#Before we collide ENGLISH version

[innerthoughtsmonologue]

About "Before we collide."

So, recently I've updated my novel, and there are some words in other languages, those meanings will be at the last part of the chapter, I hope it's helpfull for better understanding them. 

Enjoy and be kind! 

[flowerandblood]

The Doubt & The Delight

[ modern Frollo • Aemond x Esmeralda • female ]

[ warnings: sex content, oral sex, smut, angst, description of physical and mental disabilities, remorse, depression, hysteria attacks, swearing, trauma, suicidal thoughts, suicide attempt ]

[ description: After a car accident, his brother has to deal with the consequences of what happened, and he, as his protector, does not know how to help him. His sister comes up with the idea of hiring someone as his carer who will be able to cheer him up and occupy his mind. It turns out, however, that the girl he hired charmed not only his younger brother. Obsession, self-destructive behavior, verbal and physical aggression, sexual tension, dark, malicious Aemond. ]

Author's note: This story is a request, but I decided to freely use what I liked in the book and Disney film to create a new, disturbing story taking place in modern times. It is intended to be uncomfortable and will contain scenes that are at least morally questionable, in my version "Esmeralda" is not Romanian. This story will also include motifs from Jane Eyre, which was a separate request. My story will also touch on the problems of people with disabilities, so if these are sensitive topics for you, I advise against reading further. You have been warned.

Part 1 − The Knight & The Judge Part 2 − The Sin & The Penance Epilogue

Main Characters Moodboard Aemond NSFW Alphabet

This is the last part of this story. Thank you all for such a nice reception of this entire mini-series, it was supposed to be a oneshot, but as usual it turned out to be something more! This is probably one of my favorite works here and I can't wait to hear your opinions.

* English is not my first language. Please, do not repost. Enjoy! *

Previous chapters: Masterlist

_____

That night, after what had happened between them, he sobbed silently for the first time since the day of the accident in which his parents died. He didn't know what else he could do − he felt helpless and couldn't sleep, despair completely possessing his heart and mind.

Don't ever touch me again.

We are even.

He clenched his eyelids, letting the tears run down the sides of his face onto the pillow lying under his head.

Some part of him wanted to go to her door, to fall to his knees and beg her to open it for him, to let him hold her close, to fall asleep in her embrace.

He needed her so much, but he knew he had no right to demand anything from her.

She was doing more than she had to anyway.

He shuddered as he heard the sound of the door opening; stupefied by the sedatives and painkillers for a moment he had no idea where he was or who he was − he raised himself up on his elbow and hissed, feeling his head ache incredibly.

He opened his eyelids and immediately closed them, blinded by the light from the windows − he gave up with a sigh laying back on the couch, trying to calm himself down.

"Daeron?" He called out loudly, trying to remember what had happened, whether he had drunk too much alcohol the evening before or overdosed on sleeping pills.

He heard someone's footsteps and froze when he saw her frightened face; she came towards him with her eyes wide open as if looking at a ghost, stopping at a safe distance.

"− I'm just helping him change, we'll come soon − God, how pale you are, should I call the doctor again? −" She muttered clearly genuinely horrified by his condition, but he shook his head quickly.

"− did you call the police yesterday? −" He asked lowly, thinking with horror that no one at the prosecutor's office could find out that he was still struggling with his trauma and had almost caused a car crash.

She shook her head quickly, playing with the fingers of her hand in a nervous gesture.

"− n-no − the man we almost collided with wanted to do it at first, but when we got out of the car and said you'd fainted he called an ambulance and let it go − he apparently decided you'd just had some sort of attack and didn't want to add to our problems −" She replied once looking him in the eye, once looking away − he could see that she clearly wasn't coping with the situation or what had happened between them.

He sighed in relief, running his hand over his face, thinking about the fact that securing Daeron's fate was now his priority and he needed to pull himself together.

"− I'm going to go help Daeron and we'll make something for breakfast soon −" She said quickly and turned away, moving down the corridor towards his little brother's room, disappearing behind the door.

The two of them had tried not to look at each other all morning, heartbroken and horrified by what had happened between them − they both felt that their lives had slipped out of their control and he resented himself for dragging her into it all.

The doctors advised him to stay at home for a few days and rest, so he called Alys to ask her to bring him his documentation.

"− sick leave? − something happened? −" She asked concerned, and he sighed heavily, tightening his fingers on the base of his nose, not having the strength for this discussion.

"− I've been overworking lately, I need to slow down − can I count on you? −" He asked matter-of-factly, hearing her snort of amusement on the other side.

"− sure − I'll be there in half an hour −" She replied calmly and hung up; he sighed heavily, running his hand over his face and put the phone down on the table top.

He glanced over his shoulder, hearing the sizzle of the pan and shuddered meeting her gaze − she lowered her eyes immediately as if caught in the act, concentrating on not burning the pancakes, Daeron wheeled around her in his wheelchair placing clean plates and cutlery beside her.

They ate breakfast together, both of them really only talking to Daeron, passing cups and juice to each other out of politeness only. He felt a pleasant shudder when his fingers touched hers, looking her straight in the eyes − her lower lip twitched a little, only a quiet, sad thank you came out of her mouth.

As they ate Daeron said he would do his own homework and then change her to look after him, as if he was now the one to take on the role of his caretaker.

As he left his Esmeralda stood up, picking up the dirty dishes from the countertop − he took his plate from her hand, swallowing hard.

"− no need, I'll do it − I'm better now, I don't want to force you to stay here any longer than necessary − thank you very much −" He said in a low voice, getting up from his seat and stepping around her, opening the dishwasher with a light movement, tossing in the cutlery and other dirty dishes she'd held earlier.

He felt her looking at him, his heart pounding like crazy, for some reason he wanted to cry again.

"− I'm sorry − for what happened yesterday −" She muttered in a whisper and he raised his shocked gaze to her, frozen still.

She stood in front of him covering her mouth with her hand, trying to silence the loud, ragged breath that shook her body along with the sob that wanted to break from her throat, tears began to fall from the corners of her eyes one after another.

God, she was remorseful.

"− no − no, stop − you didn't do anything wrong, I wanted it −" He said quickly, but she shook her head.

"− I couldn't sleep − I felt awful −" She uttered with difficulty, choking on her own tears, and despite her telling him never to touch her again he put his arm around her waist and pulled her to him in one sure movement − her body did not put up any resistance to him, her fingers tightened on his sweatshirt in a helpless gesture.

"− I-I'm sorry − I'm sorry, I didn't mean to hurt you −" She mumbled out and burst into quiet sobs.

He thought with despair that he had broken this poor girl, brought her to a state where she felt like an abuser.

He embraced her tightly, snuggling his face into the hollow of her neck, stroking her back reassuringly − her wonderful scent and the warmth of her body had a soothing effect on him, he thought he wanted to remember this moment for a lifetime.

"− I'm the one who hurt you − I took something away from you and you tried to get it back − you asked me if I wanted it and I made it clear that I did − easy − breathe deeply − it's all right −" He whispered in a trembling voice, running his large hand through her back and hair. She snuggled into him so tightly that he felt tears under his eyelids himself − he pressed his lips together not wanting to let them flow out but it was no use.

"− thank you for everything − I'm feeling better now, I'll be fine by the time Helaena arrives − go home and get some rest − I'll think of something and explain to Daeron why you can't work for us anymore − I'll send you your pay by transfer so you never have to see me again − hm? −" He asked softly and she only nodded, her whole chest trembling in convulsion as she drew in a deep breath, trying to calm herself.

He wanted to tell her that he loved her.

He wanted to tell her that she was the most wonderful person he had ever met.

He wanted to tell her that if she ever needed help, she could always count on him.

He wanted to do that, but he only flinched when he heard the doorbell ring, reminding himself of Alys − they moved away looking at each other in pain, the sight of her wiping her cheeks red from tears broke his heart.

He realised that he was a monster.

As soon as he opened the gate for her, Alys walked into his house with thick folders of documents in her hands, looking elegant as usual in her jacket, long trousers and high heels. She smiled at the sight of his Esmeralda, and she pressed her lips together realising with horror that she stood dressed only in his hoodie.

"Good morning. We don't know each other yet." Alys said to her and held out her hand to her − she, not knowing what to do, herself embarrassed by the situation and how it looked shook her hand, squeezing it firmly.

"Good morning." She muttered and just threw to him that she was going to go see how Daeron was doing with his homework − Alys led her away with her eyes looking at her with a calm, curious expression on her face.

"Who is this beautiful little flower? In addition wearing your hoodie I think." She asked amused, a note of mock accusation in her voice, as if she had solved the equation. "Is it because of her that you can't concentrate lately?"

He threw her one warning, sharp look, which did not deter her, however − he sighed heavily and shook his head.

"She's Daeron's caretaker and she had to stay here to help me take care of him after I fainted yesterday. They were at a carnival ball together and she had nothing to change into." He replied coolly, wanting to end the subject quickly, frustrated.

"Is that why you both cried?" She asked lowly raising an eyebrow, the piercing look in her bright green eyes told him clearly that she felt the tension that hung in the air between them. He swallowed loudly, looking away, not wanting to look at her smile full of satisfaction.

"Thank you for bothering to come all the way out here. I'll be gone for a week, we're in touch." He replied dryly − she threw over his shoulder that if he needed her for anything he could count on her and smiled at his Esmeralda heading for the exit, saying it was a pleasure to meet her.

As the door closed behind her there was an awkward silence between them. He saw that she was wearing his hoodie and shorts that were too loose on his brother but on her they fit perfectly despite the manly cut, in her hand she held the bag with her costume.

She was leaving.

He will never see her again.

"Are you sure you can manage?" She asked uncertainly, not looking at him. She seemed pale to him, he thought that for some reason Alys' visit had saddened her, but he didn't even dare assume it might have had anything to do with him.

At most, she might have thought he was a bigger bastard and pervert than she suspected.

"Yes, we'll be fine. Thanks again." He muttered, trying not to look at her, but to poor effect, thinking only of how wonderful it was to hold her in his arms, how tightly she snuggled into him seeking refuge and comfort.

He realised that he craved such closeness from her as much as the touch of her naked body.

He wasn't just about sex.

She, however, merely nodded, raising her sad, tired, embittered gaze at him once more, and after a moment she turned and disappeared behind the door.

The hours leading up to Helaena's arrival he spent with Daeron, playing together FIFA'23 and other games that his brother thought would distract him from all the unpleasant events of the past weeks.

"Don't worry, everything will be fine. You just need to rest. It's good that you and Esmeralda have reconciled." He said clicking beside him on his pad, trying to win a race against him on the big space track. He swallowed hard, thinking with pain and shame that they hadn't reconciled at all, that they weren't even.

What she did was a desperate attempt by her to regain what he had taken from her, the feeling that she had power over her own body.

It didn't bring her any relief though − it seemed to him that it made her feel even worse.

She wasn't like him − she'd probably never behaved like this before, and she was horrified to find that she didn't recognise herself.

He had destroyed her, taken away her innocence, devoured her.

He pressed his lips together, trying to stop the burning tears that forced their way under his eyelids from flowing and grunted loudly, trying to focus on the game.

As he prepared the room where his sister was to sleep, and where his Esmeralda had previously spent the night, he noticed a purple cloth lying on the floor. He reached out and picked it up, realising after a moment that it was a scarf she had worn on her head in the form of a headband.

He pressed it to his face and closed his eyes, with a squeeze in his throat thinking that the material was permeated with her scent.

He kept it.

Helaena had arrived straight from the airport in a taxi for which she had paid crores − as soon as she stepped inside she dropped her suitcase, ran up to him and threw herself into his arms. He burst out sobbing, feeling her familiar, tender closeness.

He wasn't sure when was the last time someone had hugged him, stroked him, told him everything was going to be alright, that now he was the one being taken care of.

Taking the opportunity that Daeron was playing in his room on his laptop, they sat side by side on the living room couch to discuss what had happened.

"I think I've stopped coping. I'm slowly losing my self-control." He muttered, burying his face in his hands, feeling that he needed to at least partially throw off what was going on inside his head − he felt his sister stroking his back comfortingly.

"Me and Aegon left you alone with all of this, sinking into our own grief. We all focused on Daeron because we decided you were older and better able to handle it all." She said with pain and some kind of regret, as if she only now realised that he wasn't a fully formed adult then either.

He let the air out of his lungs, feeling like a small, clumsy child again, embarrassed that he wasn't coping, that he had chaos in his head, that he was stuck and unable to get out of the mess he had sunk all the way into.

"I thought it would be good for you to have a change. For you and Daeron to fly with me for a few weeks, get some rest, during which time we can work together to find you some sort of therapist, someone to help you get over all this." She said warmly, and he shook his head quickly, terrified of her suggestion, of having to reinvent himself somewhere, of not being in his home, of not having his things and activities.

"No, I can't do that. I need a rest, but here, at home. I do think, however, that it will do Daeron good to spend time with you, to get away from it all. Maybe when I have a bit of time to myself I can somehow…sort it all out." He muttered, feeling her worried gaze on him.

"You shouldn't be left alone."

"I haven't been alone with my thoughts for five years. I need this." He said regretfully, realising that he had devoted all his strength to his younger brother, leaving himself with nothing.

He felt empty.

"And he needs a change of environment. He sees me gloomy and tired every day. You will help me the most if you take care of him for a week or two so that I can get myself in order."

"You have to promise me that you will go to therapy. You're taking on too much on your shoulders." She said cautiously, and he nodded to her, wanting everyone to finally give him a break.

Daeron was at the same time happy about the sudden unplanned holiday, but on the other hand very worried that he was going to be left alone at home.

"But who will take care of you? Esmeralda?" He asked hesitantly, and he replied that he would manage on his own, that they would talk on the phone every day, that he just needed a bit of rest to think things over.

As they packed to leave he was with them in body, but not in thoughts which drifted far away to her, to what had happened between them.

Despite the fact that they had sex with each other twice, it was the memory of that morning in his kitchen when he held her in his embrace that he remembered most, the innocence and tenderness of that gesture, the warmth of her body, the smell of her hair, the fact that for a moment she had allowed him to get close to her.

He knew he would never see her again.

Waving them off, already seated in the taxi, watching them drive away he wondered what the point of living such a terrible person like him was.

He cleaned the whole house, sorted the papers in his office, put up the laundry and emptied the dishwasher, doing everything unhurriedly with complete silence all around him, only the sound of the wind outside the windows and the quiet pounding of raindrops against the windowsills.

He finally sat down on the sofa, staring dully ahead, before lowering his gaze to the small container of sleeping pills he'd been taking for days to get at least a few hours of sleep.

He wondered how many he'd have to swallow to not wake up.

He didn't know why his hand reached for his phone − his fingers tapped out a question on Google and, to his surprise, many different topics on forums about how to commit suicide painlessly popped up.

He read statements from some young, desperate, frightened people who couldn't cope with life and responses from others, some encouraging them to commit the act and explaining how to do it, others asking them not to do it, that they would be happy to talk to them, to support them through this difficult time.

He thought of Daeron, of how if he had done it, his little brother would have completely broken down, that it would only add to the pain of his whole family, and that Helaena would never forgive herself for leaving him alone.

That it would have been selfish of him.

On the other hand, his mind reminded him of his aggressive, merciless interrogations, the way he approached witnesses, the way he approached Alys, what he did to his Esmeralda when she recognised at once his malicious, dark nature.

How was someone like him supposed to continue to take care of Daeron? How was he supposed to pretend that he was a good man who could advise him on anything, be his authority?

He thought that his little brother should have stayed with Helaena − she was the calmest of them all, surely she would have handled his parenting much better, given him what he needed.

He reached for a small container of pills and stared at it, turning it between his fingers with a loud rattle, wondering dispassionately what he should do with himself.

He hummed as if he remembered something and slipped his hand into the pocket of his trousers, pulling out a thin, purple folded cloth − he looked at it, feeling the need to call her.

He didn't know why he would do that when he was sure she didn't want to see him and couldn't even look at Daeron, to whom he would have to explain why she would no longer be taking care of him upon his return.

He guessed that she would only pick up out of politeness, and he would again flood her with his problems, his suicidal thoughts, forcing her to worry about him, to feel sorry for him even though he didn't deserve her sympathy.

He didn't even know when he unscrewed the container, when he tilted his head and poured its entire contents into his mouth, taking a deep sip of water after this, letting his judgment of himself run deep into his stomach.

He seemed to regain his sanity only after a moment, staring at the empty vessel wondering what he had actually done.

Oh fuck.

God, what had he done?

No, no, no, no.

He went into a complete panic, his heart started pounding like crazy − he didn't know how much time he had before he lost consciousness, so in a gesture of helplessness he dialled her number quickly, wondering if she would answer from him this time.

He thought he was pathetic, but he was scared, there was no one else to turn to − his body was shaking all over from stress and terror, his breathing quick and raspy, tears of fear in his eyes.

Biip.

Biip.

Biip.

Biip.

Biip.

Biip.

Biip.

"− hello? −"

He heard her uncertain voice on the other side and drew in the air loudly, shocked, swallowing hard, taking a deep breath, running his hand over his face.

"− fuck − I − I − I did something very, very stupid − I took a whole packet of sleeping pills − I don't know what came over me − oh fuck, what have I done −" He muttered in a squeaky, high-pitched voice, like a helpless child who had broken a vase and realised what his parent would do to him when they found out.

"− what? − oh God − are you home? − I'm calling the ambulance −"

"− n-no − no, fuck, they'll kick me out of the national prosecutor's office − please −"

"− go quickly to the bathroom and try to induce vomiting − give me the code to your gate, I'll be right there −"

He seemed to act in an amok, as he rose from the couch everything around him swirled − she told him to take his phone to the restroom, so he did.

He fell to his knees in front of the toilet, shoving two fingers down his throat − after several attempts he finally threw up, whooping with his tears, coughing loudly, his whole body shaking in convulsions, his heart pounding like mad in his chest.

How could he do this, how could he be so selfish?

"− I'm sorry −" He mumbled, sliding slowly to the ground, feeling his mind begin to envelope in a blissful peace and quiet, her voice coming from the speaker of his phone seemed to him only a distant whisper.

He thought he would take a nap for a while, rest and when he woke up everything would be fine.

It seemed to him that minutes, hours or years might have passed when he felt someone move his body − he shuddered as someone's fingers forced their way between his lips, his numb body powerless to resist.

"− come on, please − get it out of you − God, what have you done − please, please, come on −" He heard her crying beside him, the tips of her fingers pressing against the back of his tongue, until finally his stomach convulsed with a powerful spasm, and his body threw it all out with his throaty cough of exertion.

He heard her sobs, smelled her scent, her closeness, how her hands washed his face with water, how she stroked his head as she hugged him to her breasts, mumbling in despair that he was a fool, something warm and soft enveloped them.

He fell asleep, recognising that this was what heaven must have been like.

When he woke up he felt everything around him spinning − he muttered in displeasure, another cramp squeezing his stomach.

He pulled himself up, in the dark looking for the toilet, at the last moment leaning over it and vomited again, panting loudly, everything around him blurred, it seemed to him that it was morning.

He heard movement beside him − someone's hand touched his back and stroked him with a gentle, affectionate gesture as convulsion again shook his body, which was trying with all its might to rid itself of what he had swallowed the day before.

Nothing more than a mumble left his mouth, his head drooped involuntarily − he felt someone pull him back to keep him from sliding down onto the tiles. He lay down, something soft enveloped him again.

"− it's okay − sleep −" He heard her whisper and thought that the pills he had taken were causing him to hallucinate, that he was probably dreaming it all, and since he was and she wasn't really there he could embrace her, his arm grabbed her waist, his face snuggled between her breasts again with his loud purr of contentment and exhaustion.

He felt her hands embrace him, stroking his head and back − he thought, feeling the hard floor beneath him, that they were lying in the bathroom and she must have brought the duvet and pillows from his bedroom, sleeping in that room with him.

He fell asleep and woke up hearing someone walking around his house, once in a while someone touched his head − he heard her voice asking him some questions that he was unable to focus on − she was only answered by his frustrated sounds indicating that he just wanted to sleep on.

Finally when he opened his eyes he managed to see anything − the bathroom door was open, the light in the room was off. He had a perfect view of the corridor and part of the living room lit up in the sun − he heard someone's footsteps, his heart jumped into his throat when he saw her silhouette in the doorway.

"− hey − hey, how are you feeling? −" She muttered walking up to him and kneeling beside him, her loose hair in a slight disarray, she was wearing shorts and a plain white Tshirt. He looked away from her breasts when he noticed she wasn't wearing a bra, swallowing hard.

He didn't reply, feeling an overwhelming sense of shame, remembering what he had done, how disgusting and selfish he had acted, that he had forced her to help him again despite having caused her such harm.

"− I − I would like to talk to some therapist −" He choked out with tears in his eyes, not looking at her but somewhere in front of him, his breathing shallow and uneven − it seemed to him as if his lungs had completely clenched.

"− alright − alright, I'll look for someone nearby − okay? −" She asked tentatively and he just nodded, unable to look her in the eye. He heard her get up quickly, and a moment later she was back, sitting down next to him with her phone in her hand, typing something quickly on her screen, apparently scrolling through the accounts of doctors who had offices in the same town.

"− there's a Dr Smith, he's got a free appointment in two days at one o'clock in the afternoon, or a Dr Morgan, but he… −"

"− anyone − as soon as possible −" He said dispassionately, looking blankly ahead, heard her swallow hard and click something quickly, heard his phone vibrate beside him on the floor.

"− I've booked you an appointment and sent you details via message −" She mumbled, and he nodded.

"− thank you − you can −"

"− I spoke to your sister on the phone while you were asleep and told her everything − we agreed that Daeron will stay with her and I'll watch over you until your first appointment −" She said coldly with some kind of regret from which he felt a squeeze in his throat. He pressed his lips together, feeling his body tremble and closed his eyes, wanting to just disappear.

He shuddered, looking at her in disbelief as she slipped her purple scarf out of the pocket of her tracksuit shorts, the same one he'd found on the floor and kept. She tied her hair with it, combing it into a ponytail, staring straight into his eyes.

"I found this on your couch. Did you think of me before you did it?" She asked, with soft, sure flicks of her fingers arranging her curls as she saw fit. He swallowed hard at her question, feeling a burning sense of embarrassment.

"− yes −" He sighed. She let out a quiet breath at his words, placing her hands on her thighs.

"− are you able to get up? −"

With her help he managed to rise with difficulty − he brushed his teeth feeling the still disgusting taste of vomit and acid on his tongue and then lay down on the sofa, grabbing his head. He watched her silhouetted in the kitchen as she opened the cupboards one by one until she found his first aid kit.

He saw her throw away all the packets of sleeping pills he had.

"− hey −" He threw to her wrinkling his eyebrows, knowing he wouldn't be able to sleep a wink without them.

"− you'd better not speak −" She said warningly, without giving him a single glance, so he gave in, sighing heavily and closing his eyes, figuring there was no point in arguing.

To his surprise she moved around the rooms as if this was her home, sat down next to him at the other end of the sofa with an apple in her hand and turned on the TV as if nothing had happened. He looked at her, wondering if she was really going to sit here for days, but then decided it didn't matter.

When he finally got the phone call from Helaena he listened to almost half an hour of a litany from her about how irresponsible and selfish he was, only to hear a moment later that she loved him very much and that he needed to start taking care of himself − he assured her several times that he already had an appointment with a therapist, and Esmeralda wouldn't leave his side.

"− is that what you call me? −" She asked quietly after he had hung up, looking at the TV screen on which the news had just been airing. He looked at her surprised, realising that it wasn't actually her real name after all.

"− yes −" He replied lowly, playing with his phone between his fingers.

They didn't talk much to each other apart from the usual basic politeness. After a couple of hours he felt well enough to get up − he was still dizzy and still had no appetite, but he drank plenty of water and thought with relief that the danger had passed.

Evening finally fell and, tired after all that had happened, he simply headed upstairs to his bedroom, wanting to give her some solitude and privacy.

Changing into his pyjamas, which consisted of a simple t-shirt and black tracksuit bottoms, he shuddered and looked in disbelief at the door to his room when it opened, her figure stepping inside as if nothing had happened, climbing on his bed, lying under his duvet, turning her back to him.

What?

He pressed his lips together, wondering if he should say something or not, but in the end he couldn't resist.

"What are you doing?"

"I want to sleep. I'm tired. Could you turn out the light?" She asked quietly.

He grunted and, as she requested, walked over to the switch, flicking it, complete darkness fell all around them.

The thought that she was going to sleep in the same bed with him, even if only to keep an eye on him, made him instantly hard.

He lay down at a safer distance behind her, looking at her back and neck, knowing that she could feel his breath, but not daring to touch her.

He wondered if she was punishing him this way, showing him that she was at his fingertips, but after what he had done there was nothing else he could do but watch.

It would have been enough for him if he could have just jerked off looking at her, concentrating on her scent and the fact that she was next to him, but he felt he had no right to bring himself relief after all of this.

He didn't deserve it.

That's why he was just dying in agony, writhing − without his pills despite his fatigue he could not fall asleep, on top of that he was too aroused, her closeness was driving him crazy.

"− will you stop squirming? − I can't sleep −" She muttered at last, raising herself up on her elbow, looking at him with furrowed brows.

He felt his lips part involuntarily in desire at the sight of her face, at the thought that she didn't have a bra under her shirt, that there were her lovely breasts under that material that he could caress all night.

"− sorry −" He just choked out, trying to calm his breathing, his cock pulsed painfully swollen under the material of his sweatpants.

He made big eyes and flinched, embarrassed as she pushed back the duvet that covered them both, her gaze going to his trousers and what was going on inside them.

A tense silence fell between them − he could feel his whole body quivering with desire, grief and shame.

He wondered if she would mock his state and his desperation.

"− we can do it if you want − like civilised people − I'd like to experience some sleep tonight −" She said softly and he looked at her in disbelief, the bulge in his sweatpants twitched hard at her words.

"− are you sure? − I wouldn't −"

"− make me feel good −" She said quietly.

He drew in the air loudly as she said this, grabbing the material of her t-shirt and lifting it, pulling it over her head, revealing her lovely breasts to him.

She sighed loudly when his face immediately pressed against her nipple, alternately sucking and licking it with the tip of his tongue, his fingers digging into the soft skin of her back. She moaned quietly, surprised when he pulled her to him, her palms sliding into his hair, holding him close.

