#Antique Desk Tray

[thakefurniture]

Fine quality Regency rosewood desk tray, with brass inlay and a shaped carry handle. Circa. 1815

[satangcrush]

helping hand

✦ PAIRING / diavolo x reader / ✦ SUMMARY: suggesting remedies for diavolo to relieve stress (suggestive!) ✦ WC: 1.3k

| MASTERLIST

══════════════════

It was a weekly occurrence for Diavolo to invite you over to the Demon Lord’s castle to enjoy time away from the brothers. It had even been added to your schedule pasted on the fridge door in the House of Lamentation, even the brothers know better than to intrude during this period – which is to say, you have never missed a single session. 

However, Diavolo had skipped the past meeting citing heavy workload as the main reason, leaving Barbatos to entertain you in the guest room. You didn’t have anything against the butler but you were disappointed seeing as you had intentionally come for Diavolo.

Thus this week, you were determined to spend some time with the demon prince even if all he’s doing is paperwork while you… sit beside him doing nothing. 

“Dia, you should really take a break.” You say distractedly as you nod your head in thanks towards Barbatos who had brought over a tray of pastries. This was also something that you missed. The snacks that Barbatos made were always something to die for.

“I would love to. But… I don’t think I have the time for that today,” Diavolo says gently, as he chances a glance towards Barbatos. Following the demon prince’s stare, you turned to look at the butler who was wearing a small frown, the expression so out of place on his normally placid face.

Usually, you wouldn’t have mentioned anything or even tried to get him to rest because god knows the amount of mischief Diavolo would get into once goaded on. But you could see the shadow of purple rings under his eyes drooping from where you were seated across the room. If that wasn’t an indication of how overworked he was, then you weren’t sure what could be one.

You let out a small sigh, as you squint at the paper he was holding. There has to be something that could at least help him relieve stress if he was so insistent on finishing his workload today. You racked your brain for something that could help.

“Have you tried rubbing one out recently?”

The shattering noise behind you grabs your attention as you twist your entire upper body to take a look. Barbatos had dropped a plate, and the glass pieces had shattered across the whole room. Even the butler looked surprised at his actions.

“Don’t mind me. I’ll head out to grab some cleaning supplies.” For the first time since you have arrived in the Devildom, you watch as Barbatos rushes out, seemingly running from something.

“Is he okay?” You cocked your head to the side, confused at the peculiarity of the behaviour that Barbatos exhibited.

You stood up, walking over to inspect the broken pieces. “These look expensive. Hopefully, they weren’t antiques or anything, right Dia?” You said.

When no reply came, you turned on your heel to face Diavolo’s desk. For some reason, he was turning red, and his eyes were staring daggers at the desk as if it had done something wrong. Now, you were starting to get worried. It seemed like the workload must be overbearing for him to show signs of physical exhaustion.

“Uh.” You paused, walking over to place a hand on his shoulder. “Is there something wrong?” Diavolo jerked away from your touch, wide eyes flitting up to meet yours.

“S-sorry. What did you say?” As if to maintain composure, he straightened his tie and cleared his throat but somehow, his eyes were looking past you.

“I asked if you were alright. The stress must be getting to you, your answers are so delayed.” You frowned, lifting a hand to try and touch his forehead.

This time, Diavolo viscerally jerked back and you paused mid-air, surprised by his actions.

“Oh Dia, you must be really stressed,” With a sympathetic voice, you pushed down the document he was holding even as he stumbled over his words to say something. After clearing a space on his desk, you hopped up to sit in front of him.

“Have you done any exercise lately?” You questioned, tilting Diavolo’s head up with a finger under his chin. Thankfully, other than the deep set of sunken eyebags, it didn’t seem like there were any other physical differences.

The demon prince nodded his head in affirmation. 

“How about getting a massage? If I recall, Barbatos is talented in this area. If you are this stressed, it could be a good idea to get one.” You said. 

For a second, you could see the flash of contemplation on Diavolo’s face. “He’s also stressed, I don’t want to add more on his plate at the current moment.”

You tapped your finger on the tip of his nose. “Well then, I recommend that you should find a chance to get off. It’s a relatively fast and easy solution.”

Diavolo looks awkward. Your face drops a bit as you observe his reaction, realising that he probably doesn’t even have time nor privacy to try out what you recommended. 

“You can consider getting someone to help you too,” You added on unhelpfully. 

There are multiple options that you were scanning through, and of course, the Avatar of Lust is at the forefront of your mind but you weren’t sure if Diavolo would appreciate a member of the Student Council helping him out with such an intimate matter.

“Are you offering?”

You almost fell off the desk, shocked by his remark. Diavolo was pinning you with an unreadable look and quickly, you realised that he was being serious about asking. Diavolo leans in closer to your face, breath hot and heavy. 

“It’s not nice of you to try and tempt a demon, love.” The demon prince continues to hover over you, arms planted on each side of the desk as he whispers. Your eyes widen but you manage to collect your bearings and push back against his chest.

“You must be joking, Dia.” You huffed out a laugh, as you turned your glance upwards. His gaze narrows and as he opens his mouth to correct you-- The sound of a knock startles the both of you. 

“Young Master, I’m coming in.”

With that sentence, both of you scrambled to make the scene less… compromising. You stand beside Diavolo, the embarrassment suffocating both of you into silence. Barbatos opens the door, holding a broom and some other cleaning supplies. A Little D trails behind him, looking thoroughly petulant.

“Please clean this up.” Barbatos orders while the Little D inspects the mess around the room. You kinda feel bad for the Little D but he was the least of your current concerns.

Barbatos looks on curiously but opts to not question the obvious distance between both of you. His gaze instead fell onto the stack of paper thrown to the ground which you had forgotten to pick up. “Why is the table so messy?”

You contemplated throwing Diavolo under the bus. “Um, I thought I saw an insect and panicked.” You lied badly.

Barbatos just blinked at you.

“An insect?” He asked, looking at you suspiciously.

With a loud gasp, you exaggeratedly glanced at the clock before shuffling past him, “Oh shoot! I have to go! Lucifer needs me haha.”

“He--” Diavolo starts.

“--Oh no! I really need to leave!” You quickly cut in, rushing out of the door. Thankfully, none of them tries to stop you this time. Your heart thrummed hard as you clutched your chest, face bright as you thought back to the earlier incident.

He must be joking, right?

══════════════════.

a/n▸ writing exercise lol. had this idea brewing around in my head for a while but finally got the time to sit down and finish it!

[words-etched-in-her-skin]

Hello, dears ❤ I do apologize for the lack of content lately (Moving to Germany and getting everything settled, on top of writer´s block and taking German lessons is the culprit, I swear 😂) BUT, I finally got around to writing that scene where Reader has to serve Alcina tea while wearing a remote control vibrator 👀This was written with Sasha in mind (if you can´t tell lol) and I do hope some of you will enjoy! ❤

TW: Slight degradation

Word count: 2,054

The castle clock hadn't yet made it to nine when you found yourself waiting dutifully outside of your employer´s office. You had known better than to enter the large room at a time other than exactly when she requested you to. Being early at Castle Dimitrescu was considered just as much of an offense as being late, with just as dire consequences depending on the Countess´mood. So, you stood there, quietly, obediently, waiting for the old steel bells in the clocktower to strike nine. You had made a point to make sure that everything placed on the silver tray in your hands was precisely as she liked it, your uniform had been freshly pressed, your hair as neatly done as you could get it, and the small toy she had commanded you to wear nestled deep within your core was - while albeit, a little uncomfortable - nice and securely settled in. 

The sound of the first bell had almost made you jump, nearly knocking the antique silver teapot over in turn. You rolled your eyes at yourself and straightened out your vest. You were admittedly more nervous than you´d expected to be - but also excited. Your arousal already beginning to pool, pulsing against the firmness of the toy. Your heart all but a flutter as the final bell finally struck, forcing a slight flush across your cheeks. With a short exhale you knocked softly on the large door. 

“You may enter, pet.” 

Her voice was warm, aged - like a finely distilled whiskey. The sound of it alone brought an even deeper heat to your cheeks, and you knew right then and there that this wasn't going to be easy. Not a single drop spilled, she had said. Not a single one. 

And she had meant it. 

You entered quickly and without pause, eyes adjusting to the bright morning sun as it shown brilliantly into the normally darkened room. Luminous rays of warmth basking the Countess in a dusting of cladden gold. 

“Right on time, pet. As always.” She smirked, looking up at you over the rim of her reading glasses - her desk covered in a mess of invoices and letters for the day ahead. You cleared your throat. 

“Of course, my lady.”

“I do believe that's how you prefer me, Countess, is it not?”

She carefully placed the paper she had been reading on top of the others before allowing the smirk on her lips to curl a little deeper. “Mh, obedient little thing, hm? So eager to please.”

You swallowed hard, mouth suddenly dry. <i>Fuck, she wasn’t going to make this easy, was she?</i> Still, you smirked a little in turn, walking closer to the desk, your stride slightly staggered. 

She chuckled. “Feeling rather cheeky this morning, I see.” 

At this you only grinned, placing the serving tray on the one empty spot on her desk and raised the teapot in your hands. “Tea?”

She chuckled again and nodded, leaning back into her chair - with one perfectly shaped eyebrow arched in your direction as her gaze raked you over, watching you. She was absolutely stunning in the fresh morning light - nearly evanescent. Her raven locked hair perfectly styled and a tight fitted, white collared shirt in place of her normal everyday dress. It was cuffed at her forearms and hugged her body quite exquisitely. In that moment, you were certain the small toy that remained in your core was already sufficiently drenched, its presence becoming ever more noticeable as you began to set out the tea.   

“I'm assuming you haven’t forgotten our deal?” 

She traced her fingers down your arm and your core immediately clenched, forcing you to adjust your stance. 

“O-of course not, my lady.” 

“Not a <i>single drop</i>.. Or there will be consequences.” 

You nodded. “Yes, my lady.” 

She smirked. 

“Though, something tells me you'd rather enjoy that.” The chuckle that now danced darkly across her lips was dripping in desire, much like the juices that had already begun to drip from your core. And the sight of the small black remote appearing casually between her fingers only fueled that.

Gods, she was not playing fair and she knew-

“Mph-!” 

You let out an embarrassingly needy moan the moment you felt the warm, abrupt vibration deep inside you, your knees almost immediately buckling. 

Fuck. Why had you agreed to this again??

Because you loved it, that's why. You loved the effect she had on you and just how needy she could get you. You loved how aroused you already were, knowing just how much higher she'd eventually take you. With your core soaking wet and absolutely aching for her. 

And this, she knew. 

“Mh.. you look a little flushed, my pet. Is the tea too hot for you?” 

Oh, that devilish smirk as she leaned back into her chair even more, eyes bright with a teasing glint while she idly allowed the remote to dance between two fingers. You cursed softly under your breath before straightening your back, teapot still in hand. 

“Quite the contrary, my lady. The only thing too hot in this room, is you.” You replied with a smug smile, making her chuckle. 

“Always with that silver tongue of yours.” 

“Last I checked you quite enjoyed my tong-” 

Another wave of pleasure erupted in your core, this time even stronger than the last. Your hands held firm around the warm metal as you moaned needlessly, wantingly, the slacks of your uniform growing more soaked by the second. You were panting by the time the vibration was cut short, which only brought forth another chuckle. 

“That I do, pet. Though, it does have the tendency to get you into trouble, no?” 

You cursed again, this time wiping the sweat from your brow before rising back to your full height. Every inch of your body now screaming for more, for release. For her fingers to replace the all too small toy that resided deep within you. You took a steadying breath and smiled, holding the steaming water over her cup. 

“I s-suppose it does, my lady. How would you like your tea this morning?” 

You tried your hardest to remain focused, but your eyes were locked on the tiny remote in her hand. Watching it's every movement, waiting for any indication that she was about to press it. That was until she cleared her throat, bringing your attention swiftly back to her. 

“Eyes on me.” She ordered. 

You nodded. “Yes, my lady. Sorry.” 

You straightened out your vest again, teapot in hand. Your cheeks a deep crimson and your underwear nearly completely soaked through. She watched you intently, a scorching gaze that never wavered and only made the heated place between your legs throb relentlessly. Her lips parting ever so slightly before she spoke, legs coming to cross in front of her. 

“Two cubes of sugar this morning, pet. And a generous pour from my flask.” 

“As you wish, my lady.” 

“Oh, and one of those intricate designs of yours I love so much.” She smirked. “Expertly executed, of course.” 

You swallowed and gave her a nod. “O-of course. Any specific design in mind?” 

“Mh.. surprise me.” She replied with a wink. 

You nodded again and moved a little closer to her desk, a slight tremor to your hand as you reached for the small silver tongs for her sugar. One small clink into the cup and then another, breathing a sigh of relief as you moved onto the flask. Though the moment the dark crimson liquid began to pour from the opening your whole body jerked in pleasure. The vibration, albeit a much softer one, was still plenty enough to send a wave of ecstasy across your body. 

You bit your bottom lip, nearly hard enough to draw blood. Your legs trembling as it became harder and harder to focus on anything other than the deep ache in your core. You moved your hand slowly, thighs clenched shut as you continued to pour the dark liquid into the cup before capping it off and shakily placing it back on the tray. A staggered exhale as the toy swiftly shut off again. 

“Very good, pet. Continue.” 

You nodded through a whimper and shifted from one foot to another, your desire now trickling down your inner thigh - your uniform becoming ever more stifling. You could only imagine how flushed your face was, if the rest of you held any indication, that was. Your entire body felt as if it set a flame. As if you were the match and Alcina the strike. You straightened your back once more, this time a little more wobbly and picked up the teapot. 

The look on your Mistress's face was entirely unfair. Smug, and knowing. Nostrils slightly flared as she could undoubtedly smell just how aroused you were - how utterly drenched. You steadied your hands, keeping them both firmly on the now cooling metal as you slowly began to tip it. The warm aroma of Alcina’s favorite tea wafting through the air. A predator’s gaze encased in swirls of steam as she watched you - intensely. A swift flash of crimson in her smile as she pressed the little black button yet again. 

“F-fu-” 

“Language. You're doing so good.” 

“Mmmph-” 

A muffled whimper as your teeth sank hard into your bottom lip, thighs clenched even more than before. You did your best to hold yourself steady. With the only thing working in your favor being the master of your craft - the ability to serve to no end. 

Especially when it came to Alcina. 

Your legs shook, body trembled. Core aching in a way that you had never experienced before. You so badly wanted to come for her, to feel the exquisite release of pleasure that only she could give you. But still, you held strong. Feeling the simple fabric of your slacks grow wetter by the second as you dutifully fill her cup with warm tea. Leaving just enough room for the foam at the top. 

By the time the vibration came to a halt within your aching walls, you were a panting, shaking mess. Hair a muss and beads of sweat dripping down your all too heated face. You honestly weren't sure how much more you could take. If the heartbeat that throbbed so strongly in your core had anything to say about it, you'd likely come the moment she pressed that button again. An act that would surely get you punished. A punishment that would surely be worth it. 

Your hands trembled as you placed the teapot back onto the tray, breath erratic as you looked up to catch her gaze. 

And that smirked. That damned smirk. 

“So dutiful, pet.” She said coyly. “You never do disappoint, do you?” 

Her tongue skated over her bottom lip and wetted it, making you groan. She chuckled yet again. 

“Almost there now. Just one more step.” 

You nodded and quickly added the foamed cream to the top of her cup. She wanted something intricate, she had said, so you knew you couldn't get away with your usual simple heart. And your mind was far too fogged to think of anything creative at the moment. So, you picked up your small metal tool and got to work, brow furrowed as you tried to concentrate. An act that was all the more difficult when the Countess rose from her seat, remote in hand. Her scent even more intoxicating than usual. Her mere proximity fueling the ever throbbing pulse between your legs. 

“I don't think you've ever smelt so aroused before, my pet.” She whispered, leaning in so her bosom was directly eye level. The ebb and flow of her chest, her warm breath across your ear, it was almost all too much. 

You took a deep breath and steadied. 

“A-and whose fault is that?” You replied quietly. 

“Oh. I'm well aware of my affect on you, dear.” She chuckled, leaning in even further. “One could say I revel in it.” 

You whimpered but held your hand steady, intent on finishing the work at hand. You were almost finished as it was, with one or two lines left to g- 

“Mmmph-!” 

There it was again, that all encompassing heat. That warm vibration engulfing your core just as you'd finished the final line on the crest of House Dimitrescu in her cup. She looked down at it, proud and knowing, and leaned her body against yours. You turned fully in her arms, wanting to feel every inch of her against you. 

“Such a good, obedient pet.” Words whispered against your lips before she took your mouth in hers, kissing you deeply. Large hands roaming over your body before resting on the hem of your pants to unbutton them. “Such a shame it'll have to go to waste, hm?”  

She kissed you again before you could even reply. The soaked fabric of your slacks and underwear quickly discarded to the floor as her thigh came to rest between your legs. You moaned, whimpered, clawed at her back as you begged for release. The toy in your core now at its highest vibration as she pressed her thigh against your clit. 

“F-fuck.. Alcina.. please.” 

Her only response was a soft growl and the subtle rock of her thigh, moving deliciously against your most sensitive areas. A prickling heat that built slowly across your body with each movement. With tears streaming down your face and your nails digging into her skin. 

“P-please.. I need to.. I need to come for you.” 

She growled into your swollen lips and pushed her thigh into you even harder, forcing you to cry out. 

“Be a good slut and come for me then.” She hissed.

The next moments that came were all but a blur. Waves of unrelenting pleasure crashing over you as your whole body trembled and shook. As your desire shot out from your core and soaked the soft skin of Alcina's thigh. You weren't even sure how many orgasms she’d given you, or just how long she’d kept you there. With a cold cup of tea resting next to you on the desk as your chest heaved in pants. The silhouette of her leaning over you as you felt yourself begin to fade. Body limp as the darkness swiftly took over you, with the small toy still nestled deep within your core.  

[my-secret-shame-but-fanfiction]

Do Us Both A Favour

Anselm Vogelweide x afab!Reader • Rating: 18+ pals Masterlist• ao3• want to be tagged? | request info • Kinktober 2024 Masterlist • Day 21: Smoking

Summary: Anselm doesn't seem to be as intimidating as others perceive him to be, at least when he's talking to you.

A/N: This is mainly fluff, I'm sorry.

Warnings: smoking, flirting, innuendo, not beta read, please let me know if I have missed a warning!

Word Count: 1248

You were part of a team hired to catalogue a collection of antique books. It wasn’t the first time you’d done this job, but this was definitely the largest and most varied collection you’d seen from a single individual. 

There wasn’t one room where there wasn’t books. Including an interesting set of laminated novels in the bathroom that were presumably to stop the bath water from splashing on the pages.

You were currently working on a bookcase in a secluded room on the third floor, taking quick notes in your notebook that you would transfer onto your computer later. 

The room opening made you jump, despite how gentle it was. 

“Oh, my apologies.” 

You recognised him instantly, despite this being the first time you’d actually seen him in person. The head of your team had warned you about him quite thoroughly - everyone was to be on their best behaviour when Mr Vogelweide was around.

“No, erm, no, please, I’m sorry, this is your house.” You give him a small bashful smile that he grins at, chuckling lightly. 

He shakes his head, taking a few steps inside. His brace squeaks with every step. He’s wearing a sharp dark teal suit that compliments him immensely. “I’ll put this out.” He says kindly, gesturing to the cigar in his left hand. 

“Oh, no, it’s fine, really.” You say without thinking, wanting to be polite. 

He quirks an eyebrow at you as he moves to his desk, “You smoke?”

You shake your head. 

“Well, I really should put it out then. Manners, you see.” He opens a side draw and pulls out an ornate and heavy looking glass ashtray. 

“Unless,” he smiles, “would you like to see a trick?” 

“A trick?” You turn fully.

He nods, “A trick.” There’s a little gleam in his eyes as he takes the cigar, the smoke wafting into the air. He presses the cigar against his lips and then, with a rather dramatic sleight of hand, it disappears. 

He shows you his empty hands, revelling in your surprised look, before he makes it reappear from his left ear. 

“How did you do that?” 

Anselm grins, “an old party trick.” He lightly presses the lit end into the ashtray. “I’m afraid it takes a lot more for me to reveal my secrets than a simple request, even if it is from a very beautiful person such as yourself.” 

You wish your words didn’t fail you, that heat wasn't burning under your skin. From everything you’d been told Mr Vogelweide had seemed like some twisted miser ready to snap and scream at anyone at any given notice. Instead, he seemed painfully charming. 

“My second trick, seems to be robbing you of your words.” He smiles cheekily as you shake your head ever so slightly, trying to break out of that hypnotic spell you had willfully fallen under. 

“I’m sorry, I…”

“You say sorry, far too much, my sweet.” He’d given you a cheeky wink before he collected a ledger from his desk and left the room, bidding you good day. 

.

It was Tuesday when you next saw him, he’d brought you a cup of sweet honey and lemon tea as you were working in the drawing room. Smiling as he placed the tray next to you. 

“For you.” 

“I, oh,” you smile, blinking heavily as your mind catches up with reality. “Thank you. You didn’t need to.” 

“Oh, but I wanted to.” He sat down, taking a sip of his own drink. 

“Thank you,” You repeat, shifting a little from your place on the floor, it was easier to look at the bottom shelf that way. 

“How is the work coming along?” He asks and you were sure he already knew the answer. But he listens intently as you explain passionately about his collection, smiling when you ask him small questions. 

