#Jackie spent a tonne

[meltingangels]

Made a quick edit because V got back into music after her brothers death, when Jackie encouraged her. And she really starts to enjoy making music, so she begins performing at small bars across the city.

She gives herself the stage name Pixie Void. Pixie for the pointed ears, Void because it fits her skills as Netrunner. And actually finds alot of success; she has quite the following.

As for her voice, I absolutely love the idea of how she can sing really soft and when needed, seductive, but can also scream like hell. Think Tatiana from Jinjer.

And fun fact, V legitimately owns that old guitar of Johnny's; she's a Samurai superfan. Jackie spent a tonne of time and money tracking it down to give to V as a surprise birthday gift.

[elthadriel]

Clean up that Blood all over your Hands

During their time in SEP Jack made Gabriel a promise that he intended to keep. He just wished it hadn't had to be under these circumstances.

Tags:  Major Character Death, Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Hurt No Comfort, Sad Ending, SEP era, Post-Recall

Read on Ao3

“Need help”

  Jack went from half asleep, squinting into the too bright light of his phone, to completely awake, jolting out of bed in a faction of a second on reading the text. He almost fell in his hurry to pull on his trousers while still staggering to the door of his room. Gabriel’s room was only just across the corridor from his own, but even that felt like to far.

  They had lost two people to this round of drugs already.

  Gabriel’s door was unlocked, they had all stopped locking their doors at some point into this hell.

  “Here,” Gabriel croaked, voice barely more than a horse whisper. He was curled into the corner of his en-suite by the toilet. He apparently hadn’t made it there in time, as there was vomit down the front of his shirt. That wasn’t overly concerning, Jack was throwing up nearly every other day at this point in the experiments, but the sweat soaking through his clothes was.

“Shit, Gabe.” Jack dropped down in front of his friend, pressing a hand to his forehead. It was clammy and unnaturally hot.

  “Bad reaction today’s dose.”  Gabriel tried to laugh but it quickly turn into a hacking cough.

  “I didn’t know you were getting more today.” Jack started to help Gabriel out of his shirt, revealing even more burning skin. There had been jokes the first time they had had to help strip the other, but they had passed the point where this was even a little funny a long time ago.

  “Me neither. Told me after dinner.” Gabriel was trying his best to help, but he was almost a deadweight, clearly struggling to even lift his arms.

  God, this was going to kill them both.

  “Fuckers.”

  Gabriel grinned, revealing blood between his teeth; he had a habit of biting his cheek when he was in pain.

  “I’m gonna get your ass into a cool shower, try and get your temperature down,” Jack said. Gabriel had probably meant to try that himself, but he didn’t look like had the strength to even crawl across the bathroom, never mind stand to turn the shower on.

  “My Prince Charming.” Gabriel drawled, slumping back into the wall without Jack there to support him.

  Jack put the shower on as strong as it could manage; at least the government had supplied them with showers with great pressure. Jack stripped off his own clothes, dropping them into a heap before turning back to collect Gabriel. “Which princess does that make you then?”

  “I always thought of myself as a Jasmine.” Gabriel said, managing a slightly pained smirk.

  Jack hauled Gabriel up, ignoring how his own muscles, pushed to the limit by his own cocktail of drugs, ached at the effort. He was getting stronger by the day, but the strain on his muscles was unforgiving.

  “Jesus, Gabe, how much did you eat today? You weigh a tonne,” Jack asked, trying to lighten the mood, as if everyone in the program weren’t eating enough for three regular, non-lab rat soldiers, and as if the evidence of Gabe’s dinner wasn’t all over the bathroom floor.

  “You shouldn’t have skipped leg day,” Gabriel said. To his credit, he was trying to carry as much of his own weight as he could, but he looked a pale from the effort.

  “Fucking hell, I’m shocked the god damn carpet can even fly with your fat ass on it. Jasmine is the one from Aladdin right? I haven’t seen one of those movies in ages.” They technically had plenty of downtime, but they spent most of it either suffering awful side effects or wired to the point of paranoia, running laps for hours trying to get rid of the anxious energy.

  Still, they should try and have a quiet evening and just watch some films; it would do them both good.

  If the experiments didn’t kill them first.

  Gabriel laughed, before it broke quickly down into awful retching. Jack barely managed to keep Gabriel on his feet as he staggered, bending almost in half. Blood splattered onto the floor. Jack would have tried to convince Gabriel to go to the med bay, if he thought for a second Gabriel would agree, or that the doctors would have better advice than shrugging and telling them to wait it out.

