#out of old habits borne from doing anything to avoid the pain and now its stuck in my fucking chest

[kartana]

I feel so sad this sucks i can't stop thinking about doing everything wrong with v I feel like im gonna cry I hate going to sleep early the day after I stay up it's just hours of laying down with stupid train of thoughts that come at night and I can't sleep I just want to sleep I don't want to feel so awful in the morning I don't want to feel awful right now I wish I could just get my thoughts in order get to the point and cry and be done with it. Nothing is going to change from yesterday to today to tomorrow I will just have been miserable and things won't change because of it I wish the world was kinder I wish the world wasn't so cruel I wish things were different I want to cry and now I can't even feel that anymore.

[scrivellc]

Dental Records

Timeline of a "Semi-Sadist"

Birth to Age 9:

Orin was born in upstate New York to Alan Scrivello and Dorothy Byrne. From the beginning his parents' relationship was a tumultuous one with his father being abusive to both his mother and Orin himself. Around 9 was when Orin's sadistic tendencies started to manifest, likely as a means of acting out in response to his trauma. This along with undeniable bruises was what finally made his mother decide to finally leave Alan, taking her son with her.

Age 9 to 14:

Now living exclusively with his mother, Orin remembers these as some of the best years of his life. However, his sadistic tendencies didn't fully go away, and his mother did her best to focus this particular energy into more "productive activities". This worked relatively well, though Orin continued to be a rebellious and unevenly tempered child.

Orin performed well in school but upon entering high school started to experiment with drugs, though nothing super serious. Mostly just smoking pot under the bleachers and such. Unknown to him his mother was sick, hiding her illness from her son in hopes of avoiding setting off anymore...unusual trauma responses in him or disrupting what she assumed was a tenuous grip on academic success.

Age 15:

Despite her best efforts, Dorothy's illness progressed to the point that she could no longer hide it from Orin, and as she deteriorated he became her primary caregiver. Later that year she died, and Orin was made to go back to living with his father.

Age 15-17:

Now back with his father, the abuse starts up again, though it leans more toward verbal and emotional now that Orin is old enough /big enough to fight back when his father tries anything. Early on in this arrangement Orin begins to self harm, turning his focus inward and on hurting himself, but it doesn't take long for him to fall back hard into his sadistic habits, wires crossing now with puberty. His drug use becomes less casual and more as a means of self medicating away the stress of his home life.

While his grades suffer during this time, he did manage to keep them high enough to get into college.

Age 18:

He kept his college acceptance from his father until one day his father found it in his room and confronted him about it. The confrontation became physical as his father tried to forbid Orin from moving away from home to pursue further education. The altercation resulted in Orin being badly injured and his father knocked unconscious. Orin quickly packed up what he could and left home for good. Going to the hospital for his injuries and getting a prescription for pain meds, which he very quickly realized got him high. A feeling he was particularly fond of as he tried not to think about how much damage he had left behind.

Age 18-25:

During this time Orin got his degree and decided to become a dentist. He began a series of failed relationships. There were a number of causes, just falling out of interest with each other, them not putting up with Orin's "reckless sexual habits", or Orin doing some active self-sabotage. He leaned more on his addictions, especially as he became more aware of the ways he acted a lot like his father when it came to how he treated his romantic partners. Eventually he settled in New York City, opening up a dental practice, still relying heavily on pain meds and nitrous oxide to deal with his internal turmoil rather than finding healthy outlets for his aggression and sadism.

Age 25-Present (Early 30s)

Orin finally got into his first truly long term relationship with Audrey. The fact that she hasn't broken up with him being a big part of why its lasted. Orin makes no real attempts to deal with his trauma, preferring instead to indulge in things that don't require him to think about the person he's grown into. And well, he's also maybe fried his brain a bit.

[braindeadbaddie]

The Ghosts That Haunt Us

I know you hear me when I cry

I try to hold it in at night

When you’re sleeping next to me 

But it’s your arms that I need this time

Chifuyu bites his lip, trying to swallow down the sobs that threaten to climb out of his throat. He grabs a pillow, stuffing his face into it and biting to muffle all the sounds that threaten to leak from his overflowing heart. 

The pillow is stained with his tears, his body shaking in silent sobs, and from the ghost of a cold cold body that he once held in his arms years ago.

Besides him, he can feel Takemichi twitch awake, shifting to wrap an arm around him. He feels him hesitate before settling his arm across his waist, pulling him into the warmth of his embrace.

God, what a terrible boyfriend he is. 

Up late, picturing a black sea and a grey sky, when he has the warmth of the sun and a bright blue sky right besides him. 

But he can’t help it. 

Tonight, he misses Baji.

Tonight, he needs him.

Look at the cards that we’ve dealt 

If you were anybody else

Probably wouldn’t last a day 

Every tear’s a rain parade from hell 

He loves Takemichi.

Their relationship isn’t laced in beauty or innocence. It was originally a partnership bred from the need to save the future. But he’s understanding, and kind, and always there to help. He’s sweet and dedicated, fiercely loyal, and so so loving. 

They sought comfort in each other because they understood each other. Better than anyone else. 

He knows Takemichi doesn’t blame him for the days that he can’t reciprocate his love, because his heart is somewhere else. He knows Takemichi understands more than anyone why he can’t share his food sometimes. He knows that Takemichi understands, better than anyone. 

Mistakes were made and there were casualties of Takemichi’s battle against time, and even though they managed to find a future where everyone could be together, the ghosts of the past still haunt them both. 

But sometimes, he wonders if their love is born out of necessity rather than true love.

Baby you do it so well

You’ve been so understanding, you’ve been so good

And I’m putting you through more than one ever should

And I’m hating myself cause you don’t want to

Admit that it hurts you

Chifuyu knows it’s hard. He cries over Baji often. 

The night of his birthday and the day of. The week of Halloween, the days before when he didn’t have his friend. Sometimes, he cries when he sees a black cat or a stray. He cries on dates they had made special memories of.

Some days are a light rain, other are storms that flood.

Chiufyu thinks that he must only exists in tears and in numbness. There are days he can feel, so all he feels is pain, and days where he can’t, so he feels nothing. 

Takemichi seems to be able to handle it so well. But Chifuyu knows. He knows this is too much for him to bear. 

Takemichi already saved the future, so he should be able reap the fruits of his labor. 

And yet here he is, fighting a losing battle to save Chiufyu. 

I know that it breaks your heart when I cry again

Over him

I know that it breaks your heart when I cry again

‘stead of ghostin’ him

Takemichi, more than anyone, hurts seeing Chifuyu cry. And yet, he has to deal with it the most. 

He feels the most guilty, the most responsible. Because he knew and he still couldn’t do anything about it. 

Chifuyu sees it in Takemichi’s eyes when he wakes up with a start after dreaming of black and grey, and red. So much red. The look in Takemichi’s eyes, screaming that he shoudn’t be here. That there should be someone else. 

Someone to go to the pet store with him every morning. Someone who helps him fight his battles. Someone who will split his yakisoba with him. Someone named Keisuke Baji. 

And Chifuyu wants to comfort him and tell he loves him and loves having him around.

But it feels pointless when his tears later that night wash away all his words. 

We’ll get through this, we’ll get past this

I’m a girl with...a whole lotta baggage 

But I love you, we’ll get past this

I’m a girl with...a whole lotta baggage

On good nights, Chifuyu will lay his head in Takemichi’s chest, curled into his side, letting him run mindless patterns into his back.

Takemichi tucks his head under his chin and whispers sweet nothings to him.

On those night, they feel like a normal couple, instead of a pair cursed by time.

Though I wish he were here instead

Don’t want that living in your head

He just comes to visit me 

When I’m dreaming, every now and then

Its hard to count the amount of times Chifuyu has woken up screaming another man’s name.

But the nightmares are so frequent, it’d probably be easier to count the times he didn’t.

In his dreams, he’s always a first-year in middle school, walking through the hallways to find a nerd who can’t spell or write properly. So he helps the poindexter write a letter and in return, he gives him a friendship with so much love that it’s enough to last his whole life.

And in the dream, he spends so many days on the floor of his or the other boy’s bedroom tutoring him and teaching him all sorts of things. And they play with stray cats that come through the boy’s windows. And there’s so much peyoung yakisoba. And at the end of his dream, he’ll get to hold him at night, and he feels warm…

…until the warmth starts to feel wet too.

And suddenly he’s back in a junkyard, holding the boy he loves as he bleeds out.

Helpless and useless.

So he screams.

And after all that we’ve been through

There’s so much to look forward to

What was done and what said

Leave it all here in this bed with you

“Thank you,” Chifuyu whispers into the dark bedroom.

Takemichi gives him a confused look. “What for?”

Chifuyu draws patterns into Takemichi’s chest. Tonight is a good night.

“For saving me. I can’t even imagine what I was like in that first future. I probably didn’t have anyone to rely on, y’know. In Toman, I’ve only really been close to you…and well…y’know.” He doesn’t want to say it, lest he break the peaceful spell his mind has cast on him today.

Takemichi tightens his arm around Chifuyu. “Ah, well. You don’t have to thank me. I just did it to get out of my apartment. I’ve been stuck there like every future.”

Chifuyu chuckles, wrapping his arms around his boyfriend’s torso, and rests his head on his chest. He breathes in Takemichi’s body wash and the scent of lavender from their detergent, counting his heart beats.

He’s still here. He’s still alive.

Cherish him.

“Thank you for saving me, for saving all of us,” he whispers as he turns to look up in his beautiful blue eyes.

There’s a flash of sadness in Takemichi’s eyes, before it’s replaced quickly. He smiles softly, though it seems a bit forced around the edges.

“It’s the best damn thing I’ve ever done,” he whispers before planting a soft kiss on his forehead.

Baby you do it so well

You’ve been so understanding, you’ve been so good

And I’m putting you through more than one ever should

And I’m hating myself cause you don’t want to 

Admit that it hurts you

On the days after bad nights, Takemichi makes breakfast. He developed cooking skills at some point in this future, he tells Chifuyu.

But on those mornings, he can badly stomach anything so Takemichi will make him a smoothie and pack a light bento. He makes him fresh green tea that warms him up, and turns on the diffuser mixing eucalyptus and peppermint.

He kisses Chifuyu on the head, never on the lips. He gives him a tight hug and whispers “have a good day”, never I love you. He tries so hard to be a friend, like he knows he isn’t the one Chifuyu loves on those days.

I know that it breaks your heart when I cry again

Over him

I know that it breaks your heart when I cry again

‘stead of ghostin’ him

They both have ghosts that haunt them.

Takemichi’s exists on high rise buildings, in truck crashes, and a building in another country with no ceilings.

There are nights that Takemichi wakes up screaming Hina’s name or Mikey’s name or Akkun’s name. There are even days where he screams Chifuyu’s. There are days where the pots will bang together and Takemichi will collapse in fear. Takemichi avoids fires, loud noises, and lives his life as if he’s apologizing for living.

On the rare occasions he’s opened up to Chifuyu about those other futures, they’re usually about the first one, the one before he ever time-leaped. He opens up about how pathetic he was and how he was always apologizing.

And even though he’s a lot more sure than the man-boy in his stories, Chifuyu can’t help but think that old habits die hard.

We’ll get through this, we’ll get past this

I’m a girl with...a whole lotta baggage

But I love you, we’ll get past this

I’m a girl with...a whole lotta baggage

Takemichi takes care of Chifuyu so well, it almost seems like he’s apologizing.

For Baji, for not being Baji, for not being able to time-leap again to save him.

For being here when he feels he shouldn’t be.

He doesn’t ask, but he can suspect that there was a future where things went really bad for him and Takemichi feels responsible.

He doesn’t ask, because Takemichi won’t tell him the truth.

That this relationship is all just one big apology. That Takemichi’s love for him is just one big savior complex. That all of this is out of a sense of responsibility.

[akitohsworld]

Disclaimer: I wrote this some time ago, when I was very sleepy. How they could've met before the exchange? I love stupid references don't@ me lol

Warning: slight NSFW at the end (under the cut)

Put a spell on me |Solomon X m!Reader

Saying Solomon was feeling under the weather was an understatement. He felt like absolute shit. His stomach was recoiling, giving him the impression he had to vomit, but couldn't. Resulting in him being wobbly on his feet. Although, he was currently trying to sober up. The lack of water caused his head to hurt, while he walked alongside the river to go back to his apartment. He was in no shape to teleport, not with the sense of orientation he had right now.

A frustrated groan escaped him as he grabbed onto the metal fence beside the river, letting gravity take over as he slouched down onto the floor.

It was a beautiful night, you could see the starry sky reflecting in the river. The silence only being disturbed by some outlandish music in the distance. Somewhere, there was another party raving besides the witches sabbath he had successfully escaped.

He knew he shouldn't have accepted that many drinks from the witches. But it had been a successful year, he was only going back to the Devildom next week... And, probably, going to meet that other exchange student by then.

"Hey fam, you okay?" A voice slurred above him, blocking the blinding streetlights before him.

"Yeah yeah, thank you for your concern-," Solomon looked up surprised. He thought he was the only one here-

"Here ," a handsome guy, probably not a sorcerer, held out a bottle of water to him, grinning friendly. "You gotta stay hydrated when drunk."

"Uhm.. thanks?" Solomon chuckled. "That's nice, but I hear I shouldn't accept drinks from kind strangers"

Their hair reflected in the warm light, along with unfocused eyes glistening in the dark, when he shot Solomon a kind smile.

Solomon suspected he was from where the music was coming from. Another rave or party or whatever, since he was wearing flashy attire and sweat was glistening on his smooth skin.

From dancing, maybe? It wasn't that warm. Rather fresh, if Solomon would say so himself.

"Hmmm", the stranger put a hand on his chin. "I guess, I'm feelin' a biiiiit brave tonight haha. Here, I'll take a sip from it first."

He chucked down a bit of water. "There."

Solomon just stared at him for a solid second. Maybe, probably, surely, this was the alcohol. But this stranger had something alluring about him. His glistening lips from the water made Solomon unable to do anything else but stare.

"You going to take it, or not?"

"Ah yes", Solomon grabbed the bottle and took a sip before putting it back down again.

"May I sit with you?" He put a hand on his neck and averted his gaze. "I- uhm came here to get away from all the noise for a bit- I don't wanna be creepy or anything-"

"Oh- Yes of course! Don't worry about it"

The grin returned to his face as he slouched down beside him. "Thank you."

Solomon took another chug of water. He didn't really have anywhere to be, nor did he have the strength to go home anyways. So he figured he might as well sober up, while making some new memories.

"Out of curiosity.. what do you mean by brave?" Solomon smirked at him.

"Well...", the stranger just smiled, a slight tint of colour dusting his cheeks. "You're pretty handsome. And I normally can't ask out guys for the heck of it.. so yeah. I'd say I'm being stupidly brave by talking to someone as hot as you."

The sorcerer laughed. "How very direct"

"Must be the alcohol", he chuckled. "I don't know anyone around here.. and I have a habit of drinking too much when I'm at social gatherings without friends.. What about you? Why are you here all alone?.. If it's okay to ask, at least."

"Ah it's okay~ I'm trying to sober up from drinking too", Solomon sighed. "It was an exhausting night.."

The stranger nodded sighing. "Tell me about it."

"So.. what are you celebrating?"

And so, they proceeded to talk about the reasons why they were here. Their conversation slowly but surely going of its original rails, from politics to religion to light-hearted shows and childhood memories.

Solomon, of course, didn't go into much detail about magic nor anything like that. They were simply trailing off into more and more different topics, running their tongues because of the alcohol.

"Wait, people avoid you when you invite them?" He asked in shock, "Even after you offer to cook for them?! Woah, that's rude after everything you've done..."

Solomon hung his head in disappointment. "I really don't know what the issue is, you know? It's not like they outright avoid me when we nee- want to hang out, but everytime I offer my hospitality they just.. you know?"

"Shiiiit bro... ," he thought for a bit, then joked, "Maybe your cooking sucks?"

Solomon sighed dramatically, proceeding to pout. "Can't blame the tasteless."

"Just kidding kidding!!" he smiled sympathetically, "Maybe it's best if you ask them directly about it. Honesty is always key, no matter where you're from."

Solomon remembered something.

"So, I'm guessing you're not from around here?"

The stranger looked him up and down, seeming to think for a bit and then smirking back at him.

"You tell me, wizard boy. Am I?"

"Oh? How do you know?"

"Know what?"

"That I'm", Solomon gesticulated dramatically, "a wizard."

He became serious and leaned closer to Solomon, putting a hand on his shoulder. Solomon's breath hitched ever so slightly as the stranger's intense gaze held him entranced.

"You're a wizard, Harry."

"Huh?"

The stranger wheezed at his reference, as Solomon finally understood and erupted into laughter himself.

He stopped himself to respond seriously:

"..A wizard?"

"Don't you feel it ," the stranger put their hand over Solomon's heart, making his heart pound a bit harder, which surprised him, "...,Mister Krabs?"

"Huh- What?-"

After a perplexed pause they looked at each other and wheezed and cackled in the cursed manner your friends laugh when someone tells a ridiculous, dumb joke.

As they sat there, next to a river enveloped by the light of street lamps in a park, their laughter erupted through the silent night. Nothing but very faint music could be heard in the distance. Solomon didn't even know why he was laughing so hard. It was a stupid reference. And this stranger was clearly out of it.

There was something about him... Solomon just couldn't put his finger to it.

"S-so haha you're a man of culture as well~", Solomon calmed down, "What's your name?"

" Of course~ (y/N)." The stranger responded smiling, wiping away a tear. "Yours?"

"Solomon.", he answered reciprocating the smile.

"Solomon the wise?"

"Yes." He shot him a knowing glance. "So you do know me~"

"Oh yes~" (y/N)'s fingers slid over Solomon's coat. "You dress like a wizard, you look like a wizard aaaaand your named after King Solomon the wise. Great literature surrounds you: like Ars Goëtia and the lesser keys of, well, you", their gaze turned to look into the sorcerer's grey eyes.

With that, Solomon understood.

This person didn't know him . He knew of his tales, the legends, basically fairy tales.

He was like most humans... Unaware of the magical world he lived in. The realisation stung a bit, but the sorcerer decided to play along anyways as he felt himself sobering up.

"Well, I can't disappoint a fan like yourself now, can I?" Solomon smirked.

"Ohh~ So are you going to show me any tricks?" (y/N) laughed, standing up challengingly. "Come at me with your best shot, wizard boy~"

Solomon didn't know why, but he felt the urge to impress the young man.

"Hmm", he stood up, although a bit wobbly. "Alright. But I'll need an assistant~"

"Oh my oh myyy" (y/N) excitedly clapped their hands together. "I'll sacrifice myself for the greater good then."

Solomon chuckled, shooting him a provocative glance through his lashes at which he thought he saw (y/N) blushing.

"So, (y/N), are you ready?"

"I'm was born ready"

Solomon offered him his hand. "Take my hand, my cute assistant~"

"Oh my, and he has a way with words", (y/N) overdramatically took his hand, "The ladies will die if you do that, you know?"

"Oh will they now?", Solomon pulled him towards himself, "What effect do you think Hecate's power will have on you?"

"I like your funny words, magic man", (y/N) smirked playfully. "Tell me more~"

Solomon scoffed. This guy is a walking reference book.

"Have you ever danced with a sorcerer in the pale moonlight?", he asked, putting another hand on (y/N)'s waist, said man's breath hitching.

"W-well, I'm pretty sure the proverb goes different, Solomon", he put a hand on his counterpart's shoulder as he let Solomon take the lead, "I thought you were going to show me a trick though~"

"Patience is a virtue", he simply said teasingly.

"-and a pain", (y/N) retorted, while taking the first step back.

"So you know how to waltz?", Solomon began to lead.

"School taught me many things", he imitated a rough old man voice, "You youngsters would never understand"

Solomon tried to contain his need to laugh.

"Aha~ Funny, enlighten me?"

"Well, I don't know what they teach in wizard boy-school", they turned, " But back in my day, they tried to teach me calculus"

Solomon quirked a brow. "Tried?" Then he spun (y/N) around.

"Well, I was busy drawing into my notes", his cold hand slipped to Solomon's neck, making the sorcerer tense up.

"And what kind of Mona Lisa-worth drawings were you working on? I bet only of the highest quality~", sarcasm dripped from his voice as he shot (y/N) a teasing smile.

"Oh you can't even imagine~", (y/N) rolled his eyes in an exaggerated manner before shooting him a deadpan look, "Penises mostly"

A laugh escaped Solomon. "How refined"

"I am nothing but refined, sir~"

Solomon spun him around again, matching no pace in particular, as he pulled him closer to his chest this time. A small gasp left (y/N)'s mouth.

"H-hey now, be careful there. Or do you want me to fall?"

Solomon's lips pursed up in amusement, but quickly froze as he looked into the man's face.

(y/N)'s expression was contorted in utter joy, like he couldn't contain their grin. He looked stupidly adorable...

Solomon felt his heart clench at the sight. But he quickly snapped out of it as he shot (y/N) another charming smile.

"So, about 'the ladies dying' at my charm.."

"You're still on about that?" (y/N) chuckled amused, "Give it a rest wizard boy. We get it, you're handsome-"

"What about you?" his cheeks burned as he felt himself getting... Nervous? That's new.

Solomon hoped the darkness wouldn't give him away, "How do you feel about my 'charm'?"

For a second everything stood still and they both came to a stop. Their eyes locked and silence engulfed them. Tension began to claw at both man's braveness, as realisation struck them. This encounter had progressively turned into something more. Not some random thing.

It felt like..

(y/N) averted his gaze, face flushing a bright red as he chuckled nervously. "It... It takes a bit more for me to die, Sol.."

Fate.

"Is that so?", Solomon's fingers interlaced with his as he slowly inched closer.

"I mean.. you could find out..." (y/N)'s eyes slowly closed when-

Strings of colourful magic sparked around them.

"Huh?!" His eyes shot wide open, grip tightening on Solomon's hands, "What-"

(y/N) looked around stunned and extremely surprised.

"So? How was that for a 'magic trick'?"

(y/N)'s gaze returned to face him. "Y-you.. How?"

The sorcerer just hummed. "Who knows?"

"This... Must be a dream then..", he sighed disappointed, a tinge of sadness in his voice, "That's a bummer.. I really like you."

Now it was Solomon's turn to blush.

"I- I understand the confusion, but- mph?!"

With that his lips pressed onto Solomon's.

The sorcerer froze, while (y/N)'s mouth opened a little, slipping his tongue through Solomon's mouth. He tasted like sweet liquor, further entrancing the sorcerer in a passionate kiss.

Solomon got over his shock quickly as his hands found the other's waist, pulling him towards himself. When (y/N) sighed into the kiss, hands burying into his white locks, excitement shot through his spine.

Solomon pressed him against a nearby tree. He grew hot as (y/N)'s soft, wet lips brushed against his, the passion growing with each passing second.

"Mnh hah", (y/N) parted for a second, a string of saliva connecting them, lips barely brushing against his, "This.. feels too real though.."

"Because it is- ", Solomon panted against his mouth, connecting their lips again with more of his own vigor this time. His tongue eagerly brushing over the other's.

God, what was he doing?

What was he doing??

But fuck it felt so good.

He couldn't resist the desire to touch (y/N) more and more. He wanted him closer and it showed.

As if on cue, (y/N)'s hand slid over Solomon's pants, suddenly palming his half hard erection and making him moan into the other's mouth longingly.

"Mnn- (y/N) wait.."

"Mnh? Oh sorry-!", he stopped abruptly.

"N-no I mean... Let's.. let's go to my place-"

"Oh~" (y/N) smiled and kissed him again, teeth pulling at his bottom lip as he parted panting.

"Alright then. Show me the way, wizard-boy~"

[vanmccannonlyfans]

Cocoon

part ii.

But that was all the Before. You were now in the After.

The crepitating silence of time resonated in the streets like 200 year old floorboards under heavy boots. All of the joy you once felt evaporated; your memories floating around like specters, tokens of a life now past. Some days it felt like a hallucination, your life now so foreign it was as if you were watching it from the outside, hovering above yourself with the rest of your happy memories sulking around town like wraiths. Haunting yourself. It seemed as though everything you once knew had evacuated; disappeared without a trace. What remained wandered around like a lost dog, homeless and hopeless. When you got the overwhelming feeling that this was just a dream, and you would wake up next to Van, you flicked the inside of your wrist to bring you back to reality. This was real. This was happening. You were here. Van was not.

Not even a year ago you were chasing each other about, skipping over broken glass and laughing at everything.

Days passed the way the trees shed their leaves in autumn: slowly, then suddenly. You started to get out of bed more; even getting a job doing freelance copywriting and editing online. It took your mind out of the guest house, out of Llandudno, and gave you something tangible to do while putting money in your pocket that would all eventually go to the baby. You started shopping for baby stuff at thrift stores and online exchange groups, still avoiding social media for any other reason. You dressed modestly and kept your head low. You shopped off peak times to avoid running in to anyone you knew. Sometimes you felt like people were watching you, but you avoided eye contact to prevent any awkward encounters and dressed in baggy clothes to avoid suspicion.

But when you were in private, you couldn’t help pull up your blouse and admire your swollen abdomen, and would often massage it for hours. It was something that was yours, something you made. No one could take this away from you.

Your body had rapidly expanded; ripe with the promise of new life. You thought you would hate pregnancy and in some ways you did, but you had never felt so powerful and beautiful. How strange and wonderful it was to be able to create life. It felt like you held the keys to the universe between your thighs. Men had to construct power out of arcane figments and through oppressing others; women were born with it, naturally.

Motherhood was never something you thought much about outside of eventually having children with Van someday. It wasn’t something you were desperate for or avoiding; just a thing that would happen in life like death and taxes. You liked kids well enough, but the idea of being a mum the way some people elevated the title didn’t appeal to you. You had always pitied the girls who got pregnant right away, pushing their babies in prams around town as if it were an expensive car. They were so simple and happy, having nothing in life but purpose. Their baby’s fathers were deadbeats or on and off again, some leftover boyfriend from high school, some anonymous and truant.

Having a child with someone you loved seemed natural. Single motherhood had never seemed like a desirable option, you never imagined yourself wanting a child so badly you were willing to do it alone. But here you were, pregnant and unwed.

What changed, you weren’t sure. You and Van had never talked about what would happen if you unexpectedly fell pregnant. He was very confident in his purpose to be a father, talking about having children as if it was coming up on the calendar like Christmas. However, he never reconciled how children would factor into his career, especially his desire to be a career band. If he was constantly touring, how often would he be able to see them? Surely he wouldn’t expect them to go on tour with him, depriving them of a normal childhood. Then again, having a rockstar as a father voids your life from any semblance of normalcy. Everything would be a compromise or a sacrifice.

It was always you and your children who would have to take the fall. You couldn’t build a life or career of your own if you were following him around everywhere. Then when you fell pregnant, having to hang back and raise babies by yourself while your love was off touring. Van would get to have a career and a dutiful partner to carry and raise his children, even if he didn’t get to see them as much as he liked. No sacrifices.

You had always thought in some part of your mind you would terminate if you found yourself where you were now. Especially in high school, before you had left to follow him, and you could have finished school and gone to uni. You’d heard of other girls having terminations, you surely wouldn’t be the first or the last. Van would have only been a short part of your life, surely you would go on to accomplish bigger things and have greater loves. When you looked back, your relationship with Van would be a series of blurs, as if it never occurred. A dream long past.

But that was all the Before. You were now in the After. Van had evenly divided your life into Before and After when he savagely dumped you. Before, you were Van’s. After, you were not. You had never considered After as a real possibility, too drunk in love to weigh the viable consequences of your present decision making. If Van were to leave you, you would have nothing, but the kind of nothing you could mold like clay into a makeshift home. Perhaps not a castle, but a viable shelter one could habit. You could finish school, go to uni, find a job, and never return.

But Van did not merely leave you. Van left you with a child. With nothing in your wallet but a ticket home. Even though he had broken up with you, it was still a child born out of love. You couldn’t force yourself to hate him. Instead, when you thought of him, your heart just sank, leaving in its wake a grief so raw it felt primal. Even though Van had shattered your heart, you still loved him. A child made from love is still born of love, no matter what happens between those two events. Terminating the child of the man you loved felt wrong, despite how thoroughly he discarded you. Especially when you had nothing else to show for it. By having this child, you were giving your love new life.

