#A PROPER WATERY LAD
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random-thot-generator · 8 months ago
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Simon's drunk and just wants to go to bed with his sweetheart.
cw: MDNI- gets a wee bit hot spicy , possible dub con (or is it?) 😏
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>>>>>
It's after one in the morning when a heavy knock at the door startles you out of a sound sleep.
You sit up in bed, still half-asleep and confused, and squint at the clock on your nightstand. Not sure what woke you, you're about to lie back down when you hear the knock again. That's never a good thing this late at night.
Now wide awake and scared out of your wits, you slide out of bed and throw on your robe. Creeping through your flat, you tiptoe up to the door and peer through the peephole, seeing an all too familiar face blinking blearily at your door.
Breathing out a sigh of relief, you unlock the door, but leave the chain on, and open it just enough to peek through the gap. "Jesus, Simon. You scared the shit out of me!"
The big Manc is standing on your stoop, swaying in place, his dark brown eyes bloodshot and drooping. "'M sorry, sweet'art. Know it's late. Had a few wiff the lads an' now I can't find m'keys." He inhales a deep breath then hiccups and makes a face. "Will ya let me in?"
He's obviously drunk, but that pitiful, hangdog face gets to you. You slip the chain and open the door. "C'mon in."
Simon shuffles inside and immediately stoops to unlace his boots, nearly pitching face-first onto the floor. "Simon!" you gasp, grabbing his arm. "You're going to hurt yourself. Go sit on the couch."
Unsteady, he stumbles to the couch and basically falls onto it, grunting as he rights himself and drops his head back on the cushions.
"'M s'sorry, love. Shouldn't uh woke ya. Jus' missed ya. Needed t'see ya."
You quirk a brow, smirking. Yeah. Totally wasted. Probably best to let him sleep it off on the couch, then give him hell in the morning. You'll help get him comfortable then let him pass out.
"Let's get your boots off, Si."
Kneeling at his feet, you start working on the laces when you feel his big hand rest on the top of your head. You glance up and smile at him, amused. His hand slides down to cup your cheek, his dark eyes watery as he stares down at you.
"Yer too good t'me, sweet'art. Bess day uh my life is when I met ya."
That actually makes you melt a little. "Aw. That's sweet, Simon."
His brows scrunch together. "'S true, love. Knew the moment I saw ya, you was meant t'be mine."
"What?"
"'M gonna take care uh ya, sweet'art. Gonna take a post at base, trainin' recruits. No more leavin' ya all alone. Worries the hell outta me, doin' tha'."
"Simon, love, you're drunk, talking out of your head. You and me aren't—"
"I know, love. I know," he murmurs, cupping the back of your head. "We're not married yet, but we're gonna be. Be proud t'have ya as my missus. Olready think uh ya like m'wife, anyway. An' one day, ya'll be the mother uh my kids. Yer gonna make a damn good mum, sweet'art; I can tell."
You huff out an exasperated laugh. "Whoa, Simon! This is getting a little too—"
He presses his thumb over your lips and chuckles lowly. "I know, sweet girl. Gettin' ahead uh m'self. Don't worry, love. We'll find a nice place t'settle, first. One uh them quiet li'l villages near the base. Need t'put my pretty wife in a proper home a'fore we start makin' babies." He smirks. "Don't mean we can't practice, though, yeah?"
He reaches for you, but you crab walk backwards. "Si, you've been drinking. We can't—"
You bleat out a startled yelp when he grabs hold of your ankles and drags you back within his reach. Big hands gripping your waist, he picks you up off the floor like a toddler and plops you on his lap, then proceeds to kiss you stupid. Hands kneading and groping, tongue shoved down your throat, you can feel his erection pressing up into the thin material between your legs.
Oh, mercy!
Finally breaking the kiss, he stands in one swift motion, making your already spinning head reel. Pupils blown wide, he smirks down at you with a feral light smoldering in his eyes. "Never too drunk t'give my li'l woman a proper fuckin'," he purrs darkly, then his lips latch onto yours again.
Lying limp as a ragdoll in his arms, he carries you back to your bed and shows you just what a proper fucking is. Several times. He must not have been as drunk as you thought. Come to think of it, he didn't taste like alcohol at all.
The sky is beginning to lighten with the approach of dawn before he finally turns you on your side and curls himself around you. One hand wedged between your legs, the other holding onto your tit, he nuzzles the back of your neck until he eventually drops off into an exhausted sleep.
You blink tired eyes at your bedside clock, remembering you're scheduled to work. Your head flops back down on your pillow. There's no way you're making it into work in the morning. Hell, you're not even sure if you're going to be able to walk tomorrow— not normally, anyway. Even so, you can't be mad about it, not after all those orgasms. Simon truly had a gift; the man is a giver.
Feeling sated, safe and warm, you snuggle back into Simon, ready to fall asleep. Still, your hazy mind can't help but wonder...
What's he going to think when he wakes up next to his favorite barista and not in his own bed?
-
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renee-writer · 2 years ago
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What If It Were Brian Chapter Twenty -seven
AO3
To call it a perilous journey would be an understatement. Brian must have some fresh air and movement. To that end, each night of the week’s trip to the docks, his parents hold their breaths as Murtagh and Fergus supervise his hour of exercise.  It is mainly walking around the forest or flatland, being as quiet as he is all the rest of the time.
 
Claire frets that such stillness will lead to problems for him. A five year old boy is supposed to be loud and rambunctious. A week of such stillness can’t be good for him. Not that they have any choice.
 
Murtagh drives the team hard. They need to get to the docks as quickly as they can. Fergus keeps his eyes open for any approaching Redcoats. This is most important when his little brother is out and when they need breaks to use the privy.
 
They are blessed for the longest time. It isn’t until the fifth day, a day from the docks, that he spots any. His family is safely ducked away in the wagon.
 
“Riders approaching from the northwest. Redcoats.” He says loud enough for both Murtagh and Jamie to hear. Both utter barely perceived curses.
 
Claire holds Brian tight against her. He buries his head in her bosom and is perfectly still. Jamie holds his dirk in his hand, prepared to defend his family.
 
“Hello,” the nasally sound of a London accent, invades their ears, ��where are you off too in such a hurry?”
 
“We’ve a boat to catch. The lad be an orphan. I am taking him to the colonies where he may start a new life.”
 
“What is your name?”
 
“Claudel.” He knows not to give his adopted name, “monsieur.” Very good, Jamie thinks. He thickened his French accent, removing any trace of Scotland from it.
 
“Claudel what?”
 
Fergus shrugs. “God alone knows. My Madre was a whore, monsieur . It could be anyone who could give me a surname.”
 
“I found the wee bastard stealing. Brought him into my home to give him a trace of morals. Now, I hope to give him a good start in his adult life. I do as I can.”
 
“Well,” A different voice, Jamie notes. So at least two of them, “that was quite Christian of you. You didn’t take his hand. That is the proper punishment for a thief.”
 
“Sir, he wouldn’t have been as useful to me in farming with only one hand.”
 
“That is true.” Jamie hears one of them walk around the wagon. He tightens his grip on the knife, “Quite a lot of cargo for just you two.”
 
“Well sir, we plan to sell some, as well as the wagon and team of horses, to help us get settled in the colonies. Must make sure we have an ample amount to pay our taxes.”
 
They all hold their breaths as both Redcoats walk fully around the wagon. Claire almost stops breathing when one of them places his hand on the chest that fully hides them.
 
“Quite a lovely chest you have here. It will fetch a fair price at market. Don’t let those thieves down at the docks cheat you now.”
 
“No sir, I won’t .”
 
“Very good then. God be with you both.” They dip their hats to Murtagh and Fergus and ride off. Murtagh has to stop the shaking of his hands before he can take the reigns back up.
 
“Mama, papa, Brian, are you well?” Fergus asks after swallowing the lump of terror that was lodged in his throat.
 
“Aye son. You did excellent.” Jamie answers. Claire is shaking to much to. Brian sits up and grins.
 
“You are like superman, both of you.” Claire let’s out a watery laugh.
 
“Murtagh, get us to the docks. Once on board Brian can tell you the story of Superman.”
 
