#never did a skin thing ever but i think starting with rabbit and steel rather than like. hollow knight is a good place to start

[ymiwritesstuff]

Seductive Darkness | Crossover Oneshot

Happy New Year! So this oneshot is not related to the celebration at all, it’s something completely different. So a bit of background: I’ve fallen down the Star Wars rabbit hole and that’s one of the only things I think about now. So I decided to do a crossover oneshot with JJBA and Star Wars! I thought making Dio a menacing Sith Lord was fitting so I came up with this. I hope you guys enjoy it and I promise to get back to writing requests asap (I’ve had a rough time over the past few weeks). Please enjoy!

Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure x Star Wars

Sith Lord!Dio x Padawan!Reader

Summary: Getting lost in a large Star Destroyer alone wasn’t a part of your plan and in the quest to look for your Master, you encounter something far more dangerous than a few battle droids.

Notes: Slightly suggestive(?)

Electric crackling and the sound of the last enemy droid hitting the steel floor echoed around the area, followed by a harsh sigh that left your lips as you retracted your lightsaber, having spent most of your energy slashing through the small army of droids on the enemy ship. You figured that this wave was far from the last one, which prompted you to start looking for your Master, whom you had gotten separated from. For a mere padawan, you were quite gifted, however you still preferred to have your exceptionally skilled Master with you. It gave you a sense of security, knowing that he would not allow any harm to fall upon you.

With quick steps, you looked around the interior of the unknown ship, keeping a close eye on your surroundings, in case the enemy tried a vicious ambush on you. Droids may have been be easy to defeat but on a large Star Destroyer like this, the sheer amount of the blaster-shooting robots was more than enough to tire out a single Jedi master. This made you worry for your Master, though you were sure that his worry for his beloved padawan was far greater. Master Jonathan was a skilled Jedi, that much was clear. He was patient and always able to keep calm even in the most dangerous situations. Still, you couldn’t help but wonder if he was safe.

The sudden sound of marching battle droids quickly reached your ears, which hastily caused you to look around for a possible hiding place. The previous encounter with a group of droids had left you rather exhausted and judging by the sound, even more of them were heading towards you. You cursed under your breath and set your eyes on the only door they could find before swiftly approaching it. Keeping your hand on your lightsaber that rested on your hip in case an enemy awaited behind the opening door, you didn’t waste any time stepping in the room, watching the door close behind you. However, as soon as you were greeted by the overwhelming darkness of the foreign area, something felt amiss.

Empty. Not a single being entered your vision that was weakened by the overwhelming darkness. In other circumstances, this would have been ideal. An empty room with no life-forms within, it was the perfect place to hide in such a dire situation like this one. However, what you didn’t see was not the thing responsible for your alarming feeling of unease, no, it was what you sensed.

An ominous presence, hidden within the shadows, your eyes didn’t detect it, but there was an undeniable feeling of power in the Force you couldn’t ignore. Your body tensed and instinctively, you ignited your weapon not only for the lacking illumination in the room but also for protection against the unknown presence lingering in it. Your (E/C) eyes look around, desperate to find the source of this being making your heart race in fear. The hand that held the lightsaber trembled as it moved from one corner to another, trying to spot the threat that evoked fright in you just by existing.

“Quite brave of you to wander around my ship all alone, young one…”

Upon hearing the menacing voice that seemingly erupted from nothingness, you immediately turned towards it, only for your eyes to finally see a cloaked figure bathing in the dominating darkness. A pair of glowing amber eyes stared at you, sending cold shivers down your spine and making every hair in your body stand up. His face was barely visible, even with you pointing your lightsaber at him, which he quickly glanced at, a small chuckle escaping his lips.

“Who are you?” You asked, trying to cover the fear that almost slipped into your voice. Fear was to be controlled as it was a path that could potentially lead to the dark side. However right now, as you stared at the person in front of you, unease was all you felt. Still, you kept your eyes on his, something the Lord noticed immediately.

“I sense great fear in you.” To your surprise, he took a step forward, enough for you to see his face clearly for the first time as he removed the hood previously covering his features. That dangerous smirk on his lips behind which you thought you saw a pair of fangs, those piercing amber eyes that stared into your very being, and the sheer power that emitted from his being alone was more than enough to make you come to a horrifying realization.

“You’re a Sith Lord!”

Another chuckle erupted from him, the sinister aura around him only seeming to grow. You held your weapon tighter, despite your hand trembling even more than before. Your eyes are locked on his form as he takes more, almost excruciatingly slow steps around you, those dangerous eyes of his examining you.

“Surprised, young padawan?” As he circled you, your insides twisted in anxiety, which unbeknownst to you, was exactly what he wanted.

“I’ve heard a lot about you, Lord Dio…”

The glare in your eyes is but an attempt to hide the terror raging within you as the closer he gets, the more that terror increased. You had never encountered a Sith Lord and truthfully, you had always dreaded the thought, for this, was far worse than you could have ever imagined. 

“I am not delicate.” You say, voice a lot shakier than you had intended. A part of you wanted to slash the Lord in half right then and there, but you knew better than to attempt something so utterly foolish. Dio’s eyes lit up, an amused grin dancing across his lips at your words.

“I’m sure you have, little one.” His voice echoed around the darkened room, its tone threatening, yet somehow alluring in a twisted way.

"It is only natural that Jonathan would warn his delicate little apprentice about what dangers lie within the dark side.”

The smirk on his face that was lightly lit up by your lightsaber grew, but so did your burning glare.

“I admire your courage. The Force is strong within you, padawan.” The way his sinister voice echoed in your ears was so bizarre, you almost thought it to be a Sith mind trick. It was almost hypnotic, so much so that you failed to realize him positioning himself behind you.

“Your Master is holding you back.”

Once you heard his voice from a new location, you quickly tried to swing your saber at him, only for it to fly out of your hand with a single wave of his own. Panic quickly made its nest within your core and before you could act a clawed hand was placed on one of your shoulders while the other held a glowing red lightsaber dangerously close to your throat.

You froze as you felt the Sith Lord’s lips right next to your ear, his overwhelming strength radiating from him through his grip on you alone.

“Tell me, young one… What does your Master teach you about the dark side? About our ways?” His claws dug deeper into the skin of your shoulder, making you wince and squeeze your eyes shut. Still, you tried to remain strong.

"Everything I need to know of your… Devilish ways!” A hum that broke into another chuckle slipped his lips, which sent shivers of fright down your spine.

“I thought as much. A Jedi weak as him who fears the Dark Side would indeed pass that fear to his padawan…”

The way he spoke, the way he dangerously whispered those words into your ear had an otherwordly effect on you, one which you had never experienced before.

"We… We aren’t afraid of you!” Your efforts to try to sound unphased by his words are in vain as he moves his lightly humming weapon closer to the skin of your neck, making you gasp and ultimately prove your previous statement wrong.

“The Jedi frown upon fear. To them, it’s a weakness. But to us, my dear…” His hand moved from your shoulder and grabbed your chin, his sharp claws now digging into the skin of your face instead.

“...it’s an asset.”

Your breathing got heavier, your heart raced and the only thing you could hear was him, that dangerous Sith Lord whose seductive and twisted words clouded both your vision and judgment.

“The fear within you can make you stronger than any Jedi. Embrace it, little one.”

He lowered his deep voice to a quiet, yet haunting whisper that immediately stuck to you.

“For it will lead you to unlimited power.”

Your eyes widened, your entire body trembled as you were lost in an invisible mist his seduction had created around you. You knew what he was doing, yet you were weak against his attempts to turn you to the darkness.

You thought back at the times you doubted your Master, all the times you wanted to become stronger. The power of the dark side of the Force had never been so apparent to you. It made you weak, yet you allowed his dangerous words and ominous voice to dominate you, for you found yourself grabbing onto them, leaning to them, submitting to them.

“Why not break free, little one?”

The lack of words coming out of your mouth widens Dio’s smirk as he realizes that he had successfully affected you with his voice alone. He can sense the conflict within you, how what he had just said plagued you internally and it was all so satisfying.

“Fear binds the Jedi.” His hand left your chin and reached forward, using the Force to make your lightsaber that was lying on the floor across the room fly to his hand.

Soon the red glow of his own weapon disappeared, leaving you in darkness once again. Dio then moved in front of your frozen form, grabbed your hand, and placed your saber on your open palm before closing it.

Suddenly, all the terror and anxiety previously dominating your body ceased to exist as you glanced at your weapon before looking up at the Dark Lord, feeling a strange surge of power flowing through your veins yet at the same time, a glow of pure and uncontrollable lust sparkled dangerously in your (E/C) eyes, which the Lord immediately noticed. Your body moved on its own, completely against your will, yet something made it feel so right. The Sith Lord had done something to make you bend to his twisted will that now controlled and bound you much like the fright within you had once done.

“Yes, Master.”

[alternateafterthought]

ARCANE - Part 3

Ø  Meaning: Secret, Mysterious, Understood only by few. MAGIC

Ø  Pairing: Panther Hybrid Min Yoongi x Reader

Ø  Summary: Some secrets are kept for the good of people. Some secrets are kept for abuse or power. Yoongi had been a victim of abuse and power, and he wasn’t going to let anyone else use secrets for that purpose. So, when Y/N comes into his life with secrets, he doesn’t want to fall into that rabbit hole again. He doesn’t want to give all his trust to someone who will abuse their power over him. But maybe Y/N’s secrets are a good thing.

Ø  Genre: Hybrid!au, fluff, angst, eventual smut

Ø  Warnings: None

Ø  Word Count: 1933

Ø  A/N: Hey guys… here is the next part of my Min Yoongi fic!! [xxxADDxxx] So, I really hope you guys love and support this fic like you did with GOLDEN TIME!! If you want to be added to a tag list, message me or leave a comment or ask!! Thank you so much

PREV / NEXT

The process was quick, everything was signed and ready for Y/N to leave with Yoongi. Y/N told Yoongi she would wait for him, walking with J-Hope back out to where she had walked in. She happily talked with J-Hope who was nothing short of enthusiastic that Y/N had chosen Yoongi.

“I do have to ask,” J-Hope finally spoke in a much quieter, solemn voice. “Did you tell Yoongi why you adopted him?”

Y/N shook her head before speaking; “I didn’t exactly want that to be the one reason as to why I walked out of here alone.” J-Hope nodded in understanding. “I’ll tell him when we get home. It would be easier that way.”

“And if he decides he doesn’t want to be your hybrid anymore?” J-Hope had to ask the question no one wanted to think about.

“If that’s what he wants, then I’ll help him get to wherever it is he wants to go.” Y/N answered, just as honestly.

Before either of them could say anything more, the woman that Y/N first talked to walked Yoongi out of the double doors from where the hybrids stayed. Yoongi had a medium sized backpack on, it seemed to be almost overflowing, his eyes on the ground as he walked behind the woman. Y/N would have though he was a guy who just got out of class with a load of homework to do over the weekend.

The woman left Yoongi with a small bow of her head with Y/N and J-Hope, the three of them quiet for a moment. For one moment it was quiet and then… it wasn’t.

“Hyung, wait!”

A loud chorus came from the same double doors Yoongi walked out of, 5 hybrids, 3 of them she had just met, came out of the doors. Quickly, and against the half-hearted declines coming from the panther hybrid, the 5 hybrids wrapped their arms around him. Even J-Hope got in on the hug, and Y/N could see, for the first time, Yoongi smile. A massive gummy smile spread across his face as he was squished into a hug, each hybrid holding tightly.

“We just wanted to see you off.” Jin spoke as they all pulled away.

“Yeah we’ve all been here with you so long that it’s kinda weird seeing you leave.” Namjoon’s hand sat on Yoongi’s shoulder.

“Here, Hyung.” A large bunny hybrid handed Yoongi a photo. “Something to remember us by.”

Yoongi looked down at the photo, Y/N could see around his shoulder that it was of the seven of them. Each boy standing in front of her, each hybrid and J-Hope, stood hugging each other and smiling widely at the camera. Anyone could tell that these boys were family, Yoongi’s family.

“It’s not like I’m leaving the country.” Yoongi put the photo into his backpack. “We’re not leaving the country, right?” He turned back to Y/N to ask.

Y/N snorted very unladylike as she talked; “You really think I could leave the country with everything I’ve told you?” Catching J-Hope’s look Y/N pulled a small card out of her bag and offered it to J-Hope. “This is my address. If they really miss Yoongi that much, you can all visit.”

“Are you serious?” Yoongi seemed more surprised while the others seemed happy, excited for the offer.

“Dinner is usually set at 7pm sharp. Just let me know when you want to drop by, and I’ll set extra plates.” Y/N nodded with a smile, letting them all know they would always be welcomed. “And I’ll make sure you don’t have to run into my family.”

“Thank you so much.” Jin stepped forward, wrapping his arms around her before whispering to her. “Promise me, take care of him. Even if he doesn’t want it, don’t let him push you away.”

“Remember, 7pm sharp.” Y/N moved back and spoke loudly for them all. “My grandmother told me it’s always rude to keep someone waiting when they offer you good food.”

With a final round of hugs, Y/N and Yoongi were finally walking out of the doors of Hope Sanctuary and joining the hordes of people. They followed the sidewalk, crossing the street and began to walk through the park Y/N had stopped before. Y/N stopped walking at the entrance to the park, turning to look at Yoongi who stared at her wide eyed.

“Here.” She handed him a thin black collar with a small tag on it. “It’s just until we get back to the hotel. You can’t be out without one.”

Yoongi knew the law but looking at Y/N it seemed even she didn’t agree with the law. To make it a little easier on her, Yoongi simply nodded, not questioning the collar, and wrapping it around his neck, the small silver tag cold on his skin. The tag was small and oval and as he ran the pad of his thumb over it, there was something engraved into it.

“It’s just my phone number and address. So, if we get separated on the way back…”

“I get it.” Yoongi nodded. “As much as I don’t like it, I wouldn’t want to be taken for being a stray.” They started to walk along the path again. “The HPA isn’t exactly merciful when it comes to strays.”

“Why is that? I thought the HPA was meant to protect hybrids?” Y/N asked, both of them walking rather slowly.

“The HPA was mostly designed to keep a very short leash on hybrids.” Yoongi shook his head as they moved past what looked like a hybrid training group. “I spent some time with the HPA, I think I would prefer the breeding facility to going back there again.”

“That sucks you had to go through that.” Y/N turned her body as they kept walking, her hands fidgeting in front of her. “I hope you know that I will never take your freedom away. I know what it’s like to have your freedom stripped from you.”

“Can I ask…” Yoongi lowered his head before looking back into Y/N’s eyes. “Why do your parents limit you so much?”

Y/N thought about her answer, thought about all the reasons as to why her parents where the way they were. She could understand why they did what they did when she was younger, but she was 24 now, and at 24 she hasn’t experienced life. She had missed out on a lot of things that all of her friends have done or gotten, and she couldn’t get those years back.

Though what she did have was a chance to make her own rules now.

“That’s not really a conversation to have out here.” Y/N’s eyes avoided Yoongi as they passed through the park and back onto the street. “Would you mind waiting until we got somewhere private?”

Yoongi simply nodded, allowing them both to make their way back to Y/N’s hotel in a comfortable silence. Y/N could see the hotel now, allowing her to give a sigh of relief as she checked the time. She had somehow made it back with 20 minutes to spare, giving her enough time to prepare Yoongi, to prepare her parents for Yoongi’s arrival.

“Yoongi,” Y/N reached for his hand, stopping him just outside the hotel’s front door, her soft eyes staring at him. “Whatever happens in here, you have to go with it. All hybrids are supposed to be on a leash in the hotel.”

“I have to wear a leash?” Yoongi asked, eyebrow raised.

“Hotel policy.” Y/N pointed over his shoulder to the massive sign.

Yoongi’s tail stopped moving, instead wrapping around his own thigh, a deep growl bubbling in his chest. There was only so much a hybrid could take, and now he needed a leash as well?

“Just until we get to the room I promise.” Y/N quickly spoke as Yoongi’s hands left hers, moving to hold the straps of his backpack. “Once we get back to my place, you’ll never have to wear a leash or a collar.”

Yoongi simply nodded, allowing Y/N to attach a light and thin leash to the black collar around his pale neck. Rolling his head, Y/N could see just how uncomfortable he was with the whole situation, and not wanting to drag it out, she simply nodded and walked into the hotel with him. Nodding and saying a small “Hello” to those around her she moved to the front desk, letting them know that her hybrid will be staying the night with her before going home.

Once everything was finalised, Y/N turned towards the elevators. Honestly, she probably should have run, but she couldn’t just leave Yoongi there. She probably should have hid, but no one, not even Y/N, could hide from the almost murderous glare coming from her mother.

“Y/N Y/L/N…” Her mother’s steady and yet intimidating voice carried across the hotel lobby. “Come here.”

“Whatever you do, don’t speak, don’t look her in the eye.” Y/N warned under her breath, just loud enough for Yoongi to hear from behind her. “Just keep your head bowed and your hands in front of you. It’ll be over quickly.”

“Y/N, leave the stray here and come up.”

Y/N’s mother was never one to beat around the bush. Anyone who had meet her mother knew that she was a very straightforward woman, never one for any type of nonsense. Her blonde hair was up, each end pulled tight against her head, the clean cut of her dress would let anyone know she wasn’t one to be messed with. The stern look on her face would make anyone quiver under her inspection; Y/N had always wondered whether her blue eyes were ever once peaceful. Instead her eyes were cold and steel, like a storm on a watery horizon, fated to bring anyone to their knees.

She stood ram rod straight, her hands folded in front of her, looking down at Yoongi before turning her attention to her daughter. Y/N knew she had a lot of explaining to do, she also knew that her mother would never bring bad attention to her or her family. And thankfully, Y/N knew how to deal with her overbearing mother, easily holding her calm smile as she spoke to her mother.

“He is not a stray, mother.” Y/N’s eyes never left her mothers, even when her mother’s did to look at Y/N’s now raised hand, holding the leash connected to Yoongi. “He is mine.”

“You bought a hybrid? Without consulting me?” Her mother raised a perfectly aligned eyebrow.

“I did not know I had to consult you with every part of my life?” Y/N questioned her mother.

It wasn’t just a question, more of a statement, between Y/N and her mother. For the past few years Y/N had been trying to get out of the hold her parents had chained her to, and at first her parents allowed her some freedom. But now, her mother’s maternal instincts had kicked back in, and she would never allow her child to be hurt.

“Well then,” Y/N’s mother looked over Yoongi again, who stood quietly half behind Y/N. “It seems we have more to talk about then you leaving your room without your father or I with you.”

“It would seem we do.”

“Very well. Up you come. The both of you.” Y/N’s mothers words were final.

Yoongi looked up for only a second, catching Y/N’s eyes, telling him to please let her handle this before moving into the elevator with the two women. Yoongi saw the floor they were going to; it was going to be the longest 28 floor elevator ride ever.

Tag List

@ariana-winchester95​ | @haven-raven012591​ | @gracehiii​ | @larenelizabeth​ | @legazix​​ | @jiminot7​​ | @narcissism-iskey​​ | @aileanagreene​ | @marvelstuck​​ | @sana-b​​ | @jisoosbitch​ | @dabmeifyoucan​ | @hoseoklefteyebrow | @kookie-vuitton​ | @namjoonies-dimple​ |

[skaryskylar]

CAMELOT

Pairing: BakuDeku, DekuBaku Switch

Type: One-Shot

Prompt: Twin Stars Week/Day 2-Pro Heroes

Rating: Mature

Warnings: Mentioned smut,  ANGST , Major Character Death, Graphic Depictions of Violence, Post-Canon

Read on AO3

"Don't let it be forgot, that for one brief, shining moment there was a Camelot." - Jackie

           The morning dew has yet to clear. Kyoka finds her gaze drawn to the gleaming drops against the lush green expanse of the lot. It goes out for as far as her eye could see, trickling even into the thicket of oak trees beyond the yard. A wisteria looms over the black gate in the distance, lavender falls obscuring an entire section of it. The fog of the night has begun to lift, but only just. The world remains in a sleepy gray.

Fitting, she supposes, for a day like this.

She turns back to the great white house that stood high above her, taking in the roman pillars on either side of the porch, the double wooden doors, wrap-around porch, and just the sheer majesty of it overwhelms her.

She looks down. 'Trespass and you die.' said the welcome mat. If anything, at least she knows she has the right house. Kyoka steels herself.

The dark cherry wood of the door opens just as she lifts her hand to knock again. A face stares out at her, and it takes a moment for her to recognize her old friend. Age had done him a favor. Grief threatens to take it away. He's blessed with smooth skin, few wrinkles courtesy of his quirk, only a hint of crow's feet.

But his eyes are dull. She remembers them as gleaming rubies-keen, cut sharp enough to kill-always staring at their target with a startling intensity.

This is the color of muddied blood, sickly with dark rims beneath the gaze. Still, she smiles, opening her arms to tug him into a tight embrace.  He doesn't resist. There was a time when such a show of affection would've meant small explosions and screaming, but the morning's silence goes uninterrupted till she dares to murmur,

"Hello Kats. It's good to see you."

He pats her shoulder, still silent as he inclines his head to tuck his chin over her head. His grip tightens once, twice, then he releases her, wordlessly drawing back inside to clear the entryway. She follows. Behind her the door shuts with a creak as she looks about the foyer, quick eyes darting from the marble staircase by the wall, to the glistening chandelier above their heads, then out to the halls. She follows the sound of his fading footsteps, taking her time as she prowls looking from photo to photo of bright smiling faces, a happier golden time.

All the while ignoring the oppressive knells of tragedy that ring out in every corner, rattling her ears till she has to cover the jacks with her hands to reduce the pressure.

