#AU as fuck

[careless-with-your-heart]

An au wherein Peter grew up on the other side as a cocky, womanizing, libertine grifter, haunted by dreams of a woman he's never met.

Chapter one is posted after the cut, but the other 40k of this still-in-process brainworm is at AO3!: Click here, my lovelies.

Chapter One

Erbil, Kurdistan

Sunday Morning, 2:00 a.m.

Peter’s skin is on fire. Not the pleasurable, touch-of-a-lover kind of fire, but the exotic-ants-and-fever fire that he still remembers from childhood—scalding and torturous, still vivid in his mind nearly thirty years later. The fire burns in a way that makes his mind white out. But he can’t move, can’t search for relief, can’t do anything but let his head loll back against the soft upholstery behind him. Everything in him regrets the decision he’d made just an hour ago.

The air around him is thick with smoke—so thick, in fact, that Peter has to squint to see the young woman passed out next to him on the dark, velvet settee. It could be that the squint is also an attempt to try and focus his reeling head, to bring down the speed of the spinning room. He isn’t quite sure which reason causes him to lurch in his less-than-sober state, only that he’s suddenly turned his head and squinted. The room slows, a bit. The girl becomes a less-hazy outline.

He can’t remember her name, but he can recall that, after they’d met in the bar at his upscale hotel, she’d led him here in exchange for an absurdly low sum in American dollars and his promise that he would pay for the night’s party favors. He’d assumed she meant drinks, maybe a joint or two, after which he could stumble back to his hotel and pass out—hoping against all odds to sleep a dreamless sleep.

This is the best club in Erbil, she had said. Very exclusive.

After an hour of lounging on the very settee he now found himself unable to get up from, drinking strong, anise-scented arak, and smoking honey-soaked tobacco from a tall, ornate hookah, a man had walked by them, speaking low, rushed Arabic to the girl before disappearing into the shadows of the club. The girl—Peter now remembers that her name is Amira—had leaned over Peter, a knee on either side of his hips, her dark eyes distant and glassy with liquor. He’d thought for a moment that she was going to kiss him, and he’d put his hands up to cup her shoulders, his pulse kicking up despite the fact that he was blitzed-out-of-his-mind drunk. 

She was beautiful, curvy, with dark hair and red-stained lips, and those lips had hovered over his, so close that he’d been able to smell the arak’s licorice perfume on her breath.

“Pay him,” she’d whispered, the words gliding out of her mouth to traverse the hot, dry air between them. He’d licked his lips, causing her to draw back slightly.

“What?” he’d rasped. Was she asking him to pay for her company? In all his years of using his father’s money to escape, he’d never paid for sex. The thought that he might have stupidly gotten himself into a situation where he’d have to decline this girl’s services irked him. He considered himself savvier than that.

Maybe it’s lack of sleep. Eating up all those big, beautiful brain cells. It was true, in part. The IQ that his father was so proud to have passed on didn’t function well on two hours a night of fitful rest.

“He has DMT,” the girl explained, sitting back so that she could cup Peter’s face. “Do you know what that is?”

He’d shaken his head. In the soft haze of his intoxication, starting to tire, he’d tipped his head to the side to rest more heavily into one of her palms. She’d slapped him lightly on the cheek, which had startled him momentarily half-sober. He’d batted her hands away and rubbed his own palm against one stubbled cheek, glowering.

Her laugh, low and promising, turned out to have nothing to do with sex. “It’s a drug, pretty boy. It lets you choose your dreams.”

His fingers had stilled against his jaw, and his breath had caught. “Choose? How?”

Choose to not see her? Choose not to wake tangled in empty sheets, arching blindly into the imagined silk of long, lithe legs? Choose not to wake reaching for the ghost with wide green eyes, who had haunted him now for what seemed a lifetime?

The ghost knew his name. She whispered it across his skin and into his open mouth, and she followed the two syllables with fingertips he could almost—almost—feel and taste, if he was caught in just the right place between conscious and not.

Amira had shrugged, rocking back to settle on his knees. “I don’t know the magic. Only the magician.”

Peter had followed the toss of her delicate chin to where the mystery man sat, just across the room.

“How much?” Not that he cared. It was Walter’s money. He just needed to know how much cash to untuck from his wallet to regain control of his dreams. Because he needed the ghost girl out of his head.

Amira named a price that he suspected was double the going rate. That was okay. Peter was often on the take, too, even if it was just for the thrill of things. Peter had handed the cash over and watched his temporary friend as she’d disappeared into the smoke.

She’d come back with a small baggie and a big smile.

That had been an hour ago.

Now, Peter sits in the redolent air, and the fire will not go away.

He lets his eyes slipped closed, willing his breathing to slow, balling his fists against the crawl of heat over his chest, his neck, his cheeks. Every breath gets harder and harder to draw.

Suddenly, relief floods him. There is a brush of cold against his forehead, and then the press of a palm that spreads the chill down both of his cheeks.

“Peter,” she says. Not Amira.

Oh, it’s the ghost. Fuck this drug. It’s only making her realer, adding insult to injury against his fever-ridden flesh. “No,” he groans. “Go away. Let me sleep.”

“Peter, open your eyes.”

The blessed relief of the fingertips against his throat makes the fever retreat briefly—Peter imagines it as the same sensation as falling through thin winter ice into the clear, startling cold that lay below. His eyes fly open.

