#then i clicked return to menu and it got stuck on a white screen

[dronningnure]

Wanted to play a bit of Project Diva X when it did this and now the game doesn't start anymore LOL

[the-red-mafia]

The Game

A morning video game session goes sour when the video game Maroon got turns out to be cursed. Now, the team is separated inside of it with no way home. Will they be able to find each other, or will they be stuck there forever? Also available on Wattpad: https://www.wattpad.com/user/TheRedMafia Next Update: [Updated] Word Count: 3423

2 weeks after “The Prince”

Maroon pushed Thorn down onto the couch in between Mad and Solana. Ae looked up at aer friend with a confused look, adjusting the light pink sweater ae were borrowing from Maroon.

“Maroon, what’s going on?” Solana chuckled.

“They didn’t fill you in?” Thorn shook his head.

“Maroon recently got a new video game from Zaeor,” Mad began, crossing one of their legs over the other, “They didn’t tell us what it is, but they want all of us to play it together.” The older teen smirked. 

“Alright, a video game challenge, then. You’re on, Mar-Mar.” Maroon smiled at their friend.

“We’re just waiting on Velvet.” Mad’s screen displayed a question mark, drawing the younger teen’s attention towards it.

“Maroon, do you remember what happened last time you tried to get Velvet to play video games?” Maroon nodded but crossed their arms.

“Yes, but this time it’ll be different. It’s not rainbow road levels of difficulty, so-”

“I hope I didn’t just hear what I think I just heard.” Maroon quickly turned to the doorway of the living room, where Velvet now stood. Her red zip-up covered most of the skull-patterned tank top she was wearing underneath it. The younger teen shook their head.

“We’re not playing Mario Kart, I promise.”

“Good, ‘cause I was going to walk away.”

“Please don’t, it’ll be fun!” Velvet glanced at their teammates lined up on the couch. Solana was still in their pyjama pants and tank top, their hair tied up in a messy bun. He looked like he had just been dragged out of bed by a certain excited teenager. Mad was in their blue jean jacket paired with a grey shirt and white skirt, much more put together than the elf next to it. 

“And…what exactly are we playing again?” they asked, crossing their arms. Maroon smiled and quickly disappeared into the kitchen. Velvet raised an eyebrow. Solana let out a quiet chuckle and scooted closer to Thorn.

“Come on, take a seat Velvie.” She rolled her eyes but obliged. When Maroon emerged from the kitchen, they were gripping a video game box in their hands and blocking the label.

“Where were you hiding that?” Mad questioned, “I didn’t see it when I was making breakfast.” Maroon shrugged and took the disc out of the box. Velvet leaned forward as they placed the box upside down.

“What’s with all the secrecy, Mar-Mar?” Thorn called out.

“It’s a surprise.”

“Well, yeah, but we’re gonna see it in a few seconds anyways.” Maroon scooped the five controllers in their arms, returning to the couch and handing them out one by one. 

“It’s more fun this way.” Thorn laughed.

“Alright, whatever you say.” 

“This better not be something stupid,” Velvet muttered, “I have things I could be doing.” 

“Like what, drama queen?” Solana joked, holding down his controller’s power button. Velvet glared at them. 

“Research. Training. Literally anything else.”

“Oh come on, you’re a nerd.”

“I am not.” Maroon plopped down on the couch in between Thorn and Mad, remote in hand. They navigated through the various menus until they clicked on a rainbow-coloured icon. After a few seconds of blackness, a loud whirring sound came from the TV. 

“Is that…a part of the game?” Solana asked, turning to Maroon. The teen stared at the screen before shaking their head. Mad began to stand, but a loud laugh stopped them in their tracks. Before anyone could move, a bright light enveloped the room. 

Thorn instinctively closed its eyes until it felt the couch disappear from underneath it. Their back slammed onto some kind of floor, knocking the wind out of them. Ae gasped for air for a few moments until ae slowly sat up and forced aer eyes open.

Gone was the familiar red of the Mahogany Mansion’s living room, now replaced with ugly yellow wallpaper covered in grey flowers. The air was stale, smelling of mold and dirt. A hallway stretched in front of them, a few more coming off of it as well. He quickly jumped to his feet.

“Guys? Anyone there?” it called out. A loud thud came from down the hallway, followed by a loud groan.

“Fucking hell,” Thorn heard Velvet yell. The older teen took off down the hallway, turning down one of the offshoots to find her slowly sitting up on the ground. They jumped a little when Thorn arrived.

“Shit- Where are we?” they asked, standing. 

“No idea, I figured you’d know.” 

“Well, I don’t. Have you seen the others?” He shook his head, causing Velvet to groan again. 

“Perfect, just perfect,” they muttered, “Exactly how I wanted to spend my Friday morning. Thanks, Maroon!”

“W-who said that?” A voice called out. Thorn glanced at Velvet.

“Maroon?”

“Maroon.” The duo ran back into the hallway. Velvet pulled a small throwing knife out of a small pouch attached to her belt. Thorn stared at them. 

“Since when did you have that?” Velvet rolled her eyes.

“Since I woke up, frūx. You just don’t pay attention.” Ahead of them, Maroon’s head popped out from behind a wall. 

“Velvet, Thorn!” They slowed in front of them, Thorn pulling them into a hug.

“You okay, mushroom?” 

“Y-yeah.”

“What the hell have you gotten us into, Maroon?” Velvet demanded, crossing her arms. Maroon looked towards the ground.

“I-I didn’t know this would happen, I thought we were all just going to have fun playing the new Johnny Darlington game and-” The assassin cut them off with a loud groan.

“Really? Johnny Darlington game?”

“Y-yeah I thought it’d be f-fun.” 

“So, does that mean we’re in the game?” Thorn asked, gesturing around them, “Because this doesn’t look very Johnny Darlington-core to me.” Velvet narrowed their eyes at him.

“It doesn’t look very what?”

“Johnny Darlington-core.”

“What does that even mean?”

“It means it’s not very Johnny Darlington-core.” She groaned again before turning back to Maroon. 

“What’s supposed to happen in the game?” Maroon looked at them.

“It’s supposed to be a team game where you work together to help Johnny Darlington escape a maze. Although, I don’t think it’s supposed to look like this.”

“Because it’s not Johnny Darlington-core.”

“Thorn, I am going to throw you into a reactor core if you don’t shut the fuck up.” Maroon laughed nervously, carefully stepping in between their friends. 

“Anyways-” they began, looking between the two of them, “Shouldn’t we find Mad and Solana?” Velvet’s eyes widened. 

“Fuck, right. Solana! Mad!” The group went silent for several seconds but no other noise came from inside the hallways. Maroon turned to Velvet.

“W-where are they?” 

Mad looked around the small room Solana and them were standing in. They glanced at the elf.

“Did you hear something?” it asked. Solana shook her head.

“No, did you?” 

“I thought I did, but I’m probably just hearing things.” The elf raised an eyebrow. 

“Can you even hear things that aren’t real? That feels counterintuitive.” Mad shrugged.

“I don’t think it was in my original programming, so it must be a soul thing.”

“Huh, interesting…” A smile appeared on their screen.

“Anyways, enough about me,” it began, “We should find Maroon, Thorn, and Velvet.” Solana nodded before stifling a laugh. Mad’s screen flipped to a question mark.

“What?”

“Pfft- just, we’re off to hunt down the angsty teens.” Mad chuckled. 

“True, although I’m not sure I’d call Maroon and Thorn ‘angsty’.”

“Really? They’re still pretty angsty, just in a different way than Velvet is.”

“I guess…wait. If they’re the ‘angsty teens’, what’re we?” Solana paused for a minute.

“Well, I’m obviously the cool, criminal uncle,” she started, earning a chuckle from the droid, “And you…are the very tired dad of the group.” Mad’s question mark flickered slightly. Solana let out a laugh.

“Or mom. Whichever you prefer.”

“W-why me?” The elf leaned up against one of the yellow-print walls. 

“I mean, you are the one who makes sure we all don’t kill each other.” They laughed again as Mad’s screen went blank before they stood up fully again. 

“Any luck with calling any of them?” Mad stared at him for a second before shaking their TV. 

“I imagine some kind of magic is involved. I think we got teleported into the game,” it said, a frown appearing on the screen, “But…why would Zaeor…” Solana raised an eyebrow. 

“Why would he what?” 

“Nothing, nevermind. Where do you think the teens could be?” Solana looked up and down the hallway. 

“No idea, but we should start walking around. We’re not gonna find them standing here.”

“True.” A crash echoed through the halls, causing the duo to stop in their tracks. It was followed by a loud, shrill scream. Solana turned to look at Mad’s blank screen. 

“Was that a kid?” The assistance droid stared towards the source of the noise. 

“I think so.” Solana cracked his knuckles.

“Well, what’re we waiting for?”

It took a few minutes for Thorn to calm their friend down, all of which Velvet spent leaning against the yellow wall, thinking. Thoughts ran through their head like wildfire, despite the blank expression their teammates saw. 

This is definitely some kind of magic, she thought, taking a deep breath, Although, I’m not sure what spell could cause something like this. A curse, maybe? But why would someone waste time cursing some stupid video game? No…something’s wrong. But what? 

“V-Velvet?” Maroon’s quiet voice brought the assassin back to reality. They looked up and locked eyes with them.

“What?”

“Are you okay?” Velvet narrowed her eyes at them but sighed.

“Yeah, fine. Just thinking.” 

“So do you know what’s going on now?” Thorn chimed in, crossing his arms. Velvet shrugged.

“Partially. My best guess is the game was somehow cursed, no idea how. If it’s a curse, then we’ll have to find the catalyst.”

“Catalyst? What does that mean?” 

“It’s basically just the object the spellcaster puts the magic to maintain the spell in,” the teen replied, standing, “It’s probably the game disc itself, but I don’t know how we’re gonna access that here.” 

“Maybe there’s a physical apparition inside the game?” Maroon asked. 

“I mean, it’s possible.”

“So we just find this catalyst and break it, then we can go home?” Velvet looked at Thorn.

“We’ll have to find Mad and Solana first, but yeah.” 

“What are we doing standing around, then? Let’s find this thing.” Thorn took a step forward, but Velvet quickly pulled it back.

“Hold on a second. I doubt our being here is the only effect the curse has on the game, that’d be a waste of a curse. We have absolutely no idea what we’re up against right now.”

“When do we ever, Velvet? What’s the worst that can happen?” Velvet let out a strained laugh and crossed her arms.

“I have a guess. Try using your powers, either of you.” The two teens looked at each other before both raising a hand. After a few moments, nothing happened. Thorn’s eyes widened as he looked down at his hand.

“W-what?” Maroon mumbled. Velvet sighed.

“Just as I thought. Whoever put this curse on the game completely cancelled any other magic.”

“And that means?” Thorn demanded. 

“It means our powers won’t work,” Maroon said quietly, lowering their hand, “And they won’t work until we leave.” Velvet nodded. She reached into her small pouch and pulled out another throwing knife. They handed one to Thorn and Maroon before pulling out another for themself. Thorn stared down at the pitch-black blade. 

“It’s not much, but it’s something,” Velvet began, spinning their knife on one of their fingers, “Hopefully you don’t have to use them. Stay behind me and keep up.” Maroon nodded, but Thorn didn’t move. Velvet narrowed her eyes at him.

“Thorn?” they called out. Their teammate snapped back to reality, quickly looking up. 

“What?” 

“Were you even listening?” Thorn glanced at Maroon before chuckling.

“Nah, your voice nearly put me to sleep.”

“I swear to gods-” the assassin paused, “Whatever. Let’s move.”

“Got it, drama queen.”

“Don’t call me that.”

“Not a chance.”

There were a few things Mad expected when it and Solana turned the next corner. One of them was more winding halls, complete with ugly yellow wallpaper and seemingly water-damaged carpet. Maybe even a child in the corner, scared out of their mind. What they definitely didn’t expect was Johnny Darlington, gripping a kitchen knife in his right hand. Mad pulled Solana to a stop as a twisted smile overtook the boy’s face.

“What the fuck…” Solana breathed. 

“Why hello there~” the character called out, raising his weapon, “Welcome to my…game.” The blade flew through the air, flying right over Solana’s head as he ducked. 

“Shit,” they mumbled. Mad quickly turned around and grabbed their friend’s arm. It took off back down the hallway, Darlington’s footsteps and laugh echoing behind them. 

“What the fuck?” Solana shouted. Mad glanced at her before groaning.

“Of course, how could I not see that?” Solana glared at them.

“See what, Mad?” 

“Whatever magic brought us here must’ve messed with the game’s code. All the puzzles and NPCs-”

“Mad, 3 words or less.” The elf pulled them around a corner as another knife soared past their TV.

“Um, okay. Uh…everything is wrong.”

“Great,” she said sarcastically, “Exactly what I was worried you’d say.” A knife sliced through one of Solana’s pyjama pants, causing the elf to let out a string of curses.

“Are you okay?” Mad asked.

“Yeah, fine,” he replied, “These are just my favourite.”

“They are good pants.”

“Why thank you, Mad-” Another blade flew in between the duo, cutting her off. Solana let out a strained laugh. 

“Right, that.” They quickly turned another corner, but Solana began to slow. Mad stared at her.

“What are you doing?” 

“It’s…a dead end,” they muttered in between breaths. Mad stopped as well, their screen going blank as more shrill laughter echoed behind them. The droid glanced down towards the yellow wall blocking their way. Solana turned the other way, quickly raising their hands. 

“Solana, wait.” The elf looked back at them.

“What?” 

“There’s a bat by the wall.” His eyes lit up as he quickly spun and sprinted down the hallway. Mad followed suit, Darlington’s laughs getting louder and louder behind them. The elf snatched the metal bat off of the ground, a wild grin overtaking her face.

“Perfect,” she breathed, swinging it in the air, “Hey, Darlington! Let’s dance!”

Maroon let the knife sit gently in their left hand as the other two teens led the way down the hallway. Velvet and Thorn were silent ahead of them. Velvet stared at the various tears and markings on the walls, seemingly trying to decipher the language. Thorn, on the other hand, was strolling with his hands in his pockets. Marook looked between them, nearly running into Velvet when she stopped walking. She quickly balanced them as Thorn turned around to look at them.

“Can you guys hear that?” the assassin muttered. Thorn raised an eyebrow.

“Hear what?”

“It’s a buzzing, almost like that buzz Mad makes sometimes.” Maroon straightened out their glasses. 

“Do you think Mad’s around?” they asked. Velvet shook their head. 

“No. That’d be too easy.” Thorn rolled his eyes.

“Sure, mhm. Of course.” Velvet ignored it and took a left down a hallway. Maroon hurried after her, Thorn following behind. As they walked, a quiet buzzing soon filled Maroon’s ears. 

“I hear it now. What do you think it is?” Maroon asked. 

“Nothing good.”

“Helpful,” Thorn muttered. The group turned another corner as the noise hummed loudly around them. A bright, neon green light quickly enveloped the trio. Maroon shut their eyes tightly and grabbed onto one of Thorn’s hands. A loud thud echoed loudly, causing the teens to jump. A cold breeze flew through the area. 

The light slowly faded away, allowing Maroon to open their eyes once again. The ugly wallpaper had been replaced with dark grey concrete blocks stacked on top of one another. The entrance was gone, with a solid wall now in its place. Another cold wind blew through the chamber, hissing as it went by. Thorn shivered next to them.

“What is this place?” Ae asked. Velvet turned to look at them.

“My guess is it’s another level in the game.”

“But don’t you have to, you know, do something to advance?” 

“Maybe the curse did it,” Maroon chimed in, “If we got too close to the catalyst…” Velvet’s eyes widened slightly before she let out a groan.

“Of course. The curse wouldn’t want us to break it.”

“Um…not exactly.” Velvet quickly turned and threw their knife towards the new voice. A squeak echoed as Maroon and Thorn raised theirs. In tje blink of an eye, Velvet drew two more blades from their bag.

“Wait, please! I brought you here!” Velvet kept the knives raised but glanced at Maroon.

“This is Darlington, right?” Maroon’s eyes widened.

“What?” The assassin stepped to the side, revealing the body of a middle-school-aged boy slumped against the wall. Velvet’s red and black blade pinned the fabric of his blue polo shirt to the…concrete?

Maroon took a step towards Johnny Darlington. The boy flinched but Maroon placed their hand on the wall. Instead of cold concrete, it was soft and pushed inwards. 

“Is this…foam?” they asked, looking down at Johnny. He nodded profusely. Maroon kneeled down and gently pulled the knife out. They tossed it back to Velvet, who promptly caught it and placed it back in the bag. Maroon held a hand out to Johnny. The boy glanced at Velvet and Thorn before taking it.

“Are you okay?” Maroon asked. Johnny stared at them for several seconds and quickly shook his head. 

“I’m fine, but you guys won’t be. You need to get out of here.” Velvet raised an eyebrow.

“Why?” Thorn asked, “What’s going on?” 

“The game is cursed-”

“No fucking shit, I had no idea,” Velvet mumbled.

“-There’s another me running around, but he’s trying to kill everyone. You have to leave.”

“We can’t,” Velvet interrupted, “We can’t leave until we break the curse.” Johnny’s eyes widened.

“That’s not possible.”

“Johnny, have you ever heard this…alternate you talk about a curse catalyst?” Maroon questioned. The boy was quiet for a moment.

“Yes, but-”

“Take us to it.” Johnny turned to Velvet as she crossed her arms.

“What?” 

“You hear me. Take us to it so we can destroy it.”

“He’ll kill you. I won’t be able to stop him.”

“Does it look like I care?”

“My magic- I won’t be able to-”

“What happened to your magic?” Maroon chimed in, stepping in between Velvet and Johnny. Velvet glared at them. 

“It’s not working, I’m not sure why. But the point is, I have no way to protect you. I can’t, in good conscience, let you face him. I’ve seen what he’s capable of.”

“Listen, Darlington-” Velvet began, but the boy cut her off.

“Please, Velvet, just call me Johnny.” Velvet raised a knife again, narrowing their eyes at him.

“How do you know my name?” He smiled at them.

“I know the names of everyone who’s ever watched my show.” Maroon’s eyes widened. 

“So you know-”

“Yes, Maroon. I know your name.” The youngest teen’s eyes lit up and a smile appeared on their face. 

“Do I want to know how that works?” Velvet mumbled, lowering the weapon. 

“I have a guess,” Thorn began, “Magic.”

“I hate you.”

“Feeling’s mutual.”

“Guys…” Maroon said quietly. Thorn glanced at their friend before letting out a sigh.

“Right, sorry.” 

“Sorry. Johnny, can you take us to the catalyst now?” Velvet asked. The boy looked up at her again.

“I told you-”

“We can handle ourselves, Johnny,” Maroon added, “We’re not going to die.”

“You have no idea-” Thorn walked up and placed a hand on his shoulder. 

“Johnny, everyone here is in danger. If you can just take us to the catalyst, we can save everyone here.” The boy looked between each of the members of the Red Mafia before sighing.

“I…okay. Fine. But you have to promise me you won’t die. Please.”

“Oh my gods, we’re not gonna die,” Velvet groaned, “Just take us there already.” Johnny reached out and grabbed Maroon’s hand. He pushed Thorn’s off of his shoulder and grabbed it as well. Velvet raised an eyebrow.

“What are you doing?” she asked. Johnny smiled at them. 

“Teleporting. Grab on.” Velvet let out another groan and stepped towards Maroon, taking their other hand. In a blink of an eye, the four of them were gone.

