#I also had my game crash and lost my last few saves earlier so it feeling extra challenge

[dumb-doll-lips]

I’m playing baldurs gate on the easier story mode. It’s always felt stil like a challenge but the game has been feeling soo hard to me lately.

A puzzle almost made cry bc I couldn’t figure it out and thought I had too. Like even a guide didn’t help me enough. Being more in a town now feels so overwhelming. And like almost tpk’d a few times.

I want to get further along in watching playthroughs so I can know more things and it maybe not seem so hard.

(This is like why I don’t play many video games, it feels rarer to like a game enough for dealing w all the struggling.)

[goddesswritings]

“Can I slap her for you?” -  Corpse Husband | Part Two

Title: “Can I slap her for you?” – Part Two

Pairing: Corpse Husband x Reader

Summary: Being stuck living with the queen of YouTube drama and partying during the pandemic has seriously worn down your patience. Meeting Pokimane has changed your life for the better, making Among Us a pivotal part of your life.

Word Count: 5.2k

Unedited for now. I was eager to post. I will edit it later.

Corpse Masterlist

********

<< PART ONE

After you left the apartment, you sat in the parking lot of some random store, trying to decide what to do now. Sighing, you opened your phone and went to Instagram. Corpse was probably wondering if it went okay.

Corpse: She left the stream, thank you!

Corpse: What exactly did you do?

Corpse: She’s sending Sean angry DM’s now.

Corpse: Hey, are you okay?

Y/n: Hey sorry, I had to pack. I’m fine, happy to help get her out of the stream. I switched off the power to her office.

Honestly, you wished you could have stood up against her more often than you did. She was four years younger, so you should have been able to have the say in things. But no, Olivia was a control freak and a spoiled brat too. She would no doubt tell your parents you started a fight with her, and she felt unsafe.

Corpse: Wow, you’re badass. Packing for what?

Y/n: Um, she may have kicked me out of the apartment, and I may have left without a fight because I’m tired of her shit. 🤷‍♀️

Corpse: Do you have a place to stay?

Of course you didn’t and you really should have thought about that before just leaving the way you did.

Y/n: Not really but I will find somewhere.

Well you hoped you could. There weren’t many people who were keen in taking in a friend during a pandemic.

Corpse: Poki’s going to call you.

At that message, your phone started to wring and sure enough, it was Poki.

“Hello?” You asked hesitantly.

“So someone let it slip that your sister kicked you out?” Poki said calmly.

“Is that someone, Corpse?”

“Yes, he said it out of shock but I’m glad he did. Knowing you, you would have kept it a secret from me.” She was right. You hated inconveniencing your friends.

“Damn you, Corpse.” You muttered making her laugh. “Yeah so I ruined Olivia’s stream and she started screaming at me before kicking me out. I didn’t fight it because I am tired of her.”

“Understandable. Well do you need somewhere to stay?”

“Yes but I will find some place.”

“Nope, you’re staying with me. Come over now or I am coming out to drag you back to my place.” Her protectiveness made you smile.

“Sure, I’ll be there in a few.” You hung up.

Y/n: Thank you for looking out for my stubborn ass, Corpse. I would have never told her.

Corpse: Stubborn is one word to describe you. Cute is another.

That comment made your face heat up from the sheer adorableness of it. Corpse seriously just called you cute.

Y/n: Can I say you have a genuinely nice hand. It’s marvelous.

Corpse: Hey, don’t make fun of my hand. It takes all the heat for me. That hand is very anxious every time I post him.

Y/n: Awe I bet. Give him hugs from me. Also tell him I’m a big fan!

The easy flow of conversation between the two of you was nice. You got along extremely well and talking outside of the game was nice, since you could focus on what you really wanted to say to him.

Corpse: He’s flattered!

This was great and took your mind off Olivia and the fact she just kicked you to the curb with nowhere to go. But Poki was there for you. You appreciated her more than she knew.

You pulled up in front of her apartment building, parking the car, you got out and grabbed your stuff. Typing in the code Poki had given you a while ago, you were let into the building. Entering the elevator, you made your way to her apartment.

Barely knocking, the door flew open to reveal Poki. She looked mad but also worried. She pulled you into the apartment and hugged you tightly.

“Can I slap her for you?” She asked calmly.

This made you giggle. “I mean I would like to slap her as well.”

“We should make a plan. Hey, the group is still on, come say hi.” She started to lead you to her office.

“Are they still streaming?” You didn’t want to reveal your face to the world, not like this.

“Oh no. We ended our streams when Olivia started talking about you. She completely wasn’t respecting your privacy and we weren’t about to let her spill it to our viewers.” That was so sweet of them to do.

You had left your bags in the other room while you followed her. An idle conversation was going on when you entered.

“Hey guys, I’m back.” Poki took a seat in front of the computer, she pulled up a second chair. “I have someone special here.”

Sitting down, you saw her nod for you to say something. “Hey, did you miss me?”

They went wild.

“Y/n! Oh we missed you!”

“Don’t leave us again.”

“I’m sorry I invited your sister to stream.”

“Hey Y/n.”

The mix of voices was overwhelming in a good way. Sykkuno, Rae, Sean, and Corpse pretty much spoke over each other which made you laugh.

“One at a time, guys. You can’t overload her.” Leslie told them.

“Sorry Y/n. We just really missed having you here. You’ve become one of our favorite friends to play with.” Sykkuno said sounding as sweet as ever. That man was just the best.

“Yes, I can say we agree.” Rae added.

It was nice to hear they missed you. It really helped to lift your mood as well.

“Did your sister really kick you out?” Toast asked

“Yes she did. But it’s not surprising at this point. She’s probably been gunning to kick me out as soon as she could.” Sad truth

“Well she’s the worst player ever. She can’t keep a secret at all. I really should have never agreed to get her into the group.” Sean said sounding sad.

“Hey Sean, please don’t worry about it. She’s always weaseling her way into things. It’s completely not your fault.” One of the things she loved to do was incessantly DM other youtubers for collabs or for free stuff. She really had no morals.

“Well thank you, Y/n. You’re literally the sweetest.” Sean said earning a bunch of ‘I Agrees’ from everyone else. That really was helping make the night better.

“Who’s up for some more Among Us to relax after that shitshow?” Lud asked making everyone laugh hard. It was agreed the group would do it. Luckily, you had your laptop and joined the call and game and stayed in Poki’s living room to play. Honestly, it was so good for you.

**

At the end if gaming, you said goodbye to the group. Then Poki showed you to the extra room that used to be her roommates before she moved out last month.

“Hey, are you looking for a roommate?” You asked as you put the bags on the bed.

Poki sent you a smile. “I am. Are you interested?”

This was good. “Yes, I mean I still have to find another job since my main is still furloughing me until this pandemic gets better but I have some money saved up.”

“Hey, please don’t sweat it. Besides, I know a friend who’s in need of an editor, I may have mentioned your name and she really wants to talk to you about it. Is that okay?”

“Wow, that’s perfect. Thank you, Poki. You’re such a great friend.” It felt good to have someone there for you.

She pulled you into a hug. “Always. I am so glad I met you. You’re one of my best friends.”

This was an honor. “Don’t make me cry.”

“I can’t promise anything. Anyway, I will leave you to rest. It’s been a long night. Tomorrow I will give you my friends details.”

“Sounds good, night Poki.”

“Goodnight, Y/n.” She waved goodbye and closed the door behind herself.

Smiling, you sat on the bed. It was such a good thing that she was here got you. But also Corpse was the catalyst that got you to actually tell Poki was what happening. He was sweet and it seemed he was looking out for you.

After changing into comfy pj’s, you brushed your teeth before climbing into the freshly made bed. Opening Instagram, you saw that Corpse has messaged you.

Corpse: I don’t like being too forward but hey here we go. Can I please have your number so we can talk more easily?

A smile made its way to your face. For a tough man, he surely had a sweet way of getting to you

Y/n: Yes you can. xxx-xxx-xxxx.

The nerves jumped when you sent that message. Less than a minute later, you received a text from an unknown number.

xxx-xxx-xxxx

Hey Y/n, it’s Corpse. Would you mind if I called you so we could talk for a little?

You liked this idea truthfully. It only helped to show how genuine Corpse was being.

Y/n

Not at all. Please go ahead and call me.

Your phone rang, displaying Corpse’s name.

“Hello?” You answered the phone while pushing away the anxiety.

A soft deep laugh filled your ear. “Hey sweet girl. How are you feeling?”

His words made you want to sigh in the most lovesick way. That never happened these days.

“I’m good. Poki had an extra room I could crash in and well I might just be her new roommate.”

“I love that. She’s so much better than your sister I assume.”

“She is. Here I won’t have to deal with the incessant pandemic partying Olivia likes to do.” That selfish bitch.

“Shit, is she stupid? She does know she’s risking a lot of lives, right?” You loved that Corpse had the logic you craved.

“So she is stupid, and her response was always that it’s not her problem and that the vulnerable people should stay home.”

“She sounds like the typical beauty youtuber these days.”

“Yes, she is. She has no morals.”

“Well that’s not good. I guess that’s why her name keeps popping up all over social media. She really needs to be careful, before she becomes the next Tana.” He was right but you personally thought she was past that point already.

“It’s too late. She’s already passed the point of return with all of this.”

“Yikes. It’s good you got out of there when you did.” A soft but deep laugh was heard through the phone. The sound made you giggle. Hearing such a tough guy laugh the way Corpse laughs, made you feel giddy. “So about what I said earlier, I meant it.”

“Huh, what are you talking about?” You truly were a little lost by this.

Corpse laughed again. “When I called you cute earlier. I meant it.”

Heat filled your face and a small smile made its way to your lips. “Thank you, Corpse. That’s really sweet of you. I don’t like to show many people who I am because they will immediately connect me to Olivia, and I don’t want that.”

“I get that. I don’t show my face for fear they won’t like me when I do. All my fans have built up this expectation of what they want me to look like and now I just don’t want to let them down. Plus it’s nice being able to stay anonymous if I go into public, but of course people will hear my voice and know. Shit, it’s hard.”

“Awe, I’m sorry. I saw what the attention has done to some people, but I think not everyone goes into that headspace. Also, I think you should stay faceless if it makes you feel better. There is no rule that says you ever have to show your face. People who push you to do it have no boundaries.”

Corpse was quiet for a while and you thought you had offended him. “I’m sorry if I said the wrong thing, Corpse.” You squeaked.

“No, you said the right thing. I was just thinking. You’re right. A lot of people have been on me to reveal my face, but I never intend to. I want to be able to live my life without being swarmed by fans, or god forbid, them judging me by my appearance.”

“Which is really fucked. When I first appeared in my sister video, the comments were awful. They couldn’t understand how she was related to me, but I never thought I looked bad. But I guess they expected Olivia to be surrounded by people in her genre. It was so hard to see those comments.” Thinking back to it, Olivia had even added to it. Telling you that you should have tried to look more like her for the video. You should have worn something more colorful and put-on way more make up then you liked. But you hated that. That wasn’t you.

“I can’t imagine the things they said. Is that why you deactivated your twitter?” How did he know about that?

“Oh, yeah. How did you know about it?”

“I remembered seeing a story about it on YouTube last year. They didn’t show your face, so of course I didn’t know it was you. But I figured it out when Olivia joined the game tonight and she blabbered on about being your sister. I’m sorry you received that hate. No one deserves that ever.” His voice was calming you now.

“Thank you. Olivia seemed to add to it, as well. Fuck, she’s just the worst person.” Family definitely had the ability to be shitty. “Meeting Poki last year really was the best thing. But also joining this Among Us group has been so good for me. Thank you for accepting me.”

“Of course. You’re a natural in the game but you also fit very well with the group.” Corpse really hoped you believed him because this was true. The group had a whole conversation about it when Olivia finally left

“I’m flattered. The Corpse Husband is telling me I fit in with him and his streamer friends. Wake me up, I must be dreaming.” You knew his words were genuine because it was just easy to tell.

“You better believe it, baby, because it’s true.”

You stopped short when you heard him call you baby. Of course Corpse had used that word before but right now it felt more intimate.

Letting out a yawn you realized it was nearing 4 am. “I appreciate it.” You mumbled, feeling the events from the day seep in.

“You’re tired, aren’t you?” His deep voice was lulling you closer to sleep.

“No.” Another yawn broke through.

“You can’t lie to me, Y/n. Get some sleep and we will talk tomorrow.”

The words made you smile. “That sounds good, Corpsie. Goodnight.”

“Goodnight, sweet girl.” Despite wanting to stay on the phone, you hung up. Sleep was quickly coming in to claim you. You can happily say you fell asleep with a huge smile on your face.

**

Waking up was easier than it had been in a long time. Normally you woke up to Olivia screaming at you or someone else. So it was nice to wake up to silence. It allowed you to relax and wake up properly.

Your phone buzzed from beside you. A text from Corpse is what you first saw, so you opened it.

Corpse

Good morning, sweet girl. I hope the night treated you well.

Sweet and to the point. His messages made you think he had a thing for you. Well you hoped he did but he also could just be treating you the way he treats friends.

Y/n

Yes, I slept well and for once I wasn’t awoken by my obnoxious sister.

It would he good not to live with her.

Corpse

I bet. Hey I hate to be the one to show you this, but your sister posted this on her instagram.

He then sent a link to the post. It made your blood boil.

::::

There was a picture of her, she was holding up a ripped picture of you. A huge frown was on her face.

oliviaxoxo It’s a shame when family starts to treat you like you weren’t the one to give them money when they needed it. This is my sister and she’s a bitch. For the last few years, she’s been the one editing my videos. Well I found out she was trying to sabotage me, so I had to fire her and kick her out. What a shame it is when family stabs you in the back. 🙃🙃

1,454,787 people like this

oliviafan23 Is this true? Damn, f*ck fake people.

queenolivia Sueeee herrrrr!

lovinliv Family ain’t shit. Spill her info so we can drag her.

sykkuwu Whoa, why are you spreading lies about your own family?

   |

queenolivia Why would you defend someone like that?

valkyrea You’re such a sad human for doing this. Stop lying.

pokimanelol Let’s see, none of this is true. Your sister has done so much for you and you’ve never appreciated it. Get some help for this.

corpse_husband This is sick. No wonder your name is always blasted everywhere. Do your sister a favor and stop talking about her.

    |

oliviaxoxo I don’t know why you’re defending my stupid sister, but that totally makes you not hot to me anymore. Ugh.

   |

valkyrea Uh, that’s what you got from this. Wow, you’re not worth this.

    |

corpse_husband What can you expect? The covid must have gone to her brain.    |

corpseandlivfan Whyyyyyyy Corpse, why would you stand up for her. Do you not realize how horrible Y/n is? Please tell me this is a joke!?!?

   |

 corpse_husband Well, she’s a good friend of mine and I won’t let people make up lies. So it’s not a joke.

::::::::

You were mad that she’d even say this shit publicly, but you should have known she would. She was nothing without her group of misguided followers.

Y/n

Can’t say I’m not surprised. This is so on brand for her. Thank you for sticking up for me. It means a lot.

Corpse

I would do it any day. She shouldn’t be able to get away with doing that to you.

Sadly, growing up, she did get away with doing the absolute worst shit and you always received the brunt of it.

Y/n

With any luck, she draws negative attention.

You clicked the link to view it again but instead were lead to a page that said the content was unavailable.

Y/n

I believe she just deleted the post.

Corpse

Oh, she did. That’s awesome.

It was. Olivia was never one to swallow her pride and admit any wrongdoings. That means she would never delete a problematic post, but she finally did

Y/n

I didn’t really read any other comments besides you and your friends and the top comments. I can’t imagine what her fans are really saying.

Olivia was completely okay with letting her fans attack people. It was seriously a huge mess. She fell into the category of YouTuber with the worst most entitled attitude.

Corpse

It’s good you didn’t read them, because they were horrible. I can’t believe she would let her fans do that.

Y/n

She’s done a lot of shady stuff. This is even before she blew up on YouTube. There is a lot of issues between us.

There was a lot that could be said about your relationship with Olivia and none of them were good. Forever it seemed, you had tried to make it work and hoped your sister would grow up and change but it never happened.

Corpse

I think she’s a vile human. From what I have seen and her complete lack of human decency, I just can’t help but feel she’s just not a good person and she never will be.

He was right. She would never change.

Y/n

You’re right. Hey, I have to go thank Poki for letting me stay but I also need to go back to that apartment to get the rest of my stuff. Can I call you when I get back?

Corpse

Yes, of course. Good luck heading over there.

Talking to him was pretty natural feeling. It was clear now that you were getting a massive crush on him. You had a crush on a man who’s face you’ve never seen. You couldn’t help it though, his personality just meshed so well with yours. He’d made you feel safe and wanted.

After getting dressed, you found Poki in the kitchen making breakfast. She sent you a sweet smile when you entered the room.

“Thank you for standing up for me against my sister on Instagram.” You were truly honored this group of friends liked you enough to do something like this.

“You’re welcome. I couldn’t just let her say that and get away with it. She’s done a lot to you, that you don’t deserve. Corpse messaged all of us the minute he found it and we all jumped into action. Sean and Felix were getting ready to comment when she deleted it.” She explained as she set a plate in front of you.

“I’m so honored. Thank you!”

“Of course, you’re one of us now and we will never let her get away with this stuff anymore.”

You could just cry with how loved they were making you feel. This is what had been missing in your life. Friends who genuinely cared about you and wanted to protect you from the nasty stuff Olivia was capable of doing.

“Would you come with me to the apartment to get the rest of my stuff?” You asked once the two of you finished eating.

Poki nodded. “Of course I will. You shouldn’t have to go alone.”

**

An hour later, you exited the elevator on the floor where you once resided. Your sister wasn’t home, which would be good but there was a chance she could return while you were packing. But you would deal with that when it came down to it. The two of you quickly got to work, packing your life up into the boxes you’d brought with you. Luckily, you weren’t one to collect a ton of stuff. You mainly just had to make sure your clothes and makeup were packed up.          

You and Poki would fill boxes and pile them by there door, then you would take them down to the car when you acquired a good amount. In the end, you figured you would fill maybe 10 boxes which is actually not too many considering you’ve lived in that apartment for five years.

Poki had left to go take two more boxes to the car while you finished up packing up your last few items. The front door closed, and you assumed it was Poki, but it wasn’t.

“Oh look who’s here? My lovely sister.” Olivia’s voice was flat and emotionless.

You rolled your eyes and turned to find her standing in the doorway, glaring at you. “Hello, Olivia. I’m just packing my stuff and then I’m leaving.”

“Who said you were allowed to come back here?” She grumbled, eyeing the boxes.

“Well, this is my stuff and I have every right to come pick it up.”

“If it’s in my apartment, it clearly belongs to me.” She snarled.

You snapped. “Cut it out, Olivia. This was my apartment too, until you kicked me out last night. You can’t just claim my stuff as your because you’re salty about me having friends.” She was a spoiled brat, and you were done letting her get away with it.

“I’m not the salty one. Everyone can see it’s you.” God she was so annoying. You taped up the last box and turned to her. She held her phone in her hand. “Everyone say hi to my sister. You know, the one I posted about earlier before someone reported my post.”

“Are you live?” You asked, keeping your face expressionless. Olivia would do this.

“I bet some of you remember the few videos I did with her. Well of course that was before she turned against me and decided she was going to try and ruin me. Say hi, Y/n.” A sick smile played on her face.

“I never consented to being in your live, Olivia. Please stop.” You tried to keep your voice calm so that she wouldn’t have any way to make you look like the bad person. But regardless, she was already doing it.

Olivia cackled. “Well I think I’m free to do as I please in my apartment.” You could only imagine what her fans were saying. “You’re right, Andrea, she is an idiot, and I should have her arrested.” She spoke aloud making your blood boil.

“You’re so immature, Olivia.” You grumbled before grabbing the last couple boxes and moving towards the door. Olivia decided to swat the boxes out of your hand, and they fell tumbling to the ground. “What the hell, Olivia. I could have fragile stuff in there.” You growled at her.

Olivia was just laughing. “This is funny. What else should I do, guys?” She asked as she panned the phone around the room.

Her immaturity was giving you a headache. Poki walked in and saw Olivia.

“Oh hey guys, look who’s here. Pokimane.” She panned the camera to Poki who frowned. Olivia just laughed and started talking shit until she was cut off by the stream just ending. “What the hell.”

You gathered the last few boxes, and Poki came to help while Olivia attempted to start another live.

“What the fuck, it won’t let me go live.” She growled while stomping her foot like a child.

“That’s what happens when an influx of people report your live.” Poki spoke as you both had gathered the boxes.

Olivia was frowning. “What did you do, Y/n.” She wanted to pounce at her, but Y/n and Poki were already at the door.

“Y/n did nothing, but I got word of your little livestream and contacted some friends for help. It will be at least 24 hours before you can have another live. But with the amount of people who reported you, well you may be banned for a while.” With that, you and Poki left Olivia standing there is absolute shock.

You and Poki put the last boxes in the car. “Thank you, Poki. How did you get so many people to report it?”

“Well it was actually Corpse. He texted me and informed me that she was doing a live and bothering you. He had his fans go report it, but apparently Sykkuno and Rae also sent their fans. I was going to send mine, but they had it handled. So this was all Corpse.” She explained.

Hearing this made you feel so soft for Corpse. “Awe wow. That’s so sweet of him.”

The two of you entered the car. “Y/n, can I tell you something without you telling him I told you?”

You looked over at her. “Yes, sure.” Your heart rate kind of picked up.

