#ooc: he will not ask if she finished the packet HE WILL NOT ASK

[astraariel]

eternal snow

pairing: sanji x fem!reader

summary: your love for sanji was unconditional, unfortunately, he didn’t feel the same seeing as there were petals coming out of your mouth.

word count: 3.6K

warnings: spoilers (?) just the name of a character from the whole cake island arc, it’s a modern!au so I don't mention anything about the actual arc!

tags: loosely based on “eternal snow” from fullmoon wo sagashite; angst; hanahaki disease; implied cheating; modern!au; hurt no comfort; lovesick; requited unrequited love

author's note: I think along with everyone opla is taking over my life so it encouraged me to finish this fic I started months ago lol. once again I like angst and this is soooo ooc of sanji he would never cheat I love him so much I’m sorry. on another note, I really like AmaLee’s cover of this song so you can give it a listen if you want to feel the vibe. 

also, ignore the fact that Pudding is sixteen, she’s older than that in this. I couldn’t really think of anyone else to have/didn't want to think of a different character. just know, she’s of age. other than that, ignore grammar mistakes and enjoy♡

──★ ˙ ̟read pt2 here!

˚₊‧꒰ა ☆ ໒꒱ ‧₊˚

You weren’t entirely sure how you had gotten to this point. You were certain that you two would be together forever. How you had unknowingly lost the one you love so dearly, you would never know.

Sanji was a flirt and you loved it, he could simply say that you looked beautiful today and you’d melt. Hell, that’s how you too met, Nami had introduced you two and Sanji wooed his way into your heart. You knew that he had you in the palm of his hand, but you weren’t sure you could say the same for him.

Sanji was an attentive lover. When he loved, he showered you with his attention. You could always tell that his presence was there whenever you spoke. He’d care and cater to every request you asked of him, not allowing you to lift a single finger. It’s who he was.

You were blinded by your love for Sanji that you never noticed him slipping away from your grasp.

The two of you were currently sitting together on your living room couch. Sanji mentioned there was a new show he wanted to watch, so here the two of you were. Your attention was focused on the TV in front of you while his was on his phone.

You glance at him, “Who’s that?” 

He hadn’t looked away from it for more than 30 seconds throughout the last episode. You watch him out of the corner of your eye as he looks at you. 

“Oh, it's the new dessert chef at the restaurant,” he shuts his phone off, “I've been assigned to help her around and show her the ropes,” he smiles, “It’s nothing, you want popcorn?” 

You turn to him, “Of course I do.” He gets up to walk to your kitchen, “Hey, I love you.”

He walks up behind you and bends down, kissing your head, “And I love you more.” He stands up and you hear him rummaging through the pantry for a popcorn packet. 

You cough slightly, “Could you grab me some water, Sanji?” He shouts back a response but you don’t make it out because you’re too busy pulling a petal out of your mouth.

♡‧₊˚

After that lone petal had made its introduction, it planted itself as a constant. Every so often for the following weeks, you’d feel something weird in your mouth, only to pull out a single flower petal.

You weren’t sure what was going on, but you couldn’t bring yourself to think too much about it. On top of the weird cough you were having, Sanji was also acting off. 

It was small at first, just tiny, little white lies that he’d tell you. 

Like when he’d say he was tired, that he was going to bed, but you could hear him on his phone laughing at something from the room. Or when he claimed that his phone had died and that’s why he hadn’t texted you back even though you were hanging with Nami at the time and he had replied to a video she had sent him a minute after you texted him. 

That was just the first few weeks.

You weren’t sure when the white lies became real lies but it had only spiraled more. You had found that he wasn’t even bothering with lying anymore, simply stating that he was too busy to come over or that he didn’t even want to hang out with you that day.

Sanji would claim to be too tired and not bother to see you for an entire week, but then he’d call you complaining that he missed you and question why the two of you hadn’t gone on a date recently and then insist that he was going to cook dinner for the two of you. Those times were always the best. It made you feel like nothing was wrong. 

It was pure whiplash. 

You were never sure which Sanji you were gonna get that day. Maybe it’d be the Sanji that you loved or this new person who had taken over and wouldn’t even text you back for days on end. 

Recently, he was your loving, doting boyfriend. Which caused you to completely forget about the flower petals you were currently collecting from your mouth when you were being distracted by Sanji’s full attention. 

You were lying on Sanji’s chest recounting your day to him when suddenly the sound of his phone pinging cut you off. 

A quiet chuckle made you peek up at Sanji, his eyes were looking at his phone intently, whatever was on his screen, clearly captivated him more than what was coming out of your mouth.

You sit up, his blatant disinterest in your day annoying you. 

“Did I do something wrong?” Your voice cuts through the room.

He looked up at your now sitting form, it looked like he was just acknowledging your presence.

He lets out a noise of confusion, “What?”

“Are you angry at me? Did I say or do something that pissed you off? Because, please, just tell me, I can't take it anymore.” you pleaded.

You notice Sanji’s body tensing, his brow scrunching in even more confusion. He laughs awkwardly, “Baby, what are you talking about? I’m not angry.” he looks away, “I love you, you know that right?”

And suddenly, you weren’t angry anymore. 

You smiled, “I love you too.”

He glances at his phone again.

But you don’t care, because he loves you. 

Satisfied with his response, you settle back down but are interrupted when you begin to cough. Quickly, you stand up to fetch your handkerchief from your pocket, wiping your mouth swiftly. 

You look back at Sanji, “I’m gonna-” but before you can finish, you feel the familiar flowers clawing their way up your throat. You walk out of the room coughing. 

Sanji doesn’t look up from his phone.

♡‧₊˚

He was late.

Again. 

You were exhausted. The constant lies that you fooled yourself into believing for the sake of your heart were beginning to wear on you. 

The old hoodie you were wearing enveloped you in an attempt to provide yourself some level of comfort that no one could really give you anymore. 

It’s late, around midnight, last you checked. The spaghetti dinner left on the table you had cooked had long gone cold. The Baratie had closed hours ago and Sanji still wasn’t home. 

You sit in complete darkness, the TV is currently rattling off an old rerun of some show you didn’t watch. You’re too tired to get up and find the remote to change the channel so you settle on watching the old comedic sitcom. You’re holding your trusty handkerchief that’s become your best friend in the past months; ready to close around your mouth in an attempt to catch the petals of flowers that’d come up your throat every so often. 

Your eyes glaze over the screen when you hear the door creak open. Footsteps were heard as a soft clatter sounded throughout the room from Sanji setting his keys down on the counter. 

You sit up slowly, in an effort to prohibit any intense coughing. 

Your eyes meet Sanji’s surprised ones, “You’re still awake? It’s late, you should go to bed.” he looks away. 

“You missed dinner.” You look over at Sanji’s form, he’s stiff, you note.

“I stayed late to help close, sorry we can reschedule.” He brushes you off swiftly.

“Was she there?” The argument had already begun, why not fuel it some more?

Sanji whips his head at you, an incredulous look gracing his features. “Who are you talking about?” Acting dumb was never a good look on him. 

Your tired eyes stare at him, “I know you’re spending time with her.” The venom in your tone was palpable.

You were over the lies. You were over the constant tiptoeing between each other, you’re honestly surprised he still even decided to come over. It would have been better for him to stay at his place and just call you in the morning to tell his lie. 

He has balls, you’ll give him that.

“Do you even love me anymore?”  

The silence that surrounded the room was upsetting. Of course, he didn’t, who were you fooling? You had all the proof you needed in all of the trashcans around your house, discarded tissues soaked in blood, and petals filled the bins.

Sanji scoffs, “I don’t know what you want from me.” He doesn't answer the question, “Why are you asking if I love you, you're being needy.” He stares at you before continuing, “If you don’t trust me,” he looks away, “Then maybe we should break up.” With a tone of finality, he turns around and walks toward the door, the sound of it shutting echoing throughout the house.

You’re left alone in the silence, the ticking of the clock on the wall muffling your coughs that were accompanied by flowers and blood. 

♡‧₊˚

With the new development of the blooms coming out of your throat, you felt defeated. You’re not sure what you did in a past life to deserve this. You didn’t wish this on anyone, it was a lonely and awful feeling, physically and emotionally. 

You’ve gotten used to your condition. It had been a month since you’d seen Sanji after he had broken things off and in that month, you would constantly find yourself leaning over the toilet bowl, hacking up blood and flower blooms. 

You finally had the courage to look up what you assumed was hanahaki disease. It was a rare condition, but you were certain that was what was causing you pain. The only cure was to have surgery that resulted in the patient forgetting about whomever they had loved. That you’d act as if nothing had happened, that you’d live in ignorance bliss afterward. 

Sacrificing your heart for your life. 

After that month, you had decided to go to a coffee shop forcing yourself to get out of the house and do something. 

So you went to Sanji’s favorite coffee shop. 

Why you had put yourself through that? You weren't sure.

You remember wrapping your hand around the door handle, ready to walk in when a wisp of light auburn hair had caught your attention inside the cafe. 

There she was. Pudding. The girl who had replaced you. The one who had captivated Sanji’s attention in a way you could only dream of.

Sanji stood beside her, you were certain he couldn't see you from inside, his attention was fully on Pudding’s face, absorbing whatever story she had been telling him. 

He had never looked at you like that.

Did he ever love you? Were you that stupid to even see the truth? Had it been there all along and you were simply too blind to notice?

An “excuse me” had brought you back to reality and had you rushing back to your apartment in hopes of not bumping into Sanji or Pudding. You weren't sure your heart could take it if you were forced to talk to them.

After that defeat you noticed that you were no longer hacking up petals, but fully blossomed flowers, you couldn’t walk for a long distance without wheezing, the flowers constricting your airways preventing you from wanting to do anything. You knew you were nearing the final stage, soon roots were going to begin to show up, but you couldn’t bring yourself to go to a doctor. You had read that the longer you kept this from being treated, you’d enter the point of no return. 

So, you simply waited.

Your mind was reeling. You never wanted to stop loving Sanji. You didn’t care about the pain that it brought you. 

You don’t care that you still long to have Sanji tell you that he loves you. To tell you and for you not to immediately have to turn away and cough up blood and flowers. 

You missed him. You yearned for him.

After Nami had found out why you and Sanji broke up, she went on a rant about how she was going to kill him, on how he could have done this to you. You weren't sure if you had ever seen her get so angry before. 

But even after that, you confessed that you still loved him. 

She proceeded to call you insane, but she simply didn’t understand. She didn’t know about how his eyes would sparkle when he would go on about a new recipe that he developed and how he was certain that it was going to be the new hit at the Baratie. She didn’t know how bashful he got when you complimented him on his food. How he’d kiss you like how it was the first time you were kissing each other.

You loved him. And you would forever love him.

But he haunted your life. Leaving you lying at night, not even allowing you to find comfort in your dreams since he haunted those too. When you’d close your eyes you could only mourn for the love that once was. To mourn for him even though he was alive and well, but could you say the same for yourself?

You had long accepted that you were going to die. If anything, you willed it. Never did you want to forget your love for Sanji. The idea that you would never be able to recall how he made your heart pound every time he’d look at you, would be a nightmare.

But you were tired. 

In the months after the cafe incident you would go through phases where the pain would turn to anger, cursing Sanji, wishing you two had never met, wishing that Nami had never introduced you too. 

But the anger would never stay directed towards Sanji. It would always circle back to you. And anger would turn to pity and pity would turn to sadness. 

You wanted to cry and scream at the sky, to yell at the world, to question why love felt this way. Why couldn't he just love you back, why were you being punished for simply loving him unconditionally?

You suffocate yourself in the love that you have for Sanji. Sacrificing your every breath to simply feel the true and fierce love you felt for him. You’d cry until you were gasping for air, til you were choking up flowers that were clogging your lungs. You wished, begged, for it to go away. Wishing that you had never fallen for him. 

But even with all the pain he caused you. You could never hate him.

You could never hate Sanji.

You can’t even bring yourself to hate Pudding, it wasn't her fault that Sanji was infatuated with her rather than you.

And you could never truly hate him for that.

The sterile white walls and the smell of disinfectant wafting through the air brought you back to reality. 

Recalling how hours before Nami had found you on the ground of your bathroom, post-hacking your brains out from the various blooms of flowers that rose from your throat at what seemed like at every hour of the day as of recently. You hadn’t heard her call for you when she entered your apartment so you weren’t able to hide anything from her. 

“Are you insane?” Her voice ricocheted in the bathroom after you had explained to her what had been happening to you for the last couple of months.

You were numb the entire car ride to the hospital as Nami yelled at you for being so careless. 

“Why are you letting that boy kill you?” 

Why were you? 

Why were you putting yourself through this pain, knowing he would never love you again?

The recent memory reminded you of Nami’s presence on the side chair that was placed beside the crunchy bed you were currently sitting on. Her brown eyes met yours and smiled softly at you. 

“You’re gonna be okay.” Nami’s attempt at reassurance was comforting to you for 5 seconds before the door swung open revealing the doctor. 

“Hello,” she said your name, “you’re the one with hanahaki disease, correct?” You glance over at Nami before replying to the doctor in confirmation. “Well, unfortunately, it has been developing for a while and if you had come just a little bit later it would have been untreatable, so I highly suggest proceeding with the procedure as soon as possible.”

Your hands grew clammy. This was it. You were going to be relieved from this grueling life you had found yourself in. You would finally be able to go back to normal. 

Normal. 

Would it truly be normal if you didn’t love Sanji anymore? Could you truly live with yourself knowing that you gave up the one thing that has been keeping you going? You guess you wouldn’t actually remember your love for him if you did the surgery but your heart would know. Your soul would know. 

You wished that all of this pain would go away. Longing to run back to Sanji, for him to stop the anguish that you felt. To have him whisper that he loved you and for you to not cough up flowers anymore. To know that he truly meant the words that he was saying.

You wondered how your life would have gone if you had never fallen for Sanji. Would your life still lead you to this very moment of hell that you’re living currently? You would think that hell would be hot, blazing with heat, but all you felt was the coldness of lies that you believed that spewed from Sanji’s lips when he spoke to you. 

You would like to think that you wished you had never fallen into this trap. That your heart never fell for him, but you knew better. You knew that he had your heart from the beginning. You were doomed from the first interaction.

Wasn’t it a true act of love if you could let the person go? Wouldn’t it be the final seal of approval of your love if you went through with the surgery? The love that you felt for Sanji would be proven by this simple act. 

You felt Nami’s hand grab yours. Her eyes were filled with remorse, a sadness that you could distinguish as the same sadness that you saw in your eyes ever since that first petal came to be.

Anticipatory grief.

She was grieving your love for him already, grieving for your heart, how you would never love again, how you would never love him again.

You sigh. 

♡‧₊˚

You wake up to the soft murmurs of the television in the corner of the room. 

Your mind was hazy, from what, you weren't entirely sure yet. It felt as if you had lost something like it was on the tip of your tongue, but you just couldn’t think of exactly what it was.

Guess it wasn’t important.

Your eyes wander over to your surroundings, the hospital room is bare except for the basic, usual furniture. Your eye caught movement out of the corner of your eye, turning your face to examine what it was.

A balloon with the words “Get well soon!” fills your vision, and your gaze scans over the hearts that surround the bubble letters in bright yellow hues. You reach over the side table to grab the card that sat under the balloon. 

Hope you feel better - Nami.

Sad that you had missed your friend, you made a mental note to pay her a visit after you were discharged from the hospital to thank her.

A soft knock echoed throughout the room, your attention to the door opening revealing the doctor. “Hi, glad you’re awake. The procedure was a success. You should be good to go soon, but take it easy for the next two weeks.”

The procedure.

You quickly scour your brain for answers of who it was you loved but came up short. 

Guess that was the point, wasn’t it? 

Before you could thank the doctor, rushed footsteps were heard outside the room, hasty knocks piercing the air along with the clamor of the door opening quickly. 

Sanji’s blond hair comes into view, and he stands, wide-eyed, near the doorframe. He was panting slightly, a sign that he possibly had been running before he got here. 

He says your name quietly, the doctor gives you a nod before excusing herself from the room to give you guys privacy. 

“Sanji,” you smile brightly at him, “Did you get off of work? Why are you here?”

His eyes shift over to the balloon on the stand beside the bed. “Nami told me about the…procedure.”

“Really?” you roll your eyes teasingly, “It’s not that big of a deal honestly, that Nami. Always the worrier, thank you for visiting me though, you’re a good friend, Sanji.” You look away before you can notice Sanji’s face falling. 

You look back at him, “Oh, could you take me home? I probably shouldn’t be driving right now.” you laugh quietly and scan Sanji’s face. His mind seemed to be somewhere else, perhaps he was really busy at the restaurant. “If you can, if not I’ll just call Nami.” 

“No,” he clears his throat, “Yeah I can take you home.” 

You offer him a smile, “Thanks, hey I think I may have to fill out some paperwork. Could you grab it while I go change?” You begin to stand up slowly before he rushes over to help you up.

You look up at him to thank him again when you realize his eyes are watering. 

Weird. 

Your eyebrows knit in worry, “Hey, are you okay?”

He blinks rapidly while looking away from you. His hand lets go from his grasp on your arm and runs it through his blonde hair while turning away from you. “Yeah, I’m fine.” he coughs, “Uh, I’m gonna go look for those papers.”

He walks out of the room before you can respond, leaving you slightly confused but you shake it off before you begin to look for your clothes. 

You don’t see Sanji standing outside the doorway, coughing up a flower petal. 

[kodzuvii]

CLUB STUPID [EXTRA: there’s a pretty girl in our kitchen]

PAIRING - suna x fem!reader ft. suna rizu aka the little sister :)

GENRE - crack + fluff

warning - just grammar and spelling mistakes lol + y/n cuts her finger + y/n is implied to be really short + suna is a bit ooc but that’s because he’s a simp for you <3

wc - 7k

SYNOPSIS - Club Stupid, an anonymous podcast meant for the dumb and dumbest to send in unspoken and nonsensical thoughts about issues they face in their day to day lives and for Y/n to speak out and give her opinions and feelings. Normal feelings though, nothing romantic like how she thinks this lazy guy with questionable hair in the volleyball club is actually pretty cute.

a/n: bringing this baby back because we recently hit 5k notes :D this is also my peace offering for my sudden absence on this blog LMAO sit back and enjoy as we catch up with suna and yn as well as witness whipped!suna 

[Somewhere at the start of December]

“I don’t understand”

“Don’t understand what?”

“You’re the one who failed your test, why am I the one buying groceries?”

“Because I paid during our last date”

“Rin, I’m helping you study. Does this even count as a date?” 

You looked down at your hands that were holding bags full of ingredients you needed to make some sukiyaki. With the boys being on break from volleyball, Suna had texted you after school asking for help to review for a retake on a test he failed. 

You had to take a double-take while reading the text because, Suna? Studying? Willingly? A rare combination.

The original plan was to go straight to his house since his family owned a really nice kotatsu table that also acted as a couch. With winter settling in and the weather starting to get much colder, you and Suna quickly realized that neither of you enjoyed going out during this time of the year. Sure, the snowflakes were pretty, but sitting comfortably under a warm kotatsu surrounded by snacks while you tried to get his mind around trigonometry sounded more appealing

Suna looked down at you, “You’re acting as if you’re not craving a hot pot right now,” You rolled your eyes, “I never said I wasn’t craving it, I just know that I’m gonna be doing most of the work because your ass can’t cook” you reasoned. Suna shrugged, “not my fault you decided to upgrade your cooking skills during the past 5 months we’ve been together” You rolled your eyes and buried your face deeper into Suna’s scarf that was wrapped around your neck in an attempt to cover up the blush rising up on your cheeks. 

A smug smile came upon Suna’s lips as he watched you get embarrassed. You two were still going strong and had hit 5 months just a week ago. Even though you both had your minor little arguments here and there, you were both still content and happy with each other. 

With 5 months flying by, Suna didn’t think that it was possible for him to fall for you even more. By now, you had both settled into a comfortable state in your relationship. Regular dates about once or twice during the week with a couple of sleepovers and late-night facetime calls thrown in between. Since it was colder, he had at least two hoodies on him at all times. One for you and one for him (but he wouldn’t mind if you took both.) He enjoyed seeing the sight of you curled up in his hoodie when you stayed over at his place or when found himself keeping you company as you edited your podcast for the week.

Once the second semester of the school year started, you started to branch out a little bit more on your own and found yourself being busier as you started joining clubs of your own interest. 

Sure Suna was a bit disappointed that he wouldn’t be seeing you sitting by the bleachers anymore during practice, but he understood that you had your own passions and needed your own group of friends outside of the boys on volleyball team.

He liked seeing the smile on your face when you talked to him about something your friend had said or about how fun of a day you had after hanging out with them. He had to reassure you many times that he didn’t mind you hanging out with other people at all, you both knew and did your best to balance your time with friends and each other anyways.

Plus, he thought it was quite cute that you’d always give him a quick kiss on the cheek when you’d walk by the water fountain before running off with your club members.

[“Suna hurry up!” he heard Atsumu call for him by the entrance of the gym. 

Suna spared him one glance before straightening himself up and lifting his palm off the button of the water fountain. He gave the setter a nod as he wiped the corner of his lip with the back of his hand. 

Just then, he could hear a familiar voice calling for his name behind him. Not too long after that, he felt a pair of arms wrap around his waist and a chaste kiss pressed on his cheek. The corner of his lip twitched up and he looked down to meet your e/c eyes. “Hey bub, don’t you have club activities?” he asked. You nodded, still not letting go of his waist, “just wanted to come and say hello, so...hello” you grinned. Suna smiled and pressed a kiss to your temple, “well hello to you too” he muttered before wrapping his arms around you and embracing you with all his warmth. 

“Y/n you piece of shit there you are!” 

You jumped back at the sound of your friend’s voice from around the corner. You pulled out of Suna’s embrace and gave him an apologetic smile while rubbing the back of your neck, “Sorry Rin gotta run, see you after school!” you didn’t even give him a chance to respond as you placed one last kiss on his jaw before running off to your friends. 

Even though he could hear the faint yelling of Atsumu’s voice calling for him at the back of his head, his eyes were focused on the way your face turned red as your friends teased you. 

God, who let you be so damn cute]

Suna took out one of his hands from the pocket of his coat and wrapped it over your shoulder and pulled you a bit closer to his side. You leaned into his side and let your hair rest lightly onto his chest.

“You’re so annoying, I’m not making any hot pot for you”

“I will lock you outside of my house”

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* 

Stepping inside the Suna household, you were instantly met with warmth. Suna flickered the lights on as you slipped off your shoes. Suna slipped off his own jacket and motioned for you to give yours to him as well so he could hang it up inside the coat closet. You smiled and put the groceries you were holding in one hand and let him help you shrug off your coat. 

“Here give me your bag, I’ll place it by the couch,” he said with his hand out. You nodded and handed him your backpack as you slipped on some house slippers and made your way towards the kitchen and settled the bags down onto the island. 

As you took the ingredients out of the bag, Suna walked into the living room and turned the TV on to a random show. You were way too invested in deciding which vegetables you wanted to include in the hot pot that you didn’t hear Suna walk towards you with his phone in his hands and the camera app open.

“Babe smile”

“Huh”

Just as you looked up, with mushrooms and green onions in your hand, you hear the sound of the camera shutter go off and Suna snicker. “Cute” he grinned. 

You rolled your eyes, “I thought you only took blackmail of the twins” Suna put his phone down and raised his eyebrows at you, “would you rather have your face or Atsumu’s all over my gallery?” he asked. You thought about it for a minute before nodding, “yeah no never mind you have a point” he chuckled and walked over to you and placed a kiss on your cheek. 

“I need to grab my charger really quick, you know where everything is right?” you nodded, you’ve been over at the Suna residence before and this wouldn’t be the first time you’ve cooked there. 

“Do you need anything upstairs?” he asked. Your ears perked up at the sound of his offer, “Can I borrow a hoodie?” you asked. Suna eyed you up and down, “you’re already wearing one of my hoodies” he stated and narrowed his eyes on the navy blue hoodie over your figure. “No, no, I mean can I wear the really soft one? The black one with the embroidering and cool design on the back” you smiled and gave him a look that you both knew he couldn’t say no for. 

Suna knew what hoodie you were talking about, it was a hoodie that you often wore of his that he hasn’t brought to school in a bit since it was in the laundry. “Think of it as your payment for me since I’m cooking you a meal” you grinned. Suna sighed, “fine, hands up,” he said as put his phone into his pocket and made his way over to you. 

You giggled and did what you were told and lifted your arms up and watched as he held onto the ends of the hoodie and lifted it over your head. Once you felt the sleeves of the hoodie be pulled off your arms, you put them down and straightened your hair and your shirt and smiled up at him, “thank you~” he rolled his eyes “you’re lucky you’re cute” he muttered and looked away which made you laugh. You made your way back to the kitchen and heard his steps going up the stairs.  

You sighed as you eyed down the ingredients, you forgot to ask him if his parents may have wanted some. You didn’t wanna cook too much and not have the means to finish it all but you also didn’t wanna make too little and leave you both hungry. “Better more than less” you thought. 

You turned around and grabbed the cutting board from one of the cabinets and a knife from one of the drawers. Placing the cutting board and the knife on the marble island, you grabbed the bagged vegetables and placed them on a clean plate and discarded the plastic in the trash bin beside the fridge. You ran the vegetables under some water from the sink to clean them before placing them back on the plate and setting them to the side so you could grab another pot and start boiling the water on the stove.

You were silently thankful that Granny and Shin had helped you learn how to make a proper hot pot. As you opened the packet of udon noodles, you were too much in your zone to notice what was happening around you. 

Your cooking was sometimes a hit or miss and with the day you’ve had, you were hungry, and the last thing you wanted was for the meal you took some time to make to taste terrible and leave you hungrier than when you started. The sound of the TV playing in the background drowned and you focused your attention on the cabbage you were cutting. 

You were way too concentrated on making sure that each cabbage slice was the same in length as the rest that you failed to hear the sounds of the front door opening and closing and a female figure walking into the home. 

“Nii-san~oh what the fuck since when did you cook-”

The sudden voice coming into the kitchen and cutting through your concentration made you jump and unfortunately for you, your finger slipped off the cabbage and met the blade of the knife you were using. 

“Oh shit” you hissed in pain and lifted your finger off the cutting board. However, instead of immediately tending to the cut, you looked up at the figure to whom the voice belonged to. 

