#the rewritten chapter is also up on my ao3 too

[raventroll80]

A Beast on Mars

Chapter 3 (Rewrite)

The Last Human on Mars

(I wasn't too happy with the original ending to this chapter so I rewrote it. Big thanks to @horseyneigh2002 for giving the new ending a read through before I posted it!)

Edit: I forgot the warnings! This chapter contains description of graphic injury, a lot of blood, and death.

Mim Digsby was a rather unremarkable person, they were just below average height with a somewhat stocky build, but they never thought it’d come in handy until they had to hide from the risen corpse of a security guard. They usually kept their hair short as they felt it was more hassle than it was worth, though they never thought they’d be grateful for it until they watched a co-worker get dragged into the vents by her hair. Mim mostly worked maintenance now, and knew the vents like the back of their hands, but they never knew that it’d ever save them from the demons that now prowled the halls of the UAC.

It had started like any other day, Mim had been scheduled to do some basic maintenance on some machinery in the morning before switching to excavation in the afternoon… that was until the screaming had started. One of the security guards had gone to investigate but seconds later he came running back firing at something howling behind him, then the something pounced on him and began to disembowel the man.

Mim and their co-workers had immediately fled the room only for another one of these…  things to jump them. The only warning they had gotten was the stench of sulfur and a flash of red light before that thing, that demon just appeared. It stood maybe six, maybe seven feet tall, its body was covered in thick yellow chitin with jagged spikes jutting out of its body. Its eyes, god its eyes…  they burned into them like argent. Mim watched as the imp gutted Samson in one swift motion, his body had dropped like a sack of hammers, his blood spilling out onto the floor. Mim could still hear his screams as the demon didn’t even wait for him to bleed out, thank god they hadn’t looked. The lockdown alarms were blaring but the doors refused to shut, something was wrong with the protocols… if the lockdown wouldn’t engage properly then there’d be nowhere for people to hide. Emerson, a technician, suggested that they go and manually engage the lockdown at the southside control room, given their lack of options everyone agreed to go. But things only got worse from there.

Mim had to lead the small group of survivors through the maintenance tunnels, during this they had passed through an observation deck where a large almost ape like monster shattered the glass. Georges and Amsbury got dragged out by the air pressure while Harris had been grabbed the massive monster. Within seconds their group of five became a band of two, Mim and Emerson had barely made it to the cargo elevator when they were jumped by yet another imp. It had managed to slash Emerson across the chest before Mim was able to blast its head apart with the shotgun she had taken from a dead guard. The demon slumped over, it’s bright red blood pooling on the floor. Mim had tried their best to stop the bleeding but it just kept pouring out. They tried convincing Emerson to come and look for a medical station, but he refused, claimed that he was fine, that it only looked worse than it actually was…

God why did they believe him…

As the elevator came to a stop the two heard the chime that accompanied an announcement over the intercom, but instead of VEGA or some other automated message it was Dr. Pierce and pit formed in their stomachs as she spoke.

“I believe in honesty, especially now, in what will be your final moments in this world. All the rumors, the human sacrifices, the Hell portal, the demons… it’s all true…”

The two gave each other a grave look before climbing the blood-soaked stairs as Dr. Pierce continued her speech.

“My brothers and sisters be thankful, you will be the first, you will have a seat along side them just as I will in what will become the new world, they create for us… starting now…” Instead of another chime indicating the broadcast was over a demonic scream blared over the intercoms.

Emerson was able to stop the broadcast from repeating before forcing the lockdown protocols to engage. The technician looked out over the Martian landscape, the blue sunrise slowly creeping over the horizon.

“If Pierce is already on their side, then how many of the others are too… if we just leave it on then some, some cultist could just swing by and turn the lockdown back off. Hel- fuck, we don’t even know if VEGA is still on our side!” Emerson said in frustration, staring down at the consol with a contemplative look.

“Then what do you think we should do…”

“You think you can shut the power off?”

“Yea, there’s a main generator not too far from here. I can use the access vents to get to it. What are you going to do?” Mim asked, not entirely sure what to make of the situation.

“I’m gonna lock VEGA out from accessing the terminal digitally. If he’s really on our side then he can come turn the power back on himself.”

Emerson initiated some sort of malware or firewall before giving Mim the go ahead and Mim jumped down into the maintenance vent. Through the dark tunnels of wires and metal Mim crawled, until they found the main generator. They logged into the access terminal and shut off the power to the Res Ops facility. Mim hoped they’d given people enough time, or that there were any people left. It was deathly quiet as the facility shifted to emergency power. Normally it wouldn’t, but with the emergency lockdown protocol in effect prior to main power shutdown the facility forces the use of the backup generators. The quiet of the facility felt crushing as Mim crawled back to the control room. Something felt off as the mechanic drew near. It was too quiet, something was missing…

“Emerson!” Mim called out as they realized that they could no longer hear the technicians ragged breathing.

“Shit, shit, shit, shit…” they muttered as they scrambled out of the vent but it was too late. Emerson was dead.

The man was slumped over, his back against the console, clothes drenched in blood. Mim took a few shaky breaths as they processed the situation. Chances where the casualties were in the thousands, and if they were being realistic… then Mim Digsby was possibly the last human left on Mars.

“God damn it Emerson… why didn’t you listen to me,” Mim pressed their forehead against Emersons before stumbling out of the control room, their body was still shaking from the shock and reality of the situation. They needed to find somewhere safe, somewhere to hide and hope there was anyone left to rescue them.

Mim didn’t know if it had been hours or days that had passed, somewhere in that time they had managed to find a chainsaw. Why was there a chainsaw on Mars? Who cares, it’s a chainsaw! Like they were just going to pass the offer of a free chainsaw in a time like this. Besides, chainsaws are great communicators when it came to the undead. Just as Mim had finished airing their grievances with a zombie they’d found in a locker room an explosion boomed from outside, causing the lockers to rattle and Mim to jolt and accidentally wedge the chainsaw deeper into the corpse. Before they could try to remove the weapon, another explosion rocked the room and demons began howling as what sounded like heavy artillery went off.

“Was it the marines? The Elite Guard?” Mim abandoned the chainsaw and climbed through an access vent to the offices above to investigate the sounds, though what they saw was far from what they had been hoping for. There, just outside the building was a behemoth of a monster clinging to the very structure they were standing in. The creature appeared to be fighting the demons outside of the locker room, though fighting was a strong word for what was happening, it was more of a bloodbath if anything. The room shook violently as another explosion rocked the cargo bay outside. The glass rattled menacingly but thankfully didn’t shatter, thank god. Mim scurried back from the window as the behemoth slaughtered the last of the demons. In their haste, Mim had knocked over a chair and alerted the massive demon. They had barely made it into the vent before the behemoth was tearing its way into the room.

Mim quietly watched as the massive creature began searching the room. Was it looking for them? God they hoped not, that thing just tore through the building like it was cardboard! Granted this wasn’t the strongest of building in the Mars facility, but the point still stood that this thing, whatever it was, would catch Mim within seconds. The mechanic watched as the creature inspected the health station in an almost curious manner. Tilting its head inquisitively, before turning it slightly as though it were listening to someone or something. Its curiosity apparently satisfied, the great beast turned around and proceeded to smash in the glass to one of the storage rooms.

“Holy shit, holy shit, I need to fucking leave” Mim hissed to themselves and they started to shimmy further into the vent. That glass was at least an inch and a half thick and that thing just shattered it like it was nothing.

Mim heard the creature walk back out to the cargo bay, catching a glimpse of it beginning to scale the wall, it’s clawed gauntlets digging into the stone. Part of them was slightly in awe of the massive beast, but overall Mim was terrified. The massive thing, looked to be nearly 16 feet tall, it could probably eat them in one bite if it wanted to. Mim shuddered at the thought, “Nope, nu-uh, nah…” The monster’s armour was complex, not too unlike that of Hayden’s Elite Guards though it was a deep green colour instead of the guards imposing red and black armour. Though Mim couldn’t shake the feeling that they’d seen it before…

A raspy hiss rattled from behind the mechanic, filling them with dread before sharp claws dug into their legs and dragged them off into the darkness of the facility. Mim was barely able to let out a scream before their head was slammed into the vent and everything went black.

As the Slayer climbed up the walls of the cargo bay, he heard a faint sound echo from below. As quick as it came it was gone, but the sound was unmistakable. It was a scream, and not just any scream; a human scream. The Slayer looked back down to the platform below, should he go look? What if they were already dead? He watched as several field drones entered the room below and fanned out. One of the drones separated from the group and hovered up to him. That familiar chime sounded in his helmet garnering an annoyed growl from the behemoth.

“I apologize for the repeated interruptions but one of the nearby cameras picked up what I believe to be a human scream. The sound originated from this sector and I wanted to know if you heard anything. The cameras have been malfunctioning, replaying audio and visuals from the start of the incident. I do not know what is causing this malfunction but it is impairing my ability to search for survivors so I will need your help in locating any potential survivors.” The Slayer huffed, clearly getting impatient with the AI.

“I do not know what your stance is on humans as a whole, but I can tell you already have a distain for the UAC. But I must ask that you please keep an eye out for any survivors.” VEGA waited for a response from the Slayer, but all he got was a soft growl from the behemoth.

VEGA left the Slayer to return to his mission, concern starting to build in his processors. Could he trust the Slayer to protect, let alone inform him of any survivors? VEGA hadn’t even been able to recover the field drone that he’d destroyed, he couldn’t even find any evidence of its existence aside from a few scraps from the outer shell… did he eat it? No, he couldn’t have. The Slayer may be a brute, but even he should know that a drone wasn’t even remotely edible. Right?

He could only hope the Slayer would be kinder to a human than he was to a machine.

The Slayer followed the elevator tracks up the chasm and into what appeared to be a mining tunnel or a cut-through point in the facility. The tunnel was long and dark, lit only by the dim string of lights that hung from the walls and ceiling. Checking his map, the Slayer confirmed that this was indeed the way forward. The giant grumbled as he walked down the cold tunnel. He was certain there was a faster route to the gore nest but VEGA was (regrettably) right. As much as he wanted to tear the UAC apart, he needed to be mindful of any potential survivors. Sure, the chances of anyone surviving this long were slim, but he didn’t want to take that risk. As he walked through the tunnel he passed by a group of corpses. Bodies both human and demon were strewn about, it appeared this group chose to make this their final stand, though it was clear the battle had no winners. Further investigation revealed that in an attempt to close off the tunnel or possibly destroy the Gore Nest ahead, the workers had loaded containers of explosives onto trolleys and carts, their lids hastily removed in a last-ditch effort to try and blow up the attacking demons.

Slayer thought about taking the explosive with him, but without the detonator they’d be harder to use. As he contemplated the explosives, the Slayer spotted movement out of the corner of his eye. Expecting a demon trying to get the drop on him, he whipped around and was about to fire at the movement, but stopped himself just short of pulling the trigger when he spotted the source of the movement.

There, slumped against the wall was a human barely clinging to life, staring at him with a fearful expression smeared across their bloodied face. Their body was heavily scarred; thick deep gashes across their stomach, their clothes torn and drenched in blood, a large chunk had been taken out of his right shoulder, their left leg had been torn to bloody ribbons while the right leg was nothing more than a bloody stump. The Slayer froze, not sure how to proceed, how the poor man was still alive was beyond him.

Slowly, the Doom Slayer approached the injured human, who quickly held up a small rectangular box, causing the behemoth to freeze. They had a detonator, if he wasn’t careful and scared the human too much then he’d bring the whole tunnel down on both of them. Carefully the Slayer his gun down and raised his hands in the air. The human gave him a suspicious look as he took his finger off the button but still refused to drop the detonator. Once again, the Slayer began to slowly approach the human, his tail slightly raised as to not let it scrape across the ground. Eventually the Slayer managed to walk up to the dying human and sat down next to him, the next few moments were oddly peaceful given the circumstances, the human had even put down the detonator and leaned his back against the wall.

The human huffed and closed his eyes, seemingly trusting the Slayer not to kill them in this moment of respite, their breath ragged and shaky. Carefully, while their eyes were closed, the Slayer wrapped his clawed hands around the injured human’s torso and pulled him close. The human in question, quickly scrambled in an attempt to grab the detonator before but all they managed to was aggravate their injuries, so instead he threw his arms over his head and braced for whatever violent end he was about to meet… but it never came.

Instead, they were placed in the lap of this strange behemoth as it removed its gloves and helmet. The creatures face looked almost human but not quite right, it-he? Stared down at the man before gently lifting their body up once more, but instead of biting his head off, the Slayer instead held him close to his chest. A soft rumbling began to emerge from deep within the behemoth.

The Doom Slayer leaned his back against the well as he felt the human slowly begin to calm down, but something felt… off. Instead of the grooved stone of the tunnel, the Slayer’s back was leaned against the cool metal of a wall, the sharp stinging scent of chemicals assaulted his nostrils. Where was he?  Mars? No, that’s not right. He wasn’t stationed on Mars, it was Phobos he got sent to… wait. If he was on Phobos, then why was he holding a miner? Miners weren’t stationed on Phobos. The Behemoth huffed, stale cave air filling his lungs, the rancid chemical smell quickly fading from his memory as he felt the human squirming under his grasp.

The Slayer quickly realized that his grip on the human had gotten tighter, hurting the poor thing. The Slayer loosened his grip and tried to give the poor man a reassuring pat with the pad of his thumb which only garnered frightened whimper. Feeling even worse for the dying human the Hellwalker tried to croak out an apology as he set the human back down in his lap, but all that came out were garbled bellows as blood began to bubble in his throat. The no-longer man quickly stopped his attempt only to realize the miner had gone still, his eyes glazed over and lifeless. The behemoths shoulders sagged and huffed as he came to the realization that the human had died.

Looking back down at his bloody hands and chestplate, down at the dark red blood from the human mixing with the bright crimson of the demons. Gently he set the still warm body down upon the cold stone of the tunnel and made a mournful sound the taste his own blood tingled in the back of his throat. As the Doom Slayer stood up, donning his helmet once more, sorrow quickly turning into anger as he remembered why he was here and that Hell was to blame for this. Checking his map, he confirmed that the Gore Nest was at the end of this godforsaken tomb, and with a vicious snarl he snatched up the crates of explosives and charged down the tunnel with blood on his lips and fury burning in his chest.

Within seconds the Hellwalker found himself at the end of the tunnel looking out into a much larger cargo bay. Across from him, the Gore Nest hung, suspended by thick sinewy cables that attached themselves to gore covered support beams. From his position, the Slayer could see the Gore Nest’s beating heart and a circle of zombies knelt around a sigil. The Unchained Predator threw the crates onto the demonic structure before lobbing a grenade towards it and firing. An explosion shook the room and the Gore Nest screamed in pain and with a running leap the Doom Slayer jumped onto it, shoving the still burning barrel of his shotgun against its putrid heart and fired.

[mythrilthread]

My magnum opus, the jewel of my Binderary round-up, the result of four months of hard work (that is to say, a lot of force applied over distance), the project affectionately known as The Motherfuckers (because it was rather unclear if I was going to finish these books or if they were going to be the end of me).

Force over Distance by cleanwhiteroom. It is currently also on AO3.

I was first introduced to this incredible story by a dear friend, who first sold me on actually watching SGU, and then said that they remember this fic since like 2011, which is always a promising sign. I went digging and found out I was in luck - the story was being rewritten and reuploaded on the author's blog. The next two weeks are described by the same friend as "one of the scariest moments in our cohabitation" as I'd spent literally every waking moment injecting the story directly into my eyeballs, and let me tell you, I'd not been doing a lot of sleeping at that time.

Then I gathered up my courage and reached out to CWR re: my burning desire to bind this story. And the rest, well. Let's dig into it, shall we?

This was my first time typesetting 540k words. Considering I tend to prefer larger font sizes for increased legibility, it was immediately obvious that this was going to be a multivolume project. I settled on three, as it's the relationship between three individuals that forms the core of the story.