“Well the other day, Corpse admitted he has feelings for you, but he wasn’t completely sure if you felt the same way for him. But I mean I can clearly see you do. Your whole face just lit up when I mentioned him. So do you?”

Heat filled your face and you suddenly felt shy. “I do, yes. Which is ridiculous because I just met the guy, and I don’t even know what he looks like. But gosh, I like him so much. When I talk to him, I feel happy. He’s been so good to me through this crap with Olivia.” You admitted, knowing she already knew.

Poki smiled and squealed in complete happiness. “You two are just the most adorable people! It’s not ridiculous. We pretty much knew from the first time you joined us, that Corpse was into you. But oh my god, you’re into him. You need to tell him!!!!”

You agreed, Corpse deserved to know. “I do. But how? It’s been a really long time since I’ve told someone I liked them. Shit, I feel like I’m in high school again!”

This made Poki giggle. “Calm down, Y/n. I have a plan. Let’s get back to the apartment and we will talk about this. Rae also wants to be involved in this.”

Back at her apartment, you had jumped onto a call with Rae and the three of you talked about what your plan was for you to tell Corpse what you felt for him. Rae and Poki decided to organize an Among Us game strictly for fun and no one would stream, they would also use Proximity chat.

“So we will get him to follow you around until one of us is imposter, then we will lock you into wherever you end up. Do it then” Rae explained sounding so excited.

“Okay, that can work. Let’s do this!” You were nervous but also excited to finally do something good for yourself.

You and Poki set up for the gane and Corpse sent you a text.

Corpse

Are you joining the game tonight?

Seeing a text from him, made you feel giddy.

Y/n

Yep I am. So I will see you in game?

Corpse

Yes you will, angel.

Cue the insane butterflies.

**

The lobby loaded and it was you, Corpse, Poki, Rae, Sykkuno, Karl, Tina, Sean, Toast, and Leslie. All streamers you had grown to like a lot in the time you have been playing with them.

“Y/n, I am so happy you’re playing with us!” Tina gushed as her little character ran around yours.

“I’m happy to be here.” You really were.

“You’re sister is a piece of work, Y/n.” Sykkuno said.

You giggled. “Don’t I know it.”

“What did she do this time?” Sean asked.

“Decided to film a live when we went to get Y/n’s stuff from the apartment.” Poki explained.

“Oh, that’s gross.” Karl commented.

“I have to thank Corpse for helping.” You stated to the group.

“Yeah Corpse was quick to text us.” Sykkuno added.

“You’re welcome, Y/n. I wasn’t going to let her get away with what she was doing. Truth is, I got a bunch of fan DMs that were telling me what Olivia was doing. So a lot of my fans were already reporting it, but the tweet helped.” Corpse’s deep voice soothed you.

“I appreciate it so much. She was just being an immature brat as always.”

The group laughed before deciding to start the game. Poki and Rae agreed to text you when either of them were imposter. Now it was a matter of getting Corpse to follow you.

The group was on the Polus map, which seemed to be a favorite for everyone.

Rae

We should lock them in weapons.

Rae had texted you and Poki through the group text.

Poki

That’s the best place for them.

Y/n

Okay but I still have to get him to follow me.

Rae

He will. Just wait, I have a plan.

You trusted Rae and Poki to help you. Now it was time to admit it all to Corpse and hope he genuinely liked you back.

Y/n

Let’s do this!

PART THREE  >>                                         

[perhaps-in-anotherdream]

..."STAR-CROSSED LOVERS"??? YES.

Thank you so much @cheri-translates for translating Victor's SAND AND SEA DATE. You're an angel. 🥺🥺🥺

Now I'm gonna start blabbering since I've many feels about this date LOL~ 🙃

⚠️Warning: There are some spoilers regarding Victor storyline from the main story chapters that haven't been released in EN yet.

🌹

From "I won't save you a second time" [CH 1] to "I don’t need you to save me a second time." [The date in discussion]-- LOL as hilarious as this is, the irony.💯

Ngl this date felt like, the writers thinking since, under the context of the theme, the physical pain of time travel & crossing countless of dimensions & timelines is not possible-- let's just nearly kill him by spilling blood & dehydration but still we gotta nearly kill this man cause he wants to be in love.🙃

Idk why I'm getting so emotional LOL but there are so many call-backs I can remember on top of my head right now--

[The lines & moments from the date are indented & in bold letters.]

MC: "Victor, I’m helping you look for a water source. Let go!"

🌹 The sad broken cup scene from [CH 18-16], MC urging Victor to let go & him stubbornly refusing, until she gives in.

MC sacrificing herself to revive the river, part of it is to save Victor- other part of it is also for the greater good of the people in the city.

🌹 [CH 18-18] MC's monologue- "This time, put everything on my shoulder & let me be your hero one last time."

& sacrificing herself for the peace of the world even though it only made more chaos.

Victor releasing the hand that supported him at the edge & deciding to sacrifice himself with her. & the vow- "No matter what awaits you, I’ll be with you."

MC's monologue: "It turns out that no matter what the ending is, he’s willing to be with me."

[CH 18-28] Victor deciding to use the sundial watch one last time despite knowing that'd kill him for sure & might lead the world to perish as well. Dummy & Selfish in that moment. His final vow before MC disappeared, "No matter where you are, I'll always find you."

[CH 19-6 Dream World Victor route]

MC: "What if this really is a dream. Then what?"

Victor: "Then I'll turn it into reality."

[CH 25 phone call- In the Hospital]

"No matter what you are facing in other space-times...Wait for me."

[CH 36-10, after Victor returns from his 10K years time travel]

Victor: I thought you are never going to be afraid again?

His warm breath moistens my eyes. I inhale through my sore nose. Resisting the urge to bury my face in his chest, I look up, staring straight into his eyes-

MC: I will never be afraid again. Because you really came back. Victor is standing here before me like a treasure once lost and now found. What do I have to be afraid of?

Victor is stunned for a moment. The corners of his lips loosens a bit, while the contours of his face softened a lot. He raises his hand to wipe the wetness from the corner of my eyes.

Victor: It seems that this dummy has grown up a lot during this period. Listen carefully, I will never return to a world where you are not.

[CH 37 PV line]

"Whatever choice you make, I'll always be here."

[CH 37 karma by-line]

"I will accompany you on the road leading to the future."--

Basically the eternal insistence of him having an internal MC GPS tracker LOL ALWAYS being by her side.

Kidnapping incident.

🌹...[CH 30-7 to 30-10] Agio Street underground gambling den mission- wants to say a hello.🙋‍♀️

Abandoning the honor & glory of leading a comfortable life as a feudal lord to restore the river & to find the fateful couple, probably hoping to find his love too, but won't admit cause even if it's AU, he be like- "I'm still Victor" LOL

[CH 11 karma by-line]

"I won't let go of you & the world."

The physically-mentally painful exhausting wait & time travelling of 10K years, walking through endless dimensions & timelines, only to start from the very beginning every single time- hoping to find a way to save the world & protect the girl-- wants to say a hello too 🙋‍♀️

MC's monologue: Still, I want to have one more look at Victor… before leaving.

🌹 This specifically reminded me of a [CH 37-5 Victor split route] monologue from MC--

"It didn't matter what was waiting for me. I would face it with my head held high. Even so, I still wanted one last second...just one second. Let me call his name one more time...let me take a good look at him...just one last time..."

Victor: In that case, stay here. Stay by my side.

🌹 He has said the same sentence in different ways under various circumstances but one I can remember right now,

[CH 24-12 Black Cabin reunion]-- "But right now...Just stay by my side."

MC noting down how she always finds herself in his arms whenever she's fainting or getting in trouble. How Victor has been quietly taking care of her & protecting her. How the person before her walks in steady steps with forceful heartbeats.

When she was in her most depressing state [CH 18], he was there like the steady pillar of support, helping her in every way he could. He was pretty much the glue that kept her in one piece.

Again, in winter world, he stood by her side even as a stranger.

Not just these two incident, throughout the entire game, especially in the latter part of the story, they work together like partners, she learns to trust him with pretty much everything & they work through everything they can together.

Those few mentions in the date-- could be referred to how Victor has always been the constant source of warmth, encouragement, strength, support, protection in her life. No matter what world or when, he never really changes. He is still the same man. & His constant state IS choosing MC every single time.

Victor lies on the sand quietly, and it’s as though everything has returned to the beginning when we first met.

🌹 Indication towards how their storyline ALWAYS goes back to square one or comes in a full circle-- from Victor saving her from the car crash as a kid [& this being repeated many times afterwards, even in winter world], to the lightning incident [MC jumping in front of Victor both as a child & an adult], to both being in coma for week, staying in the hospital & taking care the entire time [MC in CH 11, Victor in CH 32], to stabbing each other countless times. [CH 18, CH 36-- & every other times Victor has seen those incidents happening before his eyes while time traveling.] *que tears*

🌹▪️▪️▪️▪️▪️▪️🌹

I could possibly make a full blown essay which I already kinda have out of some other specific call-backs I can remember right now. Specifically the theme of the date being star-crossed lovers-

Legend tells of two lovers. Because of the pressures of their nations, they could not be together, and decided to drown themselves in a river for love.

Because of this, the River Goddess was enraged, and she cursed the land nourished by the river which was under her control. Since that day, the Socya River gradually dried up.

The Goddess left an exhortation-when the fateful couple reappears on this land, the river will be surge once again...

& This perfectly echoes the canon theme of Victor x MC storyline--

🌹 As in, Victor being someone who, objectively speaking, seemingly has everything & yet sacrificing practically everything--

[giving up over-seas university offers, staying in the city instead of moving abroad even though his business could be expanded more, relentless search of 17 years, appointing private detective for 6 years, building up Souvenir etc.]

--- to find MC & then in the mission of keeping her safe, even at the cost of his own existence. Trying everything beyond his limits to prevent the destined deaths of MC he has foreseen- from happening & it being doomed to no end every single time.

🌹 Every single time he had to give up the ONE thing he wanted to protect the most or wanted the most.

🌹 Both of them being so willing to put each other in the front line just to give each other happiness.

🌹 Another running theme of their storyline-- both of them keep losing each other countless times & then find each other again.

• Victor losing MC as a kid, finding her as an adult. Victor nearly losing her in CH 10.

• MC losing Victor due to the time rift in CH 14 & finding a way to contact each other through the sundial watch.

• Victor losing MC in CH 18 first-hand. MC leaving Victor behind in CH 19- dream world.

• CH 24 Black Cabin reunion & CH 27 OG timeline reunion

• MC nearly losing Victor in CH 32, due to him going to coma

• MC losing Victor in CH 34 due to Victor going on the time-travel journey of 10K years

• Final reunion in CH 36 [Then we have the journey to S2. But that's a whole new discussion.]

🌹So...both of them being able to truly be with each other is actually-- defying fate & writing their own destiny. *SOBS*

🌹I wanna end my blabbering with two precious moments from [CH 36- Victor split route] that echoes this theme even more.

MC: "I've always chased after your silhouette and I was never afraid. Because I know you'll always be there waiting for me. Victor, if you really disappear... I will be with you, and we will both be forgotten by the world."

MC's monologue: "Victor, once we have crossed countless dimensions and futures, and returned to each other’s embrace. If everything has to disappear with time, as dust into the wind... Then, I'm glad that we have our final promise."

[She's referring to the promise she made of being forgotten by the world to be with him & the promise Victor made earlier to never leave her again.]

[sasuhinasno1fan]

Might fall for you-Lukadrien June Day 16

So the monster high au came up in the lukadrien vault but stupid me forgot to save the info before it closed. But i had suggested Adrien being on the fearleading team and I thought since he's a werecat, he'd be perfect for a flyer, which I now know sometime appears in pro cheearleading. It was in my head when reading this prompt, so enjoy! Falling for you

“This is utterly ridiculous!”

Adrien could see the magic flying off of Chloe. He felt a little sorry for Headmistress Mendeleiev. She’d be dealing with a few cursed items if this got any worse.

“Our SKRM course is still damaged and we have a season coming up, one you will be cheering at might I remind you. may I also remind you that you had caused that damage by annoying the kraken in the pool?”

“He stole my perfume! Do you have any idea how expensive that was? How are we supposed to work on routines with they’re slamming their stupid skates all over the place? There is a perfectly fine courtyard!”

“Ms. Bourgeois, I am reaching the end of my rope. The SKRM team is practising in the gym. Your fearleading team will have one side and the SKRM will have the other. Now leave, before I have your practise suspended.”

Chloe let out an infuriated huff and stormed off, her magic causing a few things to glow.

“Um, I’d check on those things first, sorry!” Adrien ran after Chloe, who was causing the lockers to rattle. “Chlo, it’s not that big of a deal. The course will be fixed soon and then it’ll be over.”

Sabrina was waiting at the end of the hall, her fearleading letterman jacket on. She was halfway in the shadows, almost impossible to see had it not been for the neon colour of her monster emblem acting as a beacon.

“Sabrina, get out of the shadows! We have work to do!”

“Yes Chloe.”

The boogeygirl stayed smartly out of the way of the puca, sharing a look with Adrien once she’d stormed by. They arrived at the gym, where the rest of the fearleading team was speaking with the SKRM team, some doing more than talk. Adrien flinched when Chloe pulled the megaphone from Sabrina.

“Get in formation right now!”

“It’s gonna be a long practise, isn’t it?” Sabrina asked.

“that’s one word for it. Good luck.”

“You too.”

Adrien was the only guy on the fearleading team and as a werecat, he was light enough and skilled enough to be a flyer. It got easy to ignore Chloe screaming at them from her spot on the ground as he and a bunch of girls flipped, tumbled and were tossed in the air, but every now and then Chloe would say something scathing and distract them. Adrien already felt off balance with the girls shaking under him. When he was on the ground acting as a spotter, he saw that a few of the SKRM members were watching, interested.

“Do you think we could do something like that to avoid an obstetrical?” he heard a minotaur ask.

“Possibly. Though who wants to risk their neck asking Chloe to teach us?”

“We could ask the guy on the team to help. They throw him up in the air.” A gorgon pointed out.

“You’re late on the music, pick it up!”

Adrien put his hands on the bases’ shoulders and pushed up, finding his balance as they held onto to one foot as he brought his other right behind his head. He thought they were doing well, but he could see Chloe wasn’t happy. He also had a feeling that the loud clopping of the skates against the wood of the floor didn’t help either. As he brought his leg down, readying himself to get tossed in the air when one of the cyclops fell to the floor. His height added with his weight, caused the whole floor to shake. Along with already shaky hands, Adrien lost his balance and fell backwards.

Now, Adrien was a werecat, so he had the qualities of a cat, including landing on his feet. He was a decent hight off the ground but was sure he’d be fine. So when he was feeling his body start to turn to land on his feet but was instead caught by something that crashed them to the floor, he was surprised. He opened his eyes to see he was on top the same gorgon who’d pointed him out earlier. He panicked a little when he saw he wasn’t wearing any eye gear to block his stone turning power when he noticed how dull his eyes were. Gorgon contacts, for those gorgons who didn’t like glasses, they covered the magic layer on their eyes that turned people to stone.

���Are you ok?”

“Huh? Oh, yeah. Um, guess I was falling for you.” Adrien felt his ears flick back when he realised what he said. “Why did I say that?”

Thankfully the gorgon found it funny. He let Adrien get off him before pushing himself up. Adrien noticed he was wearing skates, most likely using them to get from one side of the gym to where he’d fallen. He got up and offered his hands.

“Here, let me help you up.” He took the offered hands, feeling the scales against his fur. It was a strange feeling, but kinda nice. He must have pulled harder than expected because when the gorgon was up on his feet, he rocked forward on his skates but managed to catch himself. Adrien’s ears flicked back again at the realisation of how close they were.

“Looks like I’m falling for you now.” The gorgon joked, his dull slitted blue eyes shining mischievously.

Oh my Bast, Adrien was in trouble.

“Off! Get off of him, right now!” Chloe came over, waving the two of them apart, shooting a glare at the gorgon before turning to him. “Are you ok? Do you need to go to the nurse?”

“Chlo, I’m fine, really. I would have landed on my feet anyway.”

“This is exactly what I mean when I said they shouldn’t be here!”

While Adrien worked to calm Chloe down, he watched the gorgon skate back to his team, sending him a smile when Adrien mouthed ‘thank you’. by the end, Chloe cancelled the rest of practise and he’d gone with her and Sabrina to continue calming her down. he then realised he’d never gotten the gorgon’s name.

                                             ___________________

Monster High parties were always something to look forward to. Extravagant fashion, good music and funny antics depending if there was a reason the party was thrown. This one was down in the school’s underground dock. One of the students had brought their boat and the whole party was spilling from the main deck onto the dock and the stairs. They were incredibly long so no one was going back up, but it was breathing room. Adrien leaned against the railing of the boat, looking over at Nino having fun behind the DJ stand. The original DJ got thrown in the water and was being played around with by the school kraken. He saw a few of the sea monsters trying to help, but he knew Nino would be up there for a while.

“Hey.” Adrien looked up and perked up at the sight of the gorgon that had saved him.

“Hi.”

“Is your friend here? Hoping to not get yelled at again.”

“She is, but don’t worry, she’s more focused on beating out another girl in having more admirers. Um, I never got to properly thank you for saving me.”

“Even thought you would have landed on your feet.” He reminded, though he had a good-natured smile. “I sort of saw you falling and moved without thinking. I’m Luka by the way.”

“Adrien.”

“A pleasure. You were pretty impressive by the way, as a flyer.”

“Thanks. I’ve never really watched a SKRM match.”

Luka looked surprised. SKRM was the most popular sport, even more the casketball. “Guess that explains why I never saw you last season. People always at least come to one game.”

“I also just transferred. My dad had me home-schooled for a long time. I’ve known Chloe for years and have helped her with fearleading so she dragged me when I came.”

“Guess I’ll have to come see you guys at competition.”

“Then I’ll cheer for you extra hard during SKRM season. And I guess I could tech you guys a few basic tosses to help.”

Luka smiled at him. “We’d appreciate it. But enough about ‘work’. Do you wanna dance?”

“Sure.”

He followed Luka onto the made dance floor, easily moving to the music. He noticed the snakes in Luka’s hair moving along with the music as well. Someone from behind bumped into Adrien and sent him stumbling forward. Luka caught him, his hands going around his waist.

“You seem to be falling for me a lot.” Luka teased.

Adrien’s tail flicked around, as he struggled to find words.

“If it’s ok with you, maybe before you teach the team those tosses, we can go out for coffee at the maul?”

Adrien slowly nodded, trying to stop his tail.

Maybe he was falling for Luka.

[choco-mark]

A Marriage of Inconvenience (3)

overall pairing: mafia!jeno x mafia!oc

overall genre: angst | smut | fluff

warnings: language, mentions of violence + death, oppression of women, murder/homicide, forced (?) kissing but it’s implied that she likes it, mentions of drugs + drug use + drugging someone else, emotional blackmail (kinda)

summary: when two mafia gangs decide to end their family feud after decades, your mother decides to give your hand away to marriage of their son, lee jeno. he seemed to hate you from the moment he laid his eyes on you, but could the resolution lead to something much more than a bride and groom?

words: 5.2k

masterlist

requested by 🤡 anon

18 April

You felt yourself wake up with a haze in your brain, feeling like you were fogged from heat as you opened your eyes with a few blinks. Your body felt like it was on fire, and just as you let out a groan, you tried to bring your hands to your face to rub it a bit, but you couldn’t. Your vision blurred, you tugged at your arms again, now hearing the chains that were coming from the cuffs around your wrists and ankles, anchoring you to the ground.

What happened? It was like someone had read your thoughts when you heard a bright, yet deep laugh in front of you, startling you as you struggled to look up from where you were. I was at the hideout, in the hallway, a smoke bomb went off, and—

Your memory blanked out from there, the last words in your brain being those from your darling fiancee. The entire world is a game, Park. We’re all just a bunch of players. But nothing seemed to come after that, a complete wipe out of everything that could have happened after that smoke bomb went off. “Who’s there?”

A figure came closer to you, your vision clearing slowly with each move it made until it was in the front, kneeling down to the level you were at. The ‘it’ was rather a man, and a very beautiful one in your perspective. His face inched closer to yours, eyes darting all over your face before the ends of his lips darted up in a twisted smile, painting his face gorgeously. “He was right, baby, you’re a pretty one.”

You opened your mouth to speak, but the motion was cut off harshly, the man’s lips coming crashing down on your own as you attempted to push him away. The jingle of the chains was a loud echo in the room, making the man giggle as he dodged your teeth, pressing his tongue into your mouth instead. His mouth was warm, so sweet and inviting as his tongue molded against yours, urging you to give in—to kiss him back for just a moment.

He pulled away from you, the dyed silver hair falling over his eyes as he pushed it back in one motion, licking his lips as if he had just tasted something. “I could just ruin you, Park—” A hand went to your jaw as you opened your mouth again in the slightest, grasping it tightly in his palm as he pulled you closer to him once again. 

In all your years of experience in fighting, never did you think you would go so weak in the knees for such dominance like this. Whoever this mysterious man was, he was making your heart jump in less than a second, making you wonder how you were being so affected by this. I’m drugged, aren’t I? That’s why I’m so weak. 

You weren’t wrong about that, but it wasn’t the drugs that let out a soft whimper when his teeth grazed across your neck, hoping that he wouldn’t hear. He did, however, the darkness of his eyes focusing back on you as a smirk plastered his face again. “So impatient, you are a Park indeed, sweetheart. Say—”

The man’s words were cut off short with a bang coming from the end of the room, making you jump as a door had flown open, a man coming in storming hastily towards the two of you. He let go of the grasp around your jaw, sighing deeply as he stood back up, licking his lips once again as his eyes never left yours. God, why is that so hot? What the fuck? What’s wrong with me?

