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earth-93 · 5 months

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BRIGADE FILES: MIMIC

Stars & Stripes Hotline [Version 1.12]

C: \login\BuddyHolly

C:\Users\mini\BrigadeFiles\Xmen

Directory of C: \BrigadeFiles\Xmen

04/27/2006 9:48 AM Total Files Listed: 15 File(s) 168,248 bytes

Directory of C:\BrigadeFiles\Xmen\RANKIN_CALVIN.txt

[file data =

Main Alias/Moniker: Mimic

Legal Name: Calvin Montgomery Rankin

Other Aliases: Cal

Date of Birth: February, 19th 1987 (Age: 19)

Status: Alive

Species: Human Mutate

Sex: Male

Gender: Cisgender

Height/Weight: 5'10 (1.78m) [Varies] / 173 lbs (78.47kg) [Varies]

Hair/Eye Color: Brown / Brown

Timeline (1987 - 1997): I don't have a personal connection to Calvin. Bobby and Logan have more of a bond with him than I. Still, our lives were intertwined for a brief but critical point. It's this among other reasons that I took it upon myself to draft his file, despite some of the subject matter still creating discomfort for me. For someone who has had so little control over his life, I felt I owed it to him, the closest person who can relate to his experience, to try and put it on record.

According to retrieved medical documents, Calvin inherited a glandular disorder from his mother. A genetic defect that can affect one's heart rate and blood pressure. Calvin's mother was diagnosed with the condition posthumously, as she suffered cardiac arrest shortly after giving birth to him. As a single parent whose child was in need of full-time care, Dr. Rankin was put in a vulnerable spot, one that was eventually exploited by Essex.

I don't know enough about Ronald Rankin to confidently judge his character. Even him taking employment under Essex could stem from financial insecurity, and his disappearance and presumed death could further suggest he eventually objected to Essex's treatment of his son, and was promptly disposed of. The full details will forever be lost, and whatever the circumstances the outcome was that Calvin ended up in the same lower levels of Essex's hospital that I was around that time, conducting the experiments on mutant traits that wouldn't compliment his public persona of "Nathan Millbury."

I've suspected that, through Calvin, Essex sought to refine his "chimera" experiments: The grafting of mutant genes, that he had long ago applied to himself, into a non-mutant body. Rather than splicing specific genes into Calvin, Essex altered his endocrine system to make his body able to absorb and mimic not much mutant traits, but potentially all superhuman traits. If my suspicions were true, them Calvin was nothing but a guinea pig. A trial run of a procedure Essex intended to then apply on himself. Fortunately, his plans never went that far, as Calvin escaped Essex's captivity the same way I did, when the first manifestation of my optic blasts blew a hole in the wall.

Timeline (1997 - 2003): The specifics of Calvin's activity between his escape and his first interactions with us are unclear. I can attest that Essex and his contacts made great efforts to scrub the children he experimented on from public records, so any accomodations Calvin might have fallen into have been difficult to find. It can be inferred that whatever living situation Calvin found himself was brief, and he largely spent this period mobile. Due to his trauma, his glandular condition as well as his newfound powers, Calvin's threshold for stress was considerably low, and as a means of survival his interpersonal skills were boiled down to either manipulation or confrontation. Though his powers more closely qualify him as a Mutate, as this was the peak of mutant-related discourse Calvin came to recognize himself as such. So once the X-Men came into prominence, Calvin developed a fixation on us.

Timeline (2003): Calvin's first encounter with us was through Bobby. He befriended him privately, under the half-truth of being a mutant runaway who looked up to Bobby. Bobby felt alienated with the rest of the team at the time, and was susceptible to Calvin's manipulations. Calvin's intentions were to mimic the entire team's powers, and he very nearly succeeded. The more he tried to absorb, the more taxing and unwieldy it became for him to maintain all of them. What broke Calvin was when he attempted to drain and mimic Jean's powers—specifically, her powers without the mental blocks she still had at that point. Calvin was so clearly in pain, we all dropped our guards and offered to help him, but Calvin instead overpowered us in one last feat and fled.

The powers Calvin absorbed eventually regressed from inactivity, but it nonetheless took a toll on his body. He went on a brief robbing spree, breaking into pharmacies and stealing sedatives to try and numb his pain. Before any of us could track him down, he was first found by Phillip Masters, aka The Puppet Master. Masters used Calvin as a stratagem, threatening his life if we didn't make use of our contacts with the Fantastic Four and give him access into the Baxter Building. Jean and I played along with this, bringing Calvin into the Baxter Building under the pretense of requesting consultation with Dr. Richards, while the Professor and the rest of the team tracked down Masters' psychic signature.

Masters' goal was to acquire an android built by him and an associate that the Fantastic Four was in possession of at the time. We did have to feign being the aggressors for a brief moment, but once the rest of the team tracked down and detained Masters, Calvin's life was no longer under threat and the act could be dropped. Even when Masters attempted to retaliate with the unleashed android, its own mimicry powers were cancelled out once confronted by Calvin, thus ending the threat of the situation completely. Calvin briefly resided at the Mansion with us, where we first got the best sense of his powers.

Though understandably shaken in the aftermath, Calvin appeared responsive enough to nod along to the Professor's offers to provide him care. He would mimic Jean's powers, this time with a greater sense of control, and glee yet again. Calvin would later say of this that his involvement with Masters left him in a state of despair, unwilling to trust anyone but himself lest he be taken advantage of once more. He resumed his life on the run, but maintained his fixation on us in spite of his supposed mistrust. When we went mobile after Bobby fled to San Francisco, Calvin trailed behind us, and only intervened when we nearly approached our destination.

Camping outside of Las Vegas for the night, we unwittingly came into contact with the Hulk, and a fight broke out. Calvin intervened when it appeared the Hulk was gaining the upper hand, boldly grappling the Hulk and absorbing his Gamma radiation. It was enough for us to be able to disarm the Hulk, but it also left Calvin suddenly deathly ill. Hank's quick thinking led to Logan making contact with Calvin, and by mimicking Logan's healing factor was able to naturally process the radiation.

After we all gathered our bearings, an idea had formed amongst us: That through a more focused application of Calvin's absorption and Logan's healing factor, we could potentially cure Dr. Banner of being the Hulk altogether. There was some brief contention on whether to go through with this idea, but what settled it was Calvin's consent in his role in the procedure. He said to us he was ready to repent his past misdeeds and sought to do good, and by all accounts he was sincere in that claim. In the middle of the procedure, however, his fight or flight instincts compelled him to attempt to absorb Dr. Banner's Gamma entirely, likely thinking that gaining the Hulk's nigh invulnerability would end any concern over his survival.

Jean intervened when this subterfuge became clear, and through that telepathic contact Dr. Banner's Gamma was inexplicably transfered into her. While the rest of us fell under the influence of Jean who then went out to confront the military convoy out searching for the Hulk, it ended being Logan, out of all of us, who met Calvin at his level and succeeded in reasoning with him. Once the situation with Jean and Dr. Banner was resolved, Logan stayed behind with Calvin as the rest of us continued our journey into California.

At time of writing, Calvin is residing on Muir Island, receiving treatment both for his powers as well as his antisocial tendencies.

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#earth93 #comics #fanfic #marvel #comic books #x men comics #xmen #fantastic 4 #cyclops #hulk #incredible hulk #iceman #wolverine #mister sinister #jean grey #professor x #mimic #bobby drake #scott summers

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sylono · 3 months

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Me when I casually do a bunch of autism tests bc the last time I did it was 6 months ago when my therapist offhandedly suggested it and sent some links(and 3 months before then when *I* first started seriously considering it and had actually done most of the tests of the links my therapist sent already) and so I do the tests, and everytime I'm like "this is gonna be the one that I answer 'wrong' and proves I don't have it",,,, and then I get the result and haven't checked how it's scored yet and am like, oh, whack,, that's probably pretty low, or mid at most,,,,,, and then I check the scoring and it's like people with xyz score are considered highly suspected of having autism and ppl with an even higher/lower score are very likely to have it,,,, and my scores I thimought were mid would be the ones that are more significant than the average autistic person's score on more than half the tests,,, and within range for the ones where it doesn't exceed it(literally,, there was *one* test where I got a 13 and was like, oh, that's gotta be marked out of a low number or I didn't meet the threshold for sure,,,, and then the scoring is like "yeah, so ppl with *low* scores are correlated with autism for this one and neurotypical ppl usually get 40 or above, and it's out of 80" and im---) lowkey,, despite the fact I don't even know if I'm ever gonna formally try for a diagnosis, since I can get a lot of the accomodations through my adhd diagnosis(which is what I originally started seeing the therapist for actually while I was getting diagnosed) but with less stigma and still the option to move abroad,,,, but like, even if I don't, self diagnosis validity blah blah blah,, I'm feeling hella validated

#autism #actually autistic #audhd #actually audhd #asd #self diagnosed autism #self diagnosis #yeah #so the sensory sensitivities are definitely the autism and not unspecificed mildly correlated to adhd sensitivity-itis

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ghostfruits · 2 years

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im gonna have made something in a week or two to show u

but

i wanna talk

i am inclined to talk to u quick

we have spent a lot of time in the last like little while doing what other people told us was a good idea to do bc we had never listened to anyone before and it seemed like worth at least trying to adhere to the advice of people drastically more successful than us especially as all of us individually began to experience like wild and usually financial crisises. i dont like how it feels. we r not really like, feeling how it feels. clout doesnt suit us like that. it just doesnt. its not a house that was built to accomodate it and it doesnt and im off it and niggas can suck my dick and i want to be like normal again i want to like draw stuff and post it and let the waves take shit where it gotta go. this whole rat race shit is fucking obnoxious & i dont care. iv been Strategically Not Having Fun for barely fucking 4 months and im already fed up. twitter is wild trash and i feel like angry the whole time im using it. i like the lower traffic. i like talking. we r bored to death of having fuckin conversations with othr people abt when and how to make some shit to maximize all whatever however like i give a shit. im so fuckin sick of trying to do like smash bros tournament metagame shit i dont care homie like i dont care none of us care

i dont want to be dr fuckin content, i want to make you, like, gifts

when i like found out abt city morgue or like animal kaiser tcg or bape or like 9hst3st or any of the shit i like it made my brain feel like electrical and grateful and it anchored me in wht my feelings abt stuff were, it got me like, in my mode. i have been especially careful over the years to not talk like im abt to talk bc i dont like to articulate an assumption that like anything tht gets sent to us is like purely genuine and unulterior and definitely means what it says it means but like out of 100s of people who have like said tht the things we have made at some point made them feel tht way or like have made art of the stuff weve made or like visibly and admittedly and enthusiastically co-opted our style (ur allowed) like if 20 of those ppl are telling the truth then tht is like enough of a reason for me to wanna keep just like feeding the street then

when odd future came out it wasnt just those 11 guys rly it was sort of like, a surrounding aura of like, 75 guys,there was a official roster but it wasnt rly a clearly defined In and Out of it i dont think. it really didnt look like it. u can like tell an OF nigga. nakel and the photographer guy and fuckin like half the supreme people and that one nigga w the beard and all whoever like thats odd future shit. vince staples is odd future shit. it wasnt a like single beneficiary of the flow. it was like given to the people around them pretty freely. ICP kind of did a version of this although it was a lot less organic maybe. i dont know. i am losing my thread here a little

i want to make u something u can use is all

tht is how all of us feel

we r more comfortable trying to make something of use to u than we are trying to like speedrun building some kind of dumbass particle board instagram empire

i wanna hold thanksgiving for u more than i want to like herd u and i have been getting told for yrs tht isnt like a real thing & it turns out i like dont care if it is and its just like what is gonna happen

big dog gon bark yfm

watch thsz space

#stvn

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ikkosu · 3 months

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FRAGMENTED

a short drabble with an idea that stemmed from my earlier ramble 😭😭 idk I just really wanted to write it out

"Interesting. You really are organized." Her voice— their voice, he's not even sure, eased through his audial processors, warm like the rays of sunlight blotching through water, a crystal-like cadence, yet sharp enough much as frolicking waves. He's pistoned like a sea wall trying to deflect it. With every effort, though — he's cracking at the seams.

"It's a shame, really. You'd fare better if your thoughts are so. Perhaps, a neat bundle would do. You're the type to file, yes? To be in control of what your knowledge purveys?”

With a vent, he whirled around, no longer having the patience to withstand their remarks. His door wings pike up to regard the new 'occurrences' of the recent events. That is, the porcelain, humanoid figure teetering by his doorway who stood, much like a graceful deer with hands primly folded behind their back. Engraved on their face is a twinkling smile with eyes, that bore the color of their name, that’s a creased moon, feigning luminence— the truth of darkness holding up all the same.

Prowl grimaced.

This was all but Rodimus's insistence they aid' these native lifeforms, gems Perceptor had clarified, a place to accomodate them, since they were so fragile to be left alone at the hands of their adversaries, the 'lunarians' dwindling the numbers of their species so. A single touch — if not thoughtful — would break fracture them to pieces.

He was the first to meet then — aside from the Lost Light crew. After all, he was the 'immigration officer' , a position Optimus concocted on a whim to ensure their troubled nature, maintaining all the paperwork needed for a legal entrance into Cybertron.

Many were genial. Some, naive. Yet ,from a fragmented standpoint, one mind to another — he knew they were all deceiving themselves. Look what millions of years to a person can do — years where death isn’t much prevalent, and life, as it simmers on, deteriorates the mind lest age wouldn’t do it itself.

