#thread: through the grapevine

[honeywyrdie]

Sweet Spot {part 1}

{part 1}{part 2}{part 3}{part 4}{part 5}{part 6}

Baker Felix x Florist reader

summary: You're putting together the floral arrangements for your ex's wedding as a favor, forgetting how passive aggressive he can be about your love life. Fortunately for you, one of your best friend's in the world comes over to feed you sugar and make you a sweet offer to get back at your ex. genre: fluff, smut, angst if you squint // word count: 2.8k // warnings: adult dialogue, sexual themes, wet dream // a/n: Trying out something longer and fluffier this time! If you'd like to be on the taglist, reply to this post or send me an ask 🥰

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I have only posted this here and on AO3 - user: spookwyrdie

You should have never agreed to do this. Your fingers were sore from wire wrapping all the different bouquets, one for each bridesmaid, the ring bearer’s pillow, and the flower girl. So far, you were only halfway done with the floral arch and hadn’t even gotten to start on the table settings yet. There were bits of torn leaves, crushed flower petals, and feathers strewn around your apartment, trying to deal with the last minute changes in aesthetic that the bride asked for.

 The shift from a classic summer bouquet to something more bohemian wasn’t impossible, but it was a challenge with the wedding a week away. It definitely wasn’t your favorite aesthetic in the world, but you were determined to make it work.

The question of why you had agreed to do this at a quarter of your normal fee was beginning to fester in your mind, especially for your ex’s wedding. 

You and Johnny were amicable, sure. Civil might be a better word for it. You didn’t have any leftover romantic feelings for the man - that ship had sailed ages ago. The main problem you had now with him is that he always seemed to be in competition with you, always trying to steal your thunder or diminish your accomplishments. It was always underhanded and passive aggressive and you didn’t have the energy to really push back.

Speaking of the devil, your phone pings with a text message.

❌J: hey y/n, just checking in about the florals. Jenny is freaking out and wants an update you: working on them now! [image attached]  ❌J: wow! Hard at work! Is this the bride’s bouquet? you: yep! Putting the finishing touches on it now’s ❌J: it looks really busy, are you sure this is what she asked for? you: yes. I promise I’m following her vision that we spoke about during our last consultation. ❌J okay! just making sure! I know some of these changes need a quick turn around. ❌J: oh also… ❌J: i wanted to chat with you about something you: ? ❌J: I know things have been a little rough in the dating department for you lately but you still officially have a plus one to the wedding, in case you wanted to bring your sister or someone! you: …thanks.  you: Don’t know where the idea that I’m struggling with dating came from, but I appreciate the plus one. ❌J: I had just heard through the grapevine is all. ❌J: there’s someone out there for everyone! You’ll find them eventually. ❌J: like me and Jenny! We were just made for each other 💕 you: okay, Johnny! Great chatting, I’ll get back to work now! 

You swipe out of the text thread and pinch your brow, the feeling of a building tension headache settling right between your eyes. His audacity is always bewildering, he can have such a sickeningly sweet tone while making sure to get a jab or two in to hurt you. 

Sure, you haven’t had a solid relationship since the two of you broke up, but he doesn’t have to rub your nose in it. The relationship ended amicably enough once you both graduated from college, realizing that the two of you were drifting apart as you pursued your respective careers. Staying civil made it easier to maintain the friend group, neither of you had any real reason to be upset with the other. That didn’t mean you were close, you still kept your distance.

 When he had gotten engaged, you were genuinely pleased for him, and a little relieved. Sometimes, when you’d run into each other at parties, he would make it a point to find you and tell you how well he was doing. You’d get the feeling that he was trying to showboat his accomplishments - he always wanted to tell you all about his successes, all the great things going on in his life. 

He got a great job at some law firm, a promotion and another promotion. Then he had met Jenny, they got engaged, and wasn’t it just so cute that their names were so similar? Jenny and Johnny, Johnny and Jenny! It became their whole personality as a couple and he’d corner you to tell you about how amazing she is and how he had never met anyone who just got him like she did. Every time you’d deal with this, you felt like he had poured corn syrup on you with how saccharine he sounded.

He’d hear about your ebb and flow of love and give you such a pitying look. “Oh you haven’t been dating? That’s too bad, there’s someone out there for everyone! Just look at me and Jenny!” Just throwing small digs in your direction that flew under the radar for most of your friends. 

But you knew. 

You knew he was always trying to make you feel like you had “lost” the break-up. 

~~~

A knock at the door brings you back to the present moment. 

“Y/n~! It’s me! Open up,” a deep voice lilts in a sing-song voice. 

You shake your head, trying to snap out of your shitty mood to answer the door. On your doorstep is one of the best things that came into your life with his ice blond hair, freckles, and a smile that could light up an entire room. Before you can say anything, Felix barges past you into your apartment, holding two paper bags with the bakery’s logo on it.

“I brought some new flavors for you to try, I’m experimenting for the springtime,” he says as he starts unpacking travel pastry boxes with different colored cakes inside.

“Ugh, please don't talk to me about weddings right now,” you sigh. He pauses his unpacking.

“What’s up? You sound like someone kicked your dog.” 

“I just had the most passive aggressive interaction with my ex, Johnny.”

You open the text thread to show him. 

“This is your ex?”

“Yep.”

“Damn, he’s not even being subtle about it.”

“Nope.”

The room is silent for a split second before Felix brightens up again. 

“Well fuck that, the flowers look great, despite the boho bad taste. Come try these new cake flavors I’ve been playing with! Sugar always cheers me up.”

You give him a small smile, he always knows exactly how to bring a little optimism into a shitty situation. “Sure Felix, what have you got for me?”

Soon, you have 4 plates and forks out for the different cake concoctions.

“I’ve been playing around with different florals and citrus for spring, so here we have a lavender cake with key lime frosting. Over here, we have an earl grey cake with lemon curd and lemon buttercream. Then we’ve got a vanilla cake with a pistachio filling and a rose buttercream. Finally we have a jasmine green tea cake with yuzu curd and a vanilla glaze,” Felix says, bouncing on his toes. 

“Okay, Mary Berry! They all sound delicious.”

“You have to be one hundred percent honest with me, I want actual feedback on these!” He grabs your shoulders and looks deep into your eyes, your heart skipping a beat briefly at his intensity. He looks so eager for you to try his different concoctions. Most couples weren’t looking for anything too extreme in the way of flavors, most opting for a basic white cake and buttercream, so you knew Felix loved to share the uncommon combinations he came up with.

They were all so beautiful, perfectly cut out and frosted with care. You picked up your fork enthusiastically.

“Fuck, Felix, that’s delicious,” you say, savoring the citrus flavors. Every single one you tried was more delicious than the last. Your favorite had to be the earl grey and lemon. “This one tastes like how a springtime tea party feels.”

He smiles at you, his eyes crinkling into little crescent moons, his freckles stand out when he smiles so brightly.

“Thanks, it’s always nice when I get to play around with flavor,” he says, leaning back into his seat. As he stretches, his shirt rides up to reveal a small expanse of the bare skin where his hip meets his lower belly, the lean muscle definition standing out in the lamp light. You tear your eyes away when you realize you’ve been lingering your gaze on the scant inch of skin.

 “Oh my god, did tell you?” Felix blurts out suddenly. “I’ve been working with this couple for an upcoming wedding. Absolute nightmare. Terrible taste! Guess what they finally settled on for their flavor.”

“I don’t know, something basic I bet.”

“Fucking mint chocolate chip.”

“Mint chocolate??? For a cake???” You reel back in horror. What on earth kind of combo was that for a wedding cake?

“They insisted on it!” he says, throwing his hands in the air. “Well, the bride did. The groom was never at any of these sampling appointments. She was onher own and really pushing for something unique.”

“I guess it’s unique to make your guests hate you for your choice of cake flavor,” you say, grimacing at the thought of a mint chocolate cake. “Disgusting.”

“I feel bad for their wedding guests. That’s such a controversial flavor for ice cream, I can’t imagine how it’ll go down for the entire reception.”

You hum in agreement, picking up your fork and finishing off the last of your cake in one frosting heavy bite. 

“Y/n you’ve got a little-“ he reaches up, gently holding your chin. 

His gaze softens as he looks at your lips and you freeze in place. Your heart picks up speed, hammering in your chest, at this gentle touch. He doesn’t know that you have had a thing for him for years now, but you’ll never tell him. You love having him as a friend too much to ruin it, he’s the one spot of sunshine on dreary days. There’s no chance he’d reciprocate your feelings, he could literally date anyone the way strangers constantly fall in love with him at first glance.

But right now, he’s focused on your lips, his thumb brushing them carefully, swiping the bit of frosting that was left from your last bite.

“Oh my god!” You force out a laugh, pulling out of his grasp in embarrassment. Taking a napkin, you start furiously wiping your mouth. “Sorry! It was really good!”

“That’s the perfect kind of response to one of my baked goods!” He smiles, licking the frosting off of his thumb. Your heart leaps into your throat. 

Felix never seems to notice the effect he has on people, overwhelming charm, the magnetic pull he has on anyone within 10 ft of him. When the two of you worked at the old cafe together, you’d take a mental tally of the number of customers that would leave with hearts in their eyes after ordering coffee from him. You thought that after five years of friendship you could get used to it via exposure therapy, but his allure slams you in the chest all the time.  You try to keep yourself grounded in reality when he tugs at heartstrings like this - he does this with everyone so you try not to lose your head. But the way he’s looking at you now, leaning in close with fierce affection in his eyes, makes the delusion that he feels the same about you seem almost real.

You giggle nervously and move to tidy things up from the table after you two are done sampling. Felix leans against the counter, watching you, as you start washing the plates.

“I have an idea,” he says. “For your plus-one situation.”

“Okay, shoot.” 

“What if you take me as your date?”

“Be serious, Felix,” you chuckle.

“I am being serious, I clean up real good,” he says, grabbing at your waist playfully.

“Oh!” A fork slips out of your hand and clatters into the sink. “I mean- you don’t have to do that.”

“Nah, I’d like to! Think about it, it’d be perfect, Johnny has no idea who I am and I can brag you up while I’m there. Rub his nose in it for a change.”

“I-“

“Just think it over, no rush. I think it’d be real fun though!” 

You look at him blankly for a moment, your heart thumping in your chest again. “ Yeah, I’ll think it over.”

~~~

Your eyes are closed when you feel a pair of hands slink around your body, drawing you into a chest of hard, lean muscle. The scent like an apple orchard on a rainy autumn morning greets you, petrichor and wood mixed with something crisp and sweet, enveloping you in a sense of comfort. You look up to see who’s arms embrace you to find Felix hovering over you, deep brown eyes locked onto yours. You’re so close you could count the freckles on his cheeks and give a name to each one. He hums as he pulls you in closer, a deep resonance vibrating through his chest, warming you in more ways than one. 

Tell me it’s real, he says, almost silently.

It’s real, you reply. 

He leans down to capture your lips, pausing above you to nudge his nose against yours and smile. 

I’ve waited so long for this, he says as he finally presses his lips against yours softly. His movements are gentle but insistent, trying to communicate with you, speaking quietly of the years of yearning that have been building. Your skin sings with the way his hands splay on your lower back, pushing your pelvis into him as he presses his tongue against your lips, asking for permission. The kiss deepens and you fall further into him, molding yourself against him. Your hands wind their way into his hair, those ice blond strands wrapped up in your grasp.

A small tug has him detaching from your mouth in a gasp, arching into you ever so slightly as his eyes flutter shut. His fingers find purchase in your plush hips, gripping into you harshly as he yanks you even closer to his body, no space between your body and his. Your breasts press into him, feeling his every breath move against you. He groans at the feel of you before he wraps you up into another kiss, this one more fervent. The way your soft body fits against his so well has his tongue dancing with yours, surging into you then backing away, teasing you until your body feels like it’s on fire. 

You whimper into his mouth when he shifts, coaxing your feet apart to slot his thigh between your legs. He bears down on your hips, pressing your core against his flexed muscle. Liquid heat pools in your belly as he starts rocking against you, feeling his length against your hip, pleading for friction. His hands snake down to grab onto your ass, kneading into the thick flesh, controlling the pace of your grinding into him.

You feel that arousal building inside of you, the tension has you clenching while you rut your hips against him. You feel how wet your panties have become as they slide over your clit, your hips stuttering against him, nearing your peak. 

Felix, I’m- you start to say but he cuts you off with a kiss.

Come for me, y/n, he murmurs against your lips. I want all of you. I wanna feel you lose control.

His words have you moaning, your brow furrowing as your hips shake. He holds you steady as he bounces his leg slightly to add extra pressure. You gasp, feeling your muscles tighten.

Give it all to me, he whispers against your lips. It belongs to me.

His voice sounds distant as you feel yourself coming to the edge. 

Suddenly, your eyes flutter open. You find yourself in bed, thrusting pitifully against your pillow, your heart racing and your skin flush with arousal. As you start to pull yourself out of the dream you were so wrapped up in, your orgasm shatters through you, moaning into the dark of your room. Your legs shake as your core muscles flutter, throbbing at the thought of Felix’s mouth on yours. As you start to come down from your high and settle into reality, you can feel your own pulse in your clit, your legs tangled in your sheets with a pillow between your legs, forehead glistening with sweat. 

It felt so real, like you could actually feel the ghost of his hands on your ass rocking you against his body, his groans ricocheting in your chest. You haven’t had a dream like that in ages, it was so vivid. You wanted it to be real so badly.

That settles it. You reach for your phone, the light piercing through the darkness, staring at the clock that reads 4:26 AM. Opening your messaging app, you type out a quick text and hit send.

you: okay Felix, let’s do it. Will you be my plus one?

[sgiandubh]

He was at Three Sheets yesterday night with Ashley. Check their respective stories

Dear Three Sheets Anon,

Your information is correct. What I meant by 'nothing to do with Ashley Hearn' in my post is a bit different, though. Ashley has been in London for a while already, obviously for sales & marketing purposes. She clearly posted about it and even suggested she will be in Scotland soon. But she is not the reason he is in London these days. She already successfully toured several bar outlets by herself, using her own business contacts, in New York and elsewhere: meeting her boss while in London is absolutely normal and nothing to write home about. But not the main reason he is in London right now, I think.

So it would seem they met at the Three Sheets Bar, yesterday.

S's IG story:

[Later edit]: Ashley's IG story - too bad I interrupted myself to get a delivery and then lost this thread:

S tagged both the bar and SS's IG accounts. This is a routine business meeting, especially considering the Three Sheets also deals in business consulting:

They have two outlets in London, one in Dalston and the other in Soho. Both have excellent reviews and well, the expected price range for cocktails in London (10-20 £ ):

Your ask also gives me the opportunity to come forward with several things I have been keeping in my drawers for a while, so thank you for that. Kind of.