-

The first time you and Van made love was in his bedroom. He had played you some new songs he had written, and you gushed over his talent like you always did. He could play you new songs every day and it would thrill you just as much as it had the day before. This, of course, led to making out. To your hands down the front of each other’s pants, to pulling off your clothes like they were on fire. Being naked together was still a novelty, fresh and exciting as the day you kissed at that party. The feeling of bare skin pressed together made your whole body tingle, echoing the hunger you felt in your most sacred spaces. You wrapped your legs around his back to maximize the area your skin was in contact. Your bodies rocked together and the earth stood still, as if you were the first couple to discover how to become a part of each other.

You thought your world would change upon your sexual debut, that you would gain some worldly knowledge or unleash a host of curses like pandora’s box. But you largely felt the same. There was no rapture. You had experienced something new, but it hadn’t changed anything for you. You remained yourself. The world spun madly on.

-

Van stopped inhabiting your mind as he once had. Every once and a while you would see something that reminded you of him, like jaffa cakes in the store or Austin Powers playing on TV. Or you would hear someone mention the band, which wasn’t often when you hardly spoke to anyone outside of your family. It didn’t hurt any less when you were reminded of him, but the pain didn’t visit quite so often. The band released a new album, which you only learned about by a poster near the bus stop. You didn’t listen to it.

-

When it came time to pick a name, you weren’t sure what you wanted. For so long, it had just been the baby, nameless but present. Giving it a name was making it real. It would be here soon, earthside. No longer just a concept growing inside of you. Out of your body, and into your arms. Yours.

-

Your brother would never admit it, but he was secretly ecstatic to be an uncle. He built furniture for the nursery and identified every nook and cranny of the guest house that would need to be baby-proofed. Your parents warmed to the idea of being grandparents, checking up on you daily; making sure you ate and took prenatal vitamins. Your mother started bringing home baby clothes and asking to accompany you to your appointments. But the appointments felt too private, you were doing this alone and wanted to meet your baby alone for the first time. You didn’t even want anyone in the delivery room with you. Except Van. You used to think nothing could be more pathetic than having to be alone in the delivery room, but you were excited to have your child all to yourself for their first moments of life.

The OB/GYN who helped you make a birth plan gave you a quizzical look when you said you would be alone in the delivery room. Surely she had noticed the lack of ring on your finger and the fact that you always arrived to appointments alone. Very rarely did the judgement of others truly bother you, but it hurt to be reminded that you were an unwanted fool, hungover on love. That this all could have been avoided had you terminated. But who is scorning all the men who knock women up and leave them to give birth alone? Why is there shame in being the one that stayed?

-

Soon you were so pregnant you could hardly hide it, and had to hide yourself in order to avoid the attention. You asked your family to pick up groceries for you, afraid of being recognized. The last thing you needed was more external stress when you were due any day now.

However, it was late one night and no one in your family was nearby, and you were desperately craving some yoghurt. You checked the clock anxiously, figuring no one would be at Tesco on a Friday night. Everyone but you would be at the pub or at home with loved ones. You put on your baggiest outfit just in case, but even that couldn’t disguise that you were with child.

The shops were a brief walk away, and the cover of night was suitable camouflage. You thought about how fucking pathetic you looked, a pregnant girl trying to hide it while walking alone in the dark on a Friday. The night sky was the same shade as when Van had walked you home from that party, inky and rich. Only now the breeze felt that much more bitter.

-

Tesco was predictably empty, and you exhaled a sigh of relief at the lack of customers. Being out in public gave you the same adrenaline rush as when you would sneak out through your window at night to meet Van, except this time the stakes were much higher. The only sound was the low thrum of the freezers and fluorescent lights. You shuffled to the dairy case at the back of the store, trying to make as little noise as possible, studying the brown and beige pattern of the floor tiles. Your abdomen was now too large for you to zip up your coat over it, so you held it together with your spare hand, a basket in the other.

It seemed that every section in the store had been rearranged since your previous visit, and you felt disoriented wandering around the aisles. The yoghurt section seemed to have doubled since the last time you were there. There were all sorts of flavors and various milk bases, like goat and coconut. You absentmindedly threw several in your basket, unsure of what you wanted now and later.

Suddenly, you felt the unmistakable feeling of eyes glazing over you, a petite form hovering in your peripheral. You could tell from the intensity this wasn’t a stranger--you were being recognized. That realization alone spawned sheer panic, your heart rate quickening. That panic amplified when you looked down, realizing that you had let go of the edges of your coat to stock your basket, your bump on full display.

You turned to the opposite side of the body, hoping to avoid an awkward confrontation. In the corner hung a convex security mirror. In it’s distorted reflection, you recognized the body that had been watching you.

It was Mary McCann.

-

You practically sprinted towards the self checkout, hands fumbling with every scan. You walked faster on the way home than you ever had in your non-pregnant life. By the time you made it in the guest house, you were out of breath and exhausted. Your face was wet--you hadn’t realized you’d been crying. You threw the yoghurt in the fridge, still in the plastic Tesco bag.

Leaning against the wall, you struggled to catch your breath. Fuck. On a night you didn’t think anyone would be out except losers like yourself. The cruel irony of it all.

Anyone adjacent to Van, including Van himself, was exactly who you wanted to avoid. You had no idea what he had told his parents about you. What if they thought you had broken up with him and had gotten pregnant by someone else? Surely they didn’t still think you were together.

Seeing Mary also meant confronting another painful reality for your child: that their life would be half. They would have half the parents, half the family, half the resources, half the attention. Half of the visitors, half of the birthday cards, half of the gifts on Christmas. Half of the support. Half of the love.

This realization turned your stomach, grief bubbling up through your esophagus in dry heaves and sobs. How could you be so fucking selfish? The child was yours, but at what cost to them? At least if you had terminated, you could have eventually moved on and pretended it had never happened. Now you had an eternal scarlet letter to show for it because you were a glutton for punishment.

You knew Mary and Bernie would adore any child of Van’s, whether he was with their mother or not. But the shame held onto you like an anchor; dragging you away from others. I mean, how do you tell someone you’re carrying their grandchild but their own child wants nothing to do with them? At the same time, how could you keep them from their own blood? It would be less painful if they had rejected you the way their son had. Who knows, maybe they would take his side. It wasn’t worth the potential hurt and embarrassment if they did. If Van didn’t believe in the existence of his own child, then it was best not to disturb his reality.

-

It was a crisp weekday morning when your water broke. Your brother drove you to the hospital, vowing to stay in the waiting room as long as it took so you wouldn’t be entirely alone. After several of the most transformative hours of your life, you felt the most immense, profound relief as you heard her cry for the first time. Her. Your baby girl.

Your brother wept when he got to hold her for the first time. Your whole family cried, in fact. You could hardly give her up, wanting to do skin to skin for hours while she slept in your arms. You were mesmerized, she was so delicate and fragile and you made her yourself. You had never known a love this natural and profound. The way you loved her father was different, he was someone you had found. But she was something you made, something more than yourself.

-

Single motherhood with a newborn was hard. There was no one to lean on for midnight feedings, helping with laundry, taking turns with diapers. Of course you enjoyed having her to yourself, and your family helped out as much as they could. But the exhaustion was omnipresent, as you rarely slept for more than two hours at a time on top of doing all the housework and caretaking yourself.

You tried to work whenever you could get someone to watch her or when she would go down for a nap, which happened out of the blue on one overcast afternoon. She had been fussing all morning but had refusing every feeding and pacifier, finally wearing herself out in the early afternoon so you could get some work done.

After just having settled into your desk with a warm mug of coffee, you heard a knock at the door. You didn’t know anyone to knock--your family simply barged right in, and the guest house was at the back of the property so it was out of the way of deliveries and salesmen. Throwing a sweater on over your nightgown, you softly stepped to the door, careful not to make too much noise and wake up your baby.

Nothing could have prepared you for what you saw on the other side of the door. You were sure it was a ghost--no way this could be real. The apparition was a long, thin body outfitted with black jeans and a well cut jacket; sat under a head of piecey blonde hair framing once-sharp cheekbones that had filled out with age. Most haunting of all were the piercing blue eyes--eyes you would recognize in a thousand lifetimes over.  Your vision began to shift as if you were tripping, the air evaporated from your lungs as if you were underwater. The figure lifted it’s head as if to speak, but no sound was made.

Van was home.

-

tagging: @sweetperfume

srs I can’t believe someone asked me to tag them 😭thank you bb 💕

[pasteljeon]

don’t need ur love (m)

❥ pairing: ot7/reader

❥ warnings: some vague descriptions of sex, just really angsty sorry :(

❥ based on this prompt: bts being in a relationship with y/n but then slowly all of them fell out of love with her and with another girl. from @/armyforlifelove :”)

❥ summary: four lessons on love.

❥ notes: exams are finally over so i’m super excited to share my upcoming projects soon <3 i hope you enjoy this little ficlet and lmk what you think!

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One. Love is fickle.

There is not one boy, there are seven.

“Jimin, I’m not angry. I don’t blame you. You don’t feel the same for me anymore. I accept that. I can’t do anything about it, and I’m not going to sink down and beg you to love me. I know my own worth. I am worth loving, I am worth being cherished and treasured.” You give his cheek one last fond pat, smiling lopsidedly as you pick up the handle of your suitcase.

His lips are downturned, eyebrows pinched and body stiff.

They watch with mirroring expressions of guilt and sorrow as you give the place a final, lingering sweep. But there is also relief and gratitude. You have never been the petty type, never been vindictive. You have always been the mature one, the fun one, the level-headed one.

You say, “Thank you for the memories. I’ll see you around.”

Jimin opens his mouth, like he’s ready to apologize again, but all that comes out is an uncertain, “You too.”

The penthouse is the same as always, clothes scattered on couches and loveseats and hung over the dining table chairs. Yeontan’s toys lying in a pile next to his little bed. Your mug, your clothes, your books and papers, they’re all gone. It’s like you were never here.

The door shuts quietly.

.

.

.

You fall in love in summer.

They pluck you from the crowd, these gorgeous boys, and they carve a space in your heart and fill it with them, until your chest feels so full and warm.

You’re happy for a long time. Winters pass. Spring blooms, so lovely and sweet and it makes your nose itch. They’re soft and kind and their touch is reverent, sometimes bold and daring and always loving.

Then it stops.

He’s distant, shifty-eyed and avoids you like the plague. Slowly, they all become just as detached. And you realize.

Time’s up.

He cries and cries and begs for forgiveness, he buries his face in your stomach and his hands are shaky and cold. He’s sorry, he sobs. He’s sorry he fell in love with someone else.

Yeah, you think. You’re sorry too, because you could have saved yourself from it if you’d only looked hard enough.

Taehyung is the only one that stays with you that night. You send Jimin away, too anguished and defeated to comfort him.

He’s the last one, the one whose heart still flutters when he talks to you, touches you. But you know. You know that eventually, he will leave too.

He kisses your tears away and he holds you close, murmuring sweet nothings until you finally fall into fitful sleep, and his stomach hurts, hurts so much with the way you’re curled into him, so small and fragile, clutching at his shirt as your eyes flicker with whatever dream you’re having.

And he swears he’ll never let you go, never betray you.

.

.

.

“It didn’t break me. How could it? I loved them so much, yes, but this isn’t the end. It’s not the be all end all. It can’t be. I believe that there’s more out there.” You stare into the dark contents of your drink, your reflection rippling across the surface as you trace the handle absently.

The person across from you watches you with a startlingly intense gaze, fingers crossed as they lean in, arms braced on the table.

“It was like … there was a bullet to my heart and a hole in my chest, and sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night drowning in anguish and tears burning in my eyes and cheeks wet. Sometimes it’s a struggle to breathe when I think of them, when I do something that reminds me so vividly of them.”

.

.

.

Two. Love is painful.

There were seven boys, now there is only one.

You press your forehead against his. Your voice is soft, your breath is warm and your words are sweet. He thinks he’s dying. Your ache is palpable, your grief burns, lighting a dull pain travels, throbbing and expanding, at the base of his spine.

“It’s weird because it’s not like you wake up one day with this sudden revelation that you’ve fallen out of love. It happens slowly, over a period of time, when the things you did before and the things you liked about your partner no longer holds the same charm. Suddenly, the small things that had made you fall so hard for them are annoying. Their laugh is too loud, too ugly. They leave their utensils in the sink, they forget to separate the lights with the darks They look … ordinary. Just like everyone else you pass on the street. Suddenly, they’re just … somebody. Just not somebody to you.”

“It’s okay, Taehyung. You loved me, and that was enough.”

He sobs out a garble that sounds like your name. He puts a hand over his face, shame and guilt overwhelming him like a tide that threatens to choke the life out of him completely.

You pry them away gently, and you kiss him. It’s wet and uncoordinated, lips slick and salty with your mingled tears.

You stumble into the bedroom, and he presses you against the mattress, hands heavy and hot as he makes love to you one last time. He pours everything into it, everything you’ve been through together, everything he feels for you. Slowly, slowly, because he’s saying goodbye. For real this time, because he can never look back without this weight of failure and guilt.

I’m sorry, I’m sorry, he chants, like a broken record, he sears the movement of his lips into your skin and you bear the scar even as you close the chapter for good.

.

.

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Three. Love changes you.

“But then it starts to fade. The hurt, it lessens with every day that passes. The tightness in your chest loosens and the world starts to regain some of its colour, your body begins to stomach more, your taste buds remind you that food can taste brilliant.”

You find retain old habits and find new hobbies. You reconnect with old friends, make new ones. You go out for dinner, drinks, dessert, the movies, to their houses for barbeque, the skating rink, rollerblading, the occasional club. Not all at once, never in quick succession, but you go when called, go when you ask.

You are reminded that you still have a life outside of the all-consuming romance.

You learn how to draw the perfect wing, you shop, you redecorate, you work, and at the end of the year, you take a two-week vacation to travel somewhere new. You take pictures, write stories, finish your thesis and you graduate.

You enjoy your life.

You still see them, on billboards, TV shows, concerts, YouTube videos, articles, your friends buzz with news about them, at first hesitantly and apologetically, now eagerly and excitedly.

You are proud of them, of where they’ve come, where they are, who they are and what they’ve accomplished. They are an inspiration, legends, and you are grateful to have shared a part of your life with them, to have been born in the same era as them, because this universe makes no mistakes.

And you move on.

You are living.

.

.

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Four. Love is worth it.

It is worth every tear, the anger and sorrow, the loss and the sacrifice.

And sometimes, the world works in mysterious ways.

Sometimes, you go full circle, only to end up where you should have been from the very beginning.

“Is it too late, have we been through too much, have I lost you? Is it unfair for me to ask if we could start again? The moment you left, I knew … I knew I’d given up something good. Something beautiful and I wasn’t ready to commit, couldn’t see all that I had in front of me. I was foolish, I was … a coward.” He reaches out to touch your hand gingerly, barely a graze, gauging your expression. You don’t move, and he curls his fingers over your palm.

“I thought … I thought that it was natural for me to follow, I thought I felt something for her, but I was wrong, I was so wrong. God, you have no idea how much I hated myself for hurting you like that. I … I love you, I have loved you all this time, and I miss you. I miss your smile, your laugh, the way you hold me, the way you touch me, the way you can comfort me with just your presence. I miss the way you loved me. I missed … you. I miss the colour of your soul.”

“So, I was wondering. If it isn’t too late, if we haven’t been through too much, if I haven’t lost all of you yet, would it be fair to ask you to start over again with me?” His warmth is familiar, his eyes are a burnished gold and the truth is, you are strangers. So much time has passed, he looks a ghost from the past, he talks like him, walks like him, still hates bitter things like him, but he’s not him anymore. You know this because his expression is wiser, he has looked in the mirror and found himself and he is ready to try again. To do better, to dare to become someone better.

But is it too late? Are you ready for the risk of your heart being broken all over again?

Isn’t life a game of risk and reward?

You squeeze his hand gently. “I would like that.”

Taehyung beams. His smile is still boxy, his jaw line sharper, silky hair permed, and it flops over his forehead. He looks older, is older. He pushes the black locks back and strokes his thumb over your knuckles. He’s more comfortable in his own skin, you think his chest is wider, shoulders broader.

“Can I buy you a coffee?”

[filamero]

A Son’s Shame

Word Count: 3094

Summary: 

One of the worst feelings in the world is to disappoint the ones you hold dear. Painful, excruciating, and agonizing as long as they feel too embarrassed to even claim you as one of their own.

Shame is a burden that is borne to those who cause great destruction and realize it far too late.

(In which Dream is alone with his thoughts in prison, and he can't help but think about the women he learned to call his mothers.)

[ ao3 link!: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28994955 ]

(fic below the cut!)

One of the worst feelings in the world is to disappoint the ones you hold dear. To watch their hope in you fade away until it’s gone, to be left behind in the dust as they continued on with their lives, to be cast aside when there were promises of forever. It hurts in indescribable ways, cuts deeper than the sharpest of blades, weighs heavier than the weight of the heavens that laid on Atlas’ shoulders. Painful, excruciating, and agonizing as long as they feel too embarrassed to even claim you as one of their own.

Shame is a burden that is borne to those who cause great destruction and realize it far too late.

Dream remembers what life was like alongside Puffy and Niki.

He doesn’t remember his birth parents. What their names were, what they looked like, what they did for a living, how they died—or if they even died at all, and left him behind because caring for an infant while poor proved to be far too difficult for them to manage. In his earliest memories, he was on his own, out on the streets of the marketplace and calling an old, thrown-out supply crate his home. There might’ve been people that taught him how to live as a ‘street-rat’—named lovingly so by the villagers who saw people like him as a bother instead of a cause for charity—but at the end of the day, the only person who truly cared about his own well-being was himself.

Until Puffy and Niki entered his life.

The night of the storm, when Puffy carried him home and Niki cared for him, was the first night he felt loved by someone else. He never realized just how hungry he was until Niki set a bowl of soup in front of him at the dining table, a bigger serving than what he ate for the past week combined. Or maybe even the whole month. His big, surprised green eyes met her kind, generous blue ones, taking the seat next to him and scooping up a spoonful for him. “It’s really hot,” she chuckled, making a show of blowing on it to cool it down before holding it up to his lips. “It’s good, I promise.”

Dream tentatively took a bite, heeding Niki’s warning and trying to avoid scalding his tongue. He would’ve been lying if he said that it wasn’t the most delicious thing he had ever tried up until that moment. His thoughts must’ve been obvious with the way Puffy and Niki laughed gently at him, Niki already scooping up and blowing on another spoonful for him to eat. The warmth blooming in his chest from the care slowly began to match the heat radiating off of the soup, and for the first time in his life, he felt completely safe. Comfortable, relaxed, at ease—even with the storm raging outside.

Puffy had let him sleep in her bed that night, wrapping her arm carefully around him as if she were shielding him from anything that could put him in harm’s way. The thunder boomed loudly that night, letting the world know that whatever otherworldly being ruled it was angry, its wrath coming down as the storm rampaged on. Yet he didn’t fear for himself once, simply cuddling up closer to the kind woman who he had been following around for God-knows-how-long, lulled to sleep by a gentle song that she seemed to know by heart.

Dream learned what it was like to be a son.

Puffy and Niki taught him everything that he needed to know—from English to math, history to science, and everything that they knew of in between. He grew to be sharp-witted and intelligent, his mind being his greatest weapon. Trades would come easy whenever he accompanied Puffy to the marketplace—negotiating the best deals, he found out, usually involved being charismatic and, though it felt a little like scamming, a spoonful of outsmarting the seller. Baking became a second habit, knowing his way around the kitchen well and helping Niki out whenever he could, especially on days where business boomed like during festivals or holiday nights.

But more importantly, they shaped him into what they knew. They encouraged being loving and compassionate, empathetic and sincere, reliable and trustworthy—someone who would make the world a better place rather than tarnish it any more than it already had been. “You have a very special name, you know?” Puffy said to him one day, as she settled on the soft plush of the loveseat while he sat on the floor in front of her, head tilted back to rest on her lap and look up at her. “Dream. It’s not really a common one,” she continued. “I think your parents were smart for giving you a name like that one.”

Dream tilted his head to the side, curiosity swimming in his bright, forest-colored eyes. “Why?”

Puffy snorted softly. “Look at you, already asking me questions. You’re growing up too fast, slow down,” she hummed, carefully threading her fingers through his soft, growing, dirty-blond locks with a smile. “Do you know what a dream is?”

“Those little movies that play in your head while you’re sleeping, right?” he responded, reaching up and tapping the side of his head for extra emphasis. “I never remember what mine are like.”

“Not that kind of dream! Silly duck,” Puffy grinned, a laugh falling from her lips and easing his nerves, just as they always did. “I meant the kind of dream that’s like...something you want to do. In the future.”

Dream paused for a moment, processing the information. “Like eating dinner? Is that a dream?”

“Maybe for some,” she responded, looking down at him. “But think bigger. It’s—oh! It’s like a goal. A hope. Something really, really big that you really, really want to see happen or do.”

He nodded his head slowly, though if the slight furrow in his brow said anything, it would say something about the connection it had to his name.

Puffy leaned down, looping her arms underneath his arms and hoisting him up onto her lap. She gave him a smile, one of those motherly smiles that made a certain warmth bloom in his chest and spread to the tips of his fingers and toes. “I think you’re our dream, me and Niki,” she stated softly, fixing some stray strands of hair on his face. “We’ve had plenty of dreams, you know. I wanted to sail the sea—” she gestured to herself, “—and I did that. Niki wanted to start a bakery and look at her business now. We wanted to have a happy life, and I don’t think we could ask for a better one than right now.”

Dream cracked a small smile. “Am I part of the ‘happy life’ dream?”

Puffy clicked her tongue. “You’re more.” She tugged him close into a hug, raising her free arm into the air as if painting a picture for him. “I don’t really know how to say it, but—me and Niki love you a lot. You...You’re something new every day, and I mean it.”

He stuck his tongue out at her. “You’re getting sappy.”

She laughed loudly, playfully flicking his forehead. “It’s true! I think I’m getting close to my woman-thing of the month,” she joked, pinching his cheek. “But I woke up this morning, saw you helping Niki make breakfast, and—I don’t know—I realized that I want you to go far. Wait, no—I realized that I know you’ll go far. You’re gonna blow me away, you’re gonna blow Niki away, you’re gonna blow everyone you ever meet away. Your name is Dream because you’re gonna be big someday, I just know it!”

He fell silent for a few moments, glancing down at his hands. Could he really be what Puffy was saying? He knew that she and Niki would love him no matter where he ended up—but the way Puffy talked about him just then...He wanted to be that too. He wanted to be his own dream. “You really think so?” he asked, looking back up at her.

“Haven’t you been listening? I know so!” she grinned, pulling him impossibly close into a hug. “You’re gonna be great, Dream, I know you are. Just promise not to forget us, alright?”

He laughed softly, the noise muffled by the way his cheek was pressing up against her shoulder. “I won’t ever,” he reassured, wriggling out of her embrace to look her in the eye, a determined spark igniting in the sea of green.

Puffy cooed, squishing Dream’s face up once more. “That’s my duckling,” she giggled, pressing a kiss to his forehead.

“I’ll be your dream,” he thought aloud, a smile on his face as he pictured the future. “I’ll be someone you can be proud of, Mom.”

“Oh, don’t say it like that,” Puffy chuckled, ruffling his hair. “I think I’ll always be proud of you.”

Dream grinned brightly, mind already made up. He was going to make her and Niki proud one day, he promised.

A tear rolls down Dream’s cheek, bringing him out of his thoughts. The obsidian wall is hard against his back, and the lava to his right emits just enough warmth to almost-mockingly caress his face. The laugh that bubbles up from his chest is bitter, rolling off of his tongue and leaving a sickeningly sour taste. Shaking hands come up to his face and wipe at his eyes, getting rid of the tears that threatened to fall. One was enough—though it felt like one was already too much. His eyes drift to the netherite rails keeping him in, reaching out and touching the warming metal.

It’s funny, how he’s surrounded by warm things, yet he still feels so cold. There’s a sinking feeling in his chest that refuses to leave, forever burned there the way the crater of L’manburg will no doubt be. The slow drip of lava is the only sound that reaches his ears, far away from daily life to hear any chatter that could be happening outside at that moment.

There’s something else though, an eerie voice in the back of his head—though he’s learned how to tune it out in the few days that he spent in this wretched prison.

It would be easy to blame his actions on the dreamon. To say that it’s influence increased in the time between when he first ‘befriended’ it to now. To say that it overtook him to do all the things he did, to commit all the crimes that he’s committed, and that he had no control over his body while it rampaged on.

But that wouldn’t be true.

Everything he did, he did on his own.

He knows that he wasn’t always like this. Back when he first claimed the land as his—and George’s and Sapnap’s—he had good intentions. When he opposed L’manburg during their first war of independence, because their whole country stemmed from a drug cartel. When he ‘advocated’ for Schlatt in the elections, because he didn’t really do anything wrong—all he did was join an election that was open to the residents of his server. When he smiled, and laughed, and played, and had friends.

Then it changed. He had ignored the dreamon’s influence at first—rarely letting it slip. But somewhere along the lines, he became in tune with it, using it to amplify his own skills: his combat, his intelligence, his charisma. It became a part of his daily life, working in tandem with it to maintain the order. He accepted it.

He wishes he didn’t.

Somewhere along the lines, in between his acceptance of the otherworldly being that he allowed to reside in his mind and body, the word ‘order’ blurred into ‘power.’ No longer did he wish to keep things in check for everyone to be happy; he wanted to be at the top and stay at the top. His days were spent building up this pillar, this pedestal that he set himself upon, raising him high above everyone else. If anyone dared get close, he loaded his crossbow and shot them down, no matter who they were.

The word ‘friends’ turned into ‘attachments’ and then ‘nuisances.’ How could he be the only one on top when there were others tethered to his ankles, stunting his growth? And when he did manage to climb higher, the bonds tying them together only brought them up with him—the distance remained the same, and he would be back at square one. The dreamon didn’t even influence the decision to spray every one of his bonds with gasoline, tossing a match to each and every one, watching them burn away into nothing but ashes. There were storm clouds beneath where he stood, no doubt raining down a mighty wrath—but it never crossed his mind to dip below, hold his hand out to everyone, and pull them up to his level where they would be safe from the storm.

Bile rises up in his throat. He had come full circle.

He thinks of when he was younger, alone on the streets, surviving on stolen goods alone.

He thinks of when he first met Puffy, showing him compassion after having just met him.

He thinks of when he first went home to Niki, already treating him as one of her own within seconds.

He thinks of how they taught him almost everything he knows, shaping him into the witty yet compassionate leader he is—or, well, was.

When did that foundation come crumbling down?

The hole in his chest seems to expand at the thought of his mothers—could he even call them his mothers anymore? He supposes they were caught in the wreckage when he destroyed all his relationships, isolating himself because he wanted to be number one.

Did they miss him?

Did he miss them?

He pauses for a moment, tilting his head back and leaning it against the obsidian walls the way he had done with Puffy’s lap all those years ago.

Yeah.

He missed them.

He doesn’t think they miss him, though.

Because if he were his own parent, in their shoes, he wouldn’t want to claim himself as his own.

He’s been anything but a good person. It was easy to deny this, to say that ‘the ends justify the means’, to act like he would go back and fix all of his mistakes in due time, back when he wasn’t locked up. When he still had people by his side (that stood by his side willingly). But now, deep within Pandora’s Box, when he had nothing but his thoughts to keep him company, it was hard to deny what he’s done. He knows that his actions were unacceptable, irredeemable, inappropriate in every way imaginable. Framing others for his misdeeds, manipulating nearly everyone (especially those who weren’t in the right state of mind), pulling and tangling the strings until they were so knotted that there was hardly anything that he didn’t instigate.

Who in their right mind would claim him as their son?

Tears well up a little in Dream’s eyes once again, and he laughs. It’s even more bitter than the one from before, acidic and disgusting all the same. It wracks through his body, shaking the tears out of his eyes.

Why was it only now that he was regretting his actions?

Puffy and Niki come to mind once more, and Dream smiles to himself tightly.

Once, a long time ago, he was told that his name was special. That it shone with his potential. That one day, when he was older, he was going to take the world by storm and blow everyone away.

He supposes he’s done that. Just not in the way the person who told him that expected.

“I’ll be your dream,” he murmured to himself, tears trickling down his face in a steady stream that mimicked the lava blocking his only exit off. The memory replays in his head, carving the crater in his heart out to be even deeper, emptier. His throat seizes up, and it suddenly becomes harder to talk. “I’ll be someone you can be proud of, Mom.”

