#(pre-slash)

[imaginejamesandsirius]

Could you do one where Sirius is a Gryffindor outcast after getting sorted and gets attacked/bullied by Gryffindors and Slytherins alike and James defends him :D

Sirius is a child, but he's not an idiot. He knows that, in addition to his parents being unhappy about his Sorting, Slytherins are unhappy about his Sorting. Gryffindors too. He's pissed off his parents-- and all the extended family-- a fair few times by age eleven, but it's something else entirely to have people his age upset. The adults in his family would get mad, but he knew exactly how to deal with that anger; the other students are cruel, and he's lost as for how to handle it.

Like he said, he's not an idiot. He knows that there's nothing he can do to make the other students like him. With his family, if he went to another room and waited half an hour, they'd be fine. With his peers, waiting doesn't seem to do anything except-- maybe-- make them think he's weak. He doesn't understand how trying to give someone space to stop being angry counts as weak, but when he gives them space, the next time they see him, it's twice as bad like they're having a contest with themselves.

The bright spot in all of this is James. They became friends on the Hogwarts Express, and when he Sorted into Gryffindor, it cemented their relationship as best friends. James is sticking with him and hasn't faltered, not for an instant.

When Sirius finds a massive nest of snakes in his bed, James helps him clean it up without a second thought-- though he, like Sirius, isn't thrilled about picking up so many snakes. They're both visibly nervous about it and pretending otherwise, and neither one pokes fun; if they both pretend that it doesn't bother them, maybe that makes it true. When ink explodes in his bag, coating everything in it and ruining his homework, James is right there beside him, telling the professors that he completed it and shouldn't be punished. When one shoe of every pair in his wardrobe goes missing, James lends him a pair of his own.

It goes on and on, these things charitably called 'pranks' by Professor McGonagall. Sirius thinks it's more mean-spirited than that, and while they don't talk about it, he knows James thinks the same. It's not happening to everyone. It's not happening to all the first years or all the Gryffindors, and it's not happening to all so-called blood traitors; it's just him. It's just him, and everyone's in on it except his dormmates, so no one even tries to hide it when they're the guilty party. 

One day-- after cleaning up a bucket of bugs someone dumped on Sirius's head-- James turns to him with a grin, teeth glinting, and says, "I have an idea."

Two hours later, O'Connell and Smith scream and run out of their dormitory, sending Sirius and James into peals of laughter. They don't get detention for it, even when the two fourth years go to Professor McGonagall with their accusations; "It's a harmless prank," she says dismissively, and Sirius likes her more knowing that it's how she responds to everyone, not just him.

"Mission one was a success," James says, chest puffed out in pride of a job well done.

"Mission one?" Sirius asks. "Is this going to be a habit?"

"Of course. We can't let them get away with it, the arseholes."

Peter and some bloke named Remus are the only dormmates in the room with them, and it's obvious they're listening, though they are pretending not to.

"The first one went off without a hitch. We make a good team," James says, elbowing him companionably. "And there's eighty-one more people we need to get. Well- maybe more like sixty?" he amends. He pulls a sheet of parchment out from his bedside table and squints at it. "Some people are on here more than once."

"You kept track?" 

"Of course." 

He's endlessly charmed by that, by how James cares so much about him that he's been keeping track of this from the beginning and never once faltered in believing they'd get revenge one day. Sirius peers over his shoulder at the list; it's not just names. "You wrote down the date?"

"And the offense."

Ink. Shoes. Snakes in bed. Bed is underlined three times. Paint-- red. Maggots. Snake-- one, big. Paint-- black. Dead mice. Black bird. Paint-- green. On and on the list goes, some with details, like the colour of the paint or the location it happened. Sirius skims the whole list and can't think of a single one that's missing. "Wow."

"What do you think-- chronological, or by severity?"

"Random," Sirius decides. "I don't want anyone to know if they're next."

They share a grin, an expression that promises not just revenge, but a puzzle that needs solving-- what exactly they should do for each of these, what will make the punishment equal the crime. They don't have time to plan before supper, which is a shame.

Sirius has it in his head the revenge is how they're going to operate, so he's surprised when-- after a passing upperclassman 'accidentally' spills burning hot soup down his back-- James flings a handful of green beans at their face without a moment's hesitation. Then, apparently deciding that wasn't enough, James throws mashed potatoes, which make a comical splat as it covers their eyes. It's enough to have Sirius laughing, forgetting for a few moments the pain prickling along his back.

James gets detention for that-- so does the second year instigator-- but he's unrepentant and winks at Sirius the moment Professor Grubbly-Plank looks away. Warmth blooms in Sirius's chest, bright and resilient and addictive. He wants it to be like this for the rest of his life.

[qwanderer]

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Dead Boy Detectives (TV) Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Edwin Paine | Edwin Payne & Charles Rowland, Edwin Paine | Edwin Payne/Charles Rowland Characters: Edwin Paine | Edwin Payne, Charles Rowland (DCU) Additional Tags: Post-Canon, Post-S1, Angst, Pre-Relationship, Arguments, mentions of abuse, mentions of bullying, mentions of Simon (Dead Boy Detectives), mentions of Charles's parents, this is heavy but it ends mostly happily Summary:

"Stop that right now," Charles snapped. "You can't say that, Edwin, you can't."

Edwin blinked at him, startled.

"You said I could talk to you about anything," he said, quietly confused.

"Well, not that," Charles said, standing up and hefting his bag.

[mrspasser]

The things he does for his pack

Pinterest showed me a tweet from someone who fed his co-workers pot brownies because he didn't want to be the only one dirty on the random drug test. I had some thoughts about that and the result is this Sterek fanfic :-)

Read it on A03

There’s a chilly wind blowing that he can barely ward off with the upturned collar of his jacket, his ass has gone numb from the hard bench and a few rows below him there’s a man eating nachos with the most obnoxious artificial flavouring Derek has ever smelled. 

The things he does for his pack…

At least the game isn’t a total shit show. He isn’t all that fond of lacrosse - he was on the basketball team himself, but most of his pack plays. Boyd is the newest recruit and though he’s sitting on the bench next to Stiles right now, he’s scheduled to take his place in the goal for the last two quarters. Jackson, Isaac and Scott each usually play the whole game and Stiles plays a quarter here and there - as long as he doesn’t annoy the coach too much.

They’re ahead, with only a few minutes left of the second quarter. The Beacon Hills Cyclones started off strong and scored six goals already, to a meagre two of their opponents. If they keep this up, they’ll win the game by a landslide. Stiles might even get to play. 

Besides him, Erica cheers loudly as Isaac scores the seventh goal, right before the referee blows his whistle. The team gathers around their coach to hear his instructions, though a few of them are more focused on the water cooler than game tactics. They’re laughing and bumping into each other, ignoring Finstock when he calls them to order. It seems like they think the game is won already. Derek hears both Scott and Jackson berate their teammates. If they win this game, they’ll compete in the state championships, so there’s a lot riding on this game.

“Go get ‘m, babe!” Erica yells when Boyd jogs towards the goal after the break. The young werewolf looks back and lifts his stick in response and Derek gives him a supportive nod. Boyd joined the team mostly because of his pack mates and the role of goalie fits him well. He’s not flawless, he doesn’t have enough field experience for that, but his werewolf reflexes make up for a lot.

The game restarts and it only takes a few minutes to see that a good part of the team doesn’t have the same focus as before their break. “What the fuck are they doing?” asks Erica, gesturing towards the field where two players seem to be performing some kind of dance. It’s uncoordinated and barely recognizable as dancing, still, it is anything but lacrosse. Jackson yells at them until they get back in line, which they do with a lot of giggling.

Derek frowns at the spectacle below. The visiting team scores two goals in succession: the first is a clever trick shot that he really doesn’t fault Boyd for not catching and the second shot goes in because one of the Cyclones actually hinders his own goalie on purpose. To say the team isn’t happy with that is an understatement. Within minutes the whole game is in disarray and when one of the players stumbles off to the sideline to be sick, the referee calls the whole thing off. It’s a big mess. Derek’s proverbial hackles go up: this whole thing reeks. Something is wrong, but what?

Down on the field Jackson yanks his helmet off and tosses it down on the ground, swearing loudly. Both Isaac and Scott take it upon them to direct their unruly teammates back towards the locker rooms. “It’s like herding cats,” Derek hears Isaac complain when some of his teammates start up an impromptu game of tag and run back onto the field, leaving the young werewolf standing.

Coach Finstock is almost purple from all the yelling he does and all over the bleachers there’s confusion and amused chatter to be heard. Most people have left their seats and gone down to the field. Erica stands next to her boyfriend, who is gesturing angrily at some teammates who stumble past. 

Derek gets up and scans the field for his pack. He has a nagging suspicion of foul play and it bothers him that he can’t sense any danger. As far as he can tell, it’s just the humans and his own pack on the field. There’s no-one else. The werewolves all seem to be acting normal, which leads him to believe there was something that affected the humans. 

Stiles. Where is Stiles?

Now that he thinks of it, Derek kinda expects Stiles to be at the forefront of this whole mess, yet the lanky human is nowhere to be seen. That can’t be right. The nagging sense of discomfort that sat low in his belly turned into alarm.

The Alpha werewolf lets his enhanced senses work for him as he urgently searches the crowd, though it still takes him a while to spot the Cyclones’ number 24. Stiles is lying underneath the bench, curled up against some bags of sport’s gear. He took his protective gear off and cuddled with the shoulder pads in his arms like it’s a teddy bear. Derek rushes over, unsure of the condition his pack member is in. It’s only when he’s close that he can hear his slight snores over the din of the crowd. Relief swoops through his stomach.

“Stiles!” There’s no reaction, not even when Derek calls his name a second time. He crouches down to shake the boy’s shoulder. “Stiles! Wake up!” 

Stiles wakes up with a mumbled “Huh? Wazzit?” and a lolling search of his head towards the sound. His eyes blink open unevenly. One eye focuses on Derek and a lazy, contented grin appears on his face. “Der-bear.”

Derek rolls his eyes at the stupid pet name, though he can’t hide the relieved smile that breaks through. He helps Stiles roll out from under the bench, preventing him from bumping his head into it when he tries to sit up. “What are you doing on the ground?”

Another loopy grin. “I was sleepy.”

If Derek didn’t know any better, he’d say Stiles was drunk. He’s acting even more uncoordinated than usual and he has trouble focusing his vision. Thing is, he can’t smell any alcohol on the boy, just sweat and sweets. And he knows Stiles isn’t a big fan of drinking, having seen from up close what alcohol can do to a man. Derek has to hold Stiles by the arms to keep him sitting upright; he would pitch right over otherwise. “Stiles? What happened?” 

“I dunno,” Stiles answers, slightly slurring his words. He grips onto Derek’s forearms and tries to look around him at the field. “Is the game over? Did we win?” 

Derek jostles him a little to get his attention back on him. “Stiles. Focus!” 

Erica and Boyd come up to them, giving Stiles a scrutinising look. “What’s wrong with him?” Erica asks, cocking her head as she looks the boy over. 

“I don’t know,” Derek grits out and tries to get Stiles to stand up. It’s like wrestling an octopus. The boy is not cooperating at all and after a few moments Derek gives up and lets him sit down on the bench. At least that way he isn’t on the ground anymore. Stiles immediately tips over to lean against Derek’s hip, all heavy and loose limbs.

Boyd chuckles lowly. “Dude, is he stoned?”

“Stoned?!” Erica bends over to grab Stiles by the chin so she can look into his face. “He is!” she cackles in delight. “His eyes are all red!”

Stiles grabs Derek’s leg for stability, winding his arm around it, and sits up a little straighter. “I have red eyes?” He looks up at Derek and grins. “You hear that, Sourwolf? I’m the Alpha now!”

Boyd crosses his arms in front of his chest and regards them with a knowing smile. “He’s baked.”

“No, I didn’t!” Stiles flails and Derek has to grab him by the back of his jersey to prevent him from headbutting the werewolf in the crotch. The boy refuses to let go of his leg. “Greenberg did the baking. They were delicious!”

“What are you talking about?” Derek keeps him upright as much as he can, which is surprisingly hard when Stiles resembles an octopus ragdoll. 

“Pot brownies.” The voice of Jackson cuts through and all heads turn to the team’s co-captain that comes walking up to them. He’s looking cross. “Fucking Greenberg fed the whole team edibles before the game.” 

“They were very edible,” Stiles mumbles. His voice kind of gets lost under the astonished exclamations of his packmates. He snuggles a little closer to Derek’s leg.