Remember (LOOOL and then some more for that, always) my through the grapevine info that C joined S and the team at Milady's bar in New York, on October 17 2024, after the Versace Armani event she attended with Maria McManus? I also remember the Without Pix Anon:

Well, I don't have 'pix' , but I do have the next best thing (gracias a ti, siempre ❤️):

Ashley liked what C posted on October 25, 2024. One full week after the Milady's get together - why would she, if C wasn't there at all, like all the Righteous Pundits lie to you?

She also briefly followed her on IG, but not anymore (why? I will let you draw your own conclusions), along with several OL cast members (followed all of them at the same moment, after the event): Rankin, John Bell and Skeleton. Bell and Skeleton were at that get together, too (unsure about Rankin? it's Saturday, after all and I am not the Metropolitan Police, either - please correct me if I am wrong). She still follows them on IG. Clearly they met there?

The second thing I wanted to bring along is Maximum Wobbler Bullshit's recent nonsense:

This impostor and mythomaniac I have repeatedly debunked in the past still has very scant English, negligent writing skills at best and no damn idea about what marketing means. She was completely triggered by this particular post, on November 5, 2024 (while almost everyone was looking elsewhere, for obvious reasons):

Featured in the pic is Mia Kumari, a good friend of Ashley Hearn. Maximum Wobbler Bullshit conveniently forgets to explain who Mia Kumari is:

Based in London, UK and currently mixing at the Satan's Whiskers bar in Bethnal Green (after a short spell at The Savoy, hello?), she is a well-known, up-and-coming bartender with a consistent record of awards:

The press is raving about her:

[Full article, here: https://foodism.co.uk/features/long-reads/women-london-bar-scene/]

She is also a feminist bartender, with an internationally praised agenda:

[Mia was last week in Greece, as guest speaker at the very prestigious Athens' Bar Week. Too bad I left: I would have certainly bought a ticket and gladly listened to what she had to say - https://www.athensbarshow.gr/guest-speakers/mia-kumari]

Surely a trailblazer 'in London’s dynamic and globally revered bar industry', who also is 'an advocate for equality, diversity and inclusion' does not need Sassenach Spirits to promote herself. She is doing a smashing job at it, like the pro she clearly is: on trend, progressive, sought after and more than noticed. I fail to see where the fuck the alleged cronyism is, because that would simply mean Mia Kumari is a social zero, a nobody in the UK's spirits industry, taking advantage of her friendship with Ashley Hearn in order to get more attention for her sole benefit. That is a lie and that is simply wrong: if anything, it is Sassenach Spirits that needed to prominently feature someone like Mia Kumari, in order to align itself to the values she is so actively promoting (all values C is sensitive to, hmmm). We are miles away, here, from the Cutty Sark wannabe (in)famous Labour Day boat party in Marina del Rey, featuring the BBC/Blue Bikini Chick, back in September 2023 (https://www.tumblr.com/sgiandubh/727347023165145088/its-all-fake-anyway), when all the fandom trolls were on fire. So, Sassenach Spirits needed to do exactly something along these lines, in order to promote and boost the seasonal Xmas sales of their tartan scarves, SS's most expensive merch, targeting a younger, more sophisticated urban crowd.

Clever brands constantly redefine themselves, looking for the right trends and the right crowds to promote their products to. This is a clear sign that finally adults are in the room, now, at SS's Marketing and Sales respective departments. So damn glad to see this welcome shift!

[synthetickitsune]

omg i woke up and saw your post about requests and came running!! you alr know i need all the angst in my life so can i please req dk + come back to me if he hurts you” 🥺🫶🏻

thx for helping me realize i write mostly angst for sunshine boy and continuing the tradition 🫶🏻 akjddsk

DK (SVT) | “Come back to me if he hurts you.” angst | 0.7k | gn!reader

He stares at you, processing. It feels - well, there’s no way to put how it feels. His chest is hollow. He has no parallel to draw, so he just… stares.

The information shouldn’t come as a surprise. He’s heard through the grapevine that you began dating again. Honestly, should he even care? He does. But should he? Does he have any right to care? The split was amicable, mutual. Friendly even. You’re friends still. You seem happy. He’s genuinely happy that you are happy, so why…

“Seok? Are you alright?” your panicked voice and slowly approaching hand make him wake up and flinch away. He feels his face soften from whatever grimace he was making upon seeing your hurt expression.

“Sorry, yeah,” he clears his throat, “I’m alright. Uh, so things are good, yeah?”

He tries hard to ignore your face morphing into a mask of indifference.

“Yeah, things are good,” you repeat.

The silence that follows is awkward and stretches on. He wants to break it but he has no idea how.

“This was a mistake, wasn’t it?” you laugh, but it sounds empty as you hide your face in your hands, “I don’t know why I told you.”

“Hey,” he protests way too quickly and his hand immediately shoots to your shoulder, and he pulls it back just as quickly. You turn towards him and frown. It’s unusual to see him so serious. “I want you to tell me. You’re my friend.”

Your smile is sad. He hates it.

“We’re more than that, Min,” you sigh. It’s quiet again and he’s just as helpless.

“I guess I want to tell you everything - would that be cruel?” you meet his eyes again, but all he sees is the anxious way you fidget with a loose thread on your pants, “I guess I just want to know if you think we’ll work out. You’re the one who’d be the best judge of that.”

“I’m the worst one to be the judge of that,” he corrects you, his voice slipping into his comedic persona easily, “Seeing how things turned out.”

You do laugh and some of the unpleasant feelings lift off his shoulders. He doesn’t know what would be the best or most appropriate thing to say next. He’s not sure how he’s supposed to feel. All he knows is he has to start talking or this will be very pathetic very soon.

“I’m really happy for you, sorry,” he smiles, blinking away some of the moisture in his eyes, “I don’t know why this-” he motions vaguely to his face, “Happened.”

You chuckle, but looking at you, your eyes are wet too. 

“I get it,” you nod, “I’m so scared it’ll end wrong again.”

He sighs. As if he didn’t know the feeling intimately well. 

“Did-” he stops himself before he can finish, thinking better of it, but you push for it anyway. “Did I do something? Something so bad it makes you afraid now?”

“Oh god, Min, no,” you rush to reassure him and end up grabbing his hand in both of yours. You bite your lit. This isn’t exactly how you expected the talk to go. “If anything you loved me too well. So I’m afraid I won’t feel love like that again. Or that I’ll fuck up and lose it.”

“You couldn’t ever fuck up like that,” he laughs - the idea alone is so ridiculous, “Because you’re the kind of person nobody would want to lose.”

You shake your head, leaning into him with a laugh. He’s warm against your side. It feels comfortable. Comfortable like it used to feel even before you dated, like it did when you were together too. You missed being this comfortable with Seokmin after the breakup. 

Things change, but maybe they don’t need to be all that different. You have too much history to let go. And all of it is good - as much as humanly possible.

“Come back to me if he hurts you,” he outstretches his pinky to you. You huff, but there’s a wobbly grin on your face anyway when you promise with your own.

“You got it, Min.”

[brainmuncher]

Okay, so I know we have a handful of reasons we usually revert to when it comes to ‘moving Danny away from Amity for plot reasons’. While I was about to make lunch I thought of this one and now I have to share it before my brain forgets it.

What if the Observants get fed up? Like Danny has done one too many things against them and they are sick of it? He doesn’t respect them or their authority so he is a threat. But Clockwork is refusing to work for them on this. He’s digging his feet in and not letting the Observants use him, stating it's ‘for the good of the timeline’.

So they go another route and start bribing increasingly powerful ghosts to take down Phantom.

Only Danny has noticed a pattern with the new ghosts suddenly coming through the portal. Not only are they ghosts he’s never even heard of, but their only focus is on him. Eventually one of the ghosts that are hired or maybe even one that Danny has befriended in the past that has heard down the grapevine, tells Danny what the Observanats are doing.

And instead of grouping with his friends to figure out how to either take down (preferably) or calm down (Ugh do we have to?) the Observants, Danny in his ultimate wisdom… leaves. The ghosts that the Observants are sending are after him, right? So long as he isn’t near someone else nobody has to get hurt!

And so, without telling anyone why or maybe even completely bulldozing over his friend's reasons to stay, Danny leaves Amity to protect the town.

This idea could just stay as Danny exploring the world but not in freedom like Dani, but in an attempt to escape the Observants. Maybe he even bumps into her at some point and she is surprised and tries to ask ‘Hey, why are you in Hawaii?’ but watches in shock as he runs away from her. Maybe in these adventures, he inadvertently discovers another ancient artifact that he could use against the Observants but the information is threaded throughout the world. So he continues to travel and force himself to be amongst people so that he can gather more information.

Or this could open up some neat ideas for crossovers!

One idea is Danny becoming an omen of sorts that something terrible is about to happen. If you see Danny Phantom, you know that a really bad rouge attack is about to happen in your area. And the worst part is, Danny is happy to see that everyone is avoiding him. Not because he likes to be feared, but because it's for the better. And to his horror rouges are trying to hire him to terrorize certain areas. He's accidentally become a villain because of the constant ghosts trying to take him down.

Another idea is another hero catching on that Danny is being essentially hunted and is concerned. Although their attempts to reach out and help are not being accepted. Danny is trying to protect the hero from danger but they don’t know that. They just think he’s being stubborn. So to Danny's dismay, they try even harder to prove to him that they can help.

I dunno, just something different to think about. Please tell me if there are fics or drabbles already using this kind of idea out there! I would love to read it :>

[silkscream]

CHAPTER 13: TEGAMI

ੈ✩ gojo satoru x reader, geto suguru x reader

Your mouth is a thin line that he wants to kiss. He knows better, though. The distance he’s standing away from you is a demonstration in patience itself.

ੈ✩ chapter cw/tags: explicit content (18+ mdni) , masturbation, implication of bdsm, angst... AND fluff <3

ੈ✩ wc: 5.5k

ੈ✩ a/n: soooooo sorry for how long it's been here's a love letter about satoru being a sad down bad pathetic wet kitten for you. disgusting

playlist ✸ read on ao3 ✸ series masterlist

April, 2011

Satoru doesn’t know what to do with himself. It’s pathetic, really.

He realizes that even when you were just a ghost in his house, helping your mother with her duties, you were still there. Ever-present, always available for him to play with when you were kids, to stare at as a teenager. Even when he decided he’d ignore you, you were still there. Always. It was what he was used to. It was what made him believe that you always belonged to him.

He hates being wrong.

It had been two months since he’d last seen you, and to say that he was in agony was a fucking understatement. 

Shoko would never hear the end of it. Satoru knew that he was beyond annoying, always has been, but lately, Shoko’s patience was a frayed thread. 

“She needs to be her own person, you leech,” she’d snapped at him the day before.

The amount of gin and tonics she had couldn’t even cover the amount of hours she had to tolerate Satoru, who wasn’t even being an emotional drunk at the moment. That, she could deal with – he was a lightweight after all. He’d probably knock out eventually. But no, he was this annoyingly lovesick while sober.

“She is her own person! She can be her own person next to me!” he whined. 

“You know what I mean, idiot. She couldn’t do anything without you glued to her leg. The space is probably good for her.”

“Well, it’s miserable for me,” he muttered under his breath. 

Bribing Shoko with alcohol wasn’t nearly enough for her to continue listening to his woes. There were times she thought about relaying the information to you, suggesting that you’d throw Satoru a bone just so he could stop being so fucking whiny about you, but she knew both of you better than that. She dropped some hints but was mostly met with an eye-roll, which… was fair. It was about time the strongest got over himself.

He knows he’s obsessive. He can’t help it when it comes to you.

It wasn’t like you fucking died – yet there he was, stewing in his own grief. He’d go on his missions and exorcise curses with the intention of bloodshed. Beyond grief, he often only felt rage, and it was the only thing that felt close to good. 

The only thing as violent to him as love was rage. When love was tumultuous, it shook his world, felt indescribably pivotal in the context of his life. It was pathetic, the way he felt about you. 

The missions weren’t enough.

He’d tried everything — smoking cigarettes (he hated the taste), smoking other things (his brain would be fucked and so would his cursed technique), and drinking (Shoko had to cut him off one too many cocktails far too many times). 

Fucking other girls didn’t work. They would irritate him to hell, smelling much too sweet, being way too loud in a way that would grate his ears. It’s not like anyone else could touch him the same way you could, either. God, he hated it when they would try to take control and put their hands where they shouldn’t. Manicured hands grabbing at him that felt foreign. 

He couldn’t tolerate it. It was always better when he could shove them into the pillow, pretending their muffled moans were yours. He could think of you in enough detail to cum.

Satoru had already heard through the grapevine that you were fucking that Zenin brat. He remembered having to deal with Naoya at clan meetings when he was younger — perhaps it was ingrained in his birth that Zenins were his natural enemies. Either that or the fucker was genuinely that annoying. Probably both.

Every time he thought about it for too long, he wanted to punch something. The only reason he didn’t bother to warn you because you were already deep in it, the naive little girl you were. You were too stubborn for your own good, always. There was no use. 

He should probably just kidnap you. Handcuff you to his damn bed, even if you’d hate it. 

But he won’t. Not any time soon, hopefully, if he can control himself. You’ve successfully ignored his texts (maybe you blocked his number?) and definitely threw out the bouquets he’d send (he watched you do it the first time and it took everything in him to not confront you right then and there).

He doesn’t know what to do, truly. So for now, he lays in his bed, staring at the ceiling, trying not to think about your eyes. The image of them finds him anyway, along with your nose, your mouth, your—

Fuck. He shouldn’t.

Yaga would absolutely give him shit if he was late for the meeting, but he doesn’t care. He’s already half-hard in his trousers and he’s only thought about you for less than two minutes. It’s about time he’s had a cathartic release — he’s been dreaming about your hot, panting body underneath him for weeks.

He spits in his mouth while his other hand frees himself from his pants. He groans when he palms himself, imagining your delicate hands, your eager eyes. After all these years, you would still look at him with a certain innocence as you’d palm him, your mouth watered. He missed it desperately.

Do you still think about him, now? He had been your first, your only for so long. He had to be at the forefront of your mind when you touched yourself, when your cunt got wet at all. Right? 

Maybe you’d even thought about him back in high school. Satoru likes to imagine this, that ever since you were child, you had a little schoolgirl crush on him. He tries not to think about how it’s the other way around, that his desire for you had been there since he’d known you. 

