#I tried to make them look like toys. this was a grave mistake

[aecholapis]

[crumbleclub]

I think the part of Mike that would have died in the Fox and Kit AU wouldn't have been, like, a one dimensional state, but he would have pretty big chunks of certain aspects of who he was. Kit Mike would have taken most of Michael's ability to feel fear, as well as most of his hope and most of his ability to depend on others.

A lot of that is why he would try to save the living Mike if his life was in danger.

The final moment of life for ghost Michael was watching the culmination of everything he'd ever done wrong end in the death of his little brother. Things literally could not get worse. In the span of a moment, Michael's self image went from an unnurtured kid who doesn't understand why his life is so unfair to "I am literally the worst possible human being on the planet." While Evan was in the hospital, before the Mikes had seperated, the view was that he had fucked up so badly that could never possibly do anything good. There was no going up from that rock bottom. No matter what, Michael was destined to be horrible and every action he took would end in the suffering of someone innocent, just like Evan.

For ghost Michael, that was the end.

But living Michael?

He went on. He started to clean up the mess. He couldn't bring the dead back to life, he couldn't undo the pain Evan had endured, or that his father's victims had suffered through, but he did try to help. He visited the graves, he went to the Fazbear locations, he figured out what had been done and researched how to stop it. He mellowed out, he kept to himself, he wasn't hurting anybody else.

And ghost Michael was there, the entire time. Watching.

There was a version of him out there, trying to fix things. Someone who was kind and brave and trying so very hard to do the right thing, someone kit Mike could have been, but would never be.

Both editions of Michael are filled to the brim with self loathing, but kit Mike thinks fox Mike is destined to do good where he had failed. He's not as scared, and he's older, smarter. He's learned from his mistakes in a way the thirteen year old version of himself couldn't really hope to understand. They go through situations where the living Michael is making choices, and the Michael who died is watching, knowing that he would have run away back there, or that he would have said something a little too mean to that person, or that he would have somehow screwed that up.

The only good thing he could possibly do is protect this new Michael, so he does.

I do think a Michael who had been scooped would be able to see ghost Mike, but it might start with a near death experience before that. Maybe the prior situations where ghost Mike tried to keep him safe were ones he would have managed to get out of anyway, but not this time. The cold hand that grabs him, half in earnest to protect, and half in fear and the residual instinct of a child saying protect me, I'm scared, is the only thing that saves him.

It's not until they go back home that night that Michael sees him, but I have trouble working out how he'd react. I think there'd be an initial freeze response, but after that is more complicated.

Kit Mike can definitely see the ghost kids. Seeing Evan is really hard for him, because it's his fault and Evan is scared, but I do think the latter would show himself sometimes. They haven't really fully worked through anything, but there are little shows of I see you, I know you're there on either side. Kit Michael doesn't really know how to say that he's sorry, but he's there every time fox Mike has said it. He leaves little things, toys, at the grave and at the diner when no one is looking.

He can see the other ghost kids, too. Some of the MCI kids aren't much younger than he is. They talk, sometimes. Maybe they even play games. I don't know if Evan told them what happened, but I don't think they see him as much of a current threat. He's essentially tethered to the other Michael, and they've not seen him do much other than follow him around like a lost puppy.

Now that I think about it, that might prevent the scoop, actually. Elizabeth and everyone else who'd fallen victim to Circus Baby and co might not understand that Michael had grown into his father's face, but a recognizable younger Mike who's right there, explaining it to them, pleading for them not to hurt his only chance to do some good? They may or may not believe him, but, either way, I think kit Mike would manage to stop it. If this is after fox Mike was able to see and hear him, he could straight up just... tell him what he's seen going on.

I think that the existence of kit Mike would sort of force Michael to evaluate what he once was. As much as he hates it, it's really hard to quell the instinct to comfort and protect when faced with a scared kid promising you that you aren't going to mess up this time, because he's been watching and you've been doing all the right things that he never could.

[smokedust]

She was confused. He was the one who performed the exorcism wholeheartedly, so did he have to cry like this?

"Huk, sob."

No, shouldn't she comfort him at this point?

Seeing him sob with a childish face, she felt like she should hug him and pat him on the back until he calmed down.

He bit his lip so hard that it turned red, and he covered his mouth with a handkerchief. He breath rapidly, and the ripples spread like waves, growing stronger.

Was it her imagination? The sound of water hitting the floor seemed to be getting faster and faster.

"Ha, Sarah, Sarah Abbott. Hngh, sob."

He finally closed his eyes tightly, his eyes wet with tears. The violent ripples overflowed onto the bathroom floor before gradually subsiding.

What’s this? It's not like he's truly crying...

Should she say he doesn't look sad at all?

Not long after, he took his trembling hands out of the water and examined them. The pale, delicate fingertips were covered in a sticky liquid.

"...."

In the end, all her worries about him faded away because of that last scene.

She had just realized that what he was so passionate about while calling her name was none other than masturbation.

'He's crazy. It's my first time seeing a man masturbate like that.'

Sarah was so surprised by the somewhat shocking scene that she covered her mouth.

'...He acted so dignified.'

She knew that even priests would have desires, but for that name to come out of those noble lips... It couldn't help but be a bit shocking.

And that lace handkerchief was obviously for women.

'...Isn't it hers?'

Well, it's a personal matter, so she guess it's better to pretend she didn't see it. She carefully closed the door and tried to pretend to be asleep.

[System: Warning! You cannot stop exploring the 'bathroom'.]

With a short warning, creak-

The bathroom door, oblivious to her presence, slowly opened inward.

"...."

In an instant, her eyes met Sebastian's as he looked towards the door. His face flushed instantly.

"I'm, I'm sorry. I thought you were calling me desperately..."

Sebastian's flushed face hardened. He was startled to see the handkerchief in his hand and quickly crumpled it into his hand.

What should she do? What should she say to fix this? They had just formed a strong bond(?) through the exorcism, and it seemed like it had all gone down the drain because of the masturbation.

For now, she should apologize for interrupting his private time. Just as she was about to prostrate herself…

"...I was praying in the holy water for your recovery."

"...Yes?"

"You should get dressed and leave."

What a ridiculous excuse. He was so shameless.

He prayed for her?

After calling her name while masturbating? What kind of excuse is that? It was absurd.

She thought it was a little strange when he inserted the dildo as a holy object. But now, he's gone so far as to masturbate and call it prayer.

Her apologetic feelings vanished completely at his shameless attitude. And she felt a strange sense of anger rising.

"That's a wonderful prayer, isn't it?"

"...Yes?"

"Praying naked in the holy water. Calling my name and even shaking your penis. Did you squeeze out your sem*n at the end to make it even more effective?"

"…."

Sebastian's face turned pale as she hit the nail on the head. Sarah didn't miss the opportunity and pushed him to the edge.

"I should tell Father. That the High Priest has worked so hard for me."

“…I was wrong.”

Sebastian, overwhelmed by the situation, bowed his head and confessed his guilt obediently.

“You were praying? What did you do wrong?”

“I committed a grave offense against you. Please forgive me.”

“What do you want me to forgive?”

She pressed him with a dry face, cold as frost.

“You used the toy as a sacred object?”

“That’s….”

“You scolded me like a horny child and even spanked my butt. You masturbated secretly while calling my name?”

“…Even with ten mouths, I have nothing to say.”

He seemed to be apologizing for his mistakes, but she couldn't forgive him at all.

Even if she considered the holy water, the spanking, and the rebuke for being obscene, it was still absurd that he would do such a lewd thing after refusing penetration and putting up a wall.

“Give me what’s in your hand.”

Now that things had come to this, Sarah decided to pursue the matter to the end.

“…Yes?”

“I said give it to me because I have something to check.”

Sebastian remained silent, his lips tightly pursed.

Seeing that he was trying to hide something, it seemed there was something he didn't want her to find out. Since she could guess what it was, she wanted to confirm it.

“If you’re going to hide it to the end, I’ll assume you have no intention of apologizing to me.”

As Sarah glared at him, he reluctantly reached out his handkerchief, averting his gaze.

She snatched the handkerchief and examined it carefully. It was a lace handkerchief with the Abbott family’s crest embroidered on it. It was definitely Sarah Abbott’s.

“Why on earth do you have my handkerchief?”

When she asked abruptly, he stopped for a moment before lowering his head. Sarah waited silently for an answer, observing his expression closely.

He slowly raised his head.

After a long silence, as if he were thinking on his words to confirm them, he still had a pale face.

“If I have it…”

He couldn't finish his sentence and exhaled deeply before asking self-deprecatingly.

“…I guess it wasn’t okay.”

What? His attitude was completely different from when he had confessed his guilt obediently earlier.

She thought he would say things like, “I committed an unforgivable sin,” or “I was crazy for a moment.”

She thought he would react in a very common-sense way, as he had done until now.

His unexpectedly sharp reaction made her feel a little awkward.

“Well, that’s because you’re doing something very personal with it.”

It was the same when explaining the reason.

“….”

His gaze, which had been wavering, unable to find its focus, suddenly sank heavily.

Then, as if he had made up his mind, he looked straight into her eyes and opened his mouth.

“I’ll take my punishment.”

“Punishment?”

She asked incredulously, unable to believe her ears. Sebastian seemed to have already made up his mind.

“Yes. Instead, I would like lady to punish me, not Marquis Abbott.”

“Me?”

“It’s a wrong I committed against you. Please personally give me a fitting punishment.”

A fitting punishment. From Sarah’s point of view, it was a good thing.

She had been racking her brain over not being able to complete the mission, but now he was asking her to choose the punishment. This was like a golden opportunity to escape the second floor.

Her cheekbones twitched with excitement, but she pretended not to care.

“Are you really okay with any punishment?”

“Yes. So, Sarah Abbott.”

Sebastian’s lips curved into a long smile.

“Please scold me harshly.”

[arvinsescape]

Stupid waiters

A/N: Hope you enjoy.

Summary: Tom had a special evening planned and the waiter tries to ruin his mood.

Warnings: Bit of swearing.

W/C: 2.1K

Tom was incredibly annoyed as he watched the waiter flirt with you. He’d just come back from filming and he had a special evening planned with you but this guy was ruining that plan and his mood. You hadn’t noticed or if you had you hadn’t said anything. He watched as the waiter placed your drink in front of you and flirt very obviously (in Tom’s opinion) with you and he didn’t even spare Tom a glance. He huffed as the waiter walked away.

“You okay?” You asked him as he clenched his fist under the table.

“That guy is pissing me off.” He mumbled.

“Why?” You asked with furrowed brows and he scoffed lightly.

“Y/N, he is all over you.” Tom pointed out.

“Is he?” You asked looking genuinely curious, you hadn’t noticed.

“It’s so obvious!” Tom almost raised his voice.

“Tom, calm down.” You laughed lightly. “I’m here with you and I think that’s pretty obvious. I’m not interested.” You said as you reached your hand across the table that he gladly took as you laced your fingers together. He felt his annoyance wash away, you were right and this was a special night. You were here with him and he knows you love him, there’s not a second that’s gone by where he doubts that.

“Okay, I’m sorry.” He muttered and you squeezed his hand lightly.

“It’s fine. A little jealousy is healthy, I’ve been guilty a couple of times.” You laughed.

The main course arrived and although the waiter was continuing to flirt a little Tom found himself only slightly irritated now. That was until the waiter cleared the mains and offered a desert menu.

“Can I interest the lady in a desert, I’m sure I can recommend one as sweet as you.” Tom’s blood was boiling now and he watched as you cringed at the god awful pick up line.

“I don’t know, baby do you want one?” You asked Tom as you put emphasis on the nickname. That’s right dickhead, she’s not interested, she’s mine Tom thought and instantly cringed at his internal thought. You weren’t some toy he could lay claim but he was pissed with this guy.

“Yeah, we’ll have a look.” Tom answered as he watched the waiter visibly deflate as you made it clear you were here with him. He couldn’t help his smirk as he waiter wandered off for a menu.

“Okay, fair play. He’s pretty obvious.” You laughed.

“I don’t get it, you’re clearly here with me. Why is he carrying on?” Tom groaned as you shrugged your shoulders.

“I must just be irresistible.” You teased as you brought your glass to your lips.

“You are.” Tom said in such a matter of fact manner that you snorted.

“Lighten up. It’s not like it’s gonna work.” You playfully rolled your eyes.

“That’s not the point.” Tom said as the waiter returned with the menu. He eyed your almost empty glass.

“Another drink for the lovely lady?” He asked and you politely accepted and Tom nearly swung for the guy. He’d stepped up his flirting now from when you’d first arrived. Tom clenched his jaw at the interaction and he felt you smooth your thumb over his hand that was still on the table.

“It’s Y/N by the way, if you are going to insist on calling me anything it should be by what most people that aren’t my boyfriend do.” You said in a polite but stern way. He knew you weren’t one for conflict but he appreciated that you were reminding this dickwad that you weren’t interested.

“Y/N? That’s a beautiful name.” The waiter said with a wink and Tom nearly blew his stack, face going red with anger as he clenched his jaw so hard he worried he might crack his teeth.

“Erm, thanks.” You said awkwardly. The waiter smirked and Tom swears he saw his eyes drift towards him for a second before he left.

“Tom, calm down it’s okay. Don’t let it ruin your mood.” You tried to calm him down. “I love you okay and I’m here with you. I love you.” You smiled at him and he returned a tight lipped smile as he tried to regain control of his anger. He was calming himself until the waiter returned and just seeing him made Tom’s blood boil.

“Any desert?” He asked as you gave him your order, Tom hadn’t even looked at the menu.

“We’ll take the sticky toffee pudding and two spoons.” You answered for the both of you as you watched Tom shift in his seat. The waiter glanced at Tom for a second, smirking before he spoke.

“That desert is a lovely choice. Very sweet.” He said and he put so much emphasis on the words that Tom knew now he was trying to wind him up. Your hand found his as you squeezed again in a failed attempt at calming him down.

“Are you serious?” Tom said through gritted teeth as the waiter looked at him in fake innocence and Tom could have ripped his head off there and then for ruining his mood and plan.

“Apologies I didn’t mean to offend.” He said before walking away and Tom ran his hands through his hair messing it up slightly.

“I swear if he carries on I’m gonna hit him.” Tom grumbled and you gave him a sympathetic smile.

“I’m sorry Tom. We’ll go after this.” You said and he huffed.

“No, I’m sorry. I’m letting it get the better of me. I don’t mean to.” He said, had it been any other night he’d probably have contained his anger and annoyance better.

“No Tom, he’s being inappropriate. I’d be upset if I were you.” You smiled at him. You wanted to make him feel better as you watched the waiter return with your desert and although it was slightly inappropriate in such a lovely restaurant you found yourself standing up and Tom watched you with furrowed brows. You smiled at him as you made your way round to him and sat on his knee as you turned his face to look at you and connected your lips in a sweet kiss. One of his hands instantly finding your waist and the other holding your cheek.

Tom could swear he heard the waiter scoff as he walked away and you disconnected your lips as you smiled at him.

“I love you.” You whispered against his lips and he grinned.

“I love you darling, thank you.” He watched as you made your way back to your seat and he found his anger washing away a little at the gesture you’d made. He really did love you.

You ate your desert and it was actually very sweet as the waiter had said and you both enjoyed it. When he cleared the plate, looking much more deflated than previously you asked for the bill. When he brought it back, Tom got his card out to pay and the waiter made the grave mistake of bringing up one of Tom’s insecurities.

“At least he pays, I suppose it makes up for all those nights he leaves you alone.” The waiter said to you in a jokey manner and you visibly gulped. Of course this man knew who Tom was, he’d booked it under his name and who didn’t know who spiderman was? You watched as Tom snapped his head towards the waiter and his face was red with anger.

“Pardon?” Tom spat.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to offend you but I assume when you film all these movies you leave her alone. I’m just reminding her that not all men would do that, you know, some men would be there all the time.” He fired back as he crossed his arms over his chest. Was this guy trying to lose his job?

It didn’t matter what you said, Tom always worried that he was neglecting you when he had to leave. Of course, you didn’t see it this way and told him so all the time, he didn’t have to be with you physically to be there for you and he proved that all the time. This guy had no idea what he was talking about. You felt your jaw drop at his rudeness and complete brazenness. He would not be coming back here to work ever again. You made you way over to Tom as you grabbed his tense bicep in your hands.

“Tom, leave it. It doesn’t matter what he thinks, he doesn’t know what you do for me or a single thing about our relationship. He’s not worth it.” You said as you tried to get him to calm down, that wasn’t happening.

“I have watched you throw yourself at my girlfriend in an embarrassing manner tonight. She made it clear she wasn’t interested and you persisted, which by the way, is wrong whether she is in a relationship or not. I will be reporting you to the manager of this place for your rudeness. Thank you for ruining my fucking evening!” Tom shouted at him as he made his way towards the exit.

You were dumbfounded for a second as you heard him shout. Sure, Tom had put people in their places before but this must have really bothered him, it took a lot to make him shout. You scrambled after him and had to almost run to catch up.

“Tom. Tom!” You shouted as you tried to get him to slow down. When he turned around you could see his bloodshot eyes and as you reached him you saw the tears brimming them. You placed your hands on his face and made him look you in the eyes. “Tom, forget what he said. You are there for me all the time. I know you go away to film but that’s okay, I’m happy for you to pursue your career, you deserve it, you’re so talented. Tom, I don’t know how many times I have to tell you that you don’t have to be there physically to be there for me. I love you and I don’t want anyone else.” You said and he sighed, looking down.

“It’s not just that. He ruined everything. I had this whole evening planned and I was gonna ask you to marry me and then he reminded me that you deserve better.” Tom rambled through his tears and you felt the breath get knocked out of you. He was what?