“Why would he do that?” Derek growls. It’s clear the rest of the team didn’t know anything of this plan, which basically means the guy poisoned his team mates. 

“To fuck with the mandatory drug test they were gonna have us take after the game,” Jackson explains curtly. “A random check. We weren’t supposed to know about it, but Greenberg got into the coach's papers or something.”

Derek huffs. “That doesn’t explain why he fed the whole team drugs. Why risk getting kicked out of the competition?”

“Dude’s a stoner. He didn’t want to get caught.” 

Erica laughs. “That is kinda genius, if you think about it.” At Derek’s ornery look she explains: “Chances are they would dismiss the test if the whole team tested positive. They’d think it was a faulty test, or something.” 

“Yeah, or they would just suspend the entire team,” Boyd corrects her. “Where is that asshole now?” he asks Jackson. That is something Derek wants to know too.

Jackson points a thumb back over his shoulder. “Back at the locker room. Coach is ripping him a new one. Scott and Isaac are with them.”

Derek pinched the bridge of his nose and breathed deeply. His first reaction was to join coach Finstock in yelling at this Greenberg idiot, but was it really his place to do so? After all, most of his pack was unharmed and the one that did get affected was just high as a kite. And cuddly. He grips the back of Stiles’ neck to keep his head still, so he wasn’t affectionately rubbing his face on Derek’s hip. He sighs. “Let’s go home.” 

That does get Stiles’ attention. “Home?! I can’t go home!” He clumsily tries to get to his feet, using various body parts of his Alpha as a handgrip. Derek hauls him to his feet with a hand in his armpit before it can get any worse. “My dad can’t go home! I mean, I can’t go there. My dad is at home.” He pauses for a second. “Which means he can’t go home either, because he’s already there. Huh. What was I saying?” 

“Well, you can’t stay here either,” Derek answers impatiently. “You’ve got to sleep this off, or something.” 

“I don’t know, I kinda like him like this,” Erica smirks. She shows her teeth when Derek glares at her.

“I can sleep here.” Stiles tries to turn to pat the bench he’d been sleeping underneath earlier, almost falling over the thing in his attempt. Derek gets a hold of his arm and resigns himself quietly to not letting go until Stiles was safely at home, in bed.

“Guys! We’re getting a rematch next week,” Scott announces from afar, jogging over to them. Isaac follows him in his wake. “What’s the matter with Stiles?” 

“He ate three pot brownies, that’s the matter with Stiles,” Isaac deadpans after one look at his pack mate. 

“He ate three?!” Erica guffaws.

“They were really good!” Scott hurries to say. “Besides, I had two and I feel fine.” 

“That’s because you’re a werewolf, dumbass,” Jackson hisses and for once Derek is glad that Jackson said something so he didn’t have to.

“Oh. Right.” Scott has the decency to look abashed. He moves a little closer to his friend, who resorted back to leaning up against Derek for support. “Will he be okay?” he asks the older werewolf.

“Should be fine,” Derek grunts. “Just has to sleep it off.” 

“Oh, yeah, that should work,” Scott nods sagely. Then his face clears. “Shit! He can’t go home, his dad will know he’s high!” 

“Yeah, Der! Dad will know!” Stiles agrees vehemently, turning fast to slap Derek in the chest for emphasis. “Ohh, I feel sick,” he groans immediately afterward, his face turning white as a sheet. 

Recognising what is about to happen, Derek moves them a step away from the others and holds Stiles steady as he suddenly lurches forward and pukes on the grass. Behind them, the werewolves make various noises of disgust. Derek isn’t a fan of the stench of vomit either, but Stiles is trembling on his legs like a newborn foal and making pitiful noises in between heaving up the contents of his stomach, so he supports him with a hand underneath his chest and rubs comforting circles on his back with the other.

When his stomach is finally empty, Stiles leans forward with his hands on his knees, breathing heavily. Scott helps his friend drink a cup of water from the team’s water cooler. Stiles is too out of it to do much to help. “I feel like shit,” he says in a wobbly voice. 

“Yeah,” Derek agrees gently. “Let’s get you home, alright? You can stay at the loft until you feel better.” The boy will probably be alright after a good sleep.

“Thanks,” Stiles sighs and closes his eyes. He even starts tipping forward alarmingly. 

“That’s it,” Derek decides out loud and scoops Stiles up so he can carry him to the car. “We’re out of here.” He walks off in the direction of the parking lot, Stiles dozing in his arms, trusting the rest of his pack to sort things out when it comes to grabbing their stuff and finding their own way back to the loft. 

Stiles wakes up a little when Derek positions him carefully in the front seat of his car. “Der?” he asks, his head lolling back against the seat. 

“Hmm?” Derek reaches across him to fasten his seatbelt. From the corner of his eye he can see Stiles following him with his eyes, a smile on his face that’s a cross of loopy and fond.

When Derek leans back, sitting on his haunches next to his car, Stiles strains forward in his seatbelt conspiratorially. “Don’t tell Scott, but you’re my favourite werewolf,” he whispers.

Derek huffs a laugh despite himself. He shakes his head and gets up to close the car door.

“You gotta promise, Der,” Stiles urges. “You can’t tell Scott!” 

The werewolf nods indulgently. “Sure.” 

But Stiles isn’t happy with that answer. “You gotta promise!” When Derek doesn’t react to him sticking out his pink, he shakes his hand in front of his face and urges: “Pinky swear that you won’t tell!” 

“Stiles, come on, lets just get you home.” Derek is a grown ass Alpha werewolf. He isn’t gonna pinky swear with a teenager that’s still pretty baked. 

Stiles points at him with a stern finger. “Pinky swear or you’re no longer my favourite werewolf!” 

And Derek…. Well, he can’t help it. As much as Stiles can be annoying and a handful, he’s also smart, loyal and, God help Derek, funny. 

“Can’t have that, right?” Derek chuckles and hooks his pinky finger around Stiles’. He’s awarded with a bright grin when he declares solemnly not to tell Scott that Derek is Stiles’ favourite werewolf.

With Stiles satisfied, Derek can close the car door and finally get into the car himself. Stiles watches him start the car with bleary eyes. He’ll probably fall asleep soon. 

“Don’t puke on the upholstery,” he warns his young packmate, just to be sure. 

“I promise,” Stiles responds, as serious as he can while breaking into a yawn. He’s still a bit pale around the nose, though Derek suspects he can keep himself collected during the short ride to the loft.

It’s quiet for a bit as Derek navigates the school parking lot and drives out onto the main road. “Hey Der?” it sounds softly from the seat next to him after a few minutes. 

“Yes, Stiles?” Derek signals for a corner.

“Am I your favourite human?” 

The tentative way the words are spoken makes Derek look over. Stiles actually seems bashful, it’s an odd look on him. 

Derek hesitates for a second, but… Whatever. They’re alone and there’s a chance that Stiles won’t remember this conversation by tomorrow anyway. The werewolf puts his hand on the boy’s knee and squeezes. “You are, Stiles.” 

“That’s nice,” Stiles says in a whisper. He sounds pleased. And half asleep, that too. However, half asleep as he is, Stiles still holds out his hand with his pinky outstretched. “I won’t tell Scott,” he promises when Derek hooks his own pinky in after just a short moment. 

“Good,” Derek agrees with a smile. The childish secret between them makes him feel oddly giddy. 

The boy sleeps for the rest of the ride and doesn’t wake up when Derek lifts him from the car and carries him up the stairs. He gently tucks Stiles in in his bed, figuring he can stand to have his bedding smelling like his favourite human tonight. When he gets back downstairs, his betas look at him questioningly, but they don’t say anything, especially not after he gives them his credit card to order dinner. 

Stiles wakes up around nine PM, hungry like a wolf. He scarfs down the pizza the pack left for him in a remarkable show of restraint and resigns himself to their teasing easily. It looks like he indeed doesn’t remember all that much from what happened. More importantly, besides ‘feeling a bit crunchy’ - Stiles’ own words - he’s not much worse for wear from the whole thing. Perhaps Derek really doesn’t have to go after that idiot of a Greenberg. 

By eleven, Derek evicts his pack from his home. He loves them, honestly, but there’s only so much teenage bullshit he can stand. He makes Scott drive Stiles home in the Jeep, not listening to Stiles’ protests and even flashing his red eyes when the boy doesn’t give in quickly enough. Stiles wrinkles his nose at him, though he complies easily after that. 

Around midnight, when Derek is reading in bed, his phone lights up with a message: [ FYI. I changed your name in my contacts from Sourwolf to F.W. So now we match! ]

Derek texts back a question mark. It’s a common occurrence when texting with Stiles.

A moment later there’s a reply. [ Can’t have Scott find out, can we? ;-) ] 

It’s only then that Derek notices that the name on the texts doesn’t say Stiles, but Favourite Human. He has no idea how or when Stiles got a hold of his phone this evening.

He thinks about changing it for a second, but puts his phone back on the nightstand instead and shuts off the light so he can go to sleep.

The things he does for his pack.

[berenwrites]

Like Magic, Steddie, Stranger Things, PG

A/N:  After not writing for the challenge for months, now I get 2 ideas for the same prompt, thanks brain! Please enjoy. Don’t forget to check out all the other great fics at @steddiemicrofic too💖.

Written for prompt: DRESS | wc: 350 | Rating PG | cw: none

Tags: fluff, Upside Down consequences, pre-steddie

Also on AO3 ( My Other fic on Tumblr)

Like Magic

Steve dragged himself into the bathroom feeling like he had barely slept. His dreams had been wild, full of the Upside Down. They were already fading but had left behind a feeling of unease, of something missing.

It was as he cleaned his teeth, mindlessly staring into the mirror, he noticed the dressing around his ribs was coming loose. That decided him on what to do next. He’d been under strict instructions to keep the dressings dry to let his injuries heal, washing carefully, standing at the sink, but he was fed up with that. He wanted a proper shower. He could redo the dressing later if he really needed to.

Unwinding the bandage, he gently pulled off the tape and gauze underneath. He’d needed a couple of stitches in the end, so he decided not to look too closely as he climbed into the shower. The water was probably going to aggravate the healing road rash on his back and arms too, but it was worth it to be properly clean.

Starting with his hair, he went about his usual routine. It felt so good, it wasn’t until he was soaping up his front that he realised something was wrong.

Nothing hurt.

Looking down he saw his hand was over the wound on his side, but there wasn’t any discomfort, let alone pain. As he moved his fingers, he watched the cascading water wash away the suds. But it didn’t stop there. While he stared, the wound fell away, not like a scab coming off, more like it was movie magic or something. Underneath was only the faintest discolouration on otherwise perfect skin.

Stumbling out of the shower, he tried to look at his back in the mirror. What he could see were injuries peeling off like they had never been real.

Only urgent thumping on his front door stopped him freaking out completely. Grabbing a robe, he ran downstairs, wrenching open the double doors.

“Eddie,” he said, staring in shock at the dishevelled, but very much alive figure on his doorstep.

Now he knew what had been missing.

( My Other fic on Tumblr)

[aziraphales-library]

Hi, lovely mods! I am looking for a fic that I was certain I had bookmarked but can't find anywhere. I don't remember the title or author but what I do remember is this:

Aziraphale is punished by Heaven and turned human. Crowley takes him to a cottage where Heaven and Hell won't be able to find them and takes care of him as he ages and eventually suffers from Alzheimer's/dementia. There's something in there about lilies that Aziraphale plants in their garden. And at one point he destroys all his journals and Crowley is devastated about it.

I remember it being fairly long and multi chapters. It was one of my absolute favorites that made me laugh and ugly cry and I'm so sad I can't find it 😭 any help is greatly appreciated ❤️

@cjm-timelord11

Hi, this is one of my favourites too! It's:

A Memory of Eden by ImprobableDreams900 [M]

When Crowley gets captured by angels and dragged up to Heaven, Aziraphale knows he has to rescue him—no matter the consequences.

Please mind the tags.

~Mod N

[backgroundnoisewithaview]

Unable to afford his apartment due to new insurance issues, Will finally gives into Connor's offer of living with him.

What started off as awkward, where will couldn't get out of feeling like a guest in someone else's home, and aware of everything around him was probably a months wage per item, it soon turned quietly domestic after a loooong shift at the hospital.

Connor: I don't even care about food, I want a shower and bed.

Will: I already showered at the hospital... I'll order in pizza?

Connor: Sure. Save me a slice.

Will: Yeah, course.

Will orders an extra large meat feast pizza, which comes with a free small garlic bread, whilst they're still on their way home. It arrives not soon after they do when Connor is in the shower.