"This is a nice place Kats." she calls out, to distract herself. Minutes pass. She doesn't think he's going to answer when a low, raspy voice sounds out,

"...That's right. You missed the housewarming. You were-,"

"In America, covering the war."

She finishes her snooping. Tucking into the dining room where he waited, she looks at how he looms over the bar cart at the other end of the room. The gray cast through the window bathes him in a gaunt light, placing shadows where there should've been none, dimming his usual glow till he himself was a shade. Kyoka makes her way to him slowly, but with each step, the vision steadily gets worse.

Katsuki is by no means an unattractive man, but there's something off. An...unstableness to him. The rumors swirl in the back of her mind but she pushes them away. Time may have made them grow distant, but she still thinks she knows him. Knows what he's capable of. At least, when it comes to her.

"Sorry about that again. Oh, um, just water please," She nods as the man gestures to the drinks on the rolling bar cart.

He puts her drink at the right hand seat of the head of the tables. She take her place with grace, placing her tape recorder and notebook down primly. Gazing out the window, she patiently waits for him to settle with his whiskey.

There are no words of judgement spoken aloud as he takes a hearty swig.

She can feel his eyes on her, and hear the flicker when he turns away, following her gaze out the window to the rolling lush grass, down at the brown bunny who sniffed around in the dew.

"Are you ready?" She asks after a lengthy silence. The clink of ice in his cup is booming.

"As I'll ever be."

Licking her lips, she turns to him, hand already settled on the tape recorder. He doesn't shift his gaze from the hare in the lawn. There's something indiscernible moving around in his eyes.

Clicking the record button, she begins,

"July 25th. 8: 12 AM. I'm sitting with Katsuki Bakugou hero alias Ground Zero, the Symbol of Victory, here at the number one hero's dining room table. It is a gray day, with a fog settling between the trees surrounding his grand estate and dew still lingering on the blades of grass,"

She stops, considers, concedes.

"There is a rabbit in the yard. He stares out at it instead of me as we begin this interview...Mr. Bakugou how are you feeling today?"

"... It's 'the Wonder Duo's' dining room table, and 'their' grand estate. My name isn't the only one on the deed. And if you're gonna call me that the whole time, we're ending this shit now."

Scarlet eyes flicker to her and there it is. There's the man she knows. The vicious one who would bite and snarl and rip things apart so long as he would win.

"What's going on with you Kats?" She feels emboldened to ask now. "Are you ready to talk about this today? Because if you need to shift this interview slot, I can talk to my boss and have him send someone else-."

"I'm only doing this because it’s you Phones," he says. A hand goes up as if to brush through his hair, hesitates, then drops back down to handle the glass of whiskey. "The others, I-," He looks outside once more. "I can't talk to them.They don't know me. They didn't know him. You've seen us at our worst, and I..."

He falls silent and says no more. There's a vein working in his neck. She could hear it. The quick thump thump thumpof blood flow. She wants to give her quirk to him so he could hear it too: the reminder that he is alive to sit there and say what he needs to say.

Instead, she presses the urge into her grip on the recorder, starting anew.

"July 25th. 8:16 AM. I sit here with Katsuki Bakugou, hero alias Ground Zero, at the Wonder Duo's dining room table. It's a gray day but," She glances out to the clouds overhead. "The sky shows signs of clearing....Kats,"

She waits until the man looks at her, twin rubies dull in the light. Kyoka tries to put the ball in his court.

"Tell me about your husband."

"You know the story of how we met. Childhood friends. We didn't get along around puberty, but we were stuck together throughout UA whether I liked it or not. You were there. You've seen the worst of it."

"I never understood it though. Kirishima and Mina were childhood friends and they-,"  

"Were different from us. Or rather Izuku and I were different from the rest....We were always different. Complex. Simple and easy would've bored us I think."

Ice clinking. Fabric rustling as he rolls back the sleeves of his thermal. She takes a deep breath.

"....When did it change?"

If he could, he would gouge out his eyes and swallow them whole so he wouldn't have to see this crap.

"I didn't know they were dating." Mina mumbled into her cup of tea. He doesn't look up from where Deku has an arm slung around Round-Face's shoulder, plush pink lips pressing a kiss to her cheek.

Katsuki sneered.

"They deserve each other," He took a vicious bite from his apple, enjoying the crunch between his teeth as something raw and ugly reared its head within his gut. He felt sick and angry all at once. He wanted to retch. He wanted to fight. He wanted to take Izuku and....and...and...

He didn't know, and that was the worst of it.

"Kacchan! Let me go!" Deku's wrist was rough beneath his grip. The kid had scars, more than Katsuki could even count, all over his arms. He was beginning to suspect that he got them on purpose to look stronger than he really was. If that was the case, he had no qualms about laying down a few marks of his own. Lord knows he was good enough to do it.

"We're sparring nerd! Or are you trying to slack off now that you've got your little fancy ass quirk? You can't take up All Might's mantle if you're not willing to work."

That shut him up the rest of the way to the training room.

"I was supposed to have a date with Ochako tonight," The third-year muttered as he stripped off his shirt. Katsuki looked over the muscles in his back, how they flexed beneath the expanse of tan skin, shoulders covered in dark little constellations.

(And he burned.)

There was a thrill of satisfaction at the words. He swallowed it down lest he say something stupid.

But the feeling was so addictive he couldn't help but do the same thing all over again the next 'date night'. If Round Face wanted to distract the future #2 hero, she'd have to fight Katsuki for Deku's time.

It would have to come to a head eventually. He didn't expect it to take a whole fucking year, but he was nothing if not diligent. When Katsuki opened the door of his apartment one night to find Deku, bulked up from his time as Miruko's side-kick, lingering in his entryway, rain sticking his dark curls to his forehead as his eyes ran red with tears, he knew his work had finally paid off.

It was all he could do to hold back his victorious laughter as he pulled Deku in, peeled the wet clothes off his back, and pressed his advantage.

A hand pauses the recording.

"You broke them up?"

"I didn't break anything. Those two were doomed from the start. Two blatantly gay kids playing 'Heterosexual High School'. I did her a favor. Isn't she with that girl from Class B?"  

"I...You're a homewrecker Kats. What an asshole. No wonder she still shit talks about you."  

"She still hasn't gotten over it?"

She wants to laugh, but as soon as the impulse rises, the situation bears down on her once more, sobering her amusement into something bittersweet.  

"She didn't when I last saw her...But...I mean things are different now aren't they? I don't know how she feels."  

His tiny stutter of breath almost gets lost in the 'click' of the recorder. Scarlet eyes return to following the hare.

          The first couple months were a disaster. They were either called in for work, rained out, or something. Katsuki wasn't one for religion, but he couldn't help but feel as though karma had a gun to his head and was shaking him down for all he had.

Impromptu dates were the only option. They could never plan anything out, so they went on instinct, feeling their way through the darkness of the unknown, sprinting through each new thrill. It suited them. They weren't boring people, so the typical dating process wasn't up to their speed. Their dates had to be thrilling and unusual.

Katsuki loved each and every one.

But he had a favorite. This one stuck out cause it was the least expected, jarring in how its sheer inconvenience contradicted how much laughter bubbled out of his throat.

After all, not many people could say their boyfriend snuck into their hospital room, escaping from his own by the skin of his teeth, to take them on a date. But there Izuku was, a bouquet of 'Get Well Soon' flowers in his hand still dripping water onto the floor, bandages wrapped all over his chest disappearing below loose sweats. His house slippers scritched against the floor as he approached Katsuki's bed, green eyes alight with a certain glint that Katsuki knew meant trouble.

He was smiling before the shitty nerd could even speak.

"Hey hot stuff," That saucy wink only confirmed his suspicions. "You wanna get out of here?"

"Fuck yes."

His leg was broken in three different places, but that didn't matter. Deku hooked his arms under Katsuki's body bridal style, mindful of his own broken ribs, then leapt out the open window, curtains a flutter behind them as they went through the sky. He'd remember the way the wind whipped at his face, how his leg throbbed as the painkillers that made him drowsy began to wear off, but it was the hands clutching him tight that imprinted on his mind.

It didn't matter how much time passed. He'd be able to sketch those hands from memory. He knew their touch like he knew his own. Every mottled scar and each crook in his fingers, he could see them even if he went blind. There was no touch he knew to be gentler.

Even as they landed, and the ground quaked beneath the force of Deku's feet, he was brought down so softly, as if he were a thing to be treasured.

There was a picnic already set up. He could see the large tartan blanket from the sky. (Later he would find out Shitty Hair and Pinky helped out, but for that moment, his eyes were on the tall figure of his man with his broad back to him as he faced the world, spine strong and straight as the tree trunks that surrounded them.) The little details like the picnic basket, his old Victrola and a box of his vinyl were the ones his eyes had missed. He could smell spicy takeout from the Indian joint he and Kiri always went to, and a steadily burning teakwood candle that was definitely Mina's special touch.

A sudden fondness for his friends rose quick, but he tamped it down, fighting back the smile on his face.

He lost when Deku turned.

His grin was cheeky as he held up a bottle of jack, and Katsuki knew that was definitely the other man's idea. No one else paid attention to what he preferred to drink, just taking a single sniff, scrunching their nose and running away before he could convince them to try it.

"For the pain!" Deku said excitedly, knowing damn well their nurses would have their heads if they found out.

Ice clinks in the glass. Kyoka looks at the dregs of dark liquor at the bottom.

           He couldn't pinpoint the exact moment the realization came.  They ate in relative comfort, drank more than they were supposed to well into night, watching the stars flicker into existence as the moon made its arc through the dark sky.

It might've been when they set their favorite record to play and Izuku lifted him up. Strength was always effortless when it came to him. It made Katsuki feel safe. He didn't need the protection but it didn't hurt to indulge for once, laying his cheek against a firm, barrel chest and enjoying the warmth of an embrace as they swayed. His feet dangled in the air, alcohol dulling the pain of the broken one into a mild thrum that was lost to the tingling sensation of something going right for once.

Yes, that was the night Katsuki realized this was who he wanted to spend the rest of his life with.

           He stops talking. The tattoo around his finger is as bright as any ring, a simple neon green circlet, neon green lightning bolt where a diamond would've been. Kyoka licks her lips. The recorder is held tight in her hand, knuckles turning white till she realizes and loosens her grip. The two are silent. She searches for something, anything to say, but is interrupted by the thundering of little feet on the stairs, shoes slipping on the marble floors as wild shrieks rang through the hallway.

"Dad! Dad!"

And then comes the deluge. There are six of them, tumbling through the door still in their nightgowns, bedheads wild atop their heads and sleep still in the nooks of their eyes. They clamber around them, only a few sparing a curious glance at her before turning to their apparent father.

(When did this happen? Where was she for this part of their lives? All these tiny faces were unfamiliar to her.)

Katsuki holds the glass far from their reach, despite the only contents being ice, and smiles for the first time that day, shoving back all the grief and fatigue to quirk his lips.

"What's going on brats?"

"It's Aurore," The oldest, she presumes, starts with a confident bang. "Her quirk won't shut off! She broke the sink!"

As if hearing her name, the girl, the true oldest, question comes in.

Floats in, rather. Kyoka watches in mounting horror as the teen, no older than fifteen, comes over with terrible wails, black tendrils bursting from her hands like whips. But even this couldn't keep her attention.

No, it's the pink lightning all over her body that sets off alarms in her mind. She'd seen this before, in a different color.

"Her...Her quirk...it looks a lot like De-,"

Katsuki's hand slams down on the recorder, resounding slap making them all jump. He doesn't look at her as he gets up, one long lean line of power and authority.

"I've gotta take care of the kids. Come back tomorrow."

Then without another glance back, he takes the crying girl by her wrist, tugging her out to another part of the house. The other children follow, casting glances at her with wide bulbous eyes. Confused, and a little hurt, Kyoka collects her things and leaves.

           The hare is back. She thinks its warren is nearby. It's resting in the grass, uncaring of the exposure as she stares. The fog hasn't lifted. The sun stubbornly refuses to come out. Katsuki answers the door even before she walks all the way up to the great white porch. They go back to the dining room from yesterday. He has a pitcher of water set out for them both. She doesn't even think of the eerie silence until he explains,

"The kids have gone to their Grandma Inko's for the weekend."

"Oh, I didn't mind! You didn't have to-,"

"I think," he says softly. "That she needs them more than I do right now."

There are no words that she can say to that. Slipping into the easy folds of professionalism, she sets her recorder on the table. He looks out to watch the hare.

She begins.

"July 26th. 8:01 AM. Same place as yesterday, with the same fog. The house is empty-,"

"You can't write about them. The kids." He says abruptly. She sends him a look, forcibly erasing the last couple seconds from the tape. "Sorry, but I wanted to make that clear. The kids are...They need to stay safe."

"You have my word," She murmurs. He nods. She restarts.

"July 26th. 8:02 AM. Same place as yesterday, with the same fog. Katsuki sits at the head of the table, staring out the window at the same rabbit." She slides her gaze around the room, settling on a photo propped on a side table. She was there the day that photo was taken. She could hear the fireworks, the applause, the sweet, sweet music they danced to that night.

Twin smiles look back at her, imploring her to ask.

"Kats, tell me about him. If you could tell the world what you want them to remember about your husband, what would it be?"

It's a strange question. He turns at the sound of it, then follows her gaze to the portrait.

At once, he reaches for the whiskey on the rolling cart.

           The day of his wedding, he was nervous. It would turn out to be a fine affair; there wasn't a doubt in his mind about that, but that was only if Izuku didn't come to his senses and realize Katsuki was a selfish, rude prick with a temper and a mouth to match. He panicked. He fumbled over something as simple as his tie. His hands were shaking.

And he started to cry. It was only his Dad in the room, and Masaru was a complete bumbling mess when it came to tears, so the man left and, out of all the people he could've found to help, he found his wife.

Like he said. Complete bumbling mess.

Katsuki held back a scream when the old hag appeared. He nearly didn't invite her. She was the bridezilla of a wedding with no brides, paying strict detail to every fucking thing under the moon. But as soon as he saw her, the tears stopped short. He seethed instead, recoiling angrily as she fretted over him, tying his tie as she did back when he was a child.

"Kats'ki,"

He blinked. He hadn't heard his name pronounced like that since he was child. It turned his insides into mush, soft and malleable, quieting his curses till he was looking down at her with wide, blinking eyes.

(And wasn't that a wonder? She was a giant in his eyes once upon a time, but now she craned her neck to fix her gaze upon his face, weathered hands pressing against his cheeks as they did when he was a boy.)

"You're more like me than you're father. I suppose I need to be the one to tell you how not to screw this up-,"

He wanted to protest, but she pressed a finger to his lips, shushing him before smoothing out the lapels of his jacket.

"There's no marriage advice that applies to all couples. What worked for me and your father may not work for you and my darling Izuku, but nevertheless," Fingers paused, hesitated, then squeezed his shoulders. She pressed a firm kiss to his forehead."It must be said. Your passion is your greatest asset, but your temper is your worst. Never spend an entire day angry. Talk out your problems.

"Let yourself love him. Let that love consume you whole till it feels like there's nothing left but that warm, sticky feeling. And let him love you in return."

           Everything was golden that day. Ivory and gold. He remembered how the champagne flowed freely. It went down his mouth in waves, sweetness sticking under his tongue, traces of it on the curve of Izuku's lips when he kissed him.

Katsuki wasn't a dancer but he danced that night. There was never a moment when there wasn't a hand at his waist, or his own wrapped around a firm shoulder. But, no matter where his steps strayed, he always found himself back in the same embrace, held tight against a firm chest, nose brushing against the smooth curve of a neck smelling of pine and sandalwood.

"I love you," And if he could, he would tattoo the words onto his heart, to have and to hold until he took his last breath.

That day, in that glorious, reception hall of gold and ivory and pale white roses, they had their peace. For one brief, shining moment, there was a Camelot: a fairy tale in which greatness was golden, and they had the King Midas touch.

There would be none like it ever again.

"I was at your wedding," Kyoka says wistfully. "The press was in a frenzy for any pictures. TIME said it was bigger than the royal wedding. You two single-handedly brought a small city in Japan under the scrutiny of the world..." She sighs, recalling the breathlessness of it all, of sitting in the pew and feeling the tides of history wash over her skin. "It was a gorgeous ceremony."

"...Yes," he replies, eyes flickering away from the photo. "It was."

           The honeymoon was in Nice, France. It was strange. They weren't bombarded for photos. Either nobody knew them or nobody cared. They spent their days rolling around in the cool sheets of their hotel room, or laid out on the hot pebbles of the beach, toes in the rolling water of the tide. They would whisper secrets the other already knew in the dark, nibbling on cold pizza out by the shore, staring out at the vastness of the ocean as night brought them into its cool embrace. Izuku was a light even in that darkness. He was warm when the winds were cool, and still as the earth when the tide threatened to plunge them into the depths of the sea.

He could never turn it off, that thing that made him so bright. His moral arc was unshakeable, bending ever towards his idea of justice and peace. A symbol of strength in times when others were weak.

When Katsuki was weak.

Izuku said once that Katsuki was his image of victory. But age and experience taught him that the top spot wasn't everything. There was something greater than victory to strive for. It tasted just as sweet, but it was deeper, more profound.

He couldn't put a name to it but that...that thing was what he saw in Izuku. It was an innate glow. Every smile, twinkle of his eyes and even the smallest twitch of his crooked fingers bled with it.

He thought he could taste it on Izuku's skin. He certainly tried. When they lay in bed at night, he traced the map of the heavens with his lips, following each mottled scar that formed a road, memorizing each speckled freckle that formed a constellation against a tanned sky. With each kiss, each swipe of his tongue, he would taste the salt of his sweat but there would be something sweeter looming just beyond. He could spend hours searching for it, but Izuku, in all his niceties, was an impatient man.

The taste would barely brush his palette before the man would push him back into the soft mattress, set upon him with a vigor, and thrust into his heat till he saw fireworks.

Kyoka takes a long, heavy sip of water, resisting the urge to hide her cheeks behind her hands.

           He thought he could see it sometimes. There was a little girl going around Nice, the local thief. They saw her pickpocket an elderly couple and immediately sprang into action. But she was fast. In a blink, she could cross the distance Katsuki made with ten steps.

She couldn't control her quirk though. So when they started nearing the beach, and she looked back at them with fear, there was only one deadly end that could be made. He tried to yell at her to stop, but that only made her jump. Before he could reach her, she was drowning. He was in the waves in an explosion of red and gold, but Deku came from nowhere, black whips surrounding her little body till they lifted her out of the teeming waters.

He carried her to shore, back against the halo of the sun. Katsuki could see it then, in that moment. It wasn't the electric green glow of One for All, but something more. Colorless and without a name.

(Did that sound insane? Maybe he was insane.)

He rescued that little girl, listened to her tragic backstory of abandonment as Katsuki sat fuming off to the side, eyes watching for any sleight of her tiny hand that could lead to Deku being hurt.

(It never came. Not even in the years after. Even accidentally, Deku was the one person Aurore could never harm.)

Their time in Nice, though enlivened by the incident, slowed back down after that. Deku had made a name for himself, helping out in minor incidents because of course he did. Le lapin vert, or Lap-V according to the hipster kids that skated around. He was a hero, even on their honeymoon, simply because he knew no other way to be.

Katsuki didn't fight it. He didn't mind so long as there was a familiar arm slung over his waist in the night, steady breath on the back of his neck and that deep, profound feeling of safety.

They were golden. They were good.

Then they returned to work, spent years dedicating themselves to the tireless cause of justice, picking up orphaned children and taking them in as their own, picking up falling buildings, picking up society as a whole and carrying it on their backs until....

Unti Izuku died, and all things golden and good died with him.

He takes a moment. She allows it, watching with weary, burning eyes as he slips a worn pack of cigarettes from his pocket. He at least has the decency to get up and open the window, smoke filtering out into cool morning air, blending into the drab gray.

"Thought you gave up smoking."

"...It comes and goes."

 He watches the rabbit in the yard. The rabbit watches him back.

     He had the day off. He could still remember how warm the bed was that morning. The sun's light had cast their bedroom in a blissful glow, one in which he lounged in like a cat, stretching out his limbs with a great, silent yawn.

He had kissed Izuku's forehead, soft and tender with affection he wouldn't dare display if the other man were awake, then went to put on a pot of coffee. The children were still asleep, as they were wont to do those early summer mornings. Half-days at school meant they didn't have to go in until a little later, leaving the house in a comfortable silence punctured only by the scritch of his slippers and faint chimes of the Corinthian bells hanging outside the window over the sink. It was soon joined by the rumble of the coffee maker, and a tired sigh as a strong arm wrapped about his waist.

Izuku mumbled his 'good morn'ng' in the same tone he used every day.

(He didn't realize how much he would miss it till he struggled to recall the string of syllables in his mind, searching for the exact lilt on the vowels, that low tired thrum that sent shivers down his spine, as he stood alone in the silence of the following mornings.)

They had coffee and toast, talking about nothing of importance. Class A gossip. Hero Politics. The kids.

Izuku took his shower. Katsuki washed the dishes.

Izuku left. Katsuki kissed him goodbye.

"I love you," Izuku said. His eyes used to search Katsuki's own whenever he said it. He wasn't sure what the man was looking for. Confirmation? Reciprocation? Whatever it was, he had stopped looking after the fifth year of their marriage. That morning, as many others before it, there was nothing but a warm, steady gaze that made his lips curl and heat climb up the back of his neck.

That morning, as many others before it, all he said back was, "Later, nerd."

