#Fickle Fate

[tommys-little-writing-corner]

Fickle Fate ║ Chapter I: Second Chance

》 They say fate is a fickle mistress, playing cruel tricks with the help of Lady Fortune and Destiny. However, they also said she throws problems on purpose before achieving something great. What could come out of a fire god visiting your uncle with Naruto cosplayers? And what's with the yakuza man? 》 Chapter I: Second Chance 》 General Notes: Gender Neutral!Reader, Teen!Reader, No Romance, Platonic Friendship, Slight Canon Divergence, First Person Writing, Found Family, Canon Violence 》 Chapter Notes: Initially I wrote this with an OC of mine I had, but then it just sorta spiraled into this! Hopefully, everyone can enjoy this as much as I did 》 Trigger Warnings: Brief Mention of Child Abuse, Abusive Parent Mentioned 》 Word Count: 1.2k Words

The crowds surrounding me and my opponent, Liam, were loud.

They egged us on, cheering us on as the fight continued. Neither one was letting up or giving in, swinging punch after punch. Kick after kick. Liam swung with a right kick, but I ducked down, going in to sweep him off his feet, he jumped up in time, but it left him open...

Open for the ultimate combo from my character.

I dared not to take my eyes away from the projection of our battle on Street Fighter 6. We were both in sync with our respective characters-- Luke and Juri -- who responded to the actions that were being inputted in the controllers we held in our sweaty hands. They are a part of us, representing our soul, and our desire to represent our fighting spirits. The desire to fight, our spirit of competitiveness, could never fade.

The world seemed to slow down as if to take a deep breath, going quiet as Luke's fists connected with Juri's body. Color splashed across the screen as each fist, each hit, landed successfully before everything went back to normal.

"AND THE WINNER IS DAMMECAGE!"

I let out a breath I wasn't aware of holding back, wiping the sweat off my brow as I looked at Liam and smiled. He looked defeated before shaking his head, putting the controller down before offering his hand to shake mine.

"I lost to you again," Liam spoke my name before I shook his hand back.

"Hey, there's always next season." I chuckled, pulling him into a one-armed hug before pulling away. The tournament host and his friend walked on over, talking loudly on the mic, praising my skills in the game. But yet, despite this moment of joy... I couldn't really find myself to be happy in this moment.

Just because I won the game didn't mean I won at life-- my life as (Y/N) Carlton was shit. 17 years old and have been living with my uncle, Jonathan Carlton, for the past two years. My home wasn't safe with an absent mom and an abusive dad. His father, my grandfather, wasn't a good dad either, so I guess it just sort of ran in the family. He didn't seem to care if anything happened to me, but once my uncle saw what was going on, he didn't seem to hesitate to help the family out. Uncle Johnny, along with his wife, took me in as my legal guardian, and since then I've just been living life in sunny Malibu, California.

"I'll see you around, Liam! Catch ya later!"

I waved goodbye to my friend, pocketing the trophy in my backpack before running out of the arcade. Once I got out the doors, I grabbed my skateboard and took off to ride the streets in style, headphones on to listen to tunes to celebrate my victory. My head bobbed to the beat, lightly tapping my foot as I swerved past people, swinging around a pole to go right before I continued on heading home. Today felt like it was a good day so far, and surely nothing could go wrong, right?

Well, 30 minutes of skating home proved otherwise...

I wasn't standing anywhere near the driveway before I heard arguing through my headphones. I pulled them off, raising a brow in curiosity before frowning. It made me grimace at what could be going on in there... and neither did I enjoy the sound of arguments. The sounds brought me back to my old home and I did not want to think about that.

"-ou alright?"

I felt a hand on my shoulder and jumped, almost slipping off my skateboard before steadying myself to see who it was. An Asian man with short, dark hair in an off-grey and red suit and... is that a sword on him? Does he have tattoos on his hands? Why does he have tattoos? Is he a member of the Yakuza or something? Or are they just nice tattoos?

"Um, uh, yeah, I'm good..." I nodded, hopping off my skateboard before picking it up. "I just don't do arguments, I don't know what they could be arguing about." I walked on the pathway to the large mansion with the businessman walking a few steps behind me. Curiosity itched me and I couldn't help but ask, "You here to see my uncle?"

"Um... yes, yes I am." He answered, almost sounding hesitant for a second. Was he scared or something?