They lay on their sides, embracing each other in a tight grasp. He wriggled in disbelief and delight, willing and eager to show her how much he regretted it, how much he desired her, how much he loved her − his hand grasped tentatively her other breast, kneading it with his fingers.

"− so soft −" He gasped, listening to her quiet sighs of pleasure. He felt her throw her leg against his waist, which he grasped confidently, clenching his fingers on her thigh and pulled her closer, letting her feel how much he wanted her, his manhood throbbed impatiently beneath his trousers, hitting her stomach.

"− how −" He asked between flicks of his tongue licking and sucking her hard, puffy nipple like a little child, stroking the soft skin of her hips. He slipped his hand under the material of her shorts, tracing his fingertips over her plump buttocks, wanting to be sure that this time he would do everything the way she needed it, give her pleasure and reassurance, at the pace and the way she wanted it.

She stroked his hair at his question and placed a short, warm kiss on his forehead − he murmured lowly as he felt her begin to rub against him, encouraging him to do the same, his lips letting go of her nipple with a loud plop to look at her.

"− you on top − but touch me down there first −" She whispered embarrassedly, turning onto her back, pulling his arm behind her, looking at him with a gaze hot with desire and affection.

He leaned in, letting his swollen lips brush hers, which responded immediately to his caress, her fingers cupping his neck, deepening the kiss.

"− mmm −" She hummed, squirming beneath him. He ran his hand down her body, in a tentative, unhurried motion slipping his hand under the material of her shorts, wanting to give her time to react, but she sensing this spread her thighs wider, easing his access, his fingers finally running over her swollen, hot, wet womanhood.

"− God, little one − I want to use my mouth here −" He gasped appreciatively, thinking only of the fact that he had been dreaming of this for weeks. He smiled involuntarily when he saw her nod quickly, her sweet, full lips parted in an accelerated breath.

"− okay −" She whispered quietly, letting him slide the material of her shorts and underwear off her − he marvelled at the sight of her naked body, thinking with some kind of emotion that he felt like crying.

"− so beautiful −" He whispered, placing a gentle kiss on her stomach, on her womb, on her hip, on her thigh, knee and calf. He looked at her and noticed that she was watching him intently, her breasts rising and falling in uneven breaths, her hands on either side of her head.

"− come here −" He murmured softly, in a gentle motion pushing her hips closer to him, spreading them in front of him − he heard her gasp loudly as he leaned over her bared flesh. He let his hot breath envelop her skin before his nose ran over her hot, soft womanhood, his lips lazily clinging to her folds, placing a lingering, sticky kiss on them.

He tightened his hands on her thighs when he felt her throw her head back with a sweet, surprised moan, her fingers traveling to his short hair, stroking it in impatient motion, pressing his face close to her body.

"− please −" She mumbled, and he huffed with amusement, trailing his lips up to her puffy clit, sliding then down to her leaking, swollen slit, teasing her barely, not giving her what she needed.

"− no − we're going to do this very, very slowly − with due respect to you −" He hummed contentedly, feeling some kind of pride that he could do it this way, could give it to her and be what she needed.

She whimpered softly, writhing before him, her breathing quickened and shuddered, her body trembling in his hands, thirsting for fulfilment.

"− don't be cruel −" She mumbled resentfully, as if she thought he was teasing and taunting her. He sighed quietly, placing a warm, hot kiss on her sticky skin − a surprised, loud moan escaped her lips as the tip of his tongue suddenly forced its way inside her, deeper and deeper with each stroke, imposing an intense, fast pace on her.

"− o-oh fuck, yes, lick me −" She mewled, clenching her fingers in his hair, bucking her hips against his face, trying to find a more intense source of rubbing. He smirked under his breath as he discovered after a moment between her fleshy muscles the spot he was looking for, her whines increasingly pathetic and helpless, her walls beginning to throb around his tongue.

He heard her whimper his name, her whole body tensed as if she was trying to break away from him, but he didn't stop, letting her come on his face.

He purred contentedly as he felt how much of her moisture flowed out of her tight entrance, determined to make sure he licked every drop and not let anything go to waste despite her cries.

He surprised her when he didn't pull away, but repeated all the steps from the beginning, slowing his pace again, merely teasing her with his lips, her body twitching at his every move, overstimulated and delicate.

"− n-no more − I want you inside me −" She mumbled softly, and he looked up at her, licking his lips with his tongue, feeling her words in his trousers.

Even though he planned to spend the whole night between her thighs, he couldn't refuse such a request.

"− it's okay − there you go −" He hummed, rising to his knees, slipping his sweatpants down just enough to release his swollen, hard erection leaking from his precum. He placed one hand next to her head, the other guiding the fat, pink head of his cock between her widely spread thighs.

"− such a good girl − hm? − my sweet little baby, am I right? −" He cooed and she nodded quickly, looking at him with big eyes hazed with desire − it seemed to him that she didn't recognise him, that she didn't believe he was the same man she had met then.

He didn't believe it himself, but it felt wonderful.

They both sighed loudly when, with one slow thrust, he opened her wide on his swollen length, leaning over her, pressing his forehead to hers, her trembling hand rising to stroke his cheek, her lips pressed to his in a warm, innocent kiss.

He murmured contentedly, forcing her to fit all of him inside her with an impatient thrust of his hips − he heard her quiet cry of discomfort and surprise and swallowed loudly feeling his manhood pulsing intensely inside her, so hungry for her closeness.

She closed his waist between her legs, crossing them over his back, and he lay on top of her, pulling his t-shirt off quickly, resting his weight on his elbows to keep from crushing her, feeling her little, puffy nipples on his naked chest.

She sighed sweetly, looking up at him dreamily, trailing her fingers down his face and neck as he slipped out of her only to sink into her again a moment later with a loud click of her moisture − she was all wet and warm inside after her intense orgasm, her muscles squeezing him wonderfully from all sides.

"− that's it − just like that - it's okay −" He whispered tenderly, letting himself sink into the taste of her sticky, plump lips again, her hands trailing down his sweaty, muscled back as he involuntarily sped up his pace, pressing his nose to her cheek, slamming into her with more and more sure, brutal thrusts of his hips, groaning low along with her.

"− oh, fuck, baby −" He gasped, listening to her moans of pleasure, her insides wonderfully warm and tight, quivering all over in sensation, soaking him wet. He began to root aggressively into her weeping cunt panting hard, all around them only the loud sound of their moist, naked bodies slapping quickly against each other.

"− please − please − please −" She mumbled out looking up at him with her mouth wide open, digging her fingers into the hot skin of his back − he could feel her walls clench around him tighter, sucking him inside. He shuddered hard at her words, focusing now only on rooting again and again into her warm, fleshy interior.

"− I don't know if I'm going to let you sleep tonight − I think I'd rather do this with you instead −" He breathed out into her mouth, pushing his tongue deep into her throat − he felt her body shake as she convulsed, her hands clenched painfully hard on his body as she came a second time with sweet mewl of effort, panting loudly as if she couldn't catch her breath, her muscles began to throb greedily around his cock, sucking him inside.

He tilted his head back and sighed in relief, a few sloppy, rough thrusts prolonging the inevitable − his warm cum spilled deep inside her, a hot wave of pleasure surging through his lungs.

He crushed her with his body, feeling their bodies quivering and twitching all over, both of them panting hard as if they had run a marathon, their hands running blindly over each other's naked skin as if they wanted to calm and soothe each other.

"− I love you −" He muttered, lying with his eyes closed, his nose snuggled into her hot, soft cheek. "− you know that, don't you? −"

"− yes −" She answered him quietly, and he sighed heavily, snuggling into her like a small child.

That much was enough for him.

He didn't expect anything from her.

He just wanted her to know it.

He spent that night as if in a frenzy, holding her close, embracing her from behind tightly with his arms, their legs entwined together in disarray. He fell asleep with his face pressed against her hair, completely overwhelmed by her wonderful scent, the warmth of her naked body, one of her hands placed on his making sure he didn't let go of her soft breasts.

They hadn't said much to each other after they awoke − when he turned her face towards him and he just sank into her swollen lips in a sticky, hot kiss. She purred sleepily at this caress, her fingertips running over his jaw.

She let him take her a second time then, from behind this time − she was so wet from their shared moisture that he slid into her without much difficulty, stretching her wonderfully tight walls with a sigh of delight.

He rooted into her with lazy, slow thrusts of his hips, making sure that each time the fat head of his cock rubbed her sweet spot, one of his hands playing with her puffy, little nipple, the other sunk deep between her thighs, teasing her swollen clit.

"− do you want me to stop? −" He whispered in her ear, and she shook her head, digging her fingers into his arm with which he embraced her at the waist.

"− n-no − it feels good −" She muttered in embarrassment − he kissed her hot cheek with a sticky click of his saliva seeing her lips parted in accelerated breath, her dreamy, warm gaze.

"− so I'm afraid I'm going to fill you a second time, sweet girl −" He hummed, running the tip of his nose over her pretty face. She moaned quietly at his words, feeling him suddenly speed up, slamming into her with more confident, brutal pushes − she tilted her head back, his lips immediately pressed against her neck.

"− d-don't − don't leave marks −" She mumbled out, quickly clenching her hand in his hair − she whimpered softly as she felt his fingertips dig harder into her fleshy folds.

"− I won't, baby − shhh −" He hushed her, running his lust-swollen lips over her soft skin, feeling her weeping walls squeeze him greedily at his words, forcing him to thrust into her more aggressively, his fingers sinking into her plushy thigh, holding her in place, panting along with her.

"− ah, G-God − She babbled, responding helplessly to his movements with rocking, both of them groaning in pleasure and relief as her muscles began to clench against him in a sudden orgasm, his thighs all sticky with her wetness.

"− yes, that's it − oh baby −" He muttered, letting go, with the last of his strength thrusting into her for a moment more before his seed filled her to the brim.

He hid the tip of his nose in her hair with his eyes closed, panting loudly with pleasure, holding firmly her body trembling in fulfilment in the tight embrace of his arms.

"− can I stay inside you? −" He whispered into her ear and she only nodded, falling into slumber again a moment later.

For the first time in many years he didn't have to get up at dawn, he didn't have to focus on work, on Daeron, on anyone or anything more than himself and her.

He couldn't believe it was really happening.

He lay thinking only of the fact that he was deep inside her, that he could feel her and smell her − he placed one of his hands over her heart wanting to feel how it beat, how her chest rose and fell in calm breaths.

The days before his appointment with the psychiatrist he had spent between her thighs.

She walked around his house wearing nothing but his T-shirt and it was enough for him standing behind her to lift its fabric a little to see her lovely, plump buttocks.

"− stop − we need to eat something −" She muttered as he knelt on the kitchen tiles while she was trying to prepare dinner for them, so that he could kiss her hot, soft skin with a murmur of satisfaction. His hand slipped lower, between her thighs, his fingertips collecting her moisture mingled with his semen, a reminder of what he had been doing to her all day.

"− I adore you −" He gasped, sliding his lips lower, placing warm, sticky kisses on her thighs and calves, he heard her quiet sigh.

"− does your friend know that you have a second lover? −" She asked quietly, and he froze, quickly lifting his gaze to her, understanding immediately that she was talking about Alys.

He didn't want to make a mistake and lie, but he also didn't know how to present it so she would know that it was a done deal for him.

"− I stopped seeing her after what happened between us −" He said softly getting up from his knees, looking down at her, putting an unruly lock of her dark hair behind her ear. "− I didn't see the point in it, because all I was thinking about was you −"

He confessed with a kind of pain and weariness, and she lifted her gaze to him, her bright eyes looked at him piercingly, warm and gentle. He leaned in placing a long, drawn-out kiss on her forehead.

She snuggled into his chest as if seeking refuge, and he embraced her kissing the top of her head devotedly, running his large hands down her back in a reassuring, tender gesture.

"− I can't promise you anything −" She said at last, and he swallowed hard, knowing what she meant.

"− I know − I don't expect it −" He whispered, cuddling his face into her fragrant hair, closing his eyes, her closeness and her scent calming him in some strange, incomprehensible way.

"− I will always wait for you −"

_____

Aemond Taglist:

(bold means I couldn't tag you)

@notnormalthings-blog @nikstrange @zenka69 @bellaisasleep @k-y-r-a-1 @g-cf2020 @melsunshine @opheliaas-stuff @chainsawsangel @iiamthehybrid @tinykryptonitewerewolf @namoreno @malfoytargaryen @qyburnsghost @aemondsdelight @persephonerinyes @fan-goddess @sweethoneyblossom1 @watercolorskyy @randomdragonfires

[embe95]

Can we continue, please?

Synopsis: "Can we keep learning the choreography, please?" It was a bad idea then, it's still a bad idea now. But sure, why not?

First time writing smut, very strange feeling publishing it. Oh well, it was a fun challenge. CW below the cut! This is sort of a part two to Teach me, please, but can totally be read separately.

Word count: around 4500 (mhmmmmmm okay, how?)

This story includes an AFAB reader, a pet name (angel), oral (f and m receiving), sex without condom (nope, do not do it), just two very horny people aaaand let me know if I missed something.

ˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆˆ

It wasn't like she was some horny little kitten who couldn't stay professional, but the what if's just wouldn't stop bombarding her. Their impact was so hard her eyelids kept bouncing. 

His tongue running along her jawline, hands caressing her sides and then gripping her like a vice, hard and greedy. The anguished, starved breaths, the beautiful black hair dripping with sweat. He would've fucked her so hard. His tongue would've been magic between her lips and legs. He would feel just... so good.

No sleep tonight then... oh well. Maybe not being able to see straight would help her steer clear of Hyunjin's eyes.

Morning crept in through the windows, and Y/N crawled out of bed with a string of sighs and curses. I'll be fine, let's just get to work. There are eight of them, it's not like we'll be alone.

A few miles away, an equally disheveled man sat on his floor, staring at the light climbing on the wall of his room in the very spot he'd inhabited for he didn't know how long. The thought of skipping practice rarely crossed his mind, if ever, but maybe, just maybe, today of all days he'd suddenly come down with a cold or headache and wouldn't be able to make it. How could he hide what they'd done, what he wanted to do again, from his brothers, the ones who knew him best? They'd see right through him.

And what would he even wear? The t-shirt he'd worn on that fateful night still smelled like Y/N, the scent overtook him as he brought it close to his nose. It wasn't unwashed on purpose, he just hadn't gotten around to it. It's heavenly...

She would feel so good around me, taking me. She'd taste amazing, I'm sure of it. 

Hyunjin groaned at the thought, equally frustrated and turned on.

They wouldn't be angry, they'd be worried, for Y/N as well as him. Worried for both their jobs, mostly hers, and Chan would be nervous because of the rule-breaking in general. They'd understand, but what if they'd ask her to not work with them anymore? They'd tell him they'll help him get over it.

The thought made Hyunjin's forehead tighten. What if he didn't want to get over it? Who were they to decide for him?

The sunlight was harsh on her eyes, sunglasses would've been a life saver. Unfortunately, the only ones in sight were worn by the one person Y/N had been dreading and craving to see. Y/N's feet paused. So did Hyunjin's.

So. pretty... Stop it.  Just get inside.

They collided by the main entrance, coming face to face from opposite directions as their daily routes dictated.

"Annyeong-haseyo," Hyunjin said stiffly with a polite nod.

"Annyeong-haseyo."

The politeness level was unnecessary, but simultaneously it served as an indicator to both of what the tone would be today.

Minho joined them in the elevator, pushing the doors open with a toned-down version of his irritated look due to the fact that his pleas to hold. The. Fucking. Door were totally ignored by the two inside.

"Ah, kure,"  he mumbled along with some curse words.

"Mian-heyo," Y/N stuttered softly. Minho's gaze eased up and he nodded before asking Hyunjin about lunch plans in Korean. Minho and Jeongin were the shyest when it came to using English around her, but they could communicate well enough. Minho always beamed when she spoke Korean.

Chan, Felix, Seungmin, Changbin and Jeongin had already arrived, the room was alive with excitement and warmth. Hyunjin's hand ghosted the lower back of the beautiful woman he wanted to bend over a table as they entered, impressed with how he controlled himself yet terrified of what situations the day would bring. Jisung ran in as the clock struck nine, hair a mess and his hoodie on backwards.

The practice went well, the day glided by with a few hiccups. The fear of the members finding out made their choreographer jumpier than usual, which in turn resulted in silly mistakes she would repeat in her mind well into her deathbed. Confusing left and right, and mixing up Felix and Chan and Minho and Jisung more than once gave way to every shade of red to paint her cheeks and ears.

Hyunjin's shirt lifted while doing a jump and she nearly had an aneurysm.

Hyunjin fared slightly better, but found himself stopping and staring so often he now felt his own dance style morphing into hers, that's how intently he followed her nuances and accents. His blood froze every time he noticed her nervousness, but then it melted and rushed down when he remembered she'd rolled that particular way against him during their private practice.

"Hey, you alright?" Chan patted Y/N's shoulder affectionately. Kind as always. "You did good, okay? The choreo is perfect. Thanks for hearing us out with the chorus."

"Of course!" Y/N sighed while packing her bag. "I love getting your input, it makes sense to me on every level."

The leader grinned but then furrowed his brows as their gazes met.

"You okay?"

A mumble didn't seem to suffice like she was used to when it came to "work friends". The furrowed brows climbed high.

"Just tired, I'm alright. Sorry for messing up so much."

"Naur, you're good, don't worry. We all have those days."

She lifted her almost-empty bottle to her lips.

"Hyunjin's having one of them, too."

The cough attack caused by the water in her windpipe made everyone fix their eyes on her.  Hyunjin's first instinct was to cradle her face to check if she was okay, it was fortunate the whole group reacted so his little ”ya” went unnoticed. 

”You good?” Chan quizzed after gently patting her upper back with an open palm. Y/N croaked a small confirmation that she was indeed fine, but one peek at Hyunjin made her want to dig a hole through the floor. Although, logical thinking would dictate that him being put off wouldn’t be the worst thing.

There was no logical thinking present in the grey matter in her skull, however, which was further proved when she replied ”yes” when Hyunjin quietly asked if she wanted to stay behind with him.

I have to prove to myself that I can do this. He’s my friend, and my colleague… I have to be able to do this. I just have to.

"Can we continue the choreography, please?” Mr. Hwang’s sweet accent spoke as the door closed behind Felix. The members didn’t think much of either of the diligent dance lovers continuing practice, though Minho had scolded them both for not coming to eat. 

”Yeah, sure!” she over-enthusiastically enunciated before awkwardly tiptoeing her way to the speaker. Without much thought, she put on her warm up playlist and returned to the centre, beginning a movement, some movement, any movement.

This is a bad idea. Once again, it is a bad idea.

The air in the room weighed them both down, the tension floating from floor to ceiling felt like a humid fog.

There were lines that they had already crossed, but both knew they still very much existed. Stomping all over them made them no less bright and blazing, the "TABOO" and "STOP" signs would've made any sensible pair not make the decision they made that fateful day.

If I kiss her now, who would know? Grab her waist and flip her around, take her hand and pull her to the dressing rooms. Hyunjin stared at her back, the gorgeous curve of her hips, the strong thighs that made her bounce as she danced. If she'd let me... god, I wish she'd let me.

"Hyunjin, are you okay?"

He hadn't noticed she had paused to stare at him through the mirror. His black hair moved slightly as he nodded, most of it decorating his neck and forehead tightly. Everything was turning intentional, even more so than before. He considered each motion, each blink, each clench of his jaw and each slow swallow. Maybe she'd notice.

She did.

But dancing is enough, it has to be enough.

"Yes, I'm good. All warmed up."

"Okay," Y/N nodded. ”Let’s begin.”

"Should we do the magnet-"

"No!"

The man jumped.

"Sorry! I, uh, think we should just continue the choreography." She did her best to soften her gaze while still keeping her distance. Those eyes were an endless, very forbidden adventure she wasn't allowed to venture on, no matter how big the craving nestled in her chest was. He saw her consoling look and accepted it, disappointed but understanding of the position they were in. Just two steps and he'd be close enough to touch her. To better dance with her, of course.

The contrast between what they had to do and what they wanted to do was the most irritating thing on the planet, but there was no getting around it. It was like their eyes were locked together, senses heightened, intents clear, but a wall of glass separated them. Like they could touch but they'd always burn each other, like some deities somewhere had decided to use them as puppets in some sick game or test of human character and the nature of lust. Burning had never felt so desirable. Each time Y/N directed Hyunjin's hands somewhere to touch her, her body jerked, battling whether to flinch away or moan.

And yet, somehow, they managed to keep going, both determined to stay close and prove they could do so without taking it further. The day turned to evening, the building emptying while the two ignored the clock completely.

"Good, a little to the left. Then five, six and seven and eight," she counted, moved and he followed. Arms up, arms down, arms around one another. "Yeah, then slide them down and spread your fingers," she continued, teacher mode once again activated which was a blessing in the moment. She was almost blind and deaf to Hyunjin's reactions because her entire focus was on getting the steps and placements correctly. "Ye- Not that low."

"Sorry."

"There you go. Then one, two and three, I'll arch down."

Hyunjin's eyes opened to the max as he felt her strong back muscles tense against his hands, her lower abdomen pressed against his sweats and that appetizing neck framed by her collarbones stretching so far his view through the mirror was perfect.

"Aaaand four," she slid back up expertly. The pause when their eyes met sucked Y/N out of her professional settings.

Look away... just look away. JESUS, DO IT NOW.

"And then?" Hyunjin cleared his throat.

"I... You hop back, left then right hitting five and, on six throw both hands down as if you've just washed them-  there you go, yeah. And I'll head to the floor."

Her knees collided with the floor skillfully, followed by her bending down onto her back. Hyunjin followed her as she instructed, and when the time came for him to pull her up and their skin connected, fingers tangling, they both felt something shift, very similar to last time. A crossroads, so dangerous and inviting.

"Then I..." Y/N whispered, moving a trembling hand up his torso as she slowly stood, the other still entwined with his long, slender digits. Hyunjin remembered this part, having watched his hyung do it. He was waiting for it, praying for it.

"Please, don't stop," he pleaded in a whisper, mouth next to her ear, shivering from anticipation. "I want you."

"Hyunjin-"

"I'll protect you."

His hands slid to her hips, pulling her closer, emphasized by a beat from the song. He was so hard against her thigh she had to swallow to keep the saliva from escaping the corners of her mouth.

"What if-"

"I promise."

"Wasn't dancing together supposed to be enough?" Y/N's voice was breathless, the question floated in the millimeter of air still between them. It could have been teasing, a taunt, an incredulous exclamation, a plea, a reminder. Instead, it worked as something of a final spark for the powder keg that was their otherworldly attraction towards one another.

"Is it?"

They stared, both coming to a decision simultaneously.  

Fuck it.

The first touch was primal, just like the first time their lips had come into contact. The pace seemed like they were trying to make up for every second they hadn't been kissing. They were trying to suck out each other's breath, to reach whatever it was that made the other so irresistible. One step at a time, clumsy and stumbling, a stark contrast to what could've been expected of two professional dancers, they traveled to the only soft piece of furniture in the room.

"Christ," Y/N sighed contently as Hyunjin began grinding his hips against her core after her figure was spread on the couch, on the very spot she'd stopped this very event just a week prior. This time she wouldn't be the one to stop it.

He spoke something in Korean and she could only pray it was something beautiful. The only word she understood was "woman". 

Hyunjin was incredulous, how did he get this lucky? A woman like this, so sexy, talented and strong was suddenly underneath him, allowing him to touch her. He hoped she understood how much he wanted this, how much he appreciated this, the fact she was jeopardizing something important just to give him this moment even though he couldn't express it. He felt perfect, complete drowning in this moment in all its forbidden nature. This time he wouldn't stop unless she asked him to.

"Jin," she whispered, the memory of his reaction to the nickname crystal clear in her head. It was now even greater, if possible. He moaned deeply before thanking her by sliding his tongue into her mouth. 

"Again," he panted, grinding against her with more intensity.

She repeated the syllable earnestly, happy to give him anything he wanted. "Jin, please."

"What, angel?"

Her already melted self turned into a flattered puddle right there and then. Angel? Hyunjin's hands roamed her torso, and his left finally found her chest. He felt her nipples prick through the shirt and smirked, pleased with the content sigh that escaped her mouth.

"Off," he mumbled against her neck. She obliged, maneuvering the fabric over her head as smoothly as she could with the little space he let her have. Each moment his lips weren't on her skin felt like a waste, so he followed the route her shirt traveled eagerly, cock throbbing and fingers eager. She was gorgeous, athletic, and her black sports bra had a zipper in the front, one she slowly opened for his viewing pleasure. Her breasts remained hidden beneath the fabric until Hyunjin reached them, hungrily planting kisses as his long digits moved to finally see her fully. The awe he felt was unmatched.

Thank you, thank you, thank you. Just for me, only for me. My angel. Just us, finally alone.

He froze before looking up at the corner of the room. The little black sphere stared back at him. 

”Come, angel,” he spoke with haste, taking both her hands and guiding her to stand. He stood in front of her, back to the surveillance camera, taking advantage of their height difference to protect her. She was dumbfounded by the interruption and annoyed at the sudden lack of intimacy, feeling like a child whose candy had been stolen. The situation was risky enough, why the sudden panic? Had he changed his mind?

”Hyunjin, what is it?” her voice bounced as he pulled her toward the door. He flinched when the nickname he’d just received disappeared, but there was time to get it back.

Just somewhere more private.

Hyunjin had looked for privacy before, whether it was to just be alone, to cry, to handle himself when he got a hard on. He found it ages ago.

There was a blind spot in the locker room, right by the showers. He’d make it work, he’d shared it before. Not like this though, never like this. Y/N seemed to have understood the problem and let him lead her without any follow-up questions, anything to cut this delay as short as possible. Going to either of their homes would take too long, not to mention being spotted was out of the question. Going home would create a risk of second-guessing or worse, make things more romantic and personal.

Let's just fuck once and get it out of our system.

"Here is safe."

"Good."

Y/N leaned against the wall and pulled Hyunjin to her, making a right hassle of kissing him with passion while trying to finally, finally get his shirt off and get to see his toned torso. Her flailing died down when the clothing hit the floor.

The only light in the room came from the window on the wall left of them. It created a delicate play of shadow and light on Hyunjin's features, and he noticed the same artwork painting her.

I want to paint her.

"You are beautiful," she mumbled, running her fingers across his abs. He remained serious and put her chin between his thumb and index finger. The simple motion made her clench around nothing. It was turning romantic. He was obviously romantic.