You looked up and made eye contact with a little girl who was definitely not that much shorter than you. Judging from her middle school uniform, she was definitely between the ages of 11-13. She had brown hair tied into two pigtails, rosy cheeks that were the result of the weather outside, and slim grayish-yellow eyes that were awfully familiar. 

Your brain must’ve short-circuited as two and two didn’t click in your head and a good couple of seconds passed as you both stared at each other in complete silence, mirroring the shocked and confused expression both of you had on your faces. 

Just as you were about to open your mouth and say a word, you watched her face become completely red and she dashed up the stairs leaving you stunned and completely lost while your finger continued to bleed. 

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* 

Suna hummed to himself as he rummaged through his closet and tried to find the hoodie of his that you were asking for. He had changed out of his uniform into some more comfortable clothes and had his back towards the door. 

“Shit, where did I put it?” he muttered to himself and closed the doors to his closet. Just as he turned around, the door to his room opened making his eyebrows furrow in annoyance at the amount of force that was used to open his door. 

“Babe did you need something-”

“Nii-san! There’s a pretty girl in our kitchen!”

Oh, that was definitely not the voice of his girlfriend.

Suna sighed and went back to his task of finding the hoodie that you wanted, completely ignoring the sudden appearance of his little sister. However, a small smile tugged on his lips as he heard his sister call you pretty. 

His sister came into his room and looked at her brother in annoyance as she noticed how nonchalant he looked, “hello?? There’s a pretty girl downstairs that is definitely not ‘kaasan so who-” “Idiot. That’s my girlfriend”

His sister blinked at him once,

Then once again,

And one last time just for good measure.

“HUH??” she yelled with a face of disbelief. Suna looked at her weirdly and watched as she flopped down onto his bed with a bewildered expression as she tried to wrap her mind around the new information she was just given. 

“You? Girlfriend? For real?” she asked in shock. The concept of her brother actually getting a girlfriend not clicking in her head. “Are you sure she’s not some group project partner or something?” Suna scrunched his face, “Why do you look so shocked, I told you about her before-” “Nii-san I thought you were lying!” she exclaimed. Suna gave her a blank look and sighed, a part of him not even surprised that his sister thought he was joking.

He rolled his eyes and walked over to slap the back of her head, “Stupid. Why would I lie about that” She gave him an exaggerated shrug, “uh because she’s too pretty for you! She’s even cooking for you! I’m calling it right now that she’s too good for you” she stated and crossed her arms. 

“Rizu, you’re so stupid I swear to god-” he asked. Rizu shook her head “Don’t blame this on me!” Suna gave her an unamused look, “even ‘kaasan and ‘tosan know” Rizu rolled her eyes, “I thought they were in on the joke too!” she exclaimed.

Suna shook his head but took a sigh of relief as he finally found the hoodie he was looking for hanging on the back of his chair, “You’re such a twerp. Did you at least say hi to her?” he asked as he looked down at her once he got the hoodie. Rizu’s face flushed in embarrassment and she scratched the back of her head, “Kinda I guess” Suna narrowed her eyes as he caught on to how nervous she got. He suddenly got suspicious, “what did you do?”

“Nothing bad! I think? just don’t get mad ‘kay?” Suna already began to worry about what she was gonna say. 

“I came in and called for you, but I didn’t know she was cooking so she must’ve been startled and then next thing you know I come in, and we make eye contact and -oh yeah good job Nii-san, you might be stupid but you’ve got a good eye. She’s wow, took my whole breath away you know?- anyways I had to take a sec to admire her, but I think I startled her and I think she cut herself because her finger was bleeding and then I panicked and yeah now I’m here,” she said all in one breath and met eyes with his blank once as she gave him a bright smile. 

“Rizu”

“Hm?”

“I’m gonna throw out all your posters”

“Wait what?! No Nii-san come back!!”

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* 

“Rizu say sorry”

Your eyes shifted from your boyfriend who was wrapping a paw patrol bandaid on your finger to the same little girl who stood beside him and was sheepishly looking down at the floor and avoiding all eye contact with you. 

Suna sat you down on a chair in the dining room and a part of you was zoning out as you tried to wrap your mind around what was happening. Looking at the girl who has a striking resemblance to Suna, it didn’t take a genius to know that this was his sister. They had the same striking eyes, cocoa brown hair, and she was even a bit taller for her age. 

There was no denying it, this was definitely his sister. 

But for the life of you, you can’t remember if your quiet bean pole of a boyfriend ever told you of her. Surely you would’ve remembered if he had told you. Did he forget? Or maybe you just failed to notice her presence. Then again you had been over multiple times but you don’t ever remember seeing her. 

“Sorry” she muttered quietly and began to play with the material of her school uniform top. 

Suna rolled his eyes and nudged her with his elbow, “at least look at her when you’re gonna say it” Just as you were about to interject and say that it was okay and it really wasn’t a big deal, Rizu looked up at you, her eyes glassy and her lip slightly jutting out as she puffed her cheeks, “I’m so sorry! You’re very pretty! My head malfunctioned! Please don’t break up with Nii-san! He’s lonely!” she cried. Your eyes widened, taken back by her “apology” and Suna only rolled his eyes and clicked his tongue in annoyance.  

“I-it’s fine really, it’s just a small cut anyways, no biggie Rizu-chan” you assured.

At the way you said her name, Rizu’s whole mood flipped. Her eyes instantly sparkled and she looked up at you with a face of adoration. She wiped away her tears away with the sleeve of her top and harshly pushed her brother to the side making him let go of your hands as he stumbled over. Your eyes widened at the amount of strength inside the little girl in front of you as she managed to push away your 6ft tall boyfriend to the side like it was nothing. 

“Really? Are you sure it’s okay? Y/n right? I’m gonna call you Y/n-chan! I think we’d make great friends” she beamed, her eyes still twinkling as she looked at you with an excited daze. “How come we’ve never met before? I thought Nii-san was lying about you. Do you like drama? how about musicals? You can come to my show next week! And are you sure you’re dating Nii-san? You can run now I can distract him for you-” your mind couldn’t even process the words she was saying with how fast she was talking. You felt your palms starting to get clammy and a part of you began internally panicking at how overwhelmed you were feeling.

In Rizu’s perspective, she had always wanted an older sister but was instead cursed with (in her words) a musty older brother. Now that she knew of his girlfriend, she wasn’t gonna let the opportunity slip away. They were gonna become the best of friends. She knew it.

You laughed nervously and nodded along during her incoherent ramble before turning to Suna with a slight look of panic as you didn’t know what to do or how to handle her sudden change of emotions and the never ending fountain of words leaving her mouth. 

Suna sensed your need for his help, he knew that little kids were never really your strong point. Along with Kita, you also lived with his little siblings who were your little cousins. They were the ages of 4 and 9 and you often complained to him about how they gave you a headache with how loud and rambunctious they were. 

He had to hold back a laugh at how panic you began to look when his sister began to talk your ear off. She kept switching topics and was now rambling on about how pretty you were and asking what moisturizer you used because your skin looked so soft and why you decided to date her brother who she considered looked like a malnourished raccoon. 

Shaking his head and holding back a smile, he walked over and flicked his sister’s forehead making her stop midway into her sentence and whine. “The hell was that for!” she cried as she rubbed the sore spot on her head. 

Suna rolled his eyes at her dramatics and stuffed one of his hands into his pockets while the other found its way to rest on the small of your back, drawing shapes on the cotton fabric of the black hoodie that he slipped onto your figure when he got back downstairs. “Stop being so rude brat. Relax and introduce yourself first before you start thinking about getting buddy-buddy already” he scolded in his usual bored tone.

You were baffled. Seeing your boyfriend act like a responsible big brother was something you were definitely not prepared to see today. 

Hell, you didn’t even know he had a sister until literally a couple of minutes ago. 

Suna felt you staring at him and looked down at you with one of his brows slightly raised up as if he was asking if you were okay. Before you could reassure him that you were fine, Rizu cleared her throat and took a step back from you. 

She put a hand on her hip while she proudly pointed her thumb to her chest as she looked at you with a confident and prideful smile. “Suna Rizue, Rizu for short, Class 2-B Representative and Vice president of the Nobara Middle School drama club” she exclaims proudly. She flipped away one of her pigtails back behind her shoulder before crossing her arms, the same prideful smile never leaving her lips while her eyes had a flash of mischievousness in them. “I’m also known around this household as the prettiest Suna sibling. ‘Kaasan said so herself” she spoke triumphantly. 

You stifled a laugh as Suna clicked his tongue and muttered “dramatic brat” under his breath. 

As you felt yourself slowly relax, you stood from your seat, realizing not too long after that you were barely taller than his little sister but chose to ignore that minor detail, you extended your hand out to his sister and watched the way her face lit up. “L/n Y/n, Class 2-5 and member of the Inarizaki art club. While your brother is cute, I have to agree that you are the prettier Suna sibling” you joked and turned to Suna momentarily with a teasing glint with your eyes. Suna only narrowed his eyes at you and furrowed his brows which made both you and Rizu laugh. 

You turned back to Rizu and smiled, “It’s nice to meet you Rizu-chan, Rin doesn’t really bring you up much-” or ever “so I’m sorry it took so long for us to meet.”

Rizu shook her head, “It’s okay! Nii-san talks about you sometimes but I thought he was just lying. He’s kind of lame and he zones out a lot so I thought you were just some weird figment of his imagination that he made to cope with his loneliness” your jaw dropped, were kids always this blunt? 

Rizu shrugged and pulled her phone out of her backpack, “But whatever, I guess the universe felt bad for him and decided not to make him some lonely loser. Anyways, can we exchange numbers Y/n-chan? I wanna send you Nii-sans baby photos” she smiled and looked up at you hopefully. At the sound of Suna’s baby photos being offered up on the table, you quickly nodded and typed in your contact info into her phone. 

Suna’s jaw dropped ever so slightly before scoffing and looking away as he crossed his arms. “Can’t believe my own girlfriend is ganging up on me with my sister” he thought in disbelief. 

“Rizu-chan you’re brother and I are gonna make some hot pot, want some?” you asked as you handed her phone back into her hands. Rizu nodded enthusiastically, “that sounds great! Can I help? Please!” she asked in a hopeful tone as she brought her hands together. You laughed and nodded and watched her beam and skip away to the kitchen. 

Before following her, you turned around to look up at Suna with a frown on your face and your arms crossed over your chest. Suna looked back at you, unsure of why you were giving him that look. “What?” he asked, which only made you look at him in disbelief at his cluelessness. You scoffed and rolled your eyes before making your way towards him and slapping his arm, “You idiot! You never told me you had a little sister” you hissed. 

Suna blinked at you, “I didn’t?” he asked, genuinely confused, while raising one of his eyebrows. You looked at him incredulously and shook your head, “no!” you exclaimed. “God I can’t believe you didn’t tell me” you muttered and looked away, cheeks warming up in embarrassment.

Suna eyed your actions and sighed knowing that he must’ve upset you. If he’s being honest, he didn’t mean to keep you in the dark about his sister. He just always had his mind on you whenever the two of you would hang out so he truthfully forgot about his sister whenever you two were together. He sighed, he leaned back to sit on the edge of the dining room table before grabbing your arm and pulling you closer to his chest. 

When you didn’t budge against him, he wrapped his arms around your shoulders and he leaned his head on your shoulders before muttering a quiet, “sorry” into the fabric of his hoodie. A couple seconds passed before you gave in and wrapped your arms around his waist, embracing his warmth. 

Truthfully you weren’t upset or mad at him, just a bit embarrassed that you never knew about his sister until literally a couple of moments ago. You remember how nervous you were when you first met his parents and felt all those nerves coming back because you wanted to impress his little sister. 

You pulled away first and scratched the back of your neck, “It’s fine Rin I’m not mad. If anything I’m just a bit embarrassed that I never noticed. I mean I’ve met your parents and been over multiple times. Plus I’ve slept over like twice already!” you exclaimed. 

Suna moved his arms off your shoulder and used one to support his weight on the table while the other moved your hair away from your face and tucked some strands behind your ear. “It’s not your fault, The brat is always away doing her drama club stuff or whatever so she doesn’t get back until I’ve already walked you home for the night. For the sleepover, I think it’s just a coincidence that she would be away while you were over” he said and you nodded. 

Suna stared at you for a moment, he caught onto how uneasy you looked and immediately figured out why. “Babe, don’t worry about impressing Rizu too much. Trust me, she already likes you a lot” he said while using his thumb to rub the side of your neck gently. 

You nodded slowly before looking up at him with a confused expression, “how did you forget to tell me huh?” you asked. Suna thought back for a moment before shrugging nonchalantly, “I only think of you when we’re together, the brat is old enough to take care of herself” he admitted bluntly.

Your cheeks warmed up and you chuckled making Suna’s chest erupt in butterflies at the sight of your smile. “Calling your sister a brat is kind of rude you know?” you teased. He looked at you with an unamused expression, “you call your little cousins' demon spawns as if that’s any better” he pointed out. You opened your mouth but quickly closed it as you realized he was right. 

Suna pushed himself off of the table and walked towards you and you already saw the mischievous look in his eyes. He leaned down, his lips just barely brushing over yours, “am I forgiven?” he asked in a hushed tone. Your face quickly turned into a bright shade of red once you realized how close he got. While the offer was tempting and his lips were right there, you remembered that his sister was only just a couple feet away from the two of you and you didn’t want to risk her seeing anything. 

You didn’t answer and only looked away, flustered, which made Suna chuckle. He pecked the corner of your lips before straightening himself up, “I’ll take that as a yes” he smirked, making you roll your eyes. 

Suna then grabbed your shoulders and turned you around as he pushed you into the kitchen where his little was sitting on top of the counter wearing a blue apron while a pink folded apron was in her hands. 

She looked up at the two of you entering the kitchen, she smiled at you and noticed how flustered you. She shot her brother a look of disgust. “Ew don’t tell me you were making out in the dining room. So gross Nii-san” she commented as her brother walked towards her to grab the extra apron in her hands. 

Suna looked at her with his normal bored and lazy expression, “shut it brat” he said before turning his back and making his way towards you. Rizu rolled her eyes and turned her attention back onto her phone. It wasn’t until she started to hear the two of you banter when she put down her phone in her lap and watched the way you and her brother interacted. 

She listened to you ask about what vegetables he would want in the hot pot and watched as he moved behind your back and pushed your hair over your shoulder so he could tie the strings of the pink apron behind your neck. 

The sight was strange and oddly sweet. Rizu always thought that her brother would be a terrible boyfriend. He was quiet, borderline lazy, and had no romantic bone in him. He seemed like the type of partner who would do nothing but the bare minimum when they’re in a relationship. He was often annoyed at the sight of other couples and he never had much interest in being in a relationship himself which was partly the reason why Rizu didn’t think to believe him when he told their parents that he had a girlfriend out of the blue one day.

[“Rintarou stop playing around” Their mother chuckled. 

“No for real, I have a girlfriend and she wants to go stargazing so I’ll be home late” he said monotonically before slipping on his shoes and heading out the door.

Rizu watched as her parents exchanged a lost expression with a mix of disbelief towards each other. Part of them were surprised, part of them were happy, but part of them didn’t know if he was playing around or not. 

“Did you know about this?” Their mother asked their Dad who was grabbing a glass from the cupboard. Their Dad only shook his head, “No. You think that’s why he’s been so busy lately?” he asked only to receive a clueless shrug from his wife. 

Rizu rolled her eyes and jumped up from the couch to face her parents. “Come on this is Nii-san we’re talking about. He’s probably just lying. He can’t even talk to girls, let alone get a full on girlfriend”]

“That statement didn’t age well” Rizu thought.

Her eyes followed the way he had the smallest smile on his face as he adjusted your apron, asking afterwards if it was comfortable or if you needed him to adjust it better. Once you told him it was okay, he moved onto gathering your hair into his hands and tying it back with the small black silk band he had around his wrist. Suna placed his hands back onto your shoulders to turn you around to face him. He brought his hand over your face and moved the fly-aways to the side while tucking the loose pieces behind your ear. 

After he was done, you stood on your tippy-toes and pressed a kiss onto his cheek and whispered a quiet “thank you Rin Rin.” She narrowed her eyes and had to hold back her urge to laugh at how the tips of his ears lit up into a bright shade of red. It was then that she concluded one thing:

“he’s so fucking whipped” she muttered under her breath.

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* 

“Wait are you serious? He really gave you a can of lemonade for your birthday?” you asked looking up from the meat you were slicing in bewilderment as Rizu nodded. “Mhm! It wasn’t even the brand I liked, it was the generic ones that had too much sugar” she explained as she moved past you to set the bowl of mushrooms she had cut up with the other vegetables. 

You turned to look at Suna who was sitting on a stool by the kitchen island with his attention fully on his phone. “Is this true?” you questioned. Suna didn’t even look up from his phone as he simply replied, “she likes lemonade.”

 You stifled a laugh at his answer and Rizu only scowled. She nudged your arm and whispered “I dunno how you put up with him” into your ear making you giggle. 

Cooking with the Suna siblings was definitely interesting, to say the least. You weren’t surprised to see that Rizu was a complete polar opposite from her brother. Judging from her first words to you, you knew that she was a lot more outspoken than her brother. While Suna was quiet, Rizu spoke as if she had a microphone taped onto her mouth. She was talkative and energetic while Suna always seemed like he was close to shutting off at any given moment. 

Their dynamic was different, to say the least. Rizu lived up to the annoying little sister type while her brother looked as if he could care less about whatever she did. However, all siblings had at least one thing in common and between them, and you figured out what that thing was quickly. 

They both shared a high level of pettiness. 

If one said something the other didn’t like, they’d find something expose worthy to embarrass the other person. It was a constant back and forth of how could embarrass the other person the worst. 

When Rizu told you that Suna didn’t learn how to tie his shoelaces until he was 8, Suna told you that she failed her math test. When Suna told you that she once slipped on stage mid-performance, Rizu told you that Suna came to their mother when he needed dating advice. 

[ Nii-san shut up! The stage was slippery and my costume was a long dress!” Rizu cried out dramatically. Suna rolled his eyes, “the costumes of your classmates were long but you didn’t see them tripping all over the stage” he teased. Rizu’s jaw dropped, a fire inside lit up as she felt herself getting angry with her older brother. ‘Two can play at this game’ she thought. 

Rizu scoffed and turned to face her body towards you as she leaned onto the counter. “You know Yn-chan, Nii-san always asks ‘kaasan about what he should do to impress you! You know that sunflower field date? He and ‘Kaasan planned that whole thing together ‘cause Nii-san is a clueless idiot and didn’t know what to do” You turned your head to the side and looked at Rizu with a curious expression before briefly looking at your boyfriend who had tensed up. 

“Really now? Rin had me convinced that he did all the planning himself” you teased as you narrowed your eyes at him. Suna huffed, “she just let me use her card to pay for the stupid tickets, I did everything else.” he muttered. 

You chuckled, noticing the way his cheeks puffed out and how the tips of his ears started to turn red. You smiled as you nodded at what Rizu saying, momentarily glancing at him every so often. 

How cute.

Suna then looked up from his phone, a devious smirk on his lips as he knew the perfect moment to us in order to one-up her previous statement.

“Babe did you know that Rizu sleeps with an Eren body pillow-”

“shut up!!” ]

It was a never-ending petty battle between the two siblings. 

Nonetheless, you could tell that they still cared about each other. Albeit in their own special way. 

Rizu rolled her eyes and turned to you and leaned closer, whispering loud enough so that her brother could hear, “Y/n-chan are you sure you’re actually his girlfriend? Like willingly? If he’s paying you then I can guarantee that he’s not paying you enough. Blink twice if you need help-hey!” she whined as she felt a mushroom hit her arm. You both turned to Suna who had a smug smile on his face, “stop talking shit about me brat.” Rizu narrowed her eyes and crossed her arms, “or what Nii-san?” she challenged. “I’ll tell ‘kaasan that you walked home with that boy yesterday,” he shot back. 

Rizu’s smirked dropped, “hey! You promised you wouldn’t tell her!” she whined. Suna shrugged his shoulders, “I lied” he replied simply. Rizu scoffed, “I can’t believe you’re dating such a meanie!” she exclaimed and began to angrily stir the broth in the pot.

You watched her actions momentarily before walking around the kitchen island and towards Suna and whacking his arm with a towel you were using to dry your hands. “Stop being so mean to your sister!” you scolded. He looked at you with an unamused expression as he rubbed his arm, “she was mean to me first,” he defended himself bluntly. You rolled your eyes and turned your back to go and start frying the beef.

A comfortable silence came into the kitchen as you and his sister continued cooking. Of course, this silence didn’t last long as the two siblings would go back to their back and forth bantering but nonetheless, there was a comfortable and homey aura in the atmosphere. 

The hot pot was coming together and you occasionally would have Suna try the meat and make sure that it tasted okay. Suna may not be the one cooking, but he had offered his assistance early on by cutting some of the tofu and cooking the udon noodles. You and Rizu would trail off and have your own conversation, missing the way Suna would glance up at the two of you, his hands propping up his phone as he took photos of the two of you laughing and joking around together. 

The rest of the night went by smoothly. Once the hot pot was ready, you asked Suna to prepare the table while you and Rizu set the food down. Since it was nearing 6pm by the time you and Rizu had finished cooking, you all considered this an early dinner. You sat beside Suna while Rizu sat across from you as you all enjoyed a warm bowl of hot pot during a cold winter night. 

Suna watched as you and Rizu talked about a certain anime you both had been watching and took everything within him to not smile at the moment. Seeing you interact with his sister warmed his heart and a part of him was relieved that you two got along well. 

He knew that Rizu was a bit overbearing and you weren’t a big fan of younger children so he was worried that you two would clash. 

But alas, seeing that two of you laugh together put him at ease. 

After dinner, Rizu knew better than to try and third wheel you and her brother. She could see from the way his shoulder kept brushing past yours and how his hands kept getting closer and closer to yours during dinner that he was itching to get any sort of alone time with you. 

She could be a little shit and steal you from him during another day.

Before scurrying off to her room, Rizu gave you a high five before exclaiming once again that you’re really pretty and way too good for her stupid brother while also saying that she would text you his baby photos later. You laughed and nodded along and she flashed Suna a cheeky smile before running up the stairs. 

Once his sister was finally gone, Suna grabbed your wrist and dragged you over to the kotatsu sofa in his living room and practically dragged you down. “Well aren’t you clingy” you teased as he pulled up the blankets over your legs. Suna rolled his eyes, muttering a quiet “shut up” as he laid down and made himself comfortable under the blankets. 

You mirrored his actions, shuffling under the blankets and finding a comfy spot to lay on. Suna’s hands found their way around your waist and he moved you closer to him, letting your head rest against his chest. You couldn’t help but laugh at how clingy he was being as you watched him shift so you were laying on top of him while he hugged you as if you were a teddy bear. 

Suna leaned his head back comfortably on the couch cushion as closed his eyes and a content smile came over his face. “You’re so warm,” he muttered quietly. You smiled “I think that’s just the kotatsu heating Rin,” you said quietly muttered into his chest. “No it’s definitely you, I always feel warm when I’m with you” he whispered. 

You smiled, not failing the way his words made butterflies erupt in your stomach “how cheesy” you teased while momentarily lifting your head so you could poke his cheek. “Whatever” he sighed, his arms around your waist slowly holding you just a bit tighter. “I thought we were supposed to be studying Rin” you said quietly. “Tomorrow, too comfortable right now” he answered back. You giggled, “you just want me to come back huh.” Suna didn’t even bother to deny, only simply nodding and humming a faint “mhm” before relaxing his body. 

A wave of comfortable silence came once again as you two embraced each other's warmth. Your ear was pressed against his chest and the steady rhythm of his heartbeat lulling you into sleep. Slowly but surely you found yourself getting drowsy from your comfortable position and you no longer had any energy left in you to stop your eyes from closing.

Suna wasn’t surprised to hear the faint sounds of your gentle snoring not too long after. For a moment he sat up, careful not to wake you, and he took a moment to just admire you. How soft, gentle, and unbothered you looked in his arms. He removed one of his hands from your waist and gently rubbed your arm, he stiffened for a moment as watched as you shuffled slightly before relaxing against him once again. His body loosened up and a small smile spread on his lips, ‘How could someone be so damn pretty’ he thought. 

He admired you for a moment longer. His head replaying the memories you two made in the past 5 months while silently looking forward to what you two had in store together in the future. 

He petted your head gently as he wondered starting about what he should do for your 6 months. You’ve been talking about ice skating after seeing it in a movie so he considered that as an option. The idea of seeing you excitedly skating under the twinkling lights of the ice rink made Suna excited. He knew he couldn’t skate, but he didn’t really care. Just sharing the moment with you was enough for him. 

Slowly, his own exhaustion from the day soon caught up to him and soon enough he was getting tired as well. He shuffled back down and rested his head on the cushions. He lifted his hands off your waist to adjust the blanket over you two, make sure you were all snuggled up and warm. 

Just before he surrendered himself to sleep, he pressed a soft kiss on the top of your head and another one on your forehead. Whispering a faint “love you” before closing his eyes, failing to notice the small smile that grew on your lips.

However, he didn’t fail to feel the heart that your finger softly drew on his chest. 

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* 

Bonus Scene 

“Nii-san can I borrow a pencil?”

Suna looked up from his phone and narrowed his eyes at his sister who was standing by his doorway. Suna looked at her blankly, for a moment he grew suspicious of why she suddenly wanted a pencil but he was honestly far too tired to even try and figure out what she really wanted. “It’s on my desk,” he said plainly as he nodded his head over to his desk on the other side of his room. 

Rizu nodded and made her way over to his desk that was placed in front of his window. Rizu came in front of his desk and scanned the surface for what she needed. He had an open notebook with unfinished work displayed in the middle while his pen holders lined up the top of his desk. 

Rizu saw a pencil sitting inside his pen holder and reached out her hands to take a hold of it. Just as she was about to turn around and leave his room so she could finish up her work, she noticed something taped on the side of his wall that was being covered up by the curtain blowing in front of it. 

While she knew it was wrong to snoop around other people's things, she was empty of blackmail against him and that reason alone was enough for her to justify her actions. She turned around to look back at her brother and saw that he was fairly distracted and took that moment as an opportunity to push the curtain aside. 