He knows he’s not someone that Puffy nor Niki can be proud of. Maybe he was before, but he’s far from it now.

He’s a disappointment.

He isn’t sure that he could ever look his mothers in the eye ever again. His eyes would probably be glued to the floor when they visited him—or if they wanted to visit him at all. He longs to hug them, to sink into their embrace, to cry out apology after apology, to rebuild their little cottage of memories in their hearts that he had so carelessly abandoned, left to be destroyed in the storm of consequences that he didn’t even bother to consider. It’s pathetic, he knows, how quickly he was crumbling underneath the weight of his actions now that he had to face them. How he had been so blind to the hole that he had dug for himself, all because he was too caught up in soaring higher and higher into the sky—to be number one, to be at the top, to be someone that the world would acknowledge, for his own satisfaction. How he had stomped out all the hope that the others had in him, falling further and further into the darkness that he had so willingly stepped into. How he had broken promises just as easily as he destroyed relationships.

He’s facing his actions head-on, and it burns so brightly that it’s scalding his skin, and all he can do is stand there and let it scorch, in the hope that it’ll scar over later on. No one is there to hold him close, to press cool cloths against his burns, to sing him a familiar song as he drifts off to sleep. It hurts, it hurts so bad to have nothing to do but think about just how disappointing of a person—of a son, that he was.

His shoulders sag against the wall, everything—his thoughts, his memories, his behavior and its consequences—weighing down heavily on his being. He wants nothing more than to sink into the ground and ease himself from the pain, but he knows that he can’t.

For shame is a burden that is borne to those who cause great destruction and realize it far too late.

[hopesbarnes]

Rosey Inn

Summary: Ten years ago you left your small town and small-town boyfriend believing you were destined for bigger and better things. But when your mom passes away and leaves the family Inn to you, you’re forced to face all you left behind.

Pairing: Roommate!Bucky x Reader

Warnings: Maybe two curse words, fluff, angst, loss of parent

Word Count: 6.5k 

A/N: This was written for @wxntersoldiers​ 6k AU Challenge, I had the prompt Roomates!AU. 

Also a huge thank you to @starbxcks​​​ for beta reading this. Love you to pieces. (PS spot the gilmore girl reference and i’ll love you forever)

This was not the plan. None of this was the plan. Your entire life had meticulously put together to reach one goal. And now? Now you’re sharing a house with a boy you haven’t seen in a decade, back in your home town, and owning an inn.

Talk about cliche.

The town of Rose Hill is quaint. One supermarket, one high school, everyone knows everyone’s name quaint. The people are kind and overly lax in security and come together for events. It sits near a beautiful lake and is known for its tourism. The kind of place people dream of living. The perfect American lifestyle. 

Just not your dream. Since you were little you wanted one thing. To be a big shot New York lawyer. The kind that people know will get them off for any crime, and anything. You were going to be the success story of Rose Hill, the one to get out. The one to make it.

And you did. Got accepted into an Ivy League, finished school, and joined a practice. Until you got the phone call, that your mom passed away and left the family business to you. There went all your plans, all your dreams, everything. You were right back where you started in Rose Hill. 

The Rosey Inn was a landmark, built long before your grandparents were even born. Passed down through generations of L/Ns. Each owned/managed the inn and raised their families in it. You spent your childhood hiding in the maids closet, tasting the chef’s recipes, tending to the front garden, and reorganizing the books in the front room. 

You didn’t play alone though, you had Bucky. Bucky Barnes was your best friend and eventual boyfriend. His mom was a maid for the inn, and the pair of you grew up together. He was your everything and first love. But when you left for New York you wanted a fresh start, one that didn’t include the boy who’s life aspirations were to own a hardware store. So you dumped him and left, without saying goodbye. 

Your past was but a distant memory. Until you were back and looking at the familiar inn. 

“Y/N! Oh, how I missed you!” you hear the voice of Wanda, your best friend say.

“What are you doing here!” you ask greeting the red-headed girl. She had moved here Junior year of high school and you became fast friends. She was the only one you had contact with after leaving.

“Well, I took over as nighttime manager. And when I heard about your mom I decided to fill in on daytime until you could move back. I’m so sorry about her Y/N,” she says with sincerity in her voice. 

“She’s been sick for a while, I’m just happy she’s out of pain now,” you say and pull her into a hug.

“I’ll let you settle in, then tomorrow we can go over the inn and what needs to happen.” 

“Thank you Wanda for everything,” you say and head to the house.

The inn set back from the road, with plenty of space in front for parking and picnic areas. Behind it sat a large outdoor eating area, and a gazebo. But if you take the trail to the left, it leads to your childhood home. A three-bedroom house, with two floors and far enough to not be part of the inn, but close enough you could be there in case of an emergency. 

You expected the place to be overgrown and in need of a cleaning, but it looked as new as the day it was built. And a car was out front.

When you get closer to the house the door opens and you swear you jump ten feet into the air, only to hear the voice of the one person you hoped to avoid.

“Been a while sugar,” he says smiling. 

James Buchanan Barnes looks as good as he did ten years ago when you abandoned him. No scratch that, he looked better. The years did him good, his jaw was more chiseled and light scruff covered his face. His arm filled out and he wore a button-down. He looked refined, older but damn good looking.

“Sure has handy boy,” you smile back. “What are you doing in my home.”

“Must have your lines crossed, I live here now,” he says mischief across his face and eyebrow raised.

“In my childhood home?” you ask perplexed.

“Your momma was having a tough time the past few years and needed some help. She said I could live here if I helped her out. And when she got sick she put the house in my name too, saying you would need just as much, if not more, help when you got back.”

“So we’re roommates?” you ask hoping this was all a joke. 

“Sure are,” he smiles, “let me help you with your bag.”

“I have movers coming in a few days with the rest of my things, just brought enough until then.”

You walk into the home and it’s not the dusty and doily place you remember it. The furniture is all-new, and the decor is modern. The living room has a grey fabric couch with navy throw pillows and a coffee table with a cookbook and tray on it. There’s a sleek floor lamp next to it and a flat-screen tv across atop a tv stand with movies neatly packed inside. A soft rug is on the floor with a diamond pattern on it. The entire room looks like a page from a catalog and if your suspicions are right the rest of the house is as follows.

“I took the guest bedroom when I moved in, so your old bedroom is still yours,” he says and you nod heading up the stairs following him to your childhood bedroom. When he opens the door you see it’s the one room that hasn’t changed. It still looks as it did when you were 18 years old and leaving to be on your own. 

“I’m gonna have to update this room!” you say pointing to the outdated poster on your wall. 

“Your mom didn’t want to change it, she insisted it remains the way you left it,” he says with a sad smile. You may have lost your mom, but that didn’t mean he didn’t lose her too. 

“So many memories in this room,” you say and let a few flood back. Bucky’s cheeks heat up and you look down ashamed. He had to be thinking of the time the two of you first made love. You were 17, had the house to yourself, and did what you could on the small twin bed. 

“I’ll leave you to settle in, then we could get dinner?” he asks and you nod. You unpack the few outfits you brought along and mentally map out what furniture you’ll replace with the one from your apartment. After getting a little bit of the initial shock of being back, you sit down and take a deep breath. Not only were you going to be running an inn, but apparently you were going to be roommates with the only man you’ve ever really loved. Life really does throw curveballs, doesn’t it?

· · ──────────·🌹· ───────── · ·

The rest of the night was slightly awkward. Bucky ordered pizza and the two of you made idle chit chat while eating it. He offered to hang out with you, but you wanted to get up and going early so you decided to retire to your room instead. He gave a pained smile and wished you a good night. 

The next morning you woke up at dawn, a habit you had from being in law. Late nights and early mornings. After showering you get dressed in nice pants, a blouse, and some sneakers since you would be walking a lot today. You made a mental checklist of what needed to be done: meeting with Wanda and looking over the inn, visiting the safety deposit box, and arranging for a storage unit for the rest of your furniture. 

When you got downstairs Bucky was already dressed, in dark jeans and a flannel shirt over a faded t-shirt. 

“Morning,” he said and slid a cup of coffee your way.

“Thanks,” you say and take a sip from the mug. 

“I took the day off from the store and figured I could help you out today.”

“You didn’t need to do that. You’ve already done way more for my family than you ever needed to.”

“I love your family, even used to think they’d be my family one day,” he says. The last part comes out quieter than the rest and you feel a flood of guilt. 

“I’m meeting with Wanda in twenty minutes, but after could you help me run errands around town?” 

“Anything. I gotta fix up the back steps to the inn this mornin’ anyway. Might as well do them now,” he says lowering the coffee cup. He goes across the counter to where his glove is and puts it over his hand. 

Back in high school, he was attempting to make a table for his ma. He got distracted though and sawed into his arm. They had tried to save it, but the damage was done. Word had gone through the town and one woman told her fiancee (who just happened to be Tony Stark CEO of Stark Industries) and Bucky got a state of the art metal prosthetic. But you guess he was still embarrassed by it and hid it around everyone. Everyone but you it seems. 

The meeting with Wanda was exhausting. She went over everything from payroll, to linen deliveries, to the filing system. There was a wedding scheduled three and a half months from now that took the majority of the time, as your mom was originally in charge of the day. But everything seemed manageable with help. You moved Wanda to the official daytime desk manager and promoted Clint Barton to the nighttime manager. Wanda said he functioned best at night anyway. She introduced you to the other members of the team, Vision (her husband) was the head chef. Scott Lang was the bartender at night and events, Peter Parker was the bellhop on duty at the time. She said you would meet the rest of the staff at a later time, and that there weren’t any bad seeds in the bunch.

The two of you ate lunch together in the dining room and she filled you in on the staff gossip, little things to help run the inn better. Like how Clint needed coffee or would forget he was even alive, or how Peter Parker could usually lift more than you’d think but if MJ (his girlfriend walked in) he would almost always get distracted and walk into a wall.

After lunch, you texted Bucky (he had given you his new number last night) and met him at his car. 

“How was lunch,” he asks, walking up to you. His sleeves were rolled up now and he had sunglasses on.  His hair is a mess and his undershirt has paint stains on it. He’s got his toothy grin plastered across his face, and it’s the exact same one you fell in love with as a teen.

“Good, you fix up those stairs?” you ask and get into his car. He had a dark green pickup that was in desperate need of a wash. There was a toolbox in the back, but the front was spotless. 

“Yeah, even painted over them too.” Bucky was always the fixer. Helped out whenever he could, and didn’t mind getting a little roughed up in the process. It was always the biggest difference between you. Your life was carefully crafted and there was no room for mess.

The ride is quiet. You don’t even know what small talk to make with him anymore. Do you bring up sports? Ask about his mom? Tell him about New York? It all seemed too stiff and meaningless. 

You finally get to the bank and he offers to pick up some tea for you and him while you go to empty your mom’s safety deposit box. He knew this was something you needed to do alone, so he gave you your space. 

The bank had one small room of the locked boxes, and the teller came with you holding the second key to the box. Once the box was unlocked you moved to a small table and chair surrounded by walls for privacy. The bank teller leaves you alone with the contents and you take a deep breath in.

Inside the metal box are a few papers, your parent’s marriage certificate, and the deed to the house and the inn amongst them. There are also a few family heirlooms, two necklaces, and a ring. Your great grandpa’s watch is also in the box. But what sticks out is a letter with your name on it. You pull it out and read it.

“Dear Y/N,

If you’re reading this then I’m gone. We both knew this day would come and would bring you home to where you belong. Years ago you left, and I know you needed to do that. You had dreams of a better and bigger life, but you have to know in your heart that Rose Hill is where you need to be. 

I’m sure by now you have seen that Bucky lives in the house. He moved in a few years ago to help me out, and I told him to stay after I go. Y/N, I know you don’t want to hear this- especially from your mother, but he is the one. You two were meant to be. As soon as you stop running from that, you’ll feel at peace. He’s a good man and you need to let him have your heart again.

I trust you’ll handle the inn with grace and hopefully not sell it. It’s been in our family for many lifetimes, and I want it to continue that way. But if it’s too much give it to James. He’s family whether the pair of you are together or not.

Be kind to yourself dear.

Love,

Mom

You place the letter down and let the tears fall. It was too soon, you should have had her longer. And despite your best intentions of coming, staying a few months maybe a year and finding new owners you know you have to stay for good now. And for Bucky, you don’t even know. Bucky was the past, wasn’t he?

After you left the bank you went by a storage place then back to the room. The past three weeks have been a blur. The wedding was in less than three months and the bride decided to change the entire decoration scheme to be more ‘woodsy than classical’ and you were still figuring out what that even meant. Besides that, you were trying to figure out how to run an inn. People required directions you didn’t have so you were overwhelmed. 

Between the running around you were spending all the time you could reading articles and going through the binder your mom kept. You never really understood how much time and energy your parents put into running this place. Growing up you just thought they greeted people and were friends with the staff. It never dawned on you that running an inn is more than just owning the property. 

The spare minutes you had left were spent settling into your old life. Originally you planned to come back for a year and then move back. This was going to be a blip on the radar of your life. But you know now that was unrealistic and this is where you belong. So you officially list your place rather than lease it for a year. You formally quit your job, and you’d still have to fly back eventually for cases next year but that was a ways away. 

In the mornings you shared a coffee with Bucky, and at night the two of you ate dinner together. It was comfortable but awkward. Which was your fault. You knew it was your fault, you broke his heart and left. But you just didn’t know how to fix that. 

Most mornings were silent. You weren’t a morning person and Bucky wasn’t a talker. But today he had something to say. It only took three weeks, but better late than never. 

“Natasha and Steve invited us over,” he says and you nearly drop your cup.

“They got back together?” you ask completely shocked. 

While Wanda was who you stayed in touch with and one of your closest friends, Natasha was your best friend beside Bucky. The two of you met in dance class and became close. In middle school, she started dating Steve, who is Bucky’s best friend. They were the perfect pair, she was the fiery redheaded dancer and he was the timid but loyal baseball player. However, in Junior year of high school, they broke up after Natasha got drunk at a party and admitted that Steve wasn’t her first. 

He had felt betrayed that she lied and broke up with her and she sobbed on your shoulder for a whole week. You and Bucky got in a fight about it too because he had taken Steve’s side and said she shouldn’t have lied. You fiercely defend Natasha though. It wasn’t her fault she had a hookup with an asshole that she tried to forget.

“Yeah. After high school, Steve and I got a place together while we went to the community college. One day we decided to go to a party at the university in the city. And the next day Natasha was in my kitchen. They had a ‘benefits’ only relationship for a few months before realizing they were idiots and got back together officially. Tied the knot maybe four years ago?” he explains. 

“I’d love to see them again,” you say cordially. Hopefully, they didn’t resent you for leaving.

“We’ll go over for dinner?” he asks and you nod.

“I’ll see you later.”

“Good morning!” Wanda sings when you see her. She’s awfully cheery today and dressed up. She has a black lace dress with a high neckline. She’s wearing a pair of velvet burgundy heels and looks stellar. 

“You are way too happy and look amazing today. Why?!” you ask laughing and she laughs with you.

“I may have an appointment with an adoption agency today,” she says smiling.

“WHAT! Oh my god! Wanda, that’s so exciting!” you say and pull her into a hug. Wanda’s wanted kids since you were 16 and found out a few years ago she can’t get pregnant. 

“I don’t want to get too excited because it’s going to take a while. But we’re starting the process,” she says.

“I wish you and Vis the best. I’m so excited Wan.”

The day went by in a flash. Wanda had to leave early so you were on your own for part of the day. But it went good and you were finally feeling like you had this in the bag. 

· · ──────────·🌹· ───────── · ·

You get back from work and change into more casual clothes. When you get downstairs Bucky is waiting in a leather jacket. You can tell he’d showered since work because his hair is still damp and he isn’t covered in his signature dirt and sawdust. 

“Ready?” he asks and you smile. 

“As I’ve ever been,” you say and he leads you out to his truck. Your car had been brought here two weeks ago so you didn’t have to rely on him to drive you everywhere anymore but it made sense to go in one car for this. 

The Rogers live in a nice house with a large backyard across town. It’s no more than a 15-minute drive, and you arrive at the house with a flower garden outside and scattered kids’ toys in the yard.

“They have kids?” you ask your eyes widening at the idea of Natasha Romanoff with children.

Bucky laughs, “Twins! A happy surprise though. You’ll love my godchildren.” 

“You’re a godfather?” you ask trying to not let the sadness of all you missed seep in. 

“Yeah, why they hypothetically trusted me with their literal children I don’t know.” 

The two of you walk up to the door and before you can open it a flash of red hair is seen and then you’re encompassed in a tight hug. 

“I really missed you,” she says and the two of you move in a circle without letting each other go. A few tears fall from your face but you wipe them away.

“Hi Natty,” you say and she smiles pulling apart. She moves your hair from your face and tilts her head at you. 

“If it isn’t my best friend finally. You look amazing. I really missed you,” she says and pulls you into another hug. It seems she holds no malice against you and a weight leaves your shoulders. 

“I missed you too Mrs. Rogers,” you say and tilt your head smirking. 

“C’mon in Steve’s cooking and I have two people for you to meet.”

When you walk into the living room you’re greeted by two three-year-olds. 

“Y/N meet Sarah and James,” she says motioning to the two blondes. “Sarah and James meet your aunt Y/N.”

The two kids wave and smile and say hi synchronously. They were adorable and had Natty’s eyes. 

“No hello to me?” Steve says coming in the room and you walk over and give him a hug. “We missed you here, big shot.” 

“I missed you guys too. All of you,” you say and look over at Bucky. He lets a small smile cover his face but drops it when he sees you looking.

Over dinner, they fill you in on what you missed. After school, Natasha took over the local dance studio and turned it into a competition studio that was doing fairly well. They were winning titles and having girls travel just to be taught by her. Steve on the other hand became a teacher and is teaching high school history as well as coaching the baseball team. It’s as if no time had passed and the four of you are talking like you did growing up. The kids warm up to you and sit next to you and draw pictures with you.  

When their bedtime comes Bucky and Steve wrangle them and agree to read stories, so Natasha pulls you outside to the patio. 

“So,” she says and you give her a confused look. “What’s it like living with your ex-boyfriend?” she says and you gulp.

“Oh. That,” you say. “That is bringing up feelings I don’t want.” 

“I always thought you two would get married at 19. He was so lost after you left. We all were but especially him. And he still looks at you as if you hung the moon.”

“I broke his heart, it’s not fair of me to do this to him again,” you say and she grabs your hand.

“Babe, you were young and messed up. Don’t let that get in the way of your happiness.”

· · ──────────·🌹· ───────── · ·

Natasha’s words hang on your conscious for a while. Every time you look at Bucky for the next two weeks you think of them. 

The two of you start talking over coffee in the morning, and there’s definitely long wanting gazes and the need to be close. He’ll touch your hand when handing you something, and you’ll fix his hair and lay your head on his shoulder while watching movies. 

He tells you jokes over texts and you send him gifs every time he complains about a customer. You were falling back into the way you used to be and you are so happy. 

On Friday he asked if you guys could talk after work. Which was his right, he needed answers and you needed to ask about your mom. It had been two months now since you returned and you needed to air it all out. But knowing this made you feel jittery all day long. You kept spacing out or walking into the wrong room and everyone could tell you were a mess. It got to the point where you were doing more harm than good and Wanda sent you home. 

It turns out that Bucky had finished early that day too because when you got home he was there. 

“Hi,” you say awkwardly.

“Hi sugar,” he says smiling.

“You finished your day handy boy?” you ask and take your jacket off and hang it on the hook.

“Sure did. Only had a few customers at the store and figured I could close up early. And there was no fixing to do at the inn so I figured I would come back and relax for the night. How about you?” 

“Wanda sent me home. Said I was ‘hurting her flow’. You wanna order some food tonight?” you ask trying to keep up some small talk. 

“What I really want is to get drunk and have you be honest with me,” he says bluntly forgetting the politeness his mama taught him. 

“Well, Okay. That- We can do that. Still need some food I’ll order some Chinese.” you say pulling out your phone to order delivery from the shop down the road. 

An hour later the two of you have eaten and are both slightly tipsy. 

“Why’d you break up with me Y/N?” he asks finally.

You turn to him and shrug, “I wanted to be successful and I thought I needed someone who wanted the same success as me. I wanted to leave the past behind and that meant you. But I was too chicken shit to tell you. James, I regretted it every day.” 

He gulps audibly and takes a long swig from his drink. 

“I was so lost. I was going to marry you. Move up north with you. I knew that was where you needed to be and I wanted to be who you needed too.” he says.

“You were who I needed. Still are if we’re being honest. I just didn’t know that then.” you say and look down embarrassed. I thought you’d have moved on now. Settled with a nice girl, maybe Maria or Darcy. Had a few kids.” you admit.

“Can’t settle down when you’re still hung up on a girl,” he says and you look at him.

“Bucky I still love you. But you don’t deserve me. You deserve someone better.” you say. 

“I deserve you. And as much as I want to show you that we’re both drunk and you’re still dealing with grief,” he says.

“So what now?” you ask.

“Now we wait. Make sure this is right and not just unresolved feelings,” he says.

“And if it is?” you ask.

“Then I move out and we pretend this never happened,” he says and downs the rest of his drink. You follow suit. 

“Can I ask something?” you say after a few moments of quiet.

“Anytime sug, I’m an open book.”

“Was she mad? I didn’t come home when she got sick and I barely talked to her after dad died. I should have come back. I was a bad daughter,” you say and a tear falls down your face. He grabs your hand that was peeling a label off the bottle.

“Honey, she wasn’t mad. She was so proud of you. Told everyone about your cases and watched the news whenever you were mentioned. You made her so proud.”

“Thank you for being there for her.”

“She was my family too. I think we should get some rest though. It’s been a long night,” he says and you nod and head up to your room.

The next morning you wake up with a headache but see medicine and water on your bedside table. It’s then you decide that you were gonna try to make it up to Bucky. There was a chance to mend this and have the relationship you once had, and you had to take that chance. No way were you losing this man again. Once was hard enough. So you decide this time around you have to court him.

When the pair of you were young, only 13, Bucky had learned from Natasha through Steve at the time that you liked him. So he made it his mission to properly court you. It had started with notes and small trinkets, and after two weeks he knocked on your door with two bouquets of flowers (one for your momma and one for you) and asked your parents if it was alright if the pair of you dated. 

They had of course said yes, knowing Bucky his entire life and planning your wedding with his parents when you were still kids. But back then you didn’t break his heart. Now you needed to figure out a way to mend it. 

· · ──────────·🌹· ───────── · ·

There were two weeks until the wedding and you decided you needed to ask Bucky to be your ‘date’ there. He was obviously already invited because he was needed to make sure nothing broke and if it did it could be fixed. But you wanted him there as yours.

You woke up the next day early and went into town to get his favorite bagels and a rose. You got back to the house just as he made it downstairs and gave him the flower and food.

“Thank you? Why go through the hassle when we have food here?” he asks.

“I’m wooing you.”

“Doll, you do not need to woo me. I’m already wooed!” he says laughing.

“No, I messed up. And you deserve to be properly apologized to. So I’m wooing and you’re going to let me.”

“Okay,” he says shaking his head and taking a bite from his bagel. 

Day one: success. 

Day two starts when he gets back from work. You tell him that the pair of you are going on a date and tell him to wear a good pair of shoes. He gives you a weird look but agrees. You bring him to a club outside of town and once he sees it he can’t stop laughing. 

When you and him were 16 you decided to try and get into a club. You both had horribly made fake ids and dressed up to look older. You were obviously turned away, but his car had refused to start after all that effort. So you both danced outside to his mp3 player while you waited for AAA to show up. 

“I figured we could recreate that night, without AAA and the awful heels,” you say and he nods his head. You pull into the abandoned lot you spent hours in years ago. After parking, you grab your phone and put on a playlist of songs that were popular at that time and spend the next two hours just dancing. Completely embarrassingly and in a way nobody your age should. But it’s nice and the pair of you just let go.

Days three and four aren’t that eventful as you both have a lot of work. So instead you hide little notes throughout his things both days. They’re nothing special, just enough to let him know you’re thinking of him and how much you like him. 

Day five you greet him after he closes the hardware store with a vintage Brooklyn Dodgers hat. His grandpa had loved the team and told Bucky all about them. You had to scour online for the hat and it was worth it when you saw the look on Bucky’s face. His eyes widened and he pulled you into a close hug. You would never admit it to him but you took a deep inhale of his scent.

Day 6’s plans were changed when Steve called and said Nat didn’t feel good and wondered if you would take the twins for the day and night. You told them you had to check with Bucky but would head over as soon as you heard from him. 

Bucky of course was over the moon to have the kids over so you went and grabbed them after hanging up with him. When you got there Steve had packed each kid an overnight bag and handed them to you with their blankets and stuffed animals. Apparently Bucky bought them for the twins when they were born and they refused to sleep without them. 

The twins were ecstatic to sleepover ‘aunt y/n and uncle Bucky’s place’ and babbled to each other the entire drive. You got there and saw Bucky’s truck so you figured he took the rest of the say off for the kids. 

The rest of the day was spent running around the yard and showing the kids the inn and it reminded you so much of your childhood with Bucky. You wouldn’t mind your own kids playing here too you think to yourself. 

After getting the kids to eat dinner and putting them to bed in the guest room you’re wiped and fall asleep with Bucky on the couch. 

You wake up early the next day to little hands patting your shoulder. You manage to get up without waking up Bucky and bring the kids to the kitchen. Day 7 would be breakfast in bed you suppose. 

· · ──────────·🌹· ───────── · ·

It was one week now until the wedding and you were stressed. The mothers decided to come in now and make your life a living hell by trying to undo everything the couple had done. Thor and Jane had made it perfectly clear to ignore their parents and you were doing your best to.

You told Bucky to meet you at the inn today since you couldn’t make it out to him, and when he arrived you had Vis make your lunch and the two of you picnic in the garden. 

Day 9 was a big one because you were asking Bucky to be your date today. You lit candles around the house and had a big sign asking him to be your date. It mimicked how he asked you to prom all those years ago.

You got dressed up and waited impatiently for him to come home. When you heard his car you dimmed the lights in the house and held the sign for him to read. He came in and smiled at your setup.

“Doll, of course, I’m going to be your date,” he says laughing and pulls you close to him.

“You know you don’t need to do the rest of your wooing. We can just make it official now,” he says and you shake your head. 

“James Buchanan you let me finish my last 5 days.” 

“I just want to kiss you,” he whines and you laugh at his frustration.

“Soon Handy Boy I promise.”

Day 10 you go to the old drive-in theater with him. Wedding prep is just about done and you had the night off. You fill his truck with blankets and pillows after telling him the plan and having him grab snacks and drinks for you both.

The place is playing Edward Scissorhands and Beetlejuice in a Tim Burton back to back showing and it’s a good excuse to spend the night watching good movies and snuggled close to the man you love.

Day 11 and 12 you bake for him. The first of two nights cookies, the second muffins. He thanks you for both but asks if you’re trying to Hansel and Gretel him.

Day 13 was the day before the wedding and the entire family had come into town. The entire inn was rented out to the Foster-Odinson clan. It was all hands on deck and it was the fullest you’ve seen the inn yet. But despite the craziness, everything runs smoothly. 

Midway through the day Wanda gets a call she was approved to adopt and was so excited she yelled it out. The entire place let out collective squeals (even people who had no clue who Wanda was) and the day just had a good tone to it.

For the last day before the wedding, and your last night of the ‘wooing’ you cook Bucky dinner. He’s surprised by the fact the house doesn’t burn and compliments your meal at least ten times. You tell him about Wanda and Vision.

“Do you want kids?” he asks and you nod.

“I want a bunch of kids. I want to raise them here too. With you,” you say and he chokes on his drink.

“God Doll, I want that too but don’t be that blunt about things. I’m getting older, don’t need a heart attack.” You laugh and he smiles. 

· · ──────────·🌹· ───────── · ·

After what feels like a lifetime the day is finally here. You’re up and out of the house before Bucky even wakes. He’s sleeping in since the store is closed today and he doesn’t have to be at the inn until 11 am. 

The bride and her bridesmaids are all drinking coffee and nibbling on light pastries when you get there. The makeup and hair team she hired should be here in around an hour. Jane has gel eye patches beneath her eyes and one of the bridesmaids still has their hair in a towel. 