On Wednesday he invites you to have lunch with him. Seemingly delighted when you agree and sat down in the day room with your packed lunch. Commenting that it was heartwarming to see someone you had prepared their own food. And then grinning like a madman when you’d playfully teased him about it. 

“Oh, I’m so sorry that we don’t all have personal chefs, Mr Vogelweide.” 

He snorts, “Anselm, please. You are far too lovely to have my last name in your mouth.” 

You were used to his kind words by now, sure that it was just something he did with everyone. 

You laugh, “And what is that supposed to mean?” 

“Exactly what I said, my dear.” 

“I think your surname is lovely.” You nod playfully to punctuate the sentence, knowing by now that he always reacts positively to sincerity mixed with light teasing. 

“Hmm,” the sound grumbles in his chest. “But you like Anselm, more yes? You agree that it is lovelier?” He inches a little closer as he talks, pulling a face to make you laugh. 

Some of your colleagues began to notice your friendliness, started to ask you to ask Anselm if they needed more information on certain volumes. Their perceptions of him being so intimidating weren’t surprising, but you found it a little odd that you couldn’t convince them otherwise. 

“Would you like a scotch?” Anselm asked.

You pause, halfway through your sandwich and glance at the clock. “It’s 12:35.”

“Oh, vodka then?” 

You scan his face, looking for any sign of insincerity and find none. “Are you teasing me?” 

He smiles, “Terribly, I’m afraid. You were away with the fairies.” He waves his hand.

“I was not.” You swallow, you do not want to admit you had been distracted looking at his face. 

“You most certainly were, what was the last thing I said?” 

“Do I want a scotch?” 

He chuckles, “Before that?” 

The small pause you take is enough for him to beam in triumph. 

“Ah ha, see, my dear?” He wags a finger playfully at you. “Am I boring you so?” 

“No.” You answer a little too quickly. 

“No? Well, I’m not sure if I am so convinced by your protest.”

“Anselm, that’s not fair.” You squirm a little under his gaze.

“What is unfair is you using my first name now of all times.” He leans a little closer, obviously amused. “Tell me, what has you so distracted?” 

“I… nothing.” 

“You’d be a terrible poker player, my dear.” He preens a little. 

“I would not.” 

“Then tell me.” He raises his chin ever so slightly, daring you. 

“I… wasn’t…”

“You… weren’t?” He teases, delighting in your discomfort. “Was it dirty is that why you won’t tell me?” 

Again, you take too long to answer.

“Oh, it was.”

“No, no,” you laugh in spite of yourself, “Stop, it wasn’t.” 

“I’m sure it was, it’s always quiet ones like you that end up into the most depraved things.” 

“I, what, no,” your giggles are becoming harder to control. 

“It takes one to know one, after all.” He lightly takes your hand in his, stroking the back with his thumb. 

“I have no interest in whatever depraved things you are into.” 

He chuckles, “I very much doubt that.” “Do you?” You pull a face and he laughs harder. 

“Yes, especially when you’ve been staring at me like you want to jump my bones for the last fifteen minutes.” 

You freeze, unable to even deny it. 

Anselm grins wickedly, pressing closer and whispering in your ear. “How about I do us both a favour, and instead of waiting around, I jump yours?” 

Thank you for reading!

@pleasurebuttonwrites @raven-rk @campingwiththecharmings @alexxavicry @whatthefishh

@romanarose @strangerhands @saturn-rings-writes ho

@steven-grants-world  @eyelessfaces @angel-of-the-moons @minigirl87 @lunar-ghoulie

@silvernight-m @autismsupermusicalassassin @apesarecuul @reallyrallyauthor @basicalyrandom

@alwaysmicado @mangoslushcrush @marc-spectorr @spxctorsslxt @novarosewood 

@pygmi-cygni @hammerhead96 @emma23 @sub-aro @killerdollz

 @maplemind  @mwltwo @loonymagizoologist @dameronshandholder @queerly-anxious

@homuraak3mi @swiftiegirliepop @oscarssimp @milkypompon @eternallyvenus 

@mandytrekkie @lounilu @avengersinitiative2012 @pigeonmama @marcsb1tch 

@iolaussharpe-24 @chaithetics @DowBaStan @faretheeoscar@lonelyisamyw-0love 

@queerponc @twwcs @Spnwhore2430 @mari-thesimp @ominoose

@ierofrnkk @have-you-seen-my-sanity @to-be-a-sunshine @howellatme

If you'd like to be taken off the tag list please let me know here

[guppygiggles]

Let's Get Physical!

What: Tickle fluff with a dash of mild hurt/comfort.

Word count: ~2.3k

Universe: Sea & Sky AU

Who: Avery, Casper, Finnegan.

Description: Avery gives Finnegan a physical. Emotional bonding and cuddling between the three of them. Just a little oneshot with a bit of tickling for everyone!

Friday afternoon couldn't have come soon enough.

As I made the short trek home from the bank, my eyes trained on the lighthouse as it stood tall against the afternoon sky. After glaring at my computer screen and paperwork for eight hours, it was a relief to stare at something beautiful and distant. I rolled my tired shoulders, wincing in pain as I did. Maybe I could talk Avery into giving me one of his expert massages… Not that I deserved it, I thought, after how neglectful I’d been him and Finn all week. I frowned, remembering how many times I'd fallen asleep watching TV with them -- I definitely needed to make up for lost time this weekend. I shuffled up the stone steps and turned the lighthouse’s antique doorknob, wiping my feet on the strawberry-print mat as I entered.

“Caspeheher! Hehehehelp!”

No sooner had I walked through the door – key still in-hand – than my arms were full of triton as Finn crashed into me, nearly knocking us both over. He squeezed me as if he hadn't seen me in weeks, giggling as he nuzzled his face into my neck. With some effort, I deposited my keys and wallet into the plastic tray and shuffled out of my shoes, just in time to watch Avery appear in the foyer. He was grinning in that characteristic, long-suffering way of his as he shook his head.

“What are you doing to this fish?” I asked, chuckling as Finn scrambled out of my arms and hid behind me.

“Well, I was just trying to give him a routine physical,” Avery replied, “but as you can see, it isn't going well.”

“He’s lying!” Finn protested, laughter riding beneath his words. “He was tickling me!”

I quirked an eyebrow at Avery, who rolled his eyes upward, offering a sheepish grin-and-shrug combo that told me everything I needed to know. For the first time that day, I giggled.

“Do you need an assistant to help with this patient, Dr. Nimbus?” I asked playfully, reaching back to pinch Finn's side without taking my eyes off the cloudman, eliciting a ticklish squeal.

“Why, yes! Thank you for offering, I believe that would be quite helpful!”

“What?! You traitor!” Before I could snatch him, Finnegan darted past me and was scampering back up the stairs with a gleeful laugh. I wondered why Avery didn't stop him… until the elemental floated gracefully over to me, pulling me into a deep and comprehensive embrace. I sighed with relief, my eyes automatically closing as I laid my head on his chest, listening to the quiet storm inside his body. Bergamot and old paper wrapped around my olfactory nerve like a warm blanket – I was finally home.

“Hi, dewdrop.”

“Hey, peach.”

“How was your day?”

“Tiring… This audit is wearing me out. I'm really sorry I haven't been much fun to be around this week… I promise I'll make it up to you and Finny.”

“You know you don't have to apologize for that, sweetheart. We're both so proud of how hard you work, and we understand when you're tired.” Avery's large, soft hand stroked my upper back. As it did, I felt his fingers get curious around my shoulders, pressing and palpating my achy muscles. I flinched through a cocktail of ticklishness and pain. “Oh, oh… Sorry, did that hurt? My goodness, you are tense. You've been hunching over your desk again, haven't you?”

I blushed a little. No matter how many times Avery tried to correct my posture, I always fell back into old habits as soon as work got too stressful.

“Aheh… Maybe a little… Sorry.”

“Oh, Casper… Tsk, tsk, tsk,” he chided, his touch turning softer and playing around my shoulders and neck, making me laugh and squirm.

“Ehehe~! Okay, I'll- ahaha! I'll w-work on ihihhihit!”

“You'd better, or you'll be in for a much more serious tickling than this!” Avery teased, continuing to tickle a bit more before stopping, his eyes tender as he looked at me. “Really, though… I'll give you a nice massage later, okay? I don't want you to be in pain.”

I felt my ears flush as I turned my attention to the foyer wall, my mind wandering to Avery's cool, pillowy doctor's hands coated in massage oil, squeezing and kneading my bare shoulders…

I cleared my throat, meeting his eyes only briefly, as if staring too long would allow him to read my mind.

“Don't we have a fish to torment?”

“Ah, yes! I'm sure he's up there getting impatient… which makes me worry for the state of our home. Shall we?”

He gestured to the stairwell. I took a step forward, then halted, eyeing him warily.

“... After you.”

Avery grinned. “No, really. I insist.”

“You’re a doctor; such a title affords you the right to go first, don't you think? Please permit me to offer this token of my respect.”

I watched him try not to laugh. So was I, but I was better at it.

“...You flatter me. Very well, I'll lead on.”

I let Avery believe I wasn't going to do anything. I was certain that by the time we’d passed the halfway point, I'd convinced him of my innocence. Surely if I'd planned on doing something, I would've by then. Right?

Right…?

Wrong. With about ten steps in the winding staircase to go, I reached up and gave the elemental a quick scribbling along both of his sides. Avery gasped in surprise, followed by a flurry of defeated, yet joyful laughter.

“Oh, you cheeky little-”

Just like Finnegan had done to me earlier, I ducked under Avery's hands as he reached back to snatch me, clambering to pass him on the staircase. Unlike Finn, though… dodging Avery's hands didn't guarantee my safety, as a forceful gust of wind knocked me backwards and right into his arms. I screeched with laughter as he lifted and tossed me like a sack of potatoes over his soft shoulder, my legs kicking as he easily carried me the rest of the way.

“Oh, no you don't,” he admonished, reaching up to tweak the crease at the top of my thigh with his thumb and forefinger. Panicked laughter filled the living room we now stood in as I thrashed, but none of my wriggling did any good; he was simply too strong. Avery chuckled as he gently pinched, forcing a torrent of squealing, frantic laughter from me, until he deposited me carefully on the couch.

“Did you know I was going to do that?” I asked, still giggling.

“I had a suspicion… but I will concede that you lulled me into a false sense of security.”

“Yessss!” I cheered, earning another lighthearted glare as he reached down with both hands, quickly wiggling his fingers along my sides and belly. I curled into a ball on the couch, filling the room with my hysterical squawking as he tickled any spot he could reach.

“You might be a systems admin, but you moonlight as a troublemaker, don't you?”

“NOHOHOHOOO!”

“I think you doooo~” He lilted, worming his fingers under my arms, between my neck and shoulder, and any other ticklish creases I created with my defensive posture. I was still screeching as Finn appeared in the doorway.

“Don't worry, Casper, I'll save you!” His bare, webbed feet made a sound like a duck running as he charged Avery, who whirled on him before Finnegan had a chance to try anything, easily scooping the triton into his arms and nuzzling into him.

“EEEEEHEhehehee!” Finn laughed, his fingers squishing Avery’s soft head as the cloudman kissed his neck.

“And they say chivalry is dead,” Avery tittered, taking a seat on the sofa beside me, Finn still in his arms. “Will you please let me finish your physical, brave warrior? I'm almost done, I promise... I just need to check your belly, now.”

Finn sighed dramatically, then sprawled across Avery's lap, adjusting his body such that his head rested on my thigh. I grinned down at him.

“Hi, Finny-Finn-Finn.” I swept his hair back and leaned down to kiss his forehead. The warmth of his scales was always a bit of a surprise, especially compared to Avery's chilly skin.

I was expecting Avery to go in for the kill, but as I watched him methodically inspect Finn's abdomen, I realized he was conducting a legitimate physical. He gently pressed and palpated the softer scales of his belly as he used his free arm to keep the merman’s squirmy legs still. Finn giggled, and I couldn't blame him; I'd been on the receiving end of plenty of physicals from Avery, too, and I knew those fingers tickled no matter how professional he tried to be. In the back of my mind, I knew it was likely a conflict of interest for Avery to treat us… but since he was the only doctor in Port Oleander – and more importantly, one of the few on land who could treat merfolk – I supposed an exception had been permitted.

“Does any of this hurt, Finn? Has your belly been hurting at all, lately?”

“N-no, it's not hurting. Uhm… my belly hurt last night, after dinner, though…” He admitted.

I frowned, unable to recall him saying anything about a stomach ache. Last night had been my turn to cook. I wasn't a great cook to begin with, and admittedly… it was difficult to prepare meals that both Finnegan and Avery could eat; the elemental couldn't digest any food that was too dry, and Finn’s rainbow trout biology was primarily carnivorous. Soups, stews, and curries were common in our house – dinner last night had been red curry with chicken.

“What kind of hurt? Was it stabbing, dull, hot, achy…?” Avery asked, concerned.

“Hot, especially when I was laying down in bed.” Finn looked away from me. Avery and I exchanged a glance.

“I'm sorry, Finn… I probably made it too spicy. I won't make that again. Why didn't you say anything? I would've gotten you some medicine to help you feel better.” I stroked Finn's hair back again, my face etched with guilt. Now that I was thinking back to the previous night, he had seemed more quiet than usual… but I had been too tired to comment on it, chalking it up to him being tired, too. I kicked myself; Finn was never tired. The only time the triton lacked energy was in the five – maybe ten – minutes wherein he would go from bouncing off the walls to being dead asleep. Had I been more observant, I would've realized that.

Finnegan's eyes were serious as he looked back at me, an expression that seemed foreign on his gamine face. He looked away again, though, as he started to speak.

“It's just… you've been working so hard this week, Caspy, and I didn't want to hurt your feelings or make you worry about me.”

I couldn't bring myself to meet Avery's eyes again as an arrow of regret pierced my heart. I really had been disconnected from them all week.

“Finn… nothing is more important to me than you and Avery, okay? I’m sorry I've been so busy this week, I should've paid more attention to how you were feeling. Please don't suffer in silence again, okay? If your tummy hurts – or anything hurts – please promise you'll tell us from now on.”

Finn's tail swished uncomfortably… but he managed a smile, looking up at me again.

“Okay, I'll tell you from now on… I promise.” He shifted his gaze to Avery, whose hands were still resting on his scaly belly. “Am I done, now?”

It occured to me then that the part of the physical Finnegan disliked wasn't the tickling, it was staying still. Avery's concerned expression relaxed; a rainbow after a storm.

“Yes! You're a very healthy fish, Finn. Just keep remembering to soak in the tub at least once a day when you can't go swimming, so your gills stay healthy and your scales don't dry out.”

“Okay!” He was already off the couch, stretching his arms over his head and swishing his tail, as if laying across our laps for ten minutes had made him stiff. I shook my head, grinning. “I'll go for a swim right now, actually! Love you, Caspy! Love you, Avery! Bye, bye, bye, bye!” Each ‘bye’ grew progressively quieter as he descended the stairs, tail thumping clumsily the whole way down.

Once he was out of earshot, I looked down at my hands.

“I feel so bad… he got sick because of me, and he didn't even say anything.”

Avery shifted, pulling me into his arms again. I rested against his soft, cool body.

“He got a bit of a tummy ache from eating something too spicy, not an incurable disease, hehe. You won't make that dish again, and he'll tell you next time something doesn't agree with him. No need to worry yourself sick, okay? Life is unpredictable and stressful, sometimes… but we're your family, Casper. We understand.”

I snuggled against Avery's side as he held me, my throat constricting as he said the last few words. He looked down at me, and then I felt my favorite little tickle under my chin, coaxing me to look at him.

“Now… I believe I need to tend to my other patient, hm? Why don't we start your weekend with a little physical therapy on those shoulders? I swear, you're wound up tighter than an eight day clock.” He brought me up with him as he stood, strong arms carrying me bridal-style in the direction of the bedroom, giving me no room to protest.

Not that I would have. My fingertips fiddled with the collar of his shirt, the ghost of a coy smile dancing across my lips.

“Alright, doctor… but you'll have to let me return the favor, afterwards. After all, I've got a whole week's worth of lost time to make up for. Think you can handle that much…?”

The shade of cerulean that rose in his cheeks told me he caught my meaning, and I watched his wisp of surprise turn into a bashful giggle.

“Can't wait, dewdrop.”

[hometoursandotherstuff]

This 1903 home in Biloxi, Mississippi was completely renovated and I actually like the reno. 4bds, 3ba, $450K. But, the best part is that it's been used only as an Airbnb so the owner is selling it furnished. For $450K with all the beautiful furnishings, I'd take it.

Similar to other fine southern homes, it has a dog trot hall with original stick walls.

It looks like a wall was knocked out to open up the kitchen & living room. I like the tray ceiling.

That nice little bar cabinet is staying with the house.

There's a TV room with some comfy seating.

Kitchen is lovely. Do you love the floor?

What do you think of the stairs? Love the railing. I also like how they incorporated modern with vintage via some original architectural features and antique furniture.

The banquette in the corner makes a comfortable kitchen dining space.

Off to the side of the kitchen is a dining room.

This bedroom is wonderful. Love the furniture and the purple stick walls, plus the original floor.

And, look at this bathroom. The copper tub, vintage console made into a sink and the black tile. Beautiful.

The laundry is also in here.

I like the way they put a shower next to the tub, and the tub has a lovely copper patina.

This larger bedroom looks like the primary. The beautiful porch details are visible thru the big windows, all of which have seats. Love the built-in shelves and the dark walls.

Beautiful fireplace, bed and art deco desk.

Upstairs is a very large room that doesn't have to be a bedroom. It would make a nice family room or game room, too.

A large bath is 3 steps down.

Plus, there's this nice big bedroom up here, too.

The buyer will also get this cool swan table.

Nice little deck on the back of the home.

The house is on a 9,583 sq. ft. lot.

https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/646-Water-St-Biloxi-MS-39530/77963268_zpid/?

[shattered-reflections-au]

Fluffvember 26, Infodumping // “I love hearing you talk about this”

--- --- ---

Even though Shadow worked at an antique store, he still loved his hobby.

Shadow was what you would call a thrift-store-whore. An antique shop gremlin. He let it be known.

Shadow came parading into the room, a cardboard box heavy in his hands as he sang out the name of his beloved.

"Viooooooooo~" he sang, "i have giiiifffftttssss~"

Vio spun around in his desk chair, giving his attention over to Shadow.

"okay, so, don't get mad, but i just HAD to get you these." Shadow trailed off as he planted the cardboard box down on the bed.

Shadow vocalized a drumroll as he pulled out the first of many things in his box.

"okay, so, this is a women's blouse, but it was just so "you" that i knew you'd like it." he explained, pulling out a flouncy linen shirt, light lilac and patterned with roses.

Shadow was bouncing on the balls of his feet as he handed it over to his boyfriend.

"now it is Hand was only, but i know it's worth it because look at it!" he exclaimed. "it's all hand stitched and only needs a tiny bit of repair. it was hand painted with the dye to make the pattern too, isn't' it cool?" he added. "i looked it up once i found it and apparently this particular style and pattern dates back to like, the early 1900s. isn't that cool?"

Vio looked the garment over, the little green leaves turning to violet ones in his hands.

"it's so pretty," he mentioned, seeing Shadow nod like a madman out of the corner of his eye.

"how it was in my antique shop for only $20 is unfathomable." Shadow added, pulling out the next thing.

"aaaannnddd i know you needed a new little thing to brighten up your desk," He muttered. He pulled a little trinket out of the box.

it was a little porcelain cat. A pudgy little calico asleep on a stack of books.

"isn't he cute??" Shadow asked, setting it on Vio's desk.

Vio nodded, "very cute."

"and i have a few rugs for around the house, and like more things, but i won't bore you with the details," Shadow bragged. "plus, the rugs need to be cleaned first."

"you wouldn't bore me," Vio mentioned. Shadow's gaze snapping to him.

"huh? but you didn't seem like you were..." Shadow trailed off.

“I love hearing you talk about this," Vio explained, gesturing to Shadow's box of miscellaneous trinkets. "Antiques are your thing. i love hearing you talk about them. all the passion you have for them."

Shadow smiled, suddenly looking a little bashful. "would you mind if i talked about them some more?" Shadow asked.

"wait until i can get us some tea, then sure," Vio proposed.

Shadow hopped onto Vio's bed, getting comfy. "i'd like that very much."

Vio smiled, exiting his room to the kitchen. but just before he left, he added something.

"oh, you know what i really need? a tray for having tea in bed. Definitely vintage. do you think you could make that happen?" he asked.

Shadow lit up with a grin.

"absolutely."

[cryptid-stimming]

Age-Regressor Alastor (Hazbin Hotel) Stimboard (with late 18th century/early 19th century toys)

x x x / x x / x x x

[Image description: a 9 gif stimboard; from left to right.

First line: A gif panning out on large wooden rocking horse outside in front of a red brick wall. The horse has a dappled painted white coat, a red saddle and a white hair mane that is blowing in the wind. A close-up gif of a spinning thaumatrope on a wooden stand, the thaumatrope is a circle of card attached to string, one side has an image of a birdcage and the other a bird and when spun fast it creates the illusion of a bird in a cage. A close-up gif of fingers picking up a metal spinning top (with small metal beads) and spinning it.

