#nothing prompted this in particular i just. flinch anymore when i want to get excited about winter

[j-esbian]

me: i love winter, it’s so pretty and it’s my favorite season 💖❄️

someone else: well actually it objectively sucks because I get seasonal depression. you’re saying you want me to be depressed all the time?? also winter slashed my tires and killed my dog and both my parents

[consumedkings-archive]

WITCHING HOUR, a john seed/deputy fic.

chapter eight: the living sea of waking dreams

word count: 10k

rating: m for now, rating will change in later chapters as things develop, tags will be updated accordingly.

warnings: emotional manipulation/some weird humiliation tactics (joseph is a fucker), some weird/uncomfortable relationships getting dredged up, john is a jealous little shit. some spooky scaries go on, blood and body horror (i think? tagging just to be safe).

notes: we've got some ~things~ going on here in this next chapter. i feel really excited about where this story is going and how we're going to get all these little threads put together, but mostly, i hope you enjoyed this chapter! we've got a lot going on but i promise, it will all (hopefully) be worth it in the end. and also, a tiny reprieve: some soft elliot, as a treat, because we deserve it.

thank you to everyone reading and giving me your feedback!! i love hearing from yall <3 special thanks to @shallow-gravy​ and @vasiktomis​​ for listening to me slog through this chap : ))))

“Knock-knock!”

Isolde took in a deep breath, closing her eyes and willing patience to the forefront of her mind. It had only been an hour or so since she’d left the chapel, Joseph’s words ringing in her head, a death knell.

Not after the things I’ve done for you.

Even still, even now—he knew how to get under her skin. She thought she’d never wanted to kiss and throttle someone in equal amounts, in the entirety that she had known them; to think that once, she had let Joseph take her in an embrace, sweep the hair from her shoulder and bury his face in her neck and whisper sweet things into her skin.

He wasn’t the same, anymore. And neither was she.

“Come in, Santiago,” said Arden, from where she had set up her little space across the cabin’s modest room. The heater on the floor rattled laboriously, clicking and chugging away. Isolde swept her eyes over Arden’s space—a small makeshift bed on the couch, the table stacked with a few books and a notepad she was scribbling dutifully on. Isolde had politely offered her the bed, even though she didn’t want to, and the woman had waved her off and said it was no trouble at all, that she often fell asleep on the couch at home anyway.

It was still weird, thinking that someone was—with Jacob. For a long time. But, she supposed if there was any Seed boy she thought would be in a long-term relationship, then—

The door to the cabin swept open, revealing the dark-haired boy from before. Well, perhaps not boy, but young man. Certainly too young and good-looking to be wasting his time with the likes of Eden’s Gate, wasn’t he?

“You don’t have to babysit me anymore, do you?” Arden asked, not once looking up from her writing.

“No, no. Unfortunately, our time together has drawn to a close.” Santiago lifted his arms, spread in defeat. His eyes, a vibrant blue, turned to Isolde. “I am actually here for you.”

“Me?” Isolde’s eyes narrowed. “For what?”

“Joseph has asked me to fetch you.”

“And you’re a good boy, so you do whatever he says,” she replied tartly.

Santiago flashed a grin that was all teeth-pearly, perfectly bleached teeth. He was far more groomed than any of the others she’d seen trawling about the compound. “I am nothing if not loyal, princesa.”

Isolde sighed, passing a hand over her face as a headache began to fester and bloom behind her eyelids. She thought she might have been more willing to kick up a fuss if she thought it was worth the drama—but it probably wasn’t. As much as she didn’t want to admit it, Joseph was right; she couldn’t be of any help to them if she was being contrary just for the sake of her own spite. Even if she didn’t know where Joseph got off summoning her like she was part of the peasantry.

“Coming,” she sighed, picking her coat up off the bed and sliding it back on over her shoulders.

“A sweet word, coming from even sweet lips.”

“Alright, Romeo.”

She trudged out after Santiago in the snow, casting a quick glance around the compound. Though evening had fallen, the fluorescents surrounding lining the edges of the compound cast a cold, brutal light across it, highlighting every single pore of the place, every ragged inhabitant shuffling into their bunkhouse as watch switched and folks went to retire for the evening. Some of the roofs sagged with the weight of the snowfall, which trundled on without any kind of end in sight. Isolde couldn’t remember when she’d seen real, unadulterated sunshine last. In Georgia? Had it been that long?

None of it was anything like what John had told her. Of course, she had expected some differences—the man liked to embellish, to be sure—but the members of Eden’s Gate seemed to have lost their fire. They were wayward, adrift at sea, among waves of freezing cold water and what now seemed to be a resurgent threat that they had hoped to be rid of.

And Joseph, having comforted them so very little.

“Icy,” Santiago warned, offering her his hand as he opened the door inside with his other one. “Careful.”

“Thanks,” she muttered dryly. She took his hand anyway, pulling herself into the sputtering warmth of the chapel where—at the front—the silhouettes of Jacob and Joseph stood.

The two of them were suffused in a warm amber glow, but there was nothing warm about the mood in the room; the closer she got, she could hear Jacob’s insistent words—the firm, assertive gestures of his hands, the words, just didn’t feel like it was pertinent at the time, coming out of his mouth—the more she thought, I shouldn’t be here for this. Whatever they’re arguing about, whatever it is that’s gotten them to this point, I’m not supposed to be here.

Joseph didn’t respond to whatever it was that his brother was saying, but instead turned to look at her as she approached down the center aisle of the chapel. Despite the rattling warmth coming from several heaters placed throughout the chapel, Isolde felt a chill sink deep into the marrow of her bones.

“Thank you for coming,” he said by way of greeting. He lifted one hand and beckoned her forward when her feet slowed.

“I just hope this is something I need to be here for,” Isolde ventured cautiously, her gaze flickering to Jacob’s face. The redhead’s expression was drawn tight and hard, and not the way it normally was; it wasn’t calm and focused, but strained, like he was holding himself back from saying something to Joseph that he thought he might regret later.

She had never known Jacob to bite his tongue very much, but from her own experience with Joseph, well—he was apt at bringing out the worst in people.

“Did you know?” Joseph asked when she had finally come to a stop. “About my brother’s...” He wet his lips for a moment, his gaze darting across the empty space of the floor as he looked for the word he wanted to say. And then he landed: “Pursuits?”

Isolde blinked. “If you mean the woman he says is his partner—”

“Yes,” the blonde interjected, before she could finish—a thing he knew that she hated but he seemed unable to refrain from doing. “I do.”

Sol’s eyes narrowed. When she turned her gaze from Jacob to Joseph, she was greeted with the typical unreadable expression; as untroubled as the blue sky over a sunny sea.

But there were storm clouds. Somewhere, in there, on a horizon Joseph would not let her reach now and perhaps had not ever.

“I only knew of her today,” Isolde replied after a moment. “After we saw our little hunter out in Fall’s End, I imagine he felt it pressing that he retrieve her sooner rather than later.”

Joseph made a low noise. It was like a hm, but threatening. Hm, he said, interesting, that. But what it was he felt was so interesting about that particular line of information, Isolde couldn’t only venture a guess; and if she had to venture a guess, she would have said that it would probably be that he felt it was interesting that something was going on that he had not been aware of.

If there was one thing that she knew about Joseph, affirmatively, it was that he did not like not knowing.

“Isolde, why are you here?”

A familiar spark of anger lit, hot and fetid, in her belly. “Pardon me?

“Why are you here? In this compound? In Hope County?” Even as he spoke, Joseph’s gaze was fixed on the eldest Seed, the lines of his face peaceful and serene despite the idle venom burning in the timbre of his voice. “What did John send you here for?”

The anger burned up into soot, into dread, and sat just there, curled at the base of her neck. Isolde could not shake the idea that she had been brought in here to make a point, and that she really shouldn’t be there—that this was something Joseph and Jacob needed to settle between themselves, but that was never how Joseph had operated: fair had never been a stratagem in his playbook.

“Isolde,” Jacob said, his voice a low caution when she looked at him, shaking his head very slightly. It’s not worth it, he was saying, fighting, it’s not worth it.

“Joseph, this,” she plunged on pointedly, “is not something that I need to be a part of. I’ll go, so the two of you can—”

But when she went to depart, Joseph lifted his hand and pointed at her and ground out between his teeth, “Stay. Put.”

The poison in his voice was so potent it almost made her flinch. Almost. And then the indignation started to bloom: who do you think you are, to be talking to me like that? But they wouldn’t come; the words wouldn’t come, because when she lifted her gaze to Joseph’s and saw him looking at her, it was—

“I want you to say it, out loud, in front of Jacob,” he continued, the muscle of his jaw flexing viciously. “Tell him why John needed you here.”

Jacob said, raising his voice a little, “We all know why—”

“Because you are useless unless you are aware of what’s happening. Every detail. Isn’t that right?” he prompted. “Isolde?”

She felt her molars grind. It was clear, now, why he had asked her here. “Yes.”

Joseph turned his gaze to Jacob. “Is that what you want us to be? Want me to be? Ill-informed?”

The redhead was silent for a long heartbeat. He sucked his teeth, and said, “No, Joseph, I don’t—”

“No. More. Secrets.”

The blonde’s voice had pitched so low that she nearly couldn’t hear him, so close and low and intimate was it that he was speaking to his brother, so little space between them. Joseph looked to be controlling himself quite tightly; so very little of the leash available to himself, digging the choke chain deeper and deeper into him in an effort to remain intact.

“Joseph,” Jacob began, “I only—”

“A whole year?” the blonde bit out viciously. “An entire year you spent devoting your time to this—this—”

Isolde was familiar with the precipice at which Joseph was teetering. Right on the edge of saying something vicious and mean and unendingly cruel. She had pushed him there a few times before, in their brief few months together—had seen the way he pulled himself back time and time again, seconds away from grinding out some wretched insult.

“I won’t,” Joseph bit out, lifting a hand as though to temper himself, “tolerate it, Jacob.”

Silence stretched between the three of them for a moment, pulled taut as a rubber band. Though she knew why Joseph had wanted her here—to make a point, but also to put someone there to witness the verbal lashing—looking at the two of them now, she felt more than ever like an intruder on a world she knew so very little about.

John had done nothing to prepare her. He had given her the rosy version of the story, and even that included the cult and the killing and the residents of Hope County. It still hadn’t been enough.

The silence broke when Jacob said, “I understand, Joseph.”

For a second, there was nothing; just Joseph, sweeping his gaze over Jacob for a long moment, like he was trying to wring out any deception or sign that Jacob was being disingenuous—and of course, he could find none, and that meant there was only the tense, uncomfortable silence wadded up between them, in their own fists.

Finally, Joseph said, “That will be all,” and turned, tilting his face to the lukewarm light of the candles at the front of the chapel and closing his eyes.

The eldest Seed lingered for only a moment longer before he left; his eyes met with Isolde’s for a heartbeat before he made his decision, turning down the center walkway and heading for the doors. It wasn’t until they clicked shut that Isolde felt a tiny bit of relief—if only because the source of Joseph’s ire had now departed, and she could get a better look at him.

It was her job to make sure things were under control. John had asked her here for that exact reason—and this kind of in-fighting would be the kind of thing that would, eventually, be their unraveling if they didn’t get it under control. She had only seen Joseph so angry once before, almost over a year ago now, back before he was the Father of Eden’s Gate. Back when they had been—

There are things that I want to accomplish, and they’re best done with a wife—

“Joseph,” Isolde said, leaving the memory somewhere else—somewhere dark and deep she would never find it again, “what’s going on?”

The blonde did not open his eyes when he replied, “I cannot have secrets kept from me.” After a moment, he added, “And in that vein of thought, I should get in touch with our wayward brother.”

“Do you really think it’s that big of a deal?” she prompted again. “To have started a fight with Jacob over a woman that he—”

“Even before a word is on my tongue, behold, O Lord, you know it altogether. You hem me in, behind and before, and lay your hand upon me.” His eyes fluttered open, the flicker of dark lashes illuminated by the amber glow, and he tilted his head to look at her. There was a hardness in his voice when he said, “God is perfect in knowledge, and I cannot be less. Not when He speaks directly to me.”

An unpleasant little thrill crawled down her spine when his eyes fixed on her, darting over her face like he wanted to savor her. “Then don’t use me as the whip you want to lash your brother with,” she snapped. “I’m not a humiliation tactic. You do know better than to do that to me.”

Joseph let out a little sigh. The corners of his mouth ticked upward, the shift in mood almost palpably changing the energy in the chapel—just like that, it was different. Not lighter, not better, but different.

“You’re right,” he agreed after a moment. “I do know you better than that.”

Isolde’s mouth pressed into a thin line. Deciding to forego that comment, she took a step forward, cinching her jacket in more securely around her waist. “You know what you cannot be, Joseph?” she asked. “You cannot be fighting with your brothers. Especially not the only one that’s here. Your people out there are disgruntled, and scared, and you can’t afford to be picking fights with the people who are the most loyal to you.”

“They are all,” Joseph replied, “loyal, Isolde." And then, after a moment of watching her: "Is this what you want to be doing? Herding us? Mothering us?”

“My professional opinion is that the image of your convent is severely lacking,” she bit out, once again ignoring the bait, “and the last thing you need to do is have them noticing that there’s a rift forming between the ones in charge. And yes—that is the only thing I can do for you lot at this point, and like an idiot, I agreed to come here and do it.”

Because I can’t say no to John, something tired inside of her said. Because I couldn’t say no to any of you, even if I wanted to.

The blonde reached up, and it took that gesture for Isolde to realize how closely they had drifted—it was so little effort, so little time between the movement of his hand and the time at which his fingers made contact with her cheek, brushing the hair away from her face and tucking it behind her ear. He moved so confidently and leisurely that Sol couldn’t think to pull back; and when she didn’t, the calloused fingertips trailed down the pillar of her throat, his eyes following their journey.

It was intimate; too soon her brain said, even though it had been so long since they had been in the same room, let alone regarded each other in even a passive capacity. But it was too soon enough that her brain fizzed out, the air moving thick as molasses in the journey between her mouth and lungs, the violent flashback of their closeness overwhelming her.

She said, “Joseph,” in a don’t kind of voice, and he dropped his hand from where it had come to a stop at the juncture between her neck and shoulder.

“It was smart of John, to ask you to come and shepherd us in his absence,” Joseph said, blithely ignoring the desperate little barb in the way Isolde said his name.

“I always thought you’d make a perfect Mother.”

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

It had been several days since their conversation in the hallway that night, and John had barely seen hide nor hair of Elliot.

Honestly, it would have been impressive how quickly she could make herself inaccessible, were it not so frustrating. He couldn’t help but wonder what the implications there were—had she known she could do this all along, and had been indulging in him for some reason? Had she simply decided to be done and that was it, meaning that she hadn’t been done before?

Not that she was done now, anyway. Not if John had anything to say about that. But for a few days, she barely spared him a glance—passed him in the hallway when she got home with a muttered greeting on occasion. She woke before him, left to the stables without him, and left him alone in the house. Left him alone without her venom, without her eyes on him. With her mother, no less.

Scarlet was, on paper, exactly the kind of woman that John felt confident in his ability to charm. Single, wealthy by inheritance, a little older and always with a martini in hand by ten? If he couldn’t impress her, he had to be doing something wrong. But in a way that seemed to be very typical of the Honeysett women, Scarlet remained veritably unimpressed and even disdainful of his presence—even though she had insisted he stay with them.

More and more, he was becoming convinced that it was not going to be to his benefit.

“Good morning, Mr. Seed,” Scarlet greeted him from where she sat at the table, perusing her magazine. Not once did her eyes lift to meet his, and not once did an ounce of enthusiasm enter her voice. “You are missing from the stables again today, I see. Not a horse person?”

“I might find myself to be one,” John replied with a leisurely sort of bitterness, “if Elliot would only allow me to come.”

“Yes, it’s very annoying, isn’t it?” The blonde mused idly, over her cup of coffee. “To not be handed exactly what you want when you want it?”

He sucked in a sharp breath, pouring himself a cup of coffee and trying to remind himself that this was all temporary. This house, this town, Scarlet and Sylvia and Wyatt—it was all temporary, and soon enough they would be the least of his concerns. All of his time and attention would be wrapped up in Elliot and the baby, and what their lives would look like once the end had come.

Because it would come, and then she would see. She would understand that everything he’d done had been for them, for her and their baby and—

“I only want to spend as much time with her as I can,” he replied, managing to keep his tone pleasant. “Before I go back home.”

“And when are you?” Scarlet idled. “Going, I mean?” And then, in what he could only think was a stretch of graciousness: “Not that you’ve overstayed, because I am sure you would never, and Delia is quite taken with you—”

“Surely.”

“—as is Elliot, despite her best efforts to act otherwise.”

“What?” John’s head snapped to where Scarlet was still browsing her magazine, and he cleared his throat at her arched brow to try and gather his scrambled thoughts. “What I mean is, has she—said anything to you about me?”

The blonde at the table, swathed in her silk robe and curls primly pinned back away from her face, made a sound that might have been amused. Might have been, anyway, had he not turned to look at her and seen the way her face remained serene and unexpressive.

“I am not blind, Mr. Seed,” Scarlet idled. “It takes very little investigation to find that my daughter is fond of you, against my wishes and her own.”

Before John could open his mouth to respond—and press for more information while his stomach did victorious little somersaults—she turned her head to the window, when the sound of a vehicle rolling up the drive spurred Boomer on to barking in the front room.

“Oh, would you look at that,” she murmured with a little sigh. “My prodigal child, returned home at last.”

He glanced out the window to see an unfamiliar car pulling up, a black truck that took the fresh snow of the unplowed drive to the Graves-Honeysett home with ease; from the driver’s side hopped a familiar face.

“Didn’t Elliot drive there this morning?” he asked, frowning as he watched Wyatt jog around to the passenger side despite Elliot’s waving from the front for him to stop. The man had been nothing but polite—even enthused—to meet him at the bar the other night, but that didn’t mean John had forgotten the way he’d gotten comfy enough to try and touch Elliot’s face and her hair. Even now, the man grinned, all sunshine, as he opened the passenger side door for her and offered her his hand.

Scarlet replied, her attention already having departed the window, “What a silly question to ask out loud, Mr. Seed. You're not stupid, so I would beg you—try not to give me that impression.”

His eyes darted to Scarlet for a moment, briefly grateful that she wasn’t looking at him to see the spark of irritation winding its way across his face; he could feel it furrowing his brows, drawing his mouth into a hard, tight line. Setting his coffee cup on the counter, John made his way out the front door just as Wyatt and Ell were nearly there.

“Oh, hey John!” Wyatt greeted him. His eyes swept over him briefly. “Boy, you’re really put together any chance you get, huh?”

“You can never be overdressed,” John replied as amicably as he could. “Watch the steps, Ell, they’re—”

“Icy, I know,” Elliot said. She puffed out a little breath of air and brushed his offered hand aside, instead favoring the railing with one hand and the top of Boomer’s head with the other, still refusing him the courtesy of meeting his eyes. It had been days. She had never once held such a grudge against him—not really, not where he couldn’t at least get her to give him the time of day.

“Where’s the Jeep?” he asked, his voice coming out a bit tighter than he would have liked as she brushed past him. “Surely you didn’t have Wyatt ferry you out here for fun.”

“Tire’s flat,” she snipped. “Would you prefer I walked?”

“You could have called.” He took in a sharp little breath, willing the accusation away. “I would have been more than happy to pick you up, Ell.”

“Don’t have a cell phone,” Elliot replied flatly. “And Wyatt was already there.”

“It wasn’t any trouble,” Wyatt interjected hurriedly, smiling at John with pearly whites on display. “I had to come into town anyway, and it was gonna be hours before the mechanic could get out there.”

“Well, it was very kind of you all the same,” John said with a smile that felt like it pulled too tight across his face, a smile that was harder and harder to maintain with every passing second that Wyatt West put his baby-blues on Elliot. And that was often; the blonde looked a little sheepish when his gaze met John’s, drawn away from the redhead who was readily retreating into the house.

“Like I said, wasn’t any trouble. Always happy to help,” the blonde insisted, hands tucked into his jacket pockets.

“Yes,” John replied pleasantly, “I can see that.”

Wyatt blinked, flushing. “Anyway, uh...Have a nice day, John. And you too, Freckles!”

He waved before turning on his heel and heading back to the truck. As soon as the driver’s door closed and he was starting to pull away, John turned to see Elliot watching him, her eyes narrowed.

“‘I can see that’?” She scoffed. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Oh, are we talking now?” His brows lifted, head tilting. “So kind of you, to grace me with eye contact when you’ve been storming around the last few days—”

“Don’t be a fucking baby,” Elliot snapped. “My life does not revolve around you. Especially when I can’t seem to figure out why the fuck you drove all the way here just to sulk around.”

“Perhaps it should at least be in my orbit,” John replied tersely, “considering that we are having a child together.”

“You—”

Elliot sucked in a sharp breath, clamping her mouth shut as she looked at him. There was a very brief moment where she looked like she wanted to say something, and very badly, but instead, the corner of her mouth ticked upward and she turned on her heel to walk inside without saying a word.

“It’s a cute nickname,” John continued tartly as he trailed after her. Don't walk away from me, don't, you owe me at least your attention. “Freckles. Do you prefer that one over Miss Honey?”

She closed the door behind her, promptly and without hesitation, letting it rattle in the door frame and in his face. He sucked in a sharp breath, passing a hand exhaustedly over his face.

Impudent. Surly. Ferociously, viciously, wretchedly stubborn. He knew this about her—had known this about her—and yet at every opportunity, she proved his idea of her correct, and he found himself getting more and more frustrated. It wasn’t fair, that even those moments of her attention still felt good, that the sting of her venom held some satisfaction for him, like he was addicted to it.

If she would just, came the thought, rolling over and over. If she would, if she would just, if she would just—

But just what? Just stop being that way? Would he have even liked her if she were not this purposefully obstinate problem to solve?

“No,” he sighed to himself, raking his fingers through his hair. “No, I wouldn’t.”

The reward would just have to be all that much sweeter in the end.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Three hours later, Elliot had forced herself to come to a decision.

She waffled on it for a while—going back and forth as she showered, scrubbing her hair and trying to let the hot water ease some of the growing aches and pains—and did her best to ignore the way something a little wicked chattered happily inside of her at the knowledge that John’s eyes had been sparking with jealousy. It felt immature, to like watching him squirm; more apparent than ever, too, was that old habits died hard.

There was a sick kind of satisfaction that came with finding John’s buttons and pushing them. It had felt the same way, back in Hope County—when he’d been burning with irritation and jealousy that Joseph had gotten her confession, not him, that she wouldn’t tell him what it was, pushing and pushing and jamming her finger into that button until he finally snapped and—

Kissed her.

That’s not what I’m trying to do, she thought, a little defiantly as she looked at herself in the mirror of the bathroom; tracing the WRATH scar, looking down to realize that there was, in fact, a baby bump. Oh, God, wasn’t that something fucking dreadful? Too real, but even still she’d known it was coming—worn looser, heavier clothes. She’d tried so hard not to look at herself in mirrors as of late that doing so now made her feel like she was looking at a stranger.

I’m not trying to get him to kiss me—the opposite, actually, I’m just trying to get him to fucking lay off for a minute—

And yet, as she found herself standing outside of the door to John’s room, her chest felt a little tight and her heart was doing that funny thing it liked to do when he was around; fluttering, leaping against her ribs, begging for attention. Elliot could have argued that it was just muscle memory at this point, that she had spent enough time around John letting him touch her and kiss her and say sweet things into her neck that her body was only working off of its basest instincts, and that was why she was feeling this way.

Clearing her throat, Elliot knocked on the door and said, “John?”

There was the sound of shuffling on the other side, and then his voice drifting to her: “Yes, Elliot?”

“It’s time for my appointment,” she managed out lamely. It felt even more stupid, saying it now, after she’d made such a big show of marching off after he’d committed to his display of jealousy. “Since the Jeep’s still waiting to get the tire fixed, do you think you could—”

The door swung open; John’s eyes flickered over her for a moment, his head tilting just before his mouth curved into a pleasant little smile that was two parts triumph and one part spite.

“What’s this?” he asked. “You need my help with something?”

Her mouth pressed into a thin line. “Don’t be an asshole, John.”

“I would never.” He propped himself up against the doorframe, folding his arms. “Wyatt’s taxi services currently unavailable?”

Already, she was regretting her decision—it had felt important, to have him along, but now she thought maybe she had been too forgiving for having forgiven anything at all.

“The appointment might be the one we figure out the baby’s gender, fuckface,” she snapped, “and since Wyatt’s not the baby’s father, I figured maybe you’d want to come in for this appointment, because it wouldn't feel right not to at least ask if you wanted to. Don’t worry though, I wouldn’t dream of inconveniencing you.”

“Wait!” The exclamation stopped her mid-turn from his door, the feeling of his fingers brushing the palm of her hand making her jerk out of his reach instinctively. John exhaled through his nose, and when she looked him with narrowed eyes and her arms crossed, he said, “I do want to—I want to come.”

“You sure aren’t acting like it.”

“I—Ell, I haven’t heard the baby’s heartbeat a single time,” he insisted, a little frantic. “I’ve respected that you didn’t want me there the last time, and you know, when I wasn’t here before is another thing, but finding out the gender and getting to hear the heartbeat—” He stopped, sighing. “I’m...”

Though there was a bit of pain stinging in the cavity of her chest at his earnesty, Elliot steeled herself, keeping her expression tight. “You’re what, John?” she prompted. She half-expected another blow-up; I’m the baby’s father, that baby is mine, I deserve this, it’s mine.

But instead, John’s mouth twisted and he said, “I’m—sorry.”

Elliot blinked. Had she ever heard John apologize? For anything, ever? And sincerely? She couldn’t recall a day or time in memory—and though her memory was spotty at best these days, she thought for certain that was something she would have remembered. Even when they’d been going to bury Joey, she wouldn’t let him get the words out.

“Uh,” she said very intelligently, “what?”

“I’m sorry,” John repeated, appearing a little frustrated at having to repeat himself. He shifted on his feet. “I want to come to the appointment. I mean—” And then, in what surely must have been pure agony: “Please let me come to the appointment.”

It felt so odd to hear the words coming out of his mouth that she could only blink rapidly and say, “Um, okay,” before turning and quickly heading down the hall and to the stairs. It had been her intention all along to ask John if he wanted to come to the appointment, to see the baby on the screen and find out the gender together—because despite his petty jealousy over someone he didn’t need to be concerned about in the least, and despite his insistence that he was the only person capable of loving her, she did see him making an effort instead of yanking her all the way to the other side. Even if it was a minute, tiny effort; it was an effort nonetheless.

