#Like someone said I was brilliant and someone else told me to safe and someone else wished me good health like you guys are too sweet

[steveshairychest]

Let's pretend that the upside down doesn't exist for a second.

Eddie still befriends Mike, Dustin and Lucas at school, but he doesn't meet anyone else. He knows of Steve Harrington, knows that he used to rule the halls of Hawkins High but, despite Dustin's constant begging for Eddie to meet him, he never really does.

Sure, Steve waved at Eddie whenever he dropped the kids off at hellfire and he offered to change Eddie's flat tire once, but that's it. After Eddie graduated, their paths never really crossed again.

Not until years later when they're both older and wiser and a little bit drunk in a bar far from the prying eyes of Hawkins.

Eddie bumps into a tall woman at the bar and the countless apologies he had ready instantly died on his tongue when she turned around and gave Eddie a dazzling smile. "Hi, Eddie. Didn't think I'd run into you here." She says with a light laugh. She has a really pretty laugh, and smile, and eyes and her hair looks so soft.

It takes Eddie's brain three business days to reconnect and realise that this gorgeous woman knows his name. He hadn't introduced himself, and yet she is smiling down at him like they're old friends.

"I'm sorry, have we met?" He waves over the bartender and orders himself and the mystery girl a drink.

She thanks Eddie for the drink and leans in closer to be heard over the music. "We went to high school together but I've, uh, definitely changed since then." She laughs and it's clear there's some joke he's not getting but he laughs anyways. He doesn't want her to walk away. He needs to know everything about her and he's trying so hard to remember everyone he went to high school with.

"Did we really go to school together? I think I would remember someone as gorgeous as you." He reaches up and tucks a strand of hair behind her ear so that he can see her face properly. Her cheeks flush a brilliant shade of red, and she steps closer to him. "What's your name?"

"Stevie." She says softly, her voice a little shaky. "Harrington. My name is Stevie Harrington."

Eddie furrows his brows and takes a step back to really take her in. "I didn't know Steve had a sister."

Stevie throws her head back and laughs, it's a gorgeous sound. Eddie's scared he's fucked up by not remembering that Steve had a sister but then she meets his eyes and there's something there that feels oddly familiar.

"I don't have a sister, Eddie." She says and takes a sip of her drink, her eyes watching over the rim of the glass for Eddie's reaction.

"What -" And then everything finally clicks in his alcohol clouded mind. "Oh. Oh."

He can see it now, he can see that the ghost of someone he hardly knew clings to parts of her; the moles, the pouty lips, the kind hazel eyes. They are all features he used to find himself staring at during school, features he can’t stop staring at now.

"Is that a good oh?" She asks quietly, her hand fiddling with her bracelet nervously.

Eddie motions the bartender for another round of drinks and moves closer to Stevie, a gentle smile pulling at his lips as he says, "Definitely a good oh. I was actually, uh, Edwina before I was Eddie." He pulls his leather jacket aside to point at his bare chest underneath, at his top surgery scars. Stevie's mouth forms a soft 'oh', and the tension in her body leaves as she realises that she's safe, she's with someone like her, someone who understands.

He's never told anyone his dead name before, but he could see the fear in Stevie's eyes, fear that she'd said too much to the wrong person.

All that fear is gone now as she smiles, really smiles, down at him.

There's an excited energy radiating off her as she takes another sip from her drink and bumps her shoulder with Eddie's. "I'm glad you bumped into me tonight." She admits.

"Me, too." Eddie beams up at her, her heels making her tower over him, and he's honestly never been happier.

He hopes that this time, they can maybe be more than just acquaintances.

Maybe even more than friends.

[ak4e7a]

sweet disposition – psh

notes: high school au, slice of life, scifi, jay lives to torment sunghoon, angst, hurt, comfort, i learned quantum mechanics to write this, also the first draft of this got me into grad school so #slay i guess

wc: 10.7k

cw: mentions of violence, SA, su1c1de attempt (not actually, it's a metaphor), parent trauma

trailer: you were always stuck in your ways. what happens when you decide to change out of love for someone else?

starring: park sunghoon, lee heeseung, park jongseong, sim jaeyun, and aespa karina (yu jimin)

₊˚ ‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿୨୧ · · ♡ · · ୨୧‿︵‿︵‿︵‿︵‿˚₊

“just desserts” arc — episodes 1-4

You never liked your name. You thought it didn’t suit you. 

After all, it was supposed to mean something like “sound of the heavens”, and you hadn’t spoken in three years. It wasn’t like you were mute or anything. You just didn’t have anything to say to anyone. Like, ever.

Yu Jimin was the closest thing you had to a friend, often acting as a translator between you and the rest of your classmates. You got along well with Jimin because most things she asked would be in the form of a yes or no question, and if she wanted more, it only took one look into your eyes to get an elaborate answer. And you were glad Jimin wasn’t pushy when it came to the subject of your intentional silence.

“I heard they’re playing ‘Silent Penalty’ next week! Those boys are crazy, don’t you think so? Especially Jaeyun and Jongseong,” Jimin cried, clutching her textbooks to her chest with her free arm. You were on your way to your family's cafe, where you worked part-time—Jimin as a waitress, you in the kitchen (where you wouldn’t be bothered).

The month of April tinted the otherwise muted color palette of the outskirts of Shibuya in blushed hues. You always walked home together; the stories of the Hello Kitty murder and the Setagaya Family and the Junko Furuta case so deeply ingrained into their memories that neither of you would allow the other to go anywhere alone. You and Jimin even carried dainty pocket knives in their bags; these were mostly used to open boxes at work or cut slits into the packaging of snacks from the convenience store by your school. But it never hurt to be too safe, especially as teenage girls in a big city.

You nodded, the wind blowing through your high ponytail, tousling several strands out of place. Sometimes you took pity on your friend, wishing you could be better company to the girl who had not left your side since you first moved to Shibuya. You often wondered if you should just tell Jimin how much you appreciated her, and how you wouldn’t leave her unless Jimin explicitly told you to do so. 

Tamago to chikai wa kudake-yasui, you thought to yourself as you continued to walk hand-in-hand. Why not just show her?

It wasn’t like you were a “bad” friend. You often helped Jimin with homework (you did it for her) and you were the one who taught her how to ride a bike. You prepared the best bentos, often shaping the onigiri to resemble the cats from Sailor Moon, and always brought an extra fruit jelly stick for Jimin, who would never fail to still be hungry after lunch.

You wondered if that was enough for Jimin. You supposed it was, since Jimin had never once complained… at least, to your face. But you also wondered how long that would last.

“But, I mean, their leader… he’s kinda cute,” Jimin trailed off. The boy in question was Heeseung, the quiet half of the Fox Club twins. Said “club” was known around Kokusai High School as a sometimes-rowdy, always-mischievous gang, whose members were all brilliant in their own right. “And I heard they’re looking for new members! We should try joining them! Even though… even though we’d be the only girls.”

You exhaled sharply, forcefully — your way of laughing with as little effort as possible. Sometimes, if you felt up to it, you would even treat Jimin to a smile. You followed the pebble you’d been kicking since you left Kokusai before stopping to pick it up and rub it clean with the hem of your sweater. Then you handed the polished stone to Jimin, who took it happily, saying she’d add it to her jar at home.

“I think joining them would be a good idea, even if we’d be the only girls… Maybe they’ll find a way to get you to talk again,” Jimin mumbled as you walked ahead of her. 

Sometimes, you mused, Jimin would say things and forget that you weren’t deaf, just quiet. Extremely, deafeningly quiet.

“Oh! Did you see that new experiment on TV last night?” Jimin asked, catching up to you. “The one about the snails getting their memories erased.”

You raised your eyebrows, and Jimin continued recounting the details from the news report she watched with her dad.

“I bet they taste gross. Don’t know why people have tried eating them. But you could probably find some way to fix that, huh?” she chirped, opening the back door of the cafe. “Since you’re so good at cooking.

You looked up, turning to Jimin with a playful gleam dancing along the outer corners of your normally blunted affect. You shrugged, as if to say, maybe, but it’s anyone’s guess, and helped Jimin tie her pink apron up.

It was a slow afternoon, the usual customers trickling in one at a time like the dregs of a coffee machine after it’s finished brewing. You noticed that Jimin was especially chatty at the register today, and sighed to yourself as you refilled the almond flour jar slower than your grandmother would have liked. How you wished you could join in the conversation.

It was a shame you were still convinced they’d hear you, but no one would truly listen.

When you finished every random task you could think of doing, you peeked out of the little window between the kitchen and the front counter. Its position was perfect for you to watch the television above the customers’ seating area without being caught by whoever happened to be working the cashier shift.

The program on the television that afternoon was a replay of Yuzuru Hanyu’s record-breaking short routine in figure skating at the 2014 Olympic Games in Sochi, Russia. Yuzuru had since become one of Japan’s permanent darlings, on and off the ice.

You frowned. That could have been you, had you not torn your right Achilles tendon right before high school started; had you not disappointed your entire family in front of a national audience; had you not landed on your ankle on purpose, because you didn’t know how else to tell your mother that your coach had been touching you in the locker room ever since you put your first pair of skates on. It’s not like your mother would have believed you. She was dating him, after all.

Maybe you would have been an Olympian had you not done any of those things, because no one gave medals out for lying and saying everything was fine.

“Y/N-ie,” Jimin called. “Where’s the milk bread?”

There was no answer, but that was a given. Jimin turned around to find your attention fixed to the television, eyes following Yuzuru’s every movement. If you still spoke, you would have been excitedly calling out each triple Axel and Lutz jump as you saw them.

But no sound came out of you, aside from the slow, deep breaths you took.

Jimin immediately grabbed the remote and changed the channel.

You snapped out of your maladaptive daydreaming, picturing yourself on that podium, and went back into the kitchen without any hesitation, and the milk bread was out of the oven several minutes later.

“Hello!” Jimin said. That was odd, you thought. You were about to close for the night. Usually, in the time you’d been working there, this part of your shift went interrupted.

“Oh… Is halmeoni not here?” went the soft, low voice.

Why are they looking for Grandma?

“No, not today. She hasn’t been feeling well lately. Can I get you anything?”

You crept toward the little window again, peeking behind the vase of lavender flowers that sat on the left side of the shelf that ran along the bottom. You recognized the person speaking. He was wearing the Kosukai boys’ uniform: navy blue blazer, a white shirt, burgundy and mauve necktie, and navy trousers. He was quite tall, with full, messy, dark-brown-almost-black hair parted down the middle, framing his tired, upturned eyes.

He was one of the Fox boys—but not one of high ranking, to your knowledge.

“Oh… um…”

“I’ll give you a moment to decide what you want. Pardon me,” Jimin said sweetly, before walking into the kitchen. The sound of the door swinging open startled you, causing you to nearly knock an open sack of flour over. You ducked down under the window before the boy could spot you. Jimin laughed. “What are you doing? Are you spying?” 

Pause. 

“Do you know who he is?”

No, said your pursed lips. You grabbed a sheet of scrap paper and a pen from the pocket of your frilly black apron and scrawled something down quickly. Jimin took it from you. 

I think that’s the boy Grandma told me about. The one she gives the unsold pastries to at the end of the day.

Jimin giggled. “Oh, no shit. He’s cute! But not as cute as Heeseung.”

You rolled your eyes at a specific tempo that Jimin perfectly recognized to mean shut up, he can probably hear you.

“Well, I’ll clean up here. You go give him the bread.” 

And with that, she pushed you through the swinging door as if she were moving a stack of heavy crates.

It was times like these that you wished she still had the will to speak, so that you could scream at your friend in disbelief. Jimin sometimes liked to take advantage of the fact that you would only physically protest if she thought it was worth fighting about. 

Your eyes softened when you looked at the boy, whose complexion had suddenly tinted the color of pickled plums. It was an uncanny look for someone who was seemingly so reserved and collected, from the times you’d seen him in passing.

“Oh. you ’re the granddaughter, right? Y/N? you ’re in class 3-A, right?” he said, his hands behind his back as he bowed. You nodded.

“I’m in 3-B… So it’s true, huh?” 

Pause. 

“You don’t talk?” 

Another nod.

“You can call me Sunghoon. Nice to meet you,” he said, to which he received a decidedly polite nod. “Oh, yeah. I forgot. I guess you can call me that in your head. Are you the one who does all the baking? If you are, it’s really good.”

You smiled like your muscles weren’t used to the strain before heading to the display case, a brown paper bag in hand. You slid the metal door open and used a pair of tongs to transfer the baked goods into the bag, deftly maneuvering each piece so as to not crush anything. You tied the bag closed with a piece of white ribbon and handed it to him, not allowing yourself to linger on how his cheeks had not let up on their rosy hue.

Sunghoon offered to walk you and Jimin home, out of politeness (and genuine concern for your safety, he said). Jimin accepted before you could even so much as blink a strong no, thanks, and so he waited as the two of you finished closing the cafe before heading in the direction of your apartment building. You tried your best not to panic. Being around the opposite sex was not high up on your very short list of favorite situations.

“I’ve never had a conversation so one-sided and yet only mildly uncomfortable,” Sunghoon said, having since regaled you with some of the more tame stories about the Fox Club. He told you about the time the twins came to school dressed in the girls’ uniforms, when he and three other boys (Park Jonseong, Yang Jungwon, and Nishimura Riki) got into a fight on the train after catching someone nonconsensually taking an upskirt picture, and the famous incident in which more than half of the Foxes ended up in the swimming pool, still fully clothed. “Y/N could hate me for all I know.”

You scowled. He adjusted the strap of your bookbag on his shoulder, clearing his throat. “No, wait, that’s not what you think it means. I meant that because you don’t say anything, you can spend more time judging me.”

You gave him a variation of the same exhaled laugh you only reserved for Jimin, shaking your head. You could already tell Sunghoon was kind by the way he walked on the side closest to the road, and never pushed you to speak the way others tended to do.

“You aren’t?”

I am, but I don’t think poorly of you. It’s the opposite, really.

Jimin chuckled. “She has other things to do besides complain. Like be my best friend. Right, Y/N?”

You nodded.

Of course. you’re pretty much all I have left, and that makes me more pathetic than ever.

—

The next Friday, you took the challenger’s seat at the Fox Den’s lunch table, on an otherwise bleak, foggy afternoon.

The entire cafeteria was in shock. The aforementioned seat was more of a symbolic gesture than anything; the Foxes rarely, if ever, gained new members because of how rough their games could get. The reward, however, was respect, notoriety, and the unyielding loyalty of seven teenage boys.

“Alright, hold on,” Jaeyun, the outgoing one of the twins and de-facto second in command, interrupted as the other boys cheered and swooned over you. He ran a hand through his dyed pastel pink hair cooly, eyeing you in front of him; your posture indicated that you were not scared in the slightest. 

You were everyone’s hallway crush, despite your cold exterior and refusal to even consider any confessions of their affection. Not one day could go by without you hearing usually-innocent comments about how pretty you were, garnering comparisons to different shoujo protagonists.

And to exacerbate those remarks, that week, you’d heard the boys giving Sunghoon shit after finding out he walked you and Jimin home; it was all they talked about in their free time since Monday morning, bombarding him with questions about what your voice sounded like and if there were really scars on your ankle and how you smelled. 

Everyone froze, waiting for the next words. Jaeyun looked at you as if you were a particularly difficult sudoku puzzle. “You sure you want to do this? I won’t go easy on you just because you’re a girl.”

You nodded metronomically.

Jimin cried out a sharp “No!” before covering her mouth in what you thought was a mix of devastation and realization, tears pooling in her eyes like spring dewdrops on blades of grass. When her eyes locked with yours, the universe was put on hold for a moment. You wished you could hold her hand and say it out loud.

I’m doing this for you.

Beside Jaeyun, Park  Jongseong, another one of your fellow third-years, brandished two long needles, previously wrapped in his white handkerchief. He towered in front of you like the Tokyo Skytree, his long black hair covering one eye, the other glinting playfully under the fluorescent lights of the cafeteria. He’d abandoned his blazer over the back of the empty chair in front of her, the sleeves of his white shirt rolled up, exposing the prominent veins along his inner forearms. “Who’s going today?”

“I’ll do it,” Sunghoon said over the voices of the other club members, easing his way through the slowly-growing crowd of students. “Let’s make it quick.”

“Who has the stuff?” Jongseong asked, spraying something onto the needles that made the club’s seating area instantly smell like a hospital. You grimaced only for a second, pushing back the memories of being in the emergency room.

There was an exchange between two closed fists, and before any more objections, Heeseung was announcing the rules to Silent Penalty, tossing a pair of dice in the air as he spoke.

“A roll of eight means you take a penalty mission. If both parties have eight at the end of the same round, both will face penalty. We’ll do two penalties. Keep a straight face through both, and you win. Back out, and you forfeit the whole game. Consequences will be decided later on.” He shot a glance at Y/N. “If you win, you will be the first girl in the club. Do you accept?”

You shook your head slowly. The boys whispered furiously behind you. You pointed at Jimin.

“Oh… She means that I get to come, too,” Jimin piped up, half-hidden behind Yang Jungwon’s broad back.

The dark-haired twin snickered. “Fine. That doesn’t bother me. Anyone against it? No? Then let’s start. Good luck, Y/N. Sunghoonie is our best Penalty player.”

“I wouldn’t say ‘best’,” Jongseong argued. “Luckiest, sure.”

Round one: you , 7; Sunghoon, 4.

Round two: you , 9; Sunghoon, 7.

Round three: you , 5; Sunghoon, 11.

“Shit, Seung,” Jongseong murmured to Heeseung as they stood behind Sunghoon. “Maybe you should have picked a different penalty number.”

Heeseung grinned, patting his friend on the back with a heavy hand. “It’s a thirteen-point-eighty-nine percent chance of rolling an eight. Not zero. Just be patient.”

Tensions mounted in the tenth round, but neither Sunghoon nor you were fazed. Not even when both of you rolled your first eight.

Jaeyun clapped, earning him a glare from his twin brother. “Oh, finally.”

“First penalty,” Heeseung announced, nudging Jaeyun aside. “Jongseong, the needles, please.”

Jimin gasped. “No, wait, what are you doing?”

“Ear piercings,” Jongseong answered with a grin as he began to sanitize two silver studs in his handkerchief. With his free hand, he held Jimin firmly in her spot by the cuff of her blazer. “Don’t worry, Heeseung is good at it.” Still clutching her, he used their joined hands to point to his right ear, a diamond earring in the center of his lobe. “Got this one last year.”

“Ready?” Heeseung asked, taking the alcohol-soaked handkerchief from Jongseong, hands already gloved up.

Everyone watched in silence as Sunghoon allowed Heeseung to confidently push the needle into his cartilage. Sunghoon blinked once, twice, then licked his lips all while the earring was inserted and the backing locked into place.

Taking the other needle, Heeseung sauntered over to you. You looked at him before turning to Sunghoon, brushing your hair away from your face.

“You already have a piercing,” he frowned, gingerly pinching your right ear between his pointer finger and thumb. “I’ll just pick another spot… is this okay?”

You nodded, feeling him graze over the protrusion covering the opening of your ear. You inhaled what could have been construed as the last breath of a dying woman, then exhaled as Heeseung pushed the needle through the thick cartilage of her tragus. He screwed the earring into place, smirking.

“Brave girl.” He turned to his brother. “Did she flinch?”

“Didn’t even blink,” Jaeyun praised. “Fucking sick.”

Sunghoon bit his lip, taking the dice out of your cold hand.

Round fifteen: you , 8; Sunghoon, 8.

“Damn, again?” Jongseong remarked. “That’s either very lucky or very unlucky.”

“The special lunch, Sunghoon,” Heeseung commanded. The boy ducked under the table to retrieve a bento box, blowing his bangs out of his face as he came back up. He looked like he was going to throw up. You thought the pain in his ear couldn’t have been that bad for him.

“Do we have to?” he asked. “Can’t we do something else?”

You answered on Heeseung’s behalf, leaning forward, propping your chin up with your hand, elbow resting on the tabletop as you looked into his eyes. Whatever it is, let’s just get it over with. Unless you’re too scared.

“No.” Jaeyun opened the box, revealing two snails and a small clear container filled with white crystalline grains. Sugar, you hoped, although it was most likely salt. “Here. We’re running out of time.”

You each reached for a snail, Sunghoon opting for the larger of the two.

“Wait,” Heeseung ordered, eyes narrowing to the point where he resembled the nickname he was often called—snake. You and Sunghoon waited, still clutching their own snails. “Sunghoonie, give yours to Y/N. She’s the challenger, not you.”

You resisted the urge to squirm as you felt a jolt run up your arm, like you’d accidentally touched the prongs of a plug that was halfway out of an electrical socket.

Sunghoon scowled. “This isn’t going to be pretty, regardless.”

Amane put her free hand over his, with an expression she hoped he would understand as  don’t worry, it’ll be fine, and they switched snails.

“Put some sugar and eat it,” Jaeyun chimed in.

Amane let go of his hand as he glared at the shock of pink hair sticking out in the crowd. “The shells, too?” he drawled.

“Don’t be a smartass, Hoon,” Jongseong laughed.

It was slimy and bitter, even with the sugar. You kept your focus on Sunghoon as your lips wrapped around the opening of the shell, sucking on the body until it slid into your mouth. you r first mistake was chewing, the snail guts oozing onto your palate. you r vision blackened around the edges, and in the span of several milliseconds the Sunghoon that sat in front of you was replaced by the image of a younger boy, with the same dark black-brown hair and dark eyes, albeit thinner, almost haggard-looking.

All you could do while you were frozen in place was swallow, watching the boy as he was pushed out of the front door of an unfamiliar house by someone who could have only been his father, a silver second-place trophy thrown after him. It clattered to the ground, smashing into several pieces that the boy gathered up into the hem of his black sweater. He ran through the old, worn-down neighborhood until he reached another apartment, knocking on the glossy red door until a dark-haired woman with glasses answered, letting the crying boy inside.

You felt the unwelcome but familiar sinking feeling of parental disappointment gather in the pit of your stomach, its endless tentacles swirling and wrapping themselves around the chunks of snail entrails that slid down your esophagus.

You guessed that Sunghoon was experiencing something similar, which meant that he saw the memory of a young girl gliding across a sheet of ice in a skintight jeweled red leotard and matching skirt with all the elegance and grace of a koi fish in water. Out of the corner of the girl’s periphery, a group of people gathered at a section of the plexiglass that framed the entire ice rink; one man smiled, and he saw you skate into a jump before landing with a resounding crack that caused every spectator in the stadium to get on their feet for a closer look.

He would have then seen that man run onto the ice and pick you up, cradling you too close to his body even if he were your father. His hands were in the wrong places, and Sunghoon would have to have wondered why no one was saying anything. Perhaps their focus was all on the blood that began to seep through your nude-colored tights.

“Congratulations, Y/N,” went one of the twins—your focus was too far elsewhere to distinguish or care about who it was. “Welcome to the Fox Club.” 

You ran out of the school building as soon as the dismissal bell rang, Jimin and Sunghoon calling out after you.

— 

“Umiushi,” Sunghoon said, pointing to the creatures at the bottom of the metal basin. You were in the kitchen of the apartment he shared with his aunt, who just so happened to be a marine biologist studying these so-called “memory snails”. “That’s what we ate. But it’s a special type. Jimin said she told you about them.”

You watched the sea snails in a curious disgust, afraid that they would somehow leap out of the water and down your throat. You nodded to affirm him.

“Yeah. Basically, they have some sort of molecule that can be blocked so that their memories can be blocked, too. There’s not much else we know about them… and I asked Aunt Mina—don’t worry, I didn’t tell her what I saw or anything, it was a hypothetical question—I asked her if it’s possible to transfer memories, and she said it’s impossible right now. Something like that would be magic.”

You grimaced. Magic was for children.  

It had been two months since that Friday afternoon that changed everything. Since that day, Sunghoon had followed you home, knowing full well what you’d seen from the snail he’d first touched, the one you ended up eating. He told you how his Aunt Mina took him in after his father disowned him for losing the chess tournament, and how they hadn’t spoken since. 

The next morning, you showed up at their house and handed him an origami crane with Why the bread, then? scrawled inside.

Sunghoon explained to you that he was saving all his pocket money to one day pay for a chess “tutor” to whip him into shape, so he could win enough matches for him to go home—the promise his father had made to him the last time they’d spoken, almost a decade ago. You appreciated the honesty of a mere acquaintance so much so that you returned to school after that weekend with a photocopy of several diary entries that pertained to the memory he’d intercepted.