He turned away from you, facing where the opening of the door was, the people coming into closer view as your eyes focused on the one in the front, his eyes narrow and full of pierced anger. A wave of exhaustion took over you as you recognized the person, the one with the familiar sound of his jeans and black polished boots.

“I told you to watch her, bastard!” he snarled as he took a hold of the other’s man’s collar, pulling it closer to him with a force that made it seem like he would destroy. “Not taint her with your foul blood.”

“Shut up, Taeyong,” the silver-haired man pushed him away with a palm, dusting off his clothing like it was nothing. He looked back up at him, rolling his eyes with another step closer. “All I did was kiss her, brother.”

Taeyong didn’t look at you, his eyes only angrily shaking at the man in front of him as you tried to connect the dots. Your brain was failing to cooperate, however, because with every mental move you tried to make, you felt like you were going to pass out. Taeyong. Lee Taeyong. Where am I, then?

“And you know what,” he continued, looking down at you to where he had just previously stuck his tongue down the wet walls of your throat. “My blood is your blood, you know that. Can’t you lend the girl to me? She’s a Park after all, how can I resist?”

Taeyong seemed to be annoyed with his answer, waving him away for his behavior as the anger dissipated from his face in an instant, looking down at you instead. In his eyes, you looked perfect, just where you belonged as you were locked down to the ground by his own handmade chains wrapped around your shimmering skin. 

It was exactly what you had thought when he just smiled at you, scanning your entire body as your completely wrecked figure overtook his vision. No, Taeyong wasn’t here to save you, you didn’t think he would be the type to do so. He leaned down closer to you, the other man watching as he came down to your level, raising a hand to stroke your hair softly.

“D-Don’t touch me,” you tried to get out, but it was weak, falling from your lips as a desperate whisper that almost pleaded ‘please, touch me’ as they both chuckled, the argument that had taken place merely seconds ago no longer seeming to be an issue. He’s the one who drugged me, isn’t he?

“You’re so much better like this,” his thumb brushed over your lips, the lingering kiss from the silver-haired man still sugary on the edges as he pressed past them, slipping it into your mouth for a brief second before pulling it out. It was filthy, the way your saliva coated his finger until he traced your jawline with the wetness, the liquid drying onto your skin uncomfortably. “So much prettier, pure and hmm—beautiful. Aren’t you just a work of art?”

He didn’t just drug me, he kidnapped me too. His hand trailed to the back of your neck, coldness meeting your hot skin as he chuckled at your heat, eyes darkening from how messy you were getting. Your eyes faltered, looking from Taeyong to the other man, and then back to him; you tried at the chains again, feeling so out of control.

And I think I know exactly why.

Jeno’s hands ran through his now dirtied blond hair for about the hundred time, ruffling it madly as he made his way through the hallway. It had been only a few hours since he had—just lost you from his grasp, and it was already taking a toll on him. Not only did his father just threaten to kill him, he also had held Mark with a knife at his throat, his own son’s throat, threatening to him that he would kill his brother if he didn’t bring you back in one piece.

It didn’t matter how much he reminisced over the events that took place earlier, because your presence was gone almost as quickly as it was there. He had one thing to do, and he fucked that one thing up; if he wasn’t able to find you before the two of you were supposed to have your ‘formal’ engagement, your family would probably wage war against the Lees. Well, it was inevitable at this point, though, since everything that just happened seemed so intricately planned out leading to your disappearance. It wasn’t normal.

Mark walked beside the younger man, scrolling through his tablet on something related to illegal hacking, seeming deeply focused on whatever it was until Jeno reached his room. He looked up from the screen, his eyes shining as he bid him a short goodbye and a promise to inform him if he found anything related to your whereabouts.

It was obvious that Jeno was beyond frustrated: frustrated with himself for being able to lose his hold on you so quickly, and with his father, who didn’t even offer an ounce of help in order to locate you. It was all up to him, and if you weren’t found and brought back to the Lees, other things with happen, things that included your family and his.

He was halfway through stripping his dirty clothing from his body when Mark came bursting into his room, a laptop covering his face as he slammed the door and walked over to his brother, shoving it towards. “I found something—”

The screen reflected a large map of the city, with a point fixated in the middle, marking familiar looking coordinates. Jeno couldn’t quite pinpoint what was so oddly familiar about it, and the longer he looked at the numbers, the more confused he got. He looked up at Mark, blinking a few times. “I don’t get it.”

“Doesn’t it look familiar?” He used his fingers to zoom in on the touchpad, tapping again to show the numbers of the coordinates. “Remember when Father first took us out for a battle, maybe when we were like—thirteen or fourteen? He made us memorize the coordinates.”

Of course Jeno remembered his first battle, the first time he had ever held a gun in his hand away from the training room and the first time he had shot a bullet into a living breathing person. He had earned one of his very rarely occurring praises from his father that day, but it had easy been taken away when he had overestimated himself, ending up with a broken shinbone for a few weeks. It was also the first time he had gotten hurt in battle, and the first time he had lost one.

“Y/N had a phone,” Mark continued, making Jeno perk up from the words. He hadn’t seen you using a phone, not that you were necessarily allowed anyway. “I saw her take one with her before she left, so I traced it down from a few networks to see what was actually on the phone. Whoever kidnapped her had tried to erase everything from the net, but I was able to scavenge the last message sent from her phone.”

With a few taps, he pulled up a encrypted file, typing a few more things to show the actual message. “It was sent from her phone, almost right after we got back home. I couldn’t find who the message was sent to, but it was to a contact that was frequently called in the past few days. But, I was also able to scavenge her last call.”

He pulled up an audio file, pressing it a few times before it played. Your voice came ringing from the device, a voice softer than what Jeno had ever heard from his time with you. “It’s okay, you’ll be okay without me.” The second voice was deep, and Jeno was obviously not expecting it to be a—male.

“But I miss you,” he could hear the slow burn of the other’s voice, the very slight crack that he was able to hear. “Will you come to see me after? Will you visit me soon?” There was a pause, and for a moment Jeno thought that the clip was over, but your soft chuckle was vibrant, startling him a bit; he hadn’t heard you laugh purely before, only in sarcasm or annoyance. 

“Maybe one day, Sungie, I’ll see you.”

Jeno couldn’t help but feel like he was eavesdropping on a conversation that he clearly was not supposed to hear, but he continued listening intently, listening to the male let out a dry chuckle. “But you won’t be with me anymore.”

“Shh, I’m always with you, Jisungie.” The audio broke, your voice being the last ringing noise in Jeno and Mark’s ears as Jeno looked over to his older brother, confusion spreading across his face. Who was she talking to?

“It’s her younger brother,” Mark seemed to have read his mind, taking the laptop back into his hands as he plopped down on the bed, starting to type rapidly. “I tracked him down too, Park Jisung, eighteen. Lives in the Park mansion on the other side of the city, where Y/N used to live. I’m assuming that these coordinates were also sent to his contact, which means whoever kidnapped her also wanted to tie in her family with this.”

It was all a sudden blur to Jeno, it didn’t even seem like it was real as he thought about how coincidental the entire situation was. You were kidnapped, apparently last tracked down at the exact coordinates that he had his first battle at, along with a message sent to your brother basically asking him to come there. It didn’t even seem a little bit right.

After a little more blanking out, it hit him. He clapped his hands together loudly, startling Mark as he sat down next to him. “Remember what Father said on that day? He said that one day we wouldn’t be part of NCT Lee anymore, because we would have evolved into our own people.”

Mark scrunched up his face, nodding for him to continue. “He told us that all of our skills would go use eventually, and it wouldn’t be for the Lees, it wouldn’t be for the family anymore because fighting isn’t about family. Winning isn’t about family.”

“I don’t get it, where—are you going with this?”

“Listen!” Jeno threw up his hands in slight frustration. “He told us that clans never lasted for as long as they thought they would, and that NCT would have to be reorganized once again with all of us included. That’s what the coordinates are for, he wanted us to memorize them because that’s where the beginning of the new clan would be. Or—rather, group.”

He pointed straight at the longitudinal coordinate, the numbers flashing on the screen brightly as he did so.

“NCT 127.”

There was a silky blindfold drawn over your eyes when you woke up again, the initial haze draining your body once again as you sat up, the chains having been removed from your body. But you were tied together now, ropes enclosed your wrists together behind your back, making you struggle.

A hand yanked off the ribbon around your eyes, bright light finally filling your vision. You could feel your head spinning, probably from whatever they had given you previously. “Aw, pretty Y/N is finally awake—”

It was the same sweet voice as before, and you watched as a figure appeared in front of you. You were on some kind of couch now, no longer in the same white room full of painful looking chains, and there was someone sitting across from you. The silver-haired man leaned down to your level, clicking his tongue in mock pity.

“Who are you?” The words came out groggy, almost as if you had been dehydrated for days as your mouth involuntary salivated, making you press your dry lips together. “Who—”

“You can call me Haechan,” he cut you off, his hand moving to your jaw as he forced your face upwards, his own face inching closer to yours. “Oh, baby, it’s so sad that you can’t be mine. Look at you, you’re gorgeous, hmm. I even brought you a gift, darling.” His last words came out as a low hiss, sending shivers through your body as he moved away, letting the person in front of you come into view.

You could’ve sworn your heart stopped in your chest as you saw the familiar dyed hair masking the dark eyes of your younger brother; his eyes were closed, probably dozed off from the way his stance was relaxed, though he had the same ropes around his wrists and ankles. How did he get here? Why did they take him too?

As you opened your mouth to speak, Haechan leaned over to you, untying your wrists just to yank one towards him, a syringe shining in his hands as you tried wriggling away. No wonder you were feeling so out of reality, dozing in and out so quickly, your heart rate faltering as you could barely even keep your breathing normal. “Heroin,” you whispered as you gave up against his grip, wincing slightly as he injected you with it.

“That’s right, baby girl,” he answered softly, contrasting from how he had just given you some of the most dangerously addictive stuff on the planet, pushing you down against the couch as he retied your wrists. “You’re starting to love it, sweetheart, and I’ll keep giving it to you if you continue behaving like a good girl. Hmm?”

Haechan’s hand stroked your hair as he leaned you against the soft cushions, wandering his eyes over your face as he saw you fall into the drug, being thrown into a pleasurable rush, resulting in you letting out a quiet sound. “Feels good, hmm? You like it?”

You couldn’t answer him, your mind being thrown into another reality as you foggily saw him moving over to Jisung, pulling out his arm in the same fashion. “No,” you cried out, launching yourself forward until you were on the ground, your knees grazing painfully against the wooden surface as Haechan looked down at you in awe, his hand drawing back. “Don’t—” He saw your look of desperation, a look that said ‘please, don’t drug my baby brother’ as you struggled against the ties, trying to stand up in your position. 

“You don’t want me to give him some too?” He threw the syringe on the other couch, pulling you up by the waist and throwing you back across from your brother. His fingers lingered on your body for a second longer before he pulled away, tucking a hair away behind your ear as he watched your eyes flutter shut, and then you force them open. “Don’t be selfish, baby, let him have some too.”

“N-No, don’t—please,” you choked out as he took a step back, hooking your legs around his to keep him in place. “Don’t—give him any, please. Don’t touch him—please...”

Haechan wished he could’ve given into your pleads, seeing your eyes turn glossy with each move he made. He glanced over to where the door was, knowing that his older brother would come in at any second to see if he was doing his job properly. All he had to do was put you in a position where you wouldn’t be able to refuse him, and Taeyong was smart enough to know that you could bare the pain against yourself. 

But if it was your family, that was a different situation. Parks did everything for their family, fought for pride and not victory, that was something he learned at a very young age. Family was the last sacrifice that a Park would make, the last sacrifice after themselves. “Please don’t drug him, H-Haechan—”

You weren’t sure if using his name would have convinced him not to, already having seen that he was hesitating from the way you were looking so sincere and affected by just the idea of Jisung being drugged. It wasn’t fake, for once, the emotion was just as real as you showed him, because no, you didn’t want your brother to be harshly drugged the way he had just done you.

But he didn’t speak, only pulling your legs off of him and smoothing it down to the ground, wondering if he should tie your ankles together. You watched as he let his hand wander, rubbing your thighs in a slow fashion, making you believe that he was focusing on you instead of him. It was working, but only for a second until he pushed your body back against the couch with a hard force, knocking the air out of your lungs as he grabbed the syringe again.

“I have to.”

April 19

Jeno knew that he shouldn’t have waited the next morning to go after his lead on you, but his father had refused to send him out on the same day, which seemed contradictory from his words before. He expected that he would’ve agreed immediately, considering he wanted you back that much before, but it just seemed to change in the matter of a few hours.

There was something off about the whole situation, and Jeno didn’t know if it was just his inner self telling him that something was wrong, or if he was overthinking it all. Maybe your entire disappearance was a whole mystery, which was right, it just seemed all too perfect for it to be real. There was no way that Mark would have been able to track you down that easily, usually if someone went missing from the Lee crew, it would take weeks for them to be tracked down, where they were usually found dead.

What was even more confusing was that someone had knowingly kidnapped you, which was what Jeno still couldn’t wrap his head around. They had contacted your brother from the Park household, so was there a possibility that this was a feud between the mysterious 127 gang that was only a myth from his father’s old stories. Yet they had kidnapped you under his own nose, right beside him with the knowledge that you were taken along with the Lees for a mission, which was something that no one but his team and his father knew. 

“Have you seen Donghyuck?” Mark snapped him out of his thoughts, making him look up from his spot in the lobby. “He said he was going underground for dealing before we went out, but I don’t think he ever came back. I just called him like four times, he’s not picking up and I can’t trace his phone—”

Jeno sighed, shaking his head from his thoughts at the mention of his younger brother as he stood up. “Just hope he didn’t knock up some girl again; are you ready? Shouldn’t we have left like—ten minutes ago?” Mark nodded, looking down at his phone before stuffing it in his pocket.

“Yeah, the rest of the guys are in the van already. Also, Father only gave us one today, I asked him for two but he said we wouldn’t need that many people.” He rolled his eyes slightly at his own words, gesturing Jeno towards the door. “Whatever, I think he wants us to find her because we technically lost her, so we only got five other guys. Don’t tell him I said this but, I think he’s kind of crazy.”

“Like, Y/N just got kidnapped and she’s one of the highest ranked soldiers in all of NCT, shouldn’t that like—ring some warning bells? Shouldn’t that mean we should bring more men? Unless he’s wishing us death.” Mark sounded fed up as he spoke, opening the doorway to the large garage, making his way to the van with Jeno following suit.

“I wouldn’t really be surprised if he wanted us to die,” Jeno mumbled in response, running a hand through his head as he climbed into the back of the—not very large vehicle, sitting beside Mark and his technical gadgets. “But he’s obviously expecting us to bring her back before some war breaks out or something.”

It was true, there would be an easy war started with a small match if the Parks found out that the Lees had lost you, their literal prized soldier. And the worst part was that it be completely in the hands of Jeno, the person who was supposed to fucking marry you. He let out a strangled sigh, placing his head in his hands as the van started its engine, driving off to the destination.

At this point, Jeno wished that he was married to you, rather than looking for you all over the city while having his head, and his brother’s head, on the death toll basically waiting to be chopped off if you weren’t brought back in one piece. Wait, no, why would I want to marry her? She’s a bitch.

He glanced up to Mark, who was hastily working on his laptop with something. Mark liked you, at least from what Jeno was able to perceive, he had seen the way you had calmly talked to him the day before him, in a van similar to this one. You didn’t look like you wanted to kill him, not the way you usually snarled at Jeno whenever he spoke. Mark even called you by your first name, which was weird hearing, considering you and him usually just addressed each other on a last name basis.

It had hit him earlier that day that you certainly didn’t want to be inside of his house as much as he didn’t want you in his house, especially from how you talked so highly about your family as if they were the only thing that mattered on the planet. Well, to you, family was everything. Loyalty was everything, just like you had said.

“She’s not as bad as you think she is,” a voice came from beside him, startling Jeno as he looked over at Mark, whose eyes never left his screen. “I know what you’re thinking. You’ve just been a complete ass to her, even though you’re the one she’s marrying. You know that she was supposed to marry Taeyong, right?”

“Yeah, I—wait, what?”

“I assumed that Father didn’t tell you, clearly from the way that you were, uh, behaving around her. Taeyong was the one who saw Y/N on a mission and told Father he—wanted her, I think? And you know Father, well, he’d do anything for his oldest son. So, he sent a letter of engagement. But Y/N is five years younger than him, so the Parks declined. I mean, they declined but not really, they still wanted the peace treaty, so they said they would give her hand to someone who was the same age as her. And, well it went down to you, since Donghyuck wasn’t, well—considered pure blood.”

So that’s why Taeyong was always lingering near her hallway, so he wasn’t fucking one of the servants. Jeno scratched his head confusedly. “Why didn’t I know this? Wait, how do you know this?”

“Donghyuck told me everything, yesterday actually. Taeyong was kind of—the first person Y/N when she got to the palace, and I swear he looked like he was gonna eat her or something. I knew that he was the one who wanted her in the first place, but he didn’t really seem to care that you were engaged to her, so I didn’t think it was really that big of a deal. He kept trying to go into her room, apparently according to some of the servants, and I even saw him once. But, I haven’t seen him since yesterday. I don’t think he knows that she’s gone...”

Something didn’t feel right, for about maybe the third time in the same day. So Taeyong was the one who wanted to marry you, that explained why you had kept saying you were here because of the Lees. She said it on the first day, that someone in the house wanted her here because they saw her during a battle or something. I thought she was lying—

The van came to an abrupt stop, making everyone lurch forward with a combined yelp. “What the fuck happened?” Jeno called for the driver, who had just survived some serious whiplash. “Hey! Why’d you stop? There’s nothing—”

The backdoor of the van slid open with a quick motion, making Jeno and Mark turn tense up, with Jeno aiming his gun straight at the now open door. His hands loosened as he saw who it was, the familiar man he had known so well taking a step up into the van, kneeling to avoid hitting his head against the top. The rest of the men lowered their guns, looking at each other in confusion as he turned to Jeno, a smirk on his face.

“I knew you would come, brother.”

“Y/N, Y/N, wake up,” you felt cool hands on your cheeks, contrasting from the warmth coming from your body as you heard the recognizable deep voice. Your eyes fluttered a little, opening enough for you to see Jisung, his eyes wide and concentrated on you. “Are you okay? Y/N, wait, wait, no don’t close your eyes!”

You took in a short breath, feeling at your wrists to see that they were free, your arms moving slowly as you tried to control your movements. The memories from earlier surged through your head in one motion, making you force your eyes open at your brother. “Did he inject you? Sungie—did he—”

You let your hand slide down his arm, your eyes falling on the puncture mark in the middle, making you let out a painful sigh. He only gave him one dose, right? That’s why he’s still cold. It wasn’t that much. Right? More means he would end up like me. “Inject me? What—what do you mean?”

As he hoisted you up, you looked around the room, scanning it to see no trace of both Taeyong or that—Haechan guy. With another sharp breath, you let yourself lean against the cushions, feeling completely drained out. “Do you know how you got here? Where were you? H-How did they find you? Did you leave the house for a mission, what happened?”

Jisung shook his head, his hair bouncing around with him as he looked at you worriedly and then looked to the ground. “I—You texted me. I mean, I don’t think it was you anymore, but it was from your number. There were coordinates, and it said that you would meet me—there. I told Mom that I was going underground, and I—took a car. It was the center of Seoul. I went into one of the parking garages, and that’s all I remember until—now.”

You hummed, brushing your hair away from your face as you stood up slowly, seeing the broken ropes on the ground and glancing back at your brother. “You got out of the ties, like I taught you?” He nodded, a small smile on his face as you couldn’t help but feel a little proud, reaching over to ruffle his hair. 

You knew how much he hated when you did that, but he received it with a soft expression. It hadn’t even been too long since you had actually seen him, but it had felt like too long of a time, and even though this wasn’t the most ideal reunion, it was better than nothing. You had really thought you wouldn’t see him for a long time.

“How about we get out of here, hmm?”

previous | next

hi guys, here’s the third chapter! it’s gonna get wow very spicy in the fourth part like VERY SPICY, and i won’t make you guys wait as long this time!! expect the fourth part before the dreamies comeback?!?! i hope this chapter wasn’t too boring because there’s no...action between y/n and jeno but this is important for future chapters!! :) love y’all, stay safe and healthy ♡

[multiverse-imagines]

Ryoga x reader- Always Welcome Here

(Reader is meant to be gender neutral)

You walked towards your home after a long day of school and band practice. The streets are still bustling in the Friday night sunset of Akihabara. A few dark clouds have set in above you, but you figure you'll make it home by then. It's a shame you forgot your umbrella. Passing by a park, you see someone laying on the ground. They appear to be unconscious. After your initial panic, you cautiously approach the body, and notice it's a young man around your age. He has a heavy looking backpack, and a yellow bandana around his head. He seemed to be muttering to himself. 

"Damn you… need...food.."

"Hey, are you okay?" You asked. His tired eyes looked up to you, pleading. 

"Can you give me some food? I'm so hungry." He mutters. You reach in your backpack, and grab a granola bar that you had been saving for the last part of your walk home. 

