#I originally intended for it to be a shark girl but it turned into an anthropomorphic version of the leviathan from subnautica

[ask-the-becile-boys]

Fic: Dee (crosspost)

Word Count: 3980

CW: Self Harm, Emotional/Verbal/Psychological Abuse

Summary: Thadeus attempts to revive Delilah and fails. Hare adopts the abandoned creation– a reclusive, angry mannequin– as his sister, Dee. (Originally intended to bring people up to speed with Dee’s character, now serves to provide some more detail and context to her backstory.)

-H-

A few months after Jack’s accident, Pops began working on something in the attic. He carried the scant supplies up the stairs himself, as opposed to having The Skull do the labor. Hare could hear Pops talking as he worked, the words muffled through the floorboards; one time he even heard Pops singing, and it sent a too-human chill down his metal spine. Nothing that made Pops that happy could spell good news.

-D-

There was light, and there was shadow. A shadow, thrown over her, a body outlined by a white circle glowing behind them, too bright, too bright. Everything felt wrong. This wasn’t her body. This wasn’t a body.

“Delilah?” the shadow asked, voice deep, curious, plaintive, demanding.

She might’ve been Delilah. A Delilah, at least, or something like that. She was unsure how she was moving when there was no feeling of flesh in her arms, no air in her chest.

The shadow stepped forward and she saw it was a haggard man with ugly metal gauntlets. “Do you recognize me?” he asked.

“Where am I?” she asked, ignoring his question. “What’s happened to  me?”

She held out her hands to look at them. Cloth, stitches between the joints, shaking. The man enfolded her hands in his own, trapping her in place.

“You’re alive, again,” he said. “It’s been--”

“I was dead?” she asked. “Dead? No. No!”

“Calm, dearest Delilah,” the man said. “It is all going to be alright.”

She knew a lie when she heard it, and she bowed her head over their hands and sobbed, fear afresh for her lack of tears.

-H-

Hare stood at the foot of the attic stairs and listened to the woman crying. Horror kept his limbs frozen while his thoughts raced. When had she gotten here? How had Pops slipped her past all of them? He barely stirred when The Skull’s heavy footsteps sounded next to him.

“What are you doing?” The Skull said, his words more warning than question.

Hare didn’t respond. There was no way The Skull couldn’t hear her. The first step creaked dangerously under Hare’s foot as he began to climb.

The Skull seized Hare’s arm just above a long tear in the sleeve made by The Jack’s teeth. “Don’t,” he said, voice low. “We should learn more first.”

“Learn more about what?” Hare asked, good eye staring wide at The Skull. “He’s got a girl up there. We’ve gotta get her out!”

“And then what? He dismantles you for interfering?” The Skull’s grip tightened. “No. Leave it alone, for now--”

Hare swung, they scuffled, and Hare hit the ground, making it shake. He scrambled up and went careening down the hallway, seething, plotting, dripping oil.

-D-

It was the third night. Heavy footsteps, unlike the first man’s, were coming up the stairs. She tried to stay still as the door opened, keeping her back to this newcomer, but her fingers continued to pick at her not-flesh through her sleeves. She’d been given a white dress to wear, long and old, dust in the seams, and a wig to cover her head, hide her glass eyes.

“Psst!” the newcomer hissed in a raspy voice at her back. “Hey, lady! I’m going to get you out of here!”

She did not turn, afraid to show them what sort of thing she was. But an ungiving hand, clad in a red glove, took hold of her elbow, and she looked at them and screamed. Shark-like teeth tore their way up left side of their metal mask, up to a glowing green cat’s eye, and there was no eye where the right one should be, just an oily void, and there was no face under that mask, was there?

“Get away from me,” she keened, her voice rising to a dizzying screech. “Get away!”

The metal monster stumbled back, shooting a look at the stairs. It may have been speaking, but she could hear nothing over her own terror, the howl tearing out of her body. A real body would run out of air, force her to breath, but she had no real body, she was as much a monster as the metal thing that now ran from her.

The first man, Thadeus, appeared a few minutes later. There was a splatter of dark oil on his gauntlets.

“That was Hare, my dear, only Hare,” he said. “A creation of mine that can’t help but cause trouble. Do not fret, Delilah. I’ve made it very clear he is not to bother you again.”

-H-

Like hell was Hare going to give up that easily. So the woman wasn’t a woman, per se; that didn’t make her crying any less real. If she was the product of Pops’ hands, for whatever twisted reason-- well, so was he. That made her his sister, as far as he was concerned.

The Jack wasn’t getting any better, but he was stabilizing into a new normal. Hare still had to spend a lot of time watching out for him, making sure his confusion didn’t lead to destruction. But whenever he saw Pops headed for the attic, Hare would set everything aside to crouch at the steps below, straining to listen. Most of the time he couldn’t hear more than their tones of voice-- Pops, uncharacteristically beguiling, and Hare’s sister, distressed, and growing quieter each day.

-D-

Thadeus would come by every day for a few hours and talk to her, bringing old photo albums and palm-sized paintings for her to look at as he tried to jog her memory. Sometimes he would read off from dense research papers, studies on chemical interactions that she found completely abstruse. There were boxes of women’s clothing--none of her (her?) old belongings, he explained with obvious regret, but things of her style, garments that might make her feel more like her old self.

Nothing helped. She could remember nothing of this Cavalcadium, or of a younger Thadeus, or of science. There was only a vagueness of feeling where her memories should be, dream visions: wet, swampy fields; ticks and chiggers; brushing a child’s hair; tin-sided houses; the sunset sparkling in lines on water.

The manor below was scarcely quiet; a madman lived down there, who would laugh broken screams, and another two whose arguments sometimes carried on right below her, bellowing insults in rough voices. All three were ‘creations’ of Thadeus’s work, including the so-called Hare. But Thadeus acknowledged them rarely, with open disdain.

“Only one is useful,” Thadeus said. “I keep the other two so as to keep him placated. Perhaps one day, when you are better,” he said, like it was a forgone conclusion. “Your presence will be enough emotional support for The Skull. You were always kind.”

She didn’t feel kind. It took all of her strength not to scream at Thadeus for fear of what he’d do in return. Would he destroy her? Find some way to make this mannequin’s body feel pain? Dangerous men could not be trusted.

The last of Thadeus’s visits wasn’t special. It was quiet. He was speaking about something, and she was barely listening, letting him hold her hand. A passing remark snagged on the trace of a memory.

“She has a young child, now,” Thadeus was saying. “At a particularly troublesome age.”

The words tumbled out of her mouth before she could think to stop them. “All the ages are troublesome. My daughter would cry--”

Thadeus’s grip became vice-like for a moment, then slowly pulled away. “… Your daughter?”

Had she a daughter? Yes. She nodded.

“Delilah Morreo had no children,” Thadeus said. He left, then, and she never saw him again, not in the flesh. In the dark of night, when she wasn’t in the half-awareness she now called sleep, his silhouette lingered in the shadows. In the day she would stare at the stairs door and wait, and wait, and wait for him to open it.

How dare he.

How dare he.

-H-

Pops forbade any more talk of the lady in the attic. “A waste of resources,” he had muttered bitterly, making Hare’s oil prickle like battery acid, nearly launching himself at his creator in a fury if not for The Skull hovering nearby. Instead he stalked through the manor, ignoring The Jack when he called to him, and stormed up the steps. But with every stair ledge his self-consciousness grew, until he came to the door and stood silently before it, anxiety gnawing.

Pops didn’t even give her a name. Of course he hadn’t-- he hadn’t given The Skull his, either, and he hadn’t thought he was some reincarnation.

But Hare had one. And it was time he properly introduced himself.

-D-

When the door finally opened again, it wasn’t Thadeus, but the metal monster she’d seen on her third night. Reflexively, she froze, then threw a mug Thadeus had left behind at his head.

“Get out!” she screamed. “Leave me alone!”

The monster ducked back out and the mug shattered against the wall next to the door. Damn him, damn him! She wanted nothing to do with monsters, even if she herself was monstrous. She wanted nothing to do with danger, so there would be no more silence around dangerous men, no more waiting for the disasters that followed mistakes. If this attic was her only safety, she would defend it.

She would hold her ground, even if she didn’t deserve it.

She groaned, looking down at her inhumanity. It was a constant reminder that she was wrong, that her existence was abhorrent to nature. Her hands felt no sensation, but her soul ached. Damn Thadeus. Damn his ugly creations. Damn herself.

She finally picked a small tear in the cloth of herself, in the torso, and the material tore in a satisfying, grating rip.

-H-

Hare stared, standing halfway through the attic door. He’d given her some time to cool down, and now bunches of stuffing were scattered on the rug, and his sister was laid out with her side torn open.

“Oh, hell,” Hare whispered. “Oh, hell, what did you do?”

He went to her and gently shook her shoulder. Nothing. Was she dead? There was nothing in the stuffing that indicated a power source, no tell-tale glow from within the open cavity.  Hare began to tear apart the room and found a sewing kit in one of the boxes.

He hesitated. He knew he shouldn’t touch her while she wasn’t responsive-- but she might continue ripping herself apart if he waited, and this, this amount of tearing, surely if he could pick a lock he could use a little needle?

Easier said than done, but he tried his damnedest. It was an ugly job at the end, but it held the stuffing in and it didn’t unravel when he tugged at it. And just in time; Hare looked up from the stitches to meet his sister’s furious eyes, and she slapped him. Her hand bounced off his face harmlessly, and they scowled at each other for a silent moment.

“I told you to leave me alone,” she said imperiously.

“I was never very good with directions,” Hare replied dryly. He leaned back from where he was kneeling, giving her a little space, but otherwise held his ground. “So. You’re not Delilah, but I gotta call you something.”

“I have a name,” she spat.

“Yeah? What?”

“It wasn’t,” she said, faltering. “It wasn’t not ‘Delilah,’ it was… something with a ‘D,’” she muttered, looking away.

Hare thought for a moment. “With a ‘D,’ eh? How’s just ‘Dee’ sound? You like that?”

She shrugged. “Fine. It’ll do.”

When Hare left, he closed the attic door behind him and paused, looking at it. He took off his glove and laid two bare claws against the wood, and he gouged it with straight lines, down, down-right, down-left. ‘D’.

“It’ll do,” he said quietly.

-D-

There was scarce to do in the attic, and Dee’s conversations with Hare often ended in awkward silence for lack of things to discuss, and the discomfort made her irritable. Hare soon learned to leave early, and that left hours upon hours in the day alone.

She tossed the things Thadeus had brought her out the bigger of the two windows; she spied a tall figure, one she often saw tending the grounds, retrieving the items from the bushes. She looked through the boxes and found a few things: embroidery kits that held no interest; empty journals that she sketched birds and bugs in; old novels, dense in the style of those decades.

Mostly, she slept. She could sleep for days, aware enough to notice the shifting of the sun and moon or Hare sticking his head in to check on her, yet detached enough that the time passed quickly, her foggy memories creating landscapes that she could walk (walk!) through.

One day she came back to herself to find Hare thumbing through one of the novels she’d left out.

“You like these?” Hare asked, glancing up from the dust-yellow pages.

“They’re too hard to read,” Dee grumbled.

“Yeah?” Hare said.

He brought her some new books after that, pulp fiction he’d grabbed by the handful, and colored pencils for her journals, and boxes of puzzles, and crosswords and comics. He lugged up a radio one day and a record player another, and fed wires down through the floor for power.

She tried to summon thankfulness. But there was so much rage curdled in her chest that her words came out viperous, that she’d smash the records or tear the pages from the books. She didn’t want to be here. She didn’t want to exist. She was lonely. She had hatred in her and Hare was her only witness.

Sometimes, on the bad days, her fingers would still make their way to her seams. Hare would huff and grumble, but he didn’t lecture. And with the passing of years, his stitching improved, the threads holding tighter despite the fraying of her cloth edges.

-H-

Pops died.

Hare went up to the attic after the burial, dirt and grass still sticking to his gloves. Dee was laying on her back, staring at the ceiling. Her fingers played thoughtfully over her lips.

“I felt him die,” she said, speaking before Hare could even try to explain.

“That’s... great, Dee.”

“I’m glad.”

Hare didn’t know what to say to that. He wanted to scream and cry and laugh and pick Dee up and carry her outside so she could see everything she’d been missing.

But he couldn’t touch her; he was filthy. So he left her to lay in the sun, and he grieved alone.

-D-

Dee was curious; how had she felt Thadeus die? In her dreams she often walked around the attic, and sometimes when she looked down at herself she was a human, a barefooted woman in overalls. She’d even had dreams where Hare was human, a scarred, olive-skinned man.

She wondered…

It took effort, like steering a ship liable to capsize. But Dee had long mastered falling asleep at her own volition, and she had nothing if not time to practice. She focused on her dream self, tried to stay in the attic and ignore the lure of the memory-landscapes. She could feel the wood under her feet in a muddled sort of way as she walked from one end of the room to the other, but did not feel the warmth of the sun. Perhaps there was not enough substance to sunlight to feel in this state.

But she never, never went through the door to the stairs, not even as a walking ghost. What if she didn’t make it back? What if the vile tether keeping her and her body together snapped when she got too far away? What if the manor below was even more nightmarish than she imagined?

-H-

They had a new engineer, a reedy scrapper son-of-a-bitch named Riker Szarka. Hare hemmed and hawed over the decision to bring him up to see Dee. He settled on the decision when he noticed Dee’s arm bending a little funny at the elbow.

“I think her frame is bent,” Hare said to Szarka as he led him to the attic. “Should be an easy fix, but I don’t know nothing about fixing metal and joints.”

Hare glanced inside, waiting a few moments to see that Dee was asleep on the couch before steeping in. Szarka followed, then froze.

“That’s not a robot,” Szarka said, seemingly more disturbed than confused.

“Close enough, right?” Hare said. He grabbed the seam ripper from the sewing kit and gently took Dee’s arm.

Szarka hesitated before stepping closer. He leaned down-- and Dee’s arm tore out of Hare’s grip, her hands clawing at Szarka’s face and neck.

“Don’t touch me!” Dee screeched. Szarka fell backward on his ass, luckily out of strangling range, his cigarette falling to the rug. “Get out, get out!”

Szarka obliged her, scrambling to his feet and bolting from the room, leaving the door open behind him.

“How dare you,” Dee sobbed, seething at Hare. “You brought that man here to--”

“Your arm, Dee--”

“--Damn the arm--”

“--I just wanted--”

“--I don’t care what you want--”

“--Stuck up here, and I can’t fix it--”

“--I hate you, I hate you all--”

“--It’s like you want to fall to pieces--”

“--Let me, then, I don’t care if I--”

“WELL I DO!”

Hare and Dee glared at each other.

“I give a shit, Dee,” Hare said, brow low, a drop of oil gathering at the rim of his broken eye. “I want you to be okay.”

“Why?” Dee asked, voice flat. “Why would a monster like you care about a monster like me?”

“Damn needing a reason,” Hare said. “I chose to. Every day, I choose to. Because the day I stop caring about you, and Jacky, and Skull, that’s the day I can’t keep going no more. It’s an ugly world out there, sister. Caring’s all we got. And you got me in your corner even if you wish you didn’t. So suck it up.”

Dee paused. Her lip twitched a few times, then she began to smile nastily. “Your friend looked like he pissed himself. Not very brave, is he?”

“You should’a seen him when he met Jacky,” Hare said. “But he ain’t run away yet.”

“Not very smart, then, either.”

“You can be real mean, you know that?” Hare shook his head. “You gonna let me look at your arm or not?”

Dee thought. “Fine,” she said. “But I will take out the seams.”

Hare narrowed his eye. He held up the seam ripper. “Do it the right way.”

A moment passed, then Dee held out her open palm.

-D-

Another day. Another sunrise, another herd of clouds crossing the sky.

“You reading The Lord of the Rings again?” Hare asked.

“Yes,” Dee said, not looking up.

Another day. Eventually there would be no more. But for now there was pattern and routine and her favorite books and dreams.

“Beautiful day out. You wanna come down and we’ll have a picnic?”

“Go to hell.”

“Love you too, Dee.”

-Bonus-

Dee was settled on the couch that day, with her stand crooked out in front of her. Hare’s eye dropped to the old, white dress in her lap—the same one she’d been wearing when he’d first seen her. Surprisingly, it seemed to still be in one piece. He approached her slowly, wary of her quiet mood.

“What’cha doing, Dee? You, uh… wanna put that on?”

“… No.” Dee lifted her head and frowned at him, continuing the play with fabric in her hands. “I just… I thought I felt cold, for a moment. And the dresses he gave me are the only clothes I have.”

Hare stared at her blankly. Clothes. He had never thought to bring her up any clothes. “You, uh… never said you wanted any.”

“It doesn’t matter,” she muttered, pushing the dress off her lap and onto the ground. “I can’t feel if I’m wearing them or not. And a monster has nothing to hide.”

But Hare watched her frown and stare into the distance. “You know what,” he said. “I got an idea. I’ll be back.”

He rapidly descended the steps and began sleuthing through the manor, looking for The Skull. He found him reading the newspaper in a sitting room. “Hey, Skully.”

The Skull ignored him.

“Oi, bones-for-brains, I’m talking to you.”

“What is it.” The Skull didn’t look up from his newspaper, but his grip on it tightened in annoyance.

“I need a sweater. You got one?”

“Two hundred dollars.”

Hare sputtered. “Are you freaking kidding me? Two hundred for a lousy sweater?”

“That’s what my time is worth. You want something cheap, go to Wal-Mart.”

“You crank these things out every time you sit down like it was nothing. You ain’t got one just lying around?”

“No, not that’ll fit you or will breath proper for your furnace. And it’ll need to be black to hide the soot stains.”

“It ain’t for me, numbskull!” Hare shifted uncomfortably, glancing away. “It’s for Dee. She’s cold.”

Slowly, The Skull lowered the newspaper and shifted a calculating gaze onto Hare. “… Cold, huh?”

“That’s what she said.”

The moment stretched, the silence scratching at the inside of Hare’s head. Just as he was about to hiss another sharp remark, The Skull finally spoke up. “That upstairs closet by my room’s got a box of them in it. Ain’t nobody else in this house gonna wear ‘em. She can have those.”

Hare, shocked, started to speak a few times, but choked them down, unsure of what to say. Finally he decided on a simple OK gesture, and, turning from the room, left.

As The Skull returned to his newspaper, Hare’s head popped back around the door frame.

“You lied right to my face ‘bout there not being any lying ‘round.”

“Yup.”

“Jackass.”

Hare found the box easily enough. Huffing smoke, he maneuvered the overflowing box up the stairs to the attic and dropped it at Dee’s wheels. “Here, take a look at these!” He said with a grin. “Hand-stitched by our good ole buddy Skull. He, uh. Sends his regards.”

“Does he?” Dee mumbled, leaning over and sinking her hands into the pile. “That’s polite, for a monster.” Hare let the comment slide, watching as she cautiously sorted. Eventually, she pulled one loose—gray with a dark picture patterned on the front. She looked at it for a moment before pulling it over her head.

“So,” Hare said as Dee smoothed out the wrinkles and readjusted her wig. “What do you think? Feel any better?”

“… I don’t feel anything,” she said. Hare started to deflate, but then she pulled the front of the sweater taut and looked down at the picture. “What is this?”

Hare squinted at the three figures on the sweater, then laughed. “Those are elephants. In the circus, they line up and hold onto each other’s tails with their trunks. So you got mama,” he pointed to the largest elephant, then down the line. “Sister, and baby. It’s cute, ain’t it?”

“They look like that thing in the backyard,” Dee said, looking toward the larger of the circular windows. “But rounder.”

“… Yeah, that one’s metal.” Hare’s voice took on a strange, unusually soft quality. “A metal elephant, same as I’m a metal person.”

“… I see.” Dee paused for a minute, then wrapped her arms around herself. “I think I like this one.”

“Yeah? Well, I’ll have to tell Skull he’s done the impossible.”

But he didn’t need to. At the foot of the stairs to the attic, The Skull was already listening. He glanced up the stairs thoughtfully, then nodded. That was good enough. And he walked away, leaving the soft sounds of Hare and Dee’s conversation behind.

[vitriolicdelirium]

Aquatic Creature

[maxwell-grant]

other than Godzilla, Mothra, and the creatures from Lovecraft, are there any iconic monsters and beasties from the pulps?

I do want to give a more thorough answer someday since monsters are much more of an area of interest of mine than pulps are, but for the time being, I'll name 10.

1: The Thing

A monster so iconic that most are not aware it was actually originated in a pulp story, titled "Who Goes There?", first published in Astounding Science Fiction before becoming a novel, then a movie, and then the John Carpenter remake. The Thing's popularity really speaks for itself. I could probably include other John Carpenter monsters here since I've talked before on how much of pulps came through in his films, but I'll leave it to just The Thing as it.

2: Bug-Eyed Monsters

Not so much a specific monster as a general category of pulp sci-fi monsters, usually predatory in nature, grotesquely oversized and described as bug-eyed, which were prevalent enough not just to become a stock archetype that's seen very popular usage outside of pulps, like Invader Zim, but to even be the name of horror anthology magazines

3: The Giant Woman

The almost literal poster girl for 50s pulp sci-fi/horror and all the hokeyness and parody that's usually afforded them nowadays, it's hard to think of the giant woman trope played straight for horror instead of a parody of the idea, or just as a fetish thing, and it's hard to think of them as much of a monster in the first place. Still, it's undeniably iconic, and it's a category of monster in it's own right, if only because of the sheer popularity of the poster for Attack of the 50 Foot Woman.

