#Eat Beat: Dead Spike-san

[pikabysss]

WIP

Sketch of Hazama in his yukata! Because it deserves some love.

I redisigned it a bit because I couldn't really make out the details. (Also wanted to add more stuff on it. I may tweak it, this is just a sketch)

[azure-alchemist]

..ArcSystemWorksU tweeted another ArcLive announcement and featured guests for the stream..:

Stay tuned for today's episode of #ArcLive! @_dpiddy will be hosting along our guests, @TheBiter & @ItsThatBond. We'll be playing #BBTAG, Eat Beat Dead Spike-San & give out PS4 & Steam codes for Damascus Gear Operation Osaka. Tune in 5pm PST: https://www.twitch.tv/arcsystemworksu

(Source) (VOD)

(Arc System Works youtube(US) (Arc System Works Official Site(US)

[quirklessidiot]

Title: coward :: obliviousness Pairing: Y/N x Miya Atsumu Genre: angst, romance, and very slow burn [ex to lovers au] Warnings: Cursing, alchohol, mentions of unprotected sex, unplanned pregnancy, and mentions of abortion

Synopsis: Atsumu seems nicer these days and you seem to see him more than before. Meanwhile, your kids meet someone they probably shouldn’t have.

notes:

three more chapters till the end!!! I’m so happy by all of the love! really! its definately been one of my favorite fanfictions to write since its angsty and im in love with angst stories skjsksksksks 

i think this chapter is the shortest one amongst the rest idk shhshshshs anyways i hope yall still love it wuwuwuwu. Hope you all are doing well and ilyasm!!!! have a gweat day!!!

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You thought you’d never see Miya Atsumu again but here he was, in your son's sports club, helping out Sugawara. Wasn’t it supposed to be volleyball season? What was he doing here? Helping the kids and picking up volleyballs? Didn’t he hate kids?

“...We train every morning and I personally train every night. You know my sched, it's what I did back then in college too.” He shrugs nonchalantly, “Plus I wanted to personally apologize to the brats too because of what ‘samu and I did.”

You tilt your head in curiosity, “What did younger Miya-san do?”

“Beat’s me, your brat told me that ‘samu made you cry when he confronted you,” he blinked, recalling the first meeting he had with the kid, come to think of it, they did had a pretty good reason to be wary of him from the start, “Must’ve said something really shitty if you cried, L/N-san. You never cried except that night at the frat party when I first actually got to talk to you.”

Nostalgia hits you when you recall that day, it was a shitty day indeed. The only upside was seeing and talking to Miya Atsumu for the first time and getting him to bandage your leg.

“Oh.”

“Oh indeed.” the blonde stated, wiggling his eyebrows, “He’s just overprotective sometimes which is weird since we used to get into fist fights. Doesn’t excuse him for being an asshole to ya though.”

“He was being rational.” You expressed, watching him pick up the last volleyball.

“He has no right to though.” he retorted, annoyed that you were letting it slide, “Let’s be honest here, who did you left six years ago?”

“What-”

“You left me.” He cuts you off, giving you no chance to talk, you’d think he’d sound bitter by it but he anything but that. It was as if he was proving a point, “And I’ll admit I was angry at first by what you did and how it ended but that doesn’t give my friends and my brother the right to intervene. I’m not a fucking kid, I know what I got into when we started dating.”

“Miya-san, I-”

“So let me make it up to you, alright? Before we started dating, I was your friend first. Now that we’re both responsible adults and you’re a single mom at least let your friend help you. You can handle that shit right?” He replied but before you could even agree to him, your kids went out of the comfort room, fully changed to dryer clothes.

“Kaasan!” They yell in unison but immediately stop in their tracks when they see Miya Atsumu standing next to you.

“What’s this jiji doing here?” Yuuto spat out bitterly, looking the other way. The younger twin followed suit and looked the other way too, making Atsumu laugh and bend down to their level, “I heard from your kaasan that you like to eat cake. How about a truce? I know a good place that sells good cakes.”

Yuuto and Youta eyed him warily and you patted the oldest twin’s head, “Baby don’t you have something to say to Miya-san too?” your voice was softer towards him, Atsumu still couldn’t get used to your personality switch with the twins. He watches in amusement as the twin tries to sputter out a sorry.

“S-so...sorry…” he frowned, “I should’ve been a big boy and not call you names.”

“Youta, you too.” You urged the younger one.

The other twin frowned and also had trouble apologizing to him like his twin, “S-Sorry...I won’t do the same…” he apologized under his breath.

Atsumu couldn’t help but laugh at the dynamic they seem to have created, at least they weren’t as close-minded as they were before, “No sweat, kid.” He said, “I’m sorry for making you feel bad and for what my brother did too. Now, let’s get that cake shall we?”

You hold Yuuto on one hand and Youta on the other as you head to his car, after helping the kids at the backseat, he opens the front seat for you, “Oh, um…” You blinked, the sudden feeling of embarrassment creeped in, “You didn’t have to-”

He rolls his eyes in reply, “Get in, L/N-san. I don’t bite.”

The boys were quiet at the back first until Atsumu tried to strike a conversation with them, “What made you guys like volleyball?”

Youta, being the more open one, suddenly jumps on his seat, “ ‘Kaasan has an old volleyball at home! We saw it and started asking her about it!”

“Oh?” he stops at the traffic light and stares at you, quite surprised since he never pegged you to keep something of his after the break-up, “Didn’t know you kept my old memorabilia with you.”

Yuuto’s eyes seem to widen when he hears that, “No way, that was yours?” he sputters out, shocked.

“Yeah.” he laughed, starting the car again when the light turned green, eyes crinkling in amusement, “Your ‘kaasan and I used to be very close before. I used to sleepover and leave some of my stuff at her place.”

“Hm.” you clicked your tongue, recalling those times when Atsumu would just come in your home unannounced like you both lived together, “He was incredibly all over the place and messy like you two.” 

“Wow!” Youta grins, seemingly excited, “What was kaasan like, jiji? I bet she was super nice and caring and a super good friend!”

The look of amusement never left his face as he agreed to the young boy, the rest of the ride was filled with Youta being overly-excited and asking Atsumu about you during college and about how you met him, “We were in the same class.” You replied, seemingly indifferent by it. You were used to this question before.

“Nope.” He replied, popping the p, an amused smirk worming its way to his face as he recalls differently since he never told you how he met you, “I saw your mom around a lot during the first few months of school.”

You were turned silent by his story, you didn’t know this part. You always thought that the first time you and Atsumu got acquainted was in that minor class you took during the second semester, “...I had also accidentally hit your mom with one of my serves while she was looking for a friend.” He recounts, parking the car in front of a very aesthetically-looking cake shop.

Your brows furrowed in deep thought, that was him? How come-

“Your ‘kaasan’s too famous, she probably doesn’t even remember the minimal interaction we had.” he joked, feigning hurt.

“Wow mom, I bet you must’ve hated jiji when he hit you with those super powerful serves!”

“She probably would if she remembered.” 

You take the kids out of the car but Youta was still too entranced by Atsumu that he went ahead and wobbled next to him. The tall volleyball player was nice enough to match the younger one’s pace as they walked towards the shop, “Traitor.” You heard Yuuto mutter as you trailed behind him.

“I thought you forgave him.” 

“Won’t stop watchin’ at him though, ‘kaasan.”” He grumbled but you can tell he was starting to slowly soften up to the blonde.

Atsumu (after much persistence) paid for the cakes and even got you a sugar-free one, Youta was very elated as soon as his cake was served and Yuuto was muttering something about how unfair it was as he started to stuff on hiw own slice, the blonde laughed at the contrasting personalities. They were so alike yet so different at the same time.

It reminded him so much of ‘samu and him back then.

“Oh, wait a moment. I have to pick up this phone call. Would you mind watching them for a sec?” You asked, Atsumu shakes his head to the side and he watches you exit the shop and take the call, the familiar expression of your creased forehead and narrowed eyes coming into play.

“Jiji, have you ever met our otosan?” Youta suddenly asks.

Atsumu feels his heart waver, this was such a heavy topic to ask but Youta didn’t seem to know the weight of his words. Yuuto was quiet this time too, observing him intently, the blonde setter suddenly cleared his throat, “I heard your kaasan met your otosan right after she graduated early and left me suddenly.” he tried to smile, looking unaffected, “So no, I haven’t met him.”

“Is that why you're mad at ‘kaasan?” Yuuto suddenly asks, head tilt to the side, “Because she left you su-suddenly?” The boy seemed to have a problem with longer words but he seemed very perceptive for his age. ‘Gee, were kids always this nosy?’ the blonde setter thought.

 “Did your mom tell you that?” Atsumu lilted, dodging the question well, munching on his cake.

“She said that she broke something really bad that you owned.” Yuuto disclosed, brows furrowed together as if he was thinking very hard about what you said, “And that she deserved it”

Silence engulfed the table for a moment as he felt his throat dry up with the new load of information, “Your ‘kaasan is a very strong woman,” he began. The boy's eyes,especially Yuuto’s, lights up at the compliment they heard, “And she doesn’t deserve anything bad. So when someone tries to do something bad to her, even me, make sure you give’em a good spike.”

“Really?”

“Really, kiddo.” He hums in agreement, “You have to protect your ‘kaasan since your otosan isn’t here anymore.”

Youta’s eyes flicker at the mention of their father, “Jiji, you’re so funny.” he laughs very suddenly.

Atsumu’s brow upturns at the sudden statement of the twin.

“Otosan isn’t dead.” Atsumu feels his shoulder tense at those words, it seems like the twins were giving him such a field day today with questions and new information, “ ‘Kaasan says that he’s off somewhere following his dreams and he’ll come back soon.”

Atsumu wants to ask about a lot of things.

He wants to ask about what Youta said, he wants to ask who the fucking asshole was, he wants to ask why you’re waiting for him when he left you hanging by a thread there with two kids.

He really does but when he drops you off at your home and a sudden troubled expression graces your features when you see an older woman standing there, he knows that it isn’t the right time. Instead, he quietly says goodbye and watches the interaction closely from a distance. A bit of worry filling him since he didn’t like that expression you were showing.

The twins didn’t seem to know who the older woman was but judging by her body language she knew you very well.

Come to think of it, her features were very familiar. Cold eyes, (h/c) hair, a very familiar facial feature.

Could it be-

“Y/N…” she tries to call out but you immediately walk past her, paying her no attention. He feels nervous, “Y/N, please don’t ignore me. I’m your okaasan-”

Suddenly he realizes why he has never met your family at all.

Judging by the interaction he sees, you were anything but close with them and that your relationship with them was stagnant (it probably worsened since you got kids at an early age and the father left you to dry). The kids probably don’t even know who that woman was, you continue to ignore her as you sons look at her warily.

When she starts to get physical, he gets out of the car and tries to stop the women from getting any closer to you and the boys, “What are you doing? Don’t you know who I am-” the woman tries to yell her way through but the blonde notices how you flinch away from her as soon as you hear her loud voice and hide the kids behind you as if you were protecting them.

“She doesn’t want to see you or have her near her kids, so please leave before I call security.” Atsumu tried to calm the situation down, not wanting to raise his voice, he could be wrong about his assumptions and he didn’t want to let your mom see him in a bad light.

“You don’t understand-”

“Obaasan.” his voice was anything but nice and friendly now, he wanted to try and respect the woman who brought you to this world, he really does, but right now he wouldn’t mind calling the cops on her if she resorted to making a scene here,  “Please leave before I call for security.”

Your mother grips on her expensive handbag tight and with one last glance to you, she immediately walks away. You don’t notice how you’re shaking and that Youta is crying behind you while Yuuto is trying his best to calm his twin down by insulting him and calling him a crybaby.

“L/N-san, are you-”

“I’m fine.” You cut him off, taking in a few deep breaths to calm you down, “I’m fine.”

He grabs your wrist and stares at you dead in the eye, “You’re shaking, Y/N.” He suddenly says your name softly, you're scared that if he goes nearer, he’d hear your ranging heart beat so you take a step further back and let go of his hold.

Atsumu narrows his eyes and tightens his lips at your response but decides against it, instead he turns to Youta and Yuuto, “I have a game next week and I got extra tickets, would you like to watch? The adlers and I will be playing, I heard one of ya likes Tobio-chan so much.”

Youta finally stops crying as soon as he hears the mention of free tickets and turns to a bundle of excited energy. Yuuto even starts jumping up and down at the mention of Kageyama Tobio. 

Atsumu still has a lot of questions for you though, about your family, why you haven’t mentioned them, or the fact that their asshole of a father just left you to fulfill his dreams (he’s angry, very angry especially about this one) yet when he sees the small smile on your lips as you watch your kids jump up and down.

He holds back.

Those questions can wait another day.

taglist [closed]

@fortheloveofiwaizumi ;  @svtbitch  ; @kiyoomile ; @lovedanii ; @juno-multifandom ; @gyubit17 ; @saeranoppa ; @nixxona ; @kyomihann @shorttstackk ; @intoomuchfandoms ; @yammmers ; @mx-minxx @itsmattsunshinehere ; @missingmystogan ; @volleybloop ; @imcravingyou ; @yams-wants-that-booty ; @liathachcapricious ; @pinknugget @seikamuzu ; @marigoldthoughts ; @sillykittt ; @baejinoffcl ; @alluring-akaashi ; @bnhasstuff ; @jungshookmeup ; @intheawks ; @bokuakadaily ; @agaassi ; @yams046  ; @dope-squish ; @chrisrue15 ; @vermillionwaves ; @demursv1ogs ; @just-snog-already ; @angmarwitch​

@misosamu  @Etherynaw  @ryaaaax @differentballooncollection @keniloveshaikyuu @allysasteaparty  [hi, i can’t seem to tag u guys, i think you need to open your tags uwu]

[rocorambles]

The Time Godzilla Was a Wingman

Pairing: Iwaizumi Hajime x Female Reader 

Genre: NSFW, Fluff, Smut 

Summary: A shared love for Godzilla brings the two of you together, but neither of you realize just how close you’ll end up being OR two nerds fall in love 

Warnings: Attempted Rape/Non-Con

Your body is vibrating with excitement despite it being 10am on a Sunday morning. Usually you would be still dead to the world at this time on any other weekend, but today isn’t any ordinary day. The nearby movie theater is playing a rerun of an old Godzilla movie and the nerd in you immediately bought tickets when they were released. Unfortunately, none of your friends were interested in waking up before noon to see an old monster film, so you make the trek by yourself. Once you arrive at the theater, you step in line for food and drinks. You’re debating what beverage you want to get with your popcorn when you see a familiar spiky head in front of you. “Iwaizumi-san?” The taller figure turns around at his name and, although surprised to see you, he politely greets you. 

There’s an awkward pause after that. Both of you are in the same class and you’ve seen each other around school, but you haven’t ever really spoken to each other. You’re thinking of how to continue the small talk when you notice Iwaizumi is looking down at your hoodie and you blush. Like a true dork, you’d decided to wear your favorite pale pink Godzilla hoodie and you want to sink into the ground. This is not how you wanted one of the most attractive guys in your class to see you outside of school. You quickly drop your gaze down to hide the red decorating your cheeks when you see similar Godzilla graphics on the black long sleeved shirt Iwaizumi is wearing. 

All of a sudden any nervousness dissipates and your eyes sparkle as you grin at the ace. “Are you here to see the Godzilla movie too?” Iwaizumi is slightly taken aback by your sudden change in attitude, but at the mention of his favorite character and the sight of your animated face, he also grins and nods. You both start exchanging favorite Godzilla movies, favorite enemies, favorite parts of each movie...the conversation is continuing at a rapid pace when both of you reach the front of the line. Iwaizumi asks if you want to share a popcorn and you agree as you split the cost and rush over to get good seats for the movie. The theater is relatively empty and you both settle down next to each other, still continuing your monster-filled conversation until the movie begins. 

The credits roll and if it’s possible, the two of you are even more impassioned than when the movie first began as you make your way out of the theater, breaking down the details of the film piece by piece. There’s a slight lull in your conversation as you two stand outside the theater. You don’t want to stop discussing the film with Iwaizumi, but you also don’t want to keep him for too long. You’re about to bid farewell when Iwaizumi breaks the silence first. “If you’re not busy, do you want to continue this conversation at the cafe around the corner?” You beam as you enthusiastically agree and the both of you continue to chatter over cups of coffee and sandwiches. The topics widen from just the film and you begin to learn more about each other, enjoying the company of the other. Time flies by and your hangout comes to an end as Iwaizumi realizes what time it is and tells you he needs to go to practice. You continue your dialogue as he walks you home and when he drops you off in front of your house, Iwaizumi asks if you’d want to watch other monster or Godzilla movies together in the future and you gleefully accept the offer.

Just like that, a surprising but close friendship begins. It starts off with just movie hangouts, but soon enough the two of you are studying together, eating lunch together, and walking to school together. Being around Iwaizumi so much means that you also get to know Makki, Mattsun, and Oikawa and as you become closer with the group, you internally chide yourself for ever being intimidated by the group of silly boys. Little do you know that when you’re not around and it’s just the four of them in the locker room, Oikawa and the Makki Mattsun duo are relentlessly teasing, but also scolding Iwaizumi for not making a move on you yet. 

“Iwa-chan! It’s so obvious you like her and you’re not going to find another girl that likes Godzilla as much as you. You better lock her down before someone else snatches her away.” 

“Shut up, Shittykawa!”

“He’s right, Iwaizumi. Y/N is really attractive. I’m pretty sure I saw her get confessed to today. If you’re too slow, she really will be taken and who else is going to put up with your gorilla like attitude?” 

Iwaizumi spikes a volleyball at Mattsun’s head. “We’re just good friends,” says the sharp-eyed ace. He glares at Makki as the chestnut-haired boy scoffs at his words, but the teasing comes to a halt as their coach shouts at them to get back on the court. 

A few weeks later, you go to cheer on Iwaizumi at his volleyball match. You had seen a few of the Aoba Johsai volleyball matches before you became friends with Iwaizumi. Which girl in your school hadn’t? You’d gone with your girl friends and you can’t deny that you had enjoyed watching the athletic toned figures move on the court. But after getting closer to Iwaizumi, you find your eyes drawn only to the ace and you can’t seem to look away from his toned arms, the passion in his eyes, and the sweat that drips down his neck past his collarbone....You shake your head clear of the increasingly indecent thoughts as you focus on the game and you cheer loudly with the rest of your classmates when the boys take home another win. You happily hum to yourself as you make your way to the locker room where you’d already agreed to meet Iwaizumi after the match, but your movements are forcefully stopped by a firm grip on your wrist. 

