---

Some time later Tatsumi finds himself sitting in the shrine, covered in patches and bandages by Reika’s skillful hands. “There you go,” she says. “This is as far as I can mend you. Some of your wounds are too deep for me to handle.”

Tatsumi looks up and down along himself, not understanding a thing. “Wounds?” he repeats.

“Your soul is badly hurt,” Reika answers. “I’ve done what I can for the more recent injuries, but there’s a lot that needs to heal on its own. I suspect you won’t be able to be reborn until your soul has fully finished healing.”

Dread jolts through him. “How long will that take?”

“I can’t say,” Reika replies, and the dread teeters on the edge of despair. “It depends on the person. The best thing you can do is try and heal from the bad things you dealt with in your lifetime.”

That’s a lot, Tatsumi thinks. So much he barely knows where to start.

“How do I do that?” he asks.

Reika hesitates.

“There is no one-size-fits-all solution,” says an aged voice from the door. “However, the best thing you can do is surround yourself with good things to balance out the bad.”

Reika lifts her gaze, her face lighting up. “Master Jiro!”

Striding over, the old priest sits down across from Tatsumi, Ko—in small dog form—curling up at his feet. “Find people who make you happy,” he says. “Do things that make you happy. Take your time to process all that happened to you, and then leave it in the past.”

People who make me happy. Things that make me happy.

At first Tatsumi’s mind comes up all Yumeko. If he could spend time with her, he thinks, he would surely heal in no time. Except, that isn’t an option. And suddenly she seems further away than ever.

Except, something within him whispers, he isn’t alone. He is sitting in this shrine flanked by Yumeko’s friends who insist they are also his friends, who found him in the middle of despair, picked him up and brought him here to be pieced back together. He didn’t get to know them much while alive. But maybe now he actually has a chance.

“In that case,” he says hesitantly, fully prepared for a rejection, “may I stay here with you for a while?”

The smiles on the others’ faces tell him all he needs to know.

---

“There you are, Kage-san!” Okame calls out to him as he enters the shrine, returning from a walk and a lot of thinking. “Sit down, we’ve been saving a spot for you!”

Wary, Tatsumi pauses, regarding the ronin, then the noble with him, both smiling so invitingly that it’s obvious they’re up to no good. “What?”

“Sake,” Daisuke explains, motioning to the bottle between them. “Okame-san found it in town. Would you like some?”

For a second Tatsumi wants to say no, mentioning his duties, and then he remembers he doesn’t have duties anymore. He is free to drink, if he wants to. He isn’t sure how comfortable he is…but then again, without a body, can spirits even get drunk?

“Just a little,” he says, sitting down beside his companions. Okame doesn’t look for further encouragement before pouring a cup of sake and handing it to him. Tatsumi eyes it, then the ronin, and frowns.

“I said a little,” he remarks.

“That is a little,” Okame shoots back. “Just take it! If you’re that much of a lightweight, take a sip every hour or something while we get wasted.”

Muttering an awkward thanks, Tatsumi takes a sip and can’t help grimacing. He has never much liked the pungent taste of alcohol, and the smell strongly reminds him of the stuff healers used to put on his wounds to keep them from getting infected.

“Disgusting,” he mutters.

Okame bursts out laughing. “It’s nasty when you first try it, huh?” he says, patting Tatsumi so hard on the back that he almost spills the sake. “Don’t worry, Kage-san! Just keep forcing it down, and someday you won’t be able to live without it.”

Now it’s Daisuke’s turn to laugh as Tatsumi snorts. “Is that a good thing?”

“No, it isn’t!” Reika’s voice comes from the next room. “We already have one alcoholic too many in this house,” she adds, poking her head out through the door. “Don’t you dare corrupt Kage-san with it!”

Okame eyes her up and down, then a smirk crosses his face. “Would you like a cup, Reika-san?” he says. “I’m sure we’d all love to see what our proper shrine maiden’s like piss-drunk.”

She chucks her comb at him, which he easily dodges. “Keep dreaming!” she shouts. “I wouldn’t think of it!”

Picking up the comb, Daisuke turns it over in his hand before an idea lights up his face, and he sticks it into Tatsumi’s hair. “Why, it suits you,” he remarks. “You should keep it in, Kage-san.”

“No, he shouldn’t! Give me my comb back, you thieves! I’m so sorry for their nonsense, Kage-san.” Pacing across the room, Reika reaches for Tatsumi’s hair, then gives him an appraising look. “Though Taiyo-san’s right, it does suit you.”

Tatsumi blinks. “I can’t say,” he replies. “I don’t have a mirror to check.”

The shrine erupts with laughter. Tatsumi doesn’t understand what he said that was so funny, but in the face of all this mirth he can’t help cracking a smile anyway.

---

Reika blinks as she looks up from the texts she was studying, visibly surprised to find Tatsumi in the doorframe. He understands her bafflement; he rarely seeks out the others, even now, Master Ichiro’s lessons about keeping distance still too drilled into his mind. But Master Jiro has told him to get rid of all that, so here he is, making an effort.

“What’s wrong?” the shrine maiden asks.

Tatsumi takes a breath, even though, as a ghost, he doesn’t technically need it. “Nothing,” he says. “Can you teach me about healing?”

Turning fully around, she stares at him like she thinks she didn’t hear him right. “Healing?” she repeats. “I suppose I wouldn’t mind, but…why all of a sudden?”

Tatsumi looks away. “I realized the only thing I know is how to fight,” he admits, his voice quiet and a little awkward. “I have no other skills, no interests, nothing. So…I thought I should change that.”

Reika gets up.

“Of course,” she says. “No problem at all. What would you like to know?”

For the next hour or two she lectures him about herbs and salves, cures for illnesses, pain and exhaustion. She mostly leaves out the part about patching up wounds, fully aware that Tatsumi knows that all too well already. Tatsumi listens closely. There are so many things she knows that he has never heard before, things that he hopes he’ll remember again in Ningen-kai so he can save people’s lives with this knowledge.

“You’re a good student,” Reika remarks when they finally take a break. “You pick things up fast, and you don’t ask stupid questions. I can’t imagine what would happen if I had to teach the other two idiots instead!”

“Teach what idiots what?” says a voice from the doorframe.

Reika snorts. “Speak of the devil,” she says. “How long have you been eavesdropping?”

“We just came in,” Okame retorts, entering the room followed by Daisuke. “What’s going on?”

“I’m trying to learn about healing,” Tatsumi explains. “All I can do is fight, and I want to change that.”

Daisuke’s face lights up with understanding. “Broadening your horizons is always a good idea, Kage-san,” he says. “If you would like further help, I can teach you about music and literature as well.”

Tatsumi lifts his head. “I would like that,” he says. “Thank you.”

Okame pulls a face.

“I don’t really know anything fancy,” he admits, cracking a wry smile. “But I guess I could teach you about playing dice.”

Tatsumi snorts, but he also smiles.

“I’ll take it.”

---

The moon is shining when Tatsumi steps outside, startled to find that he isn’t alone at the small stream passing in front of the shrine.

“Oh, it’s you,” Okame mutters, briefly meeting his eyes where he sits on the grass. “What brings you out here?”

For a moment Tatsumi doesn’t say anything; he only sits down beside the ronin, pulling at the grass. “You look like something is bothering you,” he remarks at length.

Okame lets out a humorless laugh. “Is it that obvious? Yeah, I guess there is,” he admits. “It’s nothing to worry about, though.”

Tatsumi looks up at him, his messy hair silhouetted against the light of the full moon.

“You can tell me,” he says.

Blinking, the ronin turns to stare down at him. “Hey, now—”

“You were there for me when I needed it,” Tatsumi adds. “Let me return the favor.”

Dark eyes rest on him, a heavy gaze, pensive and hesitant. Then Okame lets out a defeated sigh.

“I saw my brother today,” he says.

Tatsumi pauses. “What?”

“Yasuo. My younger brother,” Okame explains. “When we were out on the town. I don’t know if he recognized me, but…I keep thinking about it.” He stabs a hand through his hair. “You know, when my clan held that siege on your clan…he and I were both there, back then. Except I got scared and ran away from the final battle. And he stayed behind and died.” He swallows. “I left him to die.”

Tatsumi doesn’t say anything; he doesn’t know how to comfort people, except maybe Yumeko. And certainly not in a situation like this.

“It was so long ago,” Okame continues, “but I keep thinking about it. If I wasn’t such a coward, maybe I could’ve gone after him. Told him I’m sorry for abandoning him. But…” He shrugs. “Would he even want to hear it? Our relationship was never that great…maybe he’ll refuse to forgive me.”

Turning the ronin’s words in his mind, Tatsumi thinks, wondering what to do. Wondering what he would do in such a situation—what she would do.

“Yumeko,” he muses, “would tell you to talk to him anyway.”

Okame looks up.

“She’d say it’s clearly still bothering you, and you should get it off your chest,” Tatsumi continues slowly. “If he forgives you, maybe you can forgive yourself. And if he doesn’t, then at least you tried.”

“…you’re probably right.”

Taking a deep breath, Okame pushes himself to his feet, flashing a grin down at Tatsumi. “You’ve changed,” he remarks. “The old you was all prickly and loner-y, and here you are snapping me out of my funk.” He ruffles Tatsumi’s hair. “Thanks so much, Kage-san! I guess I’ll get myself some liquid courage and then go talk to him.”

For most of the next day Okame is absent, and when he returns his eyes are red and swollen from crying. But his features are also glowing with relief, and the grateful smile on his face tells Tatsumi everything he needs to know.

---

“Tatsumi-kun,” says a voice in the street, “it has been a while.”

Tatsumi spins around, his long-forgotten walls shooting up in a heartbeat. He knows this voice, even though the man it belongs to has aged in his absence; his hair is fully white now, his face covered in wrinkles. All the same, it barely takes him a second to recognize him.

“Master Ichiro,” he whispers. Panic grabs him. His eyes flit to the friends at his side, crowding closer to him as if sensing his fear. He wants to tell them not to. This man will surely beat him for letting people into his circle, and then force him to banish them all—or worse, cut them down to prove his loyalty to the Kage and the Kage alone.

But Master Ichiro doesn’t do any of these things. He only smiles—a sad, almost grandfatherly smile the likes of which he never showed while the two of them still lived.

“So we meet again,” he says. “I was hoping to see you here someday. I have had many students after you, but you are still my favorite.”

Something inside Tatsumi recoils at the phrasing. “Your favorite?” he repeats quietly.

“You were like a son to me,” Master Ichiro says. “It’s a shame I needed to be so strict with you to ensure your survival. I loved you dearly, you know.”

Loved me? Master Ichiro…loved me? Like a son?

Little by little, Tatsumi’s lips form the next words, quiet, calm yet filled with deep betrayal. “And you never told me?”

Master Ichiro blinks, taken aback. “Tatsumi-kun—”

“Don’t make me laugh!”

Bursting past Tatsumi’s side, Reika leaps into his path, glaring up at the old master like she wants to strangle him. “You loved him? Like a son?” she yells. “Don’t be ridiculous! Don’t even think of claiming the title of love when all you ever did was cause him pain and suffering!”

For a second, Tatsumi is convinced Master Ichiro will hit the shrine maiden, right here, in the middle of the street. But his old teacher does no such thing. He only frowns.

“I needed to do so,” he tries to explain. “It was for his own safety. Otherwise, Tatsumi-kun would—”

“Silence!”

Reika is positively trembling with rage. “For your own good! For your own safety! How many times have I heard that excuse?” Her hands are clenched into fists, barely restrained from grabbing Master Ichiro’s collar and shaking him. “I don’t care what you tell me! People who claim to love their children and hurt them ‘for their own good’ should never be allowed to raise a child—”

“Reika-san.”

Striding past, Daisuke places a hand on her shoulder, gently pulling her back. “It’s all right, Reika-san,” he says in an undertone. “Leave it to Kage-san.”

Taking a sharp breath, Reika closes her eyes and forces herself to calm down. At the same time, Okame gives Tatsumi a subtle nudge forward. “Go tell him, Kage-san!”

Tatsumi looks at his friends. Then at Master Ichiro. The man who raised him…the man who caused him so much pain.

The fear is still deep within him, intensely and painfully real. But…he isn’t the same person he used to be.

Tatsumi bows his head.

“Thank you for raising me,” he says, “and telling me the truth.”

Reika lets out a disbelieving gasp, but Tatsumi squares his jaw. Sizes up his old master. Swallows the fear of repercussions.

Then he swings and punches him hard across the face.

“And that,” he says as he returns to his cheering friends, leaving a startled Ichiro behind, “is for everything else.”

He doesn’t notice until later, but a large part of his soul heals that day.

---

When Tatsumi feels the pull, he almost doesn’t want to leave.

Of course he can’t wait to see Yumeko again. But returning to her will mean leaving his friends behind, the people he has grown to love so dearly, the people who helped him heal. He’s going to miss them. Even if, sooner or later, he will surely meet them here again.

“I have to go soon,” he tells them when he can’t resist the pull for much longer. “I can feel Ningen-kai calling. But…I didn’t want to leave without saying goodbye.”

The others’ faces are both happy and sad. “I’m glad you can return to Yumeko-chan,” Reika says. “May you be happier in your next lifetime.”

“Happier, and may you live longer,” Daisuke adds. “We shall miss you. But, who knows—maybe we shall soon follow you into Ningen-kai.”

“Or we’ll still wait here when you come back,” Okame replies. “Either way, look after Yumeko-chan for us. Tell her we still miss her.”

Tatsumi feels choked up, but he cracks a smile. “I will.”

A heavy silence falls. The pull grows stronger. None of them know what to say.

“Thank you all,” Tatsumi says at length. “I’ll never forget what you three did for me.”

Daisuke smiles. “Don’t mention it.”

“That’s what friends are for,” says Reika.

Friends, Tatsumi repeats in his head. His friends.

He’s going to miss them so much.

But the pull grows ever stronger, nearly impossible to resist. “It’s almost time,” Tatsumi says. “I—”

This is as far as he gets before Okame pulls him into a crushing embrace.

Tatsumi splutters, but before he can respond, Daisuke and Reika join them to form a big hug-pile. Tatsumi tries to hug them all back at once, physical impossibilities be damned. Okame sniffles a little.

“Take care,” he says. “Good luck.”

Tatsumi closes his eyes. Then, suddenly, the pull grows too strong, and he transforms into a ball of light and starts drifting away towards Ningen-kai…towards a new life, hopefully with Yumeko.

On the grass by the shrine, the other three remain behind.

Okame wipes his eyes, sniffling again. “I miss him already,” he says.

“Me too,” Reika answers. “Now who am I supposed to give tired looks to when you two are being ridiculous?”

Daisuke smiles sadly.

“We shall all miss him, I think,” he says. “After all, he is part of the family.”

---

From the chamber of Kage Haruko’s daughter-in-law erupt the cries of a newborn baby.

Kage Kousuke has a little brother. The child has wide, solemn eyes with a hint of purple, and somehow he looks like he has already been to this chamber, this palace.

They name him after a hero, the fearless young shinobi who slayed the Harbinger and then the kitsune god.

A boy named Tatsumi will surely be just as brave.

[bloodtroth]

Hello! Not sure if you are taking prompts but if so... Jealous Albus. I read quite great fics, including some of you (You Are Driving Me Crazy was great) with Gellert as the jealous one. I think it'd be interesting to see the usually controlled Albus show this side of him. Teen or adult, fluffy or angst, it's up to you.

A/N: So, sorry, anon that this took like. idk six months maybe. I started like three different fics on this concept until I finally managed to write this today. Hope you like it and that it at least somewhat resembles what you were after.

This was a bad idea. Albus knew that but, somehow, he was still standing there, staring down the slope at Nurmengard castle. The wind was tugging at his robes, carrying the autumn chill deep into his bones as he stared at the fortress surrounded by a barren landscape. The castle was lovely, but it stood alone, the desolateness of the surrounding mountains sharpening the feeling of acute loneliness Albus felt standing there. It did not feel like a place where Gellert should live.

Coming here had been just a moment's impulse, inspired by the pictures he had seen months ago that still haunted him. Images of a young man in an alleyway in New York, his face enveloped by Gellert's hands, his disguised face much too close to the boy’s own. The boy was with Gellert now. He imagined where else those hands had been by now.

He should leave. He should leave now. There was nothing to be gained here. He and Gellert had been over for a long time, even if his heart had difficulty letting go. He was a fool. A damn fool who should know better. He should leave now. He took a step back, intending to disapparate when he heard a rustle coming from behind him.

"Leaving so soon?" a voice asked. Albus closed his eyes. It was a voice he could recognise anywhere. It had haunted him for years, following behind his steps like a shadow, intruding frequently into his nights, in both dreams and nightmares. Still, he had almost forgotten the cadence of it, the deep smoothness that made him think of the nights spend inside the barn, their hair tousled and sweat drying on their skin. He did not dare to open his eyes. It would be too real. He would be too real.

Warmth washed over his back as Gellert stepped closer to him. It made Albus shiver and, instinctively, press closer to his warmth.

A deep chuckle reverberated between them, and it felt as if it was amplified by the mountains surrounding them.

Gellert's moustache tickled against Albus's cheek.

"You are freezing," he murmured.

A second later, it felt as if a warm blanket settled over Albus, blocking out the chilly mountain air.

Finding his voice, Albus thanked him quietly, well aware that those were the first words he had said to Gellert in years. (The last words had been shouted through tears as he was cradling his sister's dead body, his heart breaking in too many ways he never managed to count. He could not recall what he had said. The shock had erased it from his memory. Had it been words of hate, or had he been begging him to stay? He couldn't remember. And he did not wish to.)

Hands came to rest on his shoulders, and steadily, reluctantly, Albus was turned to face the source of both his greatest regret and his greatest joy. Thumbs swept gently across his eyelids, pressing them lightly, urging at him to open his eyes.

Slowly, Albus did, not certain if the sight of Gellert’s face alone would be enough to make him weep. He blinked, and there Gellert was, flesh and bone, not a reflection he could not touch or speak to. His white hair fell in small curls across his high cheekbones, framing his mismatched eyes that shone from his pale skin like two gemstones. There was a smile on his face, just a slight lift of his lips. Cautious, but resembling the one Albus had been graced with in happier times.

Albus smiled in return. He wondered if it looked as broken as he felt, standing there in front of a man who had caused the world great pain, knowing it, and desiring him still.

Gellert's hands slid down his cheeks, down his arms, coming to grasp Albus' hands in between his, his fingers sliding almost proprietarily across the scar on Albus' palm, making the skin tingle in their wake. Gellert's eyes flickered from their hands to his face.

"May I ask you what brings you here?"

Albus looked down as well, uncertain of what to say; how to explain his behaviour when it did not make sense even to himself. Jealousy. That was the only answer Albus could come up with, and it was not one he was willing to share. He felt foolish even thinking it. Gellert was not his. Had not been for years. And Albus knew very well he used his charm carelessly to get what he wanted. It had gotten him Albus, after all. Feeling more foolish than ever, Albus withdrew his hands from Gellert's grasp. His hands felt empty, and he quickly slid them into the pockets of his robes.