Inside, you confirmed his suspicions. The man was your coach, and, incidentally, your mother’s boyfriend. No one believed what was going on, and your furious mother sent you to live with your estranged father’s mother in Shibuya. It was almost five hours away from Sendai, where you had grown up and trained with one of Japan’s future Olympic figure skaters, Yuzuru himself. Before the incident, it was pretty much guaranteed that you would reach that level, too, since everyone said you were blessed by the gods with such talent. But as your mother said, it was you who ruined everything. Not the gods, not the universe, not fate.

You stopped speaking, Sunghoon learned in your handwriting, because you felt as though no one would listen if you did. You said it was easier that way, less effort on your part. It was harder for you to make promises that you didn’t even want to consider keeping. It forced people to be direct, otherwise they’d get nowhere with you. You didn’t like talking, anyway. It was worth less than acting upon things.

The final page of the diary entries was a single line, a proverb you lived by. 

Tamago to chikai wa kudake-yasui.

Eggs and vows are easily broken.

— 

You stood on the rooftop, the frigid night air whipping your cheeks the color of the sakura trees below. You and Sunghoon had snuck to the top of one of the Tokyo skyscrapers way past midnight, on a whim. Now, as one of the Foxes, you would agree that life was a bit more fun with some trouble.

You were more than happy Jimin had finally confessed her feelings to Heeseung, and he’d reciprocated, even if it meant you and your best friend spent less time alone together. While Sunghoon could never take Jimin’s place exactly, he fit into your life just fine. Maybe it was because you made space for him to be there.

He loved fruit jelly sticks just as much as Jimin, so you started bringing an extra one for him as well. You noticed that when he took the leftovers from your grandmother’s cafe, the taiyaki in the bag excited him the most. He told you that they were called something else back home in Korea, but he thought yours tasted better. After that, you would always “accidentally” make too many, and give him the rest when you thought no one was looking. You once found him in the library playing chess against himself, and the next day you sat in front of him and played until the lunch bell rang, having learned the rules the night before.

You found out Sunghoon spoke the same language as you. Acts of service. He carried around a pack of Salonpas because you were prone to muscle cramps and the occasional shooting pain in your ankle. you ’d always blush and look away when he’d hand you a clip to keep your hair out of your face, ignoring how his fingers lingered on yours just a split second too long to be platonic. When the boys would tease the two of you about being constantly together, you would text your snarky comeback to Sunghoon, and he would say it out loud for you. And everyone would laugh.

You truly were practically inseparable, though. You couldn’t bring yourself to shut him out, not when he’d already seen what you considered to be the worst part of you and why you were the way you were, and still chosen to think the best of you. On Friday nights, when Jimin and Heeseung were out on yet another city expedition, the two of you would sit on the plastic-covered couch in your grandmother’s living room and watch Yuri On Ice, the anime about a competitive figure skater’s return to the sport. And Sunghoon wouldn’t make you feel embarrassed about crying, only comforting you after making sure it was okay to touch you.

You liked him. He could doze off at times, but he never made a big deal about it. You admired that. And you also appreciated that he never said he felt sorry for you and what happened when you were thirteen. It was unnecessary, you thought. The important thing was that he was there.

The Foxes always traveled in packs. For the boys, it was a sign of friendship. To you, it was protection. Being one of the two girls in the club meant they were extra protective over you, and Sunghoon was no exception. In fact, he was the rule. Every day, without fail, he and Heeseung would walk you and Jimin to school, then to work, then back home.

The world felt a little less lonely to you. And maybe, just maybe, you could stop running from it with one good leg to stand on. Maybe you could find it in yourself to forgive a world that took, since that world had Sunghoon in it. Almost as if it were trying to make it up to you.

His black scarf was wrapped around your neck, flooding your nose with the scent of clean laundry and musk. He’d let you wear it on the train ride over to Shinjuku, and you wondered if he was falling in love with you, too. You hoped that he knew you weren’t scared of being so close to him. Not when he was everything you needed from yourself.

“It’s time we started living for ourselves, don’t you think?” you asked, staring down at the city lights in all their neon glory. Every single speck represented another disappointment, another broken heart, another fruitless wish. None of it mattered. But it still did. “Maybe start chasing a different dream. Maybe the same one. But be in control this time. It’s more fun that way, isn’t it?”

The wind blew your pleated uniform skirt upward, and when you turned to see if Sunghoon was looking, he was. At your face. You had just mustered the courage to speak again, voice raspy from years of unuse. You leaned ever so slightly over the edge, arms spread out wide, feeling the strong breeze catch your body in the current. The tickle of the urge to free-fall played around in your mind.

“Y/N!” Sunghoon yelled before grabbing your wrist at the last possible moment and pulling you back hard enough for you to fall on top of him. You clambered off after a moment’s hesitation, sitting beside him and smoothing out the hem of your skirt.

You looked down, almost ashamed of your impulse. “You….”

“Y/N,” he wheezed, pushing his bangs out of his face as he tried to collect himself. “Are you crazy?”

Your brow furrowed as you examined the worried expression that painted his delicate, sculpted face. “What… What’s wrong, Sunghoon?” The roll of your tongue felt nice in your mouth; yes, you could get used to saying his name out loud. “Are you okay?”

“Shouldn’t I be asking you that?” Sunghoon retorted, to which you answered with your usual breathy laugh.

“I don’t think killing yourself is that funny��did I miss a joke or something?”

You smiled at him, taking his hand into yours. His was much bigger, and warmer, but felt right all the same. “I wasn’t going to kill myself at all,” you said. “At least, not literally.”

Goodbye, silent Y/N.

–––

“under the moon” arc — episodes 5-8

It had been four months since the snail incident. And while you certainly would have not preferred to have someone who was a stranger at the time witness the worst thing that had ever happened to you, you didn’t regret having the sticky ooze of entrails coagulate in your body.

Because you would have never guessed you would gain a whole new family out of it.

The boys could get rowdy at times, but they meant well—for the most part. Those occasional instances when they didn’t were usually because someone had decided to bother you  and force you to speak for them. You didn’t mind talking most of the time now; all that mattered was that you got to decide when you’d open your  mouth and to whom you’d speak to.

Being one of the two girls in the group certainly had its drawbacks, but you liked to think you balanced them out just fine. After all, their detention rate had gone down in the past couple of months thanks to you insisting they stop throwing water balloons off the gym’s roof and they stop sneaking into the basketball team’s gym to deflate all the balls.

“Y/N-ie,” Jongseong chirped as he sauntered over to the Foxes’ table with his bento in hand. He was the only one besides Jimin who used that particular honorific, and you only allowed him to do so because of how stupidly tall he was compared to you. “Where’s Hoon?”

You looked up from your food, stony eyes glancing at the other boys—and Jimin, who sat beside Heeseung—and everyone shrugged. You blinked slowly at Jongseong before answering, “He’s going to enter the cafeteria in… five seconds.”

“You’re just bullshitting at this point,” Jaeyun laughed, mouth full of rice. While he was certainly more in-your-face than his twin brother, the Foxes’ vice president was surprisingly still pleasant to be around. You would never say it to his ridiculous pink hair, though, because he’d never shut up about it if you did. “Damn, you eat one snail and suddenly you’re Yuuji Itadori or something.”

“She’s not making it up, Yunie,” Jimin chimed in from where Heeseung’s arm was around her shoulder. She pointed in the direction of the double doors. “Look, there he is.”

You lifted your bag out of the chair next to you without even looking to see if Sunghoon had already reached the table. It was like you had a radar for him and him only, and you’d spent the last few days staying up late thinking about how that was possible.

You both seemed to be able to sense what the other person was feeling, which meant that neither of you were ever hungry, tired, or in a bad mood for long. You often would run into each other during times you normally weren’t supposed to be together, the rare occasions where you would spend your weekends alone always seemed to change the moment the both of you left your houses. At one point, you two discovered that not only did Sunghoon have an insane talent for drawing, but he could accurately guess what you were wearing and how your hair was styled without having seen you prior to his sketches.

Thankfully, however, you couldn’t totally read each other’s minds. You would be embarrassed for Sunghoon to find out you’d come to love him if he could hear your thoughts.

It couldn’t have been the snails that did this to you, right?

“Sorry, Hiroto-sensei was chewing my ass out,” Sunghoon said as he shrugged off his uniform blazer and sat down. He placed a carton of mango juice beside your hand, the straw already punctured through the foil seal.

“You were sleeping in class again, weren’t you?” you asked, handing Sunghoon the bento you spent the morning preparing for him. It had all his favorites—pork curry, rice, natto, a soft boiled egg, and the taiyaki from your family’s cafe.

“At this point, I don’t know why he even tries,” he laughed. You smiled at him softly. You were glad you found it in yourself to speak, because your new family actually paid attention to you. They didn’t possess Sunghoon’s attuned nature towards you, but you appreciated them all the same. “I need my nine hours one way or the other.”

“You had nine hours last night.” You paused, chopsticks in midair. “Jongseong, why are you staring?”

The black-haired boy looked at you as if you should have known the answer. “It’s like you two have powers or something.”

“Why would you say that?” Sunghoon asked.

“You two are so connected, it’s romantic.”

You tried to hide the blush spreading across your face. “Shut up.”

You and Sunghoon both agreed that God—at least, the one from Christianity—wasn’t real. Something from a World War II history documentary they’d watched together said it best—a line carved into the walls of a jail in the Mauthausen concentration camp.

“If there is a God, then He will have to beg for my forgiveness.”

Certainly, that God was all sorts of fucked up to grant free will. To allow your figure skating coach to violate your body for years. To be unable to stop Sunghoon’s father from beating him for every game of chess he lost. To give the worst pain to the least deserving.

That is the problem of evil. That if there were such suffering in the world, and yet God could not prevent it, then He is not omnipotent. Maybe He didn’t even come close to the power that Izanami and Izanagi or any of the other Shinto deities held, and they were far from perfect.

Sunghoon once told you that he would destroy the whole world for you if he could, to which you simply rolled your eyes and said that that would be no fun. This was, incidentally, after he’d gifted you a painting he’d done of the ancient lotus garden in Kumamoto. Making art was his new hobby that you made him pick up so he wouldn’t be so burnt out playing chess all the time.

“And why not?”

“Because our suffering helps us delight in everything else that much more,” you answered, resting your cheek on his shoulder. You knew you wouldn’t have said that two months ago, that you would have instead told him that humans are put on Earth to suffer and nothing else, but after being around friends who didn’t take life so seriously (if they ever did at all), you’d learned to have fun with your finite existence as it was.

Of course, you appreciated Sunghoon’s sentiment all the same. It held you close and told you everything would be alright, that the way your life had turned out was not your fault like you’d believed it was, but rather a consequence of things you could not control. In your physics class, Hiroto-sensei had quoted Albert Einstein during a lecture on quantum mechanics.

“God does not play dice with the universe.”

That was to say, Einstein never believed in the idea that atoms were governed by randomness. He turned his nose up at the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, which itself stated that there was no way to accurately predetermine the speed and position of a particle at any moment. He asserted that there was no way that anything could be certain, that it wasn’t possible to describe things in terms of probabilities. He thought that the course of all events was fixed, that God formulated and prescribed a certain set of laws and sat back to watch the universe evolve in accordance with those laws.

You would have to disagree with him.

After all, what kind of vindictive God would— 

— 

“Sunghoon,” you said as you laid on the floor of your living room, listening to music in English because you promised each other that one day you would get out of the country together. On this particular night, your album of choice was Radiohead’s Pablo Honey. 

He had mentioned that the band, at one point, refused to play “Creep” live because it was the one song the audience came to hear. You knew what that felt like. 

Sunghoon turned his gaze away from the ceiling to look at you, his eyes softening. “Hm?”

“Do… do you still like chess?”

You knew that he would understand what you meant by that. In the past few weeks, you’d had to practice with him after it turned out that you were a better opponent than anyone in Kokusai’s chess club. Sunghoon was still dead-set on going back to playing competitively, all in the name of being allowed to return to his childhood home, to his father, one day. At least, that’s what you thought.

Something about that made you uneasy, but you knew you were in no place to cast stones. After all, you had your own share of disappointing your parents. Your own mother had not come to see you in Shibuya since the day she abandoned you there, effectively handing over any parenting duties to your grandmother. The phone works two ways, and she’d never acknowledged that fact of the universe. And, unlike Sunghoon, you had never been offered the opportunity to go back “home” to Sendai. As if that place had ever been your home to begin with.

The nuances between your circumstances were only sparing, to say the least.

“You’re worried about me,” he declared. “You think I want to win a tournament so I can go home.”

You hummed in agreement.

“Well, yeah. I want to go home. But only to drop that stupid trophy off at my father’s door and be the one who never speaks to him again. Besides, why should I return to that place when I’m completely fine here?”

Maybe Jongseong had a point, you thought. Maybe you two did share something more than a lunch box of snails. Maybe it’s romantic, after all.

“Are you really okay here?”

He returned his gaze to the ceiling, avoiding your eyes. “Yeah. Because it’s where you are.”

— 

Sunghoon knelt down at your feet, lacing up your ice skates.

However, your legs were bouncing uncontrollably, and it wasn’t because of how cold the indoor rink was. Part of you wished that your Achilles tendon didn’t heal completely.

“Look, you made it this far,” Sunghoon said quietly, brushing his fingers against your supposed bad ankle. The doctors had said you’d be fine to skate on it, that it was your mind that wasn’t allowing you to try again. “We can come back another time.”

You shook your head. How you’d longed to be back, pining for a time where you would be free from the prison of invisible hands gripping her limbs, pinning you down on the ground. “No. I promised you we’d do it today. I need to do this for myself, too.”

“If you can’t—”

“Don’t tell me you doubt me, because I’ve already got that covered,” you snapped, the words flying out faster than you could control them. Your hand came up to cover your mouth. “I’m sorry, Hoonie. I didn’t mean—”

He shook his head, a slight smile tugging at the corners of his lips. “Don’t worry. It’s nice to finally hear what you think. But I disagree. You are so much more than you realize. I’m proud of you.”

Your eyes closed gently before you allowed herself to momentarily soak up those four words.

Then you shrugged off your coat and took his hand, letting him guide you to the rink. The frigid air tried to seep through your fleece-lined stockings but it was nothing to you as you began to wobble on the ice. You scolded herself internally and forced her muscles to relax. It was unbecoming of you to say you should have been an Olympian before the accident and then proceed to look like you needed a walker. 

It took several moments before you began to glide carefully, the blades of your skates just an extension of your body.

You didn’t need to go back to Sendai anymore. You could stand on both legs now, head held high.

For the next few minutes, you took your time getting used to the feeling again, silently willing all of your faith in yourself to return. You were different now. You could trust yourself. Protect yourself.  Being a Fox brought that out of you—your bravery, determination, the unabashed desire to take what the universe threw at you and spit it back in its face.

Of course, you had to thank Sunghoon for showing up when he did. Before then, you were what some people would call just waiting to die. Waiting for the possible day in which you would stop being who you were.

He never forced you to do anything you didn’t want to do. He never forced himself on you. The first time you ever held hands, it was you who reached for him in your sleep as you napped on the floor next to him, the space heater keeping the two of you warm.

Don’t be scared. Don’t be scared.

You didn’t need to, anymore. You glanced over your shoulder to find Sunghoon watching you intently, head propped up with his hand as he leaned on the railing.

One, two… three… jump.

You closed your eyes and leapt, spinning three hundred and sixty degrees before landing with only minimal strain, the skirt of your dress fluttering. You could hear Sunghoon’s overjoyed cries faintly as you continued to swim through the air, feeling the rush that used to overcome you when you were younger, although this time, there was nothing looming over you like the shadow of the Grim Reaper. Your entire body vibrated, all of your electrons dancing along with you.

Sunghoon didn’t hesitate when you came to him, pulling you in for a tight hug.

It was short-lived, though, because as soon as you came into contact,

you passed right through him.

“What… what the fuck?” he whispered, turning his head around to see you standing behind him. You were staring at your own hands, wondering what the hell just happened. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine. It didn’t hurt.” You looked at him with a mirrored wide-eyed expression. “I think we need to call Jongseong.”

“I knew it,” Park Jongseong said smugly, strolling into the lobby of the ice rink with his hands in his pockets and an unlit Seven Stars dangling from his lips. You and Sunghoon sat one seat apart, in fear that it would happen again.

“Don’t be crazy,” you muttered as you crossed your arms. You uncrossed them when you considered the possibility that your hands could go inside your body if you weren’t careful. “There’s no such thing as having powers.”

“Sure,” Sunghoon added. “But there has to be some sort of explanation for this.”

Jongseong grinned, pushing his black hair out of his face. “Yeah. You’ve heard of quantum theory, right? Atomic principles? Hoon, you weren’t asleep during that lecture, were you?”

“Maybe I was. What do atoms have to do with any of this?” Sunghoon asked, rolling his eyes.

“Well, basically… how can I explain this easily… uh… your atoms and Y/N’s were so perfectly aligned that you… y’know… passed through each other.”

You frowned. “But Einstein said—”

“He was wrong. People can be wrong. Shit, even the gods were wrong sometimes. Damn, do you sleep in class, too?”

“I—”

“Nothing,” Jongseong said, “is a guarantee. Except death.”

Take that, Einstein.

— 

“You’re beautiful. I wish I could draw you right now,” he said.

You let out a soft, nervous laugh. “Cameras exist. You could just take a picture.”

“That’s not nearly enough.”

Your hands trailed shakily along the lapels of Sunghoon’s blue blazer, fingertips grazing the hem as he edged closer to you. You wondered if the accident would happen again.

“H-hoon…” you whispered as you attempted to sink your head deeper into his scarf wrapped around your neck. “I’m scared.”

They were on the rooftop you’d killed herself on—in the metaphorical sense—all those months ago. Since then, everything as you knew it was different, from your voice to the way you presented yourself all the way down to how you felt. 

“Nonsense,” he quipped in the same hushed tone. Your eyes were locked on your shoes, feet pointed toward one another. “You’re damn well the bravest person I know. It’s contagious, actually.”

“This is different,” you replied. You rubbed the fabric of his blazer feebly. “I…”

“I love you,” he said, tucking his index and middle fingers beneath her chin to tilt your head up to look at him. “I really love you.”

I love you. I love you a lot.

“No! you  can’t just… you can’t just say it like that!” you protested, hands flattening against his broad chest and attempting to push him away from you. It was no use. Despite how lanky he appeared to be, he was built like an iron wall.

Sunghoon chuckled, wrapping his fingers around yours. “How would you rather I say it?”

You froze as heat rose to your face. They’d just discussed this in class; the story went that Souseki Natsume, a famous writer who once taught English, said that because the Japanese did not declare their love so loosely the way Westerners did, the most appropriate equivalent of the expression would be “the moon is beautiful, isn’t it?”.

And the most appropriate “literary” response to that came out of your mouth smoothly, like melted ice cream. “Shindemo ii wa.”

I would die happy.

–––

season finale: i know the end — episodes 9-12

When observed under a microscope, two particles both affected by one experience will no longer exist as individuals thereafter, but as two halves of one whole. This phenomenon is known as quantum entanglement, and had been used by several of your closest friends to describe the way in which your life had flipped itself over its axis on one April afternoon in your third and final year of high school.

Five years had passed since you’d graduated. Since the day you grew a spine and ate a snail with Park Sunghoon, the day you stopped living on autopilot. Since you’d fallen in love with him and regained the mastery of your own voice, both of these things you’d done over and over again, day after day. And it had been three years since you finally returned to competitive figure skating to prove that you could do more than just fine on your own, without your mother and certainly without a coach who would violate your physical existence.

But in those years, Sunghoon still hadn’t made it out of Japan like he said you both would someday. At least, you hoped, not yet. Not yet, but soon. You knew it had to be soon.

You sat in your small apartment in the Fairfax district of Los Angeles, an expensive neighborhood you were only able to afford because of the amount of endorsements you’d taken on. Your little black cat, Tai, as in taiyaki, as in the dessert Sunghoon loved so much, purred contentedly in your lap as you stared out of the window and into the street below. 

You’d agreed to adopt a cat together one day. You wondered if he already had one of his own by now. You assumed he did; on several occasions you could sense his presence, encouraging you, making you push forward and keep fighting against the universe, against Izanami and Izanagi, against God Himself.

This was what you did in your free time. Miss your life back home. You didn’t want to make any new friends. It was useless. No one could take or come anywhere remotely near Sunghoon’s place—or Jimin’s, or Heeseung’s, or Jaeyun’s, or Jongseong’s, for that matter. 

Soon, you promised yourself, you could show Sunghoon all that he’d missed out on. In your second year in America, you finally mastered the quadruple lutz after several doctors quelled your anxieties and confirmed your ankle really had healed miraculously. 

You decided you would also take Sunghoon to Little Tokyo, Los Angeles, where you’d go every time you felt like getting on a Boeing 747 to give up on this dream once and for all and go back to him, your other dream—if he’d still have you, that is. You didn’t know for sure.

You played with your phone in your hand, turning it over in your palm. You knew he was only a call away, but you were starting to go back to your old self, unsure of whether or not he’d even pick up. There was also a newfound sense of pride you had, not wanting to be the first one to cave in. If he was the one who pushed you forward, why should you be like Eurydice and turn around to look back?

But Sunghoon was the one who put it best, every single time you asked him why he gave up on playing chess in favor of going to art school after graduation—even though his victory in the championships would win back the respect of his father: “I don’t need to go home when you’re right beside me.”

Liar. Where are you?

That night, like many other nights spent lonely, you could feel him beside you, when everything was still except your own chest, aching for some sort of reprieve from the constant gravitational pull of your personal sun and moon, and the monotonous whirr of the electric fan that sat watch beside yoiur bed. You felt the ghost of his fingertips along your spine, and since you happened to be super lucky and lying extra quietly this time—you heard his voice, soft and low and warm like whiskey down your throat. It played on a loop until it lulled you to sleep.

“We’ll go together. I promise.”

He’d said that the night he admitted he loved you.

You also knew that he always knew where you stood on things as flimsy as words:

Tamago to chikai wa kudake-yasui.

Eggs and vows are easily broken.

And since he knew, why would he say that—when he was the one who could read you without even so much as a perfunctory glance? Why would he stand with you in Terminal 1 of Tokyo Narita without his own boarding pass? Why would he tell you to break up with him right before you got on that plane to California?

Stupid plane. Stupid distance. Stupid Y/N. Stupid, stupid, stupid. You had no patience for idiots. You weren’t excluded from your own disdain.

The only thing that kept you sane was the fact that somewhere deep inside you, in a place whose existence you were reluctant to acknowledge, you knew that one day, you’d see him again.

You had to.

You just hoped you’d still be able to recognize each other.

— 

To change the polarity of an electromagnet, two people are required. They use one snail for each person. Their most repressed memory will transfer over to the snail once it’s been touched. In order for the magnetic fields to switch, the parties must switch their snails and consume them.

The result should not end in repulsion.

The day Sunghoon’s atoms had lined up with yours so perfectly that you passed right through him was an indicator that some things weren’t just theories that could be disproved with a fallacy or two. That much was true.

You sighed, trudging through the farmer’s market in search of your favorite stand, which was run by a group of friends who reminded you so much of your beloved Fox Club back home. They sold baked goods that your trainer would frown upon if she saw them, but you believed that you deserved to eat them every Sunday.

And without fail, Sunghoon’s voice popped up in your head, reassuring you that you could eat them every day if you wanted to, just as long as you did it in moderation.

“Thank you,” you whispered quietly, still unsure as ever if he could hear your reply.

You paid for the decadent salted chocolate chip cookies and walked the four blocks home, debating for the millionth time over why you and him had to be forced apart. Did it mean you had to grow alone first? Would you be able to ever feel whole again?

You were able, however, to feel him missing you. So it wasn’t as completely one-sided as it seemed to be sometimes. It was always there, a slight tug in your heartstrings like a thread on its last life. It sat in your chest right beside where you missed him. On this particular day, it was strong. Stronger than any of the other days that came before, so overwhelming that you had to stop halfway home and sit on a bench to catch your breath.

Could quantum theory explain how he could feel whatever you were thinking? Or how you knew, back when you two were still together, what he wanted for dinner before you even asked? Or how your anxieties would disappear just as fast as they came, replaced by a flood of reassurances?

You had had a feeling that he failed his Visa interview on purpose, six months before you were slated to go to America. In the embassy’s lobby, he’d told you that the interviewer said he would have passed if you were his wife and not just his girlfriend.

Liar.

He’d assured you that he did want to go with you. He could find a job working for Pixar or Illumination or anywhere that would hire him for his talent. So why was the universe making it so hard for you to be together now, when the first two years of your entanglement were so easy?

Nothing, you learned, was supposed to make sense. You could spend hours asking “But why?” to every answer and there would be nothing to shut you up. In fleeting moments you would reconsider your decision to speak again, because the one person you spoke for was a little more than five thousand miles away.

So how am I able to be happy when he isn’t right next to me?