[howisyournight]

errands for you

inspired by khai dreams’ good advice !

the second years had always been fond of the bread that was selling near the school campus. usually, they would see each other going together to buy some but once missions got harder, they would get inumaki to run errands to buy bread. it happened once, twice but inumaki seemed to grow fond of the girl behind the counter who insisted she taught him sign language, so he found himself doing it voluntarily with a small smile hidden behind his collar.

maki heaved a deep sigh, leaning on panda as they finished another session of training. the sun was dimly shining, which they were heavily thankful for. panda was lying on the grass, yuuta was sitting on the staircase and inumaki was sitting beside panda with the usual stoic expression on his face. maki clicked her tongue before wiping the sweat forming on her forehead. 

“anyone up to grab some refreshments?” 

the four first years glanced at each other before hurriedly pointing at each other. to his misfortune, inumaki hesitated, leaving him the one to sigh and stand up. he stretched before handing his phone to maki. the girl typed the food she wanted before passing it to yuuta, who did the same. eventually, the phone circled back to inumaki. his eyes scanned the screen before heading off with his hands in his pocket.

the boy sighed, staring at the small bakery from a few feet before approaching it. the door opened with a chime, alerting the people working behind the counter. 

“welcome!” 

inumaki approached the counter, phone in hand. he stopped when the lady behind the counter recognized him, rather his uniform. 

“oh! a sorcerer!” the women wiped her hand on her apron before leaning behind, calling out to another worker. a small voice responded from the kitchen followed by a girl fixing her apron. 

“serve this one, it should be easy enough.” the woman assigned and the girl merely nodded before facing inumaki with a smile. 

“what can i get you today?” 

to say you were excited was a complete understatement. not only were you working in a bakery but you were working near the same campus your parents met. it was an astounding thing to even think about. it gave you something to be happy about. since their passing, it seemed difficult to spend every minute stuck at home. it wasn’t before the brink of you and your sister’s empty fridge that had you standing up and going. with no one to look after you both, you were left with the task to be the adult. a year behind legality, you were glad some strings were pulled so you could start working in a small bakery near the tokyo metropolitan school or rather the jujutsu tech. 

you remembered your mother telling you stories of their missions, dangerous ones that they joked about. unfortunately, you weren’t given the chance to have a technique which left you with eyes that often saw monstrous creatures. though you could easily take classes to grow stronger, applying to be a sorcerer increased the chances of you leaving your little sister. 

so now here you were, behind the counter of a small bakery near the jujutsu school. the ladies you were working with were surprisingly kind and welcoming. the atmosphere was ideal and overall, everything was perfect. 

“what can i get you today?” your head tilted and your eyes closed with a smile. before you could comprehend anything, a phone was shoved in front of you. on it was multiple bread and drinks that were present on the menu board. you stared at the boy in front of you before gaping in realization. 

inumaki watched you raise your hand, signing. he merely blinked at the sign, not understanding what any of what you said meant. you paused, your hand still raised. 

“sign language?” you worded out at the same time signing. inumaki shook his head. you sputtered before apologising meekly, a bashful smile on your face. you took the phone from him and started to write the order down. 

“right. i’ll be back.” you muttered before collecting the written bread on the pad of paper you were holding. you hummed before placing a tray in front of the boy. ducking, you grabbed a paper bag from below the counter. inumaki stood idle, watching you place the bread inside the paper bag with care. he couldn’t put a finger on what he was feeling but his eyes could not leave your figure. it was as if he was put on some kind on trance. maybe it was the lighting inside the shop that made you glow. no, inumaki felt like even if you were standing with no proper lighting he’d still see an angelic glow surrounding you. 

“-ello?” 

your voice snapped him out of his thoughts, his cheeks slightly heating up in embarrassment. 

“here’s your bread.” you signed despite already knowing the boy in front of you indicated he didn’t know how. 

he was interesting, you could at least say. maybe it was the way his lower half was mysteriously covered by cloth or maybe it was his eyes that seemed like it was staring into your soul. either way, you were silently hoping he would return. 

maybe you were getting lucky because the off-white haired boy sauntered his way into the shop the next day and for the following week. before you knew it, you were offering him free lessons of sign language. he’d handed you his phone with the question ‘how do you know sign language’ with his head tilted cutely the other day. to which you responded, 

“my sister’s mute.” you signed with a small smile, making the boy’s eyes widen slightly. so you were familiar with his case except he had the ability to speak just not without the expense of getting others included. which by the way, you had no idea about. you had just assumed he was mute as well. it wasn’t before you heard him slip a random word. 

“takana?” you heard as you sat on a table near the window. how the time seemed to slow down as you stared at him in mere shock. 

“y-you can talk!” you exclaimed, hands gripping the table and practically leaning over closer to the boy. inumaki stared before glancing away, a hand tugging at the collar hiding his face nervously. lucky for him, your expressions seemed to be positive. the way your eyes lit up when he opened his mouth relieved him. 

“takana?” you asked in wonder, sitting back down placing a hand under your chin. it seemed like eternity as inumaki waited for you to look up and started chatting again. he jolted slightly when you frantically looked up. 

“inumaki!” you snapped your fingers, remembering a story your mother had told you. “snake and fangs!” inumaki froze at the words. for all that he expected, he did not expect those exact words to fly out of your mouth. you knew about curses? sorcerers? it seemed as if his eyes asked all the questions when you clasped your hand together, sighing with a hint of sadness. 

“my parents were sorcerers.” you claimed, staring at outside the window. inumaki could see pain glazing over your eyes. “they used to tell me about their missions.” you chuckled softly. 

“the inumaki clan was a small story i can vaguely remember but i know the technique. my mother was very interested in different jujutsu techniques.” you continued as inumaki listened, following your gaze outside the window. the sun was setting, painting an ethereal blanket of orange glow in the sky - a perfect afternoon to spend relaxing and talking.

inumaki dug his brain for the past few weeks, trying to remember certain sign language you had subconsciously done. you stared at the boy as he hesitated to raise his right hand. your eyes widened when he signed an apology. your mouth fell open in disbelief and awe. he had been picking up a few of your sign language and he actually used one! you let out a giddy laugh. 

“it’s okay.” you signed back with a bright grin. the corners of his eyes slightly curved, indicating he was smiling back. you leaned forward with a smile, continuing the conversation despite it being slightly one sided. you had no care that he was using limited responses. when he would try to sign a phrase he’d caught from you, you would lean in and guide his hand. eventually, for the whole month, inumaki had been voluntarily buying refreshments for his fellow classmates without knowledge he had been making friends. maki had grown suspicious one time when he had hurriedly insisted that he can buy. though, to his relief, she brushed it off. 

this cycle continued for almost a year and a half. you were proud inumaki had gotten to use sign language with you without needing any help. it was practically second nature to him now. you two had never run out of things to enjoy. your friendship eventually led to you inviting him to movies, arcades and other places you had fun in. at one point, inumaki had met your little sister who was surprisingly clingy to him. 

you noticed, however, whenever he stayed over at your apartment, you would often find yourself staring at his relaxed figure or the way he messed with his hair. you found yourself noticing details that a friend wouldn’t. you stopped mid walk once, your eyes widening in realization. the heat creeping up your cheeks whenever he would ask how you were doing or if you had a good day were things you normally brushed off but those little things seemed to fluster you more than usual. 

you were falling for him. 

it was a dangerous thing to be feeling. after all, he was a sorcerer. you were reminded of your parents’ tragedy when you thought about jujutsu. with pale features, you try to reassure inumaki that you were fine. 

it wasn’t before a walk back to your apartment when inumaki suddenly stopped. you followed and looked at him in worry. his eyes were downcast as if contemplating something. everything blurred when he signed a phrase. 

i like you. 

your brain felt like short-circuiting. your face was heating up. you hadn’t taught him that phrase. you were at loss for words. his eyes were darting nervously back to you, his hands subconsciously tugging on his collar. he stumbled when he was met with arms engulfing him in a hug. you had tackled him when your brain had processed.

“i like you too!” 

it was that sweet laugh that followed after that made inumaki’s heart melt. you could barely see his face but the soft pink dusting his cheeks showed his happiness. it took him a few seconds to process your response but when he did, he found his arms hugging you back and his lips planting a small kiss on your head.

help i love him

[collecting-stories]

Sex on the Beach - c. 06 - Rafe Cameron

Summary: You return to the vacation house to pack up your stuff.

A/N: I wrote this in like...45 minutes 😂 The re-write is complete...now for the last two chapters.

Holiday in the Sun Masterlist | Outer Banks Masterlist

☼ ☼ ☼ ☼

The room they gave you at the resort was nice, overlooking the waterpark and the ocean, twenty stories above the ground. Not as crisp white as the Nassau House had been but not quite a Hilton. You called your dad after you checked in to tell him that you had an argument with your mom and that was why you had charged the room to your allowance card, something he was perfectly okay with because that meant you liked him more for the moment.  

“Divorced parents are something else.” You commented, flipping through the room service menu. You were starving, in part from not eating for an entire day, and were happy to be getting something that wasn’t dictated by your mom. “My dad was like ‘do you need more money?’...he always wants to be the favorite.”

“Ask him if he can get us our stuff back.” Rafe joked, emerging from the bathroom with the pair of shorts you’d bought in the giftshop on, they were gray and had an Atlantis emblem on the one corner.  

“Did you try to get a hold of Sarah?” You asked, scooting over in bed as he sat down next to you. His hair was still wet from the shower and when he pushed it out of his face little droplets of water hit your shoulder and cheek.

“Yeah, she said ‘get your shit yourself’...real fucking helpful.” He grumbled.  

“I mean, your dad is a nightmare. If I was her, I don’t know if I’d want to risk having him flip out either. Especially since they’re stuck there for the rest of the week.” You replied.

“So what’s your plan?”

“Ask Wheezie when they’re going to be out and stop by to get our stuff?” You suggested, “I still have the spare key you told me to hang on to. We could just go in and get our things and leave.”  

“No, no.” He stood up and you watched as he paced for a moment before seeming to come to some sort of decision, “I’m not fucking hiding out from him.”

“You can’t just walk in there Rafe, he’ll be pissed!” You pointed out, “I really don’t think you should cause any more trouble-”

“The boat was his!”

“I’m not saying it was your fault but maybe just don’t provoke him.” You replied, “who knows what he’ll do.”

Rafe was silent for a moment and you almost thought he was starting to calm down, maybe come around to your side of the issue and realize what it was that he would be jeopardizing if he went back to the Nassau house and tried to have it out with his father. But a second later you jumped as his fist slammed against the dresser and he stormed back into the bathroom, slamming the door shut behind him. You weren’t sure what to say, how to ease the situation or make Rafe anything but angry at his dad.  

“I’m gonna go down to the cafe, do you want anything,” you called through the bathroom door. You waited a minute for Rafe to answer but there was only silence from the other side of the door. “Rafe?”

“I don’t want anything.” He snapped.

The door to the room swung shut behind you and you walked down the long hall to the elevators. There was a little mini lobby, a room with ice and vending machines, two benches and a wall of mirrors that reflected back your exhausted appearance. You sat down on one and pulled your phone out of your pocket, calling your mom.  

���Where the hell are you?” She practically screeched through the phone and you rolled your eyes. Not the supportiveness that you were unrealistically hoping for but maybe you could mold her into someone half willing to understand.  

“I’m at Atlantis with Rafe, I’m using dad’s allowance money for a room.”

“That’s just like your father, swooping in to “help” as if you’re in trouble.” She bitched.  

“We need our stuff-”

“You are not staying with some boy unsupervised-”

You cut her off, “mom. We need our stuff,” you repeated, hoping that she would be more moldable to your cause. “Is there a time we could come get it?”

“Exactly what do you expect me to do? Pack up your things for you and have them waiting by the door? You are serious trouble young lady! You stole someone’s boat. And what’s more? You were rude and disrespectful and ungrateful to Mr. Cameron.” She complained.  

“I’m not staying in that house for the rest of vacation, pretending everything is okay. And Rafe’s not coming back either. So can we get our stuff or not?” You asked.

“Being rebellious isn’t worth your future. You’re supposed to be thinking ahead. What about college?”

“That’s two years away.” You argued, “I already sent applications, I’ve applied for scholarships, nothing is changing about college. But I’m not spending the rest of my vacation in a house with a man who assaulted me!”  

“Well maybe you can buy new stuff.” She replied, the line going dead immediately after. You listened to the click off and pulled your phone away from your ear to look at the home screen. She’d hung up on you, unsurprising but not the result you wanted.  

You said you were going down to the cafe so you did, grabbing an iced coffee and heading back up to your room in hopes that Rafe had cooled down enough. When you reentered the room he was laying on the bed, sprawled on his stomach with his head turned toward the window. He didn’t move when you came in and you placed your coffee on the nightstand, climbing onto the bed and sitting cross-legged beside him.  

“Are you awake?”

“Unfortunately.” He grumbled.  

“I think you got sunburn,” you mentioned, eyeing the harsher red of his shoulders, “or is that still from the shower.”

He didn’t answer, only pushed his face further into the pillow. You reached a hand out, laying it flat on the middle of his back. When he didn’t move, but also didn’t seem to protest, you leaned over kissing the red on his shoulders and beginning to gently rub his back.  

“I called my mom.”

“You have shitty news delivery skills.” He replied, shifting over so he laying on his back. You followed his movement with your hand, your fingers brushing over his abs as they tensed beneath your touch.  

“She basically said ‘screw you and your stuff’. So I guess you were right, we’ll have to go there.” You replied, “though I still think going while Ward is there might not be the best idea ever.”  

“I just don’t even wanna think about all that shit tonight.” Rafe huffed.  

“Oh well, I can totally help with that.”

-

It was earlier the next morning that Sarah texted saying that she and Topper could pack up your stuff and Rafe’s and drop it at the resort. A feasible and preferred plan to Rafe’s, going back in that house and provoking his dad would do nothing positive for their relationship or for the vacation. You knew Rafe was pissed and that he would likely stay pissed until he confronted his father but you urged him not to go to that Nassau house. Though your urging proved in vain because his promise to take you to dinner soon turned into a drive down the road to his family house, the two rentals in the driveway signaling that everyone was home.

“Rafe!” You practically hissed as you jumped out of the car, following him to the door, “what the fuck are you doing?”

The sentiment was repeated by Ward as the two of you entered the house, everyone sitting at the table for dinner looking up in shock at the sight of the two of you. You wanted to run back outside and drive away, or sink into the floor and disappear.  

“What the hell are you doing here?”

“Getting my stuff.” Rafe replied, already heading for the hallway while you just waited by the door, frozen, “don’t mind me though, keep having your nice family dinner.”

Ward was quick. He made it around the table and put himself between Rafe and the hallway leading to your rooms, blocking his son from getting to them. You weren’t sure what to do. In favor of not making eye contact with your mom or step-dad you had locked eyes with Topper, who was mouthing a ‘what is he doing’ to you as if you were any more clued in to the situation than anyone else. Was this what you wanted? To be the supportive backbone for someone that you barely knew because you had been crushing on him since you were thirteen and he paid you just the slightest bit of attention on a vacation that would’ve otherwise been hell. What was your motivation? That you liked him...that he liked you and that was just everything you’d ever wanted so you desperately were following him around.

“Get out of my way!” Rafe’s voice pulled you back and you looked over at him and Ward.

“I don’t hear from you for two days, no idea where either of you are...we’re all worried sick, and this is how you treat us? Show up here and waltz in like nothing is wrong, demanding your things?” Ward snapped.

“I called my mom after we checked in...I’m sure she let everyone know where we were.” You replied, “not to mention, you sitting down to eat doesn’t look like you’re too broken up about any of this.”

“You ungrateful bitch-”

“Hey!” Rafe cut his dad off, shoving him just enough that Ward stumbled back. You felt your whole body tense. You needed to get out of this room and this house and, preferably, off this island. This was nuts, this wasn’t permanent. “Don’t talk to her.”

He pushed passed Ward, knocking his shoulder with his dad’s as he headed down the hall toward his bedroom. You knew that you should follow but your feet felt glued to the spot, like you weren’t sure how to make them work anymore. Sarah got up from the table without warning and disappeared down the hall, coming back a moment later with your duffel and suitcase.  

“I already packed them yesterday.” She said, passing them to you.

“Thanks.”  

Before Sarah could say anything else the shouting from Rafe’s room got louder. Worried, you left your bags by the door and headed into the hallway to see what was going on. Rafe was at the door of his room, completely red-faced, mid-screaming at Ward, louder now that you were standing there, and very much close to tears. Ward was shouting at the same time and even in the room you felt like you could barely make sense of what was being said. It was like walking into something that you had no right to witness.  

“Rafe,” you weren’t sure he heard you over the screaming but you placed your hand on his back and it seemed to bring him back into reality as he looked back at you, breathing heavy and labored.  

“I swear to god Rafe, you walk out that door and there isn’t a place for you at home.” Ward threatened.

He paused and you almost expected him to turn and apologize or call the whole thing off and decide to stay here. Miserable, sure, but at least he wouldn’t be homeless. But instead he grabbed his stuff and walked out the door passed you.  

“Happy?” Ward asked, gaze meeting yours across the room. You heard Rafe call your name from the living room and you looked toward the sound before glancing back at Ward. If you lied, you were sure he could tell. So instead, you said nothing, grabbing your luggage and heading for the door.  

You knew you should’ve been happy, in a way. Rafe was basically choosing you over his family and wasn’t that some kind of oddly romantic thing? Except all you felt was a pit in your stomach, eating up whatever feelings you had other than dread, leaving you feeling empty. He was walking away from his dad and his home and you weren’t even sure how you actually felt about him.  

Wheezie followed both of you out to the car and you put your bags in while Rafe swore to her that nothing bad was going to happen. “Dad and I just need time to cool off,” he promised.  

“But you said we would spend vacation together!” She insisted. He had promised her, before they even left the OBX.  

“And we will. I’m not breaking that promise okay?” He hugged her and then walked around the car, getting in the driver’s seat.

You got in the car, trying to ignore the glare that she sent your way. Just when you were starting to gain favor with Wheezie you’d fucked it up again by taking her brother from her. You wanted to apologize and, honestly, you wanted to be in Provincetown with your friends. A nice, drama free vacation...not this mess.  

-

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[isitgintimeyet]

Just A Friend

The response to this story has been lovely, so thank you all for reading. liking, reblogging and commenting on this piece of fluff. Hope you continue to enjoy.

Thanks to @wickedgoodbooks for the beta

AO3

Previous

Chapter 6: From Irritation to Interrogation

And just like that, we’re friends, Jamie and I. It’s strange how quickly you can go from strangers to acquaintances to friends. After that walk in the park, something seems to have clicked with us, there’s an ease in our friendship that doesn’t happen too often. Despite our vastly different upbringings, we have many things in common: a shared love of irreverent comedy, a fondness for very good quality chocolate and wine and a determination to succeed in our chosen careers.

Of course, it helps that we don’t have the whole fancying-sexual-tension-romantic thing lurking in the background. As I’ve said before, Jamie is not my type and, judging by the pictures on his Facebook timeline, I am definitely not his, which appears to be doe-eyed, tanned, petite blondes— their pneumatic breasts frequently struggling to break free from their restraints. No tall, wild-haired brunettes with only-slightly-above-average breasts usually firmly encased in sensible lingerie.

I may even invite him to Geillis’ wedding as my plus one. We’ll see. I don’t think I’ll be dating by then, I quite fancy a few months without any of those complications.