(He'd regret not saying 'I love you' more, but especially in that last moment. He'd replay it over and over again in his mind, just thinking about 'what if's. Other words he could've said to encompass the vast wealth of his emotions, ones that could properly define the black hole created in his chest when Izuku left him behind.)

     The call came in the afternoon. The kids had left for school an hour before. He waved them off as they boarded the bus, then entered the study to try and get a handle on his paperwork. His coffee had gone cold when his phone rang.

That was the first red flag. It wasn't his cell. It was his work phone. They didn't usually call him in if they had Deku and Shoto on the job. There was an unsettling feeling in his gut but he pushed it away, thinking it may have been a call about a promo opportunity.

He slid his finger against the cool glass.

Then Kota's panicked voice rang through the speaker and he felt the world slowly tick to a deafening halt.

"-Kugo! It's All for One! He's alive! He's here! Shoto and Creati are fighting him now but Deku is-! Deku is-!"

He had never thrown on his uniform faster. He was about to rocket out the door when his phone rang. His private cell. Something compelled him to glance at the screen, instinct warring  for a say with his mind already calculating the route he would take. Seeing his old teacher's name flash only cemented the dread building in his gut.

Aizawa wasn't the type to call him unless it was something serious. He picked up the phone, flying one-handed as he did so, adjusting his balance so that he didn't crash out of the sky.

"He's at Musutafu General. He's asking for you. I know they're calling you into the field, but he says it's urgent. He says....He says 'All Might would want you to have it.' That it.."  

A shuddered breath. "That it can't die with him."

He was on a course for the hospital before the line clicked. He didn't bother with the door, heart racing as he burst through a random window in a showering of glass. He was screaming; he knew it by how hot his throat was, the frightened eyes they sent his way as he marched through the building, boots scratching up the white linoleum floors, threatening to start a fight until Present Mic found him, clasped him by his old, wrinkled hand and led him into a private room.

His Izuku was there, lying in a bed, with no one around but Aizawa. No doctors. No nurses. No one who could help him. Katsuki was set to turn the entire place into a bonfire when green eyes turned to him and his sparks spluttered to a slow freeze.

"Get out," He ordered the extras. He couldn't even hear them when they complied, blood roaring in his ears like the sea.

(The sea. They used to go out and stare at it. Watch the sun drop below the gentle tide. What he would give for just onemore sunset.)

Izuku drew him close with nothing but his steady gaze. He was beautiful, even like this. Even as blood spattered his cheeks, leaking through his heavy bandages, as his eyes looked beyond him to see a greater, brighter horizon.

(Oh, how lucky he was to get to know God's favorite star.)

"Kiss me goodbye," It was a quiet rasp, easy as their mornings. He knew that tone, that series of syllables, mottled with something deeper than sleep.

He couldn't deny him when he was like this.

Katsuki pressed their lips together as he had countless times before, pushing every word left unsaid into this kiss, seeking a brief refuge in the dying warmth of his mouth.

'I love you...i've loved you...i will always love you'

Katsuki watched it go dim, that colorless, nameless thing. It slipped from Izuku's lifeless body to travel with his soul, off to a place he couldn't reach.

"What did he look like?"

"...Excuse me?"

"You said," She clears her throat, tar and oil in her mouth even as tears burn in her eyes. "You said Izuku was there, but what...what, um,...Can you describe to me what you saw?"

A silence yawns into the morning, stretching between them like the years passed. Katsuki looks at her evenly. When she turns away she still feels the scrutiny of his gaze. His voice is grinding gravel.

"You want me to talk about the body." He says it slowly, as if that would lessen the blow. "How the bandages couldn't hold him together? The way his legs were snapped, the hole in his gut that let you see clean through him? Do you want to hear about how his arms were slipping away from the bone? Do you want to hear about that Jirou? Do you really want me to describe what I saw? Or do the sick fucks of the world want to know what it looks like when a hero falls? What the Symbol of Strength looked like when he finally couldn't carry...couldn't..."

He sniffs. Wipes at his eyes. The tar in her mouth turns to ash, bitter and dry. She's never hated herself more than she does now.

"What happened after the hospital?"

He looks to the window. That rabbit hasn't left.

One for All pulsed in his veins as his sorrow joined his rage in a vicious cacophony.

They told him after, what he did. They told him of how the city burned in a blaze of terrifying glory. How he destroyed entire skyscrapers in his chase till he finally caught up to the man that took the sun from his skies. They told him how the newscasters were forced to stop broadcasting. The Hero Commission thought the imagery of the Symbol of Victory doing what he did best was too graphic for the public.

That was the worst part of it. The greatest triumph of his career and there was nothing to show for it but the shadow of a dead, lesser man.

He didn't remember any of it. He woke up to the blood on his hands, to the burned, ripped up pieces of a man once so feared lying at his feet, features unrecognizable from the dark, scarlet mess of blood, guts, and brain matter.

He didn't remember anything other than the face Izuku wore when he died. The fine curl of his lashes against the paling cheeks, how his freckles stood stark against his skin, lips blue but turned up into one final smile as he took his last breath.

He was golden, even in death. He was good.

"Are you crying?"

     She sniffs, rubbing at her eyes as a sense of shame comes over her. She was meant to be comforting him, and here she was, falling into his reluctant embrace, pressing her nose against the sweet scent of his skin and acrid smell of smoke.

"I'm sorry...I just...I-,' She throws professionalism to the wind and breaks down in sobs, tumultuous racking things that make her chest hot and her eyes ache.

For a moment, she wonders what made her think she could do this.

But it wasn't her choice at all was it? Her supervisor demanded it of her, thrusting the assignment her way thinking that since she was 'close to the man's husband; she'd be able to get the job done'. With no regard for her feelings, or how she felt about the situation.

At the end of the day, she isn't even the one that mattered. This broken man before her-this dying fire-, is a scoop really worth putting him through all of this? Whatever she's feeling, he must feel ten-fold.  He sits alone in this huge empty white house, drowning in memories of a golden time long gone, etched into every hall, haunting him at every corner, and here she is rubbing salt into the wounds.

Oh, she's a horrible person. A terrible friend. She has half a mind to throw the recorder out the window, but Katsuki slips it towards himself before she can even try. Crossing over to the window, he pulls out another cigarette.

"Go home Phones. Get some rest. We'll be back at it tomorrow."

She sniffs once more, collects the rest of her things, and finds her way out. From the driver's seat of her car, she can see him, a slim thing in one of the many grand windows, arms crossed as he leans out on the railing, a trail of smoke rising from his lips

Digging out her camera, she snaps a photo of the widow in the white house. She has to fight off the urge to retch the entire ride home.

"I don't smoke."

She glances up from her glass of water, warily eying the way he turned the recorder in his hands.

"31 minutes and 46 seconds in, you can yourself saying 'Thought you gave up on smoking.' Delete that part of the tape. I'm a pro-hero. The second half of the Wonder Duo. Kids look up to me. I don't smoke."

With that said, he slides the recorder back to her, takes a pack of cigs from his pocket, and lights up, reclining in his seat with shut eyes as the steady waft of nicotine fills the air.

Kyoka presses the starting button, and begins,

"July 27th. 8:30 AM. The dining room table again, with the grand old windows overlooking the yard. The fog doesn't seem to want to lift."

Twirling one of her ears with a finger, she looks at her notes, eying one question in particular her supervisor had underlined three times. There's no way she's going to be able to walk into his office without asking, but she's not sure if their friendship would survive the question.

"Did you regret it? Killing that villain?"

Scarlet eyes blink open but they are unseeing, glued to a spot just above her shoulder.

"Depends on who's asking. You, or the Tokyo Times?"

"...The Tokyo Times," she answers. There was nothing Kats hated more than a liar. She expected him to watch her with disappointment, to turn away and treat her coldly for the rest of the interview, but he simply shut his eyes once more.

"My actions were considered a necessary precaution to ensure the safety of the citizens of Japan," His voice is dull, clinical. She knows a practiced statement when she hears it. They were bland. The thump-thump-thump of his heart was at neutral pace, no emotion spurring it into action. "In order to preserve the peace of this new era, the greatest evil of the old had to be destroyed. I thank my fellow pros, the Hero Public Safety Commission, and all first responders for what they did that day. If he were alive,"

Katsuki pauses. The ice in his cup melts slowly beneath the heat of his grip, diluting the liquor it floats in.

His voice goes low, but does not shake.

"If he were here today, I am confident my late husband, Midoriya Izuku hero alias Deku, would be proud of what we accomplished as a city."

She does her duty in writing down what she could, scribbling a note to get a statement on other involved parties as soon as she could.

"Tell me how you felt about the funeral." She says as her pencils scratches.

"It was a ceremony worthy of a hero of Deku's statu-,"

"No." She lays a hand on top of his. "Tell me how you felt about the funeral."

A vein in his neck jumps. She can hear his heartbeat quicken with the rising fury.

"I hated it," He spat.

          When a hero died, they received what was called an 'Akira Service' named after the first shining man made of light  that decided to take up the mantle of 'hero'. It was a nationwide affair, drawing in colleagues, elites and politicians all intending to pay their respects with speeches, prayer, and moments of silence.

It had turned into an opportunity for influencers to rub elbows long before Katsuki was even a thought in his parents mind. The first he had ever been to was during  high school for Best Jeanist. He was still young then, unsure of what was going on.

The second he had gone to was for All Might. Deku was with him for that one, as they were not only the man's protégées but had recently burst through the top ten ranking. They stood in a crowd of thousands, surrounded by vultures and wolves, with nothing but the other and a few scattered friends for respite.

"Do not let my funeral be like this," Deku had whispered to him, after the third fancy insurance company head came around to cozy up to them.  "This is hell on earth. Hi! How are you?"

Katsuki couldn't reply then, when one of the Commission's higher ups approached with a false, wide grin, but he made that promise in his heart. He was sure that Izuku would do the same if Katsuki met his end first.

  But if All Might's funeral as the retired Symbol of Peace was huge, then Izuku's death as a young, active hero-the Symbol of Strength made into a martyr- was beyond measure. People flew in from all over the globe to 'pay their respects'. It seemed like everyone Izuku had ever met had come out of the woodwork.

(It was strange, because when one of them traveled, the other wasn't too far behind. Izuku had hardly met anyone that Katsuki didn't eventually meet himself, and there were a lot of unfamiliar faces in the crowd that day.)

He intended a quiet service for those close to them. For it to be done quickly and efficiently as possible, that his husband's body would be cremated and the ashes buried in the grounds of their home, beneath the wisteria tree, where Katsuki could go every morning and pay his private tributes.

They stole that right from under him. They locked him up for 'his own safety' for days on end and by the time he was released his private cell, stumbling into the arms of his parents, he was politely informed that 'due to the nature of the situation, preparations were already underway for the burial of his partner Midoriya Izuku hero alias Deku, if we would like to be a part he would be expected to show up at the following address in the morning dressed appropriately for the followings series of events-'

     Sorrow didn't taste bitter. He wasn't sure where that idea came from, but he knew it was wrong. It tasted like nothing. It tasted like his taste buds shutting down before the rest of his body, like a muggy fog he was constantly stumbling through, blind to the path, reaching out to find his way.

Sorrow tasted like what it meant to lose, and to be lost all at once.

His only grace was that he wasn't alone through this. He had his parents behind him, Inko at his side weeping into his shoulder, the kids with bowed heads and red eyes. All gathered around the oakwood casket that was still and quiet, muted in the wake of the winter sun.

He had his friends. Eijirou would maintain his quirk for as long as he needed to, beating back paparazzi with his gentle sternness as they made their procession through the streets. Sero blocked off a 'safe' area for family and friends during the service, tape strong with Kaminari's electricity latched onto it, crackling when anyone got too close without Eijirou's go-ahead.

Mina had organized what she could. Whatever control she, Inko and Mitsuki could wrestle from the Hero Public Safety commission, they did. She was the one that stressed over the tiny details, of white roses vs calla lillies and the order of speeches, that made sure the family was the first to be notified of everything that went on, that argued on their behalf when they couldn't keep up and halted the entire process until they agreed to release Katsuki, that they acknowledged that he needed to be there.

She, and the rest of the squad had-.

"Are you crying again Phones?"

"I am so, so sorry Kats. You needed me and I...I didn't show up. I missed it," She heaves through a sob, ears filled with a static that made her head hurt with something other than a deep-rooted resentment. He doesn't look her in the eyes. His heartbeat increases. She feels his toes tapping against the floor as he struggles to find the words to say.

(And here she was again, acting selfishly when Kats was the one who needed the help. When had she become this person?)

"It's not your fault. You had work-."

"That's no excuse. You went to him when he needed you. Mina dropped a modeling gig in the middle of Rome to come home."

"What you do is a little more important than-,"

"No." She brings her hands to the table, eyes willing him to look at her, to see how serious she was. It's not until dim scarlet flicker to her watery gaze that she continues, "I want to fix this. Please tell me how to fix it."

"...You can't bring him back."

"I would if I could."

"I know, but you can't." His cigarette is snuffed out against the marble floors, ash ground out under his heel. He pulls out a pack of tissues from his pocket and an envelope along with it.

"If you really want to help me out, publish this letter along with the article." he says. The white glides along the table, easy as a leaf on the wind. Curious, she unfolds it, wiping away the lingering blur of tears. Voice clear in the silence, she begins to read,

"...And it is with great pride and sense of accomplishment that I announce my retirement from the hero profession for good. It is evident now, more than ever, that the world is ready for a new era of peace, and I look forward to seizing my final great victory by raising those heroes. Yours, in service....Bakugou Katsuki hero alias Ground Zero....What the hellis this?"

"A resignation letter," Kyoka says to her supervisor, wincing. She hates it when he yells; the decibel levels are horrible on her ears. She gets the shakes, tucking herself in tighter.

"There's no way the Hero Commission is going to let their new #1 retire! Has his agency even approved this? We're not publishing this shit! They'll have my head! I asked you to go out there and get me a story Jirou! Not whatever this is!"

The letter is thrown into the air as his hand slams onto his desk.

"I can't believe this! You were chosen because I thought you'd be able to play on his weaknesses! I thought you could make him spill his secrets! A hero gone insane! The Widow: A Murderer! That was the angle I wanted then you come back here with this piece that makes him seem so-! ...So human! That savage Bakugou Katsuki! Our Symbol of Victory! No, you go back to that bastard's house and-"

She watches him rant. How his cheeks turn red with his rage. How fast his heart beats as he begins to fully get into the swing of it.

And she thinks back. She remembers how excited she was when she first got this job, how the squad had thrown her such a huge party. She remembers how proud of her Denki was and how he kissed her that night.

She remembers how the first date she had to blow off turned into twenty. The loneliness she felt when he finally broke up with her, swearing to always be friends. But she wasn't seeing much of her friends either. Then she started travelling abroad.

People started getting married (she's still alone.)

People started having kids (does she still have a chance now at 42?)

Then people started dying, and she was filled with nothing more than regret. The man is still screaming at her but, for the first time in her life, the world goes quiet.

"I quit." Kyoka says.

Collecting her things, she snatches the article out of the man's hands and walks out. The sound of the door slamming on his spluttering gives her a little thrill. She can't help but grin, kicking her feet into a little skip as she goes through the doors, and breathes in the fresh air of freedom.

As for her article , she publishes it anonymously with Put Your Hands Up News.

Her alias? Phones. It fits her she thinks.

The Priest: There comes a time in man's search for meaning when one realizes that there are no answers. And when you come to that, horrible unavoidable realization, you accept it or you kill yourself. Or you simply stop searching...I have lived a blessed life. And yet every night, when I climb into bed, turn off the lights, and stare into the dark, I wonder...'Is this all there is?'

Jackie Kennedy:...You wonder?

The Priest: Every soul on this planet does. But then, when morning comes, we all wake up and make a pot of coffee.  

-Jackie

     Miles away from the rush of the city, Katsuki sits on his porch, water and a cigarette in hand. That damn rabbit is back again. Doing nothing. Looking at him.

He stares right back.

Inside, the children are playing. Their shouts and laughter ring high in the air, over the bluster of the early autumn winds. He thinks the noise will scare the rabbit away but it perks up, craning its ears to listen. It looks at him once more, nose twitching and black eyes curious. He nods at it, then, for a brief ludicrous moment, thinks he sees it smile.

"Later nerd," he says. (Because, even after all the 'what ifs', it turns out that there are no words more fitting than those two.)

Katsuki watches it as it hops back to the cover of the forest, disappearing under the lavender falls of the wisteria tree. There was a certain lightness in his heart with each step the thing took.  Snuffing out his cigarette, he lingers on the steps of the porch as the children wander out to join him. They run barefoot in the wet grass.

He waits. He watches.

They scream. They laugh. They look to him with great expectations.

Katsuki slips off his shoes and goes to join his children in the cool, morning dew. The fog lifts within the hour. The sun is out by noon.

The day is golden.

[longassr1de]

Kitten

Pairing: Yuta x fem!reader

Genre: smut

Word count: 2,207

Summary: Yuta wants to try something new, but he’s decided he’d rather ease you into it before he eases into you. (Sort of pwp, sorry not sorry.)

Warnings: Kitten kink, slight overstim, unprotected sex, squirting, there’s also a bell collar so if this isn’t your thing you might just wanna opt out. This was purely self indulgent, I’m not even gonna lie.

“Come here, kitten,” Yuta called out from across your home. A light tinkling could be heard accompanying the sound of your sock-clad feet padding through to where your boyfriend sat on the couch. “Good girl,” he smiled up at you whilst you stood between his legs, reaching up to ruffle your hair.

“It’s really cute and comfy, I’m just not sure I can sleep with it on or anything,” you jest, tugging at it lightly before leaning down to sit atop one of his thighs. Yuta’s chest rumbles against your head with his endearing laughter, clearly amused by how distraught you were over what he thought simply a cute accessory. His lean arms encase you, wrapping you with his comforting scent as he rests his head on yours.

Truthfully, he couldn’t stop staring at your neck in the pretty little choker, wondering how the sleek maroon velvet would look next to a littering of reds and blues made from his own teeth. Before he could bring it up however, you gave him just the perfect opportunity to attempt his next move.

“Yuta,” you whined, sounding somewhat childish, “can we go cuddle?”

“Isn’t that what we’re doing now?” he retorts playfully, loving the reactions he rises from you whenever he insists on being a little difficult.

“You know that’s not what I meant,” you huff, trying again. “Can we go to bed?” And the light-bulb in his head clicks on, suddenly all too eager to get you into bed, little did you know what his mind was brewing. He lifts you up into his arms and dramatically carries you to your shared bedroom, stopping to act like he was carrying you over the threshold of your newlywed home rather than simply your cozy apartment.

Once he sets you down, however, he doesn’t join you just yet. He ventures off to the kitchen, the closet, and the bathroom, you presume by the faraway bustling sounds of a cabinet. At long last, your prince arrives to save the day, or well, to save your impatient self from boredom.

Yuta joins you on the bed, opting to lay behind you, spooning you with his arms draped across your stomach. It’s a peaceful kind of quiet that almost lets you settle into a nice afternoon nap, but quiet never seems to last for long, much less when you’ve got Yuta around. Rather than breaking the silence with words, he starts to play with the over-sized hoodie you’d been wearing, one he assumes was probably once his but you just looked so cute he couldn’t be bothered to fight you for it.

His hands slide under the hoodie, lightly tickling across your abdomen at first, making you let out a small hiss at the contact. Yuta doesn’t stop there though, no he continues up to cup your breasts, leaning forward to bury his face into the very inviting crook of your shoulder.

“Yutaaa,” you attempt to sound scolding, but end up sounding halfway to a moan of his name.

“Mmh, what is it kitten?” he responds with a gleam in his eye, knowing full well that his plan is working, as it always does. It’s never been difficult for you two to tempt one another, not much coaxing necessary, but he needed you on board if he was going to ask you to let him try something new. Therefore, he concluded he had no choice but to rile you up.

“I was almost asleep, you tease,” you scoff at him playfully, not actually angry, and even if you tried to act it, he would always call your bluff. The good thing about Yuta was how sweet and attentive he was when it came to you, whether that be emotional or physical.

“I know a great way to help you fall asleep,” he trails wet, hot kisses up the side of your neck, licking the shell of your ear before murmuring an all too tempting offer. “How about I fuck you into the mattress until you can’t remember your name, will that help you sleep better?” He blinks innocently, a complete contrast to his words and actions. While one of his hands starts to trace the waistband of your panties, the only thing you were wearing besides the hoodie and socks, his other hand starts to tease your nipples.

By this point, you know damn well that if you weren’t already sucker into his plans earlier, you were definitely in too deep now to escape. Rutting your ass back onto his crotch, Yuta lets out a soft groan while you provide him with friction just shy of what he was after. He sits up to straddle you on the bed, pulling you by your thighs to situate you at an angle where he can take control and grind into you this time, ever the tease he is.

You tug at his freshly died ginger locks, suddenly feeling too small under his intense gaze, burning like a thousand suns through the windows to your soul. Oddly enough, Yuta finds the time to pull up half his hair into a little ponytail, looking all too cute for the sins he was well-prepared to commit. Opting to run your fingertips through the loose strands left of his hair at the nape of his neck, Yuta peels his hoodie off you, followed by your fluffy socks, leaving you in just your baby blue panties and the choker. You make a motion as if to reach for it and remove it, to which he simply grabs your hands and shakes his head, placing your arms on by your sides instead.

You look towards the devilish grin he has plastered and worry for the sake of your sanity, but you’d sold your soul to him far too long ago to begin caring now, simply strapping in to enjoy whatever ride you were about to sit through. Yuta grabs at your thighs to spread them apart, lifting them over his shoulders as you realize where things are slowly heading. One thing Yuta refuses to do is to do anything half-assed, and that most certainly applies to the bedroom as well. Often the victim of his boundless stamina, you’ve had many a night where you spend the next day limping around. And by the looks of it, tomorrow will be another one of those days.

