#more info to be shared about this au soon !!

[starlightkun]

❧ word count: 26.7k ❧ warnings: cursing, VERY suggestive/innuendous, reader teases mark a lot playfully but he’s a shy loserboy so the banter is not usually returned and it might come across as a bit excessive/mean sometimes but it’s their version of flirting i promise, blasphemous usage of the word MILF ❧ genre: fluff, strangers to lovers, modern magical creatures au, basilisk mark, sphinx reader, age gap (older reader), college student mark, career woman reader, ft. various magical neos, human renjun, human johnny (and other very special guest appearances), same universe as strawberry sunday ❧ extra info: this work is set in the same universe as strawberry sunday but can be read as a standalone! there is no continuing plotline between fics in this universe, they simply take place in the same world/magic system and may have overlapping characters (neos may pop up in more than one work!) ❧ author’s note: this one is definitely not going to be for everyone i think. but! i had fun with it. it’s got me exploring a lot of new stuff in it: writing for mark, writing this kind of relationship dynamic, figuring out what sphinxes are like in this universe, and some new characters (gasp!) so i had a ball. which of course means the word count is obscene lol. anyway enjoy the (probably) last installment of the strawbsunday universe. i’m not going to call this the official end bc i had so much fun with these characters that i could totally see myself coming back, but as of now this is all i have planned! thank you all for tagging along and i hope you're looking forward to what’s next!

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ explore the strawberry sunday universe more here!

“You—” Jisung was cut off by Chenle.

“Totally fucked our neighbor! I always knew you were a MILF hunter, Mark Lee—” Chenle’s voice was getting louder and louder, and you were sure that at this point you might not have even needed magical hearing to discern their words.

Friday night. After a long week of work, you finally could relax, order some food, make yourself a drink, kick your feet up, and just have a nice quiet night to yourself. Reclined on your couch in your comfiest silk robe, you brought your glass to your lips as you flicked through some options for what to watch. With delight, you realized that a drama you’d been watching had released a new episode. You’d barely clicked play and settled in when the raucous sounds of hooting, hollering, and electronic shooting and smashing penetrated through your living room wall. Sighing to yourself, you paused your show and stood up to walk over to the wall that your TV hung from, which you shared with your next-door neighbors.

A few months ago—at the beginning of the local university’s fall semester, you figured—two college kids had moved in next door to you. You liked Chenle and Jisung just fine; they were polite whenever you saw them in the hallway or elevator, sometimes if Jisung saw you carrying heavy groceries, the dragon would offer to help you bring them in, and while some people may not be thrilled to have a fairy next door, you knew that a lot of your neighbors felt the same way about you, so you didn’t hold that against Chenle. All in all, they weren’t the worst people to live next to. Except for when their other rambunctious college friends came over for video game nights. They didn’t always seem aware of the noise levels. Thankfully, they were quick to make adjustments as soon as you made them aware. Another reason that you didn’t mind living next door to them, despite the occasional loudness.

You banged your fist against the wall a couple times. It was almost immediately followed by a distant ‘Oh shit!’ and the hasty lowering of their video game volume. A young man’s voice then came through the wall much clearer, as if he were just on the other side from you.

“Sorry!” It sounded like Jisung. You didn’t respond, instead plopping back down onto your couch and playing your show again. No need to have a shouting match through the wall and disturb everybody else in the building. They continued their video games at a constant, but much quieter hum for the rest of the evening, and you puttered around through your streaming services until you deemed your night over.

After putting your leftovers away in your fridge, you were about to head off to your bedroom when you heard the distant shuffle of footsteps over your welcome mat. You paused at the threshold of your kitchen to your living room, waiting to see if whoever it was would actually ring the doorbell, or just keep… well, it sounded like they were pacing anxiously. Finally, there were a couple soft taps on your front door. If you were a human, you weren’t sure if you would have even heard that. Your footsteps were soft across your carpeted floor as you moved to answer the door. First looking out the peephole, your interest was piqued when you saw a young man standing there who was neither Chenle nor Jisung. Though you did have an idea of exactly what this was about.

Undoing your deadbolt, latch, then disarming the alarm, you opened the door just enough for you to cross your arms over your chest and lean against the doorframe. “I accept apologies in the form of cash or groveling.”

“Huh?” The young man stared at you wide-eyed, open-mouthed, and dumb-founded. You took note of his slit pupils, and the two fangs that hadn’t yet fully descended from his top jaw. Huh, basilisk.

“Did the boys not send you over here to be the sacrificial lamb?” You cocked your head and looked him up and down perhaps too obviously, as he shifted nervously under your gaze. A very timid basilisk at that. You eyed the oversized t-shirt he had on that had the same university logo that you’d often seen your neighbors wearing. “You are one of Chenle and Jisung’s friends, right?”

“Oh, y-yeah, I am. I’m Mark. Mark Lee.” He took one of his hands out from where he’d stuffed them into the pockets of his joggers, wiped it on the leg of said joggers, and held it out to you. As he got close enough to shake your hand, you could finally smell him. Sphinx noses weren’t as sensitive as werewolves’ or vampires’—or basilisk tongues for that matter. Not to mention that basilisks just didn’t have as strong of a scent as most other beings. They had a mild, earthen smell that reminded you of peat freshly after rain. Others tended to make less favorable comparisons such as damp caverns or even mildewy caves, but those ideas never occurred to you. Maybe it was because one of your own childhood best friends was a basilisk, so you were just used to the smell and had positive memories associated with it.

You couldn’t conceal the amusement on your face as you delicately shook his hand, now very aware of his clammy palms. “It’s nice to meet you, Mark, I’m Y/N. Now if they didn’t send you over with your big brown eyes and sweet face in an attempt to distract me from the ruckus you all were making earlier, then why are you on my doorstep?”

“Wait, you can look at my eyes?” There was a noticeable drag on his s’es when he spoke, which you noted with a certain fondness. He must be young enough to have missed most, if not all, of the mandatory speech therapy that the basilisks of your cohort and before went through during primary and secondary school. It was removed from the curriculum for being unfair and prejudiced against the creatures, but that was after your time. You could remember your friend Jongin being singled out to leave class three times a week for the “therapy.” Even now he could still recall the name of the instructor who led it, his voice filling with bitter vitriol on the rare occasions he’d choose to talk about it.

“I’m a sphinx, honey. You couldn’t petrify me if you tried,” you informed Mark knowingly. Now you were curious as to why he was out and about without magical eye protection or at least non-magical sunglasses if he was apparently so worried about petrifying people. But, not curious enough to divert you from your original mission. “Now, why are you here?”

“O-Oh, right, uhm, I’m really sorry for bothering you, ma’am, it’s just that I went to go get something from my car but then I realized that I forgot my keys in their apartment and I came back up to get them but I locked myself out. My phone’s in the apartment too, and I tried knocking but they’re not answering and—”

“They fell asleep in the two minutes you were gone?” You cut him off, raising your eyebrows slightly in disbelief.

“No, no, they were already asleep. You see, uhm, I’m crashing on their couch tonight and—”

“Got it, got it.” You nodded. Well, that explains the lack of sunglasses. They were also presumably locked in the apartment. “So, what do you want from me?”

“Can I borrow your phone really quick, just to try to call them and see if they’ll pick up? Again, I’m really, really sorry about this.”

“I will actually do you one better, Mark.” You did a small shooing gesture, and he seemed to get the idea, taking a couple steps back. Once he was off of your welcome mat, you lifted up the corner and grabbed the key that was sitting under there. You held it out to him. “Here.”

“Uh—”

“It’s their spare key, not mine.” You reassured him. “When they moved in, they asked if they could hide it under my mat because it would be too obvious to burglars for their spare key to be under their mat.”

“O-Oh.” Mark gingerly took the key from you. “Thank you, ma’am.”

“Mark, one more thing.”

“Anything!” He blurted out, then his entire face flushed as he scrambled to tone it down. “I mean, y-yeah, of course, ma’am, what do you need?”

You couldn’t help but smirk as you requested, “Stop calling me ma’am.”

“Right, sorry.”

“You can call me Y/N.”

“O-Okay!” The basilisk smiled at you brightly, another flash of his not-yet fully developed baby fangs. He presumably was only a year or so out from his first molting. They were cute. He was... cute.

“Goodnight, Mark.” You stepped back and grabbed the edge of your door, preparing to close it.

“Goodnight, Y/N.”

His eyes didn’t leave you the entire time as you shut the door. Curious, you peered out your peephole. Mark flicked his forked snake tongue out in the air once before he made his way over to your neighbors’ door. The boys had a corner apartment, meaning that despite the two apartments sharing a wall, their door was actually perpendicular to yours, so you could see it from your peephole. You watched Mark unlock the apartment, then dart back over to yours and bend over to lift up your mat. You froze, not expecting him to immediately return the key. You figured he’d just give it back to his friends in the morning. He paused after he’d put the key under the mat again, tongue once more testing the air. You held your breath, waiting for a paralyzing one, two seconds before he finally left again. You didn’t relax fully until the boys’ apartment door had closed behind him, though. You wanted to hit yourself. What were you even nervous about? A grown woman being caught standing by your own apartment door? By some random college kid? Ridiculous. You scoffed, doing up your locks, latches, and alarm again.

“Hi, Ms. Y/N.” “Hi, Ms. Y/N.”

Chenle and Jisung gave you two very polite nods as they passed you in the hallway heading out of the building at the same time that you were coming home from work. It had been a couple weeks since their last video game night when you’d had your unexpected visitor, which was also the last time you’d seen or heard a peep from either of your young neighbors. You figured they’d been keeping an extra-low profile out of guilt.

You smiled back at them genuinely. “Hi, boys.”

The third figure behind them looked at you with wide eyes, and you arched an eyebrow curiously at him, a silent challenge.

“H-Hi, Y/N.” To his credit, Mark’s voice didn’t crack at all, despite the stutter.

“Hi, Mark,” you practically purred his name, not slowing down in the slightest as you continued your path to your front door. You bit your bottom lip to keep from laughing as you heard the fervent whispered back and forth of the college students behind you.

“Dude, what the fuck?” Jisung hissed at Mark.

“Yeah, what the fuck is wrong with you?” Chenle concurred.

“What?” Mark shot back quietly.

You arrived at your apartment door at the end of the hall, still well within earshot for you. Opening up your purse to fetch your keys, you unhurriedly flipped through every key on your keyring.

“You—” Jisung was cut off by Chenle.

“Totally fucked our neighbor! I always knew you were a MILF hunter, Mark Lee—” Chenle’s voice was getting louder and louder, and you were sure that at this point you might not have even needed magical hearing.

“Dude!” Mark snapped, and you heard the sound of what you were pretty sure was the basilisk slapping a hand over the fairy’s mouth. “She can totally hear us!”

You raised a hand above your head and, without turning around, waved it. “Hey, boys. Sphinx, remember?”

“Sorry, Ms. Y/N!” Jisung called out down the hall to you, and you could picture his sheepish face in that moment. You went to actually unlock your apartment now, pushing the door open.

“Sorry!” Mark apologized too, as you had stepped into your home.

You just caught his eye and a glimpse of his pink ears as you turned around to disable your alarm next to the closing door. In the moment before the gap shut all the way, you winked at him.

Humming along to the music playing from your phone, you touched up your work makeup to make it a little more ‘nighttime’ and swapped out your studs for some more flashy going-out dangly earrings. You’d already changed into a much less corporate outfit for your night out with your friends that you had planned and were just putting the finishing touches on before you had to leave in a few minutes. You’d just finished up with your hair and makeup when you swore you heard a knock at your front door. Pausing your music to stick your head out of your bathroom, you listened more carefully. Yeah, there were definitely footsteps at your front door, and it didn’t sound like a delivery person dropping a package off and leaving. In fact, it sounded like someone pacing nervously. A very familiar shuffle, if you weren’t mistaken.

Already bemused, you took long strides through your apartment to get to your front door, deftly unlocking it. And sure enough, when you so confidently swung it open without peeking through the peephole first, your instincts had of course been right. Mark Lee was standing on the other side, shifting his weight nervously from foot to foot. His gaze immediately snapped up to you, and you barely contained your amusement at how his jaw literally dropped when he took in what you were wearing.

“Hello, Mark,” you greeted him, once more leaning against your doorway. It had been a few weeks since you’d last seen him, and you could only guess why he was knocking on your door again.

You could see him blink himself out of a trance, running a hand through his hair, knocking the hood of his forest green hoodie off his head in the process. “Hi, Y/N. How-How are you?”

“I’m well, thank you. How about you?”

“Good! I’m good.”

“So… What brings you to my doorstep again? You know where the boys’ key is.” You pointed to the welcome mat underneath his sneakers.

“Oh, Chenle and Jisung aren’t even home right now,” he said off-handedly. “I didn’t come to see them.”

“Is that so?”

“Yeah. I uhm, I wanted to ask you something.”

“Mark…” You said his name calmly, but with a hint of warning. Truly, this was your fault. You’d been having too much fun and let this get out of hand, and now you were going to have to let this sweet boy down easy before he started something he couldn’t finish. And you’d had such a good relationship with your neighbors so far, too. Maybe he’d be too embarrassed to tell them. One could only hope.

Mark’s ears were getting redder by the second. “Sorry, I know you’re probably too busy but— Could you maybe help me with my abilities?”

Well, that certainly wasn’t what you were expecting. Shoving away the strange twinge of disappointment in your chest, you reminded him, “I’m not a basilisk. I’m not even reptile adjacent at all. Sphinxes are part-lion, part-eagle.”

“I know, I just thought that, you know, sphinxes develop your powers later, right? You’re not born with them.”

“Right…”

“Basilisks too. I just thought that, I don’t know, maybe you’d be able to at least give me some advice?” He immediately shook his head at himself. “I’m sorry, you don’t even know me, I’ll just—”

“Hold on, Mark.” You went to stop him from leaving entirely. While you weren’t fully convinced, this at least wasn’t a conversation to be having on your doorstep. You had better manners than to leave the poor boy on your doormat. You stepped back from your door, opening it wider. “Here, come in.”

“O-Okay.” He obliged, walking into your apartment. “Thank you.” He stood awkwardly just a couple steps past the front door, looking around your living room hesitantly.

“Do you want something to drink? Water? Tea?” You offered, hoping it would calm him down. He looked so tense that you were a little worried about his blood pressure. “Unfortunately I don’t have any Red Bulls or whatever college boys sustain themselves on.”

“Oh, uh, no thank you. I actually don’t drink energy drinks or any of that stuff.” He shook his head, his nose wrinkling. “Tastes too… too much.”

“Hm…” You filled up a glass of water for yourself, and an extra for Mark anyway. He was your guest, after all. You sat back in your spot in the corner of your couch, putting one of the glasses down on your coffee table for him. You took a sip of the other. When Mark was still rooted to the same spot a couple seconds later, you gestured to the other two-thirds of the piece of furniture. “You can sit, my couch won’t come to life and swallow you whole, you know.”

“Right, sorry.” He laughed, looking down at his feet as he walked over and sat on the opposite end from you. Or, as far to the opposite end as he could get. You had several throw pillows on that side. He still looked nervous, refusing to meet your gaze as his eyes flicked around your living room skittishly.

“I’m also not going to swallow you whole.”

“Of course, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” Mark picked up the glass of water that he had told you he didn’t want, this time looking you in the eye as he gave you an anxious smile before bringing the drink up to his lips.

“Not unless you ask nicely.”

He immediately spat the drink of water he’d just taken back out into his cup as he coughed and choked, and you covered your own mouth as you giggled, not wanting to outright laugh in the poor boy’s face.

“I’m sorry, Mark, that was mean of me.” You patted his knee, then quickly took your hand back. You really were just trying to reassure him. “Now, you came in for a real reason, not just for me to tease you. Go ahead.”

Having finally recovered, he set his water back down on the table to talk. “Y-Yeah, right. Uhm… So, basilisks don’t start developing their powers until they’ve gone through their first molting. Mine was a year and a half ago and honestly my life has kind of been one big shit show ever since.”

“Basilisk powers aren’t all they were cracked up to be?”

“I first partially petrified my human roommate last spring and now I have to wear sunglasses around him all the time or God forbid I’m going to actually turn him to stone one of these days. I accidentally compel him, too, like all the time, and he refuses to let our witch friends make any sort of protection charm for him.”

“He wants to get petrified and compelled?”

“No, he doesn’t want me to think he’s afraid of me. But I’m afraid of what I’m going to do to him. I feel like I can barely be in our apartment except to sleep.” Mark rubbed a hand over his face, visibly stressed and upset now. “Dude definitely knows I’m avoiding him but… I don’t know what I’d do with myself if I actually hurt Johnny.”

“Well first you’re not going to punish yourself over something you haven’t even done. That’s not going to do anything for you or your friend,” you told him firmly.

“Hmph,” he chuckled cynically.

“You don’t know any basilisks that could help you? Your parents? Friends?” You suggested gently. He clearly did need help, but you weren’t going to be his best option. “They might be a bit more useful than me.”

“My parents live five hours away. Not exactly a day trip. And I don’t know any other basilisks at school. My friends have all been supportive but useless. They’re either human or have been using their powers since before they could talk.”

You sighed and nodded in understanding. “I know what you mean. It’s like puberty all over again. A magical growth spurt but instead of suddenly losing all body awareness, growing four inches, and having hormones making your brain all fuzzy, you’re trying to gain an awareness on some new part of yourself you didn’t have before, you’re teething like a giant toddler, and have magic making your brain all fuzzy.”

“Yes, the teething! God, I thought I was crazy!” Mark groaned, vindication and relief all over his face at having someone else validate what’s been happening to him. His features then turned confused. “Wait, sphinxes don’t have fangs, do you?”

You grabbed your top lip to pull it up, at the same time letting your second set of teeth descend.

“Wow…” He breathed out, watching you as you tucked them back into your jaw.

“Lion canines. Retractable, thankfully.” You let go of your lip and closed your mouth, habitually running your tongue over your normal teeth. Sphinxes still didn’t have perfectly average human teeth as their first set of teeth, they were much sharper, with a greater number of human canines. But you much preferred your first set anyway, they were the ones you grew up with, and were a lot less cumbersome than a full set of lion canines, incisors, and carnassials. All the second set was really good for was a party trick. Not that you really went to those anymore; you’d been out of college for years now.

“Have you ever met another sphinx before me, Mark?” You asked.

“W-What do you mean?”

“You knew that sphinxes get our powers later in life, but you didn’t know about our second set of teeth. I don’t know, your knowledge is a little... inconsistent.”

He rubbed the back of his neck nervously. “Well... my friend Renjun, he’s a Magical Creatures Studies major. He goes on all these tangents all the time. I kind of zone in and out.”

“So you haven’t met another sphinx, but you were listening when your friend was talking about sphinxes getting their powers later in life, but you completely missed the part about lion teeth.” You ticked every detail off on your fingers to make sure you had it straight.

“Yeah...”

You burst into laughter again, watching as the pink that had persisted on the tips of his ears spread down to his cheeks. “Sorry, sorry, I’m not laughing at you.”

“It sure feels like it,” he mumbled, but you caught sight of a bashful smile on his lips as he stared down at his lap.

“I mean, I am laughing, but it’s just— you’re just— you’re very endearing, Mark,” you tried to explain to him. “I’m being endeared right now— It’s a good thing, just take it as a compliment, okay?”

“Sure, I’ll take it as a compliment.” He nodded. “From now on, when you laugh at something stupid and embarrassing I do or say, I’ll take it as a compliment.”

You chuckled, “You’re funny, you know that?”

“You’re the first person who’s ever told me that,” he admitted, looking up from his hands to you. “You know that?”

“Wait, seriously?” Your smile faded.

“No, but you believed me, didn’t you?” The basilisk snickered.

“Oh, hey!” You retorted indignantly. “Not fair! You had me feeling bad for you this whole time with the sob story about your powers! You can’t just—” But Mark had already devolved into a fit of giggles, and you knew he was too far gone for your argument to hold any water. Instead, you watched him fondly as you realized that this was the most relaxed he’d been around you. As he started collecting himself, you took one more sip of your water, then set it down on the coffee table. “Alright, so what’s your class schedule?”

Mark stared at you wide-eyed. “Huh?”

“I can’t guarantee results of any kind, but I’ll do my best to teach you what I know at least.”

“Really?!” He seemed shocked that his own plan had worked.

“It’s not going to be a one-and-done, I can tell you that much. So, what’s your schedule?” You reiterated your question. “I get off work at five every day and have yoga Tuesdays and Thursdays. So you better be available on a Monday or Wednesday.”

“Wait, what’s wrong with Friday?”

“You may have endeared me, but not enough to give up my Friday nights.”

"Of course, right. Uh, Wednesdays should be the best for me. My last class is over at three and I usually don’t get scheduled then since it’s so late in the day.”

“Where do you work that 3:00 in the afternoon is late?”

“Campus bookstore. Closes at 5:00.”

“Gotcha. So, I will see you here, next Wednesday at 6:00.” You could see panic grow in Mark’s eyes as you started to stand up.

“W-Why not now?”

“Because I have other plans, Mark,” you told him patiently. “I’ll keep Wednesdays for you in the future, but tonight I have somewhere to be. You and Johnny have survived this long, I believe that you’ll be able to survive one more week, okay?”

He got to his feet with a sigh. “You’re right, I’m sorry. Thank you, Y/N. Seriously.”

“Don’t thank me yet.” You started guiding him toward your front door. “Who knows, I might make it worse.”

“I doubt it could get any worse.”

“I am so sorry I’m late,” you breathed out as you sat down at the restaurant booth where your friends were waiting.

“That’s okay, Y/N!” Baekhyun reassured you, pushing a glass over to you. “Here, we got you a water. We didn’t know what you were going to get to eat, so we didn’t want to order a drink-drink.”

“You’re not usually late,” Minseok, another sphinx, pointed out from across the table from you and your siren friend.

“Yeah, is everything alright?” Jongin asked from his seat beside Minseok. You especially noticed now how his s’es weren’t as pronounced as Mark’s, but at least some of his natural sibilance had come back once he got out of that speech “therapy.”

You let out a sigh, dropping your head back against the booth. “I had an unexpected visitor.”

“Ooh, do tell.” Baekhyun’s opalescent scales that sat just under the skin of his cheekbones, bridge of his nose, and forehead shifted with the inquisitive tilt of his head.

“Nothing scandalous, I assure you,” you snorted. “Just some friend of my neighbors, you know, the college kids—”

“A college boy? Y/N, you cougar!” The siren exclaimed, and you rolled your eyes.

“Are you done?”

“Yes, continue.”

“I mean, his friends did indirectly call me a MILF, but I don’t know if I should take that a compliment or an insult really.”

Minseok and Jongin guffawed at that while Baekhyun’s face lit up with delight. He smushed your cheeks in between his hands. “Oh, I’m so proud of you! My baby’s all grown up! No longer a baby but a MILF!”

“At least to a bunch of college boys,” Minseok pointed out, grabbing his glass that looked like it was filled with some dark liquor. Whiskey, maybe. He always liked to mix it up. “Don’t let it get you too down, Y/N, they probably think anybody above human drinking age is middle-aged.”

“Let it get her down?” Baekhyun scoffed indignantly. “You’re clearly missing three-quarters of the acronym here, Minseok!”

“Guys!” You cut into their bickering. “I don’t particularly care one, how old they think I am, or two, how fuckable they think I am.”

“Then why was one of them over at your place and making you late to our dinner?” Jongin arched a brow, taking a drink of what you knew was a glass of witch’s brew and tonic water. Basilisk tongues were extremely sensitive to taste, so regular alcohol was out of the question for him. Witch’s brew on the other hand was the perfect solution, with no burn and a pleasant, light, flowery taste. Almost too perfect of a solution, as you’d carried him home absolutely shitfaced drunk from plenty of parties after he discovered it in high school. Thankfully he’d both built up a tolerance and learned to pace himself and drink responsibly since then, so you hadn’t had to do that in years.

“Because I kind of just agreed to sort of... mentor him?”

“Huh?” Baekhyun tilted his head to the other side.

“Why?” The sphinx snorted and took another swig of his drink.

Jongin just stared at you wordlessly. Shifting forward in your seat, you prepared yourself to try to explain it. “Long story short, he needs help with his powers, and he thinks I can help him.”

“So he’s a sphinx,” Minseok surmised.

“Well, no...”

“Gryphon that was abandoned as a child and never learned how to fly?”

“What? No.”

“Sorry, that’s just literally the only thing that makes sense other than him being another sphinx.”

“No, he’s a... he’s a basilisk.” You crossed your arms over your chest, already prepared for the backlash from your friends over your choice.

“Then give him to Jongin.”

The basilisk scoffed, “I did not come out tonight to be given some kid. No thanks.”

Minseok gestured to him to emphatically. “See? If Jongin’s not worried, the kid’s probably not that big of a danger to society. No need to help. Which you wouldn’t be able to do anyway, because you’re not a basilisk.”

You held your hands up defensively. “Look, I told him I might not be any help, but—”

“But he was just sooo cute with his widdle forked tongue and shedding molting skin all over your couch that you couldn’t say no?” Minseok retorted, making Baekhyun burst into laughter.

“I’m right here, man,” Jongin muttered, taking another sip of his drink.

“No!” You replied indignantly over both Minseok and Baekhyun’s unrestrained laughter at your expense. “He had an actual reason! He pointed out that sphinxes and basilisks develop their powers similarly. We both are born as supernatural creatures, instead of being turned like vampires, but we get our powers later in life, unlike most creatures like sirens, or fairies, or dragons.”

While Jongin actually seemed to be considering the argument, Minseok and Baekhyun still both had disbelieving looks on their faces. The siren composed himself again to ask, “Sure... yeah. But be honest... was he at least a wittle cute?”

You narrowed your eyes at him.

“I mean, there’s a reason we don’t let you near the animal shelter, Y/N,” Minseok reminded you. “You’d adopt everything in there and never get your security deposit back.”

“I told him it might not work. It won’t hurt to just try,” you huffed.

“Just don’t let him tear up your curtains.” Baekhyun patted your shoulder.

The next Wednesday finally rolled around, and you went through your day at work with the thought of your impending guest lingering in your mind. Or, more specifically, what the hell you were going to teach him. It had been on your mind all week. You jotted down what you were first taught when you got your sphinx powers, which was mostly a lot of breathing. Probably not really what he was looking for, but it was the best you got. It sounded like he didn’t even have much of a foundation, which he needed before you could do anything close to actual compelling or petrification—or preventing such.

Locking your front door behind you, you set your purse down and made a beeline for your bedroom to change out of your work clothes into something casual and comfortable. Mark had already seen you in your pajamas once, you weren’t trying to make any impressions here. You tidied up your living room a little, moving a couple dirty pieces of clothes into your bedroom hamper, then took care of your dishes from breakfast this morning that you hadn’t cleaned before leaving for work. All those miscellaneous tasks took up your time nicely, as just as you had finished wiping down your kitchen countertops, you picked up a familiar squeak of sneakers rushing down the hallway. Glancing up at the clock on your microwave, it struck 6:00 p.m. at the exact moment your doorbell rang.

You tossed your used paper towel in the trash before walking over to the front door. Mark was on the other side, the basilisk panting heavily, panic on his face. Before you could even greet him, he blurted out, “I’m sorry! I’m so sorry! I hope I’m not late! I’m here! Please! I was studying, and lost track of time, please, I’m really sorry, Y/N!”

“Woah, Mark, slow down,” you said calmly. “You’re right on time. It’s okay. Please, come in.”

Holding the door open and stepping back, you beckoned him in with a reassuring smile. He let out a sigh of relief, walking in with his head down, eyes focused on his shoes. You got the two of you settled on the floor of your living room, sitting cross-legged facing each other.

“Okay, so today we’re really just going to be—” You were cut off by the sound of a stomach growling very loudly. And it wasn’t yours.

Mark ducked his head in embarrassment. “I’m sorry! Keep going! Just-Just ignore that.”

“You hungry, Mark?”

“Sorry—”

“Did I ask for an apology?”

“No.”

“Then why are you apologizing?” You asked gently.

“Right. Uhm, I had classes and then a meeting with a professor and then I was studying and I’m pretty sure I haven’t eaten since breakfast. I didn’t want to be late…”

You shook your head. “Well, you can’t do this on an empty stomach.”

“I’m—”

“I’m putting a moratorium on the word ‘sorry’ for tonight. You’re done. You’ve hit your max.” You stood up, heading towards your kitchen. “Come on, let’s get some food in you.”

“Okay…”

You rummaged through your fridge to bring out the ingredients for the dinner that you were planning to make tonight after Mark left. Looks like you were going to be moving dinner up. “I don’t know what kind of gourmet meals you’re used to, but don’t expect anything fancy out of my kitchen,” you forewarned him in jest, turning on the stovetop.

That finally got a smile out of him. “Better than the dining hall, I’m sure. And, you really don’t have to—”

“It’s fine. Think of it like this: Would you go on a run, or go to the gym without eating anything? Magic needs energy too, just like exercise.”

“I never realized that.” Mark’s stomach let out another growl then, making the basilisk rub the back of his very red neck, and you smiled quietly to yourself.

“And, I don’t think either one of us could focus much with your stomach rumbling like that.”

Dinner was pulled together quickly, and you took it to your dining table. Pushing aside your laptop to give you enough room to set your plate down, you headed back to your kitchen. “Mark?” You called for his attention as you opened your glasses cabinet. “Water? Wine? Beer? I think I might have a Coke in the back if you want that.”

“Water’s fine.”

You nodded, filling up his glass of ice water before grabbing a beer for yourself and heading back to where the basilisk was waiting for you.

“Thank you.” Mark accepted the cup from you. “Really, this is great.”

“You’re welcome.” You popped open the tab of your can and held it out towards him. He tapped his glass to it, and you grinned, taking a sip before picking up your utensils to start eating.

As you watched Mark dig in eagerly, you felt a warm fondness in your chest for the basilisk in front of you. You wracked your brain for the last time you’d cooked for someone else. Whoever your last boyfriend was, you figured. It was funny, you couldn’t even remember a specific instance, that was just a guess. You and your friends usually ate out, ordered in, or there was the odd occasion that Jongin would host a dinner party and you all would get dressed up to go over to his penthouse—he’d done the best out of all of you, he owned a luxury clothing brand and definitely lived like it. So as you sat here, watching the college student in front of wolf down the simple meal you’d just made for him like it was the best thing he’d ever tasted, you felt the sides of your lips upquirk just the slightest. You lifted another bite to your mouth and took another swig of your beer.

“So what’s your major?” You asked, and he finally looked up at you. It took everything in you not to immediately giggle and coo at his slightly bulging cheeks.

He quickly swallowed the food in his mouth and drank some water before answering your question. “Bio… pre-med track.”

“Wow. Human medicine or magical creatures?”

“Both. Doctors should want to help everyone.” Mark had a scowl on his face as he stabbed a piece of food with his fork.

“Good point. When do you graduate?”

“Next spring. One more year.” He took a deep breath, then let out a big sigh. “After this semester. Then med school… If I don’t catch an attempted murder charge for petrifying Johnny first.”

You looked down at his empty plate, then your half-full one. “Let’s see what we can do about that, then. You want seconds?”

“Please?”

You couldn’t help but chuckle at his big, pleading eyes. “Of course, go for it.”

Back on your living room floor sat cross-legged after dinner, you started where you left off before getting interrupted by the basilisk’s growling stomach. “Tonight won’t be anything big and showy. From what you’ve told me, you don’t even have a foundation. We need that first.”

“A foundation?” The basilisk questioned.

“The times that you’ve accidentally petrified or compelled Johnny, did you feel anything?”

“Horrible and guilty and like a terrible person and that I was a danger to other people.”

You shook your head. “I meant— Did you feel any different physically? On the inside? Or in your body? Not like, ashamed or embarrassed. Not emotionally.”

His face screwed up as he tried to think. “No?”

“That’s what I mean. You can’t even feel when you’re using your magic. Your powers are a part of you, but right now they’re functioning completely separate from you. We need to work on you being able to feel your magic at all before getting around to doing anything with it.”

“And how do I do that?”

“We’re going to go through some guided breathing techniques that I did when I first got my powers, and see how those work, okay?”

“Okay. Uhm, first, though…”

You looked at him attentively. “Yes, Mark?”

“Do you think you could show me your-your heliokinesis?”

“Asked your friend to finish his lecture on sphinxes, huh?” You snickered, twisting around to crack your back.

“Yeah, I mean—”

“It’s fine. Good move, considering. We just don’t call it that.”

“Oh. What is it called?”

“Heliokinesis is the academic word for the general ability to control solar energy, you weren’t wrong. A few different beings can do it. Witches, with the right tools or spells; some fairies; phoenixes at the zenith of their life right before they’re reborn; dryads to a smaller degree; and sphinxes. Us sphinxes call it sol-channeling.”

“Got it. Could you show me some? Sol-channeling? If that’s okay?”

Looking out the window, you saw that there were still remnants of the sunset glowing outside. “Sure, there’s still enough light out.”

The basilisk sat up straight, eagerly drinking in every move you made and every word you said.

“Now, we can only channel, manipulate, and shape existing solar energy that’s available. We can’t create solar energy. So once the Sun is down, that’s it,” you explained, raising your hand towards a beam of orange sunlight that was illuminating a square of carpet in front of you.

Delicately, you plucked the light right out of the air and into your palm, feeling the warmth against your skin as the square melted into a puddle of gleaming liquid amber in your cupped hand. The boy across from you gasped softly as you raised your hand up slightly to pour the sunlight into your other palm like sand at the beach. Tossing it up into the air, it turned into splatters in the empty space between your faces, like an abstract art painting. The deep terracotta light washed Mark’s delighted features in a heavenly glow as he watched it hover there in awe. Like wiping a chalkboard, you took the light back down into your hands again, then gestured for Mark to hold his out. “Come on.”

