#one day I’ll be able to like have them at the proper speed

[stuckasmain]

Pio Gentile

[withdenim]

I think it’s time I introduce my doomed ancient yuri to the ninjago fandom. I’ll leave the story under the cut if anyone wants to read it 💜 it includes my Wojira backstory and why I draw Nyad as oni

Wojira is the younger, less powerful sister of firstbourne, I think. Wojira and Firstbourne we’re both chill with Oni, but Firstbourne was more Reserved about it . Like, she didn’t enforce weird rules or anything but she also . Didn’t stop her kids from being really awful.

Wojira spent more time with Oni than other Dragons. Even her kids (wind and water Dragons) were sort of weird about it. She didn’t really like the sort of power hoarding attitude of the other Dragons and decided to teach them a lesson about it.

When the first master was born she realized that Oni blood COULD bear elemental magic, and she took in two Oni kids (Nyad and her brother who I made up and haven’t named yet lmao) and gave them wind and water (separately) magic. And the other Dragons were VERY mad about this. They thought it was disgraceful.

They tried to get Firstbourne to banish her . Firstbourne refused and so her kids just all worked together to banish her instead. And sort of gave her a fucked up cursed eternal headache (in the amulets) Whoops . Nyad and her brother followed Wojira into the realm of Ninjago and tried to ease her pain for years but eventually it just sort of broke her mind and she started laying absolute waste to everything.

The FSM goes through his whole story (still figuring out details of it in my headcanons) and comes to Ninjago, desperate for a new home. And Nyad and her brother (I really need to name them DIFNDKFM) are scared of him at first. But he shows them his elemental magic and they realize he’s like them (Oni with elemental magic). And they bond over that and tell him about Wojira. The first master decides to help Nyad convince the Merlopians and Islanders to resist Wojira and hopefully bring peace to the realm.

Over several months they become good friends, and they often calm Nyad’s brother by making beautiful little worlds out of their elemental magic for him. And the FSM promises that one day Ninjago will be safe like these worlds, and they’ll all be able to live there.

And these very very lonely people have made a little family.

Of course, the Oni hunters are sent to track down the FSM, and Mystaké is the first to find them. She announces herself and demands the first master return with her. He begs to stay just long enough to make this world safe for the people there, and she reluctantly agrees when they show her the safe world they’re planning to build. It looks beautiful.

Mystaké joins their efforts, hoping to speed along the process of the first master’s return to the first realm, but she finds herself amazed by their magic and (worse) deeply fond of the little trio. She falls in love with Nyad, and starts letting herself indulge in their hopeful fantasies of a safe world where no one will find them. In this time, Nyad gives the FSM a name of his own to use when they have their safer world. Hajime.

When the preparations are as ready as they’ll ever be, the Battle of Nine Days begins. On the eighth day, Nyad’s little brother (who wasn’t even fighting) is struck near-fatally, and Nyad launches a risky attack to try and end the battle once and for all. It’s unsuccessful, but she realizes Wojira’s weak spot. Like in canon, she merges with the sea, desperate to give the others a chance at the world they’d all hoped for, and hoping that her brother could be saved if the battle ended and he could get proper help.

She knows she should kill Wojira, but she can’t bring herself to. And instead of killing her she decides to take the amulets, and send Wojira into a deep, painless sleep, hopefully eternal.

Hajime is devastated by Nyad’s death, and though Mystaké grieves her as well, she’s a lot more accustomed to death, and watches her go, surprised by the ache in her heart.

The brother lives, but passes on his element very soon after the events of the battle, sick of it’s consequence. Hajime builds the new world and appoints new masters, though he doesn’t know where the water and wind elements went (not his domain). Mystaké never even brings up the idea of taking Hajime back to the first realm again, and protects him from other hunters when she can. Hajime lives a long long time before choosing to pass on and find peace for himself. Mystake lives another thousand years, farming strange enchanted teas, occasionally a companion to Wu and Garmadon.

In Hunted, she confides in Lloyd that if or when she dies, she would like to be sunk into the sea where the battle took place (not that she tells him the story. Just the location), and Lloyd thinks it’s just some weird senile old lady talk. But when she does die at the hands of his father and the Sons of Garmadon in Hunted, Lloyd doesn’t get a chance to row her out until after March of the Oni.

She liked Lloyd. He was a lot like Hajime.

[hlvraiyaoi]

HEY!!!

Do you like Warrior Cats. Do you want to ROLEPLAY Warrior Cats.

Well, I’m making a wc rp discord server…. WITH CUSTOM CLANS!!!

This Roleplay is called The City Territories! It takes place in, you guessed it, the city. It’s not any specific city it’s just A City. Clan info below!

SoftClan

SoftClan is often made fun of and ridiculed by the other clans for their nice and easy life, and lack of “proper” warrior lifestyle. SoftClan is on the father outskirts of the city, sticking closer to the small towns bordering the main city area. SoftClan receives its insults from the fact that they live in the front and backyard of a Twoleg home. The two Twolegs living there, Jerome (He/Him) and Sue (She/Her) run an open cat sanctuary and leave out food bowls and cat toys for the cats to busy themselves with. They live a comfortable and safe life, which is why most other clans consider them weak.

CarrionClan

CarrionClan is the polar opposite of SoftClan. CarrionClan territory borders SoftClan, their camp in the more remote parts of the city. CarrionClan has their name because their territory is mostly within a large junkyard, where food like rats and snakes are plentiful. Despite the harsh conditions, CarrionClan cats have adapted well, and they are one of the only clans least susceptible to diseases that rats and mice can carry. They are also more resilient to venomous snake bites, but still fall ill.

TunnelClan

TunnelClan lives a bit farther into the city; only, underground. TunnelClan cats have made the subway system their home, and cats must learn the ways of their dangerous territory young. TunnelClan cats live their lives in constant peril, all because of the trains that speed through several times a day. TunnelClan’s camp is in a safe area dug out many generations ago by the first TunnelClan cats; A large tunnel system underneath the train tracks that leads down to the larger area, their camp. TunnelClan also has its own special system; Rather than catching prey, an apprentice’s final assessment is a task to outrun a train and make it to safety. All apprentices ready are put up in this race against one another, and only the ones who come out alive are made warriors.

ParkClan

ParkClan cats are the closest into the city. As the name suggests, ParkClan cats live in a wide open space near the middle of the city that serves as a dog park. Because of the threat of canines pulling them in half, ParkClan cats have trained themselves to be strong and furious, and scare off these dogs themselves. They pride themselves on the fact that they don’t hide away in underground systems, unlike TunnelClan. ParkClan cats tend to be bigger and have longer claws.

Sky Scratchers

This is the City Territory equivalent of StarClan, in reference to the huge sky scrapers looming over the clans. It’s tradition for all clans to bring recently deceased cats to the highest point in their territory, and leave them there for the night so that their spirit will be able to climb up into the sky and join their ancestors.

Subway Wanderers

This is the City Territory equivalent of The Dark Forest. Cats who have caused great pain for others and do not deserve to join the Sky Scratchers are left to the lowest parts of the subway system. Deceased cats that have caused great harm will have their bodies taken into the darkest parts of the subway, and left on the tracks for all trace of them to be wiped away by the spinning wheels of the trains passing through. Because of its placing, TunnelClan is often assumed to have a close connection to the Subway Wanderers, and it’s become a way for other clans to insult them.

That’s all I have right now, and the Discord Server is not finished yet; But until then, I’ll keep giving more information to keep you interested!!!

[ajaywithcrowfeathers]

There are many benefits to being a marine herpetologist

This is my gift to @justanerdwithatablet as part of the DCA Secret Santa 2022! I was mostly inspired by a mix of: enemies to friends (speed-run edition), Unhinged Sun™, and hurt/comfort. Also, Song of a Siren Mer!AU by SolarRush (which I absolutely loved reading) herpetology/sea snakes, and the tumblr post by theaimfiles he reblogged which said “sharp canines and glowing eyes are top tier character design” (which is absolutely true)

Sorry about any errors, I tried to catch as many as I could but there still might be a couple hiding somewhere that I missed.

Here are the pronouns used: Sun: It/It’s in the beginning then they/them Moon: They/Them and He/Him Reader: He/Him  (I tried to use pronouns to show how connected to Sun and Moon the reader feels/how he feels like Sun is less like an animal later in the fic, I’m not sure if that shows through, but that’s what I intended)

If dialogue is in italics “like this” it means Sun or Moon are communicating telepathically.

I will also post this on AO3, if you would prefer to read it there

Without further ado, here is the fic, hope you enjoy!

Alright, just one more look around, then I’ll head back.” You tell yourself as you wade through the shallow ocean water. It’s been a long day of exploring these tide pools and cave systems, looking for the aquatic snakes you’re researching. Unfortunately you haven’t been able to find any today. 

Suddenly, a glimmer of orange scales catches your attention. You turn and look into the cave entrance where you think you saw the end of a tail. The color was odd though, as far as you know none of the snakes or other aquatic reptiles in this area have such bright orange scales. The possibility of discovering a new species or color morph replaces your exhaustion from a hard day of exploring with determination. You crouch down, peering into the cave entrance. It’s one of the largest you’ve seen in this area, definitely big enough for you to fit into even with the proper diving and safety equipment. 

At first you think your haste may have scared away the animal, but as you look deeper in the cave you see something glowing faintly. Something is looking back. Eyes, human eyes. Or mostly human, except for the lack of pupil and iris, and the lightly glowing milky sclera. The eyes are part of a similarly mostly-human face. The general shape looks human, but instead of skin it’s covered in small scales, yellow on the right and off-white on the left in the rough shape of a crescent moon. The nose looks very flat, mostly a small raised bump with two nostrils that seem to have flaps covering them while the creature is underwater. 

You know you shouldn’t project human emotions onto non-human things, but this creature looks a lot more human than most, and it definitely looks scared. 

The tense moment of eye contact swiftly breaks as the creature turns and dives smoothly into the cave. At least you get to see more of it as it flees. It definitely has a tail, and a massive one at that. It reminds you of a Naga, a mythical half-man half-snake creature you read about several years ago. Its tail is yellow-orange with splotches of red, but most concerning you notice several fresh wounds. 

You stand frozen in shock for a few moments, you’re still struggling to process the last few seconds and figure out if you slept in today and are currently dreaming. Only one thing is clear in your mind: whatever that creature was, it was clearly injured. 

Determined not to allow this strange being to suffer, you rush back to your base to gather the supplies you will need. 

After gathering your med kit and the salmon you were planning on eating for dinner you made your way back to the cave entrance. 

You gaze down into the cave and hold the salmon out in the water. You're hoping the smell of easy prey will lure the creature back out, and it accepts the salmon as a peace offering instead of deciding to eat you instead. 

You search the dark waters for those mysterious glowing eyes, or a glimmer of warm scales. Unfortunately, the sun has started to set, making it even more difficult to see into the cave. 

Thankfully, the darkness makes the glowing eyes even more apparent when the creature finally emerges a few minutes later. 

You hold the salmon out as far away as you can, and try to keep your fingers tucked away. You’re only just realizing how potentially stupid this is. Then again, you never were one to think much about your own safety when others were in danger. 

All you can see from the depths of the cave is the movement of the creature's eyes, which seem to be completely ignoring the fish. That's not a good sign. 

If only you had brought your head light, you may have had more warning. You may have been able to see the great tail coiling into position, the slim but strong arms grabbing an outcropping of rock for leverage. You may have seen the triangular fins around the creature's face flare as it bares its sharp fangs. 

Your weak human ears can not hear the warning hiss over the gentle ocean waves. 

If only you had brought your head light. 

In the split second it takes you to blink, the creature lunges from the depths of the caves. Your heart pounds in your chest and you sputter on salt water as you are instantly pinned by the hissing beast, its razor sharp fangs only inches from your vulnerable throat. 

You stare into its pearlescent eyes, trying to determine your fate. As you process the shock of nearly being killed you are fully aware that if the creature wanted you dead you would not still be breathing. You try to calm yourself, and look as non-threatening as possible. 

Slowly the hissing quiets, until it fades back into the sounds of the waves. Its jaw closes, but its teeth remain bared. The warning is quite clear: I won’t hurt you if you won’t hurt me. 

You start to speak, but your voice cracks both from lingering fear and dryness from the salt water you accidentally swallowed. 

“I-I don’t want to hurt you, I just want to help.” You try to keep your voice level and calm. You slowly bring your hand holding the salmon forward, taking care not to make any sudden movements. 

“This is for you, I wasn’t sure if you could hunt with those slashes on your tail.” You know the creature probably can’t understand your words, but you’ve been working with animals for long enough to know most can at least understand tone. 

Softly glowing eyes stare deeply into your own, they seem to see right to the core of you. Without breaking eye contact they grab the fish. Soft scaled fingers brush against your own, you can feel razor sharp claws carefully kept out of the way. 

The moment breaks, and the creature's eyes snap down to the piece of fish as they snatch it away from you. They inspect the filet closely, looking at all sides and flicking their long forked tongue out to sniff at it. Finally, they seem to deem it safe and take a small bite. The fins on their head ripple and they make a sort of trilling sound, then they unhinge their jaw and swallow it whole. 

With that distraction out of the way they focus on the med kit in your other hand. They tilt their head to the side, trying to figure out what the strange box is. 

“It’s a med kit, I saw the wounds on your tail earlier and I think I can use the supplies in it to help you heal.” You use the same calm tone as before and gesture slowly to their wounds. They look at their tail, then back to the med kit, then up at you. They then look back between you and the med kit several times, as if waiting for you to do something. 

A bit confused, you open up the kit, and allow them to look inside. They glide closer and inspect the contents of the kit, careful to not get any water inside. You can see their tongue up close as they sniff at the various supplies. It looks exactly like a sea snake tongue, except much, much larger than any you have seen. Of course, you’re never seen one attached to a human sized snake before either, so it was probably proportional. 

They seemed satisfied after a few moments of sniffing and examining, and closed the kit. They then took it from you and carefully held the handle between their jaws. 

“Wait! I don’t think you know how to use - ah!” Suddenly the creature reached out and grabbed you as well, thankfully not with their jaws this time. 

“What are you - ?!” Before you can finish the creature hugs you against their chest and dives into the water. 

Fortunately, they resurface quickly and you gasp in air instinctively. You struggle to free yourself, but the creature's hold is much too strong. You try to kick back behind you, but their tail easily dodges out of the way. 

The creature lowers back towards the surface and you quickly fill your lungs, hoping you’ll have enough oxygen to last until they resurface. They dive down, the only thing you can see is the cave entrance growing closer before you must close your eyes against the burning of the salt water. You can feel the smooth scales of the creature's stomach pressing against your back, and it's easy to feel the power within the muscles just below those scales.

After a panic filled minute you finally emerge. You wipe the salt from your eyes and look around, determining the creature took you to an air filled section deeper in the cave system. They gently set you down on a smooth rock ledge then clumsily shimmy out of the water to join you. You're so distracted by your lingering adrenaline and the somewhat ridiculous sight you don't even notice you're not alone. 

Without the ocean waves to disguise the warning hiss, it is easy to hear this time. It is deeper than before, and comes not from the creature in front of you, but from behind. 

You rapidly turn, and see a second creature. This one looks similar to the first, but is all blues and blacks with spots of yellow on their tail instead of oranges and reds. They also lack the triangular head fins of the other creature, and instead seem to have some kind of tattered hat. They are also covered in wounds, and seem extremely weak. 

They attempt to rear up and bear their fangs, but stumble and hiss in pain. The orange one immediately rushes to their side, seeming to try to comfort them. 

“Why did you bring a human here?!” You gasp in surprise as a low, rasping voice fills your mind. 

“Because he can help you, he has supplies, look!” A higher voice this time, it somehow reminds you of woodwind instruments. The orange creature holds out the med kit, the blue one glares and hisses at it. You decide you should probably try to help, you don't want his condition to deteriorate any further. 

“They're right, I just want to help you.” You try to sound as reassuring as possible. 

“He can, understand us?” Asks the blue one, he does not seem happy about this development. 

“I…may have connected with him earlier…” The orange one seems a bit sheepish as they admit this. 

“You… WHAT?” 

“I needed to see if he was trustworthy, and he is! We need his help Moon, you know you won’t last much longer, especially if infection catches...”  They look deep into the others eyes, trying to make him understand. “You're all I have left brother, I can't lose you too.” 

The blue one, presumably Moon, looks away with a hiss. He turns his attention to you. In only a few seconds he has you pinned, his bared fangs barely an inch from your nose. For the second time today inhuman eyes stare deeply into your own. The sclera in his right eye is pearlescent white like his brothers, but his left is pitch black. His pupils are glowing red slits. After what seems like an eternity, he looks away. 

“Fine. But if he betrays us, I'm blaming you.” The orange creature seems to grin at this, or they could be baring their fangs again. It's hard to tell with all the teeth. 

“Good! I suppose introductions are in order then. My name is Sun, and this is my brother Moon.”

I hope you enjoyed reading and have a lovely day, - AJ

[twicearoundthesun]

“Don’t worry, Nayeon-ssi.” The younger girl mumbled over the rusted pot bubbling in front of her. “I’ve got it, I think I know how to help. For real this time.”

Nayeon only shivered. She didn’t bother opening her eyes, she couldn’t waste the energy. She didn’t bother reminding her young companion that she could read her emotions, even in her weak state, and that the uncertainty rolling off of her in heavy waves was not at all a reassurance in her solution.

“My brother taught it to me, years ago, when Mother was sick.” She continued. Nayeon felt a flash of grief. Again, not reassuring.

“Myungsoo taught me everything he learned in training.”

Something Nayeon had noticed in the past three weeks of being with her every second of the day: when she was nervous, she filled every second of silence with useless words. Nayeon certainly didn’t need her emotion magic to notice that. She was losing patience.

The pot reached a boil over the fire.

“He was really good at this stuff.” She whispered, quieter, as she stirred. Waves of grief now reached Nayeon, thick and heavy. It pulled more energy from her than she could afford to give. Usually, she’d be able to filter it out, block her connection to the emotional world with precision. Not now.

She opened her eyes a little.

The pale girl frowned at the cauldron, brows knit. She gave it another stir, more hesitantly.

At least whatever the girl was about to feed her would be warm, and hopefully if it was going to kill her it’d do the deed quickly.

All at once, Nayeon felt the grief and shame of guilt. Again, not her own. The disappointment of failure and - her least favorite emotion, lately - pity.

“Nayeon-ssi.” Dahyun said softly. Her cheery demeanor had vanished once again. “I don’t… I don’t think this looks like what Myungsoo taught me how to make.”

“That’s okay.” Nayeon could hear the weakness in her own voice, eyes shut again. Talking took too much out of her now. It was getting dangerous.

“I’m so sorry… I-I’ll just start again, I can go find more – it’s so hard to grow a proper bulb with the ground so close to frozen, and-”

“No, no.” Nayeon rasped. “Try in the morning.”

“I–” Her voice was tight. “I need to go find more now.”

Fear. For Nayeon. Did she really look that bad, that Dahyun thought medicine couldn’t wait a few hours until dawn?

The woods were dangerous. They were already being watched, she was sure; the glowing remnants of their pathetic fire were the only source of light for miles. There was strength in numbers. The kid alone wouldn’t make it back alive … And if she did, Nayeon didn’t know what she’d come back to. Without Dahyun here, a predator would find Nayeon an easy meal; weak and wholly unable to fight.

“This is my fault.” Dahyun whispered.