Second line: A gif panning over small wooden desks in a Victorian one-room schoolhouse before ending up at an old wood stove and a chalkboard at the front of the class. A still image of Alastor from Hazbin Hotel with an edited antique pacifier in his mouth. And a close-up give panning over a Victorian school desk with a textbook and metal bow compass.

Third line: A gif of children playing with 18th century toys; a doll, wooden blocks, a jacob's ladder & a wooden ball and cup. A gif jumpcutting as a spinning top toy ballerina spins in a toy theater, and close up shots of her 'legs' and torso spinning. And a gif panning over a tray of glass marbles.

End of image description.]

[avirael]

The Frozen Lake

It was the third day since he had stopped feeling like dying.

About a week ago he had woken up from his far too lifelike fever dream and a few days later the last spikes of the fever itself had been gone too just like the hallucinations it had brought in his sleep.

He still had been sick though and welcomed Rael telling him to stay in bed until he was perfectly healthy again all too eagerly.

While he still sneezed every now and then, it was at least tolerable now, still annoying but he didn’t feel incredibly uncomfortable anymore.

That day, just like the last and also the ones before that, he had awoken late. Against Rael’s order to stay in bed he had found the courage to get up and take a look out of the window. It was a sunny day, which in Coerthas still meant that it was bitterly cold though. But the sun was shining brightly and already high in the sky too which meant it had to be almost midday. He had slept way too long again, way to many hours for a surprisingly dreamless sleep. Or maybe it was exactly the lack of dreams that allowed him to finally rest, after all in the past there rarely had been good ones…

For a moment he considered to go downstairs and ask for a late breakfast if that wasn’t too insolent given the late hour but then a knock sounded from the door.

Quickly he hurried back to bed, just in case it was Rael, but the person who carefully peeked into the room a few seconds later wasn’t a viera.

“Ah, you are awake! That’s good!”, Haurchefant exclaimed happily and brought a small tray with hot soup and also something warm to drink. “It is so late already, you must be horribly hungry. Alphinaud checked in on you earlier but you were still fast asleep and he didn’t have the heart to wake you.”

A little uncertain on how to answer to that, A’viloh just nodded. Haurchefant grinned, put down a mug on the bedside table and handed A‘viloh a comfortingly warm bowl filled with some rather delicious smelling stew.

Instead of fetching the chair from the small desk by the window, Haurchefant sat down at the lower end of the bed balancing the tray with his own lunch on his knees. Rael once told him that ishgardian society had an absurd amount of strict and antiquated rules and so A’viloh couldn’t help but wonder, that although it seemed like a very appropriate distance to him, in Haurchefant’s hometown the fact alone that he dared to sit on someone else’s bed was probably scandalous.

“I hope you don’t mind me having lunch with you.”, the Elezen asked as he noticed A‘viloh staring.

Quickly the Miqo’te lowered his gaze to his bowl of soup. “Not at all.”, he muttered and tried a spoonful of the food just to change the topic. “Mhh, this is very good!”, he mumbled, still chewing, surprised by how good this really was compared to the bland food and bitter teas Rael had usually brought him these last few days. It must have been the Viera’s way of punishing him for running away.

Haurchefant laughed and then for a while they ate in silence.

“You look a lot healthier already.”, the Elezen stated after a while with an amiable smile on his face before taking a sip from his mug.

A‘viloh shrugged a little embarrassed, since it had been his own fault that he hadn’t been well in the first place. “Only because all of you took so good care of me.”

Haurchefant nodded. “You know, you had us all horribly worried right?”

“Sorry about that.”, he said and guitily looked into his mug.

Curiously Haurchefant eyed him for a moment. “Why did you do that anyway? Run out into the storm.”

A bit surprised A’viloh looked up. Had they all thought he had done this on purpose? “There wasn’t a storm when I left! What do I know about weather? I didn’t expect it to start snowing, let alone that much!”

That made the Elezen chuckle again but he still looked at him expecting an answer.

“Still… why did you leave?”

“I assumed Rael told you…”, A’viloh replied not sure what Haurchefant wanted to hear exactly. He nodded. “Rael did. But maybe I want to hear it from you…”

A’viloh sighed. His plan hadn’t been very smart and he felt a little uncomfortable having to explain his reasons to someone else, when in retrospect it didn’t make much sense even to his own ears.

“You know the… circumstances under which we fled Ul’dah… I couldn’t… um… the fact that we didn’t even know what happened to our friends… I wanted to find out, because it doesn’t seem fair to me that we escaped while all of them didn’t…”

“Mhh…”, Haurchefant nodded thoughtfully but let go off the topic for now. Instead he asked, „And how are you feeling today?”

Somehow that question confused A’viloh even more.

“What do you mean?”

“It’s a simple question, isn’t it?”, he said still smiling politely.

Of course it was a simple question. Just the answer felt unreasonable complicated to him. To make things even more difficult people who asked such a question usually wanted to hear “I‘m fine, and you?” or “Very good, thank you.” for an answer and rarely the truth. They certainly didn’t want to hear “A few days ago I was convinced I was going to die and honestly it wasn’t that bad, so now I‘m still not sure wether I am happy to still be alive or not”.

“Alright… I guess.”, he mumbled instead. He had never been a good liar and could only hope that this fact wasn’t too obvious for the Elezen.

“You know what?”, Haurchefant proclaimed after watching him thoughtfully for a second. “Today is a wonderful day. We should go for a walk.”

“A walk?!”, A’viloh exclaimed wide-eyed, as if he had just asked something unreasonable of him.

“Why not?”

A’viloh couldn’t think of a good reason why not, other than that he was supposed to stay in bed, so he shrugged.

“Where’s Rael?”, he asked instead.

Haurchefant smirked. “Do you need Rael’s permission to go outside?”

“Of course not.”, the Miqo’te protested. “But Rael will be mad if I run off again, especially against their orders to stay in bed.”

“Rael and Alphinaud went to the observatory earlier.”, Haurchefant explained. “We’ll be back before they are, I promise.”

What was A’viloh supposed to say against that and also against the expectant look on the Elezen’s face. He took another glimpse towards the window and decided that it looked nice enough to go outside.

“Fine.”

“Good!”, Haurchefant exclaimed happily and collected their empty bowls and mugs. “There should be warm clothes for you in the wardrobe. If you need anything else just ask someone. I’ll wait for you by the northern gate.”

After Haurchefant had left, A’viloh remained sitting in his bed for a moment longer contemplating on the Elezen’s question. Yes, he felt better again. But better in what comparison? Better than a few days ago when he had felt and also been half-dead? Though he didn’t feel sick anymore now, there still was a weigh on his heart. From his plan that had failed so spectacularly and even more so from the dreams he wouldn’t have minded to keep on dreaming forever.

Vehemently he shook his head and decided not to think about that now or he would just crawl back under the blanket of his comfortably warm bed again. Instead he got up and took a look into the wardrobe. Almost none of these were his own clothes of course since all he possessed were the ones he had worn on his body that day they fled Ul’dah. Very unsuitable for this climate. But neither did he see the borrowed clothes he had worn that night when he had tried to run away. Everything in here looked even softer and warmer like someone had wanted to make sure he was feeling comfortable. To his surprise the things didn’t look that much too big for him either, unlike his last set of clothes. Besides a few Hyur most people here at Camp Dragonhead were grown up Elezen but these clothes looked like they belonged to neither. Maybe it were clothes for Elezen children, he wondered and also thought that in that case someone must have brought them here just for him.

Grateful for so much effort he picked a few pieces and got dressed. Lazily he ran his fingers through his hair to get rid of the worst knots but the look into the small mirror at the washbasin, where his tired face stared back at him reproachfully, just made him sigh. Once he was ready he took the warm coat out of the wardrobe too and went out to look for Haurchefant. Just as he had said, the Elezen was standing by the gate that led to the north-east, towards the ruins of the Steel Vigil.

From afar Haurchefant already recognised the Miqo’te, his bright red hair a singularity among all the people living here. Pleasantly smiling as always he waved at him and A’viloh couldn’t help but smile a little too and wave back as he hurriedly walked towards him.

“There you are! I see the clothes fit you nicely.”

A’viloh nodded.

“They do. Thank you very much for these.”

Haurchefant dismissively waved with one hand. “It’s the least I could do…”

But he had done a lot more than that, A’viloh thought. “I think there’s more I need to thank you for. Rael told me it was you who saved my life.”

“Mhhh…”, Haurchefant tilted his head as if he wasn’t sure if this statement was entirely the truth. “Rael is too humble. They played a bit of a role in that too. After all it was Rael who noticed you were gone. And it was also Rael who didn’t leave your bedside and tried their best to heal you.”

A’viloh remembered waking up and finding the usually quite touch-averse viera cuddled up to him with a look on their face so horribly sad like he had never seen on them before. Rael had pretended it was nothing but it had been a very unconvincing performance. Asked about it Alphinaud had only offered a few sentences about how worried Rael had looked and how they had used all kinds of spells he himself had never seen or heard of before, all of it to try and save him. It had made him feel even more guilty for his stupidity.

So maybe Haurchefant was right. But still it had been him who had risked going out into the storm to find him.

“Anyway. I still want to thank you! Honestly.”, he insisted. But how honestly was it really?

Sure, he was glad to still be alive. After all his plan hadn’t been to run out into a blizzard and freeze to death, although some of them seemed to think that was the case. But once he found himself in this situation he had to admit that he had welcomed his fate rather willingly. A fact that shocked even himself a little looking back at it now.

“You’re welcome. After all you wouldn’t be any help to your friends frozen to death out there.”, Haurchefant joked with a wry smile on his lips.

“I guess not...”, A’viloh muttered, the topic of his friends making his mood visibly sink again.

Of course the Elezen noticed and his smile turned into a playful grin. “But I acted a little selfish too, you know? I think Camp Dragonhead is a lot friendlier with your company and I would like to have you and your pretty smile around a little longer.”

For a moment A’viloh’s eyes shot up to look at the others face before he quickly pretended that something somewhere a little bit to his left was a lot more interesting. Sometimes Haurchefant randomly said things, A’viloh hadn’t had the slightest idea how to react to. Not because he was that oblivious but simply because it puzzled him. Nonetheless the air suddenly didn’t feel that cold anymore on his face.

Haurchefant was always very kind to him. Well, he mostly was kind to everybody but sometimes he seemed to admire him especially. Him of all people, although there was nothing special about him. Haurchefant sometimes spoke of him like he was one of the greatest heroes of all time and it felt so ridiculous to him. He was just silly, cowardly A‘viloh! What had he ever achieved in his miserable life to justify such admiration? The people called him a Warrior of Light but wasn’t that some grand overstatement? Some days he thought all of this had been a horrible mistake. A great misunderstanding! Then he wondered how he had ever gotten entangled in this madness in the first place and also if he ever would get out of it again. But what else should he do with his life anyway...

While A’viloh’s brain still screeched in desperate search for a proper response, Haurchefant seemed to realise he had flustered him and glossed it over by gesturing to the gate.

“How about we walk a few yalms? There’s something you need to see!”

Still too dumbstruck to speak or to even wonder what the Elezen was talking about, A’viloh nodded and then proceeded to follow him out into the snowy landscape.

After a few minutes Haurchefant paused and took a deep breath. “Isn’t the air wonderful today?”

A’viloh followed his example, breathed deeply and let his gaze wander over the snow covered landscape with a few pines here and there and the mountains and ruins of the Steel Vigil in the distance. The air was cool and fresh, still cold enough that the warm sun couldn’t melt the snow. Instead the rays of sunshine made the scenery shine and sparkle as if everything was covered not in ice but in millions over millions of tiny diamonds.

“It is.”, he answered and smiled, surprised how beautiful this inhospitable landscape could be, before with a sudden spark of curiosity he finally asked. “Where are we going?”

“It’s not far anymore.”, Haurchefant said with a grin on his face and pointed into another direction. Shortly after and only a bit further ahead they reached a small lake.

As they got closer A‘viloh noticed that it not only was covered in a layer of snow and ice but also that quite a few off-duty soldiers, given the proximity to the camp he assumed they had to be, were standing right on top of the frozen lake. No, they were not quite standing. It looked more like they were dancing or flying maybe. More or less gracefully they moved over the lake‘s surface in fluid swift strides, some just moving in wide circles and other swirling around this way or that. A’viloh had never seen something like this and it looked strange and impossible but at the same time very beautiful to him.

The two of them had almost reached the lake by then, A’viloh a few steps ahead to get a better look at the wondrous people on the ice and he already wanted to ask how they did that, when his attention was drawn elsewhere by a curious squawking sound.

“Oh! Look at them!”, the Miqo’te exclaimed, his fascinated smile still turning a little brighter, as he gestured to a small flock of wild geese resting at the shore of the lake. With ruffled feathers they sat closely huddled together at the edge of the ice and suddenly A‘viloh couldn’t help but worry about them. They looked so unbothered by his presence, sleeping through the day and all the hubbub around them, looking all exhausted and frozen with their puffed up feathers. Like anything could happen to them and they wouldn’t even mind.

Strangely he wondered what he himself had looked like when Haurchefant had found him unconscious in the snow. He must have been a pitiful sight. Had the Elezen thought him beyond saving too, just like he himself had. What if he had found him a little later or not at all? Maybe that would have been better, a voice murmured to him just like it had so many times before and for a moment, tempted by the grief heavy on his heart once again, he almost believed it.

But no, he would be dead then and while he would have liked to imagine that this would mean he could be with his loved ones again, it was not exactly what either of the tribes he had lived with believed.

Vaguely he remembered his father working for hours, digging a grave at what used to be Wellwick Wood. An elderly woman too exhausted by their long journey, his grandmother if he remembered correctly, had died shortly after they had arrived there. With a sad smile on his face his father had explained to his children, who had stared down into the hole in the ground with confusion in their eyes, how by returning her body to the earth there could still grow new life from this death.

Or the drake tribe of the Sagolii Desert, who always burned their dead and left the ashes to be carried away by the desert wind, believing that it would make it easier for the deceased‘s aether to return to the Aetheric Sea and create something new elsewhere.

With a sudden sharp pain in his heart A’viloh realised that neither of the people he loved had gotten the burial they would have wanted for themselves. And neither had A‘viloh himself wanted to die in the coldness of Coerthas and be forever forgotten under a thick layer of snow and ice. He had thought about dying before but never had he been this close to it. For a second he wondered if this was something worth speaking to Rael about, but he wasn’t sure they wouldn’t misunderstand and get mad at him again.

“Why do you make such a sad face now?”, Haurchefant asked having noticed the smile slip from the Miqo’te’s face. But A’viloh just vehemently shook his head and focused on the geese again.

“They must be horribly cold.”, he wondered in a voice that suggested he already planned to take all of them to the safety of his comfortably warm room.

Haurchefant chuckled. “Don’t worry, they survived the storm out here after all. They keep each other warm, that’s why you‘ll rarely see one of them alone. A bit like you and your friends.”

“Maybe…”, A’viloh answered thinking about this comparison for a moment. “I just wish it wouldn’t always be me who needs to be taken care of. But as proven in Ul’dah and now once again I am simply too weak and useless to keep myself alive, not to mention anyone else.”

The Elezen’s face got a little stern as he folded his arms in front of his chest. “Don’t say that, I am sure it’s not true! This was just bad luck! You are neither weak nor useless!”

A’viloh shrugged. “But that’s how I feel right now...”

Slowly Haurchefant nodded before speaking again with a silent but determined voice. “Listen. I‘ll never forget how bravely you fought for Francel although you barely knew him. You could have gotten yourself in trouble with that and you helped him anyway.”

“It’s not like I did that on my own -”, A’viloh tried to protest but was immediately interrupted. “But you still helped! And I’m sure even without Rael you would have done so!”

Another shrug was all Haurchefant got in response, so the Elezen thought for a second before making an offer. “You want to make yourself useful, right? Get stronger? I could teach you how to fight like a real ishgardian knight, with sword and shield. Or we have some dragoons at Camp Dragonhead too! I’m sure there’s a lot you could learn from them.”

A‘viloh‘s face turned to disbelief. “I really don’t think I could fight with armor and weapons this heavy…”

“You can’t say so if you don’t try! And I have you know that dragoon armors are surprisingly light. How do you think they could still be this agile otherwise? Promise me to at least try training with them a little!”

He didn’t really want to agree to that. He knew he would make a fool of himself. But how could he say no with Haurchefant trying everything in his power to cheer him up. Weakly he shook his head and muttered: “Fine…”

“Perfect!”, Haurchefant exclaimed with a bright smile on his face. “I think an early reward for your efforts is appropriate then!”

Confused A’viloh watched him take a small bag off of his shoulders, which he hadn’t even noticed until now. For a moment the Elezen was busy undoing a knot before he opened the bag and presented to A‘viloh a set of two weirdly shaped blades attached to pieces of wood with leather straps. He had no idea what these constructs were meant to do and that was plainly visible on his face. “What’s that?”

“Ice skates of course!”, Haurchefant said as if that would explain it all but the Miqo’te‘s face remained clueless, so Haurchefant gestured to the lake behind them. “You attach them to your boots so you can walk on the ice like this!”

“Oh!”, A’viloh exclaimed as he understood what Haurchefant was planning. “I don’t think-… I mean I‘ve never-… You don’t really want me to step on that lake do you?” The idea somehow scared him.

“Why not?”, Haurchefant asked for the second time today with this smile that made the question sound like a challenge.

“It’s just a bit of ice!”, A‘vi objected. “What if it breaks?”

The Elezen shook his head and proceeded to fasten the metal blades beneath his boots. “Ah, don’t worry. The ice is thick enough, it will take at least a few more days to melt.”

“I don’t know…”, was all A’viloh replied as Haurchefant pressed another pair of skates into his hands. But the Elezen remained determined and took a few wobbly steps through the snow and onto the ice. “See! I can stand on it and it doesn’t break! You are a lot lighter than me, so why wouldn’t you be able to?”

Oh, you don’t know my bad luck!, A‘viloh thought but Haurchefant didn’t look like he would take that for an excuse. Instead he stretched out a hand towards the Miqo’te. “Come one! Believe me, this is going to be funny!”

For a second A‘viloh pondered his options. The idea of nothing but a little bit of ice between him and the water still terrified him but Haurchefant seemed so excited about this and the other people actually seemed to have fun too. Maybe he should at least pretend to try... Reluctantly he sat down on a rock and tried to put on the skates just like Haurchefant had done a moment ago.

“The clasp on the back too. Make sure none of them are loose… Yes, that looks fine!”, Haurchefant helpfully explained. As A’viloh got up, he almost flopped right back down into the snow. It was a weird feeling to balance his whole weight on only two thin pieces of metal. As he carefully took the first few steps towards the lake Haurchefant reached out for him once more. “Here! Take my hand! I don’t want you to fall…”

Hesitantly A‘vi stepped onto the ice and immediately felt like the ground was being pulled away beneath his feet. He struggled for balance, feeling himself falling backwards, so Haurchefants arm was a very welcome thing to hold on to.

With a chuckle the Elezen tried to loosen A‘vi‘s desperate grip on his arm and instead took each of his hand in one of his own before carefully making slow steps backwards pulling A‘viloh over the ice, which A’vi could swear was making suspicious crackling sounds below them. There was no way to tell the blades beneath his feet not to move, so all A’viloh could do was try not to fall and plead to Haurchefant with ears flat on his head and panic in his eyes, as he slowly was pulled further onto the lake. “No, no, no. Take me back, that’s a horrible idea!”

“Calm down. There’s nothing to be afraid of. I promise.”, Haurchefant said soothingly and continued to explain to him how to move on the ice skates. And in fact the Elezen’s calm voice slowly made A’viloh feel less anxious. His hands, frantically clasping at Haurchefant’s, relaxed along with his legs. It was still a weird feeling to be standing on the ice but now it felt a lot easier to remain balanced. He glanced at the people around them while remaining as still as possible, studied their movements for a moment and then tentatively tried to mimic the way they slowly pushed their feet above the slippery surface. To his surprise he really moved forward without much effort and also without feeling the sensation of falling again, closer to Haurchefant who had steadied him with his outstretched arms so far.

“See! It’s not that difficult.”, he said while making another step backwards so A’viloh had to follow with another step forward. The Miqo’te, strangely excited about the fact that he was actually moving on these weird ice-blades, laughed happily. “You are even going backwards!”

Haurchefants laughed. “One step after the other. Let’s teach you how to go forward first, hm? I‘ll let go off one of your hands but don’t worry, I still got you. One feet after the other just like you did before…”

In fact it almost felt easier now that he could use one of his arms to balance himself. Very slowly at first they floated above the icy surface of the lake but soon A‘viloh got braver. Once he almost lost his balance but for a comparably tall and strong person like Haurchefant it seemed like a very easy task to keep a small Miqo’te on his feet. Almost falling had felt like a shock for a second but only moments later they were laughing about it and in the end A’viloh was surprised and also a little proud how quickly he had learned and how much fun this was.

He wasn’t sure how much time they spent there on the frozen lake but at some point a bell sounded from the nearby Camp. Startled A’viloh looked up (and almost lost his balance again). “How late is it? I’m sure you have more important things to do than this! I’m sorry if I’m keeping you from doing your work.”

But Haurchefant just laughed and teased, “What could be more important than prove to you that not all of Coerthas is a deadly wasteland trying to kill you? But I think we really should return soon. I don’t want you to get cold again and after all we also don’t want Rael to find out about this little excursion, do we?”

For a second A’viloh wished the viera could see him now and wondered what their reaction would be like. The thought made him chuckle.