“We’ll have to take your car,” Elliot said uneasily over her shoulder, pulling on her coat quickly. “And it’s soon, so—”

“Making haste,” John agreed from beside her. He reached over her shoulder to pull his own coat off of the rack. It wasn’t lost on her, then, that weeks ago he had gone to reach for her shoulder and she’d about jumped out of her skin; now, the smell of his cologne and his voice close to her ear was almost comforting, in an entirely self-indulgent way.

If she just broke it down to the piece of John she loved the most—his voice and the way the cologne smelled when it was on him, and the way it felt when his hands traced the scars on her hips, and the boyish grin he’d flash her—then maybe it could work. Then, maybe, things would have been fine.

But that’s not love, something inside of her said, as she made her way out the front door and to the car. John says he loves all the wretched things about you. Did you forget?

No. No, she had not forgotten the way John had kissed her when she had blood on her mouth, or the way he’d said, I would’ve fucked you there, or how it felt when he buried his face into her neck and said her name in a voice so broken she thought she might be holy.

“Too hot?” John asked, and she realized she was sitting in the car—that she had checked out halfway out the door—and they were now down at the end of the drive.

Elliot swallowed. Her face felt hot, and now it was not only because of her mind’s wanderings but also because she had been caught daydreaming.

“No,” she said, sinking back against the passenger seat. “No, it’s fine.”

He watched her for a moment before pulling out of the driveway and onto the street. She took a quick glance around the car; it was older, and sort of a beater. The kind of shitty Honda civic she’d see peeling out on the highway at 3AM because some idiot teenager thought she wouldn’t pull them over if the roads were empty. He’d probably lifted it on his way out of town to keep a low profile.

Her foot nudged something solid as she stretched out. Over the sound of the radio rattling and fuzzing tiredly, she heard a dull thunk. She squinted. It was a book. Unconditional Parenting.

“Jesus,” John muttered, “for a town this small, this traffic is a nightmare.”

“What?” Elliot asked, quickly averting her eyes from the book, feeling like she’d just rifled through someone’s personal drawer. “Oh, um—it’s a tourist town. People come here for the Christmas lights. They do like a whole lighting festival with that big tree in the square every night for weeks before Christmas.”

“And that’s why I can’t find parking.”

“That’s why you can’t find parking.”

He shot her a wry smile, taking a second loop around the square and a bit slower this time. Elliot turned her attention back out the window, but she couldn’t stop thinking about it—Unconditional Parenting. How long had he been reading baby books? Why was he so confident he’d get the chance to be a parent, anyway?

When he finally pulled into a parking spot, he let out a breath of relief. “How are we on time?”

Ell glanced at the car’s radio. “Ten minutes early,” she replied after a moment. “Right on time.”

“Great.” John paused. When neither of them moved to get out of the car, he cleared his throat and said, “So, what do you think?”

“About?” Elliot prompted. “The lighting festival?”

“What do you think baby is?” he clarified. Absently, he worried his thumbnail into the rubber of the steering wheel. “The lighting festival in a tourist town is the last thing on my mind right now.”

“Well, it should be on your mind,” she replied, a little petulant. “I think it’s nice, for the record. All of the vendors come in from out of town and even though the traffic’s a nightmare, it’s good business for the town and everyone’s always been respectful of it. Plus, the lights are nice.”

She paused, and when she looked at John, he was grinning at her. He seemed to be enjoying her firm defense of the lighting festival.

“And I think baby is a boy,” she added after a minute, pulling at a loose thread on her sweater. “Just my gut feeling.”

He seemed pleased by her answer, but if he actually was she couldn’t have said why; it was nearly impossible to read John sometimes, but especially in moments like this, in uncharted waters for them both. She lingered for a moment before she unbuckled and said quickly, “Anyway, we should probably go,” pulling herself out of the warmth of the car and into the chilly afternoon.

She wanted to go back to being angry. She wanted to go back to hating John, to being disgusted by him, to relishing in making him suffer, even just a little—but it was like her brain had reverted back to her neanderthal roots. Baby daddy reads parenting books, makes him a good father.

The sooner the moment was over and done with, the sooner she could go back to wallowing on the ways John had wronged her, instead of the ways he made her happy.

By the time they were back in the room, Elliot sitting on the end of the little bed and John in the chair under a pregnancy poster—Pregnant or thinking of getting pregnant? 3 things to discuss!—she had nearly steeled herself. If she just sat there, and replayed the last three months in her head, and reminded herself of all the reasons why she had left John behind in the first place, she would be just fine.

And then the door opened, and Dr. Harding stepped inside, and looked between Elliot and John with surprise.

“Hello, Elliot,” Harding greeted. “I see we’ve a guest today?”

“This is John,” Elliot said, trying not to sound too miserable given the riotous state of her brain. “This is the, uh—he's the father.”

John stood quickly, holding out his hand. “John Seed.”

“Nice to meet you. I’m Dr. Harding,” she said, reaching out and shaking his hand. “Excited? Elliot’s told you we might find out the gender today, yes?”

“Yes and yes,” John confirmed, sounding more and more like the kind of man she had fallen for and less like the egotistical psycho she’d turned in to the government. Right, the one that had lied, and coerced, and perhaps knowingly drugged her. She couldn’t afford to forget that bit.

As Elliot went through all of the normal questions—have you been eating well, yes, I see you haven’t lost weight, yeah, how is the sleep, it’s fine—she held on tight to that little thread of knowledge. John was here because she was letting him, not for any other reason, and it did feel good to know that this whole time he’d played by her rules. As much as he could have, anyway, showing up at her house unannounced.

She settled back against the propped back, grimacing as she shimmied the hem of her sweater up and Harding put a generous amount of gel on the swell of her stomach. Between doctor’s appointments, it was easy to pretend like maybe she wasn’t pregnant. The morning sickness had faded, her appetite had come back, she was getting fine enough sleep; if she didn’t look at herself in the mirror, if she ignored the pervading aches and pains, the roundness to her features then she could pretend like things were normal.

But then John pulled the chair over to the side of the bed, his fingers brushing hers, and nothing felt even remotely close to normal.

“Alright, let’s take a look at baby, shall we?” Harding said, settling in as she began to glide the instrument across Elliot’s stomach.

“Okay,” Elliot said, feeling uneasy. John’s eyes flickered to her, and while she chewed the inside of her cheek, her fingers curled around his—a thoughtless, absent-minded gesture, like she was a heat-seeking machine and the only heat that would do was his.

He didn’t say anything, but laced their fingers together just as Harding said, “Oh, there’s baby!”

The dull, steady heartbeat echoed. When she stole a glance in his direction, John’s eyes were transfixed on the screen as Harding went over where the features were, pointing them out on the screen to him.

“Your little one is about the size of a peach right now,” Harding was saying, “and let’s just see here...”

Oh, God, she thought, feeling her stomach roll. It was so real. Too real, to be laying there, after all of this time feeling so disconnected from her own body—like a vessel, but now with John’s fingers tangled with hers and the baby’s heartbeat and a fruit analogy regarding the size it felt too real. She could no longer act like it wasn’t happening.

“It looks like we’ve got a perfectly healthy baby boy,” were the words coming out of the doctor’s mouth when Elliot’s eyes drifted from John’s face. “It might be a bit early, but that's my educated inference. Congratulations, Elliot. And daddy too, of course.”

A boy. A boy. I’m having a boy.

A perfectly healthy baby boy.

The room felt a little like it was swimming, her throat tight and a steady burning behind her eyes and nose. She sat up a little and swallowed thickly. John had come to a stand too, to get a better look at the screen, but when she squirmed and moved he looked at her.

“Ell?” he asked, sounding very far away, or like he was talking to her underwater. His hand not interlocked with hers came up to her face, and she couldn’t find it in herself to pull away—not only because of the effort it would take, but because of the way it felt to have him right there when she thought she needed him the most. “What’s wrong? Hey, baby, are you—”

“I’m okay,” Elliot managed out, her voice thick and wobbly. “I’m f-fine, I just—um—”

I’m having a boy. Oh, God, it felt so fucking real, too fucking real, but in a good way—for once, her nerve-endings felt alive, and not with anxiety and dread but with happiness.

Sounding panicked, John tilted her face up and asked again, “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” she said, a wet, raspy little laugh bubbling out of her, “nothing’s wrong, I’m just—I’m just really happy—”

It took his thumb sweeping wetness from her cheek for her to realize that she was crying. Some unshed emotion hiccuped in her chest, and she swallowed thickly, fingers wrapping around his wrist in what she understood too late was an effort to keep his hand there; skin to skin, pulse close to pulse.

I want a home with you, she’d said to him, that night, and he’d looked at her and said, You have it, Ell, I told you.

He’d said, I’m all yours.

He’d said, Take what you need from me.

Dr. Harding was saying something, speaking softly to John. It was another reminder that it had been idiotic not to let him come in the first place—there was something so inherently endearing about John mmhming and nodding along, listening raptly as the doctor went over what they would be expecting in between this appointment and the next while his thumb swept affectionately over her cheek. She was sure that she heard the reaffirmation that she needed to be getting good sleep, staying as relaxed and unstressed as possible, but she couldn’t think about that. Her brain was going on loop, on repeat.

I’m having a boy, she thought, a perfectly healthy baby boy. My baby.

When Harding patted John’s shoulder and said, “I’ll give you two a minute,” before exiting, she felt John’s fingers threading through the hair at the nape of her neck; in a gesture that was painfully intimate, his forehead pressed to hers.

“Holy shit,” he whispered. “I can’t believe that—”

“I know,” she said, sniffing. “I can’t either.”

“You were right.” He grinned, their noses brushing, giving her hand a squeeze. So close to a kiss; she felt her lashes fluttering, the warmth of his hand spreading along the slope of her neck. “We’re having a boy. My God.”

Yes. We are having a boy. A perfectly healthy baby boy. Without her permission, the thought populated, permeating her brain.

Our baby.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

“Yes, I have him right here.”

Staci blinked. A quick intake of his surroundings reminded him that he was sitting in the cab of one of Eden’s Gates trucks—lifted from the F.A.N.G. Center. Footage of him with the cultists—the other cultists—would now be available. Footage of him walking past the corpses of Jacob’s gutted chosen would now be available.

Jacob is going to kill me, he thought, lifting his eyes from the back of the seat to look at Helmi. The woman was watching him as she spoke on the phone, with Dani sitting next to him on the backbench. Helmi had been on the phone with someone for quite a while; he’d stopped paying attention what felt like eons ago. If he just let his brain drift off, he wouldn’t think about the bodies. Fucking God, their bodies—

Jacob’s going to fucking kill me.

Helmi's hand moved. On instinct, Staci flinched, and she rolled her eyes.

“Say hello, doggy,” she said, shoving the phone against his ear. He fumbled with it for a minute before he swallowed thickly.

When he looked at Dani frantically, she frowned, her brows furrowing, and she whispered, “Don’t embarrass me, Staci.”

“Um, h...” His mouth was painfully dry. “Hello?”

“Hello. Is this Staci Pratt?”

The voice on the other end was painfully pleasant. She had the same kind of accent Dani did—Norwegian, maybe, or Swedish—but her voice was a bit deeper, a rich timbre to it.

“I am,” he replied uneasily. “I-I mean, yes. It is.”

Helmi had faced forward in the driver’s seat again and started pulling away from the F.A.N.G. Center, turning the heat down low. As the truck pulled out onto the snowy highway, she flicked the headlights off and slowed to something close to a crawl.

“S-Sorry, but—”

“You do not have to apologize to me, Staci.”

“I just don’t know—um, who you are,” he managed out. As soon as he said the words, Dani dug her elbow into his ribs; he barely stifled the yelp, looking at her as she mouthed something he couldn’t understand.

She hissed, “I told you, she is—”

“My name is Kajsa. Helmi, and your Dani, and many of our brothers and sisters are...” Her voice trailed off, and she made a thoughtful hum. Pratt tried to ignore the way she said your Dani made his heart jump in his throat. “They are my charges. It is my responsibility to take care of them.”

“Oh,” Pratt said. “So what...What do you want with me?”

“Helmi says that you have made a very good impression,” Kajsa replied sweetly. “You have important knowledge, and I want to make sure that you are safe, and taken care of. Just as I would any of the others.”

He fought back a grimace. The words sounded sweet and enticing, but he couldn’t shake the way Dani had looked at the gutted corpses on the screen and said delightedly, It will happen to us all. If we are lucky, Helmi will be the one who does it for us.

Pratt’s gaze darted up to the front. Helmi’s dark eyes fixed on his in the mirror, like she had been watching him all along.

“It is my understanding that the Seeds have not endeared you to their cause? That you know what your colleague did, that your friends have left?”

“No,” he replied quickly. “I mean—that’s right. Um, I was working for Jacob, but it was more like—”

“Do not trouble yourself with recounting. I believe you,” Kajsa interrupted. And then, gently: “It must have been horrible.”

His chest tightened. Oh, no, he thought, shaking his head and pressing the heel of his hand against his left eye. No, fuck no, don’t listen to her, Pratt, you fucking idiot.

“By now you must have some grasp of what is going on,” the woman continued, “but in case you do not, I will tell you. Are you listening, Staci Pratt?”

Pratt’s head pressed against the back of the seat. He didn’t want to; he didn’t want to listen to her sweetness, her sympathy, the way she clicked her tongue and the timbre of her voice warming him down to the marrow of his bones when he felt like he’d been freezing this whole time.

“Yes,” he whispered. “I’m listening.”

“We are well-armed. We are organized. We have a common enemy with you. And a common friend, too.” She paused, and he thought that he could hear a smile in her voice when she said, “I can tell that you want to live, my darling. That you don’t want me to have Helmi pull over and gut you open, leave you for the crows and the wolves and the woods to take you.”

Opening his mouth did nothing to inspire the words to come out of him. Nausea rolled violently in his stomach—but there was nothing left to puke up, even if he’d wanted to.

He did want to live, but not like this. Not terrified. Not. Like. This.

“I want you to live too,” Kajsa murmured on the other end.

“But you’re going to have to do something for me.”

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

When Elliot opened her eyes, it had gotten dark outside.

It took her a minute to collect her bearings, sitting up in a bed in a dark room. At her feet, Boomer huffed and sighed at the disturbance, and then she remembered; she was in her bed. Back at home. John had driven the both of them back to the house, and she’d said that she needed to lay down—and he’d let her, without protest or complaint. He hadn’t even tried to insinuate she could use a napping companion.

Pulling herself out of bed, she rubbed her eyes tiredly and glanced out the window. Everything felt a little foggy. How long had she been sleeping? Had she really been out until late into the night?

She reached absently to her bedside table, blindly fumbling for the lamp switch; after what felt like an eternity of not being able to find it, Elliot sighed and skimmed her hand over her face, looking out the window. The night outside was brighter than it had been in a while, with no clouds in the sky and the moon illuminating the snowy landscape in an unforgiving blue-white, stretching out far and far and far until it hit the treeline.

Something darted on the horizon. She blinked rapidly, taking a step closer to the window and pushing on the glass pane until it started to slide up, grinding laboriously. The longer she looked, the longer Elliot thought maybe she had just been zoning out—but then she saw it again; a flash of something, pale and long, like spider bone-white in color skittering up the dark wood of a tree in the distant treeline.

A glimpse of pale limbs. Tangled, dark hair—she couldn’t make out the color, it was too dark—but it looked wet, it looked matted, like someone had hurt it. Like someone had blown its skull open.

Something metal rattled. The trash can, she thought, her attention snapping to the front of the house. When the sound of metal crashed in the night, the motion-activated light in the front kicked on. A shadow stretched along the snow, cast long and deformed by the warping of the light.

“Hey!” Elliot shouted, but the shadow did not twitch or move in response; just the sounds of rustling, like whoever it was found themselves too preoccupied with digging through the trash can. Her heart was pounding violently in her chest; the terror that had been knotting in her stomach was doused by something hotter, redder, angrier.

Rage.

She pushed herself away from the window and out the door into the hallway. As her feet hit the stairs, there was almost no noise—just the rushing of her movements as she pushed the front door open and hurried down the front steps, turning the corner to where the garbage can sat.

“Hey, listen to me!” she snapped, propelled by the anger when she saw the figure hunched over the garbage can. “You can’t be in—”

The figure lifted its head. From the back, her eyes swept over what looked like fur, a tail, up and up to the back of a head that had two ears perched on it, until the figure’s head turned—

Fury disappeared. It was now only dread, only pure, cold dread and terror sitting in her, gutting her, washing her out as the dog with a man’s face turned and looked at her and smiled.

The square teeth, gapped and pearly, oozed with the same dark liquid as she had thought she’d seen before. In the yellow light from the porch, it glittered dark as garnets, dropping into the snow and spreading out crimson.

Move, she thought, I have to move, I have to fucking move, I have to go I have to run I have to—

“Hey!”

It was her voice. It was her voice, but it wasn’t coming out of her—it was thrown, echoing from somewhere in the trees, the dog with the man’s face spreading its mouth wider. Somehow, she knew deep in the marrow of her bones that It was making that sound.

“Hey? Listen to me?”

The pitch was all wrong. Elliot felt a moan bubbling up in her, and It turned on its hind legs, feet hanging loose around its ribcage, and faced her fully. She managed one step back before It tilted its head, as if to say, where are you going?

“Hey, listen to me!”

There was something else in its teeth. Something else, wiry and golden, and even when she willed herself a step back

(whereveryougowhereveryourun)

her body would not move; she was trapped, frozen, watching as It stepped closer

(ItwillwaitforyouItwaitsforusall)

she realized that it was hair, in It’s teeth

(ITWAITSFORYOUITWAITSFORUSALLITWILLHAVEYOU)

her hair.

A hand landed on her shoulder, and she screamed.

When she lurched and twisted around, she was not met with a familiar face. It was a woman, hair dark and bundled up in winter clothes, watching her with concern furrowing her brows as the headlights of her car made Elliot squint. She immediately jerked away.

“Are you alright?” the woman asked, her hand dropping back to her side. She was tall—she had to be at least six feet tall, and her face was sharp and angular, her eyes nearly black without any light to show their color.

“Where—” Glancing around wildly, Elliot forced a swallow. She was not in front of her house. She was not even close to the front of her house. She was all the way at the end of the drive, standing in the—

“—found you in the middle of the road,” the woman said, the lilt of her accent jarring Elliot back to reality. “I was on my way home when I nearly hit you. Are you quite well?”

Her gaze snapped back to the woman. The dog; where was the dog with the man’s face? Where had she—

Every nerve-ending felt fried, like they had become pure static; she felt like she was vibrating. She stared at the dark-haired woman with the strange, rich accent, wondering why it itched at her. Weyfield was small. Too small for her to not know about someone with an accent living there.

“Who are you?” she asked after a moment, nails digging into her palms. “You don’t live around here.”

A smile stretched across the woman’s face. She had pearly teeth, and the kind of full mouth that looked pretty, sculpted—but in the smile, Elliot only thought, broken glass, her smile looks like broken glass.

Vaguely, she was aware of John’s voice; he must have heard her scream, or seen her down the driveway, the headlights of the unfamiliar car illuminating her in the dead of night. And yet, she couldn’t shake the feeling. Paranoia spread along her spine, worming into her lungs, a most effective parasite.

“I know you don’t live here,” Elliot managed out, her voice trembling as she took a step forward. There was a tiny pinprick of relief when she realized she’d regained her mobility. “Why are you driving around this neighborhood? Who are you?”

The woman turned and headed back towards the driver’s side of her car, hands tucked politely into the pockets of her coat.

“You should be more careful of your sleepwalking. Someone else might not have been so kind as to stop,” she called over her shoulder. “And—”

The woman paused, the smile still rooted firmly on her face as she opened her car door.

“I hear stress is bad for the baby.”

Something wretched and vile twisted in her stomach, hot as a branding iron. The panic that shot through her system was so vicious, so potent, that for a second she felt like the air had been sucked out of her lungs; it crashed over her in a wave so powerful that her vision swam and she thought, I’m going to pass out.

But there was another thought, too, squirming around in there, blinking its little emergency light:

My baby, my baby, you stay away from my baby.

“Ell!”

John’s hands landed on her before she thought think to pull away, even if she’d wanted to, as the headlights of the woman’s car turned away and began to drift down the drive. The idea that she ought to chase the car down occurred to her, but the tremble in her legs and the hitch of her breath reminded her that it would only serve to make her feel worse.

The brunette frantically checked her over, panting and out of breath as though he’d just sprinted down the drive; when his hands finally came to a stop, they were cradling her face, his eyes searching hers. Over his shoulder, she watched the receding red light of the woman’s car drifting in the dark, aimless in a sea of inky black, and she wanted to throw up.

“I heard you scream,” he said, breathless as his brows knit together at the center of his forehead. “What are you doing all the way out here? Baby, look at me, what’s wrong?”

“She knew,” Elliot managed out. Her voice felt like sandpaper grinding out of her lungs. “She knew I—she knew about our baby.”

“Who?” John looked over his shoulder, and then back at her, his thumbs smoothing over her cheekbones. “Elliot, who?”

I don’t know, but the words wouldn’t come.

I don’t know who she is,

but she knew about our baby,

and she has a smile like broken glass,

and a mouth as red as blood.

[raineydaywrites]

working on from then til now (4/5)

link to part 1 (x), part 2 (x), part 3 (x), ao3 (x)

Taako couldn't explain how, but they got past it. Angus asked for more magic lessons, he hung around with Tres Horny Boys, and he put up with all of their dumb jokes until Taako stopped wanting to flinch every time they spoke.

Taako found himself growing extremely protective of the kid, much to his own dismay. He didn't want to care about this stupid kid. But he kind of already did. He'd cared about him before he'd learned what he'd done, and he'd felt- responsible for him afterward.

He loved this dumb brat, and it was terrifying, and it was amazing.

And then everything changed again.

The deaths at Glamour Springs- they hadn't been his fault at all. Not directly anyway. Not in the way he'd always thought they had been.

It had been Sazed- the fucker- jealous and bitter and taking it out on Taako and his audience.

Taako hadn't done anything wrong. Well, except for everything he did that convinced Sazed to hate him in the first place- but, but that wasn't the same. It wasn't his cooking. It wasn't his magic. It wasn't him.

It was just a dick who went way too far.

Taako wanted to be happy about that, but he couldn't quite bring himself to be. It didn't change anything that had happened, really. The only person that this knowledge benefited was himself, and, like, yeah, it was pretty great to know that he hadn't messed up in that particular way- but was it really all that much better? Still his fault. Still his food. Still his reputation ruined with no way to prove that he hadn't done it.

But he could tell Angus about it. And maybe the kid wouldn't feel so bad about him anymore.

Angus had been really torn up about befriending his parents' supposed killer, Taako knew. Kid was all about justice and fairness, so it was hardly a surprise. He had spent so long wanting to punish the killer, and then suddenly he was trusting him instead. Of course the kid was gonna feel weird about it.

Oh. Wait.

On the other hand, Angus wanted justice. He'd pushed that aside when he'd thought it was Taako, thought it was an accident.

How would he react to knowing that it had been murder after all? What would the kid do about it?

The thought of Angus running headlong after a murderer, especially while emotional and overwrought, sent a spike of fear through Taako's blood. Sazed was a slimy motherfucker that had always known how to act in his own self-interest- how to eliminate loose ends. Taako had appreciated it before, when he hadn't realized that the guy was willing to commit stone cold, premeditated murder. When those talents had been used to his advantage in running the show, and he'd thought Sazed wouldn't do anything worse than skirting some of the less convenient laws.

Sazed had poisoned the food Taako made for a crowd. He had wanted Taako to die in front of an audience, to die painfully and ruin his reputation in the process. Sazed had either not cared about or maybe even hoped for the deaths of the audience members as well. Sazed must have planned it out at least a few days in advance, if not longer, and he had spent that time calmly working with Taako while imagining his death.

Sazed had been the one to suggest running first. Taako knew that he probably would have come to the idea soon enough, but he'd been too frozen in shock in the moment to start moving. The fucker had seen his plan go awry and decided to make Taako look as guilty as possible before ditching him and stealing his shit.

He would have no qualms about killing a kid.

If Angus went after him, he'd be putting himself in danger.

And Angus would go after him. Taako knew him well enough by now to know that. You didn't become a renowned detective by the age of ten by holding back. The kid had no concept of his own limits and a years-long hope for justice.

Taako couldn't let that happen, but he didn't know how he was supposed to protect the kid either. He and the guys could go with him, Taako supposed, but that would still bring Angus into danger by the fact that he would be present with a murderer.

And Taako didn't know enough about Sazed or the situation the guy was currently in to be certain of the threat level. He was sure that he, Merle, and Magnus could take the guy if he was by himself, but what if he had allies? Who even knew where the guy was nowadays?

Taako was going to tell Angus. Of course he would tell Angus, the kid had a right to know.

But he needed to make a plan first. He needed to figure out how to keep Angus safe and still get the justice he so wanted.

-

Taako tried to make a few discreet inquiries, but 'discreet' wasn't exactly the best skill of THB. And Angus McDonald was a very good detective.

Taako was woken by an urgent eyed Davenport, and he immediately knew that something was wrong. He wasn't sure why exactly the worried look on the dude's face prompted an instinctive alarm, but he had learned to trust his instincts.

"What's happening?" he asked, even though he knew he wasn't going to get much of an answer out of the guy.

"Davenport!" was all the guy offered, his hands moving quickly, but Taako didn't understand enough sign language to actually get it.

He did notice the signs for "Director" and "Angus" though, and he was moving instantly.

"Lucretia in her office?" Taako questioned, only pausing long enough for Davenport to nod before he was pulling on his boots and grabbing the Umbra Staff.

As Taako left, he half-noticed Davenport going to Magnus' and Merle's rooms to wake them as well, but he didn't pay it any mind, moving out of the suite and towards the elevators with a single-minded determination.

By the time he got to the elevators, the other three had caught up with him, and Taako tapped his foot impatiently as he waited for Merle and Magnus to get in the damn elevator so they could get a move on.

He said nothing the whole trip to the Director's office, just knowing that something was wrong.

"Taako, there you are," the Director said, voice tight with worry when they got to her office. "When was the last time you spoke with Angus?"

"Yesterday? No, wait, day before," Taako said, stomach sinking with dread. "Why?"

"He left the base very early this morning, telling Avi that he had a family emergency to attend to. Avi had no reason not to believe him or to deny the request, so he sent Angus down planetside. But Angus left me this note-" the Director's voice cut off for a second, and Taako felt his dread increase. "He's in danger, isn't he?"

As the Director handed the note over for them to look at, Taako felt a strange, sickening sense of deja vu. Some part of his mind was screaming that everything was about to go wrong, but he didn't even know why.

