#it’s for the gift exchange so I think I’m a bit extra scared the person who it’s for won’t like it

[prisonpodcast]

Silly little guessing game of am I being overly critical of myself or is it actually bad 🤡

[x-childish-x]

Valentine’s Day Mystery Special! Part 3

How They Would Spend Valentine's Day With You!

Request: No

Warnings: Swearing, fluff

Word Count: 1243

A/N: Day Three! Here it is! The Mystery Valentine's Day Special! It's basically a brief list of some head-cannons of what spending V-Day with these characters would be like (from my opinion). SORRY THIS IS LATE MY COMPUTER DIED LMAO! Characters who receive their own special are not included on this list. Another reminder that requests are still open but will not be posted until after 2/15. However, you can send in a Valentine's Day request and I'll do my best to post it with the specials! If you would like an extension of any of these, send in an ask and let me know! I hope you enjoy!

Part Three: X-Men

Kurt Wagner

(gif not mine!)

Shyest person ever. Oh my god, so shy and awkward. He would be so shy that you almost didn't become his valentine, even if you were dating, because he was way too afraid to ask. And gifts? Oh god, for gifts he'd get so shy he'd probably teleport away by accident and then reappear and ultimately startle you from how quickly he disappeared and reappeared. He'd immediately begin to apologize about scaring you and about a "bad gift" because you'd have tears in your eyes. But the tears would be happy tears because Kurt would put literally SO MUCH time and effort and thought into your gifts. It'd take you a while to reassure him that they were indeed happy tears and not bad tears. Kurt loves you so much but he'd still be so shy and awkward about the whole day.

Warren Worthington iii

(gif not mine!)

Listen, I love Warren but he would be so full of himself. He likes Valentine's Day but mainly because it means that he gets chocolate and he gets you to spend the full day with him. He'd get you a stuffed animal and some candy/chocolate, he'd wanna watch a movie with you and probably would ask you to make dinner. You'd both share a lovely dinner but, overall, Warren's not the most romantic guy. He's the type of person who's into Valentine's Day for like two hours and then it's just another regular day (and he's not necessarily wrong). However, despite all this, he would spend the day making sure you understand that he loves you dearly and he appreciates you. You mean so, so much to him for giving him a chance after the whole Apocalypse thing, so he would definitely want you to understand your special and he loves you so much.

Erik Lehnsherr

(gif not mine!)

ROMANTIC. Oh my... I can't even begin to explain how secretly romantic this man is. Erik loves you, and I mean he loves you, and he 100% uses the excuse of Valentine's Day to flaunt it. He would wake you up with breakfast in bed of your favorite breakfast foods and he'd give you your favorite flowers and your favorite sweets. Erik would definitely pamper you the whole day and he would not be an ounce of shy about giving you gifts. He'd just be so happy to give you stuff. You'd watch a movie together and then he'd make you a gorgeous, candle-lit dinner. Of course you'd end the day taking a bubble bath together and he would be the freaking cheese to leave a trail of rose petals. Erik is the definition of romantic himself, so I have no doubt that he would love Valentine's Day for the sole purpose of getting to have an extra reason to spoil you all day because, "You are perfection and therefore, you should feel like perfection."

Logan Howlett

(gif not mine!)

Bless his heart, bless Logan's heart, but he definitely lets his ego get in the way. He'd definitely try to act all manly about the day because he doesn't like Valentine's Day that much. He would think flowers aren't manly so he'd get you some chocolates and something you'd been asking for for a long time, maybe he'd even make you something. Logan loves you more than he could ever actually express but he's just not the most romantic person, seeing as his past relationships never ended that well. Logan would definitely be watching some sports game and you'd kiss his cheek before getting up to like, refill your drink or something and this is when his guard would fall. He'd snatch your wrist and be like, "Where are you going? You're not leaving are you? I'm sorry I've been so.." and you'd just smile and raise your glass, quickly refilling your drink before coming back to sit beside Logan only to be yanked into his side and have a kiss placed to your temple as he'd mumble, "Love you so much, bub."

Wade Wilson

(gif not mine!)

Wade loves Valentine's Day so much. He'd get one of those corny Valentine's Day shirts and wear it with so much pride, and you can of course expect him to have matching Valentine's Day socks. You though? Oh you can bet your ass you are forced to stay in bed or on the couch. Wade barely even lets you lift a finger because, you're his queen and "Queens let their Kings serve them." He would get you anything and everything you wanted. Candy? He bought you enough to last you years. Flowers? You don't even have enough vases. Jewelry? You don't have enough body parts. Your first Valentine's Day, it took you maybe two hours to realize he was purposefully going over the top because... it's Wade. But you know his intentions are all good because holy fuck he loves you so much. However, when night comes Wade would literally get so flipping kinky with you because... again... it's Wade. One last thing, there's a 99.9% chance that Wade didn't even ask you to be his Valentine, he probably just demanded it.

Hank McCoy

(gif not mine!)

Hank is... well he really has no opinion on Valentine's Day. He doesn't dislike it but he doesn't necessarily like it. As for your date/gift exchange all I can say is picnic. Picnic, picnic, picnic, picnic! I can't stress this enough, Hank would take you on the cutest picnic you've ever been on. Like, it'd be next to some beautiful waterfall or on some hill with an outstanding view, but it'd be so cute and so neatly packed. He'd definitely be shy about giving gifts but would love the tiny squeal you'd left out when he'd hand you your favorite candy and something you'd mentioned a few times but not enough to suspect he'd actually paid attention. Hank is shy, so naturally he'd just want to spend the day appreciating you and making you happy. You'd be laid back in his lap, taking in your surroundings and Hank would mumble, "I'm truly the luckiest guy in the world."

Alex Summers

(gif not mine!)

This boy loves Valentine's day, can't express it enough. He full-heartedly believes that the mansion needs to be decked out in decorations, every single year. Alex is definitely not the most romantic person but he tries so hard to be romantic and his efforts definitely work. Not only would he get you chocolates and candies and flowers but he'd definitely be the person to get you balloons and a card. He would put so much thought into the gift because he'd definitely make it all into a little gift basket with all the gifts and the card would definitely bring you to tears.

Scott Summers

(gif not mine!)

Scott pretends to hate Valentine's Day but everyone knows he loves it. He loves seeing you smile and hearing your laugh. I touched a small bit on Scott in the Peter special. Definitely gives you flowers, and he would go more off of which flowers smelt the best rather than which were the "prettiest". Scott would totally get you chocolates and your favorite candy but he'd get you like those Lindt Lindor chocolates or Sees Candy. I feel like Scott would leave the whole day up to you. If you wanna watch a movie, sure! Which one? If you want to go out to eat, sure! Which restaurant? If you want to go exploring, sure! Where to first? Scott literally finds joy in seeing you happy so I think he'd just spend the entirety of Valentine's Day trying to make sure that you're as happy as possible.

[everlarkficexchange]

Written by: @alliswell21

Title: One of Us

Prompt 145: She moves in with her aunt and uncle when her parents dies in a small town. After suffering through trama, Katniss slowly starts to get better with the help of her family (aunt, uncle, cousin) and the Mellark brothers. But when things starts happening to her and the people around her, it’s revealed that she and almost everyone in the towns are apart of the werewolf pack and that one of the Mellark brothers is her mate. #werewolves [submitted by @animekpopxx]

Rated: G for general audiences.

Tags: Canon Divergent!AU; Modern with a dash of Supernatural; Grief/Mourning; Feeding as a Language of Love.

Note: This is my final submission to this year's EFE challenge! Yay! I really am grateful to @xerxia31 and @javistg for their continued support of this fandom and for hosting once again this event. You are such amazing people, and I’m absolutely honored to be part of a community with people as amazing as you two are! Thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for keeping EFE alive!

@animekpopxx, thank you too! You feed my muse! And you give me Werewolves!!!!

This story was a bit of rushed job, though, and there’s more of it, I mean... we haven’t seen them turn into wolves yet!!! 🤣 I just didn’t have time to edit the complete fic before the deadline, but if you’d like to read the finished product, keep an eye out for it on AO3. I’m fairly sure the rating will keep, but we will see.

 Kpkpkpk

There’s nothing but the sound of crickets and frogs filling the vast darkness of the night.

It’s another moonless night out here in Panem… or is I like to call it ‘the middle of nowhere’. It’s weird, how dark nights feel here, there’s barely a start peeking tonight, but in a strange way, I like it.

Sitting on my aunt and uncle’s porch to watch the infinite dark ahead while listening to the nocturnal critters it’s about my favorite thing to do… it’s what did used to do when we came here for long summer stays, anyway. He used to say he felt at peace and relaxed, connected with nature. Too bad it took him to be gone, for me to appreciate what he meant by that. So every night I come out here and sit in the steps hugging my knees, staring at nothing but the deep, black night surrounding the cabin, whisking my dad was sitting next to me.

Tonight is different than usual, though. It was raining until recently, and the smell of wet earth is so familiar my chest feels tight and my throat is knotted.

“Petrichor, Katniss,” I mumble the words noiselessly, “is the smell of rain, hun. It smells the same everywhere in the world.”

I lean my chin on my knees, wishing I could go back to feeling numb like when my parents just died. But thinking of the word petrichor, while smelling the thing, is bring forth a plethora feelings and memories I don’t know how to handle.

Dad used to love Scrabble, crossword puzzles and trivia challenges. He tried to get me interested in those games, teaching me words and their meanings, every time he had a chance.

I wish I had been more enthusiastic about learning the darned stuff; it would’ve meant an extra moment spent with Dad, and less regret to feel right now.

An involuntary whine leaves my chest. It hurts to think about it, and not for the first time, I dig my nails into my skin to keep myself rooted in place, and not tear running into the void.

I feel like I’m spiraling out of control, I fear this time something will break in my head and I’ll do something crazy, like scratch my skin away and run wild into the woods, like a beast… but the overwhelming thoughts gets halted when I hear soft noises from out in the distance.

It’s like the crunching of footsteps on the gravel at the mouth of my aunt and uncle’s property. It’s too dark and isolated here, deep into the country. I’ve seen big wildlife roaming around: deer, raccoons, coyotes and even a lynx. But the longer I hear the noises, the more certain I am I’m being stalked by something big and fast.

My heart beats erratically in my chest; every hair in my body stands on point, fear is clawing its way up my chest and into my throat, my eyes feel about to pop from my skull, and then I’m disentangling my knees from my arms, standing up as tall as I can— which isn’t saying much—and then I call into the night, “Who’s there?!”

I hear a faint disturbance of air, and then…

“Good evening, Katniss!”

Slowly, from the shadows, a blonde head pops, eerie for a second. Broad shoulders follow, and then a torso. Before the rest of his body comes visible into the light of the porch, two more blonde heads come into view, flank the first person on either side: Shoulders, torsos, Jean covered legs… The three Mellark brothers make their way leisurely towards me.

I nearly faint from relief after the rush of adrenaline pumping in my veins. Going through so many emotions: grief, sorrow, dread and relief, so fast in such a short amount of time has left me winded and unsteady.

I lose my balance, but one of the boys— Peeta, the youngest— breaks ranks, and rushes to hold me upright.

“Are you okay?” He asks softly, helping me sit back down on the porch steps. I lean my head against the main post.

“I’m okay. Just a little lightheaded,” I try not to glare. They gave me a fright, but I doubt they did it on purpose.

It’s something I’ve learn over the years. People in Panem are kind of quirky.

“Sorry we scared you,” Peeta offers, sheepishly. “We wanted to check up on you, and bring you something…” he looks up at his two older brothers and Rye — the middle one— steps forward, holding up a brown, paper bag, with little greasy spots on the sides.

I can guess what’s inside. They’ve been bringing me cheese buns almost daily, since Peeta found out they’re my favorites.

Rey hands the baggie to Peeta, and the latter offers it to me with a soft smile.

“Thanks,” I mumble, gratefully. I can smell the cheesy, yeasty treat through the bag; I can feel the warmth of the buns too! “While I love freshly baked cheese buns, you guys didn’t have to make this trek just to bring me a treat… on a dark, moonless night no less,” I fix them with a glare. “How did you even get here anyway? You couldn’t have walked and I never saw a car coming?”

My aunt and uncle’s cabin is at least 4 miles from town, and surrounded by woods; but then again, most houses in this weird little place are built in similar locations. It seems the townsfolk take their privacy extremely seriously.

“We rode our dirt bikes,” chimes Rye in, cheerily. “Not much light on those bulbs, though, but it’s okay. Our night vision is prime!” He gives me the A-Okay gesture.

“Rye,” the eldest, Bannock, warns lowly. Baring his teeth.

Rye shrugs and slips his hands on his Jean pockets.

I swear Rye hisses something like “it’s true” under his breath, but Peeta has been rubbing my back with the tip of his fingers all this time, and I’m getting drowsy, so I may have imagined the whole exchange.

“You should eat those while they’re still warm,” Peeta murmurs close by my shoulder.

I nod, and open the bag, releasing all the delicious smells of the buns, while Peeta massages my shoulders, encouragingly.

I must be really out if it tonight, because outside of my family, I’ve never been comfortable with people touching me… but, my family is all gone now, and I can’t go through the rest of my life without human touch, can I?

Grief stricken me out of nowhere, and barrels through me. I gasp at the acute pain in my soul at the loss of my parents. But in an instant, I’m enveloped in strong, thick arms, warm and steady. I’m sobbing into a hot, solid chest, covered in the softest cotton I’ve ever felt.

“Shush… I’ve got you, Katniss. I’m here for you,” Peeta whispers soothingly into the crown of my head.

He smells so good; like cinnamon and dill, from the bread he must’ve made this afternoon at his family’s bakery.

It takes a few minutes for me to get a hold of myself, and embarrassedly push out of his embrace, “I’m sorry,” I mumble, mortified.

Bannock presents me with a handkerchief, and I take it gratefully to wipe off my face and nose, before returning the soiled square of fabric to him.

I’m not sure why the Mellark brothers are being so nice to me. I’ve never been around them more than a handful of days over the past few years, when we came to see Dad’s remaining family outside mom and I, his half brother, his wife and their child.

I don’t know the Mellarks all that well, but in the handful of weeks since my parents’ funeral, the three brothers have been incredibly attentive and generous to me. Peeta more than the other two, but I don’t mind… I like him best anyway.

“It’s okay to cry and be devastated, Katniss.” Says Bannock, sagely. “You’re going through the worst time of your life, and we care for you… like family.”

“Oh,” I sit straighter, blowing my nose. I feel a little strange hearing him say that, “thank you? I appreciate your kindness,”

He nods, “Peeta’s right, though. You should eat the cheese buns before they go cold.”

“A full stomach always helps me feel better,” Rye adds, patting his belly, and smiling at me.

My stomach growls, as if to show agreement. I am hungry. I didn’t touch my supper earlier. I pick up the bakery gingerly, and pretty much shove my nose into it. The steam curls out of the baggie, filling my nostrils with the delicious smells. I pluck out a bun and practically inhale it in a second; quickly followed by another one. My third cheese bun, I decide to savor, slowly.

The Mellark siblings just hang around while I devour my treats.

The front door opens just as I’m wiping my hands on my leggings. My aunt’s head peeks out of the door.

“Oh, why hello everyone!” She greets, as bubbly as always. She’s wearing a dark purple wig, to match her dark purple outfit.

“Good evening, Effie,” says Peeta, standing from his squatting position next to me. “We brought Katniss a gift,” he points at the now empty bag in his hand.

“How sweet of you, Peeta!” my aunt gushes, “thank you for checking on our girl, and making sure she’s put something in her tummy before bedtime!”

I roll my eyes. Aunt Effie keeps treating me like a kid. I hate it. I’m 17 and mourning, not a freaking baby!

“It’s no problem at all, Effie! We were just on our way home anyway.”

“Well, it’s always nice having you boys over,” she offers, “but it’s getting late, and Primrose is already in bed, which is why I came out here to begin with, to let Katniss know that her sister was already asleep, so she’d know to tip toe back inside when she was ready to go to bed herself,” my aunt smiles.

I feel a slight pang of guilt; I’ve been wallowing in my own sadness this evening, and missed tucking my sister in to sleep. She’s the only person I’m sure I love, yet tonight I’ve let my own misery drown me.

“Don’t mind us, Effie,” Says Bannock, “We were about to leave…” he pauses and then calls a meaningful, “Peeta?”

“I’m going to wish Katniss a good night, and then we’ll go,” he says.

Not for the first time, I wonder if Peeta has a crush on me? I wouldn’t know he did, even if I wasn’t feeling so rotten inside. I’m not very good at flirting… but with Peeta it is different I think. He’s so nice to me, he’s taken up asking if I’ve eaten that day and if I haven’t, he feeds me something from his family’s bakery without charging me… it’s like he actually cares for me and my well-being, and his brothers care, because he does. It’s mesmerizing at times.

Peeta looks me in the eyes, “Are you ready to go inside?” He asks, offering his two open palms to me. He helps me up from the floor, and then smiles sweetly. He doesn’t let go of my hands while we stand facing each other.

Then something strange happens. Peeta doesn’t blink, as his clear-blue eyes bore into mine, and then his pupils blow out full, until only a ring of deep, glowing azure remains for his irises, “Sleep well, Katniss,” his voice sounds deeper and warmer than usual, “Rest and have a relaxing, dreamless night. Remember what I said: we are all here for you, to help through this hard time… alright?”

I feel groggy, “Yes, Peeta,” I mumble feeling my eyelids getting heavier.

“Oh dear, can you please instruct her to walk herself to bed? She might look lithe, but I promise, her little body is as heavy as any of us,”

Huh? What’s aunt Effie going on about? I don’t understand.

Peeta chuckles, squeezing my hands warmly in his, “You heard Effie… don’t fall asleep until you’ve gone into your bedroom and change into comfy pajamas.”

I nod, “Okay,”

“Good night, Katniss, I’ll be back tomorrow. Try to eat something on your own, I know you’re sad, but you need your strength for when the solstice comes.”

What a weird thing to say! Everything is strange here though… so I nod and march inside the house, mumbling my good nights to everyone and rubbing my very sleepy eyes. Once I’m in my sleep clothes, I lay in bed, and try to ignore the yearning of having Peeta rubbing my back like he was doing while I ate my cheese buns.

I sigh and go to sleep, a weird thought pops into my mind: “I’m so lucky to have such a sweet, caring mate. Peeta Mellark. Can’t wait to be bonded with him,”

[alienheartattack]

To All Of Us, From 2000 Years Ago

I got so mad about 139 and the leaks that I banged out my own 3000+ word ending to the manga today. Please keep in mind that this is a non-shipping story. Although I’ve exclusively written Rivamika before, this is not a Rivamika story, and although there’s an Eren/Mikasa scene at the beginning. there is no relationship between them, only the implication of feelings that are not quite reciprocated. I also threw some Levi fan service in there because why the hell not?

CW: There are references to and non-detailed descriptions of rape in this story.

You can also read this on AO3!

"You know what you have to do," Eren says. Mikasa pretends not to hear him over the rush of the little creek they're sitting by so he says it again, louder.

"I know," she sighs. "Even now, knowing that you've done something so unforgivable, a part of me doesn't want to."

"You're a good person, Mikasa. You'll be even better without me."

She snorts a laugh. "I've killed people, too. Just not as many as you did."

"You always had the weirdest sense of humor." Eren puts an arm around her, presses a kiss to her cheek. "I'm going to miss it." That's what finally brings him to tears, the thought of not seeing Mikasa again. Or Armin. Or Connie, or Jean, or Captain Levi, even the rest of them. He's had plenty of time to accept that he'd die at nineteen, was always going to die at nineteen, but now that the moment has arrived he wants to hold on just a bit longer.

Mikasa doesn't cry, at least not the way he expects her to. Tears stream down her face but she doesn't sniffle, doesn't sob, doesn't rage or scream the way she’s done in the past. He sees them both, Mikasa the girl and Mikasa the soldier, perfectly coexisting in the inky blackness of her eyes. She has made her decision. She made it before she even stepped into the mouth of the Titan.

"Kiss me one last time," Eren weeps. "Please."

"Okay," she nods, cupping his face with one hand and leaning in close. "See you later, Eren."

When Mikasa pulls away from his lips, the deed is already done. His severed head feels sickeningly heavy in her blood-stained hands. His eyes gaze beyond her, beyond the veil of this world, clouded with the knowledge of the void. The Titan around her begins to disintegrate in plumes of white steam. Mikasa swears she can smell wildflowers.

"Mikasa Ackerman," a girl's voice echoes. Mikasa whips her head around, looking for the source of the sound. Someone seems to materialize from the steam, swirling eddies of smoke coalescing in the form of a small girl, scraggly blond hair falling into her eyes, barefoot in a dirty white dress. Her face is blank, her eyes downcast.

"Ymir," Mikasa says, the name forming in her mouth before she can think of it.

Ymir nods, then points to Eren's head. "You loved him. Why did you kill him?"

"I had to."

"Why?"

"Because some things are more important than my love." Ymir stares blankly, seemingly confused. "The millions of people who died are more important. The world is more important. Besides, what kind of person would I be to stand beside someone who could slaughter so many people so senselessly?"

"You… don't love him?" The little girl blinks quickly, white lids snapping over black eyes. Something about it seems inhuman, wrong somehow. Mikasa cannot help but think of insects.

A tear falls from her face and lands on Eren’s, snaking a trail down his cheek as though he'd shed it himself. "I can never forget what he did and I don't know if I'll ever be able to forgive him for it, but I'll always love Eren."

"You wouldn't die for him?"

Mikasa answers without hesitation. "Never."

Ymir's gaze snaps up to Mikasa's, and she feels sick from what she sees in the girl's odd, dark eyes: a hunger, almost starvation, for the scraps of affection Karl Fritz would throw at her; a longing to be treated well, to be fussed over and doted on and adored. Ymir would close her eyes and dream of a shining, beautiful man when the king held her down and fucked her, made her recoil, made her bleed, beat her when she cried out or complained of the pain. She carved out a space in her mind for him where she sculpted him into her ideal. Sometime between that first bloody night and the day the assassin's spear pierced her chest she invented a Karl Fritz out of whole cloth, a man whose cold entreaties and brutal assaults were proof of his undying love.

Mikasa sees these things from Ymir’s eyes, feels the bruises forming on her back, the tearing and bleeding between her legs, the rotted wine breath of Karl Fritz in her mouth.

"I would never have jumped in front of that spear," she says, more confident than she’s ever felt. "I wouldn't even have considered it." Ymir frowns, cocks her head like she's trying to understand. "You thought you were doing the right thing, but you protected a man who never loved you. You laid down your life for a man who forced your daughters to consume your body. He didn't even mourn you."

A flash of anger contorts Ymir's face. Her eyes dart around wildly, turning Mikasa's words over in her mind. "But he loved me," she insists.