“A-Are you sure?” He looked between you and the apricot heavens that you were holding uncertainly.

“Yes. I won’t let anything happen to you, Markie. Promise.” You pushed your hands towards him again, insistent. “Now come on, before the sun sets completely and I have to send it back.”

“Alright, alright.” He put his hands out in the space between you, palms cupped together. You placed yours just above them, parting your own palms so that the sunlight fell down into his waiting hands. It had already been tempered, so you weren’t worried about it burning him. Instead, you just got to watch him breathe out in absolute stunned awe as he gently rolled around his little puddle of sunshine. “Dude…” His eyes were glued to his hands. “This is officially the coolest fucking thing I’ve ever seen. And done.”

You laughed. “I’m honored. A bit skeptical, but honored.”

“My powers aren’t cool. They’re just something else that can go horribly wrong,” he sighed, continuing to watch the light in his hands.

Looking outside at the fading sunbeams, you held a hand back out towards him. “I need to send it back. The Sun’s almost gone.”

Mark gently tipped the golden energy back into your waiting palm. You closed your hand around it, focusing on allowing the light to return to its natural state, before opening your fingers. A soft ball of pure, hazy light drifted up from your hand, before shooting out your living room window to rejoin the setting Sun.

“So that’s sol-channeling...” The basilisk murmured.

“One facet of it, yeah,” you nodded.

“It’s beautiful.”

You tilted your head as you took in the pensive look on Mark’s face. Turning back around to fully face him, you could only guess where his thoughts had spiraled to.

“And destructive. Before I could do that, I would melt things, light things on fire, burn... hurt people. Things I can’t undo.” Your voice was quiet but firm, trying to get the point across to him in the most sympathetic way possible that he wasn’t alone in this. He wasn’t the only person to have ever struggled with powers, to have done things he wishes he could take back. “You have got to stop looking at your powers like a curse, and everybody else’s like a blessing. They’re neither. They’re just... they just are.”

The basilisk was quiet, turning his gaze from the carpet up to you. You held his eye contact, easily looking back into those slit pupils with sincerity. “Got it?” You asked.

“Got it.”

Trying not to make your breath of relief too obvious, you rolled out your neck as you focused back on what you’d really meant to start with tonight. “So, some breathing techniques for grounding. Again, we’re trying to build a foundation before anything else. Throughout all of these, I want you to try to reach out for your magic. I know this whole time you’ve been trying to avoid it, right? Trying not to hurt your friend?”

“Yeah.”

“You can’t hurt me, so don’t worry,” you flashed him a confident smile.

Mark sat up with interest at this. “I’ve always heard that sphinxes can’t be petrified by basilisks, and I always kind of thought it was just one of those things about our magic canceling each other out or whatever. Like how siren venom doesn’t work on other sirens. But then Renjun said that actually nobody’s powers work on you because you’ve got... he called it anti-magic, I don’t know if that’s right or...”

“Well that’s very dramatic,” you commented humorously. “‘Anti-magic.’ No, we call it nixing, or foiling. Like all of our powers, we don’t come into it until we’re adults, so technically magic does work on us for a period of time. It also fluctuates with our magical strength, like all beings’ powers. That’s why ‘anti-magic’ isn’t the best word, because it is magic. We can use it too much and get drained.”

“So there’s still a chance I could accidentally petrify you or something!” He panicked, his voice rising with fear.

“Mark, you’re not going to,” you said calmly. “Nixing is instinctual to me, like it is for any developed sphinx. That’s why your friend Renjun called it ‘anti-magic.’ Because it’ll seem like I’m not even doing anything, like your powers are just fizzling out on their own. I promise it’ll be fine. It would take me nixing a lot of very strong magic for a very long time to be drained anywhere near levels where my nixing could have even a chance of being weaker, much less not working at all. What we’re doing won’t even come close.”

He gulped. “Really?”

“Really. Let me worry about me and my powers.” You placed a hand over your chest. “You just work on finding your powers, wherever you’ve pushed them to in there.”

“You say that like I’ve got some big cavern inside of me or something,” he snorted skeptically. “Or this mind palace thing that Renjun always talks about.”

“If imagining something like that helps you, then sure.”

“I was joking.”

“This is magic, Mark. It’s a lot more abstract and metaphysical than whatever you’re learning in your bio classes.”

He groaned. “Oh great. I almost failed my philosophy class freshman year.”

“Good thing I’m not handing out grades, then. Come on, close your eyes. I’ll start a count.”

Mark had even less of a foundation than you did when you started out. At least your powers had been tied to your emotions at first—such as the case of a rather unfortunate car melting—meanwhile from what you could tell, his seemed to just happen randomly. When you tried to talk him through recalling how he felt in the moments leading up to when he actually used his powers, he couldn’t find any sort of common thread. The first time, he’d been startled by Johnny unexpectedly appearing around the corner in a clay face mask, but other times they’d be watching movies together, eating dinner, or playing basketball. It couldn’t be self-defense, fight or flight, or even just any strong emotion—one time Mark was scrolling on his phone practically catatonic, glanced up for one second and Johnny was on the floor.

Counting back down from the last breathing exercise you had prepared for the night, you stole a glance at the time. Between dinner and this, Mark had been at your place for almost three hours, that was plenty for one night. “Alright, Mark, let’s call it there for today,” you announced quietly, offering him a fleeting half-smile. “How are you feeling?”

“The same as when I got here. Well, less hungry, I guess,” he shrugged, blowing a couple pieces of hair out of his eyes. “Thanks, though. Sorry I ate your food then just wasted your time.”

“I told you it wasn’t going to be a one and done. I think the only one of us who expected you to come in here and immediately nail everything was you.”

“It’s not that I was expecting to nail everything… just sort of hoping I’d at least be able to do something? Other than breathe?”

You chuckled, “Yeah, that’s fair. Once you can feel your powers, it’ll be a lot different, I promise.”

“Different…” he echoed. “Not easier, or better?”

“Different,” you confirmed with a nod. “Unfortunately, it’s looking like we can’t use muscle memory to get there, which is how I was taught. Since there’s apparently nothing in common with how you’ve used your powers before. Other than—” With a thoughtful frown, you cut yourself off, quickly trying to recall all the stories Mark had told you tonight of him accidentally petrifying or compelling his roommate.

“Other than…?” The basilisk prompted you curiously.

“Have you used your powers on anybody other than Johnny?” You questioned. “Other human friends? Classmates? Random cashier at a grocery store?”

“Yeah, one time.”

“Tell me about it!”

“I don’t know if it really counts…”

“It’s an anomaly, it might help. Who was it? What happened?”

“It was Renjun.”

“Your Magical Creatures Studies major friend.”

“Exactly. He’s kind of got like this list of magical stuff that he wants to do? Like, getting his blood drank by a vampire, experiencing siren venom, that kind of stuff.”

“Getting petrified by a basilisk?”

“Yeah.”

“So you petrified him.”

“Not on purpose! Or, not on my purpose,” Mark groaned. “Renjun’s like actually insane when it comes to that kind of thing. Somehow, he figured out when he was most likely to get accidentally petrified by me and… it happened.”

“Mark.”

“I didn’t mean to!”

“You need to get Renjun’s notes,” you instructed him.

“What?”

“On how he got you to petrify him. If he’s that neurotic, he was definitely taking notes and found some sort of pattern, and probably kept his notes. We need those notes. Get them.”

He sighed and rubbed his face. “You don’t know Renjun. When I say he’s insane about this, I’m not kidding. There’s no way he’d—”

“Just a copy, he can keep the originals. He can come make the copies at my office so he doesn’t even have to use his printing credits at the library,” you bargained.

“Fine, fine! I’ll ask him.”

“Perfect! Here, if you give me your phone, I’ll put my number in and you can let me know what day I can expect him.” After inputting your cell and texting yourself, you handed Mark’s phone back to him, not missing his shaky fingers. You patted his hand, softening your voice, “We’ll figure this out, Mark, alright?”

“Why?” He looked up from where your hand was still resting atop his, to your face, gnawing on his bottom lip with his baby fangs. “Why did you agree to help me? Why are you doing it so… enthusiastically?”

“I’m helping you because you asked for help. And when I was your age, and I needed help doing all of this, too, I had somebody there with me. I don’t know, call me crazy, but I don’t think all of us are here just to go about our lives by ourselves. I think people are supposed to rely on each other, criss-cross their lives so much until you can’t tell one line from another.”

“We’re all interconnected?”

“Yeah, or at least I think we should be, that’s how we’re meant to be. To rely on each other.” You nodded. “Not to randomly get all philosophical on you, I know you said you almost failed that class. You asked me for help, and I wanted to try to help you. No ulterior evil sphinx motive here, I promise. You can tell everybody not to worry about their poor little Markie.”

Mark’s face started turning pink. “It wasn’t really the sphinx part that they were focused on.”

“Oh?” You leaned back, propping yourself up with two hands behind you. “What was it then? Stranger danger?”

“No, not exactly…”

“Then I am stumped about what it could be,” you replied facetiously.

Mark started scrambling to his feet, his word speed picking up, “You know, it’s getting late, if we’re done, I should really get going—”

You followed him up with a grin. “Yeah, of course. You know, I’ve got work tomorrow, you’ve got class—Oh, is that it?” You breathed out in feigned realization. “Because I’m an older woman? They thought I was going to devour you in a different way?”

“Oh God—” He said under his breath, staring at the ceiling. His throat bobbed up and down as he swallowed hard. “I’m really sorry, they were just kidding, you know. And I know there’s no way you’d want to—”

“Remember what I said last week, Mark?”

“W-What part?”

Leaning forward just a little, you reminded him, “Not unless you ask nicely.”

His eyes shot open to the size of dinnerplates, and you could only hold it in for a second before you were openly laughing in his face, barely having the decency to attempt to cover your mouth with your hand, which honestly did little to muffle it.

“You’re awful, Y/N,” Mark groaned, squeezing his eyes shut and shaking his head. “Is this what endearing you gets me? Torture?”

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” you tried to apologize through your breathless giggles. “Anyway, I’ll let you go, stop torturing you. Let me know when to expect Renjun. In the meantime, I want you to practice that first breathing exercise twice a day on your own until next Wednesday, okay?”

“Right, thanks.”

You didn’t even look up from your computer screen as you picked up your ringing desk phone. It was the ring for an internal call, meaning that it was either the front desk or one of your colleagues calling you, you didn’t need to filter those calls as much as external calls. “This is Y/N,” you answered automatically, still reviewing the timeline that had just been submitted to you.

“Uh, Ms. Y/L/N?” It was the receptionist, the poor guy sounding rather confused. “There’s a… boy here to see you?”

“A boy?” You repeated, bewildered. “What? Like, a child?”

“No, sorry, not like a little boy. College kid, Huang Renjun, says you’re expecting him?”

“Oh, oh, yes!” You lit up in recognition. “Have him wait there, I’ll be down in just a minute to grab him.”

Striding off the elevator, your eyes immediately locked onto a young man standing in the lobby, clutching a notebook to his chest as he peered around at everything suspiciously. He readjusted his backwards baseball cap minutely, checking the watch that was on that wrist as he brought his hand back down from his head.

“Renjun,” you said his name confidently, walking up to him with a bright smile. “Hi, I’m Y/N. Thanks for coming.”

“Damn, you’re real,” he breathed out.

“Let’s go upstairs, hm?”

The two of you were the only ones in the elevator as the doors shut. “So, what part of my existence did you doubt, exactly?” You asked, amusement in your tone. “Mark knowing me? Or my being a sphinx?”

“The first one,” Renjun had recovered from his initial shock, his voice level as he answered. “I’ve met a sphinx before.”

“And what did you have them do to you?”

“What?”

“You’ve tricked Mark into petrifying you, had your blood drank, and you want a siren to dose you up. I’m wondering what about sphinxes could provide that sort of… rush.”

“I’m not an adrenaline junkie.”

“Your words, not mine.” You held up your hands. “And I’m not judging you, Renjun. Just curious.”

“I don’t know them like that, anyway. It’s my friends’ boss.”

“So what’s on your list, then?”

“I want to solve a sphinx’s riddle.”

One of your eyebrows quirked up, and it was then that the elevator dinged and stopped on your floor. In the copy room, you held a hand out towards Renjun expectantly, and he reluctantly gave you a stack of notebook paper from within his binder. You put the first page on the pane of glass of the copier, lowered the lid, and prepared the setting to make the first copy. “I’m not giving you a riddle,” you stated into the heavy silence that had descended over the two of you.

“Why not?” Renjun whined, reminding you of a petulant child.

The copier shot out the first page, and you repeated the process with the backside. “As a Magical Creatures Studies major, I’m sure you know very well why not.”

“I would totally solve it though! You wouldn’t have to worry about me going insane!”

“You either greatly overestimate your intelligence, or greatly underestimate a sphinx’s.” You shook your head.

“Plenty of people have solved sphinx riddles.”

“And even more have gone insane trying,” you retorted. “No way am I going to even risk making you go insane.”

“I’ll sign whatever waiver you want! You won’t be liable at all!”

“But it’ll still be my fault,” you sighed. “Sol-channeling, nixing, flying, I’d show you any of that. But no riddles.”

He let out a long, dramatic sigh, “Fine.”

“How’d you do it, by the way?”

“Do what?”

“Make Mark petrify you.”

“It’s all in there.”

“Yeah, but we’re going to be here for a little while I copy all these.” You put the next page on. “You can tell me how you figured it out, can’t you?”

“Well, I started by taking notes of as many parameters I could get about when, where, and how Mark was petrifying Johnny,” Renjun started, his eyes sparkling with excitement. “At first I was a bit concerned that he wouldn’t be able to petrify anybody but Johnny. But then I found that in addition to him always petrifying Johnny, one of three things was always present.”

“And what were those three things?”

“Being at home, it being nighttime—aka he was tired—or him being stressed. I figured if I could remove Johnny from the equation but hit all the other three, and conveniently hide his sunglasses, I had a pretty good chance of being petrified.”

“And what if he had accidentally turned you to stone for real?” You crossed your arms over your chest. “He’s a developing basilisk with absolutely no control over his powers, he could have seriously hurt you, or worse.”

Renjun shrugged. “That was a risk I was willing to take.”

“Yeah, for the both of you,” you scoffed, throwing the lid of the copier open and accidentally hitting the wall behind it in the process. “Do you know how awful Mark would’ve felt if he had actually turned one of his friends to stone? And then he had to live with that for the rest of his longer-than-human life? Did you even think about that before tricking him into petrifying you for some stupid fucking magic junkie bucket list?”

The human seemed to be at a loss for words, opening and closing his mouth several times before he looked down at his shoes, going silent.

“That wasn’t rhetorical, Renjun.” You closed the lid on the next page, turning to look at him pointedly. He was looking incredibly guilty, but you weren’t going to let him get away with a noncommittal silence. “Look, I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt that your heart is in the right place, and you’re just genuinely curious about all this stuff, but your magical friends are not just here for your entertainment. Whatever they do to you, they have to live with too. You know that, right?”

He sighed bitterly, and after another long, contemplative pause, nodded. “You’re right, you’re right.”

“Yeah, I know I am.”

You sent Renjun off with his original notes and hopefully a lot to think about. You yourself didn’t have too much more work left to do, and locked yourself in your office to go over the copies you’d made. He’d been thorough, and you were realizing that Mark really hadn’t been exaggerating when he’d called his friend crazy. About thirty minutes before the end of the workday, there was a timid knock at your door, and you put down the papers to go answer the door. It was one of your team members, who timidly informed you of a horrible error that had happened that would put the entire project back by two days if it wasn’t fixed today. It was really nobody’s fault, so you took a few deep breaths, rolled up your sleeves, and got to work with everybody else. It was Wednesday, though, and you kept an eye on the time as you worked, running mental calculations in the back of your mind as to when you’d have to text Mark to let him know you’d be late getting home. Thankfully, it was all solved right before then, and you were able to run out the door at just the right time where if you speedwalked and made every light perfectly, you’d be home right on time.

And so you burst into your hallway at exactly 5:59 p.m., spotting Mark on your welcome mat, just lifting his fist to your door to knock. “I’m here!” You called out to him, making him whip around, the surprise apparent on his features. “I’m here, sorry, I’m here. Got held up at work.”

“Hey, no worries,” he flashed you a bright smile, stepping out of your way to let you unlock your front door. “Everything alright?”

You threw an exasperated look at him over your shoulder as you disarmed your alarm, then led the way into your apartment. “Heavenly Sol, don’t get me started. Computers are out to get us all, I swear.”

“Yeah, okay,” Mark nodded, closing the door behind you two and flicking the latch. “Add printers to the list, too. I can never figure out the ones in the library when I have an assignment due.”

You threw your purse onto your kitchen table haphazardly, starting to look through your fridge for dinner ingredients. “Oh shit, I was going to pick up stuff for dinner on my way home, but then everything fucking caught on fire right before I was supposed to leave.”

“That’s okay, Y/N,” the basilisk reassured you. “We can just order pizza or something, alright?”

“Yeah, okay, pizza.” You shut your fridge, rubbing your face in frustration.

“I’ll call and order it, you go get out of your work clothes and stuff. Sound like a plan?”

You took a deep breath. “Sure. Thanks, Markie.”

He beamed at you again, letting you get a full view of his baby fangs. “See? I’m not totally useless.”

“Nobody said you were except you,” you finally chuckled, patting his cheek on your way out of the kitchen.

Jongin had invited everyone around to his place for another dinner party, and you were the first one to arrive tonight. You’d already cracked open a bottle of wine—you snooze, you lose, Baekhyun and Minseok—and were tipping back your first glass of the night as Jongin finished up the food preparations.

“Y/N, how’s your basilisk doing?” Your friend asked, plating a serving of pasta.

“He’s doing alright. It’s been a little rough these past few weeks, if I’m going to be honest with you,” you sighed, doing another heavy pour for yourself. “I taught him some breathing exercises, and those helped a bit, but I can only watch him breathe for so long.”

Jongin made a noise of acknowledgment, but didn’t say anything else, fingertips messing with a silver chain around his neck.

“Do you… have any tips for me?” You asked, used to his minimalist way of communicating.

Your friend pulled out from under his shirt the pendant that hung at the end of that silver chain. It was a black gem that could fit neatly into his palm, obsidian, an intricate weaving design of a snake carved out of the face of it. “Does he have an anchor?”

You habitually twisted the ring around your right ring finger. “No, he doesn’t.”

“Find him one.” He tucked the necklace back under his shirt. “Get him out of his head.”

“Right. Thanks, Jongin.”

A flurry of excited knocks came from the front door, and you and Jongin exchanged knowing looks. You threw open the door to see an excited Baekhyun and already beaming Minseok, the former’s eyes lighting up even as he gasped in mock offense.

“You started drinking without us?!” The siren threw a hand over his chest as he locked in on the glass in your hand and open bottle on the kitchen island.

“Yep, you’re a glass and a half behind,” you taunted, guiding him in by the arm he had around your shoulders. “Better catch up, Baekhyunnie.”

“She opened that not even ten minutes ago,” Jongin informed the other two flatly in lieu of a proper greeting.

“Fuckin’ narc.” You stuck your tongue out at him as Baekhyun started pouring for him and Minseok. Minseok, meanwhile, was over by the vinyl record player, flicking through Jongin’s collection until he picked one that he liked, and swapped out the classical music that the basilisk already had playing.

“I was listening to that,” Jongin complained as a funky, upbeat pop melody started coming through the speakers.

“And now you’re listening to this,” Minseok retorted. “Much better party music.”

“And you people wonder why I don’t invite you to events with my colleagues,” the basilisk sighed, taking out his bottle of witch’s brew from the fridge. His slit pupils trailed over the figures of you and Baekhyun, not nearly tipsy enough for the kind of dancing you were doing, but doing it nonetheless. “Heathens, the lot of you.”

“Oh, like we didn’t all go to college together,” Baekhyun fired back, mischievous glint in his eye. “We all know what you used to get up to on that stuff, Jongin. Before you started playing pretend at being respectable and refined.”

“Yeah, come on, NiNi!” You tugged him into the living room by his wrist, playing absolutely dirty by bringing out the nickname you used to call him when you were little, little kids. When you first met, you couldn’t quite say his name, so you somehow landed on NiNi, which you called him until you could finally say it intelligibly. Even now, you only brought the nickname out when you really wanted something. And according to the now nearly two glasses of wine in you, you really wanted him to dance with the other three of you.

“God, fine,” he rolled his eyes, taking a deep swig of the witch’s brew before letting you fully tug him into the mess.

The following Wednesday found you opening up your door a few minutes early, 5:55. Mark was already pink-eared and covering his face with his hands. “God, let me in, please, please,” he groaned, making you cock your head curiously.

Before you could ask what was going on, you heard a couple wolf whistles and taunts from further down the hall, and spotted a gaggle of college boys heading towards you. Or, rather, heading towards your neighbors’ apartment, presumably, as you spotted Chenle and Jisung in the throng of students. You opened your door wider for Mark, who didn’t even wait for you to move as he ducked under your arm to run inside. With a final humorous glance at the group, you turned around to face the anxiously pacing basilisk.

“And what are you so worked up for?” You asked with a chuckle, shutting your door behind him. “You just got here, take a breather.”

He gesticulated at the closed door, a wild look in his eyes. “Well, because they all think we’re—”

“Having sex? I know.” You laughed again and headed back into your kitchen.

“And you don’t care?”

Pivoting on your heel to focus a pointed look on him, you put your hands squarely on your hips as you told him frankly, “Mark. I’m a grown ass woman. Whatever ideas my two college kid neighbors and their little twerp friends have about my sex life are so beyond the realm of things that I care about.”

“Oh.” He blinked, and you could practically see the gears turning in his brain as he processed that. “Of course.”

With that settled in your mind, you turned your back on him again to attend to your cooking, continuing your conversation over your shoulder. “You should really try it, you know.”

“Try what?!” He squeaked as he was halfway through taking his backpack off his shoulder and setting it down beside the couch.

“Not caring so much about what other people think about you. You know they’re only doing all that because you’re reacting like this.”

“I know, I know,” he admitted with a sigh, his voice much closer now. You heard the scrape of one of the stools at your kitchen island as he pulled it out to sit down and watch you cook.

“So, have you been working on—”

“Wait, do you think I’m a twerp?”

You pivoted around, knife in hand. “Three seconds ago I would’ve said no, except you just interrupted me, so yes, I think you’re a rude little twerp with no manners.”

He looked at you with wide eyes. “Sorry, sorry.”

“So have you been working on the breathing techniques I showed you?” You tossed the last bits in the container, sealing it up before putting it in the fridge.

“Yeah.”

Putting everything into the sink to be washed up later, you spun around to look at Mark eagerly, “Good. Now come on, grab your bag.”

“Wait, we’re done already?” 

“No, we’re going shopping.”

“I thought you were cooking dinner?”

“Yeah, that’s my dinner for tomorrow, it’s got to marinate overnight. You and I are eating out tonight. Come on!” You clapped your hands together in a hup-hup gesture, and Mark scrambled to grab his bag before meeting you at the front door.

“For a lot of magical creatures who were born with their powers, they often see it as shameful to use objects to focus or help them harness their abilities,” you explained to Mark as you stopped in front of your first destination. He rushed to hold the door open for you, and you gave him a nod and grateful smile as you continued, “Save for witches, of course, that’s kind of their whole thing. But for beings like us, whose powers come on later, a lot of times having an external object can help ground us a lot better and give us something physical to tie this new part of us to while we’re learning to use it.”

“What kind of object?” He asked, looking around the apothecary hesitantly.

“It’s different for every kind of being, and even for every individual. That’s why I couldn’t just show up with some rock and say ‘here you go!’ You need to pick it out for yourself.”

“What’s yours?”

You held up your right hand, where a toffee brown gem gleamed from a silver setting on one of your fingers. “Tiger’s eye ring. My grandmother gave it to me when she was helping me out with my powers.”

“It’s really pretty.”

“She said she got it from a witch ‘friend’ of hers a while back,” you commented humorously. “Anyway, anything speaking to you?”

He looked over the merchandise around you, and sighed. “I mean, it’s all cool, but... nothing really jumps out.”

“That’s fine, don’t force it. This is just the first aisle of the first store we’re looking in. Deep breath, Mark.”

“Right, okay. It can be anything?”

“Anything. Doesn’t have to be a stone, doesn’t have to be jewelry, those are just sort of the most popular items. I hate to have to say this but... you’ll know it when you see it. You just will.”

“Y/N.” He said your name flatly. “I have never been that sure of anything in my entire life.”

You tried to keep in your giggles at his clearly exasperated expression. Tweaking one of his cheeks, you reassured him, “First time for everything, Markie.”

Three apothecaries and a 24-hour ramen place later, and you could tell Mark was Over It, capital O, capital I. He had really been trying his best, engaging with every miscellaneous item that you showed to him, but you could tell that none of them were it for him. Leaving the last shop for the night, you opted not to take him into another one, instead meandering away from the shopping district downtown that you had been in.

“I’m sorry I’m such a dud, Y/N,” Mark groaned, running a hand through his hair.

“No, you’re not, Mark,” you tried to reassure him. “You’re just… taking it at your own pace.”

“Was that supposed to make me feel better? You might as well have called me a late bloomer.”

“What’s wrong with being a late bloomer?”

“That’s what people tell losers so they don’t feel like losers.”

You rolled your eyes. “And that’s how I can tell you’re still a kid, Markie.”

“What?”

“There’s nothing wrong with being a so-called loser, or a late bloomer, or taking things at your own pace. Part of growing up, and becoming an adult, a real grown-up, is realizing that there’s no one prescribed path and way to do things. Especially when it comes to being a magical being.”

“That’s easy to say when you’re already a grown-up.”

“I suppose.” You shrugged. “Here, I’ll let you in on a secret, hm?”

“Oh yeah?”

“When was your first kiss?”

“What?” He sputtered out. “I thought you were going to tell me a secret?!”

“Humor me.”

He mumbled something under his breath that you couldn’t quite catch.

“What was that?”

“Seventeen, okay?!” He huffed. “Listen, it was my first girlfriend and—”

“Twenty-one,” you cut him off with a shrug.

“What?”

“My first kiss was when I was twenty-one,” you repeated nonchalantly. “You thought I had it a lot earlier, didn’t you?”

“It’s not like I was really hypothesizing about it or anything—”

“But the way you told me about yours, you got defensive, like you had assumed yours was late or something, and that I was going to judge you, because I must have had mine earlier than seventeen,” you pointed out. “But I didn’t.”

“But you’re… you’re so… Why?” His face screwed up in confusion.

“That was my first serious boyfriend,” you explained. “I wanted it to be special. I didn’t expect it to take that long, but it did.”

“And what was the point of this?”

“There’s nothing wrong with whatever pace your life is going at, Mark. I don’t think ‘late bloomers’ even exist, because that implies there’s a benchmark to do something by, and having it happen after that therefore makes you late.”

Mark was quiet for a few moments as you continued walking. “You really think I’m still a kid?”

“Oh yeah,” you ruffled his hair. “Only a kid would be worried about if someone thinks they’re a kid.”

He made a disgruntled sound at you messing up his hair, but did nothing to move out of the way of your hand. “Where are we even going now? Another store?”

“Nah.” You led the way off the sidewalk and into the grass, towards the river that cut through the center of town. Traffic hummed overhead where a bridge crossed the water, and you stopped at a rocky patch to pick up a smooth pebble, tossing it up and down a few times. Looking over your shoulder at a skeptical Mark, you asked, “You know how to skip rocks?”

You tossed your first one, managing to skip it a few times before it plopped under the surface. Grabbing another rock, you pushed it into Mark’s hand insistently. “Oh, gross, it’s cold and wet,” he wrinkled his nose, but readied his arm nevertheless.

“You’re literally a basilisk, dude,” you retorted, watching him line up his shot.

“Rude.”

“Hey, I don’t mind.” You held up your hands defensively. “I’m just saying.”

He got it two-thirds of the way across, and shrugged. “Eh…”

“First one to skip it all the way across wins?” You suggested with a smirk.

“Wins what?”

“Mmm…” You hummed thoughtfully. “I got it! Winner earns a secret.”

“Huh?”

“Winner earns a secret of their choosing from the loser. If I win, I can ask you to tell me a secret about whatever topic I want. If you win, same goes for you.”

“Why would I agree to that?”

You grinned. “Because you want to know more about me, don’t you, Markie?”

He gulped, then started looking around at the rocks down by his feet. “Fine. But don’t ask me anything weird if you win.”

“Aw, where’s the fun in that?” You snickered, searching for your own rock to toss.

Mark went first, and his almost made it, but lost momentum about eighty percent of the way there. You went next, flicking your wrist the complete wrong way, only getting one skip before your rock pathetically plopped under the surface. The basilisk next to you giggled. “Are you even trying?”

You stuck your tongue out at him. “Like you’re doing any better, you little shit.”

“Real mature,” he shook his head, brushing off some dirt from the rock he just picked up. “Real grown-up of you. Who’s the kid here, allegedly?”

“Just throw it.” You were already searching for your next pebble.

“So, did you say anything to Renjun, when you met him?”

“What do you mean? Of course I talked to him.”

“No, I mean like—” Mark flicked his arm a couple times in practice shots, maintaining his hold on his stone. “He apologized to me, for tricking me into petrifying him and bought me lunch. Renjun doesn’t apologize.”

“Oh,” you feigned surprise. “That’s nice of him.”

“Y/N.”

“I didn’t threaten him, if that’s what you’re asking. We chatted. He apparently thought some more afterwards.” You finally spotted a lovely lighter colored one, with dark, perfectly circular spots all along it. You couldn’t quite make out the colors in the negligible light from the moon and lone streetlamp all the way up on the bridge, but you liked the weight of it in your hand.

You looked up just in time to watch Mark skip his rock all the way across the river, skidding up onto the shore on the other side. He jumped up and down victoriously, turning around to look at you, excitement on his features. “Yes! Did you see that?!” He cheered, an ecstatic grin on his face. “Ha! Take that!”

“Good job, Markie,” you snickered, holding a hand up for him to high-five zealously. Your palm stung where he had smacked it enthusiastically, a loud slap of skin hitting skin ringing out. Taking your phone out, you turned on your flashlight to look at the rock that you had found, taking in the mossy green color and dark red spots. “Huh, cool.”

As you were about to toss it back into the water, Mark’s hand darted out to grab your wrist. “Wait a second…”

“What?” You looked at him curiously. “You want to try to make it across twice? You won’t get two secrets from me. Sorry, one-time offer.”

“No,” he shook his head, holding your hand open to stare down at the stone. “It’s… it’s a nice rock.”

“Yeah, I guess,” you agreed, continuing to study his face. “Do you… want to keep it, Mark?”

“Do you mind?”

“No, go for it.” You turned your hand over, depositing it into his palm. “All yours.”

He continued looking at it with fascination, fingertip tracing over the textured edges. “Y/N… I think this is my anchor.”

“I think you’re right.” You patted him on the shoulder. “Congrats, dude.”

“Hey, can I uh, take a raincheck on asking you for that secret? I kind of want to think on it.”

“Sure. Use it wisely.”

“I just got home, Sehun, what could be so pertinent that you need to call me now?” You sighed as you answered your ringing cell phone some weeks later. “And why are you still at work? You said only ten more minutes, thirty minutes ago.”

Your coworker sounded simultaneously guilty, nervous, and as exasperated as you, “I know, but Director Han was asking to see some of the numbers and then, well... I got this email from Mr. Shin. I don’t know how to respond. I forwarded it to you.”

Sitting down at your kitchen table, you opened your laptop, which turned on already to your work email. Right at the top was a forwarded email from Oh Sehun, and you clicked on it. You skimmed it over, your lip curling with distaste. Mr. Shin was a project manager in another department, and was apparently trying to assign “urgent tasks” to your employees that needed to be on his desk first thing tomorrow. Sehun would’ve needed to stay all night and/or come in ridiculously early tomorrow in order to get this done. “I’ll handle Mr. Shin, don’t worry about doing any of this. You go home. Now.” You directed Sehun. “And I’ll remind Director Han in the morning about the company’s overtime policy as well.”

“Right. Thank you, Y/N.”

“Of course. Goodnight, Sehun.”

Setting your phone aside, you quickly drafted an email in reply to Mr. Shin, keeping your snark to appropriate corporate levels, reminding him that he couldn’t assign tasks to your employees, and any requests such as this had to come through you first. As well as outlining the unreasonableness of the time demands.

“So what do you do?” Mark asked, suddenly reminding you of his presence. It was Wednesday, though your usual dinnertime ritual had been interrupted before it could even start, Sehun’s call coming as soon as the college student had stepped foot in your apartment.

“I’m a project manager at a company that does network security for other companies,” you informed him, not taking your eyes off your screen as you went to re-read the email for a quick proofread.

“Project manager?”

“I manage a bunch of other people’s projects instead of actually working on them myself, and get paid more than them for it.” You filled in a missing word, and deeming the email finished, pressed send, shutting your laptop. Looking up at Mark, who had an adorably confused look on his face, you gave him a smirk. “When you grow up, Markie, you’ll understand that most corporate jobs are fake and it’s all about your title and how well you can negotiate your salary and bullshit in front of your boss.”

“So you don’t like your job?”

You shrugged. “I like it just fine. It pays for me to live here by myself, after all. I have reasonable hours, and plenty of free time, vacation days, and disposable income. I keep my subordinates and my superiors happy. But if I got a better offer at another company, and my company couldn’t match it, I would have no qualms about packing it up next week.”

“Seriously?” His eyes widened.

“Seriously.”

“Just-Just leaving?” His voice rose with alarm.

“The company, yeah. Not here. I have a life here. My family, and my friends,” you explained, standing up from your dining table.

You could see him visibly relax at that. “Oh, okay.”