Not as happy as you knew you could be, but happy nonetheless. You were running after your first dream, after all.

Your phone rang when you got home.

“Jimin?” you asked, squinting at the screen. You were met with the image of your best friend, bouncing her seven-month-old baby on her lap, a little girl named after you. “Are you okay? Did something happen?”

“Hey, Y/N,” Jimin’s husband, Heeseung, called, waving to the camera. It was so surreal for you to think that Jimin ended up with her high school boyfriend while you were twenty-three and still pining over yours.

“Have you seen it?” Jimin squealed over the sound of the baby’s giggling. A TV in the background could be heard, the voices speaking Japanese. “The first episode just came out!”

“Seen what? What are you talking about? It’s literally only ten in the morning here.”

“Sunghoon’s anime! It’s so good!”

Your heart stopped pumping for a split second as you heard the double saccharine syllables of his name. The little communication you had with him while you were gone were only simple, fond exchanges over congratulations. The last you’d heard from him, he’d gotten a job at a big animation studio. Of course he was too humble to tell you everything. “What… What's it about?”

“It’s a romance. Everyone in the world is assigned a soulmate and the main characters experience a lot of crazy shit the closer they get to each other. Sorry the summary’s so bad, I promise it’s way better than I just made it sound.”

Soulmates, huh?

— 

It has been said that the atoms of the universe have been rearranged to create the world as it is known now. Should that be true, two people can be born of the same star and not realize it until the moment presents itself.

You knew Sunghoon was there before you even saw him in the crowd. The air suddenly felt different, like you’d just dragged your bare feet through carpet and was just millimeters away from touching a brass doorknob.

On normal competition days you would have attributed the charged atmosphere to nerves or the ten-thousand volt energy of the spectators cheering on their favorite skater. But it wasn’t a normal competition day, unless the winter Olympics in Seattle was just some regular thing. 

You knew it: Sunghoon had made it out of Japan this time.

“Ladies and gentlemen, in third place, USA: Allison Steadmeyer!”

Cue music. Polite wave. Applause.

“In second place, Russia: Irina Khodorkhovsky!”

Music. Wave. Applause.

“In first place, Japan: Y/N!”

The single cheer of one person drowned out the rest.

“Why did you walk away from me?” you asked quietly; anyone around would have chalked up your tears as those of victory, of making a comeback worthy of an Oscar-nominated film. That was because they couldn’t feel the way you instinctively latched onto Sunghoon like an oxygen atom receiving its electron pairing. “Why didn’t you go with me?”

“I didn’t want to get in the way of your dreams,” Sunghoon said into the apple scent of your hairspray. You trembled in his arms, the dazzling Swarovski crystals of your midnight blue spandex dress digging through the wool of his coat. “I knew I would only be a bother to you in the end.”

“Liar.” Tears swam in your vision, blurring his face until he was only the galaxy of vanilla and cinnamon you saw every night behind your eyelids. “Didn’t you know? Didn’t you know that you were a part of them?”

“No.”

You were even stronger by then. The first time you ever tried to physically push him away, he was confessing his love for you. This time, he stumbled backward, albeit only by one step. “Liar!”

“I’m sorry. You know I love you and that hasn’t changed. I just wanted you to be free, I didn’t want to be a burden on you. But it seems as though we’re really meant to be together. I didn’t do what I did to hurt you. I tried so hard to make it not hurt. ”

“What do you mean?”

“As long as I tried to be happy, I figured that you would feel it, too. You know, like what Jongseong said when we were younger. We’re connected. But it was difficult. Every day, I felt you missing me as much as I missed you.”

“What are you trying to say?”

“That even if we were across the entire fucking universe, we’d still be tied together. And nothing could come between that. I know it now, and I’m sorry.”

“I never want to hear you apologize to me ever again,” you mumbled.

— 

“Y/N?” 

You were lying on your hotel bed, one of his arms wrapped around your shoulder as his hand aimlessly played with your hair that was still wavy from being knotted in a tight bun for your performance that day.

One side of your face was pressed against where his heart beat in synchronization with yours. “Yes?”

“Did you ever feel… alone?”

You shook your head. “No. Just lonely.”

“Do you still feel it now?”

“Well, you’re here, aren’t you?”

He pressed a kiss to the bony ridges of your knuckles. “And I’m never leaving unless it’s with you.”

a/n: surprise surprise! y'all thought SSV was gonna be my debut on here? well i lied. here's arguably one of the saddest things i've written so far besides that one angst i wrote in stella's dms last week. i hope you love it as much as i loved writing it. thank you to nia for encouraging me to post this :D taglist: @karinasbaby @enha-stars @intromortal @heeslomll @venomhee @heeheeswifey

[midnight-pluto]

Hello hello, may I request a Stelle x m!reader (or gn!reader) oneshot please?

Stelle finding drunk Y/n while walking around in Penacony, blabbering about how their beloved raccoon is the best gal that ever appear in their life (and singing all praises imaginable)

Y/n said all of that in front of her face, not realizing that they're talking to their said beloved raccoon.

Stelle's ice cream dropped.

And they're not in a relationship. (Oof lol-)

DRUNKEN DAZE — stelle

TROPES: crack, pining, accidental confessions

PAIRINGS: stelle x male!reader

UNIVERSE: canon-ish

WARNING(S): alcohol

A/N: in all honesty, me creating this is like a shot in the dark since i have no clue wtf im doing 😭

THE DRINKS IN Penacony's were in strong hotel bar, that's for sure. A few shots in and you could feel yourself beginning to get tipsy; it was difficult to classify if you were a lightweight or not, all planets had varying strengths to their liquor as well as classifications to them.

But it wasn't hard to determine that the drinks you ordered were strong enough to render you hazy. Knowing that it was getting relatively late, you pay your tab and unsteadily leave the bar counter. 

As you were walking aimlessly, you lean against a railing trying to mentally put yourself together at the very least. Letting out a sigh, you look towards your right and spot a familiar head of grey hair also leaning on the railing; ice cream in hand.

Propping your elbows back up on the railing, you squint your eyes at the figure next to you. She meets your eyes and turns her whole body towards you, "Hey, do you need something?"

You merely hum in response, resting your head on your hand, "No, it's just that you remind me of someone."

"Oh really?" she tilted her head, taking another lick of her ice cream.

"Mhm," you nod, "She's amazing, one of the best things to ever happen to me. Her and the Express Crew. I never really had people like them in my life before the Astral Express, and I wouldn't trade it for anything."

"I'm glad you see us— uh, the Express that way," she smiled, scooting closer to you.

"Best people in my life, not that I had anything else to work with before them, but still; we gained a new crewmate — ha, crewmate — recently. Well, not really recently y'know, we've already been through a lot together."

"And what do you think about this new, 'crewmate,'" she questioned, gazing at you as you look up at the ceiling of the hotel.

"Talented, brilliant, incredible, amazing, show-stopping, spectacular, never the same," you rant on and on about your admiration for her, something she knew you would've never told her directly to her face.

"Really?"

"Really," you nod, assured in yourself, "I wonder if she thinks the same way about me."

"She does," she affirms.

"What makes you so sure?" you inquire, turning to look at her straight on.

"Just trust me," she pats your shoulder.

You close your eyes in thought for a moment, "Then, it would be safe for me to confess to her?"

Stelle lets out a noise of shock, mouth agape for a moment, "Y'know, I think it's about time to go to the dreamscape." Ushering you to the VIP elevator while you mutter disagreements and questions.

It took a moment for you to lie in the 'bed' but she managed to leave your room with a small sigh, "Hopefully you aren't drunk in the dreamscape too."

Eyes widening, she realizes her hands felt oddly empty.

Rushing out the hall and frantically looking each way of the corridor, she ushers over to the railing, looking down and seeing a familiar shade of ice cream below.

"WHO THE FUCK DROPPED ICE CREAM ON MY LUGGAGE?!"

On second thought, it might've not been her ice cream after all.

[bvnniz]

More siren reader x vox pls I loved ur other siren fic!

⋆౨ৎ˚⟡˖ : siren!reader x vox

𝜗𝜚 : SMUT, 18+, porn, fingering, cuckold technically, valentino mention, valentino manipulation, literal filth ngl, reader is dating vox, reader is vox’s assistant, porn without plot to an extent, reader refers to vox as daddy out of sex mostly teasing, reader is kind of a brat, vox has a sir kink . . . that’s all i need to say, orgasm denial

You Can Fuck Harder

you weren’t sure how you kept getting yourself into these predicaments. but here you were. dressed in blue and red matching lingerie ( although it pretty much being torn apart at this point ) handcuffed to a bed.

although usually when things like this happened it was just you and vox, sometimes you being handcuffed while he fucked you against his desk or you being handcuffed to his bed.

only difference here is that you had multiple cameras aimed at you and vox wasn’t the one fucking you currently. you honestly forgot who even was, being too lost in your thoughts and giving out a couple fake moans here and there for the camera.

valentino had asked you and vox to shoot a porn scene for him which you agreed to but vox declined. although valentino being the little snake he is, told you that vox agreed to let you do the scene with someone else.

you soon found that to be false as you saw vox sitting next to valentino, eye twitching and screen buffering. vox wasn’t one to share and he especially wasn’t planning on sharing you with another man.

although you had fun being a bitch to vox which is when you had the brilliant idea as the sinner behind you’s thrusts began to falter. “fuck! cum in my mouth please!” you fake whined, sticking your tongue out at him.

the sinner immediately pulled out pushing you onto your knees before shoving his tip into your mouth so the camera could see him finish. once he did, you turned towards a camera making direct eye contact at the one you knew vox was currently watching before sticking your tongue out to show the camera the sinner’s cum in your mouth before swallowing.

“cut! bonita, that was amazing!” valentino praised while having someone uncuff you. “i know.” you rolled your eyes before walking over to vox and sitting on his lap. “hi daddy.” you smirked but he just rolled his eyes at you

“i’m not in the mood for you trying to be all innocent.” he said looking away from you. all you did was pout at him. before looking towards the temporary dressing room valentino had given you. “talk in private?”

he sighed before nodding, you both getting up and walking into the dressing room. you immediately took a seat on the bed, vox stayed standing.

“to my defense i was told you agreed to have me do a scene with someone else.” he just sighed “why in my right mind would i agree to that?” all you did was smirk “‘cause we both know those stupid sinners can’t fuck me like my daddy can, i mean come on he couldn’t even make me cum.” during your sentence you had started to spread your legs, your torn up panties hiding very little from vox.

“so you have me watch you get fucked by someone else and now you want me to fuck you? fuck no!” his eye practically twitched at the idea. you just shrugged before reaching a hand down and starting to circle your clit “fine! i’m gonna cum with or without your help. just thought you’d wanna cum inside me. but, i guess it’s fine since you know you can’t fuck me as well as that guy did.” you fake yawned causing vox to be way more than annoyed

vox immediately had his hand around your throat, squeezing tight but not enough where you weren’t safe “you think i don’t know what makes you tick? believe me i know you weren’t really moaning and whining over that dude barely even going all the way inside of you.” you just smiled up at him and that’s when vox realized. all you wanted was for him to pound into you.

he sighed before taking his hand off your neck and taking his pants off as quick as possible, you immediately moved onto your knees, putting your hands on top of the headboard of your bed. once having his pants off vox kneeled behind you on the bed.

vox inserted one of his fingers into you, you immediately letting out a whine. “you know for such a brat it doesn’t take much for you to become my little slut again.” you just rolled your eyes “fuck me already please!” you practically whined out causing vox to chuckle before pulling his finger out and inserting his dick inside of you

you always needed adjustment when fucking vox, no matter how many times you fucked your body never got used to his length, although vox wasn’t complaining as you were always ‘tight as fuck’ as he usually told you.

although this time vox didn’t give you your usual time to adjust, he just immediately started pounding into you, which surprised you causing your upper body to fall down into the mattress, a couple of loud moans immediately falling out of your mouth

“sir! fuckfuckfuck!!!!” although you and vox did some . . . kinky shit together he never was rough with you. sure choking you here and there but never enough to where it hurt but in a good way. even when you guys fucked he never went as fast as he was now. especially in your current position. which was the position where vox would usually pick your upper body up and have you lay against his chest as he softly fucked into you, a more intimate position than anything.

but not right now, vox was seething, how dare you try and tell him someone fucked you better than him? the whole reason you became his assistant was because you wanted to fuck him, which was something you drunk confessed to him one night after the two of you fucked. one of the few things he remembers from that night minus the two of you going to that bar.

“fuck vox! sir! i’m close! please please!” vox thought about it for a second “just wait, cum with me.” you nodded, vox’s pace increasing which surprised you. after a couple more thrusts he came inside you, immediately pulling out before you could cum too

“maybe should’ve thought about that before being a brat.” he smirked at you, you flipped your body over before smirking back at him “oh c’mon sir, we both know you want a taste.” you put your legs on his shoulders “we know you can fuck harder but can you eat me out better too?”

[50cal-fullauto-astarion]

your bones singing into mine

nikto x GN!reader (no use of Y/N) 1.7k words

(parts: one - two )

cw: reader is a bio weapons engineer, extreme isolation, allusions to suicide

you were once a brilliant thing, a creator of terrible and powerful miracles of modern science that could bring the world to its knees, and the russian crime syndicate that swept you up tucked you away in a small, dark place to keep you safe while they moved. nikto arrives at this barren corner looking for information and resources, and he finds exactly that in you. he decides that he will keep you, put you back to rights.

+

Nikto was wonderful—he held so many other people within himself, beneath his mask, like endless refractions of facets folding in on themselves. He called himself ‘we,’ and he dug you out of your grave, and he replaced the family that forgot you down here, in the dark.

(They forgot, didn’t they? They wouldn’t just leave you? They wouldn’t pack you up like the dead family cat in a shoebox, give you a thoughtless little funeral, only to walk away forever?)

(There used to be others down here with you, but they’re gone now. A few got sick. One said he was going to see himself out, holding a bottle of OxyContin, and he told you that you ought to see yourself out as well. He never got back up to leave. And now there is a room at the back of the dark place you just don’t go to.)

Every single one of Nikto thought you were special enough to take away from the bunker when the world was well-ended, because of all the secrets you kept papering the inner walls of your skull. Schematics, calculations, formulae. Components, dosages, contacts both dead and alive. A forgotten vault of knowledge, and his kindness bought him passage into it. 

The bunker had been running on emergency power for two years now, recirculating the stale air, and the only light came from the dull red bulbs in cages at the tops of the walls. You couldn’t remember your hands being anything other than burgundy, nor your face in the water-stained mirror in the bathroom. All the food you ate was crimson, and so was all the water you drank. 

There was only one pistol, and it stayed tucked in your waistbands as long as you could remember, red as drops of blood.

(It was strange that the length of your memory shrank and shrank and shrank. You were someone important once, from a line of important people. You were a scientist, and you made powerful things. You held the sun in your hands, and contemplated the cost of unleashing it on the world.)

(What is Armageddon if it was only ever a threat? Could such a thing be controlled, directed? If it could not, was it still an effective deterrent? Could you still bend all the world to your iron fist if it meant there would be no world left were you to open your fingers? Would you kill yourself along with everyone else to prove that you keep promises?)

Nikto brought with him the first cracks of natural light you’d seen in years, and fresh air came along with it. He arrived with others, large and sharp bodies in the angry and sullen shapes of tactical gear, and he walked at the front, cradling a big gun in his sleek arms. He looked at your pathetic little pistol, shaking in your hand at your side, with something like contempt. 

“It’s over now?” you asked him, never once lifting the barrel of your gun. “Did they send you to come get me?”

He tilted his head almost imperceptibly, readjusted the grip on his gun by millimeters. There was a soft creek of leather from his gloves. He jerked his head over his shoulder, threw a hand dismissively, and his fellows fell away. To you, he said, “There is a database in this bunker. It contains the inventions of a team of scientists. Where is it?”

Oh, the way you grinned, sick-dog, mange-ridden, wanting so badly to please. “Me. I’m the database.”

His eyes under his heavy mask narrowed, then widened. “We don’t understand what you mean.”

“I have a perfect brain. It’s—a little foggy. Spiders crawled in and made lots of webs, but everything is there. It’s all there. I know how Nova Gas was invented, and I know so many big, loud things that the Soviet Union didn’t get to use,” you promised him, taking a jittering step to the side. Your voice was pain, rusted with disuse, but you were not lying. “The Kulikova’s put me down here to keep me safe while the world ended. Everyone is dead, it’s just me. So, you being here means it’s over, right? You’re going you bring me to them?”

A strange look washed over his eyes, and something happened in the carriage of his shoulders—maybe his body tilted towards you, recognizing something familiar in your rundown existence. You wouldn’t have the time or energy to think of it until later. But he chews on a silent moment, his finger caressing the trigger of his rifle, and he nodded. 

“The world is done ending,” he assured you (and it’s…mostly a lie, but only mostly—his world had ended, and your world was ended, so perhaps it was close enough to the truth), “but the Kulikova’s are dead. They…asked us to retrieve you. Keep you safe.”

A frown contorted your features, almost a sneer. “I’m supposed to work,” you snapped. “I’m supposed to work! I’m supposed to WORK—!”

He cut you off, one hand snapping from his rifle to your arm, gripping you tight. “You are going to work. We need the plans in your head. We’re going to fix the world. Do you want to help us with that?”

Your frown deepened, and you surged right into him, pressing against his body, crushing your face against his mask. He tightened severely, jerking, and it felt like your wrist was going to break.

“I don’t make things that fix things,” you spat, desperate that this stranger understand the reasons your soul was sold from day one, “I make things that make people scared. I put lightning in a bottle, and it’s only supposed to quiet the lambs on their way to slaughter. Does that make sense?”

(There were many things that the world would never, ever know about Andre Nikto. That, in a past life, he would doodle skulls and crossbones and fat sleeping snow leopards on the corners of his reports to focus his mind between sentences. That he would sing or hum Krokodil Gena’s Birthday Song to himself when he was feeling very poorly, because that’s what his father used to do to soothe him. That he preferred his tea from a samovar, and that he liked to slurp it boiling hot from a saucer with a sugar cube between his teeth.)

(That he came down to a bunker forgotten by gangsters-gone-global to find a solid state drive or a computer, only to find an accomplished scientist rotted away to insanity and almost nothing else—only to find you, and fall in love with you the moment you demanded he understand the magnitude of potential atrocity made by your hands.)

“We do,” he told you, voice a gravel-grit moment of understanding. Another note rang within it, a chord of relief stricken in some deep, hallowed hollow within him. “Would you come with us?”

Satisfied, you relaxed, though you could not bring yourself to back away from the mask. Something in his eyes locked you in—perhaps the steely gray reminded you of the Baltic Sea, along which you grew up, or perhaps you found his patchy, plucked eyelashes charming and vulnerable on such a foreboding body. You couldn’t say. But his grip on your wrist relaxed into something bordering on beckoning. 

“We’ll go,” you told him, the slip into his patterns an easy one, as if you had already stepped through his threshold and weaved yourself into the tapestry of his existence. “The Kulikova’s will want to get started.”

“They’re dead,” he repeated patiently. “They are corpses, and they’re working on nothing. Beyond that, their goals were nothing. Forget about them.”

It didn’t settle into your mind completely—it would take months before the idea even rooted itself in your mind—but you didn’t argue him. Instead, you let him lead you by the wrist, to the exit stairs you had spent years watching. 

“It’s different now that the world ended,” he warned you. “You’re going to get sick, after being down here for so fucking long, and it’s going to hurt. A lot. But we will put you back together.”

You shifted from foot to miserable foot, curling your hand to try to take his. Anticipation flooded through you, a brutal resurrection. “Of course you will. You’d’ve wasted your time if you didn’t intend to,” you said, as close to an admission of faith as you thought you’d ever manage again. 

It made him laugh—only a rough bit, the grit of powdered glass under a hard boot—but it sounded like salvation. 

“I’m going to cover your eyes,” he warned you, and you thought with great offense it was because the world was such a tragedy now that he would rather protect you from it, but he continued, “the light is going to burn your retinas like a fucking nightmare.”

You looked at him, searching, and found his eyes vexed under the mask, swimming in the black of his grease. He’d walked this path before, it was evident in his voice. All of these things had happened to him before, and he did not have someone who knew, who could prevent little pains as they collected. 

You nodded. “Spasibo. Okay.”

He laughed again, and your skin prickled at the broken-glass-and-gravel tone. “We like the Russian. You should speak it more,” he hummed, and one of his arms slid across your back to brace you. His free hand came to your face, pressing over your eyes carefully, to shield them from what was about to unfold in front of you.

With great care, because he was holding something of utmost preciousness to him, Andre Nikto led you out of the bunker that should’ve been your grave, holding you steady as your bare feet touched grass for the first time in three years, as the white-hot light of sunshine peaked between the cracks his hand couldn’t prevent over your eyes. He held you through the agony of sensation, and led you to an armored vehicle, to a new life.

“It’s overwhelming, we know,” he promised, as you curled into a ball in the backseat. He took one of your hands and held them in both of his, keeping low, as if making a vow. “We’re going to take care of you. We’re going to put you back together—we’ll never leave you behind.”

His hands squeezed tight, as if he needed you to understand. 

“You’ll never be alone again. We won’t let that happen.”

All you felt was relief and love flooding you in equal measure, your fingers turned to claws in his grip, and he held even tighter. 

You would leave outrageous damage behind in the touch if he ever left you, and he only welcomed it.

[in1-nutshell]

Can you do a BW Predacon who got the beast form of an elephant, who is an absolute unit of size and strength and intelligence, and just a nuke bomb of an enemy, but then happened to be scared out of their skin by Rattrap (based on the cartoon joke that elephants are scared of mice). Like an “Ew ew ew go away GO AWAY!*runs for their life*” type of scare.

This. Is. Brilliant!

I now have a mental image of Bot Buddy on top of a table on their tip toes staring at Rattrap.

Hope you enjoy!

Bot Buddy the Predacon with an Elephant alt mode who is deathly afraid of Rats

SFW, Platonic, Cybertronain reader

BW

Buddy had built up a reputation of making themselves one of the Predacons best weapons experts.

They were the best in the business.

If the Predacons needed something to be blown up, they called Buddy.

Terrorsaur looking from the rock ledge.

“We’re going to need to get this stinking rock out of the way.”--Terrorsaur

“Wazzpinator thinkz we call Buddy.”--Waspinator

“Don’t be ridiculous! I can get it myself!--Terrorsaur

10 minutes later…

“Okay who called?”--Buddy

“Wazzpinator did!”--Waspinator

“Hey Wasp! What did you need exploding?”--Buddy

“The rock!”--Waspinator

“Wait, wasn’t Terrorsaur with you? Or did he dump you here by yourself. Where did he go?”--Buddy

“Under rock.”--Waspinator

Terrorsaur gruntle scream from underneath the rock.

“Oh, that’s nice—Oh Sweet Primus! Hold on!”--Buddy

Their height added to their larger-than-life personality.

They were almost as loud as their explosives.

Colorful even.

Too bad they had sided with the Predacons.

Their love for explosives was far greater than morality.

Many of the Predacons believed Buddy to be this pillar of unwavering power. A fortress of invincibility against any Maximal weapon they had.

That being said, they only confided in two fellow Predacon’s about their abnormal fear.

Dinobot and Waspinator.

Waspinator found out more on accident.

The two of them were out on patrol when the incident happened.

Buddy and Waspinator walking on patrol in the jungle.

A rat scurries past Buddy’s pedes.

“EEEEEEEEEEEEKKKKKKKKKK!”--Buddy

Buddy jumped high into a tree accidentally scaring Waspinator.

“What is it?! Maximals? Predators?”--Waspinator

Waspinator looks above at the terror-stricken Buddy pointing at their offender.

The rat squeaks at Waspinator causing Buddy to shriek and shake more.

Waspinator proceeds to punt the little guy away.

“Itz okay Buddy. Rat gone.”--Waspinator

“A-are you sure?”--Buddy

Waspinator nodding as Buddy slowly comes back down.

“…please don’t tell anyone…”--Buddy

“Buddy zecret safe with Wazzpinator!”--Waspinator

Buddy patting Waspinators helm gently.

“You can ride on my hide for the rest of the ride back. My treat.”--Buddy

“Ooooohhh!”--Waspinator

Waspinator sits on Buddy, now in elephant mode, happily swinging his pedes back and forth enjoying the ride back.

Dinobot was more out of respect for the warrior while on the ship.

While he was still a Predacon.

Dinobot had shared his feelings about Megatron’s questionable things in the past. This was a big thing for Dinobot to even talk behind his then leaders back to someone else.

Buddy felt the need to show that his secret was safe with them, so they told him.

Buddy showing Dinobot a holo picture of a rat.