"Did he ever tell you he loved you? Or did he treat you like a slave?" Mikasa's voice wavers at the word slave, at the memory of Eren screaming at her across that restaurant table; the moment her wall of denial came crumbling down. No matter what his plan was, it became clear that day that he would step on any of them to achieve it. She had no idea how true that assessment would become, millions of bodies crushed into the contaminated earth beneath the feet of Eren’s Titans.

She wonders if things would have happened differently if he'd just admitted once that he loved her.

"You are free," she tells Ymir. "You choose your own destiny. I am free, and I chose mine."

Ymir says nothing, her eyes luminous with tears, and then dissipates into the smoke. Mikasa is vaguely aware of the wavering steam around her, of Levi flying on Falco's back and pulling her out of the Titan's mouth before everything turns hazy and white.

She can see the scene from two thousand years earlier as clear as though she were there, floating above it all: the crowd come to see King Fritz's speech, the hooded assassin's arm pulling back, the tip of the spear glinting in the daylight. The assassin lets the spear fly, its arc perfectly aimed at the heart of the tyrant. His wife Ymir, older and slimmer than the girl Mikasa met but still with those same sad, black insect eyes, watches in horror as the tip of the spear flies closer and closer; but she does not move, not even when it impales her husband through the chest and the light in his eyes is snuffed out.

In time-lapse, Mikasa sees it all: the accession of Queen Ymir, wise and fair, and the moderate reigns of her three daughters, and their daughters after them. The power of the Titans remains within the royal family, passed down from mother to daughter, a shameful, secret birthright. They create diplomatic ties with other countries, offering succor and counsel, avoiding the path of war so as not to reveal their ultimate power. There is no Great Titan War, no walls, no telepathic manipulation. The world moves forward in fits and starts as it always has, small skirmishes and occasional wars, but the Eldians remain steadfast and committed to peace. Satisfied with Ymir's choice, Mikasa finds herself closing her eyes, opening them for the first time again in the year 835, in her parents' house just outside Shiganshina, as a new doctor pulls her into the world. He is not Grisha Yeager, she notes, and then she forgets who Grisha Yeager is entirely.

In the year 845, there is no Wall Maria for the Colossal Titan to breach, and no Colossal Titan to breach it.

Inside one of the cities in what was once Wall Rose, a history teacher writes notes on a chalkboard before his first class arrives for the day. He draws a crown in the middle of the board and writes the subject of the day's class inside of it: QUEEN YMIR THE WISE. The teacher is startled by a noise behind him; he turns to find one of his students, a shy girl called Sarah, taking a seat at her desk.

"School hasn't started yet," he says. "You're supposed to be outside."

"I'm sorry, Mr. Smith," Sarah replies. "I was looking at a really interesting bug and the other girls started making fun of me."

The teacher nods. "All right, just this once. If you’d like, sometime I could teach you how to stand up to those girls."

Hundreds of miles away, the forests of Dauper ring with the whoops of an exuberant girl, triumphing at having killed her first deer with a bow and arrow she carved herself. She doesn't care that she's scaring the other game away with her commotion, or that she has no idea how she'll lug a hundred-pound carcass all the way back home.

In Trost, a young boy lingers over his breakfast; not because he wants to miss school, but because his mother's omelet is the most delicious thing he's ever eaten and probably ever will eat. His mother ruffles his hair and pinches his round cheek, then gently chides him to eat faster or he’ll be late.

A little boy in Ragako District, a few inches shorter than his friends, demands another explanation of the multiplication tables. He doesn't quite understand the concept, goes blank when his friends try to explain arrays of rows and columns, but he believes that he can pass today's test if he tries hard enough.

Across the sea in Marley, the prosperous Eldian District is strewn with streamers, celebrating the 2000th anniversary of the assassination of the cruel King Fritz. The children have the day off from school and are gathering in the streets, purchasing candy and ice cream from vendor stalls and exchanging them as gifts to celebrate the sweetness of life. A little blond girl receives an extra coin from her father, who tells her to get something special for herself.

A few blocks away, a doctor fills his medical bag and sets off to see his first patient of the day. As he walks through the crowd of happy children, many of whom he’s delivered himself, he hopes that his only son will change his mind and join the family business.

In Mitras, a shopkeeper opens his door for the first time, pausing for a moment in the early morning sunshine to admire the wooden shingle hanging by his doorway, gently swinging in the breeze. It depicts a hand wrapped around a mug of tea, wisps of steam rising into the air above it.

The door opens while he's adjusting the canisters on the shelf behind the counter, making sure their labels face perfectly forward. His heart leaps at the tinkle of the doorbell. He picked the most musical one, the one that made him happiest when he heard it, and he feels very good about his decision.

"Hello, welcome to Ackerman Tea— Mom!" His voice takes on an adolescent whine when he addresses his mother, which makes him feel like a child and impossibly old at the same time, despite his twenty-six years.

"Did you really think I wouldn't be your first customer?" she asks, beaming. "Of course I'm going to come support my sweet boy." Her gaze sweeps over the shop, its walls painted a deep forest green, the mahogany counter polished to a mirror shine. "I'm so proud of you, Levi. You've worked so hard and it shows." Her voice quavers, her eyes filling with tears.

"Moooom," he trills, softer this time, quietly moved. Her presence feels like an auspicious omen, a reminder from the universe that someone will catch him should he fall. "Is there a tea you’re interested in, or would you like me to help you choose? We have more than thirty varieties."

"You've been practicing," his mother notes with a nod.

Levi shrugs off her comment, feeling a bit bashful that she’s noticed his hard work. "I've never been great with people, and this job is nothing but people. At least until I can hire someone to cover the counter while I blend tea in the back."

"You'll get there soon," she says, pulling a few coins from her purse. "Get me something you'd think I'd like."

He thinks for a moment, his brow furrowing in concentration, before his face lights up and he grabs a step-stool to reach a canister of black tea flavored with strawberry and rose. "This one is sweet and floral, but it becomes so much more when you add a bit of milk. You don't even need any sugar."

"Perfect. You even thought about how I take my tea." She places a few coins on the counter, watching her son approvingly as he scoops the tea into a bag, folds it closed with surgical precision, and ties a blue ribbon around it. "You're going to be a success, my love. I know it."

"That makes one of us," he smirks, then scoops the coins into his palm and puts them in the cash register, enjoying the feel of the heavy keys under his fingers, the spring-loaded pressure of the drawer. He hopes he gets to use it many more times today.

"Will you be home for dinner?"

"I should be. I can't imagine people will want to buy tea at night."

"Good," his mother says. "Because now that you're in business, we should talk about finding you a wife."

"MOM!" he exclaims, a furious blush coloring his face.

Further south in Shiganshina, Mikasa sulks as her mother walks her into town, not wanting to leave the safety of her parents' cabin to learn and play with the other children. She is perfectly happy to do chores on the farm, to learn the simultaneously mundane and arcane secrets of coaxing a plant from seed, to throw feed to the chickens and pull weeds in the garden.

"Mikasa, you're ten years old. Your father and I can't teach you everything," her mother says.

"I can learn from books. I don't need to go to school."

"The fact that you're saying that means you need to go. There's more to the world than just our farm, my sweet. You might want to see the world someday."

The little girl huffs. "I doubt it." Her mother simply shakes her head and smiles, ruminating on her daughter’s impending teenage years, a possible hint of rebellion, but finds that hard to imagine. Mikasa is usually a calm, easygoing child, though perhaps a bit too inquisitive and stubborn for her own good.

Mikasa hugs her mother fiercely at the school gate, watching as she turns and walks back up the road that leads to their farm. She’s excited to make new friends and learn new things, but she misses her home more than she ever thought possible. She lets out a soft sigh, then turns to face the crowd of running, yelling children; her new classmates.

She trudges around the grassy schoolyard, dodging groups of kids chasing each other or playing impromptu games. Everyone seems to know each other already; even if she did feel comfortable enough to go up to someone and introduce herself, she has no idea who to approach first.

"Hey! Give that back!" someone screams behind her. Mikasa turns around to see a small blond boy jumping up and down, reaching for a book that a larger boy dangles just above his grasp. The larger boy just laughs at him, taunting him with the book, threatening to tear it from its spine.

Mikasa frowns, balling her fists at her sides, then approaches the boys. "He said to give his book back," she says to the bully. "Give it back."

The bully laughs. "You think you can tell me what to do?"

"I think you should give the book back if you know what's good for you," she snarls, putting her hands on her hips. The bully laughs again and shoves Mikasa out of the way with one hand, making her stumble backwards, tripping over her own feet until she lands on her behind in the dirt. She gets up, dusts herself off, and runs up to the bully, punching him square in the nose. He falls to the ground, dropping the book. Mikasa tosses it to the blond boy. The bully grabs his nose, tears welling in his eyes, and lets out a wail when he sees his hand smeared with blood.

"You leave him alone!" Mikasa threatens, looming over the bully, her dark eyes shining. He scrabbles to his feet and runs away and she lets out a relieved breath, her heart hammering in her chest.

"That was amazing!" the little boy says. When he approaches her, she finds that he's not actually that small, only a few inches shorter than her. "I've never seen you before. Are you new?"

"It's my first day," she replies. "I've lived here all my life but I haven't been to school yet."

"I'm Armin," the boy says. "What's your name?"

"Mikasa."

"That’s an interesting name. Are you from Hizuru?" Armin asks, his eyes wide with curiosity. He holds up his book, a thick, leather-bound tome, A Brief History of Hizuru and the Minor East Sea Islands written in gilt lettering. "My parents told me that the whole country is built around a volcano. A big mountain filled with liquid fire! Well, technically it’s molten rock."

"My mom's family is from Hizuru, but I’ve never been there and I don't know anything about any liquid fire mountains," she says tentatively.

"It's real!" he gushes. "I'm reading about it now. I could tell you about it more at recess if you want. I like to sit under that tree over there." He points off in the distance, at a huge pine tree that shades a corner of the yard. "They're going to ring the bell soon, otherwise I'd tell you now. Volcanoes are so cool. Sometimes they explode and shoot the liquid fire into the sky like a firework."

"Wow!" Mikasa marvels with a smile. "I can’t wait to hear about them."

[chasseurdeloup-retired]

Something Seams Off || Irene and Kaden

TIMING: Current LOCATION: Sew La Ti Do PARTIES: @threadofheart and @chasseurdeloup SUMMARY: Kaden goes to Irene to repair his jacket and they have a snicker-snacker of a time. CONTENT WARNINGS: None

Kaden ran his hands along the leather jacket as he watched the signs of the stores along the street. He didn’t want to miss the repair shop. Clothing wasn’t usually precious to him. It couldn’t be, not as a hunter. Sure, he had to scrounge and save for new clothing back in the day, but any shirt or pants could get destroyed in the wrong monster fight. The best thing to do was usually patch it best as he could for as long as he could before tossing it aside for something else decent. But the leather jacket in his grip was different. This was a gift. Kaden had precious few gifts in his life that he held onto, at least not prior to coming to White Crest. Either way, if anything was worth taking care of, it was the jacket Blanche had given him. To the point he was careful not to wear it on hunts, at least not often. Sometimes it was hard to avoid. Still, he couldn't figure out where some of the holes in the piece were coming from. It didn’t make sense. Definitely beyond his skills to repair. Time to try a professional for once. He gulped before swinging the door open. He had to remember whatever the price, he was fine, he could afford it. Old habits were hard to break. “Hello?” he called out. “Uh, got a jacket that needs fixing. This is the place, right?”

After the online interaction with the owner of the leather shop, Irene was quick to research some tips on how to better mend leatherwork. Since it wasn’t her typical area of expertise, she wanted to improve on it in the event she had customers seeking that specific service. Scattered across her table were scrap pieces of leather she had practiced her stitching. Several of her poor needles already set aside and bent at odd angles. Just then, the jingle of the door chimes caused her to look up at the customer entering her shop. With a warm smile, she got up from her table and walked over to the counter. “Welcome, I’m Irene, and you’re in the right place. What sort of fixing does this jacket need?” she asked, her hands gently patting on the counter indicating for him to set down the piece. Upon brief examination, it certainly appeared to be well-worn, well-appreciated.

“Hi, nice to meet you,” Kaden said, awkwardly and a little stilted as he walked towards the counter. He had no idea what the protocol was in this whole exchange, it wasn’t like he’d ever done it before. Thankfully she took the lead and indicated where to place the jacket so after giving her a slightly startled look, he did just that. Right. Made sense, she had to look at it after all. “Uh, there are some holes in it. Weird spots. I don’t think I made them.” Then again, he got so many injuries and brushed up against so many various fangs, claws, and pincers it was hard to keep track of the damage after a while. “Not that I-- I mean, I work in animal control. With the WCPD. Uh, Officer Langley.” Which probably didn't matter. Why the fuck was he introducing himself? And why was he nervous about a damn jacket repair? “You probably didn’t need to know that or care. Just, yeah. Weird holes. Does it… You think you can fix this? Not to-- I just don’t know what can and can’t be saved. Usually don’t try.”

Irene’s expert hands were quick to search typical areas where jackets typically formed holes. The seams didn’t seem to be split but with some of the holes, she likely would have to reline a couple of spots so that any fixing wouldn’t look like a patch job. Her eyes narrowed as she continued to study the jacket. “Overall, this looks like it’s in good condition, but the holes are… a little strange,” she noted aloud. “Like you said, definitely in some strange places. If this were a weather or cotton piece, I’d say maybe moths or something, but I’m a bit at a loss as to the cause.” Straightening up, she let out a small sigh and another smile. After all, her job wasn’t to determine what caused this but rather how she would fix it. “Well, Officer Langley, this probably will take me about a week. I think I have similar thread and fabric to fix this up, though once I’m done, it’ll look brand new.” It was clear this jacket meant a lot to him; the stress emanating from him was hitting Irene like a wall of bricks, so she hoped her words could offer some relief. “And I could offer you a rough estimate as well if you’re interested.”

Kaden rubbed the back of his neck as he watched the woman work through what was going on with his jacket. Putain, he wasn’t normally this nervous about simple human interactions. Something about it being new, unknown, it left him unsure. “Yeah I didn’t think moths would go for leather, but a brow--” Merde. He caught himself before he started talking about fae and monsters. Barely. “I mean, yeah probably not moths.” He felt his stupid heart pounding in his chest over a stupid conversation with a seamstress. The fuck was wrong with him? Maybe he shouldn’t quit hunting. He clearly couldn’t handle normalcy. “A week? Is that-- I mean, sounds good. I’m not sure how long this would normally take. I’ve never had anything repaired before. I normally just throw away things once they get damaged but I guess if I did that you wouldn’t have any business so anyway this is, uh, new. For me.” He was certain she could tell without him saying shit. Her next assurance had him even more wide eyed. Shit, was he really that obvious? He didn’t think he looked poor. He didn’t right? Fuck, maybe he did. “A rough estimate? Oh. Yeah. That’d be good. To know. If you--” His brow furrowed as he cut his sentence short once more. This time it wasn’t just him not knowing how to speak like a normal person. Something was moving. His brows knit together as he looked closer at the jacket. “You’re not…” His eyes darted back up to her. Her hands were in fact not underneath the jacket. And yet it was wiggling. “That’s not you moving it, is it?”

Irene could feel the intensity of his emotions grow despite her telling him that the jacket could be fixed. Was something else worrying him? In the past, she had worked with clients who held incredible sentimental value to their clothing articles. Perhaps this was one of those instances. With a warm smile, she looked across the counter at the man. “This jacket must mean a lot to you if you’re bringing this in for extra care. I assure you that your jacket is in great hands with me, officer. You’re doing great,” she added lightly with a small chuckle. Grabbing a notepad and a pen, she scribbled a few quick notes about the current condition of the leather jacket and the exact fixes the officer was requesting. That helped her approximate the cost. Just as she was about to write out an estimate, his question caught her by surprise. “Hm? N-no, what do you mean?” she asked, her eyes instantly darting to the jacket to see brief movement. Shoot, did her shop have mice or rodents? “Oh goodness!” Without thinking, she lifted the jacket up, expecting to find some sort of critter there only to spot something… not quite exactly that or anything she had seen before. “What--” she jumped back in surprise, her eyes wide after she immediately dropped the jacket back down.

Kaden nodded a little along with her words. “I mean, sure it, uh, I like it and all. But it’s not that important.” Putain, why did he say that? What if that meant she was less careful with it now that she thought he didn’t care? “Not that-- I mean. Yes. Thank you.” Fuck, what if she was fae? And he just thanked her. And why did she have to reassure him that he was doing fine with a basic social interaction. Sadly, his ineptitude wasn’t the biggest disaster in the room. When she moved the jacket, out hopped a small rodent looking creature. Only it wasn’t a mouse or rat, no no. That was a snicker-snacker. No missing it. “Putain,” he grumbled to himself. “No wonder there were holes.” Out of instinct, Kaden reached for his knife in his back pocket, but his hand hovered and hesitated. Just long enough for the supernatural rodent to scutter off. Shit. But he couldn’t just stab the snicker-snacker right in front of her in her shop. He wasn’t the most experienced with social norms, but he was pretty fucking sure destroying shops with knives was frowned upon. He twisted and turned looking to see if he could find the creature. “Must have been in the jacket. Not sure how I missed that.” Had to have crawled in one night when he was hunting. At least he hoped that was the case. If he had an infestation in his apartment, well, he didn’t want to think about the destruction waiting for him at home. “Did you see where it-- there!” he shouted as he leapt towards a corner of the store, diving onto the floor, trying to clasp the rodent with his bare hands. It skittered just out of reach, running to the other side. Shit. He had to get it or else it could be bad news for her shop. It had definitely gone to the left. Only, when he glanced to the right, he saw it there, too. No, not the original one. There were two. “Uh. Think you’ve got a problem here,” he told her, trying to pick himself up off the floor.

If the rodent-looking creature scared Irene, the man pulling out a knife immediately caused the seamstress to shriek out of surprise and fear. But her attention was quickly drawn back to the thing that jumped off her counter and was not running around her shop. With wide eyes, she pulled her gaze back to the man as she tried to process just what had happened. Irene wasn’t normally one for any sort of judgment, but yes, how had this man conveniently not realize that something like that was burrowing his jacket? Before she could even respond, Irene toward the floor as the creature skittered across her feet to the man’s left. Another yelp escaped her lips as she jumped back in surprise. It was one thing for rodents to be scampering around, but she will not have them messing up her shop. Trying to think quickly, Irene grabbed a broom from the corner and glanced to the right and saw… another one. Confusion etched across her face. “Oh no…” she muttered quietly as she slowly raised her broom. Was this her weapon now or a poor decision of a shield? Who knew. “What are those?” she asked in a soft voice, hoping not to startle these creatures with any sudden noise.

This was a problem. One snicker-snacker was bad news. Two were exponentially worse. And for all they knew, there were more than even that. Kaden started to listen and look for any more signs of them, trying to keep his steps quiet as he ducked down to look at any and every corner. “Snicker--” He paused before finishing his answer. Saying “snicker-snackers” was going to make him sound like he was out of his mind, wasn’t it? And it wasn’t exactly keeping the supernatural a secret at that point either. Putain. “Uh, rodents. Mutated mice. I think.” That worked, right? “They’ll eat through just about anything so be careful.” This whole shop would be in bad shape if an infestation broke out. All the clothes and fabric would never last. He glanced over to see how she was holding up. Broom wasn’t a bad idea on her part. Shit, if only he had his work kit. No nets or cages on him now, unfortunately. “Got anything to trap them with? A basket. A bowl. Anything?” He saw a jar full of pins. This was a terrible idea. “Putain,” he grumbled to himself as he dumped the pins as carefully as he could manage onto the table he picked the jar up off of. “Sorry about that. I, uh, I mean looks like it’ll work.” He caught a blur of motion out of the corner of his eyes and leapt towards it, jar in hand. “Sweep it towards me! Corner it”

Irene watched the man move around expertly ready to attack. She clutched the broom tighter against her chest as her heart pounded loudly in her ears. “Snicker? Like--what, like the candy?” she asked incredulously. Her brow knitted tightly as she tried to keep an eye on even just one of these creatures. “Mutated mice. Wonderful. Thank you evolution,” she muttered under her breath as she took slow, quiet steps through her shop. Rodents weren’t something she was scared of; hell, she’d seen her fair share of very brave rats in New York. This? This should be a piece of cake, though she had no idea what sort of advantages these mutations gave these rodents. Her eyes quickly scanned the room in response to his request. “Uh… how’s this? Wait!” she called out, unable to find a suitable container before the pins were spilled out. Great. But she had little time to process that before she also caught sight of a dashing blur past her. Instinctively, she swept broadly with the broom, the bristles making contact with something, and a loud squeak seemed to indicate she must have caught the rodent. “Coming your way!” she called out as she made one swift broom push toward the man. “Well, that has to be one, right? Is that it?”

“Uh, sort of,” Kaden started. With how often he ran into the supernatural in this town, it was hard to remember how few of the residents actually were in the know. Code said to keep shit secret, he needed to try a little harder. As he dove, he slammed the lar over top of where he’d seen the blur. Only to catch something just to the left of him. Shit. He reached out with the jar again as she swept the lump towards him, capturing the creature underneath. “Got it!” he shouted, keeping both hands on top of the small jar, just in case. There was a sound of something splitting behind him. Putain. He kept one hand on the jar as he twisted to try and look behind him. A table leg had snapped in two and he was certain if they didn’t hurry, there might be less than three legs there. “Shit, shit, shit.” He was making a real fucking great impression here. He had to let go of the jar to get over to the other one. “Uh, do you have a book? Or a weight? Or something? And one more--” He paused. “Maybe two more jars. Just in case.”

Irene's stress levels increased, both from wanting these creatures out of her shop and from the fact that this whole instance was creating a giant mess of her shop. Had these things always been around this entire time? A hazard of her work she never considered before? As the man dove down, Irene held her breath until she saw that he had managed to catch something. “B-book? Um, goodness, I have uh I have a couple of binders of fabric swatches,” she said, frantically reaching for these from the desk in the back. And jars. Her eyes looked for a few more of those, all filled with things like thread scraps or buttons. The priorities now though was definitely in capturing these creatures, so she poured the contents out into an empty box and quickly returned to the man. And then she saw the cracked leg on her table. Oh goodness why was this happening. “I hate to bombard a customer with orders, but please get these things out of here before the rest of my shop is destroyed,” she pleaded.

This was not the first impression Kaden had planned to make. Granted, he didn’t start off on the best foot so guess he didn’t have much to lose. He’d shifted and let his foot rest on the jar while she went to grab more supplies to trap the creatures, untrusting of what would happen if he left it unweighted. He didn’t want to find out if the snicker-snacker could topple over the glass. At least it couldn’t eat it. Well, it shouldn’t at least. It wasn’t exactly wood or fiber. He looked down. Floors should be safe, too. Right, better get them out quickly. “Thanks,” he said, taking the book and the jars from her. He dumped the book on top of the makeshift snicker-snacker trap and hoped like hell it was enough to keep it there. Out of the corner of his eyes, he saw the little pest run up and back towards his jacket. “Oh no you don’t,” he said, diving towards it and yanking it away off the counter. The mutant mouse went spinning and flying in the air as the rug was pulled out from under it, but landed on its feet and scurried off. Merde. He’d have to be more careful.