Starting slow, he runs a finger over your folds, through your panties. You whine, growing impatient, and clicks his tongue in annoyance at the fabric as well when he has to struggle to remove it in your current position. Once they’re off, a switch seems to go off within your boyfriend, Yuta eats you out like a man starved; sucking at your clit and folds, licking into your warm wetness, even sucking bruises into your trembling thighs. Your nails dig into the sheets as you let out moan after moan, turning your face to bite the pillow whilst trying to silence yourself, making the bell jingle from all your movement. And there is it, just what Yuta wanted all along, to fuck you senseless with the pretty little choker on, completing the aesthetic of his pet name for you.

He slides two fingers into you, shortly after proceeding to open you up on three of his fingers. And just when you think he’ll let you come, he pulls away entirely, leaving you to cuss at him as your legs meet the cool cotton sheets once more. Now you understand the ponytail, at least, he was just trying to keep his hair out of the way while he devoured your wetness.

He peels away from you to fully undress himself, opting to keep the apple-like hairstyle seeing as you’d complimented it earlier. Now stark naked, Yuta kneels back onto the bed before you, crawling back over until he stops just short of you, stroking his weeping length. He takes his lower lip between his teeth, murmuring expletives at both the pleasure and the way your doe eyes seem to be taking everything in. “Hands and knees kitten, I’m not planning on going easy tonight,” he practically growls, making you mentally say your prayers.

As you finish accommodating yourself into his requested position, Yuta grabs your hips, rutting his cock against your ass. “Poor baby didn’t get to cum, how badly do you want my dick baby? Tell me,” the sick sadist in him out in full force. If he wanted you to beg, you’d never get anywhere until you did, the man had a heart of gold... but a will of steel.

“Please, please Yuta, fuck me, fill me up-“ you gasp at the sensation of him entering you in one rough push. Certainly wet enough, certainly stretched enough, but completely taken aback by the sudden intrusion nonetheless. Shock aside, Yuta has to wrap his arms around your waist just to hold you up, your knees buckling and arms giving way once he begins thrusting mercilessly into your tightness. “Oh fuck, baby,” you slur your words, face halfway into the pillow before he tsks and pulls you up so that your body is flush against his, leaning up on just your knees now.

“I wanna hear that pretty little collar, kitten, but just that won’t do if you’re buried into the pillow,” Yuta bites at your shoulder and sucks yet another lovely mark into your skin, now focused on making a trail of them to your other shoulder. You try to apologize but he shushes you and slaps your clit, using his other hand to pull on your hair as he slows his thrusts to hit slower, deeper, feeling like you could feel his cock hitting so far up your solar plexus you had no idea if you had hit nirvana (or hell) yet.

The persistent jingling of the bell was only heightened when he sets you back down in all fours, rabbiting his hips so quickly it mas more like one long, constant chime from the choker. Bits of drool and a few stray tears ran across your face from the sheer, animalistic pleasure of it all.

Your thighs convulsed as the tell-tale signs of your incoming orgasm approached. Yuta continues to fuck you as he approaches his own orgasm, helping you ride out your own by rubbing at your clit. Then without warning, you come hard, harder than you ever had before, feeling your cum nearly explode as you end up squirting all over Yuta’s thighs and onto the mattress. His eyes nearly roll back into his head at the mere thought of having made you squirt, just barely pulling out in time to cum all over your ass.

Entirely breathless and in utter disbelief, both of you lay within the mess of your bed, covered in a mix of your combined cum. Yuta coos about how well you did for him, about how hard you came and about what a good girl you were for him. Too exhausted and far too sore, you simply let him take care of the cleaning as he carries you into the tub he prepared, joining you moments after he’d changed the sheets and started on the laundry. As he slips in behind you, carrying you onto his lap, you reach up to kiss him. You’d forgotten all about his little ponytail until your hands couldn’t find purchase comfortably in his bright locks. He grins at your glee, feeling you flipping about his ponytail before leaning back down to kiss you again; long, slow drags of his lips against yours, melding of tongues as your submerged bodies intertwine below the surface of lukewarm bathwater.

“You know,” Yuta starts, reaching his hand up to rub some spit off your chin before cupping it tenderly, “all this water... and you’re still only half as wet as you were for me earlier.” He lets out a loud, boisterous laugh upon the roll of your eyes, enamored wholeheartedly by your very being, but far too shy to ever be able to put that into words. Perhaps one day he’ll work up the courage to tell you how much he truly loves you, but for right now, he decides he’ll simply enjoy every moment he gets to share with you.

And as you’re falling asleep in his arms that night, you hear the twinkling of your now favorite necklace just before you feel an innocent kiss placed at your jawline. “You know.... I think you’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me, kitten,” Yuta whispers while gently stroking over your hair, mistakenly assuming you’re already asleep. “You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me too, tiger,” you tease, drifting off into your own sense of moonlit peace while Yuta’s left to mull over his own shock.

[obaewankenope]

TW FOR SELF HARM:. After reading your last writing I went feral over the idea of Crowley disappearing for periods of time and Az worrying about him so consider Crowley starts seeming more and more bedraggled and snippy every time they see each other, then doesn't show up to the bookstore for a few weeks. Az worries more and more until he gets hit with a train of pain and misery and realizes that Crowley is depressed and in danger. Az finds Crowley in his flat, feathers ripped out and eyes wild-

-wild, in a full blown panic attack. Crowley won’t let Az near him so he has to calm the demon down from afar. Eventually it comes out that all this is because Crowley hates what he is (demon/fallen angel) due to what Hell and Heaven have done and simply wants the pain and misery to end. He had hoped that with his ugly black feathers gone, he could find redemption or, at least, peace. ~fucker

You, you are a monster and I love it so much omg ps go and shout at iggysfanblog for this Angsty AF Fic lmao

Trigger warning: self-harm, mutilation, wing abuse, depression, suicidal ideation, suicidal apathy.

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Angelof the crooked wings

Title comes from Antiphon forthe Angels by Hildegard VonBingen

Crowley has always hated his job. Not because he’sa bad demon—sort of the job description, being bad—but because he’s not alwaysin the mood to commit Evil Acts and Evil Acts only. He’s a good Tempter and an evenbetter Thinker Upper Of Plans but being a demon didn’t give him thoseskills or make him so good at them. Neither had being an angel. They were justpart of him; Crowley. The core personality so to speak. Everything else wasjust dressings and trimmings to make him look Fancier and Mightier and Holierand Unholier depending on the uniform required for the job.

Once upon a time he’d had white wings—to the humaneye at least; they were really every colour in existence because angels wereeverything too—and he’d found them to be both beautiful and very constrictingin a confusing way. It’s an absurd feeling when one has wings capable offlight, but one Crowley feels, nonetheless. For celestial and infernal beings,feeling trapped when possessing wings is about as crazy as defying heaven andhell to preserve one little mudball full of evolved monkeys. 

Naturally then, Crowley excels at it in the sameway he excels at saving humanity; disastrously.

Read on AO3 or below:

Fallinghad been an impulsive act by Crowley; sort of a “maybe this will change thisfeeling” kind of thinking. To be fair, it had. It’d changed a lot of otherthings—turning his wings black had been an aesthetic choice to hide the faintscarring from the ten-thousand-mile free-fall and the boiling sulphur he’d onlybriefly landed in [1]—butit didn’t really change the sense of feeling penned in all the time. In heavenit had been rules and regulations and expectations and not thinking or askingquestions. In hell it was the same just with a bit more give if you could liewell. 

Crowleylies exceptionally well [2].

Before the Fall, Crowley had felt like he’d beentrapped in a hamster cage that wasn’t designed for housing a rabbit. After theFall, it’d been like he’d been re-homed in a larger space that didn’t look likea cage but was. It’d just took him a little while to find the edges. Thetrapped feeling always returned. 

When Crowley had first met Aziraphale—just anotherangel in the Garden back then—he hadn’t expected the feeling of Relief that theangel had elicited in him. His wings had revealed themselves against hiswill—something he controlled ruthlessly from then on—and the angel had shieldedhim from the First Rain. The angel felt as trapped as Crowley to the demon’ssenses but, whereas Crowley was aware of his predicament, Aziraphale seemedinnocently unaware of how trapped he was. Crowley wasn’t sure such a situationwas a blessing or a curse. Six thousand years later and Crowley still isn’tsure.

The only changes from Falling for Crowley wereillusionary  at best. His eyes were aChoice He Made Himself and not a visual sign of punishment for rebelling.Crowley hadn’t rebelled, not really. He’d just taken the last train out ofheaven and hitched a free ride to hell. Desertion. That’s it. Crowley haddeserted heaven, not rebelled against it. Completely different. So he gained a new employer who was abitter ex-employee of their parent company, it was all the same in thelong-run.

From angel to demon, a simple enough transitionthat gave Crowley a little more rope with which to hang himself.

Whenever Crowley is with Aziraphale, his entirebeing is released, the trapped feeling fading away to a faint buzz rather thanthe constant klaxon sounding in his mind. Unfortunately, however, Crowley hasnever been able to just be around Aziraphale all the time.That’s why he’d come up with The Arrangement. Mutually beneficial—as it reducedtravel commitments and such—it offered Crowley the easy excuse to check in onAziraphale whenever the klaxon became Too Much. It worked fantastically enough,until 1862 when Crowley had asked the angel for holy water and set off anargument he hadn’t intended to start. Over sixty years of not seeing Aziraphalewould have been impossible for Crowley to endure had he not slept for most ofit. He’d needed the sleep to escape the klaxon that got louder and louder thelonger he didn’t see Aziraphale. But then the Blitz happened and the church andthat damned bomb and- it was like they’d never argued. It was there, of course,but it didn’t make it impossible to see each other and Crowley had dropped bythe bookshop like clockwork running on a decade chime instead of hourly. Eventhe 70s hadn’t caused more issues for them, even with the- the- what- theangel’s rebuke. Yeah…

Then it had all gone to shit when Crowley had beengiven the “honour” of delivering the End Of The World and for almost a decade,the demon had been in near constant contact with Aziraphale for an entiredecade. It had done something to him—weakened him in some inexplicable way—butit was the week before the world ended that broke him. Fightingwith Aziraphale, losing him to discorporation after threats from Hastur to killhim, facing down a wall of fire, and then his own boss—and ex-employer—didsomething that Crowley fears cannot be undone.

Something he knows cannot be undone.

Wings—now inky black by choice—itch and shiftrestlessly no matter what Crowley does. Whether he’s with Aziraphale or not,the blaring alarm of TRAPPED! TRAPPED! TRAPPED! sounds on a loop. Thesense of being caged rears its head every time a primary moves, a secondarytwitches. It’s suffocating him, leaves his heart pounding like it’s trying toescape his chest, his lungs tight and constricted by bands of steel evertightening and denying his body air.

Seeing Aziraphale makes him twitch and want to clawhis skin off, smash windows and cut into his chest and slice out his heart andjust be done with it. The urge is stronger and stronger the longer he’s aroundAziraphale after the Not End so he visits the bookshop less.

Part of it is fear, that much Crowley knows. Fearof what exactly eludes him however. Not knowing tightens the bandsacross his chest more and makes his skull feel like it’s crushing his brain asthough it was in a vice. Every time he sees his wings out of the corner of hiseye—whether they’re manifested on the physical plane or just there on theastral plane that humans aren’t really built to see or interact with—Crowleywants to hiss and swipe at them; lashing out at the one constant he’s ever hadin his life.

Hiswings may be black now but that had been an intentional choice onCrowley’s part. White was the colour of heaven. The opposite then would be forhell. White makes every colour there is, black is made of those colours; itdevours them. Perfectly fitting for a demon. But his wings are Divine and havealways been part of him; Crowley cannot remember a single moment where he didnot have them [3]. They’re a part of him thathe wants to hate because he doesn’t Belong Anywhere and they’re areminder of that fact. The once represented the Divine then Infernal and now…now they’re just There and he loathes them [4].

The first feather he tears out between moultselicits a wonderful feeling of power. It doesn’t hurt for more than amoment, feels more like a particularly sharp scratch on sensitive skin but itgrants him something Crowley hesitates to call relief. He doesn’t think there’sreally a word he can use to describe what he feels after. The second and thirdfeathers are coverts like the first, torn out after he flees the bookshop whenAziraphale gives him such an openly kind look it has Crowley’s heartpounding. It gives him just enough of a sharp slap to regain the control overhis body that slipped away. But pulling coverts is like trying to staunch anarterial wound with a tissue; it’s just Not Enough.

The first primary he plucks is… a lot more painful.Wonderfully painful. He feels like he’s torn off a fingernail with no warning.The rush of feeling that burns through him in time with the hot and coldnerve-destroying flashes is fantastical. His wing snaps close to his body,tucks itself up as small and close as it can as instinct draws the injured appendageclose to him. Crowley finds that he can tolerate his wings when they’retrembling and twitching from pain and not- not whatever they usually twitchfrom. But, all too soon, the pain fades away, magic soothing the pain andturning it to a pale, ever weakening echo of the blanked-out agony it beganas. And, just like with the coverts, he pulls more and more of them astime goes on.

Aziraphalenever comments on his state though Crowley knows he notices. It’s not hard tosee really, what with the way Crowley looks like a human that hasn’t slept in amonth; skin paler than usual and a muted grey, hair lank and messy in a waythat speaks of lack of care rather than an aesthetic choice, clothing looserand worn and frayed like they’ve never been before. Crowley also knowsthe angel can see how close to his body he tucks his wings—so tightly againsthim that it looks as though he doesn’t have them anymore when he’s stood or sata certain way. But, although the angel sees it he never directly comments,Aziraphale does make pointed comments here and there: “you look like you coulduse a drink dear, I’ll make some tea; have a new type to try that apparentlyworks wonders for when you’re feeling down”, and “well this quilt is quitewarm, too warm for myself really, why don’t you have it—I know the sofa is in adraughty spot after all” and so on. Aziraphale is unlike Crowley in regard tohis wings—the angel uses them often even if they’re not visible on the physicalplane [5].

Eventually the release he experiences from pullinga feather or two here and there isn’t enough. It’s never enough. He chased thepain that each feather results in, plucking more and more from muscle and boneand tender flesh until Crowley’s wings are wrecked and destroyed by his ownhands. Even though the pain becomes constant, his magic just not enough tocontend with the aching burn that is like an undercurrent to everything, it’snot enough. He needs more. He needs-

Bones are easy to break if you know how to go aboutit. Crowley—unfortunately—does.

*            *            *            *            *            *            *            *

Aziraphalefirst notices it about a month after the world failed to end—though it hadgiven it a good go what with the Kraken, fire and brimstone, the horsemenriding and all that stuff. Since then he’s become quite used to seeing Crowleyregularly—a new fixture in the bookshop, not unlike a particularly snippystatue that happens to walk, talk, and perform minor feats of evil for the sakeof it—compared to before the whole Influencing The Antichrist plan came about.The intermittent six thousand years of meetings here and there across the worldwere—for Aziraphale—quietly enjoyable. But when Crowley had suggested theyamend their Arrangement after the antichrist was born… Aziraphale admits nowthat he’d been tempted from the get-go [6].Throughout those eleven years Aziraphale saw Crowley regularly in the Dowlingresidence—tending to young Warlock with a surprisingly gentle manner—and thetwo immortal beings had retired to a shared cottage on the grounds; a sort oflodging house for full-time workers that had been miraculously occupied by onlythe two of them [7]. After all that,Aziraphale has to admit, he’s become quite used to Crowley always being around;so much so that when the demon starts to show up less and less, Aziraphalestarts to Worry with a capital W.

Hedoesn’t do anything about it at first, mostly because he’s not certain what he cando. Crowley is, after all, quite sensitive. Although Aziraphale will never saythat to the demon’s face—he values his books too much to offend thedemon to such a degree that Crowley would ruin several in recompense for theUnwanted Compliment—it is one of the attributes of Crowley thatAziraphale finds most appealing. That this demon is capable of committing greathorrors and instead chooses to petty temptings and chicanery to annoy humansinto choosing to sin; it is a far cry from the nature of other demonsAziraphale has met [8]. Crowley would deny itwith his last breath but the demon has a softer heart than Aziraphale everwill—the angel is quite aware that it was he and not Crowley who hadaimed a weapon at a child and hadn’t hesitated to fire after all; Aziraphale ismuch more capable of being ruthless than others would first believe [9].

Although Aziraphale doesn’t understand the appeal,he is aware that Crowley likes to sleep. Something about the lack ofconsciousness appeals to the demon just as much as drinking does—althoughAziraphale isn’t sure it’s for the same reasons. Aziraphale likes a drinkhimself—he doesn’t experience hangovers like humans, nor does his body start toshut down after too much alcohol as is the case for humans so mortifyingbehaviour is his only deterrent—but he knows Crowley uses alcohol todull his feelings. Considering how much kinder Crowley is than he should be fora demon, Aziraphale can at least comprehend why alcohol is such an appealingthing to the demon. Over the centuries, the angel has come across many a humanwho have lost themselves in their vices, trying to escape whatever haunts themin their waking hours. It is saddening to think that Crowley is like thosehumans with tortured souls.

Thedemon admitted to him once that he’d drank himself unconscious after receivinga commendation for the Spanish Inquisition [10].So it’s no surprise that Aziraphale is reasonably concerned that Crowley hasdrank himself into a stupor for some reason and that’s why he hasn’t been bythe bookshop [11]. He resolves to visit thedemon’s flat after closing the bookshop tonight—that he had never visitedbefore they averted Armageddon and he’d been homeless—and check up on Crowley.In a purely platonically friendly way of course.

However, when the wave of pain slams into him ashe’s sorting books on shelves that didn’t exist before Armageddon wascancelled, Aziraphale realises he should have acted much, much sooner.

Aziraphale is in the bookshop one moment and halfwayacross London in the next, appearing with a soft rustle of feathers in a darkflat he’s been in only once before. The pain washes through him, runs along hiswings and all the way down to the tips of his alulas, primaries and secondariesbefore it peters out in the coverts. He ignores it, rushing through the flattoward the sound of high-pitched, muffled keening that tears into the angelmore viciously than any pain ever has. The sight that greets him as he shovesthe bedroom door aside—possibly causing permanent damage to the hinges, notthat he particularly cares at that moment—is enough to stop Aziraphalein his tracks.

The sight- it would turn the stomachs of even themost soulless of demons.

There are few things that demons and angelsconsider to be sacred but wings are one of them. No angel touches anotherangel’s wings without permission. No demon harms another demon’s wings withoutpunishment. Between the two groups, injuries to wings are some of the mostserious taboo acts either side can commit in battle. Aziraphale has seen hardlymore than a dozen cases where wings have been harmed—and all of those wereduring the Rebellion led by Samael. Only She has every caused permanent harm tothe wings of her creations—the Fallen Ones—but even that harm pales incomparison to what Aziraphale sees now.

Like a bird, the wings of a Divine or Infernalcreature are delicate, designed for flight and do not take kindly tobeing injured. Although they’re delicate they can withstand a lot ofabuse—courtesy of them not being entirely physical or astral but a mixture ofthe two which enables a lot of leeway when it comes to injuries; also magic,but that’s a whole other explanation—but they do have their limits as towhat can and cannot be repaired without Divine Assistance.

Aziraphale fears that this is beyond even theDivine.

“Crowley!” Aziraphale cries out, voice soft andpained and bleeding worry. “Goodness Crowley, what happened?” 

The angel approaches the demon quickly, reachingout to gently touch him but freezes when Crowley’s entire body twitches andflinches away from him.

“Don- Don’t touch me,” Crowley weakly croaks, anarm blindly flinging itself out from his curled-up form in the corner of theroom, nails black with blood, hands stained and Aziraphale’s heart feels likeit’s breaking in two. “Don’t—please don’t.”

“Okay Crowley, okay,” Aziraphale assures the demon,carefully lowering himself onto his haunches as close to the demon as Crowleywill allow him. “Wh- what happened—if you don’t mind my asking?”

The demon chokes out a laughand it’s seven different kinds of wrong because it sounds so, so broken. Ithurts Aziraphale just to hear. “H- had a bit- bit of- well, I had a bad day,angel.”

Bad day is… well it’s anunderstatement to say the least. Aziraphale stares at the demon that’s hidingin the corner of his own bedroom, blood and feathers everywhere, and the angelwants to just Wish It All Away. The pain he can feel emanating from Crowley in palpablewaves. The suffering that underlies the pain. The blood and feathers andsalty tears Crowley has shed without consent.

He wants to just Make ItBetter but Aziraphale knows that some things cannot simply be Wished Well.

“Well then, bad daysare—well—they’re bad, as the phrase suggests,” Aziraphale says, longing toreach out and at least touch Crowley on the arm but he doesn’t. Not whenCrowley seems to barely handle his presence in the room. “But bad days doend, dear.”

Crowley’s head rises alittle from where it’s sort of tucked between knees and covered with armsadorned with torn sleeves. “What- what about bad millennia, angel? When do thoseend?”

The demon shifts and hissesin pain and Aziraphale doesn’t think, he doesn’t hesitate; he reaches out andcurls a hand around Crowley’s arm, feeling the moment the demon freezes at thecontact.

“I don’t know when thoseend, Crowley,” Aziraphale says softly, carefully, and he doesn’t remove hishand from Crowley’s arm even though he can feel the muscles twitching beneathhis fingers. He doesn’t back down because Crowley needs him now and there isNothing that will stop Aziraphale from doing what needs to be done for hisdemon.