“You were- Tom what- you were gonna what?” You stammered out as you felt your heart rate increase. Tom must have realised what he’d said and he snapped his eyes to yours.

“Shit. I wasn’t meant to say that. I’m sorry.” He stuttered out before he took a deep breath. “Look I was gonna ask you to marry me tonight and he just-“

“Yes.” You interrupted him and he looked at you for a second, eyes wide.

“What?”

“Yes, I’ll marry you.” You said as tears made there way down your face, all happy, and he grinned.

“Really?” He asked as he fished around in his jacket pocket.

“Tom, I love you, you get me on a level no one, not even my family, ever has before. Of course I’ll marry you. No stupid waiter who doesn’t know what he’s talking about is gonna change that.” You laughed as he grinned and took the small box from a pocket in his jacket.

“At least let me do it properly.” He said as he got down on one knee, taking your hand in his. “Y/N. I know I’m not always here physically but I will always be there for you, wherever I am in the world. You make me a better person and I couldn’t be more thankful for you. You always push me to do better and you are my rock and I hope I can always be that for you. I promise I will always try and reciprocate the insane amount of love you give. I love you. So, Y/N L/N, will you marry me?” He asked and tears of happiness where finding their way down both of your cheeks.

“Yes, I love you so much.” You cried as you lunged yourself at him, almost catching him off guard as he only just caught you in a hug. You loved Tom and he was everything you wanted, needed and more.  

[yourmamakira]

Kira. you wont mind if you make a fluff story/chapter of the reader goes shopping with the dream team? dont ask how i got this idea.

I love this idea, thanks Simpyy <33

This'll probably be just a Chapter But I'll still make it worth the read!

Navigation

Dream Team Shopping!

You're stuck with us, wether you like it or not

I love the Boys, I truly do. But sometimes they can be alot. Miat od the time it feels like I'm baby sitting but I never really mind. I wouldn't trade them for the world...

Unless we were going shopping.

"COME ON GEORGE! GET IN THE CAR"

Always a hassle. A nightmare at most. I feel like a single mother gathering up her hard headed Kids

We got into the car with Clay in the driver's seat with me in the passengers. Nick is behind me and behind Clay sits a very sleepy George. Nick reaches in the front

"I got Aux–" I cut him off snatching the cord from him "Absolutely not. We are NOT listening to Anymore country music. I get the Aux"

He flops back down on his seat pouting and grumbling "But Johnny Cash.." he says in a sad tone

We all laugh at him as I turn on my music, one of my favorite songs come up

'Washing machine heart by Mistki'

"God i LOVE this song!" "We know" the boys speak in union I roll my eyes and sing the lyrics to the song occasionally hearing one of the boys sing along.

We decided to just go to Target to shop. On our way there we just talked about future streams and song along to my Playlist

It was a big Playlist and I never get bored of it considering its over 24 hours long.

We pull up to target and park the car. We all get out and make our way into the store. We split up, Dream being the independent boy he is went off on his own, George went with him for whatever suspicious reason and Nick Stayed with me

We got a cart and I got the shopping list out on my phone knowing we'll come out with more then we need

"Nick We need food" "But Candy?!" "Nick we can nit keep ordering food. We need an actual meal" "But–" "And No. Five guys dose not count as an actual meal" "But I love five guys" I rolled my eyes as he pushed the cart to the food section

Once we got everyone on the list eith the extra complaints of a whiney Nick. This is where things go out of hand.

As were walking to check out I spot Starbucks. I squeal and walk over, making the grave mistake of leaving Nick Alone.

I went up to take my order and waited for my drink. I smiled happily as I drank my Coffee and I turned around.

Nick was gone.

I look around for where he could be but didn't see him anywhere. "...Nick?"

I walked around for where I thought he could be. I go to grab my phone out of my pocket then I realize my phone is in the cart. I grone and throw my head back and begin my search of the roage man child that's on the loose

I walk around trying to find where he would be. I thank the Gods that I had my Wallet or who knows what they would ruin

I look at the last place I think he would be and find them...

All in the kids toy section Giggling like babies. I stand infront of them all with my arms crossed waiting for them to realize Im here

Dream realizing first and standing straight like a Sargent, he pushes geroge and he noticed me next he stood straight like George and then he cough. It didn't work do he pushed Sapnap

"Ow! Dude what the Fuuuc– Hey Mamas!"

I gave them the "you guys are so dead" look

They started to Chuckle nervously, They all looked away from me.

I rolled by eyes and started to walk away. They didn't say anything and just followed behind me with the cart

I walked into the Pet isle getting food for patches since she was low

I weeved in and out of isled getting things we needed and scolded the boys if they tried to slip away, soon thr cart was half of what we needed and half of what we didn't.

We walked up to the cashier after paying everything onto the converbelt and onto the cart.

I pulled out my card, but just before I could pay, my hand was slapped away and somone else payed. I looked up to see Clay grinning. I rolled my eyes

"Unnecessary" "Consider it an apology for having to babysit us" I sighed and pushed the cart where it belongs

I made the boys carry all the bags to the cart as a punishment, of course not without complaints but I just ignored them and kept going.

They put the groceries into the card and got in with a huff.

I laughed at their exaggerated tiredness

"Don't be to outta breath boys. We still have to go home, put them up AND clean the house"

Nick shot his head up "You're helping right?"

All eyes were now on me as I smirked and looked forward

Clay started the car and we drives home.

As I said I made them carry in the bags, put them away and clean the entire house. And I just relaxed as I watched.

But as always. I do love them to death.

End.

I hope you enjoyed this chapter! Send in more requests, Here's my Masters List

[zaunseye]

He watched her eyes, following them down to her bound body, then back to his face, when he gave her a little knowing smirk. She was in quite the predicament, being in his clutches. He would toy with her for a bit, then clean things up. "Ahh, eager to make a name for yourself? Figure yourself a hero. Is that it?" He ran his fingers along the back of his chair as he walked behind it. "You wouldn't be the first to try. There was a man before you. Someone I knew quite well, actually." He stopped, leaning himself further toward her and raising a brow. "Of course, he's not a problem any more. He's dead." He leaned back, a smug look on his narrow, angular face.

She was cocky. He could appreciate the gumption. She had bravery to come here in the first place, but arrogance to think that she could speak to him like he was some prize dragon to be hunted and mounted on her wall. He took another drag off of his cigar, blowing a plume of smoke into the air with a sigh. Her words chipped away at a calm exterior, revealing a twitch in his eye. "You're a book left open on an empty page, girl."

He eyed her suit. His men had tried to remove it, unsuccessfully. There were too many security measures taken in its design that were as of yet unknown to them. He'd planned to have his men pry through it with crowbars, eventually. "You really expected to come waltzing in here, alone, and take down my operation? That doesn't read of anything smart. It seems to me that you're a overeager child, meddling with systems you know nothing about. You've made a grave mistake in coming here. You're going to end up just like the last one who gave me too difficult of a time. Dead and forgotten."

"Working for Marcus?" Caitlyn sounded offended and she was. She just quit his little scheme of so called enforcers and still, she was being associated with him. And then she was being tied to Jayce's name. While that part was true, it still irked her that she wasn't known for herself. No, she just had to get there. This was all part of her legacy. Her journey to doing something good, something that mattered in the world. "No, I'm not," She finally stated, her gaze pointed. A huff escaped Caitlyn's lips and she glanced down at her restraints before holding eye contact with the man in front of her. She had to figure out how to get out of this but also banter with Silco. Otherwise, her little excursion here would be for nothing. "Jayce, dare I say, is not trying to accomplish anything here. He was just the inventor. I, on the other hand, am going to put a stop to your ring of tyranny."

Again, the sniper didn't have a concrete plan. In fact, she still felt dazed from being knocked out but her eyes multitasked as she scanned her surroundings and then scanned Silco himself. Her eyes were drawn to his different eye, the way he leaned on his furniture, the type of cigar he smoked and how he did it. She could tell why people were intimidated by him but all Caitlyn saw was a man hiding behind his money and power. "I know you're looking down on me. I've seen that look one too many times but you don't scare me," She declared. "In fact, you seem to be scared of me. Having me tied up and everything. You don't know my skillset, you don't know if I'm completely inexperienced or have perfected my craft since I was a child. You can't read me at all, can you?" She taunted. Maybe it was true though. That Silco didn't know who she was and in this case, that was a good thing. If he knew she was a councilwoman's daughter, then what would he do? He'd most certainly have her killed. The taunts gave her enough time to come up with a plan though. Parts of her suit could spring up like blades and if she wriggled herself correctly, she could free herself. Caitlyn just had to keep Silco hooked.

[villainsandvictimsalliance]

Damn Enji and Kotaro are literally the worst fathers

Hmm, the worst father is AFO.

Kotaro has some trauma that doesn't excuse him, but it explains some things.

Enji at some level at least was trying to reach something good? And he is right now in some arc of redemption.

But AFO is just– I still don't know how people look at what AFO did to Tomura and doesn't feel at least a little sympathy. It personally makes me physically sick to think about AFO sometimes. Let's review the reasons why AFO deserves the award for worst parental figure :

All his love was replaced with obsession. A need to control people at any minute, a need to know everything about them, to make them act like he wants to.

He was heavily obsessed with his younger brother. We all know how the first user ended. He's still obsessed over him.

AFO has a hunger for power and possessions... And in this one I mean PHYSICAL possessions even. This is the stuff horror stories are filled with.

We don't know if AFO knew about who Tenko was before or after he took him in from the streets. We don't know if he tracked the Shimuras, we don't know how exactly everything turned out so perfectly for him.

His took his obsession with his younger brother and the OFA users to Tenko. It was never about the kid, never about the human. Tenko has never been better than another body to be controlled like any nomu. The modificationa Tenko needed where not physical, no, but psychological.

Grooming, gaslightning, psychological abuse...

He made a five years old use the dead hands of his family all over his body and watched as the kid threw up from the extreme distress he was under.

He told a five years old he should never heal. I repeat, he took an already abused kid who had already many reasons to hurt and suffer that healing was bad and raging was the solution. He wanted Tenko to stay forever trapped in the bleeding.

He commanded the kid to go and kill people. "Tenko said he wanted to kill them" yes, kids say that type of stuff, they are kids that are supposed to be guided and taught. And AFO did it in the worst way possible.

He knew Tenko had no memories, he was like a blank canvas filled with hurt and rage– and guilt. What AFO did was making Tenko like him a little, people without remorse that would destroy the world for their twisted version of love.

Have you ever heard of those stories where people spend their whole lives locked in a basement because their abusive father make them do it so? Tomura was isolated from society. The only three figures in his life were a doctor who wanted to experiment with him, a half zombie who had strict orders and the demon who trapped him. No other kids to play with and learn how to act in society, for example. He had no friends, he couldn't go out that much, he got a pc and videogames and probably lessons but if we compare the room AFO gives Tenko in the beginning and Tomura's room in the bar, it's probably the same. All his life lived between four walls. Alone. Isolated. With the constant pain and rage and feeling you need to destroy.

If you think quarantine was hard, imagine this.

We also know Tomura was lacking self care when we first met him on the manga. I'm talking about some levels of hygiene and basic routines. We know Tomura is used to not sleeping in days, eating so little, and other things that shouldn't be normal at all, unless people are being negligent with you or you're living in a war or something.

Or– you're poor. This fucks me up each time because there's no way AFO is poor. And yet we've seen Tomura's situation.

Also imagine being around people who only tells you "do it for him, do this to please him, be like him, follow his lead, become him, listen to him". What type of brainwashing is that.

I still hold that Tomura's itching comes from emotional and psychological stress. And since AFO told him to never heal, you can imagine why his scars looked so bad and full of blood in the beginning of the manga.

Tomura didn't have a normal childhood or teenage years. He lost both to the trauma. What Tomura likes to do beside destroying? Playing video games, and because that was the only possible scape he had. Being on the internet lying about his identity and his life.

Note how we don't have a good memory of Tomura in those years. It's always AFO rescuing him. The last real good memory of Tomura was about Hana, his sister, and Nao, his mother, both being gentle to him.

He started really living with the League. " Why does he care about them ", even when he was a child, we have no records of Tenko having close friends. The closest thing was Hana, his sister, and Mon-chan, his dog. The League are the first real friends he ever had. Of course he doesn't know how to be a friend at first, he has never seen people around his age so close to him in at least 15 years.

And note how AFO doesn't care about them either. He sees everyone as toys to play with. He never tries to protect Tomura's friends.

AFO doesn't even see Tomura as a person, like I said before, because he saw Tomura as a body he could later posses to keep existing. A recipient, a vessel, whatever you want to call it. He only cares about Tomura's feeling because he need his hatred to take OFA.

We saw that when Deku started hurting himself from using too much his quirk, everyone worried. Deku was the only who worried about Tomura when the AFO quirk started destroying him.

AFO practically killed Tomura by relegating his consciousness to the bottom of his mind, taking over the body. Yeah sure, Kotaro tried to kill Tenko and Enji is responsible for Touya's dead, but nothing as brutal as this.

AFO gave his own last name to Tomura not as a parent-son link, but to mark that body as his.

He gave an identity to Tomura to mark him as he possession. He is so proud of that.

Besides, Tomura looks a lot like AFO's younger brother and Nana Shimura, two of the people AFO obsessed with, a lot. He also was compared before to All Might, when he was Tenko and share many similarities with Deku. Basically he sees in Tomura everything he wants to posses and destroy.

He used Tomura in almost every way.

He destroyed Tomura in almost every way.

And do it because he wanted to do it, not for some type of justice or self-righteousness or twisted parental feelings.

He enjoys destroying Tomura, he wanted to destroy Tomura, to break him.

No other character should be compared to AFO. Even Kotaro and Enji, that would be a grave mistake. At least Enji and Kotaro were humans, complex and abusive humans, but AFO is something straight out of a nightmare.

Yes, he's definitely the worst parental figure of bnha / mha.

[yamithediaperdork]

Welcome to baby land (Ben 10)

it was a tale as old as time, one that had happened before, would happen this day and despite the fall out from today's events would happen again in the future.

A young boy, fueled by fetish desires and spending hour after hour, day after day bringing himself to the peak as he looked at his chosen fetish, only to pull back last second.

Because the boy knows for what he wants, for what he's going to do.. he needs that desperate pent up denial of release to shut down his common sense. to make him nice and dumb.

His name was Ben Tennyson, and up until a short while ago he had been the hero of the universe and earth. But that was before the watch had been taken, and given to his cousin Gwen who had been picked as being a most reasonable hero. with cutting remarks that he would of never gotten the watch for as long as he had had it's marker realized who was wearing it, and being called to immature.. was it any wonder a bitter and dejected Ben cut himself off from his extended family and drove into the world of porn?

never mind he had beaten off a alien invasion, a 'pants peeing doofus' couldn't be trusted with the watch.

Fine. whatever. if they wanted to look at him as a stupid big baby.. that's what he'd become.

He didn't even like diapers at first when he started, but well.. porn has a way of warping a young boy's mind. Looking at picture after picture, caption after caption and reading the stories Ben for all intents and purposes turned himself in a diaper boy, and a humiliation junkie.

Taking birthday money he even found and brought a package of punishment diapers meant for shaming (though he got it at a discount as the shop was being put out of business) that were super thick, boasted how they could hold any mess.. and also claimed they didn't keep any stink from being contained and guaranteed diaper rash if used.

For a porn addicted loser like Ben, this was pure gold and since he paid for rush devilry he got a enema bag and a small bottle of little crampers, the enema for brats.

Ben knew what he wanted, total, public humiliation but he kept ruining it for himself with self pleasure driving the need out of his mind before he could do it.

finally, Mid October the little porn fueled loser decided enough was enough, he was gonna stop wasting his time and the diapers he'd paid for and set himself up to goon. For a week strait he subjected himself to it, and by the time he was done on Sunday night, Monday morning the little loser set himself up to fail.

waking up early, Ben used the whole bottle of little crampers even though it said to just mix 1/8 with a litlre bag for a enema kit, and groaned and whimpered as he used it, hot water and a dash of castor oil in the big enema bag, only his bulky white and black t-shirt hid the preggo belly he gave himself.

getting back to his bedroom and cramping, the soon to be ruined diaper loser looked at the pack of his punishment diapers and having not worn one till today, toyed with layering at first but they just looked too thick.

Settling on one of the bulky diapers with it sobbing crybaby design, he taped it on then tried the tapes, blushing as the package lived up to it's name.

Once taped on it would take 2 hours for the tapes to come back off, he was truly trapped. again a normal boy of Ben's age would of been panicking, realizing they had gone too fair but Ben just breathed fast, and smiled as he picked his baggiest pair of pants and was delighted that they still only JUST hid the diaper, if he bent over his padded shame would be CLEAR.

Getting down stairs and getting breakfast in himself, he was already seated as his parents came down and made small talk with them even as the delightful cramps started to build. (he'd never admit it, well at least before today's events unfolded but he'd grown to like pain, it made his heart beat fast and smile)

Still he couldn't help but squirm and groan a little bit, and got looks of concern from his parents as he finished his bowl of cereal.

"Benny you feeling alright?" His mother asked, coming over and putting a hand to his forehead. "You can stay home today if your not feeling good."

"N-No I'll be alright. just worried about a math test." Ben said, mixing truth with lies,then added: "Besides, you and dad said you were BOTH gonna be out all day today. who'd stay with me?"

"Heh, He's got a point there.. and good on you Ben. I'm proud your being mature enough not to try and get out of a test." His dad said, totally misunderstanding the happy giggle Ben let out.

His father might of thought it was Ben was so happy he was proud of him, But for diaper bitch Benny, the irony of the comment almost made him ruin the fun early.