"I get it, my uncle can be--"

I heard the door slam open before it slammed close, Aunt Cris looked furious with her bag and keys in hand before getting into her car and driving off, leaving me in awkward silence with a stranger. The air felt awkward before I cleared my throat, looking at the man before I continued speaking, "My uncle is an interesting person, as you may know. A little... egotistical, but he means well, honestly. I didn't get your name," I offered my hand to him and he looked, questioning his decision, before shaking it.

"Takahashi Kenshi."

"Oh, Takahashi? That's Japanese if I remember correctly... You do stuntwork in movies?"

"I do." Kenshi seemed to answer rather quickly, standing by the door before I opened it and let him in. At the time, I didn't think much about it, closing the door quietly as I could.

"Living room's down that hall, that's where my uncle will be. I'm just... uh, gonna go eat in the kitchen." I gave an awkward smile before I let out a sigh, shoulders dropping as I put my skateboard down to the side before making my way to the kitchen, dropping my bag to the floor before raiding the fridge to reheat day-old pizza and open a can of my favorite drink. It took a while for the pizza to reheat, allowing me time to scroll on my phone on social media.

You know what's really weird? Finding thirst edits of your own uncle... kinda gross. I mean, I can admire their editing skills. But if I had to hear "International Love" one more time, I was going to lose it. The microwave then beeped loudly, snapping me out of further doomscrolling to allow me to eat the pizza while it was still hot on the plate.

"God, I love whoever invented pizza," I muttered to myself, not hearing the brief sound of something crashing when I took a sip of my drink. I figured it was either whatever went down with my uncle it was another one of his "bright ideas" or sudden acting improvision. I didn't think too much of it before hearing the doorbell ring, but that wasn't for me to deal with. I just wanted to relax a little, enjoy intimacy in the form of a good slice of pizza, and read fanfiction. Who doesn't read those? Kinda a guilty pleasure of mine, really. Especially a good rivals to lovers--

CRASH!

A loud crash scared me, making me jump and setting my heart at a fast pace. I put the can down, hand shaking a little as I took deep breaths, calming myself down.

"I'm no longer there... I'm no longer there... I'm no longer home... This is my home now..." I repeated to myself quietly before shuffling to check out the scene. My heart was still racing as I peeked around the corner. While I intially looked fearful about the situation morphed into confusion at what I saw before me, and I had only one thing to say.

"What in the actual fuck..."

TO BE KONTINUED...

[beaulesbian]

killer in these few wano/ onigashima raid chapters is very funny to watch - dealing with luffy and kid's competitiveness, as well as witnessing luffy and zoro's insane shenanigans

and laughing about the chaos around askjds

"This crew'a a joke!" ashfjf he's right, to some extent

((love that luffy only had to say what the kaido pirates did - wasting the oshiruko soup, and zoro was on the same side immediately - this could be a great parallel to whiskey peak actually - when at that time luffy was angry for thinking zoro would hurt the people that helped them and gave them food, instead of getting his side of the story (that they were bounty hunters after them). and in this case it was zoro being angry (more like annoyed) for their cover being blown - which he made more difficult to keep with slicing a building in half). but once zoro realized it was about the food and luffy's anger was more important, they went into the fight together.))

(subtletly could never be luffy and zoro's thing, especially when those pirates spilled and wasted food. i like both of these version - in anime with zoro asking luffy if he's happy now after they caused more havoc and needed to run, as well as in the manga, if luffy's satisfied with the chaos.)

back to my previous point about killer:

yeah, tel them killer, at least your captain knows how to operate under cover during an important mission and doesn't make a scen- OH

and for the luffy & kid immediate competitiveness - it's always funny to see him so worked up with kid and law to be the best out of them

yep, idiots, all of them (affectionate) <3

"whuzzat?" "!!!" thank god killer has that mask so it can't be shown how much he's done with them, right?

[the-priestess-of-dawn]

Thinking about how when Chrom talks to Robin at the beginning of chapter 6, just after war has broken out, he specifically says "Not everything Gangrel said was a lie." And then his next line is talking about how his father waged war on Plegia, which makes it sound like, oh, okay, Gangrel was telling the truth when he said the former exalt led a crusade against them. But I'm wondering if the line that was truly eating at Chrom was actually "Yours is now a haven of hypocrisy." Because this is when Chrom goes into detail about how Emmeyn suffered ending the war and bringing peace to Ylisse, and he's, y'know, way more bitter about how the Ylissean people acted than anything Plegia did. He talks about how Plegians "rightfully remember" what his father put them through and he does mention that their desire for vengeance was part of the legacy their father left her to deal with, but what he goes into detail about, what he complains about, what he's really upset about is the Ylissean response. They hurt her and she hid the fact that she was suffering from everyone while continuing to work to heal them. And then they "forgave" her—Chrom literally uses scare quotes. Now, he doesn't say "those damn hypocrites" aloud, but the implication is pretty much "how could those damn hypocrites 'forgive' her when she did nothing wrong and they did nothing but attack her? They should have been the ones begging for forgiveness."

