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eddieexcellence · 2 years

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SOUR CANDY

part iv: dungeon master

E. munson x fem!reader

Synopsis: back in Hawkins for spring break, the reader is back from college. She gets sucked into the madness again for the fourth time with her best friend and younger friends. Plus an unexpected and unwelcome face.

Type: fixit fic, angst/comfort, enemies to lovers trope

Warnings: cursing as always, reader always in a pickle, insecure/jealous reader, clumsy reader, brief mention of blood, backstory backstory backstory, mention of a razor (teenage shaving mishaps), Eddie growing up headcanons, silly litte mentions of sour patch kids, angst.

Words: 4k (wowza)

Authors note: i think it’s the moment everyone has been waiting for? Reader x Eddie in the flesh??? I had fun with this one. I just like imagining the backstory to Eddie since we didn’t get too many details in the series. This chapter follows the plot loosely of s4 ch5: the Nina project but with the twist of the reader in it. If I missed any warnings let me know!! Hope you enjoy!! :) I’d like to also talk about the gif used and how precious he is

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You really didn’t know how you were going to get into Eddie’s trailer. You had parked by the playground, and you were just staring at the trailer with ‘53’ by the front door. There was no more crime scene and caution tape blocking it off, but Eddie’s uncle, Wayne, was home. If you broke in, he’d hear you with trailer was only so big. You also couldn’t just assume he’d let you in if you asked. He was for sure being hounded and scrutinized by reporters and police right now.

You drummed your fingers on your knees, thinking. Then you had an idea as you stared at the D&D guideline books in your passenger seat. You grabbed your bookbag from the back next to the paper grocery bag, and dumped the contents in your passenger side so you could fit everything you needed for Eddie. Not quite sure how full proof this would be, but it was worth the shot as you got out of your car. You walked up to the front door and tapped on the front door lightly taking a step back waiting for an answer composing your jitters shaking your hands slightly.

The door opened to reveal Wayne Munson, and you beamed at him as if you were putting on an act.

“Can I help you?” He asked suspiciously, confused as to why a young woman was on his doorstep. Hoping it wasn’t another reporter.

“Hi, Mr. Munson, I’m the local babysitter, Y/n Y/l/n. How’re you doing today sir?” You asked politely the smile never leaving your face.

He gave you an incredulous scowl, “have you seen the news?”

He took a good look at you, you looked familiar. Not only being able to place where he has met you and your name before, he didn’t think you looked like the typical babysitter especially for Hawkins in the casual attire you had on.

You mentally facepalmed yourself for asking a stupid question, but you didn’t let that deter you. “I’m sorry sir, how insensitive of me. It must be frustrating that your nephew’s wrongfully accused of murder.”

“You believe Eddie’s innocent?” He was in disbelief, that’s all the town was talking about, and his boys name chastised everywhere he went as of late. It was eating at Mr. Munson that nobody believed him. The police tried to be neutral, but the critical gazes told him otherwise when they interviewed him,

“One hundred percent! Eddie is an oddball, not a murderer.” You reassured him. “ Actually the reason I’m here is because a couple of his younger members of the hellfire club that I babysit let Eddie borrow a couple of things for the game. I was just wondering if I could collect them?” You gave him some puppy dog eyes.

“I also apologize for the ill timing, y’know how kids can be though.” You quickly added for extra measure.

He pointed his finger at you all of sudden, “I know who you are!”

You gulped, your smile faltered, thinking you're in trouble. “Y-you do?”

“Yes, you’re one of Eddie’s friends!” He had open the door wider. “You could’ve just said that. Come on in.” He stepped aside, and you smiled weakly stepping by him into the small trailer.

The trailer was decorated in trucker hats and mugs a yellow stain seemed to envelop everything as you glanced around. Only being in here once before. It was the first time Eddie taught you to play D&D. To your dismay there was no fairy or mermaid option for race, you went for an Elf Druid instead. Towards the middle of him teaching you, Eddie and you just ended up going through his music collection, and you watched him play his acoustic guitar he had got a few months prior. Everything looked just about fine and you almost couldn’t tell Chrissy Cunningham had been killed here almost a week ago. The only evidence was a crack in the ceiling.

“I don’t know why it took me a while to figure out, maybe you had just grown so much since a couple years ago. Eddie doesn’t tell me much about his friends anymore. Then again I’m not home much either.” Wayne looked down at his feet sounding upset. “But I do remember him being sweet on you.”

You stilled as you felt your heart pick up its pace. That swarm of butterflies seemed to flutter back into your stomach again like it did earlier. “He was?”

“Boy was he. Now, I probably shouldn’t be telling you all this. That should be his job.” He chuckled, you chuckled nervously too. “His room is down the hall on the left. Make it quick girl. I have to be at work soon.” With a blank stare and a nod to this information, you tripped over your feet, almost forgetting to walk as you went to his room feeling more uneasy.

When you walked in you closed the door so it was only open slightly ajared, preventing Wayne from seeing what you were doing. The room was almost exactly how you imagined it: piles of clothes in the corner, a couple beer and water bottles on his nightstand, band posters, posters of half naked women, and the smell of weed and his cheap cologne lingered in the air. Things you did not imagine his room to have: his bed somewhat messily made wafting a smell of fresh detergent, his desk area, music collection, and D&D shelf all meticulously organized and dusted. Seemed like he was trying to impress someone. That made you frown, maybe he was trying to impress a certain cheerleader? Chrissy Cunningham was there to buy drugs from him. You knew even Eddie ‘the freak’ Munson would like her. She was pretty, sweet and actually really funny, she never solemnly judged anybody either: only if they liked Coke or Pepsi. She was the IT girl of Hawkins High, and despite being a year older than her; it didn’t exclude you from feeling a slight green feeling in your stomach. You could’ve been over thinking, maybe he invited other clients over and tried to clean up for them too? An envious feeling washed over you, it had left a sour taste in your mouth.

You let it dull as you heard someone knock on the front door that caused you to jump out of your daze.

“Can I help you?” You heard Mr. Munson ask.

“We need to take a look around.” A woman’s voice. Footsteps creaked into the living room. A ringing, high electricity buzzing started.

You gulped, and made pace. Quietly started to search for clothes for him, and dug through his drawers throwing whatever he may have needed in your bag.

“Yeah, I think it’s some kind of leak.” Wayne said. “Hadn’t had a chance to fix it with everything going on.”

You quickly dug through the top drawer, keeping an eye on the door until fingers hit something small and hard wrapped in a bandanna at the bottom of his drawer. Did you want to know? Cautiously you pulled it out, one eye closed because you could never know. Your eyes glowed in bewilderment as you unwrapped the object. It had been something you thought you’d never see in a million years. A litle poorly lumpy gnome looking trinket. You wanted to laugh, but didn’t have time to observe the object thoroughly as the door opened. You quickly wrapped it back up and threw it in the bag, turned around to be met by Wayne.

“Girl what the hell are you doing? Are you with them?” He was furious at the coincidence of you showing up on his door steps and minutes later a government agent. He noticed your bag full of Eddie’s things poking out, his brows knitted in an angry confusion visibly softened. He grabbed your arm gently with one hand bringing you in, as his other shut the door. “Do you know where Eddie is?” His voice only above a whisper.

Frozen, unsure what to say, you started to open your mouth before quickly closing it, eyes wide, and almost scared with any answer you tried to give him.

His eyes started to get glossy, “I just want to know he’s safe.” He tried to hold it together as a few tears ran down his face.

You grabbed a hold of the hand on his arm, squeezing gently. “Trust me Mr. Munson, he’s okay. I don’t know who you’re talking about, but I’m trying to clear his name.” You whispered frantic. “My friends and I are going to clear his name.” You quickly adjusted the sentence. This was a team effort not a you effort.

He nodded, taking a deep breath as footsteps approached Eddie’s bedroom. “You need to get out of here, take this.” He took out his wallet and handed a $20 bill to you.

“I can’t take this,” you insisted, trying to give it back.

“It’s for Eddie, now go.” He closed your hand around the crumpled bill. You just nodded backing up to the window, and with shaky hands you opened it sliding the screen up. You threw your bag out first, before hoisting yourself up and through the window. You weren’t ever the most poised and graced girl so you managed dropping face first to the ground. Your body ached and burned knowing there was going to be cuts and bruises later.

Adrenaline pumped through your veins as you quickly got up dusting off the scrapes and cuts, grabbing the bookbag. You crawled around staying close to the siding of the trailer, sneaking around so you could run to the car discreetly. Noticing an unmarked vehicle was parked in front of the trailer as you made sure the coast was clear. In your last couple years at Hawkins you had gotten very familiar with a car like that knowing it could mean one thing, the government, even more specifically the Department of Energy. That would explain the whirring and buzzing.

You dashed over to the playground where you had parked. Unlocking the door and hurriedly putting the keys in the ignition, engine coming to life. You grabbed the walkie talkie from the survival box from the backseat. Peeling out of the trailer park you clicked the walkie on.

“Munson, do you copy?” You asked out of breath.

“Did you get the stuff?” He quickly responded.

You mentally checked off the list in your head: food, beer, shirt, pants, socks—

“Shit! I forgot the hairbrush!” You still had your walkie clicked on causing Eddie to hear that.

“Y/l/n, you're truly implorable to think Hawkins Most Wanted needs a brush in a moment like this.” You could hear him laugh at you.

“Oh shove off, Eddie!” You told him. “I’ll be there in less than 15.”

“Copy, Princess.” You didn’t need to see his face to know he had a smirk on his face.

Your eyebrows furrowed at the road as you clicked the walkie on one last time, “stop calling me that!”

You parked down the road from Reefer Rick’s place in a tucked away turn around spot by Lover’s Lake. Overstuffing your bookbag with the food and beers for Eddie, putting the rest of your belongings in your trunk and locked the car up. It wasn’t too far away, but far enough to make you haul ass. Cutting through the brush that was behind Reefer Ricks house then to the abandoned boat house avoiding any possible attention. Pushing your stamina as much as you could. You got to the door and quietly knocked before opening the door and closing it behind you as you slipped in.

Eddie sat on an empty trash can throwing pebbles into an empty paint can, looking bored. He looked up at you and he looked dumbfounded.

“Holy shit Y/l/n!” You were still mildly out of breath from the most physical activity you’ve had in quite a few months, holding your hands on your knees throwing the book bag to him. You didn’t even bother looking at him yet, just taking deep breaths.

“I’m never,” a deep breath, “doing anything,” another deep breath, “that involves running,” one last deep breath, “again!” You collapsed to your already bruised and scraped knees tired.

“You’ve seen better days haven’t you?” You could hear the man across from already munching on the honeycombs you got him.

You had your eyes closed still regaining yourself, “always for the flattery aren’t we Munson?” He cracked open a can of beer as you scoffed at the sound.

“Oh do you want me to tell you that you look fresher than a daisy while you have blood running down your forehead?” He retorted. “Christ Sake Y/n how’d you even get that? Got into a fight with the gas station clerk for the six pack?”

You flipped him off, putting your fingers to your forehead and felt a small wet cut on your temple. It wasn’t too bad, but still enough to stain your fingers red you noted when you opened your eyes. You set you eight on the tall unruly man, glaring at him. You eyes making contact with him for the first time since you came into the boathouse. You had only saw him in passing while dropping off Max at her trailer when you were home for winter break a few months ago.

He looked more mature, hair longer, but still wearing his typical outfit: his hellfire t-shirt, tight jeans, leather jacket with the hellfire vest on top, scuffed up Nikes, and an ungodly amount of accessories. His guitar pick necklace hangs on his chest, his wallet chain popping out his pocket, a chain bracelet on his left wrist where he only had on ring on that hand, while his right hand was clad in an obnoxious amount of silver rings in various shapes on his long slender fingers, and his timex watch on the right wrist. His big brown doe eyes glimmered mischievously into yours.

You had to fight the blush from forming hoping that if one did appear you could chalk it out to all the vigorous running. Call Eddie a freak, an idiot, or a loser, but he wasn’t unattractive.

You cleared your throat, averting your eyes to the six pack beside him. “If you’d like to know, I had to practically throw myself out of your bedroom window to flee. Now hand one over.” You made a grabby hand for a can of beer.

“Ooh, the goody two shoes breaking and entering and drinking a beer with a runaway madman?” He rolled a can over to you anyway. “That’s scandalous.”

You opened the beer, taking a thirsty gulp trying to soothe your dry throat. You didn’t care that he chastised you for having a beer, you were parched. “I didn’t break and enter, more like break and exit.” You had corrected after finishing the gulp.

“My uncle let you in?” Eddie sounded surprised.

“H-he recognized me and I made a bullshit excuse I needed to grab something for Dustin,” you stated avoiding the detail of the DOC at his front door. “He wanted to know if you were safe, Eddie.” Not knowing how he’d take the news, you anxiously took another sip of beer.

Eddie was silent, glancing down staring in front of his feet. It was silent for a minute as you two just stayed still. He sniffed, wiping his nose, was he about to cry? You braced yourself just in case he was about to. Comforting the kids came east even Nancy or Steve. But Eddie? Not so much. You didn’t really know if you could say or do anything to help.

“D-does he think I did it?” He asked, his voice shaky.

You shook your head. “No, of course not.” He visibly relaxed at the statement. You bit your lip, seeing how distraught he was. You could go on all day making snide remarks and insults at him, but you felt bad. Genuinely. “Munson, you may be many things, but you aren’t a bad person .” The tone of your voice is sincere and thoughtful as you look down coyly. This was the best effort of you comforting him.

Eddie thought you short circuited being nice all of a sudden. He studied you carefully, scrapes and bruises littered your skin, your mascara from the day before smudged, did he dare want to admit to himself that you still looked pretty? The oversized Slayer shirt hanging off your shoulders, ripped mom jeans, and combat boots that you could squash anyone in. You did not look like the girl you once were in high school not even a year ago. That girl still hid her band tees tucked into skirts under dainty sweaters and paired with Keds or Converse with frilly socks that followed Steve around like a lost puppy. You had grown within the several months since he last saw you, but reminded him more of the personality of the young girl he first met. The you he had envisioned you becoming in high school had him in awe. That didn’t happen though, instead you were corrupted by the popular kids and jocks.

“You’re not going soft on me, are you Y/l/n?” Eddie questioned mockingly as he continued to rummage through the book bag of stuff you got him.

“What, I can't feel an ounce of sympathy?” You bit back.

“I don’t need your pity!” He snapped getting mad. “If this is all you’re trying to prove, you can leave. You did your supply drop, good work soldier. Now leave.” He didn’t need your martyrdom.

You rolled your eyes, “always ruining a moment and any decent conversation Munson.” Maybe you did extend your stay in the boathouse, you were only so he could have some food and clean clothes.

Eddie still pulled things out of the bag, “if I remember correctly that’s always been you.” He pulled a crushed box of sour patch kids from it, his black and white bandana messily folded over an item flying out as he did so. Oh no.

“You’re not going soft on me, are you Munson?” You mimicked him from moments ago as your eyes fell on the bandana too.

“I-I forgot I still had that.” He tried to say. You raised an eyebrow, not believing him.

“In your underwear drawer, that I would hope you go into everyday?” That caused the man across from you to blush lightly as he unraveled the bandana from around the trinket.

“I’m surprised you didn’t smash it.” You said.

“It’s not his fault the person that made it became a brainwashed idiot.” He rolled it around his fingers.

It was chipped, seen better days, but he still knew what it was supposed to be. It was a poorly constructed dungeon master you made for art class in the 8th grade. You were great at art, pottery not so much. You made it as a token of your friendship in your free time. You were so excited when you gave it to him.

It was towards the end of the school year, so you didn’t have much to do in classes as everyone wrapped up missing and late assignments. Steve asked you to hangout that weekend, but the new Judas Priest album was coming out. You wanted to snag a vinyl or cassette for it, so you asked Eddie to come along to the music shop.

As you two waited in the small line, he chatted excitedly about what he heard about the album so far. You listened as you rummaged through your purple canvas bookbag looking for the little clay piece you made in art class for him. It was comical seeing a young girl in the crowd of mainly men clad in their metal t-shirts and flannels in the rising mid day spring heat of Hawkins. You had a pale pink sleeveless romper on with a chunky belt, a geometric printed matching baby blue and lavender windbreaker wrapped around your waist, your signature lacy white socks pulled as high as they could go to hide the razor nicks on your ankles from shaving, and scuffed white keds on. Let’s not forget the clumped on mascara coating your eyelashes, overly glittery lip gloss, and the big band on your chin. When Eddie asked about it, you said you were clumsy and cut your chin, secretly it hid the mountain of a pimple that appeared overnight.

Whereas Eddie had his Hellfire Club shirt on, some cargo shorts, his wallet chain hanging, his newfound guitar pick necklace, some mismatched socks, and black vans with scribbles on the soles. He had tried to grow out a mustache and beard, but it was mainly a sparse area of dark straggly peach fuzz above his upper lip, and ingrown hairs dotted his cheeks. You two were a sight for sore eyes as you were just awkward pubescent teenagers. Not aware of the events that would forebode within the month to come.

“Aha!” You pulled the trinket out, a bright proud smile adorned your features.

“Y/n what is that?” The teenage boy asked you. He couldn’t tell what exactly it was, it looked like a mini garden gnome at first glance.

“It’s for you!” You handed it to him. “It’s supposed to be a dungeon master, see it even has a diabolical sorcerer hat on!” As you explained more he got what you were going for. The hat with lumpy flower pieces had gold stars painted over them. It was a disproportionately large almost just as big as the dungeon master itself. Though poorly made, the details of the paint job were really good; primarily red, black, and gold accents. You had made the trinket look like it was holding a red bat shaped electric guitar, like the one he got at the beginning of the school year that his uncle helped get him for making it to sophomore year. The face is just a peach colored blob with a scowl on the face. Eddie wouldn’t be happy if he had to lug around a hat on his head three times his size too.

“I was going for if Gandalf was in a metal band.” You continued. You were so nervous, knowing it wasn’t your best work, but you still thought it was cute. “D’you like it?” You batted your lashes.

Eddie smiled, it was the worst thing he ever saw. It was the best thing he had ever received though, because you made it just for him. “It’s actually great,” he chuckled. He held his hand out for a high five. “Thanks Y/n/n!” You high fives excitedly back.

He brought it to every Hellfire Club meeting until the day you stopped being friends. It was retired on his D&D shelf until one particularly bad day between you two where you were at each other’s throats in Spanish class. It got to the point where you had to be sent to the library to do your work for the rest of the period, and he got detention. Eddie went home that afternoon ready to smash it, but the more he stared at it the more he couldn’t bring himself to do it. It had been through many great campaigns with him just sitting by his folder scowling at the other members in the club so he just carefully wrapped it in one of his many bandanas and tucked it away. He always unraveled it when his uncle would force him to clean up his room and fold his laundry getting distracted by going through his things instead.

You finally stood up, dusting your pants off grabbing your keys from your pocket turning around to leave. “Well this brainwashed idiot did her job so I’ll just go.” After the much gentle reality check Steve gave you the night before, now Eddie basically paraphrased what he had said the night prior, you couldn’t help it to be bitter as a pang filled your chest. Were you really brainwashed and desperate to fit in?

“Thanks for the trip down memory lane, sweetheart.” The malice that laced sweetheart when Eddie said it was enough to turn the hurt and confusion into anger.

You whipped around to say something, the sound of a tired screeched to stop made you both freeze. “Get down!” Eddie instructed, and he sneaked a glance through the window. You crouched down not knowing what was happening listening to him anyway.

“Shit. Shit!” He exclaimed quietly as he ducked back down, grabbing the walkie talkie beside him.

“What’s going on?” Your eyes widened as he clicked the walkie on.

“Hey Dustin. It’s Eddie, you remember me right?” He spoke through the machine. “Well the babysitters here too. If anyone’s there, we may be in a bit of trouble here.” He started to freak out. “Okay? Wheeler? Harrington?!” He smacked the walkie in frustration, “anyone?!”

You crawled over to the window he was near to see what he was so freaked out over. You bumped his shoulder as you went to peer up through the window, but he quickly grabbed you, pulling you back down before you could see.

“I believe my angry mob has arrived.” He whispered darkly.

taglist: @sunfairyy @eddiemunson4ever @babygirlwilly @creme-delacreme @ultracolorfulnerdcollection @flicksturz @thicc101q

#eddie munson #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson imagine #eddie munson smut #eddie munson headcanons #stranger things imagine #eddie munson fanfic #joseph quinn x reader #eddie munson fic #sour candy series #sour candy fic

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reflections-in-a-critical-eye · 2 years

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it’s funny because following the discussion you had with a few anons recently i almost send you a message saying as much as i love Bangtan a long break could really be beneficial to them right now…. Well, here we go…! i had my suspicion about this hiatus for months now, and Proof kinda confirmed it for me, i was just wanting for them to announce it. i didn’t send my initial message in the end cause i just venting and frustrated by them not making things clear (i’m surprised to see armys being surprised by this hiatus on my timeline tbh..). it makes me sad because I’m a pandemic European army and i feel like i haven’t fully had the Bangtan experience so far (i think they focused way too much on the us market for last 2 years and forget a bit about their fans from the rest of the world but that’s a topic for another discussion i guess). but i appreciate their honesty today and i’m glad Namjoon recognized himself that they were losing themselves and needed to take time apart. they were clearly lacking inspiration lately and i think this is the right decision for them. I can’t wait for their solo work, especially JK, JM and Hobi! I can see them maturing and coming back in a few years stronger and with interesting new concepts and things to say, hopefully less family/teen-oriented. Fingers crossed

Why are the fans surprised by the break? It was obvious this was going to happen, it doesn't take a genius to see that, it was all there. Leaving aside the emotional reactions from fans which I'm not going to criticize today because there are more important aspects to discuss, all that was said in Festa was a good thing.

I think that in this industry, a constant pouring of content is the norm. Produce music, sing, rehearse the choreography, go on tour, do promotions, share your life and thoughts on social media. But you only get a one month break after working yourself to the bone for years. And not just that, you're in your 20s and you might think about your own artistic pursuits, but that always comes second place or put on hold because the group is more important. Choose the group.

That's what BTS had to do for 10 years. They're not just entering a new stage of their career, but a new one as men who have their own needs and desires that can only be fulfilled at this point if they go their own way and see what's out there. There's nothing sad about this. Good for them, I'm happy they're doing it. It's so easy to lose yourself in the entertainment industry, of not fully knowing what is your identity apart from being part of a famous idol group. They're not boys anymore, excited to get their foot in the door and do it all together as seven. They did that already and now this is a natural progression towards choosing themselves for a while.

I'm glad they were able to be sincere and really talk about their feelings, as much as they were able to do on camera. For anyone willing to see and admit, it was obvious they lost their identity musically and as a group during the pandemic. I'm trying not to be petty here too much, but I can't help but say to all those people who said it wasn't true in the past year, ''I told you so''. Loving BTS as a group and them as individuals doesn't mean ignoring the signs and construct a carefully written story about how they must have enjoyed making that music, that they like it, that the songs are good, everyone else who is a critic is a hater. That's not love. That's blindness. To believe that everything is perfect and they're satisfied with everything when there was actually no clear direction towards what they want to do and pursue. So they forced it and I think this is the part that is purely my speculation, but I believe it definitely had to do with the corporate side. if they couldn't go on tour, then money had to be made in other ways and getting number one on Billboard Hot100 is definitely one way to do what. They got the commercial success with generic pop songs but all those promotions and what they had to say during interviews lacked so much sincerity and it was so scripted that we could see how fake all of it became. And hearing what they said today during Festa dinner just makes it all more obvious, even in the way they expressed themselves. I can also say that perhaps this was the first time in a very long time when RM decided to be sincere and stop with the usual bullshit. I give him that. He's aware of his shortcomings and as much as he is the leader of the group, he is not and should not be the spokesperson for all of them and what they think.

I'm excited for what's to come, to see the BTS members doing something without the pressure of greatness and having to fly too close to the sun in ways that had nothing to do with what they used to be as group. They are at an age in which it's important to just try and see what else is out there. If not now, then when?

#bmt asks #bts #bts festa 2022 #bts festa dinner 2022 #bts break #bts solo careers

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shihalyfie · 3 years

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Comparing the original Best Partner character song series and the new one, and what that says about the 02 cast

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So if you haven’t heard yet, a new series of 02 (it’s actually Kizuna) character songs dropped! Allegedly intended as a slightly delayed 20th anniversary project, the series is a callback to the original “Best Partner” character song album series that released during 02′s actual airing.

If you know anything about the original Best Partner series, it’s one that sets an insanely high bar, even for Digimon standards (and that’s saying something, given the deep associations this franchise has with music). The series of character songs before it, Adventure’s “Character Song + Mini Drama” series, has a…kind of questionable amount of relevance to each character; it’s not like they’re super amazingly out of character, but they don’t really tell you a lot about each character beyond some gloss details (this is probably best demonstrated in how Mimi’s song is blatantly just an AiM single disguised as a Mimi song). Best Partner, on the other hand, very intimately goes into each character’s head and their relationships with their respective partners, even putting in direct words what wasn’t stated explicitly in the series.

So does the new series live up to the high bar its predecessor sets? Answer: on top of some abnormal attention to detail on the covers, it is very obvious that the new series not only has a lot of the depth of the 02 characters in mind, but also is made in direct response to the original series itself. Moreover, putting the original Best Partner series and this one side by side reveals a lot about each of the 02 characters and what they got out of 02′s story, in a surprisingly neat summary.

Let’s go into how!

Since this is something that has a deep relationship with all of these characters in regards to the series, this particular meta would not have been possible without input from multiple people who know these characters better than I could ever hope to by myself. Thank you for all of your help.

A bit of historical context

The original Best Partner series consisted of a set of albums, one representing each pair of partners in 02. Notably, even though nowadays there’s a specific order of the Adventure/02 characters that’s used in modern media, not only does the original series not follow that ordering (as it hadn’t been set in stone at the time), it also leads with the original Adventure characters and not the 02 ones, which is pretty unusual for a series that’s ostensibly supposed to be for 02 (modern lineups will usually favor leading with whichever group the relevant product is branded with).