“Pardon me��� but are you saying that that thing is what you are most afraid of?”--Dinobot

“Yes…”--Buddy

“But you are so big! You could crush it without a single thought!”

“That’s the thing Dinobot! They are like organic scraplets! They are vermin! Very scary looking vermin!”--Buddy

Dinobot looking at Buddy’s scared face sighing.

Present…

Dinobot waking up in a cold sweat.

“How did I not realize this sooner!?”--Dinobot

The Maximals never would have thought that their smallest member would be their most volatile weapon against this juggernaut.

The fact that Buddy hadn’t even encountered Rattrap on the battlefield was even more astounding.

They finally meet Rattrap during a particularly heated battle.

Maximals are losing to the Predacons.

Buddy’s entrance being one of the main causes of this.

Buddy just having the time of their life.

“YYYAAAAHHHHOOOOO!”--Buddy

Dinobot remembering The Talk.

“Rattrap! Go to Buddy.”--Dinobot

“What!?”--Maximals

“WHAT! Are you crazy!?”--Rattrap

“Trust me!”--Dinobot

“No!”--Rattrap

“You are our only hope! Just do it!”--Dinobot

“You couldn’t pay me—”--Rattrap

Dinobot throwing Rattrap at Buddy.

“Dinobot! What did—”--Optimus

“Watch.”--Dinobot

Rattrap landing in front of Buddy’s pedes transforming into Beast mode, aka the Rat.

Buddy freezing seeing the big rat.

“Ehehe… hi--”—Rattrap

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!”--Buddy

Buddy while screaming bloody murder starts running away from Rattrap.

Buddy picks up Waspinator, Tarantulas, Terrorsaur, Inferno, and Quickstrike and is out of there.

“…”--Maximals

“Wow… they really weren’t joking about that.”--Dinobot

[skellymom]

"WORDLESS"

THE BAD BATCH ECHO x NON GENDERED READER FAN FIC

A brilliant revolutionary is rendered handicapped and loses hope. Echo steps in to help them restore their life...and finds love.

Word Count: 2.6K

Warnings: Angst, pain, crying, injury, handicapped characters dealing with their condition, kissing and sweetness. I researched Aphasia some, but PLEASE do not come for me. I am not claiming to be an expert. And, I did my very best to be respectful of portraying this medical disorder. My aim was to portray a healthy and devoted relationship with two people who have a physical and mental disability.

No smut (However, all you Echo Lovers who would like a SEPARATE smutty story with these two, PLEASE MESSAGE ME!)

(Divider credit: @hereindreamlandpng @sister-lucifer, Pinterest pic credit: will)

Listen as you read: "Don't Forsake Me" by Ofra Haza

Lyrics:

Don't cast me away When I start to fade When my mind's unmade Don't forsake me When my strength has ebbed Don't forsake me

I know the day will come I know the day will come And all my life will be haze and spark Don't ever leave me in the dark

Don't cast me away When I start to fade When my mind's unmade Don't forsake me When my strength has ebbed Don't forsake me Oh, Oh, Oh Don't cast me away

Tech adjusted his goggles while reading the holopad.  “Your name is becoming very visible throughout the galaxy. I believe the Outer Rim is NOW referring to you as ‘The Bearer of Emancipation’” 

“Kinda cool...but kinda dangerous, eh?”  Wrecker mused. 

“PROMISED Omega we’d ALL come home safe” Hunter added “And NOT bring the Empire hot on our heels to Pabu.” 

I smiled widely feeling EXTRA confident in my abilities promoting clone rights and an overall galaxy wide rebellion post Order 66. "No worries, boys. We're making wonderful headway!" 

It all started out for me as a destitute desert rat the Batch picked up while on their travels. They occasionally helped Rex with his Clone Rebellion.  The “Sassy Jokester” or the “Brilliant Orator” the boys called me.  I really had no skills that would cause them to keep me around.  Not as a medic, mechanic, cook, or anything else for that matter.  Just someone with a quick wit and courageous mouth.  They said my words gave them hope and a reason to feel like actual human beings.  And the laughs...all the laughs too. 

Then, on a mission for Rex, I met ECHO.   

In one afternoon, he wooed me with his rebellious passion for freedom and a safer galaxy.  He commed Senator Chuchi, who I had NEVER heard of.  We spoke and I was hooked. 

From that point on I became a REVOLUTIONARY! 

I traveled to so many worlds with so many different squads.  Deviating which clones would protect me while meeting the galaxy’s citizens.  Changing hearts and minds for The Rebellion. 

We had managed to largely avoid any snags with the Empire...or its cult of followers. 

So far. 

ENVOY____, ENVOY _____!!!  A young girl no older than 6 years old appeared, jumping up and down excitedly. 

She was genuinely thrilled to meet me.  Holding a festively colored box in her hands. 

I broke ranks with the boys and approached her. 

“Envoy...I... wouldn’t do that.”  Hunter warned. 

Scoffing at Hunter’s alarm, I continued to approach.  This planet was safe, and we experienced no issues with the people here... 

Her face lit up as I approached.  She held out the box to me “One of your fans told me to give this to you.” 

Crosshair’s agitated voice squawked over Hunter’s comm behind me.  He did NOT sound like his usual calm self while keeping the sniper’s view of our group... 

Her innocent face.  The face of Hope...of a peaceful future. 

Before I could take the box from her hands, it was shot to the ground from above.   

A second later Hunter grabbed the little girl, flipping and jumping away... 

The last thing I saw was Wrecker’s armor around me with the blinding light of an explosion behind him... 

Then...fade to black... 

I awoke in a rudimentary med ward, on an elevated hover stretcher with a rickety stainless-steel table next to it.  On it lay a water canteen and an empty bedpan.   

There’s a quiet yawn, turning to see Hunter seated next to me.  He had just awakened too. 

He said something.  I could hear him...but his words made no sense.  Hunter babbled in a language I barely understood.  I could read his facial expressions though: relief, love...then changing to doubt and concern the more he spoke. 

He spoke into his comm. 

My tensions began to rise... 

Minutes later Wrecker, Tech, and Crosshair warily, but relieved filed into the room as Hunter commed someone else. 

Tech approached and began talking to me.  He spoke what seemed volumes before I could discern the occasional word.   

Why was this so difficult?  Why did I feel like they were speaking an alien language? 

I opened my mouth to Tech, thinking he would be able to understand... 

...and a guttural sound fell from my mouth.  I tried again and again.  Same thing. 

I felt the tears on my cheeks.  Hunter gently wiped them away, rubbing circles on my shoulder with his other hand. 

Becoming more hysterical with every attempt to speak... 

Crosshair motioned from across the room with the air he reserved for making snide, but hilarious comments to lighten the mood.  He was not a cuddler like Hunter. 

His sinuous voice pulled the curtain back from my lack of understanding.  Where I would normally laugh, I could only mumble unintelligibly. 

Then he doubled down, clearly now NOT paying attention to Tech’s facts, nor Hunter growling at him “Crosshair, this is NOT the time or place!” 

Wrecker, standing next to Cross, trying to silence his brother to no avail...highly aware of my stress and anxiety... 

Then...Crosshair’s voice cuts through my mental haze like a knife through flesh...wounding... 

“Are you DEAF and DUMB???” 

I SNAPPED! 

He ducks just fast enough to not be struck by the stainless-steel bedpan as it hits the wall.  There’s fear in HIS eyes and immense guilt as I SCREAM at him...in an unhinged way.  I sound like an angry animal. 

Wrecker slides over and presses himself into a corner.  Trying to make himself smaller.  He DOESN’T know what to do. 

My screams of rage ramp down to a mournful howl because I AM SCARING HIM. 

“HE DIDN’T MEAN IT!”  Hunter grabs both of my arms.  His expression compassionate and... perhaps too forgiving... 

My anger FLARES as he attempts to lessen the blow of his brother's horrible choice of words.   

ALWAYS defending him!  

WHY can’t Crosshair be more empathetic?   

WHY must Hunter step in for this GROWN man? 

He suddenly realizes his mistake the second I slam my hands into his chest, pushing him away... 

...too strong for me to hurt him... 

But his FEELINGS are torn to shreds...and it shows. 

Tech is attempting to talk AT ME thinking perhaps his LOGIC would prevail in an otherwise VERY EMOTIONALLY charged situation. 

“...a TRAUMATIC brain injury...Aphasia...you can vocalize, however are currently unable to form words.”   

Then he sets his datapad onto my lap. 

“Perhaps...TYPE the message you wish us to comprehend?” 

I inhale SHARPLY.  The keys on the touchscreen resembled an angular string of symbols...and were totally unrecognizable to me. 

These SYMBOLS should MEAN SOMETHING! 

Tech was so sure of my abilities... 

A panic attack grips me.  I let out a crestfallen moan, shaking my head.  No longer even paying attention to the men in the room.   

I want to escape.  To outrun the situation. I MUST GET OUT OF HERE!!! 

Sliding from the stretcher and totally mistakin that my legs would support me post medical coma... 

And falling HEAVILY to the med unit floor, taking the stainless-steel table with it.  The water in the canteen spills all over me and the floor as I fall stomach down with a SLAP! 

IMMEDIATELY, hands on me...trying to lift... 

But my RAGE flares AGAIN! 

Punching and slapping at the well-meaning men...I FORCE them to retreat... 

So that I may lay upon the floor and keep screaming until I'm hoarse. 

Finally, silence, I inhale sharply...and exhale raggedly.  The room is silent enough to hear a pin drop. 

And the familiar thudding of boots entering the room... 

Metal boots. 

They appear in my line of vision. 

A soft but gruff voice speaks “Now...what’s this?” as he kneels. 

Then pulls me wet and bruised off the floor and into his arms.  I hug his neck.  Then try to speak.  Nothing but noise comes out. 

He strokes my hair “I won’t lie.  It’s going to be a HUGE adjustment.” 

I look up into those amber eyes as I feel his cold metal scomp on my back.   

“Up you go.” As Echo lifts and places me back onto the hover stretcher.  Hunter carefully sets a clean gown next to me as Tech hurriedly rights the table and wipes up the water. 

Crosshair stands slumped with a defeated expression.  Wrecker pokes him in the back HARD. 

He straightens up.  “I... shouldn’t have said that.”  Crosshair’s eyes meet yours.  “I’m sorry.” 

I nod.  Forgiving him while wiping my face. 

Hunter squeezes my shoulder “We’ll let you have some space.” Then ushers his brothers out of the room. 

Echo stays behind and helps me change into the dry hospital gown.  He can tell from my expression I am extremely grateful for his support. 

“I ALMOST just missed seeing you awake.” 

My eyes shot up to him in surprise. 

“Heh...been visiting you the past few weeks since the accident.  Of course, you’ve been out and didn’t know it.  You know...in-between missions...” 

He’s rubbing the back of his neck in the awkward way he does when slightly embarrassed. 

My eyes soften. 

He smiles.   

“My ship had JUST left...then Hunter commed me...” 

He steps closer tentatively and takes my hand. 

“From the tone of his voice...thought I...uh...WE had LOST you...” He looks so PAINED by the thought. 

I couldn’t hold back...he’s been such an ally.  But he’s more than that to me.  Someone very precious.  I LOVE ALL the clones... 

But Echo has a VERY special place in my heart. 

Pulling him close and embracing him, I sigh. 

“I don’t know WHAT I’d do if I lost you.” He whispers in my ear. 

I caress his cheek, then pull back from our embrace to gently kiss his lips. 

He inhales sharply. 

I know this is the FIRST kiss he has EVER experienced in his life.  Then I place his hand against my heart, trying to communicate my feelings for him.  

He understands completely. 

“Will you come with me?  I... mean AFTER you’re taken care of medically.  Just...can’t leave you again.” 

I’m elated...but uncertain about the future.  How can I continue my work?  It would be IMPOSSIBLE to advocate if I cannot speak... 

“You’ll find your voice.  We’ll figure SOMETHING out.  You’re not done.” 

I moan quietly and shake my head. 

Then I think of what he’s been through.  Now standing here, having picked me up off the floor with one arm, traveling through the galaxy fighting for peace, then coming back time and again to my bedside...a man missing most of his body, whose mind had been tormented for so long... 

In his eyes I see HOPE. 

If Echo can do it, so can I. 

Pabu is a beautiful place to recover.  The sunlight, perfect weather...and the people are so attentive and caring.  I sit on the beach and watch the waves roll in. My clone family has been nothing but wonderful and supportive.

But I can’t stay here forever.  There’s work to do.  Especially if I want EVERYONE in the universe to be able to have a safe home and their freedom. 

I still cannot speak.  According to Tech I may NEVER regain my verbalization.  But he was delighted that I was lucky enough to understand the spoken word.  Not everyone with this injury can. 

“See you made it down here by yourself today.” Echo’s pride shows as he approaches.  He’d usually lead me down the rocky steps to the sand.   

He’s dressed only in his deep red bodysuit bottoms.  Confidently showing off his prosthetics and mechanics.  Something he would have NEVER done before we met.  His skin is beginning to lose that ghostly pallor. 

I give him an “of course” expression and he smiles.  He knows I’ve been pushing myself hard.  We won’t leave Pabu until I’m cleared medically by Tech. Physical therapy works wonders with mobility.  Then there’s the lessons... 

“Here’s your teacher now.” 

Omega sprints across the beach towards us.  She’s wearing a rainbow tie dye swimsuit.  Something her and Lyana made one happy Pabu summer day. 

“Are you ready?” She’s excited and hopeful.   

They both join me on the blanket. 

“Ok, recap.  Show me what we worked on yesterday.” Omega slips into tutor mode. 

I roll my eyes and sign in Standard Basic The quick silver Vulptice jumps over the lazy Lurca. 

“PERFECT!” Omega claps her hands ecstatically. 

I want something FUN!  When will I learn swear words? 

Omega laughs into her hands and blushes. 

“That’s MY department.” Echo embraces me, pulling my back to his chest.  Then leans into my ear whispering something and gestures with his scomp and hand...a very interesting swear word indeed! 

Omega explodes into even wilder laughter and falls backward onto the sand. 

“What’s SO FUNNY” Hunter asks as he approaches. 

Nothing I sign, but giggle. 

He glances at Echo and I, then winks with a mischievous grin. 

Wrecker sets down a huge cooler of food and drinks, then takes Shep’s hand as they make a beeline for the water in their matching swim trunks.   

Batcher tears past and Omega runs after her. 

Tech and Phee approach.  She holds aloft a beautiful bottle of deep amber alcohol “Hondo sends his FINEST rum.  It’s been sold out since the Empire put an alcohol prohibition on their stormtroopers.  He held this baby back just for US!” 

Tech spreads another big blanket onto the sand as Phee hands the rum to Hunter.  Then she removes her gauzy sarong to reveal a beautifully beaded and woven earth toned bikini.  Tech is captivated by this.  Standing there smiling in his plain beige and heavily pocketed cargo shorts. 

Then he scoops her up lovingly over his shoulder and walks calmly into the ocean.  She squeals playfully. 

Crosshair opens a HUGE beach umbrella and sinks it into the sand, parking himself under it on the blanket next to Hunter. He’s dressed in a black full body wetsuit covering his tall sleek frame, black sunglasses, with his signature toothpick.  Cross had since grown out his hair only on the top.  His frosty silver locks falling lushly to a side part and long bangs mysteriously covering one eye.  Contrasted with Hunter only dressed in a pair of skimpy distressed jean cutoff shorts.  The light acid washed denim emphasizing his dark skin and toned body, deep crimson bandana, and jet-black curls resting past his broad shoulders. 

Hunter cracks open the rum, pours two glasses and hands one to Crosshair. 

The Bachelor Thirst Traps of Pabu. I sign to Echo.  The women...and men should be showing up ANY minute now... 

Hunter nods, offering us some rum. 

“We’ll pass for now.”  Echo nods back, eyeing more beachgoers descending the stairs at the top of the cliff.  “Looks like your fans are here.” he chuckles. 

Hunter stops and sighs “Can’t get a moment of PEACE.” 

Crosshair snorts. “When you prance down the streets wearing THAT, what do you expect?   

“They’re lucky I even wear ANYTHING to the beach.” Hunter grouses. 

They’d feel pretty LUCKY if you DIDN’T!  I sign.  

Echo snorts.  Crosshair throws his head back and cackles. 

Hunter smirks “You’re Basic Sign is getting much better.” 

Thanks, Sergeant 

“Keep an eye on this for me.”  Echo pulls off his scomp and tosses it to Cross. 

Cross catches and salutes Echo with it, drink in hand. 

Echo and I get up from the blanket and head over to our secluded spot at the lagoon.  He holds my hand keeping vigilant should I trip on the sand.  My legs are still a bit weak. 

We sit on a smooth flat boulder next to a shallow pool of sparkling turquoise ocean water.  No waves or currents, just a calm oasis with rocks surrounding it allowing for privacy. 

I slide in first, floating and buoyant waiting for Echo. 

He carefully pulls off both leg prosthetics, leaving them on the boulder, then inches over the edge.  I hold out my hands, carefully grasp his hips to help guide him into the water as he lowers himself down with one arm. 

There is no embarrassment, nor judgement.  We accept help from one another, welcome physical touch, and our loving devotion to one another. 

He slides into my arms and encircles me with his, then sighs... 

“I could ALMOST see us staying here...indefinitely.” 

Almost I sign.  But...that ITCH...an urgency to be a part of something... I trail off 

“Bigger” he finishes my sentence.  “Maybe even something we’ll both NEVER see.” Brief melancholy spreads across his face. 

I feel it too.  The pull from both worlds. 

We have THIS...at least for right NOW.  I sign. 

“You’re right.”  He agrees, hope returning to his face.  “Let’s make the most of it.”   

He pulls me closer to him and we make the VERY MOST of this day...and each one after that... 

[wexhappyxfew]

Hi! I love your Silver Bullets girls, and Carrie x Douglass has a special place in my heart (even more since your last writing with them). So, for them I'd like to ask 35. (kissing their bruises and scars) from the Touch prompt list or 5. (the last thing they're thinking about before falling asleep is always the other) from the Subtle love list. 💗

HI FRIEND!!!! thank you so much for sending this and i am so so glad carrie and dougie have meant a lot, alongside the Silver Bullets girls (it seriously means SO MUCH and i always say it but its true!!!) THANK YOU FOR THE OPTIONS TOO!!!! i couldn't help myself and went with the second prompt (5) and decided to focus on some of their earlier meetings with one another and how they've developed into the people today. let's just say, i had a lot of fun! thank you SO MUCH!!!!! :D this was so much fun! <3 (and sorry for the wait for this....the semester was its usual chaos haha!)

greenland

(a/n): safe to say, for my carrie x dougie enjoyers, this was FUN to write. we get a bit into life before the annie bradshaw era of silver bullets! WITH captain birdie faulkner. BUT, because i am a sucker for someone who haunts the narrative and is simply talked about, we don't actually meet birdie here, just hear about her as a leader and all (a running theme!). we also get a bit into the storyline of what dougie means when he said he wanted to ask carrie to 'dance in greenland in THIS PIECE. and also carrie's dislike for greenland lmfao. please enjoy!!! <3

Greenland was anything but green, it seemed.

Maybe that's why the Vikings called it that - to freak the living fuck out of any sort of enemy that was bound to come this way and make them mistake what was actually a stupid ice block for well - 'green land'.

The landing had been less that superb and Captain Faulkner had dismissed them all to the bar to the left of the tarmac for the rest of the evening off.

Birdie Faulkner was everything, including a realist, and she seemed to understand that the rather harrowing conditions of their landing was something that required at least a drink or two before bedding down for the night.

With a half-finished beer, Carrie was sure that she could've fallen asleep in that very chair for the time being, but she had to present herself a best she could. With the newest B-17 group collected, Silver Bullets was formulated and crafted by that oh-so-brilliant mind of Birdie Faulkner, and they all had her to thank. And Carrie had to look a bit more put-together than usual - prove she's not just a wash-out bombardier with lackluster experience. That she deserved the spot in Silver Bullets more than anyone else.

"So?" a voice came from her right, settling into the other plush, leather seat at her side, the smiling face of Bessie Carlisle appearing as she popped open her own beer bottle, "Greenland, huh?" Carrie smirked and rolled her shoulders and glanced around.

"It's cozy, really," Carrie offered, "I'm considering taking a swim in the river, suntanning-"

"Okay, smart ass," Bessie said with a chuckle, her boot nudging her own foot, "can't say I'm complaining. Finally out of those training cycles, working towards the war. Maybe, we'll actually put ourselves to use instead of waiting just to go on a practice run." Carrie watched Bessie and then smiled widely.

"Love it so much that I may tell my future husband that 'Hey, we're moving to Greenland!', pack up the truck, babe, forget Brooklyn, home is where the grass is a solid as a fucking rock," Carrie said, sipping her beer, "not to mention the weather. I love to freeze."

"Someone's happy." a new voice chimed in, as Francis settled into a chair opposite them, sucking down a portion of her beer and grinning, "I've never seen you so enthusiastic about something." Carrie deadpanned.

"I'm really jumping for joy over here, Monty." Carrie told Francis, raising her glass of beer up in mock ceremony, "You know me so well." Francis and Bessie burst out into laughter as Carrie leaned back in her chair with a sigh and looked towards the ceiling.

"When the hell are we going to England?" Carrie asked, counting the flecks of rotting wood in the wooden ceiling, her eyes tracing the pieces that stuck out of the ceiling panels before losing her spot and recounting, "If I could just get another beer started, I'd be ready by tonight to head out. No pit-stops for me, I'm just fine with a beer stop and then jetting off to England and calling it a day."

"I wish I had the same energy towards that, Bergie, I really do," Bessie said, "afraid to say I'd ask for a few hours of sleep thought over that."

"Sleeps overrated half the time!" Carrie admonished still staring up at the ceiling, "How you gonna get a thing done when sleep's-"

"Exactly what you need." Carrie blinked a few times and into focus above her head came James Douglass - fellow bombardier, with whom Bessie had introduced on one of Carrie's first days after her transfer on base.

Carrie remembered first time seeing him coming towards them, with that carpet on his face he called a mustache, a sharp smirk, a rather loud, somewhat obnoxious voice, a quick hand-shaking, before he was wrapping his arm around her shoulder and pointing out to various areas along the base like they'd been friends for years - something that had caught her completely off guard. And ever since then, with their few chance meetings, they'd been nothing but a trifle of teasing jabs and somewhat good-natured fun.

Key word: somewhat.

Because she could never actually read James Douglass unlike Benny DeMarco or Hambone Hamilton who were just about as sweet to her as her grandma's hotcakes. He'd see her and beeline, make a few jokes, flirt shamelessly, and then go dance with the next girl who'd take his hand. He was quite the character and Carrie usually didn't engage in much conversation past when he'd come to seek her out.

Except now, he was hung above her like a hyperactive golden retriever, like the dog, Kering, that had lived down the street from the Achterberg's in Brooklyn all her life. Running out of the Wilkes house anytime the door opened, barking and sniffing and tearing around the neighborhood like a lunatic. Yeah, Kering the golden retriever who looked like he was a lunatic reminded her exactly of James Douglass.

Nice to know home was never far.

"What are you trying to say, huh?" Carrie asked, still slouching in the chair and staring up at him hovering over her. Douglass grinned at her, showing off his pearly whites and that charming look on his face and he let out a chuckle.

"You know, a little sleep never hurt a soul. Only reason we're even alive," Douglass said, reaching forward to rub her shoulder, "makes the brain happy or some shit. Makes people less….cranky."

"You calling me cranky, now?"

"Cranky. Now that's just one of many words-"

"Oh, you little-"

"Alright!" Bessie said standing and shoving Douglass pack from where he currently was occupying Carrie's headspace, "Nice to know some things never change." Carrie glanced at her as she sat up and Bessie raised a brow with a smirk.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Douglass said from behind Carrie, before he moved around her chair and took the other open seat in the grouping of four, and kicking back to relax. Carrie watched Bessie before looking at Francis, who was rather interested in her cup of beer, before glancing at Douglass, who was already looking at her.

"What?" she murmured, before he made a face and she rolled her eyes.

"How was the flight over, Douglass? Invigorating?" Bessie asked Douglass, with a smile - leave it to Bessie to be sweet as cream on any given occasion.

"You woulda thought Greenland would be, well, fucking green-"

"That's what I said!" Carrie butted in, getting looks from the other three, before settling on Douglass who was watching her, with a mixture of interest and annoyance, but she couldn't seem to decipher the two and sank back in her chair, "Greenland's cold as fuck, not some East Coast paradise I'll give ya that." She heard Douglass chuckle at that as Carrie took in more sips of beer.

"With the way we were flying in, I wasn't even sure we were gonna make it at first, I'll tell you that," Douglass said, "you sit in that nose and you swear to God that you'll smash right into the tarmac. Good ole Ev Blakely don't let that sorta stuff happen though."

