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survivalist-anon · 1 month

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Log 16: A bark worse than his bite

Pine Hills most reputable bar: Big Foot Saloon. Ironically, we don't get bigfoot sightings here in Pine Hills, but with nearly 8ft space soldiers with occasionally some quirk about will probably confuse a few folks now.

The morning staff now finally get to have that night out drinking they wanted.

Fjord by this point was just enjoying himself, he was more familiar with a bar setting than I thought. He practically blended in, if were-vikings were common place the west coast.

Ronnie and guys were laughing about some plans they're going to make this weekend.

Jonas was telling us a story that happened to her for the billionth time.

Fjord intensively listening. As for me, my brain checked out a little while ago.

"-And so than, I had my tonsils removed, for the thrice", Jonas concluded.

"....Jonas I'm not certain you CAN remove your tonsils more than once...", I'm certain the last time she said 'twice'.

Frank hand walked up to our table with a rather sizable tab. "Here you go folks, hope you enjoyed your drinks", he looks to Fjord who had drunk a horrendous amount of alcohol, specifically beers, IPAs and I believe I recommended him an actual craft mead, he absolutely loved it. Yet he was more sober than I was with my one bottle of hard cider.

"Oh right, ugh, this be my 'treat'," he quickly handed the little bag of gold nuggets to Frank.

Frank takes the bag without question and promptly leaves.

Ronnie looked at me wondering why Frank accepted a mystery bag rather than cash (Frank apparently didn't believe in the American banking system). "Dang, thanks Fjord...that must have been quite the bill. That had to have been like...I don't know hundreds of dollars.".

Jonas nudged my shoulder again, "dang girl, is he loaded too?", giggling.

"Ah no worries, I just wanted to show my appreciation for being so welcoming.", his smiled warmly. Suddenly he snapped to head to the door.

Oh no.

Jeff and his gang were at Frank's tonight. I guess their usual hangover hang out at Tom's house may have gone wrong considering he lives with his mother.

I was sitting next to Fjord and I FEEL his growling. I had to whisper to him, "Fjord ...Fjord not here, you don't need to do anything.".

His eyes were locked on to Jeff, I was starting to get scared of he was going to kill him in front of everyone in the bar.

His friends from the station were laughing, meanwhile he still looked so drained, a little more rested but drained.

"Hey what are you looking at asshole!?", Tom aggressively spoke to Fjord from all the way across the bar.

Jeff turned around to see who it was...I could tell there was something brewing in him. I would feel more sympathetic to him if it weren't for everything I'd gone through with him.

His eyes shot to Fjord, it was a look of jealousy.

Fjord was standing his guard. Me and him knows he could take every single one of them. However I was more worried of the scene this could cause.

The others at our table began to worry, Ronnie looked at Jeff, than to Fjord. Whom by this point resembled a guard dog than that tall strong friendly weirdo who made wolves howl.

"Lorey, what's going on? Does Fjord know those guys?", the concern in his voice began to match my anxiety with the situation. I look to him and began to gently touch Fjord's arm to calm him down.

"Fjord, you can relax. Please. He isn't going to do anything....he can't anyway.", I felt like I didn't get through to him yet. So, I pull his arm a little, put my arm around his shoulders and place my face on to his, I didn't care about the pungent alcoholic smell from either of us... just close as contact I could get sitting next him.

It was for some... primordial reason....all I could think of doing.

Fjord, finally began to loosen his guard. "Lass?".

"Please Fjord, I'm ok, you're ok, and everyone here is ok...", all I could do is speak as if I was soothing him. I'm not even sure if it was the correct way to do it, but it was working.

He shuffled closer and wrapped his arm around me. "Yes, ok...thank you lass....".

It was a strange moment, time stopped, the sounds of the bar faded out, and it was just our hearts beating.

"Hey, man, come closer to us and-", Jonas was threatening someone as I had my eyes closed.

"-or what... you'll call the cops?", a dead toned, familiar voice had rung out.

"oh shit.", I whispered. I look up to see Jeff.... just standing next to our table. The look on his eyes was of betrayal? Bags under his eyes and an unblinking stare.

"Jeff.... seriously. Please leave us alone.", Ronnie and the guys at our table had not begun to raise their guard.

"....who's....the red head....", Jeff didn't ask...he just made a statement disguised as a question.

Fjord just turned to him, expressionless as he could muster. "....Fjord....you must be Jeff...."

"yeah..... you're not from around...are you?", Jeff was just looking at Fjord, trying to make sense of him. This huge, big red haired man, something about Fjord reminded Jeff of.... monsters...".... where are you from...Fjord?"

Jonas interrupted, "He's from Europe, Jeff, of course he's not from around here.", although Jonas could have been off by a few light-years. Her comment actually helped.

"oh...like...where.... Ireland.... Scotland?....", he continued monotonly.

Having no idea where or what was either of the two countries, "Yes. Both.", I couldn't help but think maybe Fjord was messing with him. "I have family there.".

Jeff just stared at him, than to me. "....you moved on pretty qui-", suddenly Fjord just barked at him.

"Wrouff!", it was as if I had a large but gentle dog next to me.

The scream Jeff let out along with the startled jump he did was the greatest comedic timing one could ever ask for. Not even on accident you could ask for a better jump scare.

He fell to the floor as his Tom, Beck and Mark help him up, "See I told you we should have gone to Portland today!", Beck scolded Tom.

"What and have my girlfriend find out?! Hell no.", he refuted.

Struggling to get his friend up as he was a bit tangled in the chair he felt on, "You asshole it was your idea!", Mark squeaked.

The gang was laughing harder as some of the patrons, who already had their share of grievances with Jeff's gang of friends, began to laugh too.

"Come on man! He wasn't even that loud.", Ronnie cackled.

I hid my laughter so I didn't make it worse for Jeff, Fjord's laugh sounded like the victorious chuckle of some fantasy hero who's just defeated a dragon.

"What is the matter lad? Dog got yur tongue?", Fjord quipped, the laughing continued.

Jeff quickly shuffled up to his feet, "YOU SON OF A BITCH! THATS ASSAULT OF AN OFFI-", Tom tapped his shoulder.

"Bro that isn't going to work there likes several witnesses and Chief already said you can't just say that.", Tom had made a serious point. Jeff for the longest time had always used that excuse whenever he had been inconvenienced by some of the people around. Now, it's completely pointless to do so.

Huffing angrily, "I'll get you for this! FORD!".

Tilting his head, "Ugh...it's Fjord.".

"WHATEVER YOU FUCKING SWED!!!!", he huffed again and looked at me.

Probably hoping for some cheesy revelation that Fjord is some highschool picking on the little guy trope....but it's not going to work anymore.

I just gave him a look of pity. "Jeff... please. I'm sorry for what's happened between us...but its really over now...".

The ball dropped for him right there. "...you know what....fuck it lets-", he was about to put up his fists until a heavy hand was placed on his shoulders. It was Frank.

Frank the only retired Navel officer in the whole time. He had trained out at sea for a better part of his youth, took absolutely no shit from anyone....and he wasn't just going to let a bar fight happen in his nice and reputable place.

"No pig fights allowed.", it was barely a warning, he just dragged Jeff outside along with Tom in tow, Beck and Mark were also being forced out but his brother and husband. All four where kicked out of his bar. "AND STAY OUT, chumps.". He went back behind the bar and went on like nothing happened.

Fjord was impressed by this, "Oh...thank you Frank! I owe you a debt of gratitude!", he waved.

Frank just grumbled to himself just satisfied that no one split nose blood on his nice clean wood flooring. "Oh, Pauly, can you please call Chief Colt and tell him his rascal son is causing a commotion again. He's also banned.".

Pauly cocked his eye, "Wasn't he banned from here last time for that Christmas party last year?".

Frank stopped for a quick second to think about that, "...well he's banned again until I forget.".

After a few more minutes, it was finally closing time.

Ronnie checked if it was clear for us to go to back to our cars. These guys were still police officers after all. "ok, looks like they left."

As everyone headed back to their cars and said their goodbyes, me and Fjord head back home.

I sighed from the fun, all though a little bit too close for a close shave situation, we had back at the bar. "Fjord I have to ask, why are you still so sober? I swear you had drunk like 2 gallons of beer or something.".

Licking his lips remembering the mead likely enough, "Oh yes. You see lass, all Astartes had a special organ implanted in us. It helps filter and purify any contaminats, poisons or anything that could inebriate us. However, life can be pretty boring of you're sober lass. So...we the mighty Vlka Fenryka, had found a cure for such an issue...MJORD. Unfortunately...I can kill mortals like you just by getting a whiff.", he laid back a little.

"Ah yeah, I remember you telling me that...", the mystery toxic concoction he told me about a while ago had me wondering. "...what is it made of?"

He gave a tilted smile, "heh, nothing that could be made 'ere on earth. It requires the vegetation and Fenric roots to ferment for weeks, than a ceremony has to be done to purify it so it don't just turn into some nurglelin sludge.", he huffed a little and looked out the car window to see the stars. "....I wonder where Fenris is from this planet....".

I could tell he was homesick, "you miss your home don't you?", I glanced over to him laying down comfortably.

"Well ...yes, there are aspects of Fenris I do miss...yet...so far here has been great too....it's... peaceful."

The word peaceful may mean two different things from both our perspectives. In my eyes, the world had gotten very dangerous....wars, the climate, the looming doomsdays that supposedly needs to happen.

Maybe from his world view, this place is peaceful not because it is.... because it isn't the world he is use to.

"Yeah, it's nice out here, I'm wondering...do you think I'd like Fenris if it was possible of me going?", wondering what he would say.

He looked at me a with shock, "Would fancy bein frozen the second you step foot on the cold sharp winds lass?", he said it with much urgency it was cute.

I giggled a little from his reaction, "no not really, funny enough it sounds like you lived in a place similar to Antarctica. It's the coldest place I know for certain.".

He sat there wondering about what I said, "ugh... pardon me lass but where is Antarctica?".

"It is a cold, isolated place in the most southern pole of Earth, it's name purely defined by the fact it has no bears.", I felt the need to throw that little tidbit.

The cogs in his brain were trying to figure out how dangerous were the bears on earth to the point we named a whole continent after not having bears.

He just laughed off, "Alright lass, such a strange planet this is... wonderfully strange."

We drove back home with the volume of the car low.

As we get out of the car, I checked my new yellow mail box for regular mail. Nothing new, just bills and useless advertisements.

We head inside and lay down to relax after an eventful day.

"So lass, I believe it is time for your slumber I presume?", he sat on the couch, laying his head back watching me place my things on the kitchen table.

"yeah, it's past midnight, lucky for me I have a day off tomorrow.", as I tell him this, that business card falls right out of the pocket.

"hmm.... Ben....I wonder....", I remember what Ben and his gang wanted to do but I had begun to wonder how much they knew of the space marines. "Hey Fjord, let's go out tomorrow. I want to do some...reconnaissance.".

He turns around, "Oh, what for lass? Is there something you think Aldercon needs to know about?", he gives a cheeky grin.

"Maybe, there's a guy in town who tries to find Space Marines. I'm wondering how much he actually knows...you know....to see if he could be helpful or a threat?", I look at him, he knows what I mean by threat.

"oh ok lass, do you need me to do anything for now?", he asked.

A bit of a strange question, "ugh, no I'm fine. I better get to bed.", I yawned a little, I get a glass of water for him if he needed something to drink in the middle of the night. "Goodnight Fjord, I'll see you in the morning.". I give his head a little scratch and caress.

"hmmm, goodnight lass.", his eyes close as he dozed off.

I turn off the lights and head to my room.

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

Driving down the highway, a large bus full of people drive past the welcome sign of Pine Hills.

There was noise in the bus, chanting, incantations humming in the air.

The driver.....blank masked man.

An old, greyed lady in bright, fashionably colored robes lifts her hand up. "STOP."

The bus makes a stop in a camp parking lot, the bus door eerily opening, with the clapping of her sandles, the lady steps out and examines the clearing. She looks to the stars, uttering in tongues to herself.

Praying to something....or someone.

Turning around, with a terrible grin on her face, "COMMENCE....the pilgrimage! TO THE GREAT ONE!", pointing dramatically to the forest trail. "HE awaits.....".

As her command was heard by the group of 20 or so people. As they all get out from the bus in a single file line. They collect their things, and march to the mountain ridge.

The lady stays behind, waves her hand at the bus....as a pinkish and blue glow emanates from her palm, a familiar sigil appears.

The bus begins to fold, unnaturally like if it was being crumpled like a piece of paper. The driver inside, unreactive to what was happening. He too, began to fold like paper. With metal bending, glass cracking and plastic squeaking.

The bus had shrunk down into the size of a model toy version of the bus. The driver was strunken as well.

The lady walked up to the bus, picking it up and peaking into the bus. "Soon...the great one will consume this pathetic world...and create a new world. HEHEHE HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHA!", her manic laughing echoed through the night.

What had once been considered an impossibility, had now begun to leak...into our world.

End of Log 16

@kit-williams @barn-anon @egrets-not-regrets

@gallifreyianrosearkytiorsusan @walking-natural-disaster @starfrost740

@squishyowl @sleepyfan-blog @lawnchair86

#space marine husbandry #warhammer 40k #space marine #survival log #space marines #space marine husbandry sentience #space wolves

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thiswasinevitableid · 1 year

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Spring Awakening (OT4)

The “continuation” winner was eldritch OT4! You can read as a stand alone but the first part is very good. Mild content warning: the prompt does mean there are references to body horror. There are also references towards breeding, but none actually occurs.

Winter has never been Indrid’s favorite season; it’s cold, the first chunk of it is spent with everyone telling him to give thanks and be cheery, and his van always malfunctions more.

Now he has a new reason: one of his boyfriends hibernates.

It was just after Thanksgiving that Duck told him and Joseph what would happen.

“It ain’t a full hibernation; I won’t be dead to the world.” Duck’s in his human form, which he favors for serious discussions. Indrid appreciates this, as it’s easier to read emotion on a round, friendly face than an incomprehensible mass of plant matter and ancient divinity, “but when growing things go to sleep, I go with ‘em. I’m alert enough, even in my sleep, to make sure the house keeps standing and that you two are taken care of. Not to mention this big fella will still be here.” He tips his head towards Barclay, whose resting in his bigfoot form by the fire

Joseph had a number of follow-up questions, but Indrid’s main concern was whether Duck would want them to touch him or take care of him while he slept. Phlox poked out of Duck’s shoulders as he smiled and said he’d appreciate it.

That’s why Indrid is sitting in a nook of their cabin, stroking approximately at Duck’s shoulder; his human form is all but gone, and his eldritch one seems to be melding with the wall of the cabin. A tingle runs through his fingers, as if he was running them over the tips of fresh grass.

Barclay is elsewhere gathering his offerings, and Joseph has been on assignment for over a month. Indrid ought to go into town and check the P.O box before it starts snowing again. But he doesn’t want to leave Duck’s side, the warmth radiating from the core of his form.

“I’m going to run some errands, sweetheart. I won’t be long” He leans down, kissing a dark patch of corn silk.

As he pulls on his jacket, a voice in the air drawls, faintly, “See you soon, darlin.”

He stops first at the general store, Leo waving to him as he helps himself to the small shelf of arts and crafts supplies. Neither Barclay nor Duck can quite manage to make drawing paper, so every few weeks he buys a new sketchbook for his commissions.

The post office is full of racks of pink, white, and red, all signs of the impending holiday. Valentines’ Day fascinates Barclay, and has promised Indrid he’ll do something special for the two of them, and Indrid’s fairly certain he spotted him trying to make snowflakes take the form of hearts.

He opens the P.O box, pulling out flyers for the dehumidifier store and the strange waterpark on the edge of town; they only have the box is because the farmhouse by the field has no known address. And a tendency to move around from side road to side road.

Under the multi-colored fliers is a single postcard. It’s a photo of Lake Mendota, with a little, serpentine monster drawn on in pen. He flips it over with a smile.

Dear Indrid, Barclay, and Duck,

Madison is about how I remember it. I can’t say much about the case, other than so far I’ve been right about everything and the other agents lost a car to the thing we’re investigating.

Indrid, you should come here with me sometime when I’m not working. Might sister keeps demanding to know when I’m going to introduce you, and there’s a lot of excellent places to get ice cream and baked goods. We could even bring some back for Barclay and Duck if we timed it right.

I miss you all so much. I can’t wait to come home.

Love,

-Joseph.

There’s a meticulously drawn heart after the name. Indrid tucks it safely in his coat pocket and steps back into the cold.

—------------------------------------------------------------

The frost makes it much harder to feel the decay of the stray fruits and layers of leaves blanketing the earth. So much so that Barclay spends most of his hunting for offerings in town; the high school has something called “home ec” where students' attempts at cooking sometimes end in a trash can of burnt offerings. From the taste of the cake he just finished, the baker would have produced something stunning had they watched the oven more closely.

Where his body takes in the decay in the deeper layers of the earth, he feels familiar footfalls and Indrid’s voice on the wind. He concentrates his being on the spot, taking his more mortal form in front of the bundled-up human.

“Hey, little moth. What do you need?”

“I…” Indrid peers hesitantly up at him, “I was hoping you had some time to spend with me today. It’s been a few since I really saw you, and with Duck asleep and Joseph away-”

“Think I get the drift.” He wraps his arms around the human, resting his chin atop his head, “time is weird for us, so thanks for telling me.”

“May I say something silly?”

“Sure thing.”

“I miss Duck so much. Which is ridiculous, and greedy, I have you and Joseph and that should be more than enough but it isn’t.”

“If we were interchangeable, you wouldn’t want all three of us. I mean, I miss Joseph when he’s gone for, like, a day, even if I spend that whole time making a pillow burrow with you. Pillow fort?”

“Fort.” Indrid mumbles against him, “I feel so selfish, wishing spring would come just so Duck could hold me, really hold me, again.”

“You’re not selfish, little moth.” He nudges Indrid’s hood back and kisses silver hair, “but I got an idea. What are missing most right now?”

Indrid hums, “The way he sort of...envelops me sometimes. Like he did the night we first met; heavy and comforting on top of me, touching me everywhere, like I, I’m something worth treasuring.”

“He and I sure as fuck agree on that part. And I think I have something that might tide you over until spring. Close your eyes for me.”

The human obeys and Barclay unfurls himself, his fur peeling out and away, his body spinning into its true form, mouths tasting the air, the earth, the leaves on the trees and the mushrooms sleeping beneath them.

He wraps himself tenderly around Indrid, taking care to keep his head and neck free; according to Duck, humans tend to panic if you confine their heads. Indrid sighs as he registers the pressure of Barclay around him. Of his human lovers, Indrid is the one who enjoys being bound and trapped this much; Joseph adores when Barclay holds him down or cuffs him to a headboard or branch, but anything more than that turns the excitement in those blue eyes to fear.

His hands find Indrid’s zippers and buttons as his pelt slides beneath his feet, insulating him from the snowy ground.

“Ohhhhh it’s so warm like this.” Indrid’s muscles relax and Barclay clings tighter to be sure he stays upright. Peeling Indrid’s clothes off layer by layer, more and more of Barclay’s hands emerge, eager to join the fun. Before Indrid, he never gave much thought to the texture of his fur. Now his human presses and twists his body against it, biting his lip as his cock rubs along a patch of it. Barclay smiles and his mouths multiply, kissing up long legs as his hands grope his ass, caress his face, tease his chest in hopes of showing him how much he deserves.

“That’s, that’s so lovely, I-OH” Indrid laughs, “what was that hand made of? It tickled.”

“Uh, like, mossy reeds? You mean this one right?” He rubs Indrid’s stomach and the human laughs again, much louder this time.

“Indeed.” He squirms as several hands find his cock, one thumbing the tip while another strokes the shaft and a third teases his balls, “I, Barclay please I want, I want…”

“Want what?” He rumbles.

“Cover me up all the way, please. I know why you’re, you’re being cautious but I’m not afraid. I know you’ll let me go if I ask.”

Barclay pushes his form up, cocooning Indrid and discovering instantly that this means he can now kiss his lips and cheeks, run his hands through his hair the way people do in the movies Indrid watches curled up on the couch some nights.

Pleasure is an odd thing when his body is once formless and concrete, not nearly as straightforward as when Barclay is in his mortal disguise. The most sensitive part of him when he’s like this are his mouths, and so he devours Indrid with kisses, savoring each little memory and feeling they bring to his tongues.

Indrid’s cries turn wordless when a soft, fork-tongued moth finds his cock and sucks hungrily. Human fingers cling to his fur and Barclay revels in the touch, in the pleasure of bringing Indrid this close, of being able to keep him safe, warm, and happy, all while he writhes in delight and cums with an adorable squeak.

Barclay twists and turns his body through space, bringing them back to the cabin and depositing Indrid into bed.

“I love you” Indrid purrs, eyes bleary with joy when Barclay removes the red glasses and sets them on the little stand Duck made for them so they wouldn’t keep getting lost.

“Love you too, little moth.” As he brings his mortal disguise back, a single, green vine snakes up the bed and slowly tugs a thick, mothman patterned blanket over Indrid’s body. Then it picks up the mothman plush from the corner and tucks it into Indrid’s arms.

“Thank you, my sweet.” Indrid gazes towards Duck.

The vine caresses his cheek as it retreats and the floor creaks, “rest up, darlin.”

Barclay plants a final kiss on Indrid’s forehead, then goes to see if he can recreate the home ec cake without the char.

—----------------------------------------------------------

First, the case took twice as long as anticipated. Then there was the deposition in a Michigan case from last year that finally went to trial. Finally, to top it all off, his flight was delayed for two days.

All this is to say, the most pressing thought on Joseph’s mind is how fast he can drive without putting the car in a snowbank.

When the “Welcome to Kepler” sign finally comes into view, he relaxes his grip on the wheel and carefully navigates into the library parking lot. It’s a half hour to closing, and the snow is a half-foot high on the book drop. He knocks his boots against the mat and crosses the pine-tree green carpet to return the stack of books he took on his trip. Since he has a few minutes to spare, he scans the new books shelf and the rows of romance for titles for himself or Indrid.

As he stacks a copy of Red Hot Ranch on paperback of A History of Mysteries, he spots the new sheriff and gives him a friendly nod. The man gives him a tight smile in return and ducks behind a shelf.

His initial return to Kepler after being tossed into the field as a sacrifice had been so shocking that the previous sheriff fainted when Joseph stepped into the room to explain why he, and the mayor, were being arrested for kidnapping and wrongful imprisonment. Joseph knows Duck needed the energy from the sacrifices, and that he let all but a few go, but that’s no excuse for non-consensually offering people up to him.

After the arrests, he mentioned to the interim mayor that he’d be setting up a satellite office in Kepler, since there was a lot of paranormal activity in the area. Then he made damn sure that the tail they put on him followed him all the way back to the abandoned farmhouse and watched as he stepped out of the car and into the cornfield, the stalks parting to show him the way back to the cabin.

In a way, the people in town are more afraid of him than of Indrid, in spite of them both surviving stints in the cornfield with their memories intact and then taking up residence there. He suspects they think Indrid–with his otherworldly face and aloof demeanor–is a god himself. It’s a fair conclusion, given that every tomato plant, pumpkin vine, and apple tree in town got an unexpected, final wave of fruit when he arrived. Which means they think Joseph is the only human in town able to walk with gods without fear.

He sets his books in the passenger seat and makes his final stop; Indrid asked him to pick up a few groceries on his way home. He tucks a bottle of hard cider next to the toothpaste, hoping he and Indrid can split it tomorrow while watching horror movies on the bed (he bought them some solar cell packs, as neither Duck nor Barclay have much sway over electricity).