A lot of this probably makes more sense when you realize that the original Best Partner series was released during the first half of 02’s airing. The final album was released on August 23, 2000, four days before the fateful 02 episode 21 (yes, that means the third track on Ken and Wormmon’s album is actually a spoiler). So in other words, while the original Best Partner series accurately reflects the older Adventure group’s character development and what problems they were able to sufficiently overcome, the 02 group does not have anything about their character development from 02′s second half reflected in it at all.

That’s actually a really huge disparity, when you think about it, especially because a lot happened with the 02 group in that second half – that second half was where the emotional payoff and the results of everything that had been building up over that first half came together. So in comparison to the Adventure group, composed of people confidently talking about what they’ve decided for themselves from now on, you still have the 02 group drenched pretty deeply in insecurity. Watch 02 to the end and listen to those songs again, and you might even think “wait, this is supposed to represent these characters?” So, in essence, the new Best Partner series serves to address that gap, and what the 02 group gained and learned out of 02′s second half.

Best Partner (and its successor series for Tamers, Best Tamers) follows a uniform format: a solo song for the human partner, a solo song for the Digimon partner, and a duet between the two. (Given that, the original Best Partner series was really huge, at a whole 36 songs.) Recalling that, in the Adventure universe, a Digimon partner reflects the human’s inner self and psyche, it’s pretty extensive coverage: what the human has to say about themself, what place their Digimon partner is in relative to that, and what the nature of their relationship is due to that.

Let’s go into each pair of partners in detail!

Daisuke and V-mon

For those who love 02 and love Daisuke in particular, when you ask “what kind of character is Daisuke like?” or “what’s Daisuke’s best quality?”, you’re probably going to get answers like “forward-thinking” or “positive” or “good at uplifting others” – basically everything to do with how Daisuke is an encouraging presence who doesn’t give in easily and has a strong mentality of moving forward in the face of despair. Someone who appreciates and understands others’ best qualities, and loves them for everything they are. So when you look at his original Best Partner solo song, Goggle Boy…

But more than just saving the world I really don’t want to lose, you know

…Uh…

These goggles are my proof Given by a certain someone to me The precious thing he handed over It’s just like his Crest, you know Aren’t they cool?

…Well, that’s nowhere to be found.

This is the kind of song that might make you think “wait, this is supposed to be Daisuke’s representative song?!” (It’s possibly because of this that Daisuke’s song from The Bridge to Dreams, Tomorrow, generally tended to be far more favored among Daisuke fans, although it’s more relevant to 02 as a whole than it is to Daisuke in particular.) if you listen to Goggle Boy knowing about what Daisuke’s best qualities should be, this is almost a little frustrating, because this is the kind of thing he really shouldn’t be pigeonholed as – basically, begging for others’ approval and praise and focusing on idolizing others. Even his most insightful moments in this song come from his appreciation of something that came from someone else (Taichi), not from himself.

Well, the thing is, that was Daisuke’s character for most of the first half of 02. Of course, even in early episodes, there were many times where Daisuke’s potential for positivity and forward-thinkingness were starting to poke through, but most of the time he was rolling over trying to please others and chasing after his seniors. The real period of time he started to grow into his own about this was 02 episode 24 and its aftermath – when his time spent with his friends started to fill the void in his life and his need for validation, and the escalating situation, especially with Ken, led him to have a proper grasp of what was properly important and what needed to be done.

So when we get to his new solo, RUNNING MAN…

I’ll keep on running far ahead Let’s bring everyone along with me, today, too Really, always, thank you, Thank you so much Riding the wind, going past the sky Grasping your hands and flying I’m even starting to see beyond my dreams

Even in only one section, you can get an instant image of the Motomiya Daisuke we all know and love – someone who appreciates his friends’ role in his life, loves their company, and moves positively towards the future. Because, again, after the events of 02, and after being able to bond further with his friends and gaining his own strengths in leading everyone forward, he became able to more properly express his love for everything instead of constantly vying for others’ attention. Even the title reflects the change, from a “boy” who’s flashing the symbol of courage he got from someone else, to a “man” who’s positively running forward on his own merits.

(Interestingly, RUNNING MAN is composed by Ohta Michihiko, a legendary composer who’s made many of some of the most important songs in the franchise, and also composed many of the original Best Partner songs, including Goggle Boy. It’s interesting how RUNNING MAN is the one most like the original songs in atmosphere as a result – possibly representing how Daisuke is a simple-minded person who ostensibly doesn’t change drastically in disposition – yet has lyrical content that’s so starkly different.)

As a result, this is subtly reflected in the other two songs in each album as well – remember that V-mon is one of the partners who most “matches” his own partner in terms of disposition and mentality. So as Daisuke shifted his own priorities, V-mon did too; we go from Go Ahead! being about taking a stand and fighting, whereas Beyond the Future is about a similar forward-thinking mentality to Daisuke’s.

Likewise, the duets have different priorities as well; 2-TOP was composed of Daisuke and V-mon bickering for the most of it, and the most substantial point you could get about it was that despite their bickering, they made it work, whereas HEY-rasshai! has them almost entirely in sync (with one minor moment of deviance). It’s also interesting to see the topics covered in each; 2-TOP is about soccer, which ultimately is revealed to be a fairly incidental hobby for Daisuke, whereas HEY-rasshai! is about ramen making, which, while comical, also has a very strong tie to “Daisuke’s dream for the future, and his willingness to single-mindedly dedicate himself to something when it’s something he truly wants”. In other words, while Daisuke knew what he wanted since elementary school, it says a lot that he’s at a point where he and V-mon are now taking proactive steps to have that dream achieved, now that they’re able.

Ken and Wormmon

Like with his position in 02 itself, Ken’s is probably the easiest to see the contrast without trying too hard, but there’s still quite a lot to unpack!

When you think about it, in the modern era, it’s actually surprisingly hard to find stuff too relevant to Ken’s time as the Kaiser. The reason is, simply, that the series itself discourages this – Ken himself had an obvious aversion to dwelling too much on it, and the entire series itself has a strong theme of “moving on”. It’s not to say that the Kaiser doesn’t have a fanbase (I’m sorry if you’re reading this and find that I might be implying too hard that you don’t exist), but rather that there’s a franchise and fanart tendency to focus more on “Ken-chan” than “the Kaiser” these days, and old merch from the first half of the series will all too often get responses of “it’s really sad Ken-chan can’t be there…” Of course, 02 itself was also about accepting one’s mistakes, not pretending they never happened, so it’d be foolhardy to deny Ken’s dark history entirely, but it’s retroactively interesting to see such a prominent and persistent piece of merch like Ken and Wormmon’s original Best Partner album focus so largely on Ken’s time as the Kaiser when most of the franchise ended up trying to move on.

Starting with Ken’s solo songs, and his first one, ONLY ONE:

I’ve lived without showing my true feelings, wearing this mask

Well, this was easy to tell from the series itself, but the point driven home is that Ken didn’t want to expose his true self to others, putting on a front of “strength” and smashing his true feelings into the corner so that he could become more of the “perfect” person he thought he was supposed to be. There’s also another interesting line that one should pay attention to:

I polished the knife in my heart and put my belief in infinite power

Basically, putting up a defensive front to prevent anything from approaching his weaknesses.

Anyway, moving onto his new song, Never Ending:

If I want to be proud of tomorrow’s version of myself I wonder, what can I do? Never Give-up I’ll keep fighting, even doing someone else’s part No, I won’t be afraid anymore

First of all, the main theme of the song is about putting conscious thought into understanding how to stay true to himself – basically, understanding what it is he really wants to do and become, instead of putting on fronts and hiding it from others. Not only that, we see traces of what exactly he gained over the course of the second half of 02 – because so much of it involved constantly trying to blame himself for everything, this song is about what he came to learn in terms of proactively making it up and actively fighting forward. He’s working hard!

We also have this part:

The knife that’s pointed at someone, or at myself If it’s been let go of

Two things going on here: firstly, we have an explicit reference to the metaphorical “knife” Ken referred to putting up in ONLY ONE, talking about finally letting it go instead of bothering with this kind of front. He also points out that, in a sense, the knife was pointed at himself too, either in the sense of actually having hurt himself through this entire ideal, or in the sense that he constantly was trying to blame and punish himself for everything. None of that should be necessary anymore. Moreover, Never Ending contains a lot of references to “daily life” and the happiness that comes with the simplicity of just being alive – because that was indeed what Ken gained through his experiences, the ability to treasure living life in itself instead of aspiring to an impossible standard.

Another interesting thing about Never Ending is that it’s technically in a similar rock genre to ONLY ONE instead of being “soft”, like Ken’s personality is often thought to be. This was a surprise to a lot of people who commented on how surprisingly “cool” the song was, but this is actually completely in line with Ken arguably being one of the most openly assertive people in this group even after his reformation. Note that it’s very difficult to call this song purely angsty – it’s definitely positive and forward-thinking, and the chorus itself is partially in major key – but it has the vibe of someone who’s fully aware of everything that’s happened, is putting proper thought into it, and is pushing on despite everything. Remember, the intensity the Kaiser had originally came from somewhere; Ichijouji Ken is the same person, in the end.

In regards to Wormmon’s song, the contrast is also obvious: The Future You Dreamed of, the Future I Dreamed Of. is of course about Wormmon’s tormented feelings during the Kaiser’s abusive relationship with him, whereas can change it! is about its aftermath and how they made up (including copious references to the events of 02 episode 23). Even then, there’s a certain “forward-thinking” attitude that marks this song as being representative of being after 02’s events and not during – see the line “The mistake we made that day/is exactly the reason we’ll never let it happen again”, instead of the self-punishment and shame Stingmon expressed in 02 episode 26).

On top of that, the duet song Forever Adolescence also marks a subtle progression from the point they were at from True Strength – remembering that Best Partner 12 was released at a time when True Strength was actually a bit of a spoiler, while Ken and Wormmon obviously had made up by that point, the key line in it is still “everything truly begins from here”. So what, exactly, happened after that? According to Forever Adolescence, the decision made was to keep moving forward, and, moreover, to stay “the way they are”, especially with the nuance that it means it’s okay to not force oneself into the role of an adult and stay “young at heart”. This is really, really important in light of the events of Kizuna, the 02 group’s unusual role in it and its relevance to 02′s themes (more on this below), and how Spring 2003 referred to the pressure placed on Osamu as him being “forced to grow up too quickly” – in essence, Ken and Wormmon have firmly resolved to actively move away from that kind of pressure.

Miyako and Hawkmon

I’ve pointed out several times on this blog that the actual complex Miyako was going through in 02 was that she hated herself more than anyone else in the group would be willing to criticize her – and if you don’t believe me, it’s put in a pretty heavy-handed manner in her original song, Crash and Bingo!:

Fussing about it won’t get anything done But my selfishness and problems and panic keep coming out

…and even more viciously in her own and Hawkmon’s duet, Fly High:

I can’t do anything right, besides playing around with computers

Everyone would be still be fine if I weren’t there

If you thought it was subtle in the main series, it certainly isn’t here: Miyako considered herself good for absolutely nothing and unable to be accepted by others for being too useless – in these songs, despite Hawkmon’s attempts to uplift her, she criticizes her own messy tendencies and considers herself a burden. Best Partner is a positive series, so it still has the attitude of “we’ll try anyway”, but it’s clear that Miyako really didn’t have the highest opinion of herself at all. Hence, Fly High also shows off the worst of Hawkmon having to deal with the fallout – with Miyako flailing around in panic and considering herself good for nothing, he’s forced to carry her around.

But come Miyako’s new solo, From Spain with Love!, we see a huge contrast all over the place:

I, who have evolved into an adult make everyone do a double-take at me when I walk by!

Exhibit A: actual confidence in herself and ability to consider herself worth something;

If I can always, always be honest with myself Even if I don’t put together some program, even if I keep screwing up Ah, you understand me

Exhibit B: understanding that she’s worth something to others besides her utility abilities, and knowing that she has friends who’ll support her despite her flaws (which is very true);

When things are feeling hard, the first thing you should do is call me, okay? I’ll take the wings of love and purity, spread them, and get there as fast as I can Ah, I’ll open up any gate I need to

Exhibit C: indulging in her capacity for helping and supporting others;

Al mal tiempo, buena cara We laugh exactly when things are hard

Exhibit D: understanding the strength to get through hard times, instead of emotionally crumbling under the pressure.

Yep, that’s exactly what her character arc in 02 was about; 02 episode 31 was a huge turning point for her because, in the depths of her berating herself for her messiness and expecting Hikari to be secretly judging her the whole time, Hikari revealed that she was outright jealous of Miyako being able to speak her mind, and Miyako shortly after ended up showing her true capacity for reaching others who needed her help and supporting them, a role she ended up growing into for the rest of the series. Note that, other than the casual remark of confidence at the beginning, Miyako hasn’t necessarily become arrogant or anything – it’s just that, by focusing her energies into how much she loves everyone and turning her “nosiness” and “sticking herself into others’ business” tendencies into positive energy to help everyone, she gained more confidence in her ability to be loved and accepted by others.

This is reflected as well in her new duet with Hawkmon, where, instead of Hawkmon dragging her around everywhere, their differences and mismatched personalities are outright celebrated, and while Miyako still has awareness of her messy tendencies, she’s no longer letting it emotionally rip her apart and has confidence that Hawkmon can be by her side to help her through it. Perhaps reflecting that, Hawkmon himself goes from the over-the-top, dramatic, high-strung Knight of Love to the more calm and straightforward Gentle Tornado, perhaps because his own partner isn’t constantly bouncing off the walls recklessly nearly as much anymore.

Incidentally, it’s not like all of this is without nuance, either; even if Miyako’s become more of a confident person, she’s not all put-together. Considering that the entire song has her gushing about how she’d be willing to drop anything to go see her friends (which was pushed forward in Kizuna itself, what with her willingly taking the same request she’d refused to do earlier just because her friends were involved, and even inventing D-3 gate exploitation just to go see them), when you get to the end, and her gushing about her fun in Spain suddenly derails into reminiscing about the events of 02 episode 42, the implication is clear: for as much as she wants to be wholeheartedly enjoying this fun trip abroad for what it is, she can’t help but let her thoughts float back to memories and friends she cares about, and her bonus conversation with Hawkmon drives it in further that, ultimately, she dearly misses them too much.

Iori and Armadimon

Iori also went through some drastic changes in character over the course of 02, so when you look at My Conclusion, it’s basically Iori at his “worst” point of black-and-white morality:

Everyone, I will be speaking my conclusion Evil will not be tolerated Even evil in itself will be defeated by justice That will always be a certainty in the end

I mean, let’s even consider the fact that the song is called “My Conclusion” in the first place. Iori’s slamming this all down like this is the end-all of everything, and you can’t change his mind! He does briefly admit that there are certain things reason itself won’t change, but it’s more like he’s on the verge of having an out, because in the end, really…

Everyone, I will be speaking my conclusion Our enemies are beyond reason Again and again, to the very end They will certainly use cowardly means to come and attack us

Rationality. No feelings involved. Evil is evil, and justice is justice. No takebacks. Life exists by rules, and nothing else.

Message to the Future is possibly one of the most interesting songs in the original Best Partner collection, because it does actually provide hints about where Iori should be going in the future, and also has a lot of things that retroactively hit a lot harder from the meta perspective. The song fully fleshes out Iori’s feelings and concerns about how to grow up into a proper adult (which was hinted to be his real motivation as to why he was so strict with himself in 02), and that, most of all, what he wants is for his “feelings” to never change no matter what happens. Iori expresses concerns about how he might change as an adult to Armadimon, and Armadimon assures him that he’ll still be “Iori”, no matter what.

So, come the new character song collection, Iori’s new solo song is aptly titled “Things That Won’t Change” – because, in the end, despite everything that changed, his feelings did not. He says it himself: the important parts that he really wanted, the desire to do the right thing and to protect others, never changed a bit at all since “back then”. What did change, however, was his way of going about it.

Rather than what someone else has decided I’ve chosen my own future now

and again:

Rather than imitating someone else This is to shout out my own future

The emphasis on this being Iori’s own choice is important because Iori has finally decided not to live by strict rules imposed on him nor by imitating others (remember, part of the reason he kept doing what he did back in 02 was because he had such a strong belief “my father would have done this”). Others had been encouraging him to “make his own decisions” from the get-go – even Hida Chikara himself had told him that he was the one who needed to decide what to do in any moment in 02 episode 5 – and after dealing with a violation of his own morals in having to kill a Digimon in 02 episode 44, one episode later, in discussing with Takeru, Iori has to come to terms with the decision to continue fighting because “this is what I have decided myself”, because it’s not about whether he has an obligation to keep fighting for the sake of justice, but because he, himself, wants to protect others, and will do what it takes to do so. There’s no more of these strict rules of “because it must be this way” or the black-and-white morality that caused him to be so initially hostile towards Ken and Oikawa, but an understanding that these things need to be decided from the heart.

Moreover, unlike My Conclusion, Things That Won’t Change isn’t written like Iori’s turning in some school essay, but rather, more than half the song is in casual-form Japanese (which was associated with Iori when he became more emotional and wasn’t keeping himself in check anymore), and is more of a thoughtful reflection of his own feelings rather than trying to pass itself off as following rules because he must.

Thus, while the duet Choo Choo Tryin’ isn’t as heavy-handed as Message to the Future, Iori and Armadimon acknowledge that they need to be forward-thinking and keep going (generally tied to the message of 02 in itself), and Iori outright discusses the potential pitfalls of becoming too stiff. Furthermore, the song has copious rap portions, which seems rather unfitting for Iori on its face – until you realize that not only was Iori sometimes willing to indulge in more fun even back during 02 (just because he was strict with himself didn’t mean he was a complete killjoy), Iori’s also just a lot more flexible-minded in general, and has a penchant for wanting to do things right when he’s given a task. (His delivery of the rap in the song isn’t monotonous nor overly emotional, but has the nuance of someone who’s trying to recite all of it with caution.)

The part that’s particularly striking from the meta perspective is that Iori and Armadimon are no longer voiced by the same voice actress; Message to the Future was essentially Urawa Megumi talking to herself. So now, Iori has a new voice actor, and in many ways has become very different from Armadimon – but because Armadimon sounds a little like Iori, you could say he’s helping preserve the childish side of Iori that’s more important than ever to hold onto, especially since Iori himself worried about changing too much. And so, Iori’s still willing to indulge in a sort of “fun” song like this, and in the end, despite everything, you understand that they haven’t drifted apart at all in the slightest.

That’s not to say that Armadimon himself hasn’t changed either – in fact, he’s changed himself in response to how much Iori has. His original solo song had a lot of easygoingness to it, and some constant reminders for Iori to please, please chill – but his new one has a much stronger sense of resolve and forward-thinking attitude, reflecting that, while Iori himself technically had to learn to embrace more emotional uncertainty through the events of 02, it was also able to give him much stronger resolve that this was something he was doing because he was emotionally prepared for it, not out of some sense of moral obligation.

Takeru and Patamon

I’ve already covered Takeru’s original Best Partner song Focus and how it’s probably not about shipping as much as the fanbase tends to pin it as, but in any case, the operative part is here:

Before I knew it, I was watching over you Still standing at a skewed angle from behind The focus of your heart I wonder, is it on me, or… No, I can’t ask

Takeru couldn’t bring himself to ask sensitive questions or be straightforward about his emotions – which is basically what was Takeru’s lingering problem over Adventure and 02, that he kept swerving around or even lying about sensitive topics and holding everything inside, until one of his triggers was hit and everything exploded. Therefore, even when an important question about someone else comes up, he “can’t ask”. Moreover, for all Takeru is known as a lighthearted and kind person, Focus is a really turbulent song with a really harsh arrangement, and it’s a pretty accurate view of all the complicated and sometimes even negative emotions that Takeru was (badly) coping with over the course of 02.

This was the whole issue with Takeru and Iori’s Jogress arc in 02 episodes 34-36 – that Iori felt he couldn’t understand nor communicate well with Takeru, and had to eventually take matters into his own hands in order to properly understand his feelings. Takeru’s further interactions with Iori were significantly more straightforward for the rest of the series, and the experience also led to Takeru being able to more openly communicate with Ken as well, since the two had been on awkward speaking terms for most of the third quarter of the series.

So when we get to Step High Step…

You lament, you don’t have confidence in yourself I’m saying this to you as I’ve been watching you You’re amazing at all times

The song features Takeru being fairly straightforward about his feelings and opinions instead of just dodging it and going for an “everything’s okay” keeping-the-peace attitude, and not only that, he’s commenting on someone else, something that he probably would have refrained from in 02 for being intrusive. Of course, Takeru was always a nice person, but he wasn’t exactly straightforward about being nice back then – and yet here we are.

Since Focus is probably about his relationship with Patamon and how he kind of wasn’t exactly straightforward about his worries with him either (see 02 episode 34), it’s also interesting to compare Takeru and Patamon’s duet songs as well. Steppin’ out does portray a progression from Adventure in that they’ve accepted they can “do things over” again after things crash down (presumably referring to Angemon’s death and rebirth), but you’ll notice there isn’t much in the way of actual communciation between the two – something that’s not only present in Le Lien, but also portrays them as outright in-sync to the point of “telepathy”. We’re talking about a pair where the fanbase has historically had doubts about how similar they were back in 02 because of how “mismatched” they seemed!

Which, incidentally, they weren’t actually – you can see Patamon pretending he’s not about to cry in his original Best Partner song Don’t Stop Pata-Pata, much like how Takeru would cover up his own emotions, and gritting his teeth and resolving to fight harder. Meanwhile, while Ring of Smiles ostensibly continues to have Patamon be “sweet and cute”, it contains a lot of important nuances of “appreciating daily life with friends”, even if Patamon himself can’t quite find words for it – in other words, it’s actually some rather insightful and thoughtful sentiments from Patamon about the importance of being with and connecting with others, mirroring what Takeru himself learned in connecting with the others around him, especially Iori.

Hikari and Tailmon

Remember, Hikari has two lines (one in Adventure and one in 02) that basically summarize the main “issue” she was dealing with in both series: she was selfless to unhealthy levels, and would prioritize others’ welfare over herself to the point of self-destruction. So in her original solo Best Partner song, Gentle Rain, she puts it pretty explicitly:

I want to always be wearing nothing but smiles But I can’t be cheerful all of the time

or:

So that I can become a greater version of myself Please give me strength

All things considered, Gentle Rain is full of Hikari’s own insecurities, and her belief that she doesn’t have enough strength to do anything for herself. She makes references to being pulled to the Dark Ocean, mainly because – as she says – she doesn’t want to go there, but she doesn’t have enough strength or willpower to resist it. In fact, Best Partner 11 is full of a lot of angst; Gentle Rain is Hikari angsting about her own weakness and inability to do much for herself, Getting up is Tailmon angsting about her painful past and everything to do with it, and Shining Star is basically a plea for both of them to be able to do anything despite all the pain. It’s all pretty severely heavy content, despite the initial sparkly-looking sentiment of it all.

Considering the circumstances, it’s not really all that surprising. Hikari spent her time in Adventure and the first half of 02 very “emotionally isolated” from the others, to the point very few people could understand what she was thinking, and while she’d never hesitate to put herself out for other people, anything to do with herself, like getting pulled to the Dark Ocean, would result in resignation “it’s over” and “I can’t do anything about it”. Tailmon came from the background of being effectively raised by the abusive Vamdemon, so 02 was really only part of the earliest portion of her moving on with her life and being able to spend happier moments with Hikari. But, of course, the real turning point was 02 episode 31, when Miyako finally managed to break through to her and convince her to not accept the inevitability of things happening to herself, to accept help with the support of others, and to not take things happening to her as a sign she’s doomed.

So when we reach Hikari’s new solo song, Tomorrow’s Blue…

I want to chase after my dreams and hopes, it’s fine even if they’re incomplete I won’t lose, I won’t stop, I’ll do this to stay true to myself

The most striking thing about the song is that it features Hikari assertively talking about her own desires and feelings, when back in 02 she basically tried to kick them out of the picture for the sake of everyone else (and, really, even in Tailmon’s new solo song, Tender tale, she outright calls Hikari out for still prioritizing other people over herself). It’s not demeaning herself, it’s not resigning herself to anything, it may have a slight admission that she’s not super-confident about everything yet, but it’s still her looking forward and choosing to pursue what he wants. It’s a big deal!

And instead of the constant angst that permeated Best Partner 11, the new album is about Hikari and Tailmon talking about their feelings towards each other – something that neither of them really verbalized that well over either Adventure and 02 – and contextualizing their importance to each other over the course of their “story”. Hikari talks about Tailmon’s role of assertiveness in helping her break out of her shell, and Tailmon generally provides an extremely accurate description of Hikari in a nutshell – that she’s a bit mysterious, that she’s emotionally sensitive, that she’s cheerful and lifts others’ spirits. What’s more, Tailmon makes a reference to the same kind of “pain” and “losing things” she referred to in Getting up, but instead of angsting about it, she positively accepts it as something that may happen in the process of protecting others. (Oh, and it and the new duet A Tale of the Light also make reference to Hikari’s photography hobby in 02, contextualizing it as something Hikari did to chronicle their precious memories.)

So in summary, Hikari and Tailmon have both been able to accept 02′s philosophy of becoming forward-thinking, positive, and accepting the help of others in order to move forward. Not bad!

Conclusion and digression

Despite how these songs are almost polar opposite in portraying their before-and-after development of the 02 kids, nobody’s really argued that any of them are out of character! In the end, it’s a pretty succinct depiction of what these kids were dealing with and what they grew into by the end of the series. Seriously, I never, ever want to hear that these kids were underdeveloped nor that they didn’t go through any significant development over the course of 02 ever again. That’s just not true at all, and this simply happens to be one of the many illustrations of how.