He misses the shape of your mouth when you gasp his name. He can almost hear it now as he strokes himself, his groans mixing with the wet sounds of his cock rubbing against his palm. 

You’d always been a little shy about being loud, ever since your first time. He remembers it so vividly. 

S’good. Feels good. Come kiss me.

His mind wanders to the image of Suguru’s hands on you. Suguru’s cock deep in your pussy as his own cock rutted into your mouth. He groans at the faint memories. He hates that he can only chase them like a distant mirage. 

The warmth that pools in his stomach threatens to rise and choke him. He feels feverish everywhere as his hand moves faster. He’s so fucking close — he thinks about himself ramming into you. You whining as you clench around him. Your hands all over him.

He grunts your name as he cums. Satoru rolls his eyes back as he spurts, covered in himself. When he comes down from his high, he gasps a few short breaths as he stares at the ceiling with half-lidded eyes. Body flooded with ecstasy, then shame. Enough shame for his insides to twist uncomfortably, as if he feels the need to go to confession for the mere act of what he did.

The warmth in his body only lasts for so long.

June, 2011

The handprint on your thigh stings. You’re used to rough treatment, could argue that you might even like it. You’re not, however, used to being degraded. 

You’ve always liked the feeling of being wrung out. Satoru and Suguru had liked you pliable, a vessel for them to turn inside out. Soft insides. Soft enough to bruise. 

You should’ve known that when you started living alone for the first time, some men would take advantage of that. You didn’t realize that you could meet a man that was even more demanding and childish than Satoru. 

“You have too many clothes on,” Naoya mutters, pawing at the strap of your bra. You had taken the day off because of the heatwave. Kyoto was rising to ungodly temperatures, and you were hoping to spend the day lying on the floor in front of the fan. Of course, the fucker had other plans.

He was much more charming after the many encounters you’d had at the bar. Now, it was embarrassing to be with him. You weren’t exactly with him, though Naoya thought you owed him a few crumbs after the occasional dinner date. The sex fulfilled the deepseated desire you had for more pleasurable times, but to think about those times would only make the void inside of your chest ache. It was ultimately better to be used up, distracted.

“I should make you a fucking clan princess,” he murmurs, nibbling on your ear. You’re only half-conscious during your second round. Your attempts at redressing were not met kindly. 

He laughs when you whimper. Knows how much you hate it when he talks like that, how it probably reminds you of the Gojo brat. 

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you? I’m going to be the head after all.”

He’s all talk. Maybe he means it, maybe he doesn’t. You don’t care either way. At this point, you’re just using his dick to get off. The violence is a little cathartic. You’d forgotten what tenderness felt like and refused to turn back, as if to punish yourself.

Naoya was always quick to mount you, making your thighs feel whipped. Flesh all lashed from his grabby hands. He was a little drunk tonight, which made it all more annoying.

Luckily, he comes fast because of it. 

“You’d make a good wife,” he says as he lights up in your bed, billowing smoke in the direction of the fan. 

“Shut up.”

“I mean it. Sweet girl,” he grins, lip curling. “I’ll be a good head, too. You can be my right arm.”

You look at him, half-amused, half-pissed. “I’m good.”

“I know,” he scoffs. “Everyone in my clan’s an old fucking fart. You’d probably be into my cousin, to be honest, if he didn’t fuck off like a runaway.”

You pause. “Why’d he run off?”

“Dunno. No one’s heard from him in a while. Maybe he’s finally dead from trying to kill sorcerers. Toji was basically useless without a technique anyway.”

You freeze at the name. You think of getting pistolwhipped, of a mouth scar. Zenin Toji?

“What’s wrong, babe?”

“Nothing,” you dismiss, fiddling with the buttons of the blouse you’re putting back on. “I don’t blame him for running off.”

July, 2011

You’ve always loved the myth of Tanabata. It was a story your mother loved to tell.

Star-crosssed lovers separated by the Milky Way, only bound to meet once a year. It reminds you of someone when it shouldn’t. You shouldn’t yearn for his presence. You shouldn’t even be thinking about him. 

You’ve moved on. Maybe.

You’re lost in thought about the myth when you hear the sound of someone clearing their throat. When you look up, you see Utahime leaning on the door of the greenhouse, watching you cut saplings and fill egg cartons with dirt. 

“You’re not going to be cooped up in here for the whole festival, are you?” 

“Hm?” You look up to see her smirking at you with her arms crossed. 

“Gakuganji gave us the day off. You know that, right? For Tanabata?” she raises a brow.

“I know that,” you huff. “I’m just… catching up on stuff.”

“You’re finding excuses to not leave campus. Shoko’s visiting.”

Your ears perk up at that. You hadn’t seen Shoko in months. Admittedly, you didn’t often pick up the phone, let alone text back. You tried not to be on your phone too much at all, otherwise you’d look through old photos and messages that you had no business reminiscing about. It would be nice to see her. 

“When is she getting in?” you ask.

“In about two hours. Get your kimono on and meet us at the school entrance? We’re gonna go write wishes at Kiyomizu-dera.”

You nod in agreement. It would be nice to go out. You consider the barren state of your room, the empty bottles of plum wine under your bed collecting dust and spiders. Anything was better than holing yourself up there, especially on a holiday like this. You’d always enjoyed watching the fireworks, at least. 

Your heart feels a little lighter when you get to hug Shoko later that night. She’s wearing a pink kimono with a floral pattern, something more feminine than you expected. You almost don’t recognize her without a cigarette in her mouth and lab coat draped over her shoulders. When she’s with Utahime, her face is brighter. You’re almost envious.

“Wish for anything special, baby?” she taps your cheek, feeding you a skewer from her yakitori.

You think of your messy handwriting scrawled onto a red tanzaku. You imagine one miles long enough to fit a whole letter. Maybe you should start journaling.

“That’s a secret, isn’t it?”

She grins knowingly. “I missed you. I didn’t just come here for Hime, you know.”

“Don’t worry, I begged her to come for you, too,” Utahime quips, fixing her braids. 

“You did not beg,” Shoko scoffs. “You know I’d never miss an opportunity to see my girls.”

You feel too warm in your kimono. Part of it is the heat, part of it is that Shoko was rather reliable in getting you a fix, meaning that you were immediately treated to a round at an izakaya before heading out to the festival. While the buzz through your skin doesn’t exactly translate to comfort, it’s enough for you to wade your way through the crowd without a care to get yourself some takoyaki. 

You freeze when a warm hand touches your shoulder. You’re stopped by him before you can even round the corner.

His hair’s a mess, white tufts spiked up in haphazard peaks as if he’d just woken up. The black sunglasses make him look out of place, so does his entire aura. Satoru was always a lean giant, legs going on for miles with a grin like a cowboy. Normally, you’d fall victim to it. Right now, you’re mostly in shock.

“I could’ve paid for that, angel,” he coos.

Your stomach flips. Satoru was very good at having horrible timing. Maybe it was the universe itself taunting you, but the Six Eyes has always been more calculated than that. He must’ve planned on seeing you.

You swallow back the taste of something acrid crawling up your throat.

“What are you doing here?”

Before he can respond, the girls had already caught up to you, staring in disbelief in a distance. When you glance back at them, Shoko mouths an apology before pulling at Utahime’s arm and ushering her away.

“Why did you—”

“I didn’t come with Shoko,” Satoru interjects. He shifts uncomfortably like a teenager telling a lie. “Most of the Gojo clan is in Kyoto, remember? My, uh, parents wanted to come for the festival.”

Your mouth is a thin line that he wants to kiss. He knows better, though. The distance he’s standing away from you is a demonstration in patience itself. 

He doesn’t have to tell you that he’d arrived the day before, stalking the Kyoto campus just to see what you were up to. He chalked it up to boredom, the same as checking up on an ex-fling on social media, if hovering around the greenhouse for hours was considered casual.

“It’s good to see you,” you say. You tell yourself it’s a lie, just a filler for politeness. You know that you’ve been aching for him since he had kissed you in the winter.

His heart flutters in his chest, begging to burst, but he doesn’t show it. 

“It’s good to see you, too.”

You smile at him awkwardly as you play with the fabric of your kimono. You clear your throat. 

“Have you seen Shoko or Uta yet?”

“No, not yet.”

His voice is wary, like he’s walking on eggshells with you. He searches your face for any emotion beyond indifference. The slight smile on your features is mild, and he’s sure you’re only putting it on for him.

Satoru is sure you’re begging for a way out. Truthfully, he wants to steal you away, take you to the shore so he can pin your body down to the ground, feel the softness of your skin. He’s had too many wet dreams about it that it almost feels like a prophecy in his head. 

So he lets you lead him to Shoko and Utahime, who both smile politely but maintain a visible proximity to you. He doesn’t blame them.

He should be tired. He almost rejected the offer from his mother to go on “vacation” for Tanabata since he’d come back from a three-day long mission — Yaga had attempted to arrange a sort of mentorship between Satoru and some new first-years. It was mostly a bust considering a special grade had emerged after the initial grade twos. Satoru was forced to hold his weight, of course, so he came back exhausted, too tired to go away.

When his mother mentioned that they’d meet with the clan members from the Kyoto quarters, he was suddenly eager to go.

Now you are here in front of him and his heart feels like it’s going out of his ass. You look beautiful as ever. He notices how much you’ve grown, staring at you with reverence. It’s not like you look so different than the last time he saw you, but it’s been a while since he’s seen you like this. In something more formal. 

You’d only wear kimonos on holidays. He remembers watching your mother sweep up your hair with little sticks, jade charms hanging from your ears. He couldn’t be around you then, back when you were kids. Not when he was stupid and hormonal and trying to get over you in high school. His chest hurts in the same way as it did back then. 

You share your takoyaki with him as you walk to a quieter part of the festival. There’s a garden by the large festival grounds, hydrangeas blooming and kissing the archway of a gate. They’ve been everywhere you see in Kyoto since the rainy season ended. 

Satoru clears his throat. You raise a brow at him. 

“What?”

He stares at you, his mind blank. You don’t look like you’ve missed him. You don’t look at him the same way you used to, with that certain tenderness that he always liked. He almost reaches for you.

“You look…”

“Hm?

He swallows hard before continuing. “Beautiful. You, uh, look beautiful. That’s all,” he mutters. 

“Thanks. You look good, too, Gojo.”

Gojo. When was the last time you called him by his last name? Not since you were in his estate, sweeping his damn floor. It stings more than any disparaged look you could give him. At least when you’re a little cold to him, he feels the need to rile you up. He’s always liked to challenge you that way. 

You not even using his first name is a harder blow than anything else.

“Oh, wow,” he chuckles meekly. “Big downgrade, huh?”

“Excuse me?”

“You called me, uh–” He coughs nervously. “Just– nevermind.”

Your stomach twists with guilt. He looks like he’s about to cry. 

“I missed you,” he blurts out. The distance between you two is driving him insane. 

“Uh, I know. Shoko told me.”

“You smell like cigarettes.”

“Yeah?”

His palms feel sweaty. He doesn’t know how to talk to you, can only list stupid facts like that’s a fucking conversation. You’re smoking too much. You look beautiful. I’ve been dying for months because I haven’t been able to kiss you.

“And… amber. You still wear that perfume I got you?”

You sigh. “Yes, I do.”

His eyes brighten so quickly it’s almost pathetic. He blinks at you wetly like a child, resisting the urge to pull you into his arms and bury his face into your neck. To inhale you. 

His skin itches. 

“Sorry for being weird.”

“You are being weird.”

You didn’t anticipate seeing him. Hell, you never do, even when you were together and sleeping in the same bed as him. His presence was like a lightning strike, unbearable to look away from, beaming with so much light that it hurt your eyes.

You almost feel ashamed when your stomach flips at the intense eye contact.

Satoru is at a loss for one of the first times in his life. He doesn’t know what to say. Wants to say it with his hands instead, his mouth. He shouldn’t. He bites the inside of his cheek, softly grimacing at the way you’re speaking to him — it’s so unlike how you used to be. Quiet and warm and soft. 

He huffs. “Yeah, well. S’your fault.”

You roll your eyes. His lips twitch into a smirk. Finally, a reaction from you. He’d like to make you react more, push your buttons. At least then you’d give him attention. 

“Do you even care that I missed you?” he complains, pouting.

You smile lightly at that. “You always miss me. Even when you saw me every day, you missed me.”

Fuck. 

He really, really wants to touch you. His face heats up slightly, his hands twitching again. Aching to feel your skin.

“Yeah,” he says without shame. “Because I always want you.” 

He continues to stare at you. You know he’s being genuine, but the way he’s always been so candid with his feelings felt like he was taunting you. It’s always been a bit of a game for him, seeing how far he can go before you break. But he knows you’ve always seen through him. You were the only one who could, besides —

"I’m not used to not having you around,” he confesses. 

“I’ve lived in Kyoto for like a year. You survived, no?”

The look he gives you is mildly offended before he snorts. It’s a stupid thing for you to say. He’s not a child. He can survive just fine without needing you around. It doesn’t matter that you would take care of him after missions before, that you’d take care of him out of obligation when your mother had worked in his estate. He didn’t need you. It’s what he tells himself every night before he dreams about you. It’s a lie that he repeats in his head, hoping it will stick eventually. 

“Survived is a bit of a stretch. I’ve been miserable, Twigs.”

“Don’t call me that.”

He hums and tilts his head. 

“Why?” he says, taking a step towards you. “You don’t like it when I do?”

You say nothing. He’s gotten so close to you now that his body brushes against yours. The height difference is a bit more stark now, and he’s looking down at you with that same cocky expression that you’re used to seeing.

 “I like calling you Twigs,” he almost whines. 

“It’s stupid.”

“No, it’s not.” He reaches out to you, his fingertips tracing down your jawline, then your chin, tilting it upwards ever so gently. 

“My pretty little Twigs,” he says in a soft voice, as if talking to a child.

“Satoru.”

“Finally calling me by my name, huh?” he grins at the way it sounds from your mouth, even if you’re irritated. 

He thinks that you could be screaming it, threatening him with a fucking weapon or your cursed technique, and his eyes would still be as big as the moon with twice as the amount of love.

“Don’t.”

He doesn’t listen. He’s too preoccupied by your face, by the feel of your skin under his touch that he’s missed for so long. His thumb brushes across your bottom lip as his fingers still hold your chin. 

“Still as beautiful as ever,” he murmurs.

“You always do this,” you scoff. “I tell you I need space and you don’t give it to me. It’s like you enjoying disregarding my boundaries or something.”