4: Brain in a Jar

Another type of monster generally associated with 50s sci-fi, the Brain in a Jar actually did come to life primarily on pulp magazines, enough times for it to practically constitute a character type in it's own right, showing up in stories written by Olaf Stapledon, Lovecraft, Gustave le Rouge and Otto Binder, and the rogues galleries of characters like Captain Future and Tom Shark, even being the protagonists of a couple of stories, usually as villains or tragic victims wanting to die.

5: Dinosaurs

Yup, dinosaurs as monsters is something that took off in the pulps, not surprisingly. While dinosaurs had been discovered as early as 1812-1820, it wasn't until the very late 1890s and the early 1910s that dinosaurs began taking off as great monsters of fiction, in works like Beyond the Great South Wall in 1901 which marks the first explicitly villainous dinosaur, Panic in Paris in 1910 which seems to be first on the works of fiction to feature scenes of dinosaurs rampaging through streets, and A Strange Manuscript Found in a Copper Cylinder from 1888 which is a "lost world" story that predates Doyle's by over two decades, and might have been considered the progenitor of the fantasy novel had it not debuted a year after H.Rider Haggard's She and King Solomon's Mines.

6: The Phantom of the Opera

I'm gonna avoid including human villains, but The Phantom's essentially become a sub-category of monster in it's own right, and he's definitely iconic enough to merit inclusion. My reasoning for him being grouped alongside pulp characters is because the original story by Gaston Leroux was actually published in serialized format as a feuilleton in newspaper Le Galouis, and as I've established before, feuilletons were France's pulp fiction, one of the very earliest examples of pulp even before the Americans got on it. It's hardly that surprising that Erik would be grouped among the villains and monsters of pulp fiction, considering the similarities between him and a certain shadowy avenger with a similar flair for theatrics.

7: Killer Robots/Cyborgs

Kind of self-explanatory, as they were practically the bread and butter of most sci-fi pulps pending towards horror. Although mentions of automata date from before the pulps, it was in their time that this rose to such pop culture prominence. The Nick Carter novels had what is considered the first cyborg in fiction. The term "robot" was coined by Karel Čapek, who became a pulp magazine writer. Robots and aliens were among the premier monsters of most pulp sci-fi stories, even if not necessarily their main villains usually. And speaking of aliens,

8: UFOs

While they predate pulps, the general idea of aliens as stock pop culture monsters first took life in pulp magazines. Murray Leinster’s First Contact, while it's aliens are not evil, coined the term "first contact" and provided a template for every story based around the idea ever since. The Martian Chronicles by Rad Bradbury is often credited by sci-fi historians as a pivotal event in the genre’s growing respectability and mainstream success. More famously, you had writers like Robert Heinlein, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Olaf Stapledon and Francis Flagg all striking several different speculations regarding aliens, a variety that ultimately ensured the alien's popularity as a new monster archetype.

9: The Headless Mule

Included here because I make it a point to reference one figure from Brazil's history, as cordel literature is our local equivalent to pulp, and the Headless Mule is one of the most famous monsters of our folklore and one of the most prominent stories across cordel. As cordel tends to revolve around folk poems, songs, tales and novels, monsters from Brazilian folklore tend to show up in those, and I intend on writing more extensively about them soon. The Headless Mule is one of the most popular and I'll paste a short description of her below:

The headless mule is, in fact, a woman, cursed after having sexual relations with a priest (regardless of whether or not she consents), who suffers a similar fate to the werewolf. On nights from Thursday to Friday, she turns into a dark-haired mule, with either a head shrouded in flames, or a perpetual flame for a skull.

She goes out riding quickly through villages, seven, to be exact, causing damage wherever she goes by either running over people and trampling and tearing them with sharp hooves, or burning any who approaches it's fire.

There is one way to free the woman from the curse: It carries a glowing iron curb in its mouth. If someone is brave enough to pull it out, the mule will transform back into a woman, never to change again.

10: King Kong

Proof of how irrevelant it is whether or not a pulp character was ever part of a pulp magazine. While Kong didn't start out in pulp magazines, nor was he published in one like Godzilla as far as I can recall, it's pretty indisputable that Kong and Skull Island have been extremely influential in much of pop culture's perception of pulp jungle adventures and giant monsters, influencing the creation of Godzilla and Mothra and the kaiju genre. Kong and Skull Island have had so, so many crossovers with pulp heroes that I'd be incredibly remiss not to include him, and so he's here as my final inclusion.

[beepboop358]

St unpopular opinions?

Alrighty here we go, also please don't attack me if you disagree with any of my unpopular opinions, I totally understand everyone wants different things to happen in the show.

1. When the series ends, I want Eleven to make this big heroic sacrifice for the "greater good". Whether that's saving everyone from an upside down monster, or defeating the lab for good, or stopping something horrible about to happen, or just saving her friends from their own deaths.

I talked in depth about this in my byler proof master slides (145-147), but Eleven was not originally intended to survive in s1.

In the show’s original pitch the Duffers wrote, “If Mike is the Elliot of our show, then Eleven is our "E.T.” It was planned for her to make this big sacrifice for her new friends, and mainly for the person who took her in and has bonded with (Mike, just like Elliot does with E.T.) I think it’s highly likely the Duffers will want to complete this E.T. parallel for Eleven in the show since it was part of their original plan.

There's one reason they might not follow through with this parallel, and it's that Shawn Levy has recently talked about how they "have the end of the show in sight" and they"know where the end is", but that they are aware there is interest in spinoffs. I've heard some rumors about an Eleven spin off series being possible, so if they were going to do this, they most likely would not kill El off.

Shawn Levy's actual quote:

“…What’s been made clear is there is an interest and a real voracious appetite for any offshoot, any other iteration format or extension of the franchise, the characters, the mythology,” Levy said. “Certainly those conversations are hardly evolved, but they're also not non-existent,” he added, cautioning that all this spinoff talk — at least for now, is just that: talk: “And you cannot take those words and turn it into a headline, that's like 'Stranger Things, executive producer, Shawn Levy confirmed spinoff' because I didn't do that"

2. I kind of don't want Steve to get a serious girlfriend.

I see a lot of "Steve deserves a girlfriend", and "Steve deserves to be happy" and I agree that I want Steve to be happy, but he doesn't need a romantic partner to be happy. He can be happy without one. It's not that I don't ever want Steve to fall in love, I wouldn't be upset if Steve did get a girlfriend, but I really love the idea that Steve can find true happiness in the show without being in love with someone. He does have love in his life, love from his friends, he doesn't need romantic love to be fulfilled. And honestly I think Steve's arc of self-acceptance and learning not to do just do what's considered "cool" fits into this idea. He needs to grow and learn about himself, and figure out what it is that he really wants from life, before he is ready to be in a serious relationship with anyone. Steve will most likely be flirting with girls who come into the Video Store in S4, but I really want to see Steve continue to grow by being around the others and Robin before anything seriously romantic happens for him.

Steve's death is rumored this season, (I talked about the evidence for it here), and if he does die, I don't think the show will introduce any kind of serious relationship for Steve if this is true, it just wouldn't make sense.

3. Murray is underrated, I really love Murray's character. (maybe this isn't unpopular LOL)

4. It was really sad when Barb died, but she was designed to die :(

5. I don't think Jancy will be endgame (there's lots of good theories on this out there)

6. The exploding rats in s3 were not my fav, I really liked the season overall, and I understand they were trying to have the monster represent puberty by literally making it out of flesh, but at times it felt like they were trying to go 'too big' almost like jumping the shark? Idrk how to describe it, but this is a fear of mine that they'll do the same thing in future seasons and try to do too much and go too big, and the characters storylines and overall vibe will get lost in the extreme action and gore and it won't feel authentic.

I'm sure I have other unpopular opinions but I can't think of them right now LOL

Thanks for the ask anon!

[hops-hunny]

Distance Makes the Heart Grow

CHAPTER 2

Series Masterlist

Pairing: Mafia Boss!Neville Longbottom x Reader

Pronouns: She/Her

Word Count: 2.2k

Summary: (Y/n) lives a normal life. But that’s the issue, it’s normal, it’s plain, and it’s growing boring. Everyday she wishes for something, anything to spice up her life. But, when her old school friend (and crush) shows up at her bakery with a new look (and what looks like a new life), what will it bring for her? Will their puppy love grow? Will his big secret lead to the end of them or will it spark a new beginning?

Warnings: None, just more fuel to the fire. Fluff!!

A/N: Honestly this was fun to write, stay on the look out for chapter 2.5 -winks-

“Neville?!”

(Y/n) walked around the boy, taking in his appearance. She almost couldn't believe it was him. The lanky, tall, awkward boy she spent her days pining over had truly blossomed and from the looks of it, turned into a flower truly worth attention. Part of her almost didn't believe it was him but the cadence of his voice combined with the soft look in his eyes was more than enough confirmation. She'd recognize them anywhere.

The boy nodded, a small smile gracing his face as he held his arms open, inviting him into the warmth of his embrace. She accepted it gladly, sighing as she relaxed into them, squeaking a bit as she felt her feet leave the ground. Relaxing a bit, the girl closed her eyes, wrapping her arms around him tighter. 'Just like I remember..'

"Pardon?" He asked, causing her to tense as he sat her down. Had she said that out loud? If she had she certainly hadn't intended on doing so.

"N-nothing!" She started as she made her way back behind the counter, using her distance to admire his appearance. Twyla nudged her, still eyeing up the dangerous looking men.

"Geez (Y/n), and here I was thinking you were a complete prude. Who would've thought that you knew such hot guys!" She said, biting her lip as she eyed up the red head. The shorter girl crushed her foot, glaring up at her employee. She yelped but quieted up, staring down at her boss

"To be fair, I haven't seen any of them in 3 years. And plus, none of them looked like this during our years at Hogwarts." Her eyes drifted to the rings on Neville's thick tattooed hands. "I apologize for it taking me so long to recognize you, Nev. I hope I didn't make things too awkward."

"You're quite alright, petal. I'm not the same man I was when you went to school with me." He sighed, looking out the window into the distance as he adjusted his tie. "I've changed quite a bit."

(Y/n) could tell by the tone of his voice that he wasn't just referring to his new (but most certainly not unwelcomed) appearance, but he had been through some things as well. As much as she wanted to ask him about the things he had seen and the things he had done, she knew now wasn't the time. Neville had always been private about how he felt, that was another thing that clearly hadn't faded. She reached across the counter, placing her hand on top of his as she offered him a smile.

"So, how's life been treating ya? From the looks of it, I'd assume good?" She asked, watching as he scratched the back of his neck nervously. He went to speak but Twyla cut him off.

"Yeah, you look like you've got money! How'd you get so rich?" She leaned forward, eyes squint as she eyed them all. "What're you like loan sharks or something?"

"Something of the sorts." The redhead responded, nodding as he spoke. However (Y/n) was in shambles, she gaped at her friend, giving her a pissed look.

"Twyla you can't just go around asking people if they're rich!" She hissed out, going to tell her off but stopped as she felt a hand on top of hers. Neville chuckled some, patting her hand a few times.

"It's fine, 's only natural to be curious. And to answer your question…" he trailed off as if he was looking for an answer. "We work a less...desirable form of work. Lots of things people normally wouldn't wanna do."

"Yeah lots of paperwork. You wouldn't wanna hear about it, trust me." The freckled brunette finally spoke up. He held his hand out for the (h/c) haired girl to shake which she shook. "Seamus Finnigan."

"Oh! Your Nev's best friend, yeah? I remember during one of our herbology classes we had to leave because you blew something up." She began to giggle at the memory, trying to stifle some brasher laughter. "I don't know how you manage to do that with a plant. I'm (Y/n)." Seamus stepped back, clearing his throat as his face tinted a dark rouge.

"Oh trust me, we know. The bos- Neville would never shut up about you. Sometimes he still doesn't, going on about how he wonders what you're up to. Maybe running into you like this will shut him up a bit." The ginger spoke up, offering her a nod of acknowledgement. "Ron Weasley."

"Well it's clear who the lover boy here is swooning for but what about you two? Are you single?" Twyla asked, stepping from around the corner. The three of them began to converse, leaving the two former acquaintances to be amongst themselves.

"I'm sorry about her. She's got no filter on her mouth." She said, laughing to clear the stiffness to clear the air. He joined her, his familiar dopey smile on his face.

"It's fine. Don't worry about it, really." He sighed, looking around the bakery. "You got a job in a bakery like you always wanted! I'm happy for you, truly." She could feel the sincerity in each of his words. During her time at Hogwarts, Neville had been kind enough to be the one to sample her baking all the time while encouraging her to follow her dreams. Having him in her bakery was enough to make her heart burst.

The girl felt her face heat up as she shrugged, smiling at him sheepishly. "Actually, I don't just work here, I uh," she looked back at him as he had his focus on her, engaged as every, "I own it."

His eyes widened as he gasped, a mix of happiness and shock on his face. "Really? That's even better!" Neville's eyes wandered along the different treats and such in the display table, looking at them in awe at the variety of things. Each item was different than the other and yet they all worked together. "I see you're still as creative with your flavors. You are a true artist, (Y/n)."

"I-I wouldn't go that far. I'm just doing what I love and I couldn't be happier." She squeezed the man's hand, trying to ignore the burning in her cheeks and ears. "I wouldn't have been able to do it without you. Whenever my parents would send me those awful howlers, you'd be right there to lift me back up."

He felt his eyes gloss over but blinked back his tears, clearing his throat as he unwillingly ripped his gaze from hers. "Wait- are those the chocolates? The ones with the brownie pieces in them?! I've been thinking about these for ages!" He exclaimed. If it weren't for the fact she was still nervous, she would've found humor in the giant, tattoo covered man freaking out about her coco brownie chocolates. 

"I remember you used to give them to me every valentine's day. We'd take them up to the astronomy tower and share them together." He sighed dreamily at the memory. "You were such a good friend for that!"

Right. Friends, that's what they were if you could even call them that. They rarely hung out with each other outside of school except for Valentine's day. She had originally gifted him the chocolates as a way to show how she felt about him but for some reason or another, he didn't realize the meaning behind them. She didn't correct him either. The way she saw it was any time she got with Neville was good time to her and that's all that mattered.

"Yeah...did you want me to pack some up for you?" She asked, reaching back for an empty box before leaning down, filling the box with the rest of the chocolates. "Here. My treat."

“Are you sure? I couldn’t possibly just take these from you! You’ve got a business to run here.” He responded, pushing the box back towards her. However, she pushed them right back, shaking her head.

“I’m positive! Think of it as an IOU for all those late night cram sessions during 7th year.” she wasn’t really giving them to him for that reason. Saying that though was just easier than saying ‘Hey take these, I’ve been in love with you for 5 years.’ and to be fair, she wasn’t in the mood for rejection. (Y/n) found herself being disappointed that even after all these years, she was conveying the way she felt for him through sweets. Anytime she went to say how she felt it was quickly just replaced with some excuse along the lines of ‘needing him to sample something’ when in reality, she knew her baking was good. But, there was just something so fulfilling from the way he’s eyes would light up whenever she’d give it to him, leaving the heart felt note in her pocket. 

“Thank you.” he smiled, taking them in his hands, acutely aware of the way her fingers were on his. He felt his face flush as he looked up at her, finding her eyes were already on his. “Listen (Y/n), I was wondering if you’d like to-” his words were cut short by the sound of a phone ringing. Shortly after Ron came up, whispering something in his ear which caused his soft expression to turn into stone. He gave him a nod, taking the box and ending the contact. “I’ve gotta get going. Duty calls! I’ll see you again soon, yeah?” he muttered something under his breath smiling at her before turning around and leaving the bakery. 

“Soo, what’s going on between you and the tall one?” Twyla questioned, sneaking another cookie from the display counter (which didn’t go unnoticed). (Y/n grabbed it from her hands, putting it back in the glass case as she rolled her eyes.

“First of all, you work at this bakery, not eat here. And second, nothing!” the blue haired girl gave her a look that screamed ‘bullshit’ which she simply chose to ignore. “He’s an old friend of mine and…”

“Andd?” she urged, using her hands to motion for her to continue. (Y/n) huffed, crossing her arms across her chest as she looked to the side.

“And my old crush. But I promise the only feelings we ever had in common were platonic ones!” she leaned over the counter, watching as his figure disappeared into the distance. A wave of regret fell over her wishing she had done something, anything to be able to see him again. She knew the reason he probably didn’t ask for her number was due to the fact that during her time at Hogwarts, she didn’t use a smart phone. It was something she had gotten into as of recent. But that didn’t mean she couldn’t have asked for his.

“That looked like a lot more than platonic to me.” the green eyed girl sighed dramatically, placing a hand over her chest as she spun around. “Love is in the air with you two! I can feel it, you know I’ve got a 6th sense for these sorta- woah! Look at the tip he fucking put in the jar!” she exclaimed, reaching her hand into the jar.

 (Y/n) gasped, eyes widening as she looked at the three hundred dollar bills in the girls hand. ‘I kinda wish I had just let him pay..’ she thought to herself. She grabbed the bills, holding them up in the light to check the authenticity. She knew Neville would never give her fake money but it was almost hard to believe that he had given it to her without hesitancy. When had he even done that?

“I told you they have money! I mean, did you see the ring he had on? The big skull one with the sapphire eyes?” she asked, watching as her boss shook her head. “There’s only 3 of those in the world! It’s a hefty price for one of them. They must be really good at what they do!”

“Since when do you know about fashion?” (Y/n) asked, causing Twyla to let out a dramatic gasp. 

“I’ll have you know I went to one of the most elite fashion schools in the wizarding world thank you very much!” (Y/n) eyed her suspiciously causing her to let out a sigh. “Okay I give up, I just shagged a guy who did. However I did steal his books!”

“Whatever.” she giggled out, walking over to hand a menu to a regular that walked in. She knew he didn’t need it but it was still common courtesy. “I just wonder what he was going to say before he left…”

-----------------------------------

As the sun began to set, (Y/n) flipped the sign to closed, closing the blinds. Although Wednesdays were their slow days, that didn’t mean they still didn’t get customers. There was also an unexpected lunch rush due to a conference being held in the hotel a few blocks over. Walking over to a cushion, she sat down relaxing into the softness of the chair. Her eyes shot open at the sound of the backroom door slamming open.

“You wanted excitement didn’t you?” her worker asked, causing her to nod cautiously. “Well get ready. We’ve got plans this weekend! Hope you’re ready for a much needed shopping trip.”

PREVIOUS||NEXT

TAGSLIST: @vayeya11 @pink-hufflepuff @clancyscookies @beewitchedlou @nevillelongbottomsgirlfriend @redpanda-poetry @vibingaesthetically

[deepdarkdelights]

I can't get enough of All That Glitters ( ˃̣̣̥д˂̣̣̥)

Mc's inner thoughts were so perfectly executed. Sign me up too. His actions should be creepy but why do I find it cute?

I'm normally into the opposite but the use me part had me like https://youtu.be/jzge_j-_PME ꈍ .̮ ꈍ

They keep getting away with murder mc's straight up like throw him into the sea sharks will handle it like girl hold on a minute asses the situation she was so ready (๑*ᗜ*) And him saying he will turn her in too.

Would we maybe have more of him? ( ͡°❥ ͡°)

Yeeeeeeee I'm so happy to hear that!

Yeah, the MC has a way of putting her emotions to the side and just trying to deal with the situation at hand. I also googled to make sure there were sharks around Jeju Island if not they would have disposed of the body in a different manner 😅

I might do drabbles for ATG Jimin, he was really fun to write. I originally had a 1-2k smut scene planned but the fic had gotten way longer than I had intended so I scrapped it. It's currently my longest one shot, I think 10 Series is my longest work as a whole though.

[thinkyoureholy]

Oceandust [4]

.

.

.

Pairing : Kim Hongjoong / [fem] Reader

Genre : Angst, Violence, Language, Fluff, Smut, Pirate! AU

Words : 4.1k

Previous Chapter. - Next Chapter.

≫ ──── ≪•◦ ❈ ◦•≫ ──── ≪

-Hongjoong’s P.O.V-

I stood in the middle of the deck, looking out towards the open ocean, the moon still reflecting off the waves. I stretched my arms up towards the sky, groaning low in my throat when I felt my shoulders pop. I remembered the conversation I had with Y/N just yesterday. Now that I think about it I agreed to teach that brat way too easily.  I frowned as I thought back to how quickly I caved the second she said please. The hopeful look in her eyes was just too much for me, I couldn’t possibly say no. Just thinking about the slight and probably unintentional pout that played on her lips had my heart skipping a beat, a warmth I hadn’t felt in a long time spreading across my chest. I let out a breathy laugh, a grin worming its way onto my face.

“Ah, my eyes!”

I jumped at the sudden shout, glaring at the one responsible as soon as I found him, “Seonghwa what the hell is wrong with you?” I asked as I punched at his arm roughly.

He grimaced, immediately rubbing his arm, “You just had this stupid dreamy look on your face, I threw up in my mouth a little at the sight.”

I froze for a split second, my face going blank as I reached for my swords, unsheathing them in one swift movement. I swung forward without hesitation, Seonghwa blocking the blades with ease, “One of these days I’m going to feed you to the sharks,” I threatened, pushing away from him.

“No you won’t.” He said matter of factly, sheathing his sword the moment I sheathed mine.

He chuckled softly, a grin playing at his lips, “So, what has my captain looking so happy this early in the morning? Or should I be asking who?”

I glared once more at the teasing look in his eyes, reaching for my swords again. Before I could get my hands on them Seonghwa stopped me, a nervous smile replacing the grin he had on his face earlier.

