#north face loners

[hinterland-clans]

north face loners all got their pages updated, go learn about Jaystorm and Hawktalon's family

[chaengluva]

Fear Me, Love Me

I was inspired by Regina in the all black outfit to write this

Regina George x Reader: 2.2k words: Masterlist

Requested: Yes/No

Regina rides a motorbike in this :)

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Everyone knew when Regina George was coming to school, they could all hear her coming, which made everyone tremble in fear.

Almost everyone, except for one girl that was, Y/n 'Imi'ike, which happened to be you. When you heard the sound of you girlfriend coming into school, you got excited and rushed out to greet her instantly.

The loud sound of Regina's famous motorbike engine made the ground vibrate and the school freeze in fear, then there was you, a drama freak, (Lowkey a dork) Smiling brightly as you waits for Regina to park her motorbike.

As soon as she steps off the heavy vehicle, you run after her, giving her a hug before she can take her helmet off, making her jolt back in surprise before chuckling under her breath, hugging you back, "What a warm welcome." Regina says happily, removing her arms to take off her helmet, but there is something that's stopping her.

"I missed you." you smile, still having your arms wrapped around her, which makes the taller girl giggle. "Baby, move your arms away." You do what she told you, moving your arms so she could take of her helmet, as soon as she does, she leans closer to give you a kiss, her hands wrapping around your waist to pull your body closer.

When she pulls away, she takes off her gloves and reaches out her hand, silently asking for you to hold it, which you do, the two of you were so lucky to have homeroom together, the whole class knew about your relationship with the queen bee, no one would dare question it, but everyone was wondering how did you end up with Regina George?

For more context, let's back track. You have always been a loner, being the younger sister of Janis 'Imi'ike already set your reputation low with everyone as soon as you started at North Shore.

Everyone thought you'd be crazy obsessed with art and they were surprised to see you were hopeless at the subject. You were talented in other things but you're main focus was musical theatre, you thought this would stop everyone from calling you an art freak but you were wrong, they still did.

After musical theatre, you're favourite subject was Maths, you were doing AP Math which resulted people calling you a nerd, it didn't hurt your feelings, but nothing would prepare you for what happened on April 12th.

You nervously held your books as you walked to the theatre, you were just praying that you would get the lead, Heathers as your favourite musical and your dream role was Heather Chandler. As you got closer, your nerves grew stronger as you saw the crowd around the door, Janis and Damien said that you were definitely going to get this role, but you still had denial.

You pushed through the people to be able to see the paper, you read over the names and a bright smile landed on your face as you saw that you got your dream roll, you screamed, texting your sister. Then happily walking away to your locker.

You were taking your stuff for first period, you felt a tap on your shoulder that was a little aggressive so you turn around to face one of guys on the football team, James Brown. "Hi James, what do you want?" You say with a bright smile on your face, still feeling happy about what happened earlier.

James wasn't happy, he had an angry expression on his face. "You stole my Girlfriends role!" He yelled, shoving you into the locker, you groaned in pain, "I'm sorry, I don't understand?" You say, confused with what he was so mad over, "My girlfriend's dream role was Heather Chandler! And you stole it! You're not even talented! You can't sing!" He yelled, making you flinch.

"I'm sorry but I don't know who your girlfriend is.." You say in a calm voice, hoping it would calm him down. Spoiler alert, it didn't, "Jessica Dove. She's much more talented than you, the only reason you got the role is because the directors want to fuck you!" He yelled, you tried not to take offence to what he was saying, you knew he was just trying to offend you.

As soon as she noticed you weren't taking offence he threw a hard punch to your face, you were taken back by what he did and was in to much shock to fight back, even if you did have fast reflexes, James held both your wrists preventing you from hitting back, he hits you in the face a few more times.

You can see he reaches up his arm to throw another punch, you squint your eyes, waiting for it to happen but it never comes, when you open your eyes, you see another hand, covering James' hand, and throwing him back.

You see that his facial expression turns to frightened and he rushes away, you don't know who saved you, before you can take a look at the figure, everything goes black.

You wake up in a different place, you panic, rushing to sit up because you don't know where you are, strong arms are on you, pushing you down slowly, you turn to look at the girl, you gasp and you're heart stops, you see the girl you have had a crush on your whole high school life.

Regina George, the name you have heard from your sister but you still couldn't help follow along with everyone else and liking the tall blonde. "R-Regina? What are you doing here?"  You ask, voice slightly breaking, "I saw James hitting you and I couldn't allow it to continue," She said, voice sweet as honey as she runs her fingers through your hair, you look to the side and see a mirror, you see that your face is ruined, a black eye and many bruises and even a bit of dried blood covered your face.

"My face is ruined. I won't be able to do the musical." You say, turning around, not wanting to face the mirror anymore, Regina George shakes her head, still playing with your hair, "No. I spoke with my Dad and he called the school, they agreed to postpone the musical."

You open your eyes and smile at the girl, leaning in to give her a hug, she giggled at your cuteness, when you pulled away, the two of you looked into each others eyes, you thought she was about to kiss you but you shook your head, "If I'm being honest I thought you would just leave me there." You say, slightly giggling.

Regina grabs your hand and looks at you with a shocked expression on her face, "I would for some normal losers but you're different Y/n." She smiled, looking into your eyes, then back to your lips.

Then it happened, the thing happened that you have been wanting to do since 9th grade, you felt her lips against yours.

So that's how everything happened, Regina skipped to stay with you in the hospital and you came back wearing some of her clothes and her arm wrapped around you possessively. No one expected the relationship, but it mostly a shock to your sister. When she first saw the two of you, she was in heavy denial and thought it was two people who just looked exactly like you but as she got closer, she realised it was you and Regina.

It took a while to get used to and she is still grossed out but she has never seen you this happy to go to school so she's fine with it, but if Regina ever does anything to hurt you, she won't be afraid to mess up Regina George's life.

That brings us back into the present time, Regina was holding your hand very tightly and couldn't help to notice how tired you looked, when she sat down, she grabbed your waist before you could sit down and dragged you to sit in her lap, none of the other students said anything because this was normal for them.

"What time did you get to sleep last night baby." You stay silent and don't say anything, she looks at you with her scary eyes, which always makes you spit the words out. "I didn't" You whisper very quietly, "What was that?" Regina asks, because she couldn't hear what you said, "I didn't get any sleep." You repeat louder, followed by a big yawn right after. Regina looked at the smaller girl in concern, you were always rehearsing or studying, she felt bad that you had no time to sleep, she allowed you to sleep on her chest for homeroom, you feel asleep quickly.

When she knew you were asleep, she pulled out her phone, texting Janis if its okay if she takes you home and looks after you, Janis said the Idea was perfect and that you needed the rest, Regina gulped knowing that she would have to do a lot of convincing for the next part. So she called Janis, thinking that it would be easier.

Janis picked up, wondering why Regina decided to call her, "What's up Regina? Are you taking Y/n home?" She asks, "I am but.. I came here on my motorbike." Regina says, Janis nods like Regina can see her, "Yeah that's fine but-," Janis slowly processed what that meant so she stopped talking, "Do you have a helmet for her? and safe clothes to wear?" Janis asked, Regina quickly answered with a smile on her face, "Yes! I bring a spare one everyday just in case." Janis hesitates before saying, "Okay."

The tall blonde girl smiles brightly, hanging up the phone and waking you up, she doesn't say anything she just garbs your bag and her bag and holds your hand and walks out of the school, you were to tired to process what was happening, when she brings you to her motorbike and just stands there, your worries go up high, "What are we doing? We have school!" You yell, starting to panic, the blonde pulls you in for a hug, calming you down.

"Your sister agrees that you need rest, so I'm taking you home." You frown, not even denning the fact that your so tired, she puts on your helmet and your motorbike clothes on, making sure that you're very safe, you have ridden on her motorbike before but it was scary every time. She put on her helmet and helped you on before she got on herself, you wrapped your arms around her tightly, not daring to let go once.

When you got to her place, she took you to her room right away, allowing you to rest on top of the blankets and she ran a bath for the two of you, it had only been 10 minutes but when she was done setting up, she came back to you sound asleep, she almost felt bad waking you up.

It was worth it, she woke you up and guided you into her on suite bathroom, you looked at her with happy puppy eyes when you saw what she did for you, she lit the room with candles and the bath was filled with warm water, bubbles and flower petals.

Regina undressed herself first, taking off all her clothes until she was completely stripped, you started at her for a few seconds but brought back to reality when Regina clicked her fingers and started to help you out of her clothes, Regina hoped into the bath first, she allowed you to come in after her, your back against her front with you in between her legs.

She started to wash your hair, making sure to massive the scalp, her fingers were so relaxing, you ending up falling asleep, while you were asleep, she cleaned your body, trying her best not to wake you, 30 minutes later, she had to wake you up, she lightly shook you causing you to let out a whine. "It's okay baby, you can go back to sleep soon." She whispers, helping you out of the bath.

She dried you up, giving you some of her clothes to change into, guiding you to the bed, she knew you wanted to get under the covers and sleep but she had another plan. She lied you down on your stomach after she took off the shirt you were wearing, putting some cream and oil in her hands she started to massage your body, starting at your shoulders, you were so stiff she made sure so massage every muscle to make your body less tender.

When she was down she put your shirt back on and pulled the covers over you, walking down stairs to set up another surprise for you, when you woke up, you felt happy, you felt stress free, you weren't thinking anything other then, "What is that amazing smell." You got up quickly and rushed downstairs, smiling when you saw your tall girlfriend, cooking you some pasta.

You walked up and wrapped your arms around her waist, still feeling slightly sleepy, she smiled at your cuteness, bringing you turning around to pull you in for a hug, "How you feeling baby?" Regina asks, hugging you tightly, you look at her smiling, "Hungry." The blonde girl giggles and nods her head, serving you and herself some pasta.

When you were finished you put your dirty dishes in the dishwasher and rushed up stairs, you were excited to get back to sleep but stress came back when you realised you had school tomorrow, but all stress went away when you felt Regina's arms wrap around you and you felt calm.

This goes to show that even the motorbikes don't hide how soft Regina George is for you, and everyone knows it.

[girl8890]

JK | Cabin in The Woods

word count: 6.7k

Summary: Everyone knows to stay out of the forest, but through a dare you ventured in… you just never came out. Meeting a wolf that says he needs you to survive, and you have no one else to give your love to but the animal that uses you every night.

Pairing: Werewolf!Jungkook x Human!Reader

Genre: yandere, supernatural!au, horror!au, smut, angst, some fluff (if you squint)

Rating: 18+

Warnings: bullying, disfiguration of body parts, breaking of bone, mate bonding, possessiveness, implied murder, blood, eating of people & living animals, implied/attempt at rape/non-con, vaginal sex, cream pie, cock warming, pussy sniffing & kissing, jk is horny for reader 99% of the time, kinda stockholm syndrome-ish, easily manipulated reader, dom!jk, sub!reader, lonely!reader

A/N: The best way I can explain this fic is that jk has actual wolf tendencies. He’s more wolf than man, so you’ll find that he relates more to a wolf in this fic than to his human half. I had a dream about this, probably should see a therapist, but here we’re instead! I hope you enjoy, my yandere lovers! 😌

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You don’t know why you agreed to the dare. It was stupid to even think nothing would happen to you.

All you wanted was to make some friends, so when some people in your hometown asked you to come to their party, you were all for it. When you got to said party, it wasn’t what you were expecting. Everyone’s eyes were on you, and the peer pressure was to the max. Somehow a game of truth of dare started, and now your here—alone in the woods because you were one of the few daring people at that party.

You weren’t daring, though, and the dare wasn’t random. It was pointed at you by a couple of college kids that wanted to pick on the loner girl. You realized this after the hour in the haunted forest definitely went by, and no one came to save you.

North became south, and west became east. Any direction you pointed yourself in, you would find yourself trailing deeper and deeper into the woods where too many tourists and even a few locals never came out of.

You swore the forest was even playing tricks on you. Swearing that each tree looked the same, and the fog got thicker with each step you took. You didn’t stop your hurried walking, to try and get out of the forest as quickly as possible, until you heard a snap of a twig from behind you. Slowly turning your head, something you never thought in your twenty-two years of life you would ever see was standing right above you on a rock.

It was a wolf.

Not just any wolf. A snarling, big, yellow eyed, and black furred scary looking wolf that still had animal carcass from an earlier dinner hanging out of its mouth. And you had a feeling it wanted you for desert. You, for some reason, thought if you stayed still that it wouldn’t see you. Like all the movies about predators not being able to see their prey if it stayed still. Well, you very quickly realized this is not Jurassic Park and the wolf lunged at you.

You screamed, sliding somehow just out of the way from the wolfs attack, and then booked it. Running as fast as you can, and screaming as loud as you can. You claimed this day to be the worst one of your life because even as you ran like hell, the wolf still followed closely behind. Four big paws hitting the ground way faster then your two feet were.

You think you may have run a mile that day just trying to get away from the wolf. When you finally decided to look back and see the beast, you were finally able to skid to a stop when you see it’s not behind you. You breathe out a sigh of relief… but that relief didn’t last long.

Just as you turn back around, the same beast as before springs out of the shadows and tackles you to the ground. The beast hunted you. It made you think it left and had you let your guard down. Stupid mistake because now your done for. 

The beast growled in your face, and pinned your entire body to the ground. It’s sharp, huge teeth dripping with drool right on your face. This was it. This was going to be the end of your life, and you were going to be apart of the many that ventured into this forest and never came out.

Tears streamed down your face, and because you felt desperate you even begged the wild animal. “Please… I-I’m not ready to die.”

In that moment, you thought you even heard the wolf laugh. A heavy chuckle coming from its snot. But in that moment, when the beast was laughing at your pathetic pleads, it sniffed the air around you and then it’s pupils dilated. The wolf inhaled again, this time pressing its snout right against your neck, and making you shake with fear when you thought it was going to bite you.

There was a moment of silence, the wolf keeping its nose against your neck, and then it retracted it’s snout away from you. Everything happened so fast after that…

The sound of bone crunching was the first thing you heard, but it wasn’t your own. The creature above you backed away a messily bit, and it was only because the head of it was melting away. It’s then you realize it’s body was transforming into something you’ve never seen before. Body parts coming out of its skin, and constant sounds of broken bones snapping as each piece of the wolfs limbs melted away into one of… something else.

When the first limb that was being created out of the wolf became whole, you realize it was one of a persons. A man’s hand attached to a whole arm as each piece of him clicked together. It was a gruesome and slow process to watch. One that would of had you gagging if you weren’t so focused on the once wolf turning into a man.

When each bone finally clicked in place, a man that would of had you swooning by his looks alone any other day was kneeling above you. His hair was close to hitting his shoulders, and to the opposite of what you would expect from a creature like him, his skin was smooth to the touch except a singular small mole under his lip. His lips were pink, chapped, but plump and they were above a jaw line that most women would compliment as being sculpted from the gods.

It’s then, as more silence stretches on and you’re now staring into two brown eyes that were once yellow, that you put the pieces together of what creature us standing before you. Of what creature—this very muscular, and very naked, creature of a man has been doing in these woods too. Making countless people disappear, and having too many people afraid to even step foot into these wood because of it. Because of him.

“Werewolf,” You say at the same time the beast above you says, “Mate.”

And that was the day your life changed forever.

———

Nobody missed you. Nobody went out searching for you. You assumed everyone at the party thought you died, so that was the end of loner girl y/n. Probably didn’t even have a memorial like all the other forest disappearances.

You had no parents to worry about you. Your mom died over a year ago from complications, and eventually your father died soon after from a broken heart. No siblings or other close relatives to wonder about you, so you were stuck. Stuck in the woods with the only person—being, wolf, whatever—that actually showed he… cared?

You’ve be in a small cabin in the woods with him for three months now. It was a cabin that if an people passed by—not that they would venture in to the woods or get that close to begin with—wouldn’t think twice about it being abandoned and nothing worth exploring. But on the inside was everything a girl like you needed.

A somehow working bathroom, a small kitchen right in front of the door, and a queen sized bed (that’s more of a mattress on top of a old bed holder) that was pushed into the corner of the small cabin. With a blanket and two pillows on top of it. One pillow that ironically had a picture of a wolf sewed into the fabric of the pillow case. Everything a girl like you needed to survive was in this small space.

And everything the werwolf needed, Jungkook you found out his name was the day you met him, was you and what was in the last door of the cabin. The door that opened up to a set of steep stairs, and held nothing but a steal cage in the middle. That’s where he held you the first week you stayed here. Trapped and forced to endorse his ritual of claiming you as his. Teaching you how to be the perfect little submissive human to his dominate wolf.

He never took you as a an actual wolf luckily, but he did take you that first meeting in the woods. On the ground, with your clothes ripped apart, and you crying and screaming for him to stop. It wasn’t until he bit into your neck, forever claiming you as his mate, that it felt like your whole world shifted.

Suddenly it was like you could do nothing but submit to him. You still had resolve, though. And that’s why he kept you in the cage for so long. A week may not seem like much, but it did for you. Especially when he—allegedly—left you down there at night. He didn’t let you out until you promised never to leave, and after three months you’re still here.

You’re currently washing a dish in the small sink in the kitchen. You just ate lunch of what you assumed was rabbit, Jungkook being the one to hunt for yours and his food, and once your done with cleaning it you put it on a towel to dry. You look up from the sink at the same time Jungkook as a wolf came into view of the small window in the kitchen above the sink. You can see he’s holding in his mouth what looks to be a deer, and you grimace as you think about how he killed it.

You open the cabins front door when he gets close enough to the house, and move off to the side so the big wolf can squeeze himself into the house. Shutting the door behind him, he came in into the kitchen area and dropped the dead deer on the floor. You crotch onto the floor in front of what you presume to be dinner, and you aren’t scared of the wolf’s fangs as he continues to heave out breathes next to you.

You haven’t been scared of his wolf for a long time.

“Poor Bambi,” You say as you pet the deers snout. Earning a growl from Jungkook as you touch the dead deer so tenderly, and then he pushes his own snout in between your hand and the deer so you can then pet him. “Stupid wolf.”

You smile as the wolf laughs. A husky chuckle of a noise you remember used to confuse you when you heard it, but now you know it as him laughing in wolf form.

He then backs away from your hand after a few scratches, and you look away as he begins to transform into the man you were forced to love. The only person you love.

The sound of broken bone came from your right, but it wasn’t until you feel a human nose against you cheek that you turn to see a hairless faced Jungkook. His hair is still a bit long, but you convinced him to cut it a little shorter and even chop a part of it completely off. Making it look like he had a buzzed portion of a quarter of his hair. He’s currently naked, but you ignore that fact. Being very used to his naked form by now.

“Hello stupid wolf,” You say in greeting with a small smile, and you watch his own smile twitch up for a second. He then pushes his face forward, and you let your eyes drift shut when you know he’s about to take in your smell. Something he always does when going into human form and being in front of you.

He first presses his nose back onto your cheek, it wiggling a little as it touches you. Then he moves his nose to your own, and glides it next over your two eyes. Sniffing and inhaling every few seconds. It isn’t until he goes to your lips that you allow your eyes to open half-lidded.

Jungkook’s eyes are shut, but he senses you staring at him so he opens his own eyes. Two pools of brown looking back at you as he slowly presses his lips to yours. Your eyes flutter shut, and you know his eyes are still open. It’s a small, barely any pressure type of kiss and you always think he’s doing it more for you then for him. He knows he doesn’t need to kiss you to earn your love, to own you, but he kisses you anyway.

After a moment of the soft pressure of his kiss to you, he detaches from your lips. You flutter your eyes open, and you hear a quiet growl rumble from his chest. Making your eyes flicker down to where you believe it sounded from.

“Hello… Y/n,” Jungkook says with a broken up voice. You think he’s never talked in his human form until he met you. At least not for a long time, so hearing his voice now is a rarity but you can’t help yourself and smile at him as he practices speaking.

“Yes, I’m y/n.” You press your hand to your chest. “And your Jungkook.” And then you press that same hand onto Jungkook’s naked chest right above his slowly beating heart.

You watch the corner of his lips twitch up again into a small smile, and you wonder what it would look like for him to actually smile. With teeth and all.

“Yes,” Jungkook says simply as he nods at you. He then takes his face away from so close to you, and aims his sights on the bite mark he left on you during the first day you met. You softly gasp when you feel his finger touch the surface of your neck. Gliding his fingers around the jagged teeth marks that will never go away. He then says with a mouth full of clenched sharp teeth, “Mine.”

And you’re his. He’s drilled it enough into your mind and body that you’re his. That he needs you to survive because a wolf without his mate is futile. Just like how your father died without your mother, Jungkook would die without you.

He may have brought up the situation in parts, and started this relationship in a terrible way, but he’s been alone and stuck in his wolf for a very long time. He didn’t know what “no” meant, and everything humans learned about consent and taking things slow into a relationship was nonexistent to him. So, he did what he does best when he wants something, he took it. Took you right there on the forest floor, and came deep inside you as he bit against your neck hard. Claiming you to him and his wolf forever.

Jungkook then slowly departs his finger from your neck, and wraps his arms around your arms and back. Your arms are sandwiched in between the two of you, and you’ve come to learn he likes to hold you this way. Having you safely protected in his arms, and he can easily bring his whole body on top of you so he can scent all of you at once. You pull your legs to your chest, knowing he’s going to scoop them up after he’s done sniffing your hair.