********

One of life’s pleasures, for me, when I’m not on-call, is to walk to the local newsagents on a Sunday morning for the newspaper. If it’s fine, it’s another opportunity to sit on my balcony and read it at my leisure. A mug of freshly brewed coffee and a cinnamon bun enhances this experience.

Today, it’s not so fine, but sitting on my sofa while listening to the rain pounding against the window is pretty good too. I’m just about to start the crossword when my phone rings. I quickly swallow my mouthful of bun and glance at the screen—private number. I offer up a silent prayer that it’s not the hospital as I answer it.

“Claire Beauchamp?” The female voice sounds familiar.

“Yes.” I answer cautiously.

“Jes’ a wee word of warning. Karma can be a bitch, ye ken.” The voice grows louder and angrier. I recognise that tone, last heard berating Jamie. “Ye’ll get what ye deserve. Ye canna trust James Fraser, but ye’ll find out soon enough—the hard way, like I did… thanks tae ye.”

“Look, I—“ I begin, but before I can finish my sentence, she’s gone.

My initial reaction is irritation. Laoghaire, no doubt looking around for someone to blame for her recent break up, has cast me in the role of home wrecker, clearly using my carefully honed feminine wiles to lure Mr. Fraser from her clutches. Like Frank, she can’t quite believe that anyone could break up with her, without there being another waiting in the wings, ready and willing to take her place.

My irritation dissipates as I begin to see the funny side of this. She’s obviously thought long and hard about this—checking his Facebook friends, keeping records of his phone calls when they were together. Perhaps she sees herself as Jennifer Aniston against my Angelina. I hope Jamie can see this for what it is and laugh. Besides, in this scenario, that makes Jamie what? Brad Pitt?

*****************

Two days later, Jamie and I have arranged to have a quick drink after work in a mutually convenient bar. Summer has not yet returned to the city. Whilst not actually raining, the air is damp and there’s a definite nip in the air. I do a cursory check of the outdoor seating, just to see whether Jamie is heroically braving the elements, but there’s no sign of him.

I make my way into the bar and have a quick walk around before snagging a corner table. The seats are comfortable and it’s in a prime position for me to keep an eye out for his arrival. This bar has always been one of my favourites in the city. It feels grounded, like it’s been here forever. The stone walls and dark oak beams are unchanging and watching the inebriated trying to negotiate the uneven wooden floor on their way to the toilets always makes for good entertainment. In fact, people come from miles around to marvel at its very crookedness.

I check my phone for any messages. There’s one from Geillis, accepting my invitation for girls’ night on Friday at my flat. I reply and put the phone down just in time to see Jamie heading toward me. He’s obviously come straight from work as he’s still in his navy blue suit and white shirt. I’ve come straight from work too but am not nearly so smartly dressed. Having worn my blue scrubs all day, I’m now clad in jeans and a wrap around top which used to be orange, but has faded to a light amber colour. I feel somewhat underdressed next to him.

“Drink?” He asks, before even sitting down.

I nod. “I’m parched. Think I’ll have a shandy, please.”

“Lager shandy? Half pint?”

“Bitter,” I clarify, not being a great believer in girlie drinks. “And pint.”

He returns a couple of minutes later with a pint and a packet of crisps in each hand.

He takes a huge slug of beer. “Sae, what do ye ken? What’s new wi’ ye?”

And so, I recount my day of surgery to him. And, bless him, he looks interested all the way through my narration. He does turn a bit pale as I begin to explain my use of the bone mallet and chisel, and his crisps remain untouched, but he soldiers through.

“In other news,” I change the subject as his colour returns and he rips the crisps open. “I had an anonymous phone call from your ex, warning me about you and blaming me for your break up. But, never fear, I’ll get what’s coming to me when you do the same to me—“

A bout of coughing from Jamie breaks into my conversation.  I get up and thump his back a couple of times. The coughing stops as he takes a swig of beer.

“Sorry,” he clears his throat and continues. “Crisp stuck in ma throat. She did what? How does she ken who ye are?”

“Presumably she kept a record of your phone calls and is monitoring your Facebook friends. Maybe you need to check your phone, see if she’s set up any other little apps so she can track where you are or what you’re doing.”

He shakes his head. “Aye, I’ll do that. I canna believe she would go tae such lengths. Although…” he pauses for a moment. “... mebbe I can. She was always the, er, suspicious type—asking me about women at work, convinced they were ready tae pounce on me. Perhaps I’m not the best judge of character, Claire. Ye need tae advise me.”

I laugh. “Ok. I’ll be your wingman, if you like. Or vet all your potential girlfriends. How about that?”

Jamie joins in with the laughter. His eyes twinkle and it’s funny the way he wrinkles his nose as he laughs.

“How about you? How’re the Spanish influenced dinners going? What are you up to?” I ask him.

“The plans are going grand. We’ve three dinner options planned out.” As usual, his face lights up as he explains the various menus to me.

“They all sound delicious. I’m looking forward to trying them.” And that's the truth.

“Weel, funny ye should mention that. We are looking fer people willing tae test them. How about it? Fancy trying one out? This week, mebbe? Free, of course.”

My weekend plans are getting better and better. Girls’ night at my flat could be turning into a bit of a Spanish fiesta, a mini replay of our Barcelona trip.

“I’d love that. Thanks. I’m having Geillis, Mary and Anna ‘round on Friday for a catch up. I could give you their opinion on the meal too.”

Jamie types something into his phone. “Great, I’ll sort it. So, good weekend plans then?”

“Oh yes, what about you?”

“Oh, I’ve got a sort of date type thing,” he mumbles into his pint and, to my surprise he goes a little bit red. Is he worried about telling me? Does he think that I will mind?

“That’s nice...isn’t it?”

“I dinna ken, really. I… I suppose so. It’s ma sister, Jenny’s, idea.  A friend of hers from university. Ma sister canna quite believe that I’m no’ yet married and she keeps trying tae make it happen. And Jenny, weel, let’s jes’ say that she’s a force of nature. Ye dinna want tae mess wi’ her.”

***************

I’m not exactly the most gifted cook, but I think it would be hard to go wrong with the box of food and wine that Jamie has delivered. The asparagus is waiting to be cooked, the mouth-watering smell from the simmering  chicken and chorizo fills my flat and bowls of juicy Spanish olives— some plain and some with garlic and chilli are dotted about the dinner table. Feeling inspired, I root out a large jug and begin to cut up fruit for sangria.

Like alcohol-seeking missiles, I’ve no sooner prepared the sangria when the doorbell rings. With many hugs, Geillis, Mary, Anna and I greet each other. I accept their gifts of wine, chocolate and flowers as we head into the flat.

As usual, everyone gravitates to the kitchen as I pass the drinks around, complimenting me on the wonderful aromas. Geillis’ stomach rumbles in eager anticipation.

When the four of us are together, the conversation flows as freely as the wine. Honestly, you would swear that we had not seen each other for months, when, in fact, I saw Anna on Tuesday in theatre, and squeezed in a coffee catch-up with Mary and Geillis only two days ago. The topics we cover are wide-ranging and random. Sangria and olives are accompanied by Anna’s search for a new flat, then the conversation turns to the destructive tendencies of Mary’s kitten as I serve the asparagus and Serrano ham starter.

For the main course, we have the tale of Geillis’ father refusing to wear a kilt for her wedding—he is prepared to don tartan trews but, according to Geillis, that will spoil the whole symmetry of the wedding photos. Neither, at the moment, seem willing to back down but, having known Geillis for so many years, it’s obvious to me who will win.

By the time I bring out the selection of Spanish biscuits and turrón, the conversation has moved on to men, more specifically Mary’s crush on a locum doctor newly arrived in the department. There’s a lot of good natured teasing about this—Mary seems to develop a new crush every couple of weeks, and why not?

Geillis drains her wine and turns to me. “Fantastic meal, Claire. Better than yer usual offerings.”

She pulls me close to her as she says this, and squeezes my arm to show she’s joking.

“Well, I have to confess. I did have a bit of assistance. I mean, I did the cooking, apart from the cookies, but everything came from FraserFood.”

“In that case, give me those chocolates back. I’m no’ sure ye’ve earned them.”

“But I have,” I moan. “I did all the cooking…and made sangria.” I reach across Geillis and help myself to another biscuit. They are melt-in-the-mouth delicious.

“It’s part of a new range they’re launching,” I try to explain as Anna and Mary start to squabble over the last biscuit. “Three course dinner party boxes. Everything you need. Jamie asked if I would test one of them out—“

Immediately Anna and Mary shut up, the last biscuit now abandoned on the plate.

“Woo-hoo,” Anna grins at me.

Geillis nudges me in the ribs. “Jamie, is it? And what else has Jamie given ye, eh?”

“Nothing, we’re friends, that’s it.”

“But we’ve seen pictures of him. Don’t ye want there tae be more tae it? I mean, c’mon look at him.” Now Mary joins in the questioning.

I sigh. “We can just be friends, you know.”

“Friends with benefits, mebbe?” Geillis isn’t giving up.

“No, just friends. Although…” my friends lean forward expectantly, perhaps awaiting some heartfelt confession from me, as if I’d suddenly realised my undying love, or, at least, a good bit of lust for Mr. Fraser. They’re going to be disappointed.

“...Although, I suppose you could say this free food and drink is a benefit. So,yes, I guess that makes us friends with benefits.”

Anna and Geillis look as if they don’t believe me, but say nothing. Mary isn’t prepared to drop the subject.

“So,” she starts. “So, suppose I meet yer—“

“Not mine,” I mutter under my breath.

Mary shrugs her shoulders and continues, “—yer Jamie Fraser. And suppose he asks me out and one thing leads tae another… ye’re telling us that ye wouldna mind?”

“No, I wouldn’t mind. Might be a bit awkward if you break up. I mean, can I still be friends with both of you?”

Geillis, laughing, joins in now. “Suppose our Mary marries Jamie Fraser and asks ye tae be a bridesmaid. Would ye mind then?”

I pretend to give this some thought. “Ah, now that does depend. Just how awful will the bridesmaid dress be, Mary?”

“Och, just hideous. We’ll be having a Disney themed wedding.”

All talking and laughing at once, we try to decide which would be the worst Disney outfit for a bridesmaid and finally settle on Moana.

I get up from the table to go and make coffee, but not before making one final statement on the whole platonic situation with Jamie.

“Look, I know it’s hard to believe, but I have no romantic interest in Jamie and neither does he. In fact, he told me that he’s got a date this weekend and that’s totally fine with me.”

Geillis grabs my hand in passing. “Ok, as long as ye’re fine. We jes’ dinna want ye getting hurt, Claire. We love ye too much fer that.”

I smile at my closest friends gathered around my table and feel a rush of warmth and love for them too. They’re my family, these girls, and, for all the joking and teasing, they have my best interests at heart.

“I know. Thank you for looking out for me. But, Jamie and I are friends, nothing more.”

And with that I head into the kitchen, giving Anna, Mary and Geillis, no doubt, the opportunity to continue to speculate about Jamie’s and my friendship. But really I don’t mind, they’ll get fed up soon enough when they see I’ve been telling the truth all along.

[dakotacrisis]

Transferred (12)

FRESH BAKED JUSTICE!

---

It was a beautiful day. The sun was shining, the leaves in the trees were changing color, Marinette had all her assignments done, Kagami’s dress was coming along beautifully, Alya and her were talking again, and Quinn had finally purchased a real planner.

Marinette now sat in a window seat of Nanette’s moms’ cafe sipping a mug of warm tea and listening to the excited and funny ramblings of her friends.

“You’ve been awfully quiet today.” Nanette noted. “Everything okay?”

“Everything is pretty much perfect.” Marinette sighed, “I’m enjoying the moment while it lasts.”

“Here, here,” Nanette clinked her mug of cocoa against Marinette’s. “Heard anything from Adrien?”

“Nope. I don’t know what is going on anymore with him.” After Marinette’s confrontation with Lila at the fabric store she called Adrien to vent. He couldn’t talk long as he was on his way home and had something important to discuss with his dad when he got there. She kept her complaining short and tried calling Alya instead but was met with an even more abrupt end to the conversation as someone in the background made a bunch of noisy complaints about deadlines and narrative flow.

She tried talking to both of them the next day and again was met with quick dismissals and apologies. Something was going on but Marinette for the life of her couldn’t tell what it was. Were those two in cahoots for something? If they were, why couldn’t they tell Marinette?

Marinette’s phone beeped. “This may be him.”

“And I am telling you, Tsurugi!” Quinn was nose to nose with Kagami, “I don’t care how powerful a ninja Pucca is, she could not defeat the kraken!”

“It is essentially a giant octopus. She could totally take it!” Kagami argued.

“I will physically fight you on this!”

“Children,” Nanette’s mom approached the table and swatted Quinn on the top of their head with a menu, “No shouting in the cafe. You’re disturbing the other customers.”

“Sorry, Mrs. Labelle,” Quinn and Kagami muttered. “Hey, Marinette, can you settle this for us?”

“In a minute, I got a message from Chloe.” Marinette opened her messages.

“What is it?” Kagami leaned over her shoulder.

“She sent me a video. Geez, twenty minutes? What is this?” Marinette recognized the thumbnail as her old classroom.

“Fresh Baked Justice.” Kagami read out the title, “Was the caps lock necessary?”

“Let’s see what’s happening.” Marinette propped up her phone and pressed play.

---

“Why am I the one recording?” Marinette recognized Alya’s voice behind the camera.

“Because I, unlike you, never doubted her. So I get to present the information.” Chloe was standing at the front of the classroom as the other students entered. “Now wait for my cue to start recording.”

“I’m already recording.”

“You incompetent--”

“Watch it, Chloe.” Alya warned.

“Fine, whatever,” Chloe huffed as she waited for everyone to get seated.

Ms. Bustier entered the room and gave Chloe and Alya a confused look. “Girls, what are you doing?”

“I knew we were presenting our projects today and I wanted to be the first.” Chloe said.

“And Alya is recording because?”

“Because I want to relive everyone’s jaw dropping reactions to my perfect project.” Chloe boasted but there was something slippery about the way she said it. Something she wasn’t letting on about.

“Alright then,” Ms. Bustier smiled, “Since you are so eager you can go first.”

“Perfect,” Chloe cleared her throat, “My dear plebeian peers, may I present my wonderful project of a modern retelling of an ancient story. The story of Dolos and Aletheia.”

Chloe hit a button on the remote she was holding and the slide on the screen changed to a picture of Lila with little devil horns photoshopped on her forehead.

“Now, in ancient myth Dolos was a either a lesser god or simply a personified spirit of trickery and guile depending on your interpretation. A master of cunning deception, craftiness and treachery.” Chloe continued on unbothered by the mean looks she was getting from her classmates, “The most well known story concerning Dolos is while under the apprenticeship of the Titan Prometheus he forged a copy of a statue Prometheus was sculpting.”

The powerpoint changed slides again. This time a picture of a statue of a woman with sad eyes and holding a tablet of some sort filled the screen.

“The statue Prometheus was sculpting was of Aletheia, or her Roman name, Veritas. Aletheia is the goddess of truth in ancient myth. Prometheus decided to create a statue of her so to help regulate the behaviour of people.”

Again the slides changed this time to a picture of an incomplete statue of a woman that had Marinette’s head photoshopped on it.

“Now in the myth, Prometheus was called away from his shop leaving Dolos alone. In his ambition the trickster decided to use his free time to fashion a forgery of the statue Prometheus was making. So good were his skills and in the details of the forgery that when Prometheus returned to the shop and saw the copy he decided it was impeccable and put both statues in the kiln.”

Slides changed and now stood a regular picture of Marinette with a little halo around her head and next to it was a shopped photo of Marinette twisted to give her an evil smile and a burglar mask. The devil horned Lila picture stood between them looking awfully smug.

“The only problem was that before Dolos could finish the Aletheia statue he ran out of clay and could not add any feet. Thus when the statues were done the true version of Aletheia awakened and walked with measured steps but her incomplete twin was stuck in place unable to move forward. This product of subterfuge thus came to be known as Mendacium, or Falsehood. Standing in place as a reminder that while something false can start off successfully, inevitably, Aletheia, or Truth, will prevail.”

“Well, Chloe,” Ms. Bustier looked put out, “This is well researched but how is this a modern retelling? You’ve only repeated the original myth and put your classmates faces over the pictures.”

“I am aware, Ms. Bustier.” Chloe nodded, “I was merely informing everyone of the original story. Now we will be moving onto the modern retelling. In this version the personifications of Dolos and Aletheia have been changed to Lila and Marinette respectively.”

At this the students in their seats started to squirm and exchange bewildered looks.

“Ahem,” Chloe cleared her throat and hit the button to change slides once more. This time instead of a shopped photo it was the class picture. “Once upon a time there was a normal high school class. In this class there was a pillar of truth and justice, almost to annoying degree, known as Marinette Dupain-Cheng.  All was well in the class and many people liked her. Until one fateful day when a dark power of lies and deception crept into the school. A miss Lila Rossi.”

The screen now showed a still from Alya’s interview with Lila the first day she came to school.

“Lila charmed the people around her with tall tales of interest and famous connection in order to impress the students. While this irked Marinette she could not prove her lies were in fact such and so suffered in silence. Any time she tried to call out the falsehoods being fed to her peers she was met with resistance and, in extreme cases, hostility.

“What Marinette did not realize at the time was just how much her attempts at uncovering the truth angered Lila. How if Marinette could provide concrete proof to her claims then Lila would be powerless to stop it. Unfortunately for dear Marinette, she was stunted in her mission of justice by Lila with sabotage and manipulation of her classmates.”

A video appeared on the screen of what was clearly Lila sneaking into the janitor’s closet early in the morning and leaving with a large white jug of chemicals before ascending the steps into Ms. Bustier’s classroom. The time stamp on the video read about a month ago. The day Marinette sat in bleach.

A minute later the door to the classroom opened again and Lila stashed the bleach back in the closet before integrating herself with the arriving students.

“Thankfully for Dupain-Cheng, another hero rose to the challenge. One detective Chloe Bourgeois.” Chloe smirked. The camera panned to Lila. She looked more composed than she should have considering Chloe was going to expose her for the lying worm she is. Adrien, who was forced next to Lila, looked absolutely delighted by Chloe’s project.

“This day would mark the first in a long line of pranks and lies that Lila would use to break down Marinette and drive her away from her friends and the school.”

The next video took place in the library. The time stamp read about a week after the bleach incident video. Marinette was sat at one of the computers furiously typing away on a document. A couple feet away at the printer Lila stood taking the paper out of the printer and shoving it back in all bent and crushed. She walked away and a minute later Marinette stood up from her desk and crossed to the printer to collect her paper. Only the printer was now jammed due to Lila’s sabotage. Unaware of any foul play Marinette went about unjamming the printer while Lila now snuck to the computer Marinette had inhabited and started clicking at things on the screen. She ran back into hiding as Marinette got the printer fixed and returned to send her report to the printer again. Only this time Marinette started to freak out and frantically click everywhere on the screen trying to find a now permanently deleted document.

Chloe described what was in fact happening in the video to the class so they had the proper context before reminding them of Marinette’s ‘excuse’ for not having her report done. Her ‘excuse’ that someone had deleted the document and all her notes.

A few students started to look at Lila with suspicion.

A newspaper clipping now occupied the screen. It was the article about the art students and the picture of Lila wearing Marinette’s ballgown. In the article the false name Lila gave the reporter for Marinette was highlighted.

“Now thanks to the incredible work of Detective Chloe, I was able to find the reporter of this article and ask them about the misinformed name.” The screen changed to a video of a journalist sitting in their office. The name on their desk matching the name on the article.