"You're Lapis. The librarian." He said plainly, though, not kindly. "I take it you know much of our species already, despite the nature of it so considered a taboo." His voice lowered. "You know we were coming for you."

The eyebrows eased upwards, twinkling eyes no longer a half moon. "I'd settle for Euclase's warning,” They mused, “but you're too independent to heed concerns from someone, much less, a lesser being than your kind."

He bristles but a crinkle of his nose is what he’s shown. “What would you know?”

"Not much. An opinion." They said, gloved hands, gun metal grey, tossed the hair behind their back that crackled like a wind chimes. "Is what I want. Nothing more. Nothing less. Or, perhaps, an opinion of my own too. If you're willing to concede, that is…"

Lapis pressed a finger to their temple — it fragmented at the touch of her fingertips. The cobweb of navy blue glinted. “If it assures you, officer — I am not all a threat. I’m quite fragile.”

He snorts. “Is that some kind of threat before you threaten me? Don’t make me laugh.”

He’s been warned not to interact with the gem. Rung's advice, specifically. Said something about ‘blah, blah, blah’ he’s not bothered enough to listen.Though, he’s not sure if the desire to do so outweighs his concern. After all, he’s a strategic officer. He collects information.

And an undisclosed matter would plague him restless.

“Perhaps. Perhaps, not.”

Two can play at the game.

#transformers #maccadam #lapis hnk #idw prowl #i imagine prowl despising phos a lot #then the dynamic when lapis phos and prowl would meet is a lot like mesotulas/ tarantulas #hngggggg #must not #write crossover #HGHFJFJJ

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the-land-of-eternal-winter-novel · 2 years

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Chapter 16 - The Painful Recovery

Radek had to have his stitches changed, and he was made to rest in bed for the following days. The nurses also changed the bandages around his head and ear, but there was nothing more to be done about the injury in his right ear. He eventually resigned, being thankful he was still able to hear with his left, and he rested as instructed.

He noticed, however, that Anatoliy lay in bed all day despite not being required to, so he tried to encourage him to walk around the room, if only to open the window to get some fresh air.

"You're right beside the window. Open it yourself."

"You have to move a little, or else you'll get bruises from lying down so much."

"I don't care. My whole body aches already."

He didn't know how else to encourage him, or whether pain was the only reason he refused to get up. Eventually, Anatoliy was forced to go to another room for the treatment. He tried to stand up, but his frostbitten toes ached like knives into his skin. Radek helped him walk and joined him to the other rooms, which included a sauna and a pool of hot water. As he was still feeling very cold, Anatoliy wore a bathrobe even inside the sauna, which attracted a few confused looks from the others. He sat down and tried to warm his hands. Radek tried to talk to him, bringing up neutral or positive subjects, but Anatoliy, after reluctantly joining the conversation, only managed to steer the dialogue into gloominess. In the meantine, many people left the sauna, and, before they knew it, they were the only ones left. After the conversation dragged on for a while, Radek sighed, discouraged and defeated.

"...sorry..." whispered Anatoliy.

"It's alright..."

"Why are you so kind to me? You help me walk, you try to cheer me up, but I bring you down. Not to mention that I'm your enemy. Am I not a burden to you?"

"You're not my enemy..."

"How can you say that? I'm the one who killed your father."

"I know." he answered bitterly as if he just remembered. "...But you're my brother-in-law... I can't hate you..."

"You can't, as in you're not allowed? Feel free to hate me, I deserve it, anyway..."

"Forgiveness is the right thing to do."

"What's the point, if it's out of obligation?..."

Radek was conflicted, and he struggled to find a response. He finally found an answer, but it felt half-hearted as soon as he uttered the words.

"...didn't you use to say that family is sacred? I feel it's only normal that we should reconcile..."

"Whatever I said isn't valid anymore. I did not respect family. I acted like I didn't care about anybody at all. The only thing that I cared about is that Vaidas was guilty. Now I'm the guilty one... How can I expect, let alone demand, that you forgive me after what I'd done?..."

As he talked, his voice started shaking, burning tears falling down his scarred cheeks.

"But I will... eventually..." Radek tried to keep talking, but he found himself tearing up as well.

The following day, they went to the pool to take a hot bath. Radek was relaxing, looking through the nearest window. Anatoliy struggled to accomodate to the heat, which felt like burning his skin.

"I hate this 'treatment', my toes and fingers hurt so much they might just fall off!"

"If your frostbite isn't healed, they will."

He looked at Radek with a horrified expression. He lowered into the pool, if reluctantly, until the water reached his chin. He tried to relax and ignore the discomfort, so he rested his head against the edge, letting himself float. He liked that he wasn't feeling cold like in the previous day, but he couldn't rest, because he thought about nightmare-like scenarios. Already knowing that the water was being heated gradually, and remembering a certain experiment he had read about, he suddenly imagined that they were going to be boiled alive without even knowing it. He jolted and slid, falling with his head underwater. Radek rushed to help him out as soon as he heard the commotion.

"Are you alright?! What happened?"

"I suddenly felt like we were going to be scalded alive!" he said when he finished coughing out the water.

"Why would you think that?! This is only a hot bath."

"I don't know... I always have thoughts like that when I least expect them, and at night I often have nightmares. I can't really help it. I mean, sometimes I can help it. I used to bite my nails, for example, or I would pluck out a hair for each such thought. I hope you don't think I'm insane..."

"I don't. But I wouldn't want to be in your mind. I'm certain I couldn't bear it."

"During times like these, I can't bear it anymore, either..."

As they returned to the room, Anatoliy told him about his nightmares from the previous weeks, hoping for an edifying interpretation, but he heard, just as he expected, that the dreams came from his guilt.

In the meantime, Elena and Kęstas planned to tell the people that their Empress is alive, but the Queen tried to stop them in whichever way she could. At first, she only told them that it would be useless to tell the news before they found her location, and that the soldiers were already on such a mission. They tried to insist, but, in the same period of time, Elena began to feel sick. She was made to stay in bed by her mother-in-law, as she was often nauseous or sleepy. Kęstas stopped any attempt to spread the news to the public, even if temporarily, instead staying at home to take care of Elena, and he was particularly worried, because she had had that fever. He anxiously waited bad news from the doctors, but, to his relief and surprise, they congratulated him on his wife's pregnancy.

The young couple kissed and embraced in celebration. Soon, the mother-in-law came into the room and, after exachanging the usual pleasantries, she decided that Elena must not leave her room, nor her bed, so as to protect herself and the child. Elena's excitement visibly faded. Even after the left the room, the two grew worried.

"Whaf if she's right, and we can't trust uncle Grigoriy? What if there's a war? Then, you'd have to go..."

"And I'll come back in one piece, but we are not at war now, and I say we shouldn't worry."

Elena was still worried about her sister, and she wondered how she could help her despite being confined to her house. She wrote many letters, hoping they would reach their destination, but she began to distrust her mother-in-law, sensing that she was hiding something from them.

The palace felt lonelier than ever as Grigoriy wandered around aimlessly, thinking about his lost family. For a moment he debated in his mind whether to bring Svetlana back, but he heard about the division between the revolutionaries, and the rumours that some would still want to rebel against the Empire, so he decided to keep her safe until this threat was gone for good. He figured that he had already made so many harmful decisions that now he was merely able to choose the lesser of two evils. He walked along the halls restlessly, pondering upon his life. He remembered his mother, who was a ray of sunshine, and his father, whom he resembled so much, yet so little. Although hot-tempered or grumpy, his father was a wise king and a morally upstanding man. When he was young, Grigoriy used to think himself superior to his older brother, as he was generally considered to be stronger, smarter, more handsome, and all in all more successful than him.

It struck him that his achievements so far have been, for the most part, only superficial. While his brother gained the love and respect of his family, his peers and the whole country, Grigoriy was left alone as his family was torn by a devastating divorce. He worked himself to the bone, striving for success in his carreer, but now, as he thought about his decisions, he wondered whether he struggled to gain this fame and power, at least in part, to catch the attention of his former family. There were some days when he wished he would spite his wife with his succes, or hoped his son would read the newspapers and remember him. He was quickly disillusioned: he hadn't heard from him in two decades.

He used to think that Afanasiy envied him, but in the present, the situation was precisely the opposite. What a joy beyond all words is it to have children who love you! Grigoriy yearned to have his son back, but he dared not pray, not yet. Inevitably, he remembered Anatoliy. Too often, he was impatient with him, expecting him to become the image of his own son, and rarely had he shown him fatherly affection, though he loved him. In the past, he would say that people are irreplaceable, but it was him who treated his nephew as if he was to take on the role of his son. Anatoliy, however, couldn't have been more different from his cousin, who was the spitting image of Grigoriy in both temperament and appearance, except for his reddish hair, taking after his mother.

One the other hand, Afanasiy's son, much like him, was timid and introspective. They both had an inherent awkwardness with which they were frustrated, but Anatoliy didn't manage to hide it as well. What others called madness or idiocy turned out to be nothing more than an instrinsic oddity of mind that both father and son seemed to share, only that the former managed to mask it. Grigoriy wished he had made the connection sooner, but he was trying to fit Anatoliy in a mold the shape of his son. He finally stopped walking, sitting down on the chair next to the harpsichord. He distinctly remembered that he used to be very annoyed at his nephew's finger strumming and other noisy movements, so he sent him in a room with multiple instruments, telling him to play music instead of making noise. Although this sparked Anatoliy's interest in music, he regreted that memory, as his impatient and even aggressive attitude was uncalled for, especially towards a small child.

He tried to imagine myriads of scenarios: what would have been if he had treated him differently, if he had acknowledged his uniqueness and if he had been more lenient? The only time he actively tried to be by his side (for anything other than self-interest), it was too late. His lies were what prompted his nephew to his disastrous decision, and the ensuing guilt made him think himself past the point of no return. Grigoriy tried to play a song on the harpsichord, but it was nowhere near as melodious as when Anatoliy played it. He wished he had one last occasion to hug him like a child or at least tell him he loves him. A sour falsetto echoed the room, then silence engulfed it, except for a few whispered sobs.

#the land of eternal winter #my novel #draft 1 #chapter 16

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lustinglilac · 3 years

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Hey love! I absolutely love your OA Zidan imagines & I was wondering if you could do a full on angst to smut one maybe? Idc what the angst part is centered around maybe where he's mad at the reader? but for the smut could there be a choking kink??? Sorry if this is too detailed or you can't do it , thank u !!!

A/N: I had a really fun time writing this! Even though it took me forever. I really hope you enjoy & thank you for requesting 💜

Warnings: choking kink, condescending talk, angry OA (but then fluff), some arguing, NSFW under the cut, 18+ ONLY

*GIF NOT MINE*

“OA... I don’t understand what the issue is. I invited Maggie over for dinner and Nestor just so happened to be there when I did. Big deal!” She scoffed, walking to her side of the car door.

OA tries to steady his breathing, sighing harshly before pulling open the driver’s side of the door, “The point is he’s a manipulative, selfish prick who has no care about who he screws over—“

“Honestly Omar, if you could leave work at work, that would be so great.” She states matter of factly. She fastens her seatbelt, smoothing down her dress before crossing her arms over her chest, turning to stare at something, anything, out the window.

“Y’know... out of all people, I thought you’d understand that the most.” He chuckles humorlessly, “I’ll keep my opinions to myself from now on.” He turns on the engine, the noise drowning out her heart beating out of her chest as they head for their shared apartment.

Minutes later they’d arrived outside of their building, silently getting out of the car as she held back tears. God, she didn’t even know why she was so upset. Maybe at the fact that they let someone as irrelevant as Nestor get between them? She had no clue.

“I’ll be in our room if you need me.” Once inside, she steps out of her wedges, not bothering to look back at him.

Omar contemplates going after her, his anger towards Nestor really getting the best of him as he replayed the conversation in his head.

Loosening the collar of his dress shirt, he took a seat on the plush couch, leaning his head back against it with a low groan.

She willed herself not to cry, stripping out of her short dress and putting on something more comfortable for the time being. She realized the harshness to her words earlier, pinching the bridge of her nose before making the decision to go out into the kitchen for a glass of water. And secretly to see OA.

She padded quietly down the short hallway, reaching the fridge in no time, throwing a glance Omar’s way before averting her eyes.

He watches her manuever around the tiny kitchen area, an amused smirk playing on his lips as she reached up for the glasses that were usually kept on the top most shelf, a bad habit OA had yet to break.

Her stubborness taking over, not wanting to ask for help as she reached as far up as she could to no avail.

“Here— I got you.” In no time, OA had been behind her, one hand on her hip to steady himself before reaching above her and effortlessly bringing down a cup for her to use.

She huffs audibly, “I was— I had it.” Taking it from his grasp roughly before pushing past him, or at least attempting to. OA was quick to trap her against the island before she could go anywhere.

“Really? ‘Cause it looked like you were struggling.” He hums, face neutral as he looked at his partner. “Are you done having an attitude with me?”

She laughs unexpectedly at the tone of his voice, like a mother scolding a teenager for being bratty. In essence, that’s kind of what was happening here, too.

“I don’t know. Are you done acting like I can’t do shit for myself and need you to help me every two seconds?” She counters, challenging him as she felt his demeanor completely change.

He takes his bottom lip between his teeth, letting it go just as quickly and leaning down leveling himself to her eyesight, “Sweetheart— I’d be careful what you say.” His eyes freely roam over her face, stopping for a moment at her lips and then down her neck towards her cleavage.