After checking that they’re all there and everything is running smoothly you check in on the kitchen staff. They all say things are on schedule and you nod and go to find Scott to ensure that the bar is fully stocked.

On your way to check with Scott, you find Peter carrying the suits up to the groomsmen and he wishes you a good morning. Scott, you find a few minutes later organizing the liquor. Everything seems to be running smoothly.

A few hours go by and it’s an hour until the wedding starts. You thank your lucky stars that everything runs smoothly as the guests start showing up. You feel a tap on your shoulder and turn to see Bucky in a suit. He looks fantastic and you practically drool.

“How’s my favorite wedding coordinator,” he asks and you smile.

“She’s fantastic. How’s my favorite handy boy,” you ask in return.

“He wants to know if he’s waited long enough for his kiss.” You laugh at him.

“He has. He should know that there’s a certain girl fully in love with him who would die for a chance to be his girlfriend again,” you say laying it all out.

Bucky smiles widely, “I love you too Y/N. It would be an honor to be yours again.” 

Before you can reply to him he pulls you close and smashes his lips against yours. There’s so much want and need in the kiss and you can almost feel the years lost in it. He doesn’t hold back at all and reaches one arm around you to pull you as close as possible. The other holds your hand and he keeps his lips moving in time with yours. 

And you know that it’s everything you need. He’s everything you ever need. 

[theninjasheeep]

Blood of Love

Pairing: Pieck Finger x Porco Galliard (Modern/Fantasy AU)

This is my entry for @pleasantanathema’s Through Ink and Quill | A Classics Collab. I decided to go for a character study of Porco and Pieck's relationship following my Pokkopiku week piece Sweet Pandemonium paired with some vampire lore from Dracula and Anne Rice's Vampire Chronicles.

The idea of vampire!Pokkopiku came from @sinnamon19’s over the top fan art.

You can also read it on AO3.

Summary: Since they are creatures of the night, their senses, as their feelings are heightened to lengths that can’t be explained by words. But since blood is their life sustenance, it is also their means of communication.

Warnings/tags: Pokopiku, Pokkopiku, Gallipieck, Porco Galliard/ Pieck Finger, Porco Galliard x Pieck Finger, Alternate Universe - Vampire, Character Turned Into Vampire, Vampire Bites, Vampire Turning, Blood Drinking, Mentions of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Mentions of Suicidal Thoughts, Blood Sharing.

Blood of Love

Waking up in darkness after spending most of his life shunning the sun when he wanted to sleep late was a welcome change for Porco. He could lie and pretend he was one of those humans-turned-vampires who wailed about the sun, its warmth and brightness and how much he missed it, but he didn't.

He didn't miss the impending sense of foreboding dread that clogged his senses or the tacit expectation that life should have some kind of meaning. It was a succession of routines: being born, growing up, reproducing and dying; waking up, going to work or school, coming home, going to sleep and starting again the next day. There was always an unsatisfied craving, a need to be satiated that gave rise to another....

If it weren't for that same life and the unexpected, he would still be stuck in the routine of a life that no longer felt like one. Not so long ago he was eager to die and escape the curse of boredom. However, now that he was undead, he felt more alive than ever.

He didn't miss living as a human.

He did not miss the wars that sent young men like him to fight in battles and advocate for ideals that were in no sense his own. Wars like the ones that took his brother away from him, wars that made mothers cry and lose their lives to grief, like his. He didn't miss being part of a greater good, he fancied being selfish, living only for himself and what he deemed worthy of living for, like Pieck.

Pieck who turned him, Pieck who gave him a reason to live in hope and love.

The stories that are told about vampires are rich and wide-ranging. The majority depict them as cold and devoid of emotion creatures who enjoy drinking blood and playing with their mortal victims without any consideration or pity, with no regard for their suffering.

Dracula is the one that, for Porco, is closest to the truth. Leaving out, naturally, his own inability to turn into mist, a bat or a wolf, and how terribly he has fared with the latter when he has encountered them on his nightly hunts with Pieck high in the mountains, puts him quite a distance from what is supposed to be the blueprint for all vampires.

It has been less than fifteen years since Pieck agreed to turn him and allow him to stay with her forever. Overall, he could even be considered a novice vampire, at least in comparison to the more than two hundred years his female partner has been crisscrossing the planet. However, it has been long enough to learn what is both necessary and appropriate, but what the books say is, amongst other things, preposterous and out of proportion.

Porco's hazel eyes, in the darkness of the room, shine like two torches as they scan the words in each book with unprecedented speed.

The library, nestled in Pieck's hideout in an abandoned town once called Liberio, is about the same size as the house itself. To the unsuspecting eye, the house is a dilapidated old manor from which thieves plundered the treasures long ago, leaving only the massive stone and iron columns. Underneath, however, is a hidden cellar and a sealed passageway that can only be opened with the supernatural strength of a creature like Pieck. Not even he, with his years beside her and the same superhuman strength, is able to open it without visible effort.

Once that initial obstacle is overcome, a long corridor rises up with small windows that let in just enough light to clue the nighttime inhabitants as to what time of day they are in. And behind that corridor is a scaled-down replica of the ruined house that exists above ground: three bedrooms, a kitchen - more out of habit than necessity - a living room and a huge bathroom with a bathtub built into the wall, in addition to the library, make up what could be considered Porco and Pieck's home sweet home.

Although it is ridiculous, Porco is not going to stop enjoying his reading and perusing every nook and cranny of the library while Pieck, with all her quirks, tries to do some vampire yoga in the room across on their home.

Stories about vampires always depict them as a kind of blood-drinking skeleton barely able to articulate words and unfit to walk freely in broad daylight, as the sun is their greatest enemy. The only thing they got right is that their skin burns and the acrid smell of ashes is the only thing that lingers in the air after they perish.

In other stories, they are portrayed as having no emotional capacity and could be easily mistaken for an angsty teenagers searching for their identity and place in the world, with little to no impulse control, driven by their whims, manipulating their way until they achieve their goal. In these tales, the depiction is so over-the-top ridiculous that it is almost comparable to handing a child a panic button.

What is undeniable is the enormous capacity of humans to envision and demonize what they do not know.

Superhuman strength and speed, mind reading and control, morphing into wolves, bats and mist? The books detail how versatile their powers are, how they are able to cloak themselves, thanks to their human appearance, and hide for long periods of time in large communities and lead a relatively normal life, without arousing suspicion.

Although there are also accounts that refer to them as ruthless, cruel and stone-cold beings, who toy with the humans they intend to use as food until they have had enough, and only then, kill them in the most violent and painful way possible.

At this, Porco rolls his eyes. In his experience, both he and Pieck are careful with the humans they feed on. They always look for ways not to cause them pain or fear, and above all, to avoid leaving behind scenes worthy of a gorey b-movie.

Perhaps the only time such a scene involved the two of them was when Pieck agreed to transform him into a vampire.

--

There was a moment where he couldn’t see or speak anything and everything went black for him. He started to listen to a heartbeat, two actually. One was his... the other...

“Pieck?” He asks. He can hear her voice somewhere in the distance, it sounds pained and far, far away.

Meanwhile, Pieck keeps pouring her blood on Porco’s mouth and is silently praying to whatever it is that created them and allowed them to be alive for him to survive this ordeal. She’s panicking now because he’s very pale, dead by now, but he’s not responding to her calling like he is supposed to.

“Porco, wake up!” She cries. “Open your eyes,” She pleads. “Come to me!”

Nothing happens and Pieck panics, falling in a circle of self loathing.

Giving up on him, she lets her head fall on his chest and at this point she’s just a mess of guilt and anguish. Her hair is on her face and his shirt is all bloody with his blood, her blood, her tears. She can’t move, the will to do anything has left her completely so she just lays there beside him on the floor crying.

--

He hasn’t read anything that depicts accurately how they are created. Probably humans think they just popped out of nowhere. However, vampires themselves have a myth: Ymir Fritz was the first human turned into a vampire, many call her the Founder. She was a slave but became Queen of Eldia when King Fritz was unable to defeat her in battle. He surrendered and married her and, in turn, she made him into a vampire and together they gave birth to their species.

Where are they now? No one knows, they are probably marble statues, since the longer a vampire lives, the whiter and rougher their skin becomes.

One book in particular catches his eye: its dark blue cover with gold sparkles featuring a nine-pointed star, the symbol of Ymir Fritz. However, after a brief glance, he discovers that it is a parody.

Porco snorts, he can't believe he's found a book in which vampires don't roast in the sun, but glow like a fairy in plain daylight without any repercussions for their lives. Pieck must have been really bored to get —and keep— something like that and deem it worthy of their huge underground library.

"Have you found anything interesting, Pokko?" Pieck's mellow voice reaches his ears from the bedroom. Her body doesn't make any sounds when she moves, but her soft breathing tells him that she's still trying to do vampire yoga, as if she needs to.

"Geez, Pieck!" Her taunting giggle is the only response he gets, and aware that she can also hear him from where she is, he retorts: "You scared the hell out of me." He grumbles in fake annoyance.

"Don’t worry, you won’t have a heart attack."

“Tch.”

But it is true, no matter how much she may sneak up behind him to scare him, his heart has long since stopped beating, and if he had remained a human, he would most likely have died many years ago. When Pieck came into his life one night, wounded and seeking shelter, he had lost the will to live. All that remained from the happy Porco who lived with his parents and brother was a mere shell that always reminded him of how much he resembled Marcel. And had he lived, despite his desire to die, he would have been almost forty years old by now.

Putting the books aside and getting up from the floor, Porco makes his way to the bathroom where there is a huge full-length mirror, which he and Pieck use in such creative ways when they make love at night.

A derisive smirk tugs at his lips as his reflection glances back at him through the mirror. There are stories that claim vampires don't see themselves in mirrors and that's the reason they avoid them. If only whoever wrote that knew the things the mirror in his bathroom has seen him do to Pieck.

Sometimes, when he is overcome by melancholy and Pieck's love and company fail to reach the deepest wounds in his heart, Porco wishes that particular myth were real. What would his life be if his brother were alive? What would Marcel's life be if the war hadn't extinguished the light in his eyes? The same deep green eyes that right now were scrutinizing his every feature in the mirror.

As the years have gone by, his skin has become paler and his eyes more golden. Pieck likes to say that he is slowly turning into a lion.

Speaking of Pieck...

A slender hand appears over his right shoulder in the mirror, and down his arm until it curls around his waist. Seconds later, the weight of Pieck's head resting on the space between his shoulder blades confirms that he is no longer alone in front of the mirror.

“Hey,” She greets, nuzzling against him tenderly, “what are you thinking?”

He clears his throat, embarrassed.

His left hand reaches up and intertwines his fingers with Pieck's over his chest, and looking behind him, his gaze meets hers.

“My brother.”

Pieck's embrace grows tighter and a line of kisses and scratches from her fangs on his neck make Porco forget, for a moment, how much he misses his family.

“I’m sorry.”

“You know they were long gone before I met you.”

“I know, it’s just...” She releases her hold on him, walking a few steps to stand in front of him in the mirror, her back against it. “I wish I could ease your pain, but I’d be lying if I say that I never think about my father, I miss him.”

Porco raises his hand to caress her cheeks. “You’re stuck with me forever, remember?”

She smiles softly, leaning against him and hugging him back. Porco buries his face on her neck and taking advantage of their embrace, sinks his teeth on her neck, making her moan in delight.

There’s another thing the books about them seem to ignore or purposefully miss: yes, they are creatures of the night and as their senses, their feelings are heightened to lengths that can’t be explained by words. But since blood is their life sustenance, it is also their means of communication. Drinking the blood of another vampire is a gesture so intimate and so rare, that when it’s done by partners, it’s more than just a confession of love and trust, it goes beyond lust and desire: a vampire can show what they feel through images to their partner when they share their blood, and since words are not his forte by any means, he’s always eager to show Pieck comfort and reciprocate everyday the comfort and peace she gave him.

Licking the tiny marks of his fags on her neck, he nuzzles against it, kissing her tenderly. Pieck, being smaller than him, has a harder time reciprocating his gesture, but she stands on her tiptoes and kisses him back, biting his lower lip and drinking his blood as well.

Emboldened by the gesture, he carries her and sits her in the sink, standing between her legs without breaking the kiss. At this, Pieck leverages herself on his shoulders and —finally— sinks her teeth on his neck, eliciting from him a low growl. He bites her back and through their blood they both convey to each other what their words and their hands, roaming over every inch of the other' s body, cannot: they are together until the end of time and the sadness that each one carries is shared by the other.

Together, they were safe.

[clownattack]

Castor - character bio

I’ve been struggling with getting a bio out for Cas for waaaaay too long now, but i feel pretty ok with how it looks currently - i'm going to repost it on my art blog with some drawings of Cas and Hjalle in the future (hopefully). If you want to skip most of the nonsense and just get a feel for her personality, the section under the bio paragraphs is FULL OF POINTS.

links to drawn refs here and here

Longpost under the cut

✦ Early life in Hjalle:

Being born into the noble family Aran, Castor’s early life consisted mostly of being pampered by the attendants and strict education. Cas was a rowdy kid, and with time, lack of affection and validation from her family served to amplify the trait - she went from occasionally disobedient to full-on antagonistic towards her parents, and the nobility as a whole. She began to sneak out; spending her time outside of the Fort, spying on the guards and trying to bribe knights into taking her on as a page.

When Cas turned nine a sibling came into the picture, and she made it her duty to assure Aster’s upbringing would be better than hers. She poured everything she had into Aster, but soon developed a brash and overbearing streak, unyielding in her focus to teach the meek little sister to stand her ground. Aster became torn between Cas and the parents, who in all fairness, treated her much better than their firstborn. This would remain the case until Castor’s dragon-induced injuries.

In her late teens, Cas was seldom seen in the fort - to everyone's great relief. Her mood was always sour, she gave up on her studies and only seemed to care about Aster and joining the hunting parties. Her parents reached their limit when Castor announced she would not become one of the renowned judges of House Aran - this led to an explosive argument, which concluded with Castor storming out. For the following two years, she lived and worked with rangers tasked with protecting and providing for the town.

It was in those years that Cas acquired her battle prowess and scars, the most prominent being a gift from an especially large and angry dragon. A single swipe of its tail tore Castor’s chest and forearm open, forcing the hunting party to rush her to the fort in (what the hunters expected to be) a futile attempt to get her family to provide medical help for their dying kin. The reception was cold indeed, and if it weren’t for Aster’s hysterics and outrage over her family’s indifference, Cas would have not survived the grievous wounds. The upside to this event was a new high tale to impress people with, and strengthening the bond between two sisters. The downside - Castor was now under her parent’s thumb. They made her accept the position of inquisitor; to make up for the hassle she caused them. Taking up the mantle turned Castor’s world upside down - not only would she have to work in close proximity to her father, but her dreams of being knighted were shattered, as inquisitorial duties stand in stark opposition to virtues of knighthood. As Inquisitor she was tasked with investigating and interrogating for the court - the latter, as Aran tradition had it, was extraordinarily bloody.

 ✦ Vesuvia:

Almost as soon as she arrived, the city sparked something in Cas. This was unexpected to say the least; she was certain the years of gruesome work as inquisitor numbed her to simple joys of life. The sights and sounds of Vesuvia however, made her eager to explore and see how everything ticked - and the more she saw the more she wished to remain in the city. After attending the Masquerade and becoming acquainted with Asra, Cas was prepared to do anything to stay - even if it meant sucking up to the Buffoon count and begging for a job. Lucio proved to be anything but opposed - he’d heard of the “bloody good shows” (pun intended) Castor was infamous for, and was eager to take her off her parents hands. This led to working parallel to the count and his court, but also enabled Cas to dabble in magic under Asra’s tutelage.

This slight betterment of Cas’ situation would not last long however, as The Red Plague took complete hold of the city mere months after she took up her residence in Vesuvia. After perishing, and being brought back by Asra, she very slowly regains certain memories and traits - her sister, love of astronomy, sword skills. She sneaks out, snoops, and is a handful overall; but Asra is happy to see Castor’s “new” self free of bitterness and pain.

After this point, the “game events” take place. I like to imagine Castor braving an amalgam of Nadia and Portia routes, with a fistful (or multiple) of courtier drama. Castor is tasked with an investigation, slowly  but surely unravelling how deep the corruption runs in Vesuvia, and how much of it can be attributed to the courtiers. The conclusion of her story focuses on first facing off against the court, then the Justice Arcana.

  ✦ Physical appearance

Light olive skin, she picks up a slight tan in Vesuvia.

Dark gray eyes, striking marbling on the iris.

Long girl - 176 cm tall, loves being the “tall friend” (and manhandling people close to her). Being taller than her is taken as an indirect challenge.

She has a rectangular body type, could be described as a “runner’s body”.

Prominent scarring across right forearm and torso, missing right breast.

Tastefully disheveled. Her hair has a constantly windswept quality, and the gray streaks seem to be especially unruly.

Inherited the “Aran silver” (early graying), she tries to ignore it. “The more you hide it, the more it shows”.

Secretly really bothered by the many similarities to her father. Avoids looking at herself too much, and whenever she does it feels like he’s looking back at her, judging.

Only ever smoothes herself over before important court meetings and social events. She doesn't know how makeup works, so before any party she asks Asra to sort her out. Cas looking prim is both a treat and a source of friendly jabs.

✦ Character traits

Power walking by default. This can be somewhat intimidating, and she won’t stop if someone is in her way - just put them to the side and continue.

Puts up a really convincing pretence of formality and refinement.

In actuality she finds this facade tiresome, and just wants to talk fast about battle/hunting feats or astronomy. Maybe show off her pyromancy.

Loves socializing, it recharges her batteries.

Dilligent worker.

Tends to overwork herself and neglect her relationships.

Often scatter minded and wanting to do too many things at one time.

Doesn’t appreciate people instigating physical contact or getting up in her face. She needs to prepare herself for it, or be the initiator.

Stubborn as a mule. Never knows when to stop pressing people.

Extremely callous at times.

Annoyingly overbearing

Most of this springs from a place of fear - things had a habit of getting worse whenever her family imposed decisions onto her. In her mind, if she’s the one holding the reins, everything will be better. And if something does fail - she will be the only one to blame.

Starting arguments comes much too easily to her, but she’s just as quick to introspect, and seek out the person she argued with to apologize and approach the issue in an appropriate manner.

Forgives easily

Eternally scoffing at astrology. She knows shes being bigoted, but at this point its almost like an inside joke between her and Asra. “Astrology? It's baby stuff. PSEUDOSCIENCE!” (she cries as she worries over her afternoon tarot reading and preparing pretty horoscopes for the Shop...)

A huge hypocrite at times. “Do as I say, not as I do” could easily be her motto.

Both the upright and reversed Knight of Swords card sums her character up perfectly.

✦ Occupation & Residency

Vesuvia:

Beginning of her story follows the game canon almost to a T - Cas lives with Asra in the Shop, and works there. It bores her to death, and she plays tricks on every customer just to entertain herself.

After being officially hired by Nadia as the Palace Magician, Castor moves out of the shop and purchases a modest house in Goldgrave, much below the value of what Nadia offered her, and what she could afford. It’s convenient and that’s what matters to Cas. She continues supplying the shop diligently, and takes over whenever Asra runs off.

Nadia insisted on Castor having an office in the palace. It grew on her with time, and after The Devil is dealt with it becomes her little “hub”.

Hjalle:

Cas lived with her family in the castle site until 17 years old.

After denying her parents their plans for her future as a judge, she hunkered down in a hunting lodge outside of the town, and spent almost two years living that way - she still thinks of these two years as the most joyous time in her life.

The only thing she ever used her family’s wealth for was commissioning the construction of an extravagant observatory. Reminiscent of a gothic fortress, the stark exterior is contrasted with insides filled with artwork and art-nouveau ornaments. The central chamber is a vast library with a powerful telescope in its apse - it is a sight that could take the breath of the most haughty of nobles.

There’s a tiny living space below the main chamber, furnished sparingly, but with a lovely fireplace (in Hjalle, its a necessity). It’s where Cas stays after becoming the inquisitor/whenever she visits after the in-game events.

✦ Trivia

Cas is 23 years old when she first arrives to Vesuvia - 28 at the time of The Devil’s downfall.

She freed Merlin from a merchant’s cage in the Red Market, during one of her outings in the three year interlude after her death - Asra fumes after they find out she snuck out to the market - yet is amazed that Cas found a familiar.

Cas regained her first memories via touching objects linked to her past life - a letter from Aster, articles of clothing, a sword...

This self re-discovering takes a turn for the worse when Cas finally finds a large, ornate knife - the one she inherited after becoming inquisitor. The memories it resurfaces are a staggering blow to Castor, completely derailing the beliefs she had about her own person. She thought of herself as a paragon, and remembering the torture she inflicted upon others, the lives taken in the name of “justice” made her relapse into bitterness and disenchantment. She deals with those feelings as her investigation into the courtiers progresses.

Predominantly uses pyromancy, other types of magic are strictly used for her work at the palace, and rather sparingly.

Could be best described as a battlemage - enjoys being in melee range and assaulting her quarry with both sword and fire; the latter being used more as a way to distract or stagger the enemy than actually harm. There's no fun in just burning them up!

Doesn’t cook for herself, although she has a natural knack for it - will only cook for guests and short people.

Her dislike of Lucio clashes with gratitude for employing her when she first arrived to Vesuvia - he was the knife which cut Cas off from her parents, and it’s something she could never forget.

Demiromatic/sexual.

She was offered to be knighted by Nadia after defeating The Devil. Cas declined - It’s much more than a title to her, and accepting seemed like mockery (considering her past as inquisitor).

Short fuse, she learns to better control herself while working in the palace. But if someone really pushes her the nearby candles miiiight get a bit out of control. Or she’ll just throttle them.

Hates her full name - Castor is such a mouthful. Sounds stuck up too...

[ghostiewriter]

prologue | tale of a slightly unstable teen hero

Summary: JJ’s life is thrown upside down after a school trip. Now he just decide what to do about his newly found powers and discover just how much his life has changed.

Warnings: contains strong language, a teeny sliver of sexual references, just the three boys being dumbasses? a small smidge of angst (it barely counts) and some fighting, kinda amateur but he’ll learn eventually

Word Count: 8.2K (I’m so sorry)

A/N: ahhh so here’s the prologue! Hope you guys enjoy, it’s a bit of a mess and it wasn’t meant to be this long but oh well! This is just to kinda set up the world, I promise the chapters won’t be this messy! There will be way more Kiara in the next chapter as well, don’t worry! Like I said, this is just a filler chapter! Also this is unedited and I am kinda unwell so lets hope this makes sense :) feel free to leave any feedback!! 

masterlist // taglist // ao3

JJ prided himself in always loving an adventure. A random trip at 3am when one of his buds felt down? Hell yeah! An exploration through the streets of New York when he decided to ditch his Spanish final? Let’s go, dude! A spontaneous road trip with his boys during summer? JJ was down! But this? This just felt like some sick joke.

Admittedly, JJ wasn’t listening in class when the trip was announced. And as Pope liked to remind him every couple of minutes, this whole situation could have been avoided if he had listened in class. But can you blame the guy? A whole day off school to visit some big corporation uptown where he was getting a free lunch—JJ would be stupid to reject that. Yet, JJ should’ve known there would’ve been some catch, some flaw in this trip. And that flaw was that he had to spend the day walking around Cameron Industries, the biggest nerd fest on the East coast.

JJ was bored out of his mind.

Pope was ecstatic beyond belief.

John B was ready to punch JJ in the face if opened his mouth to complain one more time.

“Why call it a trip when all we do is listen to these dudes in lab coats droning on about some weird gene thing? Like c’mon! A trip is meant for relaxing. Where the fuck am I gonna relax around here, huh? The fucking gift shop—“

“Shut up,” John B hissed at the blonde, smacking JJ’s arm for good measure, to which the blond dramatically whined at. “Just please…shut up. You’ve got one more hour until lunch, alright? Don’t ruin this for him.”

JJ huffed as he glanced over at Pope, who was eagerly questioning every scientist they came across. As much as it pained him to agree with John B, he did have a point. There weren’t enough fingers in the world to count the amount of times JJ had dragged Pope into some anxiety-provoking, impulsive situation. The least he could do is suck it up a little and mope silently as they walk through countless fancy labs that probably each cost more than his apartment complex altogether.

“I don’t know why you’re acting so chuff,” JJ huffed, his fingers twisting the rings that adorned his hands—a force of habit when he was uncomfortable and bored. “You usually back me up on this kinda stuff—“ But JJ didn’t need to finish his question. Oh no, because the answer was right there.

JJ smirked as he turned to John B, one eyebrow raised in question. However, his friend seemed much more content staring at Sarah Cameron from where she stood near the front of the group, smiling towards the tour guide like they were close friends. Which they probably were considering they were standing in the building her father owned.

Ward Cameron. Renowned scientist, billionaire and founder of Cameron Industries. A true inspiration. What started as a hopeless experiment in his high school chemistry lab ended up forging Ward Cameron’s path to success in the biggest multibillion-dollar multinational corporation that held the future for chemical engineering. JJ just thought he was some lucky rich kid that had daddy’s money to support his dream.

And it was for that reason that JJ rolled his eyes, nudging his friend out of his daze. “You do know you don’t stand a chance, right?” JJ commented.

Harsh but true. JJ and the rest of the kids that attended this trip went to Midtown High School. True to its name, it was smack bang in the middle of two very different livelihoods. Uptown Queens: home to the kids who live of old money, designer clothes and trust funds. And Downtown Queens: home to working-middle class who would spend the rest of their lives making a sliver of the uptown folks’ wages.

Take a wild guess which area JJ is from.

However, some old dude in the 60s decided to try and bridge the gap between the classes and thus, the school was born. All it did was let each know how much they resented the other. Yet, John B had fallen into the alluded mind-set of that old geezer and set his eyes on Sarah Cameron, the most uptown chick you’ll get. And of course, JJ was there to remind him of that very fact and push him off that imaginary bridge. It was a fool’s hope to combine the uptown and downtown folk; it was a fool’s hope to try and make them get along. It won’t happen now nor ever.

John B flipped him off. JJ only grinned in response.

Nonetheless, that ended up being the most exciting part of the hour. JJ shuffled along at the back of the group, his eyes constantly wandering around the labs. Did he have any clue what any of it was? Hell no, but he was naturally curious and couldn’t help his hands from wandering. Sue him, he was a teenage boy with ADHD and a knack for getting into trouble—he was bound to do something stupid.

His interest in science perked up a bit when he noticed a small enclosure of what looked like completely normal spiders, yet as their tour guide spoke, they were anything but normal.

“Our team have been working on taking the genetic code of three separate species of arachnids and combining them to form a super-spider. One which can survive and reproduce and live as any other would. It is the first step in the future of genetic engineering and modification. With this technology, we could find cures to diseases that were deemed impossible to cure. We could form a stronger, better human race—“

“Isn’t that unethical?” A voice interrupted. Everyone’s head snapped towards the curly-haired girl that stood by Sarah Cameron’s side. JJ knew very little about her—considering this was honestly the first time he had seen her—and he wasn’t complaining…nor was he actually listening to what she was saying. “I mean, won’t this just introduce a future of designer babies and a superiority of the genetically modified over the natural?”

“I understand your concerns,” The tour guide—a young redhead who honestly didn’t look a day over twenty-two but then again, JJ guessed everyone around here was some sort of genius. “But I can assure you there are a number of protocols behind this research that would prevent such a thing from happening.”

“Can you really stop the rich from getting what they want?” Ironic considering she was a rich, uptown chick.

An awkward silence washed over the group before the teacher quickly cleared their throat and directed the tour guide to continue.

JJ—being the foolishly bored teenager he was—made his way over to the unknown girl, standing next to her as they looked at the spiders in the enclosure.

“Poor things.” She sighed sadly. JJ only raised an eyebrow but didn’t question it.

“You know,” He began, his voice smooth and suave—the usual JJ charm he used on girls. “I totally agree with you on all those…ethic…things…” He trailed off, risking a glance towards the girl who only narrowed her eyes at him.

“Really?” She questioned, nodding her head for him to continue.

“Yeah, I mean, save the animals, am I right?” He grinned, nervously scratching the nape of his neck. The girl seemed unamused.

“Uh huh, sure thing, buddy.” She stated before turning to catch up with the group. But JJ’s voice stopped her once again.

