#I'M NOT JUST GOING INSANE IN THE BASEMENT I SWEAR

[sketchehm]

Augh wait, completely non Canon but I just had an idea for like, if the cats were actually kids

_-_-_-_-_-_

'I have an important message for you'

The message is followed by a three minute audio.

Finally, after hours of scrubbing through months and months of massages between Sapnap and his old family, they finally found something about his mission to infiltrate Team Mafia.

(Shadoune swears Sapnap wasn't on his phone this much. How did he find the time to text these two so much? How many times do you need to text someone a reminder to eat in one day??)

The phone is already connected to a speaker so they can all hear everything without having to circle around it, so there's only hesitante stopping them from pressing play.

This is what Sapnap was sent here to do. This spells out exactly the ways he was ordered to betray them.

Shadoune presses play.

"Hi Dad! Hiiiiiiiii" Two children voices come from the speaker, "We miss you lotssss!! I got the tiara you sent me! Me and Patches are matching now, we look like sisters!"

"Of course we do, we are sisters stupid."

Another child's voice sounds out, a little father away and a little deeper

One of the first two kids giggles, and there's a shuffle before the other's voice sounds again

"When are you coming back home? Pops and Papa say we should take down the Christmas decorations, but I like them!! Milo don't steal the phone! I'm asking Dad when he's coming home! Oh yeah... Dad we miss you a lot, will you be done with work soon?"

"You two..."

There's two tiny sad sighs

"We know... Be careful Dad, we love you lots! You need to tell us all the cool work stories when you get home! Yeah, we need like, 5 whole bed time stories when you come back! Love you bye! Byeeeeeeeee-"

The audio ends. There's pure silence in the room, a variation of shell-shocked faces all around. Serpias looks a little teary, and no one is quick enough to grab him before he rushes off, thankfully up to his room instead of to the basement.

"Creo..." Rich starts awkwardly, "Creo que eso es suficiente por hoy."

_-_-_-_-_-_-_

Honestly Serpias would probably run straight to Sapnap, but if anyone ever brought up his kids while he was in the basement he would murder them with his bare hands and I didnt know how to write that right now so... Serpias! To your room!

Serpias beloved 🥺

He just wants the best for Sapnap always and forever....

Serpias after going through every crisis and still not thinking straight, he makes a quick pitstop, shoving something in his pocket before going down to the basement in the dead of night.

Sapnap is actually awake with Dream this time. And when they see Serpias enter... Eyes bloodshot, sniffling, overall looking terrible.....well. Sapnap is beyond worried. He grabs Dream's arms tightly. He doesn't know what Serpias is gonna say.

"Lo siento."

It's quiet. Could barely hear it over his sniffling.

Sapnap thinks they're going to die.

Dream asks what's wrong. Tone dangerously grave.

"You....have children..."

Dream will tense. But Sapnap will be on his feet. Hands already gripping Serpias' shirt collar and slamming him against the door

"What happened with them?"

Serpias has never heard Sapnap so serious, so frightening. It's actually the first time he's heard Sapnap speak on his own without Dream.

Sapnap will scream in Serpias' face asking what happened. Threatening to make his death and everyone else's in this house slow and painful if they laid a finger on them. His eyes are wild. The kind of insane he's only witnessed watching Sapnap in the ring and taking down an opponent.

This is life or death to Sapnap he realizes.

George is waking up from the noise as Sapnap continues to yell and slam his head against the door. What happened. WHAT HAPPENED!

"NADA! SAPNAP HICIMOS NADA!"

Serpias can barely get it out. He feels dizzy. He might be bleeding.

"Then why are you sorry." Sapnap's cold tone hurts Serpias' more than scares him. Never wanting Sapnap to hate him ever. But he knew this would happen. Expected to be more than half dead by this point.

"For taking you away from them....They are alone..."

It's quiet again.

"Why are you saying this?" It's Dream. His tone is cold and calculating, something Serpias is familiar to. Welcomes it even. Something to focus on that isn't Sapnap's hatred.

"Para escaparé." He produces the keys in his pocket. They're for a car.

And Sapnap let's him go. Serpias feels really dizzy without the support now. The headache so overwhelming, he can't help close his eyes. He's out cold before he falls over.

When he wakes up he's in the infirmary with Farfa at the side of his bed. He can feel the headache of a concussion, the back of his head pounding. He notices the bandages wrapped around his head.

"Se fueron."

Serpias jumps at Farfa's voice. But once the words register, despite the incredible pain, he can't help but be relieved.

[eluminium]

guess whos insane about skizzleman and impulse in the life series again

its me. theres limited life spoilers here so like, if thats not your gig, now you know. did you guys see. that in this session, session 3, both Impulse and Skizz independently decided that they needed to give their allies items that would help them survive? So they both did a lot of personal hard work to make sure that the people they trust the most would always have these items on them in case of danger? and. and the items are Ender Pearls and Golden Apples? Items that both of them have history with? For Impulse and Ender Pearls... Remember the Ender Pearl Stasis Chamber that saved and failed Impulse many times in 3rd Life? Remember Impulse Ender Pearling to Bdubs, to his demise, in 3rd Life? Remember Impulse having the option to save himself from falling off the Ghast Farm with Ender Pearls but dying because he focused too hard on the boat trick in Last Life? Remember Impulse designing an escape route for him and Bdubs if they ever needed it, one that required Ender Pearls to fully complete, in Double Life? For Skizzleman and Golden Apples... (well, shoutout to this post by @aquelondungeonmaster about Skizz and Golden Apples because HOLY SHIT IT MAKES ME EAT DIRT AND WALLS!!!!) Remember Skizz being given a Golden Apple by Ren for some leather, and in a way solidifying Skizz’s loyalty in 3rd Life? Remember Skizz giving out Golden Apples to the Red Army before rushing to his own death in 3rd Life? Remember Skizz trying but failing to save himself from getting killed by eating a Golden Apple in Last Life? Remember Skizz not being in Double Life, the only series that had to ban Golden Apples because they would break things? What I’m saying is, there’s history here. History of these two with these specific items either saving or failing to save them in the previous series...and not only that, they’re kinda symbolic of how these two treat conflict. Skizz gives his allies, the people he loves and cares for, Golden Apples. Something to help them face conflict, something that will make them stronger then before. Impulse gives his allies, the people he loves and cares for, Ender Pearls, something to help them escape conflict and live another day. Isn’t it just awfully symbolic of them? For both of them to give out items to help their allies that lines up with how they treat conflicts, while also having a lot of history with these items specifically? how the FUCK isn’t the life series scrippted WHAT ARE THESE CONNECTIONNNNS????? MAYBE I’M JUST GOING INSANE AGAIN. THE IMP AND SKIZZ BRAIN HAUNTS ME. IT KEEPS COMING UP WITH CONNECTIONS BETWEEN THESE TWOOOOO

[strawbeelemonade]

PLATONIC HEADCANNONS: being miles morales best friend but your also a bit insane (Part 2!)

i'm gonna try to remember to start specifying when something is intended to be platonic or romantic.

🕷- I was literally unable to cram everything I wanted to say in the first one.

🕷- Miles is really only comfortable showing you his drawings.

🕷- He's an incredibly awkward guy, but the words come so easily when he hangs out with you. he doesn't choke up like he does with other people at school.

🕷- When he gets his powers his first instinct is to call you. He’s literally halfway through punching your number into the keypad until he stops and decides against it. He knows your number off by heart now.

🕷- You appear and disappear like a ghost its so random.

🕷- Honest to god, he lowkey thought you were homeless until you invited him over to watch Barbie Mermaidia.

🕷- “Bibble is so me.”

🕷- He’s the only person you let over at your place. its small and in the basement of an old apartment complex. the landlord couldn’t get anyone to pay to live there. you live alone.

🕷- You struck a deal, and they let you crash there as long as rent was on time and you fixed their washing machine for free.

🕷- Miles asked how you got to live there for so cheap. You tell him it’s because someone died on the couch he was sitting on.

🕷- He sits on the floor.

🕷- Miles is so eager to share his new powers with someone.

🕷- No seriously, between all the stress and lying and anxiety its nice to let himself get excited about it. To let himself have fun and see what he can do.

🕷- You guys TOTALLY video tape him trying out his new powers for the first time.

🕷- I can imagine you finding an abandoned alleyway on some random ass street after school and filming Miles Trying to do a backflip LMAO.

🕷- You gotta fish him out of a trashcan after he tries to spider climb up the wall.

🕷- You know that thing where a group of friends duck tapes one of their friends to a wall for fun? You get miles to do that to you.

🕷- You guys can’t stop laughing, The best memories of your lives are in those videos.

🕷- He’ll take you up to the top of buildings to show you the graffiti art he painted!! he’ll let you sign it off with a dick and balls or a heart if you want. You guys do homework up there together as well.

🕷- ’M & (Y/I) were here’ has been painted on every available surface of New York.

🕷- You both have the bright idea to hop on his back and go web slinging around the neighbourhood. He can carry you easily.

🕷- Miles decides If you don’t tell him to slow down, then he’s not going fast enough.

🕷- You NEVER tell him to slow down.

🕷- “Faster!!!“

🕷- Now that he’s got super strength he can put you in an inescapable headlock, he doesn’t do it too tight but he holds you there until you tap out.

🕷- He takes you to the coolest spots with the best views.

🕷- You regularly cover for him.

🕷- “We were at Jamba Juice the whole time officer I swear.”

🕷- Miles side eyes you knowing damn well he was no where NEAR a Jamba Juice.

🕷- ’Thanks’ he’d mouth.

🕷- You and Petter B will get along like a house on fire.

🕷- While Miles is extremely unimpressed by him, you don’t seem to care about any pre-existing expectations one might have when you think of the guy behind the mask of Spider-Man, your cracking jokes and feeding your pet rat a couple of French fries while the three of you sit in the diner, planning your next moves carefully.

🕷- Peter B can tell you’re a good kid. He’s at an age where a lot of your batshit tendencies don’t really faze him as long as your not hurting yourself.

🕷- Speaking of which.

🕷- When him and Miles get the chance to talk alone he warns him that he needs to be careful.

🕷- He tells him that normal relationships aren’t possible anymore. And stresses to him what a life like this can mean for your loved ones. especially since you found out his secret. This line of work isn’t just dangerous for Miles, but for you as well.

🕷- Miles is a little shaken after the conversation, no matter how gently Peter tries to put it. But what he’s implying is clear. He tries to shake it off and enjoy the time you both spend together. He won’t admit to himself that Peter is right just yet.

🕷- It’s just so easy to tell you everything and rely on you.

🕷- There will be a moment sometime in the future when reality sets in, but for now Miles makes the same mistake every Spider-Man does.

🕷- He has a best friend. :(

🕷- On the other hand, Peter comes to the staggering realisation that your actually extremely prone to accidents and danger all on your own. And he appropriately does a complete 180 from ‘casually distant bum-uncle' to ‘I am your dad now’.

🕷- It’s Nothing personal, kid. now stop trying to get in the middle of fights with dangerous criminals and let the adult— or at least the guys with super strength, stamina, speed and resilience— handle it.

🕷- He demands you stay out of the crossfire, but, to no one’s surprise you don’t listen.

🕷- You’re willing to throw yourself in front of Miles to shield him from anything, much to your best friends terror.

🕷- You hold your own surprisingly well against opponents that would be considered reasonable threats otherwise. You’re resourceful, grabbing anything and everything you can get your hands on. you get a terrifying look in your eye.

🕷- No matter how impressed Peter is, He will slingshot you around with his web-shooters to propel you out of the way of oncoming attacks. He will do this for both of you, but feels the need to do it less for Miles. He knows he can take what’s on the other end of the punch. But No matter how untouchable you make yourself out to be, you can’t.

🕷- “Do I want kids?”

🕷- He takes you on as his responsibility just as much as he does Miles.

🕷- Spider-Gwen also looks out for you in battle.

🕷- She’s more laid back, and even a little suave about it too.

🕷- She secretly wishes she had someone like you in her universe. What she wouldn’t give to decompress with you after a long day of patrolling New York.

🕷- She’s actually the most normal about you having a pet rat. You know, the one you grabbed out of a garbage can in a subway station. Yeah, That rat.

🕷- Miles watches you both get along like a house on fire and just quietly falls behind you both since he’s not sure what to do or say.

🕷- He’s so awkward, poor guy.

🕷- Your tendency to go off for days at a time ignites everyone’s curiosity. it’s a concerning habit, and Gwen even endeavours to follow you to see where you disappear to so often.

🕷- She’s unsuccessful.

🕷- It's never said out loud, but when she’s facing the one-way ticket home she finds herself wanting to stay just a bit longer. Not just for Miles, but for you to… She wonders what you’ll get up to while she’s gone.

🕷- …

🕷- Peter Porker vibes with you so hard.

🕷- no wait don’t scroll away wait

🕷- he WILL gift you the freakishly large cartoon mallet. Sorry, but miles didn’t appreciate it for what it was.

🕷- He would be cracking jokes and doing bits with you through out the whole goddamn movie.

🕷- Miles can usually let you do your own thing without sparing a second glance, but the looney tunes laws of physics that Porker exhibits WILL rub off on you at least a little.

🕷- It’s contagious. And when you start flattening eachother into to perfect discs it freaks everyone out a little.

🕷- He’s got enough to worry about in the plot,,, Damn,,

🕷- Spider Noir teaches you how to throw a good punch

🕷- in exchange you let him mess with your phone as much as he wants

🕷- "how the hell do you work this thing?"

🕷- He likes you, he thinks you got a lot of guts.

🕷- You were actually the one to design Miles’ suit. He took inspiration from one of your drawings in your school notebook.

🕷- You've always believed in him, and that made him believe in himself too.

[seat-safety-switch]

Have you ever taken a jigsaw puzzle, put it all together except for one piece, and then thrown that very last fucking piece, the one you absolutely needed, into a lake? It is here that two different kinds of people emerge. You are either exuberant at flexing your power, however limited, over an arbitrary set of rules... or you are utterly distraught that the thing will never be perfect.

Even after all these years, I don't know which one I would be. I want my projects to kick ass, just like everyone else's, but I also don't want to be a slave to them. That's what happened to Ranger Rick down the block, when he became obsessed with making sure every single bolt on his Ford Ranger was torqued to perfection. He scuffed one on the sill plate while he was torquing it, and something broke inside him. Pulled all the bolts right out, sent them to plating. Now he has several ziploc bags of beautifully cleaned and plated bolts and a big pile of rusty parts that are never going to form a truck again. I don't want that life for me.

Sometimes I like my things to be a little imperfect. Dent in the fender. Scratch on the windshield from driving through that cornfield to get away from the cops. That way, I don't get so mad when an errant shopping cart smashes into the bumper (because I was doing donuts in the grocery store parking lot again.) And I'll always have something reasonable to fix, not like Rick, who just looks at his driveway-occupying light truck frame and starts to weep.

Don't get me wrong, though. I would still be insanely upset if you took the nice turbo I've been saving in my basement for 25 years and threw it into the river. One of these days I'm gonna put that on a car, I swear. I just gotta get the perfect one.

[bella-rose29]

paper rings

Anthony Lockwood x fem!reader

Word count: 10.2k words

Warnings: mild spoilers for the later books (this is set after TEG and they're all 18+), a LOT of mildly explicit innuendoes and sexual references, swearing

this is my Valentine's Day surprise that I've been talking about, so happy Valentine's Day to you all! <3

based on the Taylor Swift song of the same name

Anthony Lockwood masterlist

It was nearly 2 in the morning, and Y/n L/n was exhausted. 

She had been on a case for the last seven hours and everything hurt and ached - including places in her body she didn't even know she had - and she just wanted her bed and an incredibly large cup of tea. 

So why was she having to babysit three other agents who really should have been old enough to look after themselves?

Two of them seemed to be high on flare fumes, giggling about absolutely nothing and making weird sounds every few seconds. The third was smiling fondly at his friends and coworkers, but wasn't doing anything to stop them from getting closer and closer to the edge of their sanity. 

Y/n sighed for the millionth time in the last ten minutes, and the third agent (the one who wasn't as insane as the other two - she'd nicknamed him Beanpole) looked over from where he was leaning back against the DEPRAC van with his arms crossed. Somehow he looked effortlessly cool and relaxed, despite the plasma stains and dirt covering his entire body. 

“Are you alright?” he asked. 

“I'm fine, just want to go home and stop looking after three other agents.” 

“Ah, that’s fair. Wait, 'looking after’?”

“Yeah, Barnes told me to keep an eye on you three 'cause you were in trouble or something.” 

“Oh, we're not in trouble,” he grinned, and although she rolled her eyes she couldn't deny the way her heart skipped a beat at his smile. “Barnes just likes being dramatic. We didn't do anything.” Somehow she didn't believe him, but the sheer amount of charm that was pouring out of him was making her disregard any concerns she had about how truthful he was being. 

“So what is it that you aren't in trouble for then?” His grin only grew wider, and Y/n found herself smiling back. 

“Minor property damage. But in our defence our client didn't warn us about the malignant smoke that she'd seen creeping out of the basement or even the intense waves of nausea she felt when walking past her under stairs cupboard. So we really can't take any of the blame for completely decimating her bannisters and front hall. Plus, we're insured.”

“No you're not,” Barnes interrupted, joining the conversation and holding a manilla folder. “You didn't have your DEPRAC standardised iron chains, Lockwood. Not according to this report.” That made Beanpole (Lockwood? Although that didn't sound much like a name) stand up, uncrossing his arms as a frown decorated his pretty face. 

“What? But we did, I made sure after Mrs Hope's house.” Y/n didn't know what had happened at Mrs Hope's house, but from the way Barnes was frowning even more than usual and somehow looking even more unimpressed with Beanpole she figured she didn't want to know. “You can go in and check if you like, they're still in the hall.”

“Fine. L/n, you go in and check.” 

“What?” 

“Just check the chains are there, then come back. They managed to at least get rid of the ghosts.”

“Alright,” she grumbled, hoisting her belt up a little and trudging off in the direction of the building Barnes had pointed her to. She shouldn't even be here, since she was meant to have been at home around half an hour ago, but now she was making her way into some random woman's house to carry out a job that any random DEPRAC officer could have done (if what Barnes had said about the other agents removing the Visitors was true). She pushed open the door, glad for her gloves at the chill in the air, and scoffed when she immediately laid eyes on the thick iron chains that had been kicked to the side in the fight. Y/n picked them up, huffing under the added weight, and was about to turn and leave when her eyes caught on the state of the front hall. “What the actual fuck…” she whispered, then shook her head and closed the door behind her, choosing to ignore the mess inside. 