"It's not much, but I hope it helps." The boy rolls over onto his back, and sits up with difficulty. He nearly swallows the bar whole before standing with a sigh. 

"Thank you. That won't hold me for long though." He fretted, "I've gotta find Furinkan High school again."

"Ah, well, you're close, you're in Akihabara. Nerima isn't too far from here."

"Really? Thank you! Well, I'll be seeing ya." He went to wave you goodbye as he left in the opposite direction of Nerima. 

"That's the wrong way!"

"Oh. Thanks." He turned and went the other way. 

"I wasn't done yet!" You say as you feel a single raindrop on your cheek. The rain began to downpour in seconds as you both ran for the safety of the underside of a slide. You made it and let out a sigh of relief, but where was the boy? You peered out from under the slide, and he had vanished, but his clothes remained. You saw movement from under them, and a little black pig emerged. It wore the headband of the boy around its neck. You used your book bag as an umbrella and walked up to the scared little pig. 

"Hey, did you just turn into a pig?" The pig stared at you wide eyed, and nodded in defeat. You sighed. "Alright, we're taking you back to my house. At least this way you can get some food." You picked up his clothes, and stuffed them in his bag. It was pretty light, but the umbrella… the umbrella had to weigh at least 10 Kilograms! (22 pounds) after adjusting to the shock of the weight, you begrudgingly lifted and opened it to use as a proper umbrella to walk the two of you back to your home.

You entered your house, and thankfully no one was home. Your father worked overseas, and your mother would be at work well past 8:30 as always. You grabbed a few towels and dried him off before yourself. 

"Go ahead and wait here on the couch while I go change my clothes." You let him sit in the fluffy pink towel. You put on some sweatpants and a comfy T-shirt then put your clothes in the dryer. You could hardly believe it. A boy turning into a pig with water. The phone rang, and you hurried a shirt on before answering it. 

"Hello, ____ residence."

"Hey, ____?" It was Mom, "I guess there's flooding over the tracks for the train home, so Kazato offered to put me up at her place for the night. I'm sorry I won't be home."

"It's okay, mom. I'll just see you tomorrow." You made yourself sound disappointed. This way your guest wouldn't receive any Berratement from your mom. You said goodnight to your mom and returned to the living room, sitting next to the little pig on the couch. 

"So, you don't seem to be surprised you're a pig. Is there a way to change you back?" You asked. He nodded, and jumped from the couch, and began wandering from room to room; You followed in curiosity. Once he found the bathroom, he jumped onto the tub, and pointed his little hoof at the hot water switch. 

"Is it hot water that turns you back?" He nodded furiously in response, "Alright. Let me get you some clothes first." You left him in the bathroom with the water running while you grabbed a blue T-shirt, and a pair of black loose-fitting basketball shorts. You hoped they would fit him. You walked back to the bathroom, and thankfully found him still as a pig, and the water level seemed high enough now. You shut off the water.

"I'll put your clothes in the wash so you'll have fresh clothes in the morning." He tilted his head, confused. 

"It's supposed to rain all night. I'm not letting you walk all the way to Nerima in the rain. What if you turn into a pig again? Then what was the point of a bath? My Mom isn't gonna be home tonight, so I'm letting you stay." You turned and left to let him bathe in peace. You began making some food for when he returned. 

It was about a half an hour before he emerged, still wearing his headband, but wearing the clothes you had retrieved for him. 

"Thank you." Was the first thing he said as he leaned on the counter next to you, "I'm Ryoga, by the way. Ryoga Hibiki."

"____ ____. And it was no problem, really."

"I'm sure you have a lot of questions." He seemed embarrassed. 

"Yeah, but, can I ask?"

"I suppose if I'm gonna be here all night, I might as well answer any questions you have." He said, picking up his chopsticks. "Let's wait until after we eat. I'm starved." You nodded in agreement, and you picked up the conversation while he helped you with the dishes. 

"Well, how did you become a pig?" He answered with the story of how he was tailing a schoolmate named Ranma Saotome. A rude boy who went to train with his father in China, and he fell into a cursed pond where a pig had drowned. Now whenever he gets doused with cold water, he becomes a pig. He can be human again with warm water. 

"If I hadn't seen if for myself, I never would have believed you." You nodded. Ryoga then went on to mention how many people who have come into contact with Ranma have ended up cursed in one of these pools in Japan. Ranma, his father, and two others have a similar curse of turning into something else via water. 

"That's so strange."

"That Ranma," He growled, "I'll get my revenge someday." He balled his fists up towards his chest, as if restraining himself from punching the nearby wall. 

"Can't you just go back to this Jusenkyo place and change back?"

"Getting there is a battle in itself. I'm, what my family calls, directionally challenged. I can even have a map in my hands and still get lost. Also, getting to China takes money, which I don't have." He grimaced. 

"That's rough," You sighed, "but it makes sense why you didn't know where you were in the park earlier." Ryoga nodded and returned to the couch, placing the blanket you had set there prior over his legs. You sat next to him, turning on the TV. The two of you watched a few game shows, and anime that played on the TV, making small talk as things became relevant. A romantic scene came on at one point, and Ryoga seemed to be bothered by it. It was late before you decided to go to your own room to sleep. You waved Ryoga goodnight as he stretched out on the couch. 

"I'll leave my door open, so let me know if you need anything." Ryoga nodded as he rolled over facing the back of the couch. You retreated to your room and crawled under the covers before falling asleep. The sound of the raindrops hitting harder and faster on the roof. 

You awoke to a large crack of lightning and a crash nearby. You sat up in bed so quickly it made your head spin. Within seconds, Ryoga was in the doorway. 

"_____, are you alright? I heard you scream!" He seemed just as startled as you were. You couldn't recall screaming, but it was probably inaudible over the blood rushing through your ears. You were tried to catch your breath before replying, 

"Yeah, I-I just heard a loud crack of lightning. I think it struck something outside." You said getting out of bed and looking out the window. A street light had fallen on the garage of the house across the street. You looked to your alarm clock to see it dead. The power was out. It was unsettlingly dark in the house now, and it admittedly worried you. 

"Now I'm really glad you aren't out there." You muttered to Ryoga. Another loud clap of thunder nearly shook the house, and you grasped Ryoga's arm. You normally loved thunderstorms, but when the thunder got too loud, you couldn't help but be a little nervous.

"Are you alright?" He asked, his voice was kinder than it had been.

"Yeah, just a little shaken from how close the lightning is."

"Let's sit in the living room for a bit and relax. Do you have any candles or flashlights?" 

"Yeah, there's some in the bathroom." You led Ryoga through the house to the bathroom, and found the handle to the bathroom cupboard. You felt around, finding the candles your mother used for her relaxing baths, and a lighter. The two of you wandered back to the living room and you managed to light one of the candles, setting it on the table in front of the couch. You lit the other two and placed them near the hallway in case you needed to go down the hallway, and the other in the kitchen, still in view of the living room. You grabbed a couple of juice pouches from the fridge, but made a note not to open it from here onward. After some time of drinking and chatting, you finally felt the tension in your shoulders release. 

"Are you planning on going back to bed?" Ryoga asked. 

"Yeah, but I'm still kind of scared. If that pole had been striked at any other angle, it easily could have fallen on the house." You changed over to him, his face also showed a frown of worry. 

"W-why don't I protect you then…" He trailed off. You felt your face heat up, 

"How… how so?" 

"You could…" His face matched yours in color, "stay on the couch with me." 

"Um, do… you think we'd have more room in… m-my bed?" You were just as nervous about this. 

"Oh, your right. But!" The two of you kept embarrassed eye contact with each other, and after the longest second of your life, you let out a breath, and relaxed yourself. 

"There's more room there, and I'd feel safer there. Let me blow out these two candles, and we'll go to my room." You smiled. Ryoga grabbed the blanket he'd been using and stood by the hall while you blew out the other two candles. You took the remaining candle to light your way to your room. You set the candle on your desk away from any papers, and climbed into bed. Ryoga climbed in after you, and you were now laying between him and the wall. Your bed was a bit small for two people, but it was vastly better than what the couch would have offered. However, Ryoga still seemed uncomfortable. It looked like he would fall off of the bed at any moment. 

"If you aren't comfortable, come closer." You said. You practically heard Ryoga swallow nervously before he inched closer to you. Soon the problem became obvious that Ryoga had nowhere to put his arms. He awkwardly had them folded over his chest, but didn't seem comfortable. You reached for his arm, and gently moved his hand to your side. His other arm went above your head like an extra pillow, and you made yourself comfortable by placing your head in his chest. His arms eventually relaxed and his top arm soon hugged your back. You tangled your legs in with his, and looked up to him in the dark. 

"Better?" You whispered, you heard his breath hitch, before letting out an affirmative noise, "Good. Thanks Ryoga, good night." You snuggled into his chest again, and made the attempt to have your body sleep. As you left consciousness, you felt his hand leave your back to pet your hair. 

The next morning, you woke up to the light coming through your window. The candle had put itself out, and Ryoga still held you. 

"....Akane…" You heard his whisper in his sleep. You wondered who that was. Friend? Family? You'd have to ask when he woke up. You would normally get up and make breakfast, but you were so comfortable you decided to fall asleep again. 

You awoke again to Ryoga shifting in the bed. You felt him get up from the bed. 

"Good morning, Ryoga." You said, your eyes half open. 

“Morning, ____.“ he sounded well rested. You heard the bathroom door close and decided to slowly get up. You noticed your alarm clock's flashing numbers, meaning the lights we're back on. You made your way to the bathroom and heard the toilet flush upon your approach. After a few seconds, Ryoga left the bathroom, carrying his clothes from the dryer. You told him you were gonna make breakfast, and you went about your morning business. You remained in your pajamas since school had been cancelled, and made a quick breakfast for the two of you. You checked the contents of the fridge to see they had remained unscathed by the power outage. As you ate, you remembered Ryoga's muttering from earlier. 

"Hey, Ryoga, you said a name in your sleep last night. Who's Akane?" Ryoga nearly choked on his food, taking a long drink of his juice before replying. 

"Akane… she's. She's the woman I…" He stared solemnly at his plate. 

"You love her?" You tried to finish for him. You gave him the benefit of the doubt he wasn't a murderer. 

"Yeah. I've been in love with her for a very long time now. But she's marrying Ranma, and he doesn't even like her!" His voice raised in volume, "I haven't been able to tell her how I feel and I can't even tell her I turn into a pig! I've spent so much time with her as her pet pig, but she doesn't even know!" Tears filled his eyes with anger. 

"I'm sorry you're going through that. That sucks."

"Yeah, it does…" Ryoga sighed, calming down, "but I'll tell her one day. I'll save her from Ranma, and her and I'll make her so happy." He stabbed a piece of food and ate it angrily.

After the dishes were done, you found Ryoga on the couch rearranging his bag, adding the snacks you gave him for the road. 

"Are you leaving right away?" You asked. 

"In a little bit, yeah. I've gotta get to Nerima to take Akane back." You frowned at this. You'd really become fond of the man you found unconscious in the park and didn't really want him to leave. Once he was ready, you walked him to the street, and faced him in the direction of Nerima. He waved goodbye, and as he left, you stopped him. 

"Ryoga," He turned to you. You kissed his cheek and gently took his hand, "I-if things don't work out, you know, with Akane, you're always welcome here. I'd be more than happy to have you." Your face heated up again, as Ryoga also seemed to pick up on what you were implying. 

"Th-thank you!" He closed shut eyes, "I'll remember that! See you next time, ____!" He shouted as he ran past you in an embarrassed ferver. 

"Wait! Ryoga! You're going the wrong… Way…" You sighed. You chuckled knowing he'd be back someday.

[buckysbitch107]

I don’t know if requests are open, but if they are can I request a Steve Rogers x Reader where at the end of end game he goes back to his lover from the 40s but instead of Peggy it’s the reader(include any backstory that you want)? Like even his compass contains the picture of the reader and not Peggy. I love your wring so far btw, keep up the good work!!!

Home Isn’t Just A Place | Steve Rogers x Reader

Summary: When Colonel Phillips himself delivered the letter stating the love of your life (and best friend since 5 years old) was dead, you were more than devastated. You were still mourning the loss of your fiancé, mindlessly fiddling with the ring on your finger, when a much harsher knock rang at your door. You expected it to be perhaps your sister or a delivery boy. What you certainly didn’t expect was for your fiancé, who you were told was dead, to be standing at your doorstep.

Warnings: Swearing, Angst, Crying

Word Count: 2.38K

A/N: Hope this meets your standards! I tried my best with this one and i hope you enjoy it! Just a reminder that I will always be accepting requests! I will be writing a Part 2 to this, so stay tuned!

“It’s fine guys! I can cook something in the apartment!” You speak, the men on either side of you giving you a small glare.

“It’s our last night, (Y/N/N). We wanna make it special before you’re alone in the apartment.” Steve mentions, wrapping his arm around your waist. You’re still taller than him, but it’s the thought that counts, right?

“That restaurant isn’t that good anyway.” You whisper, trying so hard to hide the disappointment in your voice. You’d been looking forward to sitting in that restaurant since it opened, and when Bucky and Steve said they were taking you, that meant you could finally get a chance. That is, until you got there, and they didn’t have your reservation.

“Doll-” Bucky starts, soon being cut off by your voice.

“Guys. It’s fine, really.”

“No, it’s not (Y/N)! We wanted to treat you to something special, and now it looks like we’re having cabbage fuckin’ stew for dinner… again.”

“Or,” You pause, lifting your arm to point at the sign hanging off of the corner store at the end of the street. “We could get some food from Stan’s. It’s still open and we have enough money for some hot dogs.” The two men agree shortly after and the three of you quicken your pace, eager to get some food in your stomach. The small bell above the door rings through the air as the three of you walk in, the owner walking out from the back.

“Steve, Bucky, (Y/N)! Nice to see ya! What can I get for you?” Stan asks, his smile always bringing comfort to you three.

“Three hot dogs and three cokes please!” You respond, offering him a small smile yourself. He nods and taps some button on the register, pulling the crank before turning his head back up to you.

“Thirty cents please.” You start digging in your wallet when a hand stops you, and your head snaps to meet Steve’s eyes before he starts digging in his own wallet. He hands the man 30 cents before discreetly grabbing your hand, a small chuckle leaving your lips. Stan walks to the back and returns with three hot dogs in hand. He sets them down on the counter before reaching in the fridge and pulling out the drinks. You take them and thank him before walking out the door, Steve and Bucky following you out with their own.

“Let’s go to the docks! Watch the lights in the city!” You propose, turning back to face the two men. They agree and you all walk down to the docks, finishing your food and drinks shortly after getting there.

“Sorry, it had to end like this, (Y/N/N).”

“Meh, I liked this ending better. At least this way I can say fuck.” You giggle, turning back to look at your boyfriend. A soft melody fills your ears and you search for the source of the music. You soon find it as a band plays at an oceanside restaurant, where people are probably dining on the finest steaks and champagne, but you’re happy right where you are. Steve’s hand grabs yours and he smiles, both of his hands wrapping around your waist.

“Dance with me, doll.” You nod before placing your hands around his shoulders, the two of you slightly swaying to the music. Bucky lets out a short laugh before leaning against a lamppost. Steve grabs your hand and spins you around, the blue dress flying up around your waist as he twirls you in his arms. Your eyes drift closed as he continues to spin you, a laugh bubbling out of your mouth, and you finish turning and open your eyes to see Steve on one knee.

“Oh.” Your hands fly up to cover your mouth and you see Bucky smiling out of the corner of your eye as Steve pulls out a ring.

“I know, I know it isn’t much, but it’s what we could afford.”

“Wha-Whe-How?” You whisper.

“Well, we saved up for a bit.”

“I think you’re supposed to give a speech now, Stevie.” Bucky comments. 

“I’m getting there!” Steve responds, making you let out a hoarse laugh before you start choking on your sobs. “Doll, you are the best thing to ever happen to me, Buck being a close second. You’ve always been there for me when I’m sick, which is a lot. I wanna be with you forever. I want to have kids with you, I want to give you the best white-picket-fence life I can. I swear to love you for the rest of our lives, if you’ll be mine. What do ya say doll?” By this time, your hands have migrated from your mouth to your chest, and you wipe your eyes while nodding your head, choking out a short “yes” before Steve slides the ring on your finger. As he stands up, you begin to cry harder as you pull him into a bear hug. He pulls away and you place both hands on his shoulders, looking at him sternly.

“You better come back to me, you hear me?”

“I promise I will, doll.”

“No, I need better than a promise.”

“I swear on my life, dollface. Besides, I wouldn’t leave my best girl behind.”

~~~

You’ve seen all the adverts and movies about the one and only Captain America. People see him as a hero, as the man who punches Nazis straight in the face and kisses babies, but you still see him as the little guy from Brooklyn who couldn’t run the mile from fourth grade on. Yes, you missed your fiance very much, but you had faith that he would keep his promise and come home after the war. A few months after Bucky and Steve left, you picked up a waitressing job in a mom-and-pop diner on the weekends and weeknights alongside your job as a science teacher. Bills aren’t going to pay themselves, and Bucky and Steve aren’t here to help you. You walk in the door, returning home from your morning shift at the diner, planning on quickly changing clothes before running out and volunteering at the animal shelter, something you always did on Saturdays. You throw on a simple dress, the pale yellow glowing in the sunlight streaming in from the window. Your plans suddenly change when a knock rings at your door.

“One second!” You yell, finishing pulling up the zipper on the back of your dress before walking over to the door, opening it to see Colonel Phillips himself. “Colonel Phillips.”

“Miss (Y/L/N). May I come in?” He asks, the solemn look on his face causing an uneasy feeling in your stomach.

“Of course, sir.” You open the door a little bit wider and he enters the apartment.

“You may want to sit.” You follow his instructions and sit yourself down at the kitchen table, now noticing the letter in his hands. “I wrote it all out on paper, but I also figured I should tell you in person.” He pauses, taking a deep breath. “Captain Rogers crashed a plane into the ice to save the lives of millions of people yesterday morning. I would have gotten here earlier but there were some complications with the plane.”

“No.” You mumble, standing up to directly face the colonel.

“He has been declared Killed in Action, along with James Barnes.” Your head snaps up at his comment, tears already pooling in your eyes.

“What-what do you mean they’ve both been killed in action? What-” A sob rising in the back of your throat cuts you off and you have to steady yourself against the table. Phillips places the letter on the table as you try to quiet your sobs. He quietly nods his head before turning to the door, about to step out when you choke out a short “wait”. Colonel Phillips turns around as you compose yourself, wiping the tears off your face.

“Yes ma’am?”

“Am I allowed to give you a hug?”

“Yes ma’am.” You wrap your arms around him and place your head on his shoulder, the colonel hugging you back shortly after. The two of you pull away and you whisper a small “thank you sir” before he nods and walks out the door. You turn around and grab the letter, ripping it open before focusing on the words carefully typed on the page:

Miss (Y/N) (Y/L/N)

437 West Clermont Street

Brooklyn, New York, USA

11201

I regret to inform you that both Captain Steven Rogers and Sergeant James Barnes have been killed in action in service of their country. As you know, Captain Rogers freed over 200 men across enemy lines in Azzano, Italy. He then formed a squadron, the Howling Commandos. That squadron took down more enemy bases than any other in history. It is with deepest condolences that we regret to inform you than on Saturday, February 19th, Sergeant James Barnes fell out of a moving train while defending Captain Rogers. On Friday, February 25th, Captain Rogers crashed a plane into the Arctic in order to save over three million lives from nuclear bombings. Not only has America lost a soldier, America has also lost a hero.

Deepest regards,

Colonel Chester Phillips

A loud sob erupts from your mouth as you throw the letter on the table, your hands quickly covering your mouth.

“No. Nonononono, they can’t be dead. I can’t- I can’t do this alone.” You back up against the wall, slowly sliding down as your fingers thread through your hair. It’s only when you look back at the ring on your finger that your tears of pain turn to those of anger. “YOU PROMISED!” You scream, not giving a damn if the neighbors can hear you. Your head falls into your hands as you curl up into a ball, your sobs echoing through the now eerily empty house.

“You promised.

~~~

It was a nice funeral. A lot of people you knew were there. Dum-Dum, Gabe, Jim, and Monty came, while Jaques sent his condolences. It was small, but Steve would have liked it. Yeah, you sobbed, but so did everyone else. You sit numbly in your house, the walls no longer filled with laughter, the floors no longer covered in flour and paint, now only scuff marks from your pacing panic attacks. You’re mindlessly fiddling with your ring when a knock sounds at your door, this one sounding louder and overall harsher than the other ones you’d been experiencing for the past week. You stand up and walk over, not caring to check the peephole before opening it. And standing there, is the man you were told crashed a plane into the arctic.

“Wha-”

“Hi, doll.” You slowly start shaking your head before walking away from the door, simply leaving it open.

“No, no. Nonono. You crashed a plane into the arctic. Your signal went dead. You were presumed dead! I’m going mad, I’ve gone absolutely bonkers and now I’m imagining the love of my life is in my living room when he’s buried somewhere in the Arctic!” You rant to yourself, tears slowly gathering in your eyes. You stop when Steve puts both hands on your shoulders, stabilizing you and forcing you to make eye contact with him.

“God, is this what happened after I crashed?” He mumbles, looking up and down at your frantic form. Your clothes have become a little looser, your hair a little thinner, the bags under your eyes just a bit more noticeable. But that’s not the only thing that’s changed. You look at Steve and notice he looks… different. He looks older and more exhausted.

“You aren’t my Steve?”