Jars in hand and ready to pounce, Kaden tried to move quietly around to the back of the counter to see if it had landed back there. A flash of fur and horns darted out, squealing towards the table with three legs. “Not today, you little bastard,” Kaden said as he threw himself at the table, crashing into it, causing all sorts of odds and ends to go flying and clattering to the floor as he wrestled to get the jar on top of the creature. All he got was a spool of thread. Good thing she’d handed him two jars. He reached out with his left hand and slammed the glass down, praying he didn’t break it with his hunter strength and heard a squeal as the tail wriggled out from underneath the lip. If it were a mouse or a rat, he might feel a ping of remorse. But a snicker-snacker? He dug the jar down to the floor a little harder before the tail snaked its way back under the container with another squeal. “Got it,” he said, breathing heavily as he pushed himself off the floor.

Irene watched with astonishment as the man moved so expertly. Her eyes darted back and forth between the now-occupied jar and the precarious situation of her table. “Sure…” was all she managed to respond. With her hands now empty and the man chasing after the other “mutant rodents,” Irene’s attention honed onto the jar. She could hear the skittering of the creature, sounds of tiny claws scraping against the glass in an attempt to escape. Leaning down onto her hands and knees, Irene took a peek at the rodent inside, this snicker thing, and let out a small gasp. It looked like a mouse or a hamster but with horns. What the heck was in the White Crest water that mutated the rodents into something like this? Her thoughts were quickly interrupted by the sudden slam from the man, the sound of another jar crashing onto the ground and securing another creature in its confines. “O-okay, what do we do now? I mean, are we supposed to let these go out in the wild? Is there animal control for something like this?” And how dangerous were these things? So many questions ran through her head. Then her face paled lightly at the next thought. Did these need to be exterminated? Despite the trouble they brought, the idea soured her stomach.

Kaden brushed off his pants and arms after standing and taking a look at the chaos around the room. Putain. Not how he intended this to go. Couldn’t even have a simple interaction in a store in this goddamn town. “Lucky for you, I am animal control. Obviously not on duty right this second. Or else, you know, I’d be prepared.” He sighed and pushed his hair back into place. “They’re pretty destructive, as you can see,” he said, gesturing to the poor table. Shit. “Uh, I can, pay for that, by the way. I sorta brought them here.” No clue how he was affording that but tables couldn’t cost that much, right? Shit. “Reproduce exceptionally fast, too.” He reached up and rubbed the back of his neck. This was the worst part. People already had bad takes on animal control half the time. He’d been called an animal killer too many times for his liking. And it’s not like he could tell her these were clearly monsters and out himself. No one liked to hear about dead animals and he couldn’t blame them. But these weren’t sweet little mice, these were pests. Abominations. Capable of destroying full houses if left to their own devices. “For now, I’ll take them out of here. They’re definitely not adoptable, though. I’ll do a relocation out in the woods, though.” He hoped she would buy it. There was no way he was going to chance a snicker-snacker infestation in town.

It was the sudden calmness that stressed Irene out even more. Was this it? Were all of them caught in her jars? “You? You’re animal control?” Had he said that earlier before all of this happened? She couldn’t recall. A hand ran through her hair, the other hand almost resting against her damaged table before she spotted the broken leg. She quickly pulled back and sighed. At least that table was a hand-me-down from the previous tenant of the shop, and Irene had been hoping to upgrade to a more customized work surface. “Um, yea, th-thanks, I think,” she said mindlessly, unable to fully assess the severity of these creatures. “Like rabbits. Or rats. And I thought New York rats were damaging,” she muttered to herself. How did those things even scurry onto him and into her shop? “Right, your jacket though. If uh if you still wanted that mended, I can still take that on but I might need more time now because…” her voice trailed as she gestured to her mess of a space.

“Officer Langley, yeah. That’s me. Animal control.” Kaden almost felt like he should apologize for that fact. Almost. He did catch them, after all. “But yeah, like rabbits or rats. Only they’ll eat through your table legs. Uh, anyway, if you don’t mind, I’ll go get something more appropriate to transport them and come back.” He’d make sure  to bring a knife with him, too. Maybe a few extra cages in case more of them showed up in the interim. He was about to turn and walk out when his eyes shot back to the jacket, brows raised. Right. He almost forgot. “Oh, yeah. If you can. No rush. At all. Um, thanks, and,” he paused to look around the room, “sorry. I’ll be back soon.”

[magic-and-moonlit-wings]

Chapter 54: Angor Unleashed

Becoming the Mask

I did so much unnecessary research for casual bits of narration in this chapter. So much. So unnecessary. For example, I know a lot about tiger attacks now, and this story doesn't even have a tiger in it.

Bold italics are trollish, but I'm thinking of doing away with those and just noting the language used in the narrative. Let me know what you think!

+=+

While interacting with humans in India, Walt elected to put on a more American-sounding accent. He was out of practice with it despite his station in Arcadia, but the sheer number of American tourists should keep him from standing out in anyone's memory.

He was part of a tour group in Ranthambore National Park. The Inferna Copula kept tugging at his senses. Angor Rot was somewhere in the park. From the other sensations that were echoed through the ring, Walt guessed he was in one of the ruins, which the tourists were allowed to photograph from a distance but not permitted to explore.

The tour group left the park for the city of Sawai Madhopur, where Walt parted ways with them. He napped for a few hours, and then he left his hotel room, shifted forms, and flew back to the park. It was just over eight miles back to Ranthambore's borders. He had to stop and rest once he arrived.

He'd packed lightly. His satchel had two water bottles and some troll-friendly foods, which wouldn't spoil. His money and passport were pocketed on his other form. He'd paid for his hotel room up front, so, if the staff even noticed he wasn't there the next day, they would assume he'd left early for the next tourist destination.

Ranthambore was a mix of scrubland, rocky areas, water, and dense forest. Considering Angor Rot had been here for centuries without the humans finding him, he was most likely in one of the forested areas.

With the size of the park and the inhospitality of the terrain, it could take months to search without the Inferna Copula to guide him. Walt felt a bit stupid, though, playing hot-and-cold with a magic ring. He wondered if Jim ever felt this way when trying to puzzle out what the Amulet wanted.

As he expected, the ring led him into a forest, where he landed and continued on foot.

He kept an ear out for humans – if they got close enough to hear them, he ought to shift forms, so that if he were caught, he could play the lost tourist – but for the moment he stayed in troll form. Part of the park was a tiger reserve, and they were ambush predators, so if one struck while he was human shaped, he likely wouldn't have time to shift and save himself. Stone wouldn't smell like food to them.

Tigers were also nocturnal, so that risk was substantially lower now in the daytime, and healthy tigers rarely chose to hunt humans in any case, but Walt hadn't lived as many centuries as he had by taking chances with the risk of getting eaten.

He made his way to a stone building that had possibly once been a temple. There were skulls, both troll and human, around one side of the sagging brickwork steps. The troll skulls had oversized nasal openings that looked almost like an extra eye socket, and broken off stubs that had been horns. The steps inside seemed in better shape, and rotated out of sight.

The stairs led down into a chamber at approximately a right angle to the entrance. Properly inside, the architecture looked much more trollish. Trolls seemed to love working heads into as many design elements as possible. There were grotesques high on the walls shaped like troll busts, snarling faces with forward-swept horns and clawed hands holding onto their plinths, with chains drooling out of their mouth and leading to a pile of rubble on the floor.

Actually, when Walt squinted, those busts looked unsettlingly like Gunmar …

A twisted staff was propped up beside the stones in a pile of human skulls. The Skathe-Hrün, the Pale Lady's favoured channel for shadow magic, gifted to her Champion. More skulls were scattered about the room.

Why were there so many human skulls? There weren't any other scattered bones in the room. Where was the rest of each skeleton? If they'd been eaten by trolls, it was unlikely for the skulls to be left behind. Had they been set up to try and scare humans away from accidentally freeing the assassin?

Walt took the staff and began using the forked head to lever the heavy stone bricks off the captured troll. Angor Rot's tense position might be what was keeping him from being crushed; if the chains went slack while he was still under all this weight, the shift could cause the stones to fall and do more serious damage.

When he was half-unburied, Angor Rot breathed. Walt jumped and nearly went for a knife. The chained troll tried to move, but couldn't. He had a deep, but rasping growl. Was that his natural voice or a distortion from centuries of thirst?

There was another carving shaped like a troll head on the wall which was low enough to easily reach. This one had a crest of straight, radiating horns, and a lever in its mouth. Walt set the staff down, stepped away from Angor Rot, took a deep, fortifying breath of his own, and pulled the lever.

There was a rattling sound as the chains went slack.

Angor Rot stayed on the ground for a moment. The stones shuddered from his breathing. Halting, wavering, he pushed himself to his feet. The remaining bricks on his back clunked to the ground.

"Who has awakened me?"

"I have." Walt watched the pale troll snap the manacles that had bound his arms and legs. "Angor Rot …"

"You know my name. A shame I will never know yours."

Angor Rot picked up the staff and charged with a roar. Walt threw a knife, which Angor Rot batted away in mid-air, and raised a second knife to block the strike. Golden light flashed. Angor Rot stopped mid-blow, trying and failing to push his weapon down further. It was like watching magnetic repulsion.

"My ring!" he snarled. "My flesh!"

"I had hoped we could speak like civilized trolls," said Walt, "but thought it would be prudent to have some … insurance against attack."

Angor Rot stood down, scowling. Walt saw his eye twitch.

"I'd like to make a deal with you," the Changeling continued. "I understand you once fought against Gunmar."

Angor Rot said nothing, but from the way his grip on the Skathe-Hrün twitched, Walt has surprised him.

"I'm part of group who recognize Gunmar's escape from the Darklands – or, indeed, his continued survival – would not be in our best interests. Your prowess on the battlefield is nearly unmatched. In exchange for your agreement not to attack the current Trollhunter," he raised his hand to show the ring, "I return this to your possession. If you're willing to help us further – some bodyguard work, some magical assistance – we're a resourceful lot. We'll put those resources at your disposal to find a way to restore your soul to your body."

Angor Rot's eyes narrowed.

"You don't need to decide now." Walt got a water bottle out of his satchel and took a drink, then put it on a nearby stone ledge. "Have a drink." He pulled out the most perishable of the food he was carrying, dried meat, and left most of it on the ledge as well. "Think it over on a full stomach." He bit into the piece he'd kept for himself.

It took a moment for Angor Rot to reach out, but once he got started, he ate quickly. His hands shook and he seemed to be forcing himself to pause and chew, to take sips of water instead of guzzling it down. Survival training, Walt guessed; it wasn't safe to eat too much after a period of starvation.

"Who are you?" the pale troll finally asked.

"Waltolomew Stricklander. Strickler for short. My friends call me Walt."

+=+

That was … a suspiciously human-sounding name.

Angor's golden eyes flicked to the holes in the roof, and the sunlight peeking in.

"Changeling," he growled in realization. "You expect me to believe one of your kind would turn against Gunmar?"

"Several of my kind have turned against Gunmar," said the Changeling icily. "Once another option became available."

"An alliance with the Trollhunter?" Angor guessed, based on the Changeling's earlier proposed terms of alliance. "And if the current Trollhunter does get rid of Gunmar for you, how can they trust you not to turn on them right after?"

"There would be no benefit in that. The rest of trollkind will hardly welcome us back with open arms just because we realized Gunmar is selfish and short-sighted. We need the Trollhunter's status to give us a proper opening."

"Why would the Trollhunter help you?" Angor could see one striking a deal for information, as a one-time arrangement, but not a sustained alliance.

"Let's just say he has a … personal investment."

Oh. That math wasn't difficult to add up. Angor couldn't help but snort.

"Your lover?"

The Changeling started sputtering. Angor almost chuckled. The idea sounded like something out of those melodramatic tragic sagas his cousin had loved.

"Don't be disgusting," said the Changeling. Angor not-so-idly considered testing whether a thrown knife would still be repelled by the ring's barrier. "Jim's like a son to me."

Angor had been largely cut off from his emotions since having his soul torn out, other than brief flashes of anger or amusement or disgust.

That claim … hit Angor oddly. It made him feel something. He didn't know what it made him feel but he did not like it.

Well, no wonder the Changeling – Stricklander – was desperate enough to barter with Angor Rot, of all trolls.

Trollhunters, particularly Trollhunters Angor Rot had been sent after, had notoriously short lifespans compared to the average troll.

"… You have my word, that if you return my ring, I will not attack your Trollhunter." The Changeling held his soul, what else could Angor say? If there was the slightest chance that he could truly get it back –

"Excellent."

Unexpectedly, the Changeling took off the Inferna Copula right away and set it down on the same ledge he'd been putting food and water, then took a step back, clearly inviting Angor to take it.

"You would surrender your leverage so easily?"

"I believe in opening negotiations from a position of strength," said Stricklander. "However, I'm also aware of the risks inherent in lauding one's advantages over another. An ally attained through coercion is a betrayal waiting to happen."

There was probably a lot of history behind that reasoning. Changelings were supposed to be on Gunmar's side, after all, not the Trollhunter's. (Or at least, that had been the case when Angor was first trapped here.)

Angor didn't bother to press for details.

He picked up the ring. Unworn, it didn't repel him. He put it on.

His soul was not restored.

He could feel it – he could tell it was there – but it stayed stubbornly locked away. Angor growled and clenched his fist. The Changeling backed away.

It had been too much to hope that his soul would merge back with his body just from having the ring. Angor had suspected it wouldn't be that simple. It was still a bitter disappointment to be proven right.

But it was in his hands, now. For the first time in centuries, Angor Rot was under no one's command but his own.

Angor swung his staff at the Changeling. Stricklander blocked it with a knife and pulled another one from that ridiculous collar of his. Who kept their knives in a ring around their throat?

"Just testing," Angor rumbled. For all he'd known, the Changeling had the Inferna Copula elsewhere on his person and had given Angor back a decoy. The Changeling growled at him but didn't retaliate when Angor withdrew. "Now … explain your terms for a full alliance, instead of just mutual non-interference."

+=+

Jim preferred to fight with knives, but axe training was as common as poison training at the Janus Order, since axes and sharp-bladed shovels had always been relatively common compared to swords, making them an easy weapon to hide in plain sight.

He had picked out an axe in the Hero's Forge that roughly matched Toby's – though not enough to think they'd been made for dual-wielding – and he and Toby were running drills with them while Claire and Mary sparred nearby. Darci's target practice was considerably further to the side, and facing away from the rest of them, to avoid accidents.

Blue fog wafted in.

"Hold!" called Blinky and Jim at the same time.

"But I'm winning," Mary complained.

"What's that fog?" asked Jim. "It looks like that stuff in the Void – should we get out of here?"

"Our souls are free …"

The fog went around them all. It condensed into little lights, still leaving tiny smoky trails behind them, seeming to explore the Forge.

"Floating lights – these are pixies!" cried Claire. "Cover your ears and nose!"

"We can return to our brethren …"

"Wait," said Toby. "I don't … think they've noticed us." He reached out to touch one. Jim grabbed his hand before he could. "I don't think they're hostile."

"Finally …"

"We can rest …"

"Our souls are free …"

The lights circled the patch of the floor for the Soothscryer, spinning faster and faster until it came up, and then getting sucked into its mouth.

Darci said what they were all thinking.

"What the heck was that?"

"I guess I should … follow them?" said Jim.

"I have no hypotheses at this time," said Blinky, "but I do concur with Tobias. These new spirits did not appear to be hostile. Go investigate."

The Void did not appear more populated when Jim first entered it. If anything, it seemed a little emptier, since none of the ghosts had assumed their shape from life.

"Hello?" he called.

"Jim!" Araknak's voice greeted him. "Sorry, we're all a bit distracted just now. Angor Rot's victims have been freed!"

"Who?" was Jim's well-considered and articulate way of expressing congratulations.

Kanjigar spoke up next. "Trollhunters who lost their lives and souls to Angor Rot. These souls have finally been released, and are now free to return to the Void."

"Who is Angor Rot?"

"He was a hero, once," said Araknak wistfully. "But he went questing for magic and power, and lost his soul in the process, and turned on the trolls he'd sworn to protect. He's hunted Trollhunters before –"

"And no one thought to warn me about him?"

"To consume their souls –"

"And no one thought to warn me about him?!"

"Probably to try and fill the void of losing his own; but he was trapped by his final victim and hasn't been seen for over three hundred years. I suppose he must have finally died."

"Why is there a human in the Void?" asked an unfamiliar voice.

"There isn't," said Araknak. "This is my great-great-grandson, Jim; he's the current Trollhunter."

"Just because you adopted the fleshling doesn't make him a troll," the new voice mocked.

"First, he was a troll before that. Second, by a certain use of the word 'troll', it actually does." To Jim, Araknak added, "You should probably step out while we explain things to the new arrivals." Araknak's wisp expanded into a full-sized ghost and gave Jim a gentle shove, which landed him back on the material plane.

"So what's going on?" Toby asked eagerly.

"Blinky," said Jim, "have you ever heard of a troll named 'Angor Rot'?"

+=+

Previous Chapter (Claire and Not Enrique argue about his name)

Table of Contents

Next Chapter (The kids have a movie night)

Blinky canonically had to do some research to uncover who Angor Rot is, and we never do see him learning Angor Rot was anything but an ambitious troll who cursed himself by accident in a quest for power, so it doesn't make sense that in Season 3, Jim knew Angor used to be a hero. Here, at least, some of the Ghost Trollhunters remember it, and Jim has seen Angor’s name in a few history books he just doesn’t remember at the moment

I am not using the explanation for Angor's backstory presented in the spinoff novel Angor Reborn. In my version, Angor lost his soul before the Battle of Killahead, and was eventually imprisoned by one of the Trollhunters he was hunting, shortly before that Trollhunter died from the wounds Angor had inflicted during their fight. (This is outlined in The Epic Backstory, and yes, it will come up in the text of the story itself later.)

Angor's place of imprisonment being Ranthambore is trivia found in The Art Of Trollhunters.

[aadmelioraa]

Merry + Bright 

for @tsukkinami​‘s TLK Monthly Challenge: Osferth, Boxing Day, Lights, Affectionate (aka, Holiday Fluff with the Cookham Crew)

“D’ya know where my keys are, Osferth?” Finan shouts from the next room over.

Osferth trips over a pile of laundry that, judging by the number of black t-shirts, belongs to Sihtric and falls backward.

“Jesus, lad.” Finan bounds into the room and pulls him to his feet.

“What on earth is that?” he asks, gesturing to the box that Osferth is clutching to his chest.

“Nothing, just some things I need to drop off at the church. Father Pyrlig is collecting donations.”

Finan lifts his chin to peer into the box. “That’s the sweater I gave ya last Christmas.”

He’s right. It’s a particularly ugly sweater. “Yeah, well…I grew out of it.”

Finan laughs. “I won’t take offense. But ya’ve quite a lot of clothing there, ya sure ya won’t be wandering naked come laundry time?”

“I have more than enough clothes, thank you.” Osferth follows Finan back into the room he and Uhtred shared. “Do you have anything you’d like to donate?”

“D’ya think they’d accept my warm wishes, particularly for any young ladies in need?”

Osferth grimaces and wraps a scarf around his neck. “I don’t know that anyone would find that particularly helpful.”

read the rest below or on ao3

“Pity. I have a few hats in that drawer there, I only really wear the one.”

Osferth gingerly hands Finan the worn black beanie he’s not often without this time of year and adds the remaining hats to his donation box. Finan pulls the hat down over his ears with a grin.

“Now you’re telling me that you’re helping Father Pyrlig out of the goodness of your heart, and not, say, a desire to get closer to the cute girl with the braids I’ve seen ya making eyes at?”

Osferth meticulously folds the top flaps of the box over each other, making sure the envelope of cash tips from his restaurant job doesn’t get lost in the mess of textiles. “I’ve no idea who you mean.”

Finan laughs and shakes his head.

To be honest, he isn't too far off—except that Osferth and Willa have been dating for weeks now. He’s planning to bring her to the house and introduce her to everyone next term. For now, he’ll let Finan think he had the upper hand even though Finan himself is pining over a girl he’d spoken to about twice.

“You’re headed to the church now then?” Finan’s coat makes a slight jangling noise as he pulls it on. “Ah, found my keys.”

“Yes, they’re serving dinner in about half an hour.” Osferth glances at Finan from the corner of his eye as he puts on his own coat. “Eadith will probably be there, she’s been helping Prylig organize the donations.”

Finan pulls the corners of his mouth down and nods casually as if that information is virtually meaningless to him. Osferth chuckles into his scarf as they make their way down the narrow hall and into the kitchen.

“Where are you two headed?” Eahlswith asks from her perch on the counter. She’s licking icing off a spatula while Sihtric decorates yet another batch of sugar cookies. He’s bent over the slightly lopsided kitchen table wearing a thrift store apron, meticulously applying sprinkles. Sihtric, for what it is worth, is the only member of the house with anything resembling a normal, stable love life.

“Church supper,” Finan answers as if it had been his idea. “Sihtric, are ya going to take a break from that? You've been baking for half the day now.”

“He’s got to finish decorating before the icing dries,” Eahlswith explains, rolling her eyes, as Sihtric mumbles, “I’ve only got thirty seconds per cookie to make it look really good.”

Osferth snatches an un-iced cookie off the tray and pushes the whole thing in his mouth before Sihtric can stop him. “I didn’t take one of your fancy ones!” he says defensively as Sihtric throws a dirty look in his direction and picks up the piping bag.

“We’ll see ya soon, then?” Finan says to Eahlswith.

“We may still be here when you get back,” she sighs, picking up her phone. Sihtric waves a hand at them distractedly as they step outside.

The winter chill is refreshing after the stuffy sugar-filled air of the kitchen. Osferth shoves his hands in his pockets and bumps Finan with his shoulder as he catches a glimpse of Uhtred on his way towards them.

“Boys!” Uhtred calls with a grin. “I was just coming to find you. Finan, Eadith was asking about you.”

“Was she?” Finan asks, slightly more flustered than he probably would have liked to appear.

“Well, she asked where my mates were, I can only assume she meant you.”

Finan mutters something unintelligible under his breath as Uhtred and Osferth exchange an amused glance.

“I didn't know that you were allowed in church, Uhtred,” Osferth says, stomping one boot against the ground to keep warm. “Didn’t Father Beocca ban you for stealing the communion wine?”

“Yes, but in my defense, it hadn’t been blessed yet,” Uhtred grins. “I got roped into helping Hild clean, then she sent me to find you two…and where is Sihtric?”

“Finishing his cookie decorating,” Osferth says.

“He may be several more hours,” Finan adds. “There were nine types of sprinkles on the table when we left—they seem to multiply every time I turn ‘round.”