Before the field, his last time having sex while tipsy was back in college and not particularly memorable. The more drinking became a social necessity for his work, where he was already seen as unusual and too buttoned-up, the more he was careful to never let his guard down and enjoy himself, unwilling to give his co-workers fodder to further discredit him.

The past October, he and Indrid had decided to take a picnic into the field and watch Orionid Meteor Shower, the evening still carrying traces of summer. Duck made them a dome of corn husks and sunflower stalks to eat under, the dirt turning to a carpet of impossibly soft clover as they sat down. They’d drunk something honeyed and definitely alcoholic that Duck made them and traded bites of pear cake Barclay prepared as the sliver of a moon rose.

Dinner was barely done before they were tangled together on the ground, making out with all the excitement and carelessness of far younger men. Then Indrid was on his back, humming as Joseph sat on his face, laughing because it felt nice and because he could. By the end of it there was slick on Indrid’s chin and cum on Joseph’s thigh, neither of them particularly interested in fucking full-on when there was so much of each other to enjoy.

Then they’d lain on their backs and the dome opened, revealing an infinity of stars as tendrils of grass stroked their hair and the clover turned to thick, soft fur.

God help him, if the farmhouse isn’t around this next corner he’s going to offroad to cut his time getting there. Snow be damned.

He’s saved from this poor decision by the familiar silhouette, and turns towards home. Once parked, he retrieves his bags and steps towards the field. The withered stalks try to bend, but can’t get far. Watching them, he understands the worry in Indrid’s voice the last time they spoke on the phone; knowing Duck is at a low power is one thing, seeing the signs of him weakened is another.

As he’s wondering if he can get to the cabin from memory, a form materializes from the snow.

“Hey, blue eyes.”

“Hi, big guy.” Joseph tips his face up so Barclay can kiss him, a hint of winter bonfire and cardamom on his tongue.

“Lemme get those.” Several more arms appear on his bigfoot form, taking Joseph’s things with ease. Walking close to him seems to stave off the cold, and furry, warm arm rests on his shoulders as Barclay asks about the trip.

When they reach the cabin, the god sets the bags on the table and the suitcase on the bed. Joseph kneels down to the mass of glowing fungus and twisted plant life and takes the nearest vine in his hands, bringing it to his lips for a kiss.

“Just letting you know I’m home.”

“Missed you, sugar.” The reply seems to come from the stalks rattling outside the windows.

The back door creaks and Indrid steps into the main cabin; Duck built him a little art studio–complete with pencils and paints conjured from plants– so he didn’t have to always go into the one he teaches at in town.

“Welcome home, pet.” Indrid drapes his arms over Joseph’s shoulders. There’s charcoal on his cheek, and Joseph wipes it away before kissing him. Indrid grins when they part, “I have some business with you, agent.”

“I hoped as much.”

“Barclay, will you be joining us?”

“Not as much as I want to.” The god sighs, “The freeze is deep this year, and on top of that, humans seem to burn themselves out on cooking and canning after the new year. So I need to forage a bit more tonight.” He kisses them both goodbye and then he’s gone.

Joseph unpacks his things in a hurry, knowing he won’t be able to enjoy himself with Indrid if the laundry isn’t in the hamper and the groceries aren’t put away. Indrid makes no comment other than asking what on earth can rip the tire off an SUV. As they talk, the domesticity of it all overwhelms him; a home like this with someone used to be no less out of reach than living in a cabin in a cornfield with two eldritch beings.

“You know, when I was zig-zagging about the states I–oh” Indrid smiles as Joseph gently backs him against the counter for a kiss, “shall I leave the last bag for later?”

“Please.”

Indrid laughs, allowing Joseph to pull him to the bed. Then his grin turns wicked and Joseph is trapped on his back, his boyfriend calling, “Barclay? A moment of assistance?”

Black, fur-lined cuffs appear on his wrist, leather cord leading from each to the headboard. As Indrid fetches a matching collar from a peg on the wall, Joseph groans, “I haven’t gotten to touch you in weeks and this is what you do to me?”

“As much as I love your attentive touches” Indrid closes the collar around Joseph’s throat, “we both know that when you’ve been overwhelmed with work, what you truly need is to be taken.”

“Yes” He closes his eyes, lifts his hips and shifts his legs to help Indrid undress him. He’s still in a dress shirt, but rather than uncuffing him a moment Indrid opts to leave it unbuttoned and shove the undershirt up to kiss his stomach before retreating to remove his pajamas.

When his boyfriend finally pushes his cock into him they groan in comic unison. Indrid rests their foreheads together and murmurs, “I missed you so much, pet. So much.”

Hands unable to comfort him, Joseph kisses his chin and jaw, “I’m here now.”

Indrid licks his lips, “So you are.”

His boyfriend takes his time, thrusts slow and steady while languidly kissing Joseph to capture his moans. Eventually his hand slips between them, rubbing Joseph’s dick. The collar no longer feels inanimate; now it’s Barclay’s hand, reaching across acres to close around his throat and remind him to be a good boy.

When he cums it’s with a pent up moan from over a month without the attention he ached for. Indrid switches to quick thrusts, joining him with a little gasp. Once he pulls out, Indrid rolls over, only managing to wiggle his pajama pants back on before cuddling into Joseph’s arms. He pets his boyfriend’s back, tracing his fingers over his tattoos, and spots a single, glowing eye watching them from Duck’s spot.

He hopes he enjoyed the show.

Joseph blows a kiss. The eye winks, playful, and then it’s gone.

—---------------------------------------------------------

On March 7th, Joseph and Indrid wake up to snowdrops peeking through the floor. Joseph says “that’s a good sign” as Indrid sprints across the cabin to where Duck’s form is looking more human by the moment.

“Hey, darlin. Hey, city boy.” Duck shifts positions, sitting up for the first time in two months. Skin is always the last thing to form on him, so Joseph feels as if he’s looking at an anatomical drawing where the sinews are swapped for roots and stems.

“Do you need anything?” Indrid’s hands are flapping as Duck yawns and stretches.

“Nah, I’m okay for now, sugar. It’ll take me a few days, maybe even a few weeks, to be able to do much more’n sit here and talk. By the by, that tree in the orchard that the storm took out is gonna make for some real nice soil. Good job on the decay, big fella.”

“Thanks, man.” The rug by the fire yawns, pushing up onto many hands as Barclay’s bigfoot form takes shape, “feels like there might be more mushroom this year, I kept running into their mycelium.”

“That’ll be nice, gets folks out and foraging, which I like to see. Uh” his posture turns sheepish, “sorry, shouldn’t talk shop when y’all been missin’ me, but I always wake up with all this info about how spring is gonna go.”

“I do not care what you talk about” Indrid takes an earthy hand, “I’ve missed hearing your full voice too much.”

“And I, sadly, have to be at work in forty-five minutes. Catch me up at dinner?”

“Yes” the three respond as one.

The stalks still struggle to form a path as he walks out. But when he gets to his car, crocuses bloom in the shape of a heart by the driver-side door.

When he arrives home that night, Duck has hair and a thin layer of skin and as wrapped in a robe of new leaves, Indrid perched in his lap. Joseph takes up a similar position in Barclay’s lap, breathing in crisp air as his boyfriend nuzzles his throat. They stay up well past midnight, just talking, and Joseph is glad tomorrow is Saturday.

He’s even more grateful for this when he’s awoken in the early morning by a yelp. Indrid, who was a moment ago on his side, asleep, is now being dragged across the floor to where the swirling mass of Duck’s true form is gathering in the center of the room. Even seeing it dozens of times, Joseph’s brain rebels at defining the shape as anything more general than “big” and “covered in bioluminescent patches to act as eyes.” At least he can tell that Indrid isn’t being dragged as he first thought; a tendril of green has his ankle, but he’s being spirited towards Duck by a carpet of small, purple flowers.

“I, I thought you said you wouldn’t need this kind of, of intensitEEP” Indrid squirms as his clothes are thrown to the other side of the room, “for a few weeks, when, when spring started in earnest and brought your energy with it.”

“That’s how it’s happened every year for longer than anyone can remember. But this year, you’re here, sugar. You put more energy into me just from cuddlin’ yesterday than I’d normally gather in a month. Which means I’m fuckin’ ravenous and it’s time for my little offering to do his job.”

Indrid moans, body fully off the ground in the vines sprouting from the floor and ceiling. Reality bends and cracks so abruptly that Joseph gets a headache. Then Duck’s human form is standing their, studying Indrid.

“You ready for this?”

“Yes, yesyes, Duck please”

The god takes Indrid’s face in his hands, and for a moment everything, even the air, is still. Joseph wonders what Duck is looking for, if he sees things in Indrid Joseph’s human eyes will never perceive.

Even tied up, Indrid manages to lean forward and kiss Duck. When he pulls back, the god’s smile is achingly human in its affection.

Then Indrid cries out as a tendril pushing into his ass, the noise muffled as another finds his mouth. Some of the plant matter pulls him to his knees, bright red flowers spreading out around him as another vine circles his dick and a fourth begins twining up his body.

To Joseph’s surprise, Duck’s attention shifts to him.

“Now, if I recall correctly, city boy, I ain’t shown you all my dicks just yet.”

“I, I cataloged five so far” His tongue is sticking in his mouth and his sleep pants are already a mess. As Duck prowls towards him, he seems to become more solid, more real, with every step.

“Clothes off. Now.”

Joseph obeys as thin, flexible tree branches extend from the wall to fasten his collar in place. Duck manhandles him into his lap, facing Joseph away from him, vines spinning Indrid to face them at the same time.

The scene across from makes any porn he’s seen look tamer than a Disney kiss. It’s as if all the plant life emerging from Duck’s renewed energy is reaching for Indrid, leaves forming into hands to pull his head back, vines working his cock, binding his thighs to the ground, and tugging at his nipple piercings, while the main two fuck him so deeply it’s as if they’re trying to touch inside him. Tears are coming down Indrid’s cheeks and he’s thrashing with every thrust.

“Duck? Is, can you tell if he’s alright?”

Hands the temperature of sun-warmed dirt slip around his waist to caress his chest and stomach, “Yeah, darlin, I can. I’ll feel if he needs to stop before he even has a chance to say it.” A kiss on his cheek, gardenia tickling his nose, “thanks for lookin out for him. You want me to show you somethin’ new?”

“Yes, please.”

The head of the cock slides in so suddenly he doesn’t get a chance to look at it. Staring down, he can only see the base, which resembles a hibiscus flower in shape and color. Rather than pushing into him, the base cups his body, and the “petals” begin undulating, stroking his cock and folds deliciously. The cock inside him feels pretty plain, though now and then it seems to ripple.

“I gonna get to get in on the action?”

Joseph’s head snaps up to find Barclay idly stroking his cock as he watches Indrid.

The vines holding Indrid shove him forward, offering Barclay a much better view of his ass as Duck says, “you can have as much of Joe as you want. But just for today, ‘Drid is all mine.”

“Got it.” Barclay stands, “not like it’s a bummer to just fuck you, blue eyes.” A short, thick, rounded cock bumps his mouth, “open up baby.”

Joseph takes the cock into his mouth, the tightly packed bumps on it already each moving on their own. It’s a wonderful, novel feeling on his tongue and he sucks happily as little growls come from above him. The pressure on his own dick changes, speeding up and pushing him towards his orgasm. He tries to pull off and say this, but Duck holds his head in place, forcing him to keep the cock in his mouth.

“I know city boy, I can tell you’re close. I’m glad you’re havin’ fun, but you cummin’ ain’t what stops this.”

He whimpers happily and surrenders to his orgasm. He can’t see Indrid anymore, but Duck seems to have stopped fucking this throat, and desperate, ecstatic moans are coming from just out of sight.

“Mmmm, forgot how good you feel, city boy.”

He finds Duck’s hands and squeezes them, snickering when flowers follow the path of his thumbs.

“That’s it, fuck, you both feel so fuckin good, I’m, I’m gonna-” There’s a grunt like a tree groaning in the wind and then something bursts from the cock inside him, hundreds of disctint sensations, all buzzing. The portion on the outside of his body doesn’t let up in the slightest, and the shaft inside begins not only expanding but pulsing.

“Feel that?” Duck growls in his ear, “told you I had one that had seeds that’d fill you up and get you off at the same time. But that ain’t all” another pulse and Duck purrs, “y’know what it’s doin?”

Joseph manages to shake his head.

“It’s trying to keep ‘em all in and push ‘em as deep as they can go.” A hand slides to Joseph’s stomach, “heard all kinds of stories about humans gettin’ bred by gods like us.”

Words like that would bother him with anyone else, but Duck’s grasp of human genders is shaky at best, and he knows this doesn’t change how his boyfriend sees him. Also that Duck, would never actually do something like that without seriously checking with him first.

So he surrenders to the fantasy, spreading his legs wider to feel the base of the cock widen to keep everything in.

“Fuck, you like that blue eyes?” Barclay groans, “then once Duck is done I oughta have a turn. See if I can make it so all you can do is burrow up with me and let me take care of you.”

“Good thinking. We’ll both try today. Whoever’s takes, the other guy will get to put the next one in him. Not, not like I can’t make this cabin big as we need it to be.”

Barclay cums down Joseph’s throat, and the sensation is so overwhelming combined with the way Duck is fucking him that Joseph cums again, certain he’s squirted as well.

“Fuck yeah” Duck holds him down as the cock pushes deeper, “see, your body wants us to know just how bad you want this.”

“Yes” he gasps, Barclay holding his face up so he can watch him come apart, “yes, god please”

“Your wish is my command, darlin.” Duck moans and another wave of cum pulses into him, then another, and another, the vibrations finding all the right spots inside him and he cums a third time, helplessly crying out as Barclay tells him he was made for this.

Then Duck pulls out and waves of something faintly blue drip down Joseph’s legs as Barclay cleans him and bundles him up into the bed. Indrid is limp in the vines, cum noticeable on the floor, and Duck scoops him up to carry him over, whispering all the while about how much he loves him, how amazing he is, how he’ll always take care of him.

As Indrid curls against him, Joseph murmurs, “Was that okay? They didn’t ignore you for my sake?”

His boyfriend smiles weakly, “First, pet, do not underestimate how much I enjoy seeing you ruined. But more importantly, Duck was with me, too. A benefit of his nature, I would say.”

“No kidding.” Joseph kisses him softly as Duck and Barclay cuddle up with them, the whole house moving to prepare them breakfast and clean the floor. And when Joseph steps outside after a long nap, he finds the entire structure covered in spring blooms.

#monster march #OT4: Government Men and Their Cryptid Boyfriends #indruck #sternclay #inclay #agent stern/duck newton #trans agent stern #agent stern/Indrid Cold #terato #monster boyfriend #human/monster romance

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doubleddenden · 11 months

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I'm anxious so I'm gonna ramble about pokemon

I know it'll never happen, but I want a Pokémon game that takes place somewhere you'd least expect. I know the reason it's always places like Tokyo, NYC, France, Etc is because they're popular tourist destinations (especially so for Japanese folks), and we'd most likely get games set somewhere like California or Italy in the future. Don't get me wrong, I'd welcome both as long as they actually cared enough to finish the games.

But I feel like we're missing out on some real magic and wonder by only going that route. Like instead of always going to some big city, I'd love to have it set somewhere completely out of the way so that we explore nature or some fantasy routes instead.

To me, going back to childhood, i found appreciation living in the countryside because I could always see my surroundings being perfect pokemon routes. The tall grass in the pasture? Tauros. The trees? Pidgeotto. The quarry? Onix. Ponds? Wooper, Magikarp, Poliwag, etc

You get my point.

Legends Arceus kinda scratches the itch, but I think it'd be neat to start out somewhere rural and travel the boonies and woods and rivers and creeks to catch pokemon, and then have some accurate small town vibes here and there. Not gen 1 style, but like

Starting point:

House in the boonies

Route 1: woods, pond, pastures, other small houses with tractors and farm pokemon

Route 2: closer to town, pass under some power lines, train tracks, interstate equivalent

Town 1: small community, convenience store, truck stop, small shops, a few npcs that talk about the harvest and the weather, diner, a small town school (you are not forced to attend) where you meet up with buds, have some battles on the local football field, move on-

Somewhere you get something like an ATV to help move along faster, maybe some small town hijinks

Route 3 takes you through some backwoods area with creeks, old houses, an abandoned house that could be haunted

Town 2: another small town, this one has a quarry where rock types gather, you help the locals with a Pokémon equivalent crawfish boil and BBQ party, you gain access to some form of interstate travel

Rinse and repeat. Maybe 2 big cities, but the entire thing is small town vibes. Something to really romanticize small areas that most wouldn't really take into account for a Pokémon game. Cozy, nostalgic vibes. The plot doesn't need to involve some reality splitting calamity again, maybe the biggest threat is your stereotypical "I'm gonna steal the farm" business man, and the legendary is just some local cryptic equivalent to Bigfoot that you don't see unless you track it down. Ideally some fun slice of life vibes with Pokémon battles, friends, and some small local competition or community event/party vibes.

Could have gym leaders, doesn't really need them imo. Music could be based on old songs you'd hear on the radio or a simple guitar and drum vibe.

Anyway that's all hypothetical. I know it'll never happen unless it's a fan game, but hey. Good candidate would be based near New Orleans or generally a southern US area I guess.

#pokemon

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elsanna-shenanigans · 2 years

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February Contest Submission #13: This is how it works

Words: ca. 3,000 Setting: mAU Lemon: no Content: Some descriptions of a couple of creepy creatures Song: On the Radio by Regina Spektor

From Arendelle Public Radio,

I'm Anna Nowak.

And I'm Elsa Johansen and...

"This is how it works"

🎵 This is how it works You're young until you're not You love until you don't You try until you can't You laugh until you cry You cry until you laugh And everyone must breathe Until their dying breath On the radio, uh oh On the radio...

---

Anna Nowak: Hey Elsa

Elsa Johansen: (laughing) Hey Anna

A: Welcome to our third episode

E: Or as I like to call it, our third date

A: Gosh Elsa I swear you do that on purpose

E: I definitely do darling, I enjoy seeing you flustered

A: So mean! I have to say I thought this show could not get any crazier, especially after one of the hosts impulse bought a house, right Elsa?

E: Hey! That cottage was a steal!

A: And yet here we are with episode number three: Crazy chicks chasing Cryptids. That's us by the way, the crazy chicks.

E: I see you went full alliteration for this one.

A: Came up with it while you were getting coffee

E: And, to show you my appreciation Darling, I brought you one

A: Oh my, Thank you! So... I guess, as with any good story, we should start at the beginning shouldn't we?

E: Normally a good place to start, yes. I'm pretty sure it all begun, as usual, with a phone call from one of our listeners.

A: Yeah, and this one was exactly the kind of calls I'm looking forward to the most, a truly mysterious one.

📞 Speaker 1: (panting slightly) Hey girls, my name is Honeymaren and I'm calling you from the trail head of the Enchanted Forest National Park. Sorry if I'm a bit out of breath, but I just ran back all the way to my car after I met whatever THAT was in the forest. I was hiking in the Maple peak zone when I heard a scampering in the leaves of the underbrush around me. I was trying to see where this critter was when I heard a woman screaming in the vicinity. Naturally I followed the scream to see if someone was in need of assistance, since this is quite the remote area, and when I got close a hulking, bluish figure started running straight at me crashing through the bushes. At this point I was scared and run all the way back, as soon as I felt safe I really wanted to know what chased me and you two came to mind. Anyway, this was my question. Thanks, bye.

---

E: At this point we set off to see if there were any other similar reports from the area, I really hoped we would find none because I'll admit this story spooked me a little.

A: And for a while it looked like Elsa was safe, we could not find anyone talking of sightings in the forest, except the usual bigfoot or two.

E: Until we got redirected to this person who's job is, guess what, Forest guard for the Enchanted Forest area.

A: He was really nice and agreed to an interview with us.

📞 Speaker 2: Um Hi Anna: Hello, could you tell us your name and what you do? Speaker 2: Oh yeah, right. Hi, my name is Kristoff and I'm with the Forest guard, Enchanted Forest section three. Anna: We're investigating a story about a strange inhabitant of the forest and we heard you have a story to share. Speaker 2: Let me tell you it's quite the bone chilling story, I was wandering in the forest enjoying the moonlight and listening for the deer calls to track them, you know? I was unaware of the presence lurking in the dark until it was upon me, just as I reached a clearing in the woods I heard a scream right next to me in the darkness. After that it was chaos, I tried to see what it was with my torch but I got blinded, all I can be sure of is that it was a big creature, about the size of an horse but with two sets of glowing eyes. Anna: Wait, two sets? as in four eyes? Speaker 2: Yeah, two big ones and two small ones, kind of like the primary and secondary eyes on spiders Anna: And you didn't see this creature after that? Speaker 2: Not since that night, but to be fair I was done with the Maple peak area by then and it could still be there. Anna: Thanks so much, this was really helpful! Speaker 2: Anytime, I'll be sure to listen to your program next week! Anna: Yes! spread the word.

---

E: Ok, at this point the story is getting creepier by the minute. We decided to sift through literature of the scientific and less scientific kind alike.

A: Based on the descriptions we had we ended up with a small group of possible crypto-candidates, starting with the most horse like: The Kelpie, the Nixie or Nook, and the Each-uisge. All of them malevolent water spirits generally described with the shape of an horse.

E: Followed by the frankly horrifying Nuckelavee of Orcadian folklore. According to the only known witness "the Nuckelavee has a man's torso attached to a horse's back as if it were a rider." It's also described as having no skin, muscle and entrails in plain sight, and sporting an enormous gaping mouth. All of them are said to be haunting fisherman's in many parts of the world, it is said they are after the fishes but don't mind snacking on us either.

A: By this point of the night I had to make Elsa a hot chocolate and promise her she could wake me up if she got nightmares, instead of being spooked and alone in the guest room.

E: You also promised you would not bring it up you little... I'll admit I spooked myself with all those folktales but you don't have to tease me like that!

A: (laughing) You're always as cool as a cucumber, I'll treasure the rare moments when you're flustered forever.

E: Well, you know what did nothing to calm me down? Jumping from horse-demons to spider demons.

A: I'm with you on this one. we need to mention the Jorōgumo for this category, checks both the woman screams box and the spider like box. This shapeshifting demon of Japanese tradition would be far from its home if this is the case.

E: Worth mentioning is also the Deer Lady, this benevolent spirit I wouldn't mind meeting in the woods, protects women and children according to Native American mythology.

A: We're a few hours into our research and it's late night. We've narrowed down our list of suspects to an handful, top of the list is the least palatable one, the Nuckelavee really accounts for everything, the size, the human noises and even the double set of eyes.

E: The runner ups are the Japanese spirit Jorōgumo that also accounts for most of what has been observed, and the Nixie, that checks everything except for the woman scream.

A: The next day we spent some time to try and find a scientific explanation of something like this

E: I'll freely admit I was too busy imagining dreadful creatures to really get scientific

A: My best guesses were, either someone playing a practical joke or going all in on the Scooby-Doo plan and inventing a monster to cover up some illegal traffic

E: (laughing) Oh that were your guesses? Reality really goes beyond fiction sometimes.

A: We looked up the exact area of the sighting and planned our attempt of finding out the truth.

E: I was pretty excited, I've never been camping before and this, albeit scary, was a great opportunity to go with an expert

A: Oh, I wouldn't say I'm an expert, I just like to hang around in nature when I can

E: We split up to gather our stuff for the outing and planned on meeting up early morning, to drive out to the trail head

A: I had some serious prep to do

E: Oh we will get to that soon, trust me

A: (laughing) Is that so?

E: Still unsuspecting I was heading toward our Radio station parking lot from where we planned to leave, at some ungodly hour of the morning

A: Yeah, that's my least favorite part of this kind of stuff.

E: Luckily I stopped to get some coffee, but even that could not prepare me for what you were up to.