Nayeon hadn’t known her more than a month. She hated how the tears in Dahyun’s eyes pulled on her heart, urged her to reassure to the miserable kid and deny it. To tell her anyone could have lost control and exposed them both to the village; that the idiot townsfolk were actually at fault – and that was probably true, if Nayeon wasn’t too bitter to think about it; the real people at fault were the ones hunting them. Who’d known Nayeon since she was a child and who had loved her right up until the very moment she’d been exposed as a witch.

Instead, she stayed silent. She was bitter, call her an asshole, but Dahyun deserved a little bit of guilt. It was her fault that Nayeon’s own village had turned on her, looked on her like she was some kind of monster. If the kid had never shown up...

“I’ll be quick. I just need to find another bulb, and then thaw it, and then speed its growth. I can do that. Take my cloak, okay?”

Nayeon knew it wouldn’t work. It’d already been made painfully clear that Dahyun had very little control of her powers. Suspiciously little control for a witch of her age, who claimed to have been raised by her family of earth witches. Besides the outburst of emotion and chaos that had covered the town in vines and gotten them chased out of town in the first place, she had yet to see her do more than grow a wilted little weed. She’d be wandering into the dark forest completely alone and unable to protect herself, and for no good reason.

“Dahyun-“ Nayeon slurred. Another layer, warm and heavy, was placed over her. She forced her eyes open. Dahyun now stood in only a stained, long-sleeved underdress and gray apron. A reassuring smile graced her lips. The tattered green wool of her cape covered Nayeon like a blanket.

“It’ll be okay, Nayeon-Ssi.”

Nayeon tried to force her eyes open – she hadn’t even realized she’d closed them again; she could have sworn she only blinked.

“Don’t.” Was all she could get out. She turned her gaze up towards the younger girl.

She was gone.

How long had Nayeon had her eyes closed? With a start, she realized their pathetic little ‘camp’ wasn’t cast in an orange glow, but an eerie indigo. The sun was coming up. Dahyun had been gone for who-knows-how long.

Would the girl have left her to die? Nayeon was truly dead weight; this sickness would take her soon if nothing changed. Strength in numbers be damned, she’d be smart to ditch her. If the situations were reversed, Nayeon would be gone. Maybe with the girl’s cloak, too, and a sob story that an earth witch had framed her as one of them, taken to her to the forest, and left her to die. Survival is cruel.

But Dahyun hadn’t done any of that. She’d given Nayeon the thick cloak off her back before setting off into the dark forest alone. All to find a hopeless remedy for a stranger’s illness. How naïve she must be, how sheltered she must have grown up.

Nayeon jumped at the unmistakable sound of a snapping twig. She lay still.

Could it be Dahyun? No, the girl couldn’t go anywhere without making a racket. She would have heard her coming a mile away.

She was too weak to conceal herself with magic. But an animal large enough to snap a twig likely wouldn’t be a scavenger. If Nayeon could still her breathing, use a little magic to change her appearance – maybe it’d think she was long dead and leave her be.

She concentrated on finding the being, mind reaching out to the emotions that should be around her – but being this weak it was like a dense fog surrounded her, obscuring her from sensing of anything more than a foot away, blurring everything.

She pulled herself back into her own consciousness and felt the attempt weigh her down. The world was tilting, now, Nayeon’s head felt impossibly light. Suddenly she was warm. Much too warm. It spread through her quickly as black clouded her vision.

Then, everything was dark.

[crystalcatgamer]

20 Questions for Fic Writers

Tag by @havenotwillnotreadthebooks, lo, Kefi!

How many works do you have on AO3?

122 🎵 I’ve orphaned and deleted a few along the years, though.

What fandoms do you write for?

Uhhhh. Omniscient Reader’s Viewpoint (ORV), Boboiboy, Jujutsu Kaisen and more. Currently really, really fixated on One Piece though I haven’t written fic yet, but am cooking so much toxic doomed brothers food (Donquixote Bros)

What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

Vis la goddamn DSMP phase always going to be my biggest mark in the world. Excluding discontinued fics and stuff I’m not happy with anymore for now…

Run, run (Here comes the boy) 1415 kudos

May the odds (Be ever in your favour) 1203 kudos

There are days where I don’t know the person in the mirror (And there are days I don’t care) 1161 kudos

Hold you in my hands like hot tea 1155 kudos

Knowing I’m safe cause you want me 1052 kudos (A sequel to fourth place!)

Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

I respond to every single comment I can, though sometimes I might miss some! I’ll catch them months later lmao. It’s always fun to chat with ppl about what’s in my fic

What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

I’ll call out your name, but you won’t call back. This is an ORV fic, doomed Doksoo (beloved) and since it’s canon compliant… yeah. ‘Twas full of angst that came from love.

What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

The deep blue of summer nights. This was a cute ORV fic born of me wanting to write Secretive Plotter’s birthday being celebrated by ABFD, SWK and Uriel! They’re my fav rare dynamic

Do you get hate on fics?

I think the closest I got was some discourse on my DSMP fic? To be expected, and it was cleared up soon enough!

Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

I did like years ago lmao, tucked into the depths of the internet. Definitely not on main, for this is a family friendly account sir. It was fun in a way but also I hated writing it most of the time??? More of a reader than a writer I would say. As for what kind… while, I wrote what I liked ☆

Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written?

I HAVE THREE (3) CROSSOVERS AND THEY’RE BOTH WITH JUJUTSU KAISEN. Maybe I’m more insane over JJK then I thought I was. In my defence they’re easy to cross. Okay so basically my craziest one is this ORV X JJK one (Something blue, something new) in which I wrote the ship Kim Dokja x Gojo Satoru because I was commissioned to

Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Nope and I hope I never do!

Have you ever had a fic translated?

I have not, but as long as people ask first I’m always open to it.

Have you ever co-written a fic before?

A FNAF fic I wrote with Kefi (the one who pinged me for this game): Many vegetables, one soup, and a work full of original poems with @thenamelesshaven: You are made of the sea and the stars (and one day you are going to find yourself again)

What’s your all time favourite ship?

[glances at my art gallery] Recently, LawLu from One Piece and… Sharron/Maric from Lord Of The Mysteries

What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

We Shouldn’t Be This Kind Of Tired At Our Age! An ORV fic featuring Yoo Mia witnessing Yoo Joonghyuk’s changes with every turn!

What are your writing strengths?

Uhhhh. Being able to churn out stuff at the speed of light. And writing angst (lol)

What are your writing weaknesses?

Actually having a proper outline, ehe. It’s why I usually write one-shots.

Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

Uhhhh I? Might do it some day? I’m just a bilingual guy who barely passed Chinese. It’s cool when other people who know what they’re writing about do it in their fics tho.

First fandom you wrote for?

Ehe. VIS LA BOKU NO HERO ACADEMIA (MY HERO ACADEMIA) but the fic’s been orphaned to the void ✌🏻

Favourite fic you’ve written?

Woah. Tough question, scrambling for it… this one! when I look in his eyes, well, I just see the sky. It’s a Black Butler fic I wrote recently for Whumptober (2023), Elizabeth Midford centric! I love her a lot <3

[steadfastspeed]

@somewhereinchaos​ sent... sleeping habits! + what kind of dreams does he have and does he remember them?        

for the most part, sonic is a pretty light sleeper! he can fall asleep pretty easily, and wake just as quickly. it’s something developed from his nomadic lifestyle; even without eggman in the picture, travel is unpredictable. anything could happen out in the wild, so being able to wake up and react in time is a very useful habit. sometimes, depending on the intensity of eggman’s latest scheme, he’ll pass out like a log after scrambling the good doctor, but that’s pretty infrequent.

he’s very much a go with the flow, do things as he needs to kind of guy, and sleep is no exception to the rule. as a result, he has a tendency to nap in some pretty weird spots; he’s not picky. if they’re comfy or aesthetically pleasing, he can sleep there. or, you know, he’ll get bored of waiting for the player and plonk down there because they’re taking forever so he might as well just nap!

he does try to get at least eight hours a sleep a night, though. in his younger days, sonic had a lot of trouble controlling his speed without proper rest; not getting those eight hours would seriously mess him up and make moving around difficult. nowadays, especially after the events of unleashed ( presumably, given the werehog seems like a pretty painful transformation and that there are night stages at all ), the metal virus saga, and even frontiers all requiring him foregoing sleep for long stretches of time, he can manage it fine enough... but he’ll be notably crankier and more prone to naps.

as far as sonic’s dreams go? they’re weird. which, given everything he’s seen and done probably tracks. my brain’s a little soup at the moment so i can’t really go into detail right now, but i do think a lot of imagery from the special stages tends to crop up? hmmm... i’ll come back to that one later, but i don’t think he remembers them often. if he’s remembering a dream,

 it’s because it’s it sticks out from the normal weirdness- it’s a nightmare, it’s serious, it focuses a lot on a particular person or location... he’s noticed he has more serious dreams right before or after eggman does a thing, but he doesn’t put much stock into it and thinks it’s just a coincidence. ... or something. i’ll give it more thought.

sonic did have a lot more nightmares during unleashed and the metal virus in particular, i think.

[legendtraineremily]

Day 9 of My Pokémon Yellow Nuzlocke Challenge!

A whole couple of real life days have passed without any gameplay, so I’m not counting them in my record.

We’re heading down Route 9 towards Rock Tunnel and then on to Lavender Town. Right off the bat, Belle levels up and evolves into a Weepinbell. Awesomeness! Now to find a Leaf stone to evolve her more later. Crispy had me worried for a minute when he took some Fury Attacks from a couple Beedrill, but he not only handled it like a champ, he also leveled up twice in that one battle, so yay!

We also get an encounter here:

Route 9 Encounter—Nidoran ♂/ Lawrence

Lv. 16

Hp: 41

Attack: 27

Defense: 21

Speed: 21

Special: 19

Barely got 1 step into the grass and boom! here’s a little Nidoran ♂to work with. Now, I already have my Nidoqueen, Lily, but it’s good to have a Nidoking as a fairly comparable back-up just in case something happens (let’s just pray it doesn’t). Anyway, we’ll keep knocking down these trainers and getting stronger on our way over to the entrance into Rock Tunnel.

Yipes! I almost lost Plowboy there to another Diglett! Being faster that your opponent can have its downsides in the case of both using 2-turn moves—I Dig underground, they Dig underground; I pop up and whiff, they pop up and hit. At least Belle and Mike are having a good time ripping apart the other Poison- and Ground-types and gaining levels just fine. Which makes me realize that I’ve been neglecting Zippy a bit. Whoops! Better fix that coming up soon. First, our next encounter comes in a patch of grass above the Pokémon Center next to Rock Tunnel’s entrance.

Route 10 Encounter—Machop/NachoMan

Lv. 16

Hp: 50

Attack: 35

Defense: 25

Speed: 17

Special: 18

Machop is fun as a good early game Fighting-type; though, because his evolved form, Machoke, only has a mediocre base stat total (BST), I would have to find another option before the Pokémon League. Here’s the issue with trade evolutions (Machoke, Haunter, Graveler, and Kadabra require being traded to evolve to their highest stages) and my case—I don’t really have anyone to trade with that I know of. I’m pretty sure my brother didn’t get any of the virtual console games; and being out in the middle of nowhere, it’s a shot in the dark to find someone else who can trade with in my area. Basically, I’ll be able to access a Hitmonlee soon anyway and NachoMan will likely not see much use. Oh well. 🎶Nacho, Nacho Man! Salsa, cheese, and chips; it’s Nacho Man!🎶

Now let’s make sure to heal up before we head into the long dark of Rock Tunnel. The way is dark, it was made by those who are bats, and the Zubat keep it; the way is dark…

Another thing I need to do is pull some positive vibes together so I don’t end up with a Zubat as my encounter because that would be…painful. Oh and knockout this other trainer here for more experience.

Rock Tunnel Encounter—Geodude/Cephas

Lv. 16

Hp: 40

Attack: 30

Defense: 40

Speed: 14

Special: 15

(Charlie Brown voice): I got a rock.

Jokes aside, a rock/ground-type like Geodude could prove useful for the Fire Gym in the distant future. Let’s hope we make it that long; Rock Tunnel is a labyrinthine mess without using Flash.

Yet, we’re made of tougher stuff! We don’t need to waste a move-slot on Flash especially when Gen 1 has conveniently given us the outline of walls and ladder locations. Gen 3 remakes fixed this difficulty issue by giving the player a small little circle of light around your character and leaving the rest black and blank; made it much harder to navigate if you didn’t have Flash on one of your Pokémon. Though the Gen 3 remakes also had a bunch of other fixes and QoL improvements on top of that so, whatever; maybe I’ll transfer my old Pokémon over and do a Nuzlocke of LeafGreen next and get a proper comparison.

Man! These trainers are either just terrible or my team is somehow getting better. Had some problems dealing with some Hikers’ Geodudes actually having Rock Throw finally but then I switched in Lily and punted them into the ceiling. Furthermore, the wild Pokémon are simply EXP fodder for my team as Zubat, Geodude, and Machop all fall easily to Zippy, PlowBoy and Belle, and Mike respectively. Basically, when we hit Lavender Town and Celadon City, we should be in tip-top, battle-ready shape.

So, with a little bumping around and battling our way through, we make it out of Rock Tunnel. There’s a few more trainers here just outside the exit, but I think I’ll save here and leave the rest for tomorrow.

[fruitless-vain]

What techniques did you use for training a consistent heal? My dog knows to not pull and knows how to heel but doesnt like to stay in a heel for long which is normally fine but if were walking in a store or something I would like him to heel more

There can be a lot of reasons for leaving a heel position, knowing what’s causing them to end the behaviour will likely help you sort out a good training plan.

With my dogs here’s what I focused on:

A solid release cue, ensuring they had a proper understanding of the behaviour and that the behaviour should continue until a release cue is given. This makes it easier for my dogs to understand what can signal the behaviour to end (as opposed to a distraction causing the behaviour to end).

Comfort, if the environment is scary or threatening I don’t expect my animals to ignore that feeling and do what they’re told anyways. If something causes them to need to investigate to feel safe they absolutely leave heel on their own accord to do so. Yeah in the moment it might feel frustrating but next time around they’ll be more comfortable with the thing that startled them and they’ll be more likely to be comfortable following cues. Additionally if a dog is too stressed to offer a heel instead of fighting a losing battle trying to force it to happen I just change my plans that day, do a full slow lap around the store to let them sniff it out and get their bearings then see if I can get a functional heel to be able to shop or not after that.

Reinforcement history/ duration/ proofing, practice the expected durations in a neutral context. Duration is HARD, asking for duration in an extremely distracting environment is Harder. Make sure they understand how to do the behaviour for your expected period of time in an easier environment first. Or provide a lot of breaks throughout your trip so it’s not one massively long heel. Additionally I’d practice heeling around distractions you expect to see, use shopping carts in the parking lot, have a friend help you out, walking by new smells (I like to practice this when we bring home groceries, heel past the full sniffy shopping bags before being released to go sniff them all). Do trips specifically for training so you can be focused on the task at hand and not held to an obligatory amount of time to be there. This may mean you walk back and forth outside, hop inside and immediately go back out. You just start where they’re at and gradually build from there so they can clearly see what behaviours you want in that context.

Boredom, I initially had a heck of a time getting duration on Yoshis heel because she got bored with the simple task. For her changing my speed as we walked, teaching her more precise ways to turn left and right, and a handful of fun cues that can be asked for while moving made heeling more enjoyable and creates a nice behaviour chain. Now instead of heel-reward it can be heel-switch-middle-circle-back up-left turn pivot-downstay-medical alert-reward there’s a lot of fun “spur of the moment” cues that keep her more engaged and eagerly looking for the next Job To Do.

Context and expectations. I only use heel for safety, navigating crowds, tight spaces. It’s unrealistic to want the average dog to hold a pin tight heel in most circumstances. It’s not comfortable, it inhibits normal social movement cues, it’s slow, it’s not really the most mentally enriching and joyous experience long-term. I ask Yoshi to heel in hardware stores for fun games, she likes the activity, and finds joy in having A Job when we’re doing boring slow moving shopping that would otherwise be frustrating stop-and-go for her. Sham on the other hand likes slow movement and is insecure in new spaces so I don’t ask him to heel, he wanders and sniffs and does what’s fun for him, I’ll ask for short heel bursts if we’re passing people, need to tuck out of the way, or he’s comfortable enough for some fun practice in a new environment. If I ask him to heel for long periods he gets stressed because he can’t freely navigate the environment. Heeling isn’t always the best choice for every dog!

Lastly, outlets for natural behaviours. Making sure they get a good walk in prior to the trip can be helpful. Making sure they run out excess energy and get their sniffing needs fulfilled, will make it less likely that they’ll be overstimulated by the new environment and wanting to go do everything else. A lot easier to focus when you aren’t restless and pent-up. To add to this I usually do a little mental state check before heading out to do a trip to further set us up for success. If I can’t get the behaviours I’d like to see at home then I’m certainly not going to be able to get them in the store.

[un-nonymous]

Have you ever seen someone in like, head-to-toe (shoulder-to-thigh?) spanx, but without the bra part? It’s like a BYOB (bra) situation? It’s not great.

Anyway, my best friend’s wedding is this Saturday in Chicago and we leave at 6am Thursday. I need 8 more days to be ready for the trip.

It’s been so long since I’ve written over here that I was excited to fill in the “Listening to:” field. That’s … never been a thing here. Livejournal. Twenty (20) years ago. It’s fine. You should listen to this song though.

I don’t care about no hoes, where is your spouse at?

Red text!

(Personally, I truly don’t care about no hoes nor spouses. In fact I’m very actively trying to become a spouse myself, for fuck’s sake.)

So I’m a bridesmaid in my best friend’s wedding this weekend and I love her but she did us all dirty with the color of these dresses. It’s like a smoky lavender - the kind that looks good on no one. We were able to choose our own style at least, but they are all relentless and unforgiving. I am wearing head-to-toe spanx (BYObra) and you can see like, the line of the contour? on the thigh? And it’s not because I have thick legs. I mean, it’s because the material of the dress is almost as though it was stuck to you, but it flows nicely in a breeze. I don’t know. I’ve also lost a bunch of weight since June (thanks, keto!) and that honestly helps me feel better about the dress. I took selfies tonight, even! Maybe I’ll post one.

This has been a hard week. Since Friday, I: organized and attended yet another suicide prevention training at work; unexpectedly found myself needing to support a dear coworker towards the end of that training class because he had been struggling with all the thoughts we’d been talking about for 2 hours and needed to step outside to cry and asked if I would join him (a senior general superintendent); attended a coworker’s wedding with another coworker, got drunk for the first time in a while and lost the latter coworker’s sunglasses before raising my voice at a third coworker who was getting mouthy with me; had what would have been the worst hangover of my life Sunday if it weren’t for Amazon’s party patches*; have been running around with my hair on fire at the office for both 10+ hour days I’ve had today and yesterday.

That whole thing was all about work. I’m working on that, but now’s not a good time for progress.

Seriously though, look up “party patches” on Amazon. Slap 2 of them on you (gonna do 3-4 for this weekend’s festivities, I have to be in proper shape for Nine Inch Nails at Riot Fest on Sunday #priorities) and while they won’t always stop a hangover from happening (I mean honestly how do you stop a speeding train, you know?), they will help you avoid an ambulance at least. Ask me how I know. Look for the blue and orange packages. They’re just vitamins, I don’t know what kind of witchcraft they’re about otherwise but they’re like $30 for I want to say 40-something patches? You really can’t put a price on magic.

