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purplehairedwonder · 3 years

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Hearts With(out) Chains Chapter 12

Fandom: One Piece Rating: PG-13 Pairings: Gen (eventual Lawlu) Words: 4629 Characters: Trafalgar Law, Monkey D. Luffy, Nami, Chopper, Usopp, Brook, Zoro, Nami, Franky, Smoker, Tashigi, Doflamingo Notes: I’m taking my turn at the Corazon!Law AU because my brain won’t leave me alone until this is written down. Tags will be updated as the chapters come out.

The story title is based on the Ellie Goulding song “Hearts Without Chains.”

The nickname Doflamingo uses for Law in this chapter is a nod to the story “Worth” by Doctor_Cyance.

Warning: This chapter contains the description of a panic attack.

Summary: Law is reclaimed by the Family when he's 17 and, with Doflamingo holding the lives of his crew as collateral for his good behavior, eventually becomes the third Corazon. Years later, trapped by his impossible situation, Law finds a strange connection to Monkey D. Luffy, which offers a glimpse of something he's repeatedly had ripped away from him: hope.

Previous chapters: Prologue | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11

Read also at AO3 / FF.N

After leaving the control room, Law followed the echoing cacophony of the fully collected Straw Hat crew through the halls of the lab. Smoker trailed behind him, tension on the acrid air surrounding him. The moment Law had realized what he’d let the vice admiral hear about his past, he’d debated whether to let Smoker return to the Marines with that information. But the feeling of Vergo’s heartbeat stopping in his hand was still fresh in his mind, and he didn’t particularly feel like ending yet another life today after everything that had happened.

If the other man tried to talk to him about it, though… Well, Law couldn’t make any promises then.

As he walked, Law considered his situation. With Vergo dead, the main source of the rumor of Law’s disloyalty was gone. Law had the dead man’s Den Den Mushi in his pocket, and even if he had recorded Law’s words, Law would simply destroy the recording. For a brief moment, Law considered ending his partnership with the Straw Hats since he’d taken care of his main target, but he dismissed the idea almost as soon as it crossed his mind. Law could pretend he’d never seen Vergo on Punk Hazard, but Doflamingo would hear of Vergo’s death eventually, and, considering the cause of death, there would be no mistaking who had killed him.

Not to mention, Law had obviously failed in the mission he’d been sent to complete—and he couldn’t imagine finishing it now. Not when he couldn’t shake the startled recognition that had struck him as he and Straw Hat had shaken hands that the pull in his chest had gone still, as though Law were where he was meant to be.

No, even with Vergo dead, Law was still just as stuck as he had been the moment Vergo had arrived on the island. He had no choice—either for himself or his nakama—but to continue on the path he was on.

Laughs and shouts bounced off the lab’s metal walls, and, as Law and his stewing shadow approached the source, Law recalled the blueprints he’d been provided; this must be the Biscuit Room, he thought as he stepped into the large, colorful space. He’d wondered at the name as he’d pored over the schematics on his way over, but now he understood. Smoker stepped up next to him and made a disapproving sound at the sight of what was clearly a space for children—children who had become science experiments for a mad clown.

Law narrowed his eyes, assessing the scene in front of him. It seemed the Straw Hats had taken care of their enemies with alacrity. Both Caesar and Monet were wrapped in what Law hoped were Seastone chains (he had warned them) and slumped against the wall. The cat burglar stood not far from them, hands on her hips and a small smile curving her lips as she watched the antics of her crewmates. Smoker’s second stood on the other side of the captives, clearly having taken it upon herself to guard them. G-5 soldiers milled about close to the swordswoman, refusing to fully engage with the pirates.

“Oh, Torao! You’re here!”

Law looked up to see Straw Hat across the room. He was perched atop the back of a couch next to Zoro, who appeared to be dozing. Long Nose sat across from them, his slingshot in hand. It looked like they’d been in the middle of a lively conversation before Law had caught the other captain’s attention. Nico Robin sat next to Long Nose, one leg crossed primly over the other and her hands clasped in her lap. She was smiling, as though enjoying whatever her nakama were discussing. The cyborg sat on the floor next to her. The skeleton, for his part, was wandering around the room, playing a jaunty tune on a violin. (At this point, Law didn’t have it in him to question where that had come from.)

That left the tanuki, Black Leg, and the samurai. Considering none of the children were present, Law had a feeling he knew what the little doctor was up to, anyway. Law idly wondered if he was having any luck treating the children before shoving the thought aside; he didn’t like thinking about his own history with looking to other doctors for help.

“Straw Hat-ya,” Law replied, stepping further into the room.

“What happened to that Verto guy?”

Law tightened his grip on Kikoku briefly. “Dead.”

Straw Hat simply nodded, but outraged noises erupted from the other side of the room. Law turned to look at the prisoners.

“What?” Caesar gasped loudly. “But he’s—”

“So, he was right,” Monet said, the quiet betrayal in her voice more painful than Law had expected it to be. “You were a traitor after all. I didn’t believe him when he told us.”

Though he hated the Family as a whole for what they had taken from him—and continued to take as they held his crew’s lives over his head—Law had spent years with people like Monet once he’d been brought to Dressrosa. And he didn’t hate them all as individuals. Monet was a lot like Law himself, having been rescued by the Family after an unspeakable trauma along with her sister. But, unlike Law, she hadn’t been freed from the corrosive influence of the Donquixote Pirates. She’d been fully indoctrinated and would never believe the truth of who Doflamingo truly was that Law had witnessed on Minion Island. Doffy had her undying loyalty.

Law’s jaw tightened. “He didn’t give me much choice.”

“I can’t believe you teamed up with these… idiots,” Caesar said, lips curling in disgust as he looked at the Straw Hats.

“Idiots?” the cyborg called. “That’s super rude.”

“These idiots kicked your butt,” Long Nose reminded him, aiming an empty sling shot in his direction. “So, what does that say about you?”

Caesar made some incomprehensible frustrated noises in response, but Monet simply looked at Law, her usually placid expression tinged with hurt. “Why, Corazon? After everything the Young Master’s given you?”

Law snorted, an ugly sound that caused Monet to recoil. He knew exactly where he stood with Doflamingo—the Warlord’s tool and plaything and the means to an end—and none of it was for Law’s sake.

It was never for anyone’s sake but his own.

Doflamingo liked to act like he was generous with his Family, but all he really knew how to do was take. He gave but took twofold in return—his gifts came with strings, literally and figuratively. The cost was unflinching allegiance to a madman, pieces of one’s soul irreparably damaged by every act of loyalty, every drop of blood spilled in the name of a man who believed himself a god. And the Family was happy to pay the price; Law once had felt the same before he’d been saved.

Doflamingo was also unflinching in taking from those who refused to pay fealty. He’d taken Cora-san all those years ago for saving Law. He’d taken Law’s and his friends’ freedom on a no-name island in the North Blue. He took the very existences of his enemies in Dressrosa, using Sugar’s abilities to erase them from memory and enslave them as toys.

It was fitting, Law had thought when he’d first learned of the scope of the operation in the kingdom; Doflamingo was a puppet master, literally pulling strings. He saw others as his toys to play with as he wished. Law was nothing more than another one of those toys, though a supposedly privileged one, sitting on the Heart Throne. But it was nothing more than a gilded cage. Law’s eventual purpose was still to die for Doflamingo’s immortality. After everything else he’d taken from Law, he also intended to take Law’s life. And he expected Law to give it willingly; anything else would break the illusion of Doflamingo’s complete control.

“He’s given me nothing,” Law replied coldly. Nothing that he hadn’t taken back countless times over as he whittled Law down into the shape he wanted as his Corazon, anyway.

Monet opened her mouth to reply, but she was cut off by a loud wail as the Straw Hats’ little doctor came out of a side room.

“Chopper, what’s wrong?” the cat burglar asked, hurrying to his side.

“I’ve tried everything I can think of,” he said, “but the drugs in their system are just too strong, and I don’t fully understand their interactions.”

“Of course, they’re strong,” Caesar sniffed. “I made them, and I’m a genius.”

“Shut up, clown,” Nami hissed before turning back to her crewmate. “So, what does that mean?”

“If I can’t get the drugs out of their system, they won’t get better,” the tanuki sniffed. “I can treat the symptoms, but I can’t cure them.”

“Let Torao take a look!”

Law jerked in surprise as rubbery limbs wound tightly around his shoulders and the too-loud voice rang in his ears. (His concussion complained with a painful pang in response, and Law winced.) He hadn’t even noticed Straw Hat moving from the couch. Law prodded at him with Kikoku’s hilt in a futile attempt to dislodge him, but Straw Hat just grinned at him.

The Straw Hats’ doctor eyed Law uncertainly. “I don’t know, Luffy…”

“He’s a good doctor,” Luffy said with a decisive nod. “He saved me.”

After several failed attempts to detach the other captain—the freaking limpet—Law sighed and satisfied himself with the biggest eyeroll he could manage.

“Do you think that’s a good idea, Luffy?” the cat burglar asked. Her suspicions remained, and Law could respect that. Someone on this crew needed to exercise some common sense.

“Torao can look at them,” Straw Hat said, unswayed.

“Don’t I get a say in this?” Law demanded. Being talked about like he wasn’t present was one of his (admittedly many) pet peeves.

“Shishishi,” Straw Hat chuckled. “You’ll look at them, won’t you?”

In hindsight, as Law followed the tanuki to the room he’d been seeing the children in, he’d like to say he agreed because disagreeing with Straw Hat over it would be too much trouble, and, with his head injury, he didn’t have it in him to argue. But the truth was that there was something in the wide, trusting grin Straw Hat effortlessly threw in his direction and the responding warmth in his chest that made the agreement roll off his tongue before he could stop it.

He listened with half an ear as the tanuki explained what he’d already tried with the children and what he’d found. Though Law wasn’t privy to the exact goings-on in the lab, he had a sense of how ugly some of the projects Doflamingo had his fingers in were, so nothing he heard surprised him.

“L-look, Corazon,” the little doctor said once he finished his recitation, voice trembling slightly as he turned to face Law, hooves on his hips. “These kids have been through a lot. They’re scared and in pain and want to go home. D-don’t make it worse, okay? O-or I’ll kick your ass myself!”

Law had never seen anything less intimidating—and his best friend was a polar bear mink, which said something—but he still respected the sentiment. That protective instinct toward a patient was the attitude a true healer should have, one Law had seen in his parents as they fought for the people of Flevance while it was ravaged by plague. And, despite all the blood he’d spilled over the years, it was a feeling he could feel stirring deep, deep within himself, too.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Law replied. “You probably shouldn’t be here while I work, though.”

“What? Why?”

“My methods are… unorthodox,” Law settled on. Though the Ope Ope no Mi’s effects were bloodless and painless, that didn’t make them any less disturbing to most people who saw them.

The tanuki hemmed and hawed for several moments, and Law felt his impatience growing until he just opened a Room and approached the kids. The little doctor yelped and followed him.

“You’re that man from outside,” one of the kids said as Law approached, frowning at him.

“I am,” Law agreed.

“What are you going to do to us?” another child asked, arms crossed defensively.

Law felt his eye twitch at the assumption he was there to hurt them, but Law had attacked the people who were trying to help them escape. He wasn’t entirely sure what to say—he knew a thing or two about being a traumatized child, but that didn’t make him an expert on dealing with others.

“Corazon here is a doctor,” the tanuki said, coming up next to Law.

That piqued the interest of some of the children.

“A doctor?”

“Like you?

“What kind of name is Corazon, anyway?”

“Law.” Everyone turned to look at him in surprise. “That’s my name,” he clarified, startling even himself. “Corazon is a title, but…” But he didn’t work for the Donquixote Family anymore now that he’d sided with the Straw Hats, did he?

He glanced down to see the Straw Hat doctor looking at him curiously. “What?” he demanded, feeling suddenly uncomfortable, like he was being looked through rather than at. He couldn’t help but be reminded of Bepo when looking at the small creature, and Bepo had always known Law better than anyone—often better than Law himself.

“Nothing,” the little doctor squeaked before looking back at the kids. “Doctor Law here is going to look at you. I’ll be just outside if you need me!”

With that, he glanced back at Law once more then left the room, closing the door behind him. Law, curious at the tanuki’s sudden agreement to leave Law and the kids alone, turned back to the children. He took a breath and unsheathed Kikoku to perform a Scan.

-----

Once Law was finished his work, he left the delighted children chattering to each other about what it was like having their body parts removed and opened the door. The Straw Hat’s doctor was sitting just outside, and he perked up at Law’s appearance.

“Well?”

“I was able to remove all traces of the drugs from their system,” Law said. “But most of them will be dealing with the effects of long-term exposure. With rehab, they should all be fine.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes,” Law said, slightly annoyed at having his professional opinion questioned. Though he didn’t truly blame the tanuki; whatever Caesar had been experimenting on with these children, he’d given them some incredibly potent drug combinations that Law had never seen. Anyone without the power of Law’s fruit would have had a hard, if not impossible, time treating these children.

As Law had initially Scanned the children and seen the degenerative effects of the drugs they’d been exposed to, he’d been reminded of the charts he’d seen in his parents’ clinic of patients with Amber Lead Disease and the devastating effects on the body; he’d had to forcibly shake himself from the memory to continue working.

He started as the tanuki hurled himself at Law and wrapped his little arms around Law’s legs. The Straw Hats were far too affectionate for Law’s comfort.

“Thank you!” he said, looking up at Law with teary eyes. “I didn’t know what I was going to do for them!”

“It’s nothing,” Law said, lightly shaking his leg in an attempt to remove the other doctor. He was finding himself saying that a lot around the Straw Hats, he realized. He wasn’t sure he wanted to examine that any more closely.

The tanuki finally released Law’s leg and wiped his eyes with a hoof. “Luffy was right.” He gave Law a weak smile. “So, thank you for this. And for saving Luffy when I couldn’t. Law.”

Law opened his mouth to wave off the thanks again, but he shut it when he heard his name. Looking at the little creature, he felt his chest clench as he was reminded of Bepo when he’d called earlier. “I knew it, Captain. I knew you were still in there.”

He thought of the small feeling of satisfaction he got from healing Black Leg’s fracture, from knowing his hands could still heal after everything else they’d done.