“The man has hidden talents,” Uhtred shrugs, heading down the street. “I’ll meet you back at the church, I have to drop something off at Gisela’s first.”

It’s Finan and Osferth’s turn to exchange a glance. Whenever Uhtred has to “drop something off at Gisela’s” they usually don’t see him until the next morning.

Uhtred ignores them, merely calling over his shoulder that he’ll return soon.

The snow begins to fall by the time they arrive at the church and carefully make their way down the side entrance into the basement.

Young priest Father Beocca and his wife Thyra (Uhtred’s older sister) had begun the Boxing Day dinner tradition four years ago on a whim. They’d invited all the students who remained in town during the holidays to dinner at their house on the 26th and in return asked for donations to local families in need, but by last year it had become such a popular event that they’d had to begin hosting it at the church. This year, several students had returned for the day after spending Christmas at home. It’s always a casual but comforting affair.

The basement room, which smells like freshly baked bread and Beocca’s famous lentil soup, is crowded with folding chairs and students who have gathered in small groups to sort donations into the designated bins. Osferth drops his box (and Finan) with Eadith and makes his way over to Willa and Thyra who are preparing the buffet. Willa gives him a quiet smile which he reciprocates as subtly as possible.

“Sihtric will be here with the cookies soon,” Osferth explains, hoping it isn’t too much of a lie.

Thyra smiles cheerfully and hands him a stack of mismatched bowls. “Set those out, won’t you?”

Osferth does, making note of how many more students were in attendance this year. The energy in the church basement is anything but cold and dim—Father Prylig has set up an artificial tree in one corner, and Hild and Mildrith are stringing some colorful lights up above the door.

“Better late than never, right?” Aethelflaed asks, appearing beside him.

Osferth glances down at the cheese board she’s holding. “You don't think that’s overdoing it a bit for this ragtag group?” he asks affectionately.

She laughs and set the platter down. “Maybe, but I didn't want the leftovers from Mum’s Christmas party to go to waste.” She begins to arrange toothpicks for serving, her brow furrowing just slightly. “I’m sorry you couldn’t make it, by the way. Maybe next year?”

It’s an awkward situation, trying to connect with a half-sibling you’d only known about for the past few months, but she’s doing her best.

“Yeah, maybe next year,” Osferth agrees.

She gives him a small smile and glanced across the room. He follows her gaze to where Aldhelm and Edward are arranging half a dozen mismatched tables into two long lines. Edward hasn’t quite adjusted to the idea of a half-sibling yet, so things are a little more awkward between them.

“He’ll come around,” Aethelflaed says confidently. Osferth wishes he shared her optimism, but he won't dampen her spirits.

“Oh, here—“ Aethelflaed offers him a small package wrapped in brown paper. “I was going to give it to you yesterday, but…” she trails off, a bit nervous—he hasn't seen her nervous before.

“It’s just something silly. You can open it later,” she adds, with a look towards Edward who now has his back to them.

“Thanks,” Osferth says, smiling widely, as he slips the gift into his pocket. “I didn’t get you anything—“

“Don’t worry about it,” Aethelflaed replies, eyes now fixed on Aldhelm who’s making his way over. “Next year.”

Aldhelm nods a greeting to Osferth and then begins to ask where to find tablecloths, which to Osferth appears to be a thinly veiled pretext to talk to Aethelflaed. She didn’t seem to mind.

“Your housemate is making quite a mess of the donations.” Hild is on his left now with a stack of napkins.

“Yes, but better that than the food,” Osferth points out.

Hild chuckles quietly. Finan has an unfortunate talent for making even the simplest dishes inedible.

“I see you and Willa are still keeping things a secret,” she adds, one eyebrow arched.

Hild is the only person who knows they are dating, and it was entirely because she’d accidentally walked in on them making out one day after choir practice. Osferth isn’t worried she’ll tell anyone, but the fact that two days later he ran into her on the way out of Willa’s hall one morning is an extra layer of security. Hild and Iseult, Willa’s RA, aren't “officially” dating yet either.

The tables are ready, the food all laid out. Brida, Thyra and Uhtred’s sister (who, to be honest, scares Osferth a bit) yells for everyone to make a plate.

“Thanks,” Osferth murmurs to Willa as she pulls a book off the chair next to hers.

“I think Thyra is on to us,” she whispers back, tucking a strand of dark hair behind her ear.

Thyra is indeed beaming at them from the other end of the table.

“She’s a lot smarter than Finan,” Osferth whispers back, and Willa laughs.

Sihtric bursts into the room now, carefully balancing two large trays of sugar cookies. Eahlswith enters on his heels with another tray.

“Finally!” Finan shouts.

“He’d still be decorating if I hadn’t taken away his sanding sugar,” Eahlswith says to Thyra, somewhat apologetic. “Yesterday I didn’t even know what sanding sugar was.” She sounds like she wishes she could go back.

Sihtric oversees the display of his cookies with great pride, then he and Eahlswith manage to squeeze two more chairs around one of the tables.

Thirty minutes later nearly everyone’s plate is empty. Every year Thyra tells Beocca he’s made too much food and every year she’s proven wrong. Finan, as usual, starts the singing, and nearly everyone has joined in by the time Uhtred and Gisela join them.

It’s getting late, and everyone will probably head back to Uhtred’s house to drink after cleaning up, so Osferth helps clean up his table, thanks Beocca, and heads back to the house, taking a few bags of trash out on his way.

He lingers a block away, scarf pulled up around his ears, where Willa meets him.

“Hey,” she grins, and rises up on her toes to kiss him. Snowflakes catch and melt on her eyelashes, making her brown eyes sparkle even more.

He interlaces his fingers with hers as they make their way back to the house, carefully sidestepping patches of ice and hard ridges of snow.

“Everyone will probably head back this way soon,” he says, glancing behind them as if Finan and Uhtred would be barreling down the street any moment.

“I figured,” she says, lightly squeezing his hand. “It’s not the worst day for them to find out you have a girlfriend, right?”

Osferth grins. “No, definitely not.”

When, an hour later, Finan finds out, he exclaims “I knew it!”

Osferth lets him have this one.

[sagesparrow394]

Losing Control - Chapter 1

Fandom: Sanders Sides

Summary: The newest video revealed a new ability of the Sides: when they get too overly panicked and stressed, they uncontrollably transform into giant animals or creatures. Patton becomes a frog, but what about the others

Chapter 1: Spider

----------

“Roman? Please open up! Please, I just want to talk!”

There was no response from the other side.     Patton sighed, leaning against the red door in front of him. “Come on, Ro… I promise, we love you so so much. You are still and always will be Thomas’ hero! And you’re mine too. That hasn’t changed at all!”

Finally, Roman spoke from the other side. However, it wasn’t the response Patton had hoped for. “Oh really? Because it seemed to me Deceit was your knight in black and yellow armour who saved you and Thomas today! Since you both insist he saved Thomas and will not corrupt him into a horrible evil liar!”

“Ro, his name is Janus, and-”

“Go away, Patton. I don’t want to hear it.”

Patton placed his hand on the doorknob, hoping he could will it to unlock and let him in. “Kiddo-”

“I said go away!”

Patton cried, pulling his hand away from the doorknob as it suddenly erupted to a scalding temperature. He whimpered at the pain, watching as his hand went bright red, and was even starting to blister in some places. As much as he wanted to keep trying to break through to Roman, he knew he had to get his hand under some water. He quickly ran to the kitchen, turning on the faucet at the sink and holding his hand under the water. He sighed in relief as the pain began to subside. As he stood there, letting his hand be soothed, there were footsteps behind him as someone came into the room.

“Oh, hey, Pat,” Virgil said. “Um.... you and Ro were gone for a while. Is everything, like, good?”

“Well… that’s complicated. It was all really bad at first… and then things got a whole lot worse... but then things got better! Well, better for me… I learnt a really important lesson, and I’m gonna be a much better morality from now on!”

“That’s cool.”

“Yeah, but, uh… Roman isn’t doing as good. He’s mad at me and Thomas, and he’s locked himself in his room, refusing to talk to me.”

“Jeez, what got up his butt?”

“Um… well-”

“Patton, I just wanted to come check on you after what happened today.” Logan had come in, nose buried in a book. “I understand we were all rather hard on you. Not saying we didn’t need to be, but… given the rather unusual transformation you went through, I thought it’d be best to check on you, even if, from what I understand, Janus has already done so-”

“Did you just say Janus?!”

Logan’s eyes widened as he looked up from his book, finally registering Virgil standing there. “Ah… salutations, Virgil…”

“You… you two know Deceit’s name?! How?!”

Patton sighed, knowing this wouldn’t end well. “He, um, he helped me. And he helped Thomas. Basically, when we went to talk to Thomas, we were discussing moral dilemmas, and Logan was popping in occasionally to give us extra information.”

“Well, I was until someone decided to skip my dialogue, at which point Janus replaced me.”

“And I, uh, ended up being faced with a moral dilemma that I just… I couldn’t answer. I didn’t know what was right. And I… I broke down. I went a little crazy.” Patton paused. “Okay, more than a little. I was so desperate to choose the right thing, to help Thomas choose, that I completely lost control over myself. So… Janus revealed himself. And he talked me down. Explained why how I’ve been acting is wrong. It turns out, he was right. He’s been right all along. I’ve always pushed Thomas to be too selfless. I don’t give him time to care for himself. Janus’ good. Good for me, good for Thomas, good for all of us. Thomas is giving him a seat at the table now. Though Roman… isn’t very happy about it.”

Virgil’s eyes were wide, shiny like he was on the verge of tears. He took a deep breath, but it came out as a shaky terrified laugh. “He shouldn’t be… You know, Pat, I really fucking thought you’d be the last person Janus would be able to manipulate… Who knew the strictest morality in the world could be bent to a liar’s will so easily?! And you Logan?! You too?! I thought you were all about fucking facts; the opposite of lies!”

“Kiddo, please-”

“NO! You don’t know the others like I do! I was one of them, I know what they are! And they are monsters!”

Patton chuckled awkwardly. “Trust me, if anyone was a monster today, it was me…” he then mumbled under his breath, “quite literally…”

“Great! Now he’s got you thinking you’re bad for Thomas! Great! Just… fuck!” The tears were streaming down his face now. “D-did... Did you say that… that Thomas is giving him a seat at the table?! He… he accepted him?! He’s gonna listen to him?! Th… that can’t happen! It can’t!” As he yelled the last word, his tempest tongue started to play up. But that wasn’t all - his form also glitched. And it was a glitch all too familiar to Patton. Confirming Patton’s suspicions, when the glitching stopped, it revealed Virgil now possessed an extra set of eyes as well as fangs.

Logan and Patton shared a worried glance, before the former stepped forward. “Virgil, can you name five things you can s-”

“SHUT UP! I CAN’T TRUST YOU! I WON’T DO YOUR SHITTY GROUNDING EXERCISES!” Virgil glitched again, but this time it was followed by a bright flash of light.

When it died down, and Patton and Logan were both able to see again, they were met by the sight of a giant black spider, draped in the shredded remains of Virgil’s clothes and with piercing purple eyes. Patton screeched at the sight of it, running to go hide behind Logan. The spider continued to yell in Virgil’s voice.

“Look, Janus’ evil! He’s dark! I know he is, I was just like him! I was a monster too!”

“Virgil, that’s the point, you were!” Logan called up to him. “You grew and changed. Janus has done the same. I understand it may be hard for you to accept given your… past with Janus, but he is a better person now. Patton and I have seen it. We are under no manipulation, and neither is Thomas.”

“I… But he can’t become better!” As he yelled, he swiped one of his legs at Logan, hitting him and sending the logical side flying across the room, slamming into the wall. Patton cried out to him, but found Virgil yelling over his voice. “He’s lies, deceitfulness! If me growing means he can grow… then maybe I never did grow! Like… look at me! I just became a giant spider creature! I became the monster I am on the inside!”

“No… Virge, listen!” Patton bucked up the courage and stepped forward, closer to the spider, trying to suppress his fear. “This isn’t because you’re a monster or evil! Because if it was, then I guess I must be an evil monster too.”

“What do you mean, you would have to be…?”

“This… this happened to me too.”

“...What?”

“Remember how I said I ‘lost it’? I, uh, turned into a giant frog… But my point is, turning into this doesn’t make you a monster. I’m not one, and you aren’t either. You’re amazing, kiddo, and we all love you. You changed and became such a wonderful, kind and helpful person. You’ve come so far. But, Virge, Janus has too. If you just calm down, we can show you. You don’t need to be scared. We’ll always be here to protect you.”

“... How do I know you aren’t Janus? How do I know you didn’t shapeshift into Patton to fool me?”

Patton bit his lip, thinking for a moment. However, after a moment, an idea came to him. “Janus shouldn’t know about our card exchanges, should he?”

“No… why?”

“Then he wouldn’t know what the cards said. But I do! Mine to you said ‘UR FAM’ on the cover, and ‘ILY’ on the inside, along with a drawing of you, me, Logan and Roman, and a big red heart. Yours to me said ‘You make me wanna die’ on the cover, and ‘of laughter. Best friends’ on the inside. Still the best gift I’ve ever been given. No offence, Logan, the cat hoodie is great too.

“And we are best friends, Virge. Always will be. And best friends trust each other. I’m not asking you to trust Janus right now; I’m asking you to trust me. So please? Give me, and in turn, Janus a shot?”

Virgil blinked, looking clearly conflicted in his spider eyes. However, as he looked down at Patton, and Logan  recovering from being thrown into the wall, he could just tell: it was them. No shapeshifting, no manipulation. He sighed.

With a flash of light, he was back to normal. “I… I don’t trust Janus yet. I doubt I will for a long time. But, I guess… if Thomas wants to work with him, I… can try to make peace with that. But I’m not happy about it.”

Patton smiled, opening his arms. “That’s all I ask, kiddo.”

Virgil smiled back, before accepting the hug. “Thanks, Pat… and you too, Logan. Sorry for hitting you. That was, uh… scary. Never become a giant spider before. Didn’t even know we could do that.”

“I don’t think any of us did until Patton,” Logan replied, getting to his feet and straightening his tie. “I’ll need to look into it, conduct some experiments…  I wonder if it’s the same animal every time for each person? Will Patton always be a frog, and will you always be a spider? And I wonder what animals the rest of us would become...? The only one I’m sure about is Janus almost definitely being a snake. The rest of us however...”

“Well, Lo, I think it’s for the best we don’t do any experiments to do with this, given we apparently need to get really upset and panicky for it to happen,” Patton said. “If we’re trying to lean more into self care like Janus says we need to, that probably involves not making each other upset.”

“True. I guess I’ll have to wait until it happens again organically. Speaking of organic…” Logan went to the fridge, opening the door and getting a jar of Crofters. “Ah, my very own method of self care: delicious Crofters all for me to ea-”

At that moment, there was a sudden jolt throughout the whole mindscape, causing the jar to slip from Logan’s hands and shatter on the ground. He sighed. “Apparently I can’t have nice things…”

“What was that?” Virgil asked.

“I don’t know, kiddo. I’m sure, whatever it is, it’s perfectly fine.”

“Well, we may as well investigate.” Logan summoned his Sherlock cap and pulled it onto his head. “Watson, lets go.”

Patton smiled, summoning his flat cap and scarf on. “Okay! Time to solve the mystery of the mindscape earthquake!”

However, not much investigation was needed, as the source was immediately found when the three sides left the kitchen and entered the corridor with the “light sides’” rooms. For you see, there was an extra door that hadn't been there before: a bright yellow one. After a moment, said door opened.

“Well, what do you know? He really has properly accepted me…” Janus looked to the three sides in the corridor. “You think Thomas could accept Remus any time soon? I’ll miss him quite a bit if I have to live here now.”

----------

Chapter 2

General Taglist: @tacohippy56900 @ibasicallyjustreblogeverything @pollylittlehigher-littlelower

[evelinamox]

Mammon x MC - Bewitched

*Side note before reading; I wrote this a few weeks ago. Been really out of practice writing, my peak was in 2017, so please go easy on me. ❤️ Also I should have named this something more like “Fell For You” 😂*

"Is he always late?" You groan to Satan as you wait outside RAD for Mammon to show up. Leaning against a wall, visibly pouting.

Satan shrugged and thumbed through one of his books. "Knowing him, he probably fell asleep in class or another teacher is scolding him for his grades."

You slid down against the wall until you were sitting on the ground. "Sadly I wouldn't be surprised," You looked down and picked at a loose thread on your RAD jacket. "Why did I even agree to meet with him here when he can't even try being on time? I'm never late so how come he can be whenever he chooses?"

Satan closed his book and looked down at you. "I have heard that exact line from you five times now. If you hate waiting on him then say something. I need to get going, good luck." With that he stepped away before you could even come up with a rebuttal.

Has it really been five times now? I mean I enjoy going with him places, especially photo shoots, but him always being late.. I think I'd rather be stood up at this point because at least it'd be clear how little he cares.

While lost in thought, Mammon snuck up to your side and attempted to scare you by grabbing your hip. Being an easily spooked, you let out an embarrassing yelp of fear that caught the attention of any demons within earshot.

"Grr Mammon!" You yelled at him as you jumped to your feet. Even while standing straight and trying to appear angry, you weren't near intimidating to him.

Mammon laughed at your attempt to be scary and ruffled your hair. "That's right! The Mammon has bested you! Say my name again for my victory!" He beamed a smile at you and put a hand behind his ear waiting for you to say his name again.

Crossing your arms at him and pouting, you shook your head in refusal. "Nope! Not happening!"

Mammon exaggerated a shocked look and clutched at his chest, pretending you physically hurt him. "After I grace you with my presence and you refuse my simple request?" Though still upset, his goofy nature caused you to crack a smile despite your annoyance.

Seeing you had cheered up some, Mammon did a "after you" hand motion, you started the walk together from RAD to Majolish.

Even while feeling a little better, Satans advice kept nagging at you until you spoke up. "Ya know... Not much of gracing me with your presence if you're making me wait every time." You said sounding dejected while kicking the same pebble every few steps to keep from looking at him. "I don't want to keep waiting for you on stuff you invited me to. I'm never late when it comes to our plans." The truth in your words hurt as they came out. You wanted to spend more time with him but being late for every plan he made got old fast.

Mammon at first became defensive at your words, "Why should I change my habits for a mere human?" but when you started picking up speed to get away from him, he quickened his pace to keep up with you. "Okay, fine! I will try to be on time from now on."

Due to his words you stop walking and so does he. "Promise?" You ask him with a hopeful tone.

He rolled his eyes at your question before saying "yes, I promise."

Without thinking you grabbed his hand while smiling at him. "Thank you!"

He became a bit flustered at first before nervously scratching the back of his head with his free hand. "N-no problem, (y/n)."

Unintentionally he looked down at your joined hands, but when you noticed and tried to pull away he held on tighter. "We'll keep it this way for now so I know where you are." He said while blushing brighter than you thought possible. You began blushing too since he wouldn't let go, but you went along with it as you both walked on.

Watching the shoot was intense as usual for all the workers. To avoid being caught in the hustle of all the other workers you took your usual spot against a wall between some unused equipment. You didn't ever mind your hide away nook since it also gave a decent side view of the action, and it was better than staying home studying.

After some time passed while watching the shoot, it started feeling awkward just watching Mammon. You liked him and he was undeniably hot, but you had a creeping feeling later he was going to say something like "Couldn't keep your eyes off me huh? Can't say I blame you though." Plus you weren't just tagging along to be some weird fan as much as it was entertaining.

Just as you took out your DDD to check Mononoke Land, you catch a glimpse of him winking at you which seemed to be anything but what the camera man wanted.

Was that intentional? Some kind of signal? You asked yourself. After that you continued to watch to see if it'd happen again. Before you knew it you forgot your plans catching spirits of Mononoke. Distraction. Definitely a distraction tactic that worked too well.

Finally the camera man ended the session and one of the assistants brought him a towel while a second assistant brought him a drink. It was noticeable that she tried to hold a conversation but he clearly just wanted to get away with how disinterested he acted.

Seeing him walk your direction you wanted to gather items and be ready to leave together. Rushing to pack your bag you didn't notice how numb your legs and butt were, causing you to stumble forward. Before you could fall face first Mammon caught you with his left arm wrapping around the front of you. Effortlessly he pulled you back up but then didn't let go. "Oh human, what would you do without me?" He laughed while still holding you against him.

Blushing from his bare muscles wrapped around you in what could best be described as a hug from behind, you glance around and notice a few staff looking at you two. Out of all the glances, there was a particular set of eyes glaring you down from the assistant that was trying to talk with him earlier.

"Probably have a few extra bruises." You try to laugh off how awkward you felt and lightly pushed off his arm that was still wrapped around you. "How much longer?" You nervously ask, feeling like a sheep with a wolf across the room planning its next meal.

"Aww want to know how long till we can leave and you can be alone with me?" Mammon beamed his same cocky smile.

Though you weren't sure it was actually happening, it felt as though the second assistant was starting through your back harder than before. If looks could kill, a crater would've been in your place. "Thanks." You sigh the word under your breath avoiding looking in her direction.

Completely oblivious to how uncomfortable you were, Mammon continued. "I'll get changed and we'll go. I'm not getting paid for cleanup so I'm not staying."

"I'll wait for you outside." You quickly answered before making a break to get out, not wanting to be alone in what felt like a lions den.

Waiting outside and taking in a fresh breath of air, you felt a dozen times better at the least. Mammon didn't take long either, but you did notice him shoving a strange crumpled piece of paper in his pocket while stepping out.

Awkwardly stopping at your side he extended his hand out to you while also bashfully looking away. "Let's get going."

Reaching out to grab his hand but stopping, you couldn't help but feel flustered. "Are you sure you want to still lead around a clumsy human?" You poked fun at yourself thinking back to him catching you.

Even after your question he still held his hand out but then looked back down to you. "It'd be for my own amusement, I'm not concerned or anything like that." He argued back, trying hard to not let his emotions show through.

Knowing he was trying to hide that he wanted to hold hands, you couldn't help but be a bit excited. Quickly you took hold of his hand and left together.

The walk home was fine, if not a little tiring. As a thank you gift you left a kiss on Mammon's cheek which left him so flustered that he was speechless as you quickly stepped away to hide your own embarrassment.

Next few days passed like any other school days, save for a few exchanged tsundere level flirting lines from Mammon and the usually shenanigans from the other brothers.

Early Saturday morning while sleeping you were suddenly awoken by rapid knocking on your door followed by a visitor coming in without permission.

Without even giving you a chance to comprehend his presence, Mammon deemed it appropriate to jump onto your bed in excitement.

"The hell do you want?!" You yelled while throwing a pillow at his face.

Mammon still excited ignored the pillow assault and showed you what looked like a paystub. "I got paid and decided you deserve a night out at a restaurant as thanks for coming with! We'll leave at 6p.m., so don't keep me waiting!"