The note was longer than Taako had expected, though he supposed it shouldn't be a surprise that the little nerd had babbled on.

Taako read the note as quickly as possible, cursing when he read Sazed's name.

"You two idiots can't keep your fucking mouths shut, huh?" Taako said, glaring between Merle and Magnus, refusing to admit to himself that if Angus had really been listening in for a while, he could have easily heard about it from Taako instead.

"Taako, please, not now," Lucretia said, glancing up from where she had her face buried in hands. She looked tired, and Taako thought about how much she seemed to like the kid and felt a stab of sympathy.

And she was right anyway. Snapping at his friends wasn't going to get them anywhere.

"Fine, whatever. We gotta find Ango," he said, hoping that Magnus and Merle would understand it as the apology it was meant to be. They seemed to.

"Do any of you know who this person is that he's looking for?" the Director asked. "I spoke with him a little while back and he said he was having a personal issue, but he didn't give much detail, and I didn't want to pry. Did he ever say anything to you three? I know he spends a lot of time with you."

Magnus and Merle glanced to Taako, clearly unsure how much he was comfortable revealing.

"Yeah. I know who he's looking for," Taako said. "Where'd Avi send him?"

"Wait- don't you have some way to track him through the bracers? They know where we are right?"

"They don't transmit constantly," the Director said, leaning her head forward in exasperation with herself. "I didn't want to be creepy, spying on my employees, you know?"

"Fuck," Taako said emphatically.

"It was a nice thought, though!" Magnus said, patting the Director on the back comfortingly.

"That could get invasive and weird, yeah, I suppose," Merle mused.

"Yeah, thanks for not being Fantasy Big Sister or whatever, but can we focus?" Taako said. "Where. Did. Avi. Send him?"

"Davenport!" Davenport exclaimed, spreading a map out on the Director's desk and gesturing to it, quickly marking where Avi must have put Angus down.

"Great. We're going," Taako said.

"I've had a team looking for Angus since I discovered that he was missing. They haven't turned up anything yet," Lucretia said. "I'm asking about this individual because I'm hoping that it may offer some insight to where he might be, or where Angus might seek him out."

"Team sweet flips?" Magnus questioned, a bit of excitement entering his voice.

"No, I'm afraid not. As impressive as they may be together, they're not our most- subtle team. I've sent a team of Seekers instead," the Director explained.

Taako stared down at the map, wracking his brain to figure out if he could remember anything useful. He hadn't paid much attention to Sazed, if he was being honest. He didn't know the guy enough to have a clue of where he might be.

But something familiar was whispering at the back of Taako's mind, and he focused, trying to pull it forward.

"There," Taako pointed to a small town a fair but walkable distance from where Avi had sent Angus. "That's Sazed's hometown. That's gotta be where Angus is looking."

The Director didn't question it, instead tapping at her Stone of Farspeech quickly.

"Maya? Have you and your team found anything of note in the town of- Wellspring? I have reason to believe Angus may have sought this individual there," she said.

A voice Taako was unfamiliar with came crackling back. "Yes, we have! I cannot confirm anything, but I'll send you the location information now."

Taako felt a tiny flash of relief, but didn't let it show. This wasn't over yet.

"Great, thank you," the Director said, and Taako saw the same wary hope on her face that he felt in himself.

"Normally, I would send Regulators for a task like this, but I know how much you three care for Angus, and so I ask if you-"

"Yes!" All three Reclaimers spoke before she could even finish speaking.

"Then I wish you good luck," the Director said, smiling softly at them. "Avi is waiting. I'll have Seeker Maya meet with you to explain the situation."

Taako was already leaving, barely taking the time to wave in acknowledgement as he stalked out of the office and toward the transport bay.

As they walked, no one said anything, too furious and worried to feel comfortable goofing too much. This was Angus who was in danger, after all.

The whole way there and into the glass cannon ball, Taako found one thought spiraling around in his head, over and over, somewhat nonsensical all things considered, but unshakeable regardless.

Hold on Angus. I can't lose you too.

part 5 (x)

[talesofealdancynedom]

Uncle Cetus knitting; There is a matching picture, where Morgan is wearing that sweater by the way...

Tale 21: What The Wagon Was For (chapter 8 - On The Radio 8/8 ) part 6. Stories of wizards

no warings

           Wool and yarn; Soft threads tied together to keep warm. Self soothing, and expressing creativity. Natural fibers, twirled into textiles that are plush, yet strong. The smell of plastic from the store, that turns into a soft warm sent, as fingers pull it between needles and hooks; As it is transformed into a variety of adornments. Bright as red, or white with dots, thick as rope, or thin like thread; There is no limit to the yarn available to those who seek it. Each loaf, pulled from its inner loop, and wound into balls that seem to always escape, tangle, or go missing. There is always too little, or too much of it around. With a few years practice, a hat can be made in under an hour, with argyle of red and navy, against a confetti white base; Complete with ties and pom-poms. The secret ingredient is time and love; Weaved into something comforting, to be gifted and cherished by someone. A gift of warmth that shows you care.

There is an aesthetic, sensation, smell, and rhythm, in this ancient textile art. Not only calming, but also protective and embellishing. This is why when the couples’ knitting group was over, uncle Cetus kept knitting for the family, while Jupiter kept finding odd amounts of wool in the linen cupboard. While she groaned about the plethora of thread, each autumn, Morgan and the rest of the family, eagerly awaited what Cetus had spent the year crafting for them. Made with love, thought, dedication, and material that costs more then they should. these treasures were meaningful; Because they were made by hand, just for them.

           At the end of the semester, some important paperwork finally got processed and aproved. Magic politics can only function within the common laws of a land; And the law prioritizes children in need of homes, over opinionated wizards. Cetus, after struggling to organize finances after his mother died, finally got guardianship over his sister’s precious son. The problem was that Morgan was bonded to Tiberius Gate, living in an ominous tower. With Emilia. Aunt Jupiter was no quitter; She suggested they move into the tower as well. They already lived in town, and Reginia was going to be sent to magic school anyway. She was to be Morgan’s peer support. Though cousins, they were the same age and like siblings. As magical as Pepperidge was, Cetus and Jupiter were perfectly mundane; Born to magic houses, but unqualified to care for young mages. But they were qualified to provide a supportive and loving family, to two growing youths. Cetus was up to the challenge of helping Morgan overcome his trauma, grow, and be himself.  Mage or not, Morgan deserved to feel safe after everything he went through.

Thus, Cetus became a great aid in Morgan’s recovery. A male role model, as well as an incredible barrier to the corrupt wizard counsel. Morgan, as the mage of Tiberius Gate, was the way of getting to Pepperidge, and its mages. So, if anyone wanted to get rid of mages there, they needed to control Morgan. But now, they also had to threaten the wellbeing a commoner, who had common law on his side. Cetus knew it. No one was getting their fingers in any peanut butter jar, that would mess up his family’s happily ever afters. Every advance made to contain Morgan’s abilities, was being thwarted by an increasingly close pro mage community, in the tiny town of Pepperidge; From the bus driver, to every teacher and student. If he didn’t feel it, Morgan was completely safe.

           After school, mid week, Cetus dropped Morgan off at therapy, and Jupiter would come to pick him up after sessions.

“We have a family meeting, and child welfare check next week. As always, do your best, sport.” Cetus said, ruffling Morgan’s hair. It gave him joy; After almost a year of adoption, and counseling, Cetus could finally touch Morgan without him flinching. Cetus didn’t know what Leo was doing, or if it was even Leo and not life in general; But it was working. He saw Morgan off, before taking Reggie and Emilia home.

“Hey, want to get ice-cream on the boardwalk after dinner?” Emilia said, leaning out the back window. She pulled Morgan over to kiss his check. He nodded, and shyly returned the gesture. Cetus and Reggie tried not to giggle. Morgan slowly walked into the office, checked in, and sat in the depressing psychiatry waiting room.

The fluorescent lights flickered, but at a rate that wasn’t noticeable until there was a migraine. There was the smell of bleach, and old drywall. The receptionist was taking a line of calls, as other families came in, and everyone tried not to look at each other; Because every chair was awkwardly placed facing inward. The walls were mustard, and the chairs plastic. The water cooler bubbled, and the thermostat was set low. Morgan was wearing a forest green, salmon, and black argyle knit sweater, Cetus had made it. Fall had come around, and it was almost his birthday. Morgan reflected on how it had been nine months since his uncle took him in. He loved his uncle. But it wasn’t the same as his mother and father. He hadn’t seen his parent in almost three years.

           Leo came to the front, and h led Morgan to his quiet office, while holding Dolly. The light blue walls, smelled of ambiguous air freshener. There was a stack of papers, bulletin of inspirational posters, bowl of fidget toys, and a Yuka in the back. It had started to become comforting and familiar. Morgan relaxed into the chair, holding Icarus on his lap.

“Never seen you so relaxed,” Leo smiled. He took his seat, causing the office chair to squeak. “What would you like to talk about today?” He started. Morgan sat there, looking around the room. He wasn’t feeling anything in particular at the moment. Nothing was really bothering him. Well, maybe the embarrassment and excitement of getting his girlfriend with child WAY too early, or the stress of balancing the world of fey with homework. Also, the upcoming equinox dance at school, and his birthday. Actually, there was too many things to talk about.

“How about you and Emilia, or Cetus? Your aunt and uncle are getting a review from what I hear.” Leo prompted. He had an agenda. Morgan being relaxed was good, but there is always more work to do. Morgan shrugged, like usual.

“How about what you’re feeling right now? I can bring out the chart if you like.”

“I think I’m sad? Out of all things, today I miss mom and dad a lot. They send me paint, books, and clothes, to help my uncle. Mom still knows exactly what I like. Cetus is super nice, and he’s always there for me; He worked really hard to take me in, even with all the magic politics. I appreciate it. Oh, he actually got pulled into some quests, even though he’s common folk! Now I get to graduate early under professor Hara, researching Griminthropes. Aunt Jupiter wants to do a good job too, so she’s-” Morgan mumbled on.

“Stop there. This isn’t about Cetus’s life; This is about built-up trauma, and missing your parents, in spite of your recent happily ever after,” Leo interrupted. “I’m glad you’re confident enough to talk to me, but every conversation is about a fairy tale, not a feeling. You might need to break your habit of relying on magic, legends, and individuals, to avoid problems. I just want you to have a quality of life, feel loved, and care for your yourself. Without relying only on mystical outings or old books. You have the opportunity to do so, and I encourage you to focus on yourself.” Leo suggested. Morgan was leaning inn, looking mildly confused while he listened. At least he had Morgan’s attention.

“I get so frustrated with your avoidance problem. You walk around with so much pain and suffering; And it keeps you up at night. Yet, instead of processing it, and using your support system, you go to the shadow veil, stay silent, act reckless, and harm yourself. Your gratitude is wonderful, but happily ever afters are meaningless if you desert them. Avoidance is not a log term solution, and I don’t expect immediate change. But you need to start embracing things around you in the moment.” Leo said, fizzling out into a whimper, as he tried to stay professional. Morgan looked at him, unblinking.

“Yes, Leo. That’s what the wagon was for.” Morgan said, nodding his head. Leo gave a look of complete defeat. He already knew that.

“So you’re telling me, it’s more then a scheduled avoidance quest? That now it’s something meaningful; A source of fulfillment as a seer. Thus, Honestly Morgan, do you actually still need the wagon to find friends and joy? I don’t think you need to runaway anymore; Everything you need is right here, if you’ll sit with it.” Leo continued. Morgan liked that perspective; It sounded like enjoying life, without sacrificing his dreams. Morgan smiled a bit. The meaningful stories of each object in that wagon, were tales of is growth. That wagon had helped him. But his new life was doing that too. A simple, worn, faded, treasured wagon. In primary colours, the offend the senses. Something that was purchased at a toy store, to carry children on family outings. It is easy to say what the wagon was for, and what that means now. The wagon helped Morgan runaway, and become an accomplished mage. Now the wagon reminds him of good things he experienced, and is for visiting friends.

“Thanks Leo.” Morgan said. “I’m sorry I accidentally mislead you with the wagon. It’s very distracting.”

“Your most welcome, and forgiven. Oh look! We still have thirty minutes left.” Leo laughed. Morgan groaned. He still had to unpack his relationship with his parents with feeling words, now that the wagon was gone.

TABLE OF CONTENTS--->

<---PREVIOUS

[earthendandinbetween]

This was literally supposed to be a quick prompt. But no. It’s so long. Why. What happened to me here.

Everything was loud, indistinct, too close, too far. Snow clumped together with blood and trampled footsteps from the battle, the only real distinction that he had infact won was the still retreating forms of the bonedeths in the distance.

It wasn’t really much of a true battle, more like a cowardly- stupidly pathetic infact – ambush. They had tracked the zigotons’ patrolling path and tried to pick them off like simple prey animals. ...Perhaps they would’ve, if they had accounted for his presence. He could feel enough pride that it was rather difficult for enemies to truly plan for his strength. It wasn’t like they knew how to fight against an akumapon, what with the two tribes being supposed allies and such.

Though, he had expected the commotion to have died down by now. There were still shouts, not easy to make out from his focus on his blurry vision, only really able to make out the puffs of breath that froze in the snow-field’s cold.  It wasn’t easy to get out of an ambush unscathed, he certainly expected a few hits. Some were deeper than others, but at least nothing was broken.

...He assumed such at least. The exhaustion and chill from the freezing temperatures made it difficult to tell anything anymore as he lowered down to kneel.

Just a moment. He’d be fine. He had survived much, much worse before.

A singular shout got a bit closer. His name, maybe? Probably.

He was too tired to move or acknowledge such. He didn’t usually like to acknowledge the little zigoton soldiers anyways outside of an order or two. They weren’t his troops, he held little interest towards them. Give him a minute to catch his breath, it’s fine. He’ll take them back to their general and they’ll probably plan some new stupid patrol path.

...Was it snowing again already?

Gods, he hated snow.

That was the last real conscious thought Kuwagattan had before collapsing. At least, that he could remember.

–

“He’s...Going to be alright, right?”

“Well, thanks to the others on the patrol, yes. The Snow-field can be unforgiving when one’s alone.”

“Poor dear...The zigoton scouts told me about the ambush...”

“Hm. I’ll have to plan with Gong for a new patrol route. Gathering Intel on our enemies is good and all- until things like this happen. I keep asking to send in one of the machines I’ve been working on, it could make the process so much safer.”

“It’s only a prototype, dear.”

“I know I know but-”

“I know, you’re excited, but--- Let’s save that for now, please. I don’t think a patrol route is really on his mind right now...”

“...You’re right. I’m just...Worried. You know that. I ramble when I’m nervous...”

The odd warmth and idle, soft chattering had slowly sunk into his regained consciousness, bringing with it a confusion and ache that lingered in the back of his skull. Where was he? It had to be familiar. He could recognize these voices, at least a little.

It took a moment as he squinted his eye open, blurry imagery of bricks, a desk, flames--- Ah. Part of the hideout. That seemed clearer now. One of the tents...shacks...buildings? Whatever stupid name the barracks were referred to. A mismatch of all three, really. It was dark, with only the warm glow of the small embers of the fire-pit bringing light in.

Well, at least he wasn’t freezing anymore. When had he fallen asleep? Or gotten back here for that matter? Last he remembered, the battle had just ended in the morning. This, this wasn’t morning. Dusk--- maybe. At least that guess was closer than the early morning sun. Did the scouts help bring him back? A little ridiculous, he would have been fine. He just needed a few moments and then he’d be right back on his feet again, like always.

Giving a soft groan as he moved, Kuwagattan shuffled in the thick fabric that he had been nestled in, cracking a few sore joints as he glanced about the bandages covering his form. There were an awful lot this time, almost shameful really. He was tougher than this, that was just a fact! Lousy cowards, hiding in the treelines instead of facing their own demises head-on. What good did ambushing even do for them in the end? It was the same result either way for the opposing tribe.

...The only thing the ordeal had done was plague him with an obnoxious stinging pain across his body, as well as wasting his time. If he wanted a battle, he would have gone to one. An entire day- just gone like that. The gall-

Where was his helm? Ugh, it had to have been that stupid Almighty that moved it. Anything just to be an obnoxious, soft hearted nuisance. He could mock her tone firmly in his head. ‘

He would be more comfortable without it!’ in her soft, annoying trill of a voice. Others would describe her voice as soft, kind, gentle. But to him it was all just high pitched chatter.

Great. He would have to reclaim his helm soon.

“Oh!”

Speak of the devil, and she will appear. Or whatever that saying was. He couldn’t care enough to remember. Moving his eye enough to see further into what he could only assume was a makeshift infirmary, the akumapon squinted at the two figures.

The irritant of a deity and...Of course it had to be Spiderton. Both pests he frequently had to deal with, even if the latter was only mildly less obnoxious. ...Very mildly. Maybe if he sunk further into the blanket, neither would pay him any mind. Or better yet, leave.

Calle offered a gentle wave as she spotted him, one he returned with a grunt of annoyance and roll of the eye. Not interested in the formalities. The two’s chatter resumed, quieter this time. His brow quirked slightly as the deity quickly shoo’d the spider-helmed zigoton out of the area, watching as he disappeared behind the cloth that closed off the outside world from view. Great. What ridiculous thing had she sent him off to do that he apparently wasn’t allowed to know?

“Stop starin’ at me,” Kuwagattan growled softly, not exactly up for his usual bite, “What do you want?”

“I was just worried,” Came the trill of a response, “I’m not staying for long.”

“Ugh. Good, get lost already” he hissed, “I can barely tolerate you when I’m not injured.”

Instead of the typical argument that would ensue between the two, typically resulting in the deity becoming annoyed and referring to him as ‘childish’ or ‘cruel’ before stomping off angrily, Calle simply creased her eye in worry as she dipped her head in silence. An abnormal response, not something he was used to at all from anyone. He knew the Almighty was soft hearted, willing to spare anyone and anything. He knew she did hold concern for him but--- without an argument or attempt to reach a mutual understanding first was not usual.

Had things really been that bad while he was out of it?

Couldn’t be. It was just a ridiculous display of patheticness. It didn’t matter, it kept her from speaking for now. That was fine by him.

...He wasn’t used to being cared for anyways. It didn’t matter.

Wordlessly, Calle stepped towards the cloth entrance, pulling it open without so much as a hum or chirp of wishing his swift recovery like she usually did when she found even a simple injury on him or others. A silent respect of his wishes to leave. He got a glance at the sky as she left, it was much darker than he had first thought. Truly, an entire day left wasted. Of course, just his luck.

Silence reigned, with only the crackling of the fire present as his gaze wandered about the unusually roomy area. Where even was this located in the hideout? He surely hadn’t seen it before. A vague recollection of a project the others were working on floated by his memory. ...Maybe this was that project. It would make sense, to build an infirmary of sorts. That, however, wasn’t what the akumapon was looking for right now. As he reached a hand idly to the soft tangle of fur on his head, he grumbled in annoyance, right now he was looking for a particular accessory of his that was unceremoniously stolen.

Laying on the slightly crowded table was the object in-question. Perfectly intact and completely unnecessary to remove. It didn’t exactly matter now, as he slowly stood with a grimace, popping his knees softly to try and shake the pain out of them. ...Might as well just drag the blanket with him and settle over there. He truly did not feel like playing a game of back and forth right now. He was not in the state to do such, slowly dragging his body across the room, flinching at every jostle of one of the wounds. ...They were much deeper than he had first assessed. What a shameful thing, to let himself show such weakness in battle. He would need to do better in the future.

It hadn’t taken long to retrieve his helm back to its rightful spot, tucking away a few loose strands of troublesome fur back under the accessory as he adjusted it, but the action certainly had felt longer than needed. The silence was welcome at first, slowly ebbing away into boredom and the urge to fidget about once more. This was why he hated vigils, typically. Standing around and accomplishing nothing, not even the tiniest bit of entertainment.

Kuwagattan was aware he was always seen as brash and stubborn, but he knew better than to strain himself currently. He’d come to regret it later if he did. He had done such in the past, albeit in a much weaker form, and it only resulted in a much longer rest time in the end. He could handle the boredom.

Instead, he put more of a focus on the surroundings, adjusting the thick blanket back over his own shoulders with a contented hum. The area was cluttered, clearly not entirely finished on its interior. A few bricks lay loose on the floor by the fire-pit, with tools and various maps laid about on the table. It was probably a hasty move to bring him here was the assumption. Warmer, most likely as the snow-fields could be intense. Ugh. Snow. He remembered being dragged through the Bryun snowfields and ice forest back over the bridge. He hated it then, but not nearly as much as the Sullied Tears. The storms were much more intense here, casting even part of the Field of Angry Giants in a thick ice at least once every other week.

This whole place was insane, now that he thought of it. Things were much more simple back home.

...Partially because he wasn’t expected to do much else than fight and die. That, that was most likely the major factor of not noticing how dangerous things had gotten in the world.

In the end, the general wasn’t given much time to dwell on that subject. Maybe a sign to keep the past in the past or---some weird thing he was often told or thought about on his own.

The cloth marking the entrance had moved slightly, causing him to squint in predetermined annoyance. His pupil formed a thin slit to show that whoever was here to bother him, that it was not welcome, and that it would be best to leave.

“Evening,” The voice was low, and yet even with a singular word the tone still was laced with a clear concern.

Almost immediately, the akumapon let his shoulders drop as the now identified stranger entered, allowing the curtain-like fabric to fall back into place. Soft footsteps followed, approaching him with an air of caution. Something he knew was not directed at him, just more of a mannerism picked up over years of battle.

Ah. Someone he could tolerate.

“Hey,” Kuwagattan offered a ‘grin’ as he adjusted the hold on the blanket, “I’m surprised you’re not..uh...Keeping watch or something. Isn’t it late?”

Gong stayed silent for a moment in response, taking a slow seat directly infront of the other, pupil turned away to avoid his gaze and brow furrowed. His eye was glossy, swimming with multiple thoughts he most likely wouldn’t say out loud, but were still clear. He hated these moments. Hated the soft looks and attempt at good advice to keep himself safer next time. He didn’t need to be babied, be patronized---

He didn’t need to know he made someone worry so stupidly over himself. And deep down, he didn’t want to acknowledge that he felt guilty over never listening to the others. He hadn’t made a mistake this time, it was a true ambush where quick thinking was needed. What could he possibly be chastised on this time?

“Don’t look at me like that,” He grumbled, “I’m not in the mood for another conversation about my battle plans.”

“No, I’m not here for that,” the zigoton half whispered, “My scouts told me how well you had protected them. Not a scratch on a single one of them.”

Kuwagattan huffed proudly, giving a more smug, prideful look as he responded, “Well yeah. I said I would look after your troops when I left, didn’t I?”

“Hm,” Gong dipped his head slightly in a nod, “Of course, I had no doubts of such to begin with. I just--- I had not expected an ambush, especially of that size for such a small patrol group. I suppose this entire time I’ve...let my worries wander. About you.”

The akumapon paused his quip he was about to speak. Typically this would be where the two would prod fun at each other and laugh off the danger, like any other time the other was harmed in a fight. They had both faced death and returned stronger from it, they could handle just about anything. This really wasn’t much different from a typical battle, so why the dire atmosphere?

The tone was all wrong. This was too serious for his liking, not a conversation he wanted to be apart of.   He allowed himself to shrink further into the fabric draped around himself, gaze darting away from the tateton as he heard him clear his throat to continue.

“I know that you are--- Not used to being shown concern for your well being. Kharma did not treat you with much respect as a general and--- gods know how that star treated both you and Makoton as disposable pets. I just wish that you would not push yourself like you still need to prove you are worth belonging.”

“I thought you weren’t here to chastise me,” Kuwagattan muttered, trying desperately to chase away the pushing guilt and just get away from the subject, “I can handle myself.”

“I know you can,” Their eyes met for just a moment, “You know yourself best, after all, and you will follow any path you see fit. These….these are just my own worries and thoughts, especially after today.  We all care an awful lot about you here, this isn’t like the akumapon tribe, not by a longshot. Perhaps not even like in our old territory, either.”

“They ‘care’, sure,” the beetle-helmed general huffed, sarcasm biting through that led to vague annoyance,“Whatever. You can go now.”

“I’m tired of you acting like you’re indestructable!” Came the snapping, surprisingly harsh tone thrown his way, “I did not track you down and face you alone over the bridge because I needed another soldier. I did it because you deserved to have a chance to do something other than be expected to waste your life in an unwinnable battle. You can act crude and sarcastic about the rest of them but you cannot say to my face that I don’t care or that I do not know what I am talking about.”

Kuwagattan paused before he could even will himself to utter a word. His arm twitched nervously as he  thought of any comeback or way to guide this somewhere else. Away from the concept of his ever need to prove his strength to everyone and anyone. To avoid being soft.

...He had not wanted to push the one being in this camp that he truly tolerated enough to give even a fleck of vulnerability to, and the guilt clung uncomfortably heavy to him. He hated it. If he kept quiet, maybe the other would leave and things would go back to normal by morning. It had to, right?

Hands gripped the outer section of the almost sort-of cocoon he had made of the blanket, causing the akumapon to jolt slightly, gaze finally lowering to the other general. The glossy look in his eye had only increased, leading into a stray tear or two. This...wasn’t right. This was never how their conversations had ever gone in the past. Why was it like this now?

“Why won’t you let me help you?” The burst of anger had quickly turned into a pained, hurt tone that was trying to hold back a worse choke-up, “Why won’t you let anyone help you? I don’t want to lose you, not again. There’s so much left for you here.”

Kuwagattan waited for a further word, a snap that he was being foolish, how to fix it, how to plan better. Anything that he was used to hearing, maybe an odd saying or metaphor, but he was left with the silence. Any conversation had stilled, and the only real way he could tell the other wasn’t about to up and leave was still the tight grip held onto the fabric.

He’d rather be shouted at, questioned for his mindlessness, told not to be stupid and not to ruin a plan. Anything but being left with his own thoughts right now.  The ever present worry of showing vulnerability or weakness, the fear that such would make him been seen as not as worthy as others. That if he was not always striving to crush his foes that they would up and walk over him. Or that those he was told to defend would up and leave.

The presence of what a second death might mean, and that the slightest of hesitation could bring that upon him.

It didn’t make sense. Not at all. To be encouraged to feel anything other than a dull rage, an urge to fight for a tribe that insisted it was in everyone’s best interest. He wasn’t good at having a choice, he just fell back into his old habits of defending without much thought.

Yet it had also grown so differently here. More open. Friendlier.

And he couldn’t handle such.

It felt like a ploy to get him to care, to feel like he could simply be without having to defend his worth at every angle. To be vulnerable to strike his pride down and lose everything he had begun to work for. He had been shown enough that leaders did not care for him, and that most of a tribe would not remember his name.