I also knew I wanted to keep the typeset in black and white, but play around with light and dark a lot. So I did. One of the first design idea I actually had was the way I wanted to handle projected speech. Mental link between Young, Rush and Destiny is THE most vital part of the story, and I wanted to make it immediatly obvious. I also wanted to be able to take one glance at the page and tell how much of the action is actually just two guys staring each other down :) Hence the blackout effect of thoughts being represented as light over darkness.

I also wanted to preserve as much of my reading experience as possible. So I saved all the chapter quotes/summaries in the TOC, and hid the chapter content warnings in the frame of the gate that marks the beginning of each chapter. For most of the chapter the warnings stay the same, so after a while you stop really noticing them, but then you open a new chapter and see that the familiar shape of the words has changed, and get this UH-OH feeling. Which, I think is very much how it works in my design, because when the warnings change there's usually another line of text added.

For flashbacks and dream sequences I switched from italics to a lighter shade of gray. I woudn't say it's more legible per say, but it's in keeping with the overall light/dark theme.

There are instances of people using handwritten notes in the story. I collected more than a dozen of assorted handwriting fonts, with each character having their own "handwriting". So when, for example, someone begins writing in someone else's hand, you immediately know it.

The most insane, labor-intensive part of the typeset, however, was the way I decided to handle the Ancient translations. CWR's gone through the trouble of setting up hover-to-discover for it, which gives you a very different reading experience than, say, having the translations in the endnotes. So, naturally, I said to myself that I want to replicate that, and footnotes just won't do the trick. So. Every instance of Ancient in the text has an underlay of light gray Ancient script. And an OVERLAY of paper vellum with the translation printed in blue. Now, not to toot my own horn too much, but if looks SICK AS FUCK. You also MAYBE SHOULD NOT LIVE LIKE THIS. For the two copies of this work I had to cut up 10 sheets of vellum into strips, and then spent from 20 minutes to an hour per volume tipping the strips in their proper places. I then had to wear kinetic tape on both my hands to help with the joint pain. (It was worth it.)

Now for the title spread. It is also paper vellum that you see as soon as you turn the first page (the half-title), and see it covering the title of the book and author's name. And then you turn it. And the shields sing the matter wave of Destiny through the black. And yeah, I think that's very, very clever of me, actually.

Then, of course, were the endpapers. All 12 of them are unique abstract paintings done on black cardstock by hand with brush pens and correction tape, I scanned a sample of each set for posterity. All of them are my interpretations of characters' midscapes. For volume 1 I went with the fire wind of Rush's thoughts. Volume 2 was for Young, and I went for the reverse blackout poetry effect (because for all the mental talking they do, the unprojected thoughts are opaque to their counterparts) and all the loops, hairpins and blocks he does. Volume 3 is for the combination - Rush's fire wind, changing its color to match the circuitry pattern of Destiny's AI.

The rest, in comparison, is easy. All volumes are stitched with 3 strands of embroidery floss, a combination of black, blue and silvery-gray. The French double-core endbands are sewn in the same color scheme (though with a different shade of blue and gray switched for white for added contrast). The edges are painted and splattered to look like space.

The covers feature my (signature at this point, I guess) half-cloth river pattern, with the base being dark blue linen and the printed parts being Spitzer telescope images of the W51 star forge, Jack-O'-Lantern Nebula and the Eagle Nebula (courtesy of NASA), waxed by hand for added sheen. The spines are foiled in silver with a foil quill.

Each set is 5 pound of solid hand-crafted book, with one set being my personal copy, and the other sent as a gift to the author.

And that's it, folks! This has been an incredible project to work on, and I'm very proud of what I achieved with it.

[kaelidascope]

Humor Me - It's About Beestfic

Okay so here's the thing NFKNGFKJGN I've been slowly working my way through rewriting this thing, but motivation is nonexistent when I have to keep over 110k words to myself without some kind of payoff. My dilemma is this;

I wanted to keep the original posting to preserve the hit ratio, comments, and dates seeing as this is the first fic I ever wrote. I personally think the original is absolute hot garbage and I'm embarrassed to have this thing be a reflection of my current skills. And yet, I've had many people argue they think it's one of the best things they've ever read. (seriously, what are you guys reading where you think this is good? but anyway)

I want to start releasing the rewritten chapters as they come to help motivate me. But that's difficult if I can't notify anyone they've been updated through the email notifs on AO3, and also what about the rest of the 10 chapters that are already up there that now don't correlate with the updated chapter at all? I could post a brand new rework, and just keep the old one preserved, but then I risk all the following I already gained on it, and now I'm just left in a mighty fat pickle.

So my options are this;

A) wait until all 110k words are rewritten, and mass release the updated chapters with a new archive page so that current subscribers get the email notification to reread all 110k words to get up to speed on the new work and new plot

B) Just post a new thing all together and leave the original Beestfic offline, treat it like a brand new fic

C) Post the new thing but release the original Beestfic back out for the public and just label it as 'Discontinued/Classic Version' with a link to the rewrite

D) Mark all current chapters blank and update them as I write them so I don't lose the comments or hits, but ppl subscribed to it won't receive the AO3 email until I post the next chapter. Only people following my socials will know it got updated at all

I appreciate the humoring lol I have more fun when I get to release it as it comes. I'm not the type to hoard content, I get too excited. This'll also make it more fun to cycle through projects when I get burnt out on one or the other (looks at MM... sorry babygirl you're gonna cook a lil longer that next chapter is gonna be like 19k words GNKJFNFKJG)

[stobinesque]

phryctoria | chapter 1: pyrseia (torch)

Sometimes your gay awakening is just having someone to show you it's possible. Steve comes out to Robin, and the two of them figure out how to weather being two gay teenagers in rural Indiana together.

[1][2][3][4][5][6 & 7] | [Read on AO3]

They’re both sitting in the beamer, engine idling in the Buckley’s driveway, when Steve finally works up the courage to ask the question that’s been burning a hole in the back of his head for weeks. 

“Hey. Robs?” Steve drums his hands against the side of the steering wheel to give all the restless energy a place to go.

“‘Sup, dingus?” Robin shoots back on autopilot—but when she turns to look at him she must see…something on his face, because her tone drops into something more sincere. “What’s up, Steve?”

“I—uh.” He swallows, trying to work the words past the lump in his throat. “How did you, uh, know?” the second they escape he wants to snatch them back out of the air because—really, is that not the stupidest thing he could have said?

Robin frowns. “Know what?”

Steve closes his eyes and pinches at the bridge of his nose, pushing down tears, and nausea induced by what he knows to be unnecessary fear. His face is hot with shame and all he wants is to fold himself up and hide in a corner. But. It’s Robin. It’s just Robin. He can talk to Robin. His head knows it, his stomach and heart are just having a hard time catching up right now. 

“H-how did you know that you…that you like girls?”

Steve knows that she can hear the weight behind the question, because she doesn’t poke fun at him at all—doesn't shoot back the easy 'well how did you' that sits like low hanging fruit—instead she goes quiet in that way she does when carefully considering something.

“Well…I guess I don’t know exactly when I knew, you know?”

Steve shakes his head. If he did know this would all be a lot easier. Instead it feels like he’s been turned inside out and knotted up. Like none of his pieces fit together the way he thought they did. It’s a feeling he thinks he ought to be used to by now, even if he knows he never will be. Each time his entire world is rewritten feels like it ought to be the last. (Sometimes Steve wonders what this must be like for Will. Or El. He’s got some (suspected) traumatic brain injury and a little light torture to cope with, but he was, at the very least, on the other side of puberty for most of it. He can’t wrap his mind around what it must be like to just be a kid who keeps having their life ripped away…) 

Steve is pulled from his thoughts by Robin reaching over him to turn the keys in the ignition, so that the car sits still and silent beneath them.

And then Robin—light of his life, master of his heart—continues talking. “It was all just a…gradual realization, y’know? Like—there were all these bits and pieces falling in my path along the way until one day it all kind of came together. But I guess the first time it went from this sort of, like vague awareness that I thought women were really soft, and–and pretty, and cool, was when I kept thinking about how nice it would be to hold Hailey Carmichael’s hand. Or, uh, kiss her, or…um. Other stuff.” Robin cuts the train of thought off with an awkward huff. “I think that was the first time I really thought about what it would be like if I was with another girl. But after that I thought back to other girls I’d been friends with—how I was always just a bit more cuddly with them than it seemed like I was supposed to be. Or–or how I got jealous if a girl I really liked suddenly had a new friend. And I realized there were also, like, a lot of actresses I had just thought were ‘objectively’ pretty, but actually I think they’re, like, super hot.”

Steve nods slowly and tries to catalog all of the examples Robin just listed against his own memories. He thinks about the way he used to get teased by other boys about his hugs being too soft and girly because he’d lean into them just a little too much, and linger in the embrace for just a little too long. (And, okay, it’s possible that had a little more to do with the fact that he could count on both hands the number of times either of his parents had hugged him in his memory and still have a few fingers left over but he’s going to save that crisis for another day and maybe also a shrink if he can find one that won’t try to lock him up for talking about fucking demodogs and drowned teen girls in his pool, and—right. Having one crisis at a time.) He remembers when Tommy started dating Carol and he was sulky and bitter for weeks, and it had nothing to do with wanting Carol for himself like Tommy had thought at the time. He conjures up images of Harrison Ford and Tom Cruise with no effort at all and realizes he definitely has more than a benign aesthetic appreciation for them. 

Steve’s mouth is dry when he goes to speak again. “A-and how did you know that you...don’t like guys?" Steve is shaking and he seems to lose the connection between his brain and his mouth as he rambles out the totally unnecessary clarification of— "Boys. Men. Whatever.”

At that Robin cocks her head at him, a curious look on her face. “You know it’s possible to like both, right?” She asks the question so gently. Like she’s talking to a spooked animal. Like he really might not know, and like it'd be okay if he didn't. 

(He bitterly thinks for a moment that it'd be better if the problem was just that he didn't know that was an option open to him. Except he knows that in some ways, for him, that might have actually been worse.)

Steve’s knuckles go white as he clutches the steering wheel tightly. “Yeah, I know. Just—answer the question, Rob.” His voice is hoarse and he sounds scared to even his own ears.

Robin’s eyes widen slightly, but she nods. “Y-yeah, okay. Well, uh. I guess I just never really thought I did? Like, I’d tell other girls I had crushes on boys because I knew I was supposed to. But I never really got what other girls meant when they called so-and-so hot or what’s-his-face sexy, y’know. I’d just, like, pick a guy to say I liked so that I didn’t stick out too much.” Robin is silent for a moment, but Steve doesn’t make any attempt to fill it. After a few beats of silence Robin continues on. “But that—Steve, that’s just my story. And, like, I don’t really know other, um, not-straight people, but I’m pretty sure it’s different for some people? Like, some people get married and have kids before realizing that oh, actually, maybe the love they have isn’t actually romantic, or something.”

Steve nods again. That…almost makes sense—after all, that's what happened with his feelings for her, wasn't it?—except… “What about, like, sex, though? How does someone have sex with someone for years without being attracted to them?”

Robin’s brow furrows. “Steve…you know I’m a virgin, right?”

Steve is nodding with embarrassment before she finishes the question. “No, yeah, I do. I’m sorry that was dumb—”

Robin is shaking her head. “Nope! This is a no-dumb-questions type of convo.” Robin takes a deep breath, like she’s bracing herself. “Okay. I can do this," she says to herself. And then she fixes all the intensity of a Robin Buckley Stare on him to say, “Just this once I’m gonna let you talk to me about your—” Robin wrinkles her nose “—sex life. And then never again—understood, Harrington?”

That manages to get a smile out of him and Steve turns to look at Robin fondly. God, he loves her. “Understood, Buckley.” He throws in a mock salute to really sell it. 

 “Okay, so: If, hypothetically, you have had sex with someone you weren’t attracted to, why do you think that would be?”

Steve drums his fingers against the wheel again as he considers the question. “Well, I guess…I mean, I’m supposed to like girls, right?” Steve almost expects Robin to contradict him, but when he steals a glance at her, the expression she’s sending his way just looks sad. It bolsters his resolve to keep going somehow. “Like, Steve Harrington: Golden Boy; Captain of the Swim Team; King of Hawkins High. Everyone just…expects that from me, right? And if—hypothetically—I actually didn’t want that—what I was supposed to, then the best way to make sure no one—” (even me, he thinks, but doesn't say. He thinks Robin will hear it anyway) “—that no one looks at that too closely would be to, like, throw myself at girls, right?”

Robin nods along like everything he’s saying makes sense, rather than being batshit insane. And how would she know? She doesn't have any more of a frame of reference for this than he does, really. And he thinks he has the shape of the rest of it, but it's hanging formless at the periphery of his mind. He really wishes learning things about himself didn't require so much fucking messiness and honesty, but he manages to find the courage to fight through the awkwardness to tack on, “Plus, I mean…sex…feels good? Like, regardless of if I think the person is hot or whatever.”

Robin wrinkles her nose again, but takes it in stride. She bites her lip and looks at him hesitantly—like she’s afraid of how he’ll take whatever it is she’s about to say next. “And…what about Nancy?” The question is almost a whisper. Said softly so as not to break him.

Steve blows out a shaky breath and squeezes his eyes shut. “I…Nancy Wheeler is the girl I could have lived a happy enough life with, even if it wasn’t exactly what I wanted. Or, at least, that's what I thought she was.” Steve leans back in his seat, fighting down tears. “And, Rob—I want kids. I–I’ve always wanted to be a dad, even before I wound up stuck with all the little rugrats I currently cart around.” The car is silent for a few charged beats and into the space he whispers, “How could anyone not love Nancy Wheeler?”

Robin lets out a long breath of her own. “Fuck, dude.”

Steve laughs, and somehow he’s surprised to hear how shaky it comes out. “Yeah.” He reaches up to pinch at the bridge of his nose again, still keeping his eyes shut, taking comfort in the dark. (Something he can only do now, in the safety of daytime, above-ground, where light is only a blink away.)

Silence falls again, and this time it settles like the first real snow of winter.

“So…did that…" Robin's voice carefully breaks through the silence. "Did that help?” 

Steve opens his eyes and turns to look at her, his best girl. Robin looks a little uncertain. A lot out of her depth. He reaches out to take her hand into his own. 

“Yeah, Robbie,” he murmurs. “You always help me.” And maybe that's too much, too soon. A little like saying I love you after the second or third date. But everything between them has been like that. He knows that going through hell with someone is the quickest way to tie people together, if you let it. But for the two of them it feels like more than that. Even with its short existence he knows that nothing ever has or ever will be as strong as what they have. And really, that's what he means. That's what helps. Knowing that for once in his life, he has someone that'll never leave him. 

“Oh.” Robin says, like she's managed to hear all of that (she probably has). She squeezes his hand and the two of them sit in silence for a bit longer.

Robin is the one to break the silence again, and her tone is still careful, but there's a lot more open curiosity to it now. “So…when did, um. When did you—”

“Bathroom.”

“Huh?”

“Th-the…when you…” Steve stops to take a deep breath. For some reason this feels bigger than the rest of it. Bigger than the whole sky. “Robs, you’re the first gay person I’ve ever known. At least that I know of? And, like...my whole life, uh 'queer' people had kind of been made out to be the boogeyman, you know? But I’ve, like, seen actual monsters and you—you’re just a person—the best person. And I just…if Robin Buckley can be gay, I thought…maybe it’s okay if Steve Harrington is too?”

“Oh, Steve.” Robin sounds choked up.

“Don’t you dare cry on me Buckley, or I will too.”

“I don’t know if I can help it,” Robin pulls her hand out of his to wipe not-so-surreptitiously at her eyes. “So. Did you figure it out?”

Steve looks down at his lap, staring into his empty palms. He grits his teeth. “Yeah, Robbie. Yeah, I’m…” he pauses, gathers himself up, and turns to look at his best friend—his soulmate—and prepares to shed away another layer of King Steve (fuck that guy, may he rest in fucking tatters). Robin meets his gaze head on. “I’m gay.” It’s thrilling to say. He feels euphoric.