“Sit down doll, I have a lot of explaining to do.”

~~~

“So you’re from-”

“Yeah.”

“But you still-”

“Mhm.”

“And I’m still-”

“Yep.”

“But wouldn’t this-”

“Nope.”

“Huh. And this Thanos dude he-”

“Eliminated 50% of all living beings. Yes.”

“And you’re back here because you’re delivering the stones back to their original places in time and wanted to see me?”

“Yeah pretty much.”

“Huh. Okay.”

“So, can I have this dance?” He stands up and reaches his hand out to you. You smile and take it, the man pulling you into him. You notice as the two of you start swaying that he’s suddenly more relaxed, and that he’s definitely gotten more muscular over the years. You dance for a little while longer before he tilts your chin up, meeting your lips for a gentle kiss. “God I missed you doll.”

“I missed you too.” The two of you stay silent a little longer before he pulls back slightly, a serious look on his face. Uh oh.

“Come back with me.”

“I’m sorry, what?”

“Come back with me. To 2023.”

“Stevie, I can’t. I have so many responsibilities, and it could mess up the timeline and-”

“Nope. Already checked with the Ancient One. Said it should be fine as long as no one knows about it.”

“Oh.”

“Plus, you can meet my friends, and we can finally get married, and Bucky will-”

“Wait what? Bucky’s alive?”

“Oh yeah, he was captured by HYDRA but we got him back.”

“You’re gonna need to catch me up on everything.”

“So that’s a yes?”

“Fine. I’ll come with you, but if I throw up it’s your fault.”

“Deal.”

~~~

“I’m trying to bring him back!” Banner yells, flicking switches and pressing buttons on the dash. Bucky bites at his cuticles, something he does when he’s nervous, also something you used to yell at him for. The launchpad starts whirring again and both Bucky and Sam’s heads shoot up at the noise, not familiar with it at all.

“Um, is that supposed to happen?” Sam asks.

“Only when there’s more than one body being transported.” Banner mumbles, pressing a few more buttons. “Okay. Bringing him back in 5, 4, 3, 2, 1.”

“AH-oomph.” Bucky’s eyes widen as his brain registers the yellow dress, the sparkling eyes, the dazzling smile.

“(Y/N)?!” He yells, giving both you and Steve a confused look. You sit up on the launchpad and look around, not familiar with any of your surroundings.

“Hiya Buck! Oooh, love the hair! Nice to see it change from the ol’ buzzcut.”

Permanent Tags: @wintersoldierslut​ @breakmy-bedbarnes@stuckys-hot-dogs​ @andreasworlsboring101 @yaxamarvel @donutloverxo

Just a reminder that all requests are open! My masterlist is in my bio, so you guys know who I specialize in, but really I do anyone y’all request. As I’ve mentioned, nothing is too fluffy, angsty, smutty, or gorey for me. I mainly write Marvel and its characters/actors. I can also write some characters from other things, you just have to ask! Also please let me know if you want to be a part of the Permanent Tags! But please, for now,

Call me Emily

[nexusconjunx]

@artsy-hobbitses​: LET ME HEAR ABOUT THESE BOOTLEG MEGATRONS

LETTTSSSS GOOOO AAAAAA THIS GOT SUPER LONG I tried to list everyone I can remember and who has some backstory sdjsjdkdj

Disclaimer: I’ve only read MTMTE/LL. My knowledge about any other continuity is based on Fanfic and random tumblr meta I’ve read.

Also, in theory, all of these characters are from different universes and wouldn’t have met, if it weren’t for those meddling Lost Light shenanigans…  There is a very loose background story connecting all the different universes.

(Namely, the LL that hopped universes keeps on hopping, and because unfortunate circumstances, it keeps homing in on Megatron. This is due to their first jump landing them in a SG universe where the Decepticons lost, and the resident Starscream shoved all of his surviving companions into different universes to save them. Of course, the LL wants to help, but Starscream thought it was a VERY good idea to first get his lover leader back and messed with their technology. It stops being funny after the third time they find themselves at the hands of very a pissed and murderous war lord.)

But enough of that! They do find a few Megatrons that are a bit more chill. I wish I had pics of all of them, but alas. One day. All of them get nicknames, because else it would be very confusing.

 TFA Megatron: Codename “Juno”, he/him, far over 17 million y/o. HF age: 60 - 70

He’s from a heavily modified AU where he was constructed as a kind of middle man between the protectobot high command and the warframe army. Even back then the civilian bots didn’t like to be confronted with the people that fought their wars for them, so they build new ones. Juno is at least glad that he got a pretty face out of the deal.

He learned to fight relatively late, had been sent to the battlefield as a last resort in a loosing battle against some organic planet, and Strika saved his life. They have been best buds ever since and go through thick and thin.

After the organic wars there was a short rest period on cybertron, but soon war frames were pushed to the edges of society, the rise of Megazarak, Juno joining him, the great cybertronian war, Junos overthrowal of Megazarak, and eventually Juno lost the war, but all the Decepticons (war frames and civilian alike) retreat to a new home planet.

Juno himself is. Old, worn, but still very much at the top of his game! He never crash lands on earth, but he does end up being captured by Autobot high command, and our Lost Lighters arrive just in time for him to break out.

He, Strika and Lugnut end up hopping universes with them when the LL is attacked by the TFA autobots, and Juno is delighted by how fucking shitty every other Megatron is. He won the fucking moral high ground game by loosing the war! He has bragging rights. He might still have done terrible things, but, shush!! Let him have this.

The subsequent name change comes because he really doesn’t like being shot at. Plus, after 17 million years, its time for a rebranding! His favourite activity is beating up (killing) other Megatrons. Not just because they are assholes, but to prove that he’s still got it! AU optimus primes look at him like “how did u do that” and Juno be like “What, like, is it supposed to be hard?”

He’s also delighted to tell you that, no, he does NOT fucking know who Optimus Prime is.

Besides all that, he’s the “sick cat of the multiverse”. He might be a super soldier, but you can bet that one day he’s gonna have a sparkattack and randomly die. He has a ton of scars and as a HF, a lot of them are visible. His spark is not really the strongest anymore, due to the previous loss of a conjunx, and by honour of being old as balls.

His storyline is basically “Have fun while you still can, and admit that you would really love to be in a polycule with Strika and Lugnut”.

 TFA Megatron: Codename “Junior”, he/him, just scratching 1 million. A baby. HF age: 20

He’s basically Juno from an earlier point in time. Doesn’t yet know Strika, has no battlefield experience. A real baby. Lies about his age to get into bars. Probably shouldn’t do half the stuff he gets up to.

Junior and Juno develop a father-child bond, but both would deny it under torture. Until Junior saves Junos life, that is, but they don’t talk about that.

He hates his nickname and is soon best friends with Rodimus who finds his existence delightful, because they are the same breed of young reckless dumbass.

 G1 Megatron: Codename “Molly”, she/her, only available as human, age: 50

Just an older gal living her best life in some desert. Wears tight leather pants, high heels and white shirts with a deep neckline. Sings Dolly Parton’s “Jolene” very well and very loud at her favourite bars karaoke nights. A delight to be around, if she says so herself. Still yearning for that sweet trucker gal she met on the road years ago.  Might still have ties to gangs. Drives a motorcycle.

This universe is more of a rest stop for the LL, and coincidentally it’s also a Wings!AU. Molly has Californian Condor wings.

 IDW Megatron: Codename “Billy”, he/him, only available as human, age: ~ 200

A right mean bastard. Lives in the Magnus Archives universe, and a Hunter Avatar by nature. Although, he wouldn’t define himself as such. Sure, he’s a hunter, but doesn’t that encapsulate so many more fears? The fear of being Watched in the Dark, and Slaughtered for Meat in the End?

He would say that he has had honest and good intentions. He thought himself so great when he was young and killed his first monster! But then the monsters didn’t stop. And after so many years, well, he paved his road with good intentions, and it’s leading him right down to hell. He might have killed a few more humans than necessary. But oh, it is for the greater good! And he can hardly stop now.

Someday, there will be a new, fresh hunter, with enough determination to finally take him out. He’s made his peace with that. He does hope they will stuff his shaggy hide and display it in a trophy room.

Only Megs so far who wears plaid shirts. Is actually nice to be around, if he isn’t actively after you. Hunts Pigs for sport.

Also the only one I’ve drawn so far. His Hunter form would be a irish wolfhound. With a few more jaws than neseccary.

I think that’s all of the bigger ones so far ssdjsdjsdhshshdlf. Juno really is my favourite (if you cant tell).

[hqprotectionsquad]

Notice Me (Kenma x Reader)

Title: Notice Me Pairing: Kenma x F!Reader Summary: If you move in with Kenma, you save money and you get to go to your dream school in Tokyo. Just one thing: you start developing a crush on your roommate who you barely know. Word Count: 2441 A/N: This is the original fic I had planned before I lost it for a few bits. I wrote a whole HC set for this, which is very similar because I wrote down everything I could remember. This would be an extension of a sort in that case.

A few months ago, it was never like this. You were just about ready to attend a junior college because your top choice university waitlisted you for your program. You were okay with it, considering the price was significantly less than what you expected to pay at university. What are two years working on transferrable credits anyway? In the grand scheme of things, you were making the right choice.

And then you got off of the waitlist. You jumped for joy and your parents baked you a cake for your achievements. Everything was dandy, up until you remembered the tuition. It wasn’t like you’d be in crippling debt if you attended, just debt that isn’t as crippling.

Luckily, your neighbor, Kenma is also moving to Tokyo, to study something like business or management or something like that? You don’t do much of exploring his personality until you hear a plan that your mom proposes to you.

“Mom, are you serious?” You can’t believe what your ears are hearing.

“Of course! We don’t have much money to send you, let alone boarding. So while you’re in Tokyo, you can stay with Kenma! Kenma will have a large enough apartment, according to his parents when I spoke to them about this.”

“You already spoke to them about it?!”

“Yes! And you both move in two weeks.”

It’s weird, packing up your entire life is weird. Waves of nostalgia crash every time you notice an old toy you used to play with or old photos you forgot existed. Soon enough, you’ve got everything you need in boxes that will meet you in Tokyo.

Tokyo. It still feels like a fever dream. Something that is, but you aren’t sure how it happened. A few months ago, you were days away from enrolling in junior college, and now, you’re going to Tokyo.

Today, your family packs the car with all of your clothing and things that can be easily carried. Later on, you’re in the apartment, settling your items. Soon enough, your family’s back in the emptier car on their way home. Everything goes too quickly.

The process of getting to know Kenma goes too slowly. Sure, you’ve been his neighbor for your entire life, but you’ve never really spoken to him, even though you’ve gone to the same high school and boarded the train together in the mornings.

Now, if you have classes in the morning, you take the train with him to the university. Still, after a few weeks of moving in together, you haven’t spoken much to him. It’s like ebb and flow, except he’s flowing at his own pace.

On the train to classes one day, you ask, “Kenma, do you want to have dinner together? I can pick up something after my last class.”

“No, it’s okay, I’m streaming something tonight.” So that’s all the noise he makes at two in the morning, not that you could assume anything based on the yelling.

“Oh. I didn’t know you streamed. Um, what do you stream?” You don’t want this conversation to stop. From all the years you’ve known him, you were actually jealous of Kuroo for being able to know Kenma so well. This could be your chance to see what’s going on behind that pretty face of his.

“Mostly games.” He digs into his messenger bag and you assume that the conversation is over. This is it, he probably just wants to be roommates without being friends. “You forgot this earlier, by the way. On the counter.” He puts a book into your hand.

“Thank you.” And thus begins your habit of forgetting things and him retrieving them for you. For the most part, it’s not on purpose; you’re just a forgetful human being. However, one time, you checked to see if he’d actually notice if you left something. It was a bit of a gamble, but you just wanted to see. Sure enough, Kenma came right before your class began to hand off a notebook.

These drop-offs are simple, yet his attention to detail is what draws you to him. His perspective means everything when you’re asking him for his opinion on assignments or life events.

You wish there was something more, though. He’s so reserved. It’s not like he’s actively trying to hide something, but maybe, he just wants to be by himself.

That’s such a lonely life.

He has his friend Kuroo, as far as you know, who is a year older than you two. You’re at the extremes of your mind, weighing the pros and cons between your two halves. If you try to befriend Kuroo, that could be your way to knowing Kenma, but Kenma might also be confused by your friendship with his friend. If you don’t try to befriend Kuroo, then you’re essentially stuck in the same place without a stimulant to move forward.

So you do what any college student would do; decide your fate on a coin flip. Heads is get to know Kuroo, and tails is to stay stagnant and find a way through. You flick the coin off of your thumb and it sails into the air until it finds solace in your hand. You slap the coin onto your opposite hand, and what do you know, it lands on—

“Heads.”

Huh. You’re going to have quite a time. You even begin laughing to yourself because you have no idea how to start.

“You know, Kuroo’s a chemistry tutor.” Your friend informs you after she sees your brain unfolding when you go out for a literature study session. She seemed very concerned, but you reassure her that you simply had a crush on your roommate and you aren’t sure how to go about it.

“I’m taking introductory chemistry, and I’m not near failing, Mika.”

“Exactly, it could just be supplemental and you use the studying so you can get a better grade.”

“You know what, I think you’re right. I’m going to do that.” A smile graces your lips and it’s something in between a smirk and a genuine grin, but you’ll take it.

The next time you visit the library, you stop by the corkboard by the entrance. You trace your fingers to find the chemistry tutoring sign-ups and you find Kuroo’s name at the top of a page in bold font. Lines are filled left and right, and you find an opening for two days from now. Now that you’re looking at it, there aren’t too many girls who have signed up for him, just mostly boys. You suppose you’ll find out why soon.

When you approach a table on the day you’ll be tutored, your mouth gapes when you see the face of this guy. How are there more boys who sign up for him than girls? If you weren’t faithful to your mission, you’d probably be reconsidering everything.

“Hey, I’m (Y/N), you’re Kuroo, right? You’re tutoring me in intro chemistry,” you say as you take a seat and unload your notebook and textbook from your backpack. You place your items onto the table, including your trusty highlighters and pencil case.

“Hey.” He offers you a smile. “Glad you could make it.” He does one look over you before asking, “Haven’t we met before? This isn’t an attempt to pick you up, but I mean if you wanted me to, I wouldn’t object.”

You roll your eyes and grin. This guy has no shame from the get-go. “Maybe in passing. I’m Kenma’s roommate.”

“Right, right, that’s where I’ve seen you.” Kuroo nods. “So did you want to get into the parts you have trouble with or do you want to do a brief overview first?”

“Brief overview would be good.” You start to get into all of the general basics of chemistry, like the formulas and diagrams you’ll need for tests. The way Kuroo explains all of this makes so much sense, even the things you thought you knew before.

“Alright! Water break.” It’s been about an hour, but judging by Kuroo’s expression, you might be here a little longer. Even though the world has passed by around you, it feels like you just arrived and introduced yourself.

“Have you considered being a teacher? You’re really good at explaining.”

After chugging down half of his bottle, he runs some fingers through his hair and you’re surprised he can even get them out based on the messy appearance. “I’ve thought about it, but I kind of want to go into forensics or research. Something like that. But something tells me you’re not here because you want to do better on your tests.”

“Red-handed,” you say with your hands up. “What makes you think that though?”

“You’ve kind of got everything down, but I wouldn’t expect anything else from a pretty and smart girl like you.”

Your mouth hangs open just the slightest bit and you have to force yourself to press your lips into a smile. You try to look anywhere else except meet his eyes. “I,” you stop to breathe. “I’m flattered, but um, I guess I did come here with a different intention than just studying.”

“And that would be?” Kuroo clasps his hands together and leans forward. By the looks of it, he’s even tilting his head so his ear faces towards you.

Your breath can’t make a silver barrier between Kuroo and your flushed cheeks. “I, um, kind of have developed a crush on Kenma, and since you’re his friend—”

“Damn. I really thought I could get a girl from tutoring, but it looks like she’s only interested in my best friend.” He then does this thing where it looks like he’s smirking and fake crying at the same time and you can’t really tell what he’s trying to accomplish from this. Still, he bites his lip and you’re led to believe he’s actually a little upset that he’s being passed over.

“I’m sorry, Kuroo.”

“Why are you sorry?” He laughs through his question.

“I don’t know.” With your smile on your face, you peer down at your chemistry notes, the ones you’ve just written. “I’m really thankful for all your help with this. I’m sorry if it seems like I’ve taken advantage of you.”

“Believe me, it’s no big deal. You’re one of the first girls I’ve tutored and you’re pretty cool. I still don’t know why I keep getting guys to tutor, don’t know what witch cursed me with that.” Kuroo clicks his tongue before continuing, “But you’re his roommate. Shouldn’t you at least know him up to a certain extent? I just don’t get it when you could just try to seduce him.” He pauses. “Don’t actually do that, it probably won’t work, it’s Kenma.”

“Exactly. He’s been my neighbor for basically all of my life, but I don’t know him enough to try to start something. I can’t tell if he enjoys my company or not.”

“You know what, I know you’re Kenma’s roommate and you barely know him, which is understandable, because it’s Kenma. Come check out the intramural games and you’ll get to meet the team.”

You tilt your head at his statement. “Intramural games? For what?”

“For volleyball. Kenma’s the setter, I’m the captain for our team.” Kuroo nods. “Saturday at 4. I’ll invite you out for ice cream and it’ll be all cool.” He starts packing up his stuff and shoving it into his backpack.

“Alright, I’ll see you then,” you confirm while you mirror his actions. You bid him goodbye and the last thing you hear from him is mumbling that you had to, of course, like his best friend.

Saturday comes and you wish you could say it wasn’t a blur, but with all of the volleyball lingo—still unsure what some of the positions are, but at least you know Kenma’s—and the men just talking amongst themselves, it’s not hard to get stuck in the whirlwind.

“Are you okay, (Y/N)?”

You give your head a little shake before looking to see who was speaking to you. “Yeah, I’m okay. Thanks for asking, Kenma.”

“If you don’t want to be here, I can take us back to the apartment. I’m sure Lev’s loud voice is hurting your ears.” He casts a strained glance to the man leaning back on the counter, slurping his ice cream like it’s a soup. The rest of the lot is in the circle, speaking to teammates, and whoever happened to respond to Kuroo’s invitation. Turns out you weren’t the only one that wanted to share in the company of the team.

With your unfinished ice cream cup still in your hand, you bid goodbye to Kuroo and the other team members. Turns out there really is a whole world outside of your small circle at the university. Without them, you wouldn’t have realized how interesting life could be if you continued to hang out with them all.

You wondered if you kept this up, maybe you’d have a chance with Kenma, and so you did. They were all kind enough to allow you to tag onto their plans, even if you’ve stuck onto them like unwanted glue residue. They never grumbled when you walked into cafes with Kuroo, nor did they whisper underneath their breath when you joined them for movie nights at Tora’s apartment. If you didn’t know any better, you’d say you were becoming very good friends with all of them, including your roommate.

Nowadays, he’ll subtly expect to have dinner together when you are both free and you’ll commute to school with him on the days that your classes start around the same time. All the while, you’re still trying to talk to him. Ask him about the weather, what can he recommend as far as video games go — anything that will get him to move his mouth. He really enjoys talking about the games he plays and it seems like that’s his life. Behind his nonchalant expression, fiery eyes dance.

One day on the train, he sits next to you. Everything takes you back to earlier in the year when you barely knew him. All it took was volleyball and the intervention of a very important person in Kenma’s life. He’s no longer just a roommate. He’s a friend, someone to talk to, someone who listens to you.

He turns his head and looks you up and down, from your eyes to your shoes. His gaze is sure but slow, and you aren’t certain of his intentions.

Finally, he asks, “(Y/N), are you flirting with me?”

Hearing this come from his lips tugs your own into a smile. “You finally noticed?”

navi! | master list | tag list form

[britomart-heart]

Goodness is Going With You, Ch.1

Hi all! First time posting fanfiction on this account, and first time writing in about two years. My target audience for this is approximately one person - ie myself who still likes zombie apocalypse aus, but let me know your thoughts and if you’d like more! Fandom: The Mandalorian Pairing: Din Djarin x Female Reader ****** You had been walking for days. Your small, ancient, ship had broken down on this back water planet, and even you had to admit there was no fixing it this time. But with the galaxy the way it was now, staying in one place was never an option for long.

It had also been days since you’d seen one of them. The creatures that had brought your world crashing to its knees more than twenty years ago. Just with the mere thought of them, your fingers brushed over your blaster strapped to your hip. The road had been too quiet for your liking, and it usually meant that the creatures had all moved to the same spot for whatever reason. That would make it easier for you to avoid them. It would also make it harder for you to outrun them if you did stumble across them.

You reloaded your blaster.

The virus was almost always deadly, and had taken sixty percent of the population of each system it passed through to prove it, but when a host was unfortunate enough to survive the initial sickness, it left them mindless, violent, and hungry for whatever flesh it came across. The accepted story was that the virus was biochemical warfare invented by the scientists of the Empire, meant to wipe out the last supporters of the Old Republic, but was more successful that they ever imagined. Now all that was left was barren planets controlled by warlords, travel systems overrun by pirates, and abandoned cities crawling with the creatures who prowled the empty streets hungrily.

Come to mention it, you were quite hungry too.

A map you found in a crumbling building had indicated that there was some sort of village north of where your ship had crashed, and you had been trekking across the desert sands in hope of some sort of meal, and maybe even an old piece of junk you could wrangle into flying condition. There was talk of a vaccine in the inner rim. A safe zone. It was an idea you could barely comprehend, but the whisper was enough to make you desperate to try and reach it.