“And my Markie,” you teased, pinching his cheek as you passed him on your way to the kitchen.

He squirmed a little, but didn’t knock your hand away. “Hey...”

You laughed to yourself, stopping at the sink to wash your hands before starting on dinner.

“Am I not your friend?” Mark’s question stopped you as you were grabbing ingredients from the fridge.

“Huh?” It was your turn to be confused. Your hand hovered over a bell pepper.

“You said you have your family, your friends, and me. You didn’t include me in your friends. Am I not your friend?” His voice was closer now, and you shut the door to turn towards it, not expecting him to be right on the other side. You jumped in your skin a bit, but that wasn’t the only reason your heart was racing, and a shiver shot up your spine all the way to the back of your neck. Mark’s dark, slit pupils were focused on you with such an intensity that you would’ve thought he were trying to petrify you if the both of you didn’t already know that that wouldn’t work. There was something so startlingly adult in his gaze, all sense of boyish charm that his features usually held gone as the overhead lights of your kitchen cast them in harsh shadows and angles. For the first time ever when you looked at Mark, you were reminded that basilisks were technically predators.

You laughed, hoping he couldn’t hear how nervous you were in it. Wishing your heart to still, you squeezed his upper arm reassuringly. “Oh, no, of course you’re my friend. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to leave you out like that.”

Were his arms always this toned? Or was this just the first time you noticed it?

Mark held your gaze for another moment before he blinked, shook his head, and smiled, “Yeah, of course. I’m sorry about that. School’s just fried my brain, you know?”

“Don’t worry about it.” You smiled back, patting his shoulder before opening the fridge again.

“You need any help?”

“Sure, sure. You mind chopping some vegetables?” You held the bell pepper out to him.

He nodded dutifully. “On it!”

As he started on that task with the same eagerness to please that he always had, you found that you couldn’t box him back in as just that cute bumbling college kid who had appeared on your doorstep a few weeks ago. Gently pressing your hand to his back to let him know that you were skirting around behind him with your own knife, you took note of how firm it was under your fleeting touch, hidden under another one of his school t-shirts that hung off his shoulders in such a way that it seemed as though every readjustment of his arms caused the motion to catch your gaze. When he asked you to assess the cuts he was making, you had to reach over to adjust how he was holding the bell pepper and knife, listening to his own heartbeat for a twofold reason: to not have to hear to your own spike as your gaze dragged over his forearms and hands where they gripped the handle, and because you were curious. You weren’t a fool, you knew Mark was attracted to you superficially the moment you opened your door the first night. But what about now?

You carefully made a couple minute adjustment to his fingers, letting your own fingertips graze over his skin and linger for just a moment longer than necessary, as if you were making extra certain he had the right position. To your satisfaction, you heard his heart pick up to more of a skitter, and his breaths through his nose quickened. Then, you let go of him as quick as you’d descended.

“Try that now,” you murmured. He pushed the blade down and sliced it through the red pepper easily, at the perfect width. You squeezed right at the bend of his arm approvingly as you praised him, “Good job, Mark.”

“T-Thanks.” The tips of his ears were red, and you could feel his arm tense under your grasp. Taking your hand back to pick your blade up again, you then went back to chopping your own ingredients.

A few weeks later, and Mark had been progressing pretty well now that he had an anchor. You’d taken his stone to a local coven’s shop downtown to get it turned into a pendant so he didn’t have to worry about remembering to put it in his pocket every day. Interestingly when given free rein to match the carving to him without either of your input, the witches had crafted a lion instead of anything serpentine, as was popular for basilisks. On a Wednesday morning, you had just settled into your desk at work when your phone buzzed with a text from Mark.

[markie: i am SO sorry but my prof just announced a study session tonight and i NEED to attend. are you free any other time this week? if not, next week is great as usual!]

[you: saturday. 10:30 a.m. be there or be square]

[markie: be there or be square? i forgot how old you are]

[you: nvm don’t come over you ungrateful twerp]

[you: i was joking, Sol forbid women do anything]

[markie: nooooooo im so sorry 🥺🥺🥺]

[you: nice try but those emojis are doing nothing you googoo gaga ass bitch]

[markie: i'll bring bagels?]

[you: fine. no bagels no entry]

[markie: 🫡]

Saturday at 10:29 a.m. there was a knock at your front door. Mark was in fact on the other side, holding up a brown paper bag with a logo of a nearby bakery on the side.

“Hey, come on in.” You smiled breathlessly, readjusting the toddler on your hip.

“Thanks.” He shut the door behind him, then nodded to the child. “So uh, anything new, Y/N?”

“He’s not mine,” you replied frankly. “This is my nephew. I’m emergency babysitting, hope you don’t mind. We had already rescheduled once, and it was last-minute.”

“No, of course not. Little guy’s cute.” Mark gently poked MinMin’s chubby cheek, making the little boy giggle, and the basilisk giggle back in turn. “So this is what a baby sphinx looks like...”

“Not a sphinx, he’s a wittle witch.” You cooed at the baby in your arms, gently pinching his tummy to elicit another joyous laugh.

“Huh?”

“He’s not actually related to me, he’s my friend’s kid. I’ve just known Jongdae—his dad—for so long that I get to be Aunt Y/N.”

“That’s really nice... So what’s his name?”

“Everyone just calls him MinMin. I don’t think the poor guy will ever be called by his real name unless he’s in trouble.”

“Oof, the full name scolding.”

“Speaking of... Did you remember, Mark Lee?”

“Ouch. You can literally see the bag in my hands.” He shook the bag before putting it on the dining table.

“I meant your homework, not the bagels.”

“Oh.” Mark grabbed a couple dishes from your kitchen cabinets, setting them at your usual places before doing the same with napkins. “Yes, I did that too.”

You sat down, settling MinMin in your lap as you peered into the bag for your usual bagel order, setting it on your plate. “Alright, then show me.”

“Uh... with MinMin here?” Mark asked uncertainly, looking at the child.

“Oh, right. Hold on.” You stood up and walked over to the diaper bag Jongdae had dropped off when he’d shown up and deposited MinMin into your arms in a rushed panic. His wife was an emergency medicine doctor and had gotten called into a shift at the ER in the wee hours of the morning, but your friend was already booked to perform at a wedding that day, and the only babysitter he could find at the last minute was you. You were more than happy to take MinMin for the day, even with your prior arrangements with Mark.

Rooting around through a couple of the pockets, moving aside diapers, snacks, and spare changes of clothes, you finally secured what you were looking for. A teeny, tiny, baby-sized pair of sunglasses. Taking him and the glasses back over to your spot in front of Mark, you sat MinMin down in your lap and gently pulled the green Keroppi-themed sunglasses onto the child’s face. They secured around the back of his head with a strap, which you adjusted as you spoke to Mark, “He would probably be fine, but just in case.”

Mark still seemed hesitant.

“His parents are witches, these are enchanted,” you reassured the basilisk, tapping the frames. “And I’ll be nixing anything you send our way. He’ll be fine. Promise.”

“Aren’t we supposed to eat first?” He sighed, gesturing to his bagel that he hadn’t even been able to take a bite of.

“You’re right, you’re right,” you relented. You were a few bites into your meal when MinMin had finished off his sippy cup. Picking up the empty container, you took it and the toddler with you as you stood up from the chair. “Oh, all done, bub? Let’s get you something else.”

Opening your fridge, you started pointing out the options to the child, “Let’s see… we have water, your dad left you a juice box… or we can open the chocolate milk we grabbed from the corner store before Markie got here?”

“Choco!” MinMin chirped excitedly, and you chuckled as you took out the carton. As you turned to grab the sippy cup, you weren’t expecting to see Mark turned around and peering at you with interest on his features, his eyes locked on the jug in your hand. You raised an eyebrow at him, continuing your task of rinsing out the previous drink before cracking open the carton.

“Mark…” You said knowingly. “Do you want chocolate milk?”

“Please?” He replied sheepishly, rubbing the back of his neck.

“Sure.” You smiled to yourself as you grabbed another cup from your cabinet, filling that and MinMin’s up before putting the chocolate milk back. Handing MinMin his sippy cup to hold, you carried him on one hip and Mark’s glass with the other hand, setting it down in front of the young man as you went to sit back down.

“Thank you!” He beamed, immediately picking it up and taking a big gulp.

You had the same fond smile on your face as you immediately saw his dark milk mustache, handing him a napkin. “You’re welcome.”

“Thank you!” MinMin echoed, lifting his own sippy cup to his mouth. “Thank you thank you!”

“Aww, you’re welcome, MinMin,” you giggled, patting the top of the boy’s head.

“Alright, you’re doing pretty good,” you declared as you’d reached a stopping point for the day.

He ducked his head bashfully. “You’re a good teacher.”

“Aw, thanks.” You stood up, grabbing the napkin from MinMin’s snack to toss in your kitchen trash. The boy was playing with some toys next to the two of you on the floor of your living room.

“So uh—” Mark cleared his throat over a voice crack. “What are you doing for the rest of the day? Do you have MinMin all day or…?”

“Jongdae said the reception won’t be over until late tonight. But his wife should get off sooner than that.” You tidied up a couple miscellaneous items in your kitchen as you chatted. “And what are you doing today, Mark?”

“Well—Woah!” At his sudden exclamation and the small giggle that followed, you peeked up from the dish you were drying to see Mark cautiously holding his hands up like he was under arrest as MinMin floundered around in his lap—you guessed he had fallen into it at first—for a second before righting himself and plopping down properly. “Uh… hi, buddy?” Mark said, his lack of self-confidence evident in the high pitch of his voice.

“Hi!” MinMin replied cheerily, his attention otherwise on the toy in his hand.

“You two alright in there?” You questioned, not bothering to hide the amusement in your tone.

“He just kind of sat down, I don’t know,” he quickly explained, still not lowering his hands.

“If you’re okay with him being there, that’s fine.”

“Y-Yeah!”

“You sure?” You walked back over, sitting down in front of the two boys so you could reach out and teasingly pinch MinMin’s nose. “You look terrified. He’s a baby witch, but he won’t do anything to you, promise.”

“It’s just… I have an older brother, and I’m the youngest cousin,” he admitted. “Haven’t really been around a lot of babies. Basilisk or otherwise.”

“Me neither, before MinMin,” you replied in understanding. “Only child, and so were my parents.”

“Wow, really?”

“Sphinxes are rare, remember?”

“I mean, I knew that, but I never really thought about what that really meant like, for you. Like, your family, that kind of stuff.”

You shrugged as a sort of ‘it is what it is’ gesture. “So, you never did tell me what you’re doing today.”

“Oh, uhm, well, we’re all having a movie night, at Chenle and Jisung’s later. And I was wondering if you—”

“Would let you stay here until then so you don’t have to go all the way back home then come all the way back here?” You finished knowingly, eyebrow quirking up.

“Yeah! Yeah, exactly,” he smiled sheepishly.

“Sure,” you agreed. “Looks like MinMin isn’t going to let you go anytime soon, anyway.” You indicated towards the toddler who had slowly started slumping over in Mark’s lap, very clearly about to nap.

“Uh, what do I do?” He asked you with wide eyes.

“He can sleep there, or I can take him.”

“Maybe you should…”

You nodded, standing up to go over to MinMin’s bag and pull out a floor mat, stuffed animal, and baby monitors. After setting everything up in a clear area of your floor, you scooped the boy up out of Mark’s lap and deposited him onto the mat on his back. You watched as he rolled around and readjusted until he was comfy, eyes fluttering shut completely and breathing evening out. Satisfied, you walked back over to Mark and offered him a hand up off the ground. He took it, seeming confused as you then led him away from the living room and towards your bedroom. At your room, Mark stopped in the threshold like crossing in would burn him alive, as you flopped onto one side of your bed, set the baby monitor on your nightstand, and grabbed your laptop. You scoffed and patted the other side of the bed, “Do you need to be invited inside like a vampire? Please, come in, Mark.”

“I’ve never been in your bedroom,” he muttered, taking a hesitant step in, his eyes focused on his feet.

“Really?” You scrounged through your memories, and came up empty. Shrugging, you patted the empty space on your bed insistently again. “First time for everything. Come on, we can’t watch TV out there with MinMin napping.”

He tentatively sat down cross-legged, his entire body noticeably tense as you slumped into your pillows and started scrolling through your options.

“You pick,” you declared, pushing the device towards him. “I’m in the middle of a drama and if I put it on, you’ll be confused.”

“I don’t mind, you can put on what you want,” he nudged the laptop back to you.

“Nope, I don’t need a twerp making fun of my drama preferences.” You pushed it back.

“Not a twerp. And I won’t make fun of it.” He pushed it over again.

“On one condition,” you bargained, pointing a finger at him threateningly. “You need to get invested. No scrolling on your phone. I’ll pause and answer any questions, explain everything for you. But I need you to be an active watcher with me. Deal?”

“Deal.” He nodded quickly.

As you queued up the next episode, you explained the basic premise, “It’s set in modern day, but there’s flashbacks from all different time periods. It’s about a phoenix who was cursed hundreds of years ago and can never remember her past once she reincarnates. This is obviously difficult for her vampire lover, who now has to win her over again with each reincarnation, but they’ve made it work so far. Except he wasn’t there when she had her last reincarnation, because she got into an accident while he was away at work or something. So in her amnesiac state after reincarnation, she wandered off, and he ended up losing her for long enough for her to have started a completely new life. And by the time he finds her again, she now has a new partner!”

Mark was nodding along, having listened to everything with rapt attention like you were teaching him about his powers again. “So that’s where this episode starts?”

“No, Markie,” you laughed and patted his leg. “That was just the first half of the pilot. We’re about to start episode eight.”

“Wait, that’s it?!” Mark scrolled down to the bottom of the list of episodes in disbelief. “But they just can’t leave it there!”

“The season is still premiering,” you informed him with a chuckle, readjusting your pillow under your head. “I think there’s maybe five more episodes?”

He had gradually sat back against the pillows at the head of your bed over the course of the two episodes you’d watched, and ran a hand through his hair as he let out a disgruntled sigh. “You’ve got to tell me how it ends.”

“It premieres on Fridays at 8:00.”

His brows knit together with confusion as he tried to follow the conversation. “It’s okay, I won’t make you wait five days to watch it with me.”

It was your turn to be confused for a beat, and then you realized that he thought you were offering to not watch new episodes when they premiered on Fridays and instead watch them with him when he came over on the following Wednesday. “No, Mark, if you want to watch it, you can come here and watch it. On Friday.” You clarified, then at his apparent surprise, tacked on, “With me.”

“But I thought you didn’t want to give up your Friday nights?”

“Yeah, because I’ve been watching this,” you gestured to the laptop screen. “No magic, that stays on Wednesdays. Fridays are for ‘Our Love from the Ashes’ only. Deal?”

You held your pinky finger out to him. He looked down at it nervously, then hooked his with it. “Deal,” he nodded, shaking pinkies in a very business-like manner.

At the same time, you started hearing the babbling sounds of MinMin waking up, and your phone screen lit up with a text. You grabbed both the baby monitor and your phone as you rolled off your bed, checking your messages and heading for your door. Covering your mouth, you couldn’t help the gasp that escaped.

“What?” Mark was following you, and stopped when you did by the threshold.

“Jongdae’s gig got cut short. He’ll be by to get MinMin soon,” you said, reading the message from your friend again.

“‘Got cut short?’”

You looked up at the basilisk as you said plainly, “Groom got cold feet, apparently.”

His eyes widened. “Oh my god…”

There was a knock at your front door less than an hour later. “MinMin, that’s your Dada!” You told the toddler enthusiastically, pulling on his last shoe as he sat in your lap.

He kicked his feet excitedly, making the task more difficult. “Eee!”

“Mark, can you get his diaper bag for me?” You requested of the basilisk, who was standing off to the side uncertainly.

“Yeah, of course.” He quickly went to oblige.

You walked over to the front door holding one of MinMin’s hands, and opened it for your friend. Jongdae was still in the full suit he was meant to perform in, bowtie and all, and stepped inside to give you a hug hello. “Hi, Y/N,” he patted your back. “Thank you again.”

“Hey, Jongdae,” you hugged your friend back. “No problem, he was great for us. I feel so sorry for that poor bride, though.”

“I know, I know.” He shook his head.

“Please tell me you’re still getting paid, right? At least a half-day or a deposit or something?”

“I keep my deposit, yeah. I usually don’t insist on much more if it’s not a mutual cancellation. Feel too bad…” He rubbed the back of his neck before picking up his son, focusing a much brighter smile on him. “Hi, MinMin! Were you good for Aunt Y/N?”

The boy nodded quickly. “Yeah!”

Jongdae then turned back to you, “So who did you say was coming over again? Baek?”

Mark finally approached from where he had been awkwardly hovering by your dining table just behind Jongdae, holding MinMin’s diaper bag. You stepped in to make introductions, grabbing Mark’s arm to bring him closer. “Jongdae, this is Mark, the basilisk I’ve mentioned, remember? Mark, this is Jongdae.”

“Nice to meet you,” Mark said politely, offering out the bag.

“You too.” Jongdae accepted the bag, giving the younger man a quick, mildly intrigued once-over before looking back to you. “We owe you one, Y/N.”

“No you don’t, you know he’s welcome here anytime. He’s a little angel.”

“For now. The terrible twos are around the corner,” your friend scoffed, turning towards the door again.

“You’re going to jinx yourself,” you warned him, grabbing the door handle to hold it open for him.

“I’ll throw some salt over my shoulder when I get home.” He shook his head, then gave you and Mark a nod goodbye. “See you two. Say bye, MinMin.”

“Bye!” The boy waved zealously over his dad’s shoulder, and you grinned and waved back before shutting the door behind them.

Turning back to your one remaining guest, you tilted your head to ask, “When does movie night start?” Before Mark could answer, however, the sounds of explosions and engines revving came through your living room wall, albeit slightly muffled. “Right now?” You guessed, amused.

“Oh, didn’t even realize the time…” Mark’s ears were pink as he looked at his phone as if checking said time.

“It was very sweet of you to stay, Mark, but you could’ve gone to movie night. You saw how good MinMin was, I would’ve been fine with him on my own,” you smiled and squeezed his arm appreciatively, herding him towards the door.

“There’s still dishes—”

“You want to do my dishes?” You laughed. “College boy who wants to do dishes instead of go to a movie night with his friends? What’s gotten into you?”

“Nothing, I just—I don’t know, it’s not fair. You do everything.”

“It’s my home. You’re my guest.” You cocked your head curiously. “It’s okay, Mark.”

“Well, I’m here a lot, you know? You’re already helping me with my powers and stuff. I want to help you too.”

“Okay, you can start doing your own dishes if that’ll make you feel better,” you agreed skeptically. “Next week. Go on, I’m sure they’re going to give you enough shit as is for being late.”

“It’s not just the dishes,” he mumbled under his breath, stuffing his feet in his shoes. You weren’t sure if you were meant to hear that.

As he went to grab the door handle, you put a hand on the door to keep him from opening it. “I want you to bring Johnny next time.”

“What?!” He squeaked.

“Bring Johnny when you come on Wednesday. You need to practice using your powers on someone they’ll actually work on.”

“I don’t think that’s a good—”

“I’ll be right here, Mark,” you reminded him. “It’ll be fine.”

“Alright, fine. I’ll see if he can come.”

At 5:58 p.m. the following Wednesday, there was a knock at your front door. You opened the door to two figures this time, Mark’s familiar face and another young man behind him, a head taller than him. “Mark! And you must be Johnny.” You beamed at the two of them, beckoning them in and then introducing yourself to the human, “I’m Y/N, please, come in.”

“Thank you for inviting me over.” Johnny nodded politely as he followed Mark in.

You furrowed your brows, looking over at the basilisk suspiciously. “Mark, you did tell him why we invited him over, right?”

“I did, I swear!” He promised.

“I know it might sound kind of weird, for me to be thanking you for inviting me to get petrified and compelled or whatever, but I want to help Mark out however I can. So really, thanks,” the human smiled genuinely.

You relaxed at this, guiding them further into your apartment. “Well in that case, you’re welcome.”

“Y/N, bathroom?” Mark pointed down your hall.

“You know where it is.” You waved him off as you headed towards the kitchen to grab three glasses.

Johnny followed you into the kitchen, careful to lower his voice as he told you, “Besides, none of our friends have even met you, and we’re all kind of curious about Mark’s new older lady friend that he keeps talking about, so I just had to come, petrification be damned.”

“I do hate to burst your bubble, Johnny, but Chenle and Jisung have met me before. They live next door,” you informed him.

“Oh, Mark’s other friends?”

“Yeah, I guess. He hasn’t drawn me a diagram, so I don’t have a perfect idea of who knows who, sorry.”

“Well, of our other friend group, I’ll be the first to have met you, then.”

“And? Am I everything you all had dreamed of? The mysterious sphinx in her lair luring poor little Markie in every week?” You opened your fridge, skimming your eyes over your drink options. “Wine? Beer? Water? Chocolate milk?”

Johnny chuckled, “Is that for ‘Markie?’”

“No,” you snickered. “My nephew was over this past weekend, but I figured I’d offer it to you guys since I had extra.”

“What kind of wine?”

“A very lovely red. The grapes are grown in a vineyard in this fairy kingdom whose vale naturally produces magical dew. It’s hard to describe, but the flavor that gets imparted is… exquisite to say the least.”

“Sold.”

You poured two glasses of the red wine, then filled up the third with chocolate milk. “So, if Mark hasn’t explained how this works, we’ll eat dinner first, then get into the magic stuff. It’s kind of like exercising, it’s pointless to do it on an empty stomach.”

“You’re different than I thought you’d be,” Johnny admitted thoughtfully, swirling the wine in his glass around.

“More human looking?” You guessed, expecting that you were the first sphinx he’d probably ever met. Not only were your kind rare in and of themselves, but Mark had mentioned that Johnny didn’t even meet any magical creatures until coming to college just a few years ago.

“That, and… younger?”

You snorted, Chenle’s previous ‘MILF hunter’ comment echoing in the back of your head. You set your wine down to cross your arms and cock your head as you asked him, “What do you know about sphinx and/or basilisk aging?”

“Literally nothing. Mark molted all over our apartment a couple summers ago and it was so gross but apparently that’s something that’s supposed to happen a year or two after basilisks reach adulthood.”

“So I could be a thousand years old for all you know.”

He blinked. “…Are you?”

“No.” You shook your head. “However, Mark and I will both outlive you and your grandkids, I’ll tell you that much.”

“Woah… congrats.”

“But since you brought it up…” You lifted your glass back to your lips, taking a slow sip. You then leaned in conspiratorially. “Between us, does Mark have a thing for older women?”

Johnny smirked and leaned in as well. “Why? You interested?”

“Just heard a little rumor, that’s all.”

“I don’t know about having a type, per se, but he definitely has a thing for this one older woman he knows.”

Before you could respond, you heard the door to the bathroom open, and straightened back up. Johnny furrowed his brows in confusion, and you nodded towards the entrance of the kitchen, where Mark appeared just a moment later.

“Hey guys—oh, chocolate milk! Sweet!” He happily picked up the untouched third glass. Mark then went to explain to his friend, “Y/N only buys chocolate milk when her nephew MinMin comes over. She’s way too much of a real adult to have it around otherwise.”

“Is this your passive-aggressive way of telling me I should buy chocolate milk just for you to drink when you come over?”

“Maybe. Is it working?”

“When you start helping foot my grocery bill, you can dictate what goes on my grocery list, how about that?”

Mark’s eyes widened at that, and he didn’t respond, instead taking another big gulp of his chocolate milk. When he brought his cup down from his face, he had a chocolate milk mustache, and offered you a big thumbs up as he grabbed for a napkin. “Thanks, Y/N! This is perfect!”

“Uh-huh,” you rolled your eyes, but were unable to fight the fond smile on your lips as you turned back to your fridge. “Alright, dinner’s pre-made ravioli, the next person who whines doesn’t eat.”

“Yum!” “My favorite!”

Sat at your dining table across from the two roommates, you took a sip of your drink before engaging your new guest in conversation again, “Are you a student as well, Johnny?”

“Yes, I’m a Comms major, focus in advertising,” he answered.

“And what do you want to do? Advertising?”

The human shrugged and smiled. “Don’t know. Something I don’t hate, I guess.”

You laughed. “That’s fair. I was the same way when I graduated undergrad. Didn’t care where I worked as long as it paid well, didn’t have crazy hours, and wasn’t so boring that I wanted to bang my head against a wall while I was there.”

“Exactly.” Johnny gestured at you triumphantly. “Where’d you end up working?”

“Network security company,” you shrugged one shoulder. “Honestly, I’m not even a big tech person. Can’t fix my own wi-fi if it’s out, past turning it off then back on again. I’m a manager.”

“Need an intern?”

“Dude, you have a job,” Mark interjected, elbowing his friend in the arm.

“I’m networking, dude,” Johnny replied pointedly, elbowing him back. “Not all of us can bank on being doctors in eight years, you know.”

You watched their bickering with amusement before answering the human’s question, “I can make an inquiry. The Advertising AD may or may not owe me a favor…”

“Thanks!” He beamed at you. “So, I’m sorry, if this rude or something, but sphinxes do those riddles, right?”

You arched an eyebrow. “Yes… Don’t tell me Mark has two magical adrenaline junkie friends? I’m not giving you a riddle either.”

Mark’s head shot up from where he had been sullenly eating his ravioli, his eyes going wide with mortification. “Renjun asked you for a riddle?!”

“I didn’t give him one,” you snorted. “I’m not going to be responsible for some kid going mad.”

“I’m going to kill him,” the basilisk groaned, covering his own face in embarrassment. “Why is he like this?”

“I’m not asking you for a riddle, don’t worry,” Johnny assured you. “I was just curious… Would that make sphinxes good poets or writers, then?”

“Sphinxes are good wordsmiths, yes,” you answered with a smile. “But we stick more to oral traditions. One of our favorite pastimes is riddle-weaving. Sphinxes will swap riddles back and forth, solving each other’s riddles to see who can come up with the best one. It’s a good way to pass the time on long car rides.”

“Renjun also said there’s a lot of sphinx lawyers?” Mark added.

“If you compare the percentage of the entire population that are sphinxes and the percentage of lawyers that are sphinxes, yes, sphinxes are overrepresented in that field,” you nodded. “Kind of like how there’s a lot of unicorns in healthcare and education.”

“And dryads in ecology,” Johnny followed your train of logic.

“Exactly.”

After dinner, the three of you moved into your living room. The sun was beginning to set outside, so you retrieved the glowing spheres that had been sitting in your lamps and sent them back outside to rejoin the rest of the rays. You preferred to light your apartment with sunlight when possible, as it was both more beautiful to you, and way more cost-effective than using electricity.

As you went to turn the ceiling light on with the lightswitch, you started explaining what you’d just done to your human guest, “That was sol-channeling. You might hear it be called heliokinesis as well. Sphinxes always call it sol-channeling.”

“Can you sol-channel moonlight? Since it’s technically just reflected sunlight?” Johnny questioned curiously.

“Nope. Magically different properties. Just like how werewolves are only affected by the full moon and moonstone, not by any sort of sunlight or sunstone.”

“…Right. Of course.”

“We can only manipulate existing sunlight, but we can’t make it, and we have to send it back before the Sun sets.”

“What happens if you don’t send it back before the Sun sets?”

“We’re only borrowing the sunlight from Sol. It has to be anchored to us while it’s here,” you said, guiding him by the arm to stand in one spot. “If we don’t end that connection ourselves willingly, it’ll still go back… and rip a piece of our soul out with it. The more sunlight that you’ve sol-channeled, and have anchored to you, the more of your soul that’s taken.”

You then positioned Mark across from Johnny, facing his friend from several steps away. The basilisk’s eyes were locked on your face in horror, but you just kept calmly readjusting him.

“Can you… regrow it? If that happens?” Johnny asked quietly.

“You can heal, physically,” you answered levelly, walking behind Mark. “Hurts like a bitch for a while… but healing a soul, that’s something that takes a lot of power. I can really only think of one thing that would do that…”

“What is it?” Mark blurted out.

“The Sun,” you replied bluntly. “Phoenixes, when they reincarnate. Everything is healed, soul included.” They were quiet for a moment, and you clapped your hands together, changing conversation topics, “Alright, time for some compelling! Ready, guys?”

“Totally!” Johnny gave you two thumbs-up.

“Mark?” You prompted the basilisk right in front of you.

“Shouldn’t you be by Johnny? In case you need to nix it?” He pointed to the human, looking down at his feet.

“I can nix from here,” you assured him. Reaching over his shoulder, you secured between two fingers the silver chain that you knew his lion pendant dangled from. You pulled it out from under his shirt, holding it in his eyeline. “Breathe, Mark. Let’s do a round of those grounding breaths, hm?”

You let his anchor go to rest on his chest again, and watched his eyes flutter shut as you started counting him through the breaths. Once he was done, he opened his eyes back up, the slit pupils slowly dragging up from his feet to your face first. You smiled reassuringly at him from your spot just beside him now. You squeezed his arm. “You’ve got this, Mark. Just like we’ve done before. I’ll be right back here, okay?”

As you went to step back, you saw Mark gulp, and his gaze fell down again. He wouldn’t be able to compel Johnny if he didn’t look him in the eye. While you had read through Renjun’s notes pretty thoroughly early in working with Mark, you were using them as a guide of what not to do. You didn’t want him to constantly be in a state of being stressed, tired, and stuck at home in order to be in tune with his powers. But right now, you could tell that you were hitting at least two out of three of those. Dinner had already taken up a considerable portion of your evening, and Mark was still not as relaxed as you needed him to be.

“Hey, Mark, I finally figured out why Yuta’s barely passing all his classes,” Johnny suddenly interjected.

That caught the basilisk’s attention, his voice confused as he went to respond, “I thought he was on the Dean’s List—”

“Because sirens only know what’s under C-level,” the human finished with a wide grin.

“Dude—” Mark was cut off by his own laughs. “That was bad. Like, barely made sense bad.”

“Well, did I tell you about this fairy philosophy major I met the other day?”

“What? Were they cute or something?”

“Yeah, a real Thinker-bell…”

That one even made you snort as Mark devolved into giggles. Johnny caught your eye as he continued, “You know how Taeil and Doyoung are witches that live together?”

“I mean, Jungwoo’s there—”

“And they were broom-mates…”

“Stop, dude,” Mark’s protests were dampened by his non-stop giggles as he clutched his sides. “We’re trying to— We’re trying—”

“What’s a vampire’s favorite fruit?” You cut in, making both of them turn to you. “A neck-tarine…”

Johnny actually burst out laughing at that, probably more than the awful pun warranted, as he quickly doubled over and had to hold himself up with his hands on his knees. Mark stumbled just the slightest towards you as he was still giggling, finally moving from the place that you had set him up in. “Y/N, not you too!” He complained through laughter. “God, you two are awful. Not funny at all.”

“Then why are you laughing so hard, Markie?” You pointed out with a chuckle, letting him lean his weight on your shoulder as he tried to catch his breath.

“Because I can’t believe you would make terrible dad jokes like that.” He took deep breaths, still holding his side. “Looped back around to being funny.”

“Then why’d you laugh at mine?” Johnny was upright again.

“Pity.”

And as you caught Johnny’s twinkling eyes again from across the room, you figured that you were thinking the same thing. Success. One much more relaxed Mark Lee.

Mark found his footing again, and with one more deep breath, looked up at Johnny. You watched him carefully, feeling the exact moment he made contact with his powers, extending them out towards Johnny. They weren’t overwhelming, out-of-control, hasty, or at risk of boiling over. Johnny stood still, pupils dilating as he looked to Mark for his cue.

“Touch your right index finger to your nose gently,” Mark instructed calmly. That was something you had worked on, specificity without complexity.

Johnny lifted his right hand, tapping his nose with his pointer finger.

“Put your right hand down.” After he had done so, Mark then requested, “Lift your left hand above your head, slowly.”

Johnny raised his hand like he was in a classroom, holding it there.

“Put your left hand down please.”

The human lowered his hand again.

“Thanks, Johnny, you’re done,” Mark released him, and you felt the energy draw back into the basilisk as steadily as it had extended out. He let out a breath as Johnny blinked and came back into himself. “You alright, man?”

“Great!” Johnny beamed and gave him a thumbs up. “Thanks for not making me do anything weird.”

“I told you I wouldn’t, man.” The basilisk rolled his eyes.

“Mark!” You threw your arms around his neck without a second thought, practically vibrating with excitement. “You did it! On purpose!”

“I’m going to pee, before the petrification,” Johnny whispered loudly, excusing himself down the hall.

“I-I mean, I had a good teacher...” Mark muttered, tentatively hugging you back.

“I won’t argue with you there,” you snickered, squeezing him even tighter. “I’m proud of you, Markie.”

Two days later, and it was Friday night. After a long week of work, you finally could relax, order some food, make yourself a drink, kick your feet up, and just have a nice quiet night to yourself. Well, sort of. You had actually ordered food for two, prepared an extra glass of ice water, and were awaiting a familiar knock on your door before you could kick up your feet and start your show.

Mark knocked at 7:50 p.m., just 10 minutes before the newest episode of Our Love from the Ashes would be premiering, and you ushered him in quickly. Squished into the middle two couch cushions next to each other so you could both have access to your coffee table to eat from, you were pleasantly surprised to find that he wasn’t incredibly tense or actively running away. He was doing exactly what you’d asked him to do—getting invested. Reacting to the episode with you, quiet at the tense parts, laughing at the funny parts, pretty much the perfect drama watching partner. You were done with your food halfway into the episode, and dragged over a blanket to cover your lap now that you weren’t at risk of any spillage. It was large enough to cover both you and Mark, so you put it over his lap too, and that was when he suddenly choked on a noodle.

“You alright?” You snorted, giving him a couple solid smacks on the back. “Food go down the wrong pipe?”