With one last whiff of your hair, he rubs his nose on top of your head. He then, just like you thought, scoops your legs up with one arm and supports your back with the other. Picking you up bridal style, and looking down at you as he caries you to the bed.

Your cradled and squished against him the whole ten steps there, but the whole way feels so safe. You would think a wolf like him that has such animal tendencies would be the worst place for you to be, but overtime you recognized it as the safest place for you. No one could touch you as long as your with him.

But that just means the big bad wolf would always have the ability to touch you.

———

Some time later, when your clothes are stripped off of you and your stomach is being pressed against the mattress, Jungkook drives his cock roughly into you from behind. It’s a rough, hard, and rocky affair every night. That’s right, every night.

The only times he doesn’t take you is when you’re on your period, and that’s because he hates the smell of blood on you. Keeping his distance and staying in wolf form the whole week, so he doesn’t temp himself in his human form.

Your hands are holding onto the front of the mattress in a tight grip, and his hands are clamped on top of yours as he continues to drive into you on repeat. Your moaning so loud it sounds like a scream, and each time you feel his hips press against you to go as deep inside you as possible you arch your back as a quivering sensation goes off in your stomach. Indicating you’re going to cum for the first time that night soon.

Jungkook grunts above you in a animistic way when he feels your pussy clench around his length. Making the teeth of his wolf elongate when his peek gets closer. His cock continues to drill into you at a fast pace as he brings his mouth down onto your neck. He doesn’t bite you, but he does apply a soft pressure of his teeth onto the bite mark he left there three months ago.

He doesn’t need to bite because he knows you know he already owns you. He owns your body, and he knows it so well by now that he doesn’t need to repeat the hurtful mark again. Just laying the sharp teeth across the ridges is enough of a reminder to what you are to him.

With a few more thrusts, banging his hips against your ass, your cumming along side him as he groans into your neck and you moan into the mattress. You lay there, heavy breathing going off from the both of you as your highs decrease. Jungkook takes his teeth off of you and then licks the surface of your neck. A little blood trickling down it since his orgasm was so harsh he bit down on you a little.

When he’s done cleaning your neck, whimpering a little to say sorry for making you bleed, he flips you over without pulling out of you and starts up his thrusts again. Caging your head and arms underneath him, with his arms holding himself above you next to your head. It’s like he didn’t just cum and reck your whole head space as he begins fucking you again. You expected this, though. It’s never just one round, not even two!

He continues to fuck you over and over again, placing you in new positions that keep you surrounded by his body after each time he cums deep within your clenching walls. Not a single time he’ll speak, either. Only you moaning and crying out your pleasure can be heard aside from his occasional grunt as he finishes inside of you. But the faces he makes are enough to have your mind going dirty besides doing the act itself.

When you get a chance to see his face, it’s so sexy it makes you clench around him. His mouth will be wide open in bliss, and his eyes squeezed shut. It looks like he can’t take how good you feel, but he still chases the feeling every time. Wanting to make you cum just as much as he wants to cum.

He fucks you so many times that it gets to the point tonight that you lost count of how many times you’ve orgasmed, and as he was placing you sideways to thrust into you again you felt yourself drift into unconsciousness.

———

Waking up was a start. The sun was blaring from outside the window, and you blink your eyes open to see it. Your body wasn’t sore since it’s gotten used to how rough he is on you over the months you’ve been here, and you look down to see his arms wrapped around your naked middle. You bite your bottom lip, trying to figure out a way you could get out of his hold without waking the softly snoring Jungkook behind you.

As you wiggle in his grasp, staring to remove yourself from him gently, you realize there was no way to get up without him noticing. And that was because he’s still inside you. Still hard too, which was unexpected. You turn slightly around to see the handsome wolfs face, looking innocent as ever as he sleeps.

Softly, you reach out and cup his cheek with your hand. Trying to coax him awake with a few rubs of your palm. Instead of waking up, though, he rubs his face into your hand like a puppy. Wanting you to continue what you’re doing even as he sleeps. You hold back your laughter as Jungkook begs for your rubs, but you drop your hand altogether.

Instead of waking up from the lack of rubs, his face starts trying to find where the amazing sensation went. It isn’t until his nose gets buried in your hair, him sniffing up a big whiff of your small and gripping you a little tighter in his grasp, that he blinks his eyes open.

He pulls his face out of your hair, looking down at you like he didn’t realize it was for a second, but then the corners of his mouth are switching up when he sees it’s you he’s holding.

“Goodmorning,” You whisper to him with a smile. He hums his own version of saying good morning, then he wraps his other arm around your middle and pulls you flush again him.

You cry out when his cock that’s still inside you impalas you deeper, and then he letting go you altogether when he hears your cry. He must of not noticed he was inside you until now, gently taking his slowly softening cock out of you, and he looks at you frantic when he thinks he hurt you. Hovering his hands above your arms and looking strained as he tries to push out the word, “Hurt?”

You swallow, pulling yourself together as the rough pain to your dry pussy lessens, and you shake your head and smile again at him. “Nope, just surprised me.”

He looks at you unconvinced, and because he doesn’t know what boundaries mean, he pulls your legs apart and inspects you himself.

“Jungkook!” You scream as you try to cover your core from him. He’s scene it plenty of times, but besides to aim his cock at you he’s never directly looked at it before. He still pulls your hands away from you, pinning them against your one leg as he pulls your legs wide apart. Your beat red in the face and chest now as he just stares at your core so closely. “S-stop it.”

He looks up at you, and his eyes say more then any words can. Matching with his pointed frown, his big doe eyes look up at you saddened. Even though he’s been rough with you many times in the past, using you every night for his own pleasure even if he coaxes your own in the process, he hates the thought of you hurt. That’s also why he hates you bleeding because blood means hurting, and hurting means pain, which should never involve itself with his mate.

Looking back down at you pussy, he slowly places a singular kiss onto your slit. You clench your eyes shut at the press of his lips on you. And then your full on grunting when you feel and hear him smell your pussy up close. You know it’s just him saying “I’m sorry I hurt you,” since you taught him kisses could help when someone is hurt, and the smelling is so he can check that you’re not bleeding. But out of all things, your pussy should not be getting kissed and smelt this way!

After a few more embarrassed wiggles from you, Jungkook finally clears that you’re okay and lets you go. You pout at the wolf that looks confused at why you’re upset, and you roll out of bed. As you start getting changed, you hear the cracking of bone behind you. Within seconds Jungkook is back in his wolf form, and pressing his snout against your clothed back.

You sigh, turning around and looking down at the wolf who’s staring up at you so apologetically, and you roll your eyes at him. “Yeah, yeah you stupid wolf.”

You pet him in between the ears, now seeing a smile on the wolfs face and you return a human smile of your own. One with a lot less drool. Then you head for the door, stopping when you realize the deer from last night is still on the ground from last night and look an accusing eye at the beast who brought it here. Jungkook crocks his wolf head at you, not understanding the look you’re sending him.

“Did you really just leave that thing on the floor?” He looks to where you’re pointing, and his ears perk up. Walking up to the fly swarming carcass, instead of throwing it away or putting it in the fridge, he starts to eat it whole.

You grimace as you watch him a second too long, never getting use to seeing that happen in front of you, and then you head out the cabin to start your day.

Your day usually consists of tending to the small garden behind the cabin. It’s nothing incredible, but enough that you won’t be eating dead deer or rabbit everyday. A few tomatoes and cucumbers that you were able to syphon from plants near by, and TaDa! Your own personal garden.

Besides this garden, you don’t usually stray too far from the cabin. For one, even though the monster that haunts these woods lives with you, you’re too scared to find out what else could be found lurking in these woods. And two, anytime you accidentally travel too far from it, weather it be just to walk around or to try and find more seeds to grow, a huffing wolf named Jungkook will come and coax you back to the cabin. There’s been times he’s legit dragged you by your shirt to get home, but that’s just because you were so close to finding new seeds and you didn’t want to leave yet.

You know it’s all out of protection—and maybe still out of fear that you may leave him—but he likes having you close by enough to smell you. His wolf nose being able to track anything from a mile away, so that’s how far around the cabin you’re allowed to go before he loses scent of you. Stopping your wondering just before your scent crosses over that mile mark.

Today, after you put the veggies inside the fridge, you take one of the books that Jungkook “found” for you and go walking into the woods to find a place for you to sit. Just before you cross the tree line, you see on the opposite side of the clearing you’re in that Jungkook is walking into the woods too. Probably to go on a hunt or scoot the area even.

You walk for about a minute into the woods before you find a rock and a tree you can sit, and lean against. Opening up your book, you frown when see the small pool of blood on the title page. You try to ignore how it most likely got there, and keep flipping pages until you find the first page.

It’s just when you get to chapter two, that you hear a twig snap close by. You grin at the knowledge that it’s most likely Jungkook, and call out, “Come to read with me, stupid wolf?”

“No, but I would definitely like to do more then just read with you.”

You gasp, jumping up from your spot and dropping your book on the ground in the process when you hear a human voice that’s most definitely not Jungkook’s. It’s a man with long brown hair, a beard thats unkept, and one of his eyes looks screwed shut from loss of sight.

Your body starts shaking immediately. Since you’ve got here, you haven’t seen a single human. You always thought no humans were stupid enough to wonder into these woods—unlike you, but you were lucky enough to be the monsters mate and not die. You know not a single person is going to be that lucky if they come across a hungry Jungkook. Or just him in general!

“I-I, what are you doing here?”

The man raises a fluffy eyebrow at you, and you continue to stare at him wide eyed. “I just thought I would wonder these woods that so many claims is haunted. I just didn’t think I would find myself such a sexy specimen like yourself in here too.”

You swallow thickly at his sultry words, backing up from him as he starts to move forward. “Tell me, girly. Why are you out here all by yourself?”

“I-I’m with my boyfriend.” Your referring to Jungkook, but if this man some how got past him there’s no way he can save you if this man tries something. You watched Jungkook go the opposite way of you, so you have no idea how long it would take for him to rescue you even if you scream.

The man looks both ways, stopping in his tracks with you. “Don’t see no boyfriend.” The closed lip smile on the man’s face disappears. “But I am hungry.”

You open your eyes wide, and clutch onto the skirt of your dress. You look all around the area your in, thinking up the best route to get away from this man. “I-I don’t have any food. So you should p-probably go looking somewhere else.”

The man laughs, showing his blackened teeth as he does, and then he looks at you with a pair of disgusting eyes that only mean one thing. “Oh, darling… that’s not what I’m hungry for.”

Right when his words register to you, you run as fast as you can in the direction of the cabin. Your not far from it, and you can only hope that maybe Jungkook stopped his travels early and came home. You hear heavy footsteps behind you, and you’re suddenly aware of what this chase of cat and mouse reminds you of. The difference between that day with Jungkook and you and right now is that you thought Jungnkook was going to eat you. While the disgusting and vile man behind you doesn’t want to actually eat you, but taint and ruin your body. Ruin your soul, even.

You push forward as you spot the clearing up ahead. Dodging tree branch’s and jumping over rocks. Just when you’re about to step foot into the clearing of the cabin, a heavy body pins you to the ground. You cry out as the man that was chasing yous heavy weight falls on top of you. Screaming once again when you feel a hard erection press against your ass through his jeans.

He’s not as big as Jungkook—not that that was your main concern—but just knowing it’s there and not Jungkook’s has you starting to cry already.

“Oh, shut the fuck up you whore!” The man above you yells. Maneuvering himself so he can pin your arms against your back with his knee, and you hear the start of him unbuckling his pants and belt.

You think your done for. That you’re about to be ruined beyond repair from the man above you, and never want to face Jungkook again. Even though Jungkook did the same to you once all those months ago, there was still pleasure for you being brought to the table. It wasn’t selfish, but a need for him to mate you. This man, on the other hand, won’t give a shit if you like it and wants to use you because your just there. Not because he loves you, or wants to hold you in his arms forever. Keeping you safe and making sure you’re never in pain.

This man wants to bring you pain, and you shut your eyes and cry out one last time before you think you’re about to be ruined forever. “Jungkook, help me!”

It happens so fast after that… but not what your thinking.

One second the man is pushing up your dress to reveal yourself to him, and the next he’s being ripped off of you. It doesn’t register to you that you’re no longer being pinned to the ground until you start to hear screaming, growling, and the sound of bones breaking. Breathing heavily against the ground, you stay completely still until the screams stop out of no where and the smell of blood is in the air.

You blink back your tears that are still falling, and on shaking arms you push yourself up onto your hands and knees. Before you could be brave enough to stand up entirely, a hand is being pressed into your back. You jump away from the hand and turn around to see a bloodied face Jungkook crouching in front of you.

Although your eyes are being blurred with tears, you can see his extremely upset face as he takes in your form. You don’t waste any time. You leap into his arms, wrapping your arms around his neck and legs around his waist. He makes a ‘Uph’ sound and stubbles back, but he catches you nonetheless. He’s always there to catch you.

Jungkook buries his face into your neck to smell you, while your face is against his neck to cry into. He growls against your neck when his nose processes the now dead’s man smell on you. You let him scent mark you, and the whole times he’s keeping you strapped to him. Not letting go of you for a single second.

By the time he’s down scenting you, and your crying has simmered down a little, you pull your face out of his neck to face him. The same deep frown and saddened eyes look at you, and you know it’s because of what almost transpired a few moments ago.

He swallows, pushing out a, “Hurt…?” You open your mouth to say no, because even though it scared you the man didn’t hurt you exactly. But then Jungkook is pushing out more words, “Try. To… Hurt. You?”

Your lip wobbles, and you can’t speak. Feeling your chest crumble from knowing the answer to his question is not positive, and instead of you speaking you nod your head since it’s too hard to speak right now.

Jungkook’s upset frown turns into an expression you haven’t seen yet on him. You know what he looks when he’s happy (flick up of the corners of his mouth), and when he’s sad (deep frown and drooping eyes), but this is different… this Jungkook is angry.

His sharp wolf teeth extend from his gums, and the corners of his eyes wrinkle and twitch as he thinks about what that man would have done to you. If it wasn’t for Jungkook being back on his way to the cabin at that second, it would have been too late. The man’s smell didn’t even register to him when Jungkook did an air check to smell where you were. All he smelt was something dirty, and he registered that as the part of the woods you were in smelling weird.

Never again. Never again will he ignore weird smells around you, or think your alright even if something seems off. He’ll drop everything for you. Even if he really wants to go claw some more at the dead man’s body right now, he picks you up as you’re now, wrapped around his body, and starts carrying you in the direction of the cabin.

You keep your face against Jungkook’s shoulder the entire time. Not letting go even after he puts you on the bed. You don’t remember how you got here, or even him closing the door behind you, but once your in bed and safe you still don’t let him go of him. And Jungkook is okay with that.

He puts you against the wall, making sure your caged in between his body and the wall so nothing can harm you. Even if someone were to look inside the cabin right now, all they would see is Jungkook’s naked back and ass.

Trying to be a good mate, he hums what sounds like a lullaby as he runs his sharps nails up and down your clothed back. When you finally begin to relax, calmly pulling your arms off of him so they can be sandwiched in between the two of you, you whisper a quiet, “Thank you.”

Jungkook stops humming, and stops rubbing your back. Looking down at your shameful looking face with wide eyes.

“Why?” He asks.

“Why, thank you?” He nods his head pointedly. “For saving me.”

Jungkook won’t take that. He won’t take a thank you for this. Your his mate, and he wasn’t there to protect you. He doesn’t deserve your thank yous or even you at this point. Pulling your face out of his chest with his two hands, he stares into your eyes as he tries to communicate how he feels. “No. No, thank yous. Don’t… Deserve… Thank yous. Or… You.”

Now it’s your turn to look at him wide eyed. You grab onto his hands on your face and shake your head. “What are you talking about? Yes, you do. You deserve me because I’m your mate.”

Jungkook’s shakes his head. “Not enough.”

Your lips part, and you see the sadness in Jungkook’s eyes as his hands fall off your face. This is the first time he said something without breaking the words apart, and out of all things it was him saying he’s not enough for you. Well now, your not going to take that.

You grab onto his face, making him face you and feel a little pleased with yourself when you see a surprised look on his face. You pull his face forward and smash your lips against his. He’s surprised, at first, but then he’s groaning into your mouth and wrapping his arms around your middle again. You moan when you feel his length begin to grow against your thigh, moving it slightly to allow him some friction. He growls when you do that, and you detach your lips from his as you look at him determined to make him understand just how you feel about what he just said.

“You do deserve me, Jungkook. You deserve me because I’m your mate, and you’re mine. And I-… I love you so stop being stupid and just claim what’s yours already!”

Jungkook blinks, registers your words a couple times in his head, and repeats, “Mate?”

You roll your eyes and say, “Yes!”

“Love. Me?”

You swallow, taking a moment of hesitation but then replying again, “Yes.”

Then that’s all Jungkook needs to be convinced. He smashes his lips against yours the same way you did, and you’re moaning up a storm by the time he rolls you underneath him. You take your clothing off as fast as your arms can do it, and then Jungkook is thrusting into you the second your pussy is presented to him.

Both of you making noises of pleasure as he enters you, stretching and rubbing at your walls just the way you like it as he roughly pounds against your core. As always, Jungkook fucks you rough and hard, but right now you need it. You need it just as much as him, and when you both cum at the same time, you’re scratching at his back to go another round… and another… and another.

As always, you lose count of how many rounds you both did, but this time you’re both out of breathe by the time you both decide to stop. His cum is leaking from you because you’re so filled to the brim with his seed, and you revel in it. Feeling his cum drip on your leg, and feeling his soft lips peeper kiss your face as he sandwiches your body against his and the wall again.

You love it all! But most importantly, you love your mate.

And he loves you more than you could ever comprehend.

-

-

-

The End

[lambtotheslaughterr]

Conium Maculatum

A Roman Godfrey Oneshot

[THIS STORY WILL CONTAIN THEMES OF NON-CON/DUB-CON, MENTAL-EMOTIONAL-PHYSICAL ABUSE, ETC. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED. READ AT YOUR OWN RISK. 18+. MINORS DO NOT INTERACT]

WC: 8.6k

Dividers provided by @firefly-graphics

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all AI images are created from prompts I wrote. they are not real images.

Summary: Reader has spent her whole life treated like an outsider. All she wants is to live & be treated normally. Unfortunately for her, the only person willing to do just that is Hemlock Grove's notorious rich boy Roman Godfrey.

            You felt him before you saw him. He was always watching you. Always curious. A small part of you was amused by his unwavering interest, but for the most part, you wished he would just leave you alone. Like everyone else did. All you wanted was to be treated normally. Not like an outsider.

            Hemlock Grove University was nestled deep in the woods on the north side of town. You were drawn to the small, sleepy town because of their public administration program. You wanted to major in public policy with a focus in agriculture, hearing from your Aunt Lynda that the town & surrounding forest were rich with potential farm growth. It was your dream to advocate for more natural sources of farming & agriculture that weren’t run by corporate leaders but people of the rural community. Plus, it helped that you already had family in the area.

            Lynda & your cousin, Peter, welcomed you to Hemlock Grove with open arms, allowing you to crash on their couch until you could get your on place to rest your head. Not long after you arrived, Peter moved on, wanting to explore north of Pennsylvania. It was a bittersweet goodbye. You were happy for Peter that he was wanting to venture out on his own but his parting left you with an unsettling feeling.

            “People here are not what they seem.” He had told you. At first, you thought it funny, knowing people often said similar things, if not worse things, about you & the people in your community, but Peter wasn’t joking. He warned you to be wary of others, to not be too trustful, & that if you ever felt unsafe to leave the moment you could. You promised him you would. It wouldn’t be the first time you lived somewhere where the locals treated you poorly, but you had never seen Peter concerned like he was. It unnerved you.

            But that was six months ago. And though you weren’t entirely welcomed by the townspeople of Hemlock Grove, they at least left you alone. That was except for the 6’4”, slender young man that rested against the lockers opposite of yours. You had your back turned to him but could feel him observing you.

            “What do you want, Godfrey?” You questioned without looking over your shoulder at him.

            You heard the disbelieving smile in his face, “How do you always know when I’m near?”

            “You’re not exactly subtle.” You pointed out but were smiling, nonetheless.

            Retrieving your textbooks from your locker, you stuffed them into your bag before shutting your locker & facing the wealthiest boy in town. He eyed you up down, admiring your outfit for the day like he often did. Apparently, you didn’t dress ‘normal’. But you had seen plenty of other women in your life dress the same way. They called it boho, you called it contemporary Roma.

            Roman Godfrey was your stereotypical rich boy. You had met, or rather seen, plenty of them in your travels. Yet he was different in one way. He was always alone. He didn’t have a posse following him around like all the rich boys you had seen before nor did he have a different girlfriend every other week. He was always alone all the time. Like you. You thought once before that may have been why he was keen on trying to get to know you: because you were both loners. But something innate told you that that wasn’t the case. So, you kept him at arm’s length.

            Resting against the lockers on your side of the hallway, you peered at him with a soft smile, “Did you need to ask me something?”

            He always had questions.

            “Yes, I do.” He bit his lip through a smile. He pushed himself off the wall to cross the hallway over to you, uncaring about other students trying to pass through. Your eyes never strayed from his startling blue ones. Once he was near you, he leaned his shoulder against the lockers beside you.