  “Fuck, Jack, it hurts.”

  “I know, sweetheart, I know.” Jack half carried, half dragged Gabriel the last couple of feet to the shower, letting him sink back to the ground once he was under the spray. Gabriel flinched from the water, though it was tepid at worst.

  “Was there blood in your vomit?” Jack asked, concerned at how natural questions like that had become.

  Gabriel shook his head.

  “Just the fever, and vomiting?”

  “I was shivering earlier, even though I wasn’t cold.” He let out a full body shudder. “I’m cold now.”

  Gabriel’s skin was still feverish under Jack’s hands.

  “You’re being a baby, I used to have to take cold showers before school, and it’s not that bad.”

  “Oh yeah, and then you walked uphill both ways?” Gabriel said with a smile though he was still hunching away from the spray.

  There wasn’t enough room in the shower for both of them, but Jack squeezed down next to Gabriel anyway. Their sides were pressed tight together. Normally Jack liked the heat of Gabriel pressing up against him, but now it made him worry. What would happen if he they couldn’t get his temperature down? They’d already lost a couple of others to fevers.

  “Of course, and in the snow, don’t forget about the snow.”

  Gabriel rested his head on Jack’s shoulder. It was hard to tell with the water, but it looked like he might be starting to cry. Jack was almost tempted to join him. He was so fucking tired.

  ���I know you aren’t as much of a farm boy as you pretend to be, Jackie,” Gabriel mumbled, barely audible over the sound of the shower.

  Jack smiled despite himself. “Don’t say that too loud, half of my personality is built of people thinking my best friend growing up was a cow.”

  “Don’t say that about your mother, Morrison.”

  “Oh fuck you, Reyes. I’ll leave your ass in your own bile next time if you don’t stop talking shit.”

  “No, you won’t.”

  Jack turned and pressed a kiss into Gabriel’s hair.

  “No, I won’t.”

  ---

  Their skin was starting to prune by the time Gabriel’s temperature finally dropped down enough that Jack felt safe getting him out of the shower. He carefully washed Gabriel’s hair first, cleaning out the sweat and remains of vomit. Gabriel was mostly silent, but he leant into Jack’s hands.

  They both got awful headaches that had become so standard they barely warranted mentioning. Jack had lost track of the amount of times they had sat one of them with their head in the other’s lap, an amateur head massage the only thing stopping them from going totally crazy.

  Sometimes Jack forgot he’d only known Gabriel a few months; it felt like a lifetime.

  “You think you can sleep?” Jack asked, carefully hauling Gabriel to his feet. Gabriel was standing a little more under his own weight now, but still leant heavily on Jack. They shuffled awkwardly across the wet tiles, careful not to slip.

  Gabriel shock his head, accepting a towel from Jack. “Still hurts,” he grunted, but didn’t elaborate. He didn’t really need to, Jack was all too familiar with the engulfing pain the drugs could bring. It made their blood feel like fire, burning them up from the inside. They couldn’t last much more of this.

  He led Gabriel to the bed anyway, leaving him with the towel across his shoulders while he went to find a clean pair of sweats, dragging an extra set from the drawer for himself. His own abandoned in the bathroom.

  Gabriel was shaking again, tiny little moments across his shoulders and down his arms.

  “Put this on, I’ve seen more than enough of your ass for one day.”

  Gabriel smiled weakly, either too tired to make a comment about how no one could tire of seeing his ass, or spending great restraint to hold the comment back. He took the trousers either way, managing to put them on without the help he had needed to get undressed. He couldn’t keep his hands steady, but Jack pretended not to notice as he dressed himself.

  “Thanks for helping,” Gabriel said, sitting in the far corner of the bed, giving Jack plenty of room to sit down beside him. Somehow they ended up pressed up against each other all the same. “I couldn’t move, or really think, I was just fixated on the idea that this could be hit, ya know, that I could die on the floor of a shitty bathroom, in a shitty army base, and who knows how long it would take them to even find me. Who even knows what they do with our bodies, probably cut us up and do just a couple more tests.”

  “Breathe,” Jack interjected, placing a hand soothingly on the back of Gabriel’s neck.

  Gabriel did was he was told, breathing deeply. “Fuck Jack, I’m so tired of being this scared.”

  “Yeah.” Jack wished he had something clever, or meaningful to say, something to make the situation better.