He wiped his mouth with a napkin to catch a dribble of sauce. “Yeah, sorry. Don’t—Don’t mind me.”

Right as you focused back on the show, however, loud shooting and explosion sounds started up from the other side of your living room wall, and you sighed. You reached forward to grab the remote, pausing the show before scooting out from under the blanket and walking over to your shared wall with Chenle and Jisung. Banging your fist against the wall a couple times, you then waited. The video game sounds decreased significantly, then you heard a dampened, “Sorry, Ms. Y/N!” from Chenle this time.

“That’s how loud it is?” Mark asked, now looking incredibly guilty.

“Yep,” you replied, plopping back down on the couch next to him and pulling the blanket over you again. With the show still paused, you looked over at him curiously. “Are you missing a video game night right now?”

“It’s not like everyone or anything,” he shrugged, casting his eyes down to his dish as he pushed food around with his utensil. “I mean, I think it’s just Jaemin, Hyuck, Chenle, and Renjun. Jeno and his girlfriend are celebrating their anniversary, and Jisung’s not even there at the game night in his own apartment because he’s out with his girlfriend. It was going to be a single losers night.”

“So what does it mean that you’re here with me instead then?” You mused humorously, hitting play.

Mark apparently wasn’t hungry anymore, as he set his food down and leaned back against the couch cushions. But he didn’t relax very much. Out of the corner of your eye, you could see one of his legs bouncing up and down. With the warm summer air outside, he had worn a t-shirt with some comic book character on it. As his fingers started messing with the texture of the blanket, your eyes followed the movement, up to his hands, then further up to his forearms, where you could see his muscles twitch and flex in the slightest under his skin. You were suddenly more aware of the lounge clothes you were wearing. They were nothing special, a comfortable t-shirt of your own and pair of shorts, but as you became conscious of exactly how much the shorts had ridden up with the way you were sitting under the blanket, your focus was still locked on Mark’s hands, not the show that you had unwittingly tuned out.

“Sorry,” Mark’s voice was sheepish, and you blinked, looking up from his hands to his face. “Didn’t mean to pull at a thread. I just fidget, you know…”

His fingers had stopped messing with the blanket, and you gave him a half-hearted smile and shake of your head. “It’s fine, Mark. Didn’t mean to stare like that, sorry.”

When you turned back to the screen, you were able to focus on the show for a whole two minutes. And then the main couple’s romantic kiss turned into a prolonged make-out session. Mark’s hands pulled at the thread again. You smacked a hand down over his, harder than you intended to. He jumped under your touch, but stopped his accidental unwinding of your textile. You kept your hand there to prevent him from unraveling the thread again, skin buzzing with a new kind of energy where it touched his. You didn’t look at him. Then the kissing turned into a bit more, with some conveniently placed objects in frame, and a tasteful fade-to-black. Mark shifted a bit higher in his seat. You slowly took your hand back. That wasn’t the end of the episode, as there was a very cute morning-after scene as well, but you could barely celebrate the fact that the characters were back together. Finally looking at the basilisk beside you out of the corner of your eye, he was staring straight ahead at the TV, his leg back to bouncing. He ran a hand through his hair, and you could see his throat bob as he swallowed hard.

As soon as the credits started rolling, Mark was on his feet. “Uhm, thank you for having me.”

“Right… thanks for coming over.” You walked him to the door like usual, which he seemed to be racing you to. Holding your hand on the door handle without actually opening it, you watched him shift uncomfortably in place. “Are you okay, Mark?”

“Hm? Fine, fine!” His voice cracked. “It was a-a good episode.”

“Yeah, they finally got back together and—”

“Sorry, I just remembered I actually have an assignment due at 11:59 tonight,” he blurted out, scratching the back of his neck. You peered over his shoulder at your stove clock visible from your kitchen. 8:58 p.m.

“Oh. Well, I’ll let you go then.” You went to give him a one-armed hug goodbye without a second thought, feeling him stiffen in your loose hold. Stepping back, you opened the door for him. “See you Wednesday, Mark.”

His face was bright red as he stammered out, “See-See you. Goodnight, Y/N.”

His sneakers squeaked as he took off down the hall. You closed the door behind him and looked back into your apartment, which felt oddly empty now.

Pushing open the door to Half Moon Bakery some days later, you were immediately enveloped by the cozy and sweet smells of the various breads, sweets, and pastries inside. Two employees were behind the counter, one attending to the register while the other restocked their shelves with loaves of bread from a tray, his back to you.

“Hi! Welcome to Half Moon! How can I help you?” The friendly-looking worker at the register greeted you brightly. As you got closer, you could very clearly smell that he was a werewolf, musky and warm.

You offered the young man a smile back. “Hi, I’m actually—”

“Y/N?” The other employee, who had also been wearing a backwards baseball cap, turned around then, surprise on his features.

It took you a second to place the face so out-of-context, immediately offering a kind greeting as soon as you recognized him. “Oh, Johnny, hey. It’s good to see you. Almost didn’t recognize you in the apron, sorry.”

The human gestured down to the navy-blue apron he had donned as part of the bakery’s uniform. “Yeah, it’s me.”

The first boy’s eyes widened as he turned to Johnny. “Wait, Y/N, as in…?”

“Yes, Jeno, this is Chenle and Jisung’s neighbor,” Johnny confirmed pointedly through gritted teeth. You knew very well what was also implicitly being confirmed, because if he knew Johnny, knew your name, and knew Chenle and Jisung, then Jeno presumably also knew Mark and your apparent reputation among their friend group.

“I-It’s nice to meet you, Ms. Y/N. Uhm, sorry about all the noise all the time,” Jeno stammered out an apology.

The way he addressed you made you chuckle lightly. There were only two people who called you that, and with whom he would’ve had to be apologizing for noise if he’d been with. “Oh, you must be one of Mark’s other friends that’s always playing video games so loudly in the boys’ apartment next door.”

“R-Right. Again, I’m so sorry.”

“I’m teasing, Jeno,” you reassured the poor boy, who looked like a kicked puppy at this point. “It’s nice to meet you.”

“So what can we get you?” Johnny asked, motioning to all of the various baked goods in the shop.

“As delicious as everything looks, I’m actually not here to eat, unfortunately. Another time,” you promised. Refocusing on the real reason you came into the bakery today, you looked around. “Minseok in?”

“Oh, yeah, Mr. Minseok’s in the back. I can go grab him for you,” Jeno offered.

“Would you please, Jeno?”

“So, how do you know Minseok?” Johnny asked as you waited, genuine curiosity in his tone.

“Oh, we’ve known each other for years,” you started. “We’re—”

“Y/N, hey!” Minseok calling your name out snapped your attention to your friend making his way out of the back of the bakery.

“Minseok— ah!” You got cut off by a sputtering laugh as he came around the counter to hug you, patting his back in the embrace. When you pulled back, you didn’t let your friend get very far, brushing at a white smudge on his cheek. “You’ve got flour on your face, you know? I swear you’d have lost your canines a decade ago if it weren’t for me, Kim Minseok.”

“I work in a bakery,” he reminded you with a huff, disentangling from you to cross his arms stubbornly. “Call it an occupational hazard. And you’ve got some on you, too.”

“Oh, and whose fault is that?” You scoffed, wiping at your own face where it had brushed against his in the hug.

“Yours. You’ve got to play better defense, Y/N.” He pretended to punch your upper arm a couple times as if in a boxing match.

“Defense against flour-covered hugs? My bad, I’ll train up on that this weekend.”

Your friend dropped his mock boxer’s stance. “Anyway, you ready to go?”

“Yep, I am if you are.”

“Absolutely.” He nodded, then turned to his employees, who suddenly seemed extremely invested in wiping down the countertop by the register. “I’m about to take my lunch. You two need anything from me?”

Johnny shook his head, giving his boss a reassuring grin. “Nope, nope, all good.”

“Jeno, you think she needs anything back there?” Minseok asked the werewolf.

“Nah, you saw her, she’s totally in the zone,” Jeno replied, a soft smile overtaking his features. “We’re actually taking our lunch break soon, too.”

“Cool. Be back in an hour, hour and a half.”

You lifted a hand to give them your own farewell, “It was good seeing you guys, bye!”

“Since when do you know my employees so well?” Minseok squinted at you as the two of you walked down the sidewalks together.

“They’re both Mark’s friends,” you explained.

The sphinx made an extended ‘ohhh’ sound as you rounded the corner to your destination, a quick, casual café. While you didn’t technically have a timed lunch break since you were in a salary position, your schedule was full up with meetings for the afternoon that you couldn’t be late for. Minseok held the door open for you. “So I guess I have you to thank for Johnny no longer missing shifts because he got petrified, then.”

You covered your mouth with your hand to cover your laugh. “I guess so.”

Saturday night found you hosting all your friends at your place—a rare occurrence. It wasn’t that you didn’t like hanging out with all your friends, it was that you four usually went out somewhere, or to someone else’s place. You weren’t a big hostess in general, and typically Jongin or Baekhyun preferred to do the hosting of the four of you, but somehow, this time, everyone ended up at your place for board game night.

“Something you’d like to tell us, Y/N?” Baekhyun raised his eyebrows as he dug a forest green garment out from between two of your throw pillows on your couch. He set his wine glass down on the coffee table to spread the hoodie wide, allowing you to see the logo on the front, the name of the college that Mark and your neighbors attended.

“Mark left a hoodie here?” You questioned. “The horror…? It’s a hoodie, not a condom. Calm down, Baek.”

“I just don’t get what you’re waiting for.”

“What are you talking about?” You walked over to take the hoodie from him, folding it up and setting it aside on your dining table so you wouldn’t forget to give it back to Mark on Wednesday.

“You haven’t talked about any other man since you started ‘mentoring’ this kid,” the siren said frankly, putting his hands on his hips. “Every time we see you, it’s ‘Mark did this’ and ‘Mark said that’ and ‘Mark’s doing so good’ and—”

“I don’t sound like that,” you scowled.

“You kind of do,” Minseok agreed, reclined on your couch.

You looked to Jongin, hoping that he’d at least back you up. He shrugged.

“I’m just saying, from what you’ve been saying, he’s been wrapped around your finger since he laid eyes on you,” Baekhyun continued. “So, what are you waiting for? He’s got his powers under control; he’s obsessed with you—have some fun. I think you’ve earned it. Go be the MILF you want to see in the world.”

“You mean the MILF that you want to see in the world. Pass.”

“What? Is he not cute or—”

“I said pass, Baek. Leave it.”

“Does he have a partner or something?”

“No, I don’t think so. Can we just play—”

“What is your—”

“Baekhyun.” Jongin cut him off coolly. “Stop.”

The siren held up his hands. “Fine. Sorry.”

As everyone sat around your coffee table to start setting up the board game, you could feel Minseok’s contemplative gaze on you. “You really like him, don’t you?” The other sphinx asked quietly, into the dead silence. “Your basilisk.”

Never had you ever been more relieved to hear loud, raucous video game explosions from the apartment next door. You scrambled to your feet, happy to be out of that conversation. “Oh, that’s the boys. Sorry, hold on.” You walked over to your shared wall, and banged your fist on it a couple times.

The volume was quickly cranked down, then Jisung called out, “Sorry!”

You turned back to your own friends with a pleased smile. “There we go.”

A moment later, your phone buzzed in your hand.

[markie: sorry, i tried to tell them it wasn’t quiet enough]

[you: that’s alright. thanks, markie]

[you: also, you left a hoodie here. you can grab it wednesday]

When you sat back down to set up the boardgame, your friends apparently decided to leave the topic well enough alone, letting you start reading off the direction with no further poking or prodding.

A few hours later, after the games had been abandoned but before your friends were ready to leave, you were washing up a few glasses at your kitchen sink as the others debated some movie options to round out the night. There was a faint knock on your front door, and you looked at the time on the stove clock curiously.

“Oh, can someone get that?” You called out to the living room, hands still wet, soapy, and holding an equally wet and soapy glass. “I’m expecting a package, needs to be signed for.”

“I’ve got it!” Minseok shouted back, the sound of the front door opening following just a moment later.

“W-What?” A familiar stutter reached your ears, and you grabbed a dish towel to start drying your hands off, listening carefully to make sure you’d heard correctly. There was no reason Mark should be at your door right now.

“Oh, Mark, right? Johnny’s roommate.” Nope, apparently he was, according to Minseok’s memory.

“Mark?” You poked your head out of the kitchen, the rest of your body following when you did in fact see the basilisk at your front door. “What are you doing here?”

“What is he doing here?” Mark pointed at the other sphinx accusatorily.

“So this is Mark?!” Baekhyun had joined you three at the door, delight on his features. “Minseok, don’t be rude, let the boy in.”

“What’s uh, what’s going on?” Jongin called from the living room as he, too, stood up to start walking over to the front door.

You shook your head at your friends, turning to chastise them, “Oh my God, all of you, stop it.” Clearly, the younger basilisk was in some kind of panic, and you had no clue why he was even at your door when as far you knew, he and his friends were playing video games thirty seconds ago.  Putting your focus back on Mark, you softened your tone, “Mark, why are you—”

But the college student turned on his heel and took off down the hallway at a sprint.

“Mark! Hey!” You called after him, stepping out of your doorway, but it was useless, as he was already long gone down the stairwell. With a sigh, you dropped your hands to your sides in defeat and moved back into your apartment. Leaning against the inside of your closed door, you looked around at your friends, at a loss for words.

“Do you think we scared him?” Baekhyun asked, his head tilted.

Jongin’s forked tongue flicked out, his eyebrows shooting up before his features relaxed again. “You think?”

The next Wednesday, as the time neared 6:00 p.m., you paced your living room anxiously, eyes on the microwave clock as you strained your ears to listen to every minute sound in the hallway. Listening for footfalls, or maybe even the door of the stairwell opening if it were quiet enough. 6:00 passed, then 6:01, 6:02, 6:03, 6:04, and at 6:05 you checked your phone for any indication from Mark that he was still planning on coming over, maybe just running late. You hadn’t heard a peep from him since Saturday, which included leaving you on read this afternoon when you asked him if he wanted pizza or dumpling soup for dinner. You made pizza, too distracted to trust yourself to do more cooking than putting a frozen pizza in the oven. 6:08 p.m., and you heard someone walking down the hallway, past the boys’ apartment, and finally stopped on your doormat. They knocked, and you let out a sigh of relief, rushing to answer the door before he could have the opportunity to run away again.

You unlocked your locks in record time, a breathless smile coming to your face at the familiar figure of Mark standing there. His hands were stuffed into his hoodie pocket as the side of his mouth pulled up into a sheepish half-smile. “Hey, Y/N. Sorry I’m late.”

“Mark,” you breathed out his name in relief. “Just get in here, would you?”

“I’m really sorry about Saturday,” he apologized immediately as soon as you had locked up, running a hand through his hair.

“Yeah, what even was that?” You asked, a concerned frown on your face as you stepped closer to him. “I mean, why did you come over? And then why did you run away as soon you showed up?”

“It’s… not a good reason. And again, I’m so sorry.” He ran two hands through his hair this time, thoroughly mussing it up.

“Uh, do you want to sit down, Mark?” You offered your couch up.

“Sure, sure, yeah.” He obliged, but was on the edge of his seat, leaning his weight forward on his arms and bouncing a knee. You were getting more nervous just looking at him. “Uhm, so, Jeno had told me about when you came into the café last week, when you got lunch with his boss. And I sort of got freaked. And then I came over here and he was here, I got even more freaked. And then all those other guys were here and I got super freaked and bolted. Like I said, I’m really sorry.”

You opened and closed your mouth a couple times as you tried to figure out what you wanted to address first. Finally, you landed on: “Jeno told you? Not Johnny?”

“Johnny helped me get un-freaked enough to come over tonight.”

“Well, big thanks to Johnny, then. Though I will admit that I’m not sure what to do with the fact that me having friends freaked you out so bad in the first place.”

“I-I know, it was really immature of me, I just…” He sighed, wringing his hands together.

You felt bad, he was clearly at a loss for what to do next. He knew he’d messed up and how, and had apologized multiple times. You figured he’d only gotten so “freaked” because he’d known so little about the situation, so you decided that offering some more information would help put him at ease.

“Baekhyun, Minseok, and Jongin. Those are their names,” you said. “They’re my closest friends. Baekhyun’s a siren, Minseok’s a sphinx like me, and Jongin’s a basilisk like you. You can ask me questions about them, if you want.”

“How did you guys meet?”

“We were all in the same class together in primary school.”

“Oh that’s cool!” He replied brightly.

“What?” You blinked at him, caught off-guard. That usually wasn’t the reaction that piece of information garnered from other magical creatures that were from here.

“That you guys went to school together and you’re all still friends. I don’t know how many people I went to primary school with that I could even still name off the top of my head. Did you guys have like a Cool Magic Kids Only Club type thing or something?”

You looked down at your lap. “Not exactly…”

Mark had picked up on the unease in your tone, all perk falling from his features. “What? Is something wrong, Y/N?”

It took you a moment to figure out how to phrase this for him, pressing your lips together in a line as you thought. When you settled on the words, you told him gently, “We were all in the same class because we were the only kids in our class. It was for magical creatures only.”

“Wait, what?”

“I mean, not just the four of us, there were ten students total. But, yeah, we were kept separate from the human kids in school. For their safety.”

“I’ve heard about that kind of stuff, like, when integration was first happening, but you’re not that much older than me!” He pointed out, his jaw dropped in disbelief.

You decided to do a little test. “Mark, did you go to speech therapy? When you were in school?”

“What? No.”

“Jongin, the basilisk, he used to get pulled from class three times a week to go to speech therapy to ‘fix’ how he spoke.” You made sure to throw sarcastic air quotes around the word fix.

“What the fuck?”

“I mean, I didn’t have any powers, so I just had to keep my first set of teeth in check, you know. But they didn’t believe me when I told them I couldn’t possibly be a danger yet because sphinxes didn’t get their powers until they were adults. After all, sphinxes were riddle-makers, tricksy, and couldn’t be trusted.”

“Oh, oh my god, Y/N. I’m so sorry.”

“So, anyway, that’s how we all know each other. Thirteen years of educational trauma does a lot to make some pretty unbreakable bonds.”

“Y/N… I’m so sorry, I was a dick.”

“Thanks, Mark. But to be fair, you don’t know any of my friends, do you?”

“I’ve met Minseok before.” He tried to reassure you. “And Jongdae!”

“You mean you’ve said hi to Jongdae once, and met Minseok as Johnny and Jeno’s boss.” You shook your head with a small smile. “But I mean, I’ve met a bunch of your friends. Chenle and Jisung, obviously, and I’ve met Renjun, Johnny, and now Jeno. You talk about all of them all the time. It’s not entirely unreasonable that you could’ve… jumped to conclusions.”

“But it wasn’t fair of me to do that.”

“Well, can’t argue with you there.” You agreed. After a pause of the two of you just sort of looking at each other, you offered, “Do you want to hear more about them?”

“You don’t have to… tell me anything you don’t want to, Y/N.”

“Minseok and I weren’t always the closest on the surface, you know. Baekhyun and I liked more of the same stuff, Jongin didn’t really to talk to anybody except me for our first few years of primary school, and Baekhyun and Minseok would team up to pick on me sometimes, but there was always an unspoken bond between us, since we were both sphinxes.” You decided to start with Minseok, since that’s who started this whole freak-out in the first place. “You know, we’re so rare, it was comforting to have another one of us around during all of this. We weren’t allowed to riddle-weave at school, obviously, but whenever we could find the rare opportunity at our magic-only recess, or in a corner of the library, or walking home from school when we were a little older, we’d swap riddles back and forth with each other. One of us would give a riddle, the other would solve it, then give a riddle back. And don’t get me wrong, our whole class was really close. There were only ten of us, and we had pretty much no contact with the rest of the students at our school until high school. But the four of us, Minseok, Baekhyun, Jongin, and I, were truly the best of friends. Still are.”

“What about the rest of you? The other kids from your class?” He asked.

“We keep in touch with all of them. Sort of parted ways in college and as we got older, you know. I actually work with one of them. Remember that phone call I got from my employee, Sehun?”

“Kind of?”

“He’s one of my former classmates, a witch.”

“Oh. Huh.”

“Yeah, I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw him walk in on his first day. Let me think… Jongdae, witch, he’s the only one of us to have a kid so far, MinMin; Chanyeol, werewolf, just got a promotion… then of course Minseok owns the bakery, Baekhyun has his boba shop, Jongin has a whole designer brand... Yeah, we’re all doing just… great. Really makes my heart happy.”

“Ah, Y/N…” Mark got to his feet, throwing his hands down by his sides in fists as he paced.

“Woah, Markie, are you okay?”

“No, just— Doesn’t it make you mad? That they did this to you guys?”

“It used to, yeah, absolutely. We used to be the angriest, angstiest, most vitriolic people you could ever meet. We hated that school, and society, and the world for letting them treat us like that. Hell, Jongin still hates his speech therapist, and I’ll let him die with that grudge.” You shook your head, the momentary bitterness dissolving from your tongue and a melancholy replacing it instead. “But it ate at us. And not only that, but society kept changing. And we were all stuck in that time, in those memories, stuck with that anger. It was killing us from the inside. I am so glad you didn’t meet me in college, Mark, because it was not pretty. The number of nights that none of us can remember—and not for any fun reason—is far too many.”

He still didn’t seem convinced, but had stopped his angry pacing, standing in front of you with his arms crossed over his chest.

“I mean, just look at you. You went through the same schools that I did practically right after us and had a completely different experience. A better one. And that makes me so relieved.” You beamed up at him, and saw a mixture of guilt and bashfulness flicker across his face. “It doesn’t take away what happened to me at all. But anger with no direction is useless. It all really hit us when Jongin, Minseok, and I all developed our powers the same semester of undergrad. And we were all messes. We couldn’t get them under control because we were just so angry. We felt like we were being forgotten, that our suffering was being forgotten. Everybody else was moving on and pretending like it never happened. When I uh, mostly unintentionally melted a portion of a professor’s car, my grandmother pulled me away for spring break—absolutely ruined my plans—and made me spend the entire week learning to control it all.”

“You melted—”

“Thankfully, Dr. Kwon was very understanding, and I wasn’t kicked out or anything.”

“How did Minseok and Jongin…?”

“Those aren’t really my stories to tell. But ultimately, we couldn’t hold onto that anger anymore. So instead, I try to focus on all the good that we have in our lives, and all the things we’ve been able to accomplish despite what was done to us.” You then gestured to him, “And I look at the magical creatures who came after us, how much better things were for them, and are continuing to get, and all I can feel is happiness now.”

Mark sighed and sat down on the cushion next to yours, and you found yourself relieved to see the anger drain from his face. “I’m sorry, Y/N. It’s not my… thing to get angry over.”

“No, Mark, it’s okay.” You reached out to grab his hand, pulling both of them over to rest in your lap. Your other hand was up by your mouth, where you were chewing on a nail in between your thoughts— an anxious habit your grandmother thought she had broken you of in high school. “It tells me you care, and it means a lot, that you do. Makes it still feel real. And it is your thing to get mad about, as far as I’m concerned. What happened to us—and to Jongin—could’ve easily been you and your friends too. I’m just really glad it wasn’t.”

The basilisk squeezed your hand, then scooted closer until you were shoulder-to-shoulder, knee-to-knee. But it wasn’t electricity that jumped between you two this time, or strange butterflies in your stomach. It was an unspoken, understanding kindness that connected you and Mark, and a quiet sense of security that had settled deep in your chest. You shifted to rest your head on his shoulder, letting go of his hand only to wind your arm under his and lace your fingers together.

“Mark?” You said quietly, gaze locked on your intertwined fingers.

“Yeah?” He murmured, and you could feel him turn his head to look down at you.

“When you asked me if you’re my friend… one of the first times you were over. You remember that?”

“Ah, god, Y/N.” He shook his head, letting out an embarrassed chuckle. “I’m sorry about that, I shouldn’t have asked you. I was insecure and fishing for—”

“No, I’m sorry. I didn’t answer you honestly,” you insisted. You held Mark’s hand even tighter. “You’re not my friend, and… I don’t know when it happened. Honestly, I don’t think you ever were.”

He was quiet for a moment, letting your confession settle over the two of you like a blanket. But you didn’t feel suffocated by it, or scared. It sort of felt like something that was always in the room with you and Mark, but now you two were just finally talking about it. And after Mark’s history of impulsive decisions, and talking without thinking, and getting freaked, you were more than happy to give him whatever time he needed to get his thoughts together before responding to you.

“Can I ask you for that secret now?” He asked into the empty air of your living room, his voice wavering.

“Of course. Anything.”

“How... Can you tell me a secret you have about me? About how you feel about me?”

You lifted your head off his shoulder to turn in your seat and face him. His big, brown eyes were looking at you like you were everything, and you just took a second to admire him as you pulled together your own thoughts. Here everyone was worried (to varying degrees of seriousness) that you were luring poor, innocent little Markie into your lair every week and corrupting him. But really, you’d been unknowingly leaving the doors to your heart wide open for this little basilisk to slither right in and make himself at home. And now that he was here, you had no intention of ever asking him to leave.

“I like you, Mark. Something other than friendship. Romantically,” you clarified. “I have feelings for you.”

His grip tightened on your hand as he squeezed his eyes shut.

“Mark? You okay?” You asked softly.

“Great, yep, awesome,” he promised. “Just uh, just losing my mind a little.”

You laughed, stroking your thumb over his comfortingly. “Take all the time you need. Don’t want any more freakouts if we can avoid them.”

“Y/N?” He looked up at you again.

“Yeah, Mark?”

His eyes flicked between yours and your mouth. “Can I kiss you?”

“Yes.” You agreed enthusiastically, but didn’t make another move for fear of scaring off the skittery basilisk.

He still hesitated, though. “D-Do you want me to?”

So polite. It was taking everything in you not to pounce on him.

“Yes.” You said again, a bit firmer. For encouragement, you took his hand that you were holding and moved it up to your face.

Mark took the cue and gently cupped your cheek, leaning in towards you. Your eyes fluttered shut as you let him guide your mouths together. The first touch of his lips to yours was feather-light, barely there.

“I…” He drew back, dropping his hand to hold yours again. “Like… You want to date me?”

“Yes,” you confirmed with another light chuckle.

“You’re laughing at me again.”

“Sorry, sorry.” You tried to compose yourself, but you knew that you still had the same smitten smile on your face. “You’re just… too cute.”

“Do you remember when I came here to ask you for help with my powers in the first place?” Mark asked, poking a couch cushion. “What you said about your couch?”

“My couch…?” You echoed, trying to think that far back. It felt like a lifetime ago at this point that you had first welcomed the incredibly timid basilisk into your home. Then it hit you. “I said neither my couch nor I would eat you whole.”

“Unless I asked nicely,” he added, swallowing thickly. “I’m-I’m asking nicely now, Y/N. Please, if you want—”

“Oh, Markie,” you sighed, standing up and pulling him up with you. You grabbed his jaw between two fingers, looking into his slit pupils as you pulled him closer. “You’re so adorable.”

Before he could say anything else, you crashed your mouths together. His hands immediately flew to your hips to ground himself, as you kept one hand on his jaw and the other rested on his shoulder. You had a reason for standing up, however, beginning to push him back in the direction of your bedroom.

He asked to be eaten whole, after all.

When your work alarm came the next morning, you snoozed it and buried your face back into your pillow. There was a groan from beside you, and you could hear Mark shifting as well.

“Don’t tell me that’s actually how early you get up for work?” He asked incredulously.

“I have to shower, and make breakfast, and brush my teeth, and get dressed in clean clothes, and commute,” you mused. “Can’t just roll out of bed five minutes before I need to leave and show up in the same pajamas I slept in anymore.”

“Ugh.”

You chuckled, rolling over to snuggle up to his side, throwing an arm over his waist. “Do you have class today?”

“Summer break.” His arms hesitantly wrapped around you.

“Right, right. Well, I guess you can snooze until I’ve got breakfast ready, then.”

“Mm, pretty sure I heard something about a shower?”

“You might have,” you replied coyly. “Why?”

“You know, Renjun was telling me about how climate change is shrinking the natural habitats of glacial sirens at the poles, and—”

Your laughter cut him off, and he started giggling at himself as well. When you’d finally caught your breath, you said, “I’ve heard the ‘saving water’ line before, never heard it taken to that extreme. Come on, if we waste any more time, we’ll be having untoasted bread for breakfast.”

“Ooh, my favorite,” Mark grinned, following after you.

⤷ anthology masterlist | blog masterlist

[keuwibloom]

Alright, introducing one of the reasons why I haven't been making much Parallel Synthesis art lately-- at least, of the already established characters...

Everyone, meet Pyrite!

Pyrite is an original character I made as a fankid for Parasynth Ink/Opal! I'll talk more in detail about their lore later on, but TLDR; they were an alternate reflection of Frisk that got scrapped. Since the universe didn't want them around, they got thrown into a kind of garbage dump of code.

They took a bit of inspiration design-wise from the unused kid sprite in Undertale, so their 9 year old design is heavily based off that.

Opal eventually finds them in the code dump and decided to take care of them!

They're a sassy child who is incredibly blunt and may come off as a bit of a brat, but gets attached to people really easily and is kind to those who've earned their trust.

[eryanlainfa]

I can't sleep cuz of pain, so here's the long awaited explanation post about the Youngjustice!Au for Vat7k (and tts/rta)

Donella is Batwoman and Ulla was Superwoman before she disappeared. Years passed and a new Super is in town : Superboy, aka Varian. So Donella sends her current Robin, aka Hugo, to keep an eye on the boy because she knows how dangerous kryptonians can be.

Hugo is transferred to Var's highschool. And they do not get along. At first. They Also meet as Robin and Superboy and despite not really liking each others they end up being friends.

Quirin catch up on it and confront Donella who doesn't deny anything. He is not a fan of her way of doing but approves the idea of his son not doing patrol alone. So he explains what is going on to Varian.

Robin and Superboy are forever stuck together at this point.

In the middle they encounter Impulse (kid flash if you prefer) and immediately learns his civil identity because the boy isn't veryyy subtle. It's Yong. And a bit after that Wondergirl finds them and introduces herself : Nuru. She's the one who wants to form a team of young heroes with them (to follow in her big sister' steps, who's Wonderwoman) and so the four of them become the Young Justice League.

And yes they're all in the same school. And their parents know (they mentor the team more or less)

Also the TTS characters are there. Rapunzel and co are known as the Titans. Raps is Starfire, Eugene is Nightwing (previously known as Robin), Cassandra is Raven, Lance is Cyborg and Pascal is Beast Boy (I guess). So far they're not very important story wise but they kind of babysit the Young Justice League whenever they're nearby.

The Brotherhood would be like the Shazam family because I still wanted them to be a group. Tho Quirin 'retired' from hero stuff after Ulla's death.

Storywise it roughly follows the original Vat7k, with the kids trying to find their place as supers, Hugo not taking Varian seriously because with his powers he obviously has it easy (it's false) and he's obviously too gullible (also false), and Varian discovering more about his mom and being a kryptonian etc.. There's even the 'Ulla trying to possess Varian' with Ulla's memories being saved within this one kryptonian ship hidden in the arctic (like her consciousness has been transferred to the ship or something). And obviously Hugo and Varian ends up together.

So yeah those are the basics ! So far. Changes might happen someday, I'm still debating on some stuff. I do have more details here and there I'm planning to doodle but nothing too crazy

Sooo yep, here you go

[transformersandturtles]

finally finished sketching my NAIL TMNT bois. I will slowly be putting out updated info about them soon so stay tuned! ^^

[just-jordie-things]

we weren’t just friends - okkotsu yuuta

word count: 11.9k warnings: heavy second base action (no tops, dry humping) but no smut, swearing, drinking but it’s legal summary: their friends think that if there’s tension between new roomates (y/n) and yuuta, then they should just act on it.  more info: college!au, aged up characters, roommate!au, childhood friends, unrequited(?) love

part one: “face it, you want it, you crave it” ___

Having Yuuta as a roommate was never all that weird for (y/n).  Things sort of just worked out that way, and honestly she was so relieved that she didn’t have to scramble to find a stranger to split the rent with- or face homelessness- that she hadn’t really given it much thought until a few days after he’d moved all of his things in and had settled into their now shared space.

On paper, he was the perfect candidate after all.  They’d been friends for years, having known each other since childhood it was easy to trust him in her space.  He already spent so much time in her dorm when she still lived on campus that having him in her living space didn’t seem like it’d be that much different anyways.  Not to mention she knew him to be tidy and a pretty good cook, so as long as he was able to supply half the rent every month, she was content.

The day he’d moved in she’d been so happy that she’d hardly focused at all on helping him unpack.  Most of her time was spent dancing around to the moving playlist she’d made, and she insisted they jam out while they- he- unpacked his things in the empty room adjacent to hers.  When she wasn’t dancing, she was rambling on about how delighted she was that he agreed to move in with her.  Looking back it was probably a little much, but Yuuta wasn’t overwhelmed by her excitement in the slightest.

As soon as she’d mentioned being on the hunt for a roommate he hadn’t thought twice about offering himself.  They both just so happened to decide to move off campus to find cheaper, and steadier housing.  The market wasn’t all that great so living alone wouldn’t have been possible even if either of them had interest in the roach infested studios in the area.  Even the two bedroom apartment they shared was rather tiny, the living space and kitchen was essentially all one room, and there was only one bathroom, but they made it work.  It was still more affordable than living on campus, and that’s all they cared about.

For the first two weeks it had been fun, even.  It felt like a sleepover with their best friend, but every night.  They spent most nights in cozy pajamas curled up on the couch sharing their favorite movies and swapping snacks.  (y/n) couldn’t believe how lucky she was to have him, and she was happy to tell him so every chance she got.