Confused, you turn expecting to see one of your friends when an unfamiliar face greets you instead. It’s a much taller boy wearing the jersey of the team that Aoba Johsai had just beat and your heart begins to race. You try to jerk your hand away from him, but his grip only tightens and you wince at the vice-like hold. “Get off me, asshole!” You glower at him as you quickly scan the area to see if anyone’s around, but the stadium has pretty much cleared out aside from the players who are still washing up in their locker rooms. Panic spreads within you and you begin to desperately fight back to escape the aggressive stranger, but he uses his much stronger frame to slam you against the wall and you are momentarily stunned by the impact. Your head is throbbing and you begin to cough as he begins to squeeze your throat with one of his hands. “I heard you’re dating Seijoh’s ace. It pisses me off that he won the match and gets to go home to his pretty little girlfriend. I’m going to show him what losing feels like.” Black spots are beginning to cloud your vision as you fight to breathe, but you feel disgustingly wet lips slobbering down your face and tears leak out of your eyes at the feel of a rough hand sneaking under your shirt, brushing the bottom of your breasts. With the little air that you do have, you instinctively call for Iwaizumi, but it comes out little louder than a whisper and your assaulter cruelly laughs. “Your boyfriend isn’t coming for you, bitch. So just try to enjoy this or it’s going to be really unpleasant for you.” 

Just as his hand begins to fully grope one of your breasts, his body is thrown off of you and you gasp for breath. Still a little dazed, you frantically try to figure out what is happening and relief rushes through you when you see a familiar tanned figure standing protectively in front of you. You reach out to him, but pause at the rage you can almost feel rolling off of him. You’ve seen him irritated, especially when Oikawa is involved, but this is a different level of pure unadulterated anger that makes you shiver. He starts storming over to the body of your assaulter and it’s the raising of his arms that spurs you into action as you fling yourself around his back. “No, Iwaizumi! You’ll get in trouble or even suspended. They might not let you play volleyball anymore if you hit him.” A few seconds pass before the tension leaves Iwaizumi and he’s gathering you into his arms. He gives one last look at your attacker and tells him he better not get anywhere near you again, before he carries you away to the now empty Aoba Johsai locker room. 

He seats you on a metal bench and kneels on the floor in front of you as he examines the bruises around your neck and quickly checks the rest of your body to make sure nothing else is injured. Satisfied that you’re otherwise fine, he wraps his arms around your waist and lays his spiky head in your lap as he begins to sniffle. Alarmed, you stroke your hand in his hair, coaxing his head up to look at you and you try to comfort him as you see tears begin to well in his eyes. “Hey, I’m the one who should be crying! Please don’t cry. You saved me, Iwaizumi. I’m safe because of you.” “But you almost weren’t.” “What almost happened doesn’t matter. It’s what actually happened that counts and I believe I owe you a thank you. You want to come over and marathon some Godzilla movies?” Iwaizumi smiles up at you and you both spend the rest of that night in front of your TV, laughing and talking while Iwaizumi presses an ice pack to your injured neck.           

Both of you are just as close after the incident, but the dynamic has shifted. You find yourself stammering and blushing everytime Iwaizumi’s body accidentally brushes against yours and you remember how when you were being touched intimately by your attacker, all you could think about was how you wished the person performing the actions was Iwaizumi instead. Iwaizumi can feel his heart fluttering when he feels the warmth of your body near him and he remembers how a possessive rage had filled him at the sight of another boy touching you and how he wanted to be the only one to hold you like that. But your feelings for each other remain hidden until one day Iwaizumi is asking you to go to another movie with him and you agree as you always do. However this time Iwaizumi pauses and says, “I want to go to the movie on an official date with you. Not just as two friends.”  Your smile threatens to break your face with how wide it is as you lean in to kiss him on the cheek and that’s how the two of you begin dating. 

This is the first relationship for both of you and you both approach it tentatively. Emotionally and mentally, nothing has really changed, but it’s the physical aspect that leaves both of you a little hesitant. Months pass and you never go pass a slightly heated make out session. You begin to feel a little self-conscious and wonder if Iwaizumi doesn’t find you attractive enough to take it further. Iwaizumi on the other hand is smitten with you, but he knows how special sex can be for girls, especially if it’s their first time, and he doesn’t want to push you past your comfort zone. The two of you dance around the topic and never directly address it as you continue to hold hands and sweetly kiss each other. But a long conversation with your girl friends and their encouragement for you to take the initiative if you’re ready emboldens you. Iwaizumi is supposed to come over to your place this weekend to hang out and you’d timed it perfectly with your parent’s business trip, leaving the two of you alone in the house. You slip on the black long sleeved Godzilla shirt Iwaizumi had worn the first time you guys had ever hung out and take a deep breath before mustering the courage to slide your panties off, leaving you completely bare underneath your boyfriend’s shirt. Satisfied with the way you look, you wait.

Iwaizumi knocks on your door, holding a bag of snacks which he promptly drops on the floor as he stares slack jawed at you. You quickly grab his wrist and drag him inside, locking the door behind him before shyly playing with your hair, unsure of what Iwaizumi thinks about your outfit. Iwaizumi drinks in the sight of you in his shirt. His eyes take in how the neck opening is far too large for you and reveals your collarbone and a sliver of your shoulder. They trail down to the way your hands swim in sleeves made for much longer arms than yours. And finally they land on the way your legs are fully on display for him as you clutch the hem of his shirt to keep your most intimate part covered. He can already begin to feel arousal flickering inside of him, but he gently grasps your jaw, tilting your head to look at him. “Babe, I need you to tell me exactly what you want. I want to make sure you’re completely sure about this.” He sees a hint of nervousness in your gaze, but it’s mixed with determination as you move forward until you’re chest to chest with Iwaizumi. He bites back a groan at the feel of pebbled nipples rubbing against his torso. “I want you to take my virginity and then after that I want you to keep on making love to me and fucking me, Iwaizumi.” Reassured by your confirmation, he leans down to lovingly kiss you before holding out his arms and growling, “jump”. You leap into his arms and with your arms interlocked behind his neck and your legs wrapped around his waist, you continue locking lips with him as he brings you both to your bedroom.

Iwaizumi gently lays you down on your bed and hovers over you. Your breath catches at the hungry look in his eyes as he stares at you like he wants to devour you. He roughly catches your lips with his, nipping at your bottom lip until your mouth opens and his tongue is tangling with yours. You squirm in his hold. You’ve made out before, but the intensity of this is new and your heart races as your nails dig into strong shoulders to anchor yourself. He pulls away, a thin trail of saliva connecting the two of you before he continues his attack on your neck leaving a trail of mottled purple down the column of your neck. You cry out from the intensity and the slight pain, but you can feel a burning desire building within you at the thought of Iwaizumi painting you like a canvas and marking you for everyone to know who you belong to.

As he continues sucking and biting your sensitive neck, his hands begin to lift up the shirt you’re wearing, but his brows furrow when he feels nothing underneath. He stops his ministrations to look down and growls at the sight of you completely naked, no bra or panties, and his cock twitches at how vulnerable you look sprawled before him, while he’s still completely clothed. He practically rips the shirt off of you in his haste to have your body completely on show for him and sits back on his heels, drinking in the view of you. No one has ever seen you naked before and your self-consciousness has you attempting to cover your breasts and pussy as much as you can with your hands, but strong hands stop you from moving. “Don’t hide from me, baby. You’re beautiful.” You nervously look into Iwaizumi’s eyes and your heart soars at the love you see shining in his eyes. 

He worships your body and you writhe underneath him as he leaves no inch of your skin untouched. Fingers graze you, his tongue, lips, and teeth trace across every inch of skin they reach and a fire is raging inside of you. Iwaizumi takes one of your hardened nipples into his mouth and sucks while fingers fondle the other nipple and you moan. “Fuck, baby, you sound so good. Keep on making sounds for me. Let me know how good I’m making you feel.” The room fills with your incessant moans and the wet sounds of Iwaizumi lathering all his attention on your fleshy mounds. You’re so distracted by what’s happening that you don’t notice a rough hand beginning to descend further down your body until you keen as a long digit slides into your dripping hole and begins to gently thrust in and out of you. You’ve never had anything inside of you before and you lose yourself in the foreign pleasure. Broken pleas for more spill from your lips and Iwaizumi slips another finger into you, curling his fingers as he continues his in and out motions. When he enters a third finger, your eyes shoot open and your mouth falls open when he brushes against something inside of you. Iwaizumi smirks as he relentlessly teases that spot over and over again until you see stars and your walls quiver around him, clutching his fingers so tightly as if they want to forever be filled by them. He gently continues toying with your now sopping cunt until you shiver and softly push his arms away. Completely removing his hand from you, he hovers over you again to affectionately kiss you before finally stripping off his own clothes.

You’ve seen Iwaizumi shirtless before and you appreciatively eye the veins running down your boyfriend’s toned arms as he removes his shirt and you subconsciously lick your lips at the sight of his tanned torso, but your mouth goes dry and your pussy clenches at the sight of his pre-cum glazed cock that’s revealed when he removes his boxers. Your lower mouth throbs with a desire to be stuffed full, but you nervously bite your lips wondering if something so big can really fit inside you. Sensing the slight change in your mood, Iwaizumi hovers over you, stroking your face. “I’m going to take it slow. But I need you to let me know if you want me to take it even slower or completely stop, okay?” You nod and he moves to slide on a condom before repositioning himself until you feel the tip of his hard length prodding where you want it most. He slowly pushes in, stopping every inch or so while attentively rubbing your pulsing clit and flicking one of your nipples with his tongue to distract you from the discomfort. It’s a tight fit and you feel more stretched than you ever have, but with Iwaizumi’s steady pace and his pleasurable distractions, you’re soon letting out broken whines as you tighten around his cock, milking him for more. He finally bottoms out inside of you and you both groan at how perfectly you fit together. It’s like you were made to take him and only him. “Can I move, Y/N?” You frantically nod your head and let out a high-pitched scream as he almost fully pulls out before ramming himself all the way back into you. You hardly recognize your own voice as you claw at Iwaizumi’s back as he pounds into you. A lewd symphony fills your room as his balls slap against you, your pussy squelches with every movement of Iwaizumi’s hips, he grunts and heavily pants, and you let out a beautiful vocal scale of “more, harder, faster”. But the performance is nearing an end and you finish first, your back bending into a curve you didn’t know was possible before you slump back down to the bed, exhausted. Iwaizumi isn’t far behind and with just a few more desperate thrusts, he harshly grips your hips and buries himself as deep as he can go into your spasming heat and cums. 

You both lay there for a bit. Iwaizumi has rolled you both onto your sides so he can cradle you in his arms and stroke your back and hair as he softly praises you. You nuzzle into his comforting warmth and smile fondly into green eyes. “Hajime, I’m glad you were my first. Thank you for taking care of me.” Flustered by your use of his first name, Iwaizumi stills for a second before he’s pulling you even tighter into him, a toothy grin overtaking his face and you both continue to lay there, feeling whole in each other’s arms.  

[trashdeviant]

Chapter 1

Venom/Eddie x Reader

Tw: cussing, violence

Another round clocks you in the jaw; the rebound keeping you from darting out of the way of the following blow. The crowd roars in suspense, but not loud enough to drown out the pumping of your heart beating in your ears. You shake your head at the bleat of a bell that signals the end of this round before your opponent could crack your skull open. Bloodied spit shoots out the side of your mouth as you return to your corner.

“Get to your corner!” The referee waves his arm dismissively at the mass glaring you down.

You had plenty of bulk, but they looked like a mountain compared to you. There was a split in your eyebrow you hadn’t noticed before. Cold hands shove a bottle of water into yours. The condensation wets your palms and drips down your face as you desperately down the freezing beverage in an attempt to cool yourself off. There’s another split down the middle of your bottom lips. The stinging only amplified your adrenaline.

You hadn’t realized your brother had been talking to you until he lightly smacks the side of your head. You turn to him, almost dazed.

“Look, boss, it ain’t even that much! When they take you down, just stay down. You hear me? Aye! Aye, boss!” That wasn’t what you were looking to hear. You had already turned back to the middle of the ring. He sounds his frustration behind you before he snatches the empty bottle out of the way.

You finally begin to control your breathing when the bell rings once more. The both of you raise fists and circle each other. Your hands shoot out to reach for them as you lunge hesitantly. Just as you had predicted they were quick to react to your flawed grapple. As they tangle with you-their arms over yours-you raise your knee to push them back. Your hands gripped on the back of their neck with a vice as you rinse and repeat. You can feel them struggle against your grip as you give their nose one last thrust of your knee before you let them push you back.

A shot that lucky wont come as easily next time. You put your hands back up and await their retaliation. The light almost blinds you as they swing at you. Their ponytail flicks at your face as you dodge and pass them. Their other arm swings behind them and catches you on the cheek. Hard.

That was going to leave one hell of a bruise. They quickly come back with another wild swing and all you can do is block your face as they begin to corner you. You could barely hear the voice behind you scream your name to go down. They take the advantage to connect their fist to your stomach. It almost encourages you to double over, but you hold your breath. It was all or nothing.

You surprise them with a swing of your own. Despite their heat unrelenting you manage to find an opening. Suddenly your positions were reversed. Your blood pumping and your fists flaring, you kept your pattern. ‘Boom-boom-Pop!’ you kept repeating to yourself. A mental montra you drilled into your head for years. They were beginning to grow tired if their curling figure was of any indication. You managed one last uppercut that sends them spiraling to the ground as the bell signals your victory. Dopamine never felt so good. You take in the moment as you watch your opponent tire out on the ground and listen to the audience both cheer for you and scream in disagreement. You could see your brother lose it in the crowd...

“You stubborn ass-”

“Shut up and give me my winnings, Raffie.” He only scoffs and slaps a hefty wad into your palm. You smile to yourself as you feel it and quickly count out a good amount and then some.

Rafael cackles at your pleased expression, “Heh, feel that? Legit thought you were done for. You already looked dead tired.”

“Ha, when you fight someone like that–you can’t get tired.” you joked dryly as you two swayed into the night outside of the building. Adjusting your hoodie you feel him playfully punch at your shoulder. “For real though,” he looks at you casually, “you should learn when to fuckin’ quit. Each fight so far has been bigger than the last one.”

You could only squint at him, your lips tugged in a smirk, “Aren’t you the one getting me these g-”

“Shh!” He smiles a little, embarrassed, and pushes at you. You retaliate by ruffling his curly hair and laugh along with him.

Nights after a fight were usually like this. You, being pretty banged up, and your brother pretending he’s stern when he tells you to be careful. It was refreshing. Although he wasn’t blood related. You two had met in highschool when you were quite the handful. You felt a little guilty dragging him into this kind of business, but he insisted. It paid plenty for rent and although you could never find yourself getting used to the nausea it came with, you somehow enjoyed fighting.

“Damn, boss,” a nickname that manifested easily with your attitude, “Want to go buy some ice for that real quick?”

You were out of ice, but would rather be planting face-first into your mattress right about now, “Nah, pretty sure we got some peas in the freezer.” It was incredibly dark out and the fact that he could see the redness beginning to swell, it spiked a bit of your insecurity. You shook it off and made it to your apartment complex.

Entering your room felt like ecstasy for the soul. Rafael had already passed you to grab the peas as you toed off your shoes and got comfortable on the couch. That meant sweats and no top. You hold your hand out as a chilled bag is placed in your grasp from behind you. After wrapping it with your hoodie you gently place it against your cheek, wincing in discomfort. Raf is kind enough to turn the TV on for you as you put your legs up on half of the couch with your feet tucked under a blanket. Your kin just about to make himself comfortable-

You give your brother a pitiful look, “Raffie can you go microwave me some pizza?”

He sighs and hangs his head before lazily dragging himself to the fridge. A smirk tugs at your lips again, “Aye, why are you tired? I’m the one fighting!” An exaggerated groan is your only response. You chuckle at the fact that he wouldn’t dare deny your right to leftover pizza before you return your attention to the screen.

“-Four bodies were found in an alley. The heads have yet to be discovered as this appears to be yet another victim of the Demon of San Francisco, Ven-”

“Bah…” You flicked through the channels before landing on some wildly inappropriate cartoon.

Venom made both you and your brother nervous. It didn’t take a genius to see the pattern he had. He searched for those who do bad deeds. To some goody-two-shoes it would appear that he had it out for just anyone, but you knew those who were actually in danger. You feared that you were one of them with how you and your brother were involved in an underground fight club. The only hope you both clinged to was the fact that gambling was harmless. Mostly.

The scent of cheesy jalapenos and meat wafted your senses and successfully interrupted your thoughts. You greedily take a bite simultaneously with Raf. You were full of regret one minute in. Your busted lip was searing! You muffle a complaint before dropping the peas and booking it to the sink to cool off your lip.

You whine as you could hear Raf laugh at you from the living room. Your middle finger flashes him before you rush to the fridge to drown your mouth in milk straight from the gallon.

He was almost hysterical, “No hay vaso!?”

Your eyes roll as you finally cool down. Once you return and push your plate towards him you notice something. Both plates only had one pizza. He usually ate two. That bastard.

“You-”, you smack him upside the head. Your glare could turn a man to stone. Unfortunately, he only seemed to laugh in the face of death.

You make a dramatic show of retreating to your room as he eats. Living with him taught you that he would make it up to you in the morning so you weren’t terribly pissed off.

The moment your face hits the pillow, sleep cushions your fall...

Sweat beads down your throat. You were at the height of your capabilities and it felt victorious. Your audience chanting your name and your opposer struggling to get back up. There wasn’t a scratch on you either. This high was absolutely addicting and you couldn’t help yourself. You leaned against the ropes and rose to boast and flex-the crowd going wild. Just as you were asking for more out of the audience there was a gut wrenching pull that brought you back to the middle of the stage.

The lights were suddenly blinding and your opponent looked more fierce than usual. Eyes dark and mouth seething. There was a thin layer muffling the sound of the crowd. Something wasn’t right…

Everything was warped and the corners of your vision were dark. Despite everything feeling slower, your heart was panicking. You duck when the hulking silhouette swings at you and immediately put your fists up, trying to keep your head in the game-or keep your head in general.

It was more of a game of cat and mouse. You kept focusing on dodging and keeping a distance. There was no way in hell you were going to get them beneath you. It was almost like they were growing by the second. You shook your head and tried at throwing a punch at their stomach. Now something definitely wasn’t right. Your arms felt heavy with each hit. It was suffocating and felt like you were being drawn in.