It’s the scariest thing he’s ever done.

Robin throws her arms around him, and then it’s just two gay teens in Hawkins, Indiana, sitting in a driveway, crying about what it is to be two halves of a whole. What it is to be seen so entirely.

[faroreskiss]

The Power of Understanding / Part 2 (v2)

Read on Ao3

Rewritten v2 posted on: 2023/09/10

Cheat Sheet

Chapters: Pilot, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9

Summary: You have been with the Chain for a while now, as their "scholar" and translator. You know everything about them, because you are from our world. But do they know the truth about how you can understand everyone? Loosely based on the same reader in my NSFW fic, which is a very loose prequel to this one, and a work in progress. More background info to come, if I feel like it :D Isekai reader, but she doesn't know about the Linked Universe. Warnings: None. SFW. Maybe Teen? Points of interest: This is your thing if you are into the mystery of chain being able to talk to each other. I am an actual trained linguist IRL, hence this HAD to be written! Some fluffy Twilight x Reader content in this chapter.

So, what was happening to you today? You just couldn't stop thinking about Twilight for some reason. You even carried your work over the stables, having to inhale the smell of horseshit around you. 

But he was just... there. Not like he has been far away lately. You’ve literally been stuck with him (and the rest of the chain) for around two years. Your ‘situationship’ with Wild was still there, and the rest of the chain was aware of it, you were guessing.  You both weren’t exactly super subtle about it, hand holding and such and sometimes a small kiss here and there, but you were never explicit with it either. Nobody questioned anything, everybody had their… quirks, you guessed. 

Did they think you were just in a relationship, you wondered sometimes. Were they even familiar with the word, situationship? Gods, what would they think of the involvement of you, Zelda and Link at the same time, if they knew? Technically, everybody had their room in the house in Hateno, but, well... Ah, you really missed Zelda too, and her delicate fingers on… You took a breath and then sighed. You were getting distracted.

Anyway, nobody owes anyone explanations in the Chain that you learned. That was the agreement of the Links, in which you were indirectly included. If they don't want to tell, you don't force them.

Except, you pretty much knew everything. Well, you weren't really familiar with any game where all the Links were together except maybe some fanfiction where they met in the afterlife, but Wild didn't "exist" back then, from your perspective.

Now, Time was out with the others, getting some business done in Castle Town. Wild also joined him to get some ingredients for the recipes he learned from Malon.

Back to Twilight... You were watching his strong arms, brushing the horse gently. He definitely had a tall stature compared to the other Links. The Links you are in contact with are ranging from their mid to late twenties, maybe early thirties (except Wind, though he was still almost a 16/17 -year-old teenager). So, most of them were fully adults.

"Hey, I can feel ya starin', ya know, Trivia Queen,” he said with his Ordona drawl that occasionally made an appearance, sighing, while still brushing his Epona.

Right. That was your nickname. When you first arrived, you kept spouting things about them that you supposedly should not "know" about, which made the Links (except Wild, he was used to it) extremely suspicious. Over time, they got used to it, especially after finding out about your "job" at Wild's world, as a historian, linguistics scholar. So they left it at that.

The other rule was that you were not supposed to discuss one Link with another, unless you are sure you are not revealing any secrets.

...which was a rule that was established right after you revealed that Twilight is Wolfie, to Wild. Seems like the Old Man already knew (you and Wild joined the chain pretty much as the latest additions), and it was his idea to come up with it. And it was kind of unfair because Wild said he already knew Wolfie from his initial adventure! Hah, good riddance. It did end up being revealed to everyone anyway, after his near death experience.

Fair to say, you were the persona non-grata for a while. And that nickname was not Trivia Queen, but it was Trivia-something else for a while (Thanks, Vet).

"Mhm," you idly replied.

Twilight raised an eyebrow, catching you lost in thought while the stables filled with the scent of horse dung. "Hey," he called out again, his voice carrying a mix of amusement and curiosity. "Lost in your own world again?"

You sighed, blushing slightly, and tried to shake off the daydream of you and him in a big bear hug. "Yeah, just got a bit distracted," you admitted, turning your attention back to the ranch's budget paperwork. "These numbers can be quite mesmerizing, you know."

The rancher chuckled, his eyes warm as he continued brushing his Epona. "If you say so," he replied playfully. "But I have to admit, you manage to make even the most mundane tasks seem fascinating."

You couldn't help but smile at his compliment, feeling your heart flutter slightly. "Thanks, Link. You know how to make a 'trivia queen' blush," you teased back, trying to keep the conversation light-hearted.

His grin widened, and he leaned against the stable door, looking at you with that undeniable twinkle in his eyes. "Oh, really? Well, consider it a skill I've honed over time," he said, winking playfully.

You playfully rolled your eyes, trying to hide the butterflies in your stomach. "I suppose I'll have to keep my guard up around you, then," you replied, feigning a serious tone.

Twilight chuckled, and for a moment, the two of you locked eyes, a silent understanding passing between you.

"You wish you could," he winked.

There was an unspoken awareness that, despite the friendly banter, there were lines he would not cross. You respected his relationship with Wild, and he respected your history with him. And of course, the fact that everybody's existence is but a flicker...

Yes... Who knows how long you will still be here anyway? Even the stuff with Wild and Flora is as dangerous as it is. You can literally disappear and get back to your own world, leaving them behind.

This was the thing that was stopping you from the other type of "feelings" you could catch. You never spoke about this with Wild or Flora. To be fair, not like there was any time to. You… literally had the most intense moment of intimacy one night, and less than 24 hours after that, you and Link were taken in via the portal and met with 8 other Links. Poor guy even hesitated to sleep with you in the same bedroll, literally the night after. 

 And since the adventures with the Chain started, there was this weird gloom between you two sometimes (both missing Zelda), but the respect you have for each other never disappeared. That was another unspoken agreement.

The moment you want to speak about this awkward issue of you having a heart big enough for love for other people, the reality of your existence would be bare.

Anybody can disappear, forever, anytime.

Time's return broke the moment, and you both quickly resumed your tasks, acting as if nothing significant had transpired. "So, what were you two chatting about?" Time inquired with a sly grin.

"Just discussing the ranch's budget," you replied casually, keeping things vague.

The Old Man raised an eyebrow but seemed to take your word for it. "Alright then, just remember we've got some preparations to make before the next portal appears," he said, his eyes flickering with a knowing but serious glint. It wasn't the first time he witnessed something like this.

You nodded, grateful for the diversion. "Of course, I'll get back to work."

As the day went on, you couldn't help but steal glances at Twilight, his presence always managing to captivate you. Though you were the "translation magic" of the group, your understanding of him went beyond language. It was a connection that had been forged through shared experiences and unspoken feelings of the last couple of years, despite the initial incidents you had.

And as you continued to work alongside the Chain, you held onto the hope that, in the midst of all the chaos and adventure, there might be a chance for your paths to intertwine in a more profound way. For now, you would cherish the friendly banter and the secret glances, knowing that no matter how many worlds you traveled, Twilight would be a part of your heart's journey, for now.

[somorrow]

Hi! I'm sorry to do this over Anon instead of engaging with your poll properly, but unfortunately I am crippling shy. Regardless, I love your fics, so I wanted to interact. I sincerely hope its not overstepping, and I apologise if it is because I know how presumptuous it sounds and I recognise I have no right to expect it and would never assume so, but personally I want to suggest an option that isn't even presented in the poll. I would love it if you would leave the current version of In Hell up, and post any rewritten or revamped version as a separate work, even if you changed or swapped the names to clarify that the current version was an old WIP version.

I completely understand how things have changed since you began writing it, and it will always be your choice and your perogative what you do and where you go with the series, but I love the current In Hell and all of its branching storylines. And while I'm excited to see any new directions it could go in, I feel like I would mourn it if the version I've come to love disappeared. I would miss it. AO3 is an Archive, and I would love it if you would consider leaving it up as an archived, older version of your work, even if it would no longer be considered going forward as the 'true' timeline of your story.

I understand that you probably view your own writing differently now, and I'm so glad you have found fresh inspiration. I'm glad your ideas have evolved and I'm greatful for everything you've shared and everything you will share in the future. It's a privilege to be able to enjoy your stories, and it would be a privilege to continue reliving them. They've brought me so much enjoyment and nostalgia, and as cliché as it sounds, I think experiencing your writing really did help me grow and understand myself better as a person through a medium I cherished throughout all of my formative years. Your stories are some of my all time favourites.

I'm also sorry if this sounds clinical, I have a hard time finding the right words, and I struggle to convey my meanings in a way that doesn't sound outright brazen. I'm so so aware that every chapter you've ever uploaded has been a gift. It doesn't feel right making requests, but I didn't see the harm in suggesting it in case it's an option you may find appropriate to consider. I really am grateful to you, no matter the outcome. Thank you for sharing your writing, I appreciate all of the time, attention, thought and effort you put into your very clear labours of love. <3

First, thank you. It sounds like you’ve dedicated a lot of time to reading my works, and I’m beyond appreciative that you’ve been impacted so thoroughly. Anonymous or not, your opinion matters. Please, don’t ever hesitate to send me a message. I do my best to respond to everything, but my busy schedule sometimes causes delays. Rest assured, I will always get back to you eventually. Secondly, I have a rather long response incoming, and I want to assure you that none of what I say is personal. This is just me explaining my thought process. 

I’ve thought about your suggestion for a while, and while I’m not entirely opposed to leaving the work up, I feel very strongly compelled not to. My goal is to finish the universes/fics I’ve started and then to move on to original work. What I leave behind here is something of a “legacy” to me. I can think of at least two fanfics that I’ve read over the years that really impacted me, and I wanted to be that for someone else. Naruto has always meant a lot to me, and so much of Naruto’s plot and the characters were handled poorly in canon. I’ve always done my best to do things accurately, but going through these fics years later, I realize I haven’t always done that. 

Unfortunately, the beginning of In Hell (formerly The Second Path: Hell) is something I really can’t bear to look at. I know I’ve deleted probably far too many works as is for the same reason, but for it to even be there mentally impedes my progress, if that makes sense. As a perfectionist, it’s hard—if not impossible—for me to let it sit there. I have a certain story to tell, and I want it told in the way I envision. The old version/TSP works against what I want from In Hell. The point of deleting it/replacing it is so that there would be no room for comparison or talk of "alternative timelines". The new version would be my canon/standalone version of Itachi's/the reader's story.

In general, these stories have been ongoing through too many different phases of my writing, making it difficult to find my new voice. Most were started from 2018-2021. The knowledge that people can sit there and crack open something I think is subpar is anxiety-inducing. Sometimes, I look at it all and see no improvement—sometimes, I even feel the quality is decreasing.

I’m not over-exaggerating when I say I put my everything into my writing. I do all of this as a completely solo parent while I’m in school working multiple jobs. I research for hours on the smallest of things. I cry, I re-watch, re-read, rethink, rewrite. I study the characters and the universe I’m in/creating. I study literature, grammar… I read through dictionaries and thesauruses to find the perfect word to encapsulate what I feel, see, or think. I have to sit in those thoughts and emotions for a while to properly communicate what’s happening. Exsolutus has two separate suicide scenes, for example. Another example is the rewrite of Shisui’s death. I had several passings of people who were close to me in a short time-period right before and as I was writing it. I have to live in those moments to conceptualize them. I'm glad my labors of love reach you. That's one of the biggest reasons I still try.

As most of you know by now, I write triggering content, and sometimes darker content that people might find offensive. I find myself asking: was that too far? Did I trigger too many people? I try to put things in the tags and authors’ notes, but do people even read authors’ notes? Was my grammar that bad? Is Itachi/Obito/Shisui/Sasuke too OOC? Is the reader too OOC? Was it too short, too long? If I don’t hear from anyone, I feel like what I’ve posted was hot garbage. I know I’m not alone in this, but lately it feels like I’ve been talking to (and posting to) the void, lol. I put weeks of work into the Sasuke fic, and I burned for some type of feedback. I didn’t get any until almost three weeks later… today. I’m very grateful for it, but with everything I put into that chapter, I was aching for anything. A good word, a bad word. I have to admit that this has me a bit discouraged, which may influence my current feelings of wanting TSP gone. I understand our fandom is dying but I put so much into everything I write that I take the lack of feedback to heart now. I never used to care; I honestly used to write because I had a story to tell and didn’t worry much about show vs. tell, foreshadowing, or any of that. But now that I put more nuance into what I write, I guess I take it more personally.

Maybe I never had to worry about receiving feedback because the fandom was more active then. Maybe all of my more recent studying has made me look at my writing with an excessively critical eye. I'm not sure, but I've been experiencing this for a number of years. It was part of why I quit before, and I suppose those feelings are still lingering around. Feeling out of practice worsens this. It’s painful to look back and dislike what I’ve written, especially when writing again still feels strange. In my eyes, why keep it up when it’s impeding me from moving forward?

I’ll genuinely consider your suggestion further, as I haven’t made a decision yet. Thank you again for speaking up; I wouldn’t have even thought of it myself. I would never have known people felt that way without you saying anything. Over the next week, I’ll take the time to consider this third option and will let you all know when I decide how to proceed. In the meantime, there is always the option to download the fic for your own safekeeping. Thank you all for staying with me and being so understanding. We’ll get through these fics, I swear it. I love you all.

[clockwayswrites]

Next chapter of 'Shadow of a Bat' is rewritten! Letting it sit for a few days really helped. I'm much happier with the start and I added about 1K that helped flesh out the state of things a lot more.

It's a bit of a slower chapter- more of a transition of where we left it in 2 and getting us to the finale in 4- but I think it works for what it needs to be.

I need to do a re-read pass and then I'll toss it over to my darling beta Moku before it goes up on ao3!

I hope chapter 4 will come quicker- I've a much clearer idea of what that needs to be. And the there may be a little epilogue, though that may just end up in chapter 4 too depending on how long it gets. I'll prob not post 4 until it's done also so I can combine if needed!

[viceroywrites]

reunions and opportunities - chapter 4

gary x fem!reader

both of you didn't get the ideal high school experience it would make sense that you both would be dreading the reunion.

little did you know how many doors would open after that.

ao3 version here - chapters on tumblr are slightly rewritten and restructured.

content warning: fic contains smut in later chapters. discussions of mental health including trauma and potential ptsd (aka gary is traumatized).

chapter 4

Gary headed up to his room, changing out of his baggy gray sweatpants and his black “My leader went to the Calamity Conference and only got his best henchman this lousy t-shirt” into his classic blue plaid button-up, black t-shirt and a pair of dark wash jeans. He got up and looked at himself in the mirror.

“I seriously don’t see what she sees in me sometimes…” he sighs to himself, straightening out his button-up. While he had definitely bulked up and gotten a lot stronger these past few years, Gary still felt insecure about his body. Maybe it was the years of bullying and teasing; maybe it was the fact that no one in the Horde took him seriously till he became “Two-Ton 21”

He quickly shrugged it off, grabbing his wallet and keys, and headed downstairs, hoping to make it out the door without the Monarch or Dr. Mrs. noticing. 

A curse slipped out of his lips as he heard Dr. Mrs. the Monarch’s deep rumbling voice calling his henchman number from the kitchen. He begrudgingly headed over, peeking his head in the doorway.

His eyes widened to see supper already set out, and Dr. Mrs. the Monarch and the Monarch sitting at table, eating together. It was an image he hadn’t seen in quite a while, especially since they had moved into the Monarch’s childhood home and Sheila had gotten so involved in rebuilding the Guild as a councilwoman.

“21, are you going to join us for supper?” His female leader’s voice snapped him out of his thoughts and he realized the pair of villains was looking at him inquisitively, an empty plate already set out for him. Gary bit his lip, unsure what to say to his leaders, “W-Well, actually, I have plans tonight.”

The Monarch continued to chew away at the Italian takeout his loving wife had picked up, “What plans could you possibly have tonight, 21?” Gary hesitated a bit, his cheeks flushing as he thought of you. 