(Ok here’s how I know: The last time I got that hungover, it was the morning after Matt and I got into a big argument about something stupid in public and I was crying at the table quietly but also pretty dramatically and the server had just approached with the check that I stubbornly insisted on paying. I could not pick my head up off the pillow the next morning and it took us 3 weeks to finally reach the end of the conversation because I was so embarrassed that I cried at a server as a 37-year-old woman for really the dumbest reason. I’m really fun to date. Fortunately he and I were genuinely fine those 3 weeks, we aren’t about grudges which has probably done a world of good for our 5-year run so far. But I was wearing 0 party patches that night. I currently have 2.7 packs for the bridal party and maybe the groomsmen if they’re acting right.)

Matt is standing up in the wedding too and we’re going to walk down the aisle together. I hope at least a couple people throw shoes at him. Gently, because he is a gem, but he needs a kick in the ass and he knows it.

Hope you and yours are loving your adventures lately. 🖤

[thecraftyfoxthewriterscorner]

Considering Chapters and Chapter Transitions

Hey Story Crafters,

This week, I was able to attend ACES Accelerate, a virtual conference for editors. It was an amazing two days full of sessions led by very smart, experienced editors who were kind enough to share their knowledge. There are definitely a few tools I’ve picked up that I’m excited to add to my editing practice. There are also several recordings I plan to check out while they’re available. 😊

One of my favorite sessions, presented by Christina Frey, focused on story mapping. (I’ve taken line editing classes with Christina, so I went into this session prepared to get blown away—I wasn’t disappointed!) Story mapping is basically evaluating how effective a story is on the chapter-level—the individual chapters, and in the context of the overall story. I’ve been using a version of story mapping in my own writing and editing, and when I perform a developmental edit for clients. I’m excited to apply parts of Christina’s even more streamlined method (and color coding!) into my own practice.

Which brings me to the topic I’d like to talk about this week: chapters, and the transitions between them.

In this post, my focus is on the effect chapter transitions have on the overall story—not when a chapter break should happen.

What do I mean by the effect of a chapter transition? One example is the effect of the cliffhanger. When a chapter ends on a cliffhanger, the tension is high—the reader is on the edge of their seat, gripping the book tightly, eager to read the next sentence—and then the tension cuts off as the chapter ends and transitions into a new chapter, which may or may not continue the tension from that cliffhanger ending.

There is a lot of writing advice that discusses the structure and the effect of chapters. A couple of techniques that have stuck with me include:

Chapters can follow the same narrative shape of the 3-act structure.

If a chapter starts on a point of high tension, it should switch to a point of low tension by the end. (This can also apply at the scene-level.)

(I can’t remember where, exactly, I picked up these techniques. I know they’re from webinars, but I can’t remember which ones, or who the speakers were. If I do find out, I’ll revisit this post and add the proper credit.)

Saying that either of these techniques, or any of the other techniques that exist, “should” be the method to follow for how a chapter is structured or for chapter transitions feels too prescriptive for me. Maybe it does to you, too. But I do think it’s important to evaluate how a chapter starts, ends, and transitions, and the effect those factors have on the overall story, and on the reader.

To think of it another way: The effect a story has on the reader is a lot like a rollercoaster ride.

While the initial buildup to the highest point of most rollercoaster tracks reflects the narrative shape of the 3-act structure, the rest of a rollercoaster ride has a similar effect that engaging stories have on readers. There are flat or straight sections on the track (i.e., narrative lulls between points of tension), sudden twists and turns (i.e., plot twists and unexpected developments), fast rises and sudden drops (i.e., points of high and low tension). (Of course, we don’t want the story to end as abruptly as a rollercoaster ride. But that’s a different topic.) By the end of the story—depending on the genre—the reader will, hopefully, be exhilarated and satisfied by the experience of reading your story.

And part of that effect is thanks to strategic chapter transitions. Just like engineers need to consider how a rollercoaster’s design will effect the average amusement park-goer, factors like speed (i.e., pacing), tolerance to abrupt twists, turns, rises, and drops, authors need to consider how chapter transitions affect the reading experience of the overall story.

Let’s take a look at the cliffhanger transition as an example. If a book is full of chapters that almost always ends in a cliffhanger, with the tension continuously rising and falling each chapter, the reader’s experience will be jarring, like a rollercoaster that only rises and falls, and abruptly comes to an end.

But you also don’t want a story that only has rising and falling tension within chapters, or too many chapters in a row that are static (e.g., more backstory than action).

So, what are the storytelling elements that cause this effect of rising and falling tension?

Storytelling elements to increase tension:

Conflict (e.g., an argument, or a battle) or drama (e.g., an emotional struggle the character is working through, either internally or by interacting with another character)

Character goals and motivation (e.g., a character taking action)

Stakes

Storytelling elements to reduce tension:

Backstory

Setting

Character (e.g., reflection, establishing character through familiar or comfortable interactions with other characters)

For example, there might be a chapter that ends on an argument between two characters. That argument can pick up again at the beginning of the next chapter (high tension), or the new chapter can open by setting the scene (low tension) where one of the characters reflects on the argument from the previous chapter (depending on the character’s personality, this could be a point of low or middle tension).

If you want to take this exercise a step further, you can consider the effect of transitions between scenes, and their effect within a chapter.

This exercise is one to try out once you’ve reached the editing stage for your manuscript. You could think about chapter transitions and their effect on the reader while you’re writing, but you may run the risk of spreading your attention too thin—and, worst of all, losing your motivation to write. Finish writing your manuscript first, and then try evaluating the chapters and chapter transitions.

I won’t tell you how you should or shouldn’t transition between chapters. During a developmental edit, I present possible chapter transitions for consideration, and I may advise one type over another. But the final decision is yours.

To write a story that’s engaging for readers, chapter structure and the transitions between chapters are important factors to keep in mind.

Until next time!

Best,

Leah

Substack Post: https://thecraftyfoxwriterscorner.substack.com/p/considering-chapters-and-chapter

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[le-amewzing]

Yoctosecond

The Parknight plot bunnies keep multiplying… B3c *Note: This is set after my oneshot, "Zeptosecond," so spoilers for that! I rec reading that first, but this can be enjoyed on its own, too. :3

Fic: "Yoctosecond" [FFN] [AO3]

Pairings/Characters: established!Jess Knight/Alden Parker, Timothy McGee, Nick Torres, Leon Vance, Kasie Hines, & Jimmy Palmer, with some OCs

Rating: T

Words: ~17,500

Additional info: romance, crime/murder/mystery, hurt/comfort, friendship, 3rd person POV

Summary: A case lands almost literally in Knight's lap, giving her and Parker their first test under new circumstances.

      Knight grinned when she saw her exit and signaled, leaving the high-speed lanes behind her for the slower-paced streets feeding into D.C. proper. "Well, I might be a little late, but you'll see me soon," she said aloud.

      "You're returning from a weekend spent catching up with your mother. No rush," the soothing voice in her ear insisted over Bluetooth.

      "Alden, trust me—after nearly three full days of being called 'Jessi' even though she knows I hate it, I'll be glad to file paperwork or, hell, even assist Kasie sort through evidence, if I have to," Knight commented, her grin dimming a little as she replayed the weekend in her mind's eye.

      "That bad?" Parker asked.

      She scrunched her nose up at the memories. "Could've been worse, if I hadn't been able to bitch to you via text." She snorted. "Of course, then she caught me sneaking texts, so I had to fib and say it was work-related."

      He tried to cover it with a cough, but Parker did that scoff-chuckle of his. Clearly, he was amused. "Technically, you're not wrong…"

      Knight laughed. "So, you in the office already?"

      "Not quite. Just heading into the building myself. Nothing's hit my phone and I've had no messages from McGee or Torres, so it seems like another quiet day." There was a catch in his voice, a hesitation.

      Knight didn't need him to voice his thoughts to know what ran through his head right now, because she wondered about it, too. Little more than a month had passed since Parker had popped up to Pennsylvania to assist his FBI colleague, Isler, with an old cold case. At the same time, she and Parker had hit quite an obstacle, trying to come to an agreement about disclosing their personal relationship to Director Vance, given possible chain-of-command issues. Knight had created a solution that Parker was comfortable with, and they'd presented it to Vance when they'd caught him up about their office romance.

      Vance had listened with barely a twitch of an eyebrow, like some professional poker player disguising his every last tell. Then he'd remarked that he'd wondered about the two of them, had kind of seen them coming even…which hadn't been reassuring in the moment…but, most importantly, Vance had heard them out.

      And he agreed to Knight's terms, that she'd remain part of the MCRT but would report directly to Vance instead.

      "However," he'd warned before either Knight or Parker could breathe a sigh of relief, "please note that I'll be thinking of alternatives if I feel things are working to the detriment of the team."

      Just like that, his words were water on their spark of hope. They'd had to exit his office politely while wearing tight smiles.

      But…since then, there hadn't been much for Parker's team to do. It'd been mostly paperwork and some court appearances in recent weeks. That lull was why Parker had encouraged Knight to take some personal time, actually, and accept her mother's invitation to visit. Most of Parker's family knew about the two of them, but Knight was slowly getting around to filling in her folks now that they'd made things Vance-official. Her siblings and father were one thing and liked the good things they'd heard about Parker; but her mother took some prep work, and Knight knew her family would only settle down once Knight stopped keeping her silver fox to herself and started bringing him to family dinners and get-togethers.

      Still… Vance's ominous tone was the biggest thing weighing on her and Parker's minds. She knew now, too, that Parker hadn't scoured the NCIS handbook himself for possible solutions because he was scared of Vance settling on said alternatives, especially since Parker had seen the worst happen to couples in similar situations at other agencies.

      But, all their concerns aside, she was glad they were doing well, and it made her smile, that Parker put up a bravado instead of a wall these days.

      "So, a quiet day, huh?"

      "Yep. You know, the past few days went by in a blink, really, without you."

      Knight rolled her eyes while changing lanes. Again, with the bravado! "You miss me, c'mon."

      "Of course I miss you, Jess." Parker's voice was softer now, closer. Maybe he was in the elevator? "But I also know I'm going to see you soon, so I focused on that instead."

      She blinked twice and gripped the steering wheel, heat flooding her cheeks at his sudden honesty. This smooth talker…! She laughed, though, pleased, because this trend of Parker working to be a little more honest with his feelings had started since they'd made up after that Pennsylvania case. Knight grinned, knowing he'd hear it in her voice. "Keep sweet-talking like that, and—"

      Knight lost her train of thought there, though. Up ahead, where there was more room on the road, she noticed an SUV and a small moving truck swerving and getting too close to each other for comfort.

      She frowned and eased up off the gas, falling back some more like the other cars around the SUV and truck, just in case.

      "Jess?" Parker said only her name. The rest was implied.

      "Oh, yeah, hey. I'm still here. Like, ten minutes away?" Knight glanced in her mirror—good, wiggle room behind her if need be—and then went back to observing the situation dead ahead. "Sorry, it's just some bozos on the road. I'm trying figure out if they're playing chicken or if it's road rage."

      "Can you tell me anything about them? A plate or…? I'll get Metro on it, though I'm guessing a few people might've already dialed 911."

      "Fair point. Either way, I'll probably be late."

      And how right she was: An arm then appeared outside the passenger-side window of the SUV with an object in hand. And five shots took aim at the truck, none of them missing.

      "OH, my God—!"

      "Jess! Was that gunfire?!"

      "Alden, hold on—" Cars around her screeched. Some came to a complete stop, a few bailed or pulled off to the side of the road, and anyone far ahead sped up and floored it to get as far away from the scene as possible. The vehicular chaos and sea of blinking lights in the early autumn morning tried hard to distract her, but Knight wove in and out and pulled up closer to the SUV and truck, both of which still hurtled down the road. She squinted at the backs of the vehicles, trying to glimpse the plates. She could just about make out the truck's.

      Then, not as far ahead as she would've liked, there was a sickening crunch.

      Oh, no.

      An impact.

      "OH, SHI—!" Knight looked up in time to see the truck go airborne and now descend on her with tremendous speed. She yanked the steering wheel to the left and pressed the gas a bit more, laying on the horn to alert the remaining cars around her of the incoming danger as she sailed under the flying truck and narrowly avoided hitting the car that had sent it into the sky to start.

      "JESS!" He was all but yelling in her ear now.

      "Yes, there was gunfire, and there's an accident, too—" Knight swerved, avoiding debris on the ground, and her car skidded out of her control, sending her into the row of jersey barriers.

      Thankfully, she'd had her car inspected this summer, so she knew all the safety features were in working order. But it wasn't the relief it should've been when her airbags deployed. The one in her door popped halfway, partly caught between her door and her seat. But the one in the steering column smacked Knight in the face, slamming her head back against the headrest.

      "OW," she groaned.

      "JESS! Jess, what happened?! McGee, ping Jess' phone right now. Torres, contact Metro P.D.—"

      "Parker, what—?" That was McGee. Parker was in the bullpen by now.

      "Some accident on the way here. She said she was ten minutes away from the office."

      "On it," Knight heard Torres say.

      Knight groaned again and huffed. "Hey. I can hear all of you, you know."

      Parker's phone made a harsh tapping sound. "Jess, we've got you on speaker. Can you tell us exactly what happened?"

      She winced and pressed the heel of her right palm to her forehead. "Someone in the SUV shot at the truck. Truck…" She exhaled, and everything ached. "Truck hit another car and went flying. It didn't hit me, but I crashed into a jersey barrier. I'm all right, guys, honestly. The airbags did their job. A little too well, if you ask me."

      Parker huffed, but she knew this one. It wasn't the short one of annoyance; it was Parker's breathy huff, a rare one that only emerged when he was genuinely worried. "Jess, are you definitely all right?"

      "Really, I'm all right."

      "Knight, can you describe the SUV?" Torres asked.

      She took a breath and concentrated, glad for the shifted focus. "Um…cold gray. Chevy…Suburban, maybe?" She grimaced. "I saw more of the truck's plate than the SUV's, but that's moot. Metro will have the truck's soon enough."

      "Even a partial's fine," McGee encouraged.

      Knight licked her lips. "Both are Maryland plates. The SUV's was…K…N8…" She sighed. "That's all I've got, sorry."

      "No, no, don't be," Parker assured her. "You did great, Jess. A partial plate while it's fresh in your memory is great. Now, where exactly are you?"

      She twisted her head around, thankful her neck didn't protest the movement. "I—I can't see any signs or mile markers." Had her car really spun around that much? Her throat closed up around a sob, and tears pricked the backs of her eyes.

      Parker tapped his phone again; he must've taken her off speaker. "Hey, Jess, hey. It's okay. You'll be okay. I'll make sure of that."

      Even though she couldn't see him, Knight nodded, glad to hear his words.

      "So you don't see any signs—that's all right. Do you remember the last exit you passed?"

      "Mm…" Knight closed her eyes to recall. But, strangely enough, her eyelids felt heavy doing so. She fought this drowsy sensation briefly, answering, "I think it was exit…" But the number was just out of reach, lost somewhere in her brain fog.

      Before Knight caved to that drowsiness, the last thing she heard was Parker barking orders to the others. "McGee, ping her phone now! Torres, get all emergency services there immediately. I'll run the damn plate myself."

      Knight blinked, coming to with a slight start. She glanced at her dashboard and saw that her phone remained in its holder, stuck on the dash. She lifted her arm (ugh, it felt so heavy) and tapped the screen.

      Oh. The Bluetooth symbol still showed. She hadn't disconnected from her headset? Was Parker still there?

      "Alden?" she rasped. Damn, she could use some water right about now, but her water bottle had gone flying in the crash.

      "Jess," Parker said. Her name came out like a sigh of relief from his lips. "Goddamn. You went quiet."

      "But," McGee piped up, "if you really did pass out, it's been less than a minute."

      That was surprising. "Has it?"

      "Yeah," Parker confirmed. "But, Jess, you've got to stay put, stay awake, and stay still. We don't know what kind of injuries you sustained."

      Knight frowned. She'd been through worse than this, but it'd be pointless to bring that up to an overprotective lover and two overprotective friends who treated her like a [delicate] extra sister. "Yeah, gotcha," she muttered. In the meantime, Knight inspected herself and her car.

      She ached all over, for sure, but the only thing that throbbed was the back of her head, thanks to the airbag. Her car had seen some better days but might live to see another one, since she didn't have major frontend damage. Much of the impact had been absorbed on the passenger side, but the force had caused all the airbags to deploy. Honestly, aside from some dented metal and shattered glass, the worst thing about her car was that her things had been tossed around inside.

      All right, so that wasn't much different from usual, but, hey, the car shouldn't be a total loss.

      "Jess," Parker warned.

      "Yeah, yes, I heard you. You don't want me to move around."

      "If the car was hit hard enough to deploy airbags—"

      Knight sighed and grumbled under her breath. At the very least, she unbuckled. She considered setting foot outside, but she took a look at the other traffic first, primarily to evaluate the scene. "…while I can't do much for you on location, I can tell you this is gonna be a helluva scene to process," she remarked.

      He paused before sighing and caving to his curiosity. "How bad?" Parker asked.

      "At least three cars, not including me, the truck, or the car the truck hit." Knight bit her bottom lip, but describing the accident kept her busy. "Another two sedans like mine…plus an SUV. Something small, like a Subaru? But the people from that SUV have gotten out, and they seem okay. They're helping the driver in the car closest to them. I can't see anything about the car the truck hit. But, guys—the truck's in bad shape."

      About a hundred feet behind her, the truck lay in a few large pieces with its back rather deflated. The tires were aimed oddly, so the axles had to be broken. More than that…

      "Something…smells weird." Knight lifted her nose and cracked open her car door, since there was no way of knowing if the engine would turn over so she might work the window, not to mention she wasn't certain turning the car on was the best of ideas right about now.

      The warm, familiar scent wafted her way.

      Knight's eyes widened. "Alden, the truck—"

      The breathy FWOOSH in the background beat her to the punch. Fire licked the hood of the truck and quickly climbed towards what remained of the windshield.

      Thankfully, the sirens closed in then. Easily half a dozen, if not more, emergency vehicles arrived, and two fire trucks took up the rest of the road, parking on either side of the damaged truck.

      "Good, responders have arrived," Parker stated, likely more for McGee's and Torres' benefit. "Jess, do not turn away the paramedics when they come to help you."

      Knight pursed her lips. He knew her too well… "I won't," she promised.

      Torres cleared his throat somewhere near in the background of the bullpen. "You know, Parker…it's okay if you want to meet the responders at the scene. McGee and I have got the rest of this covered."

      Knight rolled her eyes. At this point, McGee was the only person who didn't know about her and Parker, so she appreciated Torres' try at discretion. At the same time— "No," she insisted, "it's busy out here and the responders don't need anyone underfoot."

      Parker's end of the line went silent.

      Uh-oh. Knight's eyes widened, realizing how sharp that sounded and how familiar that sharp tone was. She didn't want to see her and Parker repeat their past mistakes, especially those from a month ago. "Meet me at the hospital instead," she clarified. She ran a hand through her hair, squinting while she scrambled to string a sentence together. "It'll probably be UMC, but I'll call or text if they take me elsewhere."

      She received general grunts of acknowledgment, but Parker did mumble, "See you soon."

      Knight smiled, not minding his gruffness. She noticed a pair of paramedics heading her way in the meantime. "You bet. Gotta go." Then she tapped her earpiece, and the call cut out.

      The paramedics surveyed the car doors and noted she'd already opened her door. The guy in charge donned gloves and, after introductions, also told her to stay put, but he leaned in and felt her back, neck, and head. After, he shined a light in her eyes and gently inspected her face. "You're responding well," he said when he finished and tucked his light back in his bag.