Your opponent had made zero effort to block your punches. The crowd was still muffled, but grew louder. Things were getting darker and darker. The figure in front of you began to grow just as dark before you saw nothing but the white of its eyes as they morphed into something else. It narrowed at you and all you could do was watch as its stomach engulfed your fist.

Something was opening and suddenly there was pain in your stomach that felt closer to the ache of fear. You were being pulled into what felt like your death. Your breathing all but disappeared and your heart was a screaming mess. This was it-this was your last fight-nowhere to run-

Your name brings you crashing to the surface. You’re damn near hyperventilating, but you were just thankful to be able to breathe again. Everything was still dark, but you slowly recognized it as your room.

“Y-you’re in your room, boss-it’s me Rafael...”

You turned to Raf holding his aching nose with one hand while the other was held out to you defensively. He watched your eyes dart left and right as you took your time to calm down. Your body was shaking and sticky from sweat.

“A nightmare…” He tried his best to bring you back from those. You shook your head and grabbed his hand to anchor yourself. “I’m sorry.”, it was what you could muster for now. Apparently your mouth sounded as dry as it felt considering Raf released a hand from his undamaged nose to pass you his half empty bottle of water.

Finishing the bottle, you toss it randomly in the distance. Raf was always awkward at this point and it showed.

“Hungry?” your head motioned ‘no’.

“...TV?” You take a moment, but decide you would rather watch something than try to go back to sleep.

With that he grabs some pain meds from the nightstand and another water bottle before he walks you to the living room to cuddle and enjoy a show or two.

Unfortunately he passes out in the middle of an episode, but you can’t find it in yourself to complain. Quietly, you shimmy out from his tight hold and make your way to the bathroom.

Your sticky body makes you grimace. With how tired you were it was almost a challenge to get everything off. Regardless you make it to the valve of the shower and trigger the showerhead. Heated water pours out and you carefully step in. You relished in the heat and almost doze off. But you got busy and cleansed yourself of your stench.

Half an hour later you were out and drying yourself off before putting on fresh clothing. Something casual considering it was already morning. You throw on some underwear, pants, a nerdy shirt, and your hoodie. Hiding your bruise was the least of your worries. People seemed to mind their own business whether or not you actually hid anything. You decided you would go out and grab some ice to kill time since you weren’t heading back to sleep anytime soon. Dressed and out the door, you put on some tunes on your phone. You tuck your earbuds into your ears and leave the building; heading to a nearby convenience store. The back of your mind is hopeful that Raf rubs your shoulders when you get back.

There was a dangerous moment where you almost walked into a pole, but you made it. Passing through the door you made an invaulatory map of the store. A group of teenages over by the snacks and a women by the coffee makers. You almost missed the brooding man by the freezers as you made your way towards the candy aisle. You grabbed a packet of gum before making your way towards the cashier.

“What?” It was a hushed tone, but your gaze followed the whisper towards the man staring down a bag of tater tots. Suddenly he turned to look at you, but naturally you turned away, whether you were embarrassed of staring or just scared of interaction with someone so sketchy.

You continued your travels, paying for both the gum and the ice. Currently you were struggling with your hold on the ice outside of the store. You winced when you tried to carry it as you usually did. Flashes of your previous fight reminded you that you were still very sore. Sighing, you considered walking back in to ask for a big bag to carry it in.

“Need some help there?” he sounded casual and yet nervous. It was the brooding man with the tater tots. Maybe he was tired.

You couldn’t really give a fuck if he was as dangerous as he looked, at the moment, you were just happy to get some help. You would be more worried if you didn’t know how to defend yourself. “Please?” A relieved sigh left you as he picked up the bag and held it over his shoulder with ease.

“Thanks uh-”

“Eddie.”

“Eddie.”, you mimic.

“And you are...?”, something in you stirred at that, but you ignored it and answered respectively with your name.

“I don’t live too far if that helps.” The least you could do was provide a bit of conversation. You made sure to leave an earbud out so you could hear him. “It’s no problem. I don’t live far either.” You nod in acknowledgement. A small moment of silence follows persistently.

“What’s with the bruise, if you don’t mind me asking?”, his voice makes you jump lightly; not expecting him to ask that question.

Damn, you pretty much forgot about that now that it only hurt to touch. You weren’t about to tell him your nightly activities. Skillfully, you lie through your teeth, “I’m real clumsy. Vertigo acts up out of nowhere sometimes.” you throw in an embarrassed chuckle for affect. Too busy patting yourself on the back you fail to see through his smile that masked how unconvinced he really was.

You eyed the exaggerated amount of tater tots and chocolate he had bought. It didn’t really match his figure. Instead of commenting you simply dig into your pocket and retrieve your pack of gum, pulling out a strip and unwrapping it, “Gum?”, you offered.

He shrugs and lets you feed it to him. His hands were occupied anyways. You smile playfully at the gesture and his awkwardness as he thanks you.

“Anytime.” You finally turn to him as you reach the apartment complex. You mentally groan at the fact that you were about to carry the ice up the stairs to your apartment. With your hands out to him, you gesture towards the ice, “I’m not about to make you go up the stairs with that thing, but thanks for the help, Eddie.”

“It really isn’t a problem, please, I insist.” Somehow that made you smile. You didn’t argue as you would be the same way.

“Any ideas how I could thank you?” If not you could probably throw him a fake ass ‘IOU’. Or maybe just offer him some breakfast.

There was a beat of silence where he made an expression you didn’t have time to read. “You hungry?” smooth.

As if on cue there was a smell seducing the hell out of your senses. Your brother was making french toast. “Yeah, I could eat.” you chuckled, knowing he could smell it too.

You make it to your room just after that and open the door; the aroma amplifying and the sound of sizzling makes your mouth water at the thought of bacon. You hold the door out to Eddie.

“My treat?” You joked as he beamed.

“How generous.”

He set the ice into the freezer and shimmied awkwardly into the scene where he was met with a confused curly-haired man with a spatula in one hand and a plate of food in the other. He appeared to be wearing nothing but boxers and a frilly apron. You were leaning against his shoulder innocently.

“Eddie, this is my brother, Rafael, Raf, this is Eddie.” Following that introduction, you snagged the plate and handed it to Eddie before gesturing to him to sit next to you on the couch in front of the TV. He complies and for a moment or two, the silence was painful. Raf tosses you some chocolate syrup, a small salt shaker of sugar-cinnamon and whipped cream that he threw blindly in the direction of the living room. You had to be quick to catch them, but had a horrifying second in which you had to catch the chocolate syrup from the top of Eddie’s head before it could land on his plate. You sigh an apology, however, Eddie just chuckles a little, surprised and impressed.

“So is bringing home random guys going to be a thing or…?” You could tell your shit-faced brother was smirking from the kitchen as he fixes your plate. Eddie huffs in amusement behind your bickering. You were just thankful that he could break the ice-pun intended.

You debated throwing a spoon at him, “Is you wearing my things going to be a thing or…?” you fired back before gawking at the plate in front of you. He snickers, “Looks better on me.” and belatedly joins you two with a bunch of french toast in his mouth. It appears the newcomer stole his plate regardless of being capable of making another one.

“So are you going to tell us more about yourself, Eddie.” despite his muffled voice, you sensed something suspicious about his question.

Setting down the chocolate syrup he just drowned his french toast in, he clears his throat, “I’m a journalist, I write articles for the-” Rafael burps shamelessly, “Daily Globe…” Eddie smiles, obviously trying to be polite. He takes a forkful of his breakfast as Raf opens his mouth again, “Oh you’re the guy that did the Eddie Brock show, huh?”

“The Eddie Brock Report, yeah,”, he corrects, “that was me.” Another forkful just a beat later.

“Thats cool-”, you tried to offer before your brother decided to butt in again, “-Yeah real cool. Didn’t that show get cancelled?” Eddie was visibly uncomfortable and evidently irritated which struck a chord with you.

Although it seemed like Eddie had plenty to say in response to that, you slam your hand on the table to take the attention off of him, “Hey, Raffie!” You gave him a quick stare that only the two of you could decipher as ‘We’re going to have a fucking talk later’. “Mind making me some more bacon, please?”

It was more of an excuse to keep him out of the conversation for the most part. Raf rolls his eyes before taking the hint. You took the moment to pat Eddie on the shoulder apologetically. He seemed to understand the gesture as he nods in acknowledgement.

With a defeated sigh you take a break from questions, “Cool jacket.” He looks down as if he forgot he even had it on.

“Thanks. Your hoodies nice.” He was totally just being nice. Your hoodie was ancient. You didn’t comment though, “Thanks, you’re too kind.”

“I aim to please.”

“Naturally. You lift or...?” You poke at the bulk in his bicep through the aforementioned jacket.

“Oh uh yeah,” He removes his jacket to smirk and bulge his arms beneath your touch, “Working out ‘s been helping me through somethings actually.”

Snorting, you remove your hoodie to flex the muscle you were hiding beneath the fabric.

“I kind of do too… in a way.” It was almost second nature for you to try to compete.

“Oh damn-”

“Bacon’s done, boss, I’m going to take a shit-”

‘Ever so charming…’

Raf swiftly abandons the kitchen leaving a concerned Eddie with an unamused kin. You hang your head. Just as you were getting to the flow of a conversation.

“Is he going to be alright?” There was something in his voice that sounded like concern, but closer to relief. You didn’t blame him as you were just the same.

“Yeah…” You look down at his empty plate and the pile of bacon you weren’t really going to eat.

With a wavering sigh, you gesture to the bacon, “Want the rest?”

You were already grabbing the tubbawear when he answered, “Sure…”

There was a selfish part of you that didn’t want to kick him out, but you compromised by taking a sharpie and writing your number on the side of the container with a small smiley face next to a subtle ‘text me’. Once you hand it to him he glances at the message on the tubbawear before looking back at you.

“You should probably head out. I’m really sorry about Raf, but uh,” you were suddenly nervous, “I hope we can try this again sometime…”

You just met the man, but the guilt decided that you should try to make it up to him anyways. That and maybe the fact that you’ve been in a bit of a dry spell and this man certainly looked appetizing. You mentally slap yourself.

He sent his gaze towards the direction Rafael had left before returning to meet your hopeful eyes. It seemed he was throwing you a bone, “Sure, I’d love to try this again. Maybe not here though…”

“Yeah, totally uh we’ll figure something out.” wow, could you have sounded any more awkward and desperate? Regardless, there was a snarky comment here and there before you actually got him out the door. You pressed your head against the door as guilt hit you like a truck. It almost made you want to scream. You try to calm yourself down before you go say something stupid to Raf.

Look, your face? Isn’t very pretty after that last fight. You’re still a little cut up and that bruise looks like near-death! Someone actually took a little interest in you this morning. Not to mention, he didn’t look too bad! Bed head, five o'clock shadow, and all! That jawline was something nobody could miss…

You doubt he would have been so nervous if a ‘certain someone’ hadn’t been there. Raf never usually acted like this anyways.

You sigh through your nose before pulling off your shirt and pushing yourself to face your unbearable brother. The heater was on in your room and with the conversation you were about to have, you were not in the mood to feel suffocated. When you see him he is face down on the bed, brooding. With a roll of your eyes, you sit next to him and pat his back. You try to sound sweet, but it comes out a little irritated, “Raffie?”

No answer.

“Want to talk about your little break down earlier?”

A muffled protest.

You groan, “Raf stop being a little girl…”, using whatever force you could muster, you push him onto his back to look at you. Much to your displeasure, your arms were still sore so you only managed to get him on his side. If not for the soreness you could certainly bench press him. Raf blinks at you with brown-hazel eyes in what you hope is guilt.

“Raf, please tell me why you freaked out on Eddie like that?” Your voice was tired, but seemed to finally get him to speak.

“You don’t even know him…” His eyes narrow.

“And you think you do? You never even watched his show. The hell did you embarrass me like that for?”

He scoffs.

“Is this about Jessie?”

Raf answers your suspicions when he avoids your gaze. You demonstrate your disappointment in a stern voice, “Raf, that shit was a long time ago. I’ve moved on from it and you shouldn’t even-”

“Yeah and I get that you won’t change your mind-I promise I fuckin do, but-”

“Do you really ‘cause I’m tired of you bringing it up.” It was practically hissed at him.

“Alright-alright you know what? It’s whatever at this point, right? I won’t bring it up anymore, but like I’m just sayin’ I’m tired of you being stubborn n’ shit when it shouldn’t even have to be a problem! And I mean I don’t want to drag you into things you don’t want to do, but I just feel like we could be like how we were back then when we were doing crazy shit together you ‘member? I miss that! We-”

“I don’t care about that shit anymore-I’m doing my own thing, Raf, you shouldn’t be caring this much about this anymore.”

“Yeah well you shouldn’t be wanting to fuck random motherfuckers off the stree-” Your hand stung and Rafael held the side of his head. You couldn’t tell apart any emotion that was flowing through him at this point.

“I’m old enough to make these decisions, Raf.”

“Sure don’t act like it.” That made your blood boil.

“Says the one crying like a little bitch the moment I want some closeness,” Rafael opens his mouth to speak, but you quickly shut him up, “Grow the fuck up cause I’m not about to stand here while you talk me down like I’m a fucking dumbass.” Your voice wavers in strength.

You refuse to give him the chance to respond to that, figuring the power in you was beginning to grow too sensitive by the second. As you leave the room you’re sure to slam the door shut. Before you could break you grab your hoodie and your phone off of the counter and rush out the door. Looking down at the notification made your chest sting, but managed to cheer you up enough to smile thankfully. It was an unknown number, but you knew who it was regardless.

[:Hey, holding up okay?]

A huff leaves your worn figure before you text back a small ‘yeah, what’s up?’ before adding him to your contacts and trugging out of the complex for a walk.

Maybe it would calm your nerves and distract you from feeling watched.

[goofballproximitysurveyor]

society if eat beat dead spike san did not make me dizzy even when turning the spinning background setting off

[gear-project]

Do you think that there should be a Guilty Gear rhythm game in the same vein as Theatrhythm Final Fantasy, Rudymical, or ArcSys' own Eat Beat: Dead Spike-san?

They’ve already provided guest music in the DJ Max games, so I doubt it would be something they’d do.  Ishiwatari would be more inclined to do something for Rockband or Guitar Hero, probably.

Unlike Mori, Ishiwatari tends to be very technical and close-to-the-chest with his creations.

So even the fact Guilty Gear is collaborating with Samurai Shodown is a rare event.

[crackimagines]

The New Professor (FE: Three Houses Short Fic)

Konosuba / School-Live! AU

CONTAINS School-Live! (Gakkou Gurashi) anime spoilers!

A new visitor arrives to Garreg Mach, causing a commotion among the population.

Byleth, Kazuma, and Aqua are sent to investigate who the new visitor is.

----

(Byleth) sigh

(Aqua) “Come on, tell me I’m right!”

(Kazuma) “Okay, you’re goddamn stupid.”

(Aqua) “Shut up, NEET!”

(Kazuma) “Stop calling me a NEET you bitch!”

(Sothis) “Ugh, what are they complaining about now?”

(Byleth) “Apparently something about the amiibo gazebo being part of a greater power than you or anything here...”

(Sothis) “And that’s why they’re throwing profanity around?”

(Aqua) “Listen, this is a serious discussion!”

(Kazuma) “One that you’re completely wrong about!”

Byleth shook his head. He was starting to regret asking them to lunch. 

Before he could continue eating, Alois ran up to his table.

(Alois) “Ah, there you are Byleth!”

(Byleth) “Alois, what’s wrong?”

(Alois) “We just found a woman unconscious near the classrooms!”

(Byleth) “What?!”

(Kazuma) “Wait, why are you telling him this, isn’t this stuff left to the knights?”

(Alois) “Well the thing is, we don’t know where she came from, or who she is. I daresay she’s not even from Fodlan!”

(Aqua) “Wait, like as in completely foreign country or?”

(Alois) “As in, completely otherwordly! Actually, her clothing reminds me a bit of yours, Kazuma!”

Kazuma’s eyes widened and turned to Aqua.

(Kazuma) “Hold up a sec, you think she could be...?”

(Aqua) “Only one way to find out! Byleth, we’re coming with you!”

Byleth nodded and the three of them followed Alois to the classrooms. 

...

...

----

SLAM!

Megumi shut the door behind her as hard as she could, making sure it couldn’t be open from the other side.

(???) “Let me go!”

(??? 2) Yuki-chan, stop it!”

(???) “Megu-nee’s still outside! We have to hurry!”

(??? 3) “It’s too late!”

(??? 2) “WAIT!”

(???) “Megu-nee! MEGU-NEEEEE!”

...

...

(??? 1) “Shit, she looks beat up bad!”

(??? 2) “There’s blood everywhere, what happened to her?!”

(??? 3) “You guys didn’t try to get a healer first?”

(??? 4) “We tried! There’s something in her arm that’s spreading and we can’t stop it!”

(??? 1) “Aqua!”

(??? 2) “On it! Oh no...From what I’m seeing in her injuries, it’s like some zombie infection!”

(??? 3) “Wait, what’s a zombie?”

(??? 1) “God damn, what the hell?! Tch, nevermind, questions later! We gotta use Turn Undead!”

(??? 2) “Wait, that’s going to hurt her!”

(??? 1) “Aqua, it doesn’t look like she’s fully infected yet, so maybe it can stop it before it spreads! We gotta do SOMETHING!”

(??? 1) “Damn, TURN UNDEAD!”

Megumi could only hear the voices faintly, but it started to grow louder as she felt a sharp pain in her arm that quickly went away.

(??? 2) “Alright, she’s stabilizing.”

Megumi opened her eyes slowly, the light blinding her from the windows.

(Megumi) “H-Huh...?”

(Kazuma) “H-Hey, she’s waking up!”

She looked up and saw three people she’s never seen before, wearing what seemed to be medieval European clothing.

(Byleth) “I see you’re awake now.”

(Aqua) “Hey there!”

(Kazuma) “Better places to pass out than on the ground, ya know!”

(Megumi) “Where...am I?”

...

(Byleth) “Yes, we know Sothis. We’ll try to explain it in basic terms.”

(Megumi) ?

(Kazuma) “Well...put simply, you’re in a school.”

The word school echoed through her mind. Megumi’s heartbeat suddenly spiked as she almost jumped to her feet, looking behind her frantically.

(Megumi) “YUKI-CHAN!”

When she spun around, she only saw Alois and a few of the Monastery’s classrooms.