Moreover, the songs themselves and the “conversations” that came with the new albums solidify firmly that the 02 group has extremely tight relations with their partners even at this time – with Daisuke actively consulting V-mon for help, Miyako, Takeru, and Hikari actively dragging their partners everywhere with them, Ken having Wormmon be his effective alarm clock, and Iori being so close with Armadimon that his Nagoya dialect is rubbing off on him. Daisuke, Miyako and Hikari have a huge point made that, regardless of the rather easygoing way they’re going at it, they’re very aware of what they want to do from this point out and are following it with gusto (and while it’s not stated in words, Iori carrying a huge textbook, presumably a law one, with note markers all over it drives the point home that this applies to him, too). It’s a really, really huge contrast to what was going on with the directionless Taichi, Yamato, and Sora effectively neglecting their own partners back in Kizuna – and further reinforces the reason the 02 group was in such an unusually favorable position during the movie.

#digimon #digimon adventure 02 #digimon adventure last evolution kizuna #shihameta

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makeste · 3 years

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heyy makeste, so this is a request for wish fulfilment to avoid the absolute ridiculousness of the last chapter. Neway, so we all want kacchan to apologise, that's probably the one thing the entire fandom agrees and I belive horikoshi himself has implied that it will happen (?). Okay, so, assuming a verbal apology will happen (EVEN THO WE DIDN'T GET OUR HOSPITAL TALK - HURT/COMFORT SCENE), how do you see it panning out ? I, personally, don't want it to happen in some kind of life-or-death situation, but I can't even remotely predict how an apology would now, with where the manga is, so what do you think ????

P.S: all your meta and chapter recaps are so well articulated and not to mention, f*cking hilarious, so of all the people, of course I'd ask you <3

thank you so much!! <3 and okay, so as far as my ideal wish-fulfillment apology scene, all I really require are the following two components:

a fair amount of crying (on the parts of both Deku and Kacchan, and especially me)

a hug.

that’s it. I don’t think that’s too much to ask, personally, but we’ll see how generous Horikoshi decides to be.

HOWEVER, since we’re talking about this, this might be a good time for me to bring up a thought that’s been on my mind for these past couple of weeks, and especially today what with the new volume 30 angst fuel that just dropped. so basically, here are some facts.

Deku, amidst lots of talk about the villains being after him and about him Suffering In Silence, has left U.A.

while it’s not for-sure confirmed yet, right now all signs seem to point to him being alone.

it seems EXTREMELY unlikely to me that Certain People would have approved of or consented to this arrangement! especially considering Certain People’s recent Deku-adjacent actions, which include 1) Getting Stabbed To Save Deku’s Life, and 2) Going On A Rampage Three Minutes After Waking Up In A Hospital With A Hole In Their Torso, Because They Heard That Deku Was Still Unconscious. like, I’m just saying. right now Certain People are being really protective of Deku, and I can only assume this will continue indefinitely.

Deku knows Kacchan better than anyone, and knows exactly how stubborn he can be.

Deku is also freshly traumatized from Kacchan nearly dying for him, and I’m positive that out of all the people Deku is determined to protect, Kacchan is now at the very top of that list.

but as previously mentioned, Kacchan is even more determined to protect Deku, and is absolutely not the type of person to take no for an answer.

and now here are some suppositions building on these facts.

whatever hang-ups Kacchan might have had about apologizing, I’m almost positive that having a near-death experience complete with all sorts of symbolism and flashbacks and remorseful volume covers would be more than enough to finally overcome them. in other words, an apology should have been imminent. we’re talking “the very next time I finally get to see him and speak with him” imminent.

under 99.9% of circumstances, I have absolutely no doubt that Deku would forgive Kacchan instantaneously. he would be absolutely overjoyed.

there are precious few circumstances which could ever possibly lead to the 0.1% of scenarios in which Deku does not forgive him. even if there was some part of him that did still secretly resent Kacchan in some way, it would still be extraordinarily out-of-character for Deku to deny him forgiveness, if only because he’d know how much it would hurt him. for Deku to knowingly and purposely inflict that kind of pain on someone would be unthinkable.

UNLESS -- unless -- in his mind, it was somehow a choice between sparing him pain, or saving his life.

for instance, if he had already made up his mind that he had to leave.

and if he knew that Kacchan, in his stubbornness and determination to make amends, would follow him no matter what.

and if he was convinced, somehow -- whether by the memory of Kacchan being stabbed, or by the words of a mysterious Vestige, or simply by the subdued, quietly reverberating trauma of feeling inadvertently responsible for the deaths of thousands of people -- that Kacchan would die if he stayed by his side.

then, I could see it. much as I hate to say (which, admittedly, isn’t actually that much at all, because as heartbreaking as this hypothetical would be, oh my god, the angst).

so yeah. I’ve been wondering about all of this tbh. something about the irony of all of us waiting on the edge of our seats for this, only to have it finally happen in the worst way possible. the only thing is, Horikoshi almost never does this kind of “misunderstanding” plot with his characters. I get the impression that it frustrates him. and usually I enjoy watching him subvert this trope, and seeing his characters actually communicate and improve their understanding of each other rather than doing the tired old “one step forward, two steps back” dance.

but this is also the one time I could see him subverting his own usual conventions. mostly because he already has. Izuku leaving U.A. is proof of that. it means that this is the one time that talking things out and listening to his mentors’ sage advice didn’t pay off. it means that there absolutely was some type of misunderstanding and miscommunication between somebody, somewhere. someone fucked up. because if they hadn’t, then Deku wouldn’t be out here right now standing dramatically in the wind and rescuing Shindou from being bludgeoned into a conventionally attractive pulp.

so yeah. tl;dr, what if Kacchan apologized but Deku didn’t forgive him because he thought it was the only way to stop Kacchan from potentially getting hurt for his sake. ahaha, just kidding... unless...?

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after-witch · 4 years

Text

Title: Oh Honey Honey ('Oh Sugar Sugar' Part 2) (Yandere L Lawliet x Reader)

Synopsis: The newest regular to frequent your little pastry shop is a little unusual, but his appreciation of your craft is a welcome distraction from the terrifying suspicion that you may have a stalker.

notes: yandere, stalker behavior

You waved cheerfully at a little boy through the glass window of your store, as his grandfather gently urged him along the street; he was maybe 2 or 3, and had practically shrieked in joy when his grandfather bought him the biggest, cutest looking cupcake you'd had in the display that morning.

With the store empty for the moment, you turned back to your daily specialty case and decided to give it a quick cleaning. A regular, the older gentlemen who'd recently revealed that all the treats were actually for an associate, was due to arrive soon, and he typically bought up most of your special case. You leaned over the front counter, grabbed a rag and a bottle of cleaning solution, and gave the glass a quick spritz. You were humming to yourself when you heard the door bells jingling.

You turned, smile ready, expecting the older gentlemen--and almost flinched in surprise. It was not your regular, but someone new. He had lanky dark hair and wore an unassuming, casual outfit consisting of a white shirt and jeans.

You swiftly stepped behind the register. “Can I help you today, sir?”

"Yes, in fact," the man said. "I'm here to give my compliments in person."

Confusion must have registered on your face, for he continued. "I normally have an associate buy my pastries for me. But I wanted to see your shop for myself, so..."

"Oh!"

You hadn't meant to say it out loud, but you couldn't help it; nor could you help the more genuine smile that you gave the man who'd bought hundreds of dollars worth of pastries in such a short time period. Baking was your passion--but it was your business, too, and you couldn't help but truly appreciate people who supported that business. "I'm so glad to finally meet you! Thank you for all your business."

You held out your hand jovially, and the man came forward to accept it with a low, firm and slightly awkward handshake. When he pulled away, he glanced at his hand for a moment, before returning his gaze back to you. You couldn't help but hope he was getting enough sleep.

"I should be thanking you," he said. "For all the pastries, I mean."

At that, you beamed. "Well! Let me show you what's in our special case today..."

You had a stalker. Well, maybe you had a stalker. You weren't quite sure. All you knew for sure was that something was... off, lately. At first, you attributed it to getting less sleep than normal. With your bakery busier than ever, thanks to your new regular and even a nice business contract supply 2 dozen breakfast muffins every morning, you weren't getting as much sleep.

So it would only be normal, you thought, to be a little on edge. A little testy. But less sleep didn't account for the odd, creeping feeling that you were being watched, especially at night. You could have swore you heard strange sounds, too... whirring or clicks. Cameras? You didn't know.

Nor did a lack of sleep account for some things that had gone missing from your apartment. A favorite nightgown you liked to sleep in; a favorite mug. the berry-red one you’d gotten two Christmases ago; even, as you discovered one morning, a lingerie set that you'd tried on once and then been too embarrassed to wear again. Still, it was expensive and the thought that someone had taken it--and why someone would take it--made you feel sick.

To say that you were not your usual chipper self for the rest of the morning was an understatement. You did your best to smile for the customers that came in, but even they must have sensed something was wrong; you even got extra tips from a regular, an elderly woman who tut-tutted you and told you that you should consider taking a weekend off.

The thought was tempting, but you knew that with running a small business came sacrifices--including the inability to just "take off." Still, you thought, you could take a little nap. A short one, 25 minutes, tops. You didn't often temporarily close up shop for breaks, but it was quiet and you weren't likely to get too many sales before the lunch rush, anyway.

As you were about to flip the sign, however, a figure suddenly walked up to the door. You jumped, then internally scolded yourself for being ridiculous--it was just your regular, or "Ahh, Mr. Regular?," as he'd awkwardly suggested you call him when you’d asked for his name. It was odd, but, the man was also downing an exceptional amount of sugar while buying up entire cases worth of your goods on the regular, so it wasn't your place to judge.

You bit your cheek to suppress a sigh of frustration and opened the door, stepping back so he could come in.

"Oh," he said, "are you closing?"

You smiled, or tried to smile, but it looked more like a grimace than anything resembling your typical sweet countenance. "No, no, I was just going to close up for a nap... I mean a break." You shook your head. You shouldn't bother customers with talks about naps, it probably made you sound lazy.

He quirked his head slightly, staring at you almost intensely. "Yes..." he said softly, almost murmuring. "I see those circles under your eyes... you haven't been sleeping well."

The personal turn of the conversation made you feel awkward. You looked away, embarrassed. You hated the idea of customers seeing you as anything other than the cheery pastry shop lady, a source of sugar and sweetness and delicious goodies. "Um," you said, "I guess not, I've just been a little, you know--out of it. You know how things go."

You laughed, mirthless and empty, and gestured towards the case. "So, anyway. I actually don't have many special pastries today, I've been a little busy." You mentally slapped yourself for giving excuses, even bland ones, though it wasn't like you were lying.

You'd woken up early so you could head into work and finish off some really nice specialty items you'd baked last night, but rummaging around your drawers for something to wear led you to realize the lingerie was missing, and you'd spent 2 hours drifting between panic and disgust.

But rather than walk towards the case and pick out today's purchases, your regular simply stood in front of you. Head slightly quirked still, eyes expressive--concerned, you thought, he looks concerned about me.

You couldn't deny that a customer worrying about you brought up conflicting emotions; frustration, because you didn't want to mess with your public persona; and a warm mixture of comfort and flattery. Someone liked your pastries enough to care about you.

"Is everything all right?" He said, finally. "Are you feeling sick? Or is something else keeping you up?"

You stared, feeling lost for words. You didn't really know him, and you hadn’t even told your friends about your potential stalker. But the weight of the past few weeks, the build-up of fear and disgust and stress, seemed to push you down until you found yourself sliding into one of your cafe chairs. He followed suit, pulling his knees up until he practically crouched on the seat.

You hesitated. Should you really be telling him any of this? “I… don’t want to bother you with any of my personal problems.”

“It’s not bothering me. I’m curious,” he said, lightly.

You sighed. Here goes, you thought. “I… I have a stalker?” Your hesitancy quickly morphed into an awkward blurting. “I mean, I think I do. I’m not sure. It’s just the past few weeks. I keep hearing these weird noises. And I feel like I’m being watched.” You bit your lip. “And someone took my underpants?”

Actually vocalizing the thought made you realize that it could just all be in your head. I mean, whirring noises? Missing lingerie? Maybe there were ants in the walls and you’d donated the set and forgot about it.

You half expected him to look embarrassed and give an excuse to leave. But instead, he looked thoughtfully at you. “Hmm. Have you called the police?”

It was you who felt embarrassed now. “No…” You shrugged. “I mean, what can they do, anyway? I don’t have any proof.”

He regarded you with a grim nod. “That’s true. They won’t act without evidence.” He gave a little huffy sigh of his own. “Well… if it were up to me, I’d do a stake out. See if anyone comes into your place at night. I could get some equipment, if you want.”

You smiled--subtle and soft, but a genuine smile. At least he didn’t think you were crazy. At least he validated your feelings. And he’d offered to help, even if you would never feel comfortable taking him up on that offer.

“I appreciate it,” you said. “But maybe I’m just being paranoid. I don’t want to drag you into all this…” You sat up straighter and decided to change the subject--you’d had enough worrying about a stalker for one day. “Say, do you want to see the kitchen? I need to finish up a cake I started last night, for the special case. Maybe you can pick out the fruit toppings?”

For a moment, your regular looked shocked. He nodded, slowly. His expression never quite fully recovered its normal neutrality, and he stood up almost cautiously before following your lead into the open kitchen door accessed from behind the counter.

“Sorry for the mess,” you say lightly. “I didn’t have time to start dishes yet.” You gestured towards a countertop where a small cake stuffed with mascarpone and nestled within a layer of marzipan sat. There were little dollops of cream forming a circle on the top of the cake. “I’m going to top it with some fruits, why don’t you pick out which ones you like?” You covered your mouth, suddenly. “I mean--if you want to buy it, I shouldn’t have assumed.”

He cleared his throat and a small smile flickered across his lips. “Of course I’ll buy it. Your cakes are delicious.”

You laughed a little, showing your teeth, and took out some little jars of fresh fruits from a small fridge underneath the counter. As he looked over them, you turned and began tossing a few empty pots, pans and stirrers into the sink so that they could soak. You couldn’t help but hum a little, used to singing while you clean.

“Yes, I’ve decided,” he said suddenly. You turned around and saw him staring right at you.

“Decided?” You asked. Something about the way he was looking at you felt familiar. You thought about whirring.

“On strawberries,” he replied. He slowly held up the bowl of freshly cut, ripe red berries. “For my cake.”

L sat, crouched on the couch, staring at the video he’d taken of today’s events. You confided in him, which was delightful. You’d smiled at him, which was even better. Watching you put the glorious finishing touches on a scrumptious pastry in the kitchen was just... well. Icing on the cake.

He pressed a button on the controller and rewound the video to the moment where you'd laughed, light and airy and perfectly melodious to his ears. Your smile was genuine, then--not the constrained smile you'd given when he'd interrupted your nap plans; nor was it the sometimes plastic smile you wore when you were clearly exhausted with giving endlessly bright customer service.

Your real smile was something to be treasured. Especially, he thought to himself, because it will be a long while before he sees it again. You won’t be smiling much after he kidnaps you--after he acquires you, he corrected himself.

According to his calculations, you won't start feeling more accepting of your situation for at least a few months, but it may be sooner (or later) depending on certain variables. You will be scared first, he knew--scared and maybe angry with him for deceiving you and trapping you. And that wouldn’t be very conducive to the smile and laughter he’d quickly become addicted to taking in.

He lifted up your favorite mug and took a sip of the warm coffee inside, relishing the last bits of your lipstick left on the rim, before rewinding the video to watch you again. Time will heal your wounds--but in the mean time, he will be so very generous and patient with you.

#yandere death note #yandere #yandere l lawliet #death note #yandere x reader #afterwitch writes #can you guess the name of part 3

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write-ur-wrongs · 4 years

Text

Thank you @itsjammin for the request! I didn’t fully proof-read this one so please forgive any grammatical errors!! I hope you like it !!

Geralt x reader where she’s having a really bad panic attack and Geralt’s not sure how he can help and he just holds her and helps her through it cradling her in his arms and just gently rocking her. After she’s calmed down, he just kisses her forehead and traces patterns on her back and just lots of fluff please!

Trigger warning: Anxiety / panic attack.

_________________________________________________

You were fine. You’re breathing and you weren’t bleeding and you’re fine. You closed your hands into tight fists in an attempt to ground yourself, digging your nails into your palms as you breathed out slowly through your nose. You felt the weight of your legs on the fallen tree beneath you, pushed your toes into the tip of your shoes and felt the pressure you created. Slowly, you relaxed your fists and rested your open hands on your thighs, feeling the blood rush back into palms. The tiny crescent moon indents in your palm stung dully.

You weren’t injured. You weren’t in danger of being injured. You were fine.

Geralt was watching you wearily from across the crackling fire, his steaming mug of broth hovering inches from his face. You had been balling your hands into fists, knuckles white, and relaxing them slowly on repeat for too long now. He looked over at Jaskier quizzically, a brow raised, but the bard merely mirrored his confusion, returning the look with wide eyes and an animated shrug.

You were normally a steady presence in the group, matching Geralt in energy level and Jaskier in wit. They’d known you for over a year now and had only ever seen you in that light; steady with a silver tongue. Tonight, however, was a completely different story. Nothing out of the ordinary had happened today; you had travelled a peaceful route and stopped in a nice clearing. No one had crossed you and Geralt sensed no threat in the surrounding area. And yet, there you sat, breathing slowly but with great effort, empty eyes looking out at nothing while your forehead was creased with worry.

Geralt wanted to know what was up, but he was no wordsmith. Huffing slightly, he looked at the bard pointedly and jerked his head in your direction, silently begging Jaskier to ask you what was wrong.

Jaskier might be good with words, but never when the situation truly called for it. He could banter with the best of them and diffuse tension with ease, but you were giving off such a distressing energy, he didn’t dare say anything unsure of what you’d do once the tension in you boiled over.

As such, he shook his head wildly and pointed at Geralt while mouthing, “You ask her!”

The two men mimed wildly to one another, both desperate to have the other take charge, oblivious to the fact that you had transitioned from the desperate-to-keep-a-steady-breath phase and into the weight-on-my-chest-is-suffocating-me phase of your episode.

Jaskier won out though, when he threw a torn piece of bread a the Witcher’s head. With a low grunt, Geralt gingerly placed his mug down and clasped his hands together and leaned over, bracing himself.

He cleared his throat a couple times before hesitantly muttering his question. Unfortunately, his noble attempt fell on death ears.

All you could hear was a dull ringing coupled with the amplified sounds of your body; every breath was deafening, your heartbeat was so loud you felt it in your ears, and you swore you could hear your bones creaking in their joints.

You hated this; all of it. You hated that you couldn’t identify the cause of your panic. That rationally, you knew nothing was wrong, but that wasn’t enough to keep you from spiraling as you were. Normally you could feel these episodes coming and stop them before the settled in full. Your mother had taught you countless coping methods and the healers you met along your travels helped you immensely; especially as new triggers made themselves known to you.

Yet nothing had happened, really. Geralt was a little colder than usual, and he did snap at you quite harshly but that wasn’t new. It was an occupational hazard. Jaskier had been moodier as of late, probably because Geralt snapped at him too, but they’re always squabbling and reconciling. It was their way.

You didn’t see this one coming. At the first sign of trouble, you grounded yourself and counted your breaths. When that didn’t work, you counted things around you; five conifers, three boulders, fifteen pinecones on the floor, and so on. But it didn’t work. You had even pulled out your vial of herbs – all to no avail.

Nothing was helping and everything was too loud. You were in pain but nothing actually hurt. The weight of your body against your bones was crushing but you felt like a ghost.

Oblivious to your internal struggle and unimpressed with the Witcher’s feeble attempt, Jaskier rolled his eyes at Geralt and whipped another piece of bread at him. Frustrated and frazzled, Geralt threw the bread back to the bard with force, shot him a death glare, and wiped his sweaty palms on the top of his legs before trying again.

“Y/N... hm… how –”

“I’m fine!” you barked, although your voice wavered in a way that clearly indicated you were far from fine.

Geralt looked to Jaskier in desperation, not wanting to have to try again, but Jaskier was already up and walking backwards towards Roach, mouthing ‘sorry’ and ‘good luck’ as he washed his hands of the whole affair.

Geralt rolled his eyes and muttered a quiet, ‘fuck’, before getting up to cross the fire and settle beside you uncomfortably.

The moment you realized Geralt had come to your side, your chin wobbled and you felt tears prickle at your eyes. You brought your hands up to your face and swiped at your tears quickly, doing your best to regain control.

Seeing you up close – how your jaw never relaxed, how you couldn’t sit still, the way you dragged the nail of your index finger down the side of your thumbs, seemingly unaware of the angry red lines you left behind – his heart broke.

“Come ‘ere,” he said, pulling you towards him.

Feeling his strong arms wrap themselves around you brought your tears to the surface in an instant. Before either of you could process what was happening, you were sobbing freely into his broad chest, hands grabbing at him desperately for comfort.

You cried for what felt like forever, raw and ragged sobs shaking you to your core. But no matter how deeply you surrendered into your panic, Geralt never wavered. He rocked you slowly, stroking your back softly. Every now and then he’d murmur words of encouragement into your hair and, despite all odds, you found that the low rumble of his voice comforted you greatly.

After some time, your sobs turned into whimpers, and your whimpers into choppy breaths. All the while, Geralt never released his hold on you. Only when he felt your heartrate return to normal did he lessen his grip and pull back to look down at you, smoothing back your hair.

“What –”

“I’m –”

You both laughed awkwardly into the sudden silence and waited for the other to go on. After a beat, Geralt tried again.

“Please –”

“Geralt –” you interrupted once more, shaking your head at the cyclical turn your conversation had taken.

“Y/N, you go.” He said softly, still drawing loopy shapes onto your back with his fingers.

“Oh Gods,” you breathed shakily, “I’m so, so sorry.”

“No, no,” he shushed, placing gentle kisses along your temple, “Y/N you have no reason to be apologizing.”

“Geralt, look at me!? I’m a mess,” you blurt, “and I’ve scared Jaskier.”

“Jaskier,” he replied with a small smile, “is a fool. He’ll be fine.”

“That might be worse! He’ll never let me live this down.” You say, your head in your hands. Geralt laughed softly at this, and gave your back a few comforting pats before holding you tightly and pulling you closer to him.

“If he dares,” he murmured in mock seriousness, his smile giving him away, “then I will kill him.”

“Geralt! Then who would write all those songs about you?” you said, turning back and smacking him playfully on his chest.

“Preferably no one,” he answered, face soft with laughter while his eyes remained trained on you, watching closely to ensure you were doing okay.

“Oh, you’d miss it, you big vanity.” You laughed, swiping at the last of the tears on your face and moving to stand up.

“Y/N… wait,” he said, reaching for your wrist and gently pulling you back down. “Are you… alright?”

“I’m fine,” you said, settling back down at his side, “Truly, I’m fine.”

Geralt let out a low, ‘hm’, in response, and looked at you dubiously, still acutely aware of your heightened heartrate.

“Okay, fine,” you admit, accepting that you couldn’t lie to him about this, “but I will be.” When he didn’t look convinced, you placed your hands on his arms and gave him what you hoped was a convincing look. “I promise, Geralt. I’m okay.”

He clenched his jaw tightly and breathe a sigh through his nose before speaking again.

“You didn’t just scare Jaskier tonight,” he said, slowly and with care, “you scared me too.”

You quickly cast your eyes downward, feeling shame prickle harshly at your chest. Geralt saw you bring the nails of your index finger to your thumb, ready to start your rhythmic stabbing once more, and hastily brought your shaky hands into his.

“Don’t punish yourself like this,” he whispered, rubbing his rough thumb over the tops of your fingers, “just talk to me.”

“I don’t know what to say, honestly,” you said, refusing to bring your eyes up to his. “I can normally manage by myself, I don’t,” you stopped to take a steadying breath, and Geralt responded in kind by holding your hands a little tighter, “I don’t know what was different this time. I’m… I’m -”

“Only human?”

“Gross,” you said, pulling one of your hands free so you could wipe your face, “and unfair.”

“Maybe so, but Y/N, I’m serious,” he said, putting his hands gently under your chin to bring your eyes up to his, “if you ever feel like you’re losing control again, you can come to me.”

“Yeah?” you asked, your voice small.

“Always.” He said, pulling your face towards him so he could lay another gentle kiss onto your forehead. “No matter what.”

At this, you allowed yourself to melt into his arms once more, letting his slow, steady, heartbeats soothe you as he continued to draw shapes on your back.

#geralt of rivia #witcher geralt #geralt x reader #geralt x y/n #geralt fanfic #geralt x you #tw #trigger warning #anxiety attack #panic attack #the witcher netflix #the witcher #jaskier

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leahquark · 3 years

Text

How to escape from a time loop

Prevent the causing event

Alright, so you’re stuck in a time loop. But maybe you know what caused it. Hey, if the causing event keeps happening, it’s obvious. Let’s say at the end of every day, you die. Easy peasy, just don’t die one day and you’ll escape the loop. Easier said than done, sure. Especially if the loop is short, or the event is out of your control (yea, 10 minutes really feels unfair to convince your aunt Sally on the other side of the country not to knock over her Egyptian flower vase). But hey, you get unlimited tries at this. Plus, a time loop means your money and resources reset, so feel free to go nuts and waste them. Just, don’t do anything you might regret if the loop suddenly breaks. Of course, after enough repeats, I doubt there’ll be much left in this category. If the loop happens when you go to sleep, then don’t go to sleep. Heck, chase the sun around the world if you have to. Rage against the dying of the light.

Make amends for the causing event

Okay, so maybe the event that caused the time loop only happened once. And maybe it happened on the day before the loop, or in the first iteration only. Well then, you can still make amends for it, hit the edit undo. Don’t believe me? The statistical probability that YOU would be the first person stuck in a time loop is so ridiculously close to zero. If you’re in a time loop now, that means others were probably in a time loop too, and maybe got in and got out the same way. And they kinda had to get out, in order for time to progress and trap you in your time loop today. So go track down that evil time witch and apologize to her, or find a scientist who can study the alien blood you’re covered in. Tell them to keep notes, then at the end of the time loop memorize them and regurgitate them back at the start of the next loop. Remember, you’re the only one who can retain information / make progress at the end of each loop. Only you can look out for yourself, but maybe medical science has an answer.