"You are an angel," he sighed before leaning in for a deep kiss. Slowly but confidently he let his right hand slide down to cup her heat. She whimpered. "So pretty. Perfect."

The way he pronounced the words, the way he began applying pressure, the way he was staring into her, it was all so much. They moaned into each other as Y/N decided to return the favour by stroking his length through his sweats. It only lasted a moment before Hyunjin had to stop her, hand flying to her wrist. He didn't know how to explain the reason properly in English though he desperately wanted to. He wanted to last, but with the way he was throbbing and the way even the lightest touches from his angel felt like heaven... he wouldn't. He needed time.

"Too much," he whispered, lips still touching hers as they moved. His gaze lifted.

"Can I...taste you before... I fuck you?"

Good god, that mouth. How can I say no?

"Yes, Jin."

His tongue was on her clit in less than a minute, her sweats now pooled at her feet along with her thong. His hands were secured around her thick thighs, holding on with so much excitement  she felt his desire through each spot where their skin was connected.

"Fuck, Jin! Yes, please, don't stop... please, FUCK!"

He slid two fingers inside, curling them gently against her g-spot.

My angel tastes so perfect.

His residency between her legs was one he never wanted to leave, while her lips were ambrosia, her juices were like nectar, a concoction unlike anything he'd ever tasted. The only reason he'd leave was because he promised to fuck her afterwards. Another sensation he was sure would be worth the wait after longing for this moment with her for weeks on end.

She tangled her fingers in his silky, sweaty black locks and tugged, emphasizing her moans and twitching thighs. 

He sped up his fingers, lips latching onto her clit fully, sucking hard.

How the fuck is he so good at every fucking thi-

"Jinnie, god- fuck! YES! Keep going keep going keep- please, oh- oh god-I-I'm cumming!"

He looked up at her with so much adoration she was about to lose consciousness, praying for her brain to keep this image forever. He gently licked her folds, digits slowing down to help her ride out the orgasm. His intentions were also selfish, because he wanted to keep devouring her and relish the flavour as long as he could.

"Thank you," she sighed and smiled while stroking his hair. He climbed to his feet. The tent in his sweats was as prominent as ever.

"My turn," Y/N kept smiling as she switched their positions by taking his shoulders and gently pushing his fit figure against the wall. As much as she craved to have him inside her, the opportunity to taste him was too tempting to pass. Since they were only going to do this once, they might as well do everything possible. And it felt fair, the orgasm he just gave her was earth-shattering.

It took the black-haired man a moment to register what she was referring to, but as she began descending to her knees the intent became crystal clear.

Hyunjin stopped her and lifted her back up, slamming his lips to her neck.

"No, thank you...  I need you."

Realization hit, disappointment sneaking in.

"But I don't have-"

"It's okay."

He stared at her. Y/N's arms slid around his neck and pulled him close.

"Are you going to fuck me now?" she moaned, earning a growl from him before he flipped them back around, continuing the dance. Y/N's hands flew to pull down Hyunjin's pants to help him shimmy out of them. She took a moment to admire him, finally seeing him fully, so fit and lean, dance-molded muscles all warm and flexed. His cock was impressive, slightly curved and thick.

"Yes, angel. I am. Are you ready for me?"

He lifted her with ease, the surprising show of strength raising her anticipation through the roof. Lined with her entrance, cock twitching and ready, Hyunjin looked into her eyes.

"I adore you, angel."

He slammed into her. The world exploded.

He fucked up into her with a strong, persistent pace.

"Yes, Jin, fuck... y-you feel so. good."

Please, don't ever let this end. If this is the first and only time, please let it last forever.

"Angel...fuck- so warm..."

And then the word just slipped out. He wasn't sure what he meant, what he wanted, was it his possessive side taking control. But in that moment nothing else mattered, not his work, who might find out, nothing. Having sex with her cleared his brain of all else.

"Mine... mine...."

"Yes, Jinnie- ah... fuck- all yours..."

It just slipped out. She didn't even pause with her reply. Fucking him just felt so good, the most perfect form of escapism she'd ever encountered. Screw everything else. Her second orgasm of the night was flooding in fast.

”Cum, angel. Do it.”

Hyunjin felt her pussy clenching around him and began pistoling into her. He was determined to get her to come again. Maybe this wouldn't have to be the first and last time.

"C-Cumming... fuck-"

"Touch yourself."

As soon as she pinched her clit between her fingers, she came completely undone around her forbidden lover's length happily, without a care in the world.

"God, that was... woah..."

Their foreheads were pressed together, sweat acting like glue. Hyunjin's eyes were wide and full of lust, mesmerizing and dangerous as ever. A siren. Her pussy fluttered around him, and he felt his climax was close. She knew it too and saw her opportunity.

She shoved him backward gently, feeling empty when he slipped out but she had no time to waste on those thoughts while on this mission. Her knees hit the floor and she took his length into her eager mouth quickly. The mix of his pre-cum with her own juices coated her tongue.

The moan that echoed in the room was melodical. Hyunjin's hands hit the wall, and as soon as his cock hit the back of his angel's throat he came. Hard. Korean curses fell from his mouth.

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

There was a moment of panic that he'd made her uncomfortable because he gave no warning. He couldn't believe his eyes or his luck when he watched her swallow every single drop, happily licking her lips and looking up at him.

Okay, now I can die happily.

Two sweaty, satisfied dancers got dressed in the dark room, chuckling every now and again due to nerves and disbelief. Reality was hitting them. What if someone heard? What if someone was still here? What if they'd added new cameras? What if they can't keep working together? What if the members find out? What if this was a mistake?

Why did the mistake feel so good?

"Dancing is enough, huh?" Y/N huffed when they sat side by side against the wall.

Hyunjin laughed. His eyes landed on her slender fingers that rested close to his. He wanted to hold her hand, hold her.

"Angel," he whispered and tentatively placed his index finger on hers. She snapped her eyes down, hesitated for a moment and then joined their hands.

They sat like that for a good while, both coming down and trying to make sense of what just happened.

What now?

They repeated the same route as last time; left the room together only to part at the front entrance with a courteous smile.

She felt like breaking the pavement and digging a hole to crawl into when they separated just to stop this tsunami of questions and emotions. While she loved her job and wanted to hold on to it, she also wanted to hold onto Hyunjin. Romantic, hot, talented, strong, sex-god Hyunjin. That felt so easy, the only consequence was her feeling satisfied after two orgasms. Well, that she knew of. Now she'd have to spend her days scared of getting the call to meet with the executive or something.

But there was no going back, no way to cancel what had been done. They had sex. And she did want to do it again if possible, no matter how stupid and reckless it was. How can two people be so balanced with one another? There was no fight for dominance, only shared desire and need. Just like when they danced together. It was unlike anything she'd ever felt, the connection, the adoration, the shared respect. If they'd keep going she'd love to introduce him to her submissive side. But that was the perfect first time. And last. Right.

His career shouldn't be jeopardized because she wanted sex. She shouldn't jeopardize her own either.

However, the addiction had started, beginning with the gateway make out session before plunging straight into the harder, stronger fix. Could they be alright, knowing what could be? Alright having shared this one time, just holding on to the memory of it?

Hyunjin turned to look at her as she walked away. His angel. Would he ever be allowed to call her that again? He couldn't risk her job. There was a confidence in him that his career would be fine, maybe he’s get a slap on the wrist. This wasn't unheard of within the company nor big enough to get him fired. He was worried for her. She loved to dance, she was brilliant at it, the members enjoyed their collaboration as did the other groups.

But what just happened was amazing. Addictive. If she asked, he'd leap at the chance to keep going. Hell, the way he was feeling he'd do anything for her. But the ball was in her corner now. She decides. And he'll be fine with whatever she decides. No matter how much it hurts.

Y/N sat on her bed, staring at the light disappearing from her room as the sun set.

A few miles away, Hyunjin did the same.

They still hadn't finished the choreography. Maybe tomorrow?

[astrophiliaxx]

| The Collision |

This was not how Andrea envisioned her day would be. She did not expect that the two worlds would literally collide.

Warning: English is not my native language.

“W-what. Y-you look exactly like me just-just more mature, ” Andrea stuttered, looking at the woman in front of her who seemed to be the older version of her. The woman in question just stares at her for a minute with a blank expression, then looks at their surroundings.

“Who are you, ” the woman asked. “Where are we? ”

“I-I don't know this place, ” Andrea replied, after taking in the surroundings. She had not realized that she had gotten further than she planned. She only planned to walk and find a room to cool down for a while, but it seems that she got too caught up in her feelings. The earthquake that occurred seemed to be the one that snapped her out of it.

The earthquake.

It had happened so suddenly. In just a minute the world was just normal, and then suddenly the ground began to shake so intensely that there was a massive crack in the middle of the room. Then, for some odd reason, there was a blinding light that came from the crack, and as it dimmed it revealed the woman that was standing in front of her.

After this, Andrea will definitely go and ask Kara or her friends from the D.E.O. about it because it was certainly not a normal event.

“Well, isn't that just great, ” the woman muttered sarcastically, her expression showing a mix of annoyance and worriedness. However, it disappeared in just a split second and was replaced with a blank poker face. “May I know your name? ”

“I don't think it would be a great idea to give my name to some stranger. ”

“Well, it would be too late to apply the rule of not talking to strangers. Because you are already having a conversation with a stranger, don't you think, ” the woman replied, amusement mixed within her voice.

“That-that is not why I-I won't give my name, ” Andrea reasoned.

“Sure, ” the woman hummed.

“I'm telling the truth! ”

“Did I ever say that you were lying, ” the woman bit back, one eyebrow arched as she stared at Andrea.

Andrea would have responded to the woman if she had not been startled by the sudden sound of her phone ringing in her hand. She took a glance at the name of whoever was the caller before deciding to answer the incoming call.

Miranda Priestly

“Where are you, Andrea? ”

[kathang-iniisip]

like a movie (excerpt)

Type: Oneshot

Event: Exchange fic w/ @writers-gf 🎁

Fandom: Itzy

just like a movie, even if fate separates us we'll return to every scene. you and me, no one else.

-----

I recieved the prompt while listening to these songs so that's kinda the vibe I'm going for hope it comes thru haha idk if there's any english translations so feel free to ask if you wanna know what the songs are about :)

also a much much longer version is hyperlinked to the title if anyone's interested (the title and random sentences involving Lia here would have context if you read the longer version hihi), i figured i should keep this short here but i couldn't help myself 😅 also my first time publishing (not writing lmao) an x reader fic thanku thankuuu for exchanging fics with meee @writers-gf hihi hope you like it 💗

-----

“Hongsam, no! No!” Why was there a frog in the middle of winter? Yeji felt like the world slowed down as she watched her beloved dog bound towards the frog with his mouth open. 

“Frogs aren’t for dogs, silly.” A pair of hands saved Hongsam from certain death as the red poodle was scooped up and turned away from the frog which croaked and hopped away at the commotion. 

“Yeji?” it might have been all that movie talk, but looking into y/n’s eyes again after so long brought forth all the memories of her younger years. Especially ones involving the woman before her. Yeji feels like lightly slapping Jisu’s arm when she gets back to the dorm. Who knew melodramaticism was contagious? 

“H-hey y/n. You’re here.” 

“Yeah. Seems like our schedules finally collided after all these years, huh? You were always away when I went home.” 

“Yeah.” Yeji replied dumbly. Y/n cleared her throat. 

“Is this cutie yours?” she asked, holding up Hongsam. 

He could be ours. “Uh-huh.” Yeji answered. 

“Cool… what’s their name?” 

“Hongsam. His name’s Hongsam.” Y/n nodded and proceeded to coo over the dog, saying his name repeatedly. Yeji kept staring like a creep. 

“I- I can take it from here if you need to go back home.” Yeji said, belatedly realizing that y/n was dressed in indoor clothes. She must be cold, Yeji thought guiltily.

“It’s okay, you look like you’ve got your hands full with that little one.” y/n pointed to Insam. 

“Oh I can carry them both.” Yeji assured cheerfully, standing up with Insam in her arms. “You can’t see my muscles, but I’m strong.” 

“No, I saw them” 

“Huh?” 

“Your muscles. I saw them in your photos. You’re everywhere these days, you know? Congratulations by the way, I’m glad it worked out for you.” 

“You look at my muscles?” 

“What?” Yeji saw red creeping up to y/n’s cheeks. Adorable. “No I just- I mean, I know you have them.” 

“Cool.” Yeji breathed, still unable to take her eyes off of y/n who she now saw was shivering. 

“Oh! We should go inside.” Yeji marched back to her house, hoping that y/n was right behind her. She was glad she forgot to take Hongsam from the other woman’s arms in her haste, she’s pretty sure y/n had no choice but to follow her. 

“Thank you, by the way.” Yeji said, taking a sip of the hot chocolate she’d made. 

“For what?” 

“For congratulating me earlier. I forgot to thank you.” 

“Oh. Well I was rooting for you so…” 

“Yeah… I know.” It was painful, how they were walking on eggshells around each other as if they didn’t used to be attached at the hip. 

“I came back and never saw you after that summer.” 

“I know. It was so sudden, I got accepted and they told me I had to immediately move to Seoul because I lived so far away. We didn’t even get to say goodbye. I’m sorry.” Yeji inhaled a stuttering breath as a warm hand cupped her cheek. 

“Don’t be. I’m happy for you.” 

“I didn’t even try to get in touch. It had been months since I knew you were back in Korea-”

“I didn’t try either. I guess we were both scared.” 

“Of what?” y/n shrugged. 

“I don’t know.” she answered Yeji. “I always knew you’d get accepted, that you’d debut and make it big. We never talked about what would happen to us once you got accepted though, didn’t we?” 

“We were too young to figure out logistics so we just never tried, was that all it was?” Yeji asked, though she knew y/n didn’t know either. “I feel so stupid. Years without you because I felt shy reaching out after months had passed with radio silence between us.” 

“You’re not stupid, Yeji.” 

“There were so many times when hearing your voice would’ve made things easier for me. So many times when I doubted myself and needed you. You always believed in me, even when I couldn’t dance to save my life.” Yeji felt her voice crack as she spoke softly, reaching for the hand that cupped her face. 

“It all turned out fine in the end. You made it without me, you believed in yourself even when you thought you didn’t. You would have stopped if you truly didn’t. I’m so proud of you, Yeji.” 

“Thank you.” Y/n was blurry through Yeji’s tears. Yeji’s wobbly voice prompted y/n to set their mugs aside so she could take her childhood friend into her arms. 

“I still would love to have you in my life though.” Yeji spoke into y/n's shoulder after a while. Once they had stopped crying. “I feel like we have so much to catch up on.  I know this might sound weird — especially since it’s like, 10am — but,  do you wanna stay over?  I guess ‘sleepover’ sounds kind of childish but.  I think it’d be nice.” 

“I missed you Yeji,” Yeji felt her heart skip a beat. “I would love to stay over. For as long as you’d have me.” 

I’d have you forever if you’d allow it, y/n.

[laurenfoxmakesthings]

Original date Feb 28, 2022, so written back when this was recent news:

After hearing about the very bad news in Texas, I knew I wanted to help. I'm going to donate more often from now on. But even before that, I was aware I wanted to do more, though it seemed like I, a mere cis Australian, can't really do much else to help Texas (we can't exactly contact the politicians that aren't ours).

When I was thinking about all the news happening, they sort of collided into me thinking about old World War II war bond posters. That gave me the idea to remake a war bond poster with my collage techniques into a poster/flyer promoting donations that would help trans youth and their families in Texas. At least organisations to start off with, there's many more and GFMs to look up.

I mean, twitter has been promoting many organisations and such to donate to, but the thing is not everyone is on twitter (Current Me: especially with what twitter is going through at the moment). There has to be a way to reach out internationally, but not just on social media. Physical media can though, with the help of social media to get started.

So, this is what this poster/flyer is for. It's designed to be printed (on A3 paper, but it could be shrunken down onto A4) to be spread around and put up publicly by anyone who wants to help. You can right click and save it from here or use the PDF linked below. Just be sure to use scissors on the flyer's tabs so passers-by can easily tear them off.

If you're somewhere in which trans rights flyers like this aren't exactly welcome, instead of putting them up publicly, hide them in places that could be found by those who could help or discreetly pass them on to those you can trust. Now it would be ridiculous for me to make something with this purpose without having languages other than English.

Unfortunately, my autism ensures that learning multiple languages is just not that possible for me personally, and Google translate isn't that trustworthy. But if anyone wants this in another language that they know, just request the files that allow you to edit the text and even the word balloons, through my Twitter (ask for a direct message) or comment and message through my Ko-Fi.

I have to know what software you have to see if I need to change the files' format, and I want to be sure you're not someone who just wants the files to make their version of the flyer into something transphobic. I have the username 'LaurenFoxWrites' on both sites. Good luck, everyone.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/16CEBGiG_7hzxC0WiHgZ_SVseimptWP9Y/view?usp=sharing

https://twitter.com/LaurenFoxWrites

https://ko-fi.com/laurenfoxwrites

The Donation sites themselves:

https://secure.everyaction.com/Aluze8fLdEmlU5KgX5Ar1w2

https://www.equalitytexas.org/take-action/donate/give/

https://outyouth.kindful.com/

https://give.thetrevorproject.org/give/63307/#!/donation/checkout

https://www.aclutx.org/en/donating-aclu-general-information

https://transgenderlawcenter.org/donate

https://donate.glad.org/give/123741/#!/donation/checkout?c_src=webheader

[thienvaldram]

Half Life – Residual Saga – Timeline Analysis

Introduction

The Residual Saga consists of three mods, plus a few older drafts that don’t fit into this analysis. The three covered specifically are Residual Point (From RL 2.05), Residual Life (2.05) and Residual Agent (Test Version 4). Despite their sheer scope and the almost unprecedented density of the lore of these mods, they are absurdly poorly documented in English in any capacity.

I’m not in any place to confidently relay anything to do with the more pertinent lore points like the weird temporal reboot between RP and RL, the whole Lautrec/Talisman and Sun Eater/Tiny Dwarf thing, the connections with Gadget and Third Force and whatnot. But what I can do is take all three temporally at face value, map out their timeframes, and try to map that onto the events of Half Life 1 as, whilst it is unclear whether or not the mods take place in the exact same setting as the events of the original game (or one another), it is worth taking a more thorough crack at it than the others who have tried as part of larger sync walkthroughs.

Addendum (If you want to play it yourself)

If you intend to play this version of Residual Point or Residual Life I recommend downloading the ‘FunGuy’ version on ModDB for… reasons that will become obvious if you read the comments of both versions.

Residual Point

RP begins with Jack Sohn heading into work at the Biodome Complex, seemingly working on those teleporters we see in Opposing Force when Shephard traverses the area. It can be reasonably assumed that the experiment malfunctions due to the Resonance Cascade and that the event takes place around the same time as it does in Half Life 1.

We then get a brief sequence in Xen, ending with the voice line from Half Life Blue Shift from Rosenberg encouraging Barney to return from Xen.

Now would be a good time to bring up the weighting in which voice lines can be given. RP, RL and RA are mods made by a Korean Mod developer who, whilst not speaking no English, does not speak full English either. With multiple recurrences of some lines, it is more reasonable to assume that the lines are a stand in for ‘generic chatter’ in at least some instances.

Residual Point’s Chapters are as Follows

Intro (Unnamed) – Morning

Insecurity – Morning

Incoming – Morning before incident, Unknown afterwards

Among the Ruins – Daytime (Black Ops Zombie appears)

Office Facility – Unknown

Obscure True – Daytime – Military First Appear

Residue Pit – Unknown

Bombing Surface – Evening (Or early Morning)

Recession – Unknown (ZECU First Appear, Black Ops First Appear)

Distortion – Unknown (Before Teleport/KO), Night (afterwards)

Upper Yard – Morning/Evening, then Night

Course to Lambda – Night

Into the Portal – Lambda Teleporter, then Xen

Dread Plot – Xen

Residual Point – Day (Portal Storms)

Going by that timeframe, we know the Black Mesa Incident of Half Life takes place over three days, the first consisting of Black Mesa Inbound through to On A Rail, the second beginning in Apprehension and lasting for the rest of Half Life 1, but for Shephard beginning with Welcome to Black Mesa and ending at We Are Not Alone. A second night is never shown in Opposing Force, but with the nuclear detonation taking place during the Day, one can assume the nuke didn’t detonate until the third day, with Opposing Force’s latter half, from Foxtrot Uniform to World’s Collide being the morning of Day 3 and Crush Depth to Pitworm’s Nest taking place over the second night. So by that timeframe we have…

Day 1

Intro (Unnamed) – Morning

Insecurity – Morning

Incoming – Morning (Resonance Cascade)

Among the Ruins – Daytime

Office Facility – Daytime

Obscure True – Daytime

Residue Pit – Daytime to Evening

Bombing Surface – Evening (We’ve Got Hostiles era Bombing run)

Recession – Night (HL1 Rocket Launch, then Black Ops Arrive, then ZECU first appear)

Distortion – Night

Day 2

Upper Yard – Morning, then Day and Evening whilst Underground, then Night once resurfaced. (Black Ops turn on HECU here)

Course to Lambda – Night (Same time as Lambda Core)

Into the Portal – Night (Lambda Core ending, then Sohn goes into Xen)

Dread Plot – Xen

Day 3

Dread Plot – Xen (cont into Day 3 Morning on Earth)

Residual Point – Day (After Gene Worm Defeat from OP4, before Nuke)

Nuclear Detonation (From Opposing Force)

This does result in oddities, namely that the Upper Yard Chapter takes Jack Sohn an entire day to complete, as long an amount of time as all of the previous approximately three hours of gameplay in a span of 20 minutes of gameplay. But that concession really must be made regardless on if one intends to fit Residual Point into HL1s timeline or not as it forces the Night -> Day -> Night mapping thing, were it not night after the unconsciousness in Distortion, that would allow for a teleporter break timeskip to the end of Day 2 or at the very least to extend the Recession chapter into Day 2 but with the current skyboxes this is the only real option.

Notably this placement also keeps consistency with most of the major events of Half Life 1, with early Pit Drone cameos being escapes from the Biodome (Can’t really explain that one Black Ops Headcrab Zombie in the earlier chapters which’d indicate a Day 2 placement but a Day 2 placement is impossible without fudging the skyboxes of either Distortion or Upper Yard. Either way, the Black Ops still arrive at some point between the Day 1 night time On a Rail Rocket Launch and the Day 2 morning at the end of Apprehension when Gordon is captured. As well as constraining the arrival of the ZECU to the night time of Day 1. Obviously the ZECU are not seen in Half Life proper, but one can assume the Nihilanth (or Residual Life Xen Route Boss) targeted them into specific areas of Black Mesa at specific times, and Gordon, Adrian, Barney, Gina and Colette never directly intersected those areas of Black Mesa in that timeframe. After all by the same metric, Gordon never encountered Race X during Forget About Freeman or Lambda Core despite them very much being at least somewhat active in that period.

Residual Life

Residual Life is far longer, more narratively involved and arguably more interesting than its predecessor. RL begins with Sora Kim waking up in her dorm and heading to work in the Lambda Complex, entering an elevator just after the Resonance Cascade. The elevator drops and Sora is knocked out. Waking up an undetermined amount of time later to get to the surface. Seems straightforward enough until you pay attention to the details on the surface, at first glance it seems like it’s the time of the We’ve Got Hostiles aerial bombardment but a closer inspection reveals it is in fact more likely to be that of Forget About Freeman. This is notable due to the presence of Black Operations who, in both RP and HL1 do not appear until the night of Day 1, after the timeframe it would have to be for that skybox to appear.

That at least narrows it down to either Day 2 morning or Day 2 evening. Similarly the yard chapters, No Way Out and Countdown seem to at first glance support a ‘Day 2 Daytime’ placement, around the time of Residue Processing – Surface Tension. But between the Black Ops killing the marines, something that only begins in Day 2 afternoon as per Opposing Force, and then most crucially the Nuke detonation which occurs in both Route 1 and Route 2, being the backing driving force behind the entire Countdown chapter through announcements that specifically refer to it as ‘Charlie Bravo’, concluding in it detonating whilst you try to disarm it in Route 1 or detonating as you flee underground in Route 2 indicating that the events of the daytime chapters actually take place after the ending of Opposing Force, during the era between the Gene Worm’s defeat and the nuclear destruction of Black Mesa, implying there were in fact multiple nukes shipped into Black Mesa rather than just the one we see in Opposing Force, with Route 2 implying large parts of the facility even persists after the detonations.

The Timeframe of Residual Life is then as follows

Day 1

Impossibility Dream – Morning

Black Mesa Inbound – Morning

Routine Work – Morning (Resonance Cascade)

Day 2

State of Emergency – Daytime

Legal Defence – Evening

“One is All, All in One” – Evening

Ground Zero – Evening

Between Worlds and Chaos – Xen

Day 3 – Route 1

No Way Out – Daytime

Countdown – Daytime (Nuclear Detonation)

Nuclear Portal – Xen

Ruins of Chronos – Xen

Ashes of Lautrec – Xen

Altar of Sacrifice – Xen

Impossibility Dream – Spatial Isolation

Epilogue – Night

Day 3 – Route 2

No Way Out – Daytime

Countdown – Daytime (Nuclear Detonation)

Chaotic Blue – Daytime

Ashes to Ashes, Dust to Dust – Evening

Heart of Nightmare – Evening

The Centre of All Things – Evening

The Sun Eaters Pillar – Sun Eaters Pillar

Chosin Reservoir – Evening (confirmed to be a real BMRF location in Residual Agent)

The Sun Eaters Pillar (Part 2) – Sun Eaters Pillar

The Tiny Dwarf – Sun Eaters Pillar

The Sun Eaters Pillar (Part 3) – Sun Eaters Pillar

Impossibility Dream – Spatial Isolation

Epilogue – Night

Addendum, Double Nuke Theory

When doing a multi-mod timeline with a bunch of other mods, the timing of the nuke often becomes an issue. The premiere instance of this being Half Life Echoes, which shows the nuke as happening during the night despite Opposing Force’s nuke being during the day. Taking RL into account, it becomes clear that the initial nuke(s) in OP4 (And RL Countdown) fail to destroy large parts of the facility, opening up the possibility that a second, higher yield nuke was detonated the following night after the first barrage failed to stop the Portal Storms that by the time of Day 3 would probably already be ravaging the United States, hence the attempt to contain the disaster by nuking Black Mesa.