However, instead of finding incriminating blackmail, all she saw was a picture of you and him taped from what looked like to be the inside of the photobooths at the movie theatres. The first picture was of you two smiling (well more you than him), the second was you kissing cheek, the 3rd one he had pulled you to sit on top of his lap and he was now the one kissing your cheek, and the last photo was the two of you smiling genuinely to each other, paying no attention to the camera as you both got too caught up in the moment. 

“I hate how they're so cute,” she admitted in her head.

Rizu’s eyes then drifted from the wall that had a bunch of other taped printed photos of you and him to his window sill where a bunch of little trinkets were displayed along with a singular photo frame. 

Her eyes looked over the little trinkets. He had some action figures and random knick-knacks. Nothing interesting in her opinion. “Typical boy stuff, nothing I can use against him,” she thought. Looking past the small transformers' action figure, she kept looking at his window sill until she stopped and stared at a paper box full of little things inside. She squinted her eyes, her eyes having a hard time seeing what it was with how dark it was in his room. She leaned closer and upon further inspection, it finally dawned on her what was inside the box.

It was a bunch of little origami strawberries. 

A bunch of little origami strawberries piled on top of each other, some had wrinkled leaves while others had bent corners. Rizu then looked back at his desk and saw a small stack of red and green papers neatly set on the corner of his desk. 

“weird,” she thought. 

Her eyes shifted from the paper box to the small white square frame where there was a photo of you inside sitting at the edge of the window sill. 

Surrounding you were rows and rows of sunflowers that were facing towards the sun. You were clad in a pretty dress with small floral patterns along with a small sun hat on your head that was tipped back so the sun was hitting your face. Your hair was blown back behind your shoulder, your left hand was holding a bunch of sunflowers while your right hand was resting on top of your hat, holding it down so it wouldn’t be blown away by the wind. Your eyes were closed and you had the warmest smile on your lips as you were basking into the afternoon sunshine. The sunlight was kissing your skin so perfectly that she swore you were glowing. You looked so peaceful, relaxed, and content. It was clear that you weren’t trying to pose for the camera, this photo captured you and all your natural beauty. 

You looked ethereal. 

She looked back at her brother and back at the basket of origami strawberries and the photo frame and concluded one other thing.

“what a fucking simp”

a/n: yes it’s may but this story takes place in december oops

UGH WORDS CANT DESCRIBE HOW SUNA AND Y/N MAKE ME SO HAPPY. DEADASS THIS EXTRA WARMED MY HEART AND SO I HOPE IT WARMED YOUR HEART TOO. 

I promised a while back that I was going to make an extra that featured suna’s little sister. Personally, I feel like Suna’s sister with be the complete opposite of him. Hence why I wrote her to be very dramatic and enthusiastic. He’s probably able to put up with the miya twins bullshit because his sister already made him go through so much LMAO

I’m uncertain if this is going to be my last extra for club stupid. I have one last long fic idea in mind but truthfully I’m not sure when I’ll get to writing it </3

Regardless, thank you guys so much for the love and appreciation for this series. It really means a lot to me and I’m glad to see people continue to enjoy it :)

a/n 2: ayo where do i find myself a suna? genuinely asking and in need of help. 

taglist! [CLOSED] @aircorumble​@elianetsantana​ @versatilewindow @introvertatitsfinest​ @aristatrois​ @mizukisonoda​ @amberisnotcrazy​ @kritiiiii​ @iloveyouasmuchaspoohloveshoney​ @a-moon-fairy ​ @akaasht​ @lotusweebs​ @marvelous-maxi​ @laughingismorefun​ @hhmnvm​ @sweetyrina​ @honeydrip​ @miracleboy420​ @rachelexe​ @charsdummb​ @mjoork @loser-keiji​ @dinablossom​ @ntimacy​ @kac-chowsballs​@unhappyraspberry @sbaepsae ​ @doebopeepeebbod @missalienqueen​@ssuna​ @violenthead​ @unstableye​ @tycrackculture​​ @a-applepi​​ i @lollyzen​​ @aisawa-reo​​ @ashybitch89​ @sunflowerirl​ @sapphicstarss​ @melodiamore​ @valrubiii @urbasicaveragegirl @mint-mai @4kaashl @sugawsites @anngelllla @applekenm @bumblebeesofspace @dreamstormings @milkingkageyama @tsumu-core @luvelyxp @aquariarose

[it’s been a long time since I updated this series so i apologize if I am unable to tag you 🥲]

[flaray25]

Hey there! :)

I wanted to send you those ask game questions you've sent me! :D

Sooo...

Why do you ship Squidbob?

When did you start shipping them?

How did you know it might be a cute ship?

That's all! I hope you're doing well! :)

@cry-baby139

I really appreciate playing this with you too Ellie :)

Why do you ship Squidbob?

I ship them because i think they are both just a wonderful couple! Its like the grump x the nice

When did you start shipping them?

I started shipping them around May 2020 and so goes on.

How did you know it might be a cute ship?

I'm exactly sure its cute since Squidward is a bit of a tsundere, still. Spongebob likes to stalk, enter his(squiddy) house, and kisses him on the nose or the cheek or the forehead, he also leaves sticky notes.

When i missed Spongebob the only cartoon ive ever wanted to watch for so long. I came across a video in yt of what Packet made. Its called "Squidbob Collection" and at first i didnt feel disgusted by it since what is going on my head is like. "Whats Squidbob?" "Who is Squidbob?" "Is this like- bob and a squid?" I watched the part one and when it ended. I didnt really think much of it but i get it. Squidbob is a ship of Spongebob and Squidward. And now i started watching up to 10 collections of it. And then it finished there.

I was surprised that other people actually ship squidbob. And now i ship them to the moment i rewatched spongebob episodes seeing how squidward and spongebob are a bit close to other episodes. I dont think they both could really be a match to be 'brothers' since Squidward disagrees. But to every other episodes even if squidward gets bothered by spongebob, destroying his entire house again and again, or always annoying him. He gets mad but he never makes him cry for what after he did on fools in april episode. He also appreciates Spongebob's appearance deep down inside of him. Spongebob receives Squidward's note for orders but he puts ♡Squidward. I mean that looks out of character for him 🤭 Squidward feels comfortable and appreciated when he got the teddy bear he wanted on the episode skill crane. He loves the teddy bear but Spongebob feels disappointed for not getting a thank you but Squidward did figure out that he didnt say thank you back. Squidward in the other episode Squidward got an idea on Spongebob so he thanked him and kissed him on the cheek. It was pretty shocked on Spongebob when he got kissed by him. But still ooc for squidward to allow a dance with spongebob in Bubble bass's tab.

I find them both cute in all spongebob and squidward related episodes. They both make me smile because them both are my comfort characters. And my otp forever. They will forever be stuck in my heart i still miss @squidbobpops's drawings and also plabs. But i hope she feeling fine. She's having a bit of a hard time- but i hope she is okay. But if not i wish her to be okay since we all are having hard time.

(I do not like nsfw of it)

There it is i explained it :D

Squidbob is in my heart

Spongebob fandom is rent free in my head so whenever i look at spongebob tshirts iutside or spongebob popsicle or whatever i'd be smiling now

[jeeperso]

D&D Quotes Without Context

Treasure Island edition, Chapter 2

gnome shakes the sheet of tin, whinnies like a horse "Is he gonna follow us the whole time?" "I'm on retainer."

"Okay, who in their right mind would name an ocean-going vessel 'Poseidon's An Ass'?" "It should be...Neptune Uranus."

OOC: He's along because it's an excuse to study the region, to help Meflina by finishing her obligation (and potentially finding her people) and, oh yeah, fuck flint. OOC2: Neither is Cookie, he's going because he just feels that strange pull of instinct. Like fate, or destiny, or cheese.

MJ: "It’s okay. The real treasure was the times we got baked along the way."

OOC: This entire voyage is just a McDonalds run. OOC2: We get there and the treasure is nothing but countless packets of Szechuan sauce.

"NO PATHETIC BOX CAN HOLD ME!" "Some people can sleep anywhere."

Today you woke up, hung over with a loxodon Butler offering you a hangover cure. “Is there an actual Elephant Man or am I still unbelievably high?” "Well I mean he's not pink, that's a strong case he's real." “He’s not pink?”

"From Jeeve's manners, I am optimistic we haven't been press-ganged... again."

"Thank you, Jeeves...Ugh, this cure had best take effect soon, else I'd think I was in Ra... Is that the forking gnome again?" he asks, sighting a familiar sheet of tin ready to by waved. Janus looks around...."Raven....LOAF." “They don’t like it when you taunt them.”

"I smell Funions.  I have no idea what that is but I recognize the smell."

"It's not the first time I...didn't remember the night before.... " “It’s been a week.”

You get the feeling if she wasn't so sweet an innocent, Melfina'd have enough blackmail material on the lot of you to own your souls.

"They're paying you to do that thing with your room."

"I've told you Maria, but Orange Crush does not prevent scurvy."

"What jobs are for the professor and I, given Amber already knows the secrets of palm tree and coconut technology?"

“At The Institute for Arcane Learning they had a term for this kind of thing. Bullshit.”

"There is one more item: that we are to watch for a man with a wooden leg named Smith.  We don't know if thats the man or the leg, but be on guard for either."

"Oh please tell me we didn't hire on the advice of a little man who lives in a finger..." “Probably the fairy that lives in my hat.  She keeps Dingo Company when I sleep.”  MJ takes off her knit cap and under it is a tiny glowing woman in a gold bikini. “I… uh… I don’t ask her to dress like that.”

"Oh dear, Archie doing hiring.  It's gonna be my brothers bachelor party all over again.  He still has a restraining order."

"Yes, onto who meet the crew, find out whom, after we've slept well, will mostly likely try to kill us in the morning..."

The Doctor tells you a little about the Captain he hired. "Captain Glenn Kermit is a kind but strict captain, has many years of naval command under his belt. Is normally quite polite but has a temper like a raging volcano when angered." The carriage doors open to reveal: A rather diminutive Grung in a perfectly tailored Captain's uniform. Cookie: "...that...is a very small..volcano." "Big things come in small packages." Janus says, standing at attention. Magnus does likewise, and only looks more like some foul wizard whose lair is being knocked over by teenaged adventurers.

"Cookie... I cook."

You are now suddenly very aware of the whip the First Mate has at her side. MJ looks at the whip. “Ah, that’s how we’re running the ship. I’ll make sure to order extra rum and lubricant.”

Boss makes a dollar, MJ makes a dime. That’s why she buys weed to sell on company time.

[Muppet Treasure Island role-call] “It could be worse.” First Mate: "The Bull Buggering Bishop of Bath and Wells?" “Here!” “Okay, it could not be worse.” "[Gnome]'s under contract.  We can't touch him." "Well I mean they are just names.  You can't judge a book by its title as they say." “One of them in named ‘Actual Cannibal Shia LaBouf.’”

Many of the crew duck out of sight in fear. Cookie is still ducked.  While standing.

"No, I've been at sea long enough to keep a close eye on a bosun who hires a crew like that. He is plotting something." "Shoot him first come the mutiny.  Got it."

"Well at the moment it seems the crew are well in hand either terrified of our Chaplin, or quite pleased by our food quality."

Suddenly there's a strange scent on the breeze... its almost like coffee?  You see the large ship is flying a black flag, a pirate crossbones on a coffee mug. The Captain stands on the deck and shouts. "All hands to battle stations! I know that flag!" "You don't mean.... it can't be..." He glares at the ship. "Yes, The Mad Pirate Wilkins!"

[loyally-unfaithful]

pairing: rengoku kyojuro x gn!reader

genre: fluff

a/n: henlo is me again, i’ve never owned cats and it shows i made this into headcanon format, but if you were looking for something feel free to resend a request c: alrighty hope you like it

edit: i know this is a super long time since this ask was actually sent to me?? and i honestly have no excuses to give. i’m really sorry to whoever sent the request: i was just procrastinating and then covid hit and my motivation plunged even lower. i know this is not much, and it’s probably ooc to all hell but i do hope you like it.

so ok, here’s the premise: you just moved out of your old residence, whether it was a flat or a house—you’re outta there! you is gone !

and ur friend or flatmate had a litter of cats and u just couldn't help urself but adopt one. they were just that cute.

so u did.

got that bad boi for free too, what a bargain!

and anyway u love that bastard with all ur heart.

it's just a bastard but she’s your bastard so it's all good.

very adorable dainty catto, and you took her to the vets to get her checked up, vaccinated, dewormed, and all that good stuff to make sure she will have a long and healthy lifespan.

u recall that u need to bring her in within 6 months to get her spayed so that there wouldn’t be an accidental litter. the operation is postponed since rn she’s too small, and ur like.

ok, i'll see u in 6 months.

that was 3 months ago.

now u moved out into a new apartment, with ur precious catto in tow.

after u finished bringing in all your boxes and furnitures and such, you thought to yourself, “hey, why not start this new chapter in life with a good start by acquainting myself with my neighbours”.

and that's exactly what u did: u gathered like, a packet of strawberries, and went over to the flat directly in front of urs while rehearsing what you will say in your head.

as you reached the other side and pressed the doorbell, you wondered who lived behind those doors…

first you’ll introduce yourself by name.

maybe it was a married couple? maybe even with a family?

and after that, you’ll tell them that you just recently moved in.

or perhaps it would be some elderly gentleman or lady?

and then, you will hand the gifts over and express that you hoped that the two of you will get along—something like that.

worst case scenario, the person is some weirdo… you hoped not…

the door finally opens with a click and you begin to recite what you had practiced:

« hey my name is... » your voice tapers off as you fully took in the person greeting you.

your voice disappears, meeting someone you absolutely did not expect. out of all the possibilities, you did not think for a moment that your neighbour would be the handsome young man with piercing golden eyes, lustrous locks of bright yellow hair, and an even brighter smile, standing before you.

were you staring? you were staring weren’t you? you realised in embarrassment that you were staring at the man, who was probably confused to all hell as to why you appeared on his front doors.

fighting your urge to combust and run away, you introduced yourself following the script you made up (though with more stutters than originally intended) and brusquely handed the berries over.

he happily takes your gift, repeating your name, assuring you that he was listening. it’s so stupid, but the way he says your name makes your stomach do flips. « well, welcome! he says enthusiastically. i’m rengoku kyojuro! i hope you enjoy it here! »

and that was that.

you mechanically went back to your flat, face burning and nervousness still clawing at you.

you’d say that you got adjusted to this new life pretty quickly. you seldom visited kyojuro as you were too embarrassed to pop by and chit-chat as often as you would’ve preferred to—dreading the thought of crossing him on your way to your own flat whenever you went home—but otherwise everything had been good.

alas, your cat was now 5 months old and oh boy.

something tells you your cat was entering its heat cycle or something—you were a first time cat-owner, but you had an inkling.

if your cat’s sudden affectionate, or over-affectionate, streak and unexpected attention seeking behaviour was anything to go by. she would roll on the floor, rub herself all over you and leave fluff all over your clothes, and yells.

she screm!

most stressful of all was how she absolutely wanted to escape to the outside, but you were not having it. you did not want kittens. one cat is enough thank you.

but nope, your wishes were in vain as one day, she just fucking disappeared—god knows where she is , she’s just somewhere.

understandably, you lost your shit and panicked because holy hell your cat escaped!!!

you went around to look for her, with no luck, and you were absolutely heartbroken.

that was until like??? 2 months later and you went to open a drawer to get some socks and lo and behold!

A CAT

and not just any cat! your cat! AND NOT JUST YOUR CAT! but also a bunch of other smaller cats, also known as kittens!

at this point, you weren’t even upset at the thought that you fucked up and ended up having kittens—you were just happy your cat is back and alive and well and back home. who knows how she entered back into the house.

who cares??

your cat is back!!

you’ll just have to spay her once she’s done nursing.

but as you watched over the litter, which looked like your cat but also another cat, you began to see a resemblance between their orange fur and caprisun, kyojuro’s ginger maine coon!!

and now everything makes sense…  

body working on autopilot, both because of how tired you were after watching over the cats and also because you were still dissociating from the realisation, you stiffly made your way to your neighbour and ringed the doorbell… ignoring the fact that this was now 2 in the morning.

you had to tell him, or confirm or do something with this new knowledge. his sleep can wait.

surprisingly, he answered the door without you having to ring him a second time. unsurprisingly, he looked tired and was ???? at you summoning him at such an odd time in the evening.

« i know that we don’t really talk, you started. but i need to show you something: i think your cat might have gotten my cat pregnant?? »

that caught the blond’s attention enough to wash the grogginess away from his face, and he followed you back to your flat.

normally the idea that a stranger, a good looking stranger no less, was going into your flat would fluster you, but right now you were a man with a plan, you had something to do and that was to show kyojuro the litter of cats.

he was surprised when he saw them, but confirmed that you were probably right, and that his male cat had probably gotten to your cat during her disappearance.

at this point you were a little bit (a lot) overwhelmed by the responsibility that came along with being a parent (and a grandparent), so you were about to ask him to help you coparent for the little buggers.

but he suggested it before you had the chance to, taking initiative:

« then! he expressed emphatically. we must raise this little kitty family together! kyojuro declared. »

and thus began your misadventures together as cat parents.

even though you both had work and a multitude of other things to do during the day (kyojuro still has his own cat to take care of, for that matter), you made it work—perhaps through sheer stubbornness and desire to make things right.

if anything, this whole ordeal cemented the fact that you were officially put off from having real children: if taking care of kittens was this demanding, imagine a whole actual human baby.

no way, no thanks.

you’re good.

hard pass.

funnily enough, after taking turns to take care of the cats and after the shifts to watch over them, you two had become fast friends. despite your reluctance with meeting him again after your disastrous greeting, you found yourself being very comfortable being in his presence and getting used to having him over in your flat (for the cats, of course).

but you would be lying if you said you didn’t enjoy spending time with kyojuro, conversing with him and learning more about each other as you both opened up to one another.

it was when he beamed at a joke you made, wearing his signature exuberant smile and laughing a laugh that you found so adorable, that you realised that you were in too deep. that you were definitely catching feels.

sometimes, you wished that you two would’ve been more than just friends. you wince at the thought that the two of you drift apart after this whole mess was over. but you pushed that inevitability away from your mind.

for the most part, nothing noteworthy ever happened as you took care of the kittens as the two of you fell into a comfortable rhythm.

one day, while you were both taking care of the cats, his exhaustion got the best of him and kyojuro fell asleep. you found him dozing off on the couch when you walked in, and you had to stop for a moment and tiptoe in the piece because of how peaceful he looked as he was resting. it was incredible how impeccable he looked, awake or asleep.

secretly, you took a picture, capturing this moment forever. he looks adorable. you’ll probably show the image later and tell him that he can take it easy for a while seeing as he was worn out and that you just received a few days off.

speaking of sleeping on duty, you’ve caught yourself passing out once or twice (ok a few times, more than just once or twice), but the weirdest part of all was that you would always wake up on your bed instead of wherever you fell asleep.

butterflies would go feral in ur stomach at the implication that kyojuro had been carrying your sleeping form to your bedroom.

but that was what has been happening right?

you think that at some point, you had fallen asleep on kyojuro… but to save yourself from the embarrassment, you chalk that up to your imagination running wild or a dream.

a few months into this ordeal, he pulled you over to another room to talk privately to you (ignoring the fact that there wasn’t anyone else in your apartment except for the cats).

he seemed to carry himself with a hesitance or shyness that was never there, and you found yourself dreading what he was about to tell you. what kind of bomb was he about to drop on you?

before starting, he paused for a moment, resolute… or was that a look of determination in his eyes? you didn’t know what to expect and it made you worried.

« i have something i need to tell you, convey to you! he started, confidence not lost in his voice. there is a burning passion in my heart, and it was about time that i listened to it! i know we’ve only met just recently, but after our time together i realised that i have feelings for you! he uttered your name again, with such gentleness and softness that it made your heart tighten. i like you! »

« i like you too!! you responded quickly, too quickly. you winced at how loud you unintentionally were, but he didn't seem to pay attention. »

instead, a radiant smile graced his features as he realised that you shared the same sentiment. and the same smile spread on your face, happy that he returned your feelings.

slowly, he moved closer to you and like a magnet, you mirrored him.

perhaps a bit hesitant, you could feel the ghost of a kiss over your lips as he leaned towards you, inching ever closer to each other.

but as your lips were about to connect, you hear crying from the other room…

the cats!

you two jerked away from each other, alerted by the sound, before looking back at each other, dumbfounded.

after what felt like an eternity but also an instant, a chuckle escaped you as you began to laugh uncontrollably—overwhelmed by giddiness and the sheer absurdity of this entire situation—and the blond followed suit, laughing along with you.

as you calmed down, your eyes found each other and the two of you just smiled.

the both of you wore brilliant smiles, and you were floored by the tenderness he held for you.

you look like a mess.

and he looks like a mess.

and you're both tired beyond belief.

but you’re both really happy.

and really happy to have each other.

(and your cats of course).

you’ll have to thank your cat later for helping you meet this wonderful person.

LIKE MY WORK? CONSIDER BUYING ME A COFFEE // CHECKING OUT MY MASTERLIST | LINKS CAN BE FOUND ON MY DESC

[orionxcastillo]

full name: orion castillo nicknames: ori, conejito (”little bunny” in spanish) gender and pronouns: cis man, he / him. age: thirty-eight. date of birth: april 9, 1983. hometown: chelmsford, england. nationality: british born, cuban and american heritage. religion: catholic. sexual and romantic orientation: bisexual biromantic. occupation: antique store assistant. living arrangements: lives on his own. languages spoken: english, spanish. (accent is a mess of english, american, cuban) strange history: edith alby

TW: mental institution, domestic violence, attempted murder, mental instability

Orion’s mother left America to study mythology at a British university. It was there she met his father, also studying. The pair hit it off and eventually married, Orion wasn’t far behind.

The night Orion’s mother told his father they were having a baby she took him outside to star gaze, telling him the stories of the ancient Greeks above. He struggled to see what stars she was talking about, except for Orion’s belt - three stars perfectly lined up together. Just as they would be as a family. 

When he was born Orion cried like nothing would ever be okay in the world. The nurses and doctors worried, but found nothing medically wrong. It wasn’t until Orion’s father nursed him by the window, pointing out Orion’s belt to the newborn did he seem to finally calm. The new parents felt the name Orion was fitting, as if he picked it out himself.

Life growing up in the UK had its ups and downs. He didn’t look or sound like the rest of the kids around him - his father was first generation Cuban-British, his mother was American. Sometimes there were fights in the school grounds, or out, some days he just skipped class entirely. Sometimes that was to flirt with the local girls school as they walked by his returning from sports at the nearby oval. If anything he would have thought of his childhood relatively normal, expected even. He did well in class despite his absences, he participated in sports and made friends who would invite him over to watch the latest movie on VCR. It was normal, at least in that aspect of life.

Home life was getting more and more destructive as Orion moved into his teen years. His father was becoming known for outbursts, whether anger or from distress. His mother would pretend all was okay; he was just having a ‘tantrum’ or a ‘funny day’. It was normal! Everyone had trouble sometimes. But sometimes when he was alone with his father he could hear him talking to someone, when the room was empty. He would say something to his father and the man would seem to be in another world entirely, not hearing a word that left his mouth. 

Things got the worst when Orion was 15. His grandparents, his fathers parents, moved in. They used the excuse they were struggling with money, but they always seemed to have a wallet full of cash ready to go. He was starting to get pushed out of rooms, told to go study or sleep when he heard his father scream. They didn’t want him to see what was happening to the man. He was sick. Doctors were in and out of the house, sometimes they would help - for a few days the house would grow quiet. Then things would get bad again, and every time it seemed to be getting worse.

Orion spent a lot of time out of home, he would sleep at friends houses or wander the streets. It felt for a while there no one cared what happened to him, he was pushed out and forgotten. Most mothers would worry about their son being out all night, his mother didn’t even notice. She had a lot on her hands, he knows this now, but as a teenager sometimes you need that support.

Everything came to a breaking point when one night that he did happen to be home he was awoken by his mothers screams for help. He scrambled out of bed, launched through the house in nothing but his boxers, to find his father welding a knife trying to prove to everyone they were all dead. He doesn’t remember everything that follows, his mind protecting him from as much trauma as they can. All he knows is he put himself between his mother and the knife, tackling the man he had looked up to as a child.

Orion, his mother, and his father all ended up in hospital that night. His grandparents came home after a later dinner party in time before trauma turned to tragedy. Doctors submitted his father into the psych ward as his grip on reality slipped away completely. His mother would come to divorce his father, his grandparents taking care of the man moving him to a care facility where he remains today. His mother would take Orion across the sea to America where her family would welcome him.

Orion would struggle after what he went through, it wasn’t allowed to be talked about - his mother wanting to forget it ever happened. A fresh start, why would they dirty it up with what has been? She would go on to work at Pleasance library whilst Orion finished his education through home schooling. He was of age to get a job so filled his free time working small jobs around town, planning to build enough funds that at age 18 he would return home to England. 

Except he never did. Ask him today and Orion will probably shrug as to why not, honestly he doesn’t quite know. There was something about this town, he didn’t really feel like leaving. Ever. Strange, no? In his time in Pleasance Orion has made friends, had good and bad relationships, lived a typical life. He moved into his own flat, even bought himself a cat to keep him company. His mother eventually retired and calls in on him far too often but he humours her, knowing she never meant him harm. 

Over the years Orion has received letters from his family in England looking to update him on the state of his father but they go unanswered. Truthfully, he wishes they would stop, but part of him would appreciate that the line of contact always stayed open. It was just more annoying than welcoming when a letter showed up in his mailbox.

The last few years Orion has been working at For Keeps, the antique store. He likes working there because there is always something new in store, something he had never seen before or a story locked away inside. Orion liked to research the history behind them, filling his time with books at the library or fingers tapping away at the keyboard as he looks online for further information. It feeds his curiosity, making it always annoying when he hits a dead end.

Life was normal, well as normal as you can get in this town (it’s always been a bit strange). Except, well, there was the fact he was seeing dead people. Well, Orion isn’t completely sure they’re ghosts. It’s not everywhere nor is it all the time. He first noticed it around five years ago, or maybe it was longer than that. They would just be there, doing their thing, when a figure that didn’t belong would join him. The ‘ghost’s don’t talk to him, not really. Sometimes they utter a word or shake their head but it’s never enough to know what they want from him. Occasionally they move his things, or things around the store, or follow him around as if they were breathing down his neck. 