“Now,” the video version of Chloe said, “What can you tell me about the person who gave you the name Margaret Dubois-Peng for this article.”

“It was this girl pictured in the center of the photo I took,” the journalist held up the picture, clearly pointing at Lila, “And I did not mishear her. She told me that the name of the girl that couldn’t make the picture was named Margaret. I remember because I thought the dress was beautiful and wanted to get the name perfect since the talented designer was absent from the photo.”

“I am sorry to inform you but there is no Margaret Dubois-Peng that attends Francoise Dupont. The actual designer of that dress was a girl named Marinette Dupain-Cheng whom Lila is in the same class with and knew the dress belonged to.”  Video Chloe said.

“Really? Doesn’t she know what kind of exposure an article in this newspaper can give to young artists? Especially considering that the Next Big Night Fundraiser is approaching. This is when the organizers and founders of the event start looking for possible recipients for the Next Big Thing title.” The journalist asked. “What kind of petty high school drama would make her lie about that?”

“What indeed?” The in class version of Chloe asked as the video on the screen ended. “I’m sure we all remember Marinette’s little freak out that day when she tried to vault a desk to get to Lila. Her outlandish claims of sabotage have more weight now, don’t they?”

Oops. Looks like Lila’s stone face started to crumble. Only slightly. She wasn’t about to give anything away yet.

“Now, I could go into all the other interviews I managed to accumulate with other famous contacts Lila claimed to know like, Jagged Stone, Prince Ali, and Clara Nightingale. So I will!” Chloe pulled up another video. This time a short montage of said celebrities holding a photo of Lila and stating that they had no idea who this person was and debunking whatever claim she made about them right then and there.

The quiet whispers passed around the class were now getting louder before Chloe called their attention back to her.

“Now, for the final nail in the coffin of Marinette’s departure from the school,” Chloe clicked the remote again with a list of items appearing on the screen. The stolen items Marinette was framed for stealing. “Her supposed theft of various objects from the rest of the class. Like Nino’s headphones,”

The screen changed to a picture of Lila grabbing the headphones out of Nino’s bookbag while his back was turned.

“Or Max’s charger.”

Another photo of Lila snatching the charger off of the table in the library Max was sitting at while he was reading.

“Mylene’s headband and Rose and Juleka’s pencil toppers.”

Two more photos both of Lila clearly reaching into the girl’s lockers and pulling out the objects.

“Unfortunately I have no evidence of her putting these in Dupain-Cheng’s bag as there are no cameras set up inside the classroom but I think the evidence of her initially being the one to steal the items speaks for itself. Lila Rossi is Dolos. Spirit of trickery and deception that drove away the Truth.”

All eyes were on Lila now. Unperturbed Lila stood up and walked to the front of the class next to Chloe. “Chloe, I will be the first to say that this is a very nice project. You obviously put a lot of work into it. Not only trying to create a parallel of high school drama to an ancient tragedy. Spectacular work. I can’t believe you even got all those celebrities to play along for it with those fake interviews. I’m sure that as the mayor’s daughter they were only too happy to help you with your project.”

Oh no. Lila really didn’t think she was going to lie her way out of this, did she? There was no way! There was video and photographic evidence on all accounts!

“These photos are some of the best photoshopping I’ve seen. You must have worked with Alya over there to create them.” Lila waved at Alya recording. “But I think there should be a helpful disclaimer to remind everyone that this is in fact a work of fiction twisted to look like real life events.”

“You are not that lucky, Rossi.” Chloe made a come hither motion and Adrien stood up. “While I know everyone in class has got to be at least speculative about me, I know they all believe Adrien. What reason do they have not to? He’s done nothing wrong ever in his life.”

This time it was Adrien who addressed the class. “I can confirm that what Chloe has said this morning is true. All of it. I knew Lila was a liar from the beginning and that she was hurting Marinette. I thought that she couldn’t cause such horrible damage to our class with her lies but I was wrong. I made Marinette ignore the problem like I did and it cost me dearly. Cost us dearly.”

He wasn’t smiling as he turned to Lila. “After what you did to Marinette and how I saw her cry because you had managed to turn the entire school against her I offered to come back and expose you for the liar you are. It was Marinette who convinced me not to so that the class wouldn’t turn against me next. It may have cost me some good friends but there are times that I look at this environment you created with your selfishness and think that maybe getting pulled from school altogether wouldn’t be bad if it meant getting away from you.”

At this the class got into a frenzy as they tried to attack Adrien for knowing the truth and not exposing Lila earlier if what he said was true. Chloe whistled loudly drowning out the frantic voices and restoring order once again.

“I’m not done.” Chloe rolled her eyes. “To close out my project I wanted to bring special attention to this particular parallel

“In one of Aesop’s fables he tells the a tale of a man that found Alethia in the wilderness away from civilization and asked what she was doing there. I believe this ties in very well with the treatment that Dupain-Cheng received during her tenure here. The quote is as follows: “A man was journeying in the wilderness and he found Aletheia standing there all alone. He said to her, ‘Ancient lady, why do you dwell here in the wilderness, leaving the city behind?’ From the great depths of her wisdom, Alethia replied, ‘Among the people of old, lies were found among only a few, but now they have spread throughout all of human society!’” Chloe read dramatically, “Now if we were to take the people of old referenced here and imagine it as the people of this class and the little white lies we all have told from time to time that would be a fair comparison. But when Lila Rossi started to attend our school her lies infected our peer group and her influence has been felt throughout the entire establishment. Thus the lies found among only a few have spread throughout the whole school and with it has also driven away the truth...and a friend.”

Lila wasn’t smug now. Her hands shaking slightly out of either fear or anger.

The entire class was stunned into silence for about ten seconds before everything exploded. People were launching up from their seats and pointing at Lila with anger and disbelief. It was hard to make anything out with all the noise but a very distressed Lila stood in the center of the storm trying to fix everything before getting overwhelmed and running out of the room.

After that the camera turned to Chloe and Adrien wearing matching smug grins before the video ended.

---

“That was glorious!” Marinette tried not to be one of those people that revelled in other people’s misery but Lila had this coming. And Marinette loved every second of it.

There was a message along with the video that Marinette had failed to see prior to pressing play.

You are gonna get a lot of our lame classmates texting you apologies. You should ignore them. They aren’t worth the energy.

“Chloe…” Marinette’s giddy grin softened. She would never have guessed that her long time childhood bully could ever be so...nice.

Another message popped up. This time from Adrien.

Did you get Chloe’s message?

Yes I did. She texted back. It was amazing! How are things over there now that the storm has passed?

The storm is still going. After Lila bolted no one could keep quiet so Ms. Bustier left everyone to chat and get it out of their systems while she went to look for Lila.

Are you okay? I saw how everyone tried to lay into you.

No worries here. You know how Chloe is. We’re standing in the back rn watching the chaos. I keep hearing people say: Marinette was telling the truth

VINDICATION!

You deserve it!

Chloe told me not to respond to the apology texts I’m bound to get any second now.

You know me. I’d at least hear them out but I understand how they hurt you. Forgive but never forget and all that.

You’re right. In time yes but for right now I’m gonna leave them unread. Let them squirm a little.

Marinette no!

A text from Chloe.

I’ve been reading over Adrien’s shoulder and my response is, Marinette YES!

“I may have been slightly wrong about Chloe.” Kagami smiled, “To go to all that trouble just to prove your innocence? It is commendable.”

Marinette saved the video to her phone. “That’s why she’s Queen Bee.”

---

(1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8) (9) (10) (11) (13)

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(tagged) (idk why some of the tags aren’t working. I tried guys.)

@northernbluetongue @heredemaquam @zazzlejazzle @lady-flora-of-slytherin @ladylb @immatureidiot101 @kristycocopops @schrodingers25 @sublimemagazinestarlight @shamefullove

[random-imagines-blog]

Lights Out {Ethan Hunt Oneshot}

This is a special-edition personalized oneshot for @justyouraveragefangirl1967

Wordcount: 2476 Summary: Ethan’s wife finds something strange in his office. After putting some pieces together, she begins to take a self-defense class in case his life is more dangerous than he makes it seem. Those come in handy one night.

It seemed as though Holly lived in a world where most people expected it to be bleak and dark, but it was filled with sunshine and the most perfect temperatures. Everything could be a bit much sometimes, but when one had disabilities the way that she did, it was all the more tough - but she got through it with a smile on her face. Why? Because she had an extremely handsome, generous, funny man by her side who boosted up her confidence every morning when he rolled over in bed, ran his fingers through her bedhead hair, and pressed a kiss to her cheek before he got out of bed. Others tended to see what was ‘wrong’ with her, while Ethan Hunt saw the beauty that was the sparkle in her blue eyes, the way that she smiled, and the way that she never let anything stop her from achieving her goals of becoming a writer - though she was still just aspiring at this point. He was her number one fan, always and forever - which is exactly what he had promised her when he had slipped the engagement ring onto her finger one romantic afternoon.

However, there was no kiss this morning, since Ethan had been called away for a work trip. Things were usually quiet around the house, since she was hearing-impaired and tended to keep things like the radio and television off when she wasn’t using them, but when Ethan was gone? Even the silence that she had grown accustomed to was louder than the house when he wasn’t in it. Her mind had conjured up music of its own when Ethan entered a room, created ambiance to the smiles and the frowns, to the laughter and the smooth way that he did things. Holly had accepted a quiet life, but she was missing the sound of Ethan’s smile right about now.

After her morning tea - which was a struggle because Ethan sometimes teasingly put the teabags higher up than her 4‘9 figure could reach, and he had forgotten to bring them down - she looked at the muggy day outside and knew immediately what she was going to do. Groceries were bought, the house was clean - she had no excuses except to boot up her laptop and put some effort into her works in progress.

Her own office felt rather ... lonely, at the moment. The walls did have pictures of her loved ones, including quite a few of Ethan himself, but she wanted something more. She wanted to feel his presence around her completely. And that was why she decided that she was going to work in his office instead, since he wouldn’t be at home to catch her doing so. It felt so taboo to be going into his personal space. It wasn’t locked, but Holly still felt a bit of unease at being there alone.

Ethan’s desk was meticulously clean, with only a couple of stationary things upon it. He had taken his laptop to work, which made sense - it was the only thing that he was secretive about, but Holly never pried. His business was his business, just as yours was yours. She set her laptop up in the space that his usually occupied, opened it up, sat down in his seat, and started to tap at the keys, making words flow on the white screen.

An hour passed before she decided that it was a good time for a break. She leaned back in the seat, looking at the room that she had so seldom been in. Shelves lined the walls, the window looked out into the beautiful backyard where the sun was shining, and there was a photo of the two of you hanging on the wall, which was the only decoration in the place. She got out of the chair and went to look at the books that were on the shelves, wondering if there was something that may interest her.

After squinting at the titles for a moment, she saw that a couple of the books had a thin layer of dust on them. Despite knowing that cleaning them would mean that Ethan might catch on to the fact that she was in here, she couldn’t help herself from taking a tissue and lightly sweeping it over the books. She must have gone a little harder than she had intentioned, for one book was pushed back, smashing it’s pages against the back wall. She winced and tried to reach it to push it back up to place, but her fingers found a strange button on the wood rather than the pages. At first, she thought it must just be a knot in the wood, but she pressed down on it and heard a clicking noise from the other side of the room.

Having read stories about old houses with hidden rooms, Holly’s heart started to beat quickly in her chest in anticipation of what she might find. A secret library with expensive books that Ethan might have gotten from his travels? Or even better, a thought that made her blush, a pleasure room? As she turned around, she found herself to be disappointed for what was exposed was not a room, but rather a panel in the wall that had once held a painting and a mirror. What was there now was a metallic space, lit up by little white lights, showing off something you did not expect in the slightest.

Guns.

Holly didn’t know much about weapons other than a bit of light research that she had done for a story some time back. But she could identify a shotgun, and a couple of handguns. She didn’t dare touch anything, but rather stared with a slightly open mouth. She fell back into her seat, thinking about why the guns would be there. Thinking over the past, she started to realize that perhaps she didn’t know Ethan as well as she had thought that he had.

-

When Ethan returned home, everything was back the way that it was, save for the missing dust on one of his book jackets. If he had noticed that, he didn’t say anything about it. Holly’s laptop was safely back where it should be, and she worked on your writing while waiting for him to shower and come see her.

‘Hello beautiful,’ Ethan signed once he had Holly’s attention. She looked up at him, caught the sign, and gave him a wide smile.

“Welcome home,” She said aloud. He thanked her and took his usual spot on the sofa, with his arm around her shoulders. The t-shirt that he was wearing stuck onto his still damp body, and his growing hair was starting to hang in his eyes. She looked at him lovingly, and tucked herself into his side, nuzzling to show that she had missed him. After she had found the weapon cache, she decided that she wasn’t going to tell Ethan that she had found it. Or that she had figured out what was going on in his life. He took hold of her hand and brought it to his lips, kissing it absent-mindedly as he paid attention to what was going on in the news. He seemed to be looking for something, a story in particular. Once the headlines were through, and the more fluffy pieces and weather came on, he clicked off the television, with relief in his eyes that Holly could see a mile away. She may not have known what Ethan did exactly, but she could read his face better than anyone.

‘I think I’m going to order us dinner tonight.’ Ethan signed to Holly once the TV had returned to the black screen it tended to be when he wasn’t home. ‘And we can go out for dinner tomorrow.’

“I’m busy.” Holly said, taking Ethan by surprise. “How about a late dinner?”

‘What are you doing tomorrow?’

“Just taking a class down at the community center,” Holly said with a smile. Before Ethan could ask any more questions, she stopped him with a kiss and went into the kitchen to look at takeout menus and decide what to have for dinner.

-

For a while, just because of Ethan’s job and any dangers that he might bring home because of it, Holly had gone to self defense classes. It was tough to start the habit, considering she only had one good leg, but she found that she enjoyed it. What wasn’t fun about it though, was that she had to evade Ethan’s questions about it. It wasn’t that she wanted to keep it a secret from him because she felt that she had to hide it. It was because she knew that he would worry for her, and insist that he could take care of her himself.

In the times that she had gone to the gym, she had gotten good. Actually, she had gotten pretty damn good. It brought along a confidence that she hadn’t had in a very long time. She came home each evening with a smile on her face, and ran herself a bubble bath so that Ethan could join her - which he was usually more than happy to do. She also felt more comfortable on her own when he went out on his ‘work trips’. It was a nice feeling, knowing she could hold her own, at least somewhat.

But unfortunately, that was going to be tested sooner rather than the never that she was hoping for.

It was late one night when Ethan had gone out to ‘have some drinks with the boys’, whatever that had meant. Holly didn’t question it, she just gave him a damn good kiss that he could taste on his lips until he had something to drink, told him to call a cab if he drank too much, and then settled in for a night alone. It wasn’t that she was lonely either, she liked having some time to herself, though she did spent it often worrying about Ethan and whatever it was that he was truly doing. She still didn’t ask him what that was, or accuse him, because she was smart enough to know that the secrecy was for her own benefit.

Only the lamp next to the sofa was on, and her laptop was balanced on her lap and she was tapping away at what she hoped would be the best breakthrough novel in the world. It was good to have dreams, and even better when she had someone by her side who believed that she could do it. The TV was off, there was no music on, and the only sound that was going on was the tapping of the keyboard as she plucked the words straight out of her mind and put them on the white screen.

She felt that something was wrong before she could see any sign of it. A tingling sensation, the hair on her arms standing up on end. Something was not right. She could sense that there was someone in her home - and since she could see the front door from where she was sitting, they were not someone who should be here because they didn’t come from there.

She moved the laptop from her her lap, saving her work quickly and closing it, then tucked it under a pillow so it wouldn’t get stolen. Or destroyed - both were horrible concepts. She wished she knew what she was facing. This could be a common burglar, a murderer, someone who was after information about Ethan, it could even be someone who wanted to come in and steal all of her book ideas! Okay, the last one wasn’t likely but the other three? Too much so.

Despite the self-defense classes, she didn’t know much about working with weapons. But it seemed a much better idea to protect herself with one of Ethan’s guns and her knowledge of self defense rather than just hope that these guys didn’t have weapons of their own.

Holly couldn’t hear where they were, and her seeing was also not the greatest, so she couldn’t look for shadows. But what she did have were her own senses, and they had never let her down before. She crawled onto the floor in front of the couch, and felt the floors of her home. She could feel the pressure of the footfalls. Great, she thought, there were at least three of them that she could tell. Her hand curled into a fist - she was not about to hide herself, this was her house dammit!

The first of the men came into the room, clad in black. The second followed behind with a gun in his hands, checking to see if the coast was clear. Holly didn’t breathe, didn’t let herself think about what she was about to do. She went through the motions, running on pure adrenaline. With her good leg, she kicked the gunman in the groin, making him bend over, but unfortunately, not drop the gun. The two men were startled by her attack, but the third had time to see what was going on in front of him, and brought out a rather menacing knife. Like an angry pirate in a film, he was blindly slashing, getting nothing more than Holly’s hoodie with the blade, lucky for her. They must not have been expecting anyone to be home, let alone her.

Since she had already gone for the groin of one of the men, they would certainly be anticipating for her to go for that again. As she raised her foot, the man pulled his hips backwards to be out of her range, but she went for the knee instead, which buckled him. He let out of a cry of agony, for something there had definitely broken.

The first guy came at her swinging, looking like a gorilla or something with how thick his arms were. She was small enough to avoid most of his hits, since he was a large man and had to actively work at keeping his fists low. Since he was hunched over, she had good access to his face. Grabbing a large book off one of the end tables, she thrust it forward with all of her might into his nose, causing a bloody mess over the cover, but at least it was a soft cover so it shouldn’t be too hard to clean up.

The front door was unlocked and thrown open, and at first Holly grew concerned that it was another of the bad men, but instead it was her husband. Her happiness at seeing his face was short lived, however, since the man she had kicked in the groin finally re-stabilized himself and started to shoot at the door. Ethan dived in, and turned off the lamp and that was the end of what Holly could see. She moved away from the men who had come after her, shuffling to the end of the couch and taking cover there. Three gunshots - she could feel them, as well as see the bright blasts. She held her breath once more, unable to breathe until the light turned back on and she was confronted by the face of her husband.

“You did amazing. I love you. Are you okay?” He signed to her. As she nodded, she started to cry from the pure exhaustion and fear of what had happened. He wiped her tears away and held her in his arms until she felt better. Only then did he call in some people for cleanup.

Throughout the rest of the night, he held her in his arms, touching her, kissing her, being proud of her. He still had not told her what he did for a  living, his real job, but it didn’t seem necessary at this point. She had figured something out, obviously, and that was good enough. He pressed a last kiss on her forehead before laying down in the bed on his back, thinking of the injuries that he had seen on the three men. Though they were dead, by his hand so he was certain of it, he had never seen such a bad knee injury before. Instead of being scared or nervous, he felt such overwhelming pride in his wife. He had made the right choice proposing to her, and he wouldn't regret it for a second.

[colonel-insomniac]

Bliss 15 for the prompty ask thingy??¿ (๑ơ ₃ ơ)♥

Bliss 15? Ask and ye shall receive. recommend a prompt?

—————————————————————————————

"Thank you for staying with me." The words were just barely muttered into the cold air of the room. Pon had run himself in circles after Kai had been captured, and Ezra tried his best to calm the other man down. 