Yes. His demon.

It’s about time Aziraphaleadmitted it to himself. Crowley is as much his as Aziraphale is Crowley’s.

“But I do know these pastsix thousand years have been a lot more tolerable when you’ve been beside me.”It’s a confession and an offering to the demon and Aziraphale feels like thescales have been tipped, the balance upset, because it’s him offeringthe reassurances and the temptings to Crowley.

But Aziraphale has alwaystempted Crowley, in his own way. He just hadn’t really noticed before.

“Whenever you weren’taround, I’d hide in my books so I could try and ignore the feeling in my chestthat clawed at me because you weren’t there to quieten it,” Aziraphalewhispers. “I felt such relief that night I saw you in the church even as Iworried over your safety because that- that ache faded away the moment I sawyou.”

The angel leans close to thedemon, resting his head on Crowley’s arm, his forehead touching torn cloth andheated skin. It draws a sound from Crowley that is so very broken in adifferent way to the keening of before. “I cannot imagine how it felt to- to nolonger know I was alive, to think I was dead,” Aziraphale continues and Crowleytrembles beneath his hand and head at the words. “To be so lost and alone andnot care anymore because- because your reason was gone. But Crowley—”Aziraphale lifts his head—noting absently that Crowley’s sunglasses weremissing—and looks the demon in the eye “—please don’t let me find out. Please.”

“I- I’m... I’m just so... tired,angel,” Crowley admits. “I’m tired of it all. I just- make it stop,” he begs,hands coming up and gripping at Aziraphale. “You used to make it stop.”The demon’s head falls forward, drops down against Aziraphale’s chest. “Pleasemake it stop.”

When angels cry the cosmoscry with them. Some angels affect the cosmos more than others. Archangels havebeen known to cause floods and water to form on planets where there once was nowater. Aziraphale has seldom cried in his life even though he has wished to attimes. Now- now Aziraphale cries [12].

The sky outside darkens andthunderclouds amass quicker than they have ever amassed. The BBC weather willcomment on how surprising it is for a thunderstorm to occur with so littlewarning but it’s just entering into September and the weather is always strangearound the end of summer. No human will know that the weather is the result ofa principality crying in pain and anguish for one who is Fallen and broken inways he has never before realised.

Aziraphale pulls Crowleyclose, carefully wrapping his arms around the demon in as gentle a way aspossible, avoiding the injuries he doesn’t quite know if he can Heal. He willtry regardless and put every ounce of will and love—it is love that he feels,why deny it now?—that Aziraphale has and He Will Heal The Fallen Angel.

Even if it ruins him to doso.

.

[1] It was still long enough to cause somesignificant damage to his body and wings but his core strength had remainedlargely untouched. A few cracks and gouges that he’d carefully repaired overthe years; nothing serious.

[2] So well, in fact, that he’s capable of lying to himself aboutImportant Things for eons.

[3] All six of them, in fact.

[4] They are a stain on him. A mark. Aconstant, unending reminder. Like scar tissue he can’t not see in the mirrorevery day, that he always feels and Knows is there.

[5]  Aziraphale has a habit of unconsciously drawing his wings aroundhimself on the astral plane when engrossed in a book or focused on somethingrequiring his attention. The angel draws those wings close when he’s disturbedand although humans do not see them they feel an unexplained Spiritual Breezewhen the wings move when Aziraphale is startled. It’s quite endearing even ifit makes Crowley’s skin crawl at the casual use of his wings by the angel.

[6] Of course, fear of punishment by heavenand hell—mostly hell with Crowley—had made him wary and it had taken Crowleyframing the amendment in a manner that befitted Thwarting Evil for Aziraphaleto finally agree, but the idea of sharing responsibility with Crowley forsomething… it had greatly appealed to the angel. Greatly.

[7]  They had spent most of their time initially comparingnotes on what they were Teaching young Warlock in order to try and make himneutral at least before their discussions had branched off into more friendlytopics and evenings were spent in a sort of enjoyable companionship neither hadexperienced before. Of course, in hindsight, the poor boy would likely needsome intensive therapy considering he wasn’t the subject of a divine prophecyand thus didn’t quite grasp some of the things Aziraphale or Crowley taughthim. Humans were frighteningly limited in that regard—but it made themwonderful at the same time; at least humans pushed their limits whilstangels and demons sort of wallowed within their constraints.

[8]  Witnessing Crowley sneak children aboard Noah’s shipjust as the flood began cemented in Aziraphale’s heart that the demon is farkinder than any other demon and does not commit Evil because he is evil but rather because it’s his job.If given the freedom to choose, Aziraphale is certain Crowley would performmiracles and temptings as and when he pleases. The Arrangement solidified thatbelief and after the world didn’t end, Aziraphale has watched and waited forCrowley to broach the subject himself. But the demon has remained quiet on thematter.

[9] He choose, however, to be nice andkind.

[10]  Crowley had been in the right place at the right time to receivepraise but the demon had simply been enjoying the sights. Infernal luck and allthat however had seen him credited with someone truly evil.

[11]  Even this is desperate thinking by the angel—something Aziraphalewell knows. He thinks it regardless, willfully ignorant and hopeful that he’sright when he knows full well he is not.

[12] As a cherubim, Aziraphale’s power is slightlyless than that of a saraph and archangel such as Gabriel in all things saveanything to do with his duties as a principality. Crowley hasn’t cried except theday he lost Aziraphale and on that day it rained for hours in London.

[doodlelolly0910]

Close Encounters of the Spiritual Kind

Summary: Emma Nolan spent a lot of time alone, and that was fine by her. Because one is never truly alone. She should know. She can talk to dead people. What she didn’t expect was one of these spiritual encounters to hang around, taking her down a rabbit hole of missing women, revenge, and, least expected, love. Can she save the day and Killian Jones? Is there even another choice?

Read it from the beginning on AO3 and FFN!

A/N:  *pokes head in* Hi guys! So some of you may have noticed there wasn't an update from me last week. If you follow me on here, you already knew there wouldn't be one, but I thought I would acknowledge that here as well. I struggled a lot with this chapter, and had a lot of personal issues with writing in general over the last week. I definitely apologize and appreciate all of your patience while I worked through my mental kinks. If you ever have any questions, or you just want to know what's going on with me or my writing, just send em a message or an ask. My inboxes are always open. You can follow me here as well, I’m usually moaning about my writing woes on my blog anyhow lol. More than ever this week, thank you thank you thank you to my wonderful beta and friend @kmomof4 for being so awesome and supportive, and also I will forever be in melting fangirl joy over the beautiful art that @courtorderedcake made for this story. Give her some love, and read all her stuff. She's amazing. And last, but not least, thank YOU, my lovely readers. The fact that y'all take time out of your day to read anything of mine just fills me with joy. So thank you. So much. Without further ado, here's chapter 16!

Chapter 16

Why she was still so affected by a stupid kiss, Emma would never know.

But here she was, studiously avoiding looking over to where Hook was standing with a small, rotund man called Smee of all things (oh, the irony) in order to obtain something that was not very easy to obtain. Which was apparently what William Smee excelled at, obtaining hard to get objects. She hazarded a glance at the two men, simply to find out what was taking so damn long, and immediately regretted it.

Smee was scrutinizing her, his distrust clear as day, but that wasn't what threw her. It was the set of bright blue eyes that were locked on her rapidly reheating face and the peek of tongue that slipped past Hook's lips as he swiped it over them. He thumbed the scruff on the edge of his jaw, responding to something Smee said half heartedly, his gaze staying resolutely on her face.

She couldn't look away fast enough.

Good man, Milah whispered without warning. Emma jumped, her face reddening further, utterly embarrassed to be caught in some sort of moment with Hook by his dead ex-lover. Slowly, the scent of jasmine filtered into her senses.

“Hello to you, too,” Emma grumbled, then froze, her eyes widening and her brows climbing her forehead.

Did she know about the kiss?!

Yes, Milah murmured and Emma felt her stomach turn as the spirit answered her unasked question. Good man. Worthy.

Emma's heart stuttered through a change in gears in her chest before ramping up in speed. She swallowed thickly, trying to think of a response but coming up entirely empty. She looked to where the two men talked out of the corner of her eye and saw them turn and walk into the building.

“Can you just… not… do that. We get along now. That's enough,” Emma said through gritted teeth. A silence descended in the car around Emma.

Good man.

The final whispered words faded away along with the scent of Milah’s perfume and Emma was alone again. She sighed heavily, Milah's words weighing on her already heavy mind.

Emma startled as the door opened to the passenger side of the bug, but she recovered quickly as Hook settled himself in beside her. He didn't appear to have anything new with him and Emma's brow knitted together in confusion. He glanced at her face and then quickly away and she just knew that he had done something she didn't approve of.

“All set, Swan, let's go,” he said, patting the dashboard with his good hand and shifting in his seat. She didn't move to start the car, only staring at him intently, trying to figure out just what it was that he was hiding.

He exhaled sharply through his nose and turned his head only slightly to get a better look at her stone faced expression.

“You know, vehicles usually function better once they're running.” He gestured to the ignition with his hooked arm, still not making eye contact.

“What did you do?” she asked bluntly and Killian looked genuinely surprised before steeling his features once more.

“Well you saw most of it. We had a chat, went inside, and now it's time to leave.”

“And what happened while you were inside, Killian?” He winced at her use of his given name.

“Business,” he replied, his tone clipped. He turned back to look out the windshield.

“What kind of business?”

“The kind you needn’t concern yourself with, love,” he said softly, but his tone brokered no arguments. Emma studied him for a moment longer. The way his dark hair fell over his forehead, his bright blue eyes avoiding hers. His jaw ticked, not in anger, but frustration. Her senses still fired off red flags that he had done something he shouldn’t have, but Emma recognized his behavior for what it was. He was trying to protect her.

So she let it go.

For now.

Wordlessly, she reached up and turned the keys dangling from the ignition, the engine to the little yellow bug rumbling to life behind them, and she drove them back to the compound. As soon as they had gotten back, Emma hadn’t even needed to worry about putting space between them. Twilight had already descended around them and Hook wasted no time in disappearing into the shadows between buildings.

“Get some rest. You’ll need it for tomorrow,” he said before he vanished. He was obviously avoiding her, but that was fine by Emma. If he hadn’t put the space between them, she would have, certainly.

Emma made her way back into the living quarters, staying clear of the office area in case that was where Hook had escaped to, making her way into the bedroom Hook had led her to before. She was tired. So very tired. These kinds of things tended to happen, though, when you hadn’t slept in a week and sustained more than one head injury. The cut on her head throbbed with her heartbeat a few times at the thought, but Emma ignored it. She was getting good at ignoring the small things. She had to stay singularly focused. There was no room for anything else.

She spied the blanket, sheet, and pillow that Hook had left out at the foot of the bed, for her, she presumed, and picked it up, setting it on the ground. She wasn’t a hundred percent sure whose bed this was, exactly, but she was almost positive it was Hook’s and she wasn’t looking to put him out. She just wanted to relax a moment. Setting the pillow against the wall where the headboard would have gone, had there been one, she toed off her boots and spread the sheet down over the top of the already crisply made up mattress. She walked across the room to where a small card table sat, empty of all things except her messenger bag.

She wasn’t sure what had possessed her to bring in her sketchbook from the car, but she had, and now she knew it would bring her the comfort she sought in this moment. She grabbed only one pencil from her bag and flipped open the book to a blank page before settling onto the bed. The moment the pencil touched the paper, she was lost in the motion of the drawing, unsure of what she was even sketching until a flower began to take form over the page. Long, thin, pointed petals began to fill the space in the shape of a star. She shaded a bit and began another. And another when that one was finished.

Suddenly, she was in a field of flowers like the ones she had been drawing. Instead of leaning against the wall, her back was against the rough bark of a large tree, her sketchbook having disappeared entirely. The hairs on the back of her neck stood to attention, goosebumps exploding over her skin despite the warmth of her surroundings, and she knew she wasn’t alone. Emma eased to her feet, finding she wasn’t nearly as sore as before, and turned around, laying eyes on the tall man standing off to her left.

Liam’s mouth was set in a firm line as he watched her get to her feet and approach him and Emma grew wary of the obvious disapproval in his stare.

“Hello, Liam,” she greeted him warmly all the same.

“Emma,” he returned coolly. “Would you care to explain why you were snogging my little brother in the street today?”

Emma blinked rapidly at his blunt words before the anger and embarrassment swirled in her abdomen again.

“You know, between you and Milah, I’m beginning to think I don’t have a moment’s privacy. Do you watch me shower as well? Keep track of my toilet habits?” she snapped, folding her arms across her chest. Liam blushed but his expression remained stern.

“I don’t keep track of your anything, unless it has to do with Killian. What were you thinking?” he asked tersely. Emma’s patience was already wearing thin. As she brushed her long blonde hair over her shoulder, her hands found their place on her jean clad hips.

“I was thinking that your brother is an insufferable ass who needed a dose of his own medicine. It was just a kiss to shut him up. And he kissed me first, by the way.” A thin honey colored brow arched high on her forehead.

Liam made a low humming sound, as if he didn’t entirely believe her. She wasn’t sure she entirely believed herself.

“There is a fine line that you’re flirting with, Emma.” He folded his arms over his broad chest.

“Pun intended?” she snarked.

“I mean it. You’re not here to fraternize with Killian. He is in real trouble, and if you’re only going to complicate things rather than help him, maybe it’s best if you bow out.”

“Not a chance in hell,” she growled, kicking the flowers at her feet. They exploded into a flurry of white petals, looking much like snow swirling between them.

They glared at each other for a long minute before Liam let out a sigh.

“Listen, lass, I know you’re under a lot of pressure. You’re tired, maybe not thinking straight, but I’m telling you now, getting involved with Killian is a mistake. For him and for you. Don’t forget, at the end of all of this, you’ll be going your separate ways. Think of your own heart, if nothing else,” he murmured, taking a step closer to her, and Emma scoffed.

“My heart is just fine. Your brother has become a friend, at best. You know, you and Milah, you guys came to me for help. Not the other way around,” she reminded him. Liam nodded.

“As you’re well aware, I’m sure, options to reach out from beyond are… limited. At best.” Liam’s brow pinched, deep furrows of concern working their way into his forehead. “I need to know that your priorities are straight.”

“That is one thing you never need to worry about. And, sorry to disappoint, but Killian is not my top priority right now. Finishing this case is. Finding these missing girls is. Taking down that bastard Gold is my number one priority. And nothing, not even your brother, and especially not some stupid, fucking kiss, is going to push me off my path,” Emma said, now shaking with the weight of the words pouring from her. Liam’s face was unchanged.

“You say that, Emma, but I see my brother. I watch him every day. And his heart is definitely on the line here. I’d bet my eternal soul that yours is, too,” he said, more gently this time. That statement struck Emma hard, her breath evaporating from her lungs.

His eternal soul.

The only thing he had left. The only thing that truly mattered in anyone’s life. His slate blue eyes stared into her jade green, the intensity of his words washing over the moment. There was no other way to answer him but honestly.

“I won’t let any feelings from Killian or myself get in the way of what I need to do,” she replied quietly and Liam’s shoulders sagged in relief. “And Killian will come around. We will fix this.”

“I truly hope so, lass,” Liam said, reaching out to pat her on the shoulder. “Get some rest. You’ll need it for tomorrow.” Emma smirked at his echoing of his younger brother’s words from earlier. The Jones men were so alike sometimes, and then others, they couldn’t be more different. Emma looked down to pick a white flower from the field, and when she looked up, Liam was gone.

Emma decided that she was going to take advantage of the beautiful dreamscape she found herself in, turning to head back to the tree, but as soon as she made the rotation, the scene was gone as well. She was at her apartment building, at the end of the hallway by the elevator on her floor, but there was a red string in front of her door. Her eyes followed the string down, down, down until she saw the other end laying at her feet.

She bent down, the flower in her grasp fluttering to the ground beside her, replacing it with the red string between her fingers. She began following the string, one hand on it at all times, passing it to the other and back again as she walked towards her apartment. The door was open and she followed the string inside.

She wasn’t prepared for what she saw.

Women, naked women, battered and bruised, and lifeless, their eyes staring blankly into the void of her living room, piled atop one another in a heap, all of them bearing faces that she'd only seen in case files. Emma stood frozen in the doorway, her mouth hanging open in utter horror and the string gripped tightly in her fists. Limbs stuck out in every direction, cuts and bruises marring the flesh. Suddenly, from the middle of the pile, one of the hands began to move, just a slight twitch of the fingers. Emma ran towards the indication of life, desperately moving arms and legs and hair to reach whoever she could still save.

A woman with short, dark hair in front of her face was at the other end of the movement. Emma swept her hair away to look at her pale, blemished features. She recognized her immediately. Ivy Belfrey. The most recent woman to go missing. Her big brown eyes were dimming, her life force fading like all the rest, and Emma grasped her hand tightly.

“Stay with me, Ivy, I'm gonna get you help,” Emma told her and a single fat tear rolled down Ivy's cheek.

“Why didn't you save us?” Ivy asked on a cracked whisper. Emma's throat closed up at her words and her green eyes blew wide. Ivy's expression twisted into something dark and angry and she reared up from her place within the corpses. “WHY DIDN'T YOU SAVE US?” she screamed. Before Emma could answer, Ivy had reached down and yanked the string from Emma's hand.

The entire room blew apart in a fiery explosion and Emma screamed…

“EMMA!”

Emma's eyes snapped open and she sat up in the bed she was in, looking around frantically. She was still at the compound. Her eyes cleared from the haze of her dream and found Killian, staring at her in the dark of the room, concern etched into his features. Tentatively, he reached up with his hand and brushed a wild snarl of blonde curls out of her face, his knuckles skimming her cheek soothingly as he withdrew, but Emma instinctively leaned into his calming touch. At her motion, Killian moved closer to her, wrapping his arm around her shoulders and pulling her into his side.

Then Emma did something she hadn’t done in years in front of another living soul. She cried. She turned her face into his chest and her tears were immediately soaked up by the cotton of his t-shirt. She wasn’t sure when he slipped further up onto the bed, or when she’d ended up curled up half in his lap, him murmuring soft, calming things in her ear as sobs racked her body, but she did know one thing: she felt the safest she had since this whole ordeal started right there in Killian Jones’ arms.

[elane-in-the-shadows]

Red Queen Fan Fiction - Blood Curse part 7

Find this on wattpad

chapter 1

chapter 2

chapter 3

chapter 4

chapter 5

chapter 6

chapter 7

chapter 8

chapter 9

chapter 10

chapter 11

chapter 12

chapter 13

chapter 14

chapter 15

chapter 16

chapter 17

chapter 18

chapter 19

chapter 20

chapter 21

chapter 22

chapter 23

chapter 24

chapter 25

chapter 26

chapter 27

chapter 28

chapter 29

Final chapter

A/N: Oh, something new, a fresh POV -

Gisa POV

We all squat together in the living room the first time Colonel Farley visits us. It’s been just one day since Mare left us again in the dead of night, to fight the demon king of her nightmares, and none of the Barrows has forgotten about her last farewell.

We don’t say it, but expect the worst, even if Mom, Kilorn and Tramy are good at distracting us. The colonel’s arrival doesn’t make it better with his sombre face, even though he wears it most of the time. Yet we’re too used to bad news and we steel ourselves against them. I can’t remember not thinking like that and still I feel nauseous. Right now, and every time before. My stitches blurry before my eyes.

But the colonel sounds astounded at our reaction when he greets us. He walks to Mom who embraces Clara tighter and squints at him. “Mrs. Barrow,” he addresses her, “may I – “

“What has happened to my daughter?” she barks back and I see Tramy’s grin at this; it makes me smile as well, for the fraction of a second. But I’m not surprised, of course Mom challenges him, just like Mare and Diana.

The colonel only blinks, first having to grasp our mood, and the room stuffed with fear. He draws back his outstretched hand and straightens himself. “The defense of Corvium was successful. We have no reports on the fallen yet but General Farley informed me of her and Operative Mare Barrow’s well-being.”

He pauses and our relief is visible, just like I feel the ribbons on my chest loosen. Only a little. I think about Cameron, the other electricons, Arezzo and so many more. This place is still strange, full of war-hardened and dangerous people, but I’ve followed Kilorn often enough, and I found friends among them. The colonel doesn’t talk about them. Indeed, his hesitation to go on unsettles me. There’s something he isn’t saying or can’t say. I shouldn’t be bothered, the Scarlet Guard is always like this. Even when I manage to draw tiny threads of information out of Diana if I pester her patiently and subtly enough, her father’s resolve is as hard as iron. He clears his throat and focuses on Mom again. Or rather on Clara. He speaks unusually quiet.

“The general asked me to have a look on her daughter as well,” he admits, almost shy, or embarrassed.

Mom smirks at him, her fingers toying with Clara’s. “Don’t you trust me?”

It startles him even further. “No,” he insists, “of course not, Mrs. Barrow. The general is curious, and worried, naturally. I’m merely – “ Mom laughs and we fall in line. I notice Kilorn’s distinctive cackle, a sound webbed into my memories. The colonel blushes and clears his throat again. “I see that all is well, Mrs. Barrow, I’ll visit you again when I’ve more to tell. Operatives,” he adds and turns to my brothers and to Kilorn, “I expect your presence at yard 7 at 1400,” and then he leaves.

I see Mom’s satisfied expression while she occupies little Clara. As glad as we are about the news, it’s been Mom’s accomplishment to face the fiercest soldier and win, just to lighten our grave mood like a ray of sunshine in a storm. Before Clara was with us, she’s rarely been like that for a long time. It’s something Shade was good at, too. 