“Aye.” He takes up the reigns and the team starts a fast trot.
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foreverisntenough · 4 months ago
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https://www.tumblr.com/trentione/777176044801294336/his-proud-face-in-the-first-clip
Fie, I don’t want to upset you by sending this, but I feel like you’re the only one that will get it
This made me cry real tears 😭😢
wtf is wrong with me 💔💔
(Sorry if I made you sad too though)
No... trust me. It like hurt me every time those little boys said his name. I just do not know how Trent could sit there and listen to 10+ little scouse boys saying how much they looked up to him, he was their favorite, they love him the most, and then be like
'alright see ya lads… I'm off. 🫡'
I won't hash into the whole debate again, the past year aside, and what is to come in the future, he will always be my 'local lad whose dreams just came true.'
I won't lie, I haven't posted them in a bit, but there a few edits that have made me cry, like a proper watery eyes. I won't be okay when that announcement comes. I can feel it already.
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kasarian · 6 months ago
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i want my LADS MC to really breakdown once she finally feels safe and far, far away from...
from Caleb.
She's on her bed in the N109 zone, knees to her chest, blankets scattered neatly around her and on her as she claws at her legs. Unable to deal with the weight of her emotions, she instead picks at her skin, her heart still beating so loud, so heavy and almost erratically fast and slow at the same time. She felt like she couldn't take in proper breaths, even when she called Sylus and when the harsh winds of their ride back to N109.
Even now, she refuses to acknowledge her time at that floating city, desperately closing her eyes, clinging onto the memory of Zayne taking the time to sit with her for a while before they both had to go back to the realities of their jobs.
the door opens quietly as Sylus enters with Zayne in tow. She looks up with tears gathered in her eyes as the two men go to her, Sylus by the edge of their bed and Zayne right beside her. Zayne slowly peels her hands from their tight grip on her legs as he looks at her with worry.
Her bottom lip tremble as she tries to form words, but her voice seems to fail her as she sucks in a shaky breath, tears finally falling.
"Zayne, I... I-" She hiccups, sucking in her breath through clenched teeth, Zayne remains patient as he holds her hand, Sylus somehow having grabbed a glass of water and placing it by the bedside table. She sucked in a hiccuping breath and screamed,
"Why didn't he die that day?!"
Her partners startle at her voice cracking, watery and raw as she starts fully sobbing into Zayne's chest.
"I- I feel so fucking gross, it's like I can't take the slime off my fucking skin, i want to claw it all off, I-" She breathes so harshly as she tries to squeeze Zayne tighter in her arms, her voice hoarse as she tries to talk through her tears, blabbering on and on and on about feeling disgusting, of this man who seemed to have done something to her to warrant her wanting him to die.
Zayne tries desperately to soothe her as Sylus tries to get her to let go as gently as he could, allowing her to grip anything but her own body, judging by the small flecks of blood dotting her legs and fingernails.
Both of her partners allow her to cry it all out while trying their best to both comfort her and stop her from hurting herself in any capacity.
Once she was reduced to calmer breathing and her tears no longer escaped from her eyes did either men move. Sylus wiped away the tears and snot from her face as Zayne helped her drink water.
All you could hear were her shaky breaths as Zayne quietly inquired the very same questions Sylus had before realizing she had gone nonverbal earlier in the day. The name she muttered in the quiet evening air made Zayne gasp quietly, something not quite expected but suspected.
They didn't question her any further, instead Zayne had insisted that she rest, as she requested that Sylus and Zayne lay by her side until she passed out. Last she heard was Zayne and Sylus's deep voices lulling her to sleep.
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felassanis · 3 years ago
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Legacy Of The Sparrow WIP - Reaver x F!Sparrow
This is a WIP of a full story I am planning on making. So please lemme know what you think! I am refraining from posting it to AO3 in case I need to make any alterations as I map out the chapters.
Reaver tries and fails to understand just exactly what about “Until I return to kill you and take back what's rightfully mine,” had been lost in translation. 
He was rather certain his feelings on the matter were made quite clear. In print nevertheless! How could anyone expect him to be more clearer than that?! It was as if they were begging to have their heads blown all over the walls, honestly!
Reaver even thought it an improvement on the wallpaper. Considering it was not his wallpaper in the first place.
They couldn't just contend with squatting in his Bloodstone Manor. Oh no, they had also stripped it of any trace of Reaver’s personality. Taking it upon themselves to completely refurbish the manor as they saw fit. And in their rampant warpath his oil paintings had been pulled from the walls. His collection of titillating contraptions…gone! Tossed and burned with his old sex chamber switched into a bloody office. 
They’d even done away with Reaver’s Rear Passage. Blocking the entrance with thick, hard, concrete…Seriously. Not every manor had a secret escape tunnel. They must lead awfully dreadful lives to never see the usefulness of one.
“No, this won’t do at all,” He mumbles to himself.
Blowing smoke from the barrel of Dragonstomper, Reaver steps over a row of bodies casually. Only slightly fretting what the spilled blood pouring from between their eyes would do to his floorboards. He wondered briefly, in a spurt of awareness, if anyone would miss the throuple. Only to then realise he didn’t care. In fact, there were far more pressing issues….
On his trip back from Samarkand, he’d lost all the wealth he’d accumulated from the distant, barbaric land of sand. His ship The Reaver unfortunately lost her battle to Albion’s sharp and twisted coasts on the trip home. His beloved finally finding her watery grave after many long years at last. And with it, Reaver’s reapings from Samarkand.
Now he’s found his second beloved abused, mutilated, and tortured in rampant bright colours and shackled by domesticity. Oh well, at least he still has his vault. No one in Albion could crack the code to his belly of riches that lay beneath Bloodstone Manor.
“Reaver, sir!” 
The bald man who appeared suddenly from nowhere had made him flinch. Something so undeniably humiliating that Reaver nearly put a bullet in him right then and there to save face. And he damn well would have, were it not the scout he had sent out earlier. 
“M’sorry sir! I-I just had news! The news you wanted me to get for ‘yer!” 
Now here was some village missing its idiot. The man holds his hands up in a delayed reaction as Dragonstomper glares at him with one big, deep, black eye. And as tempting as it was to pull the divine trigger…he was one of the few fools left from Reaver’s old crew who hadn’t been snatched by the wilds of Samarkand or died in the subsequent shipwreck.
“Well? Quickly now lad! Before I completely do away with the notion of ‘don’t shoot the messenger’,” 
“Well, I know we ‘ant been back from Samarkand long. But shit’s changed, sir. Some o’ the locals heard the gunshots, sir. Before stuff got prim ‘n proper, people might’ve joined in innit? Bit ‘o fun, bit o’ target practice like for the kiddies. Not these lot. Mighty fearful they were. They’ve gone ‘an told on you, sir,” He explains quickly.  
“Told on me?”  Reaver keens in interest. Tasting the question on his tongue like sugar. “My, and whom have they told on me to, I wonder? A teacher? The guards? Oh I'm unequivocally shivering in my breeches…” 
He could do with the target practice after all this. Keen to let out his frustrations on the populace stupid enough to come after him.
“No, sir. They’ve gon’ and told the Queen,” 
Reaver blinks. “Since when was there a bloody Queen?” 
--------
“Your form is sloppy. Any pisspot who remembers he has legs could kick your weight out from under you,”
Walter relents his picky point with another strike of the blade. Hurtling towards her at such a hard, unwavering speed that she barely has time to use the side of her blade to throw him off as he rams. 
Stunned, she teters backwards. Barely staying on her feet as Walter flicks the blade to his side pompously. Circling her with a cocky smile that curls under his brown moustache.
“Embarrassing for a queen,”
She lets out an undignified huff. “I’ll show you embarrassing,”
Walter comes bounding towards her like a bull, sword like horns, as he darts. Rather than exert unnecessary energy, Sparrow extends her hand outwards. Her palm directed at Walter. With a sudden gust of force, the propulsion of her Will fizzles into reality. Sending him flying back like an insect caught in a vengeful wind and with it, his sword clattering to the ground.
Walter rises to his feet, smile completely wiped off his face. “I said no magic!"
“There are no rules in battle, dear Walter,” 
“Not in writing. But dirty tactics and cheap tricks aren’t honourable,” He picks up his sword, aiming the tip towards her in accusation. “Troops look up to their leader. To find her throwing dirt in an opponent's eye to win is hardly inspirational,”
Sparrow shrugs. The act of exerting Will was hardly cheap tactics in her eyes. With a wave of her hand, she could conjure a frightening row of swords with the ease of breath. Aim them true, and her enemies would become human pincushions before they landed a single hit. Lightning and fire bowed to her whim. The very earth would bend and break if she wanted it, cowering under her might. What was cheap about that? It was hardly comparable to throwing dirt in someone’s eye.
But Walter had always been very by the book. He’d sooner lose a battle than win by tricks and wit. She supposed there was a fairness in that, something to admire. But it also felt short sighted. She could not have relied on Lucien Fairfax to prepare honourable tactics back when. Doing so would have seen her dead. As it saw so many others dead.
“My apologies, Walter,” She nods to her old friend. Perhaps it was unfair to exert Will over someone who was not a Hero. “Would you like to knock me off my feet again? I know you love it when I fall underneath you,”
Her tease is not lost on him, as evident by the hook in his brow. “Always saying what’s on your mind, eh lass?”
“I don’t say everything that’s on my mind. You’d be blushing to your toes if I said everything I’m thinking of,”
He lets out a roar of laughter at that, which makes her smile. He could be very serious when he wanted to be, too serious. The job of being her bodyguard had all but sapped the humour out of him. She wished nothing more that behind closed doors, he’d drop the dutiful act and be Walter Beck again. Like they were in the old days.
When Walter starts to pace towards her something clutches her chest, winding it tightly into a knot of anticipation. Maybe, just maybe, her teasing had struck a chord. Finally. His eyes hold something close to courage, something closer to need. Desire…
Only for it to be wounded when he stops a foot from her.
He looks like he wants to say something. His mouth hangs open, before closing promptly. 
“Come, your highness. Your council will be waiting in the throne room,”
She deflates, disappointed. But hardly surprised.
“No rest for the wicked, eh?” 
She sheathes her sword, shoving into her belt roughly like a careless punch. Side by side the two of them make their way through Castle Fairfax in silence, arriving at the doors to the throne room also as such. Where her council awaited, and where her day was about to be ruined.
Outside the hall's doors is Jasper. An elderly man, trussed up in a buttoned up suit with slicked back hair white as snow. He spots the duo, quickly checking that his collar was in top shape as if she’d care. In his hand is a red velvet cushion holding her crown.
“Your majesty,” The butler takes a bow, holding the cushion perfectly poised as he bends.
“Jassy,” She replies, taking hold of the crown and nestling it quickly on her head.
They enter the hall alongside the thundering cascade of the large oak doors being swung open by Walter, who urgently holds the door aside for his queen. The room is cast into an immediate hush, eyes trailing towards the lithe frame of Sparrow. Twinkling like the sockets of skulls. Crimson banners bearing Sparrow’s sigil drape from the ceiling, matching the elongated carpet that flowed across the marble floor towards her throne…
With a deep breath that blows up her lungs, Sparrow walks down the centre of the hall with practised grace. Though her throne rubbed her in all the wrong places, and the crown wrapped around her temples like a wreath plucked from thorns that provoked a headache, she would never show it. She could feign grace, feign poise and manners, things she had never embraced in her heart truly. It was all an act, a mask, a barricade to deflect the staring and hushed whispers that descended upon her court. She flaunted this facade for five years, it came naturally to her now.
All she had to consciously not trip over this damn carpet.
As she ascends to her throne and settles her bony arse in the stone seat. The first noble wastes no time in taking the stand.
“Your Majesty, Queen Sparrow,” 
She recognised the noble. An older man who went by Cotton Filly; befitting of his name was a head of greyish curls that fell to his shoulders like cobwebs. He was built similarly to a doll made fashioned from clay that had been pulled and stretched by a meaner older brother. Sometimes it baffled her that answering to her authority meant taking such…pissants seriously.
As the man spills his drivels, her eyes begin to wander. In a room filled to the brim with people there was comfort that amongst the sea of faces at least one was known to her. 
Searching for his gaze, she finally catches Walter Beck’s eyes. Who watches her from afar at his post at the other end of the hall. He can read her better than anyone and knows she’d rather be anywhere else. Alas, all he can just about offer is a sympathetic look.
“The current climate of the region is appealing to you to find a suitable husband. Someone of good standing who understands what it means to be a leader. And who can provide a strong and capable heir to rule in your stead when you are gone,"
Her eye twitches irritably as she is taken out of her distraction. It was one thing to hear rants about lowering the taxes for the rich or about rebuilding roads. But when they butted their noses into her private affairs. It was a little too much. And hit a sore spot…
“And as I’ve stated before, Mr Filly. I have no need of an extra mouth to feed in my household,” She tells him flatly. “I’ve enough feeding you lot as it is,”
Mr Filly, unphased by her answer, continues. “Your highness. There are many in your kingdom who would see a lone queen as fragile…vulnerable even. And more view it as a challenge. The people worry that without an heir, your…ahem, generous rule may be cut short. If that happens we will be left struggling without a guiding hand. I implore you, to reinstate the confidence in your people, find a husband,”
“And I implore you to return to your queen with concerns that actually matter to the fate of the realm. The question of who I have or don’t have under my bed sheets will not dictate Albion’s safety,” 
She could see the thinly veiled attempt at control on his part, of him trying to rein her in like a loose pup. He dressed his words up as pragmatism of course, but deep down she knew his blood boiled at the sight of her on the throne. His posture stiffened, and his lips pressed firmly into a thin line.
Years ago the only way she would have ever seen the inside of Castle Fairfax was through an unattended window, or being dragged to the royal dungeons by the guards for stealing bread from a stall. But now the lowest of commoners had committed a noble’s worst nightmare to reality… and ascended to royalty.
She was not Lucien Fairfax. And the nobles of Bowerstone detested it.
She had no status. No regard for the nobility. And no patience. She was an unnatural force of change in the once sturdy and structural hierarchy. And like most, change scared them to death. 
Sparrow had no intention of coddling them like Lucien had done. She’d force this change down their throats till they either swallowed or choked. As long as they kept in line, this feigned politeness between them and her would continue. 
Mr Filly pulls a face. “The dwellers are a solitary people. They’d rather live in the woods than with the rest of us in civilization. And that is their right. Many wonder though, if the burden of the crown is too heavy for someone used to going at it…alone, in matters,”
“You don’t need to concern yourself with the weight of my crown,”
“We are simply worried that should you perish without a husband or an heir-”
“Your worry is touching,” She snaps. “No, really. I’m moved to tears,” She strikes a finger across her dry cheek.
Once again his face scrunches. Like he had tasted something bitter in the air. “Your highness it is the responsibility of royalty to marry and continue their bloodline. And since you claim to be royalty, I feel it is my duty as a member of your court to remind you of this,”
Before Sparrow can attest to that, the doors to the throne room burst open. A set of guards painfully out of breath rush into the hall which erupts in gossip and outrage.
A strangled cry rises from Cotton Filly as Sparrow stands from the throne. “What is the meaning of this interruption?! How dare-”
“Oh do be quiet!” Sparrow descends the stairs that prop her throne up. Pushing past Filly as she attends to the two guards, who remove their helmets in respect.
Walter appears, taking quickly to her side as he addresses the men. “Figgins, Smithy! What in blazes are you doing here, lads?! You were stationed all the way in Bloodstone!”
Figgins, the much younger of the duo, wipes his face clean of sweat as he gasps. “Sorry, Walter, sir. But we have an urgent distress call from Bloodstone,”
“Distress…hah,” Smithy grunts with a weak, sickly smile. “It’s a bloody massacre is what it is…he even got the chickens, poor things…”
“Chickens? Wha-just tell us what is going on, lad!” Walter shouts.
“It started with the Billberry family, they were butchered in their own home. Shot dead like..like…” Figgins answers, growing nervous as Walter seems to tower over him.
Something lights up in Sparrow’s head then like a march to a wick. A pang of familiarity scratches at her mind over the uttered last name.
“The Billberrys…the Billberrys…” She tastes the name on her tongue.
Walter eyes her. “They’re the ones you sold Bloodstone Manor to, M’lady. Shame, they were a kind bunch of souls,”
Then it hits her. A sick cackle in the back of her mind, a voice rich in tone and smooth like velvet. Yet as sharp as any blade. A man as unpredicatble as a bomb. A walking time capsule that should have been buried and left buried. Rum and smoke and sea salt…
At first, she simply refused to believe the first thing that came to mind. She shook the memories like apples from a tree, daring to stomp on the fruits of her past…but she knew, deep down, she knew what this meant. There was but one man who could be responsible for something like this. Only one sadistic enough.
As ever living up to his name. Reaver had returned…..
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hb-writes · 5 years ago
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The Council
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Inspired by the lovely @cecii22me​’s ask. I switched Clara’s age to fifteen and didn’t do “reactions” exactly because the nagging idea of John calling a boys-only family meeting to address the problem wouldn’t leave me be. 
Summary: From the Little Lady Blinder universe and set in 1923. The boy’s reaction to fifteen-year-old Clara Shelby being friends with the Watery Lane boys. 
Characters Featured: Clara Shelby (Shelby!Sister), Arthur Shelby, Tommy Shelby, John Shelby, Finn Shelby, Michael Gray, Isiah Jesus
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“Clara!”
John leaned out the door to number six, a toothpick stuck in the corner of his mouth, arms folded across his chest as he watched his sister. She was out there in the lane with Finn, Isiah, and the boys, the only girl left after John had sent his own daughter home. 
His Sarah was at that age where she was eager to test out a handful of identities, and being that she was surrounded by willful Shelby women, it had started giving John pause to let the girl blindly copy after her Aunt Clara, or after Aunt Ada too, for that matter, because though his oldest girl was only eleven, she’d already started asking for lipstick like her aunties wore.
John had actually told Clara to come in at the same time he sent Sarah home, but here she still was, laughing and hollering with the boys, blatantly ignoring John’s solicitations.
Clara had always passed her time with more boys than girls, had grown up surrounded by the men in the shop and with her twin and Isiah for best friends. It really shouldn’t have been a surprise to any of them that as Clara grew she would still prefer to pass her time with the boys, or as happened even more often, to pass her time with no one at all aside from family.
In nearly four years, she’d made only one friend at the all-girls school Tommy sent her to. She’d kept that relationship confined to the school building and the halls of Arrow House. When Clara was on the lane, her company was family, the Blinders, and the handful of boys her twin regularly went around with.
Polly had told John to leave it when he’d first raised the issue, told him there was no harm in Clara being friends with the boys, but John grew hot with annoyance each time he saw her surrounded by the group, boiling a bit every time he saw the lads hanging off her every word with their wide smiles, sinister ones John assumed, growing as they watched his sister’s red-painted lips form each melodious syllable.
And then there was the daily clamoring of the junior peaky boys offering to fetch her from school and accompany wherever it was she needed to be that afternoon, back to Watery Lane, or over to Tommy’s office in the Bull Ring, or to one of the factories, or all the way out to Warwickshire. There was never trouble finding a volunteer.
John huffed, shouting again. “Oi! Clara!”
“Christ, John. What the fuck is it?” Clara turned towards her brother, the whole group did, but Clara was the only one who looked eager for his rebuttal.
They’d been snapping at each other for weeks, John encouraged on by her behavior and his assumptions, Clara encouraged on by John being a belligerent, controlling imbecile. 
“I told you to get the fuck in the house.“
Clara met his eye, heaving a little shrug of her shoulders. "And we’ve decided to come in when Tommy gets here.”
We. John caught the revision, the sentiment that if Finn was allowed out, so was she. If Finn didn’t have to come inside to wait for John’s ever so urgent family meeting to start, neither did she.
“You lot can come in now, then.”
“I’m in the middle of a story,” she answered although the other boys were already showing signs of dispersal, shuffling off like shy wounded animals, all except Finn and Isiah.
Clara rolled her eyes at the triumphant grin on John’s face as the boys mumbled their farewells.
“Looks like story time’s over.” John reached out to guide his sister towards the house but she pulled away before he got a proper grip.
“I’m going for a walk, then,” she said, putting a few steps between them.
“We’re having a fucking meeting!” John shouted.
“And if I’m not there when it fucking starts, you can yell at me then. I’ll not listen to your stupid mouth now.”
Clara glanced at Finn and Isiah as she started to walk away. John had already turned to them, no doubt about to insist someone accompany her, but Clara shouted loud enough for all of Watery Lane to hear. “And I don’t need a goddamn chaperone to take a turn about the block!”
Clara finally slowed her pace after turning the corner and she tucked herself there against the brick façade to take a deep breath. She closed her eyes for a moment, letting the dawdling inhale and exhale calm her as the chill of the brick reached her skin through her sweater.
John was, in the very plainest language Clara could assign to it, getting on her every last nerve as of late. He’d become the frequent source of her frustration, the cause of her perpetually clenched fists and tense shoulders. 
Every day it was some new comment about her hanging around the boys, some new scheme to play keep-away with her as the object of interest. She’d been sequestered to his office to go through the books with him twice in a week, been sent over to help Esme with the kids though she needed not a stitch of assistance, and John had picked her up from school a few afternoons as well, the two of them passing the ride across town in near silence.
“What are you doing?”
Clara kept her eyes closed, taking another breath before opening them and meeting Tommy’s eye. 
“Meditating.”
Tommy raised his eyebrow.
"John’s driving me up a fucking wall.”
Clara shut her eyes again, focused again on her breathing while Tommy watched.
“I imagine he’s not the only one driving.”
“I didn’t do anything, Tommy,” she answered, opening her eyes again. “And I’m not allowed to drive, remember? None of you will fucking teach me.”
Tommy snorted and held out his handkerchief.
“What's–”
“To wipe that lipstick off your mouth.”
Clara shook her head and tried to hand it back to him, having no intention of following his order, but Tommy occupied his hands by pulling the cigarette case from his pocket.
“It’s got your lips talking like you’re twice your age.”
“Ada got to—”
“Your sister didn’t wear lipstick at your age or talk like that and if she tells you differently, she’s only trying to get you in trouble.”
Tommy knew it drove John a bit mad, the shift in their youngest sister’s image, the sudden interest in rouge and heeled shoes and more stylish clothes, but Tommy wasn’t much bothered by it. He had already been through one sister’s adolescence and he was still convinced that Clara’s could be comparatively simple as opposed to whatever they had gone through with Ada. If slightly shorter dresses and a bit of nail varnish and lip stain were to be the worst of it, he would willingly concede Clara those things. 
And he conceded because Clara still told him things, because Tommy, despite his sister being of a certain typically unbearable age, still felt he knew his Clara’s mind and understood her heart. So Tommy asking her to wipe off the lip stain wasn’t about him controlling her sense of expression, and it wasn’t about him not wanting her to wear it in front of the boys.
He’d let Clara wear it when she wanted, found that not fighting her on it let her settle into a habit of wearing it mostly just for special occasions. It wasn’t something she often tried out on Wednesday afternoons on Watery Lane. That bit of rebellion was John’s doing because she was feeling enticed to push his buttons, urged on by his disproportionate reactions, but Tommy wasn’t worried about his sister and boys. He just didn’t like his sister getting too big for herself, didn’t want her thinking that a layer of red and a few cleverly placed curse words made her an adult.