  “I don’t know if how much longer we’ll last.” Gabriel drew up his knees, staring blankly past Jack’s head.

  “Fuck that, don’t talk like we don’t have a chance.” Staying hopeful was becoming harder each day, but the idea that death was unavoidable was unacceptable.

  “Tommy died this morning.”

  Jack froze.

  “What-”

  “Heart attack.”

  Jack’s hands were trembling.

  “We’re gonna die, Jackie.” Jack opened his mouth to interrupt but Gabriel ploughed on. “I’ve been trying to stay positive, but fuck, there’s four of us left, and I’m out of justifications of why I’m gonna live while everyone else dies.”

  “Justifications?”

  “It’s fucked up, but shit like I was stronger than them, or smarter, like they deserved it, anything to keep myself from accepting there was nothing I could do, because being helpless to this is,” He swallowed, “real fucking depressing.” Gabriel laughed, empty and hollow. “But with Tommy, and Zoe earlier this week, they were better than my sorry ass. If this shit got them, it’s gonna get me. It’s gonna get all of us.”

  “They said they think they are close to stabilising it.” Jack hadn’t really believed it when the doctor had first cheerfully shared this information with him, and it sounded even less believable coming from his mouth. Gabriel certainly seemed unconvinced.

  “I’ll believe it when we stop dropping dead because our bodies either can’t take the strain, or the poison is just a little too lethal.” Gabriel’s eyes were unfocused. “I mean look at us Jackie, my body is freaking the fuck out every other day, and each round of drugs is only making it worse, and you were unconscious for three days after your last shot, and they called that a good sign.”

  Gabriel ran a hand through his hair, hysteria flirting at the edge of his voice.

  “They’re killing us.”

  Jack was crying, he couldn’t help it. He wanted to have faith that they could make it through this, but he was so fucking scared.

  “Jack just, shit, can you just do one thing for me.”

  “Anything.”

  “I’m okay with dying, I really am, this was worth trying if it could have helped in the war, just. Please, I don’t want to die alone.”

  Jack couldn’t help but feel it was an empty comfort, having someone beside him as he died, but he would walk through fire for Gabriel, he could give him this.

  “You won’t.” Jack only hoped he'd be able to keep that promise.

  “You’ll stay?”

  “Course. I’ll be here.”

  Gabriel visibly relaxed. “Thanks.”

  “Not this week though, I have shit planned, so you’re gonna have to put off the whole dying thing for a while, how does six decades from now sound?” He tried desperately to drag the tone back to something lighter.

  “Sure thing, Jack, I’ll try and make sure my death is convenient to you,” Gabriel said drily.

  Jack wanted to kiss him, but pushed down the urge. When they’d both made it out of this hell, he’d kiss the bastard, but right now it felt too much like desperation.

  “Fucking right you will.”

  Gabriel smiled, and it might even have been sincere.

  *******

  When they finally took Reaper down, he didn’t go quietly.

  Ana was dead, for good this time. Reaper had put a round of one his shotguns through her face, splattering gore across the wall behind her, apparently without an ounce of regret. She had managed to stick him with one of her darts, too late to save herself, but enough to slow Reaper down, enough for Jack to unload more shots into him than any living creature should be able to take.

  He still wasn’t dead, still trying to struggle to his feet, even as his limbs turned to smoke around him, and his blood, covered the ground. He was snarling like a cornered animal, reaching desperately for one of his guns, metres out of his reach.

  “Lena, take the others and get out of here, I’ll join you shortly.” It hurt to talk, his voice wrecked from all the shouting he had done.

  “You sure, Jack?” Tracer flittered anxiously around in the corner of his vision. “He’s still dangerous.”

  “I’m sure. Get Winston to a doctor, see how much of his arm they can save. I’ll finish up here.” It was stupid risk to take, after all they had sacrificed to get to this point, but Jack had always been a little stupid when it had come to Gabriel.

  He walked as close as he dared before slipping to the floor, crossing his legs, and placing his gun to the side, but still very much in reach.

  “Gabe?”

  Reaper’s mask was cracked, a chunk of it missing down the left side of his face. There was smoke escaping his mouth and nose as he panted, and leaked from the corner of his eyes. His skin was a pasty grey, stretched too tight across his skull. He looked like he had died some time ago.