Yuuta couldn’t believe how lucky he was to get to spend all his free time with her.  No longer did he have to coordinate around both of their schedules in order to have quality time with his favorite person.  If she had to study for the evening and couldn’t hang out, he’d happily sit on her bed scrolling on his phone or reading.  When their friends were free they’d come over unannounced, because either (y/n) or Yuuta were bound to be around to hang out with.

It was just so easy, it almost felt like a dream.  The beginning of having their own space as young adults to do with as they please.  

Yuuta bought a fish tank for their living room, a whole ten gallon aquarium for a pretty betta fish that (y/n) helped him pick out.  They spoiled it with plants and cool rocks for decoration.  They took turns feeding him every three days, and regularly sat in front of his tank to admire him.  If one of them weren’t present, the other would spam their phone with photos and videos of it swimming around, doing next to nothing, with captions full of hearts and emojis to swoon for their pet.

(y/n) spent her freedom a little differently.  

At first it was decorating her new room with a maximalist aesthetic.  Posters, tapestries, string lights, and any strange pretty thing she’d taken a liking to covered her walls so thick that most of it began to overlap.  It could be overstimulating to some- as Maki had remarked when she first visited the place- but she loved it that way.  It took her a full three days to collage a whole wall full of her favorite photos.  Ones from childhood, some from grade school, most from her most recent experiences and adventures through college.  If she were to pull out her phone and snap a photo to make a proper memory of the day, it was likely getting printed out the next day and taped up to the wall.  Soon, those too began to pile up and overlap, but again, she loved it that way.  Even Yuuta began to take pictures for her, printing them out when he found the time and sticking them to the fridge to surprise her.

Once the project that was her room had been tackled and she was satisfied with the home she’d made for herself, her desire for freedom took the form of heavy drinking.  It might have been concerning, Yuuta certainly panicked a little bit when he’d come home from a late study group session and find her dancing around the kitchen with her favorite handle in her clutch and the belting of her favorite song echoing in the small space.  Eventually her time of drinking alone proved to be just a phase, one too many hangovers having taught her a lesson on time and place for drinking hard alcohol straight.  But he did come to learn that she was quite comfortable as a social drinker.  So if the Zen’in twins and Toge were coming over, it wasn’t odd to find a drink in her hand.  At least she started taking his advice and ending the night with a full glass of water and an ibuprofen.

All in all, living together hadn’t been too strange of a milestone for them.  It was fun, it was easy, and they really couldn’t have asked for more out of a roommate.  Being best friends was an added perk that just made it all the more smooth.

Until recently. ___

“I’m tellin’ you,” 

(y/n) huffed as she pulled the straw from her mouth as she spoke.  A signature vodka cranberry mixed to perfection after months of honing the skill of a perfect pour.  Her movements are a little delayed and awkward as she leaned back into the kitchen counter, her elbows coming to rest on it to hold herself up as she leaned her head back dramatically.  Maki, who had only been semi listening to the girl’s ranting, remained silent as she raised a brow at the display.

“I think he’s doin’ it on purpose” (y/n) finished with a mumble.

It was difficult to hear her over the game of mariokart that Yuuta and Toge were currently playing in the living room- they got quite competitive when it came to that game in particular- but Maki caught enough of it to understand where she was going.

She looked over at her sister with only mild interest in her expression.  Mai touched her fingertips to her mouth as she chuckled to herself, finding the situation far more amusing than Maki.

The situation began as simple as this: In order to save time in the mornings when both (y/n) and Yuuta had class, they’d been working on a bathroom schedule in order to optimize their time.  For example, (y/n) had started doing her hair and makeup at a mirror in her room, where she’d sit on the floor and go through her skin care routine, and any other beautification and styling she’d felt inclined to for the day.  That helped a lot with cutting back on hogging the shared bathroom.

Yuuta’s idea of helping to cut back on time, is to go back to his room directly after a shower to dry his hair and get dressed for the day.  It was a great idea in theory, and would definitely save an extra five to ten minutes.

However twice now (y/n) had run into him in the short hall from the bathroom to his room.  She shouldn’t have been so flustered.  Realistically, she wasn’t seeing anything she hadn’t seen before.  There had been plenty of times she’d seen him without a shirt.  In the backyard of the home she’d grown up in they’d often set up a sprinkler to run through.  In high school they’d gotten their volunteer hours in through lifeguarding together.  In their freshman year of college they’d gone to just about every frat party, bonfire, and beach day that was thrown, just to be able to say they had taken on the party scene in their younger years.  Seeing Yuuta shirtless was nothing new.

But twice now she’d practically run into him, with nothing but a towel held around his waist, damp hair sticking to his forehead and falling around his eyes, pale skin still littered with droplets of water, and had he started working out-? 

Even thinking about it now she felt her face heating up.  She shouldn’t have committed that image to memory- but it happened twice already so it couldn’t have been more than her mind staying sharp, right? 

“If he’s doing it on purpose,” Mai’s voice had (y/n) snapping her head up as she crash landed back in reality.  Her blush was obvious to the twins, but she hoped to play it off as the alcohol in her system.

Certainly not the thoughts that had started littering her mind, thoughts that you just don’t have about a best friend and roommate.

“Then why don’t you just do something about it?” Mai finished with a small smile on her face that suggests she has quite a few ideas in mind on how she could fix this problem.

(y/n’s) eyes widen, and she brings her drink back to her lips to ease her racing heart and spiraling thoughts.

“Like what?” She mumbles, as if there was a chance the guys could possibly hear their conversation.

Nothing could compete with the sound effect of a blue shell incoming, and Toge’s defeated screeches.

Maki scoffs before laughing, finally finding entertainment in this whole ordeal (y/n) had gotten herself so worked up about.  The last ten minutes of their girl talk in the kitchen had been for nothing, it seemed, if she wasn’t going to act on her obvious infatuation.

“Just bone?” She suggests with a small laugh.

(y/n) swears her eyes were going to bulge right out of their sockets, and what was meant to be a small sip of her drink turned into a gulp as she sucked a little too harshly on her straw.

“Maki,” Mai hisses, smacking her sister’s arm, before turning back to (y/n).  “She’s not wrong though, that would definitely solve everything” 

“I can’t do that!” (y/n) squeaks.  “I just- it’ll pass, it’s just a little crush, right? That’s normal, right?” 

She looks between the twins for confirmation, validation in her silly feelings that were bound to pass with time.  Mai winces.  Maki rolls her eyes.  This wasn’t looking promising.  But perhaps they were just too eager to set up their friends and see some drama to unfold, so (y/n) decides that their advice might be a bit on the biased side.

“Just test the waters a little first,” Maki suggests, shooting Mai a look as she tries to telepathically tell her to reel it in.  “Dip your toes in a little.  No harm in that, right?”

“You live together, how have you not experimented a little already?” Mai mumbles, her brows furrowing together as her eyes glaze over, as though trying to process how it could be possible.  The calculations simply weren’t adding up.

(y/n) gnaws on the inside of her cheek, and her fingers begin to tap on her glass.

“I guess…” She says, but her uncertainty is obvious.  “Well… how much is a little?” 

The twins burst into laughter, and they’re looking at each other like there’s an inside joke she’s not in on, and (y/n) pouts at them for teasing her in their silent twin way.  This wasn’t the first time, she should be used to feeling like an odd man out when it came to hanging out with these two, but they were her last hope for guidance, so she took what she could.

For now, she determined that Maki and Mai weren’t going to be of much help as they snickered and muttered to one another.  (y/n) couldn’t make out what they were saying exactly, but she gathered enough to realize they were slights against her, and she had enough of the bordering-on-friendly fire.

“I’m playing mariokart” She huffs, strutting out of the kitchen space and across the floor to the living room.  In this small apartment it was an open floor so the couch was only ten feet away, but it was far enough that she couldn’t hear their laughter anymore, and for now that was enough.

Yuuta and Toge were sitting on the sofa, both heavily concentrating on the competitive game.  Their wrists are flicking the switch controllers with precise movements as they steer, but when it comes to using items and drifting, their fingers are smashing buttons viciously.  As she rounds the sofa she eyes the screen, seeing that the pair are battling it out for first place, with Yuuta currently claiming the spot.

That is, until (y/n) plops onto the cushioned armrest right beside him, and he glances up at her out of habit.  The two seconds that he takes to smile up at her- even though she’s watching the screen- is all Toge needs to creep up Yuuta’s character and throw a green shell directly at his kart.

The remote tingles in his hands with a familiar vibration, his character having taken a hit.  Yuuta’s head swivels back to the screen, as he desperately tries to make a comeback, but two other characters have already passed him, and now he’s in fourth place.

“What the hell!?” He groans as he realizes his demise is inevitable.  It was the third lap of the game, and Toge’s Yoshi was about to cross the finish line.  “That was so uncool!” 

Toge’s cackling to himself, proud of his sneaky attack.  He had a feeling it would work, all he needed was the perfect distraction.  And nothing distracted Yuuta like (y/n).

As Yoshi crosses the finish line, Yuuta drops his controller to his lap with a defeated huff.  He leans back into the sofa, head hitting the cushion as he glares at the screen displaying Yoshi’s victory dance, before he turns to (y/n), who gives him a sympathetic smile, before offering her drink to him.

“That was a dirty move,” She sides with him- typical, Toge rolls his eyes at the two of them, which goes unnoticed- “You’ll get him next time” 

Yuuta takes the glass from her hand, sipping from the straw experimentally.  There had been a period of time where her drinks were so strong he was about ready to cut her off from alcohol altogether.  When a perfect mixture of vodka and cranberry juice hits his tongue, he’s pleasantly surprised that it’s not too bitter.  His eyes light up at her before he swallows.  She giggles at the obvious reaction.

“Yeah yeah” She mutters before he could even say anything.  He didn’t have to for her to understand exactly what he was thinking.

Yuuta chuckles at her, before scooting over on the sofa, closer to Toge, so that there was some space for her to sit next to him.

“You want in?” He asks, holding his controller out to her.

She squeezes awkwardly into the small space, her legs still hanging over the armrest, and her back almost completely pressed into his side.  Toge had shifted completely to one side of the couch, giving Yuuta more than enough space to also move so that (y/n) could sit properly.  But neither of them seem to notice the blonde boy’s silent offer.  Or, if they did, they didn’t pay any mind to it.

(y/n) takes the controller with a grin and a nod, and Toge starts up the next round.  Yuuta had chosen Rosalina as his character, a favorite between them that they often fought over so much she was usually off limits when the two of them played.

Despite having a delayed start because Yuuta had finished the last race somewhere in the middle of the lineup, (y/n) makes a good comeback for the both of them.  He cheers for her, leaning forward in his seat again as though he were still focused on the game for his own win.  (y/n) remained in a relaxed position slumped back against him, her fingers moving with swift ease over the controller.

She giggled at the way Yuuta was on the edge of his seat, literally, sipping down the rest of her drink as he watched her play.  He threw out advice when she picked up items, and winced for her when she took a hit.

“Use that! Throw it! Throw it at-!” 

“Yuuta you’re being a backseat driver” (y/n) said calmly, keeping the red shell in her inventory despite his demands.  

Toge barks out a laugh, still coasting in first place without much competition from the computers.  But (y/n) was quickly gaining on him, drifting and gliding past the other spots with ease, and Yuuta began to realize her strategy.  With a knowing grin on his face he leans back into the couch again, and puts his faith in her abilities.

She kicked his ass most of the time when they played one on one anyways.

Soon enough she was in second place and Yoshi was in sight.  Yuuta’s hand happily tapped at her shoulder, giddy with his excitement.  Toge had gone eerily silent as he put all of his focus in remaining in first.  But his efforts were wasted, without an item to defend himself, (y/n) was able to take him out with one blow, stealing first place for herself and crossing the finish line on the final lap shortly after.

She raised her arms victoriously, but even more excited than her was Yuuta, who bragged in Toge’s face before wrapping his arms around his roommate and congratulating her on her win.  She laughed, her head falling back on his shoulder as she laughed at his antics.

He beamed at her, and even though it was silly, there was no doubt in her mind that his pride in her was anything but authentic.  Yuuta was just like that.  He celebrated even the most minor of conquests.

Toge tossed the controller onto the coffee table with a string of curses muttered under his breath.

“Good timing,” Maki calls, dangling her keys in her hand and catching their attention.  “Are you crashing here or are you leaving with us?” 

(y/n) lifts her head up from Yuuta’s shoulder, peeking over the back of the couch at the twins who suddenly had their shoes on.  She gives them a pout.

“Leaving so soon?” 

“We’ve been here for eight hours” Mai giggles.

“It’s one in the morning you maniac” Maki rolls her eyes.

“You could just spend the night,” (y/n) offers, her features brightening up at the idea.  “Sleepover-!” 

“No,” Maki shakes her head firmly, despite Mai’s excited expression at the idea.  “We have class in the morning, we’ll do it another time, okay?” 

(y/n) nods, satisfied with that answer.

Toge shuffles off the couch, giving a bitter congratulations to the winning pair of mariokart, although he made it clear to Yuuta that he only won because (y/n) took over.

They bid their friends goodbye, promising to meet up again at some point soon, knowing fully well they wouldn’t make a plan, and someone was bound to show up on their doorstep without invitation tomorrow or the next day.

And then it was just (y/n) and Yuuta.

She was still tucked under his arm, he was still drinking the remnants of the drink she’d made for herself but had conveniently forgotten about so he could have the last of it.

“Are you going to bed, too?” She asks him, and he chuckles at her desire for staying up late.

They’d always been opposites in that aspect.  

(y/n) was a night owl through and through, whether party mode was on or not.  She was most productive when the sun went down.  It wasn’t odd to find her studying or doing chores at odd hours of the night.  He’d actually had to tell her she couldn’t vacuum in the middle of the night, claiming she was going to make their neighbors complain.  But it was a treat for him to wake up and find the apartment spotless and organized.

Meanwhile Yuuta was an early to rise kind of guy.  He had a decent morning routine for himself that involved an alarm going off at eight in the morning every morning, and it wasn’t often he broke that routine.  He’d be up for a few hours before (y/n) would drag herself out of bed and into the kitchen for breakfast- which was usually waiting for her on the counter.

“It is the middle of the night now,” He tells her, before checking his phone.  “Actually it’s not technically night anymore, it’s Friday morning”

(y/n) frowned at him.  He chuckles again.

“Fine, fine” (y/n) starts to sit up, but doesn’t go too far.  She pulls her legs onto the cushion beneath her, and then turns to face him properly.

For some reason when she looks up at him again, she’s brought back to her conversation with the Zen’in twins, and she can’t help but wonder what they would have advised her to do if she’d stuck around for the rest of their conversation.  She wondered if Yuuta had ever experienced this dilemma, or if she was the only one creating the tension in the apartment.  She wondered if he even felt it.

“Som’thin’ on your mind?” Yuuta asks after a few beats of silence pass.  His eyebrows furrow in the slightest, and (y/n’s) expression eases into something calmer.  She must’ve been thinking too hard, she supposes.

“Not really, just had a weird talk with Maki and Mai” She tries to brush it off as not a big enough deal worth talking about, but for some reason, this seems to catch his interest.

“Oh yeah?” He muses curiously.  “Don’t tell me they want to move in-” 

“No!” (y/n) let out a burst of laughter as she shook her head.  “Where did that come from? Where would they even stay?” She asks, gesturing to the small space around them.  Yuuta laughs with her, shrugging his shoulders.

“My thoughts exactly,” He agrees quietly, as though they were keeping it a secret just between them.  “But everyone hangs out here all the time, I don’t want them getting any ideas,” He says, half seriously.  “This is our sweet deal,”

Yuuta laughs again, but this time when she laughs along with him it’s soft, almost unsure.  Her heart flutters in her chest at the sentiment he shares for having this place with her.  Even after all this time, she feels relief in waves of warmth when he voices his happiness here.

“What is it then?” He asks.  He leans back into the couch cushion, but keeps his eyes on hers.  She tilts her head and hums in question.  “Your weird talk,” He reminds her, “What was it about?” 

“Oh,” (y/n) drops her gaze from his, her face warming up at the idea of admitting to him what they’d been talking about.

I’ve just been thinking about you shirtless a lot lately, and sometimes I can’t sleep over it just doesn’t seem to be an appropriate thing to say to a long time best friend who she now lives with.

“They were just asking questions about what it’s like to live together” She settles on a half lie.  They had been curious about the living situation.  She didn’t necessarily have to disclose that Mai found it unthinkable that they were able to share a living space and not tear each other’s clothes off… right?

“For us to live together?” Yuuta raises a brow.  (y/n) tucks her hands into her lap and nods.  

She tries to get comfortable leaning her back against the arm rest, but everytime his gaze falls on her, it feels heavier than usual, and she struggles to sit still.  Her hands fiddle in her lap, she squirms in her seat, and she can only hold his eye contact for a minute at a time.  Did he always look at her like that? She wondered when she dared to meet those deep blue irises again.  Was it the few drinks he’d had that made them look darker? Or was she seeing things? 

“Why was that so interesting?” He asks.  “I mean, it’s been six months,” 

Again, her heart flutters at the thought of him knowing exactly how long they’d been living together.  Or maybe she was being stupid and he was just keeping track of the rent.

“What’s so interesting about now?” 

(y/n) shrugs, a small smile on her face that she can’t help.  “I don’t know” 

But he sees through the statement, especially with that smile on her face that tells him there was more she wasn’t telling him.  Curiosity gets the best of him, and he raises a brow at her.

“Well,” He ponders, “What were they so curious about?” 

(y/n) drags her bottom lip between her teeth as she narrows her eyes at him, proving that she could read him well, too, and she could tell that he was trying to pry even though she’d been repeatedly dismissing the subject.

“Nosy tonight,” She scolds him as she kicks her legs out to throw them over his, stretching the sore muscles from sitting on her feet for too long.  “Were you eavesdropping, Okkotsu?” 

“No,” He lets out a small laugh.  “Though now I wish I had been, since you’re being unusually cryptic about it” 

“Unusual?” She repeats the word in a drawl, tilting her head and pretending to think it over.  “I wouldn’t say unusual,” She argues softly.  “I don’t tell you everything” 

“Yes you do” Yuuta replies matter of factly, his expression doesn’t even flicker.  (y/n) blinks at him.

“No…” 

“Oh yeah? Tell me something you haven’t told me then” He challenges, his lips curling into a smile.

She huffs, and quickly tries to rack her brain for something she’d kept from him.  Secrets and embarrassing moments fly through her train of thought as she tries to latch onto a memory that she was sure she hadn’t shared with him.

Her eyes light up as she finally remembers something she’s sure he didn’t know.

“Oh!” She leans forward with eager anticipation to prove him wrong.  “Remember my first boyfriend? In middle school?”

Yuuta raised a brow, but nodded in confirmation.

“On our first date, he took me out-” 

“Mhm,” Yuuta hums, recalling the details of that date without much thought at all.  “Bowling” He said calmly.

“Right,” (y/n) chuckles, flustering a bit that he already seemed to remember the event as easily as she had.  “Well, at the end of the date, when we were waiting outside for his mom to pick us up, he’d asked if he could kiss me while we were alone, before she got there,” Her words are a little slurred, which she was quick to mentally blame on the few drinks she’d had.  “But I told him n-” 

“- you told him no because you ate chili fries while you were bowling and you didn’t want him to taste it and then he kissed you anyways and you slapped him on instinct and he was a little whiner about it and said you did taste like chili fries and you smacked him again” Yuuta filled in the rest of the story, his head rested back against the cushion again, as though he was bored just from retelling it.

(y/n) blinked, her lips parting into an ‘o’ shape as she realized maybe he did know everything about her already.  Should it have been obvious to her from his confidence on that matter? Probably.  Did she still feel a determination to find something, anything, that he didn’t know? Definitely.

At her lack of response, Yuuta rolled his head to the side, a lazy smirk tugging on his lips when he regarded her soft surprise.  Her eyes narrow in the slightest at him, playful mockery of his know-it-all attitude.

“Well, then,” (y/n) scoffed as she took on a refreshed attitude when it came to rubbing in his face that she knew something he didn’t.  “I suppose you already knew that the twins were curious about how you and I seem to manage living together without some kind of netflix-romcom-level sexual tension” 

The teasing tone in her voice and eager gleam in her eye seem to disappear as soon as the words come out and she realizes what she’s just said.  In slow motion, and as her face falls into one of regret, she realizes two things.

One, that by addressing the sexual tension, whether it existed or not, it instantly thickened in the air.  All at once she’s aware of it.  Suddenly the weight of her legs in his lap is so heavy she feels a desire to curl up into him completely.  Yuuta has one arm draped over the back of the couch cushions in her direction, his hand hangs loosely just in front of her shoulder.  If she were to lean forward in the slightest movement, his fingers would graze her sweater.  His other hand lays on her knee, and sporadically he taps his index finger against it.  Sometimes she thinks he’s playing a familiar beat that’s been stuck in his head, too, but then he pauses and she loses track of figuring out what song that is.  Even her breathing is suddenly manual, and she’s afraid if she sucks in a breath too sharp, he’ll question it.  So she takes slow, shallow breaths, barely filling her lungs with oxygen.  Was that why she was getting so dizzy? 

Two, now that she’s admitted what her and the twins had been talking about earlier, (y/n) fears that she’ll have to confess that the reason they were talking about the sexual tension was because she’d created the sexual tension- and yet she had gone to them to blame him for it.

Yuuta blinks, his brows furrowing at first, as though to process the information, but he just as quickly relaxed his face and pursed his lips, giving her a small nod.

(y/n) doesn’t dare utter a word.  Instinct claws up her throat and begs her to take it back, make a joke and apologize to smooth it over and hopefully they’d never mention it again.  The words die before she can utter them.  She remains frozen beside him, focused on his every microexpression, hoping to figure out what he was thinking before he voiced it.

“I see,” He says, a small smile gracing his features that has her relaxing just a little bit.

Yuuta can feel her weight shifting as she sinks further into the couch cushion.  He could sense her nerves from a mile away, so he spoke carefully, hoping not to spook her into retreating early.

Comfortingly, his hand smooths over her knee, long fingers grazing her thigh from the short caress.

“I don’t think I would’ve guessed that,” He admits with a chuckle through his nose.  His eyes flicker over to hers, watching her closely.  Her cheeks are pink, and her gaze shifts between his eyes at a faster rate than usual.  She’s still anxious.  “But I can’t say I’m surprised” 

Her lips twitch with a curious emotion Yuuta can’t read as well as before.  Her brows pinch and then relax.  She’s reading him, he thinks.  His mind is a little hazy from the few drinks he’s had, so he might be seeing things that aren’t there, but he’s equally intrigued by the conversation.

“You don’t think it’s weird?” She asks.  Her voice is quiet, but he doesn’t mistake it for uncertainty.  In fact, he can tell just how genuinely interested she is in obtaining his thoughts.  Just as he is, she’s on the edge of her seat, and only pushing further to see where this new line of thought would lead them both.  “Living together, I mean” She clarifies, unnecessarily.

The pad of his finger taps against her knee, once, and then twice.  His lips purse and she watches the movement with her breath hitched in her throat.  The room was getting hot from the thickening tension that she’d created.  It was almost uncomfortable, her body screamed for her to get up from this couch, pull herself from where she was half draped over his lap and put as much distance between them while she still could.  She was approaching a line between them that she’d never even tiptoed across before, and she wasn’t sure what lied on the other side, but god, she was just dying to find out.

“Weird? Not in the slightest” Yuuta murmurs honestly.  She can tell from the way his eyes lock onto hers that he does mean it, and relief flooded her.  Before it came back in the form of excitement, and now her skin was buzzing everywhere that their bodies were touching.

“You’re not just saying that?” She double checks, leaning forward off of the arm rest to study him up close.  

They were already close enough, but there was a quiet desire in the back of her mind longing to push closer, until she could make out the individual swirls of blue in his irises.  Her lips curve into a soft, lovely smile as she admires him, and Yuuta fights the way his own breath chokes up in his throat.

“You really don’t think it’s weird we’ve never…” She trails off, her head shaking in a small movement, just enough to make a few stray hairs fall into her eyes.  “I dunno, like, even kissed or anything?” 

His eyes grow rounder at the question, widening just a little bit, but enough for her to notice.  She knew such a blunt question would make him nervous, Yuuta always grew nervous at any sort of romantic prospect.  He’d been that way since they were kids.  If he had a crush on someone it was obvious, but as soon as (y/n) would press about it, he’d get red in the face and begin to stutter.  It had always been cute, if not a little silly.  But now it had her curious as to why.  They’d been friends for so long, and even now that they were older, it was like his initial response to such questioning would make him shut down.

‘You could bring girls here, you know,’ She’d told him once, shortly after they’d settled into the apartment.  ‘I could even leave for the night.  Stay with the twins, or somethin.  That way it’s not weird’ 

He’d laughed, and given her a puzzled look, like the mere idea was ridiculous, like he didn’t even understand what she was suggesting.  The pink in his cheeks told her he knew fully well what she was saying.  She’d returned the confused look at the time.  ‘Don’t you want to bring girls here?’ She’d asked point blank.

‘N-no, well, maybe,’ His response was immediate but he had no clue what he was saying.  ‘I just haven’t thought about it’ He’d said instead.

She’d teased him for it, but dropped the subject.  It might’ve been entertaining to watch him squirm, but she didn’t want to make him uncomfortable.  So she’d simply reminded him that it was alright with her.  Followed by, ‘I mean, you wouldn’t mind if I brought someone here, would you?’ 

He’d stared at her for a minute, his answer not as instantaneous as the last.  His heart lurched to his throat, or perhaps it had been bile, and he found himself biting down on his tongue to keep from speaking too quickly.  His expression hadn’t flickered even for a moment, remaining neutral as she stared at him, awaiting his response.

Yuuta hadn’t said a word.  He simply shook his head, and then left the conversation completely by returning to his studies, hoping that giving his attention back to his textbook would drop the topic.  It had worked, she’d moved on right away, and it hadn’t been brought up since.

Neither one of them had brought a visitor to the apartment, besides their friends who frequented regularly.  There were no dates, no lovers, no visitors of the night snuck in, or even mentioned.  Pondering it now, Yuuta supposes there were very few things she didn’t tell him.  Then again, he didn’t exactly have an interest in knowing those things.  In fact, the mere idea of it had bile rising in his throat.

Yuuta arched a brow at her, silently questioning her train of thought.  Since that conversation early on in their roommate-ship, (y/n) rarely brought up this sort of topic.  Occasionally she had a date, but nothing seemed to last longer than a couple of weeks, and she didn’t talk much about those events in detail.  Always beginning with a simple ‘I have a date tonight’ and later followed up with ‘it didn’t work out’ and a shrug as she’d cozy up to him on this very sofa.  Yuuta never met any of the people she’d go out with.  (y/n) never offered him to.  They left it that way, unspoken, and simple.

Well, it wasn’t all that simple at all.  The nights she’d spend out of the house on these mystery dates Yuuta found himself sitting frozen and staring off into space, letting time lapse slowly as he waited for her return.  A part of him hoped no one ever lingered at the door, so he wouldn’t have to see who it was she spent her time with, who it was that was her type.  

But another part of him, the part that he tried to bury deep down, longed to look one of these men in the eyes, just once.  He wouldn’t even say anything, he was sure he wouldn’t need to.  If he could get one good look at them, he was sure he could make it clear just how undeserving of her time they were.  Because at the end of the day, she had him, and she had him in every way that mattered.  Since they were children, he’d been there, showing her what true love really looked like, felt like.  He was there for every important event and milestone.  He was here now, sharing a living space with her.  And he’d be there for everything that came next.  Because he cared about her.  Because he loved her.

And when she had him the way that she did, wrapped around a perfectly manicured finger, how could anyone else be remotely deserving of her? 

The gears in Yuuta’s mind are operating as fast as they can, spinning and whirring as he tries to decipher where exactly she’s going with this.  But the alcohol in his system has him under a haze, and he realizes he has yet to give her an answer to her question.

He clears his throat, and his lips twitch into an amused smile as he locks eyes with her.

“Is kissing the true evaluation of roommates?” He asks, a teasing lilt to his voice that has her blushing and rolling her eyes at him.  

A chuckle rumbles from his chest as the back of her hand smacks into his shoulder, the action soft, as though she were trying to be gentle with him, as though he were fragile, even with his broad shoulders and lean muscle built into his body.

He can’t help but tease again, for the sole purpose of seeing her continue to fluster before him.  The idea of making her forget how to behave around him after all this time has his heart skipping a beat, and a mischievous glint flashes in his eyes.

“What exactly are the Zen’ins feeding you, hm?” He asks, and she struggles to look him in the eye now.

“I wasn’t trying to suggest- they just- they got in my head…” She huffs defeatedly, her bottom lip sticking outwards in a small pout.  Yuuta’s eyes catch the plump pink skin, and they linger there for a moment longer than they should’ve before meeting her gaze again.  Her eyes have noticeably widened, proving he’d been caught, but he doesn’t feel as much anxiety about it as he should have.

“So what,” He speaks curiously.  “Are you asking me to kiss you?”

A small laugh escapes her, a tinkly little sound that is exhaled with the breath she’d been holding.  Yuuta’s lips quirk upwards at the nervous response, his excitement getting the best of him the longer he watches her shift her gaze and fluster.  Why this had been on her mind, he didn’t quite understand, but in their current predicament, he didn’t care too much to peel it back layer by layer.

“I didn’t-” (y/n) starts to shake her head, but her uncertainty overcomes her and she tries to switch gears.  “I don’t know… I guess they made me sort of… curious” She admits bashfully.  Her eyes focus on her fiddling hands in her lap before turning the question onto him.  “Is that weird?” Her voice is quiet again.  “Have you ever… I dunno… thought about it?” 

The hand that he had resting before her shoulder reached out then, fingertips barely grazing along the soft material of her cable knit sweater.  His gaze followed the motion as his fingers twitched and moved further on their own accord, stopping at the hem of the neckline, just before skin could touch skin.  He looks back at her, surprised to find her attention locked on him again.

All of the fucking time, his brain is so loud it almost overpowers the heartbeat pouding in his ears.  I don’t think I’ve ever truly stopped thinking about you.

“I suppose you’ve got me thinking about it now” Is what he says, quiet and smooth, although the blush on his cheeks betrays him and makes him appear a little softer than he was going for.  (y/n’s) lips twitch into a smile nonetheless, relieved again that he hadn’t made a fool out of her for admitting such a thing.

When she leans closer to him, his fingers finally graze against the side of her neck, and he wastes no time in sliding his large hand around the nape of her neck, not quite pulling her any closer than she’d already brought herself, but the presence of his hand is firm, making sure she won’t distance herself too soon.

“Do you want to?” She asks, her eyes lighting up with an excitement he’d sparked as soon as he’d validated her curiosities.  Her voice holds the silly eagerness of a girl much younger than she is.  A schoolgirl with a crush, Yuuta thinks to himself as he eyes her bright eyes and slowly growing grin.

The hand on her knee flexes with anticipation, giving her leg a slight squeeze.  He wants to say all the right things, he wants to do all the right things, because jesus christ this was a once in a lifetime opportunity and Yuuta could not afford to waste even a second of it.  He wanted to commit it all to memory, her soft voice, the smell of her perfume, the curve of her lips, the stars in her eyes- there was so much of her to take in, and not nearly enough time for him to adore it all properly.  With hooded eyes he studied every feature as best he could, wishing he could slow down time, or even freeze it altogether.

“Yeah,” He mumbles, and the word drawls out of his mouth in a long sigh as his eyes move between hers and her lips with a longing she’d never seen on him before.

If she didn’t know any better, (y/n) might have thought that look was desperation.

“Yeah, I want to,” He repeats a little louder, and he moves closer to her then, invading her space and clouding all of her senses with him.

His eyes, dark from how blown out his pupils had grown, his low almost raspy voice, the lingering remains of his musky cologne, the way his tongue barely poked out of his mouth to wet his lips- her heartbeat was racing, and her hand trembled as she reached out to place it against his collarbone.  Her touch was feather light, almost experimental despite having touched him on plenty of occasions before, just never quite like this.

Her long lashes flickered quickly as she too struggled with where to look.  When their gaze caught in passing, Yuuta gave the back of her neck a gentle squeeze, silently instructing her to hold his stare.

“You’re sure?” He asks softly, and she almost laughs at how thoughtful the question is.  How thoughtful he is.  But she doesn’t.  Instead, she gives him a sweet smile and a shrug of her shoulders.

“It’s just a kiss, right?” She murmurs, blissfully unaware of just how worked up Yuuta’s gotten himself over the prospect of just a kiss.  

He doesn’t wait for further confirmation.  He simply draws her closer by the back of her neck.  Her eyes flutter shut and she tilts her chin forward in the most miniscule of movements, and yet he can read her anticipation with ease.

Her breath hitches in her throat, and Yuuta’s closing the rest of the distance as his lips touch hers.

For half a second they’re both frozen, paralyzed by the sudden fear that there was no taking this back, there was no going back from this.  (y/n’s) blood ran cold in that brief moment, worried that Yuuta also realized this was a grave mistake.

But then his mouth moves over hers.  His warm lips catch hers with a soft yet determined kiss, and she gives into every temptation that consumes her.

Her hand presses into his chest a little harder, before her fingers are curling into the soft cotton of his tee shirt.  Her other hand falls against his shoulder when he tugs her closer in a moment of thoughtless desire.  Yuuta pulls her by her knee, sliding her closer until her legs drape completely across his, the curve of her ass flush with his thigh.  As soon as he does it he panics again that he’s made a mistake and taken this experiment of a kiss too far, but she responds so eagerly, with a quiet hum against his mouth and her hand curling around his neck as she deepens their kiss.