"I should not have come," he said quietly, turning to leave.

Before he could, a hand reached out to grasp him. It felt like a vice. Gellert turned him around roughly, and he gave a small wince. The hand loosened its hold.

Gellert's eyes were blazing, but his voice was quiet as he asked, "Please, mein Lieber. Why are you here?"

Albus closed his eyes at the endearment, feeling conflicted. He hated the power those words held over him, and simultaneously he craved it. Craved that feeling he had felt back in that summer, the heady passion of first, pubescent love blooming, the ache that he felt in his chest every time he looked at Gellert.

Sighing, he said, "I do not know." Gellert remained silent for once, letting him gather his thoughts. "It was a momentary impulse. I just needed to see- "

"Yes?" Gellert breathed in the air between them, his voice barely stronger than the wind.

"I- I needed to see you," Albus admitted, his voice equally quiet, the shame of admission weighing on him like an anchor in his chest. From the corner of his eye, he could see Gellert's lips lifting into a smile. The hands trailed down Albus' arms again in a slow caress.

"I see," Gellert said, and although his voice sounded nonchalant, Albus could hear how pleased he was. "Anything particular that prompted this impulse?"

For a moment, Albus thought of asking him, What is that boy to you? but he swallowed the question down like pieces of broken glass. Gellert had received enough victory today, without Albus giving him more with his childish jealousy. And he wasn't certain if he could bear the answer, for each answer Gellert could give was equally horrible, if for different reasons. 

Instead, Albus leaned forward to kiss him. Albus knew that Gellert could see it for the ploy it was, but he was counting on him playing along with their game. Gellert had already received his victory today. Albus was allowed leeway.

Gellert's lips were chapped slightly, and the tickle of his moustache against Albus was a new sensation. The way their lips fit together had changed; Gellert was taller now, equal in height to Albus, so no longer did Albus have to bend down to meet them. The touches were slow and deliberate, careful and controlled when in their youth their passion had been unrestrained, sometimes bordering on clumsy. Albus carefully tried not to think of how many lips Gellert had touched since then. His only experience had been a sad drunken snog behind a cottage in Hogsmeade that he had regretted as soon as it had happened and had tried not to think of since. Gellert’s hand slid into his hair and Albus tried not to think of who else those hands had touched; how many others Gellert had charmed into his bed. Gellert bit his lip gently, and Albus opened his mouth, allowing him to slide in his tongue. Gellert hummed, and the vibrations travelled through Albus' body, making him gasp. That, at least, was familiar. He had missed it. The way Gellert's hums reverberated from his chest to Albus, from his mouth to his, the way it made him feel-

With a gasp, Albus wrestled his lips from Gellert's. At some point, he had ended up pressed against the large stone wall to their left, and Gellert's hands had wandered to his hair, holding him tightly in place as the other had snuck beneath his robes to grasp at his hip. His own hands were buried beneath Gellert's cloak, wrapping tightly around his waist.

Closing his eyes, Albus lowered his forehead into Gellert's, listening to their heavy breathing. His heart was pounding rapidly in his chest, his legs shaking with tremors as arousal build between his legs. It felt tempting to just let it continue; to allow himself to be taken against the rocks, letting the stone carve marks of ownership on his flesh in bruises that would result. Or perhaps he could push Gellert onto the ground, straddle him and mark his skin so anyone who saw him bare would know what he had been doing, would know that Gellert did not belong solely to them. 

But shame, his constant companion, was slowly creeping back in. Those hands that were touching him so gently, they had ruined families, they had killed more people than Albus dared to count, people he knew and people he had not, and they would continue to do so. (She had been wearing their mother's blue dress that day; at fourteen already tall enough to fill it. In her hair had been braided pale blue flowers, the colour of the sky in summer. Leta, who carried the same shame as him, and whose last words had been of love. Aurors, whose families Albus knew, whose children he had taught.) Sliding his hands to Gellert's, he pulled them away and placed them between them. He held them for a moment, examining the new wrinkles that had replaced the smoothness of youth.

"I have to go," he said quietly. Gellert looked at him from a moment, the look in his eyes impenetrable, his hand coming to brush Albus' hair back into place before he stepped back.

Breathing easier, Albus stepped past him, adjusting his robes.

"I look forward to seeing you again," Gellert murmured.

Albus paused. "It will be the last time."

"Perhaps."

Two steps further.

“I missed you as well.”

Albus’ steps faltered. Admission and bait at one. A gift given for the victory Albus had granted him.

Closing his eyes, resisting the urge to look back, Albus spun on the spot and left Gellert behind, standing on the rocky hills above his solitary fortress.

[flowers-creativity]

Almost the Full Set

Fandom: The Musketeers Characters: Aramis (René d’Herblay), d’Artagnan (Charles), Porthos du Vallon, Athos (Comte de la Fere) Prompt: Dragging themselves along the ground Warnings: Injuries (bloodless), pain, basic field medicine Summary: When things go wrong on a mission, Aramis has little choice but hide and trust in his friends to find him.

Notes: Whoo boy, this is indulgent and very whumpy XD.

@badthingshappenbingo​

Read it on AO3

The Musketeer bent low over his horse's neck, face almost in its mane, as he narrowed his eyes, trying to discern the path in the low light. He could feel the poor animal's muscles tremble beneath him and knew he had to stop and rest soon. Already, he had had to slow down considerably from the earlier headlong flight, or else he would have risked injury to his horse and himself when the forest grew denser around him. Luckily, the same applied for his pursuers, and the sounds of their calls and horses had all but ceased – he wasn't sure if he had succeeded in shaking them completely but at least he had put distance between them and him.

Aramis felt for the thick package of papers in his shirt beneath his doublet. So far, so good. It was fortunate that their Captain had had warning that someone would try to intercept them on their mission, so they had prepared for the eventuality of being separated. They each bore a package with the King's seal but he knew that his package was blank inside. So were the packages Athos and Porthos were carrying – the lot of carrying the real documents had fallen to d'Artagnan this time. He hoped that all of his brothers had escaped, naturally, but the price if their youngest was caught was the highest. And they had almost made it to their destination, too …

The marksman shook his head to dislodge the distracting thoughts. There was no use speculating on the others' fate – he had to concentrate on his own path, and hopefully they would all reach the meeting point with the courier who was to receive the documents the next day. He ruthlessly shoved down the what-if thoughts dogging his heels.

Suddenly, something small and dark darted out of the underbrush and right between his horse's hooves. The beast, already at the end of its tether, reared up, dancing on its hind legs as Aramis latched onto its mane, trying to rein it in. But whether it was the horse's fatigue or his own, whether his skills deserted him in the moment or the animal was too far gone to react to his guidance, the next moment, the reins were torn from his grip, and then he was suddenly weightless, suspended in mid-air for what seemed to last forever, before the ground came rushing at him. He landed hard and then tumbled down a slope ass over head, pain shooting through his body so relentlessly that he could barely figure out where it originated. His head hit a rock, and darkness rose around him. The last thing he knew before it swallowed him was his body rolling to a stop in an awkward sprawl, limbs akimbo.

Then he knew no more for a long time.

Aramis' eyes fluttered open, a groan working its way up his throat. He forced himself to halt the upward movement his body instinctively wanted to engage in and to lay still and take stock. He ached. It seemed to be everywhere, and it took some time to disentangle what was what. His head was ringing from the blow it had suffered, and he raised a hand to run it carefully over the back of his head which felt like a tonne of bricks when he raised it. There was a big lump at its back, and he flinched when his fumbling fingers pressed on it. On the plus side, his right arm was obviously in working condition. He flexed his left hand and gasped at the sharp pain in his wrist that answered the small movement. Alright, the left arm was not quite so whole … His legs were next, and it only took another small movement to tell him that his right arm was probably all he had going for him. His left leg was agony radiating from the lower leg up to the hip and down into the toes – the right was faring slightly better but also protesting any movement involving his knee.

Aramis took a moment to let the pain abate and just breathe, at the same time perking up his ears to check if he could hear anything. Had his horse run off? And what of his pursuers, had they caught up to him while he had been unconscious for however long it had been? There were no sounds beyond those common at night in the forest, bushes rustling and some bird calling in the distance.

Finally, he gathered his courage and, leaning onto his uninjured right arm, he pushed himself upright. Discomfort thrummed through him as the bruises undoubtedly painting his upper body made themselves known. Another minute to breathe, and then he clumsily patted his chest. While it awakened all sorts of pain, none of that was the sharp pain of a broken rib biting into the inside of his chest, so he hoped he had been lucky at least in that regard. Not that he was feeling lucky in any way … There was no sign of his horse, and he dared not whistle for it to return. If the men on his tail were still nearby, he would certainly reveal his location to them.

He went about checking his legs and left arm with his right and ended up determining that he had a badly sprained wrist, his right knee was dislocated, and his left lower leg was broken. Fantastic. With most of his limbs injured, he was practically immobile on the forest floor, with no horse that could help him escape and no chance of getting help since he had no idea where his brothers were, nor could he hope that anyone else was nearby who did not belong to his pursuers. As far as hopeless situations went, he did not care to imagine how it could be worse. And he could feel old ghosts starting to whisper at the back of his mind, reminding him of the last time he had been alone in a forest …

Aramis gritted his teeth and shoved back against the thoughts. He knew his brothers would come for him as soon as they could. The question was when that would be and what he could do until then. The temptation to simply lay back and fall asleep – or maybe pass out – to escape the pain of his injuries and the feeling of loneliness creeping up on him was strong. He looked around the small hollow he had landed in and up the slope he had rolled down. If he was lucky – a bold assumption right now – the riders had passed him by, not seeing the dip in the forest floor and following the trail left by his horse, but he could not be sure of it, having no idea for how long he had been laying senseless. As it was, his only protection was the shadow of the slope, the trees around him too far apart and sparse to offer much cover. That wouldn't do if they were still around or returned to search for him.

His gaze settled on a patch of brushwood between two trees a few lengths from him, and he exhaled slowly. He could crawl underneath there and be well-concealed from any spurious looks, though it might not offer much protection if someone was determined to find him. Still, it was all he had right now.

Slowly, with unending care, he turned onto his side and tried to get onto his hands and knees to make his way over. However, as soon as his weight shifted onto his right knee, his leg started screaming, and it took all of his willpower and nearly biting through his lower lip for him not to do the same. He collapsed forward onto his stomach, his left arm joining into the cacophony of his ailments when it was trapped underneath him. Aramis screwed his eyes shut, his breath coming in rapid bursts as he wrestled the pain back under control. It seemed to take ages until he could finally free his arm and now lay with his face in the soft forest soil, panting. It took even longer until he could muster the courage to try again. Shifting back onto his left knee had more pain racing up and down his leg but it was bearable – for a moment, until he moved his right arm forward and tried to follow it with the opposite leg, and the pain swelled in a horrible crescendo. This time, the part of his body that rebelled was his stomach, and he tried desperately to hold himself up as vomit punched its way up his throat and out of his mouth. At the last moment, he avoided falling into it face-first by letting himself sway and topple to the left, managing to get his arm out of the way in time. Then he lay on his side, heaving some last empty gasps, tears leaking from the edges of his eyes.

Wearily, Aramis finally raised his head to look around and think again. His situation had not changed, he still needed to get to the cover. Crawling on hands and knees was not an option, though, given his experiences right now. What else was there? He groaned as he had to admit there was only one other way he could think of right now, one that mostly required the work of his arms – he could probably use his left if he kept the wrist raised. He'd have to drag himself over the ground.

He still had so much dignity left that he did not simply flop onto his belly – and thereby into the pool of vomit – but laboriously turned onto his back and then back onto his belly on the other side. Then he took a deep breath and murmured to himself: “Get to it, Aramis!” He dug his left elbow into the earth first to test if it worked and managed to drag himself forward without his wrist touching anything. It was not graceful, nor was it painless, but bit by bit, hand over elbow, he managed to worm his way along the ground towards the promise of cover and safety. The drag marks he left behind were probably a heavenly present to any tracker who came by … He just had to trust that they were not easy to see from atop the slope, which was all he could hope for, really. If someone climbed down into the hollow, they would surely find him, drag marks or not.

By the time he made his way to the underbrush, he was trembling and his vision was swimming and darkening, starbursts of pain bursting through, and all he wanted to do was collapse. He forced himself to endure until he had dragged himself beneath the branches, though, and painfully manoeuvered around so his face was oriented towards the slope and the path atop of it, drawing his pistols and sword and laying them down at his right, ready to be taken up in a single movement.

Then he put his right hand beneath his head, resting his cheek atop it, and sighed out a last, torturous groan before he closed his eyes, and the darkness swallowed him.

The next time Aramis became fully aware, light filled the forest and made him wince as his eyes fluttered open. He had been dragged back to something like consciousness by pain a few times throughout the night but it never lasted long, and he was half expecting the same right now. Still, he tried again to open his eyes, squinting until they had become accustomed to the brightness. Then he lay quietly, taking stock and listening to any sounds infiltrating his impromptu hideout. His injuries still smarted but hadn't worsened, and he knew that while his throat was dry, he could stay in place for quite a while, maybe even one or two days, without being in danger. The thought sent his heart rate soaring, though, and he sent a fervent prayer to God that he would not be forced to endure this. Right now he was holding on, the early autumn forest still lush and green enough with only a few patches of red, brown and gold mixed in that he knew it was not the same. He still had to wrestle a jolt of panic down whenever he remembered that he was alone and barely able to move, and no one knew where he was.

Resisting the urge to shift which only would awaken his aches and injuries, he lay his head down again and sighed. At least his work of dragging himself into the shelter of the underbrush had paid off – he doubted the men were still nearby. Now he had to hope for the opposite, that he wasn't too well-hidden for Athos, Porthos and d'Artagnan to find him. “Hurry up, please,” he murmured to himself.

He drifted, then, the unrelenting pain and discomfort keeping him from surrendering to sleep again while he was too exhausted and sore to stay fully aware. This state was not that deep that the sound of voices did not pierce through the veil, however, and he raised his head, trying to listen intently.

“--sure?”

“--course not sure but--horse tracks--” Scraps of their talk floated down to him, and he held his breath. Oh, he hoped this was not his mind playing tricks on him, or was he delirious from pain and old ghosts?

“--like a goddamn needle--haystack.”

Throwing caution to the wind, he raised his own voice: “Athos! Porthos!”

There was a short silence, then he heard the best sound in the world: His best friend's voice, calling out in relief and disbelief: “Aramis!”, and then the sound of someone crashing and sliding down the slope.

“Here!” he called again, “I'm here!” He bit down hard on his lip as he moved stiff muscles to drag himself forward a bit, out of the underbrush's protective shadow.

Heavy steps came closer and then came to a stop before him. For a moment, he only saw boots in front of his face, then Porthos dropped into a crouch to meet his eyes. “There you are!” he said happily, relief in every line of his face. “What have you done to yourself this time?”

“I'll have you know it was my horse and the earth who did it to me,” Aramis huffed indignantly but then inclined his head in concession and enumerated: “Sprained left wrist, dislocated right knee, fractured lower left leg.” He hesitated but added: “Hit my head, too, and I was unconscious for a while, so possibly a mild concussion, too.” His head was actually the least painful part right now, and he was chalking his nausea the night before up to the pain rather a concussion, but those were hard to determine in yourself.

Porthos' eyebrows had risen ever higher with each item on the list, and Athos who was coming up behind him huffed in a mixture of exasperation and some relief: “You really outdid yourself this time.”

Aramis craned his neck up to look at his oldest brother and deadpanned: “Yes, well, I'm quite disappointed I didn't get the full set.” He nodded to his uninjured right arm. “Though I think there's also an extensive collection of bruises to go with everything else. I won't go tumbling down a slope again very soon, I assure you.”

“That's good to hear,” Porthos grumbled. “We all appreciate that.” He moved to one side and gestured to Athos to take the other as he carefully took hold of Aramis' left upper arm.

“You probably won't be doing much of anything for a while besides sitting around in bed and being bored to death,” Athos said mildly while he followed Porthos' example and grasped his arm on the right.

Aramis rolled his eyes which made his head ache more – alright, he had probably been right about the concussion – and replied: “Lovely.” He steeled himself for what would come next and bit down on any sounds of pain that threatened to escape when Porthos and Athos pulled him from the shrubs and levered him upright. It was still less painful than anything he could have done on his own, he was sure, and they did their best to be as gentle as possible. They slung his arms over their shoulders, and he put down his right leg very carefully to take some of his weight to prevent all of it resting on Athos' shoulders – the difference in height between Athos and Porthos meant that he was hanging slightly lopsided between them.

They waited quietly until he had adjusted to being upright and had stopped panting as if he had run for several leagues. His head suddenly snapped up, and he asked anxiously: “d'Artagnan?”

“He's up there with the horses,” Porthos soothed him.

Aramis breathed a sigh of relief. “The mission?”

“Completed,” Athos said as he and Porthos slowly began to move and Aramis did his best to at least move his right leg with them without jarring the knee too much, keeping the broken left leg clean off the ground. “d'Artagnan had arrived at the chateau first and had already handed off the papers to the messenger before Porthos and I got there.”

Aramis nodded. “Good work. So, was I the only unlucky man who had someone on their trail?”

Porthos snorted. “No, you only were the only unlucky one who fell off his horse,” he replied. He hesitated, then added: “Though I did get lost and only got there this morning when Athos and d'Artagnan were about to leave and look for both of us.”

“I'm quite thankful you made it in time,” Athos drawled, “one needle in a haystack is bad enough.”

“You did find this needle well enough,” the marksman said with a smile. “Thank you, brothers.”

The other two Musketeers did not reply – all of them had thanked the others for similar acts, and all of them had been told that there was no need for thanks but they still kept doing it. Aramis figured they had given up on protesting for similar reasons as he had. Some things just needed to be said.

Getting up the slope was difficult and painful for the injured man, and at one point Athos had to call for d'Artagnan to come and join them to help. The young Gascon followed the call with an eagerness that clearly told of how difficult it had been for him to stay behind and look after the horses while the others went to get Aramis. The marksman suspected that d'Artagnan had to restrain himself forcefully from accosting him with an embrace but as they were balancing quite precariously on the uneven decline, he was very glad that the Gascon did manage to do so and just went to help them without comment.

Finally, they arrived up top, and Aramis felt like collapsing on the spot. The others seemed to be aware of that, and Porthos and Athos carefully lowered him to the ground while d'Artagnan rushed off and returned a moment later with a water skin he thrust at Aramis. He took it gratefully and drank from it deeply but forced himself to stop and wait if the water would settle long before his thirst was satiated.

He was aware of d'Artagnan kneeling down at his side and Athos softly relating to him what Aramis had told them about his injuries. As long as they didn't touch him, however, Aramis did not care what they did right now, concentrating on catching his breath, taking some more sips from the water skin and waiting for some of the agony accosting his legs to die down. He was brought back to more awareness by d'Artagnan's hand on his arm and his voice saying his name.