Maybe Bepo was right, and the boy he’d sworn to follow no matter what thirteen years earlier was still in Law somewhere. Law had long thought that boy dead in the North Blue, but Bepo had always been the wisest of the Hearts.

“They’re your patients, Tony-ya,” Law said, recalling the doctor’s name from his—frankly ludicrous—wanted poster. “I was just helping out.”

Chopper’s face lit up at Law’s use of his name, but he tried to hide his pleasure. “That doesn’t make me happy, you bastard.”

Law’s lips twitched as he left Chopper to deal with the children now that they were no longer poisoned and headed back to the Biscuit Room.

When he entered, Straw Hat perked up immediately, as though he had a radar for Law’s presence. “Oi, Torao!”

“How are the children?” Nico Robin asked, eyes following her captain’s gaze.

“I removed the drugs from their systems,” Law said. “They should be fine with some long-term treatment.”

“What?” Caesar squeaked. “You shouldn’t be able to—”

Before Law could open a Room to shut the clown up, the cat burglar smacked him on the head. “Shut up, you slimy bastard. You’re lucky Torao here was able to help the kids. If he hadn’t been able to…” She trailed off, but the implication remained.

“Still not my name,” Law muttered.

“Still doesn’t matter,” the cat burglar replied in a singsong.

Law sighed and rubbed a hand over his face then looked back up at the other Straw Hats. “Now what?” He had no idea how long he’d been working on the children, but if his waning stamina was any indication, it had been a while. It must be getting late.

“The Marines called for backup,” Nico Robin said, “but the closest ship won’t arrive until tomorrow.”

“Captain Tashigi will be taking charge of the children,” the cat burglar added, a softness in her expression. “She’ll take good care of them.”

“And our next stop is Dressroba!” Straw Hat said.

“Dressrosa,” Law corrected automatically, stomach tightening at the thought.

“From the maps, Dressrosa seems to be fairly close,” Long Nose said, pointing to some maps spread out on a table between the sofas.

“It is,” Law agreed. “Maybe half a day.”

Half a day to figure out how to extricate Law and his nakama from Doflamingo’s strings.

It wasn’t enough time.

The cat burglar nodded thoughtfully as she came up next to the table and looked at the maps. She was their navigator, if Law remembered correctly. “It’s too late to set sail tonight,” she said. “We thought we’d leave in the morning.”

Law nodded curtly. “Fine.”

“So, you want to tell us what we’re walking into when we get there?” Zoro asked, arms crossed and eye narrowed.

Law opened his mouth to respond, but he was interrupted by the muted sound of ringing. Law reached into his coat pocket and found his Den Den Mushi waiting to be answered.

There was only one person that could be.

“Shit,” Law cursed.

He had no interest in letting the Straw Hats or Marines overhear this call, so he quickly formed a Room and Shambled into the first space that came to mind: the control room. He landed on the couch in place of a pillow he’d switched with.

He set Kikoku to his side and stared at the snail for a moment before answering.

“Doffy.”

“Corazon,” Doflamingo replied. Law tried to listen for anything off in his voice, any sense he knew Law had really betrayed him after all. “How is the mission going?”

Law hesitated only a moment as he calculated the best response to give. “It’s done.”

“And there were no… complications?”

Law knew he was imagining it, but he couldn’t help but feel like Vergo’s corpse was staring at him from across the room.

“No. The intruders were taken care of.”

“That’s good to hear. I’ve been trying to call Monet but haven’t received a response.”

“She was injured during the fight,” Law said, the lie falling from his lips without a second thought. “I treated her wounds, and she’s currently sleeping.”

Doffy hummed in response. “I see. And Caesar?”

“The clown is locked away in his lab,” Law replied, allowing his disdain for the scientist creep into his voice. Doffy wouldn’t be surprised by it. “I don’t know how Monet puts up with him.”

Doffy chuckled. “She does it for me.”

“Of course.”

“And when do you plan to return home?”

“I’ll set sail in the morning.”

“Excellent. I knew you were the right man for this mission. Until tomorrow, little bird.”

Law grimaced at the nickname as he hung up the call. The Birdcage haunted Law’s nightmares to this day, and he felt like nothing so much as a caged bird in Doflamingo’s service—and the man knew it. The nickname had become more regular since he’d started bringing Law into his bed, an act that had truly felt like clipping his wings.

And now the little broken bird was going to try to fly again.

It would never work.

Law could feel his heartrate picking up as his thoughts started to whirl.

Like he’d told Violet that morning—had that only been this morning? It felt like a lifetime ago—he was Doflamingo’s creature, possessed by the man inside and out.

He lifted a hand to his chest, only to find his entire arm shaking.

Doflamingo was a Warlord and a former Celestial Dragon.

Heat rose in his face.

Who was Law?

Bile rose in his throat.

Doflamingo was a dragon to Law’s bird.

He was going to throw up.

What was Law doing?

Law pushed himself to his feet and took a few unsteady steps forward and managed to round the couch, but his vision spun in front of him.

What was he thinking?

His feet tangled under him with his next step, and he crashed to the floor behind the couch.

He was going to get his nakama killed with this futile venture.

His breaths came in jagged pants, his tight chest struggling to inhale and exhale, and all he could hear was rushing in his ears.

Everything Law had done for the last nine years had been to keep his nakama safe, and now he was going to fail them completely.

Law’s entire body shook, and he curled in on himself.

And now he was going to get Luffy’s crew killed, too.

He screwed his eyes shut and put his hands over his ears as he struggled to breathe. The walls were closing in on him. He could feel the wood of the treasure chest beneath him and the treasure they’d shifted to fit Law into the chest at his back. The lid of the chest wouldn’t move since Cora-san had placed another chest atop it to disguise Law’s hiding place.

Law tried to summon a Room to escape, but his powers refused to cooperate, slipping through his fingers like sand.

Cora-san was going to die because he’d helped Law…

A cold sweat clung to his body.

The deafening cracks of gunshots, one after another, rang through Law’s ears and tears streamed down his face.

Law couldn’t make a sound because of Cora-san’s powers. He opened his mouth to scream but nothing came out except for ragged breaths.

He flinched hard as he felt a gentle touch on his shoulder.

Wait, a hand? Law was alone in the treasure chest.

The hand withdrew, and Law slowly opened his eyes. For a moment, all he could see was a blur in front of him—then red came into focus.

Doflamingo had worn red that night.

Law jolted backward until his back ran into something solid. He hissed through clenched teeth.

“—orao? Can you hear me?”

Law blinked slowly as a voice started to form words amidst the rushing in his ears. He felt the hand return to his shoulder, but he didn’t fight it off this time. Who—?

“Hey, Torao. It’s me. Can you hear me?”

It was Luffy.

Luffy hadn’t been on Minion Island.

Right.

Law wasn��t on Minion Island. He was on Punk Hazard.

Law wasn’t a sickly thirteen-year-old boy anymore. He was twenty-six and one of the most feared pirates in the New World.

Luffy squeezed Law’s shoulder when it was clear Law wasn’t going to freak out again.

Gradually, Law felt his heartrate slow, and his chest loosened, allowing him to take deeper breaths.

“Straw Hat-ya,” Law finally managed, voice rasping from his struggle to breathe. He pushed himself up off the floor, but his limbs felt like jelly, so he simply leaned against the back of the couch and pulled his knees up to his chest. He wrapped his arms around his knees.

Shame started to creep up the back of his neck as he realized he’d let Luffy see him having a panic attack—he hadn’t had one in years—only hours after making an alliance. He’d shown his allied captain how weak he truly was on the eve of taking on one of the most powerful men in the New World.

But Luffy simply smiled when Law acknowledged him and sat down next to Law, mirroring his position with his knees up to his chest. He rested his head on his knees and turned to look at Law.

Law resigned himself to questions about what had happened and was already considering how to reply, but Luffy surprised him.

“I used to get them after Ace died,” he said quietly. “Out in the forest alone when I trained with Rayleigh. I’d remember what happened and then I couldn’t breathe. I’d feel Ace dying in my arms and the fire in my chest all over again.” A soft smile returned. “But it got better when I saw my nakama again. They got easier to deal with when I wasn’t alone anymore.”

Looking at the other captain, Law realized that despite the grin that seemed permanently etched into Luffy’s face, he’d been through a lot in his short years. They had that in common. But where Law had retreated into himself to cope, Luffy turned outward. After coming to Dressrosa, Law had been too afraid to show any sign of weakness around the Donquixote Family, so he bottled everything up until it exploded. And the explosions tended to be violent.

“Doflamingo called,” Law said after a few silent moments by way of explanation.

“That Mingo’s a bad guy, huh?”

Law’s lips twitched tiredly at how simple Luffy made the situation. He rested his chin on the top of his knees. “Yes, he is.”

His eyes were getting heavy. Between the extended use of his fruit today and now the panic attack, Law supposed it was amazing he was even still awake. It was nothing new, though; working himself into unconsciousness was his preferred method of sleeping, despite the frequent protestations of his crew.

Law swallowed at the thought of his nakama back in Dressrosa.

“We’ll get him,” Luffy said confidently. “We’ll get Mingo, and we’ll save your nakama, Torao.”

Law grunted a response, and that seemed to be enough for Luffy.

They sat like that for a time, Luffy quieter than Law would have expected he could be. Despite the way Law’s thoughts had been a whirlwind before, they were quiet now. Gradually, Law’s eyes drifted closed, and he thought he might have felt an arm wrap around his shoulders before he went under completely.

Next chapter

#As an apology for taking so long with this one #Have the longest chapter yet #Trafalgar Law #Monkey D. Luffy #One Piece #One Piece fanfiction #One Piece fanfic #Caitlin's fic

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theatrelove3000 · 4 years

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No Place Like Home

Hello, Friends! My brain is fried so there is no introduction like there normally is. I honestly doubt anyone reads them anyway. Whatever. ONWARD!

Background: Noelle and Loki were “Bound” by a witch in Alfheim after a battle they fought in. This means that the witch split each of their souls in half and one half switched places. Noelle has half of Loki’s soul and vice versa. They can feel each other's emotions and hear each other's thoughts. Noelle is also Half Asgardian, half Midgardian. Her father is Tyr and her mother is of Midgard. Loki enchanted her wedding ring so that she can be immortal with him.

Summary: Noelle is kidnapped by Hydra while on a mission in Europe and help captive in an unknown base somewhere in the country. Loki needs to find her before the worst can happen.

Warnings: Kidnapping, swearing, suggestions of attempted rape, creepy Hydra guys being gross, slight angst with a fluffy end.

No Place Like Home

Noelle PoV:

Well.

I am not sure how to describe my situation in any other way than this: I'm fucked.

It was supposed to be a routine mission. We were supposed to be in and out, no big deal. That is no longer the case.

Nope. The current situation is much more dire than such things as "routine" and "easy in-and-out". The situation is now me, gagged, bound, and surrounded by the darkness of the van that the Hydra agents had thrown me into. So I repeat. I am fucked. But then again...

So are they.

If there is one thing I know, it's the power my husband holds within himself. A power that does nothing but grow, especially when I am in danger.

They have created a cuff to cut off my magic and tied my hands behind me so I couldn't use my knives or gun. It's not ideal but I've been through worse. The only thing I'm afraid of now is who will control these men from putting their hands on me. I can't defend myself with my hands tied and magic quelled.

I soon get my answer as the van comes to a stop. I'm hauled out by the two guys who sat in the back with me. They seem to be expecting me to kick and scream, thinking they will have to drag or even carry me into the concrete structure we are about to enter. They are wrong. I keep my emotions in check. I stay cool and collected and let them walk me to the elevator.

The bigger of the two men, who I have decided looks like a Chuck, jabs his finger into the button of the floor number we need to get to. -5. Noted.

When the elevator doors open again, I am faced with a small grey room with a metal chair in the middle, a small cot in the right hand corner of the far wall, and one small light that dangles from the ceiling.

Chuck and his buddy Frankie sit me in the chair and take the gag out of my mouth. The first thing I do is make eye contact with Frankie and give him a small smile. He is clearly unsettled by my calmness and looks extremely guarded as he unties my hands and cuffs me to the chair. I let them do their job and nod my head at Chuck, who looks equally unnerved by me. Yay!

They both walk backwards to the elevator and keep their eyes on me until the doors shut once again. I keep my smile on until they are gone. Now that they left and my eyes have adjusted to the dim room, I can scope it out.

There must be hidden cameras. I can get a general sense of where based on the discolouration of the concrete. They were recently installed. This is a new base. We may not have record of it yet.

Shit. Okay, plan B. If I let the wall between Loki and myself down, he could follow the pull and find me. But that could take days. I hope that by the Fates that the tracker we have installed into our suits is still working.

I'm still thinking through my game plan when the doors open again. I look up to see a very... boring? I think that's a good word, yes. A boring man walks through the door.

"Lady Noelle." I hear the accented voice say. I unintentionally tense up. He addressed me as "Lady Noelle." No one calls me that except the Asgardians and they haven't called me "Lady" anything since my marriage to their Prince. They say "Princess" now. This man isn't of Asgard.

"Oh, not to worry, my dear Lady. You are... well, I cannot say safe but you will not be harmed if you cooperate." He walks into the light, circling me. I relax my body, with some effort, and try to appear calm.

"Forgive me, sir, but you seem to know my name, yet I don't know yours."

He chuckles. "You think me a fool?" He asks, stopping his pacing in front of me. I can see it relatively well. He looks like the basic Hydra douche in the stupid uniform and such things, but there is something about his eyes. I can't understand it but it's more frightening than I let on.

"I am not going to just give you information on myself. I suppose you think I am going to just surrender my plan to you as well?" He steps forward, resting his hands on the cuffs holding mine to the chair, and leaning in a bit.

I force a calm smile and tilt my head slightly. "Of course not. That would be ridiculous. Though, you did just tell me you are a head officer in this joint, if not the mastermind. I'll know your name sooner or later. I'd prefer sooner if you don't mind." I cock an eyebrow at him. "Build a rapport and all that jazz?"

He chuckles again and stands straight. "It appears you would be right. My men will call my name eventually and then you will know. My name is Leon Becker. I am, in fact, the leader of this base and this mission. And you, my dear, are my guest." He smiles coldly.

"Do you normally strap your guests to chairs?"

"If they are Avengers, yes."

"Ah. So you are afraid I will hurt you. Okay, no big. I totally understand." I nod in faux agreement. "Makes sense to keep a woman with no weapons and stripped of her powers locked up."