The ghost kneels in front of him. Her wide, plush mouth, the one that he has plundered in endless loops in his own private hell, is pinched in a tight line. Her brow is furrowed. He can see the worry in her startlingly verdant gaze.

And in that moment, it comes to him, inexplicably. The name of the ghost, which he’d never known before this very moment. It comes out on a rushed breath, and he reaches up to grip her hands, which are still at the open neck of his shirt.

“Olivia.”

Beneath his grip, she is solid. He doesn’t know how it is possible, but his ghost…she’s real.   

[riacte]

not romantic not platonic but a secret third thing [what would happen between earth and the moon if the earth stopped spinning as illustrated by xkcd randall munroe]

[crumplstiltskin]

bros au but they're 12 years apart and jujutsu tech scouted sukuna quite young

[artkaninchenbau]

Crocodile finds a strange stray cat an 11-year old Nico Robin (AU where they met 13 years earlier. Robin's been on the run from the World Government for 3 years. Crocodile's 27 and has not set up base in Alabasta yet)

It seems like I have become possessed. By some sort of demon.

Bonus:

[letmetellyouaboutmyfeels]

I am incredibly serious right now when I beg you all, please, and if you have Twitter or Tiktok or whatever to please spread the word: click on an author's profile on Ao3.

You want to know if an author has written more? Want to know if they're still writing? Want to see more from them? Want to know if they've written a trope or kink or sex scenario you enjoy?

Click on their name. And look at their profile.

I cannot tell you how many times in the last six months someone has read a new or newer fic of mine and said they (a new reader who has read nothing else I've done) "can't wait to see what you do next!" I've written 50+ fics and over a million words already.

"I don't know if you're still writing..." click on my profile. I am. I literally wrote a 128k+ fic for that ship last month.

"Would you ever do X?" "Please do Y!" I already did. Click on my name and look at my works.

Archive of our Own is a library. It's an archive. Not social media. It is your responsibility to fight back against the laziness that corporate algorithms have trained into you.

Click my author name. Just click it. Just click it.

Before you demand more, or ask if a writer will do XYZ, or wonder if the author still writing, or anything - click on their profile. Click on the author's profile.

I'm not trying to be mean or condescending or anything like that. I'm just exhausted. It's disheartening and frustrating to repeat myself ad nauseam, because someone couldn't take thirty seconds to do the tiniest bit of work to see if I've written lately, if I've written more for their ship, or scan my works to see if I've written what they're asking for. Please. Please. I'm begging.

Click the author's name, and explore before you ask.

[nemkero]

atla au but nothing changes except sokka is taller and zuko is shorter

[sreppub]

jason ignored the clearly labeled tupperware and ate tim’s leftover garlic chicken pasta

[buggachat]

Part 200 of my bakery “enemies” au!

First / Prev / Next / All

Kofi

[scurvyboy]

happy halloween to them only

[backpackingspace]

okay so post epic odyssey where odysseus and Penelope have surfaced from their room finally and he and diomedes are catching up I'm imagining the conversation going something like this

Odysseus: so then I gave up being merciful and became the monster.

Diomedes:....you tried being merciful?

Odysseus: Yes?

Diomedes: you did? You tried being a good merciful person? You?

Odysseus: Yah okay fuck off it was polties dying wish. I had to try.

Diomedes:.....90% of the war crimes in the Trojan war were suggested, planned out, and carried out by you. We literally stoned to death the guy you had a personal grudge against. We framed him for treason and stoned him to death. 70% of why Athena liked you was because she thought she knew all the ways to kill someone and then you'd suggest something insane and I'd see her taking notes. You literally gave Ajex a psyoctic break just being yourself.

Odysseus: shut up

Diomedes: I'm not wrong. Did you tell Penelope about your attempt to be a good person?

Odysseus: What? Of course I did. I told her everything.

Diomedes: did she laugh?

Odysseus:...shut up that's not the point

Diomedes: she did didn't she!!!

Odysseus: ANYWAY eurylochus wasn't appreciative of my return to monsterhood and he started causing problems so I

Diomedes: killed him? Yah saw that coming. No shit. I'm so shocked.

[chez-cinnamon]

Some more AU design ideas, this time with Zooble and Queenie!!

Honestly loving them both even if they're first drafts-

And some bonus doodles!! Leaderboard for life.....

[bigfatbreak]

they both got bonked for being silly.

[a-scary-lack-of-common-sense]

Local idiot absolutely destroys his twin brother

⚠️ Do not try this at home❗️⁉️

[fanaticalthings]

POV: You're on Gothamtwt

just gothamite things

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[bixels]

fine, me too.

[stars-obsession-pit]

The Worst Branch in the Country

The GIW knows Amity Park is a huge fraud. The “most haunted city in the US”, really? They’ve been checking the place out for decades with nary a peep aside from that couple of crazy scientists that moved into town around twenty years prior.

Because of this, the town became a punishment duty. One of their agents causes trouble? They get put in time out and sent to work for a while in Amity Park. Let those idiots chase after pointless rumors while the actually competent agents work with the more important ghosts. The reports back from the town get barely more than a cursory glance before getting tossed in the shredder.

…Which really came back to bite them when ghosts did actually start to show up, and they didn’t realize until after the Amity Park branch had royally screwed up the situation.

Fuck, they really hope this doesn’t start a war.

Optional DPxDC addition: they call in the Justice League Dark for help with negotiation and taking down their rogue members