He seemed so excited but you still wanted to pelt him with more pillows for waking you at 7 a.m.. "If you let me go back to sleep I'll give you a night to remember," you said, not really thinking on the meaning of the phrase.

Mammon's eyes widened and before you could take it back he ran out of the room while saying "Deal!"

"Nice one." You sighed sarcastically to yourself when you realized what you just said. In a short time you rolled back over hoping to sleep more but as soon as you closed your eyes many questions started running through your mind: Is this a date? Which restaurant? How should I dress? Did I really say I'd give him a night to remember? I mean I guess I wouldn't mind but... I must know if this is a date! It must be a date if he got that excited right? How long has he been planning this? Since when has he been a morning person?

After a fitful attempt at sleep that only lasted a few more hours, time passed and you began to obsess a bit too much over finding a outfit that wasn't too casual but also not to fancy either. Asking Asmo for help near noon, his shopping trip for you ended up taking another four hours before you could break free and retreat to your room.

Finishing putting on your favorite outfit of the assortment Asmo picked, you worry seeing that it was already 5:20p.m. and you haven't even attempted to help your hair yet. Sitting down at the vanity in your room, suddenly you noticed your face in the mirror appeared distorted. Your reflection appeared... Dead?

-Mammon's view-

While looking at his phone Mammon noticed it was already 6:20p.m.. Already annoyed he paced by the floor. "I gave (y/n) plenty of time to get ready. How dare that human make me wait." Getting tired of waiting Mammon marched up to your room about ready to pull you out of the room for the date. Nearing your room he felt dark magic in the air similar to what the witches have tortured him with. He made an audible gulp knowing that something wasn't right.

Knocking on your already open door he cautiously stuck his head in. "(Y/n)?"

Stepping into the center of the room he glanced around his eyes landed on a broken mirror and some strange green liquid he's seen before with the same witches he feared.

A churning feeling settled in his stomach and he ran to the first brother that came to mind that could help.

Slamming on the door to the twins room he started shouting. "Beel! Witches got (y/n)! Open up!!"

Beelzebub opened the door quickly when he heard that his favorite human was missing.

Completely panicking that two of Mammons worst fears became one, he didn't know what to do but he knew he needed help. "Beel! Can you sniff out (y/n)?!"

Beelzebub disappointedly shook his head at Mammons idea. "I'm a glutton but I'm not a dog! I will help you look though."

Mammon honestly thought it would be a solid plan for Beelzebub to sniff out (y/n).

Belphegor overhearing the conversation rolled his eyes at his greedy idiot brother, then got out of bed. Without a word he left the room and went down the hallway.

"Where the hell do you think you're going?!" Mammon shouted to his youngest brother. Half tempted to grab Belphi by the back of his neck like a kitten and make him help.

"Getting Lucifer, (y/n) is screwed if you're in charge." Belphie answered with his back to Mammon, still walking down the hall.

Before much time passed all the brothers were searching the property.

When it turned 6:35p.m. it became established there was no sign that a human left on foot.

Lucifer shook his head while thinking over all the information the brothers have gathered. "There's no sign (y/n) left in a normal manner. This means either (y/n) was taken by teleportation magic or managed to break the enchanted locks to the roof. We should all contact with any mages we know to see if they know what happened."

Mammon ignoring the last of Lucifers plan, his eyes widened in realization as all the pieces came together. At the photo shoot the other day he received a message from one of the assistants that was the key to all of this. One side had a phone number but when he checked it the note again later on the numbers were replaced with the message, "A tragic fall at dusk the day of Sabbath."

Mammon didn't think long on this note, thought it was a bad poem from a fan.

Without giving a explanation, he ran as fast as he could up the stairs till he reached the roof exit that only the best at magic should've been able to unlock. Much to his surprise and dismay he was right. Seconds away from dusk, you were stepping to the edge of the roof.

When you stepped off you regained control of your body, giving you a chance to scream out as you fell. Your scream was cut short, not because the ground or form impact, but because you felt someone grab onto but also falling with you. The scent and feel of the person holding on from behind was familiar, but everything was happening so fast you couldn't even think. Mammon had twisted you both in midair so you'd land on him. The feeling of the air engulfing you two before the landing deafening all the senses.

Crash landing together with a loud thud, Mammon let out a gasp while still holding your back tightly to him. "I got you. I have you." He said between gasps.

Opening your eyes you looked up at the building seeing that easily the fall could've severely hurt if not killed you.

Mammon let out a groan before rolling you over to the side of him so he could see your face. "(Y/n)... are you hurt?"

Slowly pushing yourself up into a sitting position, you nodded to him, feeling more concerned of his physical condition, though he didn't appear to be grimacing.

Mammon then sat up facing you, without a chance to ask his condition he pulled you to him in a tight hug.

Forgetting that witches were involved, only thinking of how his heart nearly lurched out his throat at the sight of you stepping off, he started shaking without realizing it. "Why? Why would you do something like that?! Do you hate it here so much that you'd rather die?!"

Unable to see his face or know what he was thinking, all you had to go on was the fall and the sound of him choking back sobs. "I.. I don't remember," You admit, wrapping your arms around his neck. "I was in my room, then next thing I knew I was falling in your arms."

"Don't ever scare me like that again!" He cried out, a few sobs escaping his mouth afterwards.

Forcing some space in his hold, you leaned back to look into his deep blue eyes. Instinctively you wiped away one of his tears rolling down his cheek. For longer than you could remember you had feelings for him, but could never get a full grasp of his emotions. For once his eyes and actions reflected how much he cared for and feared the thought of losing you. It hurt knowing how scared he was, but that made you all the more sure if there was ever a time to confess how you felt, it was then. "I love you too much to leave now." You whispered as you leaned in, your forehead against his.

In response to your words he placed his hand on the back of your head to push you into his kiss, it was a unexpected but welcomed surprise. Soaking in his emotions, a real feeling of love came from him. No force to it like lust, or void of emotions like pity. No, his kiss was perfect and reflected the bond you two built over the past few months.

When the kiss ended, his concerned expression was replaced by content. Hugging you to him once more he whispered in your ear. "I protect the things I love most, that includes you... (y/n)."

Epilogue

With help from all the brothers, Mammon found the witch responsible for the bewitching of (y/n). It turned out that a witch was helping the demon assistant steal Mammon's attention away, but the demon hoping to have just a disfiguring curse done to (y/n) was double crossed by the witch.

As it turned out this witch and Mammon held a contract but when he wasn't able to help with her most recent request, she decided to hit him where it hurt; by killing his precious human.

Though Mammon and the witch had a contract, no contract could save her from the brothers ripping her apart.

[todoshotoki]

➽───────❥ INTUITION ; CHAPTER TWO

katsuki bakugo x reader

word count: 1399

taglist: @00ashpop00

it seemed like you were the last one to enter the classroom. everyone had already begin to mingle and you defaulted to sitting toward the back where you hopefully wouldn’t be met with your intuition nagging you again.

you chose the seat in the second to back row toward the window. as you made your way there, you look up and see half and half. the one guy that had blown the recommendations entrance exam out of the water.

you were about to sit down when you heard it.

“sitting here won’t make a difference, the red headed kid will still try to talk to you,” you look up to the guy you knew it was talking about.

his hair was spiked up, probably having to do with his quirk. his eyes were wide and his grin was annoyingly addictive with sharp teeth to match. he went off yapping to one of his classmates next to you when he met your gaze. you turned it away immediately as he noticed and took your seat.

in front of you, broccoli boy was getting bullied by the red eyed blonde. the blonde had some sort of object in his hand-

“it’s going to hit you.”

it’s gonna wha-

there you had it the first day of school and shit was already being thrown at you. you didn’t even have time to get out of the shitty cramped desk when it hit you square in the forehead.

broccoli boy looked back at you in horror. “i am so sorry! please, forgive kaachan for being so rude!”

you shot up, slamming your hands on the table. “hey!” you barked at the blonde, steering clear of the now gawking blonde. “you think you can throw shit and get away with it, huh?” you snarl getting in the blonde’s face.

there was not one person in the classroom that wasn’t looking your direction. “you talking to me short-stack?” he rumbles back, clicking his tongue. “hell yeah, i am!” you cock your head to the side.

some guy in glasses had started to go off on the two of you, waving his right hand up and down as if he was directing traffic. “you, braindead blonde, i swear you want to get it! all i wanted to do is mind my own business but you’ve got to act like your the kind of the castle, huh?”

“fuck you call me? i’ll blast you to hell!”

you were going to bite back but your intuition per usual kicked in.

“falling in love with bakugo katsuki, isnt worth it. one of you will die in the end.” a quiet "what the fuck..." left your lips as you backed away. bakugo looked back at you in sheer confusion as he saw your eyes shrink from fear.

"you're not scared of me, are you?" he scoffs.

"not a bit... just you wait." you grit your teeth, shaking your head. you felt panic rise through your body. this guy? fall in love with this guy? that intuition definitely didn't have the odds in its favor. it was pulled straight out of its ass. it had to be bullshit.

"alright, alright, settle down before i have to myself," a voice droned as he entered the classroom. the teacher had finally arrived.

you had never seen such an unprofessional appearance in your life. this mop was going to be your homeroom teacher?

“the names, aizawa. i’m not going to waste any time now. i was already late as it is.” he then rummages under his desk and pulls out a huge bin of clothing. “when i call your name, please come up here and take your gym uniforms, we’ll be taking a quirk apprehension test.”

this caused a murmur to stir around the class, groans and moans of protests but aizawa merely just waved them off.

you kept to yourself as everyone just continued to complain, putting in one of your earbuds in one of your ears. “hey!” someone pokes you from the side. at first you just ignored them, how could someone want to talk to you after the exchange you shared with the other boy.

it was merely just so you would push away others. you were an asshole. you didn’t need these people in your way.

“hey, i know you can hear me!” you groan and look up toward the spiky red headed boy. “what?” you roll your eyes at him. he outstretched his hand to you. “i’m kirishima, what’s your name?” his smile- why was he smiling so wildly?

you stretched your hand out hesitantly, it was a matter of time for your quirk to tell you how useless it was to make friends but nothing happened.

you held onto his hand for an awkwardly longer time, staring at it the connection between you two. “(l/n),” you finally said. “(l/n), huh? what’s your quirk, you seem like a power type, am i right?”

you shook your head, “i have a more mental quirk. i can predict the future 99% of time time through a voice in my head.” you scratched the back of your neck. you felt so cramped up and stuff talking to him. “wow, that’s so cool! i’ve never met someone with such a unique quirk!” he was practically beaming and you had to squint your eyes a bit from the amount of bright light coming of this guy.

“how about you?” your voice cracks slightly making you cringe.

“hardening-“ he then raises his hand and it turns into almost stone, “it’s not as cool as your’s-“

“eijirou kirishima,” aizawa curs him off, calling him to the front. “sorry, got to cut this short. i’ll talk to you later, (l/n).”

you say there with your mouth slightly agape.

what the fuck just happened???

you were called up soon enough and the quirk apprehension gets started. as you were pulling your gym shirt over your head, you heard it.

“you’re not going to do well in the test,”

a fucking gain.

maybe this prediction was wrong. it had pulled that other prediction before that sounded almost unreal. maybe you could even evade the future? you had never done it before but there’s always a way.

but if you said that you got a good score was a complete lie.

“i got eighteenth...,” you whisper to yourself. i didn’t even scathe the top 15. this test was oriented completely toward physical quirks. “don’t worry, (l/n), you’ll do better next time. i believe in you!” kirishima says to you patting you on the back. “easy for you to say, you got in eighth place,” you murmured.

“all bark, no bite,” he grumbles behind you. “oh, shut up. you’re so full of yourself. i didn’t even use my quirk.” you snarl, restraining yourself from absolutely folding his ass and getting expelled.

“i expected better from someone who made it here with recommendations, (l/n),” aizawa says while passing by you which made bakugo laugh even harder. “you got in with reccomendations? and did that? are you kidding!”

“so what i wasn’t gifted with a physical quirk like you! you have no idea what my potential is! you’ll see when the festival comes around, you’ll get your ass handed!” you blurt out which you almost wish you didn’t. his face shifted almost immediately which made you hold back a frightened reaction.

“i’ll hold you to that,”

...

“a support item?” you repeat what isayama says. she nods. “your teacher, mr. aizawa also uses a support item. you have the assets for good combat but you just need that extra push so the admin is trying to work with you.”

you had been separated from the class and were put in a private training with isayama. the principal had given it the okay and since she had a teaching license you would pass with valid credits.

“i don’t even know why i got here if i’ll keep failing! i’m at the low end of the class.” you slump against the wall and hold your head in your hands.

“you need to stop comparing yourself to others. you’ll catch up eventually and there’s not way you won’t.” she knelt by you, “you’re quirk isn’t at it’s full potential yet. you’re only half way there. just try to think of your quirk as a part of you not as a separate entity.”

CHAPTER INDEX

[twokinkybeans]

Ten Grand - Starker Stripper/Prostitute!AU

Find it on AO3 here

One thing Kim and I love to do is throw AUs and fic ideas at each other. When I told Kim how I needed a tailor!AU in my life, she offered to write it for me as a gift! (See the first part of our fic exchange series!) Not much later I sent her a video of a sexy dance choreo on YouTube and as we started throwing ideas at each other I offered to write her a stripper!AU. And that’s how it all started, whoops!

Summary: It was the worst jokey birthday gift Tony could ever have imagined. At least, that’s what he initially thought when Rhodey dropped him off with a handful of cash at the hotel with a sex worker waiting for him in his room. He had opened the door with remorse, only to find a boy, no- a young man, bent over… his books. When Tony walked in, he figured he got the wrong room, but the student scrambled and threw his books off the desk, profusely apologizing for losing track of time. The young man was absolutely beautiful. Brown curls framed his face playfully, his jawline could cut stone and his wide, brown, horror-filled eyes glimmered. Tony could tell from the way his muscles bulged in his shirt, that he was strong. When Tony eyed the books’ titles, he noticed the boy was smart too. Tony had scoffed.

---

Ten Grand

“Mr. Stark!” Devon, the bar’s lean, balding host, welcomes the billionaire with open arms and a wide grin. “It’s always like clockwork with you, isn’t it? The usual?” Tony doesn’t bother to reply. He simply nods and passes Devon to saunter to his usual spot. His poker face and reflective sunglasses, that he definitely doesn’t need in the dim light of the bar, unbothered and unmoved by the ladies showing off their skills on the pole. He’s not here for them. No, he’s here for someone else entirely…

-  

It was the worst jokey birthday gift Tony could ever have imagined. At least, that’s what he initially thought when Rhodey dropped him off with a handful of cash at the hotel with a sex worker waiting for him in his room. He had opened the door with remorse, only to find a boy, no- a young man, bent over… his books. When Tony walked in, he figured he got the wrong room, but the student scrambled and threw his books off the desk, profusely apologizing for losing track of time. The young man was absolutely beautiful. Brown curls framed his face playfully, his jawline could cut stone and his wide, brown, horror-filled eyes glimmered. Tony could tell from the way his muscles bulged in his shirt, that he was strong. When Tony eyed the books’ titles, he noticed the boy was smart too. Tony had scoffed.

“Is this part of the whole act?” Tony vaguely gestures at the young man, the books scattered on the floor and then at the bed. Next to it, multiple toys had been splayed out. Tony also noticed a large duffel bag, not so carefully hidden in the wardrobe, with a uni sweater sticking out of it. “I- I’d be lying if I said yes. I’m sorry, I really am, I shouldn’t have-“ The boy’s voice is sweet and it has Tony wonder why he of all people is in this business. Tony brushes past the student, who is frozen in place. “Quantum mechanics…” Tony lazily picked up one of the books from the floor and opened it on the page the boy was on earlier. He angles his head so he can glance over the edge of his tinted glasses and uses his eyes to point at the sweater peeking out of the duffel bag. “MIT?”

The student nodded and looked at his feet, obviously embarrassed by all of this. Probably scared he wasn’t going to get paid. Or laid. “Kid, what are you doing here?” “Peter,” the young man muttered. “Excuse me?” “My name is Peter, Mr…” “Stark.” Once again, the boy’s- Peter’s- eyes went wide. “T-Tony Stark?” “What news. Answer the question, kid.” Tony gave Peter a stern look and the student blushed a bright red. He was in a room with the Tony Stark. He gasped quietly at himself when he realizes that he was going to have sex with the Tony Stark. At least, that’s what was supposed to happen. With how things are going, he figured he could probably kiss that dick goodbye. “Money and a roof over my head.” Peter sucked at his teeth. “And the sex. Lots of it.” “Can’t a fine young man like you get plenty of sex at those frat parties- wait did you just say you don’t have a place to live?” Peter ducked his head between his shoulders, the blush creeping to his ears. Tony Stark just called him fine.

“It’s not a cheap uni. Thought I could cope. Don’t have time for three jobs and this works perfectly. And no, people aren’t as interested in me in college as the men are at Stiletto’s.” “Stiletto’s?” “It’s the bar I dance at every Thursday. It’s how I get clients like you.” Peter fiddles with his fingers, not daring to look Tony in the eye. “How I get to sleep in a bed instead of under a bridge. Never mind the great sex.” Something in Tony snapped when Peter said that. “You sell your body for a bed to sleep in? Every night?” He tossed the book on the desk and took off his glasses to actually look Peter in the eye. The student/prostitute shook his head. “I’m one of Stiletto’s most expensive dancers. One evening of stripping in the bar and one night of sex and I’m set for a week.” “And you don’t mind it?” “I don’t.” Peter smiled briefly and took a daring step into Tony’s personal space. “I love it actually. Love making people feel good.” His hands crept up to toy with the buttons of Tony’s shirt and one corner of his mouth curled upwards, baring his teeth in a seductive smirk. “Want me to make you feel good, Mr. Stark?” The boy lowered himself, keeping his hands on Tony’s chest before pressing his fingers into him and drawing them down as well. When he got to his knees, his fingers curled around the hem of Tony’s trousers. The billionaire was enraptured by the sudden shift in Peter’s demeanor. How he went from shy university student to daring sex worker. It did things to Tony. Things he would never admit out loud. Tony grabbed Peter’s hands and pulled them off him. The boy looked up at him wide-eyed, unsure if he did something wrong.

“Can I pay you not to have sex with me?” Tony cocked his head. “And for you to study and get a good night’s rest?” Peter blinked a few times, barely believing what the older man said. “What?” “You were obviously studying for a midterm, I went to MIT, I know how it goes. You can use those hours of study more than my dick.” “But your appointment-“ “Wasn’t set by me.” Tony smiled and bent down slightly, cupping the boy’s jaw. Peter leaned into it instinctively and closed his eyes. His lips parted and he let out a shaky breath. “Go be a good boy and get a high grade.” Tony let go of Peter’s face and tossed the stack of money Rhodey had given him on the desk next to the physics book. Then, he walked straight out of the hotel room again, leaving the uni student confused… And turned on.

-

The next Thursday, Tony found himself wandering the streets around Stiletto’s. He’d called, requesting for “a night with Peter,” which would- to him- obviously end up with Tony only showing up to make the payment, so Peter can sleep peacefully for another week. The bar owner, Devon, had smugly said that he doesn’t pimp like that. That if Tony wanted Peter, he should come and claim him on the Thursday night. Disgustingly enough, Tony was told it would be like an auction. Whoever paid the most got to have Peter. But Tony wanted no one else to have Peter. He wanted Peter to himself. Figuratively speaking, of course. He was only doing this to keep Peter safe. At least, that’s what he kept telling himself. There were no ulterior motives. None at all.

The first time Tony saw Peter dance, he was blown away. The confidence oozed off the boy’s body as if it was melted honey. His hands played with his hair as he swayed his hips. He shrugged off the jacket to reveal that Tony was right. The boy is ripped. Tony watched the entire performance as if he was put under a spell. Peter is skilled and strong and- and… flexible. Tony’s mind betrayed him when he imagined all the positions he could bend the boy in to fuck him raw. The man forced himself to ignore his aching cock. He wasn’t here to have sex with Peter. He was here to… To take care of him, yes. Financially. When Peter spotted him, the boy seemed a lot more nervous than he was before, which resulted in less clientele at the end of the night, since he couldn’t look away from Tony as his moves turned more hesitant. Tony took that opportunity to sweep in and win the auction. Not that he ever wouldn’t win, he thought to himself.

The goal was for Tony to drop Peter off at the hotel with the cash and then drive away again. But on the ride back they started talking. And talking. And talking. And Tony realized that the boy could keep up with him. Peter didn’t just go to MIT because he was smart. He went to MIT because he’s the smartest. Their conversations were pleasant and Tony found himself in the hotel room with Peter, but not for what one would expect a prostitute and a client to do. No. They talked more. About everything. Science theories, projects they were both working on and even just… Life in general. Tony learned Peter had no one left but his aunt, who could barely afford to take care of herself. Half of what Peter earned went to her. The rest is spent on his education and the hotels.

When Peter had fallen asleep on the bed, his angelic face slacked and relaxed, Tony turned off the lights and left. He also left a bit of extra cash, deciding for himself that he can’t just get involved in Peter’s life like this. That he couldn’t just pick up every puppy he found on the side of the road. It would be better if Tony just left Peter to do his own thing. Right? Not so much. Tony spent the entire week thinking about his conversations with Peter. How nice they were and how good they made Tony feel. How much he felt understood. Not to mention the sensual dancing Peter had done on that stage. Tony would never admit it, but he got off to the memory of Peter humping the floor in nothing but a highly impractical see-through PVC pair of underwear that still conveniently hid his balls and dick more often than not. The way Peter licked his teeth open-mouthed and rolled his hips. How he showed off the crack of his ass as he twerked in the clear plastic. But no. Tony shouldn’t get involved. He should let Peter go. It would be the best for the both of them.

However, weeks passed by and every Thursday, Tony found himself back in the same spot, at the same time, whiskey glass in hand, to watch Peter dance. And boy, could he dance. His body is toned, the lines of his muscles incredibly evident as he rolled his body to the music, humping the air in nothing but a red pair of short shorts, black stiletto boots and a tight white crop top. Sometimes he wore a bow tie over ripped denim jeans, the slight lace peeking from the holes betraying that he was wearing lingerie under it. Fuck. It had Tony’s cock strain against the inside of his pants. Every single week, Tony won the auction, paying more and more with every session. As hard as his dick was for Peter’s body, his boner stood tallest for the friendship he slowly developed with Peter. They spent entire nights talking to each other in the bed of the hotel room.