  The edges of Reaper’s mouth curled into a snarl, and he abandoned his doomed attempt to reclaim his gun, to making an equally fruitless swipe at Jack. He let out a howl of pain from the effort. Fuck, there was so much blood.

  “Say what you want to say, Morrison,” Reaper rasped.

  Sometimes Jack had been able to look at Reaper, even at his worst, and still see part of Gabriel there, in the way he had stood, or something he had said. Now, curled up on himself, dying but still ready to cause as much damage as he could on the way out, there was nothing recognisable left.

  “I’m not here to say anything.”

  “Nothing to say?” Gabriel laughed, and then choked, coughing blood and smoke up onto the ground. “That’s a first.”

  Jack didn’t say anything, but reached up and unclipped his mask, pulling it from his face and placing it down next to his gun. Without it, his vision in his periphery blurred. He wanted to see Gabriel without technology altering his perception.

  Gabriel tried once again to push himself up, but slammed hard back into the ground, letting out a guttural moan of pain. Jack stayed silent as Gabriel drew steadying breaths.

  “Just here to gloat then? Either put me out of my misery or let me die in peace, Seventy-Six.” Reaper sounded as tired as Jack felt even as he tried to bury it under layers of rage.

  Gabriel’s eyes had been the prettiest brown once, but now there was only the thinnest hint of colour around his eerily big pupils, and the whites bloodshot to hell. Jack might have assumed it was a side effect of dying, but Ana had commented on them when she had seen him without his mask. She had seen many people high on all sort of things, but had said none of it had made anyone’s pupils so large.

  “Will you take your mask off at least?” It was foolish to get emotional, but Jack wasn’t sure how he was meant to do anything else.

  Reaper, surprisingly tried to comply, but his hands were so slick with blood he couldn’t get a grip, hands slipping uselessly off the faceplate. Jack, abandoning any caution he had left, shifted closer.

  Reaper’s hand slammed closed around Jack’s wrist as he reached for the mask, but even without testing it Jack could tell he would easily be able to break free. Still, he allowed Reaper the appearance of control and stilled his hand.

  “What the fuck do you want, Jack?” It would be so easy to reach out and touch the bare skin of Gabriel’s face. They had touched before, since Switzerland, but not without layers of leather between them.

  “I promised I wouldn’t let you die alone.”

  Reaper had already been struggling to hid how much pain he was in, but he the expression on his face suggested that hurt more than any of the bullets Overwatch had put into him. His grip slackened and Jack close his fingers around the remains of Reaper’s faceplate. He wasn’t sure what he was expecting, perhaps some great insight into what had happened to his partner, but instead there was more of the same discoloured skin.

  Reaper looked up at him, teeth bared.

  “You think you can change the fact you killed me, with some promise you made forty years ago?” He looked desperate.

  Jack shook his head. He slumped over a little, tugging Reaper’s closer, so he was across his lap, rather than on the ground. Reaper’s blood soaked through his trousers almost instantly. No normal human should be able to lose this much blood.

  “Fuck you, Jack, all of this is on you, you did this.”

  Jack knew Reaper was just trying to hurt him, some final, desperate attempt to cause just a little more pain.

  It still hurt. It was at least partially true after all. Gabriel and Jack had both been just as responsible in the others’ downfall as their own, but it was hard to say they had both faired as badly when Gabriel was bleeding out and Jack was going to walk away from it all.

  It had always been like that, Jack landing on his feet, while the universe conspired to fuck Gabriel over.

  “It shouldn’t have been like this,” he said at last. He wasn’t willing to apologise, not after everything Gabriel had done, he wasn’t even sure he could admit fault out loud. If this had been Gabriel he might have been able to do both, but to this shell, acknowledging the unfairness of it was the most he could offer.

  Reaper laughed, and the bitter tone made Jack whined. “I hope you suffer for this,” Reaper hissed, “I hope it haunts you.”

  Jack didn’t have anything to say to that.

  “I was going to marry you,” Jack said after a long silence. He wasn’t sure why he was saying this now, knowing it would hurt Reaper as much as it hurt him. “I was going to be with you forever. I figured we’d retire, eventually, and head back down to Cali, get a house or something, a couple of dogs. Shit Gabe, I was going to spend my whole life with you.”

  “Stop.” Reaper said, sounding more like Gabriel than he had in years. Jack ignored him all the same.

  “I loved you.” Jack said softly. “Why did you do this to us, Gabe?”