It’s like I never stop waiting. Once I couldn’t wait to finish my apprenticeship and have my own shop, now I sew – for Clara, my family, the soldiers and myself - just to pass the time. To hone skills not valued here, without the materials I came to love and enjoy to reshape. But work is a good distraction while worry twists beneath my skin. I want Mare to come back, to sleep in my room again, and go away from here. I try to make the best of our stay and be open and kind, but this isn’t a home and never will be.

Half the day I think of Summerton, the Stilts, and the life I had. I’ve started to tell Cameron about it before she left, too, and it amused her, to imagine a town not smothered by smoke. Her joy makes talk more, after I kept my experiences at work to myself, drawing a distinctive border between my family and the job. Now I pride myself to be the only person to make Cameron smile. If it weren’t for her parents, still in New Town, I’d ask her and her brother to come along to be relocated immediately. I wouldn’t hesitate, if Mare agreed. Nor would I be bothered not to see little Clara again for a long time, as cute as she is. Mom wouldn’t be as ready, but I don’t know what to feel about the baby.

Two weeks after Mare left, we’re allowed to make a distance call to her and Diana; it lasts hardly a minute. Yet Mare makes jokes and addresses all of us, promising a soon return. As much as I anticipated the call, as relieved as I am to hear their voices, I notice again something weighing on them and now I spend my empty hours trying to figure it out. 

Mom’s perception is as sharp as mine and she finds ways to keep Dad and me occupied. She tells all of us, Bree, Tramy, and Kilorn as well to attend to Clara, despite their Guard duties. They aren’t any worse than me. Bree never complains and for some reason, Clara sleeps more when she’s with Tramy. Usually, during my turns I leave her in her bed and take a seat to sew and embroider and wait for the inevitable whining. Whatever Mom says, I’m sure Clara notices her mother isn’t here. Why else would she cry every two hours and refuse to be comforted until she’s rocked for 10 minutes?

I thought it would be would be unnerving at first, but it really isn’t. Clara’s just a distraction, and a welcome one in a way. I’m used to hold needles and squint for 10 hours a day, so being forced to take breaks is a strange relief. I miss making true pieces of art and the rich materials I used, most of all the sewing machine. I’m not sure whether one’s here – I think there must be – and it would be too loud to use in this house anyway. Maybe I should just forget those times, but they come back at me in the strangest ways.

Today it’s Tramy’s turn with baby-sitting and Mom’s severe frown staunches his – partially fake – commitment. “Best if you wrap Clara in a slip,” Mom demands. “She’s used to being carried around, as Diana does it.” She sighs quietly, and Tramy does as well.

I give him a shove when Mom’s turned away. “Don’t bring you lady-love here,” I whisper to him, “or Diana will kill us if she finds out that you let a Silver get close to her precious girl.”

“Then why are you so disrespectful?” he jokes to dissemble. “It’s General Farley, not Diana.” I give him a stare worthy of Diana.

“And Ms. Ventos isn’t my ‘lady-love’”, he claims, but I’m still not having it.

“So you’re kissing your captive ward? Wow, Tramy. That’s worse. We should know that.”

He’s exasperated. “She isn’t a captive. She’s our ally, and –“

“Yes?” I insist.

He shakes his head. “I trust her, the colonel trusts her, and there’s no reason the general – or you – shouldn’t trust her as well. I’m just her main handler, as she can’t just walk around here without company.”

“Thus you still don’t trust her,” I deduce.

“I didn’t say –“ he starts but I’m already walking off.

I meet Kilorn outside. He’s about to leave for the Newbloods as I stop him. “May I go with you?” I ask.

He shrugs in agreement. “No chores today? Or are you tired of your needles and threads?”

“I just like to meet people and talk with them.” I smile at him. “This isn’t the first time I go with you.” I look away quickly when he pats my shoulder. I’m blushing and can’t help it, but my feelings for him are gone. He isn’t for me and never was, nor did he ever see me like that, not even when I got my hand shot in my attempt to help him. It was a stupid idea to begin with, and afterwards, I had bigger things to worry about than a young-girl-crush.

Luther Carver is the first Newblood we visit. Kilorn’s known him for a while, but I haven’t seen him before. He’s small, younger than 10, and sits in the grass with a sketchpad on his knees. He draws on it with a pencil but he flinches when he notices us. His alarm lasts only for a moment, then his face lights up. “Hi, Kilorn!”

We greet him back but as I introduce myself, Kilorn stops me from extending my hand. Luther’s hands are fists covered in cotton gloves. I think harder, realizing he has to be the boy with the withering touch. I tear my eyes from his hands and look at his and Kilorn’s faces instead.

“How are you doing?” asks Kilorn, his open smile as encouraging as always.

Luther sighs, struggling between glancing down and at our friend. “I’m trying. Power flashes are rare, and I usually train with plants. That works well.” He pauses and seems sad out of sudden. “I saw a hurt animal once, a rabbit. I touched it and … it died. Quickly.” He has to sniff. “It was the first time.”

Kilorn nods. “It’s okay if you don’t want to try this out. As long as you keep your ability in check –“

“Oh, I do,” Luther exclaims. “Um, it’s still only in my hands. Though I wish it stays this way, so I know what to avoid. So nothing will happen. And these gloves – I need new ones quite often but they’re cozy and can be washed.” He twists his pencil. “Good for drawing.” He dares to smile a little.

“It feels good to make things,” I say. It’s a reflex but feels right to speak, even more so when Luther beams at me.

“Yes, it does!” he agrees. And for this age, his sketches are really good. Plants and flowers, detailed and life-like.

“See,” Kilorn starts again, “you have to go your own way. If you feel better with gloves, keep them. Find your balance between feeling safe and free.”

“Because I’m in control,” Luther adds.

“Exactly,” says Kilorn, smiling, then becoming serious. “I hope I’m helpful, Luther. But I don’t even have an ability myself.”

Luther shakes his head. “And yet you’re not afraid, not of any of – us.”

Kilorn pats his shoulder, hesitating a fraction of a second for see the boy’s consent. “Someone has to keep us together. The notch team.” 

“I have to be home for lunch,” I say later on. “Will you come with me?”

“I’ll eat with Oskar and his friends,” he declines.

The stonemaker, I remember. “Well, till later,” I reply and dash off. I have to run to our house but I like that. I’ve walked the long way to Summerton often enough and I’ve become a little lazy in the last months. Not that I was motivated to do much sport. I was content to sit in our small rooms to be with my family and know that at least they were safe. But recently, the base’s open spaces turned into an unexpected joy.

“Bring Tramy down,” Mom demands when I arrive. But she grins while Dad prepares the table. He likes to help with small tasks to train walking, and Bree assists him. He’s on duty, yet he always arrives on time at meals, so the family can eat together. We need that.

I assume Tramy’s with Clara and go to the room she’s sleeping in. I hesitate at the door. Faintly sung tones emerge from inside, sung by the sweetest voice of Norta. My joy dissolves. I grab the handgrip and open the door. I see it’s not only Norta’s sweetest voice, but her loveliest face as well. Lacey Ventos’s hawkish features are contrasted by a curtain of curly hair like black velvet. The sunlight kisses her olive-brown skin, as if drawn to her, giving her a radiant look. She sings on, not having noticed me. She sits on the bed, while Tramy lays on it, his head in her lap. The scene is both intimate and modest. My brother’s eyes are on her and his hand toys with the ends of her long hair. He’s chosen a dyed tress; its former pink now bleached out like a fabric my mistress would’ve used only for lining.

I close the door behind me, soundly, yet the Silver woman isn’t irked. She turns her head to me but finishes her verse before rousing Tramy. “Ms. Barrow,” she greets me.

“Hello Ms. Ventos,” I reply, only slightly piqued. I don’t have to call her “my lady” here, not anymore, but I needn’t be offensive either.

The couple rises while I look to Clara’s cot. I know I’m blushing, embarrassed at interrupting their romantic moment but unfortunately, the feeling isn’t mutual. Lacey wears the mask of a Silver, as always, even without the elaborate make-up she wore when she came to my mistress’s shop so we might embroider her dresses with colourful patterns and motives, exceeding the limitations of her house colours of blue and orange. And Tramy remains unperturbed, too, I don’t know how, after our earlier conversation.

“Lunch is ready,” I tell him. He says good-bye to his lady-love and she leaves. I still stand in the door, so she has to squeeze herself through. Lacey has a large and feminine frame, not lean like Mare, nor muscular like Diana. More like me, and I would’ve tried on her dresses that I made, to feel the richness on myself for once, if Lacey wasn’t more than 20 cm taller than me and a woman grown.

Tramy comes to me at first but checks on Clara when I don’t react. “We’ll let her sleep,” he decides and touches my arm.

“I told you not to bring her here,” I remind him. “And it seems like you two have a clandestine exit already, which makes it worse.”

He sighs deeply. “She makes Clara sleep with her songs.”

“Look,” I say, “you wouldn’t keep her a secret if you thought this was okay. Diana –“

“Let that be my problem,” interrupts me. He stares at me until I give in.

“Fine. Your problem, just do as you wish.” I turn around and move away.

“Do you hate her?” he asks to my back.

“I had to work for her. She’s a haughty, vain Silver.”

“But she believes in our cause, really. She’s made the pledge.” He’s caught up and stares at me again. “She’s a good one, like Mare’s friends. Probably more so.”

I sigh dramatically, fully aware that I’m exaggerating my dislike because it isn’t real. Lacey Ventos impresses me every time I meet her, more than I like to admit. I’ve almost expected to smell her perfume on my brother, but of course, she hasn’t used it since she came as a captive, after she surrendered during the first battle of Corvium.

I sit outside with my sewing basket when I see her again, later that afternoon. She approaches me and I look up, squinting. Her hair’s moved by the wind, the dyed tresses grown out to her ears. Her clothes are as simple and threadbare as those of everyone here but they hug her perfectly; most of all her red shirt. The colour was forbidden to her as a non-royal burner at the Nortan court; now she wears it freely. For whatever reason, her face is friendly and severe at the same time, and even with her imperfections revealed now, she’s the most beautiful person I’ve ever seen.

I nod curtly to acknowledge her; she sits down in across from me.

“I’ve tried to meet your sister at court a year ago,” she says after a while with her melodic voice.

“Aha,” I utter, too unsure for more.

“Mareena Titanos, the real one I mean, was my cousin, you see,” she explains. “We shared the same grandfather, the storm Luiz Nolle.”

I don’t answer.

“But the witch queen wouldn’t let me. None but a chosen few were allowed to come close to the lost ‘princess’. For good reason, apparently.” She chuckles half-heartedly. “Although I was related to that bitch Elara as well.”

I blink, miss a stitch, and curse, before I spin my head to Lacey. “What?”

Her black eyes are focused on me. “The Queenstrial was a year ago on this day.”

“Was it? I haven’t noticed. I have other worries,” I reply and turn away again.

She shrugs. “I’m good with dates, information and all that.” I’ve guessed so, as she doesn’t seem like the fighting type.

“Tramy says you don’t trust me but there’s a reason I wasn’t ransomed. Because I don’t want it, although my family would’ve paid for me long ago.

“I miss them. Mostly Cassie.”

I stop sewing. “If you’re so empathetic, why did you use people like me?”

Finally, I’ve managed to make her uncomfortable. “Because … I like pretty things, I assume. And I hope I’ve always paid you accordingly.”

She did, but that’s not the real matter which I can’t pin down. I shake my head. “Then show me. Prove your allyship.”

She smiles faintly. “That might be difficult. Actually, I’ve talked to General Farley, and she gave orders to me. Though they might be considered classified Information.”

I snort and roll my eyes. “Of course –“

“But there’s something you can help me with.” She outstretches her hand to me in invitation. I notice her wrists are bare, her sparker bracelets removed long ago. Yet I take her hand and unlike Cal’s, it isn’t hot at all, but of a perfectly regulated temperature. Her eyes are still fixed on me, black like onyx, shining with feverish conviction. She wants to win me over, but unlike Cal, she’s ready to make sacrifices and give something back as well. She asks for my help, but in a way, she makes an offering too.

“I’m listening,” I say. 

Tramy waits for me in the living room, this time he has Clara with him. We exchange some pointed glances, as we’re used to do. I’m certain he must have planned this meeting together with his girlfriend.

“She isn’t that bad, is she?” he blurts finally, the first of us to break the uncomfortable silence.

I bit my lip to keep from smiling although amusement lingers in my voice. “She’s actually nice.” And committed.

Tramy looks extremely relieved. Then he smirks. “Though she’s rather determined, like the general, if you think about it.”

My jaw drops but he’s so, so right. I let out an amused sigh and roll my eyes. “Burners and activists,” I mutter, then louder, “it’s almost scary how we Barrows all fall for the same brand of persons.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I have to clear my throat and need all of my trained-on self-control to calm myself. But he insists. “Gee, out with it.”

“Well, okay, I might’ve had a little, superficial crush on Ms. Ventos. Years ago, and totally over now.”

“Gisa!”

“So, I wish you the best. Honestly. While I … like someone else now, anyway.”

His curiously has peaked. “But not Kilorn? He’s great, but –“

“Oh no, not him.” I smile. “Another girl, of my age,” I add, thinking of Cameron and wishing she’ll return safe and soon with Mare and Diana. 

@calliopexclio @clarafarleybarrow Thanks for liking my drafts and commenting on then, friends <3

@mareshmallow @redqueenfandom @wrenskonos @lilyharvord @mikey-waysjawline @universegamer @asewhj and @thomaven for the Luther scene ;-)

[rrrawrf-writes]

continued from this

Sam could feel Mickey staring at the back of his head. He sighed as they continued down the tunnel, tapping his knuckles against the brick sides every few steps. “What’s your deal, man?”

“Just trying to figure out how you’re not dead yet.”

“Crazy high regenerative abilities.” Sam took the last bite of his granola bar and stuffed the wrapper in his back pocket, before producing another one and peeling it open.

Mickey huffed, walking so close behind Sam that they kept stepping on the man’s heels. “No - I mean, yeah, but, like, I was pretty sure K was gonna murder you.”

For one terrifying second, Sam had been certain of the same thing - truth be told, he still wasn’t sure that he was out of the woods yet. But he made his voice dismissive and shrugged one shoulder. “She wouldn’t’ve,” he said flippantly, as if he had been sure of the fact all along.

Mickey’s voice turned suspicious and low. “Montoya would’ve, if he saw you pull a stunt like that.”

Sam snorted. “He literally picked up a spider yesterday and took it outside so no one would step on it. I really don’t think he’d ever kill anyone.”

The guy looked big and scary, and he was certainly capable - but he also brought the entire office flowers on every holiday and showed everyone pictures of his bunny rabbits whenever they had a new litter. At this point, Sam was fairly convinced that Eli had never murdered someone in his entire life. Not on purpose, anyway.

“You don’t know that,” Mickey said, his tone turning defensive. “You don’t know either of them.”

“And you do?”

“Better than you,” Mickey snapped, their voice echoing a little louder in the tunnel than Sam’s.

Scoffing, Sam glanced over his shoulder at Mickey. “Wasn’t the Steel thing your first mission ever with them?” His answer came by way of Mickey’s green eyes glaring at him from over the top of his tablet. Sam waited another second, eyebrows raised, then rolled his eyes and turned back around.

“Maybe I don’t know them,” Sam grunted, “but I know people.” He paused at an intersection in the tunnel and shot them another look. Mickey’s nose was buried in their tablet. “Which way?”

“Left.”

Sam nodded and started off ahead of Mickey. “Kawai -”

“K, we can’t use real names on an op.”

“K, then.” That time, Sam rolled his eyes to himself. “She wouldn’t’ve let up until I made her. So I did.”

“You hit her with a two-by-four.”

“That wasn’t a two-by-four.” Sam squinted down the tunnel, pausing when he thought he saw movement. Flashing his light on it, though, all he saw was a cluster of pipes. “Too small.”

Mickey gave an aggravated growl. “You could’ve just said you didn’t like being hurt!”

“I did,” Sam snapped, very quickly tiring of the conversation. “Several times. She needed an object lesson - what, you think I bash everyone I meet with a freaking piece of wood?”

“You tried to blow them up,” Mickey said, “and then you stabbed Montoya.”

Sam groaned. This again. Was everyone going to bring it up? “Look, if he doesn’t seem to have a problem with it anymore, I don’t think it’s any of your business.”

The two of them glared at each other, and then Mickey said, “It’s here.”

‘Here’ was a vent in the wall. Sam looked doubtfully at it, then down at himself, and sighed. He pulled a crowbar from his duffel bag, and between the two of them, they managed to pry the grate loose. The heavy piece of metal slipped, and crushed Mickey’s toes; to their credit, they didn’t curse, or drop the vent covering. Sam brushed his fingers against Mickey’s hand, but there was hardly even a bruise to heal.

He sent Mickey through first, since they were smaller. It took Sam significantly longer to squirm through the hole in the wall; he had to take off his jacket first. He scraped the skin off both shoulders and banged his funny bone when he fell headfirst out of the vent, but the only person to see Sam’s ungraceful exit was Mickey, and they were too busy tapping at their tablet to do more than sniff in contempt.

“No camera,” they murmured, “like I said. We shoulda done this first, would’ve saved so much time.”

“Don’t blame me,” Sam muttered. Mickey narrowed their eyes at him. Sam waited for the scrapes on his shoulders to scab over, before he pulled his jacket back on.

They were on a metal walkway that ran around a massive space, plunging deeper into the earth than the mostly-dry sewers they had just come through. Tangles of pipes and machinery filled the space closest to them, but as Sam moved along the walkway, his boots scuffing against the metal grating of the walkway, he saw a clearer space below them, almost like a hangar. There were even vehicles, though he had no idea how or where they exited.

He kept moving, and checked over his shoulder every few minutes to make sure Mickey was keeping up. The younger agent was walking with their tablet held up, taking what looked like a video recording of the space. Sam didn’t think there was anything special enough about the place to take a video of it, but he had never really been interested in architecture. Maybe it was important to MI.

Eventually they rounded the room, before they found a set of stairs. It went both up and down; after consulting Mickey’s tablet, they headed up, until they reached the next floor.

‘Floor’ was a misnomer; they found another balcony ringing the massive space, though in this case, it covered more square feet than the terraces below. Sam pulled out his gun, nervous, even though Mickey said that there wasn’t anyone on this level. They eventually found what looked like a control panel.

“Ugh, finally,” Mickey muttered, dropping their backpack on the grate flooring. Sam tried not to look down too often; he could see through the floor. As sturdy as it felt, he would still rather be on solid ground. A computer terminal sat off to the side of the control panel, and Mickey pulled out a frankly massive laptop.

“Why didn’t you just bring a flippin’ desktop,” Sam muttered, eyeing the thing. Mickey glowered at him, before plugging the laptop into the computer and plopping down on the floor.

“Just make sure no one’s gonna sneak up on us, muscles.”

Sam flipped Mickey off, though they didn’t see. They were already glued to their computer screen. With a sigh, Sam resigned himself to playing lookout. He was good at that. He’d always appointed himself to the job with Edrian - that way, Sam usually got to miss out on the gore. Most of it.

They hadn’t heard anything from Kawai, but Sam had been warned that that was typical - she only bothered checking in if something was drastically wrong. “She just hates talking to people,” Eli had said with a shrug. “Just hit the panic button and she’ll copy. We’re working on it.”

Sam wound between supports and thick, vertical pipes or bundles of wiring. He tried to keep Mickey in sight, but had eventually stepped out of view when they hissed in his ear, “I think I got what we need.”

Sighing, Sam turned around. Hopefully that meant they were finished. Kawai probably hadn’t finished with her side of the job yet - she got to do the actual theft - but she had told them to get out of the compound as soon as they could. Having made his way around the terrace, Sam started approaching Mickey from behind, and called softly to catch their attention. They stood up, balancing their laptop on one arm as they unplugged from the control panel.

“All right,” Mickey said, “everything’s downloaded, I -”

The bullet smashed through the laptop and took them straight in the chest.

Sam stared as Mickey fell backwards, then whipped around, bringing up his own gun. Two more shots echoed in the space - none from Sam, but they both connected. He swore and stumbled back as one bullet slammed into his thigh, and another, his shoulder, but managed to stay upright.

He could see a vague figure ducking behind a pillar, and quickly circled around. “Stay down,” he hissed into his earpiece, but Mickey just groaned in reply. Sam purposefully made a target of himself, wounds quickly healing over. He braced himself for the impact, and didn’t have to fake his cry of pain when he was shot, again.

Sam went down immediately, even though it had just plunged through his side - a clean hit (for him, anyway). He flexed his power, blocking the healing as much as he possibly could - he would hate himself for it later, but he needed the bastard to think he was down. Blood soaked quickly through his shirt. After one long moment, the shooter cautiously crept forward. Sam slit open his eyes when he heard the footsteps ring on the grate near his own feet.

He shoved himself into a sitting position and shoot the woman three times in the chest. Sam remembered seconds later that, as per Mercury Independent’s policy, he only carried rubber bullets.

At this range, they did their job. The woman screamed first in shock, then in pain as she fell backwards, dropping her gun, and Sam scrambled to his feet. Rubber bullets still hurt, and he had probably broken a couple bones. For extra measure, Sam kicked her in the head. He didn’t feel bad about it at all.

“Mick-” he started, then stopped, and tried to remember what the little brat’s codename was supposed to be. It didn’t matter; shoving his gun in the waistband of his pants, Sam limped over to where he had left them. His skin may have healed over, but that didn’t stop the fact that there were two bullets in his body, and one kept scraping against the bone in his shoulder.