“Go on,” he said, settling a cigarette in the corner of his mouth as he lit it.
Clara rolled her eyes, but she did as she was told, wiping the red away.
“You’re not allowed to wear it at school anyhow.”
“I put it on after,” she answered.
Tommy nodded, taking back the handkerchief and guiding her towards the shop.
“Can’t see why you’d need to wear it on Watery Lane unle—”
“Do you know what all of this is about?” she interrupted. “This urgent meeting John’s called?”
“You, I imagine,” Tommy answered, holding the door open for her.
Clara stopped, turning to him just before she crossed the threshold. “Me?”
Tommy nodded, a hand on her back to shepherd her through. “He’s complained about you four times in half as many weeks.”
“He’s complained about me?” Clara said. “He’s been bloody intolerable! Insufferable!”
“Complained of you and your lipstick and your four-inch heels and your smart mouth. Must be giving him flashbacks to our Ada.” Tommy smirked at her disbelief. “You think you’re innocent?”
“I think I haven’t done anything wrong and John’s being—”
Tommy placed an arm around her shoulders, steering her through the house and toward the shop. “Let’s just hear our brother out and—”
Clara turned to fight him. “No, Tommy, this isn’t fai—”
“Ah, look who’s here, our guest of honor!” Arthur boomed. “Come in, sister.”
Clara turned to face the room at Arthur’s shouting. It was just the boys, just Arthur, John, Finn, and Michael, an empty seat just in front of where they stood or leaned against the desks, the empty shop behind them.
“Where is everyone?”
“This is everyone,” John answered, pushing off the desk to come to her side. “Sit down,” he said, gesturing to the chair.
“I think I’d rather stand.”
John chewed on his toothpick, staring at his sister, both of their arms folded over their chests, the space between them shrinking as John stepped forward.
“Why can’t you do a single thing you’re told lately?”
“Because there’s no reason to do the things you’re telling me.”
“John, if she wants to stand, let her stand,” Tommy said as he leaned against the wooden beam behind him.
“Fine,” John answered, giving his sister another look and bumping her shoulder as he moved to the shop doors which he quickly pulled closed, securing the lock.
Clara glanced at Tommy, his shoulders heaving a deep breath before meeting his sister’s eye for a moment. 
“Unfucking believable,” she muttered to herself. “Right, so I don’t want to sit, but I think I will have some of that whiskey the rest of you are enjoying,” she said, nodding towards Arthur, Michael, and the bottle of whiskey sat between them.
Clara took two steps forward and Tommy pulled her back, settling her into the chair she had refused just seconds before.
“Enough,” Tommy said. 
Clara crossed her legs, folding her arms once again. “You know, it’s awfully convenient for you lot to call this meeting when Aunt Polly’s away.”
Michael cleared his throat. “Convenient is certainly one word for it.”
Both John and Clara sent him a glare. In all honesty, Clara wasn’t entirely sure where her aunt would’ve fallen in, wasn’t sure where Michael and Finn fell in on things either.
“And you two didn’t fucking tell me,” she said, shifting her glance between Michael and Finn. “Also convenient.” 
“Finn didn’t know,” Arthur said. “Sweetheart, if you'll—”
“Don’t you even dare sweetheart me, Arthur. This is—”
Michael chuckled, pulling Clara’s attention again.
“It’s not fucking funny, Michael.”
“It’s a bit funny.”
“This is an ambush,” she answered, “when I haven’t even done anything worth being ambushed for.” 
Tommy cleared his throat. "John, let’s get this over with, eh? We’re expected back for dinner at a decent hour.”
“Right,” John said, brushing his thumb along the side of his mouth. “Well, Clara, you—”
“I what, John?” she asked. “What exactly have I done wrong?”
“If you keep your mouth shut for a fucking second, I’ll tell you,” he answered. “Christ, Tommy. How do you deal with it?”
“Not like this,” she answered, “not by treating me like some fucking—”
“Like a child?” Tommy interrupted, a shift evident in his tone. “No, not unless you’re acting like one. Let John say his piece and you’ll have your turn, alright?”
Clara took a deep breath. She didn’t like it, but since Tommy had finally intervened properly, she didn’t feel she had much of a choice. And it wasn’t exactly the truth anyway because Tommy still frequently treated her like a child, summoning her to his office for lectures when the whim struck, but he never invited the others in for the event.
“Fine, say whatever it is you have to say, John.”
“For one, I don’t like the tone you’ve been—”
“It’s mutual,” she answered.
“What?”
“I don’t particularly like your tone with me lately, either. It’s fuc—”
Tommy rubbed his temple. It wasn’t his meeting. He had no intention of delivering John’s speech to their sister, no intention of reining in the girl any more than he already had, but that word was starting to grate on him, hypocritical as it was. He supposed it was because the word exasperated Grace a bit, because it seemed so incorrectly placed when Clara tried to use it within the walls of Arrow House or at the company offices or at school. He was so used to getting after her for it, it almost didn’t matter that they were in the betting shop, that the word was part of common discourse there. So, Tommy said her name, needing nothing more than that and the accompanying look to get his point across, her rolling eyes serving as acceptance.
“Clara, what John’s trying to say is…”
Her eyes flicked to Arthur and he stumbled in his words.
“…we’re just getting a bit concerned about all the uh…attention you’re getting from the boys on the lane, and all the extra time you’re spending with them.”
Clara blinked a few times, her head tilted as she processed his words. “You’ve called a family meeting because I have some friends who are boys?”
“That’s all the friends you’ve got. Boys.”
“I’ve got female friends.”
“Right, a handful of women twice your age and a pack of boys who hang off your every word while you stand out on the lane in that red lipst—” John had intended on pointing out the evidence, not noticing she’d already wiped it away until it was too late, so he pivoted. “And Lizzie and your sisters-in-law don’t count as friends. You’ve got no proper friends your own age and you’re too old to be playing around with the boys in the lane.”
“What the hell are you on about?” she asked.
“Martha was your age when…" John’s words dwindled to nothing as Clara’s face grew red, her cheeks hot with mortification and anger and embarrassment. 
"She was my age when you played around with her in the lane, you mean?” she asked.
Arthur spit out his whiskey and both Michael and Finn hid their smiles, but John didn’t smile or laugh. His face just grew red and Clara smirked, feeling a minute shift in the conversation.
“See John, Clara already knows. Doesn’t need any talk about what boys are after,” Michael said. 
Clara’s mouth fell open. "What? No, I certainly do not need that. And if I did have a need, I wouldn’t want it from any of you,” she answered.
It was another sentiment that wasn’t exactly true because Clara had already had talks with Tommy, had discussed with him expectations about her and boys. And she’d spoken with Finn and Michael, too, from time to time, seeing as they were something of her steadfast confidants in any matters she’d like to keep hidden from the older brothers or Aunt Polly or even Ada. But Clara had no interest in being lectured by John or Arthur on the subject of boys and sex, not when she’d never done more than kiss a boy.  
“And I don’t even like them like that,” she offered.
"Well, they like you,” John said.
"No, they do not. I’ve known them all since we were kids.”
“Some of them do,” Finn said.
Her twin’s first words felt like a betrayal, just as Michael’s had. They were supposed to be on her side, and most often were, but his words felt accusatory given the context. 
“What? Who?” she asked.
“Doesn’t matter who,” John interrupted. “All that matters is you’re too friendly with them, too trusting.”
“Too trusting?” Clara repeated. 
“Naive,” John corrected. 
Arthur cleared his throat. “Listen, Clara. We just want to make sure when we settle you down, it’s with a nice boy and—”
“When you settle me down with a nice boy? I’m only fifteen, Arthur! And I won’t need your assistance if I decide—" 
"Right, I think what Arthur’s trying to say is that you should be focusing on school and work for now. There’s time for boys later,” Michael offered. 
"I think I’m plenty focused on both of those things, Michael.”
Michael raised his hands in a forfeit, settling back in the chair. 
“No, Michael, what we’re trying to say is that she doesn’t know what she’s getting herself into, acting like that with them,” John said. 
“We just don’t want you getting any unwanted attention, sweetheart,” Arthur offered. “Don’t want you in over your head.”
Tommy could see his sister simmering again, could see this meeting would have no end if they continued like this, so he stepped forward. 
“Clara knows what to do if there’s a boy giving her unwanted attention.”
Clara looked at him. “Yeah, I’ll kick his fucking arse,” she said, raising her arms as she gestured to her brothers and cousin. “Like you boys taught me.”
“Yeah, and if it’s wanted attention?” John grumbled. 
“She knows what to do then, too,” Tommy answered. “Isn’t that right, Clara?”
“Yes,” she mumbled, a quick huff exiting her lips just after. “I have to bring the poor soul round for the most excruciating lunch in history with this council of oafs and hope he’ll stick around afterward." 
-----
Read more Little Lady Blinder stories here.
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commander-diomika · 4 years ago
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(Click to Read From the Beginning) Part 5 - Fandom: Rusty Quill Gaming Pairing: Zolf Smith/Oscar Wilde, literal background Barnes/Carter Rating: Explicit Word Count: ~2500 Additional Tags: Slow Burn, 18-Month Time Gap (Rusty Quill Gaming), Opposites Attract, Masturbation, Accidental Voyeurism, Pining, oh there's yearning in this one lads,
Summary: With the quarantine cell still under construction, it's not quite as soundproof as it ought to be.
It was remarkably easy to keep busy in the business of saving the world. Wilde made it his mission to get to know every face in town, and in turn have them know him, and like him. He made friends easily, the locals charmed by this tall man with his fluent Japanese and endless supply of entertaining stories. For the sake of the job - not just his own lingering fear - he was meeting every person on the island and building a solid network of people who would let him know the moment a new face appeared. The wider his web, the less he found himself reaching for the scar on his face.
Zolf won people over not by charming them, but by helping them. The gruff dwarf at the inn became known as someone the locals could go to when someone fell and broke something, or to use magic to help Stone Shape the stumps of houses that were slipping into sodden earth.
He also worked on supply lines. Trade was still relatively lively, but he and Wilde were in the market for more esoteric items than bread and booze. They needed adamantine for the cell, they needed anti magic equipment, and it was certain Barnes and Carter were going to return having depleted the stock of healing potions they’d taken. Strangely enough there wasn't a steady supply of any of those items on the island.
As much as Zolf wouldn’t admit it, Wilde smoothed the way when it came to trading. He charmed the locals and when Zolf appeared with increasingly obscure demands, he was seen as a friend by association. Zolf knew he wouldn’t have achieved that so quickly.
They both oversaw changes to the inn. Many rooms were separated with nothing but thin paper walls on slides, making the whole space quite modular. Wilde sequestered one of the few solid, seemingly defensible rooms on the ground floor and turned it into an office-cum-sitting room. Before their gentle takeover it had probably been a private dining room for special, or at least rich, guests. Zolf took the time to install a proper bed frame in his room, since his legs made climbing down to the floor-level futon bedding difficult.
On another continent, sentient creatures went wrong, turned on their loved ones, fought, died. Cities were turned and abandoned, and storms ravaged places that had never seen more than a light drizzle. But even knowing that elsewhere things were coming apart at the seams, there was a touch of peace in their little corner of it. For a few weeks they slipped into a routine.
Zolf rose in the mornings before Wilde, wordlessly depositing a coffee in front of the bleary man when he appeared. In the evenings that Wilde wasn’t out liaising they took to Wilde’s sitting room and read, or drank, or talked. Frequently about the mission of course, but there was only so much hashing and rehashing they could do. When things got too heavy, or nothing had changed, topics wandered. Zolf’s stories from the navy. How Wilde became a journalist. Small things. Easy things when they both just needed to put it down for a while.
Wilde would never do something so gauche as ask for forgiveness, or understanding, but some days when he reported another success, it sounded like I’m sorry I didn’t listen to you.
Some days when Zolf poured coffee into Wilde’s mug it looked like you don’t have to apologise.
And on the rare mornings when some watery sunshine peeked through the clouds, as Zolf practiced in the yard with his glaive, Wilde followed to idly spectate over the paper and his breakfast, and the action felt like I don’t know why but it’s easier to be around you than not.
Barnes and Carter returned in good enough spirits and got started on their isolation in the mostly-complete cell. As soon as they returned, Zolf felt himself get itchy for action and movement again. He couldn’t even scratch the itch by properly debriefing the returnees yet; the newest information from Curie posited a hive-mind connection between those infected by the blue veins. Still, this was just the way it had to be. Zolf tried to soothe his agitation. Things were just going to move slow for now. He only had to look at Wilde’s scar to help quiet any feelings of angst. A little bit of frustration was something he could cope with if it meant what befell Wilde never, ever happened again.
Four nights after Barnes and Carter returned, Zolf sat in front of the fire attempting to read the Dwarvish tome Wilde had picked up in Damascus. It wasn’t exactly riveting stuff, and his Dwarvish was rusty, but he promised he’d at least make a dent in it. Wilde came in fresh from the bath, his hair wet and wearing the yukata he’d been gifted by one of the locals. As he passed the back of Zolf’s chair, Wilde placed a hand on one of Zolf’s shoulders and leant over to inspect the page.
This close, Zolf could smell him. There was a soft, flowery note that Zolf couldn’t identify, probably whatever he washed his hair with. And then there was the warm, familiar smell of the man himself. Zolf kept his eyes on the page in front of him.
Pointing with his other hand, Wilde spoke. “This character here- the translation guide I was using didn’t even have it. Brought the whole lot to a screeching halt. How are you getting on with it?”
Zolf, nose full of Wilde’s scent and nearness, opened his mouth to reply. “I – er, it’s fine. It’s an older script but I can read it- don’ quite understand what they’re gettin’ at, but, er.” He looked over to Wilde’s face again, profile lined in firelight. His face was so close that Zolf could lean and place a kiss on the man’s unscarred cheek, if he chose.
Wilde glanced up from the book. Their eyes met for the briefest moment before Wilde straightened, letting go of Zolf’s shoulder with a small squeeze.
“Wonderful. Let me know if anything useful comes up, will you?”
Zolf simply grunted in reply, still feeling off-kilter. This wasn’t the first time Wilde had touched him like that. As Wilde started to settle into life at the inn, started to feel a little safer, some of that old comfort was returning. Zolf didn’t mind the touching. He got the feeling Wilde was lonely. He was probably used to a lot more physical contact than he was getting now. For all he had been ingratiating himself with the locals, it was clear as day Wilde couldn’t trust them. If Zolf was the only person Wilde could reach out to…
Zolf shook his head a little and tried to focus back on the text. Wilde collected his own evening reading material, some piece of Japanese fiction, and settled in the other chair. The silence, but for the ever-present sound of rain, was comfortable enough. Their new lot in life involved a lot of waiting, and they were both doing their best to try and make peace with that.
Time passed and Zolf, already struggling to focus on the dull history book, realised he’d read the same sentence three times over. Some essential part of his mind had shifted, noting a change in the soundscape. Previously, there had been nothing but the rain and slight crackle of fire, but now there was a new element in the mix.
Zolf stared blankly at the page, listening hard. It was… conversation? Perhaps, but the innkeeper and his wife had rooms all the way on the other side of the building, and Zolf couldn’t usually hear them. It was… the wind? No, for all it was raining, it was the usual dreary patter, no strong winds to explain the slow rhythm or hint of a moan in those sounds.
Zolf’s heart beat slowly. One, two, three… and suddenly he knew what he was hearing.
Zolf looked up from his book to see if Wilde had noticed. Obviously, whatever he was reading was much more riveting than Zolf’s dry historical facts, because he was still engrossed in his book. Despite his close attention to the pages, Wilde could sense Zolf’s regard. Without Zolf even clearing his throat, he looked up.
“What?” he asked mildly to Zolf’s raised eyebrows.
“You hear tha’?” Either it had gotten louder, or Zolf’s ears had adjusted to picking out rhythmic moans and whimpers.
Wilde slipped a finger in his book to mark his place, cocking his head. With his attention drawn, he contextualised the new sound quickly (much faster than Zolf) and his eyebrows started climbing. When the brows couldn’t get any higher, he straightened in his seat and placed a hand delicately on his chest in feigned shock. “Well, we didsay that Barnes would look out for him, but that’s not quite what I had in mind.”
Zolf tried not to roll his eyes.
“And we knew that Howard would struggle with the isolation period,” Wilde continued, voice artificially prim. “I’m glad they’ve found a way to pass the time.”
Zolf’s efforts to not roll his eyes failed, then he glanced around, puzzled. “How is the sound even…?”
Wilde’s eyes were bright; his expression screaming this was the most fun he’d had in weeks. “The trapdoor. The one in the Teal Sitting Room. It’s still under construction, so…”
“So, sound is travellin’ through it.” Zolf finished the thought, voice level despite the blush he could feel rising in his cheeks.
Barnes and Carter were slowly increasing in volume. Zolf could finally make out the timbre of Carter’s voice specifically, though he’d never heard him make those noises before.
“I didn’t know that Barnes had it in him,” Wilde murmured. “Or, had it in Carter, specifically.” With that puerile comment, Wilde moved. He folded the corner of a page to mark his place and stood, checking the ties on his yukata as he did.
“Where are you going?” Zolf hissed.
Wilde smiled wickedly. “Why, to the Teal Room, of course.”
“Wilde!” Zolf said, flushing angrily. He was trying to formulate a scolding regarding privacy and eavesdropping, but the scoundrel had already stridden off. Zolf’s thighs tensed and relaxed as he went to stand then aborted the movement, debating with himself. Carter voiced a particularly sharp cry and Zolf decided that anything was better than sitting here by himself.
I’m just gonna stop Wilde from doin’ anything inappropriate, he told himself as he stood and followed.
Inside the room, Wilde leant against the doorframe, body languid as if he attended a mere dinner party. There was a tarp covering a half-constructed hole in the centre of the room. When Zolf came to hover beside him in the doorway, any lingering mystery about what was happening downstairs was dispelled.
“Fuck, James, please,”Carter sounded utterly desperate. This close, Zolf could even hear the slow rasp of movement, skin-on-skin. Barnes’ voice was harder to make out, as he responded with something quiet and urgent. There was a breath, then the sound of flesh hitting flesh, and Carter making a choked noise that pulsed straight from Zolf’s ear to his crotch.
Wilde was delighted. He looked sidelong at Zolf and mouthed the word “James?” wrapping his lips around it in impish joy, as though first names were the controversial thing about this situation.
There was a grunt from downstairs that was undoubtedly Barnes
Wilde spoke sotto voce, keeping his voice under the sound of the rain. “I knew he’d be the strong and silent type.”
Zolf didn’t reply. He didn’t know where to even start. He would hate to be overheard like this, but there was something thrilling about it. Fuck, Wilde’s a bad influence on me. He knew he should leave, just walk away, but…
The pace downstairs changed. What had previously sounded like a languorous tease picked up energy. Carter literally wailed as the thump of a cot knocking against a wall started up, one, twice, three times, continuing, not rushed but steady. Carter’s whine cut off in a muffled ermf and Zolf could see in his mind’s eye, agonisingly clear, the way that Barnes had just put his hand over Carter’s mouth.
Zolf’s eyes had been locked, unseeing, on the rough tarp, but at Carter’s stifled moan, he looked up at Wilde. He was gazing back, and Zolf was shocked to see something hungry in those eyes. Mere moments ago, the energy from Wilde had been lewd and juvenile. Something had shifted.
Wilde’s scent was still in Zolf’s nose and suddenly the image in his mind changed.
His hand, hooked behind one of Wilde’s knees, pushing it up toward his chest… fucking him open fluidly, pace keeping time with the rhythmic thudding from below. Wilde’s face flushed cheek to cheek, eyes half lidded, awash with the pleasure of it.
Zolf shut his eyes, hard, hot with shame. When he opened them, Wilde was still staring him down, a touch of that imagined flush now true in his cheeks. There was something knowing in his expression as well, as though he could see straight into Zolf’s mind and the images that lay within.
They had been so in tune with each other lately, after all.
Wilde’s mouth worked as if he was seeking words, but he was interrupted. “Heavens above, James, faster please, I’m going to-”
Wilde sucked his breath in hard as Carter came. The words died on his lips and he half-shoved past Zolf to leave the room, taking long strides and disappearing down the corridor.
Zolf stumbled. If the two men downstairs were in any state to be paying attention to their surroundings, they would have heard Zolf’s clumsy footsteps, but he couldn’t bring himself to care. He went to follow, but by the time he’d caught up to Wilde, the bedroom door was shut.
There was no lock. It was only a barrier in that it was one that Wilde chose to put up. Zolf wasn’t about to go barging in where he wasn’t wanted. He lifted a hand to knock. Paused. What exactly was he here to say? To tell Wilde off? To apologise? To say, Look at me like that again, I’ll be ready this time? He lowered his hand.
Later that night in bed, for the first time in months, Zolf found himself firming a spit-slick hand around his cock, breath unsteady. He kept his mind cautiously blank. Every time he was tempted to dwell on the sound of Carter’s whimper, or Barnes’ low rasp, or that ravenouslook in Wilde’s eyes, he drew himself back to sensation alone, pleasure coiling in his gut. He certainly wasn’t thinking of Wilde’s hand on his shoulder, the relaxed set of his body as he listened to Barnes and Carter fuck downstairs, the salacious delight in his eyes.
Zolf pumped his fist faster, definitely not thinking of the thud of the cot against the cell wall downstairs as his hips rolled and breath hitched. Hanging on to awareness by a thread, he remembered the thin walls, and bit his lip to stifle his groan as he came.
His eyes closed, he listened to his hammering heart, breathing slowly. It had been a very strange night. From the buzzing post-orgasm haze, a thought emerged, unbidden.
Lavender. Lavender was what Wilde’s soap had smelled of.
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writefinch · 5 years ago
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Dear Dairy, Pt.1 (cn: noncon, Mm, kidnap, emphasis on *forced* feminization, induced lactation, milking, bondage, drugging, induction of gender dysphoria in a cis guy, things of that nature)
7th July 2018
Cold day today. I dusted off my scarves for the first time this year. Not literally, they'd been vacuum sealed and packed away when the weather turned in October. I threw out the red and yellow knit scarf, something I should have done last year, as it's far too Harry Potter. I was going to pick out the UMIST scarf but that felt a touch dull for the first scarf of the year. In the end I picked out the green silk paisley, which I felt provided a contrast with the pink shirt. I wore them with the second-hand grey Armani that I've yet to have tailored; I haven't yet decided if it's worth the trouble. I'm leaning towards yes, as I received two compliments today, one from Jason's database administrator, a charming and flirtatious--to say nothing of attractive--lady from Perth. We've talked about the possibility of meeting up for drinks at some point, and I'm increasingly inclined to take her up on the offer.
Experiment C2 is adjusting to his newfound freedom since his release last week. It was sad to see him go, and I'll cherish the time we spent together, our first night especially when he violently objected to the idea of servicing me. Oh, how he kicked and fought, clawing at his neck chain, scratching me, biting, swinging wildly. He bloodied my nose rather viciously and left me in no mood for sex that night, to the extent that I almost let him go entirely.
Of course, his demeanor changed altogether after I bagged him. A clear plastic bag over his head, taped around his neck, watching him gasp and writhe for air that isn't there, screaming his silly little head off until he's sure that he's taken his final breath, then tearing a tiny hole over his nostrils. I let him suck in four generous lungfuls of air before I bagged him the second time, and I went through seven bags before allowing him a rest. After that he became such an agreeable and solicitous cocksleeve you'd have thought he was raised in a merchant marine!
Still, he was unsuitable both physiologically and psychologically for the experimental interventions, and I only have so much space in the cellar, so I had to let him go. Some of my social acquaintances are keeping a close eye on him. He's been told that running his mouth will lead to nothing but the cold grave, and I believe he's a bright enough lad to take that to heart.
I'm beginning the search for his replacement tomorrow.
20th July 2018
I've found him! I've found him I've found him, he is everything I've been looking for, he is perfect, it is as if God placed that boy on earth for no other purpose than my need for him. I can barely contain my excitement.
He is an itinerant surf bum, twenty years of age, single, underemployed, estranged from his family. He has flowing blond hair, a few wisps under his chin that can barely be called a beard, deep brown eyes, and a lithe, rangy figure that seems to be slowly growing into the top-heavy carrot-shaped build of a classic surfer. He's been living in town since May, surfing most days, doing temp jobs, lodging in the spare bedroom of a friend of mine.