Orion would be more distressed over the idea of ghosts if it wasn’t a more comforting idea than what happened to his father. Ghosts meant he wasn’t insane, just haunted. That he could handle, they didn’t bother him enough for it to disrupt his life and sometimes the company was nice on a slow day. Of course he told literally no one of the things he was seeing, they would call him crazy and break his mothers heart. If she ever found out she would have him hospitalised and possibly end up there herself. 

Telling himself it was ghosts felt easier than the fact he was of the same age his father was when he lost touch with reality, that the things his father saw could be appearing in front of his own eyes. To turn into the man he left behind so long ago was his worst nightmare - he may not have an exciting life but he had one he longed to hold on to. So ghosts were easy to handle, for now at least. Trauma from his father? He’ll pass on that one, even if it meant his own health was a risk. 

Orion to his friends is just like his cat, he likes to find somewhere warm and settle. If he’s at the bar he’s in the corner booth with his drink, maybe a book in hand until company joins him. He likes to check out sometimes, go out to the lake with some camping gear and forget the worst exists. You’re lucky if he invites you along, he clearly doesn’t want to forget you.

Orion almost always is carrying a packet of cigarettes, a notebook or novel, a packet of gum and spare change. He walks most places so his car is collecting dust in its garage. He likes to cook for people, as long as you’re not a picky eater. He is often scribbling in his notebook, whether reminders or notes on something he’s researching, or poems no one is supposed to ever hear.

To most Orion is known as Ori, his parents are the only one who would call him conejito, which means ‘little bunny’.

OOC: 

My name is Jen but for less confusion you can call me J. I’m 27, live in Australia, and have been on Tumblr for like... over 10 years. Love me. 

He is open to all kinds of connections, I do not have a specific list so just hit me up to plots.

@phqextras

[velociraptors-dont-lie]

My Way (3)

Summary: Anita’s adventure truly starts.

Warnings: blood? fighting? More swearing? More bad writing and OOcness?

A/N: I. still.hate.this. But imma continue writing it because im not a quitter.

Part one Here, Part Two here

Chapter Three

''We'll rest here for the night''

Anita groaned in relief and dropped to the floor, still cuffed hands going to her red and sore feet. Scamp cooed sadly from his pod and his ears dropped when Anita looked at him. ''I'm okay, sweetheart, promise.''

It got dark in what seemed like no time at all, the sun just under the horizon, and All Anita could hear was the Mandalorian's pained noises. She might've offered to help if she wasn't still distrustful of him, it was only his arm after all and it didn't look too bad.

She'd fed Scamp, gave him a drink and he seemed bored, unable to run about like he was used to doing with his mother. He looked at Anita as she chewed on something she'd stolen from the encampment before looking to the metal man who seemed in pain, deciding to do something about it, Scamp started to fidget.

She saw him moving out of the corner of her eye, saw him drop from out of the pod, and head towards the Mandalorian. Intrigued, she watched Scamp raise his arm and squint his eyes only fearing once the Mandalorian took Scamp's hand and picked him up.

Only to be surprised at his gentle drop into the pod, leaving the child there. So perhaps he wasn't as course and harsh as she first thought him to be, something about Scamp had already wormed its way into his armor, it was only a matter of a time before it reached his heart.

Scamp's second attempt to help yielded the same result, It also had Anita laughing quietly to herself when the man shut the pod with Scamp inside. At least now the little bugger had to sleep.

''I can help with that if you take these off.'' She lifted her hands to show the cuffs ''They're starting to hurt and I promise I won't jump on you again.''

''It's fine''

''It's not fine. It won't get better like that, at least let me clean it.''

He looked at her for a few seconds, debating the options in his head. She hadn't done anything else since arriving out of nowhere except care for the baby. In the end, he relented and released her hands from the cuffs and watched as she took the last of her water and used it to clean his wound.

''You know, that whole situation when I found you was a complete fluke.'' she chuckled to herself mostly as she dabbed his wound dry gently. ''I can't fight at all but you were walking off with my child and I had to do something. Honestly, I didn't think I could take but I was gonna try.''

''You were smart. Avoiding the beskar.''

''Well, I didn't want to break my hand.'' Anita was grinning, checking over the wound for the last time. ''Cause you know I only have two and I need them.''

It was silent again, He didn't reply to her but she had a question on her mind.

''Whoever you're taking him to...'' He turned to face her, the only indication he was looking was that his helmet seemed to bore right into her soul. ''What will they do with me? I'm only on this planet by accident and then Nikto's found me and told me to care for him. I don't-I'm scared.''

Again he was silent, she assumed to try and find an answer that wouldn't make her panic but his silence was doing that already.

''You're his mother. I'm sure they'll keep you around him.''

''And then I need to find a way home!'' Anita looked away, her face scrunched as if trying not to cry. Shuffling away from him. ''But I don't want to leave him but I have to go home, I have godchildren, my friends, my house. I can't stay and I can't take him with me because he's green.''

He was sure Anita would have had a full breakdown if the child hadn't started to cry from within the pod. Anita's ramblings stopped as did the appearance of tears in her eyes when her attention diverted to him Immediately.

She opened the pod and shushed the child, hands either side of the pod and gently rocking it side to side. He stilled in his bed, looking up at her with sad eyes and the beginnings of his own crying fit; The Mandalorian prepared for the loud screams but instead, Anita started to sing.

La la lu, La la lu. Oh, my little star sweeper. I'll sweep the stardust for you. La la lu, La la lu.

She was a good person. He could see that and some part of him didn't want to hand her over to the likes of the client. He saw the love she had for the child, the love the child had for her and he knew she would be devastated when they were separated.

His lie would be found out, she'll hate him but it was a job he had to do. For now, he enjoyed the sound of her soft singing as much as the child.

Little soft fluffy sleeper. Here comes a pink cloud for you. La la lu, La la lu.Little wandering angel Fold up your wings close your eyes

The child had calmed, his eyes drooping down as the familiar song she sung set him off to sleep. The Mandalorian had never heard it but the soft tones that followed on the words were enough to know he'd go the same way as the child did if he wasn't focused on his armor.

La la lu, La la lu And may love be your keeper La la lu, La la lu, La la lu

She closed the pod the instant she finished to protect Scamp from the noises of the Mandalorians fixings. Anita's own eyes dropping closed, the exhaustion of the day reaping the seeds it had sown and there she herself drifted to sleep; forehead pressed against the metal of the pod.

He had gone through her bag while she slept, heavier than he expected to lift. Inside were some familiar items, food packets, water but some were not so familiar. Two rectangles, black on one side and pink and blue on the other.

Wires, one white and the other black. A weird stick, pop off the lid and it smelt...strange and he couldn't place it. Small tubes he assumed was makeup, it did say the words 'Eye' and 'lip' on them.

He kept pulling things out, it wasn't that large of a bag but yet seemed like a black hole of just ...stuff. deciding none of what was inside could be used as a weapon, The Mandalorian placed everything back inside and put the bag back with its owner.

He almost hated to wake her up, to force her closer to the separation she'll experience when they get to Nevarro. She was groggy, her backed ached and her shoulders clicked as she stretched out her arms.

He noticed her feet a long time ago, the way she tried to take small steps and yet keep up with him at the same time while also trying to feed the kid. Walking along the hot floor seemed to hurt her and yet she kept on going, he tried to think if he had any shoes somewhere on the ship for her.

Not that his ship was all that useful at the moment. After walking for a while, Anita stopped behind him as he took the rifle looking weapon from his back, kneeling and pointing it down the ridge at a ship, where some ...small beings were doing something.

''what are they?'' Anita asked as he fired his rifle, disintegrating one of them. ''The small one is your...spaceship?''  

''Jawas'' The Mandalorian fired another shot after reloading, Anita noted the rifle seemed to only use one charge at a time. ''And yes.''

''Manny, your ship looks wrecked.''

After the third kill, the Mandalorian took off running down the small ridge and towards the big fortress the Jawas had retreated into. Anita sighed but ran after him and the pod that followed whether she liked it or not, her feet burning with pain and yet she didn't want to leave Scamp with him.

''You want me to hold your gun, Manny?'' She watched him fire another shot at the moving fortress before he carelessly threw the weapon her way and continued to run after his ship parts.

For a moment, Anita was stood still and struck dumb by how fast he actually gave her the weapon. She assumed his ship was more important than her imaginary mutiny he knew she wouldn't commit.

''Oh he's-okay.''' She ran after the pod, noticing it got too far away and witnessed her only source of life on the planet was trying to climb a moving vehicle. He narrowly missed being throw off by a close wall, and the Jawas started to throw random metal stuff down at him.

Anita continued to keep pace by the pod, the empty gun in her hand. Normally, Anita didn't have trouble running, she was quite fit and enjoyed a run in the mornings; yet her now bleeding feet slowed her down, caused her to bounce each step she took and she was finding it hard to breathe.

Huffing out in relief as the Mandalorian reached the top of the fortress, hoping she didn't have to jump over any more Jawa bodies. Though the relief was short-lived as his visage seemed to glow with blue light before he dropped backward, hitting the ground below with a hard thunk.

Anita cringed as he hit the ground, the pod stopping nearby but she kept going to drop by the man's side, the rifle was forgotten on the floor under the pod. She touched the chest plate of his armor, pulling her hand back as her fingers were zapped by lingering electricity.

Hissing with surprise rather than the pain she shoved her hand under his helmet, pulling down the fabric around his neck and pressing two fingers hard just under his jaw; checking for a pulse he still had.

Scamp made a noise from the side and she looked over to give him a smile. ''He's alright. He just got a bit of a jolt.'' Anita herself got a jolt when he suddenly moved, awake and in pain. ''You good, Manny?''

He said nothing. Only sat up, looked around, and made sure his helmet was still on.  Groaning as he stood up with her following, he walked back into the direction they came from and she assumed it was to return to his ship.

The hull had a few holes in it from where the Jawas had stripped it of its metal. The Mandalorian made a few frustrated sounds and slammed some doors, understandably mad that his ship was wrecked.

She followed him to what she assumed was the cockpit, he sat down in the middle seat and pushed buttons, flicked levers. There was sputtering, the ship wasnt able to take off and he gave up, disappearing back down the ladder.

''Dude, they got you good. This place is a mess.'' Anita jumped from the cockpit, forgoing using the ladder. The Mandalorian had Scamp in his arms, moving to leave the ship and go somewhere else with them since his mode of transportation was unusable.

''We gotta get your shit back man. I hate this planet.''

''Are your feet okay?''

''No, they're fucked.'' Anita laughed, though, to him, it sounded more like a pained whine. ''But if what you're actually asking is ''can I walk'' then the answer is yes. You are not carrying me.''  

''I wasn't going to.''

Anita made a face at him from behind, still following to whenever the next destination was set. The sun was setting and was near fully got when they arrived at a camp, someone of yet another race was fixing a tall, metal pole.

''I thought you were dead.''

''He almost was.'' Anita giggled to herself. ''My name is Anita. It's ...nice to meet you.'' Though confused and still afraid.

''I am Kuiil'' he replied, starting to climb down from the pole. He was small like a child and yet his face wasn't child-like at all. when he was finally on the ground and in front of her, he noticed her feet immediately.  ''You are injured.''

''Hm? oh yeh, just a little.''

''Sit. I will bring you supplies.''

''Oh no its-''

''I have spoken.'' Anita opened and closed her mouth dumbly, looking to Manny to help her but it just continued to stand there, silent as the grave. Kuiil hadn't said it rudely, it seemed more like a mannerism of his speech more than a rude demand that he was going to help.

Scamp had crawled down from inside his pod, playing with the small froglike creatures that hopped around while Anita tended to her feet with the supplies Kuiil had brought her.  

''This is what was causing all the fuss?''

''I thinks it's a child.''

''He is a child.'' Anita butted in, wiping the blood clean from her sore feet. ''his fifty years must be at least...8? maybe younger judging by the interest in slimy friends.''

''It is best to deliver it alive then.''

''him''

''My ship has been destroyed. I'm trapped here.'' The Mandalorian ignored her correction.   Anita rolled her eyes, bandaging up her feet while the two men talked. She wasn['t looking forward to yet another journey across the planet for his ship parts.

But where Scamp went, so did she.

''Hey, spit that out.''

Anita smiled at Scamp, who had caught his frog finally and shoved it face-first into his mouth. Leaning back his head, he swallowed it alive and looked to his mother with pride on his face.

Anita giggled, clapping as she was indeed proud of her little alien son. Though it was very gross, she couldn't help but find it incredibly cute.

The child was too cute.

[trying-write-fanfics]

Shouji Mezo X Reader Remember part 9

This part is a little OOC, but whatever.

Yaoyorozu and Todoroki cornered Shouji to get more information on Y/n. He re-told the asthma attacks, how she didn’t want any help, but ended up fainting. Her dorm is by the teachers and she has her own room with a laptop that has websites blocked. With her second chance at life, she might go into biology like her mother. 

“I’m pretty sure your theory is right, Todoroki. I think she was experimented on.” Shouji said.

 It wasn’t outright said, but with what Aizawa said, this was probably her safest place. She hasn’t tried to escape or anything. Was she escaping from anymore experiments, or was she just isolated. Isolated so she wouldn’t have anyone to talk to. No one to hear “I am here and I am hurt.” Or “save me!”

“How are you feeling?” Aizawa asked.

“Physically a little like shit and emotionally shittier! How could you tell them what I did? Now they’re gonna hate me for committing petty crimes!” Y/n whined. “They’re all wide eye heroes, now they’re gonna be so heart broken their favorite teacher was secretly a thief.”

“They figured out that you were your mother’s child and thought you were taking notes in their quirks. I came clean, and I’m actually a little proud of them for figuring something out so fast.” Aizawa said.

“Yeah but now I’m gonna get bullied!” Y/n yelled.

“They’re not gonna bully you. I heard that Shouji carried you to recovery girl, and he knew your secret.” He tried to make her feel a bit better so she could set up the class review packets.

“I mean, I guess, but that’s just what you’ve taught them.” She complained. “But I was wondering something.”

“What is it?”

“Could I call my parents or siblings or maybe see some of my middle school friends? Or at least go grocery shopping. I’m yearning for some familiarity.” She told him. 

“Look at you opening up. I’d have to think about it honestly. This is supposed to be a punishment you know.” Aizawa told her.

He told her he may allow her to arrange something, but everything was going to be monitored, and that if she were to leave she’d need an escort. It turned her off on the idea a bit, not that she was planning something, she just thought it would be lame to have to hangout with her friends and Aizawa. A major reason why he was considering it was because he wanted to be the opposite of the family dynamic she had back at home. The isolation would only make Y/n worse on her development. Sure she could make new friends and adapt to this environment, but  he knew how kids were. She didn’t hate it here, but she didn’t like it either. This was a new planet, but with surveillance he can allow bits and pieces to come in and out

 The next day Y/n was the first person in the classroom putting packets together. It was boring and she was scared to face her peers, but it had to be done or she’d never move on. She was grateful for Shouji telling her that everyone knew, instead of being surprised by it. 

“So you really are a criminal.” Butt-u-go said to her. “If you ever commit a crime again while I’m a hero I will take you down.”

“I’m gonna jay walk right in front of you just to kick your ass, other than that I have no plans to commit any more crimes.” She told him. 

“How can you be so sure?” He growled. 

“My old group hasn’t tried to find me at all. It’s like they forgot about me.” Y/n whined.

“Ha, loser. They all probably forgot about you.”

“Oh shut up diarrhea hands!” Y/n yelled at him. 

“Y/n, were you only pretending not to recognize me?” Momo asked. “Was that part of the plan?”

“I remembered your name, but honestly I’m not so good with faces. Didn’t we last see each other like ten years ago?”

“Yeah, we were seated at the same table.”

“That sounds familiar.”

Not the familiarity she was looking for, whatever Momo seemed happy to see Y/n for whatever reason. Maybe it was familiarity for her. More students had questions for her regarding her true identity, and they promised they wouldn’t treat her any differently because everyone makes mistakes. Aizawa soon came in and class started. Today they were gonna train outside. Aizawa told Y/n he wanted her to teach them hand to hand combat. The rules were simple, practice hand to hand combat. Mineta was absent so with Y/n it was an even number. 

“Y/n will give you guys some pointers, do you want to pick a volunteer?” Aizawa said. 

Aizawa did have Y/n review her combat skills with him and figured there was a benefit for her to actually teach some of them. She probably learned the latest fighting styles of criminals and any tricks that were coming out to use against heroes. A 15 year old may not be the fastest and best way to combat new villains, but its a start.

“You know I always pick on Butt-U-go, does anyone else wanna try?” She said. 

“Sounds like you’re scared!” Bakugo yelled. 

“Iida lets fight.” 

“I accept your challenge!”

 “Okay so when fighting one on one you need to address your weaknesses, I don’t know yours, but I bet one is your head.” She told Iida as the others began training. Y/n took Iida’s wrists. “Make sure that your arms aren’t locked until you have you to defend yourself…” 

 She continued tactics that she learned when she was in training. Sure she still needed some, but her perspective brought a fresh light on their training, and they needed it. 

“Now try and hit me.”

Shouji heard that sentence and let his hand watch. Iida pulled his fist back and then tried to release a blow. Y/n grabbed his wrist and pulled it around his torso and got behind him. She put her other hand by his neck to make it seem like a hostage situation.  She then went to correct his form and they went again. Shouji was sure that he was going to be picked to be her partner, and yet… Why did he care?

“Iida you have more limbs that just your legs you gotta punch better.” Y/n told him. 

“I have nerve damage-“

“Wait seriously?”

“Yeah, I was-“

“When you’re up against someone who wants to kill you and your legs are all stalled out, they don’t know you have nerve damage, at least pretend you don’t to still scare them, that’s like your greatest strength is the unknown you have about yourself. That’s how I almost kicked Aizawa’s ass.”

 What? How in the hell did this 15 year old, loud mouth, go hand to hand with Eraserhead. Okay they knew, but still, sure Aizawa told them but it was weird hearing it from her. It’s a hero’s job to capture criminals, not kill. He didn’t know what L/n’s intentions were. Still when the USJ attack happened he was well equipped when versing a majority of criminals. Was it because she didn’t rely on her quirk that shocked him. 

“You have a lot of depth for this topic.”

“Well now you know, I’m a minor to reform.” She said. “By the way I’m sorry about your brother.”

“I know you have nothing to do with Stain.” He told her. “I just have a hard time understanding why you did commit crime.”

“If you think my mind set was, hey I’m gonna start trouble today, you’re wrong. It was at first helping someone.” She told Iida as she resumed the training by throwing a punch at him.  He blocked it, but her second fist was the real blow as it stopped before she hit him in the nose. “I thought I could do anything for my friend.”

Iida had already heard she sacrificed herself which was why she was here.

“Even if you knew what your friend was doing wrong?” Iida asked jumping back to give them some distance to recalculate. 

“I’m still learning my moral compass, but like hell I’ll let the stiff law be it.” She pretended to punch him. 

 He thought he knew the move she was doing. Another side punch to the face, but instead she hopped and lifted her leg to the other side of his face. She was good at diversions. While he turned his head to focus on her fist, he would have been kicked in the back of the head. But she didn’t hit him, she brought her leg back when she landed.

“You know in one of these situations, you could just push me down. You might get grazed, but you don’t have to be so defensive.” She told him. 

“I have to say, you’re quite good at multitasking. You can carry a conversation and spar at the same time.” Iida told her. 

 “...thank you.” It took her a minute not to think of a response that either made wouldn’t make her gloat or wasn’t sassy. “I’m sure you’ll get out of your straight and narrow mind to get like that.”

She can try. 

“That can’t be too much of a bad thing!”

“I’m teasing, hero bloodline.”

She gave advice to a few more students. She was able to surprise them with her tactics. Though she didn’t see them fight as much, she learned a lot by watching them all in class. The class learned they didn't watch her that well, or that she did have something to offer. Her bored face and weird phrases didn’t give them anything about her fighting style. Sure Iida had engine legs, but his reactions weren’t fast enough for someone he still underestimated. Someone who couldn’t fight with their quirk, who got caught, who never had proper training was still able to fight them well enough to surprise them. If able to use their quirk, no doubt they could fight her and win, but that’s not the purpose of the training. Someone like the head of the league of villains could touch them and their bodies would shrivel up to dust. Being too rash could result in death. 

 “So you got a rival, Iida?” Y/n asked. 

“There is someone I thought I looked down on, but he’s grown past me now-“

“It’s beefcake isn’t it.” Y/n said. 

“Hey you didn’t let me finish.”

“I can’t wait forever for you to get to the point!” Y/n whined. “God all you guys hate on beefcake.”

“I don’t hate him! I just hate how poorly I misjudged someone.” Iida said. “He’s my friend, an ally.”

“I mean, okay.” She didn’t totally understand his reasoning, but she wasn’t gonna think long on it. 

“You’ve kinda locked on him yourself.” Iida told her.

“I worry for him. He’s a sweet kid.”

“He’s our age.”

“Okay but we all pretended I was older so…”

“Hey! Pencil pusher, why didn’t you pick on me for training? You scared?” Bakugou yelled.

“I don’t want you to fart on me, god!” Y/n yelled back. 

The class went back to the room for a head count and waited to be released from school to the dorms. Y/n sat next to Aizawa. The phone rang.

“Class 1-A, teaching aid speaking.” Y/n said. 

“(Last name) your father has called. If you want to take it, come to the front office. The phone call will be recorded and listened to.” The sectary told her. 

“Oh my god really- Aizawa you wouldn’t believe it! I have a phone call at the front office, I’m practically the president of coolest person here.” Y/n said.

“You may go.”

“I don’t know where it is.” Y/n told him. 

“Kirishima, you wanna help (last name) to the front office?” Aizawa asked.

“Sure!”

“I’ll be there soon, tell my father!” Y/n told the phone.

[thecleanstreets]

Anonymous:  If you could go back in time and change one event in the past, what would you change?

I’d boil the water for longer

I’d get the rehydration solution faster

I’d bring my dad back

I’m Biyani, Anonymous, what do you think?

***

[an ooc interlude, featuring content warnings for death, space!cholera and all that entails.]

There was a boiled water advisory.

Everyone knew what that really means. Luehmani was two, and she knew what that meant. Some red sabotaged a pipe before they all offed themselves, or some sod from Orvara who couldn’t find their ass with both hands screwed up.

“Language, honey,” her father said.

She pushed her toast around her plate. “Sorry, dad.”

“After school, we’re going to pick up some water from the store.”

No one drank tap water when there was a boiled water advisory.

They knew what it meant.

***

Luehmani pushed the trolley. She liked pushing trolleys. The trolley clattered along, and she felt strong as she pushed it forward and pulled it around corners. She liked feeling strong.

Bright yellow stickers covered the shelves around the water, covered the bottles themselves in some cases. “By Order of The Province Government, Bottled Water Rationing is In Effect. No More than 5 Litres of Water Per Customer.”

Her father bit his lip and thought. He made a very particular expression when he thought, staring at the ceiling like he was trying to count the tiles. He grabbed 5 bottles, and threw them in her cart. Along with some money. It was rather a lot of money, she thought. “You remember the way home?”

She nodded solemnly.

“Okay. You go up and buy these, and head straight back home. I’ll be back soon after,” he said, as he headed over to the trolleys. “I’ll pick some more water up for us.”

***

The supermarket let her borrow the trolley, after she promised to bring it right back. She swore up and down that she could carry the bottles herself, that she may only be two but she was strong—but she was glad they let her borrow the trolley. She really couldn’t carry that much water herself.

She trundled her trolley through the crowds, feeling the clatter of the pavement through the handle, walking on tiptoes to see over the handle.

The crowd weaved and flowed around her. Most other people seemed to be carrying bags, either full of water away from the store, or empty towards it.

A hand snaked through the crowd, and grabbed a bottle from her cart.

“Hey! Give that back you… meanie!”

She broke into as much run as she could pushing a trolley.

They’d already disappeared.

She couldn’t let them get away. Her family needed that water, they weren’t going to drink from the tap, not from the tap not from the tap. But she couldn’t see them. There was no way to catch them.

She slowed down. She walked home.

She returned the trolley to the store.

***

Her father was already home when she arrived back, placing bottles of water on the pantry shelf.

“Someone took a bottle of our water. I tried to catch up with them, but—“  

“You can’t always catch up to people,” her mother said.

“They probably needed it more,” her father said.

She made an incredulous face. “Really?”

“I have no idea, but it’s nicer to think that way. Makes you less annoyed at them.”

***

The corner store ran out of water that day. It ran out of soft drinks and juice a day later.

The big supermarket, the one that sat on the border between them and the purple neighbourhood, ran out three days later.

Stock came back in dribs and drabs. A pallet one day. A single bottle the next.

Her family were never quick enough (never rich enough, she later learned) to grab any.

***

When she was one, she and her father had staring competitions over whether she really really really had to eat her spinach. It always devolved into giggles. And her eating her spinach (good for rich blood!) They couldn’t take staring at each other seriously, especially if they were trying to make serious faces at each other.

She crossed her arms, and stared at her father, her expression as stern as she could make it.

A glass of water sat in front of her.

He didn’t look serious. He looked resigned.

It reminded her far too much of their old staring games.

“I’m not going to drink it,” she said. Her stomach curled into knots just being in the same room as it. She could feel it, even without touching it.

“You have to.”

“I’m really not going to drink it, dad.” The thought of it on her tongue, on her teeth, going inside of her—

“You have two choices.” His voice was flat. Monotone. Tired. Scared. “You can drink it now. It will feel terrible, it will be terrible, you won’t be clean. But you’ll live. Or you can not drink it. You die of dehydration. And then you’ll still be polluted.”

She put a hand around the glass, but she couldn’t will her hand to grasp it, to pick it up. (She was touching it she was actually touching it she could feel it on her hand this was ten times worse no no no NO NO NO.)

“Please.” His voice somehow got flatter. “I don’t want you to die.”

She closed her grip. Picked it up. Put it to her mouth. Swallowed.

It reminded her far too much of normal water.  

***

They drank boiled water.

They knew what that meant.

They filled the kettles up with tap water–they’d bought a second one, one wasn’t enough for all of them, and kettles were still cheap. Put it on the base plate, flip the switch. Flip the lid up, so it wouldn’t finish once it started to boil. Roiling boil, for one minute.

They lived like that for months. (They lived like for years – they just boiled the water for longer, after.)

Luehmani got used to the feel of the water. It was better than dying of dehydration.

***

There was an outbreak.