            “How’s Peter?”

            “Doing well, I imagine.” You raised your brows. That isn’t what he really wanted to ask, but Roman had a habit of beating around the bush when it came to you for some reason.

            “Oh, right.” He clicked his tongue against his straight teeth, “You Rumancek’s don’t like phones.”

            “It’s not that we don’t like them.” You revealed, “They’re just not necessary. If we want to talk to someone, we go see them.”

            Roman nodded, likely having heard the same explanation from Peter. It came as a little bit of a surprise to you when you learned that Roman & Peter were friends. Peter had never mentioned his name before he left, but during your first week at the university, Roman wasted no time in making your acquaintance & talking animatedly about Peter & how deeply saddened he was to see him go. The ‘deeply saddened’ part you took with a grain of salt.

            “Which is why, I suppose, you’re standing right here.” You added, narrowing your eyes playfully.

            “If you had a phone number I wouldn’t have to seek you out, would I?” He played, his voice lowering flirtatiously.

            “Something tells me that wouldn’t stop you.”

            Roman pursed his lips in knowing at that, “Guess we’ll never know.”

            Shaking your head, you pushed off from the lockers, “This conversation has been…lovely. But I gotta go.”

            “Let me drive you.” Roman rushed out but tried covering it with a sheepish nonchalant smile.

            “Roman…” If you could keep track of how many times he asked to drive you home on one hand, you’d need at least fifty more fingers.

            “It’s going to rain.” Roman stepped forward, his arm swinging over your shoulders as he led you to the doors that went outside. You looked up at the sky, noting the dark heavy rainclouds rolling in.

            “See? I’m not lying.”

            You glanced up at him, “You drive a car with no top. I’ll get soaked anyway.”

            His eyes twinkled perversely at that but he still carried his charming smile, “Not if I speed.”

            You sighed, staring back out at the sky. It was a long walk back to your caravan in the woods, but you always enjoyed the walk. You never took any roads, rather choosing to walk the two miles or so through the woods. But you did want to get started early on an assignment & the rain would only slow you down.

            Swallowing your usual refusal, you licked your lips in trepidation before looking back up at the regrettably handsome young man.

            “Okay.”

            Roman contained his obvious excitement but still clutched the keys in his hand in a closed fist & raised it momentarily in victory.

            “Just this once, Roman.” You warned him, not wanting him to think that it meant anything more.

            “Whatever you say.” He grinned, all his teeth showing.

            Roman led you outside, his hand on your lower back as he brought you to his hot red two seater. While you knew a car like that was sought after by many, it was only an eyesore to you.

            He opened the passenger side door & held your hand gentlemanly as you slipped in. Roman was touchy. You learned that early on in your association with him, but you never minded. To close friends & family, you were rather affectionate, as were they, so physical touch didn’t make you uncomfortable as it likely would any other person. But you did have slight concern in how far Roman would go in touching you if you continued to not say anything.

            Roman sped-walk around the vehicle to his side before practically jumping in. The small car jostled under his weight as he started the engine.

            “Thank you.” You told him.

            “No,” Roman winked at you as he reversed, “thank you.”

            Roman pulled off onto a dirt wood somewhere in the woods. Your caravanwas only a minute or so walk down the narrow foot path. Lynda helped you in purchasing one & finding a decent clearing in the woods for you to call home. But what you didn’t miss was how Roman knew exactly where to drive to drop you off.

            You pressed your lips together, trying to suppress your smile. What Roman didn’t know was that you knew he would sometimes come out here at night & watch your caravan from somewhere in the woods. As you told him, he wasn’t subtle & you could always sense when he was near. It was worrisome the first couple times it happened. After all, you were a young, single woman living on her own in the middle of the woods, but Roman never made himself known. As far as he know. And he never approached. Only watched. You summed it up to be just his curiosity, & perhaps, if your innate sense was wrong, his longing for another friend like Peter.

            Unlatching your belt, you began to get out of the car when suddenly your door was being opened from the other side. You hadn’t even heard Roman get out of the car, let alone race over to your side. You chuckled surprisingly but said nothing. He offered you his hand yet again as you got out. You accepted.

            “Let me walk you to your door.” He suggested.

            You wanted to refuse, but if there was anything you knew about Roman Godfrey, it was that he was one persistent fellow.

            Saying nothing, you began to lead the way. You noted how Roman limited his naturally wide strides, thanks to his long legs, to keep in step with you. He reminded you of a golden retriever: just happy to be there.

            After a minute of silently walking, save for a distant bird song here & there, you finally came to the clearing where your caravan lied in wait.

            “Wow.” Roman feigned shock at seeing your caravan as if it was the first time, “It’s a nice set-up you got here.”

            “Really?” You felt your brows crease as you stared at him with amusement, “Never been here before, is that it?”

            “No.” Roman laughed awkwardly, trying to hide the truth, “I have no reason to come out here.”

            You nodded at him, making it clear that you didn’t believe him but said nothing. He ultimately dropped the façade, looking at you in disbelief, “How’d you know?”

            “Your cologne.” You pointed at his chest, “It’s pungent. Doesn’t mix well with the natural, earthy smells out here.”

            “Bullfuckingshit.” He retorted but appeared mildly impressed, “What are you, a sniffer dog? How the hell can you smell that out here?”

            You giggled softly, shaking your head, “A gift, I guess.”

            “You got a lot of gifts.” Roman commented, “You always know when I’m near before I’m even there, now you can smell in the middle of the woods.”

            “Mm.” You agreed. Turning your back on him, you were assuming he would know that was your good-bye & allow you to disappear into your little abode but the sound of your name on his tongue proved otherwise.

            “Yes, Roman?”

            “Are you, uh, doing anything tonight?” He asked, blinking rapidly. You watched as he reached into the inside pocket of his gray overcoat, pulling out a pack of smokes.

            “Some schoolwork.” You frowned, watching as he produced a cigarette & placed it between his lips. “Please don’t smoke that.”

            Roman paused, looking confused for a second before realizing you were referring to his cigarette.

            “The smell.” You made a dissatisfied face, “Your cologne I tolerate. That, I won’t. If you don’t mind.”

            Roman removed the cigarette from his mouth, putting it back in its pack, “Sorry.”

            “Don’t be.” You mustered a smile, “Anyway. Goodbye, Roman. Thank you, again.”

            “Wait, about tonight?” He rushed out, taking a step forward. You paused just before your door.

            “I’m studying.” You reminded him, not necessarily needing to hear whatever offer he had in mind next.

            “You won’t have to go far.” He raised his hands, gesturing the trees around him.

            “What is it?”

            He smiled at your polite response, “A party. Here. In the woods. Happens every year. It’s the spring equinox party or whatever they call it. All I know is that it always happens on the full moon.”

            You nodded in knowing, “A Worm Moon, yes.”

            “A what?” He chuckled but was entirely lost on what you had just sun.

            “A Worm Moon. It’s what the full moon in the month of March is called. In spiritual terms, it means growth.”

            “Oh, cool.” Roman smirked before moving on, “I was thinking about going, maybe, ya know, I don’t really mingle with the locals.”

            “You are a local.” You pointed out.

            “You know what I mean.” He dismissed sheepishly, “But I thought it’d be weird going by myself, so…I thought maybe.”

            “I’d go with you.” You finished for him. Roman bared his teeth in hope, “What do you think?”

            “I think you don’t like being told ‘no’.” You responded coolly but kindly.

            “I don’t, yeah.” Roman shook his head but laughed lightly.

            “Hmm.” You nodded in thought. He was being…cute. And you hated admitting that, even if it was only to yourself. Roman had a little crush on you, that much had always been obvious, but he was really trying right now. More so, he was trying to be cool about. Not like ‘rich-guy-I’m-so-cool’ cool but a seemingly innocent ‘if-she-says-no-I-just-might-cry-so-I-gotta-be-cool-about-it’ cool. It was endearing.

            “Please.” His voice faltered, “Say yes.”

            Pursing your lips, you finally nodded once, “Yes, Roman, I will go to the spring equinox with you.”

            Much as he did earlier when you accepted his ride, Roman raised both of his fists in victory. But he quickly tried to hide his knee-jerk response by shaking it off, “Great, cool, great.”

            “You said that already.” You teased.

            “Yeah.” He shrugged but his smile was as wide as it could possibly go, “Okay. Well, guess I’ll see you later then.”

            “Okay.” You couldn’t help but smile back. He really was like a golden retriever.

            Roman kissed both his hands before blowing waving them towards you, “You won’t regret it.”

            You said nothing but waved as he walked away back down the footpath. Once he was out of sight, you sighed heavily, resting your head against the door to your abode. Butterflies flapped their wings wildly within your gut. You squeezed your eyes shut, an undeniable smile ripping across your face.

            So, that’s what that felt like.

            There was no mirror placed anywhere within the small confines of your caravan. So, you could only guess you were dressed enough for a party in the woods. It wasn’t that you seriously cared about how you looked but you still had that desire to just be normal. It would be enough that people at the party would likely whisper about you when they saw you, the least you could do to ease your worries was to keep it tame tonight. Whatever that meant.

            You were about finished with getting ready when you paused in what you were doing. You sniffed the air. Cologne.

            Roman.

            And just as you thought his name, your caravan shook with the rapt knocking of his arrival.

            Releasing a breath of air, you approached your door & swung it open, revealing the tall man on the other side. Even standing on the flat earth outside your caravan & he was still taller than you. It was funny.

            “Wow.” He breathed out, his eyes twinkling as he took you in, “You look…”

            “Normal?”

            Roman’s eyes flashed to yours, “No. Better. You look like a woodland creature.”

            You couldn’t help the bewildered giggle you released, “Whatever that means.”

            Turning away from him, you looked for your jacket to throw on. After all, it was only March & the night would only get chillier. After slipping into the sleeves of it, you turned back around to find Roman leaning on the frame of your doorway to peer inside.

            “It’s a lot bigger in here than it looks.” He observed before meeting your eyes, “Think it’d fit in here, too?”

            His mischievous tone caused you to narrow your eyes playfully at him, “We’ll never know.”

            Exiting your caravan, Roman backed up to give you space but again found your fingers as you took the single step down from the wooden platform below your door. You shut the door & faced him, slowly pulling your fingers from his.

            “I figured we could walk. Since it’s close.” Roman suggested. You nodded in response. A night walk in the woods was one of your favorite past times.

            He led the way through the woods & you found comfort in the silence between the two of you. As the two of you walked, enjoying the sound of cicadas trilling, you felt a warm near your pinkie finger. You glanced down, spotting Roman’s hand as his own pinkie intentionally grazed your own.

            “If you’re going to hold my hand, Roman, then hold it.”

            You watched in the corner of your eyes as he looked down to smile at you. Then you felt his hand hesitantly tangle his fingers with your own. It felt nice. Natural. What made it better was that he was being gentle about it. Roman only continued to surprise you. Though you still had your mild reservations about him, he had yet to truly do anything earn your suspicions. For now, you welcomed the warmth his hand brought to yours.

            After about ten minutes or so is when you began to hear the sounds of a party happening. There was music playing & raucous laughter. You felt as Roman’s hand stiffened in your own. You frowned at the action.

            “Are you okay?” You questioned, peering up at him.

            “Mhmm.” He forced a smile, & it was a closed lipped one which was the biggest give-away that he was lying.

            As you two grew closer to the sounds, Roman slowed down. It was a very subtle change in speed but you still noticed it. You stopped to stand in front of him. But he didn’t look at you, his eyes were cast over your head as he stared at the party nearby. You followed his line of sight, noticing how there were quite a lot of people. They were all drinking, running around, just having fun & enjoying their night.

            But you understood Roman’s hesitation. He was an outsider, too. Those people, locals, didn’t entirely welcome the anomalies of society. Facing back towards Roman, you gently ran your fingers on the underside of his wrist in comfort. It was something your mother always did for you when you had bad dreams as a child.

            “Hey.”

            Roman’s wide stare shifted from the party behind you to your face.

            “We’ll be okay.” You assured him.

            “Yeah, I know.” Roman shrugged, his obvious anxiety suddenly disappearing.

            You smiled up at him, “You don’t have to hide it from me.”

            “Hide what?” Roman feigned ignorance. But when you kept your stable stare on his wavering one, he finally dropped the mask, “Thanks for coming with me.”

            “Of course.” You tugged on his hand, moving him with you towards the party, “Thanks for getting me out of my neck of the woods.”

            Roman smiled innocently at that.

            Approaching the party, Roman & you entered the clearing side by side. Most everyone was too busy in their own doings that they didn’t notice either of you. You bit your lip, relieved for both your sakes.

            Beside you, Roman released a breath of air, also noticing that no one really cared or, if they did, they didn’t make it obvious.

            “See?” You bumped your arm into his, “Totally okay.”

            Roman & you found a few chests near a couple tables that had a plethora of drinks on ice. He pulled out a can of beer for himself before offering you one. You accepted before giving it a taste. It wasn’t often that you drank, you had no real reason to, but tonight was a special occasion. However, you didn’t miss the bitter taste of it.

            Roman noticed the look of disgust you made, trying to hide his amusement. You stared wide-eyed at him, “What?”

            “Nothing. I just sometimes forget how pure you are.”

            “Pure?” You laughed awkwardly. Strange word choice.

            “You know what I mean. You’re not…fucking tarnished by modern day society.”

            “Sure, I am.” You disagreed before peering up at him coyly, “I rode in that eyesore you call a car today.”

            Roman’s mouth hung open in shock, “You did not just say that about my baby?”

            A giggle escaped you at his reaction.

            The night continued on quite like that for some time. You & Roman found a couple spots next to a small bonfire, nursing your second & third beers. You watched as the people around you laughed, loved, & lived, happy to just be there to witness it. In the midst of people watching, Roman had at some point placed his hand on your thigh, his fingers long enough to wrap around to the inside of it. It surprised you at first, worried he was going to try to move it close to your private area, but he kept it right where he put it & never moved it. Not even an inch. So, you forgot about it soon enough.

            And then, whether it was the alcohol or just your natural desire to be physically affectionate, you rested your head on Roman’s shoulder. You felt as he inhaled deeply at that, & it made you hide your smile behind your can of beer. The moment was comforting, peaceful, & most importantly, real. It wasn’t forced on your part or an attempt to touch you inappropriately on Roman’s part. It was a genuine connection you were forming with him.

            But the moment was ruined, disastrously so.

            “Look, man.” A voice snickered opposite the fire from where you two sat, “Those two freaks came here together.

            It would have been too good to be true really believing you & Roman could attend a normal social event without being pointed out. You felt as Roman stiffened beside you, having heard the jab as well.

            You raised your head, finding the two guys who were shamelessly looking at the two of you as they laughed to each other. You sighed but didn’t let it bother you. It was nothing new. Roman, on the other hand, was clearly more effected by it than you were.

            “Bet they have some of the freakiest sex you can think of.” The other one sneered.

            Oh, boy.

            Before you could restrain Roman, he shot upwards, his height assisting him as he stared challengingly at the two guys across from you.

            “Roman.” You said his name firmly but he wasn’t listening.

            The two noticed his stance & laughed at him more, one of them hollering, “Oh, what are you gonna do, mama’s boy?”

            “I can bury you alive if you’d like, you stupid fucks.” Roman spit.

            You rose then, your hands gripping one of his wrists to try & calm him down. But the two only spurred him on.

            “Yeah? You & that witch there gonna cast a spell on us?” They both feigned fear, “Please, no, don’t. Our mom’s will actually miss us.”

            “Roman.” You tried to get in front of him, in his line of sight despite him being much taller than you.

            “Fuck you, man.” Roman snarled.

            “Nah, thanks, we’re good.” They laughed childishly.

            “Can you guys just shut up?” You finally snapped, spinning around to face them. They stared at you wide-eyed, in mild shock & amusement at your reaction.

            “She talks!” One slapped the other.

            You rolled your eyes, turning back to face Roman, “Ignore them. They’re just being assholes.”

            “Hey, Godfrey. If she talks then you probably no what she sounds like in bed, huh? Does she chant before she cums?”

            Before you could realize what was happening, Roman knocked you to the side, launching himself over the bonfire, before he latched one of his hands onto the throat of the kid who made the perverse comment.

            “Hey, man, let him go!” The other yelled, trying to rip Roman off his friend.

            You crawled back onto your feet, racing over to the rapidly growing violent interaction.

            Roman had the kid pressed against one of the trees, his thumb digging into the larynx of his throat to keep him from breathing. The kid tried shoving Roman off, but it was clear that he was no match for the gentle giant.

            “Roman!” You yelled, but he wasn’t hearing you.

            He had his deadly sights set solely on the kid before him, “You owe her an apology.”

            The kid struggled in his grasp, desperately opening his mouth to try & get oxygen but he would receive none as long as Roman had him in the death grip.

            “We’re sorry! Fucking let go! You’re killing him!”

            Everyone at the party at that point was focused entirely on Roman & the immature child on the other end of his end.

            “Roman.” You placed your hand on the hand that was holding the kid by the throat.

            It was only then that Roman’s eyes finally fell to yours.

            “That’s enough.” You told him, shaking your head, “Let him go.”

            He frowned at you, his eyes a mixture between rage & hurt.

            “Please.”

            At your plead, Roman finally softened, his hold on the kid loosening. The kid dropped to his butt, choking as air filled his lungs. You gently pushed Roman away from the area, needing to get him as far away as possible.

            “You fucking freaks!” A voice yelled behind the two of you.

            You ignored the slowly gathering voices of anger & name-calling as you led Roman back into the safety of the woods. Once you were a far enough distance, you paused to let Roman lean against a tree. He was staring wide-eyed at the ground, as if he was in a trance. You released a breath of air you hadn’t realized you had been holding as you watched him in concern. But it wasn’t of any concern for him.

            “I’m sorry.” He finally breathed out, his voice soft, “I’m sorry, _____.”

            You stood there with your arms crossed over your chest, staring at indignantly.

            When he finally looked at you, & took in your hostile stance, he moved towards you with his hands outstretched, but you took a step back from him, shaking your head, “Don’t touch me.”

            He blinked rapidly, a forlorn frown crossing his features, “I said I’m sorry.”

            But you only continued shaking your head, “I knew to be wary of you.”

            Roman huffed, biting his lip in frustration, “Why? Because I defended you?”

            “Defending me would’ve been ignoring them & walking away from it. Not nearly killing him.” You kept your voice firm, never having been someone to yell.

            Roman rolled his eyes but continued staring at you solemnly, “They were degrading you. I couldn’t not say anything.”

            “There’s so much anger in you.” You commented saddeningly, “I could always see it but I never knew how deeply rooted it was in you. Now, I’ve seen it firsthand.”

            He licked his lips, that anger you had seen back there returning to his eyes, “So, what? That’s it? I’m not good enough for you anymore.”

            “That’s never what this was about.” You whispered, “The only person you’re not good enough for…is you.”

            Roman softened at that, but his eyes watered. Your words were hurting him, that much you knew, but he needed to hear them. You cared about him enough to tell him the truth. You imagined there weren’t a lot of people in his life who were honest with him.

            “The fuck does that mean?” He questioned, staring at you with his jaw jutted out as he tried to keep himself from losing it again.

            “No one will ever accept you.” You told him, “Not them anyway.” You nodded back towards the party, “But I do, or did. But you want more than that. You want everyone to accept you.”

            “What’s so fuckin’ wrong with that?” He spit harshly.

            “Nothing.” You admitted, “But how do you expect them to accept you if you don’t accept yourself?”

            You could tell that what you were saying was being absorbed by him. And it hurt your heart to see him hurting. But it was the truth. He needed to accept himself.

            “I’m going home.” You told him, “Don’t follow me. Don’t hang around outside anymore. I need my space.”

            “What?” He asked, his emotions highly charged, “You’re cutting me out?”

            “For now.” You frowned at him, “And when I’m ready, if I’m ready, I will come to you.”

            You could tell he wanted to say more but you turned your back on him. Tugging your jacket closer around your middle, you found your way in the darkness. You felt saddened that Roman couldn’t walk your path with you, but he needed to learn to walk his own.

            It had been a week since you last saw Roman. And, to your surprise, he kept to your rules. You never sensed him around while at school, never smelled his cologne when at home. He was giving your space as you asked for. Part of you missed him, missed his always lingering presence & mischievous remarks, but you were still upset with him. You needed time to gather your own thoughts & feelings before you approached him.        

            When you did finally decide that you were ready to speak with him it was on a Saturday. You got dressed for the day, wanting to wear something light & airy for your walk through the woods. Roman’s estate was on the other side of the university, which meant a lengthy walk for you. But you were looking forward to it. It only meant that you would have more time alone with your thoughts as you trekked the three miles to his mansion & being in the midst of mother nature always helped keep you calm & in-tune with your feelings.

            It was early afternoon when you finally made it to the Godfrey estate. Your boots scrunched as they carried you across the expansive front lawn that felt almost larger than any national part in the country. You peered up at the gothic style mansion as it loomed over you. There were no cars in sight, not even Roman’s. Perhaps he wouldn’t even be home. But you still wanted to try.

            Knocking on the front door, you stood there for some time, gathering that no one was home, but just as you were considering leaving, the door opened with a groan, revealing an elder man in a suit.