“Or what—“ Before she’d even finished that sentence, OA had crashed his lips against hers, tongue slipping into her mouth so easily as the glass nearly slipped from her grip before she set it down and kissed him back just as feverishly.

Her hands going straight for his face as he placed her down onto the island, all traces of anger and Nestor gone from their minds as he fumbled with the waistband of her shorts before ridding her of them.

She gasped as she felt the cool surface of the island beneath her bare thighs, leaning back slightly to catch their breath.

“Fuck Omar, I’m sor—“ She began breathlessly only to be cut off again by his lips before pulling back again.

He shakes his head, “I don’t wanna hear it. Not right now, okay?” OA makes sure she understands before unbuttoning his own pants and pulling himself out with a soft hiss.

She nods at him and hums softly at the stern tone he exhibits, the wetness pooling between her legs, a nice contrast to the coolness of the marble beneath her.

OA kisses her neck leaving a mark on the side of it, that she would have no choice but to cover with makeup later, as his hands grab at her tits.

“OA... fuuuck.” She gasps as she feels his hand sliding lower, slotting between her thighs, spreading them just a little to help accomodate him. He pulls away from her neck and looks at her.

“Need me to fuck that attitude right outta you?” He speaks so condescendingly that it makes her nod without hesitation.

“Yes. Please.” She whimpers quietly, thighs threatning to shut around his hand as he kept up a taunting rhythm, circling her wet clit before moving down towards her opening.

Omar smiles, knowing she was right there, right on the brink of cumming for him before he removes his fingers holding them to her mouth.

She pants, breathless, the expression on her face a frustrated one as she looks from his fingers to his amused face.

“Suck.” He presses the wet fingers against her half-open lips, groaning praises when she finally takes them into her mouth and cleans them off with a moan. With his other hand, he manages to rip her tank top down, her breasts spilling freely making her shiver at the cool air on her sensitive nipples.

As he pulls his fingers out of her mouth, he scoots her off the counter onto the ground again, bending her over roughly, tits pressed flat to the cold surface of the marble beneath her.

“So pretty like this... just for me.” He grunts, watching her wet cunt clench around nothing but his words of praise as she arches her back slightly, giving him a show.

“Just fuck me.” She mumbles, nails impatiently tapping against the counter as OA takes his time.

He rubs his cock up and down her pussy a few times making her mewl in pleasure as she tried her hardest to push back onto him, growing irritable with every swipe of his dick up and down her folds.

Her eyes roll shut as he finally pushes in all the way, leaving her no room to say anything but moan and whimper. She was speechless to say the least, until he hit that one spongy spot inside her that made her vision spot.

“Baby— ooooh fuuuck. Feels so good.” She eventually manages to pant out a few words, biting her lip as he kept up a teasing pace.

“Yeah? Right there?” OA teases, grinding his hips into her as his hand came around to cup the front of her throat, pulling her against his chest. His other hand found her clit, rubbing it in time with his thrusts as her mouth fell open at the sensation.

“Omar, don’t fucking stop—“ She gasped, his thumb pressing softly on the pulse point right below her ear as she reveled in the feel of his large hand around her throat. She loved when he got pissed off, whether it was at her (rarely) or at something from work, it usually led to the best sex.

Her tits bounced with every movement as Omar sped up his thrusts, whispering about how he was gonna fuck her till she learned not to talk back to him. And she was cockdumb, loving every word he growled in her ear as he choked her. He kissed the side of her cheek softly as he brought her to her climax, her back arching slightly as he continued until he chased his own high.

They stayed like that for a minute or so, and also because she was unable to move yet, his thumb caressing the side of her cheek softly, placing kisses along her neck.

“OA... I’m sorry.” She sighs, pulling him out of her slowly, whimpering at the sensitivity and turning around to face him.

He lowers his head, pressing his forehead against her own, “It’s fine, baby.” He assures her, placing a chaste kiss to her lips before pulling back to look at her, his hands going straight to her thighs.

“You can always talk to me about anything. I don’t care— even if it’s the most boring thing in the world. I never want you to bottle up your emotions about things in your life, okay?” She nods, making sure he understood.

“Really? You’re gonna be sick of me by the end of it.” He smiles making her laugh.

“Never that.” She places her hands on his beard pulling him in for a soft kiss.

#oa zidan #oa zidan smut #oa zidan imagine #fbi cbs #fbi smut #omar adom zidan

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marvelsmylife · 3 years

Text

I love you more

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x reader

Anon request: Hi! Can you write a Bucky smut where he and y/n are together for months and they hadn’t have sex because he’s afraid to hurt her (he didn’t have sex since he had his bionic arm) but he truly loves her, so one night they are in bed and y/n take his bionic hand in hers and shes caresses her body with it for him to accomodate to it please? Then it ends to sweet making love. I love your writings!

When you became an avenger you were worried you weren’t going to get along with the Wanda and Natasha. For some reason girls hated growing up and no matter how hard you tried to be nice the stated they would never like you. Luckily for you, wanda and Natasha embraced you with open arms. Natasha and Wanda told that they felt like outsiders before the team so they wanted to make the people who joined the team feel included. Since then you also became good friends with pepper, Darcy, Maria and Jane.

Currently you guys were having girls night at the compound and you guys were talking about your sex life “I’m telling you he might not look it but Bruce is AMAZING at going down on a girl. Every time he does I see stars” Natasha gushed as you all sat around the living room. Since guys went out so you guys decided to raid Tony’s stash of expensive liquor.

“Sadly I know why Tony’s great in bed, I’ve seen multiple woman leaving his room before we started dating. Although he says I’m the best I still feel insecure.” Pepper glared at her glass as she thought of every girl that has left Tony’s bedroom before they began dating.

All of you guys gave pepper a sympathy look because you knew if you guys were in Peppers shoes you would have the same reaction. “Aww Pepper you’re drop dead gorgeous and if Tony says your the best he’s had. It must be true” Maria tried to reassure pepper.

“What about you y/n. How are things with you and Bucky” Wanda asked and got everyone’s attention.

You couldn’t stop smiling as you thought about Bucky. Ever since you started dating Bucky nine months ago your life has been close to perfect. “Amazing, he’s everything I’ve ever wanted in a man. I never thought I could love someone as much as I love him”.

Natasha and Wanda gave each other before Natasha decided to speak “Oh we all know that, we want to know about your sex life woman ! ! ! Does he use his metal arm in bed? If so how does it feel like?” Natasha ask. Your face grew hot so you tried not to make eye contact with them. “You guys have, you know” You shook my head no and caused everyone to gasp. “How, why ! ? ! Have you tried to? Do you want to? Does he want to ? We need info girl”

You let out a sigh and told the girls your frustration you’ve had ever since you started dating Bucky “Oh trust me I tried to but every time we are close to there he pulls away and says no.” You know you shouldn’t be surprised with Bucky’s reservations. It took a while for you to get him to open up at the beginning of your relationship. But not being able to be intimate with him was eating you up inside and you still have last weeks attempt still in your head.

“Mmm Bucky” you moaned laying on top of him, sucked on his Adam’s apple. You pulled away so you could remove my shirt but Bucky stopped me.

“No” was all he said before he lifted you up and laid you down next to him.

“Why?” You complained.

Feeling frustrated Bucky looked over at you “Because no, that’s why” Bucky snapped. Not liking Bucky’s mood change you got up and started walking out of the room. Realizing he made you mad Bucky tried to reach over and grab your hand “listen y/n I’m sor-”.

“No it’s ok I should go make something to eat” you looked over at him before walked out of the room.

“Maybe he’s just not comfortable with showing affection” Maria suggested and caused a few ladies to nod their heads in agreement.

Letting out a frustrated sigh you looked over at your friends and replied “I just don’t know anymore. What i do know is that I’m going crazy because I’m sexually frustrated”.

Feeling bad because she couldn’t tell you were really frustrated Natasha got up and knelt down in front of you. “Y/n I’m going to give you some advice, talk to him about it. I mean he was hydra’s puppet for decades maybe he doesn’t want to hurt you. I was in your position with Bruce. When I confronted him about it he told me why he was like that and we worked it out. Don’t lose hope, I know you and Bucky are made for each other” Natasha smiling at you.

Feeling very emotional due to the alcohol and Natasha’s words you hugged Natasha as tight as you could “Thanks Nat I’ll do that”.

“Alright enough talking about our men, let’s get drunk” Darcy shouted holding a bottle of bourbon in one hand and her glass in the other. All you started to laugh and held out our glasses so Darcy could fill them up.

Girls night ended around midnight and by that point you were drunk. You tried your hardest not to make any noise but you ended up knocking over a lamp as you stumbled over to the couch “Y/n is that you?” Bucky’s voice echoed the apartment.

“Yes babe sorry for marking noise” you replied as you started taking off your shoes. Bucky rubbed his eyes while lazily entered the living room shirtless.

Even though he was half asleep Bucky could tell you were drunk. “Are you barely coming home? You smell of alcohol, how much did you have to drink and how did you get home”. He asked while he helped up on your feet.

You wrapped your arms around Bucky’s waist and nuzzled your face against his neck. “Too many questions at once babe, but yes I just got home, I had a few drinks with the girls and I got cab. How was guys night?”

Although he didn’t like when you drank too much Bucky couldn’t help but love how affectionate you were. “Lame, we just played poker at Sam’s place. The entire time I wished I was with you.”

“Well I’m with you now, how about we go to bed and sleep.” You suggested.

Bucky was thankful you weren’t trying to come on to him like you usually did when you were drunk. “Ok” Bucky guided you into your shared room.

Once you were inside you let out grunt because you tried to unzip your dress but because of your drunken state you found it difficult to reach the zipper “Bucky bear can you help me unzip my dress babe?”

“Sure thing doll” you felt his flesh hand on your back as he unzipped your dress. “There you go” you felt his lips on your shoulder blade before laying back on the bed. After you changed into your tank top and pajama shorts you joined Bucky on the bed.

“Bucky” you whispered and got the attention of your boyfriend who was starting to drift off to sleep.

“Yeah?” He replied and turned over so he was looking at you.

“I love you so much” you smiled at him and hugged him as tight as you could.

Bucky placed a kiss on your forehead before he responded “I love you more doll”.

You woke up to Bucky breathing into your ear as our legs were tangled together. Turing around slowly you took in Bucky’s peaceful state and you kept thinking how lucky you were to be dating such a nice and good looking guy. You couldn’t help but pepper his jaw with kisses. Since Bucky is a light sleeper Bucky woke up immediately “Mmm” Bucky moaned as he pulled you even closer to him. “Good morning doll” Bucky’s whispered.

“Morning babe” you replied back as you started to kiss his neck. Feeling frisky you slowly slid your hand down his bare chest until it landed above the waistband of his boxers.

Just as you were about to slip your hand inside his boxers Bucky pulled it away and sat up “no”.

“Why Buck? Why don’t you want to make love to me Bucky” you asked and hugging him from behind.

What you didn’t know was that it killed Bucky every time he denied your advances. He wanted to have sex with you just as bad as you did but he didn’t trust himself and thought he was going to hurt you with his metal arm during sex. “Trust me y/n I really want to make love to you. You are so gorgeous and I still can’t believe your mine but I’m scared I’m going to hurt you.”

“How are you going to hurt me” you got off the bed and knelt down in front of him. “Is it because of this” your right hand made contact with he metal arm. He nodded his head. You got up and straddling his lap and moved his metal arm until it made contact with your face. You felt him trying to pull away but you held it in place. “I know you’re not going to hurt me buck, you need to learn to trust yourself like I trust you” you dropped his hand and got ahold of the hem of your tank top before you removed it. Bucky bit his lips as he watched you unclasped your bra. Once you were completely bare from the waist up you got ahold of his metal arm again and asked “Do you trust me?”

Bucky felt slightly offended at your question “Of course I do” he replied not being able to look away from your breasts.

You guided his metal hand from your shoulder down until it reached your right breast “see you have nothing to be worried about” you reassured him before moving his metal arm down your body. His breath was getting heavier by the second so you got a hold of his chin and lifted his head. His blue eyes shinning with delight, leaning forward you pressed your lips onto his. Every time you kiss him it’s like you had butterflies in your stomach and you just want to kiss him more. Soon his metal arm was around your lower back the kiss started to get more passionate. “I love you Bucky” you managed to say against his lip while your hands glued to his hair.

Bucky’s heart pounded every time you told him you loved him “I love you more y/n” Bucky muttered against your lips and hugged you.

“Please make love to me, I trust you” you begged and tugged his hair.

Bucky found himself getting turn on by the hair tug that he decided to finally give in to you “Ok” Bucky replies. With your lips still moving against each other Bucky managed to move so you were laying down. “Tell me if I’m hurting you” he whispered into your ear as he started to leave kisses. Stopping when he reached you breast, he sucked on each of them before he continues to kiss you down your body.

Once he reached your pajama shorts he looked up at up as if he was asking for permission to continue “it’s ok Bucky, I trust you” he soon slid both your shorts and underwear down. Instantly you spread your legs for him and caused Bucky to let out a small moan because he was staring directly at your pussy.

“Do you like what you see?” you teased him. All Bucky could do was nod his head while soaked in the fact that you were completely naked.

You couldn’t help but feel ten times more confident because Bucky was staring at you in awe “love” Bucky simply replied as he ran his fingers up and down your wet folds. “Can I?” Bucky asked.

“Yes Bucky, it’s all yours” you giggled as he laid on his stomach and took a long lick. All you could do was moan as Bucky brought you the pleasure you were urning for.

Gaining some confidence from your moans Bucky continued his actions. A smirk started appearing on Bucky’s face when your moans grew louder and louder “do you like that doll?”