What a perfect physique! His body is accustomed to being dashed over rocks and whipped by surf, what fun I will have finding and surpassing his tolerances for pain! Oh, to restrict and ration out air to a boy who has trained himself to hold his breath underwater since he was a young teenager, to see those taut muscles stretched over a rack, I cannot wait, I can't wait.
I won't speak or write his name. I now take every action with the foregone conclusion that he is mine, and that he is already Experiment C3. In my mind, he is already in my cellar.
My friend has kindly allowed him to get behind on his rent, and C3 apparently plans to move to Sydney in ten day's time, driving out across the country in his decade-old Ford Ka, surfboard strapped to the roof. When he disappears a few days before that, people will assume he left to avoid paying his rent.
They won't be wrong, in a sense. C3 won't be worrying about rent for a long, long time...
26th July, 2018
It hasn't been an easy choice, and it is in fact a decision I've been struggling with for some time now, but I've decided to let my hair go grey. I'm almost forty for heaven's sake, and I noticed my first grey a year before the financial crisis. Ever since then I've been religious in my application of dye and toner, carefully concealing each and every one of the pale little buggers that pops up, but it's gone from something I'd do after a haircut to something I'm doing twice a week. I won't rush it, I'm going to ease off the dye over the course of the next year or so, but by next July I'll be au naturelle salt and pepper.
Work remains dull but tolerable. I know I'm blessed to be able to do most of my duties from home given my hobbies, but there's a certain sense of removal from everything, as if it's not really a job at all and I'm back at university doing a coursework-intensive compulsory module. On the other hand, I do enjoy going to the office in a way that I did not when I was going there five days a week!
Experiment C3 is screaming his head off again, I think. It's very faint, and I've turned off the air conditioning in the sitting room so I can hear it coming up from below. I suppose I can't blame the boy, given the circumstances. He hasn't seen me since the drugs wore off, and he's in the same configuration I first kept C2 in: his feet are in snowboard boots and locked into clips in the floor, his neck is in a steel collar connected to an eyebolt on the floor by a one-metre chain, his wrists are cuffed and pulled up towards the ceiling by another chain, he has noise-cancelling headphones strapped over his ears blaring white noise, and he's wearing a blindfold snug enough to prevent him from even blinking underneath it.
He's been there for seven hours now, since three in the morning. He can neither stand nor sit nor lie down, he cannot turn around, he cannot see--though it is pitch black in the cellar even if he wasn't blindfolded--he cannot hear his own voice, and I very much doubt he has any idea how he got there.
As I said, I haven't been down to see him properly yet, so I'm monitoring him at a distance via CCTV and also his pulse and blood oxygen readings. I'm keeping him watered through an IV drip and I'm not at all worried about feeding him just yet, though I'm sure he'll be getting hungry given that I emptied out the contents of his guts with an enema while he was still unconscious. I want him properly good and woozy from sleep deprivation before I introduce myself, either forty-eight hours or until his vitals get a tad skiffy, whichever is shorter. By my word, I am not an impatient man!
Of course, given the close monitoring required, I'll only be getting a few more hours sleep than he will. I suspect I'm getting the better half of the deal. Ah, the poor thing just wet himself. He needn't worry, it's all going into the bucket between his feet, and it'll go to good use later.
I've calmed myself down since his capture, for practical reasons as much as anything else, but I am still abuzz with energy. I am already looking forward to writing my next entry!
28th July 2018
I introduced myself to C3 today.
He spent an impressively long time in the stress position before he was unable to push his legs and instead dangled from his wrists, almost twelve hours, at which point I let the wrist rope go slack and allowed him to collapse. To prevent him from sleeping I intermittently blasted him with high pressure cold water whenever his pulse dropped below 100, for about a further four hours until I decided he'd had enough rest and strung his wrists back up.
He lasted five hours that time, so I let his wrists down again and stood sentry with a paintball gun, giving him a good and proper three-round burst whenever he stopped whimpering. Up again, barely an hour, down again, where I pinned him to the floor with wiring from an electric fence, set to deliver low-intensity zaps across his arms and chest whenever it seemed as if sleep was a possibility. He only got a few shocks, I think the first few put him in such a state of alarm that he didn't dare relax enough to be given another.
I strung him up a few more times, sometimes combining the motivators--his quivering thighs made a delightful target for paintballs as he tried to hold them in a crouching squat--until we reached the forty-ninth hour. I then played my recorded introduction tape through his headphones. It was identical to the one I'd played for C1 and C2, which was itself similar to the one recorded for B4 through B9.
Of course, as the deaf and blindfolded boy was crouch-squatting in place hearing my voice tell him that his old life was forfeit, that he was livestock now, that he would be used as a sex slave, that disobedience would only lead to misery, and the details of the hormone treatments he would be on, I was standing in front of him, masturbating.
My timing was impeccable. Just as the last lines of the recording said "if you're wondering when you'll meet me, I'm right in front of you," I came all over his whorish face. I'm afraid I'm no Peter North, I've no more than four spurts and the first one is always rather watery, but I nailed him right between the lips with one burst and smeared the rest over his face with the tip of my cock. He froze up rather delightfully during the whole ordeal, barely flinching as I cleaned off the tip in his hair.
I took the microphone and spoke directly into his headphones. I told him he'd been in his predicament for two days so far, that he was to obey my simple instructions, and that if he did he would be allowed food and allowed to rest. I told him that I would not require him to speak at any point during these instructions, and that if he so much as whispered I'd keep him strung up without food for another two days. He nodded in agreement, which earned him a hard slap, as I'd not asked him to nod or shake his head. I told him then to nod if he understood, which he did.
I freed one of his arms at a time, telling them to keep them in place and move them only as and when I told him to move them. He obeyed--a far quicker learner than C1--and I put him into the straitjacket. I unlatched his boots one at a time, putting him in ankle cuffs with a short length of heavy chain between them. I injected him in the buttocks with his first dose of anti-androgens, a painkiller, and his hormonal cocktail, and I removed the IV from his arm.
At that point I led him to his cage, a 2x3 metre cell, 1.5 metres high. I removed his blindfold, though it did him little good as it was pitch black in the entire room--I'd switched off the lights and was working via a set of light amplification goggles--and pushed him onto the wipe-clean bedroll.
"Lie still like a good little boy until the lights turn on, and then you can help yourself to some food," I said to him. He made a sound as if to respond, then silenced himself, lying still in his bonds.
The lights were on a timer, and they came on harsh and bright when I was upstairs, watching him through the CCTV on my desktop with a fresh pot of coffee. Three of the walls of his cage were walled off with a tarp, allowing him to see about a fifth of the basement through the remaining wall. Inside his cage was his bedroll, a doggie bowl full of oatmeal and bananas, a small plastic trough filled with fresh water, and a litter tray.
I considered staying up and watching him, seeing the fear grow in his eyes, his first attempt at eating cold food without the use of his hands, the humiliation of pissing in a litter tray, but I was exhausted. As soon as I've finished writing this entry, I'm going to take a well-deserved nap.
4th October 2018
The truffle salt from Coles is a waste of time. Don't misunderstand me, it's useable, it's palatable, and it has the necessary truffle aroma. "Has" is the key word there, it's got the half-life of Fermium and after a week in the cupboard it's now just table salt with black specks in it. I think I'm going to invest in some decent truffle oil at Christmas.
C3 is coming along marvelously. The combination of injections and a high-fat, high-calorie, vitamin-rich diet have had a visible impact on his physique. His skin has softened even further from a clear and healthy surfer's complexion to almost peachlike smoothness and he now has visible jiggle on his thighs, stomach and buttocks. Most importantly, he's now the not-at-all-proud owner of a set of A-cup breasts, complete with sensitive, pebble-sized nipples.
His breasts are extremely sensitive. He's told me as much directly, but I've confirmed it through experimental means. A few light stripes under the nipples with the cane used to bring a wince to his face when he first came under my care, now it brings him to his knees, and the mere sight of the thing leads him to cry and whine rather prettily.
He did have some issues with portion control, in that he wasn’t eating the full servings of food I had prepared for him. This was unreasonable and short-sighted on his part: while plain, I have not asked him to eat anything that I wouldn't willingly eat myself, and while I am not a professional cook I am certainly a talented amateur.
The solution was a simple one: if even a smear of food remains in his dish, I do not feed him for the next two to four days. I only had to enforce this rule twice, and he's finished every meal I've put in front of him for the past two months.
He's gone without sleeping for the last forty-eight hours, he's gone without speaking for the last three weeks, and I've added a low dose of LSD to his drinking water. Tonight he should be somewhat tractable for the induction of a hypnotic state. I am not trying to control his behaviour--there's nothing I want him to do that I couldn't compel him to do through more reliable means--but for an in-depth interview. In concert with a lie detector and a regulated dose of barbiturates, I am going to make him bare his soul to me.
There are a few specifics I'm interested in, such as confirming my assessment of his sexuality and gender identity, and it never hurts to shore up my security by inquiring of any planned means of escape or rescue, but in great part I am doing this for morale effect: I want him to have no respite from me, even inside his own mind. He will learn that he has no more control of his thinking than he does of his eating, sleeping or exercising.
Speaking of which, I had to leave him in an armbinder for a few nights when he insisted on doing press-ups in his cell. The additional restraints distressed him greatly, and he's seemed afraid to even move lest I restrain him further. That was back in August, and I have since acquired an elliptical trainer which I allow him to use daily, good behaviour permitting.
I will write again tomorrow with details of tonight's interview, and I only hope it's more productive than C2's interview was.
5th October 2018
Well, that was elucidating.
I left C3 unrestrained for the interview. It was his first time free of shackles and cuffs outside of his cage since he'd arrived, as I wanted him to be relatively comfortable and I was confident that his drug cocktail would prevent any serious escape attempts.
He is not a natural hypnotic subject and I was only successful in inducing a semi-trance state. I don't think he achieved a trance, but I think he believed he was in a trance, and for my purposes that was more than sufficient. He talked for hours and provided an unabridged history of his life so far. His parents, his brothers, his schooling, his love of surfing and camping, his romantic attachments and rejections, his childhood friends and bullies, his fear of dogs, his earliest memories, his deepest shames, enough to fill a short memoir.
The interview lasted for ten hours, with breaks every two hours to allow him to pee (as I'd also allowed him to drink lime cordial from a cup while he spoke) and to adjust his dose of drugs and deepen his trance state. He cried frequently and easily. He bears a great amount of shame and guilt for someone so young and so relatively innocent--raised by Catholics, naturally--and spent half of the fifth hour in uncontrollable hysterics. I let him rest his head in my lap and stroked his hair as he cried, and he clung on to me like a man drowning. Once he ran out of tears he had a bout of cathartic laughter, and after that a calm passed over him, and he remained in a state of detached, cooperative calm until I ended the interview.
Of course, most of this was filler and background information for the parts that truly interested me: his sexuality and gender identity. Both were perfect. His sexuality is less important but still delightful. He is entirely heterosexual and repulsed by men. He still has nightmares about the one time I have molested him so far, when I coated his face with cum shortly after his chapter. You wouldn't believe how hard I got as he told me that!
He sometimes masturbates in his cage, which he tells me is mostly from boredom than any sexual desire, and he fantasizes about sex with women. He has little interest in sadomasochism, no interest whatsoever about taking a submissive role, and aside from a weak interest in pegging he is plain vanilla. He has fantasies about sex in public, fucking multiple women, being woken up by receiving oral sex, and seducing older women.
His gender identity is much the same: male, through and through. He has insecurities about being slight and physically unimposing--related to bullying in school--and about being insufficiently masculine. He takes pride in the callouses in his hands and the scars on his body from surfing, and wishes that the thin, pale stubble on his face was thicker.
It's of little surprise then that he finds the changes from the hormones to be a cruel and unwanted imposition. His breast growth makes him feel powerless and disgusted with himself, he can feel his muscles weakening, the tenderness in his breasts is terrifying and degrading, and even the topic of penile and testicular shrinkage made him choke up and sob. He says that even when I allow him to sleep, his mind feels clouded and he finds it increasingly difficult to identify the particulars of his emotional state, which swings and changes in ways he is not used to.
Again, I must reiterate how promising this is. My experiments concern the induction of sexual neuroses and physical development on non-consenting subjects. C1 was unsuitable because he--well, she, more likely--was a little too keen to embrace the role I had planned for her.
C3 is sleeping now. I haven't actually left our impromptu "therapy room" and he's drifted off with his head in my lap. He needs the rest. I have big plans for him, after all.
24th October, 2018
I took a trip to the cinema today. Specifically the single-screen cinema in the back of the adult bookshop. C2 is turning tricks for the manager. I don't think it's his first career choice but for some reason he's been unable to get a job anywhere else in town. He tried being an independent streetwalker for a while, which didn't work out well for him as he was quickly picked up by the local police and treated rather roughly. Almost as if they were keeping an eye on him!
The manager of the adult bookshop got in touch with him, I believe he was waiting for him outside the local lockup in fact, and informed him of a safe, reliable means of plying his trade. Now he sucks cock in the back room cinema along with a handful of other whores in exchange for a roof over his head and ten percent of the ticket sales.
He was apparently given a second tour of the police cells for not handing his tips over to the manager in a timely and honest manner, so his left eye was still swollen shut when I saw him today. His garb was delightful: pastel pink yoga leggings with the Adidas stripes down the sides, and a duck egg blue midriff-cut t-shirt with "BOY" on the chest, with a female gender symbol in place of the O.
I sat down next to him in the otherwise empty cinema and flashed him my ticket, which had set me back $84--worth every penny--and he flashed me a charming smile. There was no glimmer of recognition in his eyes, like all of my experiments and side projects he'd never seen me without a mask. He put his hand on my thigh and told me his name, which I've already forgotten. The feature began, a rather energetic video from the noughties with Kelly Wells, Hillary Scott and Layla Riviera, prompting C2 to get on his knees in front of me. He gagged a little when he unzipped my jeans, not because I was unwashed but because I'd applied a generous quantity of deodorant and aftershave so that he would not recognise me via scent.
I enjoyed a slow, leisurely blowjob for the next hour, where he displayed all the basic techniques I'd so painstakingly taught him as well as a few new ones he'd picked up more recently. There's something to be said about consuming porn this way, not just the oral service but also watching the film from the beginning, without skipping forward to my favorite parts or switching between videos, letting myself slowly build towards my climax at the same pace as the on-screen action. I came just before the money shot, pulling out to cum all over C2's face as Kelly Wells guzzled piss on the big screen, and let C2 lick and suck my balls until the credits rolled.
Before he or I got up, I took out $20, waved it in front of his eyes, and then used the notes to wipe cum up from his face. He flinched at the roughness, scowled, told me to cut it out, and put his hand on my leg as if to push away from me. I said three words.
"Punishment position three."
It was as if I'd reached inside him and squeezed. He let out a pitiful squeak, straightened up on his knees, pushed out his chest, put his hands behind his back, closed his eyes, opened his mouth, and let his tongue hang out. I stuffed the cum-soaked banknotes between his mouth.
"Be good, C2," I told him as I stood up. He didn't move a muscle as I walked out of the cinema, and as the door closed behind me, I heard a single muffled sob. It was an enjoyable experience and I certainly needed it after the last few days because C3 has really been a handful.
It began on the weekend when the first signs of lactation appeared. C3 has been getting increasingly upset with the changes to his body, his widening hips, his weight gain, his shrinking musculature, his shrinking genitalia, and his C-cup breasts. The breasts are especially upsetting, he complains that they ache constantly and are tender to the slightest touch. In any case, when the first droplets of milk dribbled out of his nipples something snapped.
Through tears, he told me that he refuses to eat, that he cannot live with the things I am doing to him, and that I should either let him go or kill him. Obviously this is unacceptable. I told him I was not treating his request with any seriousness, and that if he did not eat his meal, he would go without for the next several days. He nodded forlornly, but still refused the food.
I strapped his hands into leather mitts to prevent him from improvising methods of self-harm, and continued as normal. For the next three days, he refused to respond to commands or obey orders, remaining silent and going limp. He wailed in pain when I caned his soles and slapped his tits, but he continued to wallow in self-pity.
He was ravenously hungry by Wednesday, but when I gave him the opportunity to eat, he would not. I left the bowl of food in his cage overnight, and in the morning it remained untouched. He had not thrown it out or despoiled it, he had simply ignored it in an admirable, if misplaced, display of willpower. I gave him one final warning that there would be serious consequences if he did not eat now. He refused, so I applied the consequences.
I fitted him into a padded restraining board, on his back, his arms, legs, chest, stomach, forehead, chin, wrists and ankles held in place by canvas straps. He could not move an inch, not that he was trying particularly hard. A hollow dildo gag with a breathing hole went into his mouth, principally to prevent him from trying to bite off his own tongue. I catheterized him and inserted a hollow plug into his backside, not overly gently in either case, much to his consternation.
Then, intubation. I fed a heavily-lubricated silicone hose into his left nostril. He thrashed and twitched, as is expected when such a procedure is performed without the aid of benzodiazepines. Undeterred, I asked him to start swallowing, lest the tube end up in his lungs. He did as much gagging as swallowing, but after a few eventful minutes I felt the tell-tale glide of it being pulled down his esophagus and into his stomach.
Once the tube was taped in place under his nose, I attached the free end to a pump until it drew fluid out from within him. A few drops of this fluid onto pH paper revealed it to be stomach acid, which hopefully meant that the hose was not in his lungs. I then attached the hose to the feeding machine, and explained to C3 exactly how it would work.
He would have his meals and water combined into a slurry, kept at a cool four degrees celsius, and injected into his feeding tube. The pressure inside the hose would make breathing difficult or impossible while the food was being pumped, and the volume of his meals--around a litre and a half of slurry--meant that each feeding would be spread out in thirty second bursts, delivered semi-randomly over the course of an hour.
As I told him this, I undid my belt and began to masturbate. Despite the obvious temptations, I had not molested C3 in an overtly sexual manner since that first facial at the beginning of his captivity. By combining molestation with removal of autonomy, I wished to impress upon him the importance of obeying me with whatever autonomy I allow him to have.
I pressed the button on the feeding machine as I approached my climax. C3 squealed and gurgled like a drowning cat from the sensation of ice-cold sludge pumping through a tube in his sinuses and down into his throat, choking as the diameter of the tube expanded enough to cut off his breathing. He thrashed in his restraints with such force that he almost moved the gurney beneath him!
Seeing tears stream from his eyes was too much, and his eyes were precisely where I aimed. I landed a good few ropes on each eye, which he scrunched shut in disgust. When the tube stopped pumping I pried open his eyelids with my fingers and made sure a good quantity of my burning, stinging cum got in each eye, then smeared the rest across his face. He tried to blink it out, with little success, and before he could do much else I applied the padded blindfold. He hates and fears the eye-shutting pressure from the neoprene padding at the best of times, and wasn't overjoyed to wear it with his eyes gunked up with sperm.
He's been like that for the last three days, unable to move, speak or see, fed three meals a day through his nose. The only interaction he's had is when I've unrestrained his individual limbs and allowed them some movement, one at a time, to prevent bedsores and deep vein thrombosis, and when I come down to grope his sensitive tits. He is only able to relieve himself through the catheter and through enemas.
After a few days of stick, he's almost ready for the carrot. Tonight I am making pork carnitas with soft tacos, which he has told me is his favourite meal. I have also purchased one of the Harry Dresden books, which he told me he is an avid reader of. When dinner is ready, I will make him an offer: he will ask me for normal food and apologize for forcing me to use the feeding tube. In return he will be allowed out of his restraints and returned to his comfortable cage, along with his favourite meal and a good book, which he will be allowed to read during his spare time as long as he behaves himself.
I hope he accepts, for his sake and mine.
16 November 2018
C3 had his first true milking today! I've been teasing dribbles of milk from his nipples with my fingers for weeks, but today the volume was so high that I had to deploy a handheld breast pump. He whimpered for the duration but was obviously relieved by the reduction in pressure. It was as if he found the whole ordeal rather humiliating.
The milk is rich, a touch gamey, and less sweet than expected. I don't think the taste will be anything to write home about while his stress levels are so high, and I think that will be the case for some time. I've taken half for myself, and I'm mixing the other half into his food.
He's been docile since the force feeding. The intensity and inevitability of the punishment is part of it, but the rewards are equally important. My deal is that he can ask for anything once. Obviously I laugh at certain requests--he's not getting a phone or a two-way radio--and some things require compromise, but otherwise I have been accommodating. His cell now contains a lamp he can turn on or off, two dozen books and graphic novels, an old mp3 player, and a box of wet wipes. His relief from the constant boredom of being confined in a cage for twenty hours a day is palpable, and he has chosen the comfort that obedience brings over the misery that stems from disobedience.
He has asked if he'll ever be free from this basement and I truthfully said yes. One day he'll be walking around outside free of physical restraints and he will sleep at night in a bed he can truly call his own, though I'm unsure if he'll ever truly be free of me. He takes comfort in the fact that he has not yet seen my face or anything that might identify me, as he reasons that I am therefore not incentivized to bury him in a shallow grave to protect myself. His conclusion is correct but his premise is wrong; he'll know who I am eventually and I still won't fear him.
I'm currently milking him once per day regardless of his feelings on the matter, and I think this has hidden from him the fact that he now needs to be milked. Without his daily milkings the pain in his breasts would become unbearable, and soon he will develop mastitis if he's not milked. This will form another important part of his development: begging for things that are distasteful but necessary. With the exception of the wet wipes, there is nothing inherently humiliating in the things he's asking for. I believe he'll find begging to be milked intensely humiliating, and more humiliating still because of the tolls I'll extract from him when he goes down that road.