As you began to daydream of what a safe zone might entail, you heard a cry in the distance, followed quickly by the warbled shrieks of the infected. Your stomach flipped, head snapping to attention. Normally such a cry would have you running in the opposite direction, but despite every instinct you had, your feet began moving towards the fray. That was the cry of an infant, of a child. Maker help you, but who would be heartless enough to turn away from that?

The noise seemed to come from impossibly far away, but you managed to find an abandoned moisture farm, and a hoard of infected swarming around the strangest looking kid you’d ever seen. Green ears nearly as wide as it was tall, it was crying out in distress as the creatures surrounded it. You’d never seen them attack like this before.

They surrounded the kid in a circle, and one by one they would try to attack with the usual sweep of their rotting arms. As one would rush in, the kid would raise a shaking three fingered hand, closing its eyes in concentration, and the creature would be flung back as if it was a rag doll. You stared in confusion, but quickly realised the child was slowing down, its eyes drooping lower and lower with each attack. You had your blaster raised without thinking and took down three of the creatures before they even noticed you there.

You slid through the gap you created and picked up the child just as it sleepily raised its arms up to you. Tucking him into the crook of your arm, you began firing shots as well as you could, swinging around, and ignoring the inevitable realisation that there was just too many of them. If you could just get out of their view there was a chance you could run, and you kept jogging backwards, until your back hit a wall.

They’d trapped you in a corner.

“Come on kid, that neat magic trick you pulled earlier would be helpful” you half yelled to the child who was clinging to your side. To his credit, the kid did try to lift his arm again, but the effort seemed to take the last bit of energy he had, and he slumped against you. Your grip was slippery with sweat, and with each beat of your heart, and fire of your blaster you knew it was hopeless. As the hoard closed in, you wiped the sweat from your brow, and the tears from your eyes, raising your blaster up to take out as many of them with you as you could.

You noticed the whistling in the air, before you noticed the tiny speeding bullets blasting into each of the snarling creatures, taking them out one by one. When the wall of them fell, a shining body that seemed solid silver landed in front of you, taking out the remaining monsters as if they were no more than training droids at a shooting range.

You stared in disbelief, clutching the child closer to your side, gaping at the number of infected this stranger had taken out in mere seconds, so stunned that you barely noticed that your saviour had now turned his blaster on you.

“Hand him over.” A deep male voice came through the modulator of the helmet, and he stretched his gloved hand out to you, gesturing towards the sleeping baby in your arms. You held him tighter on instinct.

“Who are you?”

“Listen girl, the only reason you’re still standing is because I saw you protecting him. Hand him to me, and we’ll call it even.”

You’d always been good at reading people, but this was like reading a brick wall. The dark visor hid even the slightest shadow of his eyes, and he stood still as stone, no body language to glean any sort of impression from. He held the blaster, still aimed at you, as if it were simply an extension of his arm.

But there was the slightest edge of desperation to his voice, just the tiniest hint of worry when he reached for the kid, that despite yourself you believed him. You wanted to believe him.

Slowly, you stepped over the corpse of one of the infected littering the ground and handed the kid over to the armoured man.

No, not just a man you realised, slightly later than you probably should have. He was a Mandalorian. You nearly dropped your own blaster, as you realised that an actual Mandalorian had pointed his weapon at you, and you actually had the gall to question him and survived.

He tucked the strange brown robe the baby was wearing tighter around him, with a tenderness that seemed somehow bizarre and charming at the same time.

“Why was he alone?” You asked, and the Mandalorian looked at you as if he had forgotten you were there.

“I was fighting a quarry into my ship, and the kid wandered off. He has a habit of doing that… usually I catch him before he gets into real trouble. After that, hopefully he won’t do it again.” He looks back at you, and somehow you knew he was looking over you from top to bottom. You shiver, and you know it’s not from the evening’s chill.

“I don’t have any credits.” He said, and you looked back in confusion.

“Credits?”

“To thank you. For saving the kid. Not many would have done that.”

“Oh don’t worry about it, anyone would have-“ You begin, but he shakes his head

“No. They wouldn’t have.” He tilts his head almost questioningly at you, and for some unknown reason you blush. Why are you blushing. You saved this guy’s kid, he’s thanking you, this is normal. All of this is normal.

“Well. I’d best be on my way then. Keep that kid out of trouble, he seems… special.” You answer, as diplomatically as you can.

“Yeah, he is.” The Mandalorian answers quietly, and you smile and start walking away. You’re nearly out of earshot, when the same modulated voice calls out again.

“Hey. Can I give you a lift somewhere. I’m not a taxi service but… I’m headed towards Nevarro and I can drop you there, or somewhere on the way.”

“Yes”, You say without thinking and without questioning the relief that threatens to spill over, “Yes, Nevarro would be great, thank you.”

He barely says a word after that, leading you nearby to his ship, and sets up a make shift bed for you on the ground of his rather shaken looking pre-empire Razor Crest. The kid stirs sometime after you enter hyperspace and gives you a toothy grin when he sees you sitting beside his floating crib. He reaches over to you with a tiny, green, wrinkled hand, and wraps it around your pointer finger.

“Hi kid, it’s me again”, you say and give him your name. He stares up at you with his enormous black eyes, and his calm gaze settles you enough that you allow the exhaustion of the past days to finally wash over you.

****

Over the next few days he tells you barely enough to satisfy your curiosity, but enough that your sufficiently intimidated by him. You can call him Mando, he doesn’t know the kid’s name, there’s rations in the hold that you can help yourself to whenever you want. You fill in the gaps you can with your limited knowledge of Mandalorians- that their religion is their armour and weapons, that their planet was lost before the virus destroyed everyone else’s, that the helmet never comes off.

It’s enough that your intrigued by him almost as much as you’re scared of him. His voice alone, warm and low, draws you in, and the affection he clearly has for the strange child that travels with him, is a walking contradiction to the Mandalorian code you heard about in stories and legends as a youngling. It makes you wonder if he travels with the kid out of obligation, or if he once was as lonely as you are, and couldn’t bare it anymore.

You can understand that.

You come out of hyperspace on the third day, and you hear him coming down the ladder into the hold before you feel the jolt of the ship entering Nevarro’s atmosphere. You have the kid on your lap, and were in the process of teaching him one of the few games you remember from your own childhood. He didn’t seem to get the rules, but giggled every time you clapped his hands together, and would try to do the same with yours.

“The kid likes you”. Mando says from behind you, and you smile over your shoulder.

“Well I’m easy to like. So is this little one.” You answer, and the kid gurgles in what sounds like agreement, and throws himself forward into you, stretching his tiny arms as far as he can reach, and laughs into your belly.

Mando walks forward, and gently tugs on one of the kid’s massive ears. You’re not sure if you imagine his fingers brushing over your shoulder when he moves his hand back.

“You’re handy with a blaster.” He says, in a way that feels more like a statement than a question. You’re not sure where he’s going with this, but you nod slowly.

“When I need to be.”

“You can handle moving around from place to place? You don’t have anyone waiting for you somewhere?” He asks, and it’s definitely a question this time. You nod more confidently, and turn around full to look up at him. He’s leaning against a wall, his arm resting confidently on his hip, and he’s literally in full armour, why is that a good look on him. You’re beginning to wonder if there’s something wrong with you. Maybe you’ve been alone for too long.

“It’s just been me for a long time.”

He nods in a way that makes you think it was the right answer.

“I’m trying to get into the inner rim. There’s some rumours that it’s safer there, and I need to get the kid… he needs to be safe.” He says slowly, as if he’s choosing his words carefully. Still can’t trust you with the full truth, but is offering up more than you ever expected. You try not to look too eager.

“I need someone to watch the kid while I collect my bounties on the way. You saw what happens when he’s left alone for too long. And I think you need to get somewhere safe too.”

You barely react, terrified that if you say something now, he’ll retract whatever offer he is about to make, the one you were always on the verge of suggesting yourself but kept losing the nerve to ask.

“I still need to stop in Nevarro. But you can join me when I leave again… if you want. I can pay handsomely, and it’ll be safer than travelling on your own.” He says, and you know he’s waiting for an answer now. You stand slowly, trying to look as if you’re contemplating a response, even though you know your answer immediately. You place the kid in his floating crib and wipe your hands on the front of your trousers.

“It’s a deal.” You answer and stretch one of your hands out in front of you.

There’s a few seconds of complete silence, only the unreadable man in front of you, staring at your outstretched hand, and oh maker have you misread this completely. You’re about to drop your hand, when he reaches out and shakes it with his own and seems to hold it a beat to long before letting go.

“Right, well then strap the kid in, we’ll be pulling into Nevarro shortly.” He answers as gruffly as if the conversation never happened and turns to climb back up into the cockpit. As if you imagined the whole thing.

Only, even though you have absolutely no proof, if someone asked you to bet on what expression he was making under that helmet, you’d have put money on him smiling.

[daddystevee]

Crashing Down

(steve harrington x hopper!reader)

Guys, I'm super emotional… this- is the last part to the fic. But more importantly this chapter is what the whole fic was written around. It's insane. Well more so like the very ending of it. But I'm so happy that this happened and I finally wrote my first fic ever. I just can't believe it. Thank you to everyone who read this and continued to support me through this. A special thanks to @harringtown who literally always has my back and was helping me out with this. I think i might write another fic one day but in all honesty who knows. It's freakin hard idk how Brooke spits these suckers out almost every day??? But who knows maybe i'll be more original next time and not have a full fledged slow burn fic.. Anyways love you guys! Xx ps its finally (steve x reader) !!!!

catch up here

Warnings: cursing, death, fluff, angst, super hella sadness, all the good stuff. And season 3 spoilers ig

Part 9/9

Word count: 3.7k (THIS IS INSANE??)

Summary: Sometimes things just don’t go as planned and your world just comes crashing down, but it’s a good thing that you have people in your life to be there to catch you when you fall. 

><

You squirmed out of Steve’s arms and ran to your dad, El limping close behind you pulled him into a big hug. Even though the last time you saw him was a few days ago, now was not the time for full fledged reunions you had to figure out what you guys were going to do to beat this thing.

As everyone was explaining their part of what had been going on over the last couple of days, you took your place under Steve’s arm. You watched as Jim gave Eleven the extra care she needed in that moment, making your lips curl up at the corners. 

“But instead of, like, screws and metal, the Mind Flayer made its weapon with melted people.” Steve said trying to make sense of everything he was being told

“Yeah, and it was fucking terrifying.” you say remembering what happened at the hospital yesterday.

“Yeah, okay I’m just makin’ sure”

><

Hopping up on the counter next to Steve, you watched everyone scramble around trying to make last minute preparations before, Joyce, Murray and your dad headed down into the Russian bunker. You look at Steve’s face and how messed up it is and then look back at your father, hoping nothing too bad would happen to him down there. 

Steve notice how deep in thought you were,

“Don’t hurt yourself, thinking to hard over there Hop.” he said trying to make light of a situation

You laughed slightly, still letting your mind wander in and out of focus.

“You okay?” he asked moving across the counter to be a little closer to you

“Yeah just thinking. A lot of things could go wrong, just nervous I guess.” 

He nods his head in agreement, “But this is your dad we're talking about, he’ll be just fine.”

You overhear Dustin telling Hopper that they need a head start and a car to get to the highest point in Hawkins. He turns and waves Steve over, Steve gives you a pat on the knee before jumping off the counter and heading over to him. After telling Steve what he needed to do, he hollered out your name meaning you were needed. 

Steve met you in the middle causing you to stop, he pulled you into a hug while telling you that he was in charge of taking Dustin and Erica to some radio tower. 

“For the love of God, please be safe. It’s bad enough you’ve already been fucked up by the Russians, I really need you back in one piece.” you say to him pulling him just a little closer

“Oh you don’t have to worry about me, it’s you I'm worried about.”

You took a deep breath in before pulling away. You looked up into Steve’s eyes and placed a hand on his face, stroking his cheek with your thumb before walking over to your dad. 

“I was summoned.” you say marching up to and standing next to your dad

“C’mere,” he said, pulling you into his side, “I need you to keep a really close eye on El for me, okay?”

“Of course dad.”

“This thing is after her, so you guys are going to Murray’s house, so you guys can stay safe, protected and off the radar until this is all over.”

“Alright.” is all you can muster out before he pulls you into a lung crushing hug.

><

You climb into the backseat of the Wheeler’s family car before Will and Lucas, leaving El, Mike and Max in the very back of the car. Nancy tries cranking the car but the engine just won’t start. Jonathan gets out to look, and says that there's a part missing, and it doesn’t make any sense. But all thoughts are put aside when you hear the sound of a very loud and familiar engine revving up.

“Get out, get out the car now” you say rather loudly nudging at Lucas’s side. 

You all get out of the car and head back into the mall where you would be a little bit safer.

After you get inside Mike instantly pulls out his walkie and starts sending out a code for ‘Scoops Troop’. You're standing next to El with your arm wrapped around her shoulder rubbing up and down her arm in an attempt to keep her calm. 

You see Jonathan, Nancy, Will and Max all walk over to the car that El had flipped over onto the Russian’s earlier that evening. You call Mike and follow in pursuit, climbing over the counter and behind the car to try and flip it over. You even let Eleven try to slip it over with her powers but it’s no use, but suddenly a bell goes off in your head. The same bell apparently goes off in Mike’s head because almost as if you were reading each others minds.

“Physics.” you both say in unison.

You flip the car over with the use of leverage and Jonathan begins his search for the ignition cable. 

Max was the one to notice El digging through the trash, you were the first to walk over to her and Mike was the one to call out to her. You were asking if she was okay and telling her that she needed to save her energy when none other than the Mind Flayer comes crashing down into the mall. 

“Fucking hell..”

You grab hold of Eleven’s hand and pull her away and out of sight. 

The four of you are hidden behind some sort of stand in the middle of the mall when Dustin comes over the walkie talkie telling you all to confirm your safety, but the Mind Flayer wasn’t having any of it. It let out one of the loudest screeches you had ever heard, you hadn’t been that close to it before. Tears formed in your eyes from the pain and from fear.

“We’ve gotta move.” you whisper to Mike

“There’s a way to get out, through The Gap.” El whispers back

Mike peeks his head up to see where the Mind Flayer is and is looking,

“Okay, okay. Now.” he said, grabbing El’s hand making a break for it, but of course not without making some fort of ruckus making the Mind Flayer turn and charge. Luckily you push them behind a clothing display just before it makes it to where the items had fallen,

You put your index finger to your lips signaling for them to be extremely quiet before you covered your mouth with your entire hand, attempting to silence your heave breathing. Looking at the three teens you motioned for them to crawl over behind the checkout counter in case it was just playing games, not wanting to risk anything. Though moving to this new spot didn’t help too much because you heard to your left the nasty sound of what you could only imagine was the flesh moving around.

As you turned and looked to your left you could confirm what you had heard, seeing the flesh like claw coming around the corner to snap at you. There was a loud popping noise, that sounded a lot like a balloon that caused a distraction making the claw retreat now redirecting its attention to the new sound.

“Go, go go.”  you said to the kids and you got up making a mad dash towards the exit.

You run out the back door and towards the gate that allows delivery trucks in and out trying to catch up with Nancy and the others. But as you make it just outside the gate you see Flayed Billy standing behind his car. You make the kids turn around and go back inside the mall in hopes that Billy didn’t see you, but you wouldn't go unnoticed especially since you had to go back and press the close gate button a second time because it didn’t work the first time. 

You run down a few different hallways trying to find another way out, whether that be up or down. So you pulled off into a side room where an elevator was, and mike pressed the button a few times. You really thought you had lost Billy at this point so you were good to take a little breather, until you heard the opening and shutting of a heavy metal door. 

Max was the one to round the corner and see who it was,

“Billy. Billy, you don’t have to do this. Billy. Your name is Billy, Billy Hargrove, you live on 4819 Cherry Lane. Billy please, I’m Max, I’m your-” was all you heard before the monster backhanded her out of consciousness. Mike was the first to lunge at him, but instantly got thrown against the wall and was also knocked unconscious. That left you and El, you take your stand in front of your sister and attempt to throw a punch at him, You successfully hit him in the jaw,

“You’re gonna regret that you little bitch” he says as he grabs you by the arm and twists until you’re facing away from him and he slams your head into the wall, everything goes black

><

You wake up, what seems to be like hours later, seeing both Max and Mike still unconscious on the ground. You sit up, head pounding and your wrist and shoulder in excruciating pain. You crawl over to Max and get her to wake up, and when she does, she yells at Mike to get up.

“Are you guys okay?” you ask them. The both shake their heads, but then begin looking around the small room.

“Where’s El?” Mike asks.

The three of you run around in a panicked state of mind calling out for her hoping she had fucked Billy up and ran for help, but the more you looked the less hopeful you felt. You ran back down what you thought were the same hallways from earlier, but with your new concussion you weren’t so sure anymore. 

You looked down to the ground and saw drops of blood and some sort of black stuff.

“Guys, look.” you say pointing down the hallway where the trail of blood led.

After some time you finally manage to make your way to the main part of the mall. You pulled yourself to a complete stop, sticking your arm out to stop Mike and Max from continuing on any further. El was on the floor talking to Billy. 

You watched with wide eyes as Billy stood up in a protective stance over El. He stood there and stared at his creator, the thing that had destroyed him. Millions of memories flashed before his eyes as the fleshy tentacle that was supposed to kill your sister, shot out towards him. He stuck his arms out to stop it, to sacrifice himself. 

You watched in pure shock as tentacles pierced into his sides and back, grabbing hold of him, hoisting him up. It all happened in slow motion, as if the universe was trying to torture you in some way. You watched as that thing took your Billy Hargrove and pierced into his chest.

“Billy!” you and Max screamed one after another

You choked up a sob as you took off running over to him, Max close behind. You slammed your knees into the ground as you grabbed Billy’s shoulders and shook them trying to keep him awake. 

“Billy, Billy. Stay with me. Billy?”

His eyes fluttered open for a split second, this was the last time that he’d see your beautiful face.

“Hey, hey, hey, I need you to stay with me. Baby I can’t lose you. Please, baby please.”

He somehow managed to get an ‘I’m sorry’ out but you didn’t care he didn’t need to be apologizing right now, but that was the only thing he said before his whole body went limp. You continued to shake his shoulders, in disbelief that this was happening and that if you kept him awake long enough he would be okay.

“Billy, no please, Billy.” it suddenly feels like you can’t breath but the only thing you can do is yell. You’re choking out sobs as you strain your voice yelling out his name. 

Steve makes it down to the second floor as quickly as he can and is behind you in seconds. He puts his hands on your shoulders in an attempt to pull you away and into his arms but you turn and yell at him.

“No! Stop it! Don’t let them touch him! Billy! Billy!” Each phrase is spoken with more sobs. You finally collapse into Steve’s arms, shaking violently with each cry. 

All you can seem to say at this point was Billy’s name. Steve leads you to a paramedic and says that he’ll meet you outside, turning around and running back inside. You along with all of the others are checked over and are cleared to go home after sitting in ambulances for a while.

After Steve is checked, he walks over to you, Max and El and takes a seat next to you. The two are in a very tight hug, your sister is doing her best at comforting Max in this time of loss. You sit in silence, not having enough energy or emotion to talk. Steve wraps his arms around you with his blanket and pulls you into a tight embrace. You mellow out your breathing until you realize that you haven’t seen Murray, Joyce or your dad anywhere.

In a panic you release from Steve’s grip and grab your sister’s hand leading her to stand up. The two of you spend a few minutes looking around for them with no luck, suddenly you spot Joyce. No sign of Hopper, you notice that El see’s her too and looks to you confused as to why dad wasn't with her. But then she realizes, you know it too, dad didn’t make it.

Eleven turns into your arms and lets all of her tears out, and just when you think you don’t have any tears left to cry, all of your tears fall on top of her head. She lets out one scream and that’s it, the rest are sobs. You cradle her head, holding onto her and not letting go.

Both Joyce and Steve offer to take both you and El in for the night, seeing as how the cabin had been destroyed earlier that night and Hop wasn’t there to take you in for some extra loving. Of course you spent the next couple of weeks staying the night at the Byers’ house. But after a while it started to get a little too cramped so while El stayed with Joyce while you stayed with Steve. Most days were the same, super hard and emotional. But other days, you would be taking a few steps forward to recovery. It wasn’t easy, and it wasn't ever going to get easier, but you at least had the right people in your life to help you out.

>3 months later<

Over the last three months things have gotten better, you spent lots of time with Max and Eleven. Making sure that they’re both okay and that they know that they are both very loved. Your dad always told Joyce that if anything were to ever happen to him, that if she was up for it, to take care of El. It wasn’t that he didn't trust you to take care of her, he just knew that it would be a lot for you at such a young age.

Joyce took her in with open arms, and even offered a room to you when she mentioned that they would be moving to Maine. You declined, only because Steve couldn't handle all the kids by himself. Steve’s mom even offered to let you stay in their guest room until you and Steve could get your own place, you had only been talking about it since you were 11. The two of you still planned on doing that, but with being unemployed at the moment it was kinda hard to have money to pay rent.

Today was the final day of packing up the Byers house. You had planned on being there but got pulled into a last minute job interview at Family Video with Robin and Steve. But as soon as you were done there, you were heading over to say your goodbyes. It was a hard day and you were trying not to think about it. 

Good news: the three of you start work on Monday. Bad news: it was time for the Byers to leave.

As you and Steve pulled up it looked like they had just put the last box in the moving truck. You hopped out of the car and jogged up to the door right as Joyce was coming out with a box for you to take home.