“Aramis,” the Gascon repeated, observing him with a worried frown that smoothed out slightly when he raised his eyes to meet the young man's gaze. “I think we need to set the broken leg and relocate your knee before we can go,” d'Artagnan said uncomfortably. “Or do you think it's better to leave them until we're somewhere a physician can care for you?”

Aramis smiled grimly. “No, you're right,” he said, “the pain will far more manageable once everything is back where it belongs.” He did not look forward to it but it had to be done. While d'Artagnan had already proven an adept student in field medicine, he had little experience with broken bones as of yet. But Porthos and Athos were here, too, and had their fair share of experience in this regard.

d'Artagnan bit his lip worriedly but finally nodded, steeling himself, and got to his feet. “Porthos, can you find some sticks to splint his leg?” he requested. He fetched his medic satchel from his horse and returned to sort through it and ready a pile of bandages at Aramis' side. Then he held out a small flask of brandy to him. “Since we don't need it for any of your injuries, you may as well use it,” he smirked. “As impressive as they are, at least you did good work keeping this bloodless, for once.”

The marksman snorted and snatched the flask out of his hand. “We'll speak about that again when you come off your horse during a chase through a dark forest,” he replied, pointing it at the young man, then opened the flask and took a large swallow, relishing the burn down his throat.

“Pfft.” d'Artagnan only gave him an obnoxious grin, as if the idea of him falling off his horse was too ridiculous to contemplate, and Aramis rolled his eyes – ouch – and took another drink. Already he could feel some of the edges of the pain dull as the alcohol filled him with a subtle warmth.

Before long, Porthos was back with two sturdy pieces of a branch, and d'Artagnan looked them over with a satisfied nod. He then waved over both Porthos and Athos, positioning them to hold Aramis down while he knelt down next to his legs. “Ready?” he asked the injured man. Aramis took a deep breath and nodded – he was as ready as he'd ever be.

“On three,” d'Artagnan said, and Aramis braced himself. “One – two – three!” Pain burst from his leg and overwhelmed his vision, his mind, his body … For a moment, it was everything, and the rest of the world came back to him only slowly. He was aware of a large hand stroking his hair, of a deep voice murmuring something – he did not understand the words but the tone was soothing, comforting. Finally, he blinked his eyes open, tears clinging to his lashes and breaking the light into a kaleidoscope of colours. Porthos' face appeared over him, upside-down, and the brawler asked: “There, you back with us?”

Aramis nodded weakly. He raised his head until he could see d'Artagnan down by his legs and waved at him. “Go on,” he rasped, his voice rough and throat dry. He wanted to have this over with, delaying the inevitable would only make it hurt worse.

Porthos caught his head as he let it fall back again and lowered him carefully to the ground while there was quite some discussion between d'Artagnan and Athos he didn't follow. All that counted was that a bit later, one of them touched his hand and said. “All right, Aramis, here we go. On three. One – two – three!”

His other leg exploded in pain, and Aramis jerked upwards, throwing his head back. Strong hands held him down as he tried to escape, and he thrashed blindly. Maybe he was screaming, but he could not hear it himself over the ringing in his ears.

Sometime later he came back to himself, throat and head aching, but it was an improvement that he could actually feel this over the pain in his leg which was simmering down to a manageable level. Porthos was still at his side, stroking his hair, and he rolled his eyes upwards to meet his gaze. “Water?” he asked breathlessly.

Porthos nodded quickly, and a moment later a water skin appeared and was carefully held to his lips. He only took a few sips but they soothed his throat, and he sank back with a thankful sigh.

d'Artagnan reached for his hand to give it a squeeze and said: “It's over, you did it.” While the young Musketeer got to work bandaging both lower limbs, Athos got up and moved so he could kneel down opposite of Porthos, laying a gentle hand on Aramis' shoulder. “We'll rest a while so you can recover,” he told him. “What do you think how much time you need?”

“Athos, that's not fair!” Porthos protested but Aramis put a hand on his arm – or at least attempted to; he actually ended up patting weakly at the front of Porthos' doublet. “It's alright, Porthos,” he told him. Directed at Athos, he said: “d'Artagnan should have some of the powder for a pain draught – have him make me one, please. After that, I'll need to sleep for a bit, and then we can go. Two hours, maybe?”

Athos nodded and patted his shoulder. “I'm sorry, my friend,” he said, “but even if the mission is no longer pressing, we should get back to Paris. I'm sure you will recover better in a bed than camping on the forest floor, too.”

“Quite likely, yes. No need to apologise, I understand,” Aramis replied.

d'Artagnan joined the other two and handed Porthos a cup. “How are you doing?” he asked the injured man.

Aramis gave him a smile, even if it did not reach its usual brightness. “I'm alright and happy you've turned out such an adept pupil. Finish up with this one, please?” He gestured towards the sprained wrist.

“Of course,” d'Artagnan nodded. By the time he had wrapped the limb firmly with a bandage, Porthos had made the marksman drink the draught, and Aramis was blinking sleepily up at his brothers gathered around him.

“Sleep, Aramis,” Athos ordered, “we'll be here when you wake up, and we'll take you home then.”

Aramis nodded, his eyes heavy with fatigue. “I know. You always do.” And secure in this knowledge, he breathed out, closed his eyes and let sleep claim him.

[dcschain]

He'd begun drinking. Softly and then all at once, each night, like after she'd died and things had been too blind for comfort. Never too much, but just enough. A slow, inevitable climb to the top, before the headache and the nausea the morning after, and the emptiness. Oh, the emptiness. Emptiness he didn't think he had in him, but he knows better. Steven Deschain knows it, tenderly, the way a man is tender to the hangman's noose. He knows the ache is something more than simple ka-shume, that it is char-shume also.

And it is ka. And it is ka, without the comfort of a modifier, and then the thought dies there because it is too Robert, too many traces of it, too much like him. In every bit of the words. Him, spilling and spilling and spilling.

kit he's dead. kit. kit. leave him, kit. he's dead.

It hadn't worked. Kit had broken the ribs anyway, in such a terrible, terrible way, trying to massage a heart that had stopped two minutes earlier, unable to stop himself from falling down that cliff called hope. The snapping had struck him across the face, and it had left him wide-eyed, dumb beyond words, stripped of everything behind his teeth except the fire. The fire. The fire, leaking past his eyes in tears that left tracks of destruction. His anger had been nothing but pain unable to find itself. A signifier skewed and broken, the same anger he had been devoured by when Tjaša had died and the boys had died, too, and now, here, here an-tet between them. Steven ripped him from Handsome's body like a creature unable to want. Unable to. Unwilling to need. In his dinh's arms, clinging to them, Kit Johns had screamed, kicked his legs, and then he'd sunk to the ground.

And he'd wept, his hands balled into fists in his hair, on his knees. Those shoulders, heaving, and Steven's arms around them, and Steven's eyes closed, and Steven's lips to his temple, and nothing, nothing between them.

Then Burning Chris had been silent for a moment, and Steven's grip on him had swallowed itself off of him, water off the tin roof, and all he was left with were his hands to clench the air. Smoke signals from his breathing, in and out, the rasp of the choking, the tears pressing at the base of his skull. His dinh standing so still so silent so cold, incomprehensible in the reading. Already the language between them was faulty, broken, untranslatable. In all the meanings the word tet can have, theirs has been stripped of all of them except one, the final one. Char.

Kit had looked at a father with no words and then at a father who could no longer speak them. And all his love now broken rushing to fill his lungs and throat with fluid, with phlegm, with an anger so painful it almost, almost became hate.

Almost.

Some things you cannot hate. Some hearts you cannot hate or else your own will shatter.

oh steve. steve, steve. oh, steve.

The last one in the voice of an animal pleading to be spared the butcher's block. Unable to understand the cleaver beyond its most immediate meaning – death, blood, pain. Forced to confront the cleaver and bow to it. Not wanting it. Not wanting it. Knowing that it signified one thing and one thing only: an end.

Time too long to count.

get up.

He'd said it and wiped at his cheeks with the back of his hands.

get up, kit. we gotta bring him home.

In the end. He'd had to drag him up, hands under his armpits. For the beginning of that gesture, Kit had fought him. Then he'd just let it happen, moved like a doll, his legs barely transporting his body upright, letting Steven do the thankless work of pulling him up from the world of beasts.

Steven sits very still. There is a part of him that thinks if he never moves again ka will pass over him like an angel of death over doors marked with lamb's blood and another part of him simply cannot bring itself to claw its way out of the chasm. So he sits still, and empty, and unraveled.

The small corner of peeling wallpaper. The white sheets to cover the furniture. The bottle half-empty, the light of the moon from the window, the dust delicate shaping everything into a memory, the blood stains they never really could get out of the wooden floor after they had seeped into the rug, his hat left on the commode by the door out of habit even after nearly a decade, the wood of the bedframe pressing against his back from under the sheet and his legs, those long gunslinger's legs, splayed out in front of him. He stares at his boots without really knowing who they belong to, whose feet they're on, what body's this, whose heart he's supposed to be carrying.

Any other room, and Robert's laughter would have drowned him.

He stands once the bottle's empty. To move, he claws at whatever's left in the depth of him, grabs great desperate chunks of it and clings to them like a lifeline. Pulling, and pulling, and pulling, at a bare earth that can only yield devil grass, fingers cut on the blades. But he stands. Each morning, he stands. Each time the Tower needs him, he stands.

This time, though, he stands and can see how crooked his bones are, how the yoke weighs him down, how his shins are spattered with mud. He sees it. He feels it, and it gives him no more pause than it should.

The dead man touches the noose like a lover's hand.

Tenderness.

robert, did thee know? like i know?

Does it matter? Steven doesn't have the poetics of life and death inside him to be able to answer that question. His imagination limits itself to the bullet, and the hawk, and the gun, and what those three hold he knows well enough to understand the yoke and the noose are sides of the same coin. And that ka makes its course regardless of the suffering.

He knows Robert would have had something to say about that. Something about the loneliness of the dinh, and the fact that ka can mean both fate and I, first person, singular, and that no matter the truth of an, the loneliness of self is the loneliness of the Tower, supported by bonds and by beams. Eternally, eternally by itself, despite the world around it.

But Robert Allgood is dead, and so he has no words at all to share in the matter.

He's never really known the difference between grief and fear. Out of habit all his life he has called his fear anger, he has called his anger grief, and it has made him break ribs and beg lungs and try and rip hearts out with his fingers.

When he thought Alain dead his anger shattered more bones than he bothered counting. And when Tjaša died and died for real, his anger rested against his left lung and pumped blood through his body for the rest of his life.

Now this sadness has left him with no roots inside him. There's a nothing, and then there's Nothing, and it's the second that's made itself home in him. It's like drowning only there's no water.

Pain has stripped him of what little language he knew.

He hears the door behind him open. Hears it, but can't name it, in his grief, made tongueless and formless. He tries to wrangle himself to look over his shoulder, to look Louise in the eye after the pitiful performance he had in her parlour, but it isn't Louise.

It's Josiah, looking very cold, and very tired, and very sad.

“What th'fuck are ya doing here?”

It comes as whathfuckryadoinere. Whiskey makes his breath stink and his words melt. He doesn't turn to look at Joe fully, doesn't feel the need to. On the steps, his bottom aches and his knees are bent.

“The Lady Louise's asked me to see thee home, sai.”

He does not look glad at the prospect. Kit scoffs and takes another swig from the bottle. He swallows. He spits.

“I don't need the pity.”

ahdonneedthpity.

“It ain't pity. Sai.”

He reaches down to help Kit up. But alcohol or no, grief or no, Kit's still a gunslinger of the Great Line, and like a gunslinger, he moves. Too fast for it to be real. A foot and then another and then he's on his feet, turned around, and with his gun too close to Josiah's face for comfort.

“Don't touch me, don't fucking touch me.”

donfuckintouchme.

“I don't need the fucking Lady's pity.”

This one loud, loud enough to be heard even behind the door. Because he knows. Not like Robert knew her, marrow-deep, bone-tied, but he knows her enough to know what she tastes like, and that knowledge-flecks are in his blood like bone fragments after a fracture. And he knows she's listening. Or perhaps she hasn't moved out of the parlor because she can't move, and that suits him fine all the same. Let their grief fucking drown them, for all he cares.

The scabs on his palm have begun to itch.

“Or yours. Touch me again, Paine, and your brains are gonna end up all over this door yonder.”

“I don't think that would be advisable, sai.”

“No? We ain't got a need for 'ee anymore, Joe. He's dead, ain't ya heard? AIN'T YA FUCKING HEARD?”

The throbbing of pigeons' wings, startled into flight.

“He don't fucking need you no more. You're a dog with no fuckin' master, Paine. Don't you ever fucking touch me again.”

He spits. Josiah doesn't move his boots out of the way. When he blinks his vision's muddled, blurred, and the movement of his jaw clamps down on the grief, bit-in-mouth, bucking horse. Kit sees it all and scoffs. Kit doesn't see any of it and takes another swig.

“Pity ain't gonna bring him back to us.”

“No, sai. It will not.”

Christopher holsters his gun. He turns from Joe, and as he walks away Josiah sees him a little blurred, a little uncertain on his feet. Growing smaller the farther he goes.

When he goes back inside, the Lady Louise is no longer in the parlour.

christopher. help me.

They'd used Primrose's reins and the rope Steven had in his gunna. The branches had been easy enough to find. The knife had been Steven's. Kit had started building the travois and Steven had been able to stand aside for so long before needing to do, needing to keep his hands occupied so he didn't have to look at him in the shade where they'd moved him out of the wa-- where they'd moved him to keep him off the road because moving out of the way was something you did to objects and animals and not Robert Allgood, not Robert, not even if he was dead and the flesh was just flesh and the clothes just cloth and the hands just parts of a body.

Meat was meat: it did not care what sunlight you carried inside you.

It had taken too long to build it. They knew better. They knew how to make it better, faster, more efficiently, they knew how to make it so it wouldn't break and they had because they had been taught well, but it took them so much longer than it should have.

Working with the dead man right beside you. Meat was meat. Kit thought about it once too many times and vomited beside the wood he was fastening. Steven had let him, looking away past the dirt road with the bodies of the men who had killed Robert Allgood starting to attract crows with too many eyes and those skeletal vultures that ate and ate and ate and never seemed satiated.

Kit had vomited.

Steven's knees had given out. He'd staggered, first to one knee and then sitting, under the dead blackwood tree, with his hat off and his head in his hands and all around him the low, low, desperate moan of the earth. Every day inside him. Begging in tongues he'd never stopped and learned. His fingers in his hair and Kit staring blankly at his own rancid puddle of puke.

what a waste. what a damnable waste.

don't you fucking say that. don't you dare.

If there were any less grief inside him, Kit Johns would have been scared of those eyes, blank and blue, unyielding, as they looked up from the dirt and into him.

he died for thee, steven. i won't let you put that weight down by callin' it a waste.

Steven stood, then, and walked over to the travois. The affair of moving the body was wordless. If Steven had seen the kiss Kit'd pressed to that dead mouth, he'd said nothing of it, but in the silence after he'd reached for Kit Johns to hold him one last time, their foreheads pressed together, his hand to the back of Christopher's head. Dinh for one last time.

After that, the grief had done the rest.

The tet had broken.

[aliceslantern]

Beyond this Existence: Atonement, chapter 5

Ansem always had a penchant for strays, so it's not at all surprising when he takes in the orphaned child Ienzo. The boy's presence changes everything, far more than Even is willing to admit. Ienzo's brilliance seems promising, but the arrival of a young Xehanort pushes the apprentices onto a dark, cruel, inhumane path which will affect the future of the World. And even once it's all over with--once Xehanort is dead--they still must pick up the pieces, forgive one another, find a way to atone for their atrocities, and struggle to accept the humanity which has been thrust upon them.

Or: Even's journey from BBS through post-KH3

Read it on FF.net/on AO3

---

“How is he? Has he yet stabilized?” He recognizes the deep voice almost instantly. Lexeaus. Ah. So I lived.

He can’t open his eyes, can’t, in fact, move at all. But the moment he’s conscious pain invades, his innards feeling vaguely liquified.

A second voice, hoarse, almost inaudible--”No. Not yet.”

“You needn’t speak, Ienzo. I know it’s still painful.”

Ienzo?

“I’m fine,” the second voice mumbles. He doesn’t sound fine; he sounds very ill, or worse. “You should--” A cough, one not full of phlegm but inflammation.

“You’ve been taking good care of me. I’m back on my feet. You, on the other hand, need to rest. And to avoid talking for a little while.”

“Okay.”

A warm hand grasps his wrist, taking his pulse. A pen scribbles numbers. He must've been given painkillers; he sleeps.

This time he's able to open his eyes.

He recognizes the space instantly; it's his old med bay, in Radiant Garden. Why on earth is he here, not in his sterile, pristine facilities at the castle?

Lexeaus had called Zexion Ienzo.

Oh dear.

Was it possible? Had they--regained hearts somehow? Had they found the answers in Kingdom Hearts? And how was he still so injured if it's been that long?

He hears the door creak and slits open his eyes.

He sees the boy--the young man--rummaging in his cabinets. He looks much the same as he ever did, though, he notes, the boy (Ienzo?) Is dressed in white, apprentice garb. The boy turns and Vexen quickly shuts his eyes again.

The boy clears his throat. "I'm not sure if you can hear me," he says, haltingly. His voice is much clearer, and certainly the same timbre as Zexion's, but it carries something soft and alive in it Vexen's never heard. "Even… it's me, Ienzo. I'm sure the old names are a shock to hear."

Old?

"We're human again. We found out… once a person’s Heartless and Nobody have been vanquished, they reform in the place they were split, whole. But with our Nobody's injuries. Which is why you're so hurt. I… I've no idea what truly happened to you, but you're rather unstable. You and Dilan both. But I'm tending to you."

Human?

"If you could speak… open your eyes… twitch your fingers… the EEG machines are broken and I've no magic. I'm not even sure you're in there."

Human and powerless.

"I--" He exhales thickly, and Even (the name fits again like a glove) realizes he's upset. Twelve years of emotion battering him, he presumes, child to adult in one instant. The concern wells up in him, consumes him; the pain sears him, and he's no idea whether or not it's physical.

---

Again, Even wakes. He can feel motion returning to him bit by bit, and he can close his fingers into weak fists. The physical pain is less potent now, but instead one thing floods him, sickly and constant.

Guilt. Rivers of shame, streams of remorse. Guilt for the way he stopped caring about Ienzo, guilt for all he did to the people of their experiments, agony about Ansem. Darkness can only excuse so much.

"Hi, Even."

Ienzo's back. Even can't bear to speak to him, though he's sure he can. He feigns unconsciousness, slitting his eyes open for glances of the young man.