...He hated this. He hated it.

His body shuddered instinctively. His views had been challenged and though he had thought once or twice about it, he still had kept himself shut off. He wasn’t allowed to care so much like this. He couldn’t figure out why, in the end, that he wasn’t allowed to. It was just how it had always been before.

Kuwagattan had often thought of letting himself simply be... it just never made any sense. Clearly, if this was all he had ever known and been taught, it was all he was.

Without his gruff attitude, rage, and strength…What would be left of him then? A shell? A stranger?

...Would he like to be a stranger? Something different? Not wholly different, mind you, but with less of a bite towards those that only meant him well. What would he have to really leave behind to do such?

He wasn’t sure. He hated himself for being so unsure.

His body shuddered again, and with that his eye watered without being able to mask it, nor stop it from happening. ...He would succumb to this weakness. For now.  He was being shown vulnerability from his companion, it was possibly only fair to do the same. He...did not want to lose his second life, either. Not now that he had more of a choice, whatever it may be.

It was more of an involuntary motion, but the akumapon made no conscious effort to stop himself as he  lowered slightly, pressing his face halfway against the base of the smaller general’s helm, fur brushing across his face softly. Familiar, comforting almost.

“...I’m sorry,” His speech was so much softer than he anticipated, almost foreign to himself despite it being clearly his own voice, “I’m...I’m no good at all of this...Changing, I mean.”

“...You’ve certainly come further than I’m sure you thought you would,” Gong’s response was barely audible, muffled as he adjusted himself a bit more comfortably, “You would not have admitted to this in the past.”

He wouldn’t have. He was sure of that. The general wouldn’t have even questioned for a second that he had done anything wrong, that what he was doing was anything but correct. Yet, here he was. Feeling guilt for causing worry. Something he once never even gave a second thought to, since worry thrown his way was so rarely shown. And even then, it was less personal and more of a worry of losing numbers and strength.

This. This was much different. More personal.

Kuwagattan should’ve expected as much, he had heard the term friend spoken to him a few times here and there, but the concept never really stuck. That someone would really want him around.

He wasn’t sure if he would often set aside his pride and facade like this. But, he wanted it to stick this time around. That he also cared, that he understood the risk and the worry. That the effort spent on him wasn’t in vain.

It was just showing it that made it so difficult.

“Yeah I guess so,” The pause he took in the middle of his sentence was unusual. He typically thought of his responses quickly, this was so much slower, “I-- I do appreciate what you say to me. It’s just hard to….accept it...I guess. I don’t know.”

“I understand, of course I do...You were not taught well. I should have been there more to help before.”

There was a twinge of anger. Not at Gong, not in the slightest, just the wording, the self put blame. The other general did this far too often with others. A blame that he is always the last line to catch a disaster before it happens.

...Both of them were pushed to be something more than just a general. He vaguely understood the worry with the zigoton tribe. They needed a strong leader when their queen was not enough, and she sought after strength as well to keep enemies at bay. They hadn’t seen something quite as dangerous before. Thus, the two were set up from the beginning for such.

After that...that was when he felt any comprehension ended.

With a sigh, he moved one arm from his cocoon of blanket, using it to pull Gong in closer to himself. It was the only real comforting thing he could think of other than words.

He wasn’t sure how this was supposed to work. He was never one for comforting or to be comforted.

“...Not everything is your problem, you know,” Kuwagattan muttered softly, “Nor should you make it your issue. Things can just be.”

“Hm, and yet I still feel as though, if I had done better-”

“...What difference would it have made anyways? It would’ve played out nearly the same.”

“I suppose you’re right. At least here, there was a chance to set things right.”

A chance to set things right. He understood that, at least, when he was first asked what he truly believed in. He wasn’t ever really able to answer that question before. Maybe he believed in this world being saved to use that second chance better than he had so far.

It wouldn’t make sense to leave it behind in ruins. Not really.

“Yeah. I guess,” the akumapon flinched slightly when a hand came up to flatten a bandage that had become bunched up on his side, “I think--- I think once things are back to normal I can focus on--- I don’t know. Figuring things out.”

“Of course. I can’t imagine the stress has been good for anyone’s thoughts.”

“...But if I let myself go –ugh--- soft….What would be left of me then? This is all I have.”

There was a slight shift in movement, followed by a much calmer laugh and a soft pat to his forehead.

“Changing does not mean you’ll lose all parts of yourself,” Gong responded, tone having changed from the hurt he had heard before, “Besides. Whatever you become, I’m sure you’ll be alright in the end. Give yourself some credit, my friend.”

“Hm. You think so?” The idea of still being himself was a comforting thought, being a complete stranger to himself was….Too much, “Think we’ll still be friends by then?”

“I’m very certain of such. I’ll be with you every step of the way.”

The akumapon gave an amused snort, quirking his brow in question with a ‘grin’, “All of them? You sure?”

“If you want me to be there, then yes.”

“Well, remember that when you get sick of me then! You’re stuck with me now,” It was odd to feel more at ease as he tightened his arm around the other just slightly.

“And you, General Kuwagattan, are stuck with me. We are both equally stubborn, you know.”

Oh yes, the akumapon was very very aware of such, if previous conversations and sharing of views was anything to go by. Admirable at times, for the both of them he presumed. To be passionate for something, even if he wasn’t entirely sure what he was so passionate about.

...

“Y’know, Gong…I’m really glad you’re here.”

[gotmeringinghellsbells]

Prompt from @wertzunge

 Well I would love to see a fic with Kaminari, Midoriya and Ojiro where they do a sleepover in Midoriya's room for studying and at one point Ojiro accidentally brushed Kaminari's socked sole under the table which made him giggle. He got curious and did it again, to Midoriya's feet, to see if he would also laugh...resulting into a kind of tickle contest which of the three can hold it in longer while the other two tickle them on their socked/bare feet, sides etc.

_

Fandom: My Hero Academia

Characters: Denki Kaminari, Izuku Midoriya, Mashirao Ojiro

A/N: I thought this was a really cute idea actually. Some rare trio boys being playful puppies together!

Description: A dorky idea to take a break for studying soon becomes a more eye opening experience for Kaminari. He realizes that he doesn’t need to be better than his classmates, and that having fun is part of the journey. 

_

That’s it, he officially could not take anymore of this torment. The pokemon let his face slam into his book as slender fingers ran through his yellow hair. ‘That’s it, this is so boring. Guys it’s been like…. five hours!” Kaminari, Midoirya, and Ojiro were studying together in Ojiro’s room as for the benefit of all three of their attention. 

Denki would be too distracted in his own room, the other two felt All Might’s eyes were staring into them in Deku’s room, and Ojiro’s room had nothing to really distract them and felt warm and homey; it was perfect. Or so they thought it would be. After their recent homework grades, the three decided to buckle down as a group and work harder at their studies. However, for Denki, it didn’t seem to be doing very much. 

“It’s only been a half hour Denki,” Mashido sighed as he swayed his tail a bit from general nervousness. The current subject was giving him a bit of a rough time. Deku looked equally as stressed. If Present Mic could just slow down in class that would be amazing. “Maybe we should take a break,” the third party stated softly as he shut his book. Sho-kun has been trying to help me but I just get so confused with the similar words and when to apply them.” 

Ojiro nodded. “Yeah, Hitoshi tried to help Denki and I, same with Sero. It just didn’t work out.” Denki let out a groan as he looked up with a pout. “I even tried asking Bakugou but Kirishima talked me out of it. He said I wouldn’t be able to handle Bakugou’s aggression.” Ojiro snorted a bit. “Let me guess, he got aggressive over the comment?” The other gave a nod before sighing and sitting back and leaning on his elbows. 

“Yeah man, the guy has like no chill.” Deku nodded a bit with a nervous laugh. “Ah yeah, that’s Ka-chan alright. He seems to go easier on you guys though. Especially Kirishima.” He was talking about the Baku squad. “I guess. Man, I don’t know wy you put up with him so much. He treats you like garbage.” Ojiro went to slap his leg from under the table but rather accidentally swiped against his foot. 

The Pikachu squealed in surprise before looking to Ojiro in surprise. The three were quiet, just staring at each other. That was until Midoriya suddenly let out the same noise before narrowing his eyes at Ojiro and trying to pull his feet away from the small table they were sitting around. “Don’t you dare.” Mashirao smirked menacingly as he chuckled and started to lean towards Deku’s side of the table. “Oh Midoriya~.” He was being so playful, so confident! Kaminari felt himself blush slightly from this side of his friend. 

Deku didn’t try to run that far. Rather he ended up curling into a ball and squealing as the other crawled towards him with clawed hands. “Nhahahaho! You know how ticklish I am!” He did? Denki’s blush and flusteredness faded as he started to think. Ojiro knew how ticklish he and Deku both were, but Denki had no idea how ticklish the green bean was. He had an idea.

“Wait! How about instead of breaking all together, we work on something else for a little while? Maybe… endurance training?” He wanted to see if he could out stand Midoriya. No particular reason past him feeling as if it was a fun idea, but still it was a nice breather. “Endurance training,” Deku asked softly as he sat up, panting softly. Mashirao sat back onto his legs before looking to the pikachu. 

“Anything particular in mind.” Infact…. There was. “It’s kind of weird but maybe…. Deku and I could see who lasted longer with your tail?” Huh? Midoriya didn’t follow. “Like… tickle you guys? Like at the same time?” That was going to be awkward. “Yeah,” Kaminari answered with excitement. “What, hang on,” Deku exclaimed in a panic. But…. too late. Denki was holding onto him happily. 

“Not sure where to really do this given… well… angling, and evenness.” If he tried their stomachs he may not have even coverage of both and may strain his tail trying to angle himself. There was no answer as the three thought. “I guess here could work?” The tip of the tail dusted both pairs of feet carefully, earning a giggle and snicker from both classmates. 

“O-Ojiro,” Deku giggled, pulling his legs away. “N-No man, you gotta keep them there.” Aw man. The green bean blushed before sighing. “Alright.” He didn’t see it as much of an endurance training exercise; but it did seem like a fun game. Midroiya would relax enough to give it a try. However, it didn’t take long for both to crack over, holding each other as they fell back from lack of endurance. 

“Um, guess you both fail,” Ojiro giggled as he continued to dust his tail along them. Denki shook his head, denying the fact as he giggled his head off; tears were already forming in his eyes. Midoriya was snorting and hiccuping adorably as he nuzzled into the pokemon’s neck to ease the sensation. “Mashshsirao!” Midoriya caved first, quickly quing the tailed student to stop. 

The babe smiled shyly before squatting down. You guys alright?” They were just hugging each other and giggling adorably as they caught their breath. “Rematch,” a shaky voice came. Green and black eyes widened a bit. “Huh,” Deku asked softly as he tried to look up at the electric type. “D-Denki, you alright?” Ojiro was a little concerned. 

Kaminari sat up with a little pout. “Can we go again? I wanna try to last longer than that!” Wow, he was taking this seriously, huh? Deku blushed a bit, kind of flustered from the attack. Ojiro looked between them before looking to Midoriya. “You want to try again too?” The other tried to seperate the idea of play and training in terms of tickling. It…. wouldn’t hurt. “Um… yeah, sure! It’s training, right?” Can’t go wrong with it. 

The two beans got situated again, holding hands to try and distract themselves from the inevitable. Mashirao chuckled a bit at how serious the two were taking this. Well, Midoriya anyway; he knew the green bean was trying his best and putting up with this game because he wanted to train, to have better endurance. But for Kaminari, Ojiro couldn’t quite figure it out. 

It seemed more than just like something fun for the shorter. If it was, he would have just straight out asked Ojiro to wreck him; or baited both him and Midoriya. Was he really trying to work on his endurance? It was entirely possible. But that didn’t mean it also wasn’t entirely cute to see the two flinching and holding each other at the slightest movement of the tail. 

The fluff gently touched down on the soles, earning soft whimpers from both as they tried to swallow their anticipation so that they could last longer. But it was of little use as soon they were both giggling softly. It wasn’t the full extent of laughter that wanted to escape, but they were still crumbling. 

Kaminari was trying to silence himself to prove he could last longer than someone surpassing him academically and physically in his courses, but Midoriya saw it as the first step to training himself to not be as weakened from the fun game. That would definitely help when Urakara decided to start tickle fights, or Tsu,.... or Iida. Todorki wasn’t very innocent but Deku could fight back easier with him than the other three.

Kaminari was always the weakest link when it came to tickle fights, but he wanted to feel stronger. But as Ojiro slowly broke him, his ego became less of an issue than his happiness. He was so busy being stuck in his own mind that it didn’t even click that Midoriya had fully broken. His laughter was adorable!

He was hugging Kaminari, hiding into his neck again. It semi clicked for the taller as he started to let his own laughter kick up and hold back that in all honesty…. it didn’t matter. His rank meant nothing when it came to having fun with friends or being with his friends. He was confident enough to keep trying even if he didn’t do as great as others. 

And even if he and Midoriya were tied for this endurance training…. He was having a lot of fun with it regardless. Their legs kicked as the dusting kicked up more, eventually scaring the tail away. 

As the giggles died down, the two were smiling, just cuddling happily as Ojiro squatted down nervously to check on them. This soon proved to be a mistake as they pulled him down, tickling his sides lovingly. Ojiro threw his head back, laughing softly as his tail wagged, thumping against Kaminari. 

Soon the three called a truce, ending in a nice, loving nap on Mashirao’s bed. Deku nuzzled into Ojiro’s neck as he lay between them, Kaminari cuddling the tail like a child would a comfort item. The tallest of the three yawned softly before pulling both males closer and slowly drifting off with them.

[cooltrainererika]

Hetalia Emblem: Once Upon A Hallowed Night (pt. 1)

(Note: This was originally posted yesterday, October 20th, but due to typos, I have reposted it. It is still probably a bit rough, but hopefully there’s less glaring errors. I was also intending to release fic 2 yesterday, though it will be released later today, the third one probably won’t see the light of day for a while)

Hello! This is my entry for this year’s #hetaween #hetaween19/20! The prompt is 10/20; “Crossover”. And I have delivered! At least part of it!

However, this requires some explanation; this takes place in my Samuraiverse/Flagverse AU, or “Hetalia Emblem”, a theoretical Hetalia x World Flags (if you don’t know, it’s this: world-flags.org) x Fire Emblem crossover game. Basically, it’s Hetalia characters, World Flags outfits and weapons (as well as certain character elements; they will become apparent as you read along), and Fire Emblem gameplay, story elements, and lore elements. Unlike “Alt-talia”, the AU I usually write in, I’m thinking I might use characterizations closer to canon instead. Though they still may be slightly different.

So I saw the prompt, and thought this was a perfect place to spread my AU more. Basically, this is a human AU taking place in a Japanese medieval setting with international elements. A summary can be found here: https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/DarthWiki/HetaliaEmblem (Or in my post on the subject)

Now, this requires minimal knowledge of Fire Emblem, though some spell names and skills (basically things that can enhance a unit on the battlefield) and such might be referenced. (Also, if anyone wants to use this AU, go ahead! Please!)

And tonight, I have for you not one fic, but a batch of three! First, a spiritual tale. Second, a fun trick-or-treat story with a twist. And third, an action story (hopefully)!

Also these are being released separately so I can hope to get one out the door by the end of today. Though oh well, it’s the 20th in most of the rest of the world.

Also, this is an idea for a support conversation somewhat modified to fit the holiday. If you don’t know what a support conversation is, they’re conversations that you can unlock between two characters to make them bond more, making them perform better around each other in battle. As such, it was the one I was most sure about. This is based on their C to B conversations, I think (since D conversations are a thing in this game).

I also haven’t decided fully on some names, or whether to use different names than Alt-talia, for those who were never given names or have inaccurate ones. However, I have decided to use the ones here for the time being. And Matthew keeps getting called by his full name because everyone’s name is spelled out in kanji in-universe, and in Japanese “Matt” doesn’t make much sense as a nickname for “Matthew”. Also, while a character mentioned in this fic has a name in Alt-talia, here I decided to keep him unnamed. It is kind of debatable if they’re the same character after all…

I’ll also say that many of the characters here, especially the focus characters, don’t have a set costume design or weapons, but will be assumed to be sword users for the time being until further notice, since it’s most likely they are.

And since these were kind of rushed, they may not be best written. So yeah… sorry about that. The second one in particular may kind of meander a bit.

A final note: this IS NOT shipping! Almost no shipping happens in Hetalia Emblem (so no S conversations in this game), as such pretty much all interactions are platonic by default.

Without further ado… Trick-or-Treat!

……….

On the night of the last day of the tenth lunar cycle, when the harvest is ripe and the harsh winter is nearing, the realms of the mystical and spiritual and this realm are at their nearest point, so close the barrier between them almost nonexistent; it is this one night of the year which is prime time for the departed to see those they had left behind, and for the mystical to give us a visit…

Closure

He had found her some ways away from the camp, bathed in the smoky aroma of incense, her pale hair seemingly glowing in the moonlight.

“Ms. Natallia?”

She turned, the ghouls departing.

“What do you want?”

The boy flinched a bit, but then continued to move towards her, revealing his face. Not that it mattered; his white kimono had made that quite obvious.

Yong-Soo hesitated, his face flushed a shade of pink, sputtering.

“H-hey, Ms. Natallia! Erm… it’s me again.”

“What do you want? Don’t waste my time again.”

Her voice was curt, cold.

The boy straightened himself out, shook his head, and cleared his throat.

“I won’t. You can talk to dead people, right? I mean, I heard that you have powers like that, despite not being a mage or anything, and…”

She could see exactly when his face turned uncharacteristically serious, she observed. Somewhat perplexing.

“Yes? And?”

“…I need your help.”

Natallia simply blinked.

Yong-Soo took a deep breath and continued.

“I need to tell you something.”

“…”

“…Hyung Yao isn’t my real brother. I used to have a biological brother. A twin brother, actually…”

A brother?

His normally cheerful, jolly voice had a tinge of pain behind it that was small, but as apparent as the luminous moon above. For whatever reason - though she knew why deep down - she felt her heart being tugged at.

“…But one day, he just disappeared. He was gone. I don’t know what happened to him. …I spent a year looking for him, but… I never found him.”

“…”

“I want closure. I don’t know if he’s dead or alive. But, if he is dead… I want to at least say goodbye to him.”

No response.

She turned.

“Please… please…”

The teenager’s voice was starting to break, but he didn’t care. He briskly bowed, his head down low.

“Please… Please, I only-“

“Come with me.”

The dancer lifted his head immediately, just as the woman was starting to walk away.

His face lit up, his eyes becoming misty from the shock and joy at her words.

“Thank you! Thank you!”

———

The air inside her tent was heavy with incense, the ominous glow emitted from the small fire in front of Yong-Soo and the sticks of incense giving the dim tent a warm glow.

“What is his name?”

“It is-“

Once she had heard it, she simply nodded, calling upon it thrice in a hushed whisper.

Nothing.

“…He isn’t here.”

“What does that mean?”

“Even if he is dead, he hasn’t visited you. Yet. Now, quiet.”

The boy immediately straightened himself again, nodding

“Yes ma’am.”

————

Natallia had been silent, deathly silent. Even he wouldn’t dare raise a sound. It had felt like time had stopped. Despite the warm glow of the flames and incense, he felt chills; not just any, but a strange chill from within and without. He could have even sworn he saw glowing, fire-like orbs flicker around her.

————

Ion felt the spiritual energy; what kind of dark mage would be if he weren’t. It drifted ambiently in the air, but radiated from a certain, definite place.

It seemed Huong Lien felt it as well, the mage having poked her head out of her tent, her two familiars floating around her frantically, apparently either in distress or hyper-energized by the high concentration of mystical energy.

Somewhere on the other side of camp, Arthur could be heard loudly complaining about a headache.

Ion felt he now had a good idea as to why Yong-Soo seemed so excited when he had heard from him she could see ghosts…

————-

Connecting with the spiritual realm was a strange experience that was unlike any other. It was like being in one place but everyone, trancelike but alert.

On this day, when the other realm was the closest, however, the process was made easier; relatively, at least.

Neither she nor Yong knew how long she had been there, but in time, she found herself fully back in their realm.

Yong’s anticipation reached a boiling point. He couldn’t take it anymore. He had to know.

“…So? Did you find him? Was he-“

“He wasn’t.”

His face started to light up, but with a hint of hesitation, as if barely holding himself back from hoping just yet.

“So… so he’s so alive? He’s still out there somewhere?”

“Yes.”

Tears pricked the dancer’s eyes, as the information fully soaked into the teen’s brain.

Natallia hadn’t noticed herself make a rare, small smile at the sight, though not that he noticed - he finally broke down into tears of joy, repeating “He’s alive! Gods, he’s alive!” to himself.

“Congratulations.”

“Damn it, why did he leave me for so long?! That dastard!”

———-

By the time Yong had left, thanking her profusely of course, she had finally realized she had been smiling.

Natallia couldn’t remember the last time she had felt this… happy for someone outside her family.

But it was as if she saw some of herself in this annoying dancer boy.

Some of that scared, lonely girl and her sister as they called out into the cruel, unforgiving howls of a certain snowstorm.

[transformersrelay]

Weathervane is the newest member of the Bisector family, but first he needs the grand tour!

When Radius and Mace stepped from the ship out onto the planet’s surface, a slim, yet clunky biplane was on the stretch of landing across them, still steadying himself from the gust of air accompanying their landing. The Bisector was a ship of impressive scale, to be certain. It sloped distinctly at its bow, the arching figure imposing in itself, even from the inside. By the way he hadn’t even glanced their way in favor of staring up at it, it seemed their new recruit had been taken off-guard.

Radius huffed a laugh, already fond of the blatant awe and nerves playing across this mech’s face. Mace, the miniscule drone of a bot (so small as to often be mistaken as a minibot,) waved one clawed servo excitedly, hopping into a run over to greet him. He’d been telling Radius earlier all about how excited he was to be having another flier on board, and it was a little infectious, he’d admit. He sauntered on after.

“Hello! Hello! It’s so nice to meet you!” Mace grabbed one of the biplane’s wire-thin servos in both of his, which cause the other to flinch away subtly. “My designation is Mace, it’s super cool to meet another Autobot flier! And with a very fashionable color, as well, I might add!”

The newcomer glanced down at his orange-heavy paint, then Mace’s, and blinked. The poor thing seemed a little overwhelmed. Radius laughed good-naturedly. He picked Mace up and set him on one of his massive shoulders, before turning back and smiling.

“I’m Radius. You’re Weathervane, right?”

He, Weathervane, stopped frowning nervously at Mace to meet Radius’ warm blue visor.

“Y-yeah, that’s right,” he said softly, an attempt at a little return of the smile gracing is face. “Nice to meet you. And thank you for taking me aboard.”

“No problem!” Mace said, his wings fluttering pointlessly as he spoke, (apparently mildly confusing the biplane,) “You made the right choice requesting us, ‘cuz we’re the best ship around, it’s true!” He punctuated his declaration with a pose from atop Radius’ shoulder, prompting him to chuckle.

“Alright, alright, let’s not take too long getting back in. That Captain of mine won’t be too happy.” He gestured for Weathervane to follow as he lumbered towards the ship. “We’ll give you the grand tour once we’re back up, too, so don’t worry about finding your way around.”

Weathervane hurried to follow. Radius was a Wrecker-- that would be clear to anyone. Heavy armor sat on his shoulders, towering far above Weathervane’s helm, pedes making the ship protest with every step he took aboard. He cradled obvious scars, but his smile was a constant.  

As they boarded the loading bay, looming bay doors shuttering closed behind them, Radius glanced back to see the biplane once again taking in the impressive scale of his surroundings. As he looked around, his focus seemed to settle on the one ship docked within, taking only a third of the space. He turned fully towards him and both he and Mace threw out their hands with excitement.

“Welcome aboard!” He chimed, almost too cheerfully, the smile on his lips somehow evident in the visor over his optics, “Now you’re officially part of the Bisector!”

“Ah, yes, I… am. Thank you?” His long wings fluttered anxiously as the ship rumbled, beginning to lift off.

“Haha, Primus, you have manners. Echo’ll be thrilled,” Mace’s blue visor beamed, vibrated with energy and mischief, very much like his voice did. Weathervane didn’t look thrilled.

“Don’t mind him,” Radius teased, “he’s simply full of friendly things to say.”

“Who would mind, that Radius? Don’t be silly.” the tiny flier replied, crossing his arms triumphantly.

“Anyway, it’ll be my job to show ya ‘round the place. We don’t want you getting lost on your first day.”

Weathervane simply nodded slowly. He didn’t want that either.

--

Weathervane was led through hallway after bright hallway. The ship seemed to have no shortage of power, which was somewhat impressive in its own right. That wasn’t something that was common, anymore, what with their vast resources all but a hollow memory now. There was general wear and tear to every surface, dings and scratches and the odd spot of random-planet dirt along the walls or floor plating, but the place was almost too normal to be an active warship. Almost like it had just come off the bays of Cybertron a cycle prior, rather than centuries.

“So, we’re a pretty average sized crew. We’ve got folks from Paradron to Dahros, so don’t worry,” Radius smiled lazily as they walked, “We’re all a little out of our zone, here. Luckily, there’s plenty of room here for all of us, and everything runs pretty smoothly. The Bisector’s a class-A warship--”

“From Optimus himself!” Mace interrupted, sounding like he’d just spilled their most precious secret, though Weathervane did perk slightly. Out of curiosity on how that happened, Radius assumed.

“--and she’s gotten us around more than well enough, with plenty to spare.” Weathervane didn’t add anything immediately, resigning to a distinct interest in the ship, now that its praises had been sung. Radius didn’t blame him, it was a lot to take in at once.

“Plus she’s just so full of charm!” Mace chattered. “Although considering TD, I don’t think she feels the same way about us, you know? I wonder why! Also, more orange paint, nothing better am I right?”

“I take offense,” Radius teased.

“Well, I can make exceptions. You lose points for being blue and not a flyer, but you still have a very high overall score!”

“That sure is reassuring. I was worried you’d moved on to better things and forgotten all about me.”

Mace gasped with fervor. “Never! I would never do that!”

Weathervane murmured some question, but Radius didn’t catch it, instead laughing at his companion’s dramatised distress. And off they went, chatting amongst themselves, forgetting their new company for the moment. He followed along silently nonetheless.

Radius considered himself an incurable optimist, which he knew didn’t mesh well with everyone. Weathervane didn’t strike him as all sunshine, so he tried to tone back his usual enthusiasm, if for no other reason than to make his transition easier.