“Well?” Barnes demanded when she'd made her way back. She dropped the chains at his feet. 

“Yep. I don't know why I had to do that though, anyone could have looked.” She was being irritable, she knew, but she thought she was perfectly justified in feeling that way.

“Alright.” Barnes looked unhappy about the whole situation too, but that wasn't Y/n's fault. “Then just sign these papers and you three can go.” Beanpole was smiling smugly, and he nodded and took the papers that Barnes handed him. 

“Thank you, Inspector. Luce, George, here.” They were both still laughing at something only they knew about, clutching their sides as they took the sheets of paper that Beanpole handed them. 

“Can I go home too?” Y/n asked Barnes while the others signed the forms. 

“Yeah. Maybe catch a ride with these three, they're your way.”

“Fine.”

A few minutes later the four of them were piled into a taxi and heading off down the road in the direction of Marylebone. 

“So,” Beanpole started. The moon was shining bright on his face through the taxi window, making him look like a Visitor himself when combined with his already pale skin and the dark shadows under his eyes. He still looked effortlessly gorgeous though, and Y/n found herself wondering if he was single. “You're an agent then. Solo?”

“Oh, yeah. Never liked working for the big companies. They never really cared about the people, you know? Shit,” her eyes widened as she realised what she'd said. “Are you a company?”

“Yes, but don't worry. We have a grand total of four people at our agency. Sometimes five or six if we get extra help from others.”

“That's... very small. Is the fourth your supervisor?”

“No, our secretary actually. Holly doesn't much like being in the field anymore though, but that works out alright for us. She still gets paid a good amount.”

“So if you don't have a supervisor…”

“I'm the agency head,” he smiled, but now instead of appearing chipper and light, he looked tired and weighed down by the responsibility of running a company and looking after his coworkers. “Anthony Lockwood, Lockwood and Co.” 

“Y/n L/n, formerly of Fittes.” They shook hands awkwardly in the limited space they had in the back of the taxi. 

“And you left because they don't care about the people?”

“That's right. I always wanted to connect more, but I guess that's because of my Touch. Fittes were much more businesslike about it all, just going in and getting the job done and not caring about anything other than having another successful case under their belt. It just didn't sit right with me.”

“Well if you ever feel like working for a company again, you could always come and work with us,” Anthony Lockwood said. “I'm sure we could do with someone like you helping us out. Besides, we do care about the people; it's pretty much the only thing going for us other than our skill in the field.”

“First stop?” the driver called out, slowing the vehicle. 

“Oh, that's me,” Y/n stated, grabbing the door handle and getting out. “Thanks for letting me ride with you.” She moved to the boot of the taxi to take her kit bag and rapier, and was surprised when Anthony Lockwood followed her, helping her to balance all the bags inside and making sure that nothing fell out. “Thank you.”

“Not a problem. And I mean it, if you ever feel like joining us on a case then just come and find us.”

“That's... that's actually nice of you, thank you.” He nodded with a smile, then clambered back into the taxi (which looked difficult with how long and thin his limbs were). She stood on the pavement for a few moments, waiting for the taxi to start moving again and waving at the three agents left in the cab as they drove off down the road. 

As soon as she was inside her shared house, door firmly shut and locked and kettle boiling on the stove, she pulled up the chair at her desk and switched on her computer, typing in her password and logging in. Ten minutes later she had a mug of tea brewing on her desk while she furiously tapped at the keyboard for any information on Lockwood and Co, and was pleasantly surprised by what she found. There wasn't much, since she couldn't access a lot of the full reports of cases, but there was a decent number of newspaper articles that had been uploaded for her to read. One detailed the £60,000 fine that the company had been given for setting fire to a certain Mrs Hope's home a few years prior, and from the blurry black and white photo the blaze looked like it hadn't left much behind. 

Further research provided an address for their agency at 35 Portland Row, not far away from where she currently lived. One or two articles were about the parade incident from the Black Winter and Lockwood and Co's success in protecting the people present, but other than that there wasn't much more. 

She sat back in her chair, sipping the last of her tea. Bedtime for now, but when she finally woke up she'd head to the nearest corner store and pick up some food. The fridge had been nearly empty when she'd looked earlier, and she knew that Portland Row was on the way back. 

She wanted to say thank you again (and totally not spy on their house), and everybody loved a doughnut.

~~~

Y/n had knocked on the door roughly two minutes ago, and nobody had answered. 

She knew that they were all at home, because she could hear them arguing about who was going to answer the door, but nobody had done it yet. 

Knocking once more while balancing the box of doughnuts in her other hand she sighed, waited another thirty seconds, and just as she turned to leave she heard the locks click behind her. The door swung open to reveal Anthony Lockwood, once more dressed in a suit (a lot cleaner than the one he'd been wearing in the early hours of that morning), and a wide smile on his face. 

“It's you! Miss L/n, was it?”

“Uh, yeah. Just Y/n is fine though. Um, I just wanted to say thanks again for the lift last night, and for being nice and shit when you didn't have to be, and I bought some doughnuts if you guys wanted them.” She tried to surreptitiously peer around him to take a look at his front hall, but the interior was quite dark and cluttered and it was difficult to pretend to not be inspecting somebody's home when they were stood in front of you. 

“Oh, you really didn't have to, Y/n.” He took the box out of her hands anyway. “Did you want to come in?”

“No, thank you. I should get back. I've got a lot of paperwork to get through and I think one of my housemates is cleaning today and wanted everyone's help, so…” she trailed off, rocking slightly on her heels while Anthony Lockwood watched her. 

“Right, well, thanks for stopping by! And for the doughnuts, that was very generous of you.”

She shrugged. “I've had taxi rides with people I was actually working with and they were complete arseholes to me, so I really appreciated you not being like that when you didn't even know me.”

“Anytime.” He paused for a moment, then frowned at her. “How did you find us? I know I said that you could always drop by but I don't remember actually telling you where we live. There's not a problem with it, by the way, just curious.”

“Oh, I looked it up. Figured you meant to tell me and never got round to it. Besides, I needed to go shopping anyway and I live nearby, so it wasn't too difficult for me.”

“Ah, that makes sense. Well it was lovely seeing you again, Y/n. I look forward to our next meeting.” His smile was infectious, and she still had a grin on her face at the thought of him when she went to bed that night.

~~~

For the next few months, both Y/n and Lockwood and Co were busy with their own cases, but regularly passed each other in the street. Anthony Lockwood had taken to sending her a wink or flirty quite early on, and because Y/n believed it impossible that someone like him was single and therefore able to chase after someone like her, she ignored him. Every now and then she would indulge him, of course, flirting back to see how he would react (he was always pleasantly surprised and kept their little game going for as long as he could before he was needed), but for the most part she would walk right past him. 

It wasn't entirely her fault, since many of the times they bumped into each other she was on a time schedule, and didn't have the extra minute or so to flirt with the pretty boy. 

The last time had been different, though.

~~~

“Hello again, darling,” a voice said from her left, and Y/n smiled when she recognised it right away as Lockwood's. They knew each other better now, from the few times that they had been able to talk for longer and ask how the other was doing, and when he had found out that she was calling him Anthony Lockwood in her head he gave her a look of barely contained amusement and told her she could pick one. 

Anthony had felt too personal, since everyone else that spoke to him seemed to call him Lockwood, and she didn't think they knew each other that well for her to use his first name. 

“Come here often?” he asked, appearing in her field of view and leaning on the table she was sat at in the small night café. 

“Only when I know that you're going to be here,” Y/n responded, and delighted in the faint pink tinge that came onto his cheeks. 

“May I?” He gestured to the chair opposite her, and she nodded. 

“Not with your friends tonight?”

“No, they're probably at home already, lucky bastards. My case ran on a bit longer than I expected, and I couldn't wait for a cup of tea. Plus, when I saw you in here I couldn't not come and see you.”

They sat there for a while, making their way through two cups of tea each before deciding to leave, and Lockwood offered to take the taxi home with her.

When they were nearly back to Y/n's house, he spoke up. 

“I'll pay, if you like. I'll be paying for this stretch of the journey anyway so it doesn't make much of a difference to me.”

“Oh, Lockwood, I can pay you for my part at least, it's not a big deal to me.”

“Nonsense.” He seemed to hesitate for a moment, just as they drove around the corner onto her street. “Or… you could come back to Portland Row with me?” Their flirting had never gone as far as properly inviting the other back to their place (although there had always been the comments of 'why don't we finish this somewhere else?' or 'wanna come home with me and prove it?'), and it took Y/n a moment to realise that he was being serious. 

“I mean... if you're sure? I don't want to impose or anything.”

“No, you won't be imposing, darling. George and Lucy will be asleep, I'm sure. I think there's half a bottle of wine that needs finishing off if you wanted to share? No pressure though.”

“That sounds great, actually.”

“So are you two both going to Portland Row then?” the driver called, and Lockwood nodded. 

“Yes please.” He turned back to Y/n, worry starting to creep into his expression. “You did agree, right?”

“Yes, Lockwood, I did. I think I need something that's not tea to be honest.”

“You can stay the night, too. If you need to. I'll sleep on the sofa and you can have my bed.”

“I'm not kicking you out of your own bed, Lockwood. How big is it?”

“Darling, I'm scandalised that you would ask me that question. You know that size doesn't mat-” He was cut off by Y/n smacking him in the chest, and he chuckled when she glared at him. 

“The bed, Lockwood, how big is the bed? If I wanted to know the size of your dick I'd ask you to strip.” She ignored the weird look that the driver cast them in his rear view mirror and focused on Lockwood's answer instead. 

“Steady, darling. We're not back yet.” He yelped when she whacked him again, and caught her wrists and held them so that she couldn't attack him anymore. “It's a double.”

“Well then we can both fit, can't we?”

“Asking me to strip, getting me into bed with you? If I didn't know any better, darling, I'd say that you were trying to seduce me,” he smirked, leaning in close. 

“Oh, Lockwood. I think we both know I did that a long time ago, don't we.” They were dangerously close to kissing, their lips only a couple of centimetres away from each other while their noses brushed with every jolt in the road, and then the taxi was slowing and pulling up to the curb outside 35 Portland Row. 

“Alright you two, out. And use protection please, you're too young to be havin' kids.” Y/n flushed and opened the door, moving around to the boot to take out her kit bag and rapier, and when Lockwood followed a moment later after paying the driver his face was red too.

~~~

“Here,” Lockwood said, handing over a tea mug filled with wine. 

“Thanks. You're sure the others won't mind us drinking this?”

“They've had plenty of time to drink it, and I own the house and therefore the kitchen and the contents of the fridge are mine too, so I say it's fair game.” His smile was slightly blinding, but Y/n had learned to see past the glare and look at his eyes instead, finding the pure joy behind the façade he put up for the world to see. 

They didn't know each other that well, when everything was considered, but Y/n did call him her friend when describing their relationship, and she did feel that if asked, Lockwood would say the same. 

Around thirty minutes later Y/n was nearly doubled over with laughter at some stupid thing that Lockwood had said (the wine had gone straight to her head and she had no recollection of what exactly he had said), clutching her sides as they sat in the cluttered library with the bottle of wine between them. 

“You, Anthony Lockwood, are ridiculous!”

“I am! In fact, have I shown you my hat collection?”

“Is that some sort of weird euphemism? Or are you genuinely more deranged than I thought you were?”

“Not a euphemism, love,” he grinned, and Y/n in her wine-addled state thought about how he was starting to look like the deranged young man she'd just accused him of being. 

“So... you actually have a hat collection? Why?” Lockwood shrugged. 

“It's good for disguises when I need to do a little bit of extra research for a case. I can do accents too!”

“No offence, Lockwood, but I've heard some of your accents, and I'm very surprised that you haven't been hunted down and killed yet.”

“Believe me, people have tried!” Somehow he didn't look concerned about that, still smiling just as widely as before, and Y/n thought he looked rather nice like that.

~~~

When she woke up in the morning, Y/n realised she had never taken the painkillers Lockwood had left on the bedside table for her to use. 

“Shit,” she whispered, grabbing the packet and the glass of water and swallowing the pills the best she could in an attempt to stave off the headache that had formed. After finishing off the wine, Lockwood had managed to find some more alcohol hidden away in a cupboard in the library ("It's my personal stash, so don't worry about feeling guilty about drinking this") and they had stayed up until it was nearly sunrise talking about everything and nothing. She was regretting not drinking the water before sleeping, and when she flopped back onto the bed and under the covers she realised that there was someone else in the bed with her. 

Lockwood looked peaceful asleep.

While she didn't mind waking up next to him in the morning (the view was actually rather nice), not being able to remember what had happened the night before was a little disturbing, especially since she was in her underwear and, as far as she could tell, Lockwood wasn't wearing any clothes. 

The bedsheets had been partially kicked off in the night, most likely because the heating was apparently on full from the very warm temperature of the room, and the duvet had bunched up around Lockwood's waist. She didn't want to wake him by trying to find out if anything had happened last night, since he probably never slept with the sheer size of the shadows under his eyes, so instead she carefully got out of bed and picked up her clothes.

Finding all of her things was difficult, since they'd been flung all around the room in what she hoped was drunkenness and not desperation, but after nearly ten minutes she was dressed and reaching for the door handle. She didn't make it that far though, because before she could leave the sounds of somebody waking up started coming from the bed, and Lockwood was asking her where she was going. 

“Oh, I just... I just figured you wouldn't want me to stick around-”

“Why would you think that?” He was rubbing his eyes and sitting up, and she had to force her gaze away from where the sheets were dangerously close to revealing whether or not they had slept together. 

“I don't know.” There was silence for a minute or so while Lockwood tried to wake up enough to work out what was going on, and Y/n stood by the door feeling very awkward. “Did we... did anything happen? Last night?”

“Don't think so. I feel like I would remember that, darling,” he winked, and she felt her face heat up. 

“Oh, right. Yeah.”

“You don't seem convinced.”

“No, I am,” she said, very unconvincingly. There was another silence while she hesitated. “Are you naked?” she blurted out, immediately covering her face with her hands to block out Lockwood's shocked reaction. His laughter didn't help, only serving to make her feel more embarrassed than she already was, and she stayed safely behind her hands while she waited for it all to be over. 

“No, darling, I'm not naked. But if you wanted me to be then I'm sure we could figure something out.” She could hear the amusement in his voice and groaned in frustration, knowing that he wouldn't ever let her live this moment down. 

“I'm good, thanks.” She didn't really mean it, but it was nice to have a friend like Lockwood, and she figured that having sex with him probably wouldn't help to keep that friendship at all. 

“Alright. Well if you don't want to see me in my pants then keep your hands there, I'm getting out of bed.” For the most part she obeyed, but she would be lying if she said that she didn't peek through her fingers briefly while he was getting dressed.

~~~

Luckily the other members of Lockwood and Co were not at home when Y/n left that morning, having said no to Lockwood's offer of breakfast (she would pick up something from Arif's, even if it was out of her way a little), and within half an hour she was back in her own house with a very large cup of tea and a plate of food in her favourite armchair in the living room. 

When one of her housemates asked her where she had been all night, a suggestive tone to her question, Y/n simply shrugged, and replied “What's it to you?”

~~~

One week later she was running for her life. 

It wasn't that this sort of thing didn't happen often, since her job required a lot of running a lot of the time, but normally she wasn't this exhausted from it. She wasn't even working on a case, either. Y/n had just been walking home from her actual case for that night when she'd accidentally taken a wrong turn in her fatigued state and had come face to face with a bunch of Type Twos. 

At least she had her rapier and a few flares and salt bombs left, and her boots were solid enough that despite how much running she had already done that night, she couldn't feel the ground beneath her feet when normally her soles would be protesting in pain. 

“Fuck's sake,” she grumbled, heading for the nearest iron fence she could find. Unfortunately she still had to cross a road that was surprisingly busy at this time of night (or morning? she wasn't sure where the line between the two was drawn) and then vault over the fence into the park, which was probably also infested with Visitors. Going against every action movie she had ever seen she looked back (which was precisely what she shouted at the characters for), then immediately stumbled since she couldn't see where she was going. Her brief pause in her flight allowed the Visitors to catch up a little, and within a few seconds she was seeing her life flash before her eyes and throwing up her rapier in a last ditch attempt to not die. 

Then something else was flashing before her eyes, and the ghosts were being driven off. 

Y/n realised with a start that the flash had been Lockwood and his stupid grin, dressed in his stupid long coat that was stupidly attractive on him, waving his rapier around in stupidly perfect motions. 

“Did you miss me, darling?” She didn't even have time to respond, already ducking to not be hit by the bicycle a Poltergeist had sent flying their way, and Lockwood pushed her to the ground to dodge the railing that followed. They landed with a thump, and Y/n winced when her back hit the concrete of the pavement and then again a very brief moment later when Lockwood landed on her. 

“I did, Lockwood. I really did miss you.” She hoped that he could see how sincere she was, and he looked as though he was about to say something. Unfortunately he was cut off when a badly-aimed salt bomb exploded right above their heads, and a small “Sorry!” was called out from somewhere nearby. 

“Not to worry, George!” Lockwood yelled back as he got off the floor. He offered out a hand and Y/n let him pull her up, holding her breath when he pulled with more force than was needed and she fell into his chest. “Woah,” he said, voice quiet. “You alright?” His free hand had come up to steady her by the arm, and now he was gently stroking up and down. She wondered if he knew he was doing it. 

“Yeah. Can we maybe run away from the death bikes?”

“I think that would be a good idea. You going home?” Y/n shook her head. 

“One of my housemates has their partner over, and I'd really rather not be there. I was gonna put up with it but if you're offering your bed again I won't say no,” she teased. Lockwood's face went pink, but not from the cold or the running. 

“I'm always offering my bed, darling, you should know that by now.” His smile was as blinding as the flash he had appeared in, and then he was tugging her hand and leading her away from the ghosts (which wouldn't be able to follow after a while, since she'd already run quite far from their Sources), and instead heading for 35 Portland Row. 

When they made it inside (Lucy was already in bed, but Lockwood and George had been coming back from a case like Y/n), George bade the two of them goodnight, then tiredly climbed the stairs, leaving Lockwood and Y/n in the front hall. It was dimly lit, only the lamp on the hall cupboard providing any reprise from the darkness, and the yellow glow of it made Lockwood look ethereal. 

He had dust and dirt all over him, staining his usually perfect white shirt and tie, and his hair was a mess from the slight wind outside, but he still wore his confidence and his charm like a second skin, and he had never looked more like Anthony Lockwood in all the time Y/n had known him. 

“What were you even doing out there?” he asked. 

“I was coming back from a job, took a wrong turn somewhere, and came face to face with those fuckers. I'm just really glad that you were there in time because I probably would've ended up in hospital otherwise. Or a furnace.”

“I'm glad I was there too,” Lockwood said, stepping forward. He made to move his hand, as though he might reach out and touch hers, but then his fist was clenching at his side again, fingers flexing every few seconds. “I thought you would be alright, really. Then I saw you trip - why the hell did you look back? You always get annoyed when they do that in movies. I was scared, Y/n, that you might not get back up again.” She could tell that he meant it too, from the way he was looking at her. It was almost too much, his gaze, since it was heavy with so much emotion that they hadn't even properly addressed between them, and that was probably why he kissed her. 

She both had and hadn't been expecting it. 

It made sense when she thought about it, because beneath all the teasing and flirting there was attraction and a real desire, and she had always figured that being with someone was easier if you knew and trusted them. But she had never thought that either of them would act on it, since both of them seemed happy to let the friendship cover up the truth because at least that meant they weren't without the other. Bringing the truth to light could ruin that, and then they might not see each other at all. 

Now, though, she wondered why they hadn't kissed before. 

It had been brief, a few seconds at most, but it was enough to make her realise that they had been incredibly stupid in not doing it earlier. She had had such a long night - they both had - and when he pressed his lips to hers for the second time she knew that despite the fatigue and near death experiences involving bicycles, they would be alright. Her hands had moved without her fully knowing, and when they pulled away after the second kiss she realised that they were in his hair and clutching his coat that he hadn't taken off yet. His were nestled around her waist, holding her close to him while he searched her eyes for any sign to stop. 

The third kiss was the longest yet, and it took them a long time to move from the front hall to his bedroom.