      That cheered her up immensely. "So I can get out of this thing now?"

      "I didn't say that." The paramedic frowned at her and rattled off some stats for his partner to jot down. "What I meant, Special Agent Knight, is that you show no indications of a concussion."

      "But…that's good."

      "It is." He removed a multifunctional tool from his bag and stabbed the airbag with it, so the object deflated the rest of the way and Knight could take a deeper breath. "But you told me while I examined you that you hit your head against the headrest and that you might've passed out for a few seconds. We're gonna want to run some tests just to be sure there's nothing we've missed."

      Knight pouted. That wasn't the news she'd hoped to hear. "So now what?"

      "Now" meant more examining. The lead paramedic ran through a checklist with Knight, where she felt pain and if there were any place she felt nothing, what her pain was on a scale of one to ten. The whole time, he gently prodded her left arm, side, and leg, which were readily available to him. And, finally, he had her carefully scooch forward to do one final check of her back. "…all right," he conceded. "Since you've got no back pain and everything feels correct so far, I'm going to permit you to exit the vehicle, Special Agent Knight."

      She huffed, but she accepted the hand up, especially because she was unsteady on her feet. She didn't wobble terribly and wasn't woozy, but Knight knew she'd been sitting in that position for far too long.

      The lead paramedic hummed. "Put her down for an MRI," he told his partner.

      Knight snapped her head up, eliciting a fresh wave of pain in her head and a new one in her neck, and snatched her hands from his grasp. "I-I don't need an MRI," she scoffed. She gestured to the rest of the scene. "Besides, I'd just be taking up space in an ambulance someone else needs."

      "We've got plenty of ambulances for everyone who needs them," he corrected, marching her towards the nearest one with his partner flanking her, "and you're someone who needs one."

      Resigned to bowing to their expertise, Knight left her car behind. But, on the way to the ambulance, she caught glimpses of the destroyed moving truck. All five shots were grouped together, hitting the driver's side door and, likely, window.

      Knight might not have been certain about her own health, but she knew that that disaster scene was well beyond any mere case of road rage….

      "Jess."

      Knight picked up her head when the paramedics walked her into the ER's waiting room to sign her in. The paramedics and her reasons for being here all but faded when she heard Parker call her name, though, and she hurried to him.

      Parker met her halfway with his arms up but caught himself, no doubt remembering he ought not to crush her in a hug right now. Instead, he rested one hand on her left shoulder and cupped her face with his other. He furrowed his brow. "Jess…"

      She gave him a tight, wet smile. "I've definitely looked better."

      "You were in an accident."

      "I'll be fine," she assured him. Knight rested her forehead against his collarbone, by the open collar of his shirt. "Hey, um, can we sit?"

      Parker obliged, leading the way to a pair of chairs at the corner, where the edge of the waiting room met the hallway. He sat in the seat closer to the hallway, though, putting a barrier between her and anyone or anything that might bump her in passing as well as allowing him to keep an ear out for news from the intake desk. "I take it, since the paramedics brought you here…"

      Knight nodded. She leaned against his right arm, but she no longer felt like closing her eyes. "They want me to go in for a scan."

      She felt him tense under her.

      Knight patted the back of his hand on the armrest. "It's just an MRI, and I'm sure it'll show nothing. That paramedic dude's just being overly cautious, Alden, seriously." She paused. "It's nothing new, you know."

      "…yeah."

      "It's part of agent life. Especially being part of REACT or the MCRT. We see so much more action than anyone else in the agency."

      Parker dragged a hand over his face and scratched the whiskers along his jaw. "Yeah, no, I know." He glanced down at her, and they locked eyes. Same as him saying her name earlier, this look conveyed the rest of his worries.

      Knight offered him a small smile. "Catch me up on things while we wait?"

      He frowned at the obvious topic change but caved. "Metro's processing the scene." He cleared his throat.

      Knight stopped counting the orange dots in the beige fabric of the empty chair across from her and peered up at him. "What?"

      "McGee…just got information back on the partial plate matching the SUV you saw."

      Huh. So it'd been enough to go on. "And?"

      "It belongs to a yeoman."

      Her eyes widened. "Then—"

      Parker nodded. "This is officially an NCIS case. Metro will be handing evidence over after they've finished at the scene. They're doing us the favor of processing, actually, since they heard one of our agents got caught up in the resulting chaos. The body from the truck is on its way to Jimmy as we speak," he added.

      Knight sat up straight and leaned back in her chair while she mulled over the news. "Well, damn. That's a lot more important than being here." She poked him in the arm. "I'll be all right. Go back to NCIS, work the case."

      His frown deepened, though, and he furrowed his brow. Parker turned halfway in his chair to face her. He leaned in close. "Jess. I'm done choosing work over the ones I love. I'm staying put."

      He said it with the same casualness as when he'd admitted to missing her earlier this morning. The notion made her heart skip a beat.

      Behind Parker, a squat nurse cleared her throat. "Jessica Knight?" She held up a patient folder and searched the faces in the open waiting room.

      Parker twisted around to follow Knight's line of sight. But he turned back around and gave her hand a squeeze. It was the best thing in that moment, because Knight's words failed her as she stood to follow the nurse beyond the ER doors.

      The nurse passed her a gown—"Leave it open in the back, Miss Knight"—and a pair of drawstring pants and showed Knight to a room to change. "Everything including bra off, underwear and socks stay on," the nurse added. She passed Knight a bag, too, in which she could place her belongings, and the nurse locked them up for the time being.

      They paused outside the MRI room, where the nurse had Knight stand on an X taped to the floor and slowly twirl. "Metal detector," the nurse said, pointing to the long bar attached to the wall. "Gotta scan you before we put you into the giant magnet. You're clear, though, so let's get to it."

      Knight frowned. She hated hospitals, but she'd definitely had better bedside manner… Nevertheless, she wanted this done and over with, so she kept her mouth shut.

      The nurse directed her into the MRI room, where a second nurse was busy arranging the table. "Please lie down, head that way, feeding into the machine."

      Knight swallowed a lump of anxiety and did as instructed. She'd done this plenty of times before…not necessarily always for her head, but still. The inside of an MRI machine wasn't…exactly…a scary place to be…

      "So, we're going to review a few things, Miss Knight," the first nurse said while the second nurse began tucking her in.

      "Uh, yeah, go ahead."

      "Name, date of birth, allergies, have you ever had an MRI before, what you're here for today…"

      Knight answered everything to the best of her ability, although the last question she couldn't be certain. But, mostly, it was distracting, trying to answer everything while the second nurse stuck a cushion under her legs, tucked wedges by her arms to keep her immobilized, placed a blanket over her, squished earplugs in her ears, and settled the clunkiest pair of headphones over her ears after all that. All of that before they closed the plastic cage around her head to keep her head still for this particular scan. And still the first nurse insisted on talking, even with Knight's hearing dampened by earplugs and headphones.

      "Okay, Miss Knight. This scan will be around ten minutes long. It's going to be really loud, but we need you to be as still as you can manage. Just squeeze this"—one of them placed a squishy call button in her right palm—"if you need to stop for any reason. Do you want music?"

      "What?" Knight asked.

      "Music. Do you want music, in your headphones?"

      Ugh, jeez, that was right, this thing was about to get loud. "Anything loud," she replied, hoping they'd select some rock station to drown things out.

      The nurses walked out a moment later as Knight's bed whirred to life and slowly slid her inside the giant tube that was the MRI machine. Thirty seconds after that, the first nurse clicked a button, and her voice filled Knight's ears through the headphones. "Miss Knight, how you doing?"

      "Ready to go home already."

      "Okay, then let's get to it."

      Knight smiled to herself. Music faded into the headphones…

      …it was jazz.

      Internally, Knight groaned. She had nothing against the genre, but, a minute later, the first scan began, and the high-pitched spins and the low wub-wub-wub of the MRI completely drowned the music out. The second scan was even worse and lasted longer than the initial, three-minute-long one had. Music, headphones, earplugs—nothing could block out the racket of an MRI.

      Knight wondered if this ten-minute MRI weren't drawing out to twenty instead, but it was hard to concentrate and grasp the passage of time while stuck in this stupid machine. At best, all she could do was focus on the headphone cord left running parallel to her body, along her right leg. So, while she couldn't hear the music…she could feel the rhythm, every other song or so, and concentrating on the beat reminded her of a certain someone with drumming and other musical talents waiting for her out in the waiting room. That connection offered her the only solace possible in that moment.

      Suddenly, the MRI machine powered down, and the nurses returned.

      Knight's table whirred once more as it slid out of the MRI, and she stared up at them. "Did I do something wrong? Did I move? I thought I stayed put." Oh, hell, if they had to start all over again…!

      "No, Miss Knight, you're done," the second nurse said as he set about undoing all his setup from before.

      She blinked in disbelief. "Oh." Another thought occurred to her. "How long was I in there?"

      "Closer to fifteen minutes." His smile was fleeting. "It's not a perfect science. Sometimes it takes a little finessing, trying to get a clear image."

      All right… But for what should've been only ten minutes? Once she was free to do so, Knight sat up and swung her legs off the table. She removed the earplugs herself and took the proffered hand down to get to her feet. "So? How did I do?"

      She didn't miss it: The pair of nurses exchanged a glance. But it was the first nurse who was back to answering her this time, and she ushered Knight back to the changing room by way of the lockers holding personal belongings. "We know your case is a rush, so we'll get a report summary over to you soon."

      Knight changed back into her own clothing. The first nurse led her back to the waiting room, and Knight opened her mouth to ask one more time about the MRI—

      —but the nurse must've anticipated it, because her smile was too practiced as she handed Knight over to a befuddled Parker, who stood to meet them. "Take it easy now, Miss Knight," the nurse reminded her, and that was all she was willing to offer.

      Parker kept glancing at her on the drive back to NCIS. He didn't say anything more, although doubt was clear in the lines by his eyes. Hell, even his skeptical dimple made an appearance.

      But Knight knew as much as he did. She'd filled him in on the MRI as well as every little detail of the paramedic's examination, and now she was content to be riding in silence. …well, somewhat. Given what had transpired, her right knee had a new, uneasy twitch, and Knight found herself counting each truck they passed until they reached the Navy Yard.

      They rode the elevator upstairs together after they entered NCIS, and still Parker's eyes drifted to her.

      "No one's said I have to go home, medically," she pointed out. Knight bumped his hip with hers. "So calm down already, Alden."

      "I'll…try," Parker conceded. He brushed her hair back from her face and pressed a soft kiss to her cheek before the elevator dinged and the doors parted.

      Knight led the way to their desks, but she saw they had a crowd waiting for them. She cracked a smile and laughed. "Guys, it's not the end of the world."

      Kasie made to jump on her, with Torres blocking their scientist friend at the last second. "That was some James Bond morning you had, Jess!" Kasie stated, throwing Torres a tiny glare and pulling Knight into a giant hug anyway.

      "Hardly," Knight said when she pulled away. She did a fist bump with Torres and offered McGee a hug, too, which did little to lower the frightened eyebrows that seemed to be hiding permanently somewhere in McGee's hairline.

      "Jess, should you even be here?" McGee asked. He looked at Parker, too, as if for backup, but Parker opened and closed his mouth and shrugged off answering.

      Knight narrowed her eyes at both of them. "Yes, I should. Parker said this is our case, and I'm good to go."

      Torres snorted and tried to cover it with a cough.

      She settled him with a dry look, too. "I've got no broken bones and barely any scrapes."

      "Well, yeah, but—"

      "McGee—"

      "Special Agent Knight." From the first landing on the stairs, Vance caught her attention and nodded to her. "Good to see you're well. A word, if you're ready."

      Knight nodded and detached herself from a second, smaller Kasie hug. "I'll be right back," she promised the team. She squeezed Parker's hand surreptitiously in passing and hustled to follow behind the director up the staircase.

      Vance paused by his secretary's desk, asking her to hold his calls for now, and held the door open for Knight. He shut the door behind them and sat down at his conference table, gesturing for her to take one of the open seats, as well. Then he raised his eyebrows. "Color me surprised to see you here, Special Agent Knight. You've had quite the morning."

      Knight gave him a guilty smile, not unlike the one she'd offered her mother this past weekend when caught text-bitching to Parker. "Eh, it takes more than a little fender bender to remove me from the board."

      "A bad case of road rage sidelining half a dozen cars is not what I'd call a 'little fender bender,' Knight."

      She leaned an elbow on the table and pushed her hand through her hair. Knight couldn't withhold her sigh. "Truthfully, Director?"

      He motioned with his hand for her to go ahead.

      "I ache. But I've worked while feeling worse—like the time Torres and I were still healing after the Stargazer. McGee and Kasie both look as if their hugs would keep me in a protective bubble if they could… Parker, too, has expressed his desire for me to sit this one out," she added, though she wasn't happy to report that.

      "And what do the doctors say?"

      She gave him a small, thankful smile. "Nothing much, yet. But no one's said I can't be out in the field. The paramedics felt certain I didn't have a concussion, and the MRI techs had nothing to say either. But my case is a top priority, I'm guessing because of my NCIS agent status or being in the accident or both." Knight shrugged.

      Vance leaned back in his chair. "Well, seeing as, in so far as we know, you have no direct ties to the case other than having the misfortune to be en route at the time of the incident… Currently, until a medical professional offers evidence to the contrary, I have no official reason to order you home or even to your desk."

      Knight cautiously sat up straighter. "For real?"

      He nodded, amusement toying with the ends of his lips. "For real, Knight. Besides, if the rest of your team's preoccupied, it might be nice to have someone not only who was there but who has a clear head working the case."

      She suppressed her laugh but shared in his smirk. "Point taken." She stood and faltered. "Oh, uh—was that all?"

      "For now." Vance stood, as well, and this time his mask slipped, allowing some of his concern to show in his features. "Due to the circumstances and the outcome informing us of your ability to perform your duties, you know the protocol: Your doctor will have the report, but NCIS will receive a copy, too."

      Knight twisted her lips around but nodded. "Nah, I know the drill."

      "I'm glad you're in good spirits, Knight. I'm hoping for a good report for you, you know."

      Her smile was smaller this time. "Thank you, Director Vance."

      He tipped his head to her. "Dismissed, Special Agent Knight."

      Knight exited his office with a little more confidence than she and Parker had had a month ago. Nevertheless, she dragged her heels out in the hall, before she reached the stairs, and took a breath to prep herself. Unsurprisingly, three pairs of eyes followed her as she joined the team back in the bullpen. "Where's Kasie?" she teased.

      "The body arrived when you and Parker came back," McGee explained. "Since Jimmy's done signing for it and is in the middle of staging things in Autopsy, Kasie's hovering on his periphery, waiting for the first bits of evidence to drop."

      "Good." She sidled up alongside him and Parker and motioned to the big screen with a jerk of her head. "So, where are we?"

      The three men shared a look, and Torres cocked his head to one side. "Wait—so Vance isn't benching you?"

      "No, he's not," she announced, a bit smug when she noted the unhappy face Parker pulled. "Guys, if I have to say it a million times more, I will: I am fine." She addressed this to all three of them, but she finished with a hard look at Parker. At least he had the decency to duck his eyes, properly chastised.

      An awkward silence settled on the team for several seconds. McGee found his voice first and aimed the clicker at the screen. "Then, Knight, meet Yeoman Third Class Stefan Delia."

      A Virginia license showing an olive-skinned man with dark eyes and a Marine crop in his early forties flashed, alongside his formal dress photo and several documents pertaining to his history of service.

      "Delia is a third-generation sailor, like his father and grandfather before him. He started out in the mail office, but he switched tracks along the way and became an asset assisting with evals."

      Knight picked out a detail from one of Delia's personnel pages. "That's a bit of a switch. It says there that his grandfather had been a flag writer in his own yeoman days and his dad worked on correspondence. Does he prep officer fitness reports or?"

      Torres shook his head. "It's just the enlisted evaluations. He's got a few commendations on file from superiors, several of whom note that he'd be better off as an instructor."

      "Wait a minute." Knight gestured to the document at the front of the others on screen, beside Delia's photo. "This guy's at sea right now. All we have is that his SUV was used this morning."

      Parker raised his eyebrows and rolled his shoulders. "And now you know about as much as we do, Knight. We're waiting to hear back from the ship as to whether Delia's aboard."

      McGee and Torres returned to their respective desks, and the former typed something on his keyboard. "I'm still waiting for video from traffic cams in that area so we can run facial rec."

      "And I've got Delia's financial records," Torres said with a sour expression. "It's…a lot, but I haven't seen anything so far."

      Knight faced Parker. "Then put me in, coach. Whether Torres and I should split the financial history or you want me digging into something else." Her eyes lit up with another possibility. "Actually, do we have a warrant for his phone logs yet? What if he's called his dad? Mr. Delia might have something useful on his son—"

      "One thing at a time, Knight," Parker interrupted, narrowing his eyes at her, having caught on to her plan. "But I think helping Torres with the financial records is a good place to start. In the meantime, I'll check the status with the ship, see if Delia's superiors know his whereabouts yet." He stood for a little while longer.

      Eventually, Knight relented and shuffled to her desk. Torres crossed the room to hand her a stack of files and spare her a commiserating smile, but Knight wondered if she hadn't walked right into that one….

      Splitting that first task with Torres should've been her first clue.

      Each time Knight completed some task, one of them was right there with another one to keep her in the bullpen—truly, to keep her chained to her desk. After the financial records, McGee asked Knight to check Delia's social media history since the traffic cam footage "finally arrived" and he would need Kasie's help (or, at least her tools) sharpening it to use for facial rec. After finding a horribly bland existence on only two social media platforms and a mostly empty microblogging page, Torres passed her Delia's list of evaluations from the past six months, just in case anything suspicious jumped out to her profiling, REACT-trained brain. After that, Parker asked her to run the VIN on Delia's SUV on his way out.

      "Hold up," Knight said, stopping him and Torres in their tracks. "Where the hell are you two going?!"

      Torres took a half a step back from Parker so their team leader got the full brunt of her piercing stare. "Torres and I…are going to talk with Mr. Delia in person," Parker replied.

      She bristled. Normally, she'd be nonchalant about anything to advance solving the case, and Knight wasn't someone who made a stink about taking credit. But it was her idea and, more importantly, interviewing Mr. Delia would take her outside these damned orange walls…! Knight shot up from her chair, sending the thing slamming into her cabinet behind her.

      Parker frowned but didn't otherwise budge.

      "The VIN's running," Knight snapped. "I'm going to see if Kasie needs any help." And she shoved past both of them before Parker could give her something else to do.

      The elevator ride down to the lab gave her a moment to cool down, for which Knight was grateful. …it also gave her a moment to herself, and Knight's nose caught a whiff of something unpleasant. She held her arm up and sniffed the sleeve of her blazer. Damn. She smelled like a mixture of stale car, hospital antiseptic, and (somehow, faintly) fire, even though the truck hadn't been too close.

      She stepped into Kasie's lab shaking her head. "Kase, I sincerely hope you have something for me to do, otherwise—I confess, I'm just going to hide out here from the Three Worrywarts." Knight stopped short when she noticed her friend's attire. "Lab coat not your thing anymore?"

      Kasie glanced down at her red–orange jumpsuit and laughed. "Oh, I'm not taking to wearing this all the time. I'm just getting ready to head down to the garage. The scene's been cleaned up and Metro believes they got all the pieces, so the truck should be downstairs." One of her eyebrows sank low beneath the rim of her frames. "What's this about you hiding in here?"