“Yes mmmmm oh god yes” you replied as your fingers got lost in Bucky’s hair. You felt his metal fingers spreading your folds as his tongue now entered your hole. “Oh god yes Bucky” you rolled your hips making his tongue go deeper inside. You felt him moaning and the caused you to cup your left breast as his metal hand took possession of your right.

“You taste so good doll mmm”. Bucky

You started to pant as you felt a knot at the pit of your stomach “Bucky I’m going to cum.”

“Do it doll, cum for me” Bucky encouraged you as he moved his tongue faster. Soon you felt yourself tense up and came in his mouth.

Without a second thought you for what Bucky told you to do and came “BUCKY ! ! ! !” you shouted as your orgasm hit me.

“That’s it, mmmm you taste so good y/n” Bucky continued to praise as your orgasm started to wash away. You tugged on his hair to let him know to come back up. Bucky kissed his way back up your body now 100% confident enough to caress your body with his metal arm. “Are you sure you want to do it?” Bucky asked one more time sure.

Cupping his face you looked him in the eye and replied “Yes Bucky I am, please make love to me” he pulled back and removed his boxers before laying on top of you again.

Just as he was about to enter you he realized he wasn’t wearing protection “Wait I’m not wearing-”

“I’m on the pill buck, don’t worry about it” you replied as you stroked his now erect member.

After he let you stroke his cock a few times Bucky got ahold of his cock and started teasing your entrance “Tell me if I’m hurting you ok?”

“Ok” you kissed his lips as he pushed himself inside you. “Fuck this feels better than I thought” you bit Bucky’s shoulder once he was fully inside you. Fearing he might hurt you Bucky stayed still for a few minutes so you could adjust to his impressive member. “Bucky baby please move” you begged.

Bucky felt his ego grow as he heard you begging “Ok doll” he replied as he started to move slowly inside you. After a while his movements were still slow but their was so much passion between the two of you that you didn’t care.

Grunts and moans echoed in bedroom as you guys continued to make love. Somehow you managed to get onto and started to ride Bucky. “Oh Bucky ” you rolled you hips and caused Bucky to slowly thrust upwards.

Not liking not being in control Bucky rolled you guys over so he was on top of you and picked up his pace slightly. He wanted to bring you more pleasure while you worshiped each others bodies and spiritually giving ourselves to each other. “I love you so much y/n, oh god I love you so much.”

Feeling your second orgasm approaching you couldn’t help but get more vocal about how much you were enjoying yourself “Yes yes yes oh Bucky I love you so much, I’m going to cum again” you panted and held onto him for dear life.

“Oh god please let go I’m right behind” Bucky pleaded. He had the urge to cum for a while but managed to suppress it so he wouldn’t cum too early.

With Bucky’s blessings you let go and came for a second time. “Oh Bucky yessssssss” you moaned into his ear caused him to cum seconds later.

“Yes y/n, fuck ahhh” he whispered back as he was still moving inside you, milking his orgasm until he couldn’t anymore. You stayed still for several minutes just holding onto each other. Bucky eventually rolled off you but pulled you into his embrace. “Thank you y/n” Bucky kissed the top of my head.

You couldn’t help but look up and give him a funny look “Why are you thanking me Bucky?”

“For trusting me enough to make love to you, even though I didn’t trust myself” Bucky kissed you lips.

“I’ll always trust you buck, I love you” you curled up to him.

“I love you more” Bucky whispered into your hair as you guys laid silently in bed.

#avengers imagines #bucky barnes imagine #bucky barnes imagines #bucky x reader

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fallout4reactsblog · 3 years

Note

What if a sole survivor that’s a teenager(like 14-16 years old) begins to view the companions and faction leaders as parental figures, before slipping up and accidentally calling them “mom” or “dad”? Just a thought.

Ada: “Ah, shit.”

Sole patted themself down, checking their pockets, before sighing. “I knew I should’ve taken the time to skin those mole rats.”

“Is something missing?”

Curious, Ada leaned over to check the project they were working on. They slid to the side to accomodate her.

“I just don’t have enough leather to finish my armor mods. I wanted to put some pockets in my chestplate so I could carry a couple extra rolls of duct tape, but I don’t think it’s going to happen.”

“Leather?”

She checked back through her mental inventory, sizing up what she was carrying. Enamel bucket, ashtrays, pack of cigarettes...

“Ah, here we are.” She pulled out a baseball glove and handed it over. “Will this suffice?”

“Oh, yeah, this is perfect!” They beamed. “Thanks, Mom.”

“Anytime.”

If either of them noticed sole’s little slip-up, neither of them said a thing.

Cait: Sole reminded her too much of herself, some days. She knew their jaded expression, their thousand-yard stare, the haunted look of a kid who’d seen more than they should have. She knew more about them than they’d probably like, which was how she knew to stop them before they could do something they’d regret in the long run.

“No chems,” she said, plucking the canister of X-Cell out of their hands before they could get too close a look at it. It still felt dusty from its years laying in a Concord Speakeasy, and she wiped her hand on her pants.

“I know,” they huffed, rocking back on their heels. “I was just looking.”

“Well, don’t.” She tucked it into a back pocket, making a mental note to either toss it in the closest river or sell it first chance she got.

“It’s not like anything bad can happen from just looking at it, Cait. I wasn’t even thinking about it.”

“You better not have been. If you start doin’ that shite-”

“I know.” Somehow, their tone remained patient. “I promised I wouldn’t do chems, and I won’t, okay, Mom?”

The breath left her like she’d been sucker punched. For a moment, all she could do was stand there, eyes wide, unable to form a thought, much less words. Was it really like that? Had she really let things go this far? How long until she ended up like-

“I mean, uh, Cait.”

She glanced up to see their face beginning to turn red, and they ducked their head.

“Sorry, it just slipped out. I don’t, I mean, I didn’t-” They huffed. “Sorry. I know you don’t want to be a parent or anything, and I don’t mean that you should, I just...”

They prattled on nervously, as if trying to comfort both of them, words going right past Cait’s head. To think sole thought of her as a mother. She couldn’t have that responsibility. Her parents had been trusted with a child, and look how she’d turned out. She couldn’t take that risk, not with sole, not when at any moment some switch could flip inside her and she’d turn into the monsters that had raised her.

She’d known this was a bad idea, right from the start.

Codsworth: “I was thinking about putting another mod on my pistol today,” they said, hunched over the kitchen table. They were poking at some circuit board or another, something that they’d never have been allowed to touch before the war. He eyed the screwdriver in their hands warily.

“A fine idea,” he said, resigning himself once again to the fact that a new world meant a new way of life for mum and sir’s child. “Perhaps a larger magazine?”

They chewed their lower lip thoughtfully, tightening a screw. “I was thinking something more quick-eject, you know? Speed in battle and all.”

He couldn’t argue with that.

“The only reason I hadn’t done it was I needed some more adhesive. But since Carla stopped by again and she had some duct tape, we should be set.”

“As I recall, Miss Carla had more than enough for an extra set of sights as well. You asked me to remind you when you had enough material for a large scope, and by my measure, you should be there now.”

“Oh, yeah, I forgot about that.” They nodded thoughtfully. “We can get that old hunting rifle in working order again. Thanks, Dad.”

He froze. Dad? Him? No, that wasn’t right. But they’d said it so casually, as if they hadn’t even realized they were saying it. Surely, they couldn’t have forgotten sir already. They’d had years with him as their father. Such things couldn’t be forgotten so easily.

“Sole.” He tried not to make his tone sound warning.

They, too, seemed to have realized what they’d said, ears beginning to turn red. “Sorry, Codsworth. I was just working and not thinking about it, and-”

“It’s alright. Such slip-ups happen, after all! We’ll just have to make sure it doesn’t become a habit. After all, I’m simply the family Mr. Handy. Hardly a father. I wouldn’t want to take sir’s place.”

“Right, right. Sorry.”

“No need for apologies! We’ll simply call this a learning moment, for both of us.”

They sighed, “Sounds fair,” and returned to their work.

Curie: “You have your stimpaks, yes?”

They patted a pocket. “Got ‘em right here.”

“And your bandages?”

“In my bag.”

“Extra ammunition?”

They sighed. “Stop fussing, Mom. I told you, I’ve got everything I need.”

She pursed her lips and cocked her head to the side. That was certainly an... interesting choice of words.

“You see me as a maternal figure?”

“What?” They adjusted the straps on their bag, refusing to make eye contact.

“You referred to me as your mother. I am simply curious when you began to perceive me in such a role.”

“I don’t.” Their cheeks flushed, and they turned away further. “I didn’t call you ‘Mom,’ either.”

“Oh, but there is no need to be embarrassed! It is only natural for such things to happen. Your brain is still maturing, and as the primary provider of such maternal care in your life, it is predictable that you would-”

“Okay, okay, I’m leaving now.” They turned hastily to the door. “I’ll see you in a few days, Curie.”

“Certainly. Au revoir.”

As she watched their retreating back, she let herself consider the happy hum in her chest. Did she want to be sole’s mother? Was it that she wanted to be their mother specifically, or was there simply a general maternal instinct that was now surfacing? It was intriguing that such an instinct could exist in her, since she could never have children, but perhaps there was some lingering Ms. Nanny instinct that was affecting her. No matter what, it was certainly interesting.

If sole saw her as a maternal figure, she’d do her best to provide.

Danse: He found sole leaning against a wall, panting. There was blood splattered across their armor, gun dangling loosely from their fingers, but they were smiling, which was good enough for him.

“You look exhausted,” he said.

They laughed a little and smeared some of the blood from their cheek. “That was quite the fight. We should’ve brought some backup, huh?”

He glanced over at the scribe Quinlan had sent along, who had been of even less use than he’d expected, but decided to let that go and focus on sole. “I wouldn’t be so sure. You fared quite well on your own, and for your level of training your performance was impressive.”

Their eyes flicked over to meet his. “For real?”

“I would never lie to you, especially in your field evaluation. You’ve come a long way.”

He caught a hint of their smile before they ducked their head. “Thanks, Dad.”

He paused, sucking in a breath. While it wasn’t an uncommon mistake, it wasn’t one he was exactly willing to overlook. Still, best to approach things tactfully to avoid embarrassment for them. “What was that?”

They wouldn’t meet his eyes. “What was what?”

The scribe, tapping at the terminal, decided that was his moment to be useful. “You called Paladin Danse ‘Dad.’”

“No, I didn’t. I said, ‘Thanks, Danse.’”

He allowed himself a smile. “I didn’t know you saw me as a father figure, sole.”

“I don’t.” Still, their flush of embarrassment betrayed them.

He waved a hand through the air. “It’s alright, Knight. You wouldn’t be the first to refer to their sponsor as Mom or Dad, and I sincerely doubt you’ll be the last.”

Really, they were a good kid. Young initiates usually tended to find a substitute parental figure in the ranks, and of all sole’s options, he was glad it was him. He could keep them on the right track, make sure they didn’t go astray. With any luck, they could probably take his position someday.

All in all, this was a good thing for both of them.

Deacon: “Deeks, how does this jacket look on me?”

He glanced up from the hats in Fallon’s Basement to see sole tugging on the sleeves of a leather jacket. It was a bit rough around the edges, but it was just worn enough that he could believe it had seen some action. It wasn’t really their style, though; Agent Whisper tended more toward a softer kind of spy work, based more on charisma and less on punching people in the face.

“I like it,” he said, rocking back on his heels. “It’s a new look for you.”

“I was thinking I should add a more badass disguise to my collection. Try for that intimidation factor every once in a while, you know?”

He tossed the idea around a moment before agreeing. “We could make it work. It’d need practice, though, and some other accessories.”

“We could go get a bat from Mo while we’re here.”

“Now you’re talking. You put a couple nails in that sucker, and boom. You’re halfway to badass city right there. We’ll just have to teach you how to actually use it so you don’t stab yourself by accident.”

“Yeah, sure, but you’ll teach me, right, Dad?”

He nearly choked. Shit. Did sole know something he didn’t? No, that couldn’t be true. He’d never had kids, despite how much Barbara wanted them. Plus, sole had known their father. He’d seen the body, still half in cryo in 111.

That left the fact that sole had come to see him as a father figure, which left him in the awkward position of either shutting that down, probably hurting their feelings in the process, or just letting it slide. But could he even consider the latter? He couldn’t be a father, not in this state. He couldn’t lie every other word and still consider himself a decent parental influence, now could he?

Still, that voice in the back of his head nagged, “Barbara would want you to say yes. She thought you’d be a good dad.”

“Deeks?”

They looked at him quizzically, obviously still looking for an answer.

He sighed and, just this once, gave in. “Sure, kid. I’ll teach you how. It’s not that much different from their intended use, really...”

Desdemona: She always had a certain fondness for sole’s reports. She never got to hear much about the missions, just a quick affirmation of success and not much else. Sole, though, sole always told her a story, starting from the beginning and highlighting anything that they thought was interesting.

“But, you know, they’re just raiders,” they said, twenty-some minutes after they’d started. “In the end, H2 got where he needed to go. Highrise will take it from here.”

She smiled and ruffled their hair, making them laugh. “Good work, agent. You’re making all of us proud.”

“Thanks, Mom.”

They froze immediately, realizing what they had said, but their moment of embarrassment was cut short by Tom’s sigh of relief.

“Finally! You know how long we’ve been waiting for this? You took so long to join the club.”

Glory caught sole’s look of confusion and added, “Everyone calls Dez ‘Mom’ at some point. It’s basically a rite of passage.”