“Alright, alright, I’ll stop teasing.”

“Is there something you wanted?” I asked, freeing my wrists from his grip.

“The others want to know when we’re gonna head out. They’re getting a bit antsy.”

I averted my gaze at his words, biting down on my lower lip. We’ve been docked here for longer than I had originally intended. To keep the authorities off our trail we only dock in one place for no more than three days and that’s pushing it. We’ve been in Celic for a week now and I could tell the others were starting to grow anxious but I couldn’t find it in myself to leave. I knew the reason why I wanted to stay but I’ve been vehemently denying it to myself since I figured it out. And I can’t just leave now, not after having promised her I’d train Yuri and help take the little ones to school. I just need a few days, another week tops. The kid only needs to know the basics, nothing too advanced, that should be enough for him to be able to protect himself.

“Give me another week.” I mumbled under my breath, leaning against the railing of the ship, staring down at the water. “I need another week to settle some things…”

I could feel Seonghwa’s stare but I refused to meet his gaze, “I’ll tell the others of your decision but...can I offer a few words of advice?” he paused, his tone of voice softening, “The longer you take to say goodbye the harder it’ll be to leave. I don’t know who, or what has you wanting to stay for so long but I can tell whatever it is means quite a bit to you. I suggest you nip it in the bud before whatever you’re feeling starts to grow and when it does not only will you and the crew be in danger but the source of your affection will also be put at risk.”

My shoulders tensed at his words, a certain memory trying to resurface. I shook my head to chase it away, pushing myself off the railing and walked across the deck. I was about to walk off the ship when I suddenly stopped, glancing down at my feet for a second before looking over my shoulder to see Seonghwa still standing on the opposite side of the ship.

“I know I should end it before I regret saying goodbye but...I’ve promised her a few things and I want to get them done before we leave.” I murmured, barely loud enough to be heard over the sound of the waves but the sympathetic look he gave me told me he heard me loud and clear.

-

“You’re late.”

I jumped at the sound of her voice, abruptly brought out of my thoughts. I searched for her only to find that she was walking up from behind me. I furrowed my brows as I took in her attire, the weary look in her eyes not going unnoticed by me. I readjusted the bag hanging from my shoulders and turned to properly face her, my eyes scanning over her attire. Ah, she must be on her way home from work, I thought, my expression softening as I waited for her to catch up. I reached out without thinking, taking her bag from her and slung the strap over my shoulder. 

“Do you always come home at this time?” I asked, falling into step alongside her. 

She hummed out her response, giving a nod of her head. My brows knit together again, a frown, “Wait for me at the end of your shifts, I’ll walk you home.”

“I can get home perfectly fine you know. I don’t need a chaperone.” She said as she puffed out her chest.

I chuckled softly as I reached over, ruffling her hair gently before I could stop myself, “I know you can but...let me do this, yeah? It’ll give me some peace of mind.” I said as I gave her a smile, some of my unease shining through in the smile. 

She paused at my words, falling behind but I kept walking, thinking nothing of what I just said to her. Knowing she would walk home from working in the middle of the night didn’t sit right with me, I was afraid something would happen to her. I know she must’ve done it countless times before she’s met me but I couldn’t stop those words from coming out of my mouth even knowing that. 

“You’ve been uncharacteristically nice to me. Why?” She asked, the skepticism clear in her voice. 

“What do you mean uncharacteristically? I’ve always been nice to you.” I said with a scoff. 

She raised a brow, an amused smirk playing at her lips, “I'm in no mood to entertain you, girl. Hand over the watch and I'll let you go. If you refuse once more then I'll kill you here and I get my watch back anyway...and that bracelet you have in a death grip in your left hand as well.” She said in a voice deeper than her own, trying to imitate me as she made a fake gun with her hands. 

I deadpanned, watching the serious look on her face falter, a grin playing at her lips. It didn’t take long for a laugh to fall from her lips, the exhaustion that had been plain on her face vanished completely as she laughed wholeheartedly. I watched her with what could only be described as an affection smile. I really am gonna have a hard time saying goodbye aren’t I? 

“Okay okay. In my defense you stole something precious of mine,” I said with a heavy sigh, slinging an arm around her shoulders with a roll of my eyes and continued the walk to her house.

I felt her tense under my arm but she didn’t utter a word in protest, in fact I could’ve sworn I saw a blush spread across her cheeks. Even if I wasn’t sure if I saw it a grin found its way into my face, an elated feeling blooming from my chest. 

“Yeah well if you didn’t have it out in the open like that I wouldn’t have even thought of taking it.” She huffed out. 

I scoffed, narrowing my eyes as I turned to her, hiding the surprise on my face when I noticed she was already looking at me. I had momentarily forgotten I had an arm around her shoulders, standing closer then we were before. I couldn’t help but let my eyes take in every little detail of her face. My eyes darted from her eyes to her cheeks to her nose then finally down to her lips before going back up to her eyes and then down again, repeating the course I had set my eyes on. I hadn’t noticed I was staring for so long until I noticed a red tint gradually paint her cheeks. I looked back up into her eyes, drawing my gaze away from her lips as they had lingered there for a second too long. I averted my gaze, clearing my throat as we came to the top of the hill. 

“I never thought anyone would be bold enough to steal from me, let alone stupid enough to go through with it.”

“Well there’s always a first for everything.” She said as she quickened her pace, coming out from under my arm. 

I watched her head to her house where Yuri was already waiting outside but I didn’t pay him any mind. My gaze lingered on her retreating figure, a hint of a smile on my lips. 

“Yeah...there’s always a first…”

-Y/N’s P. O. V. -

Hongjoong walked beside me in silence through the town, seemingly lost in his thoughts. It had been about a week since he had been coming over at the ass crack of dawn to teach Yuri how to defend himself. At first he was his usual flirty and cocky self when I was around but I had caught sight of his serious side a few times through the windows. The moment I left those two alone I heard Hongjoong’s voice drop an octave, sternly giving Yuri directions. I had grown curious of this side of his, the way his eyes looked clearer and the way his face said he wasn’t having any nonsense. Now that I think about it, serious Hongjoong was pretty hot, like insanely hot. Not like he wasn’t attractive before but something about his eyes shadowing over and his jaw clenching really just-

“Y/N?”

I was snapped out of my thoughts by Hongjoong waving his hand in front of my face, a concerned look in his eyes as he furrowed his brow. I shook my head to clear my thoughts, giving him a reassuring smile in response to the unasked question he had for me in his eyes.

“If you zone out like that then you’re going to bump into someone.” He scolded like a mother would her child. 

I scoffed, reaching over to flicker his forehead softly, “Look who’s talking. You were lost in your own thoughts just a few seconds ago.”

He frowned about to repeat the action to my own forehead but his hand froze mid air when a man shouted his man from behind us. I tried to turn around to see who it was but before I could Hongjoong put both hands on my shoulder, keeping me still as he faced me. 

“Sorry about this.” He said with an apologetic smile. 

I opened my mouth to question him but no words made it out, instead a high pitched squeal fell from my lips as he suddenly bent his knees and wrapped his arms around my thighs, hoisting me up and throwing me over his shoulder. Before I knew it he was running away from the man that was calling after him. I tried to look up to see who exactly Hongjoong was running from but I was being jostled around too much. I let out another squeal before wrapping my arms around his waist tightly. The second I did I felt him give my thigh a light squeeze. I ignored the way my heart caught in my throat when he did that, shutting my eyes tightly until he stopped running. It took him a few minutes to slow down to a jog and then eventually he slowed to a walk. 

“Um….Hongjoong?” I spoke slowly, hesitantly loosening my grip on him but I clung to him tighter when he adjusted me on his shoulder. 

“Hmm?” He hummed, prompting me to continue. 

“When do you think you’re going to put me down?”

“I don’t know, I quite like carrying you around like this.” He said, a teasing tone to his voice, tapping a finger on my hand that had the fabric of his shirt in a death grip.

I rolled my eyes, lifting my head a bit only to get a great view of his ass, “ Well I can't really complain. The view I have is amazing. Say Hongjoong, how many squats a day do you do to have an ass this great?” 

He froze mid step at my words, his whole body growing tense. I stifled a laugh at the look I imagined was on his face right now, about to tease him some more when he finally put me down. The second he did he twirled me around so I had my back to him. With his hands on my shoulders we started walking again, Hongjoong pushing me forward. I tried to take a look at him over my shoulder but as soon as I did he put both hands on the sides of my head, forcing me to look forward. I didn’t get to see much of his face but I was able to get a glance at the deep red tint on the part of his face I did manage to see. 

I chuckled softly, “If all I had to do was mention your ass to get you to shut up I would’ve done it ages ago! I mean you can’t really blame me! It’s so plump and round and-”

Hongjoong cut me off from saying any more, twirling me around to face him. He clamped a hand over my mouth, my voice muffled. His face was beet red, his brow furrowed as a sheepish look crossed his eyes. He averted his gaze, his eyes darting from place to place, avoiding my eyes the whole time.

“Please, stop.” He basically pleaded with me, his voice softer than I had ever heard it, “I don’t think my heart can take it. If you say any more I swear I’ll die from the embarrassment,” He whispered, finally looking at me to meet my gaze.

The instant his eyes met mine my breath caught in my throat, my heart rate picking up speed the longer I held his gaze. I don’t know why the look on his face sent my heart racing but if I continued to stare into his eyes I feel like I’m the one that’s going to die. So I looked away, already feeling the familiar heat crawl up my face. With a nod I pulled his hand away from my mouth, gently squeezing his hand in mine as I moved it back down to his side. I held his hand for a few seconds too long, my touch lingering before finally pulling away. I took a step back, now averting my gaze, hiding my hands behind my back. Well, now this is awkward…

-

Hongjoong and I got over the awkwardness that fell over us fairly quickly, now standing in front of the door to my home. After that little episode Hongjoong had grown kind of melancholic, though he tried to hide it I was able to pick up on it. I had wanted to ask what was wrong but every time I tried he would deflect the question and change the subject. And just as I was about to ask once more he beat me to it, slinging off the bag he had been carrying and handed it over to me.

“I got a few things for the kids, hopefully they like it.” He said, a nervous tone to his voice as he untied the belt he was wearing, handing it to me along with the sword that was attached to it in its sheath, “Give this to Yuri too. I kinda promised the little brat I’d get him his own sword. Tell him, he can have the day off tomorrow, he deserves it.”

I looked at that sword in confusion before taking it, peeking inside the bag to see it was full of toys, clothes, books, all kinds of things for the little ones. I looked up at him in shock, already about to decline these gifts when he stopped me.

“And don’t try and give them back. The money on them has already been spent so don’t worry about it and accept them.”

“Hongjoong...I--I don’t know what to say…” I trailed off, too shocked by the suddenness of this all.

And just as I thought I couldn’t be more shocked by all of this Hongjoong suddenly reached forward, his hands behind my neck. I froze when I noticed just how close he’d gotten, his face mere inches from mine. When he was done doing whatever the hell he was doing he leaned back, his eyes focused on  just below my collarbones, a small smile on his face.

“I knew it’d look good on you.”

I raised a brow in confusion and looked down. The second I caught sight of the necklace I gasped. It looked like it was made of pure silver, simple in design but the pendant that hung from it and the ruby embedded in it made the simplicity of it all the more beautiful. I looked back up at him, still too shocked to say anything.

“Hongjoong I…” I trailed off once more, the words escaping me. 

I couldn’t figure out what to say, or how to say it for that matter. But...why does something feel off? I felt my heart sink to the pit of my stomach as I thought about it. It felt like a ten ton pound weight was put on my chest, making it increasingly harder to breathe. If I didn’t know any better these presents felt like farewell gifts but the thought of having to say goodbye to him for longer than a day was too hard for me to bear. I had grown accustomed to his presence. He was cocky, flirty, annoying, mischievous, and sometimes even a down right pain in the ass...but I’ve come to look forward to seeing him everyday. Fearing I wouldn’t see him again I reached out, grabbing him by the sleeve, my hold on him so tight my knuckles were turning white.

“Hongjoong...why--why does it feel like I’ll never see you again after this?” I asked, my voice coming out a bit shaky.

-Hongjoong’s P.O.V-

I had to fight back the frown that tried to adorn my face at her words, the way her voice broke was too much for me. I gave her a tight lipped smile instead, offering her no words because I knew if I tried to say something I would confirm her suspicions. It was time for my crew and I to raise our anchor and set off to sea once again, I had promised them we’d only be here a week longer and that week came and went. They should already be done with preparing the ship by now and were just waiting for me to get back. But how was I supposed to leave when she was holding onto my sleeve so tightly, the look in her eyes begging me to tell her I’ll be seeing her tomorrow. 

I heaved out a sigh, raising my hand to cup the side of her face and without thinking I leaned in. I knew a kiss on the lips would be too much for the both of us right now so I did the next best thing. I planted a gentle kiss on her cheek, lingering for a while before pulling away. I gave her my best smile, my thumb softly running over her cheek before I let my hand fall back to my side.

“Goodbye, Y/N. I’ll see you later.” I said before I could stop myself.

I wasn’t exactly lying but that ‘later’ I’m promising doesn’t exactly mean any time soon. I swore to myself that I’d come back someday, I promised I wouldn’t leave her alone for too long but I couldn’t bring myself to voice these promises. Especially after seeing the way her eyes lit up at my words. Seonghwa was right, I should’ve nipped this thing in the bud before it grew too hard to say goodbye. Now I regret brushing him off. But most of all I regret leaving her. It was too late for me to deny that my heart yearned for her, and now it ached with the knowledge of being apart from her for who knows how long. I don’t know if I could call this feeling love but I imagined it was something close to it. And it was a feeling I would’ve enjoyed exploring with her but I can’t, not with what and who I am.

I took a step back and offered her one last smile before turning on my heel and leaving. As I walked away at a brisk pace I prayed, begged her not to call after me. If I heard her call then my resolve would crumble. Please, please don’t call for me. One look at your face would have me running back to you, so please don’t, that’ll only hurt us both. I pleaded with her in my head but even though I was thinking that a small part of me wished she would call for me. It’d give me the perfect excuse not to leave her but my wish went unanswered as I left without hearing another word from her. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t disappointed but what I didn’t know at the time was that she did call for me, begged me not to go...I was just too far away to hear her pleas.

. . . . . .

“Raise the sails!” I ordered as soon as I climbed aboard my ship.

The crew let out shouts of confirmation and got to work. I was about to head straight for the wheel but before I got to it Seonghwa stepped in front of me, blocking the way. The knowing smirk on his face had a sigh of annoyance fall from my lips but he just grinned wider.

“So...the waitress from the pub, huh?” He asked, already knowing the answer.

I stayed silent, about to side step him when his next words stopped me, “What was her name again? Y/N?”

“How do you know her name?” I asked, my eyes narrowing in on him.

“Eunwoo is an old friend of mine. I think you’re forgetting I grew up in Celic.” He said, looking smug about it, “I can’t tell you how surprised I was to see you with her earlier. I can’t believe a woman like that with a fine-”

I glared at him, reaching for the swords I had on my back, “A fine what?” I threatened, watching his devious smile turn into a nervous one.

“A fine head of hair! A woman with a fine head of hair would even give you the time of day.” He averted his gaze, suddenly reaching over to drape an arm around my shoulders, “What kind of strings did you have to pull to win a prize like that? I mean how the hell did you make her yours?”

I shoved his arm off of me, pushing him aside rather roughly, “She’s not some prize to be won and she’s not mine either, she’s her own person not some property to be claimed. We were friends and that’s it, nothing more nothing less,” I spoke in a harsh tone, the glare I was giving him not easing up one bit, “Now if you have nothing else to tell me get to your station, we have a long way to go till our next destination.”

The smile fell from his face completely, a serious look in his eyes as he nodded, “Yes sir.”

.

.

.

Tags : @myjiminmychimchim​ @atinyarmyx1​ @shaniquacynthia​

[consumedkings-archive]

ancient names, pt. xviii

A John Seed/Original Female Character Fanfic

Ancient Names, pt xviii: even as a dream

Masterlink Post

Word Count: ~7.4k  

Rating: Mature; nothing explicit, just mentions/references.

Warnings: almost none, though some descriptions of Elliot's recent actions, as well as some colorful threats and some poor decision making on John's behalf. This whole chapter is basically Elliot suffering and that's probably why it was so hard to write.

Notes: Hello my friends! I am once again asking for your patience as I come to you with a chapter full of emotional manipulation and almost no physical plot movement! All of this felt important to dig into and though it may not be the most fast-paced (or smutty) chapter, I hope that you still enjoy it nonetheless. Drama abound as we are slowly but surely closing in on the end.

I want to give a super special thank you to @shallow-gravy​ for listening to me whine and complain about this chapter as well as lend me their eyeballs so that I didn't go just fucking nutso trying to write this thing. As well, @lilwritingraven​ has been SO sweet, cheering me on and keeping my spirits up even when I think this was one of the harder chapters for me to get through; and everyone who comments, kudos, likes/reblogs depending on what platform you're on, thank YOU so so so much. It really keeps me going!

As always, my most beloved @starcrier​ put her eyes on this and let me feel less like I was going insane. I love you so much and thank you for loving my girl Elliot as much as I do!! God knows she DESERVES it.

“We should get our story straight.”

John’s voice wrangled Elliot out of her brain. She’d been trying to mentally prepare herself for whatever mind games were about to commence, but John stepping in front of her to block her way into the chapel and speaking was enough to yank her right out of it.

“Get what story straight?” she asked, crossing her arms over her chest. Her gaze flickered to Boomer, waiting expectantly, and she made the quiet little motion for sit ; he did, obediently.

“Our timeline,” John clarified, “for—”

“You know, for someone who insists his brother doesn’t scare him,” Elliot interrupted, “you sure act like you got caught with your hand in the cookie jar every time he wants to talk to you.”

The brunette’s mouth twisted into a grimace. His arms crossed, mirroring her own.

“I don’t ,” John said, speaking slowly, “want Joseph to get the impression that because we are romantically entangled—”

“Please stop.”

“—that it somehow compromised the work I was doing with you before,” he finished.

“But it did,” Elliot pointed out mildly. “Or did you forget telling me about how long you’ve wanted to fuck me for?”

She saw, for a brief second in time, irritation spike in John’s expression. All this time it had been Elliot smothering him, stopping him from saying the words out loud—but there was something a little liberating about doing it herself, like she had discovered something sharp that had been hidden inside of her all along. It wasn’t useful enough to be used as often as she would have liked, of course; but that didn’t stop her from getting some satisfaction in seeing John’s expression clamp down because the control freak couldn’t stand the idea of her derailing his perfect plan.

(And maybe that had been what she really liked this little game they’d played, all along—the increasing frustration in his voice every time he’d cut in to her walkie talkie, like she could tell that he was losing control thread by thread.)

“I didn’t forget.” John managed to somehow sound both incredibly frustrated and nonplussed at the same time, like ambivalence was a tone of voice rather than an opinion that he could emulate. He continued, “I just think we should be clear about the timeline with each other.”

“Nothing’s unclear,” Elliot replied. “You’ve wanted to fuck me all along—”

“Well, now—”

“—and I finally let you,” she continued.

He sounded spiteful when he said, “Twice.”

“Twice,” she acquiesced, “but do we need to include details?”

John chewed on that for a minute. “Should,” he ventured, and he was clearly trying not to sound smug. “If it’s going to happen again.”

She narrowed her eyes. “I don’t think Joseph needs to know that.” And then, light-heartedly, “But if you think he does, we should include how you said please so very nicely for me—”

“Unnecessary,” the brunette interrupted. “Fine. It happened twice, the nature of our relationship is...”

“Tenuous at best.”

“... But not without hope,” John concluded. It took every ounce of her strength not to roll her eyes so fucking hard that she passed out; because yes , she did want to say, I know John was good, sometime, somewhere inside of him, and that means maybe I can bring it back, and if he said that he’d go with me I’d let him.

“Isn’t that right, El?”

Elliot sighed. She regarded him for a moment—grinning, handsome and boyish, flashing his teeth like the cat that had caught the canary. And handsome. He’s handsome, too.

“Whatever,” she relented, at last. “Is that all? Can we go in now? There are things I want to do with the day.”

As she reached around him for the door, John said, “So what are we?” and she groaned.

“ John.”

“I just think that—”

“You are ruining,” Elliot told him, poking a finger into his chest, “the mythos of whatever this is.”

John frowned. He looked like he wanted to say something; he looked like he wanted to say it and very terribly, but like he thought she might be mad if he did. Then again, Elliot had to consider that John said plenty of things that made her angry, and he did so knowing they would make her angry, and that there was no reason that he should start now.

“It shouldn’t be a mythos,” John said after a moment. “We’re… Together, you know—”

Elliot fished the carton of cigarettes out of her back pocket and tapped one out, lighting it. John had stopped himself to watch her, his gaze sweeping over her before he grinned again, wolfish and pleased.

“Does it stress you out?” he asked.

“Baby,” Elliot deadpanned, “if stressing me out was an Olympic sport, you would be a gold medalist.”

John plucked the cigarette out of her hands after she took one drag, dropped it on the ground, and stomped it out, much to her chagrin. One wasted cigarette.

“You owe me,” she said.

“I just want to make sure that we’re on the same page when we go in there,” he reiterated. “Nothing about the nature of our relationship affected the time that you spent in my custody.”

She eyed him. Out of spite, she almost wanted to agree and then say something completely different once she was inside—just to make him squirm, and all for stamping out her cigarette. 

“Fine,” she relented, at last. “But that’s all we say about it. I don’t think anything else needs to be said, do you?”