The Monarch quickly picked up on it and a shit-eating grinning spread across his face, “Lemme guess, you’re seeing that girl you met at your high school reunion... the one you’ve been using up all our minutes talking on the phone with? Don’t think I didn’t notice! You sly dog! Also… that might be coming out of your paycheck for this month, sorry, 21.” He teased his henchman.

Dr. Mrs raised her eyebrows inquisitively, turning around to face Gary, “Are you seeing someone, 21? I didn’t even know that… Jeez, I didn’t think I’ve been away that much to not know that.” She muttered more to herself before turning to the henchman, “You know Guild law states…”

Gary sighed and rubbed his temples, “I know, I know… If a henchman is to enter in a relationship with a civilian, he must keep the activities and identity as a henchman a secret so as not to compromise his or her leader. Trust me, I’ve read that freaking handbook too many times since it’s like the only reading material you had when I was going number two in the Cocoon.”

The deep-voiced villainess blinked at how quickly Gary had snapped at her, “Oh… Well, as long as you know that, it’s none of my business…” Her blue eyes looked up at her henchman’s sullen expression, “But… it does seem like an archaic rule the Sovereign probably put in place in the late 50s so I’ll bring it up at the next Council meeting to see if we can repeal it.” She cleared her throat.

Gary’s expression lightened up a bit, hearing Sheila say that. 

“Well… I’m gonna head out, I’ll be back later. See ya!” Gary quickly disappeared through the front door, running to the subway station to catch the train.

As their henchman quickly disappeared, Sheila put down her fork, staring down her husband. “How long have you known about 21 seeing this girl?”

The Monarch sighed, “I don’t know a few weeks… why does it matter?” He pushed his food around the plate a bit, a hand underneath his chin and his expression turning grumpy. 

“I joined the Guild after one date with Hamilton, a lot can happen in a few weeks.” Sheila rasped with Malcolm’s expression turning sour at the mention of her wife’s former beau. 

“It’s like his first date with this chick! It’s not like they’re going to elope to Vegas tomorrow and have some Elvis impersonator officiate their wedding!” He threw his fork down, raising his arms in the air in exasperation. 

Sheila placed a hand on Malcolm’s arm which caught his attention. The Monarch took a deep breath, trying to calm down, and looked over at his wife, “It’s harmless… plus 21 hasn’t had anything to do around the place since we lost the Cocoon and I can’t arch Venture. We’re not his parents, let him do what he wants.” 

The dark haired villainess sighed in exasperation, “Alright, alright… I’m sorry for doubting you… I’m just a little upset that I didn’t even know about this. God, I’m so tired of this Blue Morpho bullshit! It’s driving me a fucking wall and keeping me away from you and 21!”

“Aw pookums, we understand… soon it will all be over with and we can go back to our normal lives: us, 21, the Cocoon up and running, a new Horde and arching Venture…” The Monarch stood up, embracing his wife tightly.

He was going to make sure all of that came true and she would never have to know he was the Blue Morpho.

--

You sat on a bench in Central Park, going through your agenda for tomorrow’s reconnaissance work on Dr. Venture as you waited for Gary to arrive. You decided to dress up a little more tonight but still kept it casual, not wanting to make it seem like you were too eager.

Your eyes look up to see Gary approaching you and an excited grin spreads across your face. While the conversations you had over phone and text were amazing, you had been craving physical interaction with him.

You quickly pocketed your phone and ran over to him, hugging him tightly. Gary quickly reacted, wrapping his bulky arms around you, and smiled down at you. It was so nice to finally see you again, especially after the stress filled weeks that he had been experiencing. 

“So, where are you taking me? You said you had something in mind?” You asked, grabbing Gary’s hand and intertwining your fingers with his.

His cheeks flushed a bit at the contact, worrying if his palms were sweaty or his hands were too cold. But as you squeezed his hand tighter, his tense shoulders relaxed. 

Honestly, he had always been awkward around girls and making the first move was always terrifying to him – however, you often took initiative into your own hands and it made him feel more at ease when you were in control of the PDA.

He grinned down at you, “Oh, you will not believe this place even exists. But I’m sure you’ll like it.” Gary squeezed your hand back and led the way.

--

“Okay… I want to know how you even found out about this place…” You gawked at the setting, seeing all the waiters dressed up at ninjas.

Gary laughed at the look of disbelief on your face, pleased that he picked out this place. He was on the fence between bringing you to a more traditional date setting but he knew you’d appreciate it.

“I will not disclose my sources but I told you it was something special.” He teased with a grin, beckoning you through the sliding doors into the booth.

“It really is… and I absolutely love it!” You slid inside the booth, still looking around before letting out a scream as a red-headed lanky waiter dressed as a ninja dropped down from the ceiling. 

Due to your training under Wide Wale, it was natural instinct to attack when provoked as your reflexes kicked in, punching the waiter straight through the screen doors. 

“Holy shit!” Gary’s eyes widened at how easily you knocked the waiter onto the ground, not realizing how strong you were.

“S-Sorry, you scared me there!” You suddenly stuttered, rushing to help the server up. You cursed under your breath, hoping Gary didn’t think that was too out of the ordinary.

“N-No, my apologies! I guess my ninja skills aren’t as honed as I thought.” The redhead chuckled, quickly jumping to his feet. 

You awkwardly slid back into the booth, looking down at the menu quite embarrassed and flustered. Gary noticed this and reached over to squeeze your hand, “Hey, it’s a natural reaction. I almost shit my pants the first time I came here too.” He chuckled.

You smiled and mouthed a ‘thank you’ before your waiter, named Jared, took your drink orders – both of you ordering the Virgin Deadly Colada just for the novelty of the rubbing throwing star. 

“I didn’t realize you were that strong. Like I know that guy wasn’t as big as me but you sent him flying!” Gary grinned, intertwining hands with you.

“Sorry again, I’m just a little twitchy is all.” You chuckled nervously, still quite embarrassed.

“No, don’t apologize! That was badass, dude!” Gary assured you with a smile, “I bet you could take out like half the guys here!”

You giggled and smiled, squeezing Gary’s hand. “Thanks, I appreciate it a lot.” 

You both got your drinks, occasionally sipping on them as you caught up on how life has been.

“So how’s work going? Anything interesting you’ve had to do?” You ask, playing with the rubber ninja star in between your fingers.

Gary visibly freezes and bites his lower lip, looking away. All the memories of killing Harangeutan came flooding back to him and his palms started to sweat, his shoulders tense.

You quickly notice and slowly run your thumb across his palm, “Are you okay?” You ask, the sound of your voice soothing him a little. 

He nods and chuckles nervously, “Y-Yeah… just had to do a job I really didn’t want to do.” Your eyebrows quirked a little but you didn’t question it, wanting to be as supportive as you could. You knew he had been under a lot of stress recently, ranting to you at how unrelenting his boss was but you didn’t realize it was to this extent.

He visibly relaxed and squeezed your hand, his line of vision trailing a bit behind you and blinking as he saw from a distance a figure with messy blonde hair and… was he wearing Michael Jackson’s outfit from the Bad music video?

“What are you looking at?” You ask, peering behind your shoulder a bit. At that moment, Gary’s eyes make out his face. It was Hank Venture. “O-Oh, nothing just spacing out!” he quickly stammered out, trying to get your attention.

Someone else beat him to it instead.

“[Your Name], is that you?” A female with a thick Jersey accent’s voice interrupted your thoughts and you whipped your head around. Your eyes widened as you saw who the owner of the voice was. ‘Fuck, fuck, fuck! Sirena, not now!’ you curse in your head.

The brunette approached your booth and you started to panic, your mind racing to get her away. If Gary got any inkling of you being linked to the life of villainy you were leading, he might never talk to you again. Thoughts of him calling you a freak and completely ghosting you after tonight overwhelmed you.

“Oh my god, it is! I haven’t seen you in forever, what are you doing in a place like this?” Serena quickly embraced you in a tight hug, which you reluctantly returned. “Those fucking ninjas scared the shit out of me!”

Gary glanced over at Serena, quite confused on who she was. You chuckled nervously and gestured to Gary, “I’m actually on a date, Serena.”

“Wait seriously? A date?” Serena looked legitimately shocked which you glared a bit at her for. “Okay, don’t give me that look, miss ‘married to her job’!” She grinned.

Your eyes widened when she mentioned your job, fearing she’d mention her father or the Guild. You quickly looked over to the drink at the edge of the table, and you tipped it over, staining her pants, as you tried to play it off as you grabbing the cup.. 

“Oh no, I’m so sorry! I’ve just been so clumsy tonight! I’ll help you clean up.” You interrupted Serena before she could say anything and shot up from your seat. Before heading with Serena to the bathroom, you hurriedly told Gary to order the food.

The henchman blinked in confusion at what just unfolded in front of him but he was given little time to process his thoughts when a pair of hands slammed onto the table in front of him. His eyes quickly shot upwards to see Hank in his face, clearly wearing a full black leather outfit.

“Okay, dude, I am on a date so anything involving my Pops or Brock or anything like that can wait till later.” Hank warned, pointing his finger in Gary’s face.

Gary rolled his eyes, sighing, as he knew Hank was still a bit bitter about him going back to the Monarch. “Listen Hank, I’m not here on Monarch business. Hell, if you haven’t noticed, we aren’t even arching your dear old dad anymore. I’m here for the same reason you are – I’m on a date too.” 

The blonde shaggy-haired teen looked at Gary incredulously and Gary sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. He did not have time to deal with this especially since you could come back in a matter of seconds.

“Look Hank, I promise you I am not doing reconnaissance on you tonight, okay? Scouts honor.” Gary put three fingers up. Hank sighed and uncrossed his arms, “Okay, I believe you. But I got my eye on you.” He slowly walked back to his table, his eyes glued to Gary the entire time.

Gary let out a sigh of relief and checked the time on his phone. It was getting late and he knew you had work early the next day. An idea quickly popped up in his head and he hastily ordered the food to go.

--

“Damn… So he doesn’t know anything about daddy or the Guild… Nothin?” Serena asked, sitting on the counter of the bathroom sinks, trying to dry up her pants.

“Nope, nothing. I really want to keep it that way, Serena. He’s sweet… and you know for a fact that I have not had the best luck in finding a sweet guy.” You grinned at the brunette.

“But I need normalcy in my life… I need something stable. He keeps me stable and sane cause I would be going nuts with this whole Blue Morpho shit.” You rolled your eyes at the thought of it, “I like him… a lot. And I know he won’t hurt me.”

Serena grinned, “Damn, never thought I’d hear any of this from you. I get it though. The blonde guy in the all leather get-up – that’s my date. He’s a total dork… but he’s all right. I’ve done more with him in these last couple days than I have my entire life with daddy and Rocco breathing down my neck.” 

You rolled your eyes, remembering how you used to sneak Serena out constantly for her just to go to the mall without having a dude dressed up like a whale lice following her around. “How is Rocco, by the way?” you asked.

“He’s doing good… he’s been super protective over me without you there to check him when he’s being overbearing. Pretty sure he’s tailing me right now.” Serena sighed, twirling a stray piece of her hair. You shook her head at the thought but gave an encouraging smile to Serena, “I’ll talk to him about it. Now, let’s get out of here before both of our dates start wondering where we went.” 

-- 

You blinked as Gary was waiting in front of the restaurant, carrying a bag of takeout in his hand. “Why did you get it to go?”

“Well, I know you have work early in the morning and I wanted to spend more time with you… So I got it to go and figured we could go to your place, watch some Game of Thrones while we eat?” Gary suggested with a smile.

Your lips formed into a bright grin and you quickly took Gary’s hand, leading him down the alleyway, “I love the way you think. I’ll lead the way.” 

You walked down the dark and dreary alleyway into the neon lit sidewalks of the city, heading towards the subway station. The entire ride to your apartment, you and Gary’s hands were intertwined tightly.

Getting off at a stop a few blocks away from your apartment, you walked ahead of the redheaded henchman. His eyes trailed up and down your body, hypnotized by the way your hips swayed with each step you took. He bit his lip, trying to suppress any inappropriate thoughts. 

You two walked a few blocks and you took the elevator up to your condo on the 7th floor, unlocking the door. 

“Make yourself at home, I’m gonna go change into something more comfortable.” You say as you hold the door open for Gary. He walked inside, admiring the spacious but modest space. 

You disappeared into your bedroom and Gary walked around your place, shocked at how you could afford a place with such nice utilities and a big space with a secretary office job. He settled down on your couch in the living room, setting up the food on the coffee table in front of him.

Stuffing your Guild uniform in the closet, you changed into your most comfortable set of pajamas. You stepped into the living room to see Gary admiring your collection of comic books lined along the walls. 

He quickly redirects his attention to you and gulps, finding you even more stunning in casual wear. “You look great.” He stutters out and you giggle. 

“Thank you, liking the comic book collection? There’s more in my closet but I decided to frame my favorite series and editions.” You take a seat next to him, licking your lips at the delicious food in front of you.

Gary noticed your hunger and chuckled, “Go ahead, dig in.” You quickly pick up the chopsticks and a take-out box full of noodles, opening it up and eating greedily out of the container.

The red-headed male followed in suit, eagerly eating a container full of beef fried rice. You giggled as Gary got grains of rice on his stubble and you reach to wipe some of it off. 

You reach for the remote and turn on the TV, going to your recordings but not before looking over at Gary. “You’re caught up on Game of Thrones, right?” He had a mouthful of rice so he eagerly nodded.

“Hell yeah, that means I can watch the new episode!” You grin excitedly, snuggling up to the bulky male as you scrolled through your recordings and selected the most recent episode of GoT. Gary blushed, feeling you pressed up against him but slowly relaxed, wrapping his arm around your shoulders and bringing you closer into his chest.

You smiled, snuggling into the warmth of his broad chest. Gary was quite amused at all your reactions to the drama that often ensued in the series, watching you throw your arms up in frustration or yell at the TV. He was half-watching but most of the time he was simply gazing down at you, stroking the small of your back.

He had already watched the episode so he was roaring with laughter as he saw your reaction to the major character death at the end of the episode. “What the hell?! No!” You exclaimed in frustration, shooting up from your seat, “There are too many unexplained questions left!” 

“Hey, hey, calm down – there’s like a 75% chance they’ll come back.” Gary chuckled, grabbing your wrist, trying to pull you back onto the couch. He tugged a bit too hard, causing you to topple on top of the henchman. “S-Shit are you okay?” he cursed, his face flushing at the position you were in.

You were straddled on top of Gary, your legs on the opposite sides of his thighs. Your chest was pressed tightly against his and your noses were touching, your breaths intermingling. 

Gary bit his lip, his large hands resting on your hips as he eagerly swooped in, capturing your lips in a kiss. Your eyes widened quickly before slowly closing, wrapping your arms around his neck to deepen the kiss. 

His warm hands slid up the back of your sweater, massaging circles on the small of your back. You let out a soft moan of approval against his lips, breaking this kiss to gasp for air. Gary looked up at you, looking for your approval to move forward.

You nodded, kissing him deeply, and he grinned, hoisting you up and wrapping your legs around his waist as he carried you to the bedroom, not breaking your passionate kiss.

Gently placing you down, he kissed your lips softly and chastely before pulling away. You look at him in confusion, biting your lip as you feel like you’re being rejected. Gary quickly notices this and shakes his head, “No, no it’s not that.”

He takes a seat beside you on the bed and squeezes your hand, “As much as I want to move further… I want to take this slow. I know you’re busy… and you’re focused on your career. I still want to be with you and go on dates… but we don’t have to move further and we don’t have to put a label on it.” He admitted.

You let out a sigh of relief and smile at Gary, “Thanks for being honest with me. I know you’re busy too and life gets hectic and stressful. Maybe holding off and not putting a label on it for now makes our lives a lot happier and less complicated.” You squeezed his hand in a similar fashion as he did, “But I would love for you to spend the night.”

Gary’s lips form a huge smile and he nods, “I would love to, m’lady.” 

He removed his button-up plaid shirt and jeans hesitantly, only wearing a black t-shirt and a pair of Star Wars boxers. Still self-conscious about his body, he tensed as you giggled but you quickly reassured him, “It’s the boxers.” 