And as they floated, one last circle around the lake, A’viloh couldn’t help but wonder that maybe it was happy moments like this. The reason he was still here. Moments that made his life worth living.

---

inspired by the poem The Reversal by Leila Chatti

[abbygrabska]

Voyage of The Damned

The Doctor walks around the console, deep in thought. Then something crashes through the wall and we fall to the floor.

I let out a cough and wave a hand in the air to clear the smoke. “What the fuck?!” I spot a life preserver that reads ‘Titanic’.

The Doctor gets up, and, using various controls, closes the Tardis, pushing out the ship.

The Doctor and I step out and brush ourselves off. I pat the Tardis, making sure she’s okay. The Doctor opens the cupboard door and steps out. I follow him.

We enter a wood-paneled room decorated with potted palm trees and Christmas decorations. People dressed in early 20th-century clothes mill about as waiters pass hors d’oeuvres and champagne. The band is playing a sedate version of ‘Jingle Bells’.

We approach two golden angels garbed in white. They move mechanically and I realize they’re robots.

I wander over to the window and look out, “Right.”

We’re in space.

“Attention all passengers. The Titanic is now in orbit above Sol 3, also known as Earth. Population: Human. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Christmas.”

A video of a bald man with a thin mustache sitting behind a desk, “Max Capricorn Cruiseliners-the fastest, the farthest, the best. And I should know because my name is Max.”

The screen reverts to the cruise line logo.

We walk towards reception.

We stroll through the entertainment lounge, looking around.

“Merry Christmas, sir, ma’am.” The Steward says.

We respond in kind, “Merry Christmas.” We pass by a man speaking into a futuristic phone.

The Doctor approaches a robotic angel.

“Evening. Passenger 57 and 58. Terrible memory. Remind us. Uh, you would be…” The robots voice is neutral, movements smooth and controlled, rather than robotic, “Information: Heavenly Host supplying tourist information.”

“Good, so um… tell me, cos I’m an idiot, where are we from?”

“Information: The Titanic is ‘en route’ from the planet Sto in the Cassavalian Belt. The purpose of the cruise is to experience primitive cultures.” “Titanic.” I nod, “Who thought of the name?” “Information: it was chosen as the most famous vessel on the planet Earth.” “Did they tell you why it was famous?” I ask.

“Information: all designations are chosen by Mr. Max Capricorn, president of Max- Max- Max…” The robot keeps repeating the name, becoming higher in pitch. The head jerks with every ‘Max’.

“Ooh, a bit of a glitch.” The Doctor reaches into his pocket, about to sonic the Host when the steward rushes in.

“Sir, we can handle this.” He waves to others for assistance. Two other stewards arrive and switch off the host taking it away, “Software problem, that’s all. Leave it with us, sir. Merry Christmas.”

In reception, I spot a waitress drop her tray after bumping into the man on the phone. “For Tov’s sake, look where you’re going! This jacket’s a genuine Earth antique.” “I’m sorry, sir.” She bends down to pick up the broken glass. “You;ll be sorry when it comes off your wages, sweetheart.”

I glare, storming over to him, “Hey, don’t talk to her like that. If you were paying attention that wouldn’t have happened.”

He rolls his eyes, walking off, “No wonder Max Capricorn is going down the drain.”

I kneel on the floor and help the waitress with the glass. The Doctor does the same.

“Thank you, sir, ma’am. I can manage.” “Never said you couldn’t. That man was a proper dickhead.” I grin, “I’m Abby, by the way.” I motion to the Doctor, “And that’s the Doctor.” “Astrid, ma’am. Astrid Peth.” “Nice to meet you, Astrid Peth. Merry Christmas.” She seems surprised with him, “Merry Christmas, sir.” “Just Doctor, not sir.”

“You enjoying the cruise?” She asks.

I nod, “We are.”

She stands, “That’s good.” We stand as well.

“What about you? A long way from home, Planet Sto.” “Doesn’t feel that different. I spent three years working at the spaceport diner, traveled all the way here… and I’m still waiting on tables.” She walks away. I follow her, pulling the Doctor along. “No shore leave?” He asks. She clears a table by the window, “We’re not allowed. They can't afford the insurance. I just wanted to try it, just once.” She looks out the window, “Never stood on another world. I used to watch the ships heading off to the stars and I always dreamt of… It sounds daft.” “You dreamt of another sky. New sun, new air, new life. A whole universe teeming with life. Why stand still when there’s all that life out there?” I ask.

“Yeah. So.. you two travel a lot?”

“All the time. Just for fun. Well, that’s the plan. Never quite works. Must be rich, though. Haven’t got a penny.” He whispers the last word, “Stowaway.” “You’re kidding.” “Seriously.” “No!”

“Oh, yeah.” I grin.

She laughs, “How did you get on board?”

“Accident. I’ve got this, sort of, ship thing. I was just rebuilding her. Left the defenses down, and bumped into the Titanic. Here we are. Bit of a party, we thought, ‘Why not?’”

“I should report you.”

“Go on then.” “I’ll get you two a drink…” She whispers, “on the house.” She walks away.

The singer starts ‘Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday’, the dance floor livens up. I see a heavyset couple dressed in purple country-western outfits sitting and eating a basket of chicken wings. Everyone is laughing and pointing at them.

“Just ignore ‘em.” I hear the man say as I approach.

I sit at the table with them, the Doctor joins me.

“Something’s tickled them.”

“They told us it was fancy dress. Very funny, I’m sure.” The woman says.

“They’re just pickin’ on us because we haven’t paid. We won our tickets in a competition.” The man tells us.

“I had to name the five husbands of Joofie Crystalle in ‘By the Light of the Asteroid.’” “Probably not good enough for that lot.” The man motions to the laughing crowd, “They think we should be in steerage.”

I reach into the Doctor’s pocket, “Can’t have that, can we?”

I hold the sonic at my side and aim behind me.

The champagne on the table pops its cork, spraying all over those at the table.

The two laugh.

“Did… Did you do that?”

I shrug, “Maybe.” I hand the Doctor his sonic.

“I’m Morvin van Hoff.” The man shakes my hand, “This is my good woman, Foon.”

I shake Foon’s hand, “I’m Abby, this is the Doctor. And can I just say, I love your outfits. They remind me of Dolly Parton.” “Who’s that?” Foon asks.

“She’s an Earth country singer. She has her own amusement park called Dollywood. It has a museum of all the outfits she’s ever worn on stage, it’s honestly amazing. I think she’d love you two.” Morvin smiles, “Isn’t that nice. Do you know much about Earth?”

“I was born on Earth. 1986. I’ll be 23 soon.” “You were born there? I thought Earth wasn’t aware of aliens. How’d you get on board then?” I open my mouth to answer then the PA echoes.

“Attention, please. Shore leave tickets Red 6-7 are now activated. Red 6-7.” Foon takes out a ticket, “Red 6-7. That’s us.” The couple stands, “Are you Red 6-7?”

“Might as well be.” I shrug. “Come on.” Morvin puts his arm around Foon, “We’re going to Earth.”

An older man, dressed in a tweed suit holds up a red sign bearing ‘6-7’.

“Red 6-7. Red 6-7. This way, as fast as you can.” We all walk over. Astrid approaches us. “I got you two drinks.”

I take the tray from her, “And we’ve got a treat for you. Come on.”

“Red 6-7 departing shortly.” The Doctor holds up his psychic paper and my hand, “Red 6-7 plus one.”

“Uh, quickly, sir, and please take three teleport bracelets if you would.” “I’ll get the sack.” I hand her a bracelet, “Brand new sky.”

“To repeat, I am Mr. Copper, the ship’s historian, and I shall be taking you to old London town in the country of the U.K. ruled over by the good King Wenceslas. Now human beings worshiped the great god Santa, a creature with fearsome claws, and his wife Mary. And every Christmas Eve the people of the U.K. go to war with the country of Turkey. They then eat the Turkey people for Christmas dinner… like savages.”

“Excuse me, sorry, sorry, but, um… where did you get all this from?” I ask.

“Well, I have a first-class degree in Earthonomics. Now stand by…” “And me! And me! Red 6-7!”

The owner of the voice is a small red-skinned alien with short spikes along his head.

“Well, take a bracelet, sir?” “Uh, but, um, hold on, hold on. What was your name?”

“Bannakaffalatta.”

“Ok, Bannakaffalatta. But it’s Christmas Eve down there. Late-night shopping, tons of people. He’s like a walking conker. No offense, but you’ll cause a riot ‘cause the streets are going to be packed with shoppers and parties…”

We get teleported down to Earth and arrive on an empty street.

“Oh.” I look around. “Now, spending money. I have a credit card in Earth currency if you want to buy trinkets or, uh, stockings or the local delicacy, which is known as ‘beef’, but don’t stray too far, it could be dangerous. Any day now they start boxing.” While Mr. Copper continues to talk, the Doctor looks around, confused by the empty street.

“It should be full. It should be busy. Something’s wrong.”

“But it’s beautiful.” Astrid states. “Really? Do you think so? It’s just a street. The pyramids are beautiful, and New Zealand…” “But it’s a different planet. I’m standing on a different planet. Th-there’s concrete… and shops, alien shops, real alien shops! Look, no stars in the sky. And it smells. It stinks!” She gasps, “This is amazing! Thank you!” She hugs us. “Yeah? Come on then, let’s have a look.” We cross the street to a newsagent’s booth. There’s an old man inside, bundled in winter clothes.

“Hello there! Sorry, uh, obvious question, but where’s everybody gone?” “Oh-ho, scared!” It clicks in my head, “Oh, yeah. That checks out.” “Why?” The Doctor asks.

“Well, it’s them, up above.” The old man points skyward, “Look, Christmas before last we had that big bloody spaceship, everyone standing on a roof.” He points at his small TV, “And then last year, that Christmas Star electrocuting all over the place, draining the Thames.” “This place is amazing.” Astrid admires.

“And this year, Lord knows what. So everybody’s scarpered, gone to the country. All except me… and Her Majesty.” The man stands proudly and looks at the TV.

“Her Majesty the Queen has confirmed that she will be staying in Buckingham Palace throughout the festive season to show the people of London and the world, that there’s nothing to fear.”

“God bless her!” He salutes, “We stand vigil.”

“Well, between you and me, I think Her Majesty’s got it right. As far as I know, this year, there is nothing to worry about.” We get teleported away suddenly.

“I was mid-sentence.” The Doctor tells Mr. Copper.

“Yes, I’m sorry about that. A bit of a  problem. If I could have your bracelets…”

The chief steward joins us, “Apologies, ladies and gentlemen, Bannakaffalatta, we seem to have suffered a slight power fluctuation. If you’d like to return to the festivities. And on behalf of Max Capricorn Cruiseliners, free drinks will be provided.” The ticket holders depart.

“That was the best, the best!” Astrid leaves. The Doctor and I approach the chief steward.

“What sort of power fluctuation?”

I spot a framed screen showing a video loop of Max Capricorn, I tap the Doctor’s shoulder and point to it.

He puts on his glasses and takes out his sonic screwdriver, which he uses on the frame.

It opens and he changes some settings until the screen shows the Titanic and its immediate surroundings. The shields are offline. I peer out the window and see the meteors approach.

“Is this the bridge? I need to talk to the captain. You’ve got a meteoroid storm coming in West 0 by North 2.” “Who is this?” “Never mind that. Your shields are down. Check your scanners, Captain. You’ve got meteoroids coming in and now shielding!” “You have no authorization. You will clear the comms at once.” “Yeah? Just look starboard!”

Two stewards come to escort us out of reception.

“Come with me, sir, ma’am.”

The Doctor and I are led away through reception, still arguing.

“You’ve got a rock storm heading for this ship and the shields are down!”

I slam my foot on the steward’s foot and run to the stage where the band is playing.

“Everyone, listen to me! This is an emergency! Get to the lifeb…” A host covers my mouth and pulls me away.

I am taken away more forcibly from the room.

“Look out the windows!” People slowly go to the windows.

“If you don’t believe us, check the shields yourself!” “Sir, I can vouch for him!”

“Look, Steward, he’s just had a bit too much to drink.” “Sir, something seems to have gone wrong. All the teleports are down.” “Not now!” The Doctor and I are led through the maintenance corridors. Astrid, Mr. Copper, Bannakaffalatta, and the Van Hoffs follow us. “The shields are down, we are going to get hit!”

Everyone begins talking at once.

“Oi! Steward! I’m telling you the shields are down!” “Listen to him! Listen to him!”

Meteoroids hit the ship three times and we are all thrown to the floor.

The Doctor stops me from hitting my head.

The Doctor is the first to stand, he shoes everyone and listens, “It’s stopping.”

He helps me up, “You all right?” I nod, “Yeah.” “Bad name for a ship. Either that or this suit is unlucky.”

“I think it’s you that’s unlucky.” I grin.

The Doctor kneels to examine one of the stewards, the man is dead.

“Ev… everyone… Ladies and gentlemen, Bannakaffalatta, I must apologize on behalf of Max Capricorn Cruiseliners. We seem to have had a small collision.” “Small?” “You know how much I paid for my ticket?” “If I could have silence, ladies, gentlemen…” Everyone ignores him and continues arguing.

“Quiet!” Everyone stops, “Thank you. I… I’m sure Max Capricorn Cruiseliners will be able to reimburse you for any inconvenience. But first I would point out that we are very much alive.” I notice the cut on Mr. Copper’s head, “Are you all right?” I dab the cut on his head.

The Doctor walks over to us. “She is, after all, a fine, sturdy ship. If you could all stay here while I ascertain the exact nature of the… the situation.” The chief steward goes to open a hatch.

“Don’t open it!”

The hatch opens and the chief steward is sucked out into space by the vacuum. Everyone grabs hold of the piping near them. The Doctor goes over to the comms and uses his sonic screwdriver on the computer to replace the shield.

“Everyone all right? Abby? Astrid?” I nod.

Astrid pants, “Yeah.” “Foon? Morvin? Mr. Copper? Bannakaffalatta?” “Yes.” “You, what was your name?” The Doctor asks the rude man from earlier.

“Ah, Rickston Slade.” “You all right?” “No thanks to that idiot.” “The steward just died.” Astrid points out. “Then he’s a dead idiot.”

I go to slap him, and the Doctor grabs my hand, “All right, calm down. Just stay still, all of you. Hold on.”

He walks to the hatch opening.

Astrid and I join him, “What happened? How come the shields were down?” “I don’t think it was an accident.” I look out into space and see bodies among the flotsam and jetsam floating above Earth.

“How many dead?” Astrid asks.

“We’re alive, just focus on that. We’ll get you out of here, Astrid. I promise. Look at me. I promise.” I tell her.

She nods. “Good. Now,” The Doctor looks around, “if we can get to Reception, I’ve got a spaceship tucked away. We can all get on board…” I tap him on the shoulder, “Oh.” “What is it? What’s wrong?” Astrid asks. “That’s my spaceship over there.” “Where?” “There, that box. That little blue box.” 

The Tardis floats in space. “That’s a spaceship?” “Oi, don’t knock it.” “It’s a bit small.” “A bit distant. Trouble is, once it’s set adrift, it’s programmed to lock onto the nearest center of gravity and that would be… the Earth.”

The Tardis starts to move towards Earth.

The Doctor speaks into a comms device, “Deck 22 to the bridge. Deck 22 to the bridge. Is there anyone there?” “This is the bridge.” “Oh hello, sailor. Good to hear from you. What’s the situation up there?” “We’ve got air. The oxygen field is holding. But the captain… He’s dead. He did it.” The voice breaks, “I watched while he took down the shields. There was nothing I could do. I tried. I did try.” “All right. Just stay calm. Tell me your name? What’s your name?” I ask.

“Midshipman Frame.” “Nice to meet you, sir. What’s the state of the engines?” “They’re um… Hold on.” there’s a groan on the other end.

“Have you been injured?” “I’m all right. Oh my vot. They’re cycling down.” “That’s a nuclear storm drive, yes?” “Yeah.” “The moment they’re gone, we lose orbit.” “The planet.”

“Oh yes. If we hit the planet, the nuclear storm explodes and wipes out life on Earth. Midshipman, I need you to fire up the engine containment field and feed it back into the core.” “This is never going to work.” “Trust me, it’ll keep the engines going until I can get to the bridge.” The Doctor switches off the comms and faces us.

“We’re going to die!” Foon shrieks.

“Are you saying someone’s done this on purpose?” “We’re just a cruise ship!” “Okay, okay. Tch, tch. First things first. One: we’re going to climb through this ship. Two: we’re going to reach the bridge. Three: we’re going to save the Titanic. Right then, follow me.” “Hang on a minute. Who put you in charge and who the hell are you anyway?” Rickston asks.

“I’m the Doctor. I’m a Time Lord. I’m from the planet Gallifrey in the constellation of Kasterborous. I’m 903 years old and I’m the man who’s gonna save your lives and all six billion people on the planet below. You got a problem with that?” “No.” “In that case, allons-y!”

The Doctor slowly pushes open a metal door that leads into a stairwell littered with debris and sparking cables, “Careful. Follow me.” The Doctor goes ahead clearing the way.

I follow.

“Rather ironic when this is very much the spirit of Christmas. It’s a festival of violence. They say that human beings only survive depending on whether they’ve been good or bad. It’s barbaric.” Mr. Copper says. “Actually, that’s not true. Christmas is a time of-of peace and thanksgiving and… what am I on about? Christmas is always like this.” The Doctor uncovers a dormant host, “We’ve got a Host. Strength of ten. If we can mend it, we can use it to fix the rubble.” “We can do robotics, both of us.” Foon says. “We worked on the milk market back on Sto. it’s all robot staff.” Morvin elaborates.

“See if you can get it working.” I look to the others, “Let’s have a look.”

We climb further up the stairwell and find our path blocked by the wreckage. “It’s blocked.” Astrid points out. “So what do we do?” I ask. “We shift it.” She realizes.

“That’s the attitude. Rickston, Mr. Copper, and you, Bannakaffalatta… look, can I just call you Banna? It’s gonna save a lot of time.” “No! Bannakaffalatta!”

“All right then, Bannakaffalatta, there’s a gap in the middle. See if you can get through.”

“Easy. Good.” Bannakaffalatta squeezes through the opening.

The ship lurches again sending loose debris falling.

“This whole thing could come crashing down any minute!” “Oh, Rickston, shut up!”

“Bannakaffalatta made it.” “I’m small enough, I can get through.” Astrid makes her way through the hole.

“Careful.” I call.

“I’m fine.” “Thing is, how are Mr. and Mrs. Fatso going to get through this gap?” Rickston asks rudely.

I turn my head and glare at him, “First of all, you’re a dickhead. Second of all, we make the gap bigger.” I hand him a piece of metal.

I hear laughter echo through the stairwell.

“What happened? Did they find a donut?” “Shut it!”

“I can clear it from this side. Just tell me if it starts moving.”

“What’s going on up there?!” I ask, hearing faint whispers.

“I think Bannakaffalatta and I just got engaged.”

The Doctor opens the comms, “Mr. Frame, how’s things?” “Doctor, I’ve got life signals all over the ship but they’re going out one by one.” “What is it? Are they losing air?” I ask.

“No. One of them said it was the Host. it’s got something to do with the Host.” The Doctor rushes down the stairs.

There is a commotion before Morvin and Foon come up.

Rickston goes through the opening. “I’ll never get through there.” “Yes, you can. Let me go first.” Mr. Copper sneaks through.

I do the same.

Mr. Copper, Astrid, and I are helping Foon.

“No, I’m stuck!”

“Come on, you can do it!” I urge.

Mr. Copper uses a metal pole to widen the space, “It’s going to collapse!” Foon makes it through.

“Rickston, vot damn it, help me!” Rickston refuses. “Morvin, get through.”

The Doctor comes up behind Morvin.

“Doctor, he’s stuck!”

“Mr. Van Hoff, I know we’ve only just met, but you’ll have to excuse me.” 

Morvin makes it through.

“That’s it. We’ve got you. Doctor, come on, get through.” The Doctor turns to the host, “Information override! You will tell me the point of origin of your command structure!” “I can’t hold it!”

“Information: Deck 31.” “Thank you.” The Doctor scrambles through the hole, “Let go!”

Mr. Copper releases his grip on the pole and the beam crashes onto the Host’s head.

We find ourselves in another open room.

Foon looks at a table, “Morvin, look, food.” Rickston speaks sarcastically, “Oh great. Someone’s happy.” “Don’t have any then.” Morvin says.

“Mr. Frame, you still there?” “Yes, sir, but I’ve got the Host outside. I sealed the door.” “They’ve been programmed to kill. Why would anyone do that?”

“That’s not the only problem. I had to use a maximum deadlock on the door, which means… No one can get in. I’m sealed off. Even if you can fix the Titanic, you can’t get to the bridge.” “Yeah, right, fine. One problem at a time. What’s on Deck 31?” “Um, that’s down below. It’s nothing. It’s just the Host storage deck. That’s where we keep the robots.”

The Doctor looks at the scanner, “Well, what’s that?” He puts on his glasses, “See that panel? Black. It’s registering nothing. No power, no heat, no light.” “Never seen it before.” “100% shielded. What’s down there?” “I’ll try intensifying the scanner.” “Let me know if you find anything.” He takes off his glasses, “And keep those engines going!” Astrid brings us some food, “Saved you some. You might be a time king, but you need to eat.”

“Yeah, thanks.” The Doctor takes the food and sits.