If Ben's plan had one flaw (well one he'd admit to) it was the fact that he hadn't taken into account how much slower he'd be having to waddle his massive diaper butt to school with the added fun of having to stop 3 times to force himself not to spoil the fun early.

He'd even left a little sooner then normal, his parents had been quick with their breakfast and he 'accidentally' left his house key on the desk in his room and after making sure the front door was locked, went out the back door as you could lock it from the inside while the door was open.

'No getting out of this by running home!' Ben gleefully thought.

He barley made it into homeroom before the bell rang, though since he was known to be tardy from time to time it didn't raise too much attention, get getting a snide comment from his homeroom teacher about gracing them with his presence.

Even better, home was also his math class and that was going to be first period (which was a good thing for the ever so full little perv as his 'chocolate mud baby' wasn't going to stay in him much longer.)

Mr. Fillawick wasted little time in handing out the tests and after a standard warning that he'd tolerate NO cheating and there was going to be NO bathroom breaks, he offered anyone who had to go a chance to use the potty now.

'OK..this is it..your last chance.. you could just say you need to go, and sneak out the school.fill your diapers in the woods and get out of them once the tapes give up.' Ben thought to himself, biting his lip.

it wouldn't be destroying himself in class and getting him labeled stinky baby for the rest of the year, but it would land him in hot water with the school and his parents and he'd run the risk of being seen outside right?

He almost started to raise his hand when his inner pervert took over and he just turned it into brushing his hand though his hair.

"Alright, don't say I didn't warn you. you'll have a hour to do the test. good luck." Mr. Fillawick said and shrugged, going back to his desk and sitting down, doing whatever it was teachers did.

Five minutes later and Ben was in a mixture of heaven and hell. he was twitching and sweating a little bit, his pencil twitching in his hand even as he started to leak in little bursts against the front of his diapie.

the cramps were at the point of no return and even if Ben said fuck it and got up to run, he wouldn't of made it more then five steps.

all he'd managed to do so far was write his name on the test and the date, then the cramps had gone over board.

'Ok..Ok.. this was a mistake.. I've leaked enough boy milk to see that.. maybe.. maybe I can still just.. get out..of..' Ben thought, going white knuckled as he gripped the side of his desk with his left hand as a powerful cramp hit, a low rumbling fart coming out his backside though the sound was mostly muted.

the smell however was not as the diapers lived up to their claims and Kids around Ben wrinkled their noses and looked around looking for the source of the smell and eyes zeroing in on his as he was blushing.

"Mr. Fillawick? I think Ben needs to go to the bathroom." A redhead boy behind him said. "Or at Least can he be moved to the back of the classroom.

"Mr. Tennyson had his chance for that Mr. Randal. and I prefer he stay where I can keep a eye on him." Came the teachers amused answer.

even as the class giggled and laughed, two more rotten poots escaped and there was open cries of disgust.

"Gah, at least open a window!"

"What did you have to eat this morning, a skunk!?"

Ben whimpered and squirmed, he had the whole class basically looking at him now and the teasing and taunts had brought his pervert side back up to full power.

'It's now or never.' Ben thought, though he also knew wasn't really a option. it was more like Now or never if he wanted a semblance of control over the act.

it helped he was trembling lots now but Mr. Fillawick who'd never cared for Ben much since he was a rowdy student only watched with sadistic glee.

Ben's Pencil 'accidentally' shook out of his hand and rolled off the desk and onto the floor, and Ben made a show of just reaching into his desk to find anther one.

"Mr. Tennyson, whatever your habits in your own room may be, I run a clean Classroom." the smirking teacher said. "Bend down and point up that pencil."

"Uh..but..If I-" Ben started, putting the perfect crybaby whine in his voice.

"You'll what? fart? like you haven't been doing that already?" the teacher shot back.

Putting on a show of being embarrassed and scared (he was embarrassed but his heart was beating fast) Ben leaned over the right side of his desk and there was a gasp from the students behind him as one thing he hadn't planned on happened.

"BEN'S WEARING A DIAPER!" Hooted Crash.

"A BABY DIAPER!" a blond girl added.

"More like a BIG baby diaper!" Randal noted with amusement.

Somehow his pants must of lowered enough to flash off his embarrassing diaper! Oh god! for all of 2.4 seconds trued to stop what was about to happen but the act of leaning over had been the final trigger.

as the enema finally worked it's magic and the back of his diaper started to swell up Ben could only hear the roar of his mess and though tear filled eyes almost could swear he could see image of him in just diapers and a bib, tapping a shovel on a grave that had been filled in. the tombstone read:

RIP Ben's self respect.

as the force of the mess made Ben fall forward, landing face down and ass up, his pants failing down more so everyone could watch his diapers load up in the back (thankfully they wouldn't be able to tell what he was doing in the front!) The image of baby Ben came over and looked down with a grin at the real one.

"Welcome to baby land~ no going back now."

As Ben's life was ruined, and he was designed to never be able to get that 'excited' again unless he was crapping brains out(heck, he was going to be pulled from school and his parents would begin his new big baby life, treating him like the baby they thought he wanted to be, not knowing he was just a humiliation junkie) Charmcaster smirked in her jail cell.

Sure having to watch all the events unfold from sitting into of a toilet wasn't the way she'd hope to see the spell play out, not to mention it had been that bitch Gwen she had targeting, but this worked out in the end.

Gwen would suffer being the cousin of the big stinky baby and would likely end up having to change him and it wouldn't be too long now before her uncle broke her out. wincing as Ben started to baby babble though she did have one moment's regret.

'I mean, I'm evil and wanna take over the world but was making him a diaper perv too far?' She wondered, then smiled. 'Naaaah!'

The end

[equestrianwritingsstuff]

Drowning is amazing! Please continue!!!

Thank you! I am glad that you like it!

And I wrote it. It's a late post though, sorry.

Drowning Part 4

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3

@shydragonrider

Warnings: feverish whumpee, drugged whumpee, head trauma mention, pneumonia, pills (antibiotics), exhaustion, betrayal, talk of medical settings, mentions of attempted murder, anxiety, thoughts of anticipated retribution, nightmares

~

Hero scrambled to her feet, nervousness eating at her stomach. There was Villain, standing six feet tall and raging with anger, in her doorway. Not only did he look like he just went on a killing frenzy, he had a knife.

A knife and a true intent to kill.

"Villain," Hero cautioned, approaching the tall man. He glared, snarling down at Hero.

"I know you have him, Hero," he said, not even acknowledging Hero's quiet plea to step down. "Now, where is he before I bomb the place."

Hero noted that he still had a hospital gown on. His right forearm had blood dripping down it- the remnants of where he had ripped the IV out. The side of his head was still stitched up and hued in a deep royal purple shade. His damaged right eye was swollen, but not nearly as bruised as his temple.

"Where is he!" Villain hollered again and rushed at Hero. He stumbled a little bit and swayed as if a dense feeling of nausea washed over him- and considering the state of the villain's head, she wouldn't be surprised if he was indeed nauseous.

"He isn't here," Hero lied, but it was obvious that she didn't mean it.

"I know you took him home with you," Villain clenched his jaw, the bruise pulsating. "Why else wouldn't you visit me earlier?"

"Villain, I did visit you earlier," Hero tried to reason. "Remember?"

"No, no, no," Villain shook his head. "Only doctors and needles and fogginess and..." His voice trailed off ad his gaze darkened. "Not you."

"I'm sorry," Hero apologized, grabbing the villain's hands. She felt the knife loosening, but Villain didn't let go. Both breathed deeply, trying to calm themselves. Hero couldn't afford to get protective- if that was the correct word- and if Villain blew up again, by golly she would be.

But, the villain was obviously on another page. He suddenly punched Hero in the stomach, jabbed her jaw with the hilt, and lumbered into the house.

Hero doubled over, panting for breath as she tried to reorientate herself. After a good minute of puffing out breaths, she followed Villain.

She found him slamming his hip into her bedroom room. Instinctively, Hero lept on top of him, pulling him back. Thoughts rushed through her head. She had no means of restraints other than a pair of handcuffs in the bathroom cabinet- don't ask. She didn't even have a good enough room to lock such an explosive person in.

She had to take the handcuff route and somehow lead the maniac into the bathroom. Linking her arms around Villain's armpits, she attempted to drag the thrashing man down the hall, but, half-drugged and injured or not, he was still much taller and much bigger. He dug his heels deep into the hardwood floor and grit his teeth. He was going to kill Supervillain if it was the last thing he would do, and nothing, not even someone like Hero would stop him.

He yanked himself out of Hero's grasp and face planted into a wall, knocking down a sunset painting that Hero herself did. He weakly tried to use his arms to push himself back up, but they trembled and collapsed under his weight.

Hero returned her arms back to the position that caused Villain so much strife and dragged him. The villain had clearly exhausted himself to the point of compliance, so it really was an effortless task. She brought him to the bathroom, leaned his now lolling head against the baby blue wall and grabbed her horribly placed handcuffs. Putting them on deftly, she crouched down next to Villain.

"You are supposed to be in the hospital, you know," she lightly scolded him.

"I know," came the reply, so timid that Hero couldn't even correspond the rabid wolf that entered her den with the completely subdued fawn resting in her bathroom. His eyes were closing, too weary to stay open.

"Let's go get some sleep," Hero offered and pulled Villain to his shaky feet. But as she led him to the door, she noticed that he would not be able to make it to the living room without collapsing, so she scooped him up. Now that he was just hanging there limply, it was easy- there wasn't a fight, just complete and utter trust to allow the other to care for the wounded and exhausted one.

Once Villain was settled upon the couch, sleeping soundly, Hero went back upstairs to check on Supervillain. Unlocking the door with the key that worked for every lock, she pushed the door open and walked inside.

Hero scrunched up her nose. After spending sometime in fresh, lavender scented air, the revolting scent of sickness and sweat was like a trash can that had to be taken out to the curb.

But nonetheless, she walked over to the unconscious supervillain. His face was even paler, signifying that his fever spiked again, and he was shivering profoundly. She tossed another blanket over him and performed the hourly task of slipping the thermometer under his tongue. It beeped and like everytime, it revealed a nerve-wracking temperature.

Hero ran her hand through the grimey hair with a sigh and knelt down next to him. He was getting worse. Heck, he hardly looked like he was breathing, yet the consistent rise and collapse of his chest proved otherwise. Silent whimpers slipped through barely parted lips, a little trail of saliva streamed over parched lips. Eyes were closed, but barely. Hero could see distressed pupils shifting about as placid facial expressions contorted into ones of utter misery and pain.

"Hey," Hero whispered, grabbing his boiling hand. It didn't nothing to stop the unconscious torture Supervillain was enduring. His breaths sped up and he started to outwardly gasp, but never awoke.

"Supervillain?" Hero's voice was risen in pitch. "Hey, now. Wake up for me." She shook him, tapped repeatedly at his flushed cheeks, but nothing seemed to work.

Until he bolted up screaming.

No. Screaming was not the correct word for the desperate screech that tore itself away from Supervillain's face. It filled every crevice of the room- possibly even the house- with the haggard voice of terror. It made Hero cringe, her tired body jumping backwards. After the screaming festival was over with, Supervillain resumed a crying sound. Sobs turned into coughs as the sick man dealt with both illness from the pneumonia and whatever fear drove him into such a defensive fright.

Hero wrapped her arm around Supervillain, lethargically seating herself next to him. He turned his body over and pressed his face into Hero's side, relishing in the warming comfort it brought with a contented sigh. Soon after, he fell back asleep, mouth parting to draw in more precious oxygen.

Hero leaned against the pillow, allowing her ward to sleep cuddled up to her. Her own eyelids drooped, reminding her of the dire need to sleep. She contemplated sleeping next to the supervillain, but once Villain awoke it would be a catastrophe. Yet, the instinctual pull towards the awaiting slumber was too hard to resist. Hero scooted down into a more comfortable position, pulled Supervillain onto her chest and fell asleep next to him.

It was sometime before she felt something move beside her. Hero blearily opened her eyes- still heavy with left over sleep- to find Supervillain awake, still hugging her, but staring at something by the foot of the bed. At first Hero brushed it off as another feverish hallucination, but then she saw a shadow move.

Her eyes opening all the way, Hero's head darted to where her other unplanned guest was leisurely standing, using his knife to pick at his nails. Didn't she remove that toy from him?

"What did I say?" Villain asked, pressing his palms into the bedrail. "I say: you are housing Supervillain. No, she replies, blushing the entire time. And then what do I find? The criminal mastermind himself sleeping over the little princess with the tiara. Figures." Villain rolled his eyes, or his eye because the other was still sealed shut by the purple tarp that obscured the machine of sight from the world.

"I-i couldn't just leave him."

"He tried to kill you."

Supervillain whimpered, cowering deeper into bed as Villain's blantant mention of the past triggered his anxiety. Hero would surely get back at him once he was healed. She was just waiting so that she could redo the damage already done to his lungs. Make him suffer the agony he was experiencing. Supervillain let out a quiet sob and squeezed his eyes shut.

As complex as these thoughts seemed, the thinking of them only took a moment because soon, Hero was replying to Villain's accusation.

"And you tried to kill him," she retorted. "Twice. I stopped you both times."

"And knocked me out and hospitalized me in the process. Hero, we are the victims here. Not him," Villain shot a pointed glare at the scared supervillain with a sneer.

"You gave him pneumonia! He can die!"

"Okay, okay. One, I could've died from head trauma. Two, if he was going to die, take him to a freaking hospital. And three, you helped push him into the tank. Remember that."

The memory swarmed Hero like bees- the reminder of her own grave mistake making her feel a rush of guilt.

"I shouldn't have done that and I can't take him to the hospital or he will be arrested."

"I could've been arrested."

"Not everything's about you!"

Villain was silent, chewing at his bottom lip. "This isn't a decision of intellect, darling, housing him does not justify yours or mine or his actions. Not to mention how much you are going regret this," he pointed out, flinging the knife in his hands carefully.

"Why would I regret this. I am-"

"The Hero Agnecy dear. Did you think that your little medic friend thought it was normal for you to call my injuries in? Or are you that naive?"

Hero was silent, stunned into utter silence, but Villain's words. Medic never came. She never came to help Hero, but that didn't mean that she reported Hero's possible betrayal of the agency. It didn't mean...

She never came.

And Hero brought Villain to the hospital. That was all the proof needed for the Agency to put her on a watchlist.

"You need to go back!" Hero suddenly exclaimed, jostling Supervillain who was just about to doze off again.

"To where? The mangy excuse for a hospital?" Villain snorted. "Heck no." He chuckled. "They will put me back under with restraints this time. The chances of escape will go from 95.6% to zero in a matter of seconds. Its suicidal, not to mention probably stupid beyond reason."

"They are gonna think I busted you out..." Hero's voice trailed off when she saw Villain raise his eyebrow mockingly.

"Not everything is about you," he mimicked in perfect representation of Hero's prior exclamation that could've once been described as an arguement's winning statement.

"Shut up."

Suddenly, Supervillain started hacking, but this time around not only mucus left his lungs, but blood in the color of the deepest crimson.

"Hmm," Villain stayed silent for moment, brow ceasing. Hero thought she could literally see the gears clicking and turning in his head.

"You could be right," Villain agreed. "Going back would be beneficial. Especially for me." He grinned wickedly.

"How?"

"Well... Supervillain needs medicine and care, antibiotics to kick this pneumonia," Villain started to pace. "I could go back and gather some. Tell the docs that I escaped on my own... but for a price."

Hero got a sense of Rumpelstiltskin's classic, "all the magic comes with a price" speech with the twirl of his scaly pointer finger, from the series Once Upon a Time.

"Name it."

"All of my criminal charges are dropped, meaning I get to leave that hospital when I deem ready. Not when the stupid heroes decide that I am redeemed enough."

Well, uh, that... Hero shook her head. She never thought of it, but antibiotics were needed to make Supervillain better. She had to go through with it.

"Second," Villain counted off with his fingers as he threw sarcastically intended smirks. "I get a new motorcycle. Your boyfriend trashed it."

"He's not-" Hero stopped when she saw Villain raise an eyebrow.

"Shush, honey. Lemme talk," He drawled. "I will bring you the antibiotics if you swear you will heed my requests."

All sense of caution and foreboding were lost as Hero rummaged her thoughts over the promise. Supervillain's health for two simple things. It was easy enough.

"Deal," she said, nearly involuntary, but that wasn't entirely accurate because she indeed wanted this.

Villain smirk, running his tongue over his lips as he bounded over to shake Hero's hand. The second the two's flesh met meant that the deal was struck. Hero couldn't back away, nor could Villain.

Hero was in the kitchen tenderly feeding Supervillain some soup and prompting him to drink some gatorade when Villain returned triumphantly with a large red bottle.

"Sweet!" Hero exclaimed and grabbed the much needed tuberware. She opened it and admired the pills inside.

"One twice a day," Villain instructed, sitting down in the empty chair next to Hero. His eyes glinted with excited anticipation, narrowing slightly at the edges at the way Hero regarded the antibiotics.

She then took one and opened Supervillain's jaw. He didn't even attempt to resist and compliantly allowed her to maneuver his mouth around. Even though swallowing the hefty pill was an ordeal in itself, he managed.

Hero, seemingly satisfied, picked him up and carried him to the living room to nap on the couch. Villain followed behind her, shooting glances at his phone every few seconds.

Hero propped him against her shoulder and flicked on the television. A comedy show was on. Supervillain glanced up at it before digging his head into Hero's shoulders, completely disinterested.

Supervillain was asleep, Hero was resting with a relaxed look of tranquility on her face, and Villain was draped across an armchair completely absorbed in his phone and periodically looking out the window when the door made a knocking noise.