For one second, John opened his mouth again. It was all Elliot could do not to immediately groan; stupid, pretty John, who for some reason needed to constantly be talking, the same way a shark would die if it stopped moving. 

But then he said, “Sure,” and suspicion spiked high and hot in her brain. He leaned down and pressed his mouth to hers; the kiss was unhurried, but short, and succeeded in frying her brain pleasantly.

“Don’t try and distract me,” she snipped half-heartedly, even when she felt the blush crawling up her cheeks. He grinned as though to feign innocence, before he turned and opened the door to the chapel; when he stepped inside, it left her alone.

One blissful, serene moment alone. It felt more and more like she was running short on those. It was probably intentional. Whatever it was happening between herself and John—whatever this mythos really was—it was harder and harder to keep straight with him around her all the time, breathing her in and exhaling her out, hands and mouth and—

And if she just got one more second —

Inside, Joseph said, “You don’t have the deputy with you?” and John made a noise like he was surprised she hadn’t followed right in. Elliot motioned for Boomer to stay before she stepped inside and closed the door behind her; the movement plunged her into the dim, cool light of the chapel, illuminated only by the cut-out of the Eden’s Gate star-symbol, slanting golden light across the floor. Everything else was dark. Like a womb, living and breathing and spitting out cultists.

“I trust you’ve gotten sufficient rest?” came Joseph’s next question, and it was clearly directed at her. Elliot made her way to the front of the chapel and stifled a sigh.

“Faith said you wanted to talk with us?” she prompted, and Joseph looked like he was trying not to smile; the corners of his mouth ticked upward for a moment as he watched her. He liked to do that—let a silence linger between them, let it fester for a moment until she thought she’d rather curl up and disappear than stay there any longer.

He finally spoke and said, “It’s come to my attention, Deputy Honeysett, that your relationship with our brother John has developed.”

‘Our brother,’ he said. Joseph talking like he was the fucking Pope made her molars grind.

Before she could remark on it, Joseph continued, “It would stand to reason, then, that you are intending to enter the End with us?”

I want a home with you.

“Of course,” John said, just as Elliot said, “‘Reason’ is a funny choice of word for you,” and then their eyes met. John’s expression said we’re supposed to be on the same team, but as far as Elliot couldn’t bite back instinct so easily.

She knew John could be good. She knew it, and yet he insisted on acting otherwise, and it just made her think maybe she had been some kind of exception and he really was, all this time, just rotten.

“I know that you’ve had a lot to process these last few days,” Joseph continued lightly. “The devastating loss of Hudson, having to purge all of that old poison concerning your last boyfriend…”

Elliot felt the panic wash over her in an instant. It was the same feeling that she had gotten with Kian, but the kicker here was that she’d volunteered that information to Joseph. He’d gone digging around in her brain, but she’d given him permission to have it.

I don’t want John to know, something in her said frantically, he can’t know.

“Reconsider,” Elliot bit out venomously, “what you’re going to say next, Seed.”

A moment of silence lapsed between the three of them. John was watching her curiously, waiting, perhaps, for her to elaborate on her angry outburst. She wouldn’t. He’d be waiting until he was in his fucking grave and then some if he thought she was going to say anything about it.

“John,” Joseph said, glancing at the brunette, “I’d like a moment with our deputy.”

The brunette’s expression tightened. Something, just a tiny little something, about that statement bothered John, Elliot could tell—though he said nothing about it, and instead swallowed back whatever it was, clearing his throat.

“That’s not necessary,” she insisted, looking between the two brothers. “John, it isn’t.”

Don’t. Don’t leave me alone with him. Please. I’m so tired, I’m so tired, I don’t want to do this anymore. Not with him.

“I’ll be outside,” John said, but he said it to Elliot, not to Joseph, and it did so very little to inspire any confidence in her; that John thought he needed to explain to her that he would be close by only reminded her that there was something predatory about Joseph that John didn’t like, either. 

As he went to move past her, she grabbed his wrist out of instinct—the pads of her fingers brushed the crescent marks that she’d left on him that night in the river, and the differences in the ways that she gripped him now felt monumental.

The moment lingered, suspended, between them. John reached up with his un-gripped hand and brushed some of her hair behind her ear.

“It’s only a few minutes,” Joseph offered, as though it were supposed to comfort her. It didn’t.

She dropped her hand from his wrist, and his hand drifted from her face, and he was heading back to the door before she could figure out if she wanted to pitch more of a fit or not.

When the door closed behind them and left Joseph and herself alone, in the eerie stillness of the chapel, Elliot took in a slow breath. The last time she’d been alone with Joseph, she’d been doing what she knew he wanted her to—confessing to the things that hurt, the prickly, sharp parts of her that stung the most on their way out. She’d grappled back a thread of her control that day, but what should have been a catharsis had just felt—

Dirty.

“I know that you must be tired,” Joseph murmured, closing the distance between them. “You’ve been fighting for a long time, Elliot. Longer, I can say now with certainty, than before even us. Before this.”

Fuck you, she thought hatefully. Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you. You took everything from me, you wretched fucking man.

“I am tired,” she relented, desperate to keep that tiny bit of Joseph’s favor if it just meant that he’d stop trying to pry her open all the time. “But that doesn’t—”

“The End is coming,” he interrupted, though with the slow, rich cadence of his voice, it often felt less like an interruption and more a gentle redirection, “whether you believe it or not. But let’s say, theoretically, that it isn’t. That I’m wrong.”

Elliot’s mouth went dry. She didn’t like hypothesizing theoretical situations, least of all with Joseph. “Okay...”

The man had closed the distance between them now; his eyes were fixed on her, the relentless, dauntless part of him that did not soften to his Fatherly persona. He lifted his hands, and it took everything in Elliot not to flinch back out of instinct—his fingers brushed where John’s had just moments ago, trailing the slope of her jaw, landing on the feverish bruise marks on her throat.

“We retrieved Kian’s body from the forest,” he murmured, his fingers not leaving her neck. He looked to be inspecting the bruises on her neck, at the corner of her mouth.

The scrutiny made her skin feel sickly-hot. “And?”

“You obliterated his face,” Joseph said plainly. “Crushed each bony structure on it, caved him in. His eyes barely stayed in his sockets by the time you were done with him.”

Do you feel guilty for what that man did to you?

Elliot felt her stomach churn, the vicious nausea rolling around inside of her head. She could still feel Kian’s bones crumbling under each impact of the shotgun cold, dark metal, taste the arterial spray in her mouth. And just like that, she could feel Joseph digging his metaphorical claws in, cracking open her rib cage so he could stick his hands right into the gore of her.

Will you feel guilty about this, too?

“It—” Elliot felt her brain swoon dizzyingly; for a second, the only thing keeping her anchored was Joseph’s feather-light touch. “It w-was—self-defense—”

“ I know that,” Joseph murmured, “and you know that, and John—even Jacob, and Faith, and the others. We all know that, Elliot. But your friends from the resistance? Mary May, Grace... Pastor Jeffries...” His voice trailed off. “Do you think they’ll understand, when they read the reports of what you did to that man? Of the trail of bodies you’ve left behind yourself?”

“H-He was going to kill me,” and the words came out barely past a whisper; anymore volume and it would have been a wail. “ They were—”

“Yes,” Joseph agreed, “and you mutilated his body well past the point of death.”

“He deserved it,” she managed out, “he deserved it, he—” He was in my home, he touched my things, he pushed his way into my head, he took my Joey from me, she was the only good thing I had left and he took her.

“I know.” Joseph’s breath fanned across her forehead. “I know, Elliot. I hope—”

He stopped himself, and then he pulled back so that their eyes could meet, his hands cradling her face. It was both an anchor and invasion, this incessant need of Joseph’s to touch her. It grounded her to reality, but it also rattled violently through her skeleton, aftershocks of an earthquake she’d been living through for the last week.

“What I mean to say is, I only hope you understand,” he continued, his voice low, “this gift that we are giving you.”

I want a home with you.

“Do you?” Joseph asked. “Understand?”

What would Pastor Jeffries think? How would Mary May look at her? Sharky, and Grace—would they still like her spark?

Or was she ruined now, too, like everything else Eden’s Gate had touched?

Are you happy, Elliot?

“Yes,” she managed out. “I do.”

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

When the chapel door opened, John had been standing around outside for about ten minutes—enough time to hate it, enough time to look at Boomer waiting patiently at the foot of the stairs and think, fucking dog has better patience than I do.

“We’re going,” Elliot said, moving down the steps. Joseph lingered in the doorway behind her.

John balked. Faith had said Joseph wanted to speak to both of them; she’d made it sound like there had been more for him to be a part of, and yet Joseph had just collected one-on-one time with Elliot for himself and that was it?

“We’re?” he asked. Her voice sounded thick. “To where? Joseph, didn’t you—”

The blonde walked past him, and with a single gesture of her hand, Boomer was trotting off after her. John watched her, and then looked back at his older brother; he was sure the confusion was written clear on his face, but true to his nature, Joseph let it linger for a moment before he said, “She requested a car to visit someplace important to her. I said it would be fine, if you went.”

“Where?”

“It didn’t feel pertinent to ask,” Joseph replied. John paused, and as soon as he turned to start walking after Elliot—and perhaps get more information than what it seemed his brother was willing to supply him with—Joseph said, “John?”

He stopped and turned to look at his brother, and said, “Yes?”

“The opportunity is slipping.” Joseph’s head cocked to the side, his gaze hardening. “Do not let your family down.”

John felt something—anxiety, perhaps, but probably more dread —creep down his spine at Joseph’s words. He swallowed and nodded once before he started heading off again, the slow IV-drip of his older brother’s casual, cloaked venom seeping straight into the marrow of his bones.

Joseph’s voice rattled in his skull. Tell me you can do this.

You can’t have both, Elliot’s mouth against his, voice teetering on something broken.

He gritted his teeth, catching up to Elliot as she pulled herself into the driver’s seat of a truck. 

I can. You’re mine, and I can have both.

“Ready?” Elliot asked, having elaborated not at all on what was going on and only expecting that he would come along blindly. Well, she was right—to some extent, anyway, because here he was, knowing only one thing more than before and that was that Joseph’s patience was enduring, but running thin.

John flashed her a smile when she glanced over his way. 

“As ever.”

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

It didn’t get any more clear where it was Elliot was taking him. Perhaps “taking him” was a bit of a stretch—he was going along because Joseph had insisted, and even if he hadn’t insisted it probably would have been his first choice of how to spend the afternoon anyway.

They were running out of time. That much had been made clear to him, either by Joseph or by Elliot’s itching to get out of the compound; pulled two ways, and only one of them was able to give—Elliot, with the proper amount of planting, guiding. 

John knew that he needed to stay focused. There could be no more lingering, favoring glances; she would need to be his, and he would have to make it happen. 

Fast.

The blonde turned the truck up a long, winding drive that took them further back into the wilderness of Hope County and parked in front of a house that he’d seen only once or twice before, and only in passing; he’d even considered reaping it for himself, at one point, but it was far out and small enough that it would have been more of an inconvenience than it was worth.

“So,” he said, when she put the truck in park and pulled the keys out of the ignition, “where is this?”

It was a small house, but not as small as most houses in Hope County; by all accounts, the house was probably considered upper class —the snob in him wanted to scoff audibly even as the thought considering how fucking incredible that statement alone was—but the two-story ranch house screamed Gothic South at him, even though he wasn’t entirely sure where it was where Elliot’s parents hailed from.

All of the lights in the house wereoff; the wisteria climbing the trellis that arched over the pathway had just finished blooming, and some of its perfume still lingered; ivy climbed up the elaborate railing of the top front porch, and the garden had clearly been meticulously well-kept.

“My mom’s,” she replied after a moment, sliding out of the driver’s side and closing the door. She sounded more put-together now; whatever had transpired between herself and Joseph had shaken her, but only temporarily. She’d stuffed it down, locked it away somewhere far away from him.

Oh, John thought, feeling that little thrill of delight he got every time he thought Elliot might be about to let him in and under and through. Mom’s house, hm? Interesting.

Boomer leaped from the back without waiting for the tailgate to get dropped and raced excited circles around Elliot as she made her way up the bricked path. He barked once, twice, and then Elliot lifted her hand and he quieted just before she gestured for him to go and he took off running. 

“I drove past this place when I first came back,” John said as he followed. “Your mom likes gardening, huh?”

“Don’t be stupid,” Elliot sighed, lifting one of the flower pots by the front door to fish a key out from underneath. There was something bitter and a little humorous as she added, “Scarlet Honeysett would never lift a hand to garden, except —” And here the blonde lifted a finger quite dutifully, that little Southern twang peeking through. “For her rose bushes. Nobody goes around touchin’ her rose bushes.”

John glanced around the front porch. The steps up were lined with the aforementioned bushes, tiny scalloped fencing keeping them from being in the way of foot traffic while still on perfect display. Ah, he thought absently, the neuroses.

Elliot unlocked the door, nudging the front door open with her foot and stuffing the key into her pocket. John followed her inside, glancing around in the late-afternoon light; the polished dark wood floors, the carefully placed decorations, plush foyer rug, elegant painting on the far wall leading past the stairs.

It was luxe, to say the least. A portrait hung on the wall closest to the door, a photo of a young woman and her blonde look-alike toddler. John thought that it was the kind of thing that you only saw in the home of a woman who put her daughter into pageants and drank martinis at ten in the morning. 

“Elliot Honeysett,” he began, with no shortage of needling glee, “are you rich?”

She looked at him over her shoulder. “ I certainly am not,” she told him. “My mother, however, is a trust fund baby, likely has not worked a single day in her life. Papa Graves was a retired jockey—made a lot of money, real quick, invested it, retired...”

Her voice trailed off and she walked past him to the room on the right, fiddling around with something past his line of sight. He picked up a frame on one of the side tables; it was a young blonde girl, grinning ear to ear, sitting atop a buckskin horse, her fingers tangled into its dark mane,

“You like horses?” John called.

As if to clarify, she replied, “Animals.”

Something in the next room clicked. For a second, John’s brain panicked; a gun, he thought, a brief second of considering that Elliot had brought him here to—

And then the music started to play. It was older music that didn’t quite suit his picture of Elliot—the same girl that had blasted Guns’N’Roses on their way out from the ranch—but dreamy. Hazy. The perfect kind of music to suit the golden light of the late afternoon slanting through the gauzy curtains framing French windows. For a second, John thought he could forget himself: she had let him in, to the most vulnerable part of her, this place littered with photos and monuments to Elliot as a child, Elliot as a girl, Elliot before any of this.

Joseph hadn’t gotten this. Nobody had gotten this—not Joseph, and not her ex-boyfriend, and not anyone. Not anyone except for him.

See the pyramids along the Nile; watch the sun rise on a tropic isle.

Next was a gentle clink. It sounded like ice cubes in a glass. John moved down the hallway, picking up another frame—what he could only presume to be young Elliot, perched atop the shoulders of a red-haired man, grinning like a scoundrel at the camera.

He could hear the sound of liquid pouring a room over. As he walked, he realized the table—and the walls—were covered with photos of this man, this red-haired stranger, freckles covering his face. He was handsome. His eyes looked familiar, too.

Just remember, darling, all the while, you belong to me.

“John,” Elliot said from the sitting room—what an absurd thought; Elliot Honeysett, in a sitting room , and that’s what it was, a sitting room, “what are you doing?”

“Learning about you,” John replied. “Your parents left with the resistance?”

There was a pause. He thought that he knew the answer—the only pictures of the man whose eyes were mirrored by Elliot’s own were from when she was quite young. Maybe too young to even remember?

“Mama did, yeah,” Elliot replied. He heard a match striking in the room next to him. She didn’t elaborate on her father; everything in John was itching to pry, to slide just under her skin and figure out what was going on in that brain of hers. Per usual, her decision to remain tight-lipped concerning just about everything that held any emotional bearing on her proved the biggest obstacle.

I'll be so alone without you.

John rounded the corner back into the living room. Elliot had started a fire in the fireplace, kicked off her shoes, and in her hand was a drink; she looked tired , neck still mottled with bruises, but more relaxed than he thought he had seen her in a long time. Even more relaxed than when she was sleeping.

“Didn’t even make me a drink,” he tsked, walking behind the couch to the bar cart. “Just pulled me out here for a little vacation, did you? We could visit.” His gaze slid to her, still perched on the couch with her back to him. “About whatever you’d like.”

“Just wanted to get out of the compound. Felt like I couldn’t breathe in there.” She waved her empty hand in a vague gesture, as if to indicate he was welcome to help himself. “You really don’t stop talking, do you?”

“It’s my job,” John replied, “and you’ve forbidden me from using my mouth otherwise.”

“Oh,” Elliot drawled as he idled around the back of the couch, taking in every meticulous detail of her mother’s living room, “so all I had to do was forbid you and you’d stop doing shit?”

A short laugh billowed out of him. It was so strange to have Elliot like this—was this how she had been with Joey? With the other deputies, with her friends? What she was like before that pesky ex-boyfriend of hers?

Maybe you'll be lonesome too, and blue.

John walked around the side of the couch and sat next to her, regarding her amusedly. She side-eyed him like she didn’t want to exert the effort of turning her head all the way to look at him; when he reached up to brush his fingers along her jaw, she only tilted her head out of his reach for a moment before relenting.

“Might not have worked before,” he suggested. “You’ve definitely gotten more persuasive.”

“Ah.” She arched a brow at him loftily, letting him tilt her face so that she was facing him, and took a sip of her drink. “Maybe your brother is rubbing off on me. After all, romantic coercion isn’t really your style , is it, John?”

He felt his mouth sour at the words. Dropping his fingers from her chin, he instead lifted the drink from her hand; though she relinquished the glass readily, he did see her eyes narrow, just a little. “You just can’t resist, can you?”

He waited for the bite; a part of him anticipated it now, sat patiently, eagerly for the quick-strike of venom. It had become so intrinsic to their day-to-day that he couldn’t tell if he liked it more when she was prickly and headstrong or if he liked it when she was sighing his name like a prayer.

Probably the latter.

The blonde feigned innocence. “Resist what?”

John took a sip of the drink. It was a vodka soda—strong, burning on its way down. Maybe her drink of choice? Or someone else’s. “Picking a fight with me.”

“You do have an exceptionally punchable face,” Elliot acquiesced. And then, as though to soften the blow: “But you have lovely long eyelashes.” She smiled, angelic. “Like a lamb.”

“Fuck you,” John snapped.

“You can,” she replied idly, “if you beg. ”

John felt a flare of something—maybe delight, maybe shame —red-hot and searing in his chest at her nonchalant words. He wanted to stay focused; this was the perfect opportunity to pry more out of her, to really know her and figure out exactly what it was that made her tick, what got those little draconian gears in her head churning.

And they were draconian—after that little show she’d put on with Joseph, he thought maybe Elliot was just a bit more wicked than she liked to let on.

Regarding her for a moment, John set the glass back in her hand, the burn of the alcohol still lingering in the back of his throat. She looked comfortable, draped against the couch; before, being in the same room as him put her on edge, teeth grinding and eyes wild.

“Liked that?” he asked, forcing his voice to lightness, digging. “Having me beg for you?”

“Well,” Elliot said demurely, “who wouldn’t like to hear you begging for something, you smug fucker?”

He bit back his knee-jerk retort and instead willed his words out. “You really are filthy then, aren’t you, Deputy Honeysett?”

Elliot took a swallow of the drink and looked as though she were measuring something, weighing the pros and cons of it in her head. In a fluid motion that must have cost her quite a bit of labor considering the current state of her skeleton, she swung one leg over his lap and settled herself there; straddling him, one hand flattened and smooth against the fabric of his shirt, the other holding the glass and draped over the back of the couch.

“I suppose,” she said, her eyes flickering over his face, “that you’re going to offer to cleanse me of my sins?”

“You’re a quicker study than you let on,” he replied, grinning. “You’ve confessed, but you’re hardly clean. ”

“You should hear yourself.” Elliot’s voice was clipped coming out of her mouth, even as John’s hands came to her hips and tugged her down more firmly against his lap. Her fingers undid one of the buttons on his shirt. “ ‘You’re hardly clean’. You sound so fucking stupid—”

“Let me baptize you,” John insisted. He tried to stuff away his irritation at her words, but it was hard to—even when the sharpness of her words was punctuated by a kiss, her lips parting silkily against his as she sighed, the sharp bite of the vodka chasing the warmth of her mouth. Joseph’s low, murmured threat sat heavy in his chest. “Let me—”

“Drown me?” she said with no absence of venom, even when she said it against his mouth. “Or was that just a one-timer?”

“It’s different,” he snapped. His hands slid beneath the hem of her long-sleeved shirt, tracing the dips and curves of her before splaying against her spine. “It’s different when you choose .”

She sighed; for a moment, John thought she was going to slide off of him, but she stayed, shifting idly on his lap and making the temperature of his body spike. Wicked, wretched viper, he thought, but it was affection blooming in his chest. Wicked and wretched, but mine. Legally bound to me, and all mine.

Besides; where was she going to go, after all of this? She didn’t seriously think she was walking out of Hope County like nothing had happened.

“You gave Joseph what he wanted,” he continued, feeling a little spiteful even as he kept his hands in the slope of her hips. “How’s it feel, knowing that?”

Elliot’s mouth twisted in a grimace. His words had sucked the wind right out of her sails; he saw the impact on her face, meteoric in its destruction.