Will takes a few slices for himself and leaves the rest in the box, and covers it up. He does like garlic bread but he's not in the mood for it, keeps it boxed up and figures whatever Connor leaves, it'll be good for leftovers the next day anyway.

Connor comes out of the shower freshly washed, in soft navy blue tartan pyjama bottoms and matching plain navy t-shirt. He sees the pizza, garlic bread and empty plate waiting for him next to it and his whole body realises it's been hours since he last ate. He takes a few slices of the pizza and a slice of the garlic bread.

Connor: Thanks for this man, I'll owe you.

Connor says it to the direction of the couch, where Will is slumped sideways against the arm of the couch watching TV.

He takes a bite and is glad Will took the initiative to order food, glad he's there at all.... and then realises he got no reply. Connor looks over properly, and, worried, slowly walks around towards the couch. Pizza on plate in hand.

Wills plate, empty save for some remnants of crust, sit on the coffee table. The man in question has his eyes closed, head resting on his hand but tilted upwards just a bit and softly snoring.

Connor would never say this out loud, but the sight is.... Sweet. If you can call a 6 foot, fully grown man sweet. Just for sleeping.

He nudges him with his free hand, thinking that they're not 20 anymore, Will will regret sleeping on the couch like this in the morning if he leaves him.

Will slowly opens his eyes and makes a questioning noise that comes off kind of whiny.

"You'd be better of sleeping in your bed, Will, trust me."

"Blow the bed, I'm sleeping here" Will mumbles in reply, and closes his eyes again.

Connor breathes in, and slowly blows it out with puffed cheeks. He puts his own plate down and makes a decision. "alright, man, but let's at least get you more comfortable".

With the expertise of a doctor that has had to move many an unwilling patient, he manovres Will into a lying down position, automatically on his side and then looks around for something to put over him.

Of course he doesn't have a throw on the back of the couch, he's a busy cardiothorassic surgeon with more money than style, and has been living in a click and collect bachelor pad for the past 10 years of his life.

His only option is to get something from Will's room. He leaves his plate of pizza in the company of a totally not sweet sleeping Will Halstead, trusting the man not to be a sleep eater, and returns quickly with the fleece liner for a sleeping bag that he couldn't find. It would do. He opens it up wide and lays it over the sleeping man, and then because he is a damn good friend, tucks it around his shoulders and behind his feet.

He looks down at a job well done, absolutely does not think about kissing the top of his friends head, picks up the plate of now cool pizza, and goes back to the kitchen.

The sleeping man sleeps on, and Connor takes a few extra minutes to put the leftovers in the fridge, minus an extra slice of pizza he took for himself. He writes on a note on the magnetic pad on the fridge "Pizza and Garlic Bread in fridge. Whatevers left is yours. Thanks man. C"

And then he takes his plate and a glass of water into his bedroom.

-

When Will first wakes up the next morning, he is surprised to find he is vertically on the couch and has acquired his fleece liner from the sleeping bag he lost in the move to Connor's condo. He's never been a sleep walker so his only conclusion is Connor got it for him.

He vaguely recalls mumbling something to Connor but the conversation they had is lost to the sensation of a dream you can't quite remember.

He has about 20 minutes before his alarm will go off for work, if his phone is still working and didn't die overnight through lack of charge. He turns to lie on his back, pulls the fleece higher and closes his eyes to doze the time away.

[supervillainny]

Steddie pondering

So I'm thinking about Steve standing awkwardly in a gay club in the big city, 'cos he's a Good Friend and an Excellent Wingman and Robin had been so damned excited. And he hadn't intended, but he's - not curious, but -

Okay. Maybe curious.

See, he'd thought - the Upside Down changes things. He'd even thought, y'know, Nancy, even after everything between them, so it'd make sense that Eddie had got him looking. No harm in looking, right? It doesn't mean anything, it's not like he's never noticed pretty eyes on a guy before, and the whole thing where he wants to tug the hair away from Eddie's mouth and tuck it behind his ear, that's just - it's just sanitary.

But that doesn't explain the tugging in his gut when he sees guys dancing with guys, here. Doesn't explain the way his insides light up like a pinball machine when he sees Eddie in his element on the dance floor, cackling wildly as he fails to start a mosh pit to the strains of Kylie Minogue. Ding ding ding, all the way up Steve's spine, electric and exciting but never hitting the high score.

So - with Robin in the corner gesturing expansively at an adorable brunette, and Eddie bellying up to the bar - maybe Steve gets talking. The guy's no Eddie maybe, but he's kinda cute, with floppy blonde hair and a mesh shirt that Steve kinda wants to touch. Just to see what it feels like under his fingers. He's just reaching out when -

"Sorry, man."

Eddie is a line of jingling heat against his back, one arm over his shoulder dangling a beer bottle in front of Steve's chest.

"Stevie here is as straight as they come."

No one could hear the small protesting noise over the music. Steve knows it was there.

Blondie looks disappointed, which Steve supposes is gratifying, until Eddie shoves the beer into his hand and Steve can tell from his voice that he's smiling.

"I could be persuaded, though."

And Christ, that tone in Eddie's voice curls right through him, bypasses all sense, goes straight to Steve's dick.

Blondie looks intrigued, but maybe a little nervous - which makes sense, Eddie's dressed differently to everyone here, and there's always something dangerous in the way he grins. So Steve offers a smile and a shrug.

"He's a good guy," he says, and Blondie smiles back.

And Steve's left alone and half-hard and confused, holding a sweating bottle of beer at the side of the dancefloor.

When Eddie finds him later, the guy's smirking like the cat that got the whole fucking dairy.

"I am bringing you here more often," he says. "You, Steve Harrington, are an excellent wingman."

And Steve is in hell, and all the devils are dancing in Eddie Munson's grin.

[mithrilhearts]

Can't "Rise" to the Occasion by LordOfTheRazzles

bagginshield | during the quest | 2.3k

Every evening the Company of Thorin Oakenshield gathers for food, stories, and rest around the campfire on their way to Erebor. Some stories are fun, others are adventurous, but tonight’s theme is scary. Bilbo’s idea of scary and the dwarves’ understanding of hobbit customs throws Thorin’s mind for a loop.

↳ NOW ON AO3

[house-elf-magic]

Working on a pre-slash Danny Phantom story that’s dash-centric. This WIP has been in progress (in bits and pieces) since like last year, but the end is finally in sight… 30k words later.

A snippet:

“No, just a little, uh, freaked out,” the guy said, climbing to his feet. “I’m just gonna head home. No more bars for me.” Phantom nodded.

“I think that’s for the best tonight.” The guy walked off in a daze towards the nearby residential area, and Phantom clearly prepared to fly off.

“H-Hey, wait!” Dash called, trying not to wince as he saw Phantom sighed.

“What do you want?” he asked a little rudely.

“I-I helped! Did you see that? I shot at him!” Dash said excitedly. Phantom looked at him incredulously.

“Are you kidding me? You almost took that kid’s head off!”

“But-But I--!” Phantom seemed to growl.

“Look man. Having the weapons to hurt the bad guy doesn’t make you a good person or some kind of hero. Alright? It’s not enough to just ‘shoot the bad guy.’ From what I’ve seen of you, you’re not the helpful type but a bully. Let it go. Go home and leave it to the professionals.” Dash felt his throat constrict in pain and embarrassment.

“I…” But no words would come. Phantom shook his head and flew off. For the second time in three days, Dash felt awful, especially since he realized that Phantom had a point. He hadn’t been doing it to help anyone… he’d only wanted to impress his hero.

[kit-middleton]

I wrote a thing! It’s in the same universe as Delayed Gratification.

“I apologize,” Peter continues. “The way you face down threats time and time again, I forget how young you all are. It wasn’t my intention to make you uncomfortable—”

“Yes, it was.”

Stiles doesn’t want to be a virgin sacrifice, so he does what he is best at: research.

Unfortunately, he might be thinking out loud.

Peter offers to help, rescinds his offer, then offers a different kind of help.

[agender-adrastea]

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: National Football League RPF Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Joe Burrow/Ja'Marr Chase, Joe Burrow & Ja'Marr Chase Characters: Joe Burrow, Ja'Marr Chase Additional Tags: Introspection, Cincinnati Bengals, Pre-Relationship, Pre-Slash, Getting Together, based off the shitshow that has been the contract negotiations and Weeks One and Two, Feelings Realization Summary:

It's been a challenging summer. Everything comes to a head during the Bengals' Week Two game against the Chiefs.

[minhxiao]

if a tree falls scaramouche/aether | rating: T | 2.1k words The night before Jnagarbha Day, when Scaramouche is to complete the final stage of the God Creation Plan, Aether finds him alone in the Apam Woods.

Even at night, the Ashavan Realm is a humid, verdant green. In another life, Scaramouche might have found it beautiful. 

His presence is like an aberrated ink blot on canvas. Even the local flora and fauna seem to bend away from his vicinity, the mythical Aranara making themselves scarce in his company.  

It’s hardly a surprise to Scaramouche. After all, these days, he's only the specter of a person. 

But not for long.

What does come as a surprise, however, is the sudden prickling of awareness that arises at the base of his neck, the sound of rustling grass and footsteps behind him. A draft of warm life fills the air and somewhere, a lotus blooms. 

He hadn’t expected him to show up, to find him here on the night before his ascension as a new god, but Scaramouche doesn’t mind surprises. What he doesn’t like is the feeling of being cornered. 

But he displays none of this current unease, barely even flinches or startles at the traveler’s presence. He only digs his heels into the dirt when he hears Aether come to a stop just behind him. His floating companion is mysteriously absent. 

A divine intervention, then. Scaramouche almost smiles. For a moment, it’s quiet and the wind cradles the veil of his hat like a gentle touch. 

Aether speaks first. 

“You don’t want to do this.” 

Scaramouche had strangely expected him to start with something pleasant, like “what a beautiful view” or “the sky looks lovely tonight,” but quickly realizes the absurdity of that thought. They had never been friends. Even the word “acquaintances” is far too generous. Perhaps it’s merely the strange, unsettled feeling in Scaramouche’s body tonight that is making him more prone to things like sentimentality. 

It is an immense relief knowing that tomorrow, he won’t have to deal with such things anymore.

“You seem to think you know a large deal about what I want,” Scaramouche says, still not turning to face him. “What, one look into my consciousness is enough to have me all figured out?” 

“You… You said you care for Haypasia,” Aether hesitates and oh, Scaramouche loves how he can make someone like the staunch, unwavering traveler stumble over his words. “Someone who cares for their mortal follower wouldn’t willingly throw away their humanity for something like this.” 

“Humanity…” Scaramouche muses. He really is growing sentimental on the night before his rebirth and the feeling itches in the way that he imagines a scar would feel. So Scaramouche only ghosts his fingers over the gnosis in his chest, listens to it tick like a clockwork heart. 

“You already know that I think that’s hardly something worth fighting for.” 

“And divinity is?” 

“... Divinity is my purpose. That’s all there is to it,” Scaramouche stands, slowly dusting the dirt off his trousers. “I have to say, you’re even more delusional that I had initially thought if you really hoped to achieve something with this conversation, but fortunately, you caught me in a good mood, so―”

“I don’t buy it. You’re throwing your life away just to become the Akademiya’s next puppet. You can’t tell me that that’s something you truly want.” 

Perhaps it’s the word “puppet” that sends an irrational flicker of rage and resentment through Scaramouche. His face immediately darkens as he finally turns to face him. 

And there he is, sickeningly golden like the touch of the sun’s last light.

He who has received the favor of the gods. He who had been privy to Scaramouche’s deepest memories, had witnessed his past that still bled like a raw, open wound.

He who has everything that Scaramouche does not. 

Aether.

Even a name is something that Scaramouche does not truly possess, and Aether's is something beautiful, light and free of burden like the wide expanse of the sky.

There is already a sword unsheathed in Aether’s right hand and Scaramouche realizes suddenly that Aether had come despite knowing that his words would be useless. He had approached him all alone, prepared to fight.

Anything Scaramouche had planned to say immediately sours in his mouth.

What a fool.

"You know nothing about what I want."

A sick feeling, vicious as a scythe, twists its way up Scaramouche’s hollow limbs and he decides that he’s no longer feeling generous enough for conversation. He’s moving before he even realizes it, flickering towards him in an arc of lightning. 

To his credit, Aether only wavers for a moment, his eyes briefly widening, before he meets Scaramouche’s blow with the edge of his blade. Electricity sings down the metal into the pommel in his hand, but Aether doesn’t drop his sword. 