~~~

Y/n had always been a fan of anything that shone, and had been called a magpie by nearly everyone that knew her. 

It didn't matter if it was expensive or not, if it was shiny, then she would have it. Growing up she hadn't been used to expense, and finding trinkets on the street was her speciality, but every now and then someone would buy her something a little less on the cheap side, and she would be overjoyed. 

Then of course there were the things she bought herself. 

The Fittes Ball that she was on her way to had invited agents of all kinds (a rarity for solo agents who usually went forgotten), and her outfit was one of the most expensive things that she had bought yet (other than her shared house). It was worth it, though, for the look on Lockwood's face when he first saw her. 

“You look incredible, Y/n/n!” Lucy gushed, immediately wrapping her new friend in a hug. George and Holly agreed, and while their fussing was nice it was Lockwood's opinion she really wanted. They hadn't spoken after the night they spent together two weeks ago, and now he had an unreadable expression on his face while he looked at her. It was ridiculous, really, how nervous she was to know what he was thinking, since she had never usually cared about what any man thought of her. 

“Thank you, I love your dress, Luce! And George, are you actually in a suit? No, no, no, you look very nice! Holly, you look incredible as always,” she said, returning the compliments her friends had given her. Her gaze kept darting back to Lockwood though, and after the others had moved away to talk to someone else, he cleared his throat. 

“Y/n.”

“Lockwood.” He took a step towards her. 

“You know I told you you could call me Anthony.” He had, not long after he'd taken her to his bed. 

“Oh, right. I didn't know if that was just... for then.” She was struggling to look at him now, so she missed the way his expression softened. 

“It's for whenever, darling.”

“Okay,” she said, and the small smile he gave her made her heart beat a little faster in her chest. 

“You look stunning, darling. Truly.”

“So do you, Anthony,” she replied, and this time she took a step forward to close the distance. A frown came onto her face, and when he asked her why she paused for a moment before answering. “What are we? Because we haven't spoken since... since that night, and now we're acting like we did before and I'm just quite confused.”

Instead of responding with words, he dug into his suit jacket pocket and pulled out a folded paper, handing it to her a second later. She tried not to focus too much on his hands (the memories of two weeks ago were coming back to the front of her mind now) and took it with confusion, starting to unfold it. 

“Oh, I'll be back in a minute, George is calling me over.” He flashed her one of his winning smiles and was off, moving in what she assumed was the direction of George. She finally unfolded the paper and was surprised to see that it was mostly blank, just one question and two little points below it. A pen had been folded into it, and she bit back a smile when she'd read the words. 

Would you go on a date with me? Please circle one answer

yes

no

He was ridiculous, she had decided, but then again she couldn't deny how ridiculously cute it was that he'd written out this mini questionnaire and put it in his pocket, despite not knowing whether she would actually be here or not to take it from him. Why he'd left immediately she didn't know, but maybe he was just too nervous to find out her reaction right away. She clicked the pen and circled 'yes' the best she could with no hard surface to lean on, and winced when the paper punctured. He knew where to find her, but she wrote her address anyway and the house phone number, and refolded the paper. Looking around she couldn't immediately see him, but then she caught a flash of a smile that could only have belonged to one Mr Anthony Lockwood, and she made for where he stood. He blushed slightly when he caught sight of her, then his cheeks burned brighter when she tucked the piece of paper and the pen in the pocket just inside his jacket (standing much closer to him than she needed to), and walked away without a word.

~~~

Two hours later they had snuck into the Fittes building's public library, giggling about something stupid one of the stuck-up snobs who was far too old to still be alive had said while they sipped the fancy champagne that was being served. 

“Do you think they get many kids in here? Like, actual kids who would need entertaining?” she asked, making Anthony look round from where he'd been perusing the shelves. 

“I doubt it. Why?”

“They've got origami. Look,” she pointed, putting her champagne flute down on a sideboard and picking up a sheet. “I used to be able to make loads of things, but I reckon if I tried making a rabbit or something now it'd look like someone folded a bit of paper a bunch of times and then sat on it.”

“I used to make those snowflakes where you fold it into quarters and cut bits out. Got quite good in the end; I could make chains of them eventually.”

“Of course you're good at making paper snowflakes,” she muttered, no hint of malice behind it. “You're good at everything, I swear.”

“Oh, that's not true.”

“Really? Name one thing that you can't do.” He paused, and she could practically see the cogs turning in his head. “See? You can't do it!”

“Well, I don't think that was very fair, actually, because you didn't give me long enough to actually think about it!” She moved to sit down, picking out various colours of paper squares before settling on one she liked. Anthony sat down next to her, his thigh close enough to hers that she could feel his body heat through his suit. He chose his own square of paper, immediately starting to fold it in different ways. 

“What are you gonna make?” she asked him, not looking up from where she was attempting to make an origami butterfly. 

“That's a secret.”

“Alright then,” she snorted, “be mysterious. Is that because you're bad at origami and you're trying to hide it by making me guess?”

“Sure, that's what's happening.”

They sat in comfortable silence while they worked, and when Y/n crossed her legs she made contact with Anthony's knee and drew in a breath. She refocused and looked at the paper in her hands, frowning when she realised that she had no idea how to make a butterfly out of it anymore, and sat back with a huff. 

“You alright?”

“Yeah, just bored, I suppose. What are you making?” He had folded his piece of paper into a thin strip, and now he was pulling the ends together, somehow making them link. 

“May I?” he asked, gesturing to her right hand. She didn't answer for a moment, too busy watching the way his fingers moved. “Y/n?”

“Oh, right.” She let him take her left hand in his, holding her breath for the millionth time around him both at the tenderness of it all and at the way his hands were so cold compared to her warm ones. He lifted the origami up and slid it onto her fourth finger, tightening it by pushing the ends together further. 

“You can take it off, if you want.”

She wasn't sure she was breathing. “Are you proposing?”

“What? No, if I was proposing you'd know about it, darling. I just… I don’t know.” He looked nervous, and although he hadn’t let go of her hand, she could see that he was fidgeting. 

“I love it, Anthony. Thank you.” He smiled then, small and as under as the way he was holding her hand, and she couldn’t help but ask what she’d been wondering for the last two hours. 

“Did you read my response?” Somehow he softened even more, and his grip tightened ever so slightly before he nodded. 

“Yes, I did.” Had he moved closer? She thought the distance between them was no longer as frustratingly large as it had been, but he was still too far away. 

“Well?”

“Are you free on Saturday? There’s a great place for lunch I’ve been dying to show you for a while now.” He was definitely closer, and she could make out the small scar on his lip in perfect detail. 

“Midday work for you?”

“Absolutely.” He was still holding her hand when he kissed her gently, like he thought she might leave at any moment, and when he pulled back after a couple of seconds she dragged him right back to her lips, shifting somehow even closer to him on the seat. The gift he had made that now sat on her finger felt as heavy as a gold one, filled with the promise of what could be and happy endings, and she found herself thinking that if the two of them did ever marry, she would be happy to do so with a paper ring. 

They were sat there kissing for a while, not stopping until someone shouted outside the door in drunken laughter, making Anthony and Y/n jump back in surprise. Then they were laughing too, like they were teenagers sneaking off (which, she supposed, they almost were, if you ignored the fact they were legally adults now), and he pressed one last quick kiss to her mouth before he stood up. “We should head out. I’m sure the others will be wondering where we are.” Y/n stood up too, still holding his hand, and moved to straighten his tie. She had pulled on it when they were kissing, and now it was all crooked around his neck. 

“I think they probably know that we’re together, though. I doubt that they’re too worried about us.” She finished fiddling with his tie and draped her arms around his neck, and flushed when he wrapped his own arms around her waist and pulled her tight against his body. They stayed that way for a while, just trading small kisses and swaying gently back and forth. 

“I’m glad,” Anthony said suddenly, breaking the silence. “That we… you know.”

“Nearly died and then slept together?”

“That’s one way of putting it. I just - I’m glad.”

“I’m glad too, Anthony.” Normally accidents like having sex with her friends was something she hated, but given it was Anthony Lockwood that it had happened with, she was happy to make an exception. 

~~~

That night, while Anthony finally managed to sleep next to her, Y/n stayed awake. The glow of the ghost lamp outside had woken her a few minutes ago while she had been surfacing, and now she couldn’t get back to sleep. Her dress hung on the back of his desk chair, and various parts of his suit were slung around the room in piles from where they had thrown them earlier in their haste to be as close as possible to each other. 

The ring now sat on Anthony’s bedside table, and although it wasn’t light enough in the room for her to make out its shape, she still knew exactly where it was. Before the two of them got too caught up in each other she had slipped it off, saying that she didn’t want it damaged (as it likely would have been), and when she placed it to the side her eyes had caught on the photo in the frame. 

“Is that us?” she had asked, grabbing the frame with both hands. 

“Oh… yes. Sorry, it was just a really nice photo and we don’t get to see each other that much, and-”

“Anthony,” she interrupted, warmth flooding her face at her next words. “I’ve got cut-outs from papers that wrote about you framed, so this is perfectly okay.”

She flushed again just thinking about it, and how softly he had smiled at her, and then how softly he had kissed her afterwards. She had been dreaming about him, about both of them, and what would have happened if they had stayed in the library at Fittes for a little longer (a lot of hushed moans and whispered words, and his hair completely dishevelled). 

He was the one that she wanted, she was sure of it. There had been others, but none of them had featured in her thoughts about the future like Anthony Lockwood did. 

~~~

Months later, when the seasons had gone from wonderfully warm and sunny (or as sunny as England could get) to cold and biting air, Anthony and Y/n were on a case together. 

She had officially become a member of the agency not too long after they started dating, and while Lucy and George had originally been worried about the logistics of living space, they quickly realised that their new hire would be sharing a bed with their boss. Y/n had settled in quickly, getting used to how her friends lived within a few weeks, and the company had settled into a nice rhythm. 

“A hotel? That’s a pretty big location, shouldn’t we have Lucy and George with us?” she asked as the taxi pulled up to their destination. 

“It seems to be contained to one area, from reports, and since they had a couple of actual children give statements I’m going to trust them. Just the outdoor space around the back, apparently someone - a worker, it says here - died while manning a barbecue near the large pool.”

“How do you die manning a barbecue?”

“He fell face-first into the coals, this says,” Anthony replied, waving the paper report around. They clambered out the taxi, thanking and paying the driver, and once the kit had been collected out the boot and the driver was heading back down the road, they were alone. 

“Well that’s an awful way to go. Type One? Or manifesting as something stronger?”

“Everything points to Type Two, but that’s nothing we can’t handle.”

~~~

He was right, as he so often was, but unfortunately the way in which they handled the Type Two ghost of the Barbecue Man meant they ended up jumping in a pool. 

The Source had apparently been one of the tiles on the ledge, where the Barbecue Man had tripped after falling face first into the coals and cracked his skull open on the edge of the pool. A delightful scene, Y/n was sure, but they hadn’t figured out what the Source was until much later. While she had been scouring the barbecue for any sign of a trigger for the Visitor, Anthony had been drawing it closer to the pool. He seemed to be having a wonderful time taunting the poor dead man, and she couldn’t help but curse him out a little under her breath. “There’s nothing here!”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, Anthony, I’m pretty sure!” She was just about to tell him off for questioning her when he stepped back on his right foot and made the Visitor shriek an ungodly noise. “Wait! Draw it away from where you currently are!” She wasn’t sure if he’d actually been paying attention to her words since he didn’t give any indication that he had heard her, but a moment later he started moving away, the ghost following him, and she was able to dive for the tile. The second her hands came into contact with it she felt the pain and torment that Barbecue Man had been in in the brief minutes before his death, and at the same time that she managed to dislodge the tile (it had been knocked lose, most likely from his head after he hit it) and wrap it in a silver net, Anthony jumped in the pool. When he surfaced, hair plastered to his forehead and coat and suit completely soaked, he shouted at her to jump in too, leaving the Source on dry land. She just stared at him, but then a rush of cold air hit her and she didn’t think twice. Anthony was waving his arms around, making the water move about enough to fend off the second ghost that had appeared. 

Unfortunately that meant that when Y/n attempted to come up for air, she got a face-full of water. 

“Anthony!”

“Whoops. Sorry, darling. Here,” he said, offering out his hand. She took it gladly, still spluttering slightly, and they hauled themselves to the opposite side of the swimming pool. The water was freezing, but it was better than being ghost-touched, and besides, Anthony hadn’t let go of her hand yet. 

~~~

Her hands were turning a little blue from the temperature of the pool. 

It reminded her of when they had been redecorating one of the rooms in Portland Row about two months ago. George had complained that the room was lacking something, and all inhabitants (and Kipps, although Anthony didn’t pay him much attention) agreed that they needed to update it. They had painted it blue, not too dissimilar to the colour of Y/n’s fingers in the present day, and while it had been a wonderful day it had also been the day of her and Anthony’s first fight. 

She couldn’t even remember what it had been about now, something stupid and fuelled by external factors such as job stress and fatigue, but Y/n had slept in Lucy’s bed that night. 

It had been a while before either girl went to sleep, instead spending the hours attempting to stop Y/n’s crying and watching the old tapes of movies and television shows from before the Problem that Lucy had stashed away on her bookcase. When the morning had come, Lucy had offered to go downstairs and sort out breakfast for them both, so that Y/n wouldn’t have to run into Lockwood, but Y/n had shaken her head, saying that the two of them needed to figure something out. 

The moment she had set foot in the kitchen, seeing the back of Anthony’s white dress shirt while he stood at the counter making teas (he had made one for her too, in her favourite mug), she had started tearing up again. He’d heard her sniffling and whipped his head around to see her hovering just inside the doorway, and immediately he had crumbled and rushed over to her, wrapping her in his arms and mumbling “I’m sorry” into her hair. 

Now, back from their case with Barbecue Man, they were sat in the library, Anthony pushing a cup of freshly made tea into her hands in an attempt to get them back to their normal colour. “Feeling any better?” he asked, sitting down in the chair next to hers and picking up his magazine. 

“Yeah, a bit. I can actually feel things again now, so that’s good.”

“Good. Well, I’ll keep you under surveillance for a while, just until I know you’re better.” She snorted, lifting the mug to her mouth. 

“Thanks, Doc. Much appreciated.” His responding smile was enough to warm her up entirely. 

~~~

A few hours later she woke up feeling disorientated, most likely because she never remembered falling asleep in the first place. Anthony was still in his chair on her left, but he had fallen asleep too, magazine splayed across his chest. Y/n stretched, yawned, and checked her watch, then started at the time. It was nearly half six in the morning, and they had come back from their case at around midnight. She wasn’t sure how long Anthony had stayed awake watching over her, but she knew that the moment he did finally regain consciousness she would be sending him straight up to bed for another few hours of sleep. 

She heard somebody moving around in the kitchen and went to investigate, finding George in an oversized t-shirt and no trousers putting the kettle on to boil. “Morning,” she said, shuffling further into the room and stuffing some bread into the toaster. 

“Ah, morning. Lockwood still asleep?”

“Yep. He’s in the library. Did you need him for something?”

“Oh, not really. I woke up at about four and was shockingly hungry, and when I came down he was sat reading his magazine. I was just wondering how long it would be before he was up again.” It made sense for her boyfriend to have stayed awake until he literally passed out from exhaustion, given how little Anthony normally slept anyway, and she frowned when she heard the stairs creak. A few moments later Anthony Lockwood himself appeared in the kitchen, bleary-eyed and smiling like there wasn’t a thing wrong with him only getting about two and a half hours of sleep. “I need the toilet,” George suddenly said. “If you could move out the doorway, Lockwood, that would be great. Thanks. The kettle should be boiled soon, if you two wouldn’t mind?”

“Not at all, George,” Anthony replied, already taking mugs out of the cupboard. “Who’s toast is this? I think it’s burning.”

“Oh, shit, that’s mine! Fuck that’s hot!”

“Not hotter than me though, right?”

“Shut up, Anthony. My fingers are burning.” He reached over and took her hand in his, not caring for the piece of blackened toast that sat on her plate on the counter, and pressed a gentle kiss to each fingertip. She had flashbacks to the last time her hands had been near his mouth in a far less family-friendly setting, and tried to stop her knees from giving out. 