It had been a week since then, and they'd successfully escaped to Earth. Until now, it had always been sort of an unspoken acknowledgement between the two friends that they'd both come together over the loss of Kai, and that they had to lean on each other for support. 

Nevertheless, Pon supposed maybe he'd ought to have thanked Ezra sooner for being a shoulder to lean on, and he'd intended for it to be said more audibly, but something kept him from voicing it louder. 

When Ezra looked over at Pon curiously, Pon was nearly embarrassed, but he forced himself to acknowledge that what he said had been heard. "For what?" Was Ezra's response after a minute or two. 

Pon wasn't sure whether Ezra seriously didn't know what he was being thanked for, or if Ezra simply wanted to hear Pon say it. Knowing the boy for the past couple months, Pon was willing to brush off the latter thought. 

"For, y'know, staying with me when all that stuff happened." At Ezra's blank and slightly confused face, Pon sighed. "With Kai, back on Azurelle." That seemed to spark understanding, if the look on Ezra's face was anything to go by. 

"Oh, that," Ezra started, and his face tinged a light shade of pink. "I only did what I felt was right. And I'm glad you didn't leave, if anything I should be thanking you for staying." 

Pon wasn't dumb, and could acknowledge that he and Ezra were constantly awkward in each other's presence; they just needed to spend more time with each other. Kai had been in the hospital due to the severity of his injuries, and Pon found himself wishing he could turn to his best friend to ask for advice. An awkward silence filled the room instead, leaving Pon to puzzle over what should be said next. "I'm glad he's safe." Ezra wasn't looking at him any longer. They'd visited him yesterday, but it was evident that they both missed Kai. 

Pon decided to nod his agreement, wondering exactly how he could work to improve their bond. "What's your favorite cafe to go to here? Kai's in love with sweets, so I'm sure he'd appreciate some right now." That seemed a good enough place to start, and seeing how Ezra instantly perked up, Pon decided to pat himself on the back for thinking of it. 

Ezra thinks hard about it, before shrugging and standing up. "Hm, let's go look and we can maybe visit Kai after?" Pon nods and instinctively grabs for his coat before remembering he may not need it and looks at Ezra, who shakes his head and shows his screen, which reads fifty-two degrees Fahrenheit. 

“I say just grab a thin jacket, just in case.” Ezra’s looking elsewhere, patting his pockets, and grabbing a helmet and tossing it to Pon, before picking up another one for himself. 

Pon won’t lie, especially not to himself, he doesn’t know how these things work, or how to put them on. He’s never worn a helmet before, and even in the two weeks he’s been on Earth, he not only wasn’t aware Ezra drove a motorcycle, but that this contraption was legally supposed to be worn. 

He means to watch Ezra put it on, but by the time he finishes inspecting the helmet, Ezra has it strapped on his head, and is fixing what little hair pokes out the front. Pon pretends to inspect the helmet, his eyes flicking up to watch Ezra. To be fair to Kai, Pon can understand why he has a crush on Ezra. Ezra isn’t cut like one of those male models on the magazines here on Earth, but he isn’t lanky. 

Pon stops for a moment, staring hard at the shiny black plastic of the helmet. Kai would never go for someone because they’re cute. Pon knows Kai probably better than he knows himself, and he knows that it’s all about the heart and soul for Kai. Pon only blinks out of his thoughts when Ezra picks the helmet out from between former boy’s hands. “If you didn’t know how to put it on,” Ezra begins, all kind smiles, “You should’ve asked. No shame in it.” 

Pon nods, holding still as the head protector is put on his head and strapped on, trying his hardest not to breathe on Ezra, the thought somehow making Pon uncomfortable. He watches a couple strands of hair that Ezra had pushed underneath his helmet fall forward, floppy, and Pon tells himself he probably shouldn’t say anything about Ezra needing a haircut. 

He mutters a ‘thanks’ when Ezra moves away seconds later, and opens the door. He knows that humans generally get sick of the sun, but Pon absolutely adores the heat on his skin, the sweat beading through. Because Azurelle was doused in darkness, it was impossible for the planet to be warm.

————————————————————

The bakery smells cozy. Pon knows that doesn’t make sense—not really anyways—but it’s his mind, so it doesn’t have to make sense. Regardless, the bakery smells like pastries and coffee, and the gentle chatter and typing on laptop keys sounded comforting. Ezra inhaled deeply once, before following Ezra to the baked goods display. They’d been to three different bakeries before this one, and none of them had anything that wasn’t extravagantly sweet. Pon knew Kai liked sweet, but it’s supposed to be a pick-me-up, not induce a heart attack. 

These pastries seemed to be more toned down, and Pon grabbed a hold onto the flannel of Ezra’s shirt, pointing at a few cookies, croissants, and tiny little single cakes. Ezra laughed lightly, slipping his phone into the back pocket of his jeans and chatted with the lady behind the counter for a minute. She was pretty, Pon supposed, wide brown eyes, her skin was deeply colored a deep brown shade, she practically glowed, and her hair was short on her head. Pon politely waited until they were done chatting to slip into the conversation. “You’re really pretty.” Ezra elbowed Pon lightly, and Pon scowled in return. 

“What? I’m complimenting her! Would you rather I not have said anything?” Pon huffed, not really as annoyed as he pretended to be, and Ezra looked confused, but his demeanor changed when Pon mutters “like that would stop me,” just loud enough for the lady and Ezra to hear. Ezra rolled his eyes, and the lady, laughed, thanking Pon. 

“What can I get for you guys today?” She sounded happy, if that was a thing humans— or anyone really—could sound. 

“Ooh, could we get one of those cookies, and one of those cakes, and a couple of those chocolate filled croissants.” Pon pointed at each, and grinned when the lady nodded, picking up the tongs (click clack) and grabbing the specified pastries, placing them in a cute little paper bag. 

“Would that be all?” Pon glances at Ezra. Pon isn’t the one who has money, so he won’t say anything.

Ezra briefly looks at Pon, and runs a hand through his hair as he looks at the menu. “I guess two hot chocolates.” The pretty lady nods, and after a bit more conversation, Ezra pulls out his wallet, sliding some cash over the counter, accepting the bag and gesturing for Pon to grab the cups. 

They get back to Ezra’s motorcycle, and Pon’s tasked with holding the pastries while Ezra attaches a cupholder mechanism to the handlebars, pressing the hot chocolates in. Pon makes sure to thank Ezra before climbing onto the bike. He can understand why Ezra likes riding a motorcycle, the wind whipping past Pon makes it feel almost as though he’s flying. 

The sun slowly begins its descent as Ezra and Pon practically chase the light. It’s everything Pon had wished to see on Earth all at once, and he’s at a loss of breath, the wind stealing it right from his lungs, before forcefully pressing more in. 

————————————————————

Hospitals are a sad place. Sterile, white, boring. The pair walk silently through the pristine hall after checking in, and Pon not only sips his hot chocolate, (which is delicious, by the way), but also imagines the imperfectness it would be if he ‘accidentally’ spilled the hot chocolate on the wall. Ezra looks at Pon, shaking his head as though he knows what Pon is thinking. Pon rolls his eyes, muttering that he wasn’t actually going to do it. 

There’s one thing that’s bothering Pon the most. This whole day, he’d thought maybe he would get to know Ezra more, but if anything, Ezra probably got to know Pon more. It would be a lie for Pon to say it isn’t frustrating him, because it kind of really is. He’s genuinely trying to be friends with Ezra, but it’s either Ezra doesn’t trust him enough, or he isn’t interested in having Pon as a friend. Pon’s frown only deepens at that second thought, and he shoves both thoughts away. He’ll just have to talk to Kai about it when he can. 

When Pon opens the door to Kai’s room, he’s not really sure what to expect. Based off of what he’s seen in the very few movies Pon’s watched on Earth, Kai should be connected with wires to technology in the room. There’s only one thing attached to his arm, some clear liquid in a bag dripping into the tube connected to the needle stuck in his arm. Other than that, there’s some sort of material wrapped around Kai’s leg, he knows that’s a cast though.

Pon rushes to his best friends side as soon as he’s done looking him over. Kai scrambles—well, attempts to—up in the bed when he catches sight of Pon, and drops back in, almost instantaneously giving up. Pon watches Kai’s eyes slide off him and onto Ezra, and is watching closely to see what the situation between the two is at right now. Kai stares at Ezra for a moment, his eyes practically spilling over with surprise, shock, happiness—and is that pain? Pon glances at Ezra, who’s now sitting on the edge of Kai’s bed. His cheeks are flushed, and he has a particularly dopey, love-sick smile, and Pon swallows the urge to fake gag. 

After a minute, Pon catches sight of Kai dropping his gaze to fiddle with the tube that’s connecting whatever is in that bag to him. Pon glances at his own arm, imagining how uncomfortable it must be to feel that for weeks, and shakes that feeling away. He asks Kai about all that boring stuff, “how are you feeling,” “are you in pain,” “are you hungry?” When Kai nods to the last question, and guiltily whispers about how bad the food is in the hospital, Ezra picks up the bag from the floor, handing it to Kai so he can look inside. 

Kai’s eyes go wide, and Pon knows he’s happy before Kai can even smile. Kai, in Pon’s mind, practically emotes at a level where you can feel it radiating off him. He reaches an arm inside the bag, shifting something around, and pulls it out, looking suspiciously between Pon and Ezra, who are seated on opposite sides of him. “You guys aren’t fighting, are you?” Ezra reels back at that, confused, and glances at Pon, who looks back. 

“No,” the way Pon says it, it sounds almost like a question. “No, we aren’t fighting.” Kai nods, not entirely convinced.

Ezra lays a hand on Kai’s (wait, when did that happen? Pon’s going to have to find out from Kai) hand, and shakes his head. “We honestly aren’t fighting, we just don’t know each other that well. It’s just a little awkward, right?” Ezra glances at Pon, and the latter nods his confirmation. 

Kai mutters an okay, engrossed in the fact that Ezra’s hand is still on Kai’s. There’s conflicting emotion running rampant deep in Kai’s mind, some sort of terror fighting with the knowledge that this isn’t whatever Kai’s reminded of. Pon would ask about it, but he doesn’t want to force his friend to talk unless he’s ready. 

Eventually, however, Kai returns the smile to both, first Ezra, then Pon. And truthfully, if Pon hadn’t been aware that his best friend is very much falling for Ezra, he might have been jealous. Instead, Kai scoots in the bed, and pats it, inviting Pon to sit beside him, and Ezra sits in a chair, still on the other side of Kai. It doesn’t slip Pon’s notice that the two are holding hands, even as a movie starts on the TV provided in Kai’s room. And later, as Ezra snores lightly, and Kai’s head rests on Pon’s shoulder, eyes closed, Pon remains awake, watching as another movie plays. 

And when he catches sight of the two holding hands still, even asleep, Pon knows that at the very least, he can trust Ezra to keep Kai safe. 

[fortisfiliae]

Gin, Ice and Everything Nice [Draco Malfoy x reader]

Summary: This one shot takes place some years after Hogwarts, in the early 2000s, where Draco and the reader meet again by coincidence, to find out they’re not as different as the thought.

A/n: This is for @littleroserabbit as she’s a total sweetheart and needs a little bit of fluff in her life like we all do. I’m usually writing for the Marauders, it’s my first time creating something for Draco and a lot more modern than my usual fics, so I hope I’m meeting everyone’s needs.

Warnings: fluff, get’s a little steamy but nothing too wild

Word count: 2.6k

The past week has been nothing but absolute shit.  It should have gone so well, everything was meant to be perfect in your new, independent adult life. You rented a cosy flat in London, managed to get a job in the Ministry’s headquarter and even met a chap called Aaron, who was interested enough to ask for your number. It all seemed excellent, except that it wasn’t.

The flat was described as cosy, which would have been appropriate if cosy stood for tiny, shabby and somewhat gross.  Your job at the ministry, in the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, sounded splendid when you read its description on the registration sheet, but turned out to be a disastrous struggle with heaps of paperwork, under the control of a woman, that could have been easily related to Satan himself.

None of your friends lived near you anymore, so you couldn’t vent your anger and complain about your current situation properly. The occasional owl you received from some of them, made you happy for a second, although most of their letters consisted of their collective stories, telling you how much fun they were having, going out together and enjoying themselves, without you.

At least there was Aaron, who asked you to meet him at a bar on Friday evening. Right? You were on your way to said bar, called ‘Chequers’, already walking down the busy street and looking for its neon sign when your phone rang. Two short beeps chimed out of your handbag, letting you know you received a text.  You stopped to take your phone out and read Aaron’s message:

“Hey, sorry I can’t make it tonight.”

He really had the guts to cancel your date five minutes before it started. Your brows furrowed, when you answered:

“Wow, thanks. Could have told me a little bit earlier, I’m almost there.”

You stood on the pavement, clicking the back of your heel to the ground and stared bitterly on the screen of your Nokia before it buzzed again: 

“Told you I’m sorry. I think we shouldn’t keep this going. Sorry again.”

Did he just dump you via text? A great ending to a perfect week. You sighed and let your phone fall back into your bag, not bothering to even answer that git anymore. Shaking your head, as you still couldn’t believe the audacity he had, to dismiss you such cowardly way, you turned around to see that you stood right in front of Chequers.  Shrugging, you debated with yourself, if you should walk in alone. You really could use a drink, that’s for sure, but going to a bar on your own, seemed a little pathetic. ‘Screw it’, you thought. The day couldn’t get any worse and you didn’t know anyone here anyway.

The air was thick and coated with cigarette smoke when you entered and the music playing was drowned by people’s voices. It was rather full inside, only a few tables were unoccupied, whereas the space around the bar was completely packed. You sat down at a small table in the furthest corner, that gave you a good view over the place and studied the drinks menu for a minute, before a lovely waitress came to take your order. She didn’t question if you waited for someone, which you were silently thankful for and asked for a glass of Gin and Tonic. One drink and you’d go home.

When she left to prepare it, you let your gaze wander from the people beside you, over to the bar, where a group of guys visibly blathered about some women next to them, making desperate attempts to flirt.  Another guy sat there alone, his head lowered, and stared into his empty glass. The shadow that wrapped around him, created by his sitting position, covered most of his face. ‘Fellow sufferer’, you thought, yet your eyes stuck to him, as his silhouette looked deeply familiar, but you didn’t know where to put him. Strands of his white-blond hair hung into his face and you could have sworn that you have seen this sharp facial features before he lifted his head and his eyes found yours. Piercing grey orbs looked over to you, while his brows copied your own and rose in surprise.

Draco Malfoy. Alone, in a bar. In a muggle bar to be precise. What in Godric’s name was he doing here? The smirk his lips formed sent you straight back into school days, where he managed to get everything he wanted, with exactly that grin. You had been friends back then. Well, in your first few years at least, until Pansy Parkinson decided to spend each second of her time running after him and keeping every female as far away as she could. The rumours that spread about him joining the Death Eaters, were what finally made you depart completely.

You watched him, as he turned over and waved towards the waitress, who quickly walked up to him. He talked to her and looked back to you for a second, before she turned around to take a glance as well, then nodded to him. When she returned, she handed him two glasses, filled with clear liquid, ice and a slice of lemon, which he took before he stood up from his stool and started to head your way. He looked stunning, as he walked across the floor, taking confident steps, yet elegant, almost as if he floated. He had definitely matured in the few years you hadn’t seen him and it benefited his looks even more. His shoulders have gotten a bit broader, posture looked more healthy and his three-day stubble suited him exceptionally well.

“Hello (Y/N). Didn’t expect to see you here”, he said, as he stood next to the free chair of your table, his voice a tone deeper than you remembered it to be.

“I could say the same about you, Draco”, you replied and shot him a knowing grin.

He chuckled before he went on: “Do you mind if I sit with you, or are you waiting for someone?”

“Take a seat please, I’m... not waiting”, you said, your last words turning into a whisper.

He placed the glasses at the centre of the table, pulled out the chair and sat down. “I asked the waitress to make me the same thing you’ve ordered, so I hope it tastes good. Gin Tonic, isn’t it?”

“It is. You never had one before?”

“No, I recently discovered my passion for scotch, so that’s what I’ve been sticking with”, he said and placed one of the drinks in front of you, holding up his own and tilted it your way. “Cheers to the good old days, then?”

“Drop the ‘good’ and I’m in”, you answered in an attempt to be witty, but both of you frowned slightly, remembering the war that happened in your last school year. “Cheers”, you mumbled, clinked your glass with his, took a big sip and went on talking, trying to brighten the mood again: “So, what brings Draco Malfoy to a muggle bar in London?”

He grinned and ran his fingertip along the rim of his glass, as he answered: “That’s a long story actually. Let’s just say, I may have changed some of my ways, since school. How about you? What are you doing here?”

“I moved here a week ago, for my job at the Ministry.”

“Oh, I see. Sounds great! And why did you come to a bar alone?”

“Why are you here alone?”

“I asked first.” His daring grin appeared once again.

“Well, I may or may not have been asked to meet someone here.”

“And?”

“And he dumped me ten minutes ago. Via text. Text is a-”

“I know what a text is, (Y/N)”, he laughed and pulled out his phone from his jacket. “They’re really more convenient than owls.”

You couldn’t hide the surprised look on your face. He really had changed since school. “I can’t believe that’s actually you”, you giggled. “Now that I told you my embarrassing story, let me hear your reason for being here on your own.”

He took a sip, looked at his glass while tasting the drink and nodded approvingly, telling you he liked it, non-verbally. “I’m living down the street and don’t want to spend my weekends at home, so I discovered London’s nightlife for a while.” Of course, he lived in the city centre. The Malfoys were still wealthy after all.

“You’re discovering the nightlife alone?”, you asked.

“Well, yes. I thought the only way to meet new people is going out for a bit. And as we see, my plan worked out”, he said and tilted his head your way, before drinking again.

“I’m not new though”, you snickered.

“True, but you’re one of the few people from school, I actually enjoy meeting.”

“Why is that?”

“Most of them didn’t really grow up, you know? Still hold grudges against entire families and so on.”

“So you’re not with Pansy anymore?”, you asked, trying to sound as casual as possible about it, but you knew he could sense your curiosity, as the left corner of his mouth shot upwards.

“No, we broke up a while ago. How about you?”

“Well, I only got to know this guy I would meet here some days ago, but he kind of ‘broke up’ with me, moments before our first date”, you told him and rolled your eyes at the thought of it.

“Entirely his loss, then. And my luck”, he sneered and drank the rest of his drink in one sip. “Another round on lost love?”

You snorted while downing yours and replied: “Sure, why not?”

You kept on talking for what felt like minutes, about everything and anything that happened in the years you didn’t see each other, ordering one drink after another. Your topics went from school stories, over teachers up to your current lives and your tongue loosened more with each sip. At some point, you even had the guts to tell him, that your current job was ‘nothing but a shitload of fucking desk work’, as you called it and he tried to make you feel better, by telling you he didn’t even have a job. You knew didn’t need one, but let him take part in your misery and enjoyed making fun of each other’s ‘pitiful’ lives.

It was past 4 a.m. when the waitress came over to tell you, they would close soon. You insisted to split the bill, but Draco waved you off and paid for each drink both of you have had.

When you stood up, you recognized how dazed you really were. It wasn’t that bad, but you were certainly too tipsy to disapparate home.  Draco held the door for you to exit and followed you outside, where people were still straying around, looking for another pub to stumble into.

You turned to him, trying not to stagger and said: “I’m taking a taxi home. Thanks for the nice eve-”

“No!”, he interrupted you and bit his tongue the second after he did so. “I mean, you could come with me if you want. Home.” He saw your flustered expression and went on: “Not like that. Just to talk some more. I feel like we still have a lot to catch up on.”