  Reaper twisted in his grasp, lashing out, clawed gloves slashing across Jack’s face leaving two shallow cuts across Jack’s jaw. Subduing Reaper was easy even as he struggled, and Reaper’s strength abandoned him quickly. He slumped back across Jack, breathing heavily.

  “Fuck you,” he managed between gasps. “I hate you.”

  “I know.” Tears pooled around the edges of Jack’s eyes, blurring his vision even more. Maybe it was better if he couldn’t see, it was easier to pretend the familiar weight in his arms was still Gabriel.

  “Then go, leave me. Don’t make me endure your bullshit now.”

  “I’m not leaving.”

  Reaper laughed again, loud and manic. “You can’t even do this for me. I ask you one fucking thing one my deathbed and you still can’t do it for me. You selfish son-of-a-bitch.”

  “I promised.”

  “I think the situation has changed just a little since then,” Reaper said.

  He wasn’t wrong, and maybe it would be kinder, for both of them, to leave. Jack couldn’t bring himself to move.

  “Say something,” Reaper snarled, he grabbed Jack’s throat, but it was easy to tug Reaper’s fingers away from Jack’s airways, too easy. Reaper’s strength was failing.

  “What do you want me to say?” Jack couldn’t help but push the strands of hair that had fallen across Gabriel’s forehead back. His skin was as cold as it looked.

  “Anything.” Reaper’s chest was heaving, each breathe painful and laboured. “That I did this to myself, that I deserve this, that you hate me, anything.”

  Jack wet his lips. “I don’t think you deserved this.”

  Reaper was staring past him, up at the sky. His hand had slipped down from Jack’s throat and was clutching weakly at the front of his shirt.

  “But you do hate me?”

  “Sometimes.” Jack was too tired to lie anymore; surprising, as he had always been so good at it. A dashing smile and an earnest tone, and no one would doubt a word that came out of his mouth.

  Reaper looked relieved and Jack wished he knew what he had been thinking, wished he had time to ask what he had been thinking since everything had gone to shit.

  “I still loved you at times too, though, but hating you was easier than trying to make sense of how I could love you and fight you at the same time.” He wished there had been some closure for either of them, rather than the trauma of losing him, and then raw pain of getting him back and realising what he had become all in the same moment.

  Reaper’s face twisted into something that might have been a smile. “Yeah.”

  The light was starting to fade, and his eyes weren’t good in the dark. Soon he wouldn’t be able to make out anything more than rough shapes. Reaper’s breath was weakening.

  “I’d still kill you,” Reaper said, “if I could reach my gun, or overpower you. If I could I’d make you die with me.”

  Jack cupped Reaper’s jaw, running his thumb across his cheek.

  “I know.”

  Reaper fell silent, only the rise and fall of his chest indicating he was still alive.

  Eventually, even that ceased.

  Jack pushed Gabriel’s corpse off his lap and collected his gun and mask from the ground. They had prepared for this, and Tracer had left the supplies behind. He poured lighter fluid over the body and lit a match. Reaper’s body went up in flames but he didn’t stay to watch.

  He contemplated collecting Ana’s body, but found he didn’t have the stomach for it. Someone would have to come perform clean up anyway, they could handle it along with the burnt remains of Reaper.

  He was done with this.

[curlsncynefin]

Valentine’s Day Prompts || Hella Accepting

｛ @thekarass. asked: 😳 💃 🏩 Javier and Jackie) 😳 : confess your muse’s love to my muse. 💃 : dance with my muse. 🏩 : book a valentine’s trip away with my muse. ｝

Rounding the corner, ducking under a branch, the redhead stopped short at the mesmerising sight. Nestled in the lush greenery was a small pool of sparkling fresh water, fed by the gradual waterfall of a brook. The water was so clear that it could outdo the crystal champagne glasses that were perched perfectly on the low table where the picnic had been arranged for them, on the banks of the pool.

“Happy Valentine’s Day, Jackie,” whispered her husband. Javier had surprised her with a valentines trip away for the both of them, which was how they had found themselves wandering through the Jamaican tropical vegetation.

Her wonderstruck features brightened as she looked at her companion, and grinned wide. “Oh, this is the best Valentine’s Day gift ever!” She hopped excitedly before hugging her husband, who had once been a dear friend of hers. “Thank you, Javi! Happy Valentine’s Day,” she punctuated it with a big kiss on the cheek.