And like, this all started when he was 4 years old, you know? He brings up how Emmeryn wasn't even 10 yet when she became exalt, and that means he was only 4! It's been 15 years. He's had these feelings about the situation for most of his life! And then you've got Gangrel over here, mouthing off because he wants to start a war but he needs to be able to paint Ylisse as the aggressor, and he throws out "yours is a haven of hypocrisy"— How horrific and sickening must it feel to hear the enemy who openly claims to want all of your people dead make a statement about them that you agree with.

And perhaps Chrom is thinking about himself, too. This conversation is where he gives his "perhaps I must be death's agent" line. Emmeryn would never order Gangrel killed, and he wouldn't WANT her to do so, but he is fully ready to take the matter into his own hands. He believes in his sister's ideals. But. They're not as important as HER. Virtue isn't his priority and he knows it.

Honestly, the whole Plegia arc is such a dark time for him.

[trump666traitor]

[redwinterroses]

headcanon that Scar is the only one we don't see die after winning a Life series because time is a loop and he moved on alone in the world, which then became the start of his The Crafting Dead series.

[angelichl]

.

[soapssuds]

i wanted summer tomoe so bad that i wasted 30 sq to get her

i got her but...

at what cost?

*sighs heavily* my luck for the year is officially gone. kiara wasn't supposed to come home 😭😭 I only wanted tomoe

there goes my chances at getting muramasa later on in the years

[movieposters1]

[colormepurplex2]

Fickle Flame is amazing. I love the world building so much. I hope you'll continue it in a near future. I'll be reading your other fics for the mean time. I'm really liking all of your fics and I'm trying to take my time with it, but gosh I just keep wanting to read more. Thank you so much for sharing your writings

(same ao3 anon looking for a fantasy fic)

Hi, Anon! Fickle Flame is my dark indulgence fic. I work on it in between other projects, and it's where I pour all my darker, more unhinged energy. I'm glad you enjoyed it! I do have the next chapter in the works. It's at about 5k right now, with much more to go, but I hope I can get it out sooner rather than later. If you're interested in biting into another bit of fantasy, you might enjoy my high fantasy, fae fic called Flowers of Fate. Most everything else on my masterlist is more paranormal & fantasy-adjacent, fics with vampires, witches, demons, demi-gods, angels, etc.

[honeybakedhams]

all right. we're on version 3. i have moved the magicians to a different spot in hopes that maybe i can take it off the list.

son of a bitch.

[tojiwrd]

Just finished reading the 2 part of Fate is fickle and it is so good but I want to see Gojo suffer so much karma for hurting y/n🤬

I wanted his new fiancé to cheat on him.

I wanted to him to see his best friend Suguru get together with y/n and see how Suguru treat her so much better and happier than she was with him.

Also p.s how many parts do you have planned for Fate is fickle? Just curious I need to see y/n get her happiness and her justice

I can’t wait for the next part

we all want gojo to suffer i lovveeee to see it

omg geto x yn would be so delicious likeeee he's so sneaky for no reason

atm i'm going with the flow but i have five parts (including the 2/1.5 i posted) done and we stillll aren't deep into the story so i'd estimate seven to eight

thank you for reading !! <3

[bughead-in-the-comics]

From Fickle Fingers of Fate, Everything's Archie #153 (1991).

[bobauthorman]

Punch! Kick! Punch! Kick!

[calliedion-dungeon]

The fact that I didn't see this at the premier because I was taking a nap

I'm SO fucking hilarious 👹

[houseofcatwic]

[obstinatecondolement]

That bit in Labyrinth where Sarah solves the riddle about which guard always tells the truth and which always lies, and she's so proud of herself and says, "I think I'm getting smarter! This is a piece of cake :D" before immediately being yote through a trapdoor beneath her feet into the oubliette. I feel that.