She said, “John, don’t—”

“I will ,” he insisted, watching her take another dutiful swallow of the alcohol in her glass, “and you did. You gave him exactly what he wanted, after spending all this time insisting you were going to kill him the second you got a chance to. You’ve had a chance. We all know what you did to Kian; all it would take is what, ten minutes alone with him? So, I’ll say it again, how—”

“Worse,” the blonde interrupted, her voice thick with an emotion that John couldn’t quite pin down, “than giving you what you want.”

Yes yes yes, the monster inside of him chanted. He could feel it writhing just beneath his proverbial fingers; so close to sticking the wings of her little butterfly, that special thing that she didn’t want him to have or know. Yes, all mine, give it to me, I deserve it.

The air felt thick, molten-hot and bubbling between them until he thought he was going to be dizzy from trying to breathe something so oxygen-thin. He could feel the flutter of Elliot’s pulse, unsteady and hammering, against his chest: not the heartbeat of an apex predator, but that of prey, snagged and caught and his.

John pressed his mouth to the slope of her neck, tightening his grip on her; his tongue traced the marks left there just below her jaw, and then he murmured, “Tell me how it feels to give me what I want, El.”

Elliot’s free hand had tangled into his hair, knotting there and gripping just a little tighter at his words.

“Good,” she managed out. Her voice barely broke the sound barrier of a whisper; that single word alone gave John a vibrant surge of triumph in his chest, billowed the breath right out of him. But when he pulled back to look at her, she finished off the rest of the vodka and set the glass on the side table before she plunged on, “I had a dream the other night.”

A brief pause dragged the silence on, with only the music playing absently in the background as she righted herself on his lap.

“It was after my walk with Faith,” Elliot continued. “You were there, and—it was just a stupid dream, but—”

“Dreams can be prophetic,” John said, because whatever she was unraveling was making her upset, and he wanted it; that little tremble in her voice, so sweet so sweet, the same kind of sweetness he’d wanted to taste that night he’d first gotten his hands on her.

When he opened his mouth to continue to encourage her, she slapped her palm over it and said, “Shut up or I’m going to lose my train of thought.”

John made a muffled noise of acquiescence. Elliot dropped her hand from his mouth and took in a short, sharp little breath.

“You were there, and you kept saying things like… That you wanted to be—mine,” she explained, and this whole time she hadn’t been looking at him, but she did now. “That you wanted a home with me, that we would—after Kian, we would leave Hope County and for a second—I fucking—everyone, and everything, it’s all gone to shit and for one fucking second when you were saying that I didn’t—I didn’t feel—”

So close, John thought, watching her try to work around the words that she wanted to say but that fought against her entire being to come out. I just need to hear it. That’s all I need.

“Alone,” Elliot finished softly.

It was the perfect opportunity; Joseph had made it clear that they weren’t going to be waiting to finish off the Family to retreat for the End, and that meant that John only had so much time to bring Elliot around. This was the moment that he had to take advantage of, to tell her about their marriage and hope for the best.

“It wasn’t,” John said after a moment. “A dream, I mean.”

The blonde stared at him for a moment. Her expression was guarded. “What wasn’t?”

“That night that you came back from your walk with Faith,” he began, “you weren’t feeling well, and I walked you back to the bunkhouse—”

“Uh-huh.”

“—and I told you that I didn’t want you to be alone anymore—”

“John.”

It’s fine, he thought, even when Elliot’s expression flattened and emptied out, it’s fine, it’s fine.

“—and that after all this was done, I would leave with you, and I wanted a home. With you.”

Elliot blinked. A few moments passed. Surprisingly, there was no fury radiating off of her; she looked blank, like she was still processing and taking in all of this information. Like maybe it hadn’t quite hit her yet.

John opened his mouth, very deliberately, to proceed and inform her of the next part—the completely fine and totally normal agreement to get married when Elliot said, “So you lied to me?”

His mouth closed. “Sorry?”

“I asked you about it,” she began, and now she was biting the words out, “the next morning. In the chapel. Jacob was there, and I asked you if something happened—”

“—less like it happened—”

“—and you said, John, that I walked myself to the bunkhouse and went to sleep.” Her fingers had fisted into the front of his shirt now, gripping, as if she were preparing for him to try and squirm out from underneath her. “I fucking knew you weren’t telling me the truth, I fucking knew it because my gun was on the table and I’d never fucking put it there to go to sleep, you stupid fuckhead—”

“El,” John said, lifting a hand, though he didn’t know why; maybe in an effort to soothe her, maybe to block any incoming blows, but Elliot smacked his hand out of the way.

“You fucking weasel—”

“Elliot, listen to me!”

Bad, John thought, and he hadn’t even told her about the part of this that was the most legally binding, the part of this that didn’t make her a Honeysett at all anymore but a Seed. All of that softness from before had evaporated in the heat of her rage. Bad, so fucking bad, fuck I’m fucked fuck.

“I’m gonna fucking dig the decay out of your teeth with a hunting knife, you lying piece of shit,” Elliot snapped. “You saw what I did to Kian, huh? I let you fuck me, and you lied to me—”

“I was—”

“—fucking rotten through and through—”

“Elliot,” John managed out, scrambling for something as he ducked an otherwise well-timed blow; he snagged her wrists, both of them, to stop her from landing any kind of hit. “I was embarrassed, okay? When you came in the next day and you didn’t remember, I—freaked out. Jacob was there, and I thought you’d kill me if I didn’t tell you, and also that you’d kill me if I said it front of Jacob, and I didn’t want to say it in front of him anyway because it was about how I was going to leave with you rather than stay with them!”

Her eyes narrowed, and her mouth pressed into a thin, hard line. It was a lie —a big fucking lie, in a lot of ways, but most importantly a big lie-by-omission, but though he knew it John thought certainly there was no fucking way in Hell he was going to bring that part up to Elliot now, too.

She’s clearly emotionally fragile, he reasoned, I should wait until a better moment.

“Why’d you want me to get baptized then?” she snapped. “If you were planning on leaving with me?”

“Because,” John said slowly, come on come on come on, “Joseph—knows about us, and it would be suspicious. If you didn’t.”

Elliot stared at him. “And?”

“ And,” he insisted, “I planned on telling you in the car on the way out of the compound that night, and then we got hit, and we went on Kian’s fun little nightmare carnival ride, and—”

“Shut up.” Elliot yanked her wrists out of his grip and passed a hand over her face exhaustedly. John wanted to keep talking—it was instinct to want to weave the most elaborate tale that he could in the face of Elliot’s fury—but he did as she said, keeping his mouth shut as she processed whatever it was she had taken in.

Her hand dropped from her face, and she stared at a spot on the wall over his head for a minute before she sucked her teeth and said, “You don’t fucking lie to me, John.”

“I—”

“You don’t fucking lie to me,” Elliot reiterated again, “because if you do, I will find out, and I will make you fucking suffer.”

John regarded her warily. He knew that he needed to tell her. He knew that he should, because if this was any indication to how she was going to handle it, the full truth would be astronomically worse. It would be best to get it out of the way, let her process it, and maybe by the end she’d have come around to the picture he’d paint of them, together, as the End crept in; safe and in the bunker and—

“Okay,” he replied, “no lying.”

“No fucking lying.”

“Got it.”

“And if you do—”

“Skeleton pulled out of my body,” John supplied, lowering his hands hesitantly back to her hips. She eyed him through her lashes for a moment before she seemed to relax a little, sucking her teeth and crossing her arms over her chest. As each second ticked by that she didn’t make good on her violent promises of emergency tooth surgery, John felt more and more confident that he had assuaged the monster and reached up to gently unlace her arms. She balked at first, and then relented after another few heartbeats; when she allowed him to pull her arms around his neck, Elliot let out a soft little exhale, like she’d been holding her breath.

He said, trying for lightness, “I like when you get scary.”

“Did you mean it?” she asked, ignoring his little playful remark. When John looked at her expectantly, looking for some elaboration, she took in a breath and said, “About... leaving?” And then, with concerted effort: “With me?”

Soft —she was so soft, right then and there, and only for him. It was in moments like this when John wanted to drag her down into him, kiss her until his lungs ached, until their breath mixed and intermingled; to capture something like this and keep it his and his alone, forever.

He’d tell her. He’d tell her when things were better—when she wasn’t so emotionally raw, when she hadn’t lost so much so quickly, and when she’d have a more level head about it. She’d feel safer, more secure, with this little white lie; and then he’d tell her about the End again, once things had quieted down for a few days, and explain the importance of having her by his side. As his wife.

“Yeah, El,” he replied. “I meant it.” And then, because she was staring at him with those eyes—wary, cautious, guarded—he took her face in his hands and said, “I’m yours.”

“Don’t,” she managed out, and now her voice was really wobbling, “don’t fucking lie to me again, John Seed.”

She’ll see that I did this for us. 

“I won’t.” And technically, sort of, it was true—he wasn’t going to tell her another lie now that she’d just said not to do it again. Unless she asked again. But she wouldn’t. So it was sort of like he was doing exactly what she wanted, wasn’t it? 

Elliot’s forehead brushed his. She let out a sharp exhale. “I don’t have anything left,” she said after a second, “anymore.”

He pressed his mouth to hers in a kiss—luxuriated in, drenched himself in it, indulged in the feeling of her leaned into his touch.

“You have me,” he said against her mouth. “You know that.”

“Yes.” Elliot’s voice was an exhausted murmur; her eyes fluttered shut. Got you, John thought, dragging his thumb along the slope of her cheekbone, and she said, “I know.”

Got you, hellcat.

[rosethornewrites]

Fic: The Rebellion of Adrien Agreste, ch. 14

Relationships: Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir & Gabriel Agreste | Papillon | Hawk Moth, Juleka Couffaine/Rose Lavillant, Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir/Luka Couffaine, Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug & Kagami Tsurugi, Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir & Luka Couffaine, Lila Rossi/karma, Gabriel Agreste | Papillon | Hawk Moth/aneurism, Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug/Kagami Tsurugi, Plagg & Tikki

Characters: Adrien Agreste | Chat Noir, Gabriel Agreste | Papillon | Hawk Moth, Lila Rossi, Jagged Stone, Plagg, Marinette Dupain-Cheng | Ladybug, Luka Couffaine, Penny Rolling, Anarka Couffaine, Rose Lavillant, Juleka Couffaine, Kagami Tsurugi, Alya Césaire, Chloé Bourgeois, Wayhem, Nadja Chamack, Nathalie Sancoeur, Sabine Cheng, Tom Dupain, Tikki, Fang, Principal Damocles, Caline Bustier, Ms. Mendeleiev, original minor character, Alec Cataldi, Lila Rossi’s Mother, Sabrina Raincomprix, Roger Raincomprix, Mylène Haprèle, Le Gorille | Adrien Agreste’s Bodyguard, Nino Lahiffe, Nooroo

Tags: Lila Rossi salt, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Teenage Rebellion, Swearing, Bad Parent Gabriel Agreste, Crack Treated Seriously, Lila Rossi’s Lies Are Exposed, Cuddling & Snuggling, Luka Couffaine Needs a Hug, Paparazzi, Parentification, Marinette Dupain-Cheng Needs a Hug, Gabriel Agreste Needs an Aneurism, Uncle Jagged Stone, we’re all queer here, the spirit of punk is sometimes just being allowed to be yourself, Kagami Finds Her Groove, punk rock fashion, Savage Kagami, Marinette protection squad, Good Parent Sabine Cheng, Good Parent Tom Dupain, Protective Kagami Tsurugi, Protective Luka Couffaine, Bisexual Marinette Dupain-Cheng, Pansexual Luka Couffaine, Sharing a Bed, Pet Names, LGBTQ Character, LGBTQ Themes, Instagram, Bullying, Social Media, Anxiety, Makeover, Hugs, will cure your acne, Face Punching, Bad Ass Juleka Couffaine, Rumors, Protective Juleka Couffaine, Protective Adrien Agreste, Lawyers, Hijinks & Shenanigans, Holding Hands, accountability, mental health, Jagged Stone’s well-paid pet shark, How to Make the Evening News, Sexy eyeliner for days, one fish two fish Lila is a screwed fish, How to have fun and piss Gabriel off, Fuckery, sweet litigious karma, Alya sugar, lawyer shark doo doo doo doo doo doo, Schadenfreude, Bad Ass Alya Césaire, Gaslighting, abuse denormalization, Jagged likes his lawyers like he likes his pets: toothy af, Blood in the Water, Everything you didn’t know you wanted and some things you did, Gabriel Agreste is shark bait, Denial, Consequences, Principal Damocles salt, caline bustier salt, the impotence of Gabriel Agreste, snarky Nooroo, lies and the lying liars who tell them, Lila’s brain is a narcissistic hellscape, Lila’s mind is built like an Escher piece, Alec Cataldi salt, Adrien Sugar, wholesome salt, Fu Salt, Kwami Shenanigans, Nooroo is a little shit

Summary: Jagged's Shark! Doo doo doo doo doo doo!

Notes: Jagged’s shark! Doo doo doo doo doo doo! (@norakwami​ fault, there.) For real, though. Look up the lawyer’s first and last name for extra lulz. I research too much. And also I love puns. Also researched diplomatic immunity—Lila’s mom could refuse to waive it only for her bosses to override her and waive it anyway. And for serious crimes that’s sometimes the case. I wanted some Alya sugar here; yeah, she and multiple other people believed Lila and dismissed Marinette's concerns. The adults are the ones who deserve salt, though. Not a 14-year-old.

AO3 link

Chapters 1-2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6 | Chapter 7 | Chapter 8 | Chapter 9 | Chapter 10 | Chapter 11 | Chapter 12 | Chapter 13

--------------

They were still waiting for M. Damocles to finish contacting Mme. Rossi, Marinette having fallen asleep against Sabine and Adrien tempted to follow suit, when a commotion caught their attention. Marinette blinked awake at the shouting.

Curious, Adrien got up to peer around the corner. What he saw left him gaping.

Mme. Bustier’s class had spilled out of the classroom, and were watching as Lila and her mother yelled at each other in rapid-fire Italian, both red-faced. It was almost shocking how they met the stereotype of the hot-blooded Italian in their fervor.

Adrien watched, captivated, only vaguely aware when he was joined by the others, and when the lawyer knocked on the principal’s door and let him know about the “spectacle,” as she called it.

Marinette cried out, her face pale, pointing at a butterfly hovering near the scene. Alya took out her phone to record it, her face a mix of horror and excitement, as though she wasn’t sure she wanted an Akuma just now. Mylène started crying. Juleka moved protectively in front of Rose. Other classroom doors were opening as teachers and students alike came to investigate the commotion.

The Akuma hovered, seemingly uncertain as to which of the Rossis it wanted to go after. Unfortunately, Lila saw it, her expression brightening as she dashed toward it.

“I’ll show you all!”

Adrien gasped as the girl touched her pendant to the Akuma and a familiar butterfly-shaped mask appeared over her face. She would come after him and Marinette, and probably Luka and Kagami. And Jagged and Penny and the lawyer and Tom and Sabine… They were all defenseless. He wasn’t sure he’d be able to get away quick enough to protect them.

As he stood there, frozen, Alya dropped her phone, rushed forward, and clocked Lila in the face. Once she was on the ground, she ripped the necklace from her neck. Mme. Mendeleiev rushed forward with a large beaker from her chemistry lab as Alya broke the pendant, capturing it and covering the opening with a book.

Marinette rushing past him unfroze Adrien, and he ran after her as she hugged a pale, panting Alya.

“Alya, that was amazing,” she breathed. “You saved everyone.”

“Mari— Oh, god, Mari. She wanted to be Akumatized. She was going to go after you and hurt you, and I just couldn’t—” Alya was sobbing in her arms, babbling. “I’m so sorry I didn’t believe you. I’ve been a terrible friend! You tried to tell me, and p-protect me and instead I believed someone I barely knew instead of you. I c-couldn’t let her hurt you!”

As Marinette reassured her, Mme. Mendeleiev told a pallid and shaking M. Damocles that she would put the Akuma somewhere Lila couldn’t reach it for Ladybug and Chat Noir to deal with later.

Lila was keening softly on the ground, her nose obviously broken with this punch, and Adrien couldn’t help but feel a bit of schadenfreude at the sight. Her mother seemed frozen in shock, not even moving forward to comfort her daughter.

“Alya got the Akuma on video,” he murmured, thinking aloud. “So there’s video of Lila going after it to be voluntarily Akumatized.”

Nino picked up Alya’s phone, checking to see that nothing was broken. He pressed the screen to stop the recording. “Yeah, dude. She totally did. Sabrina, you might wanna call your dad. This is big.”

Sabrina immediately pulled out her phone and retreated into the classroom; Chloé blocked the door to make sure Lila didn’t try to stop her, though it seemed unnecessary—the girl gave no indication she’d heard.

M. Damocles stepped forward toward Mme. Rossi. “We will need to have a conversation about your daughter, but perhaps that will need to wait until after her arrest.”

Mme. Rossi turned white, eyes wide. “A-arrest?!”

“Your daughter just knowingly and willingly attempted to aid and abet a terrorist, Mme. Rossi,” the lawyer said, not unkindly. “She will face far more than just the lawsuits by M. Stone, M. Dupain, and Mme. Cheng.”

She stared at the lawyer as though uncomprehending.

“Of course, you could claim diplomatic immunity for your daughter, but it is likely she will at least be expelled from France, though France may choose to refer this matter to the Court of Justice of the European Union, as anti-terrorism laws extend beyond our borders.”

“Who are you?” Mme. Rossi finally demanded.

The lawyer smiled her best shark smile. “I am the head of M. Stone’s legal team, Maître Eulalie Reschignier.”

Adrien tried not to smile when he realized her name was almost a pun.

“My daughter has diplomatic immunity from all lawsuits, as I’m sure you are aware.”

The shark smile became a bit toothy. “We’re aware of that, but also aware that she can be expelled from France at the discretion of the French government.”

Whatever response Lila’s mother intended to give was interrupted by the arrival of Lieutenant Raincomprix and a retinue of other officers.

Nino stepped forward and played the video for the officers. Afterward, Roger approached the still-crying Alya to explain they’d have to take in her phone as evidence until the file could be processed. She just nodded, accepting the temporary loss; she hadn’t let go of Marinette yet.

Then he turned to Mme. Rossi. “We’ll have her injuries checked at the station, but it appears your daughter was attempting to voluntarily become an Akuma. While Akuma victims are never prosecuted, this is a very different issue.”

Mme. Rossi balked. “My daughter has diplomatic immunity!”

“We’re aware,” Officer Raincomprix said with a nod. “Since she has diplomatic immunity, she’ll be moved to a facility outside of Paris pending her likely expulsion back to Italy. Since she attempted to aid and abet a terrorist, your home country will decide whether to waive her diplomatic immunity, but regardless she is too dangerous to keep in Paris.”

That silenced Mme. Rossi, as she realized the limits of the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations.

Several officers helped Lila off the ground and led her down the stairs toward the school entrance, followed closely by Mme. Rossi.

Adrien breathed a sigh of relief at their exit. He doubted they’d ever have to deal with Lila again—at least not in person. And he was willing to bet Italy would take a long hard look at her. Meeting Marinette’s eyes, he could see she was having similar balming thoughts; it’d take them all a while to heal from this—especially if the tears still streaming down Alya’s cheeks and the guilt in her eyes were any indication—but they’d move past this somehow, and hopefully their relationships would all be strengthened.

M. Damocles cleared his throat. “Are we finished here?”

Jagged’s smile was almost malicious. “I don’t think so. Eulalie?”

Maître Reschignier turned to the principal. “It seems Mlle. Rossi’s removal from class will no longer be necessary. Instead, we seek anti-bullying and anti-harassment training for all school personnel in addition to the investigation into the treatment of Mlle. Dupain-Cheng.”

Adrien couldn’t help but notice the elated smile that graced Mme. Mendeleiev’s face briefly, taking years off her appearance, before disappearing under her usual scowl. She, at least, was clearly not opposed to any of that. Mme. Bustier, however, looked displeased—and given that she’d rolled over multiple times to enable both Chloé and Lila, he wasn’t surprised.

The lawyer smiled, this time sincerely, at Adrien and Marinette. “I believe M. Agreste and Mlle. Dupain-Cheng would be best served returning to their class while M. Stone, Mme. Rolling, M. Dupain, and Mme. Cheng iron out the specifics with you in your office, M. Damocles.”

“Ah… Of course, Maître Reschignier.” The principal pulled out a handkerchief from his breast pocket and wiped his brow. “That seems best.”

Mme. Bustier gestured to enter the classroom. As Adrien moved past the lawyer, she murmured, “I do hope your father will present more of a challenge, M. Agreste.”

He couldn’t hold in his laughter—oh, Adrien hoped she wrecked Gabriel Agreste.

And that he had a front-row seat when she did. And maybe some popcorn.

[ufonaut]

Sportsmaster/Icicle + ISA - OBLIVIOUS -"What does Crusher have to do to make Jordan understand what he wants? After dropping numerous hints, Crusher decides that subtlety is not his style." [BONUS POINTS: The other ISA members thoughts during Crusher's prowl. Amused Paula, Haughty Henry (He's been dropping hints for YEARS and all this blonde lunk has to do is flex, dafuq!?!?!?!! and a reluctant Ito who unwittingly gets caught up in it all]

i (unfortunately) present sportcicle: origins. takes place somewhere early on

---

“I’m just saying, babe, if I died I’d want you to be gettin’ it on, y’know?” Larry says, momentarily muffled underneath the resounding crack of the nose he’s just broken. Councilman Spencer’s face, meet bat.