Hero tensed, and looked at Villain who had stood up.

"Wait here," he said, but there was no ounce of anticipation in his voice. Hero furrowed her forehead. There was even a hint of buoyancy in his typical monotone voice. Even though he usually spoke in a sarcastic air, he always seemed to drawl.

But this was different. Abnormal. Eerie. And a bit- if not very- concerning.

Hero stood up, leaning Supervillain against the armrest and pressed her ear to the recently shut door.

It was Villain who was speaking, that monotone that would stand out anywhere.

"I have them," he said. "I have them both."

Hero's heart dropped when she heard the click of guns.

[secret-engima]

In your LC Birbs verse, what would have happened if Ardyn had found Ozpin before Ramuh had intervened?

hgfgf forgive how long I’ve been perching on this ask but it’s just- has many possible answers and so I was hoarding it a little. Also I shall proceed to meet timeline for the sake of Prompto’s existence, just be aware XD.

-If Ardyn had found Ozpin before Ramuh had, he would have likely been in denial at first. He would have likely just been skulking around during a bout of restlessness, since as the Accursed sleep isn’t really an option very often, and found this isolated clone tank. Because the clone in that tank is dark skinned, at first he wouldn’t even have suspected the child was his. But then Ozpin, dimly sensing magic outside his tank and desperate to be free of this constant sedated haze, reaches out and Ardyn.

-Freezes.

-He knows that magic.

-He presses close to the tank, hands rising up to shakily touch the cold glass as the little one inside (probably only about half a year old in this AU? If that) stirs faintly. Gold eyes fight open to half-lidded cracks, and little fingers struggle through the haze of sedation to reach for Ardyn on an almost subconscious need-help-please-please. Ardyn feels his breath stutter as he looks at those gold, gold eyes and feels magic that burns slightly at his Scourge in a mix of LC-Oracle-Ardyn-Aera and feels the pieces collide.

-He yanks himself away from the tank and stalks away. It can’t be. It can’t be. The Scourge is toying with his mind again, making him see things, feel things.

-He mentally slaps at the magic that desperately reaches for him, and tells himself he feels no regret when it turns from hopeful-pleading to terrified and shrinks away.

-Ardyn tells himself he was imagining things for a month. Maybe two. Maybe far more than that, time is so hard for him to grasp. He tries to forget. But he can’t. He obsesses. The sight of the child in the tank haunts him whenever his eyelids shut, burns at him whenever he visits the lab after and catches a flicker of magic before it vanishes again.

-Finally, the need to know is too great. He returns and breaks into Besithia’s private office. He sorts through the papers about the MT project with growing frustration, yanks open locked drawers with raw strength of the desperate and paws through files of words that make little sense until he finds it.

-Project: Remnant stares back at him, a collection of photos of the tank child, of reports of various infant experiments that he cannot fully understand but sound like they would hurt (for doesn’t even the mildest strike of electricity hurt no matter how ultimately harmless it is?) and ... his origins. A project to clone the Accursed (to clone ARDYN) and while he doesn’t understand all the fancy words and self boasting littered in the reports, he understands the gist. That the initial clones all failed, daemonified within days. That Besithia had to eventually combine two extra strands of DNA in order to stabilize the child now in the tank. One of those strands was just a placeholder, a sample he had on hand that is at fault for the subject’s dark skin. The other strand-

-Tombs of the Oracles. The First Oracle.

-Aera.

-Aera-Aera-her-child-his-child-AERA’SCHILD

-Things get hazy. He remembers standing in Besithia’s quarters while the man writhed and screamed and paid for daring to desecrate Aera’s grave. He remembers setting ... a lot of things on fire, his armiger tearing open the walls as he raged.

-He remembers the crash of glass and black blood pouring from his arms before they healed as he pulled Aera’s drugged child free of the tank. The little one was so small, so alone, and somewhere with that thought in his head he thinks he snatched up another child on the way even though it was of Besithia’s blood, because there’s a screaming in his head that isn’t human but isn’t entirely the insanity of daemons insisting that hatchlings need playmates to grow up properly.

-He comes back to himself far away from the ruins of the laboratory, trekking through the wilderness with not one, but two children in his arms, one of them an infant barely a few months old. The other is his- is Aera’s- is their son. The infant is shivering and he takes a moment to securely wrap it in a spare coat (he didn’t intend to steal one of Besithia’s little MTs but he did and so this child is HIS now) before inspecting his blood child. The little boy is still drugged into sleep, unresponsive to Ardyn’s careful prodding, and Ardyn feels something inside him crack in pain as he inspects and realizes that the boy is no longer an infant, but a toddler. Perhaps two years old, bordering on three even.

-How long had he spent running away in denial while Aera’s child floated in that tank at Besithia’s mercy? Too long. Unforgivably long.

-“Oh my little one,” he breathes hoarsely, “Oh Aera. I abandoned our son. I would strike myself down were he not in need of me.”

-He carts both children through the wilds, slinking into the nearest town only to steal as many supplies as he can before flitting away again. The blond infant he’s stolen is not drugged and so wake up periodically. Ardyn had no real intention of getting attached, but his own son has reawakened things inside him, and the realization that this tiny infant is already well trained to not cry even when hungry or in discomfort makes his stomach churn and his armiger flicker briefly into being. He tries to distract himself from his worries over his sleeping son by fussing over the infant, making silly faces and cooing as he tends the infant who will be his own child’s playmate and little foster sibling. The little one needs a name.

-He will decide later. He must name Aera’s child first.

-He must ensure Aera’s child is alright first.

-The toddler finally wakes up on the second day of their travels, sluggish and confused. Ardyn feels precious, precious magic unfurl sleepily, tentatively little fingers of energy trying to pinpoint his new surroundings. Ardyn reaches back, eagerly, instinctively.

-The flinch from his son as gold eyes snap awake in fear, the way too-young magic all but recoils from him, hurts worse than Somnus’s blade through his heart all those centuries ago. The toddler in his arms gasps faintly, looking around, wide awake and confused-afraid. Ardyn shakes free of his shock and tries to hum a soothing note, but all it gets him is his child clumsily trying to raise his arms over his head like he expects a blow.

-Ardyn remembers that first meeting, that first sighting in the tank, the way magic had reached for him half asleep and needy and so vulnerable.

-He remembers how he had lashed out and slapped it away.

-It’s painfully, achingly, burningly clear that his son remembers it too, even though he shouldn’t, even though he should be too young to recall that horrible mistake, and Ardyn has to fight to breathe past the guilt screaming in his skull even louder than the Scourge. He can’t lose his mind, not yet, not again. He can’t lose his mind or run away or try fruitlessly to execute himself for the crime of hurting Aera’s child, because the little one (little ones, he hasn’t forgotten the burbling infant) need a caretaker and Ardyn is the only one (the only one who knows, who can be trusted, a magic child will suffer if given to non magical parents and he wouldn’t trust Somnus’s bloodline as far as he could throw Ifrit).

-He talks soothingly, mindlessly, trying to get the toddler in his arms to uncurl. He does eventually, looking around in fear-confusion, but his magic stays coiled tight inside him, and Ardyn’s tentative poke at it is met with another flinch and a wild-eyed gasp of terror.

...

-Ozpin wakes up and doesn’t know what’s going on or where he is. At first he reaches out, but the moment he brushes up against another, larger, magic, memories of Salem and half-formed impressions of this same magic striking him in anger that might be a dream or might be truth make him retreat and curl in on himself. He feels small, helpless, there is an eerie silence in his head where only faded memories lie instead of a new voice and a new host and he doesn’t understand.

-Talking draws him out of the haze of half-panic, but when large, dangerous magic pokes at his core again he recoils, expecting it to turn into fangs and the burning agony Salem was so very good at unleashing. It’s been so, so long since he felt any other magic than Salem’s or his own that he cannot stop himself from assuming pain will follow. That all magic not his own is intended for pain.

-The man holding him falters in his speech, like he’s in physical pain, and Ozpin uncurls again to peer at him. Is he injured? Who even is he?

-Ardyn, Ozpin learns as they travel. The man’s name is Ardyn, and Ozpin is in a toddler’s body that seems to belong to no one but him, there is another child, a blond infant who doesn’t look like he’s related to Ardyn or Ozpin but is with them anyway, who gurgles too-quiet in the way abused children do. Ozpin thinks, hazily, that this man might have rescued the pair of them from somewhere horrible. Or he might be at fault for that horrible place.

-Ardyn names the infant Prompto, and calls Ozpin “Zagreus” and Ozpin is too wary to tell him he already has a name. They’re traveling through the wilderness, one that Ozpin doesn’t know, and the moon above their heads is strange and unbroken.

-Ardyn has magic. Ozpin is too wary still to do more than flinch and hold painfully, obediently still whenever the man cautiously brushes it against Ozpin’s senses, even though he knows it hurts Ardyn to be rejected so, even though he knows he should be brave and reach out in return, because he doesn’t think this man has ever hurt him. Not yet at least. Not intentionally. The man is terrible at self care, so Ozpin thinks those repeated stretches of forgetting to feet him and Prompto are unintentional. Ozpin works up the nerve to keep track of time himself and repeatedly (hesitantly) tug on Ardyn’s coat when he thinks it’s time to feed Prompto and himself.

-Ardyn calls Ozpin his son. Ozpin has yet to figure out if that’s true or not. If he mingled magic, he’d be able to tell he thinks, because there is a strange new magic woven into his core, bolstering and healing his long-faded green and mingling into it with strands of blue and gold he can see behind his eyelids, but- he can’t.

-Every time he thinks of trying, all he can think of is Salem. And all the ways she killed him. All the times she forced their magics to mingle so he could feel her rage and hate and possessive, poisonous love as she carved him open and ended yet another lifetime.

-It doesn't help that Ardyn is ill. It’s not Grimm Darkness, he thinks after the first three panic attacks that trigger when he glimpses the man’s sickness. But it is very similar. Too similar. A part of Ozpin, his gold magic, itches to reach out and fix it, but after seen Ardyn look more Grimm than man when tearing apart the strange night monsters that sometimes hunt them, it’s all the self control he has not to grab Prompto and run into the wilderness. To let Ardyn pick them up and continue on their way. They will die without Ardyn, he knows that.

-It doesn’t make him any less afraid.

-It takes a long, long time to be able to fight down that fear even a little, to not stiffen in preparation for a strike when shaking hands pet his hair, to not duck his head and breath slow when Ardyn looks at him and speaks to him, trying to coax out a response that remains frozen silent on Ozpin’s tongue. He knows he’s acting poorly. But despite his infection, despite being so very hauntingly like Salem in some ways, Ardyn never loses his temper at either of them. He never turns violent or raises a hand against them, or withholds food or clothes or stuffed toys when Prompto misbehaves or Ozpin once again recoils from the touch of Ardyn’s magic.

-They’re wandering another continent entirely, and Prompto has already started babbling his first choppy words (Ze and Dyn respectively), by the time Ozpin works up the nerve to let his magic out into the air again. To probe at the air around them while Ardyn goes desperately, fragilely still and watches him without daring to reach out for fear of scaring Ozpin. It takes a lot of nerve, but he manages to brush his magic against Ardyn’s in gratitude-trust before retreating again, exhausted from pushing past so many lifetimes of Salem’s pain to do even that. He’ll try actually speaking aloud another day. Maybe.

-A few days later though, Ozpin hears two birds cawing hoarsely in the air and feels something familiar, and suddenly he’s racing away from Ardyn as fast as his tiny legs can carry him, chasing those birds in the sky and reaching for them with magic and need because that feels like-

-The birds plummet from the sky, and a moment later, two scraggly, wild eyed children with black hair and bright red eyes burst out of the underbrush to tackle him with gleeful cries.

-He’s found Raven and Qrow.

[pokemoncreepypasta]

Tommy Boy

[STORY SOURCE]

It was one of those sleepovers, just me and my bestie, when we got bored and had a dumb idea. Well, she got the brilliant idea anyways.

Apparently, she thought it would be “fun” to try and perform one of those summoning rituals, even though she knew anything and everything paranormal gave me nightmares for weeks. Which is why I think she wanted to do it so bad.

Of course, I wouldn’t willingly go along with the ritual, so my friend had to persuade me by offering her Darkrai plushie which I had coveted for a few weeks now. I remember wondering if the risk of eternal damnation was worth it for just a toy...

Apparently the answer was yes, since I eventually went along with this freaking idea.

The requirement for the ritual was paper, pencil, a candle, 6 random dolls, and 60 minutes of your time.

It had to be in a dark house, or in the middle of the night. We did it around midnight, after everyone else was asleep.

The first step was to put the 6 dolls in a circle.

Then draw a summoning circle on the middle of the paper and put it in the center of the circle of dolls.

After placing it on the floor, recite, “Any entity, you may enter.”

Wait for a while, around a minute, then prick your finger and put your bloody fingerprint in the middle of the summoning circle.

Recite, “By blood we are bound.”

You then turn off all the lights, if any are still left on, then light your candle and recite, “Whomever loses may never leave.”

Afterwards, you stumble around in the dark and play hide-and-seek with whatever you just summoned, if you even successfully summoned anything.

You must switch the room you’re hiding in every 10 minutes or else you will automatically be found by default. If you candle doesn’t blow out within and hour, then you win, and allegedly whatever spirit you summoned will be bound to your eternal service.

If it does blow out, then you’ve been found and you lose. Whatever happens afterwards depends on whatever spirit, peaceful or malevolent, that you summoned.

While me and my friend were huddled in the laundry room whispering and giggling about stupid things, the candle flickered out. I promptly flipped and hid in the corner with my hands over my head waiting for the worst to happen, while my friend laughed at pathetic little me.

After about five minutes of trying to convince me I wasn’t going to die, she told me she had blown out the candle herself. That made me feel a little better, even thought I still didn’t believe it.

Though, the Darkrai plushie I received the next day helped wash my worries away.

Though it wasn’t enough to wash away everything else that was about to happen.

Later on that day after my friend left, my little sister had begged me to let her play my Pokémon Emerald. I let her, since all she did was pretty much give free training to my Pokémon.

I was watching TV, and was a bit peeved when she ran into the room and started nagging me about a green Trapinch, so I waved her off. It took me a few seconds before I realized my grave mistake, so I quickly snatched my GameBoy back.

I was pleasantly surprised to see my sis had somehow managed to find a shiny Trapinch.

I told her to back off and let me handle this, since I wasn’t about to let her try to catch it. Although, things looked bad as my Pokémon were all too strong to weaken it.

But I was feeling confident with over 40 Ultra Balls in stock along with a few backups, so I kept throwing and throwing until one of them worked.

The trouble was, this stubborn Trapinch didn’t want me as its trainer. 

I might not have been able to weaken it, but it still chewed through nearly every one of my PokéBalls.

I was awash with horror at the thought of failing my first ever shiny. That’s when my sister offered to catch it for me.

I didn’t want to hand it over to her, but then my mind rationalized it by thinking that if she failed it, losing the Trapinch would be her fault, not mine.

I was shocked again as she handed me back the GameBoy less than a minute later with a brand new shiny Trapinch in my party named Tommy Boy.

The only response I could think of at first was, “Tommy Boy? Why name it that?”

“Because, it’s a boy and I wanted to name it Tommy, so Tommy Boy!”

I didn’t even want to know what went on in my sister’s head, but I quickly stopped caring and all I could do was just stare at my newfound shiny.

I went to immediately test him out and see what he could do against a wild Sandshrew.

“Tommy Boy refuses to attack!” 

I tried to fight, but I got this refusal instead. I tried to attack the Sandshrew again, but I just kept getting the same message.

“This is a load of crap.”

“Oh, I can make him attack!” My sister stole the GameBoy back and then proceeded to defeat the Sandshrew with no further issue.

“What the... How did you do that?!” My sister gave me a stupid grin, “He listened to me because I’m his mommy!” Sure, whatever, I thought privately to myself.

I was happy to let her train this Trapinch into a Flygon for me, anyway. I was puzzled by its behavior, to say the very least, and decided not asking anything would be better for my health and just kept watching TV.

I thought she would grow bored of training the Pokémon, but no. For the rest of the day and deep into the night, she worked tirelessly to gain experience for Tommy Boy. I wondered how someone could stand training the same Pokémon for so many hours without getting bored at all.

Finally, around 11 PM, she had to go to bed. Unwillingly, she saved the game and turned it off, but not before saying good night to Tommy Boy and kissing the GameBoy goodnight.

I was still allowed to stay up longer, so as soon as she was in bed, I quietly grabbed my GameBoy out from under her bed sheets. Emerald was already in, so I simply switched the game on.

Once the game was loaded, I saw that Tommy Boy was the only one in the party, for some reason.

But he was already evolved into a Flygon, and at level 66. Too bad she only had interest in training Tommy Boy, so much that she decided to stuff all my other team members in the PC.

I started to leave the desert where my sister had last saved when I ran into a wild Baltoy. I lovingly sighed as Tommy Boy came out sparkling. Then, my expression became a bit more serious.

That freaking pixel better listen to me this time.

I clicked on “Fight”. He had new moves: Crunch, DragonBreath, Sandstorm, and Hyper Beam.

I selected Hyper Beam, and desperately hoped that he would obey. I held my breath.

“Tommy Boy refuses to attack!”

“Dang it!!” I yelled at the screen.

Tommy Boy got hit with and attack, which didn’t do too much damage. I kept cursing at the Pokémon. I couldn’t believe I had a shiny in the palm of my hands and it wouldn’t even listen to me!

I selected DragonBreath, despite knowing he wouldn’t obey anyways.

“Tommy Boy wants his mommy!”