"I am not stupid, woman." He growls at me. "Your reverse psychology will not work on me. You were trained in Asgard as a warrior and then in the Avengers compound by super soldiers and highly trained assassins. I know you can beat me. You have otherworldly strength that you received from your father: an Asgardian." He begins pacing around me again.

My smile falters for a moment. How does he know about Tyr? I regain my composure. "So you know of my parentage. Well done! You did your homework." I snip sarcastically.

He smirks at me as he passes. "Your mother died of Osteosarcoma. Bone cancer. That's sad. What's it been now, three years? You laid beside her and sang to her until her last breath. Such a devoted daughter." He shakes his head. "Well, maybe not so devoted. You saw her, what, four times in the three years you lived in Asgard at that point?" I feel my throat start to close up. Momma. I do my best to hold it together. "Aw, my apologies, Lady Noelle. Did my talking of your mother upset you? Oh dear." Leon tsks. As he walks to the elevator, he says over his shoulder. "I suppose we can start in the morning. Rest well, Lady Darkness."

The doors shut behind him. As they do, the cuffs holding me to my chair release me. I take a deep breath. I will not cry. I refuse to give him the satisfaction. Making my way over to the cot, I rub my wrists absentmindedly as I break down the wall between Loki and myself.

'NOELLE!' He shouts into my mind. I wince. 'Where are you? Are you hurt? I will kill them. Do you have a location?'

'Loki, honey. I'm very tired. One question at a time.'

I feel him take a deep breath. 'Are you injured in any way? Have they touched you?'

'No to both questions. I'm not hurt and most of them are frightened of me.'

He smiles at that but it quickly falls. 'What's your location?'

'I don't know. I was in the back of a van, it was dark.'

I feel his emotions shift from anger to distress. 'I can use our... What did you call it? The link that helps us find each other?'

'Built in GPS. And you can try but I think it will be too far. We were driving for a while.'

He scowls, 'I meant what I said. When I find you, I will slaughter them all. They put their hands on my wife. I will be sure to put every last one in their graves.'

'I love you for that but really, please focus on finding me and getting me home.'

'You cannot teleport. I can't get you here either. I've been trying for hours. Why is that?'

'Well, they are getting smarter. They have found a way to create a cuff that cuts off my magic. The only reason we can communicate is because we are bound. They must not know about that.'

There is silence for a moment. 'What do they know?' He asks in a small voice.

I sigh. 'Too much.'

He nods but doesn't press the matter. He knows I will tell him eventually.

~~~~~Le Time Skip cuz I'm lazy~~~~~

I have no idea what time it is or how long I've been here. I only sleep in intervals and I'm not even sure how long they are. They can't be very long. I'm exhausted.

'You sleep in one hour intervals about 4 times a day.' I sigh. He isn't sleeping. 'Can you blame me, Noelle? You are in captivity and I do not know where you are. I am working on finding you and I will not rest until I do so.'

'I love you for it but you can't keep doing this. You're going to burn yourself out.'

'You are not the first to mention that.' He grumbles. 'Thor is saying the same. Agent Romanoff as well.'

'They're right. Listen to them. I'm alright. She is pretty smart so you should listen.'

He laughs, 'She? Only she?'

I smile, 'Thor thinks with his heart. He is thinking of you because he loves you and wants to keep you safe. Natasha thinks with her brain. She needs you to keep your wits about you and she is right.'

'I-' he is interrupted by the elevator doors opening. Frankie and Chuck step through. One is holding a tray of food, like every day, and the other holds a case file. That's new. So are the looks on their faces.

Damn it.

'I love you.' I whisper in my mind. 'Please forgive me.' Before he can respond, I put up the wall in our minds. He can't hear or feel me now.

"Breakfast for you, Lady Darkness."

I smile and say, "Thank you, Chuck." I sit up and take the tray.

"Again, that is not my name."

"Yeah, well, that's what I'm gonna call you. You realize that my best friend is the greatest nickname maker of all time?"

Chuck scowls and Frankie crosses his arms.

"You should really hold your tongue. You cannot beat us both at once without your powers." Frankie tells me. He runs his fingertips over my knee. I immediately jerk away from him. He laughs. It's a sickening laugh. I've always been outspoken and strong about things like that but he is right. I couldn't stop them both.

"The loud-mouthed Princess is speechless. Probably for the better. I would be afraid if I was such a small girl as well."

I feel a burst of heat pass through me. Whether it was bravery or stupidity, I let it control me. "Wait a minute, Frankie. You're telling me you're not a girl? Wow. Could have had me fooled."

His face turns red. "You little bitch." He growls menacingly.

"You know, I was actually pretty proud of you for a minute. A female soldier protecting a... what did you call me? 'Loud-mouth princess'? Pretty cool. But know that I know you're a guy, meh."

"Shut your mouth." Snaps Chuck before turning to his little buddy, "She is trying to provoke you. We can take her easily. Don't do anything stupid."

"You too! You think you're big tough men? You follow a coward who hides behind his pride. You do his bidding like dogs." I stand up and start summoning my strength. "That's what you are. Not men. Not women. Dogs. You are disposable and worthless to him. You mean no more to him than a-" WHACK.

Frankie slaps me hard across the face. I stumble back and hit the chair. As I stand and start towards him, the doors open and Leon stands there with another few guards. They grab hold of me and strap me to the chair again as Frankie and Chuck board the elevator.

"That was unwise, Lady Noelle." Leon says calmly. I blink away the tears that pooled from the sting.

"Never said I was wise." I mutter. I take a deep breath and straighten my back, crossing my ankles. "It was a sudden moment of weakness you will not have the pleasure of witnessing again." I raise my chin, remembering what Loki showed me when we sat on the throne while Thor was away.

"Your bravery never ceases to amaze me, my dear. The beauty and power you possess to be strapped to a pathetic chair and still sit as though it is a throne is truly remarkable."

"I learned from a king."

This comment shakes him for a moment. He walks towards me and leans his face closer to mine. "Those fools do not deserve such a pleasure you could provide." He breathes me in. I suppress a shudder.

"And you think you do? Interesting."

"I deserve better than an alien's whore," he snarls before standing straight. "But I would settle for you."

I feel my lungs grow tight. "Not to worry, Lady Noelle. I will not touch you until your husband is dead."

I laugh, though there is no humour in it. "You will be waiting for a very long time, I'm afraid. Loki is immortal."

"Ah, but that is not true, is it? They can be killed." Leon cocks an eyebrow.

"Well if that is your master plan, I suggest you pray to whatever God you believe in, Mr. Becker. My husband is not easy to kill."

~~~~~Le Time Skip II~~~~~

The next day, Leon decides that it is a splendid idea to have dinner with me. He makes idle conversation, I make an occasional sarcastic remark. He proves that the food wasn't poisoned by eating off of my plate himself. Even then I don't eat much.

"So, Lady Noelle. You grew up in New York, yes?"

I simply smile knowingly. He already knows.

"And your husband attacked New York in 2012?"

Another smile.

"It makes me wonder whether you agreed with those actions. Very curious." He puts a bite of salmon in his mouth.

"Not that I need to explain it to you, Mr. Becker, but if you must know, I was not in on Loki's attack on New York. At the time, he and I were not in contact. And for the record, he was brainwashed and being controlled by an evil being." I take a bite of rice, watching his reaction. "We later destroyed the being that tortured him for two whole years. Loki tore him limb from limb." I say casually.

He seems shocked (yay) but does his best to compose himself. "Your husband's past is very dark. And his cruelty is shocking."

"Hmm." I hum absently, "Well, I'm sorry you feel that way. Though I should tell you to prepare yourself because what he did to Thanos is nothing compared to what he will do to you."

Leon's eyes grow wide. He takes a breath and pushes a button. He stands as Frankie and Chuck come in and move the table and the chair Leon was in away. As the three if them walk back towards the elevator, I decide to take a small parting shot.

"A normal man can do the impossible to save the woman he loves, Leon." I call to his retreating form. "My husband is no ordinary man." Before the elevator doors close, I say, "He is a God."

I feel Loki laughing in my mind.

'Good show, darling.' He says.

'Thank you, thank you. Have you found me yet?'

'Just a bit longer, love. I will find you. We will find you soon.' I nod as I lay on my cot.

'I love you.' I tell him.

'I love you more.' He replies.