“So much for the stupid bulletproof jackets,” he muttered, and dropped next to Mickey. They were still breathing, slumped against the control station. Pain glazed their eyes, and their hands were curled so tightly around the ruined laptop that it took a bit of effort for Sam to pry it away.

“This is gonna hurt,” Sam warned Mickey, pulling out his pocketknife. Mickey just sobbed a little, pulling uselessly at their shirt. Sam batted their hands away, scowling, then slipped the knife under their skin.

They screamed. Sam swore and clamped a hand over Mickey’s mouth. “I’m saving your life!” he hissed. “Shut up already!” It took a moment or two before Sam could lever the bullet out of Mickey’s chest; it had hit their breastbone and splintered it. Mickey would need surgery later, but for now, Sam figured he could patch them up well enough to get out of there.

He plastered a bloody hand over the wound, feeling flesh and bone knit back together under his hand. Sam had been overflowing with energy for a few weeks now - perks of working for a legitimate (mostly) company, he supposed, instead of a mob boss or some deranged, villainous cape. He’d be worn out after healing four gunshot wounds, but not so badly that escaping would be a problem.

Mickey coughed as Sam took his hand away, and opened their eyes to stare at him in astonishment. “What was that?”

“Definitely not a nine millimeter.” Sam rocked back on his heels, glancing over his shoulder to make sure the woman hadn’t gotten back up. “You owe me two hundred.”

“Two hundred? Dollars?” Mickey squeaked. “For what!”

“For saving your sorry hide.” Sam shot them an irritated look. “MI doesn’t give me enough of a bonus.”

“You get paid twice as much as I do.” Mickey stopped to cough again, and grimaced as they pushed themselves up. Sam stretched out a hand to nudged them back down.

Sam scowled. “You don’t know what I get paid.”

“Do, too.” Mickey ran a hand over their chest, clearly amazed that there was nothing left of the wound but an angry, fresh scar. “I hacked payroll one time.”

“That’s illegal,” Sam told him. A hysterical laugh bubbled out of Mickey, as they pawed at their ear. “Anyway, we need to get moving - “

“You call K yet?”

“No.” Sam had forgotten about her, truth be told, and he watched as Mickey pushed what must have been the panic button on their earpiece. “C’mon, let’s go.”

Mickey nodded, then glanced over, and groaned when they saw the laptop. The monitor was completely ruined, but - “At least - at least they didn’t hit the main part,” they mumbled. “Grab - Grab it first.”

“What is it?” Kawai snapped over their comms a second later. “Kinda busy.”

“Your useless little sidekick got themselves shot,” Sam grunted, gathering up the pieces of Mickey’s laptop. Kawai certainly sounded busy; she was breathless, and he thought he could hear other people shouting over their connection.

Mickey glared at Sam. “I’m all right,” they said quickly. “We got the info, K. You okay?”

“I’m fine. Move out, I’ll catch up.”

“Copy,” Mickey said, and Sam echoed them. Glaring at Sam, they added, “I didn’t get myself shot. It came out of nowhere!”

Sam just grunted as he shoved shattered bits of laptop into Mickey’s bag. “I’ll help you up,” he said, because it still didn’t seem as if they could really stand on their own. Straddling their legs, Sam reached down to slip his hands underneath Mickey. “I’m serious about the money.”

“I’m not paying you two hundred dollars for doing your job,” Mickey snapped. “I can stand just fine, I - ow -”

They fell back against the control panel with a groan, and Sam snorted. “Should charge you extra for having to lump you outta here,” he mumbled. Mickey narrowed their eyes, but didn’t answer - instead, their gaze locked onto something just over Sam’s shoulder. Sam felt a brief pull on his pants, and then Mickey was shooting someone under his arm with his gun. Sam whipped around, nearly tripping over Mickey’s legs, to see a man stagger back, double-tapped neatly in the chest. He tripped over the woman, still unconscious, and then fell down the stairs leading up from the lower floor.

Mickey looked triumphantly at Sam, as they both listened to the curses and of a man clanging down a flight of metal stairs. “I’m not useless.”

[antlerscolorado]

chapter 8, part 14

Austin takes his shoes off in the foyer, depositing them on the mat near the door. The Jones house is dark and quiet, and he flips the light switch at the bottom of the staircase, illuminating the second floor landing before ascending up towards it. It’s almost a reflex. Austin doesn’t have to think about where the panel on the wall is, or which switch will turn the right lights on. It just happens, barely even a pit stop on his way up the stairs.

He’s surprised, that he remembers so much. He lived at the Hart mansion for longer than he lived here - fourteen years, between the ages of four and seventeen. His time in the Jones house was an even split between immemorable toddler years and angry adult years, though for the latter Austin was away from the house more than he was ever in it. When he was a teenager, he used to sneak across the street and into the backyard, to talk to Richard. But once Austin and Jacob moved back into the house, there were too many memories of Richard. Not just his ghost - family photos smiling in every room, mementos locked in cabinets and desks, Richard’s bedroom that neither brother wanted to claim. Too many memories of a family legacy for a family that barely existed anymore.

The last time Austin was in the Jones house, it felt suffocating. The walls felt like they were constricting around him, ready to squeeze him until something inside him gave, or popped. But it feels different now, almost too vast. He feels like he’s the ghost here, a stranger in his own home, drifting through hallways and rooms he hasn’t occupied in four, almost five years.

Austin trudges up the stairs, stomping his feet on the wood. He winces as he realizes his mistake: the sound of his footfalls echo through the house unobstructed, reminding him just how alone he is. The door of his room is still ajar from earlier - he slips inside and throws himself down on the bed, squeezing his eyes shut.

What the fuck was that, with the journal? He looses a long sigh, curling his fingers against his palm, feeling along the scar that bisects the heart line and head line. I’ve never seen something - felt something - so vivid before, that didn’t exist. But I didn’t feel any kind of presence in the apartment - didn’t see any ghosts or anything. So what - it was a hallucination? Seems a little coincidental, that I would suddenly start hallucinating, in Abbott’s apartment.

But if it wasn’t a hallucination...what was it? There’s a persistent itch in his green eye, not skin-deep like the symbols on his skin, something he can ignore if he focuses on anything else, but an annoyance nonetheless. Austin rubs it with the heel of his hand. It feels sensitive - not painful, but tender. He closes his brown eye experimentally, and finds, with a start, that he can see the threads of magic in the room. It’s easier than it was when Naberius taught him, barely any effort to see the green strands branching away from him, reaching out into the ether.

What the fuck? Austin wracks his brain for reasons this could be happening, and comes up with only one possible answer, an answer that makes him sit up in sudden, cold horror. Passive possession. If I’m passively possessed, it could increase my magic ability, and make me see things - or make me more attuned to psychic visions.

Keeping his brown eye closed, he fixes his gaze on his cell phone, on the dresser across the room, and envisions a thread of magic stretching towards it. He takes a breath, makes sure the strand holds, and twitches his index finger down by his side, squeezing slowly. Like pulling the trigger of a sniper rifle.

The cell phone pops into his hand, all in one piece, no strange void goo on it. Austin exhales in relief. He opens his other eye and flips the phone open, punching in a number that’s more muscle memory than memorization by now. He lies back against the bed as the dial tone turns to ringing, trying to ignore the uneasy churning in his stomach.

The line rings once, twice, three times, then clicks with the noise of someone picking it up. Austin sits up again in spite of himself, his heart fluttering in his chest.

“Hello?” Landis says. His voice is tinny, even softer than usual over the phone, but it’s good to hear it.

“Landis,” Austin says, his mouth twitching into a smile. “Hey.”

“Austin!” Landis nearly yelps in surprise, his voice cracking. “What - how - how are you?”

“I’m alright,” Austin says cautiously. “I’m at home, In Havenwood. I just got here this morning. Stuff has - uh, it’s been crazy.”

“Is your brother okay?”

“Yeah, yeah.” Austin runs a hand through his hair, pushing it back and away from his face. “He’s getting released from the hospital soon. I’ve been trying to work with the DPR, tracking down the guy who stabbed him.”

“Did you get him?” Landis asks.

“Uh, no. We didn’t.” Austin sighs. “I’ve been running around all day with agents, and we keep hitting dead ends. He might have left town yesterday, for all we know.” He pauses. “How are you, though? How’s everyone there?”

“We’re good,” Landis says, sounding happy for the change of subject. “I’m good. Everyone’s been asking about you. When you’re coming back. Walker, uh, he drove off somewhere a couple days after you left, and I don’t know if he’s been home since. I think he’s on vacation.”

“Sounds about right.” Austin laughs. “Have you seen Naberius around?”

“No, I...I haven’t,” Landis says. “Not since the thing at the motel. Why?”

“Just curious.” Austin bites his lip, glancing at the clock across the room, trying to count back in his head to what time it is in Antlers. Nearly midnight in Havenwood, so nearly ten in Antlers. Otter should be done with work at the hospital by now.

“Listen,” he says, “is Otter there? Can you put him on for a second?”

“Oh, uh, sure,” Landis says. “He’s around. One sec.”

There’s a shuffling sound on the line, muffled footsteps, a door creaking open. Two faraway voices, having a conversation Austin can’t quite strain his ears enough to hear, then the noise of the phone exchanging hands.

“Hi, handsome,” Otter says, and Austin can hear the smile in his voice.

“Hi yourself,” Austin says back. “Uh, listen - I’m dealing with something here that I, I’m not totally sure what it is, and I think I could use your help.”

Otter laughs. “That sounds ominous. But sure, lay it on me.”

“I have to ask you something kind of personal.”

“That’s fine.”

Austin sucks in a breath, steeling himself. “What did it feel like when you were being possessed? I mean, did - did you feel out of the ordinary at all? Did you see things that weren’t there? Did your psychic powers feel, I don’t know, stronger at all?”

Otter is quiet for a moment that stretches out longer and longer, to the point where Austin is afraid he’s hung up.

“You don’t have to answer,” Austin says, hastily.

“No,” Otter says, “it’s fine. I was just...there’s some stuff from when, uh, when that was happening that I don’t really remember. Like, I would get these - these impulses to do things I don’t think I would have done, otherwise. Sometimes I could control them, and they were just thoughts, but sometimes I felt like I had to act on them. That was what happened when I, you know, took you and Rabbit into the mines.”

“You didn’t have any visions or anything?”

“No, I didn’t see anything.” Otter’s voice is tinged with concern. “Austin, are you alright? What’s going on?”

“I’m...fine.” Austin blinks his green eye experimentally, and winces a little at how tender it still feels. His heart is beating a little slower now. I don’t think I’ve been feeling weird impulses. Whatever’s happening to me - maybe it’s not possession. Maybe it’s some magic bullshit like my danger sense. Wish I had one of Naberius’s calling cards, so I could ask for help figuring out what this is. He’s gotta have something about it in that library of his.

“You don’t sound fine,” Otter says.

“I’m a little better now.” Austin lies back on the bed. “Is Landis still around? I’d rather tell both of you what’s going on, so I don’t have to repeat it.”

“Yeah, I can grab him.”

There’s a soft noise - it must be Otter cupping his hand over the reciever, because he yells Landis’s name, and Austin can barely hear it. A door, probably the door to Otter’s bedroom, opens. Austin imagines Otter and Landis sitting shoulder to shoulder on the bed, crowded around the phone, some of the ghosts probably hovering overhead. He can feel homesickness like lead in his chest, a thick, dark weight hovering between his chest and back.

Stupid, Austin thinks, blinking away the tears that start to sting the corners of his eyes, to be homesick while you’re sitting at home.

“I’m here,” Landis says quietly, somewhere near the phone.

“I, um,” Austin stammers, swallowing, his Adam’s apple more of a lump in his throat. “I miss you.”

“You had me drag Landis in here for that?” Otter asks, his voice gently teasing.

“Shut up,” Austin groans, throwing an arm over his eyes. “I do, though.”

“We miss you too,” Landis says. His voice is still soft, but Austin has listened to Landis enough to hear the tonal shift from worried to happy. “When do you think you’re coming back?”

“I don’t know,” Austin says. “I guess whenever we catch Abbott - the guy who stabbed my brother. Which could be tomorrow, or next week.”

“You could let other agents take care of it,” Otter suggests gently.

“I could,” Austin concedes, trying not to sound frustrated. “But it’s a personal thing. I want to help catch him.”

“I get it,” Otter says. And obviously he does - he knows what it’s like for someone to hurt your brother, to feel that same need for recompense. “Just don’t work yourself to death over it, okay?”

Austin grins, even though Otter and Landis can’t see him. “Okay.”

There’s a silence, a comfortable one, in which Austin closes his eyes and imagines himself to be on the bed with Otter and Landis, almost able to sense their presences in the room. He closes his eyes and breathes in deep, the unfamiliar smell of the Jones house drawing him out of the illusion.

“I think something’s happening to me,” he says.

“What kind of something?” Landis asks.

“Something weird,” Austin says, fishing for the right words to describe it, coming up short. “Maybe magic. I don’t know. It’s like my psychic vision is enhanced or something. I can see the magic attached to stuff - the strings, like Naberius taught me - a lot easier than usual. And when I was searching Abbott’s apartment, an hour ago, I had a - a weird vision, that felt real. It was like one of the dreams I have, but I was awake. I thought maybe I was possessed, but I don’t think that’s right - it feels like my powers are getting stronger. Like something in me is waking up.”

“Are you worried about it?” Otter asks. He sounds like he doesn’t quite know how to react, like he wants Austin to tell him how to feel.

“I don’t know,” Austin says. “I don’t think so. I mean, the vision hurt, but it wasn’t real.”

“Maybe your powers really are getting stronger,” Landis suggests. “It happened to Grace. And you use yours about as often as she does, though you don’t really train them or anything.”

“I guess.” Austin rubs his arm over his eyes and sits up again. “I just wanted to let you guys know. In case something happens. I don’t think anyone here would really get it.”

“Well, whatever it is, we’ve got your back,” Otter says. It’s a hollow statement, given that he and Landis are hundreds of miles away, but it still somehow rings entirely earnest.

“Thanks,” Austin says, smiling a little more. “I think I might just get some sleep, and see how I feel in the morning.”

“We’ll let you go,” Otter says. “Keep us posted on how your investigation goes, okay?”

“Okay,” Austin says. “I love you.”

“Love you, too,” Otter says, just as Landis mumbles out a hasty, excited “Love you.” Both laugh - they’re still laughing as the phone disconnects with a soft click.

Austin presses both hands down into the bed, levering himself up to his feet. His head is hurting in earnest now, in a way easily identifiable as being from dehydration. He can’t really remember the last thing he had to eat or drink today. Hopefully the kitchen is stocked.

Slipping out of his bedroom, Austin pads down the staircase and foyer into the kitchen. The pantry door screeches as he opens it, and he winces, the sound just as strangely familiar as everything in the house. Jacob should oil that hinge.

Austin feels around the inside of the pantry, switching on the ceiling light. The shelves are stocked, but predictably sparse, lined with boxes of cereal, crackers, trail mix, a single loaf of challah. Austin checks the sell by date on the challah before bringing it out into the kitchen proper and opening it, sliding the loaf a few inches out of the bag.

Bread knife. Right. Austin chews his bottom lip, glancing at the drawers and cabinets around the relatively large room. For as many memories of this house as he has, you’d think he’d be able to find the fucking bread knife. He opens the long, square drawer next to the sink, making an educated guess, and finds nothing but junk inside. Shit.

The kitchen is still dark, illuminated only by the light seeping through the cracks in the pantry door. Austin crosses the room to the panel of switches, flipping them all up without stopping to think about it. He turns around, reinvigorated in his search for the bread knife, and freezes, his heart leaping up into his throat.

Filling the open doorway to the backyard is the tall, skeletal frame of Abbott Kilganon.

“Austin,” he says, his thin lips twitching into a lopsided, wan smile. “I wasn’t aware you were already home.”  

8.13 || 8.15

[sirhunterwalker]

The Zegba Chronicles Chapter 7

Header Credit @micolegg​

The Zegba Chronicles Masterlist

      It was about mid day when they finally stopped for a break. Zegba was an excellent rider and had been riding since he was a kid but he was not used to riding all day. When they stopped, Zegba struggled to get down from Moonbolt and the rest of the company noticed. "A little sore buddy?" Joked Nara, "Maybe you should walk and I will ride Moonblast."

       "Shut up." Zegba mumbled, "And her name is Moonbolt." Greyson laughed at their interaction and then started handing out assignments. Greyson was the senior member so he had been designated the leader. He told Zegba to start the fire while Nara skinned the animals she killed while they traveled. Zegba had freaked out the first time she all of a sudden threw her chakram into the forest. He thought that they were under attack so he had quickly slid off of Moonbolt and drew his sword. When he turned to look at his companions he saw that they were all still mounted and laughing at him.

    "Easy killer I was just catching us some lunch." She said as she retrieved the rabbit that she had killed. Zegba was furious that she had made him look like an idiot. It would have taken her two seconds to tell him what she was doing but no. She just randomly threw her weapon into the forest, what was he supposed to think. Zegba was sure that she did it on purpose to see how he would react.

     Zegba gathered up a few logs that he found inside the forest and put them into a triangle. Next he grabbed the flint and steel from his bag and struck them together. But nothing happened. He tried it again and still nothing. He had never started a fire before but he had seen it done a few times so he thought it would be easy. Nara came strolling over to him with the two freshly skinned rabbits. When she saw that the fire still wasn’t lit she laughed, “What’s wrong pretty boy? Don’t know how to start a fire?” At this Zegba began to furiously strike the flint trying desperately to get it to lite. “That is never going to work. Here hold these. She then went over to the forest and gathered up some leaves, twigs and some grass. She came back and rearranged the logs that Zegba had gathered. She took the flint and steel and struck it a couple of times and a small fire started. She rearranged things a little more and before he knew it there was a full fledged fire. She took the rabbits from him and began cooking them over the fire with a smug look on her face. Zegba had paid close attention to everything that she was doing.  He was not going to be made a fool three times in one day. After a few minutes Greyson and Shuri came back from tending to the mounts. Zegba had warned them not to get too close to Moonbolt. He told them to leave her some water and she would drink it once they walked away. Nara had of course put her two cents in saying that Moontree, as she called her, was perfectly calm and Zegba was just being ridiculous.

They ate their lunch quickly and then it was back on the road. Zegba groaned when he got onto Moonbolt, which caused Nara to snicker. They rode the rest of the day, following the road that led to Lionsguard. Once they made it there they would meet up with a local man to get directions to the dragon's lair. It would take them almost two days in order to get to Lionsguard. Zegba knew that he could get there faster if it was just him and Moonbolt but the horses were a little slower. They rode until there was about an hour till sunset, and then they found a place to camp off of the main road. Greyson assigned them the same task as this afternoon and Zegba was not going to fail this time. He tried to gather the materials exactly like Nara did. He positioned the wood like he saw Nara do and struck the flint a few times. Nothing. He tried it a few more times but still nothing. He didn’t understand what he was doing wrong and he really didn’t want to have to deal with Nara again. He was trying to figure out a plan to get the fire started when Nara snuck up behind him. “It’s ok prettyboy, I’ll take care of it again. Why don’t you go over there and put your feet up. That’s what you're used to isn’t it.” 

   “Well maybe if you actually showed me what I’m doing wrong I wouldn’t need your help anymore.” Zegba snapped back.

   “It’s not my job to teach you how to do shit most people learn when they are a child.” She laughed. Zegba was getting really tired of being laughed at. Nara moved the leaves and twigs around a little and was able to get it to light on her second strike. She threw the flint back at Zegba and said, “There you go pretty boy.” before going to place the fresh game over the fire. The other two adventures had come back over after caring for the horses. Zegba decided to go ahead and take care of Moonbolt while he waited for dinner to cook. When he came back to the campsite he saw that the other members were finishing putting up their tents so Zegba figured he would do the same. He pulled the tent out of the bag and tried to get it to look like the other tents but he had no idea what he was doing. Nara laughed at him from her place by the fire and said, “Really you don’t even know how to put up a simple tent. You have got to be the worst adventurer I have ever seen.” Zegba was fuming but before he could say anything back to her Shuri said that he would show him how to set it up. With Shuri’s help it only took a couple minutes to put up the tent

   They ate their meal while Greyson told everyone a story about his first adventure. After dinner Greyson set up a watch for the night. It wasn’t likely that they would be attacked, but he wanted to be ready just in case. Greyson had gotten the first watch, followed by Zegba, Nara, and then Shuri. They each went about doing their own things for the rest of the night. Zegba checked on Moonbolt one more time and then went to his tent to lay down. He was exhausted and sore from riding all day and he fell asleep almost immediately. 

    He awoke to the sound of Moonbolt’s barks. Zegba knew something must be wrong so he grabbed his sword and jumped out of his tent. As he was exiting his tent, Nara shouted bandits as she launched her chakram at the one closest to her. Zegba rushed the two that were closest to him. He could tell that they were expecting everyone to be asleep as they hadn’t drawn their weapons until they heard Nara shout. Zegba took down the two closest to him before they were able to fully draw their swords. Nara called her weapon back to her and launched it again at a bandit trying to sneak up on Zegba. The bandit was able to slice Zegba’s back but just barely. Zegba rushed the next group and was able to handle the four bandits with ease, not even taking a scratch. The other two adventures had just made it to Zegba when the last two bandits ran off into the forest. “Is everyone alright?” Greyson asked.

    “Ya, everyone is fine.” Nara stated, “It looks like pretty boy knows how to fight after all. Although I still had to save his ass. Maybe if you had remembered your shirt he wouldn’t have gotten you.”

   “I’m fine.” He said. “It’s just a cut.”

    “Good. Shuri, go check on the horse and make sure they are ok and haven’t run off.” Greyson started to say when he was cut off.