I gawked at this line of text. I surely hadn’t seen any Pokémon do that before. I almost wanted to laugh, the way that line was written almost sounded funny, but I was off-put and confused. Tommy Boy got hit with another attack.

“Come on, can’t you at least show some pity for your aunt?!” I spoke aloud to the game, like my sister had started doing. Tommy Boy offered me no pity and kept refusing. I didn’t want to deal with him getting knocked out, so I just turned the game off and begrudgingly went to bed.

The next morning, I found my little sister leaning back in a chair contentedly playing the GameBoy. I realized she snatched it from my room while I was asleep, which I guess was an equal exchange. I asked her if anything weird was happening with the GameBoy, but she said all was fine.

Then she asked me why I was playing on the GameBoy last night.

“Uhh... because it’s my game? I should still be able to play it too.”

She eyed me. “Just don’t mess with Tommy Boy again. Just because you’re his aunt doesn’t mean he likes you.”

She immediately changed her threatening disposition by cheerily calling out, “Oh, good boy, Tommy! You showed that Sandshrew! You make mommy so proud!”

I decided to shrug it off. I wasn’t about to get into an argument with my sister about a video game.

A few days into this, I was over her shoulder watching her play.

She was in the desert, and kept battling the Pokémon there over and over again. Tommy Boy acted like a normal Pokémon, and did nothing unusal.

“Why do you only battle Pokémon in the desert?” “Because, Tommy Boy only likes to battle Pokémon here.” She kept playing, as if everything was normal. After a moment, I thought of another question, “Why will he only obey you and not me?” “I told you, he’ll only listen to his mommy.” “It’s my game he’s on, so I should be his mommy, shouldn’t I? How does he know YOU’RE his mommy?” My sister paused for a moment. After a minute she responded, “Tommy Boy says screw you.” She giggled, while I gave up and left, fuming.

However, days turned into weeks, and my sister had been spending our entire vacation so far just sitting in her room. Apparently, she had started neglecting to eat or drink anything, and would only ever fall asleep when she passed out, GameBoy still in her hands.

It started getting so bad that my mom told me at one point she threw up blood. We’d tried taking the game way from her, but she’d screech at us like she was possessed and tear the whole house apart trying to find it.

Mom said they were arranging for her to see a therapist and get an opinion on what the heck we should do, but for the meantime she was allowed to keep the game, to make things easier for everyone until getting an appointment.

But I wasn’t satisfied with that. I needed to intervene.

One night, I decided to work up the nerve to confront her about her addiction. I found her in her room, as always. She was on the bed with the covers over her head. One would think she was sleeping, but the quiet sounds of the GameBoy gave her away.

I pulled the sheets away from her and she hissed briefly at me before continuing with her eyes glued to the screen. I hardly recognized my happy-go-lucky sister. She looked half dead. I tried holding a conversation with her, but all I got were distant “Mm-hm”s and “It’s fine.” The only way I could get her to talk to me was to attempt to take the game away, to which she immediately responded.

“NO! He’s my baby!!! He NEEDS me!” My sister screeched at me. 

“IT is an inanimate object! It doesn’t NEED anything!” I yelled back at her, clutching her arm that was holding the GameBoy. I managed to rip the Emerald cartridge out of the game while it was still running, causing it to let out horrible screeching sounds. I then pretended to throw it out an open window into the darkness outside of our house, to which my sister immediately pushed me onto the floor and jumped out into the yard after it. 

Picking myself up, I noticed she had dropped my GameBoy, too, so I discreetly plopped the game back into the system and stuffed it into my pocket.

I spitefully closed the window behind my sister. She could come back inside once she realized what this game was doing to her.

What... WAS this game doing to her, I wondered?

Once my sister had collapsed from exhaustion and been carried back to bed by my confused dad (to whom I lyingly explained I had no involvement in this), I decided I would find out for myself.

When I booted up the game, I was in the middle of my secret base in Route 120.

I checked my party to find only Tommy Boy, at a whopping level 100. Since it hand only taken her a day to get him to level 66, she must’ve reached 100 long ago, but she’d still been playing this all month.

Was she seriously doing the same battles over and over, despite him not being able to go any higher...?

When I exited the party screen and was back in the base though, a circle of six Pokédolls were around me that I hadn’t noticed before, which quite frankly creeped me out.

When I tried to move, a text box popped up saying, “Any entity may enter.”

“By blood we are bound.”

A strange red circle appeared in the middle of the circle of dolls, and I quickly realized I didn’t want anything to do with whatever was about to go down.

I tried to step away again, but another text box appeared. 

“Whomever loses may never leave.”

I tried running for dear life out the exit, but I was stopped.

“You may never leave.”

A shiny Flygon appeared in the middle of the circle and let out what I assumed was its cry, albeit I was too horrified for my life at that moment to care much for details, and the game froze.

I shut the game off, stared at it for a second, then suddenly every memory of what I had done earlier in the summer came flooding back at once. I knew exactly what Tommy Boy was now, and I was absolutely terrified.

I wanted to hold myself, cry my eyes out and throw this game into the woods where no one would ever find it, but then I thought about my sister. I thought about how if I didn’t get rid of Tommy Boy now, things would probably get worse and soon I’d wake up to find my little sister stabbing herself to death, or me.

Through my tears, I turned the game back on.

“It’s just you and me now, Tommy. Rematch. Double or nothing.”

If he won, he could take us both. But if I won, he would take his sorry demon hide back to wherever it was he came from. He seemed keen on my offer, as the game started up with no problems.

Once the game was up and running, I found my character in the middle of a dark cave. 

I instinctively went to my party to make someone use Flash, but then I remembered more than likely Tommy Boy was going to be there.

I braced myself...

But I was pleasantly surprised to find there were just some random Pokémon instead.

Of course, I didn't have the HM for Flash. Or the TM for Dig. Or any Escape Rope.

...

Wonderful.

So I stumbled around in the dark, trying to find my way out of this mess.

I kept bumping into walls and rocks, climbing up and down countless ladders, but there was no exit in sight. Or any trainers in sight, for that matter.

In fact, I hadn't run into any wild encounters either, until I came to the conclusion that there was only one Pokémon I would be running into here, and that I should avoid it like the plague.

Was spamming Super Repel going to protect me from a level 100 demonic Flygon? Probably not, but I couldn't be too careful.

After some time nowhere near an hour, I found myself in a small room that had nothing in it. I tried to go back the way I came, but I was stopped. My character wouldn't move. I started to tense up again.

The light surrounding me in-game was snuffed out, and all that could be seen was darkness. I was about to turn the game off before something happened, but before I could, something happened.

“Found you.”

The text in red popped up with a Flygon cry to accompany it, and the game froze again.

"No!" I yelled desperately, flickering the game off and on again. "One chance, give me one more chance!"

Instead, when I loaded the file, I was met with a glitchy, pixelated mess of a screen flashing multicolored lights while blaring the loudest beeping noise I'd ever heard in my life that sent my ears and eyes ringing. I quickly shut off the game and stared at the empty screen in disbelief for I don't know how long.

Had I lost the game?

I couldn't accept that. I was going to play this game all night if I had to. One of us would be leaving tonight, and it wasn't going to be me. Bracing myself, I tightly closed my eyes and powered the game on again. I expected another cacophony of buggy sounds and flashing lights, but surprisingly, I was able to boot up my save file just fine.

But, unfortunately, I didn't get the Round 3 of hide-and-seek that I had vainly asked for.

Instead, I was at the bottom of Mt. Pyre.

I still had the same team as before, unable to Fly or Surf away from this nightmarish set of circumstances that I'd been put in.

I don't know what Tommy Boy was getting at, or what he wanted from me now, but I knew the only way to understand exactly what I was dealing with would be to play along, just for now.

My only option left was to climb Mt. Pyre.

I felt a mounting suspense that kept rising each floor I went to, although I didn't know why. Maybe it was because every floor, even indoors, were all unusually foggy.

However, the wild Shuppet started to make quick work of my low leveled Pokémon.

I then got the sudden idea that maybe this wasn't such a bad thing after all. If my entire party fainted, I could get sent back to a Pokémon Center and escape the boundaries of Tommy Boy's "game."

When they all fainted though, I didn't get sent back. Instead, I was still trapped on Mt. Pyre.

All of the Pokémon that were protecting me were gone now.

I still ran into Shuppet, except I kept sending out a large "?" where a Pokémon should've been.

I kept whiting out, only to return to the position I'd started the battle in.

After a nerve-wracking climb though the graveyard, I reached the top.

Surrounding the pedestal at the top were six PokéBalls.

As I checked each one, a picture of a Pokémon would pop up.  They seemed really familiar, and soon I realized all the Pokémon here were part of the team I was just using.

After I checked the sixth Pokémon, I found my character to be trapped in the center of the pedestal with no way out.

I frantically mashed the D-Pad in hopes of finding some way to escape.

In the midst of my panic, a glowing red circle materialized on the ground, connecting all the PokéBalls surrounding the pedestal, with me still in the center.

I remember at that moment thinking, I'm going to die I'm going to die I'm going to die, and I wholeheartedly believed I was going to.

Then, a large text box in all red with a Flygon cry popped up...

“YOU MAY NEVER LEAVE.”

That right there sealed the deal.

I wasted no shred of time pulling out that Emerald cartridge and cutting it into an unrecognizable pile of green plastic with my scissors.

In my desperation, I brushed the remains of the cartridge into my trash can, wrapped up the trash bag, and went to the extent of escaping through my window and throwing it into the woods. Screw littering, screw the police, I didn't want that thing in my house.

And especially screw Tommy Boy. Screw his little game, screw the thought of him having any sort of control over me.

The only way to win is not to play, and I made sure no one would ever play this game again.

The next morning, my much more well-rested little sister asked where my GameBoy was, and I was about to tell her she was never allowed to touch that thing for as long as she lives, but then she asked to play Mario Party Advance on it.

I was baffled, to say the least, but found no problem in it and let her play it. She showed no signs of becoming obsessed and got bored of playing it after an hour, so I was relieved and assumed that the worst was over.

You can be sure I am not, and will never, plan on performing any more summoning rituals any time soon.

Thankfully, my little sister's gone back to being completely normal. If anything, her only sign of change is that she's getting into that "girly stage". She'll get Pokémon plushies and sit them all in a circle and play tea party with them in her room. At least, that's what I think she's doing with them.

Doesn't matter to me though, I'm busy with my own things. I'm happily content with my dear Darkrai plush that took entirely too much effort out of my life to obtain. I feel really bad for neglecting him these past few weeks, but it's okay.

I won't be giving any more of my time or attention to anyone else except my little baby.

[orcusnox]

It means they don't know where she died. It could have been in a contaminated zone. It could not have been. Putting something personal on the grave is supposed to tell everyone which it is.

If they die in the contamination, they come back. It's unnatural, but if there are personal things left on the grave - a diary, letters, a favourite toy - they're going to go through that. People think it's because they're trying to remember what they were before the contamination.

All the better to fool everyone, they say.

If they haven't died in the contamination, they're just dead. The personal belongings left on the grave remain undisturbed.

Like the letters written to my daughter.

Having a drink at the biggest bar in town is a mistake. There is a lot of condolences, and even more questions about how the war is going. People want to know that it will end soon, and that the focus will switch to getting rid of the contamination.

There's nothing to say to appease them, really. Men in suits who have never suffered a day in their lives make decisions the rest of us live with. Such is the world.

There's no surprise when a shock of blonde hair catches my attention. Maybe, years ago, there would have been, but survival has been too much a part of my life for too long now. I leave the beer I was nursing on the bar and slip outside, heading for the graveyard.

She's beautiful. Even with the snarling expression on her face, her fingers curled like talons. She looks so much like her mother.

"Did you try to find me after the first letter?" I ask, because I'd always known it was a risk to send it.

"You killed her," is the response that growls up from the centre of her chest.

I nod. "Because she was like you are now."

"You killed my mother because you were scared that she'd kill you," she says.

I shake my head. "I killed her because she was never supposed to be contaminated." I shake off my glove, showing off my own talons. "It was never supposed to be her."

Indecision flashes through her, and I wish I could hug her. Comfort her, console her.

"The contamination doesn't contaminate everyone," I explain. "It was an experimental military drug. She... She didn't trust it and she tried to talk to me, tried to tell me to stop takng it but... It's a drug. I couldn't stop, even though she was making sense and I was starting to want to." My voice shook.

She takes a small step towards you, listening.

"She took it one night. And she changed. Before the contamination spill, she was the first one to ever be contaminated."

"So you killed her," she says, another step closer.

"So I killed her," I agree, not telling her about the way her mother had almost disemboweled me, erratic and strong and terrifying. It had been a fight for my life, and the moment I'd started to think I might die, I remembered her.

My daughter.

She'd kept me alive for years, and if I can get her to come with me, to help me, she'll keep me alive for many more years.

See, the thing is, I hadn't lied. Part of the reason the contamination had been so successful in the early days was because once infected, lying became impossible. They hadn't even meant for that to be a side effect, but it was. And I'd been on that stuff for years, so I knew how to say enough of the truth and still not tell it all.

Because as my daughter collapses into my arms, sobbing, my arms around her, consoling her like I'd always wanted to, I find the spot that acts as a sort of shut down button for the contaminated and press it. She went limp.

It had been a risk to send the letter, but my handlers needed to see how my daughter reacted to the contamination. Would she be like her mother, or would she be like me?

I'm happy she's like me. She can help me now. Help win the war.

You’ve just got back from the war after several years. Each day you wrote to your daughter. You came back to find your letters piled on her grave.

[fanmoose12]

Partners

Characters: Petra Ral, Levi, Hanji Zoe x Levi Genre: Action / Mystery / Romance Rating: T

Detective!au

Summary: when Petra was promoted to a detective and partnered up with legendary Levi Ackerman, she felt like the happiest person in the world.

But, as she soon found out, detective Ackerman she used to admire so much was actually a far cry from the ideal policeman Petra thought he was. He was rude, harsh and easily annoyed. And, in addition, he still hadn’t moved on from the death of his previous partner - detective Hange Zoe.

Chapter 11/?

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Сhapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Сhapter 7

Сhapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

With every word from Levi's mouth, Erwin's face grew darker and darker.

"Fuck." He declared, as soon as Levi had finished. "Fuck," he repeated, rubbing his temples. He took a deep, heavy sigh, and when he blinked, the tense expression was miraculously gone, the usual look, full of determination and conviction, taking its place.

"So no sign of forced entry?” he asked, calm and collected and completely devoid of the previous frustration. “No sign of struggle? And no sign of Petra?"

"Yes, sir." Oluo confirmed with a frantic nod, which reminded Levi of a stupid toy dog Hange once put in his car.

Had the matter at hand been at least a little less grave, perhaps, he’d even crake a smile at the comparison. Hange definitely would have. Alas…

“And do we know who’s behind it?”

“No,” Levi replied. “Hange suspects one of Zeke’s man, but she also thinks some third party is involved.”

Erwin accepted his answer, slowly scratching his chin. “And where is Hange herself?"

“She went to talk to Zeke to ask if he knows something, and…" Levi faltered, not sure if he should share this information with Erwin. Hange was sure that Zeke was innocent, and Levi never doubted her, but…

"And?" Erwin prompted.

Fuck it, Levi decided. Perhaps, Erwin’s unbiased opinion was exactly what they needed.

"Oluo found Zeke's cigarette pack inside the apartment," he said, throwing it on Erwin's desk.

"It's not his," there wasn’t even a hint of doubt in his voice. Erwin didn’t even glance twice at the evidence presented to him. "Zeke would never be so careless. Someone's trying to sabotage him, and they are not very good at it."

“So you think it��s someone else?”

“Naturally.”

Erwin’s confidence eased a portion of his worries. If he and Hange were of the same mind, then it must be the truth. At least, he didn’t let Hange meet up with a potential culprit all by herself. Not that it gradually quelled his concern, but it was something…

“Zeke Yeager…” Oluo mumbled, biting his thumb. “Yeager, Yeager… I heard this name somewhere…”

“Huh?” Levi raised an eyebrow, looking quizzically at him.

“Yeager!” he exclaimed, his eyes lightening up. “Of course! Yes, now it came back to me!”

“What came back?” Levi demanded, glaring at Oluo in annoyance. God, how he hated being kept in the dark…

Oluo didn’t respond, irritating Levi even more. Instead he reached Erwin’s desk in two short strides, pushing him aside. “May I, sir?”

“Be my guest,” Erwin made a welcoming gesture, pulling his chair back. “If you know something, then…”

“Could be just a coincidence,”Oluo muttered, as he opened the database on Erwin’s computer. “But…”

For a long moment nothing happened. The office was silent, except for the sounds of typing on a keyboard, and Oluo’s quiet murmurs.  

Levi shared a look with Erwin. He shrugged helplessly, seeming just as bewildered by Oluo’s actions, as Levi himself felt.

“Aha!” he beamed, finally showing Erwin what he found. “Like I said, could be just a coincidence, but I came across name Yeager before. Here.”

“A family murdered in their own house,” Erwin began reading, his eyes quickly scanning the page. “Wife and husband found dead in their own bedroom by their fourteen year old son, who came back from a sleepover. The identity of a murderer remains unknown.”

“It was the first case I took as I started working,” Oluo confessed, scratching his neck. “That’s why it stuck with me. Don’t know if it has any connections to your Zeke…”

“The father of the family, Grisha Yeager,” Levi read the name from behind Erwin’s shoulder. “Zeke is his son. From the first marriage, but still… Maybe, he was murdered, because someone wanted to get back at Zeke.”

“And now that same someone wants to finish the job,” Erwin agreed. “The culprit was never found after all. It’s a solid theory.”