Giving her hand a gentle tug, the hotel-magnate began to move towards the picnic arrangement that had been made for them. The sun was high in the sky, but the thick forest canopy shielded them from its harsh rays. They always travelled in the lap of luxury, not only because Javier could afford it, but also because he wanted to give the best of everything to the redhead who had stepped in to help him out at a great cost to her own self. Though, Jackie had her suspicions about it, she never questioned him. She was just happy to spend time with the man she had grown very fond of.

The picnic spread was grand. Everything that one could imagine was available, and after the long trek Jackie found herself famished enough to be able to enjoy it to the fullest. The two spent the next few hours laughing and chatting over food and drinks, dipping into the pool for a swim, and even jumping off the short height from where the water cascaded into the pool.

As the couple emerged from the refreshing waters with exhaustion thrumming their limbs with that __ ache, sporting bright smiles on their dripping features, Jackie took the brunet’s hand and pulled him closer. She rested her other hand on his shoulder and said, “Remember the Halloween ball? It was one of my favourite moments spent with you.” The confession was honest and innocent. Nothing suggestive from the seductress who was a pathological flirt with almost everyone she met. With Javier, she was just Jackie; no pretence, no flirtation. With him, she could dare to bare her soul without the fear of judgement.

Slowly, she began to sway them to the imaginary tunes of the song that she was reminiscing about. His hand rested upon her hip and he pulled her a tad closer. Quietly, the couple swayed to the tunes of the babbling brook and the chirping forest. Just the two of them in their little oasis of solitude.

“Jacqueline?” His voice was barely above a whisper, as if he were afraid that if he spoke louder it’d shatter the moment.

Pulling back a slightly — from where her cheek was resting against his — the redhead looked into his eyes with her brows quirked. “Hm?” People close to her usually didn’t take her full given name, so it sort of worried her a little.

He hesitated. The uncertain creases of his brows made Jackie’s heartbeat pick up pace. Taking a deep inhale, he stared deep into her pecan hues, sending shivers down her spine. It was as if he had touched something deep inside her. “I love you.” The words were quiet, but spoken so clearly that there was no mistaking them. Each syllable held such weight that for a moment Jackie felt heavy. Her heart felt as if it weighed tonnes, pressing against her rib cage as it swelled to the point of bursting.

I love you. Words that couples exchanged so frequently, but had never been uttered in their peculiar relationship. I love you. The words that, a few months ago, would have made Jackie turn on her heel and run as far away as possible, without a look back. I love you. The words seemed to echo in the forest despite how softly they were spoken.

It was as if each second was dragging by, pulling her closer to him but at an agonising pace. Though when her lips finally met his, she felt it bolt. A rush coursed through her unlike anything she had ever felt before. Her hands cupped his face, under his ears, fingers wandering through his luscious locks as she held him close. She kissed him with every fibre of her being, pouring all of her hopes, dreams, apprehensions, and joy into his mouth.

Only when she felt like she was almost out of breath did she pull away to whisper against his lips, “I love you too, Javier.”

[chriskarrtravelblog]

2020 Hay Festival goes online

The 2020 Hay Festival has launched a free digital festival, which is online until 31 May. The festival features novelists Hilary Mantel, Anne Enright, Elif Shafak, Roddy Doyle, Margaret Atwood, Ingrid Persaud, Polly Samson, Ali Smith and Jessie Burton; actors and comedians Stephen Fry, Helena Bonham Carter, Dominic West, Sandi Toksvig, Vanessa Redgrave, Benedict Cumberbatch, Helen McCrory and Jonathan Pryce; and many more. 

In honour of our favourite literary festival, we asked a host of speakers and literary lights, “What’s your favourite place to visit in Britain and why?” Here are their responses.

Martin Shaw, author of Courting the Wild Twin (Chelsea Green Publishing, hardback RRP £14.99)

I’m lucky, the place I most love to visit is the place I live, Dartmoor National Park. Dartmoor is amok with 365 square miles of granite tors, swamp, old growth oak forest and staggering views right out over to the grey teeth of the sea near Teignmouth. Be warned, it’s prone to mood swings, and the petrol gauge has a nasty habit of hitting empty at dusk. It has proper, unbridled spook. There’s a pub (the Warren Inn) whose fire hasn’t gone out since the 19th Century, and contains beer as dark and chewy as the inevitable storm overhead. 