'I love you most.' I say as I shut my eyes, willing my body to sleep.

~~~~~Le Time Skip III~~~~~

I am awoken by banging and screams coming from above me. And then I feel it.

Loki is here.

I sit up and try to speak to him in my mind. He doesn't respond quickly and I can feel his adrenaline coursing through him in the fight.

After a few minutes, I hear him calling me.

"LEVEL -5! LOKI!"

Its not long before he finds me and wraps me up tight. "I've got you." He says. "I've found her." He says, louder this time, and not to me. He is telling the team.

"You are practically frozen, my dove." He says, kissing my forehead. I nuzzle my way deeper into his chest. He takes off his thick, green cape and tugs it around my shoulders. He kisses my head again before taking my hand in his and leading the way back to the stupid elevator.

"Loki." I whisper once we are in.

"Noelle?" He responds. I hold out the wrist the anti-magic cuff is on. He takes the hint and takes it off. Immediately after, I feel a surge of power running through my body. The sensation is so strong that I almost crumble. Loki catches me and holds me up. We reach the top floor soon after that where a helicarrier is waiting for us.

Loki gets me settled in my seat before trying to leave again, presumably to kill every Hydra agent in sight. I take his hand quickly and tug him back to me. He looks at me questioningly and kisses my knuckles.

"Please, don't leave me. Let the others get to Leon."

He clearly doesn't like it but agrees to stay. "Do you have an earpiece? I want to talk to Tony."

He hesitates for a moment before standing up to go get me an earpiece. He hands it to me when he returns and I stick it in my ear quickly.

"Tony." I say.

"Good to have you back, Elle. You alright?" Tony says, cool as ever.

"I'm alright. Listen, the leader's name is Leon Becker. He has the most decorated uniform, well-kept brown hair, a lame ass mustache that looks exactly how you imagine it will, and dark dark brown eyes. Keep him alive. We should question him."

I hear Tony sigh. He agrees but he doesn't want to. Neither does Loki, as I gather from the growl. "Fine. I'll find him and put him in the cargo hold with Nat and Clint."

"Cool. I'm going to rest a bit. And Tony? Thank you. For saving me I mean. Thank you to everyone."

"We got you, Elle. Now go cuddle your man." I hear Nat's voice and smile. I take out the earpiece and put it aside.

"Cuddles?" Loki asks, opening his arms. I need no further invitation. I climb into his lap and bury my face in his neck. I breathe him in and, for the first time in days, let my body feel. I start to cry, not because I'm sad or hurt, but because I'm safe. And happy to be where I am.

My home is in the lap of the love of my life, his arms around me and mine around him, my face buried in his neck. And there's no place like home.

@thelokiimaginechronicles @just-the-hiddles @is-it-madness @frostbitten-written @poetic-fiasco @myoxisbroken @myraiswack @lehuka123 @head-over-heart

#loki fanfic #loki fic #loki x ofc #loki x noelle #kidnapped! OFC #avengers #avengers fic #tony #nat #clint #thor

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dollsome-does-tumblr · 5 years

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Fic of 2019 Review!

Because ‘tis the season! This is sort of an unholy merging of the one that @agirlnamedkeith filled out recently and the one that I always used to fill out in the lj days. Beware!!

I included links for some fics and didn’t for others, totally randomly, based upon my level of energy answering that particular question. Whimsy!

***

Total number of completed stories: 26! You can find them all on the first few pages of my AO3 works page. There’s also, funnily, a handful-plus of fanvideos from this year. Who knew that would ever be a thing in my life again??

Total Word Count: 76,000-ish. One sturdy novel draft’s worth of nonsense!

Fandoms Written In: Anne with an E, Arrested Development, B99, Game of Thrones, Gilmore Girls, Good Omens, Grace and Frankie, Killing Eve, Reign, The Durrells, and The Handmaid’s Tale. And, as of like two seconds ago, The Office, because I decided to post something else. Mwahaha!

Looking back, did you write more fic than you thought you would this year, less, or about what you’d expected?: More! I had been kinda winding down writing fic in recent years, but TV was very inspiring this year! (Often in a rage-inducing way, but sometimes in a nice way.)

What’s your own favorite story of the year? I think probably i’d like for you and i to go romancing because writing it was very fun (I did it to cheer myself up when I was glum, and it worked!), and the reception to it was also amazingly kind. I will remember this, the greatest shining star of my fic-writing career, very fondly!

Did you take any writing risks this year? I took the risk of being super lazy by posting a few fics that weren’t fics at all -- just, like, Tumblr ramble bullet lists that describe scenarios without being actual prose! I committed this great sin with Grace and Frankie (though this one was actually quite fun and elaborate), Arrested Development (I have no explanation except that my Blunder feels simply addled my wits), Brooklyn 99 (although at least that one was in script format!), and The Office (What We Do In The Scranton Shadows, as a concept, must be immortalized!!!).

Do you have any fanfic or profic goals for the new year?: I don’t have any fanfiction plans for next year (though there are a few unfinished stories I would like to finally put endings on!). In terms of original stuff, I’ve got one novel project that’s currently sitting at like 96,000 words that I would like to complete a draft of, and then two as-of-yet-totally-unwritten novels (both sequels to previous novels) that I would also like to write. I’ve also got a few new ideas for novels that I would like to explore. I feel like all this will definitely not get done in 2020, but I live to dream!

More rambles after the cut.

My Best-Written Story: On a writing level, I really like my post-8.05 Jaime/Brienne fix-it fic, Promising Light. I felt like I was really vibing with that one in a way that only happens when canon has betrayed you utterly and lifted your writerly consciousness to a higher plane in protest. Braimeeeee! [sobs]

Story Most Underappreciated by the Universe: I guess it would be my The Durrells fic I Still Recall The Thrill based on how much time I spent writing it versus how much response it got, but that’s fair because it’s a tiny fandom and that fic is already a sequel to a previously existing fic! Frankly, I am amazed that anyone read it at all, and grateful too!

Most Popular: i’d like for you and i to go romancing. I just ... I dunno, man! Why did that happen?

Most Fun: Even though it is not even a story so much as a description of a story (or season of tv) that might exist, I really enjoyed my Grace & Frankie Season 6 romp; it was tons o’ fun to lay out a hypothetical season of TV with the episode titles and general storylines and end credits tunes all picked out and stuff. I even made a fake season 6 poster!

In terms of fun stuff that’s actually written in story shape, I really enjoyed my little Rory/Paris season 2 oneshot The Math of Love Triangles, because I deeply love season two and I deeply love Rory/Paris (of course) and it was just really fun to immerse myself in that world for a spell.

Most Disappointing: I think I am most disappointed by the stuff that I didn’t get around to writing all the way, since that always feels like such a waste of effort. There’s most definitely a few abandoned, half-written fanfictions crying in my Google drive right now!

Most Sexy: This is a category in which I am, obviously, eternally helpless, so I’ll just say my three Killing Eve fics since there’s always weird sexy vibes afoot when Eve and Villanelle are involved.

Story With The Single Sweetest Moment: I think I will give this to i’d like for you and i to go romancing’s third chapter with the handholding, because even as I was writing it, I was like, “Aaaah!!!!”, as if I had literally no control over what was going on. There are sweet moments that come after that that I really feel deep fondness for also (the clothes shopping! the dancing! the finally-smooching! All things that spilled from my fingers as if I was possessed by the ghost of ineffable husbands feelings!), but i feel like that’s kinda where it all first comes to life.

Story that shifted my own perceptions of the characters: I’m not quite sure! i feel like my first Killing Eve fic, you know i’m such a fool for you, helped me realize that I really like writing Villanelle and find her very accessible, though I’m not sure it shifted my perception of her. (Except as a character too intimidating to write!) I also wrote a second Braime AU season 8 fic called to defend the innocent, where the premise is that Brienne goes after Jaime when he leaves at the end of 8.04, and that kind of shook me because the more I thought about it, the more i was like, “Hey, YEAH! She WOULD go after him! There’s no way she wouldn’t go after him! What the hell???”, and then it filled me with even more discontent than season eight had already, which is no small feat.

Biggest Surprise: I have two very different stories here where my experience was very similar with them: my first Arrested Development fic, Les Magicians Dangereux (there’s a title for ya!), and my first The Durrells fic, A Little Miracle. In both cases, while I watched the show, I was like, “I could NEVER write fic for this show, its tone is way too specific and intimidating and perfect.” But then as soon as said show was over, I had to do it! I was taken over somehow! There was no resisting! My feels were simply too potent.

Hardest to Write: My June/Serena fic quiet company was hard, just because it is an exhausting headspace to be in and I had no idea (and still have no idea!) if it’s any good or not, and it got quite long, so it was way more of an undertaking than I originally planned. I’m glad I wrote it, though! I had to untangle those post-s3 The Handmaid’s Tale feelings somehow. But that was definitely one where I was totally exhausted and wondering why the hell I had bothered by the time I posted it.

Most Unintentionally Telling: I never know how to answer this question! this is what you wanted had a lot of elements that were really personal to me (don’t you hate when you maybe-murder your true love and then really regret it? Jk, that was not the personal part), but I don’t know if it was unintentionally telling. I think “unintentionally telling” is the most mysterious phrase I have ever heard! That’s what.

#dollsome's deep thoughts

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guilty-lights · 5 years

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Straw-Hat Pirates Death Headcanons

So someone on one my fics took up on my enthusiastic invitation in my end-author notes to ask me about my death headcanons for the Straw-Hat Pirates. (Shoutout to Jeanne-Crab on ao3 for that comment!) I was typing out my answer to that question and realised that I had Way More To Say About It Than I Thought, so I thought i might as well put it up as a post on my tumblr!

I’ll split this into two parts; my headcanons for SHP’s deaths as I think it could happen in canon, and then specifically in how it would happen in the universe as set in my fic, like the seas, you live on (in me). (Shameless plug here: If you like zosan, and also appreciate angst and hurt/comfort, read my fic? It’s zosan-but-kind-of-not-but-also-kinda-is, it’s complicated, but it’s 30k and I worked Super Hard on it and I personally think it’s pretty good so if please give it a shot! Do Read The Tags Before Reading It, Though, because I would never want to cause people unnecessarily extreme distress. And read my other fics too if you want WHOOP) Anyway, without ado, here’s my headcanons for Straw-Hat Pirates’ deaths. This is a very very Very Long post, so buckle up:

AS PER CANON

First off: Everybody, by the time of their death, has achieved their life’s dreams, because of course they have. (I won’t hear of anything otherwise, go away!!)

Luffy: Luffy dies in the war on Raftel, or wherever the final battle for being Pirate King happens. He definitely becomes Pirate King, don't get me wrong, but he dies very soon after because of his injuries and because of the amount of his lifespan he has traded in using his Gears. This is the one headcanon I think (FEAR) will happen - Oda's constant allusion to Luffy's lifespan in his use of Gears and things like that just feels so suspect to me in this regard...

Luffy is buried near where Ace is, because that's what he would've wanted and so that's what the Straw-Hat Pirates did. Not right next to Ace (because that would mean Luffy’s also buried right next to Whitebeard and that doesn't feel right to me for some reason), but somewhere close by, either on the other side of the same island or on an island very, very close by. His emblematic pirate flag is erected on his grave, and its symbol flaps ceaselessly in the wind, always in the direction of where the sea is closest to. (And next to a village called Foosha, however, deep in the heart of a mountain called Mt. Colubo, a monument to a boy is erected posthumously by the mountain bandits and villagers who live there, at the base of a tree where a dilapidated treehouse still stands despite all the years.)

Luffy is the only one to die so young; the rest don't die until years later. By that time, though, they've long stopped sailing together as the Straw-Hat Pirates. Think of it like how Gol D. Roger's pirates split themselves off after the death of their captain; they're still friends for sure, and they hold each other as very precious, but there is no point or need to sail together as pirates anymore after the death of their captain, whom they have rallied themselves with.

For the rest, I'm not sure who will die first, because within the One Piece canon literally So Many Things can happen, but here’s their burial arrangements:

Brook: Brook was interesting to figure out, because he's technically already died once before. I was trying to work out what the implications of his devil fruit is (is he immortal? But given the reverence given to Law's Immortality Surgery, that doesn't seem likely), and I decided that users of Brook's devil fruit will go once they decide it's time to just...go. So that's what Brook did. He lived until Laboon finally passes on, to make sure Laboon is never left behind again, and then he gathers the rest of the Straw-Hat Pirates in one place, says his goodbyes, and simply...leaves. His bones collapse on the ground with no spirit to hold them up, and per his request his bones are scattered over West Blue. His violin and sword cane are erected as part of a monument next to Luffy’s grave.

Robin: I’m not precisely sure HOW Robin would die, but probably for her she would die quite peacefully, of old age. Frankly speaking, after all she’s been put through from childhood to adulthood, she deserves a little peace at least at the end of her life. Robin’s monument next to Luffy’s grave is a simple pair of crossed arms made of pale marble (one of the hands holds a book). Her body isn’t buried there, however; in the West Blue, on a barren stretch of scorched land that people say used to be called Ohara, a singular grave can be found in the centre of it.

Franky: His monument next to Luffy’s grave is of his blue metal forearms (one of which is holding a little hammer). Franky's grave of his human parts, however, are buried on Water 7, at the spot where him and Iceburg and Tom used to work on trains together. A mini replica of Sunny shaped out of metal is on top of it, to tell everyone that the shipwright that built the second pirate ship that ever sailed to Raftel lies here.

Usopp: Unlike everybody else, Usopp asks to have his burial place split into two places. To make this easier, he’s cremated. One half of his ashes is buried in Syrup Village, next to his mother’s grave, and the other half of him is buried under a monument next to Luffy’s. On his monument are the words, “The Bravest Warrior of the Sea, Sniper Usopp, A Giant Among Men” (or words to that effect). His crewmates chose those words for him. His Sogeking mask is hung on his monument. His grave in Syrup Village, however, is much simpler; his original green slingshot is fastened to it (and will slowly wear down, over the years, to an unrecognisable sun-bleached stump), and on it are the words “The greatest liar of Syrup Village that has ever lived”.

Nami: Nami also gets a monument next to Luffy’s grave. (Okay right at this point just assume that every Straw-Hat Pirate has a monument next to Luffy’s grave!!) However, like Robin and Franky, her monument doesn’t have her body. Nami is buried at Cocoyashi, at the cliff overlooking the sea where her mother Belle-mere was (and where her sister is/was buried too, depending whether Nami dies before or after Nojiko does). With her in the grave is the original copy of the world map she has made, her greatest triumph.