Guaranteeing William Zarick’s reelection is the work of minutes, playing with the would-be candidates-- well, Larry can go all night. Steven’s even agreed to watch the kid, on the one condition that Artemis refrains from pulling on Juniper’s tail. Repeating last time’s unpleasantness, and both cat and girl had been firmly at odds with each other then, would supposedly result in a lifetime ban from the Sharpe household. It’s hard to tell whether Larry minds.

“Yeah but you’re... you,” Paula helpfully offers, hypnotising in full Tigress regalia, as she delivers a roundhouse kick to the councilman’s gut. It’s their third in two nights and particularly pathetic, if the whimpering’s anything to go by. “It’s been, what, three years? Jordan’s probably still moping around. He’s one of those.”

“That’s what I’m talkin’ about! Someone’s gotta step up and--” Their target’s started sniffling through the usual promises of please, I’ll do anything and other sob stories. Larry’s heard it all before. “Do you mind? I’m trying to have a conversation here, pal!” He nods to Paula and finds that the crossbow does a more than sufficient job of shutting up the councilman.

Playtime’s over sooner than intended.

“God, that always gets me going,” Larry laughs and wraps an arm around Paula while he’s at it, relishing in her answering smile.

---

For the most part, he lets it simmer. There’s missed opportunities every now and again, vague frustration when lingering hands and obvious glances lead nowhere but, ultimately, fact of the matter is that Larry always gets what he’s gunning for. It’s that simple.

Couple weeks after Paula encourages him to keep at it, not that he’s in dire need of the reassurance, Larry finds his footing.

He’s been patient enough, he thinks, well accustomed to stalking his prey.

“Larry, you’re-- very early,” Jordan remarks, shuffling whatever paperwork he’d been working on a couple more times than would be deemed strictly necessary. He’s looking right at home in the here and now, all immaculate in his suit and tie, sat at the table that takes up the vast majority of the ISA meeting room. Very little of the damp and drafty tunnels reaches them.

“You know me, love them meetings.” Larry’s grinning wide, shark-like and nearly giddy with a manic sense of victory. “And hey, call me Crusher.”

“Right.” Jordan nods. “Crusher.”

Dissatisfied with the art of subtlety, Larry helps himself to a seat right next to Jordan, dragging the chair along until there’s barely any space left between them. That’s more like it. “Listen, Icy, I think you know we gotta talk,” he says, amicably sing-song.

Perplexingly, Jordan stiffens, rigid like he’s bracing himself for a blow. Something to look into, then. Larry keeps on smiling. “If this is about Cameron drawing Artemis with horns, I don’t know what that’s about and I had a talk with him but, Lar-- Crusher, they’re in the second grade and it’s hard to explain these--”

“What? No!” Larry chuckles, shaking his head as he places a firm hand on Jordan’s knee. “Slow down there, bud,” he adds, bizarrely fascinated by the sting of ice underneath his palm.

“Oh.”

The cold, against reason, faintly recedes. If it’s emotion that gets Jordan freezing up, he’s willing to see what else he can inspire in him. “You know ol’ Crusher’s here for ya, right?” He rubs at Jordan’s knee as he meets his eyes -- blue on blue, though Larry’s bright with glee. “Say, if you’ve been feeling lonely lately, you’d tell me, wouldn’t you?”

Jordan, carrying all the allure of a cornered animal, looks down at Larry’s hand like he’s seeing it for the first time. He tries for a smile, though the act’s always looked painful on him. “I guess--”

“Uh-huh, uh-huh, listen, buddy, I just gotta tell you,” Larry starts, exceedingly indulgent in the way he’s managed to scoot even closer, “you don’t look good. I’m thinkin’ a trip to Ripped City would really work wonders on you. Get those muscles moving, right? I know a good workout always cheers me up.”

And maybe Larry’s got a different kind of workout in mind but he doesn’t let the thought deter him. The gym’s win is his, too. Then again, he’s sure he’s got Jordan all the same.

“I’ll, um, think about it,” Jordan allows and as he makes to stand up, Larry grabs his wrist. It’s a loose hold, functionally mild in the grand scheme of things. The glint in Larry’s eyes is anything but. There’s more Sportsmaster than Larry Crock in the way he’s holding himself, the predatory quirk of his smile -- rarely glimpsed beneath the mask.

“Or, and here’s an idea, I could make your mind up for you.” Out in the field, it might very well be a threat. Here, Larry merely tilts his head, perfectly genuine.

---

Jordan’s sitting on the table right in the middle of the ISA headquarters, legs spread wide to accommodate Larry standing between them. His hair’s a mess. “The meeting’s gonna start soon,” Jordan whispers, visibly breathless as he grips at Larry’s shoulder, fingers digging in when he’s rewarded with a kiss high up on his neck.

“C’mon, bud, we’re all friends here,” says Larry, grinning wide, as he steps back just enough to get a good look at Jordan and whistles. “Whoa, aren’t you a sight for sore eyes?”

There’s patches of ice here and there, skin curiously gone crystalline where -- Larry assumes -- Jordan might ordinarily be flushed. If he’s finding it difficult to maintain eye contact, Larry’s got no such problems. He pulls him by his undone tie into a rough kiss, breathes some life into the frozen landscape of Jordan. It’s not too long until they part, Jordan’s lips gone all red. A moan escapes him when Larry offers a hand to grind into where he’s straining against the fabric of his pants. “Just what you needed, huh?” Larry asks, though he’s got an inkling of the answer already.

It’s then Jordan flinches at the not-so-distant conversation drifting through the tunnels. “Crusher, we need to-- stop. We need to stop,” he gasps out and he certainly reaches for Larry’s hand, a valiant effort when he’s sounding like it’s taken everything he’s got to give, but merely holds it in place, unwilling to let go.

Larry laughs, gleefully manic, and lets Jordan rock against him for a moment longer, considers unzipping him just as Dr. Ito steps through the door.

“Spoilsport,” he remarks, thoroughly amused.

Feeling especially generous, Larry even helps Jordan off the table, stealing one last kiss in the process. “You should come over! My turn to cook tonight and Paula says I do a mean grilled salmon,” Larry adds, perfectly casual.

There’s little Jordan can do but nod, eyes fixed on their arriving teammates.

[aethersmoke-and-ash]

FFXIVWrite 2020 - #2 Sway

Sway --

(TW - implied abuse and mild body horror. I swear I'll let the fluff out...at some point.) To one unaccustomed to tenderness, a gentle touch was more jarring than fingers curled into a fist.  She could steel herself against such treatment with an ingrained detachment at this point.  Sharp cuffs were expected. This was not.   The large and weathered hand curled over her shoulder, steadying her wavering and exhausted footsteps. It was an abrupt motion, endowed with strength she knew well when it was used to intimidate and cow. This was different, and it sent the meager contents of her stomach roiling. Swallowing thickly, she didn't dare look up at it's owner, simply eyed the topography of gnarled scars and chipped nails with coiled and simmering resentment too resigned to boil over. She wanted to throw up. She wanted to run. She didn't dare do either.

Milloux had allowed herself few glances around the building she'd been brought to, either - not wanting to allow herself even the chance to guess what was happening.  As sparse and shambledown as most of the lodgings at the mill, long fallen into disrepair even before the current occupants had taken it over.  It stunk of rotting wood and moldering furniture, the swamp slowly reclaiming it for it's own in creeping vines and wayward vegetation.  Dimly lit, shadows cast all over by an anemic lantern, though that was of no particular concern to her. "Easy now," There was no comfort to be taken from Loedwyda's words, less to be gained by the note of grim encouragement that passed for approval when it came to her.  She had always been her most frightening - and confusing -in those rare moments were cruelty faded into a mockery of maternal care.   "Sit." It wasn't a request. It was never a request. Only then did the duskwight allow herself to look around, at the unfamiliar implements that had been laid out on the knife-scarred table.  Mortar and pestle. unmarked packets. A jar of some dark fluid. In contrast to the herbal smell that hung in the air, she became keenly aware that she'd had scarce a chance to clean up upon returning to camp. She smelled of travel, of blood - the grime still flecked over her.  She'd wanted to rest, to wash away the task that had been given to her, and the task before that.  It had been near a sennight since she'd been allowed proper rest, more than a few bells of scant slumber. Dull-eyed and hollow, she was beginning to realize that had likely been the point. Wear her down. Make her pliable. "Tonight's importan', tonight's special." The words sounded like breaking glass to her senses. She offered only the vaguest acknowledgement. "Like ye t' cast gaze on a right old friend o' mine."

Had there been someone else at the table when she sat? They were difficult to discern or make sense of, a hooded figure wrought and molded from pieces of the shadows around them.  A long tail lashed behind them, suggesting miqo'te ancestry, but beyond that? A flash of violet eyes and gilded fangs. A scraping of clawed and blackened fingertips against the worn down tabletop, activating the bits of arcane geometry and runework that had been crudely carved into it's surface. Milloux stiffened, shrunk back. No no, the figure insisted she lean closer with a crook of clawed fingers and Loedwyda, in agreement, offered the girl's arm to the table's surface with a rough motion. Something snapped into place when the limb made contact, lashes of light, and while she didn't yet know it, aether - lancing her into place. Keeping her from struggling too much. It burned. The reaction was involuntary, a thrashing, jerking motion of surprise and fear - one quelled immediately by the towering woman's hands.  A small sound escaped her her, hiccuping and halting. "Settle." The single word was like a shock of ice to her senses, and again she fell still and silent, as wary of consequence as she was of compliance. Clawed fingers fished into the vial and plucked a single strand from the viscous black fluid with the utmost care. A rustling sound, a brief flash of a sinuous and segmented creature composed of far too many legs and gnashing pincers. She blinked several times, as though to make certain she wasn't seeing things  The hooded figure grinned and held  a finger from their unoccupied hand to their lips. Ah, so she could see it? Just their little secret. Loedwyda only offered her approval, a low staccato sound that did little to comfort the girl as the inky blob was dropped into the stone pestle with a tiny squelch, along with a number of other foul smelling agents and herbs. Laughter like rustle leaves escaped the nondescript figure, intensified as the pestle was brought down with a distinctly sickening crunch.  Milloux shuddered again, but now, she was transfixed. The process was meticulous, drawn out over what felt like an eternity to the sleep-deprived girl. Maybe that was the point, too.   She felt her head dip once, twice -- lulled by the rustling whispers issued by the woman and the tickle of unfamiliar magic invoked by them.   Each time, that strong hand jerked her back up to wakefulness.  Beyond that room, she could hear the faint sound of calling birds and restless cicadas, but here... Her attention refocused sharply at the sound of clawed fingers dipping into the stone basin.  Was she imagining it? They grew darker before her eyes, the nibs of dry fountain pens soaking up ink. Her mouth opened, confusion nearly spilling forth though she didn't dare, clearly not following, until that same hand reached for her. The effect was immediate. The touch was cool and dry, the skin of the figure's hand bristling in the same way their voice had. Rustling, fleeting. There was as little comfort to be found in that featherlight touch as there was by the vicelike grip holding her shoulder. Vaguely, she was aware of Loedwyda's bark to get on with it. Nails dug into the ashen flesh of her forearm, the tender spot near the crook of her elbow. The effect was immediate, a tearing, fiery sensation of things skittering just underneath the surface of her skin, the impression once more of toomanylegs and restless claws on her senses as they burrowed in and found their mark. Ink drained from the clawtips, twining and reforming in the intended image. She wanted to cry.  She didn't dare. She knew the mark - the twisted branch and shark's teeth.  She hated it.  Wanted to jerk her hand back, despite the restraints holding her in place. "So ye always remember where ye belong. So everyone else does, too." Despite herself, despite everything, she finally dared to look up at the woman, saw something shining and approving in those eyes. Hated the tickle of relief and calm that approval lent against the ache in her arm.  

Wordlessly, she turned her head and retched. (yells I promise they won't all be so dark? maybe? i've had a lot of thoughts about Mill's backstory of late, especially as plot stuff is starting to take shaaaape. Also I swear I've read something with magical tattooing like this before but for the life of me can't remember so I'm definitely not claiming for it to be an original concept or anythinngggg.)

[jamiespalace21]

Barber & Weiss ~ Ch 2 Test

Chapter 2

This is a test version of the original post. To read more, check out the series masterlist below on my primary blog.

Series Masterlist

Words: 2.6 K

Pairing: Dark Andy Barber x Dark Mike Weiss x Reader

Warnings: Expletive use. References to drug dealing, drug use, and embezzlement. Dubious consent, mild coercion, sexual blackmail, contract for sex as repayment, theft. Oral sex (female receiving).

Disclaimer: The author of this work claims no ownership of characters aside from the reader, and original secondary characters mentioned. This work is not intended for those under the age of 18 due to explicit sexual content and darker themes. By reading this work or any works on my blog (jtargaryen18), you agree that you are at least 18 years of age. I do not consent to have my work hosted on any third party app or site. If you are seeing this fanfiction anywhere but archiveofourown and tumblr, it has been reposted without my permission.

Summary: You run the office at Barber & Weiss and love your job and employers. When your drug-dealing boyfriend gets in trouble with a loan shark, you’re hesitant to embezzle money from the law firm to bail him out. But he promises you he’ll be able to return the money quickly, before someone notices it’s gone. What’s going to happen to you when your boyfriend is arrested and your bosses know about your theft?