"Yeah, a real crap shoot." Carrie muttered, "Thought Birdie was gonna bring us in sideways." Douglass raised a brow as he sipped his beer.

"Guess you can say they lied about the fucking weather, too," Douglass offered, "really nice place here. Could barely move my fingers and toes when I actually stood up fully." Bessie let out a chuckle and started sipping her beer again as Carrie narrowed her eyes at her.

"Hey, they're putting on some music to dance, y'all wanna come?" Judy Rybinski's joyfully said as she appeared behind Francis, "C'mon Bessie, I know that look anywhere, you wanna!"

"You know me too well, Jude," Bessie said, getting to her feet and finishing off her beer.

"I'm coming with! No shot I'm missing a chance at good music and good company." Francis said getting to her feet, "The company part may be a stretch-"

"Oh c'mon!" Judy said, taking Francis' hand before looking at Carrie and Douglass unmoved in their chairs, "You two coming?"

"I'm going to continue working on these beers, Jude, but I appreciate it," Carrie said, "Greenland's officially fucked me up." Judy let out a chuckle.

"You enjoy that then, Bergie," Judy said before looking at Douglass, "Dougie?" Carrie glanced sideways at Douglass who sat quietly, before glancing over at Carrie and then Judy again.

"Maybe next time," he said with a nod, "I promise you a dance, got it?"

"Sounds good! Don't have too much fun!" Judy called before she disappeared and some Artie Shaw began playing over the speakers.

"Good to know we have one thing in common, Bergie." Carrie slowly looked over at Douglass, that annoying nickname rolling off his lips like it had before, "We both hate Greenland." And he grinned at her and couldn't help but smirk back.

"First off, don't call me that. Second, you might be right about that," Carrie said, sipping her beer again, "you know that it's called Greenland because of the Vikings?" Douglass let out a chuckle and shook his head.

"Nah, you're fucking with me," he said, "the Vikings? The guys with the horns on their heads?"

"I'm not kidding," Carrie said sitting up and fully meeting his gaze for the first time since he had hung overtop her, "I swear to you, they did it. Tricking their enemies. For the sake of how much can they fuck a person in the head." Douglass watched her for a moment, before letting out a laugh and sipping his beer again, before smirking.

"Maybe they were just being smart," Douglass countered, "before they knew that it was just one sheet of ice for miles on end. Then they realized what a shitty name Greenland was." Carrie stared at him for a moment, before smiling slightly, unable to hold back her grin.

"You really know how to get under my skin, don't ya?"

"Guess you could say I know what makes you tick."

"Oh so now you suddenly know everything about me, huh?" Carrie said, leaning over to give his shoulder a playful shove, "Well, go on, what's my favorite color?" She watched him and noticed him glance at her lips - surprisingly - before moving back to her eyes.

"I don't know….blue probably." Carrie watched him and stilled for a moment.

"Uh….yeah, actually." she said quickly, and forced down the way her cheeks flamed (and for what she didn't know), "Alright, well, where do I come from?"

"Brooklyn." Douglass said, laughing at the look on her face, "Look, sweetheart, that New York accent ain't just a voice with Southern twang. I know if I was walking down the streets, and I heard your voice, it'd be you."

"God, what the hell." murmured Carrie as Douglass chuckled, "You won't get this - school subject." Douglass looked at her and then smirked before leaning forward.

"Something with math, right?" he asked her confidently, "You don't just get interested in this sorta shit without having some interest there." Carrie watched him and tilted her head.

"Are you mind-fucking me or something?" she asked him, "How the hell-"

"Just good at reading people I guess." Douglass said with a smirk, "Contrary to popular belief, Bergie, I usually know what I'm talking about. There's a reason I'm a bombardier and not just some journalist or something." She watched him and licked her lips.

"Is that why you joined?" she asked him, "The Air Force? Flying in B-17s?" Douglass glanced at her and nodded.

"Had to join the fight somehow, couldn't just sit back and let the fucking Nazis think they could walk all over us," Douglass said, finishing his beer, "that sorta stuff just don't fly around here. Well, except us. We fly." The two burst out into laughter, before they both died down and looked to one another. For a moment, they were quiet regarding one another with somewhat hesitant gazes as Carrie finished off her beer.

"Well, I'm gonna head-"

"Did you wanna-"

They both watched each other, before breaking out into laughter and righting themselves.

"You go." Douglass said.

"I was gonna head out. Get some rest. Pretty tired." she said quickly, her heart racing as she smiled at him with a nod, "You?" Douglass stared at her and for the first time, she saw the sudden shyness in his gaze as he glanced away from her and then back.

"Just…was gonna get another drink, but you head out, get some rest," he said, before smirking at her, "you need it."

"Oh, you asshole." grumbled Carrie knocking his shoulder before standing to her feet, Douglass following suit. The stood there for a moment, looking at one another - usually, if this were a Silver Bullets girl, she'd give them a hug, but with Douglass, she felt frozen in place. She stuck out her hand instead, to shake, and he shook her hand, and she felt more awkward than ever before, as she shook back. His handshake was firm though, and confident and suddenly made her feel like some 16-year-old girl in high school and balked.

"Well, I'll see you around." she said, stumbling back a bit, "Night!" And she disappeared quickly - like she always did. She found the barracks, promptly settled into bed, and then stared at the ceiling, counting the dried pieces of wood hanging from the panels again.

And she replayed the look in James Douglass' eyes - over and over.

And for the first time in years, all she could think about was James Douglass' eyes that had watched her like that, as she tried to fall asleep.

To say the least, it was the best sleep in months.

[allthehumanflaws]

The Umbrella Academy S4

If you haven't completed season 4 please don't read any further

This is my complete rant- I just ughhh ohkay

So the ending huh I don't even know what to say. I don't know what that was. Was it just me or did someone else also presume that Viktor would be the one dying?? Why did all of them die? It seems so rushed. Just 5 minutes between Five realizing what's gonna happen and what they need to do and then just bam it's over i'm sorry what the fuck- I had so much hope and thrill and passion going into this season all doomed.

Don't even get me started on the Five and Lila thing. hey stevie when some of the people said they'd like to see a number five romantic subplot...... THIS IS NOT WHAT THE MEANT!?!? You're tryna tell me Five "survived 45 years in an apocalypse killed hundreds and thousands of people and the board of directors of a deadly commission just to get back to his family and keep them safe" Hargreeves the Five Hargreeves who had many a year and opportunity to find himself a woman after joining the commission but stayed loyal to a fucking mannequin fell in love with his brother's wife after 7 years of being stuck with her? SPECIALLY after he specially told Diego that Lila wouldn't throw all that away he fell in love with her and was heartbroken when she didn't throw that away????? What of the frenemy dynamic? What of the 'you killed my parents in cold blood' part of that equation? All gone cause of what? I see no point or use of that in the already fucked storyline? I don't even know what to say.

Luther had NO character this season. He's just a big soft bag of fluff I mean i don't hate that not at all but like... and his powers were just reduced to what... accidentally breaking an alarm clock and jumping of a stage into a crowd of women? yay i guess. And WHERE WAS SLOANE? WHAT HAPPENED TO HER?

Klaus oh my poor heart- a germaphobe. Really a germaphobe? Of all the things he could've been. When the grave scene happened where they were shooting outside and he covered his ears I got so excited like yes yes Vietnam Klaus... I mean yeah he's traumatized but I thought they'd work with that even just a little bit but no. None of that just terrified of ghosts druggie Klaus.

Allison Hargreeves - I have a vent about her already posted. And there it seems I hate her and maybe a little yeah but that means there was like a pacific load of area they could've worked with but no? none of that. She is just back to normal a little scared but that's all. "Since Ray walked out!" THAT"S ALL WE GET FROM RAYMOND CHESTNUT!? What why how when under what conditions??????????? Nothing?? Huff man. I know this is too much for one season and I know they couldn't have included everything in one season but they had such a great show. Such a brilliant show. Season 3 was a very apt ending. It was perfect to be very honest, this is just uncalled for. All the characters are so not who we as viewers were shown for 3 seasons which is why I feel it feels more like a disappointment. Yeah without their powers they'd be different, but they're just not them anymore.... Anyway I should probably sleep.

Tell me what you think of all this :)

[my-autism-adhd-blog]

Not really a question but I just need to say this to someone who will understand. Also, people have asked you questions what a meltdown looks like. So this is mine, one of the worst I've ever had in my adult life.

I'm 40 years old and am so good at masking that I wasn't diagnosed as autistic until my mid-30s. Normally, I can blend into most social situations. However, I have been in constant pain for 2 months due to a medical issue, and the exhaustion of pain that will never stop has eroded away all the mask. I am now 100% Naked Autistic, because I am burned out beyond anything I've ever felt in my life.

Yesterday I had a complete and utter meltdown in the doctor's office, and it was terrifying. First, he entered the room angry, yelling at me to "stop being rude to my staff". I'm extremely sensitive to being called "rude" because that's what I've been called all my life, just for existing. I've internalized it and now I know, my existence is rude. So whenever someone calls me "rude", it hurts very deeply, even when I'm NOT in a burnout state.

This doctor was SO angry and yelled at me SO much and I couldn't hold it together, I started to cry. He told me to calm down "or else", but I was already in the middle of a meltdown, I literally couldn't.

Then he gave me bad medical news. My test results were inconclusive and didn't show what was wrong with me. Which meant there was no hope of my pain ending any time soon.

Thankfully my mother was there and she helped me communicate, and we at least got him to order more tests, and to prescribe me a new medication to try. But at no point did he become kind or merciful; it was clear from his face that he just wanted me out of his sight as quickly as possible, because I am "rude".

At that point I was so overwhelmed with emotions that I turned into an animal. I had to escape; my flight response kicked in HUGE. I ran out of there. The minute I was in the hall I started to scream at the top of my lungs, and I could not stop. I punched the concrete wall over and over (my hand is all bruised today, I think I'm lucky that it's not broken). People in the hall were terrified of me. Rightly so. I was violent and out of control. I tried to rip the pictures of the walls, but they were screwed down.

My mother was brilliant. She knew I couldn't stop, or speak, or listen. She said to me "Our goal is to get to the car. Let's get to the car. We can do it." Simple, clear direction that was easy to follow. I couldn't stop screaming or crying, but I could walk. She put her hand on my shoulder and guided me, down the hall, out the door, into the car. Because if I'd stayed in the building with that behavior, police could have been called. Very bad things could have happened. She saved me from that.

I screamed in the car for a long time. I could only sob and cry and scream. I think about a half hour went by. It was a long time. Finally, because I was in a safe place (our familiar car), with a person I trusted (my mother), the worst of the meltdown passed and I was able to stop screaming.

I was exhausted. I was terrified. My hand was killing me. I was like a puppy or a little child, helpless to my overwhelming emotions. Eventually, Mom asked if I'd like to get a donut from the donut shop across the street. She moved my mind onto something else. The donut tasted delicious (I mean its a donut), and that pleasant sensory input helped me focus my mind. I finally calmed down enough that we could talk.

I am 40 years old, live independently, have a professional career, a long-term relationship with my partner, and otherwise appear to be a "successful allistic". But yesterday, I was absolutely nonfunctional. If I didn't have my needs supported by my mother, who knows what could have happened.

I am much better today. Exhausted from everything, but not overwhelmed anymore. I'm telling this story so that others who go through a meltdown can know what it is- and why they're suddenly acting like that. It's because of my autistic brain, and the fact that it was overwhelmed with more emotion than a body can handle or express.

But it passes. It ends. The next day comes, and you can try to heal.

Hi there,

Thank you for sharing your experiences. I’m not sure if you’re seeing that doctor or not, but I would try and distance myself if you work together, or see each other.

That doctor, or whoever it was, is the rude one, yelling at people and being disrespectful and not understanding. Who walks in and randomly starts yelling at people?

I sometimes have my boyfriend or mom speak for me because sometimes I don’t know what to say or do in certain situations.

Sorry for the rambling. Thanks again for sharing. I hope you have a wonderful day/night. ♥️

Also please try and get away from that doctor. Reading this made me sad and angry. I’m sorry you had to deal with this. Sending a hug.

[mama-qwerty]

The Curious Case of Miles Prower

Okay, so because I should be working on the next chapter of Fall of the Status Quo, or the next part of my Eclipse intro story, I instead wrote this. Because I can’t stop thinking about the adorable-ness that is the de-aged Tails art of @dakt37

Seriously, it’s freaking adorable. Check it out if you haven’t already.

This isn’t much, but I thought it was a good intro to the plot.

~~~~~

Sonic stared at the little two-tailed fox, currently curled and napping on the floor.

“Tails,” he muttered to himself, a tired groan mixed in with the words. “What have you done to yourself?”

The boy didn’t answer, instead curling into a tighter ball. His twin tails flicked at the tips, twitching with whatever dream the kit was having.

Running a hand down his face, Sonic heaved a sigh. His brilliant best friend slash adopted little brother usually took detailed notes about whatever invention or experiment he was working on at any given time. But sometimes—like this time, apparently—the fox got a little too caught up in his brainwork, and would only write notes once the burst of inspiration had faded.

Unfortunately, it would seem he’d never write those notes, now.

Because he was currently about three years old.

At least, that’s how old Sonic thought he was. He’d been about four when the hedgehog had originally found him, being bullied by some older kids for having an extra tail. Had he been this little then? The fox seemed littler now, but maybe it was because Sonic was older? He himself had only been about 11 when they’d met, so still just a little kid himself.

Was that only four years ago? Seemed like a much longer time. Seemed like they’d known each other forever.

Sonic sighed again, sitting heavily on a workbench stool. He glanced over the mess strewn across the bench itself—tools, papers, pencils, bits and bobs of various machines in various states of repair—and felt a sense of helplessness. “I have a system,” Tails had told him once. “I know it looks like a mess, but it makes sense to me. Don’t touch anything!”

Your ‘system’ leaves a lot to be desired, buddy, Sonic thought, glancing back at the kit on the floor. How can we fix this when we don’t even know what you were doing in the first place?

Tails gave a little squeak in his sleep, and Sonic’s ears twitched, instantly flicking toward him. The boy twitched, caught in the web of bad dreams, and a whine escaped his little throat.

Without thinking, Sonic bent to scoop the boy into his arms, bringing the kit up to cuddle against him. Tails curled tighter for a second, before uttering another squeak and turning his face into the soft fur of the hedgehog’s chest.

“You’re okay,” Sonic soothed, holding his now much littler brother close. “You’re safe. I’ve gotcha.”

Another sound left the boy’s throat, this time a kind of grunt. Then he uncurled, reaching his little arms around to cling to Sonic and hug him tight.

A lump formed in the hedgehog’s throat. Had Tails been this little back when Sonic first found him? At four, he must not have been much larger than this. What possessed him to think that he, at only 11, would be capable of taking care of someone else, especially one so young?

All their early adventures flittered through his mind then. The danger. The risks. Sure, he’d done his best to keep Tails safe and unharmed, but, again, he was ELEVEN YEARS OLD at the time. Not exactly an age that’s known for good ideas and sound decisions.

He thought about the kids around the village who were about that age, and his chest tightened. He wouldn’t trust any of them with a four year old, even in the confines of a village with other people around. Yet, he’d run around other islands, dragging a literal baby with him, without a second thought.

This stomach clenched at what could have happened. How many times Tails could’ve been hurt. Or worse. Because of his lust for adventure.

“I’m sorry, Tails,” Sonic said, his voice soft. He nuzzled Tails’ head, and the boy uttered a soft purr. “I haven’t been the best big brother. I just . . . didn’t know better. But I’ll make sure you’re taken care of now. I promise.”

Tails sighed, snuggling deeper into Sonic’s chest fur. His twin tails split, curling around either side of the hedgehog’s waist.

~~~

Like this? Check out my other snippets. Reblogs are appreciated!

[chickensarentcheap]

Lost and Found- Chapter 22

Fandom: Extraction

Pairing: Tyler Rake and Esme Drummond (OFC. But you do not have to read the others in the series to understand this fic.)

Warnings: some profanity, angst

ALSO, IT'S A LONG ONE, FOLKS lol. Sorry.

*Includes Extraction 1 and 2 canon mentions

Tagging: @tragiclyhip @munstysmind @themaradwrites @youflickedtooharddamnit @secretaryunpaid @kmc1989 @thebejeweledwatercat @asirensrage @theesirenteller @residentdormouse @arrthurpendragon @ocappreciation @occommunity @karimac @alisbackalleybbq @ninjasawakenedmystar

Link to Ao3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/43179357/chapters/130239049

My tag list is OPEN. Please just let me know if you'd like to be added :D

****

He lounges in the room Millie shares with Abuela. Stretched out on his side and propped up on his elbow; watching as his daughter quietly and contently plays just mere inches away. The four-year-old clad in her choice of attire for the day; consisting of a red and black button-down shirt paired with extremely bright and bold leggings with cat faces splashed over every inch. Her hair loose and unruly; falling into her eyes and over her face as she kneels in front of a large plastic tote box. Holding a treasure trove of belongings that Yaz had managed -after he and a small team had successfully broken in- to gather from Alessio’s home. Her entire collection of GI Joe dolls and My Little Ponies, more art and craft supplies, and a handful of Barbies and accessories.

“Tyler?”

He helps himself to one of the wine gums from the open carton that sits between them. Even in the midst of all of his prepping and immersing himself further in the role of mercenary, he had taken the time out when she’d requested his attention. Unable to resist that tiny voice, that hopeful smile, and those brilliant blue eyes. “Yeah?”

“Do you think that Barbie…” Millie holds up her favourite doll; baring beautiful dark skin and shimmering black hair and wearing a sparkling gold mini dress. And a matching pair of impossibly high heels. ”...THIS Barbie…would like GI Joe?”

“Which GI Joe are we talking about?”

“This guy!” She picks up the action figure in question; tall and muscular with blond hair and green eyes, clad in his fatigues. “He’s my all-time fave! The rest are just…I dunno…too basic for my best Barbie.”

“Basic?”

“Momma says that, in a nutshell, someone who is basic is VERY boring. Unoriginal. They don’t offer anything new. They can put you to sleep with how ordinary and vanilla they are.”

“She says that a lot about people?”

“Just the guys who try and date her. And you know what? She’s right. They’re basic as hell.”

Smirking, he pops the wine gum into his mouth.

Millie lowers her voice. “Momma actually calls them a bad word. Can I tell you what it is? Without getting in trouble? Or without telling her I said it?”

“I won’t give you any grief for it. And remember what I told you? About how snitches get stitches? Your secret’s safe with me.”

“She calls them ‘basic bitches.’” She dissolves into giggles, both hands covering her mouth, her eyes narrowed and sparkling. “Isn’t that hilarious? Basic bitches. It’s mean, but it’s funny too!”

“Does your mom date a lot? Has there been a lot of guys? Before Alessio? That come around?”

“No. Not really. Not a lot. Just a few. And momma didn’t date. They TRIED and date her.”

“Gotcha. So they ask her out and…?”

“And she always said ‘no’. That she wasn’t interested. She was nice when she told them that. She said just too busy with work and taking care of me. But once they were gone? She told me the real deal.”

“She told you? Or did you hear her telling someone else?”

“You’re good. You’re REALLY good. Don’t tell her that either, okay? That I spy sometimes? I hear things. Mostly when she’s talking to Auntie Nik on the phone or Facetime. Sometimes it’s Uncle Yaz. Mom thinks I’m asleep, but I’m really sitting at the end of the hall. She can’t see me if she’s in her room, and I’m hiding there.”

“This is when you lived in your old apartment?”

Millie nods. ”I LOVED that apartment. It was nice. Better than living at Alessio’s dumb-ass house. I wasn’t allowed to do anything there. I wasn’t allowed to make crafts because they were too messy, I wasn’t allowed to listen to music and dance, and I definitely wasn’t allowed to have a pet. I had a cat. Before we moved in with him.”

“Where’s the cat now?”

“Uncle Duey took her. Her name is Beatrice, but everyone calls her Bea. Like how my name is really Amelia, but everyone calls me ‘Millie.’ She’s super cute; she’s black, but she has white under her chin and near her nose, and she has white socks. We got her from the shelter.”

“You miss her?”

“I miss Bea all the time. She used to sleep with me. Every night. Right by my head. And she was a lot of fun! She would play fetch; I’d throw her favourite toy, and she’d run and grab it and bring it back to me! And she LOVED to sit in the window and yell at the pigeons that came on the balcony. I bet she would have grabbed ‘em and beat ‘em up if mom let her outside.”

“That wouldn’t have been good. What if they beat HER up?”

“Do you know who the Bowery King is?”

“I know a bit about him.”

“Momma and Uncle John know him. I only met him once. Momma took me to where he lives. He has tons of pigeons! And mom said if Bea ever got out and caught one of his birds? We would have been in big shit!’

Tyler gives a small chuckle. “I can imagine.”

“Uncle John said we would have been fine. He would have protected us. He would have told the Bowery King to take a hike! He didn’t say it like THAT, though. He said the ‘f word’. Do you know what word I mean?”

“I do. Very well. So about these guys your mom would date…”

She stares at him pointedly. And in those narrowed eyes and furrowed brow, he immediately sees himself.

“That tried to date HER,” he quickly corrects himself. “She didn’t like any of them?”

“I mean, I guess she liked them enough. To at least give them a chance.”

“What happened? Things didn’t work out?”

“She got bored with them. They weren’t interesting enough for her. And they all had boring jobs; lawyers and doctors and guys that work on Wall Street. Yawn city! And they weren’t even good-looking to make up for it! But there was one guy, though. That was pretty cool. I liked him.”

“What was he like?”

“He was super nice. He would always bring us takeout; pizza and Chinese and fried chicken and even tacos!”

“Everything is about food with you, isn’t it.”

“It’s my love language. It makes my tummy AND my heart happy. I don’t care if I get fat when I’m older. I’m gonna eat as much as I want. Whatever I want, too!”

“So this guy…”

“He used to take us to Rangers hockey games and to see the Mets play baseball. And sometimes, he’d take me places all by himself. We’d go to the movies and bowling and to the arcade!”

“Your mum was okay with that? Just sending you off with him!”

“She trusted him. He was a policeman!”

Tyler frowns. “He was a cop.”

“Not like a regular one. He wore normal clothes. Sometimes a suit and tie. And he would go to accidents and murders and stuff and ask people lots of questions.”

“He was a detective?”

“Yeah! That’s what he was! He was an alright guy, though. He was nice to me. And I think he REALLY liked mom.”

“Did he ever stay over?”

“Hell no! That’s a big no-no! Momma NEVER let that happen. She would always say that ‘Millie isn’t ready for that kind of thing’. And she was right. I didn’t want to see some guy walking around in his gitch first thing in the morning!”

“What happened? With your mum and this guy? She wasn’t into him?”

“She seemed like she was. They spent a lot of time together. It’s kinda weird, right? That he was a cop? ‘Cause momma’s job is totally illegal, and Auntie Nik is a criminal! Did you know that? That she was in jail?”

“I did know that, yeah.”

“Totally badass, right? But the guy? He found out the truth about what mom does for a living. And everything about Auntie Nik and Uncle Yaz. After that, he couldn’t date momma anymore. If he did, he’d have to arrest her.”

“That wouldn’t have been good.”

“No. But instead of doing that, he just decided not to see her anymore. He said he would pretend he NEVER found out the truth. That’s good of him, I think. ‘Cause then momma would have gotten in trouble, and I never would have seen her again. That would have made me really sad. Not to have my momma. And you never answered my question.”

“I forgot what it was.”

“Would my favourite Barbie like my favourite GI Joe?”

“What do you think?”

“Well, he seems nice enough. He’s definitely not boring. Like Ken. Ken is definitely what mom would call a basic bitch.”

“Yeah, he’s always been a drongo.”

“What does that mean? drongo?”

“Stupid. An idiot.”

“A dumb ass?”

“Basically. That’s what we call them. In Australia. Drongos.”

“Does everyone in Australia talk like you do?”

“Maybe not exactly like it. But we all have accents. They sound a bit different; depending on what area you come from.”

“And are there tons of cool words there? That you say different than us?”

“Way too many to count. Once you get settled, I’ll teach you all kinds of cool slang.”

“Will you teach me the swears too?”

“I don’t know about THAT.”

“Please? Pretty please? I want to learn the swears! I promise I won’t repeat them. Not in front of other adults or kids. And especially not in front of momma. It can just be for us!”

“We’ll see.”

“And am I really going to get to see kangaroos and koalas?”

“I get them all the time around the house. The koalas love the trees in the backyard. They’re always hanging out in them. You’ll have to be careful, though; they’re cute, but they can be nasty. Don’t go around chasing them and trying to pick them up, alright?”