Zoro: Zoro probably dies the most second most violent death after Luffy, what with being the world’s greatest swordsman and all. Probably he is killed/ mortally wounded by someone who comes to take his title, as he probably did to Mihawk before him. He’s cremated, and his ashes are buried next to Luffy’s as Luffy’s first mate and right-hand man (Zoro is first mate even if it was never officially stated!!!). His swords, however, are a different story; Wado Ichimonji I believe Zoro requests to be brought back to Shimotsuki, and put next to Kuina’s grave. As for the other two swords, I don’t know HOW precisely it will happen but it’s left out in the wide world for whoever is worthy to wield them again, because I think Zoro wouldn’t believe in keeping the blades for himself post-mortem.

Sanji: He also gets a monument next to Luffy. His body, however, is not there; when Sanji dies he is cremated and his ashes are scattered throughout All-Blue, where a floating restaurant called the Baratie now stays; the most famous restaurant there is in the entire world, and it’s unique in that no matter who you are, if you are hungry and come through the door, you get to eat.

Chopper: He’s probably the last one to die, I think. Not only because he’s the youngest but also because he’s a doctor, I’m sure he knows how to heal himself up whenever he gets sick. His body is buried next to Luffy’s grave, but on Drum Island, there is a monument with a distinctive hat design erected underneath the base of a sakura tree; the tree, despite the wintry climate of the island, blooms pink and full all year round. (Chopper worked with Usopp on genetically developing a sakura horticulture that could do that, before their deaths).

Jinbe: Jinbe buried underneath the sea, but close to where sunlight will always shine bright because that has always been the fishmen’s dream. His underwater grave bears his past as a Sun Pirate and all the contributions and sacrifices he has made for his people, but his monument on land, he is noted (like all the others), as a most dearly and beloved member of the Straw-Hat Pirates, one whose loyalty never wavered, up until the end.

Monuments of Going Merry and Thousand Sunny are erected, because ships are crewmates too.

AS PER MY FIC’S UNIVERSE

In terms of burial arrangements, everything I said about all the Straw-Hats above are applicable here (unless stated otherwise below), PLUS what I will say here below:

Robin and Franky: I think in my fic, Robin and Franky would be the first to die, because they're the oldest (save for Brook). In my fic’s universe it is Never Mentioned but Franky and Robin are as good as married, and had spent their whole lives together (I'm sorry but Frobin is Real to me and you can pry it out of my cold dead hands). Their monuments are side-by-side next to Luffy's. On top of their monuments holding their respective items, their monuments' hands hold each other's.

Chopper: Chopper has yet to die at the time of my fic, but when he does, whatever I described above will apply. At the point of the fic he has already worked out the horticulture of the ever-blooming sakura tree and it has already been planted in Drum Island, and has been growing steadily for years.

Zoro and Sanji: Zoro and Sanji have yet to die at the time of my fic. Their burial arrangements would be the same, however. As for HOW they might die, I recommend you read my fic to find out! (I can’t give away all my cards, obviously.)

That’s all! This has become an awfully long post, and I commend you if you managed to reach this far to the end. Let me know what you think of this: do you agree? Disagree? I would love to discuss this with people, it would be very fascinating, no matter how thoroughly sad. In the meantime, if you’d like to read any one piece fanfiction, feel free to check out my ao3 :)

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drafthearse · 7 years

Note

List of Fav unholyverse quotes

you…. asked for this….. (all quotes taken from this series!!)

I HAVE BEEN ALL THINGS UNHOLY

Frank had thought, I know you and felt a tug in his belly, like a fishhook embedded under his navel, a pull towards the surface, and he was stepping through the door before he even knew what he was doing.

It was the wings Frank had liked, her tattered wings, one out to each side and two stretched out above her head. Two more twined downwards, like legs - she was like a woman, Frank thought, a woman laying back on a bed before - no, after sex, everything on display except there was no body, just the wings, just the wings and her face, which was sad somehow, despite not actually having any features, sad and beautiful.

“Well,” he said. What he meant was, “Well?” but it didn’t always come out right, with Mikey.

“What am I, an amateur here? I’ve pierced like a hundred ball-bags, I know what I’m fucking doing. I could pierce yours right now with my eyes closed.“Mikey made a face. “Please don’t try.”

“Nanobots with napalm”

“Frank.” Durning shook his head. “You have the immune system of a blueberry muffin, man, it’s bad enough you stick shit under your skin and through your nose and God only knows where else, but now you’re slathering on some concoction made by some skank you don’t even know?”

“Are they gone?“ Frank managed, carefully not looking at the red sheets under his arm. They were white before.

the pumpkin looked like someone had gone at it with a hacksaw (with a fucking whip laughed a nasty, hysterical little voice in Frank’s mind)

those grafted-on fangs that Frank thought were stupid and kind of hot in equal measure

“Your brother’s hot,” Frank said, tossing back the last of his drink. “Your brother - Mikey, did I tell you how it feels when he touches me?”

the needles scraped further down inside his skin, against his skull, he could feel them snapping and embedding inside him

Ray looked over at Frank. “Frankie? Was it them?”Frank looked up at one of the security dudes. “You guys got security cameras out here?”The guy shook his head.“Yeah,” Frank said, spitting more blood out of his mouth. “Yeah, it was them.”

Frank’s stomach felt weird, cold and upset somehow, the creeping dreadful feeling sliding out slowly into his limbs, like when you realize you forgot your homework, or someone overheard you talking shit about them.

He didn’t think ‘soft furnishings soaked in your own life force’ was on the list of Suitable Items for the Trash Chute the super had given him the day he’d moved in. He’d have to burn them later, instead. That’s what people always did with blood-stained stuff in those crime dramas his Mom liked so much, CSI New Hampshire or whatever.

“What happened to those sheets, I bought you, sweetheart?” he said to himself when he was scrubbing blood off the wall with dishwashing detergent. He dunked his sponge in the bucket of water next to him and squeezed it out. “Oh, yeah, thanks for buying those for me, Mom. I have a ghost who’s into sado-masochism or some shit, and I guess he forgot to give me a safe word, and the sheets kind of got caught in the crossfire.”

“Just a second!” he called, and raced in there to make sure he didn’t have a giant blood smear on his cheek, or anything more mundanely unfortunate like spinach in his teeth.

“Anyway, uh, I brought you a mattress.”

A priest. A priest. And here Frank thought the worst that could happen was that he might be straight.

“I called you a hot guy,” Frank moaned. “You’re a priest and I called you a hot guy.”

“It’s okay,” Gerard smiled, rolling one of his sleeves up. “You actually made my day.”Frank stared hopelessly at the ceiling. “Oh, man, my Mom is really angry with me right now and she doesn’t even know why.”

Gerard was obviously a seriously nice guy if he went around bringing people mattresses and praying for their immortal souls, but the dude couldn’t tell left from right when he was going backwards, and more than once Frank thought he was going to have to explain to Mikey why his brother was dead in the stairwell of Frank’s building with a broken neck and a mattress on top of him.

Gerard was young. Gerard wore a leather jacket. Gerard was hot. Gerard was, by definition, celibate.Frank was the unluckiest person in the world, ever.

He leaned forward, just a tiny bit, just an inch, but it was enough and Gerard’s fingertips slid over his forehead, pushing his hair out of the way and touching gently around the marks.Frank had to bite his tongue so he wouldn’t moan out loud with relief. It was like spreading lotion on sunburn or sliding between clean sheets after a whole day on his feet. He couldn’t help it; he pushed forward a little more and Gerard’s palm flattened against the side of his head for a minute, and Frank felt the last of the pain melting away, receding through his arms and hands and dripping off his fingers onto the floor.

Maybe it was some leftover automatic reflex thing from being brought up Catholic, maybe it was Gerard’s freaky hand-magic, whatever, but he wanted to…shit, he wanted to fucking confess.

“I’m an investigator for the Vatican,” Gerard said, all off-hand like I’m a plumber or whatever. “You know, if people think they saw a miracle.”Frank was actually impressed, but he tried not to show it. “Like statues of Jesus crying blood?”“More like the Virgin Mary’s face appearing on a piece of toast in Maine,” Gerard smiled. “I was only ordained five years ago, so my assignments are pretty low-key. Most of the really crazy stuff happens in South America, for some reason.”Frank nodded. “You ever see a real one?”Gerard grinned. “South American?”“Miracle,” Frank said, rolling his eyes.Gerard shook his head. “So far,” he said wistfully, “It’s always just been toast.”

Bob might have been an inkless freak but he was a fucking knowledgeable inkless freak, and a meticulous motherfucker to boot.

Frank really fucking loved tattoos, like that wasn’t news, obviously, but he loved everything about them - the way ink virgins were always vibrating with excitement and nerves, the way old hands came in a little twitchy and went away look like they just got fucked six ways from Sunday and had the time of their fucking lives. He loved the moment before the needle touched down, when it was still just a drawing, just something that could be washed away, no more permanent than writing your name on a steamed-up window pane, and he loved the first press of the needle to the skin, when everything changed and it became a part of you forever.

He stared at the space where his TV used to be, and kept on drinking until he didn’t care that it was missing any more, and he didn’t care about those motherfuckers who called themselves his friends, and he didn’t care about his fucking wrists and his fucking back and his fucking head. Didn’t miss anything, didn’t care about anything, didn’t notice when the bottle slipped from his hand and his eyes closed and the world slipped dizzily away.

He didn’t scream. He didn’t scream because he couldn’t breathe, the pain so massive, so overwhelming, so out of the range of anything Frank had ever had a nightmare about experiencing that it stole his ability to use his lungs or his eyes or do anything but writhe helplessly in place.

Frank felt as though he was scrambling up inside his own skin, curling into a ball and leaving his hands to suffer by themselves, far out on the edges of his consciousness.

“There’s not enough stress in the world to make me suicidal, lady. You don’t know me.”

Frank didn’t nuzzle Gerard’s hand or anything, but he might have turned his face towards it very slightly. Whatever, he was only human.

“You think I listen to hymns in my car?“Frank grinned down at his lap. “You don’t?”“No.” Gerard’s hand settled between Frank’s shoulder blades. “I listen to eighties hair rock like everyone else.”

“What?” Frank whirled around, almost knocking Gerard’s camera out of his hands. “You’re telling me any minute now I could get a nail through my dick?”Gerard wrinkled his nose. “It’s extremely unlikely. I wouldn’t worry about it.”“Easy for you to say, you don’t use yours!” Frank scrambled back on the bed, pulling the blankets back over his lap like they could protect him from invisible psychopaths with a hammer and an eye on Frank’s crotch.

Gerard made a bizarre noise, and Frank looked up to find the motherfucker was laughing at him. “I’m sorry,” he stumbled out when Frank gave him a furious glare. “I’m sorry, it’s just - don’t you think your penis is the least of your worries?”“I don’t believe you’re a priest at all,” Frank said in his most murderous voice. “Priests are supposed to be nice.”

“I’m still here, you know,” Frank said, looking between Gerard and Brian, who were demonstrating their ‘you-can-trust-me’ faces to each other.

“What does the Father think?”“He thinks I have stigmata,” Frank said, because what the fucking hell, it couldn’t get any worse. He might as well just lay it out.“Oh, well,” said Brian into his hands. “Of course.”

Ray made a pained noise. “I’m pretty sure smuggling suicide risks out of the hospital is frowned upon, Bob, you wanna rumble with hospital security?”“I could take ‘em,” Bob replied. “And don’t say ‘rumble’.”

“You don’t have to help,” Bob said, bringing Frank’s stuff over so he could get dressed. “You can say you didn’t see a thing.”“Of course I have to help!” Ray shrilled, throwing his hands in the air. “If I leave you two alone you’ll wind up getting accidental vasectomies or something!”

Luckily Frank could hide behind…well, anything bigger than him, which was most things

It was depressing, Frank thought, that all his friends knew what his favorite emergency room doctor looked like.

“Wait, I show you man with head in condom.”

“Mikey,” Gerard said earnestly, “When you sleep with someone, your body makes a promise whether you do or not.”

“God doesn’t care where you stick your dick,“ Gerard waved his arms at Mikey. “He cares about you playing with someone’s heart. That’s the sin!”“Oh, for - I wasn’t playing with her, Gerard, she never even asked if she could see me again.”“Of course she wants to see you again,” Gerard said incredulously. “You’re you.” There was a silence, eventually broken by Ray saying “Aww.”

Mikey sat up and looked at Gerard. “They give you classes in how to be right all the time?”

“Nope,” Gerard grinned. “I get that from Mom.”

“Magnum frates spectat te.”

He wondered idly if the Romans had sounded sexy when they spoke Latin. Then he freaked out that God might have heard that, and coughed loudly as if that would cover it up.

Bob made his thinky face.

“This isn’t like when you decided that the kid from the coffee shop being straight was no obstacle, you know.”

“I swear, Frank, if you make an altar-boy joke right now I will recite Psalms until your ears are bleeding, never mind your wrists.“

"The thing is, I get wanting to help people, man, especially kids. But why a priest? Why not be a social worker, or a teacher?”Gerard look confused. “There are times when I am those things.”“Yes,” said Frank patiently, “But those people are allowed to have sex.”

“Anyway, what about you?” Gerard gestured at Frank’s face. “How’d you get into body piercing?”“I was Called,” Frank said solemnly.

“Stop it!” Gerard clapped his hands over his eyes like Frank was going to bust a nipple ring out right in front of him. “I can’t deal with pierced nipples at all.”“How often is that a problem for you?”“More often than you might think,” Gerard muttered darkly.

He had never met anyone like Gerard, who would just spew out these sentences that should be embarrassing but mostly made Frank want to sit at his feet and listen forever.

Frank apologized to his mother in his head and said casually, “So…do you?”“Do I what?” Gerard opened his unicorn notebook again.“Jerk off,” Frank said, curling his toes and holding his breath a little at his own daring.Gerard shrugged. “Sure.”“Seriously?” Frank squeaked.“Of course.” Gerard flipped a page, then looked up at Frank. “I don’t make a big production out of it or anything.”“Oh,” said Frank faintly. “Oh.”Gerard was talking again, something about Frank’s tattoo and the history of stigmata, but Frank totally wasn’t listening, he was trying his level best not to imagine Gerard touching himself, all naked except for his collar, oh God, Frank was going to Hell.

Gerard tossed the camera aside after a moment and put his hands on Frank’s skin, splaying his fingers out to bracket the birds. “Okay?” he muttered again.Okay was a fucking understatement. Being so close to Gerard had dulled out the pain enough that Frank couldn’t even really feel it anymore, and the feeling of Gerard’s hands sliding across his belly and hips wasn’t like taking a painkiller at all, it was like getting dropped headfirst into a giant glass of…something that fizzed, and was awesome. Frank felt a ripple of euphoria spread outwards over his entire body, every inch of his skin tingling and aching for more. He bit his lip and screwed his eyes shut and threw his forearms over his face, but nothing was enough to keep him from pressing up into Gerard’s touch, and he couldn’t help the noise he made, a rough gasp wrenching itself from his throat.Gerard’s hands stilled immediately. “Am I hurting you?”“Nnn,” Frank managed, shaking his head. He forced himself to still again, holding the air in his lungs until it burned. He could feel sweat prickling along the back of his neck and stinging his upper lip, and it took every ounce of strength he had not to wrap his legs around Gerard and pull him down.He couldn’t stop his toes digging into the bed when Gerard’s hand swept warmly across his hip, though, and he couldn’t hold back another gasp, either, and in about another second he was just going to lose it and either start crying or laughing hysterically or just grab Gerard and tie him to the fucking bed and wrap himself as closely around him as possible. It wasn’t a sexy feeling, exactly, he wasn’t hard or anything, but it was addictive and maddening and not-quite-enough, and right when it got to feeling like he was going to explode into a thousand tiny pieces, he let the air out of his lungs in a violent whoosh, and turned over suddenly, pushing Gerard’s hands off him with a whine and curling up into the smallest ball possible, still covering his eyes.“Sorry,” he gasped. “Sorry, it’s just - I don’t know, I feel really weird.”Gerard was silent for a second, then he cleared his throat. Then he cleared it again. When Frank peeped up at him through his fingers, he was bright red and staring at the floor. “Should I-”“Let me sleep,” Frank rushed, pulling his shirt back down and trying not to look like he’d just come within three inches of some sort of weird skingasm. “You should - I need to sleep. And you probably have better stuff to do than hang out here.”Gerard cleared his throat a third time and looked around crazily. “You shouldn’t be alone.”“Mikey’ll be back soon.” Frank sat up and pulled the blankets up around him, keeping his hands busy, keeping them to himself.Gerard looked like he wanted to argue, but he also looked like he wanted to bolt for the fucking door. And no wonder, considering Frank had just put on a fucking floor show for him.