“How about I take you out some time? And then you can tell me all about all this ethic stuff.” He proposed, his usual charming smirk on his lips. He was a lady’s man, he knew he was gorgeous and JJ would be a fool if he didn’t use it to his advantage. One small date to charm her before JJ wiggled his way into her bed, then boom—they never have to speak to each other again. Plus, this girl may be one of Sarah Cameron’s wee minions, but JJ didn’t let class get in the way of his ‘love’ life. He just resents the lot of those uptown kids in every other aspect of his life. No harm in fraternizing with the enemy, right? What other people didn’t know wouldn’t hurt them. It’s just a little bit of fun.

“Do you even know my name?” She asked him, her arms crossed over her chest. It took a lot of self-control for JJ not to follow the movement. He cleared his throat, leaning one hand against the enclosure.

“Uh…Samantha?”

“Nice try, asshole.” And with that, she turned around to join the group.

JJ stood there, a little dumbfounded by the encounter. He was taken aback not only by the fact she had just rejected him, but with the sass in which she did so. He would be lying if he didn’t say it was a little hot, but he expected it. Uptown kids always thought there were better, superior to the downtown kids.

But JJ didn’t wallow in his rejection for long when he felt a sharp, stinging pain on his hand. He glanced down, seeing a spider on the back of his hand and his instant reaction was to shake it off. “Little shit!” He hissed, looking down at the small bite mark on his skin.

“Hey, dude, you comin’?” He heard John B call out. He glanced around, unable to spot the spider. He shrugged, JJ has had worse than a small spider bite. He’ll survive.

“Yeah, I’m starving, let’s go!”

Little did JJ know that was his last day as a normal, hyperactive teen.

**********

“I’m telling you something is fucking wrong with me!”

Both boys looked at their blond friend with sceptic looks. It was Saturday morning and far too early to deal with JJ nonsense. Especially when they could barely understand what he was going on about. It was around 6am when John B and Pope received a very distressed call from JJ. Neither one was very sure for what reason, all they heard was ‘freaky’ and ‘fuck’ multiple times during the call. But he sounded like he was really going through something so they eventually went over—arriving at JJ’s place at 7:30am. JJ was too on edge to even try and call them out on it.

“Dude, breathe,” Pope muttered, watching JJ run holes in his carpet from how much he was pacing. “Calm down a little—“

“I can’t calm down, Pope!” JJ snapped, looking at his friends who seemed far too calm. “Like I don’t know if I am freaked out or pumped but just—“ He paused, seeing the look of confusion on his friends’ faces. He huffed and pulled his shirt off, looking at them expectedly. They didn’t react.

“JJ, did you really call us down here on SATURDAY MORNING because you have another birthmark that looks like George Clooney because I will literally murder you—“

“No, no!” JJ hissed before pointing down to his abs, and then his arms. Then he began flexing, yet he was met with blank expressions again.

“Dude, as much as I love staring at your abs, what the fuck are we meant to be looking at?” Pope asked, his eyebrows furrowed in confusion.

“They are different!”

“They are?”

“They are!”

“Uh…how?”

JJ scoffed, as if it were obvious. “They are more defined!”

“…more defined?”

“Clearly!”

John B let out an unattractive snort, pushing his hair back as he leaned back against the wall, all his worry for his friend now gone. He was honestly concerned it was something important. “What’s next? Is your hair too perfect, J? Need a bag to cover how gorgeous you are?” Pope snickered along with him.

“I mean, I am having a good hair day…” JJ trailed off before shaking his head and turning to the two of them again. “But that isn’t all, okay? It gets freakier!”

Both boys looked at JJ with amusement from their spots on his bed.

JJ rolled his eyes before he stretched his hand out, his palm facing the ceiling with his two middle fingers pressed into his palm. Not even seconds later, a THWAP echoed through the now-silent bedroom.

Both teenagers looked down at the string of substance that just existed their friend’s wrist, completely shell-shocked. It was John B who spoke first, looking away from the white substance on JJ’s bed.

“Is that like…the same as…did you just—“ John B points down to his groin area, only for JJ to grimace.

“Dude, no! EW! I didn’t just jizz from my wrist!”

“It looks like you just did.”

Pope quickly kneeled down next to the bed, hesitantly reaching to touch the stuff, ignoring John B’s comments on how disgusting it was. “It feels like…silk,” He murmured in confusion before pulling his hand away, noticing how it stuck to his skin. “And it’s sticky.”

John B gagged in the back, but JJ ignored him. “It’s like glue, a really strong glue! And then after like twenty minutes, it disappears!” He told Pope as he reached for the scissors to help his sticky situation.

“How did you do that though?” Pope’s mind was reeling with the possibilities, the science behind the completely inhumane thing JJ had just done and he had witnessed with his very own eyes.

“I don’t fucking know!”

“Does it have anything to do with that weird-ass bump on your hand?” John B perked up, nodding towards JJ. All three boys’ gazes shifted to his left hand, where in fact there was a small red bump, no bigger than a grape at most.

“Nah, dude, that’s just from the spider bite yesterday.” JJ answered with a shrug. Pope chocked on the air, looking at JJ like he had three heads.

“I—you mean the fucking GENETICALLY MODIFIED SPIDERS FROM THE LAB?!” JJ winced, trying to shush Pope but there was no avail, this boy was going off on a rant. “Are you stupid? Why didn’t you tell anyone yesterday? JJ, those could’ve been poisonous or had long term effects or—“

“Made you some weird mutant with cool powers.” John B added. He quickly shut up when he received the ‘look’ from Pope.

“We have to tell someone at Cameron Industries.” Pope concluded. JJ was quick to pipe up, taking a few steps away from Pope on instinct.

“What, no way! They are gonna stick me under some fancy microscope or inject me with needles full of…stuff! I’m not going back into that geek galore!” JJ stated. Pope looked like he was ready to open his mouth, and start spouting out arguments as to why JJ should head over to the professional scientists over his weird, overnight mutation. But it was actually John B who came to a more mutual conclusion.

“Or we just do our own tests,” John B shrugged, both boys turning to look at him with fairly discombobulated expressions. “C’mon, Pope is basically a scientist and he is smart enough to figure out whatever the hell is going on with you!”

“I don’t have half the equipment they would have—“ Pope tried to argue.

“Look, we aren’t going to find out anything through a microscope. The best way is just go out there and test what he can do. How hard can it be?” John B grinned.

Pope wanted to argue that it was very hard. Though he had read countless papers on the genetically modified spiders, even he didn’t know enough to do a full conclusive examination on JJ and his new state. He didn’t have half the things he needed, but when he looked over at JJ and saw a much more relaxed—and hopeful—expression on his face from when he had suggested returning to the lab, Pope sighed and shook his head a little.

“Just so you both know, I am going to say, ‘I told you so’ when this goes downhill.”

**********

That is how JJ, Pope and John B found themselves standing on the roof of JJ’s apartment complex, the busy streets of New York oblivious to the scientific discovery that is happening above them. JJ couldn’t tear his eyes off the skyline, finding something about it much more relaxing that the potential of just what his new body could do. He was scared—no, scratch that—he was nervous, anxious if you will. JJ couldn’t lie that a part of him was excited. It felt surreal, like something out of one of those comics he used to nick from the uptown kids. Then again, JJ wasn’t very fond of the idea of being some new scientific discovery. It made him feel like he would end up like one of those poor frogs they had to dissect in biology—poor fuckers.

“Okay, so the spiders were made from three separate species to optimize their physical properties—being able to adapt to new environments, heightened senses to avoid predators, enhanced strength and speed, stronger material to create webs for larger prey—all that jazz. No research has been done on the psychological properties though.” Pope rambled, his hands moving wildly whilst both boys stared at him with clueless expressions.

“Which means?”

“JJ could have some really cool powers but could also be going totally insane,” Pope said with a sheepish shrug. “Like I’m talking full Tasmanian devil mode here—“

“Very reassuring, dude.” JJ stated bluntly. He took it all back, he wasn’t excited. He was terrified now. He glanced down at the small bite on his hand, which was slowly deflating as time passed. JJ wasn’t sure if he was relieved or worried that the second the bite disappeared, it could mean something really bad—like him turning into some massive humanoid arachnid that attacks the city. He shivered at the thought. “Right, let’s just get on with this.”

John B clapped a hand on his back, a small smile on his lips. “You’ll be fine, dude, alright? You’re in good hands.” He tried to reassure JJ. And JJ knew that everything Pope was saying was just to help him understand what was going on too, but he couldn’t help but think there was a small part of Pope that enjoyed using JJ as a lab rat. He was a scientist, could you really blame him?

“Yeah, I know.” He said with a curt nod.

“Let’s try the web again, see how far you can shoot it.” Pope piped up, moving to stand on the other side of JJ. “The average spider can shoot a web to about four feet, but these spiders have the DNA of the Darwin Bark Spiders which can shoot webs up to eighty-two feet. I’m gonna go out on a limb and say you could reach the same, maybe more.” He then gestured for JJ to try it out, pointing towards the building opposite then, which was only around eight feet away, at most.

JJ took a deep breath before extending his hand out, the THWAP sounding clear despite the ongoing traffic down below. Yet, the web barely shot out a couple of inches before landing on the edge of the roof with a disappointing splat.

“Well then…” John B trailed off, all three boys staring at the failed web shot.

“You clearly weren’t trying, just concentrate!” Pope said with a clap of his hands. He only received a blank stare from JJ.

“I was trying, dumbass! It’s harder than it looks. It…feels weird, man. Like a sneeze…from my wrist!” He huffed, but Pope only nudged his shoulder to try again.

JJ sighed and turned to face the opposite building again. He raised his arm, his eyebrows furrowed in concentration as he tried to imagine the web shooting out and reaching the opposing roof. He tried to imagine more web fluid being shot out his wrist, he tried to imagine like he actually knew what he was doing. Not even a second later, the THWAP sound was heard and suddenly there was a white rope of silk extending from JJ’s hand onto the next roof over.

“Holy shit!”

JJ grabbed the web, giving the web a light tug. He was expecting for the web to break, for his hand to be covered in web fluid. But instead the web remained, strong and sturdy as though it was bolted onto the roof.

“This is crazy, dude.”

He snapped his hand back, watching the web breakaway from his palm and flop, hanging from the brick wall like a pathetic piece of string. “That was cool as fuck,” He murmured as he glanced down at his wrists in shock. He gently ran his thumb over his wrist, a delightful shiver running down his back. It caused him to smile a little, thinking about just how far he could shoot these webs.

“Dude, you could swing around like Tarzan now.” John B snickered. JJ gave him a deadpan look but he couldn’t help himself from glancing down at his wrists again.

“You think?”

“Only one way to find out.” John B grinned.

Pope’s eyes widened slightly as he quickly began to shake his head. “You don’t know if the web is strong enough to hold his weight, he could hurt himself or—“

“You calling me fat?” JJ gasped with a pout, a hand placed over his heart. “You offend me, Pope. Thought you were better than this.”

“If calling you fat will stop you from swinging off a building like an idiot then yes, I am calling you fat.” He hissed.

JJ grinned, his eyes quickly searching around before he noticed a large satellite pole sticking out from one of the nearby buildings. It was a bit further away, but JJ let the pride of his last success get to his head. “I can do it, bud, don’t worry about it.”

“That’s my boy!”

“Don’t encourage him!”

“He can do it!”

“How the fuck do you know that!?”

“Sixth sense, my dude.”

JJ blocked out the bickering, taking a couple of steps back from the edge of the roof. A running start never hurt anyone, right? He rolled his shoulders, stretching his neck from left to right. Never once did he let his gaze shift away from the satellite pole. He crouched down a little, already feeling the adrenaline build up in him. “Diver down, boys.” He grinned before he began sprinting to the edge of the building. As he reached the edge, he pushed himself off and extended his arm out, imagining the web wrapping around the pole and seconds later it did. He held the web tightly in his grip as he felt himself swinging towards the building. Whoops and cheers could be heard, though JJ wasn’t sure if they were coming from him or the boys back on the roof.

“JJ, THE WALL! LOOK OUT!”

But JJ was a little too pumped up to even comprehend what Pope was screaming until he noticed the brick wall getting closer. ‘Shit, shit, shit.’ The words echoed in his head and he tried to think of a way to slow himself down. But it was useless as he found himself colliding with the wall, his eyes clenched shut on impact.

“Oh, fuck.” He groaned, his limbs sprawled out like a starfish. A part of him thought he was dead, that maybe he hit the wall way too hard, he had a lot of momentum after all. But the muffled screams coming from his friends was enough to tell him that he was very much alive. “I’m alive!” He yelled out, slowly beginning to blink his eyes open, finding himself face to face with a brick wall. “What the…” He trailed off when he glanced at his hands, finding them attached to the brick wall.

His heart was pounding when he looked down, seeing that he was attached to the wall, very far up from the ground, with nothing suspending him. His mind was reeling, almost as though he was waiting for himself to fall and his body to meet the ground. But it never happened.

“You’re like an actual fucking spider, dude!” He heard John B yell, as though he was right beside him, which caused him to wince a little. He glanced over his shoulder, seeing them still very far away on that roof.

JJ shook his head and glanced up, seeing the edge of the roof a couple of feet from where he was stuck on the wall. He took a deep breath before slowly removing one hand, and when he was sure he wasn’t going to fall, he moved it up higher. Slowly, JJ found himself scaling the side of the building, his heart beating wildly even as he pulled himself over the edge, both feet finding the solid ground of the roof. He turned back to look at his friends, both of whom looked shocked beyond belief.

“What the hell…” He could hear Pope whisper, which only caused JJ’s eyebrows to furrow in confusion.

“This is a lot more complicated than I thought.” He muttered to himself, only now realising that the bite mark on his hand was long gone.

**********

JJ winced a little as he heard the bell ring, indicating the end of this period and the start of lunch—his favourite subject. Yet, JJ wasn’t exactly jumping out of his seat as usual. It was now Monday and everyone was back at school. JJ, Pope and John B had spent the better use of the whole weekend to run around, using JJ like some lab rat and seeing just what he could and couldn’t do. And JJ was fucking exhausted. The amount of times he had face-planted into a wall was beyond funny and he had learnt the hard way that the more on edge he was, the more sensitive he was…well, to everything. The sound of the chairs screeching against the floor made him cringe, the bright LED lights made him want to cry and the feeling of his sweater against his skin was scratchy and uncomfortable. JJ sure as hell wasn’t hyped for his newly found powers if this is what the rest of his life is going to be like.

The blond sighed to himself as he shoved his stuff into his backpack, swinging it over his shoulder and heading towards the cafeteria once he left the class. He kept his head down, finding the small shuffles of his vans against the floor were helping him from cussing out every single student that bumped into him, making him honestly want to scream and stay six feet away from everyone. He tried to reassure himself that he was half way through the day, that he only had a couple of hours left and then he could preferably go hide in a hole somewhere for the rest of his life. Okay, that is a little dramatic but a dark hole sounded great to JJ right now.

But here’s the thing, JJ is a Maybank. He has the good ol’ Maybank luck, which means even when he feels shit, the universe is out to make his life worse. And the universe sent that in the form of Rafe Cameron and his loyal little minions, Topper Thornton and Kelce Smith. Midtown High’s own version of the Plastics, some may say.

By some, I mean JJ. But hey, don’t judge. He was forced into watch Mean Girls by one of his flings awhile back and he won’t lie, the movie slaps. But that is besides the point.

“Oi, Maybank!”

JJ inwardly groaned at the sound of Rafe’s voice. He would much rather hear nails on a chalkboard than whatever Rafe had to say. JJ wouldn’t consider them bullies, they were simply the top tier of the uptown kids who had some sort of superiority complex. And JJ had no issue on challenging them, it was far too easy to wind up a bunch of rich kids who weren’t used to being called out on their bullshit. And it just stuck. They would say something stupid to try and provoke him, and most of the time JJ’s words were enough for them to leave him alone. He had the satisfaction of punching Rafe in the face a few times, but usually Pope and John B were quick to hold him back. After all, it would backfire on JJ if he got into trouble with an uptown kid.

“What do you want?” JJ huffed out, glancing up at the trio. The sight of the three of them almost brought a smile to his lips. Uptown kids and their need to follow trends, they wore the same outfit in different variations and it honestly made JJ want to laugh. The classic preppy look with their pastel sweaters and tennis shoes, it made JJ want to gag. But he contained his vomit as Rafe spoke up.

“Aw, c’mon, Maybank. That all you got today? A bit pathetic.” Rafe snickered, the other two laughing along with their leader. JJ rolled his eyes. The funniest thing about them was their outfits.

“As much as I’d love to talk to you little pastel powerpuff girls, I have much better things to do in my life,” JJ said with a sarcastic smile on his lips as he side-stepped the trio, attempting to make his way past them. He really didn’t have the patience to deal with them today. He had happily planned to steal food from Pope and take a nap for the hour. But the second he felt Rafe’s hand on his shoulder, he knew that wasn’t going to be happening.

“Watch your mouth, Maybank.” Rafe spat, his hand tightening on JJ’s shoulder. The act made him want to cringe away and rip off his skin. The feeling of his hand on his shoulder, his thumb brushing that little bit of skin near the neckline of his sweater, it made JJ want to gag. It felt horrible. He wanted that feeling gone.

“Piss off, Cameron.” He scoffed, harshly jerking his shoulder so Rafe’s hand would lose its grip but it only tightened. In an act of desperation, JJ did the only thing that seemed reasonable. He shoved Rafe away. Now normally, it would be enough to have Rafe stumble a few steps so JJ can make a quick exit. But JJ just so happened to have forgotten that this wasn’t like every other normal time. He wasn’t normal anymore. So, his shove was much more than a wee push, it was more like completely winding Rafe. JJ couldn’t help but cringe when he heard the sound of Rafe’s body colliding with the lockers before he slumped to the ground, a dent now evident in the lockers from the collision. Topper and Kelce looked at JJ with mixed looks of confusion and fear before rushing to their friend’s aid.

“Oh my god, Rafe!”

JJ’s head snapped to the end of the hallway where he could see Sarah Cameron, but she wasn’t alone. Beside her was the curly haired girl from the trip. His eyes widened a little when his gaze met hers, but he was only met with a glare from the mysterious beauty.

“What’s your problem?” She hissed at JJ as the two girls got closer, now seeing the full effect of what JJ had done. JJ gulped a little, his fingers tapping the side of his legs as he tried to think this through. What could he say, ‘oh sorry, kinda lost control of my new powers, I’ll be a little more careful next time’. Yeah, that wasn’t going to work.

“He started it!” JJ blurted out, only to mentally smack himself at how childish he sounded. “I barely touched him, he was being dramatic!” He added but the looks of uncertainty didn’t reassure him that they bought it. He was in the lion’s den here, a downtown kid surrounded by the privileged. He was never going to win. So, he did the only sane thing any downtown kid would do. He got out of there as quick as he could.

“He could be concussed!” Sarah Cameron spoke up for the first time, a frown on her face as she met JJ’s gaze. He could almost feel the judgement oozing from her.

“Maybe he will finally have some brain cells knocked into him!” And with that, JJ ran out of that hallway and didn’t stop running until he was far away from the school.

**********

“I’m sorry what?”

Following the fiasco on Monday, JJ’s week hadn’t been much better. Most of it was spent avoiding the uptown crew whilst simultaneously keeping a low profile, which is very hard for someone like JJ. He was used to being the class clown, milking any attention he got. Now he felt like he was under house arrest or something, trapped to keep to himself and work out what the hell was happening to him. But true to their commitment of being his best friends, John B and Pope were right there beside him. It had been a long and stressful week but they made it through. It was a little exhausting on them but they had each other to lean on. JJ was just glad he wasn’t alone.

But now, sat in Pope’s bedroom on the Saturday night, looking between the two boys with a very concerned look, JJ wasn’t sure his weekend was going to be any more relaxing. He knew the three of them combined weren’t the best combinations. They probably shared a brain cell between them and even then, it mostly resided with Pope and his weird, random facts. They had come up with some really strange, out-there ideas before—like the time they tried to give John B a perm with household products or when they convinced themselves they could do a road trip in John B’s crappy van. But this was the icing on the cake. This was enough for JJ to confirm that his friends had completely lost their mind.

“Think about it!” John B continued, practically rolling on the balls of his feet in excitement. JJ raised an eyebrow but didn’t interrupt him. To be honest, JJ wasn’t even sure where to start with how bad of an idea this was. “You have these super cool powers that are totally useless to everyday life, so why not put them to use? You could be like—the next Batman or something!”

“Batman was a rich dude who made gadgets. He doesn’t even have any powers. How the hell would I be like Batman?”

“Okay, bad example,” Pope piped up. “But just think about it. You could make a difference, be a hero!”

“A really badass superhero!” John B added.

JJ looked at them with a frown on his face. This now just seemed like a deranged joke. He was waiting for them to laugh, to say it was just a silly joke and move on with their usual weekend plans. But they didn’t. They continued.

“I mean, we could be a team! The three of us! You’ll go out and do all the crime fighting, Pope can make crazy gadgets and do all the…tech stuff and I can be your guy in the chair, you know?”

“My guy in the chair?”

“Yeah, you know, the guy in the headset…surrounded by screens…telling you where to go when you need extra help and stuff.”

“What?”

“Like Pope would set it up, but I would be the mastermind behind it! Like you’re stuck in a building and can’t find a way out, I would help you find a route. Your guy in the chair!”

JJ only shook his head, pressing his fingers to his temples to try and not completely lose his temper.

“And like every superhero ever, you’ll need a suit. So, I went looking through some stuff and I found my mum’s sewing machine,” Pope fumbled around in his pocket before he pulled out a small bunch of red fabric. He threw it to JJ, which he easily caught. JJ then realised it was like a ski mask, with two small holes for his eyes. “It’s not much but we can work on it, keep your identity secret and everything.”

“Oh, and you’ll need a badass name! I was thinking like Night Monkey, or—“

“—Spiderling!” Pope interrupted with a grin, clearly proud of it. But JJ had enough.

“Can the both of you just shut up!” He snapped, both boys instantly quieting down, looking at JJ with concerned looks. “Okay, are you out of your mind? Me? A superhero? Hate to fucking break it to you but I am not the superhero type guy, alright? I’m not your friendly neighbourhood nice guy helping old ladies cross the street or getting cats out of the tree! I could give zero fucks about the law cause all its there for is rich idiots to manipulate and use to ruin lives of people like us!” JJ cried out to them, letting go of any hope he had on trying to keep his cool.

“People like us don’t become heroes, alright? We are usually the ones that get locked up. And knowing my luck, I will be thrown straight into some loony house, in a straitjacket because of these powers! You guys have to be absolute fools if you think any of this would work.” JJ huffed as he stood up, shoving the mask into his pocket before making his way to the door. “I don’t care about other people, alright? I care about you guys, my mum and most importantly, myself. Why the hell should I risk my life for a world that won’t appreciate it anyways.” Both boys stood there stunned, looking at JJ with wide eyes and parted lips.

“JJ—“

“No, okay? Superheroes are meant for comic books and movies, not real life, alright? Grow up.” And with that, JJ slammed the door as he left the apartment.

JJ scoffed, muttering to himself as he walked through the dark streets of New York, deciding to take the longer route back home. He needed the time to clear his head, grasp his thoughts. He didn’t know what the boys were thinking, he was definitely not fit to be a hero. Were they out of their minds? Give a guy some abnormal powers and suddenly he should be putting on a cape and preaching morals. That wasn’t JJ, that would never be JJ. He was selfish, arrogant at times and beyond prideful. But he was aware. He knew what he was and he knew he didn’t have what it took to be a hero. Pope and John B needed to stop being ignorant and see that.

He rolled his eyes at the thought and continued his way back to his building complex, hands shoved in his pockets with his right-hand clenching around the fabric of the mask. Small puffs escaped his lips as JJ started regretting taking the long way home. It was October and winter was promising to come early, JJ could tell that much by the stinging cold against his cheeks. The cold was just the cherry on top of his bitter mood.

Yet, as JJ continued to make his way home, he could hear the sound of people talking, causing a frown to form on his face. JJ had walked this way many times, especially during the night, and the chance of passing someone down these streets were fairly rare. Maybe the odd one here or there, but a group of people? Definitely not common.

At first, he ignored it. He had gotten used to the heightened senses over the week, being able to hear things from a distance even when he didn’t try. For all he knew, he could be hearing the muttering of some people a few blocks over. So, he ignored it and carried on walking. But then it started getting louder and clearer. JJ felt his whole body go on alert, the hair on his arm standing up, like his body knew something was off. He could feel it in his gut, a horrible realisation that this wasn’t going to be his usual walk home.

It wasn’t until when JJ turned the corner that he realised just what he had walked into. There stood around five men, all wearing masks that covered the lower half of their faces. They were dressed in all black, probably to draw less attention to themselves, but JJ could see the glint of guns in the light of the lampposts shining down on the street. They stood outside a building, three of them seeming to try and block the view of the other two. It was then when JJ’s brain actually caught up with what he was seeing and realised what the building was. A bank. These guys were trying to rob a bank.

Well shit.

The way JJ saw it, he had two options here. He could turn around, pretend he didn’t see anything and let them get on with what they were doing. Chances were they would either get caught by the police or he would see that the bank had been successfully robbed tomorrow morning on the news. Or JJ could do something about it. He quickly grabbed his phone from his pocket, only to see that it was dead. Of course, it was the good ol’ Maybank luck. He shoved it back into his pocket and looked towards the five men.

Then an idea popped into his head. A stupid, insane idea that was nothing short of self-deprecating and downright dumb. It was short of one of the worst ideas he had ever had. JJ had done a lot of weird stuff in his life but this definitely tops it all. And the worst part was that he was going through with it, because as much as he hated it, it was his only choice right now.

“I’m gonna regret this.” JJ huffed to himself as he snatched the mask out of his pocket and pulled it down over his face, adjusting it so he could see through the small holes Pope had made. He let out a breath, shaking his shoulders a little as he tried to pump himself up, get his adrenaline going.

“You got this, it’s not like they have guns or anything,” JJ muttered to himself as he placed his hands on the wall of the building across from the bank, the one he was currently hiding around so the bank robbers wouldn’t see him, before he began to scale the building. I mean, who would expect the enemy coming from above, right?

He stopped around half way up the building, thanks to the heightened senses he was able to still see the criminals clearly. He watched them closely, seeing only the three men that were on lookout where the one with guns. “Oh, let’s hope this works.” He whispered to himself before extending his arm out.

“What the fuck!” One of them called out as his gun was snatched from his hands in the blink of an eye, his two friends following a similar reaction. JJ wasn’t even thinking about where he was throwing the guns, just as long as they were nowhere near these dudes when he confronted them.

He watched them freak out, yelling at each other as they looked around for the culprit to their missing guns. He heard the half-ass threats they used and tried not to snort before he shot a web to one of the lampposts nearby and swung down, landing gracefully at the top of the lamppost.

“Guys, I hate to break it to you but someone lied, bank doesn’t open until tomorrow morning.” JJ called out to them, giving a small shrug. All five heads snapped up to look at him, and the glares he was receiving was enough to tell him that these guys weren’t big jokesters.

“Piss off, kid, this is none of your business.” One of them replied in a blunt, scruffy voice. It honestly made JJ cringe a little.

“You see,” JJ sighed. “I’ve made it my business so…” He trailed off before snapping his wrist, a web shooting out to stick to the head of the closest criminal and with a firm tug, his head hit the pole before he slumped to the ground.

One of the men growled at JJ, clearly not happy about some weird kid interrupting their wee heist. “You had your warning, kid. Come down and play with the adults.” He taunted before JJ noticed the glimmer of something in the light. A knife. Of-fucking-course the gun wasn’t the only weapon they had on them.

“That’s a bit unfair, isn’t it?” He commented, shooting a web to wrap around the criminal’s wrist, prepared to pull it out of his grasp, only for the robber to tug the web instead, sending JJ flying off the lamppost and falling on his ass to the ground. “Fuck!” He hissed as he quickly jumped to his feet.

“Life is unfair,” The criminal muttered before reaching to punch JJ but he easily dodged it. The speed and agility with which he moved with clearly distracting the criminal long enough for JJ to kick him hard enough that sent him stumbling back into the wall. JJ barely had time to process it before he snapped his hand to the left, stopping a fist that was inches away from his face.

“Nice try, asshole.” He huffed before twisting the criminal’s arm before sending a swift punch to his jaw. There was a satisfying pop sound that told JJ he would be preoccupied for at least a couple of minutes.