“Or as solid as we can get for now,” Levi nodded.

"It's different from other cases, though,” Erwin contemplated thoughtfully, his gaze turning distant, as he taped his finger against the desk.

"Other cases?" Oluo shuddered. "Are you talking about recent... Murder cases?" he paled, his lower lip trembled, and Levi started to regret bringing him here. They needed to keep their heads clear. Petra needed them to keep their heads clear. There was no time for worrying and panicking right now.

In Levi’s experience, that attitude could only lead to more tragedy.

"It's obviously different with Petra," Erwin said, his voice going an octave softer. Levi stared at him, almost gawking. Erwin wasn't the man to give empty promises. Either he was that optimistic about this whole ordeal, or... Levi preferred not to think about the other possibility.

"Levi?" Erwin turned to him. "What do you think?"

"I think Oluo is right, Petra was taken by someone close to Zeke. But either it was the same perpetrator from before or someone else, it remains to be unknown," he replied. "And I think we don't have any time to waste."

"Agreed," Erwin clenched his jaw, his brows furrowed. "I'll talk with Pixis and Nile, ask if they know anything or if they have any people they can spare... We need to start the search..."

"Sannes!" Oluo suddenly exclaimed, startling Erwin and Levi. "Sannes, we should check him first! We’ve planted a bug on him just yesterday!"

"Fuck," Levi groaned in frustration, feeling like the biggest and the most useless idiot in the world. He had completely forgotten about it.

"I didn't see him at work today," Erwin noted. "Perhaps, it's worth checking it out. Take care of it, Levi."

"Will do," he nodded. "Permission to go?"

"Report to me once you find anything," Erwin stood up. "I'll go to Pixis and Nile."

Levi nodded again, and left the office, his steps swift and heavy.

 ***

"Could it be our lead?" Oluo asked.

They've listened through every conversation that Sannes had that day and the day before. And only one of them, the one where he had agreed to a meeting with an unknown man, had raised Levi's suspicion.

"Not sure if we can call it a lead," he mumbled, biting his lip. There was no word about Petra and no mention of the actual location, but it was something they could work with. It was a starting point, at the very least. Much better than nothing. "But it's definitely a clue. Come on, we need to continue our investigation."

"Meaning..."

"Meaning we're going to break into Sannes' office and see if we can find something inside. Don't worry," he clasped Oluo's shoulder with just a little too much force. Oluo coughed, almost doubling over under Levi’s hard hand. "Nothing you hadn't done before."

  ***

“Zeke is a fool,” the man sneered, his voice full of disgust. “He’s not the man he was before. Ever since he took in that Zoe, he made mistake after mistake. It’s time to put an end to this. It’s time for someone else to take over his legacy. Our gang needs a new leader. Someone, who has as much potential as Zeke, but who doesn’t yet possess any of his flaws. Someone, who is cunning and ruthless. There is only one man who can do this," he finished, and even from afar Petra could see a shine of adoration in his eyes.

Sannes scoffed, rolling his eyes, not moved by the passionate speech at all. "And who is that?"

"No one can achieve the greatness Zeke once possessed. Except," the man smiled, and the sight of it made shivers run down Petra's spine.

"His own brother."

"You've gone mad," Sannes rolled his eyes, still unconvinced. "You've lost it completely, and now you want to drag me down with you. I refuse. Good luck getting arrested, but I’m out of here.”

“You’ll regret this, Sannes,” the man promised, his eyes flashing. “You’ll come begging for us to take you back in no time.”

“I really doubt that, boy,” Sannes sneered, his face showing nothing but disgust. “And if you’re going to actually proceed with your plan, then be ready to meet Ackerman. Believe me, it won’t be a pleasing experience. See you in prison,” he finished, and left, throwing the door shut.

As soon as Sannes had stormed out, the man with an eerie smile turned around to face her.

Instantly, Petra closed her eyes and lowered her head, but the man simply laughed.

"There is no need to pretend," he spoke, shortening the distance between them. "I know you've been awake for quite some time, detective Ral."

She looked up then, saying nothing and glaring at him beneath her bangs. Just the sight of that man left her breathless, her heart beating so loudly she could hear it in her ears, but she wouldn’t show him her fear. She was better than this. He may have had an ultimate upper hand over her, but she would never give him the satisfaction of seeing her tremble.

"I think we've started off on a wrong foot," the man smiled, the shadow of a lightbulb above him making him look even creepier. "I haven't even introduced myself. I'm Floch, nice to meet you!"

With the same crazy smile on his lips, he reached out and patted her shoulder. Petra winced, unable to move away from the undesired touch.

"What do you want from me?" she hissed, trying to hide the shaking in her voice. As discreetly as possible, she tried to loosen her restraints. In movies she watched with Erd, Gunter and Oluo, heroes always freed themselves so easily, the ropes being nothing more than a nuisance. But in reality, they didn't bulge an inch. Petra searched through her mind, trying to remember what characters from those movies did. Wiggle out of the restrains? Broke their wrists? Or was it applicable only for the handcuffs? Shit. She should have watched more movies like this, instead of melodramas and rom-coms. Shifting her attention back to the present, she stared up at her captor, still glaring at him defiantly.

"What do I want from you? The same thing I wanted from the others."

The same thing he wanted from the others? But the others were... dead. Petra suppressed a shiver.

"It's nothing personal, really,” he continued in the same careless manner. “All I need from you is to motivate your partner."

"Levi?" Petra gasped. "What it has to do with him?"

To her surprise, the man shrugged. "Nothing, really. In a way," he swept his hand across the room. "He's just a victim of circumstances. He's one of the best detectives in this city and he has a personal connection with Zeke. It'd be a shame not to use him."

"But why do you need him?" she pulled on the ropes, leaning closer towards the man and looking deep inside his eyes, trying to see right through him, trying to understand him. "Why can't you just kill Zeke and be done with it?"

The man tutted, shaking his head. "That's not what I—" there it was, that same pleased, creepy smile. "What we want to do. Taking Zeke's life would be too easy. We want to destroy it. But unfortunately," he continued in a voice of badly feigned sympathy. "You're not the main event here."

"Not the main event?" Petra echoed, confused. If it wasn't her, then....

"Not sure if you've met...” his eyes lightened up with something dark and dangerous. The smile on his face grew wider, more sinister. “But surely you've heard of one Hange Zoe?"

"Hah," a short chuckle escaped her lips. Very soon it turned into a full blown laughter. Petra would have clenched her sides if she wasn't tied up, she would have doubled over, hands on her knees and chest heaving, overcome with a sudden feat of giggles.

"What are you laughing at?" Floch inquired, the smile disappearing under a frown.

"You, of course," Petra answered, still breathless. "You're a bigger fool than I thought. To think that you can take on Hange Zoe..." of course, he had already gotten her, but Floch had taken her by surprise and she wasn't nearly as experienced and skilled as Hange. And even if they do somehow catch Hange... "Levi would never let you even get close to her. More than that," Petra raised her chin, a confident smirk pulling on her lips. "I'm sure he'll show up here so very soon. He'll save me and ruin your stupid plan. Then you'll be rotting in jail alongside your Zeke."

"We'll see about that," Floch promised through gritted teeth. "Wait a couple of hours, detective, and we'll see if your optimism would remain just as strong."

He gave her a furious look and then did a sharp turn, heading to the door.

“Enjoy your last hours. I’ll come to check up on you later.”

With that he had left, and Petra finally managed to breathe normally.

*** "Weren't you supposed to be good at this?" Levi dryly inquired. With a bored expression on his face, he was leaning against the wall, watching Oluo fiddle with a lock on the door to Sannes' office.

"I never said I was," Oluo grunted, wiping sweat from his forehead. His head darted from one side to other, checking if the hallway remained empty. "It's my first time breaking into someone's office, you know."

"Eh?" Levi frowned, confused. "Then how did you and Petra get in the other day?"

"I stole a key," Oluo huffed.

Levi rolled his eyes, pushing Oluo aside. "Let me handle it then. You go and stand on a lookout."

Oluo didn't need to be asked twice. He got his fair share of bullying from Levi today. With an annoyed but very quiet - he wasn’t so thrilled about receiving even more insults - sigh, he rose to his feet, going to do what Levi had requested of him. He didn’t even reach the end of a hallway, and Levi was calling out to him.

"Already?" his eyebrows went up. "You broke the lock so quickly? How?"

"Well," Levi shrugged and pushed the door open, sporting an almost smug expression. "Let's just say I wasn't always a law-abiding policeman."

"So cool..." Oluo whispered in reverence, as he followed Levi inside the office.

In Oluo's humble opinion and in comparison to a small cubicle he shared with Erd, Sannes' office was huge. A large desk, a wide bookshelf that took up most of the wall, a leather couch and a mini-fridge with a coffee machine and a microwave oven? If affiliating yourself with criminals meant you can have a workplace like this... Oluo wasn't that opposed to the idea anymore.

But they took Petra, he reminded himself. They were the bad guys, even if they were much richer and more successful than he could ever be. They certainly didn’t deserve any of it. And his job was to catch them. 

"So what should be our starting point?" he asked Levi.

"You could start with telling me what the fuck you are doing inside my damn office."

With heart in his throat, Oluo whirled around. As his eyes met Sannes' dark and furious ones, Oluo gulped, slowly taking a step back.

He chanced a glance at Levi and was surprised to see that he didn't look as scared and panicked as Oluo himself felt.

Quite the contrary.

"Sannes." he snarled.

With wide eyes and mouth open in shock, Oluo watched how Levi manhandled Sannes, a man, who was almost twice his size. He pushed him to the wall, fisting hands into his shirt.

"Where is Petra, you scumbag?" he hissed into his face. "Where are you holding her?"

“Let go of me, you freak!” Sannes shouted. “I don’t know what you’re talking about!”

“Oh, but you do,” Levi’s voice dropped even lower, almost resembling a growl. “You know about everything – Zeke’s dealings, Petra’s kidnapping, Hange’s survival,” he pulled Sannes even closer. “So I repeat my question – where are you holding her?”

"I don't know!" Sannes wheezed out, already out of breath.

"Bullshit," Levi answered, his voice so dark and dangerous it made shivers run down Oluo's back. And he wasn’t the one Levi was talking to. He really didn’t envy Sannes right now. "You know it, and if you're not a complete idiot, you're going to tell me everything right fucking now."

Sannes looked down at him, his gaze calculating.  "If I tell you, do you promise not to reveal my connection with Zeke?"

"No,” Levi answered coolly, shaking Sannes once more. “But you're going to tell me anyway."

Sannes closed his eyes, breathing deeply through his nose. "Fine,” he said. “I'll tell you everything. Just let me go."

"Smart choice," Levi murmured and instantly took a step back.

Sannes sighed, running a shaky hand through his hair. "He's keeping her at the docks,” he mumbled, his face aimed at the ground. “I'll send you the exact location."

"Good," Levi nodded, much calmer now. "And after you do that, go straight to Erwin. If I were you, I wouldn't make him wait. Perhaps, he'd be more merciful then. Although,” he added, sending Sannes one last glare. “I doubt he actually would."

Levi turned on his heels then, walking out of the office. Oluo stayed behind for a second longer, a pressing need to ask Sannes a question arising in him.

"Petra?" his voice broke on her name, but Oluo willed himself to stand strong, looking up at Sannes without an ounce of fear. "Is she alright?"

"Dragged and unconscious," Sannes replied, rubbing the spot where Levi had grabbed him. "But she's unharmed. For now."

For now. Those two words made his knees buckle. They needed to hurry. Petra's life was on the line.

***

With sweat dripping down her face and completely out of breath, Hange finally reached Zeke's hideout.

Panting like a chain-smoker and with her leg muscles burning, she climbed all four sets of stairs, cursing Zeke all the while. Why couldn't he put his office on the first floor? Or next to a police precinct? Would have made her life so much easier.

As expected, Zeke was inside his meeting room, smoking. The fat rings of smoke were flowing around the room, flying just below the ceiling before dissipating into nothingness. Hange narrowed her eyes, squinting at the cigarette in his fingers. Could the cigarette from Petra’s apartment really belong to him? Perhaps, they should have run some tests on it… No, Hange shook her head. Zeke was innocent - at least, in that regard.

She looked around the room, nodding at Pieck and Porco, who, as usual, were sitting next to their boss.

"Ah, my dear Hange!" sweeping the ash from his cigarette, Zeke raised his hands, opening them in a welcoming gesture. "What brings you here? Already missed us?" he winked and Hange scoffed.

"Missed your ugly face?” she rolled her eyes. “Not in a million years."

Zeke shook his head, his gaze filling with disappointment. "Detective Ackerman has a terrible influence on your sense of humor," he complained, his expression turning sourer.

"Whatever," Hange fell down on a chair next to him. "I came to ask you for help. Petra is missing."

"Petra?" Zeke frowned, looking genuinely confused. The lost look inside his eyes cemented Hange's conclusion that he wasn't the one involved in her kidnapping. Zeke was sleazy and unreliable, but he was also a very bad liar. Well, that meant they managed to rule out one possible suspect…

"Yes, Petra. Levi's partner."

"Ah, he found a new one already?" Zeke spread his lips into a wide, self-contained smirk. "Not very loyal, is he?"

More loyal than you will ever be, Hange wanted to say, but stopped herself. Now was not the time to start a pointless squabble.

"Do you know something or not?" she demanded from him.

"I don't," Zeke answered, putting a cigarette to his lips and exhaling the smoke right in Hange's face. He knew how much she hated it, asshole. She waved the smoke away, scowling fiercely. "But I do know one thing," he turned to Porco. "The time has come, start packing."

Without asking for clarification, Porco nodded, thrusted hands into the pockets of his leather jacket and hurriedly left.

Hange watched him go, stunned. Was Zeke planning something? What could it be? Why didn’t she know about it?

There was only one way to find out. She surveyed Zeke’s face carefully, trying to see his motives reflected there.

"Packing? To where? What the hell are you talking about, Zeke?"

"Don't worry about our destination," he patted her hand, looking so condensing Hange had to clench her fists to stop herself from punching the bastard. "You're going with us after all."

"Like hell I will!" Hange threw his hands off, glaring at Zeke. "And you can’t seriously expect me to follow you. What does all of it mean?"

Zeke shrugged, lightening up another cigarette and taking a long drag. "It's the grand finale, Zoe. The dramatic climax, the thrilling last act. And I was never the one for theatrics. So I'll leave the stage and go on my way."

"You promised to help," Hange grunted. She couldn't believe it, she actually trusted the bastard, and now he tries to escape? She wouldn't let him. "Or did you lie to us?"

"I wasn't lying," Zeke scoffed. "Like I said, I don't enjoy the drama. I simply changed my mind."

"So you won't honor your promise?"

Zeke rolled his eyes. "Zoe, please. I'm a criminal. The word honor was never in my vocabulary."

"Fine," Hange huffed, blowing hair out of her face. The attempt to awaken his consciousness failed. Maybe, she could appeal to his ego instead… "But someone is targeting you. Don't you want to know who it is?"

"Not particularly,” Zeke shook his head. “Since they went through all that trouble just to get me, I'd rather we never meet. Lord knows what they're going to do then, and, unlike you, detective, I know what self-preservation means."

"So that's it? You're just going to leave?"

Hange couldn’t believe it. She knew Zeke was a scumbag, but goddamn it. She didn’t expect him to be that untrustworthy.

"Of course, I’m not going to just leave," Zeke smiled. "I'll take you with me. To make sure that no one is going to follow us."

Hange snorted. "You're that delusional? I told you already, I'd rather die than go anywhere with you."

"Be it as you wish," he said. "Pieck," he lazily outstretched his hand to her. "Make our dear detective cooperate. Do with her what you want, but make sure she won’t get in our way."

Hange turned to Pieck, her heart skipping a beat. She held her breath and tensed her muscles, anticipating her first move. She could take Pieck in a fight, in theory. But in reality, she came unarmed, and Pieck always carried a gun. And a couple of knifes.

And Hange wasn't sure that her wits were much sharper.

There was a bit, the air in the room growing stiff. Hange swallowed, her one eye narrowed, as she watched Pieck. Maybe, if she makes the first move—

"No." Pieck said suddenly.

For a moment, there was silence. Hange sat there, dumbfounded, staring at Pieck and feeling utterly lost. She didn’t mishear? Did Pieck really—

Next to her, Zeke seemed to have the exact same trouble. He blinked a few times and then his expression changed, turning into a look of betrayal and fury.

"What did you just say?" he snarled, baring teeth at her.

"No," Pieck repeated, staring straight at him, not swayed by his outburst. "I won't touch Hange, and you, Zeke, will go with her and surrender to the police."

"What do you think—"

"Stop it, Zeke," Pieck sighed tiredly. "Own up to your shit and stop running away. Do you really not get it? If you do this right now, whether you'll kill Hange or take her with you, this—" she gestured around, her gaze on Zeke hard and disappointed. "This running and hiding will never end. If you touch a hair on her head, detective Ackerman will get you even from underneath the Earth. Accept it, Zeke," she stood up and squeezed his shoulder. "You've lost that battle the moment you started it. You simply picked up the wrong opponents."

With slow, elegant steps Pieck approached Hange and bent down to leave a gentle kiss on her cheek. "Goodbye, Hange," she murmured, tucking a hair behind her ear. "It's been fun."

In spite of herself, Hange smiled. Sarcastic, adorable Pieck always had such an effect on her. "Are you leaving already?" she asked, touching a place where Pieck's lips met her skin.

"Well," Pieck grinned. "Pock had started packing, right?"

"And where are you going?" Zeke wondered, his lips pressed in a line and hands crossed at his chest. He stubbornly refused to even glance at Pieck.