            “Yes?”

            “Hi.” You smiled kindly, “Is Roman home?”

            The man eyed you curiously, “And who, may I ask, is asking?”

            “_____.” You told him, “A friend.”

            “I’m afraid Mr. Godfrey is out at the moment. If you would like, you may wait in the den here for him to return, though I can’t tell when exactly that’ll be.”

            “Oh. Okay.” It was only the afternoon. You had no obligations to make, & you did just walk three miles. A break would be okay. And if he wasn’t back by the time you thought it appropriate to leave, you would try again tomorrow.

            “Thank you, I’d like that very much.”

            The man nodded once before opening the door wider. You stepped inside & were reminded about just how simply you lived. You had never lived anywhere that had more than just a couple hundred square feet to it. You couldn’t even imagine living somewhere like this.

            “This way, Miss.” He guided you with his arm to a set of double doors off the foyer.

            Once opening them, he gestured for you to take a seat on one of the couches, “My name is Conway. If you have any questions, please, don’t be afraid to ask.”

            “Thank you, Conway.” You smiled up at him.

            “Before I leave, could I interest you in something to drink?”

            “Oh, no, I’m okay, thank you.”

            Conway nodded once before exiting the room, closing the doors behind him. The room was silent, save for the ticking of a grandfather clock in the corner. You sat still, taking in the room around you. It was beautiful, you had admit, what with the high ceiling & intricately detailed molding along the walls. You stared at the heavy looking desk, imagining Roman sitting behind it as he nursed a glass of scotch. You were unsure if that was anything he actually did, but you could see it.

            After a bit longer & with no sign of Roman, you decided to take a closer look. Trailing the length of the room, you eventually found yourself at the desk, overlooking the put-together items atop it. One item stuck out, though. You fingers the frame of the picture, recognizing only one of the faces in the family portrait. Roman was younger in the photo, not much younger than he was now, but still young. He stood behind a regal woman who sat before him, her hair long & dark. She had his same piercing eyes, though hers were dark. And on either side of her were two young girls. One with blonde hair who smiled sweetly, & the other with dark hair who kept her face hidden from the viewer.

            You were lost in thought, not knowing Roman had sisters as he never spoke about them, when you heard the front door to the mansion swing open followed by a resounding slam.

            “Conway!” It was unmistakably Roman’s voice.

            “Mr. Godfrey.” You heard Conway’s softer, more polite one through the wall. “You have a visitor.”

            A pause, then “A visitor?”

            “Yes, a Miss. _____.”

            It was less than a second later when the doors to the den burst open & Roman stood in the doorway, searching the room for you. When his eyes finally landed on yours, his eyes softened.

            “Roman.” You greeted. But he said nothing. He closed the doors behind him before quickly moving towards you. You didn’t have time to think or react before Roman had you gathered in his arms, hugging you close to his chest.

            You gasped softly at the unexpected bout of affection, but couldn’t be surprised at the same time that that was how he greeted you after respecting your boundaries for a week.

            “I missed you.” He breathed softly, his breath brushing the hairs at the top of your head.

            Your heart softened at that, leading you to wrap your own arms around him. It was incredible to you how in such a short amount of time, Roman had become someone you cared deeply about. At first he had been amusing to you, if only slightly annoying, but his persistence to become closer to you eventually won you over.

            He held on to you for some time, acting as if he was fearful of letting you go, that he would never hold you again, but you ran your hands up & down his back in reassurance. You weren’t going anywhere. Not unless he gave you another reason to.

            When he finally pulled away, he stared openly at your face, as if remembering every detail of it to lock & store away in the deepest recesses of his mind.

            “I’ve missed you, too.” You revealed. And you had. You weren’t lying. Couldn’t, honestly, even if you wanted to. You were raised to always be transparent.

            Your admittance sparked that charming smile he usually adorned to cross his handsome European features.

            “Come with me.” He exclaimed like a child excited to open a long-awaited gift.

            Unable to resist his childlike enthusiasm, you allowed him to lead you out of the den & through the many halls & rooms of the estate. You had no time to admire or inspect the details of the rooms before he led you to a set of glass doors. You peered up at him wondrously. He grinned down at you before pulling open both doors & gently pushing you inside.

            An amazed gasp parted your lips at the sight before you. Roman had brought you the estate’s greenhouse, & it was thriving with life. You stepped forward, running your fingers along the many different textures of plants & flowers, inhaling deeply the earthy, floral scent of the space. It was humid, as well, making you grateful you wore light clothing, but it too made you feel grounded.

            You glanced back at Roman, an elated smile on your face. He returned it, his eyes twinkling brightly.

            “It’s beautiful.” You commented.

            “It is.” But his eyes remained on you. You looked away. Roman Godfrey, the only person in existence who made you look away in embarrassment.

            “I’m glad you’re here.” He shared, walking further into the space, “I have something for you. Been wanting to give it to you ever since last week but you wanted your space so.”

            “Thank you, Roman.” You caught his eyes, “For doing that. It really meant a lot.”

            He nodded once, smiling softly.

            Turning away from you he leant over a table, his hands tangling among plants & flowers alike in search of something. You tried to peer around him, curious about what it was he was doing, but his large frame made it nearly impossible. And then he turned around. In his hands, he held the stems of many small, delicate white flowers, smaller than the palm of your hand.

            “It’s—”

            “Hemlock.” You finished for him, staring at the beautiful, yet deadly, plant with admiration.

            “Yeah.” He breathed out, grinning. “I remember you telling me about what the Worm Moon meant & I got to thinking about how all sorts of things could mean lots of things, things normal folk probably don’t even think about.”

            He handed you the hemlock & you accepted it gratefully as he continued, “So, I was doing a lot of reading one night, just reading about plants & whatnot & their meanings & I came across hemlock. I was especially curious about it’s meaning, ya know, considering the town we live in, & I learned that it means, actually, a lot of bad things, I guess you’d say. Stuff like poison, gloom, sorrow. But you know what I learned?”

            You knew what but you wanted to hear it from him, smiling up at him as he stared gleefully down at you, “Resilience. Potential.”

            You felt the butterflies return to your insides, fluttering around madly in there.

            “You were right.” Roman began, his hands cupping yours as you held the hemlock, “I don’t accept who I am. And the people of this town don’t either. Likely never will.” He chuckled lightly before continuing, “I’ve been ridiculed by them my whole life & I let it shape who I am. I let it control me rather than control it myself. But I’ve also survived this long. And…I believe I can be better, do better.”

            His eyes gazed adoringly into your own, “I have potential, _____. And you helped me see that.”

            “I know.” You cupped his cheek lovingly, “I’ve always seen it. It’s always been there.”

            You stared at each other for a moment longer before Roman finally leaned in, his lips capturing yours. You sighed into the kiss, feeling your body relax into his touch. So natural. So right.

            He kissed you for a moment longer, deepening it by cradling the back of your head. You opened yourself up to him, allowing him to feel you, mind & soul.

            Then he parted from you, his forehead resting against your own. You laughed lightly & he joined you. Your sweet, soft laughter filling the space.

            “Have dinner with me.” It wasn’t a question. And it didn’t need to be.

            Dinner was fulfilling. You were filled with good food & good energy. Roman held your hand atop the table the whole time as you ate & drank a few glasses of wine. The wine was far better than the beer you had a week ago. The night was coming to a close though, & you were sad that you would have to leave soon.

            Conway began clearing away your plates as Roman led you from the dining room & into the main corridor. You expected him to lead you to the door, but were surprised when he began leading you up the extravagant staircase.

            “Where are we going?” You asked, his hand gently guiding yours.

            “One more thing before you leave.” He smirked down at you.

            At the top of the landing, Roman led you down another corridor with many doors. You wondered how anyone could need so many rooms & what all they were for exactly. But your curiosity was redirected when Roman brought you to a door near the end of the hallway. He opened it & led you inside.

            You stared in mild awe at the size of the bedroom. And that’s all it was. A bedroom. Roman raised his arm in a grand gesture as you took in the floor-to-ceiling windows & the detailing on the ceiling. It was like a museum. Filled with beautiful, crafted pieces of furniture & the finest fabrics around the world.

            “What do you think?” Roman asked, smiling in anticipation.

            You marveled the room before returning his smile, “Beautiful. Again.”

            “I’m glad you think so.” He bit his lip, “Because it’s yours.”

            That made you stumble where you stood. You eyed him warily, waiting for him to say he was joking & that it was, in fact, his room. But nothing of the sort ever came.

            “What do you mean?”

            Roman gestured to the room again, “It’s your room. Now that we’re a couple, you can stay here. I mean, most nights you’ll probably be with me in my bed,” he chuckled at that, “but ya know, for when you want your own space.”

            Words evaded you. It was dizzying, everything Roman said. He was moving fast, too fast for your mind to keep up.

            “Roman, that’s not…” You frowned, shaking your head.

            He approached you then, gripping your hands in his, “What, what is it?”

            You gazed up at him forlornly, “I don’t need a room here—”

            “Well, that’s okay, you can just stay in my room then, I just thought that you—”

            “No, no, Roman, listen to me.” You stopped him, tightening your hold on his fingers, “I won’t be here that often. And we haven’t even discussed being a couple, I’m not even sure what that means exactly. Look, you’re moving fast. Really fast. Too fast for me. We just made up. And I feel I’m still getting to know you. I don’t, I don’t feel it’s necessary to rush.”

            “But… I love you.” He stared at you, his voice soft & low.

            Those words caused conflicted feelings with you. Love was a strong word. A big word. Not a word to be tossed around so easily. He was getting in over his head, again, & you needed to bring him back down.

            “You don’t love me.” You retorted as gently as you could, “You hardly know me.”

            “Don’t tell me how I feel.” His voice hardened suddenly, along with his eyes as his expression shifted to the one reminiscent of the night he got into that fight.

            “Emotions are high, okay? We don’t have to talk about this right now.”

            “Yes, we do!” He raised his voice, “I love you, _____, & you’re… I don’t know what you’re trying to say but all I hear is you not saying it back.”

            “Okay…” You responded calmly. You attempted to pull your hands from his but as you did he held them tighter. Your eyes flashed to his, “Roman, let me go.”

            “No.” Roman’s lips quivered, his nostrils twitching, “You’re staying.”

            He tugged you closer to him. You felt your body stiffen in response, your fight or flight kicking in.

            “Roman, stop this, now.” You struggled against his hold but he was much too strong for you.

            “Why are you trying to leave? Why are you always trying to get away from me?” His voice shook with that same rage you heard that night.

            “I’m not, Roman, stop! You’re starting to hurt me.” You gritted your teeth as you felt the bones in your fingers begin to grind against one another in his death group.

            “Hurt you?” He asked blasphemously, “What about me?! You’re hurting me!”

            “I’m not meaning to!” You cried out as he crushed your hands against his chest.

            “But you are.” His voice softened as he gazed down at you, “No more. No more hurting. I just want to change. And you’re the only one who can help me with that.”

            “And I will, but first you have to let me go.”

            Roman erupted with a roar as he yanked you forward before you fell to the floor. You managed to catch yourself on your hands but weren’t quick enough to get back on your feet before Roman was on top of you, crushing your front against the hardwood.

            “Roman, stop!” You pleaded with him but your words fell on deaf ears.

            He then kicked your legs apart, forcing one of them to bend upwards as he made room for himself between your legs.

            “I told you!” He yelled, one of his hands on the center of your back, forcing you stay down, “You’re staying!”

            “No, Roman!” Panic gripped your heart & yanked when you felt him gather the hem of your dress & bunch it around your waist.

            This wasn’t happening. This wasn’t happening! This was Roman! Soft-hearted, charming, & always making the butterflies in your stomach flutter. But they weren’t fluttering anymore. There were snakes in there now, & they were sinking their teeth in.

            You heard the clinking of his belt buckle as he fought to get his pants undone.

            Had you really misjudged his character? You knew he was strange, different, much like you, but you viewed those qualities as endearing. But the signs were all there. The following you around school, staking out in the woods at night as you milled about in your caravan, buttering you up with sweet words that anyone would fall for. Even his touches were gentle.

            You felt a prodding at your entrance, suddenly regretting your choice to never wear underwear, having found bras & underwear a pointless form of clothing. But even if you had, Roman would have surely torn the fabric to pieces.

            Roman wrapped an arm below your chest so he could capture your throat in his hand, stabilizing your struggling movement as he forced himself inside you.

            A pained yelp filled the room as he stretched you beyond comprehension. You had never been intimate with anyone before, taking the idea of having sex for the first time as a serious choice. You wanted to wait until you found someone who it felt natural being with, who you could be yourself with. And up until five minutes ago, Roman was looking to be that person.

But not anymore as he took it by force, causing the most horrid cries to erupt from you.

“I never wanted to hurt you.” He grunted in your ear as his thrusts tore you apart, “Never. I only wanted to make you feel how you make me feel.”

Tears cascaded down your cheeks, the burning of his assault spreading throughout your whole body. Never before had you felt more violated. Humiliated, embarrassed, ashamed, yes, but always from strangers who didn’t know any better or were too ignorant to care. But nothing ever like this. Not from someone who you felt genuine, real feelings toward.

And he was ruining everything.

His moans of pleasure were grating to your ears, a mockery of all the feelings & sensations you were forced to endure. His hold on your throat tightened, your air becoming restricted. You cried out but it was hoarse. You remembered the sounds the kid from last week had made as Roman held him against a tree, & wondered if he was as fearful for his life as you were in that moment.

“Ro—” You attempted to say his name but the lack of air only made it come out as a wheeze.

He continued to assault you, using your body as a means to show to prove to you his own twisted devotion. You felt him everywhere. His hands on your throat & hip, his chest flushed to your back, his thighs pressed harshly against your own. There was nowhere he wasn’t touching you, wasn’t hurting you in some way.

And even when it was over, when he grunted satisfyingly as he stilled above you, he was still hurting you. You knew, deep down, that the pain he caused you that day would never leave you.

When he rolled off you finally, having remained there for some time as you both caught your breath, you felt little comfort. Your world had crashed around you & were lying there in the ruins of it. But you needed to get up. You needed to get as far away from Roman as possible.

You winced quietly as you pushed yourself upwards, your arms shaking beneath you as you did. The pain Roman caused shot through you as you bent your legs, forcing a hiss to form between your teeth. The sound made Roman look in your direction.

He quickly moved towards you, his hand outstretched in concern but as he drew closer you slapped him. Hard. His face whipped to side, your handprint leaving a bright red mark on his cheek.

“Don’t touch me.”

It seemed as if, only then, it dawned on him what had just happened. He remained on his knees as he stared through you, his eyes watering & shaking, “I’m sorry…I’m so sorry.”

His apology meant nothing. Today was the last time you ever looked past his dangerous behavior.

Pushing yourself to your feet, you felt hot liquid ooze down your thighs due to the force of gravity. You didn’t need to look down to know what you would see.

Steeling yourself, you readjusted your dress until it covered your thighs, hiding the evidence of what Roman had done. Swallowing the dinner that threatened to come up, you limped away from Roman.

“_____.” He spoke after you, his voice wavering as he cried silently, “Please don’t leave.”

Ignoring his plea, you exited the room, leaning on the wall for support as you made your way to the stairs. Half-way down the stairs, you heard Roman behind you.

“I’m sorry!” He practically yelled, begging you to stay, “I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

Pausing on the stairs, you turned to face him one last time. You glared hotly at him, fresh tears blurring your vision, “Yes. You did.”

Your claim forced Roman’s own tears to spill down his cheeks.

Turning away from him with finality, you hobbled the rest of the way down. Conway appeared out of nowhere, eyeing you as one normally would until he realized your state.

“Miss?” The concern in his voice almost made you cry again, but you surpassed him, helping yourself to the front door.

“Mr. Godfrey, what happened?” Conway’s voice faded as you left the estate, the door left open behind you.

Gripping your abdomen, you willed yourself to make it all the way. You had to. After all, walking through the trees always brought you peace & that’s what you needed most off, even if your blood seeped from between your thighs & coated the earth.

But as you did, Peter’s parting words rang loud in your ears.

People here are not what they seem.

this is 5/10 requests from my 500 followers celebration request opening!

i am so so so so so so SO happy with this oneshot/request. i fucking LOVE roman & writing for him has been a dream come true. (also, the amount of times i accidentally types rafe instead of roman while writing this was ridiculous so if you spot any sneaky rafe's that i missed, please let me know lmao)

big shout out thank you to the anon who requested. anon, i hope you loved it as much as i did writing it, PLEASE be sure to let me know what you think.

as always, please drop a comment, reblog w reviews, or talk to me in the ask box so i can read your thoughts/feelings. they are my drug.

thank you for reading!

oona<3

Read this post on why doing more than liking a tumblr writers work is essential to our content creation.

[my love language is words of affirmation, it would make my day if you could comment your thoughts, reblog with tags, or drop an ask that shows your support. thank you for reading tumblr writers, we appreciate you]

taglist:

to be added to a taglist read rule 11 here. requests will be dismissed otherwise.

[sensei-venus]

Serpent-Cide (1/?)

(Unedited) (Reader secretly hates everyone, she just wants to go home. Number one #fuckthenorthsiders fan Reader. Reader is just a loner who tolerates everyone’s bs.)

(Part One|Part Two|Part Three|TBA|)

Reader didn’t want to think about school. She didn’t want to think about having to walk the halls along side the stuck up students. The cheerleader, jocks hell even the geeks of the school where assholes. It was like the north side was a target for producing shitty ass people.

Just about everyone in the whole town could be labeled a horrible person.

It was like they where breed here, raised here, meant to start a life long relationship with hurting others. Both physically and mentally, hell even emotionally.

Half of the kids at that school where skilled at emotional manipulation.

“Reader you will be assigned to the welcoming committee. You don’t have any community hours for this semester so this should give you quite a few. Make sure you meet in the hallway tomorrow morning, 8:00 sharp. The new transfer students from SouthSide High should be arriving by then.” One of the volunteer heads said. Reader slumped in her seat a little and rolled her eyes. Great, now she had to deal with not only the stuck up northsider kids but now the southsiders.

Moments later the bell rang for first period and everyone in the community room slowly started to leave. She waited a moment until just about everyone was gone. Slowly grabbing her bag from off the floor she made her way to class. The hallway was crowded as she maneuvered around the crowds of students. Flooded with kids, pushing and shoving each other.

The sound of something hitting lockers, hard, filled the hallway and made her look around. She pushed past the people around her. Hoping to just get to class. She didn’t need to get into anyone business, know anything she really didn’t need to. It would just be a reason for her to keep thinking about the people who lived, breath and love this shitty ass school. All she wanted to do was get to class.

Sadly her luck wasn’t on her side this time, it never seemed to be.

Her eyes caught the one and only Reggie Mantle as he shoved some poor kid face first into a locker. Their eyes only met for a moment before him and his friends went back to what they where doing. Messing with some bottom feeder kid who probably just looked at him wrong. The urge to just go the other way she came started to bubble into her gut. So that is what she did, turned right back around and went with the flow of the opposite direction of traffic. It would take twice the time to get to her class but she didn’t have to worry about bumping into that jerk. She huffed as she was shoved deeper into the crowed.

Why did this school always have to pull the worst shit over on her.

The next morning didn’t go as planned at all. The bus she usually took to go to school broke down and she had to walk. Instead of waiting around to get a ride she decided to just walk it. She ended up having to jog just to make it on time. All she needed was some stupid mark on her record for “trying to skip a volunteer credit” or something from the leadership board.

Huffing she enters though the front of the school where she was meet with a few different faces. Most of which made her even more exhausted then she already was.

Archie, Veronica, Betty and even Cheryl stud around the almost completely empty front hallway. It was almost as if half of the student body didn’t want to be around the southside kids. She kinda understood where they where coming from, then again she didn’t really care. Stereotyping a whole group of people they had never even meet before wasn’t really something she had hopes of doing. The southside was bad, shady and drug filled. But as long as these kids didn’t mess with her like the kids at this school, she would be ok with them.

Hopefully they would just cut her some slack and leave her alone for the rest of the year.

Or, her worst nightmare, they picked up on half of the schools ideals for bullying people, no matter who they where or what they did.

“Hey Reader you made it! I was scared you would have skipped the introduction.” Betty said in a whisper as they walked to a more casual spot in the hall. Reader just sighed, looking at the closed front doors of the school. She had to admit that her nerves where a little on edge. Being around people for her was hard, even people she knew. Betty was a okay person, a little preppy and a bit of a good girl but she was nice enough In Reader’s opinion.

She wouldn’t say they where friends per say but rather good acquaintances. They worked on a few projects together, sat with each other at lunch a few times, borrowed books from each other when they checked them out of the library. Nothing huge to make them good friends but decent enough that Reader didn’t see her as a issue to deal with.

“Stupid bus broke down and they wanted me to wait for a whole hour for another one to show up. All I need is that community leader to try and say I was trying to skip. It’s always something with this school…” she trailed off. Lazily she checked her phone, Betty only nodded saying “I get it…this school definitely sucks some times.” Reader snorted, sarcasm laced her voice “Puff that’s the fucking understatement of the century…” she pushed her phone back into her pocket. Betty only gave a small half smile before walking off to go see Archie.