Millie nods. “Momma said there’s lots of snakes there, too. Will we get to see those?”

“Sometimes they even get in the house. Then I have to grab them and take them back outside. Are you scared of snakes?”

“Nope. Momma is, but I’m not. I think they’re cool.”

“You can help, then. We get any in the house, you can be the junior snake wrangler.”

“Is it true that the spiders are the size of dinner plates? That’s what mom said.”

“They can be≥ d. They won’t hurt you, though. They’re huge and ugly, but they’re not dangerous.”

“I wanna see one. Really bad!”

“Tell you what, first one I have to relocate ‘cause your mom is threatening to burn down the house? I’ll let you hold it. Get you used to handling them. So you’re not freaking out when you see them wandering around the place.”

“So I’m not a ‘fraidy cat like mommy! When we lived in our old apartment, we’d get spiders! Just little ones, though. And daddy long legs. She was even scared of them! I’m the one who had to get them for her. And she would always want me to kill them! ‘Millie, get him! Squish him!’ Mean mom! But you know what I did instead? I saved a spaghetti sauce jar and cleaned it all out and that’s what I’d put them in. And then I’d take them outside and let them go!”

They lapse into a comfortable silence, and Tyler watches her as his little girl neatly arranges her toys and craft supplies in the bin; not having the heart to point out that all the transporting during their relocation to Australia would no doubt leave the bin in a disorganized mess. She hums while she works; a trait she’d inherited from her mother, and he’d both discovered and fallen in love with- during their year together.

Yet despite the similarities to Esme, he sees more of himself inside Millie than anything else. The identical profile -before his nose had been broken and left him with the bump in the bridge-, the same furrows in the brow, the brilliant blue eyes, the curve of the jaw line, the slim, slender neck, and long, almost gangly limbs. And it’s almost unsettling; sitting across from his ‘mini me’ with all their likeness and her resemblance in physical appearance, personality and likes and dislikes she shares with his son. Their love for drawing and crafts. Their care and compassion for animals. Their endless curiosity and love for life and everyone in it.

Sitting back on her heels, she shoves her hair out of her face “Tyler?”

“Millie?”

“Can I ask you a question?”

“You’ve been on a roll so far. I don’t see a reason for you to stop now.”

“It’s kinda personal. And touchy.”

“Personal and touchy for who?”

“Me. I might get emotional.”

“That’s okay. You’re human. Nothing wrong with being emotional.”

“I don’t want to embarrass myself. In front of you.”

“There’s nothing for you to be embarrassed about. It’s normal; to get emotional and show and talk about feelings. Even guys like me do it.”

“Really?”

He nods. “I didn’t do it for a long time. I was always scared to. And then I met your mum, and she taught me that it was alright to show that side of myself. To get angry and sad. To even cry sometimes.”

“YOU cry?”

“Everyone does. Or everyone should, at least.”

“And mumma taught you that?”

“Your mum taught me a lot of things. About myself. And about others and how to treat them. What do you want to ask me?”

Millie releases a long, heavy sigh as she steels her emotions. “Do you think he’ll like me? When he meets me?”

“Who is ‘he’?”

“My dad.”

His entire body tenses; throat and jaw tightening, stomach clenching.

Millie continues, not noticing his sudden discomfort. “My daddy lives really, really, REALLY far away. We’ve never actually seen each other. And momma said that when I’m a bit older, she’s going to take me to meet him. And I wanna meet him, but I’m scared. That he won’t like me.”

“Why wouldn’t he like you? What’s not to like?”

“What if he thinks I’m annoying? ‘Cause I talk so much? Or what if he thinks I’m too noisy and too messy and too bossy and that I need to go live somewhere else? Away from mom.”

“Did someone say all those things? About you? Is that why you’re afraid he will?”

“Alessio. He didn’t like me being around. He said I was ‘too much’. That I needed to be taught how to behave ‘cause mom obviously never bothered to do it. He wanted to send me away. To a special school. Where I’d have to live. Instead of with momma.” Her lower lip and chin wobble as tears sparkle in her eyes. “I don’t want to be away from momma. I’d miss her too much. I’d cry all the time.”

“No one is going to take you away from your mum. You’re going to stay with her. Until you grow up and you meet some nice guy and…”

“Or girl. It could be a girl, too. That’s okay, you know. If girls love girls and boys love boys.”

“...and you have little ones of your own. Then you’ll want your own space. To raise your family.”

“But somewhere close to mom. Real close. Maybe next door. ‘Cause I don’t want to be far away. What if I need her? Or what if she needs me?”

“Then you live as close as you can to her. But still be under your own roof. No one is going to take you from your mum. She’d never let that happen. I’D never let that happen.”

“He was mean. Alessio. Mom and him fought all the time. Is it my fault? That they did?”

“No. It’s not. And nothing that happened the other night is your fault, either. You know that, yeah?”

She nods.

“You didn’t do anything wrong. You didn’t cause them to fight. They fought because your mum was sticking up for you. Because she would do anything to protect you. And he didn’t like that.”

“And because he’s a drongo!”

“He definitely is. A big fucking drongo.”

Clamping a hand over her mouth, she giggles at his words.

“And why would your dad not like you? What’s not to like?”

“Because I can be super loud. And messy. And a bit too much.”

“You’re four. You’re supposed to be loud and messy. And a bit too much.”

“So you think he will? Like me?”

“No. I don’t think he’ll like you. I think he’ll love you. How can he not? You’re his little girl. His baby. So unless he’s a complete asshole…”

“He’s not. Momma said he’s a really nice guy. And momma wouldn’t lie about that. If he was a jerk, she’d say so. And she wouldn’t take me to meet him, that’s for sure.”

“What else has your mum said? About your dad?”

“Just that he lived really far away and that he was a good person with a really good heart. That she wished things could have been different and that she never had to leave. It made her sad, you know. That she couldn’t stay. It made her cry. Talking about it. I don’t like it when mom cries. It hurts my heart.”

“Hurts my heart, too.”

“And she said she loved him. Very much. And that she always would.”

He noisily clears his throat in a desperate attempt to wash away the lump of emotion that threatens to choke him.

“Do you think he loves her? Still?”

“Maybe. You’d have to ask him that.”

“Can I tell you something?”

Tyler nods.

“I’m also scared that he’ll want momma back. ‘Cause we’ll be living with you. And you love momma, and she loves you, and we’re gonna be a family, right?”

“That’s what I want.”

“But what if he wants momma for himself? And you have to fight over her?”

“I’m not worried about that. I already know I’d win.”

“I don’t want to be away from momma, but I don’t wanna be away from you, either. I want to meet him, but I don’t want to live with him. I want to live with YOU. You wouldn’t let him take us, would you? You’d stop him, right? If he tried to force us?”

“He wouldn’t stand a chance. I’m not giving you or your mumma up. You guys are stuck with me.”

“If he doesn’t like me, will you punch him in the face?”

“If you ask me too. But you don’t have to worry about that. He’ll like you. He’ll LOVE you.”

“You promise?”

“I promise.”

“And you promise you won’t let him take us? To live with him? Like I said, I wanna meet him, not live with him.”

“You and your mom aren’t going anywhere.”

“What if mom goes? If she does, can I stay with you? I’m sure my dad’s a good guy, but he probably can’t protect me like you can. He’d probably be scared of the bad guys. And he’s probably not as awesome as you. With the cool hair and all the tattoos and stuff. I bet he’s not like that. At all.”

“You won’t know until you meet him. But even if he is cool, there’s no way he’s as cool as me.”

“Oh god…” Millie gives a dramatic gasp. “...what if it turns out he’s a basic bitch?”

“No one as awesome as you could ever come from someone that’s a basic bitch.”

“That’s a really good point.”

“Your dad is going to love you. Don’t ever doubt that. And don’t ever doubt how much your mum already DOES love you. There’s nothing she wouldn’t do for you, Millie. You’re her baby. You always will be. No matter how old you get.”

“Momma always wanted to be a mommy. Did you know that?”

“I do. We used to talk about it. And we used to talk about having babies. Together.”

“Really?”

Tyler nods. “We wanted to get married. Have a family. And then things fell apart, and we broke up.”

“But if you didn’t break up, she never would have met my dad. And I wouldn’t be here.”

“Where there’s a will, there’s a way.”

“What’s that mean?”

“Let’s just say that if something is meant to be, it’ll be. If someone is meant to be in your life, you’ll find your way back to them. No matter how long it’s been since you last saw them. And I haven’t seen your mum in a long time.”

“But you still love her?”

“I love your mumma very much. More than I ever thought I could love someone. And you know who else I love?”

The four-year-old shakes her head.

“You.”

Millie squeals when she’s scooped up and thrown high over his head; dissolving into giggles when he effortlessly catches her effortlessly and then tickles and lightly pinches her sides. He switches to pressing endless kisses over every inch of her face until she’s laughing hysterically; squirming and complaining that his beard is scratching her. And when he at last collapses onto his back, bringing her tiny body to rest on top of him, she wraps both arms around his neck. Noisily kissing each of his cheeks, and then beaming down at him.

“I love you, too.”

*****

After helping settle Millie for the night, he meets with Nik and Yaz in the former’s hotel room; slowly and meticulously going over his end of the extraction. Pouring over the blueprints of the hotel’s ‘bowels’ spread across the table as Yaz paces the floor; laptop in hand as he verbally rifles off pertinent information. Nik stands alongside Tyler; hunched over the papers, using a red marker to circle and isolate important spots on the map.

“The route will take you through a few different places,” Yaz announces, pausing his pacing in order to take a swig of coffee. “This is the order: secondary kitchen, boiler room, laundry facilities, and an underground bunker.”

Tyler uses the tip of his index finger to trace the path. “What’s the bunker? What’s the story of that?”

“It’s where Winston hides out during ‘intense situations,’” Nik explains. “It’s highly stocked; every handheld weapon you can possibly think of. And its corresponding ammo.”

Tyler smirks. “Something tells me it’s not your basic ‘shelter in place.’ I highly doubt he hangs out somewhere with concrete walls and bare lightbulbs.”

“It’s as luxurious and over the top as you’d expect from him,” Yaz pipes up. “He’s known to hold ‘executive meetings’ and talks with weapons dealers in there. It’s how we first met him. Years ago.”

“There’s no other way to the loading docks? That doesn’t take me right past his little hideout?”

Yaz shakes his head. “None. When it comes to the blueprints, what you see is what you get. Everything that is available to us is right there. There’s no secret passages, no hidden hallways, no indirect path. It’s this way, or no way.”

“And there’s no other options? When it comes to exits?”

“This is the safest route out of The Continental. There’s too much foot traffic if you go in any other direction. This is the only path that’s NOT heavily patrolled by security. And trust me, this place doesn’t just have regular, run-of-the-mill guards to keep things running smoothly and make sure people stay in line. They’re heavily armed. AND expertly trained. You take a different way and run into half a dozen or more…”

“Yaz and I have walked every possible path, documented every step,” Nik says. “None of them give you even the slightest chance of going unseen and unheard like this one does. It’s too risky any other way.”

“Can’t exactly go unseen and unheard if I have to go right past it. I’m leading her right to the wolves. If Winston is hanging out in there and he hears us…”

“It’s a secure room,” Yaz explains. “It’s essentially a vault; with walls thicker and more secure than anything you’d see at even the most high end of banks.”

“A bomb could go off right outside the door, and whoever’s inside wouldn’t even hear it,” his sister adds. “There is no way if he WAS holed up inside, that Winston would know you’re even out there.”

Tyler sighs. “Just the thought of taking her right past his doorstep…”

“This whole place is his doorstep,” Nik reminds him. “There’s no one hundred percent foolproof way to get out of here. In the end, it comes down to picking the least of the evils and just going with it. Hoping for the best.”

“That’s hardly reassuring. This isn’t exactly the job I want to resort to just ‘hoping for the best’. I can’t just cross my fingers and hold my breath and pray that everything’s going to work out. If it wasn’t so personal…”

“We wouldn’t have decided on this route if we had any other option. You know that we’d never put you at risk. That we’d…”

“I don’t care about me. This comes with the territory; putting my ass on the line. But taking her right into the lion’s den? And just hoping nothing goes wrong? That’s not good enough, Nik. That’s not NEARLY good enough.”

“If there were any other options, we would have found them. But this is it, Tyler. It HAS to be this way. There’s nothing else. It’s this way or no way.”

Heaving a sigh, he runs his hands through his hair and down his weary face. Stepping away, he pours himself a cup of coffee from the carafe on the window sill; his back to the others as he nurses his drink and stares into the night. And he finds himself marvelling at the neighbouring buildings; blazing pillars of light that climb high into the black canvas of sky. And in that moment, in a city of millions and in the midst of the hustle and bustle, he’s never felt so…done. Tired of the job and everything that comes with it; the danger and the unpredictability from one moment to the next. He finally feels ready; confident in the decision to -when the final mission is finished and the coast is truly clear- to walk away from it all. To concentrate on creating a normal life; pouring his attention and his energy into firefighting and running his own business. And being a husband and a father. Someone that Esme and Millie can rely on. Not just to protect them, but to provide for them.

Love them.

Nik joins him at the window, uncapping a bottle of water and taking a sip. “Talk to me.”

“About?”

“You’re unsettled. This isn’t like you. You’re usually focused. You have your head on straight. You never break a sweat. Now…”

“This isn’t a regular gig, Nik. You can’t expect me to act like it is.”

“I HAVE to expect it. In the same way YOU have to treat it like you would any job I give you. You can’t let your heart overrule your brain. It’s dangerous. Life threatening. If you start feeling too much…”

“How can I not? This is as personal as it gets. This isn’t just random people I’ve been hired to help. It isn’t my ex-sister-in-law and her kids. This is MY kid. And it’s Esme. MY Esme. These aren’t regular clients.”

“You have to treat them like they are. If you don’t…”

“I can’t just turn it off. Maybe six, seven years ago, I would have been able to. I would have been able to separate THAT Tyler from THIS Tyler. But now…”

“This was a bad idea. Getting you involved. And I told her that. That calling you was the worst thing we could do. That I had other people that could handle this sort of job and…”

“Calling me was the best thing you could have done. For more reasons than one.”

“We’re not going to talk about that. Now isn’t the time. Now…”

“You should have called me a long time ago. About Millie. You had every chance to tell me; that I had a kid out there. And the least you could have done was tell me Esme was alive. You have had every opportunity to put my mind at ease. To let me know that she was okay.”

“I already have explained. Why I did what I did. And I’ve already apologized. I’ve…”

“I don’t care about your apology. I don’t need you to keep saying, ‘I’m sorry.’ Remember when you gave me shit? For not telling you it was my ex-wife who hired me in Georgia? How you talked about not needing my apology but my trust? That should have went both ways. Because now? After everything you’ve done? Everything you COULD HAVE done? How am I supposed to trust YOU?”

She blinks, taken back by his honesty.

“I can’t do this anymore. Not even as a side gig. I can’t keep putting myself out there. Everything’s changed. The second Esme walked back into my life…”

“Don’t make any hasty decisions. Right now, you’re running on pure emotion. You’re…”

“She’s going to need me, Nik. And not like THIS. She doesn’t need mercenary me. She needs a partner and husband and a father to her little girl. And any kids that might come after that. She needs me home. Safe. She shouldn’t be watching me walk out the front door and then spending days…weeks…wondering if I’m going to walk back in.”

“You’re going to have all the time in the world to think about quitting. When this job is done and I’ve taken care of things here in the city, and there’s no more threat…”

“I don’t need any more time. My mind was made up the second I saw her. As soon as she walked into the room and I realized she was the one who hired me, that was it. I don’t need to think about it.”

“Is it what she wants? You walking away?”

“It’s what she deserves. This life? It’s not good for her. And it’s definitely not good for Millie. It’s time, Nik. This is it. No more. No more calling me and asking for favours. I’m done. And if that means you lose my number and forget I ever existed, then that’s the way it has to be.”

“That would never happen. Whether you work for me or not.”

“Esme and Millie have to be first. I made that mistake with Mia; putting the military before her and our boy. I’m not going to do it again. Not with Esme. Not with the love of my life. I lost her once. I’m not going to lose her again.”

“And you’ve talked about this? With her? You’ve…”

“We’re getting married. As soon as we can. Just something small. The two of us and Millie and a couple of witnesses. We have five years to make up for. We’re not going to waste any time.”

“And you’ll be happy? Giving this up? Entirely?”

“Maybe not at first. But it’s something I HAVE to do. I have a family now.”

“You’ve had a family all this time. Yaz and me and…”

“It’s not the same, and you know it. I have a daughter. I’m going to be a husband. And those are the two things I have to concentrate on. I need to give them a normal life. Away from all of this. They deserve better. From me.”

Sighing, she nods slowly as she considers his words)

“You’ll find someone else. That annoys you as much as I do.”

“Maybe that’s true. But I definitely won’t find someone that can do the job nearly as good as you.”

“Maybe it’s time for you to move on, too. Do something else with your life. Remember what you told me? In Austria? About how my entire life fit inside one little box? And how I should do something about it. Well, it’s taken me a couple of years, but that’s exactly what I’m going to do.”

“If anyone deserves a shot at a normal life…”

“And maybe you should take your own advice. You can’t tell me this is all you want. Being caught up in all of this. You can’t tell me this is the only kind of life that makes you happy? What about filling your own boxes? When are you going to start on that?”

A smirk tugs at the corner of her mouth. “I’m not taking personal life advice from you. Considering the mess you made of things by getting hooked up with Delaney…”

“I know I’m not the guy who should be talking. I don’t exactly have the best track record; when it comes to women and marriage and having kids. But this can’t be it. This can’t be all you want. And don’t even try and lie; I know when you’re full of shit.”

Managing a small laugh, she reaches out to rub his upper arm. “I hope it all works out for you. I hope you and Esme go on to get married and stay that way for a few decades. I hope you have more babies. And grandbabies. I hope you get your happily ever after.”

“So do I.”

“But for now, can we concentrate on other things? On what’s in front of us? Because none of that will happen for you if you don’t get Esme out of here. If that goes wrong…”

Tyler sips his coffee. “I’ve got…concerns.”

“About the plan? The route?”

“I’m not thrilled with having to take her that away; parade right past where Winston might be hanging out. But if there really is no other choice, I’ll make it work.”

“There Is no other option. Believe me, I would have given you one if there were.”

“It’s more than that. Something doesn’t feel right. Something ISN’T right.”

“In what way?”

“Winston’s been way too quiet. Since that sniper tried to take Millie and me out. He hasn’t come up to the suite once; to see how she’s holding up. Don’t you find that a little odd? Considering he calls her his granddaughter? You don’t find it strange that he hasn’t bothered to check if she’s okay?”

“It’s more than a little odd. Much more.”

“All he cared about was the room getting shot up. Us ‘making a mess’ of things. Bringing trouble here. Other than taking the time to try and reem you out…”

“He learned very quickly. That NO ONE speaks to me like that.”

“...he hasn’t made any attempt to contact Esme. And I know that should make me happy; considering he’s got some kind of fucked up old man crush on her…”

“It’s unsettling.”

“Very. He spent how many months keeping her safe here? After that adjudicator showed up at our place, and Esme took off? Better part of a year, yeah?”

Nik nods.

“Even after that, when she finally could go on with her life, he kept tabs on her. Made sure that no one was watching her or causing her trouble. And look how fast he came to the rescue this time. When she and Millie needed a place to hide out.”

“He isn’t just seeing her as a daughter. I’ve always said it; that the way he feels goes far beyond what a parent would feel for a child. It never sat well with me; how much he doted on her and needed to be around her.”

“It’s fucked up. Not just how he feels about her, but how far he’s willing to go to keep her here. Under his thumb. And away from me. Offering me the money to walk away, threatening me, having a sniper try and take me out…”

“We don’t know that was him. That organized that. We…”

“All of that, and now suddenly he’s disappeared? Gone silent? He doesn’t give a shit about her anymore? He hasn’t bothered to check up on her or Millie? It doesn’t make sense. Something isn’t right, Nik.”

“Is that your brain or your gut telling you that?”

“A bit of both.”

“I’ve already told you to listen to your instincts; that they’re very rarely wrong. And if something doesn’t feel right to you…”

“It feels FAR from right.”

“You think he knows what we’re up to? Do you think we might have a mole? That’s tipped him off?”

“It’s possible. He could be just lying in wait. For us to make a move. Is there anyone that you don’t trust? On the team? That sat in on the plans and might have shared the info?”

“I wouldn’t have them here if I didn’t trust them.”

“If he knows what we’re up to, we’re fucked. He’ll be on us before I even get Esme anywhere near the exit. And if he knows what day and time…”

“You’re thinking he might ambush you.”

“Not just him. If he does have a small army of these highly trained security people…”

“Should we change the date? The time? We can’t change the path. There’s no other route to take. And if we’re not out of here before the deadline he’s given us…”

“How comfortable do you feel going to him?”

“It’s pretty much the last thing I want to do, but…”

“What if I asked you to go and talk to him? Try and find out what he knows. See if you can convince him to give us some extra time?”

“Stay here even longer? Tyler…”

“Not actually stay here. But put it in his head that we’re going to, then leak a fake date and time. If he thinks we’re taking off then, that opens the door for the plan we already have. Puts him off our scent.”

“You think he’d fall for that?”

“I don’t know. But at this point, I’m willing to try anything. I HAVE to get her out of here. Without him knowing. Because if he catches on and tries to stop me…”

“If you kill him, you’re just opening up a whole new world of hurt for yourself. And for Esme and Millie.”

“If he gets in my way, I won’t have a choice. Because he’ll stop at nothing to keep her here. And I can’t let that happen. I can’t let him get his hands on her. She’s not his to have.”

“The High Table will come for you. If you kill him, they won’t let you have a moment’s rest. They will track you down. And what kind of life is that? Living with that fear?”

“I’m not scared of them.”

“You should be. Because they won’t think twice about using Esme or Millie to get to you. If you kill Winston and manage to get out of here, you will have a target on your back for the rest of your life.”

“I’ve had one on my back for years.”

“Not from THEM you haven’t. Why would you want to take that risk? Having The High Table after you? Why…?”

“He gets in my way, I will take him out.”

“Don’t do it, Tyler. You may not care about your life, but it isn’t just you anymore. Think about Esme. And Millie. They don’t deserve to live with that kind of fear. And they certainly don’t deserve to lose you. You just got Esme back. You just found out you’re a dad again. Why…?”

“If he doesn’t give me a choice, I’m doing what I have to. To get her out of here.”

“You won’t be safe anywhere. Wherever you run to, they’ll follow. They WILL find you. I’m warning you, Tyler. Don’t do it. Find another way. To deal with him. IF it happens. But don’t do THAT. Anything but that.”

“I can’t make any promises, Nik. Because if he tries to stop me or he hurts her in any way…”

“I am begging you NOT to do it. To not go that route. You can’t take it back. You can’t make things right. If you take him out, you’re signing your own death certificate. You know that, right?”

“I’ll do what I have to do. To get Esme out of here. And if they come for me…”

“Not if. When. WHEN they come for you.”

“Then I deal with it. I pay the price. But you gotta promise me one thing. If that happens.”

“I’m not putting my support behind this. I can’t. I can’t give you my blessing. Not for this. I’m sorry. I…”

“I want you to take care of them. Esme and Millie. Make sure they’re alright. If I’m not around to do it…”

“Don’t talk like that. Don’t…”

“Just promise me, yeah? You’ve done it before; made sure they were safe and taken care of. I’m sure you can do it again. Promise me, Nik. That if something happens to me and I can’t do it myself, you’ll take care of my family. For however long you have to.”

“Tyler…”

“Promise me. That Esme and Millie will be okay. That you’ll keep an eye on them.”

Nik relents. “I promise. But let’s hope it doesn’t come down to that.”

“Yeah…” Sighing, he turns back to the window. “...let’s hope.”

******

It’s after midnight when he returns to the suite; quietly letting himself into the bedroom and then navigating the space by way of the moonlight streaming through the gaps in the curtains. Slipping out of his clothes and tossing them in the open suitcase near the window, he gingerly pulls the blankets back and slips in next to her. A hand on her stomach as he presses his front to her back; eyes closing as he buries his face in her hair and inhales deeply. Taking in that familiar scent. Desperately needing the comfort. The closeness.

“You’re making a habit of this,” Esme teases, her voice quiet, laced with sleep. And she pushes her fingers through his; giving an initial squeeze and then tightly holding his hand. “Coming to bed really late.”

“I’m sorry.” He presses a kiss to the nape of her neck. “It ran longer than I thought it would.”

“Everything went okay? There’s no major changes I need to know about?”