He only winces before summoning a snarl of Dendro, bending the earth to his will as vines sprawl to curl beneath Scaramouche’s feet. The irony is not lost on him that Aether is using Rukkhadevata’s power against him, the essence of the energy overflowing with growth, vitality. The thorns nick against the skin of his calves, but he doesn’t register the pain.

Scaramouche singes all of the thorns to dust. 

In a flash, he has his fingers around Aether’s wrist, sending a bolt of lightning lancing up his arm, strong enough to shock the weapon from his hands. 

Aether jolts with a stuttered gasp as he drops his sword, the static making his hair rise as his veins bloom with electricity. His lips are parted in surprise. This close, Scaramouche can feel how harshly his breath leaves him. 

But Aether recovers quickly enough to yank Scaramouche’s robes and drag him bodily to the ground. His hat tumbles from his head with a soft clink. Teeth gritted, Aether arches his knee to drive it into Scaramouche’s stomach, but the Balladeer only twists out of the way and slams his elbow into Aether’s ribcage. 

Scaramouche normally doesn’t fight like this. He never understood the point of getting his hands dirty. But for the first time, he finds there is some physical delight in feeling how his fist connects with Aether’s jaw, how skin meets skin in a moment of perfect, intimate violence. 

Maybe it’s the stark knowledge that this is the closest Scaramouche will ever come to touching something truly holy. 

Aether spits out blood. It splatters crimson across Scaramouche’s knuckles. 

He grabs a fistful of Aether’s hair and tilts his face to look at him. 

The traveler glares at him, chin lifted. Every part of his expression is so devastatingly human that Scaramouche finds himself observing him for a moment. And he’s unbearably easy to read, every feeling that flashes across Aether’s face is as clear as the heart he wears on his sleeve.

“Look at you,” Scaramouche digs his knee against Aether’s hip. “So worked up over me. I should feel flattered.” 

Aether’s brows furrow. He twists to kick his legs, but it’s hardly a struggle to keep him pinned there on the ground. 

“I could say the same for you,” Aether’s voice is low, controlled, though his eyes cut with an unspeakable venom. Oh, he’s angry, and Scaramouche likes that― likes seeing the way he tempers his anger, hones it mid-swing like the arc of a blade just before release.

Anger had always been too tame of a word for Scaramouche― no, what he felt was always something much uglier. Hideous. So there was a strange satisfaction in being able to see that feeling perfectly mirrored in Aether’s own face. 

It’s comforting, in a way. Knowing that even he was capable of such an unsightly feeling. 

Aether’s chest glows green and gnarled tree branches twist along Scaramouche’s legs, rooting him in place. Scaramouche lets go of Aether’s hair just as a vine darts out to snake along his forearm, squeezing tight enough to bruise.

“I’m only indulging you right now since I have the time,” Scaramouche answers, eyes catching on the Dendro energy swirling through Aether’s form. He hates that it’s mesmerizing, that a part of him wants to reach out and dip his hands into that pure, sage green light. “Wanted to see how you’d play the hero.” 

What he doesn’t say is that he really just wanted to see Aether fight for him. 

To see just how desperately the traveler would try to sway him so that maybe, Scaramouche could vainly hope for one second that someone like him was really someone worth saving.

“I’m not trying to play anything.” Aether’s vines curl their way up his shoulder.

“Really? Then why are you here?” Scaramouche lets them constrict and wrap around the length of his torso. “Don’t tell me you thought you would actually be able to convince me.” 

Scaramouche doesn’t miss how Aether’s eyes flash with something raw and honest before it quickly settles back into a heated glare. He falls impossibly still in realization. 

He really did think he could convince me. 

The idea is so absurd that Scaramouche actually goes silent, stunned speechless. 

Aether must see this, because in his momentary distraction, the traveler pulls back his fist and swings it squarely into Scaramouche’s face.

It stings, but only because Scaramouche’s not expecting it. His head snaps to the side, mouth opening.

“I don’t know, maybe I did,” Aether pants, eyes glowing. “ Maybe I thought more of you.”

Something in Scaramouche’s chest stirs with heat and he mistakes it for the stolen gnosis between his ribs. His jaw aches.

Those words almost make you sound like a friend who truly cares.

And Scaramouche looks down at Aether then, his golden hair splayed around him like sweet flowers in the dirt, his fingers slightly shaking in his clenched fist. He sees how the sharp Dendro tendrils are poised around Scaramouche’s neck, paused and waiting― how he’s too merciful to strike him unaware, even now.

In a brief, terrifying moment, Scaramouche wonders if he should just let Aether kill him. But his resilient, infallible body is incapable of death, even at the hands of someone greater. 

How honorable, to be a hero. To carry a title as liberating as “the witness”, “the traveler.” In another life, Scaramouche might have loved to have been the same.

But Scaramouche has long forgotten about things like “honor.”

His voice comes out hoarse. “Sorry to disappoint.”

He sends a current of Electro straight down through the blooming vines until they snap like dry, brittle bark. 

Aether flinches when Scaramouche lifts him up by the scarf and arcs his hand back to strike. 

The palm of his hand crests with a surge of Electro energy, a blinding violet. His power, her power. 

Scaramouche knows, in a moment of heightened clarity, that he could kill him. Right here, in the middle of the forest, with no one else watching― he could kill him so easily that it would be laughable. No one would even know who did it. The entirety of the traveler’s unfathomable, mundane life all within the palm of Scaramouche’s hand. 

In that split second, he sees Aether’s eyes widen with the same realization. Aether’s lips part in a soft intake of breath. 

When a star dies, does it make a sound?

Scaramouche remembers then, that death is a soundless, lightless thing. How it does nothing but leave you and leave you. Even if he were to become a god, he has a feeling he would always remember this death, the way an axe always remembers the tree.

And maybe it’s a moment of weakness, maybe it’s the slight breeze in the woods that reminds him that the forest is watching him. Or maybe it’s Aether’s expression, full and alive with something intangible.    

But he can’t bear it. 

All of Scaramouche’s power leaves him in a split second, his body draining into a hollow vessel. His hand falls limply atop Aether’s chest, right over his stupid, beating heart. He feels it thrumming wildly beneath his fingertips, his pulse warm and rabbit-like.

It's nothing at all like the sound in Scaramouche's chest.

Aether’s breath returns to him in sharp bursts, his hand instinctively rising to curl loosely around Scaramouche’s wrist. His head falls back against the ground in muted relief, the tension slowly bleeding from his body. 

He sees Aether’s mouth open, his gaze swirling with intensity, but Scaramouche suddenly feels exhausted. And he doesn’t want to stick around any longer to hear what Aether has to say. 

So he tugs his wrist from Aether’s grasp and pushes off of him, reaching over to grab his hat. 

The moon peeks out between the clouds, painting Aether’s figure in an incandescent silvery light. Part of his braid has come loose. His lip drips blood in a line straight down his chin. 

(But even bloodied and bruised, he is a vision of everything Scaramouche is not.)

He can’t stand it. 

“Scaramouche, you―”

The Balladeer turns to leave, not intent on hearing the end of Aether’s sentence. His veil rustles as he tips his hat to shield his face. He raises a useless hand in farewell, hoping that the gesture feels mocking.

And if he spends the rest of his night thinking about Aether’s expression right before he could have killed him, no one has to know.

[polizwrites]

Treading a Rocky Road

This is a fill for today’s @flashfictionfridayofficial  prompt [#FFF244 Critical Ice Cream] as well as a March prompt from @buckybarnesevents   Build a Bucky Bingo - Bad Coping Mechanisms 

Fandom: MCU/Marvel Pairing: Bucky Barnes & Tony Stark  Rating: Teen Tags:  Tower fic, ice cream as a coping mechanism, flirting & innuendo, pining, pre-slash Summary: Bucky gets swept up in Tony’s emotional eating episode .. but he doesn’t mind a bit.  

Bucky was minding his own business,  leafing through a reader’s guide to Lord of the Rings when Tony swept into the common area of the Tower. “Come with me. Now.”  

He grabbed Bucky’s hand,  barely giving him time to scramble up from the comfortable armchair he’d been sitting in before dragging him into the kitchen. 

“What’s going on, pal?” Bucky spluttered out as  Tony sat a large insulated bag down on the island.

“I have had a terrible day and now feel a critical need for ice cream,” Tony replied as he got a couple bowls out of the cupboard. “They only had my favorite flavor in the quart size,”  he opened the bag and pulled out a fancy-looking container,   “ and if left to my own devices, I will eat this whole damn thing and make myself sick,” Tony thrust a spoon at Bucky, “so I need you to split it with me.”  

“Uh, okay.” Bucky wasn’t really hungry, but there was no way he was going to turn down something sweet. Or a chance to spend time with his crush.  “What kind is it?” 

“Rocky Road.”  

“Never heard of it.”

Tony’s face lit up as he pried the top off.   “Oh sunshine, You are in for a treat!” he exclaimed with an almost fanatical grin.  “Unless you’re allergic to walnuts or almonds?” 

“Nope.”  Bucky hoped he wasn’t blushing too much at Tony’s casual endearment.  He held out his bowl as Tony loaded it up with what looked  – and smelled - like chocolate ice cream with chunks in it. “What’re the white bits?” 

“Marshmallow.” Tony served himself an equal amount and - still using the large serving spoon - took a big bite of the ice cream.  He let out an obscene sounding moan that sent pleasant shivers down Bucky’s spine. 

“That good, huh?” Bucky murmured, taking a bite of his own.  The ice cream was amazingly rich and smooth, coating his tongue with dark chocolatey bliss.  The marshmallows  added an unexpected, but welcome chewy texture to the experience, contrasting nicely with the crunch of the nuts.  Bucky couldn’t hold in his own hum of pleasure and Tony’s eyes lit up in delight. 

“I know, right? It’s better than sex.” Tony winked. “Well, almost.”  

“Afraid it’s been too long for me to make a valid comparison.” Bucky found himself saying, adding in a wink of his own. 

Tony raised an eyebrow. “That is both a surprise and a shame, my handsome friend.” He scooped up another spoon of ice cream and gave it a  slow, seductive lick.    “Let me know if you’re interested in refreshing your memory any time soon.” 

[scifrey]

Carpe Diem

Status: One-Shot

Series: the Hob Adherent series

Fandom: The Sandman (TV 2022) Includes some comics canon, and some cameos from the wider Gaiman-verse (including the Good Omens and Lucifer television shows), but it’s not necessary to know to enjoy the story.

Rating: Mature

Warnings: Discussions of grief and in-canon character death.

Relationships:  Morpheus | Dream of the Endless/Hob Gadling, Eleanor | Hob Gadling’s Wife/Hob Gadling (past)

Characters: Dream of the Endless | Morpheus, Hob Gadling, Lucifer, Patrick the Bartender, Crowley, Aziraphale, Johanna Constantine, Matthew the Raven

Summary: Hob turns six hundred and sixty-six, invites some fellow Immortals to his bar to celebrate, and receives a gift from Satan herself. Or, the Key to Hell was always going to Be a Problem(tm).

Set between the epilogue and chapter one of Cling Fast.

READ ON AO3 OR READ BELOW:

Hob tells Patrick he’s turning thirty-six. 

About five minutes before the party is set to start, he takes immature delight in adding a tiny little x2 between the 3 and the 6 on the poster wishing him a happy birthday with a sharpie. Normally Hob doesn’t make much of a fuss about his birthday–it’s too easy for his fellow, aging humans to start tracking them that way–but it’s May 1st in the Year of Our Lord 2022, and Hob Gadling is turning six hundred and sixty-six years old.

He figures that deserves a party.

They close The New Inn for the private event, and Patrick, grumpy bastard that he is, refuses to hire in a catering staff so he can enjoy himself, too. 

“It’s your birthday, Bob,” he says, as Hob is tying off the last of the bunting above the banquettes. “I’m not having a stranger back here screwing up your orders.”

“We do need to hire a server before the summer, though,” Hob points out, jumping down and wiping the tread-prints from his shoes off the leather seat. “And a new kid for the kitchen.”

“Well it’s not happening any time today, so just… let me celebrate you from my happy place.”

“Fine, fine,” Hob grants with a smile. Patrick is very, very good at his job. He also has an anxious fear of crowds, when there isn’t wood and fridges and pint-glass washers between him and other people. “But tell me you’ll try to relax a bit, please. It’s my party, and I want you to have fun.”

Patrick gifts him with a set of bowfingers and turns his back to resume prep. Hob wonders what the Signature Cocktail du Jour is going to be, with that many sliced limes, peaches, and strawberries.