He scoffs back at you. “Or something,” he repeats.

Satoru takes another step until you’re fully pressed against him. His hand moves from your chin to the back of your neck, his fingers playing with the edges of your hair. It’s satisfying when you give him a reaction, and your expression of annoyance makes him want to grin widely. He holds it in, not wanting to make you outright angry.

“Your boundaries are inconvenient,” he says. “And pointless. And I don’t like them.”

“I don’t care.” 

“Why do you care so much about boundaries, sweetheart?” he teases. “You used to be such a good girl. Always doing what I said.”

Your breath hitches. God, you need to fucking get out of here. At least out of his grip.

He notices it immediately as your body responds to his proximity. The little gasp you make, the way your eyes flutter a little faster than you mean to. It encourages him. Makes him cocky. His hand moves from behind your neck to your waist.

“Always letting me touch you,” he continues saying lowly in your ear. “Letting me do whatever I wanted. You’re still my good girl, aren’t you?”

“You’re a fucking dick.”

“Is that your way of telling me I’m still hot when I’m pissing you off?”

You stare at him coldly and his smirk falters. The look on your face stuns him a bit.

“You’re actually upset.” It’s not a question.

"Yes, I am. Because every time I see you, you just treat me like a fucking toy. It's exhausting."

“Toy,” he repeats, his jaw clenching. “That’s what you think I see you as. A toy?”

The idea of you thinking that he’d ever see you as just makes his chest tighten. It reminds him of when he first started seeing you. The pitiful look on your face whenever he would be stupid and careless, nothing but a fucking toy. He’d like to think that he was better than that, that he could be better for you. He loved you too much to ever actually think of you as a toy.

"I don’t like it when you say things like that. I’ve—" He stops himself halfway. He’s on the verge of giving you too much — of being too truthful and baring too much of himself. “Fuck. You don’t get it.”

“What don’t I get, Satoru?”

The words are on the tip of his tongue. He can feel them, how desperately he wants to say it. But he can’t do it. He huffs instead, and turns his head away from you. 

“It doesn’t matter.”

“Right,” you spit back bitterly. “Of course.”

You’re angry but it isn’t enough. Even with the tone of your voice, you were still rather nonchalant. It’d be better if you cried or yelled or pushed your small hands to his chest. 

Anything other than the sardonic treatment he was getting. You’ve always been a little too calm for his liking, even when you were upset. It reminded him of when he would fight with Suguru. You must’ve gotten it from him. 

“I’m sorry, okay?” Satoru says, almost pleading. Bleeding with desperation. He takes your wrist in his hands, turns it over so he can trace your veins.

“Sorry for what?”

“For disrespecting your boundaries, and for being a dick, and being so dismissive when Suguru left. For being selfish about you, for wanting you all to myself, for talking to him without letting you know. I’m so sorry.”

He’s prepared for you to walk away as he looks down at you nervously. There’s a heavy silence between you, the distance a growing chasm that he doesn’t know how to bridge. It had all crumbled so long ago and he fucking hates it. He hates how everything has changed. He hates how despite all the pain, he can only stare at you and be enamored by how beautiful you look even when you’re pissed off with him.

You do the last thing he expects. You hug him.

Your body is flush against his and his heart races. It’s like a dam breaks, the way he tightens his arms around you, almost crushes you. Satoru nearly kisses you. The ache in his chest hurts so much. 

“God, Twigs,” he mumbles into your hair. “I missed touching you. I missed everything.”

“I know. I do, too.” 

You stay like that for a while. Quiet. The sounds of cicadas and street vendors and children from a distance are background noise outside your little bubble.

“I feel like I've been bound to you since we were kids,” you whisper. “I'd hate it. Even when I'm in love with you, I hate it. I just... I wanted to try to be my own person."

His breath catches in his throat at your words, because he knows exactly what you mean. He’s felt it before, too. The strange pull that ties the two of you together no matter where you go. No matter how much time passes, it still seems to bring you together.

“You are your own person,” he says, his voice muffled against your neck. “You’ve always been your own person. And I—“ he swallows, gathering himself. Trying to calm down the heavy thrum of his heart. The dull ache in his head. “I never wanted you to feel trapped. Never.”

You nod, pulling away. You look away from him, your eyes fixed now on the moon. You think of the wishes you made, if anything you wanted would ever come true. If you should be ashamed that all you ever wanted was Satoru. 

“What are you thinking about?” he asks quietly.

“Tanzaku trees,” you whisper. 

“What did you wish for?”

“I’m not supposed to tell you,” you roll your eyes. 

He pouts. “You never tell me. Even when we were kids. C’monnn, you can tell me. Is it something naughty?”

You laugh and Satoru feels like his body is starting to soar out of itself. Like his spirit jumps out of his skin. Beaming.

“Well, what’d you wish for?” 

“You. Like always.”

You scoff, wanting to hide your face in your hands. It almost makes him grin wider. He steps closer to you, his large frame surrounding you, his height blocking the moon from your view. 

“I used to wish for you when we were kids, too. I’ll probably wish for you every year.”

You can’t help the small smile that forms on your face. He’d always had a way of getting to you. You suppose he always will. His white lashes flutter at your reaction and he steps closer, brushing a strand of hair behind your ear. He’ll keep pushing his luck for as long as he can if he can at least see you smile like that every so often. 

He’d be damned if he ever gave up on you. His persistence was exhausting. It was one of your favorite things about him, even when he was unwelcomed.

“Are you surprised or charmed?”

“Neither.”

You sniffle. Dry tears making your face sting a little, but the moonlight helped conceal them. You could feel the weight of his stare making your insides melt and congeal like a hard rock. You’d let yourself reunite with your lover just like the deities.

You used to believe in angels and spirits and eyelash promises. Satoru Gojo at the forefront of it all, every small desire, even if you refused to admit it. 

You felt impulsive. It was the banter that you missed. It didn’t even take a drink or two like it usually did, not the proximity that Satoru forced out of habit. Yes, his persistence as annoying. Your willingness annoyed you even more.

You look up at him. Always stupidly tall, white hair blocking the moon from your view. It’s a view you’d seen so many times, wishing you could capture it with a camera, but photography would never be able to do the little halo any justice. Stupidly beautiful, stupidly prophetic-looking. It was like the stars were hung just to complement his eyes.

Your lips touch his gently and it satiates him at first. Calms down the manic need until starts back up again, a groan rolling from his throat as he finds his bearings in your waist. Satoru tries to keep it slow, but fuck, he feels like a virgin again. Heat drunk. As if he wasn’t having pussy every other day of the week to distract himself from the way your hair smells.

You pull away when you hear a faint moan, the brush of something thick against your thigh. You almost laugh.

“There’s your damn wish.”

“What about a buy-one-get-one? Tanabata special?”

“That was a gift. Don’t be greedy.”

“Please, baby?” He ignores your warning, already has kisses trailing down the length of your throat. Dandelion-soft to tease you, but to also restrain himself from biting. “It’s been so long. Let me have you for the holiday. You can be my little weaver girl.”

“Are you going to say the whole poem now?”

“Sure. Something something, Heavenly River. Ano natsu no hi, kirameku hoshi,” he sings, purposefully offkey.

“Is that the fucking closing credits song from the anime we used to watch?”

“Yes,” Satoru deadpans. “It references the folk tale, duh.”

You look at him incredulously. He smiles with all his teeth, blinding white. Too perfect. You should punch the lights out of him, really, but you find your grin matching his.

“Jesus, you’re a nerd.”

[westanleovaldito]

Looks like you made the request through Leo, so:

Leo Valdez x daughter of Dionysus making grapevine wreaths together?

Such a pretty beautiful lovely amazing great idea xx

Grape Vine Crowns

The sun beat down on you both, splotching through the short stubs of woody vines. Normally, the camp grew strawberries, but with the help of you, the Hermes campers convinced your dad to grow grapes as well for very sober purposes.

You probably could have done this with strawberries. Regaurdless, you sat cross legged under a grape vine, facing your favourite mechanic

Your hands carefully wove the familiar vines together, occasionally poping a grape into your mouth and glancing at Leo, who had forgotten the wreath he was tasked with making.

You chuckled, shaking your head before glancing up again. "Cant follow directions?"

"I got distracted" he smiled, looking at you like you were some kind of mirage.

"What? Y'like my hands?" You ask with a grin that he had only a month ago realized matched his (he also found it to be just as hot as you found his), adding a wink for emphasis.

He stuttered and flushed as you sat there giggling. Giving up, he tossed a grape at you with a huff.

"Is this like one of those uh- candy necklace things?" He asked after a short pause.

Tilting your head with a hum as you think. "Yeah... yeah, I see it"

You just finished tucking the last bit of vine into itself, making a cute little wreath of ripe, red grapes. Smiling with pride as you held it up for Leo.

"For the prettiest prince at the ball!" You mock, bowing exaggeratedly, holding it out for him like a tiara.

He gave a gasp, putting a hand on his chest. "My leige!" He said, holding back a giggle as he let you move up onto your knees to crown him the king of grapes. "Surely, I must repay you mi amor!"

The fact that he very clearly couldn't weave the vines together amused you to no end. A cackle escaped your throat as you stood to pick more threads of vine for yourself. "Guess I'll just have to teach you~"

Just realized I took 'wreaths' for 'crowns' :/

[ladystarksneedle]

Heads and Tails

Summary: A lady at court comes to learn that oaths made are seldom broken.

Word count: 1.4k

Warnings: suggestive themes, gore, mentions of period typical crimes and their punishments, minor character death.

Prev<

If there was one thing that she could be sure of, it was that her betrothed was always true to his word.

She'd been shifted to new chambers the following morn, her belongings and keepsakes stacked and arranged meticulously as she sat sipping her tea. There was a silence to the day after the previous night, dulling her senses just enough to wash the dread away without dampening the glimmer of excitement in her belly. She knew his visits would now be chaperoned with all the attention they'd drawn to themselves. There would be whispers in the hallways, maids trying to catch a glimpse or get an earful only to be sent scurrying away, page boys peeking about and guards turning their heads ever so slightly in keen observation. The grapevine of the Keep was ever alert and buzzing after a fresh scandal, one only needed a keen sense of perception to know what was afoot.

Much to the dismay of her new retinue, she hadn't had any visitors, only a squire to let her know that Aemond would visit her for dinner. As the day passed and she busied herself with the mundane her thoughts were drawn to her father and how he hadn't visited her once. Had he left already, just as swiftly as the Baratheons? Had he spoken to Aemond? Had he forgiven her boldness or did he still hold on to his anger?

What would her mother think when she heard of it all? She knew she'd stayed behind reluctantly and the news of her only daughter's quick betrothal would add injury to insult. What must she think of her and the circumstances in which all of it had conspired?

The gnawing returned and her hands busied themselves, pulling and weaving rapidly mirroring her own warring thoughts. Threads of green and burnt orange decorated her work, taking a monstrous yet fragile shape as she focussed on the fabric at hand, trying to perfect the image embossed in her head. The first time she'd seen her was magical and it was imperative that it showed in her work. “Where are we going?” he'd hushed her as he put his cloak around her shoulders.

“T’is so thick” she'd complained “Why do I need this”

“For the cold” he'd said. “I shall warm you up regardless, but it'd be better if you wore it.” He'd appraised her afterwards, as she drowned in the navy fabric, before grabbing her hand.

“Come” he'd said as he led her through the winding streets at twilight with the agility of an alley cat. It had been a cool night with a nip in the air when he'd brought her there, bowing in greeting to his other half. She'd lifted her head and sniffed a puff of smoke, gazing at her with eyes as old as eons, shining with judgment, before turning her head away again, much to her dismay.

“She likes you,” he'd said smiling.

“She hardly looked at me”

“Trust me, you'd know if she didn't” he'd responded before hauling her up towards the skies. It was the happiest she'd ever been, to be up with him in the heavens, screaming for joy, wrapped in his arms while he grinned behind her. She'd pestered him then on, to take her with him everytime he went out flying and though it wasn't always possible, he'd obliged twice. “I'll please the old lady next time when she sees you with this, then she'll surely let me come more often, ” she thought to herself as she worked on.

As the threads before her turned from foxtrot to olive, shining warmly in the light of the setting sun, she stretched and looked out the window, before deciding to get ready for dinner. It would be the first they'd share as newly betrothed and she wished to look her very best. He'd entered later just as she was putting on her earrings, marching through the doors in annoyance, quick to dismiss the servants.

“Leave us, we shall dine alone.”

They scurried away from him as he looked at her, his gaze softening before he held out his arms. She smiled rushing to him as he pulled her close.

“It seems someone has missed me.”

“Va moriot” she replied as his eye darkened in pride. (Always)

“Emā issare jollōragon” (You have been studying)

“Mirrī” she replied sheepishly. “Iksan.. trying” she continued embarrassed as he chuckled.

“Sȳz olvie, it seems I shall have to tend to you more” he said leading her to the table.

“How was your day?”, she asked him as they began to eat after their prayer. They'd kept up the tradition in private, her for her faith and a reminder of her ties to home and him for his loyalty to his mother.

“There were things that needed to be settled. We can continue our lessons on the morrow.”

“What about my father? Has he left? I've not been informed nor has there been a note sent to me.”

He put his chalice down in thought as he looked at her.

“He left at dawn, just as I arrived to train. I was informed shortly. He shall return as he's been commanded to, in a fortnight with the rest of your family. Do not worry, they may write to you once he reaches home”

She wrung her hands as he ate, before he reached out to grab them, making her latch on to his own instinctively. His fingers were long and bony and she loved playing with them. She ran her fingers over his knuckles, tracing the callouses from his training and he let her continue her exploration in peace. Her touch was welcome in all ways behind closed doors.

“What is this?”she asked, coming upon a bloodied fingernail.

“A mishap at dawn perhaps” he answered nonchalantly.

“You've never hurt yourself training” she remarked looking at him.

He hummed, his eye darkening in response.

“What has happened?”, she asked persistently, keen to know the reason he hadn't visited her all day.

“What is the word for trust in Valyrian” he asked.

She swallowed in response. “I just wish to know.”

“Ivestragon nyke” (Tell me)

“Pāsagon” (Trust)

“Hmm” “There were words spoken that needn't reach your ears. Things which, as I said, have now been dealt with.”

“The people of this realm needed a reminder of the power of our house, you may rest assured. We shall resume our routine as was before. Eat now so that we may finally get to what I've come here for.”

“I am a slow eater”

“Then I shall wait, I've never enjoyed the rush” he replied as she dug into her food.