(Alois) “T-Take it easy ma’am! We know you’re confused but!”

Megumi’s breathing was out of control, her head jerking back and forth trying to find anything familiar. 

But to no avail.

(Megumi) “YUKI! KURUMI! RII-SAN! ANYONE?!”

(Byleth) “Miss, please, calm down!”

Kazuma grabbed the shoulders of the woman and kept her still.

(Kazuma) “Take a deep breath, alright?!”

Megumi eventually stopped shaking as she took in more of her surroundings. It was clear she wasn’t at the school anymore but...

With a deep exhale, she finally calmed down.

(Megumi) “I-I’m sorry...I-I don’t know where I am.”

(Byleth) “What’s your name?”

(Megumi) “My name...My name is Megumi Sakura. I’m a teacher at Megurigaoka Private High School.”

(Aqua) “That sounds a lot like...”

(Kazuma) “Japanese.”

(Aqua) “This is a weird question to ask but...Are you from Japan?”

(Megumi) “Yes, I am?”

Kazuma took a little comfort in that. He now wasn’t the only person thrown to this world from Earth.

(Kazuma) “Well...how do I put this? You’re not in Japan anymore, you’re pretty much in the same boat I am. We’re in a country called Fodlan.”

(Megumi) “Where is that?”

(Kazuma) “It doesn’t exist back on our world, Miss Sakura. We’re basically in a Fantasy Europe with straight up magic, dragons, all that crazy bullshit.”

(Megumi) “But...what happened to our world? My students?”

(Kazuma) “Um...I’m not sure. I didn’t come from YOUR world, per se. My world was in peace while yours seemed to be...uh...”

(Megumi) “I see...”

Megumi’s heart sank. She just happened to be unlucky enough to be in a world where crisis struck them instead of having a normal life like Kazuma.

(Aqua) “I’m sure you must have a million questions, but you need some rest! Here, follow me and I’ll try to answer anything you might ask on the way.”

(Megumi) “B-But...”

Sighing, Megumi followed Aqua to her room.

(Alois) “From another world? First you and your friends Kazuma, now her! What a crazy time to live in! Poor thing must be so confused if she’s shouting for her students like that...”

Kazuma couldn’t help but shiver at that. He couldn’t imagine coming to a brand new world completely alone. He was lucky to have others with him here. At the very least, he had some semblance of a fantasy world, Megumi must be feeling as if she were on another planet.

Which in some sense, she was.

(Kazuma) “Hey uh...she said she was a teacher, right?”

(Byleth) “Yeah, of some private school.”

(Kazuma) “Do...Do you think she could teach alongside you, professor?”

(Byleth) “What?”

(Kazuma) “Well, if the church throws her ass to the curb, she’s going to be completely lost! She doesn’t understand a world like yours in the slightest.”

Byleth looked at Megumi and nodded.

(Byleth) “I’ll talk to Rhea about it.”

...

After a few days of getting settled in and recovering, Megumi began to explore the Monastery with Kazuma and his gang.

(Aqua) “The Monastery is more of a military academy than a normal school.”

(Kazuma) “Yeah, Garreg Mach Monastery, or The Officer’s Academy, is the full name of this place.”

(Darkness) “Many people are aspiring to be a knight here. That is my goal. Well, being stuck here anyway.”

(Megumin) “My goal is to make a name for the Crimson Demon, and no matter the world we’re thrown into, that shall always be my top priority!”

(Megumi) “I had no idea other people could be thrown into worlds so casually...A-And what about God and?”

(Aqua) “Well you see I’m-”

Kazuma elbowed Aqua, shaking his head.

(Kazuma) “The poor woman’s going to be more confused, alright?! Just keep that to yourself for now!”

(Aqua) “Jerk!”

(Megumi) “Oh by the way, where is that blue haired man?”

(Kazuma) “Oh, professor Byleth? I’m not sure, honestly. I asked him to talk to the head honcho here of letting you teach here.”

(Megumi) “Huh?! B-But, I don’t know how to fight!”

(Aqua) “That’s fine! There’s still stuff like math here!”

(Darkness) “It’s just something to help you fit in. We don’t want you getting thrown out while you have no idea what’s happening.”

(Megumin) “Besides, I’m sure you’ll love the students here!”

(Claude’s Voice) “Well, probably just me.”

Claude, Dimitri, and Edelgard walked up to the group and noticed Megumi.

(Dimitri) “Ah, so you’re that new teacher that has been causing quite a stir! I am Dimitri, House leader of the Blue Lions.”

(Edelgard) “My name is Edelgard, and I am the House Leader of the Black Eagles.”

(Claude) “Claude, Golden Deer. Nice to meet ya!”

(Megumi) “T-Thank you! My name is Megumi Sakura...I-I’m sorry, did you say new teacher?”

(Edelgard) “Why yes. We’ve been informed that Byleth has an assistant who will be helping teach the three houses.”

(Megumi) “HUH?! W-WHY DID NO ONE ASK ME FIRST?!”

(Dimitri) “Hah, are you getting cold feet Professor Sakura?”

(Megumi) “...Professor Sakura...”

She smiled a little, blushing at the name.

(Megumi) “Well, at least someone’s finally referring to me as my proper teacher name.”

(Edelgard) “What did people usually refer to you as?”

(Megumi) “Megu-nee.”

(Aqua) “Aw, that’s actually kinda cute!”

(Megumi) “It’s not befitting of a teacher!”

(Claude) “Megu-nee..Hah, I like that sound of that a bit better honestly!”

(Edelgard) “Megun-nee. It does have a nice ring to it.”

(Dimitri) “Well, Megu-nee, we’ll be seeing you soon! We just wanted to say hello.”

(Claude) “Be seein’ ya around!”

(Megumi) “D-DON’T CALL ME MEGU-NEE! IT’S...ah...”

Everyone else laughed at her embarassment, but Kazuma put a hand on her shoulder.

(Kazuma) “You’ll fit right in, Megu-nee! Those three will put in a good word for ya! Byleth will be too, no doubt!”

Everyone gave her an encouraging smile.

(Darkness) “Please, if you need us for anything do not hesitate to ask for help.”

(Megumi) “...”

A part of her was going to miss her students so dearly. Yuki, Kurumi, and Yuuri would be alone without her, missing her and thinking that she was dead. She wanted to tell them that she was alive and well thanks to the help of everyone here so far but...

Megumi knew that was going to be a long time before that happened.

With the help of everyone here, she knew the road was going to be a lot less lonely than she thought. 

(Megumi) “I never could’ve anticipated that this was where my life was going to go once I thought I was dead but...I won’t waste this second chance you’ve given me, so for that I will do my best to repay it and continue teaching!”

(Byleth) “We’re happy to hear it.”

Byleth smiled at her as he walked over, extending his hand.

(Byleth) “Welcome to the family, Megumi.”

She hesitated before giving her hand, but she took Byleth’s hand and shook it firmly.

(Byleth) “Come on, the rest of the staff wants to meet you.”

(Megumi) “R-Right!”

(Kazuma) “Good luck, Megu-nee!”

She spun around quickly and pouted.

“Kazuma, don’t call me Megu-nee! It’s Professor Sakura!”

Unfortunately for her, no one would heed her wishes to be called that.

Everyone greeted their new professor, Megu-nee.

---

[Indirect Sequel: Megumi Sakura as a Professor AU]

[theliterarywolf]

eat beat dead spike san is a pretty good rhythym game from the land of blazblue

I did look this one up and, I don’t know, something about it isn’t catching me despite it bearing the Blazblue license. 

[konohagakurekakashi]

Rinne-Whoops: Who Died and Brought You Back Out?

Don’t  even ask--Post continued from here

@minaa-munch

@senjutsunade

“Inōichi-senpai?” Izumo murmured as all four shinobi continued to stare at the Kage in contemplation, afore Kakashi nodded (in answer to both Izumo and his yellow-haired, former Sensei) the arm, rubbing at the nape of his neck venturing further upward to tug his forehead protector back into place over his left eyelid. “Hai, he will be the most qualified to help with, Yondaime-sama’s muddled memories.” The Iryō-nin whom had her palms clasped in front of her chest agreed with him in a low hum, dark hues shifting from the slumped Fire Shadow towards the Jōnin. Kotetsu seemed less convinced however, sharing a brief glance with his partner, before his digits came to rest on the juts of his hips. “Demo…would it be wise…to let someone from the Intelligence and Interrogation unit know…won’t they…catechize him, Kakashi-senpai? I get that we can’t exactly keep this type of thing a secret, but maybe just until Tsunade-sama wakes up? I mean…He already seems to be in pain…” The Chūnin trailed off lamely, his own orbs flittering over the shambolic cavern, the edge of his sandal toeing at a scroll fragment.

“…That is exactly why we need to enlist Inōichi-san’s help.”  Kotetsu blinked, looking up to find the Hatake had yet to sever his gaze with the cerulean-eyed Shinobi. “It is as you said, we can’t keep this type of thing secret for long, but we can govern who gets to know of this /first/. Inōichi-san is a loyal shinobi, an avid believer in the Third’s Will of Fire…but he was also a good friend of the Yondaime. I don’t believe catechizing an old comrade would be something Inōichi would do right off the bat.” It was then that the Hatake shifted, a begloved palm landing heavily on the Chūnin’s shoulder. “…If he sorts through Lord Fourth’s memories and ends up putting them back into the right order, I doubt an official interrogation will be necessary. You both did good bringing me here, demo, you can leave now…” His single, visible hue curved in what he hoped to be a show of ‘encouragement’, before he let the other go, deft fingers coiling into the familiar signs of the Tiger Seal. “M-Matte, Kakashi-senpai! What do you mean? You can’t expect us to just do nothing.” Kakashi in turn cocked his head to the side as if ruminating over the other man’s words, mouth twitching underneath the fabric of his mask, though not enough to be considered as a smile.

“Iie…I never suggested that…Domo, a lot of time has passed. The two of you should return to Shizune, though stop by the Ikayaki tent on your way; maybe consider a side-order of fried rice, brown. When Shizune asks for Tsunade-sama’s files just confirm that you met me half-way and that I offered to get it in your place, as I was already on my way to the outer-rim. My chakra imprint is all over this cavern, but yours aren’t. Plus I’d be willing to wager my signed copies of Jiraiya-sama’s special anniversary addition of Icha Icha Paradise that neither Shizune nor Sakura have left Tsunade-sama’s side to eat something decent since she’s collapsed. Nothing quells ire or an array of unwelcomed questions quite like a nice, warm meal…ne?”

Kakashi’s leaden gaze flittered towards the Kunōichi. “As for Hakui-san…It’s best that you return to the medical tent before you’re missed. With skills like yours and with construction accidents on the rise, I’m certain that your chakra will be needed to do a lot more good.” Kakashi then proceeded to mould his own chakra, the mauve energies, bubbling and pitching, before divvying into half—an exact clone appearing at his side amidst a puff of smoke. “It’s a hassle…but my Raitōn Clone will look for the Godaime’s papers while I’ll make sure Minato-sensei gets to the Yamanaka Compound…luckily it’s not far from here…That’s the plan for now at least. I don’t need to stress that neither one of you were here. At all. Yes?”

The Chūnin chorused their accord, before slowly meandering their way toward the corridor, unable to find fault with the Jōnin’s nippy reasoning. Only Izumo hesitated for a beat longer, his visible hue skimming over the mess of wood-chips and paper. “Not gonna lie, Senpai, I feel bad about leaving you to deal with the dirty work, even just your clone…” Kakashi gave an evasive wave of his palm, sucking in a long, impassive breath. “..It’s fine…It’s fine…Though I could use your bandana…bandana yes…give it here, Izumo.” Izumo’s dark orb blinked, digits rising to fumble with the navy material, but found nothing but a mess of chocolaty strands as the Jōnin already nicked the accessory from off his head, shoving the man towards the corridor at the same time. “Arigato, Izumo-kun, your sacrifice was a very noble one, best not keep Shizune waiting any longer. Bye-bye.”

Turing on his heel Kakashi inclined his covered chin at his clone to get him to work, before his gaze settled on the form of the Kage once more. For the first time the two of them found themselves alone, Kakashi’s gaze assuaging at the soft echoes of ‘please’ and the sheer helplessness cleaving to the Kage’s form like a second shroud. Not wanting the man to suffer from the onslaught of his own thoughts and memories any longer, the Hatake moved to crouch in front of the rock lip. “I’m not ‘gonna put you under, Minato-sensei…but I am going get you some help….Just…” The Jōnin paused to peer at the pallid, pained features of the Yellow Flash, before he leaned forward to hide the distinguishing, yellow spikes with the Chūnin’s pilfered bandana, careful not to rub against the red, inflamed scrapes and nail indents visible along the sides of his temple. “….Trust me?” The Jōnin then lifted the Kage’s arm, wounding it about his neck, while his own limb curled about the man’s middle, heaving him upward and out of his sarcophagi.

Moving the former Leader was far from an easy task, the man practically a dead-weight, slanted into Kakashi’s side and still wrecked with uneven breaths and the occasional cough. But Kakashi expected as much as he maneuverer the both of them through the chamber towards the passageway the others disappeared through prior. The plus side was that they met no resistance along the snaking, narrow warren; nor did the Jōnin feel the flecks of any prying chakra signatures. Years of experience advised that in itself wasn’t enough of an indicator that they weren’t being watched and/or followed, so Kakashi remained alert, muscles starting to twinge with how tense he held himself—and as the dimness began to lift, the faint tinges of afternoon sunlight signalling the exit up ahead, Kakashi adjusted his hold on his former mentor, before urging forward once more, pace perpetually slow.

“The Exit is up ahead, it seems to be late afternoon still, so you might want to…shield your eyes.”

Kakashi didn’t check to see if Minato complied by fluttering his lids closed, choosing instead to alter his intent stare down the rough iron steps and into the crater where everyone was still bustling along like little, carpenter ants. Any minute now people would start to pack up their tools and wander towards their respective tents, the barracks, their homes; increasing the chances of being spotted by a weary individual or two (not to mention the receptive ANBU Platoons, as Kakashi has it on good authority that Ibiki upped the patrol roster in lieu of the Pain attack) As such Kakashi called on his chakra reserves (those violet swirls not tasked with keeping his clone within this plain of existence) to haul both of their forms from the Hokage Mountain in a concise body flicker to appear once more at the foot of the steps.

Sure, it might not be the best tactic when supporting a severely /disoriented/ resurrected, but the Hatake reasoned that cleaning chunky spew from his flak-jacket and standard-issue blues, would heavily outweigh the panic and outright bothersome questions he might have to consider answers for /if they were caught/ not to mention the datum of time, time which they did not have. The silver-haired shinobi could not put his finger on it, but there was a nagging feeling at the back of Kakashi’s skull that caused him to constantly shoot a narrowed hue over the swell of his shoulder. A feeling like he failed to take something important into account, that he /missed/ something, though re-examining his chosen actions thus far failed to provide further elucidations. It only urged the Jōnin forwards that much faster and placed a heavy hope on the shoulders of his Raitōn clone. Kakashi hoped that he would be thorough whereas Kakashi was heedless.

They made their way passed the off-turn which lead toward the Hattori Clan Ruins, the towering Hashirama and Ginkō trees passing by in blurs and blotches of green and brown, a tell-tale that they reached the boundary leading into the Nara Clan Forest. If Kakashi wasn’t certain that Shikakū was still in the presence of the old war-mongerer; he might have consider cutting through the deer forest towards its compound neighbour, but as the current Head was still indisposed, the Jōnin thought better of chancing his luck via trespassing. The two shinobi continued to travel along the borderline, Kakashi stopping only twice (once to avoid two Akimichi huddled around a cluster of brightly coloured mushrooms, the second to avoid the kids who were once Kurenai’s Genin team) afore they finally made it to the outskirts of the Yamanaka Clan Compound. The clan dwelling was the most centred of all of the Konohagakure Clans, a fact evident in the vast amounts of dirt and debris littering what used to be fields of wild Lavender and Tiger Lilies, the depository houses the Hatake knew to have contained many herbs and flowers of all shapes and usages, all but destroyed.

As Kami would have it, the main estate seemed to be mostly intact, save for a few missing roof-tiles and the windows on the west side of the house that were replaced by a see-through, green tarp. Kakashi ambled forward, praying that the elder Jōnin was home and in a particularly benevolent mood, while his digits flexed against his mentor’s side. Despite being an active shinobi since the tender age of five (many of said years spent within the sombre underbelly of the ANBU) Kakashi only ever worked with the Head of the Yamanaka clan once or twice where a mind-probe proved an ineffective interrogation method thanks to tricky conscious seals and the Sharingan was required as an alternative. As such Kakashi wasn’t as versed in the Clan Head’s habits and methods as he was in the ways of the man’s two teammates. Yet the Yondaime’s laboured breaths urged him to swallow any uncertainties (those he never dared voice to the three Chūnin) as soon as it dared to flicker into existence.

‘Maa, a shinobi should never second guess his actions, huh.’

The Hatake found himself uttering with some amount of discontentment, while calloused fingers rose to rap twice against the door. It took a moment, but soon Kakashi’s ears picked up the steady thuds of feet and the door opened to reveal a tired Ino still smudged with the sweat and grime of a hard day’s work. Periwinkle orbs widened as they fixed upon Kakashi’s hunched form, before they shifted briskly towards the other shinobi slumped against the Jōnin's side, his chin dipped toward his chest and obscuring any features from the girl’s keen inspection.

“Aa…Ino…Is your Tou-san home? I would really like to speak to him, it’s a bit of an emergency, you see…”

[hoodie-lover]

My Multiverse Ask Event! #3

“UT sans why do you refuse to fight the human until they are level 19 in genocide route?”

“Because it is the only time it matters. Any other time I don’t have to worry about the world ending. If you were trapped in a world where nothing, almost nothing, you do matters, why do something that doesn’t matter? And I must say, the look on their face when I launched my first attack, and their faces afterwards, were worth it.” Sans said, smiling at the memory of their shocked face.

“Flowey if the human genocides you are aware they won't hesitate to kill you right? ps why not just pop up from the ground in the room with the human souls and take them?”

“I know. But I like watching everyone die, it’s funny as they try to stop an unstoppable threat, how they sacrifice themselves and whatnot. And if the human can beat Sans, Undyne, and slaughter almost every monster of all, why would the souls be able to do anything? Sure I could flee, but I am the Prince of the Underground, I’m going down with my ship.” Flowey said, his face appearing to be a mix of Asriel and his own before morphing back as he chuckled a sinister giggle.