For a good few minutes she just watched them. The two teens where talking about something and then Veronica joined them. She raised a brow as she glanced over at Cheryl who looked to be glaring at the other teens. It was funny to see the “Queen of the school” not be invited to their little party. Even if that party was three other people talking without her. Stuck up bitch. A smirk passed her lips for just a split moment.

Suddenly the door of the school entrance opened with a huge bang.

Some kids that were still in the hallway scattered at the mere sound, some from the sight of who walked through those big doors. The braver students stayed in their place, a hand full, mostly the jocks. They slowly started to creep up from the back of the hallways. Slowly inching closer and closer. Inching in towards new pray, or more like an even foe.

The southsiders were making their way into the northsiders territory and threatening their sickly little teen livelihoods. The big dogs were about to get pounced on by a whole bunch of serpents.

A whole herd of students walked through the doors, stomping up to the small group of teens. Reader was reluctant to join them, not because she was afraid of them or like most of the other kids still sticking around wanting to harass them. She just didn’t want to act like she was alongside any of these people.

She was quick to notice that one of the leaders was actually Jughead, which was a little shocking but not by much. Jughead was just as much of an outcast really as she was, maybe a little more popular seeing as he was Archie’s best friend.

The look on his face was insanely similar, mostly because it mirrored hers. The look of both boredom and disgust crossed his face quickly. As soon as he stepped close to Cheryl it seemed to double by ten folds. Out of nowhere, Reggie made his appearance from one of the hallways, a few cheerleaders and half of the team of jocks followed close by. He stepped up and stood behind Cheryl who only smirked at Jughead.

“Listen how about you and your little “serpents” go find another school to destroy. We don’t need your low IQ’s muddying up our school. We can only expect our test scores to start dropping dramatically in the next few weeks because of you and your little trailer trash bunch.” Reggie bowed up “Yeah and your little junkie friends. Bet we will start finding needs all over the hallways and burnt spoon in the trash cans.” Some of the jocks and cheerleaders laughed. Cheryl only smirked, her cherry-red lips only seemed to grow at the words.

Two of the kids behind JugHead almost growled at them, bowing up but then being held back by Jughead.

One was a girl, slight brown skin with long dyed pinkish purple hair with a serpent jacket on. It also my swamped her shoulders in the thick leather material. Her face was twisted up in a nasty scowl as Jug held her back.

The other person was a tall boy with black hair and a good-sized snake tattoo on his neck. Reader couldn’t help but look him over in curiosity. The tattoo stuck out to her as she scanned him over, the bob of his throat, the glimmer in his eye of pure hate. It was…interesting. She was glad that she stood off to the side. Maybe no one would notice her gawking at the bean stock of a boy- slash that, man.

Reader almost jumped a little when the boy broke free of Jugs arm. He marched up to Cheryl and Reggie and basically growled right in their face. Jughead was quick to grab him by the back of the jacket along with the help of the girl. Both of them use a good amount of strength to pull him back. It wasn’t easy as he fought back against their attempts to reel him back in. His height and weight alone kept him from even flinching at their pulls.

Lucky he seemed to calm only by a little and stepped back. He bared his teeth at them, almost in mocking and anger.

This did nothing to phase Cheryl and only made Reggie more riled up. One of his eyes twitched and a vain popped from under his collar. He stares all of the southside kids down, trying his best to some how intimidate them. Believing that somehow it was going to do something to them.

It failed miserably as the other southside kids held their ground.

“Love how I’m gone only a little while and I come back to this, the same loving treatment as before. Great job keeping your mutts in line Cheryl.” Jughead mocked with crossed arms. His gaze shifted from her to Archie for a moment. A look of displeasure corsages his face. Maybe even a hint of sadness threatened to form. But it was quickly gone within moments of appearing. Archie gave a small smile back hoping to show his feelings on the situation. Jughead seemed to take it with a grain of salt.

“Can we just stop fighting for once. We have to share our school and it’s only fair that we at least try and be civilized.” Veronica said getting between the two groups. She put both hands out to stop the two groups from getting any closer to each other. There was a small table a few steps over, she walked over to it and grabbed a few papers.

Looking them over before holding them up, she looked back toward the serpents. She cleared her throat saying “Over here you will find your class schedules, locker assignments, and a map of the school. We will also be assigning small groups of new students with some of our volunteer students. They will help you with any questions you may have about the school, show you around, and also help you figure out any resources you may need.”

There was some mumbling among the group.

Betty and Archie walked over to the table and grabbed some of the papers. Betty read over a few things on one of the pages. The other girl shoved a new paper into her hand making her roll her eyes. She looked it over and raised a brow.

“Are you sure about this?”

“Yep, it’s right there. Start grouping up after they all get their schedules.”

Suddenly Veronica’s gaze shifted over to Reader. She cocked her head to the side and just stared at her. Reader felt herself clam up a little.

This was definitely not going to be a day to go down into the good history of the school.

It was going to be a literal blood stain by the looks of it.

(Will be continued, will be cross-posting to AO3!)

[unserenedreaming]

on the "Sansa being the true loner of the Starks"

I just saw a post saying that Sansa is the 'odd one out' amongst the Starks because she's surrounded by her brothers and a tomboyish sister (Arya). It is true that she is surrounded by brothers and a sister who rejects the patriarchal roles of a woman (Arya) but she is by no means a loner.

The two other named young noblewomen in Winterfell are Jeyne Poole and Beth Cassel. Jeyne is the closest thing to a best friend for Sansa, while Beth is described more as a hanger-on than an actual friend. Jeyne strived to make Sansa happy, often at Arya's expense: Jeyne would often whinny like a horse or call Arya Horseface when Arya would walk by. When Mycah is unjustly killed by the Hound, Jeyne taunts Arya by telling her the Hound cut Mycah into so many little pieces that his own father assumed it was a bag of meat to eat. Jeyne Poole was the daughter of Winterfell's steward. Arya was the daughter of Lord Eddard Stark, Lord of Winterfell and Warden of the North. In my opinion, it is only by her close friendship with the other daughter of Lord Stark that Jeyne feels emboldened enough to make such a comment.

And then let's talk about Catelyn. There is no denying that Catelyn Stark loved each and every one of her children with the fury of a thousand suns. In fact, the older I get, the more I understand her (excluding her treatment of Jon which deserves an essay all on its own) She saw Sansa as the perfect daughter:

"Sansa was a lady at 3, always so courteous and eager to please. She will grow into a woman far more beautiful than I ever was, you can see that." These are words from Catelyn Stark about her elder daughter.

"Arya was a trial, it must be said. Half a boy and half a wolf pup. Forbid her anything and it became her heart’s desire. She had Ned’s long face, and brown hair that always looked as though a bird had been nesting in it. I despaired of ever making a lady of her. She collected scabs as other girls collected dolls, and would say anything that came into her head." These thoughts from Catelyn Stark about her younger daughter.

Sansa fit into the traditional patriarchal view of what a noble woman was supposed to be, which made her easier to manage for Catelyn. Arya does not.

The only person that Arya truly, honestly and deeply feels akin to is Jon. This is not me saying that the only person who loved Arya was Jon. Her family loved her deeply. But I am examining the POV of Arya and Sansa.

Arya loves and gets along with her siblings, but she is an outsider compared to them: they all have the red hair and blue eyes of the Tully's. Only Jon shares the looks of the Starks. This to me has always been the most obvious divide; the physical differences between Robb, Sansa, Bran, & Rickon and Jon & Arya. Jon and Arya have always relied on each other more than anyone else, pre-canon or into ADWD.

To wrap this rambling post up, I disagree that Sansa was considered an outsider/the odd one out in the Stark family. In truth, that position doesn't even belong to Arya, though she is the odd one out amongst the trueborn Starks. It belongs to Jon and Theon. Both are boys who desperately want to be Stark children but can never be, and their subsequent actions, both positive (Jon) and negative (Theon) are direct results of that desire and lack of result.

AND AGAIN, THIS IS NOT AN ATTACK ON SANSA. This is a response to a comment I saw from a (presumed by me) Stansa. Sansa absolutely deals with isolation in the series as the books goes on as a captive in Kings Landing. All the Starlkings do as they are separated across the continent and eventually Essos (Arya).

Anyways, hope this wasn't too much of a pain to read, I'm buzzed right now. Love Y'all.

[burnyouwithacigarettelighter]

(2) WHAT LOVE DID THEN, LOVE DOES NOW [r.l]

“Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.” — ‘wuthering heights’, emily brontë

pairing. rowan laslow x vampire!reader

warnings. swearing, mention of bullying, suggestiveness, spoilers for wednesday s1

summary. to convince the school you and rowan are dating, you have to do some… things

word count. 3.3k

>pt1, pt2, pt3

ii. 

To be honest, you actually don’t know much about Rowan Laslow. 

You don’t know anything about him. 

All you’ve ever heard were rumours. Rude connotations. Mocking assumptions. 

Cheeky notes written on the sticky passed around the class, every single eye poking Rowan Laslow, outcast, freak, loner, loser. He sits in the corner, by himself, and you don’t write anything on the sticky note. 

When you catch his eye, and the note makes its way to you a second time, you ball up the small square paper and throw it out. Your classmates stick their tongue out at you, murmuring ‘buzzkill’, and Rowan looks at you carefully. 

Consideringly. 

You look away. 

This is the extent of you and Rowan Laslow’s relationship. You’re two peaks on opposite sides of the world. The north and the south. Your lives are fundamentally different, and you never speak to him. 

Except that one time, that is. 

You’re on the roof. Weem’s doesn’t permit students up there on the rickety, old and decaying shingles, but it’s not like she can catch you. 

The worst thing she can do is, probably, maim you. Even then, you won’t die. 

Immortality, and all that. The blessing and the curse. 

It's a problem, but there are many times in your long, infinite life that you get like this. A pathetic moment where you contemplate the why, the how, and the what next. 

Contemplate your immortality. 

You’re on the roof, legs hanging over the edge, and you let this moment come. You think of the lives you’ve lived, the things you’ve done, the people you’ve met. 

To be honest, you’ve done everything. Maybe that’s why life has begun to lose its charm. 

More plausible than not, it's to do with the upcoming anniversary of your spontaneous “birth”, if you could really even call it that. You’d been “born” fully formed, already with perfect skills and perfect technique. 

You were like a product popped out of a machine. You were never young, and you never grew up. You weren’t raised; you weren’t even human, and you could never even begin to grasp the concept of that. 

There's no nowhere to go home to, and as long as you’ve spent in Nevermore, it still feels unfamiliar. You’ve spent three-centuries searching for home, and you don’t even know what it feels like. Sounds like. Looks like. 

You’ve done everything, but you don’t know anything. 

When it begins to rain, you lay down flat on the roof shingles. You close your eyes, and let the rain kiss your cheeks. The droplets start small, just teensy little things, and soon enough they’re large globs; a heavy downpour soaking you entirely. Your thoughts swim around your head, and you imagine they spill out your ears, carried away by the rain. 

Just when you’ve gotten content with the predictable pattern of raindrops — you don’t feel them anymore. 

Your closed eyes open, and the bottom of an umbrella covers your view of the clouds. You turn, following the direction of the thin hand wrapped around the umbrella handle, and see Rowan Laslow. 

He’s standing on the flat part of the roof, where it's all open space, radiators and the entrance back down. Laslow leans, arm outstretched to shield you from the rain. 

“Laslow?” You say, not getting up. You stare at his solemn face, his soaked hair and heavy shoulders. What business did he have up here, talking to you?

“[Last name].” He grunts out an acknowledgment, eyes falling away. Your gaze makes him nervous, and you retreat it back to the underside of his umbrella. “You’re going to fall.” 

Your back is still flat against the roof, your legs dangling off the edge. From his perspective, you look just about to die, the rain pushing against you.

“What’s it to you?” You say, closing your eyes again. You can certainly feel the rain dragging you down, but then again, no dice. You won’t die. 

(The blessing and the curse.

Maybe, it’s just a curse.)

Laslow is silent. You’d think he’d have already walked away if not for the umbrella still stopping the rain from pelting down on you. 

“I won’t die anyways,” You say nonchalantly, just to fill the silence. To make a point, your hands form a pillow behind your head. 

When his silence stretches on, you open one eye, and turn to see the annoyed way his face twists: lips curled in, bit through the teeth, eyes squinted. You outline the way his eyebrows knit together, jaw clenched. 

“That’s - not the point. Principal Weems is in the Quad,” he says when he notices your eyes on him. Laslow then sighed, looking rather pained at what he was about to say next, “and I would rather you not expose my hiding place.” 

This particular part of the roof overlooked the entirety of the quad, all the shrubs and statues looking like they were in a miniature sandbox from this birds-eye view. From up here, everything looked like nothing. Miniscule. 

You opened your other eye. “This is your hiding place? Nice taste, Laslow.” 

He frowned, brows knitted tighter. “Just - stop dangling your legs off the side of the roof.” He pleaded, painfully watching Weems beneath you two, making her rounds in the Quad.

“Alright, then.” You said, and turned your entire body the other way, legs hooking onto one of the shingles and leaving your upper body hanging off the roof. “Happy now?” 

You didn’t know why you were messing with him. It was rude, and you thought you weren’t one of those kinds of people; the kind who poked and prodded at Rowan Laslow, the kind who made fun of him for no other reason than existing.

He caught you in a bad mood, and that's not his fault, either. You suppose it’s yours, as you hang lifelessly off the roof, your fault that you get into these moods, your fault you’ve wandered aimlessly this entire eternity of yours. 

(Your fault you can’t seem to find a place you fit, anywhere on this planet, and even less in the one place you should.

You suppose Laslow shares the sentiment. Maybe, you’re doing this because he makes you nervous. The one person who’d get what you’re going through sobers you entirely, and you feel far too vulnerable.) 

His expression immediately grew alarmed. “Please —“ He shakily climbed up onto the shingles, “just, get up.” He whispered, face screwed together. 

“Please?” he keened, repeating himself. His tone, although the circumstance was one of desperation, made the heat rush to your cheeks. You blinked, and sobered immediately. 

“I - uh,” You felt your ears burning, and you slipped yourself back onto the flat part of the rooftop, pushing your hair out of your face, “sorry, Laslow. Just a practical joke.” You said, avoiding his eyes. 

After a moment, he let out an abhorred sigh — behaviour changing like a light switch from begging to annoyed — and lifted himself back up on two feet. “I don’t care what you do up here, just,” he pressed two fingers between his eyes, “keep your mouth shut.”

Your eyebrows lifted, disbelieving. “Whatever you say, Laslow. What’re you hiding from, anyways?” 

“It’s not any of your business,” He said prickly, before using his powers to create a bubble around himself. The rain avoided his general vicinity, and he then began pulling various homework out of his bookbag. 

“Well, fine, then.” Your eyes drifted away to Petropolus and Thorpe’s ant-like figures blurrily stalking the outdoor halls, skipping third period like both you and Laslow. 

The rain continued on heavily, and you and Laslow stayed quiet. Time burned like paper on fire between you two, and soon enough the rain began to clear. At the sight of the sun peeking through the clouds, you began to leave. You’d forgotten your sunglasses in your dorm, after all. 

However, Laslow suddenly spoke. “I’m… hiding from everyone else.” 

You stopped and turned to him. He was still focussed on his homework. 

“I'm a bother to everyone in class. Hell, I’m even a bother to my roommate.” said Laslow painfully, digging crescent shapes into his pale palms.

You let out an ungodly laugh. He glowered at you, hunching in on himself. 

“I’m not making fun of you,” you assured after composing yourself back into a monotone expression. “I just think that this whole situation,” you gestured to the both of you sharing the rooftop, “shows how un-bothering you are.” 

“Un-bothering isn’t even a word.” 

“Just admit it, Rowan. You don’t bother me, and you don’t bother anyone. You’re way too into your own head. If it’s any consolation, I think most of us are more bothered by ourselves. Our entire existence has called for a special “outcast” school.”

His eyes crinkled, looking up at you for a second, before pulling away. “Don’t - do that.” 

The sun filtered through the clouds, rays spilling onto his back, and you squinted. “Do what?”

“Don’t,” He pulled his knees up to his chest, abandoning the messily scrawled on paper, “don’t say those things. You’ll make me believe you.” 

“Maybe I want you to believe me. But fine.” You pushed your leaning body off the side of the roof edge, “Whatever you say, Rowan.”

-

“What you saw, Wednesday, was a…” Weems grimaced, “sudden… lover’s skirmish between two vampires. You’ve certainly seen a pair fanging so you know how violent and… lustful they can get.”

“Rowan isn’t a vampire.”

She sighed, “Rowan Laslow has since been turned. [Name] [Last Name] did so in the name of… love.”

“[Name] turned him? When?” 

“This is as much a surprise to me as it is to you. However, I am afraid I’m without answers, as I haven’t been privy to his turning until this situation arose. That does not mean you are to bombard these two with your questions, Wednesday.”

Since morning, this was the rough period of events: you and Rowan find out Wednesday — or, more precisely, Bianca Barclay — called the cops. 

This happens after you and Rowan appear in front of Principal Weem’s office, where, inside, Wednesday sat being interrogated by Sheriff Galpin and Weems. 

The dark Addams was in the midst of convincing the sheriff that Rowan went and got offed when the pair of you opened the door. Her mouth goes mum, face goes stiff, and her eyes go so wide you’d think she saw a corpse.

(Ha.)

Immediately, Sheriff Galpin dismisses Wednesday’s claims and exits the room. Weem’s smile is beatific, as always, and Wednesday looks like she wants to commit a murder-suicide. As always. 

Then, you and Rowan are beckoned over by Weems, and Wednesday is sent out to wait in the hallway. 

To make her long suffering lecture, aghast expressions and numerous, unashamed gasps short: she asks the nature of your relationship; you tell her you’ve turned him. Weems asks why; you pretend the two of you are so in love you wish you’d become conjoined. Without missing a beat, Rowan grins, his pearly fangs on display and nipping his tender bottom lip.

Cue another round of incredulous mouth opening and closing, like a fish. After several moments of doing so, Weems settles on a thin-lipped smile, sends you two back out, and beckons Wednesday in. 

Out in the hallway, Bianca Barclay had just been finishing a stilted interrogation with another officer who hadn’t gotten the memo. The normie officer looked off-put by Bianca’s necklace, nervously looking at it then back at her face, obviously worried she’d siren him. On the other hand, Bianca looked off-put by even the assumption that she would. 

When they wrapped up their terribly awkward conversation, the young siren breezed past the both of you, eyes trained on Rowan’s dull, brown fang bite on his exposed neck. Self consciously, Rowan turned the other way, hiding his scar. 

Overall, Rowan felt a great deal more self conscious about his appearance: besides the new fangs that he kept making the mistake of biting into his bottom lip, his neck and face were littered with thin, white scars. To top it off, your healed bite was above every collar on every shirt he owned. 

That then brought you to now, your ear pressed against the side of Weems' office door, right hand cupped around the shell to hear better. In comparison to your suspicious pose, Rowan leaned against the wall, hands wrist deep in the pockets of his purple Nevermore zip-up, begging he looked nonchalant rather than nervous.

After a moment of silence in Weems’ office, you heard two pairs of feet heading for the door. You scrambled to position you and Rowan in the chairs near her office, putting your hand into his own and tightening your grip.

“Do not bother this couple any more than you already have, Wednesday,” Weems warned. 

She then turned to you, “[Name], I believe you knew that turning others has been forbidden for the last two hundred years. This sort of behaviour is unbecoming of a Nevermore student, much less a vampire with centuries under their belt. But, nonetheless,” Weems looked at Rowan tiredly, “your father is without qualms, Rowan, so I suppose we must bid this matter adieu.” 

Without further warning, she disappeared back into her office. But before you and Rowan could leave, Wednesday locked onto you with her sharp, black eyes. She gave the impression of a hunter stalking its prey, inching closer slowly so as not to scare the two of you off.

“Rowan. [Name].” Wednesday acknowledged, gaze coursing over the both of you multiple times without blinking. Her eyes, then stopped on your hands curled against each other.

“[Name], you’re centuries old. No humans caught your fancy in that time - enough for you to turn them?” Wednesday looked you square in the face. “What’s so special about Rowan?” 

You turned to Rowan, who gave you an exhausted face, and pulled him closer to you. You rested those hands on his neck, and laid your head on his shoulder. “He kisses better than any eighteenth century prince,” you winked, a smile splitting your face in two, fangs glimmering in the light. “But most of all, he wanted it. Those pretty Romanian princes were too scared of my fangs after I told them.” 

Wednesday’s face twitched, the slightest semblance of emotion you’d seen in her face since she got here. “Pity for those princes. They’ve missed the opportunity of a lifetime.” 

You gave her a curt, tense smile. Her eyes thinned suspiciously at your expression, before she walked away, her large and clunky boots making clacks off the tile. 

After you saw Wednesday disappear around the corner down the hall, you immediately extracted yourself from Rowan’s body. “Sorry.” You said, seeing his frozen face. His eyes were wide and bug-like, like when he’d woken up in your dorm after being turned. 

Rowan quickly shook his head, regaining animation in his body. “No matter. It’s a rather smart plan, and although I detest it, you do have the reputation of being…”

“Slutty?”

“Romantic.” He rolled his eyes. “No one will question anything. This cover is perfect.”

Rowan had originally shied away from your every touch, but after you explained how the only way Weems - and everybody else - would believe the reason you turned him was by selling it with PDA, he reluctantly agreed. 