“The plan’s staying the same. I’m not hundred percent on board with it, but considering there’s no other options…”

“Nik wouldn’t take unnecessary risks. With either of us. If she’s adamant that this is the only way it can go…”

“I think I’m just being paranoid. If it wasn’t you and Millie caught up in all this, I’d just go with whatever idea Nik drew up. But seeing as it’s so personal…”

“But do you feel better about things? Then you did last night? Because that spooked me; you questioning everything and not having a lot of confidence in how it’s going to go down. You’re not like that. Not when it comes to the job.”

“This isn’t just any job,” he reminds her.

“You’re going to have to try and focus. You’re going to put your feelings on the back burner and just go with your instincts. Pretend that this IS just like any other job. Because that’s what I need from you. When the time comes. I need THAT Tyler.”

“I’m fucking trying, believe me. But it’s a lot easier said than done.”

“I trust you. To get it together. When it comes to work, you’ve always been able to shut everything else out. Maybe not get rid of it entirely, but at least put it on the back burner. You’re going to have to treat this like it IS just another job.”

“You have a lot of faith in me. You always have.”

“Well, someone needs to.” She rolls over onto her side, eyes briefly closing as he places a kiss on her brow). “How DID it go?”

“It went. We finalized things. And got some loose ends tied up.”

“So that means you’re more confident? About how things are going to go?”

“Yeah…” Leaning in, he nuzzles her temple with the tip of her nose and then pecks her cheek. “...much more.”

“Everything’s going to go nice and smooth,” she enthuses. “According to plan. We’re not going to have any setbacks, no one is going to fuck anything up, people aren’t going to get in our way. Things are going to be perfect and uncomplicated.”

“When did the roles suddenly reverse? Aren’t I normally the one trying to convince you?”

“I can admit, I am usually a touch neurotic…”

“That’s the understatement of the century.”

“...and you are usually the one talking me down off a ledge. But I feel good about this. I feel like everything is going to be fine. That we won’t have any roadblocks. We’ll just get the hell out of here…”

“While I want to share your optimism, when do things ever go smoothly? On the job?”

“I mean, I’ve had a couple of gigs that weren’t major disasters. They weren’t flawless by any stretch of the imagination, but…”

“Remember Dhaka? How easy we thought it would be? After I got a hold of Ovi? That we’d get him to the boat, and we’d be free and clear? Do you remember that?”

“Unfortunately, very well.”

“Believe me, I WANT this to go nice and smooth. No hiccups, no one getting in my way and trying to stop us from leaving. I want that more than anything. But you’ve said it yourself; these people don’t accept defeat easily. They’re not just going to roll over if we DO get out of her.”

“WHEN we get out of here,” she gently corrects. “WHEN.”

“I just don’t want you putting all your eggs in one basket. It’s good to be confident and optimistic, but…”

“It can lead to bad decisions. Stupid mistakes. You get too cocky…”

“Just err on the side of caution, yeah? That’s all I’m asking.”

“Are you asking or telling? Because if it’s the latter, you’re starting your bossiness a little early. I technically don’t have to listen to you until it’s ‘go time’.”

“Who are you trying to kid? You’re not even going to listen to me AFTER that.”

“I promise I will be on my best behaviour.”

“I know what your best behaviour is. And while it’s a step up…”

“I will be completely unproblematic. I will listen to every word the big, bad, mercenary man has to say.”

Grinning, he presses a feathery to the corner of her mouth. “You are so full of shit.”

“You just want to be the boss of me,” she chides and wraps both arms around his neck. “You don’t get to wear the pants very often, but when you do…”

“I wear the pants all the time.”

“You keep telling yourself that. Everyone knows I’m the one in charge. That I’m the boss. I just let you take over every now and then. Stroke your ego. Feed your masculinity.”

“You’re just a regular bleeding heart.”

“And, there are times I DO like you being all aggressive and assertive and bossy. You have to admit, it’s always at the best possible times. The naked ones. Not even you can deny that’s your favourite time to be in charge.”

“I’ll admit to nothing.”

“You don’t have to. The evidence speaks for itself.”

“What evidence is that?”

“I’d say eleven inches poking me in the stomach, or the ass is usually all the proof I need.”

“Eleven? Come on now…”

“Ten and a half? Ten?”

“You are really good for my ego.”

“We’ll have to get an official number. An accurate measurement. I’m sure we’ll be able to track down a tape measure or a ruler when we get to Australia. Inquiring minds want to know.”

“You’re an odd duck, you know that?”

“I like my weirdness. All my quirks and eccentricities. You’ve missed them. Over the course of the last five years. Admit it.”

“I have, actually. I’ve missed a lot of things.” Hooking a finger under her chin, he tilts her face upwards; covering her mouth with his in a long, soft kiss. So pure and beautiful; nothing hurried or aggressive, nor teeming with unbridled lust or overwhelming want and need. A kiss at its most innocent point: adoring, tender, languid. Yet somehow enough to curl her toes and take her breath away.

She gives a sigh when it ends, her eyes remaining closed when he rolls over onto his back; settling her much smaller, lighter frame on top of his.

For five years, she’d longed for this; the smoothness of his skin and the hardness of his muscles. The way his calloused fingers tip continuously skim up and down her spine, his familiar scent and the sound of his voice and how she is able to feel its rumbling deep within his chest. Desperately missing him nearly every second of every day; wanting nothing more than to pick up the phone and beg and plead for forgiveness and end up in his life and his arms and his bed once again. But it had always seemed so far out of reach; believing she was past redemption. Even if he could accept her running away, there was no way he’d ever forgive her for keeping his daughter a secret. Not after the tremendous loss he’d already suffered; still wracked with guilt, regret, and profound grief when it came to the death of his son.

****

“Did you talk to Millie?” His fingertips drift down her spine and briefly settle at the small of her back; a lone fingertip commencing the tracing of the elaborate tattoo that stretches from one hip to the other. “About going with Alcott.”

“I was going to do it tomorrow. Well, today now. After breakfast.”

“I want to be there. When you tell her. I mean, as long as you’re okay with that.”

“Of course, I’m okay with it. You’re her father.”

“Only she doesn’t know what, does she? She has no clue.”

“We’ve talked about this. About when we’re going to tell her. I thought we agreed that…”

“She asked me about him today. Her dad.”

“What do you mean she asked about him? She brought him up out of nowhere? Why did she want to know? What…?”

“She asked me if I thought he’d like her. When she got to meet him. Can you imagine being a little kid and wondering something like that? If your old man is even going to WANT you?”

“No. I can’t even begin to imagine that.”

“She’s four years old. And she’s asking stuff like THAT? She’s worried that she’s going to meet him and he’s going to hate her? Find her a nuisance? Think she’s too loud and too messy and…”

“A bit too much,” Esme finishes for him. “She said that to me once. When she asked about him. About YOU. She said she was worried he’d find her annoying. I just chalked it up to Alessio being a total prick to her. I didn’t think she really felt that way. About herself.”

“She’s just a little girl. And she's carrying around shit like that? How could you have him around her? How could you put her through it? Him treating her like that?”

“I didn’t have a choice. I was in the middle of a job, and if I let my guard down or he found exactly who I was…”

“You should have told Nik you wanted out. The second he started treating Millie like that. As soon as he tried breaking her spirit, that should have been it. You should have got the fuck out of there. She didn’t deserve any of it. Being treated like that.”

“I thought we weren’t going to do this.” Moving away from him, she slaps and shoves his hands away when he tries to prevent her from sitting up. “Not here. Not right now. I thought we were going to wait until we were in Australia and somewhat settled before we talked about all of this. I thought…”

Sitting up, he stretches out his legs and leans back against the headboard. “I can’t do it, Esme. I can’t pretend that everything’s okay. That I’m not pissed off. That I’m not hurt. Do you know what it’s like? When everyone around you has a bigger role in your own kid’s life? All people tell me about is what Millie was like as a baby, all the things that they’ve done for her and with her.”

“They’re not telling you those things to hurt you. They’re just sharing what they know about her. So you can get to know her better.”

“All I hear from people is how they’re her family.”

“It’s because they are. Maybe not a conventional one, but…”

“I’M her family. You didn’t make that baby alone. And I didn’t see any of them making that kid with you either. So unless there’s someone you’re not telling me about…”

“Don’t do that. Say shit like that. I know you’re upset. And you have every right to be. I’ve never once tried to take that away from you. Or tried to downplay it. But you have no reason to question whether or not she belongs to you. Just look at her! She IS you! From head to toe. You’re just lashing out and trying to hurt me, and you know exactly how to do it.”

“I’m not trying to hurt you. I’m…”

“Just admit it, Tyler. Just admit that there’s a part of you that wants to punish me. Make me pay for what I did to you. I’m not going to judge you or hate you for it. I get it, alright? I did a horrible thing; keeping Millie away from you. And you have every right to want to punish me for that.”

“No. I don’t. I’m not like that. I’m not that kind of person. I would never hurt you.”

“I see it in you, sometimes. I’ll catch you looking at me a certain way. And I’ll see it; all this hurt and anger that you’ve got built inside of you. So just tell me the truth. I’m a big girl. I know my mistakes. I admit to them. I own them. So don’t…”

“I don’t want to fight, Esme. That’s not why I brought any of this up. That’s not why…”

“If you didn’t want to fight, you wouldn’t have thrown Millie in my face like that. You don’t think I know how badly I fucked up? Bringing her into that kind of life? You think I don’t feel like complete and utter shit for what happened? What she went through? What she KEEPS going through? You think I like any of this? Having to hide here? Having to hire a fucking mercenary to get us out here and…”

“So that’s how you see me. That’s all you see me as?”

“I never said. Don’t put words in my mouth. I’ve never seen you as JUST that. It’s part of you, but it’s not ALL of you. And I’ve never once thought it was. Who was the one who always talked you down? Every time you’d mention that you did nothing but kill people for a living? Who was the one person that reminded you that you did so much more? Who always tried to convince you that you weren’t the monster you saw yourself as?”

“You.”

“I stayed on that bridge because you deserved a second chance. Because you made your amends. And selfishly, I stayed because I wanted more of you. I wanted more time. I wanted all those plans that we made; I wanted to travel and see the world and fall in love. With YOU.”

“It didn’t exactly go that way, did it.”

“No. It didn’t. But you know what? What we had was good. It was so good. It wasn’t perfect. But neither are we. We had what we needed, and that was enough. We were happy. Weren’t we?”

“We were.”

“I love you. I have always loved you. I always WILL love you. So don’t you ever accuse me of anything else. And never…and I mean never…try and tell me I don’t love my daughter. OUR daughter.”

“I would never say that.” He slides down the bed and reaches for her when she begins to cry; frowning when she pushes him away and stands. Moving to the table in front of the window and leaning back against it; sniffling noisily as she wipes at her eyes. “I’m sorry.”

“I don’t want you to be sorry. I want you to be honest. I need that from you, okay? I know you’re afraid of hurting me; it’s why you won’t just come right out and tell me how you’re really feeling or what’s really going on in your head. But I NEED that, Tyler. Because until you’re truthful about it, I can’t start to make amends. How can I move on and heal when you won’t even acknowledge what I did to you?

“I don’t understand why you need me to be angry. Why..?”

“Because it’s holding me accountable. For what I did. I don’t want you coddling me and holding my hand and patting me on the head and treating me like I’m some fragile little thing. Do you think I’m not going to love you? If you’re honest about everything? Is that what you’re afraid of?”

“I don’t know,” he admits, and swings his legs over the side of the bed. “I guess. Maybe? I don’t want you to think I hate you. Because I don’t. I never could.”

“I know you love me. I know it without you even having to say it. It’s in everything you do. It’s like those five years never even happened. The way you look at me and the way you touch and kiss me and make love to me. It’s like none of the bad stuff ever happened. And I don’t know what I did to deserve that. The way you feel about me. Or if I even DO deserve it. But I don’t question it. Sometimes it’s the only thing I’m sure of.”

“I just don’t see what good can come of it. Me just letting it all out. I don’t understand why you need me to be out there with it. Why can’t you just let me deal with this alone and…”

“That’s the old Tyler. The one that existed BEFORE me. He’s the one that died on that bridge. You’re not HIM. And you haven’t been him in a long time.”

“Maybe I went back to it. Being him. During the last five years.”

“There’s no way. Because you weren’t happy. Being that way. Being HIM. And you worked way too hard after Dhaka. To become better and DO better. There’s no way you’d go back to that.”

“I think you have way too much faith in me.”

“I think you don’t have enough. You would never go back to being like that. I know you. I know your heart. I know…”

“You don’t know a thing about my heart. And you know why? Because you broke it. You fucking tore it out of my chest and stomped all over it. And you expect it to be what it was before you did that?”

“If you were the old Tyler, you wouldn’t have stayed. When you found out I was the one that hired you. You would have turned around and walked out, and that would have been it.”

“I would have stayed. For Millie. I would have done it for her.”

“No, you wouldn’t have. It wouldn’t have mattered. Millie or no Millie, you would have left. The old Tyler? The one with the death wish? The one who didn’t give a fuck about anything except catching a bullet? He would have been long gone.”

“I would have never walked away from her. Even if I wanted to walk away from you, I’d never turn my back on my own kid. I did that once. I wouldn’t do it again. I learned the first time.”

“Is that why you’re here? Why you REALLY want things to work with us? Is that…?”

“I wouldn’t be sharing a bed with you and fucking you. Don’t insult me like that. I know I can be a real dick sometimes, but I’d never lower myself to that. And I would never use you. No matter how pissed off I am.”

“I was just asking. I was just…”

“I’m here because I love you. Because even though you ripped my heart out of my fucking chest and ruined my life, I still want you. In every way. And maybe that makes me a fucking idiot. Maybe I’m just pathetic. A simp. I don’t know. But I love you, and I never stopped loving you. Millie? She’s just this extra piece. This fucking amazing, beautiful, perfect piece.”

“She is pretty amazing, isn’t she.”

“I would never…EVER…accuse you of not loving her. I see you with her. Your entire face lights up when she walks in the room. And every time she hugs you or tells you she loves you or even just calls you ‘mummy’? To me, you’re beautiful all the time. But when she does those things? You’re the most beautiful I’ve ever seen you.”

“She’s my baby. I had wanted to be a mom for so long. And you gave me the chance. You gave me HER. And I could thank you enough for that. For giving me her. Because aside from you, she’s the best thing that has ever happened to me.”

“I know you love her. More than you love yourself. More than you love me. And that’s how it should be. You’re an amazing mum; no one could ever deny that. Or say anything different. Everything you’ve done for her; taking care of her on your own, keeping her safe, managing to bring up this awesome little human. You know how many women wouldn’t have even had her? Considering the circumstances?”

“There was no way I wasn’t going through with it. She was my connection to you. My ONLY connection.”

“Thank you, Esme. Maybe that sounds weird; considering I AM angry and I AM hurt. But thank you. For her. I know it wasn’t the most conventional of ways to find out I’m a dad. But still. Thank you.”

“Please don’t say that. Not after everything I did. Please don’t…”

“She wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for you. I wouldn’t have gotten a second chance at this; at being a dad. It’s just the truth.”

Sniffling, she uses the bottom of her t-shirt to wipe away her tears. “You’ve always been nothing if not honest.”

“You broke us. What we had? You destroyed that. And you’re right; it wasn’t perfect. But it WAS good. It was so fucking good.”

“And now? You don’t think it’s good NOW? You don’t think we can get back to that?”

“I don’t want to go back to that. I want to be BETTER than that. We’re not those same two people anymore. We’ve both changed. Mostly for the better, I like to think. Do you want that? For things to be even better?”

Esme nods. “That’s all I want.”

“Then just look at me and tell me why. Why did it have to get to this? Why did five years have to go by? Why…?”

“I don’t know. I honestly don’t know.”

“That’s not an acceptable answer for anyone over seven, and you know it.”

“I was scared. I was selfish. I was so worried about being rejected. And I couldn’t get past that feeling. That fear.”

“I never would have rejected you. Or her.”

“Logically, I knew that. But sometimes, logic isn’t an easy thing to come by.”

“How could you do that to me? Leave like that? After everything we’d been through. After nine months in that fucking hospital. Three quarters of a year, you stayed there. You fought for me. You were the only one who didn’t give up. And then you go and do something like THAT? Just leave?”

“I wanted to protect you. You’d already been through so much. You shouldn’t even have been alive. But you WERE. And I didn’t want it on my conscience; losing you because of something I did.”

“You didn’t do anything. You thought you were in the free and clear. You were told that you were. Long before you met me. It wasn’t your fault; that The High Table went against their own ruling and came for you. You know that, yeah?”

“I think I do. I think I know that.”

“Why didn’t you just give me a chance? To get you out of that fucking mess? I would have done anything to protect you. If that meant packing up and moving thousands of miles away and hiding out? I would have done it. And if they found us, we would have packed up and found somewhere else to hide. Other people could have dealt with it. The bullshit here.”

“I didn’t even think of that at the time. I was more worried that you’d try and go against them. Physically.”

“Esme, I knew my limits. I was clinically dead a year before. Do you really think I thought I stood a chance against The High Table? Alone? I know I’m not the smartest guy on the planet, but give me SOME credit.”

“You always said you’d do anything for me. To keep me safe. Why wouldn’t I think that?”

“If you had told me what happened…with The Adjudicator…we could have talked about all of this. Avoided you taking off. But you didn’t even give me a chance.”

“I just wanted to protect you.”

“And I love you for that. For thinking you had to. But you didn’t just ruin my life when you left. You ruined yours, too. That’s not protecting me. You should have known that’s the last thing I would want. Hurting yourself like that.”

“It’s just such a mess,” she tearfully laments. “A big fucking mess.”

“And if that wasn’t bad enough? You couldn’t even let me know that you were alive. That something horrible hadn’t happened to you. Do you know what’s been going through my head? For five years? The horrible, gross shit it came up with? Even if you didn’t want me back, the least you could have done was let me know you were alright.”

“I fucked up. Badly. I’m the first to admit that.”

“And then you got Nik and Yaz involved. They’ve had to lie for you. Do you really think that was fair? Getting them tied up in this shit? All you had to do was let me know you were alright. You didn’t have to drag it on. Make things even worse.”

“I didn’t know what else to do. I thought I was keeping you safe. I had the best of intentions. I did. But…”

“Even after things settled? And there was no trouble? You still thought there was a reason to keep me safe?”

She shakes her head. “That was just me being a stupid, selfish bitch.”

“You should have told me about Millie. You know everything about me. Every ugly, deep, dark secret. I’ve never hid anything from you. Especially when it comes to my son and what I did. I was always honest about that. Right from day one. In Dhaka. And you knew I wanted to be a dad again. We talked about it. Having kids. I was scared shitless, but I was willing, wasn’t I?”

Esme nods.

“And yet you kept her from me. For five years. You knew I wanted another kid. That I wanted a chance to do things right. Yet you couldn’t even tell me about her.”

“I didn’t do it to hurt you. I WAS going to tell you. I was going to bring her to Australia. Right to your doorstep. After this job was done…”

“It shouldn't have taken this long. You know there was no reason… REAL reason…to keep her from me. Were you scared? The fact you had a kid with a mercenary? One that’s burned a lot of bridges and…”

“No! That never even crossed my mind. I knew what you were. It was never a secret. I knew what you did for a living. It’s how we MET. And I never once worried about you being her dad.”

“So it was just you being scared. Of being rejected.”

“That’s all it was. I’m telling the truth, Tyler. I know I kept a lot of secrets and I’ve told a lot of lies, and I even made a living out of doing things. But I am telling you the truth. That is the ONLY reason.”

He nods slowly, considering her words. “I believe you.”

“I am so sorry. For everything I’ve done. For hurting you like I did. And I know I can’t go back in time and change it, but…”

“No. You can’t. And I wouldn’t even ask you to. Change one thing, it changes everything. I’ve always said that.”

“...but I can spend the rest of my life making up for it. Or at least trying to.”

“You don’t have to. I don’t want you holding onto this for forty, fifty years. Or more. That’s not what I want.”

“What do you want?”

“I want you. I want US. I want to get married. As soon as possible. I want us to raise Millie together. Be a real family. That has normal jobs and fairly normal lives.”

“That’s what I want, too. I want you to be my husband. I want you to be able to be Millie’s dad. Not have to hide it. I want us to have a home and a nice little backyard with chickens and goats and…”

“And more babies. I want more babies.”

“How many more? I do have to draw the line somewhere.”

“I don’t know. Three. Four.”

“You just want to wreck my vagina, don’t you. You’re determined to do it.”

“Why would I ever want to ruin my favourite part of you?”

She gives a derisive snort.

“I’m kidding.” He holds out a hand; a silent request for her to join him on the edge of the bed. And he gathers her close when she sinks down beside him; both arms wrapping around her tiny frame as he drops a kiss on the top of her head. “It’s not my most favourite. Second favourite, maybe…”

Laughing, she playfully elbows him in the stomach, then tilts her face up towards him. “Do you feel better? Getting all that out?”

“Shockingly, yeah.”

“Me too.”

He kisses her softly; the long and languid press of closed mouth upon closed mouth. “I meant what I said. Five years ago. When I told you that there’s nothing I wouldn’t do for you.”

“I’ve never doubted it.”

“I will get you out of here. Away from this place. This life. And I’ll stop at nothing to make that happen.”

“I believe you.”

“You’ll never have to think about it again. It’ll just be us. And Millie. We’ll make a new life. The one we were supposed to have. Before this all happened.”

Smiling, she presses a series of feathery pecks along his jaw, then rests her head on his shoulder. “That’s all I’ve ever wanted.”

[weirdly-specific-but-ok]

Hiiiii!!!

The Hindi songs guy again (salaamat recommendation, if "Hindi songs guy" is too vague)! Firstly, thanks for telling the name of the song, I listened to it and *sighs* it was them!

Secondly, i didn't know you were from India too! Got to know some days ago from your posts, and then just read your post when you were drunk and telling about India. And I fully agree, it was accurate (and as a North Indian, I'm sorry for the racism🙊). And I'm also sorry about the transphobia and every other awfulness you might've experienced. I love youuuu (sorry if this is too weird🙆🏻‍♂️). Also, the career prospects thing was 100% true: I was 'supposed' to become a doctor, but I had taken science just coz i liked it, and then there was a three years long tragic battle against doctor as a career, and then finally after a failed suicide attempt, I was able to choose English Literature, and things are only now (5 years after the fact) looking better....sooooo I guess your fears about college are totally valid but it will be better, you'll meet great people and learn so much beautiful stuff and create sooo many brilliant thingss! Again, I love youuu (and again, sorry if all of it is too much info, too weird, I'm just...weirdly emotional, idk why)

Thirdly, I really like your name! Asmi is a beautifullll nameee!

Fourthly, sorryy for the long and weird ask, just... I'm glad to know someone else from India here, who's also a Good Omens fan and evidently a lovely person. Sooo lots of long tight hugss!

Lastly, sorry for all the sorrys, and you can totally ignore this if it's uncomfortable or anything (if you couldn't tell by the sorrys, I'm super self-conscious, so thanks for the anonymous option)

Love and hugss, and best of luck for college, for your art, and life in general!❤️

Hey anon maggot! I'm so happy you listened to the song and loved it.

And thank you so much for sharing this with me. It's awful that you had to go through all of that, and I'm so proud of you for surviving. I spent three years preparing for medicine too (11th and 12th year, which caused me to fall sick and miss the NEET test, so I took a gap year etc) and I really did want it. Well, I thought I did. It was more that I didn't think I had any other choice.

TW: explicit mentions of transphobia and disregard and discrimination on the basis of mental health below. Skip the below paragraph if you need to.

I'm glad you're doing better. Yeah, I am not looking forward to college. I know there will be fun parts and all. But I had a go at college for three months back in August, and despite it being very liberal and open and stuff in theory, I had to drop out because the entire student body was isolating me because of my mental health and things my ex-roommate had said about me, and a lot of transphobia from the admin too. When I went to the dean and told her I felt unsafe and the environment was horrible, she told me to stop being so self-absorbed (and then denied she said that the next day to my parents). Luckily after the whole medical ordeal my parents had learned to listen to me and they helped me leave.

I will try again. It's just that it's... disheartening. That was design school, too, just like my next college will be. And I really did try my best. It's weird thinking about all that stuff because Tumblr and you maggots have kind of, well, healed it in a way, and given me such a safe space here that it feels unbelievable that the real world could be so, so fucking shite. Apologies for the vent here, but I do want to be honest, and I want everyone who's faced the same thing to know that they're not alone. Because I know so many people, too many, who've been there.

Thank god for Good Omens and you all. For the ridiculous amount of support and love and joy I've got here. It's easier to forget about all of it for a while when I focus on Crowley's pouts and Aziraphale smiling and making you all laugh.