“Your eyes still hold mine in question,” he said, kissing her neck as they laid together later, making her whine in response “It troubles you still, does it not”

“A little bit, though these thoughts evade me with you here. Stay” she asked him breathlessly. He tutted in response “And what would they say if they found me like this in your bed my lady, hmm?”

“They've never found you before”

“Ah but they're more alert now, you see. Someone could just walk in” he responded teasingly.

“Then all your training shall be put to task and I'm afraid you'd enjoy it even more” she answered laughing.

“Sleep. Mirre kessa sagon sȳrī” (All will be well) he said kissing her temple as she drifted off dreamlessly.

As dawn broke, she awoke to find the sheets crumpled nearby. Running her fingers across the bedding she saw a little note tucked beneath the pillow.

“Nyke kessa gaomagon ñuha kivio naejot ao, va moriot”

(I shall keep my oath to you, always)

She smiled in response, running her hands over the letters, reading them out in her head, before pulling the bell to summon her maids. She held it in her hands as they bathed and dressed her, while they tied her stays and combed her hair, still smiling to herself.

“Perhaps my lady would like to break her fast in the boudoir. There have been many who've been wishing to speak with you.”

She thanked them as she moved to attend to her visitors, excited for the day.

“Let me greet them now as the wife of a prince", she thought walking into the room.

A shrill scream broke her reverie as she witnessed the disarray. The room was in shambles, with most of the ladies huddled around each other whispering frantically and some on the floor around a lone figure, clutching her chest and wailing as she looked out the window. As lady Blount screamed for her beloved mounted on a spike, she clutched the note in her hands with tight certainty.

If there was one thing that she could be sure of, it was that her betrothed was always true to his word.

Taglist: @witheredoffherwitch @arcielee @chompchompluke @barbieaemond

[raven-at-the-writing-desk]

Ordinary Day

Isn’t it nice weather? Let’s take a short stroll and enjoy it.

This is part 16 of 20. We come close to the conclusion.

The Tale of the Cursed Raven:

Part 1 I Part 2 I Part 3 I Part 4 I Part 5 I Part 6 I Part 7 I Part 8 I Part 9 I Part 10 I Part 11 I Part 12 I Part 13 I Part 14 | Part 15

Information has a way of spreading by word of mouth. Without a form, there is nothing to restrain them from travel, and from the details straying from the truth. By the end of the school day, Kon has already picked up on at least seven variations of the same story.

The disappearance of one Raven Crowley, and the aftermath of it.

She hadn’t attended class for some time now, hadn’t shown her face in public. A wind blew through the grapevine, supposed tea brewing. 

“I think she transferred. Didn’t really fit in here anyway. Probably at some all-girls place now.”

“No, no, she’s being homeschooled for safety reasons. The headmaster keeps her locked away in that tower and personally tutors her.” 

“I heard she’s dead. She Overblotted and went on a rampage in the woods. The dorm leaders had to suppress her and collect the body afterwards.”

He grips onto his textbooks harder, fingers digging into the leather-bound cover and spine. Kon is always anxious, but the whispers tug at his nerves, pulling them taut.

It doesn’t come from a place of concern, he knows. Gossip is gossip, meant to amuse and entertain. 

He wonders if he should confront them, ask them to stop--if they’d even listen to his pleas. 

Because no one wants a story’s end to be as sad as that…

Instead, he ducks behind a column and waits for the chattering group to pass. The debate grows heated, turns into betting and rough housing. Ugly, unpleasant sounds.

The thought occurs to him again. If he tries…

“Are you going to say something?”

Kon startles at the sudden question. 

He senses a figure beside him, but is too frozen with fear to turn his head, to see who it is.

From his periphery, he can glean glimpses of them. Auburn waves threaded with gold, a frilled gown colored as green as the springtime. A soft voice to belong to one of the rowdy mobs. It’s sweet yet flat, like a soda without the carbonation.

Who is this…?

His mouth won’t move to utter what he wants it to. 

“No? You won’t?” they ask. “Ah, you choose to observe then. You are wiser than you would appear to be. A story is just meant to be witnessed. To involve oneself is to meddle. The impartiality, ruined.”

Shock dislodges the knot in his throat. “Wh-What are you saying? The rumors floating around… I don’t think anyone would want that.”

“Talk is what they have, so they relish in it.  Action is difficult. Very few manage to scale the tower to witness the truth for with their own eyes. The chosen, the worthy.”

“I-I don’t understand what you’re saying.”

There is a scoff.

“Perhaps not now, but in the future you may.”

He sees a hand extend, cupping the sunlight. It is sheathed in a billowing green sleeve, nothing like the NRC school uniforms.

“This is a day like any other. Please enjoy the mundaneness to its fullest. We do not know for certain how long this peace will stay with us.”

“You’re not a student,” Kon says weakly. Already, he is sweating up a waterfall on his forehead. “Who are you?”

In the response, a slight smile.

“Just a visitor passing through. Pay me no mind.”

“’Scuse me! Sorry! Comin’ through!”

A ghost outfitted in a mailman’s uniform weaves his way through the hallways of Octavinelle. He doesn’t so much as go around students as he was fazing through them. The only trace of him left behind is a slight chill in the torso, like an ice flower has just melted there.

The mail ghost launches itself through the Mostro Lounge doors.

It’s a busy night.

Students are seated at the booths and at the bar. Friends with friends, soaking up jazz and the aquatic ambience. Plates of seafood and colorful drinks, served under glowing jellyfish.

The conversation flows like water.

“They shipped her off to a lab to get tested. Or maybe she got kidnapped.”

“Nah, she’s in hiding somewhere.”

“She opened up a portal to another world and hopped into it.”

From the podium up front, Jade bows to the mail ghost.

“Welcome to the Mostro Lounge, honored guest,” he greets. “I’m afraid we are fully booked at the moment, so if you wish for a table, you will have to come back in 45 minutes’ time. Though--” Jade eyes the bag of mail hanging from the ghost’s body. “--I suppose dining was not in the cards from the start.”

“Just here for the usual mail delivery.” He reaches into his bag and produces several envelopes, fanning them out.

“Thank you for your service as always. I will receive them for Azul.”

The exchange is made, and the mail ghost continues on his route.

As soon as he vanishes, Jade allows his smile to relax.

The merman begins going through the envelopes. It’s a distraction, but preferable to paying mind to the swirling hearsay. It will only make him irritable.

Plain white, mostly bills or spam mail and advertisements. Hardly anything worth gracing their dorm leader’s desk.

Azul.

Jade frowns.

Since Azul had been whisked away to the emergency meeting, he has been more alert than usual. Jade notices it in the subtleties. His breaths, his glances, the way his fingers drum.

Whatever happened that day, it still bothers him.

He had “spoken” with the other dorm leaders, of course—but none of them knew much, not even Kalim, who claimed to have found her. “Not sure why she was in the woods, but all that matters is that she’s okay now. Maybe she just wandered and got lost?”

Wandering and lost. Those were apt descriptors for how she had looked that night she had stumbled into him. She was haunted then, small and shuddering in the glaring moonlight.

Jade dislikes not knowing, dislikes being kept in the dark.

He barely bats an eyelash until he comes to the final envelope. It doesn’t look like the others, with their formal business addresses and postage. Pitch black, with golden embellishes.

His name is written on it.

In handwriting that makes his heart stop.

“... What is this?”

He tears it open at once, retrieving the letter inside.

Jade,

I realize receiving this may be awkward, given our history. However, I still hope it finds you well.

Lately, I’ve been reflecting about many things. Our time together, our relationship... and also about myself and what it is that I’m seeking.

I haven’t been very brave or honest. I think I can admit that now, though it doesn’t leave me feeling good. It’s like when a baby bird first hatches from its egg. It can’t quite see the world clearly, and nor does it have feathers to shield its vulnerable body from the forces of nature.

I have something important to tell you. Too important to scrawl on paper. It must be said face-to-face.

The apple tree in the courtyard is in bloom. It’s so very beautiful this time of year. I wish I could stare at them forever and ever. In the language of flowers, apple blossoms can mean many things. Love, peace, rebirth, good luck... a long life too.

Let’s meet there, in the shade of the apple tree and under the cover of stars.

Tomorrow, right before the stroke of midnight.

I will give you my answer then.

Best regards,

Raven Crowley

Life at Night Raven College continues.

A single cog it may lack, but the mechanism continues to churn. There is a spot in the core that is empty, where the missing cog belongs. Still, the machine operates without its heart.

Another day comes and goes.

And in the highest room of the tallest tower...

Something goes bump in the dark.

Someone stirs.

[philtstone]

24. Showing up injured at their friend/mentor’s house: for shawn? :)

[emerges from writing this fic bloody and beaten and on the verge of collapse] ill explore karen vicks character in an overly complicated post-episode missing scene fic or die trying! set immediately post "right turn or left for dead". i genuinely dont know if im happy with this but i also cant figure out how to fix it. actually, it would have probably been easier to write if i was willing to rewatch the episodes its based on. which i am not, because i am a sensitive little soul. so i winged it. i think there are like 10 different ideas that crop up and theyre all equally fascinating as character threads but i have no idea if i tied them together in an even remotely coherent way. also, WOULD she say that??? i had to call my brother twice to ask. this is what yall get for sending me actually interesting prompts, huh

“Oh, it’s no problem,” Henry’s voice said on the phone. “I’ll send Shawn over with them on his way out. He's going in your direction, anyway.”

In her short tenure as the junior detective to Henry Spencer’s lieutenant, Karen Vick observed two things:

First, that he was a far more clever strategist than most people gave him credit for. Despite the ongoing wreckage of his impending divorce and a kid who was slipping through his fingers as everyone looked on, Karen didn’t agree with the other junior detectives’ impression of him as a smash-the-door-down old school hard ass with thinning hair and a worst attitude. The man played four dimensional chess right out of a bonafide Star Trek episode. When he really wanted something done, Henry Spencer could bullshit and bluff and battle plan with the pros, and half the time you’d get too caught up in the blustering misdirect to realize his game was intricately thought out three steps in advance.

It was how they caught the Shorttown Killer, and also how they got that idiot Trembley at the mayor’s office to finally replace their coffee maker. Karen went home to her then-boyfriend, now-husband, and, right before bed, pulled out an old school workbook and took notes.

The second thing was that Henry Spencer loved his son. 

Not a lot has changed since then, Karen thinks, staring down the weirdness that she now faces through her open front door.

“… Oh — Mr. Spencer,” Karen says, because it’s rude not to greet your employees when they show up at your home outside of work hours, and are also your old friend-slash-colleague’s kid. “Hello. Thanks for — bringing these over.”

“Dad said it was urgent,” Shawn says.

Urgent isn’t quite how Karen would describe it, but hearing through the grapevine that your department might be facing an audit sometime in the next quarter does light a fire under the proverbial ass. Karen would rather bend a few rules and make sure the last year’s i’s and t’s are dotted and crossed right than leave her detectives vulnerable to the whims of a mayoral stooge. 

In general, Karen prides herself on caring about the people under her command just enough that it inspires genuine friendship and loyalty. The just is important. Care needs tempering – it’s important to pull back, press pause, keep certain lines uncrossed. It’s especially important if you want to be successful as a woman in an authority position where lives are often on the line. 

What she’s saying is that she tries to make it none of her business what her employees get up to in their spare time. She really genuinely does. She’s shut O’Hara down gently midway through the twelfth sweetly-frazzled attempt to overshare about her dating life (or her efforts to befriend her next-door neighbor, or the endearing personality quirks of her last cat – rest in peace, Triscuit, you will be missed –) enough times to be well-versed in the art of I Won’t Ask, You Won’t Tell, But You’ll Probably Know I Care Anyway.

An invaluable rapport to maintain. In any situation, Karen thinks, but especially when you’re a person who regularly hires and works alongside Shawn Spencer.

She’s not sure whether what she’s looking at right now makes her want to second guess or double down on her usual policy. 

“Special delivery,” Shawn adds, like everything is super normal.

Karen narrows her eyes. She glances behind them into the quiet residential street.

“Shawn,” she says.

“Yes, Chief?”

“You didn’t drive here, did you?”

“Ha,” he says, half rolling his eyes to accompany a weird aborted grin. “No. Even I don’t think riding a motorcycle with a concussion is a good idea. What if someone who wasn’t me got hurt? That’s — that would be no good, then you’d have to arrest me. Wouldn’t that be a huge bummer for the whole team, Chief? Gus would cry. And my dad wouldn’t let me take his truck.”

Karen stares at him. Shawn stares at the ground.

“I got a cab,” he says.

“And you are … taking another cab – home?”

Shawn looks quite suddenly like he’s going to be sick.

“Sure,” he says. 

Shawn looks terrible. Bruised face, bags under his eyes, and a weird frenetic energy twitching in his limbs that doesn’t pair well with his general air of exhaustion. He’s holding his shoulders stiffly and can barely meet her eye. His t-shirt and sweatpants are rumpled, like he slept in them, even though it’s too early in the evening for Henry to have woken him up to send him here, and when he thrusts the promised files out into the air toward her, abrupt and, admittedly, Shawn-like, he only just hides the awkward wince that immediately overtakes his left side.

The last couple days have been a bit of a whirlwind, so Karen can’t say she necessarily blames herself for not looking more closely. 

Even so.

Slowly, Karen reaches forward and divests him of the case files. They slip a little bit, because Karen can’t seem to stop peering shrewdly at Shawn’s face while she does it, and on instinct he reaches forward to stop the stack from toppling. 

It does help, but the autopilot he moves on makes it harder to mask what is to Karen’s eyes a very obvious flinch. 

“Alright,” is all he says. “Well, good to see you. Time to head back to the old hay stack.”

Like a needle in a haystack and time to hit the hay, Karen supplies needlessly in her own head. Aloud, she says, in many ways against her better judgment, 

“Mr. Spencer, are you okay?”

Shawn sways on the spot for a second, one fist clenched, mouth half open. For a strange moment, Karen gets the impression that he’s trying really hard not to say the wrong thing.

“... As rain,” he finally manages, then nods to himself like he achieved some great feat. “Okay. Well –”

“Did something happen to your shoulder?” 

“What? No!” Shawn’s eyes flutter closed and he shakes his head, “I’m – fine, Chief. It’s not – I mean, I’m – normal, fine. Fine in a normal way.”

“That’s not something an individual who’s fine in a normal way would say,” Karen says. 

“Uh, is it not! It is. I would know, because I am that individual. It’s – I was – there’s just mild – pfft … stab wound – or something, who would even …”

Is Shawn broken? is the unhelpful thought that pops into Karen’s head. She’s never heard an attempt to bullshit collapse so quickly into pathetic nothingness before – certainly not from Shawn.