For a kiss on a whim between friends, (y/n) kisses him with the fervor of a woman starved, and Yuuta internally struggles on where the boundary between them currently lies.  His hand twitches on her thigh, squeezing the plush of her leg and aching to move, to explore the rest of her warm and inviting body, to touch her everywhere he could reach.  He has to hold her a little tighter just to fight the urge.

(y/n) is less worried about taking strides across the gray area of a boundary between them.  The hand on his neck slides into his hair, scratching at his scalp before her fingers tangle into the dark tresses.  She gives it a small tug, and his lips part against hers as he gasps, before chuckling quietly at her curiosity.  He feels her smile against him before she’s pressing closer again.  Her tongue darts over his swollen bottom lip, and she gives him no time to react to the hot and wet sensation before she’s capturing his lips again.

Yuuta wasn’t sure what he should’ve predicted when they’d drunkenly admitted to sharing a curiosity for kissing one another, but he hadn’t expected this.  Her hands have a tight hold on him, on his shirt and in his hair, and her sweet, cranberry flavored lips feel relentless as she slots them into his again and again.  He supposes he’s treating this little experiment the same, meeting each of her kisses with the same amount of heated excitement.  He tries not to think about when he’s supposed to stop, when he’s supposed to pull away and say ‘well that answers that.  Goodnight!’.  So for now he pretends that moment won’t come.

On the other hand, (y/n) knows she should stop.  She knows she should pull away from his addictive lips and release her shackles from him before she gets carried away.

But she’s already too far gone, isn’t she?

Shakily, she releases his shirt, and her hand blindly maps across his shoulder, then down his arm.  Her touch is light but the tips of her fingers burn across his skin.  His muscles are taut, and she wonders if he’s flexing to be impressive or if he’s filled with so much anticipation he’s fighting the urge to go further.  When her hand reaches his it stills, and she presses her palm into the back of his hand where it lies on her leg.

A shudder escapes her and she pants softly into his mouth, breaking their kiss as she grabs his hand a little tighter, and moves it.

Yuuta breaks away instantly, wide eyes meeting hers and an apology on the tip of his tongue.  But before she can pull his hand away from her, he realizes she’s holding it to place it somewhere else, not to pull it away.

She blinks her eyes open lazily as she sits up further, curving one of her legs across his lap, setting her knee down beside his hip.  Yuuta follows her movements in a daze, his hooded eyes flitting across her body as he watches her straddle his lap and settle back into him carefully.  She’s slow, agonizingly slow, giving him ample time to halt her, to say the word that he was done and his curiosity had been satiated.

He doesn’t.

Her hand pushes his again, guiding it up to her waist, and then down over her hip.

“This okay?” She mumbles, and his gaze moves from where she’s still lowering his hand.  He tilts his head back as he looks up at her, and the look in his eyes has her melting right in his lap.  Her free hand spreads out over his chest, fingers stretching as far as she can reach to feel as much of his heated skin through his tee shirt as she could.

He looks at her with his pupils so blown they almost eat up every last splash of blue in his irises.  His lips are swollen and parted as he takes in quiet, heavy breaths.  He nods at her lazily, drunkenly, and she wonders if it’s from the alcohol or from her.

When she pushes his hand under her ass, she doesn’t have to guide him any further.  He squeezes into the supple flesh right away.  She giggles quietly before his other hand is pulling her into him again and smashing her lips against his.

They’re much closer now, it had taken little to no effort for him to pull her into his chest, and their hips collided at the sudden movement.

All she thinks about as she tangles her hands in his hair and parts her lips for his tongue to lazily explore her mouth are those couple of times she’s caught him in a towel fresh out of the shower.  How she’d scurried into her room and tried to ease her mind of the dark thoughts he’d made blossom.  She thinks about how there hadn’t been anything to quite satisfy those thoughts.  Ignoring them did nothing, acting on them in the safety of her room and her hand down her panties made them worse, and even now she feels tortured by the image, making her ache for more, more, more.  Nothing was quite enough.

His teeth sink into her bottom lip and she whimpers, her brows pinching as her hips stutter against her will.  She feels as though she should apologize for grinding on him so shamelessly, she could feel what this makeout session was doing to him after all, but he doesn’t seem to want an apology.  His hands grip her hips and he pulls her down again, dragging her slowly over the growing hardness in his pants with a low groan.

The guttural sound reverberating from his chest only spurs her on, and she complies with the rhythm he sets on her hips, slow and painful.  Their kiss breaks as she lets out a few soft pants, but she never fully catches her breath as she grinds into him.

She can’t help but peek her eyes open at him, falling in love with the way his eyes are screwed shut and his lips are parted as small moans fall from his mouth.  The sight makes something spark send a jolt of pleasure down her tummy and to her core.  She knew she should’ve given him a quick peck of the lips and called it a night, because she’s not sure she could muster the strength to stop where she so desperately wanted this to go.

As though annoyed that she’d stopped kissing him for too long, Yuuta pulls her in again, his hand curling around the back of her neck as his lips plant hot kisses down her throat.  A high pitched gasp escapes her as his mouth drags along her skin between each kiss, and her hands are curled into his long hair again.  Her hips stutter in their pace, but he has no issue with grabbing them tighter and guiding them back through his favorite rhythm.

His mouth lingers at what little of her collarbones are exposed, leaving wetter kisses there as he appreciates them as fully as he could, before traveling up the side of her neck.  His teeth barely graze the sensitive skin, and he’s dying to mark up every inch of her, but he restrains himself from doing so, instead compromising for lingering nips and gentle sucks against her skin.

“So fucking beautiful,” He praises in a husky murmur, biting down on a particularly sensitive spot just under her jaw.  He’s rewarded with a sudden rut of her hips and a pretty little moan as she angles her head further back to expose more of her neck to him.  He soothes the spot with a painfully slow drag of his tongue before kissing it sweetly.  “So perfect, so perfect f’me” 

The praise sends her into a dizzy spell so strong she’s not sure she’s still on earth with him.  This must be another universe, maybe heaven, maybe a dream.  Her fingers fall from his hair, tugging at the collar of his shirt with an irritated whine.

When she tugs a few more times and he doesn’t get the hint, she throws her hands against his chest defeatedly.

“Yuu” She whines, and the sound of his name has his dick twitching in his pants, which he’s certain she could feel.  His face flushes with embarrassment, but she just as quickly grinds into him with a roll of her hips.

He hums questioningly against the side of her neck, before tilting his head and kissing his way to the other side to give it attention too.  She sighs, half irritated, half pleasured, as he sweeps her hair to the other shoulder with one brush of his hand.  (y/n) continues to paw at his shirt, bunching up as much material at his shoulders as she could, her desperate attempts were weak, barely exposing the skin of his abdomen.  When he still didn’t comply with her unspoken desire, she opted to reach for the skin that she could get her hands on.

Yuuta’s abs tensed and he shuddered as her fingers ghosted over the exposed skin.  At first she barely trailed her fingertips over the muscle, but watching him twitch and shiver had her eager to slide her hands up his stomach, eagerly mapping their way up his chest, and pushing the rest of his shirt upwards on their mission.

His face is completely red as he watches her heavy gaze admiring his body.  He wants to laugh and remind her that she’s seen him without a shirt many times before now, and he’s never seen her look at him like this, but her eyes are darkened with lust and his voice is stuck in his throat, so he doesn’t say anything.

Instead, when the hem of his tee shirt is bunched up at his chest, he leans forward off the couch cushion, and takes his hands off of her hips so he could grab his shirt from the back, lifting it over his head in one quick yank.  (y/n) watches with her lip between her teeth as his hair falls back in his face, and he’s left shirtless before her.

The idea of slowing this down now is far from either of their minds.  She hums with appreciation as her hands smooth along his collarbones, fingers drawing loopy shapes into his skin as they travel down his chest, slowly exploring the skin she’d been fantasizing about for weeks now.  His blush runs down his neck and stops just short of his collarbones, and (y/n) admires every inch of it.

Eventually her stare is too intense and Yuuta begins to stir, wrapping his hands around her hips once more to pull her against his chest before his lips meet hers.  It’s a slow kiss at first, and her tongue brushes over his in a way that almost feels sweet.  He could still taste the vodka and cranberry juice in her mouth, and he swears it's enough to get him buzzed.  But as his hands climbed her hips and dipped below the hem of her sweater, she picked up her pace, and he could feel quick puffs of air from her nse hitting his cheek.

She’s getting worked up again, and he’s eager to see just how far he could push her before she gives in completely.

He pulls her in close enough that her hands dart back into his hair, gripping at the back of his head tight enough that he couldn’t tear his lips from hers if he wanted to.  Not that he’d want to, with how drunkenly she’s sucking at his lower lip and whimpering into his mouth with every roll of her hips.

Learning she’s so vocal when she’s turned on was a mistake on Yuuta’s part.  Because now all he longed to do was find all the right things that made her tick and do it more.  Every strained whine and whimper was music to his ears, wordless praise that he was doing something right, and he’d be damned before he found every spot that had her making those sweet noises for him.

Calloused hands roam over her abdomen, feeling it dip as she inhales sharply, and smirking against her mouth when he reaches higher, skimming the hem of her bra.

Unlike him, she wastes no time at all.  Leaning back from their kiss abruptly, and grabbing her oversized sweater from the bottom and pulling it over her head with great urgency.  Yuuta’s eyes fall to her chest instantly, wide and eager as they take in the simple red bra and how pretty the color makes her tits look.  The thin lace on the edges complimenting the swell of her chest so beautifully he hopes he commits this image to memory.

Now it’s her turn to fluster and blush while he unabashedly stares.  And she could tease him, remind him that he’s seen her in a bikini, that this was the same amount of skin he’s been gifted to see before, but she finds herself growing bashful under his heavy gaze.  She can feel the way his eyes take a mental picture of her before he finally leans forward to enjoy the exposed skin further.

“Fuck,” He mumbles, lips brushing over her clavicle before kissing downwards, between the valley of her breasts.  “You really are s’fucking beautiful, y’know that?” His words are slurred as his hands roam up her sides and hesitate just before reaching her chest.  “Can I touch you, pretty girl?” 

The praise and pet name swirl in her mind in a sweet haze that gets her high.  She gives a soft mhm and a nod of her head before his hands gently cup over her chest, squeezing with a surprising softness into the warm flesh.  Yuuta continues to kiss along the exposed skin he could reach, her collarbones, the swell of her tits, her shoulders, his lips dragged over every inch, making sure to disperse his attention diligently.  

“So beautiful,” He sings praises between each kiss, noticing the way it has her squirming in his lap.  “So perfect, every part of you” 

He grabs her hands by the wrists, pulling them up to his shoulders, until her fingers twitch and reach for his hair again.  Her hips roll over his with a quiet moan.  He lifts his head at the noise, a lazy smirk on his lips as he gazes up at her.  She furrows her brows at him as she moves her hips again, trying to get more friction between them.

His hands squeeze her tits simultaneously, before his left thumb drags over the thin material covering them, finding her hardened nipple with ease and rolling over it teasingly.

“Yuuta,” She sighs, tilting her head at him as her gaze drags slowly down his body, the desire in her eyes obvious.  

It made the room thick with sexual tension, and they both only grew hotter in temperature the longer this was dragged out.  When her eyes met his again it was undeniable what she was thinking.  Her every want and desire was clear solely from her eyes focused on his, and how her fingers tightened in his hair, pulling him close to her face, but not quite kissing him.

His hands slid up her chest, fingertips prodding at the lacy cups of her bra until it gave way and he could slide his hands over the soft skin beneath.  Her bottom lip quivers with what she wants to say next.

“Yuu, I-” 

A sharp rap of a fist against their door has them jolting back to reality with a harsh swivel of both heads turning towards the sound.  Without thought Yuuta’s hands fall to her waist and he pulls her into him, instinctively covering her barely exposed body if someone was to let themselves into the apartment.  But the door doesn’t move, and the knocking persists.

“What the- it’s two in the morning,” (y/n) mumbles with a brow furrowed in confusion.  “Who could-?” 

The pair lock eyes as realization floods over them at the same time.  Oh.

“Shit” Yuuta curses, and (y/n) quickly scurries off of his lap as she begins searching for their discarded articles of clothing.  

Yuuta’s faster, tossing her a shirt and pulling one on for himself as he gets up off the couch and quickly heads for the door.  He glances down at his pants with a wince, trying to adjust the obvious hard on, but to no use.  He tugs as far as he can at the hem of his sweater to cover it.  It’s a half decent job, and as he approaches the door he hopes it’s enough to hide it.  He gives (y/n) a quick look to make sure she was decent.

She’s still sitting on the couch, her head peeking over the cushions curiously as he goes to open the door.  Her hair is a mess, and her cheeks are flushed, both obvious giveaways to what she’s been up to for the last fifteen minutes.  Yuuta’s sure he doesn’t look any better, and his hands rush to his head to smooth his hair down before he finally grabs the door knob and swings it open.

“What?” He greets Toge with more annoyance than usual, and the blonde on the other side of the door raises a brow at the tone.

Lavender eyes sweep over Yuuta’s flushed face and messy hair.  He points into the apartment, vaguely towards the living room.  Yuuta steps aside, letting his friend in for whatever it was he’d forgotten.

Toge gives (y/n) a friendly smile and waves as he strides into the living room.  She returns the smile with weak lips.

Their visitor grabs a hoodie off of the arm chair to the left of the couch, something neither (y/n) or Yuuta had noticed left behind.  He shrugs it on and stuffs his hands into the cozy fleece-lined pocket with a satisfied smile before waving goodbye to (y/n) and walking out of the room just as quickly.

“Sorry I didn’t notice it sooner,” Yuuta says sheepishly as Toge passes.  “I could’ve brought it to you tomorrow” 

Toge waves a dismissive hand, before twirling his finger around and shrugging.  He must’ve still been in the area, Yuuta realizes.

He’s about to step out the door and leave without a catch, but he hesitates just as he steps over the threshold, his eyes doing a double take as he notes the dark green cable knit sweater Yuuta’s wearing.

His eyes linger on the article of clothing, brows pinching with familiarity, before he lifts his gaze to Yuuta’s, who’s also suddenly aware of the shirt he was wearing.

Before he can stop himself, Yuuta’s head is swiveling to where (y/n) was still watching them both from the couch.  She’s sporting a tee shirt too loose on her frame to be hers.  Toge follows Yuuta’s gaze, his eyes widening with realization.

“Anyways!” Yuuta clears his throat as he turns back to Toge with a grin so forced his cheeks hurt.  “I’ll see you later?” 

Toge opens his mouth, a grin of his own forming and a small laugh coming from his throat, but before anything could be said, Yuuta was ushering him through the rest of the doorway, already trying to shut the door in his face.

“Yeah, later, goodnight, Toge!” 

The door closes a little harsher than he meant it to, the frame shaking as the latch clicks into place.  Yuuta locks it just as quickly, before groaning and hitting his head against the wood.  It felt like his heart was beating in his throat.  He worried he might throw up from the anxiety coursing through his veins.

“That was close,” (y/n) says quietly, just loud enough for him to hear.  

He’s too anxious to look at her.  He squeezes his eyes shut and stays put against the door.  Distantly, he remembers his dick is still hard.

He can hear (y/n) stirring, getting up from the couch and padding closer to him.  She pauses just before she reaches him.

“Do you think he noticed the shirts?” She asks quietly.

Yuuta sighs, finally lifting his head from the door only to throw it back and stare at the ceiling.  He doesn’t want to see how worried he’s sure his expression looks.  He doesn’t want her to get the wrong idea about the regret pooling in his stomach.

“Probably” He admits in a quiet groan.

(y/n) shuts her eyes as she winces, covering her face with her hands.

The tension in the room is no longer due to sexual desire overtaking their inhibitions.  It was awkward.  Painfully awkward.

“I feel so stupid,” She mumbles into her hands.

Yuuta’s head snaps towards her, taking in the shame in her body language.  His heart sinks towards his stomach.  Had they made a massive mistake? (y/n) drags her hands down her face before looking up at him, her brows drawn together with a knot of worry between them.  Had he made a massive mistake? 

“I am so- I’m so sorry,” She tells him weakly.  “I shouldn’t have- that was- I was-” 

She can’t even finish a thought, much less an explanation on how ridiculously impulsive and embarrassing that was.  Her face is growing pale and she feels sick to her stomach.  She couldn’t believe she’d just ruined one of the greatest friendships she’s ever had over a silly conversation with the Zen’in twins about a silly crush.  She couldn’t believe she’d just ruined the perfect living situation with the perfect roommate over a crush that probably would've gone away on it’s own had she just handled it maturely.

“It’s okay-” He starts to say, trying to find the right way to explain to her that he wasn’t upset in the slightest about what happened between them.  He’d only been embarrassed about practically getting caught.  He knew their friends well, and he was sure that Toge wasn’t the only one to notice the swap of shirts.  Surely Maki and Mai had already been given an earful about the whole ordeal.

Before he can say anything else, (y/n’s) cutting him off.

“I should go to bed,” Her voice is too soft to overpower his, but he shuts up as soon as she speaks.  “I’m… I’m really sorry, Yuuta,” 

His eyebrows furrow as he takes in her sad, apologetic eyes.  She really meant it.  She really felt guilt over what had happened.  His stomach twists with disturbance, and fear.

“Please forgive me, I… I hope you can forget about… that” 

Forget? No…

But she’s turning away from him, running her hands through her hair in a stressful manner as she quickly darts for her room.  Yuuta’s left standing at their door, wide eyed and open mouthed in his shock.

Did that all really just happen? 

His palm comes up to cover his mouth, the realization settling into his bones and making his blood run cold.

God, it did, it really did.

He’s slow as he puts the switch remotes back on the console to charge, before turning off all the lights and going to his own room.  He unzips his pants and kicks them off somewhere in his room before crawling into bed, not bothering to change into something proper to sleep in, or take off the sweater he’d accidentally stolen.  He lays on his back, eyes focused on the blank ceiling of his bedroom as he replays it all over and over in his mind.

(y/n) also sits awake in her bedroom.  But she’s far from frozen.  She repeatedly kicks the covers off herself before tugging them back on, undecided on if she was hot or cold.  She’d abandoned her pants and laid awake in Yuuta’s tee shirt, the scent of his cologne and something else that was distinctly him still clinging to the fabric.  Tears welled in her eyes as she curled in on herself, hugging her pillow to her chest in a desperate attempt to seek comfort.

Neither one of them gets much sleep. ___

xoxo ~ jordie

[ew-selfish-art]

Dp x Dc AU: Tim doesn’t rest, not even in Death.

It’s a heart attack that gets him, well, that and the insane amount of fear toxin flooding his system. He was dead for a full three minutes before he watches (how was he watching?) his eldest brother get his heart going again and get his unconscious body to the cave. Alfred gets him onto bat-life support and Leslie looks gravely at his family after she’s done her best to heal him. They decide to keep trying, they don’t want to believe he’s gone.

Tim watches in fury. He’s more useful than this, he’s not just going to die and let the family mourn him! Tim sets to work trying to understand what’s happened to him and he realizes he must be a ghost. Therefore, if he wants to understand ghosts he needs to go where ghosts are, and thankfully he just read a JLD doc saying to avoid Amity Park at all costs.

It’s takes him a second to get used to flying at full speed, but he finds himself surrounded by strange people in a strange town and… he notices himself becoming more visible. He’s able to interact with more and more objects, he even picked up a pencil! Poltergeist is a step forward in his plan, Tim accepts this change of pace.

Then Tim meets Danny, a normal human kid who looks like he could be brought into the manor and given a cape, who looks straight at him.

“Wait, who are you? You didn’t die in Amity did you?”

“No, I died in Gotham. I came here to understand how I’m a ghost and how I can get back to my dying body. I just need a few answers.” Tim explains, and notices that his voice isn’t his own, like it’s a different language entirely that comes out.

“Well, uh, I dunno about going back to your body but it’s not safe for you to be here. The GIW are looking for lost souls like you that people won’t notice go missing. So get back to your family and find peace. Im sorry but that’s really the best advice I have.” Danny answers.

Tim begs him for answers on the GIW. Begs him for any answers at all. Danny shrugs him off each time, tell him that he’s just a ghost and he needs to move on before he gets hurt or becomes a problem.

Tim decides if he’s a problem, he’ll probably get more answers.

Soon enough, he’s stepping into the end of a battle where Phantom is getting Skulker into a thermos, and demands answers, and if not answers help.

They brawl, and Tim’s training as Red Robin gets him farther than a lot of ghosts. And then, when he knows he’s beat and he’s about to share thermos space with the robot jackass (who he can interrogate and then build his own robot) Tim realizes something.

“You’re still alive, aren’t you? You’re Danny, black hair and blue eyes.” Tim says and suddenly Phantom is as still as the dead despite the accusation.

“How the fuck- dude. Okay, you know what? Fine. Lets go talk, you’re clearly not giving up and I need you to never say that shit out loud ever again.”

Because blackmail works in life for Tim, blackmail also apparently works in death.

He’s given all of the info they have on the GIW, he’s introduced to ghost technology and how it works with ectoplasm. He’s told about the portal (although they refuse to sneak him into the house to see it- he can handle a few lasers, ugh) and he’s told about the general sequence of events in Danny’s life/death.

And then Tim is suddenly back in his body in Gotham.

The family found a way to bring him back and he’s 100% alive, no longer ghostly, but he retained all his memories.

“We have a war against the government to start” are not the first words his family expected to hear from Tim post death.

[su-inverted-au]

Chapter 4 - Scene 1 << Prev | First | Next >> Do not repost! Please reblog instead. Scene info and more below! VVV

HI! So this is going to be a bit of a montage/speedrun of the rest of the story, or at least what scenes I wanted to include the most. There's a lot in between I'm gonna be skipping for the sake of time and my wrist. It will all culminate in a grand finale that I'm excited to share with you all.

Each scene will have a brief explanation and maybe some bonus info about the story and AU, but for the most part it's up to reader interpretation. I'll be answering asks about it if they come.

The comic really stalled on this chapter, and specifically this scene. The big hiatus hit right before a reveal I wanted to do and it frustrated me to no end that I wasn't able to keep going.

Scene 1: How chapter 4 was going to continue was that Steven would jump into the fray and attack Centipeedle, drawing her attention. When Centi tries to attack back, Steven's gem powers would activate and draw out a shield! But not Rose Quartz's, it would be very different.

This would lead into Pearl managing to poof and bubble Centi and Greg appearing, finally having caught up to Steven. The adults would go off to talk about what's going on with Steven while he tries to figure out how he managed to activate his gem powers.

And that's where chapter 4 would end!

The next scenes won't be framed by any particular chapter, but they will be in chronological order. Stay tuned for scene 2, coming soon.

[fluentmoviequoter]

Speed Limit 2525

Requested Here!

Pairing: Tim Bradford x fem!reader

Summary: When Tim Bradford goes head-to-head with a bomber, he finds himself on a bus carrying a bomb and you.

Warnings: spoilers for Speed (1994) (I think this qualifies as an AU/rewrite), angst, bombings, nightmares, death and fear of dying, teasing, fluff, a little make out scene at the end? basically every warning that applies to the movie and The Rookie. I also made up a story about "Reaper"

Word Count: 11.7k+ words

A/N: This isn't completely proofread, but I'll be back soon to check it. I hope you enjoy!🤍

Masterlist Directory | Tim Bradford Masterlist | Request Info/Fandom List

Shoot him.

Tim doesn’t feel the trigger depress, only the hot desert air beating against his face. Though the trigger doesn’t move, a bullet rips through the barrel and into Tim’s only surviving squad member. He yells to warn his teammate, but no sound comes out. The wind is loud in the desert, yet the sound of Tim’s friend falling against the sand seems to echo for miles.

“Bradford,” the injured soldier coughs. “Wrong target, Reaper.”

Tim’s chest is tight with guilt and anxiety when he wakes. The sheets are wrapped tightly around his legs, and his shallow breaths distract him from freeing himself. Before he has time to orient himself, Tim’s phone rings and snaps him out of his post-nightmare, adrenaline-fueled state as he reaches across the empty pillow to answer it.

“Bradford,” he says.

“Get to the station as soon as you can,” Sergeant Grey demands. “Your Metro captain has me calling everybody in. We’re sending patrol units out, too. It’s gonna be a long day, Tim.”

Tim forgets about the nightmare and the memory within as he rushes to get ready. Tim’s tunnel vision focuses on work, and everything else fades away. Middle-of-the-night calls aren’t unusual, especially for a Metro Sergeant like himself, but this many officers getting a wake-up call is. Whatever is happening is big, and it doesn’t sound to Tim like it will be over any time soon. He makes it to the station in record time, and his commander is directing the other Metro officers when he enters.

“We don’t have time,” she says suddenly. “I’m running this force from here. Sergeant Grey will fill you in on the way. Get to the target location and stick together. Bradford, you’re with Temple!”

Tim nods as Harry Temple walks to his side. Harry was one of Angela Lopez’s first patrol partners, but he decided Metro was a better fit when the time to move forward in his career came along. Like Tim, he was in the Army before becoming a police officer, and he and Tim have some shared experiences. Neither of them is overly eager to bond over them, however.

“Do you know what’s going on?” Tim asks Harry as he turns on the lights and sirens in the shop.

“All I heard was ‘elevator,’” Harry answers. “I’m assuming they’re more to this than that.”

“Listen up,” Sergeant Grey says over the radio. “This is your official brief. When we roll up to the scene, we go straight in. No time for questions after we exit these cars. Fifteen people are trapped on an express elevator. The owner of the building is also inside. A bomb took out the cables, and our bomber is demanding three million dollars, or he blows the emergency brake, too. Cell phone service is spotty in the building, so we can’t rely on that to track anyone or anything.”

“Cell phone service is nonexistent in the elevator. A defensive move against trade secrets,” someone adds.

“What’s our clock, Sergeant?” Harry radios.

“He gave one hour when he called, which leaves us with twenty-eight minutes.”

“The only thing that’ll stop the elevator is the basement, right?” Tim adds.

“The city plans to avoid that. They’re working to release the money.”

Tim stops the shop beside the curb at the front of the building. He leaves the lights on as he and Harry remove their weapons from the back and meet the rest of their tactical team in the lobby.

“We can’t just unload them,” an officer says.

“The bomber wired the elevator doors and the hatch to trigger the bomb. So, he’s crazy, but he ain’t stupid,” Wade explains as he enters.

“Harry volunteers to examine the device,” Tim interjects. “He was on the bomb squad in the Army.”

Harry turns to glare at Tim as he says, “Right. And since Bradford also has Army experience, he’d like to provide a second opinion.”

“Fine,” Wade says. “You two check it out. Hey! Where’s the nearest access panel?”

“32nd floor,” a nearby employee answers on his way out. “It’s in the hall by the storage closet.”

“Report only. We’re in a holding pattern until we get word from your Commander back at the station. Confirm building evac and keep your radios active.”

“What about the other elevators?” Harry asks the employee.

“In an emergency, all passenger cars go to the nearest floor and shut down,” he says.

Tim frowns and moves his gun to his side. “Looks like we’re walking up the stairs.”

Harry nods before sprinting up the stairs behind Tim. Tim outpaces him but waits at the access panel for Harry to arrive with his small tool kit. He begins removing the nuts from the metal cover while Tim watches the hallway. Harry gives Tim a signal and Tim lifts the metal sheet. Light filters into the elevator shaft as Tim crawls through the opening and moves to the top of the elevator, where the bomb rests.

“Ladies and gentlemen, this is the L.A.P.D.,” Tim announces loudly. “There has been an elevator malfunction. Just relax and we’ll have you out of there as soon as possible.”

Harry looks up from the bomb and raises his hands in question.

“I didn’t lie,” Tim defends.

“I don’t recognize this work, Tim. Whoever our bomber is… he’s a pro and the work is solid,” Harry says.

“Bradford, Temple, hold position,” Wade radios. “We’re waiting to hear back from the bomber.”

Tim looks at his watch and muffles a curse. Their time is nearly out, and Tim continues to look at his watch rather than think about the lives in the metal death trap below his feet.

Harry sees the look in Tim’s eyes and decides to distract him. “Terrorist in a crowded room, five pounds of dynamite. He’s got a deadman’s stick. What do you do?”

“How close am I?” Tim asks, looking away from the elevator.

“Twenty feet.”

“Taser. He can’t let go with enough volts surging through him.”

“Alright, hot shot. Fifty feet?”

“Nice try.”

“Airport, then. Gunman with one hostage, using her for cover. He’s almost on a plane, you’re a hundred feet away.”

“Why is the hostage always a woman in these scenarios? Watch too many romcoms in the academy?”

“What do you do?” Harry repeats.

Tim kneels to examine the bomb once more and remembers his nightmare. Shoot him. He shakes his head before answering, “Shoot the hostage. Take her out of the equation, he can’t get to the plane, and I have a clear shot.”

“You are out of your mind, Bradford.”

“This is wrong,” Tim says suddenly. “He’s gonna blow it. How much do you think this elevator weighs?”

“Why? You wanna try to bench it?”

Tim doesn’t acknowledge the teasing as he adds, “We can do something about the hostages.”

“No shoot them, right?”

“Roof,” Tim reads as he points to a roof access sign. There’s a heavy-duty winch secured to the corner of the roof, and Tim runs to it as he says, “We don’t shoot them. Just take them out of the equation.”

Tim pulls the cable from the winch toward the elevator housing on the roof. He drops it in and watches it fall several feet before it catches.

“It’ll hold,” Tim tells Harry. “It’ll hold,” he repeats, quieter.

“Six minutes,” Harry alerts.

Tim throws his legs over the edge of the housing and lowers carefully onto the elevator cable. He hooks the winch hook to his tactical vest before moving down in the elevator shaft. Wade and the Metro team argue with the city council about releasing the money in the lobby, and no one has a clue that the shooter is listening to their radio frequencies. Without cell phones, they’re completely reliant on their radios to stay in touch with one another. Tim ignores his radio as he flips so he’s headfirst as he nears the trapped elevator.

“One more pop quiz,” Harry begins. “Psycho Sergeant Tim Bradford rigs an elevator to drop thirty stories. What do you do?”

Tim rolls his eyes before gesturing for Harry to hold the winch cable steady. A small pile of C4 waits beside his feet, but Tim ignores it as he secures the cable hook to the frame of the elevator.

“Why did I take this job?” Tim murmurs.

“Hey, a few more decades and you get a tiny pension and a free watch,” Harry answers.

“Hit the switch, Temple.”

Harry runs to the winch, hoping that the cables used to wash windows are strong enough to catch a free-falling elevator. He flips the switch, and the winch begins pulling in the cable. As the extra cable Tim pulled into the shaft begins unspooling, he moves up to the open access panel.

In the basement, a man missing a thumb presses a button on his handheld device. Instantaneously, a red light illuminates on the bomb. Tim sees it and throws himself through the access panel just before the bomb goes off. The passengers begin screaming, but the winch catches the falling elevator before it reaches the bottom of the shaft.

“What is happening, Bradford?” Wade asks, his concern evident over the radio.

“He’s early!” Harry yells as he returns from the roof.

“We have to get them out of the elevator. They can’t be lower than 28,” Tim exclaims.

When he and Harry meet the rest of their team on the 28th floor, they see that the elevator is stranded between floors. Only the floor is accessible from their current position, but there is no time to run up and down the stairs and look for the perfect access point. The elevator passengers lower to the floor and Tim and Harry pull people out one at a time. Tim pulls the last woman to safety seconds before the winch fails and the elevator plummets to the bottom of the shaft. After the sound of impact, Tim and Harry lean back against a wall and pant from the effort they exerted.

“Is your watch slow?” Tim asks.

“Nah. He jumped the gun,” Harry says with a shake of his head. “We had three minutes.”

“He blew more than the elevator. He blew his three million dollars. Why would he do that?”

“Maybe he decided it wasn’t worth it.”

Tim sits up as he declares, “He’s here.”

“He could have blown that thing from anywhere, Tim.”

“He knew we were doing something, that’s why he acted early. That means he’s close.”

“He’s not gonna corner himself in the building. The building we evacuated.” Harry leans his head back against the wall and thinks for a moment before he adds, “He’d want to be here, yes, but stay mobile… The elevators.”

“All of the passenger cars stopped, and we checked them.”

“Did we check the freight elevators?”

Tim’s eyes widen in realization as he and Harry push themselves to stand and run to the freight elevator doors. Once Tim pries the door open, he slides down the cable and lands on top of a car. Harry reluctantly follows and freezes when a noise echoes inside. Tim doesn’t notice Harry behind him as he prepares to enter the elevator. Before he can, a shotgun is fired between them, and Harry falls into the elevator. The man inside knocks him out with the butt of the shotgun, and Tim waits until the elevator moves up to drop in through the roof panel. As he lands, he looks up and sees a shotgun barrel in his face.

“I don’t suppose anybody would pay me three million dollars just for you,” the nine-fingered bomber muses.

He pulls the trigger, but the gun is empty. Tim removes his Glock from his side and demands the bomber lower the shotgun. He does so but opens his coat to reveal dynamite strapped to his chest and a deadman switch detonator in his hand.

“Hotshot,” the man begins. Tim’s jaw clenches as he realizes the man listened to their conversations over the radio, but he can’t say anything before the bomber says, “Terrorist holding a police hostage. He’s got enough dynamite to blow the building in half. What do you do?”

“Fifty cops are waiting for us in the basement,” Tim states.

“Standard flanking, I’m aware.” He presses a button on a device wired into the elevator controls. “So, maybe we’ll get off early.”

The elevator stops at a parking level, and Tim watches as the bomber pulls Harry toward the door. His eyes open slowly, and Tim keeps his eyes on Harry rather than the man pulling him.

“Well, end of the line, Bradford. This day has been a real disappointment, I don’t mind saying.”

“Why? Because you couldn’t kill everyone?” Tim asks.

“There will come a time, hotshot, when you will wish you’d never met me.”

“I’m already there.”