“What’s this?” you ask, taking the box from her

“Just a couple of Hop’s things, I thought you'd might want them.”

You sat the box down on the front porch and pulled her in for a hug, “Thank you, for everything. For the stuff and for basically being my mom and for taking El in. It means a lot to me.” A few tears escaped from your eyes.

As everyone was saying their final goodbyes you pulled El in for one final hug. 

“You don’t have to go, you know..” you say in a half joking manner. “you could stay here with me, get our own place or fix up the cabin. He did it before.”

All she does is chuckle lightly and buries her face deeper into your chest.

“I'm really gonna miss you, kid” you say quoting something your dad would say, “but I’ll see you soon. I think we’re all coming up for Thanksgiving next month and then Christmas is right after that.”

“I know” she said quietly, “I love you, Y/N” 

“I love you too El.” you pulled away from the hug and locked pinkies with her and kissed your own hands. Giving each other a small smile before moving on to the others. 

“You have Steve’s number right?” you asked before pulling her into one last hug. She nodded her head as she pulled you closer for one last squeeze before climbing into the passenger seat of the moving truck. You shut the door behind her patted the door and just like that they were gone. The kids all ride their bikes back to their designated homes and you and Steve climbed back into his car to head home too. 

><

As Steve puts his car into park he shifts a little in his seat, you don’t notice because you're looking down at your hands with tears rolling down your cheeks.

“I know today’s kind of a hard day for you, but I have something that might make you feel a little bit better.” he says running a hand through his hair.

He reached behind you into the back seat and pulled out a flat velvet box, you give him a curious look,

“Max and I, we talked about this for a really long time and she really wanted you to have this.” he says handing you the box.

You open it and your eyes fill with more tears as your hands drop to your lap and your head hung forward. Inside the box was Billy’s Virgin Mary necklace. It had been polished and shined and cleaned and it looked better than ever. You set the box to the side and you wrap your arms around Steve and give him a hug. After you pull away you pick up the box again and look down at it. 

“I miss him Steve,” you say resting your head on his shoulder.

“I know you do.” he said as he wraps his arm around you 

You sit up and look at him and he's looking back at you with nothing but love in his eyes, you think it’s time you told him.

“Steve there’s something I need to tell you.” your heart is beating so hard you’d be surprised if he couldn’t hear it. “These last 3 months have been some of the hardest months of my life, not only because I lost so much but because I’ve realized a lot of things. I learned my self worth, it’s been a while since I’ve truly been happy. And I found that I’m only truly happy when I’m with you. I also know that Billy would’ve wanted me to move on at some point, and as much as he said he hated you Harrington, he wouldn’t want me to be with anyone but you.”

He looked at you like if he blinked everything would fade away and none of this would be real. You reach out and place a hand on his face, looking over where wounds had once been and were now turning into scars. 

“ I love you Steve.” You finally say 

He doesn’t say anything back he just leans in and presses his soft lips against yours. The kiss held so much love and emotion. It felt just like the movies, like the moment when these things always happened. Time seemed to have slowed down, allowing you take it all in and cherish it.

“I’ll take that as the feeling’s mutual?” You say with a giggle. 

Steve brushes his nose against yours before kissing you again, only this time with more force. You took this as his way of saying yes. His mouth hot on yours as his hands grabbed your waist awkwardly from the place he was sitting and pulled you as close as he could. You both only pulled away to catch a breath. 

This would be a moment you would remember for the rest of your life. It wasn’t your first kiss, wasn’t even your second, or hundredth, but it was your first kiss as lovers, but it definitely would not be your last. The world would throw crazy things at you, especially when you aren’t ready for it, but you don’t have to deal with it alone anymore. 

You just always have to know that sometimes things just don’t go as planned and your world might come crashing down and it’ll fall apart, but always remember that you’ll have people in your life to be there to catch you when you fall.

Taglist:

@ughhhitsfan @eleventhdoctorsangel @chloe-skywalker  

[valeptraglia]

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Battle of Calormen

(All rights to C. S. Lewis)

Chapter 5: "A warm breeze and a poisoned edge"

The next morning I woke up early. A thin line of sunshine entered through the small opening between the two curtains and right in my face. I blinked a few times to accustom to it and tried to cover my eyes with my hand and pillow hopelessly. I finally gave up and sit up leaning on my elbow looking at the window with a grimace. The light coming from it was orange so that meant in was early in the morning, or maybe late in the evening?

I stood up and walked over the window, when I reached it I could see dust floating through the light. I slowly opened the curtains and a beautiful view greeted me.

As I opened the balcony doors delicious fragrances from the flowers below in the garden hit me; roses, lilies, daisies, jasmines, daffodils, iris, marigolds, gerberas, orchids, and many others I didn't even know their names. Mum used to make me help her with her little garden, and she would point a flower and said its name and how to take care of it, after a while doing this the names just stayed in my head.

Also there were beautiful trees in which under their brunches you could see dryads sleeping heavily, caressing their trees in a motherly way or brushing their hair. But what caught my attention were the big apple trees near the stone walls in the orchard. I smile broadly remembering the day the moles planted them and said some day we would be grateful planting them, something I really doubt at the moment, funny how things turned out. Years later I found myself eating hungrily the delicious apples in order to not die from hunger.

Further on I could see and hear the waves crashing lightly against the stone of the cliffs. Home.

Once I dressed and washed my face I got out of my room and walked through the deserted hallways.

I walked through several rooms, some were locked, and some leaded to different studies.

One leaded to a circular room, on its walls hang some paintings of the forests and mountains of Narnia, of dancing fauns and nymphs, of the dryads and their trees, of glorious armies, of men and creatures all like equals, of old Kings and Queens, including some of me, Peter, Susan, Lucy and Caspian; of the wasteland of the lantern, and the most beautiful painting of the Great Lion, Aslan. He looked magnificent with his golden mane and wise gaze.

I looked at his painting intently as I remembered the first time I met him, I could still hear his valuable words ringing in my ears, words I would never forget.

I remembered all the times he sent us here, to Narnia. The first one to saved it from the White Witch, the second one to return freedom and the reign to the right person, Caspian; then to help Caspian to find the lost lords, next he sent Eustace and Jill to save Rilian; and now he sends us here along with two more strangers to help Narnia against the calormens when we shouldn't be here, nor me, nor my brother and sisters, we weren't supposed to come back.

I sight in frustration and turned to leave the room when I felt a warm breeze. I turned quickly. I was sure I hadn't seen any windows in this room. I looked around carefully and sure enough there weren't any windows.

Then my gaze set on the Great Lion's painting. I couldn't look away or move my feet, I was like glued to the floor. I looked deeply in those wise eyes and I was sure he was holding my gaze. A twinkle shone on his painted eyes.

Carefully I touched the painting. "we are going to help them. Narnia won't fall. We won't fail these people. I won't fail you" I promised. Then I stood there in shock. The lion in the painting shook his mane and open his mouth his breath hit me right in the face. I closed my eyes tight and opened them again. The twinkle in its eyes was gone and the painting was still again but I was sure it had happened.

I left the room feeling light.

Soon I found the library in the east wing of the castle, on the third floor, it was huge, shelves covered in books decorated the walls, some coffee tables, desks, chairs and comfortable armchairs were spread across the room in between shelves or in front of the fireplace. A chess game was placed in one of the coffee tables. This would be one of the places I'll visit the most.

As I left the library I saw King Erasmus coming through the hallway. His faced was twitched with concern and a frown; he appeared to be thinking hard. Dark circles under his eyes. But as he raised his head and saw me he smiled broadly, like a father with his child.

"Edmund!" he said surprised giving me a clap on the back, "Good morning! What are you doing so early?"

"Just walking" I answered with a smile of my one and shrugging my shoulders. "Sleepless night?"

"Yes, I guess you could say so" he said with a tired voice.

We resume walking down the hall. I saw Erasmus was scratching his chin deep in thought and I started getting curious of his attitude.

"Is everything alright?" I asked him.

"What?" he looked quite surprised by my question.

"I meant, if everything is alright, did something happen? You have that serious face…"

"Oh! Yes, well, too much to process. So much I am trying to understand through the last few months. I am just worried" he looked at me warily and I nodded my head knowingly. He continue "And then there's the prisoner, a healer was with him yesterday taking care of his wound, but he is reluctant to talk, Diácano was with him the whole night but still no progress unfortunately"

I nodded my head in understanding. We kept walking in silence for a while.

"Do you think he will talk?" he asked suddenly.

"I don't know. But we will figure this all out" I said sincerely.

He sighed and then smile to me. "Today I'd like to have a council with you and your siblings. I wish for your advice, to be honest I feel kind of lost here." He looked at me hopefully and then quickly added "If it's alright with you, of course, I don't want to pressure you, I know it's been a little too much since you came back"

"By all means, yes, don't worry, we will meet you at the council. We are glad to be helping you." I reassure him.

Erasmus gave me half-smile and we kept walking making small conversation. He showed me around the "new" Cair Paravel, the royal chambers were at the east wing, while the guest's chambers were on the west wing, all chambers were on the second floor while the paintings room, library, council room, the King's studio and other sparcing rooms were on the first floor. The kitchens, the thrones' hall, and the dining room were on ground floor.

"Fancy some breakfast?" asked Erasmus gesturing to the dining room.

"Do you have to ask?" I replied with a smirk.

We greeted the fauns posted at the doors and walked past them into the dining room. As we entered Erasmus opened his arms wide and jovially spoke to someone. "Good morning Anne! You sure are an early bird"

A young lady was seated at the table, already with a cup between her fingers. She looked up and gave him a small smile. I observed her quietly until I realized, she had taken care of my arm the night before on the infirmary.

"Dear, may I introduce to King Edmund?"

I stepped forward and offered her my hand to shake, she took it with hesitation.

"A pleasure to formally meet you, your Maj-"

"Edmund, just Edmund" I corrected her. "And it is a pleasure to meet you too Anne"

"How's your arm?" she asked pointing at my bandaged arm.

"It's great actually, it doesn't even hurt that much. Thank you" Really, the wound was excellent, the inflammation was gone and the pain was barely there.

"Anne has a unique talent for herbs. She's been taught by the centaurs themselves" he was looking fondly at her, like a proud father. She blushed and dismissed him with a hand movement.

"Well, that's quite impressive. Centaurs don't teach just anyone" I told her sincerely. Centaurs are rather misgiving with their knowledge.

"Told you" said Erasmus with a pointed look "well, let's have breakfast, shall we? A long day is ahead of us".

A short time after Queen Calantha made an entrance and soon one by one the rest came down to share a very fresh breakfast.

"As I was telling earlier to Edmund" Erasmus said in between bites "I am holding a council in the evening and I would really appreciate if you were there. If it's not too much to ask of you. I am looking forward to hearing suggestions from experienced people"

"Of course, we'll be there" Peter assured him to which Susan and Lucy agreed nodding their heads with solemn smiles. Although Susan's smile didn't reach her eyes. I made a mental note to talk to her later, she's worrying me.

"I would like to see the prisoner first Erasmus" he looked surprised at my request but complied anyways.

I was curious, given the fact that he was so reluctant to talk it was worth the try.

After breakfast I went down to the dungeons accompanied by Diácano and two wolves, part of the King's personal guard. They were slender and powerfully built creatures, a little bigger than an average wolf probably, and with large yellow eyes. Big and heavy teeth adorned their mouths. Accalia, a she-wolf, had black shiny fur, less massive than his partner, Amaruq,a huge grey wolf, his fur was dense a looked quite fluffy.

In spite of being talking creatures they preferred to walked around the castle in a menacing silence. Their eyes warily taking in their surroundings.

We descended the last flight of stairs leading to the dungeons and we met Bavra, the faun, on guard. He nervously bowed at me and quickly open the iron door. I could hear Amaruq grunting under his breath when he walked past Bavra who visibly shivered and suck on his breath.

·Stop that" Accalia reprimanded him.

Amaruq was shaking with quite laughter while Diácano and I grinned at him. We came to a top at a dark cell. It was very silent and through dark a bulk was visible on the floor.

"Get up" I commanded the prisoner with a loud and strong voice.

Nothing.

"Haven't you heard the King? Get. Up." demanded Diácano nearing the bars of the cell. Nothing. He looked back at me.

"Open the cell" I told him.

He quickly turn and galloped back to Bavra in search of the keys. I approached the cell with my hand on the bars, I tried to look past the darkness but it was impossible, so I grabbed the torch from the wall and illuminated with its dim fire the cell. Effectively the man was lying on the floor and he wasn't moving. At all. Besides me Amaruq and Accalia were grunting leaning over the cell, their tail up and active. They glanced at me worried.

Hearing the sound of hooves on the stone floor we withdraw to let Diácano open the cell and soon I was standing besides the prisoner. I passed the torch to Diácano as I squatted in front of him.

"Your Majesty, should I call a healer?" asked Bavra from his spot on the cell door.

"It's too late. He is already dead" I stated making him gasp.

The man's eyes were wide open, his skin pale, violet spots beginning to appear on it, his hand cold.

Accalia approached and started smelling the body and as she near his stomach she scrunched up her nose shaking her head. "Poison" she confirmed.

Carefully I lifted his shirt to reveal a cut on his abdomen, it was a thin line, not even deep but it's outline was black, as if rotten.

Directing towards Amaruq I ordered him "Find King Erasmus. Do not talk to anybody on your way there. Tell him to summon the council now, we can not wait any longer"

Nodding his head the grey wolf took off. I then turned to Diácano, his face expressed the same worry I felt.

We had a traitor in the castle.

(End of Edmund's POV)

[just-things-things]

Oh my gosh Assassin!Peter Parker GO! Also as a bonus question favorite and least favorite fanfiction tropes.

Ah, yes, I love me some assassin Peter Parker. Honestly, I just love the concept of evil Peter sooooo much, so thank you for the ask! I hope this is good for you!

Also, to answer your questions, I love all fanfiction tropes, but I'm probably going to have to go with "there's only one bed" and "slow burn fics" as my favorite tropes. I also love writing Alternative Universe Au's, but I'm not confident enough to post them. They're kind of really out there. :/ And the only trope I don't like that much/just haven't found a good story for is Peter teaching an older Morgan to become Iron Woman. I really like the concept, but just haven't found a good fic done for it. Someone should DEFINITELY leave suggestions in the comments :)

Lastly, I'm writing this at work, lol, so it's a bit rushed:

_____

He likes to think everything he's done is for a good cause. Really, if you only look at the minimal details, truly you'd see the nature behind his decisions. There's no point in watching how he kills people, or the satisfactory look he gets when collecting his prize.

At least, that's how Peter looks at it. Peter Parker - the more humane side of his alter ego. He remembers clearly when his job - his life - really started.

It was a cold September, the start of a freezing winter. He remembers being so scared for a moment before his insides were filled with pure rage and vengeance.

Looking back on it, his reaction might have been normalized for someone who had witnessed their Uncle's murder. And he was only thirteen at the time, young enough to substitute jail for juvenile detention.

After cradling Ben and listening to, "With great power, comes great responsibility," for the last time, he realized his responsibility. He was responsible for two things.

Ben's untimely death. And two:

For catching his Uncle's murderer.

Maybe his decision making was far fetched, maybe Ben never wanted this to happen, but in a panicked moment, Peter fled the seen for a man in a hooded jacket and 380 ACP.

He chased the guy five blocks to catch him. To tackle the man in an abandoned warehouse and when on top, he found a renowned strength. He had never throw a punch before. He never remembered being that strong.

While the punching continued, Peter wasn't planning on killing the criminal, but in their flurry of movement and the man reaching for his gun, he freaked out. It was either kill or be killed. He didn't want to join Ben yet, he couldn't leave May alone. He had a responsibility.

So, twisting the other's wrist and catching the gun mid-air, he aimed and shot two bullets. The man spasmed as Peter rolled over, taking two large breaths and throwing the weapon into a corner. He laid there for what seemed like hours, trying to find a way out.

In the end, the body ended up in the Hudson River. Peter returned home - bloody and bruised - to find May gone. A note was left to go to the local police station with twenty dollars on top.

He didn't go. Instead, he used his extra time to get the grime off himself in the shower. Afterwards, he called May to tell him he was home and would take a taxi as soon as he could. She yelled at him for ten minutes, wondering where he had been, why he didn't answer his phone or call earlier, in the end she broke down, apologizing and saying she'd be home in a few minutes.

By the time she returned, he had finished brewing some tea and cooking a couple of eggs. It was already four in the morning. Peter held his Aunt for the next three hours. Letting her grieve, letting himself listen to his own thoughts. He didn't cry, didn't feel bad about the man he killed - by now he was comfortably numb.

He knew he had to be more careful. He knew he had to figure out why he could punch so hard, what other things - powers - his body had obtained.

And when he found out his unnatural ability and crazy amouts of strength, Spider-Man would be born.

When he first took on the mantle and name of a "Superhero," that's all he intended it to be. To save people and help get other out of harm's way. To be the friendly neighborhood Spider-Man.

The first illegal thing he did in his beginner suit was break into Oscorp. After months of fighting crime in a ratty sweatshirt, he was sure need of an upgrade.

So, with Peter's high IQ he produced a flashdrive with Oscorp's codes and firewall breakthroughs. Everything about the company could be found on a tiny store-bought chip.

Sneaking into the place was harder, making sure to use the right codes and not set off any alarms was difficult, but once he was in and posing as an intern, things had ran smoothly. He worked diligently in a lab, constructing a functional suit with new designs and better usages.

Getting out was simpler, deciding to strut out the front entrance with his new suit in a backpack gave him an adrenaline rush, causing him to run to a bathroom to change for patrol. That would lead to his second illegal action in a suit.

Even though he was excited, the streets surely were not. About to finish his sandwich from Mr. Delmar (it was on the house) and return to the apartment, a lady yelled out from below his streetlamp, "Hey, you're that Spider-Guy, right?"

Startled, he nodded and hurriedly pulled his mask down, "Uh, yeah. Spider-Man, actually, but that's me, do you need help with anything, or something?"

"Yeah, I do. But we shouldn't really talk about it here. C'mon down, little spider." Peter gulped, conflicted on running or following the women. Looking up and down the street, he found it empty.

"Why can't we talk right here?" Realization dawned on him and he dropped his voice to a whisper, "Is someone following you."

The women nodded. Peter hopped down to her level, taking her arm in his, "Do you think we can pass as a couple. I mean - I'm wearing a suit."

"I noticed, it's new. I've been looking for you." Closer now, Peter could see the women's features more sharply. Hazel eyes shaped with cutting-edge cheekbones and wavy-ginger hair.

"Who's following you?" There was no point in beating around the bush.

"My husband, he's about two blocks behind with a pocket knife."

Peter glanced at the store they passed, "Do you want me to go take care of him. I can call the police and have him sent to jail, only if you have proof, though."

"Don't believe me?"

"I do, but I also know the cops won't do anything without evidence. It'll be a lost cause then."

She sighed, "I don't want to get the cops involved. I want you to kill him."

Spider-Man stopped, "What?"

The women pulled him into an alley way and oped her purse. She pushed a smaller bag into his hands, "I need you to kill him."

Peter was shaking, he didn't understand. He slowly opened the bag, it was full of wads of cash, "That's seven thousand dollars. Go kill him, call me when it's done." He watched as the women pulled out a paper and pen, scribbling down her phone number.

"I can't."

She stared at him, almost like she could see through the mask. Groaning, she replied, "Fine," she ripped the money out of his hands and began leaving the alley way.

Peter froze. Seven thousand dollars. That was alot of cash. And it was rent week, he knew May couldn't pay it. He also knew he needed a new computer. Decisions. It seemed that's all his life was right now. So many decisions.

May needed the money. It was his responsibility to help get it for her.

"Wait! I'll, I'll take the job." The women looked over her shoulder and grinned,

"I knew you would, I'll be waiting."

By the time he left the crevice between the buildings, the husband was already on their street.

Peter swung and landed in front of the man, startling him. The boy could already tell from his drunken-state that this would be easy.

"He has a pocket knife," the words rang in his head. Peter looked down and sure enough there was a bulge in his pants in the form of a small dagger.

"Is that a knife or are you just happy to see me?"

The man shoved him, "Beat it, Kid. I don't have time fore games."

"Yeah?" Peter cocked his head, "Neither do I." He shoved his knee in between the man's legs, watching him double over and then using his strength to throw him into a post.

With the other's uneasiness he webbed his chest and catapulted him into the air. Climbing in the apartment and swinging the man upwards to finish things on the roof.

He didn't feel bad when the guy crashed against the fire escape. He was unconscious when they reached the top, his breath evened out and forehead already swelling. Peter stared.

After a moment, he fished out the knife and undid it. This would be the easier part, he knew where to position the blade and where to put pressure against the man's skin.

He didn't take honors biology for nothing.

Finishing the job, he called the women after sending a picture of her husband. With the seven thousand dollars he should invest in a burner phone.

"Good work, Spider-Man. I have another job for you, but that can wait till later. Get rid of the body and the cash is yours. I'll leave it behind the dumpsters." She hung up before he could say anything. That left him with a dead man and a prize to collect.

He later found himself counting the cash and debating on when he should call the women back. He knew the answer, though. He shouldn't. You need the money, he reminded himself.

In good news, he received a new laptop and burner phone all while sneaking May money for rent at the end of the week. He still had a shit ton of good money left. Even treating May and him to dinner. She never questioned anything.

After Peter calling the mysterious alley way women back on his newer phone, things began to slowly progress.