Thus the nuke shown in Echoes is not the first nuke but in fact a final ICBM that truly destroys Black Mesa, matching up with the implication in the HL2 era that Black Mesa is utterly gone. Sora’s final escape in the Epilogue would therefore (if real) be shortly prior to the final nuclear detonation.

Residual Agent

I had not played Residual Agent prior to this, nor to be entirely honest have many people. The developer of RP and RL only ever officially hosted RA on their personal Naver blog, making it prohibitively difficult, but not impossible, to access. Unlike RP and RL, RA is also a spinoff of Half Life Zombie Edition and is currently unfinished with far less gameplay than RP or RL. Its less-linear nature and tendency to loop back on itself makes skybox analysis much more difficult too but there’s still a few things we can glean.

For instance

The Black Ops are present

The Black Ops and HECU are working together

The skyboxes are morning/evening.

3 means it has to be one of the following

Day 1 Evening (We’ve Got Hostiles era)

Day 2 Morning (Apprehension era)

Day 2 Evening (Forget About Freeman/“We Are Pulling Out” era)

Day 3 Morning (Foxtrot Uniform Era)

Day 3 Evening (Post-Nuke, Chosin Reservoir Era)

Day 3 Evening can be ruled out right off the bat as the combatants don’t match that of Chosin Reservoir in RL, plus that’d drastically increase the likelihood Rezina-rhagithor 3320 (The headcrab protagonist of Residual Agent) and Sora Kim met which didn’t happen in either game.

Number 1 rules out a Day 1 time, since the Black Ops only arrive on the night of Day 1, number 2 meanwhile rules out Day 2 evening (Which is explicitly when the Black Ops turn on the HECU) and Day 3, meaning the most viable setting as of the current demo is Day 2 morning. This means that Rezina passes through RLs areas before Sora which tracks with the fact the ‘Circle of Death’ secret from RL is not yet unlocked in RA.

So we have

Intro (Chiola Breeding Citadel, Xen)

Field of Blood (Possibly Day 1 Night)

Reign of Blood (Day 2 Morning)

Lake of Blood (Day 2 Morning)

Path of Blood (Day 2 Morning)

To Be Continued…

[lemongingerart]

The escape, part 1 till 4.1

THIS POST IS TO COMPLETE ALL CHAPTERS ON TUMBLR! I've shared these chapters of my fanfic in links before, but never the full text. So nothing new to read, alas... (but, I'm working on the publication of arc 2 very soon, I swear 😇)

Summary: The first arc of my Armitage Hux x OC fanfic, working title "shattered ambitions, rebuilt into dreams." or, "chocolate cookies and tarine tea" depending on my mood 🤔💁.

Rating: Explicit. This is the NSFW version (first 2 chapters are SFW). So, Minors, do NOT read or interact. 18+. Family, friends and colleagues, please don't read this. :'-)

Tags & warnings: TRoS fix-it (kind of), Hux!lives, Hux doesn't like Kylo, Not a Redemption Arc, maybe a little bit, shameless OC insert (there are cliches but entertaining ones imo), slow emotional burn, medium sexual burn, Enemies to Enemies With Benefits to Lovers, Hux is a villain with villainous thoughts at first, but let's see what a different environment will do, Choking, Virgin Characters, Masturbation in Shower, and out of the shower too, Unresolved Sexual Tension, Past Child Abuse, Very short suicide mention.

I will add tags as we proceed in the story, please let me know if I forgot one!

From chapter 3 on: mentions of choking, non-consent actions, vague sexual thoughts From chapter 4 on: NSFW - mentions of sex, non-consent plans, masturbation, Hux is a manipulative asshole and a shy coward at the same time. Has shady plans. I love him.

A/N:

Hello there!

I wrote this little fanfic about 2 years ago, to get my very vivid daydreams under control. I wasn't really planning on publishing this, but it feels wrong just to have it catching digital dust on my drive. So recently, I picked it up again and started to flesh out the parts that were still missing. I haven't finished it at all, but at least the first arc is done, so I can update that one on a regular basis!

The initial fic started as smut, but somehow I've written more action scenes than lemons. And worldbuilding. And fluff. And character development. So, this has no genre? There *is* a main plot, but there are filler episodes as well to just explore the character's interactions, or just because I like to add easter eggs to my version of this vast Star Wars universe.

Anyway, I hope you enjoy it! And bear with me, English is not my native language. I never thought myself to be a fanfic writer at all, but I sincerely hope this is as entertaining for you as it is for me. Constructive comments are always welcome! I love to hear your thoughts and learn what I can improve!

(Also the first paragraph is kind of heavy, but it's the character's fault I swear!)

Chapter 1 - escape destiny

First Order star destroyer Steadfast , 35 ABY.

Allegiant general Enric Pryde was not a fool. From the moment he and his armada came out of the unknown regions, to reinforce the current First Order military fleet known to the galaxy, he knew. His guidance was needed for the survival of the order. 

He had watched those two immature boys for some time now, seeing how their positions within the First Order had changed. He knew that Ren was the one illegally seizing power and trying to sidestep Hux, just because he could. He saw the rivalry grow, leaving Ren and Hux bickering over the most futile decisions. It was corrupting the order, as the emperor had foreseen. 

After Snoke’s fall, there was no clear vision left, no straight path to victory any more. At least not without him, that is.

He knew his chance to seize command would come soon. Ren was now too occupied with the Jakku girl, and Hux's frustrations towards Ren’s chaotic behaviour grew every time they collided. Pryde was not happy either with the self-proclaimed supreme leader’s decisions, but at least he could use them for his own good. Hux, on the contrary, was barking like a caged Akk dog, bitterly knowing he’ll be the first to fall after his failure at Starkiller base. His misstep on D’Qar, letting the dreadnought Fulminatrix get destroyed, left a second stain on his career as well. 

Pride inwardly smiled. Hux used to be a prodigy, but he lacked experience and was too frustrated with his loss of power, and that caught onto him. And now, it appears he has no backbone to cope with the sticky situation he was in. It was like Hux's late father once mentioned to him, back when their paths crossed in the unknown regions. His son has no spine and is not made for this life. 

Thinking back at that particular conversation, it was actually surprising he lasted this long. 

Lately, Pryde noticed that Hux even stopped stating his concerns to Ren. He seemed beaten, or at least, that was the impression he was trying to make. And Ren, he was growing more and more insane. That boy was even worse to work with, a loose cannon on deck, only kept there by the emperor because he is supposed to be some part of a prophecy. Pryde suspected that the emperor’s plan for Ren would soon become clear to him. He hoped it didn't involve him having to keep answering to that short tempered idiot.

He stopped his trajectory when he arrived at the middle of the bridge, and peered outside through the front view.

It was only a matter of time for him to take over from those two foolish boys playing toy army. And then, nothing would stand in his way to shape the universe to the vision of the one true emperor. Pryde’s own flavor included, of course.

But first, he needed to catch the culprit who got word to the Resistance about Exegol. Although Hux reassured him that his men are trained well and fully indoctrinated with the first order's philosophy, he had his doubts. Lately, rumours reached him about Phasma being the one who had assassinated Hux’ father, Brendol. The fact that Armitage Hux and Phasma had been seen together more frequently, before her demise, was another big red warning sign for him. 

He had decided to keep a close eye on both of them already a while ago. Now, Phasma was eliminated, and the spy continued leaking information. 

He assumed Hux's changed behaviour towards Ren was no coincidence either. He had seen the ginger boy in action before, scheming and working his way up. He was not to be underestimated, and the fact that Ren was taking every actual decisive power out of Hux’s hands, wasn’t going to be digested well by the latter. 

Yes, the leader of the first order's army and former supervisor of Starkiller base was his number one suspect.

The hiss of the bridge's main entrance woke Pride from his speculative thoughts.

A trooper squad approached the Allegiant General, bringing forth a prisoner.  “Sir, we have found another one. As requested, we brought her here”, the first trooper reported. “Ah, the emperor will be pleased", Pryde replied. He turned to another officer standing to the left of him and replied: "Officer Trach, can you prepare the test?” Trach nodded curtly and turned around.

The handcuffed girl looked at Pryde with fierce amber eyes and spilled a waterfall of angry words: “Let me go! I didn’t mean to slice into the system, I was just experimenting! I didn’t do anything wrong, you’ll see! There wasn’t anything interesting to find anyway!”. She slightly heaved from the outburst.

Pryde looked over his shoulder and looked down upon the rather short prisoner. What a... rude chatterbox..., he amusingly thought. Such noise for such a small girl.

“Oh, but you’re not here because you didn’t do anything wrong. It’s because of what you might do in the future,” he responded, his face sporting a wry smile. Trach had joined his flank, and Pryde took the test device from the officer. The two troopers, who were escorting the struggling girl, routinely forced her on her knees, not waiting for Pryde’s orders. One of them took her right arm and pulled up her sleeve. She tried to fight back and snarled: ‘Hey, let me go! You’re hurting me!’ to her assaultants, who were struggling to keep her pinned on her position.

Pryde approached her, pulling back her head by her hair. She groaned, but found the strength to spit straight in his face. The allegiant general backed up, letting out a low growl. He wiped away the spit from his cheek with his gloves. 'You insolent bi-…' he started saying, instantly pushing the test device to the skin of her arm and definitely applying more force than necessary. He kept his distance this time, making sure he wasn't going to be covered in spit a second time. She looked him in his eyes, as if she could strike him down glaring. He chuckled, this was one of the reasons why he didn’t delegate the tests, whenever his schedule permitted it; he liked what was coming next. She was a fiery one, full of life, but not for long. 

He pressed the trigger with force, and enjoyed the way he saw her face flinch. Her eyes went teary and lost focus. Ah, he savoured that feeling of power. “You see, eventually, everyone ends up the same way.” he stated with a sly smile, releasing the trigger and giving back the apparatus to Trach.

The girl fell limp and landed face first on the immaculate deck.

Pryde turned around and went over to the center of bridge, reminiscing about moments like these, when the test subjects started to lose their consciousness. These tests were a great reminder of how he could toy with the lives he overpowered. And power, he craved.

“Report me if the midichlorian test confirms the reported values” he routiniously said. Trach nodded and took the device elsewhere.

At that exact moment, Pryde heard the repulsor doors to the bridge open again. He turned around, seeing his number one suspect and adversary approaching. 

He raised his eyebrow, confused and intrigued by this new turn of events. General Hux was limping, his leg hastily bandaged. Blood was already seeping through his uniform pants, the wound clearly caused by a blaster shot. 

Pryde noticed that the general looked even paler than usual, and somehow he lost some of his annoying pride and charisma. Not that he had much of both left lately. Of course, given the situation, he didn’t expect anything else from that overconfident boy. He always thought he was worthless, only thriving because there used to be a void in the first order’s leading positions. It appears he's not resilient enough to cope with a few setbacks , he mused. As I expected. 

He could admit though that Armitage was smart, smarter than his father, but Pryde had lived longer than him. He saw how the galactic empire had brought order to the galaxy, by ending the clone wars. He saw dozens of people with ambition come and go. The higher their aim, the greater the fall. The emperor saw through them time and time again, together with his counseling. This time, it was Hux’s turn to fall and - finally - his own time to rise.

 'It was a coordinated incursion, allegiant general', Hux recited, his voice trembling either by anger or by fear. Maybe both, Pryde considered, thinking back about his earlier train of thoughts. 'They overpowered the guards and forced me to take them to their ship.' 

Liar , Pryde thought, feeling strangely satisfied. This was it. The opportunity he was waiting for. Hux's half-baked excuse was exactly what he needed; he just presented Pryde with perfect leverage to bring him down . It seems I was right all along, and even if he's not the spy after all, I will make sure everyone believes he was. This is the perfect moment . 

 'I see', Pryde responded dryly.

 'Get me the supreme leader,'' he requested his communication officer. 

That exact same moment, he took the blaster from the nearest trooper and swiftly turned around, shooting Hux right in the stomach. His target’s body immediately flew backwards and landed several meters further, carried by the force of the blast.

The allegiant general was thrilled by the rush of action, but quickly tried to hide it from his subordinates. He still had it in him. He had to play this game to the end…

 'Tell him I found the spy,' he stated to the communication officer. 

A sense of pride and self indulgence overcame him. 'Throw the traitor's body in the trash compactor, where he belongs', he loudly stated, making sure he was heard by the very soldiers Hux had recruited and had overseen their training for decades. 

He eliminated his first rival, now it's time to move onward to the second one, Ren. 

Pryde turned towards the empty void of space, feeling the adrenaline rush slowly fading from his veins.

'Sir, what about the girl?' He heard officer Trach ask. Pryde looked up to him and turned to the side deck. He almost forgot about her. The captive was still on the floor, staring with wide eyes at the place Hux had stood, just half a minute ago. She looked pale, as if she saw a ghost. Heh . He thought. Seems like she lost that boldness already. It only took just one kill for her to witness, just that bit, to silence her. As I expected from a mere civilian.  He replied: 'Lock her up as usual. Until the results are confirmed, we don't know if she can onboard the shuttle’.

What the kriff… What's happening? First I get abducted by some creepy hooded individuals, then I seem to be on some dank first order flagship, and now this bastard forces me down and gives me this shot from a device that looked way too fragging big to be medically responsible… which was shukking painful by the way… and my head is spinning so hard.. .

Miko shortly lost her consciousness from the blood that was quickly pulled from her veins. She didn't feel the smack when her head hit the shiny black durasteel floor, everything went dark for a few seconds. 

When she regained her sight, she saw two black boots turning away from her. A moment later  after the deafening sound of the blood rushing in her ears stopped, she could hear the typical sound of a repulsor steered door opening. She didn’t feel completely conscious yet, but the adrenaline rushed her senses on full alert in no time. Someone had entered the bridge, she assumed, as that old bastard was not paying attention to her any more. 

Good, maybe she could come up with some plan, or at least get a clue of what the frack was going on here. 

She righted her head and turned towards the newcomer. Her whole body was loudly complaining, refusing her to fully lift up her head, so she turned it to the side. She couldn't really understand what they were saying, her ears were still buzzing. But somehow, she could feel the tension rising fast. It was like the atmosphere was getting electrically charged. She saw the older one of the duo, the one that just kriffing harassed her, turn around again, stepping away from the younger one and taking the blaster from the trooper next to him.

W-whoa...wwait! Don't shoot! She tried to yell, but nothing came out. She had tried to reach out with her hand, as if she could stop the grey-haired bastard from shooting the red-haired douchebag, but her body just didn't respond to her commands like it should. 

The officer fully took the shot and his body violently flung back to the bridge's main entrance. 

D-did he just kill another crewmember like it was nothing? I… I knew the  'worst order' had a fragging bad reputation, but... this? 

Miko suddenly felt sick from watching someone die in front of her, even if it was probably someone she hadn’t wanted to get to know better, anyway. She never witnessed something as life-threatening as this before, and wished she never would, again. Her stomach turned. A cold blooded murder, executed by the officer who took interest in her. 

Great .

She heard someone ask a question that probably referred to her presence, but her mind wasn't able to register what exactly was going on. The troopers that had pressed her on her knees, now pulled her on her wobbly feet. She was slowly getting able to move again, but all felt like she was in some kind of bad dream. One took her by the handcuffs, while the other went to drag the lifeless corpse to the trash compactor.

Miko was roughly pulled forward through the hallways of the Steadfast . The two first order troopers were now walking next to her, one on each side. The right one was holding the cuffs tightly. When she looked the other way, she saw the other trooper with two boots in his hands. He was disrespectfully dragging the dead officer forward, like he was sweeping the floor. The trooper to her left scraped his throat and started talking to his comrade: “the trash compactor is closer, let me first throw him in”. The other trooper nodded curtly. She shivered. She knew the First Order was bad news, but this was much worse than she expected. How am I ever going to get out of this frigging hellhole?

I have to come up with a plan , she desperately thought.  She had to try to look around for some way out.

The group turned down another hallway, reaching one of the many trash compactor entrances that existed on the resurgent-class star destroyer. She heard the other trooper sigh. Was this business as usual for them? Or were they affected by this wicked situation as well? She wondered. Their black visors and stiff armor hid their expressions very well, it was impossible to tell.

She felt a lump in her throat, thinking back about what happened on the bridge. Should I have a last look at him? She thought, somehow feeling sorry for the shot down officer. She turned her head and shoulders to catch a glance of him. However, the trooper that was holding her in check, suddenly reacted to her maneuver, and roughly pulled her cuffs towards him.  But instead of pulling her back in line, she lost her balance, falling backwards with a swirl, right onto the lifeless corpse.

Miko froze. 

She was staring right into the empty blueish green eyes of the man that was just shot and killed. 

Her cuffed hands had landed on his chest, and the physical contact with this corpse made her feel like she was going to throw up. She desperately closed her eyes to ignore the sensory overload and felt a cold chill, like a shockwave, go through her. This was how she was going to meet her end too, right? A dead lump, ready to be composted on this stupid war machine. How did this all happen so fast? And - by the fragging stars - why?

Her hands were pulled up once again by the trooper, but she felt so limp, she couldn't find the strength to react. The situation went south so quickly, and there was no escape whatsoever, she hopelessly thought.

She felt movement beneath her, and opened her eyes again, expecting that the other trooper had started pulling the still warm body. But instead, she looked in the exact same blueish green eyes again, staring back at her . 

What the fr-...? 

The presumed-dead officer quickly pulled his hand from beneath her, reaching out to the trooper holding her handcuffs, swiftly grabbing the trooper’s blaster from its holster. He shot the other trooper in the chest, before the blaster was even removed from the holster. The framed trooper turned around in confusion, receiving a shot in the stomach himself. 

In a mere few seconds, Miko found herself on the ground in between two lifeless troopers, a man who was very much supposed to be dead sitting next to her. 

She looked at him in shock, not understanding a bit from what had just happened. 

To her surprise, he looked as confused as she was. The burn from the blast was apparent on his otherwise spotless uniform and she could’ve sworn that he was really absolutely dead just seconds ago. Not that she had any experience with laying on a dead body at all, but still.

“What did you do?!” he half whispered-half shouted her way. 

“What did I do? I witnessed you die back there!” she responded with the same hissing voice. The officer ignored her reaction and started touching the hole in his uniform. “It pierced through the blaster protection, as I feared…" the man frowned. "Why were you present on the bridge?” he sternly demanded. 

Miko felt even more confused and slightly annoyed by his commanding tone. “What do you mean? And I have no idea why I was there! That creep took some painful blood samples from my arm and was going to lock me up, that’s the only thing I know!” She responded, slightly raising her voice. 

He looked at her, one eyebrow raised. “Did he by any chance say anything else?” 

Miko tried to recall the situation, but everything went so quickly and the blood loss made her memories blurry. “Yeah, he said something about some midi-what-the-hell-ian values he was going to check”. She crossed her arms, scanning his face for answers. 

The first order officer stared back at her, nose twitching, as if she had caught some rare disease. He then started rubbing his chest again in slow circles. His hand clenched at the fabric for a fraction, before he quickly stood up and started walking further into the hallway and away from her, his back straight. 

“Hey! Where the frag are you going?” Miko shouted. He didn’t respond, didn't look back at her or slowed down. He acted as if she wasn’t even kriffing there. 

She didn't like this attitude of his at all.

Miko stumbled and almost fell, having trouble standing up with her hands cuffed. But she quickly ran after him and grabbed his arm, hoping to get some response out of him. She didn't like the idea at all, but he was probably her only chance of survival, so she wasn't going to let him get away just like that. 

He suddenly turned and looked back at her with a menacing glare, as if touching him was way off limits. She backed away and forgot about her plan, surprised by his reaction and taken aback by his piercing eyes. Luckily, he paused for a second and looked back and forth, as if he was overthinking the situation.  

He sighed. “Follow me if you want to get out of this ship”, he coldly replied.

Chapter 2 - escape from Steadfast

What’s this? Why am I on the floor? And why is this odd fuzzy hairball staring at me like she had just seen a ghost? And why in the order's name is she on top of me? Hux thought in disdain. He was confused, disoriented and absolutely not comfortable with having someone invading his personal space. 

He tried to clear his mind and focus on the past events. Wasn’t he on the bridge of the Steadfast ? 

Pryde . 

He remembered. 

While his eyes were adjusting to the hallway light, he saw 2 troopers slowly reaching for the girl, unaware of him regaining his consciousness. This was the moment he needed to act on. 

He reached for the nearest trooper's blaster and swiftly shot both soldiers. The girl automatically moved to the side, making way so he could get up on his knees. 

Hux stared at the white armored bodies. What a waste, I had to shoot a total of five troopers in one day, he thought. 

He paused and gulped down the nauseous feeling he got from the turn of events. Not that any of them mattered to him any more.

The girl quickly told him what happened. He cursed inwardly. If what he suspects was true, he was just saved by a force sensitive. Ugh , he absolutely hated the thought of being saved by someone with the likes of Kylo Ren. Apart from his rivalry with the latter, he wasn’t a fan of anything that couldn’t be scientifically explained either. 

It seems that she is not aware of her abilities, though , he noticed. For now, let’s keep it that way. I don’t want to give her any ideas. But why is Pryde picking up force sensitive people? One is already too much! He felt his frustrations rise again, thinking about the self-proclaimed supreme leader and the way he used that Force power to lash out at him physically. He unwillingly touched his neck, remembering his latest encounter with Kylo.

He tried to regain his composure. Let’s evaluate the situation later, she might come in handy right now.

He looked at the two troopers he just shot. My first priority should be a swift escape, which will be much easier as long as I'm presumed dead,   he reasoned. He took the blaster from the floor, started walking and eventually called the girl to follow him. “We should get to the lower hangar, my shuttle is stationed there. I was planning to depart, so it should be fueled up by now” he stated, increasing the pace.  

He suddenly stopped in his tracks. If the girl was the only one leaving a trace, no one will know he’s still alive, even after his escape. That would give him a significant tactical advantage. He should come up with a plan to reach the shuttle without being noticed.

The girl, obviously still confused about the whole situation, walked right into him, giving him a bump in the back. 

“Watch we’re you’re going!” he hissed. She was looking back into his eyes, anger showing in hers. She pointed a finger to his chest, her hands still cuffed.  “You’re hard to keep up with, you’re at least 2 heads bigger than I am, and then you frigging stop out of the blue! What do you expect to happen!” She silently shouted back. 

Hux felt his anger level rise. This whole day had been full of stress and frustration, and this brat was only adding fuel to the fire. She should learn her place, or this is not going to work well, he thought, while grinding his teeth. She bothered him already twice in this short timespan, and with such insolence. 

But he also knew that he didn’t have any better options, and he had manipulated people into serving his purpose in the past. He had to make this work, for his own sake. 

He looked at her with cold stern eyes, then turned his head towards a hallway with an open door, leading to the hangar. “We need to get to my ship and make sure we can take off. We have to get authorization from the control tower first,” he stated.  She sighed, tried to cross her handcuffed arms and replied with a sceptical look: “And how are you going to pull that off?” 

Armitage thought he felt a vein in his brain pop, not used to receiving such answers. He refrained from the urge to verbally lash out to her and forced himself to think about the situation ahead. 

He brought his gloved right hand to his chin. She did have a point. He had to give up his cover, if he wanted to try to convince someone. He could go back to take the trooper’s helmet, call control tower, and hope that the microphone unit would cover up his voice. But using his authorization code was a great risk. Most of the troopers knew him all too well… he implicitly recruited and oversaw training for most of them, after all. He was the image of the army's propaganda. News of his demise had probably already spread, so using anything related to his identity would most certainly ring some alarms. 

His shoulder was pounded upon again, so he looked down with slight resignation. The girl was holding her hands to the side, wanting to put them on her hips, but not able to do so due to the handcuffs. “Leave that to me”, she whispered with a sly smile. 

He pulled one eyebrow up again. “What do you mean?” he responded with a slightly cynical voice. 

“Can you guide me to an access port somewhere?” she smiled enthusiastically. 

Her reaction looked somewhat childish in his eyes, and that really didn’t give him any confidence. But his plan was too risky anyway, so he could at least give her the benefit of the doubt, he considered. 

Hux pointed her to the nearest access point. She sat down on one knee, looking at the port. He was feeling very sceptical about this. How can this girl do anything with that access port? Without a scomp link, she can't even access it, he wondered. He saw her looking over her shoulder, whispering something. She’s not going to do some force magic, right… he thought in disdain, furrowing his brows.

‘PC, you can come out now’, he now heard her  whisper. A tiny droid crawled out of the neck sleeve of her jacket. It had 2 visual sensors and 4 motoric ones, it resembled something animal-like. A small reptilian type of animal, including the bulging eyes and flexible tail. The thing found its way via her arms to the access point, turning to use said tail as the communicator, the scomp link. She whispered instructions to the little droid, before she pulled out a small working pad from her gear. She started scanning the screen with full concentration and started slicing, clearly forgetting his presence.

Hux was intrigued by the droid, he never saw such a small animal-like model. The way it swiftly moved the access point’s turning wheel was peculiar, but most effective. If he was head of the infiltration division, this model would make a great asset. 

If I was still in charge… but that’s all over and done now. He gulped. 

If… only I'm able to get to Ren . The stakes were high, too high for his liking, but he would do anything to make the idiotic force user disappear. 

The droid made a squeaky sound.  The girl turned to Hux again. “All done!” she exclaimed, enthusiastic about her presumed success. He was still sceptical though, her enthusiasm only making him feel less confident. Does she really know what she's doing? She sure doesn't act like it , he wondered. But… if she really achieved changing flight plans and authorizations without notice, she could disable the surveillance cameras as well. She might even be able to diminish the amount of troops in the hangar, too , he reasoned. The longer he was presumed dead, the better. 

He asked her if she could pull that one off, and she responded positively. The droid squeaked, and she focused back on the access port. 

Hux was nervously pacing through the hallway, and although it took her and that droid only two minutes, it felt like eternity. The more dead moments like this, the more chance they could be discovered. 

He felt his heart racing from not being able to do anything, his mind starting to come up with all kinds of worst-case scenarios. He took another swing, and saw her standing up and putting two thumbs up in the air. Good. Urgent time to leave.

 “Okay, let's advance and check if your little trick worked. Walk before me and pull up your hands.” he stated. 

“What? Why?” she responded with a low tone, clearly finding his request suspicious. “I’m going to transfer you as a prisoner to the shuttle”, he explained with a hissing tone. “Oh-okay, I can go with that.” She said with a voice full of doubt. 

As if she had another choice , he thought scornfully.