Perhaps even more than his father, the kid’s a pro.

And then the rest of the sentence catches up with her.

“A mild stab wound?”

Oh boy. She watches Shawn’s eyes widen with the panic that proceeds an unquestionable blunder.

“Chief –” 

“In.”

“Chief, I really, really don’t think –”

“Inside my house. Now.”

He’s certainly uncoordinated enough that he doesn’t put up much of a fight. Karen herds him  through the door as firmly as possible and leads them in a beeline past Richard’s office toward the bathroom, ignoring the reedy stream of consciousness that spills out of Shawn’s mouth as they go.

“Oh, hey, woah, it’s been like forever since I was in here. Did you redecorate? I swear that lamp wasn’t there the last time we visited. It could be the tacos I had earlier, but I’m sensing a distinct neo-modern Chinese aesthetic going on here, Chief, which calls to mind the merits of cultural appreciation in suburban home decor – hey, is that your husband’s office? Can I meet him? Is he home? That man is a true enigma to us, Chief, and it’s leading me to believe that he must possess all the facial and personality qualities of the pop superstar Mr. Pitbull Worldwide –”

Richard is home, actually, and Karen needs to alert him to the fact that they have an unexpected house guest, so, ignoring Shawn completely, she calls out,

“Honey? Shawn Spencer’s here for a couple minutes about a work thing! I’ll go up to put Iris to bed in a second!” in the finely-honed There Are Many Layers Of Complicated To This secret married tone that Richard should probably be able to catch through the closed office door. 

“Alright,” floats out her husband’s pleasant voice. “Tell him hi from me.”

Perfect. There’s about a ninety-three percent chance he understood.

They make it to the bathroom, only stumbling slightly. Shawn says,

“-- or The Rock. Does your husband look like Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson? I really think that would make so many things about the Chief Vick family make sense –”

Karen closes the bathroom door with a snap and crosses her arms.

“Sit,” she says, in a voice that even he knows brooks no argument.

Shawn does. He looks – well, beyond uncomfortable, and more than a little bit miserable, and probably closer to completely dissociating than either of them are prepared for. Karen wonders belatedly if he's gotten any sleep at all in the last forty-eight hours.

“I’m assuming you have not been to the hospital.”

He gives her a baleful look, like he really expected better of her. She only just stops herself from rolling her eyes in response. And there’s that huge goose egg on his forehead, too. What, exactly, he got up to in between Carlton’s wedding reception and oh-eight-hundred hours this morning Karen has no idea, but he looks like someone’s run him through the world’s most aggressive industrial tumble dry cycle and spat him mercilessly back out. 

Or maybe over with a truck.

Sending a silent prayer to the universe that Iris never hit puberty and remains a sweet-tempered six-year-old forever, Karen gets to business.

“Well, I had to at least ask. Shawn. Does it need stitches?” He mumbles the answer the first time, and then looks beyond startled when she grabs him under the chin so he’ll look her in the eye. “Listen. I won’t make you do anything you don’t want to do. But you’re going to tell me the truth. Got it?”

Shawn grimaces so hard at her words it’s almost a flinch. 

“No,” he says finally, clearly enough that she hears him. Karen raises an eyebrow. “No, I don’t think it needs stitches,” he articulates, but doesn’t meet her eye.

“Hm. Alright. I have gauze and tape in the medicine cabinet. Can I … is it alright if I pull up the sleeve of your t-shirt?”

Released from her hold, he groans and presses his face into one palm. “Chief –”

“I don’t really know what you expected, coming here! It’s not like I’m any less of a hardass than your father.”

“Yeah, but I can bitch back at my dad,” Shawn says, sounding like he’s finally realizing the magnitude of his mistake. Karen smiles grimly.

“Tough. Now pull your shirt up while I get the first aid kit.”

While Shawn proceeds to wrestle awkwardly with his t-shirt in a muted shuffle against the toilet seat, Karen rummages efficiently through the cabinet and eyes him through the bathroom mirror. He seems oddly reluctant to expose himself. In fact, in a stark contrast to his usual insistence on making his presence and contributions as obtrusively obvious as possible, Shawn seems intent on shrinking into the aforementioned Asian-flavored floral wallpaper (which does need an update, unfortunately) with all the equanimity of an anxious chameleon. Karen feels her eyebrows crease. Taking the first aid kit in hand, she brings it over and deposits it into his arms, ignoring his small startle.

“How about you hold that,” Karen says. Shawn does, against his chest, like a pillow. She walks around him and surveys the damage, antiseptic gauze in hand.

He wasn’t lying about the severity, at least. It’s a shallow thing, already mostly congealed, and has only stained his shirt in a small smattering spot of crusty brown blood.

Karen swabs at it with the alcohol using light careful fingers.

“Ow, ow ow ah –”

“Don’t be such a baby. It’s hardly a life-threatening injury.”

“Super insightful, Chief,” Shawn snaps, as genuinely sarcastic as he’s probably ever been with her, “never thought of that myself. Totally the reason why I just had to go to the hospital.”

He doesn’t pull away, but she can feel the tension radiating through his back. She blinks, one eyebrow crawling up her forehead. 

Alright then. So that’s how it’s going to be. 

“I’m assuming your father doesn’t know about this,” she says.

Shawn grunts, noncommittal. Huh. Maybe he does know, then, and has just been disallowed from doing anything about it right now.

She tosses the first used antiseptic wipe into the trash.

Goddamn four dimensional chess.

She supposes she’s never been bad at the game. She may as well work her way backwards through the moves: Guster, the most obvious node in Shawn’s turn-to-in-a-crisis-system, would never voluntarily abandon his friend in a time of need, so Karen assumes that whatever this is has either already included his support or not been made known to Gus at all yet. Henry’s likely exhausted his own usefulness in the situation, and Detective O’Hara is …

Karen has to work very hard for her hands not to pause in a way that gives away her hard-earned mental sleuthing. A bad feeling wholly unrelated to her ill-advised hangover of the day before begins to bloom at the back of her gut.

“You have really small hands, Chief.”

Shawn’s voice is notably more subdued than before.

“Do I?” 

“They’re like … little kangaroo hands. Like the mom kangaroo from Whinnie the Pooh.”

“Didn’t you know?” Karen says, not unkindly. “They’re given out at the hospital when all first-time moms leave with their baby.”

He lets out a tired little laugh, more boyish than he probably means it to be, and in spite of herself Karen feels her heart clench. She isn’t blind. In all her last seven years as the leader of their chaotic little precinct, she has never seen Juliet O’Hara look as ill as she did yesterday morning. The usually sweet-faced young woman had all the pallor of a Victorian ghost, and stood so far away from Shawn in any given room that to an unassuming observer he might have had the plague.

There are only a handful of things, Karen thinks, that could have invited that particular evolution in their dynamic. She rips the surgical tape from its canister a little bit more harshly than is strictly necessary and fights the urge to pinch the bridge of her nose between her fingers.

“So,” she says conversationally, laying the tape down in neat, gentle little strips, trying not to pinch the wound too tightly. “Any fun plans for the evening?”

Shawn sniffs. She can see him gripping his hands together over his knee from where she stands above him.

“Um, yeah, uh –” he clears his throat, “you know me, Chief. We’re working our way through a Robert Guillame marathon, which means some good old fashioned Benson, running commentary on the quality of that child acting, naturally.”

“Naturally.” 

“Then Gus and I were gonna hit up the new, the new chili cheese joint up by Hermosa, you know – they’re doing sliders –”

“Chili cheese sliders?” Karen hums, contemplative.

“Buy ‘em by the pound,” Shawn agrees. “Then I was thinking of getting a tattoo, maybe a belly button piercing, I’ve been really – really needing a change – would you let Iris get one, if she asked?”

“A tattoo?” Karen clarifies, cutting off the next piece of tape. The skin around the cut is warm to her touch but Shawn’s arms have goosepimpled. The hair at the back of his head sticks up unstyled, like he slept weirdly and couldn’t be bothered to fix it come morning.

“Of a marmoset. That’s what I’m thinking. With distinctly effeminate vibes.”

“Well, Dick hates marmosets. So I’d probably encourage her toward something else. Perhaps a sea lion.”

“Like Shabby.” The nervous note has bled into his legs again, and his earlier subdued tone has gone back to sounding strained. “Yeah, that’ll – that could be it.”

“All in one night, huh?” Karen says.

“I –” Shawn doesn’t even hiss when she presses down with a cotton gauze to cover the last of the thickened blood. His legs are properly jittering again. “I was – yeah, y-you know me, Chief, total night owl.”

“Shawn?”

“Yeah?”

“What about going home?”

Silence. Shawn doesn’t answer for a moment long and pregnant enough that Karen wonders if her question will be ignored entirely. 

Then,

“Chief,” he says finally, in an awful, tiny little voice, “I really, really fucked up.”

Finally, her hands do falter in their ministrations; as emotionally exuberant as Shawn often is, she doesn’t think she’s ever actually heard him close to tears. For a horrible moment she wonders if Shawn Spencer will suddenly start crying atop her toilet seat for reasons neither of them are capable of discussing honestly. Then she wonders if her horror makes her a terrible boss.

Boss – mother – person.

Oh, dear.

She sets down the surgical tape and lays a ginger palm over the newly-bandaged gouge in his shoulder. It’ll probably scar, but not at all badly. She doesn’t like to think about the far more obvious one just below, puckering in a violent yet unassuming divot. Another narrow miss for Henry’s boy. 

At this point there are so many of them to count, Karen has to question the statistical likelihood of the whole thing. Becoming a mathematical anomaly is, Karen can attest with confidence, not exactly the future the Lieutenant Spencer she knew dreamed of for his increasingly unmanageable teenager. 

Doing what he loved, on the other hand – absolutely. Being with a person he loved, even more so. Karen grits her teeth at the irritating web she’s spent the last six years constructing around herself and wonders if this evening right here is some kind of cosmic karma for leaving Iris in the care of nannies for the first three years of her life.

That sounds like the kind of thing those horrible parenting magazines and Karen’s mother-in-law would claim, anyway.

“Shawn,” she says slowly, because she has to at least knock this possibility off the list before risking her career in an attempt to mediate her detectives’ love lives, “did you … you weren’t – unfaithful, were you?”

“What?!” 

Shawn yanks his shoulder away and whirls around to face her with such a look of horrified betrayal on his face that it’s almost comical. 

“No!” 

Thank fucking God, Karen thinks. Aloud, she says,

“Well, I’m sorry, I had to at least ask!”

“No! No! What the hell, Chief!”

“Oh would you be quiet! I’m gathering my evidence here!”

“How could I – I would never – you’d even think that I could –”

“I know! Shawn, for God’s sake –” He’s scrambled to his feet in the cramped bathroom space, glaring, and has probably messed up all that surgical tape in the process. The half open first aid kit and his crumpled shirt press lopsided against his front and her garbage can is now full of oxidizing bits of cotton. Karen officially gives in to the urge to press her palms against her forehead. “I had to ask!” she repeats finally. “You and I both know you’re not gonna give me much else to work with, and you sounded so – so sad!” 

Shawn barks out a hysterical little laugh. Karen almost growls in frustration. 

“I am not going to risk all the very hard-earned rules I have in place without knowing for sure that my instincts aren’t wrong. Is that so hard to appreciate?”

Does it count as sound police work when the framework for your investigation is an unacknowledged lie? Karen doesn’t really know. Probably there’s another math metaphor to be made in there (you screwed your proof from the very beginning, maybe, Richard the professor would definitely have thoughts), or just a straight up joke. How to solve a case that’s cold before it ever has the chance to go live; a cover-up if she ever saw one. Unlikely that O’Hara will peep a word, and things will be a true mess for a few weeks, if she can’t make an educated guess about it. And no one will be explaining anything to Carlton, either …

Right before their goddamn audit, Karen thinks, aggrieved. She wonders if Henry considered this in his calculus. Send Shawn over, have her deal with him. Offer a huge unspoken you’re gonna be walking into a shitstorm tomorrow canary for her perennially chaotic mess of a coal mine. 

She can’t help but feel begrudgingly grateful, but that doesn’t mean she and he won’t be having words about this later.   

“Jesus, Karen,” Shawn mutters, pressing his face back into his free hand. Karen shakes her head and squares her shoulders.

“Well then! Back to the issue. You fucked up.”

“You know what? I can’t talk about this with you.”

“Oh, Mr. Spencer, I assure you I am more than well aware.”

Shawn blinks at her between his fingers, looking genuinely confused for the first time since he showed up at her door. 

Karen does not bother to clear up his confusion; it’s better this way, anyhow.

“Will you be sleeping at Gus’s place or your father’s?” she asks, crossing her arms.

“I’m – I don’t –” Shawn doesn’t meet her eye. The earlier thread of anxiety is back. “I wasn’t …”

So, neither. 

“Put your shirt back on,” she says. “We’re relocating to the living room.”

“Chief –”

“That was an order, Mr. Spencer.”

The living room is as quiet and mundane as it was an hour ago. It’s past Iris’s bedtime – she’ll have to go up, and soon at that. Karen seats her guest, retrieves a mug and a bag of chamomile from the kitchen, and removes the fluffy throw blanket from the basket behind the couch on her way back in. He’s deflated completely by the time the tea and blanket are set in front of him. Small and exhausted. Caught. It’s a horrible way to think about it. But she can’t avoid the hundred yard stare – Karen has seen it one too many times in people only just realizing they’re about to go away for life.

“Shawn,” she says, firm as she can make it. “Drink the tea. You’re dehydrated.”

“I’m … what?”

“Your lips are dry. You shouldn’t be dehydrated with a concussion.”

He doesn’t say anything for a minute, and Karen suddenly wonders if he’s going to get up and leave. She has experience with these things – she knows a runner when she sees one.

“I might as well have,” Shawn finally whispers.

She doesn’t catch it the first time. “What?”

“I – I might as well ha – Chief, I …” Deep shuddering breaths. He’s finally shutting down, she realizes. She can’t send him back out like this; Henry would give her the stink eye for a month.

Goddamn Spencers and their goddamn irritating overcomplicated lives.

Karen pushes the tea directly into his hands and tilts her chin so she can meet Shawn’s eye. He’s still lucid enough that she doesn’t think he’ll start hyperventilating, but now that the outrage and adrenaline has worn off, the symptoms of shock are pretty hard to miss. “Shawn,” she says again, and wills for him to understand.

“What if she – what if I never –” He can’t get the full sentence out. He looks at her, eyes wide and terrified.