They looked to Dez for affirmation, and she could only nod.

“It’s true. It happens to everyone, sooner or later. I’m more than used to it by now.”

“You sure?” they asked, voice still hesitant.

“Positive. The only one that hasn’t is PAM, and she doesn’t have the capability.”

“Give her time,” Tom said. “She’ll get there.”

Gage: “You’re being stupid,” he snarled.

They glared back with surprising intensity. “You’re being a prick. You said yourself, I’m the Overboss. Things go how I want them to.”

How they’d managed that little trick, he didn’t know, but he hated it more and more every day. “Bein’ the Overboss doesn’t mean you don’t have to listen to anyone. You’re still new here. You better show me some respect.”

“Oh, fuck off, Dad,” they snapped.

That only pissed him off more. “What did you just call me, you little shit?”

They blinked, anger seeming to cool for a second. “Gage. What else?”

“No, you called me Dad.” His temper settled in return, hovering at a simmer. “Like this is some sort of family reunion or some shit.”

They snorted. “As if.”

“Don’t try and take it back now. I heard you.”

“You’re old and losing your hearing. Old fucker.”

His temper flared again, and despite that he knew they were baiting him, he couldn’t resist. “What was that?”

“What, I need to enunciate everything for you? Do you need your hearing aids, Grandpa?”

“What the fuck is a hearing aid?”

“What do you think, dumbass? It lets you hear better when you get old and lose your hearing. Like you.”

A knock on the door interrupted what he was going to say, and he snapped his mouth closed with irritation.

“Overboss?” The voice was muffled through the door. “Do you have a minute?”

“Yeah, just a sec.” They dusted their hands on their pants, anger instantly melting into a mask of cold determination. “Come on, Gage. Work to do.”

He huffed and resolved they would finish this later.

Hancock: He was always impressed with how well sole handled Goodneighbor. It went to show that they were much tougher than their age and pre-war softness let on; that this kid who looked like they’d never even handled a gun would shoot you without question if threatened. He’d seen how they’d handled Finn.

“Cold today,” they said, blowing into their hands. “This wind is killer. You wanna head inside and check up on things while I barter here?”

They gestured in the general direction of KLEO’s shop, and he chuckled.

“I dunno. Maybe the big, bad mayor better stick around to make sure you don’t get yourself into more trouble.”

They rolled their eyes. “Come on, Dad. I can handle myself, you know.”

They realized their mistake before he did, eyes widening, jaw snapping shut. He faltered, snappy words dying in his mouth before he got hold of himself again. Dad? Were they kidding? Their face said they weren’t.

“Woah, now.” He held up his hands. “It ain’t like that, kid. I’m not exactly the fatherly type, y’know. Cool uncle, maybe, but I ain’t anybody’s Dad.”

They huffed, clearly embarrassed, and diverted him by saying, “Bet you’ve been more than one somebody’s Daddy, though.”

“That’s more like it.” He nudged them in KLEO’s direction. “You go do your shopping, and I’ll go make sure they ain’t burnin’ down my town while I’m away.”

“Sure. If I’m not here when you get back, I’ll be in Hotel Rexford.”

“Sounds fine. Get me somethin’ nice while you’re at it, huh?”

“Alright, but I’m charging you a convenience fee.”

Content that they were back on the same page, he agreed and went to find Fahrenheit.

MacCready: “Your fever’s gone down a little.” He rested a hand against their forehead. “Seems you’re gonna pull through.”

They smiled a little, eyes still hazy with sickness and medicine. Soon, they’d be on their feet again, he hoped.

“I bet you’re a good dad, Mac,” they said. “Duncan must really love you, huh?”

He let out a sigh. Sole had been strangely emotional ever since they got sick, which had annoyed him at first, but lately he’d just come to accept it. After all, there wasn’t much he could do about it, was there?

“Jeez, I don’t even know if he remembers me. It’s been a while since I got to see him.”

“He remembers you. I mean, I remember my dad, and he’s been dead for a couple hundred years now, I guess.” They laughed a little, as if they’d said something funny. “But you should go see him. Take a break. I’ll be fine without you.”

“Nah, we’ll go together. After all, he’ll probably want to meet you.”

“You think?”

“Yeah. He’ll probably see you as some kind of adopted older sibling or something. You’ll get along.”

They exhaustion in their laugh betrayed them. “Sure, whatever you say, Dad.”

There was a wryness in their voice, an almost mocking note that told him they’d meant it as a joke, but long after they’d fallen asleep, he sat at their bedside, watching them. He’d thought he was joking, too, but now that he was along with his thoughts, he had to wonder. Maybe he did want them to meet Duncan, and maybe he did want them to get along like siblings. Could he do that? Was that wrong?

He sighed and rose from his chair. No use worrying about it now. Sole had probably been joking about him going to DC anyway. After all, there was work to be done here.

They definitely weren’t going anywhere until they were better, though. For now, he had to focus on making sure they pulled through.

Maxson: He watched them across the table as they studied the map of the Commonwealth spread between them. It was a crude battle plan, mostly consisting of bottlecaps and buttons, but it was enough for them to discuss. He found he was regularly impressed by their knowledge in this area; in many ways, they reminded him of himself at that age.

“What if we swung south?” They pushed three bottlecaps across the table. “The way C.I.T is set up makes anything but a direct assault difficult, but we could try to split their forces, or at least their fire.”

He hummed, considering. “You’re still assuming we can’t assemble Prime in time.”

“Right. I’m concerned they’ll force our hand before we’re ready. We need to be prepared for that.”

“If you hope to split their fire, we’ll have to split our forces. That means we’ll need more men overall and be pulling more away from the airport, leaving us vulnerable.”

They scrunched their face as they thought about it. “You’re right, but in these circumstances we’re already at a disadvantage, don’t you think? We’re outgunned and outmanned.”

“Both of which can be overcome by outplanning them.” He leaned back in his chair. “What you lack in physical strength can often be overcome with mental acuity.”

They glanced away from the diorama to look at him. “That’s pretty good advice. Nice one, Dad.”

He felt his heart skip a beat. They had already returned to the diorama, now considering the forces around the airport, but he suddenly couldn’t focus. Sole considered him a father figure. Did he mean that much to them that he was someone they looked to for guidance, not just on the Prydwen, but in all aspects of their life? To be a father to them, to be able to guide them, was more than he could have ever asked for.

He cleared his throat. “I believe you mean ‘Elder,’ Knight.”

“Hm?” They looked up again.

“You referred to me as something else. I’m reminding you that the proper title is ‘Elder.’“

“Oh. My apologies, Elder. It won’t happen again.”

He sighed. “I ask that you’re careful around the others. That is all.”

They nodded, mind clearly already on other things.

Nick: He watched them poke around Earl Sterling’s apartment, careful eyes taking everything in. He lingered by the doorway, letting them do their thing, curious to see how it would play out. He was taking a bit of a risk letting them work the case, but he figured he could clean up any mistakes they made along the way.

Mistake number one was probably letting them pick up all those beers, but he figured as long as he watched them sell them all, it would be fine.

“Aha!”

Triumphant, they emerged from where they had crouched on the floor, brandishing a piece of paper.

“Find somethin’?” He flicked his cigarette to the side, nudging it out with the toe of his boot.

“Some sort of receipt, I think. Facial reconstruction with Dr. Crocker. Appointment date... should have been sometime around his disappearance.”

“That means ol’ Doc could’ve been the last to see Earl alive.” He nodded thoughtfully. “Good work, kid.”

They flushed with pride and perhaps a bit of embarrassment at the praise. “Thanks, Dad.”

He raised an eyebrow, hoping they would realize their mistake on their own, but they were busy tucking the receipt into their bag. It seemed as though they hadn’t noticed at all, and after a moment of thought, he decided not to mention it. After all, there was no need to embarrass them. They’d realize what they’d said eventually.

Plus, it was kind of nice, in a way.

Piper: “You’ve got ink on your face.”

Sole glanced up from the freshly-printed edition of the paper, fingers wandering to their cheekbone. “Here?”

“Little to the left.”

“Here?”

“Less to the left.”

“Here?”

“Oh, just hold still.”

She leaned over, wiping the ink off their cheek with her thumb. It smeared a little bit, but was a marked improvement, and she scrubbed the rest away with the heel of her glove.

“There you go. Good as new.”

They nodded and returned their attention to the paper. “Thanks, Mom.”

They seemed to realize immediately, eyes widening, and Piper felt a sharp pain in her chest.

“Aw, Blue, you know I’m not really...”

They visibly deflated. “I know. I’m sorry, Piper.”

“Not like that.” She leaned forward, putting her coffee to the side. “I’m not upset by it. I’m just not that kind of person, that’s all. I’m like your older sister, not your Mom. I wouldn’t want to replace her. It’s not a big deal, just, you know, get it in your head.”

“Older sister?” That seemed to perk them up a bit, and she smiled.

“Yeah. You’re still part of the family, Blue. Just not like that.”

They smiled. “I guess I’ll take it.”

Preston: The first sign was always the quiet. Sole wasn’t likely to stay quiet for too long; they were always listening to the radio, humming or singing along. When it was quiet for too long, that usually meant they’d either wandered off without telling him, which was never good, or they’d fallen asleep somewhere.

Sign two was the glow of a lantern at the workbench. It wasn’t uncommon for them to work late into the night, but that was always accompanied by the sound of work: the screech of metal on metal, the hum of an engine, the rattling of loose hardware in its drawers.

Quiet and light together meant they’d fallen asleep at the workbench. Again.

“Sole.” Gently, he shook their shoulder. “Come on. You can’t sleep here.”

They sat up, bleary-eyed, a sheet of orange plastic cut from a pumpkin stuck to their cheek. Almost unseeing, they looked up at him with a sleepy, questioning hum.

“Come on.” Gently, he pulled at their arm.

“Sorry, Dad.” They rubbed their eyes, rising on unsteady feet. “I’m going.”

A smile crept to his face as he led them across the Sanctuary street to their home, making sure they got settled. Almost instantly, they were asleep again, long hours of hard living catching up to them all at once. Quietly, he closed the door behind him.

It was too good to be true. They were just tired, and mistook him for their father in the dark. But still, a part of him wanted to believe that it was possible. Maybe he could be a father to sole. He could show them how to make it here, in this unfamiliar world, and support them as they grew into the General he knew they could be.

Maybe, just maybe, they would let him.

X6: He watched them pace back and forth in front of the door, coat tails swirling with every pivot. They adjusted their lapels for the fifth time, sighed, and glanced around for a clock.

“It’s only four twenty-five,” he said. “You’ve still got twenty-five minutes.”

They sighed and sank heavily into a chair. “Are you sure?”

“Positive.”

They groaned and dropped their head onto the table. “You said it was thirty minutes to go, like, an hour ago.”

“Five minutes ago.”

“Doesn’t feel like it.”

He set his gun on the table with a sigh and set his sunglasses beside them. “If you keep worrying about it, you’ll only work yourself up more, and the time will seem to pass slower. Your best move would be to get a cup of coffee and relax.”

“I can’t relax.” They leaned back in their chair. “It’s my first meeting as the director. Half of the Institute already hates me because I’m so young, so if I mess this up I’ll be out on the street by dawn. This is no time to relax.”

“If you don’t relax, you’ll be more likely to make a mistake.”

“I know, but it’s easier said than done, Dad.”

He blinked. At first, he wasn’t sure if he’d heard them properly, but his hearing was beyond satisfactory. If he’d heard it, they’d said it, but that didn’t mean anything.

“Case in point. You’re upset, you make mistakes. Like that.”

They sank their head into their hands. “You’re right. I’ll- I’ll get some coffee. Sorry.”

“There is no need to apologize. Humans make mistakes, after all.”

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chronicillnesscaneffoffplease · 3 years

Text

Being chronically ill in uni is just…

Spends forever dithering about the “introduction email” you have to send your professors at the start of semester, outlining your accomodations/EAP from disability services and the fact that you are always sick™️

Feels weird about the fact that that is sometimes their first impression of you (esp. if it’s an academic who is well respected in your field who you’ll hopefully work alongside some day 😐)

Alternatively, having professors who taught you before you got ill for another class and wondering if they think differently/less of you now

Requests extension and feels weird about how much to put on the request form. Also extension request should take 10 min, actually takes hours.

Feels weird about extensions and special exam accomodations (like extra time) in general.

Feels weird about academic achievement. Especially if I do well when I got an extension.

Tries to discretely take meds during class.

Attempts not to have my super loud joint pop when I’m studying on the silent floor of the library.

Meets other chronically ill students/academics in later stages of their academic careers and feels reassured that it’ll all work out somehow. That being chronically ill won’t hold be back from the career I want.

Has no idea how much to say to classmates and friends.

Plans doctors appointments around class to try to minimise clashes. This is hard when you don’t know your schedule for the next semester when booking in 6-month follow-ups with your specialists. It’s also hard in general when your option is take something with a class clash or wait another three months to see them. But health has to come first.

Attempts to hide the outward signs of brain fog and pain.

Feels really invisible, but knows I’d hate being visibly ill and having to deal with people being weird because of it.

Is the person to go to for information about accomodations/deferred assessment or exams/ medical withdrawal.