As always, Peter did try to get into Tony’s pants, wanting to repay the man for everything he does for Peter. Tony always refused. He wanted Peter to do well in school. He wanted Peter to thrive. He wanted to hire Peter for Stark Industries. He… He truly wanted Peter to himself. Tony couldn’t bear the thought of Peter having sex with other men. How Peter would present himself as he gets fucked by a different guy every week. Tony wanted no one else to touch the boy. His boy. Peter was his. And he would take care of him. Tony noticed Peter’s growing frustration, though. After nearly three months of being financially supported by Tony- three months of weekly conversations that lasted until the early hours, Peter admitted that his balls were bluer than ever before. Tony had laughed at that. Told the boy to get off in his own time. But Peter didn’t want that. Peter wanted to get off on Tony’s time. And so he tried to. He simply started to palm himself through his jeans and moaned. “You’re trying to get a reaction out of me,” Tony said and the boy smirked. “My job is to have sex with you, daddy- do you mind if I call you daddy?” Tony’s cock immediately sprung to attention and Tony swore quietly to himself when he saw Peter noticed.

“I don’t want your sex,” Tony said with a stern nod. It felt like the biggest lie he’d ever told. “But daddy, what if… What if I want yours?” Tony ran out of the hotel room that night, leaving Peter rejected and alone. They both knew Tony wanted it. However, neither of them knew what was holding Tony back. They flirted constantly. Tony was very pro-active with that. And Peter actively flirted back. After their blooming friendship, something else had sprung into a bud. Something more. And where Peter imagined his tight hole to be filled by Tony’s big cock, Tony imagined his big cock filling Peter’s tight hole. The math was simple really, yet Tony held back. He still had this sense of dignity that he had to keep. As if pretending to the owner of Stiletto’s that you fuck his diamond in the rough every single week instead of just giving him money so he can study in peace isn’t enough proof that Tony doesn’t actually care about his dignity.

Because if Tony truly wanted Peter to just do well in school, the man would have told him to stop dancing. He would have told Peter to quit his job at Stiletto’s, that he would support the boy financially, maybe through a scholarship, to get through uni. But no. Peter knew exactly why Tony didn’t do that. He liked to watch the boy dance. Liked to get achingly hard and refuse himself the pleasure of having sex with him. As some sort of punishment. Peter knew Tony thrived on buying Peter, knowing the boy was his and his alone. That he would put up a show every Thursday night to give the men at the bar leaking cocks at the sight, only for Tony to bite his lip and put down another smack of cash so he could take Peter home. To own him. To deny the other drooling men the delight that is Peter’s presence. It was a power fantasy that had Peter jerk himself off to under the shower stream on a near-daily basis. He was Tony’s. Tony’s alone. And shit, did he want to get fucked by him. So bad.

-

But now, even though Tony left Peter by himself in the hotel room after the boy confessed he wanted more out of their relationship, Tony is back in his trusty armchair at Stiletto’s, waiting for his boy- his Peter- to strut down the stage and put up a show. And onto the stage he came, donning his red stiletto ankle boots, black shorts that hugged his body so nicely you could see the outline of his cock, and Tony’s favorite shirt: a black mesh crop top. Covered, yet incredibly exposed. The holes are large enough for Peter’s nipples to poke through.

When Peter spots Tony in his chair, he grins and licks his lips, winking playfully and throwing his head around while he pushes his hands through his hair. Tony’s breath quickens immediately and his dick twitches. He spreads his legs slightly and leans back more. Peter pulls out all the stops that night. Tony knows exactly why. The boy still wants to get in his pants. But with everything Peter’s been doing, Tony isn’t sure how long he will be able to hold back anymore. His own sexual frustration is growing by the second and Peter is so hot climbing the pole. The loud beat thrums through Tony’s chest at the same pace at his heartbeat, which he can practically feel thumping through his dick at this point. It’s hard and leaking and he holds his breath when Peter throws his head back as he presses his clothed cock against the pole and moans . He’s never moaned on stage before, not like this. Obscene and filthy and hot. Tony downs his double whiskey in one shot, knowing he will regret it.

The sweat on the boy’s skin glows under the fuchsia and royal blue stage lights, highlighting his toned and engaged muscles as he climbs and climbs. He hooks his leg around the pole and lets go, keeping himself from falling with just his clenched muscles. Tony stares at how Peter practically flies. It’s not long before he changes moves, still going in circles as the pole turns. The boy shows off his strength, his flexibility and how absolutely gorgeous he is. The lights create an aura around Peter’s head. Tony wants to pull at the soft, brown curls. Use them to keep the boy’s mouth on his cock as he face fucks him until tears roll down Peter’s cheeks. Peter captivates the audience with his increasingly more sexual performance. He slowly slides down the pole, his dick pressed between it and his abdomen. When he lands, he rolls his body a few times, creating friction. His half-lidded eyes still haven’t left Tony’s reflective glasses and his jaw hangs slack as he sticks out his tongue, curling it upwards.

Peter lets go of the pole and almost lazily walks away from it. He sits down on his knees with his legs spread and starts playing with his nipples while biting his bottom lip while he slowly rolls his hips to the slow, sensual beat. One hand travels down, tracing the lines of his hard cock through the tight shorts. The performance is practically soft porn at this point, but nobody is stopping him. Nobody wants to stop him. They’re all staring at how Peter’s teasing himself. One would think it’s to get clientele. Tony knows better, though. The billionaire’s jaw is clenched, eyes locked with Peter’s. Peter can only see his own reflection in the glasses, but he knows Tony is watching him. Knows Tony only has eyes for his Peter. The boy never looked away from him. Not even for a second. They know what they both want. All that needs to happen now is for Peter to tear down Tony’s defenses. And shit, Peter’s a wrecking ball of insane proportions.

Peter rolls over, stretching out his legs and pointing his feet to the ceiling. When he’s on his back, he puts down his feet and brings up his hips to thrust upwards, hips rolling. His hands are still tweaking his erect nipples Tony swallows when he sees Peter swearing under his breath. Peter rolls further, back on his knees, resting on all fours, still staring intently at Tony. He puts his hands on the floor, expertly arching his back and sticking out his butt. He licks his lips and winks at Tony before raising one hand off the floor to push it down his chest, tugging at the mesh crop top before palming at his dick again. Peter glances at Tony’s evident hard-on. The mistake Tony then made, was to cover it with his hands, to hide it from Peter, but the sudden pressure had him gasp. He knows what would happen if he just…

Tony squeezes his eyes shut for a second and suppresses a groan when he cups his hard shaft through the fabric of his pants. It doesn’t take long before he realizes what he’s doing and he opens his eyes again. He wants to let go of his dick. But Peter. Peter… The boy is crawling towards him over the stage. Crossing his arms in front of him and arching his back with every step. He effortlessly glides down the platform and saunters over to Tony until he hovers over him. Tony stares up at Peter. The boy is panting, sweating, and he’s hard . So hard, Tony can see the slight wet spot in his shorts. “May I?” Peter breathes out, staring down at Tony with his chin angled up. Tony presses his lips on top of each other. The entire situation is incredibly overwhelming. The thrumming bass, the smoke seeping off the stage, the alcohol coursing through Tony’s bloodstream, the colored lights framing Peter’s body and- fuck- Peter’s body. Glistening and toned and oh, Tony wants to touch it. Touch him. All of it feels like a dream. A dream Tony never wants to end. And there’s only one way for it to continue.

Tony nods. Brief. Curtly. And Peter’s immediately all over him, not making any physical contact, as per the rules, keeping his distance but pushing into Tony’s personal space deliciously. He rolls and sways his hips, staring at his reflection in Tony’s glasses. Peter rolls his nipples between his thumbs and index fingers and he jolts involuntarily at the surge of pleasure shooting through his body. He finally gets to make Tony truly feel good. He can sense it. Tonight’s the night he’s going to get fucked. And he wants Tony to be as desperate for him as he is for Tony. He turns and turns, making eights with his hips until he can slowly twerk his ass right in front of Tony’s face. He puts one knee on the armrest and leans in until he’s sure Tony could smell his arousal.  

Peter pulls back again, standing up on both legs, slightly further apart than needed, back still facing Tony. His hand reaches down, wrist curling under his crotch so his spread fingers rest on his ass. He slowly leans forward again, keeping his legs straight, using his index finger to draw circles around where his hole is. His flexibility allows him to make eye contact with Tony again, while folded against his legs, upside down. He bites his lip seductively and purses his lips into a kiss, before coming back up again. Tony is unreadable, save for his thumb rubbing circles on his hard shaft. Peter is winning this, he knows. Maybe he has already won. In any case, he wants to drag this out for as long as he can. And so, he brings up the hand he just groped himself with and starts sucking on the index finger. He closes his eyes and moans around it, hips bucking involuntarily once again.

According to the rules, Tony is not allowed to touch Peter until he pays for him. But he doesn’t care anymore. Peter finally did it. He broke Tony. And thus, Tony will break the rules. He reaches forward and grabs Peter by his wrist, aggressively pulling the boy into his lap. Peter gasps surprised, but doesn’t wait. Doesn’t hesitate. He immediately grinds his crotch into Tony’s and they both moan obscenely, finally finding the friction they were both yearning for. Tony lets go of his empty glass, which shatters on the floor, and he grabs Peter’s face with both hands to guide the boy towards him. The salty taste of Peter’s sweat invades Tony’s mouth when their lips crash on top of each other. Peter grabs hold of Tony’s shirt, whimpering soft, sweet sounds as he pushes himself even further down into Tony’s crotch. “Took you long enough,” the boy grins against Tony’s lips. One of Peter’s hands creeps up to take the reflective glasses off Tony’s head. He gasps when he sees Tony’s black eyes, pupils dilated with lust. The billionaire can only growl, wrapping his arms around Peter’s neck and pushing his hips up to meet Peter’s. Around them, the other audience members are booing, but neither Peter nor Tony care.

“Tony!” Devon shouts from a distance, taking big strides towards the two of them. The death glare he sends Peter goes unnoticed; the two men are too caught up with each other to see it. Tony knows what’s coming, though. He will be kicked out for breaking the rules. Maybe banned. There will always be paying customers for Peter. Devon doesn’t need Tony to make money, regardless of how rich the man is. Peter however… Peter could truly get into trouble. Since, well, he broke the rules too. The boy will definitely get a strike. Might even get fired for this stunt. However, Tony won’t allow Peter to get scolded. “Keep kissing me, sweetheart-” he whispers as he turns his head to Devon, who is – as expected – followed by two security guards. “Need your lips on my skin, Peter- I need you-“ “Need you too, daddy-“ Peter licks right under Tony’s jaw, near his ear. The man’s mouth opens wide at the name and his entire body spasms with pleasure.

“Ten grand-” Tony groans. Devon stops in his tracks and stares at Tony with wide eyes. He raises his hand to stop the security from tearing the two apart. Peter still ruts himself against Tony, kissing the man’s neck feverishly. “Excuse me?” Devon’s eyebrows go up to where his hairline would be if he wasn’t bald. Tony fumbles, grabbing his black credit card from his inner pocket. He traces one corner of the card over Peter’s back up to the mesh crop top and the boy moans, goosebumps spreading over his body. “Peter’s mine,” Tony growls. “Ten grand.”

Devon could never go against it. If he refuses, he will miss out on all that money. The most Peter had ever gone out for, for one night, is four grand. And that was for Tony, two weeks ago. No one in the audience would be able to go over the ten grand. Devon would have to choose between his principles and between the money and, like the true pimp he is, he picks the latter. He stomps towards Tony and grabs the credit card from the man’s hand. Tony immediately moves his hand back to caress Peter’s body and he continues kissing Peter. Desperation is evident in both of them. Devon puts the ten grand on the card and within an hour, Tony tosses Peter on the bed of his hotel room.  

-

“Knew you’d let go for me one day, daddy,” Peter sighs seductively as he stretches himself out over the bed. Tony pulls the boy’s stilettos off his feet and discards his own shoes with them, right next to Peter’s uni books. “Wanted to let go for you since day one, you filthy slut,” Tony growls. Peter moans at the nickname and clutches his mesh crop top, hips bucking up into thin air. Tony pulls Peter towards him by his ankles and jumps on top of him, knees resting on the bed to keep Peter from finding friction. “A vixen, that’s what you are.” He bites into Peter’s bottom lip and the student arches his back. Tony keeps the boy in place with his hands by pressing down Peter’s wrists into the mattress. “Why don’t you fuck my pussy, then, daddy? I’m ready for you.” Peter grins, angling his head up to look at Tony through half-lidded eyes.

“Vixen!” Tony pushes out through gritted teeth as he suddenly lets go of Peter’s hands, grabbing the boy’s cock through the thin fabric of the tight shorts. He squeezes it and the wet spot in the short creates a squelching sound. A high pitched whine falls off Peter’s lips at the sudden attention. “D-daddy!” Peter’s eyes roll back, but he collects himself fast, whimpering softly as Tony continues to slowly rub the boy’s cock in his outfit. “So much money spent on me…“ Peter smirks. “Was it worth it?” Tony’s other hand crawls under Peter’s mesh top to pinch his nipple. Peter whimpers at the sparks shooting through his body and he can’t help but buck upwards into Tony’s touch. The man leans down and sucks a hickey on Peter’s neck. The student is already seeing stars. He can’t believe this is happening. He’s wanted this for so long. “Every p-penny, Peter Parker.” Tony softly suckles on the spot he just bruised. Peter is intoxicating. So sweet, yet so filthy.

Now that Tony’s finally allowing himself the pleasure, he doesn’t want to wait any longer. He lets go of Peter and throws off his jacket and starts fumbling with his shirt. “Get your clothes off before I rip them off that pretty body of yours.” Peter obeys immediately, knowing that he will get what he craves sooner rather than later. Tony’s belt buckle clanks as he aggressively throws it away from him. His pants drop to the floor and he kicks them off. “On your hands and knees, slut. Now.” Peter’s now freed cock twitches and he turns, presenting his bare, pink asshole to Tony. When the man had found the lube, Peter doesn’t know. He’s too drunk on arousal, too caught up in his own lust, to really realize what is going on. The only thing he knows for sure is that he wants to get fucked by Tony. Hard and rough. Peter hears Tony squirting the lube behind him and before Peter can make a comment about Tony being slow, he gasps as he feels a finger probing around his entrance.

“O-oh!” “This what you want?” Tony growls, squeezing Peter’s ass with his other hand. Only the tip of his index finger slides in, but he immediately takes it out again to rim the boy’s hole again. Peter whines and pushes himself towards Tony, wanting the man to go in further. “Yes, yes-yes-yes, daddy, please open me wide, fuck me, fuck me-“ “Ohh,” Tony coos, his lubed up finger sliding down Peter’s crack all the way until he’s at the boy’s balls. He traces unrecognizable patterns on them and Peter can’t stop himself from making filthy noises. It feels too good to keep quiet. “So desperate…” “As are you-“ Peter pushes out, earning himself a hard slap on his butt cheek. The sting has him gasp and buck forward. He throws his head back, feeling his cock spurt the tiniest bit of precum at the pleasurable sensation. Tony gently rubs the pink-turning skin and grins. “If you want daddy’s cock, you’re gonna have to be a good boy.” He brings his finger back to circle around Peter’s hole again and Peter sobs once. “Please, daddy- want your cock- need it- fill me, fuck me, please-“ His entire body is shaking under the attention and he tenses up when another slap hits him. “-AH! D-daddy, want to be your good boy, please- please, tell me how to be your good boy.”

Tony smiles and leans in to press a kiss on top of the pink outline of his hand on Peter’s ass. At the same time, he pushes his finger in again, further this time. Peter moans, but he doesn’t move back, trying to stay as still as possible. Tony doesn’t move either. He just pushed his finger in, waiting for Peter to unclench and adjust. “Tell me who you belong to.” Tony’s voice rumbles, vibrating through Peter’s body. “You, I’m yours-“ Peter moans. Tony seems to approve as he slowly starts to pump his finger. The sensation has Peter gasp. He clenches his jaw in an attempt to at least kind of control the noises that fall from his lips. “Then why do you keep selling yourself?” The question was sincere, yet paired with an increase in thrusts. Tony wiggles his finger to open Peter up more and the boy’s body is once again glistening with sweat. “B-because I want to dance for you. Make you hard for me. And- And I know you’ll buy me,” Peter says breathlessly. “Want only you to buy me. Want no one else to touch me.” “That’s right,” Tony groans, adding a second finger and scissoring them, which causes Peter to let out a high pitched whine. Tony’s other hand massages Peter’s ass like it’s dough. The slapped, sensitive area sending jolts of pleasure through Peter’s body. “I don’t want anybody else touching you either. You know why?” Tony’s fingers start curling, looking for Peter’s sweet spot. “C-cause I’m yours, daddy-“ Tony leans in to growl in Peter’s ear. “You’re mine.” Tony continues thrusting into Peter and the boy finally gets a good view of Tony’s cock, hard and aching. “You’re my Peter. My slut. My good boy.”

When Tony speaks the last word, he finally grazes past Peter’s prostate, causing the boy to open his mouth in a silent scream. “That’s it, sweet slut-“ Tony groans. “Look at you, so hot and wet- so close, almost ready for my cock to fill your little hole, isn’t that right?” Peter nods aggressively, eyes closed, barely able to speak as Tony mercilessly attacks his prostate, adding a third finger. “Y-yeah, feel so good, yes- please- fill me- please-“ Tony’s hand leaves Peter’s cheek and works to slicken his own cock, partially with the lube and partially with the precum at the tip. He continuously gives Peter the attention he craves, while stroking his shaft and lining it up with Peter’s hole. “Well,” Tony quips. “Only because you asked so nicely.”

Before Peter can ask what’s going to happen, Tony takes out his fingers and immediately replaces them with his dick. A low grunt escapes his lips as he pushes himself into Peter, finally feeling the boy envelope him. Peter yelps, clenching and unclenching instinctively around Tony’s throbbing cock. He feels so deliciously full. He pushes himself down until they bottom out. The real thing was nothing like what their imaginations had come up with over the past few months and they both chuckle at how mundane it is. How normal. Yet, it’s absolutely perfect. It’s not long before Peter starts wiggling his butt; a silent plea for Tony to start moving. The man does so, and he grabs Peter’s curls, the one thing he’s wanted to do the most, to have the boy arch into him. They pant and moan and groan and grunt and slowly but surely the room is hot and heavy with their sex, the sound of skin slapping together at the intensity of Tony’s thrusts only adding to how horny both men are.

“Take me so well, boy, so good for me, so tight-!” Tony leans down to bite into Peter’s shoulder. He growls. “Daddy’s little slut!” The change in angle has Peter scream. “Right there, oh god, daddy yes, I’m your slut, please don’t stop, right there, right there!” Tony yanks at Peter’s hair, causing the boy to moan obscenely once more. “God, Peter, you’re so filthy- who would’ve thought that a sweet MIT boy could be so disgustingly hot.” Peter can only nod in agreement. He’s a filthy whore, he knows. And he loves it. But now… Now he’s Tony’s. Only Tony’s. “Wanna be yours forever, Mr. Stark-“ Tony thrusts particularly hard at the mention of his name. “Do you, now?” He breathes out with a scoff and a grin. “Want to be my sugar baby? Want me to spend my money directly on you and not on some pimp who takes half?” The mere thought has Tony increase his pace. It still enrages him that not all of his money went to Peter and now, with Peter’s request, his wishes might actually come true. “Daddy- please, yes, I want that, want-want-want-ohhhhhh!” Peter can’t finish a coherent sentence, but it doesn’t matter. All that matters is that Peter wants Tony. And Tony wants Peter.

“Wanna move in with me? Make me show you all the corners of the tower, fuck you dumb, take you in every position?” Peter nods and nods and nods. “Dumb slut, wanna be yours-“ “Good boy, good, good boy, oh fuck!” Tony exclaims. His movement is becoming more erratic; he’s losing his rhythm. “Wanna talk with you for hours and hours and cuddle and watch movies and ask you to help me with my studies and fuck- fuck- want you to fuck me-“ Peter pants. “Own me.” The fact that Peter thought of more than just sex for the two of them had Tony seeing stars. He’s right on the edge, but he doesn’t want to come before Peter does, so he ignores his own white-hot desire and moves his arm around Peter’s waist to grab his cock. The boy squeals at the sudden attention on his shaft. “Want that too, sweet Peter, want to teach you everything I know, want you to help me with my projects, teach you how to cook a meal, want to fuck you raw- want to make you come so hard you can’t walk for days-“ “Daddy, I’m so close!” Peter yelps, squeezing his eyes shut and clenching around Tony’s cock while the older man pumps him without remorse.

“I know you are, baby boy, it’s okay-“ Tony tenses up too and groans as he does everything he can to hold back his own orgasm. “So dirty, so beautiful, so hot, shit, Peter, you’re so fucking hot- Wanna come for daddy?” “Yes, yes please, wanna come so bad- daddy please-“ “Good boy, such a good boy for me, come, Peter, come for your daddy-“ Peter tips over the edge with a scream. White spurts of lust cover the hotel bed sheets and Tony’s hands and Peter clenches down on Tony’s dick, causing the older man to fill up his Peter with cum. They yell each other’s names in unison and it’s not long before Tony collapses on top of Peter. The student loses balance and lowers himself into his own stickiness on the sheets. But he doesn’t care, the afterglow of his orgasm still coursing through his veins.

They remain quiet for a bit, relishing in each other’s presence while Tony is still sheathed inside Peter. They both smile, absentmindedly tracing patterns on the skin of the other. After a short while, Peter finally speaks. “Did you mean it?” he whispers. Tony looks at him with his big brown eyes and sniffs once, before he grins. “What- the moving in?” Tony cocks an eyebrow. “Yeah.” “I did. I wanna take care of you, kid. For real.” Peter doesn’t reply straight away, which gives Tony the opportunity to ask his counter-question. “Did you mean it?” Peter looks down, nodding shyly. “I want to be just yours, Mr. Stark. If you’ll have me.” Tony smiles and presses a soft kiss on Peter’s forehead, twirling the boy’s hair between his fingers. “Oh, sweet Peter,” he coos. “I’ll have you any time.”

---

Read Kim’s fic for our fic exchange here!

[nat-roman0ff]

beep beep

beep beep

-

shawn gets lost in a parking garage and you’re lucky (or unlucky) enough to have to help him.

words: 1,839

warnings: aggressive paps, car alarms and lost pop stars. 

-

Your arms are weighed down by the amount of bags in your hands and roped around your arms. Being a personal shopper for the super rich around the holidays for some extra cash was starting to become more of a burden than it was worth. 

 But at least you’ll never have to do arm day in the gym ever again. 

 The parking garage is full of fancy cars and SUVs and your beat up Camry sits amongst them like a rotten dandelion in a rose garden. There’s some commotion as you come out of the elevator, a pap stalking some celebrity asking him questions. This wasn’t an unusual sight in Los Angeles, but you always felt a pang of sorriness for whoever was being harassed. 

 You recognize him almost immediately, with his soft curly hair pulled back in a headband. Shawn Mendes. He’s even prettier in person despite the deep crease of worry between his eyebrows. He’s pacing the aisles looking at license plates with an increasing panic on his face. 

The pap continues to harass him, asking him personal questions and he laughs them off with a snarky remark or with another question. He’s good, you think. 

 “Oh my god, THERE you are!” You exclaim, giving him the eye as he passes by your car. 