The official government line was that strange selection pressures had made the bacteria thermophilic, able to withstand being boiled.

The unofficial line was that the skyrocketing inflation and shrinking imports created a shortage of oral rehydration solution, turning an entirely manageable infection rate into a plague of pollution and death.

The official government line was to stay away from hospitals unless you were old, young, already ill. Stay at home, use oral rehydration solution. It was an effective management solution.

They were all, at some level, correct.

(Luehmani took a third line. It was, somehow, her fault.)

***

She made her father coffee. She enjoyed making it, even though she didn’t drink it. It made her feel helpful.

She filled the kettle. Turned it on, flipped the lid up. Watched the microwave clock for a minute to tick over.

Filled the cup with hot water, stirred in a spoonful of coffee mix, and handed it to her father.

He ruffled her hair affectionately. As he drank the water, she knew he knew where the water came from.

***

Luehmani could guess what the wet noises coming from the bathroom were. She wished she couldn’t. They were quite… unpleasant. “Should we take dad to the hospital?”

“Only the old and young can go,” Her mother said. She pressed money into Luehmani’s hands. “He needs oral rehydration solution. Or electrolyte powder, they’re more or less the same. Can you go and get that, while I stay here and look after him?”

She nodded solemnly, and raced out the door.

***

Luehmani ran up and down the aisles of the corner store, skidding along the linoleum. The shelves were almost empty, their bareness accentuated by the lone box of biscuits carelessly strewn among the laundry powder.

“You looking for electrolyte powder?”

Luehmani spun around, startled, to face the manager. She nodded.

“You’re the fourth person today. Sorry, we only got three packets from the warehouse.”

“That’s okay.” She sprinted out of the store.

“Stay safe, kiddo!”

Luehmani jogged in the direction of the big supermarket, the one near purple neighbourhood. They didn’t run out of things. Sure, they may not have a lot of whatever you needed, but they always had it.

It took her 10 minutes to get there. Her fringe plastered itself to her forehead, and she tried not pant as she rushed to the pharmaceutical aisle.

Someone was picking up the last box of rehydration powder. They were purple, sweating and pale and looking like they hadn’t sleep in a day.

It was rude to ask people to give you things they were trying buy, Luehmani knew that… but this was important. She had to ask. “Excuse me?” Her voice was quieter than she expected. “Do you need that? I wouldn’t want to take it if you’ve got someone sick at home—“

“My little sister.” They looked three.

“I’m sorry. You can have it.” Luehmani paused. “You should take really young people to the hospital.”

They smiled, but it was an un-smile. It was too tight, and only their mouth moved. “They’re already full.”

She scanned the aisles, trying to find someone to help her. Her dad needed this.

Someone restacked the shelves with soap.

“I know I shouldn’t ask this,” Luehmani said. “But I really have to know, my dad is sick. Do you know where the nearest supermarket is? Other than this one.”

They turned around, knelt down. They ended up shorter than her. “Catch the 22 train, ride it for five stops, and there’s a bigger store right outside the station.”

“Thank you so much!” She left, and paused outside the door. She counted her money.

She’d seen the stickers on the shelves. She couldn’t afford to catch the train and buy the rehydration powder.

She sprinted off in the direction the train went.

***

She ran and ran, until she couldn’t, until her jaw ached, until her legs fell from underneath her like boneless meat. She followed and followed the train line until she couldn’t, until it went into a tunnel and she couldn’t work out where it left it, until she’d gone in circles around a block and everyone’s directions spun her around more and more.

It took her a long time to find the store. She wasn’t entirely sure how long. An hour, hour and a half? (The train ride was 20 minutes.)

The store had rehydration solution. It had a shelf half full of it, with a choice of flavors. She nearly cried when she finds it, too tired to keep her emotions in.

She did cry when she saw how much it cost. Her dad needs it.

She picked it up in tears, the salt of her tears mixing with the salt of her tears. She waited in line in tears. People murmured behind her “What’s she crying about?” “Why isn’t anyone calming her down?” “What silly thing has got her so upset?” They quiet down when they see what’s clutched to her chest. They shuffled away a bit, too. The outbreak was common knowledge.

The cashier looked concerned, when she got to the head of the queue. “Are your parents around?”

“No, they’re at home.” She tried to use her big kid voice, tries not to sniffle and sob, but she couldn’t. She’s too tired. Too worried. “I know I don’t have enough money, but my dad is really sick.”

The cashier made a strange expression. (Luehmani learned to recognise it later, working as a cop. It’s the face people make when they decide whether to do the right thing, even if it would harm them. She cried again, when she learned that. That money must have hurt to give.) They dug in their pockets, and dropped a few coins in her hand. “Now you have enough.”

She paid, and headed as home as quickly as she could.

That was not fast. She was a tired, lost child, in an unfamiliar neighbourhood who’d already ran her heart out.

It took her longer to get home.

***

Luehmani looked it up when she was three. The knowing would burn her, but not as much as the lack of knowing.

Some part of her had to know if this was somehow her fault. (She’d been told a thousand times, by her mother, by teachers, by other students, that it wasn’t. But some part of her was deeply certain that it was.)

Most patients can survive six, twelve hours, without oral rehydration.

The unlucky ones only had one.

***

She half ran, half tiredly flailed into the family apartment. “I got the powder! I’m sorry I’m late, I wasn’t lollygagging, the corner store didn’t have any so I had to—“

Her mother put her hands on her shoulders. Luehmani could feel the calculation behind it, she learned to recognise it. “Can I touch this thing?” “Should I touch this thing?” “Is it worth it to touch this thing?” She tried to not to flinch away.

The bathroom was quiet.

Her mother didn’t speak at first, just stared at her blankly. “You did your best.”

Luehmani held out the packet. “Do you have the water ready? I’ve got the powder.”

She took it out of her hands, put it on the counter. “You did your best.”

“Doesn’t dad need it?”

There’s no calculation this time. She hugged Luehmani, hugged her like she’s trying to be armour. “I’m sorry. I checked and—and he doesn’t need it any more. I’m sorry.”

Luehmani screamed.  

***

It took a week for the body to be collected. There’s a backlog. There’s been a backlog for months.

It took another two weeks for their bathroom to be decontaminated.

They used their neighbour’s bathroom during that time.

Luehmani used it for another season.

***

She was four when she changed her mind. When the reds from Cene were transported in to the old districts, into Biyan.

It wasn’t her fault.

It was the reds’.

[nekomasmanagersblog]

ask:​Could you do hc for Murasakibara, Kagami, Kise and more one if you want with a s/o that isn't too "girly". We know the "concept" of "close your legs", "eat less". My "friend" told me that I act like a "boy". I'm really sad because for me, I'm a girl! I think that I really have a way more savage, but for me I still a girl. Could you write how the boys would react to their s/o sad about that? What they think about her behavior? 

*Murasakibara*

It was the end of the day,and you were walking home with your friend Murasakibara, it was quiet, you could only hear the small sound of munching coming from Murasakibara.

This was unusual for you both, as usually when he was eating you would talk \about your day or something crazy that had happened, but you were quiet.

Murasakibara turned his head to look at you, he saw a sad expression on your face, making murasakibara upset.

“What’s wrong  (l/n)-chin” Murasakibara asks, finishing his snack and putting the packet into a near bin.

You stop walking, you look towards the ground “Mura-chan, do you think I act like a boy” you question, not looking up.

Murasakibara gave you a confused look, you gave a small sigh before speaking again.

“Today, during lunch (f/f/n) said I act too much like a boy, that I neat too much, or laugh too loud”

Murasakibara frowned, he knew (f/f/n), they was very stuck up, being rude to most of your friend group, making mean comments, he had grown a dislike for them.

You felt a sudden pressure on your head, you looked up to see Murasakibara with a now serious expression on his face.

“Who cares if you do or don’t act like a boy, I love when you laugh loud because it shows you are happy, and I would rather have you eating to much so I don’t have to worry about you starving,just because you are a girl does not stop you from being a human like everyone else, its normal and for those who say its not should mind their own business”

You gave him a smile, “thank’s Murasakibara-kun for cheering me up”

He smiled back, then reaches into his pocket, bringing out a small sweet, and putting it in your hand “Don’t be sad (l/n)-chin, I like it when you are happy”

*Kise*

Kise knew something was wrong the minute you walked into the gym, Usually you would burst open the door, announcing yourself but this time you just walked and quietly sat on the bleachers.

Everyone one on the team took quick glances towards you, then walking over to kise to ask what was wrong.

“What’s up with (l/n)”

“Did you do something to her, you bastard”

“You better not have hurt her”

Kise shook his head “i didn’t do anything”

The rest of the team looked unsure, glancing at each other.

Kasamatsu called a quick break “Kise go make sure she is okay” he said, looking towards the sad female.

Kise slowly began to approach you, “y/n-cchi, are you okay” he asked softly

You looked up at him, debating if you should tell him or not, you gave a small sigh,

“Kise, do you think I act like a boy” you questioned

The blonde male froze, wondering why you would ask such a weird question.

“Why do you ask” he said, taking a seat beside you

“(f/f/n) said I act more like a boy, that im not girly” you answered, Kise frowned

“And that bothers you” he said

You gave a small nod, looking down into your lap,

“Well, if you do want to know, sure, sometimes you do act like a boy, but it doesn't matter, who cares if you talk or laugh to loud, it shows you are happy, I would rather you be the way you are now than sad and quiet all the time” he stated, taking a small breath before continuing,

“-you are amazing, and everyone on the team would agree, and if you are upset by what (f/f/n) said then you should find better friends, people who are their to make sure you are happy, who would never say things to upset you, like me or Kasamatsu or anyone on the team, you are already perfect who cares if you do act like a boy or if you don’t” he finished

You looked up at time, tears in the corner of your eyes, you gave him a quick hug which he returned,

“Thank you Kise” you said, giving him a smile, before getting up and walking over to the rest of the team, thanking them for worrying and that you were fine, but before you left you gave Kise a peck on the cheek, thanking him once again.

Kise stared as you walked away, his eyebrows furrowing, wait till he finds (f/f/n).

*Kagami*

You were currently at Kagami’s house, studying for an upcoming test, it was quiet between the two of you, both concentrating on your work.

Kagami hadn't noticed anything weird about your behavior, but that doesn't mean he wasn't suspicious, usually you would have said something by now, whether it being you were hungry or how hard one of the questions were, but you were silent.

“Are you hungry” he said breaking the silent, really that it he thought, mentally kicking himself for asking such a pathetic question,

You gave a small no before returning back to your work,

“Are you sure” he asked

“Yeah” you answered again, giving Kagami a weird look.

“Okay, umm, (f/n) are you feeling okay” Kagami questioned

“Im fine stop asking” you snapped at him, Kagami looked down at him, you gave a sigh

“Im sorry” you said “and there is something that has been bothering me, its a weird reason so I tired to ignore it”

Kagami gave you a look, as if to say go on.

“Today, at lunch, (f/f/n) said I eat to much for a girl, and its not lady like, then she/he started to say that a boy eats as much as I do and I should try eating less, not acting like a boy, but I am a girl, so I didn’t understand as to why she/he would try and say im not, just because I don’t act like one” you finished, you looked at Kagami, waiting for a reaction.

“I think your amazing” he blurted out, going red then trying to explain himself,

“I mean, I think you eat perfectly fine for a girl, not that you eat to much, and I would rather you eat a lot than not at all, and you do act like a girl, and really there is no difference to how the genders should act, and if someone thinks that a girl should act like a girl, its unfair, we can't always control how we act, and if we are comfortable then who should have a say in what we do” he said, rubbing the back of his neck.

“Thank Tiaga” you said “that means a lot” giving him a soft smile,

“N-no problem”

okay so I fucked up, I just realised it said hc,

also accidentally answered this in private so everyone couldn't see it,

sorry for ooc and spelling errors

also took to long to answer this,

I also gave my opinion. but it was really long and the person who asked got to see it, but if anyone wants advice on stuff feel free to ask me.

Feel free to request as my inbox is empty.

[trashmouthhharrington]

Thin Mints and Menthol (Steve Harrington x Reader)

This is now a series!

PART 2   

PART 3

Pairings: Steve Harrington x Reader

Summary: It’s set a year after Season 2 has finished and you’re a senior in high school who’s often getting into trouble with the law for petty crimes. And Hopper usually gets you out of trouble. Then one night the new officer Steve Harrington joins him.

Words: 1.7k (YIKES)

Warnings: Mild swearing, mild mentions of smoking, hints towards abuse. Slightly OOC Steve

A/N: Okay so this is the first time I’ve ever written anything so please go easy on me, I just love Steve and I’ve had this idea in my head for a few days so I had to write it down.

You sit on the cold step outside the gas station. Mr Pritchard stood looming over you smugly, as the Chevrolet Blazer pulls up, ‘Hawkins Police Dept.’ printed on the side. Parking itself roughly. Chief Hopper steps out of the vehicle quickly reaching into his pocket to his packet of cigarettes, he removes one and places into his mouth. He walks over to you whilst sparking up. There’s a ghost of a smile playing on his lips. The passenger door suddenly opens, startling you, it was usually just Hopper himself who dealt with you.

Steve Harrington? That’s new. You chuckle slightly as he walks to join Hopper stood before you. He’s staring at you in confusion. You scoff and hang your head. “This is the third time this month you’ve been caught shoplifting (Y/N).” Hopper says as he blows smoke out of his mouth. “I’m starting to think you’re enjoying the excitement.” He chuckles.

“I’d raise my hands in defeat if this asshole,” you say jerking your head towards Mr Pritchard “hadn’t tied my arms in front of me with fucking rope.” Hopper glares at Pritchard, the old man crosses his arms in defiance to Hopper. He huffs slightly and begins to explain to Hopper that you had been trying to run away. Bullshit. Everyone knew you didn’t run once you were caught. As Hopper and him get into an argument you lean back and glance at Steve as he’s scribbling furiously in a notepad. The khaki coloured uniform he’s wearing looks freshly starched, his name tag shines under the glare of the street-lights. His hair is pushed back and looks neat, except for the strand that’s fallen out of place. It bounces in time with his writing.

“You, er, don’t need to do that”

“Huh?” He says stopping mid-word on the page. He stares at you confusedly.

“He never presses charges against me. I usually just get a two week ban.” You tell him, grinning. A small smile tugs at his lips. “That’s what you get for shoplifting a packet of Salem's’ I guess.”

“Salem’s? Refreshing. Wouldn’t have pinned you for a menthol kind of girl” You both laugh. “Well, Hop- I mean, the Chief told me I should write everything down…” He says placing the pen in between the pages. He closes the notepad, holding it in his left hand. He stands awkwardly waiting slightly too close to Hopper. You’re shocked, since when did Steve Harrington want to be a cop? It was unusual to say the least, you always figured he’d end up at an Ivy League college. Yet here he was standing before you looking slightly uncomfortable. He’d been in the grade above you, and was ten times more popular than you were. The ‘King’. That was till Nancy Wheeler broke up with him, started dating the Byers kid, and he faded into obscurity. You’d still see him in passing but he’d mainly kept to himself focusing on his studies, always in the library. You’d heard rumors he was friends with some fourteen year olds, but you didn’t know him well enough to find out if they were true or not.

“Do want me to untie you?”

“What?” You ask as you realize you hadn’t been paying attention.

“The rope. Do you want me to untie it?” He asks again. You look at his hands. His notepad, you notice, is safely stowed away in his breast pocket.

“Oh, sure. Yeah, please. That would be great.” You say stuttering over your words slightly. You internally kicked yourself. You can’t believe you’re getting nervous over Steve fucking Harrington of all people. He bends down slightly, you’re inches apart, you can feel his breath on your cold hands as he reaches for them. You lift them up slightly from your lap. He starts to try and unknot the large knot that Pritchard had tied it with. He pauses and looks up at you, smirking. He lowers his voice.

“Now, you’re not going to dash the moment it’s unravelled are you?”

“On my honour.” You whisper. You smile at him.

“Oh, were you a Girl Scout.” He asks as he starts to work on untying you again.”

“Unwillingly, but yeah I was for about five years. Prettttttttttty sure, I sold you some Thin Mints once.” You told him struggling back a laugh.

“What, really? How old are you?” He moves his hands away from yours. You grin at him.

“I’m seventeen, but my birthdays in a week. I figured you wouldn’t recognize me.” He snickers quietly and slowly begins to tackle the knot again. You watch his hands move across the rope, grazing your wrists lightly, sending shivers up your arms.

“No I’m afraid I don’t think I’ve seen you around, I know I’d remember if I had someone like you before.” You look up at lock eyes with him. The rope around your wrists falls into your lap. Steve takes both your wrists in his hands and looks and the marks left on them. He rubs the rope burn with his left thumb. His brow furrowed, he opens his mouth as if to say something.

“Alright! I won’t press any further charges, just tell her that she needs to stay off of my property. For good this time, I’m giving her a permanent ban!” You both gaze up at the two men who had been having a heated debate about your actions.

“That seems fair. You hear that (Y/N)? You’re permanently banned from this gas station.” Hopper tells you whilst Steve helps you to your feet. “Permanent means no entry, and no sneaking in with a hat and sunglasses on like you did at the convenience store down street. Steve glances down at you with an amused look etched across his face. 

“You really did that?” He says questioning you.

“I thought it was a good idea at the time. I was very mistaken.” You tell him with a huff as you fold your arms, the temperature had dropped quite drastically. He leans his head back laughing, his hair moves like it has a mind of its own.You stare at him in awe. He is annoyingly pretty. You think to yourself. Boys like him shouldn’t be so pretty.

You bite your lip to stop yourself from joining him in his laughing fit. Instead you peer over at The Chief who’s not paying attention and is instead staring at his watch. He walks up to you and gently takes you by the arm and leads you towards the vehicle.

“We need to be leaving, its 9pm and I need to pick up El- I mean, Jane from Mike’s after dropping (Y/N) at her house.” He tells Steve who nods and makes his way over to the car, he gets in and you can see he’s still beaming. “See you later Fred.” Hopper says to Mr Pritchard as he opens the door for you.

“Bye Fred!” You say as Hopper pushes you into his car. Mr Pritchard walks into the gas station ignoring your exaggerated goodbye.The door slams behind him the car shaking slightly. He puts the keys into the ignition and sets off driving in the direction of your house. The mood in the car is some what hostile. You go to make a smart remark to relieve tension, but Hopper stops you.

“Whatever you’re about to say (Y/N), save it. This is your final warning. Like I said earlier this is the third time this month that someone’s stopped you shoplifting. I’m sure you’ve done it more you just haven’t been caught. I’m worried about you kid.” He gazes at you in the rear-view mirror, you turn away so you don’t make eye contact. “Next time I pick you up, you’re going to be in handcuffs. You understand?” You nod, there’s a prick behind your eye. Tears begin to well up in your eyes.

“I’m sorry… Sir.” The air is suddenly as icy as it is outside, despite the heating sputtering it’s warm breath around the car. You zone out and begin to stare outside, watching houses as they pass by. Wondering if their teenagers were as troublesome as you were. You’re startled as a tear falls onto your cheek, you quickly go to scrub your eyes. Uncaring if you smudge the eye make-up you have on. You didn’t want to let Hopper down, he’d looked out for you each time there had been an incident. And yet you knew he was serious this time despite always telling you it was the final time he was clearing up after your messes. Somehow the presence of Steve made you embarrassed. Why do I even care? I don’t even know him. You think to yourself. And yet looking at the wing mirror and seeing him give you a reassuring smile was comforting, you return it sadly and turn to stare out the window again.

As the car drove up to your house the lump in your throat grew. It was fear. Fear of what was waiting for you at home. The lights were on meaning you were in for a rough ride. You sit forward as the car draws to a halt. Wincing as your hand touches the cool metal of the handle.

“Tell your old man to go easy on you.” Hopper says to you. Without turning to face him you open the door getting out.

“Thanks for the ride boys.” You say plastering a fake smile across your lips as you slam the door shut. The grin instantly drops from you face as you make your way up to you red front door. You can feel both Jim and Steve’s eyes watching you.

“Do you think you could get me any of those Thin Mints? I’ve got a real craving!” You hear Steve shout to you. Turning to face him, he’s beaming from ear to ear. You start laughing, you flash him the middle finger and give him a sarcastic smile as you close the door. Blocking you off from the world. You place your hands on the door and lift your eye to the peep hole to watch as Hopper’s car rolls out of sight. You sigh as you hear angry footsteps approach you. Grabbing at your arm, pulling it from the door.

“And where the fuck have you been?”

Part 2?????

[canaryatlaw]

I'll give today a rating of fine. It was just that, really. Nothing super exciting, but still no complaints. Woke up and got out of bed like the champ that I very occasionally am these days, got ready and went off to work. Get there and check in with my boss, she gives me a few small things to handle and so I went back to my office and did them. It was mostly CIM's (critical incident memorandum, not sure if I've shared that before) which is like a UIR but more serious, one for the unfounded packet I did recently and one for the recent 14 day notice that was issued after the allegation of corporal punishment. Not terribly interesting, but they were fine. Then I spent a while going through the psychological and neurological for the kids from the staffing last week, the same ones mentioned above that recently got the 14 day notice served on them (:/). My boss had just asked me to mark anything noteworthy, which reminded me of working for the CAU mostly, using tabs, and I decided to do the table system to keep track and better explain like I did pretty much every day there, so that was a nice throwback lol. I sincerely hope these kids (4 and 5 years old) don't get thrown in residential, because they definitely don't need it. They need a specialized foster home and a hella lot of services, but residential should be such a LAST resort for any child, something to try after literally everything else has been ruled out, especially for kids this young who so need the structure of a family during those crucial formative years. But, anyway. I finished that and then had lunch, my boss didn't have anything else so I checked in with one of the other lawyers quickly about the two permanency hearings I have for her tomorrow for the medically complex cases. It was a short talk, I had all my bases covered based on interviews and talking to the caseworker, so we were good. Then I had nothing to do but go back to my lovely prison phone calls, which are really such an emotional drain lol but I couldn't tell you why. Playing candy crush between taking notes helps a little, I think. I've been trying not to write down irrelevant information just because it's a summary of the conversation if we truly don't need it. That's kind of difficult though because practically everything out of mom's mouth is absolutely nuts, and that's not really what we need to prove, but it certainly doesn't hurt to have documented. But I got some good stuff today about the case because they had a court hearing and the dad was yelling at the mom about what happened (of course he completely misunderstood what actually took place and what was gonna happen next so pretty much everything he said was wrong) but mostly just got good stuff about them clearly planning on staying together and that's what they're lying to the court about so that's what I need to get. And yeah, I did that for the rest of the afternoon. Caught the 5:03 bus (that didn't arrive until 5:06) and caught a little traffic, but got home by 6:17, so not bad. Made dinner (heated up leftover chicken fried rice which I'm very pleased with how it turned out) and basically settled onto the couch to watch my legends, and watched through the end of the second season, and I have some thoughts. For one, HOLY SHIT, THE WAY THEY TREATED MICK WAS SO OOC FOR. ALL. OF. THEM. ALL. SEASON. Like seriously, even in the latter half of the first season they didn't treat him like that. They were constantly shitting on him and it just pissed me the fuck off. It was interesting to rewatch 2x15 knowing they would come back to it in the finale and seeing exactly what would happen, and I appreciated the no man's land scene more since seeing Wonder Woman, lol. The treatment of Mick and Leonard's OOC treatment of him was my main complaint, though. I largely appreciated the rest of it. I'm not like super crazy about Nate as a character (he has his funny moments, but overall he doesn't do that much for me) but the storyline with his grandfather in the space episode was just gutwrenching, definitely one of the emotional high points of the season, and I have to give credit to the solid acting involved there. At least that was one part of the JSA storyline they did right. Going into season 3, I'm hoping it keeps improving as a show, and it decidedly doesn't get darker as the CW superhero shows have tended to get in their third season, but I'm not too concerned about that because I mean, this show is ridiculous, you can't really make it dark the way you could with Arrow and The Flash. I would like to see Sara grapple with her bloodlust while being captain because I think that was way too good of a plot line to be dropped the way it was, especially when she is very clearly still killing people (see ninjas in 2x03, evil knights in Camelot, etc.). I think that would be a great storyline for her in her role as captain and seeing her deal with that. Of course I also want Snart back for good so I can have my bbys back together, but I'm trying to temper my hopes on that. I know Wentworth confirmed that he'll be on the new seasons of both legends and the flash, and I don't know how an actual coming back to life plotline would work for that, but hey, I can hope, and I will. I think I'll cut my musings off there for now though, because I could keep going for a while lol but it's late and like I said I have two hearings in the morning I'd rather not be fighting to stay awake during, so I'll bid you goodnight now. Goodnight my dear friends. Congrats on being more than halfway through your week.

[gotta-save-your-ass-for-a-change]

Who Would Have Thought?: Chapter 7

Chapter Title: Alive Fandom: Shameless, Mickey/Ian Rating: M Summary: Mickey and Ian are finally tying the knot. Notes: So, after completing some research on wedding ceremony scripts, I have come to the realization that all wedding ceremony scripts annoy the hell out of me—they’re beautiful in the moment, but they’re so awkward out of context, and I just couldn’t manage to write that way—and as such, I have chosen to skip many of the ceremony details. Hopefully, it works. Also, this whole thing is so corny and probably ooc, but this is the way it came out, so here we are. I’m kind of low key proud of it.

Also, I hope the reasoning behind the reading choices is clear (and, I hope they’re correctly quoted because I just found them online—it’s been awhile since I’ve had these texts in hand). I didn’t want to spell it out too obviously here, but I feel like each excerpt really captures their history together and the role of their personal struggles. So. Hopefully that comes through.

Title from Darren Hayes’s “Alive.” Basically the track that inspired me to continue this.

Ao3 Link

Chapter One * Chapter Two * Chapter Three * Chapter Four * Chapter Five * Chapter Six * Chapter Seven * Chapter Eight * Chapter Nine * Chapter Ten * Chapter Eleven * Chapter Twelve * Chapter Thirteen * Chapter Fourteen * Chapter Fifteen

“Is that a fucking coffee bar?” Mickey’s voice is incredulously as he scrunches his nose up in confusion.

“Yeah,” Trevor nods with a little shrug. “I know it’s probably not your thing, but Casey offered it. Figured it’d be nice while people wait on the ceremony.”