Astrid sits with us, “So, you look good for 903.” The Doctor speaks through a full mouth, “You should see me in the mornings.” I stare at him, “You barely sleep.”

“Doctor, it must be well past midnight, Earth time. Christmas Day.”

“So it is. Merry Christmas.”

“This Christmas thing, what’s it all about?” “Long story. I should know, I was there.” “But if the planet’s waking up, can’t we signal them? They can send up a rocket or something.” “They don’t have spaceships.” I say.

“No, I read about it. They have shuffles, space shuffles.” “Mr. Copper, this degree in Earthonomics… where’s it from?” I ask.

“Honestly?” “Just between us.” “Mrs. Golightly’s Happy Travelling University and Dry Cleaners.” He mops his brow with his hankie and sits.

“You… you lied to the company… to get the job?” “I… I wasted my life on Sto. I was a traveling salesman, always on the road and I retired with nothing to show for it. Not even a home. And Earth sounded so exotic.”

“Hm, I suppose it is, yeah.” “How come you know it so well?” Astrid asks.

“Abby was born there. And I was sort of… a few years ago, was sorta made… well, sort of homeless, and, um there was the Earth.” “Thing is, if we survive this, there will be police and all sorts of investigations. Now the minimum penalty for space-age fraud is ten years in jail. I’m an old man. Well, I won’t survive ten years.”

There is a banging on the door and the Doctor drops his food and rushes to the opposite door.

“A Host! Move! Come on!”

The pounding on the door continues, which dents from the force. We all follow the Doctor to the opposite side. He uses his sonic on the door and it opens to reveal a space that runs the height of the ship. The only way across is a makeshift bridge, created by a fallen strut below which are the engines. “Is that the only way across?” Rickston asks.

“On the other hand, it is a way across.” “The engines are open.” Astrid points out. “Nuclear storm drive. Soon as it stops the Titanic falls.” “But that thing, it’ll never take our weight.” “You’re going last, mate.” Rickston sneers.

“It’s nitrofine metal. It’s stronger than it looks.”

“All the same, Rickston’s right. Me and Foon should…” Morvin steps on a weak piece of metal near the edge, the railing gives way and Morvin falls towards the engine with a scream.

“Morvin!” “I told you! I told you!”

I turn to Rickston, “Shut the fuck up!”

Foon talks to the Doctor, hysteric, “Bring him back! Can’t you bring him back? Bring him back, Doctor!” “I’m sorry, I can’t.” “You promised me!” “I know. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” A group of Host is marching through the halls towards us. “Doctor, I rather think those things have got our scent.” “I’m not waiting.” Rickston starts across the bridge. “Careful! Take it slowly!” There’s a rumbling as the ship rocks and Rickston is nearly knocked off, “Vot help me.” “You’re okay. One step at a time. Come on, you can do it.”

“They’re getting nearer!” The Doctor uses his sonic on the door, “Seal us in.” “Leaving us trapped, wouldn’t you say?” “Never say trapped, just inconviently circumstanced.” “Oh.” Rickston is halfway across, “I’m okay!”

“Maybe he’s all right. Maybe… maybe there’s a gravity curve down there or something. I don’t know. Maybe he’s unconscious.” “I’m sorry, Foon. He’s gone.” I hug her. “What am I going to do without him?” She cries.

“Bannakaffalatta, you go next.” “Bannakaffalatta, small.”

“Slowly!” I call.

The Host are pounding on the door from the other side. “They’ve found us!” “Astrid, get across right now.”

“What about you?” She asks. “Just do it. Go on.” Astrid starts across, “Mr. Copper, we can’t wait. Don’t argue.” Mr. Copper follows, “Abby, go, I’ve got Foon.”

I slowly make my way after the others.

“Doctor, I can’t open the door. We need that whirring key thing of yours!” “I can’t leave her!” “She’ll get us all killed if we can’t get out!” “Mrs. Van Hoff, I am coming back for you, all right?” Foon nods and the Doctor starts across. The metal creaks at the weight of the five of us.

“Too many people!” “Oi! Don’t get spiky with me! Keep going!” “It’s gonna fall!” Astrid cries. “It’s just settling! Keep going!” It becomes quiet as the pounding stops. “They’ve stopped.” I realize. “Gone away?” Bannakaffalatta asks. “Why would they give up?” “Never mind that. Keep coming!” Rickston urges. “Where have they gone? Where are the Host?” Mr. Copper looks up, “I’m afraid… we forgot the tradition of Christmas that angels have wings!” He points. 

The Host glide down from above and encircle us. They reach for their halos. “Arm yourselves! All of you!”

We all reach for pipes and metal to defend ourselves as the Host throws their halos. We keep batting them away.

One grazes my arm and another Mr. Copper’s leg. 

Astrid falls to her knees, “I can’t.”

“Bannakaffalatta stop! Bannakaffalatta proud! Bannakaffalatta, cyborg!” Bannakaffalatta lifts his shirt and discharges energy, disabling the Host, and all but one fall toward the engines. One falls onto the strut behind the Doctor.

“Electromagnetic pulse took out the robotics. Oh, Bannakaffalatta, that was brilliant!” Bannakaffalatta falls and Astrid goes to him, “He’s used all his power!”

“Did good?” Bannakaffalatta asks.

“You saved our lives.” “Bannakaffalatta happy.” “We can recharge you, get you to a power point, and just plug you in!”

“Too late.”

“No, but… you gotta get me that drink, remember?” “Pretty girl.” Bannakaffalatta takes one last breath before dying.

Astrid goes to button his shirt when Mr. Copper reaches for his power source. “I’m sorry. Forgive me.” “Leave him alone.” Astrid says.

“It’s the EMP transmitter. He-he’d want us to use it.” He removes it, “I used to sell these things. They’d always give me a bed for the night in the cyborg caravans. They’re good people. But if we can recharge it, we can reuse it as a weapon against the rest of the Host. Bannakaffalatta might have saved us all.”

“Do you think? Try telling him that.” Rickston points behind us.

We all turn to see the host that landed on the strut begin to move.

“Use the EMP!” “It’s dead!” “It’s gotta have an emergency…” Astrid takes the EMP from Mr. Copper.

The Doctor confronts the Host, “No, no, no. hold on. Override loophole security protocol… 10! 666! Oh. 21, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. Um, I dunno, 42! Uh, 1!”

The Host stops mid-motion and stands passively, “Information: state request.” “Good… right. You’ve been ordered to kill the survivors, but why?” “Information: no witnesses.” “But this ship’s gonna fall on the Earth and kill everyone. The human race has nothing to do with the Titanic so that contravenes your orders, yes?” “Information: incorrect.” “But why do you want to destroy the Earth?” “Information: it is the plan.” “What plan?” “Information: protocol grants you only three questions. These three questions have been used.” “Well, you could have warned me.” “Information: now you will die.” The Host prepares to strike the Doctor with its halo when a lasso is thrown over its head and tightened around its body by Foon, “You’re coming with me!”

Foon closes her eyes and jumps over the side, pulling the Host with her.

“NO!” I scream.

We all watch helplessly as Foon falls to her death. “No more.” We make it out and into another set of maintenance halls.

“Right. Get up to Reception One. Once you’re there, Mr. Copper. You’ve got staff access to the computer. Try and find a way of transmitting an SOS. Astrid, you’re in charge of this.” He holds out the EMP, “Once it’s powered up, it’ll take out Hosts within fifty yards but then it needs sixty seconds to recharge. Got it? Rickston, take this.” He gives Rickston his sonic screwdriver, “I’ve preset it. Just hold down that button. It’ll open doors. Do not lose it! You got that? Now go and open the next door. Go on! Go!”

“All right!” Rickston runs off. I take down the first aid kid and hand it to Mr. Copper, “We need you fighting fit. Astrid, where’s the power point?” “Under the comms.” The Doctor and Astrid run to the power point and he shows her how to recharge the EMP.

“When it’s ready, that blue light comes on there.” “You’re talking as if you’re not coming with us.” “There’s something down on Deck 31.” I answer, wrapping my wound, “We’ve gotta find out what it is.” “What if you meet a Host?”

“Well, then we’ll just… have some fun, eh?” “Sounds like you two do this kind of thing all the time.”

“Not by chance. All we do is travel. That’s what we are, just travelers. Imagine it. No tax, no bills, no boss, just the open sky.” He grins.

“I’m sort of… unemployed now, and I was thinking the blue box is kinda small, but I could squeeze in. like a stowaway.” “It’s not always safe.” I say.

“I’ve got no one back on Sto, no family, just me. So what do you think? Can I come with you?”

I look at the Doctor and nod.

He smiles, “Yeah.” The ship lurches again and the Doctor stands and speaks into the comms, “Mr> Frame, you still with us?” “It’s the engines, sir. Final phase. There’s nothing more I can do. We’ve only got eight minutes left!” “Don’t worry, I’ll get there.” “The bridge is sealed off!”

“Yeah, yeah, working on it. I’ll get there, Mr. Frame, somehow.” The EMP turns blue, “All charged up? Mr. Copper, look after Astrid. Astrid, look after Mr. Copper. Rickston, um… look after yourself. And we’ll see you again, promise.” The Doctor grabs my hand and we run off.

We run into a small kitchen and are surrounded by four Host. I grab a pot by the handle, prepared to use it as a weapon.

“Wait, wait, wait, wait! Security protocol one! Do you hear me? One! One!” the Host stop advancing, “Okay, that gives me three questions. Three questions to save my life, am I right?”

“Information: correct.”

“No, that wasn’t one of them. I didn’t mean it. That’s not fair. Can I start again?” “Information: no.” I slap my forehead, “Honey, for fuck’s sake, please think before you ask the last one.” “One question left. One question. So, you’ve been given orders to kill the survivors but survivors must therefore be passengers or staff, but not us. We’re not passengers. We’re not staff. Go on, scan us. You must have bio records. No such person on board. We don’t exist, therefore… you can’t kill us. Therefore, we’re stowaways, and stowaways should be arrested and taken to the nearest figure of authority. And I reckon the nearest figure of authority is on Deck 31. Final question: am I right?” “Information: correct.” “Brilliant. Take us to your leader.” He smiles, “I’ve always wanted to say that.”

The Doctor and I are escorted by the Host to Deck 31. There is much structural damage as well as small fires.

“Now that is what you call a fixer-upper. Come on then, Host with the most, this ultimate authority of yours, who is it?” 

Two doors slide open behind us and we turn around, “Ooh, that’s clever. That’s an omnistate impact chamber. Indestructible. You can survive anything in that, eh?”

A vehicle starts wheeling out, “Sit through a supernova or a shipwreck. Only one person can have the power and the money to hide themselves onboard like this and I should know, ‘cause…”

The vehicle is revealed to be a giant life-support system for Max Capricorn who is now just ahead, “My name is Max.” The gold tooth glints.

“It really does that.” I whisper.

“Who the hell are they?” “I’m the Doctor, this is Abby. hello.” “Information: stowaway.” “Well…”

“Kill him.” “Oh, no, no! Wait, but you can’t. Not now. Come on, Max… you’ve given me so much good material like… How to get ahead in business. See ‘head’? ‘Head in business’? No?” 

I stare wide-eyed at the Doctor, ‘I’m gonna fucking smack him if we survive this.’ “Oh, ho ho, the office joker. I like a funny man. No one’s been funny with me for years.” “I can’t think why.”

“176 years of running the company have taken their toll.”

“Yeah, but… nice wheels.” “No, a life-support system in a society that despises cyborgs. I’ve had to hide away for years. Running the company by hologram. Host, situation report.” “Information: Titanic is still in orbit.” “Let me see.” Max moves forward and we step out of the way, “We should have crashed by now. What’s gone wrong?” He goes to the edge and looks down at the engines, “The engines are still running! They should have stopped!”

“When they do, the Earth gets roasted. I don’t understand.” I say, “What’s the Earth got to do with this?” “This interview is terminated.” “No, no, no, no, no, no! Hold on! Hold on! Hold on! Wait! Wait! Wait! Wait! Wait! I can work it out. It’s like a task. I’m your apprentice. Just watch me. So… business is failing and you wreck the ship so that makes things worse. Oh yes! No. yes. The business isn’t failing, it’s failed. Past tense.” “My own board voted me out. Stabbed me in the back.” “If you had a back.” I say, “So.., you scupper the ship, wipe out any survivors in case anyone’s rumbled you and the board finds their shares halved in value. Oh, but that’s not enough. No, ‘cause if a Max Capricorn ship hits the Earth, it destroys an entire planet. Outrage back home. Scandal! The business is wiped out.”

“And.. the whole board is thrown in jail for mass murder.” He grins. “While you sit there, safe inside the impact chamber.” The Doctor says.

“I have men waiting to retrieve me from the ruins and enough off-world accounts to retire me to the beaches of Pentaxico Two where the ladies, so I’m told, are very fond of metal.” The Doctor speaks indignantly, “So that’s the plan. A retirement plan. 2,000 on this ship, 6 billion underneath us, all of them slaughtered. And why? Because Max Capricorn is a loser.” “I never lose.” “You can’t even sink the Titanic.” “Oh, but I can, Doctor. I can cancel the engines from here.”

Alarms sound.

“You can’t do this!” I shout.

“Host, hold them.” The Host hold us by the arms and pull us away.

“Not so clever now, Doctor. A shame we couldn’t work together. You’re rather good. All that banter yet not a word waster. Time for me to retire. The Titanic is falling and the sky will burn. Let the Christmas inferno commence. Oh! Oh, Host! Kill them.” The one Host not holding us removes their halo preparing to follow orders.

“Mr. Capricorn!” I turn my head to see Astrid in a forklift, “I resign.” She starts the forklift and rushes towards Capricorn.

“Astrid, don’t!” I shout. Astrid lifts the front of Capricorn’s life support just enough so the tires have no purchase. His rear tires have enough traction to cause a standoff. The Host who was about to kill us throws their halo at Astrid but misses, hitting something else. “He’s cut the break line!” The Doctor realizes.

Astrid looks at us. She stares meaningfully at us before she turns back to Capricorn. She raises the fork higher, lifting Capricorn fully off the ground, and steps on the gas. They both go over the edge.

“Astrid!” I scream.

We run to the edger and see Astrid falling towards the engines, her hands reaching for us.

“Titanic falling. Voyage terminated.” The Doctor and I walk away as sparks fall behind us and fires burn. I grab onto him and he holds out his arms to either side. He snaps his fingers and the host holds his arms and fly us upwards.

With arms raised they break through the floor of the bridge causing Frame to shout.

“Deadlock broken.” We climb through the hole and stand.

“Ah, Midshipman Frame at last!”

“Uh, but… the Host!”

“Controller dead they divert to the next highest authority and that’s me.” “There’s nothing we can do. There’s no power. The ship’s gonna fall.” “Titanic falling.” The Doctor takes the wheel, “What’s your first name?” “Alonzo.” I share a look with the Doctor, “You’re kidding me.”

“What?” He looks at us puzzled.

“That’s something else I’ve always wanted to say. Allons-y Alonzo! Whoa!”

The ship lurches dramatically as the Doctor tries to steer. We fall straight towards the Earth’s atmosphere as Alonzo screams. The Doctor fights with the wheel.

An alarm sounds, and I check it. The computer shows the impact zone to be somewhere in London.

I sigh, “Ah.” I use the comms to ‘dial out’, “Hello, yes, um… could you get me Buckingham Palace?” I get through to a very confused security guard, “Listen to me! Security Code 771! Now get out of there!”

“Engine active. Engine active.” The Doctor pulls back on the wheel, sending Alonzo back against the wall. Straining and bent over backward, the Doctor regains control. I can see from the monitor we’ve barely missed Buckingham Palace.

Once out of danger, the Doctor begins to enjoy steering and laughs.

Alonzo rings the ship’s bell. “Whoo-hoo-hoo!”

The framed picture of Capricorn sparks and falls to the floor.

Alonzo sits on the floor, the Doctor and I join him. “Used the heat or re-entry to fire up the secondary storm drive. Unsinkable, that’s me.”

“We made it.” 

“Not all of us.” I pause, “Teleport!” I get up, “She was wearing a teleport bracelet!”

The Doctor and I rush out the door.

We rush into reception, and the Doctor with his hand out, “Rickston! Sonic!” Rickston throws it and he catches it, “Mr. Copper, the teleports, have they got emergency settings?” “I don’t know. They should have.” “She fell, Mr. Copper. She fell. What’s the emergency code?”

“Uh, let me see…”

“What the hell are you doing?” Alonzo asks. “We can bring her back.” The Doctor begins to work on the teleport.

“If a passenger has an accident on shore leave and they’re still wearing their teleport, their molecules are automatically suspended and held in stasis so that we can just trigger the shift.” The Doctor finishes, “There.” He stands and turns around.

A glowing, transparent Astrid appears, “I’m falling.” “Only halfway there. Come on.” He adjusts the inner workings of the teleport. “I keep falling.” “Feed back the molecule grin, boost it with the restoration matrix.” The teleport sparks, “No, no, no, no! Need more phase containment.” “Doctor…” “No! If I can just link up the surface suspension…” “Doctor,” I say softly, “she’s gone.” “I just need to override the safety. I can do it.” “Doctor, let her go.” The Doctor turns to face Astrid’s ghost-like figure. He kicks the teleport in frustration, “I can do anything.” “Stop me falling.” The Doctor walks towards her while we watch.

Mr. Copper stands beside him, “There’s not enough left. The system was too badly damaged. She’s just atoms, Doctor. An echo with the ghost of consciousness. She’s stardust.” He walks closer, “Astrid Peth… citizen of Sto… the woman who looked at the stars and dreamt of traveling. Now you can travel forever.” He opens a window behind her with his sonic screwdriver and she turns into motes of light, “You’re not falling, Astrid, you’re flying.”

The lights go out the window, leaving us.

“The engines have stabilized. We’re holding steady till we get help and I’ve sent the SOS. A rescue ship should be here within twenty minutes. And they’re digging out the records of Max Capricorn. It should be quite a story.” Alonzo tells us. “They’ll want to talk to all of us, I suppose.” “I’d have thought so, yeah.” Mr. Copper wanders over to us, “I think, uh, one or two inconvenient truths might come to light. Still, it’s my own fault, and then years in jail is better than dying.”

Rickston walks over to us, “Doctor… I never said… thank you.” He hugs him, “The funny thing is… I said Max Capricorn was falling apart. Just before the crash, I… sold all my shares, and transferred them to his rivals. It’s made me rich. What do you think of that?”

I look at him, before looking at the Doctor, “Can I?” He sighs, nodding.

I grin, step forward, and knee Rickston right in the crotch. He groans bending over, I hit him in the Adam’s apple and he gasps for breath, hobbling off.

“Of all the people to survive, he’s not the one you would have chosen, is he? But if you could choose, Doctor, if you decide who lives and who dies…” Mr. Copper shrugs, “That would make you a monster.”

The Doctor looks at Mr. Copper, curious at the insight, “Mr. Copper…” He turns to the teleporter and takes three bracelets, “I think you deserve one of these.” Mr. Copper smiles and puts on a bracelet. Alonzo sees, and mouths ‘Hey!’ as he stands.

Mr. Copper chuckles and the Doctor starts the machine. Before we disappear, Alonzo salutes and the Doctor salutes back, forefinger to the forehead.

The Doctor, Mr. Copper, and I walk across to the Tardis, in what appears to be falling snow.

“So, Great Britain is part of, uh, ‘Europee’ and just across the British Channel you’ve got Great France and Great Germany?”

“No, no, it’s just… it’s just France and Germany. Only Britain is great.” “Oh, and they’re all at war with the continent of Ham-erica?”

I wince, “No, well… not yet, uh… could argue that one.” We arrive at the Tardis, “There she is.” I pat her, “Survive anything.” “You know, between you and me, I don’t even think this snow is real. I think this is the ballast from the Titanic’s salvage entering the atmosphere.” The Doctor looks up, “Yeah. one of these days, it might snow for real.” “So, I-I suppose you’ll be off.” “The open sky.” I grin.

“And, uh, what about me?” “We travel alone. It’s best that way.” “What- what am I supposed to do?” Mr. Copper asks.

“Give me that credit card.” I say.

Mr. Copper hands it over, “Well, it’s just petty cash, spending money. It’s all done by computer. I… I didn’t really know the currency, so I thought a million might cover it.” “A million? Pounds?” “That enough for trinkets?” “Mr. Copper, a million pounds is worth 50 million credits.” The Doctor grins at him. “How much?”

“50 million and 56.” “I… I’ve got money!” “Yes, you have.” I hand back the card.

“Oh, my word. Oh my vot! Oh my goodness me! I… Ya-ha!”

“It’s all yours, Planet Earth. Now that’s a retirement plan. But just you be careful, though.” “I will. I will. Oh, I will.”

“No interfering. I don’t want any trouble. Just… have a nice life.” I smile at him. “I can have a house, a proper house, with a garden, and-and a door, and… Oh, Doctor, Abby, I will make you proud.” He hugs us, “And-and I can have a kitchen with chairs, and windows, and lace…” He skips off laughing.

I pause as the Doctor unlocks the Tardis, “Um, where are you going?”

Mr. Copper chuckles, “Why, I have no idea!” “No, me neither.” “But, Doctor, Abby… I won’t forget her.”

I look up at the sky and see a blue streak of light zigzag across. I look back at Mr. Copper skipping away, “Merry Christmas, Mr. Copper.”