“Look! I have your partner, I’m in charge! I drop this stick and they clean us up with a sponge!”

“Go ahead!” Harry yells. “Drop the stick!” “Shut up!” Tim demands.

Harry looks at Tim and mouths, “Shoot the hostage.”

Shoot him. Wrong target, Reaper. Tim takes a deep breath and shifts his arms to shoot Harry in the leg. He collapses onto the floor, and the bomber steps back in shock before running into the garage. Tim steps over Harry to shoot behind the feeling suspect. As the man reaches the door, he looks over his shoulder to smile at Tim before he disappears. Tim can’t check on Harry as the garage explodes and the force pushes him back against the wall. As Tim collides with the concrete behind him, everything goes dark. And everything changes.

After Harry’s unplanned and involuntary retirement party, Tim nearly oversleeps. His alarm pulls him from a dreamless sleep, and he winces at the sound before turning it off. Before he showers, he decides to go for a quick run to clear his head. Once he’s dressed and ready for the day, he drives to his favorite café. It’s one of the only places in Los Angeles where you can get a decent cup of coffee and breakfast without being surrounded by millennials working on their screenplays. Tim nods at another regular, Vince, as he enters.

“Hey, Tim. You look awful,” Bob, the owner of the café, says.

“Thanks, Bob,” Tim grumbles.

“Pretty boy party too hard?” Vince asks Tim.

“I- I don’t remember that well.”

“Wake up alone?”

“Always do.”

“Must be nice,” Bob interjects. “The last time I partied like that I worked up married.”

Tim shakes his head as he accepts his order and walks out behind Vince. He sets his coffee on top of his truck as he retrieves his keys from his pocket. Vince’s bus starts behind Tim and pulls away from the curb. Tim turns to wave at Vince before unlocking his door.

After it crosses the first intersection, the bus explodes. Tim stumbles as he looks toward the source of the noise. He runs to the bus as it rolls to a stop and fights against the flames to help Vince, but it’s too late. As Tim lays his hands on his knees in shock, he notices an abandoned cell phone lying on the sidewalk behind him. It rings continuously, and Tim doesn’t hesitate before he answers the phone.

“What do you think, Bradford?” the bomber from last month asks. “You think if you and Harry find all the driver’s teeth they’ll give you another medal?”

“Where are you?” Tim demands.

“Twenty-second delay. I’m in the air duct when the garage blows. Did you think I wouldn’t come prepared? I spent two years on the elevator job. Two years. I invested myself in it. You couldn’t understand the commitment I have. A child, Tim, you’re a child. You ruin a man’s life’s work and then think you can walk away. You’ve got blinders on, but I got your attention now. Didn’t I, Tim?”

“Why didn’t you just come after me?”

“This is about money – 3.7 million. Not you and your ego. None of it had to happen, Tim, and I hope you realize that. How long do you think the driver’s wife and kids will wait before they get worried tonight?”

“When I find you, I will kill you,” Tim threatens.

“There’s a bomb on a bus, hotshot. Once the bus hits fifty miles an hour, the bomb is armed. If the bus drops below fifty, it blows up. What do you do?”

Tim doesn’t answer but looks around for any sign of the suspect.

“What do you do?” he repeats.

“I’d want to know what bus it was,” Tim answers. He’s accepted the challenge and knows that it has to end with a death: either his or the bomber’s.

“You think I’m going to tell you that, Tim?”

“Yes.”

“Very good.” The man sounds happy, and Tim presses a hand against a nearby wall to control his anger. “Now there are rules, Tim; we have to do this right. No one gets off the bus. One passenger leaves, I will detonate it. Now, if I don’t get my money by 11 a.m., there’s also a timer.”

Tim looks at his watch: 8:05 a.m. “I can’t pull that money in time-“

“Focus, Tim! Your concern is the bus. Don’t call, the radios are jammed. Number 2525, running downtown from Venice. At the corner of Lincoln and Pico…”

Tim drops the cell phone and runs to his car to follow the bus. The lives on that bus are in his hands, and he doesn’t plan to shoot any hostages today.

“Please stop! Sam!” you yell as you chase your bus.

You don’t want to ride the bus, but since your most recent speeding ticket, it is your only mode of transportation. In the few weeks since your license was suspended, you’ve gotten to know the driver, Sam, and some of the regular passengers. You hope that camaraderie is enough to convince Sam to stop for you. The brakes on the bus squeal as it stops, and the door opens.

“This look like a stop to you?” Sam asks.

“You are an amazing man, Sam,” you say as you walk onto the bus. “The men in books and songs have nothing on you.”

You swipe your bus card and take a seat before saying hello to Ortiz, a regular passenger. Comfortable in your seat, and glad that none of the passengers are in a talkative mood this early on a weekday, you relax and hope to get your car back soon.

Tim drives his truck in and out of traffic, onto the shoulder, and into the emergency lane as he tries to catch up with bus 2525. Other drivers honk their horns, flip him off, and yell insults through open windows, but Tim doesn’t notice or care. If he can stop the driver before it reaches 50, then the bomb will never activate. The only danger would be the man with the detonator.

You look up as Sam slows for a traffic jam.

“Can’t you just drive over them?” you ask with a smile.

“Is it always like this?” a man asks from the back of the bus. “It’s my first time here, and it took me three hours just to get out of the airport.”

“Yep,” you answer. “It’s usually worse.”

“That’s why I never drive,” the woman behind you interjects. “I’d never have a car in this city.”

“I have a car. I miss my car,” you lament.

“In the shop?” the tourist asks.

“Something like that. Sam, seriously, the bus is huge, just run them over,” you say again.

When Tim sees the bus has stopped because of a stalled car ahead, he sighs before he pulls onto the shoulder. He exits his truck and runs toward the bus, but the accident clears faster than he expected, and begins moving before he reaches the door. Hitting his fist against the side, Tim yells for the driver to stop.

“Can’t blame him for wanting to get on the bus,” you mutter as you watch him slap an open palm against the door.

“Get off the doors, man! Wait for the next one,” Sam yells before he speeds up.

Tim removes his badge from his pocket a moment too late. He continues chasing the bus, and you look down at your phone as the other passengers watch the unknown man run down the freeway.

Nearly half a mile from his truck and with no other option, Tim stops and waits at the edge of the road. He sees a speeding sports car approaching, and he moves into the middle of its lane and raises his badge.

“Stop!” Tim yells over the traffic.

The young man driving the car slams on his brakes to avoid hitting Tim. Several cars behind him blow their horns, and he raises to yell over the convertible’s windshield.

“What the-“

“L.A.P.D.,” Tim interrupts. “Get out of the car.”

“This is my car! It ain’t stolen and you have no right!” the driver argues.

Tim pulls his gun from its holster and says, “It’s stolen now. Move over.”

The man nods quickly before he jumps over the console and settles into the passenger seat. Tim sits behind the wheel and swerves into another lane as he ignores the owner’s pleas not to scratch the car. Tim drives the expensive, sporty convertible exactly as he had driven his truck, and the man in the passenger seat covers his eyes in fear for his car more than his life. As Tim steers the car beside the bus, he lays on the horn. Sam looks over and immediately recognizes him, and his eyes widen to prove it.

“I’m a cop!” Tim yells.

Sam lowers the window and raises his voice to ask, “What?”

“L-A-P-D!” Tim spells slowly. “There’s a bomb on your bus.”

“There’s a what?” Tim’s passenger exclaims.

“I can’t hear you,” Sam says.

“There’s a bomb on the bus!” Tim repeats.

Sam shakes his head, and Tim looks at the convertible’s speedometer. He’s over 50, so the bus must be, too.

“Drive!” Tim yells as he gestures for the bus to keep moving. “FIFTY! STAY ABOVE FIFTY!”

Sam nods rapidly and trembles a bit as he holds the speed steady. The commotion draws your attention, and you turn in your seat to watch the man who desperately needs a ride or is crazy.

“Call the Mid-Wilshire division station,” Tim says as he hands his phone to the man beside him. “Ask for Detective Angela Lopez.”

“Okay, okay.” The man speaks into the phone briefly before passing it back to Tim.

“Angela,” Tim says.

“Why are you calling me on your day off?” she asks. “Harry’s here, if you’re looking for him.”

“He’s alive.”

“Who?”

“The bomber! He’s back.”

“Harry!” Angela calls.

“Tim, did he hit the bus in Venice?” Harry asks as he approaches Angela’s desk.

“Temple,” Wade interrupts. “We just got a ransom demand from your dead terrorist. Says he rigged a city bus. Where’s Tim?”

“Where do you think?” Harry replies.

Tim ends the call and navigates around the back of the bus to drive alongside the door. Traffic is increasing with the morning rush, and he doesn’t want to risk getting stuck in another slowdown. He honks to get Sam’s attention, and gestures for him to open the door.

“Drive straight,” Tim directs him. “Stay in this lane.”

Sam agrees before Tim speeds up to get ahead of the bus. He opens the driver-side door and hits the brakes, so the bus rips the door off the car. Tim presses the accelerator again to catch up with the bus as he is yelled at by the owner of the car.

“Take the wheel!” Tim says.

Tim waits until the car’s owner moves back into the driver’s seat to jump into the open bus door and pull himself up the stairs.

When the bus rips the door off a convertible, you finally look up. The man driving the car beside the bus is attractive, but you’re a little concerned for his mental well-being. Sam seems willing to help him, and you don’t understand why. When he jumps from the car and onto the bus, you stand and grip the bar above your head. He locks eyes with you before holding up a police badge.

“Everyone, I’m Sergeant Tim Bradford, L.A.P.D. We’ve got a slight… situation on the bus,” he explains.

“Are you crazy?” you ask.

“Ma'am, if you’ll please sit down, we can deal with this in an orderly-“

“But what are you-“

“Ma’am.”

His tone and the look in his eyes convinces you, so you sit down as Tim walks toward the back of the bus and looks at the other passengers. You watch him move and wonder if he’s truly a cop or just insane.

“Just stay in your seats and remain quiet,” Tim says. “Then we’ll be able to defuse the, uh, the problem.”

A passenger you’ve spoken to before, Jay, leaps from his seat and points a gun at Tim.

“Jay!” you yell worriedly.

“Get away from me!” Jay demands.

Tim pulls his gun and matches Jay’s stance. Two women at the back of the bus scream, and you look between Tim and Jay from your seat.

“I don’t know you, I’m not here for you. Let’s not do this,” Tim says calmly.

“Stop the bus, Sam,” Jay calls.

“He can’t. Look, I’m going to put my gun away.” Tim holsters it slowly and raises his hands to show they’re empty. “I don’t care about what you did. It’s over. I’m not a cop right now. See? We’re just two guys on the bus.”

Tim tosses his badge to the floor beside your feet, and you look at it before raising your eyes to Jay again. You understand why he calmed down so quickly; Tim Bradford has a soothing voice, and his presence is assertive but caring. More importantly, you can relax now, because his badge looks real. Jay’s hands begin to lower, but your fellow passenger Ortiz jumps onto his back before Jay puts it away.

Tim rushes forward as Ortiz tries to pull the gun from Jay. A shot goes off, and everyone ducks before a second shot fires.

“Sam!” someone screams.

You turn toward the front of the bus before moving to help Sam. Tim disarms Jay with minimal effort while another woman joins your side.

“Move him,” you say.

“He’s bleeding,” the woman argues.

“We have to stop the bus!”

At your words, Tim spins quickly to face you.

“No!” he yells. “Stay above fifty.”

“Sam is wounded,” you begin.

“You slow down, and this bus will explode!”

Tim holds your eyes and nods slowly. He’s not kidding, you realize. Turning quickly, you look at the speedometer, which falls to 51. While Sam is still in the seat, you push your foot onto the gas pedal and watch the line rise above fifty.

Tim handcuffs Jay to one of the poles before he explains, “There is a bomb on this bus. If we slow down, it will blow. If anyone tries to get off, it will blow.”

The women on the bus surround Sam and help him get comfortable as they try to slow the bleeding. As they pull Sam from the driver’s seat, you slide into position and steer into another lane to keep the speed over 50.

“We’re only gonna make it through this if everyone stays calm, sits down, and listens to me,” Tim adds.

You don’t hear everything he says, with your complete focus on the road ahead and the speedometer on the dash. Your knuckles are white because of your grip on the wheel, and you don’t hear Tim approach behind you. He lays a hand on the headrest behind you and leans down.

“This is great. A bomb on wheels,” you muse sarcastically.

“Can you handle this bus, ma’am?” Tim asks.

“Yeah, yeah. It’s just like driving a big Toyota, right?”

“Can you handle it?”

“I’m fine. What’s the plan? Is there a plan?”

Tim nods and stands to his full height. He watches you take a deep breath before turning to the rest of the passengers.

“Everyone, I need your cell phones,” Tim announces.

“No way, man!” the tourist yells.

“There is a terrorist out there with a bomb, and I don’t need any of you live streaming or interfering with the radio signal he could be using to detonate a bomb. So, I will only say this one more time. Phones - and anything else with a cellular connection – now.”

The passengers nod and offer all of their cellular devices. Tim accepts an empty bag from a woman beside Sam and places everyone’s belongings inside. He returns to your side and removes his phone from his pocket.

“Do you have anyone you need to call?” Tim asks softly.

“No. I- I don’t want to think like that,” you answer.

“We don’t have to. Everything’s going to be okay. Just keep doing what you’re doing.”

You nod and Tim lays a kind hand on your shoulder to add, “But I need your phone.”

“Oh, yeah. It’s- uh- it’s in my back pocket. Right side.”

Tim’s hand brushes your lower back as he pulls the phone from your pocket. He apologizes, though you can’t imagine why. You’ve only known Tim Bradford for a few minutes, but his words mean something, and you can only hope he keeps the promises he’s making.

“You’re a cop, right?” you ask.

“That’s right. Metro Sergeant,” Tim says. “But you can call me Tim if that’s what you’re asking.”

“Uh, no. Thanks, and you can stop calling me ‘ma’am’ while we’re at it. I just- I should probably tell you that I’m taking the bus because my driver’s license was suspended.”

“What for?”

“Speeding.”

Tim shakes his head and hides his smile before calling the station again. He leans forward, but keeps his hand beside you, to look at the news chopper circling above the bus.

“Lopez, it’s me. I took phones from all the passengers. Where do we start?” Tim asks.

“Alright. Harry and Wade are with me,” Angela replies.

“Check the speedometer, Bradford,” Harry says. “Has it been messed with? Any wires or anything that don’t belong?”

“Sorry,” Tim whispers as he leans in front of you to check the dash area. “No, it’s clean.”

“Then it’s gotta be under the bus. Probably rigged to one of the axles.”

“I can’t get under the bus to check right now. The whole you stop, you die thing. Remember?”

Tim doesn’t sound like he’s kidding; in fact, he sounds grumpier than when he first boarded, but his comment makes you laugh. He pats the back of your seat before turning.

“Sergeant Bradford,” Sam calls weakly. Tim kneels beside him to listen, and Sam stutters, “There’s a- an access panel… in the fl-floor.”

“Hold on, Angela,” Tim says into the phone.

He unscrews the panel and pulls it aside. The asphalt moves quickly under the bus, and Tim looks around before handing his phone to a passenger. You look up in the mirror above you to watch Tim briefly before returning your attention to the road.

“What’s your name?” he asks.

“Stephen. I’m a tourist,” Stephen introduces.

“Welcome to the City of Angels. Hold my phone, please. Tell my partner what I see.”

Stephen nods and raises the phone to his ear as Tim moves so he can see under the bus. He takes a deep breath; Tim knows a bit about bombs from his time in the Army, but it’s Harry’s expertise.

“Okay, there’s a bundle here,” Tim yells over the wind. “Pretty big.”

“There’s a pretty big bundle,” Stephen relays.

“Brass fittings. I think I can reach the circuit wire.”

“He can reach the circuit wire- No, don’t do that, Sergeant Bradford. It can be a decoy, he says. What else?”

“Hold on,” Tim murmurs before moving further underneath the bus. He sees the extent of the bomb and pulls himself back up to take the phone. “Angela, Harry, there’s enough C4 on this bus to take out everyone on the highway. There’s a wristwatch: gold band, cheap.”

You look back at Tim quickly before inhaling sharply. “Sergeant,” you call.

“What do you think, Harry?” Tim asks.

“Bradford!” you yell into the bus speaker.

Tim moves to your side and places a hand on the dash to lean forward. His face is right beside yours, and you wish you were nervous because of him and not the bomb underneath you.

“Everybody’s stopping,” you point out. “What do I do?”

“Get on the shoulder.”

“This is an exit!”

Tim flinches as you sideswipe several cars.

“Tim!”

“Off. Get off!” Tim yells.

You nearly miss the ramp and pull the wheel to the right to merge onto another road. Honking the horn and yelling for people to get out of the way, you take a deep breath. At least you’re off the freeway. Tim tells you to keep driving as he answers his phone again.

“Where?” he asks. “Got it.”

“Do I stay here?” you inquire.

“Yes. Just straight on this, they’re trying to clear the roads for us.”

“I’m never getting my license back, am I?” you grumble.

“The police commissioner will buy you a car if you ask,” Tim says quietly. “You’re doing well, okay? Don’t worry about anything else.”

You nod and return both hands to the wheel. Tim removes the flannel shirt he’s been wearing, leaving him in a white t-shirt, and drapes it over the back of your seat. Your eyes catch on his biceps before you chide yourself for getting distracted.

One of the phones in the bag rings, and Tim yells, “Who didn’t turn their phone off?”

No one is willing to admit their fault or doesn’t want to risk dealing with Tim’s wrath and ending up like Jay where he sits on the floor. Tim digs through the bag and pulls the ringing phone out. The number is one he recognizes, but he hesitates before answering.

“Taking their phones was smart,” the bomber says as the line connects. “2525… nice passengers, aren’t they? See, that’s the beauty of being in this day and age. I know everything about everyone on that bus. So, if you or your little girlfriend, or even the tourist from Kalamazoo try to double-cross me…”

“The bus explodes,” Tim interjects. “I’m aware.”

“What’s with the attitude, Tim? You’re seeing one of the prettiest places in the world, riding a bus for free… Oh, no, I know. Can’t shoot a hostage that makes that cold heart beat again, huh?”

“What do you want?”

“You know what I want! 3.7 million dollars. I get the money, and then we can both get what we want.”

“You don’t know what I want.”

“I know what you don’t want. Tell your girlfriend to keep her eyes on the road.”

The call ends and Tim raises the cell phone in his hands. “He knows who is on this bus.”

“How?” Ortiz asks.

“Your bus passes, your phones, both, maybe. Look, one of the conditions of our survival is that no one gets off the bus. If he knows who you are, then we are even more obligated to keep that promise.”

“You didn’t even try to get us off the bus!” Jay accuses.

“Because he would have blown it. I understand what you are feeling, but I need you to trust me, trust the L.A.P.D., and work with me on this.”

“Tim is this your team?” you ask over your shoulder.

A police car pulls into the lane in front of you as several more flank the sides of the bus. The road clears around them, but more news choppers are joining the airspace above you.

Tim nods and looks at you. “Are you okay?”

“Yes. What happens now, though?”

“My teammates are working on it. We’ve got gas and open road, so keep driving.”

“Is it- can I be okay and really nervous at the same time?”

“I’d be more concerned if you weren’t nervous.”

“You don’t look nervous.”

“My friend Angela says I never look anything; thinks I can’t show emotion because I can’t feel them.”

“Is it true?”

Tim looks at you and lowers to squat beside you. “No, it’s not.”

“How’s Sam?”

“The driver? He’s gonna be alright. Thanks to you.”

Someone calls for Tim, and he squeezes your shoulder reassuringly as he stands. You glance at him in the mirror as he returns to the access panel. A police helicopter drops to fly above you, and you wonder what the news stations and police officers know or think about the situation. The bus begins losing speed as you steer around a curve, and when you try to speed up again, you realize something is wrong.

Back at the station, Harry and Angela work with Wade and a bomb expert to search for a way to disarm the bomb and for their suspect. Harry has a description of the bomber, but there’s only so much they can learn about the bomb without seeing it.

“Sergeant Bradford!” you cry as you press the gas again.

“What?” Tim asks with wide eyes. You were calling him Tim, and your sudden change of formality and tone concern him.

“The gas pedal’s stuck.”

“What else can go wrong?” Tim asks under his breath. “Move your foot.”

You pull your foot from the pedal and steer as Tim presses his leg against yours to slam his foot down against the pedal. It doesn’t move, and the speedometer dips closer to fifty. Tim moves his hands to cover yours on the steering wheel and moves his leg between yours to try a new angle. You’re close to him, but the fear of dying keeps you from enjoying it in any way. He pushes the pedal again and his shoulders drop.

“There,” he announces as he steps back.

You take the wheel back and press the accelerator down again. The bus gains speed and you catch up to the police car before you.

“Lopez, talk to me,” Tim greets as he answers his phone again.

“You’ve got a hard left coming up,” Angela says. “Really hard.”

“Hard left up ahead,” Tim tells you.

“We’ll tip!” you argue.

“Who is that? Your driver?” Angela inquires.

“We’re not going to tip,” Tim says.

“Yes, we are!”

The curve in the road comes into view, and Tim suddenly agrees, “We’re going to tip.”

He leaves your side to move everyone onto the right side of the bus. The weight distribution keeps the bus from tipping, but as Tim helps you pull the wheel as hard as possible to make the turn, you forget why you were concerned. His presence is the only thing keeping you calm, and you wish he could just sit beside you the whole time.

“Angela, get those news crews off our tail!” he yells over the cheers of the passengers.

You look in the mirror beside you. The news crews must have arrived recently because you didn’t notice them before.

“On it. Harry’s working with the bomb squad. Keep it fifty,” Angela responds.

“Don’t try to make that a thing, Lopez,” Tim says before he ends the call.

“Hey, who’s doing this?” you ask Tim.

“The bomber? He’s just a guy who’s angry with me for foiling his last bombing attempt,” Tim explains.

“So, he’s trying again? Using you to get whatever it is he wants?”

“More or less.”

“What if you stop him again?”

“We do this again tomorrow. Until one of us dies trying.”

“That won’t work.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, I’m not available to drive tomorrow.”

Tim nods but doesn’t reply before a flatbed truck merges into the lane beside the door. His Metro captain and two officers are on the back, and the driver blows the horn to get his attention. Tim opens the door and moves out of the door to talk to them. You can’t hear much but suspect that they want to get the hostages off the bus, which Tim already said was impossible. Your sudden and unbending trust in him should probably concern you, but you will do anything and everything he tells you, even if that means staying on a bus with a bomb on it.

“He called the station looking for you,” an officer announces.

“Why? He has my cell,” Tim says.

“Maybe it died.”

“Just give him my number again! And keep looking; find this guy so we can move these people.”

Tim steps onto the main platform again and closes the door.

“Are they going to help us?” the woman holding Sam’s head up asks.

“Sure, they will. They’re the police,” someone jokes.

Another phone rings in the bag, and Tim pulls your phone out this time. He hadn’t thought to turn yours off because he was concerned about you and wanted to make sure you could drive like the bus needed to be driven.

“Hello?” he answers.

“Tim, you know I trust you. But it looks to me like you’re trying to move passengers off the bus,” the bomber says.

“I need one as an act of faith,” Tim argues. “The driver has been shot.”

“You shot another hostage?”

“He’s dying! If you want your money, show a little charity.”

The line is quiet for a moment before the bomber says, “Fine. You can try to get the driver off. I have more people to kill. Tell your girlfriend behind the wheel not to slow down or he won’t get a chance to bleed out.”

“We’re getting the driver off,” Tim announces after returning your phone to the bag. “Just him for now.”

Ortiz moves out of the seat to help Tim move Sam to the door and onto the truck.

“Get as close as you can,” Tim says. “A little closer.”

The side of the bus hits the truck and swerves, and you rush to apologize.

“It’s okay.” Tim says your name, and you know that he means what he says. “Perfect! Hold it steady!”

You sigh as Tim walks past you again after getting Sam to safety, but then you see a woman walking toward the door. The officers on the truck reach out to help her, unaware of what will happen if she steps off the bus.

“No!” you yell.

“I have to,” she responds.

“No! Don’t get off! Stop!”

An explosion echoes through the bus as the steps fall out and go underneath the bus. The female passenger disappears after she falls with the debris, and you look away quickly as Tim falls forward trying to catch her.

“You’ve got to get those choppers out of here!” Tim yells to his captain. “He’s watching!”

The bus is silent as Tim stands up and waits beside you. With your eyes on the road, he doesn’t see the tear that leaks out. When the passengers start arguing behind you, your grip on the wheel tightens.

“Hey!” Tim calls as he turns to face them. They silence, and he moves his attention to you. “How are you doing?”

Tim steps forward, sees the tears covering your face, and squats with an arm behind you. “What can I do?”

His voice is softer than when he yelled at the men behind you, and you can’t lie to him.

“I thought that was the bomb. When I heard it… I thought everything was over. But then I saw her fall under the bus, and-“

“You’re glad you’re still alive,” Tim finishes.

“I’m so sorry. Does that make me a terrible person?”

“No. It doesn’t mean you don’t care. We’re still alive, and we’re all allowed to be thankful for that. The guy who put us here? He’s a terrible person. Don’t think that you’re a bad person. You’re not.”

“Tim,” you say before pointing to his Captain, who is waving for his attention.

“There’s a gap in the freeway. It’s big. We have to get these people off, Tim,” he says.

“You know I can’t, Captain.”

“Tim?” you ask as he walks past you. “What’d he say?”

“There’s a gap in the road,” Tim tells everyone.

“How big is a gap?” Ortiz asks.

“50 feet, a couple of miles ahead,” Tim says.

“Tim?” you repeat. “What if I shift down and just keep the engine revving?”

“He thought of that… Floor it.”

“What?”

“There’s an interchange, maybe there’s an incline. Just floor it.”

“Okay.”

“Everyone keep your heads down.”

The police car leading you falls off the side, but you continue driving toward the unfinished overpass. The needle on the speedometer nears 70, and Tim waits beside you. As you approach the end, Tim yells for everyone to hold on. He puts his arms around you and pulls your head down with his. You feel weightless for a moment, grounded only by his arms around you before the bus collides with the other side of the interchange. Looking up over Tim’s arm, you see more road ahead and press the gas again, so you don’t slow down.

Your forehead begins to burn and hurt, and you press your palm against your temple as the people behind you cheer. Tim checks on everyone before returning to your side, and he immediately realizes that you’re in pain. He moves your hand and presses the bottom of his shirt to your head. It’s stained with blood when he pulls his hand away, and you grimace at the idea of a wound on your head.

“Get off here!” Tim calls suddenly.

“Yes! Get off!”

You obey and soon enter the Los Angeles International Airport. Tim gives you directions to an emergency runway and explains that you can simply drive here. Without traffic or road closures, the only concern is staying above fifty.

Being in restricted air space is also a bonus, and you notice that the news helicopters are hovering at a distance. Tim seemed concerned about the presence of news cameras, so maybe the location will also keep the bomber from knowing exactly what is happening.

“Yeah?” Tim asks as he answers his phone.

“The airport. Well done. You had some close calls, but you did well, Tim,” the bomber says.

“What do you want?”

“My money. Help me get it before it’s too late, will you? The negotiators think I’m doing this for fun?”

“Are you not?”

“Oh, now you think you know me too?”

“I know you want money you didn’t earn. More than you deserve.”

“I did earn it! I got a medal, too, you know.”

“Let me off. If you want my help, I need to explain that you’re not bluffing. Just me.”

“Alright. But you have to come back. I can see everything; remember that.”

Tim ends the call and slides his phone back in his pocket.

“There’s a plan now?” you ask.

“Maybe. He’s letting me off,” Tim says.

“Hey, don’t forget about us,” you call as he steps off the bus and onto an SUV. “He’ll be back,” you promise the others.

While you circle the airport runways, Tim works with the other officers he told you about to find a way to disarm the bomb. Ortiz walks to your side and looks out at the airport.

“Ortiz?” you ask.

“He’s not coming back, I’m telling you,” he says.

“He didn’t have to get on in the first place. Hey, get behind the yellow line.”

Ortiz looks down and takes on short step back. “You let the cop up here.”

“What is that?” Stephen asks as he joins Ortiz.

“I have no idea,” you answer as you look at Tim standing on the back of a truck covered in machinery. It pulls over in front of you, and Tim lowers onto a cart attached to a winch, and you mutter, “I was right. He is insane.”

“How’d they get that so fast?” Stephen asks under his breath.

You focus more on driving in a straight line as Tim disappears under the front of the bus. He looks up at you just before he disappears, and you nod once. Knowing that he’s under the bus makes you more nervous to drive than you have been at any other point today. Driving in a straight line at the airport is more stressful because Tim is underneath a moving vehicle and touching a bomb. You know he has friends and colleagues who are helping him, but you feel more than a need to survive when you look at Sergeant Tim Bradford.

The winch on the truck releases suddenly, and the cable unfurls.

“Check and see if he came out the back!” you demand. “Can you see him?”

“He’s not back here!” Ortiz calls.

“Look under the bus! Back by the tires!”

“I don’t see him.”

The winch cable snaps and the back tire bounces over something. You press a hand over your mouth in shock, and Ortiz runs to the back access panel.

“Please tell me he’s alright!” you yell. “Do you see him?”

“I see him!” Ortiz responds. “He’s alright!”

You look back and forth between the empty runway and the back of the bus. Ortiz and Stephen pull Tim up onto the bus, and you can’t decide whether to be angry or relieved with him. Tim thanks Ortiz before walking to your side.

“How are you?” he asks.

“You scared me!” you accuse. You slap his vest to express your displeasure before hissing in pain. “What’s that smell?”

“Gas. We have a new leak.” “You caused a leak?”

“It was that or get run over. You can see the difficulty I had choosing.”

“Don’t try to be funny right now. I thought I killed you.”

“I’ll ask my captain to get a fuel truck.”

“Will it work?”

“I don’t know.”

“You’re not exactly comforting, you know that?”

“You just hit me and now you want comfort?”

You sigh and look at him again before saying, “Thank you, Tim.”

“Just doing my job… ma’am.”

Tim stays beside you while Harry and a S.W.A.T. team infiltrate the house listed on the bomber’s records. He was surprised by how quickly they found his identification, but now that they have the element of surprise, he hopes that this game is almost over.

 When he gets another call, you can only see the anger in his eyes as he listens to the person on the other end. The bomber tells Tim that Harry and the S.W.A.T. team walked right into his trap. You watch him and can only wonder what is making him so mad. His life is in danger, but something is capable of pushing him even further, it seems.

“I’m going to rip your spine out. If you know as much as you think you do, you know I can,” Tim threatens lowly.

“Oh, I do, Reaper. That’s why you should do what you’re told. You and I both know you can’t do it without Harry and his ability to follow a cheap watch, anyway. Get me my money and it’s over. Otherwise, you, lumberjack-ie, and the others are dead. Got that?”

“Yeah,” Tim says after a moment. “Howie.”

The bomber hesitates at the mention of his real name but doesn’t let it stop him. Tim listens to Howard Payne’s demands before ending the call. Tim turns around and kicks where the stairs used to be before pulling against the handrail in his anger. You try to get his attention over his yelling, but it falls on deaf ears.

“Tim! Please!” you try again. “I can’t do this without you. Please.”

Tim slows his movements before gripping the rail beside you. His jaw is clenched as he looks at you, but your pleas soften his eyes.

“Please stay with me,” you whisper.

“We’re going to die,” he says.

“No. You got us this far, right?”

Tim leans against the dash beside you and looks at you. His shirt is still behind you. Lumberjack-ie. Your little girlfriend.

“Lumberjacks wear flannel, right?” Tim asks.

“Uh, yeah. As far as I know,” you answer. “Why?”

“He can see you.”

“What?”

“Keep looking straight ahead.”

You turn your face to the windshield and watch the runway as Tim examines the top of the bus. He sees the camera at the top of the windshield and shakes his head.

“He said, ‘your girlfriend behind the wheel’ and ‘lumberjack-ie’. I didn’t even realize. There’s a camera in your face. He can see the whole bus.”

“He can see me, but can he hear me?” you ask.

“Doesn’t seem like it.”

“Bus cameras can’t be very high-tech, Tim. Can’t your people get it on a loop or something?”

“You’re brilliant,” Tim murmurs before pushing himself off the dash and to his feet. “Guys, there’s a camera over my left shoulder. I need everyone to sit still. No big movements, no talking, just look concerned and sit still.”

He calls his captain and asks for someone to approach the news trucks at the fence to end the live broadcasts and use their equipment to make a video loop. His captain agrees and texts Tim with an update that the reporters are cooperating.

“Remember, stay relatively still. Just look scared,” Tim reminds everyone.

“That won’t be hard,” Ortiz grumbles.

Tim leans beside you while the video is being recorded. You drive in silence for a minute before noticing the blinking red light on the dash.

“Tim,” you whisper. “Look.”

“Cap, roll the tape. We need fuel,” Tim says into his phone.

“We only have a minute recorded. That won’t convince him, we need more footage” Wade argues.

“No time. Get these people off before this bus runs out of gas.”

“Fuel tanker is running behind. Driver said big rigs need radio signals, and they’re still jammed. Crazy not stupid, right?”

“Right.”

“Now what?” you ask Tim. “Are you tired of that question yet?”

“I’d like an answer to it,” he replies. “Get alongside this bus, okay?”

You nod and drive steadily alongside an LAX passenger bus. Tim’s team lays a wooden board between the bus doors and helps people cross to safety. You listen to Tim encourage the passengers across and are glad he was the cop who got on the bus today. The rear tire blows out suddenly, and you pull the steering wheel back to the middle and yell for Tim to come help.

Tim falls on his way back to the front of the bus, but when he reaches you, he moves his arms across you to pull the wheel.