“Better?”

“Um… I guess. Yeah.” If anything she was worse, since now her whole body was on fire at how sweet that one gesture was. He hadn’t even thought about it, since there was less than a second between her saying her hand hurt and him kissing the first fingertip, and that had her knees weakening all over again. She took a step towards him, threading her burning fingers with his and placing the other one on his chest to grab at his collar and pull him in for a kiss. He’d had a long night, she was sure of it, and the more-prominent-than-usual bags under his eyes were giving her a solid argument. The kiss was short and sweet, and when she pulled back he followed her for a moment before realising that it was over. He pouted, his eyes practically begging for her to kiss him again, and she let out a small laugh before obliging. That kiss was sweet too, but lasted a little longer, and the third one would have gone on for longer still had George not come back from the toilet and pretended to gag. 

~~~

“Anthony?”

“Yeah?”

“Do you ever think about just… leaving for a bit? Not completely, I don’t think I could stay away from London forever, but just running off on holiday for a while. Getting a break from the ghost hunting and constant threat of death.”

“That’s… really? You want to ask that now? Darling, my mind is not in the right place for an actual conversation right now.” His hand trailed over her bare side and his eyes were looking at everything but her face, proving that he really wasn’t in the right mental place for a conversation like this, but she tried again anyway. 

“Okay, but do you?” He sighed, reluctantly dragging his gaze up to meet hers. 

“I suppose I’ve never really thought about it before.” He paused, shifting his weight to get comfortable. His legs knocked against hers and his hand hadn’t stopped tracing the skin of her body, and he had never taken off the ring he always wore. It had been a pleasant chill against her earlier when she thought she was going to combust from his touch. “I think because of the company I wouldn’t take a break. And I’d have a lot of guilt about leaving when there are people who might be in danger and I could have helped them.”

“But if you could drive away, would you? None of the guilt, or people getting hurt. Just… going off on your own for a bit.”

“I don’t know about alone. I think I would want you with me, darling.” He punctuated his statement by lowering his voice and pulling her closer by her hips, flush against his body, and although she was tired she couldn’t help but feel warm again. 

“I’d be happy to drive away with you, Ant. Anywhere you go, I’m going too.”

“You mean it?” he breathed, eyes looking almost golden in the glow of his bedside lamp. He looked desperate for her answer, like he needed to know that she would truly always be with him because he couldn’t stand being left alone again. 

“Of course I mean it, Ant. I want it all with you; everything. The complications and fights and of course all the good things too. The horrible Mondays where we get clients who don’t realise that what we do is a full-time job and we don’t really get weekends, the times we do get days off, and we can just be… together.” She ran her fingertips over his arms, marvelling at the hidden muscles she felt. Given how skinny and beanpole-like he appeared, the first time she had realised how toned he was she had been pleasantly surprised. It made sense, she supposed, since he was incredibly proficient with a rapier and had been from a young age, and being that good meant he had to at least be somewhat physically fit and capable (he was very physically capable in other ways, too, something else she had learned early on). She didn’t think she would ever get over how much she loved his arms, or his hands, or how they looked when he rolled his dress shirt sleeves up and folded his arms against his chest, and from the look he was giving her right now he apparently knew that she felt that way. 

“You alright, darling?” Good lord, had his voice gone even lower? His eyes had gone from being a honey-golden to a dark syrupy brown, and if what she could feel against her lower half was any indication she could tell that his mind was back to being somewhere other than their conversation. She sounded out of breath when she spoke. 

“I’m alright. Do me a favour?”

“Anything.”

“Wrap me in your arms?”

“Absolutely.”

She definitely shouldn’t have this much of an obsession with his arms, but the moment his arms tightened around her torso and her thigh, bringing her on top of him fully while he sat up with her in his lap and kissed her deeply, she couldn’t find it in her to care. 

~~~

On their one-year anniversary, Y/n woke up early. 

She didn’t want to, but the moon was shining brightly through the bedroom window, and there was a gap in the curtains that let the light through. It was landing on the books that had been stacked up on the bedside table, titles just about visible and all of them ones that she had read before. The moonlight was also resting on Anthony’s face while he slept, and he looked like he had in the taxi on that night when they had first met, ethereal and effortlessly gorgeous (but not quite so tired and weighed down by responsibility), and she found herself falling in love with him all over again. 

It was probably all forms of creepy to just lie and watch him breathe while she tried to go back to sleep, but there was something oddly soothing about it: the rise and fall of his chest and the peaceful expression on his face. It was rare she got to see him so relaxed, the only other times were when he had a day off and was sat in the library with a cup of tea, Y/n sat nearby, or when they had spent time exploring each others’ bodies, hands roaming over skin and through hair while they made love. 

The paper ring that he had made her just over a year ago, not long before they started officially dating, was sat on the bedside table next to the stack of books. He’d made her new ones at random points throughout their time together, but the original one that he’d folded from that piece of paper in the Fittes public library had remained in pride of place in her jewellery dish in their now shared bedroom at 35 Portland Row. 

Looking at it now she was absolutely certain that he was the one that she wanted, taking him in marriage with a paper ring, putting their pictures in frames to decorate their home, and he was the one she wanted in all of her daydreams. 

Anthony Lockwood was her future, and her future was looking wonderfully bright. 

lockwood tag list: @anathemaloren, @anthonylockwoodandco111, @augustisintheair, @avdiobliss (hopefully you get this notification, ik it's been weird recently), @briar-rose23, @curseofhecate, @dangelnleif, @el-de-phi, @ell0ra-br3kk3r, @informedimagining (hopefully this works for you too my lovely), @karensirkobabes, @locknco, @mischivana, @mitskiswift99, @mrsklockwood, @mrsyixingunicorn10, @novelizt, @ran23sblog, @superpositvecloudshipper, @t2sh0, @taygrls, @tournesol77, @no-morning-glories, @whenselenefallsinlove, @wordsarelife, @zoom1374, @light-23, @ahead-fullofdreams

and then I'm tagging @neewtmas, @oblivious-idiot, @bobbys-not-that-small, @maraschinomerry, @uku-lelevillain, and @lewkwoodnco because I've been promising you this for a while and you just didn't know it :D

if there is anybody who wants to be added to my lockwood tag list, then please go here! I am aware that it has been a while, but from now on I will be checking this post every time I write a new fic to see who is there, so head on over to give a comment or a like and I'll pop you on for next time! <3

[darkbluekies]

AHHH JUST GOT ANOTHER REQUEST! silas with a crackhead gen z s/o.This guy would be so fking confused.😭😭

Silas:walk out of that front door and I'll break your legs👿👿.

s/o:*uses the open window besides the door instead and casually walks away*

Silas texting:WHY ARE YOU NOT HOME YOUR GONNA GO THROUGH HELL IF YOU DON'T COME BACK.

S/o: You're* dumbass and proceeds to ignore the calls from this dumb af guy.

first anon (im sorry but i thought this was funny 😭😭)

[Do you want to break him??? Congrats, you succeeded 😭]

Not a joking matter

Mafia!yandere OC x reader

Summary: you decide to pull a stunt on Silas while you are fighting, which causes him to go insane with fury. He promises himself to make sure you never dare to do it again.

Warnings: yandere content, mentions of killing, guns, threats, isolation punishment, Stockholm syndrome, Silas who can't take a joke, manipulation

Word count: 1.5k

Normally, you wouldn’t dare fight with Silas. It only gave you consequences you couldn’t bear. Besides, just giving in and listening to him makes your world turn easier. But some days, things get too much and your anger bubbles out. This has led you and Silas to argue down by the front door about his jealousy.

“I’m literally done!” you scoff out. “You’re insane, this is insane! I’m leaving!”

“If you walk out through that door, I’m breaking your legs”, Silas warns you with his arms over his chest. “Don’t test me, little thing.”

You give him a long stare before opening the window next to the door and jumping out. Silas gaze darkens as he watches you walk away. How dare you?

“What are you doing, boss?” one of his men asks with a shaking voice. “Are you just going to let them leave?!”

“They will be back soon”, Silas says through gritted teeth. “They can’t survive without me. And when they return, they’ll go back into the basement until they apologize sincerely.”

“And if they don’t come back, boss?”

“Then they’ll regret it.”

You walk along the road, cursing Silas for living out in the middle of the fucking forest. You’re not even wearing shoes! Why did you walk out like that? Well, at least you’re free. Right? This has to be worth it. You have to show Silas that you mean business … he can't treat you like that.

You reach the nearest city after an hour of walking. You're sure you've destroyed one skinlevel by now. No blood has been drawn yet, but your skin is ripped and dirty. You sink down by the side of the road, next to a coffee shop. Now what? You don't have any money … only your cell phone. Silas IT master has blocked the phone from calling any other number than Silas.

It buzzes. You look down and see a message from him.

"WHY ARE YOU NOT HOME?? YOUR GOING TO GO THROUGH HELL IF YOU DON'T COME BACK, DO YOU UNDERSTAND THAT?"

You shouldn't do it — it's childish — yet you do it. Your fingers tremble as you type the message back, but you can't help but snicker for yourself.

"You're*"

If only you could see his face once he receives the message. Silas, on the other hand, throws his phone at the wall once he gets your little fun text. He calls you, but you don't answer. He calls again … and again … and again. Same automatic voice telling him to try again later.

"This little shit, I swear to God-" he growls before grabbing his car keys. "I'm going to get them, I don't fucking care. They'll be sorry. Who the fuck do they think they are? Seriously? Fucking brat.”

“What are you going to do, boss?” the same man as before asks.

“If Y/N wants to act like a shitty, little brat, then I’ll treat them like one.”

He rips open the door and walks out to his black sports car. You might be his darling, but this car is his baby. Although he doesn’t know where you are, he has an idea. There's not a lot of places you could have gone to. You're not stupid enough to run into the forest, you'll have followed the road. You can't have gotten too far. He'll find you.

He notices that you're not on the road.

"These little legs were faster than I thought", he mumbles. "Just wait til I get my hands on you."

He drives into the small city, looking around. A smirk creeps up on his face once he sees you sitting on the sidewalk. He parks the car right in front of you and jumps out. His anger turns into some weird adrenaline kick once he sees your terrified eyes. He will punish you, don't you worry … but first he wants to play.

"Either you get in the car now or I'll make you", he says with one hand resting inside of his jacket, on his gun. "I'll blow this place up."

You know Silas, and you know what he keeps in his pocket. You know he's not lying. Suddenly, incapable of moving, paralyzed in fear, you shake your head desperately. Silas smiles.

"Boom", he says, forming his mouth to an 'O'.

"No, please", you whisper.

"Yes? If you say so …"

He's about to pull put the gun. You finally manage to move your limbs and shoot up from the sidewalk, stopping his hand.

"Silas, don't", you beg.

"But you wanted to be bratty and not do what I said", he pouts and gives you puppy dog eyes. "It's not more than fair that I get to play too?"

"Silas, people will get hurt if you do that."

"People could have gotten hurt by your stunt too. If I wouldn't have found you …" He moves closer until you can feel his breath against your face. "... I'd killed all of my men."

You shiver and give him a horrified glance.

"Y/N, get in the car now", Silas tells you seriously, no longer in the mood to play games.

And you do.

"Y/N, I want you to know something", Silas says as he starts driving away. "You only 'escaped' today because I let you. The only reason you're still alive is because I went to get you. You should be happy that I love you because what would you have done without me? You have no money, your phone — which you should be grateful I gave you — only works for my number … you aren't even wearing shoes!"

Your head slumps. You shouldn't feel so guilty, you shouldn't start to cry … but you do.

"I could have left you", Silas continues. He won't stop until you've broken down completely. "I could have forgotten about you and moved on, find somebody that actually appreciates what I do for them and is grateful for my love. But I went back for you because I love you."

He has noticed that you've started crying in the seat next to him, but he isn't done.

"People could have died today and it'd be all your fault", Silas says.

"Stop!" you shout and cover your ears with your hands. "I get it! I'm sorry!"

"I'm not sure you do, baby. That's why you'll spend a little while down in the basement once we get home. Just to make sure this won't happen again."

You want to protest, but his gaze makes you shrink to the size of an ant. Yu're already six feet down, no need to do yourself any further.

When you get back to his house, he pulls you with him down to the basement and chains you before saying a word.

"Silas, I'm really sorry", you sob. "I'll never do it again. Please don't leave me here.'

"You've acted like a complete brat, baby. My partner is an adult, not a damn child, do you get that?"

"Yes!"

"Good. I will see you in a while."

"No, Silas, please!" you shout. "Don't leave me here!"

You hear the door to the ground floor, leaving you in pitch black darkness. You sob out into the emptiness and hug your legs, burying your face into your knees.

You don't know how much time passes by. You have no idea how long time you've been down here, all you know is that your growling stomach stopped making sounds a long time ago. It doesn't hurt anymore … although it should. Your body must have gone numb because you can't feel anything. Or you've died. That's at least what you tell yourself. You no longer live and will never feel anything else ever again. This basement works wonders on the brain.

The door from the ground floor creaks. You look up, seeing how Silas come walking down. Your body fills with electricity. He came back!

"Hey, baby", he says and squats down in front of you.

"Silas …", you say quietly, tasting the name, seeing if he can hear you. Seeing if you're alive.

"Yes?"

A wave of relief flows through you. Your hands start reaching out for him, needing to hold onto something to fully convince you that you're still real.

"Careful, baby", Silas says softly and stops your hands. "I have to remove the chains first."

Impatiently, you wait for him to unlock the heavy metal keeping you to the ground. As soon as you feel the weight lifting, you throw yourself at him, locking your arms around his neck and hiding your face into his warm shoulder. He chuckles and wraps his strong arms around you in return.

"Eager to see me?" he smiles right by your ear.

You don't answer. You're happy to see someone. It just happens that this someone is Silas.

"Do you want to come upstairs now?" he asks.

You nod against his shoulder.

"You're not going to be a bratty little shit anymore?" he asks.

You shake your head.

"And you won't pull a childish stunt?" he asks.

You shake your head. Your humor doesn't work on him and you learned that the hard way.

"Very well then, let's go", Silas says and stands up, pulling you up with him.

You wrap your legs around his torso and keep your arms in place. You can hear him purr like a cat. Silas always gets what he wants. He always wins.

[fakeusernamelol]

Sorry I'm obsessed with bad ending teen dad stancest--

When Ford leaves home for college he takes Stan with him, Stan thinks it's fine, it's not their boat but it's basically what he used to wants, they're out of jersey and they're okay. Fiddleford asks him what he wants out of life sometimes but that question's made him sick since he was twelve and realized he wasn't smart enough to be much more than a housewife for whatever man he ended up with. Instead he tells Fiddleford he's gonna be a pirate, because it makes him laugh. Then Ford wants to go to Gravity Falls, and Stan's back to being alone with him. By the time they're 27 he's stopped trying to keep his hair short, he makes for a piss poor Ma as far as hes concerned but the twins aren't old enough to get that yet. Bill gets mad at Ford so Ford gets mad at Stan, and Stan sleeps on the floor next to the kids' beds because Ford's better than their father, he won't lay a hand on him in front of the kids, and Stan uses it because hes a conniving coward with a distant look in his eyes that their own Ma used to have.

But then the portal, it drives Fiddleford insane, Fiddleford tells him Ford is dangerous, that he's going to kill them. And Stan didn't believe it until he spent a night barricading a door covered in height marks and crayon while Bill tried to claw his way in and then the next morning when he caught Ford crying in front of the TV, Ford punched him full in the face in front of the twins.

So it was so easy, hitting Ford back for once, shoving him just a little too far and letting the portal take him away, leave Stan with the house and the kids and a new name to inherit and the freedom to cut his hair and get himself the glasses he needed and call himself Stan instead of what Ford called him.

SORRY IF I RAMBLED TOO MUCH IM EATING YOUR DRYWALL I NEED MORE AU--

would that be a win-lost or a win-win?

PLEASE PLEASE DON'T APOLOGISE WHEN YOU ARE GIVING ME EXACTLY WHAT I WANT, I LOVE YOU AND OF COURSE I'M GIVING YOU MORE DEAR ANON you and me are now friends and i don't take no for answer 🤭🤭💖💖💖 Also what a good name for this au, im using it now 😘

(tw: Transphobia, Misogyny, Abuse, a lot of implied noncon yadda yadda you already know where's this going 🤷)

Stanley needed something to hold on to try to survive this new life, it's not exactly what he always dreamed but it's not bad, he has ford and that's all he has always needed, isn't it? He can get used to, come on he has always been seen this way he can get through it.

But when he met Fiddleford those thoughts were becoming harder to support again, a new person, new air and new perspective. Sure he wasn't going to tell him all those crazy thoughts he had because that would make ford mad but he can express a little of it, fidds wouldn't ever know that those jokes were actually his dreams but at least he can say them and think a bit of them every once and then to distract a bit from the real life. Maybe... Who knows,maybe one day Ford wouldn't be this harsh with him and he and their kids could still sail the world once he's done with college! Joke's on him, of course they were going to do what ford had in mind and he can't say anything, after all if he's not in the streets is thanks to him so,heh, could be worse. going to miss fidds anyway...

But well, not time for thinking about himself, they are already grown adults and since he's not getting a job the least he can do is be a good as possible mom for their already 10-year-old twins. Ever since they've been in Gravity Falls, Stan can swear that he's seen all kinds of strange creatures but Ford seems delighted with it and only times he doesn't talk to him in a rude tone is when he says something about them so, it's not that scarier as it was the first times. He doesn't quite understand what Ford is actually doing with that information, but after that he goes to the basement and warns him and the kids to stay away from this as possible, and he's going to obey for his own sake.

...At least as much as he can because things are becoming even weirder, he has seen Ford obsess over an investigation before, but this time he seemed to be going genuinely crazy, not all bad tho, at least fidds was back again and having a new face in the place was genuinely a good thing for him, sure he was here for working but anyway stan would try to sneak up on them like bringing them something to drink after a long day of work in the basement, Ford wasn't so harsh when Fiddleford was around so he wasn't so scared to do that and share a few words with a good friend not knowing that ford would make him pay for that later.

« what did I tell you about going down the basement, [ ] ? You have your things upstairs with the kids. »

It was fine, he deserved it. He has never said anything about Ford's abuse, because ever his teenhood he knows he deserves it, He only knows how to screw things. Maybe if he hadn't broken that stupid machine ford would change his mind but he had to fuck it. Yes, he sometimes still daydreams about a world where ford could accept him, a world where ford would hug him often and not hurt him again and maybe, a world where he calls him stanley for once... but time has passed and his hope has faded away, Now he just wishes that thoughts to leave his mind once for all.