“Hey, man, I’m not complaining. I’m about to marry Ian in a fuckin’ bookshop. All bets are off,” Mickey insists, and when Trevor laughs at that, Mickey cracks a half smile. “Thanks, Trev. For all of this. This place? Gettin’ it for the wedding made Ian so happy. Made us both happy. I appreciate it. Especially considering how everything went down.”

“Don’t sweat it.” Trevor waves it off, voice honest. “Water under the bridge. Ian and I never would’ve worked. You two are like the fucking definition of meant to be. Everything worked out the way it was supposed to.”

Mickey’s eyes narrow playfully for a moment as he stares Trevor down. “I still feel like you should be more pissed than you are, but I guess I’ll take the win.”

Mickey notices Ian approaching then and nods as he reaches out an arm, tucking Ian under it and kissing his forehead as Ian beams at him. “Hey,” Mickey murmurs before pressing another kiss to Ian’s lips. “Trev got us a coffee bar.”

“I saw,” Ian smiles at Trevor then, and adds, “It’s fucking awesome, man. Thank you.”

“You should be thanking Casey,” Trevor insists. “Whole thing was his idea. Keeps insisting it’ll be good for business, bring back some of your guests. But I’m pretty sure he’s just got a big soft spot for weddings.”

Trevor’s smiling fondly in Casey’s direction, and Mickey and Ian share a look. “Something going on between you two?” Ian asks curiously, a playful shine to his eyes.

Trevor whips his gaze back to Ian and Mickey with an embarrassed scoff. “No! He’s just a friend.”

“Mmhm,” Mickey mocks playfully with a little smirk. “You’re lookin’ at him the same way Ian used to look at me when he thought I wasn’t payin’ attention.”

“Fuck off,” Ian throws at Mickey, jostling him with a shoulder as Mickey laughs with that carefree smile on his face that Ian loves. “He’s not wrong, though.”

“All right,” Trevor counters, throwing up a hand to try to stop them both, “It’s weird chatting about my love life with my ex and the guy he left me for.”

“You’re at our fuckin’ wedding,” Mickey shoots back, pulling an incredulous face and throwing his hands up in question.

Both Trevor and Ian laugh and that and Trevor shakes his head in surrender. “Okay, yeah, there might be something going on. But I don’t wanna jinx it, so just leave it alone, all right?”

“Whatever you say,” Ian smiles. “We’ve gotta head back anyway. Finish with the setup. We’ll see you at the reception. Bring Casey.”

Trevor rolls his eyes and shakes his head at the two of them as Ian twines his fingers with Mickey’s and tugs Mickey away to finish prepping for the ceremony.

When Fiona finally finds Ian and Mickey, they’re in the main space helping to set up the seating. Not one of the lovely wooden chairs are the same, but each one has been wrapped with a soft, cozy knit throw, all in varying shades of cream and beige. It’s an eclectic collection, but somehow every one works with the others, and it’s becoming a lovely space.

When she spots Ian and Mickey, though, Fiona rolls her eyes and crosses her arms, trying her best to look stern. “The fuck are you two doing?” she calls, stopping them in their tracks. “You’re supposed to be getting ready.”

“We are getting ready,” Ian insists.

“Somebody’s gotta get the place set up,” Mickey chimes in, still carrying in chairs.

“Really?” Fiona throws up her hands at them in exasperation. “We literally have an army of Milkoviches and Gallaghers here. You two can relax. Enjoy your day. All of it.”

“Fiona—” Ian attempts to protest, but Fiona cuts him off.

“I’ve got this under control. Now go. Get dressed,” she insists, pointing toward the back room that houses their tuxes. After a moment of contemplation, Ian shrugs at Mickey and tilts his head in the direction of the back room in surrender. Mickey sighs with a smile and a shake of his head, and they both comply, Mickey reaching out to draw Ian’s hand into his own before heading off. Fiona notices the looks they’re wearing immediately, and she calls after them quickly. “And if you two are late because you’re fucking back there, I am going to lock you in that fucking room and commandeer your fucking party!”

“Your sister’s fucking bossy, man,” Mickey complains as they shove through the door to the little back room that’s serving as their changing space, their tuxes already hanging off to the side, waiting.

Ian laughs as he hooks his arms around Mickey’s waist to drag him into a hungry kiss. “Yeah,” he agrees when Mickey pulls back for air, “but she’s got some great ideas.” Ian’s eyebrows raise in expectation as he smirks down at Mickey, who bites his lip against the sudden surge of want that hits him at Ian’s display.

“Ian, we can’t,” Mickey counters, but his voice is soft and yielding, and they both know his heart isn’t in the protest. “We’re getting married in a couple hours. Fiona’s gonna be back here looking for us.”

Ian scoffs at that, pressing a playful little kiss to the corner of Mickey’s mouth. “We’ve got plenty of time.”

“We don’t even have any stuff,” Mickey protests again, but his words hold little weight when his voice wavers with the feel of Ian’s lips where they’ve moved to ghost down Mickey’s jaw. Without breaking contact with Mickey’s skin, Ian pulls a packet of lube and a condom out of his back pocket and presses them into Mickey’s hand. When Mickey realizes what he’s holding, he lets out a sharp, amused laugh. “Are you fucking serious? You planned to fuck me in the back room before our fucking wedding?”

“It’s tradition,” Ian deadpans, and after a moment, they both break down into happy laughter, faces beaming with bright smiles.

“Fuck you,” Mickey offers with amusement.

“Looking to switch things up, huh?” Ian smirks down at Mickey, lifting an eyebrow. “I could go for that if it’ll get me laid.”

“Jesus Christ. Stop with the jokes and let’s fucking go, Gallagher,” Mickey counters, dragging Ian back against the little table that stands by the wall and hiking himself up onto it, wrapping his legs tightly around Ian’s waist and pulling Ian down into a harsh kiss.

The space is amazing. It’s warm and inviting, and Mickey and Ian are standing before a blazing fireplace with intricately carved bookcases lining much of the open space, framing the rows of blanket-wrapped chairs that only add to the cozy feeling that emanates from the space. The lighting is dim, most of the light coming from the stained glass lamps that stand in the empty spaces and hang from the ceiling. It’s strange for Mickey, really, because it’s not a space he ever would have imagined, but he has to admit that it’s amazing and the joy it brings to Ian’s face is well worth it.

Most of the ceremony is a blur. Mickey hears next to nothing their officiant is saying, his eyes focused only on Ian as he holds Ian’s hand gently in his own, Yevgeny perched on Mickey’s hip. They’d decided early on that they wanted the toddler to be part of the ceremony. It was just the two of them and Yevgeny, though. Briefly, they had considered asking Fiona and Mandy to stand up with them, but something about the idea just didn’t sit right. Mickey had suggested instead that they forego a wedding party altogether, and Ian had agreed quickly, enamored with the idea of an intimate ceremony between just the two of them and their son.

So now here they are, ceremony rushing by in a blur of words, and Mickey’s paying next to no attention. All he sees is Ian, smiling softly at Mickey from a couple of short feet away, happy tears shimmering in Ian’s eyes. Mickey thinks his own might match Ian’s, as he tries to blink away what threatens to fall. No one but Ian Gallagher has ever been able to turn Mickey Milkovich into a blubbering mess, but Ian’s a fucking master at it.

Partway through the ceremony, Mickey tunes back in when their officiant mentions their readings, which they’ve all agreed Ian and Mickey will read themselves. After a bit of research, and in honor of their venue and Yevy’s presence, they’d each chosen a ceremony reading from Yev’s favorite books, and they’d planned to read them together, Yev settled in their arms. It felt less awkward that way, having a reason to read the excerpts aloud, and reading with Yev has become one of their favorite pastimes with their son—something Mickey never would have predicted, but that had somehow happened along the way. Ian and Mickey hadn’t shared their choices with one another, though. Instead, they’d handed them over to their officiant to be sure there was no overlap and moved forward with a plan to surprise one another on their wedding day.

So when their officiant hands over the first book, Ian and Mickey shift close to one another, Yev still cradled on Mickey’s hip, and Ian holding Mickey’s choice for him, smiling down at the book in his hands with happy tears in his eyes.

“Can we read you part of a story, Yev?” Mickey asks quietly, bouncing Yev on his hip.

At the question, Yevgeny glances down at the book in Ian’s hands and his bored face lights up as he squeals in excitement. “Story, daddy! Rabbit!”

Ian laughs, resting his chin on Mickey’s shoulder as they stand, shifted toward their guests so their voices carry, as Mickey begins to read:

The Velveteen Rabbit, Margery Williams

“What is REAL?” asked the Rabbit one day, when they were lying side by side near the nursery fender, before Nana came to tidy the room. “Does it mean having things that buzz inside you and a stick-out handle?”

“Real isn’t how you are made,” said the Skin Horse. “It’s a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real.”

“Does it hurt?” asked the Rabbit.

“Sometimes,” said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. “When you are Real you don’t mind being hurt.”

“Does it happen all at once, like being wound up,” he asked, “or bit by bit?”

“It doesn’t happen all at once,” said the Skin Horse. “You become. It takes a long time. That’s why it doesn’t happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don’t matter at all, because once you are Real you can’t be ugly, except to people who don’t understand.”

“I suppose you are real?” said the Rabbit. And then he wished he had not said it, for he thought the Skin Horse only smiled.

“Someone made me Real,” he said. “That was a great many years ago; but once you are Real you can’t become unreal again. It lasts for always.”

By the time Mickey’s finished, he can feel Ian’s tears dripping onto his shoulder, and he can’t help but turn to Ian to whisper, just for the two of them, “You make me Real, Ian.”

And when Ian inhales a sharp breath at that, another rush of tears dripping silently from his eyes, Mickey smiles gently and turns his head to drop a kiss to Ian’s hair. In response, Ian’s lips fall to press against Mickey’s neck as he closes his eyes and breathes slowly to get his emotions under control.

After a moment, Mickey laughs softly and jostles Ian a bit. “Your turn,” he reminds softly with a little smile.

Ian takes another sharp breath and presses one more kiss to Mickey’s shoulder before pulling himself back together. Ian draws away from Mickey then, just far enough so he can reach out for Yevgeny. Mickey passes Yev into Ian’s arms so they can resituate, Mickey holding the book in his hands open to Ian’s choice of excerpt and making sure Yevgeny can see the pages, a big smile covering the child’s face.

Ian kisses Yev’s cheek, blinking away the last of the tears that linger on his lashes before he begins to read:

Now We Are Six, A.A. Milne

Wherever I am, there’s always Pooh. There’s always Pooh and Me. Whatever I do, he wants to do.“Where are you going today?” says Pooh. “Well, that’s very odd ‘cos I was too. Let’s go together,” says Pooh, says he. “Let’s go together,” says Pooh…

“Let’s look for dragons,” I said to Pooh. “Yes, let’s,” said Pooh to Me. We crossed the river and found a few. “Yes, those are dragons all right,” said Pooh. “As soon as I saw their beaks I knew. That’s what they are,” said Pooh, said he. “That’s what they are,” said Pooh.

"Let’s frighten the dragons,” I said to Pooh. “That’s right,” said Pooh to Me. “I’m not afraid,” I said to Pooh, and I held his paw and I shouted, “Shoo! Silly old dragons!” – and off they flew.

"I wasn’t afraid,” said Pooh, said he, “I’m never afraid with you.”

So wherever I am, there’s always Pooh. There’s always Pooh and Me. “What would I do?” I said to Pooh, “If it wasn’t for you,” and Pooh said: “True, it isn’t much fun for one, but two can stick together,” says Pooh, says he. “That’s how it is,” says Pooh.

The fingers of Ian’s free hand are resting gently against Mickey’s waist, and as Ian finishes, he squeezes Mickey’s hip gently, offering the grounding the touch provides. Mickey has tears in his eyes again, but he presses them away with the palm of his hand as he shifts away from Ian and they return to their rightful spots, Yevgeny staying with Ian this time as they prepare for the exchange of vows. Mickey tunes out again for a moment, too enamored by the sight of the man he loves cooing to their restless son. For most of his life, Mickey had believed this kind of happiness was an impossibility for him. But then, Ian came along and turned his entire goddamn life upside down, and now here they are, pledging their lives to one another in front of everyone they care for—the most important cradled in Ian’s arms—and Mickey has never been happier.

When their officiant calls their attention back with the announcement that they’re approaching the exchange of vows, Mickey feels like his heart is about to beat out of his chest. For Mickey, this was going to be the hard part—bearing his soul and love and adoration for everyone to see. But he’s ready for this, and he squeezes Ian’s hand gently in his own to help hold himself in the moment.

Ian smiles softly at Mickey, squeezing back just a touch. Before moving forward, though, Ian turns to Yevgeny for a moment, tickling the toddler’s tummy to draw his attention.

“Hey, Yevy?” Ian whispers, just loudly enough to be heard by Yev and Mickey and maybe a few of their guests. “Is it okay if I marry your daddy?”

Yev shrieks in excitement and claps his hands together. “Daddies!” he shouts happily, and that’s all the confirmation Ian needs. With a happy smile and a little laugh, Ian kisses Yev’s forehead and turns his eyes on Mickey.

“I think he’s okay with it,” Ian murmurs playfully to Mickey, and Mickey laughs and reaches out to run his fingers over Yevgeny’s blond hair.

“I think you’re right,” Mickey confirms before they turn back to their officiant, faces alight with joy, and awaiting the moment when they will officially recite their vows.

In the end, it’s Ian who begins, still holding Yev. He entwines his fingers with Mickey’s then, choosing to ignore the script their officiant attempts to pass his way. He knows he’ll remember the important parts, and he’ll speak from the heart for the rest.

“I have loved you since I was fifteen years old,” Ian begins, his voice soft and yielding. “Since that first time, when we were supposed to hate each other but found so much more because you let me in; you let yourself trust me. There have been times when I’ve taken that trust—that love—for granted. But I swear to you, Mickey, that I will spend the rest of my life loving you the way you deserve. You’ve taken care of me, loved me more than I’m worth, given me a family.” Ian squeezes Yevgeny, then, kissing the boy’s cheek and drawing happy giggles from him before turning back to Mickey with a watery smile. “You are my everything, Mickey Milkovich. And I will love you every moment for the rest of our lives.”

Mickey lets out a little laugh in a huff as he tries to hide the sob that nearly escapes him, and he presses the fingers of his free hand against his eyes to stop the tears that threaten, just barely managing to pull himself together before the officiant is looking to Mickey expectantly.

Finally, Mickey gathers himself with a deep breath as he begins: “Not so long ago, I had to live without you for a year and a half. I never want to be without you again, Ian. You taught me how to love. How to be me. You gave me a safety I’d never had before. Welcomed me into your home, your family—your heart. You broke down all my walls, saw through everything I tried to hide. I have never in my life loved anyone the way I love you. It will always be you, Ian. And I promise you, no matter what this life throws at us, I will stand by your side. I love you. And that means we take care of each other. It means thick and thin. Good times, bad. Sickness, health, all that shit. You and me, Ian. For the rest of our lives.”

Ian breaks at that, drawing a long, shaky breath and swallowing hard. He’d always known Mickey had meant those words the last time he’d said them as much as he does now, and hearing them again, here, a promise they’re both willing to make in this moment erases all the bad and the loss and the loneliness that had come with them before. This time, they mean forever, and Ian can’t help but collapse into Mickey’s arms, tucking his face into the crook of Mickey’s neck as Ian lets a few tears fall freely. Mickey smiles, drawing Ian as close as he can with Yevy still perched on Ian’s hip, and he presses a kiss to Ian’s hair, stroking his fingers through the soft locks and savoring the moment with his little family.

When Ian gets himself together, though, he pulls back with a quiet laugh, wiping at his tearstained cheeks for a moment before capturing Mickey’s fingers in his own once again. “Sorry,” he whispers, and it’s meant for their officiant, but his eyes never leave Mickey’s, and Ian can see the tear streaks that decorate Mickey’s own features. Ian has never felt happier or more complete than he does in that moment, and the soft, affectionate smile Mickey offers him only enforces the feeling.

Finally, when it’s all official and Mickey’s allowed to kiss Ian, he leans forward to press his lips to Ian’s gently, fingers coming up to cradle Ian’s cheek. It’s soft and sweet, and just before they move to pull back, Yevgeny leans forward to smack loud little kisses on each of their cheeks, and Mickey can’t help the laughter that bubbles up in his chest as he drops his head to the crook of Ian’s neck. A moment later, when he gets his laughter under control, he leans up to smack his own kiss to Yevy’s cheek and the boy giggles while Ian rocks him.

And as the officiant announces them for the first time as Ian and Mickey Gallagher-Milkovich, Mickey can’t help but lean forward again to capture Ian’s lips, fingers finding their way into Ian’s hair and joy shining from his eyes. “We’re married,” he whispers against Ian’s lips, his voice wavering with excitement.

“We are,” Ian agrees with a bright smile, pecking Mickey’s lips again before using his free arm to pull Mickey into the closest hug they can manage with Yev still balanced in Ian’s arms.

Chapter One * Chapter Two * Chapter Three * Chapter Four * Chapter Five * Chapter Six * Chapter Seven * Chapter Eight * Chapter Nine * Chapter Ten * Chapter Eleven * Chapter Twelve * Chapter Thirteen * Chapter Fourteen * Chapter Fifteen

[allofthisnonsenseplease]

Nightrunner fic: The Light Prince

A/N: This is hugely self-indulgent and Seregi is ooc all the way through. To be fair, there’s a reason for that last, but still.

Fusion with The Light Princess by George MacDonald.

It got to be too weird having a finished fic unposted, but I can’t really say this is any good, so I’m going to compromise and not put it in the tags.

Disclaimer: The characters in this story are from Lynn Flewelling’s Nightrunner series and do not belong to me.

1. An Inauspicious Christening

Once upon a time, in a land so cluttered with kingdoms and queendoms that it was nearly impossible to throw a rock without hitting a palace, there lived a King and Queen in the country of Bôkthersa. They were as happy a couple as could be found, save for one thing. Although his dear wife, Queen Illia, had given him four daughters, King Korit yearned for a son. After years of trying, his wish was finally granted, but the cost was far higher than he had expected. His beloved wife died in childbirth, leaving him behind with their four daughters and a squalling infant son.

Stricken with grief and remorse, the King nevertheless meant to honor the customs of his people. In the midst of the month of mourning, he arranged for the christening of his son, whereupon the boy would be given his name. Invitations were sent out to kings and queens, princes and princesses in all corners of the land. In his sorrow, however, there was one person who he forgot to invite. In the normal course of events, such an oversight would be a minor embarrassment, but nothing terribly troubling. Unfortunately, in this case, the person the King had forgotten to invite was none other than Princess Phoria of Skala, a proud and cunning woman with little love for his people and a long memory for grudges.

When Phoria realized that she had been excluded, though her mother and both sisters and even her twin brother had been invited, she was incensed. No practitioner of the magical arts herself, she found a wizard willing to brew up a curse which she would then be able to activate with the simple application of a few herbs and a short incantation. Thus armed, she contrived to attend the christening, pretending that she had not noticed the slight, while the King remained unaware that he had even forgotten her.

In the milling confusion before the guests took their places for the ceremony, Phoria emptied into the font a packet of fine powder that had been mixed up for her by her wizard. Then, she had only to wait until the infant was sprinkled with the water and christened with his name. When she heard the King pronounce the name of his son—Seregil—she knew the moment was ripe and spoke the spell under her breath.

"Light of spirit, by my charms, Light of body, every part, Never weary human arms— Only crush thy father's heart!"

In an instant, the reverent silence was broken by a squeal of laughter from the infant Prince. The sound of it masked the gasp of Princess Adzriel, his oldest sister, who happened to be holding him. Although no one saw that anything was amiss as she clutched her brother tightly, in an instant, she had felt all the weight go out of his tiny body.

Prince Seregil's laughter continued unabated in shrills and gurgles of joy. Thinking that the magic she had purchased had failed, Phoria spent the remainder of the ceremony in an even worse temper than she had been in when she had initially been slighted. It was only toward the end of the evening that she noticed the first sign that all was not well. Adzriel was drawing the King away, speaking low and urgently to him and holding out his son to him.

When King Korit took the boy, his face betrayed his shock. He hefted the baby, but his grip must not have been sure. At the height of his lift, Seregil floated free, cooing happily, and came to rest against the ceiling. He hovered there quite contentedly and with no apparent inclination to drift back down, while gasps and cries of alarm came from the crowd below.

By all accounts a difficult woman to please, Phoria's lips pressed thin in a dissatisfied line as she watched and wondered if her revenge had truly been served.

2. The Gravity of the Situation

The curse—which must never have been properly explained to Phoria, as she would merely have scoffed at the idea and found a different wizard—robbed Prince Seregil of his gravity. Never again did the baby cry or wail. Instead, squeals and shrieks of laughter issued from him in response to any stimulus. And although such a cheerful baby was almost universally loved despite the unfortunate circumstances of his birth, his condition did give rise to certain unusual and awkward situations.

A nurse, bouncing the infant one day, let her grip relax too much and, before she knew it, Seregil was laughing his baby laugh while looking down at her from the ceiling. The same mistake was made by the King and two of the Prince's sisters. One evening as they sat at table, Seregil was accidentally let go up into the lofty ceiling of the dining hall. A ladder had to be sent for and placed carefully on the long table over the platter of venison. Even then, the servant sent to fetch the Prince down could not reach him. In the end, the baby had to be handed down after being snagged by a pair of tongs.

Special care had to be taken even when the Prince was laid in his cradle. A mishap one afternoon involving open windows and a mischievous breeze left the castle all in an uproar when it was discovered that Seregil had been whisked away out of the palace. He was eventually found in the garden, having been blown into a hedge of roses. His skin was scratched from the thorns, but no lasting harm was done, and from then on, it was always made certain that a dozen silk cords secured his clothing to the sides of his crib.

King Korit was devastated. His wish for a son had cost his queen her life, and had left him besides with a child that was in no way the boy he had wanted. Seregil was not a child he could teach to ride and hunt and fight as he had long dreamed of.

“Don't despair, Father,” Princess Adzriel said to him. “Perhaps he needs only to grow out of it.”

“Perhaps a cure will be found,” suggested Princess Mydri.

The Princesses Shala and Illina were of the mind that their brother ought to be sent away to someplace where he could be forgotten, so as not to bring further shame upon their family.

The King refused to send his son away, but the loss of his wife had stolen his ability to hope. His heart remained heavy as stone, as if it had taken on all the gravity that Seregil so sorely lacked.

Although the King lamented both his loss and his son's fate, Princess Adzriel doted on the child, and Prince Seregil was the darling of the servants. There was nothing they could do that didn't please the infant, and he was coddled and bounced and played with all the hours of the day. One of the games they loved best to play with him was ball, and Seregil enjoyed it no less for actually being the ball himself. Peals of laughter rang out as he was tossed from one pair of hands to another and, although they had to be careful not to toss him into a hearth or allow him to get tangled in a chandelier, at least there was no danger in dropping him.

As the years passed, Prince Seregil grew into as fine, handsome, and healthy a young man as anyone could have asked for. The only flaw in his constitution was his continuing lack of gravity. He had learned to make his way by taking up large rocks in either hand, and these had the effect of weighing him back down to earth between his bounding steps, but nothing worn on his person would do. Indeed, anything from his heavy winter cloaks to his fine golden crown would lose its own gravity as soon as he put it on. After one too many close calls where Seregil had accidentally dropped his ballast, King Korit finally decreed that he was not to be allowed out without an escort of half a dozen men holding lengths of silken cord tied to his clothes, along with as many mounted riders—just in case he should slip his leashes. Adzriel also insisted that he always carry on his person a small grappling hook on a length of rope in case of emergencies.

Outings with Seregil were always merry, as the Prince laughed at everything, and took no offense when his strange gait encouraged laughter in others. One step would send him up into the air, feet moving as if he could still propel himself forward, while his direction was at the mercy of any breeze that chose to blow past. His ballast would see him brought back down to earth until another step kicked him off again and then up he would go.

Inspired by these foreshortened flights, Seregil had on more than one occasion confided in fits of giggles that he should like nothing more than to be tied to a very, very long cord and flown like a kite. If his father's heart had not long since been broken, that particular bit of silliness might have been the final blow to it.

Given his unusual method of locomotion, it was hardly uncommon for him to be blown off course and into one of the courtiers or servants that surrounded him constantly. In fact, Seregil had claimed his first kiss in just such a manner. Rushing to greet his sister Adzriel one day, an ill-timed puff of air had caught him mid-stride—that is, a few feet off the ground as he began his descent—and sent him directly into the path of a young man not much older than he named Ilar. Lips already puckered to kiss his sister's cheek, Seregil collided head on with Ilar, who was only too happy about the misplaced affection. His happiness did not last overlong, however. Although Ilar fancied the Prince, Seregil could not take him seriously at all, and the laughter that remained the constant response to Ilar's overtures in all their future exchanges eventually changed his infatuation to bitterness. Seregil didn't even notice when Ilar left the court to return to his own home.

Seregil's treatment of Ilar was but one example of how his comportment remained as unaltered by time as his exemption to the natural law of gravity. Nothing could be said to him that he would not laugh at, and nothing could happen that he did not find humorous. There was, however, a strange quality to the Prince's laughter, a sort of lack or hollowness at the center. At times, his laugh could sound quite brittle, but it went on all the same. It was his sister, Adzriel, who loved him best of all, who noticed that although her brother might be easily set off into fits of laughter, it did not reach his eyes. He rarely smiled.

He never cried, not even a single tear of mirth.

3. Try Everything—Something's Got To Work

Adzriel never gave up hope that the curse on her brother could be broken. She wrote to wizards, magicians, fortune tellers, oracles, physicians, and philosophers. She invited them all to Bôkthersa to examine Seregil, and visited those who could not or would not come. She was inundated with suggestions, both solicited and freely offered, and found that she discarded more of these potential cures than she tried, as many of them were ridiculous at best and dangerous at worst.

Thero í Procepios, a wizard of Orëska House, believed that something had gone wrong with the soul inhabiting her brother's body.

“Two souls, seeking out their appropriate habitations, must have somehow met, rebounded off each other, and lodged in the wrong bodies. It is no wonder the Prince is not subject to any natural influence—his soul belongs to another sphere. He must therefore be grounded in this world. Fill him with its history of every variety: animal, vegetable, mineral, social, moral, political, scientific, literary, artistic, musical, magical, and metaphysical. Fill him with the weight of the world he must dwell in.”