The noise that was intended to be a giggle, came out of you as a grunt and you asked: “Are you trying to seduce me, Malfoy?”

“I’m trying to be a gentleman here, but you’re not making this easy for me”, he chuckled.

“Fine, let’s go my gentleman”, you chimed and linked your arm with his, not only to emphasize your statement but to keep more balanced as well and you weren’t sure if the tickling feeling in your stomach was the Gin or tiny butterflies.

The two of you walked for about five minutes, you follow his lead and kept on talking about Draco’s attempts to get into professional Quidditch, which have been unsuccessful yet. None of England’s pro teams contacted him, except for the Appleby Arrows, who offered him to practice as their reserve Seeker, which he declined. He seemed to be slightly embarrassed about it, so you didn’t ask any further before he pointed to a tall building you approached and went to open the heavy gate of the ground floor.

You went in after him and took the elevator upstairs, to the top floor. ‘Penthouse. How typical’, you thought and grinned, swearing yourself, you would never let him see your bad excuse for a flat. When you arrived at the highest storey, the lift opened and Draco walked towards the only door in the hallway to unlock it. His movements stretched the fabric of his jacket between his shoulder blades and showed off his muscular torso, making you want to touch him.

Your hand was faster than your thoughts and landed on his back softly before you were able to comprehend what you just did. He turned his head your way, as he opened the door and sent you a questioning grin. “What are you doing?”, he asked in a chuckle.

“Sorry, I’m drunk”, you mumbled, but went a step closer, in contrast to your statement.

“You are”, he said and brought his hand up to your face, to tuck a strand of hair behind your ear. Draco took your hand, to lead you inside, but you leaned into his touch and pressed your body to his before he lowered his head a tiny bit and kissed you.

It started slow when he pulled you in, your lips brushing over his softly, but turned deeper and more eager very quickly, as you felt your hunger for him emerging, more prominently each second.

The door shut behind you, he pulled his head back, his pale lips now tinted pink and breathed with a smile: “You’re drunk.” He said it like he meant it, yet his hand cupped your cheek and his lips touched yours again.

You nodded as your kiss continued, his tongue now stroking teasingly over your own. Your moves happened without prior discussion, you held on to his shoulders, jumped and Draco picked you up, your legs wrapped around his hips and he started walking, while you nestled your face to his neck, closed your eyes and giggled quietly to the soft vibrations his steps sent.

When he stopped, you lifted your head to see that he brought you to his bedroom. “You’re drunk”, you chuckled and kissed him once again.

He nodded this time, went towards his bed, where he let you down on. Your heads parted for a moment, his hooded eyes traced every inch of your face, mouth slightly agape before your restless lips collided once more.

“We’re drunk”, you mumbled as you gasped for air, yet you pulled the collar of his shirt down, to get him even closer.

“We are”, he sighed as he let himself fall to his side and held your hand to prevent you from further yanking his clothes. “Should we stop?”

You watched his chest rising and lowering at a swift pace, rolled over to lie on your side as well, to face him and agreed: “We probably should.”

He ran his fingers through your hair, which sent a string of shivers down your body, and nodded endorsing before he kissed your forehead.

“Draco?”, you asked, snuggling into his chest.

“Yes?”

“I think I’m too dizzy to leave. I’ll disapparate home when I’m sober, okay?”

“Okay. Or, you know... You stay for a little longer.”

“Okay.”

Hope you liked it, please tell me if you did, or didn’t. As always, thank you for reading. xoxo

Permanent tags: @geeksareunique @little-hufflepuff-badger @marauderskeeper @giggleberts @way-obsessed5 @oreofrappiewithblueberry @draqcnheartstrinq @hpwritersnet

[matesclever218]

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Jun 14, 2008

I have just installed a new Mac Pro. Everything works except I get occasional mouse pointer freezes. They last for about 1 second each time and seem to occur randomly, on average with 1-2 min intervals. The only things I have installed on top of OS X so far driver wise is MouseWorks to power my Kensington trackball. I use my older large full-keyed white Pro keyboard and only use the smaller wireless one remotely. I have tried deactivating Bluetooth but the mouse freezes still persist.

IMac :: Mouse Pointer Out Of Control - Not Allow Clicks

Apr 27, 2009

Today I was working with my iMac without any problem, suddenly the mouse pointer start behaving very odd, when I tried to click an icon, menu or whatever the mouse start moving not allowing me do the work, I changed the wireless mouse suspecting was a hardware problem but when I connected the USB mouse I got the same problem, then I shutdown the iMac but after starting I got the same problem. I suspect is a trojan virus but I heard that Leopard operating system is very robust and virus is not currently a problem.

OS X Mavericks :: Mouse Pointer Not Always Changing On Mouseover

Sep 6, 2014

I have an issue with my mouse that started a few days ago. My cursor doesn't always change properly when I mouseover certain things. For example, when I hover it above a link, it turns into a pointing hand like it should, when I navigate to the URL bar, it will stay as the hand even after clicking for a short while before changing to what it's supposed to become (the thin bar.) Sometimes it will remain a thin bar when it's supposed to be a black arrow, and so forth. I've tried troubleshooting the issue, but I haven't found much of relevance. One user seemed to be experiencing the same thing albeit only in some pro software I don't use. Mine is system wide. I'm using the trackpad on a 2014 baseline 15' rMBP running Mavericks 10.9.4. Info: MacBook Pro with Retina display, OS X Mavericks (10.9.4)

MacBook Pro :: Mouse Pointer Missing On The Screen?

Jun 29, 2014

I am using macbook pro 15' with latest Maverick OS.Lately, I find that after I log in, the pointer goes missing from the screen and as a result I am unable to click on any icon.I have tried plugging in a USB Mouse, mouse pointer again does not show on the screen.When I force switch off from the power switch,and switch on again I get the pointer.Some times I have to repeat the process.

IMac :: Mouse Pointer Tracking Speed Very Slow

Mar 17, 2009

I just opened my brand new 2009 24inch IMac! The Mouse pointer speed is very very slow. I adjusted the tracking speed to the fastest possible, but this is still under par. I typed my question in google and it directed me to download a program called 'Mouse Zoom' which was downloaded onto my... 'Desktop.' I didn't click the icon to run it because I am afraid of a virus. Is 'Mouse Zoom' safe to click on? Will it fix the problem, or is there an alternative to this issue? I cant imagine something so nice being crippled by something as simple as mouse speed.

MacBook :: Mighty Mouse Pointer No Longer Working?

May 6, 2009

I've been using my M Mouse successfully with my MacBook until recently when the Mouse Pointer no longer moves. The button does engage the dashboard and if I position the cursor using the MacBook trackpad, then the click function of the mouse does work. I have tried changing the batteries. It appears I am having a similar problem when I use a wired mouse. Just in case it's connected, I run Parallels and did recently upgrade Windows software.

Hardware :: Making Mighty Mouse Pointer Use More Precise?

Oct 31, 2009

I just made the switch to Mac. I just got the new macbook pro 15 inch. The only thing is that I bought it mainly for graphic design and I am struggling to use the might mouse. I feel like I have to work so hard just to get the mouse over the icon or tab that I want to select. When I was using a PC the mouse was so much more precise if I wanted to select something or click on something small it was easy. Is there a setting or something to make it easier on the mac using the mighty mouse?

Software :: On Clicking Icons Get Stuck To Mouse Pointer

Jun 24, 2009

Occasionally if I click an icon (usually on my desktop) it'll just 'stick' to my mouse pointer, it'll appear as if I am still clicking and holding the icon, and it drags around. I also can't trash, drop or do anything with it. Other programs on the computer can't be used either because it's still using that icon. I'm forced to use keyboard commands to restart Finder, which works until I click any other icon again.

MacBook Pro :: Remove The Green Circle On Mouse Pointer?

Mar 14, 2012

How do I remove the little green circle with a white plus tied to my mouse pointer Info: MacBook Pro (13-inch Mid 2010), iOS 5.1

OS X Mavericks :: Bluetooth Mouse Pointer Works But Can't Land Anywhere

Jun 5, 2014

It is happening more and more often: When I start my iMac the mouse pointer is moving normally but when I click on, say, Finder nothing happens, or when I click on the Dock nothing happens. It will not stay or land on any app. It is just hovering and nothing seems to be affected by the mouse pointer. I turn the mouse off and back on and it works fine. So it is an erratic behavior which baffles me. I have read numerous cases in the discussions and all point to a PRAM reset. Will a PRAM reset delete or revert modifications I have made to my iMac, such as disabling the startup sound, via sudo? I don't mind restarting the mouse but it is a hassle Info: iMac, OS X Mavericks (10.9)

MacBook Pro :: Trackpad Keeps Bouncing The Mouse Pointer When Tap To Select

Sep 4, 2014

had problems with the trackpad - when I tap to select an item the mouse pointer 'bounces' off the item I'm trying to select. It happens randomly - not every time. I migrated all my data and settings from my old Mac Pro (2011 model, also running Mavericks) via Time Machine - could that have an impact? Not using any non-Apple power supplies or other devices. Info: MacBook Pro, Mac OS X (10.7.4)

OS X :: Mouse Pointer Converted Into Black Square After Sleep Mode

Jun 22, 2006

A bizarre thing: when I wake my Cube from sleep, the mouse pointer seems to have converted itself into a black 1' square. As soon as I click in a program it changes back to an arrow.

Software :: Mouse Pointer Freezes When Multiple Applications Are Open

Oct 16, 2008

My mouse continuously freezes when I have to many applications open. I have the mirror door G4. When it freezes I can access the F11 and F12 buttons on the keyboard, but have to restart the computer. I have switched the mouse, but it does not fix it. The more I use the computer the less it happens. It appears to happen more with multiple browser windows open in Safari.

Mac Mini :: Mouse Pointer Disappear And Webpages Drop To Bottom?

How To Open A Mac Mouse For Battery Change

Mar 23, 2012

My mouse pointer disappears when still, if I open a webpage or app store the page drops to the bottom and I cant get back to the top with the mouse. I have tried six different mice (blue tooth and wireless including mac magic mouse) , all the same. Also when the sound is on and the system starts up there is a low buzzing sound until I move the mouse or open something up. Should I just restart the whole os as this is only one week old and I am over it already! Info: Mac mini, Mac OS X (10.7.3)

MacBook :: Get The Colorful Circle Thing On The Mouse Pointer Every Time?

Mar 25, 2012

Calibrate Mouse Touchpad

I have a 2008 Aluminum Body MacBook and recently its been working extremely slow. I always get the colorful circle thing on the mouse pointer every time I try to click on anything. I was wondering if anyone had this problem before and what you did to fix this? Or if anyone knew how to fix this problem. Info: MacBook, iOS 5.1

Intel Mac :: How To Stop Scratching Sound When Moving Mouse Pointer

May 6, 2012

For approximately one week I have been getting a scratching sound when I move the mouse pointer accross desktop no matter what program I am running. Current OS is MAC OS X 10.7.3. Sound continues when I turn sound off. Info: iMac, Mac OS X (10.7.3)

MacBook Pro :: Track Pad Doesn't Work Properly And Mouse Pointer Is Jumping All Over Screen?

May 19, 2012

it feels like someone else is controlling my mouse. This just started happening. My trackpad doesn't work or works sporadically. While typing the pointer is scrolling all over my screen.

OS X V10.7 Lion :: Why Doesn't It Give Us The Possibility To Change The Mouse Acceleration Or Pointer Style

Jun 21, 2012

as a former Windows user I really miss the option to tune the mouse pointer acceleration or to change the pointer looking!why can't I simply use my trackpad for my iPad supporting the multitouch gestures available on the iPad's OS just on the track pad? Info: MacBook Pro (15-inch Late 2011), Mac OS X (10.7.4)

MacBook Pro :: Mouse Pointer All Of A Sudden Started To Move Slower With A Small Delay

Jun 30, 2014

my mighty mouse pointer all of a sudden started to move slower with a small delay. I have checked the battery but it's 100%. Macbook Pro 2.7 GHz Intel Core i7 / 16GB RAM / 751 SSD

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Parallels Desktop 5 for Mac

Virtualization

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When I last reviewed virtualization software in 2008, I found Parallels Desktop 4 for Mac effective, but saddled with a bit of bugginess and lacking some DirectX support. Parallels 5 Desktop for Mac (I tested build 9308) solves both problems, while adding features and improving performance.

Among the most notable of those new features: a much-faster virtualization engine; automatic compression of Windows’ hard disks; a new virtual machine manager; and a new lockdown mode, which requires a password to exit full screen mode, make changes to the virtual machine state, or manage snapshots (perfect for system administrators who don’t want end-users mucking up their machines).

Installation, setup

I tested Parallels Desktop 5 by using it to install Windows XP Pro, Windows 7 Ultimate (both 32-bit and 64-bit versions), and Ubuntu Linux 9.10 on my Mac Pro (2.66GHz quad core with 8GB of RAM, running OS X 10.6.2).

Installing both Windows and Linux is easy in Parallels; it has assistants that automate the process for both. It also installs Parallels Tools, which handles the task of mouse integration between the guest OS and Mac OS, as well as allowing easy guest desktop resizing by resizing the guest OS window.

There are a couple aspects of installing guest OSes that could be improved. First, every time you create a new virtual machine, Parallels creates an alias to that virtual machine on your OS X Desktop. There’s no way to avoid this, so if you find the aliases useless (as I do), you have to manually remove them each time you create a virtual machine.

More troubling is that, when creating a new Windows virtual machine, the default settings are for full integration of the Mac OS and the Windows guest—the default even sets the Windows’ user folder to the Mac’s Users folder. As someone who has personally experienced Windows malware infections, total integration is not something I recommend for most virtual machine users, and yet it’s the default behavior in Parallels.

Parallels also defaults to booting Windows virtual machines in the fully-integrated Coherence mode, where the Windows desktop vanishes, and Windows’ windows are intermingled with those of OS X. For someone expecting a standard Windows interface after installation, this can be disconcerting.

The basics

Like Fusion 3, Parallels 5 now supports Windows Aero in Windows 7, and also includes OpenGL 2.1 acceleration in both XP Pro and Windows 7 (Fusion only supports OpenGL 2.1 in Windows XP Pro). In addition, OpenGL acceleration is included in Linux guests, enabling full visual effects (such as windows that deform when dragged) in Linux systems such as Ubuntu 9.10. More usefully, you’ll also be able to run Linux programs that require OpenGL acceleration. Parallels is alone in its support for OpenGL 2.1 in Linux and Windows 7. I found the Aero effects worked very smoothly in Windows 7 on my Mac Pro.

As with its competitors, Parallels handles typical office productivity applications with ease, in both Windows and Linux. Microsoft Office (Windows) and OpenOffice (Linux) both ran well, and had no troubles with the mixture of spreadsheets and documents I tried opening and editing in both. Web browsers and e-mail clients also performed well; if this is the extent of your virtual machine needs, Parallels 5 will easily meet your requirements.

Parallels 5 was also the fastest of the three programs I tested in the vast majority of the benchmark tests I ran—including the all-important real-world tests. Whether it was copying files to or from the Mac, or expanding zip archives, Parallels easily outpaced its competition. As one example, copying 2.5GB worth of files from the Mac to a Windows 7 machine via a shared folder took just over a minute in Parallels. That same task took nearly two minutes in VirtualBox, and about a minute and a half in Fusion.

Suspending, waking, booting, and shutting down were all quickest in Parallels, too. There’s a small caveat there, at least with suspending. When I tried sleeping the machine while a 3D game was running, it worked, but the game didn’t work after waking from sleep. In Fusion, the same experiment worked just fine—so one tradeoff of the faster sleep time in Parallels is, at least in my testing, an inability to sleep and then resume a 3D game. As a user, you’ll have to decide whether the faster suspend times in general are worth this tradeoff when trying to suspend an in-progress 3D game. (This may not be an issue with all games, but it was in the two I tested with.)

Like Fusion 3, Parallels 5 offers improved multi-monitor support, treating two displays as separate monitors in Windows, and as one large gargantuan display in Linux. Adding a third screen to the mix worked perfectly in Windows. In Linux, however, the third screen was seen by the system (the horizontal resolution reflected its existence), but it was all white, and I couldn’t see anything that I dragged onto that screen.

To make working in full-screen mode easier, Parallels 5 lets you specify behaviors for mousing into the four screen corners—you can switch to one of the other available view modes, or show the Parallels menu bar. Once you’ve set a behavior for a corner, moving the mouse into that corner will “peel down” and reveal a bit of your OS X desktop. Unfortunately, there’s no visual indication of what happens if you then click the mouse, so you’ll need to remember which corner you’ve assigned to which task.

New looks for Windows

Parallels 5 features a new view mode, Crystal, along with a new Mac-like theme for use within Windows. Crystal view mode takes Coherence mode one step further. You won’t find the Start menu or task bar anywhere in Crystal mode—in fact, you won’t even see the Parallels Desktop icon in your Dock. Instead, a menu bar icon lets you change view modes, see the Windows Start menu, or work with attached devices. You’ll also find your task bar icons (optionally) in the menu bar, and Windows Applications folder in your OS X Dock. Any open windows will be integrated with your OS X windows, as in Coherence mode.

Crystal mode works reasonably well, though you can’t Command-Tilde to toggle between multiple windows of the same Windows’ application, nor can you use Snow Leopard’s Dock Exposé mode with Windows’ windows. Both of these features work as expected in Fusion. I also found that dragging windows around in Crystal mode, when using an Aero theme in Windows 7, was quite laggy on my Mac Pro. I had much better results after I disabled Aero in Crystal mode (you can control this in the virtual machine’s Settings).

I experienced some strangeness when I had Windows Media Player window open in Crystal mode, and then used Exposé’s All Windows mode. In addition to the opened windows, I also saw three “ghost” windows for Windows Media Player, and some visual distortion was visible in the Excel window.

Selecting any one of these “ghost” windows would simply switch to Windows Media Player, so it wasn’t a critical issue, but it definitely looks odd when using Exposé.

The second new look for Windows in Parallels is MacLook, which is actually an OS X-like theme for Windows (XP, Vista, and 7). You apply MacLook via the View menu, and Parallels then works for a minute or two to install the theme. The objective is to make Windows less visually shocking for someone switching between the Mac OS and the Windows OS.

While that’s the idea, I think MacLook fails fairly badly in achieving the goal.

Because not every element in Windows is themable, what MacLook winds up giving you is a series of different-looking windows within Windows—some look something like OS X windows, others look like native Windows windows, and still others look like some strange Frankenstinian mixture of the two.

Some windows are square, others are rounded; none seem to have shadows and some are missing edge borders; some have the red/yellow/green buttons from OS X at the top right, some at the top left, and others lack them completely.

I can’t imagine that anyone who likes and uses the OS X interface regularly will find MacLook to be an improvement over the stock Windows theme—at least there’s some consistency there, and the windows all mostly look the same.

When I unchecked the MacLook entry in the View menu, which should disable MacLook, I had some issues in Windows 7—the uninstall process didn’t quite complete, leaving an even odder mix of window appearances. I was able to resolve that issue by using the Personalization section of Windows preferences to pick a stock Aero theme.

Graphics and gaming

Parallels Desktop 5 has a very good engine for gaming. I had excellent results with older games, and very good results even with more-recent releases. The demo version of Call of Duty 4, which I was unable to run with decent frame rates in Fusion, ran acceptably (albeit at minimum levels of detail) after some tweaking in Parallels.