The droid retreated back into her jacket, its lean form making sure it wasn’t visible from the outside. Hux removed the bandage from his left leg. The bleeding hadn’t entirely stopped, but the white fabric was way too obvious. The black hole on his chest was clearly visible, too.  “Walk closely before me, so they don’t notice the damage on my uniform,” he added, while disposing of the cloth. He took the confiscated blaster and pointed it on her back, coercing her to start walking. 

The duo marched over to the hangar deck. Hux scanned the hangar. Good, it seems the dock was manned with minimum capacity. Maybe her slicing efforts actually had their results.  

Apart from that, he spotted nothing out of the ordinary, which was a good sign. It indicated that the news of his presumed death had not reached the hangar personnel yet. If he was lucky, none of them would think back about this moment or even notice them. They had to move as subtle as possible. 

He slowly picked up the pace, but tried not to go too fast so that he had to limp. The shot wound in his leg was slowly starting to take its toll. They passed a few of the hangar crew members and he sternly nodded to a trooper that saluted him. He hoped none of them would see the sweat on his forehead. Or wonder why he was there and no pilot was with him. It’s been a while since he flew himself, after all. 

They walked on the ramp of the shuttle and he opened the cargo doors. Without looking up, they both stepped inside.

(small bonus doodle because I love awkward situations and they need more attention)

Chapter 2 - escape from Steadfast (II)

Hux closed the shuttle door as fast as possible and let the girl free. He let out a breath. He didn't prefer to be in risky situations at all. Being on the bridge, executing battle strategies was his forte, not actually being in the field. 

He marched to the cockpit, the girl followed in his wake. He swiftly sat down and started to power up his shuttle. “Prepare for a swift jump to lightspeed” he stated, without looking her way. She slowly looked around,  taking in the environment. “O-ok” she absentively answered. 

He paused, wondering how much flight experience she was lacking. 

“Put yourself in that chair”, he pointed out. She quickly sat down and put her hands on her knees. 

She’s clearly not used to space travelling, he mused . A real planetary brat.

The ship's motors started roaring to life. Moments later, the ship took off, and Miko was pressed against the back of the seat. She had a hard time taking in what was happening, but was finally feeling relieved to see the stars. It gave her some hope that this nightmare could be over soon.

Hux turned to her: “we’re going to jump into hyperspace as soon as possible. I’m setting up the hyperdrive, can you give in the coördinates?” he asked her. 

“Where?” she replied, absolutely willing to help to get out of there as fast as possible. 

“at 3h” he responded. 

Who the hell talks in hours? She wondered, reminding herself she picked him up on a military base after all. She sighed and closed her eyes for a second,  in an attempt to find some inner peace.

First, he treats me like kriffing trash, he doesn’t believe I can slice the system, then he drags me into this ship with a fucking blaster pointed at my back, and now I have to know how a shuttle works? This man is giving me grey hairs! She thought instead, frustration starting to grow. 

She found the hyperspace panel and started looking through the pre-filled values. “Anywhere?” she asked, turning back to him. 

“Would you just choose something already?” he shouted back. “Why are you shouting, I can hear you when you talk, sir whatever!” she responded angrily, pressing the confirmation button. If he’s going to treat me like this - again - he’s not going anywhere! She stubbornly thought.

“By the sarlacc pits, they locked on us!” Hux shouted, while the shuttle was violently shaken. Miko closely held onto the chair behind her and momentarily closed her eyes. When the shaking stopped, she remembered his words. “By the sarlacc pits”, who says that anyway? She wondered. This guy is a kriffing relic. A next shake threw her out of her train of thoughts again and made her focus on the present.

  “The coordinates are ready!” Miko called back. Hux pulled the hyperdrive gear, the stars quickly changing into blue lines. 

“Phuh, that was friggin close!” Miko sighed, letting herself fall into the co-pilot’s chair. 

“We’re not out of this yet” Hux said while glaring at her from the side. “Prepare to jump back” he added. 

“But… no! I don’t want to go back! Why should I…” she argued. 

“Just do it already!” he angrily shouted. 

She hesitantly went over to the controls again, but at that exact moment, they were pulled out of hyperspace, reaching their destination. She looked out of the cockpit’s window, staring into empty space. Hux started turning the ship around. 

Right at that time, a squadron of first order TIE-fighters appeared from hyperspace. 

Hux cursed inwardly. The squadron opened fire and hit the shuttle a few times, giving Miko a hard time to stand. Red warning lights blinked on the right control board and if Miko wasn't panicking yet, this would certainly do the trick. The TIE's turned and a second salvo followed. Hux did his best to avoid the little buggers, but he was no trained pilot, unlike their current opponents. 

Their shields held back most of the shots, but some hits got through, making alarms go off all over the shuttle’s cockpit. 

“Wha…. They can jump through hyperspace? And they are tracking us?” Miko whispered, taken aback. 

“Put in some coordinates, now!” Hux shouted towards her. “O-okay!” she whispered in confusion. She quickly pressed the control and entered one of the preprogrammed destinations. The shuttle took another jump to the designated coordinates. While in hyperspace, he turned towards her and stood up straight. He righted his back and looked down to her with a menacing glare. His hair was slightly tossed up from angrily turning back and forth between looking at her and at the navigation panels. 

“Now, listen carefully this time. Once we arrive, jump back to the place we just came from, and then directly jump back to the Steadfast . Once there, we’ll jump again to a random spot, and so on. At least four times. And this time, do it, without hesitation!” He shouted, pointing his finger at her. 

You can’t just throw orders at me like that! She angrily thought, frustration growing and her head getting furiously red. She stood up, trying to face him on a more even level, and replied: 'I'm trying to get out of this hellhole as well, you don't need to shout at me!' She knocked away his hand and turned around. She could feel the frustration radiating from him as well; she could hear him breathe heavily and gritting his teeth. 

Miko took a deep breath and tried to calm down. She did realise he clearly knew more about this tracking mechanism, so her best chance to survive was to listen to that self-righteous idiot.

The moment the shuttle jumped out of hyperspace, they immediately jumped back to their previous location. At her right side, she saw a flash of one of the TIE-fighters landing at their location, just before the next jump was executed. She swiftly gave in the coordinates of the Steadfast’s location. “Ready!” she shouted in Hux's direction.

The third jump took them only seconds, this time no pursuing ship was seen. Another alarm was sounding and she saw Hux gritting his teeth and adding extra pressure on the steering handles. They came out of hyperspace right before the Steadfast. Miko was still entering the next coordinates.  "Hurry up! They've spotted us!", she heard him shout, while she finished the procedure.  "Done!" She exclaimed, at which Hux immediately reacted, initiating the fourth jump. 

The required fifth and sixth jump followed, and to be absolutely certain about losing their pursuers, they did another few. 

The duo arrived somewhere before a nebula, at the edge of the unknown regions. Miko was completely worked up, but the sight before her made all the tension in her body disappear. She was marvelled by the sight of the clustered stars and dusty space clouds. She had never been in outer space, and this was the first time she could actually pay attention to its beauty. For a moment, she forgot that she was in a first order ship together with some easily angered, high-minded and conceited officer. She forgot about the alarm wailing on her right side. 

“We should debate a strategy” she heard from her back, pulling her mind back into reality. Hux sat in the pilot’s seat and turned his gaze towards her. He waved his hair back in shape. He still looked like he was angry at her, but it seemed like he had found his composure again.

He stepped over to her side, checking where the alarm came from. The next thing she heard were his fists landing on the lower control panel. “This is unthinkable! The navigation unit was hit. I can’t access any of the preprogrammed coordinates any more!” he waved his hands out of anger and stepped to the other side. 

“I’ll check it out,” Miko replied quickly, willing to help. She felt a bit guilty for not following his orders. It's because of that, they were in this mess after all. 

She thought she could hear him let out a frustrated growl while he passed the spot she was standing in.

Her droid friend appeared out of her jacket again and crawled over to the data port, looking at the damage as well. Hux sat down and pressed his fingers to his forehead. He let out a long sigh. 

“The board is fried, there’s nothing I can do… it's already a miracle we could perform those last jumps. It must’ve been fried right after." Miko brought her hand to her chin. "Maybe I can check if you have access to the HoloNet on this ship, so I can look for a place to go? We can still use the direct input with coordinates,” she suggested. He didn’t look up. “That’s no option. You’ll give away our position if you do so” he responded.

 “I can put up a proxy…” she started replying, the corners of her mouth curling upwards. Her droid came to sit on her shoulder, ready to help her out. 

“They will still find a trace, trust me. I know what my men are capable of” he interrupted. He absentmindedly scratched his hair.

“From what just happened, I don’t think they’re your men any more...” Miko muttered inwardly.

Hux stood up, gave her a menacing glare, and walked out of the cockpit, leaving her there on her own.  

Great. I can add hard-headed to the list , she sighed.

Hux was losing it. He was just shot twice, left for dead but apparently saved by a naïve girl with authority issues and possibly with force powers. He didn’t know which part was worse. 

Now he was stuck in a shuttle with limited resources, having nowhere to go. He just lost everything he worked, lived and stood for. And there was no way to get it back. The only thing left was his resentment. 

First Ren, and now Pryde. They took everything from him. His life's work went up in smoke, just like Starkiller base.

If there’s anything he was still willing to achieve, it was orchestrating their demise. 

But he was practically powerless now. There wasn’t a way to get into the first order again, wasn't there.... 

He paced around in the small central wardroom, rubbed his face and tried to weigh his options.  Going back to Arkanis and using his family name could work to a certain degree, but even if he could convince the cadets on Arkanis, he had no chance against the both of them. He was the spy after all. Come to think of it, he had made sure the cadets knew how to deal with traitors. A cold shiver ran through his spine, remembering how effective and cruel his orders were towards them. No, Arkanis wasn’t an option. 

He couldn't think of any other option within his connections within the First Order. The chance was too high that they would side with either Ren or Pryde. 

But what other option is left?

Hmm. maybe the enemy of my enemy, can become my ally. If only for getting to Ren and Pryde, I’m willing to switch sides. For now. And when the opportunity presents itself, I’ll take back what’s mine. 

He stood still. If that defected trooper FN-2187 and Dameron were still alive, he might have a chance. He saved their sorry lives after all. But how to find and contact them… and first, how to get out of here...

He sat down at the table in the wardroom and thought about his options. They were stranded and they only had the navigation history of the jumps they just did, before the navigation memory unit was wiped. From what he recalled, none of them were nearby an inhabitable planet. On the other hand, it’s not like he had time to check the surroundings, so maybe they could give it a try and jump back. They have to wait for a few days to use those coordinates anyway, to avoid getting caught. 

The fuzzy hairball came in. Right, I almost forgot about her. He rolled his eyes. He realized he had no idea if there were enough provisions for one, let alone for two people. He should check that first, to be able to estimate if this was the time to get rid of her. 

She stood before him with her arms crossed and started talking: “It seems the hyperdrive got a hit too, PC is looking into it. He said we can’t use it at full speed.” 

He sighed. Another setback . He felt a cold rush climbing up his spine. How did he end up in such a sightless situation? He hated the feeling of not being in control. 

She came to sit down on the bench in front of him, and leaned forward, elbows on the table. “How did they track us through hyperspace and how did we just manage to escape?” she hesitantly asked, looking at his face like he was fishy. 

He sighed again, sat back and started explaining. He had other things to do, but he felt that explaining how superior his research division was, could at least brighten his mood a bit. 

“It's a First Order standard procedure to lock on any hyperspace trace their sensors catch. The fighters do the same.” He leaned forward as well, looking her in the eyes. He made notice on how her amber irises slightly dilated when he locked his gaze on them. Good, I have her full attention .  “We developed active hyperspace tracking, it’s very effective in pursuing targets. But if you travel backwards, you make use of that same path, making your backward jumps nearly untraceable. The technology can do some extrapolations, that’s why we had to jump the whole trip back to the Steadfast and then further on. Once they found out what we were doing, we did more than enough extra jumps to lose them.” He put up a wry smile, self-content his plan worked. It was one of his theories after all, but it wasn't tested before. 

But then he was reminded of his current situation. “Too bad we can’t travel anywhere now”, he grumbled. 

“We can travel to my place if you want?” the girl responded, cocking her head to one side. He looked up, a very sceptical look on his face. ”Your home planet? And how are we supposed to do that? The navigation is fried, did you forget?” he said, clenching his fists under the table. She's definitely not the brightest , he thought, again. He was starting to feel annoyed for the fourth time in a row now. He could feel that the combination of her presence and the recent turn of events were slowly making him lose his otherwise unbreakable self-control. 

She crossed her arms, leaned back and stated: “I know the coordinates by heart”.  

What? Who in the whole galaxy knows coordinates by heart? It’s a 48 long digit code! Hux thought, not believing her one bit.

“Are you serious?” he said, more like a statement. He couldn't take her seriously, and this definitely was not the time nor the place to mess with him.  

“Of course! One should always know how to find their way home!” she happily responded, a smart smile on her face. 

Hah, that’s funny, he thought: “You never left the planet” he dryly stated. 

“S-So what?” she responded, slightly pouting and blushing, probably feeling caught. His assumption was correct, it appeared. But still, knowing such a code by heart? That would be very unlikely.  “Why would you learn such a long code by heart if you’re never even going to use it?” he said, disbelief in his voice.  

“We can use it right now, can’t we?” she immediately countered, leaning her head backwards and starting to raise her voice again. It seems that he was not the only one who wasn't in a good mood around here. Her behaviour wasn't helping Hux to keep his calm at all. 

"Then let's hope you don't make a mistake so we don't crash into a sun, for example." He replied, the tone of his voice increasing. 

"Since the fragging hyperdrive is only working at a fraction of its speed, we don't have to worry about that, right?" she threw back at him, almost shouting.

He sat back again, breathed through his nose and tried to control the rising anger. He let out another exaggerated sigh. This girl was going to make him lose his cool sooner or later. This was worse than staying with Ren in one shuttle.

The little droid tripped from the cockpit onto the girl's seat, eventually settling down on her shoulder. 

The girl broke the loaded silence first and tried to make some progress on the plan. “Okay, suppose if we go there, what are we going to do?” she asked him. “I don’t want to get my people involved in your personal vendetta,” she added. 

How can she know about that? Is it that obvious? Hux wondered, feeling surprised and even more annoyed because he apparently couldn't hide his motives from this girl he had never met before. 

He huffed. 

“I’m planning to turn myself in with the resistance” He stated. “I have valuable information that can bring down the leaders of the first order, in exchange for my immunity.” 

She looked at him, turning one eyebrow up. “And you think they will just let you walk in there?” she responded.  

“I have been providing them with information the last months, and 2 of the resistance's key figures know about my identity. I’ll take my chances if I can get Ren and Pryde to pay.” He said, not able to hide his disdain for both. 

He cursed inwardly. He wasn’t the type to play hero, he usually let other people do the dirty work for him. But now he was practically alone, only this girl was here, but she won’t be of much help anyway. He had to do this on his own, and this was the only plan he could come up with. It could work, but it was risky and he didn’t like it.

“I think I can get us into contact with a resistance faction if we’re at my place” the girl said, holding a finger on her lips and looking back to the cockpit. Her droid was following her movements. “I’ll put in the coordinates!” she said and stood up. 

“Hey, you can’t just decide on your own!” Hux shouted back at her, but she already closed the door to the cockpit. 

This girl was going to be the death of him. 

And how did she lose those handcuffs?

Chapter 3 - escape from the psychopath (I)

Armitage Hux went back to the cockpit, seeing the girl bowing down over the panel, putting in the digits. “Apparently, it’s going to take us 28 hours to get there, due to the hyperdrive malfunction” she mumbled. The little droid was walking over the cockpit’s dashboard, keeping an eye on Hux. 

She turned around, scanning him from head to toe with a questionable look on her face. 

What’s her problem now? He thought, feeling uncomfortable under her gaze. 

“Let me see that wound.” she said, walking straight to him.

He jumped back. No way he was going to let her come that close. 

“I’ll have a look myself!” he hissed. He pulled his uniform straight, as if he could remove the damage by adjusting it, and quickly stepped out of the cockpit, head high to keep up appearances.  He then marched through the wardroom and into the private quarters, locking the door. 

He let out a sigh he didn’t know he was holding,  wondering in the back of his mind what had actually just happened. 

Armitage carefully pulled off his uniform and the blaster-repulsive vest he was wearing underneath. It was pierced, as was expected from such a close shot. He was right to wear it that day; he knew the chance of being shot sooner or later was growing more and more realistic. It was the risk he knew he was taking, by leaking information, after all. 

On his stomach, right where the shot landed, he found new scar tissue, but it was way too shallow for such a blast. So it is true, she somehow stopped the impact from the blast. It must’ve happened that instant Pryde took the shot. But why? At that moment, she could not possibly know that I could get her out of there.  

He was puzzled. Now that he thought about it, he didn’t even know her name. And she looked pretty oblivious from who he was. How that's even possible, he couldn’t understand. 

And it utterly annoyed him.

Hux found 2 bacta patches in the first aid kit and applied them on his chest and upper left leg. The bleeding of his leg was still not entirely stopped and now that the adrenaline wasn’t subduing his pain receptors any more, he started to feel the continuous tingle of the burn. 

His thoughts automatically went back to the moment he regained consciousness in one of the many halls of the Steadfast . Only now, it seemed to seep through how the girl had been way too close to him. Physical contact has always made him cringe and there has been more of said contact than he has had in a very long time. 

All what had happened the last hours on that ship was catastrophic, and it all could be summarised to him losing control.  Losing control over his carefully laid out plan, his precious army and his own body. Feelings of resentment, hate, disgust and spite rose in his chest like a tidal wave.

He rubbed his face, trying to concentrate on the tasks at hand. He hoped the wounds would heal soon with the help of the patches, because he was starting to feel worn out already. He knew his body could take the damage, history proved that already. But he also knew its limits and the effects of blood loss, which were already making him feel light in the head.

He then took one of his spare uniforms from the wardrobe and decided to get back to the wardroom. He had to find out as much as possible about that girl and her home planet. He needed to know in advance what his options were.

Oh, and he should still check the rations.

Did he just flee away when I was trying to help him? Miko was perplexed. His behaviour didn’t really add up to what she observed during their escape. He was so full of himself before, and now he got out of here like he was scared of me helping him out... 

She went to look for the officer, but he locked himself up in what she assumed was the bedroom of the ship. She then started wandering around, to explore the shuttle a bit. 

Great. If that’s the bedroom, there’s only one. She let out a huff. It’s his private shuttle after all. How was she going to get through the next 28 hours?

She heard the door open and saw him step out of the room, wearing an immaculate uniform. He must’ve changed just now, she mused. He’s really keen on his appearance, it seems. What a kriffing self centered jerk. He sat down on the bench again and started tapping his fingers on the table, which slightly worked on her already overworked nerves. 

“What’s your name?” he asked bluntly. 

Oh, we didn’t introduce ourselves yet, that’s right!  

She realised, welcoming the conversation despite his uninviting tone. ‘I’m Miko Ylena, engineer at Tagge Industries, communication division on Utapau Four. So that’s where we’re heading.” She casually swinged her hand to the cockpit, stepped closer and went to sit down, too. PC walked from her shoulder onto the table.

“Hmm… that’s a first order plant, if I recall correctly?” he wondered. 

She replied: “In theory, yes. It’s been a family business and from what I understood, nothing has changed much over the years. First,  there was the empire, now, the first order. There is a garrison stationed to oversee the production, but Henry Tagge’s still waving the scepter. Which is a good thing for us, for now. If we do our jobs well and without too much hassle, we get paid enough to come by.” 

She looked at her gloved hands. She was still wearing part of her working gear. Somehow, someone had overpowered and drugged her on the way back home. She remembered some hooded individuals, but that's all. 

PC walked up to her again, as if the little droid felt her slight distress, and went to sit between her arms.

“We’ll have to lay low so those troops don’t spot me.” Hux said. 

She looked at him, quizzical. Her mind has been working overtime, she was full of nerves and definitely not thinking straight. 

“Why? Is your hair color that rare?” she blurted out, sporting a sly smile while thinking back. He did stand out in the crowd. She remembered that ginger hair as the first thing she had noticed, when she first saw him on the bridge of the Steadfast .

But at that same moment, she already felt bad for saying it. The officer closed his eyes and was audibly biting his teeth after hearing her reaction. Woops. He must’ve misinterpreted me… she realised. It seemed like reacting assertively was a way for her to cope with the stress of the situation, and maybe she shouldn’t have started smiling. It didn't seem to land well with him at all. 

On the other hand, why should she care? It’s not like he had been friendly with her. He ordered her around like she was a subordinate of him, and it was continuously besting her tolerance level towards him. She just wanted to get him out of her life as soon as possible, before one of them did or say something they might regret. 

What did she just say?

“What does my hair color have to do with this at all?”  Hux requested, annoyed. He felt his anger level rising again. “Do you even know who I am?” he added.

“No. Some officer that was shot because he was a traitor?” she casually answered, like it was nothing. She wasn’t looking him in the face, and he could only interpret this as defiance. He started fuming. Seriously? She even works in a first order alleged company and doesn’t know about me?  

“Don’t you know anything about the commanders of the first order?” he questioned with a lower voice. 

“nope, I’m not interested in politics” she replied casually, while she was inspecting her gloves, as if this conversation was of no importance.

What? Not interested in politics? How can she say that with such impudence? 

“Wh… “ he started his rhetoric, but apparently she didn't notice that he was going to reply, and she unintentionally interrupted him: “I never paid attention to those topics in the academy, it’s not like I have any say in it. And it's manipulated shit anyway. It's a former imperial academy after all. ” She crossed her arms and leaned back. “Why do you ask?” she added. 

Hux mind short circuited. “How can you know your planet’s coordinates by heart, but not know who I am?” He was baffled, and she still looked unimpressed. What’s with this girl? 

Under normal circumstances, people were either scared or cautious towards him. At least, for the last 15 years that is. This was a new experience for him and it didn't sit well.

“I’m General Armitage Hux, commander of the First Order army. I lead the training programme of the first order troopers as well as the R&D department. My research team developed technologies such as the active hyperspace tracking you just witnessed. I oversaw the construction of Starkiller base." 

He stopped right there, he wasn’t going to let her know he played a major role in the destruction of the new republic and their pitiful resistance. He needed her to believe he was worth something for the resistance, alive.  

”I was running for Grand Marshall,  becoming the most powerful person in the whole first order,  next to the supreme leader." he stated, pressing his index finger on the table to make his point. He was feeling a bit better hearing himself say those things. Especially after all that had happened these last hours.

She was still looking at him with that sceptical look. She took a breath, then paused for a second. In the meantime, that droid of her climbed back to his usual spot on her shoulder. “Should I be taken aback or just be disgusted?” she replied, crossing her arms. 

What?  

“Either way, do you know what they were planning to do with me?” she interrupted, trying to change the subject. 

Hux was sitting there, not knowing what to do and not really registering her request. How can she just change the subject and react like that? She just keeps addressing me like I’m some unimportant individual that just happened to be on her way… and why ‘disgusted’ anyway? He thought. He was still watching her like he didn’t know what to do with her. 

She broke the silence: “Look, general Hux, I don’t want to have anything to do with this. I never asked to be abducted. I was bored, but not that bored. So I’m going to drop you off at Utapau Four and point you to my connection. From then on, I’m going back to my boring life and you can do whatever the shit you want to.”

This girl is unbelievable, he inwardly sighed.   

“You do realize that you can’t just go back to your old life. The First Order just picked you up from there.” he said with a low voice. She replied angrily: “You mean they abducted me. They stunned me for fuck sake!” 

Why is she always swearing? He was starting to get seriously annoyed yet again. This girl is really going to bring out the worst of me . 

He breathed through his nose and thought back to her initial question, changing the subject back before both of them started shouting again. 

“From what I can deduce, they were testing if you were force sensitive. I have no intel on who requested this test and why it was carried out.” 

Actually, wasn’t he going to keep quiet about this? Again an example on how she's somehow indirectly messing with me , he realized. He cursed inwardly. Why couldn’t he be more of his manipulative self?

Miko responded: “Me? Force sensitive? What a joke! I should at least know by myself, then, right?” she said with a laughing voice. She was now leaning backwards even more, making him wonder if she was going to slide off from the seat soon and fall on the deck. That would teach her from behaving so... uncivilized , he amusingly thought. 

Hux wanted to call her out on her demeanor, just to get all the frustrations out of his system, but he refrained himself from doing so.

“Was a blood monster taken from you recently?” He asked instead.  

The girl looked at her droid, which looked back in return, as if the thing would know better. “Not very recently, a few years ago. It’s standard procedure to see if we don’t get polluted by the iridium.” she mentioned. 

“It’s feasible that those results were picked up by someone within the order.” Hux reasoned. He knew he had approved an order to build an automatic system to upload and interpret blood samples before. About 13 years ago, he himself had the directive to exterminate any force sensitive beings he could discover within the ranks, but that was under Snoke’s reign. This reeked of something different.

 It was highly possible that this system was still operational and reused for other purposes, unbeknownst to him.

“That guy, the one that shot you, acted like he was doing a routine job," she mentioned, “to lock me up for transport, as usual”.” she added, while mimicking the allegiant general.  

Hux shivered unwillingly when hearing Pryde’s reference, sentences full of elaborate insults addressed to the other general already forming up in his head. He subdued the urge to let them all out and tried to concentrate on what really could have been happening.

Hmm… if Pryde’s involved with force users, and Ren never mentioned it in the supreme board meetings, I can assume that Ren is not aware of this with a high probability. Is this some plan from that supposedly resurrected Emperor to use these force sensitives for his own good? Or maybe just kill them to get rid of the competitors? He didn’t like the first scenario one bit. Honestly,  he'd prefer the second one much more and finally get rid of those freaks. 

But first, he had to make sure this particular freak could be put to some good use.

He looked up again, seeing her questioning eyes directed back at him. They seemed almost yellow due to the soft light in the wardroom. They made him feel uncomfortable, as if they were piercing through his image and looking to read his mind. The fact that she was a possible force sensitive, didn’t help at all.

“I have no clue” he lied. 

This information might come in handy, but for now I need to keep her in the dark as much as possible, he mused. 

She didn’t seem to be happy with his answer, but she let it slide.

“What should I do then?” she asked him, as if he was the source of her problems. 

He hadn’t thought about her situation at all, it's not like he cared anyway. But maybe, if she was perceptive to his suggestions, there was something to gain for him as well. She did prove to be a relatively good slicer and that inventive little droid of hers was also on his radar. 

“Since the First Order might still be on the lookout for you, your best option is to disappear or try to join the resistance.” He reasoned. 