      "Parker, McGee, and Torres." She rolled her eyes. "They've kept me busy at my desk all day. Yeah, I'm working the case, but." Knight put her hand on her hip. "I haven't even been allowed to go grab food or refill my water—the moment I stand up, one of them does it for me. Being treated like a fragile doll is aggravating as fuck."

      Both of Kasie's eyebrows rose, since Knight tended to reserve her potty mouth for Wine and Misdemeanor nights. But her grin didn't fade. "Yeah, I've seen it. I went out to lunch earlier and spotted Parker fetching your lunch from the fridge—that was weird."

      "Please don't remind me that he did that."

      "I mean, it was kinda sweet, but it was weird."

      Knight groaned. "Well, until I get that official clean bill of health, I've got to deal with their doting bullshit…"

      "Preach, girl." Kasie locked her computers and grabbed her clipboard, ushering Knight back out the door before she locked the lab up, too, behind them. "Then again, if it were me, I'd have 'em wait on me hand and foot until they just started to regret it."

      At that, Knight shared a matching, devilish grin with her friend. Coming to see Kasie definitely had been the right decision.

      Kasie seemed to think so, too, linking her arm through Knight's on the elevator ride downstairs to the garage. "And, hey, if you really mean it about helping me with the truck—"

      "Oh, yeah, no, I do. Happy to help, and not just for the change of scenery."

      "Good. Because this is one of the largest jigsaw puzzles I've been sent in a while."

      The two women stepped out into the bustling evidence garage, and the faint scent of fire hit Knight in full force, coupled with the chemical smell of fire suppressant. Knight thought to pinch her nose, but her mind's eye flashed back to this morning. She froze for half a beat but shook it off before Kasie noticed.

      Kasie, meanwhile, walked around the truck pieces laid out on tarps on the garage floor and gestured with her clipboard. "As you can see, one of the wheels came off during transport—broken axle. Then there's the back, with the doors off the hinges since the back got crushed. Part of the back side's…over there, along with a mirror," Kasie said, turning around to account for the pieces on her top sheet. "The truck cabin itself is in hundreds of pieces inside, according to Metro." She gestured to a trash bag beside her worktable. "They gathered every last piece of glass from the scene, just in case."

      Knight frowned. Well, this did beat staring at her computer screen and waiting for the VIN details to come back. "Where do you want me?"

      "Grab a spare jumpsuit, if you don't mind. I'll dig things out of the cabin myself, but I'm gonna need help with all the sorting."

      Knight nodded and took a spare navy jumpsuit from the bottom drawer of the worktable. She yanked it on over her slacks and shirt and gathered her hair up before pulling on some gloves and tracing Kasie's footsteps, for now aiding by having a tray or jars at the ready and taking photographs.

      They started with the tire first, since it had come lose. Aside from printing the treads and collecting bits of gravel, it had nothing to offer, and so Knight and Kasie turned to the bag of debris next. Kasie handed her a mask and protective goggles, and then they dumped the bag over an extra-large sift. That, too, was surprisingly fruitless; the debris was mostly glass and a few bits of metal, mainly things that had come off the truck.

      "Not even a single shell casing?" Knight asked, stunned.

      "Metro notes that they didn't recover any," Kasie replied, reviewing the report the local cops had forwarded.

      "But—I heard at least five shots, Kasie. How can there be no shell casings?!"

      Kasie shook her head. "Actually, it depends on the vehicle's speeds. If they were roughly matched and if the shooter's gun wasn't all that far from his own window, then hypothetically the casings could've flown backwards into the SUV."

      Knight gaped at her. "That's insane."

      "That's physics."

      She exhaled, halfway to sighing. "What does Metro's report say?" she grumped.

      "Well, the truck's legit, no stolen plates." She tipped her head at the truck's body, and the motion made her hair buns bounce in the slightest. "It belongs to a moving company: Metro Mainline Moving, owned by a Ryan Foster–Shelley. The driver didn't have I.D. on him, and the accident and fire, uhh, make it a little hard to compare him to his photo on the company website, so we don't know yet if our shooter took out Mr. Foster–Shelley himself or an employee or someone else entirely."

      Knight pursed her lips throughout Kasie's summary. Then a thought struck her. "What about the truck's contents?"

      Kasie shook her head. "Jess, the doors are off the hooks—literally. And nothing flew out at the scene. If they made a delivery this morning, things transpired after that. Or maybe they were on their way to their hub to start the day."

      "So little evidence…" Knight flipped through the digital camera's memory, noting what little they had so far. But the photos of the glass got her thinking again. "No shell casings…"

      "Yeah."

      "…but that doesn't mean no bullets."

      Kasie furrowed her brow.

      Knight glanced at the ceiling before meeting Kasie's eyes. "Jimmy's bound to dig bullets out of the victim's body for you to run. But, Kasie, come on—what are the odds that five out of five rounds hit their target and only their target at that speed? Even a skilled marksman couldn't account for every last variable."

      But Kasie snorted and grinned along with her. "Well, damn, girl! We haven't even touched the cabin yet, but I like the way you think." She curled a finger at her friend to follow her to the cabin. Since the truck wasn't stable enough to be seated upright, the garage techs had left it propped on the passenger side with the driver's side door facing the ceiling. A step stool was open in front of the lopsided vehicle so Kasie had access to the interior. Kasie grabbed a hard hat before climbing inside.

      That left Knight to watch from outside what remained of the broken and charred windshield. She moved one of the spotlights when Kasie flagged her, and that gave Knight a better sense of what was left of the cabin's insides. "See anything?"

      "Aside from the usual junk—trash and too many charging cords," Kasie stated. "Hey, Jess, do you remember at all—could you see if the gun had been aimed down or upward? Even just a little," Kasie added, switching gears from searching the floor to peering at the headrests and starting to inspect the ceiling.

      Knight closed her eyes and concentrated. Briefly, her MRI flitted across her consciousness, but she buried her concerns and focused on the shooting. The road hadn't been bumpy…and she'd only gotten a glance before everything had gone into motion…but… "Maybe…up?" She opened her eyes and sighed. "I can't be certain, though."

      Kasie didn't comment. She went quiet as she continued her inspection, digging out a penlight from her pocket and scanning the passenger seat. Then—she paused.

      "Kasie?"

      "Hold up." Kasie crouched down low on the passenger seat, her back to Knight and barring her friend's view. All Knight heard was thick fabric tearing. The next moment, Kasie struggled to stand and poked her head and arms out the driver's side door. She beamed at Knight and held something shiny pinched between her pair of plastic tweezers.

      Knight grabbed a small evidence dish and squinted at the large prize when Kasie placed it. "A silver-tipped bullet? With a brass jacket?"

      Kasie climbed out of the cabin and hopped down to the floor. "And an unusual caliber, too. That's definitely larger than what you guys carry in your SIGs."

      "Yeah…" Knight met her eyes. "And Navy uses SIGs. So Yeoman Delia wasn't shooting from his service weapon."

      "Or it wasn't Delia who shot our victim in the first place," Kasie finished with a nod. "Somehow, more answers lead to more questions."

      "Maybe more evidence will settle those?"

      At least, they hoped. But they spent the next several hours combing through the truck bits and pieces. The only new item was some lint from the empty back, but Kasie didn't get Knight's hopes up about it, especially since the truck belonged to a moving company. "But at least we have a bullet to run," Kasie assured her when it was time to call it a night and head back upstairs.

      Kasie had just walked Knight back to her desk when the elevator dinged and Parker and Torres returned to the bullpen that evening. Knight briefly met Parker's eyes, but her look wasn't so harsh this time, not with her respite in the evidence garage having eased her tension.

      Parker cleared his throat and addressed McGee first. "How'd the footage turn out?"

      McGee shared a glance with Kasie. "Despite sharpening it to the best of our abilities, we only have a likeness. Running it through facial rec got us nowhere. It's the angles, Parker."

      He nodded. "Nah, I understand. We'll catch a lucky break elsewhere in the case, McGee." He nodded to the women. "Jess, Kasie?"

      Knight inhaled. "VIN came back clean while I helped Kasie go over the truck." She tipped her head Kasie's way.

      Kasie did a double-take and scoffed. "Jess, I cannot take all the credit for this one." She looked at each of the men in turn. "Thanks to her fantastic memory, we were able to find an intact bullet in the passenger seat."

      Torres scoffed, himself. "You're kidding."

      "No, Nick, I'm not."

      Parker furrowed his brow. "Have you run it yet?"

      Kasie shook her head. "We just finished everything with the truck. I'll come in early tomorrow morning and get to work on identifying the manufacturer and weapon then. But I'm with Knight on this one—it's not Navy-issue."

      "So it might not be Delia's gun, just his car," Parker said, drawing the same conclusion they had.

      Knight's knee bounced impatiently under her desk, but she stilled it with her hand, her eyes darting from him to Torres and back. "…how'd it go with Mr. Delia?"

      Parker glanced at Torres, who pulled a face. "Mr. Delia's…a kind man," Parker said.

      "But?"

      Torres scratched the back of his head and put his hands on his hips. "Something—just doesn't sit right about him, y'know?"

      The other three shared a look, and McGee quirked an eyebrow. "In what way?"

      Parker made a so-so gesture with his hand. "The neighborhood's pretty nice-looking. Clean streets. Mostly single-family homes, a few split-levels and double-deckers."

      "But Mr. Delia himself," Torres said. "He and his house look worn. Like. They don't belong? I'd almost expect someone to say something, but neighbors walking by just smile at the man." He winced even though Parker nodded in agreement. "I dunno. It's just an odd atmosphere."

      "And it's something else to press in the morning," Parker said. He motioned at his team with a jerk of his chin. "Day's over, folks. This case will still be here tomorrow."

      Torres and McGee nodded, with the former making a beeline for his desk to turn off his light and grab his bag. Torres was the first to leave, since McGee wanted to tighten up a file first.

      Parker drew near Knight's desk and drummed his fingers on the front. He dropped his volume. "So…are you heading to your place or coming home?"

      Knight pursed her lips. Around him, she met Kasie's eyes, since the scientist had been chatting with McGee on her way out. Kasie's big eyes clearly read "Need a bailout?", so Parker had been overheard. But Knight subtly shook her head. "I'll go home with you," she answered softly as she shut down her computer for the night.

      Parker's shoulders visibly slackened as his tension lessened.

      "As long as you treat me like Jess," Knight continued. She stared up at him, unblinking. "Just—your Jess. Not she-was-in-an-accident-today Jess."

      He nodded, once, twice. The reminder of his behavior today turned him surprisingly docile, and Parker kept respectfully out of her way as Knight got ready to leave. Even in the elevator, he was quiet.

      Knight actually began to worry she'd been harsh with him a few times too many today, since his silence and politeness continued even as they exited the building together.

      But finally it broke on their way out to the car. They were halfway down the aisle when Parker blurted, "Jess, I'm—I'm sorry. Really. For worrying. For being overbearing. I just—I'm sorry."

      At least they weren't butting heads anymore. Still, Knight sighed and gave him half a smile. "Thank you, Alden. I don't want you to be sorry for worrying, though. I like that you care enough to worry. The overbearing part needs work, though, true. But." She waited until they were by his car and she could push him, gently, against the side and lean into him. She jabbed a finger into his chest. "I haven't forgiven you quite yet, okay? I want you to lighten up around this case. I can and will work it. Hell, I even helped Kasie find that piece of evidence a shit-ton faster since she had an idea where to look thanks to me." Knight stared up at him and patted his scruffy jawline. "Understood?"

      Parker nodded once more. "Understood."

      This time, she really felt that she'd been heard, and Knight was ready to start fresh. And what better way to start fresh than with a makeup kiss?

      …there was, of course, makeup breakfast, too, in a way. Rather, it was breakfast as usual, with Parker waking first and then Knight, and them having enough time to make their meal together before sitting down to enjoy it. For the first time in twenty-four hours, Parker basically was back to his old self, and Knight couldn't be happier to have her Parker back.

      But Parker was one worrywart. She still had two knuckleheads at the office to handle.

      Knight and Parker arrived at the office on time after grabbing coffee and pastries, and Knight had a sliver of hope that McGee and Torres would mind their own business since it was a fresh day. But she rounded the wall of the bullpen partially making up her desk area and nearly collided with McGee if it weren't for Parker bracing her by the elbow. "McGee—"

      "Oh, Knight, sorry!" He patted his pockets for napkins and dove to his desk for tissues.

      But Knight took the handkerchief Parker offered instead and dabbed her blouse where some of her coffee had splashed. "In a hurry this morning?" she asked, never minding how huffy she sounded.

      McGee did his fish impression and looked between her and Parker. "Oh, uh, I, uh. No." He glanced at Torres. "I just figured you'd be getting in, so…"

      Knight pinched the bridge of her nose and set her things down. Then she turned and marched between his and Torres' spaces so they each had a good view of her. "All right. Tim. Nick. Yesterday was irritating enough. Stop acting jumpy in the office, or it's gonna carry out into the field, whether or not you realize it."

      Torres opened his mouth to protest, but Knight stared him down. He ducked his eyes instead.

      "So thanks, both of you, for caring, but knock it off now. Or keep it up and you'll be doing my paperwork for the next month so I get to go home early," Knight decided as the idea came to her. Finally, something to make her smile.

      That had Torres protesting now. He scoffed, shot her a look, and glared at Parker. "Hey! Parker, c'mon. She can't really do that, can she? I mean—McGee and I—we both outrank her on this team."

      But Knight caught in her peripheral vision Parker throwing his hands up in surrender and would bet he was busy suppressing his laughter, too. "This matter is for the three of you to settle and I won't stand in your way."

      "I distinctly recall three of us being overprotective yesterday," Torres griped.

      "And I apologized like any decent gentleman."

      Knight smirked at her friend. "You might try that sometime, Nick, admitting you're wrong."

      Instead, he pulled a stink face. Yeah, she had nieces and nephews who were single digits and more mature.

      Yesterday's work resumed, though, and did help redirect the team's attention. Parker assisted McGee in splitting the work of digging into Ryan Foster–Shelley and his moving company, while Torres helped Knight with the task of reviewing in detail Yeoman Delia's history of evaluations. Delia's interactions with other sailors so far were normal, suggesting this was a dead end.

      "If everything's good at work, maybe it really isn't good at home," Parker remarked as the morning wore on.

      Knight lifted her head from another evaluation and set the file aside. "You mean his father's home?"

      "I haven't ruled out another visit. But I'm more curious about that neighborhood in the first place."

      Someone from across the room cleared their throat, but Torres had the bad luck of having no other agents walking past him at the time, so it gave him away. Knight narrowed her eyes at him. "I wouldn't mind meeting Mr. Delia myself," she stated.

      Luckily, before Torres could open his mouth insisting that he be the one to tag along, Parker's phone rang. "Yeah, Jimmy. Got it." Parker nodded to his team. "He's ready for us in Autopsy."

      "I'll come with," Knight said, pushing away from her computer and happy to stretch her legs.

      Parker waited until the elevator doors had closed in front of them. Then he waited an extra beat. "…paperwork for a month, huh?"

      Knight laughed at the reminder and held her head in her hand, trying to hide her grin. "It's a big win. After all, you did apologize, like a gentleman." She slid her eyes his way, grinning when some of that pink dusted Parker's cheeks.

      Parker exited the elevator first, ignoring her soft snickers behind him. "So, Dr. Palmer, what do you have for us?"

      Jimmy did a double-take. "'Us'?" Then he glimpsed Knight by Parker's shoulder. "Ah, Parker, Jess. That saves me a call, actually."

      Knight blinked at him. "It does?"

      "Yeah. But first—autopsy results for Mr. Foster–Shelley." Jimmy respectfully tugged the sheet covering Foster–Shelley partway down, so he missed the quizzical look Knight and Parker exchanged. "Ryan Foster–Shelley was in pretty excellent condition for his forty-two years. He was a little on the tall side but kept in good shape, maintaining a good muscle mass, which makes sense for his line of work. He needed all the power he could get hauling things around for customers in the moving business."

      "So he was well-suited to his line of work," Parker commented.

      "Very much so," Jimmy replied. "Aside from a bout of childhood asthma that was very minor and has been mostly dormant and therefore very sporadic into his adulthood, nothing would've stopped Mr. Foster–Shelley from living a long life." But he gestured at the body on his table.

      "Except for four rounds in his body," Knight stated.

      "Except for four rounds," Jimmy agreed. He passed them his report diagram to view. "As you can see, two bullets entered the thoracic cavity at odd angles. One nicked the bottom lobe of his left lung while the other…" Jimmy winced. "It sort of bounced around off his ribs, guys. It's—It's not pretty in there. A lot of bone shrapnel."

      "We'll take your word for it," Parker said. "So that's two out of four rounds. But your drawing shows one in his arm and—is that his neck?"

      Jimmy nodded. "One lodged itself in his biceps, flattened against the humerus. It's that last one that killed him, though." Jimmy pointed in turn to the entry wounds, ending with the gnarly sight that was the victim's neck. Despite the skin having been broiled briefly by the fire, it looked as though someone had taken a garden tool and raked it against him, clawing the neck open. "This bullet came in and hit his carotid on both sides."

      Knight squinted at the gruesome sight. "Damn…"

      "I pulled all the bullets and sent them up to Kasie for analysis already. Silver-tipped, so not what I usually see in here."

      Knight met his eyes. "Silver-tipped and brass jackets?"

      "I guess so. They were mostly squished or in pieces, though. You'll need to wait for Kasie's report. Why, was there another bullet?"

      She nodded. "Only one missed Foster–Shelley here."

      Jimmy frowned. "Wish I could say he was lucky, but." He pulled the sheet back up over their victim's head, hiding the gore from view.

      "Thank you, Jimmy," Parker said, handing the diagram back. He leaned Knight's way. "I'll head upstairs first."

      Knight furrowed her brow, but she realized why he chose to give her privacy when Autopsy's doors slid shut and Jimmy beamed at her. "Oh. Did the hospital send over my results?"

      The medical examiner nodded and plucked his gloves off, tossing them in the nearest wastebasket. He headed for his desk. "They did."

      "And?"

      "And Director Vance was right to permit you to continue to work. Your scan showed a very minor bruise on your brain—"

      She gaped at him.

      "—but it was smaller than a dime and over a really old injury, too. It'll heal on its own, aided with ice and pain meds, though rest will be best. But you can keep working just fine." Jimmy skimmed the fax before showing Knight. "I'm guessing you've been in similar situations before?"

      It was Knight's turn to frown as she scanned her MRI report, not reading it but searching for keywords. "Prior damage." "Good health." "CLEARED FOR DUTY." "Oh, uh. Yeah… One fender bender in college, but most of the time during my REACT years."

      Jimmy quirked an eyebrow, though that smile didn't fade when she met his eyes. "Everything all right, Jess? Thought you'd be happier, getting the all-clear."

      "No, I am." Knight shook her head and passed her results back. "It's just—"

      He hummed in the back of his throat. "Lemme guess. The mention of the old injury?"

      Knight shrugged with only her right shoulder. "…sort of." She stole a peek at the doors behind her, almost expecting Parker to be waiting for her out in the hallway. "…yesterday was crazy, Jimmy," she admitted. "Parker's good now, but McGee and Torres still have this stupidly chivalrous streak in them, and it's." Knight took a breath and offered the bespectacled man a tight smile. "Making me a bit snappish. So it's not great hearing that maybe they're right to be worried."