“Use this to hold down the gas pedal,” he says.

You take the device from his hand and lower it into place. Tim steps back to tie the steering wheel to the floor of the bus, and you steer to keep the bus straight while he works. The moment it’s secure, he pulls you to your feet and tells you to get on the metal access panel.

“I can’t do this,” you argue.

Tim raises his hands to either side of your neck and brushes his thumbs along your skin as he promises, “Yes, you can. I’m right here with you.”

You swallow nervously and nod before sitting on your escape route, a thin piece of metal that Tim moved with no problem. Tim moves to lay over you, and he wraps an arm around your waist as you hide your face against his shoulder.

“I got you,” he promises once more.

The bus turns and the access panel cover falls out of the bottom. You clutch Tim tightly as the metal door slides across the runway and into a nearby patch of dirt. He sits up and watches the bus slow as it nears a plane but doesn’t let go of you. Just before the bomb detonates, Tim pulls you down again and lays over you to protect you from any debris. Sirens echo in the distance, and you wrap your arms around Tim’s back.

“Are you alright?” he asks again.

“No,” you answer, your first honest answer of the day. “Oh, I hate the airport.”

Tim moves to your side but keeps an arm around your shoulder as he looks into your eyes.

“You can’t get mushy on me. You can’t show emotion, remember?” you tease.

“I think I might be able to after all.”

“Relationships that start like this never last. It’s just the high-stress, adrenaline pumping, all that.”

“Oh, yeah? Well, maybe we can change that.”

“Uh, I think your friends are here.”

Tim looks up but doesn’t move as Angela and Wade exit a police car and run toward him.

“I was worried about you,” Angela says. “And here you are.”

“I’m sorry about Harry,” Tim offers. “I wish we could have changed it.”

“You good?” Wade asks. “’Cause I might be a nice guy and let you take the rest of the day off.”

“And stop worrying about what we could have done differently. You saved a lot of lives today, Timothy,” Angela adds.

“A day off sounds like a good deal,” you murmur.

Tim shakes his head before introducing you to Detective Angela Lopez and Sergeant Wade Grey. When he finally stands and sees the scrapes and gashes littering your skin, he forces you to let a paramedic treat you. Tim follows you to the ambulance but hangs back to talk to Angela. He’s lost a partner before, too, and knows what it’s like.

“I’m sorry for bringing everyone into this. Howard could have just come for me,” Tim concludes.

“I appreciate everything,” Angela responds. “But, you’re going to the hospital, too. Is that Chen?”

Tim turns quickly and sees Lucy running toward the police cruiser parked behind the ambulance.

“Sergeant Grey!” she yells. “We’ve got Payne on the line, and he wants to know when he’s getting his money. Whoa, Tim, are you alright?”

“He doesn’t know,” Tim says. “He doesn’t know the bus exploded.”

“Tell him thirty minutes,” Wade alerts all the nearby officers.

“Stay in the ambulance,” Tim tells you.

“But I-“

“Ma’am, stay in the ambulance.”

You nod and climb into the ambulance after refusing help from the paramedics. They continue bandaging a cut on your leg as Tim climbs in.

“I need to make a quick stop on the way to the hospital,” he tells the driver.

“Where?” she asks.

“The drop spot. Pershing Square.”

The driver reluctantly agrees, and you watch Tim as she drives. He demands you stay in the ambulance until he returns, and you agree but don’t mean it. You’ve been beside Tim for most of the morning, and you neither remember how to be away from him nor do you want to. You stand on the sidewalk beside the ambulance and watch people move around you. It’s another normal day for them, but your life will never be the same after today.

“Miss, you can’t stand here, you need to move back,” an older officer says as he grabs your shoulders.

“Oh, I’m waiting for Tim-“

“Tim Bradford, yes. He asked that I move you out of harm’s way.”

“But he told me to stay here.”

His hold on your shoulders tightens as he says, “And I’m telling you to move.”

“Payne is late,” Angela complains.

“He’s not late,” Tim says. “He’s never late.”

“Two hundred cops are watching that sculpture, plus a tracker in the bag. He hasn’t been here,” Wade explains.

“Turn on the tracker,” Tim requests.

“What for?”

“Just do it!”

Wade presses a button on the laptop before him, and the blinking light of the tracker travels across the screen.

“He’s got the money,” Angela says.

Tim runs out of their hiding spot and to the drop spot. He pushes the art installation over and kicks it when he sees the opening in the sidewalk beneath it. As he drops into the defunct subway system, he sees someone walking farther into the tunnel and pulls his gun.

“L.A.P.D. Freeze!” he yells.

The person stops, and he aims at their head before saying, “Pop quiz. Someone has a clear shot at your head. What do you do?... Turn around.”

“If you don’t do it, I’ll kill Tim Bradford,” Howard Payne threatens as he secures a vest covered in dynamite around your chest. “What are you going to do?”

“Wait- wait for him to come in and walk away. Then I listen to you,” you answer shakily.

“Perfect. Maybe you two can have your happily ever after all. You say one word that I don’t like and you’re both dead.”

Howard disappears down the subway, and you bite your bottom lip to refrain from crying or screaming for help. Tim may shoot you, no questions asked, but at least he will be safe. When you hear something crash above you and sunlight infiltrates the dark staircase before you, you take a deep breath and begin walking away.

Tim’s voice doesn’t carry the same comforting words or soothing lilt as in the bus, but you still recognize it and want to hear it as he yells at you.

“Turn around!” he demands.

You turn slowly and can see the moment Tim realizes he’s pointing his gun at you.

“I’m sorry,” you whisper.

The apology echoes off the concrete walls as Tim lowers his weapon. You don’t see or hear him, but you can feel the change when Howard appears behind you.

“Be prepared!” Howard says as he walks up the stairs behind you and raises the detonator, a deadman’s switch. “What are you gonna do, Tim? I don’t think you can shoot this hostage.”

“Let her go,” Tim demands as he points his gun at Howard.

“I don’t think I’m going to do that. Move the money,” he tells you.

You transfer the money from the L.A.P.D. bags and into Howard’s duffel bag as Tim yells at him to let you go.

“You don’t need her!” Tim adds.

“I will let go,” Howard threatens as he moves the detonator switch. “You don’t get it, Tim. Do you know what a bomb that doesn’t explode is? It’s the cheap, gold watch they gave me after I lost a finger and a life to my country.”

“You’re crazy.”

You push yourself against the wall as you listen to their exchange, but you keep your eyes on Tim rather than the bomb just below your chin. Howard demands you take his money and enter another part of the tunnel system and you know that you’re going to obey because he’ll kill Tim if you don’t. You tear your eyes from Tim and walk exactly where Howard leads you.

As you enter a crowded stop, Howard fires several shots into the concrete ceiling as you drop your head and cover your ears. The subway passengers waiting for the next train flee in terror as you try to get away from Howard. Tim can’t be far behind, but when you’re pushed into a subway car, you’re tempted to think that no help is coming. Howard handcuffs your hands around a pole before the subway lurches into motion.

At the back of the subway, Tim struggles to pry a set of doors open before he falls into the car. He moves strategically through the empty rows of seats with his mind on you and ending this game with Howard Payne once and for all.

The subway conductor reaches for his radio, and Howard forces the deadman switch into your hands and tells you to hold it. He turns his back on you and kills the conductor as you struggle to move away.

“Look, you won. You beat Tim, you beat everybody, you can just throw me off the train. I don’t care,” you plead.

“You see this stick? When you explode, the police will come there. But that’s not where I’ll be, so I get more time. I promise it won’t hurt,” Howard replies as he pulls the detonator away from you.

A series of dull thuds echoes, and Howard looks up quickly. He smiles, and it makes your stomach flip.

“Hey, Tim. Is that you?” he asks. “He’s so persistent. Wouldn’t be able to interest you in a bribe, would I, hotshot?”

Howard kneels and opens the duffel bag full of cash. You watch as a dye pack explodes in his face and paints his money purple. In his anger, he fires bullets into the roof, and you drop to the floor as Tim rolls out of the line of fire. Howard runs through a door, and you can only listen as he climbs onto the roof and begins struggling against Tim.

Howard has the deadman stick in his hand and can kill you by moving a centimeter to the left or right, but you’re more worried about Tim with every noise against the roof. You stay low on the pole you’re cuffed to, twisting your wrists and manipulating your fingers as you try to slip free. The struggle above you silences suddenly, and you watch the door nervously.

“Tim!” you call when he rushes in. “Tim. Where’s Payne?”

“Uh, he lost his head. Turn around,” Tim says.

You circle the pole, and Tim rips a wire free before loosening the straps of the vest.

“Let’s take this off,” he says before pulling the vest away from your chest.

“Tim, can you hear me?” someone asks through the driver’s radio. “This is Wade. Listen, the track isn’t finished.”

“What else can go wrong?” you murmur.

“Wade, I copy,” Tim radios.

“Do you copy? Try the emergency brake.”

“I copy!” Tim tries again before throwing the radio down.

He steps to the right and hits the emergency brake. After the train doesn’t even slow, he begins hitting other buttons, but nothing happens.

“None of this works!” he exclaims as he hits the control board.

He turns away from the useless machinery and returns to you. When he notices the handcuffs holding you in place, he slows.

“You can uncuff me and we can get off,” you say with an exaggerated nod.

“I don’t have a key,” Tim replies.

“You don’t have…”

You trail off and look at the handcuffs. If only you could slip your hands through them, you think. Tim begins pulling and kicking the pole as you try again to pull your hands through the metal cuffs. He pauses and lays a hand against your arm to look at how tight the cuffs are.

“Help me pull,” you grunt as you lean your weight back against the restraints.

“No, no,” Tim says quickly as he pulls you forward. “You’re just hurting yourself.”

You stand still and see a bead of blood running down your fingers. As you stare at it, Tim walks to a map on the wall. He remembers the nightmare again; a series of bad memories that end with him, “the Reaper,” standing alone in the desert before being rescued and awarded a medal. As he searches for a way to save you, Tim decides that he will never shoot the hostage again, and he won’t leave you behind, even if that means dying with you.

“Tim, please just go,” you beg.

“There’s a curve ahead. I can make it jump the track.”

“Tim! Sergeant Bradford!” Tim turns to you, and you repeat, “Get off this train. You can still jump. Tim, please. Please.”

Tim ignores you as he returns to the controls and increases the train’s speed. You slide your hands down the pole as you sit on the floor, and Tim walks silently to your side. He leans in beside you, and you raise your arms to wrap around his neck as you lean your head against his. He moves his arms around the pole to circle you and holds you tight as the train picks up speed.

“I’m sorry,” you whisper just before the lights go out.

The train car hits something and spins, but Tim tightens his arms around you. With every bump and move of the subway, you become more convinced that you’ll never get out of this position. Light enters the windows as you crash through something, and the car flips onto its side as it lands on asphalt. The impact loosens the pole, and you fall onto Tim, whose grip on you doesn’t waver for a second. As the car slides to a stop, you squeeze Tim and take a deep breath.

“You didn’t leave me,” you say before forcing yourself to open your eyes.

Tim cradles the back of your head before moving his hands to your back. You lean up gently and look into his eyes again.

“I told you to leave me!”

“I didn’t have anywhere to be just then. Rest of the day off and all,” Tim responds before pulling you down against him.

He kisses you, and you’re surprised that it is more than adrenaline. The kiss is more than a relief to be alive, and you want to feel Tim Bradford at your side every day for the rest of your life (which would have ended today if not for him). You move your hands to Tim’s short hair as you return his kiss. It’s relief, joy, love, and passion in a single touch. When Tim begins breathing heavily against you, you move up.

“I’ve heard relationships that start during intense situations like this never work,” Tim says.

“Oh,” you sigh. “Then I guess we’ll be the first.”

“Whatever you say, ma’am.”

Glass rains down on you as you kiss Tim again, and though your day went nothing like you thought it would, it’s now the best day of your life. Tim helps you stand as his team approaches the scene, and you stop him before you exit the car.

“You know if this was a movie, they’d make another one where the same thing happens again, right?” you say softly.

“We’re never taking public transportation again,” Tim states.

“Yeah. Hey, where is the truck you were driving this morning?”

Tim hesitates and tightens his arm around your waist before turning away to yell, “Chen! I need you to do something for me.”

[lynaferns]

Beekeeper Fairy AU

TW for bug features

Well, more like bee-helper fairies.

I wasn't really going to share this yet but you can thank @shirajellyfish for encouraging me to show it, even if I'm not yet sure if this is going to go somewhere or is going to stop here like my other projects and AUs.

These sketches are a few months old, I'd like to polish them a little. I was getting into the fairies mood lately so hopefully I'll redraw them soon but y'know I can't promise anything when it comes to drawing.

Some close-ups and more info under the cut + Ferns design for this AU (Now I have no excuse not to make memes between my 3 selfinserts lol)

So the idea of this AU is mainly to be a chill and cozy story. No angst or anything, maybe memories of a couple of bad events from the past, but now everything is healed and they are focusing on living peacefully.

The story would be around Fern who has their own shop of handmade kitchen tools, tableware, tea, coffee etc etc. (all ecofriendly vegan products) in a village. They are also a beekeeper, so she sells honey too at the shop.

One day collecting honey from the hives she finds a tired bee-helper fairy trying to hide. Decides to ignore it not to stress the little guy, but the fairy was still there when they were finished with the bees. So she goes inside the shed for a small cup of water with sugar to give to the fairy.

After that, the fairy followed Fern to the village and now it visits the shop very often. And Fern always has some treats for the fairy.

I have the idea of making an askblog for the AU. People could roleplay as the villagers coming into the shop to buy something and ask about the fairy(ies) and Fern would be the one anwsering. BUT that would require a lot of effort from me, making the drawings and expressions of Fern and the fairies, and have backgrounds from the villagers POV of the shop. And I don't want to do low effort background, I want the world to feel organic.

So idk, maybe I'll do a small comic but I can't assure to keep constant motivation for this.

[majickth]

Hermit's Hollow Masterpost

What is Hermit's Hollow?

Hermit's Hollow is a mysterious small town AU centered around the titular town of Hermit's Hollow. It's is heavily inspired by works such as Twin Peaks, Welcome to Nightvale, TAZ: Amnesty, Gravity Falls, and other similar media. The story, while not always in chronological order, is told through transcripts, recovered photographs, journal entries, and -- occasionally -- strange puzzles strewn about. Basically, there's weird things in the trees, the town may be almost be literally alive, and the weirdest thing at the local tourist trap is its owner.

What's the story?

Grian is a former journalist with a tarnished reputation. With nothing else left to lose, he accepts an invitation from his sister to start anew in the sleepy mountainside town of Hermit's Hollow. What appears to be a peaceful escape quickly reveals itself to be far more, however, as soon Grian is embroiled in the mystery of a missing scientist, a charming tourist trap owner, and a town that's far more than it seems. Now, armed with only a Polaroid camera and his intuition, he's determined to uncover the town's secrets -- for better or for worse.

Find the AU here: #hermits hollow au.

Official Playlist

Got some art/writing/anything you wanna share? @ me and be sure to tag it! I love seeing all the cool stuff people make :D

Art:

Grian + Pearl (Official Character Sheets)

Scar + Cub (Official Character Sheets)

Grian and Pearl Reunion (Comic)

Dead is Better - Ex and Cleo (Comic)

First Time at the the Diner

Strange Things Happen For No Reason

Take a Picture

Scar (Doodles)

Etho (Doodles)

Gem (Doodles)

Scarland [by @fadedandromeda]

Doc [by @rainoftime3]

Cleo [by @rainoftime3]

Welcome to Hermit's Hollow [by @suffer-my-beloved-mutuals]

Etho at the Pass N Gas (Comic) [by @domithekingoffools]

Fics:

Not Very Ideal, Is It? (Tumblr) [by @roxie-roo]

Day 2 (Tumblr) [by @roxie-roo]

Inbetween - Etho (Tumblr) [by @eagle-warri]

A Hollow Mystery (AO3) [by @myths-gay-and-random-bullshit]

Cosplay:

Grian [by @myst3ry-pl4nt]

Info:

General Character Overview

The Hollow is Weird

The Lunar Express

The Diner, The Facility, and The Past

Doc

Joe Hills

Impulse

Bdubs

Keralis

xB

Xisuma/Ex

Mumbo

Etho

Tango

Zedaph

False

Wels

Hermit's Hollow Recap (KHHR)

NOTE: this masterpost is incomplete. If I am missing anything, lmk and I will add it as soon as I am able.

[cappycodeart]

Can we have some information on glitch simon au? 🥺🙏

HEHEHE ABSOLUTELY!! I have a lot of Itchy stuff on the back-burner I'd be happy to talk about while I doodle up new Winter stuff! :D I actually have MORE itchy art/lore than Winter lore surprisingly it's just... really scattered and needs a lot of explaining dhsghfdsja... but we'll disperse it in small chunks...

This is his current main ref (kinda wanna update it tho bc there's some things about it that I don't like anymore).

Aaaaaaand a little bit of info I can give on him:

After the events of the failed ritual, this Simon is no longer human, but he's also not aware of this. He's a cosmic entity behaving like a human-shaped portal. Very in-tune with time and space and super sensitive to it's changes and flows.

Is made of a VERY powerful energy and suffers from MMS again. However, because he clings to his sanity as an anchor, his usable magic is limited (needs magitech to access most of it).

He's not glitching 24/7, although it takes him effort to keep himself from glitching. Physical pain and mental/emotional stress will cause him to lose stability.

He can time-travel AND universe hop, but hasn't figured out how to control the destination. If he glitches too hard, he will go full portal mode and teleport into a random universe and a random time period (if you touch him, you will teleport with him).

Has "future memory" which functions similar to past memory. He can recall events (within his own timeline) that haven't happened as if they've already occurred. This memory isn't perfectly clear and he's NOT all knowing. Gets memories of the future mixed up with those of the past (I read the Enchiridon's page on Amok Time/Multiverse stuff and got a bit inspired).

And that's all the info I'll give for now! I'll definitely be sharing more about him / his story in the future. I just haven't drawn or written a lot of it out besides scattered doodles that might be hard to understand without full context. I have a little Betty scenario that will be posted soon, but in the meantime I hope this is satisfying!! :)

[wynn-ing]

Finally have everyone done, which means I can post my Slay The Princess x Spire: The City Must Fall au!! info below the cut <3

So! These are the classes of all of the voices in the order they appear above! Smitten: Idol (artist and performer whose art is, in itself, black magic). He's a fairly popular performer, and he's sung on stage with Damsel a few times. Ended up joining the ministry because Hero took some exaggerated story of his as fact and decided to recruit him to 'rescue' Damsel from her 'evil employers' (Smitten made this up and has no idea how to break it to Hero that he was just venting and now it's been months and he's in far too deep) Hero: Firebrand (by the people for the people type). He's the leader of the entire set by default, since he's the only one who literally everyone likes and agrees with. Cold: Mortician Executioner (works for the government to 'fix paperwork' wherein the paperwork says someone is dead and they happen to be alive). Spectre is a benevolent spirit who shares a body with him, and the two of them can happily switch places and take turns with the body. Wraith, on the other hand, is a weapon bound by cruel magic to his heart, who can hurt everyone except for him and is mad about it. Opportunist: Gutter Cleric (cons the gods themselves). Very skilled at convincing godlings and sewer-angels that he's tooootally devout by using the right prayer buzzwords to skim off the top of their divinity for petty miracles and cheap tricks. It doesn't work so well on other mortals, though. Skeptic: Vermissian Sage (eldritch train wizard). His actual official job is as a detective, so he's pretty busy. Stubborn: Knight (exactly what you'd expect but with slightly more alcoholism). He spends most his time duelling Adversary, but he's open to doing favours for his besties whenever he's not fighting her. Broken: Lajhan (Moon-clerics who sacrifice themselves and their sanity to heal their companions). They fell into the following of Tower and betrayed their goddess and their friends, and then Tower attempted to ascend by stealing their divinity and the lives of all of her least favourite followers. The event was... Explosive. This is the design from beforehand. Cheated: Inksmith (fourth wall breaking writers). Works damn hard, always has a deadline, and always keeps a gun under their desk. Contrarian: Inksmith. Plays damn hard, never has a deadline, always causes problems for Cheated, who works at the same publishing company as them.

I'm calling this au slay the aelfir and will be posting a whoooole bunch of sketches soon <3

[yanderes-galore]

yandere Natasha vs yandere Wanda for Marvel :>

I'll try, sure! @universallyweaselwobblermuffin gave me motivation and the Wandavision idea. I'm excited to talk about this because I love them ^^

AU where they aren't in a relationship with Bruce or Vision.

Yandere! Natasha Romanoff vs Wanda Maximoff

(General Thoughts)

Pairing: Platonic -> Romantic - Rivalry

Possible Trigger Warnings: Gender-Neutral Darling, Obsession, Manipulation, Stalking, Overprotective, Jealousy, Implied mind control, Kidnapping, Violence, Forced relationship.

I feel this rivalry is a bit unfair due to the power difference.

Yet I still like this idea.

Natasha is like a mentor to Wanda so that may also affect the rivalry.

In fact they see each other as family.

I'm going to keep this as just me spilling general thoughts due to the circumstances of Natasha's fate before Wandavision.

Natasha is a skilled spy and assassin, she would be great with stalking/gathering info while keeping and eye on you.

Wanda has magic, having access to hallucinations/mind control, telekinesis, and creating false realities. She's certainly the worse yandere of the two and the most delusional.

Their obsessions most likely start after Age of Ultron.

It would make sense if you were part of the Avengers but you could also be a civilian friend of them.

Both of their obsessions would start platonic.

They see you as family like they do the rest of The Avengers.

They both grow close to you because both of them have been deprived of families in their past.

Wanda lost her parents and lost her brother.

Natasha grew up as an assassin/spy and was made infertile so she can't make a family.

So the two see you as a close friend and part of family.

Wanda likes to watch Sitcom shows with you.

Meanwhile Natasha likes to train you for self-defense incase she can't always watch over you.

When they both see you as platonic they are fine with sharing.

It's when one of them sees you in a more romantic sense that things are an issue.

To make the rivalry last the longest I'd say Natasha's obsession would have to start first.

As said before the rivalry is rather... unbalanced.

If Natasha fell for you first her original obsession increases.

She begins to see you in a new light and realizes you're important to her.

She wants to be closer, maybe she excuses her feelings as wanting to protect you.

As a result she sticks around you more.

She watches over you way more than she used to and rarely leaves your side unless she has to.

This sudden behavior change doesn't go unnoticed by Wanda.

She feels upset that Natasha keeps dragging you off.

Whenever Wanda invites you to relax with her Natasha makes up an excuse to have your attention.

Wanda may not even realize her own romantic feelings for you until she sees Natasha's motives.

Wanda would still see you as a friend until she sees Natasha flirting with you.

Her heart tightens at this betrayal... she recognizes this emotion as jealousy.

It's then Wanda realizes she loves you... more than a friend.

This even is what would fling this into rivalry.

The two could platonically share you as a friend.

Yet the moment one of them wants you as their romantic partner and tries to take you from the other one?

That's when things get bad.

Cue manipulation on both sides.

Wanda wouldn't want to use her powers at first as she still cares for Natasha.

Yet she still begins fights with her, accusing Natasha of stealing you.

The reason I feel this rivalry would be short lived is Wanda would soon realize she can just... take you.

Natasha can try to fight her but Wanda will try to push her back.

Wanda feels the perfect form of revenge is to simply take you back from Natasha.

After all, in her eyes, Natasha's stolen you.

Would not be surprised if Wanda did another Wandavision to keep you to herself.

She's erase Natasha from your mind and make you her spouse in her perfect family.

Unhappy? She can fix that.

Natasha could try to break you out of that false reality.

It most likely won't work without help.

This is why the rivalry is short lived.

Once Wanda feels she's fighting for your affection... even if she cares for Natasha...

Wanda probably won't hesitate to hurt her and take what she wants.

[twilightspinkyfinger]

Reader finds out Twilight is Wolfie before Wild

Part of my Hyrule Historian AU, for more info, check out my masterlist!

You and Wild shared a lot of things as best friends. You shared food, secrets, gossip, clothing, and sometimes even a bed. But one thing you tried not to share was your every waking thought, especially thoughts that could be deemed as obvious observations.

You quickly learned while traveling with the chain, that your definition of obvious was very different from Wild's definition of obvious.

You considered Wild to be a very observant person during your adventure to defeat the calamity in your own Hyrule, but you were reminded how much of an idiot the Champion was when the topic of Wolfie came up.

Within your first week traveling with the chain, you were suspicious of the relationship between Wolfie and Twilight. Something just seemed off, so the scholar in you decided to start taking note of the two of them to figure out what exactly was going on.

Your observations started to practically write themselves.

You were quick to notice a pattern start to form: whenever Wolfie was with the chain, Twilight was nowhere to be seen, and whenever Twilight was with the chain, Wolfie was nowhere to be seen.

You also noticed Wolfie's ability to follow the chain, despite the use of travel via portals that the chain used to hop from one era to another. The only other beings you had noticed were able to accomplish this feat were the shadow and the mailman.

Wolfie also only accepted kissing from "pretty girls" and got annoyed at the boys when they showed him the same affection you did, which seemed exactly like something a Link would do if he had the ability to turn into a canine.

If you had been particularly affectionate to Wolfie, Twilight would avoid you for the rest of the day, which seemed like reason enough to link the two together, since it was a normal reaction to be flustered when someone kissed you.

Additionally, Twilight always smelled like a dog after he returned from being "missing"

To you the answer to the Wolfie/Twilight mystery was obvious: they were one and the same. You had no idea how Twilight managed to turn himself into your furry friend, but that did not matter at the moment. You figured you would find out the answer to the transformation at some point, as he seemed to not be telling any of the chain about the phenomenon, so why would he tell you? You weren't even a Link, just a historian from the Champion's era.

You hadn't felt the need to divulge any of this information to Wild, as you trusted that he was intelligent enough to figure out the same patterns, but boy were you wrong.

You had no idea that Wolfie had saved your best friend, only to reveal himself as the Hero of Twilight, and you sure as hell didn't think Twilight being Wolfie was a secret.

All of these factors led you to a very amusing scenario, at least it was amusing to you.

You had plopped yourself under a tree a little ways away from camp, that way you could have some peace and quiet to read. Your peace was soon interrupted by your best friend and the wolf by his side.

You looked up, smiled, and waved at the two before speaking, "Hi, Wild. Hi, Twilight."

You were shocked by what occurred next, when Wolfie transformed into Twilight before your very eyes looking very betrayed and upset before he turned to face Wild.

"You told them! I thought I specifically asked you not to tell anyone!" he shouted at the other young man. Before you could reply a very offended-looking Wild stood up for himself.

"I didn't tell them anything! They must have figured it out on their own. If there's one thing I know about them it's that they are definitely smarter than all of us, especially me. Did you really think I would so easily break a promise? I'm hurt." Wild frowned looking up at Twilight.

"It was supposed to be a secret?" you asked innocently, not intending to make Twilight upset. "I didn't know, I apologize if I said something I shouldn't have. I just thought it was common knowledge that you were Wolfie, after all, you don't do a great job at hiding it," You said while smirking at the hero before you.

Twilight was quick to apologize to both you and Wild following his outburst. Honestly, Twilight was a little relieved that someone else in the group knew his secret, and he started to become closer to you as well.

That being said, Twilight was embarrassed at how quickly you were able to find out his secret on your own, and Wild was annoyed that you didn't tell him that you figured it out.

Oh well, you guessed you would be sure to inform your local idiots of all the things you noticed from now on, as your little duo soon became a trio that included Twilight.

[8um8le]

Back with some asks about Cyberpunk au!

-Can the boys detect vitals?

-Can they defend a human from being harmed by another human?

-Does Bot hang out with the others daily?

-You’ve mentioned that Bot has taken the other boys to a lot of cool places for sightseeing and entertainment. When the boys go to clubs do they dance? Do they often break into places to sightsee? I’d imagine they’d be kicked out soon after entering cubs or get enforcement called on them fairly often.

Ooo nice questions, answers under the cut <3

Can the boys detect vitals? 

They can only detect their own vitals, and understand why another robot would be close to shutting off forever. It can be pretty confusing for them to understand the human body when it comes to helping them out, but at the same time they know how to kill a human, and where their weak spots could be, so they could use that info to know whether they are about to die or not. 

(Gore mention tw)Their lack of comprehension of how the human functions is a reason why 8ot likes to dissect and play around with how he ends a human’s life when it comes to targets, especially with the guilt that he couldn’t save a loved one because of having no knowledge how a human body falls apart. He’s almost like a doctor or mad scientist when it comes to bots, he can repair and build robots, so he wanted to expand towards organic life. 

Sun and Moon don’t know as much as 8ot when it comes to saving a human’s life, as they don’t have a reason to why they would need to save a human, when their job is to end them. They stayed distant from humans for a long while since they only tried to scrap them in their first vessel. Their experience with humans trying to smash them to bits is another reason they learned to fight for their survival. 

Of course this would change if they happened to meet a human that they end up caring about, they’d want to learn more about organic bodies. (Possibly a y/n/oc interaction dynamic ehhehe)

Can they defend a human from being harmed by another human?

Okay so the city’s justice system is complete ass, people can get away from murder as long as it’s not the wrong person; being the super rich that has a network of others who will hunt down your entire bloodline, OR a super strong opponent that turns the table and ends up killing you instead. The only time police get serious is when someone makes a huge mess or destroy a large chuck of property (example would be using explosives to make a building completely crumble to the ground) 

Does 8ot hang out with the boys on the daily?

Yeah they are very close to each other, although I left their relationship with one another to be ambiguous, the viewer can chose whether they are involved in a romantic or platonic way. 8ot often drops them off to their day job on his hovering vehicle.(aka flying car lmao) They are very comfortable with each other that they show up to each other’s place uninvited. The two are also comfortable with telling 8ot just about anything. Thing is it’s usually one sided when it comes to pouring their heart out about their past, since 8ot is self conscious of what he was, often trying to copy the mannerism of people around him to cope. 

Koi is also another guy who is close with everyone in fact, even Eclipse. Funnily a lot of people like to rely on him, and turn to him for comfort. Eclipse loves to hang out with him when he gets the time, and Eclipse shares his knowledge on robots while Koi shares his knowledge of organics (since he is a organic himself)

Eclipse is seen as a higher up/ apprentice to Sun, Moon and 8ot. He also happens to have a soft spot for the three, actually caring about their well-being, normally he wouldn‘ t even bat an eye towards his lowers in the criminal underground. He still acts coldly, strict and harsh when it comes to the boys, but that’s his weird way of showing he cares. For this reason I like to joke about Eclipse being their dad since he’s constantly and voluntarily on babysitting duty.

When they go to clubs do they dance? Do they break into places to sight-see? 

Yes they go to clubs to dance and overall vibe and wind down, their dynamic making all their trips interesting. Sun being a responsible person and tagging along to keep an eye on the two trouble-makers, but genuinely having a good time in the process, Moon thriving in the chaos and even starting fights, 8ot knowing where to go, and laughing at the other two. 

AHHHhahah getting kicked out or police gettin called on them, the first part is definitely true, but police don’t get called often since the city doesn’t trust or rely on police, but if they have body-guards or a posse, they’d call them to scrap. As goofy as it is to see two shiny eight foot robots with a sun and moon mask as their heads, and a feminine looking humanoid with a masculine voice and mannerism, they have the upper hand when it comes to combat, never losing a fight yet. I mean it’s not like hey can afford to lose a fight, since that would cost them their lives when it comes to this city

[neverniko101]

Third AU babyyyyy

🍂Horror!Dreamtale

Go send me some asks!

Yes, with the leaves! To help distinguish from other AUs :)

Origin Comic!

Summary

As the linked comic shows, the main idea of this AU is that the Tree of Emotions is infected with a disease that corrupts the surrounding land and causes a famine. The Twins are blamed and cast out into the forest, where they begin to starve from lack of both food and emotions (especially Dream). Nightmare resorts to a combination of hunting wild animals and livestock as well as robbing anyone who comes into the woods. The general strain, lack of food, and sickness from the tree, makes their magic unstable.

More info below!

Dream

Aka: The Guardian of Positivity (official title), Will-O-Wisp (called by the villagers), Firefly (called by Nightmare)

Physical appearance: A small, thin, 4’9 skeleton about 14 years old. His magic is too unstable to contain in his body, so it floats around him in the form of flames, glowing brighter the more energy he has. His eyes (especially his right) glow yellow even through his hood. He almost always wears the top outfit.

Notes:

- He and his brother alternate days on who roams the woods and who guards the Tree.

- Anyone he comes across will likely fall victim to his traps and pranks- although mischievous, he is not malevolent and is unlikely to seriously injure anyone.

- Like his nickname implies, he enjoys luring travelers into the woods at night with his wisps of flame. Once they are thoroughly lost, he steals all their belongings (especially food).

- He uses a staff of wood carved from the tree to help focus his magic.

- He is light and fast, but very physically weak.

Nightmare

Aka: The Guardian of Negativity (official title), The Huntsman (called by the villagers), Nighty (called by Dream)

Physical appearance: A gaunt 5’1 skeleton with a tufted tail, about 14 years old. He typically wears fur-lined cloaks, wearing a white mask outside their house. He usually carries a crossbow.

Notes:

- Don’t ask about his tail, he’s self-conscious

- He has taken on the responsibility of taking care of his brother very seriously, hunting animals with his crossbow.

- He does his best to not let Dream see the animals he hunts and butchers, as it upsets him.

- He insists on giving Dream a larger share of food, saying that he doesn’t need as much because of the negative emotions from the town (which is only partially true)

- The lack of food, however, contributes to the instability of his magic- whenever he becomes too hungry, stressed, or angry, he undergoes a monstrous transformation… more info coming soon :)