A: Hey, I still stand by my idea, it made sense!

E: I'll let our listener make that call, let's just jump into my recordings of the events

▶ (rustling sound) Hey guys, it's... 3:40AM and I'm almost at parking lot where I'm meeting up with Anna. There is this thin fog hanging low, it's shrouding everything in its humid embrace. (sound of turn signal) ok, looks like I'm first one here, I'm going to wait for a bit. ... it's 3:45 now and Anna just arrived, let's go meet her.

(wind blowing on the mic) Good morning darling, I got you coffee!

Hey Elsa, can you drop it on the front sit? I need to set up our bait.

Bait? you didn't say anything about bait Anna. Oh my, is that a fish?

Yup.

Why?

To attract the alleged water spirit of course.

And you brought a living fish in its bowl for that?

Yup.

I don't think I had enough coffee.

---

A: Hey I stand by my idea, and it's not like I had you carry it!

E: That's fair, since it turns out I'm not exactly fit for hiking but I'm still baffled at your rationale on this one

A: And yet it turned out to be exactly what we needed, didn't it?

E: Anyway, we drove out to the Enchanted Forest national park, picked up our backpacks with snacks and plenty of water, and headed off toward Maple peak while keeping our eyes pealed. Wading through the boscage on the hunt for any sign of some strange creature

A: (laughing) Plenty of water indeed, for us and the fish. You guys can't see it but Elsa is face-palming.

▶ (breathing heavily) Anna... wa-wait a minute

Everything ok Elsa?

Yes. just. out. of. breath.

We can take a break then, Coffish was getting restless too.

Coffish?

In honor of your ridiculous love for coffee.

I don't know if I should be flattered or mad.

I'll be happy if you can be oxygenated instead.

(rustling)

shhh! Did you hear that?

Not really, what was it?

I think something moved in the bushes

Darn, me and Coffish missed it! did you see where it went?

No, just heard the sound.

Ok then, let's try and get to the top maybe we can see something from there.

---

E: As I said it was my first time doing a real hike, the next couple of hours of recording are just me either dazzled by the scenery or totally out of breath, which is ironic for an ex-professional Broadway singer, let me tell you.

A: Hey, don't beat yourself up, you did amazing!

E: Thanks Anna! You can see a lot of pictures on our Twitter @thishowitworks. The scenery was absolutely breathtaking as we walked toward Maple peak. This mountain is in the middle of the Enchanted Forest, a beautiful birch-maple forest that in this season is just starting to show hints of yellows and reds in the foliage. As you walk along the trail you cross countless brooks and rivulets that sometimes form this small but delightful waterfalls.

A: I absolutely adore all the water! we should go back in winter, then it freezes over in some of the most amazing natural architectures you'll ever see!

E: In our walk we soon climbed up to where the maples give way to tall spruces and from this point you could see the craggy peaks of the Northen mountain range capped by the Ahtohallan glacier, everything is bathed in the golden light of dawn. This is when I finally get why people subjects themselves to all the effort.

A: It's great isn't it? Our next stop was the maple peak, where we have a panoramic view of the forest, and hopefully of its mysterious inhabitant. At least that was the plan, the day went a very different direction from here on out.

E: And I guess we have to thank Coffish for it?

A: (laughing) Sometimes my genius scares me

E: Ok, let's get back to the recording of what happened

▶ Wow

I know, the view from here is something else isn't it?

I'll admit it's worth almost dying of fatigue to get here

I can see why you succeeded in theater, so melodramatic!

Shut up

Ok, ok, you stay here watch over my baby Coffish while I take the binocular and survey the forest, maybe I can see some suspicious movements.

---

A: I was looking around for a few minutes when I hear Elsa calling

E: A little salamander, probably attracted by the fish tank water came in to inspect us

▶ (whispering) Anna, we have company

what?

I think Coffish made a friend?

Oh my he's swimming with Coffish now! hope it's not trying to get an easy snack.

I think it's friendly. Hey little guy, what are you doing all the way up here?

Hey I think it wants us to follow?!

Well, I didn't spot anything interesting, we may as well...

---

A: The next hour was one of the most surreal experiences in my life

E: We followed this little salamander off the beaten path into the thick of the forest until we heard a bloodcurdling scream

A: I was pretty scared but our little guide was undeterred and so on we went

E: Let's hear what we captured on the field

▶ (loud scream in the distance)

Holy moly, Elsa did you hear that?

Yes, what the hell was that? wait, Bruni where are you going!

Bruni?

After Coffish you are banned from naming anything ever again.

Is that really important right now? let's run after him!

(rustling of leaves and heavy breathing)

Wait Elsa stop, I think I see a clearing up ahead, we should approach carefully

Good. idea. I also need to... catch my... breath in case we have to run more

Ok, I think I see something

We're getting closer, I hear some water too.

Oh damn, is that a goat?

That's what's screaming so loud?

That must be it! but why is a goat all the way out here?

Wait I think it's not alone! There is an horse there?! why is it walking weirdly?

Elsa, let's get over there and find out.

---

A: So, after all that walking and worrying we have found the source of the screams and it's a goat!

E: Not only that but the goat was living with this huge and very friendly blue Roan who is sadly blind.

A: After getting closer Elsa managed to befriend this apparently wild animals

E: They are not wild, they are super sweet

A: I said apparently! as soon as we got close we found out that Bruni likes to hang around on top of the horse head

E: Nook, that's his name

A: (laughing) I see what you did there!

E: And the goat is called Gale, she is super sweet and somehow she acts as a guide-goat for Nook.

A: Naturally with the case solved we have to call our listener, Honeymaren!

📞 (phone ringing) Elsa: Hello Speaker 1: Hello, Honeymaren speaking Elsa: Hi I'm Elsa from "This is how it works" Anna: And Anna Speaker1: Oh my god, hi girls! Anna: So, we heard about your encounter with the creature of the forest Speaker1: Yes, it scared the hell out of me. I had quite the workout running all that way. Elsa: I'm in awe you could run for that long, it took me forever to get back to the cars! Anna: First thing first, we clearly survived whatever lived in the forest! Speaker1: (laughing) I'm really happy to hear that Elsa: Are you ready to find out how this all worked? Speaker1: More than ready! Anna: We found this funny little salamander in the woods Elsa: We called him Bruni by the way Anna: It's pretty unfair, Elsa gets to name everything Elsa: You still have Coffish the fish Speaker1: I like the name, is very Punny Anna: THANK YOU! Elsa: Please don't encourage her. But I have to admit that our Coffish apparently vouched for us with Bruni because we just had to follow for a while to get to the hiding spot of the mysterious beast Anna: Yes, this is wilder than any cryptid sighting! we reach this nice clearing in the forest with fresh grass and a nice little stream and there we find Gale, the goat, screaming her little head off to help Nook the blind horse. Elsa: Meanwhile Bruni scampers all around in front of them like some kind of little explorer Anna: We contacted our friend in the Park Guard and they have launched an investigation, it seems like somebody abandoned Nook to avoid the Vet bills and the demanding care Speaker1: Oh no, that's awful Elsa: We also managed to organize a rescue and you'll be happy to know that all three of them are together and safe! Anna: And this is how it works! Speaker1: Wow, that's amazing. And reassuring, now I can go back hiking with no fear of being eaten! Anna: Well, you definitely won't be by this three, you should still watch out for bears Elsa: have fun hiking, we may meet on the trail sometimes! Speaker1: Goodbye!

---

E: That must be one of the most out there stories I've ever heard, I wouldn't believe it if I didn't see it with my own eyes!

A: And for those of you who can't either we put up a video of the three of them in action on our site!

E: They are the cutest things, and they seem to like my new cottage garden as much as I do, so I decided to adopt them

A: You did what?

E: And Anna is kindly volunteering to help me care for them, how nice is she?

A: I'm doing what?

E: Thanks everyone for tuning in for this week episode! I'm Elsa Johansen

A: Wait a minute Elsa

E: That's Anna Nowak and we'll see you in next week episode of "this is how it works"!

#elsanna #february 2022 contest #prompt: never

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ghost-at-the-masquerade · 3 years

Text

Friends in Low Places

Part 2: Tourist Trap

Rating: PG

Count: 2666

Summary: A few days after the events of Tremors, the trio stops for a bite and tour of a roadside attraction. Or: Juliette makes an excellent choice, and Zeke makes a bad one.

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

“Afraid she’s never gonna be the same after a shock to her suspension like that.” Zeke sighed, patting the side of the truck as he came around. Juliette and Roscoe sat on the tailgate, boxes and bags of their belongings pressed against their backs.

“Is it real bad?” Juliette said through a mouthful of cheese-steak, brows creased.

“Well, it’s not good, but we’ll get by.” He shrugged and leaned past her to grab his own sandwich.

Juliette swung her feet, marveling at the sweeping height of the pines around them. The smell of ceders heavy in the air. They were parked in a gravel lot with nothing but half-rotted blocks of wood to mark the spaces. Back around the bend, toward where they came in, was the little food stand where they had grabbed their lunch; a weather-stained building with just two windows to order from and three friendly, stocky folk tending it. In the other direction was their next destination.

A building made of logs almost black in color, with a steep roof and its name up in gaudy, blood-orange lettering; Twinkle Cove’s House of Terrors. ‘Terrors’ had a dripping effect that had clearly been added later. It might have been a home once, but the windows and doors had since been replaced with dark frosted glass. The inside of the door was plastered with fliers for other local businesses.

Once they were done eating, Zeke led the group to join just one other small party in the lobby, ditching their trash in the can outside. A gust from the AC swept over them at the threshold, making way for the faint smell of dust and taxidermy. Lights over each display cast heavy shadows to hide the seams on the tackier fakes. Floor vents rattled in the corners.

Zeke removed his sunglasses and let them hang from his shirt collar, grinning all the while. Usually he tried not to make comments about Juliette’s stops, not wanting to influence her choices, but he loved this hokey shit and could make no secret of it.

The counter to their left was manned by a spindly fellow who reminded Zeke of a harvestman; those tiny, long-legged spiders. Dressed in a clean black suit and cloak, gloves and bowtie a rich sanguine, topped off with too-big silver cufflinks and a swirl in his hair. He acknowledged them with a nod and a flash of pearly-whites.

The three of them split across the room. Juliette went for the counter, its glass case holding an array of trinkets. Gems inset in gargoyle claws, decently realistic rats, wands and supposedly cursed objects.

Zeke himself made a round of the room, looking over the displays that you got for free. A passable piece of taxidermy claiming to be a were-badger, crafted, as far as he could tell, from a honey badger and a red fox. A tuft of brown hair that almost looked burnt, kept behind glass; the plaque described it as a trophy from an encounter with the local woodland witch. Several unsettling mannequins he couldn’t get a good look at, since they were occupying the small family also in the lobby.

Roscoe went to peep down the hallway to the right, which was cornered off with a single strip of velvet rope. When they went to lay a hand on it, the man at the counter tutted and called out in what was surely his stage voice, “Folks if you would just gather here, I’d be glad to sign you up for our grand tour!”

Juliette side-stepped over in front of the register to be first in line, a cheeky smile on her face. The man returned her a smile that crinkled his eyes. Zeke joined her shortly, and it took no time at all the register both parties.

Thus the lot of them gathered in front of the rope divide, the man in charge standing before them with his shoulders braced and hands twisted together. It was hard to tell if the posture was part of the bit, or genuine nerves.

“Hello, hello, I’m your host and owner of all these terrible delights, Terry!” He stumbled over his script with an appreciative laugh when a couple of them cheered. Moving the rope aside, he gathered himself and continued, “Stay close behind me and don’t touch anything you aren’t willing to… get attached to.”

With that and a menacing laugh the tour began. Through the first narrow hallway, with concerningly real cobwebs in its crooks and crannies, past an alcove leading to a bathroom and an office, they took a left-hand turn into a room even darker than the lobby.

As their host briefly explained; “Certain items can be damaged over time in bright lights. No flash photography, of course.”

There were the staples of places like this; traces of Bigfoot and hair of the moth-man, hooves of unicorns even. More interesting was a purple checked hood, dropped by the flatwoods monster - the holes in front lightly singed from the intense light of the creature’s eyes. Surprisingly life-like stone statues of woodland critters, victims of a basilisk. The basilisk itself, even, or a depiction of it.

“Even the corpse is dangerous!” Terry proclaimed, a finger held sternly in the air, “Not suitable for display.”

To his credit, Terry seemed genuinely enthused about each and every piece. But his clear favorite, in the final room, was most impressive of all.

This room was smaller than the others they had passed through, holding only one display. Hidden behind a heavy satin curtain, deep red and lightly dusty. Terry crossed the room with a twirl of his cape, his hands almost seemed to tremble as he reached for the thick braided cord that would pull back the curtain.

“Parents, please hold on to your children.” The party of strangers obliged for the hell of it. Juliette made a point of scooting away from both Zeke and Roscoe.

Terry yanked the cord and revealed a dark, hairy, humanoid figure. Vaguely canine in the face, with great black horns that scraped the ceiling. Hands that weren’t quite hands, but not quite paws either, with jagged, broken claws. Roscoe leaned closer, mouth open slightly. The thing’s fur was as black and fluid as ink, eyes shimmering unnaturally bright for the dimness of the room. Surely, it had to be a sort of projection, but search as the eye might, they could not find the subtle tells.

“The grand prize that no doubt drew you to this place, the lesser demon slain by our very own local monster hunter, Paul Anderson!” Terry shook like an excitable dog.

The younger of the two children there reached out. When their fingertips brushed its bent knee, a single second shattered into a thousand. The beast’s head snapped down, teeth barred in a growl. It staggered forward, knocking over the rope divide. The children shrieked and all seven of the guests scrambled backwards.

Zeke’s hand snapped to his side automatically, instinctively going for his revolver. Thankfully, it was still in the car, so the situation would escalate no further. Terry was absolutely howling with laughter.

He crowed after the little family, who were already back in the previous room, “All in good fun, all in good fun, that’s the one that keeps them coming back!”

Roscoe clutched their heart, despite being blank-faced as ever, aside the raised eyebrows. Juliette tugged at her braid.

Zeke spat out the scare and laughed. “Aw, okay, you got us. That’s pretty damn good. What’s that, animatronic-?”

Terry didn’t even let him finish, moving out of the room, “I’m afraid that’s all there is to see for now! But we always have more attractions coming, if you’d come see us again in the fall…!” His spiel continuing as they returned to the lobby.

With a little distance, everyone was in good spirits about it, though the younger child was a bit huffy in denying that they’d been scared. The family argued briefly over whether to buy anything before ultimately leaving empty-handed. Juliette gently bullied Roscoe into buying her one of the cursed spoons from the display case. Roscoe cast a meaningful glance back at Zeke before taking her outside.

Business concluded, the register rung - an old fashioned thing - and Terry came around the register again. He cast a wary, sideways look at Zeke as he went to set the rope barrier back in place. “Something I can help you with?”

Zeke sidled up next to him with a few casual, swinging steps, put on a sloppy, side-ways kind of smile and a bit of concern on his brow. He clicked his tongue and looked around the lobby as he spoke, “Awfully bold of you to be flauntin’ it like that these days. Pretty neat setup you got going on, though. How’s the monster-hunter involved?”

When he actually turned to look at him, Terry was frozen stiff, breathing in quick, shallow breaths. Zeke held up his hands, any humor dropping from his expression.

“Whoa, whoa, hey, I’m not-” the rest of his words were forced out in a gasp as Zeke threw himself aside. He turned back to find a comically large axe splitting the floor where he had just been standing. His gaze shot up to Terry’s face, wide-eyed, unreadable.

“I didn’t mean it like that!” He held out a hand even as he crawled backwards toward the hall. Terry shook his head rapidly, fists clenched in his cape.

“That’s what they all say!” Shadows shot up to swallow the light from outside, crept up the walls like thousands of spiders to dim the overhead lights. Terry jerked his arm out dramatically, “That’s what all of them said!”

The weight of those words came into focus quickly; the three grotesque mannequins, their horrified faces looking as though they’d been covered in clay, came to flank Terry. Their bases scratched the floorboards, following as he moved into the hall after Zeke.

Zeke did all he could do; scramble to his feet and try to put distance between them. The options for where he could get it were severely limited; continue on down the hall, into the bathroom, or the office. Zeke didn’t fancy being cornered that quickly. He backed away, still holding up a single pacifying hand. The walls cracked and splintered on either side of him, oozing viscous void from their wounds. Lightbulbs screamed, formless things flitted through the edges of his vision.

“Listen, I’m not here to start anything,” Steady words that simply bounced off his pursuer as they made it into the main display room, “It’s not like that, I’m not with those bastards.”

“I won’t be lied to. I won’t be taken that easy.” Terry spat. The jackalope in the case to his left sprung to life, flailing and trying to bite through the glass, dead eyes flashing. Zeke’s eyes flitted around the room for his next move.

The room dimmed further and suddenly silver flashed in Terry’s hand. A simple, smooth blade. Something clicked together in Zeke’s head, but there wasn’t even time for it to form as a whole thought before Terry threw.

Zeke’s arm shot up in defense, but to no avail. A glass display teetered as he staggered back against the wall. Pain coursed through his ribs - far less than it seemed like there should be. Ragged breaths drew through his teeth as he saw but couldn’t feel the blood pooling up under his fingers. Something that sounded like stomping was lost at the edge of his perception, overtaken by static.

Everything in the room distorted and flickered, twisted and turned sickeningly, lights searing bright before settling back into normalcy. And then it was gone; the knife was gone, both flesh and fabric mended. He palpated the spot just to be sure.

His gaze shot back up to where Terry stood shaking, eyes glistening. The mannequins were gone. And over Terry’s shoulder, he could see Roscoe, an indecipherable mess of guilt and pain and concern on their face, their hands laid on his shoulders.

“I’m sorry - I don’t like to do it so quickly.”

“He stabbed me!” Zeke objected to the apology, hand still on the spot where the knife had been.

They couldn’t really disagree, so they just grimaced and tilted their head.

Zeke pushed himself upright. “Can we please just talk now?!”

“Are you going to take me in, then?” Terry’s voice was small. Frightened. He swallowed and said more insistently, “All I can do is scare people, I’m no good to you. Just parlor tricks.”

Zeke did his best to steady his voice, “No, I tried to tell you, it’s not like that.”

But with his only defense disabled, the fear split him anyway. “Then what?! What do you want?!”

Something like guilt made Zeke’s temper flare, “I just - wanted you to know you got fucking caught! That somebody who knows something about conduits is going to see through you if you keep this up!” Zeke turned on his heel, away from the palpable tension in the room.

Terry did nothing to cut it; he stayed stock still, looking at the ground until he finally slipped to his knees. Roscoe backed away a step.

Zeke put a hand over his mouth and sighed through his nose, trying to ignore the tiny adrenaline tremors still coursing through his arms. He turned back with a suspicious squint.

“If it’s all just tricks of light then how did it hurt?”

Terry looked over to the jackalope display, conspicuously fingering the hole where his cuff-link had been, “I mean, objects can be disguised…”

Zeke’s face felt hot. Had he really reacted so dramatically to something so small? Fear had a power all its own.

“The hunter - you asked about the hunter, Anderson,” Terry twisted his hands together, “He- he caught me. And said… said I could use him as part of the story…”

The subtext settled neatly beneath the silence, like dust beneath a sheet.

“You wanted to talk, that’s where I am. He hasn’t imposed much and it’s been good for business. So what do I do?”

Many questions compounded into one. None that Zeke had the answers to.

“What do I do?” He repeated, shoulders drawn in.

Zeke opened his mouth, but all that came out at first was another sigh. “I don’t know. I don’t know. I can’t-” He walked past them into the hall on autopilot. He needed out of this suffocating place.

Roscoe picked up for him, knelt down next to Terry and produced from their vest a light purple business card. “The best we can offer is somewhere to run, if it comes to that.”

Terry took the card like it might come alive and snap at him.

Zeke heard the two continue to talk, softer now, but didn’t tune in to what else was said. Then Roscoe’s hand was on his back, leading him outside.

The light of day was blinding after the all-consuming dark Terry imposed, every bit of metal or particularly bright rock boring into him. Zeke breathed deep the smell of ceder and hot stone as he put his sunglasses back on.

“Coulda gone better.”

Roscoe laughed and put their hands on their knees. “It was not one of your better showings… I’m glad you’re in one piece.”

“Two pieces, but yeah.”

They laughed again as they straightened up, letting their arms hang loose. “But are you okay?”

“Okay as I’m gonna be. Feel kinda stupid.”

“Normal, then.”

Zeke punched their arm, smirking anyway, “Asshole…”

Across the lot, Juliette was hanging out the window, arms crossed on the edge.

Zeke looked to Roscoe, but from the corner of his eye, he could see movement in the lobby. Inside, Terry quickly looked away, the card still in both hands, face drawn. Zeke sighed. “Put it in the Rolodex… I think we’ll be back.”

#Infamous #Infamous 2 #Zeke Dunbar #that's a dumb trans joke toward the end. because I'm trans and dumb

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imaginepirates · 4 years

Text

Twenty-First Century

A fic for @tiny--spock about James getting stuck in modern times. I decided to include a little personal stuff, like the setting of the story. I lived next to Seattle for a while (I don’t anymore), but I loved it. Forgive me this indulgence.