“But I can’t just leave my father and friends behind!” She half-shouted. 

“You do realise that if you stay, you’ll just be killed and probably kill them in the process” he coldly reacted. She’s not only stubborn, she’s also short sighted. This is going to be a very long trip, he thought again.   

He stood up and righted his back. 

“I’m going to retreat and take some sleep. We should discuss tactics afterwards.” he concluded. He went to his chambers and closed the door.

Some trivia!

Tagge industries: The Tagge family is a famous family throughout the whole saga (legacy and new), but I made up Henry. He's the only one with a normal name and he's probably the only moderate Tagge family member out there... he's a bit of an outcast 😂

Utapau Four: one of the 9 moons of Utapau. There are moons in canon, but I made up the whole moon's population and geography and so on.

Chapter 3 - escape from the psychopath (II)

Did he just leave me here, just like that?

Miko let out an annoyed sigh. She was exhausted, but the thrill of recent events was still raging through her body. She noticed that she had been reacting very assertively to everything, but then again, it’s not like she was ever abducted, tested upon, jumping through hyperspace and stuck on a ship. 

And accidentally saving the biggest prick in the galaxy in the process. From the grave he had dug for himself, no less.

She started wandering around the wardroom, finding out what was where, thinking which spot could serve best for taking a nap. They still had a long way ahead of them, after all. 

She found weapons, and the pantry as well. She dug through it, took something to eat and lay down on the bench. 

Her droid walked from her shoulder onto her stomach, turned around to watch her and sat down. 

At least the bench was long enough for her to lay straight. Or I am short enough, she mused. 

Back home, she was always the largest of her friends. The inhabitants of Utapau Four were shorter than the average human-like races. They originated from the Arkanian offshoot a very long time ago, bred for mining labor. Due to gravitational differences on the fourth moon of Utapau, before it was completely terraformed, their race evolved this way. She was a bit of an exception though, because of her mother’s genetic material, which was Corellian. 

She stared at the durasteel ceiling. If Utapau Four was no option for her any more, maybe she could travel to Corellia, to see where her mother grew up. Surely she could start a new life there, out of the frigging Worst Order's prying eyes.

Or maybe not. 

She didn’t know much about her mother’s past. The only memories she had, didn’t tell anything about who her mother used to be, before Miko was born. And her father was avoiding the conversation for years now.

I have to ask him one last time, before I leave. Maybe ask him about this crazy abduction as well. Some of his resistance friends might've heard something about it. It’s too suspicious. 

Kriff, am I really going to leave them?

The thought of having to say goodbye to her only family left, felt heavy on her chest. She never left the substitute planet, and maybe now, so suddenly, it was for good. This whole situation was still unreal and unsettling. 

She finally felt the fatigue taking over, having a hard time keeping her eyelids open. 

‘Hey PC, keep an eye on me while I fall asleep, will you?’ She requested her droid with a hoarse voice. The droid hummed positively as a response. She didn’t feel comfortable around that general, so she felt glad having her droid around as a bodyguard. The little droid looked up and then placed itself back on her stomach, while she slowly drifted away.

About 6 hours later.

Why is there trash on the table? Hux wondered. 

He just had given up on taking some rest, the recent incidents haunting his brain and ripping him out of his slumber again and again. 

He just did a few steps outside his cabin, and his blood pressure was already rising to the same agitated level as before he left for a break. 

He went further and opened the pantry, only to find that things were not in their initial place. 

He looked at the girl sleeping on the couch, striking lightning with his eyes. 

How could she make a mess of everything so fast? And not clean it up afterwards? He bristled and started to put everything back into place, his movements harsh. 

When he was done with the cupboard, he placed the jars on the counter to the exact spot they belonged, according to him. 

It took him quite some time, since the compartiment was slightly different from the one in his quarters on the Finalizer. But once everything was back in order, he felt his calm returning. 

If she ever does that again… he started thinking, clenching his hands tight. Stars, why was he so easily provoked?

Right at that moment, he heard giggling from behind his back. He turned around, only to find Miko silently chuckling. Her hair was even messier than before and her eyes were still foggy from napping. Combined with her snickering sounds, it made her look like she was drunk or high. Her little droid was nowhere to be seen. 

He turned his head down and closed his eyes for a minute. 

“Are you mocking me?” he asked with a dangerously low voice. 

“How can you focus on something like that? Aren’t you like - a general - busy with much more important things than how your stuff is put?” she said, obviously finding the whole situation funny, although there was a certain sharp edge to her words. 

Did she just taunt me even more? 

Insolent brat, he thought.

Anger started boiling up again quickly, since he hadn’t entirely calmed down from their encounter before. The girl seemed to cope with stress in a very annoying way. Or maybe she's always like that, he wondered in disdain. 

I should definitely get rid of her as soon as possible, he decided. The fact that she took a ration unbeknownst to him and moreover without permission, wasn’t working in her favor either. 

“Shouldn’t you focus on our escape plan or something, instead of combing your hair?” she added, letting out a snicker and rolling her eyes. 

He did wash up and combed his hair like he usually does when he starts the day cycle. It’s part of my status as an officer in a leading position, how could she just laugh that away?  

He started fuming. He had already realised he couldn’t treat her like a subordinate; his usual set of verbal threats were useless against her. And for a fraction of time, he didn’t know how to handle her. 

The idea only added fuel to the fire.

He suddenly hit both fists on the table before her, too enraged to be surprised by his own reaction. “Do not mock me! You shouldn’t stick your rude nose in someone else’s business!” he shouted, losing his cool but barely even noticing it. If she was a subordinate of him, or any other crewmember part of his flagship, he had her locked away already. And then put her on rehabilitation duty. Let the indoctrination programme prove its success. Such misbehaviour should be dealt with accordingly. But now, he had to use other means to put her in her place. If she wanted to argue, she was going to regret this, he angrily thought.

“I’m stuck in this ship as much as you are, so it’s my business too! You need to get your priorities straight” she shouted back at him. Her facial expression shifted from laughter to rage in a mere second. Her eyes were slightly wet, as if she was on the brink of tears.

Priorities straight? Does she even know what she’s saying? He felt like he was going to explode. 

“And oh, excuse me if I disturb your unreasonable need for order! Why are you even still wearing that uncomfortable uniform, if you haven’t noticed it yet, you’re not a general any more!” she added, volume rising.  

“Shut your mouth, you’re being blatantly foolish! You can’t possibly understand this! You didn’t even have any clue why you were abducted!" he threw back at her, "You were just going to go back to your pitiful old life, like nothing happened!” 

She was going to push him over the edge, make him lose his self-control and she was going to regret it.

Miko stood up and angrily faced him. He was still leaning over the table, so they were able to look straight into each other's eyes. 

“At least I had a life! You seem like you dug a big hole for yourself, that other guy got you hard there! And all you care about now is your appearance. Wake up, there’s no one to impress here!” she ostentatiously swinged her hands around, pointing to the empty space. 

“At least I have an impeccable appearance, you look like you haven’t washed for days, and what’s with those piercings anyway? I’m surprised you’re allowed to walk around with that at Tagge’s department! If it was under my supervision, this wasn’t tolerated!” he yelled, and she immediately yelled back: “It’s what they call style, mister general! But maybe someone of your age is not aware of that!”

“Are you calling me old?” She’s really going too far now, he thought somewhere in the back of his mind, too clouded by rage. His blood kept racing through his veins and each word that came out of her mouth only increased the pressure. 

This argument made no sense at all, the insults they threw at each other were downright pathetic, but he was too far gone and too hyped on the adrenaline of the past events to think clearly.

“Yes. And pale." She added, her face getting red from keeping up the volume with his shouting. "Have you seen any sunlight in the last decade? Lucky your hair stands out a bit, otherwise you’d really be mistaken for a corpse. If we land on my moon, make sure you won’t get sunburnt!” 

Did she really mock my hair? Again? 

Hux snapped. 

He instinctively and viciously reached out to her throat with his right gloved hand. He took her neck in a tight grip, starting to strangle her. The leather of his glove was making a scratching sound from the pressure he applied, which matched his angry breathing. 

He looked down at her reddened face with furious eyes. Her amber tinted irises were starting to change size, her expression going from angry and surprised to alarmed. It gave him cold chills, which provided him with an odd sense of satisfaction, somewhere deep beneath the raging anger.

She frantically grabbed his arm with both her hands and tried to shout, but only a feeble squeak came out. 

Silencing her felt good, very very satisfying, after all the recent tension buildup. This is what she gets from driving me mad, he thought, still so angry with her behaviour towards him. He wasn't sure if and when he would let her go, he was too far gone to think clearly now. 

She started to violently shake his arm and began to writhe with her legs, trying to get some grip so she could get loose. But he was towering over her, too strong and too enraged. 

She was harshly pressed against the backrest of the bench, Hux had stepped aside to discard the table and was now leaning over her. There was no escape from his pressing hand, and he could feel her throat moving, trying to swallow or maybe gag as a reflex to get her airtube clear.

His rough anger turned into a smoldering rage when the fire from her eyes was starting to fade and was turning into a desperate plea. Her leg movement slowed down until they fell limp. He could see her lips moving, begging for her release, but no sound came out. 

And then he felt something else than anger surging through his body. At this very moment he felt in total control. Oh, he missed that feeling. He took in the sensation like an addict finally experiencing the long-denied rush again. He could do literally anything to her, the way she crumbled under his grip. Anything. And the lower part of his body started thinking about doing something to her.

PC came out of nowhere. The tiny droid quickly jumped on his outstretched arm, instantly threatening Hux to give him a power surge.

Hux looked down to the suddenly menacing droid and snapped out of his trance. He abruptly loosened his grip, violently shook the droid from his arm, looked back at Miko with a bewildered look and stumbled back unceremoniously. 

The girl lay scrambled on the bench, touching her violated throat and heaving heavily to catch her breath. She turned to face him with squinted eyes.

Their gaze locked and instantly Hux was hit by a wave of cold sweat, the intensity of the amber made him breathe erratically. 

After a slight hesitation, he quickly turned around and stomped back to his cabin. He shut the door the second he entered. 

What the hell was that? He hastily wondered, trying to control his raging heartbeat. He rubbed his face, removing the sweat from his forehead.

He looked down. This has never happened before. He has always been in control of himself, he never lost his cool like this. He was the one who could drive another person insane, this was the first time it was the other way around. Well, at least after his father was removed. 

And in what way… What had just happened to him? I was always stronger than this. Was I going to murder her, out of rage, or… rape her?

He made sure the door was locked, took a glass of water and drank it down in one shot. He needed to stay inside, cool down, think about this incident and what to do next. 

I need a cold shower.

Chapter 4 - delicious disaster (I)

Miko coughed violently to catch her stolen breath. Her whole body was still shaking from the shock. She hadn't seen that outburst coming, but maybe she was too angered with his delusions of grandeur and stupid misplaced pride that were based on nothing but lies and evil deeds. She was so stressed and angered at him for leaving her out in the dark, it had clouded her mind. She hated how he was nitpicking on stupid details, as if this situation wasn't already hard enough for both of them. But, maybe if she thought this through, she should've known he was a psychopathic maniac. 

She never cared much for physical strength before, never needed it in particular because she was the tallest one at home anyway. Although Utapau Four was under First Order rule, Tagge's influence on the planet made sure she lived in a rather protected bubble. Consequently, she absolutely wasn't prepared for any kind of attack like this. 

She felt lucky she programmed her droid well.

She gently rubbed her sore throat. She could feel where the leather had left its marks. It already started stinging more, the moment she grazed her skin. This was going to bruise ugly.

She gulped. She decided she had to be extra careful with this man. He was definitely more dangerous than she anticipated. Maybe she should look into the armory again, to arm herself with something, anything, just in case. Not that she was able to shoot, but that won't matter if he came close to her. She hoped she wouldn’t hesitate too much.

Miko thought back to the moment he lunged at her and slowly started to feel confused. Something was bothering her, other than the fact that he tried to strangle her to death. His eyes went from pure rage to something else. When PC jumped on his arm, it was like he snapped out of some trance. When he did, he looked bewildered, confused, vulnerable?

But what bothered - scared - her even more, was that short moment before he let go of her neck. His grey-green eyes looked dark, glassy, and simmering hot. 

Kriff. What am I thinking? 

The cold water of the refresher was slowly calming Hux down. He tried to ignore what happened, but he knew the moment he was going to step out of his quarters, the situation was going to be very awkward. He should try to collect his messed up thoughts. 

That outburst reminded him too much about Ren, and he didn't like it one bit. This wasn't him, he should be above this. He has always been a master in self-control, since he's been in charge, up until now. 

And then, there was that other sensation he experienced, slowly creeping up on the skin of his back, giving him hot chills. 

He could feel his groin get itchy again, and turned the knob of the refresher to make the water even colder.

His mind involuntarily started drifting to the past. He hadn’t felt like this for a very long time. It’s not like he was immune to the hormonal reactions of his body, but getting the chance to actually profit from a situation and get his physical needs satisfied… that was another thing. 

There had been a few people he met when networking, trying to get to his money or get access to intel. He wasn’t stupid to give in to their feeble attempts. Fellow officers or even cadets had been trying to use him to get higher up in ranks. He disapproved of this behaviour, finding it utterly pathetic. Climbing up in the ranks and assuming a higher position should be done by knowledge, wits and politics. And, if necessary, by manipulation, but only if done well. Bribery in any form was something he had used as a tactic before, but never to get higher up. It always concurs with a significant backlash. There were always loose ends. 

Apart from that, he never was keen on the thought of having sex with a colleague itself, reminding him too much about what had happened in the past. A bed partner could’ve asked troublesome questions he rather wouldn’t like to answer. He unintentionally rubbed his stomach.

There had been a few times when he thought about getting his way though, unsurprisingly with people that were not part of the First Order. An escort on a diplomatic mission. The citizen that would've given him all, just to stop the military operation. That one feisty prisoner who had no respect for him. 

It seems he wanted to be the one choosing who he wanted to use, not being used himself. He was done with that. 

But eventually the situation never really lended itself for it. Although he made it to general, there was always someone above or beside him he had to report to. And his ambition and the future of the First Order were always a higher priority. 

But right now… he was alone, with a girl, all innocent and naive, on his ship, slowly travelling to possible hostile territory and they only had a few cards to play. He knew there was a significant chance that he wouldn’t survive much longer than a couple of days. 

And… she actually didn’t look that bad, he admitted to himself. She angered him utterly, but apparently that awoke an unexpected gnawing feeling in him. A kind of itch that needs to be stilled, or it would haunt him for the rest of his days. A sensation he tried to hide away for so long, but suddenly had broken free. 

The way her eyes shined like a blazing fire when she was mad at him or enthusiastic about who knows what, automatically popped into his mind. They were as strong as her idiotic will, passionate but also chaotic. All things he should despise, things he always despised in people, but, he didn’t want to admit it, they looked so attractive right now, like something he’s been missing for eternity. He wanted to get a taste of it. 

She was like a fire he wanted to contain just enough not to get it extinguished. 

Oh, and those hips. He suddenly remembered the way she stood in the cockpit, bending over the controls of the ship and checking out the issue on the navigation panel. He didn't feel how his fingernails were leaving marks in his palms.

He was completely lost in these disturbing thoughts, the cold recycled water still slowly streaming over his body. 

This was absolutely not the way he was supposed to be thinking to calm down.

Can I force myself onto her? He wondered. This might be my last chance to get this nonsensical physical need satisfied, without any consequences. There’s no career that I need to uphold this time. I could do whatever I want to her. 

He rubbed his face again, as if that would help him to start thinking straight. 

But is it a wise thing to do? Can I still manipulate her into helping me out on that moon of hers? It was her father she wanted to contact, if I recall correctly? 

Hux stared at the wall of the shower cabin for a few seconds. If that man knows his daughter well, he’ll most likely know something is up. 

He sighed and looked down, the water dripping from his hair, following the indents of his cheekbone, down to his chin then leaving his skin to fall to the sink. 

The risk was too big, and he was feeling like a coward again. But in the back of his mind, he was not sure if he could bring himself to not doing anything. 

He at least had to try, for his own sake, he wanted to convince himself.

Miko decided to camp in the cockpit’s seat. She had taken a blaster from the armory and had positioned it on top of her legs. PC placed himself next to the blaster. She was staring at the stars flashing by. Only a day ago, she loved the view, but now she felt a bit claustrophobic. There was nowhere she could go and hide from that asshole, the cold durasteel hull of the ship was now her confinement. She was disgusted by the First Order general’s assault, even if she probably provoked him. 

She was even more disgusted by what she thought afterwards, but she tried to ignore that particular train of thoughts, not wanting to go there again. 

He still lashed out at her like it was nothing, so he absolutely wasn’t to be trusted. She wouldn’t let him corner her again. She has always been in charge of her own persona and freedom, so in no way she was going to let him come close without her consent.

Am I ever going to grant him that? She couldn't help but wonder. 

Her head absolutely said no, but there was something nagging in the back of her mind. She never met a man like him. A kriffing self centered, merciless, fragging vain asshole, a breathing example of the Worst Order and every norm she despises. But when talking or shouting at him, she felt alive. It was good to get rid of the frustrations of the previous problematic events and if she was honest, in the life she led before; all of her friends back home were either too kind or too scared of her. This man was a challenge, and it was attracting her in every bad way there could be, she secretly admitted to herself. 

But, on the other hand, this probably could've happened with anyone she met outside of her home planet, she realised that much. The things that have occured the previous day, the adrenaline rush, and being locked up in the same cramped space together, probably have been influencing her, too. And then again, she never really met anyone taller than she was, which didn’t help either, but wasn't a particular reason to take an interest in him.

She knew she should stop thinking about things that never should happen anyway, and focus on what was coming ahead. 

What was she going to do? 

She stared into the stars, trying to collect her thoughts, but hopelessly failing.

[duhragonball]

Jaco the Galactic Patrolman Ch.1-5

After the premiere of Battle of Gods, and the crossover appearance of DBZ characters in Toriko and One Piece, Akira Toriyama published a new manga, entitled Jaco the Galactic Patrolman.  The series ran in Weekly Shonen Jump from July to October 2013.

It’s weird, because 2013 wasn’t even that long ago, but it feels like a different era to me, at least in terms of how I consumed anime and manga.  At the time, I was interested in the new Jaco series, but I was also resigned to the fact that it would be years before I could read it.  As it was, I managed to snag a fansub of the Battle of Gods movie around that time, as the DVD was released in Japan in late ‘13, but the movie wouldn’t reach the U.S. until the following year.

Since then, new Dragon Ball movies have premiered in the U.S. within months of the Japanese release, and the delay seems to get shorter each time.  A lot of new anime, including Dragon Ball Super, has been simulcast on Japanese television and Crunchyroll. 

Also, scanlations for new manga seem to be a lot easier to find than they used to be.  I read all of Jojolion through a website dedicated to providing translations of current manga titles, and the only reason I’m not reading JoJoLands right now is because I wanted to wait a while and let a few chapters build up before I start. 

The idea that I would have to wait for a proper English language version of a new release had become so alien to me that it seemed genuinely frustrating that Stone Ocean was exclusive to Netflix, and we all had to wait for episodes to be debuted in batches across 2022.  But back in the early 2000′s, that’s how it was for everything.

Anyway, I wasn’t too concerned with Jaco as a character, but then he showed up in Resurrection F, and like, a bunch of episode of Dragon Ball Super, so I kind of felt like I had missed out on something.  But I never felt too motivated to sit down and read this thing, even after it became available in English.  But that’s what the 2023 Dragon Ball Apocrypha Liveblog is for, folks.  I made a list of all the stuff I hadn’t gotten around to checking out, and now I’m finally getting to it. 

Chapter 1. Jaco is on his way to Earth for a mission, when he accidentally collides with the moon and damages his ship.  He crashes in the ocean, and has to carry his ship ashore onto an island.  There, he meets the island’s sole inhabitant, Professor Tokunoshin Omori, who gives him food and shelter while he tries to repair Jaco’s ship.

Over the course of the story, Jaco tosses out tidbits of outer space lore.  For example, he knows all about Earth because the Galactic Patrol has sent robots disguised as insects to gather information.  Jaco learned all Earth languages thanks to a technology that uploads the information into his brain.  Why doesn’t he possess the knowledge to fix his own spaceship?  Because he skipped that lesson.

Omori is a scientist, and back in the day the island was a government research facility working on developing a time machine.  Then one day there was a terrible accident which killed Omori’s wife.  After the government pulled up stakes, he stayed behind, living in isolation near his wife’s grave.   He asks Jaco if they have time machines in space, and Jaco says there’s no such thing, because it’s extremely dangerous to manipulate time, and so it’s expressly forbidden in intergalactic law.  

Omori mostly wants Jaco out of his hair, because he’s a misanthrope who prefers living alone. He still cares, though, and the only reason he didn’t take his boat out to rescue Jaco was because of a monstrous shark that terrorizes the surrounding waters after sunset.  But the shark gave Jaco no trouble at all when he splashed down, and later he goes back out to kill it to repay Omori’s hospitality. 

Throughout this chapter, there’s news coverage of an Earthling rocket launch called Twinkle 8, and there’s going to be a pop idol on board.  Omori finds the entire thing to be crass and absurd, just like everything else about humanity. 

Omori’s attitude leads Jaco to question the purpose of his mission.  He was sent to Earth to intercept an alien invader, but since Omori has such a low opinion of his own kind, then maybe the Earth isn’t worth saving after all. 

Fortunately, Jaco has a device which will eradicate all intelligent life from the planet.  When activated, it will release a deadly virus.  I like how Omori’s bitterness turns to dread here.  It was easy for him to complain about the world around him, because he never dreamed he would meet someone capable of destroying it without a second thought. 

Each chapter ends with a character profile.  I won’t show them all, but I’m mostly interested in this one because it has Jaco’s full name. 

Chapter 2.  Omori takes a look at Jaco’s ship, and they continue to talk.  He’s surprised by Jaco’s strength, considering his small size, and Jaco defensively says he’s the third tallest of the 38 Galactic Patrollers.  How can they maintain peace in the galaxy with only 38 Patrollers?  Jaco says there aren’t a lot of planets with intelligent life. 

Then a ship arrives on the island.  Jaco spot it from very far away, and he moves out of sight when its passengers disembark to speak with Omori, but he still hears their entire conversation, because Jaco has super-hearing too. 

Basically, they’re from the government, and they want Omori to leave the island, so they can turn it into a resort or something.  Omori is just squatting here, so he has no legal claim to the place.  He pleads with them to reconsider, reminding him that his wife’s grave is here, but they won’t listen.  Jaco waits for the ship to leave before coming out of hiding.  He extends his sympathies...

But he also tells Omori that he spotted an experimental time machine in a secluded spot on the island.  Omori admits that he’s been working on it ever since the accident.  His goal is to use the machine to save his wife and assistants from the accident that killed them.  But he says it doesn’t work.  The best it can do is slow the passage of time to a near-standstill, and it only works for one person.  Jaco decides he can let that slide.

He also throws a rock at the departing ship, and the chapter ends with the people on board using a life raft, since Jaco’s throw was powerful enough to sink the ship.

Chapter 3.  Jaco continues to insist that he is a Super Elite, because the Galactic Patrol is a small organization under the direct supervision of the Galactic King.  Jaco was one of nine people to apply for a spot on the team, and he was also one of the five people chosen.  Omori isn’t very impressed.

I guess that sums up the flavor of humor with Jaco.  He’s got all these super powers and advanced technology, and Omori is sort of impressed, but not as much as you would expect.  Jaco’s got all the resources of an advanced civilization, but he still flew his ship into the moon and he blew off the lesson on spaceship repair.  It’s impossible to tell if the Galactic Patrol should be taken seriously or not.

Omori has now studied Jaco’s ship long enough that he thinks he understands the general principle of its operation, and it all depends upon this unknown substance in the engine.  A laser is supposed to hit it, which produces enough power to fly the ship, but it was damaged in the crash, and it will have to be replaced.  So Omori first has to identify the material and then find out if there’s any of it on Earth.  So while Jaco waits, he watches more media coverage of the upcoming Twinkle 8 launch.  This feels kind of important, although it’s unclear how this could possibly matter to anything. 

Finally, Omori discovers that the unknown material in Jaco’s ship is available on Earth.  The problem is that it’s called “Sky Gold,” a precious metal that costs 76 million yen for the amount needed to resupply Jaco’s ship. 

I like how Jaco’s first reaction to this news is that he’ll have to do part-time jobs to earn the money, like that’s going to be the setup for the true premise of this comic.  I mean, it could have been.  I could see that being a hit.  But Omori’s like “What the hell are you talking about?” 

Anyway, the good news is that Jaco only needs about 19 million yen’s worth of Sky Gold to make it back to his headquarters.  Oh, right, I should point out that his communications systems were also damaged in the crash, so he can’t send out a distress signal. 

Chapter 4.  Jaco and Omori don’t know what to do about the Sky Gold problem, but in the meantime, Omori needs to sail to the mainland to buy more food.  Jaco can only eat milk and cheese, and he just drank the last of the milk, so he’ll need more.  Jaco expresses an interest in the city, so Omori reluctantly agrees to bring him along.

The problem is that Jaco keeps making a spectacle of himself whenever he sees a crime in the city. 

Omori buys some peanuts and Jaco remarks that in his culture, “peanut” is a word they use for a woman’s left buttock.  Omori is intrigued that Jaco’s species has women, and asks if Jaco has a love interest.  Jaco does not, because he’s a colossal dork. 

Chapter 5: While Omori is buying dairy products for Jaco, Jaco wanders off and notices another crime in progress.  This time he sees a bunch of jerks pushing around a teenage girl.  I don’t know if they’re a gang or what, but I like the whole theme of them being dressed up like different soldiers.  The one guy’s got Roman soldier gear, and there’s a Medieval knight with a gun and some sort of samurai, I guess. 

A lot of folks in East City are dressed in weird costumes like this.  It seems to be part of the local culture, and I guess that might explain why Tights looks like some sort of hippie.

So Jaco sees this happening and he leaps to the rescue.

Seriously, I just really dig all these costumes.  See, this is what sets Toriyama apart from all the wannabes.  You or I could go “Uhhh, how about a Super Saiyan 5!  Or maybe Frieza and Cooler fuse and become Coolza!”  Meanwhile, Toriyama actually comes up with genuinely new ideas. 

I mean, the action in this story is pretty similar to that of his other works, but it’s a completely fresh direction.  Jaco is super-strong like Arale and Goku, but he’s an alien who needs to keep a low profile, and his commitment to justice overrides his better judgement.   