Hob is generally very pleased with himself and the world. He’s in a university and profession he loves, he’s inspiring young minds and hearts towards kindness and generosity to their fellow humans, he’s very slowly restoring the White Horse one city council fight at a time, he is master of The New Inn and it’s domain, and he is swiftly becoming best friends with a magical talking raven. 

And, of course, in the nine months since Morpheus has broken free of his prison and returned to Hob’s life, he has become a fixture of his Tuesday afternoons and no small part of his attention and affection besides. That's something worth celebrating, too. Hob's Stranger has somehow, wonderfully, become his friend. And he’s agreed to come today, which is even better. Hob has been getting better at couching his requests in dares, and highlighting his pleas with sad puppy eyes. The two things Morpheus, humanity’s facet of Dream of the Endless, seems to be weak against are a bet, and Hob showing any unhappiness or disappointment.

These facts are carefully recorded in his mental List of Things I Know About The Stranger. The list is growing longer, slowly but surely, which is thrilling in itself. Hob is starting to feel like he knows Morpheus, for a given value of ‘knowing’ when it comes to interacting with a singular facet of anthropomorphic personifications of vast universal concepts.

He’s also not above using this knowledge to his advantage, although he’s careful to deploy this hoarded wisdom to his own advantage very, very sparingly. No point in tipping his hand this early in their fragile friendship.

Hob is immortal, he’s happy, he loves his life and the people in it, and it’s his birthday. 

What isn’t there to celebrate?

The first guests arrive around happy hour, and clump together on one of the banquettes. They’re his colleagues in the History department, with the addition of a PhD hopeful who’s clearly tagged along in order to get into Doctor Gadlen’s good graces before the mad race for a thesis supervisor begins in the summer. Patrick knows some of them, as Hob’s dragged them here from the university often enough, and is happy to take care of them while Hob fiddles with the music. 

He's curated a playlist of his favorite songs from the last six and a half hundred years (the ones he could find recordings of, of course), and damn anyone who complains that the mix is weird.

Hob’s offering up beer and wine on the house, as well as soft drinks for those who prefer it, and platters of nibbles. Word must get back to the school because soon a second wave of professors and TAs slide through the door. The maxim is entirely true: academics are cockroaches and will pop up anywhere free food and booze are on offer. Hob’s happy to welcome them in, even if he only knows a few of them on sight, and even less by name.

A party is a party, and it fills him with joy to know they’ll be going home full and happy. Hob is High Priest of the Last Temple of Morpheus. It’s his duty to ensure everyone who comes through the doors of The New Inn leave in a state of mind and body to rest peacefully and fully.

Hob’s colleagues are joined soon enough by some of the bar regulars, folks from the social charities and organizations that Hob works with to keep the people on his little patch of city well-cared for and housed, and a few people who serve on the same Heritage Protections board as he’s a member of on behalf of the White Horse.

But there’s one particular person he keeps craning his head around to see, every time the little bell above the door jangles. The one particular person who has not yet arrived. Hob distracts himself with gracefully accepting presents he very specifically told people not to bring, offering up cheek-kisses and handshakes in return for the collection of cards, wine bottles, and novelty teacher mugs.

The sun sets, bringing along with it Johanna Constantine, and Ric the Vic, both of whom Hob knows peripherally through the Goings On (™) of London. They offer him their congratulations, and slide into one of the tables in the corner to enjoy their free libations and pretend strenuously that they’re not not planning to leave to fuck in the next few hours.

Hob had spread word through what passes for a grapevine in the sparse community of Otherfolk of the city that they, too, would be welcome at Hob’s birthday party. After all, they’re the only ones who’d understand–and enjoy the irony–of the number. He doesn’t actually expect many of them to take him up on it, but manners are manners.

All the same, he’s fairly sure he sees some of the Doors slipping in and out between his supply cupboard and the bar with a platter of pigs-in-a-blanket, and Bod Owens chatting up the PhD hopeful by the loos. The Marquis de Carabas’s coat catches his eye and Hob turns to welcome him, only to come face-to face with a very different imposing nobleman in a long distinctive coat.

“Happy Birthday , Hob Gadling ,” Morpheus greets him. He’s got the world’s tiniest potted cactus cradled in his palm, and he holds it out awkwardly to Hob. The tips of his ears, mostly hidden by the puff of his dark hair, are delicately pink. They’re the same shade of the seductive-slick curve of a conch shell, of the secret inside curve of his lips when he pouts, the tip of his tongue when he chases a stray drop of wine in a startlingly mortal gesture.

It’s adorable.

It’s not fair .

Hob really needs to get this stupid crush under control.

“Aw, is this for me?” Hob asks, delighted, as if the cactus pot wasn’t already embraced by a silky red bow.

Morpheus just raises his eyebrows, as if to say, Are you daft? so Hob takes it. He wonders if it would be too forward of him to buss a kiss off Morpehus’ cheek in thanks, as he has been doing with all of his other gift-givers this evening. 

It’s a step more intimate than the hand-holding they do when one or the other of them needs comfort during a difficult confession. But Morpheus is Hob���s friend now, and it’s how he greets his other friends. Morpheus deserves no less. He decides to go for it.

The King of Nightmares takes the kiss with startled good grace, and Hob pulls back quickly so he’s not imposing on Morpheus’ personal bubble. His friend can get prickly when he feels his sovereignty threatened, or his independence violated, for very understandable and obvious reasons.

He fiddles with the cactus, turning the pot around in his fingertips and admiring the single dusty-purple bloom at its apex. He hopes it’ll get enough sunlight in here.

“Where’s Matthew?” Hob asks, to fill the awkward silence.

“Behaving extremely poorly for a denizen of his station. ”

“Come again?”

“ Out front, entertaining some of your regulars by repeating filthy words for peanuts,” Morpheus says, amusement and disdain warring in his tone. Morpheus is forever despairing over Matthew’s constant desire to be in the spotlight. 

Hob laughs, delighted, and chivvies Morpheus over to the bar for a glass of his teeth-suckingly sweet wine. He directs his friend around to the empty place where the bar meets the wall beside the tiny area cleared of tables and chairs for dancing. No one has moved to that side of the pub yet, so it's empty of the press of dreamers that Morpheus sometimes finds overwhelming. 

Hob slips behind the bar to pour Morpheus's libation himself, ignoring Patrick’s eye roll. He doesn’t understand why Hob wants to be the only one to touch the wine. Sure it’s expensive, but it’s not like Patrick is going to pour it wrong or something.

But for Hob, it’s a ritual. It’s a gift.

It’s an offering to his friend and god.

It means something that Hob is the one who pours, who presents, who proffers.

Morpheus takes the cup with all the dignified grace that the gesture demands, and backs into the shadows to enjoy it in peace. Hob moves the cactus to pride of place on top of the coffee machine, and goes about fetching himself his own first drink of the evening. Now that Morpheus is here, he can finally relax and indulge.

“Don’t get any ideas above your station,” someone hisses at the little plant, and Hob peers around the machine to find The Bentley Snake hunched forward on his elbows, propped up behind the hidden corner of the bar, whiskey in hand. His dark red hair is shorn short on the sides this time, a long standy-uppy flop at the top, and he’s wearing the latest in a long line of painfully slim-cut black suits. 

Sometimes Hob wonders if he’s doing Immortality wrong, being the only one of the lot who seems to like wearing more than black or white.

“Please don’t threaten my new plant friend,” Hob asks him.

“Needs ssssssome threatening,” the Snake says, sunglasses trained on the cactus. “Thinks its high n’ mighty just cause it sprouted in the Dreaming.”

Hob processes this as he pulls a pint for himself. “You know about the Dreaming?”

“Sleep, don’t I?” the Snake mutters.

Hob refills the Snake’s whiskey glass, and clinks his pint off the Snake’s tumbler. “I don’t like to assume.”

“Oi, I sleep, don’t I, Lord Shaper?” the Snake says, with a jerk of his chin at where the bar meets the wall. 

Morpheus is little more than a black shadow and starshine eyes. He must be feeling a bit crowded, to have retreated so thoroughly. Hob doesn’t blame him–it’s starting to get stuffy, what with all the bodies and the salt-rank whiff of booze and sweat. The music is a touch loud now that there's so many voices competing to be heard over it, and Hob is thinking that now’s a good time to open the windows, let the pre-storm breeze that’s kicking up wash the place fresh.

Though he doesn’t point it out to the man, Hob’s Stranger has been different since his return. 

While before he was reserved and formal, now he’s skittish about touch, always buttoned up to the throat in whatever clothing he manifests for himself, and reluctant to allow himself to be crowded or contained. They're working on it, with long walks along the quay or visits to farmer's markets, but overcoming trauma is never a fast process. Even the occasional therapeutic hand-holding Hob imposes on him has to be well telegraphed, or Morpheus will shake him off without realizing he’s done so.

These are all very understandable and normal reactions to the torture he’d suffered at the hands of Burgess. But while Hob has done his best to comfort and guide Morpheus toward healing in his limited, mortal way, it’s not like he can he can force the God of Sleep to make an appointment with a headshrinker.

Hob flashes a glance over at Colonel Williams, by the front door, who is one of the social support folks Hob knows from helping the unhoused get back on their feet. She specializes in suppressed trauma and PTSD, and Hob wonders if there’s a way he could maneuver Morpheus into an ‘accidental’ conversation with the woman sometime tonight.

“ So deeply that I cannot oust you from my realm for decades at a time, Serpent, ” Morpheus rumbles, and right, Hob’s forgotten that he’s supposed to be mediating between two otherworldly entities. Morpheus turns his gaze to Hob. “What is he doing here?” 

Morpheus sounds two thirds curious and one third jealous.

He doesn’t mean it like that , Hob tells himself. It may be my birthday–well, the date I chose to be my birthday–but I’m not going to get that lucky.

An odd tension frazzles the air, and the Snake rolls his impossible spine backwards a bit, not retreating, exactly. Just not standing so close to Hob.

Huh.

Who knew that Morpheus would be so territorial with his head priest?

Hob laughs, trying disperse the feeling that if he’s not careful, he may inadvertently start a supernatural brawl. “Come on, my friend. You think after six and a half centuries, you’re the only creepy-crawly I know?”

“I am not a creepy-crawly, Hob Gadling,” Morpheus rumbles, with all the theatrical offense of a maiden-aunt. “But I did not think you would consort with the likes of him . Not with your upbringing as it was–”

The Snake bristles. “Hey! I was invited!”

Morpheus steps out of the shadows just enough for his face and hands–and empty wine glass–to be visible in the dim pub lighting. Night has well and truly fallen outside. He sets the glass on the bar top with a challenging tink .

“ Invited ,” Morpheus repeats flatly.

“I just let it be known among the Othered set that they were welcome to drop by,” Hob hisses, low enough that Patrick won’t be able to catch it over the conversation and music around them.

“It’s a special number, you know. I felt like it should be celebrated with everyone , especially those who really know what it means.”

Morpheus inhales sharply and turns narrowed, laser-focused, glacier-blue eyes to Hob’s face. “ How did you phrase this invitation? ” he asks with no little urgency.

Hob blinks. 

“Uh, something something freely welcome to partake of my hospitality, all those who know the number something something?” Hob says, nerves flooding him. He tugs on his ear. “Did I… um… say something I shouldn’t have?”

“ All those who know the number ,” Morpheus groans. “The number of the beast.”

"Six-one-six," the Snake says.

"Six- six- six," Hob corrects, "According to modern translations. Which is also the number of years I've… oh. No. No, it's my birthday ,” Hob says, sweat beading by his hairline and trickling down the back of his shirt. “That’s… that’s what I meant.”

“But that it is not what you said .”

The Snake straightens up all at once, eyes popping wide behind his glasses if the sudden height of his eyebrows are anything to go by. He slams back the rest of his whiskey and chokes: “That’s me out, then. Many happy returns, you poor doomed bastard. If you ever get any.”

“That’s not ominous at all,” Hob says, and chugs half his beer.

The Snake wends his way to the front door and is gone in a gust of chill spring breeze, and the sound of the rain just starting up outside. Hob hopes Matthew has found a good roost under one of the table umbrellas. One of these days, he's going to make good on his threat to get the raven a Service Animal vest, just so he can come inside in weather like this.

Morpheus fully manifests, posture tense, nostrils flaring. He scans the crowd. For who, Hob can guess, but he doesn’t like to think on it.

Morpheus has, after all, told him all about his trip to Hell.