@emdrabbles @tesserphantom @paljonkaikenlaista @viper-official @wordsinwinters

~3150 words

~~~~~~~

The rain flowed over your umbrella in rivulettes, dropping off the edges to plunk onto the ground. It was a peaceful rain, but cold, so there were few people outside. You made your way to the bus stop, returning from the library. The forecast predicted rain for the next few days. You figured it was as good a time as any to pick up the books you’d been meaning to read.

You picked out a lone figure at the end of the street. You might not have given him a second glance, but he had no umbrella. It rained often where you lived; everyone knew to keep an umbrella on them. You watched him turn around a couple of times, looking hopelessly lost. You’d have to pass him, and figured you might as well take him to the covered area of the bus stop. He was probably soaked already, and your effort would make no difference, but you figured it was the thought that counted.

As you drew closer, you noticed his strange clothing. From a distance, his long coat hadn’t been out of the ordinary, but up close, you could see the brass buttons and golden epaulettes. His pants, too, looked more like breeches out of a Jane Austen novel than anything someone would normally wear.

He paid you no mind, hardly noticing your approach. It was only when you were directly next to him that he seemed to see you.

“Would you like to share my umbrella?” You asked. “There’s a covered space not far from here, if you’d like me to…” Your words died in your throat as the man turned to you.

“I’d appreciate it.” He gave you a tight smile that you were only used to seeing from the screen of a TV. “Thank you.”

You wondered for a moment if you’d slipped and hit your head, and if you were trapped in some sort of hallucination. It would explain a lot. Otherwise, you had a fictional character standing right next to you. You almost pinched yourself, but thought it might be rude, so you decided against it. You reminded yourself at the last minute not to stare.

In a daze, you held up your umbrella, sharing it with him. Then you turned and walked to the bus stop, thankful your feet had memorized the way. This is fine, you thought. I’m just going crazy, is all.

You weren’t sure if you should be thankful for the emptiness of the bus stop or not. With nobody there, you had to try talking to your companion.

Thankfully, he started the conversation for you. “I’m afraid I’m a bit lost.” The look of embarrassed confusion on his face made him look, to you, a little like a lost puppy.

“I’d say that’s probably true, Mr…” You let him fill in the blank. It would probably be creepy if you told him you already knew who he was.

“Norrington.”

“Where are you looking to go?”

Norrington looked around, staring at the streets and buildings. “I’m not quite sure, if truth be told. Ah, perhaps it might help me to know where exactly I am?”

The look of mortification on his face was complemented by the awkwardness on yours. “You’re in Seattle, Washington.”

“Right,” he said, though he clearly had no concept of where either Seattle, nor Washington, was.

Oh god, you thought. America wasn’t even around in his time-period. We were still a colony. “And,” you continued, “if it would interest you, we’re in the twenty-first century.”

You were sure you’d never seen a person so pale before. He looked, for a frightening moment, like he was going to be sick.

The bus pulled into view, catching the attention of both of you. James looked confused, and might have asked you what a bus was if you hadn’t spoken first.

“If anyone asks, we were at a convention,” you said. This earned you another look, but you pulled Norrington onto the bus before he could ask.

The bus had blissfully few people in it, and nobody gave you or Norrington a second glance. This was Seattle, after all. It was best not to wonder, sometimes. With nobody talking to you, you and James sat next to each other in awkward silence, dripping little puddles of water onto the floor.

You led him off at your stop, hurrying him to your apartment before your neighbors could see you with a strange man. It was difficult to keep the umbrella in the right place; James was considerably taller than you were, and it proved hard not to hit the top of his head. You struggled with your ring of keys for a moment, desperately trying to find the one to your apartment as quickly as possible. Once inside, you ushered him in and shut the door firmly behind you.

You stared at him blankly before remembering any sort of hospitality. The rules had changed since his age, and you hoped taking his coat and hanging it in a closet would be close enough to what he was used to.

This still meant that you had a dripping wet man in your house who probably wouldn’t dry out very soon. Wordlessly, you led him to the bathroom, handing him a towel. He understood well enough, so you stepped out to give him some privacy. Then, you realized that you had no clothes for him to change into. Damn.

By a miracle of god, or whatever divine power was out there (most people in Seattle considered Bigfoot the local deity), you found a sweatshirt and pants your dad had left at your apartment ages ago. You’d stuffed them in the back of your closet, a gift to the void, and had thoroughly forgotten about them.

You knocked on the door to the bathroom, told James you were setting some clothes outside, and you made your way to the kitchen, where you decided to wait. Then, you pinched yourself for real. This is a character from a movie. I’ve read fanfiction about him! It was an awful realization. You’d read lots of things about him, and held discourse over his character. You’d fantasized about him, even. I. Am. Insane. It’s official.

You were torn from your thoughts by James entering the room. The pants were a little short, but the sweatshirt seemed to fit, which you were thankful for. He looked awkward, standing in the doorway, and you motioned for him to sit.

“Hungry?” You asked. Even if he wasn’t, food was a great way to hide awkwardness, so you would make some anyway. You ended up making bagels, and James nearly fell out of his chair when the toaster went off. You had to smile at that; it was too cute not to.

You both hid behind your food, and you observed the surprised look of someone who had just discovered refrigerated cream cheese. When you were done eating, you set the dishes in the sink. You and James made awkward eye contact, and you couldn’t help but ask what was on your mind.

“How did you end up here?” You asked. In the movies, he had died, of course, so how he ended up by your bus stop baffled you.

“I don’t particularly know, actually. There was a hurricane, and I was knocked unconscious, and the next thing I knew, I was standing in the rain.”

“Right.” That solves that, then. The hurricane James had chased Jack through somehow transported him here, to you. “We’ll find a way to get you back home.” You had no idea how, though. The chances of your being able to return him to his own universe were next to zero. You just didn’t have the heart to tell him.

“While you’re stuck here, though, we have to set some rules,” you continued. “I have a job. I’ll be gone for most of the day. If you leave the apartment, people are going to notice that you’re… a little odd. You’re going to have to stay inside.” You showed him the pantry, and all the things he could make for himself for food. “I’ll teach you to use the stove later,” you promised.

You showed him around, teaching him how to work things. He was fascinated by the most basic appliances; he switched the lights on and off a few times before believing they were real.

“You’ve come a long way.” He looked around in awe. The shower, the stove, and electricity were all new to him. “I wish we had some of this where I came from.”

You wished he had more clothes. You vowed to find some the next day.

There was the dilemma of sleeping arrangements. You lived by yourself, and thus owned one bed. You had a couch, but you figured it would be rude to offer it to him. You found yourself throwing out the awkward suggestion of sleeping together. Norrington looked appalled.

“I can build a wall of pillows between us,” you suggested half-heartedly. “Though I’m afraid the bed might be too small for that.”

Though James insisted that he sleep on the floor, you finally managed to convince him otherwise. You found your back pressed against his, hardly daring to breathe. You both lay perfectly still, trying not to disturb the other. You could feel the heat of his back through the T-shirt you were wearing to bed. No doubt he could feel you just as acutely.

When you woke, you were stiff as a board. You hadn’t changed positions all night. Neither, as it seemed, had James. He was just as stiff, and looked just as tired, too.

“Good morning,” you said, rolling over.

“Morning.” He had rolled onto his side, too, so you were facing each other. He blushed a little, being so close to you, and you found yourself doing the same.

You introduced him to cereal not long after, and left him with a few books to choose from to keep himself occupied while you were away. You had to work, and you figured books would keep him entertained.

The day was made longer with the knowledge that James was waiting for you at home. You worried about him; everything was new to him, and you hoped curiosity wouldn’t get the better of him. You doubted it would, knowing how he was, but you couldn’t help the feeling that someone would see him, even if just through the window.

Stopping by a store, you picked up some clothes on your way home. James needed more to wear than the single outfit your dad had left behind. You managed to get some variance, trying to appeal to a style that James might like, though you had no idea what he’d think of modern clothes.

You came home to your neighbor, and elderly lady, watering the small potted plants at your doorstep. She smiled and straightened up as you walked by. “That’s a nice young man you have in there! I think you’d better keep him,” she said cheekily.

You couldn’t help your blush, and you fumbled for words, nearly dropping the stack of clothes you carried. “You met him?”

“Oh, he came out to help me water the hanging baskets. You know I can’t reach them well anymore.” She waved a hand dismissively. “That boy saw me through the window and came out to help me.”

“How nice of him.” You were internally mortified, but you tried keeping that to yourself. You only hoped the woman hadn’t told any of your other neighbors about James.

You pushed the door to your apartment open with a hip. James awaited you inside, sitting on the couch with a book in hand, a glass of water on the little table next to him. He looked up, smiling softly. “Literature has changed.”

He was reading Dickens. It’s changed a lot more than that. “And are you enjoying it?”

“Immensely. I love Shakespeare, but I can only read a play so many times.” He set the book down, stood, and offered to take the clothes from you. “Although, I’m afraid I don’t know the background to these books. I take it that the people of France were unhappy with the government?”

“Are you reading A Tale of Two Cities?”

“I am.”

“You are correct. France spent too much money supporting other countries; it finally couldn’t support itself.”

“Ah.”

He set the clothes on the table. They were in bags, and you told him to peek through them to see what he liked. He thanked you as you prepared to make dinner. “I hear you met my neighbor today,” you said.

“I did. A nice woman, though she asked a few questions I didn’t understand.”

Of course. “And they were?”

“She asked if we were ‘dating’, though I was unfamiliar with the term.”

“What did you tell her?”

“I said I was unsure.”

You tried to stifle a laugh and failed. Glancing over your shoulder, you found James looking uneasy. “You might have given her the wrong idea of our relationship. Don’t be surprised if she tries convincing you to ask me out.”

He blushed. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know….”

“Don’t worry about it.”

“What is dating, exactly? And she said something about a needle from space.”

You saw that your evening would be full of explaining. “Dating is quite a lot like courting, where you come from, but it’s less formal. Typically, a person dates multiple people before finding the person they’re going to marry.” James understood that, at least. “The Space Needle is a building downtown. It’s a quirky part of Seattle, and a good place for going on dates. Probably why she mentioned it.”

James continued to look flustered as you cooked. You finished and set the table, eating in awkward silence. James seemed to enjoy his meal, which resolved some of your anxiety.

“I can show you around tomorrow after work,” you offered. “Seattle is lovely. There’s a lot here, but I can give you the general tour.”

“I think I’d enjoy that, thank you.”

When you arrived home the next day after a long day of work, you found James trying to communicate with your Alexa. He was failing horribly, and you couldn’t help but laugh. He tapped it to see if it would turn on.

“Having trouble?” You asked.

“It started talking earlier. I was a bit afraid to touch the buttons, in case they did something odd,” he admitted.

“Don’t worry. Alexa,” you called out, “play Vivaldi.”

James took in a startled breath as the music started. He stared down at the device in fascination, and you explained how it worked.

“Brilliant,” he said.

You took him out to the car. As awful as it was to drive in Seattle, you didn’t live far from the downtown area, so it would be easy enough to get around. You climbed into the car, motioning for James to do the same. He braced himself against the dashboard when you started pulling out of your parking spot.

“Think of it as a carriage with no horses.”

He nodded, looking around at the car’s interior. He changed his focus to the surrounding area. Skyscrapers surrounded you as you drove into the city, some made almost entirely from glass. Advertisements were plastered across the fronts of buildings, and trees dotted the sidewalks next to you. Eventually, you came into view of the Space Needle, towering six hundred feet above you. James stared out the window like a child, enraptured. You thought it was adorable.

You parked and walked around the space beneath the structure. The Space Needle looked a little like the Eiffel Tower, with three legs holding up a disc that sat at the top. A central scaffolding acted as an elevator shaft. The top held an observation deck from which a person could see the entire city. You thought of taking James up, but decided against it. No doubt it would scare him; it had scared you the first time you’d gone up.

Instead, you took him down to the waterfront, a bustling area with lots to see. A giant ferris wheel was decked out in neon lights of all different colors. James gaped at the massive cargo ships passing by. A hundred shops dotted the piers, and the two of you windowshopped as you walked.

You eventually grabbed a bite to eat in the public market. It was always full of people, and food of every sort could be found within its multiple levels. You settled on crepes, which James was vaguely familiar with. After dinner, you pulled out a package of gum, handing a piece to James.

“Chew it,” you told him.

Tentatively, he popped it in his mouth, chewing for a moment. “What exactly is the purpose of this?”

“Enjoyment. But there’s a reason I gave it to you. You’ll see.” You led him out of the market and up into the street. A few blocks later, you found yourself at your destination. The alley was narrow, and there was seemingly nothing special about. At first glance, it looked like any other; brick walls, cobbles, and papers advertising a thousand different events plastered across the walls.

As you walked to the end of the alley, the popularity of the spot became evident. The walls were covered in hundreds of thousands of pieces of gum. They were delightfully colorful, and gum stuck to every centimeter of space. Happily, you walked up to the wall, took your gum out of your mouth, and stuck it to a brick.

James looked both disgusted and intrigued, and you couldn’t blame him. “It’s tradition, really,” you told him. “People have been putting gum here for years. Gross, yes, but also pretty cool.”

James carefully stuck his piece to the wall, making sure not to touch anything else. “It’s very interesting to see the sorts of traditions you come up with. The future is an curious place.”

“We say the same about the past.”

He smiled. Looking at the wall again, he said, “People chew this just for the flavor?”

“Yes, though it has other uses. It makes you concentrate harder. And some people chew it before a kiss, though the actual impact it has is debatable.”

James flushed, and you did the same. The thought of kissing him was certainly attractive. It had been, for years.

“Well,” he said bashfully, “there’s only one way to find out.”

He took a step towards you, leaving little space between you. Then, slowly, he placed a careful kiss to your lips.

“I hope I haven’t overstepped myself,” he breathed, stepping back.

“No, you haven’t.” With that, you pulled him closer again, kissing him with a little more fervor.

Perhaps it wouldn’t be so bad, having him around. He was a quick learner, after all. And a good kisser.

And for those of you wanting to see what the gum wall looks like:

#potc #pirates #pirate #pirates of the caribbean #norrington #James Norrington #commodore norrington #norrington x reader #writings #writing #drabble #request #requests #drabbles

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bidean-byedean · 3 years

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holy shit, I posted a fic?

Merry Christmas fruits (affectionate), here is my Christmas present to me: actually writing something for a prompt and posting it!!

SPN Advent Calendar Day 24: I’ll be Home For Christmas

AO3 Link

It’s silent in the Bunker. But not empty, not even close. It waited patiently. As it always does. For those who were meant to find it, did. They always do. And for the first time in many years, for the first of many years:

The Winchesters are home for Christmas.

It’s silent in the Bunker. Empty. No one around for miles that even knows of its existence. Patiently it waits. It knows that eventually, someone will hear its calls and find their way. Those who are meant to be there always do.

Sam Winchester is the first one home. Technically now, Sam Leahy. He pulls up in the sensible car he managed to snag from a grateful dealership owner who had a problem with a cursed family heirloom, and no matter how much Dean teases him, Sam appreciates the normality of it. Especially now.

Coming around to the passenger side, he opens the door and holds out his hands for Eileen to grab, her centre of gravity no longer where it should be. She pretends to huff, but softens immediately as he pulls her to her feet, her enormous belly pushing them back apart. It’s easy to forget how lucky they are, with all that happened in the last year, and then he sees Eileen, sees her growing with his baby, and it hits him all over again. For all the bad they went through, where they’ve ended up is pretty incredible.

Eileen tip-toes up to kiss him, their lips already cold despite only being out of the car for thirty seconds. Something wet lands on her face and they both look up to see the first flakes starting to fall. She smiles brightly.

“I love snow,” she signs.

“I know, but we should go in before-“

“Wait, just one minute. Please.”

She breathes in deeply, letting the cold air fill her lungs and tingle all the way down into her fingers. Where she grew up, there wasn’t snow on Christmas, always the possibility, but it usually amounted to cold rain and miserable clouds. Here, there’s proper good snow, the kind that falls in fat, fluffy chunks from the sky and settles quickly, building up to a thick blanket in the time it takes you to find your coat and hat and gloves and scarf.

Letting her face fall back, the flakes tickle her skin, landing on her eyes and mouth, melting almost instantly into tiny cold droplets that run into her hair and down her neck. Sam watches her entranced. He’s never thought much of snow before, not more than it being a type of weather that usually denotes Christmas time and them getting stuck somewhere because the Impala is not an all weather vehicle. But Eileen, she makes it magical. The way it makes her smile, how she breathes it in like it’s her first breath of fresh air in years, and not to mention, she looks even cuter than usual with her cheeks and nose all pink from the cold, her eyes shining brightly in the darkness.

“Why are you staring at me?”

“Cause you’re beautiful.”

“You say that to all the girls.”

He pulls her into another kiss, deeper than the first, trying to tell her that he and Dean may have saved the world but it’s her that made it worth saving in the first place, it’s her that makes it beautiful,.

Inside the Bunker, it’s perfectly toasty, the rush of warm air that escapes when they unlock the door is like a hug, as if the Bunker itself has come to greet them. The place looks like Santa’s grotto on steroids. Their Mrs. Butters interlude may have ended tragically, however she did remind them that they shouldn’t be embarrassed about embracing the holidays - you never know when will be your last chance to celebrate with your loved ones. No one was meant to have another Christmas, and definitely not the Winchesters, so going all out was a unanimous decision.

The banisters are laced with tinsel and the insanely long strings of lights that the boys found tucked in the back of one of the storage rooms. It took hours to get them just so, but the effect is breathtaking. Sam flips off the main lights and lets the place be bathed in coloured lights: reds and blues and greens and golds and whites. Some of them blink in and out slowly, some change colour, the motion giving it all a dream-like quality. Although they finished putting everything up in the first week of December, Eileen still hasn’t gotten used it to. It’s just so much and she loves it.

They unpack the last minute groceries and put the oven on for tonight’s dinner: party food. If it comes frozen and in miniature, they were eating it. Sam couldn’t wait to see Jack’s face when he saw tonight’s offering, which reminded him- when would Jack get here? He didn’t exactly have a cell that they could call, but he usually gave them the heads up before he was popping in. He kind of expected him to be here already, it was Christmas Eve and Jack had seemed so excited about the holidays…

The lights click off briefly, so briefly that Sam thinks he might’ve just blinked but when he looks up he sees Eileen by the light switch, an urgent look on her face.

“Come, come, and shhh,” she signs before disappearing without waiting to check Sam follows. He always follows.

She makes her way through the Bunker into the library, slowing down to sneak into the room like she was trying not to disturb someone, but as far as Sam knew, they were the only people in the Bunker.

“What?” He signs frowning, but then he sees:

In the library is the tree; the biggest, most obnoxious tree that they could fit through the front door. Thankfully, they found a ladder so they could actually put the lights and tinsel on the monstrous thing, but apart from that the green bows are bare. It’s not the tree that the pair are concerned with though, it’s who is standing, staring up at it.

Jack’s had Christmases before. The one with Mrs. Butters was his favourite, but not a perfect one because Castiel wasn’t there, and if Castiel wasn’t there then it couldn’t be perfect. This year would be perfect and his favourite because they would all be there. Him, and Castiel, and Sam, and Dean, and Eileen, and the baby.

He likes the Christmas tree. He feels its life energy coursing through the evergreen leaves; thankful that Sam listened to him about making sure to cut it so that it could be sustained and replanted. It looks beautiful. He likes the lights, the way they blink slowly, changing colour as if they think you might not notice, bleeding from one hue to another almost perfectly. Jack likes perfect things. Which is good because he thinks everything is perfect.

“Hey Jack,” Sam calls out.

They think he didn’t know they’re there, and he let them. It’s nice. “Hello.”

“Do you like it?” He signs while he speaks. He’s getting much better at that, Jack smiles. “Biggest one we could get.”

He nods up Sam. “Very much.”

“We, uh,” he taps a box on the floor with his foot. “Left the decorations for you. Thought you might wanna put them up. There’s an angel for the top.”

“Can I wait for Castiel and Dean to get home?”

“Of course.”

“Want a hot chocolate, Jack?” Eileen asks. “I think baby does.”

His eyes drop to her belly. It’s much bigger than the last time he saw her, the baby is almost ready. His sibling, that’s what Sam and Eileen said. He would be big brother. “Can I have marshmallows?”

“Duh! And whipped cream?”

They disappear together, Sam staying behind to look at the tree for a moment. Flashes of childhood Christmases come rushing back, all jumbled into one. There’s one particular year they had a tree in their sad little motel room, probably stolen from a store or something, but it was still great. They even put their gifts under it and waited until after midnight to open them, almost like a real Christmas. How Christmas should be.

It’s hard not to be angry or ungrateful or dwell on the horrible shit that happened to them over their lives, but it also isn’t healthy to pretend to not be all those things. He spent so much of his life feeling like he didn’t deserve good things, like he would never get to be happy because he was created for evil and doing bad. The fact that Sam Winchester, the boy with demon blood, Lucifer’s Vessel, was decorating for Christmas with actual God, who considered him a father figure, was almost the most insane thing that had happened to him. But it was good and real and he deserved it. He did.

“We’re home!”

Dean’s voice echoes through the Bunker making Sam roll his eyes; no matter how many times he tells Dean it’s a dumb habit, his brother just couldn’t drop it. Sam finds them all in the kitchen, Dean already trying to swap out Jack’s Christmas mug of hot chocolate with a beer.

“Hey! Full house, huh?” Dean beams. “I was just telling them, it’s a fuckin’ nightmare outside. Thought we were gonna get stranded.”

Cas sighs loudly. “You should really get a car that can cope with the weather. Or at least snow tyres.”

“Don’t insult Baby like that, Cas. She got us home, didn’t she?”

“Just,” he mutters into his own drink. “Can I ask the plan for this evening?”

“Food, food, and more food?” Eileen signs. “Did you want to finish the tree first? We can put the presents out now too?”

“Good idea,” Dean nods and they all slope back into the library.

The box of decorations is extremely old and extremely heavy. Inside, it is packed away meticulously, one of the last remnants of Mrs. Butters’, which they had no hope of replicating when it came to taking it all down again. However, no one is thinking about tidying up right now. They rummage through the vintage decorations: delicate glass shapes, baubles filled like snow globes, and weird festive caricatures of monsters like Bigfoot with a Christmas hat on it’s head. There are spell bags for good fortune and keeping spirits high and hangovers at bay, which they check over thoroughly before deciding are not traps and can go on the tree.

Soon enough there’s only one thing left.

“Jack, will you do the honours?” Castiel asks, handing the porcelain-faced angel to him.

He nods happily and steps into the air. It’s surreal to watch him walk as if on solid ground but get further and further away from the floor. He pauses by the top of the tree and smiles before securing the angel to the point. From the ground, it’s almost too far away to really appreciate the thing, but they all beam up at his handiwork anyway. Then they put out the presents. Somehow everyone managed to get on board and there are five distinct piles, everyone getting their own wrapping paper in order to minimise confusion. It’s really quite impressive that they’ve managed it all so smoothly. Mistakes will likely come to light quickly in the morning when they actually come to unwrap them.

Silently, Castiel slips his fingers through Dean’s, and as always, the Hunter’s heart leaps in his chest. He never wants to get used to the way that it feels to touch Cas, whenever he wants, however he wants. He would never get used to the fact that Cas wants to touch him back.

“We’ll go set up the Den,” he announces, pulling Cas along with him.

“Not on the blankets!” Sam calls after them. “And crack a window, we have to sit in there too!”

He flips his brother off over his shoulder. However, the big galump has a point. Not that he’s taking Cas to the Den do anything inappropriate, even if that is their usual MO. It’s not Dean’s fault that they have a built in netflix-and-chill room and that Sam decided to get his wife pregnant immediately instead of making the most of not being dead. Plus, he and Cas had years of lost sex to catch up, as was their God given right. (He doesn’t have the brain capacity to unpack the use of that phrase now that his kinda-sorta-maybe-son-in-law is God).

The Den is also Christmas-fied, just not to the extent of the rest of the place. There are always fairy lights strung up (their Cas’ favourite lighting), but now, they’ve been swapped out for festive coloured ones.

“Wait,” Cas says, stopping them as they go through the door. Dean frowns at him, but Cas just looks up until Dean follows his gaze. Ah. “Mistletoe. I believe that mistletoe over a doorway signifies something.”

“Does it now? Do you know what?”

They move in closer.

“I’m not quite sure.”

“Oh? Must not be important then,” he starts to turn away.

Cas catches him and pulls him in. “It’s coming to me.”

“Mmm?” Dean licks his lips.

Cas mirrors him, his eyes glittering with the reflections of white-blue lights. “On the tip of my tongue.”

Their faces move together slowly as he speaks. Dean’s hands are on Cas’ waist, while Cas’ travel up Dean’s arms, dragging his fingers over the soft fabric of his shirt, until they settle behind his head. Their lips meet in a gentle kiss; gentle but wonderful.

When they first started kissing, it was urgent. Every kiss was full of importance, full of words they hadn’t said, full of moments they had missed out on; full of anger and sadness and lust and hatred and betrayal and forgiveness and begging and demanding and everything. They couldn’t touch each enough or at all, it was like sticking your hand in a bath that’s too hot, like gripping an ice cube until it eats into your flesh. It was all too much and they nearly collapsed under the weight of it all.

But they didn’t.

Now they kiss in the moment. Lazily in bed when they wake up, and briefly when they leave the Bunker without each other, and playfully when they tease each other, and defiantly when people give them bitchy stares, and desperately when they’re drunkenly stripping each other, hungry for each other’s skin. They learnt to be Dean and Cas, this new Dean and Cas that, as it turns out, isn’t all that different from what they had all along.

The kissing is definitely an improvement though.

They set up for the movie marathon silently, working around each other in perfect synchronicity, hands brushing, shoulders bumping, content with the smallest reassurances of each other’s continued existence. By the time that the others appear, laden with food, the pair are back to making out on the couch.

“There are children present,” Eileen says loudly, making them jump apart. “Schooch!”

It takes a second to notice what’s going on, but Sam’s stupid grin is what makes Dean pay attention.

“No, no way, absolutely not!”

“C’mon! It’s fun!”

“You’re idiots,” he says and signs. “No.”

“Cas, you know you wanna,” Sam wiggles his eyebrows. “You’d look great in them.”

Cas looks between Dean’s scowl and Jack’s smile for a second before giving in. “Hand them over.”

“Cas! You’re supposed to be on my side!”

He sighs. “You’ll understand when you’re a father, Dean.”

“Hey-“ Dean jumps up after him. “What do you mean, when I’m a father, you brought me two whole ass kids that I-“ They disappear down the hall to get changed and he gets cut off.

When they come back, Cas is beaming and Dean is failing not to do the same. The onesies are teddy-bear fleece, red and white fair-isle style with a reindeers and Christmas trees and candy canes, and ridiculously cutesy. The fact they’re all wearing one makes Dean want to throw up until he actually sees them all together: this is his family, one that he was never supposed to have, and yet, here they are. His throat stings and he scrunches up his face to try and stop the tears before they’ve even formed, but he catches Cas watching him and knows that he’s been caught out.

“Dean, come here,” Sam beckons. “Picture.”

“Dude, no way-“ But then Jack is pulling him over to the couch and he’s letting him. “I cannot believe-“

“Shut up and smile,” Eileen says, pushing his shoulder roughly.

Someone has set up an instant camera, balancing it on books and DVDs until it’s the right height, and they all crowd into where they think the middle of the shot is. On the couch, Eileen sits at an angle against Sam so the camera can pick up her bump, his arm around her; Jack is on the floor by their feet grinning brightly; Dean drops next to him, between Cas’ legs; he rests a hand on Dean’s left shoulder and Dean puts his right hand on top of it. It’s the perfect picture of the frankenstein family and Jack insists on taking more; ones less serious, less perfect, but even better than the first.

Sam dates them all with a sharpie on the white boarder. One will go in the family photo album, the others to be tucked away into wallets and jacket pockets and personal picture frames. Cas snags the one where Dean is looking up at him instead of the camera, completely focussed on his boyfriend. He’s always liked Dean best in the moments that he is unaware of being watched, that’s when he’s the the most beautiful, the most Dean.