Has a professor who is nice-ish but weirdly anal about class attendance and emailing her about stuff. I think she’s going to be a bit tricky. It’s a clause in my EAP that allowances have to be made if I miss class occasionally due to my illness, and considering I’m hoping I’ll have my upper and lower endoscopy scheduled during the second half of the semester I’ll be off a few days recuperating- I’m pretty foggy after anaesthesia. But I don’t want to have to deal with her going “just ask your classmates about what you missed”- I shouldn’t have to disclose to them just to get the class information, when that’s your job as a teacher and it’s an accomodation outlined in my EAP. I’ll just have to unleash disability services on her if she’s being weird about it. But already not looking forward to that 😓

#postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome #chronic illness #invisible illness #university #academia #in honour of me making it through the first week of the new semester #have these chronically ill in uni vibes that have been my constant companion for the past few weeks #oh! the professor who I didn’t know and I was particularly 😐 about was actually so chill and it was legit the best response I’ve ever gotten #his reply was so nice #🥺🥺🥺#comfie place to sit #escape hatch #I had his class yesterday ans hes a chaotic woke dad #it’s gonna be such a fun class #werewolf is a woLF MAN!

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hiraemy · 3 years

Text

Lumine and The Goblet of Fire

Word count: roughly 2.7k for this part

disclaimer: first of all, this au was heavily inspired by @majunju 's incredible art! she made chilumi as beauxbatons and durmstrang students and my brain went brrr so i had to write something for them??

both Genshin Impact and Harry Potter are not created by me. However, i took the liberty to mix a lot of concepts in this AU, so have that in mind when reading.

for sake of plot, lets pretend that Durmstrang is located in Russia. Lumine, Paimon and Aether are the only ones from Beauxbatons, while the rest are from Hogwarts unless mentioned otherwise. All the characters that have adult models, like Jean, Lisa, Kaeya and Diluc are presumed to be adults, with Childe being the only exception. Also, all the characters that use children or teens’ models are students, with a few exceptions like Venti and Scaramouche [mihoyo pls stop giving us confusing ages and body models i never asked you anything]

(please, have in mind that english is like, my third language, if you notice a spelling or grammar error, feel free to message me!)

Act One: Lumine and her stupid impulse control

“I’m going to put my name on it.” Aether broke the silence suddenly

“What...? No! Oh god, I expected that from Paimon, but you’re just as bad as her!”

There were a lot of things that Lumine hated.

Open shoes. A very specific type of silk-flower based perfume(Aether once tried it because he wanted to impress a girl, but it ended stinking for two weeks straight). History of Magic. Condensed slime— those that Paimon loved, but she couldn’t even see it without being sick—, potions that took more than one single day to brew. But the worst, certainly was—

“C’mon, Lumine! You’re just afraid that you’re going to get your ass kicked in the tournament!”

...when Aether was being dumb.

“No, I’m not!” She countered quickly, ignoring the way Aether smirked like he knew exactly what buttons to push. Actually, it wasn't that far from reality, if she was being honest. She eyed the paper carelessly torn from his notebook that had his name as if she could burn it only with the power her heavy gaze. “You’re being dumb! Are you deaf or something? DIdn’t you hear them saying that the Triwizard Tournament has a high death count?”

“Paimon is sure it isn’t that bad!” The half-fairy smiled at her, eyes twinkling in greed and mischief. Lumine narrowed her eyes at the way she happily jumped in her steps, staying afloat in air for more time than it was normal to common humans “After all, they're opening it again, right? I’m certain that the ministry has done something to make it safer!”

“You’re the one to talk! You don’t care about anything other than the mora!” Lumine was quick to shut her down, sending a glare that didn’t affect any of the two. In that moment, the three of them entered the hall which had the Goblet of Fire in its full glory, a bunch of Hogwarts students surrounding it like curious birds, eager to know which students were applying for the tournament.

“Have a bit of faith, wont’ya?” Aether smiled boyishly, flicking his wand from his sleeve and hitting it slightly at the top of his head, also giving a wave to a bunch of ravenclaw girls that awed at his presence. He continued in his confident stride, each step leaving him closer to the Goblet “Arent I the best of our school when it comes to Charms? Besides, I have my beautiful, great and awesome sister which of course, will give her full support and use her full knowledge to—”

“Shut up, you know it's not that what I’m concerned with!” Lumine hissed, grabbing her brother’s wrist and tugging, lowering her voice. In the corner of her eye, she saw the Dumstrang guys eyeing her, Aether and Paimon like wolves, ready to pounce on them. “You heard the rumors, right? Please, don’t tell my you’re that reckless-”

“What rumors?” Paimon squeaked, her eyes going wide for a fraction.

“The Fatui. You know them, right? The Tsaritsa’s pawns.” She whispered, narrowing her golden eyes and not daring to let her guard down when she was in the same room as the Durmstrang and Hogwarts students. “There are rumours that they are at the move. Some say that her personal minions, The Harbingers, are also involved in some dark scheme around Hogwarts.”

“Nah. You’re just being paranoid, there’s no way someone of that caliber would be here" Aether raised his eyebrow and Lumine wanted to tug her hair out in pure frustration. “Besides, it’s not like I'm some helpless dead weight. I know I already said it before, but I’m really confident it’s going to be fine.”

“Aether is right, Paimon thinks you should relax!” The white-haired girl smiled brightly, nodding her head to herself. “Or even better, you could enter the tournament too! It would make our chances of representing Beauxbatons even higher!”

“Don’t you ever listen to me? Why would I—” Before she could complete her nagging, Aether quickly threw his paper into the Goblet, the flames flickering aggressively before consuming his entry. Her mouth fell open in disbelief, but the crowd around them didn’t seem to notice her reaction as they gave a round of applause for her twin.

“What, Lumi? Are you afraid of losing?” He made a point of taunting her with the most infuriating shit-eating grin he had “Or… Maybe you’re not up to the challenge…? Y’know, it’s really okay if you feel too scared to face some bad guys—”

Ah. Right.

Aether knew how much she loathed being underestimated.

“Shut up!”

"Aww, there is no need to be this angry! I'm your big brother, of course I'll know when you feel too scared to put your name on the Goblet! It's okay to feel insecure, and I think it is better for you to not enter as you might not be able to—"

The crowd cheered again as the Goblet of Fire consumed another entry from Beauxbatons Academy.

“Lumi—”

“Shut up, im still mad at you.”

Aether smiled sheepishly under his sister’s heavy glare and Paimon giggled. Lumine also sent her a heated look, making the half-fairy squeal childishly.

“Luuuuumi!” Aether whined, making her sigh. “Don’t be mad at me! You were the one who put your name on the Goblet, right?”

“Don’t act like you’re innocent! You know damn well what you did—” She hissed like a annoyed cat. Aether pouted and tried to trap his sister into a hug, but she slapped him away on pure instinct.

“Chill, chill! At least we’re getting a feast tonight, right? Not like we don’t eat well in any of the other nights, but a guy told me that Hogwarts’s food is really amazing on these special days!” Aether pleaded, the bright grin revealing how amused he was with his sister’s grumpiness.

“Free food is great, but free great food is even better! There is absolutely no way you can be mad after you eat, right?” Paimon tried, and Lumine let out an even more tired sigh. “Besides, a lot of students applied for Beauxbatons! What are the chances of you being chosen, especially since you don’t actually want to do it?”

“Shut up Paimon, you just jinxed it,” Lumine scolded half heartedly, tucking her notebook under her arm.

The bunch of Hogwarts students were a handful. Even with the merged classes to accomodate the Beauxbatons and Durmstrand delegations, it seemed like the hosting school’s own students were never going to be used to see them in the classrooms and corridors of the castle. Everywhere they went, their blue uniforms made the crowds stare them down with admiration, suspicion, curiosity or even anger in some cases.

Aether and her were somehow getting even more stares than the other Beauxbatons students. Her twin shined under the spotlight, offering a gentle smile to the brave girls who tried to talk to him sometimes —how strange it was to see her brother gathering a bunch of fangirls—, but she felt uncomfortable under the attention.

“You’re too tense, Lumi” Her brother chimed, as if he could read her thoughts. His arms were carelessly fold behind his head and he shot her a gentle smile. “No one is going to bite your head off if you smile a bit, right? Just relax!”

“Now, the moment you all have been waiting for...! The Champion Selection!” The Headmaster, Barbatos announced, his voice carrying in the big hall and being able to shush all chatter. With a swoosh of his hands, the lights on the walls dimmed down, leaving the Goblet of Fire as the main attraction.

Lumine felt a shudder in her spine, knowing that despite seeming like a simple gesture, the skill level required to perform a wandless and also wordless spell was higher than everything could even imagine herself doing. Deep inside her gut, the respect she had for the Hogwarts Headmaster was raised to the roof, especially since his appearance was nothing but of a kind and carefree young boy.

Below the table, her hands were connected in a silent prayer. Her luck couldn’t be that bad, could it?

If everything went well, neither her or Aether would be chosen.

“Mr. Alberich, would you like to do the honors?” Barbatos asked a blue-haired man, who Lumine vaguely recalled being a member of the Ministry of Magic named Kaeya. As he nodded and approached the Goblet, she felt her shoulders getting even more tenser.

The flames flickered aggressively, but Kaeya didn’t seem to be intimidated by it. He slowly extended his hand, the fire spiking suddenly and changeling from blue to a menacing pink as it spat a piece of paper.

“From Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, Albedo!”

The crowd— majority being from Hogwarts itself, the hosting school— cheered loudly, the most excited ones being from Ravenclaw. A boy dressed in blue rose from his seat, his ash-blonde hair styled in a braid at the back of his head and teal eyes immediately catching Lumine’s attention. He quickly went to the front and was guided by one of the teachers to a backroom, disappearing from everyone’s view. Mr. Alberich waited until the cheers died down to announce the next Champion, the flames shaking as if the own Goblet was impatient. Finally, with a burst of green, another paper flew into his hands

“From Durmstrang Institute, Childe!”

This time was the turn of the students seated at the end of Slytherin’s table to scream, a lot of figures rising at once and making it almost impossible to pinpoint who exactly was Childe. However, Lumine could see how a tall guy with a slim build was receiving some strong pats on his back, his messy ginger hair being attacked by another short guy who was too enthusiastic. His eyes still glinted with pride and excitement, even if the neatness of his red uniform was entirely ruined by his peers.

She clapped politely, lowkey still distressed about the next Champion. She was suddenly startled when the guy, who was definitely Childe as he finally went to the front, made unexpected eye contact with her. His eyes lingered a few seconds more than she would be comfortable to admit, making her even more anxious.

Mr. Alberich approached the Goblet again for the third name. For some reason, Lumine thought that the man was being slow on purpose, or that the Goblet was being too indecisive, as the flames flickered between blue, yellow and orange aggressively for a few seconds. Everyone else seemed to notice this too, a few curious whispers breaking out between the students. Kaeya narrowed his eyes and then, not a second too late, the Goblet spat the last entry.

“From Beauxbatons Academy…”

Her stomach dropped and she thought she would throw up on the spot.

“...Lumine!”

Aether screamed the loudest, right beside her ears. Paimon came to a close second though, shaking her by her shoulders like a ragdoll as if there wasn't a tomorrow.

"Lumi! Lumi! What are you waitin' for? Go to the front!" She got up, feeling her stomach do all the kinds of flips and lowkey dizzy. Her head couldn't even register properly the cheers, her mind too busy shouting all the bad words she knew at her mental images of Paimon and her brother.

She took in a deep inhale, keeping her breath until she was in the front of the whole hall, right in front of the teachers. Lumine saw the Beauxbatons Headmaster’s eyes take her in with slight tension in his slender fingers and she couldn’t help but to feel out of place.

"Mr. Zhongli…" She greeted quietly at the man, his tiny nod being the only thing to indicate his acknowledgment. He quickly led her into the backroom she saw both Champions go before, his brown cape flying elegantly behind him with every step.

"Miss Lumine, what a pleasant surprise… I must admit I didn't expect you to put your name in the Goblet." Zhongli started as a matter of fact, even if his eyebrow had a curious arch, as if expecting her to explain this turn of events.

“Yeah, neither did I, if I’m being honest.” She sighed, her hand wrapping around her stomach to hopefully help with the nausea and anxiousness

“Be assured, I’m sure the Goblet of Fire made an excellent choice for our school.” Zhongli said, his voice acquiring a softer tone, probably noticing how the blonde fidgeted a lot. Lumine clenched her fists, taking a deep breath. The man didn’t say anything else, and both of them reached a room decorated with Hogwarts’ trophies from the many tournaments held before.

She immediately saw Childe in a corner, poking a shiny statue that seemed to react at his mean touches, his eyes shining with some kind of rush and impatience she really didn’t want to explore any further. A tall woman, with elegant white hair that reached at her waist and ice blue eyes, slapped his hand harshly, freeing the poor statue from the Dumstrang’s clutches. Lumine didn’t know who exactly this woman was— It was common knowledge that Durmstrang Institute’s headmaster couldn’t be bored to attend the tournament personally—, but she could assume safely that she was at least a teacher.

With his distraction taken forcefully from him, Childe finally seemed to notice Lumine, turning on his heels with hands on his pockets. The witch felt another chill, incredibly uncomfortable with his heavy gaze analysing every feature, but she prayed to every god that she could at least maintain the stoic features she was quite infamous for. His blue eyes stopped carefully to analyze her face— a fact that she pretended to not notice by looking away—, with a satisfied(?) smirk appearing on his face that screamed bad intentions.

It took more than she would like to admit to pretend she wasn't the least affected by his heavy gaze on the side of her face. Her arms crossed around her face, her hand resting discreetly above the hidden pocket in her blazer that had her wand. Golden eyes searched the room again for another distraction, until they landed on the figure of the ash blonde boy chosen for Hogwarts.