“But it’s not enough,” You said, wringing your hands together. 

“Practically having sex in public isn’t enough?” He lifted a brow. 

“Practically having sex in front of just Wednesday Addams and Principal Weems, yes.” 

You needed someone, someone who gossips like it's their fucking job, to see the both of you. 

…Like it’s their job?

“Bingo,” You said out loud. “We need Enid Sinclair to walk in on us doing… whatever nasty things the other fangs do, and let her spread the information like wildfire.”

Rowan grimaced. “God, Sinclair?” 

He, as a student of Nevermore, knew how gossipy she was. The both of you remember when Bianca Barclay said, and you quote, “Enid Sinclair gossips more than she fucking breathes.” A little mean, but not like it wasn’t the truth. 

“Do we have to?”

“Don’t worry, Rowan. I never kiss and tell.”

-

“Ground rules?” You said, messing up your hair and unbuttoning your shirt. 

“No taking advantage of the situation.” Rowan listed off. You ran a hand through his hair, mussing it up, before making his glasses askew, like you’d pushed them while making out. 

“No touching below the belt.” You said next, pulling up your uniform sleeves and undoing Rowan’s tie.

“And none of this takes any longer than needed.” He said lastly, throwing his loose tie on the floor. Then, he untucked his dress shirt. 

Your plan had been to makeout in the art supply closet, where you knew Enid regularly ventured, as she was making Ophelia Hall’s Poe Cup boat. After watching her for half a day, you found she’d come to the closet every four hours, give or take a few minutes. The rest of the plan came along smoothly, and there you two were, waiting for her in the closet. 

The art supply closet was a small, tight one, and it certainly wasn’t meant for two people. This was evident when you and Rowan were forced to stand flush against each other. Your breath fanned on his neck merely from talking, and Rowan’s hands were barely able to rest at his sides. His arms were long, longer than yours at least, and you could feel them hovering around your thighs. 

You shook yourself of such thoughts, and distracted your mind by patiently waiting until the both of you heard Enid’s humming voice and tittering steps reach the door. 

Like a director had said action, the two of you immediately started on eachother. Your hands ran through Rowan’s hair, planting your lips tentatively on his cheek, angled in just the right way so it looked like you were kissing. His skin was cold to a touch, and you could feel him flinch as you tugged lightly at his brown locks.

Meanwhile, his fingers curled around your belt loops, both hands pressing against your waist and lifting you up ever-so slightly. His grip pulled your body closer to his own, and you could feel yourself breathing heavier with his every touch.

The door opened, and Enid’s humming immediately stopped. You both looked her way, performing the unapologetically vampiric attitude towards sex and relationships: without a care. 

“Hi, Enid,” You said, eyes thinned, a dizzy and fanged smile on your lips. 

“We’re busy, Enid,” said Rowan emphatically, who was convincingly pretending to be annoyed at the interruption. 

“Oh! I - didn’t know you were -“ Enid blinked several times. “Sorry!” She said, skittering off, presumably to spread the rumours like you’d intended. 

As soon as she left, you extricated yourselves from one another. Rowan’s hands left your waist, and your fingers extracted themselves from his soft, brown hair.

Enid, having left rather quickly, also left the door open, and fresh air filled the room. The both of you felt you could breathe again. 

You fanned your face, still warm from the… things you two had to perform, while Rowan looked similar, his ears and neck flushed red and sweating. 

“I wasn’t that bad, was I?” You said, trying to lighten the awkward mood. 

Rowan’s nervous face broke into a breathy chuckle, “Oh, you so were. What was with the,” he pointed up to his messy hair, “hair tugging?”

You snorted, “It’s a… makeout thing. I don’t know, it just… came to me in the moment.” 

Rowan lifted an eyebrow in disbelief, face mocking. “Really? And I suppose you've had a lot of experience with “makeout things”?”

“Oh, shut up. I could say the same about you and my belt loops!”

His face immediately burned bright red, the cool air not helping him at all. “I - it wasn’t - I didn’t mean - anything by it, it was just…”

“A makeout thing?”

Rowan threw his hands up in the air. “Fine. You win.” He then stalked out of the dim closet. 

From behind him, you grinned, cheshire. “You said it first. Hey, wait for me!” 

[lulu2992]

Uncovering the unreleased Far Cry 5 in-game Encyclopedia

The almost complete but unused in-game encyclopedia, reconstructed thanks to the oasisstrings file.

Please note that it’s still cut content, so some information might not be relevant anymore.

You can read the oasisstrings file here. Pictures from this encyclopedia were also extracted and posted by @xbaebsae here.

Part 6: Characters

Aaron "Tweak" Kirby

Uppers, downers, sideway-ers... Tweak is all about pushing the limits of the human condition.

Adelaide Drubman

A confident go-getter with deep pockets to do whatever she wants, like living with booze, bazookas, and boy toy Xander Flynn.

Bo Adams

A hardcore survivalist that chooses to live out in the woods and off the grid.

Boomer

A scruffy pal with unparalleled loyalty.

Cameron Burke

A U.S. Marshal with an agenda. The only thing standing between him and his political aspirations is the Project at Eden's Gate.

Casey Fixman

A grill cook with a classified past. Most locals don’t believe his outrageous war stories or the wisdom he serves up with every order.

Chad Wolanski

A self-styled prepper chef who sells food out of his food truck since his restaurant "The Grill Streak" burned down.

Dr. Charles Lindsey

A veterinarian drafted into service as a medic. There's no one else to do it, and aren't we all animals?

Cheeseburger

Orphaned as a cub and raised by Wade Fowler, he's the star attraction at the F.A.N.G. Center. He loves eating cheeseburgers.

Clutch Nixon

A legendary stuntman who left this world the way he entered it: Face first onto a pile of rocks.

Dave Fowler

Wade Fowler's brother, he runs the business end of the F.A.N.G. Center.

Richard "Dutch" Roosevelt

An old prepper who'd worked himself to the bone and lost everything even before Eden's Gate came to town. Same shit, different horse.

Dylan

(no description found)

Eli Palmer

A bonafide prepper and the leader of the Whitetail Militia. He helped Eden's Gate design their survival bunkers before he wised up.

Faith Seed

The Siren in the East. The youngest in the Seed family pacifies unruly followers to make way for the Collapse. Some believe she's only an illusion.

George Wilson

George is a Whitetail Militia and baseball enthusiast, but spends most of this time as a lookout because of his age.

Grace Armstrong

A medal-winning shooter and army sniper with a vendetta against Eden’s Gate.

Guy Marvel

A genius movie director envisioning a masterpiece of anarchy and gold statue wins. Even an auteur needs help to make movie magic.

Deputy Joey Hudson

One of your fellow Hope County Deputies who has absolutely no time for bullshit and has the fists to back herself up.

Hurk Drubman Jr.

His wit and intellect may have been blunted by paint huffing, but that hasn't stopped him from living a life of adventure.

Hurk Drubman Sr.

A retired oil baron who is the undisputed master of his domain... what's left of it after the divorce.

Jacob Seed

The Soldier in the North. The eldest Seed brother serves Joseph by creating the army that will defend the Project with their lives.

Pastor Jerome Jeffries

The local man of God who will do whatever it takes to protect the people of Hope County – even if it costs him his soul.

Jess Black

Dutch’s niece. Jess is a loner who nearly lost her life in Jacob's camps, only to discover a new talent in the process: killing Peggies.

John Seed

The Baptist in the West. The youngest of the Seed brothers, John is in charge of reaping the land of supplies that will help the Project survive.

Joseph Seed

The Father. The middle Seed brother heard a Voice that told him to initiate a great Project, to prepare for the Collapse of everything. And so he has.

Kim Rye

A world traveler who chose Hope County to put down roots, and those roots are on the way - she's in her third trimester.

Larry Parker

Genius or crackpot? Science will decide.

Mary May Fairgrave

The tough-as-nails barkeep who blames Eden's Gate for the death of her parents.

Merle Briggs

A local prepper. Merle could talk your ears off about his dream bunker, or the shelf life of canned goods.

Wilhelmina Mable

Wilhelmina Maybelline, big cat whisperer and taxidermist. The well-being of Peaches the cougar is her top priority.

Nadine Abercrombie

The last living member of a family of hoarders, though she considers herself a collector. Much classier than simply hoarding. And more selective.

Nancy

(no description found)

Nick Rye

The best dang pilot in Hope County. Give him a chance and he'll put on a show.

Peaches

The long-time pet of Miss Mable. Probably named for the color of her fur and not the sweet disposition she lacks.

Deputy Stacy Pratt (yes, his first name is actually spelled Stacy in the files)

One of your fellow Hope County Deputies who’s a good cop when his ego doesn't get in the way.

Dr. Sarah Perkins

A lone biologist determined to unravel the mysteries of how Jacob's Judge wolves are created.

Sharky Boshaw

A wanted arsonist, Charlemange Victor Boshaw IV hides out where he can live his fire-blazing, rockstar fantasies.

Sherri Woodhouse

She gave up city life, opened a fishing store, and began the hunt for her family’s missing legendary whiskey.

Skylar Kohrs

A high-powered expert fly fisher hell-bent on landing a legendary fish.

Tammy Barnes

Once a homemaker, now the chief interrogator for the Whitetail Militia. They say her marshmallow blondies are to die for.

Tracey Lader

A woman determined to bring down Eden's Gate, especially Faith. They used to be friends and the sting of betrayal fuels her wrath.

Virgil Minkler

A trusted mayor for the past 7 terms, now hell-bent on stopping the production of Bliss after it took the life of his son.

Wade Fowler

The co-owner of the F.A.N.G. Center, an animal rescue facility that takes in orphaned wild animals.

Walker

A member of Eli's Whitetail Militia.

Wendell Redler

He made it through Nam with his buddies. Now he’s an old man, his buddies are gone, and this is not the America he fought for in his youth.

Wheaty

The smart-ass quartermaster for the Whitetail Militia who also has a radio broadcast to counter the Father's propaganda.

Earl Whitehorse

The devoted sheriff of Hope County. He believes delivering justice with a gun should be a last resort. On the eve of his retirement, duty calls.

Willis Huntley

Just a man in love with the good ol' US of A.

Xander Flynn

Left California for Hope County to detox from the city life. Ended up finding "modeling" gigs at the Drubman Marina, and a cult cramping his style.

Zip Kupka

A self-proclaimed conspiracy "realist" who finds a new reason to hate the government with each passing day.

There were three more:

Coyote Nelson

Fishing is life.

In the files, Coyote Nelson is the name of the fisherman you meet at fishing spots.

Morris

A bright kid of Blackfoot heritage and the go-to person for all things computers and arcade machines. He keeps it on the down low.

The character’s full name apparently is Morris Aubrey. He’s the person who’s always near Far Cry Arcade machines and telling you how “awesome” the game is.

Scooter

A supply runner for the Whitetail Militia.

All I know about Scooter is that, according to a deleted mission objective, this character (who was also cut) was supposed to be escorted to the Wolf’s Den at some point.

[tvckerwash]

Alright I want to expand more on this reply and this reply I wrote because I was cooking and these thoughts are so good they deserve a whole post dedicated to them (this post will make more sense if you read those two posts I linked first btw, but it’s not 100% necessary lol).

I believe Wash’s role in Project Freelancer was to see what kind of impact a hyper-competitive, heavily individualistic focused environment would have on an individual who has previously been deeply embedded into the forced collectivist assimilation seen in the military, and vice versa; What kind of impact an individual of Wash’s inherently outgoing and collaborative temperament would have among a group of hyper-competitive, introverted loners.

Wash really stands out to me because he seems to outright refuse to compete with the other Freelancers. I mean, admittedly, all the guys in pfl come off as significantly less competitive than the women (which is its own can of worms), but Wash is the only Freelancer who shows no competitiveness period.

North for example, was not happy about Carolina showing up at the oil platform and voices as much to South. I think North’s displeasure is directly related to pfl’s competitive nature, because normally when you’re outnumbered and outgunned—As he and South were—You’d be very glad for reinforcements. So logically, North being upset about Carolina showing up must be because it will reflect on them poorly. 

Maine and Wyoming are characterized as sore losers—They were so pissed about Tex handing their asses to them that they were willing to seriously injury, if not outright kill her, by using live ammo and live grenades in a training exercise.

York’s competitiveness is portrayed in a similar vein to North’s, as in it’s very subtle. York was just as frustrated as Maine and Wyoming were, and I don’t see another reason for why he’d force himself to leave medical early after having a grenade blow up in his face beyond the longer he’s off the roster, the further down the board he gets.

We don’t see any type of competitive behavior like the examples above from Wash throughout the entirety of the flashbacks, but we do see a different type of behavior from him.

Project Freelancer creates an environment that is trifled with animosity, exclusion, and favoritism, and while The Director is able to fool the other Freelancers into perpetrating this behavior among their ranks, he isn’t able to fool Wash into it—In fact, Wash refuses to tolerate it, and he actively fights against it everywhere that he can.

When Ct is beating herself up over a failed mission, Wash is the one that goes to comfort her, and what kind of language does he use to do so? Language that avoids pinning the blame on Ct alone and instead puts it on the whole team. “It wasn’t your fault, Connie.”, “So the ball got dropped, we were all there.”, “Everyone make mistakes.” 

When Maine and Wyoming bring out the live ammo, and York gets injured because of it, everyone else is mad at Tex. But Wash? He’s pissed at Maine and Wyoming, it was their choice to use live ammo that lead to York’s injury, so he expects them to get punished for it—And he’s rightfully baffled at The Director’s refusal to do so.

When York shows up for the heist, Wash makes a point to approach Carolina about it. He understands that she doesn’t want to appear weak and unsure of herself in front of The Director, and that she doesn’t want to give her teammates any more reasons to dislike her than they already do. By approaching her first, he’s able to give her an out if she chooses to do so—And if she had agreed York wasn’t ready, then it’s Wash who York can blame for it.

Wash recognized almost immediately that Tex was going to get the brunt of the team's anger and outrage over York’s injury, and he makes sure to let everyone know that she likely kept him from getting killed. He also recognized that she was being set up to be excluded from the rest of the team, so the very first thing he did when he got a moment alone with her was reach out by making friendly small talk, trying to establish a connection so that Tex could use him as an entry into the team's inner dynamic. 

Now going back to the blurb I opened this post with, I ask these questions:

What would Wash—As someone who sees himself as one part of a bigger whole—Be willing to do in order to appease the people around him? What actions would he take to try and lower the mental burden that such a competitive and inherently hostile environment would put upon his teammates?

The answer? I think Ct puts it very well with this line:

“Some of us very specifically make mistakes, and some of us don’t seem to make any mistakes at all.” 

This line is meant to be seen as half Ct calling Wash out on his bullshit, and half her being genuinely upset over Carolina’s status as ‘Ms. Perfect’, because in Ct’s mind, Wash and Carolina are very much two sides of the same coin; Intentionally making mistakes that don’t get you or your teammates killed requires the same level of skill and attention to detail that it would take to avoid making any mistakes in the first place. This is why Wash’s talk about them being a team makes her so angry, and why she sees it as him trying to make excuses for her: There are no excuses for fucking up when you work with people who have to intentionally choose to make the same mistakes that you unintentionally do. 

uuuhhhhh idk how to end this post but I really love looking at Wash through this lens because it speaks volumes about him, and it adds so much more complexity and nuance to his already incredibly layered character. 

[ga-yuu]

Things we learn about Rikka...

These are all the facts I learned from reading his past story with Tamamo and 1st chap of Ibuki and Kurama sequel. Rikka route isn't out yet btw. I'll keep releasing new facts and cute moments as I read the next chaps of Kurama and Ibuki's sequel.

Rikka and Tamamo were best friends. Their friendship started even before they were known as some of the strongest demons of Japan. Tamamo knew Rikka since he was a kid. So it looks like Rikka is younger than Tamamo.

Rikka is from the Yukijoro clan. There are basically different clans within the Otherworld/Demon world. There is the Fox clan, Oni Clan, Tengu clan (which doesn't exist now) and now the Yukijoro clan consisting of Yuki-onnas.

Rikka is basically the male equivalent of Yuki-onna. In the Yukijoro clan, it's all women. These Yuki-onnas, go to human village, find a man to have sex with, gets pregnant, gives birth to a baby girl and comes back to their clan. Sometimes, some of these Yuki-onnas would even kill the men they had sex with by freezing them to death.

Within the Yukijoro clan, like I said consists of only females, but every 100 or 1000 years, a baby boy could be born. There is no guaranteed, but a chance. That's how Rikka was born. Rikka doesn't seem outcasted by his clan, he's more of a loner and an introvert. Also unlike Yuki-onnas who's only mission is to trap men, have sex with them and get pregnant, Rikka's mission is something else. We don't yet know what it is.

Tamamo only knows very little about Rikka. He only knows what Rikka tells him and nothing more. Tamamo also doesn't want to look into Rikka's business because Rikka has a habit of disappearing without giving a word. So he fears that Rikka might disappear on him forever if he were to look into Rikka's business.

Tamamo was also feeling exhausted and wanted leave his clan. So he asked Rikka if he wanted to run away with him so they can be with each other forever. Rikka, at that time, rejected the idea because he cannot seem to let go of his duties and missions unlike Tamamo. I didn't get this part!

When Rikka tries to say goodbye, meaning that this will be the last time they meet, Tamamo held him back saying that he didn't want Rikka to say 'goodbye'.

After meeting with Tamamo, when Rikka returns to his clan, which is on the north most side of the Otherworld map, one Yuki-onna, who was hired to keep an eye on Rikka saw Rikka meeting Tamamo. When confronted, the Yuki-onna suggested that they must team up to kill Tamamo, Rikka threatens her with a smile - "Try it, I dare you. If anything happens to Tamamo, I'll freeze the whole world." (I think Rikka really loves Tamamo. I think he's bisexual)

In the sequel prologue, we see Yoshino run towards the Shogunate because there is a meeting among the SHogunate members, the Rebel members and the Imperial Court trio. While running, suddenly from the corner of her eye, she noticed something black in the dark alleyway. She noticed a man sitting with his head down. Thinking that he might be sick she approached the man to help him. That man was Rikka. Yoshino was stunned by his beautiful face and Rikka touched her with his cold fingertips. Rikka was sitting in the shade because he couldn't handle the summer heat. Rikka thought that Yoshino approached him to have sex with him and Yoshino denied it immediately. After making sure he's all right, she walks away quickly.

Rikka on the other hand, remained in that alleyway and smiled while watching her go. The rest of the prologue is not changed.

Later in Kurama and Ibuki's sequel chap 1, after the whole meet and greet with the hentai monster and getting hero's might, the whole gang were walking through the forest towards the Shogunate to plan out their next move. Suddenly the surroundings became all foggy and Yoshino gets separated from the rest. Ofc guess who catches her? It's Rikka.

Rikka hugs her without her permission and Yoshino's body was feeling all cold. Because Rikka is cold. Rikka apparently doesn't know what 'giving someone some space' means because he was touching her cheeks and was checking her out.

On the other hand, the male leads realised that Yoshino was mission and Ibuki sensed a demon's presence. Soon they all started feeling cold and Tamamo feels a snowflake on his cheek. The fog starts to disappear and the male leads found Yoshino walking towards them with a man hugging her from behind. lol

Tamamo recognised Rikka and Rikka also recognised Tamamo. Tamamo thought Rikka was dead, but apparently Rikka went into lockdown for 100s of years and he came out because he missed Tamamo. So he came all the way to the human world despite the heat and found Yoshino in the streets. He realised that she had Tamamo's scent on her, so he followed her and found Tamamo.

Rikka was quiet jealous that Tamamo made many friends while he was in lockdown.

Tamamo explained everything that's happening and Rikka asked if Tamamo really wanted to help humans? Tamamo said yes, because he thinks the other male leads as his friends. Hearing that Rikka decides to join them and give them a helping hand. We don't know what are his intention behind this.

Everyone was suspicious about Rikka but since he was Tamamo's friend and keeping a demon under a close eye is better than having him do whatever he wants somewhere else, everyone agreed to bring him to the OKURA PALACE HOUSING COMPLEX, rent-free.

As soon as Rikka entered the Shogunate, he rushed to the shadiest corner of the meeting hall because he feels hot and sits there. Tamamo also joins him happily and everyone decided to leave Rikka in Tamamo's care because Tamamo knows him better.

Rikka is cute man!

[leohtttbriar]

been thinking more and more about this illustration of jadzia dax as a cowboy and how westerns are about loneliness and how big the world is and how scary everything can be, but the best ones are actually kurosawa-remakes about weird-loners taking care of people in only the weird-ways they know how---and how if jadzia were in such a film, her ways of caring would be extra weird. for a western. and i produced this tall-tale while imagining her in a poncho.

knees in the saddle and a seat in the sky (ao3 link)

Dry air only hurt when you breathed.

Perhaps Jadzia could hold herself closed, wrap herself up in all the necessary layers and feed a water-mister through her nostrils, directly into her lungs, so her chest would stop cramping and her mouth would stop hurting. It was a possible option for her, if boring. She would keep considering if for as long as she worked in the endless aridity of Bajor’s ancient desert mountains, with only a simple bandana for protection.

And for now, for this morning, with the air so cool, she could mistake the dry for something else—something more invigorating.