He blushes hard at the picture, but allows Cas his indulgence.

They get through a lot of food and about two and a half movies before people start to wind down for the night. Lying down for long periods of time is guaranteed to mean that the baby starts up a gymnastics routine, and Eileen lets Jack watch until going to the bathroom becomes imminently required. Her getting up makes everyone else realise that going to bed is a good idea, so they end up switching off the film halfway through and clearing up a little. At least taking the food back to the kitchen so it doesn’t go stale and inedible overnight, stinking up the Den for the foreseeable future (it happens far too often).

Cas takes Jack to bed, even though he’s God and 1) doesn’t actually need to sleep and 2) probably doesn’t need his (kind of) father to tuck him in. However, his delight at discovering that theyve put sheets on his bed that match his pjs reminds Cas that Jack may be a cosmic being of unfathomable power, but he is still his son.

“Thank you, Castiel. This is the best Christmas Eve ever, much better than last year because you’re here.”

“I’m glad you feel that way, Jack.”

“It’s difficult being human,” Jack says suddenly. “Even being partly human is tough, and I think you’re doing a great job.”

Cas cracks his knuckles, a new nervous habit that he’s picked up. “Thank you. It gets better everyday, easier; I miss my old self less.”

Jack pats his chest. “I’m taking good care of your Grace, don’t you worry.”

“I have no doubts about that,” Cas smiles, only slightly wistful. There have been many days that he’s wanted to ask Jack for it back, mostly days when Dean gets injured and he cannot do more than silly little human remedies. But it’s better this way. Living a human life with Dean, it’s right. It’s what they both deserve. He hugs Jack tightly before he leaves. “Goodnight, Jack. Merry Christmas.”

On the way back to his and Dean’s room, Cas meets Eileen, a spoon in her mouth. He raises his eyebrows and she puts a finger to her lips.

“Cranberry jam,” she admits. “At least my cravings are seasonally appropriate!”

“I’m not telling if you’re not.”

She winks. “Thanks for making Dean put the pjs on.”

“He loves it really.”

“Not as much as he loves you,” she says it so casually and Cas feels his face burn. “Still?”

“It takes some getting used to… after so long…”

She nods and pulls him into a hug, her bump pushing him away as much as her arms pull him in. The baby kicks against him, a clear foot making contact with his side, which is still surreal to feel to say the least. Before Eileen’s pregnancy, the only time he’d been allowed to touch a pregnant belly was when Kelly put his hand on Jack. It took some getting used to, processing the fact that there was a little person in there, growing and becoming, and in a matter of weeks, it would be out here with the rest of them.

“Strong.”

“Oh yeah,” she laughs. “Sleep is getting pretty impossible. But it’s good, strong is what we want.”

“Your child could be nothing less.”

It’s Eileen’s turn to blush. The impending motherhood nerves have been getting harder to handle lately; every time she gets a good kick to the ribs, she’s reminded that there is a real baby in there, and soon it will be in her arms and she’ll have to raise it and make sure that she doesn’t mess them up. She can do that, right? Even though she and Sam lost their parents to hunting, they can do better, right? They can find the balance. The idea of going out on a hunt while her baby sits at home waiting for her makes her heart ache, but she cant imagine never hunting again… Maybe she’ll fall in love with the Men of Letters like Sam and she’ll be happy with researching, perhaps be a consultant like Dean’s considering, but somehow, it doesn’t feel right yet. There’s still so much to prove: that you can be a badass Hunter as a woman, as a Deaf person, and soon, as a mother. But would she really risk losing her family just to prove a point? After everything Sam and Dean went through to make sure she got to live her life at all? There’s so much unknown, but as long as she has this family around her, she can face anything.

“We should get to bed. Merry Christmas,” she goes up on tiptoes to kiss him on the cheek and then disappears into her and Sam’s bedroom.

The quiet of the Bunker is soothing, even though Cas isn’t often up late enough to be the only one - he can never say no to falling asleep in Dean’s arms - he enjoys the solitude. It’s different from being actually alone. He knows that behind the doors, his family slumber peacefully, able to relax and dream of good, hopeful things. The existential horror of constantly fighting for your life abated, at least on a cosmic level; if the idiots around him still want to throw knives at monsters, that’s their prerogative. And he doesn’t even have to pretend to be happy with it.

He turns off the main lights as he makes his way through the rooms, checking each one out of habit more than an actual need. Soon, he’s bathed in a gentle, colourful glow of the fairy lights, the only illumination left on. He stops by the tree, staring up at the adorned branches, his heart full of a contentment that he used to associate so solely with faith. So strangely similar: the peace he feels knowing that he is loved and that he is able to love back, and the one he felt when he followed God’s commands. But this little family, being part of it, is like a new kind of worship. Now his heart laid down before the altar of love instead of obedience - the difference is he gets something back. Now he knows that when he puts out his hand to hold his God, it will hold him back.

What would Dean make of him thinking like this? Equating their love to something so intrinsically holy? And on Christmas, of all days. He would mock him, but only out of embarrassment, the continued belief that he is inadequate to be compared to the divine, even though Cas has never met anyone more deserving of the epithet than Dean.

In their bedroom, Dean is already tucked in bed, reading a battered copy of We that Cas found buried in one of those chaotic secondhand book stalls. He should’ve saved it for Christmas, but Dean’s already halfway through and it gives him a little thrill to know that he did good in picking it, because he knows Dean.

“Get lost?” He jokes without looking up from his book. “C’mere.”

Cas climbs in and under Dean’s outstretched arm, which he promptly tucks around Cas, pulling him tight into his side. He’s taken off the onsie and is in just his underwear, which is probably for the best considering how they both run hot during the night and always end up kicking the covers off even when they sleep naked. Cas presses small kisses to Dean’s side and chest, not entirely meaning to distract him from his book, but also not being unhappy with that side effect.

‘Something on your mind?” Dean asks playfully. “Could give you an early present, if you like.”

“Mmmm?” He moves up to Dean’s collarbone and throat, sucking a little at the soft flesh, but not quite hard enough to leave a mark. “What kind of present?”

“One you only get if you’ve been good this year.”

“And if I’m on the naughty list?”

Dean looks surprised at Cas’ reply, usually he takes a bit of warming up when it comes to their role-plays. “We- We could go through all the bad things you’ve done… See if can’t figure something out.”

“I think that’s for the best.”

The Winchesters are home for Christmas.

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ciircusbrats · 4 years

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✮ - ❛ a chat in the early morning. ❜ / not accepting!

@sublunary-supernatural said: ☕🥘! For both babs

SEND ‘🥘’, THEY HAVE TO TALK ABOUT A GROUP OF PEOPLE THEY WANT TO BE AROUND WITH OR ASPIRE TO BE WITH. IF THE EMOJI CANNOT BE SEEN, SEND ‘Hotpot’.

"Witches," is Dominy's immediate answer, firm and true. She looks away from the house of cards she had steadily been building since the circus returned to the train. She was in the middle of creating a third floor when the question was asked: a mansion of black and gold and upturned images. "There's always been something about them that draws me in. There are a lot of witches in the circus, did you know? The fortune tellers, the baker and the shadow master, the illusionist and the lovely lady in the Garden of Unearthly Delights. Oh, and i suppose there is this one, too," she adds, with an indicative tip of her chin towards the teenager by the window. Westin sticks out his tongue in response. Dominy makes a face back.

"But anyway," she continues, taking another pair of cards from her deck. "I simply think witches are wonderful. Obviously, there can be exceptions, as with all groups of people. But my experience with them so far has been lovely."

From his spot by the window---or rather, under the window, for he is sprawled over a puffy couch on the floor---Westin clicks his tongue and lifts his eye from his phone. "I dunno. Witches are, like, old news. Y'know who would be cool to hang out with?" he flips over so he's laying on his stomach, and his mouth is stretched into a conspirational grin as he goes on. "Cryptids. Bigfoot, shadow people, the mothman. Can you imagine the kind of stories they could tell? Oh, and I'm like, obviously still down to party with the zombies of Beethoven and Mozart and stuff. Best dj's, you can't even argue."

Dominy gapes at him from her velvet chair. Her hands fall slack on the table. "Do you ever take anything seriously?"

He seems a breath away from answering. However, the boy is then seemingly hit by a sudden epiphany, and he snaps his fingers in wide-eyed excitement. "And ghosts! Some good ol' spooks. We love that." Dominy tips her head back and groans.

SEND ‘☕️’, THEY HAVE TO TALK ABOUT SOMETHING THAT KEEPS THEM GOING AND LIVING. IF THE EMOJI CANNOT BE SEEN, SEND ‘Coffee’.

He laughs; though it's a clumsy, low sound. "Haha. Wow. That's a way to kill the mood. Can we go back to talking about ghosts?"

Dominy doesn't frown at him this time. Instead, a subtle tint of agreement colors her features for just a moment. "It's a heavy question, yeah," she mumbles out. Even so, the doll has always been one to see things through, so she crosses her legs and hums thoughtfully. She's never understood how she's able to do this; she doesn't have a throat in the first place. "Mmm. Okay. Perhaps I still dream of... mmm, getting my own body...?" her forehead wrinkles in thought. In the corner of her eye, she does not miss the way Westin frowns and spreads out his arms in exasperation. Dominy scoffs.

"And no, I'm not saying i don't appreciate what you did for me, you missed a show for this, I know---" she adds quickly, spotting the inevitable protest on his tongue, "---but it's... I'm not sure. A human body would be a lot more... convenient, wouldn't you say? Nothing I would have to wear every day." Even as she says this, however, the words do not click together in sentences that feel true. She puffs out her cheeks and exhales air that she cannot feel in her cotton-stuffed torso. The tips of her shoes shoes bump against each other underneath the table. "I'm not very sure. I'll think on it."

"Well, I feel terribly validated, now," Westin remarks, in that saccharine voice that he always uses when he wants to tick her off. And Dominy doesn't take the bait this time (though the snarky response is just on the edge of her fake teeth, snapping and biting, only a breath away from answering with a sharp, 'not everything is about you, idiot'). Instead, she fixes him with a crimson stare and raises a brow.

"What about you?" she asks. "Are you not going to answer their question?"

There. A pause. Triumph sings in her chest for just a moment. Westin seems to be trying to school his features into something; amusement, indifference, contemplation. He ends up with a frown. The boy gives up and scoffs, but she's known him long enough to see right through it.

"What am I supposed to say, dude?" he rolls over on his back again. "I'm like, seventeen. This a question for, like... I dunno. A middle-aged adult or something. Or a grandma. Like yourself," A tilt of his head and a sharp smile. Dominy has to drown out yet another biting remark. She's better than this, she knows. Even when a subtle part of her bitterly agrees.

"I don't think so," she says instead. She make sure to wear that all-knowing voice that she knows irritates him. A subtle tremor of irritation still trails her words, however, and so she tries to steady it before she speaks again. "I think everyone has something that keeps them going, no matter their age. And I think what keeps you going is spite." A groan of protest. Dominy remains unruffled. Remains confident.

"You know it's true," she continues. "You're not exactly subtle. You want your name back. You want your parents back, don't you? And you want your chance to leave."

She was sure it was right when she said it---she was confident when she said it---but she hardly realized it wasn't the right thing to say at all. Dominy is certain a cotton-chest can be refilled, and a button eye can be sewn back in. She's certain human bones can mend.

The subtlety and delicacy of emotions, however, and the way they weave into complex yet seamless patterns, she has yet to truly grasp.

And so it's with pure surprise that she jumps when Westin rises from his seat, his knuckles clenched into thin crescent shapes and his mouth pressed into a tight line. She meets a single eye and is faced with a swirl of things: things so raw and heavy that they’re near-palpable.

And she flinches when he snaps.

Amidst her surprise, Dominy misses a word or two. Shut up and watch and words. The rest slip from her grasp like individual raindrops in a downfall. Her hands grip wrinkles into her skirt.

"And yes, I'm not subtle," she hears him say over the static in her head; his voice is sharp and it is cracking. "I don't care about anyone on this fucking train, I’m not tryina hide that I don’t want to be here. When did I ever want to be? And I didn’t even sign my name, I didn’t know, I was---I was little, and---and it’s so stupid!” He’s yelling, and Dominy realizes it’s been a while since she’s seen his face furious like so, crumbled like so. Westin doesn’t leave room for words other than his own---she doesn’t have the voice to utter them, anyway---and he keeps going with the kind of tremble that breaks his words into little stinging shards as he speaks.

“I'll leave, y’know. I’ll go so far away that I won't have to deal with stupid dolls that---that aren’t even human, and they try to tell me who I am and what I even want. Like..." He chokes on a word, or a laugh. Perhaps both. Dominy observes the water that lines his eye when he looks at her, unblinking. "Not even you know what you want, okay? Stop acting like you know everyone when you barely know a single thing about yourself. It’s really fucking annoying."

His gaze briefly slides to the house that she has spent so long building, made of the cards that she reads under tiny lanterns and wishful stares---his own stare burns so intensely that Dominy worries he'll come and knock it over.

He doesn't, though. His eye returns to burn into her again. When the silence stretches out long enough and he begins drumming his fingers against the puff, his jaw clenches with decisiveness. “Nothing to say. Thought so.” He gets up to leave. Dominy doesn't try to stop him, not even as the door of the wagon slams shut behind him. She realizes she's tense. How can she be tense, if there isn't a shred of muscle in her body?

With a huff, Dominy decides she isn't in the mood to work on her mansion anymore.

#✮╎┇❛ 𝗙𝗔𝗡𝗠𝗔𝗜𝗟. ❜┇╎ .asks.#HI THIS GOT TERRIBLE AND IM THE OPPOSITE OF HAPPY #and also it became something of a drabble instead so cdhauisfv it's under a cut!!#anyways im :(#idk how impactful this is i havent written strong emotion in a Long time cdhuifv #and it's from dominy's point of view as well so she's?? a lil numb #to stuff like this #i genuinely have no idea lmao #good character study but im SAD NOW

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thiswasinevitableid · 3 years

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71. you’re famous and you want to hide out in my bookstore which is fine except the stupid paparazzi won’t leave and now there’s a photo of us in the tabloids and they’re printing misinformation and why the fuck won’t you clear this up on your twitter account

Sternclay, NSFW, please!

Here you go! Let's end this round of meet uglies with a bang

The post-holiday slump is always the worst; everyone maxed out their credit cards last month and doesn’t want to buy anything, and the tourists won’t be back until the spring. It’s not that he’s concerned about keeping the lights on; Bookworms is popular and has a prime spot downton. It’s that he’s bored out of his mind.

All his orders for the day are in, everything’s been received and shelved, and he’s running out of things to tidy. If he’s lucky, the clouds that have been threatening a snowstorm since this morning will burst and drive some people to shelter among the stacks.

Dingdong

Thank the lord.

“Welcome to Bookworms, can I help you?”

The man stays by the door, peering through the glass onto the street while pulling off his beanie, “Huh? Oh, uh, nope, just coming in to, uh, get out of the cold.” He turns, and two realizations slap Joseph in the face.

One: this is the hottest man he has ever had the pleasure of seeing.

Two: He’s seen this man dozens of times, just never in person.

Barclay Cobb is a Food Network darling who got his start on Youtube, sharing recipes from vintage cookbooks he found at garage sales. That’s not why he’s starstruck, but it is probably why the taller man is hiding in the craft books alcove and keeps nervously looking his way.

“I won’t tell anyone you’re here, Mr. Cobb.”

“Phew” the man sighs, unzips his jacket, “thanks man. Thought I’d be bundled up enough that no one would spot me while I was out, but I didn’t get my hat on in time coming out of the Chinese place down the block.”

“I love that spot, they have the best beer-braised duck.”

“Yeah, I always stop by when I’m in town, they’re food is worth getting photographed for.”

It’s odd, everything he’s read suggests chef Cobb is friendly and warm when approached by fans in public.

“It’s not that I don’t appreciate that people like my shows but, I, uh, sometimes I just want to eat or walk down the street without someone taking pictures of me.”

“Do you want to head into the back sections? There’s no windows in that half of the store.”

“Sweet, thanks. Uh, would it be cool if I autographed any books of mine you have? I like doing that, means I can send a little business towards smaller stores.”

“Of course. Here, the cookbooks are on this wall.” He slips into his office to grab a sharpie while Barclay pulls a stack of books and sits down on the floor. As the scratching of the pen fills the air, Joseph takes a trip to the paranormal and occult section, coming back with three copies of The Case for Bigfoot.”

“Y’know, not everyone stocks these.” Barclay smiles as he adds the paperbacks to the pile.

“Which is terrible business; you’re just as famous in the cryptozoology community as you are in the foodie one. This is the best book on bigfoot ever written, and I should know; I run a, um, a blog where I review books on paranormal topics.”

“You a true believer?” The cook blows on his signature in the copy of Desserts for All Seasons

“More an optimistic skeptic; your book is perfect because you make your case using actual evidence instead of reporting the same ten, poorly verified stories that everyone includes in their books. And I appreciated that you included recipes from the places you visited; that was a very nice touch.”

“Funny story about that” Barclay freezes as the front door opens. There’s definitely more than one person coming in, and when Joseph pokes his head around the corner he sees fifteen people, all with cameras or phones.

“Shit. You might want to hide in my office for a few minutes.”

By the time the crowd reaches him, Joseph is almost done re-shelving the signed books.

“Good afternoon, let me know if you need help finding anything.”

“Uh, yeah, we do, someone saw Barclay Cobb in your store-”

“Strange, we’ve only had one customer” he winces as someone’s shoulder knocks a hardcover off its display, “I didn’t get a good look at them before they went downstairs.” He tips his head at the staircase to the YA and Graphic Novel sections and is promptly knocked into the shelf as the throng hurries away.

“Come on, I can get you out through the back door” Joseph whispers to the Red Dust on his Soul poster on his office door. Barclay is remarkably quiet for a man his size as they sneak across the floor and let frigid, January air rush into the store.

“Thanks man” Barclay whispers, “I owe you one.” He sets a big hand on Joseph’s shoulder, squeezes it with a wink, then pulls on his hat and disappears into a crowd coming off at the bus stop.

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

Joseph always comes in through the back, flipping on lights as he goes, so the sea of bodies pressed to the front windows like a zombie horde surprises him. He knows Barclay tweeted about the signed copies, but this seems like excessive excitement even for a celebrity chef.

“Morning, Joseph--whoa, what the heck?” Aubrey clocks in without taking her eyes off the crowd, “why is everyone here this early.”

“Fan culture. I think.” The registers finish waking up, “I’ll pay holiday rates if you open that door for me.”

Aubrey gives a thumbs up, unlocks the double doors, and is swallowed up so quickly he worries she might have been trampled until she emerges near the greeting cards. Some people swarm the cookbooks, but an alarming number cluster around the counter, all shouting for his attention.

“How long have you been seeing Chef Cobb?”

“What?, I, I’m not-”

“Does he often visit your store?”

“No! He just came by yesterday!” There’s a horrible clatter of all the books on display near the door taking each other out like dominoes.

“Do you fuck in the backroom all the time?”

“Oh come on” He pushes past the man who asked that, deals with shouting all the way to his office and slams the door. A quick Google search for “Barclay Cobb” brings up a blurry photo of them in the alley, Barclays hand on his shoulder, and multiple headlines speculating on why the reclusive chef and author has chosen a nobody bookstore employee (he’s the owner, damn it) as his lover.

Okay, there’s a logical, easy fix to this.

He opens the door enough to speak, whistles so everyone will be quiet and listen to him, “I’m sorry, there’s been a misunderstanding. Mr. Cobb isn’t in any kind of relationship with me; he just came into the store yesterday for some peace and quiet. So, if you’re looking for information about him, this is not the place for it. If you’re looking for the signed books, the cookbooks are there, and the paranormal section is just around that corner.” He gives his best customer service smile as the paparazzi exchange perplexed glances.

“...Is it true he bought you this store?”

“Wh--no! We rent this space.”

“From him?”

“Arggh!” He closes the door, slumps against it and cards his fingers through his hair. As he contemplates closing for the day, he spots a little, copper card on his desk. It’s Barclay’s, which is what he expected, but when he flips it over there’s a message scribbled in pen.

Main St Hotel, room 503, here until Monday.

He pulls out his phone, tells Aubrey she’s allowed to get the crowd out by any means necessary except for fire, and elbows his way out into the winter air.

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

Barclay almost purrs when he peers through the peephole in the hotel door; Joseph, as his nametag read, is standing on the carpet, looking twice as handsome as he did yesterday. His cheeks are even a little pink, and Barclay has some thoughts on how to make that blush deepen.

“Hey, glad you found-”

Joseph holds up his phone, screen in Barclays face, “please fix this.”

“Oh fuck.” He ushers him in, “I’m so sorry, I thought they’d stopped doing this shit.”

“No, and they’re fucking up my inventory as a result.”

“On it, lemme text my assistant, she’s good at drafting these kind of messages.”

“Thank the lord. Right, thank you for that, I’ll go now.”

“Wait” Barclay reminds his instincts that blocking the door is rude, “do you wanna stay a few minutes? You look kinda stressed.”

“Because my store is being overrun!” Joseph snaps, then takes a deep breath and straightens his sleeves, “I’m sorry, that wasn’t called for, this morning has just been a mess. And it, um, it’s a little bittersweet to have people thinking I could land a hot chef when I can’t get past a first date with most people. Um, sorry. Too much information. That’s a bad habit of mine.”

Barclay tucks his hands into his pants pockets, “About that. Y’know how I left my card?”

Blue eyes blink, then brighten, “I thought that might be the reason but I dismissed it as wishful thinking.”

“Nope. A guy who's hot, nerdy, and competent enough to sneak me away from the paparazzi? Sign me the fuck up.”

“I’m not opposed to a, um, tryst, but I really, really need to get back to the store, I can’t abandon Aubrey to deal with this mess on her own, that’s not fair, and now we’ll have to reorder things too....” He laughs, a tense sound, “good lord, I get a chance to fuck a celebrity crush and I’m turning it down for work.”

“Hey” Barclay sets his hands on Joseph’s shoulders, “it’s okay. You’re not the first guy to be married to his job. But, uh, out of curiosity, you got any vacation days to spare?”

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

“This is all yours?” Joseph takes in the sprawling farm as Barclay unlocks the front door of a charmingly rustic house.

“Yep, all the way to the creek and all the way to the road. Might surprise you, but I like my privacy.”

“I’d never have guessed.” He replies with faux shock.

“Smartass.” Barclay kisses his cheek, holds the door open with his shoulder so Joseph can pull his bags inside. He packed as light and efficiently as he could for two weeks away (he’d initially planned on one until Aubrey and Moira ganged up on him and told him he hadn’t taken a real vacation in years so he was taking one now, damn it) but his suitcase is still heavy as he rolls it to the stairs.

“I got that.” Barclay shoulders his own travel bag and hoists Joseph’s in the other hand, carrying them to the second floor like they’re nothing more than pillows.

The week the chef was in Madison, Joseph went to his hotel almost every night. Fell asleep in his bed more than once, when discussions of fusion cuisine or the Fresno Nightcrawler turned into frantic, heated kisses under the covers. It’s only when the cook drops all luggage into the master bedroom that the truth of why he’s on this trip sets in.

“You really invited me all the way here because you think I’m hot.”

“Yeah but no.” Barclay drapes his arms over his shoulders, lips still a little chilly as he kisses them, “brought you here because you’re smart” another kiss, this one on his jaw, “and funny” another, on his nose, “and you’re the biggest bigfoot fan I know.”

“You wrote a book on it!”

“Point stands. And yeah” he pushes Joseph back so he lands on the bed, crawling atop him as he growls, “I invited you here because you’re so hot I wanna pour sugar on you and see if it melts. Now get your pants off; I’ve been thinking about sucking your dick since we left the city.”

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

“How did the whole bigfoot thing start?” Joseph sips his Irish Coffee as Barclay puts his feet into his lap.

“Guess the same way any famous person ends up with two gigs; I was doing the thing I love, then was dicking around on cryptid hunter forums and found out I was also hella good at researching bigfoot. By the time I got really into it, I had enough cash that I could write my book without worrying about going broke. Helps that I’d handed off The Arch and The Lodge and was just the exec chef on them, since then I could travel if I needed to.”

Joseph nods, moves one hand down to rub Barclays foot; in spite of no longer working the kitchens of his five restaurants or having to test recipes for the books right now, he spent most of today on his feet making elaborate meals for two. Joseph teases him that he’s trying to stuff him to the point he can’t leave. Barclay always chuckles and says he doesn’t know how right he is. The last two days, Joseph then wraps his arms around his boyfriend and tells him he’d stay forever if he could.

He’s never thought of himself as romantic; he’s pragmatic, knows that relationships are things built out of time, trial, and error. But god help him, he’s fallen for Barclay like they’re rom-com leads with only ninety minutes to reach their happy ending.

They’re out near the creek--really more of a small river--the next morning, talking about books and speculating on the existence of life on other planets, when a storm sweeps through the trees. As trunks groan and roots pull loose from the snow, Barclay calls, “we better head back.”

He gives a thumbs up. Then the ice under him cracks.

He doesn’t correct course quickly enough, the rest dropping from under him and dunking him in freezing water. It’s deep, too deep to stand, but he’s a decent swimmer and kicks towards the surface. When the shadow covers the opening with a boom, panic threatens to push the rest of his precious breath away.

The tree that fell across the ice is heavy, and no matter how he pushes it won’t give. He bangs on the ice on either side, trying to get it to crack, but his lungs scream and his limbs alert him that the cold will soon shut them down.

He closes his eyes, trying to think, not ready to give up, not with Barclay so close. There’s a groan of wood and frozen water. His mouth opens without permission, desperate for air, and chokes him on frost instead.

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

“...be dead, please don’t be dead, please please please don’t be fucking dead.”

“Nnff.” That’s not what he meant to say, but it seems to calm the voice above him.

“Thank fuck. I’m so sorry, I got to you as fast as I could, do, do you need anything?” Barclay sounds exhausted.

“Cold.” He mutters.

“I’m trying to warm you up gradually, that’s what the first aid book said but, uh, here.” Warm, fuzzy arms draw him into a hug.

Wait.

The first thing he sees when his eyes flutter open are arms covered in reddish-brown fur. When Barclay rubs their cheeks together, it tickles more than his beard usually does.

“Barclay? What the hell is going on?”

“Uh. So.” He’s rolled with ease to face a creature he’s never seen and eyes that he’d know anywhere, “I’m bigfoot. Or, uh, a bigfoot. Maybe that’s kinda obvious now.”

His brain crackles to life, “What better way to stay undiscovered than get famous by giving people the wrong information about you.”

“Some of it’s true. Just not anything people could use to actually find me.”

“Smart, big guy” Joseph pets his face.

“You’re taking this pretty well.”

“I think my system is too shocked to experience more shock.” He shudders, “relatedly, how’d I get out of the river?”

“I lifted the tree off and pulled you free. Took my disguise off to do that and, uh, the fucking thing fell into the water when I got you. So I’m gonna be stuck like this until a friend of mine can get me a new one.”

“No complaints here. You look incredible.” He runs his hands up and down Barclay’s side and chest, warmth seeping into his fingers as he does, “But I’m a little surprised you were willing to risk someone seeing you or me blabbing to someone and trashing your whole life in the process.”

A low rumble as Barclay kisses his forehead, “It’s worth it. I, this is gonna sound so fucking cheesy, but I haven’t felt this way about someone in a long time, and there was no way I was gonna lose you.”

“Oh.” Affection and surprise well up in his throat, pressing down his words so all he can do is nestle closer to the cryptid and let himself be loved.

His mind rebounds quickly from his misadventure. His body would like him to remember it for a while so he doesn’t put it in such jeopardy again any time soon. Instead of helping Barclay with cooking and chores, he lays under the covers while the storm rattles the roof and the cook clangs pots on the lower floor.

Barclay, attentive to a fault, is downright doting now that he’s stuck in bed. He’s never without a hot drink or something to read, and the cryptid is happy to answer the majority of his questions about the finer points of being bigfoot. When it’s bedtime, his boyfriend pulls him atop his massive frame and cuddles him, whispering over and over that he’s glad he’s okay, until they fall asleep.

Today followed much the same pattern, though when dinner time rolls around he gets a fantastic surprise.

“Chocolate fondue?” He peers hopefully at the bed tray in Barclays hands.

“Only the best for you, babe.” The cook sets the burnished wood down on the bedside table, “we lucked out, the berries I bought last week are ripe.”

Joseph reaches for the fork, but Barclay beats him to it.

“You should save your energy. Since you’re, uh, still recovering.”

He shrugs, sets his hands in his lap and opens his mouth for a chocolate dipped raspberry. It doesn’t take long to spy Barclay’s ulterior motive. The cook has a whole wardrobe designed to fit his cryptid form, but it’s having trouble concealing certain things.

“You’re getting off on this.”

“I, uh, I, maybe a little” Barclay blushes under his fur.

Joseph raises an eyebrow, tilts his head at the bulge in Barclay’s pants, “You call that ‘little’?”