Ienzo looks pale, thin, the boyishness gone from his face, but the change makes him look unhealthy. His hands, when they feel Even's pulse, are clammy, oddly warm without gloves. Even can't remember the last time he's actually seen them. He's aching to look the boy in the eyes. He chances it, once, while Ienzo fusses with the bandages on his chest; gone are Zexion's steely, empty blue eyes. The humanity is back, soft, opening.

He can tell from a glance that Ienzo is in agony.

More horrifying yet, he can just see below Ienzo's collar when he leans over--thick bruises surround his windpipe, along with an angry red scar.

He'd had difficulty speaking.

Who dared do this to him?

Unconsciously, the boy pulls his collar up. Even forces his eyes shut. "I'm afraid there's a lot to catch you up on," Ienzo says in that same frighteningly gentle tone. He explains about Xehanort, about the time travel, about the vessels, the hearts the Nobodies are regrowing, the Organization's real goal, the Keyblade War from the old times. "I… I could really use your help, Even. I know I was so dreadfully cold to you. I… I am sorry. You were always kind to me when I was small. You were there when Master Ansem was not--" His voice catches. "Excuse me, I am feeling unwell."

Even hears him sit and chances another look. Ienzo sits with his head in his hands, rocking slowly, trying not to cry.

No, boy, cry. It's alright.

"I… forgot how much this hurts," he says, with a dark laugh. "I am… so unsure of who I am… you'd doubtless find it fascinating. Can you imagine the psychological journals, Even? What happens when you try to give a twenty-year-old man an eight-year-old's heart?" A sob. "I'm so sorry. I… am trying to pull myself together. They need me. But I could never let them see me like this."

Cry it out, little one.

For a time, Ienzo does just that, a sound that makes Even's heart (heart) ache, triggering another vein of remorse.

I should have protected you.

"I'm sorry," he repeats. Even shuts his eyes again. He feels Ienzo take his hand. "This is most unbecoming, isn't it? I bet you'd say I'm making a disgrace of myself. I have to… check on some things. Get some rest."

For a long while Even lies reeling. His physical pain lessens  into a throb, while his heart seems to grow heavier and heavier with regret, the I should'ves and that's my faults. Ienzo and Ansem take center stage, his abuse and dishonesty towards them pounding in time with his heart.

Ienzo comes and goes every few hours. Even is too much of a coward to talk to him.

"It's… bizarre," the boy says. "Your body… is healed. Why aren't you awake?" Even hears a click, sees bright light; he wills himself to flinch as little as possible as the boy forces his eyes open. "Even, if you're pretending, it's alright. We can work through this."

Don't move. Don't move.

"If only we had a replica for you… or one in general…"

Why do they need one?

"I miss my old friend. Come back soon."

He's gone again, and Even aches for him. The loneliness is nearly as potent as the guilt.

He can't lie like this forever. He needs to make a decision, needs to talk to the boy, needs to begin to figure out where to go from here--

"You're so full of shit."

It's the voice that startles him. Braig. Of course the man is back too. He opens his eyes. Unlike Ienzo, he's in the Organization coat still.

The true vessels.

The fool.

Even stares at him. "Is there a reason you're here?" His voice is hoarse from disuse, but clearer than he thought. "Perhaps to put an old man out of his misery?"

Braig smirks. "You wish," he says. "I've been watching these tender scenes play out between the two of you. Who thought Ienzo would be such a softie? To think, he was wanted."

"By Xehanort, I presume?" He spits.

"Who else?" Xigbar shrugs. “He's good. So quickly. A heart and instantly everything changes. But there's no point getting rid of him. Xemnas is sentimental. Who would’ve thought?"

So callous. Even scowls.

"How's humanity feel?" he asks, with a smirk. "You look like death. Bet you feel like it too."

"Is there a reason you're here?" he repeats.

"Let's just say I have a proposition for you." He scowls a little. "We could use you. He could use you."

A spark, an idea. "Why should I? What do you have to offer me?"

"We're closer than ever to Kingdom Hearts. If that doesn't intrigue you, I don't know what will." Xigbar comes closer, his footsteps almost silent. "Would you rather stay here? Crappy place, overworked and underappreciated… reminders of the past everywhere. Doesn't it just hurt. "

He has to restrain himself from rolling his eyes.

"If you can barely look at Ienzo…" He clucks his tongue. "Why don't you think about it? I got the impression you never liked humanity anyway."

"Nor you," Even says softly. "This life just doesn't suit creatures like us."

Xigbar smirks and disappears into a dark corridor.

---

An idea comes to him slowly, fettered by guilt and headaches, and Ienzo's surprisingly loose tongue. Zexion was verbose but careful; Ienzo talks almost constantly, with little ability to stop himself.

"I'm… almost at my wit's end," the boy admits. "I'm inundated by what we did… I knew it, factually, but Zexion made my memories so cold. To feel it…" He rumples the curtain at the window. Even's glad he doesn't look at him; it means he can watch him. "How could we? I… I don't understand how we made the leap. Was it all the influence of Xehanort, or darkness? Why did they let me--do this?"

The weight of it might just choke him. They'd started this darkness, made it spread faster than it would've naturally; they upended a balance just to see what would happen, with little care who or what was lost.

I took an oath.

Even's a bloody hypocrite.

"I've been trying to help them," Ienzo says. "Sora, the restoration committee. They've been so terribly gracious about it. It truly is the least I can do. I've given them everything that I had, but you classified and encrypted so much. They have a right to know what really happened. Maybe if they know… their outside perspective can help us put a stop to it. I… wish you were here, Even. There's so much you never told me, things that could be of use. We… need a light. I don't understand a whit of your research, the small bits I've managed to decrypt. I wonder if this reformation process has given me some form of brain damage." A wry laugh. "These emotions do make me feel… much clumsier. Doesn't help I've been using you as a captive audience. But the others… truly cannot understand what it is I'm going through. I wish I were able to find it fascinating. Mostly it is hampering my ability to be of use."

He's silent a long time. When he speaks again, it's much more quietly, to himself. But Even's always had good hearing.

"If I can break the code… find Roxas… it could change everything. But the bodies… I need to know what Even knew."

He hears Ienzo leave. Slowly, Even sits up. He feels weak from being so still for so long, but otherwise functional.

It all makes sense. Everything.

Yes. This would be how he can atone.

---

Xigbar returns soon after. Even's already sitting waiting for him. "I'll go," he says tiredly. "Seems to be the only way to further my research. I've no need for such... paltry emotions."

Xigbar's grin is killer.

---

The transformative process is just as painful the second time. Again the emptiness. He feels his mind wander, tempted again by darkness, by the ability to set bonds aside, but he reigns himself in each time. Thinking of Ienzo, his devastation, of his betrayal of Ansem's trust. He doesn't feel quite hurt anymore, but it weighs heavily on his conscience. No matter.

He can fix this. He will fix this. No matter the cost.

He acquiesces to the New Organization’s demands, because they, too, need replicas. All the more excuse to perfect what he knows, to leave the most flawless in stock for Roxas and for Xion--though he can barely remember the latter. All he has of it-- her --are his own reports. But if she were with Roxas long enough, she’ll be important. More convenient yet, Xemnas wants her, her easy mimicry of power.

There are too many familiar faces in this New Organization--Organization Rehash, Larxene calls it, and Vexen can’t help but agree. Xigbar, Saïx, Xemnas, the four neophytes.

Saïx is initially welcoming to him, and visits him again.

“To what do I owe the pleasure,” Vexen says evenly.

“I wonder if you feel it too,” the man says.

“Feel what, nostalgia? That’s all this Organization is.”

“You gave up your new life. That says a lot about you. Was this truly about research?”

Vexen turns, sorting the lies he could tell.

Saïx knots his hands. “I gave mine up too.”

Vexen rolls his eyes, turning back to the new replicas, still forming in their chambers. “Yes. And?”

“I wish to… put an end to this nonsense. I sense you may feel the same.”

Vexen looks at him, his gold eyes (so like Vexen’s own, now--he tries not to think about it more than necessary) somewhat unreadable. Is this a trick? Are they trying to lure him out?

Saïx leans in a little, drops his voice. “Let me help you,” he says softly. “Together, we can put an end to this Organization.”

Vexen feels the gut punch; caught. Yet, he reads earnestness in Saïx’s tone.

“You were once my teacher,” he continues. “I know what you’re capable of, and vice versa. I think--if we’re careful and clever--we can give the other side what they need.”

“How am I to know you won’t merely turn me in to Xehanort?”

“It matters not to him whether you fill out the ranks so long as he gets his bodies. Not since you and Demyx have been… ah… retired. He’s spread himself too thin, shattering his heart so. He wouldn’t notice a thing.”

Vexen inhales.

“I don’t want to be this way. I don’t want this to be my legacy. I’m sure you feel the same. We must end this suffering.”

“And how do you propose we do that?”

Saïx smiles. “Simple,” he says. “We do what he asks--and have a third party ferry a replica over to Radiant Garden. One whose movements are hardly ever noticed--because that’s the way he likes it.”

Vexen has an idea where this is going. “...Do I even want to know who you have in mind?”

The smile becomes even larger.

---

Demyx agrees to meet him in Radiant Garden. To be so close to Ienzo but unable to contact him is a sensation that sits oddly in his breast. Vexen explains it as simply as possible, but Demyx’s reaction is relatively theatrical.

“What? ” He’s making much too much noise--Vexen clamps a hand over his mouth.

“Quiet, you dunce,” he hisses.

Demyx swats his hand away. “But dude, why would you pick me?”

“I cannot let the chosen catch wind of this, understand?”

Immediately he gets defensive. “Oh, I see, it’s because I got benched.”

This is more frustrating than he could have hoped. His tone is much shorter, and louder, than he intended. “I got “benched” too.”

“What! Hey, quiet.” Now it’s Demyx’s turn to try to silence him.

They both look around and see nothing, though admittedly this is meaningless. Vexen turns away, trying to think.

“Okay, man, look. Real talk? Backstabbing those guys would be stupid.”

Vexen rolls his eyes. As if this life is truly worth anything.

“If they find out, we’re yesterday’s toast. I mean, what’s in it for me?”

Vexen wonders if this angle is the right one. “Forgiveness.”

He seems genuinely surprised. “Huh? For what?”

“Men like us--in the pursuit of science, we sometimes make terrible mistakes. Lose sight of our mission to help people. But now I can help someone with my research. Now, I can atone.”

The boy’s been listening with interest, a calculating gleam in his eyes. But what he says next is only further disappointment. “I’m not a scientist.” He turns to leave, with a dismissive wave.

Something very like panic overtakes him--if the chosen heard of this--”Wait, wait, wait!” He grabs Demyx’s shoulder. The younger man shrugs him off with ease.

“C’mon, dude. I’m useless, I’m chicken, we’re not friends. I can count the amount of times we’ve hung out on one hand--less than one hand. I didn’t even know you in the old life!”

Enough of this. For a moment, Vexen wishes he had more patience with Demyx in the past, if only to make this encounter easier. “Fine, fine. But listen.” He pulls the boy close. “This is Saïx’s doing.”

Demyx’s eyes widen almost comically. “Huh? No way.”

Good. He has his interest. “It’s true. The whole thing was his idea.”

“Huh… no fucking way…”

“He wants to atone too. But, he is one of the chosen, so his hands are tied. Hence my actions on his behalf, hence my need for you to act on my behalf should all go awry.” He’s listening intently, Vexen notes. He could use Xehanort’s callousness towards Demyx to his advantage. “As you said, we are far from friends. No one would ever suspect you.”

“So I’m not doing any fighting?”

“Correct. And more importantly, no benchwarming.”

He smiles, and Vexen knows he’s won. “Yeah baby! Sign me up! Yes! Demyx time.”

Vexen sighs heavily. This certainly would be interesting.

---

He’s more than a little alarmed when he catches wind that the “chosen” are seeking Ansem. Apparently, the man’s been spotted in Twilight Town. Xehanort’s Heartless intends on intercepting him. The man is too dangerous.

Vexen doesn’t hesitate. He’s abandoned Ansem once; never again.

He’s been mostly ambivalent to his status as a Nobody, but it does grant him a certain strength he didn’t have before. He’s able to stop Xehanort’s Heartless, to let Ansem escape. It comes to him, in a flash--the chosen hardly ever watch him, now that they’ve gotten their bodies--perhaps he could let Ansem know, to get the word back to Ienzo and the others. Perhaps he and Demyx could rendezvous, with the replica. Ienzo would need his help. Doubtless the reunion would be… dramatic, but he knows the boy is capable of completing the task at hand.

It’s time to shore up. Time to stop being a coward. Time to apologize.

But he is glad that, as a Nobody, he cannot feel much.

Ansem looks as though he’s aged much, much more than twelve years, despite the fact that he could not age in the realm of darkness; it seems as though there are many more years between them than merely five. He’s with some teenagers, those friends of Roxas, those assisting, albeit in a very tertiary manner.

Even struggles to find the words, to assuage them all he means no ill will. “My dear Master,” he says slowly. “You are safe.” It’s a lame, tone-deaf beginning. Because they are anything but.

“Who’s there?” one of the teenagers yells.

In a shockingly even-keeled voice, Ansem asks, “Even, is that you?” A beat. His expression barely changes, all coldness and indifference--not that Vexen anticipated anything more. “So, those Nobodies were your doing.”

Vexen lets the Dusks appear. Then, very deliberately, he bows. “I have been waiting for this,” he admits. “Gave up a normal life in order to plant myself in the Organization. And when I heard Xehanort had gone looking for you, I realized it was my chance to find you as well.” And keep you safe. “For you see, I, too, wish to atone.”

Ansem’s expression is closely guarded, but he very nearly smiles. “Is that so?” he asks slowly.

“How could I not? To be human for those days again… made it all so real.”

The teenager who’d yelled gave him a once over. “You’re one of them, aren’t you,” he spits. “Sora told us about you.”

Vexen ignores him. “I wish to help. I… realize you have no reason to trust me.” He chances taking a few steps forward. “I also realize any apology I offer could never possibly be enough.”

Ansem is silent for several moments. “Am I not at fault, as well?” he asks.

“You��” He wants nothing more for these teenagers to disappear. “You still didn’t deserve the fate you received.”

His eyes are empty--so empty. He turns to the children. “Thank you for all your help, but this man will not harm me. Come, Even. Apparently we have much to discuss.”

Vexen wills the Dusks to disappear. They walk for a long time in silence, the two of them, in this perpetual sort of twilight.

“We cannot return to the mansion. It’s being watched for now,” Ansem says. “Keep your voice low.”

“We seek to take down the new Organization,” he says. It’s beyond odd to be this close to him.

“We?”

“Myself. The man you knew as Isa.”

Ansem smirks. “And how do you propose to do this?”

“In these intervening years… I did perfect the replica program. More or less.” He doesn’t feel pride any longer. “We have a… third party willing to deliver one directly to Radiant Garden, for Roxas’s heart. To Ienzo.”

Ansem’s calm exterior slips, for just a moment. “How… is my boy?”

“I did not see him for very long,” Vexen says. “He is… well. Whole again.”

“You hesitate.”

“Of course I do.” He takes a breath. “He’s received his humanity after years of numbness. The adjustment… I fear it’s not been easy. But I have faith. His brilliance has only grown with him.” He sighs. “With this replica, and our ally, I wish that you, Master, will go to him.” Ansem says nothing; his face is stony. “I realize the feelings you have are complicated. But he needs someone to help him, and I must keep my cover.”

“...Yes. Quite.” He nods. “However could I face that poor boy?”

“With the warmth and grace you’ve always had,” Vexen says softly. “Once this is all over… humbly, I would like to return as well.” If he survives the process. “That is, if you’ll have me. I wish to do nothing more than to ease the pain I’ve caused. I should like to regain your trust.”

Ansem nods once. “This is a good start.”

---

It pains him, to not be present for all this, but his own feelings and notions are irrelevant. He dresses the replica in a coat to protect it, wraps it up further in a blue blanket--almost like an infant.

Demyx arrives--on time, for the first instance that Vexen’s ever witnessed. “So, here we go, right?” He’s smiling.

“...Quite.” He touches Demyx’s shoulder. “I must… thank you for doing this.”

He shrugs. “I’ve been thinking about it. It’s not right for Xehanort to use us for his own stuff, you know? It kinda bites.”

Vexen chuckles. “Indeed. I’m afraid I must ask one more thing of you.”

He rolls his eyes, but his tone is affable when he says. “For pete’s sake, what now?”

“You and I must lie low, once this is through. We must wait and hope for Xehanort’s defeat.”

Demyx glances down at the replica, in its swaddling. “...And then what?”

“Whatever you like, I suppose.”

He bites his lip. “Yeah… that might be nice.” He hefts the replica over one shoulder. “This thing is hollow, huh?”

“Not for long. You know where to go?”

“Yeah, get the old man. I hear you.”

Vexen sighs. “Good luck, Demyx.”

For just a moment, before he disappears into darkness, Demyx smiles, and it’s the most genuine expression Vexen’s ever seen him wear. “You, too.”

---

He can’t be certain that Ienzo receives the replica, can’t chance checking. He goes to an anonymous world, hides in the wilderness. He waits, and to a degree he prays. Weeks pass. He wonders if he should chance contact, should see how things have gone--between Ienzo and Ansem, and along with Dilan and Aeleus, there shouldn’t be any issues with the procedure.

Then he feels an ache in his heart--the heart he doesn’t quite have. The piece of Xehanort. Without hesitating, he returns to Radiant Garden, knowing that he will not have the ability to travel for long.

Because it’s withering, and dying; he can feel the sickly pain, the feverishness, inexplicable agony in his whole body. It must’ve worked. They must’ve beat Xehanort.

It’s all over. At last.

[mskatesharma]

Alone

SPOILERS FOR 8x01

Working title ‘Jonno Really Needs a Hug’. So I realise I’m a week late with this, but I’ve been trying to properly sort out my thoughts on that parentage reveal by Sam (not one thought is pleasant) and this attacked me yesterday evening, and wouldn’t stop hounding me until I wrote it. So here, have some word vomit of Jon Snow dealing post parentage reveal. Let me know what you think! :)

The air is thick, getting thicker, Jon can feel it sticking like tar, and he’s choking. He’s long since told Sam to leave him, but his words linger, fester, and Jon can feel the truth of them on his chest. Did you know?

He had come down to the Crypts to seek some solace, some quiet. A familiar tiredness had started to settle into his bones again, since arriving back at Winterfell, and Jon found himself aching for the silence of the Stark family tombs, the comfort he always found from his Father’s statue. What would he have done in my place? It only took a few words for Sam to shatter the borrowed peace, to shatter Jon.

The air starts to claw. The hard stare of his ancestor’s statues judging. His mother’s ancestors. Do they judge my presence here amongst them? His mother’s statue is soft and lovely. Did she ever seek solace in this place? Did she ever think about having a son? It’s suffocating. He’s at the bottom of a crush, bodies piling on top of him. He needs to get out before he’s buried.