      "Jess, it's fine to be snappish. You went through a lot in one morning and then the guys didn't exactly let you forget it." Nevertheless, he waved the MRI report in front of her. "So you've had injuries in the past—you should ask Nick and Tim to divulge some of their close calls one of these days, make them put things into perspective."

      Knight was taken aback. "Well, Torres' undercover work would explain a lot, but hasn't McGee kinda always done his"—she pantomimed typing at a keyboard—"thing?"

      "There are a lot of stories you're missing. And maybe there are some you want to share at some point with us," he added, an encouraging twinkle in his eye. Then Jimmy set the report down and smoothed the front of his lab coat. "But this report says you're fine, and I concur. You also say and show that you're fine. If that's not enough, I could always bring the summary up and explain it to those two in detailed medical-ese to them?" He beamed again, but it was a more mischievous look this time.

      Knight laughed. "No, but I'll keep it in mind, Jimmy." She turned to leave.

      "Hey, Jess?"

      "Yeah?"

      Jimmy's smile was smaller this time. "I know they're overdoing it. But it's just the team's way of showing we care, you know? You're well-loved around here, Jess."

      Knight paused and nodded. "…yeah, I know."

      "You're in a better mood," Parker observed on the drive to Mr. Delia's Virginia home that afternoon.

      Knight nodded, since there was no use hiding it. "Jimmy got the hospital's MRI summary. I'm officially medically cleared to work, so we can all set our minds at ease now."

      He raised his eyebrows and glanced at her when they stopped at a red light. "You didn't want to mention that to Thing One and Thing Two back at the office before we left?"

      "Eh, I'll let them worry just a little bit longer. Besides, I was itching to get out of the office, and you said it was time to pay the yeoman's father a second visit, so." She shrugged.

      Parker did his scoff-chuckle. "Point taken."

      Knight looked at the GPS, which said they'd arrive in half an hour. "We're all still skeptical Stefan Delia's even involved, and we haven't drawn a line from him to Foster–Shelley yet. What if talking to Mr. Delia's a waste of time?"

      He frowned, deep enough that a dimple appeared beneath his whiskers. "…that's already occurred to me, but—something doesn't sit right with that neighborhood, Jess. You'll see for yourself when we get there."

      She noted the slight way his eyes narrowed and found herself frowning in conjunction. "Did the yeoman's ship ever get back to us?"

      Parker groaned. "Not quite. The vessel's locally docked, but a chunk of the crew is on leave, so they're trying to account for everyone. And they're having some comm issues on top of that."

      Knight leaned back in the passenger seat. "Well, look on the bright side, Alden."

      "Yeah? What's that?"

      "At least Kasie promised she'd be done running the ballistics when we return."

      It was bright enough to make him smirk and snicker, and Knight smiled, too.

      The Delias' community in Virginia was a smallish one, but it conjured the word "close-knit" in Knight's mind as she and Parker drove through the main thoroughfare before taking a rotary and weaving through several smaller roads into a sectioned neighborhood. Every building here, business and house alike, was nice and well-kept, and people frequently slowed down or stopped to chat with each other. It didn't matter if they were on foot or in cars.

      "…huh," Knight mumbled, smiling automatically when a stranger waved to her.

      "Sorry, but there's friendly, and then there's too friendly," Parker remarked.

      "What, you think places like this don't exist?"

      "Only in movies and TV shows, maybe."

      Knight stifled a chuckle, thinking him a sourpuss…but, honestly, she didn't disagree. Especially since becoming a cop, rarely had she received such a warm welcome anywhere.

      They made one more turn and rolled down the road at a snail's pace until Parker pulled over in front of a single-level, beige-colored home with dead grass. "We're here."

      She eyeballed the home and fought the urge to gawk. Especially in comparison to the other homes on either side of this one as well as across the street which all looked as if they'd been cut out of pricey, home-design magazines, this house was old and in need of repair. The siding hadn't been washed in a while, the door was worn, the roof was gray (and possibly not genuinely that color), the screen door hung off the top hinge, and the walkway leading from the driveway to the door was broken up by grass and weeds. There supposedly was a car under the tarp in the driveway, but Knight wondered if it were a full car or just parts.

      "Yeah, that was my and Torres' reaction the first time, too. Come on, Jess."

      Knight hustled to join Parker at his side, though both of them had to watch their step approaching the door. Parker tripped on one broken bit of path stone hidden by overgrowth, but Knight caught him in time.

      Parker knocked on the door trim, careful to avoid bringing the screen door down. "Mr. Delia, it's Special Agent Parker from NCIS."

      Footsteps shuffled inside. A moment later, the door cracked open, a beady eye peered at them, and then the door creaked open, revealing a pale, round man with some of Stefan Delia's facial features. "Oh. Agent Parker. Hello again." He cocked his head at Knight.

      "I'm Special Agent Jessica Knight, also NCIS. Nice to meet you, Mr. Delia."

      He smiled at them both and pushed the screen door open to welcome them inside. "Please, come in."

      "Thank you." Knight went first…but instantly wondered if that had been Parker's manners or because he already had experienced this home.

      Stefan Delia's childhood home was just as shopworn inside as it was out, but the stale smell assaulted Knight's nostrils the moment she crossed the threshold. It nearly made her eyes water, but more importantly it reminded Knight of her pre-NCIS days when she thought she'd have a different law-enforcement track as a ranger… That staleness was a particular scent one didn't forget, especially when one got used to earthen smells, like mildew. And mildew that was no longer damp but aired out? That was this staleness.

      Mr. Delia motioned them to the couch in his living room before heading into the next room, presumably for refreshments. That gave Knight a chance to catch Parker's eye.

      But he shook his head. "When Torres and I spoke with him, the guy claimed he sees his son often enough and they have a good relationship."

      "Often enough and doesn't notice all this?" Knight hissed back in undertones.

      "Please, have a seat," Mr. Delia said, returning with some water and crackers arranged on a square serving tray. He took the armchair positioned comfortably between the fireplace and the television.

      Parker remained standing by the end of the couch close to the door, so Knight bit the bullet and sat on the edge of the couch. Good thing, too, that it was the edge, because she could feel a pull behind her; if she backed up even an inch, she'd sink into these ancient cushions.

      "So, you wanted to talk about Stefan some more? I still haven't heard from him, and I couldn't find my copy of his schedule. I really don't remember if it's this month or next when my boy's on leave." His smile dimmed, and he sagged into his armchair. "…I do miss him, though."

      Knight softly cleared her throat. "Special Agents Parker and Torres mentioned to me that it's just you and your son. Has it always been that way?"

      Mr. Delia folded his hands in front of him, his elbows resting on the chair's armrests, and nodded. "Yes. As I told your colleagues, my wife passed when Steffie was still a young boy. At the time, the three of us had my father with us, too, but he went into a home when my wife passed, because I couldn't look after both him and my son on my own. My father"—he lowered his gaze briefly—"didn't last long in the home. So it's been just Steffie and me ever since."

      "I'm sure that's given the two of you a lot of time to bond, but I can imagine it's been incredibly lonely at the same time, Mr. Delia."

      He shook his head. "No. Not in this community. Everyone here treats you like family—like those commercials for that restaurant," the father added with a laugh.

      Knight's eyes flickered to Parker's. Neither of them laughed. "Yeah, we, ah, noticed how friendly people are around here, waving to strangers as if we're locals," Knight commented.

      "That doesn't surprise me. Folks are just polite and extra nice here." Mr. Delia's eyes brightened. "Oh! That reminds me that I have Mrs. Montclair's casserole dish to return to her." He pushed up from his chair. "Uh, if you'll excuse me for just a minute—I want to bring it out here so I don't forget it later."

      "Sure, Mr. Delia. Go right ahead."

      He nodded his thanks, giving Knight the opportunity to scoot closer to Parker and lower her volume. "Maybe we're just not used to having good neighbors, where we come from," she pointed out.

      But Parker stroked his beard. "It's not just Foster–Shelley's background coming up too squeaky clean that doesn't add up. When McGee ran Yeoman Delia's financials, it showed that a lot of his paycheck comes right back home to his father. This isn't a large house, and clearly that money's not going to upkeep. So where's it going?"

      Mr. Delia returned then and set down an ivory crock with a marigold pattern rimming the bottom. Then he laughed. "Ah, almost forgot the lid."

      Parker's phone hummed with a Bandium notification. "Perhaps it's time Special Agent Knight and I got going, Mr. Delia. We've still got a lot to uncover, so we need to head back."

      The elderly man frowned but nodded. "I understand. But I do hope you hear from Steffie's ship soon. I'm sure this is all a misunderstanding. Someone else must've stolen his SUV, Agent Parker."

      Parker pursed his lips but didn't offer the man any condolences. Instead, he tipped his head to him, and Knight thanked him for the refreshments. Outside, Parker wasn't as quiet. "Kasie says she's ready for us, and it's—I quote—'a whopper.'"

      "That all?" Knight asked.

      "No. I had Torres pause with the evaluations to investigate this neighborhood, and he just got back to me. In the past five years, there've only been three reported incidents."

      Knight caught his arm, stopping him in his tracks halfway back to the car. "Less than one crime a year?!"

      Parker's eyebrows hovered high above his eyes, too. "I don't think that makes sense, either. While we should head back soon, we're not exactly done here. I think it's time to have a chat with some of our friendly neighborhood inhabitants."

      They had their pick of faces. The aforementioned Mrs. Montclair lived in the Colonial across the street, the Heymans were out for a jog with their two chocolate labs, Mr. Syed was pruning his camellia bushes next door, and the sisters Duff were playing cards on their front porch up the road.

      Afternoon melted into proper day as Knight and Parker met with each of these neighbors. The Heymans Parker left to Knight, since the couple didn't want to interrupt their exercise for a chat, and she could keep up while interviewing them at the same time, so Parker discussed neighborhood dynamics and plants with Mr. Syed. They reconvened to introduce themselves to Mrs. Montclair, who offered the panting Knight ice water with a lemon slice (served in what Knight would swear was crystal), and they pried themselves away half an hour later to interview the Duffs, who only talked with them on the condition that Knight and Parker played a round of gin rummy against them. The NCIS agents lost, but the sisters took pity and shared their gossip anyway.

      The sky was turning yellow–orange by the time Knight and Parker wound their way back to the car. "This has been one of the most exhausting days on the job by far," Knight mumbled as she slid into the passenger seat.

      "But enlightening," Parker remarked. He hesitated before turning the engine over. "No one claimed to be familiar with Foster–Shelley and said they have no use for a moving man anyway since people rarely leave here… Everyone praised this neighborhood as being the safest in the country. And, when it comes to the Delias, they have nothing but nice things to say."

      "Yeah… But I also noticed how they all feed Mr. Delia, often." Knight furrowed her brow. "I mean, his house is run-down, sure, but it seems…functional? Does he really need handouts?"

      "I thought the same. I mean, I have a couple neighbors in my building I trade dishes with every now and then, but not monthly, let alone weekly. And Mr. Delia's neighbors gave me the impression they have a schedule going, to cover nearly every day of the week."

      Knight buckled up and pulled out her phone. "I'll message McGee and see what he can dig up on Mr. Delia himself. Maybe the son's caught in something that goes back to the father."

      "Maybe…"

      The drive back gave them time to toss around theories about Mr. Delia's involvement. Parker mused that the father's background in correspondence might've given him access to top-secret information, perhaps by accident, that could've made him a good target for blackmail. Knight wasn't so certain Mr. Delia's naval history had anything to do with it, though; he wasn't someone who mentioned his past even to highlight a single achievement—he was focused solely on his son.

      But those theories weren't anything solid, and McGee and the rest met them in the bullpen when they returned at the end of the day. McGee's grim face gave away that he did have something new to share.

      "Don't tell me Delia, Sr., was hiding national secrets in his service record," Knight said when she met McGee's eyes.

      He shook his head. "It's not that. I just heard back from Yeoman Delia's ship."

      Parker's eyes darted to Knight. "Not there?"

      "He's one of several sailors on leave, and no one's heard from him since he left the ship. No one knew his plans, either. His CO said that his usual M.O. is to go see his dad, but Delia didn't bring it up at all this time. And, Parker—yesterday was his last day on leave. Delia's AWOL."

      Parker blew out a long breath and rubbed his brow. "So we have a dead moving truck owner down in Autopsy with no connection to the Delias, a father with neighbors who go beyond 'helpful,' and a missing sailor whose vehicle was used in a crime."

      McGee nodded and Torres huffed from between Jimmy and Kasie beside the taller man. "Rule thirty-nine," Torres grumbled. "No coincidences, man, and this reeks of coincidence."

      "Which makes me the second bearer of bad news," Kasie stated with a wince. "The bullets Jimmy pulled from Ryan Foster–Shelley and Jess and I found in the truck's remains are .45 Colts. Guys, these are rounds meant for an Army revolver, specifically the Colt Single Action."

      "Army?" Parker echoed.

      "And the news gets worse from there. The striations on the intact slug from the truck match a Colt on two other open Metro cases." She pursed her lips. "Since I know you guys by now and figured bringing in Army on this might complicate things, I made a few, low-key, friendly calls to Metro's forensics department myself."

      "Kasie," Knight warned.

      "Don't worry—we're all good." Kasie grabbed the clicker off McGee's desk and brought up the photos from her work on the plasma. "It turns out Metro's been seeing more of these rounds in recent years, to the point where they've dubbed this particular revolver a street weapon for our area."

      The team sighed. "Because anyone can just go and buy one," Knight presumed.

      "Exactly, and most military have transitioned to issuing SIGs these days." Kasie held up a finger. "So the ammunition isn't much of a lead anymore. However." She clicked, and a 3D image of the truck and SVU took up the screen. "I spent the other half of my day working on this mockup using Metro's calculations. I can definitely conclude that, given wind and traveling speed, only someone with extensive gun training could've made these shots."

      "So…we've narrowed our suspect down to the entire U.S. military," Torres summarized.

      Kasie shrugged. "Hey, I work with what evidence I'm given. The rest is Special Agent stuff."

      Except they were running out of "Special Agent stuff" to do. Nevertheless, Parker nodded to McGee. "McGee, if you haven't already, put out a BOLO for Yeoman Delia. Even if he turns out to be a victim, too, in all of this, the sooner we find him, the better."

      That left Torres and Knight to finish with the evaluations and Parker to catch Vance up, as well as touch base with Delia's commanding officers, on the off chance there were any extraneous details they had that could help. But, aside from Knight and Torres confirming that Delia was well-liked by the enlisted and got along well with the younger sailors, they had nothing else new to work that night.

      "And so concludes a second, fruitless day into this investigation," Knight said with a sigh when she got her desk light.

      Parker cleared his throat, though, catching her eye and tipping his head in Torres' and McGee's direction.

      Ah, right. In all the "excitement," she'd forgotten to catch those two up on her good news. "Hey, uh, Tim, Nick…."

      Luckily, by the next morning, McGee was back to his norm and even smiling at her again. Torres would take at least half the day if not a bribe before he stopped grumping at her for their being the last ones she told about receiving her clean bill of health. All in all, Knight finally considered things to be going her way.

      But that seemed like small beans when compared to their case. The BOLO on Delia was out with no hits yet, leaving little else to do. It was enough to make Knight want to pull her hair out—and she had half a mind to do so but settled for burying her fingers in her locks behind her computer screen. "Admit it: We've come up short," she groaned.

      "We've come up short," Torres delivered.

      She picked her head up and narrowed her eyes at him from across the room. He scrunched his nose up at her, grouchy, but he couldn't hold the expression for long, not when he looked as exhausted as the rest of them.

      Parker sighed off to Knight's left. "And you two found nothing in Delia's work files?"

      Torres crossed his arms and shook his head. "No. The guy's well-liked and has no complaints against him."

      Perhaps it was the second night of decent rest…or having several of her own worries off her mind…but hearing Torres say "well-liked" caught her attention. Knight sat up straight in her chair. "Yeah, no complaints whatsoever," she confirmed.

      McGee scoffed gently. "Yeah, no, we, uh, we got that, Knight."

      "No—" She looked from Torres to Parker. "It's like having barely any crime in the Delias' neighborhood. Not that they're related, but. What if Stefan Delia's got his father's charm?"

      Parker furrowed his brow. "…Jess, I'm not following."

      "Their neighbors all know and look after Mr. Delia. What if Stefan Delia has even one or two people like that on his ship?" She met their eyes in turn. "It could be a stretch, but…

      Now he connected her dots. "You think one of the enlisted he evaluated might be a personal connection?"

      "And they might know where Yeoman Delia's gone. Hell, they might even know something about the shooting."

      Parker stroked the dense patch of whiskers on his chin. "That's not a bad idea…" He got up and took the few steps to her desk, holding his hand out. "Let's further split the evals. Torres, give half of your pile to McGee. We're looking for anyone from the Delias' neighborhood or the surrounding towns with familiar surnames." He grabbed his travel notepad from his blazer's inside breast pocket. "And, by familiar, I mean 'Duff,' 'Heyman,' 'Montclair,' 'Syed.' Keep an eye out for close misspellings and mothers' maiden names, too."

      The white noise of the office faded with their constant typing and paper-flipping in progress. There was the occasional gasp and grumble from McGee, cursed to get a papercut with every profile he reviewed, but the team's focus was narrowed to just this task now.

      Then again, even with splitting up sixth months' worth of evaluations amongst the four of them, it wasn't quick work. Knight was more than halfway through her pile when McGee piped up.

      "Tim, I swear, just grab another box of Band-Aids from the supply closet—no one will notice or care," Torres half snapped at their friend.

      McGee shot him a tiny glare. "It's not that." He hit "ENTER" on his keyboard and aimed the clicker at the plasma. "It's this."

      A file and photo flashed onscreen. The official picture depicted an expressionless, young, blue-eyed sailor with the usual Marine buzz cut.

      "This is Douglas Montclair, a Seaman Apprentice aboard the yeoman's ship."

      Parker and Knight tore their eyes from the screen to stare at McGee. "Related to that Mrs. Montclair? From across the street?" Parker asked.

      "So it would seem. Douglas is her grandson."

      Knight frowned. "Why would Delia be in touch with a neighbor's grandson? Just a hometown connection? Maybe an unexpected romance?"

      McGee shrugged. "Could be either. You said you never found much of interest for Stefan Delia on social media, so he could be the type to keep his private life, well, private." He shook his head. "But I can't be sure, either. What I can tell you is that Stefan Delia went to high school with Douglas Montclair's parents, so these two families are closer than they've given us the impression before."

      Parker exhaled, low and slow—it might've been a growl if they didn't have this lead, Knight knew. "Regardless of what kind of connection these two have, they have one. And I'm willing to bet Seaman Montclair's leave status is questionable, as well," he grumbled, turning around for his office phone to dial the yeoman's ship once more.

      "I don't like this," Knight declared later that night.

      Parker froze, clearing away their plates after supper. He glanced at the empty dishes in hand. "You'll have to clarify, because I've never seen you turn down Italian, and you inhaled the cheesy garlic knots like usual."

      She blinked and shook her head. "Oh! Oh, jeez, sorry, Alden." She smiled at him, though the action was twitchy. "I think I left my head at the office."

      "Conversation was pretty quiet tonight over our meal, but I don't mind." He rounded the corner, disappearing for a second to deposit the dishes, and returned with his hands in his pockets. Parker leaned against the corner between the kitchen and the small dining room. "I certainly can't blame you, not when I've been known to do it myself."

      "Yet another hazard of the job," she remarked. But Knight's thoughts didn't dwell on her accident this time. Instead, her preoccupation was tangled up with where their leads had taken them. "I'm just curious about the Delias and the Montclairs."