A rumbly whine, the fork paused halfway to Joseph’s mouth, “I can’t help it. I’ve got a thing for taking care of partners, especially ones who are all competent and put-together the rest of the time, and you look so good when you eat and, ohfuck.”

Joseph inhales sharply as chocolate hits his exposed upper chest. It’s not hot enough to burn, and he moans as the sensation seeps across his skin. Barclays eyes, wide and ravenous, keep flicking between the splatter and his face.

“Looks like you made a mess, big guy.” Joseph begins undoing the remaining buttons on his pajamas, “you should clean it up.”

“Fuck yeah.” Barclay lunges, mouth first, lapping and sucking at the marked skin as Joseph laughs. Their shirts hit the floor together as he digs his nails into auburn fur. Barclay grunts at the pressure, sits up with a grin, and drips a line of chocolate down the right side of Joseph’s ribs.

“Oops. Better fix that too.”

“Cleanliness is importantAH, ahhnn.” He squirms a bit as Barclay nuzzles his stomach before dragging his tongue up his skin. There’ve been times he mourned the fact T didn’t make him as hairy as some other guys, but right now he’s grateful for the clear canvas Barclay can mark however he pleases.

“A mess can be more fun.” The cook licks his lips, sucks a hickey above his belly button, “and by the time I’m done with you, babe, won’t be a single part of you that isn’t one.”

“Then get to it.” He shoves his pants down, lets Barclay pull them the rest of the way off and fold them. He lays back, resting his arms behind his head, and moans as the cook drizzles chocolate on each hip. Joseph feels like a gourmet dessert and, from the growls between his thighs, Barclay intends to treat him like one.

His boyfriend is always enthusiastic when sucking him off, but tonight he throws finesse out the window in favor of burying his face at the crease of each thigh in turn, licking his hips clean while clawing at his calves and sides. He lifts his head, wipes his mouth with a satisfied grin that shows the points of his teeth, and dives down again.

Joseph yelps with pleasure, the hint of fangs hitting all his buttons, lighting him up like downtown on a dark night. It’s intense, the scratch of fur on skin just different enough from the usual beard to remind him of who’s down there, and his legs try to kick closed. Barclay growls again, holding them open with ease.

“Not until I’m done with you, babe.”

He surrenders to flood of feelings from both outside and within him, Barclay’s sheer delight at his body rendering all his doubts and worries toothless and small, quieting them until all he can think about is incredible creature holding and all he can say is some variation on-

“Barclay, please, right there, lordalmighty that’s good, that’s so good big guy, please.” He squeezes his eyes shut, craving the impending orgasm more than he has words for. Barclay sucks determinedly and huffs, pleased, as Joseph's thighs tense in his hold and his climax chases away the remnants of yesterday's aches.

As his brain insists that really, body, opening our eyes isn’t that hard, there’s a metallic zip and strong legs bracketing his thighs.

“Here I thought you couldn’t look any better.” He murmurs as Barclay gleefully strokes his cock, “as soon as my brain works again, I’m coming up with so many ways to use that gorgeous thing.”

“Can’t, fuck, can't wait to hear ‘em, but I only got one for tonight; I’m gonna use it to cum alllll over that fucking perfect body, fuck, Joseph, you look so good when you’re ruined, fuck.” An impressive amount of cum spatters up his stomach, chest, and neck as Barclay howlgrowlpurrs and then sets his hands carefully on the bed.

Joseph’s whole body is sticky with chocolate, sweat, and cum, and Barclay definitely has at least two of those things mussed into his fur.

“You’re right, big guy, a mess can be fucking amazing.”

That being said, being sticky gets old quick, and soon they’re in the tub, Joseph whistling as he shampoos Barclay’s chest. The cryptid hasn’t stopped purring, and every time he looks Joseph’s way the sound deepens.

“When are you next in the city?”

The cook yawns, “Was gonna check on how the new chef de cuisine is getting on at Kepler in about two week.”

“Would you like to stay with me? It’s not fancy, but it’s close to the Ismuth, so you can get to Kepler on foot without trouble, and there are fewer crowds there this time of year. I suspect paparazzi are also less likely to track you down at some random house than at a hotel. That might make up for my lack of, um, high class amenities.”

“Good point. But I gotta be honest babe; as long as you’re there, that’s all I need to be happy.”

#sternclay #agent stern/ barclay #meet ugly #taz amnesty #terato #monster boyfriend #trans agent stern

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sjenvs3000 · 3 years

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Interpreting Nature and Growing a Friendship

Did you ever have a seemly ordinary spot that’s special to you and gives you a “sense of place”? Ivy Cottage was that place for me. I visited that little white cottage on its winding country road every other summer to stay with my Grandma and Pa.

View of Ivy cottage from Pa’s Field– Photo by Erin Jones

I loved visiting England to see my grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins but the most memorable part of every trip was Pa’s garden. Nothing felt more magical to a little kid from a big city than the English countryside. In the summer it was always filled with flowers, vegetables, hedges of blackberries, and a small field that held more than just the potatoes Pa planted. The stone walled field contains trinkets for my sisters and I to uncover including ink wells, pieces of pottery and bottles.

Various inkwells and bottles around my house have come from Ivy Cottages’ Field – Photo by Stephanie Jones

With every new found treasure, Pa would explain how these items were thrown into the field by their old owners once they were useless. With every new piece, my sisters and I would create worlds surrounding our new treasures someone once considered trash. Today I still find wonder in the finding objects in the field and often wonder about their place in the history of the land.

Pa in his field – Photo by Erin Jones

I believe my appreciation for nature flourished because of my time at Ivy Cottage and other experiences I had in the wilderness. I was the kid who loved collecting rocks, talked to wild animals, and made “pet snails” a trend in my 3rd grade class. When we weren’t visiting relatives, my family also liked to camp. My favourite camping trip was at the French River because I remember learning about the history of the rivers and how they were used as Fur Trade routes (Ogilvy, 2019). As we canoed to our campsite, nicknamed Blueberry Island, I remember wondering what it would be like for those people to travel these routes out of necessity instead of for leisure and tried to appreciate their ability to navigate every bend. I realize that this interpretation of the land allowed me to feel more immersed in nature.

Finding our way to blueberry island along the French River – Photo by Stephanie Jones

Now my relationship with nature looks very different but the same fondness has remained. During my time at the University of Guelph, my friendship with nature has drastically changed. My love for animals drove me to the University of Guelph, originally to study horses. However, working at a private zoo and seeing a plethora of incredible animals inspired me to switch into Zoology. During my time at the zoo, I had to face fears I didn’t even realize I had, like feeling comfortable around snakes, tarantulas, birds and even a sassy Canadian Lynx. I learned to appreciate nature’s diversity with each new relationship I formed with an animal.

Top photo: Ball pythons became one of my favourite species at the zoo! – Photo by Avery Harte; Bottom Photo: Bigfoot the surprisingly sweet Goliath Birdeater– photo by Stephanie Jones

Living in Toronto, my relationship with nature has always felt like a long-distance friendship. Since the lockdown, I’m learning to value that relationship even more if I have to work a little harder to feel immersed in nature when in a city. Walking my dog along the river and getting lost in park trails have been a much-needed reprise from the countless days inside and endless stream of COVID news (even if it does require a mask). As I finish up my time at Guelph and plan to move on, I know my relationship with nature will change and I am excited for that evolution.

My dog, Rosie, is loving the extra walks quarantine has to offer! – Photo by Stephanie Jones

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mediaeval-muse · 4 years

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Book Review

The Unidentified: Mythical Monsters, Alien Encounters, and Our Obsession with the Unexplained. By Colin Dickey. New York: Viking, 2020.

Rating: 4/5 stars

Genre: non-fiction

Part of a Series? No

Summary: In a world where rational, scientific explanations are more available than ever, belief in the unprovable and irrational--in fringe--is on the rise: from Atlantis to aliens, from Flat Earth to the Loch Ness monster, the list goes on. It seems the more our maps of the known world get filled in, the more we crave mysterious locations full of strange creatures. Enter Colin Dickey, Cultural Historian and Tour Guide of the Weird. With the same curiosity and insight that made Ghostland a hit with readers and critics, Colin looks at what all fringe beliefs have in common, explaining that today's Illuminati is yesterday's Flat Earth: the attempt to find meaning in a world stripped of wonder. Dickey visits the wacky sites of America's wildest fringe beliefs--from the famed Mount Shasta where the ancient race (or extra-terrestrials, or possibly both, depending on who you ask) called Lemurians are said to roam, to the museum containing the last remaining "evidence" of the great Kentucky Meat Shower--investigating how these theories come about, why they take hold, and why as Americans we keep inventing and re-inventing them decade after decade. The Unidentified is Colin Dickey at his best: curious, wry, brilliant in his analysis, yet eminently readable.

***Full review under the cut.***

Content Warnings: references to nuclear war, racism, cultural appropriation

Since this book is non-fiction, my review won’t follow my usual format. See my complete thoughts below.

I really enjoyed Dickey’s book, Ghostland, so I was excited to see how the author would take on cryptids, aliens, and other fringe beliefs. This book didn’t disappoint. What I loved about Ghostland was the emphasis on the “whys” - why do people believe in ghosts? Why does the architecture of this house seem off? Why do certain places feel “haunted”? The Unidentified takes up similar questions; Dickey is no so much interested in debunking belief in Bigfoot or claims of government conspiracies (though he does do that, briefly) than he is examining how they came about and why they endured. In that respect, I found this book fascinating. Dickey’s argument that many of these fringe beliefs (as we know them today) have roots in the political and social climate of the 20th century is extremely compelling, and he expertly highlights certain patterns that make fringe beliefs seem less the result of delusional individuals and more a reaction to change.

One thing I appreciated was that Dickey didn’t beat around the bush when it came to identifying racist and appropriative aspects of fringe beliefs. If a description of an extra-terrestrial encounter seemed to reinscribe conservative or white supremacist values, for example, Dickey was quick to point it out. If a cryptid bore resemblance to an Indigenous legend or figure, Dickey would highlight how settler colonialism was partially responsible. Dickey never used euphemisms to water down these observations, and I appreciated his bluntness and refusal to let believers escape criticism.

I do think, however, that many of his points get buried in his overview of history. Don’t get me wrong, I love history, but I think it can obscure the author’s own voice, and at times, it certainly did so in this book. I also think the book could have benefited from some images, though I do realize that so many images of cryptids and UFOs are low quality and difficult to replicate in print.

Nevertheless, The Unidentified is a well-researched, accessible read for anyone wanting to learn about the historical context of the rise in fringe belief systems. I wouldn’t recommend this book to those wanting a collection of stories about certain cryptids, or a through debunking of each and every UFO sighting, but I would recommend this book if you’re interested in 20th century history (especially American history) and cultural phenomena.

#book reviews

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gem-rewatch · 5 years

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SU rewatch- S1E7- Bubble Buddies

Our first Connie episode!! I was super excited to get to this one, mainly because Connie is one of my favorite characters in this show.

Her growth as an individual throughout the seasons is so, so good- and despite becoming an integral part of Steven’s busy chaotic life she never comes across as “just the love interest” or “entire life revolves around Steven” like female characters tend to do in plenty of other shows. This show- despite being told exclusively through Steven’s POV- still respects the fact that Connie has her own life separate from him and Gem stuff, giving glimpses into her relationship with her parents, her school life, and giving her plenty of hobbies, likes, and dislikes. I really appreciate that.

Okay, so first off I wanna talk about Steven and the glow stick. So, he saw this cute girl watching the parade drop her glow bracelet, and saves it in the freezer just in case he ever sees her again right? And it was a big Beach City boardwalk parade, likely with lots of tourists there watching, so there’s no guarantee that he’d ever see her again. Even with this, he still holds out a spark of hope that he’d be able to give it back. Which, is just who Steven is- he’s a hoper and a dreamer.

And like the world’s best miracle, there she is. Right there. Sitting on the beach close to his house, reading a book.

(As an added note, Connie ran out to on obscure corner of the beach away from the boardwalk to go read a book in peace. She probably wanted to get away from her overbearing, overprotective parents for a bit to relax.)

Oh my- oh my lord, it looks like he’s doing the Bigfoot pose. I desperately hope this was intentional.

But Steven. Steeeeven. Honey. Are you really gonna have your first line be a tacky pick-up line??

Steven: “It’s a smooth ride.” (after absolutely digging his wheels through the sand. GAWD.)

Honestly it’s probably good that Connie’s first impression of Steven was him being a complete doofus like this rather than his bad attempts at flirting like a leather studded biker.

But gawddd even on first watch it’s made explicitly clear that this is someone Steven’s seen from a distance before and wants to get to know. This poor kid just doesn’t know how to... actually do it.

Steven: “It’ll mess up my funky flow!”

He doesn’t seem to need any so-called ‘funky flow’ talking to anyone else in town- in fact, he’s about as extroverted as they come. This kid would willingly converse with almost anyone. Almost. His awkwardness about this one person drives home the reality that Steven probably thinks she’s cute and doesn’t know how to deal with that sort of crush stuff yet. Because let’s be real- with anyone else, this wouldn’t be a problem. He’d just bound up to them in all his enthusiasm as if they were already friends.

Garnet: "We won’t watch.”

She says, as she adjusts her glasses.

She already can sense what’s going to happen anyways, she doesn’t need to watch. XD

He’s already eaten through the cookie cats, and he grabs the same little glow stick that’s been seen in the freezer in episode one. A nice continuity detail.

(Although I do wonder how much time has passed between Gem Glow and now.)

Steven: *testing out different vocal inflections* “Hi! My name is Steven. Hi! My name is Steven...”

Having to script out introductions to ease one’s nerves about talking to someone new is literally so relatable. The story of my life. It’s reassuring to see a traditionally extraverted character do this too.

Ah yes, the protective bubble overprotective Pearl’s always dreamed of enveloping Steven in. Thank god he can now summon one himself.

Assuming nothing else happened off screen, this is the third weird gem thing Steven’s ever been able to do in his life- after summoning his shield once and attempting to shapeshift. Thank god it’s a helpful one this time.

Connie: “What... happened?” *Steven pauses for a short moment, considering.* Steven, casually: “I’m magic!”

Now, for Steven... Beach City has been his whole life. Here, the handful of locals have lived alongside Gem weirdness for long enough that they accept it without question by this point, with a sorta “it might as well happen” attitude. Because of this, I get the sense that he’s never actually had to explain anything before.

And so, as awkward as they come, he info dumps.

Steven: “Well, half-magic. [...] I’m a member of the Crystal Gems, we fight monsters and protect humanity and stuff-”

Connie, bless her heart, just sorta shrugs and goes “okay” to all of this. But hey, there’s no reason to deny the existence of magic when it’s all around you!

All of THIS scene is gold:

Steven: “That’s Lars. We’re basically BFFs.”

Lars: *making fun of the kid by slathering his tongue against the bubble’s surface like an utter loon, who as a result actually appears less grounded than Steven at the moment*

This is not the only time Steven tries to get his point across by playing pictionary and drawing an over-complex picture that literally no one gets the meaning of. It’s an ongoing habit, apparently.

Nice cameo of Obsidian’s sword! Makes you wonder how it got all the way out here. Also, is this an actual sword that Obsidian forged in their lava mouth, or is it a fake sword made exclusively to be a part of the fusion temple (before it was crumbled a bit)?

Connie: “Now we’re going to suffocate or starve at the bottom of the ocean, and only my parents will notice, because no one else cares about me! I’m gonna disappear without ever making a single friend!”

This scene makes me genuinely hurt. Connie is so lonely that one of her biggest fears/regrets at this point is dying without anyone caring what happened to her.

What we know about her and her parents tells me that they’re just... so sheltering that she’s had barely had time to socialize with anyone. It’s left her timid, so anxious about meeting new people that it literally took Steven knocking right into her to save her life to get her to say hello. All she wants is one good friend, someone who will stick around, someone who will remember her-

And then comes along Steven. A boy who saw her drop a glow stick, and cared enough to save it in case he ever saw her again. A boy who remembered her, who wants to know her.

...a boy who’s. Apparently getting down on one knee to ‘propose’ friendship to her. XD

Hey, whatdya know? I guess diamonds really are a girl’s best friend.

Jokes aside, this is such a sweet moment-

Steven: “We could be friends!”

It’s exactly what Connie needed to hear, and it’s exactly what he always wanted- to get to know the girl from the boardwalk parade more.

As a final note, Steven blushes so hard when Pearl and Amethyst are gently teasing him about Connie. Honestly I think the fact that Steven has a canonical crush on Connie is about as blatant as they can make it from episode one.

That being said, most of all he just wants to be a friend. I’m thankful I’ve never sensed any sort of “possessive, jealousy” behavior from him when it comes to Connie which automatically sets Steven Universe as a show apart from like, pretty much every other kid’s show with a crush between guy and girl best friends. (I’m lookin’ at you, Star vs. the Forces of Evil.)

They’re friends first, and he respects that- and thus I respect him.

#su #su meta #steven universe #connie maheswaran #conniverse #bubble buddies #jen rewatches su

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leiascully · 5 years

Text

Fic: Baseball Metaphors (7/?)

What can I say except you’re welcome, it’s PG-13, and don’t expect more until the weekend probably.

+ + + +

Between their travel schedule and Ethan and Jenny's various appointments, it's three weeks before they manage to get together for dinner again. Mulder is honestly surprised it even happens. He assumed when they all promised it would be a regular thing that everyone else was just saying it for the usual social reasons. He's never quite sure what to do anymore when someone who isn't Scully enjoys his company. But he dutifully makes reservations at an upscale Latin American place in deference to Jenny's cravings for beef and avocados, and Jenny practically croons as she looks at the menu.

"Oh, Fox, I can't believe you remembered," she gushes. "That's so nice."

"That photographic memory," Scully says fondly, and pats his hand. She's wearing a blouse tonight, silky and pink with one more button undone than her usual office wear, and a skirt that looks like it would be easy to slide his hand under. But he's definitely not counting his bases before they hatch, or however the metaphor would go.

"There was no way I was getting between a pregnant lady and her tacos," Mulder says.

"These are going to be way nicer than the ones we make at home," Ethan says. "Nice job, Fox."

Jenny pats her belly. She's showing slightly now. "I'm sure our little peanut will appreciate that."

"He's so considerate," Scully says. She throws Mulder a melting look.

"Sorry we haven't been able to meet before now," Ethan says, "but big news - we closed on the house. It's officially ours."

"Maybe we'll have you over for dinner!" Jenny says. "After the painters finish, of course. Can't be around the fumes right now." She laughs.

"Of course," Scully says with a gentle chuckle. "Maybe it'll inspire me to redo my apartment."

"I thought you were going to redo your apartment soon anyway," Mulder says in a meaningful tone, nuzzling at her ear.

"Oh, Fox," she says, playfully pushing him away. "You know we haven't worked out all the details yet."

"We've got news of our own," Mulder says, turning back to Ethan and Jenny. "We're moving in together." Jenny claps her hands.

"That's so wonderful!" she says. "You'll have to have a housewarming when you find your new place."

"We haven't even decided whether we're getting a new place," Scully says, smiling.

"You will," Jenny says decisively. "You know when you get to our age, it's just too hard to let someone else into your space, or to give up your own place. A fresh start is better. That way you can work together from the beginning. It all starts with compromise."

"Wise words from a beautiful lady," Ethan says, leaning in to kiss her cheek.

"I just know you'll find the perfect place," Jenny says. Her eyes are shining. "And if you need any help, Dana, I actually love looking through the real estate ads. I'd be happy to look up a few places you might like."

"That sounds perfect," Scully says. Mulder nudges her knee with his under the table. She presses back firmly.

Dinner, fortunately, is delicious, because it's accompanied by endless details about Ethan and Jenny's bungalow, their paint colors, the new stove they're having delivered, and the plans they have for their guest room. In the absence of wine, Scully indulges in a margarita or two. Mulder watches her lick the salt off the rim of her glass and remembers the kisses they shared in his car. They haven't talked about it since, but he's indulged in a few reminiscences, alone in his apartment. He picks up a forkful of pickled vegetables and pork from his Cuban plate and orders another margarita for himself.

The meal ends with churros, fresh-fried and glistening with sugar. Scully dips one into the accompanying chocolate sauce and holds it to Mulder's lips. He bites into it, only a little self-conscious. It crunches gently, hot and delicious. He looks at Scully and it's like they're the only two people in the room. Maybe that's where this ridiculous ritual comes from.

It's a nice night, somehow, or nice enough, for a night that doesn't involve watching either UFOs or baseball. He couldn't have imagined becoming anything even approaching friends with anyone who'd ever dated Scully, but Ethan isn't that bad, and Jenny's definitely trying to smooth everything over. He can tell that all this domesticity is still pressing on some sore spots in Scully's heart, but it isn't intentional. Ethan and Jenny just genuinely want to share their joy.

They say their good nights at the door of the restaurant. Mulder puts his arm around Scully and she slips her hand into the back pocket of his nice jeans. He isn't sure whether she's actually squeezing his ass, but at this point, he wouldn't put it past her. When he agreed to play pretend as her boyfriend, he didn't expect either of them to commit to the bit so fully, but it makes sense despite Scully's generally reserved nature. When she goes for something, she goes all in. Rewriting Einstein. Pursuing some kind of accelerated program through med school that he still doesn't understand so that she could join the FBI. Wrangling him and investigating the X-Files. Cuddling up to him at a restaurant as if they're sickeningly in love.

He's seen worse coping strategies for dealing with one's ex and one's ex's new house purchase, promotion, and pregnant pretty fiancée.

"See you soon?" Ethan says, holding out his hand for Mulder to shake.

"We wouldn't miss it," Mulder says. "Or that double housewarming." They wave as Ethan and Jenny turn to go through the parking lot.

"Is this what it's like to have friends?" he murmurs to Scully.

"I'm not sure anymore," she says wryly. "All I have is you."

"I'm not so bad," he says with amusement. "Am I?"

Now she's definitely squeezing his ass. "You do all right."

"You okay?" he asks.

She sighs. "It's srange," she says at last. "On the surface, it seems as if they have everything I've always wanted, but I don't look at Ethan and want to be with him. I don't even know if that life is what I want at this point. I mean, it is, but this job isn't exactly compatible with parenting, and I don't want to give it up, and I don't want to have a family unless I have a partner, which I don't have time to find. My parents loved each other, but I saw what raising four kids basically on her own put on my mother. And Dad missed so much."

"Meanwhile my parents had nothing but me in their lives," Mulder says. "After Sam, I mean. That wasn't ideal either."

"So two to four kids," Scully muses. "I don't think I'm the type for immaculate conception."

"That should be the least of your worries," he tells her, opening the car door for her.

They bicker amiably about the existence of Bigfoot on the way home, a refrain as familiar as anything on Top 40 radio. He parks outside her building and turns to her, trying not to have expectations. But he can't stop remembering the heat of her kisses that fogged up the windows, the weight of her balanced in his lap. She blinks at him slowly in the dark of his car and he thinks she's remembering too.

"Walk me to my door?" she says, and the quirk in her lips makes her intent clear.

"It would be my pleasure," he says, and follows her into her building. He props himself against the door jamb as she unlocks the door. It takes her a second, even though he knows they were at the restaurant long enough for the margaritas to wear off. If she's jittery, it's for some other reason. He hopes it's him. The lock clicks open at last and she tugs her keys out.

"Well," he says, grinning, "good night."

She reaches up and tows him into her apartment by his shirtfront. He kicks the door shut and lets her press him against it as he bends down to kiss her. He does taste salt and sugar flecked at the edges of her lips this time, but what matters is the heat of her and the way her lips and tongue insist on capturing his full attention. He cups his hands around her face. He'd pick her up if he dared and let her wrap her legs around his waist, but as natural as it feels to kiss her, all this is new.

"I think you've earned second base," she says. "For outstanding performance at an endless dinner."

"You sure?" he asks.

"I saw the way you looked at me in that hotel room in Oregon when I showed up in nothing but a robe," she teases. "To say nothing of assorted evidence I've gathered over the last few years, up to and including elevator maintenance. If you're not interested, we can say good night, but I better not hear any more bullshit about method acting."

"I'm interested," he assures her. "It's just that pesky real life and office that we share I'm worried about."

She shrugs. "It's worked so far. I'm not going to tell my therapist about it, but it's worked." She pulls him closer and looks up at him. "If I didn't let Them take you from me, I'm not going to let this take you from me."

"If you're sure," he says.

"I'm sure that I'd rather that you were feeling me up than that we were continuing this conversation," she says, pressing her body against his. "So shut up and put out or get out." She winks to soften her words.

He kisses her again and unbuttons her blouse with feverish intensity, sliding his hand inside to touch the lace of her bra. Her nipples are already hard. He flicks his thumb across them and she gasps against his lips.

"Ah, Scully," he says reverently.

"Couch," she commands, stepping away and taking his hand, and he follows her over. She perches on the arm of the couch, her shirt half-open and her eyes half-lidded. He sits below her and buries his face between her breasts. She laughs, her chest rumbling against his forehead as he nuzzles against her velvety skin.

Scully, in a surprise to no one, has absolutely perfect breasts. They're perfectly shaped, with a perfect weight in his hands, and her nipples are rosy peeking through the lace of her bra. He loves them. He could play with them forever. From the noises Scully is making as he gently squeezes them, that's more than all right with her.

He loses track of time. He's hypnotized by the texture of her, the salt taste of her skin under his tongue. He pulls her on top of him, toppling onto the cushions. She's straddling him and yes, he was right about the skirt being easy to push up. He undoes her bra and pushes her shirt off her shoulders. She slides her arms out of the straps and he has access to all of her. The way she braces herself above him changes the shape of her breasts and he could spend forever just exploring all the things gravity or the lack thereof could do to her body. He wants to get her in a pool. He wants to take her into space. He wants to grow old with her, and fuck, he already knew it, but it's a whole new world.

"Mulder," she says, and her voice comes from far away, but he reels himself in. She slides down his body until she can look into his eyes. "I don't want to stop."

"I hear a big 'but' coming," he murmurs, kissing her.

"But I don't think we should round the bases tonight," she says, her voice brimming with regret.

"You know I hate it when you're right," he says. She leans down, smiling against his lips.

"I know you do," she says. "But you and I both know we're going to have to have more dinners with them. It makes more sense to ration it out."

"Just in case of catastrophe," he says.

"That and I don't want to fling myself into your arms to assuage my regrets about my former relationship," she says. "You deserve better." She kisses him again. "But god, I want you."

"You'll just have to wait a little longer," he says indulgently, brushing his hand down her bare thigh.

"At least until the nursery's painted," she says, rolling her eyes.

"That's third base," he tells her. "Housewarming is home."

"Who put you in charge of the calendar?" she teases.

"I'm kind of in charge of the elevator," he jokes back. "Besides, who knew the way to get you to drop all your inhibitions was to put you at a dinner table with a nice boring suburban couple?"

"That sounds much more scandalous than I think you intended," she says with a smile.

"My scandal level is precisely calibrated," he says. She climbs off him and he sits up. He'll have to address his situation again when he gets home. He's half-amazed he didn't come in his pants like a college boy fumbling around in his twin bed with his first hookup.

"Good night," Scully says, tracing a finger down the buttons of his shirt.

"I guess you didn't get to second base," he says, looking at his chest. Hers is much more appealing. She's shrugged her shirt back on and her breasts are bare inside it, flushed and possibly marked by his teeth.

"Next time," she says. "You don't have quite as much to work with."

"I might surprise you," he says.

"Next time," she says again, and this time it's a promise. She sends him out the door with a kiss and a slap on the ass. He shakes his head in the hallway, only half-believing that any of this is happening at all.

#the x-files fic #xfiles fic #the xfiles fic #msr #mulder x scully #fic: baseball metaphors #my fic #i wanted to squeeze one out for you all #so to speak

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starletwriting · 5 years

Text

Killervibe Fic Week Day Seven: Fairytale

Word Count: 7.3k

Notes: This is so late I’m not even sure if I can consider it a part of fic week anymore, but I worked way too hard on this to let it go to waste. It’s 21 pages on Google Docs. It’s my longest fic for fic week. I’ve been working on this one for a while, so I hope you guys enjoy!

Warnings: guns, bullets, description of a gunshot, bullet wound. Cisco says fuck. like. exactly one (1) time. It could be a PG-13 movie.

Tags: @thatkillervibe @shakesqueer-writes @narniasfinestavengingsociopath