Suddenly things get worse. «they could?» it seems to be.

Ok, sleeping in the kids room wasn't so bad, sure the floor was cold and he only had a blanket in order to not die of hypothermia but at least he had his kids near him and that was fine, ford wouldn't try to make something to him with them near. Now, seeing the eyes of that friend he always thought of like a kind of safe place full of fear and warning him of such an unthinkable danger for him what's indeed something he would never forget and fuck shouldn't do it. He thinks he knew what Ford was capable to do, sure he's angry with him ever since and his touch is not the gentlest, but stan didn't think he would go so far as to endanger himself, much less his children... Seems like everything he thinks is really just bullshit, he says to himself while using his body to lock the door of the kids room while hearing those strange creepy laughs and scratches from behind the door.

Ok so things are going to be dangerous now, but the next morning when he sees ford crying with his hands in his face and his legs on the floor he gets second thoughts, something was wrong with ford, he don't get what but maybe he could...

So you know, Stan has endured a lot of things ford has done: the words, the insults, the abuse, the punches, the constant contempt and more but punching him in front of their kids was enough.

For the first time ever since that night in the bathroom floor stan had enough of ford and didn't even think twice before giving him the punch he has always deserved it. Not punch, punches.

HE was angry, HE was tired, and not even the cries of his little children in the background had made him stop while Ford tried, like the coward he really was, to flee from him when he saw that this time his blows were not saving him.

Funny, stan thought, « I always protected ya' from Crampelter and his herd, no matter what. Ya' we're afraid of givin' them a good punch but what about me, sixer? Are ya' scared of me now? »

Stanley was stupid, but he was stronger, even if ford has always despised him for being born as a woman, HE was stronger than him and for once he wasn't scared of his rejection.

But.. sure he didn't expect what happened next. He has never seen what he and fidds were doing in the basement and now, he knew it even less.

He was angry but fuck he didn't mean that! Why does everything have to be so complicated towards Ford? Fuck!

...On the bright side, those 30 years will serve Stanley well to realize everything that his brother held him back from for years, guess who's the one being welcomed with a punch in the face here. 😗

So, you can say the bad ending au got a good ending? Lol 🙆

[marcandreyuri]

"that wasn't part of the plan" + sidnate 👀 (IF you would like) or pairing of your choice

dialogue prompt meme

as if i could get this prompt and not write the sidnate unplanned pregnancy au ive been thinking about since june. this ended up being a little disjointed but oh well. previous sidarmy mention. 714 words.

"This clearly wasn't part of the plan," Biz says on the stupid summer trade panel that TNT is having to go over all the free agency moves. "The Penguins expected Crosby back this season, and now they have to scramble this summer trying to cover him."

Sidney growls and jams his thumb into the power button of the remote, and the TV mercifully turns off. The news came out last week, an official press memo going out that redefined his ambiguous upper body injury into a pregnancy that will have him sitting out what was supposed to be his final season.

"Biz is an idiot," Nate says from the doorway of the living room having just come up from his gym in the basement, dripping with sweat after his workout with Andy. "C'mon Sid, everyone knows that."

"No kidding," Sid says. He runs a finger lightly over his stomach, feeling the gentle swell of it, the way his skin is stretched and growing to accommodate their baby.

She's the size of an avocado. Nate swears she's a boy. They find out for sure next month, when one of them will lord being right over the other.

Nate comes over and leans over the back of the couch, the smell of his deodorant and sweat mixing together in a way that reminds Sidney of rolling around on gym mats together, stolen kisses in empty locker rooms. He puts his hand over Sidney's stomach and rests it there as Sidney lets his head fall back and rest against Nate.

"Sorry about your season," Nate says like he does basically every day, guilt dripping through his voice.

Biz was right. This wasn't part of the plan. Sidney was meant to have his final season playing before going to work in the front office, scouting a junior league in Canada and sneaking back to America to see Nate when he could.

"It's fine," Sidney says. "It is what it is."

"I'm gonna gonna take a shower, and then do you wanna go out on the boat?" Nate asks.

He lets his hand linger on their baby for an extra second before straightening out when Sid says, "Sure." It's a relatively windless day, so hopefully the water will be calm. Sid doesn't exactly want a repeat performance of two weeks ago when the wake was choppy, and he threw up four times off the side of the boat before they called it a day.

He and Nate go upstairs, Nate slipping into the shower as Sid changes out of the sweatpants he's been wearing basically nonstop this summer. Before he puts on his swimsuit and t-shirt, he stares at himself in the mirror, turning so he can look from all angles.

His mom says she'll be a small baby, Sidney's stomach barely popping out, but he knows it's still early. When Tanger had Alex he was tiny until the ninth month, when he randomly ballooned basically overnight.

Tanger was in the gym doing his insane workouts every day until he gave birth though, and Sid has embraced the gentle workouts Andy's switched him to. He knows it's only a matter of time before his body changes into something completely unrecognizable, something unable to play hockey even if Sidney tried.

As he pulls on his trunks, he thinks about the abortion he got when he was nineteen, he and Army terrified of him giving up hockey and scheduling the appointment the day they found out.

This time was different, this baby--his daughter--and this relationship with Nate. He's humming happily in the shower, buzzing since they got the call from the doctor telling them Sidney's vomitting wasn't because of the flu.

Sid has to give up his final season, which fucking sucks and probably always will, but his first thought when they found out wasn't get rid of it like last time. He didn't think about hockey or next year's playoff push or setting any more records. He and Nate had turned to each other with stupid, wide smiles on their faces instead.

He pulls his trunks on, but waits for his shirt, putting his hand over the bump and imagines next summer, he and Nate and their daughter on the boat and feels a warm glowing feeling move through him.

[zalrb]

PLL 1x19 Review - As Per Anon Request

Honestly, I feel like the opening theme would be more effective to play after the recap and before the actual episode starts.

Shay. Can't. Cry.

What IS this?

"He told her to come closer ... ... and she did." LOL, Great dialogue there.

There is no tension in these interrogation scenes it's so funny.

What is Spencer's jacket? Is she a nutcracker?

"Whoever said 'the truth will set you free' never met A." "Jesus. Jesus said it. It's from the bible." Emily, WHY was that necessary? Like ... what kind of contribution to the conversation is that? They don't actually need to know WHO said it.

"You know, sometimes telling the truth does more harm than good." "Who said that?" Not Jesus. "Alison." Clearly the opposite of Jesus.

"Hey, Emily." "Garrett??" "You're a cop now??" Who is this person.

I don't have siblings but beefing with your 16 year old sister is insane. You're a grown ass woman, Melissa.

"I don't want to go home until my parents get back." WHY WOULD THEY LEAVE? THEIR SON WAS ARRESTED ON SUSPICION OF MURDER AND THEIR CHILDREN HAD A SEXUAL RELATIONSHIP UNDER THEIR ROOF. WHAT IS GOING ON?

"You never talk about your parents." OK but does he actually have any??

ooooooooh the convenient and contrived revelation of 214.

Hanna, why would you tell Caleb to come upstairs when you know your mother is home? And would it not make more sense to bring him food to the basement and collect dishes?

And Caleb really does act like this is house.

"I know guys like Caleb. He's a tough guy." HOW? HE JUST WEARS A BEANIE AND THEY ALL DO, IT'S THE 2010s! You are the actual criminal here, get a GRIP.

I swear to god if a plot twist is that Jenna actually isn't a high schooler and has been lying about her age I would be like, that is the one thing in this show that makes sense.

"What's her story about?" I know that Ezra is already crossing every boundary that matters but don't talk about another student's work to your child bride, you dick.

"I'm waiting for a manager to call me back." Are you not the police?

"Mr. Fitz isn't seduced by controlling characters" Aria, please. Also what the fuck kind of English teacher is Ezra? 1984, Animal Farm or Brave New World should be on that reading list.

20 dollars? You didn't even haggle.

"Jenna's glasses. This is her room." She just has a standing room at a motel she doesn't stay at or live at?

Hanna, you and your mom just had a conversation about Caleb because he left the toilet seat up in a house he's squatting in because he acts like he actually lives there and you don't even think to check to see if your mom is home first? Because she probably is. The plot's gotta plot.

"Mom?"

Remember when you stole money?

I don't even remember what Emily's side quest is.

Emily just deciding to move on from Maya is lol. Because she sounded happy in one phone call?

Maya was nothing like Alison. Alison is a psychopath.

"Welcome home, honey." I don't know if I just think Aria dresses more childish than the others because she's with Ezra and the clothes themselves are just regular clothes but the whole dynamic of them is like, she's clearly a teen, she dresses like a teen and you're an adult, or if it's that plus the fact that they just give Aria more girl-like clothes and by girl-like I mean, like, little girl-esque. It's obviously not Lolita fashion but you get it.

"But out here you're Dora the Explorer? You have any other personalities that I should know about." Her personality didn't change, Caleb, she just has other skills and interests.

Neither Hanna nor Caleb are good enough actors for this scene to be as poignant as it should be but it works better than anything else, so.

Are you two going to have sex in that tent.

I love that they probably couldn't afford a Pink song so they just have Paige butcher it in karaoke.

Spencer and Toby scrabble scene is my favourite scene of theirs so far. "Thanks for the 'g' I was waiting for it."

They need to keep it at that energy of meeting your match. The intense longing stares don't work imo.

So Maya gets cut off because she sounded happy one time but Paige tries to drown you and it's makeout time?

Spencer being the big spoon tracks.

"We might see people we know there." You're on a picnic in the woods everyone goes to, Paige. Caleb now lives in those woods.

Gossip Girl (and AtS) is the only show I can think of that takes place in a city, like a big city like New York. Can you think of any others?

"I like you too." Even though you tried to drown me.

If I ever did what Hanna did, the door would be locked if I tried to come back. Oh, the lives of teenagers in teen dramas. The freedom. The audacity.

"There's a chance that you'll never look at me the same way again." I like how his response is just "Aria..." like he didn't commit one way or the other, girl.

Also, he's a predator.

I hate how Toby speaks: It wasn't ... ... ... a complete wash. *speeds up* Tobehonest ...

Oh wow, the kiss happened way sooner than I expected.

Idk make up your mind. Is Toby awkward and hesitant or is she assertive?

Also, I feel like Caleb is supposed to have some kind of charisma and charm and if that was the case, instead of asking if he could take a soda, he would warm himself up to Hanna's mom by offering to help her cook dinner. Like, all of you can say whatever you want to say about Dean in Gilmore Girls but he learned the traditions of Rory and Lorelai, he knew Lorelai was important to impress.

Ezra and his serial killer eyes.

"Thank you for looking at me tonight the same way you did yesterday" You're sixteen, Aria.

I keep wanting to call Hanna's mom Melissa even though her name is Ashley.

*gasp* CaLeB wOrKs fOr A????

"Honey, they know that you were seeing Ian" so then why is SHE being questioned? SHE'S THE MINOR. Jesus Christ. And why would she be a person of interest just because she was "seeing" Ian? That has nothing to do with Alison if they don't believe that he was seeing Alison.

[thewrittingpan]

Painting Lies 3

Phinks x reader, Fetain x reader, Shalnark x reader

Tigger and content warnings include but are not limited to: blood, gore, violence, kidnapping, abuse, mental health issues, trauma

Wc: 6501

Tumblr links: Part 1, Part 2, Part 4

Ao3: Here

You think you remember the two blonds being there, but you also remember your legs being twice their usual size. Honestly you just stared at the ceiling for a bit wondering what the hell was going on in your head. For all you know you did get into a fight with a giant blanket yesterday but also you felt like you had somehow completed an entire treasure collection in that game you played. Everything in the dream was too close to reality for your liking.

“Hey Phinks?” You looked out into the hall to see if he was up.

“What?” The door across the hall from you opened.

“Weird question, did we have a staring contest during dinner or did I dream that?”

“That kind of happened.” he went to close the door.

“Okay, did you play video games yesterday with me watching?”

He looked at you terribly confused, “no?”

“Did we set up the table?”

“No, shalnark did.”

“Did I go to the basement? Does the basement have a whole art studio too? Because I dreamed there was like some art supply store or something in it and I feel like I'm going insane.”

“Yes to both.”

“Okay okay, now the part that ia really fucking with me is that i swear i woke up in the middle of the night-”

“You did.”

“-and you and the other guys were there-”

“Correct.”

“Then I got kissed goodnight by the three of you? And like some drink that you see moms in movies make for kids after a nightmare?”

He stood looking at you, you had no idea what he was thinking, honestly he looked as confused as you were.

“That didn’t happen, those two just wanted to see you before leaving.”

“Weird.” You mumbled to yourself. “It all felt like stuff that happened or could have.”

Everyone had dreams that left them confused when they woke up, or well you think everyone does. Waking up from them can vary, like with every other kind of sleep. When it came to “what the fuck happened who am I” level of confusion dreams waking up in anyway that left you dazed was not a good thing. What you personally think is worse is when you don’t feel like you have been asleep, or when you think you haven't had a dream.

Your thoughts fizzled out until you could have been a cartoon character with smoke coming out of their head. Confusion sticks, the whole day would probably feel off, and hell you might just fall back asleep with how just trying to think through it all was driving you mad.

“Are you going to spend time around the house or in your room?” Phinks was leaning against the door frame.

“Oh-“ you sifted through your ideas to keep yourself entertained.

There were the new games you’ve been given, but the clearly visible camera in your room had been creeping you out. You had some books but part of you couldn’t stand the idea of reading at the moment, something in your bones felt like they couldn’t find a comfortable way to sit to read. Maybe you could draw- there was that sketch you wanted to paint.

“I might go paint something?” You asked him.

It felt like you were allowed to go paint down there whenever, or that was the ideal goal they had with showing you it. Though there was something about this house, even with Shalnarks advice of Phinks being surprisingly soft, you felt like you were standing on an inch of ice and it was already waiting to break.

He nodded, “Not a bad idea, just don’t go past the curtain, Fetain doesn’t like anyone touching his things. I’ll make something simple to eat, I’m not much of a cook so you’ll have to put up with it or make your own food.” He walked past you towards the kitchen, “I’ll stay down there to make sure you don’t go poking around in things you don’t want to see.”

Yeah totally not threatening or creepy in the slightest. Hell part of you felt like a horror movie character right now, that vague warning only made you want to see what was down there. As you gathered your sketches your mind ran wild. The stairs in this unfinished basement were creaky wood. You looked at your feet as you descended, the wood was nice and sanded, with no nails that you could notice. Yet your mind drew with jagged lines, poorly put together stairs covered in splinters. That would be too empty, not enough visual interest but something could be drawn from those mental images of stairs. Maybe if something was spilling down the stairs it would be interesting, something twisted hidden in the shadows or beneath the stars themselves, something hard to notice but once you do it’s shocking.

You pulled out a pre-stretched canvas. For a while your hands hovered over two, each size would have its benefits, the smaller ones could make the figure have a “weaker” tone. Though the larger would allow the grotesque details you were longing for. Yet you could alter your concept slightly and “zoom in” on a smaller canvas, get up close and personal with the spine. You propped them both up so you could more easily compare them while sorting through your sketches. You tore them from the sketch book with a strange chaotic need. They were spread out across the cold concrete floor. Scattered and overlapped so they could all be seen without taking up much space. It was a kaleidoscope of paper and ink, and you were the crazed lunatic who had created it.

“You’ll have to pick those up when you finish painting.” Phinks stepped down the stairs holding a large plate full of scrambled eggs and waffles. “Or do you think you’ll need to have them spread out while working?”

“Do you have tape?” You asked, “Something stronger than a basic office tape, I could hang them on the wall?”

“Eat some, I’ll find some.”

The food was weirdly over and under done. The waffles had parts that were slightly more runny than they should be but the eggs were concerning. Parts were crispy and almost burnt, while the rest was fluffy, almost as if he had gotten distracted and almost made a bad omelette.

“Duck tape and packing tape.” He placed one roll of each on the table beside you.

“Oh, thanks, that’ll work fine.”

He was quiet, but it wasn't the same way Fetain is. Fetains silence was a threat, one you had grown used to. He had this weight to him that was impossible to ignore when alone, though he easily blended in and was easy to ignore in a group. Phinks was almost the opposite. You never noticed him when it was just him, though that didn’t mean you trusted him in the slightest. There was a comfort to him, familiar almost, half memories of moments with an old friend or a split second where you almost felt like you were sitting in the room with a long forgotten family member. Warmth tried to spread through you, you desperately wanted to trust him when you felt the familiarity, but how could you when you knew nothing about him.

You taped away. Deformed figures, haphazard diagrams and sketches of anatomy from memory. While each sketch held some semblance of a thought, a firework of an idea, sometimes you found that the best ideas grew when you worked without a clear thought. Molding fog and light created forms and shapes that you may overlook, sometimes you could compare them to an instinct, or a deep need to connect with something you had yet to fully understand.

These things made the beginning difficult but one of the most fun parts of it all. Every thought could be quickly scribbled out, fulfilling the urge to create, but not held back by perfection. It was wild, untamed, which made it unpredictable. A great idea could last a second before flickering out while a bad one could haunt you, not because the idea’s roots were rotten but because the branches had been infested by a failure to succeed.

You stared at the sketches of green bruises. The needles poked through skin, emerging from the bones themselves. Single drops of blood would sit atop the skin, staining it, drying deeply into the grooves. If the dirt and grime of the depicted horror went untreated it would stain not only the mind, but cling to the body like death itself, unable to be removed with hours upon days of scrubbing. It would always feel dirty, and you could always end up permanently stained.

This gorey twist that you adapted in your work was a little strange, even you had to admit it. You didn’t like the idea of torture porn when it came to horror movies, which some found surprising, clearly you didn’t hate it, but there had to be something gained from it. In your pieces you wanted each graphic mark to mean something, there needed to be a story you could read into if you wanted, but often they became reflections of struggles. It was relaxing, in the way that snapping and throwing something can make you sigh and sob after the frustration was finally released.