Adzriel had her doubts about the efficacy of this cure, but reasoned that knowledge never hurt anyone and saw to it that her beloved brother had the finest tutors.

Charis Yhakobin, an alchemist from Plenimar, paid a visit and proposed a more physical solution.

“It is his heart that's the problem. I believe that somehow the motion of it has been entirely reversed, drawing the blood in where it should be forced out, and forcing the blood out where it should be drawn in. In this manner, blood suffuses the body through his veins and returns through the arteries. With such an extraordinary reversal at work, it's really no wonder that other natural forces do not affect him as they would a normal person.”

It was at that point that he outlined his plan to correct the problem, a plan that involved draining the Prince's blood until he was at death's door, then re-setting the flow of new blood through his body through the use of ligatures around the left ankle and right wrist, and air-pumps over the right ankle and left wrist.

The alchemist was thanked politely for his time and expertise, and sent away without his experiment being carried out.

Another Plenimaran, a necromancer by the name of Vargûl Ashnazai, hypothesized that the Prince needed to be properly grounded, and should be buried alive for three years. Adzriel shuddered and burned his letter.

One of the ideas put forth time and again from various sources was that the Prince's gravity would be restored if he could be made to cry. To this end, Seregil was told that his favorite uncle had died (though in fact, he had not), was presented with the sorriest tale of woe from the kingdom's most unfortunate beggar, was made to listen to the most heart-rending ballads ever composed, and was even whipped quite soundly. Nothing had the desired effect, although his laughter during that last measure sounded unsettlingly close to screams.

It was even suggested at one point that perhaps the best thing for the Prince would be for him to fall in love...though how that would occur in a heart so strangely untouched by the larger spectrum of human emotion was a mystery.

Adzriel continued her efforts on her brother's behalf, refusing to lose hope despite the growing number of failed, nonsensical, and impossible cures she was presented with.

4. A Refreshing Dip in the Lake

As it turned out, there was one thing, discovered quite by accident, that mitigated the effects of the curse. The palace was located on the shore of a beautiful, deep, blue lake. One lovely summer day, as the court enjoyed itself on a fleet of small pleasure boats, Seregil took it into his head that he wished to visit with his friend, Kheeta, who was in one of the other boats. Given Seregil's unique nature, it would be easy enough to arrange the transfer. As the boats passed each other, Adzriel lifted up her weightless brother, laughing along with him, and went to toss him into Kheeta's arms. However, it so happened that a mischievous wave upset the motion of the boat just as the Princess stepped forward, causing her to trip. She let go of her brother as she went down, but her momentum had carried over to him, and down he went as well, past the railing and directly into the water where he promptly sank out of sight.

There was a general outcry. Accustomed as they were to their Prince's wayward habits of movement, none of them had ever seen him propelled downward in such a way. He had never sunk. Kheeta was into the lake in a flash, followed by several other members of the boating party. They searched frantically for Seregil, until a whoop and a splash drew their attention clear across the lake to where the Prince had surfaced. The entire party set out to retrieve him, but no entreaty would draw him out of the water. He stayed in until darkness fell, and returned at first light the next day.

Seregil dove and swam as if born to the water, quick and lively as an otter, and from then on, there was nothing and no one in the world that he loved so much as the lake. He spent most of his days swimming, even into winter, although he could not stay in quite so long once the water grew cold enough for ice to form on its surface. The water of the lake was the very same that had filled the font at his christening, been dosed with the magical powder, and sprinkled upon him. Whether through some flaw in the curse or by some other mechanism, it was within that water that Seregil regained something of what had been lost to him ever since that day.

So it was that Seregil grew to be a young man of seventeen, flighty and lighthearted, beloved by those who surrounded him at all times on land, but happiest when he could slip away alone into the lake.

5. Falling In

It happened one late spring day that a young woodsman named Alec made his way into the thick woods that skirted the mountains north of Bôkthersa and shaded one side of the lake. Unaware that he had stumbled into the royal forest, Alec explored the woods, captivated by the serenity and emerald beauty, by the lushness of the forest and the ready game it provided.

Eventually, on a warm evening when the moon was rising full and bright, he came to the shore of the lake. It captured the moon's brilliance in a million silvered wavelets, making it seems as if the stars had fallen to dance upon the earth. The scene was drenched in evening blue, and every branch, every leaf, every blade of grass was limned in silver. The air was cool and sweet, and fireflies winked on and off in the shadows. To his right, the land rose sharply into a small cliff crowned by trees and overhanging the deepest part of the lake. To his left, a sandy bank curved around the wide edge of the water toward the palace which was now just visible by its twinkling lights far in the distance. Realizing for the first time that his presence might be considered trespassing, he was about to turn around and leave the way he'd come when a sudden sound halted him in his tracks.

He thought he'd heard a shriek, though there was something odd about the sound. After a moment, he most certainly heard a splash. Looking out over the water, he spotted a pale form floundering not too far from where he stood. Thinking that it must be someone in need of aid, he waded in and swam to the rescue. There was some struggling, some panic, some considerable effort put into keeping both their heads above water, but Alec made it back to shore with the man he'd ostensibly saved, only to be treated to an enormous shock as the weight in his arms vanished as soon as he was lifted from the water.

Not knowing any better, Alec hefted his spluttering burden without making sure to hold on. The result was that Seregil found himself not only dragged out of his beloved lake, but heaved unceremoniously up into the air.

“You little scoundrel!” He shouted. “You villain! How dare you pull me down out of the water and throw me to the bottom of the air!” Never before had anything succeeded in putting Seregil into a passion, but then, no one had ever dragged him without warning out of the water.

“I beg your pardon?”

Heedless of the squelching of his waterlogged boots, Alec hurried after him as he drifted toward the trees. So amazed was he by the sight of the young man floating up into the air, that he only belatedly noticed the rather complete lack of clothing upon his airborne person. Blushing hotly, but finding it hard to look away, he watched in bewilderment as the floating man snatched desperately at a branch as he passed, pulling himself close enough to grab the one below it, then the one below that, hauling himself toward the ground as if climbing a ladder upside down.

“Well?” Seregil demanded once he was more or less righted. With no stones to hand, he relied on his grip on the lowest tree branch to be sure the wind didn't carry him off again. “What's your excuse for pulling me from my lake, boy?”

“I pulled you out because I thought you were drowning.” Being somewhat more concerned with modesty than the man whose life he had just tried to save, Alec very carefully kept his eyes averted.

“Drowning?” Seregil fell over laughing at the idea, rolling around in midair. “How could I possibly drown, you silly boy? If I could have my way I would become a merman and live in that lake!”

“You seem more bird than fish to me. How is it that you can fly?”

“I can't.” He laughed again at the suggestion, realized that he was drifting off like a bit of dandelion fluff, and caught at another tree. “Everyone says that I lack gravity. But do you know what? Sometimes I feel as if I am the only one in the whole world with any sense!” Delighted by his own revelation, Seregil was off again in a fit of laughter.

Alec followed along after him as he floated deeper into the trees, borne up by the wind. “Aren't you afraid that you'll float away?”

“All the time!” Seregil called back, and though he laughed as if this was the funniest thing of all, still it was true. Deep down, he had a fear of the air much like many people had a fear of heights. But while most people could avoid heights, it was impossible, without remaining always cooped up indoors, to avoid any sudden breeze that might whip up and carry him off.

The wind changed direction in the woods, driving up against the hill and pushing Seregil along before it as he was too weak with laughter to keep hold of any branch for long. Alec followed after him, amazed and curious and more than a little embarrassed by the unavoidable glimpses of certain bits of personal anatomy, until they neared the top of the cliff.

“You're running out of trees,” he warned. Then, remembering the scolding he'd gotten earlier, he asked: “Do you need any help?”

“What's your name?”

“Alec. And yours?”

“Seregil.” He reached out a hand, and Alec clasped it, reeling him in away from the empty air that threatened over the very top of the cliff. Seregil wrapped his arms around Alec's neck, pleased by the way the boy's deep blue eyes widened in surprise at his weightlessness, as well as by the charming blush dark enough to be apparent in the moonlight.

“Alec. As it so happens, I do need help. As you were the one who took me out of my lake, I want you to put me back in.”

“Easy enough.” Seregil was no burden at all, and the walk back down was a short one. As he turned however, he was interrupted by a laughing protest.

“Where are you going, silly boy? The lake is that way.” Seregil pointed to the top of the cliff, and Alec frowned at him.

“I'm sixteen. I've been on my own for almost a year now. I'm not a boy.”

“But you are silly, going the wrong way like that.”

Hesitantly, Alec walked them up to the top of the cliff, stopping a few steps back from the edge. “Look, I can't put you in the lake from up here. What if the wind catches you and blows you away again?”

Alec's hands were shaking, though not from holding Seregil up, as his weightlessness prevented strain. The cause was emotional, rather than physical. Just that very moment, he had discovered a rather powerful fear of heights. As he started to take a step back, Seregil jerked suddenly forward for a better look. Weightless he might be, but his grip around Alec's shoulders was sure, and suddenly Alec found himself off balance and stumbling forward. His foot came down on the very edge of the cliff, and for one heart-stopping moment, he thought he was safe. Then, the ground crumbled out from beneath him. His own wholly natural relationship with gravity took over and he found himself falling.

It was lucky for them both that the cliff face was concave so that there was nothing solid between them and the water. Still, the fall was terrifying for Alec, and he screamed and clutched at Seregil. Having never experienced anything quite like it before, Seregil gave one great shout of exhilaration before they plunged beneath the surface.

Alec shot back up in a moment, gasping and feeling as if his heart was about to beat right out of his chest. He spun, looking for Seregil, but it was several long seconds before he surfaced some yards distant. They swam toward each other, Seregil wide-eyed with wonder and Alec just as mad as the Prince had been when he'd pulled him from the lake.

“You idiot!” Alec shouted, whipping his hand through the water to splash Seregil. “You made us fall in!”

“That was falling in?” He ignored the angry splashing aside from raising one arm in halfhearted self-defense. “How wonderful! I've never fallen in before! Let's do it again!”

“Not on your life!”

“Everyone else obliges me.”

“Well, let everyone else dunk you in your damned lake, then.” Alec struck out toward shore, but Seregil followed him.

“No! This is my place! They follow me everywhere else, but not here. I want to fall in with you.”

“Absolutely not,” muttered Alec, whose heartbeat had still not returned to normal.

Seregil easily outpaced him in the water, swimming around to block his way and catch his hands. “At least come swim with me for a while.” He was amused by Alec, who treated him so differently from everyone else.

“No. I need to get out and dry off. I've got to get moving tomorrow.”

“Why?” Seregil played with him, letting Alec slip around to the side in order to get past, then diving so that he could surface in front of him once more. Slowly, slowly, he herded him away from the near shore.

“Because I don't think I'm supposed to be here. I wandered in by mistake.”

“Do you like our forest?”

For the first time, Alec paused, simply treading water to remain afloat. “I do. These woods are beautiful.”

“I can grant you permission to stay a while. If you'll agree to fall in with me each evening.”

Alec stared at him. “To do that, you'd have to be....” His eyes widened. Hadn't he overheard some talk a few weeks back? He'd gone into a village to trade for a few supplies, and heard the most ridiculous story about a prince who had to be tethered to his retainers lest he float away.

Seregil grinned at him. “Do we have a deal?”

The shock faded quickly, and Alec turned himself around in the water, scanning the shoreline of the lake. “Only if we can find someplace a bit less high up to jump from.”

6. What a Silly Thing to Be!

From the tail end of spring and on into the maw of a fiercely hot summer, Alec remained living in the woods near the lake. By day, he hunted and set his snares, skinned his catches and stretched out hides to dry, trimmed and fletched arrows, and occasionally ventured into the market to trade for bread or cheese or supplies he couldn't make himself. By night, he swam with Seregil: holding the Prince in his arms and jumping off rocks that stood the height of a man above the lake's surface, diving and splashing, racing through the water, or floating serenely upon the surface to count the stars and talk.

One of Alec's favorite things was when they swam down, down into the depths until they could look up and see the moon shining huge upon the surface, broken only by the occasional blue ripple, then they would shoot up through the water, bursting through that bright reflection, and stare up, gasping for air as the moon shone in the blue night as if from the bottom of the vast pool of the heavens. The breathtaking sight sometimes left Alec feeling dizzy, and he always knew when he looked particularly dazed because Seregil never failed to tease him about it.

Seregil teased him about a great many things.

On the second night that they met, Alec sat upon the bank, waiting for the last of the boating party that had accompanied the Prince in the waters near the castle to row back to shore. As the stars came out and the courtiers returned to the palace, he began to sing softly to himself. It was a simple hymn to Dalna the Maker, one of the few songs he knew, but presently, he heard a soft splashing and saw that Seregil had come into the shallows to sit only half-submerged, listening.

“You have a passable voice,” the Prince said when Alec fell silent. Pent up laughter made his voice thick, and in the next moment, he was doubled over with it, shoulders shaking, as he forced out: “I should have guessed you were a Dalnan! What a silly thing to be!”

“Why is that silly?”

“Why did you blush so prettily yesterday?”

Remembering Seregil's state of undress and supposing it would certainly be the same tonight, Alec felt heat rise to color his cheeks. “I'm not used to seeing others naked,” he muttered.

“Not used to seeing your own skin, either, if the way you smelled last night was anything to go by. Does Dalnan modesty prohibit disrobing for bathing, as well?”

Face burning, Alec stood up to leave. He paused only to scowl as Seregil started laughing again.

“Oh, come now, don't be like that! Why must everyone always be so serious?”

“I would suppose it's in our nature,” Alec said stiffly, wondering what had caused such an odd lack in Seregil's.

“If you're just going to be as tiresome as the rest, then I won't bother speaking with you.”

He turned away and swam off without a look back, leaving Alec, who had spent the entire day roaming the royal forest with Seregil's conditional permission, feeling increasingly guilty over not holding up his end of the bargain. It didn't seem as if that had been Seregil's intention, or that the Prince was playing coy. As far as Alec could tell, Seregil truly no longer had any interest in him. He sat back down on the bank, watching the play of silver light on the surface of the lake and tracking Seregil's movements, though he lost him for long moments whenever the Prince would dive beneath the surface.

Presently, Alec began to sing again. When that failed to get Seregil's attention, he got up and stripped down to his tunic, then walked the edge of the lake until he came to the cluster of rocks he had found that would do for jumping into the water. He climbed up onto them, then waited for Seregil to swim past.

“Would you like to jump in with me?” Alec called to him. “Or do I still stink?”

“A good swim will fix that!” Seregil called back, now hurrying eagerly toward him.

If he'd had any hard feelings over their earlier exchange, Alec couldn't tell. It would be a while longer yet before he would start to wonder if Seregil was even capable of such feelings.

That evening set the pattern for their meetings. Seregil would search him out once all the others had gone in, and Alec would spend time lifting his new friend out of the water and holding Seregil in his arms to jump back in, over and over again. It was always Alec who tired of falling in first, but Seregil never complained too strenuously about remaining in the water. They spent hours every night swimming together, talking, racing, competing to see who could dive deepest.

Seregil seemed to know at least a little bit about every subject in the world. His knowledge astonished Alec, who hadn't taken him for an attentive pupil. Alec's mistake was in supposing that the inability to take anything seriously meant that Seregil had no interest. On the contrary, everything was of interest to him, if only for how absurd it appeared from his point of view. Seregil had an excellent memory for details, and Alec found himself soaking up knowledge secondhand with a powerful thirst as Seregil's endless chatter covered all possible topics, from politics and history to fashion and gossip.

Aside from being intelligent, Seregil easily won all of their contests. Rather than being put off by the fact that he was slower in the water, Alec pushed himself to keep up until he was just as quick and could dive just as far and hold his breath just as long. Seregil barely seemed to notice. Win, lose, or draw, he only ever laughed at the end of their contests.

He did tease, however, quite mercilessly, although there was no malice in him. Once Alec had grown more accustomed to his friend's ways, he took no more offense than he would over a spot of inclement weather. And, despite the fact that Seregil laughed about everything—which was not, as Alec soon realized, the same as being happy about everything—he felt that maybe Seregil was just a little extra fond of him. He couldn't help but hope so, at any rate. Sometimes his friend would even say something that would nearly be enough for Alec to believe that.

“Perhaps I like you so much because your eyes look almost as blue as the depths of my lake,” Seregil told him one warm night in early summer.

He'd been very close, enough that their legs brushed beneath the surface while treading water. Alec hadn't known what to make of the words, not when Seregil looked almost serious as he said them, and not when he was comparing Alec to the one thing he could truly be said to love. Alec felt his face heat up under the scrutiny of those unusually serene gray eyes, and the awareness of the blush creeping up his neck and over his cheeks only made him all the more embarrassed. The moment was shattered quite suddenly as Seregil laughed. Before Alec could think up a response, the Prince had spun and disappeared beneath the surface, off to enjoy himself alone. Left treading water by himself, the words suddenly felt like a joke, and Alec's heart sank.

He wasn't entirely sure what the warm, anxious feeling was that filled him up whenever he saw Seregil, but he worried quietly that he might be falling in love.

7. A Leak in the Lake

Summer drew slowly to a close, hot days lingering into autumn even as the evenings pulled chilling winds across the lake and made Alec all the more reluctant to leave the water each night. He and Seregil were playing around, tussling near the shore: tackling each other into the water, squirming free, and swimming back around to counterattack. Alec had by this time grown accustomed to Seregil's preference for swimming au naturale. Seregil had yanked Alec down under the water, then darted away grinning. Intent on revenge, Alec had come up behind him where he'd surfaced, treading water near the boulders they so often used as a jumping off point. Something about the set of Seregil's shoulders gave him pause, however. Rather than dunking his friend, Alec moved to get a better look at his face. Lit only by pale moonlight, Seregil looked pensive, an expression so enormously unlike him that a shiver of dread coursed through Alec's body.

“Seregil?”

The Prince didn't respond, only stared a moment longer at the rock beneath his hand. Then, without a word, without even a glance at Alec, he shot off through the water. Alec trailed him, watching Seregil flit from point to point along the shores of the lake, looking at something only he could see, and growing visibly more troubled as he went. No matter how many times Alec called his name, his concentration never wavered. Finally, as Seregil swam back around to the shadowed pool beneath the balcony to his bedroom, Alec caught his arm.

“Seregil, what's wrong?” He had never seen his friend like this, and was nearly in a panic himself.

Though Seregil's eyes met his, his gaze was troubled and unfocused. “I need to go,” he murmured. “Give me a boost.”

“Tell me what's going on,” Alec demanded.

Seregil only shook his head. With a sigh, Alec lifted him free of the water and heaved him gently upward. He watched his friend rise through the air until he could catch hold of the railing of his balcony and pull himself inside. Immediately, Seregil drew the curtains.

With a heavy heart, Alec started on his way back across the lake. From the onset of his confusing feelings for Seregil, he had tried to remind himself that anything more than friendly affection wouldn't be returned. Seregil's curse made it impossible. Hope was not so easy to kill, however, and it had insinuated itself a little deeper into the nooks and crannies of Alec's heart with every evening they had spent together. Now, suspecting that Seregil had noticed something wrong with the lake, Alec was left deflated by the painful reminder that his friend harbored no special feelings for him. Far from it.

Before leaving the water that evening, he examined all the same places that Seregil had looked at earlier, trying to fix their appearance in his mind's eye. Maybe whatever his friend had noticed would turn out to be nothing after all. If not, Alec wanted to be able to offer whatever help he could.

The very next morning, Seregil was out at the lake at first light. He swam completely around it, studying the water level in certain places and ordering that marks be painted at each one. His unheard of seriousness had stunned the servants that followed him, and it didn't help anyone's state of mind when he voluntarily left the lake as soon as he was done and shut himself up in his room.

Alec had slept through the entire spectacle, but he was awake when Seregil returned just before sunset to make another inspection of the lake. With a retinue trailing his friend, Alec stayed out of sight in the woods, but even from a distance, he saw Seregil's distress. His heart squeezed painfully in his chest as he watched Seregil abandon the lake after one swim around its edge, and he waited impatiently for everyone to leave before shedding his boots and breeches and wading in.

It took Alec no time at all to spot the marks painted that morning. Seeing them two handspans above the surface, the same dread certainly that affected Seregil now occurred to him.

The lake was sinking.

For the next several nights, Alec checked the marks regularly, but there was no denying the fact that the water level was dropping inexplicably quickly. The grasses and reeds growing along its shore began to dry up, and rock formations formerly hidden by depth were becoming visible just beneath the surface. After a few days, there was no longer any need to actually swim the circumference of the lake to tell that it was shrinking—the difference was plain to see from any vantage point.

To make matters worse, Seregil was more than simply upset by the discovery. Whatever power the water held over him was tied more strongly than anyone could have guessed. As the lake shrank, dying by inches, Seregil's strength began to fade. He kept to his room with the curtains drawn against the sight of the dwindling lake. He spoke less and less. His laughter died away to silence.

Even so, he still never cried.

Fearing for her brother's life, Adzriel redoubled her efforts to find someone who might be of use in restoring the lake. No one had any solution to offer, and no one could account for the sudden change. Day by day, the water continued to disappear, and Seregil's condition continued to worsen.

Forgotten, and terribly afraid for his friend, Alec felt alone and helpless, and grew increasingly more frustrated.

The only person to rejoice at the news was Princess Phoria. Having heard what joy Seregil took in his lake and how it eased the hearts of those who loved him, she had summoned the wizard who had first created the curse, and demanded that something be done to assure her revenge was not subverted. This time, the wizard went himself to see to the casting, the spell not being something that he could prepare in advance and leave to an ordinary person to cast.

Hidden on the steepest slope of the tallest mountain that cradled the palace of Bôkthersa was a narrow opening only just barely big enough for a slender man to squeeze through. The wizard made his way to that crevice and crept along it in darkness until he came to the very heart of the mountain. Here, the walls fell back to create a small cave with an ancient, iron-banded oak door locked fast opposite the entrance.

The wizard called up light, then a wooden tub, then water to fill the tub. He pulled a bit of dried snakeskin from his robes, and tossed it into the water. Adding a magical powder, he stirred the water with his arm until a snake as white as new-fallen snow lifted its head from the tub to regard him with its milky eyes. The wizard allowed the snake to drape its coils along his arm and around his shoulders, then pulled out an iron ring that held a hundred iron keys. Taking the first key in hand, he opened the wooden door, stepped through, and locked it behind him. A few stone steps led him down, then he encountered a second door. He unlocked this with the second key, stepped through, locked it back behind himself, and went a few more steps down to the third door. So he continued, unlocking and locking, progressing a few steps, and pausing at another door until he had gotten through all one hundred doors leading down into the bowels of the earth.

A vast chamber lay beyond the hundredth door, with stone pillars as big as trees holding up the ceiling. The wizard lifted his hand, and the snake uncoiled, stretching up toward the ceiling of the cavern, head swaying from side to side as if seeking a scent on the rock. Muttering spells, the wizard walked a circuit around the cavern, gradually spiraling inwards as he went around and around until he reached the very center. There, the snake suddenly lunged, sinking its fangs into the stone.

For three days and three nights, the wizard sat and spoke the words of his spell. After the third night, the snake shriveled away once more. All was still for a long moment, then a drop of water condensed where the serpent had worked at the stone, grew fat and heavy, and fell to the floor of the chamber with an echoing splash.

With all haste, the wizard fled the cavern, unlocking each of the hundred stout doors and locking them back behind himself as he fled. As he went, the sound of rushing water gradually rose to fill the passageway.

The very last thing the wizard did before leaving Bôkthersa to report back to Princess Phoria was to walk the land surrounding the lake. At every river and waterfall he encountered, he threw in a pinch of his magic powder. Every source of water dried up. Not a spring, creek, or rill remained to replenish the lake. In time, it would go completely dry, and the task set him by the Princess would be complete.

8. There is Always a Price to be Paid

The dwindling lake left the residents of the palace beside themselves with worry. Adzriel continued to follow every path of inquiry opened to her. Mydri spent much of her time at Seregil's bedside, nursing him and trying to coax him to eat, though he would take no nourishment but lake water. His condition continued to deteriorate so that there was no doubt in anyone's mind that he wouldn't survive the death of his beloved lake. King Korit took the news gravely, retreating into the heartache that had never quite left him after his wife's death.

The palace fell into a mourning quiet, made all the more apparent by the fact that for the first time in seventeen years, Seregil's laughter did not ring through the halls. Outside, the lake steadily drained away, leaving bare, glistening banks strewn with all manner of refuse and dead creatures. The muck baked in the sun and stank of rot, and still the waters receded. Alec retreated further into the forest during the day to escape the stench, but he still returned to the lake shore every evening with the dwindling hope of seeing his friend. He sang his Dalnan hymns and racked his brain for anything he could do that might be of use.

The lake was almost completely dry before a solution presented itself.

One day, a group of children scavenging along the lakebed came upon a golden shield. Inscribed upon it was a simple verse that no one could make heads or tails of.

"Death alone from death can save. Love is death, and so is brave— Love can fill the deepest grave. Love loves on beneath the wave."

The shield was brought to the temple of the Ruhi'auros in the hopes that one of them could make sense of it. Soon enough, the mystics came back with an answer.

There was but one way to restore the lake and save the life of the dying Prince Seregil. The hole through which the water was draining away must be found and plugged, but it could not simply be stopped up by normal means. A willing sacrifice must agree to block the hole, giving up their life as the lake filled in over their head. This was the price for restoring the lake and the rivers that nourished the valley, and for saving the Prince in the process.

Shaken by such a revelation, Adzriel still wasted no time in issuing a proclamation. Word of the curse and the cure was spread throughout the city and the surrounding villages, but no one stepped forward to volunteer. Days passed as the lake grew dangerously dry. Adzriel was considering taking on the burden herself, and leaving one of her sisters to become their father's heir in her stead, when Alec, having finally left the woods long enough to hear the proclamation, announced himself at the palace gates.

One mention of needing to speak with Princess Adzriel about volunteering to plug the hole in the lake was enough to grant Alec an audience with the royal family. Having only ever met Seregil, and never when the Prince was clothed, Alec felt small and grubby standing before the finely dressed King and his four daughters. He had asked only for Princess Adzriel, having gathered from listening to Seregil that she loved him best out of all his family, and had therefore not been prepared for such an audience. Reminding himself that he was doing this to save his friend, Alec stood straight and spoke with more confidence than he felt.

“I'm here to restore the lake.”