With OpenGL acceleration in all main versions of Windows (and Linux), Parallels can handle programs that the other two virtualization apps just aren’t capable of running at present. In addition, Parallels’ OpenGl implementation, as measured in the Cinebench benchmarking test, was the fastest of the three programs in any version of Windows. (All game tests were done in Windows 7, to stress the virtual machine as much as possible.)

Calibrate Mac Battery

Parallels also does an admirable job with DirectX games in Windows. For example, I was able to play the MotoGP 08 demo with good frame rates in a 1024x768 window, though the audio did stutter a bit.

More impressively, Microsoft Flight Simulator X, a program that just a few years ago required a high-end PC to run at all, ran admirably well in Parallels. The audio was mostly stutter free, and the frame rate in a 1024x768-sized window was more than acceptable in the missions I tested.

That’s not to say I was getting anywhere near the frame rate I’d get if I were to reboot my Mac and run Flight Sim X natively via Boot Camp. However, for someone who doesn’t need every bit of speed in their games, the loss in frame rate may be worth the convenience of not having to reboot.

Most older games run very well, so much so that there’s no reason to reboot via Boot Camp to play “vintage” titles. Note that some older games may need to run on older versions of Windows; Windows 7 won’t run all your older games.

Given what was possible in gaming and graphics with the first version of Parallels a few years back—basically nothing—it’s amazing how much progress has been made in a very short period of time.

Multimedia performance

To test Parallels’ media handling, I watched a 1080p Windows HD media file in full screen mode in each version of Windows. I was watching for visual glitches, listening for any disruption in audio playback, and tracking CPU usage to see how each virtual machine handled the task.

In short, all three of the Windows OSes handled the HD video file without any major issues. The one-CPU Windows 7 box had a bit more variation in frame rate than did the two-CPU machines, but it was very hard to spot unless watching the video back-to-back (which I did, many times).

Other features and observations

This version of Parallels cleans up the installation on a Mac—in prior versions, Parallels’ virtual network drivers were visible in the Network System Preferences panel. In Parallels Desktop 5, those drivers no longer appear, preventing possible user confusion.

Also new in Parallels 5 is support for Apple’ multi-touch gestures (swipe, rotate, pinch) using an Apple Magic Mouse or the trackpad in a multi-touch capable Apple laptop (you can also use an Apple Remote for some basic control, if you wish). Parallels Tools takes care of the communication between the mouse/track pad and the guest OS, so there are no special requirements on the Windows side—gestures simply work in Windows XP and newer.

I tested this using XP Pro on my MacBook Pro, and it worked as described. I was able to use pinch to zoom in/out on images in Microsoft’s Picture Viewer, and to change the size of the text on an Internet Explorer page. Rotation gestures also worked as expected on the images. If you’re a laptop or Magic Mouse user, this is a nice addition to your Windows virtual machines.

Mac Mouse Cursor

As you can probably tell from the features described in this review, Parallels is a feature-rich program. Sometimes, though, feature overload can lead to a complex user interface, and there are spots in Parallels where that’s the case.

Take the virtual machine Configuration panel, for instance, which contains 15 separate sections. Or the Preferences panel, which includes 11 separate tabs, some of which contain a large number of items that can be configured. While these sections and tabs are relatively well laid out, the sheer number of choices can cause confusion.

For example, you might think that defining how Mac and Windows 7 keyboard shortcuts coexist would be found in the virtual machine Configuration panel…but that’s not the case. Instead, you define the shortcuts in the Preferences panel, where you can set up definitions for Windows, Linux, OS X, and generic guests.

Parallels Desktop 5 for Mac

Pros

Multi-touch support

Very fast in all facets of use

Very good DirectX and OpenGL support

Cleaner installation than prior releases

Feature rich

Cons

Sleep mode may prevent resuming 3D games

MacLook theme for Windows isn't all that good

Features add complexity

Defaults to fully-integrated OS X/Windows mode

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[animegirl266]

I’m Home||Daniel Seavey||Why Don’t We Imagine||Part 1

@avanunez13​, you requested a “fuck me up fam”. I hope this lives up to your expectations. Ending coming soon. ;)

The blinding purple and blue stage lights shock you as you walk into the venue. The screams of hundreds upon hundreds of girls fill your ears before you could prepare yourself. You don’t even know what you’re doing here or where here is. All you know is that you’re surrounded, no where to go but forward. 

You push your way toward the stage, your feet guiding you when all your other senses are muted. 

“And if the sky falls I'll catch it Just steal you a star”  

You look up at the stage and meet the eyes of a gorgeous boy, and suddenly, the two of you are alone in the crowd. You’re mesmerized. You feel like he’s singing to you and you alone. No one else matters; no one else is there. You hold his stare for what feels like a century, the two of you stuck in time. Your breath catches in your lungs and your heart hammers in your chest. 

A young, teenage girl pushes you lightly, trying to get closer to the five boys on stage and you nearly fall to the ground. When you find your footing again and look back to the boy, he’s already gone. 

The concert has ended for a band you find out is called Why Don’t We. You also discover that the boy’s name is Daniel. The teenagers you had asked earlier looked at you like you were insane, starting on a ten minute rant about how much they love the boys who performed. But you were only half listening; Daniel’s face the only thing you could really think about. His bright eyes in the darkness of the room, his sharp jawline, the little dimples that poked at his cheeks, and you’re not sure if you imagined it, but you remember him giving you the most handsome smile you’ve ever seen. 

You hang around the back wall for all of the after party, seeing the WDW boys buzz around to different groups of girls, but throughout the whole thing, you didn’t see Daniel once. You had just about lost hope and had turned to the door when someone grabbed your wrist.

You turn suddenly, your hair spinning around to your back. With a shocked expression, you come face to face with the blue eyed boy you’d been waiting for all night. You feel your face flush red as his grip stays firm on your wrist. You flash him a shy smile and glance down at his hand. He follows your gaze and lets go quickly, scratching the back of his neck nervously. 

“Uh... sorry.” He lets out a breathy laugh. “I... I saw you earlier and,” He shakes his head as he speaks, smiling like an idiot. “I couldn’t help but think that you’re absolutely gorgeous.” You immediately get the same feeling from before. Butterflies fill your stomach, making your heart flutter. You touch your wrist, your skin boiling hot from where he had touched you. You feel yourself smile, placing a stray lock of hair behind your ear. 

“Thanks.” You say, your eyes darting from the ground to his. 

“I’m Daniel by the way.” He sticks his hand out and you shake it, not failing to notice how sweaty his palm is. 

“Y/N.” You giggle. You found comfort in his nervousness for some strange reason. You spent the rest of the after-party with Daniel glued to your side. He made you laugh harder than you ever had in the past. He made you feel beautiful, special. He made you feel like you were the only girl in the world.

You left the venue with the biggest smile on your face and Daniel’s number in your phone. He even walked you out to your UBER (against his bandmates’ better judgment). Before falling asleep, all you could think about was the way Daniel smiled when he looked at you. Even if you had just met him, you already felt yourself falling. 

*beep beep beep* Your alarmclock rang on your bedside table. You groan, rolling over in your bed to shut it off. You close your eyes again, falling back asleep within seconds. But of course, just about two minutes later your phone rings, making your eyes squint open. Without looking at the screen, you answer the call, putting your phone to your ear. 

“Hello?” You say into the microphone, your voice being deep and groggy. 

“Y/N? Sorry, did I wake you?” Your eyes burst open at the sound of Daniel’s voice. You bolt upright in bed, suddenly feeling wide awake.  

“No, no. I should have gotten up anyway, it’s fine. What’s up?” You clear your throat, combing your fingers through your hair. 

“Nothing really. I just wanted to make sure you got home safely after the show. I really should’ve called you last night. Sorry.” He chuckles lightly, making you smile. This boy was too good to be true. Not only did he compliment you every ten seconds, have the voice of an angel, and walk you to your car, but he called in the morning to make sure you were okay? It had to be a dream. At least, that’s what you told yourself. 

“Don’t apologize. The fact that you’re calling at all makes you something special.” You laugh softly. There’s silence on the other end of the line for a second and you panic. Did I say something wrong? Of course I screw it up when Prince Charming comes around. I cannot believe I drove him away. 

“Hey, Y/N?” Daniel’s voice breaks your thoughts. 

“Yeah?” 

“Are you free today?” You inhale sharply, the butterflies returning to their place in your stomach. 

“Uh... yes. I am.” 

“Would it be too fast if I asked you out to lunch?” You could hear his voice shaking through the phone, making you sigh in relief. 

“No, Daniel. It wouldn’t be too fast at all.” You couldn’t tell if he could hear the smile in your voice, but you didn’t really care either. 

You open the door of your UBER, stepping out on to the curb. Daniel had picked a little, hole in the wall Italian restaurant. As you open the door, you start questioning whether or not this meal will be any good, but he had warned you not the judge before you had the food. “Plus, if you’re not satisfied, I guess that’ll mean that I’ll have to take you on another date to redeem myself.” You had laughed at that for sure. 

Taking a look around the restaurant, you find Daniel sitting in a little booth next to a window. He looks up from his phone and starts waving you over. Your boots click on the tile as you make your way over to him. He stands up and gestures for you to sit down. 

“Oooh, what a gentleman.” You say, easing yourself into the booth. He smiles, exposing the gap between his two front teeth. He’s wearing a black baseball cap, a dark blue and white flannel with a t-shirt underneath, and his signature black jeans with holes at the knees. He’s utterly adorable in your eyes. 

You catch him staring at you more than once while you look over the menu. You put your menu down and match his gaze, taking a sip of your water. 

“Can I help you?” You smile slyly as his face turns a light shade of pink.

“You’re just... really, really beautiful.” It was your turn to blush now. You open your menu and cover your face. You hear Daniel chuckle and your skin grows hot to the touch. 

Lunch goes by faster than you wish it would. You end up getting your favorite pasta dish, landing a bit of sauce on your cheek. You look up at Daniel as he reaches over to your face, taking it gently in his hand. Using his thumb to wipe away the sauce; you watch his eyes intensify. As he pulls away, he realizes what he’s doing and he drags a hand down his face, no doubt it turned as red as a tomato. 

Two months go by and Daniel’s still stuck with you; the only difference being that in that time, you had gone from the breathtaking girl from the concert to his gorgeous girlfriend. He spent just about every second of the day thinking about you. The boys seemed to like you too. Daniel was especially thankful for that. 

He sits on the couch next to Jack as he and Jonah play 2K. His legs bounce up and down, a giddy smile on his face. He couldn’t stop trembling in excitement. 

“Daniel, I swear, if you don’t stop doing that, I’m gonna smack you.” Jack mumbles, side-eyeing your boyfriend. 

“I can’t help it! I can’t wait to see her!” You hadn’t seen Daniel in a week, you being busy packing for college. You were leaving in two days and was coming over to the Compound to spend your last couple of days with him. You didn’t want to leave Daniel, but you weren’t going to pass up the chance to go to Berkeley, your dream school. 

Jack rolls his eyes and brings his focus back to the game. The boys hear knocking on the door and Daniel’s face lights up. He shoots up from his seat and barrels toward the door. Pulling it open, he’s greeted with your beautiful face. He wraps his arms around you, picking you up as he hugs you tight. You let out a yelp, a smile growing on your face. He spins you around a few times before setting you down. His hands grip your hips as he presses a kiss to your lips. 

“Hey baby.” You whisper, resting your forehead against his. 

“I missed you.” He says, keeping his voice low. 

“I’m sure you did.” You smile, grabbing his hand and leading him toward the living room. 

“Y/N!” Jonah shouts as you come into view. You lean down and hug him, planting a kiss on his cheek.  

“Hey you.” You smile at Jack and he returns the gesture with a wink. 

Daniel brings you to the couch on the other side of the kitchen, pulling you down with him. You lay down on your back, him beside you on his side. He brushes your hair out of your face, cupping your cheek gently. You smile up at him. God, you had missed his touch.

“I don’t wanna leave you. I’m gonna miss you so much.” You say quietly, running your fingers through his hair. “I won’t be able to hold you, or talk to you,” You match his gaze. “Or kiss you. It’s gonna suck.” You pout. 

“You better stop doing that.”

“Doing what?”

“Saying things that make me want to kiss you.” You drag your hands down the sides of his face to the lapel of his denim jacket, gripping it. 

“Now why would I want to do that?” You grin mischievously. He lets out a breathy laugh before bending down to kiss you. He presses his lips to yours and you grip the back of his neck, deepening the kiss.

He was obsessed with everything about you; your eyes, your scent, your touch, your taste. When his lips met yours, he knew he was home. He couldn’t help but want to be with you at all times, always craving your warmth, your smile. You thought it was adorable how he would FaceTime you in the middle of the day just because he wanted to see your face. He hadn’t voiced it aloud but he knew he loved you. There was no other explanation for the way you made him feel. 

You break the kiss, gasping for air. You look into his eyes and find everything you’ve ever needed. You don’t want to leave him, but you know you have to. 

After two days of pure bliss in Daniel’s arms, you find yourself putting the last of your stuff in your car and shutting the trunk, your mom sitting in the driver seat. Daniel stands behind you, watching as you drag yourself away from him. You throw your purse into the passenger seat and walk over to Daniel slowly, looking at the ground. You walk towards him until he reaches out to you, rubbing your arms up and down. 

“Look at me.” He brushes his fingers down your cheek. “Hey, look at me.” He says gripping your chin. You try pulling away but his grip is too tight. You look at him with tears pooling in your eyes. You didn’t want him to see you cry. He’s taken back by your tears but gives you a sad smile, pulling you into his chest. You cry silently in his arms. 

“I don’t want to leave you.”

“I know, baby girl, I know. Believe me, I don’t want you to go either, but you’re going to Berkeley! Just imagine, you’re fulfilling your dreams; going to your dream college. You’re going to have the time of your life.” You pull away just enough to see his face. 

“The last two months have been the time of my life, Dani.” He smiles down at you, wiping away all your tears.

“Y/N! We have to get going!” Your mom yells from the car. You look back at her and step out of Daniel embrace. He pulls you back, resting his chin on your shoulder. 

“I love you, Y/N.” He whispers into your ear and your eyes burst open. Your breath catches in your lungs as he pulls away to look at your face. “I promise, no matter where you go in the world, I’ll find you.” 

“I love you, too.” You hold back your tears as they threaten to spill once again as you get into the car. You wave at Daniel as your mom pulls out of the parking lot of your apartment building. Daniel runs along side the car until you get to the end of the road. You look out the window at him until he’s just a speck. You let the tears pour when he’s out of sight. Your phone chirps a text and you glance at it. 

Daniel: Don’t cry, babe. This isn’t the end; it’s just the beginning. ;) 

You smile down at the little screen in your hand, holding it to your chest. This ray of sunshine in your life won’t die. You wouldn’t let it. You knew that that gorgeous boy from the crowd would never leave you. 

[moonmurph-gamedev]

Task 3

To start my prototype menu system I imported all the graphics I created in photoshop to my project in unreal engine.

I created a separate folder for them to keep it organised and I used the same resolution in photoshop for UE4. I made sure my canvas size in photoshop was 1920x1080 which is what I’m working in. I’ve chosen three bright colours and stuck with them throughout all the graphics. The only other colours are the white rectangles which act as a highlight for the buttons.

During task 2 I looked at ‘Hello Kitty Roller Rescue’ a game which I speak about in my history of games which was my first introduction to the playstation. It uses these white rectangles to clearly show the buttons. The splash screen and menu are very loud so it is important to highlight what the player needs to select so they know where to look.

I created a menu widget and used different canvas panels to contain the different pages of the menu. 

Here’s the splash screen. The prompt to press X takes the player to the next menu. It’s also informing them that X is the select button.

After pressing X the canvas panel is collapsed and the main menu opens.

Here the player can select to Start the game, exit the game or view the credits. Each of these also collapse and open a new canvas panel. (Except for start which simply closes the menu)

If the player does select ‘Credits’ they are brought to the credit sequence. This is simply a placeholder as I’ve not added any credits yet. The credit title however is animated to tilt side to side.

The player can exit the credits which will collapse the canvas panel and return them to the main menu.

Once the player has started the game they can pause the game by pressing ‘P’ (This is placeholder as it will later be ESC on keyboard or Start on gamepad.)

I opened up the project settings and added Pause in the action mappings. I then created a blueprint which paused the game. 

If the player selects ‘Exit’ it closes the pause menu and resumes the game.

On the pause menu the player can select ‘HELP’ this opens up the Help menu which displays the character controls.

The player can view the controls then select ‘Exit’ to return to the paused screen. They can select ‘Exit’ once more to resume playing the game.

Video Showcase

I’m really happy with my prototype menu so far. I especially like how the normal appearance and hovered appearance change. It makes it clear to the player what they’re about to select. I plan on adding a sound for when they select to make it more satisfying. I’ll need to ensure the sound isn’t shrill or annoying.

Issues that I came across whilst developing my menu system was that I had to manually place the graphics and size them. This caused some of them to look stretched. I realised I could go back into photoshop, view the PNG and get the exact size from there. 

This allowed me to display the graphics at the exact same resolution so they look uniform. 

Interactive Elements

 I plan on creating an environment to be displayed behind the splash screen/main menu for before the player spawns. I’ll also add interact-able in game assets to make it more fun. It’s common in games to have interact-able elements to menus.

Skyrim lets character rotate and view in game models. I think this is a great system to keep the player entertained during loading screen and also showcase your models. 

Bayonetta allows the player to practice combos. This is a great system for a fighting game however my project isn’t a complex fighting game so a system like this won’t be needed. 

I’ll look into ideas for what interactive element I’d like to implement into my menu system.

I decided a fun idea would be to have clickable assets which react in different ways. I created a cute bird model in maya and exported and textured in UE4.

I created three different animations. Two Idle animations and one ‘shocked’ animation for when it’s clicked on.

I imported the mesh, imported the skeleton and the three animations and created a blueprint class actor. I then set the animation setting to ‘play animation blueprint’ I then began creating my animation blueprint.

An issue I came across was all the birds were doing the idle animation in sync which looks unrealistic. I used the random sequence player to add my two idle animations/  This means the birds will randomly do 1 of 2 animations at different speeds. 

Another issue I came across was when the birds were clicked on and played their ‘shock’ animations they lost their idle animations forever. This was fixed by making the idle animations as an ‘IDLE’ state in the animation blueprint and making use of montages.

Here’s a preview of my untextured smallscene which acts as the background for the Main Menu and Level Select. As the player uses the menu they can also play around with the birds placed around the scene. 

Audio

I finally got around to adding audio. I downloaded simple boop noises in WAV form and used the modulator node in UE4 to adjust the pitch and speed.

This allowed me to create two sounds one for selecting and one for going back.

Something that’s really fun that I found when using animations blueprints is you can have different ‘mins’ and ‘max’ so every time the sound is played it varies in pitch/volume. This is really useful for characters footsteps as it makes them sound more realistic. For my menu I made the pitch modulation quite small to not be too jarring.

I used the ‘Play Sound 2D’ node as it’s what you’d use for sounds which don’t exist in the game world like the interface. The other node is ‘Play Sound at Location’ which would make use of spatialization in the 3D Space.This is useful for alerting players through audio which direction the source of the noise is.

BugTesting

Most of the issues I came across were easily fixed with some workarounds however when I had issues with figuring out where in the code it went wrong I made use of my dual monitors to watch the code and see if it stopped at any points. 

I also used breakpoints which freeze the project once a certain node is fired. This is great as it shows me exactly where it is in the project where nodes are firing.