The thing about art is that it sucks ass. While it can be a weight off your shoulders and drain all of the stress out of you, it could just as easily make you want to stab someone’s eyes out. Staring at pins and needles for long enough just made you want to see your eyes shut so you didn’t have to see them everywhere else. Even closing your eyes made you think of the horrible blotchy shading that just did not want to work because you didn’t think and added too much water to your paints. Hell every time you groaned in frustration your fucking kidnapper look scared. So you tossed the brushes in the sink and worked on scrubbing out the paint before you ruined them right away.

“Do you usually work in these long multiple hour sessions?” He asked you over the sound of running water.

The water was cold, dangerously so. Your fingers toyed with the hair gently mixing small amounts of soap into it. This rhythmic movement helped calm you down and get out of the “holy mother of cats why won’t things go right” headspace that you got stuck in.

“Yeah, that’s common, anything less than three is an oddity.”

“I guess I just didn’t understand how hard it was.”

“Every job is kinda like that.”

You left the brushes on a spread out towel to dry. The pallet of rapidly drying paint was still there and there were a few reasons for why you didn’t clean off the paint; it’d ruin the plumbing, it was half dry anyways, you didn’t care, and it was fun to peel off later. If that little thing could give you some control maybe it would be worth it to wait and try to earn a way out.

Part of you felt like you were giving up too easily, that you had already lost your will to fight when you woke up that first day. Yelling at yourself wouldn’t do anything and you knew that but you felt like it was your fault. Perhaps you’re just the circus elephant tied to nothing. Yet you didn't blame yourself, or at least not as much as you think you were supposed to. Playing along and being good allows for you to be taken as a cute little pet that might be too frightened to try anything. Maybe other kidnappers are different.

You looked at Phinks from when he was leaning back in the folding chair balancing on its back legs. He was large, so much strength loomed over him, making him seem like the biggest in the room. Some damn part of him made you both think he was some jockey asshole like in movies and tv, or some large warm hearted man, though the latter seemed like a stretch.

“You’re starring again.”

“I’m thinking.”

“About?”

You gathered up the sketchbook you had ripped a handful of pages out of. You should lie. Shalnark said something like “he wasn’t perceptive” right? What if you were wrong? What about telling the truth? Would he kill you in anger? Slam you into the wall? Be the manifestation of the shadows from the covered half of the basement that had been driving you crazy, pulling you back and deep down into its maw, screaming as you die from-

“Just say it, I’m in a good mood, I don’t want it ruined with some anxiety attack because you’re scared to say someth-.”

“I don’t know how to feel.” You didn’t turn back to him as you walked towards the stairs, stopping at its feet, so he knew you weren’t trying to run away. “I don’t want to upset you or the others and risk dying or something arguably worse. I feel like everything has to be said correctly or not at all so I don’t find out someone is secretly more delusional than a damn LSD trip.”

You heard the chair squeak a bit as he stood up and walked towards the stairs, he didn’t stop like you and slowly started climbing them, slowly so you could continue.

“I should be scared, angry, maybe I should try to kill someone, or myself, try to escape? I don’t know, I can’t do any of those. I don’t want to, I hate how nice my room was, there was so much thought, so much detail, it felt so real, so close to my messy room. It creeps me out, enjoying the food, the room, the clothes, even the personal products make me feel like I graduated from a top academy with no debt and no depression.”

You lead him down the hall towards the living room. “I haven’t even looked outside you know, somehow I feel like it’ll make or break the dream. I think it might make me try something stupid, make me snap or something. I want to feel okay but I don’t, and when I don’t want to feel okay I do!” You ripped the curtain open, startling yourself.

“Did the window change anything?”

Woods. Beautiful moss covered trees that stretched far. The fire kissed trees rained down their leaves and it looked gorgeous. It reminded you of that date with the cats, the betrayal, of this fuck up of yours. It was something akin to heaven in your eyes, a perfectly twisted picture.

“I miss home.” You said finally tears slipping through your horribly masked emotions. You turned from the window stepping away from its bright light and into your dark room. You didn’t close the door fully behind you, it was very easy to look through the gap.

The blankets were smooth but when you burrowed into them to avoid everything, they felt fluffy against your skin. Even as your breath filled the underneath of them with hot air that felt suffocating, you accepted it with open arms. Stale warm air was unpleasant but it felt like the first warmth you’d felt in eons. The world outside this nest was cold and cruel, and you felt chained to the bed the more you thought about it.

The room's gentle darkness left you thinking as you tossed and turned. You fought back sobs but didn’t care about the tears that leaked down your face. Your sweetest boy laid next to you, his paw resting atop your hand as you faced him and the wall. You longed for the comfort of your real bed, sitting on the small balcony with your cat as he stared wide eyed at the birds.

Maybe you could have avoided this. Maybe if you had kept to yourself, avoided people like you had grown accustomed too, you could have continued your life. It didn’t change the fact that you were here now, but you were haunted by it. Those dark eyes at the damn exhibit. Why did it have to happen? Were you a fool? Were there any signs that you could have noticed? No matter how much crying you did or didn’t do you hated every second you were left to think about anything. Each damn second made you manic, and every other one made you depressed and unable to move. You felt so nauseous that soon you just vomited and sat on the bathroom floor headhung as you finally sobbed.

It was loud and obnoxious, you were lucky only one other person was home. It bounced off the walls. Phinks could definitely hear you. It was the kind of sob that was scratchy and full of angry screams, perfect for a tantrum that would destroy everything in a close area. You felt like a toddler who had been told no when asking for candy, a brat who wanted something. It felt like you were the problem even if you were just a victim of your surroundings. Yet you screamed and cried until your throat was sore, until it felt like it could have been bleeding, and you choked on the bubbling sobs as snot filled every airway.

You laid in a puddle of yourself, not moving when the front door opened and slammed shut. Unblinking as keys jingled down the hall with heavy footsteps. Looking with tired weak eyes, up at Phinks who stood, with plastic bags in hand, his face red and his eyes looking at the wall instead of you.

“It’s late, Fei and Shal want you to have a routine but they're not here… come stay up late and watch a movie or something? Shal bought some of your favorites and ones you’ve talked about! I have some chocolate, or popcorn if you’d like? I’m not sure what you all like when it comes to movie snacks…”

Your voice was so scratchy it hurt to hear you speak. “Please…” you whined as he helped pull you up and onto the living room couch.

He handed you the bags, a multipack of tissue boxes, an assortment of chocolate, popcorn, beer, teas, sodas, chips... You dug through it all and he returned with blankets in hand and a stuffed animal he knew you were attached to, that they all knew you were attached to.

He sat next to you, draping the blankets over you. He pulled a box of tissues out handing one to you. “Use the bag as a garbage bag for now.” He laid out everything haphazardly. He gently pulled your head down onto his lap and pressed the remote into your hand.

The blue glow of the tv puts you to sleep soon enough. It didn’t matter if it was one movie or ten, you were asleep, as soon as you were Phinks was too. You used his lap as a pillow, and Phinks leaned back, his head tossed over the couch’s back, his mouth hung open with a light snore as the tv eventually turned itself off.

In the morning you woke up when the keys turned to open the door’s lock. It made you jolt awake as the door was pushed open. Shalnark was clicking through his phone as he carried in a handful of something.

“Oh, you’re both up? How was the movie night?”

You sunk into the blankets giving back into your exhaustion. “Okay.”

You said it mostly to avoid any upset feelings on his end, the movie night was a nice way to avoid it all. You hated it considering everything, but those few hours of just zoning out at the tv and falling asleep to your favorite movies made you fell like home. You could imagine it so vividly it is what lulled you to sleep, the house didn’t have that smell of the three men, it was your home filled with cat fur, paints, and gesso.

You could feel the canvas frame from when you had to custom build one for a commission. Having to stretch it yourself, and you struggled to pull it back enough for it to hold well. The frame was obnoxiously large, you couldn’t fathom how they had the money to commission it or why they’d need one this size. That one had become a secret favorite, it was in someone’s private collection, an anonymous commissioner. You remember them sending someone to pick it up, which was strange, but if someone had that money how weird could it really be?

“Fei will be appearing soon, he has to drag something down to his office.” Shal giggled to himself speaking without catching his breath. “He’s surprisingly very interested in the work he brought back. It’s like a cat that got a hold of a mouse and doesn’t want to let it go.”

He set his envelope of papers down on the table, and sat down next to you on the couch. He was in front of you really, your back pressed firm against the couch nearly sinking into the cushions and the framework. Shalnark was turned slightly so he could face you and Phinks easily, his knees pressed against the front of the couch and one of Phinks’ knees. He breathed in deeply, his breath pushing both his stomach and chest out, he sort of chuckled as he sighed and leaned over to rest his head on the sofa’s back next to Phinks’ shoulder.

“I missed being home.”

Phinks and you didn’t say anything in response. Maybe Phinks secretly hated Shalnark, well, obviously not, but his silence kind of confused you. He cared deeply about the two from what you could tell, but who's to say you were ever good at reading the room. Your view upwards was obstructed by Shalnark hovering-leaning over you. Phinks moved his arm, you could see its shadow crossover you briefly, but you didn’t see what he did. Shalnark sat there resting with the two of you, this serene glazed look to him. He looked so pleasant, his hair hanging in his face, and his eyes closed.

He did eventually move, while he seemed content that was in no way comfortable to sit there for long. Shal eventually collected his things and ran off to go put them away. You gathered up the mess from the night before. Phinks took the trash out, you saw the cement steps out front as the door opened, and cool air rushed in to kiss your cheeks. The cat with wide eyes watched him complete his chores from the window, while you avoided looking at them. It was easier to stay busy with wiping the table and stacking the coasters in a neat pile in the center.

You kept wiping the table. Slow circular motions as you dazed off. The window just hurt you. Its clear glass was a mirror of your betrayal and gentle suffering, every damn time you saw that view it reminded you of the damned date. That date would remind you of his hands in your hair as you sobbed into his lap. What kind of suffering is this all? To be cursed with the inability to act, but blessed with a comfort of home and kindness. though it came from triplet tyrants. What tragedy had you fallen out of?

You went about giving yourself chores, dusting the shelves and tv stand, sweeping the kitchen floor, making a few pancakes with a box mix you had found, then cleaning up the mess you had made. Your hour or two of small chores only could keep you distracted for so long. You could hear Shalnark from his room, typing away on a keyboard and flipping through papers. When you walked past the basement you could hear things being moved around. It was faint and muffled, almost like you were hearing things, you wanted to go down there, the curiosity haunting you, but I’d anyone scared you the most it was Fetain.

You pushed open Phinks’ door. He had looked up at you as you did, but he didn’t say a thing, just motioned for you to come in. It was simple, navy sheets that were wrinkled, a strange mixture of pillows that didn’t have matching cases. There were some clothes lying around the room and the closet was open. He had a simple fold up chair in the corner and some green running jacket thrown across it. He didn’t have curtains, just the plastic blinds though some were bent and damaged. The closest thing to decoration was a digital clock on a wooden stool made bedside table and high quality at home gym equipment on the floor and tucked away into the closet.

“Need something?”

“I’ve never seen your rooms.” You half ignored the question, “and I don’t want to work on my painting when Fetain is working.”

He hummed, and you sat down on his bed looking at his window with the blinds pulled shut. “I hate it,” you said quietly to yourself, not knowing fully what you meant. “I might drive myself crazy. I keep trying to make things make sense, but I don’t get it.” You flopped down and rolled over, you didn’t look up at his face, didn’t acknowledge if he was looking at you or listening. “I think I’m ignoring half of everything to try and pretend that I’m okay.”

His hand rested on your head, his fingers playing with your hair. “You’re putting up with it well, though coming from me that doesn’t mean much.”

You grabbed his hand and his shirt. Pulling yourself up, straddling his waist. “Why couldn’t you have killed me? Torture me? Why not just make my life a real living hell? I feel like I’m burning but there’s nothing there, I keep thinking I’m drowning but I’m not!” Your hand trailed up to his neck, your nails pressing into his jugular, as you pinned him down to the bed. He laid there with his eyes wide but he didn’t move. “Please give me a good reason to hate it here! Please, I can't understand what’s going on! I didn’t ask for this. I don't know what I’m here for!” you screamed at him, though it wasn’t loud, just desperate. “I can’t do anything.”

His hand grabbed your hip and his other grabbed your neck, and he flipped the roles so he was hunched over you. His nails pressed into your skin. There was no weight to the threat. His hands while touching you, felt like they were hovering.

“You’re allowed to be angry, you don’t need permission for it.” And his hands were lifted away. and he was back on his side of the bed laying just like he was earlier, as if you never disrupted him.

Then you cried, you laid there curled up in a ball next to him. He never touched you, until you reached out and touched him, pulling yourself into his arms. He held you then gently and quietly until you relaxed and laid there half asleep and exhausted. His hands cupped your cheeks and you were held close to his face, his mouth a meare inch from your nose.

“I’ll do anything for you, even if you don’t like us or being here. We will do anything to keep you safe. I’ll make you as happy as I can, I swear to you I will.”

You heard Fetain come up from the basement when the door slammed shut. He was lighter than air with his footsteps so when he walked into Phinks’ room and ended up next to the bed you nearly screamed. “Try to sleep at ten and wake up at six. You need good sleep routine.”

You nodded, Phinks had mentioned it right? Ten to six seemed reasonable. “Exactly 6 am?”

“Roughly. Take time to change, one week to do yourself.”

“I’ll try to do it.” You nodded and a yawn slipped from your lips.

“Take nap, us three will talk work.” He waited for Phinks to get up.

Phinks patted your shoulder, “stay here and sleep for a bit we don’t want you dealing with our work stuff yet.”

“Okay.”

But Feitain hovered for a second longer than he needed to, just quietly looking at you with this deep thoughtful look in his eyes, yet he left without saying anything.

They had a habit of leaving you alone with your thoughts. Thankfully your cat at least sits with you when you need it, most of the time.

There was nothing to do with them all being busy. Something told you not to poke around for answers about what they were discussing. Even though you weren’t gonna search around for answers your mind wandered. It was a gross wandering similar to how one could lay in bed and gaze up into the darkness and just sit there. Rambling and turning whispers in your thoughts flashing images of blood gore and violence. How could anyone imagine what their jobs could be? You were used to surrounding yourself with images of oozing guts, but just beccause you had been decentized to it didn’t mean that fucking kidnappers who seemed more than used to living isolated was something you could handle.

You ran your hand back from the cat’s nose to his ears. He pressed himself so firmly against your hand that his eyelids were slightly pulled back as he demanded all of your attention. You could feel him breathing on you, his soft purrs are loud as he clung to you. When the fur around his face is pushed back his whole meringue look changes to one of a rat. His eyes while blown wide into dark saucers continue to look up at you fondly, his fur looks like a front facing bald eagle. There’s a reason you hardly ever see those angles, it’s less flattering. There’s less pride and a slicked back edge that is perceived as coolness. This is what that sweet cat looked like from this angle, his poofy roundness disappeared and strange looking from the front, while you never truly have looked too explore the other angles of the strange hair-do, the adorably crafted ugliness makes you melt into him as he melts into you.

As you lay there thoughts bubbling up worries and anxiety scratching away at your insides, this sweet fluff keeps you grounded. As was his task, he was an unofficial emotional support cat, nothing more than a pet that kept you mentally stable and provided both a comfort and reason to live. It was easy on the days where the paints seemed poisoned to be unable to reason and find out why you were alive. You wondered if everyone questioned this at times perhaps that’s why your artwork seemed so desperate, why you just cling to an intestine rope to pull you closer to answers and people who relate. It’s not something you can say for sure but even now, after a few years of this cat he kept you perfectly content to question but not give up.

He was also a good muse, posing in ways during his naps. Belly up, his head laid back against a pillow, his front paws folded under his chin but his back legs sticking upwards like two towers, fluffy and off white. He laid his ways that made it hard to determine if he was a cat or strang fluffy void, even though lots of cats did that. No matter how many photos and squeals you let out, it never felt the same, there simply isn't a connection. No photo could replace your cat, because you knew just about everything about him.

Sometimes you wondered if you relied too much on the cat, you’d question if the kidnappers thought the same if you weren’t so preoccupied with anything else. Even in captivity it seemed like you never had time for anything. All your plans would get mixed up or you would get horribly distracted. You acted as if you were wandering naked in a dark maze with how time snuck up on you. With no one to truly tell you otherwise you gave into it when you could, which was most of the time. Hours would be spent gazing off into walls and corners as you painted in your own head, it didn’t matter if you pictured it or not, it was the mental motions of the act that kept you entranced.

A jiggle of a brush, a whirlpool of the paint thinner. Hell the actions are what lured you down into the basement again. You hadn’t been told to stay, hadn't been told not to. You may not have paid attention to the home as you were pulled down to the basement by your navel; the living was quiet though the three men hummed and buzzed with a quiet conversation. You continued onto the door opening it so gently and silently you might have well just phased through the door to begin with. The unfinished steps hadn’t groaned or creaked as you stepped on them even though they should. The door hovered open, the light peering and stealing across the floor to the hall now behind you. As a moth would you step down and forwards moving towards your painting.

At this moment your eyes flashed with one lucid thought, “something isn’t right.” It didn't take a genius to know this but somehow as you were drugged by your own relaxation and you had taken the liberty to forget about everything that had been a bright neon sign telling you something was amiss. You looked away from your studio and across the room at another’s.

It’s important to note that some people have a personal belief that art is in the eye of the beholder, regardless of whether each piece usually has an original meaning in the grand scheme of things. You had thoughts and ideas, messages and stories to tell through your paintings. Each a commentary on something since you didn’t believe in unthoughtful gore and brutality, that wasn’t to say it had no meaning, but that there wasn’t a personal thought being expressed even deep below the surface. In this belief of art interpretation all art has at least two meanings, the artist’s original suffering inquiry, and the viewer’s lack of understanding. With this in mind the scene behind the curtain is much different then one in your studio.

The curtain had always been a temptation, that’s a simple fact of the matter. Place a marshmallow in front of a child and most struggle to resist even with the promise of more. This curtain in your case was so much more than temptation. A temptation is often pictured as sweet and sugary, lustful even, not a need but a want. This curtain was so much more than that, it was thorn covered and speckled with a lifetime of warnings but it wasn’t sweet, there was no guarantee of safety but an expectation of more. Even then you peeled it back.