A brief note on his physical changes: his breasts are bigger but they remain C-cups for the time being. There are now a striking set of stretch marks on the sides and undersides of his breasts, along with some smaller, subtler ones on his thighs and buttocks which have also thickened up nicely. At some point I'm going to give him a regular schedule of retention enemas until he gets stretch marks on his belly befitting a pregnant little broodslut. His skin is delightfully soft and I'm shaving his face daily until the home electrolysis kit arrives. The combination of hormones, daily exercise bike sessions, and a lack of any upper body resistance training has changed his physique from a surfer's build to a more bottom heavy one.
As soon as I have finished writing this entry I am going to give him two gifts. The first gift is an ear piercing. It will be home to a yellow plastic tag, a miniature version of a cattle tag. The second gift is his name. He's not C3 anymore, and he's certainly not whatever stupid name he called himself before I acquired him. He has lovely tits and he's a milk cow, so his name will be Cowtits.
Cowtits. I think it suits him.
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juleswolverton-hyde · 5 years ago
Text
Not by the Moon | 01
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Genre: Smut, Romance, Strangers to Lovers, Drama, Tragedy, Werewolf AU, Supernatural AU, Bookshop AU
Pairing: Bookshop keeper!/Werewolf!JB x Reader
Warnings: Mild swearing, allusion to anxiety
Summary: Every story has a purpose or goal it is dedicated to, their authors at times going to great lengths to see the project they once started to completion. Nevertheless, the things the writers swore on to see their latest art piece to completion are static.
Unchanging.
None of them swore by the Moon nor Love because they can solely genuinely swear on all that changes like themselves.
And yet, a wolf in love foolishly swore by the moon.
That is when Time truly started ticking.
Next chapter
Masterlist
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There is nothing quite like visiting a bookshop on a rainy autumn day, walking the pavements that will soon deepen in their shade of grey as the scarlet and burnt orange leaves will be decorated with tiny watery crystals. The fierce wind preludes to the sorrow of the gloomy clouds overhead, the chill creeping beneath the navy trenchcoat cooling the little skin bared by a simple ink black V-neck shirt. Caffeinated bordeaux sneakers hasten their step when leaving the district ruled by busy city life and entering the artisans district on the east side of town, where the boroughs are ruled by artists, individual shops, cafés and independent bookstores that each have their own vibe.
For a while now, a specific one has yet to be visited, intending to drop by ever since that long walk that lead through many a cobblestone street lined with brownstone houses and not a single business anywhere in sight. Except for Paper Souls, a hidden gem tucked away at the edge of the area where homes and commerce just meet and have resulted in a small store disguised as a proper worker’s house. As can be judged from the window display, the shop sells both well-known titles alongside more obscure ones, bound in editions fresh from the press and those having lived a ready life on someone’s shelves.
A second before the first tears of the heavens fall and make their presence known by ticking against the window, the bookstore is entered with a low sigh of delight. Nothing comes remotely close to the distinct scent of books, this specific combination of mustiness and ink laced with the fragrance of the weather outside and perfumes of customers. Or, in this case, solely the owner’s.
Here and there, a rumour about the man ruling the paper kingdom has been picked up and it is safe to say not all have been positive. A subject that has been frequently touched upon, oft causing more of a stir than the overall intimidating attitude, are the differently coloured eyes. One brown like hazelnuts at the end of the year and the other as blue as the ocean far outside the harbour.
The ones belonging to long blonde locks with dark roots looking up from the current read behind the counter and which are briefly met with a polite nod and casual greeting. At least one aspect of the groundless gossip is true because the disgruntled stoicism on the handsome face acknowledging the professional meaningless acquaintance silently makes the heart race and constricts the throat. It awakens the need to run and hide somewhere among the chestnut shelves, become a character in a tale so as to vanish and thus avoid upsetting the clerk by merely being present. Which might be the biggest problem, considering today’s goal of staying inside and spend it as is habitually done.
Don’t be silly. Just find a book and settle down somewhere to read a few pages. As long as you’re quiet, nothing’s gonna happen.
Thus, mayhaps repeating the self-chastisement once or twice, the creaking worn floorboards are walked upon as ghostlike as possible though every step makes the Body cringe due to the loudness disturbing the silence. 
And him.
The young man whose gaze is momentarily met before fleeing to the vintage couch in an incline with a gorgeous Penguin hardcover copy of William Blake’s Songs of Innocence and Experience, which has been found in the poetry section across from the counter. Breath was held while standing on the tips of the toes while reaching for the thin volume on one of the highest shelves, hoping to not attract attention and refusing to use one of the nearby dark-wooden stools to climb atop because such acrobatics would likely not sit well with the person causing the hairs at the back of the neck to stand on edge.
A sigh of relief cannot be helped when loosening the buttons of the trenchcoat and tossing it over the arm rest before snuggling up in the corner of the sofa. Finally a moment devoid of stress, a chance to be carried off by the works of a beloved poet and artist embodying the truth of childhood and adulthood.
But being brought back all too soon from criticism on the corrupt Catholic Church by the oppressive presence of loose ripped jeans which are perceived just above the edge of the mustard cover. Despite being barely able to gather the courage to look away from the page, lashes nevertheless look up to hands tucked into denim pockets and non-matching irises peering down. Curiously, though it is also alarming, the gaze from above is awkward as if unsettled by the mere presence of a well-meaning bookworm which confirms the assumption about being a nuisance.
Although, the paradoxically misplaced inquiry spoken in a husky voice undermines the deduction. The lowering of broad shoulders does too, allowing personal defenses to waver a bit in the pursuit of kindness. ‘’How do you like your coffee?’’
Bewildered yet finding no clear reason for the kind question in the stoicism of two-toned locks, the simple reflex of asking for a repeat is acted upon with a sheepish tongue that does not know what to make of the situation. ‘’Sorry, what?’’
‘’Coffee. How do you drink yours?’’ A gruff slightly chubby thumb points toward the door, the glass decorated with autumnal tears. ‘’It might be raining, but I still need caffeine. Figured I might as well buy you something too. So, what should I get?’’
What do I do? Do I accept the offer? I mean, he offered it, but declining would still be polite. Then again, it’s free coffee.
‘’Oh, uhm, that’s very sweet of you.’’ The bundle is put down in the lap, flabbergasted shy hands tucked between the thighs while trying to stay as small as possible. It is a silly instinct, but the closeness of the intimidating bookshop clerk calls for it. Moreover, the deep slightly hoarse tone that sounds both as if still recovering from something and being exhausted with the world does not make matters better. 
However, albeit for a split second that is not credible enough, little will-o-the-wisps illuminate the entrancing wildness of an ocean and hazelnut forest as a quicksilver smile flashes over roseate lips. A beautiful fleeting sight which might never have arisen from the solemnity resting like a mask on the youth’s face.
A daydream.
Indeed, surely that is what it must have been. What other reason could there be to show a sign of being pleased with someone who does not feel particularly welcome and at ease in this paper kingdom?
Led astray by the unfocused train of thought, distracted by what may or may not have been witnessed, the actual answer comes out on a mumble. All the while boldly looking back, wondering. ‘’An iced vanilla latte... would be nice.’’
Acknowledging the order with a mere low rumble similar to a wolf’s, the clerk sets off on a caffeinated journey and leaves an affected soul behind. 
While still being highly uncomfortable with the lad’s presence, the thought of what just happened and the offer of a drink that was not in the slightest reluctant imprints a warm impression on a racing heart. Yet, before any ungrounded fantasies arise, the poetry bundle is quickly picked up again and later exchanged for a thick volume of Keats’s poetry that has been picked up in a rush to seemingly have never moved from the leather couch. To not leave a single trace of chaos which might trigger the wrath of the bookshop keeper and perhaps end up in being drenched by cold coffee. 
All the fear is evidently in vain because, when being once again engrossed by poetry, the ghost of a touch over the cheekbone breaks the spell. As if awakening from a dream, the suggestion of the outstretched cold drink passes unnoticed. Instead, it is replaced by a look at ripped jeans beneath a loose tartan blazer, resulting in the novel discovery of a little gem embedded in the right nostril. 
The rattle of ice entrapped in plastic fully awakens the senses as well as the sharp rustle of a paper bag bearing the logo shaped like an apple out of which a bite has been taken. ‘’Here. It’s on me. Don’t think anything of it, I just don’t want you to get dehydrated or hungry.’’
‘’Right.’’ With trembling hands expecting to have the food carelessly thrown into the lap and drink pushed into the palm, the surprising meal is accepted. Without the slightest sign of pushing. ‘’Still, thanks.’’
Once again, a beastly grunt is all that is received in return before checkered trainers retreat to the front of the establishment. Strangely, they soon return with the current read which was enjoyed behind the counter alongside the cold brew that was picked up to battle the fatigue that noticeably laces demeanour. Because, when sinking back into the sofa after having been gestured at to scoot over and haphazardly making room, lashes flutter shut for longer than a mere blink. Notwithstanding, they are awake enough to notice the shift in reading. ‘’Keats?’’
‘’Uh, yes. He’s one of my favorites alongside Blake, Donne and, on occasion, Wordsworth.’’ Personal enthusiasm takes over when mentioning the last poet with whom there is a love-hate relationship, erasing any anguish at being close to the keeper of the kingdom and thus making it possible to ignore the few centimeters of space between bodies. ‘’Even though he’s basically a fraud by turning his sister’s experiences into poetry. It makes one wonder whether he had any talent to come up with something himself. Now, I do believe some of his works are genuinely his, but not all. Sorry, I’ll- I’ll shut up.’’
Questioning chestnut and water reintroduce the silence disturbed by autumnal rain accompanied by howling winds, stretching out over the empty streets. Nobody likes a blathering fool, least of all the stoic who surprisingly has decided to join one’s company. 
Or, so was the original thought that is now nullified by a sliver of a smile and something inaudible smokily mumbled beneath breath. There is no courage to inquire about what was said nor ask for a reason for being evidently entertained, simply rapidly picking up the volume again to resume reading with an overheated, ashamed mind.
Here and there, however, sneaky peeks are thrown in the direction of bleached locks thoroughly enjoying Dante’s Inferno, a work that has been on the to-be-read list for the longest time and somehow has never been crossed off.
Come on, you can do it. Ask him how it is, whether he likes Dante. Don’t be a marshmallow. Okay, one, two... fuck.
‘’How’s Keats?’’ Beating the barely daring tongue to it, the young man interrupts the hardly focused enjoyment of poetry that maybe lasted about fifteen minutes.
‘’Good.’’ More wants to be added to the opinion, but cannot be shaped nor voiced due to the bafflement at seeing sincere interest pierce through an unwavering expression. On the other hand, another unnameable sentiment underlines attitude too, floating ever so slightly beneath the surface. 
‘’You haven’t touched your food.’’ Lips slightly pout when glancing at the paper bag that rests on the trenchcoat that had hastily been draped over the other arm rest when bleached locks sat down, colourful irises dimming. 
Worry.
Why does it affect him? What does it matter if I eat or not?
To hopefully grant a bit of reassurance, an absent-minded promise is made before diving back into the misery of a nightingale. ‘’I’ll eat in a bit. Just one more poem.’’
As fast as lightning, the volume flies from hapless palms and the scent of books mingled with musky mint suddenly leans over to grab the purchased treat, fingertips pressing against the side of the thigh. Every muscle tenses up at the new form of intimacy, inwardly praying for the tartan blazer to return to his place as soon as possible. ‘’No, it’s already two o’clock and I’m sure you had breakfast early. You should eat. Where’s your coffee?’’
A trembling finger points to the untouched iced vanilla latte on the floor, put just in front of the sofa. Hands rise even higher when the bookshop keeper’s heartbeat and heated broad chest can be temporarily felt when slightly chubby digits lean over to grab the plastic cup. ‘’I’m not…’’
‘’What?’’ Clearly not understanding the need to keep looking away, unsteadily focusing on the sides of the nearest bookshelf, the question comes out agitated as the retrieved items are pushed forward, unmistakably intended to be taken. The shift in behaviour is as little comprehensible as the likely appearance of warm rosy cheeks going paired with a fist pressing on the lips, tongue-tied.
Mentally chastising oneself for the awkward display, courage is forcibly gathered to face the puzzled grumpy young man and answer with a whisper. ‘’I’m not comfortable eating in public.’’
‘’We’re not in public.’’
‘’Or with people I don’t know.’’
This revelation is clearly unexpected, eyes widening when reluctantly elaborating on an irrational fear with folded hands tucked between the thighs. For a second, there is nothing but an uncomfortable hush in which the worst outcome is vividly painted in the mind. Fortunately and oddly, it is broken as the stoic’s attitude shifts to something that has not been witnessed before and which goes against any rumour floating around town. 
A gentle smile plays around the corners of the mouth as the tense grip on the food and drink loosens, gently putting the rustling bag in the lap and a warm palm grabbing one hand to place the lukewarm cup in it. ‘’There. I’m Jaebeom, JB for short. Now, can you please eat something? And I promise I won’t judge you.’’
‘’Shouldn’t- Shouldn’t you eat something too? You look like you could use some energy.’’ Up close, the fatigue has become visibly noticeable outside the moment of sitting down and closing eyes for a little bit longer than would suffice for a blink. Affected by the niceness of the gentle acquaintance and thoughtfulness, the croissant in the bag is torn in half to offer a part to the current company. ‘’How about we share this?’’
‘’You don’t have to.’’ A low breathy chuckle rolls forth at the gesture, strangely elating the heart and stirring up a storm of butterflies in the stomach. Again, the same unintelligible phrase that was muttered under breath earlier seems to be repeated.
A penny for your thoughts. What did you say?
Putting aside curiosity to not prematurely cross any boundaries of politeness, what wants to be asked is suppressed and reformed into a request for sharing. After all, the lack of energy outlined by vague dark circles beneath non-matching irises is truly a cause for concern. ‘’Please? I don’t have that big of an appetite.’’
With a resigning sigh, the offer is accepted. Much to the strange delight of the soul who still is not entirely trusting of the bookshop keeper yet already has the mental defenses down a little bit more than before. ‘’Alright, if you insist.’’
What follows is an absolutely adorable though also surprising scenario as the pastry is enjoyed in one bite, the food disappearing without any trouble. Nibbling on the other half, staring cannot be helped as a sip of coldbrew is enjoyed to wash the treat down. However, the unintended impolite mannerism, of course, cannot pass under the radar. Hence is why dark brows furrow in puzzlement when remarking upon being a point of attention. ‘’What?’’
‘’Nothing. You just…’’ a moment is taken to try and find the right word yet failing to think of one which accurately describes the eating manner, ‘’you just wolfed that down.’’
‘’Sorry if it makes you uncomfortable. I can be a bit, well, unmannered at times.’’ The gaze focusing on the iced black coffee adds to the sorrowful side profile, unwillingly nostalgic, but unapproachable for comfort. ‘’I try not to be. I’m trying to, no, never mind.’’ Another sip. ‘’Forget it. Just eat and stay as long as you like.’’
‘’Jaebeom?’’ In a reflex, after swiftly wiping fatty fingertips on the coarse paper napkin, the bookshop keeper is grabbed by the sleeve as he tries to move away. Alarmed by the sudden bold move, non-matching irises briefly flare with an odd mixture of fear and annoyance before seemingly realizing something and thus calming down. All this goes hidden behind a badly enacted tolerating low hum. ‘’Can you, I mean, only if you don’t mind, could you... could you stay here? For a little while? At least sit down for a few more minutes. I promise I won’t stare as I did and actually read.’’
‘’You want me to... stay?’’ Dark brows furrow in a strange confusion, uncomprehending of the normal request. Although, perhaps it is not so casual seeing as it needs to be thought about. ‘’Stay? Here?’’
‘’If you don’t mind? I’m sorry if I freaked you out, I really didn’t mean to.’’
‘’You didn’t. I should be the one apologizing for being so distant.’’
‘’I don’t blame you. You barely know me.’’
‘’I don’t know you.’’ The observation hits hard, the sternness of the reply crucifying the heart and constricting the throat. How odd a fact should have this result. Withal, the misplaced hurt is a little soothed by the promise that follows. ‘’I’ll stay. But I’ll be closing in about two hours.’’
And thus, for one hour and a half, the paper kingdom falls quiet. Solely the tinkering tears of heaven decorating the glass of the windows, howling winds stirring the richly warm leaves into dance and occasional wandering lonely umbrella break the silence. Inside, the only noise to disrupt the hush is the turn of a page or sniffle that may or may not prelude to a cold. 
However, all tranquil beauty knows an end for Time always runs out. Henceforth, it is at half past four that a light tap goes paired with the barely audible comment “you have to go”. Likely due to the aftermath of being pulled from a world of poetic Nature into gloomy Reality, there is a wrong perception of Jaebeom’s voice. Surely, the sorrowful reluctance is imagined.
As you said, you don’t know me.
The mere thought pains Body and Soul when grabbing the navy trenchcoat off of the faux leather arm rest, stepping towards the bookshelf where Keats was found and the exit afterwards. No chance of wandering a little longer between the books is given, the clerk following closely behind and unconsciously guiding feet towards the entrance.
‘’Y/N? Will you, uh…’’ Restless trembling palms hover in the air like two bent paws failing to illustrate something, a rosy flush spread over the cheeks, ‘’Can I put your jacket on? I mean, let me help you put your jacket on. That’s how you say it, right?’’
With an affirming hum, big palms with slightly chubby digits are allowed to help dress into the piece of clothing.
Glide over the side of the neck when collecting hair to make it flow over the collar instead of being tucked beneath it, leaving a trail of goosebumps and sharpening breath. 
All the while maintaining eye contact, both our faces distorting with timidity. It is then that glances are haphazardly thrown around the empty store to avoid each other for a second wherein composure is hopefully found. 
And it would appear that the buff tall blonde youth is the first to do so, speech matter-of-factly when voicing an unspoken suggestion while holding on to the upper arms. ‘’I haven’t even asked your name.’’
Bashfully, the answer is uttered in a proper vis-á-vis with entrancing two-toned irises though the urge to bolt out the door remains. Nevertheless, the rapid loss of contact is disliked, JB realizing how the intimacy might come across when glancing at the fingertips digging into fabric, almost begging to stay. ‘’It’s Y/N.’’
The instinct to flee is lessened by the step forward thoughtfully repeating the name, carefully feeling out the syllables as if comprehending a siren’s song. ‘’I had a good time, Y/N.’’
‘’Me too.’’ It is true because, despite the distance that was endeavoured to be closed with food, reading and shallow conversation, the time spent together was actually quite enjoyable. Notwithstanding, too much of the clerk remains unknown to say whether all has been out of politeness or if any sincere trust has been shown.
‘’Even though you’re still scared of me?’’
‘’I’m not!’’ A sigh rolls off the tongue at the sight of a smug grin on roseate lips knowing better than to lie about genuine sentiments. ‘You’re just... just kinda intimidating.’
‘’Kinda? To me it seems like a whole lot more than ‘just kinda’. You almost seem eager to go even though you were hesitating earlier.’’ Bright hazelnut and the summer sea are overcast by lonely grief putting on the airs of suppressed rage, painfully re-establishing and enhancing the distance that was briefly shortened with a step backwards. ‘’To get away from me. Make up your mind.’’
‘’Yes, I’m intimidated by you. A lot.’’ The renewed cold emptiness is warily bridged, planning out the words to say to not make matters worse. ‘’And, to be honest, I don’t want to go. Still, it’s because you intimidate me I might seem uneasy and glad to go, but I can assure you I’m not. I really had a good time. We might not have talked a lot, but I still had a splendid afternoon. With you. And for that, I’m grateful. I’m sorry I confuse you, make you feel awkward because of my behaviour.’’
The waterfall of a confession catches the bookshop keeper off guard, but also manages to make tense broad shoulders lower their defenses as colourful eyes calm down. Digits rise from the pockets of loose ripped jeans to envelop the upper arms once more, this time rubbing them reassuringly and let the personal walls crumble too. ‘You don’t have to be afraid of me nor apologize. Look, we’ll talk about this another time. For now, you have to go and I have to close the shop. Get home safely and don’t catch a cold.’
‘’You too.’’ 
‘’Don’t worry. I won’t.’’
With a last nod and gentle smile relieved at the prospect of good health, warm palms are stepped away from.
The watery autumn chill cools the heat from being seen off by blonde locks.
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I couldn’t get sick even if I wanted to.
When the enchanting scent of summer citrus, autumnal blackberries and juicy peaches has faded, the two volumes that were touched by it are picked from the shelves without a clear understanding of why. Neither is there a sense of comprehension when it comes to the sheer curiosity about what it is that the adorable shy doe so likes about these specific poets. Notwithstanding, both books are picked up and put on the counter alongside the current read to take upstairs after sweeping and properly closing the shop.
Which does not take long, soon after already stumbling up the metal stairs to the apartment above the establishment with a famished stomach and tense muscles, watching the oppressive concrete clouds slightly give way to the lilac dusk before heading inside. Fortunately, dinner has been prepared in advance so the various side dishes solely need to be warmed up in the microwave just like the rice in the cooker. The hair dye job, however, will have to wait until tomorrow. That is, if it is remembered like the face of the local historian who seems awfully fascinated by the affliction distorting identity.
Shedding off the weight of the day, clothes are removed and tossed on the couch to be replaced by the bathrobe that was put there in the morning after yet another long night filled with amnesia. Afterwards, bare feet trod to the kitchen to retrieve the cold dishes from the refrigerator and put them in the microwave to heat up. 
It’s getting late, but at least there’s still some time to read. Funny how my last thought is of you.
Just as the melancholic thought arises over a big bowl of bibimbap accompanied by William Blake’s Songs of Innocence and Experience, the screen of the phone on the counter lights up after a brief buzz. When getting up to check, the message appears to be from the supernatural scholar.
“Good luck tonight. I’ll be at your place around 7. Hopefully, you’ll be yourself again. If not, I’ll wait outside. Jinyoung.”
As always, the text is signed with the young man’s name to help ease the recovery of ever-fading memory. Even after living around three years among humans again, the ability to recall actual names alongside how to enact civilized behaviour remains hard.
And becomes more difficult with every passing day.
For now, I want to try. I want to speak to you at least one more time and explain myself. Part ways on good terms, let you know what I am.
A smile cannot be helped at the sight of the bowl next to the mustard poetry bundle, vividly re-imagining how it was held by small hands on the faux leather sofa this afternoon. 
How those same tiny digits tore off half of the croissant without hesitation and offered it to an animal, nibbling adorably on theirs while endeavouring to put on a human act and failing due to the hunger always preceding hell.
But a fantasy never lasts.
Time never stops. 
It solely ticks.
Runs out.
Hopefully, I’ll remember you.
And the moon cannot be sworn by for She cannot stay away nor remain the same. 
That night, the name of the bookish fawn is the last powerful word to recall before losing a grip on the world in the cold dark illuminated by artificial light. 
Naked and shackled beneath the concrete ground.
Hoping for a memory. 
Y/N.
145 notes · View notes
feckin-zicons · 4 years ago
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Squids, Dancing, and Dirty thoughts... Not necessarily in that order or all at once.
Apparently people like this? I am more confused than Liam is in this chapter. Which you know, makes sense bc this character only exists in my head, but also doesn’t at all bc I have no idea what goes on in there most of the time. Anyway this is for Zayn, Oxford commas, @stanmedusa who pointed out Zayn was also an Oxford comma stan, @redyellowberry, and their anon to started this mess. Also please imagine Zayn with his current blue hair, but also with his long Aladdin hair bc that’s what I’ve been doing and oh holy gods do I need that to happen. Please. Hair gods make it happen I’m begging
Same warnings as ever its 4AM, this is much longer than planned, and I have no interest in editing, making it sound coherent, or good. No, I don’t know about the squids either.
Parts 1&2 here
Liam would like to point out while he's not a stranger to feeling confused, he's still having trouble pinpointing how exactly he got to be Dance Mistress Irina Alinova's personal bitch. 