Bob said, “Come on, let’s get you into bed.”Frank rolled his head towards him. “I’m not that kind of girl.”“I’m not that kind of gore fetishist,” Bob replied, gathering Frank up and heaving him onto the side of the tub.

“You probably don’t need towels in Heaven,” he told Bob, and then started giggling crazily.“If you get blood on my shirt,” Bob said grimly, “You’re going to Hell.”

Bob’s theory of injuries was that if you didn’t look at it or talk about it or acknowledge it in any way, it probably wasn’t there at all

“I’m so over walking. You can carry me whenever you want.”Bob set him down on the bed and re-wrapped the bloody towels quickly. “Well, shit, Frank, now I gotta find a whole new life’s ambition.”“Let’s get married,” Frank called after him when he went to get the door. Bob ignored him, of course.

“Saint Teresa’s holy wet dream”

“Do you cuddle on the bed with everyone you investigate?”

They totally weren’t cuddling, they were just sitting next to each other, but Mikey looked like he’d walked in on them flying around in a sex trapeze or something.

“Why do you even have a cleaver? You’re vegetarian - Mikey, don’t do as he says!” Brian said exasperatedly as Mikey turned to go get it.

Frank looked up at Mikey. “On three.”“Oh, Jesus,” Ray moaned, covering his eyes.“One,” said Frank, curling his other hand into a fist and shoving it into his mouth to give himself something to bite down on.Bob shoved his chair away and backed up, shaking his head. “This is a really fucking bad idea.”“Two,” Frank said around his knuckles.“Frank, no,” Gerard said desperately.Frank took a deep breath and closed his eyes. “Three.”“PUT THE FUCKING CLEAVER DOWN RIGHT THE FUCK NOW.”Frank opened his eyes. He still had two hands. Brian was standing between Mikey and Frank.The cleaver fell to the floor with a harsh clatter. Mikey took two stumbling steps backwards and collided with Ray, who caught him and held on.“Everybody sit the fuck down!” Brian shouted.Everybody did."You are,” Brian seethed, “The stupidest motherfuckers I have ever come across in my whole goddam life, do you know that? I don’t know how the fuck I managed to work with you assholes in a place where we’re surrounded by sharp objects and not lose a limb every other week, you crazy bastards, you are all motherfucking certifiable and I swear to God the next person to suggest something so fucking insane it could land us all a fucking Darwin Award is going to feel my wrath, never mind The Almighty’s!”“I agree with Brian,” Gerard began, but was cut off by Brian whirling around and pointing a finger right in his face.“You’re a priest! You of all people should fucking know better, but no, you’re the worst of all! It’s not enough that you show up in our lives and suddenly we’re fighting God or the Devil or some crazy renegade tattoo artist who thinks he’s the Devil, but now you’ve got my staff pointing knives at each other? I don’t know how you roll in the Vatican, Father, but this is not how we live our lives!”Gerard opened his mouth. Frank shook his head furiously. Gerard closed it again.“This is totally out of our league!” Brian yelled, whirling his arms everywhere. He was bright red in the face. “Ray is a hairdresser!”Frank started to laugh. Just a little at first, the stupid inappropriate giggle that always fought to escape him when someone was yelling, or he was hurt, or something terrible was happening, but then another followed, and another, and then he caught Bob’s eye and Bob was pressing his mouth together in the way that meant he was about two seconds from cracking up and Frank was just gone, laughing so hard it hurt and he had to struggle to breathe, drawing in choked gasps of breath and making a stupid noise and laughing even harder, and then Ray was laughing too, and Mikey, and even Gerard, although he was trying to hide it in Frank’s shoulder.“I’m a hairdresser!” Ray wailed, collapsing against Mikey, and then even Brian’s mouth twitched at the corner and he sat down heavily, dropping his head into his hands.“I hate you all,” he moaned, making Frank wheeze and clutch at Gerard’s arm because Gerard was squeezing him so tight he really couldn’t breathe at all. “I should just let you all stab each other to death and have done with it.”When they’d calmed down a little, Mikey admitted, “Okay, maybe that was kind of a dumb idea.”

Gerard gave Mikey the finger without moving his hands off his head. Ray and Frank exchanged a dorky, excited glance - a priest! Flipping the bird!

"How do we know Frank’s not going to - I mean, you know.” Ray made a hand movement that could have been Frank’s side exploding, or an aborted attempt at the Macarena.

“We can make a salt circle around the bed!” Ray said. “I saw that in a movie.”“You saw that on Supernatural,” Bob corrected him.Ray flipped him off. “Whatever, man, they have AC/DC on the soundtrack, that show’s awesome.”“I don’t know, it’s not very accurate,” Gerard said, wrinkling his nose.“You didn’t care that Buffy was inaccurate,” Mikey reminded him.“Well, duh.” Gerard rolled his eyes. “Buffy was good.”Ray gasped, like, actually a gasp, and stared at Gerard. “I can’t believe you would say that!”

“And I’m not a,” Frank couldn’t think of a word for someone who would try to seduce a priest. Even if that priest was totally hot and had magical hands. “A harlot,” he finished finally.

“I’m not just worried about him,” Mikey said carefully, searching Frank’s face with his eyes. “You’re all needy and shit.”“Oh, well.” Frank folded his arms. “Thank you, Doctor Phil.”

He was too busy listening to Ray, Bob and Brian argue about who got to share the couch with Mikey.“I’m short,” Brian kept saying, “And I’m your boss.”

“Jesus isn’t good with quiz shows?”Gerard grinned. “For someone who’s omniscient, his general knowledge sucks.”

Gerard’s eyes were huge and dark in the gloom. “I’m only human, Frank.”

Gerard didn’t move at all, he was so still, he wasn’t even breathing, until Frank swept his thumb over the rise of his cheekbone and Gerard’s mouth moved, ever so slightly, pressing back infinitesimally into the kiss. His lower lip caught between Frank’s, and it was so sweet Frank ached with it, for one, long second.

There were low candles burning on a small table in the corner, their guttering flames casting weak licks of light over a picture of what looked like the Virgin Mary, only - wrong, in some horrible way Frank couldn’t define

“You can’t save him,” Luke crowed.Mikey looked over sharply. “Yes we fucking can.”

Gerard let his hand drift back down to the bed again, back to Frank’s skin.Frank covered it with his own, lifted it to his mouth and kissed Gerard’s knuckles, the ball of his thumb, his palm.

“I wasn’t worried,” Frank said roughly, and he’d thought it was true, but hearing it straight from Gerard made something shift inside him and he felt the relief start, like a giant block of ice in his chest was slowly melting at the edges, making it easier to breathe.

Gerard’s voice was low and bitter, and then he looked up at Frank and smiled, sudden and soft and real; it was like having a front-row seat to a mood swing, and Frank felt kind of dizzy with it.

the sick, swoopy embarrassment that comes when you realize you’ve been a complete fucking moron, even if you’re the only one who knows it

It was a pretty masterful I-have-no-idea-what-you’re-talking-about face, if he did say so himself, and Gerard might see God’s plan everywhere, but he couldn’t see through that

“You’re going with Gerard to save lives,” Frank repeated slowly, just to make sure it sounded just as stupid when he said it. It did.

Frank clasped his hands under his chin and fluttered his eyelashes at them. “You guys! You’re so sweet to think of including me in your completely fucking insane plan to go out looking for more crazy assholes who like to bleed people to death. I’m so fucking touched I could just shit.”

Oh. Well. Of course.

"You want I should open a vein? Bleed some more? Because I gotta tell you, Father,” Gerard actually winced at that, and it just wound Frank up further. “I lost my job and my friends to you in the last five minutes, and I don’t really have much else to give.”

“It’s the Catholic Church, Frank,” Gerard sighed. “Not the Mafia.”“You’re damn straight it’s not,” Frank said heatedly. “The Mafia never led me to a psycho’s door as a really weird way of saying they wanted my help. I thought God was supposed to deliver us from evil, not deliver us to its fucking doorstep.”

He could feel his thoughts rolling around in his head like marbles, or like those little ball bearings you had to get to sit in the dents. He tilted his head this way and that, letting them move around and settle, and once they had, he took a shaky breath.

“How was I supposed to know it would explode?” Frank demanded, trying to tear off some more tape but mostly just succeeding in getting it stuck to his face.“Because it always explodes, Frank,” Gerard said exasperatedly, grabbing the tape from him and tearing it himself. “If I have learned one thing over the last year, it’s that everything always explodes.”

STARING THROUGH THE DEMONS

“I read books, fuck you.“

"Sister Wendy rocks.”

“Mikey,” Ray said, touching Mikey’s arm to get his attention. “What do you think he’s going to say?”“I don’t know,” Mikey said honestly, “But I think we should be ready to ignore it.”

“Okay,” Frank yelled from the bathroom. “Now I’m jerking off!”

“Raybledore”

Mikey sighed. He loved having his hair done. When he was rich and famous he was going to pay someone to do his hair every day. Well, probably he would just get Ray to do it, still.

Frank frowned when he was concentrating, and he did this thing where he stuck the tip of his tongue out the corner of his mouth. Once Mikey bet him that he couldn’t paint his nails neatly without doing the tongue thing. Frank made a total mess, and Mikey made five bucks. It was awesome.

"If you stick a needle in me, I will die.”“What about if you need a shot, like, from a doctor?” Frank grabbed the book and pulled himself to sit up. “What happens then?”Mikey laughed. “Oh my God, it’s hilarious. He has to lie down and the doctor has to do special breathing with him.”“Shut up,” Gerard said, smiling.“In through the nose, out through the mouth,“ Mikey said in a high-pitched voice. "The nurses have to hold his hand.”Frank laughed, opening his cigarettes. He stuck one in his mouth. "Do you get a sucker after, too?”“Sometimes,” Gerard said, opening another book. He gave Frank a sly look from under his hair. “It depends on the nurse.”

“The house was built on-“"If you say an ancient Incan burial ground, I am out of here,” Mikey interrupted.“-top of the site of the original house,” Gerard went on, rolling his eyes.

“I’m the Amazing Mystical Abuse Withstanding Boy.“

Frank shook his head. "Like that time in Wisconsin when I got knocked out and Bob had to step up and almost bled to death?”“I bled a tiny bit,” Bob corrected him. “And only from the ears.”

“I’ve never seen anything like that before!” Craig was enthusing to Ray. “How did you find out you could do this stuff? Did you train? Are you in a coven?"Uh,” Ray said brilliantly

Mikey had never thought of himself as someone who was particularly wedded to the idea of normality, but it turned out to be something you could have cravings for, when your life was one long deleted scene from The Exorcist.

“You’re Pete Wentz,” Mikey said, even though Pete Wentz probably knew that.

“It’s nice to meet you, Mikey Way,” Pete said, smiling a smile so big it took up half of his face, and most of the room they were standing in.

Gerard had pulled the lid off his smoothie and was staring into the cup like it contained the answers to life, the universe, and everything. As Mikey watched, he stirred with his straw, raised his eyebrows, then frowned.

Mikey waited another moment, then stuck out his hand for Pete to shake. At the last minute he thought he should maybe do something cool like bumping fists, instead, and ended up just making a limp claw in the air.

Brian turned the key, and the engine exploded.

“You know what, when you move up to a bus, you sort of miss the van? In the way where you never want to have to ride in one again.”

Pete and Patrick were still looking expectant, so Mikey said, “So we’re a group of…traveling…personal grooming experts. I guess.”Patrick looked at Gerard. “And their priest.”“We’re very spiritual,” Ray mumbled.

“Yo, Pete, word on the street is you’ve got us bunking down with a preacher man. Weird kids aren’t doing it for you anymore?”Pete said, “Hi, Cortez,” and then turned to Gerard and said, “This is Matt Cortez. He’s a guitar tech who will stop saying things that make me sound like the Child Catcher if he wants to keep his job.”

“I just,” Frank said, then cleared his throat. He played with a loose thread on his sleeve for a few seconds, then went on, “I really like listening to you talk, man.”“Well.” Gerard went pink and looked down at his lap. He twisted his hands together, and coughed twice. “That works out, because I really like talking.” “Frank laughed and shook his head. “Shit, you do.”

“That wasn’t even a seduction, okay, that was a military campaign. The kid never stood a chance!”“Shut up!” said Frank. “Shut the fuck up, Toro.” “But Frank, I’m straight!” Ray squeaked“Sure you are, baby,” Bob boomed in an exaggerated pantomime of Frank’s voice. “Another beer?” Mikey couldn’t help laughing, even though he knew it would make Frank mad. Frank’s efforts to convince the kid from the coffee shop that a trip down the Kinsey Scale would be a healthy life experiment were legendary; it had gone on for months, seriously months of Frank going to the coffee shop every damn day and hanging over the counter and wearing all his cutest clothes and convincing the kid to go to shows with him and getting him wasted enough that he didn’t mind Frank getting handsy. It had worked in the end.

“Well,” Mikey said to nobody. “That went really awesomely, Mikey. Well played.”

The room was completely silent. Mikey wished he wasn’t lying down, that he could get in between where Frank and Gerard were staring at each other, Gerard’s face locked down tight, Frank’s completely incredulous.Finally Frank stalked over to Gerard. He got up in his face and hissed, “I didn’t take any fucking vows,” before slamming out of the room.

It was always bizarre for Mikey to hear Gerard talk about God like he was real. It wasn’t that Mikey didn’t believe, exactly. He wasn’t entirely sure and he was fine with it – it was the way Gerard was sure, his unshakable conviction that God existed, and that he cared, and that Gerard’s personal relationship with him mattered. God was as tangible to Gerard as any flesh and blood person, and it weirded Mikey out that Gerard was so close to someone Mikey could never meet.Especially when Gerard got all upset with himself for not understanding God’s mysterious ways or whatever. That mostly made Mikey want to call God up and tell him to fucking explain himself because he was making Mikey’s brother crazy and that shit wasn’t cool.

“I don’t want what’s best for Frank,” Gerard confessed in a tiny, anguished voice, and then immediately covered his mouth with his hands like he couldn’t believe he’d admitted that out loud.

Frank held up a finger, then went to rummage in Cortez’s empty bunk. He came back bearing two pairs of handcuffs. Both were padded. One was leopard print. Mikey liked those the best.

Mikey loved his Grandma and he would miss her for the rest of his life, but she had been Gerard’s hero. And that was different, because Mikey’s hero was Gerard.

“You’re not leaving this room,” Frank said softly. He wasn’t even sweating or anything, he looked totally calm, and Mikey found that almost as scary as the gun. “Shoot me if you want, kid. Kill me, I don’t care.”

More than anyone Mikey knew, he thought that Brian deserved to get rich someday, if only because he seemed like he would actually know what to do with more than fifty bucks.