He turns, abruptly, and fights his way up the steep steps. Quickly, quickly, now. He throws open the doors, and sucks in a lungful of the night air as he puts his hands on his knees. It’s a violent rush, a sudden stabbing of nausea, and he vomits. He glances up, thankful the courtyard is quieter than when he had entered the crypts, and that no one seems to be paying him any heed.

Jon feels a harsh glare, turns his head to look behind him. Nothing. Of course they can’t follow him from the crypts. His skin begins to prick, and suddenly he isn’t far enough away. Breathing becomes heavy, laboured, and then he’s walking in whatever direction his legs are taking him, just as long as it’s not here.

He knows the frosty dark air should bite, longs for it to sink it’s cold heart into his being, if only to freeze the storm raging inside him, ice the waves causing him to feel dizzy. Duty…. Love….. Honour…. Family…. Did Lord Stark ever resent him? Resent his presence? Resent what his existence meant? Resent what the protection of his life cost him?

He finds himself longing for the days where his greatest worry was Catelyn Stark and her scorn-filled stare. Did she know? No, of course not. Would her treatment have been different had she been aware? Might she have treated me like her true born children? Jon’s stomach rolls as he finds he does not care for answer.

He can feel his blood licking in his veins, a bitter secret acrid on his tongue, and it’s not just bile he swallows down. Before he quite realises what is happening, he’s taking a practice sword and aiming at a target pole.

A stake is being driven into his into his heart, each forceful blow of the mallet a different realisation. Winter is Coming (thwack) Fire and Blood (thwack) A stain on Ned Stark (thwack) Lyanna and Rhaegar (thwack) Whore mother (thwack) Lord Stark is my father (thwack) Married in secret (thwack) Not my name (thwack) But my blood (thwack) We’ll talk about your mother (thwack) I promise (thwack) Aegon Targaryen (thwack) Not a bastard (thwack) Daenerys is Queen (thwack) Not a bastard (thwack) It’s treason (thwack) A son of two noble houses (thwack) Dany’s nephew (thwack) Not a bastard (thwack) Heir to the Iron Throne (thwack) Not (thwack) A (thwack) Bastard (thwack thwack).

He stumbles forward at the force of his last blow, the anguish flying from his mouth and the sword from his hands, across the empty courtyard. Yet still he can feel a hard stare. Away. He must retreat further away.

Exhaustion crashes over him and Jon blinks once, twice. His feet carry him forward once again, until he realises where the path he is taking leads, and forces himself to stop. Daenerys. His aunt. He wishes it false, a cruel jape by Sam in a moment of grief. He wishes it impossible. The Gods truly do play brutal games. Had they not toyed with him enough?

He wants to feel her hand in his, to feel the comfort her presence provides; a comfort he had not allowed himself to dream of finding. He longs for it now the most. He wants to go back to the waterfall, back to the rush of being with his love and riding a dragon. We could stay a thousand years, no one would find us. He should have insisted they stayed.

Will she want to look at him? Would she be disgusted with him? True heir to the Iron Throne. No, NO. Daenerys is Queen, the rightful ruler of these lands, these kingdoms. He wants her to know, needs her to know. He wants to fall at her feet, give her no reason to doubt him.

He wants to run to her, have her arms encircle him once more. He wants to be back on that ship, with quiet sweet words, with a physical intimacy his body always craves, humming just under the surface. He loves her and he’s her nephew. He feels she loves him, can see it in her eyes, knows it in her gentle caresses. And yet the steady ground she provides for him is irrevocably shaken.

No one stops him as he makes his way back into the keep, and he’s grateful. He takes the darker corridors, hidden stairs; routes well known to a bastard, one who is supposed to live in the shadows. A Warden’s work is never done, especially one preparing for battle, but he knows he cannot speak, does know what he might say, what exactly might spill from his lips.

He finds himself outside his boyhood chambers, those he occupied before he left for The Wall. He opens the door, and finds the stale air does not bother him. No one is currently occupying this room, surprising with the sudden increase of the castle’s population. There is no longer a bed, just some furs thrown over some drawers, and Jon is thankful for how unbusy it is.

How many hours, days, had he spent in this room thinking of his mother. Wondering if she was kind, imagining her face. Did she love him, did she care? He doesn’t know how long he gazed at her statue this evening, motionless time, spent looking, thinking, of her life, of her death, bleeding and in pain, her last thought of him. Would she be proud of him?

He remembers an overwhelming childhood thought, that his mother had thought he would be a bad son, a bad person, a bastard could be no other thing after all , and so she could not bear to keep him, to give him the loving touch of a mother. And Lord Stark, the most honourable man, with all that is good, did not shirk his responsibility. His example gave Jon the thing he clung to as a child, determined to be the best son he could be, the best person he could be. To show enough to earn a place as one of Lord Stark’s sons, to be more than a stain on his reputation.

And what of his Father? An uncle, not a father. For so long being the son, even the bastard son of Lord Eddard Stark had been his only source of pride. He should have wondered about his father too. But it’s gone, decimated by a lie, and Jon feels his breathing grow shallow.

Robb and Sansa and Arya and Bran and Rickon. Cousins, not siblings. Would his remaining family turn from him, reject him, cast him from the only home he thought he would know. Elia. Aegon and Rhaenys. Murdered and butchered, for their name, for their father, and yet here he is, life protected by a blanket of snow.

So many dead for the sake of a lie….

Deeper, deeper, further down he spirals.

A sound at the door breaks him away from the knot of thoughts. A scratching, followed by a low whine, and Jon scrambles to the door. Ghost.

Of course; he isn’t surprised, knows he can feel his anguish, this creature, this beast that is a part of him. The dire wolf enters, and Jon sinks his hands into his animal’s soft fur. He rests his forehead against the door as he closes out the rest of the castle. He feels Ghost nuzzling his side, and Jon turns before collapsing against the door.

His wolf sits, protectively. He remembers the times the when the wolf felt like the only friend left to him. Arriving at The Wall. Stupid green boy. Running to Robb after Fa-Ned...Your Brothers brought you back. Ygritte’s death. You were wrong to love her. The loneliness of being Lord Commander. Didn’t want it. Arriving back after Hardhome. You failed them. Betrayed and murdered. I should have stayed dead. Every move as King in the North being questioned. Didn’t want it didn’twantitdidn’twantit.

He can feel the cracks throughout his soul; ruptures and fractures, a million different pieces, spreading, until there is nothing whole.

Ghost pressing his snout into his face brings him the only warmth Jon knows is available to him now. The only thing that feels real in this moment.

It’s only here, with Ghost, as he buries his face into his only companion’s fur, does he allow himself to so completely break.

[dopedoodes]

Time Away From You. // E.D

AN: Hey guys! I never wrote a Military!Au before so sorry if anything is un-accurate but I’ve done my research and tried my best. Reblog and share.

Summary: Ethan is away serving the country while his lover is home wishing nothing more but to see him again. Will she?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

185 days, that’s how long it’s been since you’ve seen Ethan.

When he told you he had to report to his base for six months you laughed. Surely, your sweet Ethan hadn’t been stupid enough to enlist in the military at age eighteen, but you were wrong. 

Ethan  had enlisted as a naive eighteen year old with a passion in his heart to serve his country, but then he met you a year later and suddenly the military didn’t seem like a good career option. Unfortunetly, the military doesn’t just forget about enrollments and on Ethan and your’s three month anniversary, he got the call.

185 days without you. 185 days without him.

Life was tough without your favorite Jersey boy next to you. College wasn’t the same without your intense study sessions in the library that eventually turned into make out sessions. Your dorm felt empty without the presence of his six foot tall shadow lingering in the doorway waiting for the invitation to enter and join you in your binge watching sessions. And with no one to confide in or hug when things got out of hand, you felt alone.

Sure, the two of you emailed each other profusely but that didn’t stop the ache in your heart. With every bing from your phone your heart broke more wanting nothing more than to hear his voice instead of the swoosh sound from another email being sent. Sometime you’d receive handwritten letters in Ethan’s poor penmanship. 

His words were hard to make out but that didn’t stop you from staring at the piece of paper for hours, your fingers tracing each and every letter as you imagined the hazel eyed boy hunched over writing to you from thousands of miles away.

You never did get to hear his voice though. His calls saved for those times he called home to his family. The same family who you frequently visited on weekends just to get a little dose of the Dolan world you so desperately missed. Though, spending time with them was hard most days. It was especially hard when the doorbell rang unexpectedly and a face of worry washed over everyone in the room – you’d silently pray it wasn’t military officers standing their with a flag in arms. 

Thankfully, it hadn’t been.

Despite it all, you pushed on hell bent on keeping your promise to Ethan before he left. You went to class, found yourself a part time job on campus, and even managed to get in some pleasure reading you’d been struggling to indulge in for months. You stayed occupied during the day, but when your head hit the pillow your worries set in. Often time, your cries being the only thing to drown out the nightmares and lull you to sleep.

It was a Monday morning. day 186 without Ethan, when you heard the familiar bing of your phone. Already awake for your morning class, you opened the email quickly praying that it was the news you had been waiting for. You scanned only the first two sentences before your heart drop. The dreadful words jumping out at you faster than you could comprehend.

Two weeks, maybe more.

Next deployment is delayed.

I’ll be home as soon as I can.

Love you - E

You wanted to scream. Wanted to throw yourself on your bed and sob for the next two weeks. You didn’t even know what to write back, too frustrated with more empty promises and the rising count of days the two of you had been apart. 

Sighing, you did what you always did. You wrote him a heartfelt email back promising you’d be here when he got back and then you were off to class, not even bothering to splash water on your face to relieve your red eyes.

You ran on autopilot the minute you left your dorm, your body carrying you towards the english building without even telling it to. Your thoughts were preoccupied with worries for Ethan, worries for you, and worries for your relationship together. After all, the two of you weren’t even together for long before his deployment. You’d spent most of your nine month relationship apart and you couldn’t stop the nagging in your brain telling you that was no way for a relationship to start and strive.

No one said anything when you waltzed into class five minutes late. They didn’t even glance at you when you tossed your notebook on the table in a careless manor. To them, you were just the girl that was always sad. The girl who wrote the poems about loneliness and long distance relationships. You were simply a background character in their epic stories of high school, only their to fill the space and make them feel better about themselves.

You were so caught up in your own headspace that you hadn’t even realized the knock on the classroom door. In fact, you were so distracted you didn’t even hear the audible gasp from your classmates nor did you realize all their attention had turned to you.

“Ms. Y/L/N,” your professor said, pulling you back to reality.

It was only when you looked up from your notebook did you acknowledge everyone staring at you. Confused, you started scrambling for an answer to a question you assumed you did not hear. You kept babbling for a few seconds before you noticed your classmates attention shift from you to the door, your own gaze following theirs.

It took a minute before your brain registered who was standing in the doorway. You blinked. Once. Twice. Three times. Your jaw fell, a gasp rolling off your tongue before you were pushing the chair away from the desk. You couldn’t say anything, instead you collapsed into Ethan’s arms, chocking out a sob as you buried your face into his chest.

He smelt like sweat, the faint smell of the stale airplane air lingering on his military jacket. He was leaner than you remembered but his arms were huge, his jacket having trouble staying in place as he wrapped you in his arms. He was different, his eyes were tired, his hair longer, and his presence less intimidating but he was also the same. His lips on your forehead felt the same as they did before he left. His whispered words of endearment sounded the same as they had 186 days ago. And his body was still as warm and welcoming as you had remembered.

You could have stayed wrapped in his arms for hours, but the sound of your classmates clapping and crying made you pull away. You felt your face heat up, embarrassed that they had witnessed such a intimate moment but you couldn’t help but feel an ounce of pride too. Finally, they could see who you truly were outside of these damn four walls.

“What are you doing here?” you asked.

“I wanted to surprise you,” he smiled. “They didn’t really extended my time. I just told you that.”

“You’re an ass,” you said, smacking his chest before nuzzling yourself into it.

“I’m really sorry to intrude, Sir,” Ethan apologized to your professor. “Do you mind if I steal her away for the reminder of class?”

“I suppose I can’t say no,” he mumbled.

That was all you needed to hear before you were shoving your notebook back into your backpack. You didn’t even have time to thank your professor before you were tugging Ethan out of the room and into the empty hallway. The feeling of your hand intertwined with his forcing a smile on your face.

“I missed you so much,” you said against his lips before pulling him in.

“I missed you more,” he challenged. “Now come on, we’ve got a few hours to kill before we drive home to see my mom and Gray. Cam might even fly out if my mom can trick her.”

“Do they know you’re here?”

“Nope,” he smirked. “I’m surprising them too!”

“Only you would find it amusing to worry everyone in the hopes of surprising them,” you said, shaking your head.

“Awe come on, you loved it and so will they. Now, I need to spend time with my girl before my mom gets her hands on me.” He said with a cheeky grin.

He’s back.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Hoped you enjoyed!!! 

[fanficimagery]

Imagine being someone that the Gecko brothers attempt to take hostage. They don't expect you to be as calm and collected as you are, nor do they expect you to be anything other than human.

Gen Fic X Reader

Glancing at the three individuals who've dropped into the empty seats across from you, you smirk at the two men who immediately start making demands and threatening violence should you not cooperate with whatever they have planned.

"Is this meant to intimidate me?" You chuckle, leaning back in your seat and crossing one knee over the other as your arms cross over your chest. Your gaze quickly darts to the girl who looks no older than eighteen, nineteen at the most. "Are you trying to draw attention to the table, kid? Keep glancing nervously over your shoulder and someone's going to realize you're acting sketchy."

She guiltily turns forward once more, a blush staining her cheeks. "Dammit, Princess," the one man with tattoos visibly crawling up from under his shirt and onto his neck says. "Chill out. We got this handled."

"Dream on, pretty boy. You've got shit handled."

The telltale sound of a gun cocking echos from beneath the table. The man with glasses and slicked back hair raises an eyebrow at you. "You were saying?"

You roll your eyes and drop your hands into your lap. "Relax, boys. And lose the constipation face. We're all friends here. Sort of." You smirk ferally this time, your teeth a little more sharper than usual and the two men shift uncomfortably in their seats. "So who's hungry?"

"What?" The girl asks.

"Do.. you.. want.. food?" You enunciate slowly. "Because no offense, but you guys look like shit. And for three drifters such as yourselves, plus the way your boys immediately started demanding money, I'm assuming you're low on funds and decided to hit the first person who looked as if they came from money."

"You don't look like you come from money," Glasses says. "You do come from money. We've been watching."

Your smirk starts to widen again. "You've been watching? Well if you've been watching then you'd realize that no one messes with me. There's a reason for that."

"Yeah? And what's that?" The other male asks. The two men are rather cocky and their patience are starting to wear thin. The female, however, still seems a bit rattled.

Leaning forward in your seat, you rest your right arm on the table. "People like your brother call me la loba." Both men tense and you huff a laugh. "Do calm yourselves. Richie isn't the first generic vampire I've come across. Nor will he be the last."

"You know who we are?" The young girl asks.

"People like my brother?" Seth Gecko frowns.

"I am not a generic vampire." Richie Gecko scowls and you laugh again. "I'm a culebra. We're.. unique."

"Sure. Whatever makes you feel better." Then turning your attention to Seth, you say, "You didn't think I was human, did 'ya? I'd have been a fool to be human and be as calm as I am with your weapons trained on me under the table. Newsflash, boys, your bullets won't do much damage to me."

"But they will do damage."

"For a minute or so," you muse. "And then I'll only be in a pissed off mood." Glancing at the girl, you smile your first genuine smile. "To answer your question, I do know who you are. What you and the Geckos have been doing all around Mexico does not go unnoticed."

"Who the hell are you?" Seth then demands. "What are you?"

"That's a story.. to be shared over food. Now seriously," both your hands slap the table top and you push yourself to stand up and the three strangers all tense in surprise, "who's coming with me to get tacos? I'm not carrying back everyone's orders."

"Kate, go with her," Richie says.

"Like hell she will," Seth grumbles. "I'll go."

It takes the brothers only a few seconds to holster their weapons and for Seth to grumpily stand up. You grin at his mulish expression and then make your way towards a taco truck without offering him or his companions a backwards glance. You order three tacos, plus a lemonade, and then motion for Seth to order for his party all on you. He does and then after a tense fifteen minutes all your food and drinks are ready.

Opening one of your tacos, you drizzle some hot sauce in it before closing it back up and taking a bite. Then after washing it down with a sip of lemonade, you go on to tell them your story. "I grew up knowing about the supernatural. My family was known for.. hunting the bad ones," you say. "There's a certain breed of werewolf that the alpha's of that breed can turn a human with just a bite. It's fifty-fifty, really, because the bite can either turn your or kill you."

"And you, what? You were bitten?" Seth wonders around a mouthful of food.

"Not really." After eating a few more bites of your own, you continue. "It's also said that if an alpha's claw dig just deep enough, you can turn that way too. But that way of turning is really rare."

"Let me guess," Richie deadpans, "you were one of the rare occurrences?"

You wink at him. "Some alpha asshole ripped my throat out and then left me for dead. I would've woke up in the morgue, but some people who knew what was happening stole my body and left me to turn away from prying eyes. And now here I am. Still doing the family business with the added bonus of being a supernatural bad ass myself."

Kate frowns around her straw. "So you're a werewolf then? Does that make you an alpha too?"

"Oh no. I'm not really sure how everything works, but when you Turn.. your form reflects your inner self. There are a lot of creatures that fall under the were category."

"Yeah? And what's your inner self?" Seth asks.

"If you're lucky enough, lizard, you just might get to see for yourself."

The rest of the food is eaten in relative silence with the Gecko brothers still a little stiff. After everything is eaten and no one really knows what's going to happen next, you heave a little sigh and offer them an olive branch.

"Look. I know you guys are in some trouble what with who've you been freeing and killing. I know I'm only one person, but if you want.. I have a place you can crash at. It's a bit out of the way, so if anything happens then it can happen with as little causalities as possible."

"Why are you being so nice?" Kate wonders. "Seth and Richie didn't exactly start off on the right foot with you."

You shrug. "Honestly? Out of the four of us here at the table, you don't deserve to have to live your life looking over your shoulder. And I also might be a tad bit lonely. Because of who I am, people tend to stay away. I miss having someone to talk to."

"About that," Seth then pipes up. "What is la loba?"

"It's a myth," you chuckle. "It means she-wolf. Basically, la loba collects the bones of creatures from the desert and it's said her preference are wolves. And when she has the full skeleton of her wolf, she sings to it. She sings and sings until the skeleton regrows it's flesh and fur, and then the wolf leaps up and runs. Sometime during the run, the wolf transforms into a laughing woman who runs free into the sunset."

"Why you though? Why were you given the name?"

"Because I'm usually spotted in the desert either killing a rogue supernatural or running with nature's very own wolves in my own were-form. Some people have seen my shift from human to creature and just dubbed me with the name."

"So you don't bring to life skeletons?" Kate quietly asks. "Because that'd be pretty neat."