Brigit Strawbridge-Howard, author of Dancing with Bees (Chelsea Green Publishing, paperback RRP £10.99)

I fell in love with Northumberland on a school field trip, when I was just 13 years old. From the youth hostel in Wooler (still there today), we walked and picnicked in the Cheviots, travelled by boat to the Inner Farnes, and spent a glorious sunny afternoon exploring the Holy Island of Lindisfarne. I have returned since with my husband, my children and my grandchildren, and loved each and every visit. Northumberland has everything: history, walls, puffins, hares, romance, vast empty beaches and skies, castles, hills, rivers, rocks, and wild open spaces where you can breathe, and feel fully and completely alive. Definitely my favourite place in Britain to visit!

Lara Maiklem, author of Mudlarking (Bloomsbury, paperback RRP £9.99)

My favourite place to visit is a village on the Kent coast called St Margaret’s-at-Cliffe. It was my escape from London for years, I wrote part of my book here, and I have good memories of it. There is a small pebbly beach, which is perfect for seaweed collecting and pebble hunting, and a pub with views over the Channel to France, which is tantalisingly close. The walk from St Margaret’s Bay, over the white cliffs to Dover, is dramatic and moving. It is the front door of the nation, so as well as a sense of end there is also a feeling of welcome and beginning. 

David Abulafia, author of The Boundless Sea (Allen Lane, hardback RRP £35)

Credit: Marit Hommedal/SCANPIX

I live in (and prefer) Cambridge, so to say that my favourite place to visit is Oxford might sound like a predictable answer.  But it is the difference between the cities rather than their similarity that draws me to Oxford. The palatial grandeur of Radcliffe Square and the nearby colleges and libraries is not matched in Cambridge; nor does Cambridge make nearly as much use of the honey-coloured stone that is one of Oxford’s glories. And North Oxford, with its massive villas, parks and riverside walks, is a different and delightful world away from the crowds.

Miranda Krestovnikoff, author of The Sea (Bloomsbury Children’s, hardback RRP £12.99)

I love the island of Skomer, especially in May where it is washed with indigo as the bluebells emerge.  This is also the season to see the puffins – characterful birds with rainbow-coloured beaks, who always seem to be in a hurry. They nest in old rabbit burrows, the same pair nesting in each burrow year after year. Standing in amongst them, you are surrounded by wheeling birds coming in to feed their newly hatched chicks or pufflings, closely followed by marauding black-backed gulls looking for an easy meal.  At night, the nocturnal Manx shearwaters return to the island – tens of thousands of them. Poorly adapted to life on land, they land clumsily before waddling to the safety of their burrows. The sights and sounds of such huge numbers of these and many other seabirds is a real wildlife spectacle.

Jackie Morris, author of The Unbinding (Unbound, coming soon)

Credit: Davina Jelle

Two places draw my heart back. Both revolve around bookshops. 

The first is Dulverton in Somerset, tucked into steep wooded valleys, where the trees colour the land, bird filled and raucous with rooks. Number Seven is the smallest of shops but so filled with beauty, it’s a real haven.

The second is Grasmere, where I swam in the lake that mirrored the hills. Where a heron in flight almost touched wing tips to fingers. Where I sat beneath a beech tree drinking lavender tea in Faeryland, talking of swans. Where Sam Read books has shelves filled with wonder.

Oliver Bullough, author of Moneyland (Profile Books, paperback RRP £9.99)

I love wild bits of the British coastline, whether that’s northern Norfolk and the seals of Blakeney Point, or Jura and the crazed waters of the Corryvreckan, or the fossil beaches of Robin Hood’s Bay. For me, the best of the lot is the coastline of northern Pembrokeshire and Ceredigion, from Strumble Head, past the Teifi Estuary (with lunch at the market in St Dogmaels), on to Mwnt – with its gem of a chapel, and its tiny beach – and along to Penbryn beach. It’s as good as Cornwall, with a fraction of the crowds. 

Stephen Moss, author of The Accidental Countryside (Guardian Faber Publishing, hardback RRP £16.99)

I just need to pop down the road from my Somerset home, to the Avalon Marshes. These former peat diggings, within sight of Glastonbury Tor, have been restored as nature reserves, and are now one of the best places in Britain for birds. In winter, they are home to the famous starling murmuration, and watching these huge flocks as they form patterns against the setting sun is simply unforgettable. In spring and summer, the marshes echo to the sound of warblers, newly returned from their African winter-quarters, while great white and cattle egrets, and the secretive bittern, feed amongst the reeds and pools. 