A/N: Mike gets you all to himself for the night.

~~~*~~~*~~~

The next weekend Laurie went out of town for work and Andy promised to stay with Jacob Friday night until she got back. Mike didn’t want to leave their little office manager by herself in Andy’s house since it had been less than a week since Jimmy had been picked up.

They’d given her a couple of days to get moved in, to adjust to the situation they’d devised for her. Mike had arranged for some of his more street-wise friends to pack up her belongings and bring them to Andy’s. He knew she’d been worried about how she’d get her things.

Honestly, she’d been on the edge of worry since they’d hired her. It showed in the sadness he read in her face when she didn’t know he was looking, the tension in her body at the end of the day. With that asshole for a boyfriend, it really wasn’t a surprise.

Their girl was a damn good office manager, represented Barber & Weiss perfectly. But her experience and professionalism weren’t the only reasons they’d hired her.

It was just last night that they’d all gone back to Andy’s for dinner. Then as they had the first night, they moved everything to Andy’s guest room. They’d enjoyed their girl, loved her until she was a trembling mess between them. And just as he had the first night, Mike eventually headed back home.

But even with the friends who came and went at all hours, Mike’s humble house was quiet and lonely in a way he’d never noticed before.

It made sense for her to stay at Andy’s. Sure it did. Mike just didn’t like it. Not now that he had time to think about it.

Tonight, she didn’t know he was coming, and Mike wanted it that way. He’d had a late meeting with an expert for the Fields case, so he’d sent her home, loving how flustered and confused she was with Andy already gone and knowing the house was empty. He’d called a friend to make sure she made it okay since he had the interview.

And he could have knocked when he reached Andy’s house. He let himself in instead, wanting to see how things really were.

It was an hour until midnight but she already had the lights out downstairs, a hint of her perfume lingering around him as he headed for the guestroom.

It was empty. Mike shook his head, knowing immediately Andy had moved her into his own bedroom upstairs.

Sneaky motherfucker.

Andy knew when he came up with the idea for how their little angel could pay back the money she’d stolen that he had to include Mike. They were equal partners in the firm. And Andy knew Mike wanted her as badly as he did.

But it seemed that’s where equal partners ended. Andy had the advantage, and he knew it.

That being the case, Mike didn’t have to worry about playing fair now, did he?

Quietly, he climbed the stairs, finding her in Andy’s bedroom, in Andy’s bed, just as he expected. Mike lingered in the hallway, just taking her in as she sat against the headboard, flipping through channels on the huge TV in front of her.

His little angel looked small in that huge bed in just a black band t-shirt and little sleep shorts. She looked tired and he knew everything was preying on her mind. The wariness in her eyes as she found something to watch and tried to focus on it brought out a need to protect her, to make her feel safe.

Oh, Andy was in for a fight. He just didn’t know it yet…

Tapping on the door to let her know he was there, he knew he’d scare the shit out of her. He didn’t like the way she jumped on the bed, her eyes wide as he walked into the room.

“Sorry,” Mike whispered. He meant it. “I didn’t want to wake you if you were sleeping.”

She blew out a sigh of relief, trying to smile as he stopped at the edge of the bed. “How did the interview go?”

Mike shoved his hands in his pockets, moved closer. “Good. I think he’s going to be able to help us.”

When he sat on the edge of the bed, she didn’t shift away but she still eyed him warily. Maybe it was because Mike wasn’t supposed to know she was sleeping in Andy’s bed. Maybe because she was reluctant about their arrangement. That would be understandable.

Maybe she preferred Andy to him.

No.

“Had any trouble?” he asked, toeing off his shoes and scooting up to stretch out next to her.

She shook her head. “I got here, had something to eat, and decided to turn in early.”

She didn’t say home. Mike smiled.

“Want some company?”

“You mean for…?” she asked nervously.

Mike traced a finger along her trembling lower lip. Yeah, okay, the arrangement seemed like a good idea in theory. But he didn’t like this. He didn’t want her this way.

But he very much wanted her.

“Anything you want,” Mike told her. “I can go if you—”

“No,” she cut him off. “Stay.”

Mike knew she was mostly afraid of Jimmy and his friends, but he’d take it.

“What did you eat?” he asked.

She didn’t expect the question. “Oh, I had a sandwich… Have you eaten? I could make you something.”

Guilt had his heart clenching in his chest. Still taking care of him even with the situation they’d maneuvered her into. Mike shook his head.

“Let’s get takeout,” he offered. “Have it delivered. Anything you have a craving for?”

Mike didn’t miss the way her gaze moved quickly over him. Oh, there was interest there.

After a moment, she shrugged. “I like most everything,” she said finally.

Easy enough. Mike pulled up the app for an Italian restaurant he liked and delivered late on his phone, placing an order. When he caught her climbing off the bed out of the corner of his eye, he stopped her.

“Where you going?”

“I should at least put jeans on or…”

Mike threw her a grin. “Why? Relax.”

Submitting the order, he considered that. Sitting up, he pulled down the black suspenders he wore, pulled off his tie. When he stripped off the dress shirt, he didn’t miss the way her gaze roamed over him.

She liked that, huh?

In less than an hour, they enjoyed dinner in Andy’s dining room. Him in his suspenders and slacks, her in those cute little shorts. Mike made them drinks. Watching her relaxed and enjoying her meal had him smiling.

That’s better.

They put up the leftovers, piled the dishes in the sink.

‘What are we watching?” he asked with a wink as he herded her towards the stairs.

Mike got an eye full of those curvy legs, her nice ass as he followed her up.

“There’s a crime series I wanted to watch,” she admitted as they reached Andy’s room.

“Crime series,” he mused.

“Right,” she laughed nervously. “Too close to the day job?”

“I can tell you every time they’re full of shit.”

“Pass,” she said, slinging him a shy smile over her shoulder. “A movie?”

“Whatever you want.”

Mike climbed up on the bed with her. Grabbing the remote, she stretched out on her side facing the TV, scrolling through every single streaming service that Andy seemed to have. Once she found a movie she wanted to watch, a superhero movie no less, he grinned.

His little angel could watch whatever she wanted. Playfully, he pushed her onto her stomach, straddling her thighs as he slid his hands under her t-shirt, his fingers finding her muscles tense. He grinned as he got to work on that, watched her fold her arms to cradle her head..

She hummed contentedly under his hands. Her skin was warm velvet under his fingers, the tension eased from her as he worked.

“That’s it,” Mike whispered. “Relax. I’m not going to let anything happen to you.”

Her eyes were closed, hiding some of her emotion from him.

“You… you don’t owe me that,” she muttered.

“Hey,” he stopped to get her attention. “For my part, I’m not upset at all about the money. I told Andy you didn’t know the real reason Jimmy wanted it. I was right.”

His hands began moving again, sliding to her lower back.

“Guys like Jimmy are a dime a dozen,” Mike went on. “I’m just grateful this happened before the loser really did do something to hurt you.”

Her eyes opened, she was watching him in her peripheral vision.

“What?” He could tell she wanted to ask him something.

“You said you’d bought from him,” she said carefully. “So you…”

“Used to be a user?” Mike wasn’t going to hide it. “Yeah. I’m mostly clean these days. Haven’t really bought anything off the street for a few months now.”

She nodded, her eyes closing again as he continued the massage.

“Mike?”

“Hmmm?”

“Why… I mean, you and Andy…”

Mike expected the question she was trying to ask.

“Andy told you that first night,” he explained. “We didn’t talk about it when we first hired you but… Probably shouldn’t have hired you since both found you very attractive.”

She froze at that.

Mike moved his hands down to the globes of her ass. The silky shorts weren’t really much of a barrier.

“But I was recently divorced at the time and trying to get clean so…”

She took a deep breath as he moved down her body, allowing him to get his hands on the backs of her thighs. Her skin was supple, smooth.

“You would have…”

“Asked you out?” Mike grinned. “Yeah. Dating an employee is usually not advisable but since when do I ever worry about things that aren’t precisely spelled out by the law?”

She chuckled. “Never.”

Mike worked on her thighs, letting his fingers roam over that sensitive flesh. He could feel the damp heat near her center. But he didn’t want to jump right in. She’d gotten quiet.

“But now I’m just…”

“You’re just what?” Mike stopped to ask. “It’s a private agreement. We all get something out of it. You get our protection from Jimmy. We get you. But that doesn’t make you any less than the woman we… I want.”

I won’t let Andy keep you.

Gripping the hem of her t-shirt, he pulled it up and off her. Grinning as she shivered beneath him. She wouldn’t be cold for long.

Mike’s hands smoothed over her back, down her sides. She shivered again for a different reason. Sliding his hands under her, he palmed her breasts. The centers were already hard little buds from his touch. Draping himself over her, he teased her ear with his lips.

“Can I have you?” he asked gently. “Right now?”

She rolled her hips, a gentle grind into his aching cock. As an answer, it would suffice.

Mike chained heated kisses over her shoulder, down her back. He took his time, loving the way her fingers dug into the duvet, the restless little shifts of her body under his. When he reached those barely-there shorts, he lifted only long enough to yank those and her panties off.

His gaze met hers when she glanced at him over her shoulder, just in time to watch him grab a pillow from the top of the bed and stuff it under her hips. Her mouth formed a little “o” as he pushed her thighs apart, wrapped his arms around them. It just made him harder for her.

Mike loved the way she struggled in his grip as he took her apart with his mouth. He teased her lower lips, her weeping entrance, not even going where she desperately needed him yet. The tension in her thighs, the grind of her hips against his mouth had his libido growing fangs. His little angel was tangy as summer lemonade and Mike took his time, had her singing before he even got to her clit.

By the time he was drawing on that pearl with the tip of his tongue, she came for him. Cried out for him. She was a responsive little thing and what man didn’t appreciate that? Mike kept her there, worrying that little button with his mouth and enjoying the way her entire body lit up. Once. Twice.

His name was whimper when he brought her off a third time, left her panting. Taking his suspenders down, Mike undid his slacks and took himself in hand. He was so hard it hurt. Pressing inside her, he had to close his eyes, to breathe through it. She felt so fucking good. So tight and soft around him.

She had him fighting like hell not to come.

Once he’d worked his way in as far as he could go, Mike eased himself over her, caging her to the bed. When he began to move, her sigh was contentment. Hell, her walls were still trembling around him.

“You good?” Mike slid his hands over hers, lacing their fingers.

“Yes,” she whispered, her silken walls clamping around him making him groan, urging him to keep moving.

It was so easy to get lost in the feel of being inside her, being joined with her. She fit against him perfectly, her snug little channel able to take him. But the squeeze? Fuck. It was satisfying. Mike dropped enough of his weight on her to hold her in place as his hips worked, grinding into her over and over.

“You like this?” he whispered hotly in her ear, fucking her gently.

Her fingers squeezed his. “Yes.”

“You feel good?”

“Yes.” It sounded like a plea.

A plea for more? He’d give her more.

Mike held her to Andy’s bed and fucked into her, knowing the minute when the tension began building in her again. When her thighs tightened, Mike shifted, pushing them together and holding them tight with his own. Oh, it had her tight little passage clamping around him like a vice, almost brought him off. But the position made it feel like a deeper plunge into her, gave him the angle he needed to hit the mark that would drive her crazy.

“Oh.” The breathy little sighs she released sped up and her grip on his fingers almost hurt.

She struggled as the pleasure built, and he wanted her to. Mike wouldn’t grant her a reprieve, wouldn’t let up. Not until she came screaming one final time and she did, the sound echoing in the quiet of his partner’s bedroom. The flutter of her walls around him triggered his own release and he thrust into her hard and fast, unloading into her as currents of pleasure coursed through him, shook him like a storm.

Rolling onto his back, Mike struggled to breathe. That had been good. That had been so fucking good.

She was shaking when she lifted up onto her elbows, looking wrecked, looking fucking beautiful.

Wrecked because of him. He did that.

Not Andy.

“Hey.” Mike traced a finger over her lower lip. “Want to get some sleep?”

At her nod, Mike pulled her to him for a kiss. He loved the tender feel of her lips against his, the way she submitted to him. Yeah, Andy made her sign a damn contract and that was probably why she’d do whatever he asked. But he could pretend for now. His heart demanded it.

He helped her climb up the bed, get under the covers. She was blinking like a sleepy owl by the time he climbed off the bed to take off the rest of his clothes.

With a smirk, he plucked the suspenders off his slacks, tossing them under the bed.

Mike climbed in with her, pulling her in to be his little spoon.Fighting off bitter thoughts.

Had she been sleeping Andy’s arms every night? Mike was thinking there would have to be some revisions to this agreement.

But she was sleeping in his arms tonight and that was something he very much wanted. He was pretty sure she was asleep by the time he pressed his face into her hair and just enjoyed getting to hold her.

[tsarisfanfiction]

Origin (Tales From The Heart)

Fandom: One Piece Rating: Gen Warnings: None Characters: Law, Franky

With the absence of one Monkey D. Luffy, Law had hoped that he would be at last permitted some peace and quiet, especially as he was now on board his own ship and therefore the captain in charge (while 'alliance' meant the captains were on equal terms, it was difficult not to feel on the back foot on board the Thousand Sunny, especially as her captain didn't follow traditional alliance rules anyway). He still had four of the Straw Hats with him, but in the grand scheme of things he thought peace and quiet still wasn't too much to ask for; Zoro-ya and Nico-ya preferred keeping their mouths shut anyway, Nose-ya was still terrified of him and Robo-ya…

Well, Robo-ya was turning out to be the problem. Law chided himself for not realising that the shipwright, who had built both the Thousand Sunny and its personal submarine, would be incredibly interested in the Polar Tang, which was a far more superior specimen than the Shark Submerge (although Law would admit the quirky submarine was well built for its size and purpose). In the confined space, the cries of SUUUUUUPERRRR reverberated nauseatingly, and no amount of creativity employed by the Heart Pirates (Law included) to block their ears was even remotely successful. Irritatingly, the other Straw Hats seemed totally deaf to his cries.

A sacrifice was required, and as Law looked around at those of his crew in the area, he realised he would have to be the victim. As difficult as it was to believe, his time with the Straw Hats had mildly desensitised him to their antics and he only had to take one look at Penguin and Shachi, concerningly out of sorts even before the cyborg's cries had begun, to realise that there was no way his crew would survive close quarters with the shipwright for any length of time with their sanity intact.

Choosing not to ponder what that implied of his own sanity, he followed the noise to find not just Robo-ya, but also Nose-ya prodding at the security lock of the engine room. Unnerved that no alarms had been set off at the intruders' attempt, and also relieved that Nami-ya wasn't around to assist otherwise they would have definitely succeeded in gaining entry unsupervised, he strode up to them and placed a hand over the passcode input.

"Torao-bro!" Robo-ya greeted cheerfully, not at all abashed to have been found trying to force entry into the most delicate part of a ship that wasn't his. Behind him, Nose-ya at least had the decency to cower. "Just the man! Show us around, would ya, bro? This girl's a SUUUUUUUPERRRRR beauty, yeah!"

Law wanted to refuse. As the ship's captain, he had every right (and with the absence of Mugiwara-ya he technically held captaincy over the four guests although he knew full well that only Nico-ya had any inclination to obey him and even that was on her own terms). However, these were Straw Hat Pirates. He had never, either through personal experience or the newspaper, heard of a single occasion when the Straw Hats didn't get their way in the end. The fact that the security alarm on the door had already been bypassed without his knowledge, and that they'd had no qualms about even trying in the first place, made it clear that sooner or later they'd be back, and he didn't really want to unduly punish his own crew by adding an extra watch to the rota (especially as he could quickly narrow down who had a chance of stopping the Straw Hats one-on-one to barely a quarter of the crew, including himself – there were reasons the entire crew had their own bounties, after all).

Thus, with a sigh he gestured for the two of them, apparently now three, as Zoro-ya had materialised while he was considering his options and (while Law was certain the swordsman hadn't intended to find his way there) was standing with all the poise of a man who was exactly where he wanted to be, to follow him to the nearby locker room, where he located boiler suits for them all.

"I am not treating you for stupid injuries," he ground out when all three looked at the Heart-emblazoned outfits dubiously. "The Polar Tang's machinery is far more dangerous than the Sunny's." Having seen both, he felt qualified to make such a claim (the Sunny ran on cola, for goodness' sake! Then again, with a captain like Mugiwara-ya, a child-safe mechanism was probably wise).

Nose-ya was first to cave, and Zoro-ya followed suit after Law began to pull his own on – a nice yellow colour, to distinguish him from the rest of the crew at a glance. He wasn't even sure what persuaded the cyborg to eventually pull on one of Jean Bart's spares, but he'd learnt to never look a gift horse in the mouth, especially not when the Straw Hats were involved.

Hoping he was not going to regret his decision, Law keyed in the code, making sure to block the others' line of sight to the passcode as he did so, and the door slid open with a quiet hydraulic hiss, revealing the heart of the Polar Tang.

Clione, the crew member currently tending the engine, looked up in surprise before looking at Law questioningly. Law simply shrugged as Robo-ya carefully advanced into the room, eyeing the equipment with a look Law couldn't quite name. It was almost as if it was what he'd expected, although Law was under the impression there were little to no other submarines of the type in existence. It was possible Robo-ya had the required genius to work out what was most likely, though, so he tried not to dwell as Nose-ya started asking questions. Law was glad for Clione's presence, as he didn't know the answer to many of the more technical ones (the Straw Hats had no room to comment on that, though, as Law was confident Mugiwara-ya knew about as much about the workings of the Thousand Sunny as he did the Polar Tang, if not less. Mugiwara-ya likely would proclaim it all a 'mystery' or simply point out it was Robo-ya's job to know).

Eventually, Clione became the main spokesperson and Law perched himself down on a bench near the entrance (Zoro-ya was sat on the same bench but closer to the door, and seemed unnervingly like a jailer; Law put the thought that he was being intentionally trapped far out of his mind, paranoia would do him no good). It was hot in the room, almost unbearably so to Law, who had never managed to shake his North Blue roots of preferring the cold, even if he hated winter, but Robo-ya and Nose-ya seemed a long way from running out of questions, so he endured in silence, watching the two like a hawk. Allies or not, unconventional allies or not, he refused to let them near the delicate part of his ship without strict supervision.

It was probably an hour before their curiosity was sated, just in time for Ikkaku's shift to begin – she gave him a quizzical look as she entered to relieve Clione, which Law responded to with a pointed glance at their guests – and he managed to shepherd the three out of the room and into slightly cooler air.

It took no time at all for Zoro-ya and Nose-ya to strip out of their borrowed boiler suits and disperse back towards the living area of the Tang (Nose-ya kept tugging at Zoro-ya's sleeve when he tried to take a wrong turning), but Law waited for Robo-ya to finish as well before daring to leave. Robo-ya appeared to be being intentionally slow, and Law wasn't sure what to make of it as he folded his own boiler suit and put it away neatly.

"Torao-bro," Robo-ya began, uncharacteristically serious as he finally freed his legs from the suit. Law turned to give him his full attention. "Where did you get this girl?"

It was a loaded question, and Law wasn't sure he wanted to know why Robo-ya was asking. The cyborg had somehow positioned himself between Law and the door to the room, though, and while Law could teleport himself out with a Room, he didn't like the unusual behaviour. He was getting enough of it from his crew as it was, he didn't need the predictably-unpredictable Straw Hats adding to the headache.

"What does it matter?" he hedged. There was a click, and a compartment opened up in Robo-ya's arm. Rummaging around, the cyborg withdrew a wad of paper.

"Those two years," he began, and suddenly Law knew it was serious because the Straw Hats never talked about the years they'd vanished from the limelight, "I was on Karakuri Island – Vegapunk's home island. He'd left a lot of blueprints behind, and I thought they were all incomplete projects, so I took some with me when I left." He offered the paper – blueprints, Law realised – to him. "Seems like this isn't incomplete after all." Law took them and glanced down, only to freeze.

In his hands were the unmistakable blueprints of the Polar Tang.

[courage-a-word-of-justice]

BnHA 84 - 86 | Uchitama 9 - 12 (FINAL) | Eizouken 10 - 12 (FINAL) | Magia Record 8 - 13 (FINAL) | ID: INVADED 12 - 13 (FINAL) | ACCA OVA

BnHA 84

Ey? So Gentle is basically Luffy, only he can do stuff with air too.

“Tokoyami, it’s in lesson 3.”

Eizouken 10

LOL, you can see a name similar to “Rachel Enyoung Choi” in one of the credit lists. Update: Euyoung Choi is credited on one of the other folders.

“Kanamoney” is catching on, I see.

“Well, dough.” - Sarasoju, where soju is some alcoholic Korean beverage.

The back of the clock reminds me of that Skipper and Skeeto game I used to play.

Did Kanamori get a fringe cut…?

You can see the symbol for Eizouken on the (imaginary…?) warehouse.

Uchitama 9

The video got encoded funny again…

I‘ve heard of AIBOs before. They’re robotic dogs, although with newfangled drones, Google Nests and stuff, they went out of fashion years ago.

Aibou (with kanji) means “partner”, come to think of it...

While everyone else is talking in the foreground, I’m staring at Beh in the background…

Come to think of it, I don’t think I’ve seen Kuro and Nora interact all that much.

Natsuki Hanae as Leo, huh?

Uchitama 10

Second-last episode!

Neko (cat) -> Koma -> ari (ant)…isu (chair) -> suika (watermelon) -> tamago (egg, or sometimes it sounds like tabako/tabacco to me) -> ??? -> koi (carp) -> ???? “Kooten” seems to be a nonsense word.

The video got encoded funny again…

…and that’s twice now…

LOL, this is based on Millionaire.

…thrice…

The original quote is (something like), “It is said that heaven does not create one man above or below another man.” (Yukichi Fukuzawa)

The answer was C, obviously.

…4 times.

Bull does his best Thinker impression.

Oh my gosh, they’re bringing that joke back…? (LOL) Update: The portal joke.

“chunk of meat” – Uh…what?

Holy s***! It’s Bull’s dad! Bull time travelled!

Magia Record 8

I like how the anime introduced Gomakashi, then had the proper OP.

Chuo Ward (Chuoku)? In Hypnosis Mic, that’s a sign Ayappe is definitely a girl…but this ain’t HypMic, so no worries!

The greeting is “Kamihama” because it sounds kind of like konbanwa and the host is Mr Hammer because that sounds like the back half of Kamihama, I guess.

Magia Record seems more overt about its lesbian undertones, I see.

I noticed a piano on a poster in the back. Wonder what that means…?

Just reading translations of radio transcripts like this makes me think of the HypMic radio show. I’ve been using that (and all of HypMic, to be honest) to cope in these tough (COVID-19) times, which is why I’m mentioning it a lot.

Mami!

Eizouken 11

So this is how they met, huh? I never knew Kanamori could have such little faith in people, considering how she is now.

ID:INVADED 12

What I don’t get is Hayaseura’s motive…

Uraido…”from behind”? I need kanji to figure this one out…

Whose well is this Bliss background, ayway…?

Momoki and Matsuoka pass a sign saying 大井南 (Minamioi), which is in Shinagawa.

Why does Momoki need drugs…? To subdue Asukai…?

Oh no. Inami is going to have a vendetta after her man was killed!

According to Ramuda, the optimist sees the doughnut, the pessimist sees the hole…I think’s that’s important for that moment.

…Welp, when a hole in the brain doesn’t kill you, a shot to the stomach does.

In this time of COVID-19, I think talking about people coming back to life is inappropriate…

Post-credits segment!

Uchitama 11 (FINAL)

According to Ramuda, the optimist sees the doughnut, the pessimist sees the hole…

“Tullip” (sic).

Oh, so instead of “Tama” it said “tanu___”, so the kids assumed it said “tanuki”.

Ooh, cat meeting. This should match the dog meeting from earlir in the season. Plus Nora’s face on the title card.

The video got encoded funny again…

“I’m busy right now.” – Nora, sleeping – Yup, that’s my mood. In fact, I was woken up by a call this morning…

I still think the Momo x Bull ship is stupid…

Nora can talk to crows…?

BnHA 85

…huh? What’s up with Bibimi?

Oh, in La Brava’s room there’s a graduation album. No one translated that.

Seriously, Deku’s gotten kinda creepy these days…

Tobita = essentially “to fly” + “field”. Makes sense when the Quirk is elasticity.

“It’s dangerous to go alone!” – I want to reply with “Take this!”…LOL.

This bouncing around thing was basically done by Sonic in OPM.

Update:  Turns out the kanji for elasticity is read dansei, which is th same rading for the characters for a man (but with characters meaning “male gender” instead and the last kanji being shared betwe the two). That’s why Danjuro is Gentle Criminal.    

BnHA 85

I noticed some of the decorations around the school look like heroes we’ve seen – there’s a Midnight one and a Thirteen balloon.

Why is the crowd chanting for YaoMomo…?

It’s in English, huh?

End of credits segment! Keep watching!

“Guys like you who say there are no do-overs in life…”

Hawks! This is the first time I see him outside spoilers!

ID:INVADED 13 (FINAL)

Was gonna finish this the day I got it, but I got access (limited to 1 week)…to Akira, which is a movie I’ve never seen before.

The sharks are a nice touch…(LOL…?)

Welp, John Walker has his hat back now.

Uraido…Hayaseura. Of course, how the heck did I not make the connection?!

The video got encoded funny again…

…wow, after learning a thing or two about CPR, this part actually makes sense to me now…Amazing. (Also, I learnt about comminuted fractures from Double Decker.)

COVID-19 is entering these notes too…because if you cut yourself off from society, you won’t know about pandemics…

Why do I get the feeling Kiki’s gonna kill herself…?

She…almost did it. (Wow, I should try predict things more often.)

That pool…is basically the one from Minority Report!

Wow, that just did an Eva…

Why did they choose such a lively ending song…? Anyways, that wrapped up really well (no pun intended!). See you next time!  

Magia Record 9

The tower appars to be modelled more after Tsutenkaku rather than Tokyo Tower.

For some reason, the subbers like to capitalise “Magical Girl”.

One of the speech bubbles in the back says koneko no gorogoro, or “the cat’s laziness”.

“Stand alone!” This is probably some kind of wordplay on the Solitude (Hitoribocchi no Saihate), since “alone” is hitori de.

Interestingly, the word for “delete” here is keshite (literal meaning: “to erase”).

The sign that passes Sana by while she’s on the boat says “Futaba” on it.

The blue letterboxing is an interesting effect.

“Sorpredente” = surprising.

Eizouken 12 (FINAL)

“They have their own business to run.”

I’ll miss this OP song when it’s gone…*sigh*

LOL, the contrast between Asakusa’s imagination and reality is huge and that’s what makes Eizouken so fun.

“I’m here to deliver the promised data,” Kanamori says (which I think is a more literal translation, ut works better).

It’s unfortunate Comiket 98 was cancelled…

Hey, why didn’t Anime vs. Real Life cover Eizouken?! That would’ve been so good!