Life sentence, Karen thinks again. The messy stack of files Shawn brought over sits almost unimportantly on the coffee table between them and a memory comes to her, unbidden, of words penned carefully in the corner of a modified police report that she pulled the minute the door closed on the McCallum case seven years ago. 

Date: May 4th, 1995. Reporting Officer, Spencer, Lt. H. Perpetrator a caucasian male, brown hair, five foot nine, insists on wearing those stupid earrings just to spite me. What the hell do you want me to write here, Chief? Spent two hours in the fucking principal’s office convincing them not to expel him one month off from graduation. All that effort, and I still booked the kid. It’s gonna follow him for life, and it’s gonna be me that did it to him. For life. You think he’ll ever forgive me? He’s the greatest thing in my pathetic little world and he keeps breaking my heart, and I can’t even properly accept that it’s my fault. 

How’s that for a fucking crime.

She needs to go put her daughter to bed. It’s the thought that keeps running through her head, oddly enough, like a strange antidote to the impotent anger and heartbreak and frustration she’s feeling for the people under her care.

With all the notes she took in that little workbook, she still let herself become complicit in the painstaking, convoluted resolution of Henry’s mistakes without accounting for all the variables.  

Richard’s footsteps sound muffled in the next room; he’s made his way upstairs in Karen’s absence. She needs to go. She wants to hear the soft and sleepy love you Mama that with her unpredictable hours and regular long nights isn’t nearly routine enough.

“Shawn,” she says evenly. “Do you love her?”

It’s hard to reconcile the smarmy kid who tried to barter with her for twelve hundred a day with the devastated young man sitting on the couch in front of her.

“Chief …” he starts, barely above a whisper.

“Good. Then she’ll see that. Detective O’Hara is a smart and observant woman. What she chooses to do next is her decision, but … you might be – well, comforted by the fact that she’ll know that – truth.”

Shawn stares at her. The tea steams in front of him, cooling in increments. She takes a deep breath and gets to her feet, patting his uninjured shoulder brusquely. 

“I have to go check on Iris. When I come back down, I can drive you to the Psych office.”

Iris is fast asleep when she gets there. A library book lays open face down over her stomach, and her soft brown hair fans out against the pillow, silhouetted by the soft glow of the unicorn nightlight in the wall above her. Karen turns off the bedside lamp, tucks her daughter in, and kisses her forehead. Just before she leaves, she hears it: murmured, half-awake.

“Love you, Mama.”

“I love you too, baby.”

Karen goes back to her living room, car keys in hand. She’s planned her next move in the driver’s seat enough times throughout her career that it shouldn’t be too hard. 

[soaringthroughthegalaxy]

Prompt: someone is mean to wrecker and the rest of the batch either chooses violence or chooses to comfort wrecker

Hello there!

I saw this as an opportunity to write about the Batch as cadets, and I RAN with it. Though I broke my own heart having to write a few mean things about Wrecker 😭 They’re sweet babies, and I want to give them the galaxy 🥹

No reader in this, just the boys. Hope it's okay!

Art by @alligatorpie1945 - go check out her awesome art! I kept her 'Through the Ages' series on my screen while writing to help get me in the headspace. All her art is gorgeous!

Brotherly Bonds

The holonet can be a wonderful yet vicious place. When Wrecker’s feelings are hurt, and he questions his place in the squad, his brothers rally together to fix it and comfort him.

Word count: 2.5k

Warnings: Bit of whump, Wrecker being cyber-bullied by a Reg, caring brothers, protective brothers, bully gets called out, conflict is resolved, comfort and reassurance, happy ending.

The light of his datapad casts a blue glow over his face as he reads. It’s late, their barracks dimly lit by the moonlight, but Wrecker can’t sleep. His eyes trace the words repeatedly. Slow. Clumsy. Idiot. Each one feels like a vibroknife between his ribs.

It started a few days ago after a training drill with his brothers and a handful of Regs, who had seen him struggling with hand signals and tripping over his feet. It wasn’t his fault he was bigger than everyone else and that hand signals all looked similar to him from a distance. He’d been made this way. He was trying his best with what he’d been given. One day, he’d grow into his size and understand the signals. He was sure of it.

Wrecker sighs softly, turning onto his side to face the wall of his bunk. He pulls Lula closer, tucking her under his chin as he continues to read. He knows he should stop, that he’s only making himself feel worse by continuing, but he wants to know what everyone’s thinking and doesn’t want to walk into the mess hall tomorrow and be caught off guard.

The mean comments continue in the thread posted to the cadet chat boards. He and his brothers frequently ignore them, not caring for gossip, but Wrecker had heard things whispered under a Reg’s breath at mealtime – a Reg who hadn’t been part of their earlier drill. Other than hearing it through the grapevine, the boards would be the only other place.

Wrecker’s fingers tighten around the edges of his datapad, the cold metal digging into his palms. He takes a deep breath, trying to shake off the hurtful words. Despite his tough exterior, the comments on the chat boards have chipped away at his confidence. The camaraderie he shares with his brothers shields him from most insults, but the online world has found a crack in his armour.

As he scrolls through the thread, Wrecker can’t help but notice the lack of empathy in the words of his fellow cadets. The faceless avatars behind the comments don’t understand his challenges, trying to fit in a world where he doesn’t – metaphorically and literally. He wonders if they’d say the same things to his face or if the anonymity of the virtual space emboldens them.

Lula provides some comfort amid his turmoil, a reminder that his brothers care and love him, the stuffed tooka being a present from them. He squeezes her a little tighter as he contemplates shutting down the datapad, shutting out the negativity, but a stubborn curiosity keeps him scrolling. It’s as if he’s searching for that one comment that might offer understanding or support, even though he knows the likelihood is slim.

Wrecker’s brow furrows as he reads a particularly cutting comment. ‘Idiot can’t even understand signals. How'd he even make it out the tube? The rest of them are carrying him.’ The words sting, and Wrecker feels a surge of anger, but beneath it lies a more profound, more insidious emotion—doubt.

He glances at the sleeping forms of his brothers in the dimly lit barracks. They trust and depend on him, yet the doubts the Regs have planted in his mind start to take root. Wrecker wonders if he’s genuinely holding the team back. Maybe his brothers would be better off without him in the squad, with someone more agile and quick-witted in his place.

Lula’s stitched eyes seem to gaze at him with understanding, and Wrecker can almost hear Tech’s voice in his head, rattling off statistics and probabilities to prove that their team is more robust with him in it. But those voices are drowned out by the relentless comments scrolling on his datapad.

In the solitude of the night, Wrecker quietly shuts off his datapad and gets up, careful not to wake his brothers. He steps outside into the bright corridor and starts walking, going until he reaches one of the many bridges connecting different parts of Tipoca City. It’s cool out, but the earlier stormy weather has passed.

Leaning against the railing, Wrecker looks up at the stars. The vastness of the galaxy puts his problems into perspective. But the doubts linger. As he contemplates his place in the squad, he wonders if he should ask to be transferred. He doesn’t want to be the weak link, not when his brother’s lives are on the line.

A voice startles him. “Hey, Wreck, having trouble sleeping?” It’s Hunter, concern etched on his face as he reaches him, standing at his side at the railing.

Wrecker tries to shrug off the unease. “Nah, just needin’ some air.” He slaps on a grin. “Was hopin’ to see that big ol’ creature they say lives out here.” His gut rolls with the lie as he gestures to the choppy sea surrounding them, not wanting Hunter to worry. Although they were still cadets, he knew his older brother was already carrying a heavy weight, and he was being primed to lead them once they were old enough to fight.

Hunter studies Wrecker for a moment, his sharp senses missing very little. He sees beyond the forced grin and recognizes the turmoil in Wrecker’s eyes. Without saying a word, Hunter leans on the railing beside him. “Yeah, I heard about that creature too.” He says with a faint smile as he plays into his brother’s lie. “But I think it’s just a story to keep cadets like us from wandering too far.” He adds on. Silence lingers for a second before he speaks up again. “You doing okay, Wreck? You seem a bit off tonight.”

Wrecker hesitates, then sighs, the weight of the words on the datapad still lingering in his mind. “Just... things people are saying. About me. On those chat boards.”

Hunter’s expression tightens as he glances at Wrecker. “You shouldn’t let those get to you. People don’t know what it’s like for us.”

Wrecker nods, but the doubt remains evident in his eyes. “I know, but sometimes I wonder if they’re right. If I’m really holding the squad back.”

Hunter turns fully towards Wrecker, his gaze unwavering. “Wrecker, you’re an essential part of this squad. Don’t let some unfounded comments make you question that. We’re not just soldiers; we’re brothers. And brothers stick together. You’re not holding us back; you’re lifting us up with your strength, both in training and out of it.” His tone leaves no room for doubt.

Wrecker looks at Hunter, a mix of gratitude and uncertainty in his eyes. “You really think so?”

Hunter reaches out, placing a hand on Wrecker’s shoulder. “I know so. Who else could toss droids across the room like you do? Who else could diffuse a bomb so quickly without breaking into a sweat? We need your strength and steady hands, Wrecker, and more importantly, we need you. We wouldn’t be the Bad Batch without you.”

Wrecker’s tense shoulders gradually relax under Hunter’s reassuring touch. The doubt in his eyes begins to fade. He takes a deep breath, absorbing Hunter’s words.

“Thanks, Hunter. I appreciate it.” Wrecker says, a genuine smile breaking through his earlier turmoil.

Hunter nods, squeezing Wrecker’s shoulder before letting go. “Anytime, vod. Remember, the opinions of others don’t define you. We know your worth, and that’s what matters.”

Hunter’s words gradually sink in, pushing back against the doubts that had taken root in Wrecker’s mind. As they head back to the barracks together, Wrecker can’t help but feel grateful for the unwavering support.

The following day, as Wrecker takes his turn in the fresher, Hunter slips across to Tech’s bunk, gesturing with a hand for Crosshair to join them. The three boys gather, and Hunter shares what happened last night. Before he’s finished the story, Tech reaches for his datapad and other equipment strewn around his bunk area, fingers flying over the screen as he starts to pinpoint who started the thread and the names of every cadet who’d commented.

Crosshair’s expression darkens as he listens, his hawkish eyes narrowing on the information on Tech’s datapad. “We’re going to have a little chat with this individual.” He hisses, anger curling through his body that Regs were daring to pick on his brother. None of them deserved to be tormented, especially not Wrecker – he was the softest.

Tech nods in agreement, his fingers working efficiently on the datapad. “I’ve already gathered enough evidence to expose them.”

The day progresses as usual for the squad, with their training and drills occupying most of their time. Though still carrying the weight of the hurtful comments, Wrecker finds solace in his brothers’ unwavering support. Hunter keeps a watchful eye on him, and Tech and Crosshair discreetly work on their plan to confront the Reg who had started the thread.

As night approaches, the boys gather in their barracks after dinner. The atmosphere is tense, a mix of anticipation and determination. Wrecker can sense something is brewing, but his brothers maintain their usual poker faces. He decides not to pry, trusting in their brotherly bond.

They settle in for bed, comfortable in their bunks. Hunter, Tech, and Crosshair wait until they hear the familiar sounds of Wrecker’s light snores before they move, pushing back the flimsy sheets to put their plan into action.

The trio slip out of their bunks with practised stealth, moving like shadows through the dimly lit room. As they exit the room, the hallways of Tipoca City are eerily silent at this hour. Tech guides them towards the quarters of the cadet responsible for starting the thread.

They arrive at the designated quarters, one of many identical doors in the sterile corridor. Hunter knocks firmly, and a moment later, the door slides open to reveal a surprised cadet dressed for sleep.

“Hell do you want?” the cadet asks, eyeing the trio suspiciously.

Without a word, Crosshair steps forward, scowl firmly in place, making the cadet uncomfortable. Tech, meanwhile, holds up his datapad, displaying the evidence of the derogatory comments. Hunter’s gaze is stern.

“Axel, right? We need to talk.” Hunter says calmly, but there’s an undeniable edge to his voice.

Axel stammers, realizing the gravity of the situation. The brothers are not here for idle chit-chat. The door to the next room opens slightly, curious faces peeking out to see the commotion.

“Your comments about Wrecker end now.” Crosshair declares, his tone cold and uncompromising. “And we’re making sure everyone knows the consequences of targeting one of our own.”

Tech steps forward, his datapad at the ready. “We have evidence of every comment you made and the names of those who joined in. You can either stop this now and publicly apologize, or we can take this to General Ti and let her handle it.”

Axel, now visibly nervous, stumbles over his words. “I... I didn’t think it would get this serious. It was just banter, y’know?”

Hunter narrows his eyes. “Banter or not, it stops. Now.”

Axel nods quickly, realizing he’s caught in a situation he hadn’t anticipated. “Okay, okay. I’ll delete the comments, and I’ll apologize. Just... don’t involve General Ti, please.”

Crosshair leans in, his eyes piercing. “You mess with one of us; you mess with all of us. Remember that.”

The trio leaves Axel’s quarters, their message delivered. As they walk back to their own barracks, Tech speaks up. “I’ve ensured that the evidence is backed up in multiple locations. If they try anything again, we have leverage.”

Hunter nods in approval. “Good. Hopefully, this won’t happen again. We’re a team, and we protect our own.”

The three brothers slip back into their bunks in their barracks with the same practised stealth. Wrecker stirs slightly, arms tightening around Lula, but he remains blissfully unaware of the nocturnal mission his brothers had just undertaken on his behalf.

In the morning, as Wrecker and his brothers assemble for training drills again with the Regs, there’s a noticeable shift in the air. Although he’s still feeling a lingering sting from the chat boards, Wrecker picks up on the change. Only when they pause for a break, and he’s approached, does he start to piece together bits of the puzzle.

Axel approaches Wrecker with a hesitant expression. His eyes avoid direct contact, and there’s a nervous shuffle in his stance. The other cadets nearby glance between them, sensing that something is about to unfold.

“Wrecker.” Axel begins, his voice a mixture of discomfort and reluctance. “I... I wanted to apologize. I started the chat board thread, and what I said was out of line. I didn’t realize how much it would affect you. It was just stupid banter, and I didn’t think about the consequences.”

Wrecker looks at Axel with a mixture of surprise and scepticism. He wasn’t expecting an apology, and part of him wondered if this was just another act. Hunter, Tech, and Crosshair watch from a distance, ready to step in if needed.

Axel continues. “I deleted the comments, and I’m sorry for any hurt I caused. I’ll make sure it doesn’t happen again.”