Prevent and make amends for everything that could possibly be the causing event

Okay, so maybe you don’t know why you’re trapped in a time loop. Alright, then try this. Go through a list of everything you did the day before the loop, and during the first iteration of the loop. Focus on things you said, places you went, objects you saw, things you thought about. It’s important to do this before the time loops repeat so many times you forget what happened the first time around. One of those things, something as minor as not hanging out with a friend, could have been the causing factor… at least according to movies and TV. In reality, it’s probably as likely the time loop was caused by a passing black hole, or a scientist at the large hadron collider. But hey, if it’s something not related to your personal life and daily activities, then you’re kinda screwed. So just completely change your daily routine, do things you’d never think to do, break that habit that you do on every iteration of the timeline, and hope that the loop was just some catharsis for your morning coffee addiction. Now is the time to fix any regrets you may have, to make amends, to become a better person.

Binge watch time related tv

Also read some sci fi. Of course, if you’re reading this, you’re probably on track already, and getting into the more obscure sections. That’s good, a lot of those mainstream sci fi movies are more meant to make you feel good than actually discuss the repercussions of time loops. But hey, you never know, maybe you’ll get some inspiration for something. Heck, a lot of escaping from time loops is getting the right inspiration. So yea, take a break, and binge those bad tv shows. You’ve got all the time in the world to do what you love… assuming you love sci fi television as much as I do. Heck, I won’t judge if you just want to use the time loop to binge all day, enjoy yourself! (You are trapped in a serious science anomaly we don’t fully understand after all) Just, make sure you eventually take a television break if the time loop doesn’t show any sign of fixing.

Find a guide

Alright, so basic fact of logic, there’s only one person on the planet who knows the absolute most about time loops, and chances are it’s not you. At least, it wasn’t you when you got stuck. For all you know, that person walking down the street next to you knows more than you. Heck, maybe they were trapped in a time loop too. So go ahead and ask. What’s the worst that could happen? No seriously, what’s the worst that could happen? You’re trapped in a time loop, any social awkwardness you display will be forgotten by the next loop. Go up and talk to random people, find that person who knows a ton about sci fi. My DMs are always open, and I’m sure you can find some people in a sci fi discord server. Want a real kicker? Spend one loop learning all you can about a person, just talking to them friendly and nice. Then next time loop start the conversation with an announcement that you’re in a time loop, and prove it by reciting those same facts you learned about the person in the last loop. Get to know someone, make some new friends, or just reach out for help (its so hard to escape alone).

Convince the government

That trick I mentioned, in point 5… that’ll probably work for the government too. Imagine calling up the president of the United States on his personal cell phone, telling him you’re in a time loop, and backing it up with a whole host of personal facts. What they won’t see, is the hundred or so timelines you spend going from convincing the police, to the FBI, to the governor, to your local senators, etc, etc. At every step of the way, wasting one or two timelines to learn all their personal info, then regurgitating it to them in the third timeline as proof you really are looping. It’s exhausting. All to convince some bureaucrats and some scientists to look into it. Let’s hope they really do have aliens in area 51, or this will be a massive waste of time. But hey, time is something you’ve got too much of anyway. The effort may be exhausting, but you can’t give in, you need some professional backup on your team, and no matter how much you repeat yourself, its worth the effort.

Number those timelines

Alright, so at this point, try anything. But you need a way to stop yourself from trying the same thing twice. And you need a way of prompting the people you are with to stop saying the same old ideas. If you wake up on the same day every morning, and ask the people around you to help you escape a time loop, then they’re going to be repeating a lot of their responses. But in my experience, people reply, think, and remember differently based on the prompts they’re given, and maybe those different prompts will jog your brain, and the brains of the people you’re around, into thinking of something new. One way to do it is get a dictionary, or some other book with a wide variety of words, and each day refer to the next word in the book as that day's prompt. Do something completely random, completely insane, but make sure it started with you and your time loop guides reading and thinking about the prompt. So you’re probably going out to go touch an aardvark then. Come back when you’ve ridden a Zambonni and I’ll know things are really desperate. Point is, keeping trying new things, and enjoy them while you’re at it.

Keep trying

Alright, it’s not really like you’ve got much of a choice here. Going about your day, or repeating the same day twice, or acting and pretending like you’re not really in a time loop, are all ways of experimenting with something new (though, frankly I think these will just lead to frustration). Heck, maybe instead of acting crazy, what you really needed was to act normal. Maybe it’s a sentient creature keeping you trapped in the loop, and it’ll sense when you’ve given up hope and then release you from the loop. Maybe. Really doubt that though. Technically, it’s impossible to give up. But hang in there. Keep yourself, and your joy. You get to live. You get to experience something no one else has felt. You can learn a hundred new skills, and master them all, and live frivolously every day. You get to meet every person on earth, and study them all in a single day. You are technically immortal. There is nothing you have to do, no responsibilities. There’s nothing new on television to keep you glued to the screen, and no point putting any of your dreams off until tomorrow. You’re trapped in time, but in a way free. Free of consequences except the ones you choose for yourself. So choose to be happy, choose to live. Choose to value this day with your friends and family, even if they won’t value or remember them. Maybe plan one million for escaping the time loop is to go down to a nice sunny beach and just relax. In a strange way, that’s got just as much chance of working as anything else. And it’ll make your eternity here a lot more bearable than moping around your house all depressed like.

Don’t die

I have no idea what the religious implications are of being trapped in a time loop. And the thing with most time loops, at least the ones I’ve seen on tv, is that death doesn’t let you escape the loop. And frankly that’s a good thing, because death is something worse. I’m not going to go into this too much, though if you really are trapped in a time loop I’m sure these few words are tantalizingly short. (If you need more, there are plenty of resources out there) But no time loop has ever been solved by dying. Even if it did resolve, your eternal purgatory would probably end up taking the form of a time loop. But don’t worry, I can give you my personal assurances that you’re alive right now. And that’s good. Because life is a beautiful thing, even when the day repeats. You know, especially then. After all these dark and gritty escape the time loop stories, of tormented characters driven mad because nothing they do matters, can’t we have one where someone is happy to be in a time loop? We all die, eventually that is. Whether you’re trapped in a time loop or not. But not all of us live. Not all of us truly live. Maybe being trapped in a time loop will help you live truly. I mean, if you really think about it, in several thousand years, is anyone even going to remember you? Remember your accomplishments? You may as well have lived for a day. If you want to escape the time loop so what you do matters again, maybe it’s time to face the reality that what you do… may not have mattered. And that’s okay. Life is about the living. Living every day, day by day, and making the most of it. We don’t always get to control the hand that life gives us. Maybe we know someone with Alzheimer's, whose memories fade at the end of each day, and makes it seem like we’re living that moment over and over. Maybe they don’t even remember who you are. Maybe, to them, you’re a stranger, who met them today, and knows so many things about them. Is it happy when someone laughs, if they won’t remember it later? Did it really happen? Yes it did. Yes it is happy.

10.

You can’t escape / why did you listen to me, I’ve never been trapped in a time loop

Life is a beautiful thing, time is a beautiful thing. It’s beautiful because it doesn’t loop. I can understand the anger, that bitter rage people can have, trapped and unable to reach out, repeating the same day over and over. Unable to move on. Unable to break free. And sometimes they do break free. Sometimes, silly movies and tv shows, that avoidance of the causing incident, or the help of scientists and their research, are enough to fix even the most terrible of fates. But sometimes they can’t, and we can go on, suffering forever. I’ve never been trapped in a time loop (I thought I was once, in fact, all my friends thought I was too, and they all tried to help me out of it. But I wasn’t. I wasn’t, right?), and if any of the people around me have, they've been hiding it exceptionally well. They’ve worked today, for the hope of relaxing tomorrow. They’ve made progress, with the thought that their accomplishments matter, and their adventures can wait. That’s the mindset a lot of us go through life with. But maybe, just maybe, life can’t wait until tomorrow. Maybe it takes getting trapped in a time loop to realize. When your hard work doesn’t pay off, and you can’t think of what evil thing has landed you where you are, when the universe deals you a bad hand, maybe that’s when you realize what’s important. Waking up, every day, with people you care about, ready to live life for today. Maybe tomorrow won’t come. Maybe it never will. Maybe you have to live, live every moment of your life, today. Or, maybe, just maybe, tomorrow is right around the corner. And when you tell those people around you that you love them, maybe this time they’ll remember. But what the hell do I know? I’ve never been trapped in a time loop. I’m just a person, one of billions on planet Earth, living life.

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morkleemelon · 4 years

Text

Jet Lag✈️

1) you and Mark are both idols and you're on video call from different countries and you miss each other. You surprise Mark secretly visiting Korea and you then surprise him in his room and you guys cuddle and stuff ^~^

@smolninja thank you for your request! I hope it’s everything you wanted! I’m sorry for the delay, I had so many issues with Tumblr and accidentally deleted it when I was like 70% done it was so sad. Nonetheless, I really liked writing it! Enjoy :)

Warnings: mild swearing

Word Count: 3k

Genre: Fluff, slight angst

Fem Idol!reader x Mark Lee

The set up: you’re in a 7 member kpop group called Girl Trouble and you’ve just finished the first concert of your Japanese tour. We’re pretending corona doesn’t exist :) The general public does not know that you are dating Mark Lee

-----

You feel the van come to a stop as flashing lights bloom from outside the tinted windows, waking you from your much needed sleep.

“We’re at the hotel y/n,” your bandmate, Yeeun, informs, fixing her hair in her phone camera to make sure she was ready to be photographed.

The excited cheers coming from the street bring you out of your sleepy stupor and you stretch your arms above you in a big yawn.

“How do I look?” you ask Nayoo, your best friend in the group who’s sitting next to you, touching up her concealer.

“Perfect as always y/n, duh,” she replied, playfully winking as she put her stuff away.

“Ok I’m opening the door!” you warn as you grab the handle and take a deep breath, putting on your best smile.

Swinging the door open, you’re met with an uproar of fans calling out your name and a storm of camera flashes eager to capture your latest look. It was your group’s first time in Japan so the fans were especially excited to finally have the chance to see you.

*Click click click click*

You stepped out of the car as gracefully as you could, smile never faltering as you showed off your pearly white teeth and prize-winning dimples. Brushing your hair back slightly as you walk, you tease your new gold earrings as a subtle endorsement to the brand. Your members following suit, you wave to the crowd and make your way to the entrance, nodding at a few fansites you recognized.

- - -

Throwing yourself onto the bed, your freshly showered hair promptly soaks through the comforter but you couldn’t care less.

“Ugh...,” you sighed, melting into the plush goodness of the hotel mattress, “I’m so goddamn tired.”

If only he were here with you...

“Oh!” you gasp, head shooting up from your now wet pillow, “I promised I’d call!”. You rolled off the bed and scrambled to find your phone in your bag, suddenly wide awake.

“You’re calling loverrr boyyyy?” Nayoo teased, dragging out the letters because she knew how much you hated it.

“Stopppp!” you whined, throwing your soggy pillow at her and trying to hide the growing blush on your cheeks.

Frantically unlocking your phone, you scroll through your contacts to find your boyfriend, heart racing with anticipation. It’s been a few weeks since you’ve seen Mark and you know it’ll be a few more until you have the chance. You promised each other to call whenever you could, but with NCT dream having a new comeback and Girl Trouble was starting to be really popular, there was only so much you could do. On top of that, it was stressful trying to keep your relationship a secret with all of the prying eyes around you and Mark’s intense fan base. Nevertheless, you’ve been going strong for about 8 months now you know that everything, every struggle, is worth it because of how much you truly love him.

Calling: Baby💕💋🦁...

You don’t bother to fix your makeup-less face and frizzy hair because you know that he’ll say you’re beautiful.

You smile at the thought of him as the FaceTime chimes ring.

*whoom*

“Marky!” you whisper cry, heart racing with excitement as you see his face for the first time in days.

“Baby!” Mark squeals back in the same tone, losing himself to giggles as you both giddily recover from the excitement of getting to see each other. You can hear the sound of voices mocking him in the background and Chenle’s piercing scream cuts through the audio.

“How have you been, baby?” you ask adoringly, ignoring the dreamies and look longingly at the boy in round glasses and his favorite grey hoodie.

“Shut up guys! I’m trying to talk to y/n!” he yells back at them, met with only more mocking and screaming. Sighing and giving up, he turns back to the camera, “Ah you know, I’ve been alright. We’ve been pretty busy with practice. I’m actually at practice right now if you can’t tell”. He pans the camera to the other members of dream who are clearly only taking a break because Mark made them stop for this phone call.

Guilt grips at you as you realize how you were probably inconveniencing them. After all, it was getting late and they all have to stay even later now because of you.

“Oh... if now’s not a good time we can always try tomorrow,” you offer, smiling slightly but not enough to hide your disappointment and guilt.

“Aw baby I’m sorry,” Mark soothes, “don’t worry about us I didn’t mean it like that. I missed you so much and these guys can spare a few minutes it’s fine”.

“I wish you were here, Mark. Or I was there,” you whisper, lying down on your bed once again. Placing your phone in front of you, it’s almost, almost, as if he were there lying with you.

Mark wears a pensive expression as he looks down, using his free hand to fiddle with his hoodie strings.

“Yeah. Me too”.

His voice is strained as he thinks about the nights you’ve snuck out together and the secret dates you shared. He misses the way you feel in his arms and the way your soft hair felt when it tickled him awake in the morning. He misses your terrible dad jokes and your night cooking. It was really frustrating how you were both so young and so in love, but everything else in life had to get in the way. Mark really missed you.

You reach out instinctively to stroke his hair but instead of comforting the boy you loved, your hands are met with only the cold surface of your screen.

The two of you talked for a few more minutes, trying to make the most of the time before he had to go. You could tell by the way his voice strained that he was really exhausted.

When he finally hung up, you couldn’t shake the empty feeling off; not being next to him, being able to touch him, to comfort him, to be with him was the worst feeling in the world.

And before you could stop yourself, warm tears began to fall as your shoulders shook with your heartbroken sobs. Video calls were supposed to make you miss each other less, not more. You loved him so much that you’d miss him even if he was right there with you. Being apart was devastating.

“Oh, honey…,” Nayoo coos, crawling into your bed to give you a much needed hug, “It’s okay. It’s going to be okay. Let it out”.

Wrapping your arms around your best friend, you let the tears fall onto your already soaked pillow and spilling out the feelings you’ve kept buried inside for so long.

“I just miss him so much,” you gasp, squeezing your fists around the fabric of Nayoo’s sweatshirt.

“Oh I know y/n, I know,” she comforted, “remember back when we were trainees and you just started dating Mark? And I was always there to distract Manager Kim when you snuck out to meet him?”.

You let out a small laugh at her attempt to lighten the mood. Nayoo was truly a good friend and she always had your back. You were really lucky to have her in your life.

“I do, Nayoo. I never thanked you enough for that”

“You know I love you. I’d do it again now if you wanted to sneak out and meet him. Actually I bet you could pull it off since our next show isn’t for another 4 days”

“Wait…”

Both of you sat up at the same time, looking at each other with wide eyes.

------

“I can’t believe we’re doing this”

“Shush! We already bought the tickets there’s no backing out now”

“What if someone notices me?”

“They won’t. Look at you”

You looked in the mirror of the lobby bathroom you were hiding in. You were dressed in plain, unbranded clothes, your hair tucked in a low, messy bun. The majority of your face was covered by a mask and a baseball hat, making you look nearly unidentifiable to anyone looking.

“I guess,” you sighed, still nervous, “let’s just go over the plan again”.

“Alright sheesh,” Nayoo groaned, “as if I am not a wizard of distracting our manager. You’ll get into the Uber we just called and go to Japan Airport. Your flight is at 2:30am and you’ll arrive in Korea at about 4:00am. Then you’ll go to Mark’s dorm and make out with him yadda yadda-”.

You punched her in the arm.

“Okay! Did I lie though? Anyways, you’ll be on your return flight the next day at the same time so you better savor your time. MY job is to tell Manager Kim that you are having lady problems and you can’t make it to practice today. He hates when we talk about periods so this is fool proof seriously. Plus we know that you will do fine on stage without one day of practice”.

“Okay…,” you chewed your lip nervously, half dreading the thought of being caught and half thrilled at the thought of being in Mark’s arms in a few hours. Your phone buzzed in your pocket and you looked at the notification.

*your Uber driver Ayako is here! Look for license plate A29&Q on a black Honda Pilot*

Hugging Nayoo goodbye, you rush out of the hotel and into the cab, adjusting your cap and mask to make sure it covers your face.

Each second that passed, you became more excited about seeing your boyfriend and less nervous about the consequences.

Mark, I’m here for you. I’m coming, just wait a little bit longer.

Your hands itched to call him and tell him what you were doing but you knew that he was catching up on some much needed sleep by now.

When you arrived at the Japan Airport, you thanked the driver and walked briskly through the airport. You had nothing except a small backpack and your plane ticket so getting through security was quick. Thankfully, there weren’t too many people there at 2 in the morning so you began to relax.

Successfully making it through security, you finally board the plane and claim your seat at the very back.

Looking out the window to the dark, starry skies, the lights of the airplane wings illuminate the drops of rain that began to fall.

-----

You jolt awake as the plane lands at the South Korea Airport with a rumbling thud. Your hands dart to your face to make sure your mask and hat are still there, sighing in relief when they remain unmoved.

Grabbing your bag, you walk down the aisle of the half-empty plane, each step bringing you closer to Mark.

Rushing out of the airport, your steps gain traction as you feel your heart racing in excitement at the thought of seeing your boyfriend so soon. The cold night air greets you familiarly as you call the nearest cab over. Telling the driver the address of Mark’s dorm building, you watch as the streetlights pass by and you near the boy you’ve been dying to see for weeks.

At last, you arrive at the steps of the apartment complex. Thanking the driver, you rush into the building and attack the elevator button going up. Your breathing is shallow with excitement knowing that he’s there right now. He’s there and you’re going to be with him.

Every second in the elevator feels like hours and you kick yourself for not taking the stairs. The floors seem like they’re all a mile away from the last and you tap your foot impatiently on the carpeted floor.

8...9...10

*Ding*

You speed out of the elevator and find your way expertly to the infamous 10th floor dorm room. Feeling around the crevices of the carpet floor for the spare key, you feel a slight twinge of nerves because you’re technically breaking into their home. But, as soon as you enter the familiar room, any guilt you have washes away and the only thing you can feel is the rapid beating of your heart filled with love and anticipation.

Making your way silently through the dark common room, you stop at the oh-so-familiar door. When your hand touches the cold metal of the doorknob, you swear that the beating of your heart was loud enough to wake the entire building.

Taking a deep breath, you open the door and you see him. Your breath hitches at your throat and you fight back the urge to cry right then and there. Mark was lying on his bed, snuggled under the covers with his arms and legs wrapped around a pillow like he always does when he sleeps. His soft breathing was rhythmic and calming, the warm scent of his room inviting you in.

Without wasting another second away from him, you drop your bag on the messy floor and walk up to his bed. Carefully, you pull at the pillow in his embrace and replace it with your own body. Mark shifts slightly and you freeze, not wanting to wake him up from his rare sleep. His eyes remain closed and his arms instinctively tighten around you. You can see through the darkness that his eyebrows furrow slightly and his lips part, and you wonder if he knew you were there.

“Finally,” you thought to yourself, reaching up slowly to caress his hair, “we’re finally together”. It didn’t feel real. You couldn’t believe that you were finally here in his arms. His body was so warm and felt like home to you.

You can feel Mark’s fingers autonomously rub circles into your back. As if his body realized what was happening, Mark’s eyes opened slowly and he peered into your face, blinking slowly to process this new information.

“I’m here, Mark,” you whisper as softly as you can.

Without any hesitation, Mark leans forward and presses a deep kiss onto your lips, conveying ten thousand words with his actions that could only be interpreted as “I missed you so much”.

You kiss him back, fingers gripping onto his shirt with raw emotion in an “I missed you too”. You breathe in deeply, not wanting to forsake any aspect of him, taking in all of his scent and drinking it all like a flower with no water.

He pulls away with a sigh and presses his forehead against yours. Mumbling incoherent words, you notice that he seems to have fallen back asleep.

Your own eyelids feel heavy and they flutter closed as you succumb to the warm welcome of sleep, your heart whole with love.

-----

Dull beams of sun fell slanted through the curtains as you drifted awake the next morning. You felt a hand playing with your hair and you opened your eyes slowly, temporarily forgetting what you had done the night before. Memories flooded back and your attention narrowed in at the smiling boy in front of you.

“You’re really here,” Mark whispered, “how are you here?”.

“It’s a long story,” you whispered back, voice still hoarse from sleep.

He pulled you in closer to his chest and you gladly snuggled into his warm body, nuzzling at his favorite hoodie, the one you got him for Christmas.

“I thought it was all a dream when I saw you last night,” he admitted.

“Stay with me today?,” you ask, worried that your time together would be short. If he had to go to practice, you could hardly see him at all and you’d go back to missing him a thousand miles away.

“I’m not going anywhere today,” Mark replies, kissing the top of your head, “my wishes have finally come true and you magically appeared in my bed. I’d be an idiot to leave”.

You giggled at his words, working your fingers to draw shapes into his back.

You start to tell him what happened after you called him the night before and how devastated you were when you weren’t with him. Mark’s arms tightened around you as you told him you cried when you saw how tired he was and you weren’t there to cheer him up. You told him about how you put on a disguise and snuck around Manager Kim who thought you were dying right now. His body shook with laughter at the crazy night you had and you both agreed that this was the wildest thing you had ever done.

“How long are you gonna stay here?”

“My flight back to Japan is at 2:30am tomorrow morning. What time is it now?”

Mark shifts to unlock his phone on the nightstand.

“It’s 10:49am”

You sighed and buried your face deeper into his chest, trying to get impossibly closer to the love of your life and make the most of your hard-earned time together.

“Let’s do everything today,” you heard him say.

“What do you mean?” you ask, tilting your chin up to look at him, pressing a small his to his jaw.

“Let’s just do everything we always wanted to do. Let’s get ramen from the convenience store together and then go on a walk at the park. Let’s get matching sweaters from the mall and then full sugar boba tea. You’ll drink half of mine and I’ll let you because I’m a good boyfriend”. Mark giggles at his imagination and peppers kisses across your face.

You laugh at the ticklish sensation and your heart swells with love for the Canadian boy.

Your whole body tingled, the feel of his body around yours and his lips on yours sending your head spinning. Rubbing your nose adoringly against his in an eskimo kiss, you vow that you would be strong for him from now on. You might be apart for work a lot, but the love you share is inseparable and undeniable. Nothing could ever come between you. You were his and he was yours.

“Let’s do it, Everything”

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quillvine · 4 years

Text

Yacht

Aaron Hotchner x Reader

A/N: This is based off an ask I left @agenthotchner about the BAU on a yacht. Honestly I thought I would have this out two weeks ago but apparently I cannot proof read to save my life.

You didn’t think you had that many clothes in your closet. After looking through your clothes for what feels like hours, they’re all starting to blur into one big blob of color and you still have no idea what to wear.

You sigh as you paw through your closet, “What even counts as preppy clothes?” you ask Aaron.

“I don’t know honey, just wear whatever, you look good in anything,” he tells you.

Rossi had invited the team out for a trip on his new yacht for a day off. As soon as everyone heard the word ‘yacht’ (and ‘day off’) they were immediately on board. Especially Penelope who took the word yacht and ran with it, demanding that everyone wear preppy clothes, because “it’s a yacht you guys, preppy clothes are mandatory.”

It sounded like a fun idea at the time, but what the hell do preppy clothes look like?

“Baby, what do you think?” Aaron asks as he holds up two shirts, “Navy or red?”

“Uhh the Navy one, it goes nicely with those khakis I like.” You tell him as you go through your clothes.

“Oh, these khakis?” He says pulling out the pair from the dresser.

You look up to meet his eyes. The amusement in them matches the shit-eating smile on his face and your wolfish grin. He knows exactly what you’re thinking.

“Yeah those, they highlight your assets nicely.” You say nonchalantly as you pull some pieces out of your closet, “what do you think, complement or match?”

“Nuh-uh, we are not done here,” Aaron says as he walks towards you.

You slowly back up, falling onto the mattress when the back of your knees hit the bed frame. He leans over you pushing your hands over your head. Slowly his lips move to meet yours, he kisses you leisurely and gently. But the way Aaron’s hand grips your wrist tells you that he’s hungry.

You gently push against his hold, he lets you go, instead choosing to frame your face with his forearms. He lovingly goes to pepper kisses down the column of your neck making you giggle. You turn your head and bring your shoulders up to your ears in an effort to get Aaron to stop.

“Come on we’re going to be late.” You say pushing him away, “Dave said that they’d leave without us if we’re late”

“Don’t worry about that. Dave wouldn’t dare.” He tells you as he tries to go in for a kiss on the lips.

You hold a finger against his lips to stop him from coming closer. He stops his attack on your lips to kiss, instead choosing to press a kiss to your index finger. His antics make you roll your eyes but with the way he gazes at you with complete adoration in his eyes, you can’t stay mad at him for long.

You give him a silly grin before saying, “But he would make a joke about how a quickie is supposed to be quick and you know Emily and Mor- oh!”

Aaron cuts you off by burying his face into your shoulder and laughing. The vibrations tickle your sensitive skin effectively silencing you. His lips forge a path up your neck to your neck, his nose bumping against the sweet spot behind your ear. Your fingers find their way to his hair, curling around his dark locks.

At this point, you don’t even care if you guys are going to be late because the way Aaron is nibbling on your neck trumps any worry about jokes from the rest of the team. You knew from the moment he pulled out that navy shirt you would have a hard time keeping your hands to yourself, but you didn’t think that it would happen so soon.

Throughout all of this Aaron has managed to push you up the bed so you’re leaning against the headboard. His hands are on your hips and he sits on top of you straddling your waist. His warm hands make their way up to your waist, his thumbs brushing against your rib cage.

Suddenly he pulls away from you and you groan in frustration. He better have not gotten you all worked up just to deny you.

Instead, he trails a finger up from your stomach, over your chest, and to your now marked up neck. He hums thoughtfully biting his lower lip as he admires your form on the bed.

“I think match, it’ll highlight your bruises.”