"If only," you smile gently. "Now.. who's ready to get going? I've had a tiring day and I need a shower."

Your house is big enough for several guests, but it's the compound behind your house that catches everyone's attention. After you had given everyone a brief run down of the bedrooms, bathrooms, and kitchen, the attention had been brought back to the building that sat at least half a football field behind your house.

"It's the playground," you tell them when Richie becomes curious. "Want to go see?"

Seth and Kate were hesitant, but tagged along anyway when you and Richie set out through the back door. You deactivated the alarm system and threw open the door, presenting the inside with a sweeping motion of your arm. Seth's eyes widen in shock.

"There's a gun range in the back," you say. "Up front is all the merchandise and you can test it out in the back. As long as you're here, I'll leave the alarm system off so you can come and go as you please."

"Holy shit," Richie breathes in awe.

"But you can start playing tomorrow. Tonight all of you need some rest because Seth and Kate are starting to smell sick."

"Smell sick? How can you even tell?" Seth huffs.

You tap the side of your nose. "Perks of being Other."

The brothers reluctantly leave your very own playground in favor of getting out of their rumpled clothing and into clean sleep clothes after showering. Kate immediately heads to bed, Seth lingers about, and Richie finds solace in your library as he skims through information about some of the supernatural creatures you've kept journals on. But fatigue eventually wins out and everyone heads off to bed.

Your guests have stayed for a week, basking in the freedom and quiet of not moving from place to place after realizing you had no ulterior motives. Though they definitely started off on the wrong foot with you, something about the three of them made the ache of loneliness in your chest ease just a bit. Hence the olive branch and chance of friendship.

Unfortunately, good luck is bound to run out.

And today is, unfortunately, that day.

Seth had taken Kate into town to grab some necessities the young girl suddenly found herself needing and they came speeding back down the private dirt road nearly two hours later.

You and Richie had thought nothing of it and entered the compound, only to have Seth and Kate rush in moments later- Kate looking rather shaken.

"We got company!" Seth shouts.

You and Richie freeze, and your grin turns into a frown at Kate trying to hug herself as she glances between everyone and unsure of what to do. "How many? And who?" You ask.

"Three cars followed us, but one car stopped and turned around after we turned down the dirt road to head here. My guess is culebras. They're the only assholes we've had problems with since escaping Mexico."

Your grin reappears. "Which means we've got two cars full of generic vampires who have no idea whose territory they just trespassed on. Ohhh, this is going to be fun." Richie and Seth stare at you as if seeing you for the first time, you then looking to Kate. "You comfortable with shooting a gun, kid?" She hesitates in answering and you gesture towards a hallway. "There's a panic room back there. Once the door is shut behind you, only you'll be able to open it from the inside. The code is written down and taped to the key pad. Don't come out until you see the fight is over on the cameras."

Glancing at the brothers for permission or whatever, Kate only leaves when Seth gives her a nod. Then cracking your neck, you turn towards the opened doors of the compound. "So what's the deal? Why are they really after you guys?" You ask as you await the inevitable fight.

The brothers hesitate before Richie sighs. "Kate is the key to finding a blood well full with ancient blood. All the culebras want to claim it as their own and everyone knows that to get it, they need Kate."

"So protect the girl. Got it," you nod. You shift your feet so they’re shoulder width apart and rotate your shoulders to loosen some of the tension. Seth produces a gun from the back waist band of his pants and fixes his own stance, readying himself for a fight.

Figure after figure enter and eight hissing generic vampires form a half circle in front of you and the Geckos. Your gaze darts from one figure to the next, your eyes narrowing on the one brave idiot who steps forward and hisses.

"Where's the girl?"

"Fuck off."

"What girl?" You shrug innocently. "I'm the only girl here." The culebras hiss in annoyance and you smirk.

"Keep your mouth shut, bitch, or we'll take you along with little miss cherry pie."

Their leering smiles and mocking chuckles makes you tense and see red. Richie hisses from beside you and you don't need to look at him to know he's transformed, and Seth takes aim with his gun. Your smirk slowly fades. "Wrong answer."

The culebras bravely step forward, Seth fires off two rounds, and you bend at the knees.. your own transformation happening within a second as you let out a heart stopping roar. Given the sudden quietness, plus the wide eyed stares and Seth's mumbled, "What the fuck?", you know what you look like to them. Your normal human flesh is now tinged dark gray and lighter gray in places, the whites of your eyes have turned black while the irises now shine a molten green, the bones in the middle of your forehead have shifted and changed to give your face a more animalistic quality, your fingernails have elongated into claws, and your four canine teeth have elongated drastically.

"La loba," one of the culebra murmurs. "She's real."

"No shit, asshole. And you just trespassed onto my land."

Silence reigns, and off in the distance wolves howling and coyotes yipping distract the now uncertain culebras. You give no warning as you rush forward, swinging one arm back and slashing your first victim diagonally from shoulder to hip. You use your claws to stab and slash, roaring your anger and relishing in the fact that the power in your voice is enough to make the culebras stumble. Seth is firing off round after round while Richie goes toe to toe with a culebra of his own.

All too soon, though, the fight is over.

Chest heaving with exertion, it takes a moment for you to get your bearings. Your eyes dart all over the room and you must be a sight to behold because the Gecko brothers tense when you shift in their direction.

"Y/N?" Richie says.

You growl in response. You can feel the blood splatter dripping from your chin and finger nails, but the thrill of the fight is still thrumming in your veins and you're finding it hard to shift back at the moment.

"You good?" Seth asks, eyes narrowed.

Gulping, you nod once. "Yeah." You inhale deeply before blowing it out slowly. "Yeah. Just.. I'm on edge. I'll change back when I'm ready. Kate's good to come out if she wants to. I don't hear anyone else on my property and I'm under control. None of you have anything to fear from me."

A moment passes and then Kate's scent is filling your senses. Your gaze darts to her as she rushes passed you to reach Seth and Richie, and you offer her a faint grin. Slowly, but surely, you can feel the change washing over your.

"Seeing someone change never gets old," Seth mumbles. Richie snorts in response. "What exactly are you?"

"I'm a jaguar," you say, grinning. "Much cooler than a measly werewolf."

The coyotes and wolves are still howling and yipping in the distance, and the three standing before you seem to finally recognize it and become wary. "I know you said that la loba was a myth, but what's up with that?" Richie asks.

You shrug. "I don't have any control over them, but we do understand each other. People like to shoot them for fun or for their fur and I put a stop to it. In return, when I howl, they answer. It's like.."

"A pack," Kate says, smiling. "Your very own pack."

"I guess you can say that." The tension seems to leave everyone and you all linger about, glancing at the bodies littering the floor. "So I'm in desperate need of a bath," you mention. "And afterward I think we need to all sit down and talk about what the hell is going on. I'm not too keen on these generic fucks," you say while distractedly kicking a body, "hunting down a teenage girl. That doesn't sit right with me."

"You and me both," Seth grumbles.

"Mhm. So we need to come up with a plan. That third car that fled with tell others where Kate is laying low at, so either culebras will test their luck and come in droves or my presence might actually be enough to keep those who know me at bay."

"I don't want to be a burden," Kate softly says. "You've been more than kind to let us stay-"

"And I'll continue to be more than kind and teach you how to defend yourself," you cut her off, smiling. "If you’re going to run with the Gecko's, you really need to know how to handle a weapon, kid. Okay?"

"I.. okay," Kate agrees, a bit sheepishly.

"Okay. But first.. shower! You boys," you then say, pointing between Seth and Richie, "clean the place up. I got the most kills so I get to skip out."

You leave without a backwards glance, but throw your head back in laughter when you hear Seth sigh and mumble, "Dick.", under his breath.

Later on when you go back to check, you smile when you realize they’ve sterilized the entire front room of the compound where the blood bath had taken place.

[jae-daddy]

Bad Habit (9)

Jaebum Mini-Series

one / two / three / four / five / six / seven / eight / ten / eleven / twelve

Pairing: Im Jaebum x Reader

Genre: Angst, Mature, Romance

Plot: It’s been two weeks since he walked away, and its been two weeks since you’ve been waiting. It’s been three hours since you gave up on waiting, and now something was definately changing. 

warning: no actual appearance from jb soz

a/n: i dont know if i like this or not, but i hope y’all get whats happeneing lol. hope y’all enjoy it!

You stared at the clear liquid at the bottom of your glass, as you folded your arms on the cherry-wood counter. The bartender stood in front of you, and you pushed the empty glass towards him and asked for another round. 

In an instant, a filled glass was placed in front you, and you sighed as you lifted the cup. 

You couldn’t believe you were being so truly pathetic. You couldn’t believe one boy had the power to turn your life upside down. 

But when you remind yourself who that boy is, everything made sense. 

Im Jaebum had the power to wreck you with the softest of his touches. 

You had been hiding away from the world the past two weeks, locked behind your apartment door. Every day spent binge-watching all sorts of romantic entertainment and recorded lectures. You spent two weeks on your couch, only moving for food, peeing, and really long baths. 

You snickered as you thought of Jaebum, and his sweet words as his velvety touch traced the goosebumps that rose on your arm. 

“Sometimes I think what I’d do without you,” Jaebum whispered, his delicate eyes meeting yours for a few beats, making you smile idiotically. 

“Yeah? What would you do?” You asked, playfully. 

Jaebum sighed, before moving in and resting his forehead against yours gently. 

“I tried to think, y/n,” he whispered, his voice low and nervous. However, an adoring smile fought its way to the corners of his lips. “I really did try to think of a life without you, but I can’t.”

“I can’t live without you,” he whispered, so lovingly, that no I love you could ever compete. 

“Hey, what’s your name?” A deep voice spoke from beside you, snapping you out of your memory. Your hands froze mid-way the intoxicating clear liquid an inch away from your lips. 

You turned around to the boy next to you and placed your glass back down, uninterested. 

You sniggered before grinning at the blonde-haired boy who looked at you predatorily. He was cute, you noted, but so different from the boy who occupied your mind. 

His hair was the lightest shade of blonde, while his were as dark as the midnight sky. His eyes were light and sparkling, while his were so deep and enchanting that you stole your nights away. 

The boy in front of you was not him, but all that your heart wanted was Jaebum. 

You missed Jaebum. 

You missed his kisses and his laugh. You missed the smile he gave you whenever you said something absurd. 

You missed him. 

You missed him all of your foolish heart. 

You missed him so fucking much. 

But you were getting lost by loving him. 

You didn’t want to spend the rest of your life waiting on your couch, hoping he’ll show up at your door any moment. You were getting tired of hoping that one day it will be you, when it was clear as the passing of time, that it will never be you.  

It was finally time to face the world; the true world where Jaebum and you were dirty. The world where you never existed; the world where you could run to, to escape from his hauntingly sweet memories. 

So, for tonight, you traded your hoody for the shortest and tightest dress in your closet. You ditched your sneakers for the most painful heels, put on the darkest shade of red on your lips, and you were ready for the world. 

You left home to forget him. You painted yourself in all the colours that made him mad. You were ready to lose yourself in someone other than him. 

However, you couldn’t do it. 

As soon as you entered the bar, you beelined for the bar and sat there for an hour, staring at the glass of liquor you finished in thirty minutes.  

Now, here you were; in a dim club with loud music, a second glass of liquor and a boy completely inverse to the one who ruled your mind. 

The fair-haired boy, leaned in closer, a delicious smile lifting the corner of his lips. 

“You don’t talk to strangers?” He asked, amused. 

You gravely sighed internally before wiping away all emotions from your face. 

“Nope, I just don’t want to waste my time.” You shot him a sweet smile, before downing the rest of your drink. 

The clear liquid trailed down your throat leaving a path of fire behind, before dissolving hotly in your tummy. You hated the taste of liquor, but you enjoyed the bliss it brought. And, god knows you needed it. 

“Goodbye.” You whispered to the boy, as you strutted towards the dance floor. 

You couldn’t believe you were doing this. 

The lights shone done on you, as the music vibrated in your chest. The bodies around you danced differently but all rode the same beat of the music, and you began to lose yourself in it too. 

But, with every passing second, you felt more pitiful. 

You wanted the alcohol to hit you now, and make you forget all the sorrows that haunted your every moment. You wanted to forget your aching heart and Jaebum’s heart-stopping smile. 

You danced to the beat, all by yourself, pretending like you had no care or worry. You danced like the drink was taking over you, and you had finally gotten away. But you weren’t; you were stuck exactly where you were three hours ago. 

Your heart still felt as fragile and numb as it did the moment Jaebum brushed past you like you were nothing. 

You closed your eyes to stop the tears that threatened to spill and pushed yourself harder. You threw your hands in the air, and swayed your hips, trying to tire yourself. You tried to empty your mind, and fill it with the club that surrounded you, and consumed everyone around you. 

You tried to fill the emptiness with the loud music that resonated in your chest. The gaping hole of loneliness, you tried to fill it with the heat of the bodies enveloping you. 

You tried to fill yourself with something other than the sadness that had been eating you away, since the moment Jaebum left you with a shattered a heart. 

But it didn’t work. 

Nothing worked. 

It was almost as if your emotions ignited out of every pore in your body and lit up the room in your sorrow. Even in a club full of welcoming bodies, you felt alone. Even with the music pumping through your veins, your lungs struggled for air, as bile threatened to spill out a sad tale of heartbreak.  

No matter how hard you closed your eyes and tried to push him back, you couldn’t. 

You couldn't run away from Jaebum. 

His smiling face appeared behind your closed lids and you choked with tears. 

“I can’t do this,” you whispered lowly. Your voice shook with desperateness, and fear. 

You couldn’t do this to yourself anymore; you needed to get away from this feeling before it consumed you once again. 

You opened your eyes scanning the room in an attempt to find a distraction. 

You found a familiar face in the crowds, and without thinking your feet began moving towards him. 

With every step, your shoes rubbed against the newly forming blisters, and you welcomed the pain. You welcomed the pain and the sweaty heat of the bodies that pressed against you as you rushed across the dance floor. 

His tall frame stood with a group of boys, except you didn’t care. 

You reached up, grabbed his shoulders and spun him around to meet your reddened face. His eyes widened in surprise but before he could utter a word, you brought his lips to yours and shut him up. 

You pressed up against him, and let the coldness of your body seep into his heat. 

Your lips moved fiercely; hoping his warmth would melt away the bitterness that began freezing up your heart. Your hands moved into his hair, and you welcomed the slight roughness of his hair due to the bleach. 

You welcomed everything that he did differently to the boy you were running from. 

You welcomed his hands that landed on your waist, and stayed there, instead of roaming over your body like they knew their path. You welcomed the taste of mint, strawberry and alcohol that his lips carried. You welcomed him, his heat in hope that it would hide you away from your sad reality. 

Finally, you moved away from him and bit your lips as peered up at him. 

“Wow,” he looked at you at amazement, before an aggrogant smile teased his lips. You rolled your eyes and tried to normalise your racing breath. 

You felt nothing. 

You felt numb. 

Your heart and mind went silent, and only your body remained, screaming at you to take him back home. 

However, as you stared into his eyes you realised something. There was a sparkle in them; a gentle glow of pink hue glistened in softly them. He looked at you with adoration after one little kiss, and it made your heart sickeningly swell. 

You wanted him to fall for you. 

You wanted to play with him. You wanted to see if you could hold the same power Jaebum had on you, over him. You wanted to break his heart into a million pieces and see how it felt. 

“You forgot to tell me your name,” he said, making you smile slightly.

“My name is-”

“Y/n?” A familiar voice interrupted you. 

Your eyebrows scrunched together in confusion, as you peered behind the broad shoulders of the guy you had just kissed. 

Your eyes widened when you realised who it was. 

Jinyoung. 

You couldn’t believe he just saw you do that. You considered pretending like you didn’t know him, or like you didn’t see him. However, you swallowed those ideas when you saw his eyes darken in distaste when he took in your appearance. 

You self-consciously pulled the black dress down your thighs, but it was pointless. The hem of your dress remained true to its shortness, not falling an inch under the almost-to-short line. The dress clung to your body, accentuating all your good parts, leaving very little to the imagination. 

You swallowed as Jinyoung’s dark eyes snapped to yours. 

Within two steps he was standing in front of you, as he pulled you away from the other guy’s arms.

“Sorry, Mark,” he told the blonde boy, his voice cold and almost threatening. “Find someone else to play with, she’s with me.”

You stared at Jinyoung and felt something stir inside you. Your chest felt heavy, as it swelled so big that you could barely breathe. You felt your cheeks burn red, as you vividly felt were his fingers gripped your wrist. 

Jinyoung’s jaw was locked in anger. His eyes telling the same tale of anger and dark emotions. His hands, however, were a different story. They were wrapped around your wrist with softest of touches. His warmth seeping into your veins and making you relax under his touch. 

Jinyoung turned towards you; his brown eyes meeting yours, and you couldn’t seem to look away from him. 

not edited

[jimlingss]

Lovesick

Words: 4.7k Genre: Angst, smidgen of Fluff Summary: In a world where love is a disease...your heart skips one too many beats. Warnings: Mentions of illness and medication

Love is a sickness.

It’s an illness that once too far gone becomes incurable; terminal.

Scientists have discovered it as an infectious disease, a parasite that crawls its way under skin to the heart. It can cause numerous complications, including delusion and blindness. Those who are affected by ‘love’ may be susceptible to mood swings, an increased dependency, a feeling of loneliness and obsessive thinking. It can cause stress, shortage of breath and mental disorder. In severe cases, it could cause physical aches to the chest - a term known as ‘heartbreak’.

Centuries ago, the majority suffered under ‘love’. Many victims had to lose their freedom and became detached from their schooling and careers. They were separated from reality and was unable to work efficiently. Those victims had psychotic behaviour, sometimes experiencing ridiculous amounts of happiness to feelings of jealousy, rage or sadness. In the worst of cases, some people allowed themselves to be hurt again and again in an endless cycle of pain. It’s as if ‘love’ was an addiction. Unfortunately, only one of every ten people were free from ‘heartbreak’.

“Since then, civilization has longed moved on from such feelings. We have detached ourselves  from this idiocy.” The suited lady on the television nods. “If you notice any symptoms in others or in yourself, it requires immediate medical attention. Symptoms include an irregular heart rate-”

“Is there nothing else to watch?”

“No, but you can try to find something else.”

“Fine.” You flop down onto the couch, digging your cold feet under the blanket. “A documentary it is.”

The documentary continues on the horrors of the illness. The two of you are curled next to each other, silence taking over as you concentrate. You ask yourself why anyone would want to suffer at the hands of this disease and willingly at that too. What was so special about ‘love’?

“Hey, Y/N.”

“Hmm?”

“What do you think it feels like to love?”

It happens when you turn your head. It happens when you look over to him. It happens before you can stop it.

His face is illuminated by the glow of the screen. His velvet lips lay still, a void emotion written across his features. You can see how he was drained by the day, exhaustion settling in with the night. The voice that speaks to you is of a breathy timber, a question that isn’t really looking for an answer. It’s a thought spoken out loud. No. He is close but out of finger’s reach. This can’t be right.