Mace, on the other servo, was a chatterbox. A chatterbox who didn’t pick up cues-- ever, really. His antenna clacked constantly as he talked--which meant that they clacked a lot. He had it on good authority that the way his wings bobbed incessantly as some form of fidgeting also confused other fliers (or in his “good authority”’s case-- that being the only other flier on the ship-- it was incredibly frustrating.) He prattled on in his absurdly energetic tone about every room they passed on their way to the main deck.

“This one is the hangar, obviously!” Okay. “These are the suites, rec room, energon storage-” Uh-huh. “Armory, storage closet, ventilation shafts, staff exit-”. Got it. And the Wrecker just passively encouraged him as they went. He did start to worry that Mace’s breakneck-speed introductions were beginning to stress Weathervane out, though. He seemed like the type to get stressed. Radius supposed, thinking fondly of his sparkmate, that he would know. So he kept an eye out, but nothing came of it.

There was no mistake to be made, the Bisector was stocked impressively. They clearly weren’t wealthy in resources, but the armory was fully loaded with some of the highest-end weaponry in the cosmos. The hangar was large enough for at least 3 cruisers-- one of which already present in the bay. Weathervane gave it special attention, perhaps wondering if it was an emergency escape, or if it belonged to anyone on board. Energon was in fair supply, Radius informed him, or at least rationed very responsibly, and the hab suites were big enough for 4 average mechs.

The rec room sat at the very end of the hallway, and wound down the inner edge of the ship, a large, curved room lined with windows that peered out into the inky abyss of space. The guides spoke of this particular area fondly, their hub for gathering and socializing, and it bred a sense of comfort and normalcy.

“Most of us end up in here at the same time at least once a cycle,” Radius mused. “It’s pretty relaxed. The whole crew is pretty easy to get along with.”

And like clockwork, there was a new face. She was small, very small, and stalking down the hallways with purpose. The seering yellow visor flickered over Weathervane so fast- so unfeeling- that Radius could see him suppress the flinch. Only Radius’ booming voice slowed her down, a simple, “Hey, Batt, meet the newbie! This is Weathervane.”

“Battery,” she all but spat back, and despite the visor, very blatantly scanned his entirety in both disinterest and critique. And without another word from any of them, she turned on her heel and sped off on whatever she was doing.  Perhaps the largest mech sensed the biplane’s nerves, so he was the first to speak again.

“She’s uh… Like that with everyone. It’s not personal,” he gave a slight shrug before leading on. “She’ll warm up to you, they always do!” The biplane wasn’t going to bring up the contradiction.

Radius was all too excited to give their newest the rundown on their crew. It wasn’t the first time he’d played welcome party, and this part was always his favorite. They had twin medical chiefs, outlying agents, and specialists on every facet of the ship’s workings, in one way or another. Battery, in all her pleasantries, was in charge of managing and maintaining the armory. “She’s a weapons specialist,” Mace offered, as if he was proud on her behalf.

“That explains a lot,” and Weathervane managed to rouse a laugh out of both of them.

----

From that point on, the crew would come floating by one-by-one. Bumper, an easy-going grounder about Weathervane’s size, meandered into their path shortly after the first encounter with Battery, emerging from the far end of the rec room. He seemed friendly, with a lazy smile and an obnoxious, optic-aching color scheme.

“Bumper’s our ‘inventory manager’,” Radius offered, and Bumper immediately chuckled.

“Ah, that’s what we’re callin’ it now, ey?” He turned to the new recruit, “They give me scrap about ‘loiterin’’ around the high grade, but don’t listen to ‘em, it’s not true.”

Mace sputtered from his perch, “It so is! I’ve seen it with my own two optics! Don’t try and mislead our poor naive recruit, it’s his first day!” Weathervane muttered that he was new to the Bisector, not being an Autobot, and Bumper just waved the drone off. The three bursting into laughter. Their recruit seemed to sulk.

“So, where you from? How’d y’end up here? That last rock was a long ways from anythin’.”

“Vos. Last crew… uh… didn’t make it.”

“... Oh.”

And everyone got quiet for a moment longer than Weathervane was probably comfortable with. Thank Primus that Bumper broke the silence.

“Sorry to hear that,” he said. Generic condolences were standard this deep in a war. “Listen, we should meet up for a ‘newbie drink’ when you’re settled in. It’s kinda customary around here.” He smiled. “Helps with the nerves.”  Weathervane watched him for a moment, and his optics seemed to soften, if only slightly. That was almost comforting. Genuine.

“I’d like that,” the new flier simply agreed, and that seemed to lift the heavy mood that had come upon them.

Next to cross their path was Stagger. Mace hung off this poor mech even worse than he did with Radius.  He was hulking, much like his crewmate, and nearly the same height, just with less bulk to his silhouette. He was an almost unnatural, pristine white, and his face rested at a distinct sag. He didn’t look pleased at a new recruit, and was very clearly skeptical of the stalky biplane being introduced to him.

“Nice to have you.” He greeted simply, before turning to Radius. They were a striking pair, with their brilliant red accents and clashing blues and whites.

“Another one?” He’d tried to be subtle, but wasn’t quite out of range. The taller mech just sighed, flashing an apologetic smile, and rested a hand on his shoulder.

“Try not to worry, Short-Stuff. It’s always a good thing.” Whether Stagger knew better than to believe him or was simply annoyed at the dismissal, Weathervane couldn’t tell based on his glare.

Whatever it was was promptly left behind as his guides moved on. “More ship to show!” Mace chirped, “We’re running a tight schedule and you’re distracting us!” Stagger groaned, but didn’t seem offended as Mace shifted back from Stagger’s shoulders to Radius’, and the group parted to continue their tour.

“‘Another’?” Weathervane repeated, curiosity getting the best of him as they entered the main hub of the ship.

“Ah, don’t mind him,” the Wrecker assured, “Not everyone on board is uh... as inclined to strays as Echo is. It’s just a running joke.”

There was a peculiar, empty space where Mace’s response should have been. Weathervane spared him a glance.

The main deck was as any bridge in any good ship should be. It was huge. It framed the space above and before them so powerfully that even Radius couldn’t help but feel small as it all towered above him.  It was clean-- almost obsessively so-- and brimming with shouts when they arrived.

A behemoth of a mech, all wingspan, turbines, and angry red biolights stood in the center of the bridge, hovering over some holographic diagram projecting from the middle of the room. Pitch black in color, and so high up that his words either vaporized halfway to the ground or shook it entirely. By the look on the new recruit’s face he felt his energon go cold. Their astro class crewmate seemed to have that effect on everyone.  

Somewhere far, far below him was who he was arguing with: a smaller mech glowing an electric shade of blue.

“-risk will outweigh the reward. It’s idiocy, Shrapnel.”

“You can continue to play these things safe! It’s absurd to not use these opportunities!”

“‘Opportunities’ that will easily cost us lives. More than we will ever have to spare. Is that a worthy sacrifice to you?”

“Or what? Taking no chances, making no moves, just waiting to be struck first? It’s not tactically sound judgement to--”

“This is not a discussion of tactics. This is a denial.”

“... Fine! Captain.”

Unceremoniously, the astro class turned, some frustrated sound whirring dangerously through turbines as large as Weathervane himself, and saw himself out. He didn’t acknowledge the small welcome party as he passed, and didn’t offer so much as a nod in his fellow flier’s direction. Weathervane settled, if only a little, paused and frowned. He glanced back at the other mech, smaller than he was, evidently putting it together that this was the Captain. Perhaps he’d assumed it was Shrapnel, Radius thought bemusedly.

He casually continued from where they left off, as if nothing had happened to begin with. Very little on this ship made him feel out of place anymore, not an awkward strut left in him. It seemed Weathervane didn’t have the same luxury.

“You got a minute, Echo?”

The smaller Autobot turned, as if just noticing them himself. “Never,” He replied, almost vacantly, before eyeing the new recruit, “Weathervane, I take it. Captain Echo.”

The addressed nodded. If he seemed to have relaxed any at Shrapnel’s absence, the calm evaporated once more under the piercing, uncomfortable power this bot-- Echo-- exerted by glance alone. Immediately the signs of suppressed anxiety resurfaced.

Thankfully, Echo only focused on him for a fraction of time, though it felt much longer, before coming to a simple, “We’ll discuss your position, shortly. Welcome aboard.” With that, he went back to his control panel and a not-at-all-apologetic excuse of ‘I have work to do.’

Radius hesitated, if only slightly, before turning to usher the recruit out towards the exit on the other side of the main deck. “We’ll show you the medbay and the rest of the quarters, next,” He thought aloud, returned to his same enthusiastic way. As the door opened to let them pass, two sleek black figures strolled past. Their engines purred as they went with their floating gaits and flippant conversation.

They were Velocitronians, clearly, with their flashy, athletic features. They paused as they passed by, throwing warm greetings at the guides and unambiguously sized the newcomer up. The femme with her blazing yellow optics, warm orange stripes and bulky frame, and her partner, all sleek points and neon greens slicing across the black pearled paint. They watched him carefully, curiously, and he pressed his lips to a thin line-- the barest sign he was scrutinizing them in return. Perhaps he just didn’t like the attention. Perhaps he felt challenged. While the two weren’t all pure Velocitronian vanity, some of them definitely was.

“These are Circuitblitz and Calgarydome!” Mace chirped, unprompted as always.

“Pleasure,” The femme-- Circuitblitz-- drawled finally, her lazy accent obvious and thick, “Blitz is fine”. She watched him with unburdened optics sharp, as calculated as steel, and painted orange lips upturned in a vibrant, practiced smile. He managed a soft ‘Weathervane’ in return.

“And I’m Calgarydome,” the other offered energetically, his helm quirked slightly and his smile much more open than hers, “I go by Cal, though! Don’t go forgetting it~”

“I won’t.”

Calgarydome laughed. “Man, you sure are nervous, huh?” He leaned to nudge Weathervane playfully, though the biplane tensed significantly.

“We don’t bite, promise!” Mace giggled from Radius’ shoulder.

“Supposedly.” The Velocitronian shot the drone a taunting look, as if about to start a debate with the little flier. The newbie simply smiled weakly, taking a step back to account for the contact.

“W-well, that’s reassuring.”

“We should be moving on,” Radius finally interjected, interrupting the incoming standoff-- swear to Primus, this always happened. He reached to steady the new recruit, his hand sitting squarely on Weathervane’s shoulder, covering it. “We’re almost done with the tour.”

“Ah, yes. Come on, beau, let’s not harass him,” Blitz purred patiently, mirroring the Wrecker’s hint and reaching to turn her partner back towards the main deck. “We have to report in to the Captain.” Calgarydome groaned.

“Glad to have you two back,” the Wrecker finished as they went their separate ways, and the duo laughed.

“Flattered,” Blitz replied, as the doors closed between them.

“Iii like them!”

“I know you do, Mace.”

“They’re so cool. Do you think they think I’m that cool?”

“Oh, certainly.”

“aHA good! ‘Cause I think I’m pretty close but--”

Weathervane just took a moment to breathe.

--

“This’ll be where your quarters are,” Radius explained, opening a hab suite for the recruit to inspect.

It was near identical to all the others they’d already passed by, two layered berths sat against the far end, a small screen on the closest wall, and even had a small desk, littered with datapads. Lights were built into the upper rim near the ceiling and lit the room a soft, hazy blue. These suites were on the inner edge of the ship, and therefore didn’t have windows like the rooms on the other side, but that was okay. There was plenty of room for a mech his size, clunky wings and all, and that was more than enough.

“Thank you,” He said simply, appreciatively. The Wrecker almost beamed.

“Of course! Nothing like a little slice of home, right?”

“Right.”

--

“And lastly, right down here is the medbay.” Radius stopped as the double doors slid open to let Weathervane in first. He was quickly met by two large bots. They weren’t quite Radius’ size, but still dwarfed the biplane easily. They looked identical in every way except paint, and didn’t have any obvious indicators of vehicle mode-- no wings, no wheels. One looked at him in distant curiosity, while the other--

“OH recruit day was today!?” She gasped, bright yellow optics on him immediately, “I didn’t know it was today!”

“That’s because you don’t keep track of the schedule,” The darker teal one offered humorlessly. The femme shot him a look, but didn’t focus on him.

“Hi! I’m Operandi!” She smiled, bending down slightly so that she was closer to face-to-face with the flier. “That’s my brother, Modus,” she jabbed a finger in the other’s direction, “But don’t mind him. He’s not very friendly--”

“Hey--”

“--But I, for one, am super excited to meet you!” She was obviously quite young, her voice curious and innocent. She didn’t reach to touch him, which was such a welcome change already.

“Weathervane. It’s nice to meet you, too,” he answered with a small smile.

“Welcome to the medbay! Come right in! We hope not to see you often--” she paused, “No offense.” The other twin, Modus, groaned quietly in the background, setting down the datapad in his hands and looking both apologetic and embarrassed. He’d clearly heard that one many times before.

The medical ward was moderately sized, but looked like two different rooms entirely. Half was neat and organized. Datapads were stacked precisely, all the same height, medical supplies in easy reach, labeled in careful, delicate New Cybertronian. The vials were color coded.

The other wasn’t quite sloppy, but was definitely less maintained. Though, this side seemed to have more to do with aftercare and cosmetic fixes than the more surgical, meticulous other half. There were coolant creams with the caps half off and buffers with the cords sloppily wound, pieces of emergency patchmetal and spare pieces in a disorganized pile.

“Well, I hope not to be here often,” Weathervane returned carefully, but Operandi (and Mace) laughed, and so he allowed himself a grin.

“How’re you sparkplugs doing?” Radius asked, seeming content that Weathervane had warmed up to them enough to joke.

“Excellent, Sir.” Modus replied with surprising volume, “We’re finishing our medical evaluations, per Captain Echo’s request.”

“Relax kiddo. Good work.” The Wrecker smiled, and the medic immediately sputtered, murmuring a soft ‘thank you’. “And Peri?”

“She’s also finished with her assessments, Sir, she’s on her way to log them. Barring your information, of course.” He looked at the biplane indicatively.

Weathervane paused at the nod. “...Information?”

“It’s standard medical protocol,” Modus answered. “We log your serial numbers and proto-activation date to narrow down what kind of parts you require. It’s purely to make sure that if you’re injured, we can treat wounds effectively with as little discomfort and incompatibility-shock as possible.”

“...You can do that? How do you find the parts…?”

“Cal and Blitz are experts at tracking down stuff like that,” Radius offered, “They’re amazing once they get talking.” Weathervane found himself curious, but didn’t get the chance to ask after more.

“Hello, kids--Oh! and others!” A femme poked into the medbay along with them, datapads in her servos. Bumper wasn’t far behind her, sipping absently at a cube and giving Weathervane a lazy smile that was quickly returned.  

“Weathervane, Perimeter. Perimeter, Weathervane. Peri, this is the new guy,” Radius introduced, gesturing between the two.

“Phew! I think that’s finally all of them, Rad!” Mace sighed, as if he were so exhausted by their endeavors, before looking down at the biplane from his perch, “That’s officially it, bud! You’re fully educated!”

“Well, aside from the guys who aren’t aboard,” Radius said.

Weathervane didn’t pay Mace much mind, which just prompted more indignant squawking from the drone. Operandi laughed openly at him and Bumper seemed bemused.While Radius’ comment interested him, the new bot held the biplane’s attention, as always. He simply disliked being in the dark about someone, especially when he would be working with them for quite a while. Call him a people person.

“Very nice to meet you, Weathervane!” Perimeter’s pale faceplate was calm and open, reaching to shake his hand.

“Nice to meet you, too,” he replied, suddenly relieved to not have to repeat the phrase anymore. For a moment, he found the sentiment in himself funny. He took her servo tentatively. She had a firm grip for such a small thing.

“I’m sorry that I can’t stay for now, but I’m sure we’ll be able to talk much more in depth soon! I’ll be sure to ask Echo to excuse you for your evaluation as soon as possible.”

“Evaluation?”

“Ah, yes. I’m a psychologist, so it’s part of the medical analysis process to chat with you upon your introduction to the crew.” His optics tightened. “Which is to say that I look forward to knowing you better!”

He nodded stiffly, but if she noticed she didn’t mention it. He’d been dealing with Radius and Mace all cycle, afterall. Surely he looked tired.

She handed off a stack of her notes to Modus, appreciative of his willingness to rewrite them into the ship’s logs by hand, and doted on Operandi for a brief moment before excusing herself. She spared him a quick smile as she went, eyes suddenly trained so firmly to him that he almost flinched--as if she was looking right through him. Weathervane had the impression she was perceptive. Smart, more so than she let on. He frowned.

“So, where are you from?” The mech twin suddenly turned to Weathervane, snapping him from his thoughts.

“Oh, uh. Vos.” He said. Modus had a datapad back in hand, he noticed, already writing things down.

“And how old--”

“Oh, Vos!” Operandi interrupted, “That’s one of the big cities, right? On Cybertron!”

“Y-yes, it is?” Weathervane frowned, confused. Why ask such an obvious question, unless-- ah, unless, of course, they’d never been on Cybertron. Oh, they were very young, weren’t they.

“I heard it was super tall, since all the fliers lived there!” She was saying, enthused.

“What was it like, living there… if you don’t mind?” Her twin asked.

Weathervane tipped his head, considering. “That’s a lot to cover, if you haven’t even seen the place.”

“I would hope!” She smiled brightly at him. There was a glitter in her eyes, a pure eagerness to learn. Modus, too, had his full attention turned to him from a safer distance, unabashedly interested. There was a passion for knowledge burning in both of them, it was clear to see. He couldn’t help the little spark of fondness that cropped up.

“Alright, alright,” Bumper put up his hands, frowning. “That’s enough ‘reminiscin’ for my tastes. If you’re gon’ start talkin’ about all this, I’ll just catch ya later--”

::All report to the main deck. We’re landing::

“Ah, that can’t be good,” Radius mumbled, not sounding as concerned as his observation suggested he should be.

“What’s going on?”  

“Probably just another maintenance check.  Fuel’s been spotty.”

Weathervane frowned. That would’ve been nice to know before he boarded.

“If that’s the case, it’s a quick fix. Let’s just hustle up to the--” Before the Wrecker could finish, the lights-- so impressive to him before-- suddenly died. Red filled the ship’s hallways, blinking slowly, threateningly.

“Well, that’s definitely a bad sign,” Radius was moving, and Weathervane decided all he could do was follow, taking twice the steps to keep up. “So, this is defensive protocol,” the larger explained, his calm demeanor turned unsettling, “We’re very likely under attack-- or going to be.”

The biplane glanced back at the twins, but they hadn’t moved. Staying behind, he discerned. He moved to keep up with the Wrecker.

“Suitin’ up?” Bumper asked from beside him. Radius hummed an affirmative. They whisked away to where Weathervane recalled the armory was. It was on the way to the main deck, so he didn’t bother to point out the detour wasn’t part of their orders. Especially as a number of others were gathered, too, with the minibot, Battery, handing out various weapons.

Weathervane hesitated, hanging back. Bumper grabbed a small blaster for himself and Radius holstered one. The smaller gave him a questioning glance.

“Not really good with those,” he answered, giving an apologetic smile in the pulsing red light.

“They hinder flying,” Mace agreed, now on his own two feet. He seemed more subdued. Nervous, perhaps. Weathervane supposed they all were, but it was still a noticeable contrast to his previous demeanor. At least he was making himself helpful, though.

“Let’s get to the deck” Radius said, taking a step and then pausing, glancing down at Battery for a moment.

“I’ll catch up once everyone’s stocked.” She tipped her visor his way. “Don’t be reckless.”

“We’re Wreckers,” Mace said, cheer returning a little, “it’s in the name!”

She gave him a look. Didn’t say anything more.

“Right, well,” Radius said, continuing on in a rush. He was good at playing calm, but Weathervane knew enough to spot the cracks.

He suddenly realized he hated lingering this long in the hallways, red swimming in his vision softly. It was ominous, and everyone was much too quiet, with the exception of footsteps. They couldn’t reach the deck fast enough.

Once they did, the Captain was already there, as was the largest of their crewmembers-- Shrapnel, he recalled. They weren’t arguing this time, seeming to agree in their stoic, battle-readiness. The difference in their size was stark, but they held the same tense air of authority.

“Line up,” Shrapnel boomed, once they had all entered. The same holographic map from before was still sitting in the center of the main console, a large red dot looming over the otherwise peaceful blue diagram of their current planet.

Decepticons.

The entire squadron obliged, as close to ‘shoulder to shoulder’ as they could be. Shots clearly rang out from beyond the ship’s sturdy walls, and the battle plans immediately began.

--

The hatch on the bay doors came undone easily, the dense metal sheet retracting into itself and into the Bisector’s high ceilings. It took with it the sense of protection and the physical shield from the foreign planet’s surface-- and whatever was waiting for them.

He couldn’t help the shudder that chilled his plates as white light filtered through the opening. Everyone around him shifted into their alt modes as he stood, hesitating and disoriented, and when he got a grip Bumper was by his side.

“Come on, keep close,” he said, giving Weathervane’s arm a soft tug along as he went. The sounds of fire and explosions never stopped frightening him. They ran out and around, as far out from the ship as possible-- couldn’t attract gunfire to it if they were able. He noted the area they were in was full of boulders, rock faces, outcroppings. Nothing so exaggerated as to make for a bottleneck or hinder flight, but he wasn’t sure if that was to their advantage or not. Ohh, spatial awareness was never his strong suit.

“Now listen up,” Bumper startled him out of his thoughts as they slid down behind cover of a small, half-buried boulder. He poked his head up, blaster held ready in front of him. “These guys don’t know we have an extra flier on our hands, y’know? That means you’ve got the element of surprise.” He shifted back down, gave Weathervane a confident smile. “We just need to figure out how to use that.”

“Right,” Weathervane said, glancing around. Checking what he could see. “I’ll figure it out.”

Behind them, up on the side of the ship, (Primus, she really was small to be able to fit up there,) Battery had climbed out with a variety of heavy weapons in tow. She had what appeared to be a rocket launcher and was taking shots at a very large flier above them, probably an astro class. Shrapnel was almost too difficult to keep track of, flying with tremendous speed and grace. He was doing an excellent job of keeping the astro class’ attention, as well as two other fliers. The fire coming from the enemy Cybertronian jet made Battery’s rocket launcher look like a pea shooter. How frightening…

A number of other fliers were sweeping low, trying to get behind the Autobots’ cover and flush them out. It was clear to Weathervane they were experts, probably military caste (what a useless thought, most of the survivors this far in were,) maneuvering with such elegance and ferocity. Zipping closely to their position, a little drone caught his sudden attention. That paint was terribly familiar--

He felt himself yanked harshly into Bumper’s side as a shot connected with the rock where his chassis had been a moment earlier. Bumper peppered fire back at the drone, forcing them to pull back. Likely to loop back around on them, though. Weathervane, still leaned against his companion, watched their direction carefully.

“This might as well be a good moment,” he muttered, getting back to his feet and creeping to the other side of their cover. Bumper watched curiously, face still set, but a tiny, approving grin dancing across it. He coiled his wires and anticipated when the dark blue flier burst into their line of sight, leaping forward and feeling his wings snap into place, the air buoying him from his falling arc. He surprised them, for sure, by the way they hadn’t started shooting yet.

He just had to get close, which might be a bit easier said than done. It was moments like these he wondered if he really ought to invest in learning to use blasters. Not that he wanted the drone dead, there were things he wanted to ask them, after all. They were far more experienced in the air than he was, as earlier surmised, of course, which was unfortunate but not unpredictable. They tried to loop up and behind him, but had to twist away to dodge a few shots from the ground. Weathervane was quickly becoming quite fond of Bumper.

He lurched and pulled straight up, climbing altitude with as much speed as he could muster, and he could barely hear the quiet hum of the drone’s sleek engines as they followed. They climbed and climbed, and his metal suddenly burned with the attention of several other hostiles in the air. Fire hailed around him, and he felt panic suddenly starting to bubble beneath his stupid fucking plans. He throttled it. Not now.

Abrupt, he dropped into root mode, slamming feet-first into the drone’s nose. Briefly they flipped, but recovered on sheer instinct. Weathervane had counted on it in order to land safely on their back. With a flick of the wrist, his digits became long and sickeningly pointed, rose above his helm as he eyed the metal body beneath.

They spiraled, interrupting his attack. He managed to cling on, but then they shifted to root mode and he was finally thrown off.

He saw her visor, and paused.

She shifted her arms to their blasters as they fell, she head-first and still as graceful as ever.

Weathervane snapped out of it and frantically shifted back, boosting himself in the air just out of the way as she shot at him. He evened out and decided it was time to regroup with-- someone. She was certainly chasing. Think.

A sudden bang from dead center made him stutter his flight, shrieking, absolute maniacal laughter filling the air. He tilted to see another astro class in the middle of the field, (how many did this Decepticon fleet have?) tanking multiple shots in order to stand there and laugh. When she was done, she broke into a full sprint and there was an audible panic from below. A shot grazed his wing and he was reminded he couldn’t afford to stand back and observe right then.

New Decepticon paint flashed under him, passing beneath and ahead with ease before whipping around to face him. He dropped, engines cut just in time to avoid a new set of fire. Mace’s bright orange paint caught him completely off-guard, rushing to his defense with fervor. Though he targeted the pink-and-white jet, the other drone twisted and fled.

Weathervane just focused on getting away.

In the distance to his side, a tower of rock toppled over. Certainly there was a group of Autobots that way, but if he were a guessing mech…

Out of the question. He felt more than saw the explosion. The grounded astro class, still laughing, was tossed smoldering and battered from the blast below. Frantically, he looked for the Autobots. Radius and Stagger were there, with Echo behind them, still on their feet, he noted with some relief. From the way they were heaving, they must have had an intense confrontation with the ‘Con. From the size of the blast damage, he could understand why.

Unbidden, he wondered if Echo had devised some devious plan. Wreckers were known for brute power, not deception.

Unable to find a group not locked in battle, he decided to duck down to the ground and hide while he collected his thoughts and came up with something better than aimlessly buzzing around in death-infested air.

He dropped behind a secluded-looking outcropping, and immediately realized his mistake.

The Decepticon whipped around to face him.

He locked eyes with burning red goggles, frozen.

To be fair, the other mech looked just as plainly shaken as he felt. Neither of them moved for what could have only been less than a couple seconds. Felt a lot longer, as he took a small, shuddering breath in. His fans begged for air.

Slowly, the other mech holstered his gun and raised his hands. Weathervane, feeling a twinge of relief, gave him a slight nod. They break away with a jump, he transforming and skimming the ground back to where he remembered that rock tower toppling. The crumbly surface whips past as panic starts trying to set in again.

He landed into the company of Bumper, Circuitblitz, and Calgarydome just in time to hear the issue clearly:

::They’re pulling back, retreat to the Bisector before they get a chance to regroup.::

Weathervane passed a glance to his teammates, the two Velocitronians already shifting gracefully to their sleek vehicle modes and tearing off without more than an acknowledging nod.