As it turns out Rossi did in fact almost leave you behind. The smirks the team gave you when you came running down the dock were only rivaled by the ones they gave you when they saw the badly covered up marks on your neck. Not that you minded, you’ve always liked to show off.

You’re sitting with Penelope under the awning of the yacht, it seems that you two are the only ones who care about not getting skin cancer. The rest of the crew is out enjoying some vitamin D. Aaron and Rossi are sharing a drink, while Morgan, Emily, JJ, and Reid are playing a rowdy game of poker.

Damn you wish you were rich. Then maybe all of your weekends would be like this. Jack would certainly enjoy yacht time. Not to mention that you could see Aaron on nice fitting slacks and preppy country club outfits all the time. What a sight would that be, even if it’s not his normal style Aaron looks good in basically everything.

You lean back in your lounge chair as you chat with Penelope, or rather as you listen to Penelope talk. You love her to bits but she has the tendency to steamroll over a conversation.

You’re not really listening though, you’re too busy looking at Aaron’s ass in those slacks. Man, you really should try to get him to wear them to work more often. Or at least try and get him to forgo the blazer in the office.

He catches you staring and gives you a small smirk. Busted. Unfortunately, Dave sees Aaron’s little smile and turns around to give you a smirk of his own. Double busted.

It’s not really your fault though, how can you not keep your eyes off of your very very sexy husband? He has his sleeves are rolled up showing off his forearms and you can see his muscles flex as he crosses his arms.

Aaron catches your gaze again, this time giving you a look that makes you squirm in your seat and wonder if it would be entirely appropriate to drag him into one of the guest rooms and take him right then and there.

Surely Dave wouldn’t mind, he’s been eyeing the poker game for a while now and Penny can totally join too, she'd definitely have fun. It’s not like you have anything to lose, sure you’ll probably get teased by the team later but it’s not even that big of a deal if you get to see Aaron out of those khakis.

You’re pulled from your thoughts by a smack on your arm. You glance over to see Penelope gaping in disbelief, “You are so not listening to me! I’m trying to tell you a story so good it’ll blow your mind and you’re making bedroom eyes with Hotch.”

“Pen, I’m sorry, but can you blame me?” You ask her.

“No I can’t you know how I feel about my Chocolate Adonis,” she says, “But I am telling you the story of how I managed to get Reid to wear that magnificent nautical-themed striped sweater, so you better listen up.”

You sneak one last look at Aaron, before turning your attention back to Penelope. She’s talking animatedly, waving her hands around to emphasize her point. You smile and nod along at all the right points but your mind is still on Aaron and how delicious he looks today.

Later. You tell yourself. You’ll get into his pants later. After all, what’s the point if there’s no chase?

It seems that the later it gets the more out of control the team gets. The sun is just setting and drinks have been flowing ever since you guys got on the yacht so you know you’re in for a wild night.

All of you have joined the poker game now and are losing handily to Reid and his Vegas/MIT magic. Sometimes you can’t tell if he’s really that good or just stacking the deck. The team hates it, Morgan especially he always loses big.

“Royal flush,” Spencer says smugly as he lays his cards on the table.

“No, no,” Derek says, “Nuh-uh you cheated.”

“I did not!” Spencer argues, “poker is inherently mathematical, I can easily calculate the among of hand combination at any given time you simply have to-”

“Nuh-uh, if it would get you banned in Vegas it's cheating,” Derek tells him.

“I’ll have you know that I have done this multiple times and have not been banned, so tell me Derek Morgan are you calling me a cheater?”

Spencer is practically fuming, he curls his fingers into a fist accidentally bending the cards in his hands. His jaw is set and he stares down Morgan definitely with a raised eyebrow.

“Ya know what? Yeah, yeah I am, Spencer Reid you are a cheater.” Derek says as he slams his hand on the table.

You all hold your breath as you watch the scene unfold in front of you. Neither of them is actually going to full-on fight each other but that doesn’t stop the team from trying to provoke them.

“Fight, fight, fight” Emily cries, jumping to her feet.

You follow suit, clapping your hands together, “yeah come on Reid don’t just sit there and take it.”

You feel Aaron’s warm arms grab you around the wait and bring back to sitting. He plants you down firmly back on your chair giving you a squeeze. It’s tight enough for you to know that a play fight between Reid and Morgan is the last thing that he wants, but not tight enough to actually hurt.

You turn around to give him a guilty smile but the damage is already done. Morgan has already started taking wide swings at Reid with Emily and JJ are both goading them on.

Spencer steps back to avoid Morgan’s hands, his feet dangerously close to the edge.

“Derek if you step any closer you’re gonna push Reid into the water,” Hotch warns.

Neither of them listens to Aaron’s warning. Instead, Morgan makes another playful jab at Reid who just barely manages to dodge it.

You guys cheer as Reid begins to fight back, making small jabs of his own. He’s terribly uncoordinated though, nearly tripping over himself as he lunges towards Morgan.

Derek shakes his head in amusement “You're gonna have to do better than that Pretty Boy.”

He shifts on his feet reading himself to take another swing at Spencer. Reid copies Morgan’s stance pressing his feet against the deck of the yacht. The two of them standoff, circling each other. They’ve managed to move away from the edge of the yacht, you notice. Hopefully, no one will fall ov-

Splash.

It seems you spoke too soon.

Somehow Morgan had misjudged the distance between him and Spencer and his forward momentum from when lunged at Spence carried him overboard.

You all peer over the edge of the yacht wondering you should get the life preserver ring out. But Morgan surfaces, sitting water out from his mouth.

“Hotch did you see that?” Morgan yells clinging to the side of the boat, “he totally pushed me.”

Aaron sighs and rests his head against your shoulder in dismay.

“I did not! You fell over on your own.” Spencer exclaims as he throws his hands up in frustration.

“No, you totally pushed him,” Emily argues.

Reid throws his hands up in frustration “JJ, back me up here,” he says gesturing to her.

JJ backs away shaking her head, “Don’t bring me into this.”

“Don’t bring you into this?” Morgan says indignantly, as he hauls himself out of the water, “as if you weren’t just goading us on a moment ago. Plus the only side you are going to be taking is mine ‘cause Pretty Boy definitely pushed me in.”

The four of them break into a full-on argument while the rest of you watch on in amusement. Or well, while you, Dave, and Penelope watch on in asumsent. If the anxious tapping of your Aaron’s fingers on your waist is any indication, he is not too pleased with the arguing.

As the argument crescendos, you feel Aaron’s arm leave your waist as he stands up from his chair abruptly.

“All of you, grounded.” He says

Rossi gets up and heads into the interior of the yacht, “And I think that our cue to turn the boat around.”

The rest of the team follows Dave inside but Aaron still lingers on the outside deck.

The sun has fully set and the stars are shining overhead. The rising moon is giving Aaron’s hair a soft silver glow as he gazes out towards the water. The lights of the yacht reflect off the sea smoothing his features out and making him look younger.

He really does look good today and you can’t help to wonder now is the perfect time to drag him off to one of the yacht’s bedrooms.

Sneaking up behind him you wrap your arms around him, pinning his arms to his body. You rest your chin against his body and squeeze as he turns to give you a soft smile.

“What’s on your mind handsome?” You ask as you give his bicep a small kiss.

“Nothing.” He tells you, giving you a gentle kiss.

It’s only gentle in the fact that his lips are soft as they move against yours. You know that the pleasure and desire that flows through your veins is matched in his.

He breaks free from your grasp and moves his hands to cup your face. With his slow but deliberate movements, it's like he’s trying to brand you in the most time-consuming way possible.

Breathless you break away and move to bump your nose against his “Are you sure Hotchner?” you mumble as you cradle his face in your hands.

“Well you know I hate it when the team gets like this.” He murmurs as he leans in for another kiss.

You hum in disbelief, “Nuh-uh I don’t buy it, they couldn’t have gotten you that worked up.”

You move to wrap your arms around his waist. Aaron brings his hands to rest on your hips laughing as you tuck your hands in the back pockets of his slacks.

“Can’t get anything past you can I?” He asks, his voice rife with mirth, “I saw you eyeing me up earlier, got me a little worked up.”

You bite your lip and give him a teasing smile as you lean up to brush your lips against the shell of his ear.

“Well, we’ve got a little bit until we get back to shore…” you say as you bring your hips flush to his, “why don’t we make good uses of one of the guest rooms?”

The hungry look in his eyes tells you all you need to know.

Tags (lmk if you want to be added!): @winterscaptain @yes-sir-hotchner @mrs-joel-pimentel-23-25 @crying-river @genevievedarcygranger @ange-must-die @ogmilkis @saintd0lce @agenthotchner @dr-reid-ismyspiritanimal @toasteddragoness @misskirkstark @rousethemouse @good-heavens-chris-evans @arganfics

#aaron hotchner x reader #aaron hotchner #reader #x reader #the bau team #Criminal Minds #Criminal Minds Fanfiction #criminal minds x reader #david rossi #Penelope Garcia #spencer reid #derek morgan #Jennifer Jareau #emily prentiss

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epicspheal · 4 years

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Hi again! Just wanted to know your opinion on the Pokemon villains, especially towards a chance of redemption. I think the only villains that kinda got redeemed was Archie and Maxie, learning that what they did was a mistake ( a little too late tho) and maybe Colress ( being the true neutral he is), through the Alola games. But yeah, what's you're opinion on them?

Hi Ihopethisendswell!

I’ve been sitting on this ask for a bit just trying to gather my thoughts. To be honest, the Pokemon Villains are some of my least favorite aspects of the games, mainly because in my opinion they’re rarely handled well (except for original Team Plasma and Team Skull, those guys are amazing and I except no slander of either)

I’ll start with Team Rocket. They have a very basic but realistic evil goal (especially in a setting as fantastic as the world of Pokemon). I honestly can’t say I dislike them. I would like to see more teams using their concept of just taking advantage of Pokemon for profit and selfish reasons rather than trying to tie in some philosophy (because to be honest in my opinion most of the teams who try to use philosophy to justify their extremism just end up looking really stupid for the most part). I like Kanto Team Rocket better than Johto’s plot and Rainbow Rocket was only good for the “what if” aspect and adding to the new multiverse lore. As far as redemption...I don’t think Giovanni or the grunts really deserve it.

For Team Aqua and Team Magma, I actually like them in a “so bad it’s good” type of way (definitely nostalgia based as even though I got into Pokemon during the original anime, I didn’t get to play a main game until gen 3). Like the idea of having two separate evil teams competing against each other to see who can enact their plans first is a super cool concept in my opinion but wasted on the idiocy of the “expand the land/expand the sea” goals. I will say I enjoyed their Emerald enhanced plot and ORAS’s expansion on them in the Delta Episode. I think the Emerald clash of Kyogre and Groudon was the most logical conclusion to their schemes. As far as redemption goes, I do think Maxie and Archie should’ve served some jail time like Chairman Rose because their plan was just as catastrophic if not more so.

For Team Galactic, ugh. They’re my second least favorite. They were just boring and made an already painfully slow game even more intolerable. This is where I give the Pokemon Anime credit, they made them more interesting in the games and I actually really loved how it was adapted (proof that when they want to the anime can have some really solid writing). Redemption for them? Nope, you literally tried to rewrite the world. Even with Cyrus’ tragic backstory...still nope.

Now for Team Plasma. This is how you do an evil team. Easily one of my favorite teams to actually go up against in game. I like that they actually tried to tackle an ethical question with Pokemon in Team Plasma. N was a fantastic antagonist and I’m glad he saw the light at the end and he definitely deserves the redemption. And all of the Team Plasma grunts who actually believed in N’s goal deserve redemption. I really enjoyed what they did in BW2 where they had the Plasma House with the misguided former grunts and the confrontation between the old team plasma and Neo Team Plasma about how ostracized the reformed grunts are. Although I don’t like Neo Team Plasma as much (although the outfits are 100 times cooler), it does make sense that the ones still loyal to Ghetsis would try for another attempt. Also it took me a second runthrough of White 2 to really appreciate Colress and his “this is for science” mantra but you know what, I love him. Him and N are really awesome and deserve the redemption. Ghetsis can go jump in a fucking volcano though, him and his followers (: As for Team Flare, they suffer a lot from not getting a sequel or third version. But like Team Galactic the anime adaptation did a lot of good for them. Team Flare is like Team Aqua/Magma for me in that I think they’re so bad it’s actually good. They actually had some funny dialogue bits and there was actually a lot of potential for them storywise if we had of gotten another Kalos game. The Great War, and AZ all had a lot of potential. Plus having an Elite 4 member working with them? That was more of a twist than Lysandre being the boss. And the Xerosic post-game plot was heartbreaking. Redemption wise though, it’s kind of hard to do with a group who literally tried to nuke the world.

Team Skull. I love these guys. I love them so much. This is another example for me personally of an evil team done right. I really liked how they weren’t even evil, just frustrated youth who were failed by Alola’s tradition. Like I could seriously go on about how toxic the Alolan community really is if the fact that a child failing the island challenge (a coming of age journey) somehow makes them feel so down about themselves and feel like rejects to the point they join a literal gang to find some sort of belonging (this is of course not talking about the origins of Team Skull being from a disgraced Kahuna who incurred the wrath of the tapus). Like I feel so sorry for them and I wanted to yell at the Kahunas in game for them not recognizing that their traditions were creating the Team Skull problem. Team Skull definitely deserved their redemption as they reformed in the post game

Aether Foundation though, ugh. Easily my least favorite. I really disliked the Aether Family as a whole as I felt they were invasive to the plot and that the focus should’ve been on team skull and how traditions while important can have harmful consequences. I will say it was nice to have female antagonist and I vastly prefer SM Lusamine to USUM Lusamine. USUM Lusamine was more redeemable but she was less interesting and USUM really screws up Lillie’s development which I dislike (which is saying something because I really can’t stand Lillie).

Team Yell was a disappointment. Honestly there was so much potential because like Team Skull they are a very grounded team (as you can see, I like the grounded in reality teams more so than the philosphical extremist ones). Like I can totally understand why they would form considering how dilapidated Spikemuth is. The issue is that they aren’t given a chance to do much actual evil. Even though Team Skull wasn’t really all that bad, they still did bad things. Which is realistic given their desperation. As desperate as Team Yell was to get Marnie to become champion I was expecting more sabotage and outright hostility. Which while being bad, would be realistic given their situation. That and the fact that no one really calls out the fact the irony of their sabotage actually delegitimizing Marnie’s strengths as a trainer. Like is Marnie truly one of the strongest trainers from the gym challenge or were their people who could’ve beat her who got targeted by Team Yell and ultimately dropped out? Not to mention the implications of ongoing beef between Team Yell and Chairman Rose. Again so much potential wasted. If they had of just made them just a tad more hostile and had someone point out how they were unintentionally making Marnie look bad, they’d easily be one of my favorites.

Macros Cosmos. I think this was the team most screwed over by the plot, and the controversial anime adaptation did them only a few favors. I’ve said this before, but the royal twins historical manipulation plot was more interesting than Rose’s “I’m going to start the Galarian Apocalypse to save Galar” plot. And the sad part is Rose could’ve been a very compelling antagonist. I’ll say that if they really wanted to make Rose an antagonist, they could’ve taken away the Eternatus plot and just used his poor communication skills to cause problems for the gym leaders and champion. A bad boss with impatience and crappy communication skills is something many people can relate to, and I think would’ve been a more interesting plot than trying to force philosophical extremism on to him because.

And lastly the Royal Twins. Man I hated them, but also they’re some of my favorite antagonists. I think people at times look solely at their goofy hairstyles and entitledness and forget how dangerous these two actually were. They had a whole network of spies loyal to them? Imagine a game with them as the main protagonists where it gets to the point you can’t trust the NPCs because who knows which one supports them. Also their historical revision plot is something so relevant today with textbooks being written in a way to minimize horrible atrocities such as the trans-Atlantic slave trade. Granted their plot in game left a lot to be desired, but they had so much potential and honestly a better reasoning to want to awake Eternatus than Rose did. As you can see I prefer the more grounded teams such as Rocket, Plasma, Skull and Yell (in theory) and the Royal Twins given how their goals relate to the real world. I also think in many ways Gamefreak does better with those plots wiriting wise than the philosophical extremist teams.

#team rocket #team aqua #team magma #team galactic #team plasma #neo team plasma #team flare #team skull #aether foundation #team yell #macro cosmos #sordward and shieldbert #ask epic spheal #ask me anything #thanks for the ask!

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lailannajacobs · 4 years

Text

The Fey King is Cold but at Least it’s not Forty Below | GIBP V

Pairing: fey!Loki x fem!reader

Chapter Summary: Your day doesn’t go as planned after a heated council meeting.

Warnings: more fluff!

Word Count: 5.4k

A/N: Thank you to those of you who are still following this series despite my sporadic updates! I hope you enjoy this chapter and let me know what you think! It always makes my day when you do! <3

Chapter Five

Loki groaned, the sound of his alarm clock taking him only seconds after he’d fallen asleep. He knew that technically it wasn’t true, but it definitely felt like it. Even for moons before YN had arrived, the days had been blending together, problems piling up, one after the other with barely enough time to solve one before the next arose.

He let his head fall back against the pillow. Loki missed the days when he actually saw his court for reasons that weren’t life threatening. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d spent the day in the library with Wanda or the last time he’d played a few rounds of cards with Bucky and Gamora. The only thing he still did was spar in the barracks with Nebula, but it had become more of a necessity at this point than a social call. Loki was beginning to think that the last time any of them had had genuine fun was when his brother had been king. Thor had only been king for fifty years but Loki missed those days more than anything. In all honesty, he missed his brother.

With a sigh, he pushed himself to a seat and stared at the door that separated his room from YN’s room. Nebula was right to be worried about the human on the other side of the door, especially that there was nothing Loki could say to reassure either of them that he’d made the right call. He’d spent most of the night awake trying to think of something — anything — that would serve as proof that he hadn’t just condemned his realm by making this deal with YN. The only thing he’d found reassuring was the way she seemed to wear her emotions on her sleeve. Emotions that seemed real enough — especially her hatred towards him. It was the reason he’d been so surprised by the way she’d so gracefully handled the party last night.

But parties were the least of their worries. They were filled with noblemen and ladies whose opinions didn’t matter. At least it was good practice. Practice he needed. Loki had been so preoccupied with protecting his realm from the inevitable war coming that he’d forgotten what it was like to flirt and act like the burden of his title didn’t exist. It was even harder than he’d expected to act like the same lighthearted, overconfident prince he’d once been because until last night, he hadn’t realized that he’d lost sight of that person to begin with. Even if he still enjoyed the way he’d managed to get flustered reactions from YN, he was a far cry away from convincing.

There was no movement on the other side of the door, but that didn’t reassure Loki in the slightest. He’d learned his lesson the last time. Rubbing the fatigue from his eyes, he got ready for another day. There was a council meeting this morning that he knew would make a scene if he brought YN along with him, but apart from that, he’d promised her that they wouldn’t be spending their days together and he’d meant it. He had to believe that giving her her freedom was the right thing to do even if his sleepless night had made him doubt that it really was the safest thing to do.

He could have used the door connecting their rooms, but he chose to walk out into the hallway and knock on her door. Loki had seen the way she’d looked at their proximity with revulsion and he wasn’t about to piss her off for something like this — no matter how much he enjoyed the look on her face that made him wonder if she would try to stab him. He knew she had a dagger on her. He didn’t know where she kept it, but he knew it was there. And knowing it was there made things all the more interesting.

After a few knocks, he heard faint movement and then the sound of her dragging her feet to the door. When she pulled open the door, she groaned.

“What?”

Loose hair poked every which way out of her braids and her already squinty eyes narrowed even further. Judging by the baggy, soft looking pyjama — courtesy of Valkyrie — it seemed he’d been the one to wake her up this time.

“Morning,” he chirped.

“Rot in the seven hells,” she muttered back.

Loki was sure she was going to slam the door in his face but then she seemed to remember where she was and why she was here. The forced smile she shot him made her look queasy.

“I mean,” she sucked in a long breath, her eyes fluttering closed for a moment as she collected herself, “good morning, Laufeyson.”

His smile grew. Her eyes darkened with fury.

“No actually, I really did mean rot in the seven hells,” she whispered before slamming the door in his face.

“Guess you’re not a morning person,” Loki muttered to the door.

He leaned against the doorframe and closed his eyes, waiting for her to come back out. He heard her soft footsteps padding around in the room as well as the sound of drawers opening and closing. He wasn’t paying much attention to her other than to make sure she didn’t escape out the courtyard window. Even if she did it only to explore more of the palace on her own, he wasn’t sure how he’d be able to explain the escapade to the council. Loki was well aware that he was already walking on thin ice with them, his lies barely convincing enough for them to swallow.

When YN walked back out of the room, her scowl was replaced by a smile that was almost terrifying it was so phoney. But with the hallway deserted, it quickly dropped. She opened her mouth and then closed it, eyes darting to the walls as she swallowed her anger. Still, he could see it there, simmering just below the surface.

It didn’t matter how well she’d hidden it at the party, there was no doubt in his mind that she hated him. So he grinned, knowing it set her on edge. She sucked in a deep breath and for a second he held his, wondering if this was the moment she was actually going to throw a punch at him but she only smiled sweetly. He held her gaze and nodded, oddly satisfied that she wasn’t going to back down. He knew it was stupid of them to be acting this way in public, but this silly competition between them was the only thing lately that didn’t want to make him crawl back into his bed.

“It’s going to be a quick breakfast today,” Loki began, leading her down the hallway as if they hadn’t been locked in a staring contest, “we have a meeting soon.

“Great.”

He wasn’t looking forward to it either.

“I deserve the most amazing breakfast after what I did last night,” she continued.

Loki knew that was true, but they didn’t have the time for it. Not wanting to say as much, he replied arrogantly, “that was only because you were following my lead.”

He smirked when her face pinched in frustration.

“If any of us was pulling the weight last night, it was me,” she snapped with a glare that would have withered most people.

Loki made a mental note to keep her away from Nebula for now. He wasn’t sure the palace was ready for what might happen if the two of them met, regardless of whether or not they got along.

“Doubtful,” he taunted.

“Don’t be an asshole.”

He stopped short, surprised. She crossed her arms over her chest, not looking apologetic or like she was about to take back her words any time soon. Fine with him. He didn’t want her to either.

“How about we call it a tie,” he offered even though what he really wanted to do was see how far he could push her before one of them gave up and called it quits.

“I don’t do ties,” she answered haughtily.

He chuckled unable to look away from the fire in her eyes when he said, “neither do I.”

You hated to admit it, but breakfast, although quick, had almost made up for being woken up this morning. Almost. But that wasn’t because of failure the food’s part. Your body was already showing signs of fatigue and wear, and only a battalion of food and sleep would stave off the effects of your abilities — because the one solution to your problem wasn’t an option here.

You sat at the head of a massive oval table with Loki, listening to the councilmen bicker about a new policy which, if you had understood correctly, would increase trade between Asgard and the realms that had once sided with Odin during the war. The longer they argued about the semantics of the policy, the angrier you became.

Loki had been silent through the whole matter, looking like he was about to fall asleep. He hadn’t spoken a word the entire time you’d been here either, not even a word as you’d walked in. But your presence had spoken volumes, silencing the room as you’d entered. Only a nod from Loki had started the meeting.

The councilmen’s voices never rose beyond mild disinterest — never showed real emotion — as they spoke of the best way to profit and collude with the people who had condoned a genocide hundreds of years ago. You wanted to bash their heads into the table, their words exhuming memories of screams and terror and smoke. You fought to push them back into their box, but the harder you pushed, the faster the memories rose to the surface. Fear and anger washed over you until you weren’t certain that you would’t lunge across the table and rip them to shreds.

Fingers brushed against the back of your hand and you jumped, almost snarling at the contact. Loki’s fingers smoothed back and forth along your clenched hand, but his attention was elsewhere as if it was a mindless gesture he did every day. You smoothed out your hand, and the evidence of your frustration, feeling the eyes of the councilmen on you. You weren’t sure if they’d felt your anger pulsating across the room or if the little act of intimacy had caught their attention, but they now stared at you expectantly as if they were waiting for something.

You looked over at Loki, trying to figure out what you’d missed. You half expected him to return your gaze with that cocky little smirk of his, but his expression was colder than Niflheim. It wasn’t focused on you either. It was focused on the fey in front of you.

“No,” was the only thing Loki said, voice eerily calm.

Helio’s lips spread into a satisfied grin.

“No, prince?” He sneered the title like an insult, “without an active king on Asgard, these matters fall into the hands of a council vote. And if I must remind you, there is no active king on Asgard.”

Loki’s fingers stopped moving, “It will wait until the orange moon.”

The air suddenly dropped in temperature as Loki’s command reverberated throughout the room. The other councilmen flinched at the raw power behind his order, but Helio only sneered.

“I’m afraid it cannot wait. Svartalfheim and Alfheim have given us until the next moon to decide,” Helio replied pleasantly, leaving the obvious unsaid when he continued, “we must act now.”

You stared between them, your anger rising up into your throat like bile. None of them looked at you directly, but you knew this was a direct hit at you. They hadn’t said anything about your presence here, but you’d known by their faces the moment you’d walked into the room that Loki had broken some sort of rule by bringing you along. And now, because of Loki’s arrogance, realms filled with terrible people who had done horrifying things were going to benefit from it. And of course, as the leader of the realm who turned its back on the Dual Realms during the war, you knew he wasn’t going to try any harder than he had to to stop the policy from going through. This was all part of the act. He was acting frustrated on your behalf, like the lover of any human would. He was a fraud and a coward. He didn’t care.

“I will not see Thor’s work destroyed by Fey who wish to see humans eradicated because they are terrified of them,” Loki affirmed, his voice no louder than a whisper.

Magic crackled in the air and the councilmen seemed to freeze, their spines straightening as if they’d been electrocuted. Their faces paled with genuine fear, but Loki hadn’t done anything more than whisper a threat. Or so you thought. A memory of the pain you’d felt that first night flickered through your mind and you realized that maybe he was doing something to them — something only they could feel.

“We will not loosen our policies with the angels or the dark elves,” he continued, “there will be no vote.”