It was more than a treasure trove of goodies, it was a threatening pile of one. The lights were on and you were slammed into with information as you peared across it all, for instance the room was large, much larger than you thought it was. While most of it was still unfinished further back against the far wall was a much more finished section. That is what you noticed second but you just were too in shock to register the first yet. The furthest wall was finished, a simple gray paint and from it hung old custom paintings, things both long forgotten and new. They were strange to see though in comparison to your room when you had first woken up nothing crazy. The first thing you noticed was crazier, though not too surprising.

The wall was lined with a board, hanging from it an assortment of household tools and even more specialty ones. Mostly pliers, wrenches, screwdrivers of all sorts of sizes. There were spools of wire, rope, and bolt cutters. There were more too, there were tweezers, the heavy duty kind, expensive looking, stainless steel and with a rubber grip. Each item while normally not threatening was fucking horrifying. The blindfolded and gagged half-dead looking man would ultimately agree if he saw the line up. Yet the detail of the organization, to the bindings, and yes even the table he was on, made it look like a perfectly created scene. To Feitain, who you half-confidently assumed was the resident torturer, this must be something artistic or even religious, sometimes the two came hand in hand.

His hair was glued by brown dried blood, his nose broken, the bruising covering his cheeks and eyes from what you could tell from afar. There was no way for him to escape from his binds, strapped down to the table. The table itself looked to be something akin to an embalming table, slightly slanted towards a floor drain, some blood already leaking down from the man and dried against the table’s cold smudged metal. He had bruises down his arms and legs dark purple and splotchy. His ankle looked painfully enlarged, not enough to be a break but horribly sprained.

You should have screamed in horror, your heartbeat sped up like crazy after all. There was enough adrenaline that maybe you could have killed a person, not your captors from the look and attitude of them. If a captor can be so unconcerned like they were either they were morons or knew full well that they had perfect complete control. From a second kidnapped person being in the basement looking like a corpse it’s easy to decide which.

Looking on even in your shocked state you made your third discovery. There were bulkhead doors. A small flight of stairs led up to them. In your shock you continued to move like a ghost, even though your chest was pounding. It rumbled in your gut, twisted and stabbed at your lungs, and you looked upwards at it, upwards into the dark steps a small crack of light. Your cat in all his loving sweetness rubbed up against your leg, mewling softly. You walked forwards reaching upward towards the door, climbing the stairs and gently pressing to see if they’d open, to your surprise it did.

[oddvanilla]

kinda pray for monkeypox not becoming a big deal

like our world going NUTS we dont need it too THO very often i think about how everythinh that happens is part of future's history and it makes me kinda less paranoid because people been thorught worse and it wont be a big deal for anyone

ALSO GOT REALLY OFFENDED BY THE APPLICATION THAT CPVID MADE PEOPLE STRUGGLE WITH ASKING FOR KETCHUP for me it qasnt covid i swear i jusy became insane and now try to get more like a human

YESSS YOU GET ITTT!!! LIKE I JUST HOPE ITS NOT TRUE. THE WORLD HEALTH ORGANISATION IS ALREADY FINDING CURES TO IT OR SOMETHING LIKE OMG PLS GO BACK TO FINDING A CURE FOR CANCER LIKE MONKEY POX WONT GET THAAAT BAD....right

(upcoming yap session put Ur seat belts on)

I often think about how back then it was way worse. Like ah yes, I'm a Victorian child born into a lower class family and I'm forced to labour all my life living in the streets of London or something. Of course, you don't have food or water or any source of hygiene to begin with. The worst part is..water quality was so bad back then that if you don't have drinking water; people just drink beer instead.

Imagine your 6 year old daughter working her life off mining in a cave with starvation since yesterday and you have to just give her MORE beer to fill her stomach 😭 like oh GOD that's miserable..

and after all that, im surprised the diseases we get now are more "dangerous" than back then. Mind you, people in the 1800s or 1700s had like NO technology to even think of finding a cure. Like damn you didn't even invent a microscope YET. <- I'll educate you a bit about history..the first microscope as a CONCEPT was made by a Dutch man named Zacharias Janssen all the way back in 1590!!! But the first MODERN microscope that we know nowadays with all the different lenses and even coloured was in 1774. That's like almost 2 centuries later...and incase you haven't focused in your 7th grade science class, the first atomic theory was in 1804. If you understand where I'm going with this, we humans are slow as HELLL.

I'm mentioning all of this saying dude...you're telling me people back then had some deadly diseases, couldn't cure it, DIED on streets, and didnt even GET quarantine.

LIKE NO OLIVIA YOU DO NOT WANT TO BE A WIFE IN THE 1800s. NOT ONLY WILL YOU GET YOUR RIGHTS TAKEN AWAY BUT YOURE ALSO GONNA GET BORN, MARRIED AT 7 YEARS OLD TO THE PRINCE OF FRANCE, GET A DEADLY VIRUS AND DIE BY 12. MUST BE SOO NICE TO BE A WIFE IN THE 1800s CAUSE YOURE BORN IN THE WRONG GENERATION...right?? ❤️

Talking about generation...which I bet everyone is sick of me talking about..but like dude would our generation survive if we just got a time machine to the 17th century. Although I dont believe in the evolution theory because we are NOT monkeys but I believe over time humans learn new skills, which changes their life styles therefore their bodies change too because every creature adapts. Cool!!

You ever see those articles about how nowadays we stay on our phone all day and that'll make our bodies lazy and not used to work blah blah blah,, at first I was gonna say if we go back to the time the Spanish flu for example started we would PROBABLY survive because we have better education, better immune systems due to actual healthcare and we could definitely survive with just common sense. Like wtf?? I'm NOT going to visit by rat filled basement bare foot..

HOWEVER compare the average human who sits on bed all day scrolling and laughing at a glowy rectangular shaped decide called a phone...we would not last a day without internet...at least I know I wouldn't 🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️

So like...think about it. Why is corona so dangerous?? It's only borderline to older diseases. Or maybe it's the other way around. Corona itself is DEADLY, but it's just the situation and life style we have today that makes me wonder why it's harmless. Like cough cough I got covid oh no!!! I can just stay in my home all day.. like you get what I mean?? I'm sure you would just get back to work if you were unfortunately lower class victorian child and had covid..and dying probably gives you more peace than working a lifetime for 10 cents..

So that's it!!! Silly lil rant about Victorian children, diseases, Humans Adapting, science and history, and of course generations. MY ALL TIME FAVOURITE TOPICS TO TALK ABOUT!!!

[randomly--accessed--memories]

Went through the RAM playlist and picked out all my favorite lines

I still don’t know who you are / I only know that I’m still lonely / That morbid sort where even company can’t cure me / And the more you reassure, the less I trust - Against the Kitchen Floor

All the king's horses and all the king's men / Couldn't put me back together again - All the King’s Horses

Make me pay for fucking up the rest of your life - AND I’M GONE

Take my identity / All the best parts of me / And mould them into what you want! - Another Tuesday Night

And it’s my problem if I have no friends and feel I want to die - Are You Satisfied?

A prison’s not always a dark place / With grey closed in walls and big loud chains / They can hide in the skin of a home - As Above So Below

Someday I will go back outside and see her, okay - Baby Hotline

Reborn / Reform / Twist my legs to one / And mind to none : Don’t leave me be / I’m a bathtub mermaid / I cannot swim but only sing - Bathtub Mermaid

I feel like / I never knew you / And I never wanna know you again - Better Off Gone

In this case, just won’t you go and please let it be / Because I still won’t be able to say sorry - Breaking Things Into Pieces

Tell me when to drink, tell me when to eat, tell me when to smile, tell me when to breathe / Tell me when I overreact / No, tell me again, please / I love being told what to do, but only when I'm told by you / At least, that's what I used to think, but nowadays, I'm on the brink - Cannibal

Take this pill, you'll feel much better / When you wake up numb and your brain's been severed - Careful What You Wish For

Take a good look this is me / This is what I’ve come to be - The Chattering Lack of Common Sense

They say they wanna help, but they always fucking leave - CODE MISTAKE

When did I become a man / Trapped inside a ghost? / If you could only see me now / I know I'd disappoint somehow - The Comfort of a Laugh Track

You'll be fine you honeycomb / Who could ever hurt you? Who could be so cold? - Community Gardens

I’ve become what you like / I am what you wanted, right? - Copycat

Stay asleep / And blame / Everyone for giving up - Cross

Oh, circumcise my love for you / It's far too vapid and aimless - Cupid

Under my skin, you're unwrapping / All that I am, I swear / I wanted to keep, I wanted to stay / Deep in your head forever / I wanna show you something / Melting through my brain / Every time you're around / You're assaulting me - D D D N N N A A A

Carved right into my head / Quick lobotomy / Then left me for dead - Dangerous

I don't think I know myself, without your help - A Dangerous Thing

Buried in the basement, cold cement / Dead comes talking, can’t put them to rest - The Dead Come Talking

So I’m taking your narrative, and I’m making it mine - The Dismemberment Song

I’m gonna be in love forever cause I’m gonna die tonight : Transformation complete, transformation complete / You are now, as you once were: beautiful - DOGMATICA

Well, who should I be then, if I'll never be the same? - Dr. Sunshine Is Dead

I’m black, then I’m white / No! Something isn’t right! / My enemy’s invisible, I don’t know how to fight - Echo

And so long to the person you begged me to be / He's down, he's dead / Now take a good long look at what you've done to me - Farewell Wanderlust

You hurt me / You hurt me / But it's all okay / Because I love you anyway : I have no clue what you’re saying / I’m gonna lose my mind! - Folie a Deux

I was shown my place, but I didn’t care for it - Gambler

I get to be dumb, you get to exercise control - GIRL HELL 1999

I’m not her / And I’ll never be / I’m just debris - Going Insane

You told me something along like / The lines of “It’s all my fault that you are the way you are” / That is right, it is all your fault / But I hope you just remember that it's not all there is to it - Heavenly You

A vivisection of me / Done by God for all to see - Honey I’m Home

Am I a toy to you, my love? / Just a thing to play and / Then throw away - A Human’s Touch

My love must be a kind of blind love / I can't see anyone but you - I Only Have Eyes For You

Me and the TV are enemies / Sickening static surrounds my mind - I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead

I've got you under my skin / I've got you deep in the heart of me / So deep in my heart that you're really a part of me - I've Got You Under My Skin

You say that I’m better / Why don’t I feel better? - Karma

Do I know who I pretend to be / Of whom am I a copy? - Language of the Lost

I only turned out to be just one more girl you slew - Let the Record Show

There’s an old voice in my head that’s holding me back / Well, tell her that I miss our little talks - Little Talks

You’re just a clown, just a pet / Whispering love yet again - Loveit?

Some moments last forever, but some flare out with love, love, love - Love Love Love

And now, even though you're mad, and these memories won't stay / That's okay / Cause now I get to meet you for the first time every single day - Marbles

Die once every three minutes - Marijuana’s a Working Woman

Doctor, I can’t tell if I’m not me - The Mind Electric

You want a taste of my brain / Okay, it’s yours anyway - Misery Meat

You were never my god - My Creator

The girl is like an architect / And I am just the new invention - New Invention

Please spare me indignity / And won't you please give me some decency? / And won't you please call it if our time is through? / Cause I know that we fall apart when nothing's new - Nothing’s New

I know exactly what’s best for you / I’ve don’t exactly what’s best for you - Novocaine

You're not a coward 'cause you cower / You're brave because they broke you / Yet broken still you breathe : Cause I'm not trapped, oh with you, you see / You're the one who's trapped with me / Cause you are in the earth of me / You are in the earth of me / My head's not yours, it's mine / And I'll take my fucking time / 'Cause I know, I know, I know - The Old Witch Sleep and the Good Man Grace

Novocaine, lobotomize me, teach me how to think - P3T

Safe from pain and truth and choice and other poison devils - Pet

What’s a pound of flesh between / Friends like me and you - Pound of Flesh

Folded puppets in a chest / Satin, static, lost in manic - Puppeteer

Close your mouth / And your eyes / And your heart / Your new eternity lies with us - Return to the Motherland

I get high to leave all these problems on the ground / Then to my surprise, they're right there when I come back down - Riptide

Look at me, look me in the eyes / Forget yourself, surrender your mind / Right now, you're mine / All mine / Give in, you're mine / All mine - Rule #34

Must be lonely loving someone / Try’na find their way out of a maze - Should’ve Been Me

There's something quite enjoyable when someone is destroyable - Sink or Swim

You hung me on your wall / Stabbed me with your push pins / In public, showed me off - The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived

Now it sounds so good to me and it used to sound so good to me! / It doesn't sound so good to me, it never sounded good to me! - There’s Something Happening

This, this, this is not love / I don’t know what it is / But I know this / This is not love - This Is Not Love

You’d say that things have improved, right? - Those Who Carried On

I made you my temple, my mural, my sky / Now I'm begging for footnotes in the story of your life - tolerate it

I know / You belong to somebody new / But tonight you belong to me - Tonight You Belong to Me

So she dressed me up as the man she loved / Then threw me in a box when she had had enough / Now the light of day I no longer see / She stuck her voodoo pins where my eyes used to be / Accidentally tragic / Victim of her black magic / Had a boy once who loved me / Now he's so afraid of me - Toy Boy

The things I see are a dread I must withstand / On my own - Uncanny

I don’t think there’s anyone under your skin - Under My Skin

I wanted someone tall and firm to reassure that I'm doing this right / But it's starting to hurt when you hold me tight - Unreliable

When I'm too far gone / Dead in the eyes of my friends / Will you take me out of here - Watercolor

Stranger things than death can happen / To lab rat girls and pretty white rabbits - …well, better than the alternative

And when you scream, "I'm not alright" / And throw my picture at the wall / You were supposed to be my light / And keep me safe against them all / "How could you leave me here?" you'll scream / And louder, I'll scream back to you from that unknown / And say, "I know you're strong enough, I know you're strong enough / I know you're strong enough to do this on your own” - Welly Boots

Transformation / You've changed within / Some selfish mutation / A stranger I once called a friend - What Have You Become?

My head is spinning, I am beaten in the end - White Happy

Just take me as I am / A memory so vivid / And savor all the parts you can / Cause no one mourns the wicked - Wicked

You don't have to say you love me / Just be close at hand / You don't have to stay forever / I will understand - You Don't Have to Say You Love Me

[cc-for-cy]

The Ricky Montgomery Legacy Challenge

Inspired by @dizzywhims' Sour Legacy, I decided I wanted to make a legacy based on my favorite album, Montgomery Ricky by Ricky Montgomery!

The rules on this challenge are pretty lax, as I built it more for myself, however, the more I sat on it the more I wanted to actually put it out for everyone! So, here's all the rules! Make sure to tag either @cc-for-cy or @heretoreadmyfics and use the tag #montgomeryrickylegacy if you do this challenge, I would love to see it!

Rules written out are under the cut and make sure to STREAM RICK (OUT NOW)

| 0 - Rules

This challenge is NOT base game friendly, and uses almost all the packs. Feel free to alter this challenge if you do not have a pack used. 

Mods are encouraged! Try not to use many cheaty mods however. Basemental Mods is encouraged for two generations but you may not use them if you feel uncomfortable with it. 

Unless specified, drama, how many kids you have, etc are totally up to you!

This challenge is very storyline based! Feel free to go insane with the storyline, and use my descriptions as a baseline. Requirements are, of course, required to happen. You may also edit or add challenge rules depending on how hard you want the challenge to be, as this challenge is written for beginner storytelling.

Heirs can be any gender, HOWEVER the challenge is written for a patriarchy, and patriarchy is preferred.

If you play this challenge, please tag me, @heretoreadmyfics or @cc-for-cy and tag it #montgomeryrickylegacy

---

| 1 - California

“I am just a boy, but with a little bit of a culture, I'll go far

I want the world to know that I'm not just a photograph!”

Having just moved back to Del Sol Valley, you’re ready to get started on your big break! You swear you’re not going to fall into the pitfalls of stardom, saying “I love all my fans” when you don’t, becoming someone you never saw yourself as, but… Will that sentiment ring true when you finally get all you want?

Aspiration: World Famous Celebrity

Traits: Self-Absorbed, Creative, Ambitious

Career: Actor or Entertainer (Musician Branch)

Requirements:

Max the Acting and/or an Instrument (guitar, piano, violin, etc) skill

Date a celebrity and have at least 1 child with them

Become a 5 Star celebrity

---

| 2 - Get Used To It

“You want a garden, but you got a balcony

And you’re always looking for some company”

Growing up being a top celebrities kid, your life was luxurious, filled with parties, and general monkeying around- even some trying to make it on your own, but it wasn’t that important to you… Until it was. You used to be crazy with creativity but now.. you don’t feel as important as you once did. And you’re gonna have to Get Used to It. 

Aspiration: Live Fast (Teen), Party Animal

Traits: Non-Committal, High-Maintenance, Childish

Career: The OPPOSITE of whatever you majored in (EX. Drama Degree -> Go into Business)

Requirements:

Max out the Gardening skill

Go to University

Have an eventful teenage/YA life that settles down halfway through, to your dismay

Have at least 2 different partners before meeting the one you marry

DON’T complete your aspiration

---

| 3 - Cabo

“Ashes, ashes, dust to dust

I think I found a place for us”

Once your parents finally settle down, they never really let you have creativity. They never let you have anything, really, saying that the real world would end all your hopes and dreams, and for a while you believed that, until you met them and suddenly your life felt colorful and loved. But.. You had to keep it secret. Because your parents would just tear that down like all your other dreams. 

Aspiration: Soulmate

Traits: Romantic, Gloomy, Clumsy

Career: Painter (Either branch)

Requirements:

Max the Painting skill

Take a vacation and meet your partner there. 

Partner must have blonde/white hair. 

Keep your relationship secret from your family your entire life

Eventually live in the place you met your partner in (if available)

---

| 4 - My Heart Is Buried In Venice

“My heart is buried in Venice

Waiting for someone to take it home”

After seeing what love your parents showed, you thought romance would be easy. You had no idea what they went through, and when you finally found a partner you knew you were going to be everything to them. But maybe the issues your family had plagued you, because suddenly you were worried that nobody would ever love you the way you did to others. And the life you had with your partner crumbled, and over a small argument, they left, seeing your flaws. And now you’re alone, waiting for someone to take your heart home.