He was pretty, no one could deny that, but even if he had those stupid charming eyes of his, there still was something about him that really threw her off. She couldn't exactly pinpoint it, but Lumine was sure that Albedo had some kind of deep dark secret kept hidden in himself. Was the whole Harbinger thing making her paranoid?

Before she could answer her own question, Barbatos entered the room with other Hogwarts teached in tow. The three of them— her, Childe and Albedo— came closer to the fireplace where everyone gathered, eyeing the teachers and the Headmaster who stood in front of them in a neutral position, except for mr. Zhongli, who was behind her, and the mysterious woman she supposed was Childe's teacher behind him. Occupying the vacant space, a pretty woman immediately went to stand at Albedo's back. She had light-brown hair and alluring green eyes, but the most iconic feature was her curvy body accentuated by her purple dress.

If she had to guess, she would assume that she was Ravenclaw's house head. Technically, Barbatos had to be a neutral party, as the hosting Headmaster, even if everyone knew his favouritism towards his own school.

"Well, now that we're back here, far from prying eyes, guess I can finally drop the formalities!" The small man suddenly said with a big smile, catching her off guard. In the corner of eye, she saw that Childe had a similar reaction, but Albedo seemed exasperated. "I must say, this year's competition is going to be tough. But I'm sure you three will be able to handle it just fine, hehe!"

Oh god. Was Barbatos like this in real life…? Suddenly, the previous mighty and ruthless image she had of the Headmaster was shattered. All the books talked about him as one of the seven great wizards of the last war, so she expected something more… Aggressive?

"Venti, please." For a greater surprise, Mr. Zhongli seemed used to his attitude, poorly hiding his smile behind a fist.

"Yeah, right. The Triwizard Tournament" He forced a cough, hardening his expression and straightening his posture. "From now on, Mister Childe, Mister Albedo and Miss Lumine will face difficult trials to determine which one of you is the greater wizard. I should also mention that the prize will be eternal glory and ten million mora, of course."

"We already warned you before, but let me repeat it. If you don't take these challenges seriously, you'll probably be squashed to the ground." Mr. Alberich stated bluntly.

"Is there a chance of dying?" Childe asked, the way his head tilted indicating that he wasn't asking just because he was scared.

"There were a few casualties some years before, but this time, the Ministry is making sure to bring some precautionary methods." He answered cooly, his expression not changing the slightest. "That being said, we still stand on the recommendation that you take extreme caution."

He didn't deny it. The fact didn't pass above any of the students' minds, Lumine tensing her shoulders, Childe grinning madly and Albedo pressing his lips.

"Anyway, about the first task," Barbatos took the lead again, a satisfied smirk on his lips. "The three of you will face an ability challenge. In other words, you'll be facing magic combat right from the start."

"Against each other?" Lumine asked, not wanting to fight Childe even in her dreams. He exhaled some mad, maybe sociopath vibes if she looked at it from a certain angle, and she certainly didn't want to test her theory.

"Nope," Barbatos said easily, tilting his head in fake innocence "Where's the fun in that? I can't say anything else, since it's supposed to be a secret until the trial— Ah, by the way, about the test, it will be on November 24th. You have two weeks to prepare, so have fun!"

Forget every good thing she had thought of him before. He was a Madman. She was surrounded by a bunch of madmans.

Oh dear lord.

#genshin impact #genshin #genshin lumine #paimon #aether #genshin childe #Chilumi #fiction #wow look at me again #brain go brrrr #getting into another fandom be like #brainstorming for 30 hours #and then regretting all life choices #aether is dumb but we love him anyway #paimon is a half fairy sorry i dont make the rules

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pokemonthingsandstuff · 3 years

Text

Cara Liss fled the region about four years ago, and traveled around the world, screwing up so many fossils, before she was eventually apprehended in Unova. Thank goodness. Most of her creations had a life span of a few weeks, but the ones that did make it for a while have had some special accomodations made to make their life less awful.

We have not properly restored all the fossils yet, but we're making good progress on the Draco- and -zolt fossils so far.

If you do have one of Liss' fossil monsters, then I really hope you're an expert. Here's some tips for non-experts, a few for each of them.

Dracozolt: This one is an herbivore who can generate a lot more power than it used to be able to. It's the mismatched tail that has most of the muscles that Dracozolt uses to generate electricity, so the -zolt fossil will be a lot stronger than it used to be and it will be very confused by this. The tail is also generally just powerful, and might knock you over if you get hit. Also, when I say herbivore, do not assume like standard bird herbivore. See, the -zolt fossil is a carnivore, but the Draco- fossil sure is. Since most of it's organs are in the lower half, it has to eat plants, even though that's not what the -zolt fossil is supposed to do. You're pretty much going to have to feed it a specialized formula, like a baby. Not to mention, the -zolts were social critters, so this thing is going to want friends. Luckily, Dracozolt is considered to be the least screwed up of the Galarian fossils. It still needs help getting up if it falls on it's lower half, though.

Arctozolt: This one is constantly shivering, slow, and unhappy. Luckily, both halves are predators, even if they eat different things. They do seem to both be able to eat the Arrokuda line, which is pretty good. We've actually made some progress on learning that the Arcto- line is likely an ancestor of Lapras, so that's a good thing. Unfortunately, this means this thing is even more of a social creature than Dracozolt. Now, it does have a tendency to accidentally freeze and shock everything. Keep an eye out for that. It is also constantly sick. Like, it has a ruined immunity system, meaning it's pretty much permanently sick. It has tiny arms, so it can't do much with them, meaning you'll have to assist them with near everything. You can't really fix the constant cold, either. You can't warm it up without melting it, but they do seem to like scarves on their upper half.

Dracovish: This one is generally considered to be the worst off of the bunch, and also my first ever fossil pokemon. It doesn't even have a proper digestive tract! You literally have to feed it the same stuff you feed Dracozolt. It can't breathe unless it's underwater and it's got fish guts stuffed inside a bit of an empty cavity of a tail. Not to mention, the spikes on the inside of it's torso is a real problem. These things aren't meant to be on land, since they can't breath on land. They're water-breathers, they have gills. They require a lot of care, seeing as they can't even excrete on their own. It takes a lot of surgery to right some of the biological wrongs, but even then, it still can't breathe without water. These ones have the shortest lifespans of any fossil pokemon, due to the fact that they are literal biological nonsense. They do enjoy living and seeing things, but they are mostly in constant pain. They're stunningly happy for how screwed up they are, with their lack of limbs and organs. They aren't easy to care for, but at least they're happy.

Arctovish: This one is not immediately noticeable for how messed up it is. However, its head is upside-down and it really needs to be underwater. Like, this is a pokemon that consists of two pokemon that need to be underwater. It also has breathing problems, which is a problem once again. At least it eats fish pokemon, any kind. It does freeze prey, and prefer live-feeding as well. They have a definite preference for cold water, as in that's the only place they can survive. Since their gills are a bit screwed up and partially frozen, they can't really stop moving or they will perish. It's a tough thing, yes, but it pretty much never stops moving. It can't eat outside of the water, and it isn't fast. These ones are hard to care for, but care is pretty straightfoward.

I had a Dracovish of my own when I was 10, my sweet Scylla. It turns out, it's not hard to trick a bunch of kids from age 10 to 13 with a cool idea like fossil restoration. Scylla died three years ago, unfortunately. There was a lot of health complications. The Galarian fossils weren't meant to be, so I'm glad Cara Liss was finally taken down. Fossils are hard enough to take care of, but ours are harder than most. Good luck, for those of you who still have Galarian fossils.

#I FINALLY FIGURED OUT HOW READ MORE WORKS #anyways on to the normal tags #pokemon headcanons #pokemon handling #fossil pokemon #galarian fossils #dracozolt #arctozolt #dracovish #arctovish

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thehaemanthus · 3 years

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Our Savaged Souls

Trying out a new thing of posting the full chapter on tumblr. You can read from chapter one one AO3 (unless it’s not your thing, and in that case you can send me an ask and I’ll be like! sure! I love to be accomodating! I’ll post full chapters on tumblr :) )

Feyre Archeron is born under the new Wall separating human lands from the Spring Court- her home. She hunts in her forest, forms a friendship with the High Lord's third son, and is introduced to his friend. Then it all goes wrong.

Chapter 6

Tamlin soon forgets his ire about the Suriel. Or at least, he pushes it down far enough and eventually bounces back, dragging her out on more adventures. He manages to swing by for a few hours of her birthday party, and then is required at home for much of the spring. By the time the summer rolls around, Feyre can tell he’s eager to be away from family and make up for lost time.

The latest outing is a jaunt to a pool of liquid starlight, one that Feyre has visited only a handful of times. It’s one of Tamlin’s favorite places, she knows, and she felt the honor in the first invitation.

Her linen dress brushes just past her knees, only half of her hair pulled back in anticipation of a relaxing afternoon spent lounging in the shade and wading in the water. No boots or tight braid needed today. Her contribution to the picnic is a batch of scones, some ruby-red cherries, raspberry preserves, and roasted almonds. With her bounty and dress, Feyre decides to winnow rather than pick through the forest.

Feyre expects it to be a small party, but she does not know how small it actually is until she arrives.

There are two people there. Tamlin and Rhysand.

Of course. Rhysand. Of course he is here.

“You managed to make it on time!” Tamlin greets her with an enthusiastic kiss on the cheek and takes her basket from her hands, retreating to add it to their pile of food and blankets. The space already looks inviting, dappled in shade. Sweating bottles of lemonade and ice water peak out from a wicker basket full of white porcelain plates with painted primrose borders and crystal glasses. A partially wrapped loaf of bread and hard cheese rests on top, along with a sharp knife and a bounty of fresh fruits.

Feyre scowls. “I was late one time, Tam, it’s not funny anymore.” She glances at Rhysand. It would be impossible to pretend he’s not there. It’s just the three of them. It would be rude to not say anything. It should not be difficult at all to just greet him. She wrangles her expression into something pleasant. “Hello, Rhysand.”

“Feyre darling,” he smirks. “I thought you were calling me Rhys now?”

She actually turns a bit red and fumbles. Thankfully, Tamlin’s big mouth saves her. “When did that happen?”

“A while ago.” Rhysand reclines on one of the picnic blankets, lounging like a cat. He waves a hand. “Won’t you join us, Feyre?”

There’s really no way to refuse. She takes a seat, folding her legs under her. “It’s hard to break a habit. I’ve been calling you Rhysand for a long time now.”

“I’ll have to keep reminding you, then,” he says as he roots through a picnic basket, plucking out a tin of cookies. “Want one?”

“Thank you, Rhys,” she stresses his name, plucking one of the cookies from his hand.

He smiles at her, and the tension seems to melt away.

Has she always looked at him like this, or did the Suriel trigger something in her soul that flipped the world upside down? Feyre wonders how long this feeling, this awareness of him has been growing in her heart, encroaching so slowly and naturally that she has not noticed until someone drew her attention to the blossoming.

For a child of the Night Court, Rhys looks good in the sun. She has always known he is beautiful, but something has changed. As they chat and nibble on the picnic, Feyre observes him. There is something fuller in his laughs, more playful in his smirks today. It would be impossible to forget that he is an Heir— powerful radiates from his body and he approaches every conversation and confrontation with arrogance. He is still guarded. But if his true soul is an impenetrable fortress, Feyre thinks they’ve passed through the gates of one or two battlements.

The sun beats down on them, stronger now that the world has moved and positioned itself in summer. The Day Court is absolutely sweltering, Rhys informs them, and there’s been some problems with heat sickness in Summer. In Spring, Feyre keeps an extra canteen of water and takes frequent breaks when romping about.

Sweat gathers at her brow and pools on her upper lip. Eventually, sipping cool drinks and relaxing in the shade is paltry comfort.

“I’m going for a dip,” she stands. “Anyone want to join?”

The males scramble up after her. It’s some work to unlace her stays, so they end up shucking their clothes and splashing into the pond before her. Feyre finds herself sighing in relief when they don’t look twice or offer to help. It would be well meaning from them, her friends, if not a little playful and flirty. But if Rhys offered…

Mother above. Surely it should take her longer to fall?

“Are you coming?” Tamlin calls from the water, flicking some water in her direction. It glitters like diamonds where it lands on the grass and dirt. It might not actually be water, but Feyre has never known what else to call it.

She scowls. “It takes a little longer for me.” She toes off her slippers, wiggling her feet in the cool grass. In the past, Feyre hasn’t had trouble with stripping down to almost nothing and jumping into lakes and rivers. Now, she keeps her chemise on and tries not to think too hard about it. After tossing her hair pins on the blanket, she wades in.

The pond is cool and refreshing. Sunlight almost blinds her as it bounces off the surface. Feyre glides through the water, slowly acclimating herself. When she dunks her head under and emerges, the liquid starlight clings to her lashes and makes the world look brighter and chaotic. She swipes a hand at her eyes and blinks to clear her vision.

Tamlin floats on his back, golden hair floating around his head like a halo. Rhys lazily swims a circuit around the pond, much like she was. Feyre treads in place for a moment before floating a bit closer to Rhys.

Sensing her presence, he surfaces. Feyre’s breath catches. She’s sure he reads something incriminating on her face, but before he can speak she opens her mouth. “This pond suits you.”

“Oh?” he questions. His feet must reach the bottom, because while Feyre is working to stay afloat at the edge, he is merely holding out his arms to keep himself steady.