Nothing happened in the room for an eternal moment and then a collective sigh escaped their lips along with five terse nods. No one said anything, their glares of hatred a clear enough message. You shivered. Loki might have won this battle, but judging by their looks, they weren’t finished with the war. Not by a long shot.

“We’re done here.”

Loki stood, lifting your hand with his. His face had softened slightly into a half smile, but all you could see was the cold fury in his eyes. You inspected him a little closer, surprised. There was no way you could have misjudged him, knowing what you did about what had happened during the war, but it was hard to believe that every emotion he portrayed was an act.

His grip on your hand lessened and you realized he was reading your inspection as hesitation. You held on tighter knowing you couldn’t break the act. Not now.

“We’re done here,” you echoed, your anger and frustration on full display.

Loki nodded tersely and led you out of the room, not once looking back. Neither of you said a word on the way to your rooms, you because you were were too afraid to say anything incriminating that might be overheard and him…well you honestly had no clue what was going through his head. All traces of emotion — real or fake — that he’d shown in the meeting were gone, his face unreadable. You couldn’t say the same for yourself. All you wanted to do was hit something. Instead, you began counting the tiles on the floor as you passed, hoping to take your mind off the meeting long enough to calm down.

“I have a feeling it’s not me you’re angry at, but it’s hard to tell by the way you keep glaring at me,” he murmured with a soft chuckled.

At the sound of his amusement, it took all of your restraint not to grab your dagger and jab it into his chest. He hadn’t once looked your way but he obviously knew how you were feeling. The thought enraged you even more, knowing you weren’t skilled enough at courtly politics to keep any sort of emotion off your face.

“After a meeting like that, I have every right to be,” you snapped, refusing to clarify whether you were mad at him or at them.

“Yes, you do,” he answered softly. Loki stopped beside your bedroom door and rested against the wall, peering down at you with a sad expression on his face. “And if it’s any consolation,” he shrugged slightly as if the words made him uncomfortable, “I’m sorry about what happened to your people.”

Your heart jammed into your throat, the words knocking the breath from your chest. How did he know what you were? How had you managed to give away so much? And how could he be sorry when he’d sat by and let it happen?

Somehow you managed to echo, “my people?”

His brows furrowed slightly, “humans.”

Your people. Those weren’t your people. Other than your sister, there weren’t any of you people left. He’d made damn sure of that when he’d chosen his own realm and left yours to die.

“It’s not a consolation,” you managed and pushed open the door.

You strode to the middle of the room, hands about to tear out your hair when you realized that you hadn’t shut the door behind you. Loki peered around the corner, barely having moved from his position.

“What do you want?” you growled.

He shrugged again, “I’m glad you haven’t forgiven them…any of them… for what they’ve done. I know it was generations before you, but none of them deserve your forgiveness.”

The words were out of your mouth before you could stop them, “no thanks to you.”

The expression on his face hardened, the temperature dropping with it. He didn’t move, his body taking inhuman stillness. A predator waiting to pounce. The silence itself felt dangerous and you could sense your magic rising like hackles in anticipation of a fight — a fight you very much wanted. You held his gaze, daring him to contradict you. You held it just to prove that, unlike the other nobles here, you weren’t afraid of him. That unlike the Fey, you weren’t his to command.

You continued with a snap, “You don’t get to have an opinion when you’re just as much to blame as the rest of them.”

“Watch it YN,” he warned, eyes darkening, his voice a low growl in the back of his throat.

You let out a cold laugh, “make me.”

“You don’t want to go there,” he took a step forward but seemed to remember himself and then stopped.

It only made a ferocious grin spread further across your lips. His eyes flared, a green so bright you could have sworn you saw magic and fire through them. Good.

“You want a fight? Courtyard. Five minutes,” he barked through clenched teeth, “jump out the window if you don’t know how to get there.”

He turned away and slammed the door behind him.

You let out a breath as if the step he’d taken into your room had sucked all the air from it. But that didn’t mean that any of your anger was gone along with him. It wasn’t going to be a fair fight, not while you were in this form, but you were sure in the seven hells not going down without one. Him and his people had ruined thousands of lives during the war. You were going to make him hurt for that.

Loki trembled as he strode away from YN’s room, his fists clenching and unclenching at his sides. His breathing shallowed and he could feel the memories ebbing in like shadows from the corners of his mind. He tried to shove them down before they could wrap those dark tendrils of despair around him and cripple him completely but they weren’t having it. He stuffed his fists into his pockets before anyone could see. He could feel the magic currents in the air, stronger now than before, and it took all of his restraint not to pull on one and watched an explosion of magic follow in its wake.

She hadn’t been there. YN hadn’t been there during the war and yet even she knew how much of a failure he’d been. The word echoed in his mind, bouncing around and repeating itself until the only sound he could hear was failure. Loki tried again to push the feeling down and lock it away like he’d gotten so much better at doing, but nothing stopped the word from getting louder and louder in his head.

His steps quickened. If she wanted a fight, she would damned well get one.

He was in the courtyard before the minute was up a materialized a long bamboo stick. Just because he was loosing his head didn’t mean that he was stupid enough to fight with real weapons. He paced around the dirt, unable to stand still. He wasn’t calm, but at least he wasn’t shaking anymore. He twirled the stick in his hands. He checked the time. Paced to the other side of the courtyard and back. Checked the time. Took the top layer of his tunic off. Rolled his shoulders back. Checked the time.

The wind picked up, carrying the smell of the sea even this far inland, dragging along dark clouds in tow. A storm was coming. If that wasn’t a sign that this was a bad idea and that he should turn back, he didn’t know what was. But he couldn’t do a damned thing to stop himself.

When the five minutes were up, the courtyard was still empty. He didn’t blame her for not coming. Not after the way he’d snapped at her and ordered her here. He was about to head off to the barracks to find Nebula for a fight when he heard YN step out into the courtyard. She didn’t take another step, and with his back to her, he wasn’t sure he should turn around and face her. He was about to tell her to go back, that this wasn’t a good idea, but she spoke up before he did.

“If you were going to order me around like the king you once were then I would have thought you’d have the decency to let us fight with actual weapons.”

He turned around, and even though he didn’t feel like it drawled, “Somehow, I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

That earned him a cold laugh, “maybe you’re right.”

Valkyrie had done her job well, giving YN a sleek, lightweight fighting tunic that he knew would protect her far more than it looked like it would. She stomped across the courtyard with the purpose of someone who was very, very pissed off.

“One?” he asked, lifting the stick so that she knew what he was talking about. He hadn’t risen to her taunt but he wasn’t calm enough to be polite about it.

“Two.”

He materialized two short sticks and handed them over, arm outstretched, not daring to get any closer. YN didn’t flinch at his display of magic, which either meant that she was accustomed to it or she didn’t care. Loki hoped it was the latter because the former would meant that things were infinitely more complicated.

She took the smallest step necessary to reach the sticks and lifted them from his hands with surprising gentleness. She turned them over in her hands delicately, twirled them around once, twice, and then nodded. He wasn’t sure if it was to him or to herself.

She lifted her head, “Rules?”

“None,” he replied. It seemed that neither of them could manage more than a one worded answer.

She barred her teeth in a cat like grin and through all his emotion, he felt a prick of interest. Fighting a human would be easy, but the look in her eyes, alive with fury and determination, promised him a good fight. Even if he found that hard to believe.

She backed into a fighting stance. He did the same, waiting for her to make the first move. She took a small but steady step and they began to circle. Loki refused to give into the instinct to finish the fight before it even started, reigning it in despite how much he itched for a real fight Every step he took, he took waiting to see what she’d do next. He was never waiting long. Her steps were human and easily predictable and the mindless circling was making him more frustrated than less.

She slashed with one of her sticks and he easily sidestepped the hit without returning it. He grinned, only to taunt her. But despite her temper, she didn’t lash out and waited for what would have been an opportune moment had he been human. Instead, he feinted and sent her tumbling to the ground. To his surprise, she caught herself at the last second and rolled back up to her feet.

“Stop holding back,” she snarled.

He hesitated, not sure if he should follow her demand, knowing she physically wouldn’t be able to keep up.

“Do it,” she ordered, and then added just because she could, “Prince Loki.”

He moved on instinct, blocking and countering her moves easily until, within moments, he had her pinned to the ground, his body hovering just above hers.

“Was this what you wanted?” he growled, finding no satisfaction in the easy win.

Her lips spread into a feline grin that, paired with the crazy look in her eyes, sent shivers down his spine — even if she was the one pinned down with a stick to her throat.

She lifted her chin higher, their noses almost touching, and crooned, “look down, prince.”

He titled his head, his anger momentarily giving way to curiosity. She was too confident for him to think that he’d won this fight. And he wasn’t wrong. There, piercing the fabric of his tunic, was a very real dagger — the same one she’d pointed at him the first night — poised to stab him in the heart if she wanted. Of course, now that she’d told him it was there, there was no way she could move fast enough to strike the killing blow, but somehow, she’d drawn that knife on him without him realizing it.

“You cheated,” he huffed, admittedly impressed.

He couldn’t deny, even through all of his anger, that there weren’t many people who could have pulled a dagger on him, let alone a human.

She dropped the knife and tucked it into her boot, their bodies brushing against each other at the movement. Loki knew it hadn’t been there in the first place and that she had done so in order to keep its hiding place a secret. If he was in her shoes, he would have done the same.

“Human,” she shrugged as if it wasn’t the most vague answer she could have come up with.

He lifted up off the ground, but didn’t offer her his hand. He knew she wouldn’t take it.

“So that automatically makes you a cheater?”

“It means that I’m always at a disadvantage and I do what I have to,” she said, brushing the dirt off her pants.

YN picked up the other stick that she’d discard in the fight, her fingers paling from the death grip she had on it. She may have looked collected, but obviously he wasn’t the only one who was still itching for a fight. Good.

He propped up the stick, ready in his hands, “I’ll keep that in mind for the next round.”

“Next round?”

The words were phrased as a question, but she was already twirling her sticks, eyes widening as she readied for a fight. It didn’t stop him from goading her even further.

“What,” he smirked, “are you tired, YN?”

“Don’t use me as an excuse to give up, Prince Loki,” she retorted.

His grin widened, “I wouldn’t dare.”

You were pretty sure you were about to collapse, but at least you no longer wanted to throttle everyone in this place. Sweat dripped from your forehead onto the ground and you wiped it away before taking a long sip of water. Loki stood at the far end of the courtyard, whispering with a dark elf who looked just as imposing as Loki did. Your human body had been ready to quit the round before the last, but your pride and anger had refused to tell him that. Mercifully, the elf’s interruption had made Loki declare it the final one. You didn’t know who the elf was and neither of them had offered up any introductions, but you could tell he was important judging by the way Loki listened to him so intently.

From your spot sitting on the ground you kept your eyes on them, trying to glean any information you could from the exchange. Both of their expressions remained neutral, never giving anything away. The only thing you knew for sure was that they were talking about something important.

You dug your fingernails into the dirt. Had Odin known how impossible his demand had been when he had made it? Had he realized you weren’t prepared for any of this? You balled the earth in your hand. It didn’t matter. He didn’t care.

Loki pursed his lips, the first sign that he wasn’t happy with their conversation, but he nodded anyways. That seemed to satisfy the elf and he turned around, your gazes locking for a second. You forced your face to remain neutral, trying to keep the surprise off your face. The entirety of his arm from his shoulder down to his fingertips was a dark metal laced with traces of gold. You’d never seen anything like it. Dark elves were notoriously fast and strong, and yet something had taken off with his arm. You shuddered to think what that thing could be. The corner of his mouth barely moved, so much so that you weren’t sure it had, but you had the impression he was amused. He was already walking away before you got the chance to look at any of his other features.

“Do it now,” the elf called over his shoulder as he left the courtyard.

You looked over at Loki to see how he’d take the order, but he didn’t seem fazed by it. Actually, he looked as tired as you felt even though you knew that couldn’t be true. He rolled his head from hide to side, a gesture more human than you thought possible from a Fey. Strange.

“Do you think we can manage dinner with the councilmen tonight?” he asked, striding over, “because we’ll be dinning with them every second night.”

You groaned and let your head fall back against the wall.

He didn’t say anything but you could feel his eyes on you, watching in that same unnerving way he always did. Even with your eyes closed you felt like you were giving away more information than you could afford to part with.

“How many days until the orange moon?” you couldn’t help but ask, too tired to do the math anyways. You didn’t care that he knew you wanted the Hand and that you wanted to leave. It was the one thing between you that wasn’t a secret.

“Anxious to be queen?” He chuckled.

I snorted, “I was never meant to be queen.”

He didn’t say anything to that and when you opened your eyes you almost flinched back. His hand was right in front of you, extended. You hadn’t heard him approach, even on the crunchy ground, because of your stupid human hearing. He smirked but there was none of the usual humour in his eyes. Instead he looked almost…sad.

“If it makes you feel ay better, neither was I,” he said, pulling you up to a stand.

You stood facing each other for a moment as you tried to figure out what to do with that information. If you’d known more about Asgard you might have understood, but you’d never been very good at sitting down for lessons and you couldn’t remember much from them anyways. Something had happened to make this fey a king and as much as you hated him, you got the feeling he had never asked for it.

But you knew that if you pressed him for information he would never trust you and you’d never get the Hand before the orange moon. And anyways, this place had to have a library. Just because you hated sitting down for a lesson didn’t mean that you weren’t able to do it now.

“Meant to be queen?” you teased instead.

You felt victorious when you saw the tension leave his face. If you could control your temper long enough to get him to trust you then maybe this whole thing wasn’t as hopeless as you first thought. For the first time since it had been put around your neck like a noose, Odin’s pendant didn’t feel as chilling.

“Exactly,” he chuckled, “shall we go to another excruciating meal with the council?”

You looped your arm in his, “only because we have to.”

#loki #Loki Laufeyson #loki fanfic #loki fanfiction #loki fluff #fake dating #marvel fic #fan fiction #fanfic

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nobodyfamousposts · 5 years

Text

Missing 3.4 Final

Good news: No more Lila!

Bad news: Cliffhanger.

Fair warning: This is a good 40+ pages.

Adrien arrived at school early that morning with a plan and a hope. He would have also had a speech already typed out if Plagg hadn’t forced him to go to bed. And it wasn’t like the akuma fight had left him with much time to really plot anything out, either.

That was the other thing taking up his focus. Ladybug had been acting strange recently, but it really showed last night. She didn’t cast her Lucky Charm. She had done nothing for Alya as the akuma victim despite having plenty of time to at least talk to her. She had also been particularly stand-offish with him during and after the fight, even disregarding their standard fist bump.

It was worrying. And Plagg’s strange silence on the matter wasn’t helping.

It threatened to eat away at his mind, and admittedly had to some extent. But if there was one thing Plagg had been useful for, it was keeping him grounded.

“You can only focus on one thing at a time. Focus on the here and now.“

In the here and now, Ladybug was not here and there was nothing he could do about her current state. Nor was there much he could do for her today, especially once he reached the school. However, Alya still needed him, and he would be going to school where he would be in a prime position to at least try to help her.

There was no way of knowing how much he could do or what he could accomplish. But he was bound and determined to try. For Alya. For Nino. Even for Marinette, despite her no longer being there.

“Mr. Agreste? The Principal will see you now.”

Adrien took a breath.

It was time to step up.

Damocles blinked in surprise when he entered.

“Mister Agreste, is something the matter?”

“Yes.“ He said, mentally preparing himself for the conversation. “I have something to tell you about yesterday‘s incident.“

To his credit, Damocles had listened to him this time. And he did seem rightfully angered when Adrien told him what he had heard. But his expression at the end of Adrien’s tale was apologetic and did not in any way suggest any sort of action would result.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Agreste. While that does shed new light on things, that does not in any way justify the assault of a student.“

“Sir, I don’t believe that Lila was assaulted in the first place. Or at least if she was, it was by her own hand.“

He appeared skeptical. “But why would she do such a thing?“

“Because Lila is a liar.”

The man’s eyes widened in shock. “What?!”

Adrien took a breath. Don’t back out now, he told himself. You’ve already started and gotten this far. Alya is counting on you.

“Lila is a chronic liar and has shown a tendency to target people who call her out on her lying. She first became an akuma after Ladybug confronted her in the park about her claiming to be her best friend. She became an akuma again and pretended to be me after I told her I would be happy to be her friend but asked her to stop lying the first day she came back to school. She had been making comments and spreading rumors about Marinette after she started pointing out issues with her stories. And now she’s claiming Alya attacked her during an incident when Alya was calling her out on her lies.”

“But you weren’t there for the actual assault.” Damocles countered, skeptical of what he was being told. “So how can you prove that she didn’t hit her?“

Adrien’s eyes narrowed. “With all due respect, sir, where is your proof that she did?“

The man appeared affronted at that. “Well, Miss Rossi did say—

“Lila Rossi is a pathological liar. Her word can’t be trusted.” Adrien insisted firmly. “And Alya just spent all of yesterday telling you she didn’t do it.”

“But Miss Rossi’s cheek was marked.”

“Which was at best circumstantial evidence, and something she could easily have done to herself.”

Now it seemed that Damocles had enough. “Young man, that is quite the accusation!”

“So was her claim that Alya struck her.” Not that they bothered to appropriately investigate it in the first place. “And that wasn’t the first wild claim she’s made.”

“Be that as it may, some minor stories don’t disprove this incident occurred.”

“But they do imply a trend.” Adrien argued. And really, it was more than just a simple trend by this point. If he had plotted it all out, he was sure this was probably her norm. And it made him all the more regretful that he hadn’t spoken up about it sooner.

He had failed to stand up for his friends before. First with Nino and his father. Then with his other friends and Chloe. Then with Marinette and Chloe. And then again with Marinette and Lila.

He wasn’t going to make the same mistake this time.

“Sir, she’s lied about Marinette before. You know this. Three lies in one day: Accusing her of stealing the test answers for a mock exam, of pushing her down the stairs, and then of stealing a family heirloom. All of which were lies used to wrongfully hurt and humiliate Marinette. And nobody listened to Marinette back then either, just like you didn’t listen to Alya yesterday.”

“She has a condition—”

“The condition is just her lying.” Adrien emphasized. “If you know this—if she told you about this supposed condition of hers, then couldn’t it have been a part of the situation yesterday?”

Damocles frowned at that, clearly having forgotten that matter. “But there was the mark!”

“And with Marinette, there was the test answers and the necklace. Lila still admitted to those claims being false. Why couldn’t this be false, too?”

He hesitated. Because yes, these were all things that didn’t add up. They were issues that the Principal and the school should have looked in to more, and really should have handled better. At least better than just disciplining each girl based solely on the word of one person. Especially when it’s the same person both times.

Damocles appeared uncertain, but still seemed unwilling to budge on his position. Emboldened, Adrien cut him off before he could try to make further excuses.

“Sir, with all due respect,” Disregarding that the man before him was far from deserving of any such respect at this point. “I understand that you want to be a hero. And as the Owl, you have supported people. But your actions as a Principal have been lacking at best and at worst, have been clearly biased and unfair. If you really want to help at making things better, wouldn’t it matter more to do so in the role you already have?

It was probably the meanest that Adrien had ever allowed himself to act towards an an adult—especially an authoritative figure. But it was also the most honest, and he for once didn’t regret it.

Damocles looked shocked. Possibly that he was being spoken back to. Possibly the fact that the one doing it was Adrien. He opened his mouth to respond.

Only to be cut off by the door to his office opening.

“Excuse me, is this where the meeting is supposed to be?”

Both Principal and student turned to the doorway to see a middle aged woman. She in turn seemed confused upon seeing them, glancing between the two uncertainly. “Is this a good time?”

“Oh, is the best time!”

Before either male could speak, Chloe Bourgeois appeared at the door, politely (and wasn’t THAT well out of the ordinary for her?) encouraging the woman further into the room and all the way to the Principal’s desk. To the further confusion of everyone besides Chloe, two police officers as well as a man in a semi-formal if not somewhat cheap looking jacket entered the room after. One of the officers quietly shut the door behind them.

Damocles frowned in a mix of bewilderment and annoyance from that bewilderment. “Miss Bourgeois, what is the meaning of this?”

Chloe merely sauntered to the desk, smirking.

“Principal Damocles, may I introduce Mrs. Rossi. Lila’s mother. She has a rather...interesting perception of what’s been going on at the school for the past few months...”

_______________________

“I was so scared! I had never been attacked by an akuma like that before. I’m just lucky that Ladybug got to me in time.”

Not even a day after causing the akuma in question (who had never even gone after her) and already she was back at it as bad as ever. Watching the ease with which she fluttered her eyelashes and quivered her lip was enough to make anyone want to break something.

Alix was finally getting a sense for how frustrated Marinette had to have been for all those weeks when she was the only one to have known the truth. Seeing the way Lila teased and manipulated her classmates with falsehoods and promises she clearly had no intention of keeping was infuriating and it took everything Alix had not to scream at times.

Nathaniel at least had been a comfort—a stable source of sanity and reason during this time. Someone to assure her that no, she hadn’t gone crazy (yet), everyone else was just being that stupid.

But Marinette...for all that time, Marinette hadn’t even had that much.

Given all this, part of her was wondering if what Lila had said was right and Marinette hadn’t decided to run away due to everything.

Part of her wouldn’t blame her.

As much as she wanted to call Lila out on her bull, she knew even without Nathaniel’s grip on her arm, that doing so at this point would be a bad idea. Lila would simply cry and act as the injured party, then Alix would no doubt find herself next on the list of people to suddenly be removed from the school thanks to Lila’s unsubstantiated claims.

It didn’t help that both Rose and Juleka were fully entrenched in Lila’s stories. Kim was there as well and seemed sympathetic to Lila’s fake tears. Ivan and Mylene were also present, though they appeared a bit withdrawn as they stood further away from the small group and were giving each other wary glances rather than respond to anything Lila was saying. Even Sabrina was there, though she was standing off to the side and was doing something on her phone.

Alix had to wonder what that was about, but was in no position to ask. At least, not without the risk of drawing everyone else’s attention. Especially Lila’s, whom was the one person Alix needed to not be noticed by at this time.

Because if Lila did notice her and try to speak to her directly regardless of the reason, Alix couldn’t promise she wouldn’t start verbally tearing her a new one.

Alix and Nathaniel agreed to try and discuss the matter with their other classmates. But with Lila present, that was no easy task. Especially since she would comandeer their attention. Trying to tell everyone the truth up front was pointless with Lila present and in a prime position to retaliate. And trying to get each of them alone would only get Lila suspicious.

Honestly, Alix just wanted to forego the subterfuge and out Lila anyway. And her stupid story and dramatics weren’t helping with that!

“She’s truly a great friend!” Lila continued, dabbing at her completely dry eyes. “Once she heard about the akuma, she came to check on me first.”

Alix rolled her eyes. It took a less than gentle nudge from Nathaniel to keep her from scoffing outright.

Fed up, Alix turned away and headed for the front hallway. She could wait for any of the others outside and away from all that drama. In particular, she had been hoping to talk to Adrien or Nino. Nino at least should be able to give an update on Alya. And Adrien could give Alix some peace of mind by confirming Alya’s version of events. Then maybe they could go to Damocles or work together to convince the rest of the class.

At the very least, they could make things easier for Alya’s return by ensuring their friends knew what really happened.

“Alix, you need to calm down.” Nathaniel’s voice cut into her thoughts as he caught up to her in the hallway.

“I am calm.” She retorted as she spun around on him. She wasn’t blisteringly angry like she was yesterday, at least. That was calmed down, right?

His deadpan expression made it clear he wasn’t impressed and certainly didn’t believe her. He was right and she knew it. She sighed and took a few seconds to clear her mind.

“You’re right.” She admitted. “But listening to that? Now that we know for sure, it’s just…”

Why had they ever believed her? How had they ever fallen for it? It felt like such a waste and hearing Lila keep it going made Alix want to start yelling.

“I know.” Nathaniel agreed, fists clenched tightly around his tablet. “I’m upset, too. But the only thing getting angry will do is attract an akuma.”

“And that would be bad because…?”

“It would give her more ammo.”

Oh.

Yeah. There was that.

Confronting Lila won’t work. They both knew that. Marinette had surely tried, and it hadn’t made a difference when none of them believed her. Granted, that wasn’t truly their fault for not knowing, but it did mean that repeated attempts even by other parties were not exactly guaranteed success.

Still, they had to try.

And it was fortunate perhaps that a certain genius arrived at that moment, offering the first one they could try to convince.

“Max! We need to talk to you about Lila!” Alix called out as he approached.

Max glanced to his bag, appearing uncertain. “Can it wait? I have something else that is rather pressing to attend to.”

“No, it can’t. It’s about what happened yesterday.”

He frowned, his gaze falling back to Alix. “You mean the akuma attack.”

“Are you okay? We heard Lady Wifi made a comeback and that she targeted you.” Nathaniel cut in. Alix would have been annoyed, but her friend had been kidnapped and she had been just as worried about him as well.

Max hesitated. Possibly due to the shock? Or trauma perhaps?

“It was...harrowing, yes.” He finally stated. “Fortunately, Ladybug and Chat Noir were able to restore her to normal and then Chat Noir escorted me home.”

“But do you know what caused the akumatization in the first place?” Alix asked him.

“I assumed it had to do with Marinette’s disappearance.”

Both of the other students blinked in surprise at that. It wasn’t quite what they expected, though it did make sense for Alya to focus on helping her friend.

Still, they needed to focus. “Yesterday, Lila got Alya suspended by making a false claim of being attacked.”

Max tilted his head. “You are certain the claim is false?”

She nodded. “Yes. I spoke with Alya after the fact and she not only insisted she didn’t do it, but that she wished she had.”

That seemed to get his attention. “But why would she regret that she hadn’t harmed Lila?”

“Alya found out that Lila has been making up everything.” Nathaniel told him.

“It was a bunch of lies. All of it!” Alix exclaimed. “From her charity work to her celebrity friends and even that whole napkin thing—”

“You mean her joke?” Max asked.

THAT made her freeze. “What?”