Another simple way but slightly longer is adding printstrings to code which directly show text on the viewport when nodes have fired.

Updated Video

Evaluation/Feedback

I’m really pleased with my menu and the intractable birds. I learnt a lot about animations, canvas panels, cameras and player controllers. Anonymous feedback from my peers said that the seagulls was one of their favourite parts. This shows I should think about adding more ludic elements to my game. They don’t necessarily have to have any importance to the game narrative but players seem to just enjoy interaction. Feedback I received to improve the seagulls was to have some fly past during camera  transitions. I think this is a great idea to make the scene more alive.

This was also the first time I used audio in UE4 and I was surprised at how simple it was. Unfortunately during my presentation and showcase of my menu, the speakers were not working so my peers couldn’t properly hear the audio. It can however be heard in the demonstration video I made.

Some feedback I received which I was really pleased with was that my ‘art style followed the same style throughout and suited my target audience’ I’m happy that my peers thought so because I spent a lot of time during pre production trying to keep my references a similar style and properly picture what I wanted to create. 

The UI for example (health bar, skill bar) was received quite well. It kept to the same style suited for a younger audience. 

All constructive criticism was to keep building on what I already have. To my knowledge there wasn’t anything missing that was required and the menu functions perfectly. It’s now just about going back and polishing what I’ve created. At the moment my menu system is functional and clear which I’m happy with. 

I’m going to keep working on my menu system as I want to eventually make the Level Selects buttons physical objects in the small scene rather then a widget on the view port. I also want to add different interact-able elements such as clicking on lights to make them flicker or clicking on billboards/posters to change colours or pictures. I’ve created materials before where the colours change, this can be done by making the colour a parameter and making a material instance.

I implemented all the minimal elements on the assignment brief which work properly. I’ve bug tested my menu and made changes when necessary such as the animation blueprint with the seagulls. I also changed the pitch slightly on the audio to make it less shrill. 

I enjoyed this Unit and I’ll be keeping this menu system in my current project which I’ll be using for the other units.

[danielshae]

Chrono Trigger on Steam: Dang-o

Well It’s Not Exactly Pretty

By DANiEL SHAE

No driving thesis here, just some thoughts and observations of the port.

Like many of you, I’m a lifelong fan of this game. I still have my SNES (actually, I have four of them), and my original CT cart with a “got all the characters to ** and defeated Pink NU Spekkio” file on it. Even went so far as to get a NU tattooed on me. Because I am a sucker for this game.

As you’re probably aware, toward the beginning of 2018 SE granted us a “surprise release” of Chrono Trigger. Like so many others, I bought it immediately. Then? The backlash. Tremendous backlash. Mostly for the weirdly smoothed graphics that appeared to most like a “bad mobile port”. So, somewhat responsibly, six months later SE pushed an update attempting to appease the mobs of enraged fans by allowing the game to be viewed with graphics “similar to the original pixel art”. That description is straight from the in-game menu.

The release of the update was surrounding by a flood of articles purporting that “SE put the original graphics back in Chrono Trigger and now it looks WAY BETTER...” (I’m paraphrasing here). And to a degree, sure, it is certainly better than it was. But dang-o. Guys, this game is still pretty mangled. For a game whose original was so thoughtful, beautiful, and meticulous, this feels sloppy AF. And I know that some people likely worked their asses off, because I too work in the game industry and I understand how it goes. This isn’t just any game, though; it’s Chrono Trigger. I would think that, regarding a game which was completed 23 years ago and is considered by millions to be a masterpiece, people would be a thousand times more careful touching it now than even the original team who created it back then. That’s certainly the case with nearly any other art you’d find in a museum. But that’s not the case here. Square Enix has the resources to do it right, but this port is unfinished.

First 15 minutes of gameplay, I encountered some triggered events which caused me to become stuck inside another sprite and I had to reboot the game to continue (the specific one I remember is returning the girl’s lost kitty at the fair). Thank God for the “bookmark/resume” feature, which is actually a pretty cool addition to the game. Anyway, I’m now 20 hours in (Death Peak after a lot of grinding), and I’m glad to say that pattern has thankfully not persisted.

But there are other issues. Some minor. Some kinda hideous.

I won’t bore you with pixel uniformity (or the apparent lack thereof), but as you can see pictured above, there are some serious issues with mixed aesthetic. You may have to give it the ol’ “right click, view image” to better see what I’m talking about. Most of the assets are displayed in clearly defined “pixels”, but then there are bits like the Epoch, which appear more like, for my lack of real terminology, freaky blurred nonsense. Flying this bad boy around is a uh...well it’s a “trip”. I’m not one to easily embarrass, but between you and me I keep my head ducked and hope to God an NPC doesn’t walk out onto the world map to see my smeared-ass ride rippin’ across the sky to elevator jams. Also I tried switching between “Original” and “High resolution” graphics—Epoch appears to be the same in both. Maybe I’ve just unearthed a bug in my game, but then if so that’s still a problem.

There are lots of other graphical issues: Orphaned pixel noise that becomes painfully visible during effects like white screen flashes. Freaky solid black pixel chunks during the “cool parts” with the Ocean Palace and the Black Omen. The area around Giga Gaia’s face gets honorable mention for some extra weird shit going on when you slap him around (I was using Cube Toss/Iceberg Toss).

As they say: The list goes on.

I’m actually fine with how the battle menu and gauges look now, even if the gauges sometimes cover sprites a little crudely. I get it. Sacrifices must be made. However, the speech panels and game menu panels don’t look like they belong at all to the same game. They’re bizarrely clunky, a different resolution than the rest of the game assets, and frankly the texture on them looks as though somebody was just dicking around with the spray paint tool. Which might be fine if they were the same resolution as the other assets.

SIDE NOTES ON THE MENU: 1) “Settings” can be accessed from the title screen menu and from the in-game menu, and it offers completely different options depending on which you’re in. That’s what they call a UI/UX “no no”. 2) The behavior of the title menu is...weird. That’s as profound as I’m going to be on this bullet. 3) From the in-game menu, to find the “Quit” option, one first has to navigate to “Settings”.

How the hell is quitting a “game setting”?

The hit boxes, or colliders, or [whatever the hell they are] are unpolished as well. This version of the game feels much stickier in places than previous releases I’ve played (SNES, PS, DS). I’ve encountered several NPCs whose colliders are perhaps double their actual width/height, making it a real pain to traverse certain areas.

I can’t make up my mind about the anime cutscenes. I was super pumped at first when they added them to the PS release, but now I almost wish they were a separate thing from the gameplay. Watching those moments in anime, only to immediately see them again in the original 16 bits, ends up feeling a little disjointed. Plus, occasionally (specifically I’m thinking of Frog blowing open the cave to Magus’s keep), it causes the sound to break for a few moments when it comes back from the cutscene to the 16-bit animation. I dunno. Mixed feelings.

I’m still having a blast playing through it. It maintains maybe 85% of the original charm—and 85% of Chrono Trigger is still a hell of a party. I’m glad they added the DS content. I’m not overly pissed that they only opted to keep half of Woolsey’s localization (frog still charmingly speaks in Old English, just not when he’s having flashbacks to being a child/young adult for some reason) but modified parts of it to include some of the newer English dialects (featuring phrases like “nom nom nom”). OK. Cool I guess. We need the newer generations to “understand” our art.

OK, that’s more-or-less the end of my thoughts on this. It’s enjoyable, but extremely messy. I don’t recommend this version for first-timers to the game. If you can swing it, play the SNES cart. On a CRT. Play it with scanlines. Sweet, beautiful, hot, sexy scanlines. And if you can’t, get a DS copy.

Actually I’m not so obsessed with the “glory days” that I’d turn my nose up at a full-on remake of this game. Pls. I’d take a modern Chrono Trigger in a heartbeat.

EDIT: 49 hours. Beat the game. Multiple times. Got all 13 endings. The most noticeable of the graphical issues are: Epoch, beating Magus and warping to 65 Million BC, Ocean Palace appearing, Black Omen appearing, random buildings throughout the world maps, racing Johnny, scenes with the Gurus/Janus being warped away from Lavos, Black Omen after killing Mammon, and pretty much all of the endings. The Epoch and ending credits sequences are the worst. Still, tremendously fun—just not impressive looking compared to the product that was completed 23 years ago.

[latestnews2018-blog]

macOS Mojave 10.14 first look

New Post has been published on https://latestnews2018.com/macos-mojave-10-14-first-look/

macOS Mojave 10.14 first look

Seems like iOS gets all the love these days. And it’s easy enough to see why. The smartphone has long been the dominant device in many users’ lives, while the desktop/laptop category has been on the decline. But macOS still has some life left in it yet.

A year after introducing the more incremental High Sierra (it’s right there in the name), Apple has returned with a macOS update that’s jam-packed with new features. Unlike other recent updates, a number of the big additions here are targeted at creative professionals, as Apple refocuses its efforts on the user base that has long been a core part of its target market. In the case of features like Dark Mode and Gallery View, there’s a lot to like on that front, as well.

For the first time iOS apps have been directly ported to macOS in an effort to kickstart cross-platform development, while Stacks should go a ways toward helping users stay a bit more organized — and sane. Now that the operating system is in public beta, here’s a rundown of the biggest and best new features Mojave has to offer.

Dark mode

The biggest addition to Mojave is also one of the more interesting from a populist standpoint. Apple made it clear during its WWDC presentation earlier this month that Dark Mode is a hat tip to creative professions. It’s a category the company once owned outright, but one Microsoft has been aggressively gunning for in recent years with its Surface line.

Apple’s been knocked for a handful of decisions viewed as taking its eye off the ball for the small but loyal contingent that has formed its core user base. The company’s been making amends for this over the past year and change, with the addition of the iMac Pro and the promised return of the Mac Pro. Dark Mode is clearly a nod toward those who spend long stretches staring at bright screens in dark rooms.

Of course, it’s not just for creative pros. Dark Mode is a potential boon to all of us desk jockeys looking for some respite from eye strain. It’s also just aesthetically pleasing, and a nice visual break from a Mac desktop design that really hasn’t changed much in the past several generations.

Apple’s done a good job here maintaining consistency across its own apps. Along with darkened menus and frames, Mail, Contacts and Calendar invert to white text on a dark background. The default Mojave desktop image of a winding sand dune has also been transformed accordingly.

Better still, there’s a dynamic version of the wallpaper that will darken, based on the time of day, as the sun sets and stars come out in the desert sky. A nice touch. However, only the default wallpaper is capable of doing that at the moment. If you want the effect, I hope you don’t mind staring at sand.

The biggest issue with Dark Mode (in this admittedly still early public beta stage) is compatibility. Apple says that the mode is designed for easy adoption by third-party developers, assuming their apps are built for the macOS Mojave SDK, but there’s no guarantee the apps you use regularly will have that compatibility at launch. That means there’s a decent chance your dark desktop scheme will be regularly interrupted by a blast of white light.

This is also the case for Apple’s own apps like Safari (though iWork and other not preloaded Apple apps don’t yet have the functionality), which have implemented aspects of Dark Mode, but in which you’re going to be spending a lot of time looking at bright pages regardless.  For most of us who spend time in and out of various apps, Dark Mode’s actual functionality is pretty limited, but you’ll no doubt be compelled give it a go anyway. At the very least, it’s a nice departure from the default macOS color scheme you’ve been ensconced in for so long.

Stacks

Dark Mode may be the feature that got the biggest crowd reaction at WWDC, but Stacks is the best. No question here, really, and this is coming from someone who’s gotten fairly consistent about tidying up his desktop. This thing is worthy of a clickbait-style “One Weird Trick to Organize Your Life” headline.

This is a surprisingly cathartic act. Hover over the wallpaper of your out of control desktop, two-finger tap the touchpad and select “Use Stacks” from the drop-down. Poof, they all shoot into their pre-ordained piles on the right. The default mode categorizes files by product type, which is probably the most straightforward method of the bunch (you also can switch to category or tag). If a file is the only one of its kind on the desktop, it will maintain its name below the thumbnail; otherwise, the file kind will show off below. Unclassified files will show up in a less helpful “other” Stack.

When new files are added to the desktop, they automatically appear in their associated pile, so long as you stay in Stacks mode. When the mode is enabled, files are essentially stuck to these spots like a grid. You can drag and drop them into apps, but can’t move them around the desktop.

Once everything is sorted, clicking on the top of the stack will spread it out so you can once again view everything all once. Click the top of the pile again, and poof, everything goes back into the pile. You also can hover over the top with the cursor and swipe the trackpad left or right with two fingers to scrub through the list. I find the method a bit less useful, but some will no doubt prefer it.

If you decide the whole cleanliness thing isn’t for you, two-finger tap the wallpaper again. Click “Use Stacks” and poof, everything gets sent back to its original entropic position on the desktop. Good on Apple for letting users revert back to the madness.

Apple’s added a LOT of different features — from Launchpad to Tags — designed to help users get better organized. For my part, I’ve largely tried and failed to incorporate them into my daily usage. Stacks, on the other hand, is a genuinely useful addition and a strong contender for the most useful feature Apple has brought to macOS in recent memory.

Desktop

Gallery View is an interesting addition for similar reasons as Dark Mode. The feature is a spiritual successor to the familiar Cover Flow. It’s less dynamic, relying on a bottom scroll bar, rather than large images up top. It puts meta data front and center much more than before. This is especially apparent when dealing with images, giving you an almost light-room level of detail on photos.

The information includes, but is not limited to: dimensions, resolution, color space, color profile, device make, device model, aperture value, exposure time, focal length, ISO speed, flash, F number, metering mode and white balance. It’s lot for most users. In fact, it’s probably overkill for a majority of us, but it’s clearly another indication that Apple’s working to maintain its hold on the creative professional category by building that intense level of detail directly into the Finder.

Tucked down in the bottom-right corner of Finder windows are Quick Actions. There are a handful of handy features for editing images and PDF docs, including Rotate Left (as found in the iOS Photos app), markup (as found in Adobe Acrobat), Add Password and Create PDF, which turns files into PDFs, as advertised.

It’s an interesting system-level embrace of Adobe’s file format, and also makes the need for Preview somewhat redundant, as it’s baked directly into Finder. The options are dependent on file type — so, if you have, say, an audio or video file, you can trim it directly in the Finder window. For most tasks, you’ll probably want to open an editing app, but I would love to see more personalized actions down here. For my own needs, something like file cropping and resizing would be great to have built directly into the Finder window, saving me a trip to Photoshop or some online editing tool. I realize my needs aren’t the same as everyone’s — but all the more reason to offer some manner of customization down there, akin to what Apple offers with the MacBook Touch Bar.

Screenshots

File previews are getting a lot of love here, throughout. I’m not sure how often normal people use screenshots, but I take them all the damn time, so any addition here is welcome. Beyond general usefulness, I suspect a lot of people simply don’t take screenshots because the key command is fairly convoluting. Shift-Command-5 isn’t exactly easier to remember than other, similar combinations, but it does bring up a hand control window overlay.

From there, you can choose to capture a full screen, a window, a selection you outline yourself, record a video of the entire screen (which I used for the above Stacks GIF) or record a video of a selection. It certainly saves from having to memorize all of the different commands. The new screenshots also make it possible to set a timer of five or 10 seconds before snapping a photo.

Apple’s taking a play from iOS, offering up a small window in the right-hand corner of the screen once the screenshot has been snapped. You can click directly into that, or just wait for it to disappear. From there, you can markup the file, drag and drop it it into a document or have it automatically sent to the desktop, documents, Mail, Messages, Preview or a Clipboard, so they don’t all wind up in the same spot.

Continuity Camera

Not sure how often this feature will actually prove handy for most users, but it’s a cool feature, nonetheless. Continuity Camera essentially uses an iPhone as a surrogate camera for the desktop. It’s a clever bit of cross device synergy.

Say you’re in Page. Go to Edit > Insert from Your iPhone and choose Photo. Take a shot, approve it on the device, and it will automatically insert itself in the doc. It works like a charm. The scan feature also works surprisingly well here. I took a shot of a crumpled receipt and it looked pretty pristine, regardless. As someone who recently went through a lengthy visa process, I wish I’d had access to this thing a few weeks back.

FaceTime

This one definitely wowed the crowd. FaceTime’s macOS/iOS-only is the main thing that’s hampered my own use of the service, but there are some really nice additions here that are making me rethink the decision. The ability to add up to 32 users is far and away the most fascinating, and Apple’s done a good job managing that kind of unruly number.

Similar to services like Google Meet, the system automatically detects who’s speaking and places them front and center in the app. Also like Meet, you can manually prioritize the users on whom you’d like to focus.

Other users will shrink down and eventually populate the carousel at the bottom. You can get the list of participants by clicking the Info button. And invitations for more users can be extended while the chat is in progress.

iOS apps

Apple made a point of addressing longtime rumors of a convergence between the company’s desktop and mobile operating systems, flashing a giant “No” onstage. That said, the two OSes are getting even more shared DNA. The biggest news on this front is the porting of three iOS apps to the Mac. This is clearly the first step toward a larger convergence of some kind, but more to the point, it’s a way to start getting app developers to port their iOS apps to the desktop.

Sure, macOS had a huge head start, but iOS has been getting all of the developer love in recent years. Making it easier to create apps cross-system means devs don’t have to decide. It also means that the app that come to macOS through this method will be more likely to do so through the Mac App Store — a distribution method Apple clearly prefers over more traditional downloads, for myriad reasons.

To start, Apple has brought over News, Stocks, Voice Memos and Home. In my time with Mojave thus far, News is the one I now use pretty regularly. I was a bit hesitant to move to a more walled approach to news delivery, but I do appreciate having a centralize hub of the trusted news sources I visit regularly, coupled with alerts that populate the Notification Center at right.

It’s probably not going to replace my use of TweetDeck for work-related news, as, among other things, it just seems to update more slowly. But it’s a nice tool to have churning in the background, along with a check-in once or twice a day, to make sure I haven’t missed a moment of the horror show that is news in 2018. Fun!

Voice Memos probably has the most limited scope of the bunch. I’ve switched over from various third-party tools I use to record meetings from time to time, and it’s nice having that sharing across devices. Students will likely find it handy for lectures as well, but beyond that, it’s probably not going to get a ton of play for most users.

Home is the most interesting addition of the bunch. Certainly it makes sense, as Apple makes a bigger push to remain competitive against the likes of Amazon and Google in the smart home. The Mac isn’t designed to be a hub in this case — that’s still the job of Apple TV and HomePod, so far as the company is concerned. But the desktop OS does make for a nice control panel, and it’s handy to be able to check in on your place remotely from the comfort of your MacBook.

Given that they are, in fact, ports, not much has changed from a design standpoint. That means it’s essentially the same layout as the one you’ll get on your iPad, with a grid of tidy little boxes representing your various connected home devices. It’s pretty hard to shake the compulsion to reach out and touch the things. Apple, of course, has taken a hard-line against incorporating touch into its laptops and desktops, so reaching out won’t get you very far in this particular case.

Odds and ends

The Mac App Store gets an overhaul here, including search filtering and new content categories. Apple’s also added the kind of editorial curation it’s had on iOS and other apps.

More privacy permissions is always a good thing. In addition to the standard access to Contacts, Calendar Photos and Reminders, Apple’s added notifications for apps accessing the camera, mic and sensitive data. That means more pop-ups to click through, but more importantly, some extra peace of mind.

The system now does “password auditing,” to make sure you don’t reuse the same passwords over and over again.

Siri gets a couple of additions on the desktop here, including the ability to add passwords with voice.