“Frisk so your saying that your next reset will be a genocide if so is it because your possesses by chara or because your a bad person. ps if your possesed by chara during genocide why kill flowey knowing he is asriel? pps do you even make it to the surface after genocide?” “Chara is only there to make me remember my crimes, kill Asgore, and Flowey. And I’m not really a bad person per say, I’m just a kid having fun! And why would I return to the surface? The Underground is more fun. Asriel is dead, Flowey is someone new, and Flowey is pathetic.” Frisk said, smiling. “To all skeletons when you eat food where does it go? do you even have a stomach?” “We only eat magic-based foods so it is instantly absorbed. It just disperses and helps heal and stuff.” Papyrus said, making hand gestures to help explain it. “Error, when are you guys going to start looking for who Error once was? We can help! We know multiple versions of Error and many versions of his backstory to draw reference from. I'd start with G̵͈͇̙͖̰͇̠̥̱͍̅̿͌̀̋̄͛̇̽̒̄̿̄̑̈́̾͊̔̉̄͒̕ȩ̸̛̠̗͓̗̃̈́̏́͆̓̃̅̎͊̾̃̐͐̍̍͘͜n̸̢̢̛̲̬͎̱̘͍͎̗̯̘̭͉̦̓͗̓̓͂̀̈́̀͜͠͝͝ơ̵̢̗̼̳̥̞̱̺̭̠̅̐̐̾̽͋̋͐́̍͊̈́̈́͘͠. Trust me.” “What? We didn’t hear what you said.” Error stated, sipping some hot chocolate. Mini marshmallows danced on the surface. “Well, since you apparently can’t say who to start with, I guess we have no where to start from.” “How about we look at the timelines? Talk to the voices and see how long Error was there and what timelines had separated before and after then.” Horror said and Nightmare shrugged. “Sure.” In the Creator Realm, Maxie, Zack, Beatrice, Jana, and Jack were listening. “We all know it’s Geno right?” Maxie said and they nodded. “How about we drag this out? Make them suffer!” Jack said, and for once, Zack agreed. “It would be funny, just as long as they learn the truth eventually.” Zack said, earning a sadistic grin from Maxie. “Yay! I wonder if we can get some help in leading them astray?” Maxie said, calling over to the group asking the questions. “Wanna help us drag this out?” She asked. “UT sans when are you going to tell papyrus about resets?” “I already know. Though I have asked Sans the same question many many times.” Papyrus said, giving Sans a dirty look. Sans had come back from his sentry station for lunch. “You’d forget! Just because you know doesn’t mean you’ll remember. I’d figured out it was possible while looking through scans and other old work I look through every day. Plus knowledge of the multiverse helps.” Sans said, “I actually did tell you once, but it crushed your spirit. I didn’t want you to lose what made you, you. and I had a support group so I wasn’t handling it alone like I used to.” Sans said, Papyrus sighed in response. “UT sans how do you manage to put 29 hot dogs on a person's head and why not 30 hot dogs?” “Why not 28?” Sans said, and Papyrus groaned. “Ok ok I think we have embarrassed the boys enough, for now.... Dream any stories from your brothers past he would rather his boys not know about?” “YES!” Dream cried out and Nightmare tried to silence his brother, but he was tackled, bound, and gagged on the ground before he could make a sound. Everyone listened to Dream intently. “Nightmare, in the early days of our village’s founding, had a girlfriend.” Dream said, Nightmare thrashed on the ground as everyone gasped “Who?” Cross asked, eyes wide as he heard Chara snicker and make faces at Nightmare. “I don’t remember her, we didn’t really talk all that much, but what I do know is that,” Dream donned the smuggest and most evil smirk as he gave his brother a wicked glance, a twisted smile on his face. “Nightmare, lost his virginity to her.” Dream said and everyone went nuts. “Did he top?” Horror asked, and Killer laughed. “Was she a virgin too?” Dust cried out, looking at his struggling father. “She wasn’t, and I think he bottomed based on what he told me.” Dream said, genuinely puzzled. “So, how old were you?” Error asked, Dream thought about it. “We didn’t know at the time, as far as we’re aware, right now, we’re about 1200 years old, and the village was around for about 1,000 years, but she was about a young adult, maybe 20 or so.” Dream said, looking at his brother for confirmation. Tears were streaming down Nightmare’s face and Dream took pity on his sibling. “There, there, I only have one more to tell.” Dream said, picking up Nightmare and placing him on his lap as he cuddled him. “What’s the story?” Fresh asked, he was mostly silent but he was curious. “Nightmare’s first time drunk.” Dream said, and Nightmare froze as he tried to run away. “Nope.” Dream said, keeping Nightmare in place easily. “One day, I was given a present by someone, I don’t remember who they were. Nightmare girlfriend, Lily was her name, had long passed away by this point. They broke up but remained friends. It was a bottle of whisky, hardcore whisky.” Dream said, “Like Blue’s signature drink spiker.” Dream said and Blue gasped. “I do not spike drinks!” Blue said, huffing. “Sure.” Dream said, rolling his eyes as he continued. “Anyway, I wanted to share the gift with Nightmare, as I always did. I even broke apart, remade and regifted presents I recieved to Nightmare to make him feel better. So we drank the entire thing, Nightmare having most of it.” Dream said, clearly embarrassed. “If we had known, that night would have ended differently.” Dream told them. “Nightmare ended up singing a random song at the top of his lungs at the top of the tree. I was about to pass out most of the time. We never got drunk again, the hangover was bad.” “Ok back to embarrassing the boys, on a scale of 1 to 10 how cute is Error? this is for anyone that wants to weigh in on the Error cuteness scale. Also does he have glasses in this multi-verse and do they up his cuteness? Sorry Error you are my favorite!” “10.” Everyone said they had by this point released Nightmare. “I do have glasses, Nightmare gave them to me soon after they learned how bad my eyesight was, but I began to wear contacts when I started fighting with them.” Error said. “They were bigger and red versions of Harry Potter’s glasses, and they increase his cuteness to a solid twenty-six out of ten.” Cross said, smiling as Error blushed. “Oh I saw someone else mention how we know of many different Errors. I gotta say most of the Errors I have seen have been tortured horribly and are left in a pretty bad state. Are you sure you want to know where you came from? You can't ever go back to what you were before, and I don't want you to get hurt Error.” “I know. But, I want to know my story, I know I can’t go back, I know I have a Papyrus, Toriel, Alphys, Undyne, and all. But I never thought about it, and with the revelation that I’m an alternate timeline, I can dive a bit deeper. I know these people, and Killer, Horror, and Dust can help me. They know what it’s like.” Error said, “And I’m not asking to know about what you have put other me’s through, I can infer what you’ve done to them.” Error said, glaring. “Frisk, what do you think about the humans from other AU?s” “AUs? Do you mean, alternate universes? I was involved with many fandoms, so I know the term. Papyrus broke script last time, and Sans was acting odd a few years ago. Interesting. I must thank you, if I’m right, then I might be able to see my own handiwork again.” Frisk said. “Frisk, have you encountered Gaster yet? ps do you even know who Gaster is?” “I know who he is. Though he always disappears before I can say a word to him.” “Stretch, my tall orange jerk. How did you take the news that not only did Ink lie when he said the dark sanses took blue, but Ink was actually the one to take him and do some pretty bad things to our sweet little blueberry? What about when Ink had Dream hurt blue to keep him crashing? And how are taking Blue being more like Error now?” “I was mad, I wanted to kill him with my own hands. I let myself be fooled, and I can’t even blame myself half the time! I was just so powerless. I’m glad he’s dead.” Stretch said, grumbling as he blew out a puff of smoke. “I was ready to dust Dream right then and there, but Blue held me back. And the yellow squirt’s apology was overwhelming. I could barely go a day without a text or in-person apology, and when he finally earned my lack of distrust, we haven’t talked since aside from the occasional ‘hello’. And Blue had it worse.” “It took awhile for me to get used to Blue’s glitching. Sometimes he crashed and rebooted, those were scary and they still are. Error helped Blue and I adjust, helping us figure out Blue’s glitching triggers. Stress being a big one. I’m grateful for his help, though I may not like him.” Stretch said, lighting another cigarette. “And now the most important question ever asked... Who wants to join the Error protection squad? I'll make badges!” “ME!” Blue cried out, eyes glowing big and blue as he smiled. “Don’t forget about us!” Cross said and Error sighed as he buried himself in his outfit as everyone announced how they would join. “It’s ok Error. I’d defend you, but I don’t need a badge.” Dream said and Error smiled, he was glad his family would defend him. He felt safe, and he felt loved. “What is the worst timeline or version of this universe any of you have ever experienced? I mean, this is a multiverse. What are the darkest reaches of it?” “Aside from our own personal trauma, I think it was one of those torture AUs.” Nightmare said, and Cross snapped his fingers, realizing what Nightmare meant. “Yeah, where the people exist only to be beaten and broken, no hope, no dreams, no reason and will to live. There’s also HorrorLustFell.” Cross said and everyone shuddered. “‘Nough said.” Dust announced and everyone nodded. “Frisk you know a genocide is technically impossible because you never kill annoying dog ps what do you think of annoying dog?” “The annoying dog doesn’t count, and I never get to Alphys or the people she evacuated either. And the dog is cute, I want to cuddle them.” Frisk said, their face looking like an innocent child’s instead of a mass murderer.

Formatting is off because of glitching in my word processor. I have it fixed.

Next

Previous

[talesfromatypewriter]

Hear My Battle Cry Watch Me Fall

chapter one: new roots

She ducks, the katana whistling past her head. Sakura weaves through a flurry of blows, pink hair a blur as she twists and flips, balance impeccable. The blade flies past her shoulder, the skin of the re-animated corpse grey and flaking. She kicks back, sending the katana flying out of his hand. Grabbing the samurai by the forearm, she twists him over her shoulder and sends him crashing through half of the surrounding forest. The thick, century old oaks snap like twigs in the breeze, tearing the woodland to shreds. 

The samurai slumps over, battered armour splattered in blood. He’s down, but not for long Inner chides. As if on cue, the corpse jumps to its feet, broken bones sliding back into place with a sickening crunch.  Sakura visibly grimaces, the noise not sitting well with her. He lunges. Not to be left on the defense, Sakura sprints to meet it, channeling chakra into her gloved fists. The wind stings her cheeks, and sweat runs in rivulets down her back. From only a few metres away she can see the emptiness in his long-dead eyes, hating the detached look plastered on his face. I wonder if he’s in control, Inner muses. Or if he’s just another one of Madara’s puppets. She pushes the thoughts away, and grits her teeth. At the last second she slides under his legs, ignoring the stench of rotting flesh. 

The rusted blade goes sailing over the place where her head should have been. 

Landing a solid kick to his back, she watches as his body folds in on itself, spine broken in two. The re-animated nin flies across the battlefield, impaled by a jagged spike of someone's forgotten earth-jutsu. The corpse shudders, dark cracks spider webbing across the body. Falling limp, he twitches one last time and crumbles into strips  of paper, disappearing with the wind. He deserved better, she thinks. The dead should be laid to rest, Inner agrees, sombre and quiet for once. Sakura falters, throat dry and constricting. He was alive once, and they used him like he was nothing.  He died a shell, forgotten and alone. There is a pause as Inner struggles to find the words.  Mourn later, she settles on.  Survive. 

And so she will. 

Sakura turns her attention back to the War, grounding herself in the smell of coppery blood and the corpses of her fallen friends and allies. She will mourn for them- let herself mourn for them when the day is done. But for now, she will do what she can. Fight for them. Scream her battlecry for them. She will live another day for them. For everyone. With the heel of her foot, she sends one of the reanimated corpses ten feet down into the earth. Running through a few quick hand signs, Sakura encases the body in a coffin of granite. The ground beneath her shifts and bulges, swallowing the dead kunoichi whole.

Praying for her forgiveness, she heals her bloodied knuckles and dives back into the fray. 

.

At the end of the day, she lines up with the rest of the medics and clears the bodies from the fields. It’s the ugliest part of war. 

“Akira, Koyo, with me. Haru, grab the stretchers and help Saya with her earth-jutsu, will you?” she stifles the wavering in her voice and clears her throat, scanning the group of medic-nin with a practised  eye. Akira is slathered elbow deep in blood and gore, her white uniform covered in stains. There is a hollowness in her eyes that wasn’t there before, and her scrawny frame trembles in the wind. . What were they fucking thinking, bringing someone so young into this… this- mess! It’s sick. The elders are fucking sick. And every part of Sakura agrees. Akira is young, turning thirteen in only a few months. When Sakura was twelve she was chasing feral cats down alleyways and cleaning trash from the river. Akira’s a genin, but picked up medical training a little too well for the village to pass her up. War spares no-one, that much is clear. 

Medical teams from Kumo, Suna and Kiri spread over the battlefield in a wave, checking for pulses and missing limbs. Corpses of friends and past foes are laid into caskets and sealed into scrolls, sent back to their respective villages and families. The black scrolls with Leaf insignia have begun to pile up in Tsunade's office, stored carefully away in a chakra sealed environment. The others, those who are unrecognisable, are  burned. Surely enough, the smell of charred remains fills the air, unsettling and unwelcomed. She picks through the wastelands with Akira, watching as the girl collects the abandoned hitai-ates  and stores them in her pouch. Her hands tremble as she pulls the headband lose from a decapitated head, growing greener by the second. Akira throws her head to the side and retches, tears running down her cheeks. 

“Akira-chan!”

Sakura jumps into action, rubbing circles on the young girls back as her heaving slowly comes to a stop. She is shuddering and shaking so violently that Sakura pulls her tight to her chest and utters soft words of forgiveness. She can smell death on every inch of her--from the blood under her nails to the stench of bleach in her hair and ash on her clothes. War spares no-one, Inner echoes. And fuck, didn’t she know it. Akira shouldn’t be here. She should be back home in the leaf, chasing Tora around the village and getting into stupid genin trouble. They should have let her be a kid. 

Akira’s crying eventually comes to a stop, and she’s a dishevelled mess. Her eyes are red, her arms to thin, her heart too soft and hopeful for war. It’s like looking in a mirror. 

Yes. 

This is the ugliest part of war. 

.

.

.

She stops breathing when Ino stumbles into the medical tent, chest ripped wide open. Sakura has seen it all, but the sight of Ino lying unconscious on an operating table  is the one that stops her heart in her chest. The medic-nin around her swarm into action, slapping on rubber gloves and surgical masks. Their hands glow green as they try to weave her chest back together, desperately trying to fix the gaping cavity where her lungs should be. Blood soaks the plastic sheets, so dark and so red that it Sakura just stops and stares. What the fuck are you doing? Help her! Ino is dying! Inner is screaming at her to  move,move,move but she can’t. It’s like she’s lost touch with every limb in her body, merely a passenger along for the ride. There’s so much blood. 

“Sakura-sama!” Akira. It’s Akira. She can feel her lips moving, forming words, but nothing seems to come out. Her cheek is stinging. Slapped. Someone slapped her. Akira slapped her. Her bony limbs beat down on Sakura, begging for her to do something. She is hysterical, screeching and yelling, the other patients stirring to life. 

“Please, please, please Sakura-sama! You can fix her- I know you can! I...I don’t want Ino-sama to die, please!” 

Akira pulls at her hands, dragging her over to the surgical table. The nurses avoid her gaze, ducking out of the tent or moving on to tend to other patients. What are they doing? She doesn’t know. 

“W-what are you doing?” Sakura says, rushing to Ino’s side. Patches of newly grown tissue form a spider web of muscle and flesh, but the gaping wound is still open and bleeding. Furiously, she channels chakra into her hands and focuses, the skin knitting itself back together. She fixes the broken ribs and grows her new viens, but the bleeding just isn’t stopping. Her lungs are torn to shreds and she is just barely alive, but Ino is a fighter. She’ll make it. She has to make it. Sakura pushes harder, green chakra exploding in a flurry of light. She pours everything she has into the awful wound, ignoring the blood pooling at her feet and the quickly cooling body. 

“Sakura-san! Sakura-san! She is dead!” The head medic wrenches her away, anger scrawled across every inch of her face. Numbness floods her. “There are hundreds of patients flooding this tent- you can save them! But Ino-san is gone,” she spits the last word out as a curse, and in that moment Sakura wants to break every bone in her body. But what good would that do her? She slumps to the floor, chakra reserves almost emptied. Ino is dead. Gone. The puddle of blood she is lying in is proof enough. 

She lets herself fall. 

.

.

.

She misses Ino’s funeral by the time she comes too. 

From what Naruto tells her though, it was a good send-off. She smiles weakly and tells him that she’s glad, or whatever that means, and rolls back into bed. Akira visits often, always smelling strongly of bleach and soap. She holds her hand and tells jokes that never seem to make her laugh, but she appreciates the effort. In the end, Sakura can only look at her for so long before seeing Ino’s smile staring back at her. Tsunade drops in every now and again, her position as Hokage keeping her on her feet at all times. They grieve together, Sakura the loss of her best friend and Tsunade the loss of a daughter. Maybe even two, she doesn't know yet. They get drunk and they cry, but Tsunade protects every citizen of the Leaf, and Sakura is only one in a sea of many. She leaves too. Kakashi comes once and only once. He brings a twin pack of Naruto's cup-ramen and they eat them together, the entirety of the ordeal silent and understanding. 

He of all people is the most familiar with war. 

She doesn’t see him for a while after that.

.

.

.

.

.

The battlefield becomes everything that she is, knows and ever will be. She fights without conscious, every move, blow or justu only existing for one purpose. Everything Sakura is exists only for one purpose. To break. She fights without mercy, no longer praying for their forgiveness, but for their pain. She revels in it. Wonders if her fists hurt them as much as they’ve hurt her. Wonders how long this satisfaction will last. 

One of the nin lands a solid blow to her stomach, and she coughs up the remains of last night's dinner. She got distracted. Sakura flies over the corpses head, grips his skull in her hands and pulls, tendons snapping as blood speckles the porcelain of her skin. She drops the head, large blue eyes growing dead and cold before flaking away into nothing. Breathing heavily, she clutches at her broken ribs and hisses, green chakra flooding her system. She hates it. She hates it all. The conflict, the fighting, Ino for leaving her and Madara for dragging her into this mess. His eyes are cold and cruel. He is a man ready to rip the world to shreds,  and a man ready to fix it with broken pieces. 