And hey, you have nothing to feel sorry for. I'm so grateful to you for taking the time to write this. I love you too, anon maggot, so very much. Take all the tight hugs right back. I'm so proud of you for fighting for the future you wanted and deserved. I know it's not easy, both to fight with your internalised doubt and the others.

I'm so proud.

Good luck.

All the love, Asmi

[skylarstark4826]

I need a safe place to play Spin the Bottle, Ginny thought as she paced back and forth in front of a blank wall on the 7th floor of Hogwarts. When she had repeated the mantra three times, she stopped and watched as a door magically appeared on the wall in front of her. She stepped forward cautiously, and opened the ornately carved door.

Inside was a room almost exactly the Gryffindor common room, except all four house colors were represented. Whoa, she thought and smiled. This is perfect.

"Will it work?" Harry asked from behind her.

"Oh yeah. It'll work. Look," she said, and stood aside to let Harry, Ron, Hermione, and Luna look into the room.

"Wow," breathed Luna, as she stepped inside, followed by the Golden Trio.

"It's brilliant. The Room of Requirement has outdone itself once again," Hermione commented, staring around the room in admiration.

"Seriously," two new voices said simultaneously from the doorway. There stood Fred and George, flanked by Dean and Seamus.

As they walked inside, Ginny felt a wave of apprehension wash over her. The idea of playing Spin the Bottle had seemed good at the time, but now she wondered whether it was such a good idea. The courage that she had had minutes before flooded out of her. What if I get Dean? Or Harry?

"Hi, guys. Can I come in?" a nervous looking Neville asked as he cowered in the doorway to the room, interrupting Ginny's train of thought.

"Of course!" Ginny grinned as she rushed over to grab Neville by the wrist and drag him in. Before she had gotten away from the doorway, however, she caught a glance of Malfoy and Zabini coming towards the room.

Malfoy smirked at her, but Zabini remained impassive. Oh god. What was I thinking inviting them?

She hurried away from the door, dragging Neville with her. She had just gotten Neville pushed into an armchair when she heard Ron shout, "What are you doing here?"

Obviously, Malfoy and Zabini had just entered. She turned to face Ron. "I invited them. I thought a little house integration would be more amusing."

Ron just snorted and turned to talk to Harry. Finally, Parvati and Padma arrived with a giggling Lavender. Alright. They could start. After checking to make sure the door was closed, Ginny walked over to the crowd of people lounging on leather couches and armchairs in front of the huge fireplace where a nice fire was burning in the grate.

"Alright. Hello, everyone. As you know, I invited you here to play Spin the Bottle," she started, and pulled an empty butterbeer bottle out of her robes and placed it on the carpet. "Here are the rules. One, no same-sex kissing. If you get someone with the same sex, spin again. Same thing applies with siblings. Two, you can choose whether to kiss here in front of everybody, or in the closet," Ginny paused and pointed to a door opposite her. "Three, the kiss has to last a minimum of five seconds and can last up to five minutes. We don't want to have a snog fest here. Alright. That's about it. I'll go first."

After making sure everyone agreed to the rules, she bent down and spun the bottle.

XXX

Draco held his breath in anticipation. "Please land on me. Please land on me," he thought over and over. Normally, Draco wasn't the type to wish for a thing as petty as getting chosen for Spin the Bottle. But things with Ginny were different. She was different. After the incident in the prefects' bathroom, Ginny had avoided Draco like the plague. The last interaction he had had with her was after they had both gotten dressed. She had come up to him, and told him that what had just happened was a one-time fling, and nothing else. She hadn't meant what she said about liking him. It was just her being caught up in the moment. After she had ripped his heart out and stomped on it a few times -metaphorically, that is- she had left him in the bathroom, feeling hopeless, and hollow.

After that, Draco would settle for any type of interaction with her, even kissing her in a stupid, immature game. So Draco continued to recite the phrase and mentally willed the bottle to stop in front of him. Finally, the bottle slowed, but much to Draco's disappointment, the bottle landed on Lavender Brown. Thank god she has to spin again.

And Ginny did spin again, and Draco continued to repeat, Please land on me. Please land on me, in his head. The bottle seemed to be listening to him! It was slowing down! But much to Draco's chagrin, the bottle stopped right before him, and landed on Blaise, instead

Oh bloody hell, Draco thought as he watched in horror as Ginny walked over to Blaise, calm as can be, and placed her lips on his.

His Ginevra was kissing his best friend. And that best friend was going to die. Slowly.

He watched as Ginny leaned in even closer to Blaise and then -the bloody git- wrapped his arms around Ginny's waist and pulled her onto his lap, so she was straddling him. Ginny wrapped her arms around Blaise's neck, and deepened the kiss. They're probably Frenching, too, Draco thought bitterly.

He heard the others catcalling and whistling, but he didn't join in. How could he, when all his thoughts were concentrated on not strangling Blaise with his bare hands?

Finally, Ginny extracted herself from Blaise with a grin, and he groaned in protest. She calmly walked over to the front of the fireplace and asked who was next.

XXX

"Hermione?" Ginny asked as the brunette blushed. "Come on, it's your turn." Slowly, Hermione got up and knelt down next to the bottle. With a determined push, she sent the bottle spinning. Hermione watched as the bottle spun round and round, losing speed. Finally the bottle stopped and Hemione's face grew as red as a tomato when she saw that the bottle was pointing at George. She looked like she was about to pass out, but George just grinned evilly, as he stood up and walked over to Hermione.

"Don't worry, 'Mione. I'll be gentle," he winked down at the blushing Hermione, and pulled her to her feet. As soon as her feet were securely planted on the ground, George bent down and kissed her.

One-one-thousand, two-one-thousand, three-one-thousand, four-one-thousand, five-one-thousand.

Ginny announced that the five seconds were up, but instead of them breaking off the kiss, George tightened his grip on Hermione by winding a hand in her hair and placing a hand on the small of her back. Blimey. I didn't know George fancied Hermione. Ron's going to kill him, though. Ron was red in the face and glaring murderously at his older brother. Ginny just laughed.

XXX

Eventually the red-headed twin stopped kissing Granger. Why he kissed her longer than absolutely necessary was beyond Draco. Finigoon was up next.

Draco watched in boredom as the Irish 6th year spun the bottle, a wicked grin playing on Finnigan's face. When the bottle landed, however, Draco sat up in alarm. Why the bloody hell does this keep happening? The bottle had landed on Ginny.

Draco watched in anger as Finnigan walked over to the red-head standing near the fire and crushed his mouth to hers. Ginny responded immediately by wrapping her arms around his neck.

Finnigan deepened the kiss and pressed Ginny against the wall.

"Get a room!" one of the Weasley twins called laughing as Finnigan wrapped Ginny's thighs around his waist.

That does it. "Five minutes is up!" Draco announced hurriedly, wanting to end this misery as soon as possible.

Reluctantly, Finnigan released Ginny. Draco was elated. That feeling disappeared quickly, however, when Ginny turned and gave Draco a death glare. But it was gone so quickly, that Draco thought he might have imagined it.

XXX

What the hell? Ginny thought as she turned away from Malfoy. She had told him that she didn't like him, so was he acting like an overprotective git?

"Neville's next!" Ginny stated, grinning evilly at the pale boy looking like a deer caught in headlights. She grabbed him by the wrist and pulled him to his feet. "Go on."

Neville looked like he was going to refuse, but bent down and spun the bottle. It landed on Luna.

"Yeah," Fred and George chorused, winking slyly at the terrified boy.

"Don't worry, Neville," a dreamy voice said. "There's no need to be nervous. I don't bite. It's the Nargles you have to worry about."

Typical Luna. Neville blushed, but walked towards the blonde and pecked her on the cheek.

"Oh, come one!" yelled Fred.

"You have to kiss her on the lips!" shouted George.

"Go on, Neville. You can use the closet, if you want," Ginny said, ushering the two to the closet. She shut the door and waited. After about ten seconds, Ginny knocked. "Okay. You can come out now."

The door opened and out walked a blushing Neville with a dreamy looking Luna right behind him.

The game continued smoothly after that. After Neville and Luna sat down, Zabini spun and got Lavender. They started furiously making out and had to be pried apart when the five minutes were up. Dean spun next and got Seamus. After Seamus had prodded Dean about him being absolutely irresistible and it being okay with him if they kissed, Dean spun again and got Padma.

Next, Parvati spun and got Harry. Ginny felt a little uncomfortable watching Harry kiss Parvarti, but all of that died away when she glanced towards Malfoy and saw Zabini and Lavender snogging like there was no tomorrow. She couldn't tell where one body left off and the other began. Well those two seem to be getting along nicely, Ginny smiled to herself.

XXX

Ech. Blaise was making out with a Gryffindor. I need a new best friend. Or at least a distraction from this horrifying sight. That's exactly what he got, too, when he looked up to find Potter snogging his Ginevra.

It's like the universe is trying to test me! 'How far can we go before Draco loses his cool?' Draco needed to intervene. This game was killing him. Fortunately, he didn't have to interrupt again and risk Ginny's anger. Someone else did it for him.

"I think it's time we end the game. If we don't I think there may be a chance Zabini and Lavender will swallow each others faces," one of the twins said, and Harry extracted himself from Ginny to look.

Slowly, everyone agreed and took their turn in pairs to leave. Draco made his way out with Blaise -who was attached to the hip with the Gryffindor- but told them to go on ahead. When he made sure no one was looking, he ducked out of sight behind a statue to wait for Ginny.

Eventually, after Potter and his friends had left, Ginny came out and watched as the door slowly faded away to a blank wall. Now's my chance, Draco thought as he stepped forward and walked towards Ginny slowly, who still had her back to him. When he was close enough, he reached out, and swept Ginny up into his arms, bridal style.

Her reaction was immediate. "What are you doing? Let go of me!" Ginny screeched as she kicked and squirmed in Draco's arms. He shifted her so he could carry her comfortably and set off down the corridor.

XXX

Ginny continued to kick and scream as Malfoy carried her down the corridor. "I'll drop you if you don't stop," Malfoy whispered in her ear.

Ginny shivered involuntarily. "What part of 'I don't like you' did you not understand?" she spit at him.

"The 'don't' part," he smirked. Ugh.

"Where are we going, anyway?" she asked, looking around. They seemed to be nearing the dungeons.

"You'll see," was all he said. Ginny decided to calm down. After all, if she wasted her strength trying to get out of Malfoy's arms -which seemed to be damn near impossible- she wouldn't be able to get away once they got to wherever they were going. So she relaxed and rested her head on Malfoy's shoulder.

After another five minutes, Ginny was starting to feel drowsy. Snogging three guys took a lot out of her, and the lulling rhythm of Malfoy's step was making her really tired. Giving in, she closed her eyes and soon fell asleep.

XXX

Ginny awoke to someone tickling her neck. She groaned and swatted at whatever was tickling her and she heard someone laugh. She slowly opened her eyes to the sight of Malfoy peering down at her.

"Well, hello," he smirked. Where am I? Malfoy seemed to read her thoughts. "You, my dear Ginevra, are in my room."

Ginny sat up quickly. "What? Why the bloody hell am I in your room?"

Malfoy just laughed. "Well you seemed so tired when you fell asleep in my arms that I thought it would be better if I just brought you to my room," Malfoy said with mock-innocence.

"Let me go."

"Hm.. no. After all, I'm sure you don't want to be caught out of bed after-hours." Ginny thought about this. It was true. She didn't want to be caught walking around the castle this late and risk getting detention. Then again, she also didn't want to spend the night in Malfoy's room.

"Fine. But I hope you like the floor, because that's where you're sleeping," Ginny said coldly, as she stepped out of bed and walked over to a door that she assumed was the bathroom. After opening it and checking to make sure, she swept inside.

XXX

Draco waited a few minutes before following. Hadn't he said he was going to fight for this girl? And he was indeed. Before he went into the bathroom, he took off everything but his boxers.

When he walked in, Ginny's back was to the door. She had already taken off her robes and was now slowly unbuttoning her shirt. He walked carefully over to her.

"Let me help with that," he whispered and wrapped his arms around her waist and started unbuttoning her shirt for her. She jumped a little, but then quickly regained composure.

"Get out, Malfoy. Now," she said. Her tone implied that she would hex him if he didn't get off.

"Why? I've already seen you naked," he replied as he finished unbuttoning her shirt and pulled it off her. Before she could come up with a reply, he bent his mouth down to her neck and started sucking gently. She gasped and he smiled to himself.

Draco gently turned her around and looked down at her. Damn she's gorgeous. And before she could protest, Draco bent down and pressed his lips to hers.

Ginny stiffened, but he wouldn't have that. He wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her closer. Slowly, Ginny's arms wound there way around Draco's neck and her hands tangled themselves in his hair. Taking this as encouragement, Draco parted her lips with his tongue and sought hers. He felt her relax and melt into him.

Deepening the kiss, he picked Ginny up and sat her on the counter top next to the sink and wrapped her legs around his waist. She moaned in his mouth and tightened her grip, trying to get closer. This drove Draco crazy and he slid his hands up her skirt.

XXX

Ginny broke off the kiss abruptly. What was she doing? What was he doing? She quickly pushed him away and jumped off the counter. Grabbing her clothes from the ground, she stormed out of the bathroom and jumped into Malfoy's bed, tossing her robe, her shirt, and her shoes on the ground. She quickly burrowed and the covers and closed her eyes, willing sleep to come. What had come over her? She had been snogging Malfoy. Malfoy. She shuddered and lay in silence.

Finally, she heard the bathroom door open and close and Malfoy walk over to a couch.

After a while of listening to his breathing, she fell asleep.

XXX

Ginny woke up the next morning feeling confused and warm. She felt a pair of arms around her. A pair of arms? Oh yeah. She was with Malfoy. And he had done what she told him specifically not to: to get in bed with her. She tried to wriggle herself out of his grip but his arms tightened around her and pulled her against him.

"Good morning, Ginevra," he whispered in her ear.

"Morning," she replied flatly.

He only chuckled and started to nibble her ear. Damn that feels good. She tried again to wriggle out of his grip. "Where do you think you're going?" he asked, amusement plain in his voice.

"Back to my dormitory."

"Stay with me."

"I can't."

"Why?" Why indeed? She knew he liked her. So why not stay with him? It's not like there was anything worth leaving him for. And -as much as she didn't like to admit it- she did like him. In a way. "Come on. Stay with me," Malfoy whispered and kissed her neck.

"Fine. But you're getting me breakfast."

He laughed and pulled her closer to him. "Okay."

And with that, Ginny snuggled into him, closed her eyes, and listened to Malfoy breathe. Slowly, she fell asleep.

[ebongawk]

"(don't want to) break these chains"

part one | part two

She'd done it.

A nondescript Friday in the middle of June, and Chrissy Cunningham had just upended entire her life.

The path of her trajectory had been laid out when Chrissy was still toddling around in diapers. She would be pretty, she would be quiet, demure, unexcitable and small. She would do gymnastics, she would do cheer, she would meet a nice boy in high school who came from a good family, and they would get married in college, move back home, buy a house in Loch Nora and raise two-point-five kids behind a white picket fence.

By all accounts, everything was going according to plan. She was small, and pretty, and quiet, because she was never allowed to be anything else.

But there was one thing her mother couldn't have possibly accounted for––

him.

Eddie Munson stormed into her life like a fleet of ships outside the war-torn country of her soul – unexpected and breathtakingly brilliant. Tossing ashore the aide she hadn't before realized she needed. Stepping onto the beach for only a moment of reprieve, only to be submerged in the help of his extended hand.

She thinks maybe she fell in love with him, just a little bit, that very first day.

As those days stretched into weeks, Chrissy stole away more and more moments to sneak back down to the sand. To dig through the piled heaps of garbage and find all of the gemstones he'd hidden throughout the trenches of her mind.

Mean and scary Eddie Munson became set up in her harbor and sheltered her through the hurricane of her life. He became the safe space she'd never known she needed. She craved him, craved the comfort of his arms, the heat of his hands on her body. The way he kissed her, touched her, like she was something to be savored. The way he talked to her like she was someone worth listening to.

And yet.

And yet.

As he built her up, creating a beautiful paradise in the eye of her storm, Chrissy never realized that she was slowly killing him.

"I love you," she'd said on Wednesday, lying together in the back of his van next to the lake with a joint clutched between her fingers. The first time she'd ever told him. A truth that had been bubbling beneath the surface of her skin for what felt like her entire life.

And Eddie–– she'd expected him to laugh, or to smile. To say, shit, Princess, I love you, too, because that's what all those romcoms he'd watched with her – the ones Jason had refused to watch, even to humor her – said would happen.

But Eddie laid there for a long stretch of silence before sitting up. He took the joint from her fingers, swinging his legs over the back bumper and flicking what was left into the woods.

"I think you've had too much," he replied instead, fracturing the delicate muscle pumping blood beneath her ribs. He couldn't even look at her. When was he ever not looking at her?

"Eddie?"

"I... Let's go get some food, yeah? Bring you down before I take you home."

She'd barely smoked half of the half-joint he'd just discarded. And her tolerance was low, but it wasn't on the floor.

"Eddie, I love you," she'd tried again as she sat up, wondering if maybe he'd just misheard her. His shoulders shook, and Chrissy laid a gentle hand on one, flinching when he shrugged her off.

"Yeah, Cunningham, I heard you," he'd said softly. "And that's... That's not fair, alright? You can't just.... You can't say that to me."

The fracture in her heart split wide open. And nothing – nothing her mother or Jason had ever said to her could've prepared her for that pain.

"Wh–Why not?"

"Because what does it change?" he'd asked, scrubbing his hands down his face and finally, finally awarding her with his gaze. Her heart, already in her throat, nearly purged itself from her body completely when she saw the wetness, the pain in his irises. "Huh? Tell me, Chrissy. Tell me this makes anything different. Tell me you'll leave Carver and stop treating me like a dirty little secret. Tell me."

The plea in his voice was something she'd never heard before.

Every piece of her was begging her to tell him yes, Eddie, yes, I'll change everything. I'll do anything to keep you. All those little fractured pieces in her throat readied to shatter, to spill into the palms of his hands as an offering she didn't know she was ready to make.

But she didn't.

She didn't.

She stayed quiet. Stayed small. Mouth sewn shut by her mother's incessant machine as it took in her clothes and took in her skin and took in her life. Making her as ill-fitting as the shirts and skirts she struggled into everyday.

And Eddie reached over the canyon in her heart, still splitting, crumbling around her as the earth moved inside of her bones. He took her hands, pulling her palms to his mouth and kissing her like he wanted to fall to his knees and worship her.

"I can't," he breathed against her flesh. "I can't keep ripping myself open and hoping you'll see something you like. I thought I could, but it's gotten too fucking difficult." Dropping her hands, Eddie turned, climbing back through the van and into the driver's seat.

Taking her home without another word.

As soon as she'd been in the safety of her bedroom, Chrissy had fallen apart.

Tears she didn't know she'd been storing poured down her cheeks; a torrential rainstorm. But this time, there were no outside sources to blame, and no harbor within which she could find safety.

The storm tore her apart from the inside. Shredding her flesh and muscle and bone down to atoms, each one imprinted with his name like the tattoos he wore so proudly over his skin.

And it was like this – curled up in the emptiness left behind by his absence – that Chrissy realized she could fear her mother's wrath, and Jason's anger, and every other unknown that currently lived in the whirlwind of her mind.

But it couldn't hold a candle to the absolute hopelessness she felt at the prospect of losing Eddie.

So she called Jason two days later, after wallowing for an entire day and night in bed, and ended their relationship, walking away as he sputtered up excuses and disbelief.

And she took her mother's anger in stride, sneaking out of the house as soon as the sun had set and riding her bike across town.

The bar was called The Nightfall, and it was the first gig Corroded Coffin had scored that wasn't at the Hideout. A coveted weekend slot, and one that had been offered, not begged for.

"We're moving up, baby," he'd said proudly when he'd told her. "These are just the first steps."

Sitting at the back of the bar, nursing a diet soda and watching, enraptured, as Jeff sang lead vocals and Eddie's fingers flew over the strings of his guitar so quickly they blurred. The crowd was significantly larger than five drunks. It made her stomach twist, her throat filling with emotion, because how could she not want him? How could she not want to show him off, parade around on his arm, and announce to the universe that they could keep whatever they wanted of her flesh as long as she could keep him?

Swaying to the music, Chrissy lost herself in Jeff's impressive vocals, his deep tenor of a voice as he carried them through a playlist of covers and original songs.

Then, as they came nearly to an end, Eddie stepped up to the mic.

"I don't normally take the helm," he announced. "But, uh. Y'know. I wanted to tonight. So. This one's for you."

He wasn't talking to anyone in particular. He didn't know she was here. Yet Chrissy was convinced that he was speaking to her. Because that look in his eyes – that pain – was exactly what he'd held in his gaze the last time she'd seen him.

When he'd let her go, and she'd allowed him to drive away.

The crowd was already worked up. They cheered, expectant, as Eddie launched into a song that wrapped a hand around her throat and squeezed the air from her lungs. The lyrics flooded her mind, his voice a soulful growl that bounced through her body and left her in jagged pieces on the bar floor.

I wanna love you but I better not touch I wanna hold you but my senses tell me to stop

She knew this song. She knew it, because Eddie had listened to it in the van. I wanna kiss you but I want it too much I wanna taste you but your lips are venomous poison

She knew it because Eddie had called it a hate song.

"This is what you sing when you're consumed by someone else," he'd said, "and you know they'll end up killing you. When you're so obsessed you think it's love, but it's just... raw desire and nothing."

Nothing.

Nothing.

Why would you ever think you mattered to him? You're just nothing.

It was a nondescript Friday afternoon in June that Chrissy upended her entire life. Ruining the trajectory of her mother's carefully curated plans to reach for the one thing that had felt safe after so many years adrift in the war.

But it was the barest early hours of Saturday morning, the clock just tipping past midnight, when Chrissy Cunningham's heart broke completely.

[meowww-ffxiv]

The amount of Uncle Respect that the twins had for Mordred that they didn't for Liios lmfao.

Liios was a dear friend to them, of course. More than once, he had also comforted them and of course watched their backs. But there was a glass wall, thumb-width worth of uncrossable distance between himself and the twins. Alphinaud had long since learned that it was intentional. Many knew of Liios; few knew him. Alisaie was frustrated by it, but she could never break through Liios's blithe-smile stubbornness of not saying One Goddamn Thing that he didn't intend to.

You know what the most insulting thing was? Alisaie once said to Liios, "It's as if... It's as if even after all that we've been through together, you don't tell us anything." And Liios reassured her by saying, "...It's not like I told my brother anything either."

Alphinaud and Alisaie knew he was dependable, of course. They knew he was brilliant, and strong, and all the adjectives better bequeathed a character yet not a person. If Liios could not lie, he would simply shut down and say nothing. They knew that even Ptolemy couldn't get him to talk if he was stubborn. Couldn't get him to admit that he was hurting.

Meanwhile, Mordred was always firmly himself first and foremost. His reputation didn't tend to precede him. You could know he was the Warrior of Light and everything, but when you sat down and talked to him, there was only Mordred Surana in that room. He embodied himself to a remarkable degree, in every facet of himself he would show.

Alisaie didn't actually call Mordred the "Blade of Eorzea" for too long. The second or third time she called him that, he pulled her aside, shook his head, and asked her to stop. "A blade is a tool. It doesn't think, it doesn't have free will, and therefore it's not participant in the slaughter," he told her. "I am a man, and in my free will I have ended others' lives, no matter how justified my cause. This is the sin I'll carry in the defense of my home, but no one, least of all you who benefit from the slaughter I cause, should demean it by likening me to some tool."

It was a long moment before Alisaie found her voice again. "I apologize if I cause you offense. I meant it as a title of honor," she said eventually.

But Mordred only shook his head. "So honor me," he replied. "Know me by my name and by the bloodshed left in my wake. Nothing less."

She agreed.

He was so much more than that, now. He was someone used to grief, and had many years of living with his own to help hers feel more bearable. He was someone who'd had to deal with catastrophic circumstances and so could pull Alphinaud up. He was the person who told Alphinaud, "You are a kind, thoughtful young man. I could never understand why you chose to hide it behind such bravado when you first came here." and in so doing affirmed the person that Alphinaud was and wanted to be. He was the one who set aside his hatred and pragmatism to help them on their idealistic, blazing path, because he wanted the future to be theirs.

Alisaie used to, and still hated, living in someone else's shadow. Even if it was someone that she loved, someone with whom she felt safe. But somehow, even with all her traumatizing and terrible partings, with Mordred, he'd made her feel like their final goodbye was both inevitable and an occasion for pride and joy, not just grief.

She knew that one day she would look back, and he wouldn't be there anymore. And she knew too that she was going to be just fine with that, because she would surely carry him along with her. Every step of the way until it was her turn, too, to entrust the future to those who would walk after.