It was a fresh morning: a gray dawn shedding the layers of dark as the planet turned into daylight. The path she walked was hardly still but there was almost a pretense of stillness, as if all the creatures who moved among the shrubs and burrows and sandstone were aware of the delicacy of transition. From full night to full day, Jadzia started her work in the in-between.

She hiked along the well-trod path, tamped down first by animals and exploited now by Jadzia and her research. Then, at the small marker she had left on the trail months ago when she had first been dropped off in the middle of this nowhere-everywhere, she turned into the brush, stepping as carefully as she could to keep the places where he boots fell a minimum. Despite her devotion to cautious preservation, she let her fingers drift over the soft fuzz of the emerald-y flowers, blooming like a storm, and closed her eyes briefly, tipping her nose up in the daylight.

She climbed across several foothills, scanning the area for shifts in the pattern or light gleaming off objects in a way it shouldn’t. All she saw was much the same as the day before. Eventually she reached her destination.

Along the southern reaches of the Tanis Canyon plains, before the world burst into mountains, a long stretch of fencing ran east to west. With a Cardassian-designed netting and pinched-wires, the fence was littered with the corpses of animals used to roaming the plains freely, caught in the thin and sharp lines of fence no one used anymore. It had been abandoned long before the Bajorans successfully ousted the Cardassians, and its remoteness left it further forgotten still. One of Jadzia’s many self-appointed duties in the area was to dismantle the fence. She slid gracefully down the final slope to the empty buff and found where she had left off the week before, pulling out her pliers and magnetic-disabler.

The dust kicked up as she walked forward and crouched by the fence-post. She tucked her bandana tighter around her face and bent to her work.

The rough-shod agriculture of the Occupiers had left what was once fallow-soil a crumbling and delicate layer of sediment. Any rain that fell obliterated the earth, washing everything into the canyon, leaving behind a vast expanse of use-less powder. Any life found was that of a traveler or a desperate scavenger, making their way from the highlands of the south to the wetlands far in the north.

Jadzia turned on her magnetic-disabler and began the painstaking work of untying the sharp netting from the post, rolling it up, and removing it from its stake in the ground. Each piece on each post had to be untied individually and could only be worked on so far as the magnetic-disabler’s field extended. It was boring and solitary work—a kind Jadzia hadn’t been used to since she was joined—but she performed it as best she could.

As rough and lonely as it was, she had seen no sky bigger than this one on the edge of the plains. It was a comfort for all that she hid under her hat to avoid its great glare. You couldn’t be truly alone with a sky like that.

Her thighs were aching and her fingers were cramping by the time she started on the fourth post, several hours later. But before she could untie the first knot, a shadow appeared over her hands. She startled and looked up.

“Have you forgotten to eat again?”

Kira had arrived. Next to her was her mount, Rabu, a palukoo-deer—the gray-green ungulate native to the desert plains, antlers curling over her flopping ears and framing Kira’s shoulders with their moon-blooms (closed now in the day), her large angry blue teeth dropping out of her mouth, her nearly two-meter legs restlessly pawing at the sand. They were long domesticated creatures, the first people in the region having befriended them for their scavenging abilities many millenia before, but Kira’s friend was a special sort, reared by Bajorans but left in the wilderness very young by the Occupiers, and so was very touchy and serious for such a pack-oriented animal.

Kira raised her eyebrows, waiting for Jadzia’s answer.

“…No,” said Jadzia.

Kira tilted her head in doubt, knelt in front of Jadzia and pulled her bandana off her face.

“Say that again.”

Jadzia rolled her eyes but didn’t bother trying to lie. “Curzon Dax was an excellent liar, you know,” she said.

“So why aren’t you?” asked Kira with a small laugh.

Jadzia shrugged, glancing out at the endless solitude of desert. “Some things stay the same.”

“Thank the prophets,” said Kira, though Jadzia couldn’t tell what she meant by it. “Now come on. I think you’ve done enough for today. You can’t leave your cats and lizards to fend for themselves and you can’t protect them without a midday meal.”

“They’re not my cats and lizards,” said Jadzia, getting to her feet and stretching her stiff legs. “They’re their own people.”

“They’re animals.”

“You’re an animal.”

“So I’ve been told,” said Kira with a grin.

“You’re jealous then,” said Jadzia, lightly. She helped Kira tie up the dismantled netting and posts in the wagon tied to her deer.

“Jealous?”

“Of how cute they are,” said Jadzia, pushing her hat back to let a rush of air cool her hairline and forehead. “Of how captivating they are. The whole ecosystem. Cute.”

“No one in the history of Bajor has ever called guerto lizards cute.”

“I can’t accept that, Major.”

Kira tried to pout at the title but gave up and held her cupped hands out to hoist Jadzia up onto Rabu. Then she pulled herself up in front of Jadzia, twisted the reins in her hands, and set off for the settlement.

“Can’t you go faster?” asked Jadzia, squeezing Kira’s hips for emphasis.

Kira laughed and then nudged Rabu into a run. Jadzia gasped, as always, with delight, and wrapped her arms around Kira’s waist. The dry air and the dust seemed to fade as they sped across the land, the feel of the moon-deer’s strides ricocheting through Jadzia’s sore body, Kira’s iron-y scent splashing over her. For a moment, the dearth of the soil slipped from Jadzia’s anxious mind.

Kira urged Rabu to slow as they neared the Bajoran settlement, the smallest and most remote one in the Tanis region. Several streams of farmers were making their way into town for lunch, equal parts laughing and exhausted. Kira guided them through the sparse crowds easily, stopping to drop off the fence-pieces at the local Province Engineers’ lab, and then taking Rabu to a feeding and watering well near the diner.

Jadzia slipped off the deer and made her way to Rabu’s head quickly, before the creature got distracted by the feast of dried fish-meat waiting for her.

“Here you go, sweet thing,” murmured Jadzia, spreading her palm on Rabu’s furry cheek and pulling out a few syrup stones she’d gathered from high-up in the mountains. Rabu opened her indigo-maw and snatched up the treat, twittering happily while Jadzia beamed.

“You need to stop spoiling her,” said Kira, hands on her hips.

“I will stop the second you actually want me to,” countered Jadzia, wiping the palukoo-deer slobber from her hand onto her grimy vest.

Kira blushed and Jadzia, somewhat overwhelmed at the sight, turned away towards the diner.

“I hear they’ve made fried river-kelp cakes today,” said Kira, catching up to her. “Have you tried them before?”

“I haven’t,” said Jadzia. “You got my list?”

“Of course.” Kira patted her pocket where she kept a small book of notes—mostly small reminders to herself to keep her busy schedule from crumpling under its own weight, but in the back, on a couple splattered pages, she’d added: Dax’s Bajoran Cuisine. She’d started it as a joke after Jadzia got lost trying to explain everything she liked about Bajoran food since Starfleet had arrived on planet and she mentioned wanting to keep a spreadsheet of all the new things she had tried. Kira had produced her faithful notebook and now it was nearly a year-long tradition to eat her midday-meals with Kira while Kira notated what Jadzia ate.

They stamped their feet on the wooden steps to the diner, trying to rid themselves as much as they could of the sprawling desert dust, before swinging through the doors and pushing their hats back to their neck upon entering the shade. The room was crowded with tired workers—scientists, farmers, diplomats, soldiers—and the bar was even more so. Kira forced her way to an empty corner of the bar and Jadzia followed, desperate for something strong.

“Nerys!” They turned. Shakaar was near the front of the diner waving his long arm over the crowd. Kira nodded at him, said, “I’ll be right back,” before making her way back through the room.

Jadzia settled against the bar, content to wait for Kira before ordering, pushing the loose strands from her braid back over her head and allowing herself a moment of rest.

The moment didn’t last long.

“Hey, Starfleet.” It was one of the diner’s regulars. An engineer—formerly of Kira’s old resistance cell—who spent his days trying to restore the moisture-generators in a thankless and helpless task bound to make anyone bitter the rest of their waking day. That his bitterness was consistently directed at Jadzia was…her burden to bear, she supposed.

“Druner,” she said, keeping one elbow on the bar and turning enough to acknowledge him but not enough to invite him. A couple of his buddies were behind him, covered in mechanical-grease and smelling of goat-shit. They must have been working near the old dairy pastures.

“Found anything useful yet in the mountains?”

Jadzia fiddled with the frayed button-holes on her sleeve cuff. She could tell him about the little river of lichen that was breaking down iron deposits in the stone, leaving freshly-freed metal droplets, encased in keratin, gleaming greenly in the red dirt, feeding the flying desert rodents and giant bajoran-caterpillers, who in turn spread base-metals and other nutrient rich stones just under the duff layer of mountain soil. But she knew this wasn’t the sort of thing he wanted to hear. Instead she gave him a smile and said, “Everyday.”

“Bullshit,” he laughed. His buddies laughed with him. “When you gonna help out with the real work?”

“I am doing real work,” said Jadzia, calmly. “I’m doing what I’ve been ordered to do.”

“Starfleet needs to get its priorities straight.”

“You’re normally not this direct, Druner.” Jadzia raised her eyebrows, keeping her tone light. She could tell their conversation was attracting more attention than any one conversation out here should.

“Maybe I’m just in a mood,” he said, laughing again, nothing friendly about it.

Jadzia understood his frustration. She certainly didn’t ask for this position. When she’d arrived a year and a half ago, she’d been expecting to stay on the Space Station working on restoring its systems or to be assigned as a medical assistant on planet. Instead, Benjamin had assigned most of the senior officers to the Tanis Canyon province, where the worst of the ecological disaster had manifested after fifty years of occupation. And soon after, he’d taken Miles and Julian with him to the more populous area of the province, leaving Jadzia behind.

It wasn’t entirely her choice—she had expressed a simple curiosity in returning to the desert mountains closing in the Tanis plains, eventually, and Benjamin had tipped his head in that way he does when an idea has come upon him, his hands squeezing an imaginary baseball in front of him, before he suggested (ordered) that someone should stay to begin the ecological restoration work that no scientist on Bajor yet had the time for. Jadzia had taken a moment to work through all the reactions that all her selves had to this—those parts of her she attributed unconsciously to Lela and Curzon were the sinking-gut feeling, unhappy at the prospect of spending so many months doing field-work in near-solitude. But Jadzia was the feeling in her heart that lightened—who perhaps found the thought of camping alone in alien mountains somewhat thrilling.

But within a couple months she had made the enemy of the dairy-engineers after freeing a hara cat from a thorn-trap which had then proceeded to make off with a silver-goat whose horns were ready for milking. The ensuing fight when the engineers had discovered that it was the alien from Starfleet who was responsible for the loss of a prize milk-producing animal was only prevented from going bad in a “permanent” way because a Major sent that day to the settlement by the provisional government had fired a ear-busting warning blast into the air.

Kira, then a stranger, had given a Jadzia the most bewildered look when it was explained what the fight was about.

“Are you kidding me?” she had asked, one hand on her hip, twisting heavily on the heel of her boot in the crunching dirt. “A hara cat? You let a hara cat loose?”

Jadiza had simply spit a mouthful of blood to the ground, grinned, and said, “All thing have to eat.”

Kira has stared at her, jaw working, large, dark eyes shielded by the wide brim of her hat. Then she had promised the group of resentful workers that she would “take care” of Jadzia, which ended up being a half-hearted lecture about not starting any fights and then a thousand curious questions about the hara cat she had freed.

So Jadzia had continued her work of monitoring the ecosystem of the area, of working to understand it and understand the ways the creatures all moved and behaved and lived, despite the desertion of good soil in the plains below the highlands, and Kira remained her reluctant champion for her efforts. The tension between Jadzia and the people of the settlement was largely assuaged by Kira’s backing and by the fact that when Jadzia came into town she would look after the children and share with them her collection of fallen moth-wings, shedded and laced around a decomposing cactus. But many Bajorans weren’t happy with Jadzia still.

“The reclamators still haven’t arrived yet, have they?” asked Druner.

“Not that I’m aware of,” answered Jadzia honestly, wishing not for the first time there was something else she could say on the subject.

“Well I’m glad you’re trying your best, anyway,” he said bitterly. “Unless…”

Jadzia said nothing.

“When’s your captain coming back?” he continued. “Still making friends with Vedeks? Keeping with the higher ups?”

“I don’t know when he is returning.”

“Meaning, he probably won’t.”

“Meaning I don’t know.”

Druner snorted and moved a little closer to her. Her hand automatically drifted nearer her hip, where he phaser hung.

“Maybe you people should stop playing around,” he said. “Can’t get us the reclamators. Can’t divert funds or manpower. All Starfleet can do is leave us you. So you can satisfy you curiosity.”

“I’m not here for you, Druner,” said Jadzia, hardening her voice.

“Yeah, I know.” His hand fell on his weapon. “That’s the fucking problem.”

Jadzia’s heart raced but she was itching for something, after months of living like this, of being an outsider, of being grounded, of being an officer who serves no appreciable purpose. She narrowed her eyes. The air was thick.

“Step away.”

Kira was suddenly there, just over Druner’s shoulder.

Druner didn’t budge, his glare forging deeper lines into his face.

“I said,” Kira raised her voice as the whole room began to quiet. “Step away from her.”

Druner took the tiniest step back, his expression twitching with new self awareness. Jadzia smirked, just a little. Druner froze, smirked back, then threw the first punch.

~

The stars were out. How Jadzia loved to look at them. High up in her lonely camp, beneath the stone carved of ancient geological forces, on her measly mat, as the fire died down, and the only sound in the air was the night-wind and the simple tunes she could play on her mouth-organ, the stars filled the emptiness—reminded her that emptiness, in fact, did not exist.

The crunch of approaching footsteps alerted her to a visitor but she kept her sore face turned up to the sky. Only one person ever visited her camp in the mountains.

“I’m starting to get sick of pulling you out of fights,” said Kira, softly, emerging from the dry brush, her dark eyes lit by starlight and the dying embers of Jadzia’s fire.

Jadzia shrugged and finished off her slow tune on the organ. “Sometimes they’re just looking for someone to punch.”

“No, Druner definitely hates you.”

Jadzia turned and looked up at Kira who was staring into the fire, arms crossed.

“Not as much now,” said Jadzia, keeping her smile small to avoid re-busting her busted lip.

Kira sighed and then crouched to stir the flames. She tossed another log onto the fire and then sat by Jadzia’s hip.

“You don’t have to do that for them.” She still wouldn’t look directly into Jadzia’s face. “You don’t have to serve that purpose.”

“I have to serve some purpose.”

“No,” snapped Kira. “You don’t.”

Jadzia was quiet.

“What did Shakaar want?” she asked, too afraid to touch the fervor lurking under Kira’s voice and skin.

Kira fidgeted with the ends of her jacket, gaze down. “He found out that there’s a single Vedek holding up the transfer of reclamators to the Tanis plains. Seems like she’s been campaigning to have them used in areas with a better hope of recovery. Captain Sisko is doing all he can to have more engineered but already this demand is…driving a wedge.” She sighed again. “I’m not good at this kind of work. I was never a politician. I just want…”

She cut herself off and then looked up. Jadzia followed the long line of her neck back to the stars.

“People look at a place like this and see everything it isn’t,” said Jadzia, eyes finding the small light of the Space Station orbiting just beyond most of Bajor’s satellites in the inky black-blue of the sky. “It’s not a rainforest or a wetland or an ocean. The creatures that live here are all spiny and subsist on relatively little. But all life yearns to grow.” She nudged Kira’s leg playfully, twisting a little to see her face better. “This place will flourish again, Nerys.”

“That a promise?”

“It’s a professional opinion,” said Jadzia. “I’m a Science Officer. I’m full of them. Professional opinions.”

Kira’s tense, worried features slipped into a grin. She rolled her eyes and then finally looked down at Jadzia. Jadzia tried to smile back without making her lip bleed.

“Flourish?” Kira repeated, falling back onto the ground and turning on her hip to face Jadzia.

“Of course. Until, well, the eventual heat-death of the universe. Or probably when your sun turns into a red-giant. Or maybe there’s a climate crisis on the horizon that no reclamator can fix.”

“That’s comforting.”

“Change is going to happen,” said Jadzia. “That’s all I can say.”

“In the meantime,” said Kira. She reached out a hand, hesitated, then continued. Her rough fingertips landed delicately on Jadzia’s cheek, moving back to trace her spots, push a strand of greasy hair behind Jadzia’s ear, before settling warm on her jaw. Jadzia, throughout it all, didn’t breathe. “In the meantime,” Kira said again, softer this time. “You have to stop getting hurt. The hara cats need you. And the guerto lizards. And the needle-covered moths. And the wild palukoo-deer.”

“No,” said Jadzia, her heart thumping loud enough in her chest to scare her. “None of them need me. That’s kind of the point. They’re all smart. They’re all survivors.”

“Then I do, Jadzia,” said Kira simply.

And Jadzia couldn’t not kiss her.

She fell atop Kira’s body, finding her mouth quick enough to steal her last breath, and Kira’s fingers slid from her jaw to the back of her head, clenching.

“Finally,” Kira gasped against Jadzia’s lips.

“You could’ve said,” said Jadzia, kissing the iron-ridge of Kira’s nose before falling back to her mouth.

“I’m not that sort of brave.”

Jadzia kissed her again, feeling too big suddenly for everything that she was—feeling for the first time like she needed another body to hold it all.

It wasn’t difficult to be brave out in the remote arid land of Bajor’s newly-liberated planet. The Occupation hung like moonlight, the history clung like salt, and everywhere you walked in the desert was the sound of your footsteps, the sound of your weight, reminding you over and over that you can be heard, witnessed, found, and eaten. But it also wasn’t difficult to be a coward, to let your mind habituate to the greatness of everything else so you never have to look inside. Jadzia, spending her long, lonely days tallying the birth-rates of guerto lizards in their various dwellings on the mountainside, always found she could be both.

And perhaps she would allow herself to interfere with this subject of study—move beyond the realm of objective observer. She did so with the hara cat in the thorns.

And Kira, like this land, was a creature too fascinating to not give her attention.

[hinterland-clans]

this is a mess but here's the new age list woot woot

Mintmoth (160 moons) †Vinestar (160 moons) Tuftear (152 moons) Halfskip (140 moons) †Snapleaf (140 moons) Longear (138 moons) Screestar (134 moons) Thor (129 moons) Thrushsong (125 moons) Sparrowscreech (120 moons) †Hickorystar (120 moons) Badgerface (112 moons) Icewhisper (115 moons) †Dovesky (115 moons) Snowspiral (115 moons) Blizzardfur (115 moons) Katria (109 moons) Applepatch (107 moons) Coppershade (105 moons) †Cloudbreeze (105 moons) Batswoop (105 moons) †Timbertail (100 moons) Oakfire (100 moons) Batswoop (100 moons) Shimmertail (98 moons) Ruepetal (98 moons) Beamer (97 moons) Sandstar (96 moons) Goldenglow (96 moons) Sheen (95 moons) Hollyfrost (92 moons) †Volebelly (92 moons) Smokestorm (90 moons) Meadowmoth (90 moons) †Starlingfur (90 moons) Wolfshadow (89 moons) Elmleaf (89 moons) †Crowpebble (89 moons) Rosestar (87 moons) Ryeberry (87 moons) Flurryfeather (86 moons) Icegaze (86 moons) Dusty (83 moons) Nitfeather (82 moons) Slatepatch (80 moons) †Blackreed (78 moons) Thicketburr (78 moons) Heronstalk (78 moons) †Mistybush (78 moons) Thorn (77 moons) Fox (77 moons) Russetmoon (76 moons) Darkeyes (75 moons) †Breezefeather (75 moons) Perry (72 moons) Brackenroot (70 moons) †Magpiepaw (68 moons) Rainmist (66 moons) Berrysplash (66 moons) Night (64 moons) Bee (60 moons) Flintclaw (55 moons) Aspenfleck (55 moons) Fawnstreak (50 moons) Bouncefoot (50 moons) Foxtuft (48 moons) Cavernpool (45 moons) Pheasantruff (45 moons) Sunblaze (44 moons) Birdpounce (44 moons) Lakeripple (42 moons) Silverbird (42 moons) Dexter (41 moons) Snufkin (40 moons) Blazeflower (38 moons) Cloverlight (36 moons) Jadewing (35 moons) Brightnose (34 moons) Dustplume (34 moons) Greenshade (32 moons) Duskfur (32 moons) Cindershock (31 moons) Quickwhisper (31 moons) Puddlepelt (30 moons) Fernsplash (30 moons) Flamewisp (30 moons) Jaystorm (29 moons) Hazel (29 moons) Larkslip (28 moons) Lilystream (28 moons) Tangleswirl (27 moons) Bobtail (25 moons) Echocall (25 moons) Tacker (23 moons) Grassripple (22 moons) Splinterfang (20 moons) Robindown (20 moons) Oceanroar (19 moons) Blitz (19 moons) Harepaw (16 moons) Acornpaw (16 moons) Minkpaw (14 moons) Whiskerpaw (10 moons) Tumblepaw (9 moons) Fleetpaw (9 moons) Littlepaw (9 moons) Cloudpaw (7 moons) Swiftpaw (7 moons) Hawkpaw (6 moons)

[tgr-2x5-roleswap-au]

You've Got Mail - Chapter 1

Chapter 1 - Pen Pals (April 1964)

Goodbye Fat Controller - Season 19 Episode 25

Word Count: 933

:D

~

He wrote back.