He looked down at his Darth Vader boxers and chuckled, “Honestly, I forgot I wore these. Okay, you need rest – you’re the one who has to work early.” You nodded, slipping underneath the sheets. Gary followed in suit and wrapped his arms around you tightly, nuzzling the top of your head. 

As you drifted to sleep quite quickly, Gary gazed up at the ceiling, unable to sleep due to the stress and trauma from his PTSD. Looking down at your sleeping form, he sighed and thought to himself, 

‘I have to tell her the truth soon or I might lose her for good.’

[elysian-drops]

Appetence Update

Hi everyone! So I just wanted to give you guys all a little update regarding Appetence.

First off, yes it’ll be returning here pretty soon! I’m angling to post some new material in the next couple of days or so. I can’t really say I’ll have a more concrete updating schedule (because lol, when have I ever? 😂) but I do have ~50 pages or so written, and my next steps are pretty plotted out. So fingers crossed!

Secondly, I have rewritten Chapter 66 entirely. That means I’m scrapping what has been posted and will be deleting that chapter from Ao3 shortly. I originally wrote 66 when I wasn’t in too great of a headspace, and after reading it again, I’m overall unsatisfied with the character interactions and yeah. In fact, I’ve decided to change my direction slightly. Because of this directional change, I feel we need more development in Harri + V’s relationship to make more of an impact for what I have planned, and the current 66 doesn’t really give us that. That being said, as fair warning, the new chapter might be a little rough to get through in the first half (I can already see people gunning for V in the comments 😂 which I don’t blame them for lol) but I promise it pays off in terms of their growth. Just giving you all a little heads up here because, ya know, it’s still Voldemort, and he’s trying to deal with a bunch of feelings that he isn’t equipped to process (and Harri is, well, Harri 😂).

Overall, that’s the extent of my update announcement for now! If you guys are really attached to the current 66, I say either download the chapter, or I can have it posted here as a sort of deleted scene tidbit. Either way, I’m super excited to move on and come back to this story 💕 And, because I’m so excited and I’m grateful to everyone who has stuck around throughout my hiatus, I’ve included a bit of a snippet from the new chapter below (please excuse any errors, I still need to edit!)

(also it's been how long since Harri laughed?? oopsie—)

[awakefor48hours]

The Maribug Fic -- Rewritten

[Fanfiction.net] || [AO3]

[Chapter 2 >]

Fandom: Miraculous Ladybug Relationship: Maribug/Ladynette Tags: Crack fic, No beta, I will update this every time someone asks Characters: Marinette Dupain Cheng | Ladybug, Adrien Agreste | Cat Noir (more to be added later) No warnings

Summary: Cat Noir asks Ladybug an important but difficult question to answer. So she tells him a ridiculous lie. What's the worst that could happen?

Woohoo, I'm stable enough to write this. If you don't know, last year, I tried to write a Maribug fic but I was fighting some of the worst depression in my life and I could tell the fanfiction was suffering because of that. But I'm better now. Also, this is going to take place at the same time as the original fanfiction (a little before Kwami's Choice special and a little after Elation). Now without further, onto the crack.

Cat Noir and Ladybug were sitting on a roof of a building watching the sunset after spending the day on patrol. Fortunately, there wasn't much disturbance today. Just a few kittens stuck in trees.

"I wish patrol was like this every day, M'Lady." Cat Noir commented.

"I do too but as we both know, that unrealistic." She then stood up about to leave only for Cat Noir to stop her.

"Before you go, M'Lady, can I ask you a question?"

She turned to face him and just said "yeah, sure, go ahead."

"Okay, so I've been wondering... why have you only given a Miraculous to Marinette Dupain Cheng once?"

Other than being Multimouse, technically speaking... she has given a Miraculous to Marinette Dupain Cheng. In fact, she's given a lot of Miraculouses to Marinette Dupain Cheng. But of course he wouldn't know that.

"Cat, don't you remember? I can't give a Miraculous to Marinette Dupain Cheng. We both know her identity!"

Cat Noir scratched the back of his head. "I know about that but this isn't the first time we've both known the identity of a holder. We both know Ryuko's identity, Bunnyx's identity, Pegasus's identity." Why did he have to make good arguments now? "In fact, when you gave Chloe the Bee Miraculous, the whole world knew her identity. Not to mention, along with being a great a holder of the Mouse Miraculous, she's one of the few people in Paris who still hasn't been akumatized." Not an easy task. "It's also doesn't hurt that her parents have the best bakery in all of Paris. So, I just don't understand why you gave her the Mouse Miraculous once."

She had to think of something to say but it was really hard. She wasn't expecting questions like this and he made some damn good points.

Think Marinette, think! What is a totally believable reason for not giving herself a Miraculous without blowing her identity?

"I, uh, have a crush on Marinette."

Was it too late to reveal her identity?

"You do!?" Cat Noir sat up in surprise but also... intrigue.

"Yeah... I... have... a... crush on... Marinette Dupain Cheng." What is she even saying? "So in order to stop myself from getting distracted on the job, I just... I just haven't given her another Miraculous."

She could see the gears turning in Cat Noir's head. He probably already saw through her lie. "That's actually a great decision!" Or maybe he didn't see through her lie. "You're already losing your composure just thinking about her."

"Yeah... I sure am!" She started gesturing wildly. "If I think about Marinette for too long, a villain could definitely take my Miraculous easily. So it's best that I just don't get distracted."

Cat Noir stood up and put a comforting hand on her shoulder. "You made such a great choice."

Ladybug laughed lightly. "You're, uh, not gonna tell anyone about this, right?"

Cat Noir took a step back and bowed at her. "Not even if the most heinous akuma tries to torture it out of me."

"Gooooood." She was thankful for that at least.

"I'll see you around, Ladybug." Was the last thing Cat Noir said to her before using his pole to catapult himself into the air, leaving Ladybug alone.

She watched him for a few moments before heading home herself. When dropped into her room, she detransformed and reality finally caught up to her and it hit her like a truck.

"AAAAA!" She screamed, then started her head against the wall. "I TOLD CAT NOIR I HAVE A CRUSH ON... MYSELF!"

She then tightly grabbed her hair, almost to the point of pulling it out. "This is a disaster! A disaster! A disaster! A DISASTER!"

Tikki flew to her eye level. "Calm down, Marinette. It's not the end of the world."

Marinette now focused on Tikki. "It might as well be! I already blew my chance at being with Adrien and now I just my chance at being with Cat Noir! I'M SO LAME!"

So glad I took that break because I'm already loving this rewrite more. (Also like my Adrichat fic, new chapter comes out when someone asks for it)

[voidthewanderer]

If you go onto my AO3 page, you'll notice that four of my posts are missing. Mnemonic Impressions, Chemical Love, Christmas Miracles, and the Drabbles/One Shots collection. I've removed them to rewrite them.

Unfortunately, Mnemonic Impressions strayed way too far from the plot I'd originally intended to the point that it's probably just never actually going to wind up being finished. There were too many loose ends that I made for no real reason, honestly. I'm going to be tightening up the plot, removing the unnecessary side plots with irrelevant characters and actually getting to finish.

Chemical Love only had two chapters up anyways; however I want to work a little bit more on it before reposting it. One of those "I know where I want to go with it, but it's gonna need a few drafts" sort of thing and I should have held off posting it until I actually had a more concrete storyline.

The Drabble/One Shots I took down because I do want to rewrite my older stuff. Even though they're original character centric stories, I also wouldn't hate posting them individually more as "Slice of Life" world building type things.

Christmas Miracles is because I needed to rewrite it anyways, but since it technically takes place after Mnemonic Impressions, I want to be able to rewrite it how I had originally intended to write it. So that won't be back until after Mnemonic Impressions is finished.

Now, as for the two I've left up: Addicted is in a place where I can move forward without issue. I'm just currently stuck on chapter five because I know I need to tread carefully with what was revealed (and implied) at the end of chapter four. It's a sensitive subject and I refuse to write it shitty and incorrectly portray what Shae would be feeling upon learning that information. I need to make sure I do all of my proper research and fully understand the emotions that someone like her would go through before I actually post anything.

Dinner Date is staying up as world building for my personal Fallout universe. I've already rewritten it so that it flows a bit better.

I have been... very distracted... for a while now with my writing. That's why I've been focusing a little bit more on getting at least one prompt done when I have them in my inbox a week. I just can't focus on writing right now for some reason. I'm really not sure why. But, I am trying. I'm just hoping I can get back on track soon. There's a lot going on in my mind right now (as well as just a lot going on in general), which is probably why I'm so flighty with my writings; but it doesn't make it any less annoying.

Thank you for understanding my reasoning for this decision! I hope that the flighty mood towards my actually accomplishing any writing ends soon.

[druidgroves]

Chapter 12: Into Each Life Some Rain Must Fall

Fandom: Fallout 4 Words: 9,327 Characters: Georgia Tate (Canon Divergent Sole Survivor), RJ MacCready, Piper Wright, Nick Valentine Notes: warnings for self-harm, but otherwise enjoy ! also go check out the rewritten chapter one if you haven't already! read on ao3 / read on tumblr

The days spent in the house by the river went by relatively quickly. Far too quickly for Mac’s liking, who for once was in favor of sticking to one spot for more than a day. Having a breather between taking down the Gunners and whatever came next was a blessing as far as he was concerned. That didn’t mean he wasn’t still bored, however.

Georgia seemed to pick up on his antsy energy pretty fast. With no injuries preventing bodily-movement, Mac was able to futz around the house as he pleased. Mostly, he paced in front of the broken windows, half reading a comic and half looking out at the water. It wasn’t long before his back and forth in her peripheral made Georgia delegate a task to him. When they arrived, the group had done a preliminary sweep upon arrival, clearing out the radroaches in the process, but had neglected to do a real sweep.

“If you pick over this place good enough,” she said, nodding towards the rest of the house, “my treat at Power Noodles when we’re back in the city.”

Mac perked up at something to do. “What do you want me to look for? Probably not anything good.”

Georgia gave him a doubtful look over her glasses, “You know what I like.”

Thinking of all the junk in her backpack (bar the rings he still pretended he knew nothing about), Mac knew he did. He channeled her energy during his search, and within an hour, he had every leftover knick-knack, lamp, and alarm clock from every room in the house laid out on the kitchen counter. He’d even found a few bottle caps that he pocketed cheerily. Once he was done, he not so subtly got the attention of Georgia, who had been quietly observing his comings and goings over the pages of her book.

Turning down the corner of the page, Georgia sat it on the couch next to her and peeked over the cushions. Her eyes scanned over the spread and she gestured for him to continue with a nod of her head.

Mac cleared his throat and got right into it.

“Three table lamps, with one intact lightbulb, six screws, and usable wiring,” he began, gesturing to the items as he went. “Two alarm clocks with complete circuitry and wiring—I had to bust ‘em open to check. One phone with four screws on the bottom that I could count, plus whatever’s inside. I found a camera in the hall closet with a cracked lens, but I shook it around and nothing inside sounded loose, so that’s good, right? Then I saw a mini toolbox in there I thought you’d be interested in, too. Oh, and another fan.” He paused for a moment then turned back to her. “How’d I do?”

“Not too shabby,” Georgia said with a grin. “Help me strip it all down, and I’ll even buy you a beer at the Dugout.”

“Sounds like a deal to me.”

Picking junk apart down to its base components had only occupied him for so long. Stripping metal and wires wasn’t exactly quiet work either, meaning that once they were ready to bed down and it was his turn to be on night watch, it had to be put away. Naturally, idle hands and minds were prone to wandering. On the table across from Georgia’s sleeping form on the couch, was a stack of books prime for picking through.

After the first couple pages, The War of the Worlds had been the only thing keeping Mac from falling asleep during watch out of pure fear (aliens, man). Of course, Mac would never tell her that, not in a million years. After he had read the chapter describing the extraterrestrial creature emerging from its silver tube, Mac knew there wasn’t a chance in hell that he’d actually sleep. That kind of thing had always freaked him out, and the book had only cemented that fear further into his psyche. Besides, just the two of them, out there by the river, alone where anything could snatch them up if it so chose...

But Mac had more tangible things to worry about than aliens. Didn’t stop him from staying up the rest of that night, though. Since they had nothing but time, he planned to take a couple of cat naps throughout the day to catch up on sleep, but upon noticing her stack different from how she left it, Georgia seemingly couldn’t help but pester him about it.

“I didn’t know if you were a science fiction type of guy,” she said, holding up the book, “I figured your super heroes were more your speed.”

“What can I say, I’m a complex person.”

She snorted. “So what’d you think about it? Did it leave you with anything?”

Mac raised a brow. “Huh? What do you mean?”

“Y’know,” she said, trying to find the words. “Themes, messages, commentary. Personally, I think there’s somethin’ to be said about the theme of invasion and how it can be applied to critiques the old world, though I guess hindsight gives me the ability to recognize that more than most.”

“Hindsight?” he asked, then snorted. “What, you some sort of time traveler?”

“You can travel through time with a good book is what I meant,” she replied quickly, seemingly distracted by a hangnail. “Read a lot of…first hand accounts about life before, is all.”

Boring, he refrained from saying out loud. The old world was the old world for a reason; he didn’t see the point in even thinking about it too much. It was all bombs and ghost stories now as far as he was concerned.

“Anyways,” she continued, turning the conversation back to him, “did you have any thoughts at all? The War of the Worlds is a classic. Apparently.”

Mac blanched. He hadn’t gotten past chapter six.

“It, uh…It was good,” he started, awkward and sweating under her attentive look. “Had a lot of interesting themes, but uh…I don’t think aliens are for me.”

Georgia had almost looked a little disappointed, but then waved it away as she said, “Ah, don’t worry about it, we’ll find you a book you like yet. To tell you the truth, I tend to be more of a romance kinda gal myself, but I figure it’s good to branch out into other genres to keep yourself well rounded, know what I mean?”

“Yeah, sure,” he’d agreed, if “well rounded” meant reading both Grognak and The Unstoppables. He hadn’t been much of a book guy since leaving Little Lamplight, where attempted performances of old world plays had been one of the many ways to keep themselves entertained whenever the holotape player broke for the thousandth time.

On the fourth day, they decided to move out, but only after Georgia swore up and down that her foot was fine and Mac’s own battle scars had healed enough. With generous stimpak applications for each of them courtesy of the Gunners’ loot, they were back in fighting shape again.

“I’m serious. If you fu—mess it up again,” Mac warned her once more before they left, “you’re on your own.”

“Somehow, I doubt that’s true.” He replied with a heavy roll of his eyes, making her laugh.

“Yeah, well, I’d make you work for it first. Maybe press you for that extra medic pay, huh?”

“What, is my friendship not payment enough?”

Mac laughed, then paused for a moment, thoughts turning to their contract and where it hung in the area between employment and friendship.

“Are you even still paying me technically?” he asked suddenly. He almost felt bad about asking, but not bad enough to not ask. “I mean, I know we’re friends now, but uh, a guy’s gotta get by, you know?”

“You’ll still get your fair share, that much hasn’t changed,” she assured him, “but I guess it’s more equal. It’s like we’re...partners, now, instead of a boss and an employee.”

Partners.

For days, Mac had been trying to put the discovery of the wedding rings in her pack out of his mind, but now she had brought it all back to the forefront. Before him, before Piper, before Preston, did she have a partner? Someone who watched her back and kept her alive for more do-gooder shit? Someone who could have worn one of those rings, having or holding depending on which golden band belonged to them? Who were they, and why, Mac suddenly found himself asking, did he care so much?

He spared a glance at Georgia’s hands. Her fingers were short but thin, with surprisingly well-trimmed nails that were currently tapping an anxious rhythm against her thigh, waiting for his response.

“Partners,” he repeated, nearly choking on the word. He cleared his throat and looked back up at her face. “I can work with that.”

She smiled, her nervous tapping subsiding as she reached for her pack, “Well then, partner, let’s get a move on. Diamond City awaits.”