 So now Omori is horrified, because this time Jaco’s attracted more attention than they can possibly avoid, and they have to hide from the authorities.  But just as they worry about what to do next, Tights offers to help...

So this is off to a promising start. The stakes are a lot lower than what we see in Dragon Ball, but it’s nice to read a smaller, slower story.   The first three chapters are kind of dull, but a nice, relaxing dull that you don’t mind at all. 

So far, Professor Omori is what makes this for me.  I like his bitter attitude, and how he uses it to mask his obvious grief.  And I think I’d like Tights too, but we really haven’t gotten to know her yet, so I’ll reserve judgement until next time. 

[graaythekwami]

Yo, whats up? I know this is probably not the right place for me to be doing this, but technically there's a question at the end, so yeah? I just get whipped in the middle of night and wrote an alternate version of Sonhador that I realized fit the context in Crimson And Noire a lot and ended up changing it a bit. So welp... Enjoy and say what you think if you want! :3 (ps: english is not my native language so forgive me if it's weird)

She staggered through the darkened corridors of Françoise Dupont just in time to see the purple glitter flecked with gold pass across the walls and roofs, and Marinette wondered the akuma had a target in mind by the way he seemed to be plaguing specific places in the city. Her skin tingled slightly as she touched the cool metal of the science classroom's door, hoping that the shard of some broken vial would be enough to rip through the akumatized pad when she gained an opening to transform.

However, as soon as Marinette entered the classroom she was immediately greeted by total darkness, not even allowing her to see the classroom's large windows to get a general sense of where the akuma was going, so be able to see where was the pantry with empty vials was cleary out of the question.

"Marinette!" A voice that sounded eerily like Kagami's roared behind her, but the bluenette only managed a brief glimpse of her silhouette running towards her before the classroom door was slammed shut by a hand.

"Well well, if it isn't Marinette Dumb-Cheng~" The girl nearly jumped out of her body upon hearing the familiar disdainful voice being directed at her, turning around to find Chloe staring at her with a characteristic smug smile.

"C-Chloe? What... what are you doing here?" Marinette stuttered taking a few steps back, one hand touching a wall so she wouldn't get lost in the absolute blackness that was the room. Though Chloe's figure stood out in the dark like a sore thumb.

"Ugh, do you always have to be so slow?" The blonde rolled her eyes, flipping her hair over the shoulder. "We're hiding from the akuma, duh! And because of you my precious adrikins got caught by it!"

"Wh-What?" She swallowed hard, before replaying what Chloe had said in her head one more time. "And what do you mean we-

"Hey guys! It's Mari-Woe! We can use her as bait for the akuma and escape from school!" Marinette squealed as Kim seemingly popped out of the ground behind her, along with him also Alix, Juleka, Ivan, Nathaniel-

Fuck all her classmates were there.

"The odds of this tactic working are exactly 87.3%, a great number I would say." Max commented by doing something on the calculator in his hands, before lifting his head to look directly at her through the thick frames of his glasses. "After all, you are already used to being the sidekick, aren't you, Lady Noire?"

Marinette felt her stomach drop. "G-Guys, this isn't- Ouch!" She hissed in pain as her knee collided with what sounded like a chair from the noise, but that and everything else was quickly forgotten as she opened her eyes once more.

Because Alya and Kagami were in front of her.

Alya looked terrified of something. Kagami disappointed.

"That was a waste of time." The fencer said in a tone that left no room for argument, turning on her heels to disappear into the darkness without flinching.

Trying to swallow the lump forming inside her throat, the bluenette held out her hand with her girlfriend's name on the tip of the tongue, ready to scream, beg her to stay.

She felt her blood run cold as she saw the silver gleam from her fingertips.

"... Why?" Alya finally whispered, slowly backing away and just like Kagami starting to fade into the darkness. "We... We trusted you! I trusted you! Why out of so many people did you have to be this... thing?"

Gritting her teeth, Lady Noire Marinette lunged forward in an attempt to stop Alya from running away from her, not again- "I am not a thing! I'm not-

The words died in her mouth when she touched the journalist's wrist.

Her claws dug easily into the skin in sickly growing shades of gray, and Marinette felt out of her own body as she watched Alya stare in horror, her body slowly dissolving into ash that disappeared into the darkness like an afterthought, just like that damn stadium, that damn building, that-

Marinette fell to her knees when she found herself alone once more. The girl thought she heard someone calling her name in the distance, or maybe it was just a projection of her head. It was difficult to register or distinguish what was going on around her as the voices seemed to get louder and louder and louder and-

"Freak!"

"I don't…" She gasped, her lungs couldn't seem able to pull in enough air to keep her awake, so why should she insist on keeping trying-

"Monster!"

"I didn't mean it..."

"Useless!"

"Stop..."

"Gross!"

"Stop this-

"Failure!"

"STOP IT-

And everyone died, the end :3

Someone give Marinette hugs!! The poor girl deserves all of them!!

Seeing as the Sandboy chapter is one of the chapters I'm really looking forward to writing, it is really cool to see your take on Marinette's nightmare! Very sad, but written so well. Her hero life and civilian life colliding in such a way would truly be a nightmare. :( Hopefully someone saves her from this soon.

[ideas-on-paper]

Monster Hunter Tri Diary, Part 11: Exploring the Sandy Plains

For previous entries, search for #monster hunter tri diary

Disclaimer: Text is paraphrased from my localization and might slightly deviate from the English version.

Quest: Secret of the Crystal Bones

Since we're going on an expedition to a desert now, I packed 3 Cool Drinks. (3 instead of 5 because the Guild graciously supplies us with 2 Cool Drinks; once again scrounging what I can, since I don't have to buy them if I take the free ones. And if you don't use all of them, you can even stock up your own supplies a little! :-) ) In addition, I donned my leather armor again for some gathering bonuses.

I chose to eat Grainy Wheat + Cudgel Onion this time, and despite both ingredients being fresh, that apparently tasted absolutely disgusting. So now, my max health has been reduced. Eh... But hey, at least I still got Felyne Woodsman and a boost to Thunder resistance! :-)

This time, our client is an archaeologist who claims that hunters are mocking his studies about Crystal Bones, which according to him are important to learn more about "the life of old and the mysteries of today". First off, I can assure you I would never mock you - I'm the kind of person who drinks up any MH lore content I can find. I wonder what exactly he means by "the life of old" and "mysteries of today" - I think I remember from the artbooks that there are some extinct monster species (most of which are based on scrapped designs), so does he intend to study them and how they evolved? (However, bones from prehistoric animals turn into fossils, not crystal; though perhaps, the bones of the MH creatures contain some substance that causes them to turn into crystal instead?)

Still, I wonder where this "hunters are dimwits" bias is coming from, given the biologist said something similar. You certainly need some brains to hunt monsters, as you can't defeat them by randomly flailing at them. (If you tried, you wouldn't survive very long.)

And here we are: The Sandy Plains! One of my favorite desert areas in the whole series, for both the soundtrack and the overall design. I just love how the first areas (1-5) are more savanna-like, and it transitions into a desert further out (8-10).

This is also where we encounter our first Veggie Elder, who kinda aimlessly wanders around in the base camp. (I wonder if he got lost?) He gives me some random stuff, including a tuna bait; I probably shouldn't overload myself before gathering anything though.

Veggie Elder, giving me the tuna bait: "Take good care of it, you hear?" Yeah, yeah, old man, I hear you! (I wonder what's so special about a tuna bait, though...)

Btw, the increased Thunder resistance actually comes with a visual effect: I've got something like a green aura surrounding my character now. Kinda cool!

Moving on to area 1, and... OH GOD, it's Rhenoplos! Yep, I certainly remember you guys. (More specifically, I remember the many times you knocked me down when I was just doing my own business.)

Rhenoplos monster info: "Extremely territorial herbivores with poor vision but accute hearing." So they're basically rhinos, I take it. (Rhinos also can't see very well, but they have excellent hearing and sense of smell.)

Note to self: Do NOT hit Rhenoplos on the head; your weapon will just bounce off. Instead, get around them and attack their rear.

LOL, the Rhenoplos ran into a rock! xD Just randomly happened after I dodged its attack; didn't even plan that. (But that's probably what their description means by "they often collide into boulders".)

Rhenoplos Scalp: "A sturdy part of the skull that yields, shall we say, dashing results?" Heh... I see what you did there! ;-)

I've never seen a Gluehopper before. I think I've seen it listed among the required materials for some equipment though, so I better hold on to it.

Gluehopper description: "This bug's expectorations make for a strong adhesive that can bond any materials." Makes sense why they would use it for crafting, then.

There are some Giggis in area 7 (I killed 3, so I only need one more for the subquest), as well as some Kelbi. (Kinda surprising that Kelbi thrive in savanna environments too.) Also, there's a fishing spot, but I’m not sure if my tuna bait is going to be very useful here. Besides, I've got more important things to do right now.

Btw, thank God you don't have to use Hot Drinks in the caves anymore; I would always forget this in MH1/Freedom Unite since it felt so unusual. xD (The 1st Gen had no snow areas, so the Hot Drinks were exclusively used in caves.)

I got some Nitroshrooms from a gathering spot as well. Definitely gonna hold onto those so I can cultivate them later, which is gonna be really handy to make Barrel Bombs/gunpowder.

Still, despite this, I don't see a single mining spot around here. Well, guess we'll have to go deeper into the cave...

And into the everlasting darkness we go - I'm definitely gonna need a torch to explore area 6 (which, thanks to my wise foresight, I forgot to take from the supply box). Still, I really want to get the extra supplies from the subquest as well, so I'll just see if I run into a Giggi while blindly stumbling through the darkness.

Alright, I did manage to kill one Giggi for the subquest, so I'm gonna get out of here and pick up the torch and some other supplies at the base camp; BRB.

Okay, so this cave is absolutely hardcore: You've got Giggi and Bnahabra near the entrance, and Melynx further inside - no matter where you go, it's absolute hell. The Melynx snatched some items from me, but thankfully, I still had a Felvine I gathered before so I didn't lose anything more valuable. One of them made off with my tuna bait, though. (So much for "taking good care of it". xD)

Finally I managed to find some mining spots where I could get my Crystal Bones - I was beginning to believe I might actually fail the quest. xD And you bet I'm not gonna go anywhere near the Melynx right now - I'm not losing my quest items right after getting my hands on them.

Since I have time left to gather some other stuff now, I went back to where I entered the cave and picked up some Choice Mushrooms. They’re not worth that much money, but a penny saved is a penny earned.

As always when you explore a new area in Monster Hunter, there is so much stuff to gather, and so little inventory space... I'm gonna skip the gathering spots in area 5 since they don't have any interesting items and move on to area 9.

What the--?! Just when I was peacefully gathering some Cactus Flowers, a swarm of nasty Delex attacked me. Why can't you troublemakers just pass by and be on your way? I've done nothing to you!

You know, viewed from afar, the Delex look like dolphins in a sea of sand. They move exactly like dolphins do, leaping out of the sand as if it was water! (I gotta say, I love the design concept Capcom has going on here: On one hand, we have the actual ocean in Moga, and on the other, an ocean of sand in Loc Lac. Awesome!)

I followed the Altaroth in area 8 to the gathering spot, getting some Might Seeds from their shinies (which is nice since Might Seeds are kinda expensive to cultivate). Also got some more Waterblock Seeds and Monster Fluid from them.

The gathering spot where the Altaroth go also yields Fire Herbs. So now, I can cultivate both ingredients needed for gunpowder!

The monster info for the Delex says they retreat if other Delex are killed. Thought I would try this out in area 10, but nope - despite killing one of them, they continue to annoy me the same as before. You know what? I'm just gonna leave these bullies to themselves.

I gathered all of my courage together and jumped down the bottomless chasm leading into area 11 (pretending I didn’t know there was no fall damage in MH). Found some additional mining spots there to get some more Crystal Bones from. I technically don’t need them for the quest, but they are gonna be good for extra cash! :-)

Was the connection to area 7 a one-way route in 3U as well? I can't precisely remember, but I don't think so. (Maybe they changed that to make it less of a hassle to get to area 11.)

Anyway, back to the base camp we go. Just before I left, I grabbed a Cool Drink for the one I used from the box as well as an Old Pickaxe. As I said: Scrounge anything you can. ;-)

Quest: No guts, no glory

I actually threw my whetstones out to have some more inventory space. Also, I exchanged my Cool Drinks for Hot Drinks, since we're going out into the desert at nighttime now.

As a dish, I picked a Plumpkin + Drybutter (both fresh). That apparently tasted boring, but at least I got Felyne Woodsman.

Btw, I love how the English quest name is essentially a proverb taken literally. xD

Our client is a caravan leader explaining to us that Delex attacking in packs are devious (yep, can confirm that one), but their guts make for good field rations. So I guess the guy got stuck somewhere near the Sandy Plains and now wants me to help him out by killing the Delex pestering his caravan as well as restocking his supplies. Fair enough, I suppose.

The quest description also contains a great example of a MH universe-specific idiom: If I remember correctly, the Caravaneer once said "what the Diablos?" instead of "what the devil/hell?" in MH4U (implying that a Diablos is these people's equivalent of the devil, which is… understandable xD); in a similar spirit, the caravan leader says slaying the Delex is like "killing two Vespoids with one stone". It might just be my localization though since he literally uses the phrase "kill two Vespoids with one swatter" (derived from "kill two flies with one swatter", meaning the same thing as killing two birds with one stone), which makes it funnier since, y'know, Vespoids are overgrown insects. xD Still, really cool if the translators are adding this kind of flavor for each individual language!

I left the Cool Drinks and Paintballs in the box for now (I won't need Cool Drinks at night, and there are no big monsters around), but I plan to pick them up once I get back to deliver the items for the quest.

What I did take, however, were the Sonic Bombs from the supply. If only I could stash them away for later... (You can't buy them and need Screamer Sacs to combine them, which you don't have much of this early on, so they're quite valuable.) However, killing Cephalos without Sonic Bombs was already enough of a hassle in MH1, and Delex are way more nimble and harder to catch, so I'm probably going to put those to their intended use.

On my way through area 4, I picked some stuff from the mining spots, including a Golden Bone. Going by the description, it's literally a bone made of gold. I mean, bones made of crystal are already wild enough, but bones made of solid gold? How the hell did those come into existence? (The best explanation I can come up with is that they're from some kind of ore/metal ingesting monster; Lao-Shan Lung, for instance, is said to feed on ore, and depending on the region where it lives, its scales can be colored differently, caused by the concentration of minerals and other substances in the rocks. So maybe for some ore-eating monsters, the ingested metal is deposited in the bones rather than the scales.)

Moving on to area 9, and I definitely wasn't wrong: The Delex are way harder to hit than Cephalos (especially if you're using a Great Sword).

To make matters even more difficult, Monster Guts seem to be a quite rare carve from Delex - at least it feels like that after I got 5 Sharpened Fangs and exactly 1 Monster Guts from 6 Delex.

So the Delex do leave the area after all if you slay their buddies - however, you have to kill a few for them to get frightened. Looks like they're leaving for area 10 right now, so let's go after them.

I threw my second (and last) Sonic Bomb juuust right to get 10 Delex out of the sand at once! xD Wohoo! (However, I only managed to kill one, since they were pretty quick to get back into the sand.)

We've got that subquest in the bag, but I’ll definitely need to kill more than just 8 Delex for 3 Monster Guts. Can you please give me my Monster Guts already?

Just when I finally got the third Monster Guts, the Delex decide to leave once again. Phew... I actually thought I might run out of whetstones, since I solely had to rely on the two mini whetstones from the box; I would've been pretty screwed if this went on for longer. ^^' Still, everything worked out fine in the end; let's gather some extra stuff for cash and then get out of here.

At night, area 11 is unusually deserted - like, there aren't any monsters there, not even a single Jaggi. Okay, then - makes it easier for me to mine some Crystal Bones. I'm gonna go back to the base camp real quick to gather some more in area 6 as well.

I finally found out how you can gather while holding a torch! What you have to do is NOT select the pickaxe/bugnet from the item menu; at spots where the icon pops up, you simply have to press the gather button and hold R (with the Classic Pro Controller at least).

Ugh, of course the Melynx are still there... You know what, I'm gonna leave area 6, go all the way around to area 5, and then enter area 6 from the other side so they don't spot me.

And I got a new item from one of the mining spots: Icethaw Pellets! Yet another one of those elemental berries. (Though I wonder what they're doing inside a rock formation; are those even still edible?)

Got my first Ice Crystals as well! These caves have to be pretty cool for them to not melt, though. (I have a feeling Capcom might have planned that you have to use Hot Drinks in the caves like in the older games, but they decided against it; in that case, thank you, Capcom - thank you from the bottom of my heart!)

Snuck up on that one mining spot near the Melynx reeeally carefully, filched the last few items right under their nose, and then bolted off. Wouldn't want the Melynx to get any ideas about snatching our hard-earned Monster Guts, would we?

Back to the base camp we go, and as I said, I grabbed myself some free Cool Drinks and Paintballs from the box. Take what you can while you can! ;-)

Village Talk

Item seller: "I love Sonic Bombs. Sometimes I throw them just to listen to them." Oookay... The item lady has some weird preferences, I suppose. (Where did she get the Sonic Bombs, though? They're certainly not for sale in her shop. Do you love them so much that you don't wanna sell them to me?!)

"When I throw stones, I also want to throw iron or machalite ore. Weird..." Maybe that's because all share the same icon? xD

"Sometimes, there are monster bones that are too big for S and too small for M. So many objects, so few adjectives…" So whether a bone belongs to the "S" or "M" category is determined by some kind of common measurements, I take it? (Seems like the tolerance limit is a topic of debate, though. xD)

In today's episode of MH food lore, we learn that Salty Milk was created by a careless servant who added salt to milk instead of sugar, which ended up tasting surprisingly well. Lucky for the servant, I suppose. xD

The Wandering Cook is a big fan of Mosswine meat (confirming my suspicion that Moss Pork comes indeed from the Mosswine). He says it's delicious, especially the feet, which taste best with bean puree according to him. He does note, however, that you have to give it a good wash so you don't end up with more moss than meat. Well, I guess it's called "Mosswine" for a reason. xD

The cook describes the Twinshroom as a "strange mushroom" growing in pairs; both are identical in color and shape, impossible to tell apart and inseparable. So, they're not just Twinshrooms, they're conjoined Twinshrooms.

Also, we finally learn what an Escargogo is: It's an "unusual snail" that spins inside its shell for its whole life, so "the world is practically spinning around it!" (I wonder if "You Spin Me Round" is playing on a loop inside there. xD) Given it's classified as seafood, I assume it's a sea snail, and the name seems to be derived from "escargot", the French word for snail. (Also, Escargogo is the title of a French children's book, apparently? xD)

According to the description of the Rhenoplos armor pieces, it's commonly used in mining and resource prospecting (primarily ore and water). So I guess it's just the workwear of miners from the MH universe. (I can't imagine it's very comfortable to wear that all day though. xD)

Also, I get the impression it's primarily used by workers from Loc Lac, since the description of the greaves says it's "often used to mine resources for city development". ("City" being synonymous with Loc Lac in Tri.) Would make sense, since Rhenoplos are a local species and the materials thus easy to come by.

Oh no, the terrible pun disease is spreading further! While arguing that bowguns are both handy and elegant, the Outfitter used an idiom literally meaning that they're not a "shot in the oven" (the English equivalent of which would be "a lead balloon"). I'm not sure what she says in English here, but it did make me chuckle. xD

I've sent the fleet out to hunt for the first time now. If I remember correctly, it's really just a way to farm materials from smaller monsters so you don't have to bother to do it yourself all the time, but let's see what they bring back.

Guild Sweetheart: "Are you enjoying yourself? I was super busy around here. Manicure, napping... I even carried the piglet from the farm into the village. We played the whole day! Then manicure again." Yep, relaxing effectively is a super though job. I can imagine you needed another manicure after playing all day with the Poogie though... xD

Alright, so now that we're done with the Sandy Plains quests, I'm going to do some free hunting in the Moga Woods next. (Conveniently, we've got a Ludroth breeding in the north and a herbivore breeding in the south, so I can get both some extra paddles and the Super-sized Dung I need.) See ya then! :-)

To be continued

[innerthoughtsmonologue]

"Before we collide" WIP

Does this count as a #WIP ?

[storiesbyrhi]

Can I get a quick little eddie drabble? Something with metallica in it? Pls and thank you.

Hello friend. Here's a very small thing for you. I have a vague idea for part two if you (or anyone else) want it?

No warnings. Just vibes.

Drabble 002 (part 1) 576 words

Eddie Munson was a lot of things to a lot of people. Luckily, you didn’t care too much about what other people thought. And while you knew he was smart and totally wanted him to graduate, you were kind of happy to see him back in the hallways of Hawkins High for another yet. It meant you would finally share classes. Senior year, baby.

The next thing to do was to, you know, talk to him. That was turning out to be a much more difficult task than any of the work assigned in class. Opportunities were abundant but backbone, not so much. Eddie was just so goddamn pretty and anytime you tried to say anything to him you lost yourself in his stupid puppy dog eyes.

None of it was very metal of you. And that’s the thing… you were kind of metal. You listened to the same bands as Eddie. You worshipped at the alter of Ronnie James Dio, just like he did. It was in your blood, and when Eddie glanced over at you one afternoon and he saw the sketch in the margins of your English book, he learned that about you.

The sketch was the other Eddie, the one who represented Iron Maiden. Your version was wearing the dumb sailors uniform the dweebs at Scoops Ahoy wore but was otherwise still his zombie-esque self. The usual Eddie, the one who represented the freaks and geeks of Hawkins, started to take far more notice of you.

That wasn’t to say he hadn’t noticed you. He had. You were kind and gentle, and seemed different to your peers. You were glued to your Walkman and read fantasy novels. Yes, Eddie Munson had certainly noticed you.

Finally, on a Friday afternoon, he made your world collide with his. You were on your way to the library when his unmistakable voice called after you. He was calling your name and that alone was enough to fuel your fantasies for the weekend.

“Hey, glad I caught ya,” he said, grinning. “What are you doing tomorrow night?”

You had a date with your record player and self-pity. Metallica was playing a show in Indianapolis but it sold out before you could get tickets.

“Um, nothing,” you said, aiming for nonchalant, hitting close enough.

“Me and Jeff were gonna go see Metallica, but he got grounded. So, I have this spare ticket… if you maybe wanted to, like, go with me?”

He held out the tickets, let you take them in your hands.

“I know we don’t know each other well, but I’ve seen your drawings. Think maybe we have some stuff in common,” he continued. “And I did my research. Your dad works with my uncle. Wayne said he'd put a good word in with him. Promise him I’m a complete gentleman.”

Holy shit.

You nodded before you could speak, trying to buy time while you thought of something to say.

“Just say yes,” Eddie said like he’d read your mind.

“Yes. Definitely. Yes,” you quickly replied.

Eddie twirled on the spot and did a little victory punch to the air. “You hold onto those for us. I’ll pick you up tomorrow. Maybe a bit early? We can get dinner in the city first?”

“I’d like that,”

“Alright then. I’ll let you go re-borrow The Hobbit,” he said, taking a step back.

“How did…”

“How did I know? I know a lot. I’m observant... I’ll see you tomorrow. Midday.”

Edit: Here's part 2!

[asylumwise]

I've just started watching the rerun and I think I'm gonna cry??? The brainrot is real. Gonna just liveblog in this post so I can reread my train of thought later. So, for your entertainment: my rundown of the KPWT

(edit: added skit titles for clarity)

That intro is just... ✨cinematic masterpiece✨

But can you image how it must have felt for them? Standing there in their swag outfits just waiting for the screens to rise while that thriller music is making your heart race and you hear a whole arena screaming?

They all look so fucking proud of eachother during the introductions 😍

Them welcoming us in different languages is also verrrrry... 🥵

I know live translating/subtitling is a noble art but was there no way to prepare the scripted parts in advance?

(TayTimeTem skit)

Love this first song, had it in my spotify playlist since watching the live stream 😂 I'm also getting really good at singing in phonetic Thai

Having not read the original novel, I was never really into the TayTimeTem-thing, but omg this show makes me wish we had 20 eps so they could have explored that storyline thoroughly as well. Especially Us would have given us everything

(Jeff solo)

I can't begin to explain the way "Why don't you stay" pulls on my heartstrings. For me, it's up there in my top 5 of most beautiful songs ever (with Harry Styles' Sign of the Times & Pink Floyd's Wish you were here, for example). It breaks my heart to hear how Jeff's still a little hoarse after his covid infection 😭 there were definitely some flat notes there that wouldn't have been there otherwise

(Slot Machine performance)

Wish I could see a live performance of Slot Machine one day, looks like they're amazing live. I've been listening to them on Spotify and I really love their music!

Pretty sure that Mile's more showing off and having a good time than actually playing and I love that for him. He's so fucking precious.

Jeff. Look at you. Jeff. Gorgeous rockstar. You were born to stand on such big stages. Jeff. Please conquer the world. I wanna see you live one day. Love you Jeff

My mouth fell open the first time I heard him hit those notes in Lost Stars - he's a fucking talent and I'm sure he can be the next big thing in rock. It's quite hard to explain to people in the real world how much I love him 🤣

(VegasPete skit)

Bible YES. Do it to me. Props to the music and choreography team. And the scene setting 👌 also A+ on the BibleBuild acting.

(Nodt solo)

OMG the Big sequence 😭😭 I don't know who came up with it but Nodt is killing it. You can almost touch the pain on his face. I also love it how the crowd goes wild when he confirms Big was in love with Kinn.

(Us & Build duo)

Having just been to Tomorrowland, that amount of EDM and laserlights is really triggering 🤣 But omg their dancing looks so much fun

(Anita & Barcode stuff)

YES MOM. Having Anita dance to Doja Cat makes no sense at all (not for her character nor for her amount of screentime) but I'm so here for it. Might be the pansexual in me speaking.

And BAM suddenly we understand why everybody's always hyping up Barcode. That kid is gonna be BIG. He's a totally different person when he's on stage doing his thing - hard to imagine the cute and shy kid he is rest of the time.

Love how Anita/Namphueng is like 'let me put a coat over you' while he's already wearing like, 5 layers

'My older son is handsome, my younger son is sweet' - 'isn't my mom handsome?' WE WERE ROBBED

I know it's controversial but I love that little grain of KimChay closure they've given us. I liked how they ended in the series: Kim realising that he has a lot of groveling to do and Chay taking agency - but not ending together, giving Chay space and time. He's 19 - I like to imagine he takes a few years to grow up and learn to be himself before they collide again, and take it from there.