“They’ll buy us extra time,” Bumper’s voice was short and rugged, quick to follow their lead and transform. Weathervane just nodded, shifting back to his shaky wings and tearing off towards the warship, its engines roaring back to life.

--

“-Battery?” “Here”

“Stagger.” “Here”

“Weathervane.”

He started, “Uh, here.”

Echo was much smaller up close than he’d even originally thought --perhaps just shorter than Bumper, who was already quite short-- but not any less intimidating. Where there might’ve been expression in another mech’s visor, much like Radius’ immediately gave him away, there was nothing. He looked in Weathervane’s direction, but didn’t look at him. It was almost cold in its calculation, but the fact that he was here, personally checking his soldier’s wounds, was contradictory and perplexing.

“All present, Captain.” Bumper’s voice caught the flier’s attention, calm as always from where he sat along the wall of the main deck. His leg had been grazed by stray laser fire, so he’d been made to sit while they checked their ranks, but he was otherwise unharmed. He flashed Weathervane a lazy smile, catching him looking his way. He weakly smiled back.

Frustration at their disadvantages seemed to be running high, if the silence was anything to go by, but everyone had made it back in one piece, so he didn’t hear any complaining, either.

They had been largely unscathed. Injuries were mostly minor, some burns and new dents at the worst, nothing that couldn’t be easily mended. Radius and Stagger had taken the most impressive damage from that astro class on the ground, it seemed, but he hadn’t seen the Wreckers so much as flinch at their oozing wounds. Weathervane himself was surprised-- and grateful-- that he’d managed to avoid anything severe. Those fliers had given him a run, and he knew his aerial skills weren’t anything to brag about.

“Good work,” Echo finally addressed, once the crew list had been affirmed, voice resonating in the hollow chamber of the main deck, “The Dreadnought’s crew have certainly become aware of our shortage, but pushing them back is a victory in itself for now. Those of you with injuries, report to the medbay. The rest, back to your stations. We’ll regroup to discuss our plan of action once the cycle is through.”

The Dreadnought, hm?

There was the low buzz of ‘Yessir’s and shifting footsteps. Their own resident astro class was the first to leave, opposite the way of the medbay, he noted, despite the fact he had clear chemical burns trailing up his wings. Battery wasn’t far behind. Weathervane didn’t move though, given that he was both uninjured and still station-less, instead opting to wait until a familiar face could point him in the right direction.

He watched for Radius, who was likely his best bet. He wasn’t difficult to spot in a space much too big for a crew their size to hide him, standing off with Mace, across the room from Weathervane’s perch by the door frame. The obnoxiously colored little drone stood quickly at the dismissal and began to crumple in on himself as soon as his weight reached his pedes.  Radius seemed aware of this before it even happened, a hand waiting to catch the little flier before he even started to tilt. Weathervane didn’t see any injuries on him. Something internal?

Bumper left towards the medbay, not limping but not quite walking right, and Radius followed with Stagger and his little companion not long after.  Weathervane waited, watching his Captain’s back as he worked and eyeing the ship’s many flashing dashboards in shaken curiosity. He hadn’t been on a battlefield in too long, maybe. His long fingers were still twitching from the rush and the panic, and the stress and exertion and the panic. Ah, what a nuisance. It didn’t usually take this long to calm down.  

--

“Hey, you good, rookie?” Radius’ voice surprised him.

He’d been staring in vacant interest for too long. The Wrecker still sported his new injuries, but the leaking energon had been taken care of via a quick solder.

Mace was nowhere in sight.

“Yea, I’m fine,” He answered breezily, not sounding terribly convincing.  

“Listen, I gotta talk to Echo, but if you want to take a breather in the rec room? Might do you some good, it’s been a hell of an orn.”

Weathervane wasn’t going to argue with the offer. “Sure, I think I can manage that.” Radius seemed pleased with that answer, again resting an overly large servo on his shoulder in what he assumed was encouragement. He resisted the flinch.

“Excellent. I’ll catch up with you later.” The smaller nodded, inching out from under the other mech’s hand, and they parted ways, Radius towards the silent mech in the center of the room. He’d almost forgotten he was there at all-- he hadn’t moved or made a sound since the crew had cleared out. Then again, neither had he.

The biplane turned to leave out of the door nearest to his new destination. Once he was in the hallway, he turned to look back across the deck and watched Radius quietly take the captain close to him.

The doors closed behind him, so he kept walking.

It didn’t take him any time at all to remember where the lounge was, but the sound of his designation stopped him. Bots on this ship sure did enjoy interrupting each other--

“Just the mech I was lookin’ for,” Bumper wasn’t walking like he’d been shot anymore, which was a good thing. He had two cubes in hand, both the telltale hot pink of high-grade.

“What a day, hm?” The grounder asked, stopping just short of the newbie and offering him a cube, “As promised.”  

Weathervane took it curiously, swirling the liquid in its container, before looking back up to see him walking ahead already. He moved to follow Bumper’s easy stride towards a long, high-set table near the back of the room.

“Shrap-- the second-in-command-- keeps this stuff stocked pretty well,” he was saying, “Not sure why, never seen ‘im drink any, but maybe it’s a build related thing. I always figured jets must just drink stronger stuff. Or would it be fliers in general?”  He was asking, but truthfully, Weathervane didn’t know. Purified Energon was still a new concept to him, let alone something as filtered and potent as high-grade. He’d heard others say the stuff was supposed to burn faster, but they could have easily been misinformed. The feeling of being in the dark about something was not doing his nerves any favors, though he was relaxing quite a bit in Bumper’s presence as it was.

“Not that I’ve ever heard, but I don’t know,” he said as much. He then, belatedly, wondered why Bumper was allowed to take it, if it were Shrapnel’s. Could be for the whole crew, but somehow Weathervane doubted Shrapnel kept the stuff in supply out of the kindness of his heart.

“Ah, well. Don’t have enough fliers on our squad to know for sure. Unlikely we’d ever get the reason outta Shrap anyway,” Bumper chuckled, easing into gossip so easily, as if they hadn’t just been on a battlefield not too long ago, “He’s not the talkative type.”

“I noticed. He seems… standoff-ish?”

“That’s an understatement. ‘N’ he’s hardly the worst of them.”

Weathervane’s interest was piqued, and he thought Bumper could tell. The look he gave him all but said ‘go for it’, a devious, lazy spark to his visor as he sipped his cube in no delicate fashion. The biplane cautiously took a sip of his own, trying not to balk at the foreign, overpowering taste of it. It wasn’t bad, but he’d have to adjust to it-- it was a far cry from the barely processed fuel he was used to. Bumper didn’t seem offended by the hesitance.

“Nice work out there today, by the way. Wasn’t an easy first day,” the grounder mused, filling the silence, “But you handled it well. ‘N’ you’re pretty quick.” He tapped the side of his helm indicatively.

Weathervane smiled, not as thin as before. “Thanks.” He glanced away, as if, perhaps, bashful. “For having my back, that is.”

“No worries, rookie. That’s how it goes around here. Luckily, only most of our fights are that intense,” He laughed slightly, as if it was a joke.  Weathervane took another conservative drink.

“I’m… not actually a rookie, you know.”

“Sure y’are, a rookie to the Bisector, anyways.”

“That’s not how that works.” Weathervane pouted, which got an amused grin out of the other mech.

“A matter of perspective,” he teased, and Weathervane was surprised that he chuckled at that. It only made the other smile a little more.

“Woe is me,” he said, trying at his drink again. It kinda burned. Not in a bad way, but also a bit in a bad way. He wasn’t sure what he thought of it yet, but it gave him something to do.

“So,” Bumper started slowly, after a bout of comfortable silence, “you look like you’ve got questions.”

“Tons.”

“Well, then ask away.”

[writersrealmbts]

Protect Them-Hybrid AU: Part 10/Finale

Description: Safe with Me Sequel! You work two days a week teaching kids the joys of learning and reading, your favorites being the triplets. When the triplet’s adopted older brother is the one that starts picking them up, you’re not sure what life just handed you but you’re pretty sure it’s just another little slice of heaven. Hoseok x Reader.

Warnings: I don’t even know, if you do, let me know and I’ll change the warnings.

Posted: 02/27/2019

Tags: Hybrid!au, hybrid!Hoseok, Safe With Me Sequel

Angst with fluffs: 2,016 words

A/N: We’re here. The end of this particular arc of the series. I still have a holiday request to fulfill (I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, but I didn’t know how the story was going to go and it would have messed up my ability to finish the story) for Hobi and reader, but that might be a while. I’m also working on finishing up a story I’ve had in my drafts for a while that didn’t go quite like I planned, but it should be fun. I’ve been pretty focused on editing and posting Army Medics on Ao3, so I haven’t done much in the way of some of my WIPs. Also, we got three feet of snow this past weekend, so there’s even more snow than before. My car was buried. Anywho: Thank you everyone who has read it and given me feedback, thanks for the likes, the comments, everything. I’m sorry it took so long for me to finish this series (I posted the prologue on Oct. 5th and the first part on Nov. 14th), but thanks for sticking with me for the journey! I love you all.

“Are you sure?” “Yeah. I’m sure. I mean, it’s a nice place and it’s actually not far from here. There’s a bus I can take to get to work, which will give me time to read.” You smiled down at the baby in your arms. “They’re adorable, Emma.” “I know.” She grinned down at her son, Jaehyun. “Is Aimi asleep?” “Yeah, she is,” You replied, setting her into the cradle before looking at Emma. “I should get going.” She set Jaehyun next to Ami, smiling as they curled into each other with soft, puppy-like sounds. You made a soft sound. “That’s adorable.” “Isn’t it? I missed when the triplets used to do this,” She lightly brushed their heads, then sat back and looked at you. “Have you talked to Hobi?” You shook your head. “No.” She nodded a little, tucking your hair behind your ear. “Are you going to?” You looked at your hands in your lap. “I…I don’t know.” She didn’t say anything more, simply rubbing your arm in a comforting manner. You looked up as Jungkook knocked lightly on the doorframe. “Hey, your bag is in Hobi’s car because he’s insisting on driving you.” You took in a deep breath, then nodded. “Okay, thank you.” He nodded, hesitating in the doorway before disappearing into the hallway. You got up and stretched. “Oh, time for another few hours of torture.” She laughed softly. “Don’t be so melodramatic. This give you the chance to talk to him. If it doesn’t go well, call me. Okay?” You nodded and hugged her. “Thank you for everything, Emma.” She hugged you tightly, then released. “I’m so glad you’re better.” “Well, as much as I can get better, yeah.” You sighed, smiling. The doctors said it was likely that now that they had started, you would continue to have seizures, probably for the rest of your life, and your vision in your left eye still fluctuated between blurry and blind, but your leg was fully functioning now. You were still not allowed to run and it still got tired long before your other did and would get sore, especially at night, but you could put weight on it and move. The triplets all nuzzled into your neck at once when you went to hug Nari goodbye first, causing you to laugh softly. “Why are you leaving?” Minsu asked, rubbing his cheek against your shoulder since Kaemon was blocking your neck. “Because I have to go back to living in my own place now that I’m all better,” You told him, pressing a kiss to his cheek, which prompted the other two to whine for kisses as well. Adorable. “But I like you being here,” Nari said. “Everything is good! I have a baby sister, and I have you and Hobi, and Eomma and Appa!” “And a baby brother,” You added. “I already had brothers, now I have a sister!” She said dramatically. “Be excited about both. Just think about it, one more kid to play with. You love your brothers.” She grinned at them. “I do.” Minsu giggled and playfully tackled her to the ground, rubbing his nose against hers. “You better.” Kaemon flopped on top of both, earning groans and giggly protests. Jin chuckled, watching them carefully from a distance. “Lunch is ready, pups.” “Food!” Minsu cheered. “Get off me! There’s food!” “He’s asleep. Again!” Nari let out a dramatic groan of disbelief. You laughed at their antics, standing and receiving the hugs from Jungkook, Jimin, and Jin. “I’ll see you on Monday,” Jin said, patting your shoulder. “It really was a pleasure having you with us. Don’t be a stranger.” “I’ll try not to be,” You answered, smiling and walking toward the door. Hoseok waved to his family, then followed you out. You two were almost to the summer house, your sister having left everything to you, when you finally broke the heavy silence. “I could’ve taken a taxi,” You started. He shook his head. “I won’t feel comfortable unless I know you’re okay.” “Right, because you feel responsible for me after seeing me get hurt,” You murmured, looking out the window. Anywhere but him. It was quiet again. “Wha…whe…” He made a couple more sounds like he wanted to ask a question before falling silent after a quiet and meaningful, “Oh.” You wouldn’t even look at him after he had parked in front of the house. He just sat in the drivers seat as you got out and went to the trunk to get your bag. You knocked on the trunk and he seemed to flinch before moving and popping the trunk, quickly getting out of the car. You carried the bag inside, even though you could sort of tell that he wanted to carry it for you. But you weren’t hurt anymore. He followed you inside. You set the bag on the couch and gestured around. “There. Happy? I’m safe.” He looked at you with surprise. “Y/n…can I talk to you? Sit with me?” “We sat in silence the whole ride, and you want to talk now?” He nodded, coming over and taking your hand, guiding you to sit beside him. “In the car, you said something about me feeling responsible for you after seeing you get hurt.” “I was just—” “Repeating what I said, that day in the bathroom back when you first got hurt. The day you were sick. I told you that.” He nodded. He seemed nervous. “I told you that my instincts went crazy after seeing you get hurt, and having your blood on me from carrying you to the hospital. But there was more to it. Sure, that’s enough to make a hybrid protective and attached…but when that happens and it’s someone that you like…really, really like…as in…romantically…well, it’s about ten times worse.” “Why are you—” “Not yet. Just, listen. Please. Hybrids can generally tell from a few interactions if someone they’re interested in could be a potential mate. We fall in love quickly. Easily. I’m not an exception. And seeing you that first day, with the kids? And then every time I saw you again…I got there early that day because I was hoping I could talk to you before your shift ended. Then the tornado, and the way you protect the kids. Risking yourself, getting hurt and then rubbing yourself on me so that hte kids wouldn’t notice my fear scent as much…” He was smiling warmly. “How could I not love someone as kind and caring as you?” Holy. Crap. You stared at him, unable to think of a proper response. “Then you got hurt. The guilt I felt…the anger…I couldn’t protect you, or keep you safe, because we were both trying to protect the kids and that led to you getting hurt and it killed me. Because I had to choose and I wanted to choose you, but it was too late and I knew that I would never be able to forgive myself if the kids…and you were so alone…” He was starting to get a little fragmented. “I know you think caring for you was burdensome and unflattering, but honestly, I’ve never really been happier because I got to be close to you and try and help you get better. And you did. And while there were times when you were discouraged you always put up a cheerful front for the pups and…taking care of them with you that week that all that crazy stuff happened was honestly the best week of my life because I got to pretend that we were really together, that they were our kids and we were in love and I had to tell you that I love you because if I don’t I think I might go crazy.” You blinked rapidly at him. “I love you. I love your stubbornness and compassion, and the way you sleep is adorable.” He was holding both of your hands. You weren’t even sure if you were blinking anymore. “Please tell me you aren’t having a seizure while I’m explaining all of this because I might cry if you are.” “I’m not,” You said softly, finally dragging your gaze from him to try and process everything. “That punk.” “What?” “Jungkook. He couldn’t have just said that I was being stupid and that you liked me too. I’ve been driving myself crazy, over something I could have had months ago because of you and your stupid explanations about hybrids and their sense of duty,” You hit him with a couch pillow. “Are you kidding me?! Do you realize, I’ve been tearing myself apart inside thinking that you, the most amazing man I have ever known, saw me as nothing more than your patient and that I would never stand a chance with you. I stopped almost every fantasy, I shunned every niggling idea of something more because…” You let out a shout of frustration. “I love you too, idiot.” He grinned and pulled you to him, lips pressed to yours in a kiss that you wouldn’t forget anytime soon. He had to be a god. “So much better than I thought it would be,” He murmured, kissing you several more times afterward. “Shh,” You scolded, locking onto his lips again. His lips parted from yours, kissing the scar on your face. “I’m moving in. You shouldn’t live alone when you could have a seizure at any time.” “Ok.” “I have to be at Emma and Jin’s before Jin goes to the Sanctuary, so you can ride with me to the house and then with Jin to the Sanctuary.” He tucked his head into your neck. “Mmmm,” You responded semi-coherently. “You’re stuck with me forever.” “However will I manage?” Your response was half-heartedly sarcastic and rhetorical, earning a chuckle from him. He kissed you again. “I’m mating you tonight.” You smiled up at him. The man that had driven you crazy for the past four months. “Fine, but you only have three years before I insist on having kids.” He grinned. “Sounds perfect.” He kissed you again, soft and sweet, then pressed his forehead to yours. “I love you.” “I love you too. More than you could ever imagine.” Maybe life wasn’t perfect and you had lost a lot, but you had Hoseok. “What did you say that night?” “What night?” “The night Emma and Jin went to the hospital to have the twins. I said they’ve got good genes, and you said something else, but I was half-asleep.” He pulled you into his arms completely, laying down with you after kicking your suitcase off of the couch. He was mostly on top of you, forehead pressed against your temple. “I said that ours would be cuter.” Nevermind. Everything bad was worth this perfect moment with him. “So…did you actually want to wait three years, or was that just in case I wanted to wait a few years? Cause, I’ve sort of had to deal with watching and imagining you as the mom to my pups so…” “Oh, that was totally for you, I’ve had baby fever ever since you said ‘our kids’ when I told you to tell people that the triplets were your kids.” “I don’t need the years.” “Then we’ll discard the years.” “Do you need time to adjust to the idea of us being in a relationship?” “Now that I look back on it, aside from the whole sex, sleeping together, and romance we were basically a married couple so not much really changes except I can stop torturing myself.” You nodded. “Huh. I guess you’re right.” “Yeah.” He pressed a kiss to your cheek. “This is really comfortable.” “It is,” You agreed, yawning. “Nap time?” “Totally nap time.” He wiggled a little, getting more comfortable, fluffy tail covering your legs as well as his. “Goodnight, y/n. Love you.” “Goodnight, Hobi.” His hold on you tightened and he grinned. You pressed a chaste little kiss to his lips. “I love you.”

Masterlist.  ~  Part 9.  ~  Masterpost. ~ Specials: Next

Tagged: @jiminslye @musicandmusing @it-is-dana @kimmie113080 @bluebirdphantom

[lavenrain96]

I’m Here

For @mikayuuweek

Day 7: “I swear I’ll definitely save you” + Free Day + Prompt Generator (Fake Dating AU)

So, it’s the last day of MikaYuu week so it’s common courtesy to say farewell to it, yeah? Anyway, after writing for Day 5, I feel like a jerk for leaving just one thing (I’m a dormant perfectionist) for the event so here is my drabble for Day 7. The prompt I got from the generator was Fake Dating AU and I was very excited cause that’s one of my favorites! (Whoo!) So here’s to the final day of MikaYuu week, and I dedicate it to the host/s of the event for their hard work. Thank you so much for accepting a late comer like me. Please enjoy~! ^^

The deal was very simple. If Mikaela could pull off being Yuuichirou’s boyfriend in the whole duration of his parents’ stay for a month, then he could have the money enough to pay off his debt from the loan sharks that his father forcefully dumped on him the moment he died. Yuuichirou was aware of this and offered Mikaela this peculiar ‘job’, which was pretending to be his boyfriend for a month. Mikaela didn’t mind the entire thing because Yuuichirou was his friend ever since elementary school, but being his boyfriend was… another thing in itself.

If Mikaela would be honest to himself, Yuuichirou could have chosen anyone to play the role with how popular he was to his seniors and juniors. But no. In the end, he chose Mikaela right off the bat with no second thoughts, and it concerned the blond.

“… Why?” Mikaela found himself asking late in the afternoon after what Yuuichirou proposed. Classes were already over and they have all the time for themselves to discuss about the matter as they walked. “I’m not someone amazing. I mean, I could barely stand out in class and all I’m ever good at was in academics. I don’t think I can impress your parents.”

“No, they will. I know they will.” Yuuichirou reassured with a toothy grin before it fell into a sympathetic smile. “And besides… you’re in debt, right? Let me take this chance to help you too.”

That made Mikaela purse his lips. “I… Thank you, Yuu-chan, but I can handle it myself.”

“That’s bullshit and you know that.” Yuuichirou immediately countered with a small frown, making Mikaela flinch. “I heard from Shinoa that you’re doing a part time job in a nearby café but their pay is very bad. It barely lowered your debt if I’m not mistaken.”

“My debt has nothing to do with you…” Mikaela muttered while he looked away in shame.

“… It does.” Yuuichirou admitted as he raised a hand up to scratch a bit of his nape. “Mika, we’ve been friends for a very long time now. We’re practically like a family with how close we are, and as such, it’s only natural for me to be concerned about your well-being whether it’s at school or your family. Your debt, in particular, is something that really worries me.”

Yuuichirou sighed as he lowered his hand from his neck and gave Mikaela a warm smile. “Geez, you’ve been like this ever since we were kids… always saving and protecting others even if you got hurt in the process…” Yuuichirou shook his head, pretending to scold Mikaela. “As noble as you sound, you ought to be selfish once in a while, Mika. You’ll just break yourself if you continue like this.”

Mikaela shifted uncomfortably under Yuuichirou’s gaze, looking down at his shoes and the ground. He wanted to say that he was perfectly fine so that Yuuichirou wouldn’t get involved in his problem. However, Yuuichirou was a literal force to be reckoned with. He wouldn’t back down on something once he set his mind into it as he was determined to see it through the end, giving his support all the way. It was one of Yuuichirou’s endearing qualities, but Mikaela wished that he wouldn’t waste it on a nobody like him.

“I’m fine, Yuu-chan, really…” Mikaela tried again with a restrained smile to accompany it as he finally looked at Yuuichirou. “It’s a slow progress, but it’s getting there. I’ll be out from the debt in no time. I just have to be patient and—”

“—Mika…!” Yuuichirou raised his voice which made Mikaela stop talking as hands were on his face, cupping it and making him look at Yuuichirou straight in the face. “For fuck’s sakes, stop forcing yourself to say that! I swear if you’ll pull off that martyr crap again, I’ll knock you out!”

Mikaela blinked in surprise.

Yuuichirou sighed as he pinched a bit of Mikaela’s cheeks and stretched it. “We’re not kids anymore where we could just let things go and forget it the next day like it never happened. This is a very serious matter that I know you couldn’t handle alone and I’m willing to shoulder half of it so that you can relax even for a bit, you dummy.”

To prove his point, Yuuichirou stretched Mikaela’s cheeks some more that earned him a squeak at the mild pain before he let go with a sigh. “You saved me multiple times in the past… so let me save you in return.”

A small blush appeared on Yuuichirou’s cheeks that was easily missed with how the sun was already setting in the horizon. But even then, Yuuichirou didn’t bother to hide it and instead pointed a finger directly at Mikaela as if to dare the other to protest against him. “I’m not taking a ‘no’ for an answer, Mika, and sure as hell, I won’t back down with what I said. I swear… I’ll definitely save you. You can count on it.”

Mikaela felt his heart thumping when he heard that and he slowly broke down with his blue eyes glimmering brightly as tears cascaded down. There were so many emotions for Mikaela to handle that he unceremoniously fell to his knees on the ground while covering his face and sobbing.

A loud thump was heard and warm arms were wrapped around him. A hand caressed his blond locks while Mikaela cried softly within Yuuichirou’s arms, murmuring a very quiet, “Thank you, Yuu-chan.”

Yuuichirou smiled as he held Mikaela close, content in just staying in place for as long as Mikaela wanted and giving the comfort that he needed. “It’s okay, Mika. I won’t leave your side. I’m here.”

[rorykillmore]

so i have an extraordinary number of friends with march/april birthdays, and now that it’s technically the 26th, it’s @tailsthesales!!! HAPPY BIRTHDAY GIZ!!! they asked me to write a little leon/laura thing for our panfandom site soooo i gave it a shot! luv that alliteration they have goin’ on,

but first, to get mushy for a second... giz, i know you deal with a lot. you’re not one to complain very much or put it on other people but.... i know you do and i also know that you work so hard to stay strong and positive and kind for your friends and i love that SO MUCH about you. thank you so so much especially for everything you’ve helped me with staff-wise on denny lately and just, in general, for making my life a little brighter and better. i hope you have a wonderful birthday because you deserve the WORLD <3 <3 <3

anyway now enjoy leon and laura laughing alone with salad(tm) at the gala event 

What is it with her and nice guys?

Okay, not ‘nice’ -- genuine, kind, decent fucking human beings. They make Laura feel so empty in comparison.

In life, Laura had never considered herself a self-conscious person.

In death, she’s sheer, walking defiance. Mad Sweeney cracks his seventieth dead wife joke, and she doesn’t give a fuck. Random passersby stare to her pale, discolored face half-masked by the usual giant pair of sunglasses she wears, and she doesn’t give a fuck.

As a rule: she generally does not give a fuck. It’s one of the best things about being dead.

It’s one of the things she doesn’t miss feeling.

But there’s something about getting glammed up to go to a high-end political gala that’ll smack the self-consciousness right back into a gal.

No amount of washing, it turns out, will give her hair back the natural sheen and bounce it had when she was alive, and no amount of make-up is going to convincingly return the glow to her skin. Laura guesses she was pretty, once. It had never been very high on her list of concerns, mostly because Shadow would have looked at her like she was the most beautiful woman in the world even on a terrible day.

Tonight, she’s just trying for presentable. But Leon beams at her when she actually shows up anyway, kind of like Shadow might have, and she’s not sure if it makes her feel better or worse.

“Hey,” she says when she’s close enough to greet him, feeling a bit silly as she wonders if that was somehow too informal.

“Hey, Laura,” Leon returns amicably. “You look great.”

Laura raises her eyebrows at him, in a ‘come on, you can say it’ kind of way, but as per usual, Leon seems nothing if not sincere. She decides not to ruin his mood by griping, even if she can’t understand how someone who’s been through everything he has can look at a dead woman and feel anything but uneasy at best.  “Thanks. You too.”

It’s not a lie on her part: Leon cleans up nice. It’s a little jarring to see him in something other than casual attire, but his clean, pressed black suit makes him look a little less weighed down, somehow.

Or maybe it’s just the vibe of this place. Laura can already tell from out here that the gala is thrumming with a kind of excitable energy that even she can kind of feel. She guesses most rifters haven’t had anything quite like this to look forward to in a long time.

“Shall we?” she asks Leon, only a little sardonically.  He offers her his arm and she rolls his eyes and takes it carefully, quietly grateful that it’s not skin to skin contact.