He then noticed two of the criminals trying to corner him, and he couldn’t help but smirk a little under the mask at just how cliché it seemed. In seconds, JJ has webs shooting out each wrist, attaching to the chests of each men, before yanking the two towards each other. Groans echoed through the empty street as both men collided with each other.

JJ’s head snapped to the side when he heard an angry battle call as he saw the man with the now dislocated jaw running towards him. JJ crouched down a little before he began running towards the criminal, his arms hooking around his knees. He kept running forwards until JJ felt glass smash around him and the two of them fell through. He quickly got up, wincing at the window he had just broken before turning to the criminal and giving him a good smack in the face—he definitely wasn’t holding back with his strength on that one.

JJ began to work fast, not knowing how long each of the criminals would stay dazed and unconscious for. In no time, he had them piled together, a healthy amount of web fluid keeping them tied together. They wouldn’t be going anywhere—at least for twenty minutes. But it was just JJ’s luck that he didn’t have to worry about that time limit because not even seconds after he finished, he heard the sirens and saw the blue lights flashing down the streets.

Police cars began to surround the bank, creating a semi-circle to prevent any possible escape. Officers began to exit their vehicles, guns set and loaded and now aimed towards JJ. “This is NYPD, keep your hands where we can see them!” One officer called out.

“Shit,” JJ muttered to himself as he raised his hands in the air, watching as officers slowly approached the crime scene.

He watched as a look of confusion washed over their faces as they took in the scene: the smashed window, the five tied up men, the weird silky rope that was binding them together and of course, JJ in his crappy mask.

He watched as they evaluated the situation. Watched as they tried to piece it all together before one officer—the badge telling JJ her name was Captain Peterkin—stopped in front of JJ with raised eyebrows. “Did you do this?”

“Sure did, ma’am.”

“Why?” Another officer perked up, JJ could see his badge said Officer Shoupe.

“They were robbing a bank, what did you want me to do? Sit around making daisy chains until you showed up?” JJ immediately defended, glaring as best as he could with the mask on his face.

Peterkin smiled a little before she cleared her throat, JJ’s attention shifting to her. “Then I guess we owe you a great deal of thanks for your work.”

“All in a day’s work, can I leave now? I’m sure the security cameras will give you all the answers you need.” JJ stated as he already began to take a few steps away from the crime scene, walking backwards.

“Can we at least know your name?” Peterkin asked.

JJ looked down at his wrists before he snapped them up, watching as the web attached to nearby building. He looked at Peterkin and couldn’t help grin under his mask as he answered her question before tugging on the web and swinging away into the night.

“Call me Spider-Man.”

Taglist: @alphinias @popcornhook @loveyatopluto @teamnick @peanutbelley @iccyyyybitch @jiara-maybank @donkey-is-my-spirit-animal @carissarose16 @unspokenfaith @largedenominationsplease @jiaaras @homebody-nobody @smileymikey @hvitstark @shaymq7 @hmspogue @falseungodlyhours @aarchiess @rcsales @raeoffuckingsunshine @jjskiaras @parker-holland-osterfield @thesadprose

[yoon-kooks]

Blood to Spare

Pairing: Prince!Jimin x Knight!Reader

Genre: Angst, Smut, Royal!AU

Summary: When a malicious threat is made against Prince Jimin’s life just hours before Garreg Mach’s annual ball, it is your sworn duty to accompany him as his date and ensure he makes it through the night unscathed. For as the Prince’s personal guard, you must be willing to cut down any blade that takes aim at him, even if it’s your own heart.

Word Count: 6.7k

Warnings: blood, death, fingering, unprotected sex, it’s honestly super vanilla

A/N: wooooooo 2020 is finally here and so is prince jimin;;;;; this fic is based around fire emblem three houses, but you don’t need to know anything about the game to enjoy the story! but if you do love fire emblem like me, you’ll pick up on some references here and there. also lmk if you guys are interested in a prequel and sequel! ++special shoutouts to @d-noona and @scalbra​ for the love and support💖

-

You examine the bright red trail streaming down the set of ribs in front of you. The boy lies there in pain, but you offer him no sympathy. It’s his own fault, after all.

“Agh!” He tightens his fists as you press the weight of your body down onto the wound. And if the pressure alone is not enough to make the boy beg for mercy, you know what is. Alcohol and ointment seep into the depth of his gash until the burning sensation draws the response you’re looking for. “Is all of the pressing and stinging really necessary, Y/N?” he yelps.

“It wouldn’t be necessary if you had been more careful like I advised, Jimin,” you shake your head, bandaging up the boy’s disinfected ribs. “But we can’t afford to have our beloved professor and future ruler of Fodlan bleed to death after a mock battle with his students. Especially not with the ball tomorrow evening.”

In the land of Fodlan, an annual ball is held during the Ethereal Moon to celebrate both the year’s end and the founding of Garreg Mach Monastery. For this year in particular, it is crucial for Fodlan’s Prince Jimin to be present and act as a bridge that unifies the continent’s three main nations: Adrestia, Faerghus, and Leicester.

And although you despise formal gatherings such as this one, it is your mission as one of the Knights of Seiros and Jimin’s personal guard to ensure that the Prince is well and able enough to fulfill his political affairs for the night.

“Speaking of the ball, I have yet to find myself a date,” Jimin says as he reclothes his upper half. “It seems no one is interested in sharing a dance with me…”

You know that’s a big fat lie. Jimin may not be the only professor at the Officers Academy, but he is certainly the most popular one amongst both students and faculty due to his charm and royal status. Even back when he was a student himself, he always seemed to have everyone wrapped around his finger. Everyone except you. Though you suppose that’s the reason you were appointed to be his personal guard since becoming a Knight of Seiros.

“That’s too bad,” you say. Again, you offer no sympathy or solution to the boy’s misfortune.

“Well since all of the Knights of Seiros have to be at the ball anyway, I wouldn't mind if you were my date, Y/N.” He tilts his head to the side and smiles, as if that’s going to make the offer any more tempting.

“No thanks. My job at the ball is to protect you, not dance with you,” you shake him off. This isn’t the first or last time he’s tried to make a romantic advance on you. The naïve teenage you might’ve been swooned, but ever since devoting your life to protecting Jimin, romantic affairs have become of little significance to you. “And besides, if you’re not in immediate danger, it’s better for us to keep a distance at the ball.”

Jimin’s smile fades because he knows you’re right. It would reflect poorly on Fodlan’s future ruler to be associated on an intimate level with someone who lacks nobility and a crest. With a heavy sigh, there’s nothing the boy can do but concede defeat to your rejection. You, on the other hand, have more to say.

“Rather than worrying about finding a date to dance with, keep in mind your responsibilities as the prince. Tomorrow is an opportunity to build a stronger relationship between-”

“-the three nations,” he interrupts your scolding to end the conversation. “You don’t have to remind me, Y/N.”

It is not often that the Prince speaks with bitterness towards you. You don’t take personal offense from it, though, because you know it comes from a place of built-up stress and frustration. To be born into a position of power has its cons too, and you know better than anyone that this isn’t a path Jimin would’ve chosen for himself.

Still, it’s your duty to make sure the Prince is properly fulfilling all of his duties. And sometimes he needs to learn to set aside his personal feelings, just as you’ve done with yours.

“Very well,” you say, stepping out of his room. “I’ll see you in the morning, Your Highness.”

-

When morning comes, the walk to the Knight’s Hall feels exceptionally long and quiet. Students are rushing to set up last-minute décor and finishing touches before sundown when the ball is set to begin. However, all that chaos and chatter is drowned out by the piercing tension between you and the boy you’re escorting.

It’s clear he’s still mad at you. Probably because you last referred to him, not by name, but by status. Ever since you became his personal guard years ago, he’s always encouraged you to simply call him Jimin. It took a while, but you eventually picked up the habit and noticed the delight on Jimin’s face whenever he heard his name. As far as you know, you’re the only one who drops the formalities with him.

But because you had purposely called him “Your Highness” out of spite, you’ve now reopened the gap between you and him. Like cutting back into an old scar.

You’re thankful when you finally reach the Knight’s Hall and your fellow Knights of Seiros waste no time in filling the void of silence that had followed you into the room.

“Early this morning, a student found this letter posted on the doors to the Entrance Hall,” Seokjin hands you a torn parchment paper to look at.

“We cannot allow the nations of Fodlan to become one under the absolute rule of the Central Church here at Garreg Mach. We urge the Archbishop to consider canceling the annual ball, and with it, the meeting between Adrestia, Faerghus, and Leicester. If not, we will have no choice but to burn the bridge that seeks to unify Fodlan as one. Peace shall never be found in an allegiance that blindly sides where power lies.”

It only takes a second for you to piece together who the target in question is—the bridge that seeks to unify Fodlan, Prince Jimin.

“They want the ball cancelled or they want the Prince’s head,” you grind your teeth.

To an extent, you understand the point of disagreement between political views. The current rule, for example, does not exactly favor the Crestless or have plans of changing that any time soon. Even if Fodlan were to unite as a single nation as it had hundreds of years ago, the divide between nobility and the Crestless would only continue to increase.

That being said, a threat on the Prince’s life is enough for you to set aside your own feelings as a Crestless. If someone is willing to go as far as point their blade in Jimin’s direction, they are already dead in your eyes.

“I’ve already spoken with the Archbishop and she wishes for the ball to proceed as planned. For all we know, this could be an empty threat. I doubt the enemy has the means to break through our defenses,” Namjoon says. “However, we, the Knights of Seiros, will still need to be on high alert to ensure the night runs smoothly.”

“Understood,” you say, glancing at the boy whose life is on the line. “I will not allow anything to happen to the Prince.”

“Actually,” Namjoon continues, “the Archbishop has requested for you to act as Prince Jimin’s date for the night as a precaution to any assassin that may be lurking from within the monastery.”

“Understood,” you say again, but with an awkwardness far worse than the silent void from earlier. The last thing you need is to act all lovey-dovey with the boy you just rejected and are not on good speaking terms with.

Once the other knights have left to stand guard and investigate the origins behind the letter, your mind starts spinning. You don’t want to formally attend the ball, you know nothing about the proper etiquette of nobility, Jimin probably hates your guts, you don’t know how to dance, you have no gown to wear, and Jimin probably hates your—

The boy motions for you to follow him, pulling you out of your daze and into town to grab all the essentials for the Garreg Mach annual ball.

-

Several hours later, you sit in the Prince’s quarters, staring at the long flowy gown you’re supposed to be wearing. As a knight with a commoner upbringing, the occasion to wear such a fancy garment never arose, so you feel a bit perplexed with what to do next. For starters, you don’t even have a clue how to get it on.

“Do you need help?” Jimin raises an eyebrow at you as he straightens up his royal blue uniform, one very well suited for a prince.

“I got it,” you shake your head. Succumbing to the Prince’s assistance would only be a sign of weakness. You’ll find a way to figure it out on your own if it means avoiding Jimin’s gaze as you struggle to get the dress on. “Just turn around for a second and don't watch me from the mirror either.”

“Yes, Your Highness,” he hums, lowkey throwing shade as he turns his back to you. You haven’t yet apologized for calling him that, but he’s definitely making sure you’re aware of it.

You bite your tongue until you’ve stepped into the dress. It still feels a bit loose, but you put it on to the best of your ability. When you give him the okay to turn around again, the first thing he does is crack a smirk.

“What?” You shoot him a dirty look.

He gestures for you to come closer and spins you around. As he reties your dress’ complex ribbons from behind, you feel the gown becoming snugger in the appropriate places. Very slightly, you feel the cold tips of Jimin’s fingers tickle your skin as he ties the last ribbon at the back of your neck. You don’t say anything, but your body reacts accordingly.

“Oh? Someone has goose bumps,” he snickers, spinning you back around to face him. Before you can blame it on his cold hands, he gives you a good look from head to toe. “The dress looks pretty on you, by the way.”

“Thank you, Jimin.” More than his compliment, you’re thankful that he’s at least speaking kindly to you again. “And my apologies for yesterday.”

The chilling tips of his fingers have since wandered up to your cheeks, and the only reason you don’t swat him away is because it’s something he’s done since the two of you were little. He cups your cheeks and gives them a gentle squeeze before jumping back to the conversation as if it were nothing. You’ve never questioned him about it, but given the context of all the times you can recall, you assume it’s his way of showing forgiveness.

“I should not have lashed out at you in the first place. The thought of becoming Fodlan’s ruler is just… a lot for one person to bear,” Jimin finally releases your cheeks and backs away to the edge of his bed. “But that’s why it’s a relief to have you with me at my side tonight.”

“That’s what I’m here for. Not just tonight,” you remind him. “Always.”

“Yeah, but it’s not every night I get to see the cold-blooded Y/N all dolled up and without a swor-” He cuts himself off when he sees you lifting up the skirt of your gown as if you’ve forgotten a (handsome and needy) boy is still in the room with you.

You’re so focused on trying to hide your trusty Hero’s Relic sword, Blutgang, beneath your dress that you do not realize how much of your lower body you’ve exposed. “A knight can never be without their blade.”

“What if it tears the gown open…?” Jimin’s question gives the illusion of concern, though he probably would not be opposed to that scenario.

“It would be embarrassing, but I’d rather be embarrassed than unprepared,” you blink at the boy.

“I suppose you’re going to stick the whole Aegis Shield down there as well then?” He blinks back. You know he’s trying to clown you, but it’s also no secret that you’ve never been without the shield since it was gifted to you from the Prince himself.

You shake your head. “It’s too big to hide. I don’t want to stand out anymore than I already will.” Because amongst a crowd of nobles and royalty, a Crestless like you will be no more than a fish out of water. Even the most beautiful gown cannot hide that reality.

“If anyone says something about you, I’ll-”

“You’ll smile and move on because you have a reputation to maintain,” you finish the statement for him.

“Will you really be okay with that?” Jimin frowns.

All you do is nod. You don’t need protecting or for your feelings to be spared. It’s your job to defend him; not the other way around.

-

As the sun sets later that evening, you follow the Prince’s lead into the glamor and prestige of Garreg Mach’s annual ball. Aside from keeping an eye out for anything suspicious, all you need to do is act pretty and proper. You’ve learned at least that much after observing the event from afar all these years as a Knight of Seiros.

You don’t hold his hand, but rather, you hook your arm around his. If you were truly in love with your date, you’d much prefer to intertwine your fingers with his and never let go. That, to you, would feel more comforting and secure. But love is not the game you’re playing.

As Jimin makes his rounds to greet each and every guest, you evaluate their individual intentions. Fortune, luxury, reputation, power. From years past, you recall that many female guests had also made romantic advances on the Prince through not-so-subtle caresses, bedroom eyes, and the like. The way you stare at them with such intensity of judgment must be quite intimidating because not a single romantic advance is made on Jimin this year with you beside him.

Even through the casual, yet all important, gathering of Fodlan’s leaders, you observe no sign of suspicious activity and sense no danger to the Prince’s life. The King of Faerghus, the Emperor of Adrestia, the Leader of Leicester, and Jimin all chat as though they are one big happy family, each expressing interest in moving forward with the unification of their nations.

If the letter turns out to be an empty threat as Namjoon suggested, perhaps the unification of Fodlan can be settled without any casualties. That would be the best case scenario, though you’re still skeptical that anything could ever be that simple.

Once handshakes are exchanged and the meeting is adjourned, Jimin sends his fellow leaders off with that charming smile of his, and you try to do the same. You wouldn’t exactly describe your own smile as charming—“forced” is probably a better word for it—but it seems to be satisfactory enough for all but the Adrestrian Emperor.

She doesn’t say anything, but her long stare in your direction tells you she knows something. Whether it’s that you’re the only Crestless in attendance, or that you were once a child of Adrestia, she finally returns a smile similar to your own before heading back out of the meeting room.

“That went pretty well, didn’t it?” Jimin pulls you in closer to him as the two of you step back into the lively reception hall where most of the guests are gathered. When you turn to face him, he radiates. Part of you wants to mention the off-putting vibe you got from the Adrestian Emperor, but a larger part of you wishes not to put a damper on Jimin’s high spirits. So you keep your mouth shut.

Besides, you believe the Emperor’s intentions, if any, are not directed toward the Prince. And that assumption is quickly confirmed based on the gossip now floating around amongst the noble guests.

“What business does a Crestless have with the Prince?”

“Prince Jimin can do so much better.”

“I heard that’s the one who slaughtered an entire army with a stolen Hero’s Relic.”

“The one also responsible for Prince Hoseok’s death?”

“Such a sinful Crestless exists?”

“At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter who he’s fooling around with. As heir to the Fodlan throne, there’s no way anyone would allow him to marry below nobility.”

You do your best not to roll your eyes at the comments made about yourself. They don’t upset you, but you are annoyed. You certainly do not need to be reminded of your worth, your sins, or that Jimin would be better off with literally anyone else as his date. You don’t need to hear the very thoughts that have haunted and tormented your mind for as long as you can remember.

They don’t know your whole story, and you don’t care to share it with them either. Let them think what they will.

You suddenly spin Jimin in front of you, close the distance as much you can without kissing his ear, and whisper, “Can we get a change of scenery?” The boy agrees and pulls you away from the festivities of the ball.

“I wish you didn’t have to hear all that nonsense,” he says after closing the door to his quarters. Luckily, his room is not too far from the reception hall.

“Oh, I wasn’t bothered by that,” you shrug, unhooking the sword from the garter on your thigh and leaning it with the unused shield. “I just wanted those foul guests to believe we eloped or something. Maybe they’ll start a rumor about that too.”

“Y/N,” Jimin sits you down on his bed, “I can tell when something bothers you, you know.”

“How?”

“You start acting petty out of spite.”

He’s not wrong. Your pettiness is one habit you’ve never been able to shake from your soul. “Regardless, those nobles can think or say whatever they please about me. Nothing will ever change the worth of a Crestless anyway.”

“It shouldn’t matter if you bear a crest or not,” he says softly.

“It shouldn’t, but it does. It matters plenty to the nations of Fodlan. Crests hold a lot of power, which means bearers are not exiled from their own bloodline, they are not expendable objects, and they do not have to fight for their right to exist. If not for the Central Church, you and I-”

“You and I would not have met.” He’s wrong.

“We wouldn’t have met under these circumstances, but we would’ve met,” you say, “as enemies of war.” Because had the church not taken you from your birthplace of Adrestia as a child, you’d surely want to stop Fodlan’s unification like the ones who wrote that letter.

“Then I’m forever grateful we met the way we did,” Jimin leans over you until your back is down against the bed. From above, he has you in a place of vulnerability. “Because I will always fancy you more than any bearer of a crest.”

From below, you look up into his eyes and find solace in the one person you want to trust. It’s just a matter of accepting that solace and allowing yourself to trust enough to let him in.

Before you know it, soft caresses of the Prince’s lips invade your skin. He starts just below your cheek and works his way down your neck, leaving a trail of kisses as he goes. Your chin lifts and tilts on its own, as if to uncover more skin for the boy to please. He thankfully picks up on the cue and tends to your needs.

At the same time, you struggle to downplay the desperation in your body. You shouldn’t be having an intimate moment with the Prince when you’re supposed to be protecting him. After all, it’s wrong to be so lustful for a forbidden affair.

But the feeling of him against your bare skin is painfully addicting. The more he kisses, the further you want to go.

“We shouldn’t… be doing this…” you manage to say against your desires.

“What should we be doing then?” Jimin’s fingers run through your hair as he waits patiently for a response, but even the most innocent touch is making it hard to think. You only have one thing consuming your mind, and it isn’t what you should be doing.

You reach for his ruffled collar to pull his body down closer to you, practically reducing the space between you and him to nothing. To answer the boy’s question, you start unbuttoning his uniform from top to bottom. After tossing the princely uniform aside, it only takes him a second to rid you of the gown that had seemed so difficult to get on.

Without thinking, you pull him back on top of you. You’re aching to be touched, you need to be relieved of this unbearable heat, and you’ve reached the point of desperation where your legs are spread out as wide as they can go.

“You poor thing,” Jimin teases, staring right between your thighs for the longest second until finally swiping a sample of your glaze. He makes it a point to show you how wet you’ve made his fingers before sucking them off with a naughty smirk. “Is this what years of lusting after me tastes like?”

You hate that he’s very much aware of the feelings you had for him at one point in time. However, those feelings have since become much more complex. You’ve done your best to block out any romantic feelings and channel those lost emotions elsewhere for the sake of protecting the Prince. So what does that really leave you with?

“Aah…!” A moan escapes your throat when Jimin’s fingers give you another pleasant surprise down there. Only this time, he strokes you in a circular motion, over and over again. Your breathing quickens to the rhythm of his touch—he’s taken control over your body’s sensual instincts. And every time he casually brushes against your erect little bud, a wave of sensitivity makes you gasp out in pleasure.

Though your eyes remain shut for the most part to cope with the immense pleasure, you do catch a glimpse of the Prince’s now swollen cock. Either he’s been multitasking while pleasuring you, or the sight and sounds of your feverish state were more than enough to get him hard. When he stiffens and moans upon your sudden touch, you know it’s the latter.

As you glide your hand up and down his length, you angle yourself right beneath him to be in the optimal fucking position. With your free hand, you use your index and middle fingers to spread yourself open, and, with the other, you direct and ease the handful of cock into your entrance.

Once Jimin’s in deep enough, you let go and soothe the throbbing of your excited clit. As you take your time in building up the intensity, you glance up at the boy to make sure he’s watching you play with yourself. The sheer arousal reflected in your eyes seems to encourage him to start thrusting in and out of you to build up his own climax.

As your fingers continue to tease your clit and Jimin’s length continues to run through you, the sensations become so overwhelming that you can no longer tell where they’re coming from. Your entire body feels hot and tingly as if the sex were a wildfire that spread from head to toe. The only difference is that you wish the flame would never go out.

Based on how much Jimin’s moans have increased in volume and frequency, you can tell he’s as close as you are. You at first try to keep your fingers in rhythm with his quickening thrusts, but the rhythm is lost when the fucking becomes driven by total lust and no thought. Still, you manage to hit your high just before he reaches his.

For a long while, you lay there, waiting for your heartbeat to calm as Jimin does the same from above. If there was ever any tension, sexual or not, between you and the Prince, it’s certainly gone now. Looking up at the boy now, after the waves of sex have finally settled, you feel at peace. Even if it’s short-lived, you have to be content with the intimacy you were able to spend with the boy you once loved.

So when he goes in for the long-awaited kiss, you have to interrupt him. A kiss from the Prince would be asking for a little too much on a forbidden night of many other sins.

“I should go back to being your guard now,” you say softly, scooting your ass over to change back into the gown. “Then we need to return to the ball. I’d hate for assassins to attack over there while we’re here in the middle of… this…”

But before you can hop off the bed, Jimin stops you in your tracks. “Don’t worry, the assassination attempt won’t happen.”

“How can you be sure?” you ask in genuine curiosity because there must’ve been something you missed.

“Because I was the one who faked the letter this morning.”

You freeze. Why would the Prince ever want to fake an assassination threat on his own life? You can think of one reason, but you really hope that’s not the case. “Jimin, if you faked a dangerous situation for the sake of getting me to attend this damned ball with you, I won’t forgive you.”

When he fails to give you a response, you ball your hand up into a tight fist and start putting on your usual knight uniform as opposed to your gown. You can’t believe you allowed yourself to be so foolishly deceived.

“Y/N, wait-”

“Do you really not give a damn about your own life or duties as the future ruler of Fodlan?” you snap. “I’d rather give my life for someone who prioritizes their responsibilities for the sake of the entire continent than an entitled little prince who’d forgo all of that for someone born without a crest.”

You’re mad at not only the Prince but also yourself. You thought that after being so blinded and betrayed by trust once before, you’d never forget the fatal consequences of opening your heart to anyone. Trust and compassion have only ever brought you despair.

“If the assassination threat was all a hoax, I suppose my protection is no longer needed for the rest of the night.” You pick up your sword and slam the door behind you, leaving the shield behind once again.

-

You escape to the woodsy outskirts of Central Fodlan south of the monastery. The area may be recovering now with young saplings and shrubs as small animal families return home, but you still remember the scorched land from years ago when the first war you fought in took place. No matter where you walk, you stand on the soil once soaked in the blood of your enemies and allies.

But before the war, you had often paid visits to this secluded part of Fodlan whenever you needed time and space away from the monastery. There, you had first encountered a kid around your age who was kind enough to befriend you, despite your differences. It’s a shame you can no longer go back to the time when you could ignorantly trust in people without worry. And even if you could go back, you’d do everything differently so that the Prince would not have had to suffer the desolate fate you bestowed upon him.

It’s all your fault for carelessly putting your trust in others.

When you find a tree tall enough to lean against, you unsheathe your sword and examine it under the moonlight. The reddish brown sheen that reflects in the light is not rust, but your sins. It seems the blade will never be rid of the blood that tainted it on that day.

“It’d be best if we could lure the Prince and his guard away from the festivities.” Your sharp ears pick up on a small troop of rogue soldiers headed in the direction of the monastery. It sounds an awful lot like an assassination attempt.

From behind the tree, you try to figure out what the heck is going on while also deciding on the best course of action. Why are there foreign soldiers going after Jimin if he said the threat was a fake?

…Unless he was lying about that too.

You groan silently to yourself. For as long as you’ve known Jimin, he’s always been quite unpredictable to you and his actions are often questionable until you get an explanation. Perhaps there’s a better reason for his lie this time. But for now, you have to find a way to lure the soldiers away from the innocent guests at the monastery.

Just then, you swing your sword around at the slightest brush against your shoulder, but it turns out to only be the foolish Prince everyone’s looking for. You lower your blade.

“What are you doing, walking out here without a guard?” you hiss.

“Actually, I’m looking for my guard who seems to have abandoned me,” he says with the Aegis Shield you had left behind.

“That’s what you get for being an irresponsible Prince.” You keep your eye on the soldiers. “But before I smack you in the head for that, we have to do something about that troop over there.”

“They don’t look really tough, though.” Jimin takes the opportunity to lean right over you against the tree, but you aren’t quite ready to start accepting his flirtatious antics again.

“But that’s what makes it suspicious,” you blatantly ignore his failed kabedon. “They know they won't stand a chance against the Knights of Seiros, so why even bother?”

“It could be a trap?” he suggests. “Or maybe they have other intentions.”

“Whatever the case, we’ll stop them here and now.”

You make sure the Prince has a sword of his own before shoving him out from behind the tree. If the rustling of dead leaves did not already capture the attention of the soldiers, your shouting and waving at them does.

The alarmed soldiers quickly shift their sights from the monastery to you and the Prince. As soon as they begin to charge, so do you. Unlike many royal guards who stick close to their highnesses, you do not. Jimin may have lived a life of luxury as Prince, but you’ve made sure he learned how to fend for himself. In fact, he was the one who suggested that you teach him proper swordsmanship in the first place—perhaps one of his many elaborate schemes to get closer to you.

As soon as you clash blades with a soldier brave enough, you recognize the enemy troop is no pushover like you and Jimin had anticipated. Though they have the appearance of commoners who’ve never held a weapon in their life, the power behind their swing is comparable to your own. And it doesn’t quite add up.

When you’ve suppressed several soldiers, you glance over to Jimin exchanging blows with an assassin who has a more proper handle of his blade. Jimin’s golden shield blocks many of what could’ve been fatal blows, but its weight also hinders his movement against the nimble assassin.

You rush over, whipping your sword at the assassin to push him back from Jimin’s vicinity. Once you engage in a long drawn sword exchange with the assassin, you’re taken back by the familiarity in the energy he emanates. It somehow feels like the power from the Crest of Fraldarius, the very crest that Jimin bears. But that can’t be the case when crests are inherited through specific bloodlines by chance. And as far as you know, this random soldier has no blood connection to Jimin or House Fraldarius.

Either way, you eventually gain the advantage and pierce the enemy as the curved blade of your Blutgang bleeds once more. Crest or no crest, the enemy nor the Prince can keep up with the mercilessness in your every swing. In what feels like minutes, you’ve cut down the entire troop aside from the few that Jimin could handle himself.

You stare down at the body of the soldier who had given Jimin an exceptionally hard time. “Did you notice that this one had-”

“The Crest of Fraldarius,” Jimin nods. “There’s no mistaking it, but somehow it felt off.”

“Like it wasn’t the real deal?”

“Like it was a crest that didn’t belonged to him.”