“Fine,” said Brian, in that voice that meant he really wanted to kill you for your own good.

Gerard paused and looked into the distance for a minute, evidently contemplating the Pope’s coolness.

“Do you have a problem with dudes being into dudes?“

Mikey was starting to wish he was in any other room of the house. He could see Frank winding himself up on the other side of the room, and he could feel how stiffly Gerard was holding himself when he said, quietly, "Really, really not.”

“But you can’t just quit!” Gerard said urgently, and then stepped back, startled, when Frank slammed his hand down on the counter.“I can do whatever the fuck I want! I say what happens in my life, not you, not the Church, and not your fucking God either!”

“A moral evil, are you fucking kidding me? And you fucking pander to it, it makes me sick.“

"You lied about your sexuality so they’d let you be a priest, and you try to spin it with all this bullshit about how it doesn’t really matter, and it’s based on out-of-date opinions, and God doesn’t hate fags blah blah blah but at the end of the day, you made a conscious decision to hide it - and not because you were ashamed. Not because you believe them when they tell you that it’s wrong. You deliberately hid it because you wanted in. It was more important to you to be accepted into their creepy-ass institution than to stand up for what was in your heart - ”

“You are not this fucking deluded,” Frank yelled back. “The Church hates us, you idiot, and you know it! You know you would’ve never been ordained in the first place if you hadn’t hidden the fact that you’re queer!”Gerard didn’t say anything; he was flushed and he looked scared, but he didn’t back down either, just kept staring steadily at Frank.“You got a justification for everything,” Frank went on softly. “Queers aren’t going to Hell, jerking off isn’t a sin, abortion isn’t the worst thing a woman can do in the eyes of God. But here’s the thing – when it comes right down to it, your bosses don’t agree.”

“Maybe it’s different for them. Maybe they still see you as a priest.” Gerard hesitated, then said, “And you don’t?” Frank looked up at him. “No,” he said quietly. “I see you exactly as you are.”

Mikey didn’t know which one of them moved first, but the next thing he knew Gerard had Frank pinned against the counter – at first Mikey thought they were fighting, and he thought how strange that was, when Gerard was so gentle – but of course they weren’t, they were kissing, Frank making desperate noises against Gerard’s mouth, his fingers tangled tightly in his hair.

Frank’s eyebrows creased; his expression was gentle, and he touched Gerard’s face. Gerard frowned deeply, and Frank looked anxious as he tried to move in again. "Don’t – just come upstairs with me,” he said urgently. “You want to.”Gerard hesitated, then took a step back, shaking his head. “I can’t.”“Why?” said Frank again, his hands still stretched out. “Because it’s against the rules? Or because you have a justification for everything except me?”

“Are you telling me that your work is genuinely the most important thing in your life? That you’d give us up? That you could give up someone you loved in the name of doing God’s work? There’s no way, I know you. You could never do that. So why can’t you-“"What?” Gerard burst out. “Abandon my calling so we can fuck? Is that what you want?”Frank looked like he’d been slapped, and Mikey felt guilt deep twist deep in his belly like a knife. They stood there staring at each other for a minute, and then Frank reached into his pocket; he brought out Gerard’s rosary, and laid it down on the counter. Gerard’s eyes followed it the whole time.

“Their eyes are big,” Mikey said, feeling like he was going to throw up. He tore his eyes away from the kids and looked across the stage to see Gerard, Bob and Brian disappearing backstage. “Their eyes are so big because they’re looking at God.”

“I can’t do it,” Gerard said, and then he punched Frank in the face.

“Go to hell,” said Frank quietly. His voice sounded raw and unused at the same time. “You don’t know the first fucking thing about how I feel.”“It’s the same as how we feel, you selfish motherfucker, don’t you understand that?” Bob yelled, moving forward and getting in Frank’s face. “We all loved him!”“Not like Frank did,” Mikey said. Bob went silent and turned to look at Mikey, amazed. “You know Frank, guys. Little thing like the priesthood was never going to stand in his way.”Bob stared at him for a minute longer, then turned back to Frank. He stepped back suddenly, putting space between them, his hands coming up in front of his chest, palms out.“Oh,” said Brian. “Oh, Frank.”

His shoulders touched his knees, his arms trapped tightly in between, the rosary hidden somewhere in the center of it all. His hands covered his face and the only sound in the room was his trapped, heavy breath, the ragged, awful noises he let out between each inhale.“I wish it was me,” he said, and then moaned, a horrible, impotent sound like something wounded. “I wish it was me.”Mikey stared down at him. The back of Frank’s neck was exposed; pale, tender skin. There was a lamp on the corner table with a heavy base. Mikey could pick it up and bring it down on the back of Frank’s head. He could knock him out and take the rosary away. He could kill him.His fingers twitched by his side.

“We didn’t make up after we fought,“ he said, his voice thick and clotted with tears. "We didn’t – oh, God, Mikey, the things I said.”

Frank covered his face again. Mikey thought that Frank hadn’t known Gerard very long. That it hadn’t been just one fight. That he didn’t have a whole lifetime to fall back on.

Mikey pushed the rosary gently back into his palms. “It’s not mine,” he said, something small but important coming loose inside him as he said the words. “He gave it to you.”

HEAVEN HELP US

The things he’d kept to himself – the secret conversations, the nights he’d force himself to stay awake just so they could talk when nobody else was listening – he hadn’t hidden them just because he knew Mikey would be pissed. It was because they were the only things of Gerard that Frank had all to himself, the only time Frank got something from Gerard that nobody else did.

“I wasn’t,” Frank started, feeling unaccountably guilty, like Brian had just caught him doing something he shouldn’t have done. He looked down at his own hands, clutching the rosary, and up at Mary, and then back down at himself, on his knees on the floor. “Oh,” he said. “I guess I was.”

all of it screamed vow of poverty, my ass.

“It would seem,” the Cardinal finished, “that Father Way’s body has disappeared.”There was a silence. Eventually Bob said, “What the fuck?”“Yes,” said the Cardinal. “Quite.”

He pressed his fingers under his eye, remembering. He didn’t mind that it hurt.

“People wake up in morgues and then wander off all the time.”Bob raised an eyebrow. “All the time?”Ray flushed. “Well, on the Discovery Channel. And it’s not like there isn’t a precedent for this within the Church.”“Right,” Bob said slowly. “But the other dude it happened to was Jesus.”

It hurt not to kiss him, it physically hurt

he pressed his cheek against Gerard’s and hid a secret kiss in his hair, back behind his ear where nobody would ever find it.

He said, "Oh, well, of course,” and then turned around and slammed his fist against the wall as hard as he could.

(Mikey’s unicorn notebook, said Frank’s brain in Mikey’s voice)

“Is this where you ask me if Mikey’s said anything to me about you?”“What are we, in middle school?” Ray scoffed. He rearranged the blankets over himself, then cut his eyes at Frank. “Well has he?”

“The whole ‘I Don’t Know How To Love Him’ deal.”

“Private investigator?” Ray suggested.Bob gave him a look. “We are private investigators.”“Yeah, but we suck at it,” Frank said truthfully.

“Thanks for the shirt,” Gerard said in the same voice, making Frank’s stomach tie itself up and his mouth go dry. “It feels nice. Wearing your clothes.”

“You know,” Gerard murmured, moving his fingers over Frank’s collarbone; not touching, but so close Frank’s skin prickled with imagined sensation. “Tattoos are a form of defiance against your creator. This body is yours, and you’ll do whatever the fuck you want with it. It’s pure rebellion.”

“I know this one!” Frank snapped his fingers again. “Like, his sisters send to Jesus to tell him Lazarus is sick, right, only he doesn’t get there in time, so the dude dies, and then Martha’s all mad, and Jesus is like, chill, he’s gonna rise, and she’s all, yeah, on Judgment Day, and he’s like, nu-uh and brings the dude back, right?”Everyone stared at him. Frank shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “Right?” he repeated, looking at Gerard. “Isn’t that what happened?”Gerard got a tiny smile on his face. “I’ve never heard it told like that before,” he said slowly. “But yes.”Frank made a victory fist in the air. “See, I can read a book, motherfucker.”

He just felt like he should be with Gerard, not in the stupid you-complete-me way, but in the way where he just couldn’t see the bad in it.

The low sun was casting orange light over everything, and it caught the shadows of Gerard’s face in stark relief. He looked beautiful. He always looked beautiful to Frank.

“What if I did?“ Gerard said, stopping Frank in his tracks. "What if I did want to leave?”Frank squeezed his eyes shut, blinking hard, twice. “Don’t say that shit to me,” he said, his voice coming out hard and angry. “Don’t say that if you don’t mean it.”

Gerard made a small sound and slid one fingertip across Frank’s palm, from the web of his thumb to the base of his little finger. “I just need to know you’re there.”Frank shivered and stretched his fingers out again, opening his palm up, silently encouraging. He was such a fucking sucker for Gerard, he couldn’t help himself even though he could see the crash waiting for him on the other side. Gerard stroked two fingertips across his palm this time, then down to the tip of his little finger, which Frank crooked to catch his fingers and keep him there. Frank was barely breathing now, his eyes tight shut despite the dark, his whole focus narrowed down to the touch of Gerard’s fingers against hisHe felt Gerard press the pad of his thumb into the center of Frank’s palm; press his ragged nails between Frank’s knuckles, trace gently over the inside of Frank’s wrist. Every touch was magnified a thousand percent by the dark and the danger and the closeness; when Gerard opened his own palm and pressed it flush against Frank’s, Frank barely bit back a gasp, he couldn’t help it, he felt it all the way down to his toes. Gerard swallowed audibly and laced his fingers through Frank’s, squeezing and then not letting go, so that they were holding hands in the dark.

Frank bit his tongue and counted to ten. Okay, to three.

“Uh, while you’re at it?“ said Mikey, who was peering at Bob’s leg. "I think Bob needs an ambulance.”“Bob, was your leg on fire?”“What?” Brian shut the water off and came to kneel down by Bob. “Why does Bob need an ambulance?”“Bob doesn’t need an ambulance,“ Bob scowled. "Bob needs you to stop overreacting.”“Frank needs Bob to stop talking about himself in the third person,“ said Frank. Bob gave him the finger.

"Bob, was your leg on fire?”“No,” Bob said firmly. “My jeans were on fire.”“Your leg is in your jeans, asshole!“

"They’re just agreeing with each other because they’re sleeping together.”“Jesus Christ,” Brian dropped his head into his hands. “How do you all find the time for this shit?”

“It’s my leg that’s hurt! There’s nothing wrong with my fists!”“So what are you gonna do, sit in the passenger seat and punch anyone who comes near enough?”

“I’m okay!” Brian didn’t sound okay: when Frank risked a look he had one Hood’s arm hooked tight around his neck and was fending another one off with his feet. No part of him was touching the ground - it was fucking impressive.

Remembering the way he’d behaved was like recalling an episode of TV or a story somebody had told him about a total and utter fucking jackass

“I think,” Frank snarled, “that you’re the guy tied up in a chair. And I’m the one still standing.”“You can’t even take credit for that,” Gerard scoffed. “If you’re not on the floor it’s only because your friends are holding you up.”“Yeah,” said Ray. “Friends’ll do that. Just another one of those pathetic human things, I guess.”

Gerard’s head snapped around at an unnatural angle and his eyes fixed heavily on Frank’s. “I am beyond pain,” he growled, his voice rolling gutturally from one syllable to the next. “I was cast out of Heaven, human, you know nothing of pain. I will visit such suffering on this Earth that pain will be a beautiful dream you once had. Your children’s skin will blacken and their eyes will roast in their skulls and they will still be screaming even as the flames lick their way up their tiny throats and out of their charred, ruined mouths, and they will still be screaming, screaming for their God to save them and He will not come.”“Blah, blah,” said Bob. “Is anyone else really bored of this guy?”

Brian fumbled his hand out of Mikey’s grip - he caught Mikey’s chin clumsily before scrabbling at Frank’s shoulder. “What is it?” said Frank, catching his hand. “Brian?”Brian couldn’t speak yet, but Frank was watching his face and he saw his mouth form the words, “I didn’t.”“I know you didn’t,” said Frank, holding on tight. “I know you didn’t, I know that.”“He didn’t what?” Bob demanded, still holding Brian close.For a minute Frank couldn’t answer because he wasn’t there, he was back in his bathroom, sprawled out on the floor, and Brian was holding him in his arms until the ambulance came. “He didn’t try to kill himself,” he managed eventually, leaning into Mikey, pressing Brian’s hand between his own. “It was Gerard.”

“Liar,“ Gerard breathed against his ear. "I think you want him any way you can get him, Frankie. I think you’re aching with it. I think you’re really, really hurting for him, sweetheart, and here’s the secret: he feels the same.”Frank shuddered and tipped his head back, encouraging the first slide of Gerard’s lips on his throat.“He thinks about it all the time,” Gerard went on, sliding his hands up over Frank’s chest and down to his belly. “He lies awake at night burning for you, Frankie, he stares at the ceiling and prays for the strength to keep his hands off you for just one more day. The thought of you with someone else makes him sick, did you know that? Someone else touching your skin, tasting your mouth, feeling you hot and desperate against them. He wants to be the one in your bed, Frankie, he wants you to hold him down and spread him open and taste every dirty, shameful inch of him, and I can give you that.” Gerard pulled back to look into Frank’s eyes, and slid his thigh between Frank’s, pressing up and smiling when it made Frank gasp and clutch at him, his eyelids fluttering as his head fell back against the wall. “I can give you everything you want, and all you have to do is set me free.”

“You were right,” Frank whispered in his ear when the kiss broke, settling his hands firmly on Gerard’s shoulders.Gerard nuzzled the side of his face. “About what?”“I don’t do what I’m told,” said Frank, and with a flick of his wrist he shook the rosary out of his sleeve and jammed the crucifix as hard as he could into the broken skin on Gerard’s neck. Gerard howled and staggered, hands coming up to clutch at his neck; Frank shoved on his shoulders, sending him to the ground, and followed him down. “You think I’d sell him out for sex?” he hissed, throwing his leg over Gerard’s hips and pinning him to the ground. “You stupid motherfucker, you don’t know the first fucking thing about me.”

His face was pale and he was sweating, obviously in pain, but his eyes were calmer than they’d been for days. “Again, Frankie,” he urged. “For hope, this time.”

Gerard stroked over Frank’s mouth, pressed in closer. He was looking at Frank like he wanted to eat him whole, like he wanted to crawl inside the words coming from Frank’s lips.

“Gee, you don’t get it.” Frank closed his eyes. He shook his head. “What I want from you, it’s not like that. The way that I feel, and the - the sex thing, you think they’re separate.”Gerard touched his face so gently Frank barely felt it. When he opened his eyes, Gerard said, “And they’re not?”Frank shook his head. He couldn’t speak.

"When I’m with you,” Gerard said so, so quietly. “It hurts. Less.”

Gerard sighed brokenly into Frank’s mouth, cupping his hands around Frank’s face and kissing him back fiercely, letting Frank guide him back towards the bed.

then they were kissing again, deep, shivery, bruising kisses; not like the first sweet kiss they had shared on Frank’s bed, not like the angry, bitter kisses in Pete’s kitchen, and not like any of the ones since, the kisses that hadn’t ever really come from Gerard.

He didn’t know how to be less desperate, how to take it any slower, how to make Gerard understand that there had been times Frank needed to touch him so badly that it felt like he was bleeding.

he wanted to keep Gerard there forever, safe between Frank and the mattress where nothing could ever hurt him

He made a meaningless noise, meant to be soothing, and surged back up to kiss Gerard, who clutched at him harder and kissed him back like he was trying to leave a bruise.