Aspiration: Serial Romantic

Traits: Paranoid, Romantic, Overachiever

Career: Civil Planner (Either branch)

Requirements:

Max a vacation based skill (ex. skiing, snowboarding, rock climbing, selvadordian culture, herbalism, etc)

Have a relationship break off after an argument (can be autonomous or not)

Have at least 1 kid with the partner that breaks up with you, and that has child has to be heir (may have more afterwards)

---

| 5 - Dont Know How

“I wanna do it but I don’t know

I don’t know how”

Seeing your parents relationship crumble over something so small never really gave you the confidence to ever even approach someone- so for most of your life you were alone and unloved, and kinda a nerd.. Until you see her and goddammit she is so out of your league! But even looking at her makes your knees buckle and your heart beat so hard- so you’re gonna try dammit, for the first time ever, to win someone out of your league! But.. Do you know how?

Aspiration: Nerd Brain, Villainous Valentine

Traits: Socially-Awkward, Self-Assured, Nerd

Career: Scientist

Requirements:

Have the Nerd Brain aspiration, but change it after competing the first two parts, and switch to Villainous Valentine

Meet someone who changes your life by being really hot and proceed with a romantic endeavor that gets your confidence up! Then cheat on them.

Every woohoo has to be a try for baby. You’re confident like that. 

Max out the rocket science and/or programming skill(s)

---

| 6 - Line Without A Hook

“She’s a, she’s a lady

and I am just a line without a–”

Insecure and bad. That’s what most of your relationships have felt like. It didn’t help that your parent had a sexual promiscuity problem, which probably didn’t really help your endeavors. But once you get someone, you are determined to never let them go- no matter what!… But. Your relationship becomes codependent. It becomes a problem- you can’t stop being around them. And your problems are cropping up again— so what do you do? You’re a line without a hook. You leave. 

Aspiration: Angeling Ace

Traits: Erratic, Perfectionist, Jealous

Career: Conservationist

Requirements:

Be best friends with your spouse, but eventually leave and abandon your family 

(abandoning family is considered the end of this generation)

Max out the fishing skill

Finish the frog collection

Never live alone

---

| 7 - Last Night

“Last night

I was fine!”

You weren’t super young when your parent abandoned you, but definitely old enough to destroy your teenage/YA life. It seemed like they always had something else better to do than love you, like for example loving your other parent way more. Were you really wanted? You spend your days forever at the bar, drinking and trying to forget. Eventually you’re dragged away, every time. By someone who allegedly loves you. 

Aspiration: Master Mixologist

Traits: Loner, Snob, Dance Machine

Career: Culinary (Mixology Branch)

Requirements:

Go to nightclubs/bars at least once a week

Be close/best friends with the parent who didn’t leave you. 

Have a partner, but cheat on them with a one night stand, that results in the heir. 

Master the mixology skill

---

| 8 - Mr Loverman

“I’m Mr. Loverman, 

and I miss my lover..”

Your life was always a little bit of a mess, but you keep going. Eventually you meet the love of your life, and you love and live with them as hard as you can. For so many years… But eventually… you lose them. And you mourn that love for the rest of your life, falling deep into problems that are generational. 

Aspiration: Soulmate

Traits: Cheerful -> Gloomy, Music Lover, Slob

Career: Freelancer (Writing Branch)

Requirements:

Lose your spouse, never remarry

Have a nuclear family (at least 3 kids + a pet)

Fall into old habits, start sabotaging relationships + going to bars.

Max the Cross-Stitch skill

---

| 9 - Snow

“Bury me six feet in snow”

Once one of your parents dies, your other parent becomes very vindictive towards the rest of your family. You took the heat of it, and quickly your life fell apart. You get into a toxic relationship, and lose who you were slightly in the process. When everything seems calm, you jump ship. You aspire for your kid to have a better life, and bury your skeletons to make sure they will. 

Aspiration: Extreme Sports Enthusiast and/or Super Parent

Traits: Adventurous, Self-Absorbed, Family-Oriented

Career: Law (Either Branch)

Requirements:

Have a toxic relationship with your partner, break it off when it starts to get better

Have one kid, and max out all their skills as a toddler/infant

Max the Archeology skill

---

| 10 - This December

“This December

I’ll remember”

Your parent always wanted better for you. But you can’t help but think about the generations before you, how all their problems ruined their life, and how it seemed like every generation passed it down to their children. But you decide no more, this isn’t going to happen to you. Instead of fall into the pitfalls of your parents, you break the generational trauma, and decide to live a life free of the problems you know your family has been through. Don’t forget to look back, and see how far you’ve come. This December, you’ll remember everything. 

Aspiration: Successful Lineage

Traits: Family-Oriented, Loyal, Insider

Career: Education (Either Branch)

Requirements:

Fall in love healthily, get married, and adopt.

Celebrate the winter holidays the hardest. Go all out!

Master the Wellness skill

Reminisce on family often.

[kissorkill16]

To Keep You Safe: A Hello Neighbor Fanfic

By JJ

Summary: The day Mr. Peterson went insane.

Mr. Peterson jolted upwards out of his trance when he heard a loud bump coming from the front lawn, he immediately got up and ran outside. He wasn't ready for what he saw. Mya was being held in Aaron's arms, bleeding from the head, eyes open and blank, pale-faced, not moving. Aaron was holding her, crying her eyes out.

Aaron looked up to see his dad, staring at him, his face unreadable.

"Dad! I swear, it was an accident! We were on the roof, and I hid her favorite doll and...", Aaron couldn't speak anymore. His voice was drowned out by his crying.

The next thing Mr. Peterson did was get his gloves on, and with a heavy heart, he buried his daughter. While he did, he kept thinking. All he had was Aaron, his son. He was the last family he had left, with both his wife and daughter dead. He was scared that Aaron might die too. What would happen? Would he fall off the roof too? Would he get run over by a car? Would he go missing and never be found?

Mr. Peterson couldn't risk it. If Aaron died, he'd have no one left. His family was the only reason he ever wanted to live right now, but now without his wife and daughter, all he had left was his son. So he quickly hatched up a plan once he finished burying Mya.

Aaron just ate a sandwich that night, he didn't bother asking his father what was for dinner. How could you talk to anyone when you just killed your own sister? How could you talk to anyone? Aaron flinched when he felt the other side of the couch dip. He looked up to see his dad, all dirty and tired from burying his sister.

"...Dad. ...I'm really sorry.", he whispered.

"I know you are."

"I really am. It was an accident. I didn't mean to push her. I was just so angry that-"

"Aaron."

Aaron looked up at his father, and he was looking right back at him. Expression unreadable.

"I know you didn't mean to hurt your sister. Accidents happen, son. Just try to calm down."

Aaron didn't understand.

"Do you want me to give you a hug?"

Aaron didn't know whether or not he should accept. He didn't know whether it was a trap or if his dad genuinely meant it, but he was a little desperate for comfort at the moment. So without another thought, he ran into his father's arms and embraced him in a tight hug.

Suddenly, he felt a pinch at his neck, then everything went dark.

Aaron woke up on a mattress with two blankets. Even though the place he was in was pitch black, he kind of knew where he was. His first clue was the windows, he had painted those windows when he and his family had first moved to Raven Brooks. This was the basement.

Why was he in the basement? He had absolutely no idea. When he heard the door open, he immediately got up and ran to the door, but a giant forearm stopped him in his tracks.

"Dad?!"

"Aaron, you're awake. I'm glad to know I didn't give you too much sedative, but I wouldn't be moving around so much if I were you."

Aaron backed up. "Dad, what am I doing in the basement?", he asked in a panic.

Mr. Peterson put his hands on Aaron's shoulders. "First of all, calm down, please. Otherwise, you'll fall back asleep. Second of all, I just want you to know that I'm only doing this to keep you safe."

Aaron's eyes widened in shock. "Keep me safe? Dad, you're locking me in the basement! This isn't keeping me safe, this is keeping me prisoner!", he shouted. Then his head felt heavy. Great, now he couldn't even yell without getting dizzy!

Mr. Peterson scooped his son in his arms and put him back down on his makeshift bed. "I warned you. Aaron, please try to understand. You're the only one I have left. Your mother and sister died, the outside world is too dangerous and risky, I can't lose you too."

Aaron somewhat understood what his father was trying to do, but it was a weird and twisted way. "Dad, I get it. You want to protect me, but there are other ways to do it. Please, don't lock me in here."

Aaron looked at his father with pleading eyes, but Mr. Peterson simply turned away, only sparing his son one last glance. "I'm sorry, son. But I can't lose you.", and then he locked the door behind him.

Aaron ran up to the door, jiggling the knob, as if that would open it. He gave up and sunk down to the floor. When his legs regained energy, he clutched his stomach, and let out a loud scream into the dark room.

What Is He Hiding: A Hello Neighbor Fanfic

By JJ

Summary: The day Nicky found out that Mr. Peterson had been acting stranger than usual.

Nicky was just running down the street, kicking his ball. He had been trying to take his mind off of the disappearances of Aaron and Mya, and so far, it had been working. Not a lot, but it had been working.

He finally reached the front of his house, and that's when he stopped kicking. "Alright, I think it's time to hit the sack.", he said to himself, and bent over to pick up his ball.

Just then, he heard a loud, earsplitting scream erupt out of nowhere. He turned to where it was coming from. The Peterson house. Why was someone screaming in the Peterson house? Was someone in trouble? Curiosity got the better of him, so he tip-toed over to the front window.

There he saw Mr. Peterson, clutching his head and leaning on a door. A big metal door that was boarded up with 2 wooden planks and a red lock.

Why would Mr. Peterson have that?, thought Nicky. What could he be hiding?

He ran away from the back window when he thought Mr. Peterson had spotted him. He ran to the backyard, where he tripped on a rock and fell to the ground.

As he was getting up, he wasn't ready for what was in front of him.

It was a tombstone. A tombstone which has Mya's name on it.

Oh my goodness!, thought Nicky. Mya's dead?! Why is Mya dead?! Did Mr. Peterson kill her?!, his head screamed in a panic. A chill ran down his spine when he felt a gloved hand grip his shoulder.

"Nicholas.", said the voice behind him. "You shouldn't be here."

Nicky turned around to see Mr. Peterson standing behind him, an angry expression on his face. "Mr. Peterson! Is everything okay? I heard someone screaming and I got so worried and-"

"You shouldn't be here.", was all he got for an answer. "Leave. Now."

Nicky hesitated for a moment, but he could no longer stand being under the gaze of Mr. Peterson's angry stare. So he ran like the wind. As soon as he got in his house, he ran all the way upstairs and into his room.

He flopped down on his bed, tired from running. But he quickly regained energy when he heard that same screaming noise coming from the Peterson house. He peeked out his window, and squinted his eyes.

He had to figure out what Mr. Peterson was hiding.

[radarchives]

IM SAYING LIKE they served so much cunt with the 2021 halloween fits and we went mostly downhill from there, could we perhaps get your thoughts on the rest of the set too, maybe which were your fav and least fav ones? 🥺👉👈 i could write a whole essay on them tbh i swear im normal about them

the halloween fits truly were everything. with the bunny fits one of the only events where looking at the bottom parts only made me break out in sweats half the time.

i'm not necessarily gonna rate them, but i'll give my thoughts.

so let's start

lucifer

solid outfit. the hat i'm okay with since it doesn't look like it's got a life of its own (hat that shall not be named). the zipper shoes however need to go, the white is not giving and certainly a choice for an almost all black outfit. even in white they'd look way better as dress boots with laces.

also love how they somehow managed to give lucifer even more pieces of clothing than usual, unquestionably a skill.

anyway i can't really complain about the outfit bc the card was drawn by the dilf hair lucifer artist. i forgive all mistakes for that.

mammon

it's giving shady vendor it's giving Dr.Facilier with the colour scheme. maybe a bit questionable that he isn't wearing any socks but. it's the horror outfit so maybe that checks out. i personally would've replaced the tie with a bunch of necklaces and have given the man some damn socks. i'd always give mammon at least 60% more jewelry in general that man should be dripping in it.

for me this one is the least exciting one out of the bunch, but i still like it.

leviathan

the jason mask??? the boots?? hands down this is one of the only times i am in love with obey me brand shoes bc these look GOOD (maybe it's just the obey me church stompers trauma talking). love love love the coat and i am also weirdly okay with the brown pants since they match the dried blood on the coat. the gloves are a bit unnecessary though.

satan

i both love and have my beef with this outfit. when i saw the dress i almost flipped my phone because finally!! the devs let a charcter aside from asmo be a bit more feminine looking! then i saw the bottom and went. hmmmm. i think i just don't like that he's wearing both a dress and dress pants (that have buttons on the side. ew) combined? i genuinely think the outfit would've been more cohesive if they either leaned more into the feminine side (dress closed a bit further down, tights, boots with a higher heel) or the more androgynous side (corset with lacing in the center, dress as more of a blouse, high waisted pants, bottom of the dress if kept more like an overskirt?)

asmo

he's perfect, he's beautiful, he looks like linda evangelista, he's a model

no questions asked. perfection. the spider theme/black widow theme is so fucking perfect for him. also the placement of the blood on his hands and sleeves? casually going insane over him they did him so well. definitely my favourite out of them all.

belphie

alright. i am conflicted about this one. because it's camp. no idea what made the devs give belphie a sexy nurse theme but i'm here for it. maybe not necessarily the executiion but still. the skeleton print is my arch nemesis. what in the hot topic fingerless emo gloves is going on here. love the little belt on his thigh but also. safety. hazard babes. he'd be getting poked by needles every step he takes. i don't even wanna look at the little bo peep ass looking shoes.

i would've loved the outfit even more if they'd given him a skirt instead of his little short shorts. maybe not a visually appealing one but definitely an amusing one.? like yeah it's ugly but yeah i also like it because it's silly.

beel

for a beel outfit? god tier. man always has to suffer from boring outfit syndrome, but this one is good as long as you keep your eyes trained on the upper part. the devs shortly released him from the yas girl give us nothing basement. we do not talk about the ginormous clown stompers on his feet though. it looks less camp than belphie's nurse outfit and i'm here for it.

[liunnarieisfree]

◇Author × Ben Clark◇

Warning; Horror and creepy

Insanity is the only way out.

It's been months since the time that we went to Savannah where everything started. If only I knew that it would turn out this way, I would've chosen to sleep in my bed rather than go to Savannah. That place is curse.

"HEY!" I jolted from where I was standing when that voice came out of nowhere.

I heard Aiden laugh because of my reaction. Where did he get all that energy from? Is he not tired from dealing with those Phantoms? Because I am.

I sighed and rolled my eyes at him. I look around looking for that one person who's mostly sane in our group, unlike his cousin.

"Looking for Ben?" Aiden asked.

Obviously, yes. But instead of saying that, I just nodded my head in response.

"He's kind of sick because of those sleepless nights that we had." He said.

"He's having a fever?" I asked.

"Yup." He said with a nod.

Before I could even think properly, I immediately turned around and started walking myself out of the school.

"HEY! WHERE ARE YOU GOING?!" Aiden shouted and calling my name.

"To your house." I said, I'm not sure if he heard it, but I don't seem to care.

It took me half an hour to arrive at Aiden's house and I immediately knock at the door hoping that Ben would open it but a few minutes have passed and no one open the door so I decided to twist the door knob hoping that it's not lock. My prayer is answered because the door is not locked, and I walk myself freely inside.

I look around the house, hoping that I'll see Ben.

"Ben! Where are you?" I shouted his name, but when I didn't hear any answer from him, I decided to walk around the house and look for him.

I'm close to Aiden's family because Aiden's mother is my mom's best friend. So, Aiden and I grew up with each other, but I didn't know Ben until recently when he decided to live with Aiden's family. After years of being close with him and his family, there's only one thing that I'm sure at. Their family is no different from mine.

I kept on walking around, hoping that I'll see him, but there's still no sign of him being in here. I went upstairs to knock at Aiden's room, but still no response, same with Ben's room. I've been walking around the house looking for him for half an hour now and I still couldn't find him.

The more time that I spent looking for him, the more I felt fear. I've been feeling this lately to the point that it keeps bugging me, and I couldn't just ignore it.

There's still one room that I haven't gone into and I don't even know if it's safe to go in there because Aiden's family kept telling me that it's the only room I'm not allowed to enter.

I'm not sure if he's in there, but I'm hoping that I'll see him already. I heaved a sigh before walking my way downstairs, which led me towards the basement. The stairs kept on making a sound while I was walking, and that didn't help me at all because it just made me think of those horror movies. I swear if I died in here, I'd cry out of embarrassment because that's the most stupid way to go.

The stairs lead me to a dark wooden door that looks so much older than Aiden's house. I don't know if that's possible. I gather all the courage that I have within me to twist the rusty door knob.

Oh, please help me.

The room is dark because there's no sign of light in here, but my eyes immediately adjust on the dark. Perks of being in a phantom realm.

I look around, hoping that I'll see Ben, but I can't see anything except boxes and papers that are scattered on the floor. This room is filled with dust as if it's not clean for so many years.

I walk around the room looking for him, but there's something that caught my attention. There's an object that's covered with a white blanket, and so out of curiosity, I walk towards it and remove the blanket that is covering the object. As I removed the blanket, dust immediately flew in my direction, which made me cough.

And it shocked me to see a cylinder looking machine. I haven't seen any like this before, so I thought maybe it's just being invented.

While I was busy looking at the machine in front of me, I froze at my place when I heard a static sound like a TV being opened. I felt shivers run through my spine, and I couldn't move. I took a lot of my courage to turn around and look.

And that's the most dumbest thing that I've ever done for today.

The TV is on, and it shows a woman trapped inside of a cylinder machine that looks exactly the same with the machine that's beside me right now. The woman is shouting and laughing at the same time, like she's losing her mind, but she looks more like a phantom in a person's body. But what's at the TV is not something that I should be concerned about. It's the person that is standing beside it.

I saw Ben standing beside the TV with a wide smile on his face, showing his white teeth while his eyes were wide open, looking directly at me. He looks exactly like the woman on the TV. He looks like a phantom.

I was frozen at my spot, and I couldn't move nor utter a single word. My mind keeps telling me to run because the Ben that is in front of me now is not the Ben that I'm looking for.

"Liunnarie." That's the first time that I've heard him speak because he never does that. I never heard him talk. Not even once. Not until now. And the sound of his voice is scratching my brain because he doesn't sound like a person. This is far from what I expected his voice to be. He sounds like a phantom rather than a person.

And that's when I confirm it. It's a phantom that's standing in front of me and not Ben.