    “Don’t worry about the horses, Moonbolt would have made sure they were safe and stayed where they were.” Zegba stated.

   “Even so I would still like to check just to be sure. It is a long way to Lionsguard and I would rather not walk it. Nara you keep watch in case the bandits try to come back. Zegba and I will search the bodies.” Greyson commanded. They went about their task and it took about half an hour to gather up all the bodies. Shuri came over after checking on the horses to help them search the bodies. They didn’t find much, only a few gold pieces. After they had finished, Greyson told them to try to get some sleep. It was Zegbas turn to take watch so Greyson told him to keep an extra close eye out. Zegba decided to leave his shirt off as it was a nice night out and he was sweating from moving the bodies. He thought for a second that he caught Nara checking him out but was sure he was just seeing things. There is no way that Nara would be looking at him like that.

[shadowbeast-horror]

City Lights

Here’s the one that (sort of) inspired my URL. I’m not sure if it’s 100% done, but If I keep fiddling with it then I’ll never be happy.

Most people will give you the same reasons over and over why they don't like the city: it's bright, and it's loud. Me? I'll never move out of this shitty downtown apartment for exactly those reasons. There's always some light or another shining in your bedroom window, always someone shouting at someone else, sirens wailing in the distance, even ancient air conditioners groaning and wheezing their white-noise sonatas. Hell, some nights i wish i could join in the symphony of the streets, but not having a voice makes that difficult to say the least. Thank AgriDam Agricultural Pest Control Solutions for that little gift.

See, I'm not originally from downtown. I was raised on a farm in the middle of Bumfuck, Georgia, miles from what most would call “civilization”. Country boy, born and raised, i guess you'd say. In fact, that's where i lived, laughed, and loved until i was eighteen. The day i turned eighteen and got the hell out of Dodge, as a matter of fact. After what I'd seen, and what I'd survived, i was never setting foot outside of a major metropolitan area again.

It all started when i got back from the hospital when i was, oh, nine or so years old. I had just learned that i would never speak again, due to “severe chemical burns on my trachea and vocal chords,” or something like that, and i think the severity of that diagnosis was still setting in. I would sit in my bedroom, day and night, subsisting on an all-liquid diet, just to be safe. My parents had brought me books on sign language and they wanted me to study, but i still clung to the belief that i would never need to know it. Instead, I would stay up late into the night, listening to my little portable radio and imagining myself on stage with whatever band was playing, performing to crowds of people. Hell, sometimes I would even stand by my bedroom window, imagining the rows of corn to be my adoring fans. The distant tree line, bathed in silhouette, played the part of the walls of the arena. This fantasy would end when either the trees waved in the wind, reminding me that they weren’t walls of concrete and steel, or I would actually try to sing along.

It was in the middle of one of these fantasies that my radio’s battery died one night. Normally, this wouldn’t be much of a problem. My dad kept a healthy stockpile of batteries of all sorts in his bedroom, just in case, but he was definitely asleep by now, meaning that I would have to wait until morning to have my entertainment back. I glanced back at my desk and the small pile of books laying, unopened, on its surface. I looked back out the window, trying to think of a way to distract myself from the silence without actually doing any work. I took in the shadowy landscape of the family farm, past the rabbit hutch, beyond the corn, out to the utter blackness of the trees swaying gently in the wind. Thinking back, I think I noticed that while the silhouette of the trees was moving slowly back and forth, the corn was still as the grave; I just was too preoccupied with my boredom to think anything of it. Ultimately, I decided that sleep was better than studying, and I went to bed.

The days passed quickly, as my parents started talking about getting me back to school. They wanted to put me in special classes where my muteness wouldn’t be as much of an issue; I wanted to stay home entirely. Maybe I was worried about being made fun of, the kid who was in “special” classes who couldn’t even argue his case? Maybe I liked staying home when everybody else was in school, what kid wouldn’t. But I think, when it comes down to it, I was just waiting for my voice to work again. So I could laugh, sing, tell jokes, everything that everyone else can do. I would turn up my radio as loud as I could without waking my parents up, dancing around my room, performing to the silent, screaming crowds of corn and rabbits outside my window. The next time the batteries in my radio died, though, I definitely saw it. It happened suddenly, one moment there was music and the next moment it was pure silence.

The acres of corn stalks swayed in the wind, and the dark beyond swayed with it. But as I watched, frustrated at my lack of foresight in not getting extra batteries, I saw the corn slow to a stop while what should have been the trees only moved faster. Faster than any wind should have moved them, not without some kind of incredible storm. Curious, I opened my window, and heard nothing but more silence. No leaves rustling, no creaking of wood, no cries of animals in the night. Just… silence. But the trees kept moving. I ran to my bedside drawer and pulled out my emergency flashlight, pointing it as far into the trees as I could, only to find that they weren’t moving at all. In fact, the shadows of the trees outside the beam of my flashlight seemed… different, somehow. Smaller. Not shaped like they were just moments ago. I chalked it up to the trees being funny, I don’t know. I closed my window and, for once, my curtains, and went to bed. I still didn’t need sign language.

My dad woke me up early the next morning to get my help with some chores, saying that if I was going to be out of school for this long, I was going to at least make myself useful. We cleaned the rabbit hutch, pruned some less-than-healthy corn stalks, made sure our bird kites were in decent shape, and then I was given free roam of the farm. When asked, I told my parents that I had been reading my sign books, but acted like I couldn’t remember anything useful when they pressed me. That evening, my dad, seeing through my lie, forced me to sit down and work on learning how to sign. He watched me for a time, then went to bed without my noticing. I never did ask him for new batteries.

The night was as silent as ever, but it creeped up on me rather than appearing suddenly; when you focus on learning something new like that, you kind of appreciate the quiet. I only got up from my desk once before bed: I went to my windows, pulled back the curtains, and prized open the pane to get a bit of fresh air. The only things on the air that night were the smell of corn, still air, and… just a hint of something else, I never could identify it. If you had asked me back then, I would have said it smelled like the storage shed after we let it air out for a bit. Nowadays, I don’t like to think about what that smell could have been. I noticed the corn dancing about, as if a stiff breeze was blowing. I looked up at the trees, and they remained still. I remember thinking that was odd, and decided to ask my dad about it in the morning.

Instead, I was awoken from my sleep early in the morning by a sharp scream; my mother’s scream, from outside my bedroom window. I got up as quickly as I could and raced to the window, yanking the curtains back to see what the problem was. I saw my mother running from the rabbit hutch, towards the house, and shouting for my dad to come help her, please, it’s terrible. I ran downstairs in my pajamas and went straight to the rabbits, where I saw a terrifying and gruesome sight: All the rabbits were not just dead where they lay but… caved in, almost. Their skin and fur clung to their skeletons, as if they were literally nothing but skin and bone. My dad came in a minute or so later and he started turning them over, he and I both noticed that the rabbit didn’t seem to have been injured or harmed in any way. He picked one up and brought it into the kitchen, but my mom refused to let me in to watch. From the little I could see form the doorway, my dad performed an autopsy on the rabbit and found that it was exactly as I had thought: it had no internal organs at all, only a pelt wrapped around a skeleton. He ran to get a second corpse to perform the same procedure, and I was able to take a closer look at the body on the counter. Aside from the cuts my dad had made, I couldn’t find any sign of injury, animal attack or otherwise. When my dad returned, I was discovered looking at the body and was forced into my bedroom until they were done investigating.

After what felt like hours, my dad came into my room and sat on the edge of my bed. I reached for the pad of paper I had started keeping on my bedside table, but he seemed not to notice and started talking anyway, not making eye contact with me. He told me that all the rabbits had been attacked, and that he wasn’t sure what did it. Possibly coyotes. He assured me that I had nothing to be afraid of, nothing could get in the house to hurt me, but he also told me that he knew I had been staying up late and urged me to let him know if I saw any animals out my window after dark. If we had a predator problem, then that was something he would need to take care of. I nodded at him and reached again for my paper, but he reached over and stopped me. He told me to try studying a bit, and that he would bring me some food in a little while.

Not wanting to put any more stress on my dad than he was clearly already under, I sat down at my desk and opened the sign book I had been flipping through lately. I tell you, I tried my hardest, but something felt off. Was it my concern about what had happened to the rabbits? Was I subconsciously remembering something from the previous night? I’m almost certain that both were true, but I quickly realized that the main reason I was having such trouble focusing was because I was trying to study in relative silence. Sure, I had the dull tweeting of the birds outside my window, and the faint sound of machinery on the farm, but my radio was still dead! I grabbed it off my desk and rushed downstairs to get more batteries from my dad before I forgot again.

As I approached the dining room, I heard my mom and dad quietly arguing. I slowed down to listen in, knowing that they probably didn’t want me to hear what they were talking about. My dad was whisper-shouting that he didn’t know what had done it, he didn’t know what could disembowel a dozen rabbits without leaving a mark on any of them while my mom begged him to go outside and look for any kinds of tracks or anything. He replied that he already looked and he didn’t see jack shit, but she pleaded for him to go look again because surely there must be something. Dad gave in at this and went back outside, muttering to himself, and I saw my opportunity. I walked slowly into the dining room where my mom was standing, facing away from me and trembling slightly. I walked up to her and waved at the edge of her vision to get her attention, trying my best not to startle her. She jumped anyway, but softly asked me what I needed. I pointed to my radio and I saw the understanding in her eyes, but she told me to ask properly. I rolled my eyes and struggled to think of what I needed to say, and did my best to sign what I thought was “music dead”. I could tell that she hadn’t been studying either, because she smiled and took the radio from me as if she had understood completely. After replacing the batteries, she sent me back up to my room. I turned the radio up decently loud and returned to studying, with much more success than mere minutes before. Occasionally I would glance out my window and see my dad either working or walking from one end of the yard ot the other, presumably looking for tracks like my mom has requested. I couldn’t hear him, but I could see his frustration growing throughout the day.

Eventually, I got lost in my music and my books and only realized the sun had gone down when my mom told me that she and my dad were going to bed, and not to stay up too late. True to her wishes, I recognized when tiredness started to creep over me. I clicked off my radio, closed my book, shook my tired hands, and walked to my window to close the curtains. Of course, though, I couldn’t help but look down at the now-empty rabbit hutch and wonder what could possibly have happened to them. Surely I would have heard my dad exclaim that he found evidence of something, right? As my mind wandered, so did my eyes. Across the tree line, down to the corn fields, blowing with the wind. I distinctly remember thinking the wind must be strong that night, because that’s when I remembered that the wind had seemed strong the past few nights as well. Sure, I couldn’t see the plants themselves in the pitch darkness, but the contrasting shadows danced and waved like nothing else. I’m not sure if that’s when I first considered the idea that there was something in the shadows, making everything move like that, but I knew for damn sure that whatever killed our rabbits wasn’t a coyote, mountain lion, or anything my dad might consider. Either way, I yanked my curtains closed and slept with my radio on that night.

My dad woke me up at the crack of dawn the next morning, as was quickly becoming normal. I was so used to the way my dad woke me up that I was surprised that I had trouble waking myself up, and realized I must have had some bad dreams that I simply wasn’t remembering. By the time I sat down at the table for breakfast, I had made up my mind. I had brought my paper and pen downstairs with me and started writing hesitantly, trying to use the best, most accurate words that my young mind cold conjure. After a couple minutes of writing and ignoring curious questions from my parents, I read over what I had written and handed the message to my dad. He read my explanation of what I had seen the previous night with only a faint look of concern on his face, but didn’t seem to give it too much thought once he had finished. He handed it back to me with a gentle smile and told me that I must have been more tired than I thought, and that combined with the drama of the previous day, my eyes were playing tricks on me. We would double check the bird kites, maybe put up one or two more, and he told me to get my flashlight the next time I saw the corn moving like that and see how many crows I could spot flying around.

That night, I didn’t get much studying done. Partially because of burnout, since I had gone from not caring about learning to sign to at least trying to get the basics down in a matter of days, but mostly because I was too preoccupied with my window. I would sing along to my radio to help keep myself calm while I swept my flashlight beam across the trees and the corn, looking for crows that never showed up. I don’t know what it was about the previous nights that weirded me out so much, I can’t put it into words now and I sure as hell couldn’t back then either. But dammit, I was going to get to the bottom of this mystery. My dad followed up with me over breakfast the next morning, but I could only report that while I didn’t see any crows, the corn wasn’t waving like it had been either.

By this point, home life started to settle into a new routine, one where I didn’t go to school. I liked that, because it made me feel like my return to school was some far-off thing that I didn’t have to think about for the time being. Learning to sign got easier, probably because I was learning on my terms. Well, for the most part. I would be woken up around dawn to have my breakfast smoothie before helping with chores, and we would work until near lunchtime. If we finished early, I would have some extra leisure time before lunch. Then I would sit down with some yogurt, a banana, and a nutrition shake at my desk and study some more sign, before having time to do whatever I wanted around the house. Come four or five, my parents would sit down at the table with me for their sign lesson, when I would teach them what I had learned that day. They were slower to pick it up than I thought adults would be, but I like to think I was patient for a kid. Then we would finish up a couple extra chores while dinner cooked, we would all eat together, and then I would retire to my bedroom. On good days, I would study a bit more, but most days had me dancing around my room and desperately wishing my parents would knock on my door, just once, and tell me to stop singing so loudly, they were trying to sleep. I tried not to think about the fact that they never would. The only sure thing about my nighttime routine was my flashlight examination of the shadows just outside my window. I remained vigilant, but I only ever caught one more strange thing outside.

It was during a break in my studies, I had gotten up for a couple minutes to stretch my legs and give my fingers and hands a break from their constant maneuvering. I turned my radio up a touch louder, as loud as I was comfortable making it without fear of waking up my parents. I paced about my room, letting my mind wander, when I realized I had inadvertently made my way to the window. I glanced back at my desk, where my flashlight sat waiting, and decided to forego it, just this once. I really ought to appreciate the moonlit landscape, I probably thought. Or whatever a nine year old’s version of that would be. And, for a couple moments, I was glad I did. As my eyes adjusted to the darkness outside, I began to make out a buck walking along the edge of the trees. A decent size one too, if my dad was to be believed. Seeing deer was less common that you might think, personally I chalked it up to a fear of the machinery and the people. But every now and then, I suppose. I took a second to appreciate the deer before something in my head told me that I should shut the radio off, for fear of scaring the thing away. Lord, everyone knows how skittish they can be. I took a quick couple steps back and clicked the radio off completely, it was the quickest and easiest solution. I never once took my eyes off the window, just in case the deer decided to run off. I caught a hint of movement in the shadowed trees behind the deer, but I was focused, dammit. I hurried back to the window, not wanting to miss a moment of its presence.  It was taking its time, and I wasn’t about to complain about looking at it for a bit longer. I felt a slight smile begin to creep onto my face, maybe the first genuine smile since the burning coughing fit that got me sent to the ER a month or two beforehand. But then, that glimmer of happiness vanished in the blink of an eye.

Though my focus remained on the buck, I couldn’t help but notice the silhouetted treeline, must have been force of habit. It looked unlike anything I had ever seen - the best way I can think to describe it would be angry. The shadows looked like flames licking up at the night sky, as if the forest itself was a hungry toddler throwing a tantrum. And then the shadows collapsed. The tops of the trees became perfectly pronounced against the sky, all motion stopped. Suddenly, the shadows lurched forward and engulfed the buck whole. I gasped and held back a scream, and by the time I composed myself enough to get back to the window, I couldn’t see hide nor hair of the majestic buck. I clicked my radio back on quicker than anything, hid under the covers, and fell asleep with the light on that night. In the morning, I wrote out to my dad that I had seen a buck outside my window the previous night, leaving out its, well, disappearance. He seemed amused, and gave me a smile. His reply, though, chilled me to the bone. He told me that it was funny I mentioned it, he had found the body of a buck just that morning, just past the tree line. It wasn’t particularly rare for him to come across one, but this buck in particular had given itself to nature in an unusual manner: whatever scavengers had happened across it has totally cleaned out its internal organs before much of the skin had been eaten at all.

After that incident, things were relatively quiet for the next two weeks or so. I stuck to my routine, I got better and better at signing, and my parents began seriously talking about sending me back to school again. I was able to fumble through weak arguments most of the time, but there wasn’t much that I could do. I had known that my days of staying home when I shouldn’t would be numbered, and I resigned myself to my fate fairly quickly. Well, quickly for a nine year old. But until the fateful day of my return to society, I remained steadfast in my routine. Most importantly, I would always, always look over the landscape with my trusty flashlight and drift off to sleep with my portable radio playing on my bedside table. In fact, it got to the point where the sound of my dad turning off the radio in the morning would become a critical part of my waking up. Most people would love something that could reliably wake them almost instantly, I certainly did.

So when my brain realized that my radio wasn’t playing anything in the middle of the night, it must have clicked into wake-up mode and my eyes fluttered open. I rubbed my eyes and was immediately disoriented by the darkness of my bedroom. Sure, my curtains were drawn, but sunlight still shone through well enough in the mornings. I was further thrown off by my dad, who wasn’t standing where he usually was. Every morning, I would open my eyes to see him standing over the side of my bed, one hand on my bedside table beside my radio, the other on my shoulder. But this time, he wasn’t there. Instead, I could see a silhouette at the foot of my bed. I assumed this was my dad, but something was off. As I woke up and came to my senses, I realized that it wasn’t moving at all, and it wasn’t even shaped like my dad. It wasn’t shaped like… anything, really. It was a shape, a shadow, that shouldn’t have been there. Almost instinctively, I reached out to grab my flashlight and clicked it on to find out what the hell was watching me, only to find that nothing was there. I shone the beam into every corner of my room, on every inch of every wall, but absolutely nothing was out of place. Nothing was out of the ordinary, and nothing could possibly have been casting any kind of shadow across the far wall. For good measure, I even pulled back the curtains and performed my usual search twice over. Again, nothing out of the ordinary. I tried going back to sleep, but without my music to distract me, I couldn’t even sit still. I turned on the lamp on my desk and sat in bed until my dad came to wake me up. I tried explaining to him what I saw, but again, he chalked it up to a bad dream. Rather than arguing, I asked if I could get a night light next time they went to the store, and they brought me one that very day. Oh, and plenty of batteries for my radio. There was no way it would run out of power for more than thirty seconds again, not on my watch.

Time passed and I never forgot everything I had seen. My parents could make all the excuses they wanted, but I knew what was out there. I was the only line of defense between it and everything I loved. I went back to school, I adjusted to a proper life without a voice, but I never let my nightly routine miss a beat. I never let the radio die, I always kept a light on, I always scanned the area outside my window for any sign of the thing that was out there. And I knew it was out there. I remember standing at my window, music playing behind me, with only my flashlight for light. All I had to do was click off the flashlight, return the outside to its near-complete darkness, and watch as the fields of corn seemed to begin to boil. The shadows no longer waved, they rolled and fumed like the ocean in a storm. But as soon as my flashlight beam turned on it again, I saw that the corn itself was still as the grave. It was angry, now. It had started hunting me and my family out of convenience, but now it was a personal vendetta.

Despite all this, I never let it get to me. You would think that being the only thing standing between your family and certain death would cause insane amounts of stress, but I think my being so young was what allowed me to handle it as calmly as I did. It was just another thing I had to do, like brushing my teeth and doing my homework. Plus, I don’t think I realized how serious the situation was, the permanence of the consequences if I slipped up even once. Now that I’m older, and I’ve seen so much more of life, I’m surprised I’m still sane. I still sleep with a night light, and I still look out my windows at the cars below, the lights in the other shitty apartments across the road, and I simply can’t sleep unless I have something playing. Pointless now, I know, but you know what they say about old habits.

I’m not writing this now just to scare you, though. And I’m not exactly working on a memoir. “The Silent Farmboy” or something? Don’t make me laugh. See, I never put much thought into what kept it from going after my parents. By the time I was old and cognizant enough to consider it, my routine was so ingrained into me that I had half-forgotten why I started doing it in the first place. The knowledge of the thing was there, but the fear had stopped having such an effect on me. Protecting everything I held dear was just something I did, I guess. But I got a phone call today, one that made me think back on my experiences with it and reconsider my actions. It was an innocent enough call, my mom getting in touch to keep updated on what was going on in our respective lives. I told her about recent drama at work, the debate I’d been having with my neighbors, nothing too major. My mom told me that life back home was as boring as ever, nothing much to report. The most exciting thing, she said, was that they finally had enough set aside to pay for a surgery my dad had been wanting for many years, to take care of a persistent snoring issue he had had for most of his life. The surgery is scheduled for a few days from now, and once all is said and done, he should be a silent sleeper for good. I didn’t think much of it at the time, but I couldn’t get it out of my head for hours and hours after hanging up. Then it finally hit me, the reason my parents had stayed safe even after I had left home and couldn’t perform my nightly ritual: my dad’s snoring had the same effect as my little radio. Without knowing it, he had kept himself and my mom safe from the thing that stalked our farm for nearly a decade. As soon as I realized the implications that his surgery would have, I texted my mom, but she didn’t answer. I messaged her again, and again, and again, until finally she answered. They were trying to get to bed, what could be so important? I asked her if she still had my night light, and I asked if she could find it and put it in their bedroom. The excuse I used was that they were getting older, and the last thing I wanted was for one of them to trip and fall in the middle of the night and not be able to get help in a timely manner. She distractedly told me that she would look for it in the morning, but she really had to go because she needed to go to bed. Rather than try to argue the importance of a simple night light, I let her go. I’ll just have to trust her, I can’t go back to visit on such short notice. I tell myself that she’ll listen to me, that she trusts my judgment, but you know how parents can be sometimes.