 Shawn raises an eyebrow, “oh, uh, hi?” 

 You raise both eyebrows, “we found your car! Now let’s get these gifts to the children’s hospital!”

 “Oh right,” he pips and the pap finally drops their camera, “the children’s hospital. Well have a lovely day sir and tell your friends at TMZ to expect my Christmas card in the mail!” 

 The pap looks confused but shrugs, “alright man, have a good one.” 

 You and Shawn watch the man leave via the elevator and he lets out a sigh of relief and slides down the side of your car. 

 “Although I’m not sure what a child would like with a lingerie set from Victoria’s Secret I’m glad he bought it,” you pip. 

 Shawn lifts his head, “he didn’t buy it. But he wasn’t fucking leaving me alone. So thank you.”

 You nod, “you’re welcome,” you wait, and Shawn goes back to burying his hands in his face, his knees drawn up to his chest.

 “Does that happen a lot?” You ask. 

 He nods. 

 “Not much of a talker, eh?” 

 Shawn’s head perks back up, “sorry, shitty morning, worse afternoon. Then I had this guy chasing me around and now I can’t find my car.” 

 “Well,” you say, placing your hands on your hips, “how about you help me get these into my car and I’ll help you find yours?”

 He stands and reached his hand out to shake yours, “deal. I’m Shawn, by the way.”

 “I know,” you wink.

 He smirks, “of course you do. So why do you have so many bags?”

 “I’m a personal shopper. Us peasants need a side hustle to get by sometimes.”

 Shawn nods, “I get it. I had a paper route when I was thirteen.”

 “Congratulations, you’re a multimillionaire now.”

 He snorts, “touché.”

 Shawn takes care of the last few bags and slams the trunk shut. Wiping his hands together and proud of his work. 

 “So do you have any idea where your car is?” You ask. 

 He’s silent. 

 You groan, “okay so what kind of car do you have?”

 “A Range Rover.” 

 You slap your hand against your forehead, “yeah you and everyone else in LA. Alright, time to pound pavement, Mendes.”

 The two of you walk the aisles of the vast parking garage, Shawn clicking the little button every few seconds to see if he hears the locking beep. 

 “Hey what does this one do?” He asks, pointing at the bright red button on his fob. 

 You side eye him, “that’s a panic button.”

 “Oh,” he pips, “good to know.”

 You just nod and walk with him, pointing at various Range Rovers with no luck on that floor. Shawn looks down, like he’s physically here but his mind is not. It takes you saying his name a couple times before he responds when you ask questions and his replies are half hearted and soft spoken. 

 You decide to take the stairs and after about five minutes or so of uncomfortable silence Shawn finally speaks up, “I’m sorry if you think I’m like the biggest Hollywood idiot on the planet right now.”

 You shake your head, “nah, you just seem...sad? Tired? I guess. I don’t know you so I don’t want to ask questions, just want to help you get to your car.”

 “Thanks,” he smiles for the first time since you’ve met and it’s absolutely mind blowingly beautiful. 

 “Plus,” you start, “you’re famous so you can’t kill me since you’re too easy to track down. You’re like the safest stranger ever.”

 Shawn laughs, “thank you, again. I can’t believe I’m taking time out of your day for this.” 

 “It’s fine,” you shrug, “just means when we find this car you owe me big time.”

 “Oh yeah?” He says, raising an eyebrow, “what does the lady desire?”

 You ponder for a moment and your stomach growls, “food.”

 “Let me take you out for dinner then,” Shawn replies, “tonight? If you’re not busy, of course.”

 “Not so fast!” 

 His face drops. 

 “We still haven’t found your bloody car yet.”

 “Fine,” he stops you both where you’re standing, “if we don’t find my car you’re driving us to dinner.”

 “Oh, smooth.”

 —-

 You and Shawn drag your feet to yet another floor of the parking garage and groan in unison as you’re met with row upon row of tightly packed parking spaces. 

 “How fucking big is this place?” Shawn cries, throwing himself onto the concrete ground. “I give up. They can keep it. I hate that car anyways.”

 Shawn pulls himself into a ball, face pressed into his knees. His body starts to shake. Is he crying? You’re first filled with fear, and then a warm kind of sadness starts to spread. You sit down next to him on the ground and rub his back. He looks up, his face red and blotchy and his eyes wet. 

 “I’m sorry, really. This is fucking embarrassing. It’s just - I’ve - I’m...yeah.”

 “I get it. I do. If you don’t mind me asking, what’s going on?”

 He lets out a breathy laugh, “what isn’t going on?” He pauses for a few moments to allow himself to recollect, “I’m stuck in a shitty contract right now, making music I don’t want to, being turned into a brand, and I’m missing my sister’s school awards ceremony back home in Toronto because I have to be here. Doing nothing but getting chased by dudes too lazy to get a real job and losing my car in the mall parking garage.”

 You suck a stream of air through your teeth, “well that’s certainly a lot to unload.”

 “You asked,” he deadpans. 

 You nod, “very true. Okay, well. I don’t know much about the entertainment industry and contracts and such but can’t you just like, I don’t know, go home? Call out sick? You’re the star so I would think you’d have some type of holding power with that.”

 “Yes and no,” Shawn starts, “I just want to go home and sleep in my own bed. I want to wake up and go to my favorite coffee shop around the corner from my place, pet my neighbor’s dog on the way back, maybe write a couple songs and see my friends and family again.”

 “That sounds nice,” you say, resting your hand over his, “you should do that.”

 Shawn looks into your eyes and your gut tells you to kiss him but your head tells you that you sat in chewed gum. Instead of kissing you, much to your chagrin, he rests his head on your shoulder. 

 The two of you sit there for a little bit, only until the high pitched horn of a Prius scares the both of you out of it. Shawn lets out a shrill scream and you both scramble to your feet. 

 “I’ll give you $100 if you pretend you never heard that,” he says. 

 “Deal.”

 The sun is starting to set, and the glow of the lowering sun beams into the parking garage. Golden hour, it’s called. And while you watch Shawn point his fob at each passing car hoping it’s his, you think sunsets like this are made for people like him. 

 Somewhere in the distance you hear the faint beep of a car locking. You both stop dead in your tracks and look at each other. 

 “Did you?” Shawn starts and you nod. 

 He raises his keys again and hits the panic button. Off on the other side of the garage the alarm sounds and he takes off in a dead run towards it. You do the best to follow but his long legs give him an advantage. He eventually slows, holding his hand back for you to grab it so he can drag you along. 

 When you reach the car, the alarm is blaring and you’re both panting. Shawn throws his hands up in the air and sinks to his knees, “thank you baby Jesus,” he whines while trying to catch his breath.

 He gets back up and pulls you into a hug, burying his face in your neck. You hesitate for a second before hugging him back. You’d never met a stranger quite like this before, let alone had one hug you. No one at work was going to believe you on Monday when you told them the story. 

 “Time to go home,” he says when he releases you. 

 “Home home or -“

 “Want to come with me?” He asks, and doesn’t even give you a second to respond before continuing, “I’ll buy your plane ticket. Got a passport on you? Let’s just run with it.”

 The look in his eyes is of pure relief, like whatever was holed and balled up inside of him a few hours ago had passed. His eyes were wide and bright with wonderment. 

 “No,” you say, shaking your head, “go home, enjoy some family time. And call me when you get back.”

 “Fine,” he says, “but you’ll let me take you out for that dinner, yeah?” 

 You nod. 

 “Do you want a ride back to your car?” 

 You bite your lip and shake your head, scared to answer, and pointing about half a dozen cars down to yours, where the madness all started. 

 “Oh you have got to be fucking kidding me!” Shawn half yells, half laughs and the two of you just end up in hysterics over it all. 

 The sun has finally set when it’s time to say goodbye, although neither of you want to. You watch Shawn leave and smile at the thought of him being able to go home, and even more so about meeting with him again. 

 But the smile immediately drops when you reach for your phone, and realize the two of you had never exchanged numbers. 

--------

i wrote this on my phone at work today...and yes there is (probably) going to be a sequel...

[dansantat]

44 (The Annual Birthday Rant)

THE BEST BIRTHDAY GIFT I EVER RECEIVED FROM A STRANGER

What I’m about to tell you all happened about twelve days ago.

I was walking outside of my local grocery store when an African American man approached me. He slowly approached with a wide grin on his face and was dressed in an old brown secondhand suit that was a few sizes too big. Although his physique indicated he was maybe ten to fifteen years older than me he looked much older and worn. He had a story to tell

“Now, I’m not gonna hurt cha,” the man said.

I stood and smiled hesitantly.

“How can I help you?” I asked.

“You probably don’t remember me, but we met before… a few years back.”

I searched through my mind, but found nothing. “Oh really? Where did we meet? A book store event? A school?”

The man stopped his approach. He stood safely about ten feet away.

“We met here.”

My mind still drew a blank.

“Anyway, sir, I don’t want to take up too much of your time…. But I wanted to give you this…”

He reached into the pocket of his oversized suit and slowly pulled out a healthy wad of nicely folded cash.

And then in that instant. I remembered.

It happened two years ago in 2017. I bought groceries and was carrying the bags to my car. A homeless African American man wearing tattered clothes hobbled with a limb over in my direction. He was in rough shape. He clearly hadn’t showered in weeks and his body appeared gaunt, and malnourished.

“Hey, man, I was wonderin’ if you could spare some change?” he asked.

I placed my groceries into the trunk of my car and pulled out my wallet. I had just gone to the ATM because I was going to go out to breakfast with some friends after dropping off the groceries at home.

I pulled out a $20 and gave it to the man. His eyes popped open wide and a huge grin crossed his face. I would typically only give a few dollars in a situation like this, but today was special.

“Aw, thank you, sir, I really appreciate it! God bless!”

Just as he was about to walk away I stopped him.

“Wait,” I hollered, “Hold up.”

The man turned and looked back at me. I paused for a moment thinking about what I was about to do.

“*sigh* Today’s your lucky day.” I said

I opened my wallet and gave him all the cash that was inside.

“Here. Take it all.”

The man was flabbergasted. “Wh-….. What?”

“You look like you need it way more than I do. There’s about $400 here… Just take it.”

“Wh…wh…why are you doing this?” he stammered

I paused for a moment. Was I really doing the right thing? You hear people tell you not to give money to homeless people because they’ll just go use that money to buy drugs or alcohol, but I proceeded with my decision, “It’s my birthday today, and every year I always make it a point to do something special for someone to make their day better, and today you’re the lucky person, I guess.”

The first time I ever decided to be generous on my birthday was at a local car wash on my 35th birthday. Now, I never found much value in the machines that car washing facilities provide. Those contraptions that you would drive your car though to get washed. It was simply a series of spray hoses and soap suds being lazily dragged over your car by a set of waving rags. The real cleaning job was done from the guy after that process. The guy who would drive your car off to a dry corner of the lot and scrub off those tough stains with a spray bottle and a towel. Here in LA, they were most likely illegal immigrants earning a measly wage just enough to get by here in Los Angeles (one of the most expensive cities in the country) The man who cleaned my car that day spent a half hour wiping off the dashboard, and the tires, and even parts of the door joints you wouldn’t normally expect a car wash employee to clean. The guy was cleaning my car better than I would have ever done myself, and when I approached the car it was absolutely immaculate.

The car wash was only $19.

That day, I gave the man $40.

He was so grateful he shook my hand with a smile, and in exchange I felt amazing. I helped make his day a good one and it was an absolutely wonderful feeling.

Ever since then I try to do something kind for someone on my birthday. It’s my gift to myself.

In the years following I would give $40 tips to waitresses, $60 tips to a trio of buskers, I once bought an entire box of candy from a kid who rang my doorbell trying to save up money for camp. That was about $75.

But this was $400. What the hell was I doing?

The man waved off the money. “$400?! That’s too much,” he responded, “I can’t accept all that! A dude gets stabbed on the streets carrying that kind of cash around”

“I want you to have it, and I don’t want to sound rude, but you look like you need this money way more than I do.”

He stood hesitant. His own pride was preventing him from taking the money.

“What are you doing with that much cash on you? You a doctor or something?”

“HAHA! No, but there was a time my parents wished I was.”

The man looked at me with a hint of suspicion.

“You’re crazy. How do you know I’m not gonna go use this to go buy crack or something like that?”

“HA HA! Are you?” I laughed. The thought of the possibility of my own hard earned money being used to buy illegal drugs was somewhat humorous to me at the time.

“N- NO! NO! I won’t! I promise! But are you sure you want to give me all this? I don’t even know you.”

I hesitated, half thinking for a split second that I would perhaps reconsider and just give him an extra $20, but what would an extra $20 do for a man who needed so much more help than that? What if he had enough money to change his course in life if he really wanted to? From that perspective, $400 seemed like just a drop in the bucket. 

But maybe it was also a start?

“I’m not sure, but I know that no matter how you got into this situation, I know it’s not because you’re a bad person. You’ve probably just hit a string of bad luck.Hell, for all I know maybe you WILL blow all this money on booze and drugs, I don’t know… But what I am hoping, is that it gives you a chance to get back on your feet if you really want to…”

The man glanced back at the money.

“Take it. No strings attached. Do whatever you want with it. Buy booze or crack or whatever you want with it. I’m not gonna lecture you on how to live your life because, dude, you’re already totally down on your luck and I think that you just deserve a little kindness. You know the mistakes you’ve made and you don’t need to explain yourself to me or anyone. I just thought this money would help make things a little bit easier for you, that’s all.”

The man looked away for a moment. His lower lip trembling. Then he slowly glanced back and took the money.

“Thank you….. God Bless you, sir. I really appreciate it.”

“Take care of yourself.” I replied as he walked away.

The man walked away and never looked back.

Now here we are.

Two years later.

Standing in the same parking lot in front of the same grocery store.

My jaw drops open.

“Holy shit! I remember you! You’re that guy! LOOK AT YOU! I DON’T EVEN RECOGNIZE YOU!” I shouted.

“Now you remember me, right!? HA HA!”

This man’s voice once a whisper was now strong and deep as if his lungs consumed every molecule of oxygen around him and projected it out like water from a fire hose. He was no longer gaunt, but healthy, if not slightly overweight. His hair was clean and trimmed, but he still carried himself awkwardly with a shaky newfound confidence that now occupied a body that once resembled a dilapidated house.

“You look amazing! Where have you been!?”

“Aw man, It’s a long story-“

“I’ve got time!”

“Well-“ he hesitated

And then I paused.

“Wait. I’m- I’m sorry. It’s none of my business. You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to, but I just want you to know that I’m really REALLY proud of you, man. I know we don’t know each other, but dude, you’ve completely changed. I don’t even recognize you. You look amazing.”

There was an awkward pause in our conversation. We were like two friends who had just reunited after a long absence, but suddenly also realized at that moment that we were also two complete strangers who knew nothing about one other. The man took a deep breath, “I’ve been coming around to this grocery store every now and then hoping I would run into you…I’d stand out here waiting for you for a half hour or so hoping you’d come by to buy groceries… I wanted to thank you for the kindness you showed me a few years back and… and I wanted to finally pay you back.”

He grabs my hand and presses the nicely folded bills into my hand. The folds and creases tell me they’ve been sitting folded like this for quite a while.

“$400. Every cent of it.”

“Hey, you don’t need to do this. It was my pleasure. I’m glad the money helped, you can keep it.” I reply.

“Well… “ he paused, “I don’t want it. Too many painful memories from it.. That day you gave me that money I took it and I used it all to get high.”

“Oh…Shit… I’m sorry, man. I shouldn’t have-”

“And afterwards there were some more really rough months after that. I felt so ashamed. I hated myself and I didn’t wanna live no more so one day I couldn’t take it anymore and I went over to the Colorado Street Bridge and I was gonna climb the fence and jump off…. I was gonna kill myself and end it all… but I chickened out.”

(FYI, The Colorado Street Bridge is the bridge you see in the movie, LA LA LAND)

“Man, I was so scared, and I was crying on the ground and I was thinking about my wife leavin’ me… and how I let my son down, and now he had his own son.. you see, I’m a grandfather, and I got so messed up I couldn’t be around any of them, you know?”  

Meanwhile, my groceries were sitting in the hot car. My milk was going to go bad, but I continued to hang on to his every word.

“So shortly after that incident the cops pick me up off the side of the bridge and they take me to this local homeless shelter. I get cleaned up, I get a little something to eat, and then later on that evening they gathered us all around in the cafeteria at one point and they read us this story called, After the Fall.”

I was shocked.

“Wait... What? That’s my book.” I responded

“Yeah, I know! The book changed my life, man! Humpty Dumpty finding the courage to change his life like that? It inspired me! It made me want to change! And so I see your name on the cover and one day I went to the library with my social worker to look up more of your books and I see your picture in one of the books and I thought, HOLY SHIT! That’s the guy who gave me the $400! I recognize those eyebrows from anywhere! This is a sign from God!”

“HAHAHA!”

“So, I’m getting’ all psyched up and inspired and the social worker helped me get me a sponsor, and after a while I got myself cleaned up and started working around town. I used to be a carpenter, and I was doin’ odd jobs here and there and so now I work at a hardware store.” 

He pauses for a moment and takes another deep breath.

“You see, I got myself a work related injury years ago and I had to stop working. Then when my insurance wore out I was still in pain and I started trying to find any kind of drugs I could to help with the pain, man. It was awful. I got addicted to painkillers, over time it cost me my marriage, I lost my house, and my kid moved away and he started a family of his own…. I haven’t seen my kid in years. They all wanted to help but you can only be helped if you want to be helped, you know?”

“Yeah, I’m so sorry to hear that, man”

The man begins to cry a little

“And I knew they cared about me, but…. But I let them down, and there’s just a point when the people you love just can’t stand seeing you hurt yourself no more, and they couldn’t stand watching me tear myself apart like that, you know?”

The man’s story cuts me like a knife. I’m starting to well up with tears. We’re now two strangers crying in front of each other in the middle of a grocery store parking lot. The manager of the grocery store who I see often sees us crying outside 

“Is everything okay here guys?”

“Yeah yeah yeah, We’re good. We’re just talking,” I rapidly answer as I wipe tears from my cheek. The manager walks back inside.

“…Uh… Weird question… You know my name now, but, do you mind if I ask you your name?”

“…I’m Randall.”

“Well, I’m glad you got your life back together, Randall. I’m sorry about all that stuff that happened with your family but I think what you accomplished with getting your life back together was huge and, I mean, I don’t know you, but man, I’m so proud of you.”

“Thank you, brother. I just wanted to see you in person so I could give you back that money… oh, and I was hoping you could sign this for me….”

Randall reaches inside his oversized brown suit and pulls out a copy of After the Fall and hands it to me with a pen.

“I’ve been carrying this around with me for a few months now hoping I’d see you. The shelter gave it to me. Would you mind signing it?” he asks.

“I’d be honored, Randall… Do you want me to make it out to you?”

“Please make it out to Randall the Third”

“Wait… your grandson?”

“I’m going out to see my son and his family next week. They live out in Arizona.”

“That’s amazing. Are you nervous?”

“I’m excited to see my grandson, but I’m terrified I could screw things up with my family again.” Randall mutters.

“Well, you made it this far. I’m sure you’ll be fine. Just take it one step at a time.” I reply.

“Just like Humpty did. One step at a time.” says Randall.

I sign the book...

To Randall III, Your grandfather is a true inspiration to me.

Dan Santat

“Thank you, God bless.”

“No, Randall, thank you. This was the most amazing birthday gift I think I’ve ever received.”

“Oh, it’s your birthday today?!”

“No, it’s in twelve days. Heh… it’s when my milk expires”

“Oh shit. I should let you get going man, I’m sorry I took up all your time!”

“No, man. No! I’m so glad you did this and that we could catch up... and…. Here.”

I pull out the $400 and I hand it back to Randall.

“What are you doin?”

“I know you don’t need this, so I’m not giving you this money. Get something nice for your family, you know, a housewarming gift or something, that’s all. If you ever want to pay me back you know where to find me.”

In this parking lot.

In front of this grocery store.

“Use it to buy a huge ass teddy bear for Randall the Third. Shit get him a Playstation 4 or something I don’t care. As far as I’m concerned you worked so hard to get where you are now and you earned every cent of this. This money should be yours”  

“HA HA HA! Aw sheeeeeeit….Thank you, brother.”  

I grab Randall’s hand and I place the nicely folded wad of cash into his palm. 

“Well, I should get goin’…” Randall says.

“Yeah, me too.”

Then after a few quiet moments we exchange a hug.

“Thank you, Dan Santat…. God Bless you.” Randall whispers

“Take care” I reply

We complete our goodbyes and then head off in our own opposite directions.

I’ve received lots of amazing gifts over my 44 years, but never one as incredible as the rebirth and transformation of Randall.

Peace.

[unto-the-breach]

✨Inferno & Bucky✨

Pre-Relationship-

4.) Who felt romantic feelings first?

General-

3.) What was their first kiss like?

Love-

2.) What are their primary love languages?

Domestic Life-

7.) How do they celebrate holidays?

bet alright let’s gooooooo

gonna throw this under a read more bcos it won’t make sense to literally anyone but jor, Inferno is my marvel OC who’s shipped with Bucky Barnes! 

there’s sort of two answers to these questions, the Back Then and the Now answers. For context, Inferno has sort of got two “lives,” one that she lived as Quinn Watson, an army nurse in World War 2, and afterwards she became a science experiment and got all fiery. She’s been pretty much in hiding since, until Captain America and Bucky Barnes start running around again, and she figures if they can show off, so can she. I know you said Inferno but I’m going to mostly answer these from the Back Then (pre-Inferno and pre-Bucky-falling-off-a-cliff) perspective because that’s the part of the relationship I have mapped out the best! Also, just in case you were wondering, yes I am answering these to further put off finishing her biography. It’s all I have left to do for her form and it’s like a third done, but. I don’t wanna. 

PRE-RELATIONSHIP- 

4) Who felt romantic feelings first? 

This is sort of a toss-up. Bucky was sort of immediately attracted to Quinn and the powerful vibes she was throwing out, but it took a little while before it became more than a passing interest for him. Quinn thought he was pretty from the moment she met him, but didn’t give him much of a chance, because she assumed he’d be like many of the other Male Officers she’d come across so far. She’d spent some time in a field hospital before being assigned to the 107th, and hadn’t received the respect she deserved from many of the male officers--even though she technically out-ranked them. However, she changed her tune when the two of them were the only ones in reach of another soldier who was wounded, and she began barking orders at him and he took every one of them swiftly and efficiently. This caused her to start seeing him in a different light, and her fondness of him only grew. She was much nicer to him then, and he began to realize he was more than just passively interested in her. So, romantic feelings, probably Quinn, but not for long. 

GENERAL- 

3) What was their first kiss like? 

God I actually have SO MANY thoughts about this one!! 