Ever since he accidentally interrupted one of the dance practises while looking for a missing prop for Director Corden, more and more of them started disappearing only to show up in the basement. No one else was interested in facing the Dance Mistresses' wrath, but Liam didn't mind the yelling. As long as Mistress Alinova didn't start throwing things, he figured he was safe enough. After all, it gave him the chance to see the blue haired ballerino again.  
Zayn Malik, the god in mortal form, the prima ballerino, the prettiest man Liam had ever seen, who had no idea who Liam even was. 
Liam had it bad. 
Liam had it so bad.
Liam had it so bad he tripped over thin air, spilled hot coffee over himself, and walked into a door when he thought he saw him at a Costas with Louis. The man he saw wasn't Zayn, thank fuck, but the entire sequence of events did give Louis more ammunition to tease him with. Stupid pretty boys with long blue hair and piercings sent from hell just to ruin Liam's life. Yeah, he was a goner. 
Louis dragged out the whole sorry story after Liam texted him about spiking his lunch and laughed himself sick knowing just how much of a mess Liam became around people he was interested in. They still didn't talk about Danielle. Which was a good thing considering the end of that relationship had Liam pretty much swearing off women for the rest of his life. No pussy was worth that mess. Dick though? Liam was willing to take that chance on Zayn, even if asking Harry didn't give him much information. 
According to Harry, Zayn had been around for a few years but mostly kept to himself or the other dancers. There was something about him throwing a fit a few weeks before Liam showed up. Upset about being forced to learn the choreography for Winston's show when it was just going to fail on opening night like it always did. 
Liam thought he had a point, considering. He didn't know what bananas, ballet, and really bad rapping had to do with King James VI but didn't want to voice that in front of the man playing the gay king. No one dared fire Zayn, considering he kept the whole theatre afloat, but it also didn't make many actors happy with him. Especially not Mizz Wendy Williams, who played Marie Antoinette in the play. Again, Liam had a lot of questions he didn't dare ask out loud. It's not like he was ever good at history, so it was entirely possible the two lived in the same time period. Or it was some sort of allegory that went over his head like the aristocrats wearing banana suits did. 
Louis always found his stories about his placement hilarious, but even that one had him wondering if there wasn't some sort of gas leak in their apartment. It wouldn't have been the first time, or the second. Most likely, it was the theatre that was growing some sort of mold that caused insanity if breathed in. Some of the things Liam had been forced to clean in the past few weeks were unspeakable. 
But even that probably couldn't explain Zayn Malik. Nothing could explain that sort of beauty and talent. Or those hands... and thighs... and fingers. Ung. Liam would love to get up close and personal with all of him.  
Either way, Liam had just been cleaning the mirrors in the practice room, humming along to Brandy and Monica on the radio, wondering if Niall was actually going to come down and help him instead of hiding away like a coward. Again. By the second verse, he'd given up trying not to sing along, not expecting anyone to come by. It was late, the dancer's practise long over, and Winston left screaming over an hour ago. Liam would have done a recce and skipped out on the last half hour if one of the managers wasn't sticking around still. Piers Morgan, an absolute cunt who treated the lads on probation like hardened criminals, and he was the prison warden. Despite, you know, most of the lads on summary probation, and Liam’s arson charge being the most serious crime out of all of them. 
Anyway, the last thing he's expecting is for anyone to come in while he's singing about the boy being his, rolling his body to the beat. Which is probably how he ends up tripping over himself when he notices Zayn leaning up against the open door, watching him. Watching him, in bright, tight, teal dance tights (were dance tights usually blue? They should be) that looked nice with his hair and complimented the gold tones of his skin. The skin he could see a lot of. Because he was shirtless. Because he was shirtless and had a lot more tattoos than Liam realized. Tattoos Liam wanted to bite. Not hard enough to make a mark or anything, that would be sacrilegious, but enough to make him make a sound. God, Liam hoped he was a moaner. Not that he thought he had a chance with Zayn or anything, but it would be a shame if Zayn was the type that stayed quiet during sex. 
Except he wasn't being quiet now, he was talking. And Liam was staring at him, like an idiot, not paying attention. Because he was an idiot. 
Oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck, why did this always happen to him? 
"Er, what?" Liam asked, desperately hoping he didn't sound as stupid as he felt right then, which was pretty fucking stupid. He probably looked even stupider than he felt and ruined his chances at ever-
"I asked if you were almost done? Was planning on practising more tonight," Zayn answered him. 
Zayn, Zayn Fucking Malik, answered him, and he was still staring at him like an idiot. Shit Liam say something.
"Pretty" 
Not that you idiot.
"What?" Zayn asked, looking confused and adorable.
Oh god, he was precious. Was that a smile? Was he smiling at him? Liam? Oh no.
"Pretty much, I meant. Pretty much done," Liam replied, wishing the ground would swallow him whole. "Just one more mirror, and I'll be out of your way."
There, those were words, sentences even. Now all he had to do was act normal and finish cleaning. Easy. 
"So, Brandy and Monica, right? You like R'n'B then?" Zayn asked him, walking into the room with a heavy dance bag, setting it off to the side.
Liam felt himself flushing as he turned back around to finish cleaning the mirror so Zayn wouldn't see.  "Yeah," he answered, trying not to peek at Zayn bending over as he rifled through his belongings. 
Those legs, Fuck. Liam wondered what it'd feel like to have them around his- 
"I didn't expect that," Zayn said, drawing Liam out of his filthy thoughts, and making him turn back around.
"What?"
"No, I- I didn't mean it in a bad way or anything. I guess I just expected you to listen to more rock?" 
Liam was pretty sure he missed half of the conversation somewhere. Was Zayn blushing? He was so pretty. Wow. 
"No, I like everything," he replied dumbly. They were still talking about music, right? That would make sense. Why was Zayn talking to him again? God, Liam couldn't handle this. "Do you like it? The music, I mean."
"Yeah, grew up listening to ‘em. My older sister was obsessed with Monica. So... Who's your favourite artist?" 
"Artist? Oh uh, I've been listening to a lot of Post Malone? How about you? What do you- who do you listen to?" 
"Post Malone's sick, mate. I like most music I guess, but I've been listening to a lot of The Weekend."
"Have you heard his new album?"
"Yeah, it's sick! Do you-" Zayn was cut off by Niall running in out of breath. The bright orange tee that labelled him as one of the community service workers was wet and stained black. Actually.. all of him was soaked and stained black. Was that ink?
"Hey, Payno, are you done yet because we have a situation upstairs," Niall gasped out, hands on his knees, looking like he'd just seen his life flash before his eyes. 
"What the hell happened to you?" 
"There's a squid stick in the toilet." 
"There's a what?"
"A Squid! A giant fucking squid in the toilet!" 
Liam blinked in confusion, trying to wrap his head around why there would be a squid anywhere near the theatre let alone one of the toilets. Did Corden want live animals in his show now? Or Winston. It could be either of them. 
"Why do you need me?" he asked. "I don't know anything about squids."
Niall sounded like he was at the end of his rope when he replied, "You know something about plumbing at least!" 
"Not a lot! Enough to keep the water on at home, but I'm not a plumber." 
"Doesn't matter, we need your help, Ashtons gone to find some butter," Niall said, stomping back around, leaving behind a trail of watery black ink. "We'll meet you upstairs when you're done."
"Wait, what do you need butter for?!" Liam called after him but didn't get a reply. Butter? How was butter going to help?
A muffled giggle distracted Liam from his thoughts, and he was abruptly reminded Zayn was still in the room. Zayn, might as well be a god, was in the room, and Liam was just talking about squids in toilets.
Why him?
"I guess I should go see what they need help with?" Liam tried to say without sounding... Well, he wasn't sure what the proper response was in this situation or how to react to it. 
Zayn smiled at him, and oh. How was it possible he looked even more attractive now? 
Liam thinks Zayn said something about the other lads needing him and it sounding urgent, but really, Liam was in a daze until he also got a face full of ink... From another squid in an entirely different toilet. 
What the fuck.
Louis was never going to let him live this down. 
Really? Squids???
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matrixaffiliate · 5 years ago
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New Story! FFN and AO3
Being a godfather can be complicated, especially when you're Harry Potter, but thankfully his godson is always ready to set him straight. Hinny family fluff piece. One-shot. Rated T.   Happy Birthday Meg! @thisismegz birthday is this week and this little fic is for her! Love you darling, and all the wonderful ideas you share with me! Thank you!  
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Harry set another balloon up on the ceiling with his wand and turned to survey the front room again.
"It looks fine, love," Ginny called from the kitchen.
"Says the woman who has been putting final touches on Teddy's cake for the last thirty minutes," Harry called back.
"Well, I'm done now so you should be too," Ginny grinned as she levitated the cake into the room and onto the table.
"I suppose I have to be," Harry looked up at the clock, "Andy should be here any minute with Teddy and the boys."
"And that means that Teddy's friends will be here in the next twenty minutes." Ginny set a cooling charm on the drinks.
Harry shoved his hand into his hair, "Do you think this was a good idea?"
"A birthday party?" Ginny tilted her head at him.
"Just, having it here instead of at Andy's?" Harry sighed and shook his head.
"Hey," Ginny wrapped her arms around his middle, "Remus and Tonks made you Teddy's godfather because they knew they could count on you to treat him like your own. And his home is our home, right?"
Harry pulled her closer and swallowed the lump in his throat further down.
"You're right, I just…" He trailed off.
"I know," Ginny rested her head on his shoulder.
Teddy was ten years old, today. Nearly ten years ago Remus asked Harry to be godfather. Nearly ten years ago Remus and Tonks would leave their son and never make it back to him.
Harry and Ginny had three children of their own now, the youngest of whom was sleeping in her room, but Harry felt guilty whenever he considered Teddy his own. Harry's feelings about the whole situation were complicated. He worried about taking more from Andy than she had already lost. He worried about erasing the importance of Remus and Tonks from Teddy's life by trying too hard to be the father figure in Teddy's life. And he worried most of all that he wasn't doing right by Teddy. That he was only going to make things worse for this fellow orphan.
But before he could rehash all these concerns with Ginny for the millionth time, the fireplace burned green and the birthday boy tumbled out of the grate, hands tightly gripping Jamie and Al.
"Is Lily awake yet?" Teddy pulled Al up from the floor as he stood before helping Jamie to stand.
"Not yet, dear," Ginny laughed as Andromeda stepped gracefully out of the fireplace.
"You two have outdone yourselves," Andy smiled as she looked around the room. "This looks wonderful."
Harry ruffled Teddy's hair and smiled, "It's not every day one turns ten."
"Daddy," Jamie pulled on his leg, "Can Teddy play the video game with us until his friends get here?"
"Sure thing, mate." Harry nodded the cheering boys towards the Muggle-room.
Andy sighed, "I can't believe that one more year and then we'll send him off to Hogwarts."
Harry felt his hand in his hair and took a deep breath.
"How did we get here?" He chuckled and grinned at Ginny. "I still feel like the kid that snuck around at the Burrow with you."
"Oh, you'll always feel like that," Andy chuckled. "I still feel like the girl that sat in the back of an automobile for the first time with Ted and felt like the biggest rebel in the Wizarding World."
Ginny grinned, "Little did you know that your cousin would be on a mission to take your title."
Harry laughed as the stories of Sirius that Andy had told them came to mind.
"He was more worthy of the title than I was in the end," Andy smiled.
And then the doorbell rang and the circus began. Harry both loved it and felt like they were insane. Within about five minutes they had nine ten-year-old boys, Victoire, and his two boys running through the house like the world was on fire - and they had started it.
"Why is there a girl here?"
Harry spun around from where he was to defend his niece's presence at Teddy's party only to see Ginny advancing on the unsuspecting boy. But she never got to say her piece.
"Vicky's my best friend," Teddy pulled Vic into a one-armed hug. "And she has really good control over her magic already. Show them, Vicky, make those bright blue flowers."
And suddenly Victoire was the coolest one at the party.
Harry shared a smile with Ginny as relief washed over both of them.
When Lily woke up, Ginny brought her down to join the party, but the minute Teddy saw Lily he asked to hold her.
"You like to hold the baby?" A different little boy asked as Teddy started explaining to Lily the game that was being played.
"Of course, I do," Teddy smiled, "she's my sister."
Teddy kept Lily with him until she'd had enough and wanted to eat.
The boys ran and played choosing to play games in the back garden for a time. Harry volunteered to be the adult to go out into the damp weather, and that was when it started.
"Hey, Teddy's dad," one of the boys ran up to him. "Can you help me? My shoelace is knotted and I can't get it undone."
Harry's brain stopped. Mechanically he undid the knot and even tied the boy's shoelace, but inside he was panicking. What was he supposed to do? Should he correct the child? Would that embarrass Teddy? Would it be better to pull Teddy aside and ask what he wanted? Was Teddy telling the kids Harry was his dad?
It all felt overwhelming.
Then another of the boys ran up. "Teddy's dad, where's the loo?"
Harry took a deep breath and directed the boy back inside. Why was this happening? What was he supposed to do? Why was there not a book or something that Hermione could throw at him about how to be a proper godfather to a child who was orphaned because you couldn't defeat a crazed murder with a world domination complex fast enough?
"Teddy's dad, what time is it?"
Harry thought he might scream.
And then Ginny was there.
"Why don't you lot all come inside and we'll have Teddy open presents?"
Harry could have kissed her. It was hard enough seeing how fast Teddy was growing up and knowing that Jamie and Al and even tiny Lily would follow suit, let alone adding these awful mixed-up feelings about the ten-year anniversary of the end of the war and now being called Teddy's dad.
"Teddy's mum, have him open mine first!"
Harry looked up and caught Ginny's eye. She looked about as floored as Harry had felt the first time one of the boys called him in the same fashion.
They both turned to look at Teddy.
Teddy smiled and reached out for the present. Ginny handed it to him with a watery smile.
"Oh wait," Teddy paused and turned to Andy, "can I hold Lily? I want to show her how to unwrap a present."
Andy handed over Lily and shared a long look with Harry and Ginny. She smiled encouragingly at them and Harry determined that as much as he didn't want to, they really did need to address this. But the birthday and the party came first, and so they finished up the last hour with presents and a trip to the Muggle room where Teddy introduced all his friends to video games.
It flew by and in a blink everyone was back home, Bill picking up Vicky last and leaving the Potter-Lupin-Tonks family to sort out their insanity.
"Did you have a good party, Teddy?" Ginny asked as Teddy showed Jamie how to use one of the presents.
"This was awesome! Thank you!" Teddy grinned before trying to lure Lily over to him with her blanket.
"Mate," Harry waved the last of the rubbish to the bin, "we noticed that you didn't correct your friends when they called us your mum and dad."
Teddy scooped Lily up and gave her a hug, "Yeah, it's easier."
Harry's heart clenched, and he wasn't sure which emotion within him was going to win out.
"What do you mean, love?" Andy put a hand on Teddy's shoulder.
Teddy changed his hair color and made Lily giggle.
"Well, I mean, I guess they're sort of right. Some of the lads know that you two are my godparents, not my parents, but I guess, well..." He frowned.
"Think it through," Ginny smiled, "there's no rush."
Teddy nodded and his hair slowly shifted back to its regular brown. Then he looked at Harry.
"You once told me that you were going to try and be as good as my dad."
Harry nodded, finding that pesky lump in his throat trying to climb higher.
"And, well," Teddy paused again, "I guess that I don't correct them because you are as good as my parents. They can't be here, but you can, and so, I guess, I guess that it's not worth correcting them because they're not wrong."
"Well said, Teddy," Andromeda smiled at them as she squeezed Teddy's shoulder.
Harry moved to the floor and wrapped Teddy in his arms, quickly feeling Ginny there with him.
Lily immediately took advantage of the proximity to steal his glasses.
But Harry didn't mind at that moment. Because this amazing boy had managed to settle the anxiety that Harry had been feeling all day with the simplicity that can only come from a child. Remus and Tonks weren't here, no matter how much Harry wanted to change that, and he owed it to them to be there for Teddy in every way he could.
And that included being the godfather that Teddy needed, the kind that let him choose when to worry about the prefix, and when not to.
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robron-ficlets · 5 years ago
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Title: let me down slowly
Author: @kayceecruz​
Summary: Robert and Aaron meet in a completely different way.
Written for Robron Week 2020 Day 1: first meeting/meet-cute. Sentence prompt: "Need to put a name to perfection? Allow me to introduce myself.”
Link to AO3
“Need to put a name to perfection? Allow me to introduce myself.” 
Robert tries not to roll his eyes and glances at the bloke in the seat next to his. His drink is dangling from his fingers as his grip tightens and honestly, this is why he hates bars. This has been going on for the better part of an hour and really, he needs to give it up at this point.  Robert’s been watching him get told off for most of the time the man has been trying and it was not what he’d wanted when he’d walked in here tonight.
All Robert wants is to drink away his loneliness and this was what he got for not just doing that at his new flat. 
The woman the guy had been talking to, gives him a withering look and then shakes her head, leaving her seat and heading out the door. 
Robert snorts into his drink and then on his other side, he hears someone laugh out loud and say, “You can’t pull to save your life, Adam, just admit it.”
Robert turns his head to agree with that assessment and then his gaze meets warm, blue eyes and he feels a little struck. His chest feels tight, his insides glowing a little and he hasn’t felt something like that in a long time. The other man smirks and Robert couldn’t help but smile back, laughs a little. 
“I can!” 
Robert keeps his eyes on the other man, watches as his smirk turns into a real smile, a little blinding, and he gulps hard, swallows something down. Then, that gaze turns back to him and he keeps his act together, raising an eyebrow in question. 
“Alright, fine, let’s ask him. He’s been sitting here as long as me watching you be an idiot for however long it’s been.” 
Robert opens his mouth and says “Nearly an hour.” 
The man points at Robert. “See? He’s been keeping time, Adam.” 
Someone taps Robert on the shoulder and he turns to look toward the failing idiot - Adam, he supposes - and stares waiting for whatever it is he wants. 
“So, you saying, mate, that Aaron over there, is right?” 
Aaron. 
Robert leans back, glances quickly at Aaron, then shrugs, finishing his drink. “I think your mate, Aaron, was being pretty kind, actually. You’re bloody awful at this.I mean, seriously, it was painful to have to listen to. Please never do it again.” 
Aaron laughs and Robert can’t help but grin at him. 
“Was that too much?”, he asks and Aaron shakes his head.
“He deserves it.” 
“Oi! I’m your best mate, you know.” 
“Yes, I know.” Aaron sounds put upon and Robert does laugh out loud at that. 
He wasn’t there to meet anyone. That - he and Ben had just finished and that had been on the tail end of the disaster that was Chrissie and him. He hadn’t moved back home for any other reason then to lick his wounds and get his shit together. 
That was the last thing he wanted, to meet someone. Someone like Aaron who made him laugh and his stomach flip and his blood sing. 
Aaron is still watching him and Robert knows - knows - that he isn’t going to do what he should and walk away, 
He sticks his hand out. “Robert. Sugden.” 
Aaron nods, his eyes widening a little, takes Robert’s hand in his warm clasp. “Aaron. Dingle.”
Robert freezes for a moment and then starts laughing because of course he is. 
That’s how Robert met Aaron. 
-- 
It could’ve  ended there. 
It should have. 
Robert should have tried right then and there to get Aaron into bed. 
Before he’d found out all the ways Aaron was way too good for someone like Robert.
Before he’d walked out of his new flat at Jacob’s End and found that Aaron lived just down the street. Before he met and liked his gobby little sister, Liv. Before his sister stuck her nose in and told him all the ways Aaron was the bravest person she’d ever met. All the ways he’d survived and still managed to stay this grumpy, loving,  stupidly kind lad. 
But he hadn’t wanted to -- he’d wanted more when he took his number. He thought maybe a date or two before they ended up shagging. 
Now. 
Aaron was his friend. His proper friend. Months down the line and the only person Robert wanted to talk to when something good or bad or awful or stupid happened was Aaron. Every time that Aaron went out with Adam (who was behaving himself now that he thought he had a chance with Victoria) or Ryan or anyone else, Robert would hole up in his flat and not think about it too hard. 
Andy calls him on it, one day when Robert was glaring a hole in the back of some random doctor Aaron was kinda seeing. 
“You ever gonna tell him or what?” 
Robert frowns, pulls his gaze to his brother, “You what?” 
Andy sighs. “You love him, idiot. Tell him.” 
Robert doesn’t bother to disagree. He’d told his family as soon as he’d set foot back in the village that he was bisexual. That he’d just ended a relationship with a man. That he’d been engaged to a woman before that. 
He is still surprised that Andy noticed, though. 
“He doesn’t feel - he doesn’t think of me like that.” He stops at Andy’s snort, turns to him in confusion and then looks away when Andy’s face falls. Robert hates that look. 
“Rob, you aren’t kidding, are you?” 
He doesn’t answer and before Andy can say anything Diane and Vic show up. Family dinner starts but Robert can feel Andy’s gaze on him through most of the meal. 
-- --
“I like Alex.” 
Robert’s pencil stops moving and he glances at Liv. They’d been trying to deal with Geometry for her upcoming Maths test. He isn’t sure how they segued here. 
“That’s - yeah, I knew that. He’s a nice bloke.” 
Liv nods. “I like him but you know - I love you.”
Robert’s heart melts a little and his chest tightens even more than it normally does. He keeps so much inside that it hurts too much. 
He leans in, meets her eyes and smiles. “I love you, too, Trouble.” 
She smiles a little then sighs. “He -- just -- you mean a lot to Aaron, Rob.” 
Robert nods, looks away. “We’re best mates.” 
Liv groans, slams her books and Robert tries to stop her but she pushes his hand away. “Stop being stupid, Rob. Please. Just -- tell him, okay? Because it’s hurting - just tell him.” 
He watches her leave before he drops his head with a thud on the table. 
-- --
Robert rubs his hand against the back of his neck. He shouldn’t have listened to Jimmy and Nicola. Blind dates were the worst. That had been two hours of hell and when he’d slept off his boredom and disappointment and hollowness, he’d tell them both off. 
He steps out of the taxi, thanks Pete and pays him, before walking slowly down the path to his home. He smiles at that. It does feel that way now. Like home. This village is home because everything he loves is here. Even if he can’t have it like he’d like to, it’s all here. 
His steps falter when he notices a shadowy figure sitting at his stoop. He recognizes that puffy coat, smiles as he picks up speed. 
Aaron stands up when he hears Robert coming and this time Robert stops flat out. 
Aaron looks done in, eyes a little red and his shoulders are tight and when he looks at Robert, his face does the same, tightens. 
“What’s happened? You alright?”
Aaron lets out a humorless laugh. “No. I’m not.” 
“Aaron, what’s going on?” 
Aaron shakes his head, motions to the door and Robert understands he doesn’t want to talk out where anyone that is up can listen in. Their village is full of nosy neighbors. 
Robert nods, brushes past Aaron, pausing when his friend takes a step back, before opening his door. He takes his coat off, throws it on the cushy chair that he bought for Liv to do her homework in when she visits him. 
He turns to see Aaron standing in the doorway, his eyes looking around the flat, like it’s the first and not the hundredths time he has seen it. 
“Aaron, you’re worrying me. I don’t know-” 
“How was your date?” Aaron spits it out and Robert is thrown but he answers quickly. 
“It was fine.” 
Aaron looks about to say something when Robert speaks again, ‘“You know what? No, it was boring. I wasn’t interested. Hadn’t even wanted to go on it to begin with but since everyone keeps telling me I need to date then -” 
Aaron straightens. “Everyone who?” 
Robert throws his hands up in the air. “Everyone who knows me, Aaron. Come on.” 
Aaron bites his lip and then says, “Alex and I are done.” 
Robert blinks slowly. That explains it, then. Aaron being upset. 
“Aaron, I’m sorry, mate. Is there - can I do something?” 
Aaron glares at him and he points at Robert. “Yes, you can. Just tell me, Robert! Ask me. Stop pushing me away. I thought that maybe -” Aaron breathes in deep, hands on his hips and he pins Robert down with his gaze. “Say it. Tell me so I know I’m not alone in this. Say it so I can say it back and we can do this. Properly.” 
Robert is speechless for a moment but then he lets out a long breath. “Aaron, I’m not good-” 