James didn't think Emily's idea would work. Sure, it had worked fine for her but that was her sister. It was someone she knew. Edward was, in the end, a foreign stranger. Yet—

"He actually wrote back!" James exclaimed, seeing the closed envelope Fred, his driver, waved in front of him with a smile. "What did he say? Can you read it, please? Please?"

James' driver chuckled at the ecstatic engine as he looked around. The engine and his crew were in a siding, with a brake van and guard in hand, awaiting clearance. There was a disturbance up the branch line. "I don't see why not, chap. We have plenty of time."

"Open it, then!"

"Calm down!" he scolded. "Not that long ago, you were brooding about."

With a snort, James retorted, "No, I wasn't!"

"We nearly missed the boat."

James huffed, letting his cheeks burn. "Ok, maybe a little."

Satisfied, the elderly raven head pulled out his pocket knife and cut the envelope open from its side. He grabbed it from the opposite end and tapped it against the palm of his hand, getting the letter out. It took a bit but it eventually slipped out and into his hands. The Englishman was about to unfold it, only to see another letter slip out. With a quick reflex, he was able to catch it before it fell onto the tracks and under James. Unlike the first one, there was writing on the outside.

Curious, Fred cleared his throat. "From Quinn Burns, a volunteer of the Furness Railway Trust," his driver read aloud, just as George, James’ fireman, quietly approached them. "I'll read this one first."

"But-!" James began.

"It could be context for what Edward has to say," interrupted his driver. "Might as well know who wrote it for him."

James hummed impatiently, receiving an eye roll from his fireman.

The driver quickly tucked the first letter and the envelope into his pockets. He opened the second letter, pinched the opposite corners between his fingers, as if it were a scroll, cleared his throat, just to get a kick out of James, and read what was written with ink on the thin sheet of paper…

.

.

.

"Greetings to James' crew! 

When the Furness Railway Trust received your engine's letter, we were quite surprised, especially with whom it was addressed. While we were aware of the mishap that led to FR 21 being on the North Western Railway by accident, we were unaware that he had made a friend. And for that, we are very grateful for!

For one, Edward didn’t have, shall we say, stable relationships in the past. When Old Coppernob was around for the Great Railway Show, Edward didn't get along with him. He ignored him the moment they met, so he's been a loner since. Considering what little he's told me about his "prime" days, I can see why.

And two, I don't think I and the rest of my colleagues have ever seen him this happy before, compared to how he reacted when we told him he'd partake in the Great Railway Show once again. Edward told me everything that happened while he was in the NWR. He was initially apprehensive about James but with the little time he spent on the island, he enjoyed his company. We're glad that he's made a friend.

Sincerely,

Quinn Burns"

.

.

.

Fred chuckled at seeing James’ face scrunch up, curious by one piece of information, joined by George.

“‘Once again’?” repeated James. “He's been to the show before?”

“Sure seems like it, old chap,” replied his driver, folding the letter back up and tucking it back into the envelope. He proceeded to do the same to the other with no writing on the outside. “Let's see what your friend's got to say,” he continued as he opened the letter, the paper audibly wrinkling.

.

.

.

“Hello there!

In all my years, I didn't expect a letter. Much less from another engine, so I would like to thank you for that, James.

I would love to be ‘pen pals.’ And I have managed to find a way, as you can tell. Mr. Burns is a very nice man. I talk to him the most and he was there when the letter came in.

How have things been? I know not much time has passed but still. We might as well start somewhere, should we not?

By the time this letter reaches you, I’ll be at the British Transport Museum. I'll be there until May. Then I'll go back to Derby for a short while. Until then, I won’t be able to answer. I’m truly sorry. I will try to respond as soon as I get back.

Sincerely,

FR 21 Edward

.

.

.

James huffed out steam in a heavy sigh. Of course, something was going on, he thought.

His "Day 1” crew picked up on the disgruntled engine. “Cheer up, old boy,” whispered his fireman, ignoring James’ “I'm not old!” “At least we know when he's going back.”

Knowing Mr. Turner was right, James snorted, eliciting a chuckle from his elderly crew. While this behavior bothered others immensely, this was the norm for the trio. No other crew knew how to handle this particular iron horse.

“We can write back later,” noted Mr. Quill as he heard a nearby shrill. He looked at the source of the sound to see their guard waving his flag. “The line's cleared.”

Satisfied with the suggestion, James agreed. Once his crew settled in, Mr. Quill opened James’ regulator with practiced ease, beginning their journey to the next job.

~

Alternatively: James and his "should've retired by now Day 1" crew.

They have tried recruiting a new crew for years by this point (Fred + George have been working with James since their late 20s) but previous candidates just couldn't get along with James, and the NWR wasn't about to risk an accident from happening because of that. The NWR will take accidents caused by the engines over the ones caused by the crews ANY DAY.

Notes:

The way Edward speaks in his letters versus his actual dialogue will be different (but progressively will be the same) since someone is writing for him, as well as guiding him with what he is trying to say.

Correcting myself with this one because I didn't say what I meant to say: Edward DOES know how to speak but the reason why he's speech is broken is due to the sudden change in his life. He did not have to deal with socializing for 4 decades (1923 - 1963), losing that practice. Now that he does interact with others, its become overwhelming. Times have changed, and so has the world around him. He has a lot to adapt to, such as social standards.

[mistresskayla-blog1]

Tooth First Into Her

Characters: Ray Levine x OC werewolf Jesula Paul

Lyn's Writing Event - Challenge Days - Day 30 (late submission)

May 30th: Challenge Days: Chupacabra

Characters:  Ray Levine x OC Haitian Fem werewolf – Jesula Paul

Fandom: Richard Armitage – Ray Levine – Stay Close

The character of Ray Levine was created by Harlan Coben

The character of Jesula Paul was created by Kayla B Crowe

Word Count: 1.9k (P1)

Warnings: werewolf, shapeshifting, potential smut, chupacabra, blood thirst, full moon, goat death,

Location: Haiti, Caribbean (Insulated fantasy timeline)

The Chupacabra legend dates back to the 1980s when they were started to be seen in Puerto Rico, but many accounts from the local’s date earlier, as well as farther reaching. All through the Caribbean and even as far south as Chile, and as far north as Maine. The legend states that sightings of a dog like creature that fed off the goats, draining them of their blood like a vampire.  Ray caught a whiff of this legend, and like many other expeditions he had been on, post Callie, he wanted to see this thing for himself.  He booked a flight and headed for a sighting a message board said was “fresh” and “hot” in Haiti. Ray knew whatever he found down in Haiti would be worth the trip.

The message board accounts talked about likelihood during a full moon, so Ray made sure he landed and stayed for the duration of that event, four days in the warmth, sun and spirit of the islands. It was mid may in Haiti, the full moon fell on the evening of the 22nd.  Ray flew in that afternoon from Newark, and about a day later he arrived in Port Au Prince, to a balmy 90 degrees, making him shed everything but a t-shirt when he got off the plane. And furthermore wish he owned more than 2 pairs of jeans. He popped into the shop and grabbed some cargo khaki shorts and kind of chortled at them, remembering the last time he wore khaki, in the desert with Simona. Glad to be out of the fray, and into something else, even if it was a wild goose chase by all accounts. Ray didn’t mind, he wanted to find the truth of the mysteries, stir up the natives and see what his lens could pick up.

Ray checked into his hotel room and dropped his stuff, looking out to the sea.  A bar sat along the edge of the beach, so he took a little walk down to it. Music was playing an island tune, the kind that made you want to pull someone onto a dance floor and hold them close. Ray looked over at a young couple, doing just that, he snapped a couple shots and smiled in kind. The girl’s young face was etched along the chest of her lover’s shirt, framed in the light of the sunset. The sky against the lapping shore was bigger than he had ever seen in New Jersey. The night fell fast and after a few beers Ray could watch the moon rise from the sea like a Goddess just missing her lover in rendezvous. He caught what he could with his lens, and then just stared out into the reflections, and listened to the waves crash against the shore.

A women came into view, she was clad in skirts, and a hair wrap, that made her head billow against the moon sitting on the water. Her shadow, an etching upon its face. Ray started snapping again, from afar. Hypnotized by her form as it trailed farther and farther down the beach, until she was just a spec against the looming darkness of the jungle. He swears he could smell her on the wind, as it came towards him. Some kind of rich, earthy scent, that mixed with the sea breeze in an heady manner. It electrified him away from the bar and down the shoreline to the water.

---

Jesula decided to take a walk on the beach that night, her hunger sated from some fresh local fare, she had found in the Port, by a little shack. It was getting late and the moon was rising. Another opportunity to test her mettle and see if she could change. She had become a loner because of her tribe’s rejection, and Jesula wanted more than anything to just know her true power, so she could go back to them. The life of a werewolf could be a lonely one, if you didn’t have your tribe to fall back on. Jesula wore her head wrapped, to conceal, as her ears started to punch through her thick black hair, when the moon rose to its place above the water. Her tail protruded from under her skirts, and started to sway with her hips as she walked.

She had the hunger that was for sure. In more ways than one, but Jesula had not been with anyone, since she was born into this awareness. The thought of laying with another werewolf terrified her, would she like it, would he lose control? She had heard stories, but what about if it was a human man? What if she changed him, then would it be easier? Could it be controlled? Too many questions and not enough answers. Jesula kept walking down the shoreline, focusing on her thoughts, and the taste of blood still in her mouth. She knew no matter what, men would taste different than goats.

---

              Ray trailed after her a little while, until he reached the edge of a rock face, and did not see her anywhere, but that scent still lingered in the rustling of the palm fronds. Hitting his senses and motivating him further. Ray walked into the jungle’s edge, in the dark, barely enough light from the resort to help him. The streetlights were further away, and as the scent drifted away, he felt himself fade as well. Ray stopped and shaking off his wanderlust, he turned around and headed back to the hotel.

---

The next morning, Ray was, as usual passed out in his clothes in his bed, face first like a teenager. He rolled over, the breeze from his room coming through the natural windows. It was already humid today, and Ray peeled himself off his sheets and stumbled into a shower of cooler water. A little shave, and a fresh shirt, shorts, and oh lord, a pair of sandals. He was looking like a tourist for sure now, he chuckled to himself. “Oh if Fester could see me now” he said aloud.

              Ray went into the hotel shop again, looking for some snacks and a map of the area, and stumbled upon a little semblance of bottles on a quaint display. He pulled one out, and read the label, “Vetiver”, he said as he read the bottle. He opened the stopper and took a whiff, yep, that was what he smelled last night on his patio. It flowed in the air as he watched the full moon rise. It was lemony, woody, and earthy with a smoky undertone, bred from the grounds, the rich earth of the region and just as potent as anything else he had imagined before stepping foot here. Just as potent as that woman on the beach last night, her siren’s call that propelled him down the shoreline to her. He hoped her ran into her again, at some point, even if its only at night. Ray paid for the map, some crisps, and the bottle, and headed down the streets towards a village called Petion-Ville.

Ray walked for about an hour, taking in the bright buildings, people and culture. His camera a flurry of clicks as life happened all around him that morning. He found an art gallery and stepped inside. The Galerie d’Art Nader, is a local gallery of artists. Ray looked around at all the fabulous local color, all the art and feeling inspired, he attempted to leave the Galerie and smelled the woman from the night before. This time he heard the lilt of a woman to the scent, and when he turned towards that sound, he saw her looking right at him. She was talking to someone else, but her sharp lavender eyes against her chocolate skin took his breath away.  She didn’t smile at him, not right away, just held his gaze. She finished talking to the other woman he assumed was the owner and stepped towards him boldly.

“Is there anything that interests you?” Jesula asked.

Ray was momentarily stunned, he looked down at his camera, and then back up to her, “Oh, um, yes, but no. I wouldn’t have a place to put it. My walls are already full, but everything here, (he looked around before his eyes landed back on her) is beautiful.”

Jesula felt the heat on her neck when he locked eyes with her again. Something about him was different. She smiled a bit, “Thank you, my friend, owns this place, she is very proud to have so many local artists here.” She pointed to his camera, “Are you an artist as well?”

Ray looked at his camera again, putting the cap back on, “Oh, yeah. Of course. But I don’t paint, that is different type of creation. I am more of a documentarian. Observing life and then capturing it”. He thrust his hand out in the traditional fashion, and she took it, softly in her own. That electric motivation surged when they touched, and both of them felt it. They both visibly twitched and then retreated their mutual hands. “My name is Ray”, Ray said, Jesula looked up at his gaze again, “I am Jesula.” Putting her hand to her chest, fumbling with an amulet around her neck.

Ray found his boldness again, and asked curiously, “Are you working here, or can we, get a coffee?” He kind of chuckled because he wasn’t sure if he was messing up a custom or anything.

Jesula nodded, “We can go get some drinks, sure, let me just let her know I’m leaving.” Jesula walked away, her skirts swooshing, he noticed then some other bells were jingling on her hips. She made music as she moved, that was very attractive to his senses as well. Jesula swished back, and Ray put his hand out to escort her out. She giggled at him, lightly amused, and led him across the streets to the café. They sat down and engaged in conversation for a while, musing at each other, and the heat grew between them as the day grew warmer around them.

Leaving nothing up to chance, Ray asked her out to dinner later in the evening. Jesula accepted and offered to meet him at the bar by the Marriott where he was staying. Ray left her at the café and went back towards his hotel, taking a taxi this time. Jesula had given him some pointers on the best way to use a taxi in Port Au Prince. He was grateful when he was dropped off efficiently and with most of his cash still in his pocket.

Ray logged into his computer when he got back to his room and checked the message boards. Sure enough, someone had been tracking him, and said, “did you see the goat deaths in the area are higher during the full moon? Maybe that’s the connection.” Ray spoke out loud to the screen, “So I’m looking for goats?” he laughed. He typed that as he said it. The message chimed back, “No, but where they have loss, you will be on the trail to catch the infamous Chupacabra.” They are known to feast on the blood of goats, its what started the legend. Fay nodded, “I’ll let you know what I find.” He logged off and closed his laptop. Ticking his hands on the desk. He looked around the room, checking the time on the bedside clock. “So now what do I do?” he said to an empty room.

Part 2…planned. dripping in soon.

Taglist:

@middleearthpixie @legolasbadass @scariusaquarius @sweetestgbye @lathalea @riepu10 @evenstaredits @amylupotter @linasofia @enchantzz

Thanks to all the great writers that supported me through this challenge and those who commented and those who liked my work.

[tribbetherium]

The Middle Temperocene: 150 million years post-establishment

A Load of Bull: The Boarochs

Each of the major continents of the Middle Temperocene possesses its own unique megafaunal herbivores: Arcuterra has the piggalo, which Mesoterra has too in addition to the thompers, Gestaltia has the altolopes and buffalopes, Austro-Easaterra has the tetracorns, Fragmus has the mudmallows and North Westerna has the last of the hammoths: all convergent products of the presence of vast grazing land but ones with the threat of large carnivores. And South Ecatoria makes no exception, with a clade of rather unusual large grazers of its own: the boarochs.

Boarochs are far larger cousins of the the porcuswines, and indeed many species still bear some quills on their vulnerable backsides. Yet they are larger, by a far greater magnitude: the largest species, the saddled boaroch (Suitaurus maximus), can reach as heavy as one and a half tons in the biggest males. Their other prominent characteristics are their large heads, supported by powerful neck muscles attached to a dorsal hump, which bear a pair of curled, forward pointing tusks on the upper jaw modified from the first upper molars: their diet of tough vegetation has favored molars that grow continuously, and in the boarochs one pair were repurposed as weapons, which their powerful neck muscles can wield with deadly force.

Their large humpbacked forms and broad heads echo the beelzeboars of the Glaciocene, yet unlike their mostly-gone predatory cousins, these giants are entirely herbivorous. Their formidable tusks are used instead for self defense, as well as competition with mates and helping dig up food such as roots, rhizomes and tubers, which are their favorites and help in controlling the spread of invasive, fast-growing grasses unpalatable to many other grazers.

Most boarochs live in large, gregarious herds, but some are solitary, gathering only to mate. Black mataboars (Tauroporcus melanus) are one such example, known for being territorial to other members of their kind. Females gather in small groups during the breeding season, but otherwise aggressive to others as the males are all year round. Once young reach sexual maturity, they are frequently chased away by their mother as they become aggressive to her too: rarely are mataboars seen together, as they are loners by nature, and their fierce tempers and tough hides mean they have few enemies.

Some members of the boaroch family have also taken to the wetter regions of the continent, as rising sea levels in the warming climate of the Middle Temperocene have favored the growth of coastal swamps, marshes and beachpeach forests. Here is the home of the the swampland borkhorn (Tauropotamus brachypus). Semi-aquatic by nature, they forage in the flooded zones for water plants and floating beachpeach fruit. While living mostly in water, they are very dense-bodied and do not float easily: their range is thus restricted to depths where they can easily push off the bottom to surface and breathe.

Despite their disparate lifestyles, the boarochs all share the characteristic of being very heavily armed both front and back. Their fronts are defended by their tusks, and their rears are well armed by the quills of their boarcupine ancestry which deter attacks from behind, and a ferocious disposition to back it up. This is in part due to the predators of South Ecatoria consisting primarily of the lycanines and the tigerillas, the latter of which, in recent times, have gotten increasingly more terrestrial, descending from the trees to hunt more on the ground as carnivorous lemunkies begin to become competition. But ultimately, the boarochs may face their greatest challenge yet: as South Ecatoria, in the beginning of the Middle Temperocene, sees the rise of some of the most unusual and remarkable predators yet.

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[quibbs126]

I’ve been drawing more of my North and South Dragons these past couple days

I tell you, for some reason it’s been really hard for me to make a full sketch page like I used to. I think it’s because my brain now thinks it needs every sketch to be connected with one another in terms of characters and things I’m going for, when before that wasn’t really the case. But whatever, I’ll figure that out

So first up I had some normal Cookie disguises for Choco and Milk Creme, in which they go by their actual names, just omitting the Dragon bit, mostly because most Cookies don’t actually know their real names and it’s just easier. I based Choco off the physicians and Milk the warriors just because I wanted to base them off other NPCs in the kingdom, and doing different roles seemed more interesting. Another design idea was making them look more like some of the villagers we see, like Milk Creme looking like one of the Milk Tribe, but I just went with this instead. Maybe those are other disguises they use when they feel like it

With their colors, I wanted to make them look more like Dark Cacao, giving them purplish eyes (though they’re more of a pink), and I gave them somewhat similar dough colors, with Choco Creme’s being darker and Milk Creme’s being lighter. They’re also supposed to have long hair (though probably not as long as his), they just keep it tied up

So since I based them on Cookies in the Citadel, I decided that these guys actually show up in the Citadel. Every couple decades, they disguise themselves as members of the Citadel, Choco Creme a physician and Milk Creme a soldier, and spend a few days there, just to see how things are going with Dark Cacao and his kingdom. The other people of the Citadel know they’re odd, as they mysteriously show up one day and mysteriously leave shortly after, and no one has seen them outside of those days, not to mention there are those who have been there long enough to see them more than once and know they haven’t aged since last time, but at this point they’ve been showing up for longer than anyone but Dark Cacao knows, and he seems to be fine with them, so they’re just something people accept. Many suspect that they’re the Twin Dragons, but no one knows for sure. During one of these, they’ve met Dark Choco Cookie (though they likely first met him as a freshly baked Cookie), when he was a child. They probably told him who they are, but he’s meant to keep it a secret, which he does. Not sure if they know what happened to him though

Anyways, then I wanted to draw the two and Dark Cacao as smalls, with younger versions of their designs. To be honest, not sure I’m satisfied with these designs; I know I had a lot of trouble with the hair and I ended up just giving up, and it was a similar story with their outfits. I tried to base them off of Dark Cacao’s new flashback outfit, because I’m imagining that he would have gotten it from them. I also wanted to give them identical outfits, since they were a lot more attached to each other when younger. Over time they grew to individualize themselves more rather than just being a pair, but this was before then. For Dark Cacao I redesigned that young look I gave him before, making it have darker colors. I think I like this one better, I feel like it looks more like him? Also I’m aware that the fabric is facing the wrong way on his outfit, that was supposed to be intentional

To be honest, now that I’ve finished Episode 14, I feel like changing my personal headcanon for Dark Cacao’s backstory, but I was already making this before doing that, so I’ll just do that later. But some things I plan on keeping is that as a young child he ended up lost and alone in the mountains, the dragons find him and take him in, he grows up essentially a loner of the wilds, who goes around helping other Cookies, he meets the Ancient Cookies and we know the rest from there. Which I now realize is essentially the backstory I already gave him, but in my head there are more differences, like the dragons’ age when they meet him and stuff like that. And I might just throw it all out and start fresh. I dunno I’ll work on it

And the last one I did mostly just to fill up space, but it’s supposed to be one of them finding him and bringing him back with them. I like to imagine they’re big enough to hold him in one hand. Also it’s supposed to be like that ferret thing, but maybe I’ll draw that more clearly later. But they do pick him up in one hand and throw him around like a rag doll.

Also the dialogue is in parentheses because they’re supposed to be talking in the Dragon language, but I don’t know what that would look like, so just assume it’s in another language but being translated

Anyways yeah, dragons