“She claimed to have saved me from a napkin.” He pointed out. “What was that supposed to be if not a joke?“

Of course. Of freaking course the class genius knew and completely mistook the entire situation.

Alix groaned. “It was a lie, Max.“

“Oh.“

A pause followed.

“It wasn’t a very good one, was it?“

Looking back, it hadn’t been. Which only made it all the more vexing that they had believed it.

Nathaniel seemed torn, looking like he wanted to laugh while also trying to hold himself back from slapping his forehead in exasperation.

Max glanced between the two, taking in their expressions and seemed to catch on.

“I apologize. I misread the situation.” He had thought it was a joke that everyone else was already aware of, and only played into that. He hadn’t realized that it was an actual manipulation tactic on Lila’s part and that everyone had been fooled, or that he had helped her to fool them. In a way, he blamed himself for this discovery coming too late.

“It wasn’t your fault, Max.” Nathaniel told him.

“Yeah,” Alix agreed. “We all misread things. Just...in different ways.”

“I guess the question now is what will we do about it?” Nathaniel asked.

That, they weren’t sure. The obvious thing to do seemed to be that they needed to inform the rest of their classmates about Lila. But would they be believed? And if they were, how would they react?

Lila had manipulated them all, yes. But other than getting special treatment for a time, there wasn’t much that any of them had truly suffered at her hands.

No. The ones who had suffered had been Marinette and now Alya, both of whom had found themselves targets of Lila’s more malicious tactics once they had called her out on her lies.

Looking back, the circumstances of Marinette’s expulsion from the school, however temporary, had been not only unfair but also clearly orchestrated. There was no way Lila could have known about the test answers and her necklace being with Marinette unless she had seen it or seen to it personally. Marinette had never been the type to willfully steal another person’s possessions as far as they knew. And she CERTAINLY had never cheated. Nor would there be any benefit to stealing test answers for a mock exam that had no real weight.

Marinette was smarter than that.

She was also smart enough to not just have the test answers plainly visible at the top of her bag the day after the exam. That was just sloppy work, and Marinette was often paranoid when she thought she was doing anything wrong. If she had done it, she wouldn’t have been so clearly surprised.

Lila had been the one responsible. She set Marinette up for no other reason than to hurt her. She had told lies and attempted to frame her.

Alix could have forgiven the girl for trying to play herself up. She was a new girl at a new school and surrounded by strangers who had been involved in amazing things. Alix could understand her trying to lie if she thought it would help her fit in. But Lila’s antics went well beyond simple self-praise, and she could not forgive her for trying to drag other people down. And especially not for trying to frame Marinette for things she hadn’t done and get her expelled just for not buying her bullshit.

And now that she had attempted the same with Alya, it was more than clear that Lila’s actions were dangerous and not simply a one-time affair. She’d attacked Marinette. Then Alya. And thinking back, that one creepy akuma Adrien-look-alike had probably been tied to her as well, meaning she’d had some issue with the blond despite whatever interest she appeared to have in him.

“We need to let the others know.” Alix stated. “And from there, we can work out what to do with Lila.” They would have to. Because her tactics would get notably worse once she was aware they knew the truth about her. And given the response from Damocles and Ms. Bustier…

Yeah, they wouldn’t be able to count on the school officials to actually help them.

To her surprise, Max backed up a step.

“I’m sorry.” He stated. “I want to help, but there is something very important that I have to take care of first.”

Nathaniel frowned. “Can’t it wait? It would really help us out with convincing the others if you were there with us to confirm the truth.”

Max shook his head. Whatever was going on, he was insistent. “I will join you as soon as I can, but this is something I must see to immediately.”

He looked back to the window, noting the approach of Alya and her parents to the school.

“It’s important.”

_______________________

Alya hadn’t known what was going on. Her parents had gotten a phone call requesting they come to the school for a meeting in regards to her suspension. Her hope was that Nino or one of the others had spoken to Principal Damocles on her behalf and perhaps he would be showing leniency regarding her suspension. Or that she would at least be given the opportunity she had been denied previously to actually be able to tell her side and reveal Lila for the lying faker she was.

To her irritation, only her parents were invited inside the Principal’s office while Alya herself was asked to wait. Whatever was going on inside, it looked like a full house. She noticed a number of people sitting and standing around the office, including a couple of police officers (which was concerning). She had maybe all of a couple seconds to notice Adrien was in there and see him give her a shaky smile before the door was closed in her face.

She sighed and took a seat. There wasn’t much else she could do. Whatever the door was made of was pretty good material, because at best she could only pick up some sounds of murmuring on the other side.

She just hoped that whatever was going on would work out. And that maybe if she could get a chance to actually talk, that would be real swell.

“Alya. You’re back.”

The whispers that had followed her and her parents through the halls indicated that news of her presence would no doubt reach the class soon enough. She was even expecting that one of them would approach her, hopefully to check on her or get her take on what was happening.

But it wasn’t Nino who was there to greet her. Or Alix. Or even Adrien.

It was Max.

Alya didn’t remember much from her time as an akuma, but it didn’t take long for her to hear how Max of all people had been her target.

“Alya. It’s good to see you back to normal.”

She winced. “Max, I am so sorry for kidnapping you. I don’t even remember what I did, but I’m really sorry—”

Except his words cut her off.

“I’m not.”

Startled, she drew back and frowned in confusion. “You...what?”

He pushed up his glasses. “Last night, you kidnapped myself and Markov and took us to the the TVi station. You then had us hack the cellphone tower located there.”

She jerked back in shock.

“I did...why?”

He looked up at her, his gaze a strange mix of sympathy and pride.

“You were trying to find Marinette.”

Everything. Everything just stopped.

She had...

Even as an akuma, she had done all that? Gone that far? Not to get revenge on Lila or the school like she’d thought...

...but to search for her best friend?

As if sensing her confusion, Max explained. “You had us hack into the cellphone tower to try and locate her cellphone signal. It was...weak. And strangely disrupted. But we found it. And once you had it, you vanished.”

“I see.” That was some of the night accounted for, at least.

“From what I gathered, there was something strange going on with Marinette’s phone. It wasn’t ‘on’ and wouldn’t let you teleport directly to where it was, so you couldn’t find it. However!” He raised a finger. “While her phone didn’t give off a physical location, the signal was still there. That was what you had us track and that what what you were trying to locate last night.”

On the one hand, Alya was impressed with herself for managing this as an akuma, as well as Max and Markov for their efforts. On the other hand, she had still been an akuma and kidnapped her friends—regardless of the reason.

“At least now I know what I did.” She admitted. “Still, I should never have put you in that position.”

“But if not for you, I never would have been in that position.”

She frowned, confused. He made it sound like her kidnapping him wasn’t actually a bad thing.

“Under your orders, Markov and I had hacked a cellphone tower.”

She nodded, still confused. He had already explained that. What was he trying to say?

Max gave her a rather odd look.

“I’m sure you understand, legally speaking, that such an act is a crime and not something I would do were I not coerced.”

“Of course—”

“So you understand, legally speaking, that anything I happened to find was only because an akuma ordered me to.”

“Well, sure—”

“And certainly not because I took advantage of an opportunity to look up some additional information the akuma did not necessarily ask for but would have wanted had she known.”

It took a moment for the full meaning of his words to register.

She gaped.

He coughed. “Legally speaking, of course.”

“Of course.” She echoed numbly.

Because Max was telling her something. It wasn’t something she was sure she wanted to hear or not.

“Now IF by some bizarre luck I had gotten access to some extra data, I could hypothetically have gained some intel that might be of interest to select persons who knew Marinette rather well.”

That certainly got her attention.

“And IF such data existed in my hands, those select persons would be better able to make use of it.”

Her eyes widened. He wasn’t really...was he?

“Especially if one such person was an investigative sort who would have the skills and inclination to use the data appropriately.”

Oh god, he was!

“Though if that person should get caught, they certainly didn’t get any data from me. And it would do well to remember that lest a number of computer viruses be needed to completely erase their blog and entire online identity to remind them.”

Alya nodded. She barely even took notice of the threat. Not that she had any intentions of ratting our Max. Or even letting anyone know she had it in the first place.

“Of course, that’s just hypothetical.” Max reminded her.

“Of course.”

Max gave a resolute nod. He glanced around for any possible witnesses, and upon ensuring they were alone, he gave her a keychain.

It was cute. A little cartoonish kitty that smiled up at her with such innocence. She recognized the type of keychain it was though. Beneath that adorable exterior lied a usb device.

“Good luck.” Max whispered.

‘Bring her home.’ He left unsaid.

_______________________

Nino sighed once he’d reached the school. He’d been hoping to meet up with Adrien first thing, just to have a buffer and friendly support if nothing else. But the blond was nowhere to be seen and his attempts to call him went straight to voicemail.

He hoped he was okay. While they had talked things out the day before, he knew Adrien was still pretty sensitive.

There was nothing for it, though. He would just have to wait and see his bro when he got there.

...and try to survive in the meantime.

Nino was admittedly less than happy when he arrived to the school knowing Alya wouldn’t be there.

But seeing Lila sitting on the bench surrounded by his friends and lamenting over the ‘horrible akuma that tried to attack her the night before’?

He could see why Alya had lost her cool yesterday.

“Oh, Nino!” She exclaimed when she saw him, sending the rest of the class looking his way. She seemed to actually draw back from him as if uncertain, something he could now tell was method acting and a play for sympathy. “I’m so sorry for what happened yesterday. I never wanted Alya to get in trouble.”

Of course she didn’t, he thought sarcastically. She only lied about Alya attacking her to make herself look like a victim when Alya called Lila out on her crap.

He couldn’t quite bring himself to speak out. It was like he couldn’t form the words. Both Rose and Juleka were staring at him warily. Kim was frowning, though his focus seemed to be on Lila. Ivan and Mylene were giving him sympathetic looks. Sabrina was there as well, close enough to be “with” of the group but far away enough to not actually be part of the conversation.

He clenched his fists around his bag straps.

“Lila, dude...er...ette.” He started, trying to be as polite as he could bring himself to be. “It’s early and I’m just really not up for talking about it if it’s all the same to you.”

Lila gasped. “You don’t think she was right to hurt me, do you?”

It felt like all the air was being sucked out of his chest as everyone around them gasped at that and stared at him in shock.

“What?! No! No one deserves to be hurt!” Rose insisted, coming up to Lila’s side. “Right, Nino?” She added, looking up at him expectantly.

“Whatever happened yesterday wasn’t cool.” He replied, neutrally. Hoping that she would simply leave it at that.

But that wasn’t good enough. She covered her eyes and gave a wail.

“You do blame me!”

“I didn’t say that.” He insisted.

“But you didn’t not.” She shot back with a small sob that drew the classmates close to her. Rose put a hand on Lila’s shoulder in comfort while Juleka sent him a clear frown.

Oh god. It was like nothing he said could be the right answer or even just left alone. Anything he tried to say would be twisted and turned against him.

Was this what had happened with Alya?

Was this how it was for Marinette?

Or hell, Adrien? It was little wonder he was so scared to speak up then! How could he when it was like this? When Lila made it this hard to even dare to speak.

That was why...

He took a breath and straightened his cap, readying himself for what he was about to do.

“I shouldn’t be expected to apologize for what other people do.” Nino stated flatly. “But even if that were the case, I would still stand by Alya before I ever bow to you.”

Lila reared back in (fake) hurt. The others all stared at Nino in shock or outrage.

“Nino!” Kim gaped.

“How could you!” Rose exclaimed, tearfully.

Juleka’s frown grew into an outright glare.

Ivan and Mylene though…

They were gazing at each other, hands clasped. On the cusp of a decision. One he hoped was in his favor.

“You’re just as bad as Alya!” Lila cried out, hiding her eyes behind her palms. “You and Alya both!”

“Say that to me without covering your eyes and I may actually believe you.”

“You may want to check her hands first.” Came a voice from behind him. Nino looked over his shoulder to see Alix and Nathaniel arrive, the girl giving Lila a particularly dirty glare. “I wouldn’t put it past her not to be using some sort of eyedrops to complete the look.”

“Please.” Nathaniel said with a roll of his eyes. “With her level of acting, she’s probably taught herself how to cry on command.”

Nino hadn’t been expecting either of them to speak up on his behalf, but he was certainly grateful as they both seemed to be in his corner.

The air wasn’t nearly as oppressive now. He could speak and let his voice carry. He turned back to the others, resolute.

“Lila’s a liar.” Nino announced to the group present. “She’s lied since the first day she came to our class. She’s not Ladybug’s friend and she never spoke to her about looking for Marinette—both Alya and I can confirm this when we spoke to Ladybug during the search we did two days ago.” Around him, he saw eyes widen in shock and Lila’s in fear.

Seeing the response, Nino felt emboldened. “Alya didn’t do a damn thing to her and I would bet my hat that Marinette never did either.”

“Just because she’s your girlfriend doesn’t mean she’ll tell you the truth!” Lila insisted.

“I trust her more than I’ll ever trust you.” Nino shot back. “Especially after what you’ve put her and Adrien both through yesterday.”

Lila’s head shot up in surprise. Sure enough, her eyes were glistening and Nino had half a mind to follow through with Alix’s suggestion to check her hands for eyedrops. “What...what are you talking about?” She demanded.

Alix actually let out a huff. “So she really did say it, then? That Marinette ran away because of us?”

Lila paled as the other students nearby gasped. Nino wanted to sag in relief. It seemed that Alix had spoken with Alya and was at least willing to consider her report on the events.

Nino nodded to her. “Yeah. Adrien himself confirmed it to me yesterday when he ran away after Lila told him that.”

“How cruel!”

“Why would you say that?!”

Lila coughed. “That’s not true! You’ve got it wrong! That is not what happened at all!”

Nino crossed his arms, glaring at Lila. “That’s not what Adrien says.”

“He misunderstood!”

“And his report matches Alya’s.”

“She’s twisting things!”

That seemed to get the others thinking. Ivan and Mylene both had heard Adrien’s account first-hand. They knew the truth of what Lila had said to instigate the situation even if they weren’t sure whether the attack itself had actually happened. As such, they both looked ready to speak up.

Except…

Kim stepped forward first.

“So, I wasn’t going to say anything,” He said, directing his words at Lila. “But there are a lot of things that haven’t been adding up here for a while.” He rubbed the back of his head, uncertainly. “Your injuries have been all over the place, and I’m talking literally. Your tinnitus would switch ears. You claimed a wrist injury but never wore a brace for it. And when you fell down the stairs, you didn’t have any scratches or bruising afterwards. There were too many and they were never consistent. There just never seemed to be a good time to ask and I didn’t want to make assumptions.”

He shrugged to the others, apologetically. “But if we’re getting everything in the open, I couldn’t help but notice how Lila’s injuries were suddenly not a problem during our search party for Marinette.”

Lila froze. “What?”

Kim frowned. “You went out of your way to join us, Adrien’s group specifically. And you had no issue keeping up with us until he left and you were suddenly too weak to continue. But up to that point, you didn’t seem all that inclined to help with the search. If it was your injuries, that’d be one thing, but instead of bowing out yourself, you kept trying to get the rest of us to drop it.”

“What? That’s not true!” Lila insisted.

“Looking back, she had seemed pretty intent on trying to stop us from helping in the search.” Nathaniel noted.

“Hey yeah! Weren’t you saying you had Ladybug helping in the search?” Alix questioned. “Was that even true?”

“It wasn’t.” Nino insisted. “Ladybug herself said she had only just heard about the case from Chat Noir.”

“That was before I talked her into it.”

“It was after you said you spoke to her.” Nino cut her off. “And what’s more, we outright asked and she said she doesn’t even know you!”

“She was lying!”

“Just like Alya was, right?” Alix mocked. “And Marinette. Tell me, Lila. How many people are suddenly going to become liars if they point out holes in your stories?”

“She was just trying to protect me!”

“If you needed to be protected, why announce your friendship and make yourself a target in the first place?” Nino questioned, glaring at Lila. “Wouldn’t a real friend of Ladybug’s not put her in that position?”

Lila glared at him with such hatred that Rose found herself backing away in fear. Even Juleka seemed surprised and uncertain.

“It sounds a lot like you didn’t want Marinette to be found.” Came a quiet voice, drawing eyes to Ivan. “If you lied about Ladybug looking for her, then telling people she ran away…”

“That’s not it at all!” Lila exclaimed, losing the hateful glare and trying to make herself look innocent. “You can’t take Nino or Alya’s word for it!”

“We’re not. We’re taking Adrien’s.” Mylene cut in, glaring at Lila in distaste. “He told us what you said. How you started the argument yesterday. Honestly, if Alya HAD slapped you, I wouldn’t have blamed her after hearing some of your comments.”

“And it says something,” Alix mused, “that NOT hitting you is the one thing Alya regrets.”

“So you’re taking her word for it then?” Lila demanded angrily. “She has no proof!”

“To be quite frank,” Nathaniel pointed out blasely. “Neither do you.”

Lila’s ire only grew at that. “What?!”

Ignoring the way everyone stared at him in bewilderment, he merely shrugged. “I mean, there’s no proof other than your word that Alya was the one who assaulted you.”

Lila gestured to herself, angrily. “I’M the one with the injury!”

“Yes.” The artist noted. “On your right cheek, from your report.”

She frowned in uncertainty, able to tell that he seemed to be leading up to something but not sure what. Many of the others appeared confused as well.

Nathaniel pointed to Lila’s face. “Alya is right handed. If she slapped you, her reach should have gotten your left cheek.”

Eyes widened and immediately sought out Lila’s face. Lila jerked back and covered her cheek, but the damage was already done. And if anything, her instinctual reaction only drew more attention to the placement of her right hand over the remaining mark on her face.

“Wait—you mean Lila did that to herself?!” Kim demanded, outraged.

“Of course not!” Lila cried out, but no one really listened.

“It’s circumstantial at best.” Nathaniel admitted. “But from an artist’s eye, the mark and scratch on her face fits more in lines with the awkward placement of her own hand rather than that of someone else.”

It was true. His attention to detail wasn’t definitive proof of anything. But it was enough to make the students doubt.

And sometimes, a little doubt went a long way.

Lila knew that full well.

“Y-you’re just making things up!” She hissed.

“It’s merely an observation.” Nathaniel stated. “I can’t prove it, of course. But your response is rather telling…”

Lila grit her teeth. She had to get things back under control. “Why wouldn’t I be upset? How am I supposed to respond when all of you are ganging up on me and accusing me of awful things!”

“We’re not accusing you.” Ivan stated flatly, uncomfortable but steadfast.

“I am.” Alix cut in.

An emotional appeal often worked in her favor. When someone would confront her with the truth, crying and acted as the wounded party would often draw the attention of others and gain her people willing to defend her.

She gave out a sob. “I thought...I thought you were my friends!”

“Funny.” Came a voice. “I thought you were mine.”

Everyone spun to see Alya arrive. Max trailing along behind her.

“Alya? What are you doing here?” Nathaniel asked, more confused than anything.

The other girl shrugged. “My parents and I were called in to talk to Principal Damocles. I don’t know why.”

Lila drew back in apparent fear. Though whether it was of the growing force against her or any genuine concern that Alya might supposedly hurt her was anyone’s guess. “You’re not supposed to be here!”

Alya simply stared down the Italian, undeterred. “I’m where I need to be.”

Max shifted his glasses. “We overheard the commotion from the Principal’s office and came over to investigate.”

That it sounded like the potential for an akuma in the making didn’t need to be said.

“Here to attack me again?” Lila asked, making her voice quiver. It was enough to elicit some sympathy and make a few want to move to her side to protect her.

They had to hold themselves back.

“Marinette was right. You lie as easily as you breathe.” Alya said with a roll of her eyes. “I never attacked you in the first place. Heaven knows I should have. At least then the suspension would have been worth it.”

Murmurs broke out around them.

“How could you?!” Lila cried out with a sob.

“No. How could YOU?!” Alya retorted angrily. “I trusted you! I believed in you! I stood up for you and defended you, even when you didn’t deserve it and I had no basis! I…” She choked, gritting her teeth. “I admired you! I wanted to believe you. And you made me want to do better. BE better.”

Nino reached out a hand to comfort her, but it was Alix who held him back, shaking her head slowly.

Let her speak.

She needs this.

“Every time you came to me, I listened to you and took you at your word. All the things you said. About yourself. About Ladybug. About Marinette and how she had been acting. I kept trying for both of you, even when I felt like I was being torn apart.” She clenched her fists, her muscles tightening.

“Do you have any idea what that’s like? Being stuck in the middle between two people I care about. Both of whom I care about. Both telling me bad things about the other? I didn’t want to believe either of you because I wanted to believe in you both. But I kept getting pulled in two different directions until I couldn’t take it anymore. in the end, I was forced to pick a side, and I chose you.”

She glared at Lila with disgust.

“I chose wrong.”

Alya shook her head, chuckling bitterly.

“All this time, I’d thought Marinette was the one being unreasonable, but she had you pegged all along, hadn’t she?”

She took a breath. “I wish I’d listened to her sooner. But the sick thing? The truly disgusting thing that I hate myself for is that even now, even more than that, I wish that she hadn’t been right about you.”

“Alya!” Lila cried out, scandalized.

“Don’t.” She shut her down. “You’re a horrible person and a worse friend. You’re not capable of even being a friend at all. Not to me. Not to anyone.”

And how sad was it that Alya wanted that to not be true?

Alya would have done anything for a friend. She would have moved mountains and scoured an ocean. When Alya put her mind to something, she put her ALL into it to see it through. It was part of the reason she had been so forceful with Marinette in her pursuit of Adrien. And in turn why she had been so adamant on Marinette having undeniable proof about Lila.

“Lila lied to us all. But I’m just as complacent in her getting away with it.” Alya admitted to the others. “I told Marinette to check her sources when she tried to warn me, but if I had checked mine, we would’ve known about this from the beginning.”

“To what? Bully Lila?” Rose asked, clearly uncomfortable.

She shook her head. “No. To know not to simply believe whatever she says without checking first.”

They never had to believe Marinette without question. Their “Everyday Ladybug” never wanted that from any of them. But at the very least, they should have listened and considered her point, if only enough to investigate matters themselves and try to discern the truth.

Marinette deserved that much, at least. Hell, THEY deserved that much. They all deserved better than to be fooled like this. They should have at least looked. That way, if Marinette had been wrong, they could have explained their discovery to her and worked things out. And if she had been right, they could have confirmed it. Either way, there had been other means they could have resolved things.

No one had to be hurt and this whole divide and drama never needed to happen in the first place.

Lila realized she was losing her influence. Individually, none of her classmates had enough to truly counter her. But now that they were all here and collaborating, it was becoming increasingly clear to them that her stories weren’t adding up. She could lose her standing. All the relationships and benefits she had put such effort into.

“I can’t believe it. You’re really letting Marinette corrupt you!” Lila wailed. “And I thought her bullying couldn’t get any worse once she was gone! Now she has you bullying me for her!”

Alix scoffed. “You’re really trying to say Marinette was the one bullying you?”

Ivan nodded. “Yeah, Marinette has been bullied by Chloe for years! She wouldn’t do it herself.“

“Actually, statistics say—”

“Max.” Alix cut him off, exasperated. “I’m sure your statistical information is very interesting, but it’s not the point right now. Especially if you know Marinette is telling the truth.”

He coughed. “Duly noted.“

With that, the pinkette turned back on Lila. “We’re not all completely blind. Even if I didn’t necessarily believe Marinette that you were lying, I could read situations. Marinette never liked you and never bothered to hide it, but the thing was, you clearly never liked her either. Only you tried to be sneaky about it.”

Lila gasped and held her hand to her chest, as if asking whether Alix could possibly be referring to herself.

“Don’t act shocked.” Alix snapped. “If you don’t like someone, you should be glad not to deal with them. Marinette was certainly less tense when you weren’t around, and she simply focused on having a good time with us. But you? You never stopped poking or trying to start something.”

“That’s true.” Mylene agreed. “If you weren’t bragging about yourself, you were complaining about her. In some way, anything that happened had to be about you.” And wasn’t she just kicking herself for being one of the ones to get onto Marinette for her attitude against Lila, now that she knew the truth?

“I was only trying to be part of conversations.” Lila countered. “I never meant to come off as self-absorbed. I just wanted to fit in—”

“That is by no means the point here!” Alya hissed out. “You’ve been lying this whole time!”

“No.” Ivan stated flatly, to Alya’s surprise. “The problem isn’t that Lila has been lying. The problem is that it is clear she has been doing so maliciously.“

“That’s right!“ Kim added in agreement. “Lila hasn’t only been lying about herself and her accomplishments to make herself look better. That at least would be understandable, even if still not OK. The problem is that she’s also been lying about other people to make them look worse. She did it to Marinette. And now she’s done it again to Alya.”

That got the other students thinking. About Lila. About her claims. About their interactions with her. And now Lila could see she was truly losing her hold on them.

Lila hunched over, looking wounded. “Guys, this is ridiculous! Doesn’t it seem strange that this is happening now? Alya is Marinette’s best friend! Of course she would have reason to be antagonistic towards me! Marinette’s loss has been pretty hard on her.” She said, sounding overly sympathetic. “But that’s not justification for her to attack me and accuse me like this! Are you all really just going to take her word for it and do the same? After everything we’ve been through?”

It seemed they were. Looking around to her classmates, she saw guarded expressions and wary looks. She noticed Max standing somewhat in the back and away from the rest, and her expression brightened at the realization.

If she could get the genius of the class to openly confirm her, surely the others would believe it. He was the smartest kid in class, after all.

“Max! Come on! You remember how I protected you, right?”

But the boy only narrowed his eyes at her.

“The throw of the paper napkin had neither the trajectory nor the force to touch me. Even if it had, it was a napkin. The probability of damage was minimal.”

Lila gaped, more shocked that he was against her than the logic he was pointing out.

“But...but your eyes!”

“I had incorrectly assumed your antics at that time to be a joke of some sort, albeit a poorly humored one I did not understand. It was a napkin. I was wearing glasses. It wouldn’t have scratched my lenses, much less touched either of my eyes. At most, it might have left a smudge—hardly life threatening to warrant praise for catching it.”

“I was only trying to protect you!” She insisted.