They have a lot of moments where they come close, pressed tightly against each other in a foxhole he’d pulled her into when an enemy opened fire, leaning over him to put pressure on a wound that would be fine, but she wanted to be safe, quiet whispers when they were scared they might not make it through the night, but their first kiss doesn’t actually come until a little ways into their story. 

It was late one night, and Quinn certainly should have been trying to sleep, but Barnes had volunteered for the first watch of the night. That day, they’d taken some quasi-victory--it was something small, but in their situation, you learn to celebrate the little things. Many of them had been drinking, sitting around a fire and telling stories, breathing in the smoky air and thinking of home, and these two weren’t exempt from that. Neither of them were drunk (most of what they’d drank had worn off by this point in the night) but if you asked them the next day, they’d say they were. 

Quinn went out to find him at his post, not exactly sure what or why she was doing what she was, all she knew is she wanted to see him (even though she’d spent the earlier half of the night glued to his side, nearly in his lap as they all shook with laughter). She’d sat down next to him, and he’d smiled, and they’d talked a little bit (neither of them remember later what on earth they talked about), and she’d leaned in, and so had he, and suddenly they were kissing, and it was everything. 

“We can’t,” she’d said. 

“Right, right,” he’d agreed. 

And they’d done it again. 

And again. 

LOVE- 

2) What are their primary love languages? 

I think that Quinn/Inferno, having grown up really during the Great Depression, has a big thing for receiving gifts. She never quite got out of the mentality of being so, incredibly poor for a large part of her childhood, that receiving gifts means so much to her. A lot of her childhood, her family and her neighbors would exchange goods for services (her neighbor gave her homemade jam for babysitting her kids, her father repaired a rocking chair for someone who gave them a bolt of fabric to make clothes from in return) and gifts simply for the sake of being gifts were somewhat foreign to her, but nevertheless incredibly appreciated. Giving her a gift now won’t produce quite the teary eyed response it might have when she was fifteen, but it still strikes her so deeply, and feels like such a great act of love. It’s not necessarily her primary love language, but it is one that strikes her straight to her core. 

I think they both have quite the thing for physical touch, and that when they were in the war together, just being able to feel the other person’s warmth and know they were alive went a long way. Probably a primary one for both of them, this is something that has really stuck for the both of them I think. Moving into the 21st century, positive physical touch is something Bucky has been deprived of for so long I think it would scare him a little bit, but especially when they finally admit that they both still love each other, I think just being there and holding each other would be big for them both. 

Real talk, Bucky has been deprived of love period for a long time, and I think it probably really messed up how he expresses and receives it. I think back in the war, Bucky seems very much like a words of affirmation kind of guy? Looking into his backstory, he was a big time over-achiever as a kid, and was apparently a 3-time YMCA boxing champion, and that all screams “loves being told that you’re proud of him” kind of guy. 

I’d actually love to hear your thoughts on this in regards to a current Bucky, because I don’t know how I think his current relationship with Words and generally what he went through might change that. Would that only get stronger after he’s used to the closest to praise he gets is being told his mission was successful? Would that make him crave honest affirmation and love even more? Or would it mess with his relationship with that sort of thing and make him really reject it? I’m sort of leaning towards the former, but I’m not sure. What do you think? 

DOMESTIC LIFE- 

7) How do they celebrate holidays? 

Oho boy. So, after that last question, I think some proper fluff is in order. So we’re actually going to skip into their timeline a little bit. 

Think of this as a few years down the road, when they’ve settled into a relationship and are living together. And we’re gonna talk Christmas, because, well. It’s christmas. These two were children in the 20s and 30s, and I think a lot of what they do for christmas is stuff that reminds them of back then, back in simpler times. Their first christmas living together, they watch three different versions of A Christmas Carol (because it was SUPER popular in the 20s!) in the week leading up to the holiday, and they debate whether they could get away with putting real candles on the tree (”I’m always here for fire” “you could put it out if something happened right?” “ah, it doesn’t work like that. I can only make the fire” They use LED lights). Bucky makes an incredible eggnog--he doesn’t quite remember the ingredients and proportions, but he tries using a recipe and then totally veers off the path and it comes out incredible. Quinn/Inferno is generally a really great cook, and she intends to cook Christmas dinner by herself (as was typical of her day) but Bucky wants to help, and she’s nervous he’ll be terrible at it but he’s actually great, and they cook together. They make way too much food, but all these years later, the excess doesn’t give them anxiety anymore, it feels good to be able to celebrate Christmas like this. They have leftovers for a week, and give extras out to people who don’t have their own. 

They love to host Christmas Eve dinner for their close friends, but no big crowds. Maybe a gift exchange with friends, and the first year they do this, they both say that they’ll open their gifts for each other at the gathering. However, on Christmas morning, they both reveal that they’d kept a special gift for the other person to open that day. They’re both shocked to see the other did the same thing, but think it’s adorable, and from then on it becomes a tradition. They always save one, special little thing for Christmas morning. (Maybe one year it’s a ring? Idk that’s not solid but it seems like the logical follow through on this!!) 

There it is!!! Thank you to Taylor Swift and the things I should have been doing but didn’t want to for how long this ended up being, and thank YOU for these questions it got some Real Creative Juices Flowing !!! 

@oh-cruel-fate i’m p sure it’ll notify you I answered your ask but just in case, you can never trust tumblr notifs and if you didn’t see this i might actually cry 

[itsuki-minamy]

BEFORE ZERO: CHAPTER 2 “BIRTHDAY CELEBRATION”

Translation: Naru-kun Raws: Ridia

A cat that has disappeared recently appeared at the front of the garden with a prey that it had killed.

When Akio, who went to a distant university, visited a young man about six months later, Shiotsu was immediately associated with such a scene.

"Marry this boy."

Contrary to Akio's expression at the entrance, which is something she's good at, she brought a strange one.

Shiotsu thought.

The young man in front of him is slightly shorter than him. The age is the same as her, who is 20 or two younger, but when it comes to Akio, who is mistaken for a high school student at eighteen, she appears to be an adult and a child.

What kind of person does it mean to show up at someone else's house after being after a girl?

No, the reason he sees them with such colorful glasses is that he has probably been involved in Akio's love affairs several times in the past. If he looks at it without prejudice, the young man in front of him seems to be a very ordinary person without any special points. On the contrary, polite behavior makes he feel even better.

However, there was a sense of incongruity, like "why is Akio such a genuine person", which made him feel like it was strange.

Unfortunately, there was no advance notice for the day's visit, and her parents were paying, so Shiotsu decided to deal alone.

"I'm sorry to have arrived suddenly."

The young man, who called himself Hayatoshi Minato, sat down by the table and bowed deeply.

"Today, I was visiting Akio's parents' house to receive a greeting, and suddenly there was a story that said," I will show my face to Brother Gen."

From the first glance impression, it was a reasonable greeting, he was calm and uncomfortable.

On the other hand, Akio,

"Well, this is also like a family home. It's another home."

She immediately stretches her legs to make it easier.

"Akio... I don't mind if you relax, but at least after the greeting."

Minato nodded his head as Shiotsu frowned.

"I was planning to show you what I'm doing today."

"Oh, by the way... it's a pain."

Akio sat in a sitting position next to Minato, even though she was scared. Since she is experienced in kendo, when she sits down seriously the form is determined.

"Oh..."

It wasn't his attitude that attracted Shiotsu's interest.

Akio obeyed what the others said.

It is the fact.

"Akio told me that she has a family relationship with Shiotsu-san."

"Oh..."

Shiotsu returned to Minato's words.

"Well, it's a long-distance relationship, but this street and my house are in the neighborhood."

"Especially, Shiotsu-san was like a brother and sister, and they went to the dojo together."

"They told me to be careful not to hurt their son..."

"I see... Akio-san is committed to everything. The parents would have been relieved to see Shiotsu-san."

"Yes, I'm fine with that."

He was caught up in an indirect conversation, and Akio got in the way.

"Yes. Then..."

Minato corrected his posture towards Shiotsu.

"I think I was surprised by the sudden story, but I'm not overly cheerful. I don't know if it will be five or ten years before I get married, but I look to the future. I would like to apologize for the relationship I established."

"Ah..."

It is a long time to say that two people, who have just met, will ask for forgiveness ten years in advance...

"Sorry, nothing... what if I say 'I won't forgive you'?"

After blurting out such a word, Shiotsu rushed in and added Minato.

"No, I'm sorry. Right now, I want to say, "I don't mean to speak in the first place."

As a social resignation, it should be possible to say "Congratulations" or "Cheers to Akio" here. However,

"But it's okay."

Once again, he was afraid to say it again.

"Besides, brother Gen says that."

Akio sharpened her mouth.

“It's the cancer that makes you think 'it's not going to last any longer', so I came all the way to see you. You'll be fine next time."

"Eh?"

Minato bows his head and...

"Oh. Are you hanging me "decently"? I see, I see."

He didn't seem to feel uncomfortable with "next time", Minato cried, laughed and turned to Shiotsu again.

"Again... that's why, Shiotsu-san..."

Minato said, leaving a smile on his cheek.

“I want “brother Gen” to support me. Both Akio-san and me."

++++++++++

After that, the situation changed more quickly than originally expected.

Far from "five years, ten years ahead," he entered the group six months after the greeting, and a year later, Akio had twins.

Akio wanted to get married and give birth, of course, but Akio's parents and others around her with their "we want to summarize the story this time" and "we want to calm Akio" helped.

The other party, Minato,

"So, it's faster than I thought, but let's start over."

He made arrangements for important things like finding a job and moving.

Minato's parents died prematurely and it was said that a small inheritance had allowed his to earn a living until his income was stable. He said, "It's a long time before we can give back to all of you...", but he had no tactic to rely on public support or the home of Akio's parents.

Although Minato is calmer than the average person, Minato, who has not passed the age of 20,

"It's okay. You have plans for the future; I think there is something like a life plan."

I confirm Shiotsu every time,

"If I say it strongly, my plan is to complete it with Akio."

Saying that, Minato laughed at ease.

"I will not be bored for the rest of my life."

"Not boring." Shiotsu, who tends to accept unplanned situations as stress, is an idea that never comes to light.

"If it is okay..."

Rather, it is less flexible.

Have thought about it,

"I think it's good for Shiotsu-san to have the ideal of 'being there' in things," he said.

About five years later, the relationship between Shiotsu and the Minato family continued unabated.

Shiotsu, who dropped out of college to become a policeman, and Minato, who became a general clerk. Akio, who has had several short-term jobs while raising her twins. In general, they are a very ordinary citizen.

Akio's parents died one after another when the twins were three or four years old, and Shiotsu decided to take care of them on behalf of their relatives, but Shiotsu also had his own job and his own life. When he visited the Minato family on occasion, he was surprised by the growth of the twins.

The reason it changed is the appearance of a person named "Blue King".

The "Blue King" Habari Jin recently established an organization called "Scepter 4". As a result of the aptitude test within the police, Shiotsu was chosen as one of them, and was soon placed in the position of the King's official lieutenant.

Furthermore, the Minato family, who were related to Shiotsu, underwent a similar test, and it was found that everyone, including children, was fit to have powers.

Unlike Shiotsu, who originally had an ideal of social order, they had the option of living as ordinary people while being watched by the authorities. However, mainly due to Akio's high hopes, the Minato couple received an installation from the "Blue King", and they both became members of the "Scepter 4" maneuvering section.

Of course, Shiotsu objected. The functions assigned to the new organization are those in which the exchange of lives is normal.

Not recommended for couples with young children. That is something common sense cannot admit.

But there were some extraordinary factors in the situation.

One is that Minato Akio has displayed unusual aptitude that surpasses Shiotsu's. If she accidentally wakes up to a Strain and become a stray person, along with her own direct personality, it cannot be left out in the general public.

And one more thing is the rise of the "Red King" Kagutsu Genji. The number of people who can control the members of the red clan led by Kagutsu is scarce, and the breakwater that stops the collapse of society must be reinforced no matter what.

++++++++++

These are ancient stories.

Akio's twins are 12 years old. They will become middle school students this spring. It seemed to him a great achievement that this family was able to enter milestone season without missing any.

By the way, the twins' birthday is in early March. He tried to adjust the shift for the Minatos to celebrate this with their family, but he couldn't make it easy for Minato and Akio to go home at the same time, so the month was halfway there.

And now that day.

"It's a bit late so start first."

Said Minato who got the phone call from Akio,

Shiozu was a bit gloomy.

"Uh."

There are already five plates on the table. Minato's home cooking. He knows it's always good to work, but it will take a certain amount of time to prepare this beautiful dining table.

It was planned that Minato after the night shift would get ready for today's party, and Akio, who will be leaving the office for the night, will join him later. Shiotsu, who happened to be working at the same time as Akio, also decided to participate, but he remember that he was just an "uncle of a relative" and is in an extra position.

Although, that's...

Akio, the mother of this family, wonders what she would do later than that. Where the hell would she stray on a day like this?

While Shiotsu was irritated, Minato and their sons were...

“I can't help it. Hayato and Akito. Let's cut the cake."

"Yes, I'll get a knife."

"I'll serve you a plate."

Then she changed her schedule and started working. He's used to Akio not moving as planned.

Also,

"I'm glad Shiotsu-san is here. Only three of us really lack emotion."

"Oh."

It made him worry about it.

Akio returned home about an hour later.

"Oh, have you already given a gift? Did you give it to Hayato and Akito, brother Gen?"

The twins waited in time, looked at each other and responded with their voices.

"Catalog gift."

"Buhahaha! What is that?"

Taking the catalog brought by Hayato, Akio laughed even more.

"Brother Gen, this is what you will give them! It's like tableware or futon!"

"It's not interesting and I'm sorry."

Truth be told, a paper cutter similar to the one custom made the other day for "Blue King" Habari Jin.

The twins of the Minato family are said to have a strong longing for the "Blue King" Habari Jin.

If he gives a gift that matches Habari, Shiotsu's thoughts that would make him happy would collapse on his birthday.

The paper cutter that was supposed to be given to Habari was used to kill the member of the “Purgatory” clan at the hand of Zenjo, a member of the Mobile Task Force. A similar one is too sinister to give away.

"Brother Gen is really boring. He's too boring to laugh."

"Akio, I'm not saying that."

Minato gives up on Akio who keeps laughing,

"I am happy, Shiotsu-san."

"I have fun choosing."

The twins said to Shiotsu.

"It's good to be funny."

Akio said with a smile and satisfaction.

“Because we are like that. It's just ordinary boredom."

Namely, this year's gift that the twins were given with the couple's joint name, chosen by Minato, is a fountain pen with the names Hayato and Akito.

“It is a souvenir. It won't force you to be interesting."

Minato smirked.

"Thanks Dad."

"I appreciate."

The twins said.

"This house would be useless without me."

Speaking like this, Akio went to the front door and returned with a large box in both hands.

"What are you doing with that big box?"

When Shiotsu asked, Akio raised the box to her face level,

"I bought a set at an electronics store."

"Wow!" Said the twins.

"Akio..."

When Minato yelled, Akio looked back in trouble.

"I know. I spoke with the children and "decided to graduate the toy". This is not a gift, it is mine."

"Is there such a graduation?"

Akio ordered the twins, ignoring Shiotsu's words, if there was such a graduation.

“Hayato and Akito. I'll let them do it, so I can connect various things."

While Akio was late and ate, the twins clashed, hooked up a game console to the TV in the living room, completed the initial setup, and started playing together. For the game software, they choose what they bought together with the main unit and tested it.

Finally,

"Okay, let me do it too."

Akio, who had finished eating, also intervened there.

"The controller is not enough."

"There are only two."

"I am the owner. You take turns."

"She is not willing to give it to her son."

Minato said to Shiotsu who leaned forward.

"Apparently that was the correct answer."

"Correct answer...?"

"The children said:" We are adults now.", So I thought about putting them together... but I'm afraid I still don't have enough time to play."

The appearance of Akio and her children addressing the television in the living room is more like a close brother and sister than parents and children.

"But in high school, playing with parents would be boring."

"Perhaps it is a great distance from children of the same age. After all, the occupations of their parents and the qualities of children's blood are special."

"I see... it's a job."

"Even if I'm working or raising a child, I'm trying to find everything... I trust Akio's nose."

"What is that "nose"?"

"I call it instinct... She always looks messy and always makes the right decisions where necessary."

Shiotsu looked towards the living room. Both Akio and the children play seriously, shake their bodies and raise their voices. When he was really serious and Akio's legs stopped, Minato rushed over and stopped.

"That's it…"

Marriage, childbirth and enlistment in "Scepter 4". Akio's actions and choices thus far seemed to always be hasty and reckless from Shiotsu's perspective.

If everyone is connected to this scene,

"I see, it's true."

It certainly feels that way now.

(To be continue…)

[secretlittlerandezvous]

Choosing A Godfather - David Pastrnak

Summary: David and the reader invite the boys over to meet their newborn baby. After awhile they need to announce who they picked as the godfather.

Words: 1489

“Here’s to the nights that turned into mornings with the friends that turned into family.”

It was like the whole world around me or rather around us suddenly stopped, the time slowed down and I completely lost track of what day of the week it was. Sometimes I didn’t even know if the sun was rising or setting. But it didn’t matter to me as I was still in awe of becoming a mom, having our son with us already and of finally being a family of three which was something we wished for many long months. I couldn’t believe how in love I was with our little boy and how my feelings for David became even stronger and how strong my love for the two boys I got to call mine was. I was unable to find words that would describe all the emotions I felt. Love, joy, happiness just as exhaustion, stress and a little bit of anxiety. It was a mix of emotions some of them I knew and some of them were new to me and only those with children could truly understand them. No matter how hard I tried to describe how overwhelming and endless my love for our son was I always felt like it wasn’t quite enough and that my friends without children couldn’t possibly understand it.

The moment we found out I was pregnant David turned into a sweeter man than he already was. He willingly helped with everything and did housework without any complaining which was definitely a surprising change and he protected me more than it was healthy but it sure paid off considering how clumsy I could be. He started cooking and kept asking me about my cravings although I very rarely experienced them, he held my hair when I was throwing up in the mornings and he cuddled with me every chance we got. He insisted on going to every doctor's appointment and he cried when we saw the ultrasound or when we heard the baby’s heartbeat for the first time. I’ve never seen him happier and more excited.

People around us shared the joy and excitement together with us. My family and his couldn’t wait for the newest addition to the family and they all started planning their visit once he’s here. My closest friends cried when I announced the news to them as they knew it was a long journey for me and David, they were excited to become aunties and started buying cute outfits and toys even before we knew the baby’s gender. I was grateful yet the superstitious part of me worried each time we received a new gift and I was scared of bad things happening. The boys threw a big party for us (well mostly for David and themselves) and the ones who had kids already welcomed David to the dad’s club. I dreamed of having a family of my own one day but only when I got pregnant, I realized I was already a part of a new family.

“Bergy called saying they’ll be here in fifteen minutes,” David whispered sticking his head in between the doors to check if our boy was sleeping or not. “We can still cancel it if you’re tired. You didn’t get much sleep last night.”

“No, we’re not canceling anything. I’m alright,” I gave David a reassuring smile and took our boy out of his crib. “The boys couldn’t wait to meet him from the moment we told them. I’m not ruining the joy for them.” I chuckled.

“Not for all of them though. Don’t forget that Marchy and Torey showed up in the hospital anyway,” David laughed at the memory. Brad and Torey visited us in the hospital on the second day of being there and they couldn’t keep their eyes off of the newborn and they kept arguing about who was going to be the godfather.

Once Brad, Torey, Patrice, Jake, Coyle, and Zdeno arrived the whole house was filled with laughter and unconditional love and happiness and I felt a little sad we decided to welcome the boys in smaller groups because I suddenly missed the presence of the rest of the boys and of course Tuukka’s presence although he hardly ever hang out with us. We had good food and drinks and we exchanged different stories from finding out about the pregnancy to labor to how fast they grow.

“I gotta say I was worried that poor kid will look like David, but he looks just like you Y/n,” Marchy laughed.

“He really does,” Zdeno agreed. “Little man is lucky to have you two as parents. His dad is an absolute legend already and his mom is a gem. I’m happy for you guys.” Zdeno’s words warmed my heart and I could tell from David’s face he appreciated the words from not only his captain but also a close friend more than he would admit.

“Let’s pray he won’t be as annoying and immature then,” I joked. I always teased David about being an overgrown child and that he was immature but in the last nine months he turned into a different and more responsible man.

“Torey, I don’t want to be that person again but I have to remind you that you have a baby at home as well so you could share this one with the rest of us,” Charlie complained and carefully took the little boy into his arms, sat down to get some extra support and he started smiling and tickling him on his little stomach.

I went to sit in David’s lap, wrapped my hands around his neck and kissed his cheek to express my happiness and gratefulness without having to say a word. We looked at each other for a moment and then we glanced over at the guys who gathered around our son and made all sorts of faces at him and sang different songs.

“So, have you finally decided who’s gonna be his grandfather?” Torey asked and all of them raised their eyebrows at us. The boys started arguing and begging us to make them his grandfather shortly after we broke the news to them and me and David never had the heart to announce the decision. We knew all of them would do their absolute best and we never doubted about any of them for a single second, yet we ended up choosing one and we postponed the announcement for as long as it was possible.

“Boys, we love you all, we truly do and we know you all would be excellent grandfathers and if we could we would choose all of you without thinking twice about it,” I started the speech I prepared in my head dozens of times knowing it would be handy sooner or later.

“Oh, stop it Y/n, we all know you guys picked me and Katrina,” Marchy said confidently but the boys disagreed and immediately laughed at him.

“You seriously think they would choose you Marchy? They, of course, chose me,” Charlie joined the conversation.

“You? You don’t even have kids why would they pick you?” Torey questioned.

“That’s exactly why they should pick me. So, I can gain some experience.” Charlie answered.

“Meanwhile these idiots argue I just wanna tell you guys that I’ll be happy with being just a funny and protective uncle,” Jake came to sit next to us and smiled and we all laughed together at the group of grown-ups arguing like little kids.

“Maybe we should’ve picked Jake after all,” David laughed. “Anyway, before we tell you I would like to say thank you to my love Y/n for giving me the best gift someone could ever give me. Y/n, honey, I adore you for everything you do, and I love you.”

“I love you too,” I smiled and sent him a kiss before he continued.

“I also wanted to say thanks to all of you guys. We’re really grateful to have such an amazing family and we’re happy that our boy will have so many great uncles. I hope you won’t be mad at us for choosing Bergy as the godfather.” David said the last sentence so quietly that even I had a hard time understanding him although I sat right next to him. The boys seemed to understand perfectly. They all clapped their hands, hugged Patrice and with genuine smiles congratulated him.

“I don’t know what else to say except that I love you all and thank you. I’ll do my best to be a responsible godfather to this beautiful boy.” Patrice took his godson into his arms, kissed his forehead and then went to hug as and shortly after it we took some pictures together.

We spent the rest of the day the same way it started. We spent it by laughing, smiling and enjoying every moment of each other’s presence and soaked up the love and happiness.