~~~

They call her Killer Frost.

Cisco had heard the stories since he was a child. They told of a woman who was supposedly born from the ice, her body as old as the Earth itself, her immortal feet walking amongst the dirt and snow since the dawn of time. Her eyes have seen humanity rise and fall, her ears have heard the sobs of mankind, her fingers could either bless or curse with just one touch. She wasn’t a god, for people did not worship her. Rather, she was nature. She was the beauty of the snowy forests in which she lived. She was the harshness of blizzards and the delicacy of snowflakes. She was the calm before the storm, and the damage left behind once it’s gone.

Growing up, Cisco and his brother Dante would always ask to hear those stories again. Killer Frost fascinated them. Their mother would tell them the same story each night before bed, and each night they fell asleep in complete awe of the mysterious ice queen.

Both boys grew up wanting to be an adventurer. They played with sticks in their backyard and pretended to be fending off any danger that might arise. Dante got a children’s adventuring kit from his parents for his birthday one year, much to his younger brother’s dismay. Cisco stole that kit from him so many times that it became partly his, despite Dante complaining each time. The brothers once found a stray cat in the woods behind their house, and they imagined it as a magical creature they had stumbled upon in their travels. They ended up befriending and adopting the cat, and Dante later brought the cat along with him when he moved out.

When Dante started his first ever expedition, his parents were overwhelmed in their support for their son. They told everyone that would listen about what a great adventurer Dante would be, and how they simply couldn’t wait to hear about all the amazing things he’d find. And their pride wasn’t misplaced. Dante Ramon became a remarkable adventurer, admired by many, and the well-deserved winner of a few awards. He was the first person to get close to Bigfoot. He discovered a ring of faeries and brought back pictures to show it. He befriended some dwarves in Russia. He slayed a hostile vampire and saved a city in the process.

It seemed that Dante’s great achievements became the topic of all of Cisco’s conversations with his parents. His brother did this, his brother did that. Dante’s name was his mother’s favorite word. She and Cisco’s father were bursting with pride and affection for their older son, while their younger son was lost in his brother’s shadow. The longer it went on, the more Cisco became aware of the fundamental truth: Dante could do no wrong, whereas he could do no right.

Dante got married to a beautiful girl named Melinda Torres. His mother cried upon receiving the news of their engagement, his father patted him on the back in congratulations. Cisco was best man, and he gave a speech in front of everyone, looking back on past memories he shared with Dante and commemorating how far he’s come to become the man he is today. Cisco was happy to be by his brother’s side on his big day, but he couldn’t help but feel a lingering feeling of jealousy deep down. Not because of the marriage itself, but because it was just one more event with his brother’s name in lights. One more gathering in which everybody was looking at Dante Ramon, adventurer extraordinaire. It was just one more opportunity for Dante to outshine him.

But then, two years later, they received the news that changed everything.

Dante had been killed by a pack of werewolves while on an expedition. His family had been told first, but the press found out in a matter of days. He had a funeral immediately. His family members, no matter how distantly related, came to say goodbye to the boy they had known and whose blood they had shared.

While Dante’s family weren’t the only ones mourning his loss, Cisco mourned the most out of them all. He looked back on his childhood memories and remembered all the good times the two of them had shared. Every laugh, every playfight, every smile. The hours they spent playing together as kids. Cisco even looked back on their childish bickering fondly. He had lost his only brother, his childhood playmate, his partner in crime, his best friend.

Except… Cisco lost those things a long time ago. They were all victims of his jealousy. Cisco not only mourned the loss of his brother, but he also beared the weight of his regret. He regretted letting his spite get in the way of his relationship with his brother. It was never Dante’s fault. Dante didn’t ask to be the favorite. He rightfully earned his praise. Now Dante was gone and Cisco was out of opportunities to reconnect with his brother, all because Cisco refused to let go of his childish envy when he had the chance.

Two months after Dante’s death, Cisco got a call from his mother asking him to meet her at his childhood home. When he got there, he found her sitting in one of the wooden chairs surrounding the dining room table, with a cardboard packing box on the table in front of her.

“Come, sit.”

Cisco sat in the chair opposite her.

He had about a million questions. Why did she want to meet him here? Why did she want to meet at all? What was the purpose of talking to him now, after all those years of not caring?

Despite all his questions, he only voiced one. “What’s in the box?”

“Open it.” She said. “See for yourself.”

Cisco did so. Upon opening the box, Cisco gasped, and took out its contents to hold it in his hands ever-so-gently.

“Dante’s adventuring kit. I haven’t seen this since we were kids.” Cisco said. “Where’d you find it?”

“It was in his room.” Mrs. Ramon spoke delicately, as if she was trying her best to stay strong despite her mourning. “Your father and I were going through his stuff and we found it. I thought it would be best to give it to you.”

He went through its contents. A cheaply made pair of toy binoculars, a cheaply made flashlight that ran out of batteries years ago and never got a replacement, a handbook on the many different kinds of fantastical creatures out there.

“I want you to have it.”

Cisco met his mother’s eyes with an incredulous expression, as if asking if she was sure. “You do?”

She nodded. “You loved that kit as a kid. You and Dante, always playing in the backyard, always asking me for more stories about noble adventurers. You should have it.”

“I couldn’t. It’s Dante’s.”

“He isn’t here, mijo.” Her gentle voice reflected her own pain on the topic, but still she stayed strong. “Look, I know I haven’t been the best about encouraging your own aspirations like I did Dante’s. I’m sorry about that.”

The apology took Cisco off guard. He wasn’t sure how to respond at first. Does he tell her “It’s okay”, even when it’s not? Does he tell her about all the times in his youth he cried into his pillow because he knew he would always be second-best? Did it take Dante dying for his parents to remember they had a second son?

He decided against it, telling himself that his mother apologizing was a good thing, because it means that maybe the future will be different. So, instead he simply smiled.

“Thank you.” He said. “I appreciate the apology.”

“Are you still planning on becoming an adventurer?”

Cisco shook his head. “That was a long time ago.”

“You should.” She said. “It was your dream. You and Dante alike. Don’t give up on that now.”

“I dunno,” He sighed. “I don’t want to steal Dante’s spotlight.”

“You aren’t.” Mrs. Ramon met his eyes with a sincerity that he couldn’t explain. “Honor your brother by becoming an adventurer. Carry out his legacy. Finish what he started.”

Cisco furrowed his brow. “What do you mean?”

“What was the one legend that you and Dante always admired? The one that Dante dreamed of finding for himself, but never did?”

His eyes grew as the realization dawned on him.

“Killer Frost.” The words came out as a soft exhale.

Mrs. Ramon nodded. “Continue Dante’s life’s work. Find Killer Frost. Be an adventurer not in spite of Dante, but to remember him.”

“Are you sure I’ll have what it takes?”

“Of course you will. You’re my son.” She said. “The Ramon family needs an adventurer. I may not have supported you as much as I should’ve, but that changes now. I will encourage you every step of the way.”

A smile grew on Cisco’s face.

“Thank you.”

Mrs. Ramon walked around the table to brush Cisco’s hair behind his ear and place a soft, motherly kiss to his forehead.

“I believe in you, mijo. Go show the world what you’re made of.”

And so, with that, Cisco started his career as an adventurer. He started off small and built his way up. In the first year, he searched forests for elves and faeries, ventured out into the sea in hopes of finding mermaids, visited Nessie’s lake, and even found a wild griffin. Meanwhile, on the side he researched as much as he could about Killer Frost. He visited libraries and read ancient books about her. He discussed the myths with locals who live near places she’s supposedly been sighted. He’s looked up everything he can about every alleged sighting. The most recent alleged sighting happened about ten years ago and was told by a man named Bartholomew Henry Allen. Cisco grimaced. That’s an unfortunate name. He looked up Bartholomew in hopes of interviewing him for more information, only to discover that Bartholomew had died a few years back. He was killed by a man named Eobard Thawne. Cisco grimaced again. That’s an even more unfortunate name.

It wasn’t until the December of Cisco’s second year being an adventurer that he decided he was ready to start tracking down Killer Frost.

He gathered information from various alleged sightings in hopes of pinpointing possible places Frost could be. She stayed in snowy biomes, ones with thick forestation, natural wildlife, and high elevation. There was one place that had all of those things. Far up north were taigas covered in snow, with high steeps of rock in which many natural caves could be found. He figured that was his best bet.

So he camped. He packed his travel backpack with all the compact packing methods he had taught himself growing up, so that he could fit everything he needed into one large backpack. He bought a compact tent that folded itself into the size of a small purse, and he attached that to the bottom of his backpack. He knew a trick to fold entire outfits into compact rolls as to fit more into smaller spaces. He was sure to pack lots of winter clothes as well as miniature heaters and heating pads to prepare him for the biome. He brought food that wouldn’t go bad and that he could prepare easily without any extra equipment. He carried a knife for self-defense, and so that he could hunt animals in the case that he ran out of food. He made sure to wear silver jewelry to protect him from werewolves. After losing his brother to them, he wanted to be safe.

With that, Cisco embarked on the expedition that would change everything.

Days and nights blurred together. Cisco brought along a handheld notebook and a miniature pencil, and he logged each day he spent in the forest, or else he would’ve lost track. He adjusted to his camping life after his first week, and it got easier from there. When Dante was alive, he would tell Cisco stories of his expeditions, and he’d talk about how hard it was to live out in the wilderness for long periods of time. The past year had been consisted of a ton of time in the wilderness for Cisco, so now he finally understood what he meant.

One morning, Cisco was inside his tent when he heard foosteps outside. He reminded himself to stay calm, and assured himself that it was probably just a deer. He grabbed his knife and held it out defensively, and prepared to open the tent flap and run out. He purposefully kept his breathing calm and slow, so that the animal outside couldn’t hear it. He ensured that he was still wearing his rings of silver and a silver chain around his neck, and then he opened the flap.

The second he did, he screamed.

It wasn’t a deer. It wasn’t werewolves or a bear, either. It was a woman.

Her hair was white as snow. Her lips were frozen and pale. She had no blood running through her veins, no heartbeat to keep her alive. Her skin was a ghostly color with a light blue undertone, like ice personified. Her eyes were a piercing white, as intense as the eyes of hawks but with the harsh cold of the Antarctic Ocean. And yet, they were staring at Cisco with fear and surprise and intrigue, all at once.

There she was.

The lady from the myths, the woman Cisco had longed to see in the flesh, the reason for this entire expedition, standing right before him.

Killer Frost.

In Cisco’s head, the moment he saw Killer Frost, he’d be gasping in awe at her beauty, recording this incredible sighting down in his notebook, never to forget it. He definitely didn’t imagine himself holding the tent flap open with one hand, holding his knife in the other, staring her in the eyes, and screaming his head off.

Cisco’s scream startled Frost, who was already greatly on edge. She started screaming as well, and she held her hands up defensively, her palms facing Cisco, conveying that she was ready to shoot ice blasts at Cisco at any given moment.

Cisco never thought his greatest achievement would be standing in front of one of Earth’s most majestic myths while they were both screaming at the top of their lungs.

Once Cisco registered that it was Killer Frost and not some scary werewolf, he shut his mouth and cut off his scream, but his mouth was only shut for a second before he opened it again, this time gaping at her in surprise. It was Killer Frost. The Killer Frost. The very being he had hoped to see.

He dropped his knife and it clattered to the ground. He didn’t mean her any harm. His mind was still processing. The wheels in his head turned as he stared at her, half-expecting it to all be a dream.

For an ice queen, she was gorgeous.

“What’re you doing here?!” She snapped. Her voice didn’t sound human. It sounded like ice and wind and harsh blizzards and deadly winters.

“I, uh-” Great. Cisco’s first words to the great legend Killer Frost and he stammers. “I came here to see you. I had heard the stories about Killer Frost and I wanted to see you for myself.”