[omniblades-and-stars]

The Last Time (A Game of Cat and Mouse)

Read on AO3

"Bancroft Exports and Logistics Headquarters" read the sign carved from impeccably polished wood, no doubt from Earth. It was mounted on the wall next to a door made of frosted glass and featuring antique bronze hinges and a matching bronze doorknob, shaped humorously like one of Earth's large felines, a lion, if he remembered correctly. He always did. As he reached for the door knob with a green-scaled hand, Thane Krios noted it as something to ask Mr. Bancroft about. It was obviously meant as a statement, the expense of retrofitting a Nos Astra office building for an ancient human door alone meant that it was not simply a design choice.

He straightened the front panel of his expensive suit jacket as he strolled into the lobby. There was a reception desk with a high counter wrapped around the front, topped in the same dark polished wood that the sign at the door was. There was another office door directly to the right of the reception desk, and a cart against the wall with porcelain tea cups hanging from metal hooks. One was missing.

The receptionist was not at their post, it seemed. There was, however, a small sign that read "Press Button for Assistance". He was surprised when there was no audible tone when his carefully filed talon depressed the cool metallic button.

After several seconds of empty silence, a booming, "I don't pay you to stand around and look pretty! Go see who it is, damn it," reverberated from the office behind the door. A feminine voice answered back, the words of her quiet reply were lost to the barrier provided by thick walls. Thane clasped his hands behind his back and waited patiently to be greeted by someone. He was going to enjoy killing Mr. Bancroft later. 

The door cracked open and the first thing out of it was a slender, human, woman's foot. It was clad in a precarious, ruby red high-heeled shoe, a thin strap buckled around a delicately arched ankle. Her legs, shapely and well-toned, were covered by sheer black stockings. A pronounced seam ran up the length of her calf, disappearing behind her knee and beneath the hem of a charcoal gray skirt so tight, it could have been a second skin. 

His eyes traveled up her body, taking in the receptionist as she pushed sideways out of the door. She held a silver tea tray in her delicate, gloved hands, and despite her unreasonably high heels, she moved with well-practiced grace and fluidity. 

A pristine cream colored blouse covered a supple chest, the promising curve of soft flesh hidden beneath whisper thin fabric. A collar buttoned high on her slender throat with dainty, round pearls, covered a scar he knew was there. He was surprised to see her here. She was supposed to be dead.

He killed her.

Bare skin burns hot, pressed and writhing beneath him. A soft moan turns to a surprised gasp and her fingers dig sharp into the muscles of his arms. Silken lips parted against his in a silent plea. Breaths ragged from exertion and the effects of the venom still coursing in her veins. Crimson rivulets wash down the cold metal of his blade. Tears bead at the edges of her clouded, disbelieving eyes, pupils wide, surprised by the betrayal she knew would inevitably come. "Why?" She mouths, unable to speak.

"We can't keep doing this. This is the last time," he whispers, and tenderly brushes wisps of dark hair from her sweat-dewed cheek. Tears that are not hers fall, mingling with the ones sliding over her skin and into the hair tangled on the pillow below her. Her grip on his arms falters as she grows weak. He leaves her alone to die in a Presidium hotel room, disquieted and regretful.

It had been too difficult to stay. He should have known she would pull through. She was stubborn, tenacious.

Beautiful, precious.

And above all, a devious, deadly viper.

But why was it relief that he felt to see her again?

Familiar honey-colored eyes glared at him as she turned to greet him. She drew the plush flesh of her burgundy lip in between her teeth, seductive and no doubt a sign of the anger she felt at the sight of him.

The anger burning in her wide, clear eyes disappeared in a flash, as though it had never existed. A wide smile took its place, creasing the corners of her eyes, and she broke her silence by proclaiming, "Oh, you must be the security consultant here to meet with the board. I am so sorry, how do you pronounce your name, Mister…" Her voice was soft, dripping with syrupy cheer. Her head cocked slightly to the side quizzically, a convincing charade played out for no one but the two of them. 

"Tuek. Rumi Tuek. It is a pleasure to meet you. Though, I am afraid that I do not know your name," he said in reply. In this, he told no lie. No living person knew her true name. Her names shifted like the crashing tides of the sea.

"Julia Tophana," she answered cheerfully and bravely turned her back on him to set the tray on top of the cart. "When I first saw your name on the appointment list this week, I assumed it must have been a salarian name," she lied easily, putting on a breathy, airy voice that he knew very well was an act. She continued putting the pieces of the tea service away with gloved hands as she filled the silence with trite chatter. "I thought, 'Surely it couldn't be a drell name, there are so few to be seen away from Kahje.' But what do I know? Mr. Bancroft always says, 'I didn't hire you for your brains, Jules.'"

How long had she been working as the man’s secretary just to murder him?

She loved the long game.

Julia turned and flashed a charming smile at him, holding a stained tea cup in her left hand. "He underestimates me. They always pay for underestimating me. Don't they?" Thane's hand ghosted over his abdomen, where the memory of her blade made itself known. She started this destructive little game of theirs.

She cries out for help as his target tries to pull her into a filthy alley, one of so many on this part of Omega. He runs to help this stranger, a young, human woman out for a jog. A gunshot echoes out of the alley, and the woman's screams stop.

Too late, he fears. But as he turns around the abandoned building at the entrance to the alley, he sees her standing hunched over a body, hands gripping the pistol like iron. She holds it like it is both her only lifeline and the most terrifying thing in the galaxy. Like she has never fired it before.

"I'm so sorry! I didn't mean to! I … I … was so scared! I didn't … oh God, what did I do?" Her cries are shrill, panicked, she is nearly hyperventilating. Her hands shake and tears streak over the gentle curve of her cheeks. She looks up at him with large, pleading, amber eyes, and drops the pistol on the ground right before she heaves and vomits all over her lavender running shoes.

"Please, let me help you get cleaned up," he offers quietly as he approaches. She clutches his hands with her own trembling fingers and allows him to lead her away. She tells him her name is Artemis, tells him about how she ended up on Omega, and how lonely it is living on that horrible station.

It's hours later and they are still together, she's pressed against him, hot and needy. Her kisses taste like peppermint toothpaste. "It was so easy. This is the last time you'll see me, see anything," she whispers against his lips. Cold metal bites into his skin, just below his lung and it twists as she pushes him harder against the wall. Her strength is surprising. Too late he realizes that she is not just an innocent woman out for an evening run. The pain forces a groan coursing up his throat. He can feel the blade scraping through his ribs, feel it pierce through the other side. "I don't do competition," she explains and strokes his cheek with a soft hand, now coated in emerald blood. She simply walks away after, leaving her blade, and him, pinned to the wall. It is the kind of folding blade engineered by and for killers, expensive and easily hidden.

The truth of the matter was that she was a small, beautiful woman blessed with large, doe eyes, and perfect, bow shaped lips. Traits that she carefully wielded to her advantage at every available opportunity. Including here, in this moment, where he was her only audience. She was like the sirens of Earth’s ancient mythology, and he too often found himself ensnared by her song.

Arashu protect me, Amonkira guide me, and Kalahira, please take this damnable woman to the darkest, coldest depths of your oceans.

She brought the cup down onto the hard surface of the desk, shattering it with purpose. "Oops! How clumsy of me!" She brushed the shards into the trash can, and in a smooth motion removed the gloves from her hands and deposited them into the receptacle after, careful not to touch the outside material with her bare fingers.

The gloves must have cost a fortune. They appeared to be made of real animal skin, unlike the synthetic leather worn by most. Even in their line of work. 

She'd always been one for flair, even if only for her own sake.

His eyes followed the dexterous lines of slender fingers, recalling the feeling of them tracing tender lines over the ridges of his scales, the feel as they dug into his flesh as she tried to tear his grip from her throat. With a raised brow, he started to ask, “Mr. Bancroft, is he-”

“Dead? He is, but he doesn’t know it yet,” The Shepherd responded while she checked the watch set into a dainty silver band around her wrist. “He will have a “sudden” stroke in approximately four hours.”

Of course, poison. 

One of her favorite methods. She had always been one for a more personal approach. She liked to get in close, get to know the target. She loved to play games, like a cat toying with a mouse that didn't know her claws were already piercing its skin. Until it was much, much too late.

She always played games. 

Thane's lips curled into a disapproving grimace. He despised that she got to Bancroft first.

He despised that she waited until she knew he would be here to do it. This entire charade, this whole show was for his benefit alone. 

It was payback. It was his turn to be the mouse, it seemed. It was probably no less than he deserved.

Deserved or not, he would not let her win.

Her clean up finished, The Shepherd picked up a datapad and waved for him to follow her into the curving hallway. “This way, Mr. Tuek. The board meets on the next floor up, accessible only by the interior elevator.” She strode in front of him, the long curve of her legs accented by the pointed heel of her shoe. Absently, she brushed a long dark lock of hair that had fallen loose from her bun, held together by shining metal sticks, behind her ear. It was much longer than their last meeting.

“I like what you’ve done with your hair, Ms. Tophana. It is a shame that I will kill you before I get to enjoy it,” he whispered in her ear as they walked past the office workers diligently working at their desks in the open office space nested behind the reception lobby.

“I like the piercings you have there on the ridge above your frill, those are new. I will take great pleasure in tearing them from your smug face right before I end you,” she retorted while looking straight ahead. Her mouth curled up, confidence hidden in the upturned corner of her lips. "This is the last time, Krios," she whispered hotly.

"You are sure of this? You have yet to kill me, Shepherd," he reminded her and placed a gentle, threatening hand at the small of her back. The silken fabric of her blouse slid pleasantly over his scales. 

Their walk through the office came to a halt at the elevator, tucked into a hall filled with more office spaces. The Shepherd turned to face him as she pressed the call button for the lift. "It will either be me or you this time. To the death, once and for all. I'm not leaving this building without your life."

The elevator arrived with a chime, and the door slid open. "Then you will not leave this building," he answered emphatically and stepped into the elevator.

The Shepherd pressed her arm across the opening to prevent the door from sliding closed. She leaned in, passing the datapad to him, her lips ghosted dangerously close to his cheek, her breath hot on his skin, stirring heat deep within him. Her hair smelled like honeysuckle. It always smelled like honeysuckle. "You make mistakes when you underestimate me. Don't make it easy for me," she whispered. Suddenly, she pulled back, "You'll understand why I won't be joining you in the elevator. The boardroom is directly to your right, through the preposterous double doors. You can't miss it." 

She had the audacity to wiggle her fingers at him as though she were waving goodbye to a friend as the door slid shut. 

He looked down at the datapad and turned the screen on. Thane didn't know whether to be greatly amused or greatly irritated by the image that greeted him:

"A Game of Cat and Mouse" written out in the flowing script he knew to be hers, followed by a humorous drawing of a cat with human hair styled just like hers. And pinned beneath her feline paws, a mouse with green and black scales.

Hiding in an office suite after his meeting, now entirely pointless due to Bancroft's impending death, had concluded was a simple matter. It was easy enough to duck into the office of some executive who was almost certainly on vacation, and simply wait until everyone who was not The Shepherd left. By the time the work day drew to a close, he found himself pondering the pendulous motion of the Newton’s Cradle decorating the large wooden desk in his hiding office.

Click.

Clack.

Click.

Clack.

Click.

Cla-

“We’re alone now, Krios. You can come out of hiding,” she shouted down the hall from her roost in the lobby.

As he walked silently down the hall, he removed his suit jacket, slinging it over his shoulder and cuffing his shirt sleeves at his forearms. When he rounded the hall into the lobby, she was standing with her back to him. Her arms were raised, the mass of her hair held tightly in her fist as she began to wrap it around her hand and tie it more suitably to the base of her skull. The two decorative sticks were laid on the counter, perfectly symmetrical to one another.

“That’s close enough, Thane. Rules first,” she said firmly without turning to him. She grabbed one of the sticks and popped the bottom tip off of it, revealing a very fine sharp point. She leaned to the side and pulled the hem of her skirt taut in her fingers. The Shepherd drove the point into the stretched fabric and then pulled it. The organic fibers parted noisily up the side of her leg, up to the leather belt fastened around her thigh, just above where her stockings came to an end, teasing him.

Thane drew his gaze back to her hair. Her hair was safe, it was drawn up messily in a simple elastic band, and was quite possibly the only part of this that wasn't a performance. “I am listening, Shepherd,” he confirmed. She paused, and almost imperceptibly shivered before leaning to tear the other side of her skirt.

Muscle and bone shifts beneath the tan skin of her back as she undulates. Her back is a star-chart, made up of tiny constellations of freckles and scars. Bruises blooming purple and blue prove the background of the galaxy mapped out between her shoulder blades and beyond. He props himself up on one hand before gently running a short talon over a long jagged scar just below her shoulder blade.

"This one?" He asks, breaking the silence. Her skin pebbles beneath his touch, goosebumps, she calls them. She shivers as his finger trails across her back.

"From the time I killed an elcor diplomat," she says through heavy, panting breaths. "Didn't think he'd be sneaky enough to hide a knife." She is lying, a preposterous lie at that. He has asked her about it before. The last time, it was from a krogan battlemaster's pet varren. He is fairly certain it is a scar from a turian's unfiled talon.

He moves again to sit up completely, and her back arches to accommodate him. His left hand circles around her body, tracing gentle lines over her skin, admiring the bumps that form in its wake, but only for a moment. He presses his other hand around the base of her throat, he can feel the tendons shift as she swallows and moves, and the beat of her heart, fast and strong. He can feel another line, just under her breast. "And what of this one?" He asks with his lips pressed against her neck, he can taste the salt of her sweat.

He knows the answer. He put it there. 

They are moving in tandem, languid, and unhurried, savoring this beautiful charade, awash in blinding pleasures. This time, they started as enemies and ended as lovers. He much prefers it this way than the other. Tonight, she is sweet … by the gods is she sweet. Her hair smells of honeysuckle, and the softest sounds drip like nectar from her lips. And he is an addict for them. He can almost imagine that she isn't like a poison to him, or him a sharpened knife to her.

"I tripped and fell into that one. It was an accident, really," she says with a smile in her voice. "Dropped my guard, for the last time," she explains and lies and tells the truth all in the same sentence, through the same panting breaths. He can't explain why he finds these little, unnecessary lies so charming, so enrapturing, but he does.

He is caught in her web, and he climbs further in of his own volition.

"No guns, no poison, no omni-tools, and no warp fields. Agreed?" The Shepherd rolled her shoulders back and stretched her neck, the elongated curve of it far too tempting. The very edge of the silvering scar peaked over the edge of her collar.

"Agreed."

She stood on one leg and pulled her foot up behind her, stretching her leg and rolling her ankle. She was still wearing those impractical, ridiculous, attractive shoes. "Good, any additions you'd like to make?" She continued her stretching as though she were preparing to go on a run,  and he was not a professional assassin ready to attack.

"I would appreciate it if you did not use your biotics to pull my central nervous system apart this time," he requested with a smile. One encounter with her biotics had left him twitching and blinking sporadically for weeks. "I believe that is a fair exchange in return for not using mine to rip you apart from the outside."

"Oh, I hate when you make a good point. Fine. Questions?" She asked as she turned to face him. He had expected to see her cocky smile, or a demure smirk. Maybe even a deep, hateful scowl. 

But her lips were pressed in a hard line, and her eyes were bloodshot, and lined harshly red at the edges. Had she been crying? Was she frightened?

Or was this a part of her game? He could never tell with her. It could have been another of her little lies. Even still, it gave him pause, tightened a knot in his gut. 

Thane shook his head and tried to push off his reservations. He was in her snare, he knew. He tossed his jacket to one of the small chairs in the lobby and clasped his hands behind his back. "Who hired you to kill Bancroft?" 

He was merely curious, very few people earned having more than one assassination plot against them.

"His wife. You?"

"His son," he answered with a smile. Even fewer people were so hated by their families that they would independently hire someone to kill them. "Do you have any questions for me?"

The Shepherd cocked her head and furrowed her brow. Her question fell from her lips quietly and without preamble, and it detonated like a hydrogen bomb, "If I die tonight, will you mourn me? There isn’t anyone else." She fumbled her words and hastened to add, "Who would even notice, much less care if I die, I mean."

The aftershock rolled into him and sent blood thundering through his chest. "Yes, I mourn you every time, " he answered sincerely and before he could grasp the magnitude of his own words. "Shepherd, if Kalahira calls me to the sea tonight, will you mourn for me?"

"Yes. Every time."

They had killed each other, or tried to anyways, far too many times.

The seconds that passed before either of them moved crackled with electricity. The only warning he had before The Shepherd leapt at him was the flaring of her nostrils. She held the slender stick in her hand like a blade as she pushed off the ground without a sound. He threw his left arm up and pushed the blade away with his forearm, and curled his right fist up towards her ribs.

Her body bowed out of the way of his strike, and stepped in towards him. She hooked her foot around his ankle and pulled him off-balance. Her elbow connected with his collarbone sending a sharp pain shooting through his neck and shoulder. Just as the tiny little blade made its way to his chest, he thrust the flat his hand up. The air around his body ignited cerulean blue, and the blade struck the barrier and snapped. 

The Shepherd stumbled backwards, dropping the now useless implement to the ground. "Shit, I hate it when you do that," she grumbled and adjusted her stance again. 

He pressed his hand into his shoulder and rolled it, stretching out the muscle. "You know, you possess the same skill? It might be useful for keeping much more of your blood inside of your body."

Her small nose crinkled up before she smirked, "That your professional opinion, since you're so good at freeing me of mine?"

"Deserved, although the same could be said for you of mine," he retorted right before advancing on her. They fought. Fists, hands, feet, all moving with blinding speed and precision. He pressed hard against her, and she took steps back, all the while blocking quick strikes and narrowly avoiding getting caught in his grasp.

She came to a stop with her back pressed against the reception counter. The Shepherd reached behind her without looking away from him, and snatched the other hair pin up, releasing the pointed tip hidden under a small metallic cap. She was quick, and aimed the small weapon for his neck.

Thane wrapped one hand around her wrist, and pulled the implement free with the other. He didn’t hesitate and drove it into her side, earning a snarling hiss from the woman.

He’d always been faster than her.

The Shepherd struck him hard in the chest with her outstretched palm, and a concentrated blast of energy followed it a fraction of a second later. Indigo light flared from beneath her hand and he was pushed back across the room, knocking the air from his lungs, and his body to the floor. She pulled the weapon from her side with a grunt, vermillion spreading across the thin fabric of her punctured shirt.

She closed the gap between them with a short run. She raised her foot to bring it down hard on his chest. Thane shifted and rolled away just as she brought her foot down, throwing her off balance. He struck her other foot with a blunt kick, bringing her down to his level.

“Fuck!” she shouted as she crashed to her hands and knees. Immediately, she began to crawl away, working her way back up to crouching, trying to stand again.

Until he grabbed her around the ankle and began to pull her back towards him. “No you don’t,” he grunted as he dragged her thrashing body, preventing her escape. “Why do you wear these shoes, Shepherd? They are quite impractical for walking, much less a fight.”

The Shepherd stopped thrashing and allowed him to pull her nearer while answering, “Have you seen what they do for my legs and my ass?” He had, he could see it right now. “Besides, they serve a function.” She pushed her hands up under her body and flipped herself onto her back. She drove the hard, narrow point of her heel hard into the musculature just below his left shoulder.

He growled and nearly bit his tongue. 

Evil, demon of a woman. 

The stiletto ground against sinew and bone, the pain sending a flash of white static through his vision. He dropped his grip on her leg, and groaned as she pulled her foot free from his shoulder, centimeter by visceral centimeter.

The woman scurried away, standing and disappearing around the corner in the hall at dead run. 

He stood and tested his shoulder, it seemed that she managed not to tear any ligaments or tendons. He could move through the pain. Thane darted off after her, “Running away? That is very unlike you.”

“No … ugh … just looking for a change of scenery,” he heard her breathless and grunting reply from down the hall heading towards the elevator. As he neared the hall, he saw her forcing the doors open and pulling herself up and into the empty elevator shaft. He followed after, fully expecting her to be waiting at the next floor to push him to his death down the shaft.

But she was not there.

Instead, a small ceramic saucer came flying at him, a projectile sent from inside of the truly ridiculous, large double doors leading into the boardroom. He ducked below it, but didn't see the next saucer, until it struck him right in the side of the head. The ceramic shattered against his scales, and he could feel the stinging heat of blood gathering on small cuts.

The Shepherd was standing on the board room table, an enormous expanse of wood cut from a singular tree, stained and sealed with resin. She pulled her foot back and kicked a holo-conference terminal, sending it sailing towards him. Thane leaned to the side, easily dodging the awkward projectile.

He balled up his fist and pulled it back, gathering biotic energy before releasing it. It sailed into her and sent her sprawling to the surface of the table. Paper, more saucers, and a datapad or two went scattering out from under her fall. He jumped onto the table, rapidly closing the distance. 

She crossed her ankles around one of his legs, pulling him to the surface of the table. Their fight turned into something more akin to a schoolyard brawl. They traded sloppy, awkward blows, rolling back and forth on the broad meeting room table.

Suddenly, she had him pinned, pressing hard into the wound on his shoulder while she reached for the belt secured around her leg.

Thane wrapped his right hand over her face and pushed her head back hard, and grabbed her wrist with his other hand as she attempted to stab him with the knife that had been hidden on the inside of her thigh. He pushed up while she pushed down. She shifted her head and snapped her teeth around the base of his thumb hard enough to draw blood.