And then the lights flicker.

Hob is… well, he’s almost disappointed by how dramatic the Devil’s entrance is. 

In the last six hundred years, he’s come to learn that people like him tend to lay low and not bring attention to themselves. Even Morpheus, with his fine clothes and fist-sized ruby, behaved as a mortal might at their meetings–walking into the White Horse, sitting down, no excess displays of power or even wealth, really, save for the handful of dreamsand he’d blown in Lady Constantine’s face.

But Hob has to give the Devil their due. When they play, they don’t play small.

The storm that’s been brewing since sunset suddenly, and violently breaks. Rain cascades against the roof like the rush of an oncoming train. A clap of thunder loud enough to rattle the martini glasses in their hangers above the bar shakes the room, making more than one person yelp. The crack of lightning that follows flares like an atom bomb, white light blasting in through the windowpanes, casting everyone in harsh, dramatic black-and-white chiaroscuro.

Ears ringing and eyes sparking, Hob sets down his beer and scrubs at his face.

(Okay, so he’s also a little disappointed there’s no fiddle sting to accompany their appearance. But then again, the New Inn is hardly Georgia.)

When his vision has cleared, Hob whirls around to check on his friends and colleagues. There’s probably something dangerous about turning your back to Satan, but he’s got the King of Nightmares guarding it. He’s more worried for the humans than the two celestial entities that are, if he knows his friend, puffing up and posturing. Hob skims out from behind the bar, heading for Patrick, who has stopped a few steps away from the service gap. 

And he's… he's just standing there.

Fear seizes Hob’s throat, and for a terrible second, he worries that the light really was an atom bomb, that everyone he’s ever known and loved in this life are nothing more than people-shaped pillars of ash, and it’s his fault. He invited them here, and then he invited the literal Devil as well, and now they're—

But no, when he reaches Patrick, his friend is alive. He breathes, he blinks, his flesh is soft and warm. But he’s frozen. Hob looks around and… yes, the humans in the room–well, the mortal ones, at least–have simply stopped moving.

“Are they…?” Hob crackles.

“ They will be fine,” Morpheus assures him. His hair is sticking straight out, like a furious cat, and he’s starting to lose coherence around the edges. His coat swirls off into shadow like heavy ink in water, his eyes are as fathomless as deep space, and his fingers elongate into razor-sharp and obsidian-tipped claws. “Time has stopped for them. When it resumes, it will be as if the lost moments never happened. ”

Not all of them, Hob thinks, seeing Johanna’s eyes darting around the room with terrified fury. He decides not to point it out, though, in case the Lightbringer decides to do something permanent and terrible about it. He just gives her a long look, and tries to put as much reassurance in his expression as he can. I’ll get us out of here safely, don’t you worry.

Johanna blinks back once, slow and squinty like a cat. Message received.

A quick glance also confirms that the rest of the Otherworld denizens have made themselves as sparse as the Snake. He doesn't blame them.

Then, finally, when he’s assured himself that everyone under his roof and thus in his care is as safe as they can be, with the literal Ruler of Hell sharing that selfsame roof, he skirts around the bar to join Morpheus on the empty dance floor. Only then does he allow all of his attention to settle on his new visitor.

They are… tall . ‘Grand’ is the adjective that comes to mind first, followed by ‘statuesque’ and ‘ literally awe-inspiring’.

That’s an angel , Hob things. Or at least, they used to be. Of course they’re so… present. So overwhelming.

It’s like having all of his senses buffeted all at once–all he can smell is the acrid tang of sulfur, all he can hear is a high-pitched screech, all he can see is an overwhelming brightness that might actually be an overwhelming darkness, and his skin feels like it’s covered with biting fire ants. He gasps, reaching out clumsily behind him to clutch at the bar, the crush of the gravitas emanating from the corner stealing the breath from his lungs.

One of Morpheus’ fingers stretches out, impossible and eerie. It taps Hob gently on the forehead, right where his third eye would be, if he was that kind of spiritual. The drowning rush of screaming discomfort snaps off, like a faucet cranked shut. Air rushes back into the room. 

“Be not afraid,” my hairy arse , Hob thinks, as he coughs and scrubs his eyes again. It’s a wonder the blessed virgin didn’t shriek her head off and go running off into the night.

“I’m… I’m fine,” he reassures Morpheus, as his friend shuffles a step closer, hand resting protectively on Hob’s shoulder.

It takes him a few seconds to actually see what he’s seeing. Satan themself is presenting as a white woman, with fair, severely arranged golden curls that resemble nothing so much as a crown of thorns across their forehead. What Hob took for giant bat wings is actually a luxuriously patterned black pashmina, draped artfully over across one shoulder, over a rich white tea-length dress.

For being the ruler of Hell, Hob has to admit that they actually look… well, glamorous . 

“Hello, Robert Gadling,” Lucifer Morningstar purrs from the empty stage in the corner of the pub. It’s little more than a triangular riser jammed against the wall, just big enough for a tall stool, a mic stand, and some folksy performer on Sunday afternoons. But it gives them an even greater height from which to look down their nose at him, so of course that’s where they manifested. “I am ever so grateful to be included.”

“Er, yeah,” Hob says, pushing himself upright and wiping his clammy hands on the thighs of his jeans. “Welcome, then.”

“ Hob ,” Morpheus says, scandalized. Shadows writhe anxiously in a puddle by his feet, the Nightmare side of Dream closer to the surface in his worry. 

“What?” Hob says. “Doesn’t hurt anyone to be polite.”  Hob steps forward and holds out his now-dry hand for the Devil to shake.

“Certainly not,” Lucifer agrees, and takes his hands between theirs. They pull him forward a few more steps, pressing his fingers between their palms as if they could taste his sins on his skin, and peers down at him with intelligent eyes the same color of the storm clouds outside. “And it’s been ever so long since I’ve been to a party .”

Hob cranes his head back to look up at them. They’re just a handspan away now, only their entwined arms between them keeping them parted, and for an absurd moment, he thinks that Lucifer is going to kiss him. Morpheus must think so too, because he lets loose a ripping growl, warning and threat in the sound to rival the thunderstorm outside.

Lucifer laughs and lets Hob go. They take a dainty step down from the stage, and sashay their way toward the bar on totteringly-high bleach-white pumps.

“I, uh, I‘ve got wine and beer,” Hob says, spinning around and scrambling to catch up with them. “Or anything harder. Or softer. Whatever you like, really. What can I pour for you?”

“Red wine, naturally,” the Devil purrs.

They stop at the bar just an arm's length from Morpheus, a clear challenge. They lean elegantly on one elbow against the padded edge, eyeing him up like they’d either like to eat him alive or gouge his eyes out. Possibly both. Hob slips between them like a fleshy immortal shield. Maybe it won’t actually keep them from lashing out at each other but, meh, he can’t die if they do.

He reaches over the bar, grabs one of the open bottles of Syrah, a glass from the rack above their heads, and pours a generous measure. He holds it out genteely to the Devil, and they accept it with good grace.

Hob then immediately refills Morpheus’ abandoned glass with his Vinsanto, and tops up his own with an awkward backwards reach for the amber tap. 

“So… are you gonna release them?” Hob asks, once Lucifer has raised their glass for a clink, and he’s very cautiously obliged. It feels like bad luck to drink from it right away, though, so he turns to offer the same toast to Morpheus, who stares hard at Hob as they clink glasses, as if he’s drilling a blessing into Hob’s skull.

“No, I think not,” Lucifer says, taking their first sip, and offering Hob an appreciative eyebrow bounce at the taste. “No need to cause a panic. But don’t worry; I shan’t stay for long. I only wanted to pop in and wish my new friend many happy returns.”

“Is that what we are?” Hob asks, with a huge gulp of beer. “Friends?”

“Of course!” Lucifer says, their eyes narrowing a little, shoulders tensing up, lips slimming tightly and… “We are friends, aren’t we Robert Gadling? Why else would you have extended your invitation to all who know the true number of your years?”

Which is… a bit of an odd thing for the Lightbringer to be worried about, honestly.

Hob looks again. There’s nerves there. There’s concern. Why would…

Oh . Hob thinks. They’re lonely, too.

Hob risks a glance back at Morpheus, who is clutching the stem of his wineglass tight enough that it’s creaking. His eyes are leaking purple-black starstuff around the perimeters, which whisps away like the leading edge of a fast-moving cloud. Otherwise, he's perfectly still, posture ramrod straight.

“Yes,” Hob answers, turning back to Lucifer. “Yes, we are friends. Why not? I’ve no quarrel with you, unless you’re here to drag me to Hell?”

Whatever it was the Devil was expecting Hob to say, it wasn’t that. They look first genuinely surprised, then flattered, then secretly pleased, then distraught in such quick succession that Hob barely has time to pass each expression as they pass over their face.

“Of course not!” Lucifer says, so quickly and so completely surprised that it comes out in a rush. They sound genuinely hurt at his assumption. “My kingdom only contains those human souls who believe they should be there. They send themselves to Hell. Please. I have better manners than to drag anyone against their belief and will.” They narrow their eyes at Hob and take another sip of wine, struggling to regain their teasing nonchalance. “Why, have you done something worthy of punishment?”

Many things, Hob thinks. Terrible things. Things I just hope one day I live long enough to be able to atone for. 

“Ah, well, this isn’t about my death,” Hob hedges. “Which I am still not interested in, thank you very much. This is a celebration of my life!”

“It is indeed. Happy six hundred and sixty-sixth birthday, Robert,” Lucifer says, and they clink glasses once more. 

“Hob,” he offers up. “My friends in the know call me Hob.”

“ Hob, ” Morpheus hisses again. “ You are being unwise. ”

“I’m being personable ,” Hob corrects, but takes a tiny step back, closer into Morpheus’s orbit, to appease him. One of the swirling black shadows wraps around Hob’s ankle.

“Dream Lord!” Lucifer greets him, sounding as if they have just noticed him behind Hob for the first time. “What a delight to see you again so soon.”

“Lightbringer, ” Morpheus growls in return. 

“And how do you know our dear little birthday boy?”

Morpheus lets out another grumbling snarl, all without changing the placidly haughty expression on his face.

“Robert Gadling is my head priest, as well you know, ” Morpheus intones, voice as deep and dangerous as the fathomless darkness at the bottom of an ocean. “ You stand in my temple uninvited. ”

“Just as you bullied your way into Hell?” Lucifer asks silkily. They sip their wine showily. “Besides, I was invited, wasn’t I?”

Both pairs of eyes fall on Hob, their weight like a physical blow, and he buys himself some time by taking a long drink of his beer. Which, of course, goes down the wrong pipe, and leaves him coughing like a complete tit in front of two of the greatest powers in the universe.

Oh yeah, that’s me. Hob “embarrassingly human” Gadling.

Morpheus sets down his wine and hastily lays a hand on Hob’s curved back. It’s probably meant to be as possessive as it is calming, but at this point, Hob doesn’t mind. It feels good to have the comfort of his friend’s proximity. And the very visible gesture of his claiming and protection.

“I see I am in danger of wearing out my welcome,” Lucifer sighs, as if put upon. They finish their wine in a serpent-like gulp, opening their jaws wider than the mouth of their human-shape ought to allow, and set the glass aside. 

“Quite.”

"In which case, allow me to present me with your gift unto you now, Robert Gadling of Essex," Lucifer says.

With a flourish, they're suddenly cupping something spindly and large in both their palms. It is the ivory of old bone, gnarled and pitted, and looks nothing so much as a big, eldritch key. There’s a circle at the top, crowned with four spikes, and the teeth on the shaft look as if they may be made of actual fangs.

And, of course, much like Morpheus’ cactus, it is topped with a whimsical, cheery red bow.

Morpheus lets out a horrified gasp.

“I had intended on bestowing this differently,” Lucifer drawls, eyeing Morpheus meaningfully. “But as it is in poor form to attend a birthday party with no gift for the celebrant.”

She turns the full weight of her gravitationally heavy gaze on Hob.

“Er… thank you?” Hob asks.

“You will not, soon enough.”

Yeah, okay, that sounds like a trap , Hob thinks. But with no clue how or even why he might refuse the gift from a literal fallen angel, and what the eternal ramifications of that action might be he does, Hob reaches out to take the key.

“ Do not accept! ” Morpheus all but wails. “ If you become ruler of Hell, you will never again cross the threshold into my realm.”

That’s saying a little more than I think Morpheus means to , Hob thinks, fingers frozen in the air, hovering above the ribbon. It sounds less like “you’ll be barred from my realm” and more “I’ll never see you again.”