He looks at you deep within your eyes, a stare that you can’t draw away from. You’re magnetized, bewitched under the brown hues of his irises. Beautiful. He is different somehow that you can’t quite explain. But maybe the difference is within you. No. Jimin is your friend.

Then it happens-

Your heart skips a beat.

“Y/N?” He laughs and shifts to look at you again when you move away. “Are you okay?”

No. “I’m fine.” This can’t be happening.

“Okay, weirdo.” He stops bothering you, looking back at the screen.

You must’ve imagined it. How could you ever feel something more for Jimin? It’s impossible.

That night, the boy who’s been your platonic companion from since you could remember, falls asleep on your shoulder. The soft and silver strands of his hair grazes against your skin. The knot between his brows has dissipated and his cheek is cutely smooshed against your collarbone. Something constricts inside as you stare at him, eyes pinned on his curled lashes. You linger in his warmth, the weight pressed on your side. Jimin.

What have you done to me?

Your heart skips yet another beat.

//

“You’re not just coming in to see me right?” He laughs, rolling back in his chair to put away some file folders. “Or is it because you think I have time to kill?”

The walls are white, floor and ceiling in the matching void colour. The odor of disinfectant and the emptiness of the hallways would otherwise make you feel uncomfortable. But you’re in the presence of your trusted friend and that makes everything better. It doesn’t feel like a potential illness is looming over your head. It doesn’t feel like you’re a patient, ready to receive news of your death. It’s probably nothing. You’d simply thought that a checkup wouldn’t hurt.

“No.” You pout at him, staring at your hands in your lap.

“Okay.” Seokjin stops and gives you all the attention you need. “What’s wrong?”

You would’ve never gone to the doctor’s. But Seokjin is a friend that you know would never judge you. If your suspicions are true, he would never force you to undergo surgery. Jin would never make you feel disgusted with yourself or treat you like you’re contagious.

“I think I’m sick, Jin.”

He frowns and the mood becomes grim. “What do you mean sick?”

“I-” You’re at a loss of words. “My heart skips beats. W-….when I see this..person, I feel happier and when they’re not there then I feel.....lonely. It’s pathetic, isn’t it?”

“No. It isn’t.” Jin scrambles for a clipboard, digging through his belongings before he sits himself in front of you. The first question he wants to ask as he looks at you is- who?

Who made you this way?

But he knows you wouldn’t answer; that uttering the name out loud would cause even more panic and pain. “Does your heart go faster?”

“Yes.”

“Do you feel any nervousness or anxiety around this person?”

“Yes.”

Jin is completely serious, the persona of a professional taking over as he asks you a few further questions. The more you answer, the more afraid you become. “Is it what we both think it is?” You beg him with tears welling up, “Tell me, Jin.”

“I don’t know for sure.” He shakes his head, ready to step out of the room to immediately book an MRI scan. “Let’s just hope it’s not.”

The man in the white coat tries to reassure you, following you in every step. He’s there when you take your x-rays, blood tests and to monitor your heart rate. “Everything’s okay so far. It’ll be okay until the end. Don’t worry.”

You look up at him, lying on the table in a thin gown. You’re about to be swallowed by the machine, brain picked apart for any abnormalities.

“I’m scared.”

It’s a small and weak confession that whispers out from your parted lips. “What if it really is what I think it is? What will happen then? What will I do, Jin?”

He takes your hand within his, holding it tightly. “Then I’ll be here to help you.”

It’s late past midnight. Hours have passed and the clinic is vacant. If it weren’t for Jin, you’d be laid out for assessment in the cold eyes of numerous doctors. They’d exploit you until you feel naked, scorn you underneath spectacles and spit out terminology spun into tongue twisting language. Instead, he’ll be the one to find your secrets.

Kim Seokjin.

Whose eyes are bloodshot red, carrying black bags underneath them. He stifles every yawn, blinks hard to keep himself awake. And the moment you glance at him, he always smiles back at you without missing a single beat.

“It’ll be okay.” He reassures you a second time, grip tightening. “You’ll be okay.”

You’re being pulled into the scanner and his fingertips slide away from yours. “Thank you.”

The white fluorescent lights burn to the back of your lids. You shut your eyes, expelling away the water that threatens to spill onto your skin. “Y/N.” His voice comforts you again. “I’ll be here.”

It takes twenty minutes.

When you’re out, he stops you before you can bombard him with questions.

“I have to give it to another doctor who specializes in this area to take a good look at it.” He softly smiles. “Twenty four hours. Do you think you can wait that long?”

“I can.” You let out a staggering exhale. “But whatever the results are...good or bad...don’t hide it from me, okay? I want you to tell me the honest truth, Jin.”

“Of course.” He bumps you lightly. “I am a doctor. You think I can just hide the results from you because you’re my dear friend? I’d get fired!”

You laugh, feeling the most calm you have since the other night. Jin ushers you outside the room, leading you straight to the other room that you changed in. Once you switch the patient gown for your regular clothes, you find your friend leaning against the wall with his white coat taken off. He’s puffing out his cheeks, swinging his car keys around his finger.

“Let me drive you home.” It’s not a question but more of a statement. You don’t get to argue as he casually walks off. He beams when you have to run to match with his large steps.

Jin slows down his strides for you. “You owe me a meal.”

“What?” You giggle at him in disbelief, “why me?”

“Because it’s like two in the morning!” The man childishly pouts. “You know I’m suppose to be dead asleep right now? And I have to return in a few hours! You owe me, Y/N. And I won’t take ‘no’ for an answer~”

“Fine….” You nag at him in feigned exasperation. “You’re going to empty out my pocket again, aren't you?”

Seokjin opens the car door for you and makes a big gesture for you to go in. You roll your eyes and he shuts the door. “You bet I will!” The empty parking garage echoes with his voice. He mischievously grins and winks at you as you laugh.

It’s a breath of fresh air. You don’t feel as afraid as you were before.

//

The door opens and immediately your ears perk at the sound. “I’m home.”

“Welcome back.” You try your best to ignore, keeping your head low and focused on your keyboard. Your fingers tap relentlessly, the words not quite making sense on the document. But the false concentration is shattered by the smell of- “You brought food home?”

Jimin smiles and hums gently, placing the plastic bag full of takeout onto the counter. “Did you have dinner yet?” With one look at your bewildered expression, he already knows. “No, right? Well good. Now we can eat together.”

The boy snatches your laptop away, plopping down next to you and demanding all of your attention. It’s a long silence before he catches your eyes. “Why are you looking at me like that?”

“I-” You shake your head, forcing yourself to forget about your accelerating heart. “Looking at you like what?” You fake a laugh, “If anything, it’s the ugly on your face.”

“Pft.” He shoves the box gently into your hands. “Yeah, right. You wish you had my face.”

You roll your eyes, feeling too tired to join with his silly antics. But when you open up the box, your breath hitches- “Oh.” It’s your favourite.

He melts into a sheepish smile when he notices how surprised you are. “Can I hear a ‘thank you, Jimin’?”

A seeping heat sweeps itself up your cheeks, burning in a shade of rose that you pray he can’t see. “Thank you...Jimin…”

The boy who is unaware of the misery and yearning, who doesn’t know that you itch to hold him in your arms, reaches over to messily ruffle your hair. For the merest second, his fingertips touch your skin. “Why are you being such a good girl today?” He leans downwards, looking up into your eyes with a teasing smile. “Y/N.”

“W-What is it?”

He laughs. Even if Jimin didn’t have bad intentions, you wish he knew of the cruelty; how you felt like you were being played with each sound, how each movement made you hope of something more. “Eat your dinner.”

Could he not tell how nervous you were? You were on the edge of your seat, unable to control whatever foreign feelings were settling at the pits of your stomach. All day, you couldn’t stop thinking about him. And now he was here with you - in a way that was so surreal and…..utterly painful.

When did this happen?

The tide of emotions had once tickled your feet and erupted giggles from your chest. Somehow when you weren’t paying attention, it had snuck up behind you and enveloped you into the blue, pulling you deeper and deeper in. Now you were surrounded in him and nothing but him.

//

“Y/N. You need to come here right now. It’s urgent.”

You’re not sure why you’re so calm. Maybe you had expected it all this time but you find yourself walking into Jin’s office like you were visiting him as a friend and not as a patient.

“What is it?”

“Just...take a seat first, Y/N.”

“Jin.” Your eyes are full of determination. “Tell me.”

Kim Seokjin takes his hands from the pockets of his white coat. He stands up and meets you in two strides. His darkened irises are focused onto you, his black locks disheveled from the busy day. “Y/N.”

You’ve never felt more vulnerable.

Pathetic. You can’t control the sobs that shake your body. Your hands automatically raise to shield away the tears but then you feel arms drape your shoulders, pulling you close in comfort. He encases your trembling frame, protecting you from the bitter bite of the air. Jin is the clothes that cover your nakedness, the shield to your exposed feelings that have been served on a silver platter. You let go. You allow yourself to break down.

“I love him.”

“I know.” Your friend whispers into your ear, a sweet hum of a lullaby. “We can stop it before it’s too late. Plenty of people are able to fall out of love naturally on their own….If not then we can take a more drastic measure.”

Surgery is what most in his field would encourage in this situation but he knew how horrific it was. They’d have to mess with the chemicals inside your head, cut parts off in your brain. The last thing that Jin wanted was to see you lying pale and sick in a bed, halfway to death but not quite. It was too cruel. The thought of you in that position made him sick.

“I love him, Jin.” You murmur again, tears dripping to his clothes. “I’m in love with Jimin.”

The confession hits him like a freight train. Park Jimin who he’s known as long as he’s known you. Park Jimin who isn’t a stranger that Jin had hoped. He wanted it to be someone he didn’t know. He wanted the person who had made you ill to remain faceless. That way, he could despise them as if they were a monster or untouchable entity of a second world.

“I’ll prescribe you with some medication.” Jin’s embrace tightens around you. “Just...try to stay away from him.”

Jimin. His own friend.

Jin can’t find it in himself to hate the person who has harmed you in this way, even if it was unintentional. But it pains him even more to see you so broken...sick...in love.

//

Staying away from Jimin proves more difficult than said.

After that night in Jin’s office, you had listened to his advice and actively tried to stay away from the boy who gave you the disease. If Jimin left early in the morning, you’d leave before he did. If he was to come home late at night, you’d make sure to return when he was asleep. You even went as far as searching for a new apartment to move into, condemning your past self as to why it was ever a good idea to become housemates with your friend.

You still think about him everyday. It becomes natural, automatic. Whenever there is time to spare and your thoughts begin to wander...you daydream of a boy whose eyes crinkle when he smiles, who calls you silly names with his head tilted to one side...who makes you so unbelievably happy that it aches.

“Y/N?”

“Jimin?” You shut your eyes, opening them again to make sure it isn’t an illusion. “What are you doing here?”

The rain pitter patters gently, puddles growing at your feet. You’re hidden underneath a bus shelter, the cold nipping at your nose. It wasn’t a shower, more like Heaven’s teardrops raining down. It made you wonder if the angels were sorrowfully weeping for you.

“I was looking for you.” He’s hyperventilating, having ran outside with little warning. When Jimin saw how it started to pour, he chased after you to make sure you wouldn’t get drenched.

“You didn’t have to-”

“Why are you avoiding me?”

His question is straight to the point and it leaves you stuttering. “I-I’m not.”

At your weak retort, he raises an eyebrow. “You aren't?”

“I’ve been a little bit busy.” You say with more confidence and a masked smile. “Did it seem like I was avoiding you? I’m sorry, I should’ve said something-”

“No.” He tips his head back with a relaxed expression. “I’m relieved. I thought there was something wrong.”

“There’s nothing wrong.” You reassure as your throat tightens. “There’s...nothing wrong.”

“Good. That’s all that matters.” His grip on the umbrella handle eases. The sunny yellow of the canopy vividly stands out in the surroundings of grey rain. “If there was something wrong, you know you could always talk to me about it, right? You’re my best friend and I care about you.”

“I know.” You step forward and under his umbrella, protected from the cold. The drops that drip from the sky softly knocks against the surface. It’s a beat to the song of your despair.

“Let’s go home.”

The symptoms are worsening. You can no longer restrain the butterflies that explode in your stomach; like the first of spring’s season. It churns and makes you feel sick. When he comes too close, goosebumps helplessly erupt over your skin. You find yourself hyper aware of each of his actions, hanging onto every single word.

You’re always staring. You are captured by his spell, captivated as your eyes run over the slope of his nose, each eyelash and the dip of his plush lips. All the while, Jimin is simply looking ahead. He never once notices. He doesn’t detect how you desire to be held, to be touched...to want more than to watch.

“Are you okay?” He taps on the door. “What’s taking you so long, Y/N?”

“Just-” With the energy you can muster, you outstretch your arm, struggling to turn on the tap so he can’t hear your coughing. “-one second!”

You’re collapsed on the floor, leaning lifelessly against the counter. Twenty pills have spilled in your palm, the bitter taste of the medication still on your tongue. Your eyes are reddened, cheeks stained with the anguish. Why? No matter how many you’ve taken, it doesn’t go away.

The feelings don’t disappear.

“Is there a way for me to have him around?” You ask Jin over the phone, a few dials and seconds away before you can hear his soothing voice. “I can’t do it. I can’t cut him off.”

“Y/N…” He calls you softly, the hurt returning to bore into his bone. In his hands hold your paperwork, the last check up telling him that your disease has progressed into unrequited love.

Jimin has always and forever will be compassionate, considerate and kind. You know him like the back of your hand. And that’s why it hurts even more. Because you aren’t special.

Not in the least bit. He treats you like he would anyone else. You, on your own, had to misunderstand his intentions. You let hope sew itself into your heart. You took advantage of his kindness. You brought this pain onto yourself. You let yourself become sick.

But was love ever a choice?

//

“Is falling in love so bad?”

The hope cannot be smothered. You’re desperately yearned that the things he speaks to you means something more. And you’ve become selfish. If he was sick like you...maybe it wouldn’t have to be so painful.

“Are you okay, Y/N?” Jimin looks at you in concern, “What’s wrong?”

He never answers your question.

The symptoms worsen even more until it feels like you’re held captive under his reign, on edge from his every glance. You’re ill. In a way that makes you feel disgusted with yourself. The world continues to move but you’re glued to the same spot. There’s nothing you can do.

Nothing he can do.

Jimin is at a loss, befuddled at your behaviour. The way you look at him is strange. How your eyes are soft and your words are always full of hesitation. The way you react is strange. He finds you withdrawing when his hands accidentally grazes yours as if he’s burnt you. You’re always mumbling to yourself...lost in another world. Yet at the same time, you’re always smiling when he is, your laughter has become brighter and it makes him happy that you’re happy.

He is your friend after all.

“Y/N?” Jimin lightly calls your name. Upon hearing no response and seeing that you’ve fallen asleep, he smiles and walks away. “Why is she always sleeping on the couch?” His mumbling and the padding footsteps aren’t enough to wake you. But when you feel a warm blanket drape on your body, tucking you in, one of your eyes flutter open.

Why? Even through your hazing mind, you’re screaming inside your brain. Why does he always treat you with so much kindness? Why does his compassion hurt you so much?

Your hand automatically wraps around his wrist and he freezes, eyes trailing up to your body to meet your eyes.

“Stay with me.” It’s a murmur that befalls from your parted lips, half between a desperate plea and a breath. “Can you please stay with me?”

Those are words that you wanted to say. Those are words that sobbed to be spoken on your tongue. Those are words that you were too cowardly and too scared to utter.

“Thank you.”

Jimin doesn’t respond and he doesn’t need to. You watch him smile, let your heart quicken in pace - thump, thump, thump - and the butterflies in your stomach do acrobatics, swan dives and fluttering leaps. His eyes crinkle like the crescent moon in the night sky and you allow your lips to mimic his.

“Go to your own bed, brat.” He ruffles your hair and you sink deeper into the covers. “Your neck will hurt in the morning.”

If only he knew how much you wanted him to be with you. How much you wanted him to call your name. How much you ached to have him embrace your body and kiss your lips. If he knew that you were ridden with disease, a lovesickness that you can’t get rid of, would he feel something more than pity?

You watch the silhouette of his backside blur in the darkness of the hall.

That’s when you realize that it never happened overnight. You never loved Jimin merely by sitting on this very same couch that’s filled with his scent, not by watching his face glow in the television’s light, not when he fell asleep on your shoulder and you realized how beautiful he was.

The feelings were always there.

They were buried deep underneath, grown over time and experiences. It was tended to, sprouting inch by inch each time he laughed to that very time when he nagged you to death about staying out late. The question that he mindlessly spoke (“What do you think it feels like to love?”) simply had made you recognize that the seedling wasn’t a bud anymore. The roots had clung on no matter how hard you tried to rip it out.

“Y/N.” Jin’s voice quivers, “The sickness has deteriorated...into the worst kind of love.”

Unconditional love.

No matter what happens - you’ll still love him.

“Be honest with me, Y/N.” Jimin has his hands in yours, the two of you sitting down together one afternoon day. “Is something going on? If there is...I want to be there for you. Whatever’s happening in your life...You’re my best friend.”

It stings. But you’d still hang onto every word like the fool you are.

And he’s left unaware.

“I’m fine. Everything’s going to be okay.”

Because even if Jimin never knows for the rest of his life, you’ll truly be happy for him.

As long as he’s still smiling and laughing, you’re content. The undying yearning has subdued under the noisy palpitations of your chest. The happiness that you so longed for yourself is overridden by happiness for him. To love unconditionally is not to love no matter what he does to you. It’s not to love him when he hurts you. Rather it’s to love without expecting anything back.

“What do you think it feels like to love?”

You don’t know all the answers and you never will. But you know it’s one of the most painful and beautiful things that can happen to someone. You will never stop cherishing him. And your heart will never stop skipping beats and racing to the non-existent finish line. Your cheeks will always glow and bloom hues of rose, warming up to the caress of his fingertips. The butterflies won’t cease when his irises connect to yours, when he smiles or calls you silly names to tease. You might never stop wanting more, never stop thinking about him when your daydreams skedaddle off but at the very least - you know now that this love has made your world less grey.

This love is the one that swept you off into the tide of emotions. It made you learn how to love.

Jin doesn’t know what he’s doing.

He especially doesn’t know when he stares at the bouquet of lilac flowers lying on his desk.

What was he thinking? Maybe he wasn’t feeling well. After hearing that you were coming by his office, he had abruptly turned into the florist’s shop. Now the scent of floral was haunting him and the image of your flushed cheeks came to mind within the snapshot of a millisecond.

“I’m going crazy.” He mutters to himself and throws the flowers into his trash bin.

At the exact same time, the door to his office slides open and you’re greeting him with a grin. “Were you just talking to yourself?”

“No.” Jin defends himself with a pout that quickly grows into a smile when he sees you. “How are you?”