He bared his teeth at her and growled. Thane shifted his weight and wrapped his leg over her hip, with her knife-wielding hand still held firmly in his grip, he pulled her down close just before rolling over her. He sat fully on her abdomen, preventing her from rolling and thrashing.

She clawed at his throat with her free hand, curses quickly turned to animalistic cries as she struggled to keep her grip on her precious little knife. Much of her hair had come loose, splayed out in messy tangles around her head and cheeks. Blood seeped from a bite mark on her lip and her eyes burned with fury, and perhaps, fear.

Thane wrenched the knife from her hand and threw it off to the side. It hit the tiled floor with a sharp, metallic crack, but was immediately forgotten as the woman returned to clawing, scratching and hitting him with every ounce of energy she could muster. And it did hurt. He wrapped his hands around her slender wrists with crushing strength. She let out a guttural cry and twisted at the abdomen, trying to free herself. Her legs scrambled to find purchase on the table and push him up from on top of her, but all she accomplished was scraping deep ruts into the resin coating on the wood.

He gathered her wrists in one hand and brought them down hard and awkwardly just above her head. He brought his other hand to her throat, the buttons of her collar long since pulled free during their struggle, and he paused.

Beneath his fingers, the smooth, but too long line of the scar taunted him. It was thin, almost surgical in its precision, but cruel. His cruelty, not hers. 

His heart skipped while hers thundered beneath his ghosting touch. Her chest rose and fell so rapidly, she was on the verge of hyperventilating. Genuinely.

The Shepherd looked up at him with those wide, terrified eyes of hers. She let her head fall back to the tabletop, exhaled, and squeezed her eyes shut. “Just do it, Thane. You win. Better this way, wouldn't want it to be anyone else.”  Silent tears rolled from the corners of her eyes. “The last time, right?” she asked with a choked, pitiful laugh.

"No," he said, frozen in place with just the barest contact with her skin.

Her breath hitched and her eyes flew open. Impossibly, her heart began to beat faster, breaths came out in short, fast bursts from her nose. "What? Fuck, don't drag this out!” She cried out. “Just snap my neck, or shit, strangle me. Plea-"

Her confused protestations were silenced when his lips covered hers in a bruising, searing kiss. She gasped and he released her hands. Just as he was pulling back to ask her if that was alright, she grabbed fistfuls of his shirt and brought him back to her lips.

In seconds they were consumed by each other, psychological games, anger and violence all but forgotten in the blinding heat of raw, pent up desire. The way she moved and how they were suddenly undressed was dizzying. His memories of the softness of her skin and sweet melody of her voice could never compare to the satin plush of her thighs gripping his waist, or the sounds that tumbled from her mouth.

By the gods, the sounds she made. They were healing waters from the wellspring of her lips. They were quiet, keening mewls, breathy gasps, and those hushed moans pressed against his lips like mumbled prayers. And oh, the way she whined when his teeth scraped against the delicate curve of her throat. He was drunk on the way she breathed his name with muted fervor.

His world turned upside down, and the cool surface of the table met his back. Loose tendrils of her hair brushed his scales as she moved over him. Her head tipped back and her lips parted, forming the perfect silhouette of ecstasy. The muscles in her stomach slithered and writhed with the hypnotic rhythm beneath his hands.  

He was lost in the intoxicating, feverish warmth of her. 

It crested, they existed on the edge of a corona, just before falling over the edge into the crushing gravity, and all-consuming, plasmic bliss. It surged through him like an electric shock and stole his breath, made his fingers tingle like her skin held a static charge.

She collapsed on top of him, the full weight of her small body pushing what little air was held in his lungs out with a groan. The Shepherd laughed, breathless but musical. “It happened again,” she muttered against his chest.

Thane wrapped his arms around her, holding her tight to him and carding his hand into her hair, and drawing gentle circles between her shoulders with the other. She shivered, goosebumps rising beneath carefully filed talons. Her fingers traced lines over the soft ridges of his neck. He stared up at the ceiling above them, struggling to control the surge of confused emotion mounting inside of him. “It did,” he agreed quietly. “Will you tell me your name?”

He could feel her muscles tense, and her shoulder blades drew close together before she released the tension with a sad sigh. “No,” she started and then hesitated. “My real name belongs to someone I’m not anymore. Call me Sophie, always liked that one.”

“Sophie,” he repeated into her flower scented hair.

“There isn’t anyone else. To love or to hate me,” she said suddenly, somehow disarming him again.

“You have me,” it rolled off of his lips too easily. She did that to him, pulled his guard away and rendered him loose with his affections and tongue.

She’d probably try to kill him right now. Tear him apart with biotics, or reveal that she’d poisoned some innocuous part of the office that he touched. Maybe that absurd lion’s head door knob at the entrance to the office. Maybe even the heel of her ridiculous shoe. That’s how this usually went.

Instead, she raised her head and looked at him with tired, quizzical eyes, “To love, or to hate me?”

“Perhaps, it is both,” he responded honestly. Maybe the gods knew, because he certainly did not.

“We can figure it out the next last time,” she said with a small smirk playing at the corner of her bruised, cut and perfect lips. “Assuming we don’t kill each other first.”

He returned her smile with one of his own. “I would not want it to be anyone else.”

[yeahcurrahhe-e]

𝐇𝐄𝐀𝐕𝐘 𝐄𝐘𝐄𝐒

〚 𝐑. 𝐒𝐏𝐄𝐈𝐑𝐒 〛

𝐇𝐄𝐋𝐋 𝐇𝐀𝐓𝐇 𝐍𝐎 𝐅𝐔𝐑𝐘 like a woman scorned.

Sexist? Certainly. A shred clever? Perhaps.

Particularly when the woman was a superior shot with her sterling Garand rifle, and already was grappling for a seat at the table with the sniffy, big headed men of her battalion, snarking them with a hell of an attitude that christened their faces crimson most days. Now, she had to embark the battleground of distinction and worthiness with her enemy being a young woman — much like herself if she were to be fashioned into a French rebel. The reward? Her childhood best friend; Ronald Speirs.

It was incredulous — revoltingly petty — to lay out a breathing person as the trophy for a spiteful rivalry between a pair of impetuous women. Yet, it was all she could do when the ghastly creature of jealously reared its head in the wake of her already shortening fuse. Ronald Speirs wasn’t hers to possess, hang onto like the threadbare rag of a childhood toy, but perhaps it was the subtle reminder of home…the echoing of a few words the evening of the Normandy jump.

Amidst their backwater town, he had been the most sought after boy, yet always was following blindly a girl consumed with zany pipe dreams — her. If it weren’t for her greatly religious loon of a mother fancying her hair and adorning her in florid dresses from the tailor of the town each day, anyone would’ve supposed the brazen young girl was a boy. And whilst she appreciated her share of dolls, antique tea sets, and the like, she almost always would be seen racing the fields with her brothers and a young Ronald Speirs.

For all of her life, wherever she was, so was he.

Frankly, that was until their battalion was withdrawn from the front lines, battered and internally butchered by war. They were bunked with French families racked by the conflict, their vacant rooms only untouched because the prior inhabitants were casualties consigned to a makeshift grave on the outskirts of the town. Y/N was refuged with a young family in their moderately shelled brick house in the center of town, adjacent to the delegated houses of the other lieutenants and their commanding officers.

Interaction with Ron had been touch and go since every marked day since their touchdown into Normandy at the initial rolling days of June — for all she knew, the days could’ve been far more than was acknowledged. Time was obscured by the confines of death and infiltrated by the poison of screams, gunfire, and dense thickets of smoke. Minds were more engrossed in a prayer than a pondering thought for the day of the week.

And now her own battle-riddled mind was intrigued with the nightly observations of the leaden shadows of Speirs and the neighbor’s daughter in the separating alley of the houses. When Y/N was fields of nightmares and a pile of reports away from sleep, and sat at a pine desk residing in a window’s airflow — one posed above the aforementioned strip of alleyway, her stupefied glimpses retreating to the whispers against the bricks and balling the paper in her hand absentmindedly when the murmurs partly passed from the mouth of Ronald Speirs.

Some lonesome ache in her threadbare conscious pondered if any shred of truth lay beneath his sickly sweet nothings. Yet, when the bitter daylight shone its revealing beacon, and the lieutenants would be massed at CP for their morning briefing, Ron’s typical rigid attention would be hindered when she’d shuffle into their shelled building, hair pinned and makeup brushed across her supple features with an experienced hand, bearing a tray of her mother’s pastries of gratitude. Y/N would watch his eyes as she strode about their table of leading officers — a sight for his sore eyes — and it was evident to the wound in her confidence that he was mesmerized. And she wished it was her. Because it was increasingly blatant to her numbing mind that she was no good for him.

Her daily appearance seemed endlessly defined by a thick layer of mud from head to toe, her clothing a baggy uniform for the skinniest of privates. Her hair was a scruffy, awkward mishap, a broken hairbrush in her belt not much good, and her own features ill-defined by muck. The last time her face had been eleganced by makeup was their last evening in Aldbourne, the makeup bestowed by a forlorn elderly woman with no use for it no more — its owner a deceased nurse on the frontlines of Germany. That was the very evening when Ron had snatched her into an alleyway with the damp warmth fraying the whirlwind ringlets poking from beneath her garrison cap, and he admitted every feeling of his to her; uttered of his love for her that had branched from their childhood shared on rolling green hills and cornfields. It’s when he had kissed her.

Now, she amused a displeasing thought as she slouched in a chair alongside Intelligence officer, Lewis Nixon. Perhaps that the admission erupted from a feeling of fright, a reckless upheaval of emotion because, hey, we may die tomorrow! She roughly trilled her fingernails against her ridged glass of whiskey as tendrils of fury thrashed through the thought. Would Ronald Speirs be as much of a douche to do that? Make her his false confession? Lead her on?

“You gonna actually drink that or glare at it until it boils?” Lewis murmured around a cigarette suspended from his mouth, perking an eyebrow over the paper ridge of his intelligence report.

“Perhaps I’m just enjoying the fact that its coming from an actual glass and not your rusty, diseased canteen, Nix,” she smiled sweetly at him when he rooted her with a piqued eye roll.

“Yeah, yeah,” he shook his head in slight whilst inhaling a brief puff of his cigarette, “Last time you ever get a sip of my Vat, kid.”

Y/N glimpsed at him, unimpressed, and sardonically uttering from behind the rim of her glass, “I’m devastated.”

Not truly until she peered nonchalantly out the adjacent window and its bullet-ridden glass, the half-light of the evening partly shading the passing figures of Ron and the town girl — Fleur. And then they halted with an ignorance for the presence beyond the window, the shadows concealing the flustered lieutenant and the oblivious intelligence officer. They stand with her holding his hand. And she felt herself getting colder.

“For fuck’s sakes,” Y/N mused, teetering on a bout of rueful laughter whilst essentially slamming her glass to the pine surface of the desk, nearly spoiling it into a heap of shards from fury.

The tousle of paper from her left indicated a startle from Nixon and he would’ve ripped her a new one for the outburst that resembled the rebound of artillery or a gunshot, if she didn’t scuffle out the room just as vehemently.

In calculated steps did she approach the front door of the battalion headquarters, a stoic expression infiltrating all recognizable composure along her features. It would be Ronald Speirs getting ripped a new one now. Was that all Ronald Speirs was good for? Hurting a nice girl like her that merely was attempting to infiltrate the negativity that always seemed to obscure any sense he had? She clenched her fist, bitten nails veering over the groves of bloodied knuckles.

And sure as anything, she strode out onto the gravel footpath, anchoring her helmet onto her head to emit a scrap of warmth in the crisp evening. From beneath the curved rim of her helmet as she tweaked it on the crown of her head, Y/N caught glimpse of Fleur pressing a whisper of a kiss on Ron’s lips, lingering there with fury igniting her veins, and kindling the ticking bomb of wrath of her core. But he likes her better. And she wishes again that it was her. Why had he ever kissed her? All that damn time ago in Aldbourne?

“Lieutenant Speirs!” she belatedly exclaimed, cinching her helmet straps taut beneath her rigid chin.

The oh so harrowing lieutenant of Dog Company leapt back as if a pitcher of bitter water was thrown down his backside, scuttling to dignify himself with a hasty hand combing through his hair and the other yanking his uniform into a straightened place around his torso. Fleur remedied the furls in her dress and trawled manicured fingers around her mouth to clear up the blemishes of askew lipstick. And Y/N couldn’t suppress the lapse of confidence that bittered her nerves as she stood in her rumpled and threadbare OD’s, her braided hair muddied and unfurling with humidified curls, face disbelieved with muck and blood. A far cry from the modish woman standing as sure as anything alongside Ron.

Yet, she matched the radiating poise of the French girl with ease whilst striding towards the pair of them in the dusk of night. And the peripheral glimpse she captured of Fleur rooted her with the unspoken yearn — a crave — like a fiendish beast to see her break down, mourn, and realize where she belonged wasn’t and would never be at Ron’s side. To learn to lose him wasn’t something she could afford. Y/N was the woman who had long since made a name for herself since Toccoa, got detested for her existence on this very planet by Sobel himself, yet still managed to pluck Easy Company from his blundering clasp. She was the most esteemed woman in the entire battalion, and she wouldn’t be disparaged by some hotspur of a French girl.

“You seem to be enjoying the locals,” she halted before them, her radiating dismay and frustration could nearly be felt in the confined alleyway, standing in its midst, burning it off like a furnace.

And Ronald Speirs mentally prepared himself for a reprimanding of his life.

“Particularly if it’s sticking your tongue down their throats,” she shifted to face him, almost amused at the vexation that festered beneath his stony gaze, his shut up unspoken but pristine in his jagged eyes.

“I mean, for fuck’s sakes, if I went around batting my eyelashes at every man, I’d be getting ripped a new one by every man with a gold bar pinned to their jacket!” In her cruel attempt to inflict a good cut into Ron’s esteemed ego, something — his hand — heaved her abruptly backward.

“What were you thinking?!” He essentially growled in nearness to her face once the rooftops shadows cast down privacy.

His voice — it was all just a billowing cape of anger and confusion that was girdling them in the alleyway. Yet, it was so completely uncanny and out of character for him that she couldn’t — didn’t want - to acknowledge that it was Ron shrilling in her face and previously yanking her away by her shirt. He wouldn’t hurt her. Yell at her.

She hastily wrenched her shirt out of his grasp, well aware that he saw the inferno glare in her gaping eyes in that fleeting moment of confrontation.

She twisted around furiously so she could push him away for the security of distance, “What was I thinking?! You’re the one sneaking, no, lodging your tongue down the throat of the daughter of the family you’re rooming with!”

Y/N was glowering at him, eyes searing holes into his soul. And a matched anger seemed to ooze out of every pore of his body.

“And why do you fucking care?!” Ron clamored vehemently, his hot breath fanning over her crimsoned cheeks, which fell sunken as she inhaled with uncharacteristic reluctance. Therefore, he veered into the opportunity in her silence and delved an allegorical knife further into her conscious,

“You said you didn’t want to do this — that you couldn’t jeopardize your position in the battalion. And I’m not just going to throw every girl aside because your feelings get hurt!”

Then, he regarded how she winced like she was in anguish yet was swarmed with resolve at the same time, and her own internal conflict released through a lump in her throat , “You said you’d always be there for me, and you’re not. Was I supposed to choose between you and fitting in where everyone expects me to fail?!” She suppressed a hideous sob with a hurtful bite of her bottom lip, and there was a sadness in his moonlit eyes.

“You know you always got me, Y/N,” his response was clear of his razor blade patience and the pair were simultaneously now a disaster of convoluted emotions as their headstrong mental barriers fortified.

“And to be your side to do what? Kiss your ass?! Because it seems clear that all I fucking do is put my own ass on the line for you!” Y/N ticked with pristine waves of fury rolling off her petite frame and he glanced towards her in utter incredulity, as if denying her zealous words.

“And you don’t even care,” she murmured with interception of his bewildered gaze and her chest throbbed hotly with a fallen hollow. Furiously, she propered her posture to standard of her rank that the war at her back beckoned, aiming a bitter glance upon Ron, “Have your fun.”

And for him, the hostility from her eyes exposed the betrayed young girl — his best friend — within.

Her back shot towards him flippantly rather than shouting up more of a fiery storm in the alleyway, reducing both of them to the children aching distantly in a defenseless ravine in their consciouses. And, perhaps, this is where that curious tie between their very souls would be pitifully burned away by their own contempt for the other.

“I don’t want you to leave my side!” Ron abruptly boomed, rounding in front of her and hindering her departure from this dispute that he didn’t want to conclude like this, with her marching off in unbeatable wrath.

And it had to reach this degree for him to say something like he meant it — for her to realize that it wasn’t mutterings of bullshit and a shield of measly excuses.

She halted when his futile exclamation poked holes through her contempt, crimson head-fog, silent for a heartbeat as she faced him at their meager distance. Her narrowed eyes observed Ron bring his hands to his face, kneading around the weariness and subtle stubble on his stern jaw.

“You give me a reason to be better, to do better, Y/N,” he sternly confessed, drawing hesitantly closer to her, only for her to take a few steps back to maintain the still rigid distance. A icy sting cascaded through his veins; was it actually too late to mend this?

“And I was an ass to do what I did — but she initiated that kiss out of nowhere and it frankly means nothing because….fuck, Y/N.…it wasn’t you,” Ron hastily asserted, somber as ever to polish over the hopeless numbing of the lump in his throat. Emotional vulnerability was potentially the sole weakness he had to his name.

“There was never any connection there and she knows it,” he lowly acknowledged, glance digressing to where the French girl had been, only for vacant space to be adrift in her new absence, and he exhaled rather contently.

“Why the hell did you even do it in the first place?” Y/N pressed, rightfully so in her defense, easing her tone but her eyes pointedly exuding her disappointment in the man before her.

“After Bastogne, my confidence was in the shitter and I was desperate for an….outlet….. It was never meant to happen….” he murmured, his typical poise absent from every edge of his express and curve of his eyes — and she had never quite witnessed it before. “I’m a shitty person.”

His hands trembled ever slightly as they wrenched out a grotty carton of Lucky Strikes, wrangling out a cigarette and straining to kindle its lethal end as his grasp fell futile with the lighter. Ron grunted with a tasteless amount of frustration radiating from him and Y/N hastily stepped the distance between them, plucking the corroded metal of the lighter from his hand, his brow furrowing when she cast it to the gravel.

“Stop,” she murmured as his weary eyes sought around hers so acutely, “You are not a bad person, Ron. You care about people, you care about these men — care about me. Yes, you have rumors and whispers of fear that follow you around, but that’s not who you are. And….if it’s true that this wasn’t supposed to happen….you made a bad call because you felt stuck. We all feel it.”

Her left palm rose to cradle his cheek, thumb grazing about the short reaches of stubble on his jaw; they were both broken differently and yet somehow still the same.

Her chapped lips were pressed against his before he could erupt with more grovels, and he returned in an unabashed desire. He could feel her lips form the bow of smirk, it being a rush in the tenderness of the kiss, his hands toying with the hem of her shirt.

And despite the pair of them being hotheads that tread on simmering ground, they loved each other. They steadied each other, encountering the other in the middle of a vacant field rather than a battlefield razed by devastation of death, smoke, and artillery.

[sims4t2bb]

weekly update

Hello everyone! The weekly update can be found under the cut — onwards and upwards!

— Base Game

Items included in TS4 Base Game update patches have been added.

The BG Update Index has been removed from our pinned post.

Green Privacy Hedge, High Floral Hedgerow, High Hedgerow, and Privacy Hedge With Flowers conversions by AdonisPluto have been added.

— Expansion Packs

High School Years

Frank the Flying Womp-Womp, Frank the Mini Womp-Womp, and Pearl the ThrifTea Monkey conversions by @nonsensical-pixels have been added.

— Game Packs

Dream Home Decorator

Awestruck Erik by Be Modular, Closed Storage Space, Employee’s Choice Cabinet By Be Modular, "Everything Must Go!" Area Rug, Leyland Home Travel, No-Nonsense Butt-Hugger Chair, Partly Open Storage Space, Patterns and Shapes Modern Rug, Rags to Riches Chair, Slabs On Sticks Modern Desk Solution, Studious Retro Desk by L.U.M.B.E.R., Such a Mood Moodboard, The Acute Coffee Table By Be Modular, The Acute Desk, The Acute Floating Wall Bookcase, The Acute Floor-Placed Bookcase, The Acute Large Glass Floating Shelf, The Itty Bitty Plant Committee, The Rounded Coffee Table by Be Modular, The Rounded Desk...brought to you by Be Modular, The Rounded Floating Wall Bookcase by Be Modular, The Rounded Floor-Placed Bookcase by Be Modular, The Simply Squared End Table By Be Modular, The Tall Rounded Floor Shelf with Single Hatch by Be Modular, Thrice Knobs Tall Rounded Wall Shelf by Be Modular conversions by Ladysimplayer8 have been added.

— Kits

Pastel Pop

Double Puddle Wall Mirror, Luv Heart Wall Mirror, and The Aesthetically Portable Tablet conversions by @neosimi have been added.

Everyday Clutter

Sealine Memories, Shine On Shine Off, The Adoringly Adorned Jewelry Stand, Antique Spare Watch, Beacon of Intention Active Set, Boom Blocks, Coinoctagon, Gym In A Box, Invincible Frame Tray, Mega Magazine Stack, Once a Pawn a Time Chess Kit, Procrastinator’s Box of Stuff, The Pro-Tector, A Slightly Creative Collection, Snack Pack 2 Go, Spare Specs, Subtle Serve Makeup Kit, The Thirsty Thermos, and Trinketville conversions by @neosimi have been added.