“Is that true?” Hob asks. "This will make me ruler of Hell ?"

Lucifer smirks triumphantly.  “I have already emptied Hell of all its demons. The gates are shut. Even now, the fires ash and grow cold. I have renounced my crown. A new King is required. They who next touch this Key will become that King.”

Hob shudders, short hair springing up, skin crawling with horror. Demons. Loose on Earth. Loose everywhere . And unable to be commanded to return to Hell by exorcism or spell, for the gates would be barred to them.

He cuts a look to Johanna, who is clearly following all of this. There are tears running down her cheeks. Sweat breaks out on Hob's brow, heart pounding hard behind his ribs, dread creeping down his spine. He hasn't felt this sunk with terror since he first came face-to-face with a machine gun in a muddy trench.

He's being given a choice.

It's not much of a choice.

Hob licks his lips, hoping his voice is steadier than his trembling, hovering hands.  “What happens if I don’t accept your gift?” he crackles, voice barely above a whisper.

“Then I will think that you have very poor manners indeed,” Lucifer pouts. 

Hob's breath shudders out of him, leaving his skin cold and nerves on high alert. “That’s all?”

"Of course, I will then have to bestow the Key upon the next most worthy candidate,” Lucifer says, eyes slinking up to Morpheus over Hob’s shoulder like toxic honey and, ah, there it is.

There’s the trap.

If Hob accepts the Key, he will become King of Hell, and never see Morpheus again. But he could command the armies of the damned back into their pits, and possibly, like he has in his little kingdom here on Earth, find new and better ways to help those there punishing themselves.

But if Morpheus accepts the Key, then Dream of the Endless will become King of Hell, plunging every sentient being in existence into unspeakable horror every time they fall asleep.

Which makes Hob’s choice a very, very simple one.

Before Morpheus can stop him, Hob plucks the key out of Lucifer’s hand. 

" Hob !" Morpheus wails.

He reels back, as if all the places he was touching Hob suddenly burn him. The floor shudders beneath their feet, the foundations rumbling without warning. Thunder? Hob guesses, then, No, earthquake!

The room shakes with the power of Morpheus' fury and agony. Hob grasps at the bar to stay upright, and wonders if now that its head priest has become overlord of another realm, the temple of the New Inn will defile and crack apart around them all.

Morpheus keens like a wounded hart, clutching at his chest. He staggers, rocked by the judder of the floor, what little color he had manufactured for this humanish form draining away entirely. Outside, Matthew is cawing furiously, battering against the window in a desperate attempt to break in.

Hob's stomach heaves, and he's not sure if it's from the shaking of the building, or the enormity of what he's just done. What he's just accepted.

“What, no kiss for my gift, your Majesty?” Lucifer laughs, shrill and triumphant. 

They seize Hob's face between red-taloned hands, and press a fire-hot, acid-slick mouth against his. Hob screams , the crawling burn of his flesh melting from his lips outwards throwing his animal mind into a mindless, terrified panic. Someone's hands fist in the back of his jumper, yanking at him, but the Devil's grip has seared him down to the bone, fingers embedded in his cheeks, nails scraping against the side of his teeth and tongue. The searing agony reaches his eyes, sizzles in his tears, so all he can see is the poisonous green steam of his own eyeballs boiling in their sockets.

Glass shatters, a bird cries out, a door slams open, cracking against a wall, a sonorous voice calls his name, and Hob flails, kicks, screams, and screams, and screams and—

"Forgive me, I am a titch late. I got caught up reading and… goodness me!" a prim voice gasps. "Well, this won't do at all!"

A loud noise, like a fleshy crack, rings out. 

As suddenly as a snap, the pain is gone.

Hob gargles on the tail end of a scream that aborts somewhere behind his teeth. 

His nose is filled with the scent of the rain and the petrichor from the gravel drive beyond a broken window and a wide-standing door, not with the reek of burning flesh. His heart races wildly, but it is still within his body. The rigid tension of his hell-electrified muscles ceases and Hob flops backwards, dropping against Morpheus' chest. Strong arms come around his chest Morpheus tilts his pelvis to cradle Hob's sacrum, one strong thigh behind his legs to keep from folding. He plays one hand up Hob's throat, caressing, paling his face, checking for damage and soothing all at the same time.

Hob pries his aching lids open, and finds his eyes have not boiled away after all.

The New Inn is unshaken, all in one piece, save for the way the front door is hanging off its hinges, cracked straight down the middle. The person who did it is obscured by Hob's view by the coffee machine, and the little, forlorn-looking cactus.

"What did you do to him?" Matthew caws from the mic stand, puffed out to twice his size, wings spread and a murderous gleam in his eyes. "What the fuck did you do to him?"

" I will end your miserable existence! I will throw you into the sulfurous lake from which you should never have crawled, you worthless, lothesome, hateful—"

"I'm fine!" Hob chokes out, feeling like he's vomiting up half his esophagus with every syllable. "I'm fine! " 

" Your dare! I will tear your atoms apart and scatter them across so many universes that you will never again—"

" — peck your fucking eyes out — "

"Oh, dear! I do apologize, I believe I broke your door in, I'm so sorry, my dear boy—

"Guys," Hob gags. "Just let me catch my breath…"

And before him, unmoving and unperturbed by the overlapping, rising threats and verbal assaults, Lucifer watches him with a knowing, miserable look on their face.

"Enough! Quiet!" Hob thrust the Key into the air, and silence drops like a guillotine. He heaves on a few more breaths, then swallows hard, licking his lips. In an agonized, throat-shredded whisper he adds, "Please."

Because it never hurts to use one's manners.

Slowly, agonizingly, with the gentle help of Morpheus, Hob gets his feet back under him. The first thing he does is reach for his half-finished pint and drain the glass. The alcohol burns its way down, and Hob tastes the faintest touch of blood. Christ's nails, how loud had he been screaming?

Feeling more settled, he turns to face Lucifer.

Whose lipstick and painted fingernails are still utterly pristine.

They… they didn't kiss him.

"You…" Hob pants. "You didn't do that?"

"No," Lucifer says softly, and folds their hands together with elegant contriteness, fingers pointed downward in a reverse prayer. 

"But you," Hob starts, then has to stop to swallow the bloody spittle that his screaming has produced. "You know what just happened?"

"The Key does it," Lucifer whispers. "Changes you. Every Devil needs a Face."

"I don't want a Devil Face," Hob says stubbornly.

Lucifer smiles, but it's thin and pained. "You don't get to choose."

Hob snarls and drops the Key onto the bar top. He half expects it to be stuck to his palm, or burned into his flesh. But it falls from his grip easily and lands with an unsatisfying clack . Morpheus, still hovering at Hob's side like Peter Pan's shadow, reaches out for it.

Hob smacks his hand away. "Don't you fucking dare."

" I would not see you suffer—"

"And I would not see all of humanity suffer, so you just fucking back right up there, friend."

Morpheus lowers his arm, but utterly fails to back up. If anything he presses closer. If the skinny little fuck had any bodyheat to speak of, Hob was sure he'd be feeling it through his own clothes right now.

The man by the door steps out of Hob's blindspot behind the coffee machine, and comes around to stand a respectful distance away, and peer at the Key. It's the queer little Bookseller of Soho. Late to the party, because he got caught up in reading, and Hob couldn't be more grateful for his perpetual absentminded tardiness.

“Well!" the Bookseller exclaims. "That’s where that silly old thing has gotten to! You would not believe the fuss that has kicked up in The Silver City. If you’ll give me just a moment…” He snaps once, a downward motion, as if yanking on an old-fashioned Edwardian-era bell pull.

A golden chime rings through the air and the Bookseller nods as if he's done some sort of momentous good deed. "Help is on the way, dear boy. But, ah, I would be ever so grateful if you did not tell them it was me who alerted them? I couldn't bear the paperwork."

And with that, the Bookseller is straight back out the door, which, miraculously, isn't actually broken off its hinges like Hob had thought it was. Turns out the window isn't broken either; it must have been a glass Matthew knocked over on his desperate flight inside.

Lucifer, very graciously, and very apologetically, refills Hob's pint glass by reaching over the bar for the tap, as Hob had done. Hob takes the pint (half head and spilling over the side; Hob guesses the Devil can't be good at everything ) with a nod of thanks. His hand is shaking so badly that Morpheus has to steady his arm just so he can drink.

"Well, friend," Hob says to Lucifer, once he's had a few long pulls on the cold fizz. "That was a hell of a party trick."

Lucifer snorts extremely inelegantly. "Pun intended?"

"Entirely."

" After what you suffered, you would still call the Morningstar friend ?" Morpheus asks, horror in every syllable.

"They didn't do whatever that just was to me," Hob points out. "The Key did. In fact, if that's what it feels like to hold it, then honestly, I don't blame you for wanting rid of the literally damned thing."

Lucifer's red, red, red lips part in gentle shock. They touch one lacquered nail to their own soft, pale cheek, then brush their palm across their neck as if double checking that the flesh there is indeed intact.

"You are generous in your forgiveness, sire," Lucifer says demurely.

"No more generous than all those who punish themselves in Hell for their past deeds deserve, I think," Hob says back. Including you , he doesn't add. But he doesn't need to.

Lucifer offers Hob a grateful bow.

Matthew makes a confused sort of snorfle sound. He hops his way down and across the room to Morpheus, who stoops to allow Matthew to perch on his hand, then transfers the raven to his shoulder.

"So now what, my lords?" Matthew croaks tentatively.

"Now we wait for whatever help was supposedly—" 

Another unexpected surge of light interrupts Hob, and he squints against a golden flash-bulb flare of it. When it clears, two male-presenting beings that could literally only be angels stand before them. 

This corner of the pub is starting to get awfully crowded, Hob thinks with all the hysterical sarcasm his ordeal allows him to muster.

The angels are both statuesque, both blonde, both clad in raiments of glowing white, with enormous golden wings. Hob glances at Lucifer, who rolls their eyes as the pompous way the angels carry themselves.

"Dream King," one of them says in deferential greeting. Both of the angels bow low to Morpheus.

" Remiel, Archangel of Hope.  Duma, Archangel of Silence. Your presence in this moment is most welcome." 

Morpheus inclines his head in a shallow bow, not letting on that it was the Bookseller who called them here, as asked. Hob doesn't know much about the hierarchy of celestial beings, but if the depth of their bows and nods to one another are anything to go by, Morpheus is a lot higher on the celestial pecking order than Lucifer's address to him has made it seem.

"Thank you," the one who is clearly not the Archangel of Silence says. "And our gratitude, also, for summoning us."

As one, the two archangels turn to the fallen one.

"Lucifer," Remiel says.

"Brother dearest," Lucifer sneers.

"The Divine Creator demands that you take up the Key and return to your throne."

"It's not my throne any longer," Lucifer sneers. "It's his now."

Remiel spares a glance over his shoulder at Hob that makes it very, very clear that the imperious twat thinks Hob is not much more evolved than pond gunk. The angel turns back to Lucifer.

"A mortal cannot rule Hell."

"Not mortal," Hob speaks up, just because he does not appreciate being snubbed in his own pub. And on his own birthday, to boot.

"Still human , though," Remiel sneers, the facade of literally-holier-than-thou superiority cracking a bit.

"And what's so wrong with being hummmuph," Matthew harrumphs as Morpheus reaches up and pinches his beak shut.

"Oh, well, guilty as charged then," Hob sneers right back, shoving his hands into his pockets and slouching his shoulders in the most insolent way he knows how.

Duma strides silently to Hob's side. Gently, but inexorably, the angel takes Hob's chin between his fingers, and holds his face still for his gaze.

"Doesn't hurt any more," Hob answers the ethereal creature's silent question. "But now we've got a bit of a problem, if you say a human can't rule Hell. Because it looks like it's either me, or Morpheus, and we all know what will happen if Dream of the Endless is forced to don that crown."

Duma's gaze grows tearful and sad. He shakes his head, just once, then releases Hob. Then, with the same hand, he reaches for the Key.

"Brother!" Remiel gasps, grabbing at his draped sleeve to stop him.

Matthew shakes free of Morpheus's fingers and, in a resounding voice that is clearly not his own, booms: "Hell cannot be entrusted to other than those who serve the Name directly… I shall take over Hell."  The raven shakes himself all over, blinking rapidly. "What the fuck was that, boss?" He turns his sharp beak toward Duma. "Hey, don't use me as a puppet, man, that's violating!"