“I see.” She glared at him, as if she hadn’t just been screaming with him a moment earlier. “Leave now, and I will spare you.”

“I don’t mean you any harm.” Cisco raised his hands in surrender. “I promise.”

She scoffed. “You humans are so alike. You all say the same things, and they’re all lies.”

“I’m not lying.” Cisco assured her. “Here, I’ll show you.”

He gently kicked his knife out of the tent and it landed softly on the snow next to her feet.

“That’s my only weapon.” He said. “Now it’s over by you. If I were to reach for it, you could stop me.”

Frost slid the knife behind her using her foot. “That was reckless. What’s to stop me from killing you?”

There was a certain smug twinkle in his eyes. “Trust.”

She raised an eyebrow at him.

“You’re a very strange human.”

Cisco laughed. “Believe it or not, I get that a lot.”

~~~

The sun was beginning to set along the west horizon. A fire crackled and danced before them, putting on a show of red and orange, burning the wood underneath it and forming a thin stream of smoke above it. They heard calls from a distant owl, but they couldn’t see where it was hiding. At one point, Cisco saw a white hare jump into a bush, and he smiled and commented on how adorable it was.

Cisco had invited Frost to stay at his campsite. She didn’t respond, but the fact that she still remained even hours later gave Cisco his answer. After Cisco had gone through so much to find her, the last thing he wanted was for her to leave. Plus, she made surprisingly good company.

“You hurt yourself.”

“What?” Cisco furrowed his brow.

Frost pointed to a spot on his ankle, just above his shoe, where he had a few scrapes. They were enough to draw blood, but still, hardly an injury. They were already starting to heal.

“Oh, that.” Cisco waved his hand dismissively. “I walked too close to a thorn bush this morning and it scraped my ankle.”

She laughed. Her laugh was icy and inhuman, and yet at the same time, surprisingly warm and genuine. “Humans are so fragile.”

“I guess we are.” He shrugged. “I never really thought about it. What about you, then? Do you not get injured?”

Frost shook her head.

“Huh.” He said. “That must be nice.”

Cisco reached over and grabbed his backpack, and started rummaging through it. He pulled out a whole bag of granola, and started eating fistfuls of it straight out of the bag. Frost watched him with a raised eyebrow, her piercing eyes studying him up and down with an inquisitive look.

“What’s that?”

“Granola.” Cisco tilted the bag in her direction. “Want some?”

She shook her head. “I don’t eat.”

“Can you?”

Frost furrowed her brow. “What do you mean?”

“If you chose to eat, would you be able to?”

“I… guess so.” She said. “Why?”

“Do you want to try?”

Still a bit startled from the offer, she hesitantly took a handful of granola and placed it in her mouth and began to chew. She made a face of disgust a few moments later, and spit it out onto the snow.

Cisco couldn’t help but laugh. “Not a fan, huh?”

“It tastes bad.”

“Well, not all foods taste the same. If it’s the taste you don’t like, then you can try something else.” Cisco reached into his bag and pulled out some beef jerky he brought. “Here, try this.”

She took the piece that he offered her and bit into it. She chewed it hesitantly at first, then slowly warmed up to chewing it at a faster pace, then swallowed. She ate the rest of the strip in a matter of seconds.

“Yeah, that’s way better.” She said. “What’s it called?”

“Beef jerky.”

“Huh.” She blinked. “Eating is kinda fun. What else do you have?”

“I have lots.” Cisco zipped his bag open completely and started rummaging through the contents. “I have apples, raisins, dried peaches, cereal, energy bars, instant noodles, instant rice-” He cut himself off when he accidentally knocked his wallet out of his backpack. “Oops.”

Frost picked his wallet up off of the snow and brushed it off. “What’s this?”

“My wallet.” He zipped up his backpack. “It holds money and other important stuff.”

She opened it out of sheer curiosity, and pointed to the picture on the inner flap. “Who’s that?”

“My brother, Dante.” Cisco said. “He died about two years ago. I’ve kept his picture in my wallet ever since. It’s my way of remembering him. Well, that, and becoming an adventurer.”

“You became an adventurer to remember your brother?”

He nodded. “Dante was an adventurer. I’m continuing his legacy.”

“Legacies.” Killer Frost scoffed. “I never understood that about you humans. Live your own life, not your brother’s.”

Cisco faltered, unable to think of a reply. She hadn’t said much, and yet her words carried meaning. Cisco recalled a saying he heard once, “a life lived for someone else is a life wasted”. Frost’s words reminded him of that saying.

“Has anyone ever told you you’re very wise?”

“I don’t exactly socialize with humans much.”

“Right, of course.” Cisco said. “Have you ever had conversations, like this, with a human before?”

She didn’t respond. It wasn’t the first time Frost had stayed quiet when Cisco asked her a question she didn’t want to answer. She was selective, one moment she’d answer any question Cisco asked, and then, radio silence. He didn’t necessarily blame her, but it was a bit frustrating with how unpredictable it was.

“It’s getting late.” She said. “Doesn’t your body require sleep to function?”

Cisco nodded. “It’s the curse of being mortal.”

“Get some rest, then.” Frost stood up. “It’s time I left anyways.”

“Hey, Frost?”

She turned to face him.

“I’m glad you spent the day with me.”

Frost met his eyes with a certain… regret. Worry. She hesitated for a moment before simply nodding and walking off without saying anything.

~~~

The next day, the sun shined bright as Cisco walked across the padded snow, calling Frost’s name at the top of his lungs. He had ventured into the woods trying to find her, to no avail.

A white weasel heard Cisco’s voice and dashed into a bush.

“Hm.” Cisco stopped walking and turned to stare at the trail of footprints he had left behind him. “If I were a beautiful immortal ice queen, where would I hide out?”

He decided to search for caves. He walked along large rock precipices, searching for any openings he could find.

Eventually, he found one. It was a smaller cave, maybe about seven feet in height and eight in width. It was dark, and the pathway stretched around the corner, so if Frost was there, he couldn’t see her.

“Frooooost?”

The word echoed.

He walked further into the cave, and turned around the bend. He didn’t have to walk far. Right past the bend was a smaller round portion of the cave, about the size of a small hut. There she was, sitting with her back to the rock. She saw Cisco and her eyes widened to twice their size.

“Hey, Frost.” He held up his bag of beef jerky. “I brought some beef jerky.”

“What’re you doing here?” Her voice rebounded against the cave walls. Cisco could’ve sworn he felt the cave shake. “Go away!”

The harshness in her tone took Cisco off-guard. All he could do for a second was stand and blink. “Oh, I-I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to intrude-”

She flicked her hand and a wall of ice grew in between her and Cisco.

“Leave.” Her words were muffled from the ice, and yet still powerful. “Now.”

He did so.

~~~

Cisco stared at the roof of his tent. He had put up a small camping lantern the night before, and although he had turned it off, he hadn’t bothered it to take it down, even though it was morning and the tent’s walls were thin enough to let the natural sunlight through. He had wrapped himself up in a thick heat blanket and zipped up his sleeping bag so that it completely covered him, and yet he was still cold. He was eating from a bag of almonds, and was simply dropping them into his mouth from above. He missed a few times, and they fell onto his pillow instead.

He had been awake for over an hour. He had moved around and gotten dressed and started his day, but he came back to his sleeping bag when he got cold.

Although he tried not to, he couldn’t stop thinking about his last interaction with Killer Frost. The fear in her eyes, the anger in her tone. The wall of ice between them.

Did he just blow his chances of ever seeing her again? Does she hate him now?

Cisco shivered, despite the three layers he was wearing. He pulled the blanket closer to his face and curled up for extra warmth.

“Cisco?”

The voice came from outside his tent, but it was not the location of the voice that got Cisco’s attention, but the person it belonged to. Her voice sounded icy and yet soft, inhuman and yet gentle. There was only one person it could be.

Cisco crawled out of his sleeping bag and unzipped the tent.

“Frost?”

She was looking at him with a level of awkwardness that he never would’ve expected from a majestic immortal being. It was almost off-putting.

“Can I come in?” She asked.

He nodded, and so she did. Cisco zipped the tent back up, and Frost sat down with her hands in her lap. Unfortunately, her presence only made Cisco’s tent colder, so he got the blanket and wrapped it around his body again.

Frost opened her mouth to speak, but a few seconds of hesitation passed before words came. “I got you these.”

She opened her hand and revealed a few berries. They were coated in a thin layer of frost, but edible.

“They’re Fayeberries.”

“Whoa.” Cisco gently plucked them from her palm and held them in his hand. “I’ve only heard about these in books. Do they really taste like your favorite meal?”

Frost nodded.

Cisco let the frost thaw and plopped one in his mouth. “They taste like my mother’s enchiladas. Cool.”

“I wanted to apologize.” She looked as if the words for difficult for her to say, but she spoke them anyways. “For how I acted.”

“I just want to know why.” Cisco kept his voice even. “Did I do something wrong?”

“No.” Frost shook her head. “No, not at all. It’s not you.”

“Then what is it?”

“You’re human.” She sighed, frustrated with herself. “And I didn’t want to make the same mistake twice.”

Cisco furrowed his brow. “What does that mean?”

She hesitated. “Do you remember when you asked me if I had known a human before?”

He nodded.

“The answer is yes.” Frost said. “It was about a hundred years ago, give or take. His name was Hunter Zolomon. He came into this forest, plentiful as it was back then, and he found me. We talked, and for a moment, I was starting to care for him.”

“What happened?”

“The next thing I knew, there were fifty humans crowding the forest trying to find me and take me away from this forest.” Frost said. “Hunter had told them where I was. He didn’t care about me, he only wanted recognition amongst the other humans.”

“That’s awful,” Cisco’s words came out as a soft whisper.

“After that, I was convinced that humans were liars.” She said. “When I met you, I was hesitant. But you, you’re different. Honestly, the moment you tossed me your knife and made yourself vulnerable… that’s when I knew you weren’t Hunter.”

“I’m not here to hurt you.” Cisco said. “And that’s a promise. I know some humans are awful, but I’m good on my word, I swear.”

“I realize that.” Frost said. “You’re a very strange human, Cisco. And I want to get to know you.”

Cisco couldn’t help the grin that was forming.

“In return, I promise to stop holding stuff back.” She said. “You can ask me anything.”

“Alright,” Cisco thought for a second. “Do you have a name? I mean, besides Killer Frost.”

“No.” Killer Frost said. “Names are a human concept. I am nature. The humans have come up with several names for me over the years. Killer Frost is just one of many things they’ve called me. The Greeks called me Khione. I was quite fond of that one.”

“I read about that.” Cisco said. “The name ‘Killer Frost’ came from harsh winters.”

Frost nodded. “I am everything ice is. The beauty of it, and the danger.”

“Did you used to be human?” Cisco asked. “Like in Greek mythology, when humans were turned into gods?”

She shook her head. “I was never really born in the way you humans mean it. I was formed from icicles. I’ve always been like this. I don’t age, I just am.”

“Alright, one last question.” Cisco said. “Does this jacket make me look cute?”

Frost erupted into icy laughter.

“You’re cute for a human, Cisco.”

Cisco found himself blushing. Why was he blushing?

~~~

Frost frequented Cisco’s campsite often after that day. They talked daily, as they were the only ones keeping each other company in the vast icy forest. She invited him into her cave, and they could sit and talk, away from the biting cold of the forest. They would light a fire for when Cisco got too cold. Frost had no need for warmth, but she liked admiring the bright colors as the flames danced back and forth.

“One of my favorite memories from when I was a kid is sitting by the fire on a cold winter day and drinking hot cocoa that my mom made.” Cisco said. “Campfires kinda remind me of that.”

“What’s it like, growing up?”

“Uh, I don’t really know how to explain it.” Cisco scratched the back of his neck. “It’s something so normal that you kinda take it for granted. You can look back on your memories from when you were younger, but you can’t remember things from when you were super young. Like, no one remembers anything from when they were a baby.”

“Why not?”

Cisco shrugged. “Your longterm memory doesn’t start until you’re two or three or so.”

“Humans are such a weird species. You need to eat and sleep to live, you grow up, and you don’t even retain all your memories.”

He laughed. “I guess it’s weird, when you put it like that.”

“I’ve been alive since the start of humanity.” Frost said. “Humans have such short lives compared to that.”

“Well,” A smug-yet-silly grin grew on Cisco’s face. “You don’t look a day over 30.”

“Huh?” Frost furrowed her brow.

“Nothing,” He shrugged it off. “It’s a joke.”

She smiled.

“Sometimes I wonder what it’s like to be human.” She admitted. “I wish I could experience that, even just for a day. I get curious too, after all.”

“Maybe you can.”

Frost furrowed her brow. “What do you mean?”

“I have a hat and a scarf in my backpack. I could give you my bushy coat.” Cisco said. “We could disguise you enough to pass you off as human. Then maybe we could find a local town. Explore a bit.”

“Really?” A smile started to grow on her face. “You think it would work?”

Cisco nodded.

“There’s a town not too far from here.” Frost said. “If we leave in the morning, we could walk there.”

“Then it’s a plan.” Cisco met her eyes with an uplifting smile. “Tomorrow, you get to be human for a day.”

~~~

They had tied up all of Frost’s hair in Cisco’s beanie. Cisco had gotten the thickest scarf he had brought on the trip and wrapped it around her neck, propping it up so that it covered the bottom half of her face. He had an extra bulky coat which he had her wear, partly to cover the paleness of her skin, and partly because it would be suspicious to not wear a coat in this weather.

“Here, I have contacts.” Cisco dug into his bag and brought out a box of them. “They’re the disposable kind, so you can wear them.”

Frost held them in her hand. “What do you do with these?”

“Put them on your eyes.” Cisco said. “It’s always tricky to do it for the first time. Here. Hold your eyes open.”

He took the contacts and gently placed them on her eyes for her.

“There you go.” He said. “I don’t have a mirror, or else I would show you how human you look right now.”

“Wow.” Frost exhaled, creating a soft puff of swirling snow. “We’re really doing this.”

“We’re really doing this.” Cisco nodded. “Just don’t be suspicious, and don’t let anyone look at you too closely, and you’ll be fine. I’ll be with you the whole time in case you need me to cover for you.”

“Thank you, Cisco.” Her eyes practically melted with gratitude. “It means a lot that you’d be willing to do this for me.”

“Of course!” He said. “We will, however, need a fake name for you. I can’t exactly call you Frost when we’re in the town.”

“Do you have any ideas?”

Cisco thought for a moment. “Caitlin.”

She laughed. “Why Caitlin?”

He shrugged. “I dunno. It was just the first thing I thought of. Besides, I’ve always liked the name Caitlin.”

“Alright then.” She said. “Caitlin. It’s a nice name.”

“Caitlin Snow.” He decided. “Because you represent ice and snow.”

“Wouldn’t that be obvious?”

He shook his head. “Nah.”

When it was time for them to head out, Cisco put on a thick coat of his own and gave Frost a pair of gloves from his bag to hide her hands.

The walk didn’t seem like long, not to Cisco. They say time flies when you’re having fun. Sure, logically, the town was quite a ways away from Cisco’s campsite or Frost’s cave, but Cisco got caught up in telling Frost about his childhood memories that he didn’t even notice. He would tell her funny things that Dante used to do in middle school, and Frost would laugh in that way she always does, the laugh that always made Cisco’s heartbeat race.

“There it is,” He spoke when they were close enough to see buildings. “Here’s your shot at being human for a day.”

It was a pretty small town. The buildings were old and plain, and overall unimpressive. Wooden signs hung above the doors in order to differentiate one building from the next, because otherwise they were identical. Snow blanketed all the rooftops in the town, including the small well in the town’s center. Windows showed families inside, cuddled up next to the fire. Women were knitting, men were drinking, children were playing.

“So this is humanity.”

“This is a very, very small slice of humanity.” Cisco said. “But, yes. It’s humanity.”

They walked further into the town and discovered a snowman outside one of the homes. It had children’s gloves as its hands, implying that a child made it, maybe on their own, maybe with the help of a parent or two. Its coal smile seemed to be welcoming them into its home.

“What’s that?” Frost asked.

“That’s a snowman.” Cisco said. “Have you never made a snowman before?”

Frost shook her head.

“Huh, imagine that.” Cisco whistled. “You literally are snow, or at least the embodiment of it, and you’ve never made a snowman. Here, we need to rectify that.”

Cisco pulled Frost off to a corner of the town away from the buildings, and started packing up snow to roll in a ball.

“See, you get something like this…” He rolled it along the snow on the ground, demonstrating it for Frost. “And then you roll it until it’s big enough to be your base.”

“Or you could do it the easy way.”

Frost waved her hand, and a flurry of snow emerged from her fingertips and wrapped itself around Cisco’s attempt at a snowman base. It grew, and grew, and grew, until it was about the size of the base they saw on the other snowman, and oh-so-perfectly round. She made the torso and the head with two more perfect circles, and the buttons and facial features were made out of chunks of ice. It was the most flawless snowman Cisco had ever seen.

“That works too!”

She shrugged. “Magic makes things convenient.”

“Y’know,” Cisco said. “Since I’m holding snow anyways, there is another time-honored tradition for having fun in the snow.

“What is it?”

Cisco tossed the lump of snow at her.

“Snowball fights.”

The snow erupted across her face, causing her to explode into her usual icy laughter.

“Yeah?” She asked, still laughing. “How about this?”

She twirled her finger and created her own snowball from scratch, which she grabbed and held in her hand. She made playful eye contact with Cisco and smirked. There was a mischievous glint in her piercing white eyes as she threw the snowball at him.

“You got it!” Cisco grinned, brushing the snow out of his hair. “That’s the essence of snowball fights.”

“Humans have so much fun.”

“Really?” Cisco asked, confidence twinkling in his eyes. “Then how come I have the most fun when I’m around you?”

Frost blushed a shade of light blue.

“Here,” He fixed Frost’s scarf for her. “Let’s go see what this town has to offer.”

They found a pub nearby, indicated by a worn-down wooden sign with faded letters that were hardly readable anymore. Cisco held the door open for Frost, and the two of them walked in.

The pub was full of townsfolk. There were big, burly men with brown beards drinking beer at the far end of the bar, and they all turned to look at Frost and Cisco when they walked in. Frost gulped and stared at her feet. Cisco laid a reassuring hand on her shoulder.

Cisco sat at the bar and gestured for Frost to take the seat next to him.

“Do you want a beer?”

Frost furrowed her brows. “What’s that?”

“It’s a human drink. It tastes awful and it messes with your brain, so you legally have to be 21 to drink it.”

“Then why do people drink it?”

Cisco shrugged. “No idea.”

He ordered a beer for himself.

“I get the feeling that people are staring at me.” Frost muttered. “I’m not used to it, and I don’t care for it.”

“Trust me, I’ve been there.” Cisco said. “Frankly, I haven’t seen a single person in this town that isn’t white, and that isn’t a very good look.”

“Do you think they can tell that I’m not human?”

“Nah. Humans are very good at seeing what they want to see. They’re just staring because we’re not townsfolk.” Cisco said. “And besides, whatever happens, I’ll be right by your side.”

“Thank you.”

Soon enough, the bartender slid Cisco’s beer to him. He took a few sips and turned to Frost.

“You wanna try some?” He offered.

“Um… okay.”

She took it from him and held it in her hands ever-so-delicately. The stares of the townsfolk sent chills down her spine. Closing her eyes as to tune them out, she hesitantly raised the glass to her mouth and went to take a sip.

“Oh, no.”

The dread in Cisco’s voice concerned Frost. She opened her eyes, and gasped.

As soon as her lips had touched the liquid, it had turned to ice. And the whole pub saw.

She turned to Cisco. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to-”

Cisco didn’t have time to reply. The men who had been sitting at the other end of the bar were now drilling holes in Frost’s spine with their glares. They packed a lot of hate in one look. Frost looked more terrified than Cisco had ever seen her before. They stood up, and grabbed guns from holsters at their waists that Cisco and Frost hadn’t noticed previously.

“Fuck.” Cisco muttered. “Run.”

They scrambled out the door. Cisco grabbed onto Frost’s wrist and kept running. He turned behind him and saw the men from the pub following behind them.

He felt his heart pounding in his chest. “Oh, god.”

Not fast enough. An ear-splitting gunshot sounded in the air, and Cisco felt dread sink in his chest. The bullet flew through the air and perfectly hit Frost’s chest… then it kept going, leaving Frost unharmed. It was as if the bullet had gone through a cloud.

“You’re immune to bullets.”

She nodded.

He let out a sigh of relief.

“Thank god.” Cisco said. “Okay, let’s get out of here before-”

Too late. By the time they heard the gunshot, the damage had already been done. Cisco’s breath hitched, cutting off his words as he fell onto his knees, clutching his now-bloody gut.

“Cisco!”

More bullets flew through her head as she bent down to Cisco’s side. He was still breathing, but he was badly injured. She picked him up, flicked her hand and created a wall of ice between her and the men, and ran as fast as she could.

She ran far away from the town, all the way back into the woods. She surrounded herself with trees and bushes, and every so often she tossed ice blasts behind her with one hand to ensure she wasn’t being followed. The further she ran, the more her fear solidified, and the more her eyes welled up with tears. They streamed down her face, but she didn’t care. When she was sure she was far enough away from the town, she collapsed onto her knees, and laid Cisco down in front of her.

“I’m so sorry, this is all my fault, I wanted to go to the town, I blew my cover, I- I- I’m so sorry-”

“Hey,” Even when he was fighting the pain in his gut, he still managed to look at Frost as if she was the only thing that mattered in his life. “Don’t be sorry. I’m glad-” He winced. “I’m glad I met you. You… you gave my life meaning.”

“No, no, no-” If she had a heartbeat, it would be pounding. “This can’t be the end, it can’t be-”

An idea popped into Frost’s mind. Her eyes widened, and she looked at Cisco with newfound hope.

“I can save you.” She said. “I can make you immortal. Like me. But you have to be okay with it. There’s no going back. There’s no going back to your human life once I do it.”

Fighting the pain, he reached out and grabbed her hand.

“Do it.”

She nodded.

Frost leaned down and softly, lovingly placed a kiss on Cisco’s lips. The moment the contact happened, Cisco’s lips froze over and turned a shade of blue. His hair transformed from its usual black into a white that matched the snow his head laid on. His bullet wound froze over and healed instantly. He let out a soft exhale, the last breath he would ever need to take. His heartbeat stopped in his chest, and his body heat dropped to freezing temperatures. He wasn’t alive anymore, but he wasn’t dead, either.

He opened his chilling white eyes and sat up.

~~~

They call him Frostbite.

Children heard the stories. They told of a human who won over Killer Frost’s favor enough for her to make him immortal in the last second of his life. He walks with Frost side-by-side, hand-in-hand. They are equals, they are lovers, they are partners in crime. They were not gods, for people did not worship them. Rather, they were nature. They were the beauty of the snowy forests in which they lived. They were the harshness of blizzards and the delicacy of snowflakes. They were the calm before the storm, and the damage left behind once it’s gone.

They were not married, for their bond was much stronger than marriage. They were soulmates, through and through. And, as long as snow and ice existed on the Earth, so would their eternal love.

#killervibeweek19 #killervibeweek #killervibe #the flash #killer frost #cisco ramon #caitlin snow #fairytale au #did you guys pick up on all of my references to the canon #bc I'm actually pretty proud of myself for those #there are the obvious ones like Eobard Thawne or Bartholomew Allen or Hunter Zolomon or Caitlin Snow #but then there's more subtle ones #like when I said Killer Frost was born from icicles because on the show her dad's alter ego is named Icicle #I'm actually pretty proud of this fic. I worked rlly hard on it #it's probably my favorite of all the ones I've posted for Killervibe fic week

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