Conversions of all items, sans the Shine On Shine Off mirror, by @tony-veis have been added.

Beacon of Intention Active Set, Invincible Frame Tray, and Subtle Serve Makeup Kit conversions by @melekbens1 have been added.

This pack is now fully converted!

[artificialqueens]

🏳️‍🌈 Don't Call Me on my Bluff (Anetra x Sasha Colby) - Writworm42 

A/N: Summary: in which Sasha needs to take care of business before she can take care of Anetra.

Thank you slutnetra & ria for the brainrot that started this fic, petitmonde for the pep talk that finished it, and athena for the beta-ing that made it post-able. Please note that I tried some new stuff for this fic--big TW for graphic depictions of violence.

Title from Bitch Better Have My Money by Rihanna

Sasha fucks into Anetra hard, pulling the younger woman's ponytail like a leash to jerk her ass back onto Sasha's dick. Anetra gasps and moans, gripping the surface of Sasha's desk for dear life as the sheer force of each snap of Sasha's hips practically pushes her doubled-over form right into it.

"That's it, good girl…" Sasha murmurs down to Anetra, though her voice is quiet, almost distant. It's not intentional, necessarily. Normally, answering emails while fucking her girlfriend would hardly be a challenge.

Unfortunately, Sasha has had to deal with quite the mess all morning. And for once, she's not talking about the one currently about to come all over her brand-new antique desk.

"Daddy, daddy, fuck , I'm so close--"

Sasha closes her phone and slides it into her blazer pocket, speeding up as she prepares to turn her full attention to Anetra.

At least, she means to--just as Sasha opens her mouth to egg Anetra on, her phone rings.

"Hold on, baby, one second," Sasha frowns as she fishes for her phone, her thrusts shallowing as she answers the call.

"John Anders is here for you, Ms Colby," Sasha's doorman informs her.

Fuck. He's early.

"Send him in," she tells the doorman, sighing as she brings her movements inside Anetra to a stop.

"Wha--"

"Our guest is here, sweetheart," Sasha sighs as she pulls out. "We're gonna have to finish this later."

"But I--"

"Fix your dress, baby," Sasha adjusts herself as she gives the command. "Our guest has wandering eyes, I don't want him getting any ideas."

"Just tell him to wait!" Anetra pouts, her leg twitching as if she’s itching to stamp her foot. It’s a tempting suggestion; Sasha’s cock is straining against her pants, and her belly is burning with desire to see Anetra come undone underneath her. 

But deep down, Sasha knows if she’s going to truly enjoy herself, she needs to get this over and done with. So she pushes her desires aside, shaking her head as she extends a hand to tuck her fingers under Anetra’s chin.

“I’m sorry, kitten,” she sighs apologetically. “Daddy needs to get this done as soon as possible, then we can finish where we left off, okay?”

“This is so unfair,” Anetra huffs, rolling her eyes. It absolutely is, Sasha thinks, but what’s done is done--any second now, her doorman will knock and their guest will arrive, so business is unavoidable. 

Thankfully, there is one saving grace to the situation, one that always cheers Anetra up.

“You know,” Sasha smiles, grabbing Anetra’s hand to pull the younger woman on top of her lap as she sits down, “If you want to stay for the meeting, there is something you can help me with.”

“That sounds boring,” Anetra says apprehensively, and Sasha has to hold back a laugh. 

“I promise, baby, it won’t be--in fact, if you’re willing to stay and be patient while daddy takes care of business, I think you’ll have a lot of fun at the end of the meeting.” 

Sasha watches with satisfaction as the realization dawns on Anetra. A twinkle lights in Anetra’s eyes as a smile spreads on her face, and she nods eagerly.

“Good girl,” Sasha laughs, kissing Anetra on the cheek. “Now here, baby, roll this for daddy, will you?” She slides the rolling tray waiting at the corner of her desk over to her girlfriend, “I could use a smoke.”

As if on cue, there’s a knock at the door, bringing the discussion to a close. 

Alright, Sasha. Game face . 

“Come in!” 

Anders looks nervous as he enters the room, though it's obvious from his frankly unconvincing scowl that he's trying not to. Sasha doesn’t bother standing up; instead, she waits for him to approach, extending the hand that isn’t around Anetra’s waist for Anders to kiss.

“Pleasure to see you, Mother.”

“Have a seat,” Sasha says coolly. A strange look flashes in Anders’ eyes, but it smooths out as he sits down across from Sasha, clearing his throat as he leans back. There’s a beat, a moment of silence that Sasha knows is awkward for the man in front of her. Good; it’s when things are awkward that jitters spill over and people run their mouths, cracking without Sasha having to lift a finger.

Unfortunately, Anders is better at handling his anxiety than Sasha had hoped.

"Is it necessary for her to be here?" Anders frowns as he looks Anetra up and down, the corners of his mouth twitching. Anetra bristles, relaxing only when Sasha strokes her side soothingly with her thumb.

"Anything you can say to me, you can say in front of her," Sasha shrugs, leaning back in her chair to take a puff of the blunt Anetra had just finished preparing for her. "Isn't that right, kitten?"

"Mhm," Anetra hums, sticking her chin out for Sasha to place the joint between her waiting lips. 

“I just think that—“

“You know, funny thing about that,” Sasha watches as Anetra exhales a thin cloud of smoke, her whole body relaxing a bit against Sasha’s own. “I don’t remember asking what you think. Do you remember that, baby?”

“Don’t think so.” Anetra fixes Anders with an almost predatory look, her lips curling into a smile. She’s enjoying this too much, Sasha thinks; if she doesn’t slow Anetra down, their cards might get drawn too early by mistake.

“Patience, baby.” Sasha opts to disguise her warning with a kiss against the shell of Anetra’s ear. “Let daddy work first.”

Anetra makes a discontented noise, but relents nonetheless. 

“So let’s cut to the chase,” Sasha turns her attention back to the man sitting across from her. “Do you know why I called you here today?” 

“I assume to talk business,” Anders says, his tone brusque. Anetra stirs, and Sasha quiets her with a kiss to her cheek. 

“Don’t like how he’s talking to you,” Anetra burrows her face into Sasha’s neck, her murmur so quiet Sasha doubts Anders can hear. Honestly, it’s probably better that way. Anders looks nervous because of Anetra’s whispering, as if the fact that he can’t hear what Anetra is saying is destabilizing him.

Sasha will have to thank Anetra for that trick later. 

“You know, I like you, Anders,” Sasha sighs, running a hand through Anetra’s hair. “You’re good at what you do. Professional. You get your job done quickly without asking too many questions.”

“Thank you, Mother,” Anders clears his throat. The look in his eyes has lost its hard edge now, and it’s plain to see that he’s losing his footing.

“We need to talk about the Rembrandt.” 

“I don’t see why,” the man bluffs, and Sasha resists the urge to roll her eyes. 

“Baby, why don’t you show Mr Anders what I’m talking about, hm?” She sends Anetra off her lap with a tap to the younger woman’s ass, watching bemusedly as Anetra flounces over to the filing cabinet beside Sasha’s desk. Anetra stares at Anders wickedly as she fishes the key out of her bra, pulling out the requested file almost instantly without breaking eye contact.

“He sweats a lot,” Anetra giggles as she takes her place back on Sasha’s lap, licking her lips.

“Hush, baby,” Sasha pinches Anetra’s thigh in warning. Anetra hasn’t been able to attend one of these meetings in weeks, and it’s clear the resulting boredom has been getting to her--if Sasha doesn’t reign her in fast, Anetra will wind up jumping the gun, and Sasha won’t be able to get what she needs. 

She decides to hold Anetra extra close as a safeguard even as she pushes the dossier over the surface of her desk. 

“I paid you two and a half million to make sure the sale was untraceable. Tell me, does this look untraceable to you?” 

“I… I don’t--I don’t know what you…”

“ God , I want him,” Anetra whines, her feet kicking just a little in displeasure when Sasha ignores her. 

“Take a look if you don’t know what I mean,” she spits. “But I think you’ll see quite clearly where you so carelessly left footprints. It cost me almost three million more to cover those up, you know.”

“Well, mistakes happen, Mother--”

“Oh, I know they do,” Sasha sighs. “And like I said, Anders, I like you, so I was prepared to just chalk it up to that. But you see this little kitten here?” 

Anetra practically purrs as Sasha strokes a hand through her hair, laughing softly. 

“Why don’t you tell our guest what you found while you were looking through those papers, baby?” 

“He did it on purpose,” Anetra points out with a smile, reaching over the desk to point right at the centre of one of the splayed-out documents. “You can see it at the bottom of this page here, there’s a transaction of an additional half-million to an off-shore account that we don’t own. And then you can see in these transcripts of your Swiss account that someone from Russia was looking into it. And then look at this, daddy--the Rembrandt never made it to the buyer, it got intercepted in Chechnya. And remember how you called Smith after, and asked him all those questions? And then Smith called Ngo, and Ngo called Babanin? She said someone paid Mr Anders a lot of money to take the Rembrandt away from you. And you were gonna find it, but then the police knocked and we had to make the problem go away?” 

“I do remember,” Sasha laughs hollowly. “Tell me baby, what did the whole ordeal wind up costing me?”

“Five and a half million, daddy.” 

“That’s right,” Sasha echoes. “Five and a half million fucking dollars, and I didn’t see a cent of the original eight million sale.” 

“Well, I can hardly be blamed--”

“Except you can,” Sasha cuts Anders off the pass. “And you will be. Tell me, Anders, how much did the thief pay you?”

“I don’t have to tell you anything.”

“Babanin already did,” Anetra sniffs. “She said you got a whole ten million this time.” 

Anders says nothing, but his face pales, mouth opening and closing like a cartoon fish before he sets his jaw desperately.

Bingo. 

“And you have the audacity to come in here and call me Mother,” Sasha laughs harshly. 

“So here’s what’s going to happen, Anders,” Sasha takes another puff of her joint as Anetra starts practically vibrating next to her. “You’re going to reimburse me every cent I spent on the deal, then give me what’s mine. Fifteen and a half million by tomorrow evening, you understand?”

Anders hesitates, and Anetra tenses.

“I can see you’re apprehensive,” Sasha smiles. “So let me sweeten the deal for you a little, alright? Starting with my girl here.” 

She grabs Anetra by the chin, pulls her in for a deep kiss. 

“You see, my baby’s a very playful person--she just loves all sorts of games. Problem is, she tends to get a little… excited when she’s playing. Poor thing breaks her toys so fast, Mother just can’t keep up! It’s a real shame--her tantrums aren’t very pretty, you know. Scares lots of new friends away.”

Anders swallows hard. “And this concerns me because?”

“Because she loves playing with boys especially, and I’ve heard you have five of them back home who she’d love to play with,” Sasha smiles. “Your youngest even just turned the same age as her--a perfect new friend to introduce her to! Wouldn’t you like that, sweetheart?”

“I love playdates,” Anetra muses, licking her lips. “Am I getting one, daddy?”

“Well, that depends,” Sasha purrs. “If I get my money, then sorry, baby, you’ll have to wait. But if I don’t, then I’m sure young Matthew will really love playing with you. What’s that game you like, baby? This little piggie, I think?”

“You’ll get your money,” Anders croaks. “You have my word.”

“I had your word last time, too,” Sasha says dryly. “Call your bank now, while we’re watching. Then I’ll believe you. Ah, ah, ah--I don’t want you calling a decoy on me. Give me your phone.” 

The call takes less than ten minutes, but it'll take about 72 hours for the money to hit Sasha's various accounts. Not what she was hoping, but it doesn’t really matter; good things come to those who wait, after all.

And that goes doubly for the woman on Sasha's lap, who looks like she might burst any second.

"So are we done here?" Anders huffs after Sasha passes his phone back to him. 

"You and I are done, yes," Sasha chooses her words carefully as she nods to Anetra, who smiles.

"Hold on," Sasha interrupts Anders, stopping him in the middle of standing up from his chair.

"Yes?" His voice is apprehensive, and the fear in his eyes makes Anetra squirm with delight on Sasha's lap.

"I said you and I are done, John." Sasha lets her hand drop from Anetra's waist, taps her back to signal that it's her turn. "That doesn't mean you're free to go."

"Mother, please--"

"Have fun, baby!"

Sasha leans back in her chair, closing her eyes to listen to Anders' screams as Anetra pounces, pulling her knife from her dress pocket in one smooth motion.

"This little piggie goes to market, this little piggie stays home!"

Anders makes a choking noise as Sasha snuffs out the rest of her blunt. She doesn't dare look to see which finger Anetra chose to shove down his throat.

"This little piggie had roast beef—“

Sasha just hopes Anetra has the decency not to go too wild this time--last time she played with someone this way, Sasha was picking shreds of skin out of the carpet for days afterwards.

“—And this little piggie had none!"

Jesus, Sasha's dry-cleaning bill is going to be astronomical this month.

"And this little piggie went…”

" Please, please, please!"

"... Aaaall the way… Home!"

Sasha opens her eyes right as the blade of Anetra's knife lands between Anders' own.

"He ruined my new dress," Anetra sighs glumly as she turns back to Sasha with a dejected frown on her face as she points to the deep red stains wetting her shirt. 

"I can see that," Sasha nods. "It's alright, baby--we can get you a new one.”

The offer seems to placate Anetra, who brightens up instantly.

“Say, think we’re gonna wind up meeting his sons after all?” Anetra brings her knife to her mouth, smiling as she licks it clean.

“Oh, I don’t doubt it,” Sasha shrugs. “You know how families like ours can get--unless they’re much smarter than their dad, it’s only a matter of time before they visit.”

"True," Anetra folds her knife closed, slides it back in her pocket before reaching for Sasha’s hand instead. "Think I can come up with a new game for them before then?"

"Anything's possible. Now come on, sweetheart. Let's go upstairs so you can thank daddy for the playdate, yeah?"

The pep in Anetra's step as they go is almost adorable enough for Sasha to forget what they've just left behind.

--

Sasha’s breath comes out ragged as she thrusts in and out of Anetra, the younger woman’s hands tight around Sasha’s neck. Even filed down into ovals, Anetra’s nails dig into Sasha’s skin so hard that Sasha knows it’ll bruise, but she can’t bring herself to care.

Mother can do what she wants, after all. 

“Daddy, daddy, fuck , I’m so close, shit--”

“I know, baby, I know,” Sasha gasps, snapping her hips harder. “Just a little bit more, yeah? Hold it a little longer for daddy, there’s a good kitten.”

Anetra’s eyes roll back, her grip slackening and mouth dropping open as Sasha changes her angle slightly, picks up the pace. 

“That’s right, baby, that’s good,” Sasha praises. “Fuck, you look so good like this, taking my cock so well.”

Anetra beams, the praise spurring her on to tighten her grip on Sasha's throat again, grind down to meet each of her thrusts a little harder.

"Don't stop," she pleads, "Even if-- shit --even if I come…"

"Oh, don't you worry," Sasha laughs, "Believe me, baby, I'm not stopping until you're not walking."

As if on cue, Anetra tips over the edge, her whole body shuddering and arms falling to her sides as Sasha fucks her through her orgasm. It’s a sight that’s mesmerizing; Anetra looks so delicate like this, so vulnerable. Like Sasha could destroy her utterly and completely, and she wouldn’t care at all. In fact, Sasha knows Anetra doesn’t, because the very next second, she dissolves into a puddle of gratitude, thanking Sasha over and over again for reducing her to such a state. 

“Not yet, baby.” Sasha hushes Anetra with a hand over her mouth, shaking her head. “I told you, daddy’s not done yet. You had your chance to play, now I’m going to have mine.” 

“You don’t need to make any more calls?” Anetra frowns as Sasha starts to move inside her again, letting her hand slide from Anetra’s mouth to close around her throat.

“Not tonight, baby,” Sasha laughs, picking up her pace as she feels her own orgasm approach. “Tonight, business can wait.”

Pride Challenge Points: 1435

[shecreateshome]

46 Creative Decor Ideas for a Welcoming Guest Room

46 decor ideas to make your guest room not only aesthetically pleasing but also a comfortable and inviting place for your friends and family to stay.

Cozy Bedding: Layer soft blankets and pillows for comfort.

Accent Wall: Add a bold paint color or wallpaper.

Personal Touches: Frame family photos or artwork.

Reading Nook: Create a cozy corner with a comfy chair and lamp.

Curtain Drama: Long, flowing curtains for an elegant look.

Statement Headboard: A unique headboard can be a focal point.

Travel Theme: Decorate with souvenirs from your adventures.

Fresh Flowers: A vase of fresh blooms brightens any room.

Vintage Charm: Incorporate antique furniture or decor.

Neutral Palette: Calming colors create a serene atmosphere.

Wall Decals: Easy to apply and remove for a playful touch.

Art Gallery: Hang a collection of your favorite artworks.

Twin Beds: Perfect for accommodating different guests.

Mirrored Furniture: Reflects light and adds glamour.

Aromatherapy: Use diffusers or scented candles for relaxation.

Desk Area: For guests who need to work or study.

Coastal Vibes: Beachy decor with seashells and driftwood.

Rustic Charm: Wooden accents for a cozy feel.

Layered Rugs: Adds texture and warmth to the floor.

Monogrammed Bedding: Personalized touch for your guests.

Wardrobe Space: Ensure ample storage for their belongings.

Books and Magazines: A small library for leisure reading.

Tray with Essentials: Water, snacks, and toiletries.

Plush Towels: Soft and fluffy towels for a spa-like feel.

Blackout Curtains: Ensure a good night's sleep.

Wall-Mounted Shelves: Display books or decor items.

Garden View: Position the bed to overlook greenery.

Accent Pillows: Mix and match patterns and textures.

Charging Station: USB ports and outlets for convenience.

Layered Lighting: Overhead, task, and ambient lighting.

Fairy Lights: Create a magical atmosphere.

Luggage Rack: Provide a designated spot for suitcases.

Customized Welcome Sign: A warm greeting for guests.

Guest Bathroom Basket: Stock with essentials.

Artificial Fireplace: Adds a cozy ambiance.

Minimalist Design: Clean lines and simplicity.

Soft Throw Blankets: Drape over furniture for added comfort.

Oversized Mirror: Makes the room feel more spacious.

Matching Nightstands: A sense of symmetry.

Soothing Artwork: Nature scenes or abstract art.

White Bedding: For a crisp and timeless look.

High-Quality Mattress: Ensure a good night's rest.

Ceiling Fan: Control the room's temperature.

Aromatherapy Diffuser: Infuse the room with calming scents.

Wall Clock: Keep track of time in style.

Full-Length Mirror: Convenient for guests getting ready.

[seranouk]

The Essential Elegance of a Dressing Table

A dressing table is more than just a piece of furniture; it is a space of personal retreat, organization, and elegance. Often a centrepiece in bedrooms or walk-in closets, the dressing table is a functional and aesthetic element in modern and traditional homes.

Its design, purpose, and versatility make it an indispensable addition to interiors.

Purpose and Functionality

The primary function of a dressing table is to provide a dedicated space for grooming and personal care. With a mirror as its focal point, individuals can easily prepare for their day.

Whether applying makeup, styling hair, or selecting accessories, the dressing table helps streamline daily routines. Its design often includes drawers or compartments for storing essentials such as cosmetics, jewellery, hair tools, and skincare products.

The organization offered by a dressing table is unmatched. With everything neatly arranged, it eliminates the frustration of searching for small items. Many modern designs also incorporate organizers, trays, and even hidden storage spaces, making them ideal for decluttering bedrooms.

Design and Style

Dressing tables come in a wide variety of styles, ranging from classic wooden designs to sleek modern pieces. Traditional dressing tables often feature ornate carvings, antique finishes, and intricate details, exuding a sense of timeless charm. These are typically made from rich woods such as mahogany or walnut, making them both durable and visually appealing.

On the other hand, contemporary dressing tables are designed to complement modern aesthetics. These may feature minimalist lines, metal accents, and glass elements. Colours like white, black, or neutral tones dominate the modern palette, allowing them to blend seamlessly into any décor.

Compact designs with foldable mirrors or wall-mounted options are also gaining popularity, particularly in urban homes where space is limited.

Adding Personality to Your Space

A dressing table can be a reflection of your personal style. It provides a canvas for customization, allowing you to express your tastes through décor elements.

Add a plush ottoman or a chic stool for seating, or drape fairy lights around the mirror for a whimsical touch. Decorative trays, scented candles, or a vase of fresh flowers can further enhance the charm of your dressing table.

For those who prefer a minimalist look, simple elements like a sleek mirror and a small tray for essentials can create a clean and modern vibe. On the other hand, vintage enthusiasts might opt for a gilded mirror and ornate frames to add a touch of opulence.

If you are looking to buy the best furniture online, browse https://www.serano.co.uk/.

Multi-Functional Uses

While traditionally used for grooming, a dressing table can also serve other purposes. It can double as a small workspace or a vanity for writing letters. In compact apartments, some designs integrate with desks or side tables, offering dual functionality.

Conclusion

A dressing table is more than just a practical addition to a home; it is a statement piece that combines beauty and utility. Whether you’re drawn to its organizational features, aesthetic appeal, or sentimental value, the right dressing table can elevate the ambience of your living space.

With countless designs to choose from, there’s a dressing table to suit every taste and need, making it a timeless investment in personal comfort and style.