"A secret," she chirped, smiling cheerfully. "But I'll make sure to send a postcard. Hange, I'll send yours to detective Ackerman's address?” she winked, chuckling at the sight of red color on Hange’s cheek. “And, Zeke? You'll be staying at the state prison, right?"

"Oh fuck off, Pieck," he groaned. "Go away already."

Their eyes met for a second, and Zeke's gaze softened ever so slightly. "Try not to get caught, will you?"

"Roger that, chief!" Pieck saluted, kissed Zeke too and then headed to the entrance, gliding on the floor and humming under her breath.

"You two should talk," she advised Hange and Zeke, and then quietly closed the door.

As soon as Pieck was gone, Zeke dropped his head on his hands, sighing in frustration.

"How the fuck do you do it, Zoe?" he sent her a side-glance. "How the fuck do you manage to inspire that kind of loyalty in people?"

Hange shrugged, sitting back in a chair, and curled her lips in a crooked grin. "Try not being a complete jerk, perhaps?"

"Fuck off," he retorted, hiding his face again. "You'll send me to jail, right?"

"R-right," Hange sang. "And before that, you'll help us looking for Petra."

"And if I refuse?"

"Initially, I planned to be the one organizing your arrest. But I can give that honor to Levi..."

Zeke visibly shuddered.

"Fine," he looked up, fixing the glasses on his face and brushing the hair back from his forehead. "I'll help you. Now get the hell out of here."

Hange arched an eyebrow. "You're coming with me, you know that?"

"I'll come," he huffed. "I promise. For real this time," he added, when Hange just kept giving him an unimpressed look. "Just give me half an hour to get all of my possessions in order, would you? I don't know if I'll be coming back after all."

"Half an hour." Hange nodded, looking at him strictly. "If you don't show up in half an hour, I'm sending Levi to get you."

She would have stayed behind and monitored him, but time was of the essence. She promised Levi she'd back in two hours. And the watch was telling her it was almost an hour past that. She needed to get back, and quickly. Hurrying out of the building, Hange rushed to the precinct.

But in her haste to get back to Levi, she didn't see a swift shadow that followed right after her.

***

One way, then the other, back and forth, left and right, Levi paced around the room.  

Seven. That was the amount of steps needed to get from one end of Erwin's office to the other.

Levi glanced out of the window, and then turned around, starting anew. He clenched and unclenched his fists, thinking if he should look at his phone again. Maybe, he missed a message? Didn't hear its ringing? Maybe, she had already replied to a dozen of his texts and calls?

"Levi," a heavy hand fell on his shoulder, making him stop in his tracks. "Levi, we can't wait any longer," again, Erwin's voice was so much gentler than usual, and that alone should have been enough for him to realize that he was being irrational. That, the eyes of a dozen other policemen, gathered in Erwin’s office, who looked at him with a mix of worry and sympathy.

"We have the location," Erwin reminded, bringing him back to present.

"I know."

"We have the team."

"I know."

"We have a plan."

"I know," Levi gritted through teeth. "But we do not have Hange!"

Frustrated, he turned away from Erwin. He took out his phone, holding it tightly.

Why didn't she call? Why didn't pick up the phone and answer his texts? Where the fuck was she? She promised to be back in two hours. Almost three passed and no sign of that messy, four-eyed brilliant weirdo. The knot in his stomach grew tighter with each passing second.

Logically, he knew Hange could be simply running late. She could be stuck in traffic or she could be busy trying to get some kind of useful information out of Zeke. But while Hange was never the one to care about such trite matters as punctuality and she could easily get absentminded and usually appeared to be scatterbrained and frivolous, she was so very different during the times like this. Times, when lives were on the line. Hange never let herself be so unfocused, that’s why Levi was so worried now. He was anxious, and he knew that feeling won't go away until he sets his eyes on Hange, alive, breathing and well. He just got her back, the thought of losing her… Levi cursed, checking the phone again.

"Levi..." Erwin sighed, patting his shoulder. "You know, we can't waste our time."

He knew that. Petra needed their help, needed him. He couldn't let her down, but still...

Hange, oh god, Hange. He couldn’t lose her. Not again.

"Perhaps, detective Zoe isn't going to come back," came a quiet murmur from the corner of the room.

Levi’s head whirled in that direction, and, in a flash, he was beside him. "What did you just say?" he demanded from Oluo, barely stopping himself from grabbing him just as forcefully as he had done with Sannes.  

Oluo swallowed, a trail of sweat rolling down his face, but he stared back at Levi, raising his chin.

"She was working with an enemy for more than two years. Maybe, she was the one who kidnapped Petra."

Levi closed his eyes, counting to ten in his head. He was not going to lose it right now. He was not. Not when Erwin - and a dozen other of his colleagues - were looking at him.

"Bozado," he began as calmly as he was able in that moment. "Do you trust me?"

"Of course, sir!" he answered without a moment of hesitation.

"Good," Levi nodded. "You trust me. And I trust Hange. With my life. And if you are at least half as smart as you're trying to appear, you'll trust her too. If you're not ready to,” his gaze grew harder, enabling Oluo from turning away. “Then get the fuck out of my team. If you doubt Hange, you doubt me, and I can’t work like that, I have to trust my people. So what do you say – are you leaving or staying?"

"I'm... I'm staying with you, sir."

"Alright," Levi watched Oluo’s face for another second, his eyes narrowed. Would he follow his orders without question? It seemed like he would. He hoped so, at least. With a low, thoughtful hum, Levi turned to Erwin. "We can start the operation. Bozado will lead my team."

He pointedly ignored the shocked gasp from Oluo. The boy wasn’t nearly as experienced, wasn’t even a detective, but their mission was to get back Petra. And Levi believed Oluo wouldn’t let himself fuck it all up.

It's obvious he has feelings for her, Hange once told him. She was right that time, but then again – when she wasn’t?

"And you, Levi?" Erwin asked.

"Half an hour," he promised. "Half an hour, and I'll be at the location."

Hange swore to come back to him. This time, Levi won't let her broke that promise.

Closing the door behind himself, he hurried to Zeke. He prayed that Hange was alright. Zeke wouldn’t get out of this alive, if she weren’t.

***

The silence pressed onto her. The silence, the waiting for god knows what - it was all making Petra go slowly insane. She wanted to hear something, any sound would do at this point.

Or so she thought.

But then Floch came back, sauntering inside and still sporting the same deranged grin, and Petra realized that she preferred silence so much more than the low, out of tune humming mixed with the sound of him polishing the various knifes taken from a long table in front of him.

She squirmed, the ropes digging into her skin even more. It would leave bruises, she thought absentmindedly.

Bruises? She chided herself almost immediately. Who would care about bruises if they find her dead? She suppressed another shiver.

They won't find her dead, Petra tried to persuade herself. They won't, because so very soon Levi would be here, and he'll save her. Perhaps, detective Hange would be with him, maybe, Oluo too...

She had friends who cared about her. They won't let her be murdered. She just had to keep believing in them.

"What are you waiting for?" she asked Floch, trying to distract herself from the thousand of horrible what ifs.

Why haven’t you— no, she wouldn’t ask him that. She would remain optimistic.

“You’ll see very soon,” he told her enigmatically. “My friend is almost here.”

His friend? Did he mean Zeke’s brother? The one, who had planned it all? And what would happen, when he comes? Would he—

No, she stopped herself once again. She needed to hold onto that hope. She needed to stay strong.

The sound of footsteps somewhere above her startled Petra. Hearing them too, Floch started chuckling. He turned to Petra, pressing a finger to his lips.

“That’s my friend,” he whispered quietly, as though it was the biggest secret in the world. “And he brought someone with him.”

The next second, the door opened and a man – so young, probably in his early twenties – stumbled in. He was hobbling slightly, his hand pressed to a place just below his hairline. His face was a mess – split lip, bruised eye that already started to turn deep purple, bloodied nose and forehead.

“You didn’t tell me she was a fucking psycho,” he grumbled, glaring daggers at Floch. “I wouldn’t have a chance, if I wasn’t armed.”

“But?” Floch passed him a white cloth to wipe off the blood. “You’ve caught her, right?” his voice was full of hope, and his fingers were trembling in anticipation.

“She’s in my car, dragged out of her mind. Help me get her here.”

“With pleasure,” Floch turned to Petra, winking. “You’ll have company so very soon, detective. I hope you’re excited! I am!”

He didn’t stop to hear her response, following after his friend and leaving her alone once again.

It was possibly her last chance, she realized. Petra desperately pulled on the ropes, trying to get away, but to no avail. She couldn’t move an inch, and it seemed like the more she struggled, the tighter her bindings became.

Not enough time passed, before Floch had returned, dragging a body inside. His friend put the chair, right next to Petra, and Floch dropped the body there.

No, not just some body, Petra realized. Fear crippled inside her, seizing her heart in its merciless hold.

Not just some body, Hange Zoe’s body.

Her head was bowed, but even from where she was sitting, in a poorly lit room, Petra could see blood dripping down her cheek and neck.

So much blood, she thought. She was breathing, albeit faintly. But she wasn’t waking up.

Her heart stopped, as Petra realized another thing – if Hange was there, no one was looking for her. And if no one was looking… then Hange and she… they would most probably… not be found.

At least, not alive, or so it seemed.

Petra tried to hold onto that sliver of hope, but with Hange Zoe’s bloodied face in her line of sight, it was getting increasingly harder and harder to.

[mistaeq]

Hi !!! I wasn't sure if requests were open or not bc the header description thingy (??? hsksvdks)said they were closed, but if they're open, can you do the jojo's reaction to their s/o being pregnant with twins after a long time of trying? Pick whichever ones you want or all !!! Plz don't overwork yourself :( 💖

The Jojos: Finding out their s/o is Pregnant with Twins

TW // none

DORA IS BACK! ^_^ i can't describe how happy i am to be back at writing, after several days👀 i hope this work is worth a comeback! enjoy your answer <3

The Jojos finding out their s/o is pregnant with twins after a long time of trying.

WORD COUNT: 1.5k

JONATHAN JOESTAR

He smiles, probably thinking you're messing with him. You spent a lot of time trying to have a baby, and now you're joking about having more than one baby and stuff because of that... aren't you? He might faint if you are being for real.

"Y/n, please don't joke with me on these things... you know how much I care, I would burst into tears if I happened to believe... what do you mean you're serious...?" his voice breaks, his heart feels so full already. Two babies?

Jonathan does burst into tears. It was a miracle for him even realizing you were pregnant, but two babies? Two angels of his growing inside of you? It's too much for his romantic, loyal and devoted heart, and it'll show. He won't stop kissing your belly and constantly caressing it.

He doesn't care whether they're two boys, two girls or a boy and a girl, he knows he'll give them his unconditional fatherly love regardless of their gender. Jonathan is blinded by the love and the happiness the good news made him feel.

Jonathan hopes that both his features and yours will be recognizable in your children's bodies. It would make him feel like the happiest man in the world. He wants to look at them and remember they come from a pure and loyal love.

For the days to come of your pregnancy, he'll keep on referring to you as three people. "Good morning, sweethearts.", he'll whisper every morning, giving two tender kisses on your growing belly, one for every twin. Jonathan feels like he's dreaming.

JOSEPH JOESTAR

As soon as you walk into the room, he's overjoyed already, running towards you. "Your next line is: we're gonna have twins!" you never understood how did he do that, but in that moment you just nodded, letting him pull you in a strong embrace.

Joseph laughed thinking of all the negative pregnancy tests you took in the past. He kept them to remember how much you two tried, and promised he would have thrown them away only once you succeeded. You were even having twins, now.

He panicked quickly when he noticed that all of your attempts were useless, and he even got to the doctor to make sure he wasn't sterile. Poor boy. He cared a lot about giving you babies, and honestly got a good amount of scared.

"I hope at least one of them is a girl, I'd like to name her Holly..." he pouts, caressing your belly. He'll be the happiest regardless of their gender, but having a baby girl has been a dream of his, and he'll keep on hoping until you can find out the genders of the babies.

Joseph dreams of when they'll be born, and he'll be able to hold both of his children at once with his huge and strong arms. He subtly hopes at least one of them will be able to learn how to use hamon. He'd like it to be a family tradition like it is for the Zeppelis. It would be really cool and he would be able to playfully brag about it on Caesar's grave.

"Y/n, but... if you're gonna have two babies in your belly... won't it like... explode? How do you manage to keep them both? What if you start floating like a balloon because of the babies stretching your belly too much?" he knows how to get a laugh from you when you feel bad during the pregnancy.

KUJO JOTARO

At first he's not gonna say anything or look too surprised. Sometimes doctors happen to get these things wrong, he heard of lots of couples who thought they were gonna have twins but then it turned out to be a mistake. [Dora's parents, for example]

Jotaro won't show it, but despite this thought, his heart is pounding at the thought of you two having twins. You had talked about having a baby, but no matter how much you tried, every attempt seemed to be useless. And now you were telling him this.

"Yes... it would be amazing if you were right." he holds your hands. "Let's not get our hopes too up." Jotaro mumbles in a calm tone, while Star Platinum shamelessly exposes its user giving happy "ora"s and an embarrassing amount of kisses on your cheeks.

When you find out that there's no mistake, he will hug you and not let go for a couple of minutes at least. "I don't know anyone else who would so happily carry children of mine in herself. I am grateful, y/n. Really grateful."

You know Jotaro's trying to keep calm and look strong for you to admire him, but you felt his voice trembling and can't ignore Star Platinum slowly summoning itself, sniffling and moving to carefully caress your belly, a sweet and calming smile on its face "Ora...".

He's not sure he's gonna be a good father, even more now that he knows the children will be two and not only one, but Jotaro would never admit his fears. He tends to bottle up every single feeling of his. It would be the right thing to do if you sometimes made him feel like he'll be a perfect dad. He needs it.

HIGASHIKATA JOSUKE

"T-Twins? Like t-two babies? One + one? Me and you? R-Right there?" he'll ask, pointing at your belly with his widened eyes, right under your amused gaze. Josuke is a pure angel, he won't fully realize it for the next twenty four hours.

If you're fine with it, he confesses that if one of them is a boy he'd like to call him Ryohei, his grandpa's name, to properly remember him and everything he did to protect Morioh-Cho. You don't want to say no to him on this. He really cares a lot.

He enjoys having long conversations with your children, you sitting on the couch and him laying on his belly, ear on your own belly. "Mommy and daddy are impatient, here... can't you speed up your birth a bit? I can't wait playing with your hair and styling it in two cute pompadours..."

Talking together, you both decide he won't use Crazy Diamond to calm down your pregnancy pains. You want to fully live your pregnancy without stand powers, and Josuke agrees. He wants to be next to you when it happens, but like a normal boyfriend/husband.

Crazy Diamond still is overjoyed just like its user, when you tell Josuke about the twins. It's eager to help, when you start buying the little beds and proper furniture for the babies, and you won't even have to worry about setting those up, Crazy Diamond will do it by itself even without Josuke telling it to.

As soon as she learns it, Tomoko will invite you by her for a dinner, to celebrate the two angels you're gonna give birth to. She still can't believe her Josuke gave her grandchildren with you, and will personally call Jotaro to inform the Joestar part of the family.

GIORNO GIOVANNA

Since you get along with Mista really well, he'll think it's a joke, and won't listen to you for the first minutes, at least until you show him the papers the doctor gave you that morning, proving you're really pregnant with twins.

He'll stare at those papers for five minutes straight, speechless, smiling. You've been trying for a lot of time. Gold Experience had been caressing your belly several times after you and Giorno made love, to stimulate your body in creating life. And now that you finally succeeded, it's twins.

"I wonder if there's a possibility for them to be stand users... i'll still be willing to keep our babies away from Passione's business." says Don Giovanna, keeping you close. If Mista's task was protecting him, now GioGio's new request is for the gunslinger to protect you.

Since now you know you won't only have one baby, there's much more to buy, and since you're pregnant and Mista can't go away and leave your side because of Giorno's request, the one who has to go shopping for the babies is Giorno himself. Finding a Don buying baby clothes and toys is always hilarious and cute.

GioGio will often panic and call Trish for help. He doesn't want you to think he's not able to handle buying stuff for two babies instead of one, so he has no guts to call and ask for help from you.

He's never had a good father figure. So he can't really say he witnessed good examples of a parental figure to imitate. But he remembers the love in Bruno's eyes. The love of a person who chose to protect his fellow gang members. He'd like his babies to feel with him the same way he felt in Bruno's protection.

[lightspeed-lightspeed-lightspeed]

How did it happen?

(Bucky barnes x Female reader)

A/n:  (Tw: cat. If you don't like cats gtfo of here) Although it is narrated in third person, the narration gravitates more around Bucky's pov (sorta). This is gonna be quite lousy so have fun, I guess.. If you can.

"How did this happen?" he whisper-sighed. "How? When?" He asked himself as he was staring into the distance, absent-mindedly stroking the white ball of fur curled up on his lap. Alpine let out a soft meow as if answering his soliloquies.

But for real though, how did he fall for you? The last he checked, you both were calling each other names out of contempt. Y/n y/l/n was simply insufferable, he always thought. Where did your acts of annoyance start blooming into everything he now yearns for?

As much as he would like to hide behind the idea that these sudden, irrational feelings hold no reason and meaning- how could he? How could he hide from what he knows? from what he realized? He could lie to himself all he wants- Hell, he had been lying to himself all this time, ignoring the wisps of light that marked the warnings through the pavements of this path he was sauntering down. He was walking into love and he refused to know it.