“Are you asking as my doctor…” You plop down in the seat across from his desk. “...or as my friend?”

He laughs at your mischievous expression. “Both. But...mostly as your friend.”

“If I’m being truthful…” You lean back. “I’m not doing as badly as I was before. It’s still...difficult on some days but I’m okay. That’s why I’m here-” You pause with an inhale. “I wanted to drop by and let you know that I’m leaving.”

Jin tips his head to one side. “What?”

A smile lifts your lips and you fiddle in your lap. “I’ve decided that I needed to get away...just for a while. Travel and see the world...free my mind a bit.” You meet Jin’s eyes again, overwhelmed by thankfulness. If it weren’t for him, you would’ve made it this far. “I don’t think I’ll ever stop loving Jimin. But I’ve come to terms with it and it’s not so bad…”

“How-” He nods to himself and gets a grip. “How long will you be gone for?”

“When I’m ready...if it’s a few weeks or months...maybe even a year.” You melt into a sheepish smile. “Thank you, Jin. I don’t know what I would do without you. You’ve helped me so much. I-”

“It’s the least I could do.” He means it with all his heart, “I’m just happy that you’re happy.”

It happens before he can realize. It happens before he can stop it. It happens when you bid him a sweet farewell.

The scent of the flowers are still lingering in the air. Your silly smile is imprinted into his mind. He gazes at your backside when you walk out the door...

Then it happens- Jin’s heart skips a beat.

[duskholland]

Friends? (Stiles Stilinski imagine)

Summary: You are in love with your best friend and maybe - just maybe - he feels the same way.

Based off the prompt: “Wait, no, don’t take off my hoodie. I love the way it looks on you.” from this prompt list.

Warnings: one minor curse word and fluff that might make your heart explode. (I’m serious, this is extremely cheesy).

Word Count: 3.6k 

A/N: I love love, and I think it shows. The question on everyone’s lips: will I ever stop writing the best-friends-turned-lovers trope? To that there is only one answer - no. I love it too much. As always, I hope you enjoy reading!

“I was right,” Stiles announced, a smug expression glued to his face. Adamantly, you shook your head, rubbing the tops of your arms as you attempted a grimace.

“I’m fine.” To prove your point, you held your arms out. A rush of cold air instantly attached to your exposed skin, and you had to hold back a shiver. “I can handle this, Stiles.”

“Mhmm,” he hummed, obviously doubting your words. “Let’s carry on then - unless you’d like to admit defeat.”

“I’ll never give you that satisfaction.” Slinging your hand around your best friend’s arm, you pulled him down the crowded street.

It was Scott’s birthday in a few weeks, so you’d decided to drag Stiles along on your quest to find the perfect gift. The three of you had been friends for years, but neither you nor Stiles could think of a present that Scott would like so it had seemed logical to team up.

When Stiles had shown up at your door, thick hoodie over his torso, you’d laughed - the sun had been out, a warm breeze filling the air. He’d replied with the prediction that it’d cloud over and go chilly and, sure enough, the weather had done exactly that.

“We should try a bookshop. Maybe they’ll have something on veterinary medicine,” you suggested. Stiles shrugged, allowing himself to be pulled around the shopping district.

You’d been surprised when he agreed to come with you - Stiles was never one who normally enjoyed the pleasures of recreational shopping - but you’d began to notice that he was making a conscious effort to spend more time with you. You’d initially put it down as him simply wanting to bond with you before you split off to go to college, but you were beginning to wonder if there was some type of ulterior motive at play.

“This one’s good,” you spoke, sighing when you stepped into the warm shop. 

Stiles gave you an unimpressed look. “See, I’d be just as relieved as you are but I’m nice and toasty in this jumper,” he teased. You rolled your eyes, moving towards a shelf with the title ‘vet’.

“Shut up and do something helpful,” you instructed, words carrying no heat. Stiles gave you a mock salute, a shit-eating grin on his face.

“Yes, ma’am.”

You began to search through the shelf, fingers flicking over an assortment of titles. Nothing leapt out at you, and half an hour later you found yourself collapsing into an armchair with a disgruntled sigh.

“Give up already?” Stiles’ voice caused you to look up, and your eyes lit up when they landed on the pile of books stacked between his arms.

“I couldn’t find anything. Where did you get those?” He passed them over and you began to skim the blurbs of each, tension leaving your shoulders when you realised that Scott would love them all.

“There’s another section on the third floor, I just had to look a little deeper.” Smiling, you stood up and grabbed your bag, slinging it over your shoulder.

“This one, I think,” you held up one with a scarlet cover and Stiles hummed in approval. “I think we should get something else as well, though.”

“Another thing?!” Stiles exclaimed, trailing after you as you walked towards the cash desks.

“He’s our best friend. I think we owe him more than one book,” you said, riffling through your bag to find a purse. You were called to a server, and Stiles followed you like a lost puppy.

“$25, please,” the server announced. You pulled out a few notes and paid for the book, exiting the shop a few minutes later.

“What are you thinking for this second gift?” Stiles asked, smirking when you began to shiver.

“I’m not sure,” you admitted, shifting from one foot to the other. “Do you have any ideas?”

“Uh, socks?” He offered, throwing his hands into the air when you shot him an unimpressed look.

“Socks? Stiles, he’s turning eighteen!” You peered down the street. For a fleeting moment, you let your eyes fall on a young couple. They were sitting on a bench together, the boy’s arm around the girl’s. A short pang of...envy? loneliness? desire? shot through your chest. They looked so happy.

Your gaze shifted back to Stiles where you found him watching you intently.

“Everything okay?” he checked, eyes reflecting sincerity. You nodded, rocking back on your heels as you dropped his gaze. You couldn’t tell him that you longed to be like that - wrapped up in a love where you felt nothing but safe and secure. Well, you could, but you’d have to leave out one very key detail. You’d have to neglect the fact that the only person you could picture yourself being with was him.

“Let’s go to the plant shop. He mentioned wanting a cactus a few months ago.”

You were quiet as you browsed the shop, Stiles’ non-stop chatter filling the air in comfortable waves. He seemed to be aware of your mood, making a continuous point of reaching out to pat your shoulder every now or then, and occasionally scattering a few compliments throughout his speech. You appreciated the gesture, but it just caused the ache inside your heart to grow.

“I think this little guy is the one.” Stiles thrust a cactus towards your face, causing you to jerk back suddenly. “Oh! Sorry,” he mumbled, a flaming blush coating his cheeks, “I forgot it...has spikes.”

You waved him off, grabbing the potted plant and inspecting it thoroughly. The pastel-coloured ceramic was cute and you were sure that the stark greenness of the plant would add a much-needed pop of colour to Scott’s room. “This is perfect,” you decided. Stiles nodded happily, pulling a wallet from his back pocket. You went to complain, shoving your hands into your bag, when he stopped you.

“This is a joint gift. You got the book, I’ll get the cactus.” There was no flaw in the logic, so you let him go ahead and pay. Upon leaving the shop you took custody of the plant, not trusting him with the responsibility of another living thing.

“Stiles,” you said, teeth chattering. He turned to look at you, face perking up when he noticed the cold flush of your cheeks.

“I win?”

“You’re enjoying this way too much,” you grumbled, “but yes. You were right to bring a jumper - it’s bloody freezing.”

Stiles threw a triumphant fist into the air. “I knew it.”

Before you could roll your eyes, he was grabbing the bottom of his hoodie and pulling it over his head.

“What are you-” you started, heart pounding when he held out the warm fabric.

“Put it on,” he instructed. You noted that he was wearing a long-sleeved flannel beneath it, the red material contrasting against his skin in a way that made him look extremely attractive.

“Put it on?” you echoed, turning it over in your hands.

“I’ve watched you almost freeze to death for hours, trying to prove a stupid point, Y/N. Please, take it. If not for you, do it for my sane of mind.” He seemed genuinely worked up, so you caved and shrugged it over your head. The blue jumper fit well, and you found yourself moaning at the sensations of being engulfed in a cosy cocoon.

“This is so soft,” you commented, smiling up at him. The gesture warmed not only your skin but also your heart.

“I stole it from Liam. He has good taste.” You laughed, slinging your arm around his. You pulled him into your side, clinging on with a little too much force.

“Where to now, m’lady?” Stiles asked, squeezing your arm. You melted against him, slow thoughts drifting through your head, reminding you of annoyances such as boundaries, and lines-that-shouldn’t-be-crossed. You drowned them out, focusing instead on his firm presence beside you.

“I’m getting hungry. Are you good with food?” You asked. You’d left in the early afternoon and time had flown by. It was now approaching six, and the empty growl of your stomach had grown tiresome. 

“Yes!” He exclaimed, startling you by suddenly running forwards a few paces. “I found this place a few months ago and I think you’d really like it.” Nodding, you bit back a grin as he took charge over the journey.

In a flurry of warmth, hurried footing and gentle grips, you found yourself being seated in a diner a little while later. The place was beautiful - tucked away down a side street so it wasn’t too busy, but it still had a nice, friendly atmosphere. You’d claimed a booth, the red leather bouncy as you slid into your spot opposite Stiles.

“You’re right. Again.” You reluctantly admitted, “I love it here.”

Stiles flipped the menu between his fingers, smiling down at the table. “I like to think I know you quite well.” And there it was again! Not for the first time, you were glad Stiles didn’t possess the hearing of your supernatural friends - your heartbeat felt as though it was hammering itself out of your chest.

“You do.” You let out a short breath, risking a glance at his warm, open face. “You know me better than anyone else.”

The server came to take your orders before he could respond, and then the topic of conversation shifted. Easy words flew between you, the product of many shared experiences together. You were having a great time, but something was...off.

You’d been on dates and you’d been out with friends. The day you were spending with Stiles - especially now you’d migrated to the restaurant setting - felt suspiciously like...both? The lines between friends! and lovers! blurred in your mind, everything covered in a low film of confusion. It felt like a date, but you were only friends. It was odd, to say the least.

Things would switch from playful banter to something more within the blink of an eye. It was happening constantly, and it left your head reeling.

“It’s so hot in here,” you commented, fanning your face. There was a large light just above your head, and you had a feeling that the bulb was the cause of your discomfort. You were just beginning to pull your arms out of his jumper when Stiles interrupted you.

“Wait, no, don’t take off my hoodie. I love the way it looks on you.” Love.

“It might be cold out there, but it feels like I’m sat in a volcano right now, Stiles,” you mumbled, feeling a warmth paint your cheeks.

Stiles pouted. “You look cute though.”

Unsurprisingly, you gave in. “I guess I’ll survive.” You might have been warm, but nothing was worth ridding his face of such a pleasant smile.

The food came out and you quickly devoured your meal, stealing a few of his fries whenever he looked away. You knew he saw, but he chose not to comment on it. Once you’d both finished your main course, you decided to share a milkshake as they were a ‘staple item’ and you ‘couldn’t visit this place without having one of them’. Stiles’ words, not yours, but you had a feeling the milkshake would be worth it. He’d been right about everything else, after all.

“Red or blue straw?” He asked the moment the shake was on the table. You hooked your finger around the blue straw, eyeing up the drink.

“Blue.”

He went for the red. Whether it be a trick of fate, or instead the combined awkwardness of the two of you, the moment you leaned in to take a drink of the milkshake, you banged your scalp against Stiles’ forehead.

“Ow!” You exclaimed, laughing softly when you took in his startled expression. A red mark spread across his forehead, and whilst you could feel a similar mark on your own, you chose to reach out and press your fingers delicately to his skin. “I’m sorry,” you said sincerely, fingertips trying to brush the pain away. His blush spread down his neck, and you suddenly became very aware of his breath fanning against your arm.

Retracting your hand, you tried to play off your move by excusing yourself from the booth. Once in the bathroom, you splashed your face with some water and gave yourself a pep-talk.

It was time to get your head in the game. You liked him, and you were fairly sure he reciprocated those feelings. The lingering touches, the off-handed comments...they all amounted to suggest that, perhaps, his heart beat a little faster around you too.

You had two choices - you could either ignore it or take control of the situation. You knew what to do.

After splitting the bill, you dragged Stiles towards a park. It was past 8pm, and the sun had just dipped beneath the horizon. The vibe of the street was different - people laughing, people joking. Everything felt brighter.

In his jumper, you had a firm hold on his arm when you steered him through the entrance of the park. When the path cleared and you had a straight view of the space, he gasped.

“Is it like this every night?” He asked, voice full of wonder. You nodded, eyes sparkling.

“Beautiful, isn’t it?”

Strings of fairy lights laced across the trees, giving the park an enchanted feel. Various water features had beams of light illuminating the water, adding an extra layer to the magic. A few musicians were scattered around the plain, and off in the distance, you could see a couple slow-dancing across the grass together.

“Amazing.”

At some point, your arms must have fallen, because you found yourself gripping his hand. You’d held it before, but it had been years since your fingers had slotted together, and never had it felt as good as it did right then. Whether it be the result of an accident or coincidence, neither of you let go.

“We should sit here,” you said, gesturing towards a bench. The decorative panel detailed curved love hearts, and it almost felt like the universe was sending you a sign.

You sat close beside him, the hoodie bunching up around your waist as you carefully manoeuvred yourself so that you were resting lightly against his side. Having been separated when you sat, you made a conscious effort to reach down and grab his hand.

A silence fell, the gentle sounds of distant violins and people laughing occupying the background space. You were focused on the feeling of his thumb tracing circles over the back of your hand, the soft movement anchoring you firmly in the moment.

“What are we doing?” You asked, hint of a quiver in your voice.

“I don’t know about you, but I’m sitting in a park with my best friend.” Probably wrongfully so, you found yourself bristling at his choice of words.

“Is that what this is to you?” you asked, clearing your throat when the words threatened to break. Instead of meeting his gaze, you shook off his hand and placed yours back on your lap.

“What do you- uh, what do you mean?” He seemed uncertain. You didn’t know whether that made it easier or harder.

“I just,” you broke off, knowing the end of your sentence would alter the course of your friendship, “today felt like a date. And it was nice. Really, uh, nice. I don’t know if it’s just me reading into things, but I think you felt it too.”

With the words out of your mouth, you released a breath you hadn’t realised you’d been holding. You risked a glance at him and saw an expression you found to be unreadable.

“When we were fifteen, I practiced asking you out with Scott,” he began, pausing when you let out a laugh.

“What the hell?!” you exclaimed, trying to suppress the excitement that began to bubble in the pit of your stomach.

“It was awful. I made him wear a wig, and afterwards, he wouldn’t speak to me for weeks.” Stiles gained a distant look in his eyes, the corners of his mouth twisting into a smile. “I liked you so much, Y/N. It was worth it, to me. Scott isn’t the point, though. I was going to ask you to homecoming but you ended up with Jackson and I knew better than to interrupt his date.”

“Jackson was a terrible guy back then,” you mused, memories of being abandoned by the punch station drifting through your head.

“Yeah,” Stiles sighed, “you cried so much that night. It was really horrible to watch.”

“Are you saying I’m an ugly crier?” You said, taking delight when a look of sheer horror flickered across his face.

“No! You’re a beautiful crier! It was just hard to see you upset when I could’ve prevented it in the first place,” he covered, words spoken so quickly they were almost unintelligible. “I nearly admitted it that night, but when you were in my bathroom, Scott texted me and told me not to. It was probably for the best, I don’t think you were in the right frame of mind.”

You nodded. “Yeah, Scott was right. I wouldn’t have taken it well.” You’d cried a lot that night, and it could have had something to do with the fact that Stiles spent all night in the arms of some other girl. You doubted you would’ve been able to handle a declaration of love on top of everything else.

“Anyway,” Stiles cleared his throat, “that’s not the point. I liked you back then.” You began to grow uneasy at the repetitive use of the past tense. Seeming to sense this, he reached out and tenderly gripped your fingers.

“You liked me,” you repeated. A violinist walked down the path and set up a few metres away from you. You wanted to laugh when they began to play La Vie En Rose; everything felt like a cheesy romance novel.

“I don’t like you anymore,” he said, tongue flicking out to wet his bottom lip. You sucked in a breath, bewildered. “I love you.”

You opened your mouth to respond when he barrelled on. “As in, I’m in love with you. Have been since we were sixteen. We were studying for that stupid math test and you threw the textbook across the room. It was, uh, really hot. I knew it, right then, that it was you. You were the one I wanted in my life forever, and I reckoned I may as well keep you as a friend if I couldn’t date you. But I do - do love you, do want to be with you.”

The violin music filled your ears and you laughed. You laughed a lot. Once you’d began, you couldn’t seem to stop it; all the nervous energy was finally overflowing.

“Are you seriously doing this right now?” Stiles asked, gaze darting around. You could feel strangers watching you as you doubled over.

“Are you seeing this?!” You exclaimed, finally gasping enough air to form coherent words. “We’re in a moonlit park surrounded by fairy lights, and there’s a violinist playing whilst you declare your love for me. This is...this is unbelievable!” You were smiling, and he was too.

“I love you too,” you said a moment later, eyes skating the curves of his face. “Have since we were fifteen, probably won’t ever stop. My heart goes crazy when I’m around you, and, if I’m being honest, I’d really like to kiss you now.”

“Being forward now, aren’t we? At least ask me on a date first,” Stiles joked. You rolled your eyes.

“Can I take you on a date, Stiles Stilinski?”

“I would love it if you did.”

And there it was. His eyes flickered down to your lips as he turned his body, free hand going to curve around your side as he pulled you closer. He did the heavy lifting, but it was you who finally, finally bridged the gap.

You’d heard a lot of myths about kisses. Given the fanciness of the situation - there was a violinist playing French love music, for God’s sake - you expected fireworks. You expected to feel blown off your feet. You expected some big, grand, life-changing moment where everything fell into place and you could ride off into the sunset with the love of your life.

In reality, it was only a kiss. Granted, it was a superb kiss. His hands trailed your sides, delicate touch sending shivers down your spine as you found yourself gravitating as close to him as possible. Your fingers tangled in his hair as your lips met his, soft brushes and nudges guiding you back to where you were supposed to be.

Kissing Stiles felt right. It was not an Earth-shattering moment because that would imply that it was something unexpected, or full of a fragile uncertainty. You were meant to be together, and if the tender way he held you in his arms was any indication, you knew that you’d stay united for a long, long time.

“Wow,” he spoke, forehead resting against yours. You chuckled, eyes fluttering shut when he reconnected your lips.

Okay, maybe it was a little Earth-shattering.

“We should go, it’s getting late.” As much as you didn’t want to disrupt the nice rhythm you had going on, you were aware that the evening was drawing to a close.

“Can’t we stay here? Just for a little bit longer?” Stiles pleaded, bottom lip curling into a pout. You caved. You’d waited long enough for this - you weren’t about to cut the moment shorter.

“We have time,” you replied, smiling when he patted your side over the hoodie.

“We have all the time in the world,” he added.

And that, thankfully, was completely true. You did. And you intended to make every moment count.

any feedback? I would love to hear any thoughts you have on this!

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