“They might not move,” Mikey said. He looked at Frank out the corner of his eye. Frank heard the you might hit them as clear as if Mikey had spoken it aloud, and it didn’t sound like a warning, either.“Good,” he said, and put his fucking foot down.

“Jesus, Frank!” Ray slammed into the back of Frank’s seat. “You’re going to kill us all before we even get there!”There was a noise, then, a horrible, garbled, howling noise, and Frank didn’t even have to look to know it was Gerard.“Scratch that!” said Ray. “Keep your fucking foot down, all right?”

Bob and Ray climbed out first, then together with the Suits they pulled out Gerard, who was thrashing around and snarling and his face was - Frank pulled Mikey to him quickly, turning him away.“Don’t look,” he said, holding Mikey firm when he struggled. “Don’t look, Mikeyway.”

It might have been a year ago but Frank would never forget the way it felt, and the first sharp, sick split of the skin on his forehead was as familiar to him as his own name.

He felt like his head was going to explode; his skin was splitting open further, he could feel his flesh ripping itself apart and he felt that his bones would be next, that his skull would crack like an egg, that his spine and his wrists would shatter inside his body.

He was lying in the hospital bed. Bob was sitting next to him, wearing a hospital gown. He looked like shit. Frank felt like shit. Ray was sitting next to Bob, fully-clothed. He looked marginally less like shit.

“And they made me wear this stupid gown. It doesn’t even close in the back, the nurses keep staring at my ass.”Ray laughed. “Well, it’s a nice ass.””“I know that,” Bob grumped.

Gerard twisted his hands together. He nodded, slowly, like it hurt. He moved suddenly, fumbling in his pocket and dragging out the rosary, which he held out to Frank. “Here,” he said hoarsely. “This is yours.”Frank looked at it, and his fingers twitched with how bad he wanted it back in his hands. He clenched them into fists and then looked at Gerard’s face. “No,” he said, forcing the words out around the lump in his throat. “It’s not.”

“I heard you, you know?” Frank told him quietly. “I heard your voice. When I was under.”“Yeah,” Mikey whispered. “I knew you would.”

“Well, all right then,” he said, putting the cigarette in his mouth.His Mom frowned and clicked her tongue. “You know I don’t like you smoking,” she said, and then leaned across the table and lit it for him.

They gathered in the parking lot afterwards and Frank was instantly thirteen again, huddling around one shared cigarette and pretending they weren’t scared of their Moms finding them.

“Maybe it wasn’t Gerard’s calling we were following, you know? Maybe - maybe it was ours.“

Ray grinned. "Can we embarrass Brian by handing out poorly-designed business cards at bars?”Frank gave him a look. “Dude, Brian is not embarrassed by business cards, okay. He dreams about them at night.”

“Dude,” Frank said reverently. “Health insurance?”

Frank slapped it and spun in a circle. “Man, health insurance, Bob got wet - this day can’t get any better.”"Uh,” said a voice that didn’t belong to any of the people Frank knew were there. “Hi?”

"Brian,” Gerard interrupted him. “Call me Gerard.”Mikey made a noise, and Frank looked up. Gerard had unwound his scarves and was holding the mess of tangled wool in his hands. He was wearing a T-shirt under his coat. His throat was bare.

"I want to be where I can do the most good.”

“It’s an Ewok,” Frank said unnecessarily.“I know,” said Gerard, even more so.

“I’m not saying no to you, you dumb motherfucker,” Frank crossed the room and stood in front of Gerard with his arms folded. “I’m saying no to your stupid ‘I’m not worthy’ bullshit. You think I’m going to like you better after you…I don’t know, find yourself or whatever? Don’t bother, okay? I found you. You’re standing right there. Job done.”

“You know what I don’t get about you?” Frank went on, raising his voice so Gerard couldn’t interrupt with any more monumentally stupid ideas. “How you know so much and fuck all at the same time. You think this,” he gestured between them, “happens every day? Let me tell you something that I know, okay: if you find someone who would die for you, you don’t wait around to see if it sticks!”

“You drive me fucking crazy,” Frank tried to tell him, but he couldn’t seem to stop kissing him long enough to make the words, so it came out as a moan, which was pretty much what he was trying to say anyway.

Gerard laughed, the sound broken in the middle when Frank licked a broad, firm stripe up his throat and Gerard shivered all over.

“I just didn’t think that the reason could be this simple, you know? I didn’t consider that maybe I was supposed to meet you…just because I was supposed to meet you.”"Gerard,” Frank looked down at their joined hands. “Let me get this straight. You saved my life. You literally died for me. And now you’re telling me you think God’s plan is for us to be together?”Gerard smiled wonkily. "Sums it up.”

“It was never that I didn’t want you,” he whispered fiercely against Frank’s hair. “It was never, ever that.”

“Let me take you home,” he murmured against Gerard’s lips, and Gerard sighed, stroking his fingers through Frank’s hair and pressing another kiss to the corner of his mouth. “Let me take you home, Gee.”“Okay,” Gerard nodded, and when they managed to pull away from each other, he reached down and took Frank’s hand.

He realized belatedly that maybe Gerard might have assumed Frank would be wearing underwear, but it was too late now, and anyway Gerard didn’t seem to be complaining.

“You,” he said in a strangled voice, then fumbled to pull Frank close to him, kissing him hard and moving his hands all over Frank’s hips and thighs. “You’re fucking beautiful,” he said, and the thing was that Frank could tell he really meant it, that it wasn’t seduction, wasn’t flattery or hyperbole, it was what Gerard thought and he wanted to say it. “You’re beautiful all over.”

“Oh,” Gerard said in a choked little voice, his hips jerking under Frank’s hands like he couldn’t help it, but there was an edge of panic there, too. “Yeah, um. Okay.”Frank stilled his hands immediately. “Too fast?”

Gerard shook his head. “It’s not that. It’s just been a while since anyone’s, you know. Seen me. Naked.”“Oh.” Frank pressed a kiss to the soft place underneath Gerard’s jaw, and let his fingers wander a little, tracing the skin right above Gerard’s waistband, pressing in until he could hook his fingertips underneath. “How long exactly?”“Oh, you know,” Gerard said, probably aiming for casual but ending up somewhere around hysteria. “Just a decade. Plus. And this may come as a shock to you, but I wasn’t exactly Don Juan before that, you know? Shit, Frank, I don’t know what I’m doing.”“It’s okay,” Frank murmured, slipping his thigh between Gerard’s and pressing up. “I do.”

“I wish you had never had to hurt,” he said, and kissed the inside of Frank’s left wrist. “But I wouldn’t want you to lose these, not now.” Gerard turned Frank’s hand over and kissed the other side, before raising his right wrist to his lips. “They mean too much.”

“I’m with Frank,“ he said, his voice going shy and turning up at the corners

"If this turns out to be a dream, I’m gonna be pissed.”“Well,” Gerard said thoughtfully. “Not that this isn’t amazing and everything, but in your dreams are we usually being observed by a framed picture of you in your high school uniform?”“Oh, God.” Frank fumbled his hand up over Gerard’s face to cover his eyes, grinning when it made Gerard laugh and squirm. “No, come on, don’t look at it! Don’t, it’s from before I got cute.”

“No chasing Ray off the porch with a shotgun, okay?”

Gerard pulled away enough to tug Frank’s shirt over his head and then went to work on his jeans.“Right here?” Frank blinked at the top of Gerard’s head. “Before dinner, even?”Gerard looked up, and the grin he gave Frank was so completely gleeful at his own daring that Frank laughed out loud.

“It’s not my fault you’re such a nympho.”“Hey.” Frank poked him. “Who pushed who up against the door?”“I did!” Gerard said giddily.

“Do you think there’ll ever come a day when I don’t have to bribe you into church with free pastries?”“Sure,” Frank said comfortably. “The day I no longer fit into any of my pants.”

Frank had heard it before, so he wasn’t sure if he believed it. But he knew that Gerard did, and that was what counted, in the end.

“You would be amazed at what I can be skeptical about,” Bob said darkly.Brian nodded. “It’s true. He doesn’t believe in the moon landing.”

AFTER WORKING HOURS

Even if Mikey wanted to – which he didn’t – there would be no denying that he and Gerard were probably closer than most brothers. They talked about things other siblings didn’t discuss (they talked about things other siblings didn’t have to discuss, like Hell and psalms and whether or not Bob was temporarily possessed last week or he was just really angry with Frank)

“It’s not here,” said Frank, muffled with his head and shoulders disappearing into the lowest shelf on the bookcase. “What color is the cover again?”Gerard chewed on his thumb a little, then sighed, “Green,” in a dreamy voice when Frank bent over even further.

“Gerard, seriously, it’s not down here and I am two breaths away from Death by Dustball, okay, just-” Frank looked awkwardly back under his arm, and when Gerard didn’t drag his gaze away from Frank’s butt in time Frank made his eyes hugely round and his mouth dropped open in an exaggerated pantomime of shockGerard cracked up, burying his face in the books he was holding, and Frank straightened up, went over to him, tugged the books out of his arms and replaced them with himself. Gerard was still giggling when Frank kissed him, when Frank pushed him back against the desk, when Frank grabbed his hands and reached behind himself to put them firmly on his ass.

TURNING POINT

When Frank came into the living room, Gerard held up his copy of Rose Madder and said, “Explain to me again why your books are allowed at home and mine aren’t.”“Because your books are work books,” said Frank, taking the novel and placing it carefully back on the shelf. “And mine have stories in them.”“Mine have stories!” Gerard protested, trailing Frank to the kitchen.“Stories about Jesus.”“Those are the best kind!”

“Father Way?”It had been a long time since anyone had called Gerard that, and for a second he froze, staring down at the peas like they could tell him what to do. They just cheerfully re-informed him that they were ‘pod to packed in 24 hours!’ though.

“I knew it was you!” she cried, and threw herself into his arms. Gerard waved the peas helplessly in the air for a second, then balanced them on a nearby stack of Crisco cans so he could hug Nicole back.

“This is Frank,” said Gerard.“Hi Frank,” said Nicole, and then they both looked at Gerard expectantly.“Frank is,” Gerard started, and then he didn’t know what to say. Frank hated the word partner, and lover didn’t really cover it, plus Gerard didn’t actually think he could say that out loud. He wasn’t sure Frank would appreciate being introduced as Gerard’s soulmate, even though it was true. This was the first time Gerard would be introducing Frank to someone who knew him as a priest, and he was blindsided and suddenly furious that there was no word for what Frank was to him.“My boyfriend,” he settled on eventually, and Nicole made a comically shocked face, which Gerard could understand because Frank was really beautiful, even in sweatpants pushing chickpeas around the supermarket, and Gerard was as surprised as anyone else that they were together.

just a guy trying to sneak overpriced vegetables past his thrifty other half

Frank didn’t know what to say a lot of the time, Gerard thought, but he could hug like a motherfucker.Then he said, “You want to stop and get some coffee?” which just showed that he did know what to say after all.

Gerard turned indignantly to Frank. “You passed Starbucks!”“We’re not going to Starbucks.”“Why aren’t we going to Starbucks?”“Because I hate Starbucks.”“But we always go to Starbucks!”“And I always hate it.”“But we always go anyway,” Gerard insisted.

“Tell me about it,” Frank drawled, and leaned on the counter like he wanted to take it home.

Gerard waited for Frank to do what he’d done, use a word to say what Gerard was, but he didn’t, he just leaned in close and draped his arm around Gerard’s shoulders and said, “What can Kevin get for you, baby?” in his bedroom voice, then kissed the corner of Gerard’s mouth.Gerard’s voice disappeared and he knew his face was flushed, but he couldn’t help it. It was so stupid, he told himself furiously, after everything he’d seen and done and been through, after everything they’d been through together, to stammer and blush like an idiot whenever Frank fluttered his fucking eyelashes.

Sometimes he felt like Frank knew everything about him but he didn’t know anything about Frank from before they met, although he said that to Bob once and Bob said, “What’s to know? He was a little shit then and he’s a little shit now. Only difference is he’s hungover less often and he has you to drive his ass to the emergency room when he can’t breathe,” which was no help.

“Do you feel further away from God now?”Gerard felt warm, as though someone was laughing. “No,” he said. “I feel closer than ever.”

A lot of times Frank made Gerard feel like he’d been punched in the stomach, like he was going blind. Maybe that wasn’t how it felt to other people to be in love. Well, they weren’t other people.

“Did I ever tell you that after I met you I stopped jerking off?”Frank was holding the peas in his hand. The freezer was open. “Excuse me?” he said, in an odd, uneven voice.

“The peas!” said Gerard, when he could get his mouth free.“Fuck the peas,” Frank growled, but he did let go long enough to throw them in the freezer and slam the door shut.

They rolled over somehow and Gerard pressed Frank down into the pillows. Frank loved it like that, and Gerard loved to do it, loved to spread Frank out and kiss him everywhere, let his lips follow the ink that curled so lovingly over Frank’s skin, the story there. The birds on his belly, the faint round scars on his wrists. Gerard touched them all with his lips, but reserved his most tender kisses for the carefully-inscribed letters of his own name.

“I didn’t know you’d be so tender,” he said, and kissed Frank softly. “So - that it would mean so much. How much you’d be able to use this to show me about how you feel. I guess I thought sex would just be about getting off more than anything else, but that’s so not it with you. I mean even when it’s – even when it’s rough, and fast, and you’ve got me face-down on the bed,” Gerard crooked his fingers and pressed up, hard, riding it out when Frank shouted and bucked, “even then I can feel that it’s – that you love me.”“I do love you,” said Frank roughly. “I love you so much I don’t know what to fucking do with myself.”“I know,” said Gerard, working his fingers inside Frank. “That’s what I’m saying, it’s - you’re so expressive.”

“Let me watch you,” he said, resting his hands on Gerard’s knees. “Just for a minute.”Gerard felt his stupid face flame, and he couldn’t even feel his hand moving at first, he was in a weird bubble of embarrassment. They hadn’t done this before, not like this, not this way around, not with Gerard up on his knees and so exposed and – but Frank had asked him for it, and Frank wouldn’t ask him for something that would hurt to give.

happy, dirty noises

tracing sticky patterns on the inside of Frank’s hip

It didn’t take long for Gerard’s post-orgasm blissful lassitude to give way to feeling like post-orgasm blissful lassitude could only really be achieved if he had a cigarette.

“Oh my God,” Frank said faintly. He took the cigarette Gerard passed him, but just lay there with his arm hanging off the bed, like he didn’t have the strength to lift it to his mouth. “That was awesome.”“It really was,” Gerard agreed.“I mean even by our standards,” said Frank. His eyes were closed. “That was up there with like…Christmas.”“And Easter,” Gerard added.“I hope you know how weird it is that Jesus gets you hot,” said Frank. He took a deep drag on his cigarette. “Your birthday.”“Your birthday,” said Gerard. Costumes were awesome.Frank exhaled smoke, smiling to himself. “Last Tuesday.”“Oh yeah,” said Gerard, remembering.

“I can’t – we’re not built to live without each other, you and me.”

“Maybe sometimes I just worry about what’s going to happen when you realize what a giant boring pain in the ass I am.”“I realized that a long time ago,” Frank said heavily.

Frank frowned, concerned. “Do you feel guilty about something?”“Frank, I’m an ex- priest,” Gerard said, rubbing his forehead. “I feel guilty about everything.”

“I sleep like a dead rock in a coma, even when I’m dreaming about dying a horrible bloody death. They should bottle me and sell me to people like you.”

“Craig would let us run a crack den out of the back room if we told him it was for the greater good,” Frank said affectionately.

“I got your cereal!” called Frank, bearing it proudly into the kitchen. “I had to kill a man to get the last box.”Gerard rewarded him for the lie with a kiss.

#it's very very long oh boy #originally i was like ''okay but i'll keep this sfw'' and then i.... didn't #there's heavy shit in here too #we got all sorts of shit #we got angst #we got hilarity #we got spicy spicy

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