“Interesting, given that the napkin ball had clearly been targeted at you.” Nino commented.

“Which Marinette threw to intentionally agitate my injuries!” Lila accused, trying to shift the focus to Marinette’s wrongdoings in an attempt to deflect.

Kim frowned. “Yeah, injuries or not, that wasn’t cool of her. But it was a napkin and she was trying to prove a point. It was only once she announced what she was doing that you suddenly acted like you were in pain.”

“Also, I think we need to reiterate that it was a NAPKIN.” Alix gestured with her hands to emphasize the sheer silliness of the entire thing. “It wouldn’t have injured you if you hadn’t caught it. And if it was bad enough to cause you pain by holding a napkin, it should have been in a brace. So why wasn’t it?”

Lila huffed. “I hadn’t wanted to cause a disruption.”

“Like requesting the seating chart rearrange was? Or having us carry things for you?” Nathaniel asked, annoyed.

Kim shook his head, honestly disappointed. “You know, we’re a good group. If you had just asked for help, we would have given it. You didn’t need to lie.”

“I’m not a liar!” Lila shouted angrily.

Everyone took a step back at that, automatically wary.

Rose looked around at each of her classmates. All of them, every one of them seemed to be angry with Lila. Each of them seemed so sure of her being the one in the wrong.

“Rose, you don’t believe them, do you?” Lila asked, near begging with tears in her eyes.

The poor blonde floundered. She wanted to believe Lila. But they were her friends and they were all so very angry and insistent that Lila was lying. She didn’t know. She just didn’t...

A arm wrapped around her shoulder and gently pulled her away from Lila. Rose looked up to Juleka in surprise. The goth girl merely kept a heated glare on Lila.

“You don’t touch her.”

This was it. It was official. Lila had actually lost her hold on all of them in the span of a day, and the worst part was that she had no idea how it all fell apart.

“I can’t believe it.” Lila gasped out. “After everything I’ve done for you—”

“You really haven’t done anything for us.” Nino pointed out. “I mean, sure, you’ve made promises and offers...and they sounded great and all. But this ‘friendship’, if you could even call it that, was generally more about what we could do for you rather than the other way around.”

“Oh, I should be the one saying that!” Lila bit out angrily. “All you did was take Marinette’s seat to get to sit next to your girlfriend and carry things for me. That was hardly any real effort on your part. And in return, you were the ones only being nice to me to use me and my connections.”

“But we never asked you to, Lila!” Rose cried out, getting everyone’s attention. The blonde was still crying, and sounded angry for once. “You’re the one who brought up the people you knew and how you could introduce us! None of us even cared about your connections and famous friends until you started offering to introduce us to them!”

Juleka hugged Rose tighter.

“I just...I just don’t understand why you had to do this. We were happy to be your friends! You only ever needed to be yourself! You didn’t have to lie!”

There was silence.

And then a hiccup.

Lila dabbed at her eyes. “I’m sorry everyone. I was new and scared. You were all so amazing and I was trying to fit in. I only wanted to make friends.”

“Can the crap.” Alya snarled. “There’s trying to make yourself look good to be liked and then there’s the way you’ve been manipulating everyone and actively targeting anyone you don’t like.” She shook her head. “You wasted no time turning on me when I called you out.”

Nino’s eyes widened in horror as he remembered something else Adrien had told him. “That creepy Adrien-akuma was you! You attacked him and turned into him to make him look bad as payback because he knew you were lying and asked you to stop!”

Lila froze, panicked. “I would never—!”

“Don’t.” Nino snapped. “Adrien already told me how you lied your way into his home and got to his dad.” He was still kicking himself for his part in that and helping Lila to emotionally manipulate Adrien.

“You probably faked the accusations against Marinette, too!”

“You got her expelled!”

There were too many accusations coming from too many people all at once. Lila appeared overwhelmed and was clearly struggling to juggle them all.

“It was an illness.” She explained, trying to appear calm. “The Principal knows I couldn’t help what I said. I explained everything and helped her come back. Doesn’t that prove my intentions?”

“Not when you’re the one responsible for it all in the first place.” Alya snapped.

Max looked through his phone, frowning. “That only explains what you said. But that doesn’t explain how or why you got the test answers in Marinette’s bag. Or your necklace in her locker.”

Alix rolled her eyes. “And I’m pretty sure there is no illness that makes you walk down a flight of stairs and conveniently fall to the ground with no injuries before crying and accusing someone of pushing you.”

“Sounds like a whole bunch of lies. All targeted at one person.” Alya stated flatly.

“The one person who wouldn’t go along with you.” Kim added.

“How convenient.” Nathaniel sniped, feeling just a little petty after everything.

Lila crossed her arms over her chest as though she were trying to protect herself from physical blows instead of words. “I was only protecting myself.”

Everyone bristled at the sheer audacity.

It was Nino who broke. “No! You don’t get to make yourself the victim here! No one told you to lie! No one made you slap yourself and accuse Alya. And no one forced you to do those things to frame Marinette! That was all you!”

“You can’t even say they were threats to you.” Ivan pointed out. “We all believed you, remember? You knew that.”

“They’re the liars!” Lila shouted. “They’re the ones making things up just to hurt me!”

Nino stares at her incredulously. “Do you really believe your own lies that much?”

Finally…

Finally, a break in the mask.

“And now you sound like Marinette.” Lila scoffed. “Always with the goody two-shoes act. ‘We can only be friends if you stop lying, Lila!’” She sneered at the memory. “Are you all really that pathetic?”

“So Marinette was right!” Kim exclaimed.

“Yeah, we kind of already knew that.” Nathaniel reminded him in annoyance.

He simpered. “Well, it seemed right to confirm it.”

“Isn’t that what we’ve been doing?”

“Make it official, you know?”

Alix groaned. “Guys, not the time!”

“It just goes to show that your friendship really is conditional.” Lila said, crossing her arms and looking away, appearing hurt.

“Honesty isn’t too much to ask for, Lila!” Alya shouted.

“Yeah, it’s kind of the basis for any sort of relationship.” Kim added.

“Don’t kid yourselves.” She scoffed. “If that was true, you would have believed Marinette, who had been nothing but honest with you.”

The class as a whole glared at her.

“We’re not going to forget who was the one instigating everything here.” Juleka told her, sounding cross.

“It’s not like it matters now anyway.” Lila stated, snidely. “Everything’s been said and done.”

“Au contraire!” Came a new exuberant voice.

Everyone turned in pure confusion to see Chloe approaching the scene with all the grace of a queen—or at least someone who seemed to think of herself as one.

Needless to say, the assembled students were mostly less than impressed. The one exception being Sabrina for obvious reasons, who brightened upon Chloe’s arrival.

Nobody was happy about this.

Except for Chloe, who approached the group with a smirk and stopped a few strides from Lila.

“Chloe Bourgeois, protector of the weak and Savior of Paris!” She announced pompously with a flourish. “You may bow at your leisure.”

Lila stared, more annoyed than anything. “Are you serious?”

“Chloe, this really isn’t a good time.” Kim started, only for the blonde to cut him off with a fierce grin.

“Oh, but it’s the BEST time!” Chloe said, downright gleefully. “I couldn’t help but overhear your mention of Lila’s antics and it made me wonder about one thing that stuck out to me in particular…”

The rest of the class frowned, glancing at each other in confusion before turning back to Chloe.

“You all said Lila had been lying about getting Ladybug involved in the search for Marinette. Which Ladybug, of course, denied. Then later, she said that Marinette had run away. She said this to Alya and to Adrien.”

Lila raised an eyebrow. “So? She probably did. It’s not my fault if they can’t handle the truth.”

Alya looked furious and even Nino seemed half inclined to start shouting.

Chloe, however, merely tapped her cheek, the picture of obliviousness.

“The truth? You seem so sure of this.”

Lila shrugged, uncaring. “What’s your point?”

“I just have to wonder if perhaps this little ‘Runaway Marinette’ story wasn’t something you told anyone else? Like say...the police?”

THAT got everyone’s attention.

“After all, everyone in the class had to have been called in for questioning by the detectives investigating her case. Since you’re all ‘oh so close’. And if that’s the case, Lila...was that the story you told them?”

“I never told them she ran away. I merely mentioned catching her with an older man and implied a couple of reasons she may want to leave together. Is that a crime?”

“Yes, I’m pretty sure it is.” Max retorted, angrily.

Lila looked away, flipping her hair without any concern. “I only told them what they needed to hear. Isn’t that what I’ve done for everyone? It’s not my fault if they act on it.”

Alya stared in growing horror. “Wait...you lied to police about Marinette running away?!”

“What the hell, Lila!” Nino shouted, downright furious. The rest of the class wasn’t too far behind him on that, and it almost looked like a brawl was about to break out.

Lila, however, simply shrugged. “Well, why wouldn’t she leave? I mean, after the way you all treated her, who would want to stick around?”

The classmates winced at that. Several lowered their heads. A few others only glared more hatefully at Lila.

But Alya wasn’t taking it. At all.

“No. No, no, no. You are not turning this one around on us because there is nothing we’ve done that compares to you lying to police about our friend running away!”

“Wait, so not only did Lila lie about Marinette being a slut, she lied to police about it?!” Kim questioned, getting him many dark looks from the other classmates. But he took no notice of this, instead glaring at Lila and looking angrier than they’d ever seen him.

Which rather said something. Kim was often foolish, and at times hurtful. But he was never angry the way he seemed to be now.

Alya frowned at him. “Are you trying to imply something, Kim?” Because it sure sounded like he was minimizing the issue of spreading false claims about a girl in that fashion. Reputation and relationships can easily be destroyed by things like that, and Lila was certainly manipulative enough to try it. Whether police were involved shouldn’t discount that.

Kim shook his head. “Marinette is 15. If Lila had convinced the police Marinette was the type, they could peg her as a runaway and write her off as eloping.”

That certainly got everyone’s attention.

“That would result in her disappearance being deemed intentional and reduce the resources spent trying to look for her!”

“Lila, what the hell?!” Mylene demanded, shocking everyone. The girl never cursed. She never even raised her voice before!

“Mylene...”

“Who does that? What kind of sick freak even does something like that?!”

Ivan grabbed Mylene and pulled her into a hug as she started to heave. It hurt. It was sick.

This was...this was beyond what they had been expecting.

“And what can you do about it?” She smirked. “Nothing.”

Silence.

“Sabrina? Did you get all that?”

The red-head smiled and nodded, holding up her phone. “We got it all, Chloe!”

Lila froze, paling at the implications. “What?”

Chloe only smirked. “I should really thank you, Lila. Who knew you were one to brag so much? I think this should be more than enough evidence.”

Lila gaped at them in horror. “You...you can’t record me! It’s illegal to record someone without their consent! You—you could have edited that!”

But Chloe’s smirk turned downright devious. “It’s a good thing that this isn’t a recording then.”

“MISS ROSSI!”

Lila jumped and spun towards the direction of the Principal’s office, where Damocles and several other adults stood, all of whom were looking rather furious. Adrien was there as well, though he had separated from the group to make his way to his classmates, appearing relieved and disbelieving all at once.

“TO MY OFFICE NOW!”

The class glanced around in confusion, uncertain what had just happened. Looking to Sabrina, Alya noticed the other girl’s phone in hand, with the screen still on. Not recording, but rather in the middle of a call.

On speakerphone.

“Lila.” A woman said, approaching the girl and looking rather cross. She must be Lila’s mother. Their appearances were similar enough. “Young lady, you have some serious explaining to do.”

Alya’s eyes widened as it hit her. Sabrina had been on the phone this entire time. She had been on the line with Damocles’s office. Where everyone including Damocles, her parents, and all those people were.

Everyone in that office had heard them. Who knows for how long? But at least enough for sure for Lila to implicate herself.

Lila shook her head. This wasn’t it. This couldn’t be it. She could still find some way out of this. It wasn’t over for her yet!

“Excuse me.”

Everyone looked to the entrance to see a mostly professional-looking woman entering the room. What did not appear professional, however, was her purple hair. As well as her clicking of a pen, which may have been a habit or nervousness.

Juleka gasped upon seeing her, recognizing who she was. The other members of Kitty Section weren’t far behind, getting some looks of confusion from others in the class.

The woman took no notice of this, merely glancing around at the class.

“I am looking for a Miss Lila Rossi?”

Lila’s expression immediately shifted to something pleasant and seemingly innocent—at least to anyone who didn’t know better. She stepped forward with a polite smile. “I’m Lila Rossi. Can I help you?”

“Yes.” The woman replied. Her glance slid over to Mrs. Rossi standing next to her daughter. “Actually, am I correct in assuming you are her mother?”

Mrs. Rossi frowned. “I am.”

“All the better then.” The woman stated as she handed over a folder. “Your daughter is being sued for defamation of character.”

Everyone gasped at that, but none were more shocked than the poor mother herself. “I’m sorry?”

“Your daughter’s report to police implicated Jagged Stone in a crime. One he did not commit and one that was, quite frankly, disgusting to him.”

Whispers broke out around them. Jagged Stone? Lila had lied to police about Jagged?

Mrs. Rossi opened the file and read through the documents before her face paled and her mouth opened in horror.

“We will be seeing you in court.” Penny stated before turning around. Seeing the familiar teens nearby, she gave them a small smile before going on her way.

“Lila. Rossi.” The woman hissed, glaring at her daughter. Lila actually seemed frightened for perhaps the first time. “Come here. NOW.”

That was it. The final nail in the coffin.

And just like that…

It was done just like that…

Lila was clearly enraged, but forced herself to calmly walk by everyone and head to the Principal’s office where the group of adults and police were waiting.

Everyone moved aside to let her through, willing to watch her walk of shame and bear witness to her upcoming judgement. Lila refused to look at any of them, keeping her head straight and her eyes forward.

She passed Chloe last.

“I’ll find a way out of this, mark my words.” Lila hissed to her as she passed.

Chloe smiled back.

“After everything I’ve done, there’s no shovel that will unbury you.”

She leaned in close to Lila’s ear.

“This was for Adrien, you bitch.”

Because how dare she—HOW DARE SHE make Adrien cry like that!

Lila meanwhile marched to the Principal’s office, seething internally. She was guarded on all sides with no way to slip through or make an escape. And nowhere to go if she tried.

She was trapped. Finished.

Though there was one thing she could do...

Lila allowed her rage and indignation to build.

No doubt Hawk Moth would sense the emotion and send an akuma for her.

She still had avenues to change things in her favor.

_________________________

“It seems Miss Rossi has gotten into a bit of trouble.” Hawk Moth mused from his lair.

“Still...we might as well make some use of this.” He said, summoning a butterfly to his hand and about to infuse his power into it when—

“Sir,” Nathalie interrupted, appearing at his side. “Audrey Bourgeois is calling. The Style Queen magazine can’t seem to finish publication for the expose on the latest runway show. She says they’re missing key pieces.”

If he were a lesser man, he would have rolled his eyes.

“Can’t it wait?”

“No, sir. She is very adamant to speak with you directly on the matter.”

“What is the issue? Everything she needs should be available.”

“That’s just it, sir. It isn’t.”

That got his attention.

“What?”

The butterfly was released from his grip.

_________________________

The group watched as Lila trudged to the office where the Principal was waiting. She entered, but not before sending one final glare back at Chloe and the class. Damocles ushered her in fully and shut the door behind him.

Alya sighed, releasing not only a breath but all of the anxiety and turmoil she had been holding in.

Catharsis.

With Lila’s exit, there was an absence or at least a lessening of the tension none of the class had known they were being suffocated by.

“Does anyone else feel like a lobster that just escaped a boiling pot back into cold water?” Kim asked.

Several chuckled.

“That...is quite possibly the most apt metaphor for the situation.” Max said with a small smile.

His choice of words was silly, but he certainly wasn’t wrong in his description. Lila’s manipulations and poisoning of the class had been going on for so long and slowly getting worse over time. None of them had even noticed just how much more stressful and tense things had been getting with her there. Not until they were faced with the prospect of her leaving and found themselves feeling relieved. It wasn’t quite the sort they were hoping for, though.

They weren’t glad it was over. The relief was less a feeling of freedom and more a sense of uncertainty. Just because a poison is gone doesn’t mean a wound isn’t left behind.

It was sad, as she still had been someone they considered a friend. And there was also a sense of hollowness. They had been lied to, manipulated, and turned against a friend. Lila being revealed didn’t undo any of that.

All it meant was that they had lost a friend. A bad friend who clearly hadn’t returned the sentiment, sure. But knowing that didn’t erase the feelings they’d had. Because they had all cared about Lila. And it hurt to lose that, as one-sided as it may have been.

Now that the source of the toxicity was outed, all that was left was to clean up the pieces and try to work out which pieces were hers or theirs.

“You know this doesn’t fix things.” Nino said to her, tentatively. “That her being gone doesn’t make things better.”

“Yeah.” Alya admitted. “But at least she can’t make things worse.”

Because Lila had been actively sabotaging any efforts. Trying to limit their attempts to search and lying to police to put them on the wrong trail. Enough time had been wasted because of her. How far would it have gone if they hadn’t learned the truth when they did?

_________________________

Ultimately, Lila left the school not with a bang, but with a whimper. Granted, the whimper happened to come with a police escort, but the point remains.

When Lila first arrived at the school, she was surrounded with rumors and speculation. And now that she’s left the school, it was much the same.

Only the rumors and speculation were not nearly as in her favor this time around.

“I heard she assaulted another student.“

“It was sexual harassment, I think.”

“No, she had something to do with that girl who disappeared.”

“I heard she was involved in human trafficking!”

In the end, no one outside of the class and the administration knew for sure what had happened. Lila remained shrouded in mystery, but it was a much less appealing one than when she first came to their school.

Honestly, it was less than Lila deserved after everything. Alya wasn’t sure she was satisfied with that.

But with the ensuing investigation and charges against Lila that no amount of lies could pull her out of, she would have to be.

_________________________

“I’m sorry.” Adrien said, speaking just above a whisper and barely enough to be heard.

“What for, man?” Kim asked, concerned.

“I knew.” He admitted. “I knew all along that Lila was lying and I never said anything to anyone. If I had, maybe things wouldn’t have gotten this far.”

Nino immediately moved to stand next to his bro, placing an arm around his shoulders in support.

Several among the class glanced at each other, unsure. Yes, it would have helped to know, and they were admittedly put out that he hadn’t told them.

Alya shook her head. “Honestly, I’m not sure it would have changed much.”

Nino looked up at her in surprise. “Alya?”

“I mean…” She shrugged. “Lila was good at lying. Like...really good at it. Maybe it was our fault for not investigating more thoroughly, but if we had all known the truth, that would have just caused her to up her game.”

Adrien hung his head, remembering how Lila had been akumatized into Chameleon and abused his friends.

“If you think about it,” Mylene noted with a frown, “she went pretty far to implicate Marinette and get her expelled just because she knew the truth. If she’d do that to her, there probably isn’t much she wouldn’t have done.”

Max nodded in agreement. “Her methods were precise and well thought out. She performed a three-pronged attack to discredit Marinette. It was no wonder her lies were easily believable.”

Rose shuddered. “That’s scary to think about.”

“But Adrien, I’m trying not to be upset...but why didn’t you say anything?” Alix asked.

Kim frowned. “Yeah. I mean...I think a few of us suspected something was up, but we didn’t know for sure like you did. Why not tell us?”

Adrien winced. He opened his mouth but couldn’t speak. He just couldn’t find the words to explain.

It was all the more reason why he was so grateful for Nino, whose gentle presence kept him stable and who knew perfectly well when to speak up and what to say.

“It wasn’t that he didn’t think we’d listen to him, it was that he honestly believed he wasn’t supposed to say anything in the first place. That he wasn’t allowed to.”

The others stared.

“That’s messed up, man.”

Adrien winced again and looked away. “I’m sorry.”

“Look, Adrien.” Kim said, resting a hand on his shoulder. “Chloe—and now Lila aside, we’re a pretty chill group. If something’s going on, we WANT you to tell us.”

“Yeah.” Nathaniel agreed with a gentle smile. “We don’t want you or anyone else to force yourselves to be okay with something when you’re not.”

Rose sniffled. She wanted to be supportive, but it was clear she was still hurt by the whole thing. “It kind of hurts to think that you don’t trust us.”

Mylene frowned at that. She understood Rose’s feelings, but at the same time, she understood Adrien’s as well.

“To be fair though…he wasn’t wrong to think that way.” She drew back when the others turned to her in surprise. “Well, if you think about it, we haven’t really been the best at listening to each other either.”

“Maybe if we had, everything would still be okay.” Juleka mumbled as she turned away, echoing what everyone else was thinking.

“No!” Came an unexpected voice.

She spun in surprise, and quite frankly everyone there was surprised as well to see Adrien glaring at her and looking angrier than they’d ever seen him.

“Their only fault was trusting and trying to help someone who never deserved it.” He forced a smile. It was hurt and frustrated, but it was still real. “You guys...you’ve been nothing but awesome this whole time. To me and to everyone you’ve met. You were kind to Lila because that’s how you are with everyone. Lila was the one in the wrong for taking advantage of that. But all of you…”

He raised his head. “Look, we fell for some lies and trusted the wrong person. We all did, even if we realized it sooner or later. That doesn’t make anyone here bad, it just makes you kids.”

They stared.

Nino gave him a side-look. “Speak for yourself. You’re more of a kid than any of us.”

Adrien blushed as the others laughed.

It was dumb.

It was silly and childish.

And yet for the first time, Adrien wondered if maybe things would be okay.

_________________________

Adrien sighed as he fell onto his bed.

After all was said and done, it had been a long...long day.

But at least the truth was known. Alya’s suspension was lifted. Lila was gone. Chloe...he probably owed her a new wardrobe. And Marinette was finally vindicated.

…

...Marinette…

“Kid? You okay?

“I wish Marinette had been there.” He whispered.

Plagg said nothing.

As his own eyes closed, Adrien never noticed how the kwami’s eyes glowed fiercely as he looked out to the city.

It was only once Adrien was asleep that Plagg phased through the window.

_________________________

Plagg was patient. But there was only so long he was willing to wait.

Seeing Adrien like that...trying for her when she wasn’t there? All while unaware how close she was? Uttering his wish like a shameful secret he wasn’t allowed to have?

Something had to give.

And his own curiosity burned for an answer.

He found her lazing on a rooftop. Not even her own balcony, but a random roof of no significance.

“What are you doing?” Plagg asked her.

It meant so many things.

Why didn’t she return home?

Why was she staying out as Ladybug?

Why was she letting everyone think she was missing?

But Ladybug seemed altogether unconcerned.

“I’m patrolling.” She stated.

Which was...not the answer he wanted. Or really any answer to any of the questions he wanted.

“What?”

“Since I have nothing else to do, I’ve been keeping an eye out for anything suspicious. Being out like this now, I can try and locate any akumas before they affect someone. Perhaps I can even determine where they may have originated from.”

That was…

Well, it was smart, actually. At least in the sense that she could gather intel and was trying to track down Hawk Moth. He’d give her credit for that, at least.

But it was a simplistic plan littered with holes. Paris was a big city and it would be a matter of luck if she happened to be in an area close enough to catch the butterfly before it reaches its target—assuming she even sees it at all since akumas ARE butterflies and let’s face it, they aren’t the easiest things to pick out and keep track of in the first place.

Then there was the matter that if she was staying transformed, that was taking up a lot of time and energy on a plan mostly counting on chance. Tikki may be a being of energy and power, but she needed fuel to keep it up. And even transformed, Marinette was still human, and thus susceptible to normal human needs like hunger, thirst, and sleep.

And that wasn’t even getting started on the wave of upset that her disappearance had caused, which would just give Hawk Moth more potential targets to choose from like her friend. Alya had come close to track Marinette down that day. There was every chance that more of her loved ones could be akumatized into Champions with any array of powers that might allow them to locate Marinette.

Then if they find Ladybug in the process? He’d said people were blind, but it wouldn’t take that big a leap for someone to put the clues together. And the last thing they needed was for that someone to be Hawk Moth.

“Nice plan.” He deadpanned. “Very clever. Just one little problem: what about Marinette?”

He felt something. A tickle in his throat as he said it. But he shrugged it off and continued to focus on the girl in front of him.

Ladybug scoffed at that. “What about her?”

His frown only grew. “Don’t you think she should be making a reappearance at some point? You know...got a lot of people rather worried about her.”

His kid included.

But Ladybug…

She just shrugged it off.

“She’s just some girl who got lost and is causing people to worry. It’s not like it matters.”

Not like it matters? What foolishness! What outrage!

“Of course it matters! YOU’RE—”

He felt it in that moment. Like a collar around his throat. Unseen but clearly felt as it started to tighten in warning.

Plagg froze, his eyes wide in shock at the sudden sensation as he realized it for what it was. Familiar...but never in this way. Never like this.

But there was only one thing it could be.

“What is it?” Ladybug asked, frowning at him in confusion at his sudden silence.

No.

He opened his mouth, feeling the sensation again. Stronger this time.

Marinette.

No.

Marinette.

It shouldn’t be possible.

Marinette!

She was right there!

You are Marinette!

It was her! She was RIGHT THERE! She was the only one there with him!

“You are—”

He cut off, choking as that damned magical binding tightened and transformed his words while still in his throat. He knew this feeling. He knew this magic. He hated the feeling of it every time.

He didn’t want to believe it. There was no way it could be right.

But logic and possibility didn’t matter as he was forced to gag out the physical remnants of what only seconds ago had been her name. The true name of Ladybug. The name of a Miraculous user.

A name he could not speak to someone who did not already know it.

He gaped at the green bubbles.

This...this made no sense!

It was her. He could feel Tikki’s magic. He KNEW this was Ladybug. And Ladybug was Marinette.

So why…

Why would that binding activate now?

“Plagg?”

“I...I have to go!” He shouted quickly before taking off.

He had to get to Adrien.

He had to see Fu.

Whatever was going on…

It was worse than he’d thought!

#ml fic #missing #missing au #ml angst #cliffhanger #adrien agreste #alya cesaire #nino lahiffe #max kante #kim le chien #alix kubdel #nathaniel kurtzberg #miracuclass #lila sucks #lila the liar #karma is sweet

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