“You’re taller in heels.” Leon notes, catching Laura off guard by teasing her.

“Shut up.”

The banter settles her nerves a little, and they head inside. Everything’s a little too bright, or at least it feels that way to Laura, fresh out of the night and down her usual pair of shades. Maybe ‘zombie’ has been missing the mark, this whole time. Maybe she should’ve been making vampire jokes this whole time. 

“You okay?” Leon asks her, and Laura tries not to feel taken aback at how quickly he notices her discomfort.

“My eyes are a little sensitive, that’s all. You know I don’t even really see in color anymore?”

“That’s probably lucky, in this particular situation.” In mild amusement, Leon watches some kid strut past, and even Laura can tell that his suit’s the gaudiest fucking thing she’s ever seen.

Wait --

“Let’s go this way,” she says suddenly to Leon, tugging his arm perhaps a little harder than she meant to and unbalancing him as she jerks them both out of the Technical Boy’s eye line.

“Hey --” It takes Leon a moment to find his footing. He glances over his shoulder. “Who was that?”

“No one important,” Laura says, knowing it’s technically a lie but also that it isn’t, because that particular God is not particularly important to her. “Just one of those awkward ‘I don’t want to run into anyone I know’ situations.”

“Why was he dressed like that?”

“I ask myself that question every time I see him.”

Leon chuckles, and Laura manages to smile a little despite her slightly frazzled state. “What about you?” she continues.  “As an... official member of the MLD, you’re probably expected to do some socializing, or something. Right?”

Leon glances at her, slightly pained. 

“Shitty co-workers?” Laura prompts, and is a little pleased to hear him laugh again.

“I just don’t know them that well,” he tells her gingerly. “Except for the chief -- Felix? He’s actually pretty decent.”

“Surprising, for a police chief.”  Idly, Laura scans the room as if she thinks she might be able to pick Felix out on sight, even though she’s never met him before. “Well... if you don’t want to introduce me, what do you want to do?”

He looks pensive for a second.  “We could get some drinks?” Then he nearly stammers over his own words, giving her an apologetic double-take.  “-- Sorry. I forgot.”

“You forgot?” Laura needles him, though it’s entirely playful. Somehow, some of her earlier self-consciousness has ebbed away without her noticing. “It’s fine, Leon. I don’t care if you wanna get a drink -- you’ll probably need it.”

But Leon is shaking his head, and his expression is different now in a way that Laura can’t quite read.  “...Or... we could dance?”

Laura stares at him, deadpan.

“Is that a no?” Leon asks, smiling easily, and Laura knows that if she did say no he wouldn’t push her. But that doesn’t make her feel any less like she’s starting to put a damper on his night. 

“No. I mean, yes. I mean --”  She huffs a little, or at least goes through the motions, since she doesn’t technically breathe anymore.  “Nevermind. What kind of asshole comes to a thing like this and says they don’t want to dance? Let’s go.”  

She leaves his side to stalk out onto the dance floor, praying that whatever universal karma is almost definitely working against her at this point doesn’t prompt the DJ to start playing Thriller, or something. Leon follows a little more slowly, and looking back at him, Laura suddenly wonders if he hadn’t expected her to say yes. The slight uncertainty in his posture makes her feel a little better about her own nerves, at least. She doesn’t think she’s done this since her’s and Shadow’s wedding, and even then, she wasn’t stellar at it.

“So...” Leon begins as they come to a standstill.  Laura can’t bear the thought of them awkwardly sizing each other up any longer, so she reaches up to put her hand on his shoulder, and uses her other to take one of his. She knows she must be cold to the touch, as she always is, but to Leon’s credit he doesn’t flinch. 

“You lead,” she tells him. “‘Cause I will definitely fuck us up.”

Leon carefully settles his other hand on her waist, and Laura only thinks about the fact that there won’t be any pulse for him to feel for a second. She’s more preoccupied with trying to remember how to slow dance without looking like an idiot.

Not that anyone said that this was supposed to be romantic, but it’s so entirely the opposite as they both try to find their footing that she kind of wants to laugh. Which, in a weird sort of way, makes her feel a little better. Soon, they settle into an easy, swaying rhythm with the music, and -- sure, maybe it’s not the total, cheesy, embarrassing nightmare she might have imagined it as.

It’s almost kind of nice. And because she can’t let herself have nice things for too long, Laura starts to circle back around to feeling guilty again.

What is it with her and nice guys?

Okay, not ‘nice’ -- genuine, kind, decent fucking human beings. They make Laura feel so empty in comparison.

But then again, pretending that Leon isn’t capable of being a reasonably aware judge of character after all he’s been through is probably doing a disservice to her. And telling herself that nothing has changed - that nothing will ever change - since she was alive won’t get her anywhere.  

And Laura’s not sure where it is she wants to be... but she doesn’t want to be standing still.

Neither does Leon, she thinks. That’s why he’s always pushing forward, why he’s already secured his position in the MLD, why he still wants to help people even though Laura knows he’s probably met too many people who were beyond helping to count.

It’s not like Laura wants to be his charity case, or anything, but she’s not so sure she likes the idea of being beyond help either. So maybe they can help each other.

If only for tonight. If only a little, in passing moments like this one.

[peacefulwriter88]

Eurydice & Orpheus

Chris Beck X OC WoC Adria Devereaux

Warnings: SMUT and angsty af, cheating

A/N: I don’t know, @geminimoonbeamx got me all fucked up thinking about Chris Beck and this particular prompt (like all inspo credit goes to her lol) and I’ve been wanting to write an OC for a while so this is me doing it! Enjoy lol

His scent is intoxicating. It takes over the space of her small apartment, permeates more than the sheets that she had washed two times to ensure the scent would go away. Instead it wafts in the air, sticks to her skin, clings to her mind and she has to open a window to get it to go away.

She allows herself to stand there, looking out of the window. Into the busy streets of Boston, watching mindlessly as people with different agendas, careers, families walk by and she wonders if she can join them, to escape the situation she’s allowed herself in.

Not again.

It’s what her heart echoes out, yells at her with a steady beat, a song trying to break her of his spell. And she almost listens, almost doesn’t cav.

But then his voice is closer.

“Spent about five days down in Florida with this new crew that is destined to fly out. Trying to give them best practices for hypotheticals that won’t happen because we’ve already lived the worst case scenario and you know all I could think of? Between all that math and young excitement? How much I’ve missed you.”

It hurts, those words as she turns and lean against the window, still dangerously away from him. He hasn’t moved, he’s still sitting on the couch, those beautiful cerulean eyes trying to get a read on her as she gives a small smile.

“Sure you did. Because beyond Ethan and Beth, you thought of me.”

She doesn’t want to sound pained, or angry, or frustrated. She just wants to stop lying to herself, wants to stop the long nights that she’s lying in her bed, alone, wondering if he’s thinking of her. Knowing the truth.

He had a beautiful wife. A beautiful baby boy.

Why would he be thinking about her?

His eyes don’t shift, don’t betray what he’s thinking. That she can’t possibly know the relief she provides, his brilliant best friend, the astro-physicist that he’s known almost all his life, who was just as obsessed with the stars as he was. It was supposed to be her. She was supposed to be the one who gave him his child, who would live with him in the big house he owned on the opposite side of town, who was to be his wife.

But she wasn’t. Life intervened and by the time he had realized the consequences of those actions, he had to choose.

And he didn’t choose her.

She shifts, trying to cross her arms over her body. He had caught her fresh from a yoga class, waiting patiently outside of her apartment with his bag near him. Hadn’t told Beth he got in a day earlier, instead choosing to spend the evening with her. She hadn’t changed, not out of the tight capri leggings that had plastered themselves on every inch of her skin. Not the cute bralette that crossed over her cleavage, each breast pushing outside the crisscross design with each breath she took. The sun was starting to set, that six o’clock burnt orange brilliance streaking in, highlighting the way her gingerbread skin stood out in the light, the darkness of her black curly hair. It was especially hot and humid for Boston, even for August, and despite her AC the last faint droplets of sweat were falling down her neck, into that damn bralette he couldn’t take his eyes off of and he wanted to taste it, the mingle of her natural saltiness with the honey perfume that hit his nostrils every other breath he took.

Adria Deveraux was his beginning and his end and none of that mattered.

Because she wasn’t his.

“Don’t say that Adria,” he gets up and he notices the way she flinches away, pushing herself back. “I took an early flight home because I wanted to spend the evening with you. Don’t you miss us cooking dinner together and cuddling on the couch?”

She has to look away, close her eyes because how dare he. How fucking dare he. Of course she remembered. It was what she lingered on when the aching loneliness consumed her, when she denied friends blind dates or went to events solo along her partnered friends. Waiting for Chris Beck.

Always waiting.

“Chris…I think we should stop.”

She doesn’t open her eyes, instead keeps them barreled tight, fighting the overwhelming feeling of sadness and fear. She doesn’t want to say the words, wants to hold on to him for just a little longer, wants to be selfish and live in this moment. But it’s not enough, not anymore.

“I’m….I’m sorry of the snapshots of what we used to be. You’ve moved on and…..I should too. I shouldn’t….we shouldn’t be doing this. It’s wrong.”

She doesn’t open her eyes but allows the tears to take over, to spill down her cheeks and he breaks inside. Can feel his soul ripple with pain, to watch his sweet girl, his best friend in pain because of him. She was right. He was being selfish. He didn’t want to rock the boat with Beth and wanted to keep up the image of being a good father to Ethan while also fucking and loving the woman he’s lusted after for more than ten years. He should leave, he should accept what she says and leave and don’t look back.

But too many nights he’s laid in bed, Beth snoozing by his side while he looked out at the stars, thinking of her. Thinking of how much he wished she was by his side instead of the woman he called wife.

And she was crying and he could never handle her tears.

So he does the worse thing he could do and walks to her, wrapping his arms around her and pulling her to him tightly. She breaks down in sobs, trying to push away. Cursing him under her breath, calling him a selfish piece of shit and she was a selfish piece of shit and was trash and all of these things that weren’t true. Couldn’t be true because she was pure, she was like the space particles after a shooting star, glimmering in his heart, stained in his mind even seconds after they disappeared. And he was the dying star, dragging her down with him in pain because he couldn’t let go.

“You are Venus,” he whispers, “Your cozy, winter mornings and bright summer days. You’re a star shower in space or the northern lights on earth. You are worthy of love and I am tainting you of it.”

He knows it – that he’s the problem and she looks away, lashes matted with mascara and her thick tears as she sniffles the snot that’s trailed down her nose. To anyone else she would be a mess but to him she was just beautiful – loved when she was vulnerable like this – and he drinks in the image because he doesn’t know how long he’ll be able to relish it. She’s so mad at him but her hands have stopped pushing him away, fighting him because he always knew the right words.

“You’re a selfish asshole Chris Beck. You know that?”

Her words are broken and torn and he nods as he leans down to kiss her. Then nothing matters. His hands are hot on her skin, like a comet violently rushing through the earth’s atmosphere as his mouth tangles with hers, teeth clanging as his hands find her ass. She was so fucking beautiful, so fucking perfect and he wanted her forever.

But she wasn’t his.

She wants to stop this, wants this to end because she told herself no more, not after the last time. But he came to see her straight off the plane and maybe, just maybe, he was being honest in his words. She wants to believe, even for fifteen minutes as her hands find his curly hair, raking her hands through the short curly strands as he groans into her mouth, pulling her as he moved clumsily throughout her apartment.

He doesn’t make it far – her Beck – barely hits the couch with the back of his legs as he falls backwards and they both laugh as she stumbles on top of him, letting gravity take its course. This was how they met oh so long ago, at a college party that was way out of their league for the young witty pair. He had been looking down trying to memorize some equation for a quiz, two beers in his hands because why not, and she was too busy taking in the fucking glass ceiling and wondering how the fuck her black ass had made it into a party where you could see the stars when they bumped into each other. Beck fell back onto the pristine white coach with the cheap Keystone beer flying and Adria wasn’t far behind. It had been clumsy their landing, like they were now fifteen years later as adults, but he had looked into her big doe cinnamon eyes and knew that he was hers. Beauty wasn’t in the form of a planet – no – it was on earth and looking at him with the brightest smile.

The memory hits both of them at the same time, unbeknownst to the other, and for a second they stop tugging on the thin material of their clothing and just look at each other. Drink in the laugh lines and small strands of grey starting to emerge at their roots and ingest that fifteen years is a long time to be going through this. Adria thinks that this is the curse of all black woman – never good enough to be the wife of a prominent white men but good enough to fuck, only behind closed doors and Chris thinks that he’s too cowardly for someone as strong as her – too weak and afraid to tell Beth the truth and allow Adria be the woman he’s always wanted her to be.  

But they never say it.

Not what’s in their hearts – no – instead she leans down and kisses him. If part of the curse was to accept this fate, that she was only going to be a token and nothing more, then she was going to take what she could in this moment. He accepts it, accepts the languid way her tongue moves into his mouth, allowing her to be dominant as he his hands find her ass and pulls her closer to him, scooting the both of them so they can lay down comfortably on the couch. Her kisses taste like salted caramel – sugary sweet but littered with tears of disappointment and his hands move to her breast, kneading the supple tissue as she pulls away and moans. She was always so sensitive, such an expressive lover and he takes in the way her mouth pops into an “O”, the way she her eyes clasp close as she ruts her hips into his.

Venus was the brightest star that shone upon the ancient, the easiest to identify by the naked eye and the one who bought love and fertility. He wonders if she understood this was why it was what he lovingly called her, that Beth got nothing more than ‘honey’ because she was dull in contrast to her. She stood out always, conceived his thoughts even when he thought he rid himself of her – his Adria. The name that really meant darkness, which seemed like a joke because she provided light in his moments of darkness, the sun in which his shadow danced in.

He mentions this, later on, in a note when it doesn’t matter anymore.

For now, though, he allows himself to get lost in the way she sits up, throwing her bralette over her head as he sits up, pulling her closer to him as he suckles on her nipple. She throws her arms around him, drawing him closer as her moans fill the space, and his erection is biting into the thin material of her leggings, causing her hips to buck involuntarily. She would allow for foreplay later, when she could move past the disappointment and live in the happiness of his smile, the comfort of his voice. Right now, she needed to fuck him, to feel as dirty as her soul and she pulls away, yanking at his belt.

He purrs, deep and low and it makes her whine as her fingers brush against his erection and he’s quick to help her, to shimmy out of his pants and boxers with one swift move as she moves her pants down. Her scent was pungent, sweet and all he wanted in the moment was to get his mouth on her lips, to suck her sweetly until she had no more to give. But she’s impatient, always had been as she positions herself on top of him. He inserts himself into her, not slowly but swift and she yelps, pulling at his hair as she settles on top of him as she looks down at him. She’s still crying, tears falling down her face but there’s something else glimmering in her eyes and he knows it. Has said it too many times casually, in the context of their friendship, but too afraid to say it in person, as vulnerable as they both were now.

“I love you.”

She deserves to hear it, wants her to know that he does, that he’s so fucking afraid to be anything more but he fucking loves her before he’s pulling her on top of him and slamming her back down. She feels like a maelstrom that every part of her is getting pulled into him – Christopher Beck – that she has no control over her emotions but the senseless knowledge that has always lived within the both of them.

He loves her. Probably as long as she had loved him.

And it was too fucking late.

It’s rough, the way he pumps his hips into her, causing her to fall off the couch at one point and even though they laugh, take in the way she’s fallen between her couch and the coffee table he is quick to push the heavy wood aside so he can fill himself in her again. She wants it, wants him to fuck her raw as her nails rake down his back, her hips lifting to meet his as she looks at him. His eyes are a stormy, dangerous color, dark like denim as he tells her again and again that he loves her.

That he’s a coward.

That he has only loved her.

And he’s a fucking coward.

It resonates in her like a chord striking in a piano, reverberates in her soul as he cries and tells him she loves him too but it’s too late. When she comes, it’s loud and musical and fills his ears with his name and he fucks her harder, his dick relishing the way her walls flutter and squeeze him tight, until it’s pumping his seed into her, filling her. He see stars – not in the form of Orion or Aquila or Ursa Major. No, he sees only his Adria – the way her bright smile fills up a space or the key of her laughter or the softness of her voice. He sees the future of what he wants of them together, the world he’s too afraid to push until he’s left with darkness, nothing more than a faint memory.

She’s under him, silent because he’s never been honest with her, not like this. Beck was a dirty talker but not an intimate talker, not sweet words while he fucked her. He saved those intimate moments for beforehand, and even then he had never said that he had loved her.

If it wasn’t for the way he looked at her, those words would mean nothing. But she had never seen him look at anyone the way he had just looked at her. Not Beth or any of his ex’s.

He loved her.

The tears find themselves in the cave of her tear ducts as she looks away, shaking her head and whispering,

“What the fuck are we doing Beck?”

And he doesn’t answer because he doesn’t know anymore.

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[clairelutra]

Allurance-Teasing

love me some altean!lance :Dc

send me a ship and a word for a drabble! (and be prepared to wait like 5 months for it rip)

“Why so serious, guardsman?”

Lance flinched, startled out of his life-or-death contemplation of the chessboard, and blushed. “Uh, you know, just… considering my moves!”

“Hm,” Allura agreed, contemplating the boy across from her.

Lance was something of an enigma—not in and of himself, he was cripplingly transparent in every way—but in their relationship, stilted as it was, and how she felt about him.

There were three Alteans aboard the Castle of Lions, and they were likely the last Alteans in the universe. There was her, of course—crown princess, heir to the throne of a kingdom of ghosts—and there was Coran, her father’s trusted advisor and the man who’d raised her from a young age.

And then there was Lance.

Why he was one person to join her and Coran in the cryopods was a mystery. He was a lowly guardsman, not even yet a captain, just someone who’d stood beside her seat at important dinners and patrolled the castle perimeters. He wasn’t a terrible shot, and he did know how to use a broadsword, but there had been so many better candidates, so many other warriors and champions and masters that her father could have preserved for her protection.

But no, here was Lance, the only person the Blue Lion had yet accepted—and an idiot by most all accounts. He was a hopeless flirt, had no sense of gravity or tact, and spent more time getting on his whole team’s nerves than he did fighting the war against Zarkon.

His presence baffled her—almost as much as how intensely she wished she could connect with him.

He was her age, give or take a decade or two, and she’d never spoken to him once before. Do we have similar interests? she wondered endlessly. Did they know the same places, miss the same food, like the same music? Did he remember that one awful ball where Lady Aline had made everyone wear pink because other colors were too gaudy for her tastes? Had he ever found that one lovely little glade behind the library? Had he been as excited as she to hear that The Quiznackers would be playing at the capital?

And yet, as eager as he was to fling inappropriate comments at every single other female they came across, he could barely trade pleasantries with her.

She’d never thought she’d want the attention of someone like him.

It was… infuriating.

She’d finally managed to convince him to play this human game called ‘chess’ (a bit like ‘war’ but with different rules and the assumption that all the pieces were grounded), which was… well. It was better than nothing.

Very gingerly, Lance picked up his queen… and placed it directly in the strike range of one of her pawns.

This was the fourth time he’d thrown the game to her.

Irritated, she ignored that and put one of her bishops right in between his two rooks.

Lance regarded her move, expression caught halfway between consternation and honest panic.

“…Tell you what,” Allura said, thoughtful as she looked over the board. “Let’s have a bet.”

“A bet?”

He didn’t have to sound that alarmed.

“A bet,” Allura repeated firmly. “If I win, you’ll do one thing—any one thing—that I ask.”

Lance, frowning, opened his mouth.

“And if you win,” she continued, mercilessly cutting him off, “I’ll do any one thing you want.”

His face twitched like it wasn’t sure what emotion it was supposed to show. “I… Okay?.”

Satisfied, Allura relaxed in her seat. “Good.”

Now… maybe, just maybe, she would be allowed to lose.

She was not allowed to lose.

It was her turn for consternation, staring at the stone-carved king piece that rested cool in her palm. She really had been counting on being able to tease him, or maybe convincing him to get her to do something ridiculous, or maybe just… get him to prove to her that he wasn’t someone she wanted to associate herself with at all.

Anything, anything at all beside this damnable stalemate.

In her peripheral vision, she saw Lance glance between her palm and her face, waiting.

Vindictively, Allura wondered how he would take it if she just didn’t acknowledge the bet at all, or if she insisted on two out of three. They were going to be stuck in dead space for another three vargas—surely…

“Your request, your highness?” Lance prompted, as deferential as he always was with her, and Allura’s patience snapped.

“Hop in a circle three times while you hold your right foot in your left hand, and declare Lord Blaytz as the best Black Paladin there ever was.”

“…What?”

Allura lifted her chin, smug and supercilious and a little vindictive. “In front of all the other paladins.”

“What?”

Allura clapped the king back onto the board, standing in one smooth motion. “You really should have just won,” she sniffed, tucking her disappointment away, “but I suppose there’s always next time.”

Lance looked so lost she might’ve been inclined to take pity if she’d been a little less frustrated.

“Come. We should find the others.”

“Your Highness—”

“Yes?”

There was an odd look on his face. “Did-Did you want me to win?”

…After a fashion.

Allura blew out a breath. “I… wanted to be taken seriously.”

It came out sulkier than she intended it to, but Lance was looking at her like he’d never seen her before.

“But, wasn’t I…?” he started, then trailed off and blinked.

The awkward silence that reigned then made it up to a permanent position in Allura’s top ten list of awkward silences.

“…Oh,” Lance finally said, a revelation in a word. A slight, curious smile crossed his face, one that made her heart do something strange. “Okay. I’ll remember that.”

“Oh. Well. Good.”

Her tongue felt awkward in her mouth, her cheeks tingly. The next time he lost to her, she was going to make him pay for making her go through this.

“…So, when’s the rematch?”

“After your grand performance will do,” Allura informed him, tasting sweet victory when he cringed and groaned. The door hissed open as they approached it.

“I am so getting you back for this,” he muttered under his breath, and that tasted even sweeter.

“Good luck,” she singsonged as they approached the bridge. She grinned over her shoulder. “You’ll need it.”

“…Yeah,” he agreed slowly, a softer kind of realization in his voice. The rush of the double doors opening nearly overrode his quiet, “Thanks.”

That moment in particular stuck with her even after Lance held up his end of the bet, after their systems were all back online, after they set a path to the next Galra stronghold.

She couldn’t put her finger on why it felt so important, but… well.

Lance wasn’t holding her at arms’ length anymore, and that was all she’d wanted.

[sheewolf85]

Writing Challenge – Day 33

Prompt: Imagine Person A of your OTP just found out they’re pregnant.  Now imagine them coming up with a creative way to tell Person B.  Bonus if Person B misunderstands hilariously. Pair: SpicyHoney Rating: M Tags/Warnings: language, mpreg, skelepreg, I don’t think this counts as kinkshaming, but there’s a misunderstanding involving kinks, Edge might be kind of an idiot, anxiety over a misunderstanding, internal fears NSFW/SFW – mostly? Notes: I’m only rating this an M because of the kink in the misunderstanding.  I’m not sure if PG-13 would be more appropriate, but I guess I’d rather rate higher than lower than necessary. AO3 Link

Stretch stared down at his pelvis for a long moment, unable to believe what he was seeing.  At first, he’d thought he missed a spot showering that morning, but when he’d looked closer…well, that wasn’t spent magic.  He’d poked at it gently, curiously.  It was strangely spongy.  Inside the tiny, orange orb, he could see an even tinier soul glowing white.

It was a womb.  He was pregnant.

He sucked in a deep breath and let the initial wave of panic ride over him.  He and Edge had never talked about having kids.  Edge was very particular in his life plan, and this would throw a kink those plans.  The money they’d managed to raise for that vacation Edge had talked about for two years now—all of it would have to be used to get ready for the baby.  They’d need to get a bigger place. They’d need to buy shit.

He gave himself five minutes. Five minutes to panic and feel overwhelmed and scared.  After those five minutes passed, he straightened his spine, wiped his face, and forced himself to think about this logically.

Pushing his own emotions aside, he asked himself if Edge would really be upset.  No.  Edge was a master at adjusting to shit life threw at him.  He would understand that Stretch hadn’t done this on purpose, and together they would figure out what to do.

And maybe for the first few months, Stretch could work extra to make up for the money they’d be using out of the vacation fund.  Maybe they could still do that before the baby came.  It was a long shot, but Stretch wouldn’t give up hope.

After he’d managed to calm himself down and stay calmed for a while, he told himself it was time to think about how he was going to tell Edge.  A part of him wanted to just get it over with and face the consequences, but another part of him wanted to drop cute hints until Edge figured it out.  The one outcome Stretch wanted to avoid at all costs was the one where Edge didn’t think he was happy about this.  Because he really was.  He’d thought about kids before, but never really felt it was time to bring it up.

He thought of an idea and smiled to himself.  It would be perfect.  Part puzzle, part confession, part hopeful plea to be happy about this.  With that thought, he finished dressing and went to get started.

Edge eyed Stretch carefully.  Something was off.  He couldn’t put a phalanx on it, but something was different with his boyfriend.  He didn’t like it.  He had thought if something was wrong, Stretch would talk to him.  Instead of talking, Stretch was acting like nothing was amiss at all.

Stretch noticed the way Edge was looking at him.  He wanted to say that everything was fine, but he knew once he opened that conversation it wouldn’t stop until Stretch confessed.  He hoped Edge would hold off on confronting him until after dinner, because then Stretch could put his plan in place.  He had tried to act normal, but in doing so had overcompensated and raised Edge’s hackles even more.

“WHAT’S GOING ON?” Edge finally asked as they sat down for dinner.

Stretch figured it was a miracle he’d gotten this close.  Instead of making Edge wait any longer, he got up.

“i have something i need to show you. stay here.”  He left to get the bag from the closet.  It was a pink and green gift bag with no words or hints on the outside.  He set it down on the table in front of Edge’s plate.

Edge furrowed his brow bones.  “WHAT IS THIS?”  He eyed it like it was going to attack him.

Stretch smiled.  “it’s the answer you’re looking for.”  He leaned forward on the table, resting on his elbows, and waited for Edge’s curiosity to get the better of him.

Edge looked his boyfriend over carefully.  Nothing in his face or his stance showed any kind of malice or trickery.  Perhaps a bit of excitement and worry, but nothing bad.

“ALRIGHT, ASSHOLE; I’LL BITE.”  Food forgotten, he picked up the gift bag and pulled out a handful of pink and white tissue paper.  Inside was a card and a small, wrapped box.  He set the tissue paper aside and pulled out the card.  Eyeing Stretch the whole time, he opened the card.  The front of it was white with three words printed in bold letters:

Happy Father’s Day

Edge raised a brow bone and opened the card.  Stretch had written, “i love you, daddy” on the inside in his messy scrawl.  Edge coughed.