Gavin Francis, author of Island Dreams (Canongate, hardback RRP £20)

As a boy my holidays would be to campsites of Fife’s coast; at night, as I drifted off to sleep, I’d watch the lighthouse on the May Island and dream of reaching it. In the Middle Ages its chapel was a place of pilgrimage; the whole island is now a National Nature Reserve and home to thousands of puffins, auks and gulls. In my twenties, finally, I went there as a volunteer nature warden, and the beauty and tranquillity of those weeks, the simplicity and the satisfactions of living and working there, have been a touchstone for me ever since. 

Joseph Coehlo, poet and author of Poems Aloud (Wide Eyed Editions, hardback RRP £12.99)

I’m a huge fan of antique shops and Rye has a tonne of them, I believe around 50 odd. So Rye is perfect for exploring and getting lost and perhaps finding some treasure, or at the very least some lovely tea and cakes. Nearby Winchelsea is also very much worth a visit for the Parish of Winchelsea and its associated ruins. When you’re done with the ruins and antique shops and had tea and cake, the sea isn’t too far away for a paddle. 

Mark Haddon, author of The Porpoise (Vintage, paperback RRP £8.99)

Very possibly the Pembrokeshire coastal path from Tenby to Abereiddy or thereabouts, excluding the Milford Haven oil refinery but very much including Skomer and Ramsay Islands. Running sections of it, early on a clear winter morning before everyone else is up and about is a particularly glorious thing to do. Sometimes, if I’m feeling cabined and confined, I will walk a section on Google Street View and even that makes my heart lift and swell.

Jenny Valentine, author of Hello Now (HarperCollins Publishers, paperback RRP £7.99)

I live in the landscape of the Black Mountains in Wales, rich and green, full of light and open spaces, so my favourite place to visit in the UK, for contrast, is my old home, London.  I miss crowds and strangers and movement and Art and noise and restaurants and traffic and Film and conversation and histories on that kind of scale. I love the pace of it, the flow and mess and heart and guts. From Hackney to Southbank to Hampstead Heath, as a guest in the city there is always something to see, something to learn, something to get involved in.

Allie Esiri, author of Shakespeare for Every Day of the Year (Pan Macmillan, hardback RRP £18.99)

If you have never been, you may know the north coast of Cornwall as the backdrop to Poldark moodily riding his horse across the cliff tops. The area is protected by the National Trust and is largely uninhabited save for the odd flock of handsome sheep. If you take a boat out you can see the old smugglers’ coves where pirates – as the storylines of Poldark often plundered – used to smuggle in their illicit loot. I love the cliffs, the coves and the beaches and you have to stop me quoting from Kipling’s poem, ‘A Smuggler’s Song’. 

If you wake at midnight, and hear a horse’s feet,

Don’t go drawing back the blind, or looking in the street,

Them that asks no questions they isn’t told a lie.

Watch the wall, my darling, while the Gentlemen go by!

Five-and-twenty ponies, trotting through the dark—

With brandy for the Parson and ‘baccy for the Clerk.

Laces for a lady and letters for a spy,

And watch the wall, my darling, while the Gentlemen go by!

Running round the woodlump if you chance to find

Little barrels, roped and tarred, all full of brandy-wine;

Don’t you shout to come and look, nor use ’em for your play;

Put the brushwood back again,—and they’ll be gone next day!

If you see the stable-door setting open wide;

If you see a tired horse lying down inside;

If your mother mends a coat cut about and tore;

If the lining’s wet and warm—don’t you ask no more!

If you meet King George’s men, dressed in blue and red,

You be careful what you say, and mindful what is said.

If they call you “pretty maid”, and chuck you ‘neath the chin,

Don’t you tell where no one is, nor yet where no one’s been!

Knocks and footsteps round the house—whistles after dark—

You’ve no call for running out until the house-dogs bark.

Trusty’s here, and Pincher’s here, and see how dumb they lie—

They don’t fret to follow when the Gentlemen go by!

If you do as you’ve been told, likely there’s a chance

You’ll be give a dainty doll, all the way from France,

With a cap of Valenciennes, and a velvet hood—

A present from the Gentlemen, along o’ being good!

Five-and-twenty ponies, trotting through the dark—

Brandy for the Parson, ‘baccy for the Clerk.

Them that asks no questions isn’t told a lie—

So watch the wall, my darling, while the Gentlemen go by!

  Explore highlights from past editions at hayfestival.org/hayplayer

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