(Jeff solo WDYS english version)

THERE IT IS. I was waiting (after having watched the clips on youtube for daaaaays). This is devastatingly beautiful for me (again, for reason I can't explain myself). It's not even the fact that it's in English - by now I've become so used to the Thai version that the sounds are wrong. But omg the scenery and setting. The piano, the build-up, the choir and Jeff just releasing it. I honestly don't know why this man isn't world wide famous yet (yes I will die on this hill). It will take a long time before I'm over this.

(KinnPorsche beach skit)

Honestly the beach bar part is one I liked less. Even if we have KinnPorsche being adorable and MileApo going 60% tiddies again. Mile has an amazing and soothing voice tho. And his fingers while playing guitar are 🥵

At first I thought the places on the those wooden signs might be clues to future stops of the world tour, but 'Iceland' is on them and although that would be awesome, I don't see it happening anytime soon 😅

(Minor family skit)

It will never not be funny to me how they give us a Minor family montage with the melancholic music and sad Vegas moments and then have Bible flying over the stage half naked to Imagine Dragons' Believer.

And that's not even mentioning what comes next.

Ta entering on skateboard is such a Macau thing. But I have conflicting feelings about the outfit - but only because I thought Macau was like 15 and that makes my tingly feelings very inappropriate.

Ex is the finest daddy to ever daddy (or more like, ultimate zaddy). Do you think this is just a regular friday night in the Minor family household?

Just, what was the train of thought behind this act? What was the process? Who came up with the idea "the minor family is hot, let's put them in leather and harnesses". I have questions.

Ex has a very peculiar accent, lots of rolling r's.

(Sailor Moon skit)

Oooh this is the part I missed during the livestream! I know what's coming tho and I have even more questions.

But Perth is clearly living his best life so good for him.

I should have watched Sailor Moon as a kid.

So much respect for them doing that skit in high heels. And omg their legs? How are they so elegant??

Tong, you absolute king. MVP.

The state of Perth's wig is atrocious.

(Justice Bao skit - had to look that up)

Next part. I love how Apo is hanging there literally going 'This was all Mile's idea and I'm just going along for the right because I (platonically) love that bastard'.

(Bodyguard/Magic Mike skit)

Wait you're telling me there was a poledance and it wasn't Bible doing it?

As someone who often comes into contact with high-end events & awardshows in their professional life, I'm really impressed with the production value of this show 😳

That bodyguard/Magic Mike part. How did the people on the front row SURVIVE???? 🥵🥵🥵

I've been using the 🥵 emoji a lot.

(Pond intermezzo)

Oh those clips 😊 little babies <3

I want that t-shirt. What was the deal with the merch again? When is it open for international orders?

(Cast speeches)

Hello I'm in love with Perth's Australian accent. Hello Perth baby sending love from Belgium!

Even though I only understand half of what they're saying (due to the slow subtitles), I'm so fucking touched by all of them. Love how they're all getting emotional the longer it takes. I'm really enthralled by these sixteen (16) men. How they clearly like and love eachother and lean on eachother. How they all express their gratitude to everyone and especially P'Pond. I love that man so much for what he did for them. And us ofcourse!

STOP IT BUILD I'M GONNA CRY WITH YOU

Apo's speech I'm - 😪 And omg Bible?? Who ever made these babies feel bad? Imma smack a bitch.

I feel like the translator just gave up halfway Mile's speech. Fair enough 😂 he's giving off real "I do what I waunt" vibes, mr. one-of-the-CEOs-of-BOC. But oh the 'family' part 😭

(Cumulus)

Aaah the long awaited Cumulus. They're really good musicians and what they're lacking in the vocal department, they're more than making up in fun.

Thai pop/rock music has some absolute bangers. These are alle going in my spotifiy playlist.

Yeah I'm gonna need about 200 high quality photo's of Jeff and Barcode singing together with the latters foot on Jeff's knee.

I hope they're saying sorry to those background singers for being such a bundle of chaos

(Finale)

THAT TRAILER I don't know what to say guys, this movie can actually only disappoint after the expectations that trailer raised.

I want to go clubbing with these guys so bad. Or even better, go to Tomorrowland (biggest and best EDM festival in the world) with them. I'll secure a spot on the bill for Ta, he's doing better than 50% of the dj's I've heard there.

Their dancing is... sorry sweating and dirty thoughts only

How is this WHOLE cast so exceptionally beautiful?

However much I love this and however much fun they seem to be having, they also look dead on their feet. But who wouldn't be after this marathon of a show?

Ooooh the famed Macarana remix! This is actually... really good? I want this in clubs this summer! (not that this mom of two is doing a lot of clubbing nowadays)

Wow Ta is actually a really good dj

(the end)

Bye boys, love you. So happy I got to see this show in full and with complete concentration. Thank you for giving it your all!

I don't think this full show is going to be the one that's going on tour, it'll probably a much smaller version. I'm very curious about what it's gonna be tho and if it's coming to Europe (to an easily accessible city), I'll sure as hell go see it!

The show's over and I have 6 minutes to spare so that's me rewinding tot 01:58:00 for Jeff's WDYS on piano kthxbye

[orphicrose]

The Only One

Rick x Reader Fanfiction

Summary : life is strange in the rick and morty universe, as we all know. But things get just that little bit weirder when Rick meets you. Something seems oddly familiar with you, but for once In his life he has no idea why. So he searches from reality to reality to try and see if he had met another version of you, only to realise there where none. You where the only one. That’s when it finally hit him…

This is inspired by a song from Rick and morty that I think is beautiful https://youtu.be/epiOcz3HXNo

I accidentally got carried away and wrote too much, so I will probably just do a part 2 so it’s not to much to read if anyone is interested <3

_________________꧁♥︎꧂_________________

Humans are such fragile creatures, always have been and always will be. You knew that, but you refused to surrender down to it. Not wanting to be included In whatever earth had to offer, so you ran away. And not like how a silly fourteen years old runs away from home, Hah… no.

You left the fucking planet, not leaving behind a single trail or speck of dust for someone to follow you with. Your intelligence and ambition was all you needed to carry yourself through life. Travelling the infinite void of space, soon making a name for yourself. For good and for bad. An ordinary person couldnt even dream nor comprehend the things you’ve experienced or seen. And that’s just how you liked it. Being different. It was truly a gift to be intelligent.

And then there was rick, high IQ and normally not happy about it. Seeing his intelligence as a curse. Rick hadn’t seen it all, it was impossible, but he thought he had seen enough to make a valid opinion on life.

It’s pointless.

Such a bitter man with a bitter view on everything, including himself. You see, when you have an overwhelming amount of knowledge weighing down on your mind, you can go two ways. The first being ricks way, not caring about anything since he has seen how big the universe is and doesn’t see a point.

Then there’s your way, feeling blessed to be able to see things that no one else can, and finding a new reason to live every single day.

You two where polar opposites, but also the same. You where both alone in a universe you felt didn’t need you anymore.

The day both of your worlds collided should have been written down in the history books. It was the day both of your beliefs where almost questioned. Wondering whether fate really does exist.

————————————————

Out of the many things you have done, you’ve never visited the same place twice. Making everyday an adventure, as much of a cliche as that sounds it’s true. Not only that, but you seem to have people after you almost everywhere. For your intelligence, or for revenge. But there is one particular spot you cannot get enough of. Finding yourself there when you lose yourself.

It’s an isolated planet in the middle of the andromeda galaxy. It’s a newly ‘emerging moon’ as you like to call it. In fact, you pretty much founded this planet, since its a recent creation. This also means there is no intelligent life yet evolved, so it is safe for you to do what you please.

You go there often, to watch the two suns set over its small horizon and the thousands of stars come into view. Giving you time to reflect on your life. To appreciate it, but not to regret anything. The stars are far to beautiful to bring your mind to anything negative. The planet itself seems to project the meaning of peace and tranquillity even without life. Maybe that’s why it’s so comforting.

Your thoughts where leaving your mind, as you held your eyes closed. Feeling the breeze brush through your hair gently. That beautiful, genuine smile found its way to your face without you noticing. You where to lost in the feeling of relaxation.

But that soon came to an end. That euphoric state was snapped out of you when you noticed a bright light coming towards you. Getting bigger and bigger in just seconds. Until it became more clear, it was a spacecraft of some sort. A poorly built one to say the least. You sat and watched, mesmerised, as the flames from the object slowly engulfed it. Burning in the atmosphere. Finally hitting the ground, you shook your head and sighed. Being brought back into reality.

The flames took a second to fade after the ship had crashed. And it was clearer to see, it was the stereotypical UFO. The type you’d see in cheesy ski-fi films. But it had encryptions written in English. Which was very unusual, especially for it to be in this part of the galaxy.

What was even stranger was that it didn’t have even the slightest burn mark to it’s metal. Your vision of it became clearer and clearer the closer you got, slowly creeping past the incredibly green trees towards it. But just before you got too close, a figure fell out of the vehicle. Swearing like a drunken sailor.

This is what really messed with you, it was a human. You gasped quietly, not being able to remember the last time you saw one. A mix of feelings rushed over you; confusion, fear, excitement? You couldn’t help but stare, his unique blue hair bounced as he picked himself up, not even bothering to dust off the dirt on his lab coat.

“Fuck! You fucking piece of shit spacecraft. You’ve really done it this time Rick you fucking…” he didn’t finish his sentence, as he kicked the lump of metal. Screaming at the top of his voice.

“Fuck!”

You caught a small glimpse of his face, and recognised him. But you weren’t sure where from. You had met millions of people over the years so he could really be anyone. But there was something so compelling about his character. Something that felt like you where being pushed towards him. Or pulled, by a red string perhaps. Something that was just telling you to interact with him.

You stayed hidden behind a rather tall tree, still collecting your thoughts and questioning whether you should help him. Rick had slumped himself against the ship, putting his hands to his face and grunting. Pausing his breakdown for a second to take a sip from his flask, then proceeding to carry on.

He stayed like this for a good few minutes, before you had decided to approach him. Your curiosity and questions where burning at the edge of your mind. You just had to investigate. Keeping a hand on your weapon tucked neatly in a pocket behind your back. You slowly walked towards him, not even being able to speak before he noticed you.

A gun had been pulled to you, aiming directly between your eyes

“What do you want? I’m not in the mood so just tell me in advance if I should shoot you or not..” his eyebrows furrowed, looking at the hand tucked behind your back.

You rolled your eyes, putting your hands up in surrender. Just how you remembered humans to be. Aggressive and impulsive.

“Calm down, I saw your ship crash. Thought you where in need of some assistance. And put that gun down, god…” to your surprise, he did. With a loud grunt he put his gun back into his pocket and turned away. Usually, he probably would’ve shot on site. And who’s to say he still won’t, but right in this moment he is too preoccupied to care.

“God doesn’t fucking exist…” he mumbled “and I definitely don’t need any assistance!”

You raised an eyebrow at him, watching him as he attempted to fix his broken ship. Opening the lid to the engine and being greeted by a storm of smoke. Now Seconds away from another breakdown.

“Are you… okay?” You hesitantly asked, daring to inch closer to him. Probably was the stupidest thing you’ve ever done. He threw the wrench down at the engine as he exploded.

“No, I’m not fucking okay. I lost my grandson, the entire galactic government is after me, I broke my portal gun and I just crashed my ship into a planet with no helpful resources to fix it.!” His speech sped up, and he went dead silent when he stopped talking. Clearly regretting telling you anything. He is usually good at keeping his mind together and keeping his problems to himself. But he had so much adrenaline pumping through his blood, he could barely concentrate.

“I’m, i’m sorry for your loss” is all you managed to get out

“What? Oh no, my grandsons not dead. I just left him somewhere and forgot exactly where…” he spoke slightly softer, still grunting as he tried to analyse his engine.

There was a small silence while you processed everything he had just said. Moving closer to get a look at his engine, you shook your head.

“You’ve burnt it out…”

“Yeah, no shit smart ass” he bit at you

You rolled your eyes and snatched the spanner from the place he had dropped it. Not using it to fix his engine, but you pulled out a small metal box from your pocket instead. Fixing a few pieces together. Rick stood there and watched with a puzzled look on his face. Moving his eyes from the gadget, then up to get a look at you.

His eyebrows softened as he took in your features, the creases in his forehead disappeared. A rush of a strange feeling replaced the adrenaline, not being able to pinpoint what it was but he didn’t like it. He could only describe it as his heart softening, and getting lost in a place that was familiar to him. Thats what he felt when he looked at your eyes, reflecting off of his.

“Hav-have we met before?” He said in a much calmer tone

You placed the gadget on the engine and pressed a small red button on the top, looking up at him.

“I don’t think so?” The box moved around the engine, like a shield. Fixing it effortlessly, Ricks eyes darted from you, to the engine, then back to you. Now with amazement written all over his face.

Deja vu was the only state good enough to describe what he was experiencing. You broke the silence by holding a hand out to introduce yourself.

“I’m y/n”

It took a quick second for him to respond, still trying to process your face and remember how he knows you.

“I’m… Rick” he finally shook your hand.

“Rick Sanchez..”

That name was oddly familiar to you. Like you’d heard it in a dream. Or it was a loved ones name in a past life. You felt like you had heard it before, in a very distant memory. But no recollection of the connection.

“That seems…familiar” you tilted your head, squinting your eyes at the old man who gave you the same look.

“Well, I wouldn’t be surprised if you knew me. I am the smartest man In the universe”

[sylverstorms]

Miranda x Mia---- Eternal

A Ko-Fi commission I wrote for the wonderful @saltwatereulogies. Thank you so very much for the support and I hope you enjoy the fic!

Drip. Splatter.

The first sound you’re aware of is that of the occasional waterdrop crashing onto the same humid, uneven floor you’re lying on.

The second is the sound of her voice.

“Rise and shine.” she says, somewhere off to the side. You are still too disoriented to pinpoint exactly where.

You’re not dizzy enough, though, to not immediately realize you’re trapped. The way the light behind your captor shines makes it all the more obvious, casting large shadows in the shape of your prison bars across your small, moldy cell.

“Y-you…” you struggle to talk. Your throat is too dry and your temples pound like a war drum. It feels like you’ve collided with a truck. And yet her voice commanding you to sleep is the last thing you remember.

“I haven’t formally introduced myself. Though I’m sure your friend has told you about me.”

You blink to make your vision focus yet it’s hopeless. She is but a dark blur to you –am I hallucinating or are those wings?

“My name is Miranda.”

Suddenly, that name snaps everything into focus so sharply you could get whiplash. You’re on your knees the next second, just about ready to leap at her. She’s the one. The one Chris warned you about. She may look like an angel but she is a devil.

“I don’t care who the hell you are! What do you want from me?!” you demand.

“Your cooperation in my experiments, for starters.” she says it calmly, but she is no fool to believe you’ll just agree to that, you can see it in her crystal-blue eyes.

“Ha! As if!” you retort.

“Well. That answer will change when I have Rose.” The name of your daughter makes every nerve ending in your body kick at once.

“What. Like Ethan will just hand her over to the likes of you?”

“Actually.”

A slow smirk crosses her full lips. Then their shape changes to match yours. All of her does, until you are left looking at a perfect mirror of yourself. Only, there’s no way you look quite that good inside of this shitty cell.

“He’ll hand her over to you.”

When she laughs, it is your own voice haunting your ears.

-

-

She has your daughter. She has your everything in her hands. So, she has your cooperation, as well.

Miranda doesn’t really talk when she comes to collect blood samples for whatever experiments she needs them. Your initial cries and questions were muted the second she told you the more helpful and less annoying you are, the more inclined she’ll feel to bring Rose to you for a while.

In the end, you do let yourself be her docile little lab rat.

Until you literally can’t take the silence anymore.

“Was it really… that easy?” ‘To enter my home and take my daughter’ you want to add but you can’t even get the words past your throat.

She seems to understand, though. “Effortless.” she isn’t being cocky as she says it. In fact, she seems almost surprised herself. At least, from the angle you get of her face, while she’s studying a strange rock-like substance under a microscope.

“How the hell did Ethan not figure out you aren’t me?!” That moron. He just gave your daughter to her. That clueless moron!

For a split second, you see her lip twitch in what could, perhaps, be a withheld smile. “I was there for a day, so. Seems like your husband doesn’t know you quite that well.”

Is it really fair to blame him for not knowing you, though? With the secrets you’ve kept from him? The distance? The trauma from the shared nightmare you experienced coming back to you every time you even looked at him?

God, Rose really is the only thing that kept you together, isn’t she…

It’s easy to hate the accursedly beautiful bitch outside your cell. It’s easy to blame Ethan for not even suspecting something was amiss with you for a whole damn day.

It is not so easy to blame yourself as much as you do them.

-

-

Miranda replies when you ask her things, so you ask her about herself. To your surprise, she does not shroud her motives from you.

She has lost her daughter, she tells you, and the only way to get her back is through yours. For the first time since you met her, you see emotion clearly expressed in her eyes and voice. You recognize how she longs to be with her child again.

You can understand the never-ending grief of a mother losing her offspring. You know if anything happened to Rose you would rather fling yourself off a cliff than live a life without her.

And apparently, that is what she tried to do, too. She tried to die –and discovered life instead. That is what she calls it, anyway. All you can hear as she explains is that she found –and founded— the Mold. The same one that ruined your husband and you.

One more reason to hate the psycho witch.

And yet.

When you try to reach for the rage you previously held for her, you find that it’s gone. You’re bitter, you’re exhausted, you want to cry and above everything you want to see Rose again. But you don’t loathe her as you should.

“What do you mean… the only way to get Eva back is through Rose?” you dare ask after several minutes of silence.

She turns to look at you, eyes as piercing as they are blue. “Technically, the trade is simple.” Maybe you’re losing it from the stress and lack of sleep, but you think she almost hesitates for a second. “…a life for a life.”

As soon as she speaks and the meaning of her words registers in your mind, you’re gripping at the rusty iron bars with all your might, rattling them, shouting profanities at her. You are back to hating her all over again. It’s much simpler this way.

Until… she walks over and grabs your hand over the metal. Her touch is oddly warm for such a glacial heart. You cannot tell what she does to you, but it feels like an aura flowing through your system that silences you. Calms you. You do not want to be calm.

“I wasn’t finished.” she speaks. “That is where the experiments with you come in. By running tests on your blood and Rose’s and using my DNA as a medium, during the ritual I can trick the Megamycete into giving me what I want through a form of mitosis. Essentially, cell duplication that will not override the existing vessel.”

To be honest… you lost her midway through the very first sentence. You were quite good with biology back in the day but right now, in the state you’re in, science is going right over your head.

“...Is there an English version of that.” you ask.

Her mouth curves into that almost-smile again. It would be quite gorgeous, actually, if she hadn’t kidnapped you, infiltrated your home as you and abducted your daughter.

“If the tests succeed, you get your daughter back, I get mine from cloned DNA and Mold cells.” There’s a hint of pride in her voice as she says it.

And now, assuming she’s telling the truth, you want those tests to succeed more than you want to get out of here. Her hand leaves yours and the weird calm she blasted into you dissipates with it.

“Wait. So…” Realization strikes you like a thunderclap. “So these tests are for me?”

“You’re welcome.”

“I didn’t say thank you, you crazy b—blonde.” You rattle the iron bars again, a tad weaker than before. She does smirk over the microscope, this time. “How likely are the tests to succeed?” you ask impatiently.

“Quite.” she replies, flat once again.

“…And if they don’t?” you hate how your voice shakes there, at the end.

She looks at you, dead in the eyes, as she answers: “I am getting my daughter back either way, Mia.”

You can’t believe it. You cannot believe you’re thinking this, but you hope the crazy bitch knows what she’s doing.

-

-

Miranda is… despicable, but she is a woman of her word.

She brings you Rose for hours at a time and in exchange you help her outside of your cell. You thought your daughter would be in a worse condition, considering who keeps her, yet she’s healthy as ever, well-fed and clean. The worst part is, she laughs every time Miranda comes close and she even reaches out for her.

“No, my darling, don’t do that.” you tell her, tucking her tighter in your arms, before the woman behind you notices what’s happening.

Except it’s too late. “Ah, I see.” Miranda speaks, coming up to you from behind. She’s tall enough to lean over your shoulder and wave at Rose, who moves both hands towards her. “A lady of taste.” the woman praises and the lightness to her voice almost makes her sound like someone else. Someone normal.

“Stop it.” You turn your child away from her. “She’s just confused because you’re lit up like a Christmas tree.” You motion with your chin at her getup.

Miranda chuckles. “What. She senses our bond. Rose feels safe with me.”

Safe with the monster who wants to sacrifice her to get her own child back. You cannot swallow that thought down. “But she’s not, is she?!” you snap.

“She is.” Miranda reverts to her cool facade, glancing down at your daughter. “I will never let anything hurt her. And when she gives me Eva back, I will make sure she grows up bathed in luxury.”

It’s the Mold, you’re sure of it.

It’s the Mold’s fault that you believe her.

-

-

You were supposed to see Rose today. Instead, Miranda comes into the cave alone, looking irritated. You start to worry. Nothing phases her without a good reason. What if—

“Where’s my daughter?!” you demand, eyes wide.

“We have a problem.” she tells you. Your blood goes cold in your veins. “A problem named Ethan Winters.”

“Ethan?” you gasp.

“He is trying to get Rose back and according to reports from the Lords under me, he cannot be killed. His hand got cut off and he just reattached it. You wouldn’t happen to know anything about that, would you?” she’s certain that you know. You can see it in her steely eyes.

“I— why would I—”

“Before you think to lie to me, hear something else. I bear good news, as well.” Miranda says. “I have succeeded in my experiments. During the ritual, I can guarantee Rose will remain unharmed and unchanged.” the edge of her lip curls up as she delivers the news. You almost cry from the sheer relief.

You almost leap forward and hug her, yet you remember who she is and that she caused this mess in the first place.

“But my conditions have changed.” her voice is a sword that cuts off your happiness just like that. You knew it was too good to be true. “For me to save Rose, you will tell me how to permanently get rid of Ethan Winters.”

…What?

She wants you to… trade your daughter for your husband? How the hell can I do that?!

“He has ruined too much for me to let him walk away happily now.” Her jaw is tight enough to sprout new lines on her flawless face. She wants him dead and she always gets what she wants. “He has killed colleagues of mine. Spat in the face of a damn-near god. I will have his head.”

The corners of your eyes sting with welling tears. Your body is far more honest than you in making a decision. Nobody is too important to sacrifice when it comes to your daughter. Not yourself. Not Ethan. And Miranda knows this better than anybody else. You loathe how she knows.

“Give him to me, Mia. And in a few days this whole thing will be over.” she continues in a significantly softer tone, getting closer to you. Her wings shift, the very edge of black feathers brushing your arms.

“You want me to aid in killing the father of my child?!” you sob, grabbing at her clothes. You’d expect her to shove you away, but she doesn’t move. She doesn’t even blink.

“You have been so cooperative and so brave.” she soothes, gold-taloned fingers coming underneath your chin. “Make one last sacrifice for me. Help me murder Ethan so Rose can live. Help me and I vow to be her eternal guardian angel. Hers and yours.”

She could just force the answer out of you. She’s touching you and you know she has that power. But she doesn’t do it and it’s far worse this way. She wants it to be your choice.

You look away from Miranda’s icy eyes and her promises of everything.

And you tell her.

-

-

You do not ask about Ethan. All that’s in your mind is the ceremony.

For the entire morning, you cannot breathe. You trace notes in her lab and pace around until you literally feel like you’ll explode—

And then Miranda comes in. She is radiant, smiling from ear to ear, glowing with pure joy. She looks every part the goddess she pretends to be. The golden circle usually adorning her back is gone, her long blonde hair is left free to flow like fine strands of silk past her square shoulders.

“It is done!” she tells you, a hand extended for you to take. “Come. I’ll take you to Rose and you will be the first to meet Eva.”

Her hand is warm when it closes around yours. Black wings shroud you both. There is a gravitational pull around you that’s so intense you shut your eyes and grab onto her biceps for dear life.

“You can look, now.” she speaks once the world is stable again. Your gut is churning, yet every bit of exhaustion and discomfort vanish the second you see Rose. She is safe within the first of the two golden cribs in front of you, bathed by the soft sunlight that disperses across the luxurious, dark-tiled chamber you’re in.

You run towards her, lifting your daughter in your arms and kissing her forehead over and over. She laughs at you, blue eyes crinkled. My love. My everything, you think. Everything was worth it for this moment. And you would do it all again, to ensure her safety.

Miranda’s steps, regal and authoritative, come to a stop near the other crib. You lean closer, take a look… to see another little angel there, sleeping peacefully. She resembles Rose, yet she resembles Miranda, too.

“Oh my God.” you breathe. “You really did it.”

“I did it and you and Rose made it possible, Mia.” she says. Your child extends a tiny hand towards her. She removes one of her claws and lets her finger be taken in your baby’s grip. “You don’t have to leave. She loves me already.” A proud smile curves her lips.

You hate how it looks like a sunrise.

You hate it even more that you understand why Rose is so charmed.

“Her mom can grow to love me, too.” Crystal eyes look into your own. “There is no place safer than by my side. Stay and we will raise them together. You won’t have to fear disease or death with me. You and Rose will have every little thing you could ever want. Forever.”

You don’t want your child to be co-patented by this selfish megalomaniac, who is the killer of her father. But. Then you stop to consider what you have been through until now. Nightmare after nightmare; this vicious cycle does not look like it will be broken. One thing or another will haunt you and hunt you wherever you go. You don’t want that life for Rose.

You won’t accept that life for Rose.

“…we will stay. But you can forget that part about me growing any fonder of you than I am now.”

Miranda nods, but something in her expression is so damn cocky you want to smack her. “Oh, what’s that, Rose? You can tell your mother is lying, too? My genius girl.”

Your jaw drops. She is my genius girl!

Miranda then touches your chin and tilts it up. You don’t want to be any closer to the gorgeous fucking witch, but when she stops there, hovering just over your mouth for a skipped heartbeat, looking down at you with those crystalline eyes of hers, you’re paralyzed.

Her lips slide over your own for just one slick, hot second. When she pulls back, she caresses Rose’s cheek and winks at you.

“I hate you.” you say, yet it holds no real bite. God, you’re exhausted.

“That’s alright. We have all the time in the world to change that.”