I noticed one of the viewers had a “No Disc” pop-up of some sort. Also, the moving logo exists now, too (LOL).

I like how 1 of the UFOs hits the windshield.

The arrows really bring your attention to what’s the same in the split screens.

Magia Record 10

The Mifuyu in the previous episodes was either a flashback or a fantasy, right?

Mami is wearing a Wings of Magius badge…!

On the titlecard, there’s what seems to be a radio tower with a small lightning bolt above it.

BnHA 86

Hey, Tsu has a sister..?

Ah,so this is Mirko! I’ve heard of her too!

Is it just me, or does Endeavour hav CGI on him…?

Hawks reminds me of Fubuki from OPM…

Wow, even Endeavour’s trying to be funny…the world really is different now. (This humour has a terrible success rate with me, though.)

There seem to be holes in Hawks’ jackt for his wings.

So basically, Hawks is being the Iori to Endeavour’s Riku (but without too much of the homoerotic overtones that come from being close in age, since Endeavour is 46 – 7 and Hawks is 22), so to speak.

Oh! That punch is based on All Might’s! Same framing and everything!

Hajimari no doesn’t suggest a pronoun, so they must have chosen that based on the manga or the production company or something.

Magia Record 11

Shaft headtilt!

This Witch…apparently it appears early on in the OG series according to This Week in Anime. It does give off that vibe.

…wow, that fight was fast.

The video got encoded funny again…

Why are all the magical girls Naruto running???  

Hachibey = Kyubey (where kyu = 9), but for 8.

ACCA OVA

Who’s this-oh, never mind.

I don’t remember the OST being so…cool.

Jumo, where ju = tree I guss.

Nino! Who’s the blonde though? I forget…

Jumo for Jumoku…right. I forgot.

Shinro, literally “path of advancement”. I’ve grown a lot since I last watched ACCA, but I only feel I’ve gotten dumber since then…to be honest.

I like how the flashback is saturated in blue…actually, that reminds me of Given, now that I think of it.

Where’s Grossular? I liked him the best because he’s basically older!Kyosuke Kuga. Update: Spoke too soon.

Now that I’ve learnt keigo between the OG and now, I can understand more of what Mauve says.

Magia Record 12

(no notes, sorry!)

Magia Record 13 (FINAL)

Is it just me, or can I see a feather-like object floating down the screen…? (Or is that static?)

You can see one of the hooded Wings (on Touka’s left) has dark blue hair – roughly Sayaka’s shade.

Ooh, Mami and Sayaka fight! (I’ve never been one for catfights, but this is certainly a match-up I want to see!)

Mami’s fate really sucks, huh? Her head came off in the OG and now she’s a tool for the Magius…

Yachiyo does look a lot like Togo from Yuki Yuna, doesn’t she…?

Anyways, this is all for now. There’s an s2 on the horizon, but COVID-19 means it could be years down the line…see you when s2 arrives.

[softsan]

BTS DARK WIZARD AU (jungkook)

🖇Falling for your faded face (pt. 2)

MASTERLIST

PARTS: | 01 | 02 |

DARK WIZARD PROFILES

GENRE: Urban Fantasy, Enemies to lovers, Villians vs. Hereos, Arranged Marriage 

QUOTE: “Jungkook had been disorientated by rage. He demanded that someone had kidnapped you. He swore he would rip apart the world to get you back.”

WARNINGS: 

You lifted your head up higher. You would never show how intimated you were to these lowlives. You kept a nonchalant expression over your face as you awaited them to walk past you.  

They did.

You weren’t surprised. You weren’t the kind of person that demanded a second look. You use to detest how ‘unremarkable’ you looked but these days you were thankful. You didn’t need any reasons to draw more attention to yourself.

‘Wizards’, you hummed under your breath.

The men circling like sharks around the group of women were wizards. They introduced themselves with fake names and devilish smiles.

“They are so good looking,” A blonde girl with space buns squealed into your ear.

‘Not really,” You grumbled with distaste.

You heard one of the wizard's chuckle, stopping to face the girl beside you. She beamed, misreading his predatory gaze. He pulled out a silver pendant out of his pocket, securing it around the girl’s neckline.

You recognized the silver pendant, it was a magically shackle that would make any human blindly obedient to its master. You turned your eyes away as he placed a swift kiss on her lips, taking her hand and leading her into one of the many chambers.

You had originally followed these extravagant wizards to rob them while their backs were turned. You just hadn’t intended to stumble upon a jail-like brothel that they were operating. These human women, flirting laughing with these wizards were all chained by pendants. They were lured here by false prospects, then entrapped in an endless cycle of abuse.

You felt sick to your stomach. 

You cursed whatever higher power that had put you in this position once again. First, a human trafficking ring organized by wizards, now a brothel.

You just could escape... the entrance didn’t appear to be very well guarded.

You sighed. You couldn’t just leave these woman here.

*

Seokjin shared a worried look with his brother Jimin.

“I thought, Jungkook going to the human world be enough of a distraction,” Jimin admitted.

Seokjin shook his head. “You saw how excited he was on his wedding day… None of us could have imagined she would just run away.”

“Why didn’t she just run away before the marriage” Jimin spat.

Seokjin shared his brother’s disgust. Wizards only ever married once, marriage was considered to be very sacred between wizards. Till’ death did they part was a very literal term for wizards, their souls would be bound until the end of days.

Jungkook had been disorientated by rage. He demanded that someone had kidnapped you. He swore he would rip apart the world apart to get you back.

He refused to listen to reason, he refused to hear any utter that you had willingly betrayed him.

Jungkook had spent the last few months searching, his anger becoming desperation. As the more time passed the more hopeless he became.

It hurt Seokjin to see his youngest brother in so much pain. It was the reason he had decided to conjure a plan with Jimin to take Jungkook’s mind of things.

But it didn’t work. It was Jungkook’s first time in the human world and the only thing he cared about was continuing his search for you.

“I doubt it will do Jungkook any good if he ever finds her.”

Jimin raised an eyebrow. “Do you really think he saw her the other night at the club?”

Seokjin shrugged. “It doesn’t matter, what matters is he thinks he did.”

Jimin nodded.

Jungkook had thought he had seen you dancing and smiling. Acting completely oblivious to the torture he had been enduring since your mysterious disappearance.

Seokjin watched his brother’s desperation brew into fury. His youngest brother was becoming even more unstable.

“He’s still there, isn’t he… waiting for her?

*

Jungkook continued pacing back and forth. He ignored the strange looks humans walking past gave him. He didn’t care. He didn’t care about much these days.

He was lurking around the club, on the street, on the rooftops waiting for you to return to him. He saw you the other night. He was sure. He just couldn’t comprehend how you manage to get away from him.

It made his mind race. Nobody had ever outrun him before. That was the beauty of his teleportation magic, he could always hunt a person down. But not you. It made him question what kind of magic you possessed? It must have been a magic that allowed you to disappear before his eyes.

On top of everything why would you want to avoid him? All this time Jungkook had assumed that you had been kidnapped or taken by force. He never dwindled on the possibility that you left his side by choice.

Seeing you again, made him question everything.

*

You placed the crystal flute between your swollen lips. The wizard that had struck you with the back of his hand, step backward, his face alarmed.

His stubby purple finger shakily pointed to you with disbelief.

“Where in the hell did you get that?”

You simply smiled back, continuing to play your tune.

The flute you were playing was something you had stolen a while back. It had belonged to a dark witch you had crossed paths with. The devil-like witch was known for luring her victims into a web of darkness, slowly feeding on their souls.

You had made a bet with the witch, gambling your soul in exchange for your freedom. The witch, like most, looked down upon on humans. You use this to your advantage, escaping her castle of horror with her most prized treasure, a crystal flute.

The crystal flute had magical properties and could paralyze those who dare listen to its beautiful melody.

The wizard in front of you froze while clasping his ears.

You stop playing, considering your options. You nodded to yourself, trying to gather all your courage.

You pulled out a small dagger hidden in your sleeve, you held the blade for a few seconds looking back and forth between your weapon and the wizard.

You tried to tell yourself that this wizard deserved any punishment you could inflict but your hand refused to lift the dagger any closer.

“I still can’t do it… After everything, I still can’t bear to take a life.”

You slipped the dagger back in your sleeve, walking past the wizard and giving him a kick instead. He’d feel it once the spell wore off.

You continued to play your flute, paralyzing the wizards in their wicked positions. You tore necklace, after necklace freeing the bewitched girls. Many sobbed uncontrollably, half undressed without any memories on how they got there. You had to shake them back to reality and their reality was they were still in danger and needed to run far, far away.

You ripped the last necklace from the blonde girl, the one with the cute space buns. The wizard had hidden her in a wardrobe as he fled to safety, away from your song.

“It’s okay,” you tried to soothe, curling your arms around the girl.

The girl only cried even harder.

“We need to go,” you said gently, weary that the wizards might unfreeze at any moment.

The only downside to your flute was that once a wizard unfroze, he would be immune to your song it for at least twelve minutes. A lot could happen in twelve minutes, it would take them mere seconds to slice your throat.

You pulled the girl up, letting her weight lean on you as you started to run.

“Please you have to run too.” you encouraged.

The girl whimpered but her legs beginning to run with yours.

*

Jungkook looked up to the starless sky, the city lights polluting the night. He sat at the steps of the club waiting for any sign of you. A number of drunk people had sworn and spat at him to get out of the way but Jungkook remained unmoved.

“Let him be,” Seokjin said while handed the club’s bouncer a wad of cash.

It had been the third-night Seokjin had bribed the bouncer not to physically remove Jungkook. Seokjin was really saving the bouncer from an unsightly fate, confronting Jungkook could lead to the bouncer dangling off the rooftops by his ankles.

“Jungkook.” Seokjin tried to think of something different to say but he was lost for words. There was only so many times Seokjin could tell Jungkook to give up on you.

“I know, Hyung.”

“You could try.”

Jungkook closed his eyes. “You know I can’t. Our souls are bound to one another.”

Seokjin opened his mouth to protest but was cut off by the sounds of a strangers cries. He turned to focus on two women, one trying to run whilst the other woman’s knees buckled underneath her body pulling them both to the concrete road.

Seokjin’s eyes widened in disbelief.

“Jungkook.” His voice trembled.

“What is it?” Jungkook asked opening his eyes.

Jungkook’s body was shaking, his hands clenched.

*

“Please,” you begged the girl, “They’re still after us, we need to go.”

The girl let out a loud sob.

“I’ll protect you I promised, please we’re nearly at my place.”

The girl looked up to you with teary eyes, nodding her head.

Thank goodness. You said to yourself, helping her back to her feet.

You turned forward to start running again but hit a solid force, stumbling backward.

“Jungkook,” The word escaped your mouth before you had any time to think.

“Y/N” He responded coldly. 

His brows were knitted in anger, his eyes narrowing onto your face.  

You felt like your heart had frozen, just like the victims of the crystal flute.

“HOW COULD YOU-” He began to growl but paused catching sight of the yellowish-purple bruise on the hollow of your cheek. His rage melted away as he delicately tilted your chin to examine the red stream of blood trickling down from your cut lip.

There was no way he could remain angry at you.

Ending note: Not sure about this chapter but I hope you like it? I’d love to hear what you think! Please leave me a like/reblog, it’s a huge encouragement for me. 

[thechroniclesofdaraliss]

100 Mutants & Masterminds Session Ideas (Part III)

It has been some time since I made one of these lists. But when you fight crime with your best friends every few weeks from the comfort of your DM chair, you have some stories you want to share. That’s right, another 100 ideas for all your superhero adventures! Whether you defend a small neighborhood or the entire planet, there should be something here for everyone. If you like what I do, please like, comment, or reblog. So let’s grab our utility belts and bend our morals like iron bars, and take to the skies for another day of heroism!

A mercenary from the last war has developed psychic powers, and is targeting the rich. Forcing them to see the war through his eyes, to endure what he did behind enemy lines.

An underground community is revealed that has people forced into acting out the master’s wishes.

An anonymous Hero is stealing from the rich and giving to the poor.

The world’s smartest computer strays from winning chess matches and desires to conquer humanity.

A miraculous medical treatment has the whole world excited. Strange insects can apparently heal any wound or cure any illness. But the origin of these bugs is horrifying. They are mingled with vampiric blood, and perform these procedures to cure patients and eat them once they’re made whole. They cure meat, not disease.

A mysterious figure (robot, knight, etc) waits at the same location for a worthy opponent to defeat him. No matter who approaches, they remain undefeated.

The villain has infused the next rainfall/snowfall/hailstorm with a deadly substance (acid, micro-explosives, a carnivorous liquid species). They will hold the city to ransom, or let loose with the deadly drops.

A skilled hypnotist is bending people to their will. They don’t appear to have designs of conquering the world or even the city, but they are still ruining lives.

A fiendish union has formed in the criminal underworld. Four of the most powerful syndicates have joined forces for their biggest operation ever (super-heist, massacring heroes, expanding influence to another major city, etc).

The most powerful figures in the city are committing acts that open them up to scandal and criminal punishment. Acts they wouldn’t perform in a million years. They seem to have no will of their own, like puppets. You must find out who’s pulling the strings.

The sewers of the city are overrun with monstrous creatures at the call of a villain (hidden foe who’s resurfaced, new alien presence, mad science gone wrong).

A young con artist is being hunted by the mob and the FBI. He plans to ruin both his pursuers in one big sting before skipping town. You have been tasked with taking him down.

You discover that a young individual is absorbing demons to fuel their power. But they aren’t trying to cause harm. They’re doing this to arm themselves for an onslaught against an archdemon. To fight fire with fire.

Royalty from the Far East has arrived to demolish agents of an organization dedicated to tearing their family and throne apart. They have requested that you and your team assist in defeating them.

A rogue religious leader is performing miracles of biblical proportions. You must get to the bottom of this before he garners too strong a following. His human flock could become an army and his meta-human acolytes could become powerful villains.

The Police department’s golden boy/girl has been shot in cold blood. While they are recovering in the hospital, their would-be murderer is still on the loose. You need to track them down before they try to kill them again.

Someone is using Transmutation to turn all of the scrap metal into military-grade weapons.

A monster is running across the city, absorbing people’s bodies almost instantly by touch. Is he a dog on someone’s leash, acting on his own, or part of a larger operation?

Energy-absorbing entities are fighting to reach earth’s surface so they can harness the power of the planet’s core. Earth will shatter and die, but they will continue their conquest among the starts. That is, unless you stop them.

A scientist is attempting to perfect the technology to steal superpowers. But when his latest attempt goes sour, he is an amalgamation of all his subjects. A screaming mass of bodies, personalities, and super-capabilities.

A demented and extravagantly wealthy cyborg has designs on taking political office. While the press and voters adore him, there’s evidence suggesting he’s in league with the underworld.

A collection of stone tablets have been discovered at different sites across the globe. But when they are unveiled at a museum opening, they summon giants made up of the four elements, all in order to summon “the Fifth Element.”

Men are turning up in hospitals wounded and completely unaware of who they are. It turns out that a psychic has been taking to the streets. One with the ability make people forget who they are the more they make you look into their eyes.

When a team of arcane champions dies, the ancient order they represent go for the next best candidate, your team. They need you to defeat an Elder Evil.

A villain has been released from prison. Their crime was forgiven too easily, and they seem to be immune to the law when they get out.

A convention for heroes is being held in your city. All of the heroes gather for panels, signings, and interaction with fans. It’s the perfect place to recount your adventures, or for your enemies to set a trap.

After a public execution, a practitioner of black magic has risen from the grave. You must discover the truth behind how it was done, as their return is the beginning of a “grand design.”

A meta-human child has emerged with incredible powers. But they don’t want anything other than to find their mother, who has gone missing.

A legendary hero has issued you a challenge. If you complete all of his trials, he will share the secret to expanding meta-human abilities.

In wake of the solstice, a supernatural force demands an audience with you and your team. The twist? The villains have intercepted this message and want to destroy the contact point before you get there.

A band of young rebels aid your team in the fight against crime. But their methods entail terrorism, wanton destruction, and interrogation of civilians.

As you engage in superpower practice, you discover that anomalies are forming in your DNA. Is it the next stage in your development as a hero, or could this spell disaster for you and your team?

You discover that the world will be destroyed in a few years time (alien invasion, super-virus, magic-induced apocalypse) unless you destroy the pillars of the plan. While some prove to be simple, others demand you to do the unthinkable.

A movie star comes to the city, and their arrival coincides with the theft of government property. Is the star responsible, or is there more to the story?

An Android has become obsessed with creating “the master race” of humanoid automatons. They will stop at nothing until the human race has been corrected to fit his picture of perfection.

You discover an artifact that forced you to delve inside yourself and confront your psyche, both the good and the bad.

Your team has been forced into different bodies. You must find a way to get them back before the villain uses them for his own ends, and cuts you off from getting them back forever.

You investigate the theft of cargo on vehicles coming into your city. You soon discover that a race of animalistic humanoids (shark-folk attacking ships, mole-folk attacking trucks, etc) are stealing weapons that will be used to slaughter their people.

A young and inexperienced meta-human hopes to join your team. Is this a trick, or an earnest attempt to right wrongs in your city?

A vain perfectionist of a meta-human has kidnapped your entire team and forced them to run a deadly obstacle course.

A malicious presence haunts your home base and starts taking your team away one by one.

You and your teammates decide to crash a gathering of villains, only to find that they are trying to start over. All they want is to lead normal lives.

A killer is running rampant in the city, and he’s donning a Battlesuit to ensure he can fight off heroes. But how does a serial killer get access to such technology?

A contract killer has been murdering heroes so he can cover them in the press. It’s a scam worthy of the underworld’s foremost assassin.

A series of artifacts must be gathered, or a sorcerer will leave your loved ones in a permanent state of petrification. The catch? They plan on killing them anyway and unleashing a demonic entity onto your world.

One of the most powerful individuals in the city is funding both heroes and villains. They plan to start an all-out war and to get rich from the ensuing chaos.

You battle a Necromancer in the local cemetery. However, you discover that the graveyard is the ritual circle for the most elaborate mass-summoning in history.

A series of giant robots have threatened to destroy the city if the heroes don’t willingly surrender themselves. When captured, the villains reveal their plan to use your team as batteries for their most ruthless collection of weapons ever: The Dominators.

The heroes uncover a conspiracy that is nearly a century old, and the agents are finalizing the plot to demolish the country (cold-war tensions, remnant Nazi Regime, etc)

A twisted sorcerer intends to revive his deceased patsies and take over the world with their help.

Someone is kidnapping women and sending them off to an unknown location.

The most powerful and famous heroes from across the world gather in your city. Soon after, you receive word that someone has intercepted the location and intends to kill them all.

A host of powerful villains declare war on the heroes, using their mobile fortress and demand the heroes surrender. You and your team fight back with everything you have from your headquarters to each other.

A villain has set out to poison the city’s water supply.

A call for help has come from the local jail/asylum. But when you arrive, it turns out that the villains want to test your morals and put you on trial for your deeds as a hero.

A small group of aliens crash-land on earth, hoping to find one of their missing brothers/sisters. But when they find them, the individual wants to stay on earth, the result is a fight that could endanger the whole city.

Artifacts with diverse and terrifying sets of capabilities have fallen in and around your city. A villain hopes to gather them all, and use them to become invincible.

People are going missing across the city, and resurfacing the next day, completely drained of energy and reduced to shriveled husks. Find the killer before they strike again.

The Triad has entered your city and is muscling in on every criminal operation.

A mischievous meta-human has set out to use their abilities for their own ends. While they start out a hero, they discover that consequences don’t meet them, and they elect to use their abilities for more selfish reasons. If left unchecked, this potential ally could become a formidable enemy.

A new technology has been developed that has the capability of stealing data from a computer and/or demolishing it.

Miniature menaces (robots, aliens, goblins, etc) are attacking all over the city. In order to stop them at their source, you need to keep fighting and capturing them. Once you clear the area, the villain will reveal themselves and there will be an all-out battle.

A shroud of darkness falls over the city, and you have been touched by a malevolent presence within it. Since you are tougher than the average human, you’ve gotten hit with influence of this being, with only some of the drawbacks. Use this new power to fight back!

You tamper with the timeline, and suddenly your city is prehistoric, Bronze Age, colonial, modern, and futuristic, all in one!

All of the natural aspects of your city (trees, water, animals) are dying. The source appears to be a center of rot in one of the last vestiges of natural life in your city. Delve into it, and discover an entire lair, home to a Lord of Rot.

A massive crevice has formed below your city, and upon further investigation, it’s a hub of hostile reptilian creatures. You must fight them back, or the city’s will be overrun with an ancient, and overwhelming species.

Oceanic creatures take to the shore of your city and demand that you give up the surface world to the “superior regime.”

A Necromancer poses a challenge, saying he will meet you at the point between life and death. You follow his clues, and arrive at a mausoleum, only to find that you must fight a house of the dead to capture this man.

A tower shoots out in the center of the city, and it appears to be from another time (far past or far future). Approaching it from any angle makes it fire a horrible death-ray. You approach it, and suffer damages, but lose your powers. You must find a way to get them back and to stop the death ray from holding the entire city hostage.

The local police are planning a raid on the local crime boss’ lair.

A villain has approached a member of your ranks with the intent to turn them to the side of evil.

A psychic investigator falls comatose at the scene of a crime, and you swear you can hear their voice asking you to perform tasks to get them back in their body.

A trickster is zooming across the city, causing mayhem wherever he goes. The heroes intervening only convinces him to stick around.

Dark versions of your team emerge and commit the crimes. But when you try to defeat them, they know your every move before you even do it.

You have been chosen to represent earth in a series of intergalactic games that will test your intelligence, athleticism, and combat capabilities. The losers all have their planets destroyed.

A series of crystals are discovered within your city. When touched, they transport you to a dark version of your own world.

A sorcerer has inherited their master’s spellbook. But when they use it, they accidentally unleash powers they are helpless to control.

Someone is combining alien technology with human devices.

An army of aliens is bound for earth with the sole purpose of enslaving every human.

An anonymous terrorist is keeping the entire city on edge, forcing the everyman to perform services for him in exchange for keeping their darkest secrets.

Heroes have become split on the issue of siding with the government, or remaining independent.

You and your team have been outfitted with the battlesuits that will enhance your powers to fight an immense evil force. While they work at first, the drawbacks are crippling.

You and your arch nemesis are forced to work together in order to survive an onslaught against someone who is trying to kill you both.

A new hero emerges, stopping crime as soon as it appears. But it’s revealed that these supposed criminals are staging the crimes because the new hero is paying them to do it. They are actually playing their boss for a fool, and are using this leeway to actually pull off the crime and pin everything on him. He wanted glory, and will instead get jail time unless you intervene.

One of the most powerful crime families has had a coup. Anyone who was part of the uprising will be killed, along with anyone that can be affiliated. The last few survivors come to you for help escaping.

A contest has been announced where all of the most powerful meta-humans will be asked to fight, race, and compete to get the title of “Ultimate Hero.” But those who lose go missing.

A tribe of small creatures have been expelled from their home, and they ask for your help getting it back.

A gargantuan mutant has been terrorizing a small community, and they are helpless to stop him, as he has hostages. You must defeat this creature and rescue the captives.

You and your team elect to take a vacation, but trouble follows you more than ever. Little do you know that all the crimes and accidents are the attempts of a reporter trying uncover proof of your secret identity.

You investigate a set of “mystery spots,” only to find that they are connected by a strange alien presence that bends the laws of physics.

The heist of the century has begun as the villain(s) plan to kidnap all world leaders at a secret meeting.

Children are going missing, and you soon discover the Faye are involved.

A gang war threatens to tear the city apart. All of the most powerful members have meta-human capabilities.

You have been captured by a tribal meta-human society that refuses to acknowledge humanity. However, if you beat them in their challenges, they will determine you as worthy and let you go.

You discover an island in the sky, and must override its weapon system from becoming a threat to the entire world

A mysterious entity is defeating heroes across the globe and freezing them before teleporting away. The assumption is they are gathering these fallen heroes as trophies, but villains soon go missing too.

A mage has been using her influence to summon her most powerful rivals to her, and is stealing their powers. One of them comes to see your team, and says in time, she will try to do the same to you.

Your archrival challenges you to a duel to see who is the best, once and for all. Whoever wins gets to unmask the other. The loser will go into witness protection.

The resurrection of a villain goes horribly wrong, and it’s discovered living humans are required to restore them to their former glory.

You discover a portal that leads to alternate dimensions/parallel earths.