“The starlight.” Her eyes roam over his face and dip down to his neck before shooting back up. If she looks too far down she won’t be able to return her gaze to his face. “Son of the Night Court. It all works.” She waves a hand in his face, and he laughs. The starlight clinging to his hair and shoulders and dripping from his chin bring out the constellations in his eyes.

“You don’t look too bad yourself, darling,” Rhys nods at her.

She wishes she had a mirror, if only to try and memorize her own look for a painting later. “Do I?” she asks, leaning back a bit in the water and pretending like his words do not send her heart racing.

Her eyes are on the sky, but when Rhys is silent for too long she propels herself upright. He’s frowning a bit, looking more unsure of himself than she’s ever known him to be. “Rhys?”

“I can show you,” he says, expression much too serious for an afternoon swim.

Feyre laughs softly. “You have a mirror? Where are you hiding that?”

Rhys’s smirk lacks some of its swagger. He brings up a hand and, from nowhere, conjures a hand mirror. “I do have some tricks up my sleeve. But that wasn’t what I was talking about.” As quick as it appeared, it's gone.

Feyre cocks her head. Rhys wants to show her what she looks like, but without a mirror or any reflective surface...and it’s not like he’s an artist…

She gapes a little, swimming closer. Tamlin is still floating on his back, hearing muffled from the water, but she lowers her voice anyway. “You’re daemati?”

It’s the only thing that makes sense. And she would expect no less from Rhys. In addition to being obscenely powerful, to have this as well...he won’t just be a powerful High Lord, he’ll be unquestionably dominant.

His brows lift a little in surprise before his expression settles. “Clever girl. I shouldn’t be surprised that you guessed.”

Feyre bites her lip, torn between being pleased and being concerned. She does not think that Rhys has ever used his power against her. But how would she know? She has heard plenty of stories, has been given plenty of reasons to be wary of the Night Court. Feyre is not so arrogant as to think that she is a worthy target, but just the thought of her thoughts being combed through or someone getting information from her mind is disconcerting.

Rhys— whether by looking at her mind or her face— knows where her thoughts lead her. He moves a little closer as well. “I have never looked in your mind, or Tamlin’s for that matter. I’m not that kind of male.”

“I know.” The words are said without thinking, but they ring true.

He does not look convinced. “If I wanted to use you, I would have hovered in your mind as you hunted the Suriel and asked them a question myself. I would have probed your mind to see what you asked.”

She nods. Part of her knows it to be true, but another part, an animal, instinctual part, shies away from him.

But the Suriel told her to trust Rhysand.

It’s not effortless, but she stays. “You keep it a secret?”

“We keep it quiet,” Rhys admits. “We” probably means his family, his Court.

What does it mean that there is a secret daemati ready to inherit one of the mightier Courts of Prythian?

If she was a good person, she thinks, she would tell someone. But being a good citizen and a good friend are directly opposed at the moment. It does not take Feyre very long to decide which title is more important to her.

“I won’t tell anyone.” She values her friendship with Rhys, trusts him more than she maybe should. Even considering what the Suriel said, she would be a fool to throw herself into his arms blindly.

“Thank you.” Under the water, he reaches out to squeeze her hand. “I know you still aren’t comfortable with this.”

It’s difficult to meet his eyes, so she looks down. Right at the curves of his shoulder, where brown skin and black ink peek from beneath the surface. Her mouth goes dry, but she manages to force words out. “It is...strange. To realize how vulnerable I’ve been.”

There are dangers in Feyre’s life, but she has always known them. She has rules, has trained and armed herself against threats. Don’t stay out too late after night falls in the forest, don’t stray too close to creatures who have young ones to protect. Keep your eyes averted when speaking with the High Lord and try to not attract too much attention, bite your tongue in front of certain people and laugh and gossip in secret circles only.

There is no such defense against Rhys. At least, she assumes so until he speaks. “I can train you to shield your mind.”

Feyre blinks, shocked. “You can?” It’s possible? And he would offer that to her?

A deluge of cool water drenches her. Feyre cries out in shock, whirling to scowl at a laughing Tamlin.

“You two are much too serious,” he says, slapping the surface of the water again to send another splash their way. “What were you talking about anyway?”

“We had a run-in with a daemati in the Night Court a while back,” Rhys says smoothly. In an instant, his cool confidence is back. He swims away from Feyre, closer to Tamlin. She is sure there is a good reason he turns his back and tells herself it does not sting. “I was telling Feyre that I wouldn’t mind offering some lessons on how to shield her mind.”

“Why would you need to shield your mind?” Tamlin asks her.

She scowls. “Why wouldn’t I? Don’t you want to keep your thoughts private?”

“Sure,” Tamlin shrugs. “But it’s not like any daemati would target you.” He is lackadaisical and inattentive, paddling around the pond like a slippery otter. The mere word “daemati” was enough to alter Feyre’s mood, but Tamlin is barely affected.

“She’s been spending time with two sons of High Lords,” Rhys points out, flicking some water into Tamlin’s face. “I’d say that makes her plenty vulnerable. You should learn to shield, too.”

Tamlin nods, finally starting to take it seriously. “You were taught?” He propels himself upright, staring intently at Rhys. It is not hard to see how Tamlin esteems their older friend. Anyone who spends five minutes with the two of them can see how Tamlin might look at Rhys for approval, how he weighs Rhys’s words and commits them to memory. Sometimes, Feyre worries about how reliant Tamlin is, how he has replaced his own older brothers with the Heir to the Night Court. But she hardly has room to talk.

“Almost as soon as I could grasp the concept,” Rhys says. “I’ll give both of you lessons. It’ll be hard to test without an actual daemati, but it’s worth trying.”

You’ll have a bit of an advantage over Tamlin. Feyre gasps as Rhys’s voice echoes in her head. Her limbs freeze. She sinks a little in the water before propelling herself back up, sputtering.

Tamlin glides closer. “Feyre?”

“I’m fine,” she assures him, pointedly not looking at Rhys. “I thought something brushed my leg. What lives in this water anyway?”

“Nothing natural,” Tamlin scowls at the opaque surface as if his ire can be translated to whatever dwells below. “Come on, let’s leave before we find out.”

Feyre wades out of the pond, chemise sticking to her skin and hair dripping down her back. She squeezes her hair to dry it as best she can, then moves to gather a fistful of her chemise and wring out the water.

It’s silent for a moment. When Feyre looks up, she sees two males looking at her instead of getting out of the pond.

Emboldened by their attention, Feyre raises an eyebrow. “Yes?”

Tamlin coughs, looking away and stepping out of the water. He passes her without a comment, even as Rhys continues to look. Her challenge is answered as his eyes rove over her body, from long bare legs to the wet material clinging to her hips and chest. She half expects something flirty to spill from his mouth, but he just keeps the smirk on, looks his fill, and emerges from the water.

It takes a lot of effort not to pay him back in kind, though Feyre does sneak a look at those tattoos and well-muscled chest.

The light breeze chills their damp skin, and the once sweltering heat becomes a comforting embrace. The trio sprawl out. Between bouts of dozing off, they have a contest to see which pair is best at tossing grapes into someone’s mouth. When Feyre’s hair is mostly dry and her fingers get caught in tangles, Rhys slips behind her and braids it back.

She is half awake as his fingers comb through her hair, catching every other word of his explanation that his little sister has now grown old enough to demand all sorts of hairstyles and pampering from her devoted older brother. Feyre hums with a smile, picturing the scene.

There’s a knock on the edge of her mind. One she is better prepared for this time. Rhys slips a memory into her mind, one that is not hers, but his. Through his eyes he sees a head of black hair, a young girl’s bedroom, a reflection of him and a little girl, the former wrestling with a hair brush and the latter rifling through a basket of ribbons. There is a love infused in that memory, a feeling so pure that it nearly brings a tear to Feyre’s eye.

I almost neglected my promise earlier. Rhys’s voice is low and smoky in her mind. A moment later, a different memory. Her grinning face, covered in droplets of starlight.

There is emotion in this memory too, though not the all-consuming devotion Rhys feels for his sister. But it is something, and it makes Feyre smile anyway.

It is the perfect day. Feyre is not naive enough to think that this dynamic, with her two dear friends, can last forever. Rhysand will one day become High Lord, and Tamlin’s own role will likely change when his father passes. But fae are immortal, and she is untouched by death, and the thought of painful change is so far away in that perfect summer afternoon.

She cannot be blamed for thinking peace will last for a good, long while.

Being the Lady of the Spring Court is good for little else besides ordering the servants around the house.

Alis can grumble and protest and toss every veiled hint that she can think of, but in the end she cannot prevent Feyre from leaving her bed. Sleep came and went in the night. When the discomfort impeded her peace, Feyre tossed back healing tonics and pain remedies and whatever cocktail of drugs that the healer left on her nightstand.

Her smaller cuts are healed, but her ribs are still tender. The worst bruises are black and blue and impossible to look at. Feyre chooses a boring corner of the room to stare at as Alis dresses her in light fabrics and a dress that laces loosely. Alis picks a gown in an opaque green with a yellow underskirt, as if that will lend color to her pale skin or brighten her gaunt face.

Feyre tells the staff that she and the High Lord will not be entertaining any guests and to send away anyone that might drop by. Not that anyone comes for Feyre unless she specifically invites them.

The only other person in her home besides the servants is Lucien. He clearly did not expect her to leave bed and nearly leaps from his seat when she slips into the dining room. “You should be resting.”

She probably should. There is an exhaustion that has settled in her, infused in her bones and powdered on her skin. Her tongue is weighed down. Feyre has no words for her friend, only enough energy to squeeze his shoulder as she walks past to take her seat. She sees the way his eyes scan her, the way his jaw clenches when he notes how she sits gingerly.

Tamlin’s chair at the head of the table is empty. The space feels like a chasm.

When Tamlin is home, the table usually is weighed down with food. Today, Lucien just has one plate sent up from the kitchen. Feyre gets the same toast, fried eggs, and sausage. No platters of sliced fruit or tureens of gravy or plates of sugary pastries. Lucien pours her a cup of tea wordlessly.

Feyre eats in peace, but Lucien has a stack of papers by him that he leafs through in between bites. With Tamlin gone, his work will be all the more difficult. Lucien cannot make certain decisions, cannot sign off on projects, cannot approve a budget. But there are some things that must get done and emergencies to deal with.

“Anything I can help with?” Feyre speaks her first words of the day.

Lucien’s eyes flick up briefly. “I’ll let you know.” He’s gone a few minutes later, only a squeeze of her shoulder as a goodbye.

There are things Feyre can do, even some things that Tamlin might expect her to accomplish. Ferye thinks of the piles of letters she can respond to and the parties she might plan. The next holiday is never more than a few months away, and Tamlin likes to take any opportunity to celebrate and fill their home with his friends.

She does not do any of that.

The servants push back on some of Feyre’s whims, but they can never outright refuse her. A few months ago, it was a battle to get them to relinquish their gardening tools. Another battle to ask one of the gardeners to teach her, show her, and not do anything beyond that.

But a few months ago she was also a bit more fragile, and so they followed her directions with less protesting than she usually was in for.

Now, Feyre knows where to find the tools she needs. She slips on the gardening gloves that Alis procured and forced on her. While it might be seemly for the Lady of Spring to prune a few roses, cuts and calluses were utterly unacceptable. Feyre can stroll in the gardens, can even kneel in the grass, as long as she has a wide-brimmed hat to shield the delicate skin on her face.

How she longs to rip off the hat, unpin her hair, and sprint through the fields once more.

No one disturbs her as Feyre weaves through the perfectly manicured gardens. She passes tall hedges, venturing deeper until she crosses into a little hidden nook. It is cordoned off by nothing more than a charming wooden gate, but symbolism is strong. No one has ever entered without the express permission of the Lady of Spring.

Feyre let the little space go unattended for years, not caring much for gardening or pretty flowers. Now, the hidden nook is ringed with blooming jasmine. She might add a stone bench in the middle, but for now she is happy to sit on the grass.

A proper gardener might prune and use sophisticated techniques to care for the jasmine, but Feyre likes to see it grow wild. She removes weeds and brushes away dead leaves. In Spring the bushes are almost always flowering, clogging the space with their intoxicating scent. She would have kept blooms in her room, if not for what they symbolized.

Jasmine is a Night Court flower.

Tamlin does not come to her jasmine garden. He either does not know or was informed and has not confronted her directly. Now that she is in the garden, Feyre wonders if this is, in part, what set him off.

The flowers are not for Rhys. Not really. True, they remind her of him, in a way. But she mostly likes the scent, likes that when she smells it she immediately feels at peace. Jasmine is not the most beautiful flower in the world, but it is still pretty. A flower alone cannot make her happy, but it settles something in her soul anyway.

White jasmine is crisp and clean. Pure.

For a while, Feyre had no closure after the loss of her child. These things happened, so the healer ensured she was physically healthy and then sent away. There was no goodbye, no body, no ceremony to send the child off. They were there one moment and gone the next, not having made any mark on the world besides a scar on Feyre’s heart. She does not know if they were male or female, if they had Tamlin’s blond hair or her own darker shade, if they would have had freckles or their father’s straight nose. After they were gone, the child seemed to exist for Feyre and no one else.

So she planted the jasmine.

Now, as she lays on her back in the grass, she can imagine it. A giggling toddler, running circles around her. But not here, not in Spring. The flowers perfume the air and make it all too easy to pretend she’s in another place.

Maybe the jasmine is selfish. Maybe Feyre did have another motive in creating this secret space.

While she is here, she can mourn her child. While she is here, she can pretend that she is someplace else.

#acotar #acotar fanfiction

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