King Korit looked him over with tired, old eyes, then gestured toward the door. “Put him in,” he said, and guards started forward.

“Wait!” The guards paid him no attention, and Alec shouted desperately as they took hold of him. “I have a request!”

It was Adzriel who stayed the guards. She stood and stepped away from her throne, coming forward to speak with Alec on equal footing, affording him that respect as a show of thanks on her brother's behalf.

“What is your request?” she asked him kindly.

“I want....” He licked his lips, nervous and afraid, but committed. “I believe that it might take a long time for the lake to fill up. Sere— Prince Seregil and I are.... We've swum together in the lake. And talked. I'd like for him to stay with me. If I get hungry, or need someone to talk to, then I'd like for him to be there to keep me company.”

Adzriel smiled sadly, having no trouble seeing the love that Alec felt for her brother. She touched his cheek, brushing back a thick lock of his blond hair.

“That is not an unreasonable request.” Looking back over her shoulder, she addressed the King. “Father?”

“So be it.” King Korit seemed to care no more about this than he had when Alec had first volunteered. “Adzriel, have everything arranged.”

9. Love Loves On

Within the hour, Alec had been brought to the hole in the lakebed. There was only a small puddle around it now, the last of the water in the lake. Seregil was borne to his side aboard a small boat. He lay as if dead among cushions beneath a silk awning, but Alec saw with relief that his chest still rose and fell with shallow breaths.

“It's been a while,” Alec said quietly, once the others had left them alone. “You look awful.”

Seregil's eyes fluttered open just long enough to catch a glimpse of him. “They told me someone had volunteered to save my lake.”

“Yes. Everything will be back to normal soon.”

“It's very kind of you,” Seregil murmured.

“I'd have hated to watch you die.”

Seregil said nothing in response, and Alec soon realized that he had fallen asleep. There was nothing else for it but to go ahead and get it all over with.

The hole in the lake was a small, triangular opening. It took Alec a few minutes to work out that the only way to cover it completely was to sit down with his legs through the opening, then lean forward to cover the rest with his hands. It was an uncomfortable position, and the sun beat down mercilessly upon him. With Seregil asleep and nothing much else he could do, he sang quietly, beginning with the first hymn Seregil had ever heard from him.

Presently, a small wave flowed over the stone, lapping against Alec's knees. Encouraged, he continued singing, praying that the water would rise quickly before his fear could undo his resolve. Perhaps an hour passed before he heard Seregil stir, and his heart lifted. Craning his neck to peer into the boat, he thought he could see a bit more color in his friend's cheeks. He sang one more song, but his throat was growing painfully dry, and a numbing cold was creeping up his limbs, leeching away his strength. He fell silent when the hymn came to an end, and did not begin another.

“Keep singing, if you would,” Seregil murmured. “It's so very boring just lying here.”

“My throat is too dry. Give me a sip of water.”

Seregil sat up, his movements sluggish and hesitant. “They left me with chilled wine, rather than water,” he said.

“Some of that, then. Please.”

Looking as if he would rather have lain back down, Seregil shrugged and poured some wine into a goblet. He offered it over the side to Alec.

“You'll have to hold the goblet.” He nodded toward the muddy pool around them. “I can't move my hands.”

“Oh.” Seregil stretched forward, carefully tipping the goblet to allow Alec to drink. A few sips were all he could manage.

As Seregil sat back, Alec fancied that there was a hint of concern in his expression. He comforted himself with the thought that his friend's heart wasn't entirely closed to him, despite the curse, and settled into the silence that wrapped around them. Alec was no stranger to silence, and often welcomed it. He held his peace as Seregil dozed. An hour passed. Two, then three. It was only when he realized that he was in danger of nodding off that Alec thought to call out. Even as he spoke Seregil's name, however, his friend was coming awake, sitting up to look over the side of his small boat.

“I'm afloat!” the Prince cried.

Sure enough, the water had risen high enough to lift the small boat out of the muck. Beaming, Seregil looked up to meet Alec's eyes.

“Look, Alec! Soon we'll be able to go swimming together again! You must fall in with me just as soon as the water is deep enough.”

Alec managed a smile for him, although he was beginning to feel quite lightheaded. The water had risen over his stomach.

“I'm sorry, but you'll have to find someone else to fall in with.”

“Oh. Yes, of course. I'd forgotten.”

Seregil stared at the water once more, but the joy was gone from his expression, leaving only a small, troubled frown behind. He met Alec's eyes again quickly.

“Are you hungry? Thirsty?”

“Just a bit.”

Although he wasn't actually hungry, he was feeling faint. It wouldn't do to pass out before he had completed his task. Seregil pulled a honeyed oatcake from the basket packed in beside him. He broke off bits and fed them slowly to Alec.

“Your lips are chapped.” He drew a thumb across Alec's lower lip, then pulled his hand away. A moment later, and he was offering a goblet of wine. As before, a few sips were all Alec could manage before he turned his head away.

“Talk to me,” Alec said.

“What would you have me talk about?”

“Anything. Just make sure I stay awake.”

“All right, then.”

Seregil settled back amongst the pillows, but he made sure this time to prop himself up so that he could see Alec. He talked haltingly at first, flitting from subject to subject, but soon was sounding more like his old self. Alec listened as the sun disappeared below the horizon and the water rose and the numbness turned to a painfully icy chill that crept in toward his heart. He didn't notice at first when Seregil stopped talking, and jumped as fingers brushed his cheek.

“You don't look very well at all,” Seregil said. His gray eyes were inches away from Alec's own.

“You didn't look so well either, this morning.”

“Alec...are you sure you don't mind this?” The warmth of his palm and the tenderness in his voice were Alec's undoing.

“I don't mind except for one thing. I'd hate to die without....” He was sure he must be blushing, although he could barely feel it. “Seregil, will you kiss me?”

“Certainly.”

He leaned just a bit further over the side of the boat, setting it rocking upon the water that had risen up to Alec's neck. His lips were soft and warm. Alec's eyes had slid shut reflexively, and he hesitated to open them after Seregil pulled away.

“Thank you.”

Tears pricked the corners of his eyes. He tried to blink them away, and looked around at the surface of the rising lake, silvered by the low-hanging moon. It truly was a beautiful place. He was glad to think that Seregil would be happy in it once again, even if Alec wouldn't be around to enjoy it with him.

Seregil offered him more of the oatcakes, but Alec couldn't stand the thought of food. He could barely manage the smallest sip of wine. The lake rose to his chin, but Seregil, instead of regaining his old levity, seemed only to become more agitated.

“Alec, surely there's someone else who could do this.”

“No one else volunteered, and it was made clear that no one could be forced.”

“But...I want to fall in with you again.”

“Someone else—”

“I don't want to fall in with someone else!”

Words were becoming a struggle. Alec smiled, and reached for what little strength he had left.

“You'll be all right. Your lake—”

“Yes, but...!”

“It's okay, Seregil.” I love you, so it's okay.

Neither spoke for some time. Alec let his eyes fall shut. It was only Seregil who watched the water as it rose to wet his bottom lip, as wavelets splashed at the seam of his mouth, as Alec tilted his head back, breathing raggedly, shallowly through his nose. Seregil's heart was racing in his chest as he watched Alec die by inches. The lake was his life, his love, the only place he was whole. He watched as it rose high enough to close over Alec's face. Bubbles drifted to the surface: his friend's last breath. They dispersed and popped and were gone, and something in Seregil broke. With a shout, he leapt over the side of the boat into the water.

Frantically, he tugged at Alec's legs where they were wedged into the hole. Although he had gained back some of his strength as the lake slowly filled, he was still weak. His breath ran out before he succeeded in pulling Alec free, and he surfaced, gasping for breath and wild with panic for his friend. He dove again, yanking and pulling, until at last one of Alec's legs came free, and then the other. Seregil heaved him out of the water and into the small boat and crawled in after him. He set off rowing toward the shore, hauling on the oars and hollering for help.

A crowd was waiting for him on the dock, helping hands reaching to to lift him from the boat and pull up Alec's limp form after him.

“A doctor! Get him a doctor!” Seregil shouted.

“But Your Highness! What about the lake?”

“Go drown yourself in it!” Seregil snapped, and it was good for the speaker that Seregil hadn't identified him in the crowd, for he certainly would have punched the man.

Adzriel stepped to the fore and swiftly imposed order. Alec and Seregil both were brought up to the Prince's room where Alec was laid out on the bed. Mydri took charge of him, and Seregil collapsed by the bedside with one of Alec's hands held tight in his. The Princess worked through the night to pump the water from Alec's lungs and draw the chill of death from his body. She feared that it would be too late after all, but just as she was preparing to give up, the sun crested the horizon, and Alec sucked in a shuddering breath and opened his eyes.

Still kneeling next to him, Seregil grabbed Alec's face, kissed him roughly, then burst into tears.

10. A Fine And Proper Happy Ending

Seregil wept for hours, loosing all the pent up tears of his life in one torrential flood. He refused to be separated from Alec, and climbed into bed to sit against the bolster and hold him close as he cried. For his part, having died for his love and been returned to life, Alec wasn't interested in being parted from Seregil, either. Shivering beneath the blanket Adzriel had wrapped around their shoulders, he stroked Seregil's hair and helped him drink the water Mydri ordered for him to replace that of the tears he was shedding.

Outside, an unseasonably heavy rain was falling, restoring the dried up rivers and streams, refilling the lake, and even flooding the underground cavern. The rain kept up long after Seregil's tears had finally dried, and the sound of it outside was as comforting as the crackling of the fire in the hearth and the overjoyed smiles of his sisters and the warmth of Alec held snugly in his arms.

“I feel so heavy,” Seregil marveled.

“You've got your gravity back,” Adzriel said, blinking back tears of joy. She had needed to help Seregil stand up and climb into bed, for he hadn't been able to manage it by himself, not having ever had weight before. A thought occurred to her and she laughed. “You'll have to learn to walk all over again!”

“Alec can teach me,” Seregil declared. He kissed the top of Alec's hair, and chuckled to see him blush. “I promise to learn quickly. The sooner I come to terms with this gravity I've been missing, the sooner we can be married.”

Alec gaped at him, and Seregil lost himself for a moment in his eyes. He wondered how he could ever have compared their blue to that of the lake and found Alec wanting.

“You mean it?” Alec asked.

Seregil watched the shock on his face change to delight, and found that he couldn't resist the urge to kiss him once more. New sensations flooded him head to toe as he melted into the kiss. Oh, yes. He had a great deal to learn, all of it with Alec at his side. Joy too pure for laughter swelled within his heart as fresh tears welled in his eyes. Wondering if Alec felt the same, he broke the kiss to meet his eyes and saw love shining there, clear for all the world to see. For the first time in his life, Seregil felt that he was truly happy.

[riathelancer]

Prompt #3) Ria/Lyse - Emotional/Romantic/Confession

OOC Note:  Dedicated to a certain snowy-haired Miqo'te I know. She knows who she is.  I don't think she likes sappy things, but tough :P.  Thanks for being my friend.

It was ever a blustery, snow-filled morning in Coerthas, as was every day since the Calamity.  The snow piled upon snow and made the once verdant land simply a mess of nothing but white and gray upon a gray sky, the occasional soaring dragon and fleck of blue sky able to break the monotony.

It was to this land that Ria ventured, even after returning from Ala Mhigo- while many of her companions had volunteered to come with her- Sir Aymeric had even volunteered to include her in his own personal traveling retinue, to give her at least some form of comfort as she ventured north, she instead turned him down, mostly out of hearing by the rest of her fellow Scions.

“Thank you, but... this is a voyage I have to make alone.  Someone I have to go see, and... I'd rather it just be by myself.”

This pricked the ears of many of her fellow Scions, but when the Warrior of Light- the one who just broke Doma and Ala Mhigo free from Imperial control, the one who managed to put down the monster known as Zenos, especially after he'd gone and merged with the primal Shinryu, asked for something... one didn't turn her down- and besides, she was the Warrior of Light- if Caleria Amih couldn't take care of herself, well, who could?  Besides, what with the Dragonsong War over and peace coming to Ishgard, it was safer than it had ever been!

So her companions watched as she approached the atheryte in the former Ala Mhigan Quarter of the capital and as she poofed away, they each set out to work. But one question weighed upon their mind- just where was she off to in such a hurry?  As the resistance got to work, this question weighed upon many of them- only a couple of them found the time to do more than just talk.

“...I wonder where Ria was so insistent on going?  Ala Mhigo is free.  The Imperials are routed, and the least she could do is take some time for herself.  She's going to miss the victory rally and everything- they Grand Companies were looking forward to praising her, and she was going to sit next to me at the feast...”

Looking up from some papers, Alphinaud looked across the dusty street at Lyse, who had set down a case of medical supplies that were so desperately needed in the war-torn land.

“There are some days that I don't believe anyone could tell what Caleria is thinking. You have to remember, she's seen a lot more than you or I, Lyse.   One of these days, perhaps she will feel like talking about all of it- but now that I do think about it...”

At these words, all work by the rest of the Scions simply stopped, and they listened close to Alphinaud's next words.

“...did she say anything as to where she was going?”

With a let-down like that, the Scions got back to work, each wondering just how it was that Alphinaud had ever descended from someone like Louisoix, while the young youth simply looked on, a puzzled look on his face.

“...was it something I said?”

“...dear brother, they have no idea where she went.  Since it seemed that you had been joined at the hip with her, perhaps they thought you knew where she'd gone.  But, of course, never let it be said that I am not a supportive sister.  I saw her, and even in this heat, she was bundled up like she was expecting a mountain of ice to drop upon her, and sweating up a storm in this heat. That leaves... hm, only one place she could think of going, yes?”

It wasn't often Alisaie got to one-up her brother when it came to out-thinking him, but they were moments she was known to treasure deeply- as well as the visage of her brother simply opening his mouth like a fish about to hit the bait.

“...Ishgard.  She's going to Ishgard, for some reason.  But why...?”

He didn't need to finish.  He suddenly knew where she was going, and why.  Why she was so bundled up, why she'd been carrying so many things, and why she'd not told a single soul...

A mess of red filled his vision, and he looked up to find Lyse in his face, peering down.

“If one of us goes after her, the work around here will still get done. But you'll have to come along so you can guide me to the atheryte, so let's get going.  I think she's gone to do something stupid again, like when she and Yugiri went after Zenos all on their lonesome in Doma.  Maybe I'll have to knock some sense into her... again.”

When confronted by a resolved Lyse, Alphinaud made the smart decision and meekly nodded.  It was in his nature to make smart decisions, after all.

***

Camp Dragonhead was just as cold as Alphinaud remembered it- in fact, it had become a little colder, by his reckoning.  Standing beside him, shaking off the woozy feeling that guided aetheryte travel often afforded, was Lyse, who was decked out in a warm ensemble of coat and gloves, as well as warm pants. She didn't feel like she still had the freedom of movement, but at least they were warm enough to keep out the chill- and they were still the same shade of red she liked.  Much like it seemed green and black were Ria's favorite colors...

No, she had to focus. This wasn't about her, this was about their friend.  Her friend.  Just what she could be doing out here, in this snowy wasteland, she didn't know.  But she was going to find out, even as Alphinaud made some marks upon a map of the area and handed it over to her, along with some fire crystal shards in woven cloth packets.

“...I expect she's up around here- near Providence Point and the Steel Vigil. It's a bit of a run, but the day's still early, so you might be able to get there in a bell or so on chocobo.  I talked to the porter, and she remembers seeing a bird in bright yellow barding- this far north, that has to be Catdance. Ishgard usually prefers blue barding, so he'll stand out. I'll stay here- and remember to attune yourself, so the two of you can return back here via the stone and not get caught out in the snows at night?”

There were times Alphinaud could sound much like a mother, Lyse thought, even as she placed a hand upon the crystal and began the process of aligning her aether with it.  But he meant well, in the end.

Leaving Alphinaud at the camp, she struck out northward, the snowy countryside blurring past as she rode.  In the distance, she could see a hulking mass of buildings come into view- across a deep, wide ravine, the city of Ishgard rose upon its plateau, the bridge known as the Steps of Faith- where Ria had brought down Nidhogg the first time, if she remembered her stories.  There were so many stories of Ria's deeds swirling about Eorzea, and now they would be starting to spread in Doma, and Ala Mhigo as well.  She was well upon her way to becoming one of those legendary heroes she'd always read about- and then Lyse let her mind wander as the snowdrifts blurred together.

Ria always seemed to be more relaxed when it was just her, and some of her friends- but mostly, when it was just her and Ria, especially in the midst of their lessons, she looked like a different person.  There was joy in her eyes, an easy smile upon her face, her gait was light and she managed to match her quip for quip.  

Compared with the Ria she always saw in public- gratefully accepting praise, a smile seemingly frozen upon her face, always available to help anybody who needed it, anyone who asked it of her- and that was when her chocobo started warking and kweh-ing as it suddenly heard another bird, one that was standing above a pile of gyshal greens stacked in a box surrounded by enough shards of fire crystal to keep them warm and unfrozen.  The bird had yellow barding, and Lyse stopped a ways away to avoid alarming the bird.

Approaching, she held out her hands long enough for the bird to get her scent, and as she drew closer, Catdance let out a wark of recognition, and went back to eating.

If Catdance was here, that meant Ria had to be nearby, as well.  She wouldn't have gone up to the Steel Vigil, as it was called, but that left... towards the chasm?  Was Ria going to jump off?  Had she come all this way just because she couldn't take it any more?

No- there she was- talking to a stone? With a shield propped in front of it, with Ria draping her coat over the-

Oh.  Oh.

Stopping a ways away, Lyse crept forward, stepping forward until she could hear everything that was being said, and watched as Ria plopped down in the snow, her armor the only defense between her and the freezing snow.

“...I picked that up for you in Ala Mhigo.  It's not exactly my color, but... I think it would have suited you something fierce.  The drinks, well... it's something called sake, and I brought it all the way from Doma. I think you might have liked it.  It's v-very strong, but it's meant to be shared among friends.

Speaking of friends, well... I made some new ones.  Gosetsu is this great big guy, almost as happy as you were.  I think the two of you would have gotten on well- he's a Doman warrior, a samurai.  Swings a sword almost as big as I am tall.  Maybe even taller than you.  Maybe... well, if you see him over there, you could say hello, and hear some of the new stories about me from him?  I think you'd like them... he could tell you of my adventures in a palace, under the sea... or of running around the Azim Steppe- did I mention I'm the khagan of the steppes now?  Ask Gosetsu about that one, about how the small crew of us held off Twelve-knows-how-many rampaging Xaela so we could get them to show up and help out at Doma- you could have flown on a giant bird, it was amazing the first time I tried it!

But yeah.. things weren't so easy.  Ala Mhigo and Doma are both free.  The Imperials have been driven back off the continent, as far as I know, and things are only going to accelerate from here.  I just wish... you were here to help me.”

Lyse closed her eyes, a little of something quivering in her heart.  Was this a love confession?  To the memory of a dead man?

“...I wanted to ask you some advice.  I think... I think there's a reason for me to keep fighting, finally. But I don't know who to ask for advice.  A reason for me to keep smiling, like you always did.  I might have finally found someone that makes me feel whole, that lessens the grief in my heart.”

Yes, it most certainly was a love confession.  But who was it about?  Aymeric? Alphinaud?  Thancred?  Someone she'd never met, who put a smile on the face of a woman Lyse would have given anything to know better, who'd never seen the way she smiled, moved, launched quips, or even fought when it was the two of them together, all alone, deep in the palace of Ala Mhigo, or upon Rhalgr's palm at the Reach?

“...how would you feel if I said it was a girl?”

Full stop.  She couldn't mean...  No.  She didn't.  Yugiri?

“...her name's Lyse.  Wears a bunch of red, fought with me even from the beginning, in Gridania.  I owe her everything, and, well... to say she's captured my heart is pretty much spot on.  I guess... I do love her. I'm too much of a dodo to tell her outright, but... yeah.  She's been teaching me to fight, and well...  “

Ria sighed, even as she was shivering.  Lyse tried fairly severely to get her heart restarted, even as she blushed.

Ria likes me?

“She's going to be in charge of Ala Mhigo.  Leading the Resistance- I think you'd have liked her, she's almost as bubbly and happy as you were.  But I'm not going to have the time I thought I was going to, with her- one of these days, some place in the world is going to simply go to blazes, and I'll have to leave her.  Off on my own, with a hole in my heart and frozen smile on my face.  But I suppose Menphina never smiles upon a warrior, does she?”

“She does!”

That... might have been a mistake, looking at how fast Ria launched out of the snow, and stared at her red-covered form with what could only be described as sheer, abject terror- before she brought her hand to her mouth and started to run, green eyes starting to cake with frozen tears even as she ran for Catdance-

If she gets on that bird, I'll never see her again.  I know that look.  She's afraid.  Mortally afraid.

It took a moment- but Lyse found herself dashing across the snow, and tackling the miqo'te into another snowdrift, wrapping her arms around Ria even as she thrashed around, wanting to get away.

“Dammit, let me go!  Let me have my Twelve-damned dignity before the whole world finds out!  I just wanted some peace, to just be me, because-”

Lyse didn't listen- she just opened her coat and pulled the freezing miqo'te to her, bundling them both up in the warm fur, even as Ria kept fighting.  She knew she'd have to do something drastic- something Ria would never, ever, ever see coming.

The feeling of warm lips upon her own shocked Ria- opening teary, frosty eyes to see it was the girl she'd confessed about, the one that smelled of sage and sand and all those wonderful things, the one teaching her to fight, the one person she felt she could rely on in the whole damned world to follow her into the abyss- and she melted, her heart calming down.  Lyse, finally feeling Ria relaxing, pulled away softly to take stock of her, well... what were they now? Girlfriends?

She liked the sound of that.

She'd never noticed before, but Ria's eyes looked a lot like emeralds, shining in the light.  But there was so much more to them- so much more of a person beyond the Warrior in there.

So much she never got to share with anyone.  Couldn't share with anyone.

“...silly Ria.  Worrying us all by coming out here, all for a confession that I would have happily said yes to even back home, in the dust and the dirt.  I see how you fight when it's the two of us, together.  How happy you are.  How you dance through the air and upon the ground, letting your heart free for one of the only times you can.  You're beautiful when you do that, you silly cat.”

“Y-you mean...?”  Either it was the cold, or it was nerves, but Lyse took advantage and kept pressing.

“I... might just like you too.  You've been there for me ever since we met in the Twelveswood, and, well... it's just... I think it's grown beyond just like, too.  I'm in love with you, too.  I want you to be mine, you silly miqo'te.  Just... relax.  Let it out, for once, and let someone else be the strong one, because all the time I've ever seen you, you're the one having to be strong.  Protecting everyone.  You've given me my homeland back.  Won my heart without much really trying, I suppose... and you look good in a fighting dress, too.  I even made sure your tail had plenty of space to get out, and I look at you fighting, and... I'm happy that you seem so happy.”

She pulled the both of them into a sitting position, and simply sat there, holding Ria.  Holding her girlfriend.

Mine.  I don't ever want to let you go.  I'll never let you go, Ria.  Someone needs to hold onto you so tight you never forget you're loved.

“...who were you visiting?  Ishgard seems a long way just to visit a grave...”

Ria blinked- and then leaned over, leaning her head against Lyse's chest.

“...his name was Haurchefant Greystone.  He was a ward of House Fortemps of Ishgard, and the one in charge of Camp Dragonhead.  He's the one... that offered sanctuary to Alphinaud, Tataru, and myself after the debacle in Ul'dah.  Kept the Crystal Braves from finding us, got us into Ishgard to safeguard us from their constant probes, and simply gave a dose of Ishgardian kindness to their envoys when they came begging to search the Holy See for the sultana's murderer.

Without him... I wouldn't be here.  Not with you.  Not with anyone.

...he sacrificed himself for me.  Blocked a javelin of light that would have killed me, at the cost of his own.”

Lyse leaned down and kissed the top of Ria's head.

She smelled like lavender. Like the forest. A snowy forest, currently, but still a forest.

“Then I thank him, wherever he is.  I worried about all of you when I was stuck in Ala Mhigo, hearing nothing but the accusations...”

She pulled them both to their feet, and held Ria close.

“...let's go back to Dragonhead.  Alphinaud is waiting there... and we'll spend the night there.  No matter what he says. He has paperwork to do, anyways.  I should know- I packed some to give him, on behalf of the Resistance.  Enough to keep him busy and researching in the library for a night.  I want to know what makes you you, Ria- your experiences, your hopes, your dreams...  what do you want out of life?  What do you want to do?”

“...is kissing you again a good place to start?”

Lyse nodded, and she kissed her girlfriend again, holding her close, feeling the warmth blossom out of Ria even as she finally relaxed and put an arm around her.

Somewhere, she thought she could even hear a voice- a happy male elezen.

Keep her safe.  Keep her happy.  That smile is everything she deserves and more.

***

A week later, they were back at the Reach.  They were both clad in their fighting dresses, and both had made sure to bring enough animal glue to keep things securely glued in place. After all, while that might be okay when it was just them in the training hall in the palace, they were sparring in front of their friends this time, and it wouldn't do for them to see something they shouldn't.

At a signal, they launched at each other- and then went into perfect sync.  Each blow was matched, each dodge was mirrored, to the point where Alphinaud started to wonder if they shared a silent connection because of the Echo. Not a blow was landed, but the show was mesmerizing, a dance between two that had studied it- well, Lyse was holding back, but the smile upon her face matched the one upon Ria's- one that simply shone as bright as the sun.

Matched in every way, they danced upon the palm of Rhalgr, rejoicing in the feeling of love and togetherness.

My Ria.  Dance for me, show me your love, and I will show you mine in turn.  I'll never let you be far from my heart, no matter where you are.

OOC:  This one ended up better!  It started out as a Ria/Haurchefant thing, where she brought him gifts from Doma and Ala Mhigo to leave by his stone, but it morphed into a Ria/Lyse pairing thing that I think turned out so sweet in the ending that it literally made me cry.  MSQ-Ria so desperately wanted to be happy, and how could I not give her a happy ending that she's deserved for so long?   The ending just makes me all mushy inside- I know, I have eccentric tastes that run the damned gamut.  Let me have my happy ending for once, sheesh.

Ria always makes it a point to go visit Haurchefant at least once a season.  Every time, she leaves him a gift.

Afterwards, she stays at Fortemps Manor, where she's an honored guest for everything she did.