"Duma, no ," Remiel protests, but halts in the face of Duma's implacable silence. Remiel curls into himself in shame. "Very well. I cannot allow my fellow to drink from a cup I have refused. I will go with you."

"Have fun, boys," Lucifer sing-songs. "Oh, and there's a bit of a trick to getting the cold water in the palace pipes. There isn't any! Ha!"

Remiel sends Lucifer the stinkiest stink-eye Hob's ever seen in six hundred and sixty-six years.

Duma reaches for the key again and Hob is struck with a sudden flash of inspiration.

“Wait!” he shouts, throwing out a hand to block the Key. He doesn't touch it again though. He's reckless, not stupid.

"Wait?" Remiel echoes, agog. " Wait ? Who are you to command the Host to—"

"I'm the King of the Hell," Hob challenges back, puffing out his chest. "At least until you touch this Key."

"You are no Demonic Monarch, you lowly—"

“Oh, stuff it,” Hob snaps at Remiel, sick to the teeth with being polite to Celestial entities to clearly don’t feel the same courtesy toward him. “Before I give you the key, I want something in return. And I'm not giving up my one and only chance to do a deal as the Devil.”

Lucifer laughs, overjoyed. Morpheus makes a worried, confused sound. In the corner, Johanna's eyes narrow in concern.

But none of that matters. Because Hob’s remembered, all of a sudden, what Matthew had gossiped about, when he was recounting the parts of Morpheus’ trip to Hell that his friend had left out.

The boss stopped at this… this window in a spire, and a woman had called out for him with a name I’d never heard before, the raven had slurred, deep in his cups one evening while Morpheus had been trapped in the Library and sent Matthew for Tuesday Hangs in his stead. She’d reached for him through the bars, tugged on his coat, sobbing. She thought he’d come to rescue her and instead he just left there, like some heartless– He’d mantled his feathers then, shaking his head in a very human gesture like trying to disperse a bad memory. I asked Lucienne about her. She was sixteen, man, she was a kid, and the boss did her pretty dirty. She was heartbroken. It’s ugly.

Remiel bristles, the small feathers along the upper curve of their glossy white wings frazzling in irritation. “You do not bargain with God,” they hiss.

“But our absentee parent not here, my sycophantic sibling,” Lucifer purrs. “And Robert Gadling has not yet abdicated. Hell is his gift to bestow. Or to hoard. Oh, do say you will hoard it instead, little man. It will vex our creator so.”

“No,” Hob says, horrified by the idea of being sole ruler of all suffering for the rest of eternity, and being barred from Dream and the Dreaming to boot. 

Lucifer shrugs, like it was worth one last try.

"Very well," Remiel grits out, sounding like every word is costing them a gallon of golden ichor.

“Nada,” Hob says. "She goes free."

Morpheus clutches hard at Hob's shoulder in his shock. " How do you know her name? How—"

"Not now," Hob says gently to his oldest friend, taking his hand from his shoulder, and twining their fingers together behind his back. Then turns his best flinty, bandit's glare at the angels. "Nada is released in exchange for the Key. Those are my terms."

"We cannot simply release a soul from Hell," Remiel says slowly, as if explaining to a toddler. "Without a corporation, it will be naught but a ghost."

"Then give her a corporation," Lucifer says, studying their nails as if bored. "We both know the paperwork is not as persnickety as the Quartermasters make it out to be. There's stacks lying around, waiting to be inhabited."

"Sibling!" Remiel hisses at Lucifer in warning. The former devil just bares their teeth at him. Remiel tries a different tack: "The Dream King condemned her to Hell himself. We cannot give her leave until he recants—"

Hob steps on Morpheus's foot.

Hard.

" I recant!" Morpheus yelps, glaring daggers at Hob. Then he clears his throat and resumes his customary haughty expression. "Nada has been unjustly punished, and it has gone on far too long. I recant my oath, and rescind my ire. Nada is no longer prisoner by my will, nor my pleasure."

Remiel gawps.

"A new life for Nada," Hob repeats firmly, bringing the conversation back to its point. "Reincarnation. A chance to do it all again, without suffering, in return for the Key. Are we agreed?"

Duma looks between Remiel, Morpheus, and Hob.

" Agreed ," Matthew booms, and then squawks: "Man, fuck off!"

"It is done."

Hob removes his hand from the bar.

Duma grasps the Key.

The only indication that it is paining him, that it is burning his face off even as Hob is staring at him and nothing is happening outwardly, is a slight squinching of his features. Remiel makes a disgusted sound and gestures with his hand, and the faint echo of a newborn baby's cry vaults through the room, perfectly audible over the susurrus of the gentling thunderstorm.

New life.

And she shares Hob's birthday.

How about that.

"The bargain is fulfilled," Remiel spits with disgust. "Brother, come."

Both angels snap their wings out—one of Remiel's slapping Lucifer in the face, clearly intentionally by the snarl they let loose—and in the powerful thrust of a gong-like wingbeat, are gone. The Key is gone with them.

Hob immediately squeezes Morpheus's hand tight and turns to gauge whether he's fucked up their friendship forever.

Surely, surely, Morpheus must be furious at Hob for overstepping so completely. Nada had gone to Hell because she'd died by suicide, but she'd only killed herself because Dream of the Endless had seduced her against the rules that forbade him for lying with a mortal ( Do I count as a mortal? Hob wonders frantically, Would we be punished if—focus, Gadling! ) and her people had been slaughtered in retribution. And Morpheus, in his pride, had left her to rot there when she refused his hand in return for rescue. It had all been, quite frankly, some epically toxic masculinity bullshit , and Hob is prepared to square off with his friend about it if he has to. 

He doesn't want to, of course, but for the sake of a soul left suffering through no wrong of her own, he will.

But instead, he finds Morpheus limp with shock, silently weeping.

"Hob," Morpheus gasps. " Hob, my priest, my devoted one." He surges forward, anoints Hob's forehead and palms with holy, reverent kisses. The last of the lingering pain from the Key's hold  is washed away in the cool calmness of deep sleep and deeper night. It flows down his skin, making him shiver as Hob is consecrated Head Priest once more.  "How beneficent your human heart is. And how shamed I am, that it took you to force me to do right by one I had scorned unjustly and unkindly."

"Yeah, well, don't you forget it," Hob says, when Morpheus pulls away. He rubs his face, weary in a way that he hasn't felt in… well, ever. "So, are we done now? Can we… can we be done now, please? I have a party to—" he looks around the room, at all the people here under his invitation, under his burden of care. "To save."

"By all means," Lucifer says. "They will awaken as soon as I go."

" Then go," Morpheus invites, with no little amount of bitchy snark.

Lucifer offers him a hard stare, but after a moment, relents without retaliation. "I shall make my farewells to you then, Robert Gadling, from one former Monarch of Hell to another."

They lean forward and buss a gentle, warm kiss off of Hob's cheek.

“Where will you go?” Hob asks, as they withdraw. “If Hell isn’t your domain any more, what are your plans?”

“Why, stay here, of course,” Lucifer says. Then they look around at the cramped room, the stuffy air, the frozen mortals. “Well, perhaps not here , here. But as I said, it’s been ever so long since I’ve been invited to a party. I’ve forgotten how fun they can be. Perhaps I will find some space to host my own sinful little celebrations.”

“Like… a nightclub?” Hob asks, wracking his brain for what they may mean.

Lucifer’s eyes spark with intrigue. “Now that is an idea,” they murmur. “A nightclub . There’s all sorts of wicked things a soul may get into there. I’ll send you an invitation to the grand opening, Hob dearest. In thanks for tonight.”

“You know what,” Hob says, finding he really means it when he says: “I look forward to it.”

The former Devil blinks, obviously not anticipating or expecting his favorable response.

“See you then, my friend,” Hob says, holding out a hand to shake.

“Is that a binding promise?” Lucifer asks slyly, reaching back.

“Absolutely not,” Hob laughs. “I know better than to make a deal with the devil. Again.” He cuts a wink at Morpheus, who wrinkles his nose petulantly. “But you tell me when and where, and I’ll try.”

“That is acceptable,” Lucifer acquiesces, and shakes his hand not to seal a deal, but in a companionable farewell.

“Oh!” Hob says, as a dark cloud of absolutely rotten-smelling smokes begins to billow around their smart white pumps. “I used to play some violin, in the 18th century. Should I bring it?”

Lucifer breaks into a wide, frankly dorky grin of sheer delight. “No, friend. I haven’t picked up a fiddle since I lost that bout. I’m more of a piano man, now.”

And before Hob can think of anything clever to say to that, the cloud envelopes the Devil, and they are gone.

“-- the hell was that! ” Patrick shouts from beside Hob, right in his ear, and Hob startles away, nearly falling on his arse in surprise.

Hob catches himself on a bar stool, heart hammering in his throat, as all around him the humans resume moving and talking as if the massive clap of thunder that had shaken the Inn had occurred just a second ago.

“Someone should go check if that hit the pub!” one of Hob’s colleagues says, and grabs an umbrella from the stand of forgotten ones by the door and ducking outside before he can see who it was. “No! All good! No fire!”

Johanna Constantine bounds across the room like she's a bolt of lightning herself. Hob braces for a punch in the nose, and gets wrapped in a tight embrace instead. "You mad bastard," Johanna hisses in his ear. "You mad, incredible, pig-shit bonkers bastard ."

"Yeah, that's me," Hob says sheepishly, squeezing her back.

"Happy birthday!" she says, smacks a ridiculous kiss off his mouth, and then crosses back across the room, grabs Ric by the sleeve, and pulls her through the kitchen and—by the sounds of the slamming door—into the back where the bins make a conveniently shadowed corner.

"Yeah, nobody go back there for a while," Hob announces to the handful of people watching what had just happened with open curiosity.

"Ew," Patrick grumps. He does a double take when he catches Morpheus and Matthew on the far side of the bar, several empty glasses before him that he obviously didn't put there.

For a moment, Hob is worried that his co-owner is going to put up a fuss about the live animal in the building, but then Patrick shrugs in the way that mortals encouraged to overlook Morpheus' oddities by the very nature of his existence do. He busses the empties, and moves on to the next customer.

Hob, not inclined at all to overlook Morpheus, leans on the bar beside him, and grins up at his oldest, and strangest friend.

" Are all your birthday celebrations this eventful, Hob Gadling? " Morpheus asks, eyebrow raised coyly, as Matthew attempts to preen the last of his wet feathers into laying right.

"Nah," Hob promises. "Just the milestones."

" Then I already dread the party you will throw to mark your first millennia."

Hob, who has just enough beer left in his glass to toast Morpheus and toss back the mouthful, does so. Then he chuckles ruefully. "I don't, my friend. Not in the least. As a former Monarch of Hell, I have a feeling my life will be even more interesting in the decades to come." He drops Morpheus a cheeky wink. "And I have so much to live for."

On the far side of the pub, someone shuts off all the lights. A spark of candlelight goes up, and, raised in chorus, everyone that Hob holds dear—in the here and now—begins to sing.

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[sofiadragon]

Ever find a larger bill in the laundry that you thought you lost or spent? I feel like that. The tiny little slash fic website from the early 00s that I read "If you are prepared" on is long gone, all links broken, but I found it over on Walking the Plank, which is somehow still operational. I found it and I'm about to completely ruin my emotional state for the next several days by re-reading it.

If You are Prepared

I sure hope this is the dark, intense journey through deep lore pre-OotP Harry Potter that I think it is. I so hope this is the fic I think it is. I reposted a work of mine on AO3 and spotted a reference to the online slash fic magazine Swish and Flick while I was cutting and pasting the old rtf into chapters. That got me to googling around looking to see if there was any trace of it left after 22 or so years. Found a screencap with some links to different stories and... I know this title. It lept out at me, through a screencap taken of a half-busted wayback machine archived webpage from 2003-2004. It jogged memories two decades old.

Go ahead. I dare you to read it. First chapter is Snape's POV:

At the first sight of the Muggle neighbourhood I’m reminded of one of the reasons I became a Death Eater so long ago. I feel nauseous and I can scarcely resist taking out my wand and casting a growth spell on their perfectly cut grass. I hurry up the stone walk way, amusing myself in imagining the look on the Muggles’ faces were they ever to see my garden. I knock three times on the oak door.

[fic-ive-read]

Link To The Fic

Definitely suggest you read this and then go through the authors entire repertoire on ao3. They are a very good author and write for several fandoms.

It's really funny, cause before I even saw that this fic was next in my bookmarks to rec, @shanastoryteller was suggested to me to follow, so hey! I absolutely love your works and follow several fandoms your write for. Love you lots! xx