He wondered how different things would be now if he hadn't screwed up in your last mission and got you demoted to the archive library duty. Of course, jeopardizing a high stakes mission by starting a quarrel during field action is a grave mistake, but still Fury was being a little too extreme by suspending Y/n off the field for a month. Bucky didn't really believe that any of it was his fault, according to him it was you who were being your impossible self on the field that day. But he did feel sort of bad for you now. Maybe what Bucky shouldn't have done, was to try and make it up to you by spending time with you in that desolate library. Truth be told, it was partly an excuse for wanting to be around you.

There he was again, his thoughts lingering around you. Recounting the events of day before yesterday.

(  The  day  before  yesterday  )

"Did you find it?," Bucky's voice echoed through the aisles as he walked towards the base of the ladder you were perched on looking for an old file Bucky needed for his mission. "Not just yet," you mused.

The archives library was completely empty except for the two of you. The sound of his boots against the spotless vinyl flooring filled the room as he was pacing back and forth. Clack-tap,  Clack-tap,  Clack-tap,  Clack-tap.  He found the rhythm weirdly gratifying. And he could see you didn't. If something could get you to lose your cool, what's not to love?

"Quit pacing," you sighed, slightly annoyed. He started to stomp on even louder. Clack-tap, Clack-TAP, CLACK-TAP,CLACK-TAP,CLACK-TAP.  Your breathing quivered with exasperation, as your shoulders hunched and fell in gliding motions. Just as gratifying, he thought looking at it.

"Quit pacing, Goddamnit!" You practically growled.

"No." He said, scrunching up a smile fighting it's way on his face. "What are you? obsessed? Mind your business," he shot smugly.

"You're making it really hard for me to, you moron," You muttered as he broke out into a grin. Annoying you practically counted as top-tier entertainment for him.

~

"C'mon man, do something," You cried.

"Do what?"

"Search for those godforsaken files, maybe. I honestly-"

"I am searching,"

"No, you're not." You huffed.

"I am, and I'm beginning to think the files are not in he-"

"Shhh" you cut him off. He shot you a questioning look.

"Don't you hear it?" you whisper-hissed.

"Hear what?" he asked as he reached for his weapons, falling into a defensive posture.

"There's somebody else in he-" before you could complete the sentence, you were screaming and everything was collapsing as you fell off the ladder yanking the racks down along with you, a daunting cacophony of heavy crashes and clamours deafening as you and Bucky were whipped by gravity, with absolutely no idea what is happening for a solid couple of moments.

"What the fuck just happened?" Bucky asked as he looked around, his pale blue eyes wide and gleaming with absolute confusion. The racks were all fallen, everything loosely covered with the papers lying around. The room had become a little darker. "I- um.." You started, "I... It was a cat.." you said frantically as you were still trying to shake yourself from the shock. "It was a what?" he asked incredulously. "A cat! I mean, It sort of jumped at my face, and I.. It sneaked up behind the rack... and I jumped and everything fell.. I guess..." You cringed at yourself. Bucky winced and looked around again and that's when he realized. You both were cornered against the inner edge of the wall. The racks had fallen in front of you into perfect forts, blocking your way out. He was practically stuffed against you into a crooked modicum of space. Your back was pressed against his chest, his leg pitted against yours. There wasn't a lot he could've done about that. He was trapped in there with you. But most importantly, he had never been this close to you.

His heart did parkours and cartwheels. He could only hope you don't feel how hard it was beating. Where were all these butterflies coming from? His breath hitched, he wasn't even sure if he was breathing anymore, although it was the last concern on his dumb-foundedly racing mind. He could feel the softness of your hair against his neck, he'd be lying if he said that wasn't the softest, gentlest thing he has felt in about the past seven decades. It smelled like an orchard of flowers. He liked flowers. Although he couldn't tell what flower it smelled like, he knew it would've been his favourite flower. It calmed him down, that was, of course until his eyes looked down. He could see the stretch of your dangerously gorgeous collar bones sparkling in your sweat above your dress's boat-like neckline. His atheism breaking at the sight of that sculpted divinity, he couldn't help but pray, "God give me all the strength you can to keep me from kissing that work of art." The quantum leaps between the intervals of his heartbeats weren't helping either. Oh, at this moment, what he wouldn't give up to be the brittle golden necklace cascading from the graceful steeps and lows of your neck to the flesh over your heart. He held back not of strength, but because of fear.

As he was trying to fathom where all these thoughts were coming from, he was interrupted by you glazing your body against his body as you were striving to reach for a way out of the current situation. The way you groaned softly as you tried to reach for the other side of the rack-fort did things to him that he never would have expected. He was practically petrified. You gave up after a few moments, your head falling back against his ribs due to the impact. "Oof," he said his breath tickling your neck, cooling the sweat enough to send chills down your spine. "I'm sorry," you quivered in embarrassment. "So... there's no way out unless someone helps us out from the outside," you reported. He sighed in reply. He was way too nervous right now to speak in words.

~

"Are you claustrophobic or something?" you asked.

"What?"

"No, your heart has been racing real loud for quite some time now."

"I.. um.. small spaces do that to me,"

"Huh" you huffed.

You felt the coolness of his metal arm against the heated skin below the back of your neck, it was very soothing. He had laid the forearm carefully at a distance from you, and you couldn't help but wish he would wrap it around you. You could feel the vibrations of his vocal cord against your ear lobe as he talked. You were glad he couldn't see your face flushing at that.

Eventually he was able to relax, his heart slowing down. Although the situation was still quite awkward, he was not sure if he was complaining. That's when he heard footsteps. Someone was coming to their rescue. The footsteps grew louder, and there he was.

"Noah!" You exclaimed as he stood in front of you on the other side of the rack-fort. "Y/n! What's.. going on?" Noah asked as he looked at the mess. "Ah, we're trapped. Can you help us out of here?"

~~~

"Thank you," you smiled as he got them out of there with the help of the floor service. "How did you find us here?"

"We had a date, remember? You didn't show up so I just wanted to make sure you were okay."

"Oh my god, yes we did. All this happened and It totally slipped my mind. Thank god, we did though," you chuckled, looking around,    "Hey Barnes, This is Noah, he works in the communications department,"

"Hey, man" Noah greeted. Bucky gave him a half-nod and a mean look.

~

"You know, it's not exactly late. If you are up to it, we could still go grab some dinner," Noah said, giving you this innocent look that Bucky, for some reason, found revolting.

"Yeah? of course," You were all smiles.

Since when does y/n smile like that? What did she see in this guy? He doesn't even know the guy, so why does he hate him so much? He felt displeased with himself for staring at you and Noah, like, why did he even care now? Bucky had so many questions. The answer was walking out of the hall with somebody else, and there was nothing he could do about it.

He was standing there in the once again empty library, lost in the middle of the bustling race track of his thoughts. That was when he felt something tugging at his legs, pulling him out of the maze he was being consumed by. He looked down at his little rescuer with fur as white as snow. "Hello there," He called, gentleness taking over his voice as he squatted down to pet the little cat that was rubbing its ears on his shoe straps. "Where did you come from, doll?" he giggled, scratching it's chin.

~ ( Today ) ~

"You were a no-show at the debriefing. Where were you yesterday?" You asked as you plopped down on the couch in the kitchen Island, your arm resting on the back pillow, turning your head back and looking at Bucky toying with the cutlery on the counter. "I.. was in my room," he said pushing back a stray lock of hair. "Coffee?"  "Yeah," you muttered.

As you turned your head you saw a little white cat hopping onto your lap.

"I found her in the library, you know, the other day.. after you left. Guess I'm her owner now, kind of," he said as he handed you the coffee.

"Aww, he made a friend!" You giggled as you scratched the back of the cat's ears. "Hello! Do you like that, you little troublemaker?" you chuckled as the cat warmed up to you with it's eyes closed.

Bucky was blushing like an idiot. You were not gonna lie, that shade of red made him look a little too cute.

"Has she got a name?"

"Yeah well, I named her Alpine. It's a good name, right?"

"Alpine!" you grinned, "It's a lovely name."

~~

"What?" He asked, as you gave him a surprised look after sipping your coffee.

"The coffee is actually good," You said.

"Why, you didn't think I could make good coffee?"

"No, in all these three years, you've brought me coffee like 4 times, 3 out of which you put salt in my coffee and the one time you messed up the sugar real bad. On purpose, I suppose," you accused.

"To be fair, you deserved it,"

"Ah, there it is," you said.

Bucky couldn't help but stare at you. Here he was, sitting on the couch beside you, getting high of sorts on how close he was to you. He had been craving for it ever since the archive library. He locked himself in his room all yesterday, convincing himself that what he felt towards you wasn't real, although it only made more sense despite his inability to believe it. And here you were now, recklessly playing with his heartstrings. The image of a rogue strand of your hair caressing your temple, and your eyes becoming a softer shade of (y/e/c) as the sunlight fell on them vaporized the levee he built around the feelings he never thought would see the light of day again.

As if breaking him out of his trance, you said, "Ah, I'd love to hang around with you guys, but I gotta go. I said I'll be meeting Noah in a couple minutes."

"Right," he could feel his heart dropping for a second.

"Alright then... bye!" You called, and walked out of the room, as he watched your hair swaying to your stride.

And here he was, on the couch, wondering about what just happened. Alpine half asleep on his lap as he unconsciously whispered, "How did this happen?"

~~~~

[zodiyack]

Snapping Is Over Rated

Pairing: Kol Mikaelson x Salvatore!Female!Reader

Warnings: Spoilers?, swearing, angst, mention of murder, mention of the humanity switch being flipped

Words: 1,635

Summary: It’s a bad time to be dating a Mikaelson when your brothers decide they want to go on a quest to kill the Original Family, who happen to be linked to each other.

Taglist: @matth1w​, @redspaceace-writes​, @fandom-puff​, @darling-i-read-it​, @simonsbluee​

Masterlist | The Vampire Diaries Masterlist | The Originals Masterlist

It wasn’t long before Y/n discovered what her brothers were hiding. In fact, it was hiding that led to her putting two and two together. A poorly hid white oak stake and two very suspicious brothers, my my, what could be the problem?

She knew that they only hid it from her due to her romance with one of the Mikaelsons.

Kol was, like his older half-brother, a little off the walls. Nevertheless, he remained loyal and loving. Their relationship had shown her a good side of vampirism, as well as convinced him that life still had meaning even if he wasn’t a witch anymore.

But, if her brothers went through with their plan, neither of them would have that anymore. So she went out to put a large red stop-sign in the middle of their little plot.

“Gah!” Damon hissed as his younger sister sped in front of him, “Where the hell did you come from?”

“Home. Where the hell are you going?” Y/n spat back. She grinned when Damon sighed after studying her for a few moments.

“Uhhh...the Grill.”

“Ah... But, dear brother, the Grill is in the other direction.” Her smile grew wider with the feeling of success. “So, tell me, where are you going? And, please- the truth this time, if you will?”

Stefan walked up behind Damon, turning himself in as he knew they’d been caught. “Damn it. Curse our sister and her inhuman intellect.”

“Don’t curse me for my brains, curse that bitch of a vampire that turned you two as well. Had you not engaged in her games, we’d all be dead and happy in our graves.”

“You could just stake yourself or walk into the sun, ya know?” Damon chuckled teasingly but stopped quickly upon his sister’s dead glare.

“Yes, of that, I am aware. However, you two are also aware of my boyfriend...” She glanced at the bag in Stefan’s hand, somehow already having a terribly accurate guess of what it’s contents were, “A little too aware.”

Stefan sighed, “I mean, yeah. He’s a Mikaelson, Y/n/n-”

“That doesn’t matter! You can’t go through with it! Please...Damon?” Her older brother raised his hands in front of his chest, telling her to leave him out of it with a simple sympathy smirk and squint of his eyes. “You’ve got to be kidding me. Seriously? Have I ever tried to kill one of your girlfriends?”

The brothers thought for a moment before shaking their heads. Stefan looked down to the bag of stakes and back up to his sister, holding the same sympathetic expression as Damon. “I’m sorry. But, Klaus has to die. They all do.”

“No! Kol doesn’t!”

“He attacked Matt, Y/n!” Damon wasn’t one to care for most mortals, but Elena and Matt had been targets of some of the Mikaelsons for a bit of time, and he did end up growing a little closer to the group of abnormal friends, so he made an exception. Unfortunately, he was only willing to let that exception go so far.

“And? You attacked Bonnie! And Jeremy! Let’s not forget Alaric. My point is, we all make mistakes!”

“We all make mistakes, yet Kol has made over a thousand years worth of those without even apologizing. I’ve apologized...for most of them...” Stefan side-glared Damon, whom responded with a jab to Stefan’s side with his elbow. “And, well, my point is that he’s an original who’s just as bad as the other originals. We have a chance to kill the worst of them all, and you can’t stop us.”

She paused, chewing on the inside of her cheek as she thought. Usually, family went first, but they were ever so willing to destroy her happiness- to destroy her first ever romance- that she didn’t really care for the usual anymore.

“You’re right. I can’t stop you. But, if that’s how you guys wanna play,” the veins under her eyes began to darken and her e/c orbs turned red, “then lets play.”

“Wherever is your little play-thing, brother?” Klaus’ voice rang through the phone. Kol only chuckled in response, continuing to watch as Jeremy failed painfully at baseball. “I take it she has yet to arrive?”

“Well, for one, brother, she’s not my play-thing. She’s my girlfriend.” A sincere look of love washed over Kol’s features; his undead heart skipped a beat just thinking about her. “And secondly, I suppose she is rather late.”

“Would you like me to resort to plan two? I can always threaten the witch’s little boyfriend some more. Perhaps get her to do a tracking spell?”

He thought for a moment, debating his options and the situation before licking his lips and nodding. “Plan two it is. See you later, Nik.”

“Until next time, Kol.”

“Shit!” Damon yelped as he dodged a plate that flew over his head. The house had been turned upside down and wrecked in a fit of rage. Just as her brother once had, Y/n had flipped the switch.

Although flipping the switch sounds like something you’d do in a state of pain, Y/n did it in, like mentioned, a fit of rage. In result, it was more like she’d snapped than flipped a switch.

Stefan, hiding with his back against a flipped over couch, attempted to make hand motions to Damon; a wordless code. Sadly, Damon was not in the best state of mind to register the meaning of Stefan’s odd finger movements.

“What?” He whisper-yelled as his brows furrowed in confusion. “Okay, okay, can we continue this later? We kinda have a very deadly and very very angry sister trying to kill-” Damon rolled over, dodging a knife that had come out of the other side of the table due to it being thrown so harshly, “...us.”

“Damn it Damon- I was trying to get us to go,” He pointed towards the door, “in that direction!”

“I can hear you, you know!” Plate after plate hit the wall in front of them.

“On three?” Damon nodded. They began counting quietly in unison until they got to three. From there, they made a break for the front door and to Elena’s house, where they picked the doppelganger up and headed for Matt’s house. Luckily, Matt had never brought anyone from the group to his house aside from Elena and Caroline. He answered the door and let the three in quickly, looking around before shutting and locking it.

“No- you idiot- she can’t get in. There’s no point in locking it.” Damon groaned from the couch.

“Be nice.”

He bitterly responded to Elena’s demand with a fake smile and an obviously sarcastic tone. “Yes, milady.”

“So uh...” Of course Matt hadn’t been informed as to why the three were hiding in his home. “What happened?”

“Oh, ya know, the usual.” The sarcasm in Damon’s voice held thick as ever, “Pissed off my sister by telling her we’re going to kill the originals, as in all of them- including her boy-toy.”

“You did what-”

“Oops. Sorry Elena. I might’ve forgotten to add the part about pissing her off...which reminds me of the most important detail...” He smiled toothily with faux remorse.

The two humans blinked at the dark haired vampire, staring blankly as they waited for the detail he’d spoken of. When it became clear that he wasn’t going to tell them, Stefan cleared his throat and redirected their attention to him. “She flipped her switch.”

“Flipped her switch? Nah, screw the switch. It’s more like she ignored the switch and just plain old snapped.” Damon crossed his arms behind his head and kicked his feet up onto Matt’s coffee table.

He acted as if his sister was not going off the walls in anger. Or rather, he acted as if it was just a casual every day thing for the soft-spoken and caring sister of the Salvatore boys to go on a potential murder spree.

Elena rolled her eyes and scoffed before shoving his feet off the surface. She ignored the glare that burned into her skin and slapped Damon. The sound of her skin hitting his made the other two in the room flinch; it was clear that she did not approve of his choices in the slightest.

“You’re fixing your sister. S-”

“What!? That’s not f-”

“Stefan, and I will go stake the originals. Understood?” Damon huffed and ignored Elena. “Understood?” She repeated herself with a harsher tone before Damon sighed and nodded.

“Yeah yeah, understood.”

Finn was dead. And the other four still breathed the air of the living world. The link had been broken, and they’d failed.

Damon had been kidnapped by Rebekah, therefore failing to stall, as well as fix, his little sister. What he didn’t know, was that Rebekah had contacted Y/n as soon as possible, informing her on the details of her brother’s murder and the older Salvatore’s location.

She sent Stefan to pick up Damon with a disguised note, preventing him from knowing that it had been her to hint to him his brother’s location. After saying goodbye wordlessly from the shadows, she smiled to herself and ran as fast as possible to Kol.

The youngest Mikaelson chuckled as the female Salvatore knocked him off his feet and buried her face into the crook of his neck. “I see you’ve recovered from your snap? Nik told me how you flipped your switch.” His arms held her tightly against his own form. They relished in the feeling of one another, the knowledge that both were safe and together again.

“Snapping is over rated.” She smiled wider against his skin, causing a matching smirk to grace his face.

“You were faking?”

“Yep. Anything to be with you again... But, just to be safe, don’t tell my brothers.”

His chest heaved with hearty laughter, “Whatever you want, love.”