-----

By the time the walls of the Great Green Jewel came into view, the sky was starting to fade from a dusky orange to a deep blue, with black encroaching on the horizon. It had been a quicker journey with just two people, but the closer they got to the city proper, the more Georgia appeared like she was walking to her tomb.

She still hadn’t told him what her business was with Valentine, even over the four days they’d spent cooped up by the river. He hadn’t bothered to press her for anything either, especially with the thought of the rings sitting heavy on his conscience. Mac couldn’t help but wonder what she planned to do once they got into Diamond City, how long they’d stay, what they’d do afterwards. Whatever she did, Mac just hoped her plan included having him there beside her once it was done.

Georgia nodded a greeting to every wandering guard patrol the closer they got, and to Mac’s surprise, the guards nodded back. When they came upon the outside walls of the city, though, she stopped at an aged statue of some old world swatter player and considered the gate, which was decidedly closed.

“Somethin’ must have happened for them to be closin’ the gate this early,” she muttered, shouldering off her pack to dig out her Pip-Boy from inside. The screen flashed on after a handful of seconds, illuminating them both in blinding green. “It’s not even seven o’clock. I mean, I know it gets dark early this time of year, but the market shouldn’t even be closed yet. What gives?”

“Well, whatever’s going on, we’re stuck out here until they open,” Mac shrugged, leaning against the base of the statue. “Wouldn’t recommend it, but if we were sneaky about it, Goodneighbor isn’t that much further. We could hit up the Rexford for the night, come back in the morning.”

Georgia shook her head, rolling up her jacket sleeve and slapping her Pip-Boy over the cuff of her shirt, “Uh-uh, not tonight. I told Piper and Mr. Valentine I’d be back in a month and we’re already a few days late—you know how I like to be punctual.”

“Then what do you suggest we do? Ring the doorbell and hope they let us in?” Mac quipped, crossing his arms. A look fell over Georgia like she was seriously considering the idea.

“Oh, come on.”

Georgia yanked her backpack onto her shoulders again and walked up to the speaker box outside the gate with purpose. “Just watch,” she said as they approached. Mac complied and watched as she stood up straight and pushed her shoulders back, even smoothing down the flyaway strands in her hair before taking a breath and pressing the button to speak. Oh, he thought as the speaker crackled to life, this should be good.

There was a gruff voice on the other side that said, “City’s closed. Come back in the morning.”

“And good evenin’ to the night shift,” Georgia replied with an eighteen karat grin even though the guard on the other side couldn’t see it. Her accent came out long and put upon, thicker than yao guai hide. “Is there a Mister Danny Sullivan on duty tonight? I come bearin’ gifts.”

Mac balked at Georgia, eyebrows raised and wondering where the hell all…that had come from. What was she playing at?

“Unless you’re a trader, gate don’t open until six tomorrow, sweetheart—” the voice began, but it was abruptly cut off by another.

“Don’t you worry about him. I’ll get that gate open for you in just a second, Miss Georgia,” the second voice said, sounding pleased as punch with themselves.

“Thanks, Danny, you’re a doll. See you in a bit,” Georgia replied, and did Mac just see her wink? He breathed a laugh through his nose, shaking his head in disbelief. Maybe those rings weren’t the bomb he thought they were. After that, the speakers crackled once more before going silent.

The act fell from Georgia’s face as she turned to him, a singular, scarred eyebrow lifting over her glasses, “What?”

“‘Thanks, Danny, you’re a doll,’” Mac repeated, mimicking her tone and batting his eyelashes before laughing outright, “What the heck was that?”

The gate began to creak open and Georgia pursed her lips at him, “Oh, hush up, it’s not like that. You catch more flies with honey than with vinegar. Besides, I didn’t wanna be stuck outside all night, did you?”

“Hey, I grew up in a cave, I’ve roughed it plenty of times. You’d have nothing to worry about, though. I’m sure ol’ Danny boy would make sure of that,” he smirked with a suggestive waggle of his eyebrows. A flush spread over her face, betraying the narrowed look she gave him under the security spotlights.

“Don’t say anythin’ when we go in or I swear, MacCready—”

“Hey, hey, ease up. You got us in, I’ll give you that, so go grease those wheels,” he conceded, holding up his hands, “I’m sure Mister Danny Sullivan is waiting on—”

“I will make him leave you outside!” Georgia hissed, but he just laughed and ducked her hand when she tried to swipe at him. The gate had stopped halfway and she gave him a pointed look before she ducked under. “Not a word. I’m serious, Mac.”

“Not a peep outta me, Boss.” Despite his shit-eating grin, he mimicked zipping his lips and throwing away the key.

“You little—Danny! You didn’t have to meet us at the gate, you know you were my first stop—”

Mac did his best to school the look on his face before he ducked under, biting down on the side of his tongue to keep his mouth from moving an inch. He popped up behind Georgia to see a man a little taller than she was, with ginger hair and a boyish look to him, but he couldn’t have been that much older than either of them. Either way, nothing about the man said it was any bother for him to make his way over to her.

“Oh, don’t worry about it, Miss Georgia, I’m glad to see you back.” He gave a sideways glance at Mac. “With company.”

Georgia just grinned and waved off his concern. The guy definitely wasn’t subtle.

“Can’t expect a girl to roam around the Commonwealth alone, Danny. Besides, I pick up friends wherever I go. Can’t help it,” she shrugged, putting just enough emphasis on friends that Danny picked up on it quickly. That seemed to be enough for him and he grinned down at Georgia as he spoke.

“Guess that’s just part of your natural charm,” he agreed and Mac nearly broke when he saw her roll her lips between her teeth for just a second. Ol’ Danny boy had it bad, Mac could tell. He knew in that moment, Georgia was aware she may have gotten herself in too deep.

“Guess so! Now, Danny, I’d love to stay and chat, but me and my friend over here have walked from one side of Boston to the other it feels like to sell our scrap—you know, just some ammunition for Arturo and odds and ends for Myrna—so, I was thinkin’...we could skip the bag check this time?” she asked, pushing her glasses down just a touch to look up at him from under her lashes. “There could be a little treasure in it for you. I did say I came bearin’ gifts, didn’t I?”

Mac had to clear his throat to stop a laugh from escaping him and he certainly did not miss the look Georgia shot him out of the corner of her eye while Danny lit up.

“If I didn’t know you, I’d say you were trying to bribe me, but I know that isn’t your style, Miss Georgia,” he said, though he no doubt felt flattered by the notion. “I’d let you through without it because you’re you, but McDonough’s been cracking down lately and I’ve already let you past the gate. Just after you left, we had another person lose their minds in the market, accusing someone just reading the paper of being a synth. Pulled out a knife this time, but thankfully no one got hurt. McDonough thinks putting a curfew on the gate will help keep out ‘undesirables,’ but I dunno. Not everyone coming in after hours is always unwanted.”

With that, he grinned widely at Georgia, who looked perturbed by the news before switching back to a gentle, unconcerned smile.

“Oh, that’s awful to hear, but I guess I understand,” she conceded, albeit unhappily. Then she yawned, stretching her arms. “But could we still make it fast? Like I said, we’ve been walkin’ all day and would love to catch some sleep as soon as possible.”

Danny considered her for a moment, giving a deferring look towards Mac who had long ago furrowed his brow at the mention of the marketplace incident. “I’ll try to be quick. Just let me know when you’re leaving next time so I get a chance to say goodbye…if your friend here doesn’t mind.”

Mac raised an eyebrow, giving Georgia a glance. Why the hell would he care?

“I’m sure he doesn’t,” she said quickly, suddenly growing a little testy. “But let’s get a move on, shall we? I’m likely to fall asleep on my feet.”

At the security desk, Danny barely skimmed the top of Georgia’s pack. There were two other guards, one flipping through an old catalog and the other sat in a chair with his feet propped up, watching them behind dark tinted sunglasses. It struck Mac as a little odd, wearing sunglasses at night, but he turned his attention back to Georgia, who was still working her magic.

She was chatting to Danny the entire time, giving him short little snippets of what she’d been up to since she’d been in last. She had him wrapped around her little finger, even though by that point Mac knew she probably didn’t want him to be. Danny may have been somewhat motivated by it though, given that he would have liked to lay everything inside of Mac’s pack out on the counter before she stopped him. Georgia cleared her throat and started asking him about what it was like being a security guard. It may have all been an act, but Mac would be damned if he said it wasn’t working for them.

“Well, it’s been nice catchin’ up with you, Danny,” she said once the ordeal was over. “See you around.”

“For sure,” he beamed, oblivious. “You take care, Miss Georgia.”

She gave Danny one last smile before heading towards the stairs leading to the marketplace. As soon as they were out of sight, she retreated into herself and the smile fell as she let go of a heavy sigh.

“That looked painful,” Mac said.

“Jesus, you’re tellin’ me. You’re polite to a guy one time and he thinks he’s got a chance,” she groaned, pushing her glasses up and running a hand down her face. He raised a brow at her to continue. “He needed a reason for the logbooks when I first came to Diamond City, and I overshared. Now he thinks he’s gonna get lucky.”

Mac shrugged, “If he couldn’t tell that any of that was phony, then I don’t think you can blame yourself for this one.”

“I guess. But hey, we’re inside and that’s what matters,” she said as they came into the marketplace.

The shops were still open, but Georgia steered the both of them to the side door of Publick Occurrences instead, knocking a pattern into the metal door.

“First stop is Piper. She’ll let us drop off our stuff and sleep on her couch if I promise her some news,” she told him as they waited on the reporter’s stoop.

It took a while, enough for Georgia to knock again with a little more force, but when the door eventually opened, they heard Piper speaking before she had even touched the handle.

“—supposed to be with Ellie for the night, Nat, you said—”

Half in the doorway, Piper froze when she realized who was outside. She didn’t look like the put together journalist Mac remembered from the brief time he’d met her over a month ago. Her hair was slightly disheveled and her clothes—casual, not her usual getup—were wrinkled like they had been thrown on only seconds before.

Mac couldn’t stop the snicker that came out of him as Piper froze in front of them.

“Blue! And this guy! You’re back!” she said, her body filling the gap between the door and its frame as she put two and two together. “And you’re probably looking for a place to stay because I offered you my couch when you’re in town. Because of course I did.”

Briefly, she put her head in her hand and sighed. Behind her, a low yet distinctly feminine voice called out. 

“You alright, Pipes?”

Georgia spared a glance towards him, mouthing ‘Pipes?’ with barely concealed interest and he just shrugged. Through a gap between Piper’s head and the door, Mac caught a glimpse of another woman peeking into frame. She was taller than the both of them, with strong features and pale hair that tickled her chin, and equally as messy as Piper’s. Her clothes were just as wrinkled, too.

Mac’s eyes met Georgia’s again, attempting to suppress the smirk working its way onto his face, while she looked a little pink in the cheeks at their unintended intrusion.

“Yep, yeah, I’m fine!” Piper responded quickly, moving to step fully outside. “I’ll be just a second. Friend in town.”

With that, Piper closed the door behind her as quickly as she could without hitting herself with it on the way out. Georgia held up her hands before she could even speak.

“Don’t worry about it, Piper. We’ll hit up the Dugout this time,” she said and Piper deflated with visible relief.

“Thank you, Georgia,” she muttered, running a hand down her flushed face. “You’re the only person left in the Commonwealth that still has tact.”

“But you’re definitely tellin’ me everythin’ the next time I come in,” Georgia smirked. “Now shoo, don’t keep your company waitin’.”

Piper looked comparable to a ripe tato before she disappeared back into her dwelling, thanking Georgia profusely. Once she was gone, Mac let loose the bark of laughter he’d been holding in.

“Alright, alright, get it out now,” Georgia said, eyes falling towards the direction of the Dugout Inn. “Guess we’ll be spendin’ money on some rooms tonight.”

Mac quieted it down when heard the seriousness that began to pervade her voice. She fished a pouch of caps out of her pack and tossed it to him.

“Sell off all that scrap, grab two orders of noodles, then get us some rooms, my treat. Think you can handle that? I wanna touch base with Mr. Valentine as soon as I can.”

“If it’s on your tab, I can take care of it,” he teased as he caught them, trying to gauge where she was at. “Everything gonna be alright with Valentine?”

“I hope so,” she said after a pause, then straightened her pack and pushed her glasses up, trying to put on a cheerier voice, “I’ll meet you when I’m done, okay? See you in a bit.”

Mac didn’t say anything, but nodded. As he watched her retreat, he hoped that whatever she needed Valentine for, it worked out in her favor.

— — — — —

Georgia sighs as she walks away from Piper’s doorstep, leaving Mac with the easier task between the two of them. She’s had her time. She’s put this off long enough.

The walk to Mr. Valentine’s office seems almost too short, but it gives her a little more time to think (like she’d need any more after the month she’s had to do so). She wonders what the detective will have for when she steps through the door, what sort of world-shattering news he’ll give her this time. Before, it was that the person she watched murder Nate and snatch Shaun out of his arms was a man named Kellogg, and that he had been seen in Diamond City just a few months prior to her arrival. She also learned that a ten year old boy had been seen in his shadow.

She still got shivers when she thought about the man. He was the starring role in her worst nightmares, the face that put revenge in her heart like a knife, twisting it each night. She’d been apt when she described his voice like sandpaper across her face. She had been in a panic when he peered into her cryopod and called her “the backup,” but it stuck with her whether she liked it or not. Two simple words that opened up a sea of questions, but only one remained: what did he want with her son?

Before she left for a month—or, rather, if she was feeling particularly cruel to herself, before she ran away—she and Mr. Valentine had made an attempt at getting into the old house in the abandoned West Stands. She had broken six bobby pins before she finally gave up. Whatever lock Kellogg had put on his door, he made sure no one was getting in, plain and simple. Mr. Valentine had suggested talking to the Mayor’s assistant about getting a copy, but they quickly shot down the idea once they rationalized it. Given that she had taken to associating with Diamond City’s most reviled reporter and its most detested detective on the same day, all her charm could only do so much against good old fashioned bigotry. That had almost been her last straw, and she must have looked like it, too, because Mr. Valentine had put a hand on her shoulder and just told her he’d find a way to push through. She knew now that he had meant to inspire hope, to keep her going forward, but all it did was make her wish she could just stop.

Whatever vigor she thought she was going to face this new world with had disappeared when reality didn’t match up to her optimism. For the past month, she had been scared of what she’d find in chasing after the ghosts of Shaun and his kidnappers. The world Georgia had woken up in was far more dangerous than the one Shaun had been born into, even without the threat of nuclear war.

If, miraculously, the boy seen with Kellogg was her son, it meant two things: one, that after watching her own personal horror show play out in front of her, more time had passed between getting refrozen and being thawed out again, and two, it meant that she had missed out on ten or so years of Shaun’s life. Ten years possibly spent wondering if he ever had parents who loved him, when the reality was one was dead and the other a coward.

Georgia had her month of running away from her problems and not facing the truth for what it was: that her son was more than likely gone. She couldn’t bear to say or even think the other, more definitive word. She had given herself a month of putting it off and now that it was over, she had nowhere else to go.

If Nate could see me now, she thinks to herself, it wouldn’t be the first time he’s seen me at my worst.

What breaks her heart the most was that even with one parent still alive, Shaun had no one. No one to hold his hand when things were scary, no one to tuck him into bed, no one to be there for him when he needed someone—needed her—the most. She doubts there are any other Little Lamplights around to take in another of the wasteland’s lost children, and when the thought hits her, a different kind of heaviness settles on her.

She needs to tell Mac.

She’d been too fucking cagey and was starting to slip. She told him she would come clean at some point, and after tonight, it would have to be sooner rather than later. There was no more hiding it. Yes, she trusts him with her life, that much has been clear to her for a while, but they had only just breached the threshold of friends. Dumping her personal problems on top of him makes her worried she will lose the one person who wasn’t already caught up in them. Preston had known from the get go and she only told Piper on the condition that she be the deciding factor in when her interview got published. Mac had virtually no idea who she was or what her past entailed when they met, and for some reason that had enamored her enough to stick with him. For the better part of a month, between helping settlements and traveling the Commonwealth with Mac, she got to be Just Georgia. It was the closest thing to being herself, instead of General Tate or the Woman Out of Time. A savior and a spectacle. There was very little room for the person underneath.