      Parker quirked an eyebrow and cocked his head slightly, his nonverbal Go right ahead.

      Knight leaned back in her seat and chewed on her lower lip. "Well, I'm more confused about the Montclairs. It wasn't surprising when the ship got back to us to confirm that Seaman Montclair was still on leave."

      "At least he's not AWOL. Yet," Parker tacked on.

      She nodded. "I guess it's more Stefan Delia and his dad that are on my mind." Knight got to her feet and drew closer to Parker. "By all accounts, they're good people who've done good work and have made good friends wherever they go. And yet…"

      "You wonder why Stefan Delia would leave his father to live in just this side of squalor?"

      "Mr. Delia insists that they're in touch and his son visits when he can, and I didn't pick up on any suggestions that he was lying. Not in his tone, not in his body language." Knight frowned. "…I'm not off my game because of the crash."

      Parker, thankfully, nodded. He reached out and trailed his fingers down her right arm, tugging her by the hand to him. "Jess, you've had some of our best ideas on this case. You're definitely not off your game."

      "Then why am I so bothered by the Delias?"

      "Probably for the same reason that it makes me uncomfortable to visit Mr. Delia."

      That snagged her attention. Knight locked eyes with him. "You mean the smell?"

      "Well, smells can be unpleasant, true." Parker pursed his lips. "It's a reminder of my father, Jess."

      "But…you and Roman get along fine."

      "No, we can stand to be in the same room. And we do a lot better when there are witnesses," he darkly joked. He smirked when he added, "It helps that we're both quite fond of you." Then Parker sighed. "But if Dad didn't have my siblings doing their share of caring, I don't know how often I'd be going around to see him. Whether I consciously chose to avoid him or made it an unconscious habit." He paused here and waited for Knight to draw her own conclusion.

      She twisted her lips around, but…since he'd admitted to his shortcomings with his father… Knight heaved a sigh, too. "Yeah, okay. My family's a big basket of surprises, but it's hard to think of the Delias without thinking of my mom." Knight leaned in and tucked her head under Parker's chin. "It doesn't help that I'd literally just come back from three unpleasant days with her."

      "Ah, I doubt they were only unpleasant. Maybe a little irritating, too."

      Knight laughed against his chest, happy when she felt the rumble of his chuckle. She closed her eyes. "No matter the ups and down I've had with her… I can't imagine letting our relationship deteriorate to the point where I didn't know what was going on with her. If that's the Delias' situation," she tacked on, since they still had too many variables in the case.

      Parker pulled his other arm free so he could wrap them around Knight. "No, you wouldn't let that happen, Jess," he agreed. "It's just difficult when pieces of an investigation hit too close to home. But you're not alone."

      "I know." She lifted her head enough for Parker to press a kiss to her forehead. "I've got people looking out for me and caring for me," she added, giving him a light pat on the back.

      At the evidence that he was, indeed, better at caring for loved ones than he sometimes believed, Parker huffed. But he didn't disagree, not in the least bit.

      What was the morning of day four of their investigation, Knight wholly expected to turn stale. Wake up and head in to the office expecting little—that way, one wouldn't be too disappointed when yet another lead dried up.

      Instead, barely fifteen minutes after everyone made it into the office and Torres, Knight, and Kasie fought over the last doughnut hole, McGee's phone rang. All eyes went to him as he scribbled notes down.

      "BOLO's back," he said.

      "Delia or Montclair?" Parker asked, since they'd added the second BOLO the moment they'd learned about Douglas Montclair being on leave.

      "Seaman Montclair." McGee tore the note off the top and grabbed his things. "He was just chatting with some fellow sailors at a bar not far from the docks, and one of the sailors just told their CO that Montclair was heading back, too."

      "Then let's go," Parker said, setting his coffee and treats down to grab his things.

      Knight and Torres geared up, too, but—despite the cleared air—she noted the hesitancy in McGee's and Torres' glances as they went to exit the bullpen. "What?" she spat.

      McGee opened his mouth, but no sound came out, so Torres supplied, "Jess, working the case up until now has been one thing. But are you one-hundred percent? We don't know if Montclair is armed or alone. If Delia shows up, armed…"

      Her hackles rose, her anger from three days ago surging. It didn't help that Parker bit his lower lip. "I'm medically cleared, and you and I are the best shots on this team," she aimed at Torres. If need be, she'd bring up her sniper skills outranking theirs, as well.

      But those reminders were enough for Parker. "No, Jess is right," he agreed. "We don't know exactly what we're heading into, but having all four of us will minimize the chances of a prolonged firefight." He ushered the other three towards the elevator. "Come on, now. And, McGee, get back on the line once you're in the car—alert the boatyard's security that we're coming and that they're to monitor but not interact. I don't want them trying to detain Montclair or Delia until we've assessed that they aren't carrying and don't have anything rigged."

      Torres did a double-take. "You don't think they'd blow up their ship?"

      "Highly unlikely. Nothing suggests it, but we also don't really know their states of mind or whether they're villain or victim. NCIS needs to handle it, first and foremost."

      The boatyard where their ship was docked was less than fifteen minutes away by car. The MCRT passed by the bar Montclair had been in on the way, and Parker and Knight slowed to scan for both the Seaman Apprentice as well as for the yeoman, to no avail.

      Things weren't terribly lively at the docks, thankfully. "But that could change soon. Leave ends today," McGee shared when they arrived and parked along the street to blend in with civilian vehicles.

      Parker and Torres led the way across the street to the docks. "If either one is involved, escaping on a ship is a damn good way to get away with murder—temporarily," Parker griped.

      Knight and McGee followed close behind, and Knight's eyes landed on the boarding deck itself. A sailor came down partway and waved to a friend passing by as well as another just reaching the docks—then he looked up and caught Knight's gaze.

      His face wasn't memorable, but those blue eyes were.

      "Guys, I've got eyes on Seaman Montclair," she warned, picking up her pace.

      The others did, too, but Montclair's buddy turned at the same time. And it made sense why: Yeoman Stefan Delia watched four NCIS Special Agents close in on him, and he paled and unzipped his windbreaker to reach inside.

      "Don't do it, Delia!" Parker bellowed. He and Torres, closer by a yard, brought their weapons up to aim.

      But so had Delia, as well as Montclair in the chaos. Multiple shots rang out, sending the team ducking for cover and sailors aboard the ship shouting in fear. Some of those shots bounced around the shipping containers and nearby vehicles on the dock while others came too close to the agents' feet on the ground.

      McGee provided Knight with cover, so she blasted several rounds at Delia, the closer gunman. But that only served to drive Delia further up the walkway and give him a better vantage point.

      She scowled; she no longer had any doubts about Delia's involvement with Foster–Shelley's death. "Put the gun down, Yeoman Delia! You and Seaman Montclair both! You know exactly why we're here, and you know it's better to surrender."

      "I'm not surrendering!!" Delia promised. With her voice to pinpoint, he readjusted his aim and fired off several more bullets.

      Knight and McGee sank low behind the shipping container. "Any suggestions?" she groaned at her partner.

      "Aside from wishing for them to trip and their guns to fall out of their hands, no," McGee supplied with a frown.

      "Moving on to Montclair, then." Knight peered above the container and noted the way Montclair had positioned himself at the top of the walkway, beyond Delia's shoulder. That would do…

      She only got two shots off, but two did the trick. They hit Montclair in center mass, towards his shoulder, and the young sailor dropped to his knees.

      But the sight of his companion wounded infuriated Delia. He aimed once more but with seething anger in his eyes—

      McGee yanked Knight down out of the way of what would've been a headshot, and she swore she heard both their hearts pounding. He fumbled to pat her arm and met her eyes. "I, uh, I get the feeling Parker would kill me if something happened to you," he remarked.

      Knight's eyes widened at that funny, half-bewildered expression of his. Strange, that nearly getting her head blown off and slow-on-the-uptake McGee finally grasping their scuttlebutt both made her tense up. She dumbly nodded. "Thanks," Knight added a beat later.

      "Jess! McGee!" Parker called out.

      "We're good!" she replied.

      "Enough of this," they heard Torres snarl, and Knight and McGee shared a worried look, hoping he wasn't about to do something stupid—

      But they needn't worry about him, judging by the scuffle up ahead. The agents cautiously came out of hiding and watched as other emboldened sailors, seizing the opportunity with Montclair maimed, jumped on Delia and subdued him. One stuck his head up and shouted down, "Hey, NCIS! He's all yours!"

      Knight, Parker, McGee, and Torres exchanged incredulous looks. But it was Torres' grin that broke the tension and excitement of the last several minutes. "Man, I love this job—especially if that part gets done for me," the cheeky fellow quipped as he led their way up to cuff their suspect.

      "So a yeoman and a sailor from two different generations," Vance said that evening. "It sounds like the opening to a bad joke."

      Knight leaned against the conference table in the director's office while Parker, as usual, stood to her left with his hands calmly in his pockets. She gestured to the report on Vance's desk. "The case file's as complete as it'll get, Director."

      "Your team detained Yeoman Delia and Seaman Montclair first thing this morning," Vance directed at Parker. To both of them, he said, "You've had all day to wrap things up."

      Knight clasped her hands in front of her. "We spent most of the day trying to get Delia and Montclair to turn on each other. Instead, we got everything except that detail."

      "And Kasie says the evidence supports either version," Parker chimed in. "Delia, born and bred in the Navy, admits he's close with his father. But he hasn't been back to his childhood home in a while. When he'd come home, it'd be brief, just to meet at their favorite family restaurant in the town square. So he'd been out of touch with his father's situation."

      "That's where Foster–Shelley came in," Knight stated. "The neighbors were putting on an act. None of the neighbors wanted to admit it before, but we made more calls today and dug a little deeper to confirm what Yeoman Delia learned. Ryan Foster–Shelley took this moving business that he'd inherited from his mother and turned it into a front for his own, sleazy side hustle, shaking people down. It was the classic 'pay for protection' play."

      Vance quirked an eyebrow. "The whole neighborhood knew about this man?"

      "They did. But they covered for his presence better than Mr. Delia could, because almost all the other families have old money to fall back on. Mr. Delia's money had dried up and he was starting to offer up some of what his son would send him on occasion."

      Parker grimaced. "This prick took advantage of Mr. Delia while his son was at sea. The father's basically destitute. He's been living off favors this whole time."

      Their director closed the report and tented his fingers. "Then what does Seaman Montclair have to do with this?"

      Knight glanced at Parker and answered this one. "Montclair really is fond of Delia, since they come from the same place. They're friends. But, when Montclair enlisted and they hung out more and got to talking about the neighborhood, things didn't add up. Montclair never thought of it being all that friendly and he mentioned that his grandmother really pities Delia's father. Delia, of course, asked what Montclair meant by that, but Montclair didn't exactly know. So they decided to dig together. Delia learned Foster–Shelley's name from Montclair's parents and heard at the same time that his father actually had ruined his good will and reputation with the neighborhood. Realizing they were on their own again, just him and his father, Stefan Delia bought a gun off the street and tracked Foster–Shelley down with Montclair's help and info from their other neighbors."

      "So Delia's truck, Delia's father, Delia's neighborhood—but we don't have a shooter," Vance summed up.

      Both agents shook their heads. "They used their service weapons at the boatyard. …Delia did have the gun on him when we took him into our custody," Knight said, "but it was wiped clean. And neither of them will confess and give the other up."

      Vance heaved a sigh, and it was a large, long one that made Parker stand at attention and also had Knight standing up straight. "Well, we can still hold them on their charges for what transpired at the docks this morning, though I wish we could determine the shooter, given that person's actions are responsible for all injuries pertaining to the car accidents earlier this week."

      "Sir?" Parker prompted.

      "It means, I hope Miss Hines will use some of her magic to discover the evidence you need to close your case." He shifted his hands then, moved to folding them lightly atop the report so they could feel the full weight of his gaze.

      Knight shifted from foot to foot. She fought the urge to swallow the nervous lump in her throat, too, but it kept her from blurting the question on the tip of her tongue.

      Perhaps Vance had some magic of his own, being something of a mind reader. He looked from her to Parker and back. "This issue aside, I'm satisfied with how you handled this case."

      She released her breath. Good. "I just wish we had something better to tell Mr. Delia's father," Knight thought aloud.

      Parker hummed in agreement. "Not to mention the Montclairs now, too."

      Strangely, Vance smiled at them. "I'm sure you'll figure that out. Together."

      Knight's nervousness returned. Vance's words caught Parker off-guard, too, given the way his eyes widened.

      "I'd still like for Special Agent Knight to report to me directly, for now," Vance continued, "but…a job well done, you two. You can pass along my sentiments to Special Agents McGee and Torres, as well."

      "Oh, uh. Y-Yeah," Knight said. She turned to leave as Parker nodded, just behind her.

      Yet Vance had one more thing to add, and he cleared his throat first. "By the way, Special Agent Parker, there are exigent circumstances for when one's team…or family," he stated with a nod to Knight, "is in the hospital. You don't need to dodge my calls or have Torres make up an excuse for you in the future. That's all. You're dismissed."

      Knight waited until they made it outside Vance's secretary's office. Then she half turned to Parker, sharing a look with him and breaking into a tiny smile. "You dodged the director's calls? For me?"

      Parker pulled a face, but the pink tinge to his peachy cheeks over Vance letting that tidbit slip gave him away. "I told you," he grumbled, "work doesn't come first anymore." He stared into her eyes, hazel meeting copper. "You're more important."

      The ups and downs of family… The ups and downs of the last several days… All of that melted away when she heard him say those words. Knight briefly rested her head against his chest and chuckled, thinking how far she and Parker had come, getting to this point. And then she pecked his whiskered jawline and linked their fingers before they headed back downstairs.

D8 ZOMG. So… I thought "Zeptosecond" was a story that got bigger and bigger the more I worked on it. And then I had the idea for this beast, its sequel. Sure, it's shorter, but not by much, but I'm beginning to think that's the deal with case fics??? IDK! Case fics are HARD and take so much energy. Point: I drafted this back on September 3rd (can u tell I wasn't even waiting for the season premiere ;P) and I have been working on this steadily, only pausing a few times to work on a handful of other NCIS fics (and ngl a few things for other fandoms, but I digress ;P). But I do hope that this reads like an episode of the show (altho yes, ma'am, I am making up license plates/evidence stuff/yadda, so pls don't mind me c: and take it all with a grain of salt, esp if I have any military stuff confused bc that stuff is confusing no matter how much research I do *LOL*). My main goals here were to show that Parknight has had some growth since "Zeptosecond" (they're working a lot more on their communication and watching their communication since hiccups in the previous story) and to show whether Vance would be happy with the arrangement Knight suggested—and he is! :D Toss in a few headcanons as well as some s20 Easter eggs (and even some Easter eggs for those of you who've read some of my other Parknight fics :3), and we have this nice, long, oneshot. XD So, a couple little deets: A "yoctosecond" is one septillionth (10-24) of a second, making it even shorter than a zeptosecond (all it took was a split-second for Knight to end up in danger here, after all); it's also the shortest lifetime currently measured—in physics, (according to chemistryviews.org), "The elementary particle Z-boson has a mean lifetime of less than a yoctosecond, 0.26ys." That's an incredibly short average! (I'm also allowed to nerd out; I was a STEM major in uni. ;P) When Knight mentioned UMC as the hospital where she might end up, that's a real place! It's United Medical Center; they do serve a lot of military and personnel there. Final thoughts: Idk if I have more in this particular universe, but I'm always getting Parknight ideas, so at least you know you can count on there being more Parknight in general from me! Regardless, always feel free to drop me a line to chat about Parker, Knight, Parknight, or NCIS in general, and if you're a reader/reviewer, then feel free to request, too, after having a glance at my Req FAQs!

Thanks for reading, and feel free to leave an anon/unsigned review via the FFN link or comment via the AO3 link at the top of the post, especially if you enjoyed this!

~mew

[thywintwobird]

Roses and kittens - part 8 pov Tina

Tina felt like she had improved. She really did. Having someone else to practice with was working infinitely better than trying to do flips and air boxing alone in her room.

There was something exhilarating about standing in a field and trying to beat the crap out of her friend. Neither of them got too injured, as their respective transformations boosted both durability and pain tolerance.

Callahan was floating on the sidelines, occasionally giving pointers. He was able to help them both improve, and develop at least some technique.

Tina threw a punch that sent Foolish back a couple feet. As he recovered, she readied her stance again.

“Ow” Foolish pouted “why are you so mean”

“Because you're bad and you suck at this. I’ll get you!” Tina shouted as she lunged at him.

He laughed and sidestepped to dodge her strike.

They continued to spar like this until the sun started to go down. The area they were in was fairly remote, and it was unlit during the night. Tina said her goodbyes and parted ways with Foolish.

She walked home with Callahan by her side. When Tina got home she flopped onto her bed. The training had helped. She felt a little better about her abilities if the minions came back. Or when. She wasn’t really too sure about them.

Callahan had informed her that Hypixel currently had three champions, and that she’d already met all of them.

Tina thought back to her past opponents. There was the guy with the giant frog. That had been strange. She never could have predicted how her life would change the day he first showed up.

Then there was the kid with the purple cloak. He had been a bit scary, being the first one who wasn’t blindsided by her. But now she wasn’t alone, and she was sure they could beat him again.

And finally there was the one with the wings that almost seemed to glow in the light. The image was burned into her mind. Tina knew she was evil and trying to take over the world, but she could appreciate the aesthetic.

Tina fell asleep thinking about wings the colour of autumn and dangerous flowers.

She woke up to the sound of her phone’s notifications. Tina groggily looked over at the invitation on her screen. 

Who is calling for you, guardian?

“Good morning Callahan” Tina said, still shaking off the sleepiness “oh it’s Karl. He’s asking to hang out today.”

I don’t know who that is. But I trust you’ll remain vigilant even in your off time.

“Don’t worry, I will” Tina smiled at Callahan and looked back at her phone to respond to Karl.

T: sounds good :)

And so she got ready to head about her day.

Hanging out with Karl was nice. Sure the minions of Hypixel could show up at any moment and spread distrust and discord, but one had to maintain a proper work life balance when fighting the forces of evil.

They went and ordered drinks. Karl pretended like he had no money on him and Tina ended up paying for them both. He claimed he would pay her back, but only time would tell.

As they were walking down a road, Tina felt the now familiar feeling that came with the champion’s arrival. Across the street, a shouting match broke out.

Tina racked her brain in how to get to the champion without involving Karl. She wanted to keep her friends out of danger, but she knew it would be incredibly suspicious to leave without explaining why. Even an excuse could lead to him following her.

“Tina, what’s up? You just stopped mid conversation” Karl said.

Tina realized that she had stopped walking. “Oh, uh, I have to go. Don’t follow me!” Perfect. 10/10 no notes exit. Tina turned and ran towards the energy.

On her way, she transformed mid run. Ribbons elegantly flowing behind her. She did a twirl, barely losing any speed.

Tina skid to a stop in front of the champion, coming face to face with a giant frog.

“Yo! The same trick won’t work on me twice, Betsy here’s come along to put up a good fight.” The voice came from on top of the large creature. 

Standing on its head was a man Tina knew to be Amphibian, the minion she encountered when she first became a guardian.

“You won’t get away with this!” Tina declared. She put up her fists.

Amphibian leapt back as the frog he had been standing on moments prior lunged forward right towards Tina.

She yelped and dove to the side. She felt an impact beside her as the best cracked the pavement. the frog turned towards her, and Tina jumped, vaulting herself over the frog.