She closes her eyes, tired and aching all over. She pushes apart a khaki tent flap and slumps into bed, covered in a fine layer of dust and sweat.  She lets the darkness swallow her whole, falling asleep to the soundtrack of war. She channels chakra to her ears, a cooling sensation circulating through her eardrums. The screaming and yelling grows quieter in an instant, white noise washing over her in a wave. For a moment- everything is quiet. Unusually quiet. Inner? She asks. No response. She asks again, this time more desperate and prodding. Nothing. Sakura sighs, relaxing into the warmth of the doona. 

Inner has been silent ever since Ino died.

She has never felt more alone. 

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

Sakura Hadou is born on the 28th of March, a spring baby, just as they had hoped. With a final push she enters the world with a piercing cry, face scrunched up and unnaturally red. The nurses present her in a soft hospital blanket, bundled and swaddled up like a gift. Though she is in a way, he muses, admiring her unusual  tuft of soft pink hair. Gingerly, he places the newborn child in the arms of her mother, who cooes at her arrival. 

“She’s perfectly healthy,” the nurse states, a teasing smile on her lips. 

Mizuki laughs softly, exhausted to her very core. Her blue hair is sweat-soaked and flat, plastered to the back of her neck. Her usually bright periwinkle eyes are dull and tired, her grey makeup smudged like bruises under her eyes. She’s a mess in the very sense of the word- but she’s never looked so radiant.  The hospital is mostly silent (save for their daughters ungodly screaming), the cityscape outside gleaming with hundreds of stars. Mizuki cradles their child with an unmistakable tenderness, a side of her that he only sees with one other person. He smiles at this, adjusting his thickly framed glasses.

“She’s got quite the lungs on her,” she says, gazing down at their daughter with watery eyes. 

“Just like her onee-chan,” he agrees, and they both laugh at this. 

Welcome home Sakura. 

.

.

.

Sakura Haruno is dead.

But Sakura Hadou is not. 

There is warmth on her skin and a heart in her chest, red and pulsing with life. She is here and she is not. Belonging to one world, and belonging to another, but not quite fitting in between. As she delves in the  space between the dead and the living, watery images of her life pass her by in streams of silver and blue, rippling on the rivers of time. She sees the day she was born- her parents Mebuki and Kizashi cradling a newborn with pink hair and wide blue eyes. Blue? No, that can’t possibly be right. Her eyes are green, spring green (Ino had pointed it out herself). Everyone knows her eyes are green. Blue the memory warbles, shifting and changing. Mebukis blonde hair darkens to a deep shade of navy, her pale eyes quickly following suit. The scene around her crumbles like wet paper, falling through her waiting fingers like paste. 

No no no...what? Stop!

The scene rebuilds itself, a grainy image projecting itself onto the murky waters. Konoha's old  hospital is replaced by a soft green bed and sparkling new equipment, too detailed and complex and new for her to understand. The woman in the bed is beautiful- sculpted like a fine boned doll.. Her swollen stomach moves with her every breath, her hands gripping tightly at the metal railings. The man next to her clutches his hand in hers, wincing when the contraction hits and the bones in his fingers creak. With a trembling cry, the baby is free, spilling into the world with a victorious scream. The man and woman are delighted, cooing over the newborn with a sudden fondness that Sakura hasn’t seen in a while. 

“Welcome home Sakura”

The babys eyes open ever so slowly, blue and bright like her mothers. The breath in her lungs comes to a halt. Those are her eyes. Her eyes in that child. 

The scene changes again as Sakura flows downstream, snapshots of years and stolen moments flying over her head in blurry pictures and muffled sounds. The colours build up around her, like building blocks locking into place everything just makes sense. But yet it doesn’t. Not in the slightest. An energetic six-year old leaps down the stairs, duck-printed socks sliding over the polished wood. She is a flurry of energy- and by god is this girl a stomper. Even from the Afterworld the image still ripples with the pounding of her feet, shockwaves running across the usually still water. 

The blue haired girl comes to a stop outside the living room, eyes alight with a dozen questions. 

“Imouto!” 

A placid, pink haired child flips through tv channels from her spot on the couch, her yellow shirt plastered with a series of images to blurry to make out.  Her blue eyes are calm and collected, like that of an adult instead of a four-year old child. It paints a peculiar picture. 

“Shhh… onee-chan, come watch. It’s just about to start.”

It’s all just about to start…. 

this is only the beginning….

The water ripples again, tugging her downwards and away from the bubbling laughter of the two girls. She scrambles for something, anything to hold onto- but it's useless. The images simply flow through her fingers, unaffected by her touch. She plunges into the next moment, scene, time period-- whatever this is, and watches. 

The setting around her wobbles into focus, revealing two long figures on a deserted rooftop. The sky is open and blue, white clouds rolling across the sky in wisps of cotton and forgotten promises. It’s the baby from the hospital, she realises. All grown up a decade and a half-later, she sidles up beside a smudged figure and turns to him, face unclear in the churning waters. She sees blobs of colours, the faintest of smells, and barely tangible noises. The memory is there, but it’s not whole. They talk for what seems like hours, the minutes trudging by at an impossibly slow pace. 

“You’re not happy to see me.”

“No, I’m not.”

“You-”

The water swallows her, pulling her away before the girl can finish talking. Eventually the waters stop, coming to a standstill in the silence of it all. Suspended in the gap between time and space, she floats, quiet and still. She is dead- or at least, Sakura Haruno is dead. So then who does that make her? A Haruno or a Hadou? Light filters in from above, casting shadows over the waters of time. For a moment she hears it all- sees it all. She is dead and alive, part of both but not belonging to one or the other. The light engulfs her, running from her beating heart to the tips of her fingers. It spreads in a fiery tingle, down her limbs and sparking in her veins. The power floods through her, coiling and spiralling into oblivion. She is alive with power. 

She couldn’t save Ino.

She couldn’t help Sasuke. 

She couldn’t stop Madara. 

She failed. But this time, things are going to be different. 

Her name is Sakura Hadou.

And it’s time to be a hero.

A03: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19660030/chapters/46569472

[damnit-samnit]

New Chapter WIP

Looks like the chapter will drop tomorrow. I’m sorry guys but I’ve moved into gross sick and all I want to do is go burrow in bed. But I have all day tomorrow to lay around and finish this.

I’m like GRR Martin at this fucking point man. 

So to (maybe) tie you over until tomorrow, here’s my WIP if you want to read the incomplete thing and spoil yourself. It’s subject to change once I have the patience to write.

It had to rank as one of the worst days of Midoriya Izuku’s life.

Seconds earlier, he had been facing down death. Suffocating. Thinking about the sobbing face of his mother as she was forced to bury her only child. But fate was on his side -- he had been saved. A gust of wind had shattered the monster that had risen up to kill him, splattering the walls of the underpass with portions of his oozing body.

Air!

Bleary-eyed, the teen was hacking and coughing, trying to clear his lungs. Through his fuzzed vision he could see the person -- his savior -- was walking toward his crouched form. Though he had yet to beset by close-call jitters, the relief that flooded his body at being alive was immeasurable. Tears were already forming.

He was alive.

He was going to see his mom again.

All he could make out was the silhouette of his hero that grew ever closer. Midoriya attempted to call out his gratitude at being rescued but his throat still felt hoarse and clogged.

“So it had a kid.”

It was a man’s voice, Midoriya recognized. A man that grew even wider and taller the closer he got to him. By then he could see his savior’s face -- he was frowning at the teenager, his thick eyebrows furrowing at catching Midoriya’s gaze.

“Thank you,” Midoriya rasped as he internally started thumbing through the hero Rolodex of his mind. The stranger had to be a hero -- he just KO’d a villain with one attack and was built.

His distinct hairstyle immediately eliminated all unmasked heroes Midoriya could think of but his height and stature also eliminated just as many masked heroes.

Midoriya was drawing a blank.

Maybe he wasn’t a hero?

The man was shifting his jaw as he stared down at the boy as if debating something.

“Run home, kid,” the man finally said. “Consider this your lucky day.”

“Are you a hero?” Midoriya found himself asking before launching into a series of hacking coughs. He gagged and winced when a glob of sludge unlodged from his airways, spattering on the ground.

That’s part of a person.

“I didn’t kill the blob,” the man growled. “It’ll probably pull itself together when it comes to. Unless you want it to strangle you. In that case, stick around.”

The stranger was leaving, stepping around Midoryia and continuing down the tunnel, his thudding footsteps loud in the otherwise silent underpass. Midoriya’s jaw slackened as he watched him leave, mind racing.

Was he not a hero? Middle-age or not he was seriously missing out -- heroism was his calling!

What was his quirk? Something wind-based, that was for sure. It felt like a hurricane, sans the rain, had launched itself down the--

A name popped into his head.

His eyes widened.

… No. There’s no way.

Midoryia Izuku prided himself on his hero knowledge. He had notebooks upon notebooks of hero notes he had collected and written over the years. Enough that they could be used as character evidence if his passion was ever challenged.

But he knew of some villains too. Sometimes he’d dedicate an occasional page or two to the adversaries his heroes faced.

He had dedicated two pages in his notebook to the number one villain.

Had that man released a wind attack or a wind punch?

There was only one person who had that kind of power. That kind of quirk.

All Might.

With a shaking hand, he quietly raised his palm to blot out the back of the man’s head.

Cargo pants. A black shirt. It was easy to imagine a harness strapped to his torso and spiked shoulder pads.

He clapped a hand over his mouth to hide his squeak.

Was he even trying?

Relief was gone. The fear was back.

Unsteadily he was rising to his feet, grabbing his backpack.

‘Run the other way,’ his mind yelled.

But why then, why did he find himself trailing behind, following the villain?

Because Midoryia Izuku wanted to be a hero. And gathering intelligence to help the heroes apprehend the greatest villain of all time would cement his dreams, quirkless or not.

You didn’t need a quirk to be a hero.

It was all about heart.

Right?

---

The Previous Day…

Musutafu.

It had been quite a while since Yagi had stepped foot in Musutafu, a city where he had spent a good portion of his teenage years.

Walking from the train station to his hotel, he found himself slipping back into visions of another life.

It looked the same.

It felt the same.

The pharmacy where he bought all his bandages was still there, right next to the shop where he would sometimes stop to get imagawayaki on the way to the train. The arcade he used to frequent was gone though, replaced by a shoe store. The family-run corner store that had the best teriyaki bentos had suffered a similar fate -- it had been replaced by a store chain.

He could still hear the owner’s wife chittering around him, scolding him over his black eyes or busted lip. A grandmother he never had fretting over a boy she didn’t even know the name of.

“That school is pushing you too hard! Tch, look at your beautiful face!”

The owner and his wife must have both been long dead. They had been old when he was a teenager. Apparently, a family member hadn’t taken the store over.

Yagi watched the sliding doors part to allow a young woman to pass through. She met his eyes before quickly glancing away. He turned his head, facing forward as he crossed the street, leaving the vision of the old store behind him.

The hero Wash had been seen, with increasing frequency, in the Musutafu area. A sighting here, a villain apprehension there. It was a pattern that many had taken notice of and had been posting about online, curious as to why a rising star had been stationed in the mostly-residential city.

Yagi had been watching with mild interest.

It had been quite some time since All Might had engaged with a top-ranking hero. He could feel it in his bones, a steady twang that informed him he was due for an appearance. It had started a few weeks back but he hadn’t been in the proper… mood to answer the calling.

At that thought, the door of his mind started to open. Things threatened to spill out, visions of her--

How many weeks had it been?

With a heavy fist, he beat the door closed, forcing himself to keep those thoughts at bay.

No.

Not today.

His jaw tightened, he focused on the sound of his shoes striking the pavement.

… Not today.

It was coming up, the turn he would take every morning on his way to school.

Yes, focus on that. The lesser of two evils.

The bookstore on the corner was still there -- a ‘closed’ sign written in chalk hung on the entrance. At the street corner, he looked to his left, eyes following the slightly curving road as it inclined up, leading away from the heart of the city.

A twenty-minute walk. Or ten minutes if he was running, the fear of being of late motivating him to hurry.

He was tempted to follow the street. Walk his old path. Go to school.

To what? Stand in front of the big barrier? Reminisce?

He scoffed at himself, jerking his head away to pull out his phone, checking the cross streets of his hotel once more.

It appeared he was getting sentimental in his old age.

And it was starting to infuriate him.

The hotel he booked was nothing spectacular but it offered him much more facelessness than staying at some smaller establishment. Not that anyone would know who he was in either form -- he had always been careful about wearing his mask while acting as All Might.

But there was only so much protection a mask could offer.

After checking in, he left his suitcase in the room and had gone back to purchase dinner from the chain convenience store he had passed earlier. A lazy attempt at avoiding another walk down memory lane.

It was always easier to act as if his life before All Might as something… else. Like a movie or television show he had watched. That it wasn’t him.

Sometimes that worked.

Sometimes.

He regretted his choice of dinner immensely afterward, having been forced to grit his teeth and sweat through several hours of intestinal pains. He did manage to grab a few hours of sleep though he didn’t feel quite… right, when he awoke the next morning.

He took note of the slight tremor in his hands. His blood sugar was getting low. He needed to eat.

And convenience food wasn’t going to cut it.

---

Yagi got his breakfast and spent the following hours drafting up a gameplan. The shopping district was where he focused his attention, as it was one of the main arteries of Musutafu. If he wanted to be seen and make a statement, that was where he needed to be. He’d drop down from the heavens, during the commute home, and make his presence known.

He’d draw out Wash, if the hero was in the area.

In fact, with Yuuei overlooking the city, there was a good chance he’d have quite the crowd of heroes looking to take him down.

It was going to be a good afternoon.

He was on his way back to the hotel to grab the other parts of his villain getup when he watched a mugging happen beneath an overpass in a quiet neighborhood. He saw the tail-end of it: some sort of blob creature -- he assumed a person with a quirk as blobs weren’t usually sentient -- had engulfed the person walking several yards in front of him.

Yagi slowed his pace as he watched the mild struggle.

The voice that would have suggested he intervene had long since died. 

No, the only thing he felt as he watched the criminal act was annoyance.

He was on a schedule and he wasn’t one to backtrack for fear of getting in the way.

No, they were in his way.

A quick glance over his shoulder told him he was alone. He swelled up, pulling his fist back to administer a quick jab that would clear out the tunnel.

Someone low-level enough to resort to mugging was not worth a millisecond of his time. They were gnats compared to him, they fluttered around garbage.

He was a king.

No muss, no fuss. He struck before anyone realized he was there, walking ahead as he watched his wind current travel down the length of the underpass.

The was no resistance when it struck the blob. It was near-instant eradication, his mass strewn across the walls and ground of the tunnel. As he drew closer, he noted the person it had attacked was not yet dead. In fact, he wasn’t even unconscious -- he was sputtering and coughing.

Oh.

“So it had a kid,” he grumbled to himself as he leered over the boy. The green-haired teen was still lucid -- he was looking up at All Might (though, he wouldn’t have known who he was without the mask).

What to do with him?

It would be such an easy thing, to kill a defenseless kid. Easy and demeaning.

He was All Might. A borderline god. A reckoning. People died by his hand en masse -- lowering himself to kill individuals would shift the public perception of him. He wouldn’t be a natural disaster, he’d be a killer.

That’s it.

That’s all.

A killer.

He was above that.

He was a boogeyman.

“Run home, kid,” the man finally said. “Consider this your lucky day.”

All Might would let him scamper home to his family, probably telling everyone about the man who rescued him with a single punch.

“Are you a hero?”

He had to prevent the grin that threatened to spill at hearing such a question. Well, obviously he was this kid’s hero, as foolish as that was. A slight movement caught his attention out of the corner of his eye.

A witness hiding in the shadows?

No, it was a bit of the blob quivering, collecting more of its particles.

Ah. So it survived his attack.

“I didn’t kill the blob,” he informed the kid. “It’ll probably pull itself together when it comes to.” Leave dumbass. “Unless you want him to strangle you. In that case, stick around.”

There, he had done far more than he intended (and far more than he wanted to). All Might was leaving, continuing the walk to the hotel without so much as a glance back. When he felt he was alone, he dropped his muscular form, coughing into his fist as he shuffled on as Yagi Toshinori.

The backpack with the rest of his villain attire was waiting for him on his bed. A quick trip to the bathroom, a snack and some stretching and he was good to go.

Adrenaline was already pumping when he dipped into an alley near the hotel to don his villain attire. This was the feeling he lived for -- the thrill of going to work. He was All Might. He was power. He had no equal.

He was the counter to the heroes of the world. Their balance.

He kept them on their toes.

He kept them humble.

And it was showtime.

The jump to the shopping district took only seconds. The was no warning of his impending approach, just a sudden buckling and cracking of where he landed in the road. 

He could hear gasps and cries of startled surprise as dust and debris rose up from the impact site, including the air. A car that had been traveling too fast to stop so suddenly cut through the dirt right at him--

He stopped it with an outstretched hand, sending the driver lurching forward into the steering wheel.

The dust was still too thick -- he could hear the obscured people around him murmuring in concern about what could have happened. Hero? Villain? Accident?

Beneath his mask, All Might’s eyes were fixated on the driver of the car that nearly hit him.

He was waiting. The debris was settling. Bystanders could make out the rough outline of his figure. The driver was blinking. 

He would be the first to see who had caused the sudden obstacle in the road.

All Might watched the expression of the driver shift. Furrowed brows and squinting eyes as he worked to comprehend what was standing in front of him.

Confusion.

And then, a spark of recognition.

The confusion was melting, replaced with a slackened jaw and then-- 

Terror.

A low rumbling laughter escaped him. That’s what he wanted to see.

Fear.

Shouts were ringing out around him by then. Things had settled to the point where he had been identified. Bystanders who had so stupidly crowded around believed accident were falling and flailing as they tried to stumble away from All Might. His name was ringing out.

All Might! All Might is here!

What a wonderful soundtrack.

Yagi Toshinori didn’t exist.

No, he was All Might.

A closed fist to the hood of the car crumbled it forward and, in the same movement, he frisbeed the [END SO FAR]

[bluepenguinstories]

Intention Headaches Chapter Four

Croaking, creaky, doors to heaven or a flash of bright lights reminiscent of a distant city for gambling purposes. Seed or glitter tossed to the audience of bird; dove and pigeon swooped down from above in the guise of hundreds of humans, all ready for a night of party. Sign changed to that of a welcoming invitation, an embrace fulfilled.

Swooners and swingers, uppers and downers. Sitters and stands found their places, some on stages, some in the dimmer recesses. In the middle of it all, a mild-mannered strict enforcer of peace among chaos cleaned glasses.