Aaron shakes his head, takes a step forward that makes Robert take one back and he points at him again. “Don’t you dare tell me you aren’t good enough, Sugden. Don’t do it. Because you are more than enough. Just let me love you, you idiot! Stop fighting me and we can start what we should have ages ago.” 
Robert takes two long strides and he’s in Aaron’s space. He doesn’t wait. He doesn’t let his mind talk him out of this. He takes Aaron face in his hands and kisses him, hauls him up a little, holds on and kisses and kisses and kisses until they have to break part to breath. Aaron’s forehead touches his and his smile is a little watery. 
“Took you long enough. Now say it.” 
Robert laughs softly. “You are bossy.”
“Robert.” 
“I love you.” 
Aaron sighs. “Finally.” He pulls back, his arms twining around Robert’s neck. “You had me dating a boring doctor, Robert. You made me watch you go out on dates.” 
Robert looks at him softly. “I’m -- wait, you dating Alex because -” 
“Yes,” Aaron said, rolling his eyes. “Because I thought I couldn’t have you but then you were so upset about it, I knew. I thought I needed to let you come to me but - yeah, that’s never worked with you so.” 
“So when I went out on a date, you got angry and waited at my door to tell me off and demand I tell you how I felt?” 
Aaron looks sheepish but then he shrugs, leans into Robert and kisses his jaw. “Yeah, well if I waited for you.” 
Robert kisses him back, pulls him closer and starts to walk them toward his bedroom. “How long -- I mean, since when did you?” 
Aaron stops them both and stares up at Robert. “Are you -- Robert, you damn well know how long.” 
Robert doesn’t. He knows how long he’s felt this way but Aaron is a different story. 
Aaron glares at him, trying not to laugh. “You know how that whole night Adam was being an idiot at the bar, hitting on every girl sitting next to you?” 
Robert frowns and nods. “Yeah?” 
“He isn’t actually that terrible. He was trying to get your attention for me.” 
Robert’s eyes grow wide and his mouth hangs open. “Wait. That - that whole thing was so you could --” 
“So I could pull you, yes, it was. But then you got weird, I mean you are weird, and then I fell for ya and here we are. Cause you are stupid.” 
Aaron laughs at Robert’s expression then kisses it off his face and pulls him toward the room. “Now, come on and let’s do what we should have been doing if you weren’t such an idiot.” 
Robert grins and follows Aaron without hesitation.
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wistfulcynic · 6 years ago
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Drink the Wild Air (4/?)
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IN WHICH We learn more about Lieutenant William Jones, and the ship he is now a part of, and MYSTERY IS FORESHADOWED.
SUMMARY: Once upon a time a princess fell in love with a pirate. This is their story.
A Captain Duckling high-seas adventure tale in which princesses are kidnapped (OR ARE THEY), sea battles are fought, SWASH is BUCKLED and CASTLES are STORMED.
(also EVIL is VANQUISHED and FAMILIES are REUNITED)
For @thisonesatellite​ (who is somehow more delightful in person than over the internet,) @ohmightydevviepuu​ who is the best cheerleader, and @katie-dub​ who is always the loveliest. 
@darkcolinodonorgasm​​​ @kmomof4​​​​ @teamhook​ @stahlop​​ @mariakov81​​ @resident-of-storybrooke​ @thejollyroger-writer​ @shireness-says​ @snidgetsafan​ @xarandomdreamx @winterbaby89​​ @jennjenn615​ @facesiousbutton82​​
(please do say if you would like a tag or if you would like not a tag)
(Also on AO3) (Tumblr: Part One | Part Two | Part Three)
PART THE THIRD: LIEUTENANT WILLIAM JONES:
Lieutenant William Jones concluded, after some consideration, that he was not especially surprised to learn that life on a pirate ship was not so very different from life on a ship in service of Her Majesty’s Royal Navy. A ship was a ship, after all; the same tasks needed to be performed to keep her afloat, the same command structure had to be enforced, and even the mission goals were not terribly dissimilar. The line between plunder and conquest was a very fine one, comprising delicate questions of politics in which Lt Jones took no interest. All he wanted was to sail and to see the world, and the company he kept whilst doing so mattered little. 
There were some aspects of his new pirate’s life that did surprise him. The ship they sailed was an exceptionally fine one, with impossible speed and manoeuvrability which he soon deduced could only be the result of enchantment. Once going she could maintain her momentum even without wind, and after a few weeks’ careful observation of how her captain handled her, the lieutenant began to wonder if the crew was in fact necessary at all. 
Captain Jones kept his ship in pristine order and condition, and commanded the crew with military-grade discipline. So far as he had ever considered the question, Lt Jones imagined pirates to be an unruly lot, unwashed and obstreperous and prepared at any moment to mutiny. Instead they —or at least those on the crew of the Jolly Roger— were meticulous and tidy and their respect for their captain showed in every action they took. 
There was quite a lot of carousing, however. 
And yet the only thing that truly astonished the young lieutenant was the princess. Quite apart from the extraordinary fact of a princess sailing with pirates at all, it was obvious from his earliest days among the crew that they loved her nearly as much as their captain did, and there was never any muttering about the bad luck of having a woman on board or any challenge to her authority or her place on the ship. She knew each member of the crew by name, and greeted them with a warm smile and and jest that was as effective at keeping discipline as the captain’s more traditional approach. And while Lt Jones believed that the princess’s warmth and interest were genuine, he also saw the strategy behind her actions. She needed this ship and its crew for something, some purpose far outside the usual purview of a pirate ship, and the best way to ensure the crew’s cooperation in unusual or trying circumstances would be to win their loyalty. 
~
His first few weeks aboard the ship were spent in the infirmary, definitely a surprising experience for the young lieutenant. Infirmaries on naval vessels were grim places where the stench of blood and rotting flesh was infused into the very walls and men were as like to die of disease as of any injury sustained in battle. The infirmary aboard the Jolly Roger was, by contrast, utterly pristine, with cots covered in clean linen and instruments crafted of gleaming metal and air that carried a sharp, astringent odour, not wholly pleasant but compared to the putrefaction the lieutenant was accustomed to, vastly to be preferred. It was run with an iron fist and an air of benign insanity by a man who introduced himself as “Whale” and did not amputate Lt Jones’s leg. 
Lt Jones, who had already resigned himself to the loss of his limb, found he was almost disappointed. He’d been rather enjoying the notion of himself as a proper peg-legged pirate. But Whale informed him, with a grin that exposed rather more teeth than seemed appropriate for a human head, that there was no need to waste a perfectly useful and very well-formed body part, and proceeded to hand Lt Jones a rag soaked in liquid and wafting fumes with the same pungent aroma that permeated the air and instructed him to hold it to his face. This he did, hesitantly at first and then with greater enthusiasm as the edges of his vision blurred pleasantly and his body went numb, and he he began to fancy he was floating. 
He watched with detached curiosity as Whale deftly reset the crushed bone in his leg, secured it within a splint constructed of thin and flexible slats of wood then wrapped the whole affair up with strips of fine linen dipped in a substance that looked like wet clay, watery and pale grey, mottled with specks of green. After twenty-four hours this clay had dried to form a remarkably solid and resilient cast, and Whale’s pallid face wore a pleased expression as he rapped his knuckles up and down the length of it. 
“Hmm, yes,” he said, nodding in approval and flashing a grin that raised goose pimples on Lt Jones’s arms. “That will do nicely.” 
 From the infirmary’s supply closet he produced a selection of wooden crutches, which he proceeded to measure against the lieutenant’s back until he found the one best suited to his height. This he instructed Lt Jones to use to take daily exercise on the decks, along with a regimen of lifting, bending and stretching designed to keep his muscles strong and limber and his joints flexible. Lt Jones followed these instructions to the letter and after a week or so Whale permitted him to spend several hours a day performing menial tasks alongside the crew, provided they did not result in getting his cast wet. The remainder of each day he spent in the infirmary, resting and drinking cups of bitter tea at regular intervals under Whale’s glittering and watchful eyes.
After several weeks of this routine Whale pronounced that the time had come to remove the cast. He began by making a fissure down the length of it with a hammer and a tiny chisel, then gripped it tightly on either side and wrenched the whole thing apart into two equal pieces like the shell of a walnut, revealing a perfectly healed and unscarred leg within. 
Lt Jones stared at it. “But— how?” he stammered. 
“Healing herbs in the clay,” said Whale. “Among other things.” He gave the empty teacup in Lt Jones’s hand a significant glance and grinned his jovial, manic grin, and Lt Jones reflected that perhaps the prospect of leaving the infirmary, hopefully for good, was not at all a bad thing. 
Once Whale had swabbed the clinging bits of clay from his leg with a clean linen cloth dipped in another mysterious solution, Lt Jones stood from his cot and gingerly put weight on his newly healed limb. Finding it as hale and whole and sturdy as ever, he began to walk around the room, at first cautiously then with more confidence, even capping his tour by dancing a little jig. 
“Excellent,” said Whale, his pale eyes glinting. “I’ll have to remember that formulation. Most, most excellent.” 
At that moment there was a knock on the door and the quartermaster’s mate appeared, holding a stack of fresh and neatly folded clothes for Lt Jones plus his own shoes, cleaned and shined. Gratefully abandoning the split trousers and single slipper he had worn for the duration of his convalescence, Lt Jones dressed quickly and followed the quartermaster’s mate, a man called Teynte, to the crew’s quarters where he found waiting for him his own bunk, sea chest, and leather flask. 
“Bunk t’ sleep, chest t’ keep, and flask t’ drink, said Teynte cheerfully.
Lt Jones sniffed the flask dubiously. “Drink what?” he asked. 
“Grog, o’ course,” said Teynte. “The cap’n’s right generous wi’ it.” 
“Grog? You mean rum.” 
“Aye, rum ’tis, along wi’ lemons and a touch o’ sugar. Ye’d best drink it, Navy lad, it keeps ye healthy, so it do. There be times, weeks on end as can be, when we sees no food but fish and ship’s biscuit, ye’ll be grateful fer a spot o’ grog then t’ stave off th’ scurvy.” 
“Hmmm,” said Lt Jones. “I see your point.” Scurvy was rampant in the Queen’s Navy and he had witnessed with his own eyes the suffering it caused. Raising the flask first in toast to Teynte’s good health and then to his lips he took a cautious sip. The liquid was sharp and burned down his throat, but it was not altogether unpleasant. He sipped again, more generously. “I believe I could get used to this,” he said with a grin. 
“Haha! We’ll make a pirate o’ ye yet, laddie!” cried Teynte with a clap to his back that nearly sent him reeling. “Reckon the princess be right about ye.” 
~
Lieutenant Jones had of course noticed—it hadn’t taken him long—that he was the object of particular scrutiny from both the princess and the captain. More than once he had felt their eyes upon him as he did his daily exercise on the deck, and each had—separately and, he suspected, without the other’s knowledge— stopped in to see him in the infirmary, with overly casual airs and subtle but pointed questions concerning the progress of his recovery. 
A month or so after he had fully taken up his duties aboard the ship he began to get an inkling of the purpose behind their interest. The day was a bright and sunny one, freshened by a cool, salty breeze that bore a hint of spice, and Princess Emma and Captain Jones were up on deck for one of their regular sparring sessions. The crew, though they mostly succeeded in appearing to keep their attention on their tasks, watched closely, Lt Jones among them. A very active and hotly contested betting pool on the outcomes of these sessions flourished below decks; although they nearly always ended in a draw, as Smee informed Lt Jones, the crew held out hope that some day one of the two of them would actually manage to defeat the other. And on that halcyon day one of the crew would make a killing off it. 
A pirate’s life indeed. 
Lt Jones could not help thinking that today was likely not that day. In swordplay as indeed in most things the combatants were remarkably well matched, with the captain’s greater height and strength balanced perfectly by the princess’s speed and precision. What amused him more than any speculation over who—if anyone—might win was the way they sparred with words as well as with blades, taunts and innuendoes flying fast and thick as they feinted, thrust, and parried. When the match ended—in a draw, of course—both participants were panting and dripping sweat, and eyeing each other in a way that made Lt Jones long for some shore leave. 
However on that morning rather than ushering the princess to their cabin and bolting the door behind them, Captain Jones approached his lieutenant of the same name, and offered the younger Jones his blade. 
“Care to have a go, lad?” he asked, with a quirked eyebrow and a small grin.
“Against the princess?” stammered Lt Jones. 
“Aye.” The captain’s grin widened. “Think you can handle her?” 
“Er… no, if I’m honest.” 
Captain Jones laughed. “That is the correct answer, my boy. Try anyway. Show us what you’ve got.” 
Lt Jones stared at the man, searching his face for any sign of trickery. When he detected none he cautiously accepted the proffered sword and gave it an experimental swing. Though far from an expert in sword design he could tell instantly that the balance of the blade and the hilt was perfect, the result of expert craftsmanship. He swung it again, trying to get a feel for it. Princess Emma stood watching him with an amused expression and casual posture, though it did not escape his notice that she stood on the balls of her feet with her shoulders back, prepared at any moment to spring into action. 
“Ready to go, Lieutenant?” she asked. 
He bowed. “When you are, Your Highness.” 
She attacked first, leaping smoothly into the exact move he had expected her to make, with such a speed and skill that he was only barely able to parry it. Their blades met with a clang of metal and he felt the vibrations all the way up his arm. Her slender appearance was deceptive, he realised; she was far stronger than he’d thought, with a skill that could only come from many years of training under the tutelage of a master. He was in way, way over his head. 
On the strength of that realisation, he altered his strategy. This was not a fight he could win, not through skill at any rate, but he might be able to bring it to a draw. She was tired from her earlier sparring with the captain, but he was fresh, and if he could just avert a killing blow he might be able to outlast her. 
He concentrated on deflecting her attacks, holding her off but never moving in himself, never giving her the opportunity to dart in around him as he swung his sword arm as he had seen her do to the captain. He danced around the deck, forcing her to chase him as she advanced, defending, defending, defending until finally she held up her sword. 
“All right,” she said. “I’m calling it. It’s a draw.” 
Her next words were quiet, drowned out by the cheers of the crew. They were for his ears alone. “A draw in this case means you won,” she said. “Well played.”
“Well played indeed,” said Captain Jones, clapping him on the back. “You’re quite a clever lad, aren’t you?” 
“I like to think so, sir.” 
“And one with a sound instinct for survival.” 
“Yes.” 
“Excellent.” Captain Jones squeezed his shoulder. “Excellent.” A look passed between him and the princess, one Lt Jones could not decipher. “Well, now you’ve had your fun, Lieutenant, I’m afraid it’s back to work for you!” 
“Aye, sir!” 
The captain turned away and put his arm around the princess’s shoulders. Hers slipped around his waist and they headed off to their cabin together. 
~
Three weeks later, Lt Jones received a message summoning him to the captain’s quarters. He presented himself to Mr Smee, who was standing guard outside the door and gave it a sharp knock on his behalf, and was bade enter by a curt ‘Yes’ from within. Smee opened the door to reveal the captain sitting at his desk with maps and documents strewn out around him, and the princess standing at his side with her hand on his shoulder. 
“Ah, young Jones,” said the captain. “Right on time. Come in and shut the door behind you.” 
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paradisecost · 5 years ago
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When Philip steps into the cabin, he's struck by the expression on The Captain's face. It's not one he's ever seen before, and it's so alien to him that for a frightening moment, he doesn't recognise them. The stress is so palpable that Philip suddenly tears up without meaning to, a visceral *panic* taking over him before he can grab a hold of it and squash it down. "Amelia...?" // >:3
"Oh--Philip, lad, what's wrong?" They laugh in that shaky, watery sort of way that people trying not to cry do, crossing the cabin instantly to pull Philip into a tight hug. "You looked like you'd seen a ghost- I'm fine, son. A wee bit stretched thin, that's all." Drawing back, they keep their hands on Philip's shoulders to get a proper look at him; it's a relief, actually, to have something else to worry about for a moment. "You're too sweet for your own good, I keep telling you. C'mere."
 //@coming-xf-age // mobile tbt
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bee-kathony · 7 years ago
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Fraser Memorial | Ch. 6 “Grapefruits” 
Thank you so so much @sassenachwaffles for being my beta for this chapter!
Ch. 1 - Sutures | Ch. 2 - Maybe This Time | Ch. 3 - Movie Date | Ch. 4 - Two Pink Lines | Ch. 5 - Boss’s Boss
2015
I met Jamie Fraser three months ago and of three things I was certain. One: he was the only person that could truly make me laugh when I was having a shitty day. Two: Jamie was as stubborn as a rock when it came to just about anything. And three: I couldn’t live without him.
One day after work, Jamie picked me up and instantly knew that that something was off with me.
“Do ye want to talk about it, Sassenach?” He asked, blocking me from getting into the passenger seat.
I shook my head and said nothing. Sighing, he kissed the top of my head before opening my door for me and I climbed inside, wrapping my arms tightly around myself.
After driving for twenty minutes, I realized we weren’t headed in the direction of either of our houses. “Where are we going?”
“Och, I thought we’d go to the Christmas markets, do a bit of shopping and lookin’ around,” he said with a cautious smile, still wary of my off kilter mood.
“Fine,” I groaned as I looked out the window. I knew I should tell him what was wrong, but I was afraid to bring it up… to pop our perfect bubble.
Jamie was respectful though and kept to himself for the rest of the drive, never once asking me what was wrong, even though I knew it must be killing him. Snow had begun to fall lightly and my shoes made crunching sounds as we walked to the markets. On any other day, I would love this — being here with him, sipping hot chocolate and buying Christmas presents. But not today.
“Are ye hungry, Claire?” Jamie asked, his use of my name caught me off guard.
I looked up at him and saw the concern in his eyes, “Not just now,” I smiled weakly, “Maybe later though.”
It was crowded at the markets, and Jamie held my hand tightly as we made our way through the busy sea of people. We turned the corner and started walking towards the Christmas tree maze. It was all so beautiful, but nothing could change my mood, or lift my spirits.
“Want to do the maze, Claire?” Jamie asked.
I nodded, knowing that he brought me here to try and cheer me up. I needed to tell him.
“Jamie,” I pulled on his hand as he started walking away and he turned back to face me.
“There’s something I need to tell you.” Looking up into his blue eyes, I suddenly felt nervous and scared at the same time.
“Ye can tell me anything, Sassenach.” Jamie smiled, wrapping both his arms around my waist, and pressed his forehead against mine, creating a safe cocoon.
I took a deep breath, and placed both my hands on his chest. “Today at work, there was a husband and wife that came into the emergency room. They were in a terrible car crash…”
“Mo nighean donn,” Jamie said softly, squeezing my waist and letting me continue.
“And I’ve seen people injured before, obviously,” I sniffed and buried my head into the crook of his neck. “But today… today is the ten year anniversary of my parents death.”
I felt Jamie’s body tense against mine, and he held me tighter.
“How?” He said quietly.
“Car crash,” I felt tears prickle my eyes.
“Why didn’t ye tell me before, Sassenach?” Jamie pulled back and I looked up at him through watery eyes. “I wouldna have brought ye here…” he motioned around to all the people.
“I just didn’t want to burst our happy bubble. Things are going so well,” I gave him my best attempt at a half smile.
“Aye, they are. Do ye trust me, Claire?” Jamie brushed his thumb across my cheek softly, “Do ye trust me wi’ yer heart?”
I avoided looking at his eyes until the last second and when I did, I nearly fell down. His eyes sparkled, filled with tears of his own. “Yes, I do, Jamie.”
“Then trust that I’ll protect it, no matter what.” He smiled warmly, “I want to be there for ye when yer havin’ a bad day. And I want ye to know that whatever pain ye bear, whatever memories that haunt ye… I’ll bear that pain as well.”
Jamie dipped his head, slowly pressing his lips against mine. He tasted salty and I thought that I must taste the same. He held me to him for awhile — it could have been minutes or hours, I lost all sense of time.
I took a deep breath and looked up at him once again, “Thank you.”
“Anythin’ for ye, Sassenach.” Jamie kissed me and then took a look at our surroundings. “I ken ye might no want to be here right now, and I promise to take ye home, but only if…” He raised one brow, “I can make ye laugh.”
“Make me laugh?” I asked, a bit confused.
“Aye, if I can properly make ye laugh, cheer ye up a bit, then we’ll go home and we can bury ourselves under the covers and I’ll not ask anything of ye.” Jamie attempted a wink and that alone nearly had me laughing.
I took a step back and place both hands on my hips, “Alright… give it your best shot, Fraser.”
Bringing his hand to his chin, he squinted, as if thinking of his best jokes. “Aye, I’ve got one… surely ye’ll laugh at this.” He grinned and took on his natural born storyteller stance, “What’s the difference between a nun at prayer and a nun in the bath?”
I shook my head, “I don’t know… what’s the difference?”
“One has hope in her soul, and the other has soap in her hole!” Jamie said, laughing at his own joke. All I did was crack half a smile, giving him a look that read ‘that’s the best you got?’
“Hmmm, a tough wee biscuit are ye?” Jamie hummed.
“I don’t find nuns and their… holes particularly funny.” I grinned and tapped my fingers along my crossed arms. It had actually been a funny joke but I wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction on the first try.
“Alright… another one then.”
He clapped his hands together, “Sassenach, what’s the difference between a snowman and a snowwoman?”
“Snowballs,” I replied with a smirk and Jamie stared back, his mouth gaping.
“Twas my joke, mo ghraidh… ye stole it!” He laughed. “Okay… one more wee joke. Surely this will get ye rollin’.” Jamie took a step forward, placing his hands on my hips. “Yer about as stubborn as me, Sassenach.”
“No one is as stubborn as you, Jamie,” I rolled my eyes slightly.
“Aye, that may be true. It’s a Fraser thing, ye’ve met my family after all,” he chuckled softly.
“Tell me the joke,” I said, pushing my hand against his chest. I decided that even if it wasn’t funny, I would laugh at this next one. He had promised to take me home if I laughed, and I wanted very badly to be curled up with him in bed.
“How does a hedgehog make love?” Jamie said, all while sliding his hands over my arse, and pressing himself against me.
My breath was coming up short and I looked up at him, “I don’t know, how?”
“Verra…” he kissed my cheek, “carefully.”
I snorted, covering my mouth with my hand and started to actually laugh. “You ridiculous human being.”
“I made ye laugh though, didn’t I, Sassenach?!” Jamie smiled, clearly thrilled with his achievement.
I leaned up on my toes and kissed him soundly, “Yes. You did make me laugh, thank you.”
“Now we can finally go home,” he squeezed my side and started to walk back to the car, but I stayed put. “What?”
“You bring me all the way here, and yet you haven’t even bought me a cup of hot chocolate…” I pursed my lips.
“Och, where are my manners, mo ghraidh. We must see to that at once!” Jamie laughed, then led us in the direction of the nearest warm sugary beverage.
That was the first night I knew… that I would never be able to live without him. That I always needed him by my side, when the days were good and when the days were not so kind. My heart was connected to his by a fragile string, and over time I hoped our bond would grow, become strong and outlast anything that came our way.
Present Day
Shifting in bed, I let out a deep sigh and rolled to my side. At five months pregnant, carrying twins I already felt gigantic and I still had months to go. The doctor said the twins were about the size of grapefruits at this stage and ever since our last ultrasound, Jamie hadn’t stopped referring to them as his ���wee grapefruits’.
So when Jamie walked in our bedroom, carrying a tray of breakfast, I nearly choked on my own saliva when I saw two grapefruits, sliced and ready to be eaten.
“Jamie!” I said, eyes wide at the fruit in question.
“What is it, Sassenach?” He stammered and looked at me with alarm in his eyes. Quickly he set the tray on the bed and was next to me in a flash. “Is it the bairns?”
“No, it’s not the babies. Jamie…” I looked at the tray, “I can’t eat grapefruits.”
He looked back at me confused, “Is it the fruit? Only a wee joke, mo cridhe.” Jamie smirked, stretching his hand across my belly.
“Well I don’t think it’s so funny to be eating our babies, now is it?”
Jamie gasped, his eyes wide, “Are the bairns makin’ yer head soft, Sassenach? Surely ye dinna think these fruits are actually the babes?”
I opened and then closed my mouth, watching him smirk, his eyes alight with mischief. “No. Of course I don’t. But it’s just… odd, to think of them as fruits and then to see it.” I stared at the tray in front of me.
“Fine, I’ll take the grapefruits back to kitchen and ye’ll no have to see them anymore,” Jamie kissed my forehead and then picked up both fruits, cradling them to his chest. “C’mon wee Tavish, and ye too wee Tavia.”
“Excuse me? What did you just call the grapefruits?” I laughed and Jamie turned back to me, still cradling the fruits.