Wrecker studies him for a moment, then nods. “Apology accepted.” He says, surprising not just Axel but also himself. Despite the hurtful words, Wrecker knows that people can make mistakes, and perhaps this is an opportunity for growth.

Axel visibly relaxes, a mix of relief and gratitude on his face. The tension in the air began dissipating, and the other cadets exchanged glances, unsure what to make of this unexpected turn of events. Wrecker, however, feels a strange sense of closure, as if a weight has been lifted off his shoulders.

“Thanks.” Axel mumbles, still avoiding direct eye contact.

Wrecker grins, clapping a hand on Axel’s shoulder, being careful not to jostle him. “No hard feelings. Just remember, we’re all in this together.”

Axel nods, and with that, he retreats to his group, who shoot curious glances in Wrecker’s direction. The training drills resume, but the atmosphere has shifted. Wrecker notices a few glances exchanged among the cadets and the odd appreciative smile as he uses his strength to help them, but this time, he holds his head high.

Later that day, as he and his brothers gathered in their barracks, Wrecker couldn’t help but feel a sense of gratitude towards them. They hadn’t said anything, but he knew they’d played a part in Axel’s apology. Hunter, Tech, and Crosshair may not have erased the pain caused by the hurtful comments, but they’ve shown him that he’s not alone. They’ve stood by him, defended him.

As the evening progresses, the solidarity among the brothers remains strong. They fall into their usual cuddle pile, sharing laughter and snacks salvaged from the mess hall, reinforcing their unbreakable bond.

Wrecker reflects on the events of the past few days in the quiet moments before sleep claims them. The weight of doubt and hurt that had burdened his shoulders has been replaced by a newfound resilience. His brothers, the pillars of strength in his life, have reassured him of his worth and taken action to protect him. 

As Wrecker drifts into slumber, he clings to the knowledge that, no matter what challenges they might face, he’s part of a united family. In the moonlit barracks, the Bad Batch rests, stronger than ever, ready to face whatever the galaxy throws their way.

Tag list: @clonethirstingisreal

[thruthe-grapevine]

𝚆𝚎 𝙸𝚗𝚝𝚎𝚛𝚛𝚞𝚙𝚝 𝚃𝚑𝚒𝚜 𝙿𝚛𝚘𝚐𝚛𝚊𝚖...

𝚃𝚘 𝙱𝚛𝚒𝚗𝚐 𝚈𝚘𝚞—

"Oh? Now what do we have here?"

"Looks like I've got quite the audience this time."

A self-indulgent Black Sapphire RP blog has tuned in for the show! But what's this? This Black Sapphire Cookie has a little secret, whatever could it be?

Mod is 18+ and want their RP partners to be of that age or higher.

Other blogs affiliated:

@drowned-in-caffeine

@false-ouroborus

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↓ Listen in on some juicy info before sharing a rumor or two! ↓

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[OOC]: First and foremost, this role play blog is self indulgent and just for fun! Mod is pretty busy but they're always up for interaction :]

[OOC]: This isn't strict to canon Black Sapphire, there's not that much content of him so we're taking creative liberties, so please keep that in mind!

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▀▄▀▄ Intermission ▄▀▄▀

#through the grapevine 🎙 - In Character Posts

#we interrupt this program 📻 - OOC Posts

#show's over 📺 - [????]

#crowdwork 👥 - Tag for Asks

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#picture show 🖼️ - art tag

[dwtpsychward]

isnt it crazy how this wouldve been solved if they dmed her first instead of making her out to be a victim without her word on anything.

What’s also crazy is in that screenshot she says “I dmed clingyhq to tell them that nothing inappropriate happened. Because it’s true that nothing inappropriate happened when I was a minor” so clearly Clingy ignored that

i heard through the grapevine that instead of saying she was dmed by her she instead said the police told her to delete the thread after she was allegedly doxxed 🤔 interesting isnt it

[nvrcmplt]

「 HELP 」 : for sender to help receiver undress - for Narciso! Like a present 🎁

Waiting for his attendant, Narciso was smiling upon Nezumi's reflection in his mirror in wonder to their presence in his room again after speaking of never coming here again with their last visitation, but Narciso was in the middle of a fitting. Tailor made suits were his way of life, so to be upon a podium and surrounded with several mirrors as fabrics were pinned together, it was without a doubt a sight for the few. After all, it wasn't like he was properly dressed, down to his underwear in fact under the sheets of materials, but it wasn't too embarrassing since Nezumi's seen it all here.

"Do forgive this one, Nezumi. I do believe he is finished with the fitting, but a matter called him aside to deal on the phone." Narciso wasn't to move too much, habits of being stabbed many times with needles from the mishap and being scolded for bloodying the materials. "Though do speak if you are in no rush, I hear in the grapevine, you are on the lookout for someone?" A beast, monster of a vampire. "If it's about the cockroach that refuses to obey its sire in lying low and bringing clarity to its mind, I believe I who it is you are seeking." Though, as his lashes flutter shut to rest his stare from roaming Nezumi like meat. A habit due to just knowing how beautiful that man was under those layers - he didn't realise that the said hunter was at his back. Releasing him of his garment prison.

Gaze widened at the feeling really - but it was also something more intimate. "Oh." Though he didn't stop Nezumi, he did roll his lips, watching those hands slowly and softly unwrap his arms from sleeves, keeping the pins as still as possible whilst also allowing the Vampire to slither his arms free. To step out of the items when granted that freedom and to promptly look down at Nezumi from his place on the stool. Narciso wasn't a hopeless-romantic, he was a hopeless fool of a romantic, so the very picture being painted here was making his heart flutter, as slow as it was.

Oh, how he was glad that blood was slow in his veins, sluggish to mar his pale flesh with any telling's of blushing or swooning flushes, but his lips did darken. Curving into a smile of a gratitude to hold aside the hope of being swept off his feet and bridal carried to the bed. Instead, he moved to offer Nezumi his hand, mostly to ask for polite aid to step down without making a fool of himself and Narciso wasn't sure the man would help him like that in such a room. Still, as he returned to ground level, he moved to adjust his hair from his crown released from jewel stick to cascade down his back to mid-waist. "Thank you, Nezumi." Free to move now, he returned his attention to his wardrobe, gathering a long blouse to slide over his head and thread his arms through to adjust frills and string.

"May I treat you to a meal? I've made you wait long enough for our conversation." As much as he wanted to flirt, to touch that warm body again - he held himself at bay. He wasn't a predator, not with an unwilling prey. Maybe he may have to feed again - to calm himself down. Nezumi really did make him a little flustered. He felt like a fledgling all over again too. With waist high pants back in place, he buttoned the front and made sure his blouse of tucked in neatly but with some freedom as he turned back to his guest.

"Shall we get to our time, Nezumi?" Now clothed and boots placed on his feet to finish his casual look, he moved to motion the door. "Let's go. I have a wonderful bottle of 1760s Red, I'd love to share with you."

[frostgnawd]

✧ candling: the habit of taking stock of your life on the occasion of your birthday.

Obscure Sorrows

The first birthday he remembers is a simple one.

"My precious flower, blooming even in a storm." His mother's voice is distant now, a faded memory, a tune lost to time. If he lies to himself, he still remembers it, and considering he lies to himself quite often --

"Another year stronger." His father's voice is clearer, for some reason. His laughter, not so tinged with bitterness, or maybe that's wishful thinking. Trying, for him. Their faces are illuminated by candles, but the forms are too blurred for him to make out.

Save for those starry eyes, of course.

Something sweet and fresh, made by hands that loved him, fills his stomach. Something warm and pristine, an ensemble that suited the elegance of a fallen nation, wraps around his shoulders -- the threads that could be scavenged, anyway. He still gets them dirty on accident. He's just a boy, after all. He's still happy like this.

( His father leaves him to his duty the next year. Or is it the year after? )

The first birthday with the Ragnvindr's is much different.

Life on the surface is different. Confusing. The sun rises and sets and the seasons change and the words are not like the ones he knows because the words he knows are his father's and they ring in his ears without reprieve. Except for sometimes, if he lets himself experience Mondstadt -- and he always has had a nasty habit of getting distracted.

( He is 6, and it shouldn't feel like such a sin, but he's a Sinner, too, so what's the difference. )

Diluc distracts him. It's hard not to, not when you shine as bright as he does, not when you want so eager and earnestly to share all that you know that with those around you -- and Kaeya, specifically, always has been a good listener, follower, observer. (Younger brother.) Diluc makes him experience Mondstadt, or at least experience the Manor, and at his age they might as well be the same thing. They clamber over carts and barrels and bother poor Adelinde and Elzer and run through the grapevines without a care in the world.

( He feels like he's betraying his father. )

It's a chilly day when they are trudging under the stakes of the trellis, taking a break from horsing around the dormant vines and wires. There's a crystalfly resting against the grain, wings beating gently, a juxtaposition of life and Anemo's bright teal against the rugged bark of the vine, and Kaeya blinks.

He has been here for.. what, four months now? Five? Late July, early August, it all blends together -- but he's learned about the cycle of their (their, because he's becoming part of this) vineyard in that time. The grapes were still growing when he'd first arrived, nourished by summer sun and rain, and even into autumn, they'd gotten rounder, more plump, red color deepening like the wine they'd eventually produce. Just last month, the last of the vines had been harvested from, and now, they lie in repose against the trellis, preparing to endure Mondstadt's mild winter so they can bloom again in full in spring. More will be planted in December, which is only a few days away.

And that is when it occurs to him.

"I think it's my birthday soon." He says, out of nowhere, and seals his fate.

When Diluc wants something, he does not stop until he gets it; in this case, it means he gets the date of Kaeya's birth (tomorrow, actually, which Kaeya offers very apologetically, because the mood feels quite serious now) as well as the quickly cobbled together party for Kaeya the following morning. A single eye blinks at the cake on the table, as though he hardly comprehends what it's doing there.

Kaeya feels increasingly embarrassed with all the eyes on him in turn, the gifts that are solely his, the well wishes he receives en masse (he doesn't recall ever having so many people sing to him before, and he likes it, even if some are terribly off-key), but he doesn't feel like he wants to shrivel up and disappear, so he must be happy with this outcome.

His glance flickers over to Diluc's face -- he looks so pleased, and the candles shine all the brighter for him, like they know -- and he smiles, too. Yes, he must be happy.

( Is that alright? )

The first birthday when he is on his own again passes by in a blur.

So does the next. And the one after.

The only dates that matter are the days he actually gets a letter back, the days he spends with Klee, and the day that is Jean's own birthday.

He only feels like properly celebrating again when that god-given red gem is out of his possession, finally, and Charles somehow seems relieved that he actually shows up to the tavern that year, day-of.

His birthdays thereafter... well, they've been quite interesting, haven't they? He likes interesting things, and the mysterious traveler from afar, the excitement that dragon provided, the little tiff with the Abyss Order, I mean, how else would you describe it? His birthday comes, and, still riding that high, he celebrates without thinking twice.

But that delight, much like any other source of happiness he keeps, is held carefully by hands that never learned how to keep things safe through kindness (can he learn now, or is it too late?), palms open, because while Kaeya is one to accept gifts, he's not one to expect them to stay.

He's pleased they're still here, though, and when he finds himself clinking glasses with familiar faces in the Angel's Share, even the star in his gaze twinkles.

[sachingja]

@cordoliae / cont. thread

his life has taken stranger turns in the past, odd-ten years or so, from the western prosecution office to the blue house, into the deep darkness that lies in near-death, and back, of course. dongjae is nothing if not resilient, if only for the sake of his own survival, and he is well aware that simok probably cares nothing for it, or for him, if word would have not reached his bedside a few years back. his stoic hoobae, as calm as the shore of the eastern sea on any given day, coming undone with the ferocity of a wave. well, if anything, the idea is flattering, and flattery, dongjae has learned, goes a long way in the circles he moves in, and even further in his own backyard. simok, his knight in shining armor. who would've thought? they do not ever talk about it, they barely talk to begin with, and dongjae only really knows of simok's whereabouts via the grapevine of their shared occupational networks ( and via kang wonchul, who would never admit to keeping tabs on them but does so anyway, with the glee and reluctance of an absentee father; dongjae would know all about that, too. ) but the knowledge comes into handy these days.

the light has left them fast, but dongjae has no illusions — if simok would actually be done already, he would not be here but in his company-issued dorm, instead. he is no-nonsense like that, though dongjae has never seen him do anything of that sort, not since he reluctantly took him under his wing. like that ever worked out well for them, he thinks glumly, resolutely staring ahead. age looks well on the man next to him, but that, too, is unsurprising. simok glides through life with the blissful unawareness of the cool-tempered after all, the complete opposite of dongjae, who can spend hours in front of the mirror. or any reflective surface, really. appearances always mean more to those desperate to prove, or reform themselves in the eye of the public.

it was easy to charm simok's array of office drones and junior prosecutors, but less so the man himself. dongjae, prone to talking a weave of circles around anyone and anything, finds himself at silence. and somewhat at his wit's end, considering everything that has happened. " not that odd, " he mutters under his breath. sure, he has a way of sneaking up on simok, he is aware, but they are friendly after all, right? he would beg, he thinks, light knees and all. that is what you do when you owe someone your one, all-too-precious life. louder, he says, clearing his throat, " so, i am sure you heard of what happened in, uh, cheongju. the investigation," here, he pauses and frowns. the humiliation of it all, most of all, still heavy in his chest. " — and all. they dredged it all up. did they try to contact you? because they implied they might — well, i only wanted to check. " for no purpose other than his peace of mind, dongjae tells himself.

he risks a sideways glance at simok after all, his perfect profile, everything always immaculate, barely trying, unlike dongjae, who had to work for everything, had to claw his way out of obscurity and into the light. do you know how lucky you are, hwang simok? he wants to ask, shake him, trade places in a heartbeat. do you know what i have gone through to even sit here, next to you?

[magicalgirlagency]

wait, byakuya was a highschooler in the mahoaku manga?? I saw in a reddit thread that in the anime she's likely over the age of 20, she appeared to be selling alcohol at her part-time convenience store job in the first scene of the anime (meaning she'd have to be over 20), so it looks like they changed her age in the anime?? hopefully. because if she actually is a teenager, im dropping this thing immediately..

Don't ask me, I've heard it through the grapevine! Assuming from what you've described, that the heroine has a job and everything, she's got to be on her early 20s, so there has been changes to make the story easily digestible (let's not forget the creator passed away in 2014 and it was left incomplete).

I'm up on the fence about it, though. She looks way too young, so I'm not surprised why people would give it the side eye. Let's see how things will unfold during these twelve weeks (meanwhile, it's Mayonaka Punch for me).