Before she last left Mr. Valentine, she told him to take his time with her case and had put on all the old world manners she’d held on to. She thanked him graciously for his help and told him she’d be back in a month, then sobbed on Piper’s couch for two hours. She had only barely held it in before getting there—she hated crying in front of people and Nate had never known what to do with her when she did. It made her feel more than just a little pathetic.

A month ago, that walk from the office had felt miles longer when she’d been entirely focused on not breaking down in the marketplace. Now, as she realizes she’s been standing in front of the glowing neon sign of Valentine’s Detective Agency for more than a couple minutes, it still feels far too short.

Georgia snakes shaking fingers under the left sleeve of her jacket and pinches, hard enough to draw blood and focus her attention again before turning down the short alley to the detective’s door. She is in the moment now whether she wants to be or not.

She knocks first, because she’s not an animal and her mama raised her to know better. She doesn’t enter until she hears Mr. Valentine shout, “Come on in, Ms. Tate. It’s unlocked.”

Georgia pauses, smiles to herself, and turns the handle.

“How’d you know it was me?” she asks when she enters.

The synthetic man is sitting behind his desk, surrounded by a cloud of smoke that already has her itching for the carton in her pack. He has stacks of papers and faded manila folders spread out in front of him, obviously in the middle of all manner of casework. He smiles back at her, replying, “You’re the only one in this century that still has the decency to knock.”

Georgia looks around for Ellie before remembering she was babysitting Nat for the night, but beside Mr. Valentine on the floor, to her surprise, is Dogmeat.

“Well, don’t he look comfortable,” she says to him, bending down to give him a good scratch under his collar before sitting down across from Mr. Valentine. He barely acknowledges her, as if her comings and goings are inconsequential to him save the twitching of his tail saying otherwise.

“Sorry to bother you so late,” she says, turning her attention back to the synth. “Had a bit of a delay gettin’ back, but I thought I’d check in with you before I turned in for the night.”

“It’s no bother really. Glad to see you back,” he replies, always the gentleman, and nods towards Dogmeat with a chuckle. “I don’t know why he’s pretending like he’s not happy to see you too. He showed up a few days ago, looking plenty eager to find you.”

His chuckle sounds like his robotic lungs are actually capable of being affected by the haze of smoke in the room, a pack-a-day smoker’s laugh that reminds Georgia of her grandfather. It's so rough and human and familiar that it begins to calm her nerves. Even with his appearance and the general attitude towards synths in Diamond City, she has to hand it to him for knowing how to put people at ease. She wonders, vaguely, if his way with words is what drew him to his career or the other way around. She wonders the same about herself, before everything.

“Strange, because I left him with a friend back at the Castle last I knew,” she replies, picturing Preston in an absolute tizzy once he realizes he lost her dog. Mama Murphy had told her that Dogmeat didn’t really have an owner, but she knew that wouldn’t stop the man from fretting anyways.

“Minutemen keep you occupied past your shift time?” Mr. Valentine asks, picking up the cigarette filling the room with smoke from the ashtray and putting it between plastic lips.

“That, and I picked up another friend since we last spoke. Helped him out with a little bit of trouble—that’s why I’m late.”

“On time, more like,” Valentine counters as he produces another cigarette from his breast pocket and offers it to her.

Georgia didn’t realize she’d been staring it down, but she takes it without a second thought. Once she’s lit up and feeling a little more grounded, she asks, “What do you mean?”

He nods down to Dogmeat and her eyes follow. “While he’s been here, he’s certainly put in the work. Helped me out on a few local cases, actually. Folks tend to be a lot more forthcoming when he’s around. But he must have had a yearning for clues, because he started poking around near the West Stands this morning and found this.”

Mr. Valentine leans over to open one of the drawers in his desk, shaking it a few times before it finally gives. He takes something from inside and sits it down on top, moving his intact hand away to reveal a key. Georgia holds her breath.

“I tried it on Kellogg’s door, just to be sure,” Valentine says as he slides it across the desk to her. “The handle turned, but I wanted you to be there when we go inside. Are you ready?”

Georgia steels herself, lets go of the breath she’d been holding, and nods.

“As I’ll ever be. Let’s go.”

-----

Mac watches the hard line of Georgia’s shoulders disappear into the alleyways of Diamond City. There seems to be a lot weighing on her now and in this moment, he can help just a little by completing his list of tasks.

It doesn’t take long to offload the scrap and sellable trinkets. The stall owners, Myrna in particular, seem eager to close up shop and give him better prices than they usually would in an effort to shoo him away faster. Mac can only attribute it to the synth paranoia.

Getting two covered bowls of noodles from Takahashi takes even less time, though he hopes Georgia comes back before they get too cold. After that, he heads over to the Dugout.

The bar is in full swing when he enters, the beat up old radio on the counter next to Vadim cranked up as high as it’ll go. Even so, Mac can hear the man shouting over the music to his patrons as he serves drinks. He squeezes past a few people surrounding the Port-A-Diner, waving at Vadim when he catches his attention. He reminds himself to remind Georgia about the beer she owes him, then makes his way to the quieter of the two Bobrov brothers.

“Oh, a customer,” Yefim says to himself at Mac’s approach, standing up from his chair where he seemed to be having no fun at all despite the packed house. “Need a room?”

“Two if you got ‘em,” Mac says, taking Georgia’s pouch of caps out of his pocket.

Yefim shakes his head, “No good. There is only one room available for the night, bed and couch. You can take it or leave it.”

Mac sighs. At least he’s not paying for it.

“Then I guess I’ll take it,” he says, handing the caps to Yefim. “We’ll make it work.”

“Room two is yours,” the man replies as he counts the caps in his palm. “Enjoy.”

Once inside the room, Mac throws his pack onto the couch pressed up against one of the walls. He decides Georgia can have the bed—besides, there’s a chance she might fall victim to her own manners and tell him he can have it anyways, just to be nice. His stomach growls when he sets the bowls on the low coffee table and he wastes no time in inhaling his own. The warm broth and the soft yet slightly rubbery noodles fill him better than anything he’s had in the last month. When he’s practically licked the bowl clean and Georgia still hasn’t shown, Mac decides to relax a little. Surely her business with Valentine, at this time of night, wouldn’t take too long.

So he waits. He goes through the remaining inventory of his pack, counting and recounting caps and bullets.

And he waits. He pulls out his journal and doodles in the back of it, then starts on another letter to Duncan that doesn’t get very far after the standard “Hey there, kiddo. It’s Dad” before he puts it away again.

And he waits. He speeds through an issue of Grognak twice by the time a knock—the same pattern he heard knocked onto Piper’s door—comes from outside the room, making him jump. Mac doesn’t know how much time has passed, but he’s killed enough of it waiting on Georgia.

He hops off the couch to answer and when he opens it, the look on her face is all it takes to let him know something is very, very wrong. Tears streaks and red eyes make not the perfect picture of his friend.

Whatever went down with Valentine didn’t go too well by his count. He quickly ushers her inside and waits for her to say something, anything, so he doesn’t have to pull out the there, theres and the it’ll be alrights just yet. He’s never been the best at comforting people; it went hand in hand with his poor bedside manner. But by the looks of it, Georgia is in need of some sort of…sympathy, he supposes. He’ll make it work.

She doesn’t speak though, not until she takes off her pack and sits down on the bed, head in her hands. It’s awkwardly quiet for a few tense moments. Mac is watching the rise and fall of her back, wondering what angle he should come at her with, when she takes a deep breath.

“So, uh, obviously I’m not doin’ too hot right now,” she begins. She still won’t look at him and her voice shakes. “But don’t feel like you need to do anythin’ about it, alright? I just wanna explain myself.”

Mac is more confused than he’s ever been. What is he about to get himself into? Despite his confusion, he’s still curious. He can’t help himself. He nods.

“Okay,” he says slowly, leaning against the wall with arms crossed.

Georgia sucks in another breath, preparing herself before she speaks again. Her words are hoarse and paper thin this time.

“By now I know you know somethin’ is…up with me, for lack of a better word, so I’m just gonna come out and say it, okay? It’s goin’ to sound insane and crazy and, and made up, but you can’t make fun of me,” she tells him seriously, words pouring out of her like water now, and he holds up his hands in defense. Whatever she’s about to tell him, she’s treating it as grievously as the bombs.

“I make no promises,” he says, trying to add some levity to the situation, but it’s apparently the wrong thing to say. Her head whips up to look him in the eye, expression fierce in spite of the watery look in her eyes.

“RJ,” she pleads and he folds instantly, giving her an apologetic look.

“Sorry. Continue.”

She sniffs and wipes her nose on her sleeve, but then he sees one of Georgia’s hands disappear up the opposite one, catching how she flinches in a way that makes him just a little more concerned than he already is.

“I told you that I wasn’t technically from a vault,” she starts again, trying to find the right words. Mac feels a tingle run up his spine—is she finally about to tell him what he’s been wondering and theorizing about for the past month? “And I’m not. I mean, I spent some time in one, way longer than I thought I did, but…”

She trails off with a distant look in her eyes, the same one she’d gotten in the diner when she told him that story about dance halls. Georgia flinches again and tears her gaze away from the wall she had started to bore a hole into. Mac feels incredibly awkward now, unable to move a muscle, but he listens with such intensity it makes his teeth grind together.

“I’m not technically a vault dweller,” she says again after a moment, and meets his eye, “because Vault-Tec fridged me up for two hundred years and only thawed me out a couple months ago.”

Mac almost laughs outright, thinking she’s playing some elaborate prank on him—a great use of her planning skills, for sure—but stops himself when Georgia doesn’t crack a smile after. Surely she had to be fucking with him, right? Because not even in his wildest theories about the woman in front of him did he ever think to consider that she was a pre-war popsicle. It wasn’t exactly his third or fourth guess, either.

“Believe me or don’t,” she says when he fails to say anything back, “but it’s the truth and nothin’ but.”

The more he considers the idea, the more everything about her starts to fall into place. The Rad-X. The manners. The penchant for old world trinkets. Her teeth, her skin, her god damn hair. She was a walking relic of a world gone by, a living ghost from the time of dance halls and classrooms full of healthy children. A time before the bombs. To think that she had been there before everything went to shit…

Mac has so many questions rattling around in his skull. But only one manages to make its way out.

“How?” he asks after a moment.

“Cryostasis,” she explains, the word coming bitterly from her mouth. “They froze us. We were warned just a few minutes before the…before the end. We almost didn’t get in.”

She stops and this time when she flinches, her fingers come away from the inside of her sleeve smeared with blood. Mac’s expression hardens at the sight.

“What the hell are you doing to yourself?” he demands, crossing the space between them before he can stop himself. She moves away from him when he gets to the bed, holding her arm to her chest with a frown. “Georgia, you have blood on your hands.”

“I’m fine,” she hisses, and she has to know she doesn’t sound as convincing as she thinks she does, because her voice cracks in the middle when she speaks again. “I’m not hurtin’ myself, I’m just, I just—”

Mac sets his jaw and points an accusatory finger at her arm. “Pull your sleeve up then. Prove it.”

Georgia throws him an impetuous look, but relents when he crosses his arms to tell her he’s not going to let this pass. She huffs a sigh and doesn’t look at him, yanking up her jacket and the sleeve of her button up to reveal her work. All along her wrist are scarred and scabbed over crescent moons, evidence of finger nails dug into the skin until they drew blood. Three new clusters still have fresh smears around them.

“Georgia.” He can’t stop the twinge of pity that comes with it.

“I’m fine,” she tries again, though it's obvious by now that she doesn’t even believe herself when she starts to tear up again. Mac sighs, shaking his head.

“Just stay there,” he tells her, and goes for his pack. She doesn’t respond as he digs around for the medkit and snatches the roll of bandages from inside. He presents them to her without much fanfare.

“Do you want to do it, or do you want me to?”

She gives him a petulant look, almost childish as she says, “Will I need to pay you for it?”

Mac rolls his eyes, annoyed, but takes that as an answer and tentatively sits down beside her. The mattress doesn’t sink under his weight as much as it does for her—he realizes now that pre-war, she must have had access to the best, non-irradiated foods money could buy. She’s probably never known a life full of hunger and wanting, and for a second, envy surges through him before he remembers the moment they’re in, gripping the bandages tightly. Petty jealousy has no place here when she’s been nothing but helpful and kind to him, even if she’s being a pain in the ass right now. But right now, she needs his help. He gestures for her arm and she slides it over to him without a word.

Mac unwinds the bandages, rolling out a length that should wrap around her forearm more than once. If anything, it’ll stop the current bleeding and hopefully get in the way of any further marring.

“Vault-Tec told us they were decontamination pods,” she says, almost startling him. “Gave us some vault suits and told us to hop on in. God, we were so fuckin’ stupid.”

He says nothing as he starts to wind the bandages around her arm. Still, with the way she keeps saying we, he has a hunch about who else went into the vault with her. He makes sure the bandage is just tight enough that trying to wiggle a finger under it is more hassle than it’s worth. As he touches her skin, though, he realizes why she always felt so cold. A lingering remnant of her time on ice.

“We didn’t realize what was happenin’ at first,” she continues listlessly. “One second I’m in the pod, waitin’ for a bullshit decontamination process to start, and the next I’m wakin’ up to see a stranger pointin’ a gun at my…at my…”

He looks up to see her staring off into space again, her face shiny with tears. Gently, he shifts beside her on the mattress and she starts a little, coming back to the moment like she had suddenly forgotten he was there until he reminded her of his presence.

“Mr. Valentine told me the stranger’s name is Kellogg,” she says, voice feather light but the most coherent she’s been so far. “He’s the man who killed my husband and stole my son out of his arms. That’s why I’m workin’ with Mr. Valentine. To try and find him.”

Mac stops, both because he’s finished wrapping her arm, and because he needs to let the real bombshell she just dropped settle over him. Her situation hits him right where it hurts, makes his chest burn with paternal instinct. All this time, he’d known more about her than he’d ever thought. He knew what it was like to lose a partner, but to lose a child, too, a son…Christ, Mac doesn’t even want to consider it. He feels compelled for a moment to share a bit of his own past, tell her that he gets it and commiserate a bit, but he’s barely handling Georgia’s cascade of emotions. He doesn’t need the added difficulty in dealing with his own.

“Ask your questions now,” she tells him, “or forever hold your peace.”

Mac considers the moment for a while. There’s so much running through his head right now, a thousand things he wants to know. Eventually, after a breath, he settles on one.

“Two hundred years old, huh?”

“Technically somethin’ like two hundred and thirty-four, but who’s countin’?”

The corner of Mac’s mouth twitches. “You’re like something out of a comic book, you know.”

The corner of her own mouth flickers. “Oh yeah? What’s my hero name?”

He thinks for a minute. It has to be good.

“What about ‘The Cryo-General?’”

A sad, pitiful laugh comes out of her, but it’s a laugh nonetheless. It’s snotty and wet and a little gross. Mac lets himself grin just a bit.

“We’ll workshop it,” she says, and takes her arm out of his lap to wipe at her eyes.

“Can I ask you another question?” he asks. She nods. “What did you think of the wasteland? When you first got out?”

He remembers Flora telling him once that she thought she had walked out of Vault 101 and straight into hell. An apt first impression of the Capital Wasteland as far as he was concerned.

Georgia doesn’t miss a beat. “That roaches the size of a toddler were a bit much.”

Mac’s laugh causes a smile to fully settle onto her face and for that, he’s grateful.

“Dogmeat was there when I went to Mr. Valentine’s office—don’t ask me how,” she says after a quiet moment. “We broke into Kellogg’s old house and found some things we can use to track him. Mr. Valentine said a Commonwealth dog like him could sniff a man out for miles.”

“I believe it,” Mac nods. Dogmeat was nothing short of an impressive companion, one he suddenly began to miss.