“Tavish for the lad and Tavia for the lassie,” he said simply. “The names mean ‘twin’… ’tis only somethin’ to call them until we decide on a name.”
“Well you can be sure, my lad, that we will not be calling our children Tavish and Tavia,” I smirked. “I haven’t thought about baby names at all actually.”
Jamie placed the fruits back on the tray and came to sit at my feet, bringing them in his lap. “Do ye have any particular names in mind, Sassenach?” He pushed his thumb into the arch of my feet and made an audible groan.
“Beatrice for a girls name?” I said, “Has a proper British sound to it, I suppose.”
“Aye, it does. But the bairns willna be in England, Sassenach.” Jamie lifted his brows. “What about Malcolm? After one of my middle names…”
“Malcolm Fraser…” I said, sounding it out on my tongue, “A top choice to be sure, and what about a girls name?”
“What about a name of a flower? Ye like all the green stuff, ye ken.” Jamie smiled, continuing to move his fingers against the soles of my feet.
“Lily.” I said, “Lily Fraser?”
“Lilidh, of course.” Jamie said.
“That’s what I said… Lily.”
“Spelled L-i-l-i-d-h. ’Tis the Gaelic spelling.” He smiled.
“Malcolm and Lilidh Fraser,” I said, rubbing my hand over my protruding belly. “Do you two like those names?” Just then I felt a gentle kick from the inside and made a sort of squealing noise, making Jamie jump.
“What?” He moved closer and I grabbed his hand, sliding it over my belly.
“Just wait,” I said. A few moments later, I felt another kick and Jamie looked down at my belly, rubbing it slowly.
“The rascals,” he laughed, “Ye dinna hurt yer mam, ye ken. Ye both be kind to her!” Jamie bent his head, placing a kiss on the bump before leaning up to kiss me.
“If they like the names, then so do I, Sassenach,” leaning his forehead against mine, I brought one hand to cup his cheek.
“Of course, it’s two girls or two boys, we’ll need more options.”
“Aye, I’ve plenty of good strong Scottish names in mind,” Jamie kissed me and then climbed next to me in bed. He lifted my shirt, bringing it over my belly, and ran his hand slowly over it.
“I love ye, Claire. I want to thank ye if I havena already… for carrying our bairns. For being so brave.” He kissed me tenderly.
“It’s my pleasure, Jamie.” I smiled, rubbing my hand against the scruff of his cheek. Jamie shifted against me, so his head rested on top of the bump. Sitting up slightly from the pillows, I lifted my shirt over my head, tossing it to the ground. Jamie turned his head, his eyes now fixed on my hardened nipples.
“Would it hurt ye if I-“
“No, it wouldn’t… I don’t think.”
With his hands still covering my belly, he lifted his head and placed his mouth over one nipple, sucking on the sensitive nub. “Christ,” I sighed, moaning from the sensitivity.
“Alright?” He asked and I nodded. Treating my other breast with the same affection, he began to suck, and flattened his tongue on my peak. My head rolled to the side and I wound my hand at the nape of his neck, just holding him against me. With our babies growing inside of me, and my husband loving me with his mouth, I sighed happily, completely content… a feeling so unlike anything in all my life.
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gravelgirty · 7 years ago
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Captain Carrot Toys for Hogfather!
Captain Carrot Toys for Hogfather! Part 1
Marcia Wilson
*
This is 100% inspired by THIS POST from Thescarletpaperback regarding a Hogfather celebration with Captain Carrot action figures.
First. we’ll ask why the emphasis was all on Carrot, and not his Commander Sam Vimes, because Carrot wouldn’t take this kind of honor over his boss, nosirree.
Toymakers initially tried for Sam Vimes toys, because--reasons. That mess with the dragon and all that hoopla with Weatherwax (and we don’t mean the Wizard Weatherwax, thank you), positively begged for merchandise. It started when one of the Junior Assistants to an Apprentice Toymaker came home to find his children dressing up wooden clothespins and having small armies of The Watch parade over the kitchen table and defeat the awful evil represented by his husband’s Mystery Meat Soup. His oldest had gone so far as to pencil a cigar poking out of the crayoned mouth of the scowling clothespin.
This close to Hogfather, obviously, something needed to be done.
Veritable Upshot then went forth and on his five-minute luncheon breaks, begged for workshop scraps the Toymaker Guild was going to throw into The River, anyway. 
 (Every respectable Guild made sure to dump a certain level of carbon-based garbage into The River every week; it gave the gaseous-producing micro-imps something to eat and distracted them from too much gastrointestinal mischief. This custom was started by the Assassin’s Guild, who felt the inconvenience of a river that liked to combust at the most inopportune moments).
The toys were a Hogfather success, with all the children so delighted with their own Watch and opponents that they forgot to shake down the Hogfather Wreath for the hidden hog bladder stuffed with candied minnows. Veritable Upshot sat back weary with the delights of a Job Well Done and accepted a glass of steaming Cheese Wine brewed and bottled by his own beloved, Oregano Salsify. Together the couple toasted each other for a memorable holiday--so memorable, in fact, that the children completely ignored the lack of a decent meal on the table and were dispersing to the winds with their wooden watchmen. Unbenownst to them, their children would be soon renting out limited amounts of time for the other children to play with the Wooden Watch, and that payment was inevitably in the form of Holiday Excess. Late that night, Salsify did wonder about the slightly-gnawed ham basket left on the doorstep, but homemakers for 6 orphans and a Junior Assistant to a First Level Apprentice Toymaker learns to pinch pennies until they’re thinner than cabbage stamps.
It’s Sam Vimes who discovers the toys, because Young Sam comes back with his mother gabbling about how his father has his own ‘statue’ now in the main square. Vimes needs a little time to figure it out, but luckily for Sam and Sybil, the lad’s hand gestures approach fluent bilingualism, and legally, there is no minimal height requirement for an Ankh-Morpork statue.
He dons his oilskin against the wintry damp and takes a little stroll down to that little spot the Watch pretends to not know about 23 hours a day. It’s Midday, that one hour in which the worst of weather shows itself without pity. In summer the heat bakes the dirt into the stones; in spring the rains rinse all the collected leaves, dead mice, bird’s-nests, and forgotten Assassin’s daggers off the roofs and into the gutters. During Hogfather, the snows pile up high and deep and soft, one hour a day, around the Square, and children are there to play.
Vimes is a bit nostalgic about those dirty little urchins playing at the Square. He used to be one, and snow is nicer than playing in watery gutters or trying to bake mud pies out of horse patties in the summer. The first thing he sees by the Old Sundial is a well-assembled army of child-sized Snow Yeti, beasts the Trolls invoked to make their children go to bed at proper hours.  The dirty white lumps are lurching across the open face of the Old Sundial that rules the Square and defeating them is a small wooden collection of his very own Watch.
Sam watches from behind a cloud of fresh cigar as the villains are routed by not brute force, but sensibility. The tiny wooden Sam is marched up to warn the yeti one last time that they should obey the law, and when the yeti refuse, littler wooden Cheery Longbottom and not-littler Captain Carrot stride forth and the children are yelling proper legal imprecations because as everyone knows, it is highly illegal for beings made of snow to approach a municipal drinking water source before going to the bathroom.
Sam Vimes is both charmed and terrified at the enthusiasm of these children, and he can already see them grown into a Watch cloak. Especially that girl, who looks like she’s got a few different species and a lot of energetic output to channel in her brain.
But it is the youngest child, a tiny little thing with smoked glasses over his eyes that pulls at Vimes’ heart and copper strings at the same time. None of the kiddies have seen enough in the way of regular meals, and he remembers a little girl on his old street, blind, and her parents couldn’t afford real medical smoked glasses so they made their own by passing the lenses over a smoking wick. Later the mum went into what can only be politely called a life of crime to pay for treatment; people like her are why Vimes flexes his muscles with the letter of the law every day.
This little boy is smiling like Young Sam does when he has a very precious thing in his fingers, and those fingers are running over the carved doll that is Cheery Longbottom. Of course, he thinks, Ironwood for Cheery.
It doesn’t surprise him that the blind child knows he’s coming; his boots crunch loudly in the snow and his knees pop as he lowers himself to a better level.
“That’s a nice toy you have,” he says.
“Me Papa made it!” Was the proud answer.
“Oh?”
“Yes! Someday he’s going to be a Toymaker!”
Vimes asks permission for and gets, the chance to examine the wooden Cheery. Toymaker masters aren’t really ‘allowed’ to make toys on their own and he’s been called to too many complaints from the Guild, which they call a Sodality, not a Guild because Guilds must pay taxes. So often it means jealous old bastards against rising new talent. This has the look of talent. There’s love in these little nicks; love for the craft, the child, and for Cheery.
He’s halfway through a gentle interrogation of the toys when someone who absolutely must be a parent comes puffing up, staggering through the uneven snowdrifts. He’s got patches on his patches but everything’s clean, and the hair sticking up in all directions was hand-cut.
“Oh, dear!”
“At ease, Salsify.” Sam pulls one of his spare cigars out. “I was just admiring the workmanship here.” And he grinned. “Takes a bit of skill to make decent tools out of scroungings, doesn’t it? Because as I recall, the Guild keeps everyone’s tools under lock and key during work-hours.”
Salsify flushes, and the former lockpick lifts his chin. “A bit of a challenge,” he answers stoutly. “Did you know the dwarves just toss out their stoneware mugs when they get broken? All those wonderful high-temperature ceramics turned into flowerpots, or…or crushed into cobbles for their driveways!” He shudders. “Nothing like a ceramic tipped knife for cutting the vegetables, let me tell you. And never need sharpening!”
“I never thought about it, but that’s good to know.”
“I’m still living clean, Sam.” Salsify whispers under the shouts of the children. “I’m still at the Cheese Vineyard. Very and these children are everything to me. I’m not going to ruin it.”
“I know, Orrie.” Sam returns. “I didn’t expect to see you at all. Young Sam saw the toys and came back chirping.” He blew a smoke ring. “Glad to know Veritable finally got in with the Guild--Sodality.”
Oregano Salsify’s response is to snort sadly and look away. The children may look lean, but they’re well-fed next to the reformed criminal that lived on the next step over from Cockbill Street.  “They’re hard to work for,” he muttered. “Everything he does, they take the credit for it. I told him he would be better off with the Miniaturist’s Guild, but…well…a Toymaker gets more in sales when they finally become a master craftsman.”
“Which only takes ten or fifteen years, eh?” Sam wonders sarcastically. The two share a look that understands when one’s partner in life and love might be doing things the hard way because they think it is better for everyone.
“Tell Verry I have some work for him.”
“He’s not allowed to make toys on his own.” Orrie whispers, frightened.
Sam grins. It’s the sort of grin his wife’s swamp dragons cluster to, because they know it means fun things. Like chasing assassins.
*
Lord Vetinari is settling down to his breakfast the following morning when he gets a not-unexpected message from the City Watch. By ‘not-unexpected’ it means that it has been almost a week since Sam Vimes did something to stir things up in the city, and if anything, he’s overdue.
He’s almost finished reading it through when John Polliwog-Offal, lawyer for the Toymaker’s Sodality, comes storming in. Lord Vetinari is an excellent reader of emotions and knows when all five of the man’s chins are quivering with indignation, he’s going to approve of whatever caused it.
*
Lady Sybil is quite accustomed to her husband coming home with an acquaintance for dinner. This one is a shy, shabby little man with six various-sized tattered children, all of which are terrified of Lady Ramkin, but it isn’t long before the baby dragons and Young Sam puts him at ease. She loads them up with plenty of bacon and potatoes, and a glass of Cheese Wine from the country—his own work! Oregano learns from the table-talk that she paid far too much: the real vines hadn’t been ready to bud in the Century of the Cobra! Sybil promises to do something about that.
Young Sam charms him into teaching him how to make swamp dragons out of his mother’s linen napkins and a twist of shoestring. Sam goes to bed early hugging his new contrivance to his chest and the adults stay up a bit later to talk—well, mostly to complain about the price of food in winter. Oregano’s children are food-drunk, napping on the floor with their napkin-dragons. After drawing him out a little bit on the finer details of his life and work, Sybil makes certain Sam won’t let them leave until all are properly packed off in the snowstorm in their private carriage with one—make that two—heavy baskets of ‘leftovers from the kitchen’.
They watch his pale white hand, waving frantically good-bye from the open window of the carriage until the snowswirls swallow them all up.
“Sam,” Lady Sybil asks sweetly, “What are you thinking?”
“I’m thinking that it’s a bloody crime that the Toymaker’s Guild is the only Guild in the city that doesn’t have to pay taxes.”
“Oh? But they claim they shouldn’t because their purpose is to improve life and joy in the city.”
“That was their excuse.”
“And they’re a Sodality, which doesn’t exist in the city legal code dictionary.”
“That was their lawyer’s excuse.”
“Lord Vetinari can’t out-maneuver everyone, Sam. I’m sure he’s already plotting to get Ank-Morpork’s rightful dues from them even as we speak.”
“Oh, I have no doubt you’re right about that, dear.” Sam says blandly. And he smiles. In the barn, the dragons purr.
*
The children are delighted. There’s no warning: they get their Papa Verry home every evening in time for supper, and something good must have been added to this fortune because there’s suddenly a lot to eat. Papa Orrie’s kitchen smells like spices and seasonings, and the grease-cup holding the leavings from meals is brimming full, enough to fuel the little fat-lamps at the table at dark. Their flat is warm. Staying indoors with lessons is a lot more enjoyable than going outside and running for warmth now. They go to be full and content and believing Hogfather’s was somehow extended to an extra-long holiday.
*
Spring arrives, and with it, several things happen all at once:
1)    The snows peter off. This is a relief to deliverymen and citizens everywhere—too bad about the trolls, but they consider this unexpected cool weather a bit of a special treat. “And not long enough to bring in our relatives, either,” Detrius grins. Trolls have no illusions about peacekeeping in hot weather with 3,500+ extended relatives.
2)    The Watch has its own Siege Table. It’s as good as Lord Vetinari’s, a model map of the city and a gooey stripe of some mysterious substance caged from Moist von Lipwig’s rejected stamp glue to resemble The River. Every member of Sam Vimes’ Watch has their own carved representation, except for that dratted Imp, who is weirdly shy and wants only his camera-box carved instead. Everyone universally dubs Angua’s forms, both human and werewolf, to be amazing but there’s a moment of silent awe for Veritable’s skill in capturing the unique…nuances…of Nobby and Colon. There are also carved Guildsmasters, Wizards, and a few of the more restless political players.
3)    Lord Vetinari has his own carvings too. He puts his war table in his office for everyone to see when they come in. Especially for those who are the average height of the average Toymaker’s Master (pity about those stooped over shoulders and curved spines, they really should modify their work-tables).
a.    There are also a few ‘test carvings’, as Veritiable described them, and when Commander Vimes isn’t looking, he’ll come in to find a little Weatherwax (not the Wizard) facing a carved-cringing storekeeper, or the Cheery Longbottom standing on a wooden Detrius’ head to pull a tiny wooden cat out of a tree.
 *
“It would seem, Commander Vimes, that you are in an ineluctable position with the Toymaker’s Sodality.”
“Oh?” Asks Vimes.
“Oh. Yes.” Lord Vetinari nodded gravely.
Vimes waits for further elaboration, as usual. As usual, Vetinari humors him.
“It claims that you have taken one of their members and put him to work on…non-Sodality business, and remind you that it is quite against Sodality Law to have one of their members make toys without pre-approval of the Sodality.”
“This is police business, not toymaking. And the last I checked, I have the right to pull anyone I want out of anyone’s Guild if I so choose, for reasons of my choice, and the Guild has to pay a day’s wage to said member to compensate for each day they are under conscript.” And he grins again. “I’ll be sure to have Captain Carrot come around with all the paperwork.”
“Their lawyer may have some quarrel with that, Commander. For starters, you are claiming the Sodality is a Guild.”
“Oh, my mistake. The laws are still in effect, though.”
“How so?”
“The Conscript Laws apply to all citizens of Ank-Morpork, and whoever is conscripted, their employer, or representative of the entity represented by the lawful labors, efforts, craftsman and volunteerism must pay said conscript a day’s wage as designated by the city’s Treasurer to be adequate for holding body and soul together.”
Why was it, the Patrician wonders, it is simply impossible to pass a fortnight without the presence of Moist Von Lipwig? He glances up but Drumknott is already sliding in with a file comprised of City Law, summarized, itemized, and stamped.
“I confess to surprise, Drumknott. I am not aware that this vote was made—granted back in the Cobra’s Century—with such universal approval on part of the officials.”
“I daresay, sir,” ventures the worthy Drumknott, “It is because at the time it was still quite legal to pay someone to serve the city in one’s stead. Paying a willing fellow a day’s wage for every day they must face a crossbow or spear in the spirit of Civic Duty is really quite the bargain when you think of it.”
“An excellent point, Drumknott.”
“However,” Lord Vetari’s brows float up upon his stern Patrician’s Brow. “If we fail that point in court, there is the matter that a lowly Assistant to a Junior Apprentice in the Toymaker’s Sodality is paid nothing at all until they reach the rank of Full Apprentice.”
“Oh, really?”
“Yes, really.”
“That hardly seems fair.”
“Oddly enough, the Guild’s Lawyer is saying the same thing. Why pay a day’s wage for a conscript if they never pay him in the first place?”
Commander Vimes scratches his head thoughtfully. “That’s a decent point,” he muses slowly, “But, as I recall from the First Code of the Watch, the Watch is under no obligation to pay a conscript if the project is a matter of security for Ank-Morpork. And creating interactive models of the city, to be used in times of tactical and strategical intelligence, falls under security.”
Lord Vetinari never has to fake his disapproving look when it turns out Sam Vimes is actually reading up on the laws of Ank-Morpork.
“So you say, but it would appear from the financial pages that have reached my desk, the Watch was paying Mr. Upshot wages on top of the wages the Sodality was compelled to pay.”
“I beg your pardon, sir? We were feeding him. Can’t have a hungry man on our rolls. It looks bad and makes for shoddy work.”
Vetinari lowers his pen, because he absolutely can’t wait to hear this explanation. “Are you saying a Junior Assistant to an Apprentice Toymaker needs a meal chit larger than all of your Trolls during the month-long Limestone shortage?”
“Why, no, sir! But he’s got a family to feed, you know, and he was feeding them first before he was feeding himself. We had to strike a balance somewhere.”
“And the other expenses?”
“Perfectly legitimate, sir.”
Vetinari picks up an offending sheet of paper. “You bought him a half-gallon of Children’s Croup Syrup.”
“It is Croup Season. He has a sensitive digestion, I heard. Can only take children’s potions most of the time.”
“And the receipt for twelve pairs of socks?”
“He does a lot of walking to get here, sir.”
“Children’s socks?”
“He has small feet, I heard.”
“You heard? You mean you don’t know?”
“I haven’t seen his feet, sir. They’re always underneath the hem of his Guild robe.”
All right. This is definitely one of his more interesting interviews with Commander Vimes. “And if I approach the…dispensers of these goods, such as, say…(glances down) Weatherwax, he would truthfully assure me the croup potions are for your conscript?”
“What? No, sir!” Commander Vimes is appalled at the very idea. “That’s Miss Weatherwax, your Lordship! Not the Wizard Weatherwax!”
“Ah, my mistake. I wondered how he had suddenly re-appeared without explanation…” Vetinari rested the paper on top of the others. “Commander Vimes, from Hogswatch until a week before the approach of Creator’s Birthday, you have approved for the expenses of Conscript Veritable Upshot, food, socks, Children’s Potions, the services of a dentist no less than seven times, a cord of slightly-used firewood, a tinned sheep’s head (extra eyeballs), four all-expense paid trips to the village of Bad Ass in Lancre, trips to the Watch and back home (presumably when they didn’t feel like walking in their new socks?), a nanny goat named ‘I-am-a-Goat’, a gross of pencils, primary schoolbooks, and a standing credit account to collect broken crockery from the Dwarves at the Rocanahadplyce Quarry and Tavern.”
Sam Vimes tilts his head. “What about all that, sir?”
Vetinari’s composure becomes exponential. Anyone else would be looking for the trapdoor to the dungeon by now—praying for it. “All of this. All of it. What would you do with a tinned sheep’s head anyway?”
“He was supposed to get one, and he was working for us and couldn’t get to market on time.”
“Extra eyeballs?”
“The most nutritious part, I’m told, sir. If you return the tin you get a refund, so it’s really the same price as regular.”
“Slightly used firewood?”
“It was in a fire.”
Lord Vetinari closes his eyes for a moment. “Why would someone name a goat I-am-a-Goat?”
“You’d have to ask Miss Weatherwax, I’m afraid. She said that was its name.”
“Miss Weatherwax. Not Wizard Weatherwax.”
“Never is, sir.”
“No. No, it never is.”
“You could ask her, sir. She’s not against questions from my experience.”
“But she is against the questions I tend to have.” Vetinari reminded him. “Is she behind the trips to Lancre?”
“I believe so. Something about treating poor eyesight.”
“Pencils? Schoolbooks?”
“We were taking away his time to finish schooling.”
“A grown man taking primary schooling?”
“He grew up in the Shades, sir. These things come late.”
“Broken crockery, Commander?”
“Yes, sir. He was keen to get his hands on some.”
“And you didn’t ask why?”
“He said he’d pay us back.”
“…Of course he did.”
Silence ticks on and on as the two opponents wait for the other man to speak. In the background lurked Drumknott, who wanted to know which man would crack, because he really did want to know the story behind a market for broken Dwarf crockery.
“What, Commander, do you predict will happen when the lowliest of the lowliest members of the Toymaker’s Sodality returns to his masters considerably richer than everyone else, with the exception of said Masters?”
“I can’t rightfully say, sir. Mightn’t they be happy for their poorest member?”
“They’re claiming you are willfully trying to bankrupt them, Commander, by luring their members to the Watch.”
Sam Vimes thinks that one over. “Coppers aren’t paid that much.” He points out. “But they have food on the table and they pay their taxes all the same.”
Vetinari steeples his fingers together. “A point, admittedly. Do you have anything you wish to pass on to them? I shall be glad to give them your words on the matter.”
“Oh, that would be fine, sir.” Sam pulls out his cigar, unlit, and clamped it in his teeth. “You can tell them that the Watch considers all members of the Toymaker’s Sodality their first choice for Conscription, seeing as how they are the only Sodality that doesn’t pay taxes.”
“They are in fact the only sodality in Ank-Morpork, Commander Vimes.”
“All the more important to set a good precedent, sir.”
“Are you, the father of a young child, declaring war on the toymakers, Commander?”
“Not at all.” Sam smiles. “But, see, the way I understand it…the Toymakers can’t enjoy the benefits of paying taxes. They’re last for medicines and road-cleanup, no emergency food boxes for the holidays, because all these things are funded by taxes. Now, it isn’t so bad when you reach Master’s Level, and you get an annual income of $500 a year plus your own house and expenses met…it’s the lower members that I worry about, sir, and while we do know that toymaking is a very honorable profession that brings much joy and quality of life to Ank-Morpork, we have a bit of a…surfeit of joy with the monies. It really is a shame that there isn’t a…redistribution of all this joy and quality of life so that it is more even for everyone else.”
Vetinari is so damn proud of Commander Vimes, it is all he can do to keep his disapproving calm on his face. “I shall be glad to summarize your observations. One last question before you go?”
“Sir?”
“Your requisitioned supplies were enough that you could have made more than two Siege Tables.” The Patrician rises and runs his fingers over the model city.
“Always better to make room for human error, sir.”
“Of course.”
*
It never takes Vetinari long once he has a chip in the power game. Before the week is out, the Toymakers announce a move forward into the future and pay taxes, secure in the knowledge that there are more ways than one in which one can generate joy and quality of life.
“Which they should have done long ago.” Lady Sybil sniffs over the teapot. “Now everyone there can afford to feed their little ones.”
“Yes, dear.” Sam happily crunches his bacon. She had the burn just right this morning.
“Oh, are those lovely children coming over for Creator’s Birthday?”
“We did invite ‘em. Both the parents said yes.”
“Splendid. I’ll make certain everyone has a little gift—something not so very practical for once; something pleasing for the self-esteem, like a nice schoolbag with lots of pockets, or diaries for writing.”
Sam is puzzled. “Isn’t something for the self-esteem practical? Well, I wouldn’t know.”
“No, dear. And we really ought to have something for our guests, seeing as how Young Sam will be getting the most outrageously extravagant gift of all.”
“Now that is practical, and I’m not really giving it to him, I’m just letting him play with it.”
“You’re giving a small child the use of a Siege Table?”
“Well,” Sam grumps, “He’ll be taking over for me someday…might as well be prepared.”
*
And this is why the Toymakers’ Sodality—that is, Guild, is less than enthused over the topic of Commander Sam Vimes.
But that little matter of ‘image royalties’ is a whole different story.
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