Some folks, card and dice in hand, bet high stakes; those playing Russian Roulette with a full clip. Some were on their last leg. There was one, solitaire player, alone at a table, with two legs, and mouth full of stake.

She had become without arm nor ornament, having to chew the fat and whatever else was left through the means as one would have at a pie-eating contest; mouth against the table, table against the grain. Although a steak, recent losses also reduced the quality to that of a super rare rather plus ultra.

“How goes your loss of arms?” One privateer sans privacy peeked at two stumps beside a line added.

“Shit's easy 'cept can't afford prosthetic 'til our gang gets a win. Love usin' my mouth, however.”

Sage nod, wisdom as a slow up and down motion.

“Experience any phantom limb?” Phantom crook hovered over, pale and ghastly gourd in hand.

“Don't believe in ghosts.”

Damned nod dawned on hovering attention hoarders.

Toward center:

“I had a wife once,” said old friend to tender of bars.

“I know,” gave a master of tender bars.

Old friend man strolled toward former owner of arms. He relaxed a pat on a shoulder, lest a back be pat.

“One day my story will be told,” he assured more lines added.

“Yeah, and who's gonna tell it, asshole?” She shot back, less with a gun and rather chunks of meat flying from a gaping hole in a face where food at times enters. “'Cause if it's from you, it's not worth hearing about!”

His stature was far from a statue, yet his manner was monumental. Rather chipped shoulder came crashing down, upside on a frown.

“It becomes more clear.”

However, smudged was what entered from behind a hue.

“What do you have against autobiographies? My dear, a automatic biological response toward the self is a circular motion. Jerking, ever forward, sliding sleight of hand marks for a rotary notary.”

Add a shiver to a line. Creep tingled spine.

Behind, vociferous virginal cackle crackled. Stooped stature. One and only entrance, where all else was least expected.

“It has come to my attention that my family of misfits have suffered some losses!” Such an announcement. “No more! I say! We shall overcome this laboratory love, seek shelter from ourselves! Turn inward and a new leaf forward! All who join my gang today gain free drinks on me!”

Thunderous lightning in bottles.

Adeline kept head down, as head above water came skin deep.

“There are two I fear: Sylvie and Virginia.”

To the other Woolfs, howls were deafening. Fangs were spiked in drinks. Yet, when in the presence of a Virginia, her commands were akin to carrying rocks in one's pockets and heading out to sea.

Right on cue, a tunic beat sprung from leaps and bounds of snapping fingers, rickety floorboards, and pickled shoelaces. Such a hall dedicated to tango. Dancers took a new center stage. Pinstripe, tuxedo, tutu, and tunic.

“May I have this dance?” One said to the other.

“No,” other said to one.

The two proceeded to tango. Separately. Creating their own moves. Spun and hiss from the potter's wheel.

“Sing us a song, piano man!” One in the crowd cheered and jeered, a jaunty musk enchanted a nostril torpedo humanoid.

Tune in minor D, flat. Singing in major G, sharp.

“I was born in an institution, so take me to the institution. Hollow out my skull for me, baby.”

Everyone snapped their fingers, sans those without or those with taste buds. Budding tastes abased. Upper right square, centerfold, holy ritualistic loneliness devoured a devout silent speaker.

Muttered, a sufferer. Alone, red wine.

“The church claims to hand out prayers to those in need. The church claims to heal all those with wounds. But how can such wounds be shaved when they come from the hands of one above? How can prayers reach, how can one pray, when one is prey to a praying mantis?”

Her words were a sermon, to and from her alone. All those to see, herself. Though there were two, seeing her.

“Annie, the sharpshooter. Tricky, thick needle. Not one made claim to touch her.”

One of two. Pointer. Point and jeer.

“Sharpshooter or fragile flower?”

Other, drinker. Just as most. Mostly morose.

“Church. We've been over this. Bullets. She knows this.”

“Her mother keeps a keen eye.”

“Of the Sextons?”

“Not one made claim to touch her, but one.”

Turtle and porcupine pawned a torch through a blazing trail, overheard outcrop of silent words.

“Yo, Buddy?”

Turtle had a back, no shell.

“Was that my name?”

“Such a dilemma, that Annie case.”

“Which one?”

Porcupine did a sit, then pointed to a sit, then took a stand. Syd was still on the fence. Respect on a mend.

“I respect women, but what about women who disrespect women?”

Turtle dove, diving down a crown.

“Respect a little less?”

Adeline, minding less of a mind and a little more risky business, less stake for steak, took to munching carpet. Similar texture, less cost.

Decimation, ten of them. Torturous conditions. Smaller and smaller, then lesser and greater than the sum of their tears for fears. Out on the other end, next kareoke session.

“My cue!” Glee, jitter bug and shut-in cough tourist.

As all else, empty, Syd, short for a name forbidden, spoke aloud.

“MOOD CHANGE TONIGHT!” Brought impassioned introduction, then a sing along to a line of lyric. “GIRLS JUST WANNA HAVE FUUUUN!”

Abridged, bridged gaps, two ladies took hands. Unmarried, unbridled, in bridal regalia as regal as larked tongue.

“Why do you date him?” Lustrous loss owner inquired.

“He's harmless. Undangerous man, a safe, sure bet.” She curled over her hair, flexing her neck, sticking it outward in case ladies were to observe. Star tattooed, shoreline above the mantle.

Annie, less drink, more sorrow. Sylvie, more observant, sharp gaze.

“I prefer not to comment.”

“Leader of Sextons, her mother. Weren't the three of us in the same hospital?” Less Victoria, more Virginia mouthed audible.

“I share not her views. We begin and end with being acquainted.”

“Oh, come on, dear,” Sizzled, swizzled nails. Swerved, curly hair. White, silver, grey, painted. Glasses that zoom in and out of frame. “Do we not share our fascinations with death? Look around us, we have all suffered losses. We are dead among the dead. Is that not cause for celebration?”

Silent. Serene. Hostile.

“There are a million reasons to die. There are a million reasons to live. Regardless, we all experience one and the other at one point or another.”

“Hmph. Well, darling. We could talk for days about it.”

“Between nature and nurture, I do not force hands.”

She strode her stroll toward a grassy knoll within inner chambers of a table toward the back, varnished and vanished driftwood matte. Drink, had hand tilted with glass. Knotty bramble ale, crisp to the core of an apple and cider.

“I think I don't want society, but then I think I want society because society wants me to want society,” silver, slivered Syl.

“Societal pressures?” Verge in a woman inquiry.

“More that I don't know what I want if I don't have it. But do I only not want it because it wants me to not want it? And when I want it do I want it because it wants me to want it or is it my own desire? Do I desire to live in a society, or live outside? Do I desire to live, or without?”

Another fucking sip, babes took their places, hips and waist belly dances. Boomed a bounce off another end of another corner, crowd gathered to sharks and gatherers.

“I once knew a man named Dave,” dealer dealt shame.

“Say, pal, y'bought any penises recently?”

“Couldn't afford it. Couldn't win enough missions. Tried going in, trying on different dicks. Saw a penis I liked and asked the register. Clerk clocked me. Caught me and coughed up foul interplay of lessons in lack of funds and lack of missions won. Said come back when gang's more renowned. Screwed up, balls of screws.”

“What about a vagina?”

“Those are in even rarer supplies, mate. Try buyin' pussy and folks say 'our selection is for higher ranks. Come back with a little more, no a lot. Lot and lot of renown. Everyone wants one, those who can fit into one can't afford to have one. Now, them Hemingways, too good, little respect. Ain't know what to do. Men who love men, ain't go for dick, ain't try on pussy. Tell ya what's what?”

“My life's a litter box,” interjected strands of hair attached to a face, earl and mache.

“What, Dave?”

“We talking about cats? Because I own a house full. Over 20.”

“Yes, we know, Dave.”

“Y'know,” sized up undulate leader sliced up with a ruler lines of coke. “People think I do drugs, but I DO NOT DO DRUGS. What especially gets me is when they think I do heroin. No. None in this household. I am a vegan. I AM KOSHER. There are those who would call me a post-modernist, but lemme tell you guys somethin': if you measure out the diameter of a filthy swimming pool, describe the height, length, width, dimension, how clean the pool is and what made up the filth in the pool, in details, y'know what that is? REALISM. The real post-modernism is modernism, if you ask me. If you're too afraid to do a little research, then maybe DON'T GO OUT IN THE FIELD.”

Spread out were the cocaine powder locomotive rollercoaster. Salt or sugar, bitter pickle, all snow white.

“Now, anyone want some? I can't have any, I'm allergic.”

Grime, grit, salami-based muscle, pungent four fingers and a thumb attached to a potato called a palm reached for the flour, only for Dave to slap it away.

“Just so you know, a footnote is an endnote if it's at the end.”

Syl emerged from her drink, still in.

“Problem with Hemingway, when us women are ill, we are seen as the illness. When those men are ill, they are martyrs, brave soldiers. We are sent away to a hospital. To get better. Do we get better? Do we get worse? I think we change, in and out, there is a change, no doubt.” Slow sips.

“I'M JUST A GIRL, THAT'S ALL THAT YOU'LL LET ME BEEEEEE--”

Syd's singing. Unprompted.

Syl laugh. She does on alcohol.

“Do you love him?” Virginal census.

“I think I love love,” first responders. “I think I love loving love. But do I love? I think I would love to.”

“Are you in love?”

“Is love something to you as it is to me? I love love as a being, in or out. Am I being in love? I am loving being.”

Hunched, secrets whispered, lungs scattered. Liquids spilled. Glass intact. Bile of much knotty bramble.

“With me,” virgin of the wolfs. “We have much to discuss in the toilets.”

Two ladies followed the vortex of a single file line toward a horizontal stadium of stalls for all to enter. Few leave 'til close. Moss turns, moss directional, director of dissection, wash basins full of mossy oak. Ultimate of bidets on display, only few take. Most wash, some sign off on air.

Some folk wondered what the house special of the night would be, others wondered who belonged to which gang, or which gang belonged to who. There were those who wondered what constituted ale and bourbon and who owned the bonbons.

“You're probably wondering why I decided to show my face tonight,” leader of a ton of sex, hands spread, pose in a alphabetical T.

Nobody wondered that.

“Have mercy...” Mumbling Annie chit-chattered, tiptoed through tapped toes. No one took notice.

“Our gang has received a mission. Simple one at that. Simple, poetic. Seek out a member of the church,”

Others mumbled. Muttered, even.

“I know some of my children are in the audience tonight. Sippin' on some whine, wine, whinge, chardonnay. I ask: who would be willing to make me proud? My dear husband, perhaps? Or maybe I'll return to the hospital and seek if one of the doctors would be willing to join my family,” toot, tort, ruptured spinal speech, with a hoot and a howl to boot mixed in with something afoul afoot.

Splash spot, stood up was fraught fair-minded resolute, daughter with resolve.

“I'll go.”

Crone critter crept forward, slithered toward child (adult as she were).

“Ah, yes. Annie, my dear daughter,” hands upon Annie's shoulder, only her shoulder. Only her shoulder. Still, a flinch. Nerves before determination. Flushed, relieved, two faces attached to complete figures emerged and heard.

“Knowing how she operates. Disgusting.” Silver leadership spoke up.

“No flame, no phoenix. Speak of passion, yet dejection,” verge in a wolf shared opinion.

“True leaders fight alongside their people, or better yet, be the first to die.”

“At the least, inspire passion.”

“Instead, modifications.”

More shivers, between Sylver (if ever her name), Annie (a face green of gables expressed), or the great wolf.

Outside of it all, smokers smoked in the smokers' lounge.

“Wanna go back inside?” One asked.

“Nah. Hear some of the gang leaders are in there.”

Shackled awe, tight spot for jaw.

“What would they be doing here?”

“As private as they are, leadership have every bit of access to ales and spirits as any of us.”

“Now that I think of it, Ernie's always there.”

“Ah yes, 'blood of a unicorn' kid.”

“Blood of a unicorn?”

“Very same one.”

“Damn. Blood of a unicorn. I've been to the woods once or twice. No unicorns spotted. Rabbit, yes.”

“Rabbit? In the woods?”

“Very live rabbit!”

“Rabbit?”

“Hopped along.”

“Deadass? Rabbit?”

“No, alive rabbit.”

“No way. Those haven't existed for a while.”

“Anyway, we should head back inside. Bar's about to close.”

“Still, a rabbit.”

Some shady men, couple in fact, hand in hand, looking inward. Last drinks ordered: Brisk Bristol bourbon and Tempura Tequila.

Soon after, or not long, rather seconds after counting down the hours, safety in numbers huddled from day-to-day monotony began to rain away as seconds ran dry, as did the barrels.

“My doors will close,” bartender took to announcing, image appearing within every visible area of the distracted establishment. “Get your asses out and have a lovely hunt.”

Hemingway leader set down a sturdy book.

“War is ongoing,” Ernie walked, stuck to a miniscule cycle.

“Yes, my friend,” tip of the bartending hat toward world weary pint.

Other nights, others less dry. For a street of blood, oft wanted is a lick of water.

[tillyalf427]

Flying High, Falling Low

This is the first thing I've written in a little while so it may be a little rusty. Also I've been watching kuroko no basket recently and couldn't stop mixing up Hayamichi from wave and Hanamiya from knb so I am going to apologise in advance if I have accidentally gotten the wrong names anywhere, I have tried proofreading it but again it may be rusty And a quick disclaimer I had this idea after episode 11 so before they confirmed Sho wasn't dead so I'm going off that. It also makes for good angst if I pretend he is dead so whoops

Possible trigger warning for an almost panic attack but it doesn’t go into detail

Summary: "That's impossible," Hayamichi's voice was curt and held an edge to it "You could never be Sho," Some hours later and the words were still ringing in Masaki's ears, had been since they were spoken, hanging heavily in the air between him and Hayamichi as he struggled for words. 

He trudged along the beach and after tripping on another pebble, began paying more attention to where he was walking, almost immediately noticing the person who was staring out at sea, waves lapping at their feet. Hayamichi...

Can also be read on Ao3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/31168922

(Or on wattpad but I can’t work out how to link it oof)

"That's impossible," Hayamichi's voice was curt and held an edge to it "You could never be Sho,"

Some hours later and the words were still ringing in Masaki's ears, had been since they were spoken, hanging heavily in the air between him and Hayamichi as he struggled for words. He had called it quits on surfing following their conversation, finding a spot to wait for the others further up the beach and allowing his thoughts to overtake him. The sand beneath him, rather than feeling comforting like it usually would, was grating on his nerves, and he had to force himself not to begin pacing back and forth and the sun had changed from beating down warm rays to feeling like it was burning his skin.

He couldn't explain how or why but he just didn't feel right.

You could never be Sho...

You could never be...

He could never be Sho...

Of course not...Of course, he couldn't... Sho was gone now...

He was gone...

He let his thoughts wander for a bit longer until the others began traipsing back up the beach, some of them flopping down on the warm sand around him, clearly exhausted whilst others stretched wearily. Masaki wished he felt that way, unsure how to deal with the uncomfortable tingling creeping up his arms and the tight feeling in his chest.

As they began packing up to leave, Masaki listened to the others talking about Hayamichi, trying to ignore the uncomfortable way his breath hitched upon hearing his name.

He hadn't even said anything wrong. He was right, Masaki would never be Sho, what was so hard for him to understand about that?

He was jolted out of his thoughts a moment later as Tanaka nudged him in the side, alerting him to the fact that the others had already set off up the beach. Following after his childhood friend, he could feel the concerned glances being sent his way however, even if Tanaka was to ask what was wrong, he wouldn't know how to answer. He had never felt this way, even the night he had gone down to the beach and found Sho's surfboard hadn't felt this way. It had felt like he was drowning that night, and although he didn't feel okay at the moment, it was nowhere near the crushing feeling once he realized what had happened. This was different. It felt more like he was submerged in the salty water of the sea, unable to see or hear clearly but knowing that someone was trying to talk to him, trying to snap him out of whatever daze he was currently trapped in.

When even the promise of delicious food did not snap Masaki out of whatever rut he had hit, the others began to worry. They had all noticed the strange quietness and could all see the way he was simply pushing food around his plate rather than eating it but how were they supposed to help if they had no idea what had happened. Quickly exchanged glances across the table whilst Masaki was lost in his own thoughts showed that they were all thinking along the same lines but Masaki seemed non the wiser to his own strange behavior. Everything screeched to a halt as Masaki pushed his chair out, quickly standing with some mumbled excuse about going for a walk, leaving the others watching after him filled with confusion and worry.

Even as Tanaka tried calling out to him, Masaki continued walking stubbornly, unable to face another moment trying to act normally whilst his brain was running in circles.

He lost track of how long he had been walking and before he knew it, the sky had begun darkening above him, twinkling stars appearing here and there until the whole sky was dotted with them. The sand beneath his feet was still warm from the sun earlier as he trudged along the beach, not quite ready to head back to the others just yet.

After tripping on another pebble, Masaki began paying more attention to where he was walking, almost immediately noticing the person who was staring out at sea, waves lapping at their feet.

Hayamichi-san...

As soon as the thought registered, he felt his pulse spike, prepared to spin around and look for an escape however he didn't get the chance as he heard his name being called having been spotted.

He tried to think of an excuse, anything to escape the current situation however his mind came back empty with only the question of why was he so desperate to get away from Hayamichi?

With stiff movements, he approached Hayamichi, feeling more and more like a cornered animal, like his every move was being scrutinized until he too felt the now cooler sea splashing against his feet and legs.

Hayamichi began talking, just general small talk and Masaki struggled to follow along with how he could hear his heart beating wildly and how his head was spinning from him unknowingly holding his breath.

"It seems like Sho really wanted me to meet all of you,"  Masaki froze at the words, barely even daring to breathe until he felt something tickling his cheek, reaching up with a shaky hand to find tears he hadn't been aware of falling. The shaky breath he released must have been loud enough to alert Hayamichi as he called out, confused.

"Masaki?"

A moment passed filled with nothing but the quiet of the beach and the waves crashing towards the beach as Masaki tried to compose himself, reaching up to scrub at his eyes with his sleeve, doing nothing to stop the insistent tears or the hitching breath.

"Sorry-" He choked out, turning away from Hayamichi wishing he was anywhere but here.

"Masaki, here," Hayamichi encouraged him to turn back and face him "Are you okay?"

He could do nothing but shake his head, feeling like his lungs were constricting, trying to get enough air even as it seemed like breathing was futile.

The warm air seemed stifling and Masaki had no idea what was going on as his head spun from the lack of oxygen.