The boy’s suggestion gives you something to think about. You wonder if the other soldiers also had crests of some sort—crests that were not rightfully theirs. It’s as if they were once Crestless who somehow extracted and obtained the power of a crest. Perhaps by the means of the most sacred and darkest of sorcery.

Just when you’re finally able to lower your sword, you raise it again to guard against another unwelcomed guest. With a stream of dark magic striking the earth in front of the Prince, you dash over to shield him from any other potential impacts. What you get instead is a mysterious hooded mage who doesn’t seem interested in challenging you. The magic that radiates off him is far stronger than any of the other soldiers.

“Well done on putting a stop to our little assassination plot,” he says. “But it seems we’ve already gathered a lot of valuable intel on our real target.”

“Who’s your real target then?” Jimin asks.

“Someone who can wield Hero’s Relics and slaughter crest bearers despite bearing no crest of their own.” The mage looks first at the bloodstained blade in your grips and then directly at you. His eyes are not so different from your own—empty.

Rather than the Prince’s head, they wanted you.

But why?

Before you can ask the man, he disappears into the unknown along with the bodies of his fallen soldiers. And although the outskirts are quiet once more with only you and the Prince, you keep your eyes peeled and wait a good ten seconds before sheathing your weapon.

You try to make sense of the enemy’s true intentions from a rational perspective, but the mage’s words still do not sit well with you. What exactly were they planning on doing with you, a Crestless who can wield Hero’s Relics and slaughter crest bearers?

“I won’t let them have you,” Jimin nudges your side, whilst holding the Aegis Shield out in front of you and him. “I’d even die for you.”

“Oh, how the tables have turned,” you play along with his dramatic scene just for a moment. Something about the boy makes you forget about your worries, your pain. “But please never die for my sake, Jimin.”

“Then how about I live for you?” he asks.

“Live first for the people of Fodlan,” you respond, hooking your arm once more around his. “Shall we return to the ball now before everyone wonders where their Prince ran off to?”

“No need. I already properly excused myself from the ball for the rest of the night.” Jimin frowns when you unhook your arm faster than you can swing your sword. “But I would like you to escort me back to my quarters.”

“Fine,” you agree. “But on the way back, you need to tell me why you lied about faking that real assassination threat.”

So he does.

“I still think it was a stupid move, Jimin.”

“I just wanted to take your mind off of your knightly duties without worrying about my safety for once! I thought you’d feel more comfortable with me if you knew my life was not in immediate danger,” he waves his hands in defense. “I didn’t think you’d actually abandon me.”

“Well sorry for thinking you made up the threat just so I’d sleep with you. You made me believe you weren’t taking the nature of your job seriously, and that the future of Fodlan was doomed with a ruler who thinks only with his cock,” you jab lightly into his ribs, forgetting all about the wound from the day before.

“Worry not. The future of Fodlan will always be my first priority,” he assures you. “But you are also part of Fodlan’s future, aren’t you? Doesn’t that still make you my first priority then?”

“When you put it that way, I guess so,” you say, though you genuinely wonder about that. Because as a Crestless, you’ve never felt like you belonged in Fodlan. “But just know that you needn’t go that far for me, Jimin.”

“And you needn’t act so tough all the time, Y/N.” He wants you to know that you can rely on him, that you can be vulnerable, and that he’ll protect you just as you protect him. You understand all of that, and yet, it’s still easier said than done.

Once you safely escort the Prince back to his quarters, you think you can finally relieve yourself of guard duty for the night and put some real thought into the mysterious mage’s intentions. But you’re wrong.

“Let me clean up that wound on your cheek before you go,” Jimin air-pokes the high point on your cheek.

“I didn’t realize I was cut there in battle…” you say, letting the boy reel you back into his room.

You sit patiently on his bed as he searches for a bandage, but you wouldn’t put it past the senseless Prince to not have any medical supplies lying around his quarters. You’re the one who’s usually tending to his wounds with your own first-aid kit anyway.

When not a single bandage is found, Jimin walks back over to you and pinches your cheeks together just as he had earlier in the day. You don’t quite understand the context this time, and especially not after he sneaks a kiss onto where your supposed wound was.

“That should heal the wound.” The smile on his face is too smug for your liking.

Very quickly, your face turns into a big fat pout. “If you continue to lie and fool around like this, you’re going to end up like the boy who cried beast.”

“For as sharp as you are in sniffing out an enemy, you sure are gullible around me, Y/N,” he teases.

“That’s because I want to believe that everything with you is real,” you say, “even if it can’t.”

The boy’s smile is quick to fade.

“Just kidding,” you shrug, getting up from the bed. “Anyway, I should get going now. Goodnight, Jimin.”

He doesn’t stop you. He can’t stop you because he knows you weren’t kidding about wishing for a fate that wasn’t meant for you. And that’s not something a kiss could ever change.

While you’re glad Jimin will be taking responsibility in prioritizing Fodlan from here on out, you still have much to be concerned about. Your presence has only complicated matters when the Prince is someone who thinks with his heart, not his head—to the point where he’d give up everything for you.

You’ve tried to make him set aside his personal feelings for the sake of Fodlan’s future, but it’s apparent that he cannot separate you, the one he wants to protect, from Fodlan, the land he needs to protect. He cannot see that, no matter how much he wishes for things to be different, you and all the other Crestless will never truly belong in the future of Fodlan—the Fodlan he will soon lead.

If you were to leave his side, perhaps he would be able to see that he’s trying to make the impossible possible. After all, unless Crestless are able to prove their worth to the nobles of Fodlan, they are worth nothing at all. The only way to prove your worth is to be merciless, tough, and to spare no blood. And maybe only then would Jimin be able to fully realize that this is where your two paths diverge.

It’s only after you’ve walked out and closed the door that you leave the Prince with one last thing to consider. “I know my place in this world, and it’s never been with you, Jimin. Even I’m not that gullible.”

[terror-slut]

Food For Thought

Something  quite smutty I wrote a few months ago and originally posted on AO3. It's quite a long read, but I thought I might as well post it on here.

Pennywise x reader, Bob Gray x reader.

Genre: smut, horror

word count: 4578

Teeth. Rows and rows of sharp, pointy teeth piercing her neck then, taking root in the thrumming jugular vein in her neck. It burns, it burns so fucking bad that she’s surprised the intense pain hasn’t taken it’s inevitable toll on her yet, although she questions if perhaps her mind is trying to separate itself from her body. Somehow, she’s still aware of her surroundings, although everything appears hazy. Around her, everything is spinning, spinning, spinning as if she has just gotten off a fast whirling carousel after eating one too many cotton candies.

Her head swims, not able to rationalize a thought that makes sense, or any thoughts at all. The blinding pain is so extreme, resembling the feeling of a thousand needles stabbed into her skin without a care or a goal, agonizingly slow and painfully breaking the skin apart to expose little streams of warm blood that puddle together at her feet.

 She wants to let out a noise, any noise. Her mind screams at her to call for help, be smart, use the vocal cords mother nature blessed her with. Instead, all that leaves her now iron tasting, blood filled mouth is the last soft, dying gurgle of a defeated prey.

 Her body is covered in a soft film of sweat when she wakes, barely registering her unaware, still very much asleep husband that lies next to her. Her heart races, adrenaline coursing through her on edge body as she attempts at steadying her ragged, uneven breath. The clean, white sheets are bundled up at the foot of the  bed, odds-on kicked off by her at the pinnacle of her nightmare. A shaky sigh leaves her lips as she runs her clammy hand through the sweat soaked strands of her hair.

 The same reoccurring nightmare has been terrorizing her for the past 7 days, getting worse and worse, feeling more realistic each time it enters her mind. The bags under her eyes now have a purple hue to them due to the lack of sleep she has been getting. Truth of the matter is, she has been too frightened of going to sleep at night, doing as much as avoiding it entirely. There was enough housework to keep her busy, and that was even after she had been done going through about every single file she could probably prepare for upcoming work meetings.

Her husband, Michael, had laughed at her silly avoidance behavior, telling her that steering clear of such a silly thing as a simple nightmare would only make it worse. And so, with Michael’s scornful words ringing in her ears, she decided to give sleep one more chance. A decision which she deeply regretted by now.

Beside her, the man in question is still peacefully asleep, unaware of the horrors playing through his wife’s mind. Wobbly legs swing over the side of their shared bed, eyeballing additional crescent, nail shaped imprints on her legs in the soft shine of the moonlight invitingly streaming through the opened window. Another sigh falls of her parched lips, this time more in annoyance than in an attempt at calming herself down. She has the habit of attempting to fight off the monster who’s teeth claim her neck nightly, except, in the real world, no one is there, which only results in her accidentally marking up her own skin while asleep. Still, it is freaky how many scratches are carved into her skin by now. It’s hard to believe she has done them all in the span of just a week. If she didn’t know any better, she’d think…

 But now she is just scaring herself. Monsters don’t exist and she wasn’t a child any longer, she had long passed the age of believing in anything supernatural or evil.

 Slowly, her uncovered feet connect with the cold linoleum tiles, carefully tiptoeing over to the bathroom Michael and her shared. Before locking the fake silver handled door, she flicks the light switch on and scans the bathroom in its entirety, something she hasn’t done since she was a teenager. she carried her childhood fears with her for quite a while longer than just her childhood, but eventually, she had grown out of them. Something that seems irrelevant to the reoccurring nightmare.

 Come on, she tells herself as she sits down on the toilet seat with shaky hands, how old are you again? Old enough to be married. Old enough to have a degree and a job. Old enough for her mother to start asking for grandchildren. Way too old to be scared over puerile, meaningless nightmares.

 Once the toilet is flushed, and with them, hopefully her fears – something her mother had taught her a long time ago; after a bad dream, you flush the toilet and down the drain goes the nightmare – her tired eyes find their reflection in the bathroom mirror. She washes her hands, slow but thorough, the water washing away the remnants of foolish dread.

 Maybe she should paint the town red again, it suddenly hits her. The thought of going out was something that hadn’t occurred to her in quite a while, but maybe a sloppy, rough fuck from a complete stranger in an unfamiliar setting would be exactly what it would take to get her mind off of things.

 And so, at quarter to one in the middle of the night, a young woman in a skin tight dress tiptoes out of the half empty apartment, her husband left soundlessly asleep, blissfully unaware of his wife’s infidelity. The door softly falls in the lock behind her and the warmth of the lingering summer air hits her face in a comforting way, as if to tell her ‘don’t worry. He won’t find out. He’s never found out before.’

 The empty asphalt is silent under the roaring Audi, and her ringless finger – she’s not stupid enough to wear her wedding ring on a night like this – flicks through the similar sounding radio stations, silently pondering if it was worth going to The Sitting Duck, a bar on the outskirts of Derry. Derry was a small town, mostly consisting out of elderly. Anyone with a future had left the dying excuse of a town long ago.

In her mind, in theory, she knew she should feel guilty about cheating on the man whom she pledged faithfulness to in front of the alter, but she could not muster up the strength to actually be guilt ridden. She loves Michael, she does. But a girl has needs, and love won’t fill up those lust crazed, empty holes.

 -

  When she spots him – him and the balding 60 year old man a few seats away from him, who’s undressing eyes roam over her like a starving animal observing it’s next meal – she can tell he’s not from Derry. No one born and raised in Derry dresses or smells that good. She walks past the fine-looking and deliciously scented man (cinnamon? Pumpkin? Some strong earthy undertone) and sits down across from him, where she observes the gangly man like a scientist examines bacteria under a microscope before deciding if she wants to close in on the kill.

 He is a man of importance, it radiates off of him effortlessly like a heatwave in the middle of June. His suit clad shoulders are broad, and his legs are clunkily folded under the bar, and oh, good God, she realizes, he must be taller than any man she has ever had before. His features imply that he’s a young man, older than the woman sniffing him out like a famished dog, but not by more than a handful of years. In his white gloved hand is what seem like a bloody Mary. Typical.

His hair is dark and slightly messy – not that she minds; if she was allowed to have her way with him, his messy hair would be the last thing either of them had to worry about – and his eyes-

 Fuck.

 And his electric eyes have found hers, amusement glistering on the surface. A god awful embarrassment red sneaks up her heated cheeks, and she’s sure she looks like a creep, or a stalker, or maybe both; a creepy stalker, but no. He is actually tapping the seat next to him in an inviting fashion, cocks his head to the side as if to dare her to come over. She dares.

 “Hi,” she sheepishly introduces herself to the hypnotizing being in front of her. A lazy smile graces his lips as he shakes her stretched out, ringless hand with his gloved one.

 “Hello,” his voice is unsurprisingly husky, the gravel of that singly greeting sending a pleasant shiver down her spine. “I couldn’t help but notice you looking thirsty from over there, all by yourself.”

 Before she can even begin to mutter her apology, sorry-I-am-a-complete-idiot or maybe even a refuting huh-who-me-no-way!, he raises her glass to her, then winks. The fucker winks.

 “You know, you can just order them at the bar,” he teases her, nudges her with his elbow like they’ve been friends for years.

 “Gee, thanks. I’m not allowed out of the basement much. Not used to this whole leaving the house thing,” she jokes, and he throws his head back laughing like a little kid, and butterflies flutter through her entire being without as much as a warning. Jesus, this man was really God damn fine.

 He grins, introduces himself as Bob Gray, and orders her a bloody Mary with extra lime, the assumption she made about his own pick-me-up turning out to be accurate.

 “So, what do you do?” she curiously inquires, making a case of brushing her thigh past his knee while settling down on the bar stool right next to the lanky man.

 “Do?”

 “For work. Or are those gloves a fashion statement?”

 “What gloves?” She stares at his uncovered hands, no ring, nimble but long fingers wrapped loosely around his glass and heat creeps up her cheeks for the second time that night. She could’ve sworn he was wearing gloves earlier. Her eyes dart from his hands back up to this bright blue eyes and plump lips, curved up into a grin, all teeth and genuinity.

 “You’re a bit of an odd one, aren’t you?” she’s starting to feel an awful lot like having a fever dream, the sense of slipping between being asleep and wakefulness swimming through her mind. Could it be the lack of sleep from the previous nights? It had to be, or perhaps a trick of the light. Before the disorienting bewilderment consumes her, said ungloved fingers link with her bare arm to catch her attention, careful and soft, as if not to startle her.

 “Are you alright?” God, and he’s nice. He’s nice and he is funny and he looks even better than all her favorite dirty daydreams, and she wants the nightmares gone so bad and she wants more of his touch, more of him, so fucking bad.

 “Yes. Yes, more than fine, actually.”

 Michael doesn’t pop up in her mind like he usually does when she accompanies an attractive stranger home, not this time. She could be sorry, but it seems hypocritical. There was no way in hell she was letting the man sitting next to her go, not with the way his lingering touches, against her knee, soft on her arm, pressing on her shoulders, still burn on her skin like winter fire. Just as she had suspected, the current stranger does not live in the hopeless excuse for a town, but he does stay at the Derry townhouse. He takes her there, wastes no time on niceties, just how she likes it. It’s like he can read her every thought, sense the desperation for relief radiating off of her.

 Sweet, plump lips bridge the distance the second she gets her coat off, hungry, desperate, searching. Biting.

 “F-fuck,” she breathes against him, warm blood dripping down her bottom lip like honied tea spilling over the edge of a hot mug.

 “I’m sorry,” the red liquid coat his apologizing lips now, curled up in a Cheshire cat grin. His tongue unapologetically darts out from in between his parted lips, long and pink, licking away her spilled blood, first off of his own lips and then of hers, like she’s nothing more than a tasty treat. Fuck. She hit the fucking kink lottery.

 “You’re not,” she ascertains playfully, hands brazenly and without a warning shoving the lanky man that easily towers over her down on the musty couch in the deprecated room of the townhouse. He lets her, she’s awfully aware of how he lets her small frame overpower his much bigger one. In a tangle of limbs, the man of all her dirty daydreams yet to come yanks her down with him, lips chasing each other as a unexpectedly soft chuckle escapes from her throat.

 “You’re right, little one,” his breath is hot on her neck, and his hand tugs on her hair with a pleasant sting to it. His teeth graze the undisturbed skin hungrily, rows and rows of sharp, pointy teeth piercing her neck and then his tongue leaves a hot, long stripe down the length of her throat. “I’m not so sorry. I’m not sorry at all.”

 The tight but steady grip his big hands hold on her hips renders her dizzy with white hot, blazing want for the stranger below her. A laugh, one similar to the one he had let out earlier on the evening, but now somehow more cruel, escapes from his throat as she wiggles under his iron grip, desperate for more physical contact.

 “Tell me what you want, little one. Maybe I will decide to be kind enough to give it to you,” the pet name he has for her flush her cheek a bright red and send an unapologetic rush down her legs,

 “I want you,” she whimpers meagerly, entrapped by the delicious dig of his warm digits in her sure-to-be-bruised-by-tomorrow skin, and he cocks up one uninterested eyebrow at her sweaty face.

 “Not good enough.”

 “I want…. I want you inside of me,” and she’s convinced that did the trick when his fingers finally move, away from her hips and lower, lower, lower… The hem of her dress comes apart under his probing fingers, a soft, anticipating groan escapes her. His fingers are so close to where she needs them most, the warmth of him radiating brightly against the soft flesh of her thighs, and then… And then he stops.

 He snorts, displeased yet entertained by the eagerness of her trashing around in his grip, the needy whine falling off her lips.

 “Your cock inside of me, I want your cock inside of me, please!” she begs, her dress is ripped to pieces now, something that would cost any other stranger a mean fucking slap across the face, but not him. Not Bob fucking Gray with his magic hands and silver tongue.

 The old couch creeks underneath the shifting weight of the tangled together mess of limbs as he flips her naked body over sloppily like a rag doll, rough and careless and pressed along the length of her body. The suit on her one night only lover crinkles as he ruts his hips against her completely naked form messily, his hand teasingly on her clit, insufferably slow, soft circles. His cock is hard and infuriatingly out of reach, the few layers of clothing extracting a needy groan from her.

 “Such a dirty, dirty girl,” he grins in her hair as he pulls his hips away from hers, the contrast of the delicious sound of the teeth of his zipper being undone and the emptiness against her behind earning him an eager buck of her soft hips.

 For just a fleeting moment, a questioning when the hell did he take my panties off runs through her mind, but the thought is gone as fast as it showed up when he ruthlessly teases her already dripping cunt with the head of his cock, so barely there and wet, and fuck, since when was she such a pleading mess? A chuckle leaves his lips when she eagerly bucks her hips back again, begging and writhing against the tall stranger for more.

 “I want your cock inside of me, who?” He’s cruel, he’s awfully and unreasonably cruel and she feels like tears could stream down her cheeks from pure, undenied pleasure that she knows he can give her.

 “B-Bob, please,” she gasps, the tip of his leaking cock on her throbbing clit now, hot and heavy and- and then it’s gone again. A tsk in both her ears so vivid it feels like the noise is coming from inside her skull overpowers her own pleading whine for some contact, any at all.

 “Sir?” it’s a strangled question coming from her throat that provides her nothing but a correcting squeeze, first her ass, then her nipple when she stays quiet underneath him.

 “Come on, little one. You know what I want. You’ve said it before,” he hotly hisses down her neck, teeth sinking in the soft skin of her shoulder as a warning, and then it hits her. She does not stop to wonder how he knows about her past experiences, too drunken on the unadulterated bliss of him.

 “Daddy, daddy, daddy, please!”

 “Good girl. Good, impatient, little girl,” he giggles, he fucking giggles openmouthed against her cheek like he owns her as he sheaths his full length into her cunt all at once, hot, hard and filling.

 Stars rest on the field of her vision when he doesn’t even fucking bother to let her adjust to the alien full feeling of him, hitting every single spot so God damn ass kickingly perfect that it takes her a full minute to realize that moaning noise is coming from her. As far as she’s able to rationalize any different thought than oh God, oh God, oh fuck, yes she ceases her whimpering.

 “Don’t hold back those tasty moans now,” he growls, almost sounding inhuman, blended with the rhythmical thrust of his hips, knocking the breath out of her. His cock hits spots she wasn’t aware of having, like he shaped his cock to fit her dripping cunt like a perfect match.

 “Tell me I’m the best you’ve ever had in your miserable short little life time. Better than your disappointingly, small-dicked husband,” the pretty stranger has a way of making every word that leaves his mouth sound filthy. He has her draped uselessly over the couch as he pounds into her like there’s no tomorrow, it’s hard to get anything else but mind-dulling moans out.

 “Tell me,” he hisses, pulling her body flush against his, his big hand wrapped dangerously tight around her throat.

 “Y-you have the best cock I’ve ever felt in my miserable short little life time,” she chokes out with heated cheeks of embarrassment, knowing the man currently filling her up won’t be satisfied with any less. “Better than anyone else’s.”

 He chuckles, letting go off her throat not a moment too soon, black patches in her vision threatening to take over, the rhythmic slap of his flesh against her roaring around in her ears.

 “I’m going to c-cum,” she gasps, the satisfying stretch of his cock too much with the way his nimble fingers have found their way down from her throat to her clit.

 “Oh no, you won’t. Not until daddy says you can.”

 She clenches dangerously tight around his cock, earning a harsh slap against her aching pussy, leaving her gasping for air.

 “I don’t recall giving you permission to cum yet, my eager little cum slut,” he hisses against the base of her skull, tugging on her hair painfully brutal. The tone in his voice is ruthless and threatening, but his cock twitches inside her like it’s living its own life, and the mere thought of his warm cum dripping out of her has her moaning, and she clenches around his girth again, prepared to deal with whatever consequences he sees fit to punish her with.

 The intake of his breath is sharp when his seed spills, hot and thick, triggering her own orgasm. The tremble in legs would’ve been sure to have her fall to her knees if it wasn’t for the old couch underneath her, supporting her weight. Stars appear behind her closed lids, hoping, praying to whatever deity that the overpowering, blissful surge between her legs never ends, that perfect Robert Gray and his perfect cock never leave from the snug space between her trembling legs.

 They stay like that for a while, minutes, hours, after they come, she couldn’t tell you even if you held a gun to her head. The final peaceful moments before the storm. Then, he pulls out of her, cock gone soft and his seed dripping down her legs like it belongs there. She bites her lip, sad to let him go. He pats her head, as if to tell her good job and she finally switches positions, her muscles thanking her.

 The couch lets out a protesting creek when she shifts her weight from her bruised knees to her sore ass, the ripped up dress she wore earlier that night catching her eye.

 “You fucked up my dress, you know.”

  “I want to eat you,” he ignores her remark with a low growl, and she laughs, closing her eyes as she revels in the afterglow of sex and uncramping her muscles. It’s like a second orgasm all over again.

 “As much as I’d love that, I have to get back to my husband,” when he stays silent, she turns to look at the handsome man in front of her, only to see his blue eyes flicker to an unsettling shade of yellow and drool dribble down his chin. It’s unsettling, triggering goosebumps down her entire body.

 “I really should get going,” she repeats, blinking twice, praying that what she’s seeing in front of her is an illusion, a trick of the light, the unenviable costs of her lack of sleep.

 It’s none of those things. It’s not an illusion, nor a trick of the light, nor consequences of insomnia. In front of her now, where handsome Bob Gray stood mere seconds ago, now stands a terrifying 7 feet tall clown. His hair is a fiery red and his body is clad in a Victorian style clown costume. She has never really been scared of clowns before, but then again, the clowns she did meet didn’t shapeshift from handsome men into clown creatures in front of her, nor does the clown face seem etched into their skin.

 “Y-you’re not real. You can’t be real,” He — no, it, because the being in front her could not be human in any way, shape or form — uncovers its teeth in a sickening twist that could almost pass as a smile, teeth that suddenly look all too familiar to her, she now realizes with a start.

 “I-I’m not real?” It mocks the small, now trembling woman on the musty townhouse couch in front of the large being. “My cock was real enough for you, was it not?”

 “You… If I knew what you were, I would’ve never…” She needs to get away, or she can guess how this is going to end. How her life is going to end. Oh, God. She fucked this. It. Whatever the fuck it was.

 “Please, daddy,” it ridicules her voice, and fuck, it sounds eerily similar to her own. “You have the best cock I’ve ever felt in my miserable short little life time.”

 It watches as the doomed human now uselessly claws her nails at the door, naked and afraid. A laugh bubbles in its throat.

 “Don’t go hurting my feelings now, little human,” the clown’s voice is so different from Bob’s, higher pitched and laced with insanity and sadism. “You would be so lucky to have me in this form.”

 “F-fuck you!” she attempts to retaliate before realizing that she should probably focus on getting the fuck out of here, away from the clown in every sense of the word. Her nails desperately dig at the wooden door that challengingly stands in front of her, the doorknob that she knows was there earlier now gone.

 “Oh, but I did, little one, and you thoroughly enjoyed it,” it says in a singsong-y purr, higher now than she has ever heard it, and the pet name it made up for her now sounds more like a fucking threat than anything else. “Look at me.”

 Turning around to face the shapeshifter may be the hardest thing she has ever had to do, but the monster waits for her as if it has all the time in the world, - it probably does, she realizes - a demonic laugh ringing through her head, sharp and deafening. Her naked body trembles as she finally turns, tears ready to spill over her sweaty cheeks, faced with eight beady little eyes and equally as many legs, it’s gigantic mouth curled up in a sickening smile.

 She screams. She screams like she’s never screamed in her life before, a bad horror movie fucking scream that cracks, insanity closing in on her mind before the monster does.

 “Tasty, tasty, beautiful fear,” it roars through her skull, and it’s so close she can almost taste it’s foul breath on her face, stinking of blood and shit and piss and death. The fear is paralyzing, there is nothing more she can do but sit and watch as the horrifying being, enormous and disgusting, heaves itself towards her trembling frame, with only one purpose. To kill. Her screaming as ceased now, all that’s left is a pile of hopelessness filled to the brim with fear, as if it’s been the only emotion she has ever felt before. Hot tears stream down her pretty face, but it awakens no mercy in the beast’s eight yellow eyes, only hunger and a sick sense of sadistic joy.

 It’s humongous jaw then snaps open, glistering teeth welcoming her field of vision with a sickening cackle that can only come from the disturbed soul of the entity.

 Teeth. Rows and rows of sharp, pointy teeth piercing her neck then, taking root in the thrumming jugular vein in her neck. It burns, it burns so fucking bad that she’s surprised the intense pain hasn’t taken it’s inevitable toll on her yet, although she questions if perhaps her mind is trying to separate itself from her body. Somehow, she’s still aware of her surroundings, although everything appears hazy. Around her, everything is spinning, spinning, spinning as if she has just gotten off a fast whirling carousel after eating one too many cotton candies.

Her head swims, not able to rationalize a thought that makes sense, or any thoughts at all. The blinding pain is so extreme, resembling the feeling of a thousand needles stabbed into her skin without a care or a goal, agonizingly slow and painfully breaking the skin apart to expose little streams of warm blood that puddle together at her feet.

She wants to let out a noise, any noise. Her mind screams at her to call for help, be smart, use the vocal cords mother nature blessed her with. Instead, all that leaves her now iron tasting, blood filled mouth is the last soft, dying gurgle of a defeated prey.

 “Hmm... you taste as good as you feel.”

[talesofealdancynedom]

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

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

no warings

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

TABLE OF CONTENTS--->

<---PREVIOUS

[bigskydreaming]

The really great thing about allowing Dick and Jason to have a good relationship before A Death in the Family IMO, is that it opens up sooooo many more possibilities for AFTER Jason’s return.

For example:

Imagine a scenario where Bruce is gone for a week or so, the ever so useful “there was an offworld mission or something” excuse will do. And during that time, Dick and Jason are patrolling and working together....and they have an encounter with a particularly nasty villain or serial killer or whatever you want to go with. The bottom line is something happens during that particular adventure of theirs that leaves them shaken enough that they agree not to tell Bruce about it (believing the guy is dead or something), and then they try and put it behind them and never speak of it again.

Except then cut to a few years later, after Jason has come back but before he’s reconciled with the family, things are still strained and tense when their paths so much as cross, but with added angst because an actual brotherly bond torn asunder by death, trauma and lots of changes gives you way more fodder to work with IMO than the singular facet of Dick feeling guilty for not knowing Jason better - I mean, you have to at least admit that does limit your options considerably, in terms of their interactions, BUT I DIGRESS.