It led to him taking on another case for her and her pointing him into the direction of others in need of his help. He started going for more and more people, getting more money, taking even more people, all while maintaining the name, "Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man."

No one suspected a thing and his clients list kept growing. He didn't feel bad, hell, he only killed bad people. In his mindset, how could he be doing anything wrong?

Over the course of three years, his "buisness" grew and he upgraded his suits and weaponry. Most of the time, he preferred just his strength and webs, sometimes a knife if necessary, it was less of a mess, anyway. Of course, some jobs required the guns and larger daggers. They were easy enough to obtain, with his status between the dark web, anything was easy to obtain.

He never didn't take a job as long as the work could be done in New York, it was simpler that way.

There was one job he couldn't take, the one that frightened him the most and ironically had the largest bounty he'd seen. He was shocked when he pulled the invitation up. Two million dollars for the one and only May Parker.

_____

Ooh, a cliffhanger! I don't know if there will be a second part, sorry! Maybe if this gets enough love I'll consider! Speaking of, there will be an updated master list of things to drop in my ask box, hopefully tonight! Of course, if you have any other ideas or want me to do a second part of something, just ask! Thank you for the ask @etherithical

[lightning-fury]

Meant To Be

Pairing: Kamilah × MC “Amy”

Chap1 ==> Chap2 (written by @clan-sayeed-fic )

Note: This fic is the result of an unfortunate collaboration with @clan-sayeed-fic (I’m joking about the collaboration being unfortunate 😅😅 ).

Warning: Non-consensual acts and I think angst.

Chapter Three: Control

Written by @lightning-fury

Amy throws her jacket as she entered lily’s apartment and picked a pillow screaming in it.

“I see the branding went spectacularly” Lily teased

“She’s, she’s awful” Amy fell on the couch next to Lily who was playing some video game.

“Well that’s our Kamilah” lily laughed ending the game then she took Amy’s hands in hers.

“Look I’m not defending her behavior. Elizabeth’s death affected us all, but it did hit Kamilah the most, she had a special bond with her”

Amy nod in understanding. “Honestly” she thought “I would’ve acted the same way if I were in her place.”

“Enough forget about Kamilah” Lily jumped from the couch and threw Amy’s jacket in her direction “Catch. We’re going, to celebrate, not every day my girl gets her brand”

Amy catched her jacket thanks to her vampiric speed, she tried to object claiming she’s tired, but Lily didn’t take “No” for an answer. Eventually the blond give up.

Despite Lily Spencer’s chaotic way of living, she’s not only a member of clan Sayeed but also skillful hacker and the owner of one of the most exclusive night clubs in New York which was their destination.

Amy made a quick scan of the place it was flashy and futuristic “definitely styled by Lily”, a famous band playing in the corner driving the crowd crazy on the dance floor. Lily led Amy across the dancing bodies of models and New York’s elites to an exclusive second floor; well as Lily explained it’s exclusive for vampires and the few humans who knew about the supernatural. It didn’t look any different from the 1st floor except for the scent of blood. the blond’s eyes turned red a smile curled on her face showing her fangs, she was about to open her mouth to compliment Lily, when suddenly her expression hardened.

“Hell No!” she frowned.

Lily s looked in Amy’s eyes direction confused to find Adrian waving at them and Kamilah making the same displeased expression Amy making.

The new blood turned attempting to leave only to be stopped by the purple headed “Woah there, you’re not going anywhere”

“Lily I came to forget about Kamilah and this isn’t the place for that. Cause you know, she is here”

“Girl you better pose, we came to celebrate and we will even if it means kicking Kamilah out”

Amy lifted an eyebrow “can you?”

“Um No, but Amy Clark I didn’t think you’re the quitter type. Are you?”

Amy looked at Lily “No”

“So are you gonna let Kamilah win?”

“No” Amy said and smiled mischievously “Lily let’s party”  

The girls made a beeline for the bar, it didn’t take them long to get in the party spirit after some shots and the insisting of a human hotty Amy found herself on the dance floor music guiding her, she swayed with the girl, bodies moving in sync, Amy felt the girl’s body temperature rising against her, her heart beats a perfect addition to the music around, it was intoxication, in the dark of the club Amy’s eyes glow red, her hand traveled from the girls waist up to her neck, she run her thumb feeling the girl’s pulse making her shiver in respond.

The blond licked her lips fangs exposed then she sank them in the girl’s neck earning a moan from her. They danced like no one was watching.

Amy felt the girl weakening in her arms, she wanted to stop but she couldn’t, the blood was like drugs, a lust that can’t control, truthfully in that moment she didn’t want to control, the girl was dying in her arms but Amy didn’t care.

That’s when she felt hands on her shoulder a woman’s voice speaking it was commanding but soft and reassuring “Easy there, you can control this, Now you’re feeling a pleasure like you never felt before, I can relate to that but  you’re strong Amy, you can do it, it’s okay don’t rush it”

Amy did as told she slowed her drinking pace until she stopped. The girl fell unconscious, Lily catched her before she hit the floor and took her away.

The blond came out from her haze realization hitting her like a track, her hands started to shake she felt hands on her shoulder guiding her away from the crowd, the hands of the woman who helped her control her lust, Amy turned to see her face only to find Kamilah’s eyes looking at her, there was no anger no despite, only concern.

Tears of guilt welling in her eyes Amy hugged her “I almost killed her” she said sobbing.

Kamilah stiffened for a moment then she wrapped her arms around the girl “Shhh, it’s okay, you got overwhelmed, you’ll learn to control it”. They set there for a while the young vampire getting comfort from Kamilah’s touch.

Kamilah offered to drive her home since Lily is taking care of the girl. They drove to lily’s apartment in silence; Amy started to feel better but guilt still consuming her, she got out of the car heading toward the stairs but Kamilah’s voice stopped her “Hey You..”

Amy turned.

“Tomorrow at 7, you’ll start training with me. Be ready”

*******

“Get up” Kamilah looked at Amy who crashed against the floor a second ago.

“I can’t” Amy whined.

“I don’t care, move” said Kamilah

And like that the sweet Kamilah from last night was gone; Amy was getting her ass kicked by Kamilah for the past 3 hours from the moment she set her feet in the training facility.

The upcoming days wasn’t any better, although Amy’s fighting techniques improved she still couldn’t land a single punch at Kamilah.

“Call it skill, call it experience call it whatever you want that woman is unstoppable” Amy said drinking from a blood bag.

“Ames, aren’t you exaggerating a little” Lily laughed massaging the young vampire’s shoulders  

“Girl, my body’s hurting in places I didn’t know they did exist” Amy pouted.

“Look at me” Lily moved facing Amy “you’re gonna drink your blood, sleep and tomorrow you’ll show her what you’re made of. Do you understand me?”

“Yes” Amy’s eyes flashed with determination.

The next day Amy went earlier, only to find that Kamilah is already there warming up, she stood there looking at the queen moving with her daggers, dancing like a goddess of war.

“I can hear your heart beats you know” Kamilah said startling Amy.

“Hi” Amy mumbled showing herself “sorry, I didn’t..”

“Save it” Kamilah stopped her.

Amy rolled her eyes “here we go again” she thought “why am I even bothering”

The girl draws out her Katana getting in a fighting stance; it wasn’t too long before the 2 started circling each other preparing to attack they the fight started and Amy was capable of dodging all Kamilah’s attacks, she lost her Katana other than that no one succeeded to hit the other. They danced back and forth for a while, Kamilah actually looked impressed.  

Then Amy charged, Kamilah dodged it with ease and slammed her hand into the young vampire ribs, Amy winced in pain but she was quick to recover and managed to trip Kamilah, but she fell on top of her in the process.

They looked at each other, faces inches apart, Amy’s eyes scanned Kamilah face and got fixed on her lips, she leaned closing the distance, but she felt the cold metal of Kamilah’s dagger on her neck.

Amy backed away allowing Kamilah to stand.

“Do you really think I’ll kiss you?” Kamilah spat.

“How pathetic” she looked at her with disgust words leaving her mouth like poison.

Then she turned her back walking away.

Kamilah’s words stabbed Amy like daggers “Why? Why are you treating me like this? What have I done to you?” Amy shouted tears in her eyes.

Kamilah kept walking ignoring the girl.

Something snapped inside of anger filled her, she speed getting in Kamilah’s way “wait”

But when Amy touched Kamilah’s hand, everything around her disappeared.

And then …

Europe 1350

Kamilah walked through alleys hundreds of bodies laid everywhere inside the houses and on the streets it was dark times despair and sadness looming around, a man in armor is next to her he kicked a body of his way “this damned plague hit all of Europe” he grumbled

Kamilah glared at him “Banner can’t you have some decency and treat the dead with respect”

“No” he kicked another body and walked in a different alley than her.

Kamilah ignored him and entered a house, it was dark inside, she smelled death but she heard faint heart beats, she walked the stairs getting to the second floor a man and a woman laid on the bed, Kamilah approached

 “They’re dead” a weak voice stopped her.

She turned to see a young girl curled against the wall, Kamilah looked at the girl, she was blond 5 or 6 years old, pale you can see the bones from her skin, by the look she didn’t eat for days.

Kamilah sit next to the girl but the young child tried to stop her “go please, you’ll die” she said tears in her eyes “I don’t want to see someone else die”

“Don’t worry you’re not sick” Kamilah smiled at her “I can sense it also I’m really heard to kill”

The girl looked at her in wonder “what’s your name?”

“Kamilah and you?”

“I am Elizabeth” the girl said

“Elizabeth, that’s a beautiful name” Kamilah stood and extended a hand smiling “well Elizabeth, what do you say about going with me, I can be your family”

“Really?” Elizabeth said not believing what she heard  

“Yes, really” Kamilah nod

“Okay” Elizabeth smiled since the first time Kamilah saw her and she took her hand.

*******

And like that Amy got back to reality to see a stunned Kamilah

“How did you?” Kamilah said shocked.

“Kamilah, I didn’t mea..” Amy mumbled surprised by what she did too but Kamilah expression change again she was boiling with anger “Get out”.

Amy took her things and left without a word.

As soon as she walked out Kamilah fell to the floor her legs unable to lift her anymore, she closed her eyes remembering  Elizabeth’s smiling face, then she opened them and looked at her hands. the hands that hold her while she turned to ash. Kamilah wrapped her arms around her knees, tears running down her face, she set there crying for the first time in decades.

…

[party-of-rpg-muses]

Mun Plays Lightning Returns

Man, it’s been a really long time since I did this. Not only that, but I also kinda forgot to post these updates.

Tl;dr, after arriving in the Wild Lands, I found the Angel of Valahalla, a White Chocobo, and nursed it back to health. I then used him to travel to the Temple of the Goddess, where I encountered Caius and made my way to the top, but couldn’t even scratch him, forcing me to leave. But I returned to Yusnaan and eventually made my way inside to face Snow, saving him and his soul. I also happened across Vanilla, who was a Saint. I later encountered Fang while in the Dead Lands and did just find exploring the ruins until I reached the story boss, Grendel. But it proved so difficult that I stopped playing for a while and kinda forgot about it. I tried letting the time run out (it was about 4 AM when I fought it) and return to the Ark with a full EP, but its stats went up while mine remained the same. Luckily, I saved earlier (the aforementioned 4 AM) because I wanted to see how well I could do with a refreshed Lightning. Point it, I gave up and stepped away from the game for a while and got distracted with other things.

But this time, I decided to play it again. I lost again (due in part because I was trying to get re-acquainted with the controls) but I then decided to try this little strategy I’ve been thinking; fight looks until I got some EP. And after a long and arduous fight (and using more Aero abilities), I managed to win. Good to see Fang still hasn’t changed; perfectly willing to do anything to protect Vanilla, even if it means damning the entire world.

After that, I decided to search for Sazh (which was actually my intention when I accidentally went to the Temple of the Goddess, as I intended to go to the Crash Site, but wound up at the Temple). I was also balancing some side quests (and fully healed the White Chocobo) and I managed to reach the Crash Site and found good old Sash! And... Dajh! Well... what remained of Dajh, as his soul was apparently fragmented, so I went to search for them. The first two were a cakewalk. I mean, duh, the first was right outside their home. And as for the second, which was from Chocolina, I already had the item she wanted. As for the third, the one you get from Baird, it took quite a while, but hey, it allowed me to find the Moogle Village.

I actually did go deeper into Jagd Woods previously and noticed the Googles, but didn’t think much of them, even if I did wonder where Mog was. And yet, when I found the village, I was finally able to meet with Mog! I also found a Crimm Mushroom and a Moogle Fragment for Baird. I also got somewhat sidetracked doing side missions, like finding the lost Moogles and finally getting the fertilizer for Salara so I can make Gysahl Greens. But once that was done, I booked it back to Luxerion and got a Dajh Soul Fragment. I returned to the Wildlands to work on a few things until 6 AM, where I went to the Woods to pick up a few items and complete a few more quests before going to the Dead Dunes, tracking the mysterious Cactuar with an afro. The fight was long and difficult, but I managed to win before going to Yusnaan so I can get the last fragment, but saved the game and turned it off after arriving.

I have 3 days remaining and I’ll be saving Caius for last. After saving Sazh’s soul, I’ll be spending the remaining days focusing solely on side-quests before going back the the Temple. Lucky for me, Caius’ stats don’t increase, no matter how many days pass.

[raleighliving]

Pros and Cons of College Life in Raleigh

Last time I wrote about colleges in Raleigh generally and how it’s not like other college towns. This time, I’m gonna be speaking a bit more about the pros and cons so it should be a little more specific.

Before that, however, I wanna make this clear: Raleigh is not somewhere you should move to for college unless the school you’ve applied to is your dream school.  

In terms of academics, there are better choices than NC State or WPU. If you wanna study biology or medicine, schools like UNC-W or Duke would probably be a better fit for instance. If you live in Raleigh, don’t pick a school just because it’s close; if you live in another part of the states and you want to attend an east coast school there are options all along the east coast that you should consider.  

Raleigh is a great place to live and work, and there are plenty of friendly people here; but a degree from the right university can make or break your career (depending on the field and other aspects of course).

As a person suffering from anxiety, the question “Do you want the good news or bad news first” has always been a terrible one for me. Up until I hear the bad news, it could be literally anything regardless of what the person asking was doing or how much of the task they were on I’m familiar with.

Similarly, living in Raleigh (or really anywhere for that matter) is going to present a lot of subjective pros and cons. Please keep in mind this is gonna be super subjective, but I hope you enjoy reading this even if we disagree.

But you didn’t come here to read three paragraphs of disclaimer. So lets start by listing the good stuff.  

Raleigh is a city full of vibrant color, culture, and cool shit. You can find cool things almost anywhere you look, regardless of where you are in Raleigh. I mean, all of the pictures (including those in this article) I use for this blog I’ve taken in Raleigh or nearby it. As a result, the first pro has got to be the beltline highway system.  

The beltline is a highway system composed of I-440, I-40, and parts of I-540 that encapsulates all of Raleigh. It connects north and south Raleigh while having downtown in the center, letting travelers easily reach nearly any part of Raleigh. 

I’ve lived on the border of Durham, Cary, and Rolesville at different points in my life. I’ve had to make trips to Garner and Apex for various reasons. At no point in my 20+ year stay have I ever had to make a city trip that lasted longer than a half-hour (one way). It makes working in Raleigh especially easy, since the abundance of highway access points and the convenience of the loop design means I’m never too far from that loop. 

It even helps with adjusting to your new environment if you move here (for school or other reasons) since if you’re ever lost, the highways can act as a point to re-orient yourself by. I know I’ve had to do it plenty of times in the past, and it can really save you from looking like an idiot if you excuse your lost-ness by just saying “Oh yeah mate, I was just tryna get on the highway. Saves so much time.”

Does this mean Raleigh has the best transportation network of any city? Hell no. Does this mean that Raleigh has the best highway system? Not even close. But it’s still super nice, especially for students. You’ll run into the problems any urban place has like rush hour or crash delays, but this is mitigated by the fact you’ll be using it for our second pro: Everything happens in Raleigh. 

Well, not EVERYTHING everything but as I’ve ranted about before; there’s plenty to do and see in the city of Raleigh (even if you’re a student). 

For instance, according to raleighnc.gov, Raleigh is home to over 200 public parks. Not a fan of parks? Into more electronic entertainment? Then visit our very own “Arcade of Thrones” downtown and get your game on with your fellow nerds

Boring stuff like restaurants and night clubs aside, Raleigh is home to literally thousands of businesses and social clubs for you to partake in. Farmers markets, gun and knife shows, fishin’ holes and public church barbecues are available for that classic southern charm; but don’t forget to make use of our barcades, art festivals, concerts, comedy clubs and sport centers. 

The only reason why I’m not going into more detail about examples like First Friday, the downtown cultural festivals, PNC arena or other more specific events is because I want to write about them in-depth in the future.  

Of course, students having things to do and places to go is only part of the college experience. If you’re gonna come to Raleigh for college, the best pro I could possibly mention is the support network.  

Not to say that we’re exactly all one big happy family here, but in Raleigh you get that nice blend of metropolitan city life with your rural state. Orgs like the LGBT Center, Goodwill, Raleigh Missions, and more support locals in need constantly and provide for the many different groups around here.

Libraries and civic centers share the same city as mosques and churches which neighbor women's shelters and LGBT+ advocacy groups. If you’re a republican or democrat, that’s fine but be prepared to meet the other members of the political spectrum since groups like the Democratic-Socialists of America (DSA) are active downtown as well.

If you need help or want to help others, there’s a 98% chance that you’ll find someone or something out there that meets your needs. Join a community through Facebook or Nextdoor and you’ll see every diaper drive, garage sale, and community recommendation pop up whenever one is needed.

Of course, this brings us to our first con. Raleigh may be home to some of the nicest people I’ve ever met but it doesn’t mean you won’t run into some problem people sooner or later.  

There’s of course the typical collegiate douchebags, the upper-middle class young scions of no import who fumble through life with no regard for others because mommy and daddy will perpetually care for them, but being a red state you’ll also run into the more colorful republicans.

Every year there’s an anime convention called “Animazement” downtown and every year there’s a small herd of fundamentalist Christians warning all the otaku who’ll listen that they’re going to hell. Drive around town long enough and you’ll find a few different businesses that have made their opinions on things like masks and social distancing clear, not to mention there’s no shortage of QAnoners and alt-right sympathists. 

Of course, you shouldn’t let others dictate the quality of your life or the area you live in but you should be aware that these people exist. Raleigh is more liberal than other parts of North Carolina for sure but it’s not the leftist paradise those other parts would say it is.

Other than the coinflip that is neighbors, Raleigh is kind of a pricy place to live. The cost of living is on average higher than other cities in the US, cheaper still than New York of Californian cities, but pricey nonetheless.

Rent in Raleigh for a one bedroom apartment is on average $975 according to bestplaces.net and can go as high as $1200 depending on the complex and location. 

That, with a federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour, means you’ll need 

>Multiple jobs >Multiple roommates >A good paying job

or any combination of the two to be able to afford rent, utilities, and food beyond cup ramen. There’s housing programs like Section 8 and military housing initiatives to help, but for students you’re looking at some pretty steep housing costs for anywhere that’s not student dorms. 

You can get a good job that pays decent, of course, nothing’s impossible. However, finding one that won’t require roommates would demand full time hours (which might be difficult to make on student scheduling) or a degree (which you’re probably at college to get). Most living spaces require you make at least 3x the advertised rent to even be considered as well, which may limit students to seedier student living complexes like University Village or The Proper (Formerly Vie, formerly wolf creek).

Finally, if you move to Raleigh for college be prepared to drive. A lot.

As I mentioned earlier, the beltline is a god send for students and people looking to explore; but it’s also practically mandatory for moving around Raleigh. Public transit in Raleigh isn’t non-existent but it’s pretty damn close.  

Live between 10-15 minutes from your desired destination? Taking the bus is gonna be anywhere from half an hour to a full hour, and that’s if you even live near a bus route. If you’re like myself and habitually on the edge of Raleigh, be prepared to drive for a bit before you even see a GoRaleigh bus let alone a stop. 

The buses do at least run pretty late (Closing normally around 11PM), but the lack of public transit lines and bike-able roads means that you’ll be adding to the urban congestion more likely than not.

Okay with driving? Hope you’re okay with paying another arm and a leg, because at most schools down here tuition doesn’t cover your parking pass. 

NC State prices range from $105 to over $400 depending on your credit hours and where you’re staying at. Other schools like William Peace only charge a flat $130 for their parking decal, but most of the schools require you throw them an extra Apple Pencil or two for the privilege of being able to park your own vehicle close to the actual campus.

There are workarounds, like parking off-campus nearby, but those carry risks and penalties that can add up over time. The audacity these schools have to take thousands in tuition and then demand that you pay and additional fee to just use the parking lot.

Hopefully, though, regardless of my thoughts if you live in Raleigh or North Carolina in general and you’re considering attending one of the fine establishments here; I’ve provided you some food for thought. 

College can be a scary experience for many, and the area around it can really make or break your experiences. We don’t have the biggest party schools or the most glamorous cityscape; but if I had to go through the collegiate system again I honestly couldn’t imagine doing it anywhere else.

Next time I’ll be talking about some alternatives to College though, so stay tuned for that.  

Special shout out to the DSA of Raleigh as well. They didn’t help write any of this or communicate with me during the production of this article, but they’ve been doing some amazing work downtown with the homeless during the pandemic.  They are some of the most amazingly hard working individuals who care immensely for the community and you can check them out on dsanc.org.