“So we’re goin’ out tomorrow mornin’ to find him. Bright and early,” she says and looks him in the eye, making him hold her gaze. “You don’t have to come—”

He interrupts her before she can even finish the thought. “Didn’t you say you used to be a teacher?”

The dissonance is enough to stop her in her tracks. “I—What?”

“I just thought that meant you would be smart enough to know that I’m damn well coming,” he says with finality. “You helped me take out the Gunners like what, five days ago? And you don’t think I’m gonna be settling our score still? If you won’t take those caps back, then I’m coming with you.”

Georgia almost looks like she’ll start crying again and Mac is scared she might before she wordlessly throws her arms around him. He’s sitting sideways next to her, so it’s a little uncomfortable and it catches him entirely off guard, but he only flinches a little. She squeezes harder than he thought she could. Her head is next to his shoulder when she whispers “thank you” into his sleeve. He gives her arm a tentative pat before she releases him, face flushed.

“Sorry,” she says, taking off her glasses and using the edge of her shirt to clean the lenses. “I…Thank you, MacCready. RJ. You’re a real good friend.”

“Hey, you’re fine,” he tells her. “This is what friends do, right?”

She puts her glasses back on and leans over, falling towards him slightly on the mattress.

“Then can I be a hundred percent honest with you? As a friend?” she asks.

“More honest than you’ve been already?”

Georgia looks over at him and nods once. Mac nods back.

“I don’t even know if I’m even ready to find him,” she says quietly, like she doesn’t want the world to hear, but once it’s out it’s like she can’t seem to stop it. “I’ve spent all this time avoidin’ the truth like the plague. I tried to justify it, that runnin’ around with a Minuteman was me tryin’ to make this place even just a little bit safer for my son when I finally found him, but fuck if this new world doesn’t suck sometimes. I mean, you can’t go anywhere without runnin’ into mutated abominations around every corner and you heard Danny talk about that synth incident in the market—that’s the second one in as many months, Mac. Why should I even try to bring him into a world like this, when this entire time it’s more likely that he’s probably better off dead—”

“Hey,” he says sternly, cutting her off, “don’t talk like that. You don’t know for sure.”

She’s probably right, but it’s the one fear he can’t validate. Not with his own son’s life hanging in the balance back home.

“And that’s the worst part,” she whispers. “Sometimes…sometimes it feels like the not knowin’ is more bearable than knowin’.”

“Well,” Mac breathes, “how do you know until you know?”

She considers his question for a moment, running her hands down her face as she sighs, “Does it make me a shitty mom that I still don’t know the answer to that?”

“I think the fact that you’ve fought like hell to even get here means you’re the best damn mom in the Commonwealth,” he tells her, entirely earnest. “I don’t think you would’ve come this far if you didn’t want to know.”

Something inside her brain seems to slot into place at his words. It takes her a second, but Georgia starts to return to the person he knows better, the bright, actionable woman he’s known from day one. He’s glad she wasn’t lost entirely.

“We’re gonna have an early start tomorrow,” she tells him, and he can already see the gears turning in her mind. “Mr. Valentine will be taggin’ along and Dogmeat’s back on deck. I don’t know what we’ll find or where we’ll end up, but if it brings me closer to finding my son, I want to go after it if I can. No matter the cost. Are you sure you still want to come?”

For the first time tonight, there’s conviction in her voice, a promise behind her words and she means every bit of it.

“It’s not like I have anything better to do,” he says and she smiles. “I don’t think I could stay behind even if you asked me to.”

“We’ll say that’s because you can’t bear to part with my company, and not because you can’t let go of a debt,” she laughs, giving him a gentle punch to the shoulder. “But like I said, early start tomorrow. So which room am I in?”

“Oh, uh. This one. Yefim only had one room available,” he says and pats the mattress beneath them. “You can have the bed, if you want it.”

In a move surprising even him, she takes the bed without complaint or counter-offer. Later, in the middle of the night when the sag in the couch brings on aches in his back, Mac only feels a little bit annoyed.

[dreamykrimi]

What does this mean?

Well, it means I'm finally finishing Sweater Weather! Surprised? 

I never intended to abandon Sweater Weather. My life took several hard turns in 2017, and as traumatic as it was, it really did change for the better! But that left very little time or motivation for writing. I've had the bones of the last few chapters for years, and I've added to them little by little. In the last year I've become serious about finishing this fic, and I'd love to tell you all about why, but I'll save the personal stories for later. For now, stay tuned: I will be posting one chapter per week until we’re caught up. Each one shot is now a chapter, and has been edited, rewritten, and polished within an inch of its life with the help of my lovely betas. My writing has grown since 2017, and I hope you like the changes I've made. We worked really hard to make Sweater Weather into something worth coming back to. Once we are caught up to Cider Sweet, I’ll continue to post the new chapters that I have finished. As of right now, Sweater Weather is set to be a 100k+ fic in its entirety. 

HOWEVER! I have a confession to make. I have an ALMOST completed version of Sweater Weather ready to publish. I have several thousand words of content that you have never seen ready to go, but the last chapter has been slippery for me. It's hard for me to finish projects like this, projects that have meant so much to me. I want to get it right, and that's a lot of pressure. So I have a request! Please leave a comment and talk to me about this fic. If you loved it or it meant something to you or just made you feel something- anything- please let me know. Your comments inspire me so much, and it's the thing I've missed the most about Sweater Weather. You have all been so kind to me. Please, I'm asking for that kindness again now to help push me through the end of this fic! 

REGARDING THE ORIGINAL FICS: The individual oneshots from 2017 are going to be removed. I won’t take down the AO3 listing, because it would break my heart to lose the comments and bookmarks and kudos that people have left there over the years. However I will be removing the body of text from each fic and replacing it with a link to the new fic. This is your notice to save the originals NOW if you want a copy. I know I get terribly sentimental about things like this, and if that’s you, too, then you may want to make arrangements now. Some of you have told me that you have printed or even handwritten copies of this fic, and I am so flattered by that. But I’m also a bit embarrassed. My old work is just that, old. This new version of Sweater Weather that I’ve been working on is the one I want everyone to be able to save, print, bind, and return to. That’s part of why I wanted to do this. I want to give you a version that I’m truly proud of. But if you’re a silly little freak like me who holds onto old things like they’re treasure, well, this is your chance to be a silly little freak. 

I’ll be posting this message on my tumblr and adding it as a new chapter to each oneshot to make sure that everyone has a chance to see it. I will make another post on my tumblr when I’m ready to start posting the new version and removing the old ones. I don’t know exactly when that will be, but it should be soon! Keep an eye out for me!

[saiintofdiirt]

Do you plan out your fics or do you just write as you go?

It depends on the project, but also I'm a little weird lol so I've said in the past that I'm always writing and that's very literal. I compose in my head constantly. By the time I get a sentence down on paper, it's been rewritten several times, which is why I get so frustrated when it flows wrong. So I map out 90% of what is happening in my head, work it out, then write it; the remaining 10% tends to be specific details that I have to research to better accommodate or things I come up with last minute bc I realized something cool. I very rarely write actual hard copy plans (like outlines) but I do it in my head cause if I sit to write, I end up Writing Everything. This Is Bad. Please Plan Your Writing In Concrete Terms.

other fics are more seat-of-my-pants; I'd say cat's cradle was less planned, it was more a test of my ability to write in a certain voice rather than something I wanted to thoroughly plan out, so I wrote with the sole goal of making it sound as Ken as possible

with fics like atitk, that's harder to explain— I basically have a plotline that I know I have to hit certain beats in a certain order for my clonefies story to come together, while also relying on UU's plotting because it's set in UU. So I have a rough plan that is flexible enough for me to fit into the more rigid pre-established UU plot. So like. semi plotted as I pick and choose what I want to take from canon and what I just have to toss out on principle.

and despite all this, sometimes I just write and figure it out as I go. I'm not immune to just seeing some cool shit and being like let me shoehorn this into my fic cause that's sick. I guess it has more to do with what brings me the most pleasure to do, create an elaborate Machiavellian plot or fuck around and find out.

what usually saves me is I edit a lot. I finish writing a chapter, I edit. I finish an arc, I edit. I finish the first draft, I edit. I think about a chapter, I go back and I edit. I go to post on ao3, I edit. There's always something missing or done wrong because I do it all by myself, so I try very hard to Edit. I actually went to school for editing? Like that was the goal of my degree so it's helpful to keep everything tight.

in the end though! i am as prone to plotholes, errors, and oversights as anyone else. concrete planning would help reduce that, but I'm too stubborn to do it lol.

tl;dr I plan everything in my head before writing when I have a plot, I don't plan anything if I'm just havin fun or testing my skill, and I edit a lot for both.

thanks for asking!

[polarbearauri]

"After a disastrous school year in Unova, Helia Brillante and her mother move to Paldea for a fresh start. Helia isn't sure how 'fresh' of a start it will really be - she's prepared for Uva Academy to be more of the same. But she's wrong. She's so, so wrong.

In a few short months, nothing will ever be the same again."

Hello! I'm Auri (she/her/they/them); autistic girl thing, writer, and person who is quite new to Tumblr. I'm excited to get to know this platform better, though; believe me when I say it's already miles better for my mental here than Twitter.

Since I'm close to being finished with the next chapter of it, I figured now would be a good time to post about the fic I'm writing over on Ao3! It's called Terastallized, and it's a retelling of Pokémon Scarlet and Violet (mostly Violet) which will likely end up being quite long. Its main character is Helia, an artist, trans girl, and a rewritten version of Juliana, forced to come out to her family before she was ready. The story focused on her character development, expanded bonds between the members of the main cast including Helia, a slow burn romance with Nemona, and something strange lurking in Helia's dreams. It's divided into multiple parts, and the first of which is called "The Flowers of Fall".

This fic along with the games themselves are what I have to thank for busting me out of a two-year writer's block, and I'm not even sure why, really. Something about them reached out and grabbed me by the heart and would not let go, not that I really tried all that hard. I'm very excited to share this fic with the world, and the positive response Ao3 has sent its way has been very reassuring. I've also been reading a fair bit of fics outside my own writing, and it seems having a Tumblr is semi-common practice? I've kind of always wanted to be on Tumblr but never known how (and therein lies the anxiety, haha wooo). But here I am, figuring things out, posting about my work!

I'm rambling; forgive me. If you'd like to read my fic, there's a link down below to the first part of the story, and I'm nearing completion of its fourth chapter, "Bienvenida a Paldea". If not, but you read through this anyway, thank you! I hope my rambling wasn't too annoying. I'll leave things off here, I think, and will probably post again when I have chapter four done - I mostly just wanted to get some kind of post out into the world, just to prove that I can, and that I won't immediately chicken out from fear.

See ya, then! :)

[faroreskiss]

The Power of Understanding / Part 4 (v2)

Read on Ao3

Cheat Sheet

Rewritten version posted on: 2023/09/10

Chapters: Pilot, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9

This chapter can be also read as a stand-alone, it is only here to provide more information about the relationship between Wild & You & Flora. This SFW chapter also serves as an Epilogue to "Unnatural Coincidences" (NSFW)

In this chapter: Learn more about what happened between you, Wild and Flora prior to meeting the Chain. What happened the night after you... shared each other?

Summary: You have been with the Chain for a while now, as their "scholar" and translator. You know everything about them, because you are from our world. But do they know the truth about how you can understand everyone? Loosely based on the same reader in my NSFW fic, which has some info about the Reader here. You don't have to read it. Warnings: Rated teen, slightly spicy but SFW. VERY FLUFFY! Flora x Fem!Reader x Wild (Zelda x Fem!Reader x Wild)

The day the Chain first dropped into your life for the first time, it was… odd timing, to say the least.

It was the day right after the night you, Zelda, and Link, well… enjoyed each other’s company in a very specific way. Without clothes. Very, very closely.

The morning of that day was mostly quiet, sunlight gently shining through the curtains as you opened your eyes; it was still too early for you. The first thing you noticed was the ceiling; this was not YOUR ceiling. You blushed to yourself, as glimpses of what happened last night randomly assaulted your brain cells.

Then you realized the body, nay, two bodies that were also in the bed with you. Zelda was in a fetal position, her face turned towards you, her body rising and falling with the rhythm of her breaths. Link was a bit spread over in a starfish position, spreading over to a side, his mouth slightly gaping open.

You wanted to stretch a bit but didn’t want to wake anyone up.

The blanket was surprisingly still covering all of you, though most of it was on you and Zelda, barely covering Link between high legs and belly.

Right. You thought to yourself again, nobody had any clothes on. You couldn’t help yourself but gazed sleepily at Link’s torso, full of scars, yet his face was one of peace at this moment. Damn, he was attractive.

You started to shiver a bit, realizing the blanket wasn’t actually covering you completely, you adjusted it on Link, your hands coming close to dangerous places, it was wrapped and bundled in funny ways. You fixed it, this time covering yourself and turning on your side, coming face to face with Zelda’s cute sleeping face. A stray hair was dangling from the side. It just made something swell up in you, as the corners of your mouth lifted a bit. Risking waking her up, you gently put the hair up. There. All good now.

You felt Wild shift behind you, suddenly you felt warmer as he sneakily made you into the little spoon and whispered into your left ear.

“Isn’t she so… adorable?” he said lovingly.

“Shush, you are gonna wake her up,”

Link's voice was a soft murmur against your ear, his warm breath sending shivers down your spine. “I can’t help it. She looks divine when she sleeps.”

You couldn't help but smile, your heart fluttering at the way he spoke about Zelda. His affection for her was evident in every word, and as you stole a glance at her peaceful sleeping face, you couldn't help but agree. She truly was a vision of beauty, even in the early morning light. The blood of Hylia wasn't anything to underestimate.

“Don't you think we should let her sleep a little longer?” you whispered back, your voice carrying a hint of playfulness.

Link's arms tightened around you, pulling you closer to him. “Maybe you're right. We should let our angel rest.”

The intimacy of the moment was overwhelming, your heart pounding in your chest as you lay there, sandwiched between Link and Zelda. It was a moment you hadn't expected, a situation that had unfolded unexpectedly, yet you couldn't bring yourself to regret it. There was comfort in being surrounded by their warmth, a sense of belonging that you had never felt before.

As the morning light continued to fill the room, you felt a sense of contentment settle over you. The events of the previous night had brought the three of you closer together in ways you hadn't imagined, and even though the reality of the situation was still sinking in, there was an unspoken understanding that seemed to bridge the gaps between you.

As the time felt like it was stretching, you found yourself lost in the tranquility of the morning, the soft rise and fall of her breaths, the steady heartbeat against your back. It was a moment frozen in time, a moment you wished could last forever.

Eventually, you felt Link’s lips press a gentle kiss to the nape of your neck, his affectionate gesture sending a shiver through you. “We should probably get up soon. Breakfast won't cook itself, and I have a feeling you're in for a treat.”

You chuckled softly, a mix of anticipation and curiosity bubbling within you. Link's cooking was legendary, and the idea of sharing a meal together felt like the perfect way to start the day.

"Sounds like a plan," you replied, your voice barely above a whisper.

Zelda stirred beside you, her eyes fluttering open as she yawned softly. She blinked up at the two of you, her gaze shifting from Wild to you with a sleepy smile. "Morning, you two."

"Morning, Zelda," Link greeted, his voice warm and affectionate.

"Good morning," you chimed in, your heart skipping a beat at the sight of her. Even in the midst of morning dishevelment, she was radiant.

Zelda stretched and sat up, her gaze moving between the two of you. There was a brief moment of hesitation in her eyes, a silent acknowledgment of the situation you all found yourselves in. But then, a soft smile formed on her lips.

"I don't know about you, but I could really use some breakfast right now," she said, her tone casual as if it was any other morning. Good call.

Link grinned, the tension in the air dissipating. "Well, you're in luck. I happen to be an excellent cook."

She laughed, her laughter like music to your ears. "Oh really?" she feigned ignorance. Well, I'll be the judge of that."

As you all climbed out of bed, the morning seemed to hold a sense of promise. The events of the night before lingered in the air, unspoken yet ever-present.

Little did you know, all of it was about to come undone.