But anyway, Jason doesn’t have anything against Dick in the way he does against Bruce, other than accepting Tim into the fold (which he does understand in a way, because its not all that different from when Dick accepted him into the family and Robin role despite having plenty of legitimate reasons to be a lot more reticent about that).....but they avoid each other because its just kinda painful, the fact that they don’t KNOW each other anymore, not the way they used to understand each other in ways even Bruce couldn’t always follow or understand. Plus Jason’s attack on Tim, even leaning on the Pit madness as an altered state of mind mitigating circumstance....like, that’s still a hard thing to get past, one brother being like “Hey, lets do movie night tomorrow and totes just skip over the awkwardness of me just coming from hanging out with Tim who still has bandages on account of you trying to kill him the other day”.....its not the easiest thing to navigate, yeah? 

And the fact that while Jason does understand its not fair to expect Dick to have like, iced out this kid he didn’t go seeking out or anything, just for the sake of Jason’s memory.....that understanding comes and goes with how rational or not he’s feeling any particular day, because he GETS it, but that doesn’t mean he has to like it and he is after all only nineteen, and capable of bouts of pettiness, lol.

So even without Dick barely knowing Jason or Jason hating or resenting Dick, there’s still plenty of roadblocks in the way of an easy brotherly reunion, plenty of understandable and valid emotions and priorities and choices that make everything a confusing mess and create conflicts of interest and just a general miasma of uncertainty where its like, even though they miss each other and would love to get back their sibling bond, they don’t even know where to begin trying to go about that, you know? And throw in the state of affairs between Bruce and Jason still, which can be summed up as picture the Cold War, but now when you picture ‘Cold’ think ‘Ice Age’ and you’re almost there.

Like. That is the Mt. Saint Helens of roadblocks right there. A big ass volcano sitting in the middle of the road and just cuz its dormant now doesn’t mean that it couldn’t at any minute erupt and blow its top and destroy everything within a several hundred mile radius, and that’s just before Bruce and Jason REALLY get steamed, like, that’s just their warm-up.

So. Y’know. Difficulties. They abound.

But now throw in secrets from the time before Jason died that only the two of them know and they never told anyone else, and adventures they had when it was just the two of them, Jason visiting Dick in Bludhaven or Dick enabling Jason in playing hooky in Gotham because at that time Dick rotates methods of pissing Bruce off and that’s his go-to move for Tuesdays, and crimes they solved together like Dick was working on an investigation and let Jason weigh in to practice his deductive reasoning without Bruce and thus impress him with how much he’s improved. 

(My personal headcanon of brotherly advice Dick imparts to Jason on how to deal with Bruce is him telling Jason “when dealing with a man who thinks holding impossible expectations IS taking it easy on someone, he doesn’t understand the question, can you repeat it please....like, in that case there’s no shame in stacking the deck a little, whenever that’s possible.’)

Anyway, point being.....all you really need is one singular bad guy that only Dick and Jason faced, together, when they were younger. Someone particularly nasty or sadistic, enough to disturb even them despite how much they’ve seen and lived. And who for whatever reason, both of them believed to be gone for good, maybe they thought he fell off a cliff into a conveniently placed body of water where no body could be found or blah blah blah look you’re smart cookies, you get it.

Take those few simple ingredients, chuck them in a metaphorical bowl and stir them all together and then leave on low heat to simmer.....

And voila. Just like that, you have a ready-made situation that forces Dick and Jason, specifically, to work together despite how tense and fractured things are between them, and needing to find a way to repair their brotherly bond and figure out how to work together the way they used to.......thanks to everyone’s favorite Tropey McTroperson wherein a villain most foul, long believed dead, seems to be back and up to his old villainy.....and only those two who faced him before know how to stop him.....and despite all the reasons they come up with in their heads for why teaming up together now is just a recipe for disaster and doomed to failure, this is on them. 

They were the ones who stopped this guy before, they were the ones who mistakenly believed he was dead and the threat he posed was gone for good.....which makes his dastardly return....dun dun dun.....unfinished business for them. Its personal. 

All the completely valid, well-reasoned and justifiable arguments for why its absolutely bonkers for them to try and make like the Dukes of Hazzard on this case as if they’re not at least a little bit miffed at each other for various things involving killing certain people and not killing certain people and trying to kill certain people and being totally unreasonable about the trying to kill certain people.....none of that is enough to get in the way of them doing their best to put all that aside for now and team up to stop this guy for good, the way they should have the first time.

Because let’s face it. One of the definitive areas of common ground that Dick and Jason share is when things are personal....they take it VERY personally. And when they feel responsible for something, like, you could get God on the phone to personally deliver absolution and assure them it wasn’t their fault, and they’d still be like “LOL yeah, okay, that’s a good one ‘God.’ Didn’t know all-knowing deities could be super hella wrong about things but hey, everyone’s allowed an off day I guess.”

Anyway.

Two brothers estranged due to extreme circumstances, trauma, loss, grief, blame, the completely unreasonable and frankly just rude passage of time, and assorted other reasons ranging from “you stole my favorite weapon-Bruce-definitely-didnt-know-I-had-and-kept-as-a-souvenir when I was fourteen and you STILL haven’t given it back” to “you can’t just shoot someone as your way of ending an uncomfortable conversation, Jason”......

But force them together via external situations or shared goals, and you have the perfect excuse to sidestep a lot of the more impossible to navigate conflicts born of comic book writers who don’t freaking know how to CHILL when piling on the family dysfunction......and engineer a situation where they pretty much HAVE to retrace previous footsteps, comb their memories for every detail they can recall about that case and in the process remember how close they were then, fall back into old patterns and rhythms while working together....and various other things that give you everything you need to transplant them mentally and emotionally to a time before all those conflicts and problems created by other people, not them, when things were....better. 

While through the mere fact they’re successfully able to fall back into old habits and patterns of working together at all.....you can put them face to face with evidence that despite how much they’ve both changed and everything that’s come between them, they are still fundamentally the same people they always were, and the shared experiences and common ground and all of that which enabled them to become brothers in the first place....its all still there, still able to be brought back out and dusted off and then used to forge a new brother bond that takes into account the ways they’ve changed since they last truly knew each other.

And none of that erases or solves the various complications and conflicts and issues that do still exist in the present, because of everything that’s happened in the past few years and the things they’ve all done.....BUT, it allows for Dick and Jason at least to rebuild or find a new, sturdy foundation on which to stand and plant themselves before wading back into all of that.....so at least now they do so with firmer footing, and with a clear direction and goal in mind.....navigating the emotional minefield from their respect opposing sides.....and aiming to meet somewhere in the middle.

And then with one family bond rejuvenated, revitalized and consciously reaffirmed by both of them......then its that much easier to turn their attentions to the rest of the family, one by one, and repair or forge those bonds through a concerted effort....not just Jason on the outside looking in, or members of the family on the inside looking out at him like he’s a poor, lost soul they need to save (I can’t help but picture Jason upchucking at the very thought, eww, how dare they)......but rather, a mix of both. Jason making his way back into the family via walking side by side with an ally on the inside who is still keeping pace with him so they can present a united front while they work towards a common goal they both want.....a family that acts like a family instead of like.....idk, y’know, that thing they act like in the comics that’s called ‘a family’ but also, they all hate each other and wish everyone else would die except for the times when they forget the others even exist at all.

Anyway. That of course, is just one angle that can be taken with them, out of the many possibilities that arise just from letting them have a good relationship before Jason died.....and all the shared history, in-jokes, secrets, camaraderie, grief, etc that comes with that.

My point is just.....I talk a lot rant a lot about the fanon and fic tendency to paint them as having barely known each other back then and with it largely blamed on Dick having been a stand-offish asshole because he has a chip on his shoulder named Bruce and its not a chip at all its actually Mt. Everest, yup, the whole dang mountain, yetis and all.......

And then I kinda just....keep it there on that and how much it bugs, because, y’know. It bugs.

BUT.

In keeping tunnel-vision locked on that and nothing else, I’ve never really expanded on the other byproduct of this fanon tendency that I think is worth considering:

And that’s the fact that this angle, this story? The one where Dick was a douche and Jason doesn’t really like him because of that until Dick apologizes for being a douche back then and begs for a second chance to do better, etc, etc? Its been told. Literally hundreds of fic writers have written that story by this point, and in the process limited...confined themselves, to this one singular possible dynamic between Dick and Jason when the thing is, like....that’s pretty much the ONLY story and angle that can result from Dick and Jason barely having a relationship before he died.....basically just various executions of acknowledging their previous lack of a relationship, assigning blame, making apologies and granting forgiveness, and then from there building a relationship from scratch. 

Obviously, people come up with unique spins on this all the time, I’m not saying the stories that do this are all exactly the same....just that there’s an innate ceiling to that particular premise, because when that specific dynamic of ‘no relationship really existed before’ is your one and only starting point......there’s only so many places you can go from that, and wind up in the present where you then proceed to have them make a relationship for the first time.

BUT. But but but but but.

The second you allow for the possibility that Dick and Jason DID have a relationship before ADITF, and it just happened largely ‘offscreen’ due to the fact that no solo Nightwing or Robin titles existed back then so there was nowhere to showcase just the two of them together......

You open up like.....so many more possibilities and angles and avenues and directions.

Because the thing is, y’know how so many people in fandom pride themselves on not feeling constrained by canon, or better yet, speak fondly about the idea of just taking a flamethrower to the whole damn thing and cackling maniacally while shouting “This one’s for Bruce/Dick/Jason/Tim/Cass/whomever your fave fam member of choice might be”?

Well. I mean. *spreads hands*

The second you flip the switch from “Dick and Jason barely knew each other and mostly didn’t like each other, this is the only canon that exists despite the fact that we just made it up because we could and canon can suck it”.....to.....”Dick and Jason did have a relationship and were close before Jason’s death, its just we never saw it develop on the page due to logistical constraints”......

Suddenly.....you have THREE WHOLE YEARS of possible interaction that you can literally cram full of WHATEVER YOU WANT, and canon can’t say a damn thing about it because its Schrodinger’s Adventures of Nightwing and Little Wing......without any canon viewing point set up to observe these interactions and thus force them into a singular form that you either like or you hate and set on fire.....those Adventures can look like aaaaaaaaaaaanything you want, and canon can kiss your patootie if it doesn’t like it!

Its three whole years of “lost family history” just waiting to be mined for all kinds of treasure, and you can unlock it in any number of ways once Jason returns, to any number of potential end points.

They could have faced villains together just by themselves during that time, they could have teamed up on investigations. They could have had sleepovers, Dick could have helped him cram for tests or covered for him when he just needed to take a mental health day because dealing with Gotham’s upper class can be exhausting and he doesn’t know how to explain that to Bruce in a way that won’t just lead to Bruce saying “I know, I get it, I hate it too” even though the ways in which its exhausting to Bruce and the ways its exhausting to Jason are not the same and not interchangeable.....but he doesn’t have to explain that to Dick, because Dick is closer to an understanding of it, he’s been there for a version of that himself, and they were assholes to him because of his lower class and unorthodox upbringing too.

You could have Jason tagging along on various official or unofficial Titans missions or just meet-ups, the way Jason teamed up with them for the Brother Blood story without Bruce ever knowing. Dick’s kid brother that nobody minded him bringing because they all adored him, and thus just by having him and Dick get along, you open the door to Jason having established dynamics and history with any number of Dick’s friends, allowing for a wide range of potential reactions to Jason and his Red Hood persona after he comes back.

You could have Jason being really invested in his brother’s relationship in Kori because he thinks Kori is just the fucking coolest, or you can have Jason secretly shipping his brother and Babs and thinking they’d be a much better match but keeping quiet about his opinion as long as Dick’s happy with Kori. You could have Jason panicked and turning to Dick for help and advice the first time he asks a date to one of his school’s formal dances, because he’s pretty sure he’d be able to provide actual proof that spontaneous human combustion IS possible, if he had to ask Bruce for romantic advice, like, aside from the fact that he’s seen flies trapped in amber whose relationships appear to advance at a faster pace than Bruce’s does with Selina, that’s his DAD, eww, he can’t ask his DAD to fill him in on what’s normal to expect and likely to be expected of him on this kind of/level of dating, but Dick? He can go to Dick for that, and imagine the adorbs potential. 

And the likelihood of various Titans coming up with the flimsiest of excuses to keep popping into the room in order to spy on the adorbs-ness, and the literal natural disaster that is the combination of Wally, Roy, Garth, Gar and Joey all trying to be ‘helpful’ and offer their own dating tips to Jason, while Donna and Lilith kick back with some popcorn while taking shots at the various boys’ expertise and credentials in this matter, if they’re gonna be offering advice to an impressionable young teen who doesn’t deserve to be saddled with having to learn from THEIR mistakes.

And on and on and on. Three whole years you can fill with any manner of adventures, secrets, shared stories, confessed ambitions and hopes and dreams for the future, commiserating on the parts of growing up in the spotlight in Gotham that Bruce just can’t relate to, sharing things from their pasts that they’ve never even told Bruce about purely because there are some things that are just easier to tell or talk about with a sibling close to your age than to your father.

But you see what I’m saying? Rounding Dick and Jason’s early relationship down to the barest bones until its practically being non-existent......that makes for a paragraph or at most a chapter dedicated to covering that ground, something that everyone pretty much expects to pop up in a story in order to address that history they have, or lack there of. And thus its never really a surprise to see it, there’s not a ton to take away from it, and it oftentimes ends up kinda just being filler despite even the best writers’ best attempts to make it engaging.....because there’s just not a lot to say about a relationship whose defining aspect is it didn’t really exist, and I’m pretty sure most writers would love to simply skip past that entirely and not even bother addressing it because it FEELS like writing filler a lot of times, I imagine. But at the same time, you kinda HAVE to include it and can’t really come up with a way to just leave it out entirely, without having a gaping hole in the meat of your actual story that explains how Dick and Jason got from there to here. Its a part of the story that everybody already knows, or expects.....but still demands being included, because canon just skipped over that entirely so there’s nothing from canon to even reference when shifting Dick and Jason into the kind of dynamic you want them to have or grow after his return.

And so its a paragraph or two paragraphs or a whole chapter that nobody really ever wants to write, because there’s not a whole lot of new ground to cover with it, and its kinda a cause for resentment, being stuck having to include it in every story covering Jason’s return anyway, even though there’s only limited ways you can stretch and exercise your creativity and expand on that particular angle.

But with Dick and Jason having an actual relationship pre-ADITF that is filled with nothing but whatever you choose to fill it with, whenever you feel like delving into it or dusting off an old memory or vacation or want to reveal some long-buried secret only the two of them know.....the sky’s the limit. Instead of that standard stock paragraph/chapter rehashing the take on that particular story that everyone already knows but narrative structure forces everyone to shoehorn in somewhere anyway.....there’s more than enough in those three lost/secret years of family history, especially specific to Dick and Jason, to serve as the basis for entire fics exploring that time, digging up secrets or mysteries that originated in that time, reminiscing about that time or diving back into existing dynamics with people Jason met through Dick during that time without having to write Jason meeting them or only getting to know them for the first time as an adult.

(Omggggggg, imagine a story that’s just Dick and Jason and Uncle Clark, or Dick and Jason and Aunt Diana, and like, Bruce is like I GO OUT OF TOWN FOR ONE NIGHT AND YOU SOMEHOW END UP WITH MY KIDS HELPING YOU FIGHT AN ALIEN/DEMON INVASION ON SOME OTHER PLANET/DIMENSION??? WHAT THE HELL!)

In conclusion, you hate canon and how much it fucks with the Batfamily? Totally with you. But this is the one period in these characters’ lives where canon doesn’t actually weigh you down or cage you in if you don’t want it to....instead it gives you the gift of being whatever the hell you want it to be, just so long as you make sure everyone ends where they need to be by the time ADITF happens. (Assuming you don’t just end up going full AU by that point since there’s no law saying Jason HAS to die or else the DC universe will destabilize and implode in upon itself).

Anyway, I’ve waxed poetic about this long enough, I think, and without a single line of poetry to show for it, but that’s for the best. Me to poetry is like a butcher to a carcass, but only if this particular butcher is very bad at his job and always makes a mess everywhere, and it just never ends well for anybody.

And now, as usual, I end an overly long post that exhausted my brain cells and made me sputter to a stop just before I come up with an ending to the post that actually makes sense and isn’t just me going, hey you know what, maybe there is something to be said after all for the Sopranos’ sty - 

[docholligay]

PHARAH TRACER BODY SWAP FREAKY FRIDAY STYLE

I’m going to move on from this since I know some people want SM stuff and I’m already to 2600 words on this but I am having a GREAT time and please let me know if you want me to continue this! 

Lena Oxton was used to having an unusual life. She had been the world’s top fighter pilot, she had seen herself as a child, not knowing it meant, she was a medical miracle who by all theories and standards shouldn’t have been able to be sitting there next to Pharah when it happened. No, she was very used to life being just a little strange, just a little off-key, and mostly, she appreciated that she would never be bored, or boring.

None of which truly prepared her for waking up on a hardwood floor, twenty centimeters taller.

“Bloody…” she rolled over, her head pounding, and looked over to her right.

Her body was lying there, next to her. Her eyes widened, and her heart leapt into her throat, the tight panic of knowing that it had happened again, oh no, it had happened again, and she was out of time, and her whole body began to tremble as she thought of the pain of it–she couldn’t do it again, she’d die, it had nearly killed her the last time–but there was no cold at all. No pain. Just a strange tingling at her shoulder, which was offputting, but not painful. This wasn’t being lost in time at all.  

She was so surprised for a moment, that she forgot to be afraid, and sat up.

“Am I dead?” Her voice echoed off the walls, but it was wrong, it was deep and rich and nice enough, but it wasn’t hers, was it?

Her body began to moan next to her, and pinched its fingers at the bridge of its nose.

Tracer looked at herself. “Uh..you alright…me?”

Her body mumbled something in Arabic.

Tracer looked down at her hands, one metal, a gold ring welded to it, and one so much darker than she’d fallen unconscious with. Her hands, or at least, the ones she was currently processing, flew to her hair, a small low ponytail fixed to the back of her head, a gold bead wrapped around a strand. She looked back to her body, and crawled over next to it.

“Fareeha?”

Her body’s eyes opened, and blinked a few times. “Nothing, I only must have…” Pharah’s bright brown eyes looked into Tracer’s dark ones, “Ahhh!”

Tracer yelled back, and jumped away from Pharah, who was also Tracer, trying to twist her arm behind her and finding that the body she was inhabiting wasn’t quite as flexible as her own, and she fell back to the ground for a moment.

Pharah rolled to the side, and made to grab the knife from her pants, only to discover that there was no cargo pocket at all. She took in the scene for a moment, and sat back on her heels. Her body folded easily in the position Pharah had stretched herself for so many times. It was painless. Easy. She looked down at her chest, at the blue light there. ANd then glowered back at Tracer.

“What did you do?”

“Right,” Tracer said, laughing, “I’s like, God but I’d love to steal Fareeha’s body, and me with all me science knowledge, be nothing but a bit of a lark to do, just going to take me–”

“I did not mean,” Pharah growled, in a voice that was much too high to bring across the frustration she felt, “That you meant to.”

Tracer slowly stood up, a little dizzy from the strangeness of her body. She reached out a hand to the desk, feeling at it with the hand Winston had created. It felt mechanical, in a way she struggled to describe even to herself, like the information was being delivered, and was simply that. She touched the hand back to her chest. She didn’t care for the sensation.

Pharah rose to her feet. “You have to be used to it.”

Tracer walked over to the tiny closet, so much more quickly than she was accustomed, and opened the door, looking at the small mirror inside it. She felt at her face, tracing the tattoo below her eye, the sharp carved edges of her chin and her nose, her commanding jawline.

“I’m you.” She said, the mystery and strangeness in it permeating the space.

“No,” Pharah pulled at the sweater on her body, “you are in my body.”

Tracer whirled around and looked down at Pharah, which Pharah disliked immediately.

“Bloody ‘ell Fareeha, you know exactly what it is I meant, no need to get so specific over it.”

They stood there in silence for a moment, both of them attempting to wrangle with the strangeness of the situation, both of them wondering how this could possibly have happened, and if it had been borne of ill intention, or a mistake, or just one of those things that seemed to befall only those who live storied lives. Neither of them came up with much. The day had begun like any other, right up until a blinding headache and a dash into the darkness.

Tracer sat cross-legged on her desk, pulling her legs into position. “Well,” she said, chin in her hands, “Now what?”

Pharah sat down in her chair, immediately noted the desk was too high for her to comfortably type, and and pressed her lips together in annoyance, eyes closed. There was no protocol for this, no answer she knew. As far as she was aware, there was no precedent for this sort of thing, no case study or treatment Mercy could even consider.

But it would have to be Mercy, because there was no better option.

“We will ask Angela.” Pharah nodded her head, determined.

“Mmmm,” Tracer was looking at her own body more closely now, pulling up her sleeve to look at the muscles there, “Fareeha, do you ever eat a carb? Drink a beer? I’m plenty strong meself and that’s the truth, but it takes a good deal more deprivation than I care for to get this sort of definition, and–”

“Tracer! Pay attention!”

Tracer looked at her, and scowled. “Well,” she slowly dismounted from the desk, “We’ll ask Ang later, as I’m off to actually use these looks. You never bloody ‘ave, and someone ought to–”

Pharah leapt to her feet. “Are you saying you will make me cheat on my wife?”

Tracer giggled. “I’m not you, just in your body, right?”

Fareeha Amari considered herself a patient person, most of the time, and over the years, she had found a particular level of patience with Tracer, who she even, sometimes, could admit to herself, although never anyone else, she quite loved, and found charming in her own way. But Tracer knew how to needle her, and sometimes simply did it as her own sort of stress response, and Pharah was in no mood.

Well, she thought, Tracer is an excellent fighter, and I have always been curious what fighting as her might be like.

With that thought, she exploded toward her own body. But old habits die hard, and she went to throw Tracer into the wall, forgetting that she was much smaller than Tracer now, until Tracer grabbed her by the collar and tossed her back across the room. But Tracer herself was locked in her ways, and as Pharah came back for another round, Tracer tripped over herself–her balance was not nearly as keen or even as it had been–and she was staggered to find that jumping up out of the way was a near impossibility with all the stone she’d gained in the last half hour.

Whatever they had imagined fighting as the other might look like, and well they might manage a body with strengths they could not possibly know, it ended up looking quite a bit more like two toddlers on the playground. Pharah could feel that her body was one firm muscle, but she did not know how to use it, still throwing punches that could not possibly land with the force she wanted, lacking any knowledge in how to use speed and momentum. Tracer was ready for the sheer power of Pharah’s body, but not the slow planning it required to use it, born a creature of impulse and quickness. She was a hummingbird in the body of an eagle, and just as awkward.

Then Pharah tried to blink.

She had seen Tracer do it a hundred times before, even in this casual CA where she wasn’t supposed to be able to at all. It was a small advantage–half a second perhaps, maybe one in an outside chance–but it was still there, and she had used it to best Pharah on a handful of occasions. Perhaps in a wiser moment, Pharah would have recognized that knowing it could be done and knowing how to do something were cousins, but not twins, and so she should ask and practice, and be sure of herself. She was so often careful, and wise in this way. But she was frustrated, and she was angry, and she knew it was a great tactical advantage, and so, she thought about where she wanted to be, and tried to move there.

She fell to the ground immediately, not by any force of Tracer’s, who was still figuring out how to aim with the cannon that was her new body, but with a fierce contraction that went through her whole being, something that reached into her brain and fired, and she gasped with the pain of it. She crumpled to the ground, her stomach turning, heart pounding, barely able to breathe.

She heard her own voice in Tracer’s patter, and hand rubbing her back as the haze cleared. “It’ll pass love, I promise, it’ll pass. Just a moment, is all. Shouldn’t ‘ave tried it, ‘arder than it looks, in this kit, but it’ll pass.”

Pharah looked at her. “Does that happen often?”

“Nah,” Tracer smiled and shook her head, “But I do remember it. Not any fun at all. Deep breath, love, come on then.”

She helped Pharah sit up and lean against the wall. Pharah had often wondered, what it was like living in Tracer’s body, if it caused her pain, and had always thought it would be too rude to ask. Tracer avoided speaking about anything that teetered on the medical, and had expressed multiple times that while they could do what they liked if she was killed, during her lifetime she had no interest in being a scientific subject.

Pharah had not known how to make it clear she was asking as a concerned friend, and so had never asked at all.

But now she had Tracer’s body in hand, and so she felt justified to ask a short question. “Is it like that when it works?”

“Oh no, oh no,” Tracer sat beside her, “bit of nausea, sometimes, but nothing like that, love. That’s only when I don’t manage it,” she laughed, “beside all that, we’ll go to Ang, and she’ll fix us up, and so it won’t be your worry at all.”

The phone on the other end of the room went off, and Tracer reached into Pharah’s pocket and pulled out three candy wrappers and a small, blue, three sectioned box with a cheerful cartoon frog on it. She popped open the middle compartment, and handed a small yellow pill to Pharah.

“Do take this though, and I’ll thank you later when I’m back in me own body.”

She handed Pharah a glass of water, and Pharah did what she was told, the dizziness and pain beginning to subside.

“Sorry, Fareeha.” She sat next to her. “Didn’t mean anything by it. Pushed you a bit far.”

“You were only playing,” she sighed, “I…am anxious, to solve this.”

“Well,” Tracer shoved herself against the wall and stood up, “Let’s go find Ang.”

_________

Mercy was pleased with the quality of her life, since they’d moved to London. There was a temple she liked, not too far from their brand new apartment, and a pastry shop down the road, and she enjoyed sitting out on their tiny little plot of cement and reading a book in the inconsistent sunshine. Maybe they could stay, she thought. Maybe she could stop living her life as a tumbleweed, and find a place to settle, with her Pharah, and be still and happy.

It seemed more and more possible every day. Pharah complained, but she mostly did it in that way where nothing in life was perfection, or as organized as it might be, and she had long since given up the idea of moving back to Cairo, ever since a beach vacation in Spain had resulted in Mercy nearly getting heatstroke. Pharah would never want to be in a place where Mercy was unhappy, because, she had said, in that sweet and tender way Pharah herself never recognized as tenderness, then Pharah would be unhappy. They had kicked around Zurich, but Mercy never missed Switzerland, it was simply a place she had been born, and where her childhood had died. She had liked Boston, she hadn’t cared for Alberta, but London seemed like it could be home, if Mercy was ever allowed such a thing.

She was thinking on all of this, gazing out the window at the clear, humid day, when she heard the door open, and the familiar clunk of Pharah’s boots on the floor. She wasn’t normally home this early, but Mercy’s heart leapt at the thought that maybe she had finished with work, and since Mercy had finished with hers, they could go have lunch together at one of the little restaurants nearby. There was such a cute patio at the little brasserie, and Mercy had been wanting to try it–Pharah usually indulged her with a smile–so the timing seemed nearly perfect.

“Angela,” Pharah’s voice rang out into the kitchen, “I was so much hoping you would be here, I was wondering.”

Mercy’s body tensed. It was all wrong. Everything was wrong. She knew Pharah, knew her like she knew few people on this earth, and this was not her Pharah. Her voice was wrong, her movements were wrong, this imposter knew Pharah so little that her boots were still on, on the floor Pharah had waxed only yesterday. She was trapped here, with something pretending to be Pharah, and her phone was at the other end of the room.

The creature grinned at her, too wide and too bright.

Mercy grabbed for a knife from the block, eyes wide, and faced back at the thing. She would fight. She may lose, but she would fight hard.

“You are not my Fareeha.” She growled, as frighteningly as she could.

“Ang! Ang!” The monster put its hands up. “It’s me! It’s Lena! Fuck’s sake, love, just thought it would be a bit of fun.”

It was Pharah’s voice, but it was Tracer’s, too, and Mercy set the knife down, confused. Tracer came through the door, looked at Mercy with with great concern, and then glared at the strange Tracer-voiced Pharah.

“It was a terrible idea, which I told you it would be.”

Pharah! Mercy sighed relief, just for one moment, before the horror of the moment set in, as she stared across her small kitchen. There was Pharah. Same warm, dark eyes that Mercy always lost herself in, same wide shoulders, same soft mouth. But she was altogether different, too, her eyes darting around, looking this way and that, as if trying to take all of life in by snippets. She hadn’t stopped moving since she came into the room, fiddling with her hair, rocking up on her toes. And Tracer, too, was right, and wrong. A smattering of freckles, chestnut hair, chirp of a voice. But still, and solid, hair combed down and neat.

But this was impossible.