“UM…” He wasn’t sure how to feel about this.

Stretch waited semi-patiently for Edge to open the box.  He did slowly, picking the tape off carefully instead of ripping it open.  Inside was a dark blue pacifier with a skull and crossbones on the front.  Edge picked it up and looked it over, his chest roiling with discomfort as he contemplated what Stretch was trying to tell him.

Stretch bounced his leg impatiently, waiting for any sign that Edge was going to be happy about this.  He couldn’t let himself believe that Edge was disgusted, and yet that was what his face was showing.

“so…?” Stretch prodded.  He leaned forward again, this time pushing down a wave of panic.  Edge’s face hadn’t changed.

“I DON’T KNOW HOW TO FEEL ABOUT THIS,” Edge said, setting the pacifier down.  “ALTHOUGH I’M NOT SURE I APPRECIATE THE GIFT.  I THINK IT WOULD HAVE BEEN BETTER TO TALK ABOUT THIS BEFOREHAND.”

Stretch felt his soul fall to the ground.  He swallowed and looked down at his plate.  He should have just told Edge.  He shouldn’t have tried to make it cute.  Edge was from a world that didn’t appreciate cute.  He should have known better, dammit!  He took a deep breath and told himself not to panic.  Everything was going to be okay, one way or another.  He loved Edge, and he knew Edge loved him back.  They’d figure something out.

Edge watched as Stretch all but fell apart beside him.  He felt bad, but he wasn’t going to lie about his feelings just to appease someone else.  That was asking for trouble in the long run.  He reached out and placed a hand on Stretch’s arm.

“LET’S EAT, AND THEN WE CAN TALK ABOUT THIS, OKAY?”

Stretch nodded.  He knew he wasn’t going to be able to eat much, but he tried.  He felt sick.  He couldn’t help but think of the worst possible scenarios, one after another running through his head and making him nauseous.  Edge could ask him to get rid of it.  Edge could leave him.  Edge could…

“HEY, BREATHE.”

He flinched and looked at Edge, realizing that he was breathing erratically.  Edge stood up and took Stretch’s hands, guiding him up and leading him to the couch.  They sat side by side, and Edge didn’t let go of his hands.

“THIS OBVIOUSLY MEANS MORE TO YOU THAN I REALIZED.  I DON’T WANT TO HURT YOU, STRETCH, BUT I’M NOT SURE I’M COMFORTABLE WITH THIS.  CAN YOU TELL ME WHY YOU WANT…THAT?”

Stretch tried to calm down.  He wasn’t sure how.  How was he going to explain to Edge that he wanted to keep the baby?  If Edge wasn’t comfortable being a parent, they were going to have to either compromise or split up, and Stretch wasn’t okay with either of those options.

“i never thought about it before, but this morning…it was there, and i…i don’t know, edge.”  He shook his head and leaned into Edge’s side.

Edge was thoroughly confused.  “WHAT ABOUT THIS MORNING MADE YOU WANT TO CALL ME DADDY?”

Something clicked in Stretch’s mind.  He realized at that moment that they were having two very different conversations.  He suddenly understood why Edge would be uncomfortable.  He couldn’t help it.  He pulled back and burst into laughter.  Relief tore through him at the same time as the absurdity of the situation.  Edge thought the gift was him proposing a new kink!

Edge watched with hesitation as Stretch lost his shit next to him.  It took several minutes for him to calm down enough to say coherent words.

“oh…oh my stars…hahaha!” he took a few breaths and leaned in to kiss Edge.  “i love you, even if you are an idiot sometimes.”

Edge bristled.  “LISTEN, FUCKFACE, I’M NOT THE ONE—”

Stretch waved him off, shaking his head.  “no, no…see, i don’t want to call you daddy.  not like that.  but, you are a daddy.”

“WHAT ARE YOU EVEN TALKING ABOUT?”

Stretch leaned back, lifting his shirt and pulling the front of his pants down just far enough to expose the tiny womb nestled above his pelvis.  “i’m pregnant, asshat.”

Edge sat still for several long moments, staring at the evidence of their offspring.  Before Stretch had any time to get worried again, Edge’s face broke out into a wide smile.  He pulled Stretch onto his lap and kissed him hard, one hand going down to very gently touch the womb.

“I’M A FATHER?”

“yep.”  Together, they watched Edge’s fingers trace the outside of the baby bump.  He leaned into Edge’s shoulder.  “are you okay with this?”

Edge nodded reverently.  “IT’S NOT SOMETHING I THOUGHT WOULD EVER HAPPEN FOR ME.  WHERE I’M FROM…CHILDREN ARE ONLY ALLOWED FOR CERTAIN COUPLES CHOSEN AND PROTECTED BY THE KING.  AS CAPTAIN OF THE ROYAL GUARD, I WOULD NEVER HAVE BEEN ALLOWED…”  He trailed off, turning his attention back to the baby.  “SOMETIMES I HAVE TO REMIND MYSELF THAT I’M NOT THERE ANYMORE.  I’M HERE WITH YOU, AND I’M ALLOWED TO HAVE THINGS LIKE THIS.”

Stretch nuzzled Edge’s jaw.  “i really love you.”

Edge turned his head to kiss Stretch deeply, pouring every ounce of love and devotion he felt into it.

[hallythelantern-blog]

Chapter 1: Kitty, Alone

Prompt: You're injured. Please stay the night. Please.

Fanfiction AO3 Wattpad

Chapter 1: Kitty, Alone

Adrien was excited – and if he was being honest, nervous – for tonight's dinner.

On this day before his mother's disappearance, they had celebrated his father's birthday by going out to a fancy restaurant. They would always reserve a VIP room for three where they would talk about anything behind closed doors. He remembered his mother laughing, nodding her head back, and keeping the conversation going while his father would chime in with a couple of puns here and there. Adrien and Emilie always laughed at the puns, even if they were completely over-the-top. Gabriel always gave a little smirk. Then his mother would turn back the conversation to Adrien's fencing and Chinese lessons. Then, when conversation moved onto philosophy, Adrien would just sit back and watch as the dynamic flipped. Gabriel would take the lead, having full blown speeches about how a proper person should live, while Emilie danced around the topic. She didn't seem to, in Adrien's eyes, completely take in what Gabriel had to say on the matter as her own, but also saw no reason to change his view. Adrien would question whether all proper men had to own a suit, but he would let his father talk, because it was not usually a common sight that he was talking so much. By the time he was done, the workers had to remind them that the restaurant was closing in ten minutes.

He missed those days. After his mother had disappeared, a lot had changed. She had been the glue, and without the glue, the whole family drifted apart. He didn't know what his relationship with his father was anymore; his father was distant with him, as he had always been, but now it was as if he was actively trying to tell Adrien that his presence did not matter to him. Gabriel was now eating more in his office everyday – the one of two places that Adrien was not allowed in – and he had become even more involved in his son's career. Before, Adrien had done just a few small modeling gigs for his father once a week or so. Now, his face was plastered on every wall of Paris. As Adrien got bigger and bigger professionally, thanks to the help of his father, the more it seemed as if Gabriel only cared about what Adrien could produce instead of what he was.

Not wanting to lose his father as well, Adrien tried his best to please Gabriel, but now more than ever it seemed that Gabriel was never going to be satisfied.

So today was very important – for him and his father. It was the chance to set things right between them, or at least make things better. He hoped that his gift would make his father happy – he had agonized over it for months and dreaded the possibility that he couldn't get anything special for him, until Plagg had found something a week ago that was sure to make his father smile. He was hopeful that things would go right, but there was also an inner tugging in his gut that said this wasn't going to be the case.

He hoped the former was right.

It was now six o'clock. Adrien ran happily from his bed to the door, expecting the car to be just outside. He grabbed the doorknob when –

"You are not going out with your father for dinner tonight, Adrien," Nathalie said from behind.

Adrien felt like the world had collapsed upon him.

"You will be eating with him inside."

The color came back to Adrien's face, and the monochromatic colors of his house never looked warmer.

"Thank you, Nathalie!" Adrien smiled his biggest smile ever. Even if they couldn't go to the restaurant, Adrien would make the most of it. He gripped his present that was just big enough for his hand to hold onto.

Adrien still had his smile as he now sat with his father at the family dinner table. The smile was getting harder and harder to maintain; he tried his best to ignore the coldness he felt from the spoon, the hot soup, and the tablecloth, but it wasn't working. Every corner of his body was shaking.

No. He internally shook himself, gripped his present once again, and focused on the soup. Think positive thoughts. Warm. Warm. Just like the year before.

After they had finished the soup in silence, Adrien began touching the present so much that his fingerprint must have been everywhere on the box.

"My son, what are you doing with your hands?" Gabriel asked.

"Um.." Adrien hesitated, moving the present from his side to his lap, his hands shaking all the way. "Here!"

Gabriel saw his son's face replaced by a red gift-wrapped box with green ribbons. Bewildered, he took it without realizing what he had just done.

"What is this?" He coldly asked. Adrien flinched.

"It's.. it's a present, father."

"For who?"

"For... you."

Gabriel's eyes widened and then narrowed. "But you have never gotten me anything for my birthday."

"Well," Adrien chuckled nervously as he looked back and forth at the sides and Gabriel, "It's about time I change that."

Gabriel gave a look of suspicion as he began to open the gift wrap. This is it, Adrien thought. This is it.

Gabriel opened the box to see a ring. At first glance, it looked like a regular gold ring. There were no decorations, nothing. But when he looked closer, words that he never thought he would have to look at or hear again were carved on the ring.

Gabriel frowned.

"What is the meaning of this?"

Adrien looked towards the door in fright, although he forced himself to focus on his father. "It's.. it's your engagement ring. I found it in the closet a while back –"

"You found it?" Gabriel's voice rose.

"Y.. Yes. I found it." Adrien's voice got softer. Technically, Plagg had just randomly appeared with the object of their current interest a week ago, but he couldn't say that! Adrien had asked where he had gotten it from, but Plagg had only said, "inside some box in a dark room." Plagg had probably been drunk on Camembert to know where he had gone.

"So you must know that this ring was in the room that I specifically forbade you from entering? And knowing that, you decided to give this to me as a present?"

Adrien widened his eyes. "Wha.. what?"

"No.. no! Father, I had no idea that this was the room I shouldn't have entered. I guess I just lost my way."

"Lost your way in your own home?"

"No! Not like that. Well, I guess. You know how I always stay in my room?" he laughed nervously, his voice losing volume with every word. "Because I always stay in my room, I never remember where everything else is." He laughed again nervously.

Gabriel's stare suffocated Adrien. "You have disobeyed my orders, Adrien." Gabriel said. "On top of that, you have lied to me and brought upon reminders of terrible memories in this family."

"Don't say that mom was terrible! She was always the complete opposite of that!" Adrien jumped from his seat.

"Watch yourself, mister," Gabriel said coldly. Feeling ashamed, Adrien slowly fell into his chair.

"This behavior is unacceptable, Adrien," Gabriel continued. "As punishment, you will not be allowed to hang out with your friends for a month. This means that you will not be allowed outside beyond scheduling."

Adrien looked at his father, incredulous. His father was now blurry. The table was blurry. Everything was blurry. He stood up from his chair. He needed to get out. Where was the door?

Adrien finally found the door and turned the doorknob. "I just wanted you to be happy."

He shut the door behind him.

Gabriel sighed and sunk his head in his palms. "Emilie," he said. "What do I do?"

Adrien closed the door and slid into fetal position.

Plagg's ears were drooped. "It's okay, Adrien." His voice was unsure at the word. "Your father probably did like the thought that went into the gift. And besides, being grounded for a month isn't that bad. You'll get to see your friends at school and you have TV, gaming center, and a place for rock climbing in your room. You won't be bored at all for the month!"

Adrien smiled a little. "Thanks, Plagg." But the smile immediately dropped.

Plagg patted Adrien's head.

They stood like that for twenty minutes.

Adrien still tasted soup in his mouth. Even with Plagg's words of encouragement, Adrien didn't feel any better. And the room wasn't helping. It wasn't his. He needed to get out. Now.

"Plagg, claws out!"

He set his phone on the piano and leapt out to the red beams of the setting sun.

Chat Noir ran. The wind was in his face, buildings were but a blur. He even did the Naruto run.

"Wahoo!" He loved it. He jumped with joy everywhere he went.

As people saw him pass by, they took pictures of him and called out "Chat Noir!" from a distance. He loved it.

But as he kept running, everything became background noise, mundane. Even the wind blowing in his face wasn't exciting any more.

Chat Noir stopped in his tracks and looked around. No one was around him. No one called out his name. Nothing cheered him on; everything but him looked the same in an ever-expanding space consisting only of black rectangular blobs. He was… alone. A stray kitty.

He shook his head. Focus, Adrien, he said to himself. You're out here to feel better. Not worse.

"Creak," a sound came from not far away.

Chat Noir's heightened senses immediately picked up where the sound had come from. Two o'clock. A blue haired girl in pigtails was dressed in her pajamas. She had a sketchbook in one hand and a pencil on the other. She was looking somewhere far away, or perhaps she wasn't looking anywhere in particular. Chat Noir smiled. There.

"Bonjour," Chat Noir said.

Marinette widened her eyes. "Chat Noir?" she said. "What are you doing here? Is there an akuma attack that I should know about?" She clenched her fists and got into fighting stance. It looked like someone's he knew. Whose was it?

He chuckled. "No. I'm not here for any superhero things today."

Marinette loosened her stance and smiled. Within a few seconds, she had gone from badass to the epitome of softness. It melted him for some reason. No, Adrien. Chat Noir thought to himself. You're in love with Ladybug. Not Marinette; Ladybug. "Is there something wrong? Are you having trouble with love? If you want, I can certainly listen. You have helped me a lot before, and it would be rude of me to refuse the request of a hero."

"Oh not really. I mean, I guess, but.. no."

"Huh?"

"I just need some company."

"Okay."

They stood in silence for a minute, side by side, both looking at nowhere. Not touching, not looking at each other. Just.. coexisting.

He felt better.

"May I ask what is bothering you? You don't seem like yourself." Marinette asked. Chat Noir raised his brow. "N..not that I, like, know you know you," Marinette looked to the sides, her voice getting suspiciously high, "and how could I? You're a superhero, and I.." She stopped and sighed. She looked him straight in the eyes.

"You don't seem like how you were when I met you the first time. What's the matter?"

"Um.. it's.." he couldn't believe he was trying to say this. Sure, Marinette was a great, caring, and kind friend who would never judge a person for their struggles or use it against them, but this was something very dear to his heart. "It's my father," he sighed. He was surprised at what he said.

"What about him?"

"It.. it was his birthday today, and I gave him something that reminded him of someone important he had lost. I meant to give him strength, but I think that he took it the wrong way and thought that I did this on purpose to make him feel terrible."

Marinette gasped. "Oh no."

Chat Noir sighed. "Yeah.. I mean, I guess it's okay." He attempted for a smile, but the smile stopped before it could get to the eyes.

Marinette's heart dropped. Chat Noir's smile was the smile of a person who had had so many disappointments in life, the smile of a person who was trying to make the most of their life yet was always set back. Who always got the short end of the stick.

"No, it's not okay!" Marinette fumed. Chat Noir's eyes widened. "Even if you did remind him of a lost one, he should have known that you didn't mean to harm him!"

"It's, it's okay, Marinette." Why was she mad?

The wind ran through the two. Chat Noir shivered, and his teeth chattered.

"Oh no, you're cold." Marinette went over to where the door leading to her bedroom was. As she opened it, she said, "Chat Noir, would you like to come inside? If your house is too far away, you can stay for the night. We can eat cookies, macarons, croissants, or whatever you want."

Chat Noir smiled with delight at the thought. Croissants! But the sky was pitch black now. Nathalie or his bodyguard may find that he was missing.

"Thanks, princess, but I'll have to delay the offer to a later time. I need to get back home."

"Okay, kitty." Marinette looked disappointed, even though she was smiling.

Chat Noir smiled and span off into the night.

"Chat Noir!" Marinette yelled. "You're always welcome here!" she said, as she waved goodbye.

Chat Noir smiled. Thanks, princess.

I usually update fanfiction.net first.

All feedback is appreciated! 

[darkfromday]

Arc V Anniversary, Day 17

Day 17 Prompt: family

In a world where Leo’s plot destroyed all of the counterparts but Ray, the oldest Akaba child re-evaluates what family means.

It’s much longer than I expected so of course it’s under a cut.

What a beautiful city, Ray thought.

Maiami was a jewel to her: rare, coveted, all the more beautiful because no city like it had ever existed before. The people were charming, the landscape was enchanting, and the duels were electrifying. There were so many good things to eat and exciting places to explore. Even watching the sun creep slowly down out of the sky this late afternoon buoyed her spirits. She had yet to find anything that dampened her mood.

“—There you are, Ray.”

…Almost nothing.

Despite her flash of irritation, Ray lifted her head from her hands, looking up to see her father’s smiling face. Akaba Leo rarely went anywhere without sporting some kind of coat or cape, but the unusually-warm springtime meant he now joined her wearing only his single-layered white shirt and pale slacks. Since the war’s end he had seemed lighter. Perhaps because he out of everyone else had gotten exactly what he wanted.

“Were you looking for me?” she asked, putting enough inflection in her words so the why were you went unsaid but not unnoticed.

“Of course. Nakajima informed me of your departure two hours ago. I thought perhaps you skipped dinner because you weren’t hungry, and yet…”

He gestured to her lap and the picnic supplies lying there: basket, blanket, drinks. All just as perfectly prepared as the sibling who’d made it for her.

Ray shrugged. “I already have other plans with Reiji and Reira.”

“Ah…”

She hummed, offering nothing else, lost in silent worry. Her phone hadn’t buzzed yet. Reiji was going to text when he and Reira were on their way from the office.

Ray’s siblings were another thing she adored about the new world, and about Standard in particular. Though both of them were understandably reserved around her, she loved everything about them. Reiji’s quiet demeanor and rigid determination, his devotion, his intense interest in mastering every interaction he had, whether professional or personal. Reira’s trusting smile, impeccable manners and blossoming temper, a sure sign of a fiercer personality than their last. Ray connected to each of them through duels, drawing out their conversation and their comfort by beating them soundly at Fusion, Synchro and Xyz.

This evening’s picnic was another chance for Ray to spend time with them, drag Reiji away from his responsibilities at LDS and Reira away from their playdate… she just hadn’t expected to be followed out here.

When Leo finally sat next to her on the hill he asked, “Have you been avoiding me?”

He sounded hurt. And of course he would be—the one person he’d pushed an entire set of worlds away for, and she couldn’t stand to be around him for more than thirty seconds.

On top of that, he had raised her to be unflinchingly honest, and she was her father’s daughter.

“Yes, I have.”

He grimaced. “If you’re having problems adjusting—”

Ray lifted her hand, cut him off. “Nothing’s wrong with the world I made or my experiences in it. Maiami is charming; Heartland is comforting; Synchro’s City is electrifying. Even the town around Academia’s island is interesting enough. I’ve enjoyed exploring them all, but now I want to get to know my family.”

“But not all of your family.”

Ray’s eyes darkened; a familiar burst of anger licked at her insides, and she crushed the top of the picnic basket in one fisted hand.

“No, not all,” she agreed coldly. “It’s safer for me to remember you as you were before, in our world, because now you are a disappointment.”

“A disappointment!” Leo reared back, but rebounded quickly; the Akaba temper had flared in him too. “Ray, I am your father.”

“In name only! Your deeds since I split Zarc don’t match the father I knew. How can you look people in the eye knowing you sealed them away, or sealed their friends, or their families? How could you betray the people who cared for you?”

“Easily,” Leo snapped, “and I would do so again. For in case you’ve forgotten, I started the ARC-Area Project to save your life.”

Silence reigned a few moments after those words. The two of them glared at each other, raising the temperature around them, but Ray could not be cowed—in the end, it was her father who looked away first.

“My life was already forfeit,” she whispered. “I took the En Cards and went to destroy Zarc of my own free will. It was my choice. I knew I would rather give my own life than live in a world without the father I loved—but you… were so selfish that you made my nightmare a reality.”

The once-mighty Professor flinched as though struck; when she focused her glare, he had tears in his eyes. “How can you say that when I’m still here?”

“Because I don’t know this Akaba Leo,” Ray said bitterly. “This Professor in my father’s skin. The person who trained children to hunt other children, invaded the other worlds I made and separated to subjugate, the man who abandoned his own wife and son to bring back a daughter who no longer existed—snuffing out nine lives in the process… no, he’s not familiar to me.”

Leo shook his head, looking out at the sunset—even now, not daring to look at her. “I would wipe out more if it had meant your safe return, Ray—more. Akabas know how to sacrifice; it is in our blood, and it is how I knew that Himika and Reiji would carry on without me. It’s how I knew too that your sacrifice was too great, and one I would not allow you to pay.”

“I’m an adult. You don’t get to decide anymore what prices I pay, what decisions I make. Instead, you need to focus on what you can change, what sacrifices you aren’t willing to make.”

“…Explain.”

“Father…” She massaged her temple, wearing down her frustration enough to go on. “You aren’t a stupid man. You must have noticed how hurt Himika-san and Reiji were by your leaving them—worse because of what you left them for. Why do you think no one speaks at dinner, even after two years? Why do you think Himika-san sends you messages every time you’re gone on business for more than a day—or Reiji and Reira speak as little to you as they can manage?”

He looked like he would argue at first, but a moment later he bowed his head, acknowledging the validity of her words.

“Then you must know too that I’m lucky they don’t hate me for becoming your sole priority… before and after the war.”

“Ray, what happened in Union was not your fault,” Leo said softly.

“No, it was,” she insisted, fiercely stubborn. “What came after was all my doing. I shouldn’t have trusted you to move on—I should have wiped your memories completely, so you could have been a real father to Reiji and Reira these past five years, a real husband who wouldn’t make Himika-san cry, a man who would have looked at the broken pieces of me and Zarc and felt nothing.”

A few of her tears hit the basket. Her father was not the only one crying helplessly now. Sadly, this was what their relationship amounted to now for Ray—finger-pointing, bitterness, regrets. The moment her sacrifice had been invalidated, her confusion and horror had morphed into these feelings, and showed no signs of further evolution.

Leo broke their second shared silence.

“Daughter, you know I am a selfish man. No world has yet been made in which I would give up on you. But… whatever my previous words may have indicated, that does not mean I hold no regrets over the way I left things with my wife… or my son… or the child that also came to share my name. But between the two camps, I have had years with them, and lost years with you. Can you blame me for choosing to not waste any more time with you?”

“Yes, I can!” Ray cried; he was missing the point again. “Because they’re your family too. Everything doesn’t have to be a choice between two sides! I won’t allow Reiji and Reira to lose in your heart because of me, even if you will.”

“So then, you expect me to leave you here now, and ignore your presence hereafter?”

“I expect you to go home to your wife,” Ray growled. “Truly apologize to her for what you put her through. I expect you to challenge Reira to a friendly duel to get them out of their shell around you. I expect you to take the reins back at LDS so Reiji can enjoy what’s left of his childhood, and spend some time with him outside of the office! Those are just a few things you could do to convince me that my real father is somewhere in you.

“But for now—yes, I do expect you to leave me alone here to wait for my evening picnic with the other members of my family.”

Leo looked at Ray for another long, long moment, but before he could voice his thoughts once more, a honk jolted them out of their heated conversation: a sleek limo had just pulled up to the bottom of the hill.

The door opened and Akaba Reiji emerged one leg at a time—slim, polished, and much too careful for a young man his age. Much too somber too, Ray thought, feeling fondness and sympathy war within her before she noticed he was holding someone in his arms.

Then she beamed—it was Reira, waving delightedly up at her, looking so excited for the picnic they’d planned together.

“Ray! We’re here!”

“Up here!” she called; already her voice and heart felt lighter. Though she’d long since accepted her own original sacrifice, being alive again to meet her siblings and grow with them was nothing to scoff at, no matter how much she disapproved of her father’s methods.

In moments Reiji was up the hill and kneeling at her side to put Reira down. He bowed his head, the spitting image of the father he hadn’t yet noticed. “Apologies for the lack of notice. My phone died en route.”

“That’s all right. We were just…” Arguing. “…talking.”

That got Reiji to notice his father, and offer him a perfunctory greeting while Reira hid in Ray’s shirt. Likewise, Leo’s “hello” was stilted and hesitant, but at least seemed more authentic than the distant effort he gave at home.

Reiji cut straight to the chase after that: “Are you going to be joining us?”

“I… will not,” Leo replied, stunning Ray. “Another appointment calls.”

When she followed his pale gaze, she saw that the limo driver had rolled down their window down to be seen. Akaba Himika gazed back at her husband, unflinching, unyielding, drastically different from the mother of Ray’s birth yet a fitting match for the man who oscillated between Professor, provider and parent.

Despite their open disagreement not a few moments before, Leo took a minute to kiss Ray’s brow, wishing her and the rest of his children farewell before starting down the hill and sliding smoothly into the passenger’s side of the limo. Ray exhaled—she was not foolish enough to think their discussion was over, but her father’s willingness to mend at least one fence made her feel less like she’d been sparring—and living—with a stranger.

“Are you all right, Ray?” Reiji inquired. He sat right at her free side, a comfortable distance away, and ruffled Reira’s hair.

“I’ll be fine…” She smiled at him; she’d long since learned it was an expression he seldom had directed his way, and sought to fix that. “Thank you, Reiji.”

Reira emerged from her shirt and tugged at the nearest sleeve, gesturing to where the picnic basket handle nearby was still slightly smushed. “Ray, you didn’t eat without us, did you?”

“Of course not!”

Reiji smirked. Reira looked thrilled as they popped the basket open and dug in. As sandwiches disappeared into their mouth, they hardly noticed Ray and Reiji start to talk about their days, about the state of the duel circuit this year, and about the best places to go for some peace and quiet in the city that weren’t traceable by parents or bodyguards.

Ray preferred things this way, though. With her siblings around to share their city with her, with her family close by to help her sort out her chaotic feelings about the war and its fallout, Maiami was even more of a precious place than it would have been alone. Union was gone, and so many other good people from there and here were gone with it—but with some time, perhaps that would hurt less.

Maybe someday soon, she thought, I can eat a cookie with the same enthusiasm as Reira, or run a board meeting with Reiji. Try on suits with Himika-san and… have a civil conversation with my father. Maybe I can visit the places the war touched without crying. Visit the people who lost loved ones and offer them closure.

Yes. Maybe someday, when all can be forgiven, when we can sit down and eat together, we could be the type of family I was trying to save.