Her vault landed her within a few feet of Amphibian. She nearly went to strike when a voice shouted out.

“Watch out!” The voice cried. Tina was pulled back just as a large frog tongue crashed into the ground she had resided in just seconds ago. She was tinged behind a column of a nearby building.

Tina was standing face to face with Karl, who seemed to have ignored her very clear and reasonable request when she left without a good reason. Worry was evident on his face, and his eyes kept darting behind her to where she knew the champion and his beast were.

“What's going on?” He asked Tina. 

“There isn’t really time to explain” Tina gave a weak smile. 

Callahan floated up beside the two. 

Guardian, it seems you are surrounded by people with the potential to become protectors of this realm.

Eyes growing even wider, Karl seemed alarmed by the new presence. 

“Tina, what is that?” Karl gestured at Callahan.

“Do you trust me and that I wouldn’t do anything that would be too bad?” Tina asked.

“Of course,” Karl responded.

Then do you, Karl of this realm, accept the duties and power of being a guardian? Do you swear to protect this realm from those who wish to do it harm?

With one last glance at Amphibian and his frog, Karl turned his gaze back to Tina and Callahan.

“I do”

In a flash of light Karl transformed. On his head were two round ears. He had a thin tail and fine whiskers on his face. 

“I’m a mouse!” He exclaimed.

“Oh, You are!” Tina turned her attention back to the minion and his frog. “Care to help dealing with this guy?”

Karl took a small bow with a dramatic flourish and grinned. 

“Stealthy secret gift!” He said in a playful tone, and disappeared.

Tina stepped out from behind the pillar.

“Thank you for politely waiting while I took my brief break. Now prepare for defeat!” She ran towards the side of the frog to close the distance between her and Amphibian.

On the other side of the creature, a small box appeared. It was colourfully wrapped with a nice little bow. A short tune played from inside the box, and it burst into confetti. The blast seemed to stun the frog, and sent the champion towards Tina. Reacting quickly, commendably so she must say, she aimed her hands towards him.

“Purifying heart blast” she shouted. With her declaration, the minion and his frog disappeared.

In the aftermath of the fight, Tina looked around. Standing across the street was Karl, grinning like a madman.

“Care to explain what just happened?”

[thebibliosphere]

I had a question.

So, just an hour or two ago, I was going through some sort of “manic high”, sorta like how somebody with bipolar disorder would have (I don’t have BPD). It felt like a bullet train at max speed and completely derailing, and it was incredibly draining. It also got me wondering.

Do people with severe enough ADHD deal with ADHD episodes like this? My search attempts are often futile because all of it is just talking about how to differentiate between BPD and ADHD and BPD manic episodes, but nobody ever mentions ADHD episodes; the only time I’ve seen it mentioned ever was when somebody made a clip of crankgameplays to show what an ADHD episode looked like.

Do they even exist? I’ve got no idea, so I was just wondering if you knew.

Hey! Sorry, I saw your other ask a while ago, but I wanted to talk to my ADHD specialist before I answered because I’d never heard of the term “episode” being used to describe ADHD. I’m also going to splice both questions together here and answer them in segments in the hope it helps :)

So like I said, I’d never heard of the term “episode” with ADHD, and neither has my specialist. Part of ADHD is having a natural ebb and flow between inattention and hyperactivity, sometimes skewed toward one or the other, depending on your ADHD type. (What are the different types of ADHD?)

Your type of ADHD may also fluctuate because of other factors, such as stress, changes in medication, hormonal fluctuations, lack of sleep, overstimulation, or even under-stimulation, to name a few. Another overlooked part of ADHD is emotional dysregulation, which may cause rapid cycling emotions that may look like an “episode” to someone unfamiliar with what that actually qualifies. The way my therapist explained it and using your example of bipolar disorder, “episode” is used in diagnostic criteria to categorize manic or depressive episodes that last X amount of time, are usually severe, potentially requiring hospitalization, and are accompanied by other symptoms not found in ADHD.

Our “bursts” of energy or lack thereof typically don’t last long enough to be considered episodes. This isn’t to say they are not severe or debilitating, especially if you suffer from things like anxiety or depression that ADHD can feed into. Merely that “episode” is not used as part of the language used to discuss ADHD, which is likely why you’re not finding anything.

So, do ADHDers experience intense bursts of energy that are draining afterward? Yeah, we can do, especially if we lean more toward hyperactive than inattentive. (And again, it's normal to fluctuate and also for things to be affected or worsened by secondary factors.)

And I'm going to put the rest under the cut because this is hella long.

I’ve seen some people think that all hyperactivity has to come with fixation, but that’s not how ADHD works. It’s true if something gets us excited or gives us a dopamine boost, we might be more prone to becoming hyperfixated and burn all our energy up on that. But you don’t need something to fixate on to experience hyperactivity. Some of us are just wired to the moon sometimes, and yes, it can be very draining when it ends. Some people find medication helpful in regulating their hyperactivity/preventing it from coming in such big swings and dips.

Speaking personally, when I'm hyper and nothing is grabbing my attention, the world and people around me can feel painfully slow. It's like I'm going a mile a minute doing everything but achieving nothing. The crash that comes after can also be particularly bad, as I also have dysthymia, which can tip over into a major depressive episode depending on other factors in my life at that time. For years I was misdiagnosed as having "probably Bipolar Type II" by a doctor who didn't believe teenage girls could "get" ADHD* and convinced my parents I needed psychoactive drugs. The drugs I was on didn't help, in fact, they made me worse so I was taken off them.

It wasn't until I found an ADHD specialist as an adult a few years ago that I made any real progress. And I'll be honest, I was shocked when she diagnosed me with ADHD, I really didn't think I had it. Right up until we started doing the work and slowly but surely my mental health began to improve and my understanding of myself with it.

Sometimes there are days when I will be wired to the moon and it will derail my entire day because I can't focus on a single thing/I'll focus too much on a single thing. Other times, like when I am closer to my menstrual cycle, I'll crash into inattentiveness and depression because of how my hormones affect my various different conditions, including my ADHD. Medication would likely help with this, but due to medical reasons, that's currently not an option for me so I do the best I can.

That said, if you’re experiencing something more than hyperactivity but it's not mania, you may be experiencing a form of hypomania and you should talk to a doctor about your concerns.

Hypomania typically occurs in Bipolar Type II disorder, which is less severe than the manic episodes in Bipolar I. I’ve experienced both manic and hypomanic episodes in my life due to medication interactions, and they felt very different from ADHD hyperactivity. It's not just derailing mile-a-minute thoughts, it's something usually completely mood-altering and out of control feeling followed by devastating crashes.

If you're on any medications and are worried you are experiencing something like this, you need to talk to your doctor. You might just need a dosage tweak, or you might be better off on a different medication altogether. Also, make a thorough check of any and all medications you are taking to check for any interactions.

I'm on a cocktail of meds for my MCAS, which if I were to combine them with the SSRI one of my doctors wants me to try, would result in serotonin syndrome. The doctor didn't notice this, but the pharmacist sure as shit did!

Some people (ask me how I know) even develop mild hypomania from overusing the sunlamps used to treat SAD (link), which is why brands like Verilux now include warnings in their leaflets about not using the lamps for more than X amount of time a day. Thankfully it goes away once you stop overusing the lamps.

Which actually brings me to something you asked last time about being unable to sleep at night. Insomnia and delayed sleep phase cycles are not uncommon in ADHD. This is likely because our circadian rhythm is thought to be out of whack (link).

You also mentioned having racing thoughts at night too, which is not uncommon either with hyperactivity. I find if I get overstimulated before trying to sleep, I’ll end up lying there awake with what I like to call “radio ADHD” playing in my head. It can range from snippets of songs stuck on repeat, conversations, things I’ve watched on TV, arguments, or if something is happening the next day, fixating on not being late for it. Hence, I end up getting no sleep because you can’t accidentally sleep in if you don’t sleep. *jazz hands of despair.*

Sometimes I find Radio ADHD soothing if it’s fixating on something chill, but it can get annoying fast and even distressing if I’m tired and can’t “change the station.” (I’d say “shut it off,” but as of yet, I’ve never been able to do that. Medication helps some people with this, as can looking into “sleep hygiene” if you haven’t already.) Conversely, if I’m bored or something is too stressful, I will 100% fall asleep because my brain would literally rather just turn off than do something I don’t want to do or is a low dopamine reward task.

Brains are fun.

Anyway, I uh, I am not sure if any of this is useful to you, but I hope it helps. Mostly I'm just repeating back what my specialist said when I asked her about it lol. Good luck, and I hope you figure things out.

----

*NB: It's important to note that ADHD and Bipolar Disorder can be comorbid. It's not a one or the other situation. I’m just throwing it out there in case hearing that helps someone else pursue the proper diagnosis!

[lazuriite]

[21:08]

pairing: neighbour!dejun x dom!camgirl!reader

warning(s): masturbation, degradation

a/n: i wanted to try my hand at writing a sub male idol fic, p l e a s e tell me what you think

dejun doesn’t know who he’s trying to fool. he’s been scrolling through the homepage for nearly half an hour. he had joined two or three streams but didn’t stay for long. a quick glance at the bottom of his laptop screen tells him that the stream he’s actually waiting for will start soon, but he pretends not to care. he keeps telling himself that there’s plenty of other girls, far prettier and more experienced at webcamming, that you’re not worth it. 

it’s funny how, ten minutes later, he finds himself finally pulling his cock out of the confines of pants to relieve the ache. none of the good ones are online right now, his mind tells him. and you’re painfully hard, it’s just convenient that she’s streaming right now.

dejun is glad that kunhang and yangyang were out doing god-knows-what because he’s unbelievably pent up. he hasn’t had a moment to himself the whole week thanks to his sadistic professors and their assignments and it takes all his strength not to bust at the sight of you in a beautiful set of lingerie. he’s desperate for his release and if it were any other girl, he’d just finish himself off then leave half way through the stream. but it’s not a random camgirl he just stumbled across. it’s you. 

he swears it’s almost as if you knew just how sexually frustrated he was, because you’re being unbelievably mean today.

“aw, do you need more?” you mock your viewers as you slowly trace your slit with your fingers. “do my babies want me to make the ache go away?”

dejun doesn’t even realise that he’s replied with a breathy ‘yes’, slowly pumping his cock. he wants to speed up so badly but he wouldn’t dare to, choosing to rub a teasing circle around his tip instead. your instructions had been crystal clear. light touches were permitted but anything that might bring him closer to an orgasm was a strict ‘no’.

“my poor babies, it must hurt so much. fine, you can speed up just a little.” 

dejun moans with relief when his cock finally gets some proper friction, his eyelids drooping slightly. it would be so easy. he can just disobey you and make himself cum. but he can’t - because you know what you’re doing. perhaps it was a bit ridiculous. he’s so obedient but you aren’t even aware that it was him who was watching your livestream. you can’t see what he’s doing and nothing will really happen to him if he doesn’t listen to you. but for whatever reason, he finds himself following every instruction to the t. he has edged himself with your help many times and has usually ended up having a mind blowing orgasm by the end.

“my, there’s so many of you today.”

you start rubbing your clit faster, making a sound that’s a mix of a derisive laugh and a moan and it sounds so fucking hot.

“my pretty boys really like it when i boss them around, don’t they?” your voice is so condescending and it only has him feeling even more needy. the effect you have on him is unbelievable. dejun is pretty sure that if you wanted, you’d be able to make him cum with just your voice. of course, he wouldn’t mind, but he loves watching your pretty face contort with pleasure as those gorgeous lips spit out the most degrading words at him.

suddenly, you pull your fingers away from your wet heat, wiggling them at the camera before licking your slick off them. you grab something offscreen and reveal it to your viewers. a silicone dildo with a suction cup at the other end. you lean in closer to the camera, the cat like grin on your face growing as you read out one of the comments. there usually weren’t many on these types of streams, most of the viewers’ hands being preoccupied with other matters. how anyone was able to control themselves while watching you was beyond dejun’s understanding.

“yongie says he wishes he could take my dildo’s place,” you fake a pout. “honestly, I’d rather have an actual cock inside me.”

you permit your viewers to pick up the pace as you slick the toy up with lube before slowly dropping down on it. your moans sound heavenly as you fuck yourself on the fake cock and dejun feels like he’s floating. the sight of your tits bouncing, your fingers returning to your sensitive clit, your moans, it was all too much. he was so fucking close.

“I bet you all wish it was your cock I was riding, huh?”

your back arches slightly when the fake cock manages to hit a certain spot inside you, but you don’t stop talking. “how pathetic - you’re jealous of a lump of plastic.”

your movements become more erratic and dejun can tell that your orgasm is nearing. he’s seen you cum too many times to not know when you’re close to the edge. he’s probably closer than you are so he slows his hand down. he can cum when you do.

“you know i’d never let one of your filthy cocks near my pussy right? maybe though, one of these days, i’ll let you watch me get fucked. that new camboy lucas looks like he could fuck me good.”

dejun feels so dirty. the nastiness of the situation finally seems to sink in. he’s jerking off as you insult and belittle him. he’s about to cum while he listens to you talk about being fucked by another man. he should feel ashamed but his desperation trumps any other emotion at the moment. 

you finally stop speaking, your last sentence being, “go ahead and cum for me, whores. empty your dirty little cocks.”

dejun does his best not to scream since you’re next door. he can’t risk having you hear him. he really wishes your room wasn’t soundproof, the idea of hearing you cum on camera and through the wall being so hot to him. you cum just a little after he does, tiredly pulling yourself off the toy, the object of his envy. you blow your viewers a kiss goodbye and end the video. he sighs, switching his laptop off. he prays that he won’t run into you in the hallway for a while because he is fairly certain that he would not be able to look you in the eye.

[inhuman-obey-me]

Happy Birthday Barbatos!

Tumblr ate the quality on these so please click to see properly. <3 

HEADCANON

There are various dark shapes all over Barbatos's body, which might seem to be tattoos at first glance. However, if you really look at them, you'll notice that they are ever-shifting, gradually traveling across him or falling away. Some are dark and sharp, while others look more faded or fuzzy, but there are always a mix of them, always changing. Careful not to stare too long, or you'll find yourself hypnotized by the patterns, lost in the entrancing way they glide upon his skin.

They are not tattoos at all, he explains, but rather shadows of other worlds -- glimpses of moments from other timelines and universes making themselves known upon his form.

Accompanying (slightly steamy) fic below the cut! Or read on AO3 here.

It's late into the night already when you finally manage to shoo everyone out of the hotel room, with excuses of having to get up early for the next day of the Confectionery Expo.

Another chorus of the rowdy group shouting "Happy birthday, Barbatos!" fills the air on their way out, leaving the air feeling cheerful, if now empty.

"My apologies, MC, I should have realized that you were growing tired. Or," the birthday demon says with a politely deferential smile as he comes up behind you to close the door after them, "was there some other reason you wanted them all gone?"

Ooh, cheeky bastard. You were trying to be coy about it, but of course Barbatos is too sharp not to have noticed.

You place a hand lightly on his chest, playing with the buttons on his shirt and batting your lashes coquettishly at him. "Well...I'm not the only one who was kind of excited that there's only one bed in here, am I?"

With a chuckle, he gently removes your hand from his shirt, and for a moment, you worry you might have done something wrong. You'd both been saying that you were happy for the time alone all day, but maybe you had misread things? Were you being too forward?

But no, he's removed your hand so he can undo the buttons himself. "No, I'll confess I was not particularly disappointed either. I wouldn't often have such an opportunity back at the Demon Lord's Castle, I suppose." Gloved fingers tilt your face upwards to meet his eyes. "We'll have to make the most of it."

He catches your lips in a kiss, guiding your hand back onto him. You quickly slide the silky smooth material of his now-open shirt off his shoulders, exploring his usually covered-up frame until your fingers find his and he presses you and your intertwined hands back against the door.

When he finally draws back, you gasp in surprise at the sight.

Given the modesty of his usual butler garb, you hadn't really seen much of his skin before -- and you hadn't quite been expecting to see every inch of the prim and proper servant's torso covered in darkly patterned tattoos. And are they...moving?

He chuckles softly at your surprise and steps back a bit for you to better take it all in. "Not what you were expecting?"

"I don't know what I was expecting," you answer absently, too drawn in by the way the shadows glide slowly across him. Different patterns move in different directions, overlapping and coming undone as they travel, and you yourself feel like you're coming undone at watching them. "What...are they? Tattoos?"

"Not quite," he smiles. "They're shadows."

"Shadows?" you repeat.

Without thinking, you reach a hand out to trace the designs. They're smooth upon his skin, and true to his description, they feel a little bit colder on the darkest parts. Some seem to be patterned in sharply angled lines, while others flow freely in rounded tendrils. They glide across his body at different speeds, seemingly disappearing in random places at times, as others shimmer into existence elsewhere to take their place.

"Yes, shadows. Of other universes. They are from other timelines, you see," he explains, sounding a bit amused. "That one you're touching now is from a far off timeline that long since branched, in which the Demon King never retired to sleep. As the Young Master never took power in that world, conflict is ongoing between the realms, and so a group of lesser demons has surrounded a young angel, where your finger is resting. They will soon destroy and devour the angel, for many of the lesser demons in this world often go hungry."

Now that he's explained it, you're able to make out the abstract shapes of the scene a bit more clearly. Just as he described, a figure in the center morphs, a vague shape of wings bursting out before other silhouettes in the scene pounce upon it, tearing it to shreds. You follow the lines with your fingers, brushing lightly across his shoulder until the shapes lead you to his back, where they disappear.

Gently, he tips your gaze back to his face. "Careful, my love. They'll draw you in if you don't look away," he whispers.

Blushing a little at having gotten so distracted by the shadowy shapes, you quickly close the distance between you, and he pulls you into another long kiss.

It's not long before he undoes your shirt as well, and leads you back towards the bed, sitting you both down at the edge. A tingle runs down your spine at the feeling of his skin against yours, occasional colder spots leaving chilly caresses upon your body as the shadowy shapes travel across his.

You lean down to tuck a few light kisses upon his neck, and the tendrils of another tattoo-like shadow flit down to meet your lips. It tickles a bit, and you can't help but let out a giggle at the sensation. "What's this?" you murmur, running your fingers over the spot as you take the moment as an opportunity to catch your breath a little.

"A phantombeak avocet - a rare Devildom bird - building a nest," he answers, running his fingers through your hair. "They're quite famous for their long...beaks." His breath catches slightly on the last word as you mischievously dive back in to plant another kiss upon the spot on his neck.

Amused at having elicited such a reaction from the normally never surprisable butler, you decide to continue asking him about the shapes as you travel down his body.

"What about this one?" you ask, brushing your lips teasingly over his collarbone, where one set of thin, twisting black lines disappears into another.

"A snake, slithering into a cave to find its next meal," he hums in response.

You slide your fingers further down, tracing the sharp edges of another group of lines just above his abdomen. "And this one?" you ask. The lines of this set are dark, though thin, and look like a set of triangles.

He frowns slightly. "That one is a bit of a grisly scene, in a timeline much closer to this one. Another couple staying in this same room, but one of them has just discovered the other's...indiscretions. What you see there is his hand, wrapped around a knife. His lover won't survive the night, I'm afraid."

"Oh!" Your face pales, and you quickly pull your hand back, but he chuckles at your reaction.

"Not to worry, they're far from us even if the timeline is close. But," he says, rolling you over down onto the bed, the breath of his next whispered words tickling against your ear, "let us set the shadows aside for now, hmm, my love? You've been running your lips and fingers all over me the whole night. I do believe it's my turn."