"Hey, Masaki," Hayamichi's voice cut through the fog that was filling Masaki's head. "Here, come and sit down, you look like you're going to pass out,"

There was no room for arguments as Hayamichi led them further up the beach, out of the way of the sea before encouraging Masaki to sit down and following soon after. Almost as soon as Masaki was sat down, he curled into himself letting his arms come up the cover his face, still finding it in himself to be embarrassed even as he felt like he was going to be sick from nerves.

"Just try and slow down your breathing, yeah?" Hayamichi spoke, briefly resting a hand on Masaki's shoulder, a frown coming to rest on his face as he watched the waves from afar.

Neither of them knew how long they sat there, however, after what could have been hours, Masaki's voice broke the silence, quiet and shaky despite his more even breathing.

"Hayamichi-san...Do...Do you hate me...?"

The words came just as Hayamich was sure that Masaki couldn't possibly surprise him anymore that day and he found himself lost for words at the timid question coming from someone who was normally so confident and carefree.

"Of course not," Hayamichi responded, voice dismissive but also unsure. He had no idea where this was coming from but he knew that saying the wrong thing now could be disastrous. "Why..." He took a moment to gain his own composure after being caught off guard by the question "Why would you think I did?"

Masaki only shrugged from his position, still curled into a ball albeit more relaxed with his breathing coming out steady.

"I guess I just thought...Maybe you blamed me for Sho's...death...," It was spoken so quietly that it was almost inaudible however Hayamichi heard the words loud and clear.

"Do you blame yourself?"

A larger wave crashed on the shore, almost blocking out Masaki's voice "Sometimes,"

Hayamichi turned to Masaki sat beside him, emotions flicking between shocked, sympathetic, and confused.

"Why? It was an accident," Hayamichi frowned, unable to read Masaki who was usually so open with his feelings "There was no way you could have known he would go out in that,"

"But-"

"No, this isn't up for discussion. It's not your fault, it's no one's fault,"

"Then why did I wake up and find his board. If I had just been an hour maybe even minutes earlier then-then Sho would still be here," The words came out as an almost sob, like a fist clenching around Hayamichi's heart.

Watching them all surf earlier, it was easy to forget that they were all still kids. They had barely even started high school and to add to that, they had lost a close friend not even a year ago. Seeing Masaki now and hearing the anguish in his voice reminded Hayamichi of just that.

"Masaki, do you remember what woke you up that night?" He was met with a confused look from Masaki, eyes wide and confused, still red-rimmed and filled with tears.

"I think it was the wind...or possibly Isokichi barking at something,"

"Exactly, you didn't choose to wake up," Hayamichi pointed out "It was pure chance that you were woken up at all that night. None of this was your fault,"

It was quiet for a moment as Masaki turned back to watch the sea creeping closer once more before asking the one question which was playing on repeat in his mind.

"Hayamichi-san...How have you, you know, dealt with all of this?" He paused for a moment, frowning as he tried to decide how to explain himself  "You seem like you're okay but...you've lost your brother..."

Another moment of quiet before Hayamichi sighed with a small smile "I don't think of Sho as having died," He sensed the confused look Masaki was sending his way after snapping his head around "When I'm in the ocean...I can feel him,"

"Oh..." He took a moment to take in this information, glancing at Hayamichi's face before getting to his feet, ignoring Hayamichi's stare focussing on him as he made his way towards the sea, not stopping even as the water began lapping at his ankles.

It was when he didn't stop walking further into the water that Hayamichi grew concerned, shooting up and following after Masaki with a shout.

"Masaki, what on earth are you doing?" His hand shot out to grab Masaki's wrist and he turned to look at him, an unreadable expression on his face as he stood silently for a moment.

"I...think I understand what you mean," Masaki spoke after a painstaking minute.

"Huh?"

"About the ocean. I get it. I thought that when Tanaka moved away I'd miss him but it never feels like we're too far apart because I know we're connected by the same ocean,"

Hayamichi hummed in agreement, coming to stand beside Masaki despite the waves slowly creeping high enough to wet their clothes.

For the first time that evening, the quiet was welcome, a calm stillness filled with a sense of understanding between them.

Neither of them had any idea how long they had been standing there and it was only when the breeze began picking up, sending goosebumps along their skin that Hayamichi finally suggested that they head back.

Walking up the beach once more was a quiet affair, or it was until a pair of figures at the top of the beach began shouting towards them.

"Corgi!"

"Where have you been?"

"Honestly we were worried, we all split up to look for you"

As they came closer, Masaki could see the concern still evident on both Tanaka and Bill's faces, realizing he should have told them where he was going earlier.

"Sorry, I kept him talking for a while," Hayamichi gave an apologetic smile as he placed a hand on Masaki's shoulder to gently shove him towards his friends.

The two glanced between them before their gazes focussed on Masaki who looked sheepish, reaching up to scratch his neck nervously as he gave a small smile.

"Sorry! Shouldn't we be getting back? We've got an early morning tomorrow?" Masaki added, sending a smile back towards Hayamichi who nodded and waved as he set off.

Any remaining worry for their friend dissipated at the action and Tanaka and Bill exchanged a glance as they began walking, Bill sending a quick text, presumable to the others to say they'd found Masaki.

No one asked what he and Hayamichi had talked about and Masaki found he was somewhat glad, suddenly feeling the exhaustion from the day settling into his bones all at once.

Sho may have been gone but to Masaki, he had never felt closer to him. And if he happened to be so lost in thought that he almost walked into the road, he was at least glad only Tanaka and Bill were around to witness it.

[buffyversefanfiction]

Tristan Tormented

Warning: I do not own the rights to the television show Buffy the Vampire Slayer, its spin-off series Angel, its dark horse comics continuation series, or any of the characters created by Joss Whedon and others in the Buffyverse. 15 years +, Mild to Strong Violence, Sexual References, Suicidal Thoughts which may be potentially triggering. F/F, F/M, M/M, Other +

Volume 7 - Shadow Self (Part One)

“Mandi,” A traumatized Tristan spoke as the body of his childhood friend Mandi lay on a rustic prison like bed within the abandoned hospital that he, Faith and Angel had just sneaked into hoping to save the witch whose corpse was now laying there on the bed with the clear signs of a broken neck. “Mandi…” Still clearly in shock Tristan rushed over to Mandi’s body quickly holding her in his arms before shaking her as he repeatedly shouted her name, growing more and more frantic before he let out a heartbroken scream as he hugged the witch’s lifeless body and sobbed for the loss of his former best friend. He continued to hug her tighter and tighter sobbing more and more before gently placing her body back down on the bed and gently closing her eyes with the softest touch of his hands as he just stood looking at her body, knowing she was gone and had be for some time now. “She didn’t make a sound except for the sound of her neck breaking…and then she was gone just like that.” Drusilla cruelly taunted him as she opened the door and walked into the room, thrilled to see Tristan devastated by a death she had caused. “This reminds me of the day we first met…only you were innocent back then, not so much now! In fact, her blood is as much on your hands as it was on mine.” “You ruthless bitch!” Tristan screamed at his sire before launching himself at her, throwing punch after punch across Drusilla’s face before his eyes suddenly went jet black and a shadow like smoke launched itself out from both his hands attacking Drusilla instantly and throwing her through a wall only for the smoke to disappear straight afterwards, along with Tristan’s eyes returning to normal. Tristan had no idea what had just happened or how it happened and he did not care because now he had the upper hand and he was ready to take out the evil vampire once and for all as he climbed through the decaying wall in which Drusilla was thrown through and into another room filled with empty and rotting hospital beds as Drusilla began to slowly stand back up, clearly wounded from the shock attack. “I was ready to punish you like I did the witch but there’s still hope for a mother son reunion after all.” Drusilla said gleefully, seemingly knowing more about what had just happened than what Tristan did. “I am going to kill you!” Tristan said emotionless as his eyes returned to their jet-black color before he began walking towards Drusilla. “The shadow demon is a little stronger in you now,” Drusilla cackled with excitement. “You may have kept your soul, but you awakened something far more powerful something deep within the creation of the first slayer.” “What the hell are you talking about?” Tristan asked as he stopped walking towards Drusilla, his eyes once again returning to their normal color. “That darkness inside you feel now more than ever is that of the shadow demon’s heart soul and spirit.” Drusilla informed him, continuing to laugh manically. delighted with what she had found out. “The reason you have a soul is because it’s the demon’s soul.” “No that’s not true!” Tristan shouted as he launched another punch across Drusilla’s face furiously. “I’ve faced my darkness; I’ve defeated it and now I am going to defeat you.” “Oh, my darling boy you are more lost now than you ever were but soon you will be found.” Drusilla stated, “But until then I am going to have to say goodbye.” Before Tristan could ask anymore questions Drusilla ran towards the nearby window and threw herself through the already have broken glass, breaking off what remained as she jumped downwards to her escape and instead of following her, instead of seeking the revenge he now craved more than ever he just stood there frozen in the revelation. Tristan had believed his soul remained because there was good in him because he was good underneath all his monstrous acts but now Drusilla’s theory suggested something else, if anything that she was saying was true.

Tristan never got his revenge on Drusilla neither did he, Faith or Spike manage to save Mandi and the guilt quickly began to eat away at the demonic slayer growing more and more as each day and night went by. They may have left the woods and the abandoned hospital behind to return to New York but once again that place had a killer hold on Tristan. Tristan tried his best to mask his grief over Mandi’s death as he continued to work at the bar he shared with Faith but every time he found himself alone at night struggling to sleep and when he did he had the recurring nightmare of finding Mandi on repeat in his dreams, forcing him away, shaken and torn, as if he was reliving her death every single time he closed his eyes. One of those painful sleep cycles started just like they always did and ended with Tristan once again waking up with a scream as he popped up in his bed within his bedroom located above the bar but this time his scream sounded like a banshee’s wail, piercing the air so violently that the glass on the window completely shattered only adding to the look of horror on Tristan’s face as Faith came running in, ready to slay whatever made that noise. “Tristan…are you okay?” Faith asked, noticing from the look of terror on Tristan’s face that the demonic slayer was anything but okay before looking over at the broken window. “What the hell did that?” “She did!” Tristan said, struggling to get the words out, his voice sounding shaken and traumatized. “She’s haunting me, she wants revenge!” “Tristan, I do not think this is Mandi,” Faith replied as she began walking over to Tristan’s bed before sitting down on the end of the bed. “She wouldn’t do this; something clearly did but I do not think it was her.” “I keep seeing her everywhere she is haunting me, and I cannot pretend I am okay anymore.” Tristan cried. “I deserve this! I deserve it all, I just wish she would kill me already and have it over with.” “This is not Mandi!” Faith told him before reaching out her hand to touch Tristan’s shoulder, attempting to comfort him, only to be surprised when he did not strong off her hand. “What happened to her was on Drusilla not you, we tried to save her we were just too late!” “If I hadn’t killed Lucas, she would not have been alone for Drusilla to strike,” Tristan said as he broke down and began sobbing. “If I never introduced her to Drusilla, she would never have targeted her in the first place…all of this is on me! I do not deserve to be the one alive she was the good one, Drusilla should have killed her not me.” “Hey, do not speak like that Tristan do not ever speak like that!” Faith demanded before pulling a sobbing Tristan over to her as she hugged him tightly in her arms, desperate to make her friend’s pain go away, knowing that pain all too well herself. “We will find out what is doing this then we will kill it you will never speak like this again alright.” Faith had no idea what had happened that night but she did not feel like it was the spirit of the recently deceased witch however one thing she was certain of was Tristan was seriously slipping as he continued to mourn his childhood friend. She had hoped that once he broke down a little, he would feel better but this was the kind of breakdown that if she did not intervene straight away would wind up with him in the loony bin or worse dead. Faith was no stranger to the road to redemption or the dark thoughts that lurked it’s way in along the journey but she also knew when it came to pep talks and life changing hugs Buffy and Angel had her beat time and time again which meant getting them to come to New York to help their son through this giving her the free time to work out if he was really being haunted or if there was something else behind the breaking of the windows.

Buffy Summers had not seen her son in well over a year not being able to erase the memory of Tristan climbing out of his own grave from her mind which was a triggering image not only for how she felt over her son but because she had an eerily similar grave encounter of her own. Buffy never meant for it to be so long before seeing her son again but she was convinced he had to focus on his own redemption without dealing with the extra baggage that Buffy and Angel had become to their own child due to no fault of their own. She knew he needed his time to find himself again after the many toxic twists in his life or at least that is what she had let herself believe until she had got a phone call from Faith who told her of Mandi’s untimely death and how badly it had effected Tristan and how he believed he was being haunted by her spirit. Whether he was or was not being haunted by her ghost was something for them all to later investigate but right now more than ever Tristan needed his parents, the only problem was his parents had never really got the chance to be his parents especially Buffy who had no contact with him for over a year. “I packed a present, a present, like hey your friend’s dead but it is okay because I got you this cool gift!” Buffy rambled as she took a present out of her bag which was placed on her bed in the room of her San Francisco apartment that she shared with Willow, before throwing the present onto the other end of her bed. “I should be better at this, I’ve lost people, I lose people all the time.” “This is not a grieving thing it is a mum thing,” Willow told her after walking into Buffy’s room. “It’s nobody’s fault but your new to the mum thing and this is your chance to be there for him without you know him trying to kill you.” “Hey, we do not know for sure he is not going to want to kill me once he sees me again.” Buffy joked, before realizing. “Oh god, we do not know if he is going to want to kill me again!” “Drusilla did a number on Tristan and by number I mean a brainwash of the nuttiest kind coming from the nuttiest vampire we’ve ever come across but he spent time with Angel and Faith seems to have really bonded with him, not in a motherly way more like a sister brother thing which is weird considering he’s technically only a few years old.” Willow replied, trying to reassure her best friend. “Gosh, Tristan makes Dawn’s existence a lot less confusing, well until you start going into what she was before human…” “Willow, your rambling, your meant to be pep talking and your rambling.” Buffy laughed at the redheaded witch. “I kind of need reassurance right now!” “Do you want me to come with?” Willow asked, eager to help the slayer in anyway, as always. “I can be ready in five!” “I do not think showing up with my witch bestie to my son who just lost his witch bestie is a good idea, besides I’d just rely on you too much and I need to do this mother to son, who is only a few years younger than me which is weird because he is meant to be a few years old.” Buffy answered, before realizing what she was doing. “Okay I am rambling again, I need to get to packing and then going!”

Tristan walked down the stairs of his apartment, which led to the backroom to his pub Rogue’s, before continuing to walk through to the front of the bar, clearly exhausted from his lack of sleep due to the nightmares he was having only to be left shocked to see Angel sat on a stool at the bar counter looking like he had been there for some time, waiting for his son to come downstairs. “What are you doing here?” Tristan asked abruptly. “I’ve not been killing anybody…not been helping anybody either but still I do not need locking up this time around.” “Tristan, I know we focused heavily on your redemption when you were in Los Angeles with me but that does not mean I’m your sober coach so to speak.” Angel replied, before reluctantly asking. “You are still on pig’s blood, right?” “I upgraded to blood bags that I steal from the hospital,” Tristan answered him with a laugh, knowing Angel had to ask despite not wanting to. “Stealing makes me feel like I have not reverted back into the total nerd I used to be but no nobody gets killed!” “You were a nerd?” Angel responded with a laugh. “I cannot picture that.” “Big time, getting good grades were everything to me well that a boy who used me like a fool and of course my bestie…Mandi.” Tristan admitted before realizing halfway through his words that Mandi was dead, causing his face to drop with a sigh of sadness. “That’s why I’m here son…” Angel announced as he stood up to be eye level with his child. “Faith told me about your friend, and I want to be here for you.” “You called me son…I am not your son my father died a long time ago; you are not him!” Tristan snapped, lashing out because it was easier than breaking down. “And Faith had no right talking to you behind my back.” “It was not like that I promise, you do not have to get defensive about being in pain it is okay to be hurting Tristan.” Angel tried to convince his second son, eager to get through to him. “I cannot imagine all the things that must have happened to cause you to close up like this, but it is not healthy pretending not to feel especially when your grieving.” “Look I was not down for the preaching from you or Giles when I was in L.A. and I am sure as hell not down for it now and no you have no damn idea what I have been through so you have no right to tell me how to feel or how to react to how I feel.” Tristan shouted, letting his anger out which instantly started to make him feel better. “You did not kill Mandi or your parents, Dru did just like I killed her, just like I killed my own.” Angel admitted to Tristan painfully, shocking his son by the revelation Angel killed his own family, one of the things Drusilla never told him. “I know what it is like to carry the guilt of killing your family because I actually did…you did not!” “You killed your parents…” Tristan said in shock. “It was after I was turned when I was Angelus, there is a lot of monstrous things I did back then that I can never fully redeem myself for and I know you get that feeling but you do not have to redeem yourself for your parents or Mandi.” Angel explained to him, noticing tears forming in Tristan’s eyes, believing he was getting through to his son. “You had no soul back then; you are not the same person you were then.” Tristan told him, trying to make his father feel better, before reluctantly admitting. “I actually think your one of the best people I know…these days.” “Wow, I think that was close to a compliment, the closest you probably get.” Angel joked as the father and son shared a short laugh. “Look I just want to be there for you, and I hear Rogue’s might be haunted…” “Is there nothing Faith does not tell you?” Tristan asked, not realizing just how much Angel and Faith still talked. “I’ve dealt with a lot of ghosts,” Angel said, making his expertise known. “What do you say to some back up on this ghost hunt?” “I guess a séance between two people would probably not be the best.” Tristan agreed, secretly happy to have his father’s help. “I’ll get Faith to see if Spike is still in New York so we can get the numbers up to at least four.” “Spike?” Angel asked, clearly unamused by the mention of his frenemy’s name. “What is Spike doing here in New York? What is he still doing here?” “Yeah Faith said you guys weren’t exactly tight.” Tristan laughed. “Guess you and I have something in common in that sense!” Angel and Spike had a lot of jealousy shared equally between the both of them often competing with the other and it did not help they both shared a great love for Buffy Summers so hearing that his son Tristan was not fond of Spike was an instant relief to Angel. For a moment he feared Spike would have a closer bond to his son than he did but Tristan had quickly reassured him, the only problem now for Angel was the curiosity to how tight Spike and Faith were now, although he would never want to admit that of course. Centuries long jealousy aside Angel was here for his son and for his son he would be even if that meant playing nice with Spike to talk to spirits with Faith and Tristan to find out if Mandi was really haunting Rogue’s or if something else sinister was targeting his son.

TO BE CONTINUED…